Alright, just got the Lord Vessel after fighting the double boss and I am totally burned out. I noticed that I had picked up a dragon tooth and I spent an hour farming my strength so I can wield it and it turned out to be a stupid move. Its too slow. I have no idea what weapon to wield nor where to go. When I first started it was a blast to watch my character slowly etch up and become powerful, now its just overwhelming and too damn complex. I don't understand the weapon leveling system nor how to use my great souls to create unique weapons.

I am level 73 and have no idea where to go and am seriously considering dropping this game. Any help?

Look up how weapon crafting works. It's a bit complicated but you'll get a lot out of it (I don't understand all of it yet either). You can make your ordinary weapons into really powerful stuff so you don't have to use the slowest and biggest swords etc. in order to make a lot of damage.

I'm at the same part as you, but its having the reverse effect on me. Before I powered through sen's fortress and the next are (anor lordon? lol) I was stuck and having a terrible time trying to figure out how to skill the catacomb skeletons and how to curse a weapon rather than buy the curses so I could kill the ghosts. My weapons sucked and I was getting really pissed but then I just bought a bunch of arrow to kill the annoying casters in sen's fortress and powered through. Now I have some awesome weapons, I returned the fire keeper's soul too, so now I'm pumped to keep playing.

The problem I have is a sense of achievement. I have done more in this game and sank more time into it than any other singleplayer game in a long time, yet I still feel completely bewildered and out of element. I just spent some time researching the weapons and I just created my first unique sword that is enchanted. The problem is that I have to farm 25+ levels for me to be able to use it. Im level 73 so this is completely out of the question. I feel defeated. I cannot go through the archives because I am not strong enough, I have no idea what to do in the catacombs, and I have no idea where I am supposed to go. I have put a great deal of energy and time into it, but I have yet to feel a reward.

@CJduke: I know about the divine weapon and the skeletons but how do you "curse" a weapon so it can hit ghosts?

@FUMN: catacombs = blessed weapon. Get ANY weapon (prefer a blunt weapon but not needed) to +5 then upgrade it to blessed so u can kill the skele's. Go to the Painted world in anor londo. Go farm in anor londo since there are 2 mobs that can be farmed for 10k souls in about 30 seconds time and respawn when u go to a bonfire (Homeward bone's help a TON). Look up some weapons that you can use Now, and not later that you can make. go farm stones to get those weapons (leeches in swamp drop large shards like crazy, and multiple green shards). If you quit now, then the game has beat you. You say your 30 hours in? That must mean you have yet to do the forest. I am over double your hours and have done bearly more then you and am the same SL. Just do some research online to find what you want for weapons and where you would like to venture next.

@CJduke: I know about the divine weapon and the skeletons but how do you "curse" a weapon so it can hit ghosts?

@McShank: Okay. It beat me. I don't care at this point, it's an inanimate object. It does not test my mind, it does not test my dexterity. The combat isnt specifically challenging until you realize that the camera is shit. The only thing this game challenges is how much free time you are willing to dedicate to a game has no application. I came in expecting a fun and challenging adventure, but left with a bitter taste in my mouth, it was fun while it lasted, but I am totally burnt out on this.

All you needed was a lightning + 5 weapon...none of what you'd done would've felt wasted, and you'd be powerful enough to take on any area. This game is all about staying informed and doing your research. If you quit, the game didn't beat you, you beat yourself.

And you don't need blessed weapons for skellys. Kill the pyromancers, they don't respawn, and skellys stop getting up.

@Tennmuerti said:

@PepitoneConQueso said:

@CJduke: I know about the divine weapon and the skeletons but how do you "curse" a weapon so it can hit ghosts?

You need a Transietnt Curse. It's a usable item, drops in pairs. There is a couple just outside the lake. Ghosts also drop them from time to time. There is also a ghost weapon that ghosts themselves can drop.

Yep, Jagged Ghost Blade, or something. Not as good as using Transient Curse, but it gets the job done if you run out of it.

@AyKay_47: Im not falling into this whole idea that the game beat me, or that I beat myself. The only thing that beat me is that this stopped being fun and and became a gigantic waste of time.

Just take some time and look at the wikis.     They have a lot of good knowledge.     And You've beaten some of the hardest parts of the game.   Don't give up now just because your confused.   If your that burnt out take a few days break and then come back.     Its only going to turn into a waste of time if you give up.     You can make some shitty decisions in Dark Souls.     I for one used the inital fire keeper soul you get not realizing it upgrades your flask.    I was bummed about that and yesterday I completely wasted my  Soul of Sif making a shield that was too damn heavy for me. 
 
I was bummed out but its really not the end of the world.

I'm feeling the same as you. I greatly enjoyed the game until I rang the second bell then it became overwhelming. This would of been lessened if the game explained anything about it's complex and neccesary upgrade system. So much research goes into this game. I like the cryptic design but it's possible to go too far. It just bums me out because I want the challenge to come from figuring out how to defeat the enemies not lack of crafting knowledge. I'm going to give it another go as lease, I get to fast travel soon which is dearly needed at this point in the game.

@FUMN: I'm kinda just saying you're giving up way too early (yes, 30 hours is early, lol). From the way you've described your major problems so far, it just seems like you haven't fully grasped the intricacies of the game...which is kinda the actual fun part for a lot of people.

To clarify a little, you say you enjoyed watching your character get more and more powerful, but now you feel too weak to progress. From where I'm sitting, it seems you don't really understand the way "power" works in the game. I will try and help.

Most of your power comes from your weapon, and those come in two types. There are very powerful, low requirement, non-scaling weapons (I'll call these class 1 for now), and there are very powerful, high requirement, scaling weapons (class 2). The drake sword is a good example of the former, because no matter how you level up your character, it will always do the same amount of damage. This means your enemies will eventually just start shrugging it off.

What this basically means, is that early on (<100SL) you want a class 1 weapon, because then you can focus on Endurance and Vitality (the other part of your "power"). The best way to go, according to current internet trends, and my own opinion, is the Lightning upgrade. You can find a Lightning Spear in the trap chest in Sen's Fortress. In my opinion, this is the game throwing you a bone, because up until that point you can't have made a Lightning weapon yourself, and all you need to max it out is some titanite chunks, and a slab.

Now the matter of the Strength you've already leveled up. That's not going to waste. Even without damage scaling, the extra Strength will still increase your attack speed. It's not a huge help though, so focus on Endurance and Vitality til they're both around 40. Then, once you've hit NG+ and further, you can find a class 2 weapon that will do more damage than your Lightning weapon due to your high Strength, or another stat you decide to bring up.

Hopefully this'll help you push on, but maybe this is just late-night wishful thinking.

The necessary grinding is sometimes really bad. I am way earlier in the game but I had that issue - I decided to go back to the Asylum and take out the demon and black knights. The knights weren't too bad because I could chip away at them but the stray demon, while not super challenging in terms of attack patterns - he was just too tough and I was dealing too little damage. Too handing my halbard I did like 80 dmg to him and also the particular angle at which you thrust the halbard forward made me miss his huge ass like 80% of the time. When I switched to my claymore I was doing 50dmg too handed. I had him down to 50% health and he just backed up against a wall and everything in front of him was death so I died.

That kinda made me think like damn I gotta come back here later and I was feeling kinda down, but then I went to the depths and realized thats where I was supposed to be all along because I was one hitting everything and the butchers were a breeze aswell. I stumbled upon the alternate entrane to the giant rat and even with barely 30 arrows and almost zero points in dex I got him down to 1/4 life and then one pyro spell destroyed him.

All of a sudden the game felt rewarding again.

If you manage to find an area in which you're not getting completely raped by everything the game is fun. When you DO hit that wall where every path is almost impossible the game turns sour real quick.

The only advice I can give is this, pyromancy. It sounds like a lot of people are trying to actually melee everything all the time, which isn't an effective way to go about progressing at times. Pyro really just takes attunement slots, so a attunement of 14 nets you 3 spell slots which is more then enough to progress through pretty much the entire game. It doesn't scale off any stat only the pyro catalyst which can be upgraded pretty easily for a bit of farm time which is pretty reasonable if you want damage without sacrificing stats. The stray demon itself was infuriating when I fought him the first few times, then I realized there's an easy method to win and he was down in 15 seconds. Stick to his rear >_> as gross as that is... he only does his fire attack in front of him and the rest is easily dodged. Couple pyro fire orbs and he's toast, thanks for the slab big guy.

There's other ways to progress aside from stats/weapons, just gotta make use of them which many people are not doing so it's vastly more difficult for them :( (Short story, pyro is full of win if you don't have it or have not upgraded your catalyst).

@FUMN: Personally, I would take a break but not drop the game. IMO the Souls game are very good games for putting down and then coming back to at a later time when you feel in the mood. I spread out my 70-hour Demon's Souls playthrough over 15 months and didn't have any problems with that at all. You've sunk a lot of hours into the game in a week's period which will burn you out for sure. Also, I'd check out a wiki since you're stuck and frustrated. I imagine that you can figure out what you need to do in the catacombs and not worry about using that enchanted weapon for a while.