Not good at rolling. Shield any good?

[ec928]

I'm running a mage build and it's great for attacking and killing enemies from afar. But my defence is terrible: I'm not good at rolling, much less timing my rolls. Anything requiring pressing multiple buttons, in the right order and at exact right time isn't that easy.

But I can press the left mouse button and raise a shield. Would a shield help? And can you use a shield on a horse?

[MrSoul]

Can’t really use em on horse back

But in this game they are an extremely viable playstyle option as they block a lot of damage (some even block 100 of physical)

Some things keep in mind tho: need watch stamina when blocking, deplete it and essentially stuns you, enemies can still grab attack you through a block, status effects will apply on blocked attacks still and some weapons can by pass blocking stat of a shield like sickles iirc

[Professor Hugedix]

You need at least moderately high strength and endurance to block reliably, something mages typically don't have, and trying to build towards them can spread your damage stats kinda thin unless you want to spend a lot of time grinding.

And shielding doesnt work on horseback

[seaotters]

Eee, mouse button. Do try it with a controller if you can, it will be so much better.

[Señor Brown]

You'd want a shield with enough guard boost for your endurance level so you aren't guard-broken after one or two hits.

You can use a shield on a horse, but only for attacking as any other weapon (no guard).

And ironically enough, you can use a shield to help you practice your rolling.

[jasonbarron]

Plenty of people have success with shield's, so the short answer is yes. The longer, more nuanced answer is that you're going to have to practice rolling and evasion, even with a shield if you want to make it very far in this game.

Might not be a bad to scrap the mage build and start fresh specced for sword and board, perhaps a Vagabond.

[JonDiaz]

I'm a little salty that they didn't give us the Bloodborne dash... could've found a button for it or maybe quickly tapping jump button to dash and holding jump button to jump could've worked. Could swear I saw the player using the quick BB dash in the trailer.

[ZTL-Altima]

Shields are fine.

But practice your rolls. It's fundamental and easy to master. Oh, and always good to remember since in ER the amount of fatrollers I encountered in invasions was astounding: never go beyond 70% in equip load.

[Elazul]

TBH I'd just practice your rolls. But a shield can help at the start yes until you become more comfortable with the game.

[gungadin22000]

Shield types play very differently.

Small shields don't block that much damage and require a lot of stamina to block, but many of them have parry. If you're a parrying god, you can make short work of many tough enemies, but you will likely get hit A LOT learning to git gud.

Medium shields provide more protection, but if you really want to get into a blocking playstyle, you need greatshields.

See, besides having better defensive stats, greatshields have the hidden bonus that many enemy attacks will bounce off them, briefly stunning your attacker and allowing you to strike back.

Greatshield blocking style is very viable for finishing the game: hide behind shield, wait for enemy to be done wailing ineffectively at your shield, guard counter, repeat 2-3 times for critical, repeat until dead.

This even works on a great number of end-game bosses and greatshields with high guard boost stats can be found in many places.

I managed to beat the game with a greatshield + massive club and several of the end game bosses were downright trivial with this combo. Mind you, there were 2 bosses that were extremely hard for me, but that's due to them either doing damage through even perfect blocks or them using many grab attacks, and many other players struggle with those 2 in particular regardless of playstyle.

I'm a bad Souls player, so I can definitely recommend greatshielding for a first playthrough. Playstyle is a bit samey, but safe, and allows you to learn bossfight moves without getting obliterated by 1 failed dodge.

[Necroth]

引用自 gungadin22000：

Greatshield blocking style is very viable for finishing the game: hide behind shield, wait for enemy to be done wailing ineffectively at your shield, guard counter, repeat 2-3 times for critical, repeat until dead.

why? use thrusting weapons and you can attack while blocking

[gungadin22000]

That works too. Phalanx style.

[Emily Mewens]

Shields are very good so long as you have a good shield that you can use.
I would recommend the carian shield or the brass shield if you dont want to parry. Both are very solid shields and can easily carry you through the game.

Brass shield is dropped by pretty much any soldier, so it can be farmed for at the beginning of the game. Carian shield is dropped by a knight near the end of Academy

[GONDAL]

If you want to go pure shield, do it with a greatshield. With high end shields like the fingerprint slab you have close to 100 guard boost and can tank unholy amounts of boss dmg without breaking a sweat. The bane of Malenia.

Edit: You want a mage shield, I would recommend something like the brass shield or the buckler as they are both easy-to-get blocking and parrying MVPs, respectively. However, you need to roll when using these periodically as they have nowhere near the guard ability of greatshields.

[Emily Mewens]

引用自 AzureDreams：

If you want to go pure shield, do it with a greatshield. With high end shields like the fingerprint slab you have close to 100 guard boost and can tank unholy amounts of boss dmg without breaking a sweat. The bane of Malenia.

Edit: You want a mage shield, I would recommend something like the brass shield or the buckler as they are both easy-to-get blocking and parrying MVPs, respectively. However, you need to roll when using these periodically as they have nowhere near the guard ability of greatshields.

Id be against buckler, or any shield that doesnt provide 100% phys, unless youre good at parry. This is why i suggest Carrian, though theres also the Inverted Hawk Heater Shield which is super easy to get early game. You just need to venture into the Soifra River Well, and hug to the right from the second bonfire.

That said i totally agree with the fingerprint slab. If you pair that with a guard boost talisman, you can get it so you lose no stamina from blocking, and become a shield god. Highly recommended for double shield bro build.

[idiotdoomspiral]

You don't need much strength to use kite shield or it's variants and they are really good once you upgrade them, get the weapon art golden parry on them and then you have 100% phys absorb, plus ok stability, and you can parry easier.