Man, I ruined my DLC enjoyment.

[Giacomo Volpe]

Let's start with the fact that I'm a casual gamer, sure I may be not super casual (I have beaten multiple times DS2,DS3 and Bloodborne + all DLC).
But ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ this DLC is stupidly hard, and I think that starting it in NG+ is ruining the experience for me.
The First mini boss just demolished me. Sure I stopped playing for half if not more of a year and I'm rusty and I forgot I could summon other player, after summoning someone that boss became easy just because it was stunlockable(Still byshotting or trishotting if he managed to hit someone). I thought "Maybe it's one of those trap boss that they put at the start but you have to come back later to kill them and so I went toward the big fire golem. Again, two of his hit nearly killed me and my damage was nearly zero. And again I thought "Maybe I have to do something and then come back." I went forwad meet the first 3 NPC and decided to go to the City on the left. And the enemies were normal, I could kill them in one or two hit(most of them) and their damage was okay. Then those ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ horned knight... Finally I reach the boss door, enter and... Two shooted by a spastic revenant Lion... My damage was minimal...

I'm LVL 261, all stats over 30 and Vigor is 50, I shouldn't be this weak... The jump of difficulty from the last area of the normal Map to the first area of the DLC is too big in NG+.

EDIT(1): I managed to beat the Lion, It was less difficult that I tought. I don't know why with other people it was that Difficult, but Me, the NPC and my mimic tear were fine. Sure I did died 3 times but It was more manageable that I tought. But I still think they made it too difficult... Or maybe the real Hero is the Mimic tear and I'm just his servant. Bro have the same HP of a Boss.

[エロ音声作品学者]

yeah i would say make a new char to NG0 it

the DLC is very high difficulty even on NG0 - doing it first-time on NG+anything will be extremely rough if you're not a sweatlord or challenge-runner type.

[Veraxus]

Start a new game. I saw multiple publications recommend this, too. The DLC seems to be really really weirdly balanced for anyone going in with superpowered NG+ or greater characters.

[Mehermagerk]

Ya i did my first run up to Bayle on NG+2 it was nightmare one shot left and right was having zero fun 30 deaths later i killed him went on my NG toon at SL150 much better still crazy hard compared to base Elden Ring but atleast i can breathe from time to time in a fight.

[NONAME]

I beat him after 6 attemps, but that's with magic.
I feel melee is becoming less and less viable with each new From game:

DS 1 - beat the game as a regular melee build with medium armor, sword and shield
DS 2 - shields are practically useless against bosses, have to roll and level invincibility frames
DS 3 - melee is even less viable as bosses are on drugs now and have many circular attacks
ER - melee is practically impossible unless you watch youtube and learn every boss's complete moveset. Playing melee feels more like speedrun where you already know everything by heart.

[Mehermagerk]

Originally posted by NONAME:

I beat him after 6 attemps, but that's with magic.
I feel melee is becoming less and less viable with each new From game:

DS 1 - beat the game as a regular melee build with medium armor, sword and shield
DS 2 - shields are practically useless against bosses, have to roll and level invincibility frames
DS 3 - melee is even less viable as bosses are on drugs now and have many circular attacks
ER - melee is practically impossible unless you watch youtube and learn every boss's complete moveset.

Honestly only melee only build that even comes close for that old melee vibe is finger stone slab shield with hard hitting shield counter build.

[mazak]

just add more dmg negation in your build and it fixed the problem for me. you got a malu in all the status ailement per default in this dlc

[Giacomo Volpe]

Originally posted by Veraxus:

Start a new game. I saw multiple publications recommend this, too. The DLC seems to be really really weirdly balanced for anyone going in with superpowered NG+ or greater characters.

Look, if the game was the size of Ds123 then I wouldn't have a problem with creating a new character. But this game is simply too massive to create a new character and get all the items and armors. I'm kind of a collector. I hunted for every Items and Armor, The idea of getting a new character with zero of the items that I lost hours to get is just too painfull.

It's like making Ashes of Ariandel DLC with normal difficult scaling and then making the Ringed City DLC and making all bosses and enemies the triple if more difficult for ♥♥♥♥ and giggles. I remember having problem only with Midir and that was the "Last/Optional" Boss. I could understand the last boss of this DLC one shotting or byshotting, but the first?

[Jowain]

I'm playing on just New Game and no, it doesn't feel different. I'm already sick of fighting what is essentially more re-skinned enemies that just "hit harder".
I feel punished for trying to get good at parrying when my attacks don't really do that much.

Also it's a bit of a laugh that they decided to first make the game artifically harder this way, then add the means to nerf it in game, it's like the reverse of DS2 Bonfire Aesthetics, which was much better done than this.

I don't want to parry the same enemy 50 times for a small amount of crit damage, I want to actually land the parry and feel like a master when they mess up, not the other way around, which is 75% of the game; you mess up, you get punished, they mess up they... don't suffer as badly? Okay.

Also whoever decided to add the Dog enemies in every single instance is a mute, blind, deaf and comatosed lobotomy patient, as is the "skill issue" crowd, again the "ef u dunt pleay lv 1 Wretch wih a klub ur no a gaimer"

[MarioRaider18]

Originally posted by NONAME:

I beat him after 6 attemps, but that's with magic.
I feel melee is becoming less and less viable with each new From game:

DS 1 - beat the game as a regular melee build with medium armor, sword and shield
DS 2 - shields are practically useless against bosses, have to roll and level invincibility frames
DS 3 - melee is even less viable as bosses are on drugs now and have many circular attacks
ER - melee is practically impossible unless you watch youtube and learn every boss's complete moveset. Playing melee feels more like speedrun where you already know everything by heart.

Seems like a skill issue with melee

[󠁳 ⁧HardLimiter]

Originally posted by NONAME:

I beat him after 6 attemps, but that's with magic.
I feel melee is becoming less and less viable with each new From game:

DS 1 - beat the game as a regular melee build with medium armor, sword and shield
DS 2 - shields are practically useless against bosses, have to roll and level invincibility frames
DS 3 - melee is even less viable as bosses are on drugs now and have many circular attacks
ER - melee is practically impossible unless you watch youtube and learn every boss's complete moveset. Playing melee feels more like speedrun where you already know everything by heart.

I only played DS3 for few hours and only ER.
ER is really easy for me with melee (katana), even without played games like this.
I have much more problems with DS3.

But yeah, I heard many posts about that, that ER is much easier than DS games.

You played DS and has problems with ER? sounds like skill problem.
Melee is OP since beginning in ER and they never nerfed these builds.

[RiigyNo]

you aint the only one, i've been doing it on NG+2 at level 220 and it has been utter hell so far!

[Svendson]

If you play with a blood build with the bloodhound's step or two collossal weapon and spam the jump attack the bosses are not that hard , but it's not fun .

If you want to do it with a longsword and shield you will have a hard time because of false difficulty and from software is aware of that because they give us their useless damage negation upgrade that change nothing .

[Erothan]

It's the same with a New Save game. Even without NG+ 90% of the enemies kills you with 1 hit.

This "Dark Souls is hard" this is getting out of hand. They don't know what they are doing anymore.

[Giacomo Volpe]

Originally posted by Svendson:

If you play with a blood build with the bloodhound's step or two collossal weapon and spam the jump attack the bosses are not that hard , but it's not fun .

If you want to do it with a longsword and shield you will have a hard time because of false difficulty and from software is aware of that because they give us their useless damage negation upgrade that change nothing .

I don't know, maybe i'm not playing correctly, But I love RP in these games. Sometimes I just wear some footman armor and just go around with a small rould wooden shield and a short sword, maybe next time I will RP as a Spartan. I never really followed the META in these games.

[SmashingQuasar]

Originally posted by Svendson:

If you play with a blood build with the bloodhound's step or two collossal weapon and spam the jump attack the bosses are not that hard , but it's not fun .

If you want to do it with a longsword and shield you will have a hard time because of false difficulty and from software is aware of that because they give us their useless damage negation upgrade that change nothing .

I encourage you to try this idea in NG+5 against Midra and come back to tell us about your findings.