DARK SOULS III HYPE: 10 COMMUNITY SUPPORT

PRAISE THE HYPE.

I'd like to break K-FAB, and start addressing you as myself, the writer, as opposed to holding to an essay-like narrative. It's been a brief, and spammy mess to assemble this collection of hype train fuel before April actually hits. I'm glad you, and my other followers sat through each of my posts, supported me, and took the time to read what I had to say. Its shining sun-rays like you that join the Sunlight Warriors and help others down the path of glorious success. I wanted to dedicate this final article as a goodbye to each of you, as we link the flame of this adventure together. Perhaps the cycle will repeat, and we'll see each other again. Perhaps we'll do things differently next time. Perhaps it won't be so rushed, and we can enjoy the ride together instead of stumbling through it. The ride for HYPE SOULS may be over, but that wont keep us from starting again.

Thank you for being a regular reader of HYPE SOULS. If you'd like further articles on Dark Souls III, make sure to tweet @SoulsHype on your request for reviews of any Dark Souls III content you may be interested if you're waiting for first hand recommendations of the english release on April 11th. Goodbye, and PRAISE THE SUN!

DARK SOULS III HYPE: 9 PVP ARENAS

One well executed element of Dark Souls II, at the height of its prime, were the arenas; which is surprising, considering how much of a flop the one arena we had in the original Dark Souls was. It definitely made certain  covenants like the Blue Sentinels a lot more three dimensional, especially considering that entrance to the PvP arena came from assisting other players with PvE content. The arena was supposedly a place where a Knight of the Blue would go to hone their skills against other players in order to better protecting their host. It added an interesting element of depth to dedicating yourself to being a friendly phantom. It was a covenant that wasn't just simply about raid & pillage like the Brotherhood of Blood, and also wasn't completely limited to two relatively tiny areas like the Rat Covenant or the Bell Keepers. The way of the blue was simply a more rewarding experience than the other covenants, because there was simply more to do, in addition to having the exact same pvp experience as the Brotherhood of Blood. We really need more covenants with a design like this to come into making a quality experience for Dark Souls.

Keep in touch, because very soon, you'll bear witness to the final instalment of HYPE SOULS; so keep posted and make sure to follow @SoulsHype on Twitter for updates on more advice to consider bringing to Dark Souls III.

DARK SOULS III HYPE: 8 INVASIONS

 Invaded by dark spirit XxSweGBlzRYOLO420xX. 

One thing that I'm glad is never going away about Dark Souls is the random invasions. Having the risk of someone show up in your world just to ruin your day is half the danger of any souls play through. Without an element of surprise, without a human element, the game becomes boring after a while. The single player enemies become predictable, and everything that once shocked you becomes ingrained in your memory. Invasions need to happen, and getting bullied by people that are better than you is just part of your welcome to the souls community.

You can find a brief review of the beauty of inviting the human element into your world by making the choice to become human, below. But ultimately, the invasions of Dark Souls III should be the focus. It is unclear if you you can be invaded while you are hollow, but one video of a Dark Souls III random invasion on the Japanese client looked like an episode of WWE. The host had a pair of summons squaring off against a red phantom, and an invader that looked like some off shade of purple. The fight was fast paced, and chaotic, with a lot of similar animations to the original Dark Souls while textured like a copy of Bloodborne. It's exciting to be returning to a renovated version of a familiar ballpark, so hopefully some nostalgic content emerges from the community.

Keep in touch, because very soon, you'll be getting a post about Duels & Arenas; so keep posted and make sure to follow @SoulsHype on Twitter for updates on more advice to consider bringing to Dark Souls III.

DARK SOULS III HYPE: 7 SPELLS

Spells, as Remembered by Mr. Man Pants.

It's not going to be a Medieval RPG game without both Swords AND Sorcery, so spells are pretty much here to stay. Hopefully we don't have the same initial issues with a few problem spells as we did during the early launch of Dark Souls II. Although there's been plenty of issues surrounding spells, they absolutely were a fad that died with age. Melee weapons are simply more useful, and harder to counter than anything else in the game.

Spells are absolutely making a return in Dark Souls III, and not unlike the way we remembered them from Dark Souls II, Sorceries, Miracles and Pyromancies alike. The only exception is that hexes are no longer a category of spell, but a sub-class of miracles. There's definitely going to be some new spells, but people are far from having found all of them. None will be listed here. The only thing we can hope for is that none of them do absurd damage, because god help us if there's any more insta-poison or one-shot spell gimmicks.

Keep in touch, because very soon, you'll be getting a post about Invasions & Invaders; so keep posted and make sure to follow @SoulsHype on Twitter for updates on more advice to consider bringing to Dark Souls III.

DARK SOULS III HYPE: 6 POISE vs. HYPER ARMOR

DARK SOULS 1 POISE

So if you've forgotten in the several times that it's been mentioned in earlier articles on this blog, poise as a stat that's given to certain pieces of armour, based on on its weight that allows the player to avoid being stunned when at a standstill. Hyper-Armor is a special mechanic granted to slow, and heavy weapons that multiplies the player's poise so their attacks can follow through uninterrupted. 

Two years ago, Gamefaqs conducted a poll on player preference between hyper armour and poise. Astoundingly, two players preferred the concept of hyper-armor alone; as opposed to those that preferred a stun system that featured poise exclusively, or a mix of poise and hyper armour. Although, regardless of popular opinion, it's unlikely that FromSoftware is going to actually listen to the fans on this one. Because of the way poise worked in Dark Souls was way too accessible, and Poise in Dark Souls II was so complex that the wiki's even admit to not having a complete understanding of how it works.

Although, FromSoft has been extremely flip-floppy about how they want stun locks and stun resistence to work across previous games, so hopefully for Dark Souls III, we see something a little more reliable than Dark Souls I poise, and a little more straight forward than Dark Souls II poise. Although its an important mechanic, it's been changed a lot, so there's going to very little you can do to prepare yourself for this mechanic, save for being pleasantly surprised upon release.

Keep in touch, because very soon, you'll be getting a post about SPELLS; so keep posted and make sure to follow @SoulsHype on Twitter for updates on more advice to consider bringing to Dark Souls III.

DARK SOULS III HYPE: 5 LIGHT vs. HEAVY ARMOR

LIGHT ARMOR & HEAVY ARMOR

What are they, and which should you be using?

Well, as you can see in the images above, as randomly generated on the Fashion Souls App, the 'weight' of armor isn't exactly as clear cut or black & white as "Light & Heavy." Some armor is heavier than others, but is still inter-changable with each of the four slots, 'Head, Body, Arms & Legs.' Lighter armor pieces normally consist of models resembling robes or leathers, while heavier armor peices often has models that look like big suits of metal that helps resist being stunned with a stat called 'poise.' Ultimately, you can exchange them to look as stylish, practical, or even as ridiculous as you want. Most of the armor pieces in the Souls Series have extremely imaginative design features to them, be it shape, colour or texture, dark souls armor is by far my favorite out of any fantasy setting. I can't really think of any kind of RPG that lets you wear an armor made entirely out of skeletons.

The most important part though, is only wearing as much equipment as you are comfortable with. 

As mentioned on the Wikidot Dark Souls Wiki has an article on rolling which covers the subject in great detail, "The higher your percentage, the slower your stamina bar will recover stamina. The change appears to be linear. The higher your percentage, the shorter your roll distance." Effectively, your ability to dodge roll is dictated as such. Although, it also mentions that your weight only affect distance you travel when you roll. It has no affect on iFrames or roll duration, but can definitely be useful to know that you can tailor exactly how far you want to roll. You could go super far with a 10% burden, or deadly close at 70% to close in for those roll-backstabs. Regardless, your entire roll takes about 25 frames to complete unless you go over the 70% margin, so pick your equipment load carefully, using tools such as the Dark Souls II Character Builder.

Equip Load	Rolling Distance (Out of Maximum Possible Distance)
0%	100%
10%	95%
30%	90%
50%	80%
70%	65%
100%	65%
120%	60%

Keep in touch, because very soon, you'll be getting a post about POISE AND HYPER-ARMOR; so keep posted and make sure to follow @SoulsHype on Twitter for updates on more advice to consider bringing to Dark Souls III.

DARK SOULS III HYPE: 4 STRENGTH WEAPONS

THREE STRENGTH BUILD STEREOTYPES

THAT WILL INEVITABLY CARRY OVER TO

DARK SOULS III & HOW TO BEAT THEM

Regardless of whether you plan to use spells or not, there's always a need for a backup weapon. Nothing is as quick, or resourceful as a solid melee weapon. Most melee builds find themselves relying on strength weapons without infusions. However, support-spell casters may find themselves relying on weapons that are infused with their relevant element, and/or buffing it for extra damage. Eventually, you're going to pick up one of these weapons; and most likely like everyone else, try to use it 'to its fullest potential.' However, that doesn't mean you should pick up a weapon and try to excel at it because its what you want. Play around with everything, and find what play-style is right for you. Although, keep in mind not to fall entirely dependent on that play-style, Or someone will recognize the patterns in your behavior, and do everything in their power to exploit your weaknesses, and annoy you into rage-quitting.

THE CAVE-MAN

"Ugh, SMASH!"

I feel that the title 'The Cave-man' best suits the kind of person I'm talking about. They're usually someone who's completely new to the game, and carrying the largest weapon they could find, because it hits the hardest, and wearing the clothing (pelts) of anything they've killed, because it beats the heck out of being naked. You can usually tell this player apart from others, as they are used to armor with ~30-50 physical defence, and are now wearing something like un-upgraded Drangleic Armor set, or the un-upgraded Vengarl Set. Both of these sets look great on paper to someone who doesn't understand that 200 physical defense is also basically nothing. Seasoned players have come to conclude that these sets on their own are mediocre at best when fully upgraded, and that wearing un-upgraded armor is essentially carrying useless dead-weight. The Cave-man has a lot of opportunities to shock and surprise you, as they tend to act like a cornered wolf when invaded by strangers. Their attacks are inspired by gut feelings and heavily influenced by emotions. The easiest way to counter a startled Cave-man is to remain relaxed, and not to expect any informed or brave decisions from them.

THE GUY THAT READ THREE VOLUMES OF BERSERK THAT ONE TIME (A.K.A. 'GUTS GUY')

"You have the strongest armor, because you are the weakest."

9/10 times, if you find a set of armor that looks really cool in a Souls game, it means that the defenses are terrible, Guts Guy is aware of this fact, and simply doesn't care. He wears whatever he wants because he wants to look like the main character of FromSoftware's favorite anime while he fights. These sorts of people are called 'Fashion Souls' players. Every 'Guts Guy' is a 'Fashion Souls Player' but not All 'Fashion Souls Players' are 'Guts Guy.' Guts guy is most likely aware of the fact that his build is not intended to be 'good' on its own, so he'll be relying heavily on knowing the move set of whatever Popsicle sword he chose for his cosplay better than he knows his own phone number. Breaking 'Guts Guy's' spirit is impossible; however, killing 'Guts Guy' is not. 'Guts guy' does not often have any Poise (Stun Resistance), so his hyper-armor (aka Strength Weapon's Stun Resistance Multiplier) is extremely weak. Quickly closing the gap between his swings and abusing the fact that his attacks can be interrupted or prevented by getting the first hit can easily disarm most of the threat that comes from his damage and reach. At least he will die fabulous.

"YOU BETTER RUN,

IF YOU SMELL! WHAT THE ROCK IS COOKIN'?"

The joke has been made a thousand times, that the famous Dark Souls NPC Havel the Rock is secretly Dwayne 'The Rock' Johnson in disguise, however you don't simply get the name 'The Rock,' by being a softie or a pushover. Havel's Armor set is considered 'The Best' by many, simply because it has the most physical resist and poise of any other set. His great-shield has insanely potent damage negation, and his giant Dragon Tooth Club is a force to be reckoned with. Most people willing to carry a heavy burden are expecting the best protection they can afford, and thus most often resort to Havel's Armor. Although some people are intentionally setting out to play as if they WERE Havel the Rock, many are simply wearing his armor as a practical way of protecting their hides. Although Havel's armor is difficult to crack with conventional weapons, elemental damage melts through this armor like butter. Some people will cover this weakness by pairing it with the spell 'Great Magic Barrier,' but the duration of this spell will last at most ~2 minutes. Defeating Havel is an annoying matter indeed, as he is difficult to stagger while he is swinging, and can protect himself easily with his shield. If he hides behind his shield constantly; lock on, corner him and guard break him by pressing forward on the left stick and R1 at the same time. Be sure to hold both in place so the game is more likely to register the command as a guard break. This should allow for a free riposte attack, which will compliment the many opportunities for back-stabs you will have between his slow and heavy swings. If you happen to meet a Havel's armor player with a fast weapon, your best solution is prayer.

Keep in touch, because very soon, you'll be getting a post about CHOOSING YOUR OWN ARMOR; so keep posted and make sure to follow @SoulsHype on Twitter for updates on more advice to consider bringing to Dark Souls III.

DARK SOULS III HYPE: 3 DEX WEAPONS

THREE DEXTERITY BUILD STEREOTYPES
THAT WILL INEVITABLY CARRY OVER TO
DARK SOULS III & HOW TO BEAT THEM

Regardless of whether you plan to use spells or not, there's always a need for a backup weapon. Nothing is as quick, or resourceful as a solid melee weapon. Most ranged builds find themselves relying on dexterity weapons that are infused with their relevant element, and/or buffing it for extra damage. Eventually, you're going to pick up one of these weapons; and most likely like everyone else, try to use it 'to its fullest potential.' However, that doesn't mean you should pick up a weapon and try to excel at it because its what you want. Play around with everything, and find what play-style is right for you. Although, keep in mind not to fall entirely dependent on that play-style, Or someone will recognize the patterns in your behavior, and do everything in their power to exploit your weaknesses, and annoy you into rage-quitting.

THE PARRY KING
"R3, L2, I'm better than you!"

Although it's a little unfair to lump all parry spammers in with dexterity weapon users, more people than not prefer weapons with high critical modifiers, such as Daggers, Piercing Swords, Spears, Halbards & Lances to pair with their small parrying shields, such as the Manikin Shield, Buckler and Target Shield. Keep in mind that these players may also keep extremely slow and high damage weapons hidden away in their inventory, just for the occasion they succeed a parry. They'll pretty much rely on you to make the first move, or otherwise trick you into believing they've 'accidentally' left an opening for you to attack them. If someone has proven to be effective at parrying, be very careful when you chose to attack and try your best to be both threatening and unpredictable.

THE EDGE-LORD, MASTER OF TRADES
"Glorious Eastern Counter Damage, Multiplied over 1000 Times!"

On top of getting made fun of for being a weeaboo, Katana users are universally chastised for having a quick weapon with medium reach that's difficult to punish, despite doing considerable counter damage. The majority of bad publicity for this weapon comes from its misuse. People with wanton disregard for their own safety will sometimes pick up a Katana for the sole purpose of attempting to interrupt your strikes, or trading blows with you for bonus damage equal to some strength weapons. It may be interesting to experiment with this exotic samurai blade; but you should keep in mind that in this game, it's far more common than you'd expect. Despite the eons of martial arts and discipline that went into refining the expertise of the Katana, characters in Dark Souls swing it around like a glorified kitchen knife. Players with this mentality tend to be extremely aggressive. Staying out of reach of this weapon until your enemy is recovering from lashing out is a quick and easy way to shut them down.

EL ZORRO, GOD OF COUNTERS
"Lesson No. 1, never R1 in anger."

The average Thrusting Sword player is really difficult to counter, save for blocking, dodging or out-reaching them. They're exceptionally difficult to parry, unless they're playing with predictable aggression. This is rarely the case, as more often than not are simply waiting for you to be completely safe to counter-attack and retreat from. You need to play some serious mind games with this player, because their strategy is mostly reactive in nature. You need to create false openings from which you know you can recover faster than they can attack you in order to either evade and punish, or trade damage with. Be very careful when making the decision to trade damage. Depending on the build they are running, it may be very easy for a rapier player to come out on top when trading, especially if they are in their power-stance with two rapiers, the Ring of Blades +2, Flynn's Ring, and the Old Leo Ring.

Keep in touch, because very soon, you'll be getting a post about STRENGTH WEAPONS; so keep posted and make sure to follow @SoulsHype on Twitter for updates on more advice to consider bringing to Dark Souls III.

DARK SOULS III HYPE: 2 STATS & SCALING

GET SOUL, GET SWOLE

As long as there's souls in dark souls, there's going to be levels; and as long as there's levels, there's going to be scaling. Physical damage is going going to come from some mix of strength & speed and spell damage will come from some mix of smarts or faith. In some way, each souls character is bound to become someone's soul-gorged murder monster with a face that even a blind mother couldn't love.

"END. ME."

However; as per human nature, after the experimental phase, trends from previous games will start to form. People will discover the inherent advantages of certain tools of the game, and wring every last drop of life from it until it causes homeland security to elevate to code blue. There's been enough resonant weapon chaos blades and Havel-mages to make people drop the concept of PvP in Dark Souls a whole. That in itself is a true shame, because the souls series is not supposed to be a single player experience. It's a tad extreme to say that it isn't supposed to be a 'pleasant' experience, but it's not supposed to be a peachy-keen skip through a meadow of daisies. It's a dark and depressing cutthroat setting where people are willing to prey on the weak to further their own agenda, and it's an uphill battle to make friends. There will be an entire article about why Souls PvP is the way it is; but for now, the point is that Dark Souls isn't supposed to have an easy mode.

If you've played a souls game, you've likely familiarized yourself with each of these weapons seperately, because they are universally amazing in most situations. They have essentially become the 'Easy Mode' of the Souls series, because people are used to them being able to solve pretty much any problem that they face. Everything in dark souls can be either counter-hit, critical'd, sweeping swung, or crushed to death; and in every one of those situations, there's a sword for that. Of course, each of these weapons have their flaws when pitted against each other, but almost every single one of them has made a cameo in some previous edition of the souls series. Those that are good at timing will always prefer Dexterity weapons, and those that prefer rewarding trades will prefer Strength Weapons. Although scaling, the measure of damage per stat point, is definitely the biggest issue; infusions have totally complicated the concept of 'balanced damage,' and it shows. You can find more in-depths details about infusions here, but below will be a brief summary of the situation.

Essentially, you can expect there to still be some sort of ‘Ore’ system in place. Without looking in to any specifics, chances are FromSoft will be sticking with the name ‘Titanite.’ However, the point remains that you’ll most likely be spending a fair amount of time or souls on gathering some black rocks to make your beat-stick sharper and your silly hat more protective. How many ores you may discover along the way may vary based on how many enemies you kill, or how much exploring you are willing to do. Regardless, two pieces of advice remains consistent about the Souls-series early game.

DAMAGE > DEFENCE

and,

SPEED > ARMOR

Unless enormous changes are going to be made to how armor works, you can’t clear an area without the enemies in the area dying. Having a half decent weapon makes this task significantly easier than relying on environmental hazards, or slowly pin-pricking your foes to death. Although the concept of ‘Death by One-Thousand Cuts’ may be badass, it is no way to conduct battle. You may be able to survive for one thousand swings, but that means you need to wait for one thousand openings, drop your guard one thousand times, expose yourself to one thousand possible counter attacks and one thousand chances that you over-step your swing and throw yourself off a cliff.

Ultimately, if FromSoft hasn’t decided to scrap Dark Souls II’s infusion system as a whole, you’re most likely going to take a look at a chart like this, and decide which agent of doom is most suited to you and your character. Faith characters scales best with Lightning, Intelligence scales best with Magic/Enchanted. Dark & Fire are useful for a mix of both Intelligence and Faith, and because of the spells associated with them, were extremely popular for a while. On some weapons, Raw is best when meeting the bare minimum requirements of the weapon, as it adds a set amount of bonus damage that isn't dependant on stats. Mundane, when playing at higher levels can make some weapons that are normally terrible, viable by adding scaling that is based on your lowest stat. Lastly, poison and bleed are also a pair of decent weapon mechanics which after a certain amount of build up on the enemy, will trigger bonus damage; however, both have been proven largely ineffective if not literally useless in most practical situations. 

You should most likely expect a system very similar to this in Dark Souls III, as infusions of some sort have been around in almost every game. If you plan on being a magic user of any kind, look for stones that may resemble whatever kind of caster you are, and be ready to give it to a smith to maximize your weapon's potential. Just be wary that certain kinds of enemies will be more resistant to your damage type than others, and in many case you problems that other characters may not face.

Keep in touch, because coming up are even more details about scaling specifically for weapons so keep posted and make sure to follow @SoulsHype to stay updated on future posts.

DARK SOULS III HYPE: 1 PREVIOUS GAMEPLAY MECHANICS

SPOILER WARNING: IF YOU CONSIDER VAGUE ALLUSIONS

TO SIMILAR GAME PLAY ELEMENTS TO BE SPOILERS

THEN YOU'RE IN THE WRONG PLACE.

As you're probably aware, having found this blog to begin with; Dark Souls III is coming out, and you're most likely excited about it, loaded with questions; and why shouldn't you be? It's been announced by Hidetaki Miyazaki to be the last of its kind. However, Miyazaki has been known to have said similar things about Dark Souls II. Shockingly, after FromSoftware Inc. made boatloads of dollars off a game with a Metacritic score of 91%, they mysteriously changed their mind about a sequel. Who could have possibly guessed? Regardless, unless you can read Japanese, you're going to have to wait the two weeks for the English release of the infamously difficult JRPG/WRPG hybrid's third installment.

However, perhaps you don't have the patience to simply wait, and you want to figure out what you can do to prepare for your the waves of impending failure and death that you, and many other players are going to face on April 11th. Well, there is one, or even several ways.

Demon's Souls & Bloodborne, both Bandai Namco Entertainment Products. I would recommend playing the first over the second to prepare for Dark Souls III, as Bloodborne has many core mechanics exclusive to its title.

If you happen to own a PlayStation 4, and are looking for the PS4 release of Dark Souls III, consider yourself in luck, Dark Souls III will be borrowing most heavily from mechanics of the previous PlayStation exclusives, Demon's Souls and Bloodborne. Without spoiling which mechanics, are implemented, reading any community wiki articles on the core game play mechanics of Demon's Souls will give you a good rundown of how Dark Souls III may differ from its predecessors, so you aren't left high and dry, wondering how to actually play the game.

If you're currently browsing your computer, quickly finding yourself remembering that you happen to own neither of these consoles, you still happen to be in luck. You'll still be able to buy Dark Souls III on PC, as shown below. However, it's important to note, that by buying a copy of Dark Souls II or Dark Souls II: Scholar of the First Sin, will actually net you an 8% discount on Dark Souls III. This could be your chance to get into, or return to the souls series on PC; where unpopular opinion holds is the platform where both the Souls-Wiki and the YouTube community are strongest. If this is where you want to get started in your Souls Experience, there's a few repeating themes that I'll be touching on in later posts, this week. So keep posted, and make sure to follow @SoulsHype on Twitter for future updates.

Dark Souls III: Discount on Steam for Dark Souls II owners!