Spoilers - Lore Discussion - Is this the worst lore DLC From has made?

[Chris1]

Let's talk the ending boss reveal - Radahn of all people. They ret-conned Malenia saying "promised cohort" to Radahn in their battle, something that has no other reference or hint in the base game. All the most likely theories for why Malenia was fighting Radahn involved her assuming he kidnapped Miquella, or some problem with Radahn holding back stars preventing Miquella from achieving his victories.

This is also somewhat tied into the Amber Starlight, which is found directly in front of a statue of Miquella/Malenia.

St Trina? She apparently is a manifestation of Miquella's love and is left in some cave in the shadow realm. How does that jive with all the other St Trina content, including her proselytizing around the lands between? What is up with St Trina basically killing people who imbibe nectar?

The entire concept of the shadow realm, why did Miquella even need to ascend to the shadow realm? Why is Messmer related and locked there and why did Messmer seal Miquella? These are all children of Marika and yet the story trailer implies these events kicked off Marika's ascension to god-hood, so she was having these kids before that? The timeline doesn't make any sense.

IMO it would have been much cooler if they at least left corroborating hints of all of this in the base game so they could point to a cohesive and consistent narrative, but it's almost like they left everything so intentionally vague and without context that they could do whatever they want in the DLC and just call it a day.

All throughout the DLC I got strong vibes of "they are just making this stuff up and not even trying to make sense" and it kind of ruined the base game lore for me.

[David_The_Great]

Originally posted by Mr.America:

Originally posted by David_The_Great:

Marika is from the Shaman Village who was subjected to basically torture from the Hornsent to become "saints", which has something to do with the Hornsents obsession with divinity. Marika became a prominent figure in Hornsent society them betrayed them by ordering Messmer and his army to slaughter them all, as revenge for what they did to her village.

I think I'm beginning to understand the saint-pots thing. The Hornsent are trying to reach the gods, their origin seems to be the beastmen of Farum Azula, making the god in question the god of Placidusax, the very god who fled after/before(?) Bayle's betrayal and the revolt amongst the dragons. The way they try to reach their god(s) is through the divine gate, which seems to gather unnatural gold within. The divine gate itself is made from the divine spiral tree, which can be seen depicted in various places around Belurat and the tower, it is a double helix tree (looks like DNA tbh).

Here's the kicker: The tree is made from corpses. literal corpses. It also happens to stand within what looks to me like a crucible and also looks like a colloseum.

So to me, the entire pot thing, is to fertilze their divine spiral tree.

However, the shamans, which are likely Numen, do not belong to this god, if any at all. Obviously, Marika might have an issue with getting sacrificed to a foreign god.

The Hornsent originate from the land of shadow, beastmen don't have horns so they're definitely not related. But since the Crucible was the foundation of the Erdtree, I think you're onto something with the divine tree fertilizer thing.

[David_The_Great]

Originally posted by Key:

Originally posted by David_The_Great:

Which characters are yall talking about? The only one I can think of is Miquella and even that's a stretch.

Malenia, Mohg and Radahn are all relegated to being tools of Miquella with essentially no agency. It makes them appear that much less intimidating and interesting, since their motivation is now "do what Miquella says".

Radahn in particular, is now apparently the "mightiest Demigod" whose track record consists of laying in defeat under Morgott in the opening cinematic, to then losing to Malenia, to then being put down like a rabid dog by the Tarnished, and then being mind controlled by his step-brother. Dude can't catch a break. We fight him twice and both times he isn't even himself.

The Bloody Fingers are now a bunch of morons that follow a guy that's been mentally enslaved by Miquella. Luminary my ass.

Malenia is now confirmed to be completely delusional, and her motivation to kill Radahn now amounts to either jealousy or simply doing Miquella's bidding, both of which make her amount to nothing but a tool.

I mean I don't really have a problem with this. Malenia makes it pretty clear that she is Miquella's Blade and carries out his will even before this revelation.

Radahn is already in a pretty pathetic state in the base game due to his battle with Malenia so idk how this dlc downgrades him.

This takes nothing away from Mohg character imo. HIs backstory, motivation, personality, and design is still top notch for me.

And tbh, this is kinda just how souls games are? Broken worlds and famous warriors and figures reduced to husks of what once they were. Facing a character well past their prime is a common trope in these games. Hell, in ds1 Gwyn is hyped up the whole game to be this fiercesome lord of fire, only to be a pathetic husk when you finally fight him.

[Persona Au Gratin]

Thinking this "takes nothing away from Mohg" when his motivation for kidnapping Miquella is just "he was brainwashed" is leagues different from "He wanted to sleep with an Empyrean who looks like a young boy and acted on it with no influence but his own personal impulses."

Like, that is a delusional take for you to have, Dave.

[Sham!]

Originally posted by Aerieanei:

Originally posted by Sham!:

idk how people look at ds1 dlc and er dlc and go like "yeah, take me back to 2012"

funny enough, people complained about unsatisfactory lore, tanky bossfight and a too erratic movesets for the dlc even back then
we cant escape the circle

What's wrong with the lore of Dark Souls 1's DLC? It didn't do anything egregious. You already know what was going to happened because you're just experiencing the past and not the present. The DLC story wrapped up fine enough. It did what it's supposed to do. Your reward for doing it was getting a new cutscene with Sif. The experience felt complete and self contained. It set some stuff up for Dark Souls 2 and that's fine.

personally didnt mind it, quite liked it too, just like i quite like er dlc lore and gameplay, so no point in asking me why was it bad

but people did complain, ♥♥♥♥ they unironically complained about the existance of a dlc to begin with, claiming the story simply didnt need one to begin with and how miyazaki said "no dlc ever" or whatever

however i do think the size, scope and poilish of sote towers ds1 dlc and most people are really just nostaligic, had they played this dlc when they were young gamers it would be their favourite thing ever

[David_The_Great]

Originally posted by David_The_Great:

Originally posted by Persona Au Gratin:

Thinking this "takes nothing away from Mohg" when his motivation for kidnapping Miquella is just "he was brainwashed" is leagues different from "He wanted to sleep with an Empyrean who looks like a young boy and acted on it with no influence but his own personal impulses."

Like, that is a delusional take for you to have, Dave.

I meant in terms of his character. Like yeah, it makes him better person, but I was mostly interested in his relationship with the Formless Mother, his omen heritage, and his want to overthrow the Golden Order. Like, we've always known Miquella had the passive ability to charm others but we didn't know if he could directly control it like we do now. So I've always thought Mohg never really captured Miquella because he genuinely liked him, it was because of Miquellas power. Well, it was because he wanted the power of an emperyean to overthrow the golden order, but then he "fell in love" with Miquella due to his power. Now I just know Miquella was using that power on purpose.