I know of at least one person (questauthority on twitch and twitter) who played for about 2 weeks (if that) and quit in disgust. He said he didn’t really mind dying all that much but (IIRC) he was rather angry at not being able to learn from all the dying how to not die.
Angry at himself? The most frustrated I get is when I know what I need to do but I either mistime or more frequently just make bad decisions. From reading through the Elden Ring reddit I think it is very common to try and get one more hit in against a foe when you should’ve withdrawn. I’m most guilty of this when the enemy’s health bar is very low and I start thinking I can finish him with a quick flurry of hits when I should just be patient and keep doing what I’d been doing up to that point.
While I have not played Elden Ring I have been guilty of the same thing in other games. I try to squeeze in one more hit when what I really need to do is be patient and work the system.
That was true of Dark Souls 1 as well. Not sure about the intervening games.
No idea. I watched his initial streaming a couple weeks back, and I think the biggest gripe was not being able to figure out what the controls were supposed to do because there weren’t any instructions on it? Maybe.
For those interested:
Full Title: ELDEN RING - Patch Notes Version 1.03
https://www.bandainamcoent.com/news/elden-ring-patch-notes-v1-03
Massive update there - that’s very responsive from Bandai, impressed. RIP mimic carry 
Bloody slash and hoarfrost also nerfed - I use them a lot but that is fair. But the mimic is the big one fro pve. Hopefully has been tweaked, rather than buried, as it’s a great concept but was obviously OP.
On the other side of the ledger there’s a katana called rivers of blood that didn’t scale at all due to a bug, but was still decent because of a savage weapon art. If that’s been fixed then it will be top tier.
Looks like they’ve cleared out some bullshit that was spoiling pvp - a death blight glitch and the barricade shield nonsense. Bad day for the casuls - moonveil and sword of night and flame both walloped. I am sure this will be taken in good grace as the balancing issues are appreciated.
I felt a couple of the npc quests seemed weird, like they were missing stuff. Definitely Nepheli’s - she just ended up sitting there at the round table for me, right to the end of the game, like it was unresolved. And Kenneth’s seemed unusually short. Sounds like this might have been fixed.
Some of the npc quests don’t work well in the open world, imho. Dark Souls npc storylines were often quite challenging, but you could usually track folk down in the levels. I managed Ranni’s and Fia’s in Elden ring (Ranni’s is awesome) on first playthrough, but you’re given a good steer on where to go next. Doing other ones now looking them up, and the npc movement feels extremely random. Like you would have very little chance of completing Millicent’s, say, or the blind woman, just on a natural playthrough as they give little clue where you will find them next and the map is massive.
Occurred to me that perhaps they loosely follow the golden path arrows? I didn’t do this so much but they represent an optimal sort of path so maybe the npc locations unfold this way.
Nexusmods now contains an “Easy Mode” mod and within that mod page are some options for a “normal mode”.
Reductions to damage received, increases to damage given, more runes dropped. It is apparently somewhat editable and you can kind of find your own level of difficulty.
I have yet to try it or even get the game, but this makes me consider it somewhat. You have to be offline for it to work, of course, but I already don’t do online games.
140 hours later, finally completed my first playthrough!
I’m assuming any DLC(if there’s any) will center around Miquella and Ranni, as they’re the only Empyreans still alive after the ending; also, their great runes are the only ones that we can not acquire.
Nice one wjChia - what did you think of the final boss sequence?
Are you going to steam into NG+? Think I’m going to run a quick NG+ to 100% then park it up for a bit while the pvp meta shakes itself out. Played big hours by my standards so need to disconnect for a while.
Fighting the Elden Beast right after Radagon/Marika was definitely a surprise, and I really hope they make an expansion to expand on the Greater Will/other outside influences on the world!
Seeing as yesterday’s patch added a new NPC and expanded on existing NPC storylines, I’m going to take a break and wait for them to finish adding whatever they want into the game before I continue.
Note: There’s 3 achievements for getting specific endings so you’ll need to get to ng+2 at the very least.
I’ve beaten the first 2 main bosses and unlocked most but not all of the map.
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As much as I enjoy playing the game I’m starting to feel like they would have been better off breaking some of the map and releasing as DLC or gating it or somehow. I’m finding it very hard to focus on specific tasks that advance the story because I’m constantly trying to push to the next further bonfire to get the map unlocked. I know this is a choice but for me the world is just too big.
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I’m finding there are alot of large areas that feel empty with nothing to do contrary to what all the positive reviews say. That’s not intended to be a huge criticism, but just my impression. Long rides on horseback through open fields.
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The weapon selection in this game is absolutely massive and I appreciate that. I don’t feel the same about armor though. Specifically heavy armor. I’m lvl 50 now and am still wearing the exact same armor I started with as a Vagabond. I generally play Souls games as a tanky sword and board toon and so far the only way I’ve been able to improve my ability to take a physical hit is by increasing my vigor, which isn’t very exciting. I have invested a fair amount in endurance and am willing to invest more to carry heavy armor but it’s pointless at the moment because I have too much stamina but am not finding any heavy armor. I have found a ton of shields but none that feel like a real upgrade from the starter.
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Has anyone else had an issue where you summon your ashes right when you enter a boss room but they focus on attacking enemies behind the boss door instead of the boss? This has happened to me a bunch of times with the wolves. I’ll summon them as soon as I walk in and they will turn around and try to attack enemies I ran past on the way to the boss. It’s super annoying and resulted in many deaths.
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There are plenty of low and high level smithing stones to be found throughout the game but mid level stones seem much rarer, creating a log jam on the upgrade path where I’ll struggle to find enough stones to upgrade from 12 to 13 and then once I do immediately upgrade to 16 because I have so many of the higher stones. I would rather they just stuck with 3-4 tiers of stones and just required more of them to upgrade.
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Some of the boss arenas are obscenely small considering how much area/range their basic attacks cover let alone their big ones. I can’t fathom how anyone will complete a no hit no block run through this game even with some ranged cheese tactic because they are so small. The Elemer Briar Knight and Magma Wyrm are huge offenders here as are several of the bosses in the various mines.
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There are too many upgrade/crafting mechanics here IMHO. I remember feeling this way about the latest God of War too.
Since you mentioned the Briar Knight below, I’m assuming you have defeated him in his castle? You can buy his armor set in the Roundtable Hold.
There’s a greatshield in Stormveil Castle that will be a nice upgrade over the starter shields.
Did you explore all the tunnels? (they’re displayed as a red hole on the map) You’ll get bell bearings that unlock all but the last level of smithing stones at the Roundtable Hold.
Amen. I come across weapons that are useful enough to be an option, if not my first choice, all the time but I’ve been wearing the same Banished Knight armor I collected in Stormveil for the last 50-70 levels. I’ve collected lots of other heavy armor but it’s all been inferior and, unlike weapons where you have “But this one is piercing” or “This one also does magic damage”, armor is just protection and weight. Also it took me forever to find a new helm because I refused to wear the stupid skull-squishy knight helms. So I guess protection, weight and looks 
I really agree with almost all of your points. And I still maintain my initial impressions – it’s a good game but not a good RPG and if you’re approaching it for that then you’ll be disappointed. Boss difficulty can be powered through to some extent but eventually it’ll take you 100k or more per level up so, if you can’t git gud, either you’ll need to spend forever-long grinding trash to try to muscle through a mid-game boss or else you’ll hit a wall. If you’re playing it because you like the Souls formula, it’ll probably be great. If you want to try it despite the Soul’s formula, results are going to vary and your initial guess as to how much you’ll like it will probably be the right one.
Does this game limit your inventory? Like, by weight or number of each type of item you can keep?
If it does, I haven’t noticed it. Weight only accounts for items you have actively equipped. Your 8 Strength wizard can carry ten suits of plate armor without issue. You get a storage box you access at the save/Grace points but it’s split into so many categories, if there’s a limit on it I don’t see how you’d hit it without intentionally trying. I think it’s more just to keep your on-character inventory clean so it’s not a five minute ordeal to find the weapon you wanted for this boss.
Like Jophiel said, there is no weight limit for carrying inventory, just a weight limit for equipped gear. There’s a stash you can keep stuff in but frankly I haven’t used it because there’s really no reason, though that may change.
@wjChia I’m at the Briar Knight now and haven’t beaten him yet. The range on his attacks is off the charts for a space this small so even though I have a ton of stamina his combos obliterate it very quickly on block and it’s really hard to widen the standoff after attacking. When he connects he 2 shots me, which is why I need better armor. I’ve got an assload of health flasks and they are upgraded to where they 100% fill me health bar at my current vigor. I’m using a +16 or 17 Claymore, like many it’s been my weapon of choice for every Souls game because it has a familiar moveset and does solid damage. I’d like to switch to one of the many badass colossal weapons but I need tanky armor to 2 hand. As it stands I need to stick with a 100% Physical block shield.
I haven’t been following a guide at all so I’m not bee lining to specific gear but I think I’m going to need to relent and look up a few things otherwise I’ll end up not finishing the game as other priorities arise.
If you go to the Rampart Tower grace point in Stormveil and head downstairs, there’s a lone knight walking around. That’s the guy I repeatedly mugged for my Banished Knight armor set which is easily the best protection I’ve found – though it is very heavy. Drop rate wasn’t bad and it didn’t take long for me to acquire the legs, hands and chest. Don’t remember if he drops the helm but those pieces should set you up nicely if you’re playing tanky.
I’ve been watching Youtube videos of someone playing Elden Ring. They haven’t really made me want to buy the game, but I have been reliving quasi-fond memories of playing Dark Souls 1. Every time I took a stab at playing Dark Souls, I used the Zweihander; maybe I would get a few kicks out of trying it again with a high Dex character?
I haven’t had this personally, but I’ve seen it mentioned on the Elden Ring Reddit.
I’m not too worried about the armour. My tactics generally revolve around rolling through attacks and so my armour is partly based on what looks good on my character. This also means I have a very high failure rate for all bosses while I work out their moves. I think I have the Carian Knight set minus the helmet (don’t like the look of those).
I don’t have a favourite weapon just yet. I have a nice great epee that I appreciate for its ability to do damage from behind my shield and for its quicker move set as it lets me stun lock some slower enemies. I generally have it with a bleed ash of war. Then I have a great sword that does nice damage and the Bloodhound’s Fang which is a curved great sword that has a nice ability to get some distance after attacking.
The key for crafting, in my opinion, is to ignore it until you find yourself thinking you need something specific.