So my take on this is actually that this is a problem caused entirely by From, not co-opers or PvPers, and the root of it comes down to Scholar of the First Sin adding extra slots for phantoms, and then DS3 subsequently making it more difficult to invade solo players. The problem with the first thing is that generally speaking, at any point except the very start of a Souls game's lifespan, a given world is far more likely to have max friendly phantoms than max hostile. Add to the mix that invaders are hostile to each other by default, and this creates an arms race, where PvPers are looking for builds that can deal with being overwhelmed, and this normally comes in the form of builds that one-shot hosts. The second thing adds to this scenario because now PvPers go in KNOWING they're going to be overwhelmed, and thus start leaning towards hyper-optimization of their builds even more, the so-called 'gank spank' builds, especially considering the prevalence of ganksquads in DS3. This creates a nightmare for non-ganking hosts, especially those who, perhaps not able or willing to get through the game solo, summon all of their friends and just want to go through PvE with them all, utterly unprepared for PvP and not wanting to do it anyway, because they're now the most likely invasion targets, not even by choice of the PvPers. So at this point, you have PvPers unhappy because they have to go in knowing they're most likely going to be utterly overwhelmed unless they go with whatever the OP thing is at the time, and you have co-op players unhappy because they're getting invaded by PvPers optimized to murder gank squads. It may seem counterintuitive, but the ability to invade solo or group players randomly, without bias, was essential for PvP balance, because it stopped this arms race from happening. Yes, twinking was a problem, but honestly, by the time DS3 came around, some very good systems had been added in to mitigate it so that it wasn't near the level of DS1, and from there refinements can continue to come. What's important is that invaders should be able to invade without knowing about their circumstances ahead of time, so that the gank squads can be written off as outliers instead of the norm, and not something worth preparing specifically for with their builds. Ultimately I feel that From has a problem of commitment. They've seen that co-op, especially with friends is far more popular a style of play than intended in DS1, and that invasion frustrates many people after that style, but they refuse to either refine the original invasion system or utterly abandon it, taking half-measures in either direction that leave nobody satisfied.
There may now be an arms race, but I don’t think that’s actually the real issue. The big issue is simply that the game isn’t built with either co-op or PvP as a core game element. You can say that invasions are a vital part of the game, but think about it. Everyone who supports unwanted invasions says that it’s necessary to balance how co-op makes the core PvE non-boss content too easy. Co-op isn’t designed into the PvE experience. Conversely, I never have to invade anyone to progress the game, nor does it give me anything that particularly helps in progression. And that leads to invaders being dominated by people who have stopped being interested in progressing their game. People who have already beaten the game. People who repeat play the game. And when solo invasions happen even when the host only intends to get to Ornstein and Smough with humanity so they can summon Sun-bro so they can just make it through the fight and progress their first play through, they get wrecked because they are having trouble just making it to the fog gate. So of course they develop a bad taste for PvP. FromSoft theoretically put invaders at a disadvantage by reducing flasks, etc., but that was never the case, even without the problems with end game weapons being brought into it. There’s simply an inherent PvP skill gap between the standard invader vs. the unsuspecting host. In this video, Scott even says he thinks one invader vs. 3 phantoms is balanced. He expects that invaders are generally vastly better than the people they play against. In the previous video about how no one cares about the meta, he said he was having so much fun invading at high level specifically because the hosts “had no idea what they were doing”. That’s the meta that invaders have come to expect. PvP is fun for you when you are whaling on guys who don’t know what they are doing. Rather than figure out how to actually address those fundamental issues, From has simply removed unwanted PvP from the solo PvE experience, which was always the core of the game.
Make PvP an exclusively NG+ thing. However, some equipment and all covenant rewards (I know ER doesn't have them, but some incentive for PvP is good imo) can only be obtained with PvP enabled, and some bosses are locked behind No Summoning (spirit or phantom) mode. Challenge runs were fun. DS2 had the right idea with Covenant of Champions and those weapon invisibility rings. Also, still has the best NG+ system by far. I was frankly really disappointed with ER's barebones ng+ system. It's a game meant to be played for a long ass period, but does not actually reward sticking to one character like DS2 does, nor does it encourage making new characters like DS1 does. It's a jack of all trades, master of *FEW* game. Hopefully DLC fixes some of my gripes.
@@hands-ongaming7180 Not really. It's not an uncommon tactic for hosts to just sit near a campfire and wait indefinitely until the invader gets bored and either leaves or rushes. Generally speaking, in my experience, the more friendly summons in a world, the less likely I am to be able to use the mobs and environment at all because they just sit at the bonfire.
The PvP being a weird laggy janky mess is what makes me somewhat sympathize with people hating getting invaded. But this is also such a unique aspect to the Souls series that I wish From focused on improving the netcode and jankiness instead of sidelining the whole mechanic and setting up odd hoops to go through.
Ikr? I know from myself that i created some distance then the attack still connects, complete bs yall dont know how many times a died on a duel by this
When I do taunters tongue to get 2v2's and I get a dude with latency from China who's also using bhs, I might as well jump off a ledge. I've already lost the moment he came into my world cuz latency gives him i-frames from the future.
If the downscaling effectively lowered their stats (for scaling of gear/defenses) rather than decreasing health and attack rating that would lower flat defenses and stop 99 arcane instableeds.
@A cat on his hind legs. Too much menu You can just have a script that loops through your stats and lowers the highest one until you're at the top end of the host's summon range, and that stat sheet becomes a filter for incoming/outgoing damage and effects. On your end, you wouldn't lose access to your gear loadout but your online interactions would go through that downscaled mask. You do the same for weapon upgrade level, end of problem. This would be especially easy for Elden Ring because all your stat related scalings and weapon AR at various upgrade levels are stored in lookup tables. The only hard part of the implementation would be adding the slot for your stat mask itself and having the netcode look for it.
I'd be a little lenient and add a clause to this to allow a downscaled phantom to use weapons/spells they don't meet the requirements for because of lowered stats. If done correctly (big "if") things like damage output and status effect buildup would be significantly lower, but the phantom co-oping with a friend still gets to show off cool stuff from later in the game.
They really managed to do a “What if we took Twinking, and pushed it somewhere else!?” by effectively making the poorly downscaled phantoms have the same problems as the twinks of old.
and all it does is escalate this twink arms-race where now invaders HAVE to be twinked if they expect to stand a chance against phantoms, and all it does is fuck over regular hosts who use co-op the way it was originally designed and have normal phantoms rather than "let me lvl 500 friend beat the game for me". It's sad that Fromsoft thinks this babysitting of hosts really helps anybody. Or maybe they don't and they're just so extremely incompetent and disinterested in the balance side of things that they don't even understand why letting phantoms have 99 stats in early areas of the game is totally busted.
@@CosmicAeon its not even the dmg thats the main problem its the stacked defence and flat defence if you are max lvl + bullgoat everything hits you like a wet noodle in ng the only stuff that actually deals any dmg to you is mountaintops and later areas
To rebut your points about twinking, I was trying to make a character at a lower level to invade (without twinking), just getting some of the better stuff you can get at that point in the game. I was using the yellow goop and tongue just to see what invaders were like while I was making the character and I will say I got some nasty twinks. Of the most memorable was a guy in full bullgoat with the weightless tear in his flask while using the rot rapier and another rapier infused with poison and BHS. At this point in the game I hadn't come across anyway to heal rot and had very minimal poison healing, not to mention he could easily poise trade with any attack I threw at him, AND if I did manage to endanger him past his 7 +12 estus, he could just BHS waiting for me to rot away. Also, bleed builds absolutely destroy anyone at low levels due to lack of resistances and armor.
Yeah, I've co-op'd with some casual friends and I can remember getting invaded buy a guy running dual bandit curved sword with fucking sepuku and in like a single L1 combo he could essentially proc bleed and also was rocking a BHS dagger, pretty sure it was the misericorde but don't remember. He was essentially untouchable and when we did manage to hit him it didn't matter cause of the amount of vigor he had. we were low 30s and he had over 1200hp. I wasn't some squishy build either I had like 30 Vig and just remember being blown away that an invader had more health than I did when I put nearly all of my points into it on top of being completely out damaging us and having more flasks that healed most of his HP. Shit was extremely painful to deal with. I've never really had issues with invaders in the game and that was only one of a few that I can remember being a true pain but it feels like I run into far more "meta" builds that can essentially 1-2 shot you despite having 60Vig. Like we aren't walking around waiting to gank people, just going through having fun and helping a friend who isn't the greatest and the soul series but still enjoys it no matter how many times they die. Really feels like both sides have a toxic few that just inflate issues for both sides.
^ this. I made a twink build just to see how effective it was. I had a friend drop me a ROB and a silver tear mask. I lvl'd my character to 30 enough points to wield ROB and the rest in vigor, lvl'd my weap to plus 2. With two talisman slots (they were crappy talismans anyways so that didn't matter much). Out of around 40-45 invasion I lost only twice, not bragging or anything. What I did could hardly be counted as skillful. I think I only ran into a couple of hosts with over leveled phantoms, the rest were just new players trying to play the game. Just trying to prove a point. Oh I was also invading at Stormveil. Twinking is still alive in this game and definitely possible.
I got so many invaders running almost the exact same thing on my Tongue run early on. Twinking isn't dead, not by a long shot. It's just been moved to status proc builds.
yeah, but this happened because you used the taunter's tongue though. In a more normal situation you will have 2 phantoms around RL 150-200 chaffeuring you around against 1-2 reds who are way underleveled and 1 of them will be overencumbered after a few seconds.
I firmly believe this divide is the biggest issue in the souls community. And I know it's not ever going away, but damn does it feel worse than ever in Elden Ring
As for being annoyed with invaders, I kind of understand it because it's so frequent. Invaders don't have anyone to invade other than cooperaters and cooperaters usually put there sign in front of the fog gate. As a result the only people who get invaded are usually doing password matchmaking or something
And many of those password matchmakers are also still putting signs only at boss gates just to avoid the invaders, byt that's obviously not counting the people who in other games would have given a try to co-op(or even the game itself, like was my case in Bloodborne 5 years ago) if not for invasions being forced upon the players during co-op, often without even getting any semblance of a reward for actually engaging with the invader.
This is exactly the issue. Invasions basically don't happen at all unless it's password friends helping each other through the level, which are almost all over leveled. Between that and the great rune host advantage, all low level invasions after Stormveil are basically a shit show and a waste of time. You never get good 1v1's anymore, since anyone good going through the level doesn't bother to summon except maybe for some bosses. I feel like this game just ruined invasions because it's almost like a separate gank/Twink PvP mode now and not an organic part of a users playthrough.
I actually thought that this video was going to reference InfernoPlus' video called "How Elden Ring's Multiplayer System Backfired" where he talks about this. The way that matchmaking works in Elden Ring definitely contributes towards invaders and co-opers hating each other so much, and with some tweaks could be made less shit.
yeah exactly this. he didn't really talk much about how the lack of solo invasions has affected the whole MP experience but IMO that is clearly the most toxic thing about the entire system. I know people blame technical issues with torrent and the open field areas for this, but there's no reason the classic dungeon areas like the academy and castle morne couldn't support solo invaders. it's just bad design IMO.
@@chastermief839 I'm wondering tho how would the solo invasion work since we have no hollow/humanity state? Wouldn't player be invaded every 3 minute with no chance of stopping invasion since there no hollow state? Perhaps they could make it like bb or DS2 invasion cancelling tho...
See, here's the thing, you actually can enable solo invasions. Get the taunter's tongue. Everyone always says that "if you don't want to get invaded, stay hollow/don't ember." Yet, when they make that the default state, the PvP community complains about it. To me, this looks like the fun of PvP invasions depends on invading people who actually don't want to be invaded, and aren't prepared for it.
One thing you missed about low level invasions.. all you need is a rot or poison weapon and the low levels have absolutely no counter - you cant get many boluses early. The rot or poison will eat through 5+ potions. Its extremely unfair and very common low level.
Yeah Rot is definitely a issue at low level invasions, however poison is actually not that big of a deal, you can literally get the recipe to craft the boluses with the merchant behind the area where you start the game, is more a exploration issue at that point from the host
In defence of the PVE co-op players, I finally got my brother to play Elden Ring and we started new characters together. Almost immediately we were invaded by someone with end game gear. They had maxed out flasks, excellent physik flasks, and if I had to guess they were probably rocking some pretty sweet talismans. It's hard to overstate how much of an advantage having weapons with good ashes of war is in PvP. I'm ok at PvP and managed to hold them off but 15 minutes later we got another just like it who killed us while we were fighting enemies, 15 mins later it happened again. After 3 or 4 times he'd just had enough and was like fuck this game.
On-point Meanwhile Bloodborne had a diegetic opt-out of invasions and thanks to that i was able to learn how to play these games with my friends, fast forward 5 years and i'm yet to get tired of soulslikes, when i wouldn't even have thought about trying them if not for that.
Theyre not that bad... you gotta take a different mindset. If they were spawning in an extra hard a.i. enemy randomnly when you summon would that be such a big deal? Worst case you die and go back to one of the ample graces in each area. If he played solo how many times would he be going back to the grace? He would die all the time. Invaders are the wild card to make pvp more interesting because without it you would probably rip through every level very quickly
@@asdfghjkllkjhgfdsa8725 A random extra hard AI with an unlimited inventory of weapons and up to 7 full heals would be a terrible design choice, which is why they don't have exactly that in the game anywhere.
No, man, this isn't just a case of "I don't like PvP, I don't want invasions because they're annoying". This is what most content creators who share this kind of videos don't understand. The problem is how the multiplayer experience in ER works. There is NO incentive for random people to coop. There is no incentive in the overworld, where 90% of the mobs are easy enough for any single host, and where being without the horse makes exploration slow and painful. There is no incentive in the dungeons, which are also really easy, and the fact that you need to use a consumable to even see summon signs makes cooping unintuitive. So what happens? Randoms only summon at the fog gate, and the only ones constantly being invaded are friends who are just trying to have a good time. And when I say constantly, I mean *constantly*. I did my NG+ fully in coop with a friend, with the intention of goofing around, and it was a constant stream of sweaty tryhards dead set on having no fun in life. We had to stop making wacky builds and keep meta stuff at hand so that we didn't have to rush the areas. The problem here is the way ER's multiplayer works: it turned every single area of the game into Ds3 Gank City where no fun is allowed and it's a constant arms race between shell shocked players.
@@dylanisonfireOG no such thing as “chill” in a souls game though? Nothing chill about any of these games. You want to chill play Minecraft. Hard truth
You have to be chill if you want to do well in Souls games--reading movement, dodging correctly with patience, timing and counting your strikes, you have to be "chill." Anyways, you should know what I was implying with that statement so get out of here.
@@ottogofast3882 hard truth you could go to any of the three arenas but you'd rather gank co-opers and bitch so hard about it you try to change the definition of what ganking means. You could fight 1v1 with someone who isn't rushing through a level just to avoid you. You'd have a willing opponent. But you want your katana comp clips don't you? So bad you'd hack the game and risk getting banned.
The invaders share more blame. Its always been the most toxic and sweaty part of the community. They choose to invade. From should just take out invasions at this point. Even as an invader turned duelist I can't blame the PVErs.
Watching my wife and her friend try to co-op this game has given me an interesting perspective on this, and I think I see a very obvious solution. Invasions at super low levels are a complete disaster. Without any exception, over the course of 4 weekends every invader has been a hard-core twink, and the invasions do not let up for a second. They're just trying to roam around the first two sections together, they are not even slightly equipped to deal with stuff like scarlet rot. The cure isn't even available for several more sections and they are trying to experience the game not look up guides to counter twinkers. People using invisible glintstone glitch, people using helmet glitch when they get nicked even once, people using every crossbow in the game with poison and rot and bleed and so on. If I had the game for PC I would be on anti-twink duty, with a level 300 moonveil build bored out of my mind clearing twinks to give them 10 minutes to explore. As it stands I'm 90% sure they are just going to quit or wait for a mod that let them play together without any nonsense should such a thing become available. I guess the game isn't for them, kind of a shame really as they are enjoying everything but the invasions. It seems to me that the people who want help with a level and the people who want to invade are not exactly compatible. At best one person wants that fight. No joke, it's a legit tactic for my wife and her friend to just sit down. Sometimes the invaders execute them, sometimes they just leave because they DO want a fight, just one heavily tilted in their favor. No one is being serviced here except gankers, who are just twinks that have decided to hunt other twinks instead of noobs. They also want a fight, but also only one that is heavily tilted in their favor. It's the exact same thing, and any invader running an area "below their level" has zero right to complain. I agree with Scott, the ideal invasion has everyone around the same level of equipment not both sides having some stupid arms race to twink the hardest. The solution is obvious, have a toggle in the main menu to allow or disallow invasions. People who just want to chill their way through the game can, and those who want conflict can have it without using a consumable and a tongue and maybe still not getting invaded at all. That doesn't even feel like an invasion. I took multiple steps to invite you into my world. You're less an invader and more of a crappy guest. I miss solo invasions myself, I would rarely actually fight people but shadowing them and harassing them through a level was a ton of fun. Now hosts have two friends and a blue, I can hardly even do my friendly invader memes because one person getting bloodthirsty makes them act like sharks. I understand there are concerns about size of playerbase if you allow people to just turn off PvP, but I think it will increase since it would involve bringing back solo invasions. You can also have the toggle set to "on" by default as many people wont think to turn it off or it will hit their ego to think they backed away from a challenge. It can permanently switch to "on" once they reach NG+ further expanding the playerbase while giving newer players considerable time to learn the game. Solo players are unironically the people who need to be invaded, we don't need help with the level. Why are people who do the target? It's illogical bordering on bad game design. Since I've written this wall of text, the estus issue is also obvious. Limit everyone to the host estus cap at max, and allow players to allocate estus outside of a bonfire or if you have to be limiting make them select estus allocation before spawning. If that doesn't work for you then have estus amount be part of the matchmaking. If you have 14 estus charges you can only invade people with 12+ and so on. At the very least the people with the twink builds would need to go through the game again with no healing which would cut the number down by a significant amount and some folks wont rebuild out of lazyness. This would give noobs a pretty large reprieve
Hey maybe this was a while ago but I think recently they have updated the invasion down time so that you can’t get invaded repeatedly without using the taunter’s tongue. I believe it’s about 5 minutes at least. I don’t understand Stormveil twink invasions either, these people probably just want to wail on newbies for easy kills. Grow a pair of balls and invade elsewhere.
Honestly I feel like most of these problems can no lo ger be fixed. The whole game is open from the start, so anyone looking to twink limgrave and run anywhere to grab everything they need, and From can't stop them. And From intended this from the beginning, you play coop, you opt into invasion. The best solution for your wife I think, is to just play by herself until a certain point where twinkling isn't so bad any more. Like Liurnia, at least past Stormveil Castle. By then not only is she in an area with 'fair' PVP, she should also be hopefully good enough to hold her own if they do get invaded in coop. But I know some people don't play games much and, well, suck, and don't have time to 'git gud' so if it happens your wife gives up, that's how it is
@@johnapple6646 so let me get this straight. Some dude just told you that his wife has trouble with ER coop, since she gets stomped by twinkers at low levels. Your fix for that issue would be: she should play alone or stop playing at all? I hope I'm just misreading what you're saying, because that sounds super silly.
@@boneman-calciumenjoyer8290 Unfortunately he's not wrong. The game isn't going to change for her. There is a chance she decides to take that path, it just wont be the experience she wanted or would have enjoyed most. I hope she continues, it's her first souls game with exception of beating the asylum daemon in DS1 and at times she seems to be having a lot of fun.
@@boneman-calciumenjoyer8290 well yeah dude. If you have no way to fix an issue, try to change the way you interact with it. Because I'm positive from soft will never put in a "opt in/out" of pvp. Limgrave invasions are just not nice for anyone imo. Twinks, afk farmers, total noobs. Best just get past that area quickly. I fought Godrick with my friend and it was fun.
Hoked Damn straight. Sure duels are good buts that’s if I don’t get a chugger or some buff edge lord, or even ganked. Yeah, as a duelist I’ve been summoned to duel only to be surprise ganked and this is happening lots lately.
On the topic of twinking, going with your example of being level 30 at Stormveil Castle, there is no system in place to prevent invaders from also having 4 talisman slots which could also be the max level versions of said talismans vs someone who generally at that area in the game is only going to have 2 talismans at the first level of said talisman. That imo is a bigger issue than someone who has late game farmmable consumables such as better arrows or something.
Technocally its not as much of an issue in this game. Most damage boosting talismans are % based. That paired with weapon level match making restricts your damage output massively. The bigger issue is invaders in stormvale bringing 99x consumables, bombs, max flasks and max flask upgrades is where things get shameful
@@Helleuphoria Max flasks I agree with. Bombs can easily be dodged and also scale of off stats as well. So if your low level it's not going to make a difference. However having 2 more Talisman slots than someone will make a difference. Especially like the Warrior Jar shard you get at Crumbling Farum Azula. On top of how strong ash of war damage is already. I get it's percentage base but all that shit adds up. Especially when you factor in the talismans like the Millicent prosthetic and the winged sword insignia plus a the bleed talisman and mask. You will be annihilating low level players who probably have a base version of the health talisman and the green turtle talisman.
I only had 2 interactions with invaders so far, both as a phantom and both were really funny. One was in Elphael, dude started throwing fire at us from behind an I got so confused that I died. Had a good laugh at that. The other was at Farum, once again, invader was on a higher ledge throwing magic at us, this time we spot him first though, so I whip out the greatbow and start countersniping. I manage to hit him a couple times and we engage in ranged battle so much so that I think he forgot there were 2 other guys, who then proceeded to sneak up and push him off the ledge. Both encounters were comedy gold.
"Twinking got harder in this game" Me thinking about all the dual Naginata seppuku/BHS with 7 estus + 12 and 10 starlight shards I started to meet at lvl 30 during my taunter tongue playthrough Oh and don't forget the rot rapier
for me the stuff that sucks to get invaded by early is: OP ashes and spells i don't have access to yet, the pulley crossbow, and the fact that as a person who mostly co-ops fighting another human is WILDLY different and a skillset I don't have.
My friends, and I have put thousands of hours into from soft games together. We mostly PVE, but as seasoned players (just 4 of us) we know invasions are coming, and welcome them. If we are tryin to accomplish something, we can be as toxic as your typical ROB user, but 98% of the time, invaders are an absolute fucking treat. We don our stupidest helmets, and begin what ever gesture that makes us laugh as a greeting(fire spurn me) is always a classic, and depending on the aggression of the invader will 1v1, and laugh our asses off at either our demise, or victory. The looming threat of invasion by an elite player has always been one of the best parts of the souls experience for us, and we have a lotta love for you guys dedicated to it. 🤙🏼🖤
I love fighting players with mindsets like that, willing to just have fun, 1v1, and the likes. It's not expected, but it's super fun, especially silly helmets and emotes since I usually great with a Fire Spurn me and wear Albinauric mask.
Im a solo player that also really enjoys the occasional invader on my normal playthroughs, so the Eldenring situation is really shitty for me. Only way to get invasions as a solo is with taunters tongue and then there is no cooldown so i cant progress at all.
@@heibk-2019 Yeah taunter's tongue just opens the floodgates. Fun if you're trying to fight club, useless if you're trying to just let your door open a crack for em.
Hey man, not an ideal solution, and personally I would change it, but you can actually deactivate the taunters tongue. So you could activate it, wait to get invaded and then deactivate it so if you kill invader you won’t get invaded again until you activate the tongue again.
I feel like Invading should be changed from having an co op buddy to having an active great rune, both gameplay and lore wise. First of, you will be invading a lot fewer ganks, the co opers can play with their friends without getting invaders, and you would get a lot wider invasion pool. However, you would not be able to invade before stormveil. Well, lets just note down the misstakes of Elden Ring for future games. Lets hope for a better Elden Ring 2.
"thr co-opers can play with their friends without getting invaded" i wish that was the case of so much, but it's never gonna happen because fromsoftware insists thinking invasions are a good balance for pve co-op when all they do is deter most players from summoning at anything but a boss gate, even the rewards for killing an invader are pitiful to say the least and effectively the only reason not to kill yourself/altf4 as soon as an invader comes in in co-op if you are taking your time playing with your friend, is actually feeling like you might give pvp a chance due to the uneven playing field and not wanting to bother with loading screens. If either it was like you said (so basically like ds3 but with a small downside if you opt out of invasions) or the way Bloodborne did it with a "find this thing in the map and kill it before an invader comes in and you effectively opted out, now you have all the time you need to absorb the world'd atmosphere and combat step-by-step with your friend" there would be INFINITELY less vitriol in the community than it is now. But that won't happen. So at least make it worth it to fight the invaders... Even a single smithing stone piece equivalent to the weapon upgrade range bracket the invader and you are in would already be incentive enough to try and win, if rune arcs aren't possible, or maybe create an invasions currency and equivalent store, where maybe you're selling a rune arc for every two invaders killed as well as maybe cracked pots, arteria leaves, special weapons, armor dyes etc, if that was the case man, you'd see people jump into pvp right off the bat(although i'm aware that would also increase the amount of gankers, but there's really no deleting gankers from the game honestly)
Personally, I think that all this accomplishes is making me never use a rune arc outside of a boss fight. I don’t enjoy souls PvP, it’s always just felt like a shitty 3D fighting game to me, and so I just play the game with whatever PvE build I want and don’t bother with speccing for PvP. An invader with a PvP set up has a massive advantage over a single PvE player just using a PvE build. So if I’m going to lose a PvP fight if I pop a rune arc, why bother popping that rune arc outside of a boss fight (where I’m safe from invaders)? The answer is there’s no reason. This is exactly how I played DS3, I never used an ember outside of a boss fight unless I was trying to fight an NPC invader. And immediately after a boss fight when they gave me an ember, I went to Firelink shrine, spent my souls, and then jumped off the map so I wouldn’t have to deal with any invaders. To be clear, I don’t hate invaders and I want y’all to have a good time. I just don’t think the ember system is a good solution because all it does in reality is encourage those who don’t enjoy PvP to avoid the ember/rune arc mechanic at all costs because the pretty good buff isn’t worth the hassle
I will say when I first booted up the game my friend and I wanted to literally just run around Limgrave and explore together. We were both default starting characters. We ended up quitting for the evening being frustrated because we didn't get to explore anywhere due to invasions. We ended up just deciding to play solo and not bother playing together. It really didn't matter if the people invading us weren't technically twinking. It really didn't matter that we technically were similar levels and had similar upgrades on our weapons. They still had gear and abilities we didn't have or understand and they just spam killed us every time we tried to coop. Even if on paper we had the "advantage" in practice we were noobs and they weren't so we got curb stomped with almost no counterplay. It turned into a case where the two of us were too unskilled to play together since cooping meant a skilled player would come and kill us. Imo that's not a healthy state for new players. Can't do anything but be hunted down and die if make the mistake of trying to play with a friend.
It's funny how this ends up being flipped on invaders too. Invaders tend to twink so much in this game because there's so much broken shit to deal with from hosts and phantoms who actually know what they're doing, and in turn those invaders end up using way stronger things and being way more skilled than they need to be for the newer players they run into. Combine that with invasions ONLY being guaranteed for co-opers, and pretty immediately after one person's summoned and it just becomes unfun for everyone. It almost feels like this game was truly designed for invaders and co-opers to hate each other.
I went ahead and made a pretty heavily twinked character to help people kill Margit & Godrick. Eventually I got tired of people not skipping Godrick's cutscene and figured I'd give invading a shot. The difference between my character and some rando going through Stormveil for the first time is huge. I've got 4 talismans, I've got better armor, I've got a mixture of later-game weapons & weapon ashes that, even if they're only +2 or whatever, just gives me way more versatility and power than what a low level player with like 4 different weapons to his name will have. Because of this, I kind of modulate how much of my build I utilize based on how well the coopers are doing. If they're right after a grace, not fighting any enemies, there're 3 of them, etc., I'll use all my buffs and skills and whatnot and go try to win a 3v1. If there're a couple of them and they're struggling against the normal mobs, I won't use buffs, or just melee, or sometimes not even engage at all. There're times when I'll just stand out of reach and use the cheer emote. There's honestly something kinda funny about seeing someone notice you, notice you're not moving, wave at you, and then go back to what they're doing. Hell, one time, we got invaded by a second red named Hitler, and I just completely ignored the host and killed the other red, because let's be honest, if you get the chance, you gotta kill Hitler. Idk where I'm going with this exactly, other than that I think it's good to be a little conscientious as an invader. Being the boss fight is fun and dunking on people in 3v1s is great, but just shredding people who're already struggling to get through the game normally is kind of a dick move.
I also invade for the pvp side of it. Thrice I invaded in Altus only to find they're fighting an overworld boss. First time was the Sentinel duo and they're already at it. I jumped on the side wall thingy and cheered on for little bit and severed. Second time was Fallingstar Beast. Phantom saw me and immediately went to attack me hehe. Understandable. After trying to just dodge, I gave in and stopped. Wanted to cheer for them hehe. He gave a bow, probably seeing I didn't attack, and went back to help. Third time they were trying to cheese the Sentinel duo. By being high up and phantom using jar cannon, one-eye shield and Erdtree greatbow. I had fun just wasting their time. Like, when I get to the ledge that shows me, I used the casual greeting. Whenever I fall down or they throw me off, I always used the casual greeting when I showed up again hehe. I was in prankster mood that time, so I didn't really attack. Just run around and dodging. Died when I ran out of flasks.
I think bringing back solo invasions would open up the pool and reduce the friction between password co-opers (the 3v1s with over leveled phantoms) and invaders. Same argument inferno plus made. I don't think they'd mind dealing with one invader every hour or so if the pool was much bigger to invade unlike the constant invasions now.
Solo invasions are already in the game through opt in with the Taunter’s tongue. Unfortunately, it opens you up to being invaded by multiple people at once but I found it fun to do a run with the tongue active the entire time. Most people aren’t in that boat though so it’s hard to incentivize. The old system of needing humanity or embers active was never fun as it was a limited resource power up that could be wasted by pure bad luck of getting an invasion right before the boss you planned on using it against so I’m glad invasion eligibility isn’t tied to rune arcs for Elden ring
The other side of things is that invaders spend so much time building RL[X] characters to be able to deal with overleveled phantoms more than to deal with the hosts. My RL30 +8 (Yes, I grabbed Rogier's rapier by accident. I probably should raise my RL as a result, but I don't want to) character, I feel, has to complete basically the entire game to unlock specific counterplay options that are more or less mandatory for dealing with certain things (Jar Cannon/Hand Ballista and the Lightning/Explosive greatbolt merchants, Icy Spear for fingerprint, RKR, etc). It makes this situation where invaders need to stack the deck as much as they can just to be able to have a prayer of getting around phantoms that are 200+ levels above them, which leads to them being massively overoptimized for dealing with the hosts in most situations, ESPECIALLY organic invasions. So the hosts think that the invaders are trying to just get cheesy one shots, or ruin fun with cheese, but in reality the invaders are just trying to give themselves a chance to deal with the people abusing password summons. I'unno, ER is my first souls title so on my PvE playthrough I saw a bit of the pure PvEr side, and not understanding where the angle on the invaders exactly was, but after maybe 5-10 invasions I already understood exactly why they were built the way they were, and I moved over to siding with the invaders' perspective. Honestly, I don't think this would be a problem if gank squads weren't so favoured. Without a near insurmountable challenge to prepare for, pressure for invaders to hyperoptimize their builds decreases, and the mentality of "Well, I'm just going to be walking into bullshit, so I might as well play as though everything is a bullshit gank" declines. God knows I used to be the kind of invader to always bow before trying to take out the hosts' setups, but enough fake 1v1s, dragon breath corners, Nihil through floors, etc garbage more or less convinced me never to trust or treat a host honorably, 'cause if they do it, they can get saved, but if I do it and they're fakin, it's basically curtains. So yeah, I think that gankers are the root of the community divide problem. And they probably think they're being heroes for it, too is the sad part
@oohanalligator Part of what I've been doing a bit lately is solo taunter's tonguing and just doing silly shit like sitting in rainbow stone rings or writing out "U R CUTE" in them. I let things fight club if they go for it, and support with warming stones, and I pretty much just mirror whatever aggression is going on from the invaders' side. It's a lot more enjoyable that way, invader builds are often much more interesting than ganker builds, and since I'm using an invader build myself and not trying to AoW cheese people I'm hoping to give some enjoyable (albeit not organic) invasions, win or lose. Also, 2H heavy Grave Scythe is legit.
honestly though, even the aspects of overleveled phantoms that do get downscaled, don't get hit hard enough. oveleveled phantoms still have twice your health than you and deal twice your damage as a low level invader. i think from should just go nuts and downscale the shit out of overleveled phantoms. they jus make both pvp and pve a cakewalk for the host
You think it'll work if they have adjusted downscaling based on the difference between the levels of the phantom and host? The higher the difference, the more downscale they get since the players power tends to scale exponentially.
yeah I always find it hilarious how they spent 2 patches balancing Radahn as if they care about balance, but people are allowed lvl 500 phantoms to insta-kill him if they like. Don't kid yourself Fromsoft, you quite clearly don't give a shit about PvE balance (or PvP naturally)
I think it downscales everything separately; the game looks at the hp bar and says "hmm that's too high, reduce that some", then does the same for attack. So you essentially get twice the levels of value (say host is level 30 you get the max hp possible for a lv 30 and max attack possible for a lv 30) not the even balance players should have
@@mlhx9181 Ok so the game already has a system to decide the appropriate level range of a Red invader for the host. Just figure out how to set a friendly phantom so that he's at the middle of that Red invader level range. You'd have to figure out how to bring down the HP bar and stat totals but it seems like just applying the right % modifier to his stats would do it.
The most fun you can have in Elden Ring pvp is as an invader using a versatile or non-meta build and finding 3 players all the same level range actually going through the area. Instead, the multiplayer mechanics push both sides to use the strongest or most viable builds for lower skilled players.
@@davidspearim5552 invaders are pushing people to use the meta because some people just want to enjoy playing the game at normal pace look and explore with their friends instead of rushing and skipping things because they know that they can get invaded any moment now and they'd lose all the progress they made since last grace.
@@brewtron No I put down a pvp sign When people summoned me into their world to fight me I expect a proper fight not people using those weapons I understand when people wanna play the game with their friends that's why I put down that red sign in that in that Academy Where people fight a lot but it ruins the fun when they use them I understand if you want to use those for PVE
My partner and I (still on our first playthrough btw, we just haven't had the time to really binge the game that much) don't have any problem with invaders because we treat them as an event that's just a part of the game's DNA. The main problem we have is that the timing in between them feels much more oppressive than previous games, as if the "cooldown" is nonexistent, because having someone wear us down in a fight only to have someone else come in 5 minutes after the invader dies or worse; the SAME guy invading 10 minutes after, makes invasions a nuisance more than anything and it's gotten tiring at this point.
It's because there are not enough spots to invade because of current limitations, so red players wait a long time to get a spot, and those who co-op get invasions non-stop.
I'd say that PvP should be op-in completely so you don't have to deal with invaders if you don't want to but every invader in existence will disagree with that because it would effectively remove like 90% of the game's player base from the invasion pool and all that would be left are people geared for PvP which is absolutely not what an invader wants to fight. So we're stuck at an impasse where casual players who aren't into PvP are forced into it and the end result are a bunch of bitter, spiteful players whose sole objective is to make invaders as miserable as humanly possible for forcing them to do something they don't want to do.
Tbh, that really is the case. The only solution i can think of that won't make anyone angry and that ACTUALLY might be added in the game is lengthening by two to up to four times the invasion cooldown in coop and adding better rewards for killing invaders so people don't just play the passive game/kill themselves/altf4
Yes, thank you. This changes to this game's pvp mechanics lead to feedback loops that fuck over both sides of invasions. There are too many reds and so few co-op players, that co-op players just summon at the boss door. Bring back covenants to cull the red pool. Bonus points if blue invaders come back, as they could soloinvade reds. Literally every player group benefits other than those who are doing fine, like duelists, and the only ones who might get fucked are red streamers.
Invasions should work like duels imo; when you summon for co-op, you can use a separate item to permit invasions, and then you enter the 'pool' of eligible targets for invasion for the game to pick from. So invasions would work the same way for the invader, but would require consent from the invadee. This would fix two problems at once: invasions ruining the fun of those who just want to explore with their friends (which is completely legitimate, this is an rpg first not a MMO), and the issue of invaders being soft-locked in loading screens all the time.
Even if covenants don’t technically exist anymore, they could still add in new invasion items with different mechanics. Not sure if the bloody and recusant fingers having the exact same mechanics is a sign that they do or don’t intend to implement new invasion items with updates/DLC, but I really hope they do. I just want to be a moundmaker again, started having way more fun with invasion with a little minigame I made for myself where I try to befriend hosts that are obviously not building for PvP and just fight club it out with blues and a lot of the time co-opers either watch or just go on clearing the level. Sometimes they send messages thanking me for gifts or helping them through confusing dungeons like the catacombs and tombs, fosters a much more positive experience than everyone just trying to one-shot each other and tilting out their minds.
@@nxvh9062 eh, that wouldn't really do much, as it's basically just doing what it currently does but more. One of the core problems is invasions are near constant whenever you open yourself up. There are too many invaders and not enough people to invade. You're asking to make that divide worse, and it's already going to get worse as pve players get their fill and leave. Allowing blues to invade serial reds again would take away from the pool of reds (blessing pve players), while allowing opt in solo invasions (opted in by being naughty), and even open a way to invade that purposely avoids picking on noobs. Maybe there could then be a consumable that protects you from invaders for a while too, maybe crafted with the caelid faded flowers. Dunno about this though, only just thought of it. I hear someone's working on a mod to block invasions. As it stands, I can only see that making the game worse for anyone not using it, though I can definitely understand the appeal.
As a coop player i use the summon pool and not the single finger, but obviously in cealid i going to mostly get summoned at the radahn gate. Or some other boss fight, still no Voice chat, which seeing how we have power stance and passwords back idk why voice chat got left in DS2. So there is no vc, so what? Basically going through the open world is a bad idea cause now u have no horse and get invaded so only idiots summon me in open world( all of these summons are in sellia btw, which has a gank boss fight but we usually dont even do it. Cause ya'know they're idiots who dont even know/care about the boss fight ) if people wanted to summon me more at the summon pool they would but From made it unfun so they dont.
The problem with invasions and balancing is that there's alot of moving parts. More than any one person can really consider. I could write a novel on balancing issues, and admittedly I am just a normal dude who can't think of every aspect of the game. Who has the advantage in a duel? Well, who optimized thier build? What does that build bring in terms of DPS? What about utility? How do you even quantify utility? Are one or both players menu-swapping and using exploits? Obviously it's easier to win against a player using a single set up, by pulling out a weapon or tool that circumvent thier strategy. As opposed to some one who's experienced in menu-swaps and can bust out entire movesets at a moments notice while also glitching in a full health bar. In a duel, it's kind of easy to keep track of these things. Invasions? Nearly catastrophic. Who has the advantage? In DS3 I argued that against a solo host, an invader has almost every advantage. From choosing when and where to engage, when to retreat, using the PvE enemies as allies. And as more summons get added in, the advantage can either stay in thier favor, or quickly start turning. If the host and phantoms aren't interested in PvE and already cleared the level in anticipation of PvP, invaders have absolutely no advantage. From a gameplay perspective, I don't think the designers planned for or intended this sort of "Emergent Gameplay". Is the host actually capable of fighting the PvE, or are they relying on the help they summoned? Because PvE scales with the number of summons, if they sucked before, they will suck even more if thier help is dragged off to engage in PvP. If the host sucks and is actually interested in exploring, more summons and invaders are only add to thier disadvantage. Are the summons PvP'ers? PvE and PvP are aspects of the game that feel miles apart. What works extremely well for PvE might be absolute crap at PvP. An example might be twin-blades. The jumping attacks are godly at melting PvE bosses. Absolute crap at PvP, you'll never land a full jumping attack against anyone with enough neurons to roll away when they see you jump. And experienced PvP'ers will forego gimmicky PvE set ups like that, for more PvP oriented ones. Are the summons skilled at PvP? Over coming 2 bad players might be more difficult than 1 bad player, but not by a whole lot. It's hard to keep track of. Nerf the Moonviel? It's only good at low levels. At lv. 150+, moonviel is no more broken than a crouch poke from a colossal great sword using Royal Knights Resolve. Or a Cannon of Hiama from Terra Magicka. Like... I hear the line "Invasions are a staple in the Souls Games", and I certainly agree that it's a thing they put in every souls game except Sekiro. But is this a good aspect of the game? Just do to the range of variables that can influence success, you get a range of answers. IMO, and I know this going to catch flack. I think it should go. They should replace it with system where once you defeat the main boss of an area, you can engage PvP, and start a PvP brawl that summons in both allies and adversaries for a good ol' brawl when you actually want to play PvP.
Idk how invaders can complain about shit, I got invaded by a dude using scarlet rot rapier in limgrave at level 15. I hit him 5x more than he hit me, yet he won because I had no way to cure scarlet rot. It's a free win if you use the op stuff.
Would't be that much of a problem if status effects would't fucking apply through I-frames. That probably has somwthing to do with latency but it still feels very stupid to get bled out/poisoned etc. even though you dodged every single attack
Because there is the fair invader that don't use op setups like the guy you met and there is the maidenless player who uses every broken cheap trick of the book to win.
The whole co-op invader problem goes back and forth on a loop. Invaders go kill inexperienced hosts, so host gets strong friends then kills every invader, then invaders gets mad and uses Rivers of Blood or other crutch status effects not expecting a fair fight, then hosts complain. It really doesn't end. I'm not saying every invader runs Rivers or Moonveil with a dead sprint towards you, but its common enough to be seen as a problem from the hosts perspective. All hosts got is over leveled phantoms and aoe stuff to roll catch invaders because they run crutch weapon skills to win the fight. Its definitely difficult to balance everything considering Dark Souls 3 had mostly barely enchanted weapons or bland skills to Elden Ring where almost every weapon can 1-3 shot you with a powerful skill.
something I like to do on my lv 25 invader is, whenever I find a newbie host, I tryhard a bit until I kill all the phantoms and then pretend I ran out of estus, letting the host finish me off. I still have fun fighting, and I don't ruin the newbies day, and I might even give him a memorable fight! It's actually pretty fun to come up with interesting ways to lose, for example I like doing backstep-lunges with my rapiers, and when I want to lose I can "accidentally" backstep off a ledge. Or slowly back away from the hosts and slowly go towards a corner where I let them trap me and beat me down. On my pyromancer build I like accidentally hitting explosive barrels with my flame weapons. I'm hoping I'm giving them fun, memorable encounters that'll get them interested in pvp, and not sour their experience with it.
My main issue with it is the lack of cooldown/non-functioning cooldown between invasions. Played co-op with a friend and we got invaded literally every 4-5 minutes even if the invader was killed in the first minute. Gets kind of infuriating to have to deal with an invader every waking moment of the game when you're just trying to progress. (And I actually like the PvP in this game)
@@junoglrr9119 We weren't using taunters tongue. That's why it's a problem. (My friend who was hosting/I was helpin' out doesn't even have the item yet. They haven't been able to beat Alberich.)
Yeah for our 1st runs my friends and I all did solo runs while talking over discord because we didn't want reds in our 1st runs. On our 1st co op runs we were so discouraged at the amount of late game items we saw justing going through limgrave. But once we got to the academy and beyond things leveled out and honestly been more fun to get our butts whooped or whoop butts. So I say if you wanna invade Storm veil or limgrave just don't be cheap because it's the worst just trying to get started and hit with such unfun pvp fights.
That's the whole point though, the host is super weak at that point, but his coop phantoms are usually even more twinked than the invader can be because the downscaling is so favorable to them. As a result, the invaders have to twink even harder to compete, and the host just ends up being the most worthless participant in the late game ability/spell spam that everyone else around him is doing.
This comment is why I disagree with invasions. It ruins the fun of a group of friends trying to explore a world together, and ignorant PvPers who think the game revolves around them, don't see the issue with that. The duel mechanic exists for a reason, and in my opinion (perhaps with a little bit of expansion to make it more streamlined like invading), duels should be the only form of PvP.
@@nxvh9062 there's a communication wall between invaders and co-operators(mainly as the latter group doesn't really go watch youtube pvp videos which is where the multiplayer mostly gets takked about) And to this day i am yet to dee anyone but infernoplus cross that wall, even if scott made attempts, there's just a lack of awareness on the point of view of the other group that every argument in favor or against invasions just ends up falling on deaf ears. Still, it is undeniable that invasions have never been as much a point of contemption in the series since ds2's introduction of soul memory.(although in that case the debate was more the other way around)
@@nxvh9062 FROM games aren't really great Co-op games to explore a world together IMO, because it keeps disconnecting your friends between every boss/area, and you don't progress through together at the same time. So the only way to actually do it is to replay the same areas each time on each person's home world, constantly reconnecting in-between which is so tedious my friends and I don't even bother (not to mention no Torrent in Co-Op). Invasions are also a core mechanic, leading to a fun a-symetrical PvP system when they are done well, they are just not handled well in Elden Ring. Personally I'd love it if they solved both issues - Invasions should go back to being tied to Opt-In buffs so it's not only into gank squads and Co-opers, similar to Embered Status in DS3, and downscaling of phantoms or upscaling of Invader when outnumbered could balance the game better too. Co-op also would be awesome if you could truly progress through a world more organically together without all the disconnects. I believe there's an unofficial mod people are working on that somewhat accomplishes this but I haven't tried it myself.
@oohanalligator Invasions don't need to be removed, they honestly just need balance passes and most critically to be spread out to more people. The most killer thing that gets me sour on invasions is that when I am co-oping with my friend *who mainly enjoys games as co-op enterprises and has minimal interest in playing alone* we get invaded not even the every 15 minutes figure quoted. Often times we'll get invaded, he'll die to some rad bullshit like getting corner sniped by NIHIL and then summon us again and we'll be invaded again *immediately*. Because we're like the only people who can be invaded in the whole damn area. If invasions went back to how they were in previous titles - 5-15 times in a typical playthrough, they'd be fine. Even if you got absolutely clowned by total bullshit, it's once every handful of hours, instead of once every ten minutes. I actually enjoy PVP in these games a bit and I feel like I have been forced into doing more of it joining my friend for this co op than I ever played in the previous fromsofts combined. I have definitely gotten leagues and leagues better at it because the only choice is adapt or die.
I'd say the only thing Scott misses here is invaders coming in with late-ish game status effect weapons to early areas. Dual Antspur or Vyke's is just pathetic to see in Stormveil - and I say this as a dedicated invader. Rolling a new character with friends that are new to the series is really hard, and being killed by something they've never encountered is hard to justify. I have to explain "oh well that guy had kind of a cheap weapon etc etc." I don't want to have to make excuses for the PVP.
This goes both ways, you have overlevelled phantoms that have super strong gear, but also they now do tons of dmg, have god poise, and take 10+ hits to kill.
This is why when I invade I only use stuff that could reasonably be obtained by the people I'm invading. I'm not gonna beeline to the grand cloister at level 20 to go and grab the scorpion's stinger and then invade people with it. It's really the way to go, it's more fun too. Especially when you style on people spamming rivers of blood and moonveil in stormveil castle haha
Not to mention that the status effect builds up often enough even when dodging. Never getting hit once and still gettong scarletrotted is almost everytime a deathsentece in limgrave because people dont have the recipe for the cure item and then the invader runs around for 10 min.
If there is three of you, than the guy shouldn’t be a problem if he would have the same amount of healing as the host. Thats the biggest problem with invaisons, the flasks.
The removal of solo invasions was the worst mistake from made. It just makes invasions turn into an arms race. It also annoys coopers since they are the only priority. "Just use the item that allows solo invasions duh" From should have made rune arcs the requirement for invasion. I miss the day of ds2 ladle.
Preach. This was fromsoftware's biggest mistake and stupid PvE lords still think it's a good idea because "invaders bad". They have a poor understanding of how and why this affects them negatively, real shame.
At the end I feel like this system just hurts people who wanna play the game the intended or "fair" way. If the host is trying to be fair and nice to any potential invaders by having their phantoms not overleveled they get screwed when someone with double bleed cross-naginatas and rot daggers come ruin their session. When an invader is trying to be nice by making sure to not twink and abuse any oversights in balance, they run into kevin and his gank squad waiting with full bull-goats, BHS and helmet swaps ready with the hunter ring on. This system punishes people for trying to play nice, incentivizing them into playing dirty themselves because they can't have fun when they try playing honest and just get obliterated by people abusing the cracks in balance
I'm of the opinion that PVP should be something you seek, not something pushed on you because you decide to run it with friends. That's been my biggest gripe with Fromsoft games in general. To be quite honest I wouldn't mind so much if the online PVP wasn't such a laggy mess but here we are in 2022
I recall InfernoPlus talking about how he would get invaded constantly in Co-op on his 2nd channel. I think that also play into it, you just don't get time to be alone with co-op.
What I like about DS2 is that you could burn a rare item (effigy) and put yourself on the bottom of the invasion list. And I loved that you can invade people at all times. This added the choice to consume something of value, to get some rest and play the game with your friends; while not stunting the activity of PvP too much. The other problem is definitely scaling invaders down to the host - devs did not do a good job. Having more flasks, bad idea. They could have made scaling down better (both invaders and friendly phantoms), to make things more fair; in so many ways.
DS2 had the best PvP, fight me. Also, I feel like weapon level should be removed and weapons/armor/spells should be area locked. So a person whose never gotten to Farum Azula cant PvP with people who has Malikeths armor. That'd kill twinking hard
@@evinbraley Soul memory is a stupid mechanic though, it punishes first time players not familiar with the map for losing souls, it punishes people buying armour and weapons for fashion or just trying out stuff and it punishes people that buy a lot of consumables to get through the game.
Id like to point something out regarding the whole twink invaders situation , if you commit a build at a certain level ( say 50 ) and then upgrade your weapons according to the invasion calculator. its a pretty decent advantage compared to someone that's not sure how to allocate stats or " goes with the flow " so to speak not to mention the status affect weapons that can stack ( say poison + scarlet rot then offhand Poison /Cold ). Regardless id say the biggest thing there is to twinking is having access to very powerful late game ashes of war and the utility they provide . overall i agree with you but i do think twinking is still a thing , its just a little toned down and harder to achieve.
@@thunderstrucktb4758 We are dealing with it- by only summinging at the boss fogs, if at all. When the coop base dwindles further, you'll end up with a fight-club only scenario. The way the"invader" community always ends up, so stop salivating over the missed opportunities to potentially have any effect on co-opers play and enjoy your duels!
When I started my co op playthrough with my homie at lvl 1 we kept getting invaded by someone with two scavenger curved swords + the white mask and probably the mohg talisman. We still had sticks and no armor. Twinking is real
I was at level 40 with a new character and invaded a host with a password bs ng+ phantom who had full lionel with two naginatas with bleed on one and frost on the other, not that it mattered since one hit killed me. This was in limgrave next to the first godrick soldier camp
Twinking isn't limited to flasks. There's the physick, antspur rapiers, talisman pouches, consumables. There is A LOT of stuff you can bring into low level invasions that the host shouldn't have. Of course phantoms can do it too and they also have the whole lackluster downscaling issue, but invaders ain't that weak
My first thought to treat the problem would be to implement more options. Like, approaching a custom matchmaking process. Hosts choose summon and invader limits that can't be changed while using the online item. Invaders can then choose to invade host worlds of a preferred summon limit. Ideally everyone would get what they want.
I'd love that. As an average pvp'er who loves the rare funny interactions invasions can get, I'd love more 1v1/1v2 invasions. A lot of the 1v1's I've personally seen are duelists who wants to pvp without the rules of duels. And few 1v2 where the guys don't use bleed were really really fun. I die most of the time cuz I'm average, but when they're just more skilled or I make a mistake, I just laugh it off, text my friend (he's played Souls since Demon's and likes seeing how I did) and invade/duel again. But currently the amount of times I've seen the same 3 bleed builds just turns me off of invading or dueling. I now carry Stitcher with Pebble ash just for them. I usually use Serpentbone katana.
I enjoy it, except when I find overleveled dude. Even the RoB guys who I like to parry. I do wish we didn't have to do 3v1 though, but hey, it's better than nothing, and it's adaptable, plus many do just one phantom for 2v2s
The best part is that you become a god when fighting multiple enemies & players. It felt like easy mode my first couple of invasions because of how hardenee Dark Souls 3 made me. All it did was create an elite more intense invader.
Generally i think it just gets overwhelming for co-op people getting invaded endlessly every 15 minutes. It can take 5-10 minutes to deal with the invader, then you get 5-10 minutes to progress the area. It can get old quick. And each invade is bleeding your resources. In the past games you weren't endlessly chain invaded quite like this, at least not in every area lol. Covenant areas maybe. Now that you can only invade co-op players.... i mean i guess you just have to buckle up and prepare for tons of pvp. I really don't quite understand why they made it co-op only invades, the dynamic for the souls series in the past of being embered or human form seemed like a interesting idea to me, at least in context of ds3. Get 30% more HP, and see summon signs, but get the threat of invasion. I didn't summon much for helping with an area because if i did. I just got 100% invaded. Like.... was almost no point if i was actually struggling with the area already. Instead I'd end up summoning in front of the boss room, or opening a short cut to the boss from the summon pool thing to ignore invaders entirely pretty much.
That is also pretty much the reason why you every phantom and their host is a twink in their own right(aside from those who are looking to make the game as easy as possible) - No rewards for killing invaders - 10-15 minutes of downtime in a game where finishing a dungeon may take between 30 minutes to two hours if not more(not counting being stuck on bosses, and depending on how much you'd stop at just observing the environment either for awe or to find secrets in the area) - Lengthy load times on anything but ps5 - Loss of items necessary for co-op upon death And so on. There's so little reasons to actually engage in pvp or at least for doing so fairly that it's no surprise there's so much gank twinks in this game. In ds3 no matter where i invaded or when, it was more 50-50 between regular hosts and twinked out hosts, with a few ganks here and there every once in a while, but in elden ring that 50-50 is in regards to twinks and ganks, only a few invasione will actually be "regular" and i can't say i'm surprised about it. We moved backwards instead of forwards, instead of giving more incentive to play co-op, invading, or even engaging in pvp while co-op, all elden ring did was make it even less of an enticing option, even more of a waste of time for people who don't care about pvp. I hope elden ring shows fromsoftware that frustration from sucking at pvp was nearly never the reason co-op players hated getting invaded, as showcased by the stupid amount of twinks and ganks in this game.(inb4 they assume that's because players are bad at pvp and not because they just have no way out of pvp in co-op and having a braindead pvp meta weapon in their pocket to get it over with -hopefully- quickly is a more sensible solution than not summoning at all until a boss shows up)
Two days ago I made a RL30 invader for Stormveil. I twinked some throwing knives and boluses out of convenience, but nothing else. I would invade people wearing endgame gear, host and phantom, every other invasion. I was only using Samurai armor, katana, and occasionally swapping over to Halberd Offstoc if I needed to get sweaty on overleveled phantoms. For 4 hours of invading, only two guys were solo and wearing Taunter's Tongue, and one of them was abusing greatshield Vyke's pokes. In Stormveil. Sure. One invasion the host was fighting the Crucible Knight and before I could jump down, a blue phantom was summoned. The Blue had full Banished and Veteran's armor on, a dragon halberd, and full flasks. He wasn't a slouch at combat either, though I was winning our 1v1 up by the Warhawks with the explosion barrels. Then, another blue comes in, and he's got dual bleed naginatas. This is all at level 30. So I run to the banished knight by the church, the blues overextend, I almost die but kill the first one, and I get the bleed idiot shortly thereafter after healing with the flasks I got. So I climb back up to find the host, and the host is all twinked out with Radahn's, and his phantom is spamming Bolt of Gransax. I've literally had it with these tools, and in the process of running away I manage to turn and burn, then rollcatch chain the phantom, who easily gives me 120k runes, and then the host himself is such a noob I don't even take damage and finally kill him. But for crying out loud if there's not a justification to twink out and give myself whatever I need, what is there? 125 invasions are freakin' impossible, level 50 is almost too much half the time, and level 30 I'm already dealing with blues who are twinked out 100%? I shouldn't have to fight this at stormveil. From is shooting themselves and everyone else in the foot by not downscaling phantoms appropriately
that explains why i invaded once in elden ring when i was level 40 or so , and there was this guy with full poise armor not even trying to evade my attacks and just attacking as im attacking and easily winning the trade
It's misconception that invaders are cruel or evil. In truth, they care more than anyone else - so much so that seeing their brothers and sisters get ganked changes their brain chemistry and activates their mangekyo sharingan, driving them to terrible action. This is the Curse of Hatred.
I've always had the rule of manner checking the invader if I'm cooping, if the invader has any modecate of etiquette I'll have my summon fight them first, or I'll start a duel. However if it's a "funny fucker" or a straight up twat, the rancid gank commences and point downs will be handed out.
Manners maketh man. And this is why I wait for a reaction from hosts when I invade. I don't hyper-optimize, so I'm running with Serpentbone Blade, Venomous Fangs and Antspur Rapier (poison/rot build). Stitcher with pebble for BS builds. This also means I die a lot hehe
i think for PVE its the frequency of invasions that ruins it. being invaded once an hour seems fun honestly, but every 3 minutes? that's just ruining any kind of PVE you wanted to do. on the other hand, limiting invasion times would hinder invaders, but honestly once you are a high enough level i dont think this would matter much. i think a good compromise would be to increase the range of invasions to be global (any areas you have explored), but limit being invaded to once every 30 minutes. this would allow invaders to rapidly invade people, while also alleviating the spam invasions that happen to PVE players.
I have a friend who exclusively plays coop, and invasions are pretty much split 50/50 in terms of how enjoyable they are Half of the time the invaders show up and immediately wanna fight, they might throw you a wave but thats it, and that's fine, lets get to it, some added challenge can be fun, the other day one guy got caught in a geyser and almost instant died before catching up, and another just spammed madness spells until they used the sui physick which was absurdly hilarious But then the other half its these people who the second they realize they're getting roll caught or cant just spam bleed to win, they bloodhound step to the nearest field boss or large group of mobs to heal up, and just wait there refusing to engage, essentially taking over the game and deciding "it's me-time now >:(". You can't always just ignore them cuz of coop boundaries, like say I was leading my friend to a cave welp now we gotta kill this guy before we can do that, but this guy is doing everything in his power to pull us as far away from where we were going without actually fighting us ever and it's just frustrating I think invasions are cool and would never want them removed, but when all they do is spam the same broken shit it gets agitating, miss you Mad Alice or whatever your name was, you were hilarious
I miss dedicated invasion areas. I understand that since there’s no covenants they can’t really do that. But I think they could of added covenants in the game. Especially with the various factions and Demi-gods.
Eh, I don't miss it. It was only ever just a place for gankers to hang out and be toxic. What I hope to see is a return of the arena combat that DS3 added with the Ariandel DLC - which would absolutely fit in with the unused coliseums in Elden Ring.
I went into this on another channel. I'ma grab that comment and post it here, since this is a more suitable place. In my opinion It's a combination of popularity, unfamiliarity, and more importantly, the community's "mismanagement" over the years. First off, the game is immensely popular, bringing in ALOT of new people to the "Souls" series. All of which are unfamiliar with what these games _actually_ are, what the "spirit" of Dark Souls is. They only know of the stories and the memes. "Souls games are the hardest of them all" "Souls players are all masochists who enjoy making others miserable" "Invaders are the worst people in the world" "Git Gud" "You beat the game solo, otherwise you didn't really beat the game" We, as a community, have embraced this over the years. We've come to welcome the adversity. We post videos of gank spanks, 1 shots, point downs, "well what is it"s.. We have hardly _ever_ publicly shown what this community is actually like. They don't see the Jolly Cooperation. They don't see the wholesome moments. The 30 minute goof-off sessions with a random host. We treat it like an exclusive club. You have to be a part of it to understand. With every new release, us "veterans" take up arms against certain play styles, because it not only ruins the balance of the game, but also because we know our community and what we are capable of. We know the intricacies of the game, we know how to _fully_ exploit what is broken. And we don't want it. But from the outside, it looks like us "elitists" are trying to make the game harder for the new players. So they take up arms against us. Purposefully using the "broken" stuff, simply out of spite for a community they don't even know. Because we've done everything we could to (unintentionally) keep it that way. It's not entirely a lost cause however. With every new entry, the community has grown exponentially. The same will happen here. The new players who are "here for the ride" will leave with the next big game release. Those who fall in love with "Souls" will adapt and join the community. Being their very first Souls game, many of these players will then play the other titles, increasing player activity across the entire series. And then we'll start the cycle anew. Also, we as a community need to remember one very important thing. Alot of us, myself included, have been playing these games for _years_ now. We also agree that every new installment in the series is harder than the last, and we know _how_ these games work. For new players, it's their first ever experience with Souls style combat, let alone the real deal. They have no clue what's going on, or why. And the learning curve gets steeper with every game. They deserve some credit for even trying. For example: I started with Dark Souls 1. Before this, my last "fighting game" was MK Armageddon when I was young. On my first playthrough, I originally missed the side door in Asylum Demon's boss room. I fought him for over 2 hours, bare handed, quickly learning "just circle around them 4Head". The limitations of the game played a HUGE roll in this. Now take Elden Ring. You've never touched any form of Souls Combat. You, for this example, have vague knowledge of and no love for anything Souls. Learn this game from scratch..
2:00 My issue with this argument (the "that's just how it is so deal with it") is three-fold. First is that it's simply dismissive because it assumes we're asking for actual change rather than just venting our frustrations with the current system. We can both acknowledge that the system is the way it is an accept that, but that doesn't mean we suddenly actually LIKE the system to be that way. Second point is kind of a continuation from the first but it's that that attitude of "just shut up and accept it" leaves us with zero possibility of even having a long shot in the dark at getting any kind of change if we actually do want it. If we extrapolate that attitude to real life it doesn't work too well. For instance, if people are staging a protest over something, just telling them "hey, the law is the way it is and that's the reality" is that ever enough to make them give up and just go "oh alright, I guess that law we used to hate isn't so bad after all"? Sure that's a bit of an extreme escalation between real life laws and video games but the sentiment is the same. Thirdly is that at this point we've had an entire subgenre come up around these games in the formation of the Soulslike genre and there are now lots of examples of games that follow a very similar formula to the core FS Souls titles that allow co-op but don't have invasions and they work just fine. Nioh actually used to have invasions but removed them going into Nioh 2. Code Vein didn't have any invasion system whatsoever. And as far as I've heard neither does Stranger of Paradise. It's been shown at this point that "the Souls formula" doesn't NEED invasions to deliver an engaging experience. To be clear, I'm not asking for the removal of invasions with this point, as invasions are one of the most significant features to the games and could even be said to be one of the things that separates the core Souls titles from the other Soulslikes. I'm only bringing this up to show that there is evidence to show that PvP isn't as core to the experience as people make it out to be, and having PvP be an opt-in system for those who want it likely wouldn't be as big of an issue as people make it out to be. 13:06 This might be a bit nitpicky, but I think it's unfair to generally categorize people who enjoy playing co-op as people who are looking for carries. As someone who enjoys co-op as my primary form of fun in these games, even I think the people who are just doing it looking to get carried are taking it too far and we need to scale things back on that front to force people to stay more engaged with the game even when others are helping them. I'm not sure what the best solution to that might be, but as you mentioned in the previous section about unbalance in co-op phantoms I agree that making sure summoned phantoms are scaled more appropriately is at least the first step. I also think the ways they scale PvE around co-op phantoms isn't done well enough (bosses having boosted HP pools just isn't enough) but that's a completely different subject. ------------------------------- FWIW everything else you said I more or less agree with. I've been playing since the original Demon's Souls and as things are now it's just a cycle that will continue to exist simply due to different players having different preferences. As the years I spend with these games go on I'm just more and more saddened by the continued dismissal of those of us who actually find PvP unfun but love being able to help others overcome obstacles that were giving them trouble. There is genuinely no better feeling I've ever felt in these games than when someone takes the time after a good co-op run to find my name on PSN and send me a "thank you" message. I don't get any fun out of PvP because I just don't enjoy unsolicited conflict with other people in general. I just wish there was a way I could ask for PvP to be opt-in separately from co-op and not be immediately "booed off of the stage" any time I bring the idea up, even if I'm just venting.
I'll keep my response brief since I've already rambled enough wall-of-texts for one night, but to cover your major points: 1. Co-op doesn't invalidate challenge on its own, or at least it shouldn't. At this point other games have already shown that with the right handling of systems and mechanics you can keep co-op experiences without them trivializing the game even without invasions. The problem with ER and the other From Soulsborne titles is that they do next to NOTHING to counterbalance co-op beyond just throwing invasions into the mix and pumping boss HP bars if phantoms are present. With better handling of things like scaling down co-op partners abilities, adjusting basic enemies' stats, or even tweaking boss AI it would be entirely possible to design a pure PvE experience where co-op is still challenging. 2. I agree the decision to remove solo invasions in ER was a bad one. It doesn't benefit either side of the issue and only encourages both sides to lean into the cheapest, "speed-killingest" strats and builds because the odds are always entirely skewed in one direction or the other with very few encounters outside of actual duels being actually engaging. 3. Here's what I'm advocating for - I don't want invasions removed. I want invasions and co-op to be separate systems, with the PvP being strictly opt-in for the player should they happen to enjoy that style of play. Make a new item that has to be activated in order to flag your world as invadable. If that item is activated then you'll get normal invasions regardless of if you're solo or with phantoms or even regardless of if there's any bosses in the zone or not. You want to up the danger of your world by having other players to fight? All power to you. But for those of us that find PvP experiences distasteful, I just want the ability to play the way I have fun without being forced to play the way that leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Just let me have the option to keep that item turned off. If you love invasions as much as you say, surely you'd have no problem with an item that tells the game "please invade me as much as you want." And given how prominent the PvP scene is, I'm sure there's a large enough scene for PvP as a whole to continue to be an active experience for all who enjoy it. Just give me the option to keep that item turned off because PvP has never done anything but leave a sour taste in my mouth after it's done, regardless of if I win or lose. If that'd make PvE too easy, then put better systems into the PvE to make phantoms not as effective rather than relying on other players to be the counterbalance.
It would be so much simpler if invaders had their co-invader like in ds3, and that a sucessfully repelled invasion would mean at least 30 min invasion immunity. That's it, hosts will go throught this once, invaders have a better shot.
This is one way, but there's a billion other ways to go about it. The current system is literally the worst case scenario. No rewards gor killing invaders, bad scaling on phantom twinks, crazy amount of thinking doable by invaders themselves (status and piise build up with fast roll thanks to physicks as well as 4 talisman slots), minimal downtime between invasions, no doentime at all if you use a taunter's tongue, etc...
You still get a grace period after being invaded in ER. When I help my brother we simply stay a minuten or two at the grace untill we get invaded, we kill the i vader and then we play nornally untill we reach the next Grace. Then we restart the process.
I purposefully didn't level vigor just to spite my friend when he questioned why I had 14 in ds3 and we were level 300 something just having fun going through the main game. in ds3 its more possible, but in ER I had what is known as A Bad Time until I got to the respecs lol
I feel like PvP & invasions have become steadily more frustrating as time has gone on. I don't really have anything else to add to the current invasion conversation, besides that I really like using weapon level as an additional restriction, as Phantom Scaling did kill my effort to do some wacky low level invasions, but I'd like to air my thoughts on exclusively invading into groups. The change from flat invasions if: human (ds1/DeS/ds2) or from specific locations (BB); to the co-op prioritization and now co-op only invasions is going to lead to invasion's requiring builds to deal with upwards of 3 people, and so the people getting invaded are going to have to deal with the frustration of magic/faith/arcane users, people with one-shot builds out the wazoo, and the invasion builds of yesteryear where you could have a cool encounter with some dude with a weird build are long gone and restricted to duals. I probably wouldn't be so frustrated if phantom scaling worked as intended, but it really has just made me hate the invasion restrictions more than anything else. Unrelated to the topics presented in the video however, I do miss the variety that DS2 provided. Regardless of your thoughts and feelings on DS2, it had some really unique covenants like the Rat King covenant by providing players an opportunity to "build their own dungeon". I hope that FromSoft revisits those ideas in the next game. This is all coming from someone who essentially skipped the DS3 PvP scene because I didn't want to deal with straight sword builds, and I was still having fun playing BB and the fun invasions and duals you could get there so my thoughts may be a bit antiquated.
Honestly, as much as bb might have has the worst netcode, matchmaking and balance in all the games(thank you bloodgem system) at least the few times it worked as intended it was fun af no matter your stance on invasions and co-op thanks to bell maidens and just the randomness of it all. It's just that it almost never actually worked and also had the er problem of no solo invasions...(nightmares aside) If the matchmaking actually worked, there was bell maidens in every area who also respawned(or make them respawn only in nightmares if that's too much) regardless of cooperators presence, i think that would have been the best case scenario for everyone, sad that elden ring had gone in the opposite direction of adopting nearly everything that was bad in Bloodborne's online minus(?) The matchmaking while removing all the good it had.
As a person who's put the most time into DS3 PvP out of any of the other games you missed out, but your points are valid. The straight sword R1 spam was nowhere near as big of an issue as anything in Elden Ring tbh, Elden Ring is just an atrocity no matter where you look. I suggest if you wanna have a fun time with DS3 now's the time to go back and invade/duel, it's super fun and actually requires thought going into it unlike ER where you just spam the same shit and win.
@@aliceinwonderland4395 I did DS3 PvP right at the beginning of the games life and did a little right after the last DLC came out. I remember enjoying myself a lot more on the back half, and on the whole, I should really play it again. The most depressing part of Elden Ring was finishing my colossal sword build, feeling pretty letdown by how bad it was damage wise, and then going to start a dex build and immediately outdamaging my previous build. It didn't help once I got the Moonveil and I got to experience first hand what a walk through the Elden Ring landscape was like.
I’m a mostly PVE/Coop player. I do find getting invaded annoying, especially since it delays area progression. My buddies and I don’t shy away from ganging up on invaders or wasting their time (for those ambushers). For us, when you invade, you follow our rules. On fresh characters, we’ve encountered people with end game heavy boss armors and weapons, mostly a thrusting sword that does both scarlet rot and poison. It can get toxic. On the flip side, I grown to understand the woes of invaders after doing the 3 invasions for Varre’s quest. The ganks and heavily geared players are cancerous to fight.
I tried out invading and got faced against overleveled phantoms then later I got invaded by a dual naginata bhs bleed build... I only dueled after that.
To be fair, a min-max low level build is almost as strong as twinking. Dumping most of your points into vigor, using the strongest ash of war and lightning infusion with highest upgrade (for your upgrade range) makes you much much stronger than most host. Not only that since there are no solo invasions playing co-op just gets you invaded every 5 seconds. You totally shouldn’t play nice against host who are getting carried by RoB phantoms but there are also plenty of host just co-oping and getting invading by 2 min-maxing invaders against 2 dual co-oper with normal pve stats is certain death. Its kinda dumb how invaders would go out of their way to get the strongest gear just so that they can invade in Liurnia or stormveil, the true loser out of all this exchange are co-opers who doesn’t have over levelled phantoms and are just trying to play the game.
Yeah, but honestly those kinds of co-opers are getting rarer - about as rare as fair invaders. Most people playing at low levels are starting second characters and password co-oping. There's also a pretty crazy amount of twink ganks out there too. Low level online play is just kind of toxic on all fronts, ngl.
I'd also argue that FromSoft could have definitely incentivized Solo Players to use the Taunters Tongue more to at least alleviate some of the Issues BOTH parties face. Coop players wouldn't be the only group of potential invasion targets anymore and invaders wouldn't have to deal with so many overleveled phantoms/ganksquads if the Devs actually found a way to make solo Players WANT to do PvP to a slight degree.
Incentivizing pve players to pvp is the worst idea ever. Every game that has done this either still has no pvp or has a pve player base that quits because they feel punished for not pvping. Not every game is for everyone but if you don’t like the pvp system of elden ring I think that’s a clue that this game isn’t really made for you. The game is the way it is and some people are going to hate it and some are going to love it.
To address the early-game twinks, they exist. Maybe not one shotting, but doing shit loads of damage, and they're tanky asf most of the time. They have end game weapons, 4 talisman slots, and maxed out Estus. I'm on build #7 with my brother, and we still get invaded by the most tryhard twinks in the beginning.
I make 3 characters in every Miyazaki game. A red, a yellow and a blue. I theme the builds around the colors, so it usually goes pyromancy, faith and magic, but it can vary like pyromancy will sometimes be blood themed or magic could be frost themed.
If I invade the starting area at base-Lv, I'm usually greeted by BHS dual Naginata, Stars of Ruin and RoB even more frequently than during my Lv.150 invasions. There is really nothing wrong with twink invading, as you will still be outgunned by the password summons.
What if there was a mechanic where a co-op phantom could call out the invader for a 1 on 1. The invader could accept the challenge, in exchange the host and any other phantoms can't touch the invader, nor can the invader attack anyone else. These impromptu duels could give additional rewards to whoever wins.
6:20 Marika soreseal + radagon Soreseal + endgame weapons = easy twink, there's even a video of some dude making an easy twink build with the silver tear mask and slapping poison to a weapon, knowing that low level players don't even know what boluses are. Easy gank spanks so stay strong invaders 💪 *WE WILL RISE AND BE FEARED AGAIN* .
I'm in the boat for people not invading when you're just wanting to explore with their buddies. Taunter's Tongue could just enable being invaded when cooperating for people who want a classic FromSoft experience, but I would be ok with invasions if they at least weren't so frequent. The world is significantly larger and when you're on foot it takes forever to get anywhere. The worst part about invasions is every last one becomes a sweat fest, which just end up where invasions feel like they take longer than their downtime anyway. The argument he has about it being a classic mechanic and because it was always there doesn't justify its inclusion. If invasions have a more legitimate reason than just "it was a mechanic in previous entries", I'd love to know, but Elden Ring already differentiates itself from the rest of the entries, and don't include other mechanics as well. Tradition alone doesn't justify its inclusion. A good example of this is when FromSoft replaced the parry system from the Dark Souls series with Bloodborne's version of the parry system. Bloodborne's parry system required players to keep up their offensive, so it was necessary to change it.
Bloodborne also had a fun mini-game of a mechanic where, when you engaged in co-op it would spawn a "Sinister bell maiden" who could lure in invaders if one was searching in the area. But the Bell Maiden could be killed once found, and you're free from invasions for the duration of your time in co-op until it was time to summon again They could definitely do this for Elden Ring. Hell, there's a myriad of enemies they could use in place of Maidens, like those horseback revenant guys which would be interesting since they only show up a couple of times, and co-op takes you off your horse so you're at a disadvantage for catching them. They could even appear in specific locations solo (also a feature of 2 zones from Bloodborne) to bring back solo invasions
The problem with Elden Ring vs other games and 'twinking' is that the end game gear is 500x stronger than the available tools early game. It's people invading with double antspurs, one with frost one with poison, with full bullgoats and the tears in his flask to make him weightless. This is not a 'get good' moment, this is people intentionally invading for the exclusive reason to ruin someone's day. Flasks should adhere to the same upgrade requirements as weapons, if you have a +12 flask you should never, ever, ever be able to invade someone in Stormveil with a +1.
The host could still summon his buddies who have +12 flasks though. All that does is make it easier for the host to kill the invaders since it becomes a +1 vs a +1 and two +12 summons.
i'd honestly argue the opposite. because its open world, there is no real "end game gear" except that locked past the capital. You can create the most absolute busted setups before this. hell the cross naginata can be gotten in 10 minutes from a new character. you can even get the winged crystal tear without fighting a single enemy on a level 1 character. i agree antspur rapiers are a scummy twink weapon
I don't know that I agree with flasks, largely because while they do contribute power level, it's honestly not incredibly significant past level ~+4 or so if we're talking low levels anyway. The bigger reason though is that fragmenting matchmaking more will only make matchmaking worse, not better. Game will look dead, because so many different criteria have to be met at once. You'd only be viable for invades in hyperspecific areas, and the restricted areas for invasions per build is already a problem in the current state of the game. Breaking matchmaking more isn't really the solution. Also, the person in Stormveil with the +1 can have a phantom that's level 500 with +12/7 flask. Which is the whole reason people are hyperoptimizing to begin with-- Because their weapons can't hurt the bullgoat LV500s, but maybe status can. Etc etc. If password summons scaled down, I guarantee you'd see much less of that kind of thing, because frankly building optimized invaders is a chore. It's tens of hours of work, just to be able to maybe deal with Larry Level 700 The Password Summon. You don't know people's reasons for invading, either. Several times now I've invaded into someone with an obviously incredibly overleveled phantom, but who clearly is new and doesn't know what they're doing, killed the overleveled phantom, and then "accidentally" played very poorly to give the new guy a close victory, and one that they never would have gotten if their Phat Phantom just did everything for them. Hell, hopefully they can brag at their phantom about it (Which would just be some fun salt in the wound to the OL phantom in my opinion)
@@ScottJund Assuming the person looking to co-op is looking to deal with the invaders, sure, they can also have all those things. But the person who's 'complaining' about the invaders isn't looking for the pvp, but the person invading is exclusively looking for it. Which raises another problem point, if the host *is* expecting and wanting to engage in PvP while also gearing for it then instantly their phantoms are too and that's a massive disadvantage for the invader. So, I feel it's a no-win situation, the people going out of their way to not upgrade end game weapons are going to have these loadouts and the people who don't, are going to be mad. I like invasions, I enjoy the 'souls' PvP, but I think the invasion system is outdated and flawed in ways that fundamentally cannot be reconciled between people who want it and people who don't.
@@Nudgarrobot I can never 'know' someone's reason for invading, some people just find it fun, some people just really like to be annoying, it's whatever floats their boat at the end of the day, but it's not *those players* that are complaining. I feel it always stems from differing expectations. Invaders expect to go in, completely at a disadvantage, and win at any cost where the person they're invading may just be trying to play the game. These two mindsets are not ever going to be compatible and I feel is the entire body of the 'I hate invaders / invasions section of the community."
In regards to twinking, overpowered weapons, armor and ashes of war are very present in invaders at low levels. I was helping randoms go through Stormveil and encountered 3 seperate invaders all wearing late game armor and using Rot, Bleed and Frozen infused weapons with Bloodhound's Step. We had nothing to heal the rot once it finally landed so the invaders would just like bhs until we died. Twinking is definitely still a think, except instead of getting one-shot, you get scarlet rotted to death while the host has way more flasks for healing
Miyazaki trying to make the invaders work as one more hardship the player needs to endure in the world is great, what isn't great is trying to make those player always lose because then you create an imbalance where those player will minmax, twink and resort to the dirtiest of tricks to get the upper hand as it has happened time and time again in previous game and the victim always end up being new and low level players.
The best way to describe miyazaki's ideal of invasions and how they work in er is "cute idea, counter-productive implementation" You don't add in a mechanic (co-op) only to have another mechanic(invasions) be a deterrent to the first mechanic without any incentive whatsoever, all you'll do is make a miserable experience for both parties where avoiding the deterrent(bossgate summoning after rushing through areas solo) or getting rid of it as quickly and dirtily as possible (twinks, on both sides) becomes the only possible result.
Even though it was a little unfair for me as a host, I kind of liked the urgency and the panic of getting invaded when I was solo in Dark Souls 1. Forcing all invasions to only target co-opers makes sense from one standpoint, but also it creates this cycle of resentment since co-opers usually want to be left in peace and invaders don't want to be at a disadvantage constantly. And all this is on top of the crappy net code making things like roll-catching really hard and just adding to the jank. I love the game, but it hurts to see the exact same problems present in Elden Ring when a lot of people hoped for a fresher game that could really improve on it's predecessors in every way. For better or for worse, Elden Ring is very much like Dark Souls 3, and I don't think FromSoft is willing to make drastic systemic changes in their patches so I don't know if any of it will change.
Not particularly scared of Rivers at Stormveil. Now, a guy in full Veteran + Rivers + Rotten Breath, with MAX flasks? That's more scary/irritating to deal with. Things I'd change, personally: ¬ Now, cannot receive a traded item if you haven't first got a copy of said item yourself (this is harsh but should help with griefing a bit. Want something? Play the game first!). ¬ Max Flasks of Invader/downscaled phantoms cannot go over the max number of flasks the host currently have (helps both sides). ¬ Return of PVP-centric areas (think D1 Forest/ D2 Bellfries/ D3 Anor Londo) for BIG RUMBLE time. ¬ Enable of solo invasions if Host has their Great Rune active (and ONLY in that case, unless you Tongue ofc - people should be allowed to choose!). ¬ Have 1 Invader total if 2 players, 2 Invaders total if 3 players. (Hunter is excluded and can join in any case, but has a timer on re-summon of a new one?) ¬ Increasing timer after each invasion, unless Tongue or 3 players (feel like this is necessary atm, was running a co-op run with a friend and between the two of us we got invaded like ~12 times at Leyndell, holy crud. Invasions are fine but some breathing room is needed at times!) Just some random thoughts, no idea if they would practically improve the situation in any way - besides, we definitely won't get any fix on this anyways so, yeah, opinions and all!
I think for the flask limit it should be a max of one flask over the other (same thing goes for the flask level ofc). This would still make it mostly fair, while not make matchmaking too strict.
That first suggestion basically forces pvp serious people to use cheat engine and not mules. Also when I make a pvp character, I don't want to have to do everything in this game to make my build. I'd rather just do the stuff I cant trade over (like patches quest for infinite fan daggers) then trade the rest.
@@stevenluoma1268 What if it did it by user profile instead of by save file? When you get an item in-game, it flags your account (or removes a flag). Given that picking up Deathbed Smalls flagged every character you owned rather than the just the one you grabbed them with, I don't think it would be impossible for FS to implement.
@@4NSW3RM3 Sounds reasonable on paper, but I'm afraid what it would really do is simply to stop newbies to have OP weapons traded to them during their very first playthrough and abuse them to the game with ease - grievers, usually, have already finished the game at least once so, with this method, they would have access to basically all trades, making it a kinda moot fix sadly. Only other solution I can think of, is blocking invasions if Invader is using a weapon/armor acquirable in a REGION the host didn't unlock yet (e.g. Hand of Malenia/Rivers at low-RL Stormveil -> No invasion because host didn't unlock Mountaintops) but that also opens ANOTHER big can of worms (and would literally get me killed IRL by the Jar Cannon invaders). I don't think there is a way to have everyone be content and agree on this... I completely understand the sentiment of wanting to get your build specced without investing all those hours, but... Personally speaking, I'd choose fighting against grievers in general over that, I suppose. Cheat Engine is something that cannot be countered, really - some people WILL use it, no matter the odds. At least this way they are aware that they are risking a ban, I guess...?
I've been recenly running through the game with 2 other friends on a coop shield-only run. I consider getting invaded part of the fun, but low level invasions were extremely boring and unfun. Most were poison/rot builds that hit you a couple of times with arrows and consumables and run away until you die because you cant cure status effects until later on in the game.
I hate those dudes. Matter a fact, I think I might make a build that is a twink that has everything to cure myself, and just chill and stare at them while unprocing and then charge them with some op weapon. Though I would keep normal stuff for the honest ones.
Same experience, I was really looking forward to playing coop with a friend, and thought invasions would be really fun, but most invaders so far have been using such toxic and abusive builds... Honestly I don't get why anyone would play like that, it just seems so boring, going arround with broken builds hunting new players. Best invasions BY FAR have been against players who have early-game spells and weapons like us, and we've only had like two of those.
@@yordo9593 I would be on your side, but half of hosts have phantoms that are 200+ spamming stars of ruin and moonviel. You have to adapt of your just gonna get melted.
@@yordo9593 They do it because they can only get overleveled phantoms, and want to level the playing field, but they take it out on others too. I use to do this in ds3 with dragonslayer ax, but I would use it only on people I knew were also twinking or if they are overleveled. It provides a sense of justice, though it's not justice, it just fuels the overleveled and summoners, but that's not what's the problem in my opinion now, I think the problem is the innocent players getting caught up in these players wraths are being punished, on both sides too, wasting a valuable item to be destined to lose. Still, most new invaders seem to have been ran off, or leveled higher, so looks like twinks may become a problem.
@@unpaintedarmy what i do to solve this on my low level invasion character, is I have gear for fighting both types of lobbies. If the host is just a regular player going through with regular phantoms, I'll only use weapons and abilities that they would have access to at that point in the game. For example if I'm in stormveil I'll use limgrave/stormveil only equipment. However I've unlocked all the other stuff just in case. If I run into a gank with crazy phantoms and a host that has been muled late game items, I swap to all of my lategame gear to fight on even footing. That way i dont get rolled by the twink ganks, but it's a fair experience for regular players.
After a couple hours of invading and getting 3v1-ed against overleveled phantoms and BM hosts literally sitting in place for hours taking these fights, I just sort of enter "No fun, no mercy" mode. You can only get fucked over so many times, especially when taking on multiple opponents, beating them nearly senseless for 5 minutes and then getting wombo comboed to death because you made a single mistake, before it starts to sour your mood. That frustration ends up getting let loose on the hosts who really don't deserve it. This is a consequence of how the system was designed, and I don't think it was intentional. For all of Fromsoft's amazing PvE building capabilities, I've never seen a company THIS bad at making a fun and balanced PvP experience. From the awful two decade out of date netcode to a complete incapability to see a logical conclusion to the systems they put in place... they are just really bad at it. There are no casual invaders now, because there can't be. The average person isn't going to put up with THAT much failure, especially for a video game. The tryhard metalord BM invaders will always exist, regardless of how punishing the game is, but now that population is no longer diluted by a ton of casual PvP goers just looking to have fun. So almost every host gets invaded by the no fun brigade, completely souring their experience and making them take drastic measures with overleveled phantoms. Thus, the cycle is perpetuated and continues to get worse.
This was my exact experience. I started invading with a regular build. Kept getting spammed by noobveils and rivers of skill and losing. Now I invade with a bullshit 112 poise glintstone pebble build. I'm invincible, if they dare attack I can pebble for 2k damage on reaction. I was forced to do this, losing every time, especially to worse players than me just because it's always a 1v3 spam fest just isn't fun.
One important thing not covered I think about invaders is they also get a big advantage at low level regarding talismans. Being able to use soreseals, late game talismans in general and also having 4 slots is something a dude who just is going through Stormveil isn't really going to have. Overall I don't think the cycle can be stopped, even if overleveled phantoms were balanced really well, it won't stop some people from being just too annoying as invaders. That, too, has gone all the way back to Demon's Souls. It's just kinda the way some people are. Most don't like losing, so they'll try to find any way to win they can. Even with weapon level matchmaking in Elden Ring, there's still just too much a prepared invader with a finished low level build can have that a normal player going through the game won't.
9/10 outta 10 when I invade and there’s a 3 man squad they are not trying to run through the game stop the cap, ds3 ganks have fully converted over to er, maybe 1 invasion outta the 4 hours I’d play might be ppl actually running through the campaign
They even do it in legacy dungeons, they just wait for you at the top of a ladder and nuke, then when you invade its the same people in the same spot in the painted castle.
Another group of people that get shafted by the new invasion system are the people like me, where I'm not usually (emphasis on usually, exceptions exist) looking to PvP constantly, but I do appreciate that side of the game and enjoy interacting with it. I would in my DS3 runs purposely stay embered once I got through the Twink Wall and Settlement specifically to lure in an invader every half hour or so, whatever the cooldown was. That way I got to fight someone every now and then, the invader got a solo world since I know those were a pleasant treat, and I got to interact with that system. That just doesn't exist in Elden Ring. I have to choose between playing a strictly single player game or taunter's tonguing and not being able to progress in the game anymore. I've got three chars through the game and four others in various points around the game and I've never been invaded on six of them because they just...can't (the last is a co-op run with a friend and my wife). I don't like the separation of invasions from solo play because that system is what kept DS3 specifically so fun for me for as long as it was - sure I knew all the areas like the back of my hand, but if I got invaded all bets were off, it was a tense place again. I miss that, genuinely. And there's no way to get that experience in Elden Ring. I cannot do it. We need a red cipher ring that restores invasions to "souls" levels of functionality. I'd have it on pretty much constantly.
Elden Ring has the closest time where i've ever been banned in a Fromsoft game. My frist time cooping with a good friend, an invader with items he should of had killed my friend and tried to drop me something. I had to take the advice of my friend and ignore the item. It's a shame that my first ever invasion in Elden Ring was a run in with a hacker.
You can get invaders with high weapons. You can get a plus 5-8(somber) SUPER early and if someone follows the get op early build video, they now follow the get wrecked by pvp gods early farm whenever invaded
There is something incredibly funny about having to explain what Twink means in the context of Souls games. We all know what we mean, but the thought of some feminine lad walking up to you with a RoB or Ruins Greatsword demolishing you is a treat for the imagination. You go get them, feminine lad. Godspeed. Also yeah, I wish there was an appropriate way to invade single players again. Taunter's Tongue isn't even a great solution. Honestly making the pvp experience 3v1 is and only 2v2 with a TT is kinda ridiculous. I miss having 3v2 fights. Why does TT replace 1 gold slot for 1 red and not just add an extra red? A lot of odd choices... I also miss Mad Phantoms from ds3. It was so fun being given the goal of "just make sure somebody dies"
Mound makers invasions were gold. You could just turn up on the sidelines and pick off the weak ones or waltz into the melee spinning your halberd laughing madly. I once had a red drop an ember and grovel for an alliance too, good times
For the people saying chaos twinks in the prepare to die edition were ridiculous, I would just like to remind you that the invasion range in the original Dark Souls was infinite upward, you could be level 15 invading max level gankers.
Idk I feel pretty twinkled against when I am fighting a max lvl bull goats white mask phantom and, their cross nagis instantly bleed me with one hit, and deal 3/4ths my hp, and then can just whip out the moonveil that does just as much if not more. Meanwhile heavy Greatsword with 66 str does like 1/8th their hp.
I think the biggest issue is just the pvp system. I think its about time that they streamline the pvp more to make it efficient for everybody. I'm not a game designer so I don't have any answers for how but i think a flushed out pvp system may be the next big step for souls games
If a host uses a rune arc, that should allow them to be open to invasions, even while solo. Making this change would encourage more people to do co-op and invasions in order to gather more rune arcs. Also, while we are at it, make the effects gained from rune arcs more varied and way better. Most aren't even worth using, which is wild considering it is supposed to be a big deal to unlock.
@@spairus4492 I get wanting to make the game more accessible. A new player would not like getting invaded solo. However, by tying invading to co-op, that is what has produced this "cycle of hatred." Co-op groups are tired of constantly getting invaded, and invaders are tired of only fighting teams, especially since many of those teams contain over-leveled phantoms. Both groups would benefit from a more varied experience.
gonna leave a few more thoughts once I finish but a few things I notice missed 1: invaders can somewhat twink using talisman slots, if you're in stormveil odds are you don't have 4 talisman slots like an invader can have, and that's a big detriment 2: invaders can pop in with strong weapons at that level IF the host has them as well, which is particularly easy in elden ring with the open world, a handful of players will be watching the guides on getting an easy +6 somber or whatever and be in stormveil with that and there will be invaders that do that as well maybe intentionally or not and that's just an issue of improper game knowledge imo 3: downscaling flat defense should happen but it's a fine balance because in dark souls 1 from experience nuking in coop for a host at like 200 the defense could get aggressively low and it needs to be well done or else it's awkward 4: the biggest issue in the end is lack of understanding from most players, people will always complain and hate, refuse to accept the other viewpoints and that's how it'll be, and as such things will get progressively more toxic and turn into a war for the casual player base
I get co op / invasions at stormveil at somber 1-3 lvl 20-40. I tested and when I went to somber 4 I no longer got anything at stormveil, but got instant invasion at raya. Twinking in stormveil is very much a thing, and the talisman slots and perfume are a big advantage, also duping starlight shards is OP. Every once in a while you'll see a full bull goat dual naginata seppuku with the carry weight physick.
@@Chonus somber 5 or 6 would probably be better in stormveil then, as before the volcano manor jump was patched you could easily get +9 somber now it stops at +6 super easy, so that's more likely where people end up max upgrade on low levels seems reasonable as well, full challenge runners and stuff don't play online almost ever but there's some people like myself that occasionally do challenges and don't bother to turn off online, it'd be funny for an almost player base of level 10 people to go around at max weapon and pvp
@@AutistiCat2406 I hate to break it to you but you will never match or invade someone in stormveil with that high of a weapon level, there's no activity above 4.
I see the view, from both co opers and invaders, that they feel a need to "punish" the other side by making the experience as miserable as possible for them and there's just a lot of genuine anger at other people for how they play the game and they're both such alien and terminally online gamer point of views I can't help but laugh. "I'm going to be toxic in a video game because this person is playing the video game" is dumb in an objectively funny way
I just pick cool weapons and try to use them in pvp. Low level flamberge/urumi dex invasions for stormveil can be really fun, but often you just get RoB by a bull goat phantom who teabags your body like you deserved to get 1 shot bled to death by the weapon art 😞
Not sure if we watched the same video but as Jund said it's an arms-race. It's more like "I might as well do everything I can to win since my opponents are doing that". If you can't beat 'em join 'em. No one is being "punished". Dying over and over sucks. It's simply an adaptation. This is especially the case here since the game is bullshit by design. It's not really supposed to be fair.
@@aktyelements8034 Yeah, this has been my experience in it's entirety since I haven't invaded much yet and all the invasions I've done have been awful. Even right at launch my first few invasions were rot breath and moonveil spam hell. I'm taking a break because I wasn't really feeling playthrough 2 but I plan for this to be my invader character and I almost dread whatever I'm going to be walking into
Oversimplified. They're also not alien. Yes we can regurgitate "it's a game mechanic" ad nauseum but one mechanic visits something on others while the arms race is the response to said imposition. It's called adapting. Weren't pv-ers told to get gud for years? To many of them, this is what that looks like. Sometimes people are given what they ask for and still don't like the answer.
1. pick astrologer class 2. put 20~ levels into int 3. run to get meteorite staff 4. invade low levels with no upgraded weapons, 40~ int and a staff with S scaling
Maybe they need to select people by areas that they've explored. If I spend some time and collect some items in the late game areas then I won't be able to invade or be summoned by the player that is making his first steps in Limgrave.
When it comes to over leveled phantoms the only thing thats really broken about them is status effects and resistances. Twink invaders can have all 4 talisman slots, late game weapons/armor, and more flask. Phantoms will have all this to so it kinda evens out if you run into over leveled phantoms. Other then a over leveled phantom that one hit status proc then twink invaders have it better off at lower levels. Everything is so nerfed on phantoms that the host usually hits harder then the phantoms. My friend was level 20 and I was 90 with maxed weapons and he hit for double the damage I did with a 3+ katana. The same goes for invaders that they usually hit harder then the phantoms but they also have the late game status weapons so they kill the host really fast and the phantoms are nerfed where they have less health then the host but have higher resistances so they last just a little longer. Imo if your invading at lower levels you should only have the gear appropriate to that level and only have late game gear for a phantom that is also using late game gear.
Whenever I’m playing with friends, I try to make an effort to make a new character and play through with them. I’ve known the frustration of invaders since I started playing Dark souls 3, so if my friend and I do get invaded we are the same level and I’m not going to nuke any enemy. It also makes the game more challenging for you and your friend as the only benefit that you are bringing to the table is pure experience.
Would be cool if invaders’ stats could dynamically scale with the average of the hosts’ and their cooperators. Like you invade a lvl 50 guy and then he summons a lvl 100 buddy and your stats dynamically shift to ~lvl 75. Like how bosses’ health increase with summons
So my take on this is actually that this is a problem caused entirely by From, not co-opers or PvPers, and the root of it comes down to Scholar of the First Sin adding extra slots for phantoms, and then DS3 subsequently making it more difficult to invade solo players.
The problem with the first thing is that generally speaking, at any point except the very start of a Souls game's lifespan, a given world is far more likely to have max friendly phantoms than max hostile. Add to the mix that invaders are hostile to each other by default, and this creates an arms race, where PvPers are looking for builds that can deal with being overwhelmed, and this normally comes in the form of builds that one-shot hosts.
The second thing adds to this scenario because now PvPers go in KNOWING they're going to be overwhelmed, and thus start leaning towards hyper-optimization of their builds even more, the so-called 'gank spank' builds, especially considering the prevalence of ganksquads in DS3. This creates a nightmare for non-ganking hosts, especially those who, perhaps not able or willing to get through the game solo, summon all of their friends and just want to go through PvE with them all, utterly unprepared for PvP and not wanting to do it anyway, because they're now the most likely invasion targets, not even by choice of the PvPers. So at this point, you have PvPers unhappy because they have to go in knowing they're most likely going to be utterly overwhelmed unless they go with whatever the OP thing is at the time, and you have co-op players unhappy because they're getting invaded by PvPers optimized to murder gank squads. It may seem counterintuitive, but the ability to invade solo or group players randomly, without bias, was essential for PvP balance, because it stopped this arms race from happening. Yes, twinking was a problem, but honestly, by the time DS3 came around, some very good systems had been added in to mitigate it so that it wasn't near the level of DS1, and from there refinements can continue to come. What's important is that invaders should be able to invade without knowing about their circumstances ahead of time, so that the gank squads can be written off as outliers instead of the norm, and not something worth preparing specifically for with their builds.
Ultimately I feel that From has a problem of commitment. They've seen that co-op, especially with friends is far more popular a style of play than intended in DS1, and that invasion frustrates many people after that style, but they refuse to either refine the original invasion system or utterly abandon it, taking half-measures in either direction that leave nobody satisfied.
well-said
There may now be an arms race, but I don’t think that’s actually the real issue. The big issue is simply that the game isn’t built with either co-op or PvP as a core game element.
You can say that invasions are a vital part of the game, but think about it. Everyone who supports unwanted invasions says that it’s necessary to balance how co-op makes the core PvE non-boss content too easy. Co-op isn’t designed into the PvE experience.
Conversely, I never have to invade anyone to progress the game, nor does it give me anything that particularly helps in progression.
And that leads to invaders being dominated by people who have stopped being interested in progressing their game. People who have already beaten the game. People who repeat play the game. And when solo invasions happen even when the host only intends to get to Ornstein and Smough with humanity so they can summon Sun-bro so they can just make it through the fight and progress their first play through, they get wrecked because they are having trouble just making it to the fog gate. So of course they develop a bad taste for PvP. FromSoft theoretically put invaders at a disadvantage by reducing flasks, etc., but that was never the case, even without the problems with end game weapons being brought into it. There’s simply an inherent PvP skill gap between the standard invader vs. the unsuspecting host.
In this video, Scott even says he thinks one invader vs. 3 phantoms is balanced. He expects that invaders are generally vastly better than the people they play against. In the previous video about how no one cares about the meta, he said he was having so much fun invading at high level specifically because the hosts “had no idea what they were doing”. That’s the meta that invaders have come to expect. PvP is fun for you when you are whaling on guys who don’t know what they are doing.
Rather than figure out how to actually address those fundamental issues, From has simply removed unwanted PvP from the solo PvE experience, which was always the core of the game.
Make PvP an exclusively NG+ thing. However, some equipment and all covenant rewards (I know ER doesn't have them, but some incentive for PvP is good imo) can only be obtained with PvP enabled, and some bosses are locked behind No Summoning (spirit or phantom) mode.
Challenge runs were fun. DS2 had the right idea with Covenant of Champions and those weapon invisibility rings.
Also, still has the best NG+ system by far. I was frankly really disappointed with ER's barebones ng+ system. It's a game meant to be played for a long ass period, but does not actually reward sticking to one character like DS2 does, nor does it encourage making new characters like DS1 does. It's a jack of all trades, master of *FEW* game.
Hopefully DLC fixes some of my gripes.
@@hands-ongaming7180 Not really. It's not an uncommon tactic for hosts to just sit near a campfire and wait indefinitely until the invader gets bored and either leaves or rushes. Generally speaking, in my experience, the more friendly summons in a world, the less likely I am to be able to use the mobs and environment at all because they just sit at the bonfire.
I really hope they don't abandon the invasion system but i would be lying if that wasnt the vibe I'm getting after Elden Ring.
The PvP being a weird laggy janky mess is what makes me somewhat sympathize with people hating getting invaded. But this is also such a unique aspect to the Souls series that I wish From focused on improving the netcode and jankiness instead of sidelining the whole mechanic and setting up odd hoops to go through.
You hit the nail on the head. You'd think From would have a better netcode and servers by now with their giant budget.
@@Ezio9791 it’s a Bandai problem.
Yeah dying a few times is certainly the reason for hatred....
Ikr? I know from myself that i created some distance then the attack still connects, complete bs yall dont know how many times a died on a duel by this
When I do taunters tongue to get 2v2's and I get a dude with latency from China who's also using bhs, I might as well jump off a ledge. I've already lost the moment he came into my world cuz latency gives him i-frames from the future.
If the downscaling effectively lowered their stats (for scaling of gear/defenses) rather than decreasing health and attack rating that would lower flat defenses and stop 99 arcane instableeds.
@A cat on his hind legs. Or, it could reduce your stats to what your stats were at that level
@@evinbraley not a bad idea, but I imagine the game probably doesn't store that in your save file, so the info probably doesn't exist anymore
@A cat on his hind legs. Too much menu
You can just have a script that loops through your stats and lowers the highest one until you're at the top end of the host's summon range, and that stat sheet becomes a filter for incoming/outgoing damage and effects. On your end, you wouldn't lose access to your gear loadout but your online interactions would go through that downscaled mask. You do the same for weapon upgrade level, end of problem.
This would be especially easy for Elden Ring because all your stat related scalings and weapon AR at various upgrade levels are stored in lookup tables. The only hard part of the implementation would be adding the slot for your stat mask itself and having the netcode look for it.
@@evinbraley That would be extremely convoluted and, if you did any radical respecs, build breaking
I'd be a little lenient and add a clause to this to allow a downscaled phantom to use weapons/spells they don't meet the requirements for because of lowered stats. If done correctly (big "if") things like damage output and status effect buildup would be significantly lower, but the phantom co-oping with a friend still gets to show off cool stuff from later in the game.
They really managed to do a “What if we took Twinking, and pushed it somewhere else!?” by effectively making the poorly downscaled phantoms have the same problems as the twinks of old.
and all it does is escalate this twink arms-race where now invaders HAVE to be twinked if they expect to stand a chance against phantoms, and all it does is fuck over regular hosts who use co-op the way it was originally designed and have normal phantoms rather than "let me lvl 500 friend beat the game for me".
It's sad that Fromsoft thinks this babysitting of hosts really helps anybody. Or maybe they don't and they're just so extremely incompetent and disinterested in the balance side of things that they don't even understand why letting phantoms have 99 stats in early areas of the game is totally busted.
@@CosmicAeon its not even the dmg thats the main problem its the stacked defence and flat defence if you are max lvl + bullgoat everything hits you like a wet noodle in ng the only stuff that actually deals any dmg to you is mountaintops and later areas
why is it called twinking lmao that's so funny
@@mikemiles2241 cus homophobia is still prevalent today lul
@@charlotteatewilbur8838 Is twink even a homophobic word? And what does that have to do with getting op weapons at low lvls
To rebut your points about twinking, I was trying to make a character at a lower level to invade (without twinking), just getting some of the better stuff you can get at that point in the game. I was using the yellow goop and tongue just to see what invaders were like while I was making the character and I will say I got some nasty twinks. Of the most memorable was a guy in full bullgoat with the weightless tear in his flask while using the rot rapier and another rapier infused with poison and BHS. At this point in the game I hadn't come across anyway to heal rot and had very minimal poison healing, not to mention he could easily poise trade with any attack I threw at him, AND if I did manage to endanger him past his 7 +12 estus, he could just BHS waiting for me to rot away. Also, bleed builds absolutely destroy anyone at low levels due to lack of resistances and armor.
Yeah, I've co-op'd with some casual friends and I can remember getting invaded buy a guy running dual bandit curved sword with fucking sepuku and in like a single L1 combo he could essentially proc bleed and also was rocking a BHS dagger, pretty sure it was the misericorde but don't remember. He was essentially untouchable and when we did manage to hit him it didn't matter cause of the amount of vigor he had. we were low 30s and he had over 1200hp. I wasn't some squishy build either I had like 30 Vig and just remember being blown away that an invader had more health than I did when I put nearly all of my points into it on top of being completely out damaging us and having more flasks that healed most of his HP. Shit was extremely painful to deal with. I've never really had issues with invaders in the game and that was only one of a few that I can remember being a true pain but it feels like I run into far more "meta" builds that can essentially 1-2 shot you despite having 60Vig. Like we aren't walking around waiting to gank people, just going through having fun and helping a friend who isn't the greatest and the soul series but still enjoys it no matter how many times they die. Really feels like both sides have a toxic few that just inflate issues for both sides.
^ this. I made a twink build just to see how effective it was. I had a friend drop me a ROB and a silver tear mask. I lvl'd my character to 30 enough points to wield ROB and the rest in vigor, lvl'd my weap to plus 2. With two talisman slots (they were crappy talismans anyways so that didn't matter much). Out of around 40-45 invasion I lost only twice, not bragging or anything. What I did could hardly be counted as skillful. I think I only ran into a couple of hosts with over leveled phantoms, the rest were just new players trying to play the game. Just trying to prove a point. Oh I was also invading at Stormveil. Twinking is still alive in this game and definitely possible.
I got so many invaders running almost the exact same thing on my Tongue run early on. Twinking isn't dead, not by a long shot. It's just been moved to status proc builds.
he addressed this point too
yeah, but this happened because you used the taunter's tongue though. In a more normal situation you will have 2 phantoms around RL 150-200 chaffeuring you around against 1-2 reds who are way underleveled and 1 of them will be overencumbered after a few seconds.
I firmly believe this divide is the biggest issue in the souls community. And I know it's not ever going away, but damn does it feel worse than ever in Elden Ring
it's worse here because this game has become this absolute juggernaut
@@AzNZinc and It’s unbalanced af
Theres more reds than co-op players, so players summon at the boss door to avoid getting invaded. A feedback loop of constant invasions.
Once the casuals leave it’ll be fine
@@ch33zyburrito36 nah, once co-op players leave it will just be invaders and gank squads, when you even find a world to invade
As for being annoyed with invaders, I kind of understand it because it's so frequent. Invaders don't have anyone to invade other than cooperaters and cooperaters usually put there sign in front of the fog gate. As a result the only people who get invaded are usually doing password matchmaking or something
And many of those password matchmakers are also still putting signs only at boss gates just to avoid the invaders, byt that's obviously not counting the people who in other games would have given a try to co-op(or even the game itself, like was my case in Bloodborne 5 years ago) if not for invasions being forced upon the players during co-op, often without even getting any semblance of a reward for actually engaging with the invader.
This is exactly the issue. Invasions basically don't happen at all unless it's password friends helping each other through the level, which are almost all over leveled. Between that and the great rune host advantage, all low level invasions after Stormveil are basically a shit show and a waste of time. You never get good 1v1's anymore, since anyone good going through the level doesn't bother to summon except maybe for some bosses. I feel like this game just ruined invasions because it's almost like a separate gank/Twink PvP mode now and not an organic part of a users playthrough.
Me and my friends get invaded as soon as we get summoned and then every 15 minutes after that 🙃
Part of the problem I think is that we no longer have covenants like Gravelord, Blade of Darkmoon - no indictment system and so on.
with the game being as wildly popular as it is has a influence on frequent invasions as well.
I actually thought that this video was going to reference InfernoPlus' video called "How Elden Ring's Multiplayer System Backfired" where he talks about this. The way that matchmaking works in Elden Ring definitely contributes towards invaders and co-opers hating each other so much, and with some tweaks could be made less shit.
yeah exactly this. he didn't really talk much about how the lack of solo invasions has affected the whole MP experience but IMO that is clearly the most toxic thing about the entire system.
I know people blame technical issues with torrent and the open field areas for this, but there's no reason the classic dungeon areas like the academy and castle morne couldn't support solo invaders. it's just bad design IMO.
@@chastermief839 I'm wondering tho how would the solo invasion work since we have no hollow/humanity state? Wouldn't player be invaded every 3 minute with no chance of stopping invasion since there no hollow state? Perhaps they could make it like bb or DS2 invasion cancelling tho...
@@TrickyMellow Great Runes.
@@chastermief839 IMO
See, here's the thing, you actually can enable solo invasions. Get the taunter's tongue.
Everyone always says that "if you don't want to get invaded, stay hollow/don't ember." Yet, when they make that the default state, the PvP community complains about it.
To me, this looks like the fun of PvP invasions depends on invading people who actually don't want to be invaded, and aren't prepared for it.
One thing you missed about low level invasions.. all you need is a rot or poison weapon and the low levels have absolutely no counter - you cant get many boluses early. The rot or poison will eat through 5+ potions. Its extremely unfair and very common low level.
Yeah Rot is definitely a issue at low level invasions, however poison is actually not that big of a deal, you can literally get the recipe to craft the boluses with the merchant behind the area where you start the game, is more a exploration issue at that point from the host
@@IanImperial19 the problem is on combat tbdu disable the crafting. Dumbest shit ever. Why would they do this?
@@chasegaetze4507 ye being in combat removes your ability to look at the map, like wtf??
In defence of the PVE co-op players, I finally got my brother to play Elden Ring and we started new characters together. Almost immediately we were invaded by someone with end game gear.
They had maxed out flasks, excellent physik flasks, and if I had to guess they were probably rocking some pretty sweet talismans. It's hard to overstate how much of an advantage having weapons with good ashes of war is in PvP.
I'm ok at PvP and managed to hold them off but 15 minutes later we got another just like it who killed us while we were fighting enemies, 15 mins later it happened again. After 3 or 4 times he'd just had enough and was like fuck this game.
On-point
Meanwhile Bloodborne had a diegetic opt-out of invasions and thanks to that i was able to learn how to play these games with my friends, fast forward 5 years and i'm yet to get tired of soulslikes, when i wouldn't even have thought about trying them if not for that.
Yeah I'm not particularly a fan of any of this...
Theyre not that bad... you gotta take a different mindset.
If they were spawning in an extra hard a.i. enemy randomnly when you summon would that be such a big deal?
Worst case you die and go back to one of the ample graces in each area.
If he played solo how many times would he be going back to the grace? He would die all the time. Invaders are the wild card to make pvp more interesting because without it you would probably rip through every level very quickly
@@asdfghjkllkjhgfdsa8725 A random extra hard AI with an unlimited inventory of weapons and up to 7 full heals would be a terrible design choice, which is why they don't have exactly that in the game anywhere.
@@asdfghjkllkjhgfdsa8725 but they dont want pvp thats the whole issue
No, man, this isn't just a case of "I don't like PvP, I don't want invasions because they're annoying". This is what most content creators who share this kind of videos don't understand. The problem is how the multiplayer experience in ER works.
There is NO incentive for random people to coop. There is no incentive in the overworld, where 90% of the mobs are easy enough for any single host, and where being without the horse makes exploration slow and painful. There is no incentive in the dungeons, which are also really easy, and the fact that you need to use a consumable to even see summon signs makes cooping unintuitive.
So what happens? Randoms only summon at the fog gate, and the only ones constantly being invaded are friends who are just trying to have a good time. And when I say constantly, I mean *constantly*. I did my NG+ fully in coop with a friend, with the intention of goofing around, and it was a constant stream of sweaty tryhards dead set on having no fun in life. We had to stop making wacky builds and keep meta stuff at hand so that we didn't have to rush the areas.
The problem here is the way ER's multiplayer works: it turned every single area of the game into Ds3 Gank City where no fun is allowed and it's a constant arms race between shell shocked players.
This, 1000x this, plus he severely underestimates how much you can twink in this game
@@dylanisonfireOG no such thing as “chill” in a souls game though? Nothing chill about any of these games. You want to chill play Minecraft. Hard truth
You have to be chill if you want to do well in Souls games--reading movement, dodging correctly with patience, timing and counting your strikes, you have to be "chill." Anyways, you should know what I was implying with that statement so get out of here.
I can tell you never played ds1 and demon souls. Where Miyazaki intended it for co op to be played with strangers
@@ottogofast3882 hard truth you could go to any of the three arenas but you'd rather gank co-opers and bitch so hard about it you try to change the definition of what ganking means. You could fight 1v1 with someone who isn't rushing through a level just to avoid you. You'd have a willing opponent.
But you want your katana comp clips don't you? So bad you'd hack the game and risk getting banned.
The invaders share more blame. Its always been the most toxic and sweaty part of the community. They choose to invade. From should just take out invasions at this point.
Even as an invader turned duelist I can't blame the PVErs.
Watching my wife and her friend try to co-op this game has given me an interesting perspective on this, and I think I see a very obvious solution. Invasions at super low levels are a complete disaster. Without any exception, over the course of 4 weekends every invader has been a hard-core twink, and the invasions do not let up for a second. They're just trying to roam around the first two sections together, they are not even slightly equipped to deal with stuff like scarlet rot. The cure isn't even available for several more sections and they are trying to experience the game not look up guides to counter twinkers. People using invisible glintstone glitch, people using helmet glitch when they get nicked even once, people using every crossbow in the game with poison and rot and bleed and so on. If I had the game for PC I would be on anti-twink duty, with a level 300 moonveil build bored out of my mind clearing twinks to give them 10 minutes to explore. As it stands I'm 90% sure they are just going to quit or wait for a mod that let them play together without any nonsense should such a thing become available. I guess the game isn't for them, kind of a shame really as they are enjoying everything but the invasions.
It seems to me that the people who want help with a level and the people who want to invade are not exactly compatible. At best one person wants that fight. No joke, it's a legit tactic for my wife and her friend to just sit down. Sometimes the invaders execute them, sometimes they just leave because they DO want a fight, just one heavily tilted in their favor. No one is being serviced here except gankers, who are just twinks that have decided to hunt other twinks instead of noobs. They also want a fight, but also only one that is heavily tilted in their favor. It's the exact same thing, and any invader running an area "below their level" has zero right to complain. I agree with Scott, the ideal invasion has everyone around the same level of equipment not both sides having some stupid arms race to twink the hardest.
The solution is obvious, have a toggle in the main menu to allow or disallow invasions. People who just want to chill their way through the game can, and those who want conflict can have it without using a consumable and a tongue and maybe still not getting invaded at all. That doesn't even feel like an invasion. I took multiple steps to invite you into my world. You're less an invader and more of a crappy guest. I miss solo invasions myself, I would rarely actually fight people but shadowing them and harassing them through a level was a ton of fun. Now hosts have two friends and a blue, I can hardly even do my friendly invader memes because one person getting bloodthirsty makes them act like sharks.
I understand there are concerns about size of playerbase if you allow people to just turn off PvP, but I think it will increase since it would involve bringing back solo invasions. You can also have the toggle set to "on" by default as many people wont think to turn it off or it will hit their ego to think they backed away from a challenge. It can permanently switch to "on" once they reach NG+ further expanding the playerbase while giving newer players considerable time to learn the game. Solo players are unironically the people who need to be invaded, we don't need help with the level. Why are people who do the target? It's illogical bordering on bad game design.
Since I've written this wall of text, the estus issue is also obvious. Limit everyone to the host estus cap at max, and allow players to allocate estus outside of a bonfire or if you have to be limiting make them select estus allocation before spawning. If that doesn't work for you then have estus amount be part of the matchmaking. If you have 14 estus charges you can only invade people with 12+ and so on. At the very least the people with the twink builds would need to go through the game again with no healing which would cut the number down by a significant amount and some folks wont rebuild out of lazyness. This would give noobs a pretty large reprieve
Hey maybe this was a while ago but I think recently they have updated the invasion down time so that you can’t get invaded repeatedly without using the taunter’s tongue. I believe it’s about 5 minutes at least. I don’t understand Stormveil twink invasions either, these people probably just want to wail on newbies for easy kills. Grow a pair of balls and invade elsewhere.
Honestly I feel like most of these problems can no lo ger be fixed. The whole game is open from the start, so anyone looking to twink limgrave and run anywhere to grab everything they need, and From can't stop them. And From intended this from the beginning, you play coop, you opt into invasion.
The best solution for your wife I think, is to just play by herself until a certain point where twinkling isn't so bad any more. Like Liurnia, at least past Stormveil Castle. By then not only is she in an area with 'fair' PVP, she should also be hopefully good enough to hold her own if they do get invaded in coop.
But I know some people don't play games much and, well, suck, and don't have time to 'git gud' so if it happens your wife gives up, that's how it is
@@johnapple6646 so let me get this straight.
Some dude just told you that his wife has trouble with ER coop, since she gets stomped by twinkers at low levels.
Your fix for that issue would be: she should play alone or stop playing at all?
I hope I'm just misreading what you're saying, because that sounds super silly.
@@boneman-calciumenjoyer8290 Unfortunately he's not wrong. The game isn't going to change for her. There is a chance she decides to take that path, it just wont be the experience she wanted or would have enjoyed most. I hope she continues, it's her first souls game with exception of beating the asylum daemon in DS1 and at times she seems to be having a lot of fun.
@@boneman-calciumenjoyer8290 well yeah dude. If you have no way to fix an issue, try to change the way you interact with it. Because I'm positive from soft will never put in a "opt in/out" of pvp.
Limgrave invasions are just not nice for anyone imo. Twinks, afk farmers, total noobs. Best just get past that area quickly. I fought Godrick with my friend and it was fun.
A battle of people trying to out-twink each other. My man, you just stated the entire state of PvP.
Invasions*
Duels are nothing like this, you know exactly what you're getting into and expect everybody's characters to be strong and well-built
@@nxvh9062 Duels are just as cancerous, if not worse. So many chuggers, people attacking right away, BHS spammers with regen flask...
It's unfun.
Hoked Damn straight. Sure duels are good buts that’s if I don’t get a chugger or some buff edge lord, or even ganked. Yeah, as a duelist I’ve been summoned to duel only to be surprise ganked and this is happening lots lately.
On the topic of twinking, going with your example of being level 30 at Stormveil Castle, there is no system in place to prevent invaders from also having 4 talisman slots which could also be the max level versions of said talismans vs someone who generally at that area in the game is only going to have 2 talismans at the first level of said talisman. That imo is a bigger issue than someone who has late game farmmable consumables such as better arrows or something.
Technocally its not as much of an issue in this game. Most damage boosting talismans are % based. That paired with weapon level match making restricts your damage output massively. The bigger issue is invaders in stormvale bringing 99x consumables, bombs, max flasks and max flask upgrades is where things get shameful
@@Helleuphoria Max flasks I agree with. Bombs can easily be dodged and also scale of off stats as well. So if your low level it's not going to make a difference. However having 2 more Talisman slots than someone will make a difference. Especially like the Warrior Jar shard you get at Crumbling Farum Azula. On top of how strong ash of war damage is already. I get it's percentage base but all that shit adds up. Especially when you factor in the talismans like the Millicent prosthetic and the winged sword insignia plus a the bleed talisman and mask. You will be annihilating low level players who probably have a base version of the health talisman and the green turtle talisman.
I only had 2 interactions with invaders so far, both as a phantom and both were really funny. One was in Elphael, dude started throwing fire at us from behind an I got so confused that I died. Had a good laugh at that. The other was at Farum, once again, invader was on a higher ledge throwing magic at us, this time we spot him first though, so I whip out the greatbow and start countersniping. I manage to hit him a couple times and we engage in ranged battle so much so that I think he forgot there were 2 other guys, who then proceeded to sneak up and push him off the ledge. Both encounters were comedy gold.
"Twinking got harder in this game"
Me thinking about all the dual Naginata seppuku/BHS with 7 estus + 12 and 10 starlight shards I started to meet at lvl 30 during my taunter tongue playthrough
Oh and don't forget the rot rapier
In full bull goats with only like 9 endurance, thanks to the equip load flask
There should just be an Invader Server, where all Invaders can invade each other and be happy.
This lol. Scott is full of shit. He probably never had to deal with this.
@@IridescentKySoul that's literally just arena
for me the stuff that sucks to get invaded by early is: OP ashes and spells i don't have access to yet, the pulley crossbow, and the fact that as a person who mostly co-ops fighting another human is WILDLY different and a skillset I don't have.
My friends, and I have put thousands of hours into from soft games together. We mostly PVE, but as seasoned players (just 4 of us) we know invasions are coming, and welcome them. If we are tryin to accomplish something, we can be as toxic as your typical ROB user, but 98% of the time, invaders are an absolute fucking treat. We don our stupidest helmets, and begin what ever gesture that makes us laugh as a greeting(fire spurn me) is always a classic, and depending on the aggression of the invader will 1v1, and laugh our asses off at either our demise, or victory. The looming threat of invasion by an elite player has always been one of the best parts of the souls experience for us, and we have a lotta love for you guys dedicated to it. 🤙🏼🖤
I love fighting players with mindsets like that, willing to just have fun, 1v1, and the likes. It's not expected, but it's super fun, especially silly helmets and emotes since I usually great with a Fire Spurn me and wear Albinauric mask.
your words cut deep... deeper than any blade
*friendship*
Im a solo player that also really enjoys the occasional invader on my normal playthroughs, so the Eldenring situation is really shitty for me. Only way to get invasions as a solo is with taunters tongue and then there is no cooldown so i cant progress at all.
@@heibk-2019 Yeah taunter's tongue just opens the floodgates. Fun if you're trying to fight club, useless if you're trying to just let your door open a crack for em.
Hey man, not an ideal solution, and personally I would change it, but you can actually deactivate the taunters tongue. So you could activate it, wait to get invaded and then deactivate it so if you kill invader you won’t get invaded again until you activate the tongue again.
I feel like Invading should be changed from having an co op buddy to having an active great rune, both gameplay and lore wise.
First of, you will be invading a lot fewer ganks, the co opers can play with their friends without getting invaders, and you would get a lot wider invasion pool.
However, you would not be able to invade before stormveil.
Well, lets just note down the misstakes of Elden Ring for future games. Lets hope for a better Elden Ring 2.
What you just said makes so much sense that it hurts me knowing it's not the current system
@@sixft_under trust me, having this profane revelation hurts even more.
"thr co-opers can play with their friends without getting invaded" i wish that was the case of so much, but it's never gonna happen because fromsoftware insists thinking invasions are a good balance for pve co-op when all they do is deter most players from summoning at anything but a boss gate, even the rewards for killing an invader are pitiful to say the least and effectively the only reason not to kill yourself/altf4 as soon as an invader comes in in co-op if you are taking your time playing with your friend, is actually feeling like you might give pvp a chance due to the uneven playing field and not wanting to bother with loading screens.
If either it was like you said (so basically like ds3 but with a small downside if you opt out of invasions) or the way Bloodborne did it with a "find this thing in the map and kill it before an invader comes in and you effectively opted out, now you have all the time you need to absorb the world'd atmosphere and combat step-by-step with your friend" there would be INFINITELY less vitriol in the community than it is now.
But that won't happen.
So at least make it worth it to fight the invaders... Even a single smithing stone piece equivalent to the weapon upgrade range bracket the invader and you are in would already be incentive enough to try and win, if rune arcs aren't possible, or maybe create an invasions currency and equivalent store, where maybe you're selling a rune arc for every two invaders killed as well as maybe cracked pots, arteria leaves, special weapons, armor dyes etc, if that was the case man, you'd see people jump into pvp right off the bat(although i'm aware that would also increase the amount of gankers, but there's really no deleting gankers from the game honestly)
Agree mostly but change great rune active to a rune arc active
Personally, I think that all this accomplishes is making me never use a rune arc outside of a boss fight. I don’t enjoy souls PvP, it’s always just felt like a shitty 3D fighting game to me, and so I just play the game with whatever PvE build I want and don’t bother with speccing for PvP. An invader with a PvP set up has a massive advantage over a single PvE player just using a PvE build. So if I’m going to lose a PvP fight if I pop a rune arc, why bother popping that rune arc outside of a boss fight (where I’m safe from invaders)? The answer is there’s no reason. This is exactly how I played DS3, I never used an ember outside of a boss fight unless I was trying to fight an NPC invader. And immediately after a boss fight when they gave me an ember, I went to Firelink shrine, spent my souls, and then jumped off the map so I wouldn’t have to deal with any invaders. To be clear, I don’t hate invaders and I want y’all to have a good time. I just don’t think the ember system is a good solution because all it does in reality is encourage those who don’t enjoy PvP to avoid the ember/rune arc mechanic at all costs because the pretty good buff isn’t worth the hassle
I will say when I first booted up the game my friend and I wanted to literally just run around Limgrave and explore together. We were both default starting characters. We ended up quitting for the evening being frustrated because we didn't get to explore anywhere due to invasions. We ended up just deciding to play solo and not bother playing together.
It really didn't matter if the people invading us weren't technically twinking. It really didn't matter that we technically were similar levels and had similar upgrades on our weapons. They still had gear and abilities we didn't have or understand and they just spam killed us every time we tried to coop. Even if on paper we had the "advantage" in practice we were noobs and they weren't so we got curb stomped with almost no counterplay.
It turned into a case where the two of us were too unskilled to play together since cooping meant a skilled player would come and kill us. Imo that's not a healthy state for new players. Can't do anything but be hunted down and die if make the mistake of trying to play with a friend.
Damn that hit me in the feels
It's funny how this ends up being flipped on invaders too. Invaders tend to twink so much in this game because there's so much broken shit to deal with from hosts and phantoms who actually know what they're doing, and in turn those invaders end up using way stronger things and being way more skilled than they need to be for the newer players they run into. Combine that with invasions ONLY being guaranteed for co-opers, and pretty immediately after one person's summoned and it just becomes unfun for everyone.
It almost feels like this game was truly designed for invaders and co-opers to hate each other.
I went ahead and made a pretty heavily twinked character to help people kill Margit & Godrick. Eventually I got tired of people not skipping Godrick's cutscene and figured I'd give invading a shot. The difference between my character and some rando going through Stormveil for the first time is huge. I've got 4 talismans, I've got better armor, I've got a mixture of later-game weapons & weapon ashes that, even if they're only +2 or whatever, just gives me way more versatility and power than what a low level player with like 4 different weapons to his name will have.
Because of this, I kind of modulate how much of my build I utilize based on how well the coopers are doing. If they're right after a grace, not fighting any enemies, there're 3 of them, etc., I'll use all my buffs and skills and whatnot and go try to win a 3v1. If there're a couple of them and they're struggling against the normal mobs, I won't use buffs, or just melee, or sometimes not even engage at all. There're times when I'll just stand out of reach and use the cheer emote. There's honestly something kinda funny about seeing someone notice you, notice you're not moving, wave at you, and then go back to what they're doing. Hell, one time, we got invaded by a second red named Hitler, and I just completely ignored the host and killed the other red, because let's be honest, if you get the chance, you gotta kill Hitler.
Idk where I'm going with this exactly, other than that I think it's good to be a little conscientious as an invader. Being the boss fight is fun and dunking on people in 3v1s is great, but just shredding people who're already struggling to get through the game normally is kind of a dick move.
I also invade for the pvp side of it.
Thrice I invaded in Altus only to find they're fighting an overworld boss.
First time was the Sentinel duo and they're already at it.
I jumped on the side wall thingy and cheered on for little bit and severed.
Second time was Fallingstar Beast. Phantom saw me and immediately went to attack me hehe. Understandable. After trying to just dodge, I gave in and stopped. Wanted to cheer for them hehe.
He gave a bow, probably seeing I didn't attack, and went back to help.
Third time they were trying to cheese the Sentinel duo. By being high up and phantom using jar cannon, one-eye shield and Erdtree greatbow. I had fun just wasting their time. Like, when I get to the ledge that shows me, I used the casual greeting. Whenever I fall down or they throw me off, I always used the casual greeting when I showed up again hehe. I was in prankster mood that time, so I didn't really attack. Just run around and dodging. Died when I ran out of flasks.
This sad Cycle of Hatred Between Invaders and Co-Opers continues because there is no 3v3 arena where we can take it out on each other properly :P
Comment from the future. Arena exists and invaders don't use it because they don't want fair pvp. They want to bully noobs
I think bringing back solo invasions would open up the pool and reduce the friction between password co-opers (the 3v1s with over leveled phantoms) and invaders. Same argument inferno plus made. I don't think they'd mind dealing with one invader every hour or so if the pool was much bigger to invade unlike the constant invasions now.
Solo invasions are already in the game through opt in with the Taunter’s tongue. Unfortunately, it opens you up to being invaded by multiple people at once but I found it fun to do a run with the tongue active the entire time. Most people aren’t in that boat though so it’s hard to incentivize. The old system of needing humanity or embers active was never fun as it was a limited resource power up that could be wasted by pure bad luck of getting an invasion right before the boss you planned on using it against so I’m glad invasion eligibility isn’t tied to rune arcs for Elden ring
The other side of things is that invaders spend so much time building RL[X] characters to be able to deal with overleveled phantoms more than to deal with the hosts.
My RL30 +8 (Yes, I grabbed Rogier's rapier by accident. I probably should raise my RL as a result, but I don't want to) character, I feel, has to complete basically the entire game to unlock specific counterplay options that are more or less mandatory for dealing with certain things (Jar Cannon/Hand Ballista and the Lightning/Explosive greatbolt merchants, Icy Spear for fingerprint, RKR, etc).
It makes this situation where invaders need to stack the deck as much as they can just to be able to have a prayer of getting around phantoms that are 200+ levels above them, which leads to them being massively overoptimized for dealing with the hosts in most situations, ESPECIALLY organic invasions. So the hosts think that the invaders are trying to just get cheesy one shots, or ruin fun with cheese, but in reality the invaders are just trying to give themselves a chance to deal with the people abusing password summons.
I'unno, ER is my first souls title so on my PvE playthrough I saw a bit of the pure PvEr side, and not understanding where the angle on the invaders exactly was, but after maybe 5-10 invasions I already understood exactly why they were built the way they were, and I moved over to siding with the invaders' perspective.
Honestly, I don't think this would be a problem if gank squads weren't so favoured. Without a near insurmountable challenge to prepare for, pressure for invaders to hyperoptimize their builds decreases, and the mentality of "Well, I'm just going to be walking into bullshit, so I might as well play as though everything is a bullshit gank" declines. God knows I used to be the kind of invader to always bow before trying to take out the hosts' setups, but enough fake 1v1s, dragon breath corners, Nihil through floors, etc garbage more or less convinced me never to trust or treat a host honorably, 'cause if they do it, they can get saved, but if I do it and they're fakin, it's basically curtains. So yeah, I think that gankers are the root of the community divide problem. And they probably think they're being heroes for it, too is the sad part
@oohanalligator Part of what I've been doing a bit lately is solo taunter's tonguing and just doing silly shit like sitting in rainbow stone rings or writing out "U R CUTE" in them. I let things fight club if they go for it, and support with warming stones, and I pretty much just mirror whatever aggression is going on from the invaders' side. It's a lot more enjoyable that way, invader builds are often much more interesting than ganker builds, and since I'm using an invader build myself and not trying to AoW cheese people I'm hoping to give some enjoyable (albeit not organic) invasions, win or lose.
Also, 2H heavy Grave Scythe is legit.
I'm a filthy casual who enjoys the PvE and throws myself off a cliff if I get invaded to reset the invasion timer. Fight me irl behind the Wendys.
🤣
chad
Just play offline g. Unless you are co oping
honestly though, even the aspects of overleveled phantoms that do get downscaled, don't get hit hard enough. oveleveled phantoms still have twice your health than you and deal twice your damage as a low level invader. i think from should just go nuts and downscale the shit out of overleveled phantoms. they jus make both pvp and pve a cakewalk for the host
You think it'll work if they have adjusted downscaling based on the difference between the levels of the phantom and host? The higher the difference, the more downscale they get since the players power tends to scale exponentially.
yeah I always find it hilarious how they spent 2 patches balancing Radahn as if they care about balance, but people are allowed lvl 500 phantoms to insta-kill him if they like. Don't kid yourself Fromsoft, you quite clearly don't give a shit about PvE balance (or PvP naturally)
It's always been that way cos pathetic people can't get good at the game they bought.
I think it downscales everything separately; the game looks at the hp bar and says "hmm that's too high, reduce that some", then does the same for attack. So you essentially get twice the levels of value (say host is level 30 you get the max hp possible for a lv 30 and max attack possible for a lv 30) not the even balance players should have
@@mlhx9181 Ok so the game already has a system to decide the appropriate level range of a Red invader for the host. Just figure out how to set a friendly phantom so that he's at the middle of that Red invader level range. You'd have to figure out how to bring down the HP bar and stat totals but it seems like just applying the right % modifier to his stats would do it.
The most fun you can have in Elden Ring pvp is as an invader using a versatile or non-meta build and finding 3 players all the same level range actually going through the area. Instead, the multiplayer mechanics push both sides to use the strongest or most viable builds for lower skilled players.
Moonveil and river of blood and bloodhound step should not be use in pvp it ruins the fun
@@davidspearim5552 It wasn't pvp until you invaded tho.
@@davidspearim5552 invaders are pushing people to use the meta because some people just want to enjoy playing the game at normal pace look and explore with their friends instead of rushing and skipping things because they know that they can get invaded any moment now and they'd lose all the progress they made since last grace.
@@brewtron It is PvP if the rivers and BHS user invades you.
@@brewtron No I put down a pvp sign When people summoned me into their world to fight me I expect a proper fight not people using those weapons I understand when people wanna play the game with their friends that's why I put down that red sign in that in that Academy Where people fight a lot but it ruins the fun when they use them I understand if you want to use those for PVE
My partner and I (still on our first playthrough btw, we just haven't had the time to really binge the game that much) don't have any problem with invaders because we treat them as an event that's just a part of the game's DNA.
The main problem we have is that the timing in between them feels much more oppressive than previous games, as if the "cooldown" is nonexistent, because having someone wear us down in a fight only to have someone else come in 5 minutes after the invader dies or worse; the SAME guy invading 10 minutes after, makes invasions a nuisance more than anything and it's gotten tiring at this point.
Yeah, seems cooldowns in general are a foreign concept to ER. Invasion cooldowns, enemy attack cooldowns......
@@mwjgcreeves4984 taunters tongue removes the cooldown.. dont activate that and you'll wont get invaded nearly as much
It's because there are not enough spots to invade because of current limitations, so red players wait a long time to get a spot, and those who co-op get invasions non-stop.
I'd say that PvP should be op-in completely so you don't have to deal with invaders if you don't want to but every invader in existence will disagree with that because it would effectively remove like 90% of the game's player base from the invasion pool and all that would be left are people geared for PvP which is absolutely not what an invader wants to fight. So we're stuck at an impasse where casual players who aren't into PvP are forced into it and the end result are a bunch of bitter, spiteful players whose sole objective is to make invaders as miserable as humanly possible for forcing them to do something they don't want to do.
Tbh, that really is the case.
The only solution i can think of that won't make anyone angry and that ACTUALLY might be added in the game is lengthening by two to up to four times the invasion cooldown in coop and adding better rewards for killing invaders so people don't just play the passive game/kill themselves/altf4
Yes, thank you. This changes to this game's pvp mechanics lead to feedback loops that fuck over both sides of invasions. There are too many reds and so few co-op players, that co-op players just summon at the boss door.
Bring back covenants to cull the red pool. Bonus points if blue invaders come back, as they could soloinvade reds. Literally every player group benefits other than those who are doing fine, like duelists, and the only ones who might get fucked are red streamers.
Invasions should work like duels imo; when you summon for co-op, you can use a separate item to permit invasions, and then you enter the 'pool' of eligible targets for invasion for the game to pick from. So invasions would work the same way for the invader, but would require consent from the invadee. This would fix two problems at once: invasions ruining the fun of those who just want to explore with their friends (which is completely legitimate, this is an rpg first not a MMO), and the issue of invaders being soft-locked in loading screens all the time.
Even if covenants don’t technically exist anymore, they could still add in new invasion items with different mechanics. Not sure if the bloody and recusant fingers having the exact same mechanics is a sign that they do or don’t intend to implement new invasion items with updates/DLC, but I really hope they do.
I just want to be a moundmaker again, started having way more fun with invasion with a little minigame I made for myself where I try to befriend hosts that are obviously not building for PvP and just fight club it out with blues and a lot of the time co-opers either watch or just go on clearing the level. Sometimes they send messages thanking me for gifts or helping them through confusing dungeons like the catacombs and tombs, fosters a much more positive experience than everyone just trying to one-shot each other and tilting out their minds.
@@nxvh9062 eh, that wouldn't really do much, as it's basically just doing what it currently does but more. One of the core problems is invasions are near constant whenever you open yourself up. There are too many invaders and not enough people to invade. You're asking to make that divide worse, and it's already going to get worse as pve players get their fill and leave. Allowing blues to invade serial reds again would take away from the pool of reds (blessing pve players), while allowing opt in solo invasions (opted in by being naughty), and even open a way to invade that purposely avoids picking on noobs.
Maybe there could then be a consumable that protects you from invaders for a while too, maybe crafted with the caelid faded flowers. Dunno about this though, only just thought of it. I hear someone's working on a mod to block invasions. As it stands, I can only see that making the game worse for anyone not using it, though I can definitely understand the appeal.
As a coop player i use the summon pool and not the single finger, but obviously in cealid i going to mostly get summoned at the radahn gate. Or some other boss fight, still no Voice chat, which seeing how we have power stance and passwords back idk why voice chat got left in DS2. So there is no vc, so what? Basically going through the open world is a bad idea cause now u have no horse and get invaded so only idiots summon me in open world( all of these summons are in sellia btw, which has a gank boss fight but we usually dont even do it. Cause ya'know they're idiots who dont even know/care about the boss fight ) if people wanted to summon me more at the summon pool they would but From made it unfun so they dont.
The problem with invasions and balancing is that there's alot of moving parts. More than any one person can really consider. I could write a novel on balancing issues, and admittedly I am just a normal dude who can't think of every aspect of the game.
Who has the advantage in a duel? Well, who optimized thier build? What does that build bring in terms of DPS? What about utility? How do you even quantify utility? Are one or both players menu-swapping and using exploits? Obviously it's easier to win against a player using a single set up, by pulling out a weapon or tool that circumvent thier strategy. As opposed to some one who's experienced in menu-swaps and can bust out entire movesets at a moments notice while also glitching in a full health bar. In a duel, it's kind of easy to keep track of these things.
Invasions? Nearly catastrophic. Who has the advantage? In DS3 I argued that against a solo host, an invader has almost every advantage. From choosing when and where to engage, when to retreat, using the PvE enemies as allies. And as more summons get added in, the advantage can either stay in thier favor, or quickly start turning. If the host and phantoms aren't interested in PvE and already cleared the level in anticipation of PvP, invaders have absolutely no advantage. From a gameplay perspective, I don't think the designers planned for or intended this sort of "Emergent Gameplay".
Is the host actually capable of fighting the PvE, or are they relying on the help they summoned? Because PvE scales with the number of summons, if they sucked before, they will suck even more if thier help is dragged off to engage in PvP. If the host sucks and is actually interested in exploring, more summons and invaders are only add to thier disadvantage.
Are the summons PvP'ers? PvE and PvP are aspects of the game that feel miles apart. What works extremely well for PvE might be absolute crap at PvP. An example might be twin-blades. The jumping attacks are godly at melting PvE bosses. Absolute crap at PvP, you'll never land a full jumping attack against anyone with enough neurons to roll away when they see you jump. And experienced PvP'ers will forego gimmicky PvE set ups like that, for more PvP oriented ones. Are the summons skilled at PvP? Over coming 2 bad players might be more difficult than 1 bad player, but not by a whole lot.
It's hard to keep track of. Nerf the Moonviel? It's only good at low levels. At lv. 150+, moonviel is no more broken than a crouch poke from a colossal great sword using Royal Knights Resolve. Or a Cannon of Hiama from Terra Magicka.
Like... I hear the line "Invasions are a staple in the Souls Games", and I certainly agree that it's a thing they put in every souls game except Sekiro. But is this a good aspect of the game? Just do to the range of variables that can influence success, you get a range of answers. IMO, and I know this going to catch flack. I think it should go. They should replace it with system where once you defeat the main boss of an area, you can engage PvP, and start a PvP brawl that summons in both allies and adversaries for a good ol' brawl when you actually want to play PvP.
Idk how invaders can complain about shit, I got invaded by a dude using scarlet rot rapier in limgrave at level 15. I hit him 5x more than he hit me, yet he won because I had no way to cure scarlet rot. It's a free win if you use the op stuff.
Would't be that much of a problem if status effects would't fucking apply through I-frames. That probably has somwthing to do with latency but it still feels very stupid to get bled out/poisoned etc. even though you dodged every single attack
Because there is the fair invader that don't use op setups like the guy you met and there is the maidenless player who uses every broken cheap trick of the book to win.
The whole co-op invader problem goes back and forth on a loop. Invaders go kill inexperienced hosts, so host gets strong friends then kills every invader, then invaders gets mad and uses Rivers of Blood or other crutch status effects not expecting a fair fight, then hosts complain. It really doesn't end. I'm not saying every invader runs Rivers or Moonveil with a dead sprint towards you, but its common enough to be seen as a problem from the hosts perspective. All hosts got is over leveled phantoms and aoe stuff to roll catch invaders because they run crutch weapon skills to win the fight. Its definitely difficult to balance everything considering Dark Souls 3 had mostly barely enchanted weapons or bland skills to Elden Ring where almost every weapon can 1-3 shot you with a powerful skill.
something I like to do on my lv 25 invader is, whenever I find a newbie host, I tryhard a bit until I kill all the phantoms and then pretend I ran out of estus, letting the host finish me off. I still have fun fighting, and I don't ruin the newbies day, and I might even give him a memorable fight!
It's actually pretty fun to come up with interesting ways to lose, for example I like doing backstep-lunges with my rapiers, and when I want to lose I can "accidentally" backstep off a ledge. Or slowly back away from the hosts and slowly go towards a corner where I let them trap me and beat me down. On my pyromancer build I like accidentally hitting explosive barrels with my flame weapons. I'm hoping I'm giving them fun, memorable encounters that'll get them interested in pvp, and not sour their experience with it.
I can see some newbie hosts getting very happy with that.
Sainted behavior
pain from naruto had a similar argument, so i can only presume he had a prerelease copy of elden ring and had been invading at level 60 in liurnia
My main issue with it is the lack of cooldown/non-functioning cooldown between invasions. Played co-op with a friend and we got invaded literally every 4-5 minutes even if the invader was killed in the first minute. Gets kind of infuriating to have to deal with an invader every waking moment of the game when you're just trying to progress. (And I actually like the PvP in this game)
taunters tongue removes the invasion timer.. stop using that if you wanna have some peace time
@@junoglrr9119 We weren't using taunters tongue. That's why it's a problem. (My friend who was hosting/I was helpin' out doesn't even have the item yet. They haven't been able to beat Alberich.)
@@junoglrr9119 exactly, just bc you don’t experience it doesn’t mean other don’t. There is zero cooldown to invasions no matter what
Yeah for our 1st runs my friends and I all did solo runs while talking over discord because we didn't want reds in our 1st runs. On our 1st co op runs we were so discouraged at the amount of late game items we saw justing going through limgrave. But once we got to the academy and beyond things leveled out and honestly been more fun to get our butts whooped or whoop butts. So I say if you wanna invade Storm veil or limgrave just don't be cheap because it's the worst just trying to get started and hit with such unfun pvp fights.
That's the whole point though, the host is super weak at that point, but his coop phantoms are usually even more twinked than the invader can be because the downscaling is so favorable to them.
As a result, the invaders have to twink even harder to compete, and the host just ends up being the most worthless participant in the late game ability/spell spam that everyone else around him is doing.
This comment is why I disagree with invasions. It ruins the fun of a group of friends trying to explore a world together, and ignorant PvPers who think the game revolves around them, don't see the issue with that. The duel mechanic exists for a reason, and in my opinion (perhaps with a little bit of expansion to make it more streamlined like invading), duels should be the only form of PvP.
@@nxvh9062 there's a communication wall between invaders and co-operators(mainly as the latter group doesn't really go watch youtube pvp videos which is where the multiplayer mostly gets takked about)
And to this day i am yet to dee anyone but infernoplus cross that wall, even if scott made attempts, there's just a lack of awareness on the point of view of the other group that every argument in favor or against invasions just ends up falling on deaf ears.
Still, it is undeniable that invasions have never been as much a point of contemption in the series since ds2's introduction of soul memory.(although in that case the debate was more the other way around)
@@nxvh9062 FROM games aren't really great Co-op games to explore a world together IMO, because it keeps disconnecting your friends between every boss/area, and you don't progress through together at the same time. So the only way to actually do it is to replay the same areas each time on each person's home world, constantly reconnecting in-between which is so tedious my friends and I don't even bother (not to mention no Torrent in Co-Op). Invasions are also a core mechanic, leading to a fun a-symetrical PvP system when they are done well, they are just not handled well in Elden Ring.
Personally I'd love it if they solved both issues - Invasions should go back to being tied to Opt-In buffs so it's not only into gank squads and Co-opers, similar to Embered Status in DS3, and downscaling of phantoms or upscaling of Invader when outnumbered could balance the game better too. Co-op also would be awesome if you could truly progress through a world more organically together without all the disconnects. I believe there's an unofficial mod people are working on that somewhat accomplishes this but I haven't tried it myself.
@oohanalligator Invasions don't need to be removed, they honestly just need balance passes and most critically to be spread out to more people. The most killer thing that gets me sour on invasions is that when I am co-oping with my friend *who mainly enjoys games as co-op enterprises and has minimal interest in playing alone* we get invaded not even the every 15 minutes figure quoted. Often times we'll get invaded, he'll die to some rad bullshit like getting corner sniped by NIHIL and then summon us again and we'll be invaded again *immediately*. Because we're like the only people who can be invaded in the whole damn area. If invasions went back to how they were in previous titles - 5-15 times in a typical playthrough, they'd be fine. Even if you got absolutely clowned by total bullshit, it's once every handful of hours, instead of once every ten minutes.
I actually enjoy PVP in these games a bit and I feel like I have been forced into doing more of it joining my friend for this co op than I ever played in the previous fromsofts combined. I have definitely gotten leagues and leagues better at it because the only choice is adapt or die.
I'd say the only thing Scott misses here is invaders coming in with late-ish game status effect weapons to early areas. Dual Antspur or Vyke's is just pathetic to see in Stormveil - and I say this as a dedicated invader. Rolling a new character with friends that are new to the series is really hard, and being killed by something they've never encountered is hard to justify. I have to explain "oh well that guy had kind of a cheap weapon etc etc." I don't want to have to make excuses for the PVP.
This goes both ways, you have overlevelled phantoms that have super strong gear, but also they now do tons of dmg, have god poise, and take 10+ hits to kill.
This is why when I invade I only use stuff that could reasonably be obtained by the people I'm invading. I'm not gonna beeline to the grand cloister at level 20 to go and grab the scorpion's stinger and then invade people with it. It's really the way to go, it's more fun too. Especially when you style on people spamming rivers of blood and moonveil in stormveil castle haha
Not to mention that the status effect builds up often enough even when dodging. Never getting hit once and still gettong scarletrotted is almost everytime a deathsentece in limgrave because people dont have the recipe for the cure item and then the invader runs around for 10 min.
If there is three of you, than the guy shouldn’t be a problem if he would have the same amount of healing as the host. Thats the biggest problem with invaisons, the flasks.
i think those are super niche scenarios but yeah scarlet rot cheesing new players is scummy, absolutely
The removal of solo invasions was the worst mistake from made.
It just makes invasions turn into an arms race.
It also annoys coopers since they are the only priority.
"Just use the item that allows solo invasions duh"
From should have made rune arcs the requirement for invasion.
I miss the day of ds2 ladle.
Preach. This was fromsoftware's biggest mistake and stupid PvE lords still think it's a good idea because "invaders bad".
They have a poor understanding of how and why this affects them negatively, real shame.
At the end I feel like this system just hurts people who wanna play the game the intended or "fair" way. If the host is trying to be fair and nice to any potential invaders by having their phantoms not overleveled they get screwed when someone with double bleed cross-naginatas and rot daggers come ruin their session. When an invader is trying to be nice by making sure to not twink and abuse any oversights in balance, they run into kevin and his gank squad waiting with full bull-goats, BHS and helmet swaps ready with the hunter ring on.
This system punishes people for trying to play nice, incentivizing them into playing dirty themselves because they can't have fun when they try playing honest and just get obliterated by people abusing the cracks in balance
I'm of the opinion that PVP should be something you seek, not something pushed on you because you decide to run it with friends. That's been my biggest gripe with Fromsoft games in general. To be quite honest I wouldn't mind so much if the online PVP wasn't such a laggy mess but here we are in 2022
I recall InfernoPlus talking about how he would get invaded constantly in Co-op on his 2nd channel. I think that also play into it, you just don't get time to be alone with co-op.
That video is the best explaination of what's wrong with ER's invasions.
What I like about DS2 is that you could burn a rare item (effigy) and put yourself on the bottom of the invasion list. And I loved that you can invade people at all times. This added the choice to consume something of value, to get some rest and play the game with your friends; while not stunting the activity of PvP too much.
The other problem is definitely scaling invaders down to the host - devs did not do a good job. Having more flasks, bad idea. They could have made scaling down better (both invaders and friendly phantoms), to make things more fair; in so many ways.
If you burned effigy, afaik, you lost access to white phantom signs(i think small white signs would still be available but i can't confirm)
i feel like invaders shouldnt have more flasks than a host or summon.
DS2 had the best PvP, fight me. Also, I feel like weapon level should be removed and weapons/armor/spells should be area locked. So a person whose never gotten to Farum Azula cant PvP with people who has Malikeths armor. That'd kill twinking hard
@@evinbraley Soul memory is a stupid mechanic though, it punishes first time players not familiar with the map for losing souls, it punishes people buying armour and weapons for fashion or just trying out stuff and it punishes people that buy a lot of consumables to get through the game.
invaders are 99% of the time below the hosts level. so they dont need downscaling
Id like to point something out regarding the whole twink invaders situation , if you commit a build at a certain level ( say 50 ) and then upgrade your weapons according to the invasion calculator. its a pretty decent advantage compared to someone that's not sure how to allocate stats or " goes with the flow " so to speak not to mention the status affect weapons that can stack ( say poison + scarlet rot then offhand Poison /Cold ). Regardless id say the biggest thing there is to twinking is having access to very powerful late game ashes of war and the utility they provide .
overall i agree with you but i do think twinking is still a thing , its just a little toned down and harder to achieve.
And you have two other people with you so deal with it.
@@thunderstrucktb4758 We are dealing with it- by only summinging at the boss fogs, if at all. When the coop base dwindles further, you'll end up with a fight-club only scenario. The way the"invader" community always ends up, so stop salivating over the missed opportunities to potentially have any effect on co-opers play and enjoy your duels!
@@lts5674 Um yeah sure dude, not like I didn't just spend the last 6 years invading people in DS3, guess those were all just fight clubs...
When I started my co op playthrough with my homie at lvl 1 we kept getting invaded by someone with two scavenger curved swords + the white mask and probably the mohg talisman. We still had sticks and no armor. Twinking is real
I was at level 40 with a new character and invaded a host with a password bs ng+ phantom who had full lionel with two naginatas with bleed on one and frost on the other, not that it mattered since one hit killed me. This was in limgrave next to the first godrick soldier camp
Twinking isn't limited to flasks. There's the physick, antspur rapiers, talisman pouches, consumables. There is A LOT of stuff you can bring into low level invasions that the host shouldn't have. Of course phantoms can do it too and they also have the whole lackluster downscaling issue, but invaders ain't that weak
My first thought to treat the problem would be to implement more options. Like, approaching a custom matchmaking process. Hosts choose summon and invader limits that can't be changed while using the online item. Invaders can then choose to invade host worlds of a preferred summon limit. Ideally everyone would get what they want.
I'd love that. As an average pvp'er who loves the rare funny interactions invasions can get, I'd love more 1v1/1v2 invasions. A lot of the 1v1's I've personally seen are duelists who wants to pvp without the rules of duels.
And few 1v2 where the guys don't use bleed were really really fun.
I die most of the time cuz I'm average, but when they're just more skilled or I make a mistake, I just laugh it off, text my friend (he's played Souls since Demon's and likes seeing how I did) and invade/duel again.
But currently the amount of times I've seen the same 3 bleed builds just turns me off of invading or dueling. I now carry Stitcher with Pebble ash just for them.
I usually use Serpentbone katana.
I used to hate the 3v1 but after a while I have found myself enjoying the challenge of a good gank.
yup, if i win it feels dope. if i lose i don't get mad because, well, it was a gank afterall
@@lasjames7516 true
I enjoy it, except when I find overleveled dude. Even the RoB guys who I like to parry. I do wish we didn't have to do 3v1 though, but hey, it's better than nothing, and it's adaptable, plus many do just one phantom for 2v2s
same
The best part is that you become a god when fighting multiple enemies & players. It felt like easy mode my first couple of invasions because of how hardenee Dark Souls 3 made me. All it did was create an elite more intense invader.
Generally i think it just gets overwhelming for co-op people getting invaded endlessly every 15 minutes. It can take 5-10 minutes to deal with the invader, then you get 5-10 minutes to progress the area. It can get old quick. And each invade is bleeding your resources. In the past games you weren't endlessly chain invaded quite like this, at least not in every area lol. Covenant areas maybe.
Now that you can only invade co-op players.... i mean i guess you just have to buckle up and prepare for tons of pvp. I really don't quite understand why they made it co-op only invades, the dynamic for the souls series in the past of being embered or human form seemed like a interesting idea to me, at least in context of ds3. Get 30% more HP, and see summon signs, but get the threat of invasion.
I didn't summon much for helping with an area because if i did. I just got 100% invaded. Like.... was almost no point if i was actually struggling with the area already. Instead I'd end up summoning in front of the boss room, or opening a short cut to the boss from the summon pool thing to ignore invaders entirely pretty much.
That is also pretty much the reason why you every phantom and their host is a twink in their own right(aside from those who are looking to make the game as easy as possible)
- No rewards for killing invaders
- 10-15 minutes of downtime in a game where finishing a dungeon may take between 30 minutes to two hours if not more(not counting being stuck on bosses, and depending on how much you'd stop at just observing the environment either for awe or to find secrets in the area)
- Lengthy load times on anything but ps5
- Loss of items necessary for co-op upon death
And so on.
There's so little reasons to actually engage in pvp or at least for doing so fairly that it's no surprise there's so much gank twinks in this game.
In ds3 no matter where i invaded or when, it was more 50-50 between regular hosts and twinked out hosts, with a few ganks here and there every once in a while, but in elden ring that 50-50 is in regards to twinks and ganks, only a few invasione will actually be "regular" and i can't say i'm surprised about it.
We moved backwards instead of forwards, instead of giving more incentive to play co-op, invading, or even engaging in pvp while co-op, all elden ring did was make it even less of an enticing option, even more of a waste of time for people who don't care about pvp.
I hope elden ring shows fromsoftware that frustration from sucking at pvp was nearly never the reason co-op players hated getting invaded, as showcased by the stupid amount of twinks and ganks in this game.(inb4 they assume that's because players are bad at pvp and not because they just have no way out of pvp in co-op and having a braindead pvp meta weapon in their pocket to get it over with -hopefully- quickly is a more sensible solution than not summoning at all until a boss shows up)
Two days ago I made a RL30 invader for Stormveil. I twinked some throwing knives and boluses out of convenience, but nothing else. I would invade people wearing endgame gear, host and phantom, every other invasion. I was only using Samurai armor, katana, and occasionally swapping over to Halberd Offstoc if I needed to get sweaty on overleveled phantoms. For 4 hours of invading, only two guys were solo and wearing Taunter's Tongue, and one of them was abusing greatshield Vyke's pokes. In Stormveil. Sure.
One invasion the host was fighting the Crucible Knight and before I could jump down, a blue phantom was summoned. The Blue had full Banished and Veteran's armor on, a dragon halberd, and full flasks. He wasn't a slouch at combat either, though I was winning our 1v1 up by the Warhawks with the explosion barrels. Then, another blue comes in, and he's got dual bleed naginatas. This is all at level 30. So I run to the banished knight by the church, the blues overextend, I almost die but kill the first one, and I get the bleed idiot shortly thereafter after healing with the flasks I got.
So I climb back up to find the host, and the host is all twinked out with Radahn's, and his phantom is spamming Bolt of Gransax. I've literally had it with these tools, and in the process of running away I manage to turn and burn, then rollcatch chain the phantom, who easily gives me 120k runes, and then the host himself is such a noob I don't even take damage and finally kill him.
But for crying out loud if there's not a justification to twink out and give myself whatever I need, what is there? 125 invasions are freakin' impossible, level 50 is almost too much half the time, and level 30 I'm already dealing with blues who are twinked out 100%? I shouldn't have to fight this at stormveil.
From is shooting themselves and everyone else in the foot by not downscaling phantoms appropriately
They didn’t shoot everyone’s feet, they blew off everyone’s shins with a claymore
only way to solve the "Twink" problem is to implement some "Bears"
that explains why i invaded once in elden ring when i was level 40 or so , and there was this guy with full poise armor not even trying to evade my attacks and just attacking as im attacking and easily winning the trade
It's misconception that invaders are cruel or evil. In truth, they care more than anyone else - so much so that seeing their brothers and sisters get ganked changes their brain chemistry and activates their mangekyo sharingan, driving them to terrible action.
This is the Curse of Hatred.
I've always had the rule of manner checking the invader if I'm cooping, if the invader has any modecate of etiquette I'll have my summon fight them first, or I'll start a duel. However if it's a "funny fucker" or a straight up twat, the rancid gank commences and point downs will be handed out.
Manners maketh man.
And this is why I wait for a reaction from hosts when I invade. I don't hyper-optimize, so I'm running with Serpentbone Blade, Venomous Fangs and Antspur Rapier (poison/rot build). Stitcher with pebble for BS builds.
This also means I die a lot hehe
i think for PVE its the frequency of invasions that ruins it. being invaded once an hour seems fun honestly, but every 3 minutes? that's just ruining any kind of PVE you wanted to do.
on the other hand, limiting invasion times would hinder invaders, but honestly once you are a high enough level i dont think this would matter much.
i think a good compromise would be to increase the range of invasions to be global (any areas you have explored), but limit being invaded to once every 30 minutes.
this would allow invaders to rapidly invade people, while also alleviating the spam invasions that happen to PVE players.
The game on coop is so trivial that invasions i guess is a way to raise the difficulty
I have a friend who exclusively plays coop, and invasions are pretty much split 50/50 in terms of how enjoyable they are
Half of the time the invaders show up and immediately wanna fight, they might throw you a wave but thats it, and that's fine, lets get to it, some added challenge can be fun, the other day one guy got caught in a geyser and almost instant died before catching up, and another just spammed madness spells until they used the sui physick which was absurdly hilarious
But then the other half its these people who the second they realize they're getting roll caught or cant just spam bleed to win, they bloodhound step to the nearest field boss or large group of mobs to heal up, and just wait there refusing to engage, essentially taking over the game and deciding "it's me-time now >:(". You can't always just ignore them cuz of coop boundaries, like say I was leading my friend to a cave welp now we gotta kill this guy before we can do that, but this guy is doing everything in his power to pull us as far away from where we were going without actually fighting us ever and it's just frustrating
I think invasions are cool and would never want them removed, but when all they do is spam the same broken shit it gets agitating, miss you Mad Alice or whatever your name was, you were hilarious
I miss dedicated invasion areas. I understand that since there’s no covenants they can’t really do that. But I think they could of added covenants in the game. Especially with the various factions and Demi-gods.
id love a three finger covenant that invades various frenzied areas
Will probably be on a DLC...Ds1 got its arena in a DLC if i remember correctly.
stuff like fia's champions, and a bunch of other stuff could have been cool
@@silcrow4045 warriors of the jar
Eh, I don't miss it. It was only ever just a place for gankers to hang out and be toxic. What I hope to see is a return of the arena combat that DS3 added with the Ariandel DLC - which would absolutely fit in with the unused coliseums in Elden Ring.
Reminds me of the "Swf OP vs Killer OP" situation from dbd.
He escaped from arguments about deadhard and survivor vs killer just to face bloodhound step and coop vs invader.
Out of the pot, into the wolf's mouth.
I went into this on another channel. I'ma grab that comment and post it here, since this is a more suitable place.
In my opinion
It's a combination of popularity, unfamiliarity, and more importantly, the community's "mismanagement" over the years.
First off, the game is immensely popular, bringing in ALOT of new people to the "Souls" series. All of which are unfamiliar with what these games _actually_ are, what the "spirit" of Dark Souls is. They only know of the stories and the memes.
"Souls games are the hardest of them all"
"Souls players are all masochists who enjoy making others miserable"
"Invaders are the worst people in the world"
"Git Gud"
"You beat the game solo, otherwise you didn't really beat the game"
We, as a community, have embraced this over the years. We've come to welcome the adversity. We post videos of gank spanks, 1 shots, point downs, "well what is it"s..
We have hardly _ever_ publicly shown what this community is actually like. They don't see the Jolly Cooperation. They don't see the wholesome moments. The 30 minute goof-off sessions with a random host. We treat it like an exclusive club. You have to be a part of it to understand.
With every new release, us "veterans" take up arms against certain play styles, because it not only ruins the balance of the game, but also because we know our community and what we are capable of. We know the intricacies of the game, we know how to _fully_ exploit what is broken. And we don't want it.
But from the outside, it looks like us "elitists" are trying to make the game harder for the new players. So they take up arms against us. Purposefully using the "broken" stuff, simply out of spite for a community they don't even know. Because we've done everything we could to (unintentionally) keep it that way.
It's not entirely a lost cause however. With every new entry, the community has grown exponentially. The same will happen here. The new players who are "here for the ride" will leave with the next big game release. Those who fall in love with "Souls" will adapt and join the community. Being their very first Souls game, many of these players will then play the other titles, increasing player activity across the entire series.
And then we'll start the cycle anew.
Also, we as a community need to remember one very important thing. Alot of us, myself included, have been playing these games for _years_ now. We also agree that every new installment in the series is harder than the last, and we know _how_ these games work. For new players, it's their first ever experience with Souls style combat, let alone the real deal. They have no clue what's going on, or why. And the learning curve gets steeper with every game. They deserve some credit for even trying.
For example: I started with Dark Souls 1. Before this, my last "fighting game" was MK Armageddon when I was young. On my first playthrough, I originally missed the side door in Asylum Demon's boss room. I fought him for over 2 hours, bare handed, quickly learning "just circle around them 4Head". The limitations of the game played a HUGE roll in this.
Now take Elden Ring. You've never touched any form of Souls Combat. You, for this example, have vague knowledge of and no love for anything Souls. Learn this game from scratch..
2:00 My issue with this argument (the "that's just how it is so deal with it") is three-fold. First is that it's simply dismissive because it assumes we're asking for actual change rather than just venting our frustrations with the current system. We can both acknowledge that the system is the way it is an accept that, but that doesn't mean we suddenly actually LIKE the system to be that way.
Second point is kind of a continuation from the first but it's that that attitude of "just shut up and accept it" leaves us with zero possibility of even having a long shot in the dark at getting any kind of change if we actually do want it. If we extrapolate that attitude to real life it doesn't work too well. For instance, if people are staging a protest over something, just telling them "hey, the law is the way it is and that's the reality" is that ever enough to make them give up and just go "oh alright, I guess that law we used to hate isn't so bad after all"? Sure that's a bit of an extreme escalation between real life laws and video games but the sentiment is the same.
Thirdly is that at this point we've had an entire subgenre come up around these games in the formation of the Soulslike genre and there are now lots of examples of games that follow a very similar formula to the core FS Souls titles that allow co-op but don't have invasions and they work just fine. Nioh actually used to have invasions but removed them going into Nioh 2. Code Vein didn't have any invasion system whatsoever. And as far as I've heard neither does Stranger of Paradise. It's been shown at this point that "the Souls formula" doesn't NEED invasions to deliver an engaging experience. To be clear, I'm not asking for the removal of invasions with this point, as invasions are one of the most significant features to the games and could even be said to be one of the things that separates the core Souls titles from the other Soulslikes. I'm only bringing this up to show that there is evidence to show that PvP isn't as core to the experience as people make it out to be, and having PvP be an opt-in system for those who want it likely wouldn't be as big of an issue as people make it out to be.
13:06 This might be a bit nitpicky, but I think it's unfair to generally categorize people who enjoy playing co-op as people who are looking for carries. As someone who enjoys co-op as my primary form of fun in these games, even I think the people who are just doing it looking to get carried are taking it too far and we need to scale things back on that front to force people to stay more engaged with the game even when others are helping them. I'm not sure what the best solution to that might be, but as you mentioned in the previous section about unbalance in co-op phantoms I agree that making sure summoned phantoms are scaled more appropriately is at least the first step. I also think the ways they scale PvE around co-op phantoms isn't done well enough (bosses having boosted HP pools just isn't enough) but that's a completely different subject.
-------------------------------
FWIW everything else you said I more or less agree with. I've been playing since the original Demon's Souls and as things are now it's just a cycle that will continue to exist simply due to different players having different preferences. As the years I spend with these games go on I'm just more and more saddened by the continued dismissal of those of us who actually find PvP unfun but love being able to help others overcome obstacles that were giving them trouble. There is genuinely no better feeling I've ever felt in these games than when someone takes the time after a good co-op run to find my name on PSN and send me a "thank you" message. I don't get any fun out of PvP because I just don't enjoy unsolicited conflict with other people in general. I just wish there was a way I could ask for PvP to be opt-in separately from co-op and not be immediately "booed off of the stage" any time I bring the idea up, even if I'm just venting.
I'll keep my response brief since I've already rambled enough wall-of-texts for one night, but to cover your major points:
1. Co-op doesn't invalidate challenge on its own, or at least it shouldn't. At this point other games have already shown that with the right handling of systems and mechanics you can keep co-op experiences without them trivializing the game even without invasions. The problem with ER and the other From Soulsborne titles is that they do next to NOTHING to counterbalance co-op beyond just throwing invasions into the mix and pumping boss HP bars if phantoms are present. With better handling of things like scaling down co-op partners abilities, adjusting basic enemies' stats, or even tweaking boss AI it would be entirely possible to design a pure PvE experience where co-op is still challenging.
2. I agree the decision to remove solo invasions in ER was a bad one. It doesn't benefit either side of the issue and only encourages both sides to lean into the cheapest, "speed-killingest" strats and builds because the odds are always entirely skewed in one direction or the other with very few encounters outside of actual duels being actually engaging.
3. Here's what I'm advocating for - I don't want invasions removed. I want invasions and co-op to be separate systems, with the PvP being strictly opt-in for the player should they happen to enjoy that style of play. Make a new item that has to be activated in order to flag your world as invadable. If that item is activated then you'll get normal invasions regardless of if you're solo or with phantoms or even regardless of if there's any bosses in the zone or not. You want to up the danger of your world by having other players to fight? All power to you. But for those of us that find PvP experiences distasteful, I just want the ability to play the way I have fun without being forced to play the way that leaves a bad taste in my mouth. Just let me have the option to keep that item turned off.
If you love invasions as much as you say, surely you'd have no problem with an item that tells the game "please invade me as much as you want." And given how prominent the PvP scene is, I'm sure there's a large enough scene for PvP as a whole to continue to be an active experience for all who enjoy it. Just give me the option to keep that item turned off because PvP has never done anything but leave a sour taste in my mouth after it's done, regardless of if I win or lose. If that'd make PvE too easy, then put better systems into the PvE to make phantoms not as effective rather than relying on other players to be the counterbalance.
It would be so much simpler if invaders had their co-invader like in ds3, and that a sucessfully repelled invasion would mean at least 30 min invasion immunity. That's it, hosts will go throught this once, invaders have a better shot.
This is one way, but there's a billion other ways to go about it.
The current system is literally the worst case scenario.
No rewards gor killing invaders, bad scaling on phantom twinks, crazy amount of thinking doable by invaders themselves (status and piise build up with fast roll thanks to physicks as well as 4 talisman slots), minimal downtime between invasions, no doentime at all if you use a taunter's tongue, etc...
You still get a grace period after being invaded in ER.
When I help my brother we simply stay a minuten or two at the grace untill we get invaded, we kill the i vader and then we play nornally untill we reach the next Grace. Then we restart the process.
I purposefully didn't level vigor just to spite my friend when he questioned why I had 14 in ds3 and we were level 300 something just having fun going through the main game. in ds3 its more possible, but in ER I had what is known as A Bad Time until I got to the respecs lol
I feel like PvP & invasions have become steadily more frustrating as time has gone on. I don't really have anything else to add to the current invasion conversation, besides that I really like using weapon level as an additional restriction, as Phantom Scaling did kill my effort to do some wacky low level invasions, but I'd like to air my thoughts on exclusively invading into groups.
The change from flat invasions if: human (ds1/DeS/ds2) or from specific locations (BB); to the co-op prioritization and now co-op only invasions is going to lead to invasion's requiring builds to deal with upwards of 3 people, and so the people getting invaded are going to have to deal with the frustration of magic/faith/arcane users, people with one-shot builds out the wazoo, and the invasion builds of yesteryear where you could have a cool encounter with some dude with a weird build are long gone and restricted to duals. I probably wouldn't be so frustrated if phantom scaling worked as intended, but it really has just made me hate the invasion restrictions more than anything else.
Unrelated to the topics presented in the video however, I do miss the variety that DS2 provided. Regardless of your thoughts and feelings on DS2, it had some really unique covenants like the Rat King covenant by providing players an opportunity to "build their own dungeon". I hope that FromSoft revisits those ideas in the next game.
This is all coming from someone who essentially skipped the DS3 PvP scene because I didn't want to deal with straight sword builds, and I was still having fun playing BB and the fun invasions and duals you could get there so my thoughts may be a bit antiquated.
Honestly, as much as bb might have has the worst netcode, matchmaking and balance in all the games(thank you bloodgem system) at least the few times it worked as intended it was fun af no matter your stance on invasions and co-op thanks to bell maidens and just the randomness of it all.
It's just that it almost never actually worked and also had the er problem of no solo invasions...(nightmares aside)
If the matchmaking actually worked, there was bell maidens in every area who also respawned(or make them respawn only in nightmares if that's too much) regardless of cooperators presence, i think that would have been the best case scenario for everyone, sad that elden ring had gone in the opposite direction of adopting nearly everything that was bad in Bloodborne's online minus(?) The matchmaking while removing all the good it had.
As a person who's put the most time into DS3 PvP out of any of the other games you missed out, but your points are valid. The straight sword R1 spam was nowhere near as big of an issue as anything in Elden Ring tbh, Elden Ring is just an atrocity no matter where you look. I suggest if you wanna have a fun time with DS3 now's the time to go back and invade/duel, it's super fun and actually requires thought going into it unlike ER where you just spam the same shit and win.
Who is even reading these essays lol
@@JohnDoe-pu5gk it was mainly just to write out my thoughts on the matter, but I'm glad you cared enough respond :^)
@@aliceinwonderland4395 I did DS3 PvP right at the beginning of the games life and did a little right after the last DLC came out. I remember enjoying myself a lot more on the back half, and on the whole, I should really play it again.
The most depressing part of Elden Ring was finishing my colossal sword build, feeling pretty letdown by how bad it was damage wise, and then going to start a dex build and immediately outdamaging my previous build. It didn't help once I got the Moonveil and I got to experience first hand what a walk through the Elden Ring landscape was like.
I’m a mostly PVE/Coop player. I do find getting invaded annoying, especially since it delays area progression. My buddies and I don’t shy away from ganging up on invaders or wasting their time (for those ambushers). For us, when you invade, you follow our rules. On fresh characters, we’ve encountered people with end game heavy boss armors and weapons, mostly a thrusting sword that does both scarlet rot and poison. It can get toxic.
On the flip side, I grown to understand the woes of invaders after doing the 3 invasions for Varre’s quest. The ganks and heavily geared players are cancerous to fight.
I tried out invading and got faced against overleveled phantoms then later I got invaded by a dual naginata bhs bleed build... I only dueled after that.
I sorely miss being invaded as a solo player... it was the only I did get invaded back in the good ole days. And I also miss fight clubs
Then use the taunter's toungue and get invaded as a solo player..?
Why do act like you can't?! LMAO
Just Taunter's Tongue mate...
@@VeganAncientDragonKnight yeah I know, I do that but it's not the same.
To be fair, a min-max low level build is almost as strong as twinking. Dumping most of your points into vigor, using the strongest ash of war and lightning infusion with highest upgrade (for your upgrade range) makes you much much stronger than most host. Not only that since there are no solo invasions playing co-op just gets you invaded every 5 seconds. You totally shouldn’t play nice against host who are getting carried by RoB phantoms but there are also plenty of host just co-oping and getting invading by 2 min-maxing invaders against 2 dual co-oper with normal pve stats is certain death. Its kinda dumb how invaders would go out of their way to get the strongest gear just so that they can invade in Liurnia or stormveil, the true loser out of all this exchange are co-opers who doesn’t have over levelled phantoms and are just trying to play the game.
Yeah, but honestly those kinds of co-opers are getting rarer - about as rare as fair invaders. Most people playing at low levels are starting second characters and password co-oping. There's also a pretty crazy amount of twink ganks out there too. Low level online play is just kind of toxic on all fronts, ngl.
2 coopers can't be invaded by 2 invaders at the same time without using tongue.
2 coopers can't be invaded by 2 invaders at the same time without using tongue.
I'd also argue that FromSoft could have definitely incentivized Solo Players to use the Taunters Tongue more to at least alleviate some of the Issues BOTH parties face. Coop players wouldn't be the only group of potential invasion targets anymore and invaders wouldn't have to deal with so many overleveled phantoms/ganksquads if the Devs actually found a way to make solo Players WANT to do PvP to a slight degree.
yeah like give me more starlight shards and sacramental buds god dammit, I need more gravel stones for my lightning pots.
all the pve'rs love pvp, when its 3v1 with their overleveled phantoms they cant get enough of it.
if its 1v1 then they hate the pvp lol
Incentivizing pve players to pvp is the worst idea ever. Every game that has done this either still has no pvp or has a pve player base that quits because they feel punished for not pvping. Not every game is for everyone but if you don’t like the pvp system of elden ring I think that’s a clue that this game isn’t really made for you. The game is the way it is and some people are going to hate it and some are going to love it.
To address the early-game twinks, they exist. Maybe not one shotting, but doing shit loads of damage, and they're tanky asf most of the time. They have end game weapons, 4 talisman slots, and maxed out Estus. I'm on build #7 with my brother, and we still get invaded by the most tryhard twinks in the beginning.
I love when Jund talks about twinks 😳
😳
I make 3 characters in every Miyazaki game. A red, a yellow and a blue. I theme the builds around the colors, so it usually goes pyromancy, faith and magic, but it can vary like pyromancy will sometimes be blood themed or magic could be frost themed.
If I invade the starting area at base-Lv, I'm usually greeted by BHS dual Naginata, Stars of Ruin and RoB even more frequently than during my Lv.150 invasions.
There is really nothing wrong with twink invading, as you will still be outgunned by the password summons.
What if there was a mechanic where a co-op phantom could call out the invader for a 1 on 1. The invader could accept the challenge, in exchange the host and any other phantoms can't touch the invader, nor can the invader attack anyone else. These impromptu duels could give additional rewards to whoever wins.
6:20 Marika soreseal + radagon Soreseal + endgame weapons = easy twink, there's even a video of some dude making an easy twink build with the silver tear mask and slapping poison to a weapon, knowing that low level players don't even know what boluses are.
Easy gank spanks so stay strong invaders 💪 *WE WILL RISE AND BE FEARED AGAIN* .
I'm in the boat for people not invading when you're just wanting to explore with their buddies. Taunter's Tongue could just enable being invaded when cooperating for people who want a classic FromSoft experience, but I would be ok with invasions if they at least weren't so frequent. The world is significantly larger and when you're on foot it takes forever to get anywhere. The worst part about invasions is every last one becomes a sweat fest, which just end up where invasions feel like they take longer than their downtime anyway. The argument he has about it being a classic mechanic and because it was always there doesn't justify its inclusion. If invasions have a more legitimate reason than just "it was a mechanic in previous entries", I'd love to know, but Elden Ring already differentiates itself from the rest of the entries, and don't include other mechanics as well. Tradition alone doesn't justify its inclusion. A good example of this is when FromSoft replaced the parry system from the Dark Souls series with Bloodborne's version of the parry system. Bloodborne's parry system required players to keep up their offensive, so it was necessary to change it.
Bloodborne also had a fun mini-game of a mechanic where, when you engaged in co-op it would spawn a "Sinister bell maiden" who could lure in invaders if one was searching in the area. But the Bell Maiden could be killed once found, and you're free from invasions for the duration of your time in co-op until it was time to summon again
They could definitely do this for Elden Ring. Hell, there's a myriad of enemies they could use in place of Maidens, like those horseback revenant guys which would be interesting since they only show up a couple of times, and co-op takes you off your horse so you're at a disadvantage for catching them. They could even appear in specific locations solo (also a feature of 2 zones from Bloodborne) to bring back solo invasions
The problem with Elden Ring vs other games and 'twinking' is that the end game gear is 500x stronger than the available tools early game. It's people invading with double antspurs, one with frost one with poison, with full bullgoats and the tears in his flask to make him weightless.
This is not a 'get good' moment, this is people intentionally invading for the exclusive reason to ruin someone's day. Flasks should adhere to the same upgrade requirements as weapons, if you have a +12 flask you should never, ever, ever be able to invade someone in Stormveil with a +1.
The host could still summon his buddies who have +12 flasks though. All that does is make it easier for the host to kill the invaders since it becomes a +1 vs a +1 and two +12 summons.
i'd honestly argue the opposite. because its open world, there is no real "end game gear" except that locked past the capital. You can create the most absolute busted setups before this. hell the cross naginata can be gotten in 10 minutes from a new character.
you can even get the winged crystal tear without fighting a single enemy on a level 1 character.
i agree antspur rapiers are a scummy twink weapon
I don't know that I agree with flasks, largely because while they do contribute power level, it's honestly not incredibly significant past level ~+4 or so if we're talking low levels anyway.
The bigger reason though is that fragmenting matchmaking more will only make matchmaking worse, not better. Game will look dead, because so many different criteria have to be met at once. You'd only be viable for invades in hyperspecific areas, and the restricted areas for invasions per build is already a problem in the current state of the game. Breaking matchmaking more isn't really the solution.
Also, the person in Stormveil with the +1 can have a phantom that's level 500 with +12/7 flask. Which is the whole reason people are hyperoptimizing to begin with-- Because their weapons can't hurt the bullgoat LV500s, but maybe status can. Etc etc. If password summons scaled down, I guarantee you'd see much less of that kind of thing, because frankly building optimized invaders is a chore. It's tens of hours of work, just to be able to maybe deal with Larry Level 700 The Password Summon.
You don't know people's reasons for invading, either. Several times now I've invaded into someone with an obviously incredibly overleveled phantom, but who clearly is new and doesn't know what they're doing, killed the overleveled phantom, and then "accidentally" played very poorly to give the new guy a close victory, and one that they never would have gotten if their Phat Phantom just did everything for them. Hell, hopefully they can brag at their phantom about it (Which would just be some fun salt in the wound to the OL phantom in my opinion)
@@ScottJund Assuming the person looking to co-op is looking to deal with the invaders, sure, they can also have all those things. But the person who's 'complaining' about the invaders isn't looking for the pvp, but the person invading is exclusively looking for it. Which raises another problem point, if the host *is* expecting and wanting to engage in PvP while also gearing for it then instantly their phantoms are too and that's a massive disadvantage for the invader.
So, I feel it's a no-win situation, the people going out of their way to not upgrade end game weapons are going to have these loadouts and the people who don't, are going to be mad.
I like invasions, I enjoy the 'souls' PvP, but I think the invasion system is outdated and flawed in ways that fundamentally cannot be reconciled between people who want it and people who don't.
@@Nudgarrobot I can never 'know' someone's reason for invading, some people just find it fun, some people just really like to be annoying, it's whatever floats their boat at the end of the day, but it's not *those players* that are complaining.
I feel it always stems from differing expectations. Invaders expect to go in, completely at a disadvantage, and win at any cost where the person they're invading may just be trying to play the game. These two mindsets are not ever going to be compatible and I feel is the entire body of the 'I hate invaders / invasions section of the community."
In regards to twinking, overpowered weapons, armor and ashes of war are very present in invaders at low levels. I was helping randoms go through Stormveil and encountered 3 seperate invaders all wearing late game armor and using Rot, Bleed and Frozen infused weapons with Bloodhound's Step. We had nothing to heal the rot once it finally landed so the invaders would just like bhs until we died. Twinking is definitely still a think, except instead of getting one-shot, you get scarlet rotted to death while the host has way more flasks for healing
Miyazaki trying to make the invaders work as one more hardship the player needs to endure in the world is great, what isn't great is trying to make those player always lose because then you create an imbalance where those player will minmax, twink and resort to the dirtiest of tricks to get the upper hand as it has happened time and time again in previous game and the victim always end up being new and low level players.
The best way to describe miyazaki's ideal of invasions and how they work in er is "cute idea, counter-productive implementation"
You don't add in a mechanic (co-op) only to have another mechanic(invasions) be a deterrent to the first mechanic without any incentive whatsoever, all you'll do is make a miserable experience for both parties where avoiding the deterrent(bossgate summoning after rushing through areas solo) or getting rid of it as quickly and dirtily as possible (twinks, on both sides) becomes the only possible result.
Even though it was a little unfair for me as a host, I kind of liked the urgency and the panic of getting invaded when I was solo in Dark Souls 1. Forcing all invasions to only target co-opers makes sense from one standpoint, but also it creates this cycle of resentment since co-opers usually want to be left in peace and invaders don't want to be at a disadvantage constantly.
And all this is on top of the crappy net code making things like roll-catching really hard and just adding to the jank. I love the game, but it hurts to see the exact same problems present in Elden Ring when a lot of people hoped for a fresher game that could really improve on it's predecessors in every way. For better or for worse, Elden Ring is very much like Dark Souls 3, and I don't think FromSoft is willing to make drastic systemic changes in their patches so I don't know if any of it will change.
Not particularly scared of Rivers at Stormveil. Now, a guy in full Veteran + Rivers + Rotten Breath, with MAX flasks? That's more scary/irritating to deal with.
Things I'd change, personally:
¬ Now, cannot receive a traded item if you haven't first got a copy of said item yourself (this is harsh but should help with griefing a bit. Want something? Play the game first!).
¬ Max Flasks of Invader/downscaled phantoms cannot go over the max number of flasks the host currently have (helps both sides).
¬ Return of PVP-centric areas (think D1 Forest/ D2 Bellfries/ D3 Anor Londo) for BIG RUMBLE time.
¬ Enable of solo invasions if Host has their Great Rune active (and ONLY in that case, unless you Tongue ofc - people should be allowed to choose!).
¬ Have 1 Invader total if 2 players, 2 Invaders total if 3 players. (Hunter is excluded and can join in any case, but has a timer on re-summon of a new one?)
¬ Increasing timer after each invasion, unless Tongue or 3 players (feel like this is necessary atm, was running a co-op run with a friend and between the two of us we got invaded like ~12 times at Leyndell, holy crud. Invasions are fine but some breathing room is needed at times!)
Just some random thoughts, no idea if they would practically improve the situation in any way - besides, we definitely won't get any fix on this anyways so, yeah, opinions and all!
I think for the flask limit it should be a max of one flask over the other (same thing goes for the flask level ofc). This would still make it mostly fair, while not make matchmaking too strict.
That first suggestion basically forces pvp serious people to use cheat engine and not mules.
Also when I make a pvp character, I don't want to have to do everything in this game to make my build. I'd rather just do the stuff I cant trade over (like patches quest for infinite fan daggers) then trade the rest.
They should stop trading at all makes making mules to easy. We should have the same flaks as the coopers
@@stevenluoma1268 What if it did it by user profile instead of by save file? When you get an item in-game, it flags your account (or removes a flag). Given that picking up Deathbed Smalls flagged every character you owned rather than the just the one you grabbed them with, I don't think it would be impossible for FS to implement.
@@4NSW3RM3 Sounds reasonable on paper, but I'm afraid what it would really do is simply to stop newbies to have OP weapons traded to them during their very first playthrough and abuse them to the game with ease - grievers, usually, have already finished the game at least once so, with this method, they would have access to basically all trades, making it a kinda moot fix sadly. Only other solution I can think of, is blocking invasions if Invader is using a weapon/armor acquirable in a REGION the host didn't unlock yet (e.g. Hand of Malenia/Rivers at low-RL Stormveil -> No invasion because host didn't unlock Mountaintops) but that also opens ANOTHER big can of worms (and would literally get me killed IRL by the Jar Cannon invaders).
I don't think there is a way to have everyone be content and agree on this... I completely understand the sentiment of wanting to get your build specced without investing all those hours, but... Personally speaking, I'd choose fighting against grievers in general over that, I suppose.
Cheat Engine is something that cannot be countered, really - some people WILL use it, no matter the odds. At least this way they are aware that they are risking a ban, I guess...?
I've been recenly running through the game with 2 other friends on a coop shield-only run. I consider getting invaded part of the fun, but low level invasions were extremely boring and unfun. Most were poison/rot builds that hit you a couple of times with arrows and consumables and run away until you die because you cant cure status effects until later on in the game.
I hate those dudes. Matter a fact, I think I might make a build that is a twink that has everything to cure myself, and just chill and stare at them while unprocing and then charge them with some op weapon. Though I would keep normal stuff for the honest ones.
Same experience, I was really looking forward to playing coop with a friend, and thought invasions would be really fun, but most invaders so far have been using such toxic and abusive builds...
Honestly I don't get why anyone would play like that, it just seems so boring, going arround with broken builds hunting new players.
Best invasions BY FAR have been against players who have early-game spells and weapons like us, and we've only had like two of those.
@@yordo9593 I would be on your side, but half of hosts have phantoms that are 200+ spamming stars of ruin and moonviel. You have to adapt of your just gonna get melted.
@@yordo9593 They do it because they can only get overleveled phantoms, and want to level the playing field, but they take it out on others too. I use to do this in ds3 with dragonslayer ax, but I would use it only on people I knew were also twinking or if they are overleveled. It provides a sense of justice, though it's not justice, it just fuels the overleveled and summoners, but that's not what's the problem in my opinion now, I think the problem is the innocent players getting caught up in these players wraths are being punished, on both sides too, wasting a valuable item to be destined to lose. Still, most new invaders seem to have been ran off, or leveled higher, so looks like twinks may become a problem.
@@unpaintedarmy what i do to solve this on my low level invasion character, is I have gear for fighting both types of lobbies. If the host is just a regular player going through with regular phantoms, I'll only use weapons and abilities that they would have access to at that point in the game. For example if I'm in stormveil I'll use limgrave/stormveil only equipment. However I've unlocked all the other stuff just in case. If I run into a gank with crazy phantoms and a host that has been muled late game items, I swap to all of my lategame gear to fight on even footing. That way i dont get rolled by the twink ganks, but it's a fair experience for regular players.
After a couple hours of invading and getting 3v1-ed against overleveled phantoms and BM hosts literally sitting in place for hours taking these fights, I just sort of enter "No fun, no mercy" mode. You can only get fucked over so many times, especially when taking on multiple opponents, beating them nearly senseless for 5 minutes and then getting wombo comboed to death because you made a single mistake, before it starts to sour your mood.
That frustration ends up getting let loose on the hosts who really don't deserve it. This is a consequence of how the system was designed, and I don't think it was intentional. For all of Fromsoft's amazing PvE building capabilities, I've never seen a company THIS bad at making a fun and balanced PvP experience. From the awful two decade out of date netcode to a complete incapability to see a logical conclusion to the systems they put in place... they are just really bad at it.
There are no casual invaders now, because there can't be. The average person isn't going to put up with THAT much failure, especially for a video game. The tryhard metalord BM invaders will always exist, regardless of how punishing the game is, but now that population is no longer diluted by a ton of casual PvP goers just looking to have fun. So almost every host gets invaded by the no fun brigade, completely souring their experience and making them take drastic measures with overleveled phantoms. Thus, the cycle is perpetuated and continues to get worse.
So, basically Dark Souls itself is accidently an analogy for the community.
This is the best description of the problem I’ve seen.
This was my exact experience. I started invading with a regular build. Kept getting spammed by noobveils and rivers of skill and losing.
Now I invade with a bullshit 112 poise glintstone pebble build. I'm invincible, if they dare attack I can pebble for 2k damage on reaction. I was forced to do this, losing every time, especially to worse players than me just because it's always a 1v3 spam fest just isn't fun.
And we know from Armored Core that they can balance pvp really well. They just dont care for now, pve is priority.
@@heibk-2019 I miss online matches in For Answer. Blader for life.
That was unfortunately practically a life time ago lol.
One important thing not covered I think about invaders is they also get a big advantage at low level regarding talismans. Being able to use soreseals, late game talismans in general and also having 4 slots is something a dude who just is going through Stormveil isn't really going to have.
Overall I don't think the cycle can be stopped, even if overleveled phantoms were balanced really well, it won't stop some people from being just too annoying as invaders. That, too, has gone all the way back to Demon's Souls. It's just kinda the way some people are. Most don't like losing, so they'll try to find any way to win they can. Even with weapon level matchmaking in Elden Ring, there's still just too much a prepared invader with a finished low level build can have that a normal player going through the game won't.
9/10 outta 10 when I invade and there’s a 3 man squad they are not trying to run through the game stop the cap, ds3 ganks have fully converted over to er, maybe 1 invasion outta the 4 hours I’d play might be ppl actually running through the campaign
They even do it in legacy dungeons, they just wait for you at the top of a ladder and nuke, then when you invade its the same people in the same spot in the painted castle.
Another group of people that get shafted by the new invasion system are the people like me, where I'm not usually (emphasis on usually, exceptions exist) looking to PvP constantly, but I do appreciate that side of the game and enjoy interacting with it. I would in my DS3 runs purposely stay embered once I got through the Twink Wall and Settlement specifically to lure in an invader every half hour or so, whatever the cooldown was. That way I got to fight someone every now and then, the invader got a solo world since I know those were a pleasant treat, and I got to interact with that system.
That just doesn't exist in Elden Ring. I have to choose between playing a strictly single player game or taunter's tonguing and not being able to progress in the game anymore. I've got three chars through the game and four others in various points around the game and I've never been invaded on six of them because they just...can't (the last is a co-op run with a friend and my wife). I don't like the separation of invasions from solo play because that system is what kept DS3 specifically so fun for me for as long as it was - sure I knew all the areas like the back of my hand, but if I got invaded all bets were off, it was a tense place again. I miss that, genuinely. And there's no way to get that experience in Elden Ring. I cannot do it.
We need a red cipher ring that restores invasions to "souls" levels of functionality. I'd have it on pretty much constantly.
Elden Ring has the closest time where i've ever been banned in a Fromsoft game. My frist time cooping with a good friend, an invader with items he should of had killed my friend and tried to drop me something. I had to take the advice of my friend and ignore the item. It's a shame that my first ever invasion in Elden Ring was a run in with a hacker.
And how do you know this invader shouldn't have had these items? What exactly did he have?
@@thunderstrucktb4758 Panties.
@@cameronmckillop6448 caught downbad lmao
@@Shmeky. me or the invader?
@@cameronmckillop6448 the hacker obviously, people are this bad they have to hack in order to have fun
You can get invaders with high weapons. You can get a plus 5-8(somber) SUPER early and if someone follows the get op early build video, they now follow the get wrecked by pvp gods early farm whenever invaded
There is something incredibly funny about having to explain what Twink means in the context of Souls games.
We all know what we mean, but the thought of some feminine lad walking up to you with a RoB or Ruins Greatsword demolishing you is a treat for the imagination.
You go get them, feminine lad. Godspeed.
Also yeah, I wish there was an appropriate way to invade single players again. Taunter's Tongue isn't even a great solution.
Honestly making the pvp experience 3v1 is and only 2v2 with a TT is kinda ridiculous. I miss having 3v2 fights. Why does TT replace 1 gold slot for 1 red and not just add an extra red?
A lot of odd choices... I also miss Mad Phantoms from ds3. It was so fun being given the goal of "just make sure somebody dies"
Mound makers invasions were gold. You could just turn up on the sidelines and pick off the weak ones or waltz into the melee spinning your halberd laughing madly. I once had a red drop an ember and grovel for an alliance too, good times
For the people saying chaos twinks in the prepare to die edition were ridiculous, I would just like to remind you that the invasion range in the original Dark Souls was infinite upward, you could be level 15 invading max level gankers.
Idk I feel pretty twinkled against when I am fighting a max lvl bull goats white mask phantom and, their cross nagis instantly bleed me with one hit, and deal 3/4ths my hp, and then can just whip out the moonveil that does just as much if not more. Meanwhile heavy Greatsword with 66 str does like 1/8th their hp.
I think the biggest issue is just the pvp system. I think its about time that they streamline the pvp more to make it efficient for everybody. I'm not a game designer so I don't have any answers for how but i think a flushed out pvp system may be the next big step for souls games
If a host uses a rune arc, that should allow them to be open to invasions, even while solo. Making this change would encourage more people to do co-op and invasions in order to gather more rune arcs. Also, while we are at it, make the effects gained from rune arcs more varied and way better. Most aren't even worth using, which is wild considering it is supposed to be a big deal to unlock.
That's basically how it worked since forever. It's weird how they changed if
@@spairus4492 I get wanting to make the game more accessible. A new player would not like getting invaded solo. However, by tying invading to co-op, that is what has produced this "cycle of hatred." Co-op groups are tired of constantly getting invaded, and invaders are tired of only fighting teams, especially since many of those teams contain over-leveled phantoms. Both groups would benefit from a more varied experience.
Yeah, also every one should be able to use rune arcs in pvp. Host, summons and invaders. Like idk why they had to change it.
gonna leave a few more thoughts once I finish but a few things I notice missed
1: invaders can somewhat twink using talisman slots, if you're in stormveil odds are you don't have 4 talisman slots like an invader can have, and that's a big detriment
2: invaders can pop in with strong weapons at that level IF the host has them as well, which is particularly easy in elden ring with the open world, a handful of players will be watching the guides on getting an easy +6 somber or whatever and be in stormveil with that and there will be invaders that do that as well maybe intentionally or not and that's just an issue of improper game knowledge imo
3: downscaling flat defense should happen but it's a fine balance because in dark souls 1 from experience nuking in coop for a host at like 200 the defense could get aggressively low and it needs to be well done or else it's awkward
4: the biggest issue in the end is lack of understanding from most players, people will always complain and hate, refuse to accept the other viewpoints and that's how it'll be, and as such things will get progressively more toxic and turn into a war for the casual player base
I get co op / invasions at stormveil at somber 1-3 lvl 20-40. I tested and when I went to somber 4 I no longer got anything at stormveil, but got instant invasion at raya. Twinking in stormveil is very much a thing, and the talisman slots and perfume are a big advantage, also duping starlight shards is OP. Every once in a while you'll see a full bull goat dual naginata seppuku with the carry weight physick.
@@Chonus somber 5 or 6 would probably be better in stormveil then, as before the volcano manor jump was patched you could easily get +9 somber now it stops at +6 super easy, so that's more likely where people end up
max upgrade on low levels seems reasonable as well, full challenge runners and stuff don't play online almost ever but there's some people like myself that occasionally do challenges and don't bother to turn off online, it'd be funny for an almost player base of level 10 people to go around at max weapon and pvp
@@AutistiCat2406 I hate to break it to you but you will never match or invade someone in stormveil with that high of a weapon level, there's no activity above 4.
@@Chonus maybe not me
ua-cam.com/video/Ew1wslTrhj8/v-deo.html 13:30
I see the view, from both co opers and invaders, that they feel a need to "punish" the other side by making the experience as miserable as possible for them and there's just a lot of genuine anger at other people for how they play the game and they're both such alien and terminally online gamer point of views I can't help but laugh. "I'm going to be toxic in a video game because this person is playing the video game" is dumb in an objectively funny way
I just pick cool weapons and try to use them in pvp. Low level flamberge/urumi dex invasions for stormveil can be really fun, but often you just get RoB by a bull goat phantom who teabags your body like you deserved to get 1 shot bled to death by the weapon art 😞
Not sure if we watched the same video but as Jund said it's an arms-race.
It's more like "I might as well do everything I can to win since my opponents are doing that".
If you can't beat 'em join 'em.
No one is being "punished". Dying over and over sucks. It's simply an adaptation.
This is especially the case here since the game is bullshit by design.
It's not really supposed to be fair.
@@aktyelements8034 Yeah, this has been my experience in it's entirety since I haven't invaded much yet and all the invasions I've done have been awful. Even right at launch my first few invasions were rot breath and moonveil spam hell. I'm taking a break because I wasn't really feeling playthrough 2 but I plan for this to be my invader character and I almost dread whatever I'm going to be walking into
Oversimplified. They're also not alien. Yes we can regurgitate "it's a game mechanic" ad nauseum but one mechanic visits something on others while the arms race is the response to said imposition. It's called adapting. Weren't pv-ers told to get gud for years? To many of them, this is what that looks like. Sometimes people are given what they ask for and still don't like the answer.
1. pick astrologer class
2. put 20~ levels into int
3. run to get meteorite staff
4. invade low levels with no upgraded weapons, 40~ int and a staff with S scaling
Enjoy ur 396 life
Maybe they need to select people by areas that they've explored. If I spend some time and collect some items in the late game areas then I won't be able to invade or be summoned by the player that is making his first steps in Limgrave.
When it comes to over leveled phantoms the only thing thats really broken about them is status effects and resistances.
Twink invaders can have all 4 talisman slots, late game weapons/armor, and more flask.
Phantoms will have all this to so it kinda evens out if you run into over leveled phantoms.
Other then a over leveled phantom that one hit status proc then twink invaders have it better off at lower levels.
Everything is so nerfed on phantoms that the host usually hits harder then the phantoms.
My friend was level 20 and I was 90 with maxed weapons and he hit for double the damage I did with a 3+ katana.
The same goes for invaders that they usually hit harder then the phantoms but they also have the late game status weapons so they kill the host really fast and the phantoms are nerfed where they have less health then the host but have higher resistances so they last just a little longer.
Imo if your invading at lower levels you should only have the gear appropriate to that level and only have late game gear for a phantom that is also using late game gear.
Whenever I’m playing with friends, I try to make an effort to make a new character and play through with them. I’ve known the frustration of invaders since I started playing Dark souls 3, so if my friend and I do get invaded we are the same level and I’m not going to nuke any enemy. It also makes the game more challenging for you and your friend as the only benefit that you are bringing to the table is pure experience.
Gives your friend more reason to play and try to push on against the struggles too
Would be cool if invaders’ stats could dynamically scale with the average of the hosts’ and their cooperators. Like you invade a lvl 50 guy and then he summons a lvl 100 buddy and your stats dynamically shift to ~lvl 75. Like how bosses’ health increase with summons
How would it do that for a person with all min required stats. Now they can't use their stuff
@@Hedonkeviik It could just effect their damage, health and resistances.
It would be cool if when you invaded you had the exact gear of the host. No twink no preset plan no unfairness. Just a fight.
@@calvinosaurus4514 like it already does?
@@boomerbyll3004 no thanks lmao