Dark Souls SL1 / Starting Build Discussion

I was curious about that, so I actually did Great Hollow on a NG+ character with 410 item find this afternoon and managed to get one slab. Not conclusive, of course, but an interesting data point. In the past I've generally done it with little or no item find, since I tend to do GH before Sen's.

I was lucky enough to get a white slab off of the Pinwheel guys in the Tomb of Giants for my faith dude. Never got one before, or since. And I certainly didn't have the ring on.

No, I got that, too. So I could max one divine +10 and one Occult +5. This was on the XBOX, too, and I'm fairly sure it was pre-DLC and the one near Manus,

Fuck, I vaguely remembered reading this and thought that you said "sorcery" instead of "magic" and "bellowing" instead of "sorcery". Killed Griggs so no Bellowing Dragoncrest Ring for me.

So I'm in Anor Londo with a +5 fire reinforced club, a +12-ish pyromancy flame, and no fog ring. Is it going to be too hard to press on and kill Ornstein and Smough? Should I go back for the Large Fire Ember, whatever red titanite chunks I can scare up to upgrade the club, the fog ring, and maybe farm up a bit more for the pyromancy flame?

Do you have the crown or the bellowing ring? If yes, then it's a simple question of backstabbing your way there and pyro > +10 works fine to get through O&S with Great combust/combust.

Well, I made one of these, just started. So far made the successful run to New Londo to get the first bonus Firekeeper soul and emptied out the graveyard. Currently using the mace and of course starting Pyro robes. I didn't know the mace had bleed, so that's a pleasant surprise. We'll see how far I get on this; it'll be an interesting and different way to play at least.

I also like the various tips about killing off NPCs. I guess when you're SL1, anything goes for survival? :D

That takes me up to 4 characters. Does that admit me to Dark Souls Anon yet?

Sweet! You can join Team SL1 Kalameet Frustration.

Basically, yeah. Still have to be careful though so you don't do what Hanacker did and screw yourself out of some important gear.

(PS: Can someone drop into @Hanacker's game and donate their BDCR to him if they're in NG+? I'll do it when I get there but I don't know when that will be.)

Ha, four characters. I remember when I had four characters. I have twelve now. I'm pretty sure LK has used up all the slots and had to delete some.

No great combust yet either, and if you look up a few posts you'll see that I screwed myself out of the bellowing ring. I think I knew that I could do Sen's no problem, but didn't think all the way through to Anor Londo. I made it to the twin archers no problem, died a couple times and gave up, so I haven't tried at it too hard yet.

Thanks for thinking of me! How fucked do you think I am without it?

I think for the 4 K you will want an ascended flame, ideally a few levels up as opposed to the mere +10 + crown + ring. That's the only fight where it really, really makes a big difference in terms of letting you take them on earlier (because 15k for a ring is cheaper than the next level up of the pyro glove).

As far as right now, it should be no big deal, it's just easier with that big damage boost. The other solid alternative is two regular combusts, you just have to be ready to deal with Ornstein for longer than you would with GC. Perhaps consider subbing in the steel ring for where the bellowing ring would be; if you can't up your damage, increase your margin of error to stay in the fight. If you go with Solaire, it should be fine.

If you decide it's an issue tossing it over from a low level character of mine should be no big deal on the weekend.

I have no idea because it has hardly ever left my finger. For the same reason though, I think it's pretty important. You can probably get through most encounters, but geez, it's a straight up 20% damage boost which is just insanely good.

I've never gotten any kind of slab to drop off anything that doesn't drop it 100% of the time. EVER. And I've farmed Darkwraiths, my god have I farmed Darkwraiths.

Don't feel bad, I'm in the same boat.

BTW, every time I hear Manus I can't help but think of this:

There's gotta be a relation, doesn't there? Hands of Fate? His giant hand?

Well, "manus" just means "hand" in latin, so that's the connection. I do enjoy thinking of him as a reference to the movie, though.

It's worth being clear *which* is the ring you think you're going to get from killing him. He drops slumbering dragoncrest if killed, sells bellowing/lingering dragoncrest rings. Just to be sure.

Ah, here it is. That's what made it jump out at me.

Been there.

Anyone feel like co-oping Kalameet tonight? (PC)

Sorry, out of town til Friday. Good luck though.

Oh, I won't need luck.

(Because I'm not going to do it.)

Fuck, even with my suboptimal build I managed to get Super Smough down to about a quarter life. Solaire died right as Ornstein died so the last stage was 1v1. I think I can do this.

So today was going a lot worse. When I tried to kill the big knights before summoning Solaire, I'd do poorly, and when I summoned Solaire first he'd take a ton of damage. And then the fight with O&S would go poorly. I never got close and I was down to 1 humanity. I figured after I lost I'd go farm up a bit and come back. 2 statue guys go down without too many estus flasks being used. Ornstein goes down pretty well. Solaire lasts through to about 1/4 life on Smough and then I finish him off. Sweet.

And then I go to the catacombs with a gold serpent ring on and none of the necros drop a skull lantern. My main got 3...
Not sure if I want to try tomb of giants blind to get one, but maybe.

FWIW, it's almost certain you missed at least one Necromancer in your sweep. I have never gotten <1 lantern from them as an entire group, but I have frequently gotten 0 from doing just 3-4. If you haven't hit up a bonfire yet it would be a good idea to methodically back clear the area (the one just before the wheel skeletons and the one past the giant skeleton that drops from the ceiling tend to be the ones people miss).

That said, the tomb of giants is not hard to do in order to get to Patches blind. You need to follow lights, kill the first skeleton, follow lights to just before the first ramp, plunging attack the second one and kill him, then follow the ledge all the way to the right. If you look down you'll see the one humanity on the ledge below, just drop down on it. Then walk off again and you'll be at Patches.

The hardest early part of the Tomb is surviving the two skeleton duo before Patches (if you have no light), but this gets rid of that step.

You're guaranteed to get one if you kill all the necromancers, but more importantly just do Lost Izalith first and get the Sunlight Maggot.

That's what I do. I don't kill anything in the Tomb of the Giants that isn't named Vince, Nico, Leroy, or Nito.

Edit: well ok I do sometimes kill some bone pillars near the end. You know what I mean.

Charles To be clear, you mean before the first (separate) skeletons rather than the first pair of skeletons, correct?

I THINK A BUNCH OF DEAD PINWHEELS WOULD LIKE TO HAVE A WORD WITH YOU.

What I do is: run past the first skeleton, down the ramp, hook a right and run up to or past the second skeleton and dive off the cliff to my left, which dumps you out right in front of Patches pretty much.

Oh. I just prefer killing those two guys (especially the second plunging attack one) to running past them, when I don't have any light source. I like to keep my running to a minimum in the dark.

Man, I don't mess with those poor bastards. I do have a few of them on my conscience from the early days, but they and I made an agreement a long while ago that's been mutually beneficial: they'll be consistently very inept shots and as such pose no danger to me, and I will basically ignore them.