God damn is the Uchigatana fast. It's so freaking fast with no break between attacks (Dark Souls 2 has a delay after every 2 swings) and you can dodge roll immediately after swinging (Dark Souls 2 has some swing animation that needs to finish before moving). Movement is super snappy and fast. You can control the direction of your swing after a rolling (Dark Souls 2 has some momentum so you can't turn on a dime like Dark Souls 1) with no delay.

I tried some PVP and I suddenly remembered it. Yes, the lagstab is still there. One of the things that Dark Souls 2 does right is that lagstabs are a lot more rare. You can attack without worrying that the other guy is going to poise right through the first swing and pivot BS your ass. It also has "Well, what is it?" so it was nice to do that again after I killed a giant dad.

Has anyone else gone back to Dark Souls 1 to compare the PVP, weapon animations, dodging, etc.?

I don't think dead angling is a thing because it was replaced by phantom range and bad hit detection. You need to dodge every swing now because you can't be sure if it will register as a hit even when out of range.

Eh I prefer Dark Souls 2, the hit detection is whack, but the lag seems a little less painful and in my 150+ pvp encounters so far I have only been lagstabbed like 3-4 times. Helluva step up if you ask me.

Bootstrap solution: dual-wield (not powerstanced)

You can chain up some ridiculous combos on most people that way. Plus katanas are dumb; we all know that.

edit: and to answer your question, yes, I went back for a bit. As stupid as it sounds, I just can't get over the 4-way dodge. Never realized it was even in there, but, now that we have analog dodging in DS2, I'm spoiled.

qft

I generally enjoy the pvp, but if it is to have staying power they need to fix more, faster.

In Dark1 I never had a feeling it was going anywhere. This one might.

p.s. just this morning I perform my new favorite ritual and empty my flask. Opponent does the same. When things start going bad for him he pops an old radiant one. WTF. This is what bugs me more about the pvp in this game than any mechanics. What do those people get out of these fights?

@haniball: Ranks

Only time I went to play some Dark Souls recently I couldn't find anyone.

@haniball: One of my favourite moves in Dark Souls 1 was to chug all my estus when I got invaded and do the "Well what is it" gesture. I almost always got my ass kicked after or even while chugging but it made me feel like a man damnit! I think now that more people are doing that I have to start taking my shirt (err chest armour) off before fights.

Really, there is surely easier ways to get rank 3 than blue or red bro'ing it.

Lol, I enjoy the little throw away the bottle animation too! This morning I got ohk'd two times by hex users while bowing or chugging. One sent a sorry message after. But it's OK, I'm in there for having good battles, not winning. And fighting magic users was never my idea of fun anyways. Yea for profound still :)

@haniball: I don't know any other way than beating other guys. Being cheap in this regard is a way to achieve rank 3 faster and I think it is part of the reason cheapness is used so much. That's part of the reason I think the way Blue and Red bro ranking system is awefull : It's so difficult, losing is so punishing that those who want to rank up won't do it the nice way.

@myrmicus: Agreed. I would rather PVP in the gank-centric Belfries than tangle with hex spamming Blue Sentinals. The Bellbros seem a lot more confident with their power in numbers and auto-invasions, and must not feel the need to launch a million spells for you to roll through.

I've come to realize this is really my only issue in DkS2: the means for ranking up in the Red and Blue PVP covies more or less pigeonholes ambitious players into this spam to win play style. I never had as big a problem with running into a few of these guys here and there in the previous games but like 90% of Blues that I'm fighting in NG+ play this way.

It's my own fault I guess, I made a PVP character with the idea of gathering as much sin as possible (ie killing all the npcs) before travelling to NG+ an wearing the String that Titchy Grenade sells so I could practice PVP without having to invade. I'm getting invaded a dozen times per area and seeing the most barbaric PVPing I've ever encountered in a souls game. *sigh* Kids these days... I seriously should have just stuck to the Belfries if I wanted to host invasions easily lol.

What I meant is that you can get rank 3 (for the trophy) in Dragon or Sun bros comparatively easily and the spells you get are easily acquired in ng++ so I really dont see why I would ruin the game for myself and others for the rank? I guess I'm old fashioned.

Hmm, maybe I'll give the bell bros another try. I only stayed there long enough to get the spell, and it seemed that most battles were 2:1's. Which makes me think of the time that I spawned behind the fence in sol and the "host" greatbowed me from the other side. Good for him! But I am pretty sure in PVE you cannot shoot through there?

@haniball: Yeah I guess it could go both ways with those guys. You could get invaded buy multiple Bellbros or if you're invading you can spawn into a bunch of gankers. I think it's best to just hang out in the belfries and get invaded. A lot of the time you'll be dealing with 1v1, and even when another guy invades they likely aren't coordinated enough to pull off a solid gank.

I ran into another healer this morning. I know the DS2 etiquette seems to be punish the heal or shut up. But I can just feel the tension leave me and I basically just let them kill me. It's no fun.

So, to make up for it I found a nice distraction. Wait at the beginning of Heide tower. it will not be long for an invader to show up. Wait in the nook of the stairs up to where he mace knight was. And wotg them when they come down. Boom, Invader banished!

Is that how you play it? Am I getting it now?

@haniball: Fair enough. I think we're at a point where "etiquette" doesn't mean much when invasions occur. If you want fair PVP you have to do it in the arenas, or if at all possible with an organized fight club. It sucks, because Heide's is probably my favourite place to fight. Luckily Befry Sol is another favourite and I run into a lot less dinks up there.

I actually went back to invasions because the arenas are so rock paper scissors. i.e. who casts profound still first. Hardly anyone bows. I get one shot when I do. It's all good but very little fun in it.

I was watching lukaslegion2 twitch channel yesterday. He hosts fight clubs on Sundays. And he had the hardest time getting it organized because of all the trolls summoning his participants, blues invading and just overall folks not taking it seriously. Ultimately one of his two finalists switched to a ladle. He rage quit at that point. This was on PS3. I stopped watching then so no idea if xbox and pc went better. But it reflects on my experience. I still have hope. But they better fix it real soon. Today the avelyn and the Syan should get a nerf, right?

@haniball: Yeah, mega nerf day today! Pursuers Greatsword, Santiers, weapon buffs, GRS and WoG all get nerfed too. There might be more but that's off the top of my head.

I didn't realise people have been having trouble hosting fight clubs, and I've been away from the arenas for a while too. Maybe I'll try back after the patch.

Huh? I thought Santiers was already nerfed? And wasn't wotg toned down. I honestly dont think its much of a problem, the range is so limited... But the Syan needs a nerf. Hate that thing. Must be what it felt like to folks I invaded with my halberd in Demons :)

@haniball: Yeah I know WoG got nerfed before, Santiers probably as well but they're both on the patch notes. Syan is definitely a step in the right direction, and apparently Pursuers Greatsword unlimited stun lock is what is being addressed there so that's another big fix. Tests have already been done showing the length of weapon buffs effect now scales with your stats. I think you need like 50 faith to get a whole minute of SLB.

Ya, checked the notes and wow, this one is a big step in the right direction. I think I am already winning more.

p.s. why t.f. did they adjust cales armor. Is that thing good for anything?

@haniball: I had never even looked at it closely but a user on another forum said that the boots had high stats and the chest was very low, as if the values for the two had been switched by accident. I guess a lot of people were rocking the shoes because they were pretty strong and light. Lol I never even noticed.

@dudeglove: Encountered a turtle guy : Heavy armor, including ironclad chest to prevent backstab, Havel's Greatshield two handed (and I suspect magic infused) using this strategy. Killed me each time I fought him. He was pretty good, always moving to prevent me from knocking him back or flanking him... I kept my cool, but doing ridiculously low damages to him, even when I can land one hit that isn't blocked tend to make a fight hellish...

I didn't make it easy for him though, resisted well.

Anyway, this strategy seems solid. The splash area from shield jump attack seems to be pretty wide, although, it can be because of lag.