Is the cheating really that bad?

[Loopy]

Looking to get into PvP, but I keep seeing threads of people complaining how more than half of all online players cheat (especially the Chinese, it seems). Is this true? Is PvP worth it or should I just skip it because of the rampant cheating?

[urabe mikoto]

Absolutely not. Cheaters are pretty much restricted to meta SL and pvp hotspots and even then there are very, very few of them (mostly Chinese) and they can be easily blocked. Some people call players that have endgame gear at starting areas cheaters but that is not the case, considering that anyone can do that. Others consider players that use glitches cheaters but that opinion is open to discussion.

[Willheart]

It's not /as bad/ as people say/complain about. I play pretty sporadically at different times (timezones) and I haven't seen many cheaters at all - glitch-users, yes, especially at the big PvP hotspots, but one thing I noticed in a lot of those 'everybody cheats' threads is OP often confuses legitimate mechanics with cheating.

I used to play very often about a year ago, took a long break, back then I'd see maybe 1/20 using glitch exploits, and maybe 1/100 actually cheating maliciously (infinite estus, insta-kill, curse, godmode, etc).

After coming back recently (only about 18 hours PvP) I haven't bumped into any actual cheaters yet. Most people are using Estus-cancel for fast healing, and some people use animation cancel to infinite-stun you at Pontiff (it's like the same 3 people, so maybe just avoid).

Some hosts and fight club hosts will use cheats to insta-heal/refill, but only twice I've seen them it in combat, once was accident and the other guy was scum, but those folk tend to be as fair as possible, only use it to heal/teleport for convenience (like checking who's in their world taking up a invader slot if they haven't seen you in 20 minutes).

It's still worth without fear of cheating but it's a pretty different environment to a few years ago. Random invasions are usually Alt+F4 at first trouble, or the same few solo-hosts who can tagliatelle-step around you all night long, and Pontiff is still a mixed bag.

[Judeo-communism]

I'm in the final area right now, I've been invaded about 6 times from players. I've beaten 4 out of 6 of them. I haven't seen a single cheater. It's not very common at all for fresh playthroughs. I can't speak for NG+.

[Terrorize Exercise]

You will always run into exploiters but actual cheating through hacking or whatever is extremely rare to come by.

By exploits I mean stuff like Estus canceling and refilling, Ringed Knight straight sword weapon art cancel and Splitleaf menu infinite stunlock.

[GermanyMan]

Originally posted by Terrorize Exercise:

You will always run into exploiters but actual cheating through hacking or whatever is extremely rare to come by.

By exploits I mean stuff like Estus canceling and refilling, Ringed Knight straight sword weapon art cancel and Splitleaf menu infinite stunlock.

Indeed.
Got invaded a few daysa ago by someone who was so sweaty, he used every exploit and mechanic to kill me. Estus Cancel, Black Ropebomb after knockdown, Siegbräu spam, yet he didnt got me as i just entered fog gate.

But damn some guys are so sweaty.

[paulaus333]

Install the Blue Sentinel (mod) that was once recommended by the developers / publishers of the game in a sticky post on this forum. See how many people play the game 'vanilla' for yourself, as it was intended. When estus healing actually has a time penalty and people don't have infinite stamina.

Seeing end-game gear / perks in starting areas is not cheating - high-level players can get those fairly. It's just that most who have those items are either abusing their skill against noobs, or using the Honest Merchant mod to compensate for their lack of ability. :D

[Kalypso]

Originally posted by paulaus333:

Install the Blue Sentinel (mod) that was once recommended by the developers / publishers of the game in a sticky post on this forum. See how many people play the game 'vanilla' for yourself, as it was intended. When estus healing actually has a time penalty and people don't have infinite stamina.

Seeing end-game gear / perks in starting areas is not cheating - high-level players can get those fairly. It's just that most who have those items are either abusing their skill against noobs, or using the Honest Merchant mod to compensate for their lack of ability. :D

When i used to use Blue Sentinals, or whatever it was called before, I was seeing stathackers absolutely everywhere. every other invasion. less so in duels but it still happened enough for me to stop playing. Hacks don't equal skill, and i usually won anyway unless it was real blatant. I remember encountering a cheater way back in the 360 version of DS1 that would legit teleport into a backstab from across the map, was flipping with full Havels set w/ weapon and shield which is impossible, and was likely max level on top of that due to the damage i did to them. Cheaters are more common then you think. Most don't cheat that obviously.

[Berry]

Originally posted by Kalypso:

Originally posted by paulaus333:

Install the Blue Sentinel (mod) that was once recommended by the developers / publishers of the game in a sticky post on this forum. See how many people play the game 'vanilla' for yourself, as it was intended. When estus healing actually has a time penalty and people don't have infinite stamina.

Seeing end-game gear / perks in starting areas is not cheating - high-level players can get those fairly. It's just that most who have those items are either abusing their skill against noobs, or using the Honest Merchant mod to compensate for their lack of ability. :D

When i used to use Blue Sentinals, or whatever it was called before, I was seeing stathackers absolutely everywhere. every other invasion. less so in duels but it still happened enough for me to stop playing. Hacks don't equal skill, and i usually won anyway unless it was real blatant. I remember encountering a cheater way back in the 360 version of DS1 that would legit teleport into a backstab from across the map, was flipping with full Havels set w/ weapon and shield which is impossible, and was likely max level on top of that due to the damage i did to them. Cheaters are more common then you think. Most don't cheat that obviously.

People have been save editing in that way since DS1, it's crazy that the same methods still kill them like gravity/bleed. Every day, EVEN ON PS5 with Elden Ring, I see at least one cheater, whether it be invalid stats/instakill across the map/infinite hp/mp/stamina.

[Judeo-communism]

Originally posted by Kalypso:

Originally posted by paulaus333:

Install the Blue Sentinel (mod) that was once recommended by the developers / publishers of the game in a sticky post on this forum. See how many people play the game 'vanilla' for yourself, as it was intended. When estus healing actually has a time penalty and people don't have infinite stamina.

Seeing end-game gear / perks in starting areas is not cheating - high-level players can get those fairly. It's just that most who have those items are either abusing their skill against noobs, or using the Honest Merchant mod to compensate for their lack of ability. :D

When i used to use Blue Sentinals, or whatever it was called before, I was seeing stathackers absolutely everywhere. every other invasion. less so in duels but it still happened enough for me to stop playing. Hacks don't equal skill, and i usually won anyway unless it was real blatant. I remember encountering a cheater way back in the 360 version of DS1 that would legit teleport into a backstab from across the map, was flipping with full Havels set w/ weapon and shield which is impossible, and was likely max level on top of that due to the damage i did to them. Cheaters are more common then you think. Most don't cheat that obviously.

I just finished a full playthrough, got invaded several more times again in the final areas, still saw no hackers. I killed most of them, lost to three. The three I lost to were just good, particularly with hit trading 2h weapons.

[Mako]

If you just play this game casually, and by this I mean not actively focus on PvP all day long (just progress through the game, get invaded here and there, maybe sometimes invade yourself as part of some covenants progression) then most likely you wont notice any hackers at all. Surprisingly there are exponentially fewer people there running sweaty PvP builds as invaders compared to ER. You would expect 7 years old game to be played only by meta slaves nolifing in this game but no, this is not the case at all. Even around so called meta SL (100-120). And BTW only passworldless coop with randoms pretty much stops at higher levels. I was leveling spears covenant at SL180 online (dont laugh) and out of all boss fights (needed 29 wins) I got NPC only 4 or 5 times, others were PvP. At SL220 I still get invaded rather frequently, and blades join almost always when I have that blue thingy equiped. In none of those interactions other players did anything sus.

IMO some players just dont understand what cheating is. Having late game gear in early areas is not cheating. You can trade for it with other players or transfer from your other characters with friend's help. But weapons upgrades will have to be on the same level. No one can invade you with +10 weapon when your max weapon upgrade on that character is +1. Sometimes you get high ping players, especially if you have cross-region enabled, this is also not cheating. And sometimes kids simply cant accept that someone beat them, so other player has to be a cheater.

[urabe mikoto]

What the guy above said is mostly correct. I made a brand new char since the servers came back for SL 70-90 PvP and after 699+ Pale Tongues and 400+ Human Dregs I don't think I met more than 3 cheaters. If you stay way from meta and covenant areas you are pretty much safe

[Yuki]

so chugging 40+ estus in a single invasion is still ''fair game''? cuz its an ''exploit''?

[Lord Bob]

Originally posted by Yuki:

so chugging 40+ estus in a single invasion is still ''fair game''? cuz its an ''exploit''?

Depends on how you think pvp should be played.

Until now there have been no efforts made by fromsoft to remove flask refills by using the parting flame setup, just like estus cancel or everyones favourite machine gun bow glitch.
Which is also the reason why some players might argue that this is how the game is supposed to be played.

I personally never bothered to learn how to estus cancel, simply because I don't have to win at all cost.
Also, for me it's less about winning and more about how the match itself went. Sometimes, losing is a part of it.

So no, in my opinion cancel chugging 40+ times is not fair game. Not even chugging 40+ times without canceling is considered fair game for me.
But to each their own. I don't mind if I fight against players who at some point decided to implement estus cancel or refills, as the meta pretty much revolves around using everything at your disposal (including previously mentioned glitches).
And if you try to be a part of the meta, you better learn to adapt, else you will not be able to compete.

[Chere]

Try playing co-op with a new player in the beginning of the game, you'll get constantly invaded by cheaters. So yeah, it is bad.

[Lylliana of Mirrah]

Originally posted by Loopy:

Looking to get into PvP, but I keep seeing threads of people complaining how more than half of all online players cheat (especially the Chinese, it seems). Is this true? Is PvP worth it or should I just skip it because of the rampant cheating?

most malicious cheaters are in ELDEN RING. a friend got his pc crashed and his save file corrupted last he met a dangerous chinese cheaters who were prolly part of cinderella gang