Why Elden Ring Shadow of the Erdtree FEELS more Difficult than it Really is 

Honestly i Think half of the player base have forgotten how learning new moves from both weapons and enemies feels.

It's funny how the fingerprint shield can block everything in DLC with ease, It's by far the easiest way to win the attrition of resources.

Asmon is a perfect example of creating his own frustration. Ignores all the tutorials, refuses to engage with the mechanics, refuses to adjust playstyle, then when the same thing that hasnt worked 100 times before he blames the game.

Real issues -cheap Melenia combos everywhere, bosses ramming the entrance, never ending combo poise, flashy visual moves, absurd hitboxes on big bosses.

They've simply changed their philosophy. They were content before for certain exceptional players to "solve" their games and excel, dominate, and otherwise exploit every option available, knowing that the vast majority - as you put it - were still climbing the mountain using the old tools. They've since opened Pandora's box and are now attempting to shove their own world back into its cage. Players had access to high, sustained DPS? Bosses now have 1-2 second openings. Players have access to long range damage options and can disengage freely to heal? Bosses now have instant, relentless gap closers. Players could stun-lock a superboss into submission? Bosses now shrug off all but the most over-tuned poise strategies. The problem is that this doesn't incentivize a new way to climb the mountain, it simply narrows options to, as you say, the rocket boots. If you only have one second to attack during an opening, of course you're going to do a jumping, power-stanced dual katana hit. If boss health has been inflated to silly proportions, of course you're going to rely on %damage through bleed and frostbite. In sum: why should I want to follow the old rules if the bosses are playing by a new set? It's an arms race - and you can't win an arms race against the very people you want to play your game. Anyway, a well-reasoned, thought-provoking video. I also think this DLC is a rousing success overall, even if I think it's also exactly emblematic of why we're reaching the end of Elden Ring's potential in its current form. I firmly believe they could ameliorate a lot of these problems in future design iterations, but it would take a re-imagining of "the rules" as we know them. Great review, Mug.

I tried the dlc on ng+3 and barely made it past the lion dancer. I restarted a fresh game, and it was much more manageable. I think that might be a reason why so many are having a hard time.

Using the new weapons is a huge driving force for me. Holy shit Milady & dryleaf arts are the most insanely fun weapons. Blood affinity with both on arcane/dex build.

Issues I believe need to be addressed. 1. Some bosses instantly use their best special attack moments after entering the arena. All bosses should walk at you like a cool guy for at least 5 seconds and then engage with the player. This will allow the fights to take place more in the center of the arena as well as make the fight more interesting so its not just dodge X attack at the start which is not that engaging. 2. Move summon signs and spirit ash locations to outside the boss arenas. Some are inside and some are outside, bringing this to parity will remove the frustration of trying to activate summon signs while fighting for your life. 3. Certain boss strings frame data should be adjusted slightly to allow more lenience with dodge rolling. There are a few strings that will roll catch if you don't hit a very tight timing and that does feel unfair and frustrating to engage with. Elden Ring already felt like a game where you can choose too suffer or you can choose to abuse the game right back with a myriad of broken builds. But the DLC takes it to the extreme. You will abuse the game or the game will abuse you and I have mixed feeling about that. Learning a difficult encounter is allowed to be frustrating but it should also keep the player engaged. Finding the next step forward should be enjoyable and motivating but I felt my progress on a select few bosses, more then any other souls-like, being impeded by unnecessary bullshittery.

The reason the game floods you with upgrade materials is to address a criticism the base game had. Many people considered upgrade items so rare that they didn't feel free to experiment with weapons and builds. SOTE brought so many amazing new weapons spells and incantations that it's only logical from software wouldn't want you to be limited especially with how much the different bosses encourage different play styles. They are indirectly telling you to experiment.

If you like the last five bosses of ER, then you are going to love the DLC. If you hated the last 5 bosses of ER you are not going to like the DLC.

I always said that Soulsborne bosses used to play by the same rules as the player. They were just better at it. Not literally, of course, but hear me out. You could see the moments where they seem like they've run out of stamina and need to take a breath, the moments where they're ready to do their big moves that they use sparingly because of FP, how they have their options like a light attack string or a heavy attack string, some mixups in there... But Elden Ring bosses never run out of stamina, they never need to think about when to use the big moves, they never ever ever stop their attack strings. You aren't in this intricate play of working in and out of one another... you're completely at their mercy while THEY have all the fun.

I'm just annoyed that people use "it's not too hard" as a blanket answer to anyone complaining. Objectively I don't think it's too hard (haven't beaten it yet) but I DO think there are absolutely some issues and they get overlooked because people don't know how to explain their issues so they just say "it's too hard" and then people respond with "no it's not". The quickest example is just like that bigass dragon before Bayle. I almost enjoyed the fight but not being able to lock onto its legs was a nightmare and the camera being so zoomed in while the boss flies around a lot meant it was a pain just trying to see what moves it's doing that I had to dodge. Like yeah there are a lot of ways to deal with it especially if you just use things like mimic tear, but it's a genuine complaint I have about specific design of bosses or areas or enemies. Even a lot of the biggest Elden Ring supporters including like no-hit runners were complaining about some of the bosses well after release of the base game. They didn't struggle necessarily as they're able to no-hit them all, but just found flaws with the design of certain moves and such, and I haven't heard any of that in the DLC because it's so black and white between "too hard" and "no just get good and use all the tools".

💀nahh git gud But fr a lot of these issues were noticed in the final boss of the dlc. The openings are so tight that sometimes it feels like rng whether you can get in either a hit with a slower weapon or a heal with your flask. They've also got multiple "stall" attacks where you cant do anything and your buffs run out so its very rng heavy how much damage you can get in within that 60ish seconds that most buffs last. Theres also a lot of visual clutter and a cheap way of making everything harder which is on the ground aoe after-effects after every attack. And **I. Can't. Even.** with the egregious thunder-cross-split attack he does where if you're not already in the right position when he does it, its literally impossible to dodge on med load because it roll catches you with the second swing, meaning if you want to dodge that attack you have to be in that position and be mindful of that one attack THE ENTIRE FIGHT. Its like hahaa we know you'll roll this so here's a roll catch get f*cked. Still somehow a really fun boss to fight but a lot of its difficulty comes from pure bs.

My biggest issue with the boss aggression is that 1 second window you have to attack? Colossal Weapons basically boiled down to Jump Attack Spam, which makes them boring to use to me

i honestly had the most trouble with rellana. she was just early enough in the dlc that i hadnt found many blues clues and i was using a freshly aquired milady (granted it was +24). the combination of lower stats and a new weapon made it a more difficult boss. i will say that out of all the dlc bosses her fight felt much more fair and like a dance of dodging then attacking. many other dlc bosses have long combos that even if you get hit once you need to spend their 2 second counter attack window to chug an estus because it did 40% of my health bar. then its back to dodging for 10 seconds. rinse and repeat edit: and do yourself a favor; equip the new golden braid talisman and use divine fortification for the last boss fight. that gives you 57% holy damage negation for the low price of 10 faith and a talisman slot

The mountain analogy made me think of what Brandon Rogers once said: "There is no top. Reaching the peak only gives you a better view after the next taller mountain to climb."

An immediate note about the upgrade material rewards, you can access the dlc as early as Liurnia. You do not have to set foot on Altus to access the dlc. The game rewarding you with these smaller upgrade materials is to reflect that you do not necessarily have access to the bell bearings to give you unlimited materials. It is also very nice to not have to go run to the twin maiden husk every time anyways.

They give us all these cool new ashes of war. But boss openings are too short to use many of them. They give us more tools for creative expression, while simultaneously hampering our ability to use them. It's frustrating because I love many aspects of Elden Ring. And it's a pretty easy fix. Just give the boss longer openings to allow more creative combat expression, and increase the boss health and resistance to compensate. Shorten some of the attack chains, while still preserving the difficulty of evading them. Let players attack more, and it will be much fun, even if the difficulty is the same.

What I hate the most is the buffs. I just want to play a challenging game. You have to activate all kinds of thing, have the perfect talisman combo and tears. Why not have an adventure or experience level system with damage increases like strength or stamina. I mean the dude or girl runs around and kills a bunch if enemies shouldn't he/she get stronger because of all that fighting. Outside from the magical grace given power... That would immediatly fix the feeling of exploration and actually just experiencing the game. If you want to really crunch the numbers you can do that, but leave something for people that love games like Skyrim and OSRS, but love a good challenge. I hope someone reads this comment.

For me it was a two pronged problem 1.)The bosses have better mechanics then the player, it’s no longer a fight but a rolling marathon which is frustrating and boring 2.) the bosses power not only did they bust out the hyper ex super combos but they also 1-2 shot most builds. So learning the patterns of endless combos just to have the camera F you over and you take that hit and die repeatedly. The bosses were not made with souls borne mechanics in mind they seem better fit for Sekiro When I found the deflect harden physics that changed the entire game more than the tree fragments A well timed block is far better than a roll in these boss fights it way more fun then rolling for 40sec just to get 1 swing in It’s definitely was a bad design choice the bosses look amazing but the way the player has to interact with them feels very limited the lion dancer is the biggest offender You can’t parry it like you can the twin sword lady The arena/Camara are not on the players side The constant combos into projectiles and aoe left you with little room to fight the boss It just pure offensive onslaught which would be fine if I had more options the just roll or sprint Mechanical and functional the bosses are over tuned for the base player mechanics You can block the attacks unless you have a specific shield and set up Staggering the boss is difficult because you can only manage one hit at a time Using spirit ashes and summoning coop is fine but that takes away from the challenge of over coming the bosses Engaging with the boss mechanics is no longer fun the same way dark souls and blood borne manage to balance They really need to rework the players mechanics to keep up with these new boss philosophies or the games going to go stagnant The deflect harden let me play my build without having to dip into the cheese of one shot or hiding behind summons That mechanic along with the quick step should be set to the standard to keep players ing the fight against the boss and no just running from it Reward timing and quit punishing us with rolling marathons please

The dance metaphor is every apt for the bosses. If older fights are a dance between two equal partners, the DLC bosses have you in the audience watching the bosses solo performance and waiting until they trip

My issue with the difficulty on the DLC, even though I welcome the challenge: enemies and bosses often times feel like I'm fighting the developer instead of the monster. What do I mean by that: a LOT of combo attacks with insane poise (to stop us from staggering enemies and not engaging with their movesets), LONG combos with a lot of delayed attacks mixed in with the occasional input read combo extension and a roll catching move, on top of having a Sekiro-level of aggression while we still have basically the same defensive tools as DS1 plus a jump. They added a new cracked tear that actually gives us Sekiro's deflects, but that lasts for only 3 minutes. If there was a way to get Sekiro's deflects until death or resting at a grace, like Malenia's Great Rune giving us the Rally mechanic from Bloodborne, the combat would feel much more enjoyable. I envy PC players who will be able to mod in an extension on that cracked tear duration to last until death.

I loved the majority of the DLC, although the difficulty was a substantial step up from the rest of the game. The damage taken and dealt meant that the duration that error must be avoided and margin for that error to be forgiven is reduced, even if the execution of tasks isn't harder. Many of the bosses had the Elden Beast issues, well telegraphed attacks, interesting and fun move sets, but so much movement that I spent ages dodging and chasing only to get my 1 short attack window. Sometimes that single window would also go to waste as an attack would get skirted around by the boss movement. I parried the twin sword cutie to death and found the snake twink absolutely delightful and fought him over and over until I could no hit him consistently. Some of the best bosses of any game I've ever played, truly wonderful experiences to have. Then I ran headlong into performance issues on the final boss. 3080ti GPU and yet 22fps regularly during the second phase felt absolutely terrible and left a really sour taste in my mouth. Nothing like a boss with so little margin for error (much dmg), such long combos, and such short windows eating frames (and therefore inputs) like candy too.

I seriously dont think the rewards are any better or worse than the base game. How many people tried to find a route to every glowing orb in stoneveil just to eventually get to it and its a fucking mushroom? Id much rather be rewarded with smithing stones, at least those are still useful

I feel like we're approaching the point where "every subsquent game MUST Be harder than the previous" is becoming a fucking curse for this game lol

I think just having the bosses flinch more would do wonders. And tone down the final boss of the DLC.

I will argue that the best examples of "too difficult" are represented with Commander Gaius and [redacted for spoilers]. They aren't fun, they aren't thrilling, they don't make me excited to fight them. They make me feel tired, because where I enjoy Malenia's fight as a flow between her cautious approach her brutal combos, those two just start kicking me in the balls and don't stop until I've died 2-3 hits later. Now, admittedly, I'm on NG4+, so everything is just infinitely chunkier, but in the base game, I never felt like I needed to resort to "bleed/freeze" to chop off percentages but in the DLC it almost feels necessary. The absolutely relentless storm of attacks from these two also makes playing a caster build functionally impossible unless you're going to use cheese strats.

I have two guesses as to why there are many bolsering items in SoTE 1. They originally wanted to make it a bit more of an early game area where it was far more difficult but also far more rewarding in the way of upgrade materials. 2. They originally wanted to make the DLC bigger, but due to time constraints, they ended up not adding everything they wanted I believe the latter guess is more likely than the former because of how many weapon classes that were added in the DLC only to house a few weapons. Examples would be Hand-to-hand arts, thrusting shields, beast claws, etc. Edited because i accidentally posted it before i was finished.

Honestly, I think this DLC actually handles progression better than any previous FromSoft game, in that it actually has progression. Previous DLCs were always harder than their base games, but there were never any new systems for the players to get any stronger than they were in the base game, only ever more versatile with new weapons and spells. You mentioned letting weapons upgrade past the original base game limits. except that's pretty much exactly what Scadutree Fragments do, only without the need to upgrade each weapon individually, a necessity of the base game that was actually frequently complained about. Although relatedly I think that's why upgrade materials are so much more common now in the DLC, so that even players who haven't fully explored the base game to find all the miner bell bearings can still easily upgrade any of the new weapons or spirit ashes they find. As for "difficulty," it's actually pretty close to what I expected based on previous games. I mean, yeah, because Scadutree fragments provide a new upgrade path all the numbers are a lot higher than previous DLCs, but the increased spectacle and aggression is pretty much par for the course... and I say that as a veteran who is currently trying to see just how far I can get in the DLC without using any Scadu Fragments.

The only issue of these that I have is the stupid dodge for a full minute for one attack that you might still get hit during depending on the attack the boss decides to use

The thing is is that the game at a certain point just isn’t fun. The introduced a bunch of new weapons (only like 3 per new type which sucks), incantations and spells that are useless. 90% of the new stuff is weak and or not worth it. Which is honestly fairly similar to the base game. A lot of spell, incantations and ashes of war that aren’t worth the time they take to use. So they’re not fun to use even when they look cool cause you can’t afford to take a trade when trying to use them. The argument that you would just walk through the DLC if they didn’t add the Scadutree functionality I think is simply not true. I’m on NG+ 3 and med tier world enemies can still 2 shot me at 70 vigor depending on what attack they use. And by adding that function they effectively made all the time people put into building their character irrelevant, which is not fun. And finally because I don’t wanna type to much. If people need to “cheese” your game, it’s not fun. Majority of people don’t start out wanting to “cheese” a game. In a game like this they see a weapon or attacks that’s cool and build their play style around it or they come in with a default play style that they enjoy like sword and shield. I beat this DLC, but I had to change my play style to beat the final boss cause my way realistically isn’t efficient and I play that way just cause I enjoy it. But I couldn’t enjoy the boss fights in this, especially not the last one. The way this game is crafted dictate the way people play in a way that makes it not fun, that’s the problem with the dlc. Besides FromSoft not knowing how to balance their spells, incantations and or ashes of war worth a damn.

nothing is too difficult outside of the final boss and the abhorrent npc gank before him "just summon" is not valid defense of awful design. if ganks were bad in dark souls 2 then they are bad here too. you cannot criticise dark souls 2 for the same things you are ignoring or praising here.

Honestly my biggest beef with it is that they basically force you to use at least one or two defensive talismans which obviously makes your damage way lower ...which makes bosses seem way too tanky ..if you dont use defensive talismans you get 2tapped on 60 vig ...just give me 2 more talisman pouches in shadow realm and take them away in base game and Im good to go

I can tell you’re itching to talk about specific things. Looking forward to the more explicit analysis/discussion.

Do you really not realize they have all the things you said it should have in the game? You can make the game easier, you can increase your flask recovery more than ever, you can increase your stamina recovery more than ever, the game has modular difficulty and all the patch did was front load the scaling of Scadutree fragments so people don’t have to find as many early on which is a great change the game shouldn’t punish you for not exploring but it keeps that if you get stuck you can explore get stronger and come back

My only complaint was that my Xbox couldn’t handle second phase consort Radahn all the light effects really slowed things down

Finally someone that actually engages with the criticisms and doesn’t just lecture people about what they’re doing wrong! I had some serious issues with bosses in the dlc. Not because of the difficulty, but because *I wasn’t having fun.* Sure, the bosses are great when you’ve *already* mastered them, but if 80% of your time spent on a boss isn’t fun, then is it actually a good fight? I mean is spending more time in loading screens than in the boss fight a good thing?

I think the bosses, aside from one(where it FEELS like it should be a mounted battle, but that's actually a bad idea), were actually tuned rather well. I beat it using the Poison bottles, 2h. The problem I see(as I've also spent time attempting to help people with bosses), is that most players aren't reacting to the bosses. 9/10 as soon as I enter the boss fight behind the host, they have attempted to run in to a corner, and when I inevitably pull aggro off them, they still are too skiddish to actually engage. I had so far 2 boss fights where the host was aggro rather than passive, and we actually beat the boss. COINCIDENTALLY both of those players were also the only ones I have run in to NOT using bleed builds. The DLC is pretty hard, but I can confidently say this is a player issue, not a game design issue. To go with the dance metaphor: These bosses aren't ballroom dancing, this is a samba. Get Good 💀

For anyone still struggling, i highly suggest giving great shields a chance. Just hold it up if you don't know what the boss is doing. Also, the Shard of Alexander was my only damage talisman, everything else was defense. Got me through Ng+

I went with a new character, did the mandatory Radahn and took Varre's quest to get to Moghwyn early, and aside from entering the DLC too early, (lvl 60 or so, first boss and the way there gave me like 8 level ups), this feels like the intended experience and it's great. I don't have the bell bearings as a result, so getting 8 smithing stone [7] feels like a godsend, level ups feel very impactful, especially as I'm still getting 2 or so per boss, and the side-grades in weapons and talismans are just that, an alternative progression in my case since i dont have Farum Azula, mountain peak or even Leyndell. Feels great to use a light greatsword for a change. Only real issue is that I lack one talisman slot and my estus flask is a bit behind, and of course returning to the main game afterwards is gonna be a cakewalk

My entire problem with the dlc (I beat it already) is that while I get being destroyed by a boss, I DO NOT find it fun being oneshot by trash mobs. Especially the random Messmer Soldiers.

My biggest problem with dlc is that I don't really want to start new playthrough or ng+ as there is absolutely no way I'm spending few hours running around getting fragments just to not get oneshot right away. It takes away something that was always very special for me with soulslikes and instantly wanting to start new playthrough with different build. Also aggressiveness and combos of the bosses and questionable hitboxes are pretty insane

I WANT to explore, but i want to explore to find scadutree fragments, because I already have a build that works for me. And yet, almost everytime i go explore on my own without a guide, I just find anything except scadutree fragments. Yes I know to look for any statues of Marika and churches and some of the pot-holding enemies, but still I never find them without a guide and that is definitely discouraging.

The DLC was not too hard for me at all. However, the new bosses' movesets are just kind of boring. They require you to dodge for a long time to be able to retaliate for just a fraction of a second. Even if you boost your defense and attack, it will not change that. The bosses are just combo-streak freaks that never stop.

I think some of the issue with the player power curve comes from players being over prepared. In my current run, my first playthrough of the dlc, I wanted to go into the DLC before burning the erdtree so i started the DLC at rl127 with only access to the first 3 smithing bells and no glovewort bells. Having a relative lack of resources made the relative impact of finding rocks and flowers as rewards for exploration far greater and always gave me singing I needed. My runes went towards levels I desperately needed and the low level stones dropped from enemies made my new weapons stronger. I scrounged every area for 7 and 8 stones to eke out every little extra piece of damage and through that process managed to find all but 3 scadutree fragments and 1 revered spirit ash naturally. I do agree that the bosses have attack chains that go on too damn long, but in my opinion the majority of bosses that do this are kinda glass cannons. I am by no means a good player of souls games, I'm mediocre at best, but after returning to the main game to get the smithing bells 4 to comfortably take on the final DLC boss and trial new weapons to see which moveset I wanted to use against the big guy I found that I could beat Fire Giant and Godskin Duo first try. The DLC made me a better player on a fundamental level. I'm even starting to learn parry timings finally, after many playthroughs of 4 different souls games and several aborted attempts at learning previously. Maybe this experience is purely due to my own skill level and the build I had (non-cheese non-optimal bleed) but I couldn't help but feel the hands of the designers guiding me throughout the DLC. All that being said, Git Gud 💀 my friends I'm off for day three of attempting the final boss.

You made an offhand remark about leaving your sign to be summoned to help other players defeat bosses and I think this is a part of the game (the genre?) that is still untapped. They could do more with it and it's very vanilla as it is now. It could be more 'essential', imo. And with this, Miyazaki's recent comments about being open to the idea of future Fromsoft titles having seamless co-op; I think this is the direction I would choose if I was looking to shake up the paradigm and build a better mountain as it were.

I played through Haligtree and Farum Azula after the dlc on my new character and those areas felt more difficult than 90% of the new content. It feels like even when put into comparison, I receive more damage and deal less. Even the prawns in Haligtree feel more dangerous to me than those in the dlc ruins (tho admittedly, Malenia was pretty easy the second time 😅)

Some of the lesser boss encounters felt better boss designs, like old Dark Souls ones. For context, I started the DLC at SL 150, I don't like to use busted builds, I like the fashion and for the DLC I made a "viking" inspired build with a broadsword, spear, longbow and shield build. While I did have great success and fun exploring with said build, I can't say the same for bosses. It seems like I had to change my character completley just to satisfy a dps check the game wanted me to. While I feel like adapting to overcoming challanges is great for a game design, I feel like my build already covered most of the things that I wanted, ranged with the bow, long straight thrusts with the lance and short, fast and horizontal swipes with the broadsword for lesser enemies, all paired with a shield for the added protection and interaction with the lance. Instead what many bosses of the DLC wanted me to do was pick a VERY hard hitting weapon to take advantage of the very few and small hit windows the bosses give you, and double down on that one strategy, being with bleeding or raw power and thus fulfilling a dps check. One thing is to ask players to adapt, the other is to fit into a precise broken meta. Instead, if we look at the Blackgaol Knight or even the Black Knight that drops the Black Steel Greathammer fights its quite the opposite. These smaller encounters are what bosses used to be in Dark Souls and these can be very challenging fights by themselves that, obviously, can be trivialized if we put broken builds into the equation. For a bulild like mine though, I found them to be much more enjoyable, I could actually survive a couple of hits and learn the moveset, or parry windows, I stood more on the defensive and entered that "dance" stance that so many people idolize about these games. I only found that to be true with Messmer, Rellana, Romina and somewhat the Dancing Lion...the first one, the second one that summon those frogs can go f himself 😂

I think you hit the nail on what's always felt off about Elden Ring compared to other Souls games. FromSoft went too hard into the spectacle of fights where bosses just don't seem to play by the same rules you do. Now you have normal enemies doing the same thing. I haven't started the expansion yet but I instantly feel like I either need to swap to a great shield tank build or relearn how to become a Parry God just to deal with the constant onslaught of attacks seemingly unhindered by the stamina bar I'm forces to work around. As requested, "Git Gud 💀"

They need to evolve the formula in a more meaningful way. The core root of many of the game's problems are tied to combat being very, very limited. Primarily in terms of boss interactions. The difficulty is in executing timed inputs, but the inputs themselves are boring as heckies, and the resulting actions are... stale? And lacking in meaningful gameplay variation. Fundamentally, you only really have one response to any attack - roll. Yes, sometimes sprinting works. Yes, blocking also works to a very limited degree, and yet it's all about rolling in the end. And all your attacks are just... mashing the one most effective move (single input as well), spell, ash, etc. It's frankly astonishing just how far they've taken this very basic dynamic, but SoTE (and the base game too, tbf) really shows just how basic it is. Having combos, more movement options, different dodges aside from rolls, more functional parries would all open up so much design space for encounters. And yes, more staggers/flinches coming from the player. I keep thinking of Nioh as an example of what I mean. The combat in that game stays entertaining for so much longer and is much more varied (itemization is cursed though)

The only problem I have with this game is the cross slash move Radahn does. Its a BS move. Its dodgeable, but the margin for error is so small it might as well be impossible. Its like they're severely punishing the people that play the game the way they want people to play the game with that move. I am a bare bones player. I use a dex build with melee. And I'm good at it. That move is bs. Period

After beating the dlc I dedicated a day to helping other players beat bosses. The amount of players that frequently summoned me that couldn’t beat these bosses is ridiculous. The types of players that wear light armor, wield giant weapons, and buff using HoS and bloodboil aromatics and wonder “why am I taking so much dmg?” My brother you just put your defense in the negative in a fromsoft DLC. What did you expect? They rush the boss knowing they are not skilled enough to do so and most of the time they end up dying before I even get through the fog gate. lol you literally cannot make this up. They refuse to restrategize. I’m atp now where I just use all my buffs and damage the boss as much as I can disregarding myself hoping that if I at least get them low the host can finish the job themselves. Doubt that ever happens tho.

<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="180">03:00</a> "Taking something away from the player once you've given it to them is usually a big no-no in design." That sums it up nicely. I bought Elden Ring on the suspicion that despite being a Soulslike, it might accommodate my playstyle - and man, didn't it do that in a way I totally did not expect. I love exploration and deciphering lore, but I'm a roleplayer. I'm not interested in fair fights but effective fights. Give me one hour to overcome a boss and I'd rather spend 55 minutes of that hour outside the boss arena, to make sure the actual fight is a curbstomp. *This isn't cheap, it's smart* (this can't be repeated often enough)!!! ER's major boss fights are never a curbstomp but it did accommodate my playstyle well enough to overcome almost all bosses with a single-digit number of attempts, and were it not so, I would not have bought the DLC. And then...the enemies became much more difficult AND my build became much less effective. At times I feel the new bosses were deliberately designed to undo all the work I had done to achieve what I wanted - to make the fights easier for me, ie someone with just an average skill at this type of game. With the result that I just don't feel as motivated to tackle the next boss as I was in the main game, Scadutree fragments notwithstanding.

Definitely agree with what you say about builds. In the base game I never really felt the need to use overpowered builds and just used weapons I think are cool, but now it seems like I've been caught in the crossfire and every boss is a grindy slog. So ironically, I've felt more tempted to respec into some meta build, if only to make the fights a bit faster.

Honestly I prefer the base game over the DLC. Having played all Dark Souls, Sekiro and Bloodborne, I never felt like I was doing a chore while fighting the bosses, however in this DLC everytime I fought a boss except maybe 2 bosses, felt like I was not having fun for simply having to dodge 6 to 8 hits and then landing one attack and repeat. I don't like the direction From Software took with the DLC, DS3 for example had Gael and I always felt like I could get a hit or two while he was attacking, now if I try to attack rennalla or mesmer after going behind them, I just get smoked by the barrage of slashes and combos. I also felt like exploring wasn't so rewarding, I explored cerulean coast and felt like it was a waste of time after the first 20 minutes, because the area is literally the scenery and some scattered materials or common enemies.

İf I were the devs, I'd introduce "scadu runes" in the DLC. Basically another currency that let's you level up in the DLC area. Effectively this does the same thing as Scadutree fragments. But, changes how people approach the game. Instead of running around to find scadutree fragments, players can go to an optional dungeon kill the enemies/bosses and get stronger as result of that. In other words, this DLC tied progression directly to exploration. In the base game progression tied to combat. That's the biggest flaw I'd say. In the base game where ever you go, you'll find enemies and by beating those enemies you can level up and get stronger. In the DLC, you can beat all the enemies in the area but get nothing out of it. This lessens the core game loop of Souls games. In DLC, you know that when you beat those incredibly strong enemies, you'll get basically nothing. This feels cheap.

"The problem, as they say, is freedom." With all of the things that you can level up--things that can drastically alter the way you play--it creates significant design problems that are impossible to solve for every build and playstyle. I don't even think it's the weapons and the playstyles themselves that are the issues, so much as all of the other things surrounding them (like you mentioned, the buff/debuffs, the ashes, the summoning ashes, the consumable variety, the scaling freedom, etc). It's all led exactly to where you said, where the only difficulty that can be divined out of this freedom is by "denying" people from playing with them by speed, lack of stagger, movement reaction, insane health pools, lengthy combo strings, and attacks with minimal avoidance zones. It's the inevitable, logical conclusion to this system if they keep trying to increase the difficulty. There exists such a thing as too much freedom. As much as Bloodborne is my favorite FromSoft game, and I really do love Elden Ring's build variety, I think I prefer Sekiro's combat more out of any FromSoft game specifically because of how challenging and rewarding it is. I know others might not agree, but I would prefer if FromSoft started to veer more into the route of Sekiro, much like how Lies of P found a way to incorporate Sekiro into their weapon/class RPG system. Also, I think the Scadu Tree Fragment progression issue could have been solved if they had just used Shadow Realm Runes to level up in the Shadow Realm specifically, exactly how the leveling system works with normal Runes. The problem I think isn't the Scadu Tree Fragment scaling, so much as it's the presentation and the perception of how it works that's really messing with people. If it had been explained via lore that we are weak in the Realm of Shadow due to being outside the influence of the Erdtree and its grace, it would signal to the player that they need to stock up on the Shadow Realm Runes which already exist, and must use those to bolster ourselves in this new land beyond the Erdtree's grace. These runes already exist, and instead of the limited Scadu Fragments we get, they could've made finding runes way more exciting because the progression would feel similar to what everyone was used to. Hell, the Scadu Fragments could've been used instead of Smithing Stones to bolster our weapons, with a lore reason or something being that our weapons, not forged in Shadow, lack the strength/edge necessary to deal with the threats of this land. That would solve people's perception about getting so many smithing stones. I think SotE was a massive improvement over Elden Ring in most cases, but FromSoft still has some hangups from Elden Ring that have been made way more apparent here.

I think the issue of caves and catacombs being useless on subsequent runs because you know if you want or need the loot from it is a big replay killer. However, when I did a couple randomizer runs every area was important again.

The souls formula used to be that the enemies including bosses played by the same rules that we did. The movesets were manageable and fair. Everyone got used to it, so now they play by another set of rules. Now instead of a 5 move combo it’s like 20 move combo that is impossible to dodge for most normal players.

I will say I completely agree that the absurdly long attack chains need to be shortened. Honestly though, why weren't people ragging on Lies of P for doing the exact same damn thing? Because the entire endgame of Lies of P is every boss doing the same damn thing. Simon Manus, Laxasia, the secret boss. They all have attack chains that go on for a whole business day. The difference is that they maybe have 15-20% more recovery time in between (except the secret boss, screw that thing), which is... Probably exactly what these guys need. Just extend recovery by a second each, or shorten the attack chain slightly. Maybe give them 50 more bleed resist... Although it might not even be an actual problem with them so much as the Impenetrable Thorns sorcery inexplicably printing nonsensical amounts of procs, and a few other outliers. Frost is reasonable. Rot is exactly as good as the lore says it should be on the bosses it should be good against, and nerfing it wouldn't make any sense. Honestly, I'm not sure they really need to be resistant to statuses so much as a few outliers need their overlapping hitbox nonsense looked at. I guess you could get gud 💀... Or you could get the golem spirit or something, that guy is as nonsensically tanky as the enemy version.

There only 1 Remembrance Boss that took me more than 8 tries. The main bosses got spanked by me, with one exception; the final boss. The last boss took me 158 tries and 6 hours. All other main bosses only killed me 24 times combined. You see the imbalance in the difficulty? (at least 30 deaths against the last boss were before I could land a hit)

Can you explain how spells, mimic tear and high poise damage crutches have been removed from the dlc? Ive only done the first 2 bosses but I didnt see how these things would be less effective (I didnt use any of spells unless you count a lightning buff on my sword vs rennala 2 because shes stood in water, so its hard to see for this one). I certainly found myself able to still use summons, I love throwing latenna down in a corner because she increases my dps wihout fucking with my boss agro, and only once or twice did the boss rush me down before I could pull that off. And I also still found it fairly reasonable to stance break, I was using the m'lady and still got multiple staggers per battle, but maybe thats because latenna is very good at stopping stance damage decay.

so collecting higher level smithing stones is different than collecting scadutree fragments? Of which Scadutree fragments also help your defenses and not just offense.

I kinda agree; with Putrescent Knight, Romina and, Messmer, it really feels like I won because the CPU threw me a bone, instead of spamming their arena-covering, 7 swing,1-hit kill, homing, combo.

Your video was very insightful, and i feel like i understand the complaints a lot more now. Most of these things didn't affect my personal enjoyment of the game in any negative way, and i didn't feel less incentivised to explore at all, but i do recognize that the reasons people play these games vastly differ. One of the great things about Elden Ring was how it was able to accomodate such a wide range of players, while not losing, or compromising on it's identity as a souls game, where the dlc seems to cater to more specific audiences.

I have asked this question many times since its still hazy for me so is there or is there not clear (or somewhat clear ) guidance to the scadutree fragments like for example churches alway had tears and mines always have upgrade mats is there such a guidance or is it not visualized in any way meaning you just have to get lucky exploring?

ironically despite being the hardest fight, the last one was the most fun for me since it felt like there were more openings to attack than usual

Why ppl dropped their shields? ER puts emphasis in blocking. Raise (ye shields,) ye tarnished! Enemies with long strings becomes a joke. Stop trying to dodge/jump everything and block. Stop using talismans that gives you offensive buffs and invest in defensive/resistance buffs instead. Honestly it's not that bad if just stand still and block with your tower shields. Bleed is not the answer to everything.

Played the DLC on two different characters. One that was post game, as the last thing to do. One that was during a playthrough where I just after Mogh and well before the Haligtree. The character that did not have max weapon upgrades was much more rewarding.

Pretty much agree with thte video. The DLC, at least from my perspective, makes certain play-patterns necessary trough artifical difficulty. The now necessary play patterns being high armor rates, because there are attacks which are pretty much unavoidable, heavy burst damage because u can only land one hit at a time and some form of help, be it cheese or summons, to break trough the hyper-aggressivnes of the bosses. Not all of them, Messmer and a certain bug-lady being pretty cool fights, but the lion-dancer and a certain endboss are absolutely not. I wanted to play a blue dancer build in the dlc, because a lot of the new weapons being pretty light-weight. And it doesn't work, despite a lot of new equipment being pretty much made for that playstyle. Light rolling doesn't help if a hitbox has the size of a postcode, or the combo blasts on for another 5 hits. Fast attacks are useless if u are forced into trading after the first hit. So yeah, in my eyes, one of the biggest strenghts and salepoints of Elden Ring, the build variety, is severely diminished in the dlc, because everything going in without max defense and good old hyperarmor has an unecessary hard time. Which was different in Bloodbornes TOH and DS3 DLCs, where was enough room to keep going with the stuff one did in the main game.

I agree with most of the review, I want to just correct a factual error. the review implies multiple times regarding exploration, that we can only face two rememberance bosses (rellana and Lion dudes) before we get to fight any other. This is not true. You can access scuda Altus region without fighting rellana via fort of reprimand. In fact, this dlc allows fighting all rememberance bosses except Radahn without having to fight another boss, something that wasn't even possible in the core game.

The damage of the trash mobs on ng+ is absurd. While I didn't get "one shot" by them. If i got grabbed, it was about the same as when malenia grabbed and impaled me, which is ridiculous. A guy with a cleaver got the jump on me from behind a waterfall. One hit did more than an entire max rank estus flask. After the buff to the early ranks of the shadow tree blessing, it should be better now. But those early levels were awful.

I love playing a fast paced playstyle with lots of dodging and counter attacks. Well, there’s plenty of dodging, but no room for counter attacks. I feel like I have just as few attack opportunities as a full tanky turtle build, but with a hundred times the effort and infinitely more risk. All I can do is the occasional poke while watching the boss have all the fun.

Good review. I'm one of the few who went into the DLC with the same pure sorceror that I initially beat the game with (including a painful 8 hours of attempting and researching ways to beat Malenia because I REFUSED to respec) and I stayed true to that. I used the Mimic because me and my shadow are inseparable and while there were DEFINITELY times I wanted to smash my desk and burn my computer to the ground over some bosses...I still persevered and beat the final DLC boss a few days ago. Absolutely tough but I ended the DLC with roughly a lvl 200 character (entered around 167) and maybe just maybe....I'll finally start Journey 2. I'd like to personally thank the Glintstone Cometshard and Adula's Moonblade for getting me through all the major non-colossal bosses. For that I thank Shard Spiral. Bonus tip: the aromatic sprays and the bubble tear will tank any hit once so use them liberally to get an initial summon out or to tank the incoming blow. After that, GOOD LUCK cuz even the best summons can easily melt to these bosses.

I think their way to handle the DLC was quite fun. I love exploration. That's why I found alot of Scadutree fragments and got strong. I thought I could level up my character before the DLC to be ready but I was quite cool to get nerfed and you have to collect the Scadutree fragments to get back your strength. I really do hope they'll make another dlc and handle it the same way.

I mean, how something "feels" directly impacts the difficulty of something. I don't think it makes sense to distinguish between how difficult something feels, and difficult it "actually" is.

I “crafted my build” for PvP. It’s a keen Flamberge (little bit of bleed pressure, but not the focus) supplemented with electrify weapon (a suitable but fair buff) and golden vow. The ash is Thunderbolt, for the heal punish (I force honor duels, I do not care that you want to save your summon). I have 67 poise, 50 vig (those last 200 hp for 10 levels isn’t my tea) and the 60 Dex to get some damage out. This is a COMPLETE 125 level build that has trade potential. I found very few enemies respected my damage and stagger output. I usually use smaller weapons like daggers, because I value tiny openings and lighter loads very much, but strength bois have it easy, let’s be honest. Each and every boss took all my buffs, available scadur blessings, a summon (I choose not to mimic, you do you), and dumb luck. I am still not done, but I will say, as a souls vet with DS 1, 2, 3, and Bloodborne under my belt. Elden ring is just hard, unintuitive, and unwilling to play by turn. Your shield will break, your roll caught, your spell dodged, your damage out-matched. It can “be learned”, but I do not believe it can be done alone. I accept the coming git gud 💀comments. I am your martyr, farm me for your hearts. Stand strong and don’t you dare go hollow.

I was pumping endurance and vigor for most of the DLC. I was able to equip stronger armor, drop my erdtree favor+2/great jar's arsenal and open up talisman slots for other defensive talismans. If I had gotten to a point where I was dumping way too much into vigor, I was planning to respec into faith for the elemental protection buffs, which would then reopen my talismans for an offense talisman or two.

Having to upgrade every weapon to +35 sounds awful if you felt like changing builds. Just seems like a worse system than having a consistant player tied damage boost. The fragment system isn't much different from collecting golden seed or scared tears. I think instead of having only 50 a bit more should've been scattered around like with extra seeds in the base game. I wanted a challenge in the dlc. If some people don't, they should've used all the tools instead of whining.

I do like how constructive your criticism is. This isn’t just “bad cuz it feels hard” or “Just get good lul” you bring up real good points, and I agree with most of what you said. Progression is linear and slow in a way, main bosses have no flinching and leave hardly any time to attack back. They should have more down time after a long attack string or something. I have experienced not using some of my favorite attacks and spells because I knew they were too slow to use.

Im not the best soul gamer but i searched for the new level system items before i fought and any boss and came in deleting every boss.

While I disagree with the label of using tools the game gives you as "Cheese builds" I agree with most other things you've said such as enemy and boss aggression and design. The only builds I would consider cheese is "stack buff and oneshot" builds and exploits. The rest are just... Normal Builds.

every new spell and ash of war is 45 seconds to cast once every single boss punish opening is .75 seconds long and complete RNG whether you can get a single R1 with a dagger in without considering it greedy boring asf bossfights with 0 time to use anything but jump/roll/crouch attack spam with everything outside of a single straight sword poke. the damage and undodgeable moves are 1 thing but its the fact you can use precisely 0 of the cool aspects of combat outside of coop when even then a distracted boss isnt safe to use them on bcs they just AoE spam to make sure you cant use a single charged heavy or incantation behind them while they are aggrod on someone else elden ring has always been like this you just didnt realised because you kill radagon or maliketh in 3 hits

Honestly some of the complaints about the difficulty are so valid. I hate how there’s so many people that are just like “shut up, it’s not that hard, you’re just weak” instead of actually hearing out these complaints and thinking WHY there are so many in the first place. I beefed with all the remembrance bosses and honestly? It IS hard, even with all the scadutree fragments available. Fighting most bosses in the base game was incredibly satisfying because it feels like you’re given chance despite being knocked down. But it’s so hard to enjoy the DLCs bosses and learn their move sets when trying to learn feels very punishing

Git gud 💀 But you know what, I am unapologetically the type of person to wait for an update to Carian combo warriors and enjoy my power fantasy. I know that's the kind of talk to get the anonymous public to feel some way, but screw it, I'm an 80's born millennial that so far believes does a good job leading a reduced stress life. Don't need this flavor of 1's and 0's to disturb that, there are other options to challenge that particular fulfillment. I'm happy for those deadset on the vanilla experience though and have no problem watching a ZeroLenny video.

As someone who did NOT find the DLC too difficult, save the last boss, but who had difficulty articulating his mixed feelings upon finishing the DLC, I appreciate how thoughtful your analysis is. I'm now helping people fight bosses but I completely changed my build (but thankfully not my specs) and I am annoyed at how much easier a lot of thr bosses became. (Went from a dual teinblade strength bleed to a heavy load bloody pokey tank.)I feel like I lost my toys, just as you said.

I think the worst part of the DLC is that FromSoft wants to try and tackle every single thing they've deemed to be a base game problem. Every boss has to have a nuke. Every boss has to have delayed attacks. Every boss has to be hyper-aggressive. Every boss has to be fast, and able to instantly close the gap. Every boss has to have long combos with minimal downtime. The pacing of boss fights just doesn't feel good anymore. They don't want players to be able to poise through boss attacks, so they make sure the attacks ignore poise. They don't want players to have time to build up status effects, so they make bosses have 1 second windows in which you can deal damage to them. In short, FromSoft has designed new bosses around countering everything, and I'm not sure I like that design philosophy. On the thing about weapons/armour being mostly just different, rather than better, I understand that they're trying to balance it for the base game but if this DLC is supposed to take place around the endgame anyway, then I'm not sure it really matters at that point. NG+ feels like NG but you're overpowered from the get-go. Subsequent NG+ cycles might feel different, but with how the damage resistance scaling works for bosses on subsequent NG+ cycles, I'm not sure it's an issue.

Great points and very eloquently put! I wonder if a solution to both the scadutree fragment problem and the anti-rocket boots bosses problem can be solved by giving players new tools in the toolbox for the DLC? For example the deflecting hardtear has received a lot of praise for changing the way the game can be played, if they're able to tie obtaining such game changing tools with scadutree fragments instead of it giving a flat stat bonus it could make the DLC progression system much clearer and intuitive to the players. Imagine a skill tree system to unlock the deflecting ability with scadutree fragments, or a shop that sells it for fragments. The tough part is making enough of these tools to cater to varied playstyles of players while making sure specific combinations of these don't break the game all over again, but it also frees up space for brand new boss designs. Lastly, git gud 💀

Bosses have (for the most part) been tuned for hyper aggressivity to stop players from using gimmicks and rely on pure gameplay skill. Obviously this is going to give some folks whiplash when they believe everyone is playing the same game of Go Fish and their opponent whips out a reverse UNO card and stabs them in the neck. I can respect this design philosophy, but it is quickly fatiguing.

I don’t think the scadu fragments are an issue at all, and I don’t see why it is. If you don’t wanna use them, don’t use them lol.

<a href="#" class="seekto" data-time="2414">40:14</a> I see this argument but I feel like I’ve found so many windows to attack from being as aggressive as the boss, jumping over random shit or just unlocking and walking behind them. No matter how aggressive a boss looks, there’s always windows people are not seeing because you can’t roll and R1.

Bro trying to beat dts with 25 vigor 😂

(This got way longer than intended, sorry. It's not a "get good" rant, I promise, but it is mostly a disagreement/discussion of proposals.) Personally? I felt rewarded by exploration almost all the time. Aside from a few spaces that were basically just scenery (which is its own reward, of sorts), I pretty much either found something interesting or something useful wherever I went. I ended up with at least 5 different future character builds to try with gear I found that wasn't immediately useful for the character I was playing, but definitely wanted to try later, and the scadutree/ash blessing materials are all over the place. I thought exploration was amazing in the DLC. The smithing stones (less so the glovewort) are also useful for characters that aren't into the post-Leyndell game yet. You can go to the DLC very early, and having upgrade materials all over the place enables you to basically stay there rather than force you to go back and progress through the main game on that character just to upgrade your weapons. The base game also has a lot of "useless" items all over the place that you might want in your first playthrough for completionism's sake, and on subsequent playthroughs you'll probably remember to ignore that side path because you don't need what's in it. I wouldn't say the DLC map is any different in that respect. The fragments and revered ashes are basically just DLC upgrade materials, and you can treat them the same way you do smithing stones and gravewort: rush them to get overpowered early, get them as you go to build up naturally, ignore them if you feel like you don't need the boost, etc. I think it's a great improvement over their previous DLC which, by comparison, endgame builds often WOULD just immediately steamroll. This progression system (the original one; the updated version is kinda...too strong too fast, I'd say, although it does mean you can get by while finding fewer fragments if you don't enjoy the map exploration) gives the DLC content a better sense of pace than, say, Ashes of Ariandel and the Ringed City, which you can basically boss-rush and be done with in no time if you're already 120+ when you enter them. For your progression suggestion: I don't think player perception will change, and it wouldn't change the exploration issue if you think there is one, since the fragments would be new smithing stones instead. You'd still have to go out and find them if you can't deal with the current wall in front of you, and if you didn't get enough damage (and introduce an armor upgrade system to increase the defenses, which the blessing also does, to compensate for enemies having higher damage output?), you'd still feel like it's too hard, unfair, etc. This version of the system also wouldn't work at all for characters coming into it early, because if your weapon isn't already +25, you wouldn't be able to use the stones to bring it to +26 until you collected enough to get there, which would mean either doing extra DLC exploration to find all the lower-tier stones in it before you can even get to the DLC-tier progression level, or going back to vanilla before you can play more DLC content. Neither is as clean as just having the parallel progression track available to everyone at every level immediately upon entry to the DLC. Maybe I just wasn't using enough cheese (not out of elitism or anything, I just didn't want to build that way), but I'm honestly not sure what you're talking about when it comes to "tools being taken away." Infinite Comet Azur deletion is definitely off the table, and frankly some fights seem like they must be maddening as a pure caster, but then, I've never been good at playing pure caster, so maybe I'm just bad at the required tactics for it. My first full run of the DLC was done with a Milady mainhand (Wing Stance), Smithscript Daggers offhand, and good old Mimic Tear to draw aggro, for almost the entirety of the run. No new or extra gimmicks required, no min/maxing strats. The only exception was the very last boss which...yeah. Yeah, that one is way over the top. Point being, I didn't get the impression most of the DLC content "countered" anything new or specific. Tools weren't taken away. You're just climbing a more difficult mountain and your tools need more careful usage to work (and finding an abundance of blessings helps to soften the harsh weather up there). Related aside: I can't say I noticed most enemies, even bosses, being significantly harder to stagger *if you hit them consistently and hard enough,* but the sometimes ridiculous aggression/small windows to attack make it harder to do that consistent damage to get the stagger. Your fire knight spin example, for instance: jumping powerstanced/heavy attacks with at least a greatsword staggered that guy every time for me, and three powerstanced jumps (maybe two on a two-handed heavier weapon than my second run was using) opened him up for a crit. Seemed pretty normal. The Horned Warriors are the notable exception: I don't think I saw one of those even get poise-broken, much less stance-broken for a crit, in both playthroughs I've done so far. As far as I can tell they're just immune to stagger altogether, so I focus on either doing maximum dps or safe attacks instead and just assume their attack patterns won't be interrupted by anything I do. This video seems like it only approaches from the perspective of "how does the DLC feel going into it with a fully completed vanilla character that isn't interested in any of the options raised by new content", in which case I could see how it might come across as a bit bland, sure. To anyone not locked into a predetermined mindset of what is "better," however, it presents a number of new options, some of which are very strong indeed, others simply interesting or different (currently building a perfumer/archer that feels very different from anything I've tried before). I think it would be incorrect to cater to a purely perspective-based overreaction to new things, especially when it's only been out for a week. Give players a little time to get used to the new system, and for speedrunners and the like to post the new exploits and strats for players who rely on that content to absorb and incorporate, and I expect the fussing will die down without the need for many changes. (Really though that last boss, good lord, put a friggin' epilepsy warning on their fog gate or something, FromSoft. What the heck.)

Darksouls was hard but fair, i played through DS3 again before playing the DLC There are 2 a critical differences that the DLC makes that make it so much worse than the difficulty of previous games before elden ring The attack combos do have windows for the player to attack, but they also have followups that chain off of those attack windows that can randomly punish the player for taking those attack windows to actually attack The bosses are not learnable because they are not predictable, while every Darksouls 3 boss is predictable and learnable Consort Radahn is a major example of this issue because he has the most attacks with this issue, the most notable one i can think of is the jumping attack that mimicks lions claw, the attack ends with an attack opportunity which is just long enough for you to take it and get a hit in without getting hit if you go for it immediately If you go for it immediately and he chooses to do the followup attack, youre gonna get hit by an unpredictable and if you actually took the attack window, unavoidable attack The boss shouldnt be punishing the player for taking attack windows to attack with inconsistent and unreactable attacks, it should be punishing the player for not learning the moveset and rewarding them with attack windows when they succeed Consort, Gaius, and Bayle are examples of bosses also punishing players for what build they use, they all have multiple attacks that are impossible to dodge if you arent light rolling, and have so much health and damage that even with maxed out scadutree fragements and spirit summons, they can just make your build non viable and force you to respec and change your equipment just to beat them because instead of punishing lack of skill, theyre punishing your build

The new dlc doesn't allow you to comet azure every boss or one tap every boss, but it's not too difficult, your supposed to use the scadu fragments that how you level up in the dlc it's very simple. There is one major issue, this issue being fromsoft has developed a non dance style form of combat for the bosses, they don't permit you your turn anymore, rather you end up having to trade or constantly be dodging and that's not a dance, that's not a rhythm that's not learning the boss and knowing when it's your turn, like in ds3 and blood borne, it was a dance. And don't you think ds3 and bloodborne wasn't just as hard if not harder than elden ring, oh my god, midir? Midir makes Bayle look like a baby. Anyone who said Bayle was harder ovbiously never beat midir lol. I'm not even the best at fromsoft games I have never and will never do a no hit run, I never ever will be that good. But as a players who's played alot of fromsoft games I recongize the loss of the pattern, the dance is being sacrifed for a flashy boss that doesn't give you your turn for the dance, the duel.

It is kind of wild that the base game hammers home "hey the posture system is very important and you should try to break enemy posture here's a sword with Square Off to start you out" and then the expansion says "not anymore lol"

When Elden Ring first came out, I spent like an hour riding around Liurnia trying to find a way up to the Moonlight Altar area. I gave up and got there in the end through a quest. It wasn't an experience I particularly enjoyed to be honest, and the entire SotE map is basically this. Like I wanted to go find map fragments before exploring more, but over and over again every time I found a new area that I thought might finally have a path to the map fragment, it wasn't. I ended up looking up how to find them because I got so sick of it. The ONE time I felt like it was ok I still couldn't get to it was when I stumbled across St Trina's area. Other than that, I never found anything that made me glad I'd at least taken the journey, I just felt like I'd wasted more time. But once I checked out the guides and opened up the world, I started having a lot more fun riding around and finding stuff. I really hated the way the game was sort of playing 'keep away' with the map fragments, but aside from that I had a good experience with it. Exploration is kind of a one time thing, and wasn't my favourite part of the base game, so it's not a huge deal if the dlc fumbles in that area. But man did it fumble

For me, the DLC didn't feel like it was quite done. It was wide open, but sparsely populated. Lots to explore, but not a lot of rewards for doing so. The main bosses felt too move spammy, and the damage you take (even at level 16 and 8 respectively with the fragments) felt over the top; like it was making the game difficult for the sake of difficulty, rather than challenging through careful balancing. The bosses were cool, and the new areas looked great, but it just didn't seem like the DLC was done cooking yet, so to speak. That said, I did beat all but three of the bosses (Bayle and the final two) on my own via Melee with no magic and no buffs, and overall, I did enjoy the DLC. But it didn't come across as well crafted and polished as the base game (which was fantastic from start to finish). Oh, and git gud.

I would say exploration was the most rewarding part. Mostly because of scudletree stuff hidden all over the place. Reason why smithing stones are useless is because farming souls is too easy. If it was not ash of war vs albinaurics easy - those would still be really valuable

I agree with this. If From shortens enemy combo strings, gets rid of the awkward delayed attacks that try to throw off your dodge roll timing, and reduce the amount of AOE bombs combat would be a lot better.