How important are level ups?

[Paradoxical]

I'm trying to get better at souls games. I know I'm terrible but I want to try to get better overtime so I can play them all at some point.

As a way to train myself at combat I'm currently at the undead burg and I fight my way from the closest campfire to the boss Taurus. If I don't have 5 estus flasks to attempt him, I head back and level up at the campfire and try again. I felt this was more productive than dying over and over at the boss.

That said I don't really know what I'm doing with stats. I think I've put one into strength, 2 endurance and everything else vitality. I figured since it upped my HP and def a bit that was a good investment. But after doing this for 2 hours I'm starting to wonder if I'm screwing myself over. Sure I'm somewhat getting better at the combat and I'll probably eventually down the boss. However if I should be focusing other stats or something....I mean, I just don't want to have to start the game completely over because how I leveled in the early game.

[Voidlord597]

The game can be beat without ever leveling up. Good stats can improve your chances but learning the enemy patterns is pretty vital. as long as you have enough stats to wield your weapon without staggering, investing in vitality and endurance doesn't hurt.

[Chaos Mana]

Check the information on the weapons you're using, scaling is different depending on what you currently have equiped. Long swords generally go for Strength, and daggers/spears are dexterity.

Points into health is a no brainer, Endurance will increase both your Stamina, and carrying capacity, allowing you to equip more and more things without fat rolling all over the place, and also be able to do more at once without stopping to recover.

Some weapons will also have faith/Int requirements such as staffs and focuses. You will also need to use these skills with spells.

I always try to get up to about 20-25 in my chosen path ( Dex in most cases ), then focus on HP and Endurance until I can get to the blacksmith who will upgrade weapons far more than simple stat increases will.

A +2 or a +3 weapon is when I will start thinking about adding more dex

[Voidlord597]

There's some pretty good wikis that explain the stats in more detail

[Paradoxical]

Hmm, ok I see. Doesn't seem like if I invest the first 20 level ups in to vit that I'll be screwed. Well I'll keep on that path until I see a victory.

[dcy665]

Leveling up VIT without regard to anything else will still get you killed.

Seriously. What weapons are you using, and what are your actual stats, 1 STR means nothing. STR = 10 is something we can work with. Also, what level are you currently?

One last nag, Taurus Demon? What in the world do you need 5 Estus flasks with him?
Jump off the tower, dual hand your weapon, do plunging attack they taught you in the tutorial against - a Taurus demon. Do tell. Try to get in two attacks, depending on much more than I have any information to answer correctly, I've seen him taken out with two hits after the plunging attacks. Heck, I've killed him with a Bandit's Knife. Bleed is a nice bonus.

[WhitePhantom]

Press the Explanation button on the level up screen to get a description of each stat. You can't go wrong really unless you're levelling up a magic stat for a melee character or something. Even then, you can always level up later as you get more and more souls from each enemy as you progress through the game.
A few level ups alone won't make a huge difference, but every little helps overall.

[delzaron]

Originally posted by dcy665:

Leveling up VIT without regard to anything else will still get you killed.

Seriously. What weapons are you using, and what are your actual stats, 1 STR means nothing. STR = 10 is something we can work with. Also, what level are you currently?

One last nag, Taurus Demon? What in the world do you need 5 Estus flasks with him?
Jump off the tower, dual hand your weapon, do plunging attack they taught you in the tutorial against - a Taurus demon. Do tell. Try to get in two attacks, depending on much more than I have any information to answer correctly, I've seen him taken out with two hits after the plunging attacks. Heck, I've killed him with a Bandit's Knife. Bleed is a nice bonus.

depends of the weapons you have.
I chosen the deprived class for the fun, and I needed to level up in dexterity for using a better weapon (the cimeterre, i pan to craft the fury sword of queelag). After, I need to level up the strenght to use the dragon sword (truly the best early game weapon, with the black knight halberd)

[richardson]

Originally posted by Paradoxical:

I'm trying to get better at souls games. I know I'm terrible but I want to try to get better overtime so I can play them all at some point.

As a way to train myself at combat I'm currently at the undead burg and I fight my way from the closest campfire to the boss Taurus. If I don't have 5 estus flasks to attempt him, I head back and level up at the campfire and try again. I felt this was more productive than dying over and over at the boss.

That's exactly what I did when I started. It's not so much "I need 5 estus to take out the boss" as it is "if I can't get through the hollows without needing an estus, I haven't practiced my skills enough". And it's a check to make sure you're not running through underleveled for where your skills are currently at.

That said I don't really know what I'm doing with stats. I think I've put one into strength, 2 endurance and everything else vitality. I figured since it upped my HP and def a bit that was a good investment. But after doing this for 2 hours I'm starting to wonder if I'm screwing myself over. Sure I'm somewhat getting better at the combat and I'll probably eventually down the boss. However if I should be focusing other stats or something....I mean, I just don't want to have to start the game completely over because how I leveled in the early game.

Anecdata: a lot of people's first times they put stats all over, tried out every weapon they got their hands on until they found one they liked, killed a few bosses and a lot of hollows to get the hang of the combat system - then started over with a different class and used the knowledge from the first run to inform their build, so there's no shame in that.

As for stats - min/maxers, challenge runners, and pvpers might disagree, but don't sweat over a couple possibly suboptimal points. 1.5% damage at level 40 will rarely if ever be the difference between dropping a boss and having to take another shot (another shot at a boss you just got under 1%...)

There are three main paths for weapons - big honking things that prioritize STR, little whippy things that prioritize DEX, and a few more balanced "quality" weapons, primarily swords, that level with both "equally". Optimally, you'll want to go down one of these paths without putting too many points into the stat you're not prioritizing - but forex having 16 DEX to use a bow isn't completely wasted.

Try out every weapon you can swing to see if you like how the R1 and R2 attacks of the different weapon classes feel. The Zweihander (quality slightly favoring STR) and Balder Side Sword (favoring DEX) are both among the best weapons in the game - but feel completely different and require completely different fighting styles. If the basic vanilla longsword feels best for you, run with it, it's good enough to finish the game, with a little care.

As for VIT/END, a good safe rule of thumb is to level them up equally with your damage abilities. As you get better avoiding damage, you can let VIT lag behind(*), but END is a triple threat - it controls how much you can block, it controls how often you can swing, and it controls how much you can carry and still roll acceptably fast out of the way of stuff.

(*) This habit is coming back to bite a lot of ppl hard when they move to Elden Ring...

[Paradoxical]

At level 21 I "achieved victory" against the Taurus Demon but it wasn't due to my own skills or ability to evade and damage him. He just jumped back off the cliff and killed himself while I was on the edge of death and he was half life.

I have to say this "victory" feels hollow. Like I have been diligently training myself to beat him and I think I was starting to get the hang of the boss as I wasn't dying as quickly.

I dunno, the way this played out almost makes me want to quit. I'm done playing for the day anyway.

[Paradoxical]

I feel like this game is trolling me. I just played for a few hours. Came around a giant armored boar was trying to figure out how to take him down. Firebombs, arrows and sneak attacks. Those didn't do much, died a few times. I had concluded I would just have to go around him for now. I'm going up the stairs on the side and all of a sudden I see it taking massive damage and it dies.

I assumed it was just running into the fire?

I got a cool boar helm so I figured, I'll learn how to fight it at some point.

Well I end up dying and it doesn't respawn. So...the most challenging enemies in this game so far have killed themselves rather than fighting me.

Unrelated gripe. I accidentally attacked that vendor in undead burg, I didn't realize you could attack npcs. I killed him and he seems to be gone? Where do I buy arrows now? I was using his services often since I started as a hunter.

[Chaos Mana]

Originally posted by Paradoxical:

I feel like this game is trolling me. I just played for a few hours. Came around a giant armored boar was trying to figure out how to take him down. Firebombs, arrows and sneak attacks. Those didn't do much, died a few times. I had concluded I would just have to go around him for now. I'm going up the stairs on the side and all of a sudden I see it taking massive damage and it dies.

I assumed it was just running into the fire?

I got a cool boar helm so I figured, I'll learn how to fight it at some point.

Well I end up dying and it doesn't respawn. So...the most challenging enemies in this game so far have killed themselves rather than fighting me.

Unrelated gripe. I accidentally attacked that vendor in undead burg, I didn't realize you could attack npcs. I killed him and he seems to be gone? Where do I buy arrows now? I was using his services often since I started as a hunter.

The strategy for fighting the armoured pig is to throw skull lures into the fire and it will kill itself anyway

[Yanomir]

Originally posted by Paradoxical:

I feel like this game is trolling me. I just played for a few hours. Came around a giant armored boar was trying to figure out how to take him down. Firebombs, arrows and sneak attacks. Those didn't do much, died a few times. I had concluded I would just have to go around him for now. I'm going up the stairs on the side and all of a sudden I see it taking massive damage and it dies.

I assumed it was just running into the fire?

I got a cool boar helm so I figured, I'll learn how to fight it at some point.

Well I end up dying and it doesn't respawn. So...the most challenging enemies in this game so far have killed themselves rather than fighting me.

Unrelated gripe. I accidentally attacked that vendor in undead burg, I didn't realize you could attack npcs. I killed him and he seems to be gone? Where do I buy arrows now? I was using his services often since I started as a hunter.

Don't go hollow, there are many more challenges ahead of you. For a while, tough enemies won't be able to suicide.

You will have access to the vendor soon enough, just push a little more. He'll sell arrows and mutliple weapons.

[< blank >]

Originally posted by Paradoxical:

I'm trying to get better at souls games. I know I'm terrible but I want to try to get better overtime so I can play them all at some point.

As a way to train myself at combat I'm currently at the undead burg and I fight my way from the closest campfire to the boss Taurus. If I don't have 5 estus flasks to attempt him, I head back and level up at the campfire and try again. I felt this was more productive than dying over and over at the boss.

That said I don't really know what I'm doing with stats. I think I've put one into strength, 2 endurance and everything else vitality. I figured since it upped my HP and def a bit that was a good investment. But after doing this for 2 hours I'm starting to wonder if I'm screwing myself over. Sure I'm somewhat getting better at the combat and I'll probably eventually down the boss. However if I should be focusing other stats or something....I mean, I just don't want to have to start the game completely over because how I leveled in the early game.

Make sure you have at least 2 humanity on your character (not simply in your inventory you have to see the number in the top left) then turn human at the bonfire and kindle it. Congratulations, you now permanently have 10 estus at that bonfire instead of 5. Random level ups aren't a big deal unless you put all your points in resistance which will ruin your character. Collect all items you see and find a weapon you like then upgrade it at a blacksmith. If you do it right you'll eventually faceroll enemies. If you have trouble fighting your way back to the boss then your problem is that you're fighting your way back to the boss. After you completely clear an area if you die to the boss simply run back to the fog door and skip all the enemies. It might be hard at first but it's a skill that can be learned.

[L9 dorothea]

they are very important. you need to reach certain stats to unlock weapons and levels dont matter too much after that. level 30 dex and strength is a good place to stop. vigor and endurance are incredibly important to level up. after i got the weapons i wanna use i perma level those

[richardson]

Originally posted by Paradoxical:

I feel like this game is trolling me. I just played for a few hours. Came around a giant armored boar was trying to figure out how to take him down. Firebombs, arrows and sneak attacks. Those didn't do much, died a few times. I had concluded I would just have to go around him for now. I'm going up the stairs on the side and all of a sudden I see it taking massive damage and it dies.

I assumed it was just running into the fire?

As another commenter said, the archers on the bridge above the pig are guarding an item called "Alluring Skull" that allows people to lure the pig into one of the bonfires - so your kill was kinda on point anyway.

Also, his tail was sticking out of a hole in his armor, and he can be backstabbed. Note that when you see armored pigs in the future they do _not_ have this weakness. That's the real trolly part of the pig encounter...

Well I end up dying and it doesn't respawn. So...the most challenging enemies in this game so far have killed themselves rather than fighting me.

As long as you aren't using actual cheats, any boss or miniboss that you walk away from is fair. It's perfectly legit to use Taurus Demon's weakness to plunge attacks against him by continually luring him away from the ladder and running past to climb it again.

Hell, the _final boss in the game_ is made of this. Gwyn, nearly uniquely for a boss, can be parried. With an endgame weapon and the Hornet Ring, five parries in a row is enough to win the game.

Also, the Demon Firesage is in an arena with a lot of trees that hamper your mobility. Well, they also hamper his mobility sometimes. It's perfectly fair to riddle him with arrows if he's careless enough to get stuck on one.

Unrelated gripe. I accidentally attacked that vendor in undead burg, I didn't realize you could attack npcs. I killed him and he seems to be gone? Where do I buy arrows now? I was using his services often since I started as a hunter.

If you kill an NPC, they don't have a bonfire to respawn at and are gone for good. If you anger an NPC and run away without killing them, they are hostile to you, but there is an NPC you can request absolution from (for a fee) and they will chill out (I had to do this once as I managed to slash Siegmeyer during the fight at the end of his questline).

There are other merchants, and (nearly?) all of them sell arrows, including the creepy woman hanging out in an aqueduct. As the other comment said, you're getting real close to finding the blacksmith Andre, who both sells and upgrades weapons and armor for you. The merchant you killed is not that big a deal - Undead Burg, quaint place though it is, is kinda out of the way once you've rung both bells. He only sells one item unavailable anywhere else, so there's one NPC you won't be able to meet, but that's hardly required.

Don't give up. Just like your character, having something to keep you going, even if it's only sheer cussedness, is what keeps us all from going hollow. Things will get better. And then they'll get worse again, this is a From Software game, after all...