Do you want a hard mode?

Back on topic:

No hard mode, no easy mode. Just one mode.

How we approach the monolith is what creates the player to player bonds. We share our experiences, where they are similar, where they differ and how we can improve ourselves. The point of this game is to seek out others through the trials. It's why you can see others at bonfires in pristine detail. It's why you can see ghosts fighting to stay alive just as you are, and it's why we can interact via summons.

Splitting up the modes into different versions of easy, hard etc creates a selfish game experience, tailored to wants and needs. It's complete entitlement and discouraging to witness. It's disheartening to see this craving for everything to be so personally ergonomic at the expense of reaching out to lean on others to transcend discomfort. I hate to make allusions to real life but the microcosm exists in the macrocosm and vice versa.

There is no need to change the existing culture and this attempt to extract more gold than possible from the goose is poisonous.

*Dusts off the salt upon entering thread*

What I find with most dark souls players, is that no matter what the lvl.... No matter how silly the armor set up... No matter what build etc... They always have +10 armor, maxed weapons and an ascended pyro flame etc

Seriously, thanks to the BB glitch days / too much time on our hands, we take it for granted!

For example "look at my drake sword build with a plank shield, its so handicapped!" (both +5/+15 mind...)

Or "Wow I finished NG7 at SL1" (with an ascended flame and a +5 chaos club...)

But in doing so, we have made PVE ridiculously easy for ourselves, at any lvl, and at any NG.... and that was our OWN doing. So anyone who that applies to doesn't really have a case when bishing about the difficulty of the next game...


And more importantly, unless they are gonna nerf me and the rest of the people who enjoy torturing hosts when I invade, the game wont be ANY easier at all


Not sure on the relevance of this here.... But HOO-RAH all the same!

Oh god it's Rosie. Run before you've been cursed.

DE5PA1R wrote:Oh god it's Rosie. Run before you've been cursed.

Don't blaspheme in the sight of the pantheon

Serious, I asked because, while everyone is entitled an opinion, the more you played PvE the more you objective opinions you can make improvements for it, in order to improve re-playability.

DE5PA1R wrote:

How long have you been playing? How many hours? Since when?

Not sure why or how that's relevant, but the answer is hundreds of hours. Probably less than 1k, but more than 500. It's basically one of the 2-3 games I've played since it was released (got it same day it came out). I didn't play those others much.

Again, not sure how that's relevant in the slightest.

I wrote a text wall to answer this, but I pressed back and I lost it, and I don't feel like writting it again, so I'm gonna short it up:

I played for more than 5700 hours. It's relevant, because what I told Serious above. Your only point against making NG+ richer, is that anything "new" in NG+, should be instead added to NG because otherwise you "wouldn't get the full experience" (that's what I got at least). That's plain dumb. I guess you also complain about how you can't get to use Gwyn's Soul in NG? How you can't create Gwyn's Weapon in NG? How you can't acquire the Sunlight Spear in NG?

I'm not talking about adding NEW CONTENT to NG+, that isn't in NG (though I would be ok with that as long as it's way harder), I'm talking about make enemies stronger in more ways than just "increasing health and damage" in NG+. That would make NG pluses more interesting to play, because right now it's like replaying the same game with a crappier weapon and less health. Instead of being actually fun to overcome your enemy, it's plain easy because the AI in Dark Souls is stupid (though it's okay for first playthrough and such, once you know all the movements of your enemies, every playthrough is monotone and boring, also backstabs, etc.).

The whole point about DkS' difficulty is to be aware, watch your surroundings, watch your opponent's movements, and attack at the right time and the reward that comes with beating a super difficult challenge. That feeling is long lost once you beat the game, say like 2 or 3 times, because of how the difficulty works in this game (it's about enemies, and their AI). I'm just saying that while leaving intact the original formula for NG, in NG+ make the enemies way more harder not just in health and damage, but also make them smarter, or maybe at least make them quicker or something, increase their quantity, things like that.

But you say "oh no, if they do that, it should be in NG right from the bat, because I want the most extreme experience", that's stupid, those new challenges I'm talking about, are aimed towards veteran, well equipped, and knowledgeable players, not towards newbie players and/or poor equipped-low-level-players. Is aimed towards Players that already beat the game, but are looking for a harder challenge, just for fun.

That kind of challenge is not fair towards new players right from the bat, it's like saying "guys we are gonna make Ornstein and Smough spawn Black Phantom Silver Knights during the fight in NG+ and above!", and you say "hell no, I want that in NG because otherwise I wouldn't be getting the most extreme experience!", THAT is stupid. While that would be fun, it would be almost impossible and unfair towards new players in their first playthrough with gold-hemmed set, lighting spear, and Eagle Shield. Though against veteran well equipped players, that are already in NG+, that it's fair against them.

DkS is about fair, though hard challenges, and the joy of overcoming them, a challenge even new people with enough patience/will and "standard equipment" for the area/level can learn to overcome, not about unfair challenges aimed towards ultra veteran people that would crush newcomers without giving them enough tools or the chance to learn to fight them.

Chiz, most people will replay the PvE at least 2 more times if they liked the game, and then play PvP, which will take them at least another 50-100 hours.

If that's not good replay value, I dunno what is. I know that compared to your 5700 hour mark it may seem insignificant, but frankly most people have probably never played games that much in total, let alone in one game. Qualitative time to me is more valuable than simply a quantified measure. I'd rather have replay value of 50 hours in souls than 100 hours in FIFA or COD, simply because souls are far better than the latter.

I agree that the changes made to NG+ to make it harder wouldn't water down NG, frankly I dunno where despair got this whole 'higher AI' and 'Extra boss attacks' from. If they do stuff like that then obviously it would be in NG too. The extra stuff in NG+ plus bonus enemies, traps, extra points in bosses etc are things that would go beyond what any normal player should expect to come up against fresh out of souls uni.

DE5PA1R wrote:
I don't know why I have to keep posting this:

My issue with addressing the NG+ "problem" is that the majority of proposed "solutions" severely nerf NG. If the AI gets smarter in NG+, then NG is not everything it could be. If a boss uses an attack in NG+ that it doesn't use in NG, then NG is not everything it could be. And frankly, that's crap. I want the most extreme game possible starting from the moment the disc goes into the console.

Oh, and *** yes I still PvE in Dark Souls. Literally all the time. I'll take a break for a month or so and come back to beat it again. Your assumptions are crap.

Oh I dont know. I think its a matter of opinion. Such as mine, which is:

I'd love to see things change up from NG-->NG+ and so on and so forth.

Say a 20% chance to see random NPC black phantoms on NG+ and a 30% chance on NG+++. The only reason I even beat Gwyn anymore is to get more souls to level up, buy crap, and most importantly, duplicate my spells and what not.

I can appreciate the opinion of "getting the most from jump" though. This game obviously has oodles of replay value, but not much reason to go to ngs outside of build building.

Back on topic: Rosie said it best,
"There will be no easy mode upon the introduction of ME into YOUR game! Mwahahahaha!!!!!!!"
(I paraphrased a little )

I could really care less about the difficulty setting debate. I appreciate both sides of the arguement. However, Namco has already confirmed there was a mistranslation in the interview where all this started.

I think people are forgetting that NG+ errr 'unorignality' or whatever you're all arguing about is a minor problem compared to let's say the complete imbalance of the endgame in both Souls games.

But this is all off-topic anyway so, yeah, glad I'm not one of the devs for the next game.

Serious_Much wrote:Chiz, most people will replay the PvE at least 2 more times if they liked the game, and then play PvP, which will take them at least another 50-100 hours.

If that's not good replay value, I dunno what is. I know that compared to your 5700 hour mark it may seem insignificant, but frankly most people have probably never played games that much in total, let alone in one game. Qualitative time to me is more valuable than simply a quantified measure. I'd rather have replay value of 50 hours in souls than 100 hours in FIFA or COD, simply because souls are far better than the latter.

I agree that the changes made to NG+ to make it harder wouldn't water down NG, frankly I dunno where despair got this whole 'higher AI' and 'Extra boss attacks' from. If they do stuff like that then obviously it would be in NG too. The extra stuff in NG+ plus bonus enemies, traps, extra points in bosses etc are things that would go beyond what any normal player should expect to come up against fresh out of souls uni.

It's a very good replay value, higher than most games, but that doesn't change the fact it can be EASILY improved, with just making a few modifications in NG+. I'm not saying the replay value should be of 5000 hours, but just making those kind of modifications I proposed several hours will be added to the replay value.

It's an awesome game, but people should always look forward to improvement, more so if it's so EASY to achieve like just making a few modifications to NG+. There are lots of improvements people come up with for either PvP or PvE, but this is by far one of the easiest ones to do, and will have a great impact in the re playability of the game.

In the same way though Chiz, first and foremost I'd much rather they worked on developing the game as a whole to improve it than simply focus on improving replay value, which is one of the least important parts of a game in my opinion, especially in long games.

Serious_Much wrote:In the same way though Chiz, first and foremost I'd much rather they worked on developing the game as a whole to improve it than simply focus on improving replay value, which is one of the least important parts of a game in my opinion, especially in long games.

I know, and I agree, that's why I said "without modifying the original formula of the game", meaning once they get the game complete, just make a tweaks to NG+, so we can enjoy more further playthrough.

Heck if it's so darn easy why aren't you dishing out mods for the PC version?

Really. Besides how arrogant and rude you've (Chiz) been, I really wonder if you even read any of my posts. Changing the AI is not a slight addition to the game-it's basically remaking the enemy AI altogether, which is a big project. That's asking from to make each playthrough a new game rather than a NG+. To create different AI difficulties will require several entirely different sets of AI for each different NG+ level, which is effectively making half (or whatever percentage the total of ALL enemies AI is of the work put into making the game) of the game over for each playthrough that the AI set changes. If a different, 'harder' AI is used for eight playthroughs, (there were eight different difficulty levels in Demons Souls and Dark Souls) then the creators will have to make eight different AI sets for every enemy type in the game. Even if the creators wanted to do that, the company hiring them just won't support that level of intricacy. And, given the very trial-and-error nature of these games, we'll eventually learn to overcome each new set of AI using the exact same or perfectly parallel tactics and techniques, anyways.
I'm not saying that I hope that NG+ isn't improved or expanded on; I'm saying that the particular method you suggested to do so, improving AI, is not fair to the first playthrough, plausible for either the creators or the company, is practically an entirely new game besides, (if I buy one game, I expect to get one game, not two... or eight) likely won't help (much) to solve the problem anyways, and, depending on what level of AI programmers are currently capable of making, even possible. If you've got another suggestion on improving NG+, then please state it; adding a new AI for each playthrough just won't (or can't) work.

It's like your insulting the slaves who built the pyramids because they aren't lacquered in gold.

Big Time Master, will you please not digress this into a flame war? Chiz, please respond responsibly to that. I'm not aiming to insult or harass you, only invite you to look at how presented yourself.
Let's keep our community a responsible, respectful family.

Acarnatia wrote:Really. Besides how arrogant and rude you've (Chiz) been, I really wonder if you even read any of my posts. Changing the AI is not a slight addition to the game-it's basically remaking the enemy AI altogether, which is a big project. That's asking from to make each playthrough a new game rather than a NG+. To create different AI difficulties will require several entirely different sets of AI for each different NG+ level, which is effectively making half (or whatever percentage the total of ALL enemies AI is of the work put into making the game) of the game over for each playthrough that the AI set changes. If a different, 'harder' AI is used for eight playthroughs, (there were eight different difficulty levels in Demons Souls and Dark Souls) then the creators will have to make eight different AI sets for every enemy type in the game. Even if the creators wanted to do that, the company hiring them just won't support that level of intricacy. And, given the very trial-and-error nature of these games, we'll eventually learn to overcome each new set of AI using the exact same or perfectly parallel tactics and techniques, anyways.
I'm not saying that I hope that NG+ isn't improved or expanded on; I'm saying that the particular method you suggested to do so, improving AI, is not fair to the first playthrough, plausible for either the creators or the company, is practically an entirely new game besides, (if I buy one game, I expect to get one game, not two... or eight) likely won't help (much) to solve the problem anyways, and, depending on what level of AI programmers are currently capable of making, even possible. If you've got another suggestion on improving NG+, then please state it; adding a new AI for each playthrough just won't (or can't) work.

I never said they should improve every NG plus' AI, just the one of NG+, and it was just 1 among many different suggestions I gave that could improve NG+. And to be honest I don't know why you think I've been rude to you, please tell me so I know. If you read my posts, you will find that that wasn't my only proposition, and it was quickly removed from my further posts because I realized that wouldn't be much of an option (although from different reasons than yours).

BIG TIME, because I have no idea how to do it. What's up with you man? Why you talk to me like that? I only said it's easy, because I KNOW it's easy to just modify the health, damage, quantity, and speed values of an enemy. If I get you right you're mad because you believe I insulted FROM, and it's not that way. I believe there are several ways to improve NG+ and I presented them, and I told people to realize the game it's not perfect and these suggestions are easy to make.

I reacted with hostility myself there. I apologize, Chiz.
The factors in enemy difficulty include
1) Attacks
2) AI
3) Stats, including damage and health/resistances

The majority (I didn't actually see anything in this thread in your posts regarding the difficulty of anything else) of your posts have been regarding the enemy difficulty. As you said above, you also are not talking about adding any new content which means no new attacks.
Enemy stats are easy to tweak and do add to the difficulty, albeit how much is entirely variable to the particular game and very nature of the game. For Dark Souls, unless they are strengthened to the point that they rip right through shields and it becomes Nintendo Hard, this apparently doesn't add much because of the trial-and-error nature of the game.
Enemy AI is by far the hardest, most in-depth and possibly most altering way to change the difficulty. AI works as an input-output formula. (mathmatical formulas that have a different answer depending on what number you put in) When a certain input is put in, it puts out an output data-it reacts. The effects of this include

Input 1: walking within a certain distance (named the aggo range)
Output 1: the enemy walks or runs towards the player as determined by it's particular programming

Input 2: the player is within a certain distance from the enemy (within attacking distance or what will be if the player doesn't move for charging attacks)
Output 2: the enemy uses one of it's attacks. I'm guessing which one is determined by a formula designed to simulate randomness (no in-game formulas are actually random, just preferably as seemingly close to it as possible) in the same way most video games do

Input 3: the enemy's health drops to a certain number or percent
Output 3: the enemy changes to a different part of it's AI that is meant to be more defensive, such as never using attacks to lower its stamina below a certain point, being more likely to use healing items, or run away.

Beyond reactions such as these, AI can't really become much more intelligent because all AI is based on reactions to certain things that have to be number or code-based. (because that's what the program actually reacts to) For example, it doesn't understand or predict that the player is going to perform a strafe backstab; it can be programmed to react to a player strafing around it for a certain amount of time, such as 5 seconds, without attacking, and be programmed to perform a certain action in response, such as backing away, using a certain attack the the programmers think will work well on BSfishers and so on. Then, though a player will eventually be able to understand and predict even these counters that the programmers put in, and because the program can't actually create any new reactions on its own, it will be left to be exploited by certain tricks and strategies that, given enough trial-and-error, someone is almost inevitably bound to find or create that is a definite kill.
The only way that can be changed is, if after these strategies become so commonplace that enough people are using them that the programmers decide to do something, then the programmers alter or add a new reaction to a specific programmable action by the player or a status of the enemy that the programmers think will counteract that new technique. And then the players will find a way to get around that as well, creating an arms race. For the enemies to ever stay on a competing level, (ie stay difficult enemies) their AI will have to be updated with new programmable strategies every time a new strategy renders them ineffective. Someone or something has to write those new programs or make certain already-existing ones more likely to be used. This can be done either by the programmers repeatedly patching the enemies AI (which obviously is problematic on a platform game, especially for offline players) or the programs being able to do it themselves. While I think the latter is possible and can and will create the organic difficulty I think you're looking for, programmers just haven't created that yet. I don't mean From isn't using it-no one is. It doesn't exist yet. Yet.

I love the phrase nintendo hard, so ironic nowadays.

This is there's other ways to make things harder than just those three parts. Learning a level so you aggro one at a time or can sprint through is part of the game.

I'd say on NG+ having different enemy placement, but also making sure that every time you get into a fight, it's at least 2 on 1. Also increasing aggro range can increase the difficulty..

Making stuff like O and S spawn already supered up, priscilla never turns visible, quelaag's lava takes much longer to disappear etc for bosses.

To those that you suggested, Serious-why only put those in NG+ instead of just every playthrough altogether?
Except for the part on bosses. That will take the fun out them for me.

Acarnatia wrote:To those that you suggested, Serious-why only put those in NG+ instead of just every playthrough altogether?
Except for the part on bosses. That will take the fun out them for me.

With all due respect, I think THAT is exactly where we confront, it couldn't be put in NG because it wouldn't be fair against new players. The point is that once you know how the game is (enemy placement, reactions, etc.) PvE becomes very easy, that it's amplified by the fact every NG+ is exactly the same in every aspect except for enemies with higher health and higher damage output. That's why, at least, doing tweaks in NG+ and above, to make the game significantly harder (tweaks aimed towards veteran players, that's why NG is left untouched), we can make re-playability more enjoyable.

The experience in NG is fair and fun towards new players. And that's okay. But the experience in NG+, feels like doing everything again and lacks any fresh feeling, because NG+ (and above) is aimed towards veteran players (players that already completed the game at least once), by making those modes harder we can make re-playability more fun after NG.

I'd argue that the 2v1 constantly, extra enemies etc. would make the game too hard. People sometimes lack appreciation for what fine a balance difficulty actually is. The NG+ stuff is to test someone who has done it all before- who needs a fresh challenge. Expecting a new player to do the some is uncalled for and would lessen the experience.

Serious_Much wrote:I'd argue that the 2v1 constantly, extra enemies etc. would make the game too hard. People sometimes lack appreciation for what fine a balance difficulty actually is. The NG+ stuff is to test someone who has done it all before- who needs a fresh challenge. Expecting a new player to do the some is uncalled for and would lessen the experience.

Exactly.