Elden Ring: YOU DIED on a horse

Some more fun invasion clips, I just can't get enough of the magic parry shield skill:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-II0OXR0KMY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x3P_ACeWf9A

the inverted carian study hall was the most frustrating part of this game for me so far. genuine demons souls-era mental agony.

― adam, Tuesday, March 22, 2022 8:15 AM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

Oh fr? I remember it being short but maybe I missed a bunch. Do you mean the npc who keeps shooting magic arrows at you?

yup, idk why. i just couldn't counter the loretta's greatbow spam. finally got her, then fell to my death and died to some spider hands before retrieving my runes. vintage souls.

Haha. I just sat there trying to parry her shots with the shield art in those videos I just posted (worked pretty well!).

I have a magic glintblade that does similar to that parry - it can hit things you cant otherwise, cos it comes from up high and whams down on the target.

Godrick felled on fourth go! Whooo

fire giant just took me exactly 40 tries. 40 rune arcs.

Felled the wee Leonine beastie at Castle Morne fairly easily, but apparently I was meant to speak to Edgar first and missed him completely lol whoops. I gave him his daughters letter now but he didnt want the sword. Ive quit for now (work, sigh) ad hopefully he'll take it when I reload.

Given the lack of questlogs it feels like it'd be easy to break some side quests in this game, if you half get a quest, forget it/pass by a part of it/kill the wrong NPC.

You can break a big side quest really easily with Edgar, apparently, not his quest, but another quest he's needed for. I'd suggest doing a little guide-sniffing about him so you don't ruin it, as I did!

Well I wont kill him if thats what you mean - people seem to like doing that to NPCs!?

Dang, think I must have missed Edgar as well

He's easy to miss. I killed the boss before going back though and finding him (I was v anxious, I don't like having a letter that I've said I'd deliver in my pocket. And I think at that point it was the only thing I was sure I had to do in the game).

okay just met the freaky bull/insect thing (which kicked my arse, naturally), definite Bloodborne Elder Gods vibes

Spoiling for Edgar:

A particular sequence of events (that is easily broken) causes Edgar to blame you for his daughter's death, and then his phantom invades you in the Lake District. Kill the phantom and you get a key item for another quest, a larger more important endgame quest. But: it's easy to break this sequence, it seems, and many players are finding themselves un-invaded by Phantom Edgar, and thus locked out of a big endgame quest, as I was. Consensus in the community seems to dictate that it's safest to kill him after clearing Morne, and/or be fastidious about ensuring that this plot line plays out precisely

huh that seems weird. i just finished up castle morne and tried to do what he wanted so we'll see how it pans out down the road. it's annoying that to go back to him after defeating the leonine boss, you have to redo like half the castle.

finally got around to making some attempts at magrit yesterday but couldn't get him down to more than 1/3 of his HP. gonna save up for the shackle before i try again, probably.

i'm so bad at remembering to use all the tools at my disposal. like i'll get into dodging and striking and completely forget to do any blocking. and i have all these extra tools in my inventory (like the various greases) that i never remember to use. i just now started getting in the habit of using the wondrous flask. there are so many things to try.

I'm pretty sure I messed up Edgar's quest too, as I have many of the npc quests, as I usually do.

okay just met the freaky bull/insect thing (which kicked my arse, naturally), definite Bloodborne Elder Gods vibes

Is this the one from the underground poison lake area? That's where I'm at too.

I need to mess around with the wondrous flask more, I haven't even tried out the ruptured tear yet (which makes you explode).

xp no up at Volcano Manor, not as far in as you by the sounds of it

I haven't reached Volcano Manor, so I don't think I'm as far as you, haha. I've just been following Ranni's quest.

are you at "astel, natural born of the void"? got there last night, got wrecked, went to bed.

Yes! Looks like something out of Doom. He clearly doesn't want you hanging out below him, so the usual approach doesn't work. I think he won't be too bad if I can only learn to avoid that instant death grab attack.

Yeah I've not really used the Wondrous Flask thing much yet either although my partner informs me it's great for farming

this game rules

definitely ended up OP (lvl 55? or so?) when i faced godrick because i beat him first try (after losing many times to margit previously)

had initially planned to try this out w/o using guides and what-not, but i know that if i'm actually going to finish it sometime in the next hmmm year i need to get tips/tricks

that said, i've been impressed with the level design, at least w/r/t getting you where you need to go. dungeon-y games can, for me, be unplayable if you're spending all your time wandering around lost and i put off going into stormveil for a long time under the assumption that it was going to be horribly complicated. i did consult a map/walkthrough a few times but actually getting to godrick would've been manageable without i think

I like how getting to Godrick (or the main boss in general in these dungeons) is very straightforward, but finding the multiple secret paths and hidden bosses/items/npcs is not.

Kill the phantom and you get a key item for another quest, a larger more important endgame quest

If you mean the grape, somehow I ended up with one without killing Edgar or pising him off, I dont quite know how!

Oh BTW if you have killed Leonine and not spoken to Edgar just save at a site of grace and pass a day and go back to him then it works.

And btw if you have to go back to him, a tip: you can basically sneak past that pile of bodies/weirdos supplicating on said pile, and sneak past the sleeping pumpkin head and go up the ladder. BUt yeah you still have to fight those irritaing flying things.

A side note: RATS, amirite why are they some of the worst enemies I hate them.

This whole Edgar / Irina plotline is weird. I killed Lionel before even speaking to Edgar. I just went to find him at Castle Morne and he's not where he's meant to be. I went to Bridge of Sacrifice and Irina is dead but according to guides, Edgar is supposed to be there and he's not. Kind of annoying

Oh wait I should have read Trayce's posts

But time has definitely passed since I killed Lionel as I did it ages ago

Ah I'm not fighting those flying Mick Hucknall things again only to find he's still not there

"flying Mick Hucknall things" lol

And btw if you have to go back to him, a tip: you can basically sneak past that pile of bodies/weirdos supplicating on said pile, and sneak past the sleeping pumpkin head and go up the ladder. BUt yeah you still have to fight those irritaing flying things.

A side note: RATS, amirite why are they some of the worst enemies I hate them.

the rats that make you go CRAZY are extra annoying, thanks Miyazaki-san

I found the rat spirit summons, and while I haven't tried it I can only assume it's the most powerful spell in the game (possibly only second to dog spirits, if that exists).

Left Godrick for a while and came back overlevelled with a stronger, better jellyfish and that nice Nepheli person. He went down pretty easily, but I can't really take credit - I just ran up a few times and put in the odd blood slash.

Scoping out Liurnia now & it feels comfortable but not easy, which is where i want to be.

Still poking around corners of Limgrave/WP. Thought I'd seen most things but then DEATHBIRD jumped me.

Got the Carian armour, so finally looking good.

Still feeling awkward about killing dogs in front of my dog.

Haha. I only just found Nepheli, but the creepy wizard guy who wanted me to find her has died of natural causes, so oh well. Probably as a result of finishing Ranni's quest, which was truly a wild ride.

I clipped my fight with Astel, since I thought it went pretty well. It's nice that he actually gives you time to heal, it's pretty chill in comparison to some others.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nm_XZUUlue4

i guess opening up a new area moves some characters even if you haven't completed the game narrative/beaten bosses. ie i opened up liurnia of the lakes without doing margit or stormveil and now patches is hanging out in liurnia and rodericka has moved to the roundtable hold even though i didn't do the mission she wanted me to do in stormveil.

Oh damn I haven't even found Patches in Liurnia

down by the riverside

Yeah lol I never found Patches until late game and he was dead.

i had to google it - i wanted to buy margit's shackle - but he is in a pretty central location

Btw, re: Edgar...

It seems as if breaking his plot line does make it impossible to complete Hyetta's. You need three grapes (plus a Fingerprint Grape) to have her (extremely depressing!) plot line play out. But: not completing Hyetta does not lock you out of a potential big endgame thing, it just deprives you of a particular seal. So, whatever I guess?

I've whiffed three-and-a-half plot lines at this point. Re: Rya I did not find her at her second location before killing Rykard. Re: Hyetta I messed up the apparent order of discovering who with whom and was not invaded by Edgar at the Revenger's Shack, and thus missed out on my third grape. Re: Gurranq a noted issue with the final Mariner not spawning left me one Deathroot short of completion. Re: Sellen I sided against her and invaded her with Jerren, which resulted in me having an extra Big Smithing Stone but being out a sorcery reward from Sellen herself.

Happily it seems as if "Platinum Status" is not dependent upon whether these side quests play out. I assumed I guess that 100%'ing meant "every incantation" and "every sorcery" and "every talisman" but it doesn't, just certain legendary ones that you can always get (if you put the work in).

I made it to Melania last night, and she instakilled me the first time, so I went back in with a shield and a Physick-induced no-FP-required summon of a +10 assassin, and have always made it to her second stage but got to a "we're trading hits and she's regenerating" kinda stalemate. I've way more levelled than most aspirants at this point, I think. I made it to level 160 and started stocking up on materials with my excess runes, with an idea that I might upgrade my shit for a respec to mage or pure-dexterity. I can totally understand why everybody struggles with Melania, I'm overpowered and experienced with the series and she's still very punishing.

The length and detail of this game is such that I have become unfamiliar with places/things I did at the start of the game, there is just so much information that it feels like ages and ages ago since I was pthubbing Crucible Knights and Cemetery Shades. The sheer beauty and glorious design of some of the later stages is leaving me breathless, like I can't believe this game after 100+ hours still has the ability to leave me agog. I feel like the dev team must've had some kind of a dare pact, like they deliberately made an endless list of bosses and locations and just kept egging each other on for however-many-years until it was all designed and completed.

After seven entire game's worth of content, arriving at late-game area Brace of the Haligtree was such a wonderful throwback to Demon's Souls-style castlecrawling, like this particular mode of Soulsborne that had been until the very late-game mostly absent. I'm having existential kinda thoughts, like, "can I even play games after this?" The engagement I felt back in February with Horizon Zero Dawn feels so past tense. I definitely plan on a long break from games once I beat this one I think

This really is some kind of landmark, this game feels every bit as much of an achievement as any big human cultural artifacts, and I feel profoundly moved that I'm able to experience it before its details and secrets have become ubiquitous

fgti's The End of Game History thesis was controversial from the start, but few dared to dismiss it entirely

Love that fgti, I'm on board. Also, I don't know how yet, but when I reach Melania I'm committed to doing it sans summons. :)

I'm mostly having existential thoughts about the pvp, since I go in and out of having fun with it (because fighting against three people spamming insane spells & skills can be very, very difficult). Once I someday finish the game to my satisfaction, am I going to keep doing invasions for five years like I did with DS3? Unsure, but I hope so, and I'm definitely planning a lvl 40 invader where the damage-to-hp balance keeps things more fun.

In the meantime I did another respec back to pure dex, since the extra blood buildup was not worth doing arcane at the moment (and I can't change the scaling on the Ornamental straight swords, still an important part of my build). I'm going to mess around with some daggers though.

I've been drooling over some of the pure-dex builds for PvP for sure, but blood is really where it's at for PvE afaic. I haven't beat her yet or anything but Malenia is definitely staggering, allowing criticals, taking the bleed bonuses when she deserves them.