Elden Ring: YOU DIED on a horse

I'm a bit confused about Mt Gelmir and Volcano Manor. I have the inkling I missed a lot of context because Rya teleported me there and I didn't get to smell the flowers on the way so I might do the trek anyway

I've reached the Haligtree, definite "Rivendell after the Elves have left and everything has turned to shit" vibes, and I keep jumping into space. But it's really fun, and great for levelling up, I should have less trouble with that knight in Farum Azula soon.

I think I just got to "that knight".

Now THIS is a Malenia fight, holy shnikes

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7EMGrbMDGQ

And here's someone else's rune level 1 version:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MuC1WH6RBxM

LOL it is painful to watch that and see how little damage the crits do. While I respect the skill, it also doesn't look like that much fun? Anyway, friendship ended with Moonveil; now Darkmoon Greatsword is my best friend. Quite handy at dealing with Omens.

I scord the sword of night and flame and want to use but alas it needs high INT and FAITH and Ive 28 INT but like... 9 faith lol :(

Yes yes I know, respec respec SILL HAVENT GOT THAT FAR ARRGHH

I am so enjoying my low level run

I summoned some high-level friends to help me with gold Godfrey and they found that their damage was mean'd to my own level, so they're hacking and slashing and like "what is wrong with this, I'm not doing any damage suddenly?"

Meanwhile I'm dodging! and finding openings! and it's fun. Their level 300 beefsteak whatever was nice meat for the grinder I guess. (Still haven't beat the guy on this run but that's OK)

Got through a huge amount of the game last night in a mammoth session. Got to the top of Mt. Gelmir and beat the boss. Explored Volcano Manor and pretty much stumbled into Rykard (the shortcut when you get to him is a classic From Soft aha! moment). But before that, I completed all the VM contracts - sadly forgot to talk to Rya before all that and broke her quest. Then basically ran all the way through Mountaintop of the Giants and came across the dreaded Fire Giant, and that's when I had to switch off.

That last VM mission, Mr. Hoslow with the poise and the bleed whips, was a real tough nut to crack.

Fgti, that sounds fun, I've never done a no-leveling challenge in any of these games. The closest I've come is advancing to mid or late game areas on a character I'm trying to keep at a low level for invasions, in order to get some weapon or piece of gear.

Going back home for the weekend and I would literally kill someone for a Steam Deck to play this on the train

Wouldn't be much help as I have it on PS5 but whatever, Limgrave's nice enough right

just curious, what are the ps5 loading times like compared to ps4?

on ps4, when i YOU DIED and start over, i'd guess it takes maybe...20 seconds? 15? 25? in that range.

About the time it takes for two deep breaths, to re-gird one's loins. 5 secs?

Oh god, my life would be ruined with a ps5. I would never stop.

Yeah it's not quite as insanely quick as the Demon's Souls remake but not bad at all

Flashbacks to Bloodborne, especially before the first performance patch, when 1) loading took forever 2) to fast travel anywhere OR level up, you'd have to first go back to hub area, then go where you were headed. You'd have to really weigh whether it was worth the trip.

That last VM mission, Mr. Hoslow with the poise and the bleed whips, was a real tough nut to crack.

Yeah, the others were fairly easy but I had to have a few goes at him

The long load times and occasional drops in frame rates are a bit frustrating on PS4, especially when you're attempting a high level boss and have to wait each time you die. Other than that, it's pretty stable on PS4

yeah, no complaints otherwise! the framerate for the summons drops to like 15 fps sometimes (especially when you're summoning several creatures), but that doesn't bother me. and otherwise, it's very smooth, no weird bugs or glitches or crashes or anything, i've been very content.

honestly the 20-25 second loads are often a good reminder for me to drink from a glass of water or something

the load times are a bit of a pain on PS4 but they do make me think a bit more carefully and focus rather than treating 'you died' as absolutely zero-cost.

I was glad I knocked out Rennala pretty quickly. Load time plus long-seeming run to her was making my heart sink rather than hunger for battle.

Having to run all the way up that marble run each time was annoying even if you defuse the marble. I know there's a reason for no statue of Marika but it's frustrating

It's easier to go the back way -- take the stairs to the left once you unlock the tunnel, then you just have to run past that first group of enemies and the one Burger King sorcerer.

I had the same type of huge one day run in the story at the same point dog latin was (post academy/liurnia), but that was around the time I finally chose to throw all of my smithing stones into the great epee and gloveworts into the shield bro guys. Once I did that I could really steamroll things in the way that I couldn't before

I killed the Farum Azula knight, the most nerve-wracking fight in the game thus far, and made the mistake of going straight through the fog only to be confronted by the Beast Clergyman with no Estus, you can guess the rest

Oh, I guess that's not the knight I was thinking of, since I haven't seen the Beast Clergyman around here.

I was talking about the one before you enter Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds, followed by Dragonlord Placidusax etc..

Oh, unless you're talking about the knight on the horse similar to the Tree Sentinel, I haven't gone back to him yet.

lol I didn't realize the rooftop path over the Raya Lucaria was leading me in a big circle. I kept getting torched by the flamethrower crossbow guy at the end of the big hall so thought "I'll just explore the lower level of this building, surely there's something cool down there." I got excited to find a site of grace and then as soon as I rested, realized it was the same site of grace I started from a week ago.

I do wish the map was more useful when you're in areas like Raya Lucaria, even zoomed in they don't really seem to relate to what's actually there that well.

The load screen on PS5 is a snap of the fingers, you don't even notice it. The load screens on PS4 (which generously include some Witcher 3-style play tip splashes) are long enough to be noticeable and annoying over time. About the same number of seconds as a load screen (on PS5) into online play.

Fgti, that sounds fun, I've never done a no-leveling challenge in any of these games. The closest I've come is advancing to mid or late game areas on a character I'm trying to keep at a low level for invasions, in order to get some weapon or piece of gear.

That's mainly why I'm doing it! My plan was to enjoy doing some 1v2 invasions at low level with the full benefit of late-game talismans and armour choices. I restarted and did my muling and then had an "oh, right" moment as I'd forgotten that you start the game with only one talisman option. So, I started progressing through the game at my low level with +0 weapons with the intention of, at least, getting as far as beating Golden Shade Godfrey for a complete set of talisman pouches.

Haven't beaten that Godfrey just yet, he is a chore at low level. His floor stomp requires immediate flask recovery if you get hit, and any axe hits are one-hit death. He's immune to everything, too, which makes my solutions limited

The load screens on PS4 (which generously include some Witcher 3-style play tip splashes)

PS5 doesn't even show the tips because there's not enough time to read them

i feel like i'm reading on papyrus over here

Maliketh down! Turns out that doing Volcano Manor eventually results in an item that makes this fight much easier and more fun (although I'm not sure if you can get it without doing VM, or certain portions of it). Must be getting near the end.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pxR40HjdvCg

No, YOU'RE beautiful

i just lost 42K+ runes :(

still, i'm LVL69 and making steady progress. i think i even found the foot of the volcanic manor? was immediately way outleveled, backed off

Wow, can't believe how things are speeding to a conclusion here.

One more for the day, I thought the WWF superstar fight actually ended up being really fun, especially once I got a consistent phase 1 strat.

(obviously please ignore these if you're avoiding spoilers)

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

I beat Radahn! I finally feel like i’m getting somewhere. Does anyone else feel bad having to kill the viking dudes in Nokron btw? They’re just strolling about singing and herding sheep it feels wrong somehow.

yeah, killing them and the giants the latter of whom are obviously the slave caste makes me feel bad :-(

theres a spot by moghwyns palace with tons of albinaurics just chilling out, you want to leave them alone but they drop 2k runes each, my murderous greed bums me out

I feel bad killing darn near everyone in this game. Especially now that I'm at the Haligtree, which if I understand the lore correctly, is supposed to be a safe haven for all the weirdos cast out by the Golden Order? I'm like "why am I murdering all these Misbegotten who are just trying to chill out at Scary Lothlorien"

This game is so sad :(

do they remember their countless brutal murders at your hands as they are reborn again and again?

they sure don't act like it, with all these backstabs I'm getting

I'm such a monster

Looking up at you with their big dumb eyes...

Well, I did it, it's done. Wasn't a huge fan of the final boss(es), but oh well. Immediately started up a new Prisoner character to start the level 40 invader build, and of course everything goes so much faster. Magic is fun too, it turns out.

Congrats Trayce! That's great, you're definitely on your way now.

Nokron is definitely good at making you feel like an intruder.

yeah i feel bad attacking any of the dudes who don't go after you unless you attack them first. all those poor miner guys mining smithing stones or whatever.

i'm a little stuck on a rennala, which is annoying bc it seems like she should be easy. i think i'll be able to knock her out pretty soon though. i haven't had much playing time recently.

Rennala is a little tough at first, but the learning curve on her is pretty easy. The most useful thing is in phase 2 to ignore her summons entirely because they vanish after a few seconds. Also, I think her summons are random and some of them are easier to avoid than others, so a certain amount of luck is involved.

xp the miners are a good example! They may be weird inter-galactic crystalline entities but they are mercilessly slave-driven by their prawn overseers, and don't deserve to be clubbed over the head by a presumptuous Tarnished

I respecked yesterday. My bleed/sorcery build was incredible but I started feeling like I was cheating a bit. A few rock slings was taking down even tough bosses.

So I'm either going to work on this Strength/Faith build I've got going on or maybe look to specialise in Strength and just be a tank or maybe be a dragon dude, I dunno

Btw I tried starting my new game on the PS5 version, but there was all this stutter/jitter when moving the camera around. So weird! I scrapped it and made a new file on the PS4 version (playing on PS5) and it's buttery smooth, same as the playthrough I just finished.