Emarrel, my Dark Souls 1 hero already released a video about this exact thing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ncbvez_S5Tk

He/She did it.

 

That video was pretty funny. So guys, Solomon especially, post your battle builds! What do you use to kill other players?

I'm using a lightning build. Looking glass/lion mage armor, Lightning Thorned Greatsword for the extra fast lightning. And since I have tons of faith of course I use the buff suite, GMB, Sacred Oath and Lightning Blade. And some more Great Lightning spears just for fun. Here is Gendou Ikari



How about you?

 

[imgur]343FfVN[/imgur]
I haven't solidified my fashion souls yet after discovering an Alonne Captain Helm mod.

As for the build itself, it started as a glowing weapon build that played around with power stanced (buffed) Magic Blue Flames and power stanced (buffed) Dark Mace of the Insolents, but I had to respec because that didn't play as nicely with PvP as I'd like. So now I'm running with minimum requirements on my swords (Dark Drakekeeper Sword +10 and regular-ass offhand scimitar for occasional parries).

Relevant stats:
56 Vigor
38 ADP
16/16 Str/Dex
15/15 Int/Fai (note: I spiced down Dark/Resonant Weapon so 15/15 is high enough for both.)

 

All right, most players complain about. I guessed it might be a bit of an unpopular opinion, but I've personally never had any problem with any of the listed items.

Batfog? Pre-roll or moss. Santiers? Easiest weapon in the game to parry. Avelyn? Strafe. Any spell? Roll.

I consider most of the changes unnecessary. There's always rage at patch notes you personally don't agree with.

"At least trying", huh? What they're changing aren't any of the real problems within the game.

 

The biggest problem is Soul Memory, which if they fix will make this game epic, and if they dont it'll only be pretty good.

 

The poison is instant. Yes, you have options for dealing with that, but don't even pretend that's not fucked up.

They both hit too hard for what they are. If you mess up your roll against Avelyn, for example, you can consider at least half of your health bar gone. Santier's spear hits stupidly hard, too. Just because you have options for these weapons doesn't mean they're not too strong.

Two things about this: 1) by changing these things, at the very minimum some people will stop using them, which will lead to more variety; this is always good. Santier's Spears, Avelyns, and Bat Staffs are boring as fuck.

2) Half of the real problems you described are design decisions on From's part, and the other half have been around in one form or another since Demon's Souls. Good fucking luck getting From to fix any of it.

 

I know it's OP, but I'm still disappointed that WotG is getting nerfed. There's nothing funnier than killing a host and his two phantoms when they rush you in a single cast.

As for builds, I think I have a basic bread and butter Faith build. 50 Faith for Dragon Chime and spiced Sunlight Spear, Throne Defender's GS, and full Heide Knight set for the paladin look. Enough ADP to hit 100 Agility, and the rest pumped into Vig/End/Vit. In the Blueberry covenant, almost got to rank 2 for the big blue aura.

I also have another character with bare fists and the Covenant of Champions ring, but I'm not really good with that in PvP yet.

 

Consider going 105 for one more iframe! You get your next one around 113, iirc.

 

Also, keep in mind that you really don't need a lot of Vit unless you're planning on wearing seriously heavy armor. Depending on your playstyle, having the extra 5 AGI could be far more useful than any amount of equip load.

 

Some initial notes.

Mundane Avelyn does half damage and has twice as long reload time. Kinda trash now, super situational.

Santiers has 70 lower AR (mundane). Eh.

Syan, only a small damage nerf? Not sure.

GRS lost about 10%-15% dmg. Abyss Ring boost changed to below 10% boost, so GRS lost about 30% dmg in total.

Monastery Scimitar identical parry to other curved swords.

10/10 buffs last 10-15 seconds now, lol. Spicing buffs = dead.

Flame Weapon got around 40% nerf (LOLWHAT).

RW is probably 35% boost instead of 50%, so only very slightly better than dark/slb/cmw. Maaaybe worth using, but it's in line now.

 

I'll need to play around with Alonne Knights later when I have time, because I heard they also made parrying harder with curved swords in general. I don't do a lot of parrying, but if they did shaft curved sword parries, I need to know so I can swap my offhand scimitar with a buckler or something.

I'm still kinda confused about the flame weapon nerf. Considering how strong Santier's and Avelyn could be, those nerfs seem warranted. GRS was easily the best spell in the game, so it sounds like it's more in line with where it should be now. Any idea what they did to Cale's set? I don't have it, and even if I did I have no idea what its defenses were pre-patch.

E: I'll also have to check out how long my Dark Weapon lasts now, since I spiced that down to about 15/15. It should still last long enough for some PvP, but man I need to know.

 

I didnt see the buff time changes. How does this affect non spiced buffs? Any more details on that?

 

I thought that only applied to Great Magic Barrier (which apparently does actually last all of 10 seconds when spiced down to minimum), but I haven't checked my buff yet.

 

The boots had a ridiculous amount of defense for their weight, one of the best def to weight ratio items in the game, so they got nerfed.

DW lasts almost twice as long, has more casts, takes one attunement slot and does a tiny, tiny bit less damage than RW. They REALLY gutted RW.

About buff times - it seems to be fairly independent on the buff, but generally speaking, at 50 faith I'm getting around the same time as before. Someone said that 30 faith GMB lasted for 60 sec. What I'm interested about is how high the timers go with 99 faith? That + Lingering Dragoncrest could give some 2-3min buffs.

Edit: at least DW, RW and GMB have different buff times depending on your stats. Dunno about SLB/Sacred Oath.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TboX4CPGWHA

Fix one thing, break another.

 

Ah, the feared Havelix rearing its ugly head.

Let's see if it'll be as or even more broken as Havelyn was.

 

The problem isn't the weapons, really. It's the spells making him effectively invincible for an extended duration.

 

Things could go like in DS1 against dmb. Just run till they run out of buffs. That would be very sad to see.

 

I can confirm that the parry timing on regular curved swords is fucked now. If you want to parry, grab a target shield (or a buckler or something.) Otherwise you're basically wasting your time.

 

DLC announced.

Looks like a cash grab, but... dlc for a game you love!