that sounds ridiculous you think they would be compatible i dont mind restarting but i would prefer to keep my current save, i miss the game tbh, right now all i got is resident evil 7 so i got plenty of time to play other games

After much ignoring and neglecting of this series, I decided to finally purchase Dark Souls 3 via Steam last week. I played it for a couple hours the next day and found myself not enjoying it. However, I went back to it the next day and enjoyed myself a bit more. And on the third play session, I became hooked as I finally started to understand the combat mechanics better (and thus ceased dying every 2 minutes by terrible lowly skeletons, and I now die every 10 minutes or so, small steps). I've currently nearly completed the Road of Sacrifices areas after about 12 hours of play. Sounds pretty bad actually to me, haha. But considering I have virtually no Dark Souls experience beyond those 12 hours I suppose it's not too bad.

I also managed to kill Curse-Rotted Greatwood on just the second attempt, using nothing but the starting axe of the warrior class (with a +2 reinforcement), which seems of minor noteworthiness.

Overall, I am enjoying the game the more I continue to play and am getting very interested and steeped in the rich atmosphere and lore of the game. I'm definitely still learning about the item/equipment/upgrade system as I've definitely only touched the surface of that, but it seems very interesting as well.

The leveling system is quite simple, but that's not necessarily a bad thing and despite the simplicity seems to have a lot of different potential combinations in combination with the many different class options.

I have to say it is a bit refreshing to see a modern game series emphasis simplistic difficulty and skill to progress in the game, especially in an RPG, instead of all this post-WoW handholding that has been going on. I remember the good ol' days of DAoC where you actually had to know shit to be good.

I'm definitely looking forward to exploring more in this dark fantasy world of Dark Souls, and also reading this massive thread I missed out on.

Nice! I imagine few players actually start with DS3, but I'm glad you're enjoying it.

Don't hesitate for tips or advice if you need any.

welcome to the game series i think you described the souls journey well and sounds like you are doing pretty well considering i think 3 is a great souls game to start with, i cant wait to revisit the game, its a great feeling getting into the dark souls game series reminds me of this video



i know its not dark souls 3 but describes the journey through hating dark souls to being a fan

Got to start somewhere. Maybe I'll work my way backwards. I do have a copy of Dark Souls for PS3, but didn't really ever get to it.

Awesome, I did have a couple of questions. Mainly regarding these free levels and "hollowing". Which I don't quite get what that is, any chance for a quick explanation? And would you suggest taking those five free levels or not?



Thank you. I think I can see now it's going to be a staple for me and I'm determined to play through Dark Souls 3 now. I played about 6 hours or so yesterday after I got back from work. Think it's safe to say the Dark Souls hook is thoroughly set now. It's a sweet pain. haha

Has anyone seen this or posted this before:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zeNhMG97nu0

It's really making me feel....sad. And shows me how terrible I am at this game.

Okay so here's how it works.

- Every time you take a free level, you get one Dark Sigil in your inventory (under Key Items).
- And each time you die with at least 1 Dark Sigil, your Hollowing increases x the number of dark sigils. So if you carry 3 Dark Sigils, and you die once, your Hollowing increases by 3. If you have 5 sigils, your hollowing increases by 5 every time you die.
- Yoel gives free levels at certain increments of Hollowing, like at 0, 2, 6, 10, 15 hollowing or something (I'm not sure of the exact numbers but I think it caps at 15), for a maximum of 5.
- Hollowing makes you look like some ugly zombie starting at around 15 or so. You can fix that by curing the hollowing, or wearing the Untrue Dark Ring to look human.
- To cure hollowing temporarily (e.g. just cure Hollowing and reset it to 0 BUT if you die, the dark sigils are still there so you'll start hollowing again), use a Purging Stone, or visit the Velka statue in the Undead Settlement (pay a certain amount of souls). At some point, purging stones are cheaper.
- To cure hollowing permanently, you need to find a special item to bring to the Firekeeper and she can remove your Dark Sigils. However, the Souls cost will be.... 1 level worth of Souls per Dark Sigil. Making getting your free levels worthless. If anything they're more expensive because, suppose you cure it at level 50, the Souls cost will be higher than the souls you "saved" from a "free" level at level 30. Know what I mean? I mean your free levels aren't lost, but you just gotta pay for them, essentially. With interest.

What does hollowing do?
- It looks ugly
- It affects the ending. Remaining hollowed can lead you onto a specific quest line that results in a specific ending. Curing the Dark Sigils locks you out of that ending. IIRC, NOT curing it still allows you to choose your ending, it depends on some events.
- It has some gameplay advantages in some builds; the higher your Hollowing, the more potent your Bleed effect on weapons, and at 99 (I think?) hollowing on a +10 Hollow-infused weapon, you get a luck boost, as if getting +5 luck (also works on an offhand weapon like a parrying dagger or whatever, for +10 luck boost in total). Since Hollow weapons scale with luck, a luck + hollowing build based on inflicting bleed can be effective.


What should you do about it? That's up to you. What I typically do is I keep the Dark Sigils ('cause yay free levels), if I don't want the special questline/ending I just kill the NPCs that affect it, and if I'm sick of looking zombified I pop a Purging Stone or wear the Untrue Dark Ring.

Hope this helps! Sorry for the long post, Hollowing is a weird mechanic and poorly explained, took several playthroughs and some wiki help to figure everything out. At least it's not an overly important one, but still, that's Souls games for you.

I recently got back to playing this, as I had stopped for a while due to being super busy. I've explored through I o t B V and am about to go through the I D.

about A W


about HLW/entering I o t B V


My intention was to do a strength/faith or strength/pyromancy build with a heavy weapon, but I got greedy early on and dumped all my levels into just strength so I could wield a couple specific weapons. Oh well, I'll get the spellcasting side of things sorted sooner or later.

Hah, that's the exact same thing that happened to me, although that was because I'm a huge scrub and completely missed the upgraded flames/pyro trainers on my first playthrough.

Ha, I'm sure I've missed a few myself. I've given old dude a few tomes to allow me to buy/learn new stuff, but my stats just aren't there yet. Plus if I need fire damage I equip a certain greataxe, or buff my weapon with the +fire items. Ranged fire attacks don't feel necessary at the moment either, as the bow I'm using deals a pretty decent amount of damage, but I definitely want to delve further into that type of combat at some point.

one of my favourite moments/least favourite moments depending on how you look at it was the first shortcut, i am sure everyone knows of the first shortcut, early on i got to it and i was very happy i went through the lift and opened the door and everything then died because i had zero health or healing items shortly after i opened the shortcut but i didnt know it was a shortcut so i went back all that way again to get my souls only to die on my way to get my souls

i was so pissed off when i found out how easy it was to get there but i love moments like that

I know the feeling, SatanicPotato. Whenever I see a door that's locked from the other side, my first thought is, "Oh fuck...gonna have to deal with some serious bullshit to get that opened..."

lol that is one of the things i love about dark souls, the first game i played was dark souls 2(well soulsish game) and then i played the version with the new enemy placements and such and all the dlc, i remember the part of the game with the boat in the normal dark souls 2 game there was no shortcut but in the scholar of the sin they added a shortcut and i just loved that, the world design is just perfect even if you have to deal with a lot of bullshit, its the best kind of bullshit

I think, since we're over a year after the release, that we can dispense with the spoiler tags/abbreviations? What do you all think?

Unless new players still care about stuff like that in which case, no prob, I can keep using the tags. Just checking.

I'm cool with or without, I think I spoiled most of the game/lore by reading this thread and other forums. I can't get enough of the game right now.

Y t G

love this game! I used to play it for hours. Unfortunately, I have no time for it because of my study. When I have short breaks I play light games such as Island Defense at http://www.friv4online.com/ or Candy Crash. Want to return to play DS3 after passing exams.

subtle advertising

on another note its great to see people experiencing the souls series i cant wait to replay the game and hopefully not suck so badly

I just got up to the Pontiff Sulyvahn fight, holy shit I bet if you could see this guy's stamina meter it would be greyed-out with "lol gtfo n00b" written over it. I've yet to beat him, but have got him down to about 10% health a handful of times, I just tend to get excited and DPS at the wrong time during his second phase. I spend most of that fight rolling and circle strafing that when he gets that low, I'm so over the boss fight that I want to end it...and then I get wrecked.

this is purely as a mage/pyro character but for me as that type i only died to him a couple times and i actually found the part where he creates a clone easier because you could see his moves before he does them imo and i dont want to sound arrogant when i say i didnt have too much trouble with him because as usual with dark souls different bosses are easier or harder for some people and obviously some classes because i got destroyed by a boss later in the game which i will use the initials for so it doesnt ruin anything for you but ADOG was painful for me and until i noticed how easy he is the Crystal sage completely destroyed me many times when i tried to use magic against him

most people from what i read hate Pontiff though i have beaten him with a melee build but i forget how long it took

Yeah when he clones himself I try to take it out as quickly as possible, then fight him like I did in the beginning of the fight until he tries to summon another clone, and then DPS until the animation is finished and repeat. I always seem to get caught by the clone after I finish my combo, which I then get wrecked by the real PS. I can kill him, I just need to not become impatient, which is usually my issue with these fast, hard/quick-hitting bosses.

I totally feel you about how some bosses are easier/tougher for other players. I almost never play a magic-user character (few exceptions here and there in previous games) because of the patience involved with making it an offensive threat. I want to tank and slam enemies into the ground!

Nah, no spoilers is just fine. It's been a while after release.

And with that said, am I the only one who fell a rather significant emotional twinge when the Soul of Cinder's theme turned into Gwyn's? Just... fuck, From. Way to tell a story without so much as a single word.

@ Morrigan

Thank you for the explanation on hollowing. That was a better explanation than any that I read online. It wasn't clearly explained in other things I read. Sorry I didn't respond sooner!

HOLLOW FOR LIFE BABY. Currently doing a Luck run. Gonna be a fancy boy.

Re-reading through this thread, I see it was recommended to use weapons/buffs with added bleed damage for the Dancer of Boreal Valley fight, but it doesn't seem to be making a difference...I'm using a +6 Black Blade buffed with Carthus Rouge and it doesn't seem to be doing anything more significant than my non-buffed long sword.

Bleed triggers after a couple of consecutive hits. You should see a huge chunk of health disappear (and with a corresponding noise) when it triggers.

Ah, okay. I'm playing it safe and only hitting a couple times before dodging, I don't know why I thought the bleed buildup would last longer, ha. Maybe I'll use green blossom too next time so I can sneak some more hits in.

I'm laughing at how frustrated I was fighting Dancer, and when I remembered to USE MY FUCKING SHIELD it made the fight waaaaaaay easier (seems I'm still trying to unlearn Bloodborne in some places, heh). Roll dodge, block remainder of combo with shield, stick sword in her ass, rinse/repeat.

Y'all excited for the new DLC?

Goddamn the second DLC is bruuuuuutal.

yeah man, it's some rough stuff. the design of the enemies is amazing though.

I beat it tonight. All the bosses. I think I did most of everything, the only thing I'm missing are (2nd DLC spoilers, also spoils an annoying puzzle)

Darkeater Midir was a pain, I died so many times. Would often run out of Estus before the second phase, even. But once I got his pattern down I beat him with 11 estus to spare. Go figure!

Note to all players trying to beat Darkeater Midir and struggling: here's how you do it (video below). It doesn't require that much skill, just stay in front of him, bait his attack so that he lowers his head, get hits on the head, repeat. DO NOT GO UNDER OR BEHIND HIM if you can help it. Your damage will suck, the camera will screw you over and you won't see shit, and the tail whip attack will destroy you. Fight him like you would Amygdala in the Defiled Chalice dungeon.

They really outdid themselves with the last dlc boss fight, it's majestic and one of the most enjoyable of the series!

The location and some of the boss's movements reminded me Armored Core, it's just me?

Holy fuck, The Nameless King was one of the most intense boss fights I've ever endured. Unlike most people (or at least from what I've read on forums), I had a much, MUCH tougher time with the first part of the fight. That camera is BRUTAL. Once he dismounted, I had a much easier time, and could see just about everything that was coming my way. I'd like to thank the Carthus Bloodring for my success.

Yeah. The first boss fight is still owning me, even with the beastly new great sword in my armory. The first stage is a (near) cakewalk, but the second stage is just hectic. Still laughing at myself for going through the first area without realising that the bonfire was directly behind me when entering

EDIT: Also. Fuck those angel things

The angels aren't so bad when

Yeah, managed to figure that out but

I'm enjoying the 2nd DLC way more than the 1st, but GOD some of this stuff is brutal. That staircase with the handful of fat bastards & lightning gremlins & Nazgul-wannabes, in particular That part & can seriously go eat a dick.

The final DLC boss fight though is hands down the best, even better than Nameless King. Blood & thunder & shit everywhere, so.fockin'.metal.