Fast Roll overrated?

I'm not a great PvP I think; but I can hold my own, and I win most fights in places like the forest and such.

I see everyone gunning for Fast Roll/DWGR. Granted, these are very powerful. They help dodge wizards (especially with lag), they are very useful on certain builds (my ornstein cosplay its invaluable; 2H spear, and Talisman and that's it for items).

But for many of my builds, I don't need it. Med works fine, and slow can even work. Most techniques just don't really seem to work against me. This is in a no-holds barred fight, so healing allowed.

So if there's a wizard, just dodge or block with a shield, or use trees/obstructions to block their shots. You'll take damage every once in awhile, but if they're not pressing, you can just heal. I know, I know, healing is 'cheap'. But backpedalling casting spells or shooting arrows is not. Hmm.

Anyways don't want to digress that way, but all I'm saying is in a no-holds barred fight, I find Med. speed just fine. And it opens up so many options! To get a fast roll, you need so much endurance and your armour suffers big time. You can just attempt to 'trade blows' whent hey come in, and if they never come in, just heal. You can use your own items to force them a bit too (crossbow, dung pies, poison knives).

So, why IS fast rolling so important? Does it come out of the metagame of 'no heal'?

To be honest, if you're medium rolling, you may as well be using the DWGR. No change to item builds short of a ring slot, and the mobility provided greatly enhances both your offensive and defensive abilities. The medium roll is indeed fine, and is more than adequate in most situations, but ninja flipping is still better in the end :|

The first thing that comes to mind is that with fast roll it's easier to punish opponents stupid attacks or avoid large hit box magic (mostly pyromancy). I have a mid/slow rolling characters and it's not a huge problem but in certain situations you just find yourself thinking "if I would be little faster this would be a lot easier".

Mid roll would be viable if the DWGR didn't force heavy armor builds to be flipping to compete. Nerf it and it would be viable again.

What about Heavy? I know DWGR is better than Havels at Med-Low, but if you're actually going for a Med Roll or Heavy roll, you can get some pretty heavy armour with Havel's ring. Same with weapons.

I have a SL65 Iron Tarkus build that is something like this (numbers may not be exact):

Black Iron armour all +5, his shield +5, Greatsword +15 (buffed with resin), Heavy crossbow +15 (I find it stuns much easier than the light crossbow), Composite bow.

Stats are something like 30 Vit, 35 End, 34 str, and just about base in everything else. Might have put 2 pts into dex.

Rings are Havels, and then.. depends. I find the rings that grant +50 defence to magic/lightning can be really good, especially against the Soul Mass spells (really, really good. Extra 50 defence to each one if you want to tank the hit and 2H greatsword them. The glass cannon builds don't normally expect that! Follow up with a long range poke, and it can end the fight right there, as they normally expect you to spam R1).

The ring slot I personally find can really help.

Edit: saw a bunch of posts. Maybe its more helpful at lower levels; but the concept of trading blows I think has merit. Also, I have found that going for slow roll has taught me quite a bit in PvP. The one giant, limiting factor IMO is you can't chase. They can just run away and heal almost every time, which is the giant flaw from my experience.

I actually really like the Fat Roll. It opens up so many options for stats because you aren't shoehorned into investing in as much Endurance (with a full Havel Cosplay only using Havel's Ring you can fat roll at only 23 Endurance ), and it can even be useful in PvP for mindgames, mostly catching people off-guard with unlocked rolling attacks. They see you belly-flop onto the ground and are all thinking "I should run in there and punish that with a backstab!" Then you Great Club them in the face as they run around you! Feels so good

Could be a method of play. If you aren't really attacking them, they can flip around like mad, but they have to attack you somehow. So bow, or magic, or trying to flip/poke you. If you purposely go for extremely beefy armour, very unlikely that you'll be stunlocked.

So you can trade blows while pressing, and if they keep moving, you can use your shield or move around a corner/to a spot where they must engage (or both of you just idle waiting for the other to move, which has happened before).

I recently played a ton with a fat rolling build.

If you can use strength weapons effectively to trade blows you don't have a problem.

The only real scare is if they are a magic user, because unless you have 50 Strength there is no way to effectively avoid attacks like CSS, although most weaker spells can be negated with crest shield or stone greatshield

Yeah. The Magic Stoneplate ring helps, and using cover, and healing (which apparently is cheap but I don't know why). CSS can be avoided at long range; thats how I try to fight wizards sometimes with it, using a heavy cross bow and rolling/running to dodge (unlocked of course).

IV_Mark_VI wrote:Yeah. The Magic Stoneplate ring helps, and using cover, and healing (which apparently is cheap but I don't know why). CSS can be avoided at long range; thats how I try to fight wizards sometimes with it, using a heavy cross bow and rolling/running to dodge (unlocked of course).

The biggest problem with these builds though, is that you will be slower in general movement than other players.

So if you are in a large area, and a magic user is content with simply shooting spells and running away if you get close you are in for a long drawn out chase.

So I always keep the golem axe on hand.

(so good)

Yep. And I'm content with a drawn out fight. They only have so many spells.

Feels very satisfying to win one of those fight... like an overall strategy rather than tactics. I'm content to stay at the edge of their range letting them expend their spells. Usually it forces them to switch tactics which is what I want.

I'm sorry, I know this will be unpopular but I can't do mid roll. I just feel so slow I cannot stand it. It's gotten to the point for me where I can't play PvP OR PvE if I'm not fast rolling or ninja flipping.

I do prefer the fast roll, however.

Try fighting in mid roll against someone who's fast but not loaded in armor or poise... it's actually doable, you just have to dodge less and be more careful about where you'll end up after your roll.

the question is, is fast roll over rated? My answer is no, for pvp it is the best method of movement.

Now I'm not saying you can't win in a mid/fat build, but you make it incredibly easy to be backstabbed in those scenarios. Able pyros will light you up all day as well.

On healing as being seen as "cheap." It is seen this way because imagine the extreme. We all have 99 divine blessings and everytime you take damage you just get out of range and very quickly regain full hp. It goes against the whole point of a duel or battle. Which is why, it is seen as cheap. Using a bow/magic is not cheap at all because there are openings to attack. But if I'm a mom mask flippy giant, even your backstab will not kill me as I continue to heal over..and over...and...you get the point.

I love my medium roll builds, Drake@70 and Drake @ 120. They're a ton of fun and I've taken on some of the best PvP'rs on this forum with them and had plenty of success. Medium roll is a totally different play style then fast or flip, no unnecessary rolls and I don't chase people around, but its an incredibly effective style and allows for much more freedom in selection of equipment and stats.

On the topic of fat roll, well I've also done pretty well on my Smough cosplay. Thing is fat roll requires , imo anyway, particular weapon selections. You have to have a weapon with particular types of roll attacks that allow you to defend yourself coming out of a roll. So while fat roll is a bit more limiting its a lot of fun to use and feels great when you win!

One note, fwd + R2 attacks are much more useful ofln med and fat rollers, especially fat rollers. On my smough everyone I fight gets lulled into thinking I can't get after them and theyll control the range until I fwd + R2 and Smough flies at them and crushes them for 900 dmg. Those attacks come out much faster then anything else and with a good weapon cover good ground faster then you could run and R1.