Online play - how safe is it?

[peppermint hollows]

Just picked the game up while it's on sale. Let me preface this by saying I've played this before on console (and all the other games in the series), but this is my first time playing on PC. Now, I'm aware that cheaters are a bit of a problem with the souls games on pc. I started playing DS3 on pc a little while back because I already owned it and decided I wanted to 100% them all on Steam because it's my favourite franchise, and in DS3 there's quite a few community made tools/mods to help deal with cheaters (like the watchdogs pvp mod). Is there anything similar in DS2? Or is it not as much of a problem here? Can cheaters inject hacked items into your inventory and get you banned from online play in this game as well?

[🄽🄰🄼🄴🄻🄴🅂🅂]

Originally posted by peppermint hollows:

Just picked the game up while it's on sale. Let me preface this by saying I've played this before on console (and all the other games in the series), but this is my first time playing on PC. Now, I'm aware that cheaters are a bit of a problem with the souls games on pc. I started playing DS3 on pc a little while back because I already owned it and decided I wanted to 100% them all on Steam because it's my favourite franchise, and in DS3 there's quite a few community made tools/mods to help deal with cheaters (like the watchdogs pvp mod). Is there anything similar in DS2? Or is it not as much of a problem here? Can cheaters inject hacked items into your inventory and get you banned from online play in this game as well?

I don't think this game have mods or programs to make it "safer" but in my personal experience of getting invaded and invading others. I found only two people that I would call hackers, both of them didn't take any damage despite me being literally in front and attacking. Also one start attacking me from the distance.

I think because in this game the item to invade others is not unlimited (like DS3) and you have to farm it much people don't do pvp, but the people that do they stay in the "pvp areas" like the iron keep.

If you are worried and don't want to get invaded you can play offline but unfortunately this game doens't have and online/offline option. So you will have to play with Steam in offline mode.

One last thing, this game have NPC that will invaded you in some places regardless if you are playing online or offline and they will keep invaded you until you kill them.

[MobiusPizza]

As long as you don't pick up items from strangers you should be fine.
If you also get used to backup your game every time you play you will have no trouble at all.

[JellyPuff]

Originally posted by MobiusPizza:

As long as you don't pick up items from strangers you should be fine.

Not anymore. Cheaters can also alter your character stats to permanently damage your savefile and to get you softbanned. Or they'll ruin your matchmaking by messing with the amount of souls dropped, when an invader dies, killing themselves and maxing out your SM in the process.

There sadly is no watchdog for DS2. There was one in developement, but they couldn't get aorund the softban system, like that one particular version of DS3's Watchdog managed to do. I'm personally not a fan of the developer-blacklist of that one.

Anyways, the best way to avoid cheaters messing with you, is to make savegame backups every now and then and in the case of a malicous cheater, just ALT+F4 and swap your savefile with a recent backup.

[peppermint hollows]

Thanks guys, appreciate the answers.

[ุ]

you should ALWAYS have a backup of your savefile (search for %appdata% then go to dark souls II folder and copy paste it somewhere).
If a hacker were to change your character you should close the game ASAP.

[Decimus Maxentius]

Originally posted by 🄽🄰🄼🄴🄻🄴🅂🅂:

If you are worried and don't want to get invaded you can play offline but unfortunately this game doens't have and online/offline option. So you will have to play with Steam in offline mode.

Consider using Windows Firewall to block networking for DS2.

[zonaocioPCxd]

I wanted to have it on Steam, but after reading this, I lost almost all desire
What is the point of buying to have to play hidden, deactivating Online for fear that they can block you as if one had done something wrong. Personally, I find it very stressful to have to be aware every 15 or 25 minutes to make a copy of the saved game. So you don't enjoy a video game

[JellyPuff]

PC still has it perks. While some modify the game to get an advantage or to screw people over, some mods can make the game more replayable, like randomizers or gameplay overhauls, like Augur of Darkness and Tales of Drangleic.

Malicous cheaters aren't that common. The risk is relatively small and they seem to be mostly at the PvP arena. If you don't mind a tiny chance of losing maybe 1 or 2 hours of progress from malicous cheats, you can just back up your save before you start or after you're done playing. You can also tell windows to do this for you:
https://www.windowscentral.com/how-backup-windows-10-automatically

[El Vitor]

keep a backup before playing pvp.

[🄽🄰🄼🄴🄻🄴🅂🅂]

Originally posted by Decimus Maxentius:

Originally posted by 🄽🄰🄼🄴🄻🄴🅂🅂:

If you are worried and don't want to get invaded you can play offline but unfortunately this game doens't have and online/offline option. So you will have to play with Steam in offline mode.

Consider using Windows Firewall to block networking for DS2.

Doing that doesn't disable getting the achievements, right?

[Decimus Maxentius]

Some achievements depend on online interaction, like kill 1k phantoms. :) Otherwise, it shouldn't disable getting the achievements. It's like you don't have Internet, but still play and unlock some achievements.

[Edgarek]

Online interactions, specially player invaders kinda rare in this game.
For my second playthrough, when i beat almost full game without DLC, i gets invaded only 3 times. So its not issue as in ds3, with *gid gud* mentality and manchild behavior.

[JellyPuff]

Originally posted by 🄽🄰🄼🄴🄻🄴🅂🅂:

Originally posted by Decimus Maxentius:

Consider using Windows Firewall to block networking for DS2.

Doing that doesn't disable getting the achievements, right?

For achievements to trigger, only Steam itself has to be connected. Wether the game itself is online won't matter. As long as Steam isn't in offline mode, you should be fine.

Just don't block the whole Steamworks port, or more games using it will not be online anymore (edit: instead, only block DS2's .exe). You can also just reconnect your internet, everytime you have loaded in your character. The game will go into offline-mode, but Steam will reconnect, allowing for achievements to pop.

Originally posted by Decimus Maxentius:

Some achievements depend on online interaction, like kill 1k phantoms.

Achievements do not depend on online. All of them can be gotten offline. Ring of Thorns +2 (reward for killing 1000 hosts) is not tied to any achievement.

[Clail]

I haven't run into more than a handful of cheaters personally and getting invaded any where other than bell keepers and rat covenant seems incredbily rare. I suppose it depends on your region though. The cheaters I have encountered always seemed to be brazillian.

[Valden21]

There is a way to permanently avoid cheaters, and it's a very easy one: Launch the game with Steam in Offline Mode. If you do that, the only invaders you'll fight are the NPC invaders, which don't cheat.