"There is no Tier Two"

Holy ****.

Why is everyone whining about spears again? They are NOT overpowered. Go ahead and attack someone with your spear,if they have a brain,they will dodge or parry all attacks.If not,congrats.You just beat an idiot.
There is a counter for every weapon,either learn it or accept that you suck against it.I thought the entire point of this game was for every weapon and tactic to be very viable.It kinda goes against that idea to say one group of weapons is simply better than another.
Pretty sure a guy with a whip could beat the world's best spearman,that is the beauty of the game.

@anyone who will post TL;DR, please don’t. Thank you.

What this thread is not about:

-Whether or not skill and experience is the dominating factor.
-Saying "best" weapon = weapon you should play with you noob!
-Why spears are the dominating weapon class, although previous comments rebut that very statement...was hoping to avoid that. It does not need to be explained imo.

Yes Rynn makes some great points, but it does not stop there. Here are some comments from the op I believe have been grossly overlooked.

Animaaal wrote:...This is compounded by the combination of experience and the Leo Ring....

Animaaal wrote:...People tend to forget, properly kiting and having seen and recognized every weapon in the game (experience), you are more likely to hit with crits...

Also, spears can kick whereas some other weapons deemed to be equal cannot, but rather have their kick animations replaced largely in part by a move that is not as effective.

Spears sit alone in tier 1 because they meet all the criteria needed to be effective. They also take advantage of the most effective damage buff in the game.

Now to address some comments:

FinPeku wrote:...I used to think spears are too good and the best weapon class in this game, but then suddenly i started beating them way more than losing to them...

I thought that as well. But I quickly realized that it wasn’t I getting exponentially better, but the competition was getting exponentially worse. In the early days, spears were the weapon of choice. The people who agreed upon that choice, stopped playing. However, newer players were exciting me and giving me joy almost every day before I stopped playing. The vet players have almost been completely replaced, but their replacements are in the early stages of the “skill trumps everything” discussion.

With the dlc came new blood and new ideas and the rehash of the “skill can beat anyone” argument…usually with a hilt. Which is actually more of a theoretical argument than anything I’ve said, and actually pretty ridiculous. I don’t think anyone here would beat me with a hilt, not even after 5 months of not playing at all.

I really hate to keep elaborating on spears, but I pose a semi-hypothetical situation again (this time without robots).

Lets say Miyazaki is the best player of all time. In a simulation fashion, he gets to play with himself…
He uses these 2 builds:
-SKS build, properly optimized with Leo and Hornets
-Bandit’s Knife, properly optimized with Hornets and whatever you want.
I started to write the builds in mugen until I realized how irrelevant that would be. By properly optimized, I mean not mid or fat rolling, using the appropriate mask/armor combo/poise combo/etcetcetcetcetcetcetcetcetcetcetc.
SKS Miyazaki would win at the very least 50% of the time.

FinPeku wrote:...Everyone knows the pros of spears, reach, speed blah blah. But what about cons? Here are some, in my opinion:

- Bad moveset. Well, it's not like they need more than their regular attack and shield poke. But, at least you don't have to watch out for anything else when fighting a spear. Even if they do something else, 9 times out of 10 it's very easy to poise bs/roll bs or parry. Spears are predictable...

I disagree with this in its entirety. I'm not trying to be rude. But this statement does not take into consideration the player who is willing to fight for an hour.

FinPeku wrote:... I like to trade hits with weapons that have a fast, long range running attack. Like katanas or estoc...

This was addressed in its entirety in the op. I requires a player to be offensive, while spear weapons do not have that required playstyle.

skarekrow13 wrote:...I am attempting to help you define this thread's goal better so people will converse with you rather than have a spear argument...

Thank you skare. I appreciate you taking the time to reiterate the op. That was the premise. I’m not trying to say I told you so to anyone, but this was clearly outlined in the op and predicted. The problem is people not reading the op. I did not elaborate to a great extent, because I didn’t think it was necessary. I mean, look at the 3 principles I listed:
-Deal damage
-Avoid damage
-Play with lag.
That was on purpose. I thought it would’ve guided the direction of the conversation properly, but I also realized the chance of “Everything has a counter” argument, which I was ready for, just like I said in the op.

skarekrow13 wrote:...First off, I reiterate, I have seen zero....and I mean zero.....objective proof of x=best. Now, I do want to say that there's lots of evidence that some things are more advantaged than others...

But thats the thing, we have, we all have. Its because I never said one weapon is the best weapon in the game, only that spears are a dominate class because there is not 1 spear "to rule them all".

As a matter of fact, no one has even realized that the MLBH is actually a t2 weapon.

skarekrow13 wrote:...I can't stress this enough: NO ONE and I mean NO ONE should attempt to sway opinions here on what they think is the best...

True, and the exact same can be said for saying, "With enough skill, any weapon becomes balanced".

Its very misleading to newer players. The op to a newer player makes a lot of sense. As well as some countermeasures FinPeku brought up.

However, it gives the impression that a player can compete with the likes of the best players in the world with Astora's Straight Sword....an obviously misleading sentiment.

FinPeku wrote:...Animal, i already know what you're going to say and i know it will be well thought and well written... but you're wrong!...

Lol, I like that. Very good timing...you must be a drummer?

FinPeku wrote:...If you say spears are stand alone tier 1, and the majority of people disagree, then this IS a "spears are OP" conversation...

I can see that. But some of the conotation is derived from people simply not reading the op and inserting their "Oh god another spear thread" comment. Something I was obviously trying to avoid by the op.

Also, for every counter, a spear also has one, no matter how boring it is<--not passing judgement, and again, can also kick.

TheMeInTeam wrote:...The part about some of the spears being better than others is definitely NOT wrong...

Fair enough. But I only said that because the comment is also made that spears do not stand alone in tier 1.

TheMeInTeam wrote:...By far the best way to create a tier list would be to use objective data, not have 5, 10, or even 20+ different people give their anecdotal experiences and then assert that X weapon is tier 1, 2, or 3 based on their own skill set...

Again, thats been done. Its not done through mugen and finding the 2 best DkS players and restraining them in a padded room for 3 weeks 5 days and 2 hours allowing us to compute the results.

Again, Rynn has highlighted most of the empirical principles required to determine the tier 1 category.

As a matter of fact, spears are almost in jeopardy of not having the tier 1 class to itself. However because there are more than 2 spears considered to be a dominate weapon, spears can claim the title as tier 1.

TheMeInTeam wrote:...Especially because something like "if 2 robots played" isn't even a valid measure...

Please read into it. Besides, the relation of robots being effective in determining efficiency is used in almost every facet of industry today that its pathetic imo<---another discussion for another time perhaps.

Saturday-Saint wrote:Holy ****.

Pefect ending. But also the person I wanted to ellude to.

Saturday said something in a post about "buildcrafting" or "Japanese got it right"...I cant remember which one.

It was along the lines of, "Skill will inherently create equilibrium and balance."

While I may be taking his comment out of context, and probably horribly misquoted him, I do it for the benefit of the argument, which really shouldn't have happened in the first place.

Is there a weapon class that is more dominate than the others? Yes. Are there weapons that can be compiled together in order to create a more competitive tier 2 weapon class?...yes.

What are those weapons?

???:

DemonOfFate wrote:

KrazykevS10 wrote:Why is everyone whining about spears again? They are NOT overpowered. Go ahead and attack someone with your spear,if they have a brain,they will dodge or parry all attacks.If not,congrats.You just beat an idiot.
There is a counter for every weapon,either learn it or accept that you suck against it.I thought the entire point of this game was for every weapon and tactic to be very viable.It kinda goes against that idea to say one group of weapons is simply better than another.
Pretty sure a guy with a whip could beat the world's best spearman,that is the beauty of the game.

When did someone say spears were unbeatable? And parrying a spear? You can't parry the tip of a spear, and if you get close enough to parry, your opponent made a big mistake. And trying to apply that all weapons are "Equal" in dark souls is bull, we all know that, the spear has a clear advantage all around. Every weapon is viable to an extent, hell you could go fight someone with a broken straight sword and win, that doesn't mean its a balanced weapon.

Animaaal wrote:...The vet players have almost been completely replaced, but their replacements are in the early stages of the “skill trumps everything” discussion...

See what I'm sayin man???

Also, thanks for the support and understanding from those of you who agree with me. I kid I kid.

PS-@DemonOfFate, parry the tip?<--pro statement.

FinPeku wrote:Animal, i already know what you're going to say and i know it will be well thought and well written... but you're wrong! Why? Because i say so and refuse to change my point of view no matter what others say. Remember, this is not rhetoric as my opinion is a fact and has been proven in game already. Or at least the game has proven it to ME, and everyone else simply has to agree. I know you will inevitably offer proof why I could be wrong, but I will not consider it an accurate argument. Just agree with me already so we can discuss about this thing I feel is very important!

Well, I'm joking obviously and perhaps being a bit rude. But that is how this has been going so far. How can people offer anything to this conversation, when you absolutely cannot change your point of view no matter what people say? You are asking for opinions because you would like to decide something as a community, yet you refuse to listen to the community.

If you say spears are stand alone tier 1, and the majority of people disagree, then this IS a "spears are OP" conversation.

And this is precisely why this thread is not constructive from a community standpoint. Several people were singled out as having read the op and responded with a well thought out opinion. Apparently I was too obtuse, so pardon me while I lock this pointless discourse out of my own mental density.

To clarify why I locked this thread: it was not Fin's post that cause it. I quoted Fin to elucidate why this was an example of a divisive and poorly crafted thread. Fin's post was a concise breakdown on why the thread would not lead to anything constructive, and since it reflected my exact feelings on the matter, I quoted it to save having to restate what he had said.