First playthrough, DEX alone or Another stat with it ?

[Ardordor]

First playthrough, DEX alone or should i consider another stat to make it more fun/viable ? like int, fait or str?

[Name]

Anything will work but for a pve melee playthrough, str or str/dex (quality) is much better imo, especially for a first playthrough. Just dex is kind of niche. Look up some builds though because sorcery, hexes and pyro is fun and are kind of op at times. Just my .02

[Eastersimulator]

Originally posted by syn:

Straight dex is incredibly powerful, nothing niche about it. Falchion/Gold Tracer/Painting Guardian Sword, Uchigatana, Balder Side Sword, Great Scythe, Silver Knight Spear, Bandit Knife/Silver Tracer.

wrong dark souls

[Edgarek]

Try to reach VIG to 30 and secondary stat AGL to 96, while leveling damage stat. Then you can level up whatever you want.

My first playthrough all bosses including DLC, ended on lvl 175.

[BearWithBeard]

full strenght babyyy

[AJ]

strength is for chads

[JellyPuff]

Depends entirely on wether or not you want to use anything besides DEX-scaling weapons. You can make pretty much any weapon PVE-viable in DS2 and fun is subjective. For example, you could just ditch the narrow mindset of DEX/STR/FTH/INT and ascend in order to become the Ladle-master[ibb.co].

[Call Sign: Raven]

Everything is viable in DS2, don't fret over stat allocation. You get a lot of respecs if you mess up, anyway.

In your first playthrough, you should be more concerned with weapon upgrades, rather than dex vs str, anyway. Upgrades have a much more noticeable impact on your damage output than stats do in this game.

[Scraps]

Unsure of your experience with Souls games, but unlike DS1 (and DeS I guess), you can respec with Soul Vessels and a crusty lady, so there isn't as much commitment. Soul Vessels cannot be farmed, just so you're aware.

There's a lot of weapon variety and most things are viable and it's typically obvious when it isn't. Therefore, I'd say go for Quality (40/40 STR/DEX), especially if you have no interest in magic (magic is also pretty great in DS2). That way, you can experiment with weapons and see what you like and what clicks.

[Favkis Nexerade]

for more fun upgrade both str and de and use different weapons

[Hibuki]

Find a weapon you like and level for it.
My first playthrough (many years ago) was with a Rapier (so Dex) and later on the legendary "Espada Ropera" (I loved that weapon)

[Jack Daniel]

whatever you feel comfortable dying with bc youre going to die :}

[SIGMA SUPERSTAR]

YUUMI PLAYER

[Yal]

I'm gonna be a contrarian and suggest INT/FTH.

There's a fun boss weapon you can get a couple areas in called the Roaring Halberd that uses all four stats (STR, DEX, FTH and INT), if you go for mixed int/faith as your main stats (to use hexes, the dark school of magic) it's a perfect compliment.

You can access a hexing teacher after you clear Heide's Tower and the lady at the end of the area moves to Majula, pay her to open the alternate path and then find the guy in the chair along the way. (He refuses to talk to you until you have at least 8 INT and 8 FTH). He sells two spells of note, Dark Weapon and Dark Orb.

Dark Orb needs a really modest 12 INT, 10 FTH and has a whopping 30 casts and a lot of stopping power (even some armored enemies get stunned when hit by it). It's the most basic hex but it's so good it can be your primary attack through most of the game. For just investing a dozen or so levels you get a lot of bang for your buck


Dark Weapon is a weapon buff, and it's the 2nd strongest buff in the game! Not everything is weak to dark damage but it'll give you a very noticeable power boost, especially if the weapon you cast it on already has dark damage innately (and said Roaring Halberd does).

Combine it with getting the stylish Skeleton Lords boss armor from Maughlin and join the dark side, you'll have a fun time!


(Another really useful spell to get later is Dark Fog, it's the strongest poison in the game and it has a very long range, you can poison some annoying enemies from so far away they won't even notice and aggro on you)

[Heck]

a lot of weapons soft cap in this game at their base requirements.
pumping a bunch of extra stats isnt as beneficial like in the other two so basically you can be quality and just infuse+buff and its better

[Felis]

Honestly, I'd recommend going with pretty much any of the straight swords, and meet its minimum requirements, maybe a little extra in STR/DEX, it'll let you try out new weapons as you find them, though keep a soul vessel around, it'll let you respec. You should focus on getting a good investment in vigor, endurance and adaptability. Vigor has diminishing returns, but it also provides a pretty sizeable amount of health that will serve you far more than any stats, especially given your weapons won't be upgraded very far for a long time and the scaling on them will be barely noticeable. If you feel you're not able to do enough damage, you'll probably get more out of stamina, as you'll eventually be able to swing more and still have stamina to roll with. Adaptability is something you will always need to invest some points into, as it increases the i-frames you get during rolling, though its only a few frames every so many points its night and day difference, I promise.

I usually recommend a straight sword and a shield because it provides you with a very balanced, straight forward but satisfying moveset; you'll have a horizontal swing that can help with not missing some enemies, but also hitting multiple weaker ones. If you would rather a more DEX flavored build, the rapier is totally a viable option, but you may want to read up on how counter damage works(bosses have massive windows for counter daamage, so if it seems a bit scary after you check it out, don't sweat it).

Highest DPS builds will always be dark or lightning spells or weapon buffs - it sounds alluring, but I personally find them tedious and the limited castings are a great way to hurt a new players experience. I've played through the game many time and can safely say no matter what you build, you'll probably have a weapon option laying around that does reasonable enough damage to let you progress, you won't get stuck because of a bad build or anything.

Well, unless you put nothing into vigor, endurance, and adaptability. That'll make the game exceedingly painful.