Elden Ring: YOU DIED on a horse

Got a friend to help me on the first boss, and it was fun! Now we're both very much stuck on the second boss

I was at the bottom of a great dungeon, which literally kept going down and down, having a good boss fight when the power went out. Then our basement flooded and we had to unplug and disassemble everything, so I don't know when I'll be getting back to the shadow realm. :(

Sounds like the realm of shadow came to you :(

Haha yes, that lightning whip-wielding Death Knight was just trying to increase damage by flooding the arena. Dastard!

that sounds awful, hope everything's alright Jordan!

Managed to beat the second boss within an inch of my own life after about 10 tries. A very dramatic fight involving the NPC and Mimic Tear. I spent much of the fight keeping my distance and just buffing my aids.

In interesting news: My friend managed to somehow skip Castle Ensis by finding a route round the back way. I've tried to work out what she did and I've been all round, but no idea how she did it. It's not recommmended though as it apparently breaks a few NPC quests

So far I'm really enjoying this. The atmospheres and biomes are amazing. The boss fights and many of the NPCs are challenging. And I'm only just getting started. No idea about the lore yet. I'm enjoying meeting all these different NPCs (many of them look very similar to each other - they're all wearing masks!)

Bearing in mind, I'm only on the second map fragment. But a small qualm so far is that the Shadow Realm feels a little wide and empty compared to, say, Limgrave or Altus Plateau.

I'd compare Gravesite Plain to Consecrated Snowfield for that reason. I can spend a long time ploughing through these wide empty fields without really hitting anything special. Or heading down a particular road only to find a dead-end with just a single item.

Gravesite Plain is surrounded by huge impenetrable rock walls and valleys, which, in the base game would have had lots of little caves and catacombs buried in them to explore. But these are much fewer and farther between. You could argue it's delayed gratification. The ones I've found are really well hidden!

Maybe it's partly because there's no Varre-type character telling you where you need to go that it feels at-once more directionless AND more linear. "Run around and find these crosses and come back to us", feels a bit more "gamey" than "You need to obtain a rune by beating the master of Stormveil so you can enter the roundtable hold".

Thinking about it, the general lay-out reminds me of Dark Souls 2's "hub-and-spoke"-style map quite a bit.

The legacy dungeons also feel a bit more compact linear than I'm used to (although I admit I got a bit lost in Belurat). I'd equate somewhere like Castle Ensis with somewhere like Castle Sol or Castle Morne than Stormveil. There's less of that intricate higgledypiggledy wrapping-around on themselves vibe. When I spent an hour in a poisoned swamp fighting an ulcerated tree spirit and hordes of insect-creatures just to gain a few random items and only to be left with the option to turn back on myself, I was frustrated.

Anyway, these are minor complaints, or qualms I should say - I'm just getting started and I'm sure there'll be a lot more to discover!

Thanks, we took out all the floor and shop-vacuumed up the water, and I hooked the PS5 back up last night to play in an empty concrete room on an exercise bike, as Miyazaki intended.

Are we in spoiler territory on the thread now? I really loved fighting this catacombs boss, very fun and unique moveset for a miniboss.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tEXW0XQOFYQ

I haven't ventured into what I assume is Castle Ensis yet, I'm doing everything I can around it. It's kind of refreshing not to always find caves where I would expect them, but I'm not sure if it feels more empty or not. I found a really cool path northeast of the castle, descending down where a soldier was looking out with binoculars, eventually using the horse to navigate a bunch of floating (?) rocks and pillars. In the end all I found was a cookbook, a mushroom bell-bearing (lol) that I had to shoot down, and a grace. But I'm probably missing something important, idk.

Also I appreciate that two mini-bosses have given up their weapons upon defeat, but it's the classic "this weapon seems much smaller and less cool when I use it" thing. Guess I'll stick with my giant cartoon anvil that makes it hard to see, for now.

Xp oh wow, I don't even know if I've found this yet. I feel like I've poked all round Gravesite Plain, and even ended up way off in some kind of volcano biome before thinking I should head back

Re: Spoilers, I'd say it's down to your own judgement. Maybe hide big spoilers and speak more generally?

I KNEW IT

(spoilers for what's under the dancing lion's coat)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dO8vEHspEdE

10-15 hours in and won't say anything spoilery but it's got me. Started off feeling like it was a bit flat, like maybe I've done enough of this Elden Ring business, especially bombing around big dark landscapes, but bit by bit - that lion, hidden paths into big new areas, mysterious stuff lying around, fun fun weapons, repeatedly dying as I learned my way through some obnoxious gangs - I am back to thinking about it all the time and sloping off to play whenever I have five minutes.

"5 minutes"

This is always the way it goes, but it's kinda crazy to me to see all the people who are on their second or third playthrough of the dlc. I'm slowly making my way through the first main map area and still haven't entered the castle, and still telling myself I need to be more thorough at exploring (for instance I had missed that Blackgaol Knight in the starting area!). I know my tendency is to be tempted on to the next area and miss at least 35% of the things, so I'm trying to really make the most of this first experience.

I killed a dragon yesterday, did a few invasions, that's about it.

"5 minutes"

For instance I just now popped in for 5 minutes to look at a new dungeon and try out a blood backhand blade and ok, it's now 50 minutes later but that's a single order of magnitude, nothing in cosmic terms.

I've also really missed squinting at the map and trying to pick out paths to get somewhere that looks intriguing. Relatedly, fuck you cliffs.

really good playing this in summer, with me squinting at the screen because although it's sunny in my front room, it's night and raining in the proper world, and i'm crouch-walking around a camp full of things I can't really see, but which will kill me pronto.

Also fuck you cliffs. I've only played a few hours. I must admit although it's underpopulated comparative to say Limgrave, I quite like the central desolation, the sense this dimensional world is under the sole control of Messmer and his fire, with only the dubious demiurge figure of Miquella to (apparently) counterbalance the weight of power in the realm.

Got to that dungeon I think Jordan was in - a catacombs. I usually dislike catacombs, they've been my least favorite dungeons in the main game, but this one was a gem! It had two stakes of Marika, to boot! Boss was very very hard, absolutely pulled out the ashes again, but bounced him after like 10 tries. Power stayed on and my basement did not flood. Whew

Haha

has anyone been to Belurat Gaol? TMI about Iron Fist Alexander and his kin!

yep. first place i ended up! very unwelcome information!

delurking cos need to talk about this game, haha. dunno if this is a common feeling but i find myself not wanting to do anything too major yet, like i'll enjoy it more if i explore shit. i love the extent to which the game rewards you just nosing around for stuff.

i have finally done a bit of what i think is belurat gaol, some really difficult long bits between sites of grace with multiple enemies that you have to try to isolate from each other. got invaded by some extremely pompous knight and p much one-shotted him. i'm level 205 and it's hard to kill me, especially in open territory as i have so many replenishing flasks, but i wouldn't say i'm particularly good at combat. still getting back used to it and so i panic a bit sometimes or go too aggressive.

does anyone use that sword you get after killing the elden lord? it's too unwieldy to equip all the time but it is p cool when there's a well-populated area of enemies just annihilating loads of them with its special ability.

elden beast i mean, rather than elden lord.

never used that sword, but v similar experience otherwise - nosing around, taking in the atmosphere, avoiding anything that looks major for the moment, also i’m 160 and similar wrt combat - reminding myself not to spam R1 to give myself time to move away / dodge, separating out messmer troops, especially those massive lightning hammer wielding arseholes, who are slow but can p much two shot me.

i need to think about changing my weapons as well - completed ER with the Magma Sword, and also a big of the ah twirly herald club bubble blowing thing.

hoping to get some serious hours under my belt over the weekend tbh.

hello LG! The Belurat Gaol is a one-boss one-grace dungeon with lots of jar enemies as well as... jar-related enemies. It's fairly early-game and not too difficult but definitely has vibes.

i am still using bloodhound's fang and a hugely levelled up omen cleaver

xpost i must be in belurat adjacent area or similar.

I love the sacred relic sword from the final boss of the main game but I’m trying not to rely on it because there’s so many cool new weapons to try out. The lightning perfume bottlle is nuts and so fun to use.

I learned that the backhand blades get an A scaling in strength when heavy-infused, which means that my strength character is now also my dex character! Amazing, I can't say how happy this makes me. So I've been swapping between my giant anvil on a stick and these crazy fast blades (with a running attack that you can KEEP RUNNING After).

Found the Belurat gaol last night finally, I had overlooked it before. Had a weird thing happen - I died to the boss because I was trying to parry him, lost 200k souls, then stupidly died again. Got him on the 3rd try and picked up my souls...and they were all there?! Must have been a glitch.

Only gone 4pm and already today I've killed the dancing lion first go.

!!

wth. rude. i still haven't faced it though will be shortly (i'm assuming). it had better go down first pop.

Here's my fight against the two guys in a lion coat:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SyDDO8CrTQs

Finally started going through Castle Ensis last night, loving the verticality. There are a few tantalizing cliffs (probably just containing broken runes) that I have no idea how to get to.

They just updated the scaling of the scadu shards yesterday. Should make it a bit less intense.

BTW I've been using the Sacred Relic Sword (Elden Beast weapon from his remembrance) on and off for two runs now. It's easily one of my favorite weapons in the game, up there with Mohg's staff for mowing down fools en masse

Idk if I just had one of those battles where you get lucky? Took it down fairly easily. I know from the full game sometimes you try for hours then a battle plays out like none of the others and you win easily.

xpost it is so satisfying

Btw scadu is pronounced "shadow", supposedly the old English spelling

Lion took me like 20 tries with both ashes and the summon, but I shockingly best Rellana first try with just ashes! And pre patch last night. Game can be very different experiences for people

In my panic I couldn't even get my ashes summoned but realised the summon was doing a great job so went in for the kill. I can't say I did much more than roll towards it a lot.

I found the second huge knight thing way harder tbh than the lion. Still haven't killed him, just ran away in the end.

Anyone beat any of those giant fire missile launching things yet? They seem impossible rn, not even going to try until in at scadu level 10

(many xps) I use sacred relic sword to clear out trash mobs or soften up the soldiers in an encampment. But don't really use it for actual scrapping - of the new weapons enjoying backhand blade (love blind spot) and milady, the light greatsword.

I get the impression that some npc sidequests rely on summoning them for boss fights, I really don't like that (prefer to play solo, and it seems to go against the 'play how you want' ethos). Let's be real though, I'll mess up all the questlines anyway.

I heard that you can kill those fire giants by tossing a bomb in their basket, but it was not working for me, lol. Maybe it has to be the heftiest of pots, or maybe you need to stagger them first (I believe it takes three 'staggers' before they'll actually lay down for a critical).

The furnace golems? Took down the first one today (I'm scadoobie 7 or 8). Took a few goes and some patience.

Stick near its feet - the fire stomp is jumpable with a v generous window, and the grab is slow and avoidable. You don't want to be at mid/long range or he'll throw the fucking rocks.
Just keep hitting its feet till it falls over and then hit it in its stupid face for a massive damage crit (you've got ages for this - it just lies there and does nothing). Dunno if it's weak to anything. I went pure physical.

Huh might try that out next time then. They're very intimidating!

i completely bounced off the first one but hadn’t been scadoobied up the wazoo at that point, and have some under belt now so maybe shd go back for a bit more hack and slash.

i wondered whether the frozen maggots you collect in belurat gaol might be part of bringing them down but haven’t found the right cookbook yet.

do love the way you can see their burning braziers from afar. “hmm” you think.

btw ime you won't feel like you're getting anywhere till you get the first knockdown. Not really making a dent in its health till then.

what's our approach to the shades? they have a tragic air about them, which sometimes makes me leave them alone and other times seems to make me want to hack a load of them down as i ride past.

I mostly ignore the passive chill kneeling ones and take out the aggro ones. Though the aggro ones do annoy me so once I'm done with them I generally go back and slaughter the kneelers.