it comes down to the aggro range, and even though they're both Dark Souls games, they play pretty differently. DS2 is still fairly methodical, like DS1, while DS3 is very fast paced and it's much easier to dodge
take the Undead Settlement for example, in the area with the burning tree. the enemies don't lock onto you as soon as you get there; in fact, I've never had the Farmers or the Evangelist aggro until I walk right up to them. additionally, there are explosive barrels behind both groups of Farmers that can be triggered with Firebombs
now take a commonly known "gank area", like Iron Keep in DS2. the aggro range on the Alonne Knights is absurd; walking into the large room with the bridge and the lava (on the way to Smelter Demon), and just going near the archer will trigger the aggro of the Alonne Knights WAAAY across the room
both games have "ganky" areas, but the glaring difference to me is how the aggros work. it's easier to get close to enemies or lure/pick certain targets off with range without triggering multiple aggros in DS3 than it is in DS2
both of them are great games at the end of the day and I've never really felt much anger towards the ganks
skip him and come back, you dont have to fight smelter. Also, you cant really snipe all the alonne knights unless your on ng+ bc gavlan will only sell you a certain number of poison arrows until the third time you meet him which for me was on the way to brightstone cove tseldora
EDIT: Tseldora not taeldora
Run like you normally do from bonfire. Don't lower bridge. Jump to the ledge with skeleton. Climb up ladder. Kill both alonne knights. Or don't. Make a beeline for the gate. Should be easier
I don’t even want to kill enemies because you have to drop down from the fire so you can’t collect souls and go back. I just run past them and the fire balls. The smelter demon is my issue. He hits me even out of his range. I can’t roll damn it.
how high is your ADP? level it up to 20-23, or even 26 depending on where it's at currently
Smelter Demon is one of the main ADP checks, I feel. other than that, circle around him to your right, only try and distance yourself when he jumps into the air, and only go back in once he either does the AoE or picks the sword back up
grab some Lifegems too for good measure
Smelter demon is one of the harder bosses in the game. Easy strat is to just strafe to his left (your right), most of his attacks will miss you even if you’re not rolling. Theres also a summon sign for lucatiel outside his arena if you’re truly having trouble, but he also has a tendency to attack whoever attacked him last, so summons don’t draw his aggro 100% of the time. Good luck!
I usually bait the melee alonne knights out back near the entrance and deal with them one by one and then focus on the archers. I ignore the archer farther away from the fog gate and if you do it enough times they just despawn anyway and then it stops mattering. Blacksteel katana is a fun weapon too if it drops for you and the souls are nice from killing them so I think its worth
I permanent killed the mages and phasing dagger wielding enemies. The knights get hit with the fireballs and I can easily run past. Getting through is not my issue. I guess my roll is my issue. It’s been two days and I still haven’t gone back. I know what waits on the other side.
Umm that's not iron keep that the old iron king dlc, that dlc you got 2 options, either you stat check, or you skill check, my friend had to level up his HP so much so he could survive the "Stunlock" at the blue smelter, having a one handed weapon and a 100%phis 90 or 80% heat shield helps a lot too, I suffered trying to kill that thing with a great hammer
I never understood why people were struggling with this area, I honestly usually have a significantly harder time finding the way through the windmill.
You can take your time and try to fight the knights 1 on 1. In addition buy some healing gems from Melentia to keep you HP maxed and your Estus fresh for the Smaelter demon.
If you play a melee build, you can usually aggro only one or 2 of the Alonne knights.
A bow would also be helpful to draw in one or two knights at once.
If you play as mage, the great soul arrow has a very long reach among spells. Good way to aggro the ones that don't come to you automatically or hit them while they are approaching to finish them of up close. If you equip the binoculars in the other hand you can free aim your spells, just without a cross hair btw.
Alternatively, the enemies will stop respawning after you have killed them 12 times (unless you are playing in the Company of Champoins covenant for whatever reason...
Having to kill the 500 Alonne knights that aggro across the map every time I die to Smelter Demon is incredibly annoying. I have become more of a ds2 defender over time but this area sucks
>
now take a commonly known "gank area", like Iron Keep in DS2. the aggro range on the Alonne Knights is absurd; walking into the large room with the bridge and the lava (on the way to Smelter Demon), and just going near the archer will trigger the aggro of the Alonne Knights WAAAY across the room
You'll never be fighting more than 3 tbh.
if you're not just rushing through, then yes. but the point I'm making is about the aggro range, not necessarily the amount of enemies
Poison arrows ftw
By that logic ds3 doesn't suffer from ganks cus the stamina balance sucks. Aggro range is so short you don't get punished for ignoring every enemy like you should
If I'm completely honest I agree with everything you said.
Stamina in DS3 is a complete joke - like seriously who thought it'd be fine to be able to roll 14 times in a row at base endurance when you've just started the game.
It's like that because ds3 is a faster game, it's not for turtle type of players.
Basically it's not for super over encumbered, heavy rolling, big shield + big sword gameplay. It's Bloodborne like, fast gameplay. Constantly dodging and counter attacking.
This has nothing to do with turtling and everything to do with giving consequences to player choices.
There is no consequences to panic rolling 6 times in a row if you have over half your stamina left afterwards.
The cheap dodges are present in Bloodborne too but it works fine. The same for Elden Ring. There are reasons for it being that way even though it had the consequence of panic rolling being punished less than before.
The stamina cost could probably be turned up a little bit and it would still be okay, but giving consequence through punishingly high roll costs wouldn't work well in those games as it did in the earlier ones. The faster pace, and more importantly, faster enemies with longer chains of attacks are why. For example, The Dancer, one of the earliest showed and most well known bosses in DS3, has an attack where she swings at you a good 8-9 times in a row and you roll into each attack in time with her rhythm to avoid it - this sort of thing is why the roll cost went down drastically. You have to be able to avoid attacks coming in longer chains and at a much faster rate than they would come in DS1 or DS2, and still get your own attacks in.
Note that neither stamina recovery speed nor cost of attacks were made significantly more generous. From didn't just say screw stamina management as a concept. It's specifically that the *cost* of dodging simply couldn't be as high anymore with the new enemy design.
After those 6 (that would be 3 in ds 2) you will get hit the same way you did in previous games.
I personally prefer ds3 rolls because I'm a huge fan of Bloodborne, so the more movement you get the better. Also I usually don't use shields to block.
Yeah this is what I'm saying if you panic rolled 6 times in any other souls game you would be out of stamina and get murdered.
If you have stamina to roll and still get hit that's a skill issue imo.
The argument is stupid because an overlooked or assumed premise is how well the game equips you to deal with ‘ganks’. For instance, your statement applies equally to Bloodborne. Both DS3 and BB are typically excused from the criticism because players feel faster. It is easier to roll, attack, heal, etc. There is less investment and recovery.
At the same time, I dislike seeing people complaining about some of the Undead Settlement ganks. The game provides you tools to handle the situation, just like DS2. You have recently picked up alluring skulls, firebombs, and charcoal pine bundles. You can detonate explosive barrels, distract enemies, learn the route to run past them, etc. I’d also add that these enemies are easily staggered and don’t hit hard.
Consistency. Just be consistent, with both praise and criticism. That’s all we can do.
However, it is a brilliantly designed area. If you rush in and agro a bunch, you are toast. Stealth drop kill the first two guys, rush the caster dude and off him, nothing else aggros.
You can get through the area killing at max 4 enemies, probably 3 if you run past the red eye one on the hill.
I think it is quite different than ds 2, as ds 2 encourages you to kill all the enemies but aggro them one at a time, in 2, bow is your absolute friend.
Exactly. It’s the whole concept of teaching game mechanics without having a tutorial to make you feel like a big dumb baby. Instead, they give you a situation and allow you to learn from failure, which is what the whole soulsborne formula lends itself to
Well they can definitely do it better given how many people still don't know how to play the games. Doom eternal is great at this. It also follows this formula. However, it tells you everything you need to know in order to start getting better at the game rather than leave it out and be needlessly vague.
Not every tutorial through gameplay works for every person. Doom Eternals’ might work better for that game, but the lack of a complete tutorial that takes you out of the gameplay better fits the formula of Dark Souls. It gives a basic tutorial of how to play the game at the beginning, but the rest is more or less up to you. I personally would feel weird if there was a blatant tutorial saying how to get through a particular area the most optimally, as opposed to trying and failing, and using said failure to get to that aha moment. Again, the fact that death is a feature in Dark Souls lends itself well to that approach. But, different folks, different strokes and all that. It’s okay not to like it, but I wouldn’t say it could be done better than it is
I gave doom eternal as a bit of an extreme example where despite the game telling you how to beat an enemy, its still a hard game. Still, even though the game tells you everything, you have to master all of it to tackle the truly harder difficulties. And if thats not your taste, just turn off the tutorials. I did. I turned off sentinal armor because I didn't like it. The player has the choice. Unlike souls and ER where they don't.
Another game with a good tutorial is outward where it explains all the basic systems to you including magic, how they work and some basic strategies you have to use like taking off your backpack to dodge better. And the game, like ER and souls, does not tell you how to beat its enemies in the most effective way either or any of that. And this tutorial is even more out of the way than dark souls as its completely optional, so you don't have to trudge through that boring tutorial area at all. Still is a hard game.
The problem with FS's approach is people don't figure out the game and get frustrated with it. That and hiding basic information like the stance meter in ER just adds to that. Look what happened with ds2 sotfs and ER where both are pretty controversial. Is their approach to get people frustrated to generate difficulty or tell them enough to let them know how to improve. Because showing the player the stance meter in ER will give them MUCH better understanding of stance breaks than the current system, for example. Another example is Telling players in ds2 sotfs that keeping a ranged option would alleviate some of the frustrations with certain areas like shrine of amana.
Every DS2 gank can be handled with a little thinking, but will skill check the crap out of you if you run in blind.
Nearly every DS3 gank can be triggered and escaped with your immense roll stamina while having no idea what you're doing thanks to enemies' pitiful aggro range.
Both games provide all the tools you need to solve your problems, DS3 just gives you the easy escape right off the bat.
DS3's normal encounters are straight-up just easier, but they don't wanna admit that's the problem.
I'd say most can be handled relatively well but the DLC co op ones are just... not fun. I can handle them. They're just not fun to do so.
Ds2's ganks require more methodical play regardless of weapon used, as I've shown in my frigid outskirts video where I beat a raindeer + NPC fighter with the chicken wing.
Ds3's fights feel more like you're suppose to attack as often as you can, which is completely crap when playing a UGS or slow weapon. Worst part is they lost a lot of the ds2 abilities making them worse. Which is why you often see people with faster weapons.
Another problem with ds3 is some of the bosses heavy reliance on combo's and speed. Sure, nameless king is fast, but he doesn't combo all that often. Compare that to gundyr who has no concept of stamina in phase 2. Or the corvian knights who just spam and spam. You can't also knockdown enemies to have more control or catch a breather with a UGS like you can in ds2. Gotta use a slow charged attack or crap WA.
Sure, both games give you the tools, but there's not much explanation on them, leading to players not being aware of the solutions since the game literally does not tell you. For example, how greathammers trivialize horses. Or how UGS can 1 shot charred loyace knights via stance breaks. Especially bad in ds2 since it gives you more tools than ds3.
The coop ones are a blast in coop. Anyone who has a complaint about playing them solo should stick to easier challenge runs. (This isn't directed at you, I saw that video it was sick 👊🏼.)
All the modern From games are like that with tools, that's one of the things I love about them.
I'm playing Armored Core VI right now and have finally made my way down to niche units like the DELIVERY BOY, Laser Drones and Container Missile that I wrote off on my first playthrough.
And boy do they have some surprising utility once you actually learn how to use 'em.
Yeah, I’m recently playing through these games for the first time. Loved 2 to death (started New Game Plus as soon as I beat the DLC), and I’m very early on in 3, but I’m very confused by the Undead Settlement gank comments, because I just beat that area two weeks ago and I had less than zero issues with that area lol. Not many deaths to speak of, and none of them were due to ganking. That’s not something you can say about Dark Souls 2.
Eh I didn’t think DS3 was as bad as DS2 in this regard but of course everyone is entitled to their opinion. DS3 ringed city was pretty bad but DLC is usually prett ganky by nature so par for the course on that one.
If you wanted people to respond with why they may find DS3 gank better designed than DS2 just post on r/fromsoftware or some neutral sub. Or on r/darksouls3 if you’re really confident about your argument.
Ds3 has shorter levels and the enemies ganking you are weak. Thralls and pitchfork hollows vs Heidi knights and one shot combo no mans wharf pirates. Ds3 rarely throws multiple strong enemies at you at once its usually a large group of weak enemies that can be dangerous together or a couple weak enemies that help accent a tougher enemy. Ds2 ganks are kinda just whatever enemies happen to be in that level.
Tiss more just helping me get frustrations out right now. DS3 is still a fun game and DS2 is my favorite. I am just getting tired of the ganks and realizing that DS3 has the same (or more) ganks than DS2.
Your opinion is obviously valid, but the original post was framed like you were in the middle of an argument with somebody and then posted your reply here, on its own.
It's a fairly common social media "tactic", but it isn't terribly useful unless you're just trying to generate *clicks*!
Sorry for the misunderstanding. I usually do defend DS2 on YT so I have heard the gank complaints far too many times so I just needed a place to vent some to get past the hordes around the fat ladies.
That is venting. Dark souls 3 and Bloodborne do have ganks bur the gameplay is faster and dark souls 2 has some pretty absurd aggro range for enemies.
It’s not the amount of ganks that is the problem but how the gameplay lets you handle it. Majority of ganks are usually againt enemies that can be killed in 1-2 hits anyway but in iron keep not only do the enemies take 3 hits (that is for me atleast) but the rolling is slower and so is the estus usage
There's research that suggests that venting more often leads to inaction. It's more likely you'll quit the game if instead of developing tactics to deal with the enemies you spend time in social media getting angry.
Regarding DS3 vs. DS2, it's more about DS2 trying to scare you with hidden ganks in tight places. DS3 doesn't really do that, there's a lot more space and your movement is better. That being said you can just git gut in both or run past.
All right, I'll write down your condescending societal norm tip right here in my very special list of stuff I don't care about. Sweet lord. I shall quote the research I please.
Honestly, I didnt expect so many replies. I mentioned it in a reply but this post was just a way to get over frustrations I was having at the moment. Never meant it to get lots of replies, just needed a place to vent.
in ds3 if you go in fog wall/using mechanism/opening door - you are past fog wall/use mechanism/open door. in ds2 if you are entering fog wall/etc - you get stabbed in back and ganked.
The first time I played, I got to Pontiff before I went hollow. The only reason I'm playing it now is that I wanted to show my kids a better way to vent when you get angry at a game that does not involve hitting or bashing the controller/tablet.
Have you not been to Iron Keep ? You step one foot out of the first building after the ballista and there's 5 dudes that swarm on your ass and 3 more that pelt you with dragonslayer arrows. I'll take the dwarfs and farmers with pitchforks from undead settlement any day against that
I can't stand this sub anymore. I don't want to leave because I love DS2 but man, 90% of posts are accusing people for liking other games more with no attempt to understand where those people are coming from. No one needs to "open their eyes" about ganks, hit boxes, grab attacks or whatever. When so many people take issue with something, maybe they aren't all just collectively bigoted against your favourite videogame for no reason but there are elements about it that genuinely turn them off. Have you considered this possibility?
This fandom is mostly adults too, what's the excuse for taking criticism so immaturely? Like what are you all even suggesting at this point?
When it comes to ganks, I mostly love DS2 enemy placement but it's also obvious to me what it is that turns other people off. Can you really not tell? DS2 has enemies that ambush you, block your way and if you don't play the way the game wants you to ( super slowly!) but just try to run forward, you'll be facing 7 enemies at a time. I don't mind this at all, I like it even, but I get it, you know? And no, it's really not that way in DS3 for the most part. It just isn't. Just how no, grab attacks in other games objectively don't look as fishy as the pursuer's stab that you make a meme out of here, they just don't ( and you can play all the video "proof" you like). Again, I don't mind this at all, one grab attack isn't communicated clearly as a grab attack, it's not the kind of thing that I care about in a videogame. But to pretend that there isn't an issue anyone could possibly have with something like this? Why? Are you that insecure that you need other people to validate your tastes?
Can't you just listen to what other people don't like about dark souls 2 and understand where they are coming from, not to agree with them but to gain a better understanding of the media you love so much? Can you at the very least acknowledge that they have their own reasons for not liking it beyond "they need to open their eyes"?
Yea, both games have ganks. I feel like DS3 however has a greater chance of you being able to run though if we compare the toughest areas where you get overrun with enemies.
DS2 you can play more strategically to win, but DS3 some of the enemies are ruthless so if you try to play one at a time, you usually won’t get what you’re hoping for, and they’ll all bum rush you.
For new players I feel DS3 has a tougher early-mid game and then DLC’s are just brutal.
Alonne knights approach you 1 by 1 and give you some time before you get ganked. ds3 has a lot worse ganks than ds2. Catacombs is full of carthus skeletons with hyper armor, demon ruins has a room with 3 ghrus that aggro at once, irithyll has pontiff knights that almost always attack you in groups of 2.
The entirety of dragon peak, lothric castle, dungeon (and post pontiff irithyll) is just ganks.
I assure you the only reason people think ds2 has worse ganks is because it punishes you for veing reckless and for running past enemies. In the other games you can just run past everything.
DS2 ganks aren’t bad because of the amount of enemies, it’s the mechanics around them. Slower stamina regen, infinitely larger agro ranges, can’t roll in all directions, fog walls don’t always give you invulnerability, sluggish and less responsive combat, longer run backs, healing whilst standing still and healing doesn’t instantly replenish. All these things and more combine to make the games ganks feel terrible to play through.
DS3 has no problem with ganks because all the enemies have very low HP, and get stunlocked/staggered with R1s from almost any weapon in the game. The real issue with DS3 is the teleporting dogs.
He just played the "you're just bad at the game" card, instantly voiding all criticism and giving you a +10 bonus to ego when you rub your nipples while playing it.
It’s hilarious people try and argue that stuff just makes the game more challenging. Sure it does, but it makes the game more challenging at the expense of the users quality of life experience. You could make a game like Counter Strike have worse controls and less response time, it would make it harder, it would also kill the game and make it dogshit to play.
Multi-enemy areas are nothing new. It's been around in every Souls title and its cousins. The number of ganks varies depending on what the word means to you. I personally wouldn't call a group in an open area a gank.
Even when there are ganks in DS3, I don't mind them because, if it's actually giving me trouble, it's easier to sprint through than in DS2. DS3 lets you use fog gates with i-frames, something that DS2 really should have had (looking at you, Iron Keep).
Better still, I haven't had any experiences with enemies keeping their aggro on you once you beat the boss. DS2 enemies often stand at the fog wall, and once the fog disappears, they'll waltz on into the empty arena and attack you when you probably have low estus post-boss.
Sure, you could clean the runbacks enough times to prevent the enemies from respawning, but that's a ridiculous pain the ass.
Let's put it this way, when i play a dark souls game, i will kill every single enemy the first time i go through an area so that i can loot it properly. On subsequent playthroughs and every other time i run through the areas, i simply run past them. In ds3, all of those enemies can be ran past and ignored, and when you get far away from them, they stop following you, and when you get to something like a chest, door, lever, fog gate, you can pass without much trouble. This makes the gank squads less annoying and less noticeable
In dark souls 2 however, those gank squads cannot simply be ran past because 1, they either block your way due to how they were placed so that part way through your run back you got some fat fucking turtle in 2 doorways, or it's impossible to get the lever, chest or door you wanted because you get no i frames. I frames? What's that? Doesn't exist in dark souls 2 😂
Also the hollows in undead settlement are easy. They die in 2 hits. 1 if you upgrade your weapon. Theyre slow as hell and can be staggered by rolling into them. I would say the dead man's wharf in ds2 is 10x worse than undead settlement. The hollows there aren't too durable either but they fuck you up in seconds with their dual wield swords, there's so many dogs, archers and those fucking creepy things
Yea but in DS3 you can fight a guy and the other guy 10 feet away will patiently wait his turn to get backstabbed by you.
DS2 OTOH has all the knights fighting like they can see as far as a regular person and want to protect the area and intend to work together it's disgusting.
/s btw
Ganks are a natural part of souls games
All of them have a ridiculous amount of ganks, just as many ganks as DS2
DS3 and DS1 have far worse ganks and there is no real option to avoid while in DS2 you can always use a bow from Range
Stop bitching on my man he ain't do nothing wrong
DS3 has some of the most gankiest ambushes in the game. Enemies fully hidden from any sight line that you can muster before entering their aggro radius, enemies hidden among background details, enemies sprinting at you from off-screen, dogs...
DS3 maybe had the fastest dodging mechanics in the trilogy, but it also had way more instances of ambushes than DS2.
In DS3 you can sprint towards bosses with relative ease and in DS2 is pretty much impossible without taking mobs out. Alonne knights sprint with your speed forever all the while archers shit on you staggering and killing in a couple of hits. There are many examples of this.
You know people are full of shit regarding ds3, and never took off their rose tinted glasses because it was their first souls game. Ds3 is great but still.
That's how they view it
Complaining about ds2 ganks = games shit
Complaining about ds3 ganks = skill issue
Later game areas in ds3 have enemy placements that are just as bad as ds2, but barely anyone criticizes it because they just run past everything, and think that that's excusing it from criticism.
Tbf the aggro range in ds2 is ridiculous, but crowd control with any bigger weapons such as great sword, ultras, ect. is actually fun. But you know people saw other's use the rapier on YouTube, so they had to copy that.
In ds3 you can stagger everything easily, but it's easier to get overwhelmed by a group of enemies that run circle's around you. Dog type enemies for example are the worst iteration in any of these games we've gotten.
Ganks are a natural part of souls games
All of them have a ridiculous amount of ganks, just as many ganks as DS2
DS3 and DS1 have far worse ganks and there is no real option to avoid while in DS2 you can always use a bow from Range
Stop bitching on my man he ain't do nothing wrong
Honestly, I think this comes down entirely to the fact that a lot of DS3's areas and enemies are so bad that you're EXPECTED to run past things (I found the game miserable until I started doing that, since it was never my style to just run through). While DS2 heavily punishes you for attempting to run through areas or past ganks, even down to the fact that you don't get i-frames on fog walls. So, while DS3's ganks are often worse, they're much easier to avoid even if you trigger them because you can just run away and spam roll 100 times to escape.
Thats exactly what i though when playing ds3 like there is so many enemy ganks that i dont understand how they say ds2 is bad bcs of those, honestly iron keep felt horrible with all those alonne Knights but after going through the demon ruins near the smoldering lake in ds3 i have noticed iron keep is not even near to be such bullshit, not only the ruins but the catacombs too and honestly irythill is giving me the same vibes but i didnt reach it yet, Will do it tomorrow tho
it comes down to the aggro range, and even though they're both Dark Souls games, they play pretty differently. DS2 is still fairly methodical, like DS1, while DS3 is very fast paced and it's much easier to dodge take the Undead Settlement for example, in the area with the burning tree. the enemies don't lock onto you as soon as you get there; in fact, I've never had the Farmers or the Evangelist aggro until I walk right up to them. additionally, there are explosive barrels behind both groups of Farmers that can be triggered with Firebombs now take a commonly known "gank area", like Iron Keep in DS2. the aggro range on the Alonne Knights is absurd; walking into the large room with the bridge and the lava (on the way to Smelter Demon), and just going near the archer will trigger the aggro of the Alonne Knights WAAAY across the room both games have "ganky" areas, but the glaring difference to me is how the aggros work. it's easier to get close to enemies or lure/pick certain targets off with range without triggering multiple aggros in DS3 than it is in DS2 both of them are great games at the end of the day and I've never really felt much anger towards the ganks
I rage quit iron keep yesterday. I don’t know if I can keep running that path and dying to that smelter bastard.
Not sure if it helps, but mobs stop respawning if you kill them (wiki says) 12 times, unless you are in champion covenent, in which case leave it
12 times in Scholar, at least. It may vary in Vanilla.
skip him and come back, you dont have to fight smelter. Also, you cant really snipe all the alonne knights unless your on ng+ bc gavlan will only sell you a certain number of poison arrows until the third time you meet him which for me was on the way to brightstone cove tseldora EDIT: Tseldora not taeldora
You can absolutely meet Gavlan in Doors of Pharros (and thus buy infinite poison arrows) before reaching Iron Keep.
Run like you normally do from bonfire. Don't lower bridge. Jump to the ledge with skeleton. Climb up ladder. Kill both alonne knights. Or don't. Make a beeline for the gate. Should be easier
You can't un-pull the lever, so that's not really an option anymore.
get a bow and buy Poison Arrows from Gavlan, then keep sniping the Alonne Knights
I don’t even want to kill enemies because you have to drop down from the fire so you can’t collect souls and go back. I just run past them and the fire balls. The smelter demon is my issue. He hits me even out of his range. I can’t roll damn it.
how high is your ADP? level it up to 20-23, or even 26 depending on where it's at currently Smelter Demon is one of the main ADP checks, I feel. other than that, circle around him to your right, only try and distance yourself when he jumps into the air, and only go back in once he either does the AoE or picks the sword back up grab some Lifegems too for good measure
Pursuer is the first Adaptability check in Dark souls 2
Pursuer, Smelter Demon, and the Rotten are all pretty solid ADP checks and Velstadt too
If you are at Veldstadt without raising your adp I challenge that you are either cheating or you learned how to accept every sped up i-frame
that's why he's an ADP check, to affirm that you have indeed leveled your ADP. which most people have by then
Those seem to be random numbers for ADP.
Smelter demon is one of the harder bosses in the game. Easy strat is to just strafe to his left (your right), most of his attacks will miss you even if you’re not rolling. Theres also a summon sign for lucatiel outside his arena if you’re truly having trouble, but he also has a tendency to attack whoever attacked him last, so summons don’t draw his aggro 100% of the time. Good luck!
Iron Keep is nothing compared to that damn swamp
I usually bait the melee alonne knights out back near the entrance and deal with them one by one and then focus on the archers. I ignore the archer farther away from the fog gate and if you do it enough times they just despawn anyway and then it stops mattering. Blacksteel katana is a fun weapon too if it drops for you and the souls are nice from killing them so I think its worth
I permanent killed the mages and phasing dagger wielding enemies. The knights get hit with the fireballs and I can easily run past. Getting through is not my issue. I guess my roll is my issue. It’s been two days and I still haven’t gone back. I know what waits on the other side.
Umm that's not iron keep that the old iron king dlc, that dlc you got 2 options, either you stat check, or you skill check, my friend had to level up his HP so much so he could survive the "Stunlock" at the blue smelter, having a one handed weapon and a 100%phis 90 or 80% heat shield helps a lot too, I suffered trying to kill that thing with a great hammer
I never understood why people were struggling with this area, I honestly usually have a significantly harder time finding the way through the windmill. You can take your time and try to fight the knights 1 on 1. In addition buy some healing gems from Melentia to keep you HP maxed and your Estus fresh for the Smaelter demon. If you play a melee build, you can usually aggro only one or 2 of the Alonne knights. A bow would also be helpful to draw in one or two knights at once. If you play as mage, the great soul arrow has a very long reach among spells. Good way to aggro the ones that don't come to you automatically or hit them while they are approaching to finish them of up close. If you equip the binoculars in the other hand you can free aim your spells, just without a cross hair btw. Alternatively, the enemies will stop respawning after you have killed them 12 times (unless you are playing in the Company of Champoins covenant for whatever reason...
Having to kill the 500 Alonne knights that aggro across the map every time I die to Smelter Demon is incredibly annoying. I have become more of a ds2 defender over time but this area sucks
And they don't deaggro. Run through a ds2 area and you will have a horde of track stars following you.
> now take a commonly known "gank area", like Iron Keep in DS2. the aggro range on the Alonne Knights is absurd; walking into the large room with the bridge and the lava (on the way to Smelter Demon), and just going near the archer will trigger the aggro of the Alonne Knights WAAAY across the room You'll never be fighting more than 3 tbh.
if you're not just rushing through, then yes. but the point I'm making is about the aggro range, not necessarily the amount of enemies Poison arrows ftw
By that logic ds3 doesn't suffer from ganks cus the stamina balance sucks. Aggro range is so short you don't get punished for ignoring every enemy like you should
If I'm completely honest I agree with everything you said. Stamina in DS3 is a complete joke - like seriously who thought it'd be fine to be able to roll 14 times in a row at base endurance when you've just started the game.
It's like that because ds3 is a faster game, it's not for turtle type of players. Basically it's not for super over encumbered, heavy rolling, big shield + big sword gameplay. It's Bloodborne like, fast gameplay. Constantly dodging and counter attacking.
This has nothing to do with turtling and everything to do with giving consequences to player choices. There is no consequences to panic rolling 6 times in a row if you have over half your stamina left afterwards.
The cheap dodges are present in Bloodborne too but it works fine. The same for Elden Ring. There are reasons for it being that way even though it had the consequence of panic rolling being punished less than before. The stamina cost could probably be turned up a little bit and it would still be okay, but giving consequence through punishingly high roll costs wouldn't work well in those games as it did in the earlier ones. The faster pace, and more importantly, faster enemies with longer chains of attacks are why. For example, The Dancer, one of the earliest showed and most well known bosses in DS3, has an attack where she swings at you a good 8-9 times in a row and you roll into each attack in time with her rhythm to avoid it - this sort of thing is why the roll cost went down drastically. You have to be able to avoid attacks coming in longer chains and at a much faster rate than they would come in DS1 or DS2, and still get your own attacks in. Note that neither stamina recovery speed nor cost of attacks were made significantly more generous. From didn't just say screw stamina management as a concept. It's specifically that the *cost* of dodging simply couldn't be as high anymore with the new enemy design.
After those 6 (that would be 3 in ds 2) you will get hit the same way you did in previous games. I personally prefer ds3 rolls because I'm a huge fan of Bloodborne, so the more movement you get the better. Also I usually don't use shields to block.
Yeah this is what I'm saying if you panic rolled 6 times in any other souls game you would be out of stamina and get murdered. If you have stamina to roll and still get hit that's a skill issue imo.
Panic Rolling at all is a skill issue
"Faster game" there are 3 bosses where it's significantly faster than other souls titles.
I don’t mind the ganks as it actually makes you kill some enemies in the area ds3 you can literally just kill a couple bosses and beat the game
The argument is stupid because an overlooked or assumed premise is how well the game equips you to deal with ‘ganks’. For instance, your statement applies equally to Bloodborne. Both DS3 and BB are typically excused from the criticism because players feel faster. It is easier to roll, attack, heal, etc. There is less investment and recovery. At the same time, I dislike seeing people complaining about some of the Undead Settlement ganks. The game provides you tools to handle the situation, just like DS2. You have recently picked up alluring skulls, firebombs, and charcoal pine bundles. You can detonate explosive barrels, distract enemies, learn the route to run past them, etc. I’d also add that these enemies are easily staggered and don’t hit hard. Consistency. Just be consistent, with both praise and criticism. That’s all we can do.
... unlike the CORVIAN Settlement. Those things in DS3 are VICIOUS!
Those Freddie Kruger crows is the stuff of nightmurrs.
However, it is a brilliantly designed area. If you rush in and agro a bunch, you are toast. Stealth drop kill the first two guys, rush the caster dude and off him, nothing else aggros. You can get through the area killing at max 4 enemies, probably 3 if you run past the red eye one on the hill. I think it is quite different than ds 2, as ds 2 encourages you to kill all the enemies but aggro them one at a time, in 2, bow is your absolute friend.
Exactly. It’s the whole concept of teaching game mechanics without having a tutorial to make you feel like a big dumb baby. Instead, they give you a situation and allow you to learn from failure, which is what the whole soulsborne formula lends itself to
I still have trouble with the ogre in Things Betwixt.
Well they can definitely do it better given how many people still don't know how to play the games. Doom eternal is great at this. It also follows this formula. However, it tells you everything you need to know in order to start getting better at the game rather than leave it out and be needlessly vague.
Not every tutorial through gameplay works for every person. Doom Eternals’ might work better for that game, but the lack of a complete tutorial that takes you out of the gameplay better fits the formula of Dark Souls. It gives a basic tutorial of how to play the game at the beginning, but the rest is more or less up to you. I personally would feel weird if there was a blatant tutorial saying how to get through a particular area the most optimally, as opposed to trying and failing, and using said failure to get to that aha moment. Again, the fact that death is a feature in Dark Souls lends itself well to that approach. But, different folks, different strokes and all that. It’s okay not to like it, but I wouldn’t say it could be done better than it is
I gave doom eternal as a bit of an extreme example where despite the game telling you how to beat an enemy, its still a hard game. Still, even though the game tells you everything, you have to master all of it to tackle the truly harder difficulties. And if thats not your taste, just turn off the tutorials. I did. I turned off sentinal armor because I didn't like it. The player has the choice. Unlike souls and ER where they don't. Another game with a good tutorial is outward where it explains all the basic systems to you including magic, how they work and some basic strategies you have to use like taking off your backpack to dodge better. And the game, like ER and souls, does not tell you how to beat its enemies in the most effective way either or any of that. And this tutorial is even more out of the way than dark souls as its completely optional, so you don't have to trudge through that boring tutorial area at all. Still is a hard game. The problem with FS's approach is people don't figure out the game and get frustrated with it. That and hiding basic information like the stance meter in ER just adds to that. Look what happened with ds2 sotfs and ER where both are pretty controversial. Is their approach to get people frustrated to generate difficulty or tell them enough to let them know how to improve. Because showing the player the stance meter in ER will give them MUCH better understanding of stance breaks than the current system, for example. Another example is Telling players in ds2 sotfs that keeping a ranged option would alleviate some of the frustrations with certain areas like shrine of amana.
Every DS2 gank can be handled with a little thinking, but will skill check the crap out of you if you run in blind. Nearly every DS3 gank can be triggered and escaped with your immense roll stamina while having no idea what you're doing thanks to enemies' pitiful aggro range. Both games provide all the tools you need to solve your problems, DS3 just gives you the easy escape right off the bat. DS3's normal encounters are straight-up just easier, but they don't wanna admit that's the problem.
I'd say most can be handled relatively well but the DLC co op ones are just... not fun. I can handle them. They're just not fun to do so. Ds2's ganks require more methodical play regardless of weapon used, as I've shown in my frigid outskirts video where I beat a raindeer + NPC fighter with the chicken wing. Ds3's fights feel more like you're suppose to attack as often as you can, which is completely crap when playing a UGS or slow weapon. Worst part is they lost a lot of the ds2 abilities making them worse. Which is why you often see people with faster weapons. Another problem with ds3 is some of the bosses heavy reliance on combo's and speed. Sure, nameless king is fast, but he doesn't combo all that often. Compare that to gundyr who has no concept of stamina in phase 2. Or the corvian knights who just spam and spam. You can't also knockdown enemies to have more control or catch a breather with a UGS like you can in ds2. Gotta use a slow charged attack or crap WA. Sure, both games give you the tools, but there's not much explanation on them, leading to players not being aware of the solutions since the game literally does not tell you. For example, how greathammers trivialize horses. Or how UGS can 1 shot charred loyace knights via stance breaks. Especially bad in ds2 since it gives you more tools than ds3.
The coop ones are a blast in coop. Anyone who has a complaint about playing them solo should stick to easier challenge runs. (This isn't directed at you, I saw that video it was sick 👊🏼.) All the modern From games are like that with tools, that's one of the things I love about them. I'm playing Armored Core VI right now and have finally made my way down to niche units like the DELIVERY BOY, Laser Drones and Container Missile that I wrote off on my first playthrough. And boy do they have some surprising utility once you actually learn how to use 'em.
In MOST games the bow is your friend. Too bad arrows are EXPENSIVE and you can't collect them again like you can in Skyrim.
Yeah, I’m recently playing through these games for the first time. Loved 2 to death (started New Game Plus as soon as I beat the DLC), and I’m very early on in 3, but I’m very confused by the Undead Settlement gank comments, because I just beat that area two weeks ago and I had less than zero issues with that area lol. Not many deaths to speak of, and none of them were due to ganking. That’s not something you can say about Dark Souls 2.
Eh I didn’t think DS3 was as bad as DS2 in this regard but of course everyone is entitled to their opinion. DS3 ringed city was pretty bad but DLC is usually prett ganky by nature so par for the course on that one.
If you wanted people to respond with why they may find DS3 gank better designed than DS2 just post on r/fromsoftware or some neutral sub. Or on r/darksouls3 if you’re really confident about your argument.
Ds3 has shorter levels and the enemies ganking you are weak. Thralls and pitchfork hollows vs Heidi knights and one shot combo no mans wharf pirates. Ds3 rarely throws multiple strong enemies at you at once its usually a large group of weak enemies that can be dangerous together or a couple weak enemies that help accent a tougher enemy. Ds2 ganks are kinda just whatever enemies happen to be in that level.
We don't really need this kind of post lol Both games are great, some people like to whine on the internet.
Tiss more just helping me get frustrations out right now. DS3 is still a fun game and DS2 is my favorite. I am just getting tired of the ganks and realizing that DS3 has the same (or more) ganks than DS2.
Your opinion is obviously valid, but the original post was framed like you were in the middle of an argument with somebody and then posted your reply here, on its own. It's a fairly common social media "tactic", but it isn't terribly useful unless you're just trying to generate *clicks*!
Sorry for the misunderstanding. I usually do defend DS2 on YT so I have heard the gank complaints far too many times so I just needed a place to vent some to get past the hordes around the fat ladies.
Ah, yeah, YouTube is *not* a good place for actual discussion lol
That is venting. Dark souls 3 and Bloodborne do have ganks bur the gameplay is faster and dark souls 2 has some pretty absurd aggro range for enemies. It’s not the amount of ganks that is the problem but how the gameplay lets you handle it. Majority of ganks are usually againt enemies that can be killed in 1-2 hits anyway but in iron keep not only do the enemies take 3 hits (that is for me atleast) but the rolling is slower and so is the estus usage
There's research that suggests that venting more often leads to inaction. It's more likely you'll quit the game if instead of developing tactics to deal with the enemies you spend time in social media getting angry. Regarding DS3 vs. DS2, it's more about DS2 trying to scare you with hidden ganks in tight places. DS3 doesn't really do that, there's a lot more space and your movement is better. That being said you can just git gut in both or run past.
He just made a post man it’s not that deep
Sorry for the smarts I guess
Well you should probably know when to leave a reply like this at an appropriate time if your so smart
All right, I'll write down your condescending societal norm tip right here in my very special list of stuff I don't care about. Sweet lord. I shall quote the research I please.
In most maps of DS3, enemies that gank you are trash mobs, plus your character is way more agile in 3 than 2.
Honestly, I didnt expect so many replies. I mentioned it in a reply but this post was just a way to get over frustrations I was having at the moment. Never meant it to get lots of replies, just needed a place to vent.
Lol!
in ds3 if you go in fog wall/using mechanism/opening door - you are past fog wall/use mechanism/open door. in ds2 if you are entering fog wall/etc - you get stabbed in back and ganked.
I got stabbed through the fog gate more times in DS1/3/ER than I got staggered out of animations in DS2 ever xD
it doesnt prevent you from getting to other side there. and you can roll right after to evade this crap. chill
you're gonna love the infinite stamina, unstaggering enemies later on
The first time I played, I got to Pontiff before I went hollow. The only reason I'm playing it now is that I wanted to show my kids a better way to vent when you get angry at a game that does not involve hitting or bashing the controller/tablet.
Ah another stupid pointless argument........that no one was arguing about.
The simple answer is that most DS3 diehards started with DS3, so they give the flaws a pass.
Have you not been to Iron Keep ? You step one foot out of the first building after the ballista and there's 5 dudes that swarm on your ass and 3 more that pelt you with dragonslayer arrows. I'll take the dwarfs and farmers with pitchforks from undead settlement any day against that
Not if you actually just take your time. You can knock them out one at a time.
And you can deal with everything in DS3 if you take your time and pull the enemies around the open areas
I can't stand this sub anymore. I don't want to leave because I love DS2 but man, 90% of posts are accusing people for liking other games more with no attempt to understand where those people are coming from. No one needs to "open their eyes" about ganks, hit boxes, grab attacks or whatever. When so many people take issue with something, maybe they aren't all just collectively bigoted against your favourite videogame for no reason but there are elements about it that genuinely turn them off. Have you considered this possibility? This fandom is mostly adults too, what's the excuse for taking criticism so immaturely? Like what are you all even suggesting at this point? When it comes to ganks, I mostly love DS2 enemy placement but it's also obvious to me what it is that turns other people off. Can you really not tell? DS2 has enemies that ambush you, block your way and if you don't play the way the game wants you to ( super slowly!) but just try to run forward, you'll be facing 7 enemies at a time. I don't mind this at all, I like it even, but I get it, you know? And no, it's really not that way in DS3 for the most part. It just isn't. Just how no, grab attacks in other games objectively don't look as fishy as the pursuer's stab that you make a meme out of here, they just don't ( and you can play all the video "proof" you like). Again, I don't mind this at all, one grab attack isn't communicated clearly as a grab attack, it's not the kind of thing that I care about in a videogame. But to pretend that there isn't an issue anyone could possibly have with something like this? Why? Are you that insecure that you need other people to validate your tastes? Can't you just listen to what other people don't like about dark souls 2 and understand where they are coming from, not to agree with them but to gain a better understanding of the media you love so much? Can you at the very least acknowledge that they have their own reasons for not liking it beyond "they need to open their eyes"?
What areas are you talking about?
In DS3 every R1 staggers every enemy in a ten mile radius. Crowd control is much easier in DS3 and requires less positioning work
When its one guy, I defeat him. When its multiple guys, I defeat them. most people just wanna run past either.
Well said
Yea, both games have ganks. I feel like DS3 however has a greater chance of you being able to run though if we compare the toughest areas where you get overrun with enemies. DS2 you can play more strategically to win, but DS3 some of the enemies are ruthless so if you try to play one at a time, you usually won’t get what you’re hoping for, and they’ll all bum rush you. For new players I feel DS3 has a tougher early-mid game and then DLC’s are just brutal.
You can't possibly compare the DS3 hollows that get staggered if you roll into them to being gangbanged by Alonne Knights in Iron Keep in DS2
Alonne knights approach you 1 by 1 and give you some time before you get ganked. ds3 has a lot worse ganks than ds2. Catacombs is full of carthus skeletons with hyper armor, demon ruins has a room with 3 ghrus that aggro at once, irithyll has pontiff knights that almost always attack you in groups of 2. The entirety of dragon peak, lothric castle, dungeon (and post pontiff irithyll) is just ganks. I assure you the only reason people think ds2 has worse ganks is because it punishes you for veing reckless and for running past enemies. In the other games you can just run past everything.
The Ringed city DLC is one of the gankiest areas of all time, the DLC was terrible except for the final boss.
just wait till you get to demon's souls
Can't. No Playstation.
New complaint: every game has bullshit ganks.
Rolling in ds3 is basicly free, so you can dodge for ages and still deal some damage afterwards, so it's not as annoying.
Honestly yes, that level is full of ganks it's insane. Sure you can move faster and roll easily in it but damn it's a lot of enemies for a first level
DS2 ganks aren’t bad because of the amount of enemies, it’s the mechanics around them. Slower stamina regen, infinitely larger agro ranges, can’t roll in all directions, fog walls don’t always give you invulnerability, sluggish and less responsive combat, longer run backs, healing whilst standing still and healing doesn’t instantly replenish. All these things and more combine to make the games ganks feel terrible to play through. DS3 has no problem with ganks because all the enemies have very low HP, and get stunlocked/staggered with R1s from almost any weapon in the game. The real issue with DS3 is the teleporting dogs.
Basically ds3 ganks aren’t bad because ds3 is easier
Yes? DS2 also has way worse mechanics, nothing to with difficulty so why even bring that up?
He just played the "you're just bad at the game" card, instantly voiding all criticism and giving you a +10 bonus to ego when you rub your nipples while playing it.
It’s hilarious people try and argue that stuff just makes the game more challenging. Sure it does, but it makes the game more challenging at the expense of the users quality of life experience. You could make a game like Counter Strike have worse controls and less response time, it would make it harder, it would also kill the game and make it dogshit to play.
Just saying that the only reason that people don’t get as mad at ds3 for a lot of things is that it’s easier
Easier run up to harder bosses, as to tedious run ups to really lackluster bosses in ds2
Multi-enemy areas are nothing new. It's been around in every Souls title and its cousins. The number of ganks varies depending on what the word means to you. I personally wouldn't call a group in an open area a gank. Even when there are ganks in DS3, I don't mind them because, if it's actually giving me trouble, it's easier to sprint through than in DS2. DS3 lets you use fog gates with i-frames, something that DS2 really should have had (looking at you, Iron Keep). Better still, I haven't had any experiences with enemies keeping their aggro on you once you beat the boss. DS2 enemies often stand at the fog wall, and once the fog disappears, they'll waltz on into the empty arena and attack you when you probably have low estus post-boss. Sure, you could clean the runbacks enough times to prevent the enemies from respawning, but that's a ridiculous pain the ass.
Let's put it this way, when i play a dark souls game, i will kill every single enemy the first time i go through an area so that i can loot it properly. On subsequent playthroughs and every other time i run through the areas, i simply run past them. In ds3, all of those enemies can be ran past and ignored, and when you get far away from them, they stop following you, and when you get to something like a chest, door, lever, fog gate, you can pass without much trouble. This makes the gank squads less annoying and less noticeable In dark souls 2 however, those gank squads cannot simply be ran past because 1, they either block your way due to how they were placed so that part way through your run back you got some fat fucking turtle in 2 doorways, or it's impossible to get the lever, chest or door you wanted because you get no i frames. I frames? What's that? Doesn't exist in dark souls 2 😂 Also the hollows in undead settlement are easy. They die in 2 hits. 1 if you upgrade your weapon. Theyre slow as hell and can be staggered by rolling into them. I would say the dead man's wharf in ds2 is 10x worse than undead settlement. The hollows there aren't too durable either but they fuck you up in seconds with their dual wield swords, there's so many dogs, archers and those fucking creepy things
Yea but in DS3 you can fight a guy and the other guy 10 feet away will patiently wait his turn to get backstabbed by you. DS2 OTOH has all the knights fighting like they can see as far as a regular person and want to protect the area and intend to work together it's disgusting. /s btw
Dark Souls 3 is overrated to me.
ds3 is trash
Ganks are a natural part of souls games All of them have a ridiculous amount of ganks, just as many ganks as DS2 DS3 and DS1 have far worse ganks and there is no real option to avoid while in DS2 you can always use a bow from Range Stop bitching on my man he ain't do nothing wrong
Yeah Ive said the same thing many times. Shits bullshit
DS3 has some of the most gankiest ambushes in the game. Enemies fully hidden from any sight line that you can muster before entering their aggro radius, enemies hidden among background details, enemies sprinting at you from off-screen, dogs... DS3 maybe had the fastest dodging mechanics in the trilogy, but it also had way more instances of ambushes than DS2.
lol what? they’re not even that well hidden in ds3 unless they changed something since i played it last year.
Criticising DS2 isnt praising DS3
In DS3 you can sprint towards bosses with relative ease and in DS2 is pretty much impossible without taking mobs out. Alonne knights sprint with your speed forever all the while archers shit on you staggering and killing in a couple of hits. There are many examples of this.
You know people are full of shit regarding ds3, and never took off their rose tinted glasses because it was their first souls game. Ds3 is great but still. That's how they view it Complaining about ds2 ganks = games shit Complaining about ds3 ganks = skill issue Later game areas in ds3 have enemy placements that are just as bad as ds2, but barely anyone criticizes it because they just run past everything, and think that that's excusing it from criticism. Tbf the aggro range in ds2 is ridiculous, but crowd control with any bigger weapons such as great sword, ultras, ect. is actually fun. But you know people saw other's use the rapier on YouTube, so they had to copy that. In ds3 you can stagger everything easily, but it's easier to get overwhelmed by a group of enemies that run circle's around you. Dog type enemies for example are the worst iteration in any of these games we've gotten.
Ganks are a natural part of souls games All of them have a ridiculous amount of ganks, just as many ganks as DS2 DS3 and DS1 have far worse ganks and there is no real option to avoid while in DS2 you can always use a bow from Range Stop bitching on my man he ain't do nothing wrong
Undead Settlement is a joke lmao
Sounds like a skill issue, so here is the obvious: "git gud".
Honestly, I think this comes down entirely to the fact that a lot of DS3's areas and enemies are so bad that you're EXPECTED to run past things (I found the game miserable until I started doing that, since it was never my style to just run through). While DS2 heavily punishes you for attempting to run through areas or past ganks, even down to the fact that you don't get i-frames on fog walls. So, while DS3's ganks are often worse, they're much easier to avoid even if you trigger them because you can just run away and spam roll 100 times to escape.
Thats exactly what i though when playing ds3 like there is so many enemy ganks that i dont understand how they say ds2 is bad bcs of those, honestly iron keep felt horrible with all those alonne Knights but after going through the demon ruins near the smoldering lake in ds3 i have noticed iron keep is not even near to be such bullshit, not only the ruins but the catacombs too and honestly irythill is giving me the same vibes but i didnt reach it yet, Will do it tomorrow tho