+xTheVisionary Yeah, ya know what's weird? I never saw the value in them because I _never_ used the Subscription view. Like, ever. Not even clicked on it. I'd always just browse my list of users I'm subscribed to and see who had little gray numbers by their names. What lunacy. I finally checked out the sub view the other day and it was like the oceans parted and the sky opened up and I thought, "Oh, fuck me! How much I've been missing ..." So I threw a little something together on this one in 2 minutes and called it good. I'll play around with it a bit to get it fancy and helpful for at-a-glance stuff. Thanks for noticing, dude!
Good lord! I don't remember the Dragon Rings being so fragile. For context, the vid starts off with a basic rundown of matchmaking and multi-player mechanics from game to game. If you find yourself thinking, "Hot DAMN, this is basic stuff ... why, Poly?" jump ahead to 9:06.
Happy Christmas Poly. Good to see you still doing Souls-esque videos. I'm honestly relieved to see that SL matchmaking is back in DS3. As much as I wanted to go back and play DS2 multiplayer the whole SM mechanic really killed my motivation to do so. Its a shame too, because besides the "fair" matchmaking issues, DS2 pvp seems really interesting. A lot of people seem to think that the Agape Ring fixed the SM issue, but its only really a band aid for a gaping flesh wound (nice metaphor me). I don't want to have to work out a pathway through pve content to create my pvp build in the most efficient way possible. Its so much hassle just to try and emulate SL matchmaking. Not to mention it still doesn't solve the problem for archer builds, since buying arrows still costs souls (unless you want to farm arrows to sustain pvp ammo), and people who want to upgrade different weapons for the sake of variety. Making a pvp build with the intention of staying within a specific SM range is honestly just a hassle imo. My other issue with DS2 pvp is that its been split onto six different platforms, meaning the respective player-base of each platform is now substantially smaller. I was excited about the SotFS updates for my xbox 360 copy of DS2, but it was only later that I found out that the new enemy placement, new weapon locations, and many other features were locked behind the DirectX 11 versions of the game. This honestly left me feeling a tad bitter, since I feel like the updated enemy placement etc.. was implemented to fix issues with the vanilla game, and I'd already bought the vanilla game. This only further killed my motivation to get back into playing DS2, since I felt like I wasn't playing the "definitive" version of the game. Wow, rant went on for a bit there. Anyway, I'm trying to manage my expectations for DS3, but I'm liking what I've seen so far. As long as they don't limit pvp with the Bloodborne bell system then it should be ok. And I'd happily watch any Bloodborne related stuff you might consider doing in the future. Keep up the good work Poly!
+Matt Ell Great points, man. I actually enjoyed - and still enjoy - the PvP in DkS2, but do so in spite of the mechanical flaws. I sympathize. Good call RE: archers being f'd over by SM. Hexers, too. Though hexers don't get a lot of empathy based on the horrific OP'ness of some of the dark spells at launch, a lot of the more viable castings cost souls to pop off. Totally with ya on the Agape Ring, too. It was some weird pseudo-fix that locked down your level and advancement but ultimately had _nothing_ to do with how connections were established. The ring was one-degree of separation that made things almost level-based, but not. I also hate how it locks you out of experimenting with other weapons, since they cost souls and materials to upgrade. PvP on the PC is pretty hoppin' to this day in the Scholar of the First Sin edition, but I have no idea what's going on with the vanilla. I assume it's pretty dead. I haven't touched it since SotFS. I'm also assuming that's the case on the 360 and PS3, too. While I think the schism made some teeny-tiny degree of sense on the consoles, on PC it was just a crappy, artificial split. The fact that it happened so quickly - after just a year - was pretty lame in my opinion, too. Thanks a ton for your thoughts, dude. And the support/kind words!
great video man! loved the whole run down from des to dks2. the only thing I really have to say about the meta stuff is that hopefully the community learns it's lesson from bloodborne and doesn't decide on a meta level to quickly before knowing everything about the game
+Wifitoaster Thanks, Toaster! I'm glad it was an enjoyable recap and not just a "blah-blah-blah" ... was a little worried about going back and talking about some history. Being out of it, I haven't followed the Bloodborne meta-level stuff too closely but I _still_ see videos pretty regularly making a case for level X vs. level Y. What was the original snap judgment with it, 150?
+Polygoing the original was 100 and many people now are thinking that's too low but I think it's hard now to switch the meta level since people have been used to 100 for a while
So it's May of 2016 and I hadn't even seen this video. Seeing as it came out on Christmas that might have had something to do with it. Really solid video. The game's not very old yet (not even a month of the english release), but already a meta community is evolving. It seems to be settling around the 110-130 range as far as fight clubs and build-makers go. Floors are plastered with signs everywhere I go, and generally it looks like a healthy release. Hope it stays that way.
+Lady Canton Thanks, Canton! Weird ... I don't remember putting this out on Christmas; that was asinine of me. What you're seeing evolve sounds promising, though with my (still) limited time invested SL 110-130 seems like an NG+ away; is it me, or do you level slowly as hell compared to I and II? In passing I've seen a bunch of Tweets and comments from kats who are excited to make lower level builds in a non-griefy kind of way. Pretty stoked for that, too, as I used to love PvP'ing in DkS1 around 50. Hope is nigh!
I'm ashamed to say I was one of those max level scrubs in des and never found out the joy and addiction of souls pvp till I played dks1. I hope dks3 online makes use of dks1 soul level matchmaking and dks2 invasion options ( ability to invade humans and non-humans whether they have killed boss or not, ability to use bonfire ascetics, more covenants etc...) and merry christmas poly
+Adel Al-shammari Merry Christmas to you, too, man! Great call on the human/non-human invasion ability; that was a _stellar_ addition to the matchmaking in DkS2. Ditto on DeS ... for a long, long time, at least. When I finally got into PvP I had a single character at 126 amidst a crowd of 240+ pros with several stats at 99 and goofy stuff like that. Those toons eventually got nuked and paved over for the 120 crew. Freakin' FOUR character slots was rough.
+PorscheJon Personally, don't really agree - seeing as PVP isn't the only aspect of online functionality in the series. I actually am not a huge fan of the PVP, but I enjoy the messages people leave scattered around; I like seeing the ghosts of other players running around (and seeing what kind of fashion they're rocking), and call me a n00b if you like, but I love co-op. It feels good laying down a summon sign, and helping someone get through an area or boss that has had them stuck for ages. On paper, I think PVP is actually rather cool as well. You could be walking along and then all of a sudden someone invades your world, acting as a mini boss. It adds quite a lot to the game. However, from my experience, it more often than not is just an annoyance. In DS1, for instance; because of the reliance on SL for matchmaking, there were a number of players who purposely stayed at lower levels, but maxed out their equipment in order to grief new players. I imagine this is why they implemented Soul Memory in the first place; and honestly, hearing that SM was a thing was the reason I decided to give DS2 a try in the first place. I'd been oneshotted so many times by players who took 0 damage from me, and gotten so many unprompted "haha guess you better get gud"messages by the time I reached Sen's Fortress that I have refused to reverse hollowing ever since. DS2 I've had a much more enjoyable time overall; however, as I said earlier, I much more prefer co-op, or the passive online features, than participating in PVP.
Online features as atmosphere. That's a cool perspective I hadn't ever actively thought of, but now that you mention it I totally appreciate that, too. The ghosts zippin' around, seeing a ton of messages in a particularly active area, and seeing summon signs from other players even if you don't opt to use them ... it all contributes to the feeling of existing in a vibrant, populated world. The grief is real, for sure. I think SM did take some good strides towards checking that a bit, but I also feel like the addition of the Agape Ring decimated that. Heide's and No Man's Wharf seem to be teeming with the same types that used to haunt the Parish. In my experiences, at least. Thanks for your thoughts, man!
The fundamental flaw with Soul Memory is not necessarily how it effects matchmaking. In my experience the Soul Memory is completely manageable, whether it be agaped ring or otherwise. The real issue with Soul Memory is that it eliminates a core mechanic of the game. When Demons and Dark Souls were first released one of the most intriguing things about the game was the concept that death was not a "Big Deal". Instead it was used as a tool to teach lessons about other aspects of the game by the developers. The problem with Soul Memory is that it renews the significance of death. Now when you die and loose 50,000souls, because you chose to move on after a boss instead of leveling up first, you are punished (quite heavily) for your mistake. As a result Soul Memory takes away one of the key characteristics of the game that makes it unique from any other RPG. It takes away the "Souls" and leaves the "Dark". Resulting in the collective disappointment experienced by the community. Awesome to see you again Poly! :]
+AnonymousChaos Nice to be back, at least in some capacity! I actually had a brief segment where I was talking about the penalty of dying, losing souls and having them still count against you ... I chopped it out in a fit of overzealous editing. You're absolutely right, though. I remember my first character that hit 150 in DkS2 had about 3.5M in my Soul Memory counter, both from losing souls to death and from just grinding, buying stones and goofing around with various weapon upgrades and playing around with ascetics and various new mechanics. That probably contributed to some of the bitter taste the mechanic left in my mouth, as my first experiences were with dudes who significantly out-powered me. Heh. Also back in the days when daggers did 2600+ points of damage for criticals and spells hit like metric tons of bricks. Good times, dude.
Soul memory was a good idea in terms of stopping twinks from picking on low level characters. However as you stated in terms of matchmaking it makes it really hard to connect. In my opinion they should just make it a blend of the two. Make it to where in New Game you match via soul memory and when you get to new game + make it match by soul level since that's where most pvp happens anyway. Great video as always Poly and merry christmas :D.
+Codeburst Thanks, Burst! And merry (belated) Christmas back your way. That's an interesting idea; I wonder if it'd be confusing to have the two systems simultaneously implemented. Then again, for as deep as we all get into the game that'd hardly be an obstacle when things got going. I totally respect SM as a means for grief control. I kinda feel the Agape Ring broke the hell out of that while fixing other things, so it got even more messy. Blended ... intriguing. Thanks, man!
+Codeburst Nar SM was a terrible idea, not only did it break match making (and everything poly talked about) but also made life hell for less skilled players later down the line (dying allot -> inflated SM -> significantly stronger invaders), A far better method if From truly wanted to protect newbies from getting twink killed would be to simply add/change a Covenant that locked player online interactions to Co-Op only (no invasions), that way people who didn't have any interest in PvP would be safe and everyone else could also do as they wished.
Polygoing I completely forgot about the agape ring and yeah that messed up SM a lot. QwertyBoredom122 brings up a good point on how From can solve the issue of protecting newbies but I kinda also feel locking people into Co-op/invasions only covenants misses the point of what online dark souls is for. I don't know what the best option is but that was thoughts on the matter. Thanks for the reply!
Merry Christmas, Poly. It was great having this to listen to mid Christmas day. By the way, I finally got around to playing Bloodborne. It's easily one of my favorite games of all-time in terms of the single player experience. The recent DLC was top-notch stuff, too...really beyond expectations for me. The PvP aspects haven't been to my liking, but I kinda already knew that would be the case going in. Regardless, I think it's some of From's best work. Do you still think about Bloodborne at all? Or are you pretty much looking towards Dark Souls 3? I'm so curious (almost anxious) to know what route they'll go for the invasion system in Dark Souls 3...so much rides on it, in my opinion.
+ReploidZero Hey, man! Merry (belated) Xmas back at ya. That's a strong endorsement for Bloodborne; and yeah, I think about it infrequently regularly. Every time I mention I haven't played it, a reliable source - case in point - will chime in and say, "Dude, play it for the PvE if nothing else. It's truly a masterpiece." So I've had a PS4 sitting in my cart since the price went < $300 and one of these days I think the last of my resolve will melt and I'll snag it. I'm excited and optimistic for DkS3, but I'm not champin' at the bit to have it arrive like I was from 1 to 2. It'll happen when it happens. RE: invasions, I'm not sure how up-to-date this info is, but last I heard the invasions weren't unlike BB in that a host has to be co-oping to be an available invasion target. That strikes me as less than ideal ... but I'm wondering if that wasn't just a Network Test thing to ensure large groups of players were connecting to stress test multiplayer. I'm totally cool existing in the duelists' world, but I can see it being a big let down if invasions end up working in that manner. How's tricks on your end?
+Polygoing Man, I typed out a pretty detailed response a few minutes ago, but my computer crashed before I could finish. That pretty much sums up how tricks are on my end, aside from being busy with the usual shit. Once I get things sorted in January, I'll be doing a few Bloodborne vids along with finishing up the Silent Hill 2 run...that's what's on schedule for the channel, at least. I noticed that the Network Test had Bloodborne-style matchmaking. I'm hopeful that was just for the test, but I guess we'll find out pretty soon. I feel like part of the Souls magic/depth is lost when you remove true random invasions from the game. That feeling of anxiety going through a level, wondering if you'll be invaded at any moment. Or seeing that you've been invaded at the most terrifying of times...having all of these added layers of intensity that you simply can't get from another game. That';s the kind of stuff that was missing in Dark Souls 2 and Bloodborne for me. My PvP roots are in the Burg/Township, I love duels, but I just hope invaders don't get screwed over this time.
Hey great video! I have hope that DkS3 will be a renaissance of sorts for the souls pvp. SL matchmaking is really fantastic news, I agree that this is much better than soul memory for sustaining the game's community. However, based on what I've seen and heard of the DkS3 network test there are some troubling aspects making their way from Bloodborne. 1. It seemed like you could only invade people who already had a co-op phantom in their game. This sounds very much like Bloodborne. The vast majority of invasions in Bloodborne are the invader vs. 2-3 co-opers (unless you go to Bloodborne's version of the iron keep bridge). In my opinion this hurts pvp because invading groups 80-90% of the time gets old. 2. People reported a 30% health reduction for all summons. Just like Bloodborne you invade with 30% less health than the host. I know that phantoms had much less health than hosts in Demon's Souls, but it seems people can reduce that gap to be more or less at the same health as the host (I never played DS, so this could be wrong). However, in Bloodborne there was no way to diminish that health gap, you would always be at a disadvantage unless the host took it upon themselves to "blood tap" or take some of their own heath away. And of course this very rarely happens, unless you are in a strict, organized fight club. Overall, I feel this creates an environment of resentment. Close fights that you lost only because they had the health advantage, or your win feels cheap because they were at a disadvantage they couldn't control. These things add up I think, and the growth of a pvp community suffers. Hopefully, if they do implement these things, there will be an arena that puts players on a level playing field, with no health reductions. That way invading would be for players seeking dirty, nasty, kill or be killed... and if players want "honorable" random duels they can head to the arena. Bloodborne does not have this so, 80-90% of invasions in 90% of the game you will fight multiple opponents, and be at a health disadvantage to boot. Random duels exist if you can find them, but one side will almost always have 30% more HP.
+Matthew Pierce Thanks a ton, man! I hear ya on the concerns; I'd seen those, as well. I'm hoping (though not necessarily hopeful) the only-invade-coop mechanic was just a network test thing in that since it was a stress test of connections they wanted to ensure that a lot of people were in the same world at the same time. So just a development tweak to try and get at least 3 people running around and connected to see how the latency handles. I've got mixed feelings on the 30% reduction; I think that _could_ be fine if there are invader-only perks via certain rings or gear. From did that in Demons Souls and a lot of people have pointed it out as lacking in BB. But yeah, as it stands with an HP penalty and a guaranteed entry against at least two opponents ... that kinda sucks. I'll be watching it closely. Thanks for your thoughts!
Despite the introduction of SM, a strong meta community formed in DS2, that still thrives today in small streams on Twitch. So I feel that there was no worries there. The introduction of a reliable arena, that accumulated the PvP players into one place was another great addition to the game for meta players that I fear will be lost in DS3. I truly feel that the only error that has been seen in the souls community, in terms of PvP meta, is the vast gap that Bloodborne left in which a new, fresh PvP experience could be supplied. It was broken, slow and frankly unplayable. Despite being PvE games, the longevity of the From games comes from the PvP. You can only really play PvE so much before you've done everything. Dark Souls 3 may be the bandaid that this community needs to bring in fresh blood and revitalise the people and uploaded content. But was this not exactly what we hoped for Bloodborne? People thought this would be salvation from Dark Souls 2, but alas it was, clearly not. As we head towards Dark Souls 3 I can only hope for the best, but I fear the worst. Great video as usual Poly, and sorry for the wall of text
+xNMM Text walls are awesome, man. We need more text walls and fewer meme Walls. I'm totally with ya on PvP supplying the longevity for these games; I'm also in complete agreement that the Bloodborne PvP scene was a catastrophe compared to anything Souls-proper ... not so much in how it plays (again, outside looking in), but in the connection system and heavy leanings on gun and weapon spamming. I think I sounded a little more down on DkS2 than intended and didn't mean to short-change the community that's still going strong with it. Hell, I'm still playing it. And I think as a community we played the hell out of the hand we were dealt. Looking back, though, I still have some pretty bitter feelings towards the schism that happened and the DkS1 vs. DkS2 wars. I find myself optimistic for 3 despite trying to keep anticipation at bay. I'm hoping that as a whole we can embrace any changes and variance as "different" rather than "shitty." Thanks for your thoughts, dude!
I totally agree, but I'd like a way for ppl who complete the game on a low lvl character to be unable to invade newbies before they get to upgrade passed +5 wpns and armor. Essentially a twink guard system because upgraded equipment is just as big a factor as lvls. Like an overall equipment grade by wpn modification tier (none to +4, +5 to +9, +10 to +15).
+CtisGaming That's an interesting thought. So like, there's a "proficiency" factor that might tie level and upgrade tiers? Like you can't upgrade a weapon past a certain point if you're too low of a level or something. That has great potential for gimping twinks, though it would put a huge snag in things for challenge and speed runners, I'd guess. I'll mull on that. Thanks, man!
Polygoing I don't think it'd hurt speedruns. They almost always upgrade their weapon(s) and armor whenever they can. It's more so a 2nd criteria for matchmaking. I wouldn't want to limit wpn upgrades, I just don't want new pIayers getting invaded by people with Havels and lightning/poison/+15 weapons before they have access to lrg or green shards because the difference can be just as massive as levels.
Hold onto your seats, this is gonna be a long one. So lets start with good ol' demon's souls, for the longest time (like most people sadly) I had no idea that demon's souls even existed and by the time I had picked up the game for the first time and played it it was practically dead except for the one time I got invaded near the end of my first play-through and had my one and only PvP match. Which was just great btw, magic is OP in that game so I rekt him. But the whole environment and the lore from item descriptions which I absolutely loved from dark souls 1 was totally present in it's older cousin demon's. It was a solid game the first time I played it and I'm sure it will continue to stay that way. Now onto Dark Souls 1, oh man here we go. So when I was much younger and more naive then I would care to admit I saw the Bartholomew trailer for dark souls on tv and was pulled in because I was looking for an escape from all the call of duty and non-stop shooters rolling out at the time. I even remember the first words I said to the guy in game-stop for when i picked it up "It can't be that hard." Yeah, I actually said that. Here is where everything started, after playing the game over and over to try different things and going online to see what i missed I ran into videos of PvP from multiple different people (I actually ran into peeve before I knew who he was, there is a video of me on his channel under the name of "I didn't come here for you" go check it out and see my scrubiness! *Edit: looks like he set the video to private.* Anyway, I got sucked into the gloriousness of PvP it was all I could think about, all I wanted to do and it was all I did. FOR TWO, MAYBE, THREE YEARS. I don't regret a single second of it though, it's how I met all the people from the souls community and the reason as to why I even started a UA-cam channel and began making videos, hell even you Polly, you helped with that! It was probably some of the best gaming years of my life, or maybe that I'll ever have. (Assuming that DKS3 is bad, which, for the love of god I hope it's not.) Onto dark souls 2. *Le sigh* I wish that I didn't get so hyped for this game, because when I started playing it I had way to high expectations for it and it didn't live up to a lot of them, I won't get into the debate about what's good or bad about it I'm just going to say this. It was a GOOD game. IT WAS! But it was a bad SOULS game IMO. It's still better than a lot of other games out on the market right now. Moving onto less controversial topics: Bloodborne. So because of what happened with dark souls 2 I went into bloodborne a skeptic, and good lord am I glad I did. This game absolutely blew my goddamn mind. From the amazing PvE with its epic bosses "Hi I'm Father Gascoigne, welcome to bloodborne.* (which I'm playing right now, LOL.) To the fast paced PvP and relentless game-play, this game is easily in my top 5 best games I've ever played. If Dark Souls 1 were not my first souls game Bloodborne would've been above it. It is an absolute gem of a game, hell when I found out that it was getting dlc I nearly died, since the dlc is amazing as well. I just hope that a lot of this greatness carries over. Now onto the final topic:DARK SOULS 3. From what I've seen from the network test, it looks like a mix of Dark 1, Demon's and Bloodborne. Which is wonderful, however, I did see some things I didn't like, for one the poise seemed to be non-existent. I know I might be in the minority of the community when I say I actually LIKED poise in Dark Souls 1. It made fat-tanky builds actually viable and not "Ow, you poked me with a dagger and I flinched even though I have like 7 layers of armor on* I just hope that there will be a system in place to make it more like Dark Souls 1's combat because the no-poise from Demon's, Dark 2, (yes I know it had some kind of poise but I didn't like it) and Bloodborne URKED the hell outta me. The only reason it's ok in Bloodborne is because of the fast paced dodging. Which might be in Dark Souls 3 who knows, I can't say for sure. Alright....holy crap I typed an essay. But those are my thoughts on all the games thus far. All I can say is I'm going into Dark Souls 3 HOPEFUL, but SKEPTIC just like I did with Bloodborne. Feel free to give your opinions on all of this. Also, merry late Christmas Polly. I was enjoying myself to much to get on and watch UA-cam. LMAO. P.S If what I hear about you stepping foot into my Yharnam is true....hit me up for some jolly co-op. I would love to hear your reactions to everything first hand! XD My PSN is (AbyssKingChaos) Yes, the abyssking is in reference to the four kings.
+ChaosKingD0mmm Happy New Year, man! Sorry for the tardy reply. And dude, that's a strong endorsement for Bloodborne. I still haven't picked up a PS4, but I think I'm gonna next time I see a sale or another price drop happens; I'll totally hit you up for some jolly cooperation if that happens. What you said about, "If Dark Souls 1 were not my first souls game Bloodborne would've been above it," makes a ton of sense. I kinda feel that same way about DeS vs. DkS when asked. Which is the better game? Dark Souls. Which game do I like better? Demons. Funny how attached we get to that first taste of Souls, whatever it might be, and use it as the gold standard. So I wonder if people who played BB first are gonna go back and explore other From titles and (gasp!) be disappointed with Dark. I like how poise worked in DkS, too. I think it added another interesting layer to build creation in having to evaluate the weight/poise/roll speed requirements of putting a character together. It was another aspect of depth and variety that was moderately lost in 2. Good on ya for taking a break over the holiday. Hope ol' Santa was cool to your and yours, man. Always a pleasure to hear your thoughts ... essay'ish as they might be!
+Polygoing Great! Can't wait for some more co-op, and who knows? Maybe they will notice the other flaws in the game when coming from bloodborne, I'm sure they will notice the change in playing speed being so much slower in the very least. I agree with the layer of depth poise added to the game as well, the more complex the more variety right? Anyway, don't worry about the late reply we all have things going on no matter how small or maybe we just wanna relax for a bit. Speaking of relaxing ol' st. Nick was good to us. Especially the 2 new family members who haven't even been around for a whole year yet! XD Always glad to see one of your videos pop into my sub box. They are a treat that keeps on giving. Till next time Polly!
My main issue with soul memory is that in dark souls 1 if I died with 500k souls I'd be annoyed sure, but I wasn't punished for it. I could always get those souls back. However, in dark souls 2 if I died I lost a limited resource since there are limited spawns. I could technically farm the first undead in dark souls 1 to get back those 500k souls. I can't do that in dark souls 2 due to limited spawning. And to add insult to injury, if I'm building a pvp character I'm going to be down those 500k when I reach my target soul memory level. This results in me getting legit mad instead of slightly annoyed when I die. Which in my opinion, is bad. Since ultimately I play games to have fun.
+Isak Rehn That's fascinating. I'd never once thought of souls as a finite resource. You could manage that with some recent'ish updates to the way the Covenant of Champions respawns enemies and ascetics, but that's a lot of micromanagement and extra effort ... and a wild departure with how prior games worked. it's especially irksome how some weapons and armor are _only_ acquired by farming, and if shit doesn't drop you're out of luck. Unless you burn an ascetic, which has a wide range of supplementary effects in addition to making enemies respawn. Awesome call. Totally with ya on getting pissed if you lose a huge chunk of souls. It makes your deaths a legitimate, far-reaching penalty instead of a learning experience. I usually scrap a character and start over if I have too catastrophic a loss in souls since it throws your entire PvP experience out of whack.
Polygoing Thank you! I do try. The worst part is that, overall dark souls 2 really isn't a bad game. It's a very good game that unfortunately suffers from an abundance of small mistakes which in the end, at least to me, makes the game less enjoyable than it's prequels. I miss things like the really visceral backstabs and ripostes. Bosses with limbs that could be cut off for weapons. Levels that connected so incredibly well with short cuts and secrets. The extreme color variation and not just the same dull filter that seems to plague dark souls 2. I could go on but I think that's enough. I had my hopes so high for Dark souls 2 that things like that probably hit harder than it should have. And I'm doing it again with Dark souls 3 haha. Hopefully that will blow me out of the waters despite it though. Okey rant over. Sorry I had to get it out of my system since I've been playing Scholars of the first sin recently and was reminded of my initial disappointment back in March 2014.
+godly hero I hear ya; I've definitely gotten pretty sporadic in getting vids out, but I'm trying to keep things going. Here's to hoping the release of DkS3 gives things a shot in the arm.
Listening to this makes me wonder how well a PvP souls game would do. Rather, how much the PvE, exploration, mobs, and lore matter to someone who's in it for the PvP. I know there are lots of people who Cheat Engine their way into PvP builds, and that's all they do. So I guess my question is how well would a souls PvP game do, that was nothing but fighting other players. As in, you pick your weapons, armor, rings, stats, and spells from a menu. You'd get matched up with someone in a duel arena and go. Would anyone play it? Merry xmas/holidays Polly~!
+RBlue I was thinking that with CE you're basically picking a build from a menu anyway, but you're right, you would miss out on a lot of the unique situations that can arise from invasions. I think it's clear from Dark Souls 2's development that PvP is not at the forefront of FromSoftware's GDD. Thinking about it now, you probably wouldn't be able to do a lot of the goofy stuff in a sterile environment either. I.E, Strong Magic Shield + Butterfly Shield bashes. I would still love to see them try a PvP focused game.
+Goo King Many merries back at ya, man! That's an intriguing proposition with the Souls fighter. A lot of solo sports games - like Golf and Boxing - have character builder components that I think would work really well in a Souls fighter; you win matches, level up and jump to the next tier of opponents and the like. Maybe winning and advancing your toon is how you unlock new weapons and upgrades and the like, too. And before each fight, you can select your load-out and spells and what not ... just like before an arena match. They'd probably have to scale back the number of available weapons, but they did that with Bloodborne and (from the outside) seem to have done a solid job of making each weapon important and unique instead of having 12 of everything with tiny variations. You and Blue are right about missing out on the invasions; maybe instead of a static arena, you and your opponent are dropped into a little mini-level that contains minions and a bit of a layout, and the invader could bust in and kill either of you ... essentially making it a 1v1v1. I'ma mull on that. Good call, dude.
+Polygoing I'd be into it. I know a couple of the big souls streamers were playing Blade Symphony at one point, maybe something like that would work better. Being honest, they do have a PvP focused series and that's Armored Core. I'd be fine with seeing a new game from that series as well.
+AABatteries321 Oh my heavens, YES! It bothers me something fierce that if you two-hand your off hand weapon you can parry with it like normal but not riposte! Depending on what they do with dual wielding, it'd be slick to pull off criticals with both weapons - either individually or together - as well.
+Polygoing True. I'm left handed so it'd be awesome to see it happen. Hopefully dual-wield ripostes won't factor the counter damage from both weapons if they do it like that lmao.
+Fernando PEREZ AGUAYO Merry Christmas back at ya, man! I still haven't taken the plunge, but everywhere I turn people are telling me it's a must-play. I have a nagging suspicion I'll be there sometime between now and DkS3 launching ... but we'll see. Thanks a ton!
Goddamn, you're FINALLY doing custom thumbnails. Well done. Looks really clean, man.
+xTheVisionary Yeah, ya know what's weird? I never saw the value in them because I _never_ used the Subscription view. Like, ever. Not even clicked on it. I'd always just browse my list of users I'm subscribed to and see who had little gray numbers by their names.
What lunacy.
I finally checked out the sub view the other day and it was like the oceans parted and the sky opened up and I thought, "Oh, fuck me! How much I've been missing ..."
So I threw a little something together on this one in 2 minutes and called it good. I'll play around with it a bit to get it fancy and helpful for at-a-glance stuff. Thanks for noticing, dude!
+Polygoing That rock you've been living under is bigger than I had thought. Holy hell, man.
Good lord! I don't remember the Dragon Rings being so fragile. For context, the vid starts off with a basic rundown of matchmaking and multi-player mechanics from game to game. If you find yourself thinking, "Hot DAMN, this is basic stuff ... why, Poly?" jump ahead to 9:06.
Happy Christmas Poly. Good to see you still doing Souls-esque videos.
I'm honestly relieved to see that SL matchmaking is back in DS3. As much as I wanted to go back and play DS2 multiplayer the whole SM mechanic really killed my motivation to do so. Its a shame too, because besides the "fair" matchmaking issues, DS2 pvp seems really interesting.
A lot of people seem to think that the Agape Ring fixed the SM issue, but its only really a band aid for a gaping flesh wound (nice metaphor me). I don't want to have to work out a pathway through pve content to create my pvp build in the most efficient way possible. Its so much hassle just to try and emulate SL matchmaking. Not to mention it still doesn't solve the problem for archer builds, since buying arrows still costs souls (unless you want to farm arrows to sustain pvp ammo), and people who want to upgrade different weapons for the sake of variety. Making a pvp build with the intention of staying within a specific SM range is honestly just a hassle imo.
My other issue with DS2 pvp is that its been split onto six different platforms, meaning the respective player-base of each platform is now substantially smaller. I was excited about the SotFS updates for my xbox 360 copy of DS2, but it was only later that I found out that the new enemy placement, new weapon locations, and many other features were locked behind the DirectX 11 versions of the game. This honestly left me feeling a tad bitter, since I feel like the updated enemy placement etc.. was implemented to fix issues with the vanilla game, and I'd already bought the vanilla game. This only further killed my motivation to get back into playing DS2, since I felt like I wasn't playing the "definitive" version of the game.
Wow, rant went on for a bit there.
Anyway, I'm trying to manage my expectations for DS3, but I'm liking what I've seen so far. As long as they don't limit pvp with the Bloodborne bell system then it should be ok. And I'd happily watch any Bloodborne related stuff you might consider doing in the future.
Keep up the good work Poly!
+Matt Ell Great points, man. I actually enjoyed - and still enjoy - the PvP in DkS2, but do so in spite of the mechanical flaws. I sympathize. Good call RE: archers being f'd over by SM. Hexers, too. Though hexers don't get a lot of empathy based on the horrific OP'ness of some of the dark spells at launch, a lot of the more viable castings cost souls to pop off.
Totally with ya on the Agape Ring, too. It was some weird pseudo-fix that locked down your level and advancement but ultimately had _nothing_ to do with how connections were established. The ring was one-degree of separation that made things almost level-based, but not. I also hate how it locks you out of experimenting with other weapons, since they cost souls and materials to upgrade.
PvP on the PC is pretty hoppin' to this day in the Scholar of the First Sin edition, but I have no idea what's going on with the vanilla. I assume it's pretty dead. I haven't touched it since SotFS. I'm also assuming that's the case on the 360 and PS3, too. While I think the schism made some teeny-tiny degree of sense on the consoles, on PC it was just a crappy, artificial split. The fact that it happened so quickly - after just a year - was pretty lame in my opinion, too.
Thanks a ton for your thoughts, dude. And the support/kind words!
great video man! loved the whole run down from des to dks2. the only thing I really have to say about the meta stuff is that hopefully the community learns it's lesson from bloodborne and doesn't decide on a meta level to quickly before knowing everything about the game
+Wifitoaster Thanks, Toaster! I'm glad it was an enjoyable recap and not just a "blah-blah-blah" ... was a little worried about going back and talking about some history.
Being out of it, I haven't followed the Bloodborne meta-level stuff too closely but I _still_ see videos pretty regularly making a case for level X vs. level Y. What was the original snap judgment with it, 150?
+Polygoing the original was 100 and many people now are thinking that's too low but I think it's hard now to switch the meta level since people have been used to 100 for a while
So it's May of 2016 and I hadn't even seen this video. Seeing as it came out on Christmas that might have had something to do with it.
Really solid video. The game's not very old yet (not even a month of the english release), but already a meta community is evolving. It seems to be settling around the 110-130 range as far as fight clubs and build-makers go. Floors are plastered with signs everywhere I go, and generally it looks like a healthy release. Hope it stays that way.
+Lady Canton Thanks, Canton! Weird ... I don't remember putting this out on Christmas; that was asinine of me.
What you're seeing evolve sounds promising, though with my (still) limited time invested SL 110-130 seems like an NG+ away; is it me, or do you level slowly as hell compared to I and II?
In passing I've seen a bunch of Tweets and comments from kats who are excited to make lower level builds in a non-griefy kind of way. Pretty stoked for that, too, as I used to love PvP'ing in DkS1 around 50. Hope is nigh!
I'm ashamed to say I was one of those max level scrubs in des and never found out the joy and addiction of souls pvp till I played dks1. I hope dks3 online makes use of dks1 soul level matchmaking and dks2 invasion options ( ability to invade humans and non-humans whether they have killed boss or not, ability to use bonfire ascetics, more covenants etc...)
and merry christmas poly
+Adel Al-shammari Merry Christmas to you, too, man! Great call on the human/non-human invasion ability; that was a _stellar_ addition to the matchmaking in DkS2.
Ditto on DeS ... for a long, long time, at least. When I finally got into PvP I had a single character at 126 amidst a crowd of 240+ pros with several stats at 99 and goofy stuff like that. Those toons eventually got nuked and paved over for the 120 crew.
Freakin' FOUR character slots was rough.
+Adel Al-shammari totally agree man. The more pvp availability the better. If you don't want to play pvp, go offline.
+PorscheJon Personally, don't really agree - seeing as PVP isn't the only aspect of online functionality in the series.
I actually am not a huge fan of the PVP, but I enjoy the messages people leave scattered around; I like seeing the ghosts of other players running around (and seeing what kind of fashion they're rocking), and call me a n00b if you like, but I love co-op. It feels good laying down a summon sign, and helping someone get through an area or boss that has had them stuck for ages.
On paper, I think PVP is actually rather cool as well. You could be walking along and then all of a sudden someone invades your world, acting as a mini boss. It adds quite a lot to the game. However, from my experience, it more often than not is just an annoyance.
In DS1, for instance; because of the reliance on SL for matchmaking, there were a number of players who purposely stayed at lower levels, but maxed out their equipment in order to grief new players. I imagine this is why they implemented Soul Memory in the first place; and honestly, hearing that SM was a thing was the reason I decided to give DS2 a try in the first place. I'd been oneshotted so many times by players who took 0 damage from me, and gotten so many unprompted "haha guess you better get gud"messages by the time I reached Sen's Fortress that I have refused to reverse hollowing ever since.
DS2 I've had a much more enjoyable time overall; however, as I said earlier, I much more prefer co-op, or the passive online features, than participating in PVP.
Online features as atmosphere. That's a cool perspective I hadn't ever actively thought of, but now that you mention it I totally appreciate that, too.
The ghosts zippin' around, seeing a ton of messages in a particularly active area, and seeing summon signs from other players even if you don't opt to use them ... it all contributes to the feeling of existing in a vibrant, populated world.
The grief is real, for sure. I think SM did take some good strides towards checking that a bit, but I also feel like the addition of the Agape Ring decimated that. Heide's and No Man's Wharf seem to be teeming with the same types that used to haunt the Parish. In my experiences, at least.
Thanks for your thoughts, man!
The fundamental flaw with Soul Memory is not necessarily how it effects matchmaking. In my experience the Soul Memory is completely manageable, whether it be agaped ring or otherwise. The real issue with Soul Memory is that it eliminates a core mechanic of the game. When Demons and Dark Souls were first released one of the most intriguing things about the game was the concept that death was not a "Big Deal". Instead it was used as a tool to teach lessons about other aspects of the game by the developers. The problem with Soul Memory is that it renews the significance of death. Now when you die and loose 50,000souls, because you chose to move on after a boss instead of leveling up first, you are punished (quite heavily) for your mistake. As a result Soul Memory takes away one of the key characteristics of the game that makes it unique from any other RPG. It takes away the "Souls" and leaves the "Dark". Resulting in the collective disappointment experienced by the community.
Awesome to see you again Poly! :]
+AnonymousChaos Nice to be back, at least in some capacity! I actually had a brief segment where I was talking about the penalty of dying, losing souls and having them still count against you ... I chopped it out in a fit of overzealous editing. You're absolutely right, though.
I remember my first character that hit 150 in DkS2 had about 3.5M in my Soul Memory counter, both from losing souls to death and from just grinding, buying stones and goofing around with various weapon upgrades and playing around with ascetics and various new mechanics.
That probably contributed to some of the bitter taste the mechanic left in my mouth, as my first experiences were with dudes who significantly out-powered me. Heh. Also back in the days when daggers did 2600+ points of damage for criticals and spells hit like metric tons of bricks. Good times, dude.
Soul memory was a good idea in terms of stopping twinks from picking on low level characters. However as you stated in terms of matchmaking it makes it really hard to connect. In my opinion they should just make it a blend of the two. Make it to where in New Game you match via soul memory and when you get to new game + make it match by soul level since that's where most pvp happens anyway. Great video as always Poly and merry christmas :D.
+Codeburst Oh and the Network test looked pretty cool I love how fast you can apply resins now :D.
+Codeburst Thanks, Burst! And merry (belated) Christmas back your way. That's an interesting idea; I wonder if it'd be confusing to have the two systems simultaneously implemented. Then again, for as deep as we all get into the game that'd hardly be an obstacle when things got going.
I totally respect SM as a means for grief control. I kinda feel the Agape Ring broke the hell out of that while fixing other things, so it got even more messy.
Blended ... intriguing. Thanks, man!
+Codeburst Nar SM was a terrible idea, not only did it break match making (and everything poly talked about) but also made life hell for less skilled players later down the line (dying allot -> inflated SM -> significantly stronger invaders), A far better method if From truly wanted to protect newbies from getting twink killed would be to simply add/change a Covenant that locked player online interactions to Co-Op only (no invasions), that way people who didn't have any interest in PvP would be safe and everyone else could also do as they wished.
Polygoing I completely forgot about the agape ring and yeah that messed up SM a lot. QwertyBoredom122 brings up a good point on how From can solve the issue of protecting newbies but I kinda also feel locking people into Co-op/invasions only covenants misses the point of what online dark souls is for. I don't know what the best option is but that was thoughts on the matter. Thanks for the reply!
Merry Christmas, Poly. It was great having this to listen to mid Christmas day.
By the way, I finally got around to playing Bloodborne. It's easily one of my favorite games of all-time in terms of the single player experience. The recent DLC was top-notch stuff, too...really beyond expectations for me. The PvP aspects haven't been to my liking, but I kinda already knew that would be the case going in. Regardless, I think it's some of From's best work.
Do you still think about Bloodborne at all? Or are you pretty much looking towards Dark Souls 3? I'm so curious (almost anxious) to know what route they'll go for the invasion system in Dark Souls 3...so much rides on it, in my opinion.
+ReploidZero Hey, man! Merry (belated) Xmas back at ya.
That's a strong endorsement for Bloodborne; and yeah, I think about it infrequently regularly. Every time I mention I haven't played it, a reliable source - case in point - will chime in and say, "Dude, play it for the PvE if nothing else. It's truly a masterpiece." So I've had a PS4 sitting in my cart since the price went < $300 and one of these days I think the last of my resolve will melt and I'll snag it.
I'm excited and optimistic for DkS3, but I'm not champin' at the bit to have it arrive like I was from 1 to 2. It'll happen when it happens. RE: invasions, I'm not sure how up-to-date this info is, but last I heard the invasions weren't unlike BB in that a host has to be co-oping to be an available invasion target. That strikes me as less than ideal ... but I'm wondering if that wasn't just a Network Test thing to ensure large groups of players were connecting to stress test multiplayer.
I'm totally cool existing in the duelists' world, but I can see it being a big let down if invasions end up working in that manner.
How's tricks on your end?
+Polygoing Man, I typed out a pretty detailed response a few minutes ago, but my computer crashed before I could finish. That pretty much sums up how tricks are on my end, aside from being busy with the usual shit. Once I get things sorted in January, I'll be doing a few Bloodborne vids along with finishing up the Silent Hill 2 run...that's what's on schedule for the channel, at least.
I noticed that the Network Test had Bloodborne-style matchmaking. I'm hopeful that was just for the test, but I guess we'll find out pretty soon. I feel like part of the Souls magic/depth is lost when you remove true random invasions from the game. That feeling of anxiety going through a level, wondering if you'll be invaded at any moment. Or seeing that you've been invaded at the most terrifying of times...having all of these added layers of intensity that you simply can't get from another game. That';s the kind of stuff that was missing in Dark Souls 2 and Bloodborne for me. My PvP roots are in the Burg/Township, I love duels, but I just hope invaders don't get screwed over this time.
Hey great video! I have hope that DkS3 will be a renaissance of sorts for the souls pvp. SL matchmaking is really fantastic news, I agree that this is much better than soul memory for sustaining the game's community. However, based on what I've seen and heard of the DkS3 network test there are some troubling aspects making their way from Bloodborne.
1. It seemed like you could only invade people who already had a co-op phantom in their game. This sounds very much like Bloodborne. The vast majority of invasions in Bloodborne are the invader vs. 2-3 co-opers (unless you go to Bloodborne's version of the iron keep bridge). In my opinion this hurts pvp because invading groups 80-90% of the time gets old.
2. People reported a 30% health reduction for all summons. Just like Bloodborne you invade with 30% less health than the host. I know that phantoms had much less health than hosts in Demon's Souls, but it seems people can reduce that gap to be more or less at the same health as the host (I never played DS, so this could be wrong). However, in Bloodborne there was no way to diminish that health gap, you would always be at a disadvantage unless the host took it upon themselves to "blood tap" or take some of their own heath away. And of course this very rarely happens, unless you are in a strict, organized fight club. Overall, I feel this creates an environment of resentment. Close fights that you lost only because they had the health advantage, or your win feels cheap because they were at a disadvantage they couldn't control.
These things add up I think, and the growth of a pvp community suffers. Hopefully, if they do implement these things, there will be an arena that puts players on a level playing field, with no health reductions. That way invading would be for players seeking dirty, nasty, kill or be killed... and if players want "honorable" random duels they can head to the arena. Bloodborne does not have this so, 80-90% of invasions in 90% of the game you will fight multiple opponents, and be at a health disadvantage to boot. Random duels exist if you can find them, but one side will almost always have 30% more HP.
+Matthew Pierce Thanks a ton, man! I hear ya on the concerns; I'd seen those, as well. I'm hoping (though not necessarily hopeful) the only-invade-coop mechanic was just a network test thing in that since it was a stress test of connections they wanted to ensure that a lot of people were in the same world at the same time. So just a development tweak to try and get at least 3 people running around and connected to see how the latency handles.
I've got mixed feelings on the 30% reduction; I think that _could_ be fine if there are invader-only perks via certain rings or gear. From did that in Demons Souls and a lot of people have pointed it out as lacking in BB.
But yeah, as it stands with an HP penalty and a guaranteed entry against at least two opponents ... that kinda sucks. I'll be watching it closely.
Thanks for your thoughts!
Despite the introduction of SM, a strong meta community formed in DS2, that still thrives today in small streams on Twitch. So I feel that there was no worries there. The introduction of a reliable arena, that accumulated the PvP players into one place was another great addition to the game for meta players that I fear will be lost in DS3.
I truly feel that the only error that has been seen in the souls community, in terms of PvP meta, is the vast gap that Bloodborne left in which a new, fresh PvP experience could be supplied. It was broken, slow and frankly unplayable. Despite being PvE games, the longevity of the From games comes from the PvP. You can only really play PvE so much before you've done everything.
Dark Souls 3 may be the bandaid that this community needs to bring in fresh blood and revitalise the people and uploaded content. But was this not exactly what we hoped for Bloodborne? People thought this would be salvation from Dark Souls 2, but alas it was, clearly not.
As we head towards Dark Souls 3 I can only hope for the best, but I fear the worst.
Great video as usual Poly, and sorry for the wall of text
+xNMM Text walls are awesome, man. We need more text walls and fewer meme Walls.
I'm totally with ya on PvP supplying the longevity for these games; I'm also in complete agreement that the Bloodborne PvP scene was a catastrophe compared to anything Souls-proper ... not so much in how it plays (again, outside looking in), but in the connection system and heavy leanings on gun and weapon spamming.
I think I sounded a little more down on DkS2 than intended and didn't mean to short-change the community that's still going strong with it. Hell, I'm still playing it. And I think as a community we played the hell out of the hand we were dealt. Looking back, though, I still have some pretty bitter feelings towards the schism that happened and the DkS1 vs. DkS2 wars.
I find myself optimistic for 3 despite trying to keep anticipation at bay. I'm hoping that as a whole we can embrace any changes and variance as "different" rather than "shitty."
Thanks for your thoughts, dude!
How is Bloodborne pvp "broken, slow", and "unplayable?"
Good
I totally agree, but I'd like a way for ppl who complete the game on a low lvl character to be unable to invade newbies before they get to upgrade passed +5 wpns and armor. Essentially a twink guard system because upgraded equipment is just as big a factor as lvls. Like an overall equipment grade by wpn modification tier (none to +4, +5 to +9, +10 to +15).
+CtisGaming That's an interesting thought. So like, there's a "proficiency" factor that might tie level and upgrade tiers? Like you can't upgrade a weapon past a certain point if you're too low of a level or something.
That has great potential for gimping twinks, though it would put a huge snag in things for challenge and speed runners, I'd guess. I'll mull on that.
Thanks, man!
Polygoing
I don't think it'd hurt speedruns. They almost always upgrade their weapon(s) and armor whenever they can.
It's more so a 2nd criteria for matchmaking. I wouldn't want to limit wpn upgrades, I just don't want new pIayers getting invaded by people with Havels and lightning/poison/+15 weapons before they have access to lrg or green shards because the difference can be just as massive as levels.
Hold onto your seats, this is gonna be a long one.
So lets start with good ol' demon's souls, for the longest time (like most people sadly) I had no idea that demon's souls even existed and by the time I had picked up the game for the first time and played it it was practically dead except for the one time I got invaded near the end of my first play-through and had my one and only PvP match. Which was just great btw, magic is OP in that game so I rekt him. But the whole environment and the lore from item descriptions which I absolutely loved from dark souls 1 was totally present in it's older cousin demon's. It was a solid game the first time I played it and I'm sure it will continue to stay that way.
Now onto Dark Souls 1, oh man here we go. So when I was much younger and more naive then I would care to admit I saw the Bartholomew trailer for dark souls on tv and was pulled in because I was looking for an escape from all the call of duty and non-stop shooters rolling out at the time. I even remember the first words I said to the guy in game-stop for when i picked it up "It can't be that hard." Yeah, I actually said that. Here is where everything started, after playing the game over and over to try different things and going online to see what i missed I ran into videos of PvP from multiple different people (I actually ran into peeve before I knew who he was, there is a video of me on his channel under the name of "I didn't come here for you" go check it out and see my scrubiness! *Edit: looks like he set the video to private.* Anyway, I got sucked into the gloriousness of PvP it was all I could think about, all I wanted to do and it was all I did. FOR TWO, MAYBE, THREE YEARS. I don't regret a single second of it though, it's how I met all the people from the souls community and the reason as to why I even started a UA-cam channel and began making videos, hell even you Polly, you helped with that! It was probably some of the best gaming years of my life, or maybe that I'll ever have. (Assuming that DKS3 is bad, which, for the love of god I hope it's not.)
Onto dark souls 2. *Le sigh* I wish that I didn't get so hyped for this game, because when I started playing it I had way to high expectations for it and it didn't live up to a lot of them, I won't get into the debate about what's good or bad about it I'm just going to say this. It was a GOOD game. IT WAS! But it was a bad SOULS game IMO. It's still better than a lot of other games out on the market right now.
Moving onto less controversial topics: Bloodborne. So because of what happened with dark souls 2 I went into bloodborne a skeptic, and good lord am I glad I did. This game absolutely blew my goddamn mind. From the amazing PvE with its epic bosses "Hi I'm Father Gascoigne, welcome to bloodborne.* (which I'm playing right now, LOL.) To the fast paced PvP and relentless game-play, this game is easily in my top 5 best games I've ever played. If Dark Souls 1 were not my first souls game Bloodborne would've been above it. It is an absolute gem of a game, hell when I found out that it was getting dlc I nearly died, since the dlc is amazing as well. I just hope that a lot of this greatness carries over.
Now onto the final topic:DARK SOULS 3. From what I've seen from the network test, it looks like a mix of Dark 1, Demon's and Bloodborne. Which is wonderful, however, I did see some things I didn't like, for one the poise seemed to be non-existent. I know I might be in the minority of the community when I say I actually LIKED poise in Dark Souls 1. It made fat-tanky builds actually viable and not "Ow, you poked me with a dagger and I flinched even though I have like 7 layers of armor on* I just hope that there will be a system in place to make it more like Dark Souls 1's combat because the no-poise from Demon's, Dark 2, (yes I know it had some kind of poise but I didn't like it) and Bloodborne URKED the hell outta me. The only reason it's ok in Bloodborne is because of the fast paced dodging. Which might be in Dark Souls 3 who knows, I can't say for sure.
Alright....holy crap I typed an essay.
But those are my thoughts on all the games thus far. All I can say is I'm going into Dark Souls 3 HOPEFUL, but SKEPTIC just like I did with Bloodborne. Feel free to give your opinions on all of this. Also, merry late Christmas Polly. I was enjoying myself to much to get on and watch UA-cam. LMAO.
P.S If what I hear about you stepping foot into my Yharnam is true....hit me up for some jolly co-op. I would love to hear your reactions to everything first hand! XD My PSN is (AbyssKingChaos) Yes, the abyssking is in reference to the four kings.
+ChaosKingD0mmm Happy New Year, man! Sorry for the tardy reply. And dude, that's a strong endorsement for Bloodborne. I still haven't picked up a PS4, but I think I'm gonna next time I see a sale or another price drop happens; I'll totally hit you up for some jolly cooperation if that happens.
What you said about, "If Dark Souls 1 were not my first souls game Bloodborne would've been above it," makes a ton of sense. I kinda feel that same way about DeS vs. DkS when asked. Which is the better game? Dark Souls. Which game do I like better? Demons. Funny how attached we get to that first taste of Souls, whatever it might be, and use it as the gold standard. So I wonder if people who played BB first are gonna go back and explore other From titles and (gasp!) be disappointed with Dark.
I like how poise worked in DkS, too. I think it added another interesting layer to build creation in having to evaluate the weight/poise/roll speed requirements of putting a character together. It was another aspect of depth and variety that was moderately lost in 2.
Good on ya for taking a break over the holiday. Hope ol' Santa was cool to your and yours, man. Always a pleasure to hear your thoughts ... essay'ish as they might be!
+Polygoing Great! Can't wait for some more co-op, and who knows? Maybe they will notice the other flaws in the game when coming from bloodborne, I'm sure they will notice the change in playing speed being so much slower in the very least. I agree with the layer of depth poise added to the game as well, the more complex the more variety right? Anyway, don't worry about the late reply we all have things going on no matter how small or maybe we just wanna relax for a bit. Speaking of relaxing ol' st. Nick was good to us. Especially the 2 new family members who haven't even been around for a whole year yet! XD Always glad to see one of your videos pop into my sub box. They are a treat that keeps on giving. Till next time Polly!
My main issue with soul memory is that in dark souls 1 if I died with 500k souls I'd be annoyed sure, but I wasn't punished for it. I could always get those souls back. However, in dark souls 2 if I died I lost a limited resource since there are limited spawns. I could technically farm the first undead in dark souls 1 to get back those 500k souls. I can't do that in dark souls 2 due to limited spawning. And to add insult to injury, if I'm building a pvp character I'm going to be down those 500k when I reach my target soul memory level. This results in me getting legit mad instead of slightly annoyed when I die. Which in my opinion, is bad. Since ultimately I play games to have fun.
+Isak Rehn That's fascinating. I'd never once thought of souls as a finite resource. You could manage that with some recent'ish updates to the way the Covenant of Champions respawns enemies and ascetics, but that's a lot of micromanagement and extra effort ... and a wild departure with how prior games worked. it's especially irksome how some weapons and armor are _only_ acquired by farming, and if shit doesn't drop you're out of luck. Unless you burn an ascetic, which has a wide range of supplementary effects in addition to making enemies respawn.
Awesome call.
Totally with ya on getting pissed if you lose a huge chunk of souls. It makes your deaths a legitimate, far-reaching penalty instead of a learning experience. I usually scrap a character and start over if I have too catastrophic a loss in souls since it throws your entire PvP experience out of whack.
Polygoing Thank you! I do try. The worst part is that, overall dark souls 2 really isn't a bad game. It's a very good game that unfortunately suffers from an abundance of small mistakes which in the end, at least to me, makes the game less enjoyable than it's prequels.
I miss things like the really visceral backstabs and ripostes.
Bosses with limbs that could be cut off for weapons.
Levels that connected so incredibly well with short cuts and secrets.
The extreme color variation and not just the same dull filter that seems to plague dark souls 2.
I could go on but I think that's enough. I had my hopes so high for Dark souls 2 that things like that probably hit harder than it should have. And I'm doing it again with Dark souls 3 haha. Hopefully that will blow me out of the waters despite it though.
Okey rant over. Sorry I had to get it out of my system since I've been playing Scholars of the first sin recently and was reminded of my initial disappointment back in March 2014.
wow I forgot all about this channel i used to vist everyday for dks2 and 1 pvp but then it died down
+godly hero I hear ya; I've definitely gotten pretty sporadic in getting vids out, but I'm trying to keep things going. Here's to hoping the release of DkS3 gives things a shot in the arm.
Listening to this makes me wonder how well a PvP souls game would do. Rather, how much the PvE, exploration, mobs, and lore matter to someone who's in it for the PvP. I know there are lots of people who Cheat Engine their way into PvP builds, and that's all they do. So I guess my question is how well would a souls PvP game do, that was nothing but fighting other players. As in, you pick your weapons, armor, rings, stats, and spells from a menu. You'd get matched up with someone in a duel arena and go. Would anyone play it?
Merry xmas/holidays Polly~!
+RBlue I was thinking that with CE you're basically picking a build from a menu anyway, but you're right, you would miss out on a lot of the unique situations that can arise from invasions. I think it's clear from Dark Souls 2's development that PvP is not at the forefront of FromSoftware's GDD. Thinking about it now, you probably wouldn't be able to do a lot of the goofy stuff in a sterile environment either. I.E, Strong Magic Shield + Butterfly Shield bashes.
I would still love to see them try a PvP focused game.
+Goo King Many merries back at ya, man! That's an intriguing proposition with the Souls fighter.
A lot of solo sports games - like Golf and Boxing - have character builder components that I think would work really well in a Souls fighter; you win matches, level up and jump to the next tier of opponents and the like. Maybe winning and advancing your toon is how you unlock new weapons and upgrades and the like, too.
And before each fight, you can select your load-out and spells and what not ... just like before an arena match. They'd probably have to scale back the number of available weapons, but they did that with Bloodborne and (from the outside) seem to have done a solid job of making each weapon important and unique instead of having 12 of everything with tiny variations.
You and Blue are right about missing out on the invasions; maybe instead of a static arena, you and your opponent are dropped into a little mini-level that contains minions and a bit of a layout, and the invader could bust in and kill either of you ... essentially making it a 1v1v1.
I'ma mull on that. Good call, dude.
+Polygoing I'd be into it. I know a couple of the big souls streamers were playing Blade Symphony at one point, maybe something like that would work better.
Being honest, they do have a PvP focused series and that's Armored Core. I'd be fine with seeing a new game from that series as well.
Shame on you for not playing Bloodborne? Dude that's something good, be proud!
+Der Tobio We should come up with a name for the no-Bloodborne crowd. The Bonedeath? Is Bonedeath the opposite of Bloodborne?
I just want to be able to riposte and backstab with a weapon in my left hand.
+AABatteries321 Oh my heavens, YES! It bothers me something fierce that if you two-hand your off hand weapon you can parry with it like normal but not riposte!
Depending on what they do with dual wielding, it'd be slick to pull off criticals with both weapons - either individually or together - as well.
+Polygoing True. I'm left handed so it'd be awesome to see it happen. Hopefully dual-wield ripostes won't factor the counter damage from both weapons if they do it like that lmao.
soooo poly..... when will we see some bloodborne play from you? come on man!!! you are definitely missing out. anyway merry Christmas buddy.
+Fernando PEREZ AGUAYO Merry Christmas back at ya, man! I still haven't taken the plunge, but everywhere I turn people are telling me it's a must-play. I have a nagging suspicion I'll be there sometime between now and DkS3 launching ... but we'll see. Thanks a ton!
The first build you faced was a rip off from Gafwen´s Magic Hobo :3
+Lion Reichelt I had never seen the Magic Hobo vid before so went and checked it out; thanks for the tip!
You owe it to yourself to play Bloodborne. It's become my favorite of the bunch.
+DarkBlood Souls Thanks, man. There's a good chance I'll get there between now and DkS3's launch, so we'll see ...
I hate level base matchmaking.
+Shingami King I hate pudding. Cool, though - to each their own, man.