Opinion: Any boss that can one shot you is bad game design

[Krythic]

Edit: It seems I should offer a definition of "one shotting" here, because this appears to be a matter of contention. I define one-shotting as any attack that can outright kill a player with an average stat spread. Or in other words, 40 vigor as a baseline.

First off, this isn't me raging because I can't "git gud". Look at my achievements, I've tackled a good portion of bosses in the game. I'm near the end. I played Ds3 and beat it twice. I know how souls games work. I understand that you have to dance with your enemies and punish them.

So with this out of the way, I just wanted to say that any boss being able to one shot you is bad game design. There's really no intelligent way to argue against this, either. If you try, I'll laugh at you. It's not fun, it's not engaging. It's not even difficult, it's just overtly unfair. And I think that's the main problem with Souls games as a whole. There are too many bosses that can kill you instantly. I'm lvl 94 right now, wearing armor that negates 40% of physical damage, and I think around 20% in collective elemental resistances (I haven't looked that well tbh, but it's not a negligible amount.

I have 40 Vigor. Enemies can still one shot me. I might as well be running around naked because it doesn't matter what you have equipped in this game. Armor seems more like a "feel good" mechanic. Does it protect you? Allegedly. But because enemies deal a set amount of damage instead of set + percentile of max health, and that set number can clearly be within the thousands, 40% reduction, etc, doesn't matter. Bosses are designed to kill you instantly by doing such absurd levels of damage. The game is simply imbalanced in this regard.

I'm not asking for the game to be easier. I'm merely attempting to articulate that allowing bosses to one shot you is not good game design. What's worse is enemies that have no cooldown between attacks, and can just pulverize you six to seven times in less than a second. You miss a single dodge, or anything gets in the way, you're dead. Lmao, have fun taking five minutes to run back just to do it all over again.

And I know what a lot of you guys are going to ask: "How can you fix it?". Well, it's quite simple. Don't allow one-shot kill attacks. The damage for those attacks should be deferred to a percentile of max health. Massive attacks from huge bosses can deal 75% damage of max health + a modifier of straight damage. Reserve truly one shot damage attacks to massive ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ bosses, like giants, but make these attacks telegraphed and avoidable. Any attack combo that a boss does should not be allowed to outright kill you, unless you get hit with each and every component of the combo. If you get hit with every attack, that's you messing up, and you should be punished for it. A player dodging 5 out of 6 attacks shouldn't be instantly killed for failing to dodge the 6th one. They should be punished for it, sure. But not killed.

There we go. That's my rant.

[Fen'Haral]

Netsa eredeti hozzászólása:

Fen'Haral eredeti hozzászólása:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DUO1ZxvzIWg
I look forward to the forum post about you getting one shot by this guy.

You're really going to have to put a time on tag on that video. No one's watching 25 minutes of an area they're not familiar with so they can see what your point is.

Fights near the end. 20 minutes.

[Killance]

I have 42 vigor and yet to be one shot.

Stop making glass cannon builds.

[zero]

Target eredeti hozzászólása:

zero eredeti hozzászólása:

to be fair, we aren't saying that EVERY boss, or that "many" bosses have 1 shots, its more an argument that a boss shouldn't be able to 1 shot you under any circumstance IF you are at the soft cap for vit from full to 0.

how would you make a boss that cant 1 shot any build? You never have to level vit, you never have to equip any armor, so should no boss be able to 1 shot a level 1 character wearing no armor? Should they not be able to 1 shot a level 100 character who never leveled vit and isnt whearing any armor? Yes both Vit and armor make a difference.

Again in the mid to late game, 1 shots disappeared if you level vit and where something decent. Im just not seeing what you are talking about. And no, being 2 shot is not the same thing as being 1 shot, if your rounding down to make your point well that is where you are wrong. Even bosses cant 2 shot me at this point for the most part. There are enemies with something like 6 hi combos that you are designed to catch you if you roll away, I think they are obnoxious but they cant 1 shot you and the combos are escapable, albeit with deliberately awkward timing.

again, its not about "cant 1 shot every build" its about that if you are at the point where you get diminishing returns for a stat (in this game, vit is 40) then logically, you should be able to survive a hit.

its not about going into endgame with 10 vit and dying, that makes sense, but in all other from games once you got to the soft cap in life you couldn't really be 1 shot.

[Toffel]

Casval Zem Daikun eredeti hozzászólása:

Toffel eredeti hozzászólása:

60 vigor, Crimson Amber Medaillion +2, Erdtree's Favor +2, Morgotts/Radans Rune for 25%/15% HP boost. Thats around 2700hp if you use morgotts rune. If you get oneshot by attacks you are simply too squishy

It shouldn't take 60 levels, 2 talismans, and an obligatory great rune just to survive damage.
Again, no Souls game works like this.

I am talking about maximum amount of HP that doesnt need spells, you dont need everything, for example 60 vigor should usually be enough with decent armor, if not use an extra talisman or a great rune

[ace_mon0 (REAPERS)]

Stay away from open world games if you can't handle the freedom. Terraria that has bosses that can one shot you. the level cap on this game is 713, 99 cap for each stat. So, if your level is not at least 200 you need to "Get Gud"

[THE FUN ENDS HERE]

Krythic eredeti hozzászólása:

whine

You're crying because you got surprised by something nasty and weren't able to easily win the first attempt. You're salty AF. You wouldn't like what you're asking for.

[Carnasid]

At 40 vigor and in heavy armor, Alecto, Black Knife Ringleader absolutely has a one shot.

[Target]

zero eredeti hozzászólása:

Target eredeti hozzászólása:

how would you make a boss that cant 1 shot any build? You never have to level vit, you never have to equip any armor, so should no boss be able to 1 shot a level 1 character wearing no armor? Should they not be able to 1 shot a level 100 character who never leveled vit and isnt whearing any armor? Yes both Vit and armor make a difference.

Again in the mid to late game, 1 shots disappeared if you level vit and where something decent. Im just not seeing what you are talking about. And no, being 2 shot is not the same thing as being 1 shot, if your rounding down to make your point well that is where you are wrong. Even bosses cant 2 shot me at this point for the most part. There are enemies with something like 6 hi combos that you are designed to catch you if you roll away, I think they are obnoxious but they cant 1 shot you and the combos are escapable, albeit with deliberately awkward timing.

again, its not about "cant 1 shot every build" its about that if you are at the point where you get diminishing returns for a stat (in this game, vit is 40) then logically, you should be able to survive a hit.

its not about going into endgame with 10 vit and dying, that makes sense, but in all other from games once you got to the soft cap in life you couldn't really be 1 shot.

Well I have played the game, with 40 vit, and there was exactly 1 1shot attack I have ever encountered and it was a bosses grab attack, if anything should kill you it should probably be that, and I encountered exactly 1 inescapable combo. So no I dont think this is a major problem with the way the game was designed. I think there are problems, that is not one of them as far as I can tell.

[zero]

Target eredeti hozzászólása:

zero eredeti hozzászólása:

again, its not about "cant 1 shot every build" its about that if you are at the point where you get diminishing returns for a stat (in this game, vit is 40) then logically, you should be able to survive a hit.

its not about going into endgame with 10 vit and dying, that makes sense, but in all other from games once you got to the soft cap in life you couldn't really be 1 shot.

Well I have played the game, with 40 vit, and there was exactly 1 1shot attack I have ever encountered and it was a bosses grab attack, if anything should kill you it should probably be that, and I encountered exactly 1 inescapable combo. So no I dont think this is a major problem with the way the game was designed. I think there are problems, that is not one of them as far as I can tell.

its not even nessiarily a "major" problem, but it *is* a problem that there are 1 shot attacks at all, Doom/death buildup is one thing, but at proper stats and actually wearing gear, you should logically not be dying to a single attack, but several things have them, as this thread has shown

[Crazy Mage]

Bosses generally make it obvious when they are going to go for their big damage attacks

[Obi-wan Jabroni]

I'm in the snow region now and had to go farm levels to get my hp up further. Thing is at 1144 hp (think that was like 30 vigor) the enemies in the snow region were doing 50-70% of my hp. I farmed levels up to 40 vigor which I think is about 1450 off the top of my head. So even with the extra vigor I will still die in 2 hits. This is with me wearing a mix of Radahns and Gelmir knight with the imp head masked (wolf) which is some pretty heavy stuff.

Honestly I found some bosses seem impossible without a shield. Which, who knows, maybe the game wants you to play more with a shield or blocking with your large two handed weapon, Guard counters are a sign of this. I think this game is meant to be played more with just dodge, But a mixture of both. Radahn kicked my ass for hours until I fought him on foot and decided to swap my build and bring out a shield. Draconic tree sentienel was kicking my ass until I got on foot and utilized a shield, it gave me more breathing room to analyse his one shot attacks (though even built to counter lightning with a 30% lightning res armor, and 50% lightning block shield he still almost one shot me with his lightning.

Of course. Having a better dodge like bloodhound step would help players who dont want to use a shield and would prefer power stancing (however again, this kind of sucks cause now your missing out on other really cool ashes of war too, but you can always weapon swap if you want that.)


Overall I do feel enemies hit waaay too hard for a first playthrough, I find this game to be mentally draining as Im on edge. Where Ive beaten dark souls 3 plenty of times and I remember being able to take more hits, with less investment into vigor.

But again. I think we need to adjust our play style

[Casval Zem Daikun]

Crazy Mage eredeti hozzászólása:

Bosses generally make it obvious when they are going to go for their big damage attacks

By this logic, everything could be a one-shot and it'd be just fine because "just dodge"

[Ponyeater]

Krythic eredeti hozzászólása:

Fen'Haral eredeti hozzászólása:

But the point is, nothing can, mechanically, one shot you. Its all on your stats and conditions of the fight.

Another one, and one I'm personally ok with, is the iron maiden things with the giant hanging axes. One of their abilities is literally to grab you with tentacles, pull you in, and kill you.

Not sure if anyone has told you, but like previous souls games, this one has hidden Grab-interruption.
If you press the attack key a lot the grab attack is ended early. My best was only 2 ticks of damage from the Iron Maiden.

[Krythic]

I updated the OP with an edited definition of "one-shotting".

[insanelyironic2005]

Pretty realistic to me. I am m 6'4" 265. A war veteran with 16 years in the infantry. I bet Mike Tyson could still put me on my butt.