by TheMeInTeam Thu Jul 11, 2013 9:59 am
Depths is actually very easy, drop down behind butcher with ember, plunge rat, slide down, take shortcut back and open it, kill channeler, kill Gaping. All of this is trivially accomplished with any random +5 weapon, although the gaping dragon might take some time with that because of his HP. Gaping is very easy if you've killed the channeler though. It's upper blighttown that's a pain, and only then because of the toxic blow darts. The other guys are all stunlock or BS fodder. Dogs can be blocked --> kicked if you have a slow weapon.
One common thing people forget is that you don't have to have the master key to skip the depths; all you need to have done is beaten the taurus demon if you don't have it. Just run from parish (usually after gargoyles) --> darkroot basin --> valley of drakes. Getting past the two drakes there isn't hard at all, especially if you know the "block while running to roll and not jump" trick. This route also allows you to pick up the grass cress shield en route which is handy often.
Quelag is tough for beginners, but can be horrifically cheesed in a number of ways. On my last run through the start of the game, I took the basin path, stunlocked mildred with a battle axe +0, then summered her and killed Quelag with a light crossbow +5 without taking a hit (Mildred still had 3/4 health...maybe slightly less)...then ran and cheesed ceaseless --> homeward bone back to the basin. I didn't even open the new londo ruins shortcut lol, though since I have the key from the chest there I can do that any time I want.
It's also possible to kill ingward and open the valley of drakes through draining new londo, but you'll need to watch a guide or make a lot of practice runs to get past the ghosts with starting equipment + shoot him.