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[s0]

can someone pls tell me what to do about the orphan of kos?

i saw this video by vaati claiming how "easy" he was to parry. idk if im stupid but most of his parry timings seem completely illogical and impossible to get right.

[DJFloppyFish]

he has a few key attacks to parry, namely his charged up horizontal sweep (it's when he holds and charges up his shrimp to his left side (your right) i think) and his big over head bash (the one with the big dust cloud AoE). both are just kinda delayed and relatively easy to nail with enough practice. in the second form, I'm less certain cause I never bothered parrying him in it past a few lucky times (because honestly, fuck getting oneshotted that far in the fight for a parry flub).

but all of that is dumb because he's way, waaaaaaay more susceptible to backstabs IMO. both his his 1st and 2nd form (although like the parries, I didn't try for backstabs much in his second form, although it did work once or twice).

I finally beat him again tonight on regular NG. I'm honestly still at a lost for how to handle that second form. I think he hit me once in his first form and then by the end of the fight, I had six vials. for some reason, he was harder this time than on my NG+3 char, probably because I couldn't tank as much damage? idk, great boss either way. way better than that laurence shithead. that boss just makes me mad.

[TeeGee]

Finished both the DLC and the main game today.

I love how it kept being challenging till the very end (well, Moon Presence and Mergo's Nurse were a bit too easy, but I was seriously over-leveled after Old Hunters + some co-op). In Dark Souls, I was able to trade hits with late game bosses and still come on top simply due to how powerful my character has become. Here, grind is much less important (aside from the dumb necessity to farm vials every now and then). Probably because armor can't be upgraded and stats hit soft caps a little sooner. I could dish out a lot of damage, but Orphan of Kos was still able to take me down in one combo and I actually had to re-try most of the late game bosses a few times. Which is how it should be.

Even common enemies in Bloodborne are much more powerful and interesting than in Souls. I've died plenty of times to stuff like those shark dudes or winter lanterns, and that never happened in Dark Souls! 90% of my death count there was simply falling into pits or PVP.


Crazy good game overall. One of those that make me wonder why do I even keep making games anymore.

[s0]

i thought sharks were ridiculously difficult until i found out that they have probably the most forgiving parry windows of any enemy in the game and almost all of their attacks can be parried. winter lanterns still scare me shitless tho, but that's partially because from went out of their way to make them repulsive and creepy.

Here, grind is much less important (aside from the dumb necessity to farm vials every now and then).

depends. if you do the whole chalice thing (which it sounds like you didn't), you can grind a lot of upgrade materials and some OP gems that make things a lot easier for you.

but yes it's much harder to become OP through sheer leveling. tho it isn't that easy in souls either if you don't pvp. i almost never pvp or deliberately grind in dark souls 1 and im usually slightly underleveled by the end of my ng playthrough.

[TeeGee]

Yeah, I didn't do any chalices aside from the first one. I wanted to, but the design with farming ritual materials is so dumb I decided to skip them and focus on the core game instead. Really a lot of wasted potential there.

[DJFloppyFish]

gehrman is the best end boss ever

[s0]

i still haven't beaten the orphan

one thing i don't understand is how his 360 swing attack is supposed to be "easy" to parry. i almost never manage to do that and when i do, it feels "random". what the heck am i doing wrong??

[TeeGee]

I honestly never parried him aside from some lucky random shots. Seemed too risky to me when most of his moves are relatively easy to avoid, but can lead to a one-shot combo if you mess the parry.

My tactic has been simply using a relatively fast weapon (Whirlgig or Ludwig in one-handed mode for me), dodging, and waiting for those bigger slams to sneak in a few hits. It's also good to lead him to the center of the beach, as getting cornered against a wall usually turns very badly.

[s0]

i figured out how to reliably backstab him when he does his jump attack (im using the rakuyo btw). with the clawmark rune equipped each backstab heals you fully.

still no idea what to do in second phase tho

[SousaVilla]

Really good video on bloodborne geographic inconsistencies:



 

[s0]

NERD COMPLAINT: it's not "odeon" it's "oedon", pronounced "erden" according to the chapel dweller npc.  

i did kinda feel like there was something "off" about the world connections in bborne, but it's ok because bborne doesn't really rely on memorable visual landmarks as much dark souls. yharnam is just this cramped, mazelike early modern city. this also makes it more complex visually and thus probably harder to pull off these connections.

besides, even dks1 takes some liberties w/r/t locations and scale of the distance models.

[SousaVilla]

I always had the impression that dks1 had a more cohesive geography, even with the tricks. I dont think that's a problem with bloodborne, since you dont notice that while playing, but it makes me respect dark souls even more.

That video description includes links to some good analysis on dks1 geography:

http://illusorywall.tumblr.com/post/132589360859/dark-souls-1-distant-views-explained-part-1
http://illusorywall.tumblr.com/post/132589370839/dark-souls-1-distant-views-explained-part-2

  

[s0]

yeah i knew about those. i read the illusory wall tumblr regularly. i was actually surprised that the scale and locations don't quite match up because i certainly didn't notice it during my several 100 hours of play.

btw, while we're nerding out about souls games: miyazaki has claimed in interviews that he considers the fighting fantasy series of gamebooks, and particularly the book "titan" a great influence.

here's the cover of that book



now look at the name of the editor at the bottom. do you think the bborne character is a deliberate nod?

[Thomas Finch]

Beat Dark Souls 2. Doing a NG+ on it now and starting to play Bloodborne.

[InfiniteStateMachine]

yeah i knew about those. i read the illusory wall tumblr regularly. i was actually surprised that the scale and locations don't quite match up because i certainly didn't notice it during my several 100 hours of play.

btw, while we're nerding out about souls games: miyazaki has claimed in interviews that he considers the fighting fantasy series of gamebooks, and particularly the book "titan" a great influence.

here's the cover of that book



now look at the name of the editor at the bottom. do you think the bborne character is a deliberate nod?

That's awesome. I can definitely feel some similarities to firetop mountain. I haven't heard of Titan before.


I'm just playing through DS2 PS4 right now since last time I played it I stopped at about 15-20 hours because I had a PS4 copy on the way. It's better than I remember. I think the beginning parts may have been the weaker areas. I'm liking it the more I play.

I've played all the games on the console previously so the one thing that stuck out the most was the 60fps. It actually felt weird at first.

[s0]

the ps4 version (scholar of the first sin) has new and better enemy and item placements fyi. that's probably why you like it better now

[InfiniteStateMachine]

That might explain some of it. There were definitely some areas I visited that we're really different.

I'm also noticing the pursuer shows up a lot more often now. That's really cool.

[s0]

i didn't really like those additional pursuer fights tbh. i don't think he is an interesting enough enemy to fight him over and over again and also not worth the risk of potentially losing your souls when you can just run away.

[joseph ¯\_(ツ)_/¯]

Played through basically the whole game finding it very easy (gerhma, logarius, paarl, and several other bosses on my first try - most in less than 5) but the orphan of kos is impossible. Fought him maybe 50+ times so far. lvl 70ish

[s0]

i find this game harder than dks1 and demons souls to be honest. mostly because you need actual reflexes (which i don't have) and can't just turtle through everything with a shield.

glad ur at least having the same problems with the orphan. tbh your best bet is probably to grind to at least level 90 and upgrade your vit to a point where he can't oneshot you. also equip the clawmark rune which makes visceral attacks restore your HP fully in boss fights.