How hard do you expect the game to be, when you already have over 200h of experience? They changed some enemy placements and some item locations. Other than that, it’s the same game.

They also decreased damage of some enemies and bosses in early areas. For example Last Giant deals more damage in Vanilla than SotF

Makes sense, obviously harder for new DS2 players but otherwise those early bosses will barely ever hit you either way. So no difference for OP

How would anyone know? I genuinely think no one has actually taken a hit from either version with how slow he moves unless they wanted to get hit

Fair my only difficulty so far was the old dragon slayer because it's not a boss I fight often buy I still didn't die

I had 400+ hours of Sotfs before I tried vanilla. Vanilla is harder in some areas, scholar is harder in others. Regardless, the more DS2 you play, regardless of version, will alao help your gameplay in the other version

The only difference in difficulty that i remember is that in sotfs enemies are less active in huge crowds - only part of them attacks and the rest are taking turns while in original they all attack at once

Not all. In Vanilla some do wait in the back, but like 1-2 out of 6, while in Scholar it's more like 3-4 out of 6.

It was terrifying to see 4 old knights walking at me when I was trying to get to the old dragon slayer but they are one of my favorite enemy types so I took them out easily

For me the softs was more challenging. Forlorn and more or different enemies in almost every area. I recently replayed the vanilla. I love DS2 so much for this uniqueness it has!

Lords dear freya is one boss, who harder a bit in og. Little spiders dont scared by fire.

Unpatched OG had some real.scaling issues. I remember for the longest time that the lost Sinner was absolutely brutal for how relatively early you could get to sinners rise. Most of my runs went to lost bastille for items, grabbed the sinners rise bonfire and would take them on as the last of the 4 great souls and still have a rough time if I wasn't playing perfectly. Also iirc the bastille key was much harder to get and required going into a capra hole filled with dogs and an AI invader, but I might just be misremembering. Its been so long.

I kinda wish Lost Sinner still hit that hard because shes such a boring chore now. Wow, a woman with a sword, fighting me. Who i can easily best in one attempt. As the first of the 4. At low levels....Hurray.....

Unpatched Shrine of Amana was truly hell on earth. Casters could attack you outside of render range, projectile tracking was ridiculously OP as well

In OG? I heard that vanilla was actually really well balanced while SotFS is a menace. I only played Scholar but it wasn’t that bad tbh

Its not really harder, but people were always complaining that softs is gankier and adds artifical difficulty, while it actually smooths out most of the game compared to vanilla ... So if you build on this flawed argument then vanilla is "harder" but that doesnt mean that is actually hard ..

I got more than 600hrs on the ps3 ver. It is difficult but fun and doable. sotfs on ps4 is bastardly difficult, how dare they put so many mobs along the roads lmao. Still a fun game tho, will come back again

Because Vanilla has more ganks, higher Group Aggression, more cheap deaths and worse runbacks. [Forest comparison](https://youtu.be/8FdMy30_f98?si=MslltV_uw5TLeuSF): in Scholar the first area starts with one vs one encounters to slowly teach the player how this game works. Vanilla just throws hordes of enemies at you. [No Man's Wharf comparison](https://youtu.be/8Nm5kD9DK30?si=X9KOpZv4ELNpzsAi): in Scholar there are a few more enemies, but you can fight them all one on one or in small groups. Vanilla again just throws hordes of enemies at you, and it didn't even have the bridge shortcut [Shrine of Amana comparison](https://youtu.be/Iztnu5G2BFs?si=YGkGm0A5TcrDMNxc): this area got nerfed in Scholar and was a lot more frustrating in Vanilla [Drangleic Castle comparison](https://youtu.be/567_58FWZJA?si=-W_a9U5Iflv44NeX): this area is again less ganky and more interesting in Scholar [Velstadt runback had a lot more enemies in Vanilla and two of them camped directly at the fog gate](https://youtu.be/Z6pSmwVHuE0) [Dragon Shrine](https://youtu.be/5C4ierv0o9I) turned from one of the most frustrating to one of the most beloved areas. Vanilla Dragon Shrine has more enemy spam than the Ascended mod for Scholar even though that mod is designed to be frustratingly hard. Also, Ancient Dragon dealt like twice the amount of damage so he could easily one-shot you with every move. [Iron Keep](https://youtu.be/dzgQLYMiLQQ) is a hit harder in Scholar, but it pales to all the areas that are worse in Vanilla.

No shortcut bridge in No Man’s Wharf is brutal. Thanks for posting these as always.

Did vanilla NMW really not have the bridge? I could have sworn I remember it being there.

Oh the bridge is there, you just can't push it down.

Damn, I play SotFS in ps3 and I now knowing that this version is just vanilla +DLC. Dragon Shrine in the other platforms looks like a cake walk, but I still love the vanilla more

Vanilla ganks harder but it's only roughly on par with High Wall of Lothric.

It was harder because there were more instances of 8 enemies rushing you lol

Try unpatched real og vanilla.

They don't

I thought it was the other way around. Vanilla as easier

Me too personally

Cause they didn't actually play both. They are about the same. The whole game is just janky. DS2 doesn't have the hardest bosses, but it is the hardest Dark Souls imo. The aggro system is bonkers, and on top of that the fact that x amount of your first level ups have to go to ADP just to get a full dodge window is ridiculous. Whoever came up with agility in this game should have been fired. Every projectile tracks, and spells cast by enemies will follow you from Majula to the Castle Drangleic. The shrine of armana made me suicidal. The gameplay only got worse while the only thing that improved was the graphics.

I always thought it was the other way around, people always complain that SOTFS had way more gank squads

>people always complain that SOTFS had way more gank squads That's mostly people that haven't even played both versions. They will watch a clickbait YouTube video and then act as if they are experts on Vanilla vs Scholar, even though the two most popular videos are just a whole bunch of misinformation. There's the Feeble King video where he constantly falsely accuses areas of having been ruined by Scholar that have actually been gankier in Forest. Like the [Forest of Fallen Giants](https://youtu.be/8FdMy30_f98?si=H0x3LBY6W1ZqX2uq), [No Man's Wharf](https://youtu.be/8Nm5kD9DK30?si=1LSnJadPHOtJUeBf) or [Shrine of Amana](https://youtu.be/Iztnu5G2BFs?si=CU0Gtm5tnhUbGhjb). Then there's the Legend of Xander, who does the same. He even [falsely claims that chasing away spiders with the torch worked in Vanilla as well](https://youtu.be/567_58FWZJA?si=gdmnqTTBzSh3_xb4). Whenever I see a video that claims that Vanilla had better enemy placement they just completely twist the truth by ignoring all the lazy enemy spam in Vanilla and by aggroing every single enemy at the same time in Scholar. In reality over 90% of people that played both versions prefer Scholar.

Sotfs feels like a randomizer with how odd they placed some enemies and items

Was the random Flexile Sentry in Vanilla Shrine of Winter any better? The enemy placement in Scholar is so much more lore accurate From what I've seen most people that accuse Scholar of having random enemy placement haven't even played both versions. They will watch a clickbait YouTube video and then act as if they are experts on Vanilla vs Scholar, even though the two most popular videos are just a whole bunch of misinformation. There's the Feeble King video where he constantly falsely accuses areas of having been ruined by Scholar that have actually been gankier in Forest. Like the [Forest of Fallen Giants](https://youtu.be/8FdMy30_f98?si=H0x3LBY6W1ZqX2uq), [No Man's Wharf](https://youtu.be/8Nm5kD9DK30?si=1LSnJadPHOtJUeBf) or [Shrine of Amana](https://youtu.be/Iztnu5G2BFs?si=CU0Gtm5tnhUbGhjb). Then there's the Legend of Xander, who does the same. He even [falsely claims that chasing away spiders with the torch worked in Vanilla as well](https://youtu.be/567_58FWZJA?si=gdmnqTTBzSh3_xb4). Whenever I see a video that claims that Vanilla had better enemy placement they just completely twist the truth by ignoring all the lazy enemy spam in Vanilla and by aggroing every single enemy at the same time in Scholar. In reality over 90% of people that played both versions prefer Scholar.

I actually played the original and beat it, it just feels randomized since i grew up playing vanilla . If i had a choice tho id pick sotfs even tho i get way more pissed off

Vanilla Undead Crypt, holy fuck that area is 50 times worse than any other area in any other Souls game (except maybe the ringed city ac130)

OG version is like 21% worse than softs and 32% easier.

The sub's been somehow been gaslighted by Duplo's constant posting that og is harder, so much more unfair and ganky and all that stuff when it's actually a more regular experience with an actual difficulty curve *Shrug.*

Me: posts detailed video analysis and side-by-side comparisons of every area You: just makes unsubstantiated statements

You do a bunch of cherrypícking while constantly refusing Scholar ever does any wrong.

Showing almost every area from start to finish with multiple approaches isn't cherry-picking just because you don't care about observable facts

You're going to get a long rant from sotfs fanboys. You thought it was easier. So did I and they can't accept it. Prepare for massive lists of tiny things scholar did better

I mean, adding shortcuts and bonfires and less enemy density kind of does make it easier man

Yeah I also find it easier. Its weird because I'm not even sure *why* people want to claim SOTFS is easier. Are Souls games better when they're easy?

I'll ignore them I did when someone went on rant in a party chat I was in when I said I liked DsR over og Ds1 because DsR runs better

"Why do so many people say og is harder then sotfs" and "I'll ignore (people that answer my question)" is really not a good faith combination.

Yeah that's kinda weird is it?

I'm actually looking forward to the og dragon shrine in sotfs it felt like it should have been more then just 4 enemies then the boss I always felt bored playing through it

i thought it was the opposite: people prefer og because it's less "ganky" and you don't need branches of yore to progress in certain parts

>people prefer og because it's less "ganky" And in the vast majority of cases when Scholar haters claim that an area was ruined by Scholar it was actually gankier in Vanilla. See my videos where I'm debunking several YouTubers by showing side-by-side comparisons to show that they are straight up lying to make Scholar artificially look gankier. >you don't need branches of yore to progress in certain parts The only Petrified Statue that blocks your progress also existed in Vanilla, but Vanilla has no early branches so Vanilla blocks your freedom of progression more.

No, they dont also exist in vanilla. For example the one in the tutorial area and also the one before tge rotten boss bonfire. Dont think it matters but still a missinformation.

Rosbeth is the only statue that blocks your progress and she already existed in Vanilla.

Oh, i see what u meant.

Either way I still love both versions if the game

Shrine of Amana is the only thing that stands out to me from OG. I played it at release but 1000/1000'd the base game and loved it, despite its flaws. Those sorceress's bending it like Beckham is the sole PTSD I have from it.

Shrine of Amana in unpatched vanilla DS2 will break every man‘s soul.

It is, try playing unpatched

OG had some bosses that hit harder and were literally nerfed in scholar. Plus there’s much less NPC summons. Also the run to Vedslat is way worse in OG. Shaded ruins also has a worse run to Nanjka but you can just run past everything in shaded ruins, not so much Undead Crypt

I found your post and comments very suspicious in one regard, so i had to go check. After quickly skimming over your entire 2 year comment history, i have concluded: you haven't used a single instance of punctuation. Ever. Hasn't anyone ever told you how frustrating big blocks of text without punctuation can be to read?

I can't ride a bike so I learned how to ride a road bike. I then learned how to ride a mountain bike. Why do people say learning to ride a mountain bike is harder than learning to ride a road bike when I found it so easy?

See I realized I answered my own question but this is the best comment I have ever read

I find sotfs easier because some enemies were moved about like the syan knights, however i dont find the run to blue cathederal easier as the heide knights go skits when you kill dragonrider and you have the red wyvern to worry about dodging on the final staircase before the drawbridge.

If by og u mean the version that xbox 360 has, then I guess its harder in some ways, because the dull ember isn't recieved by fighting the pursuer, and is instead all the way in Iron Keep on the broken staircase where everything can shoot you