Reposting at the request of @mb

Just another Dark Souls II thread to collect random thoughts on how to 100% the game, or how to get the Platinum trophy; these aren't necessarily the same thing; for example you don't have to kill the super starship destroyer of dragons to get the Platinum, but who could call that not being 100% done? This time around the platinum is no joke, whereas in the previous games if you could beat it then getting the platinum was simply a matter of time investment; in this there's just straight up extremely hard/random trophies and even limited attempts for some stuff. Bosses have greatly increased resistances when you summon this time around so summoning an extra person is not always or even the majority of the time going to make the fight easier; and you have to summon pretty crappy NPCs and keep them alive the whole fight for pretty much every one of the hardest main story bosses to get a few particular trophies. NG+ is also evidently a ridiculous monstrosity of an affair, and you have to go through it twice. Try not to just copy/paste what the guide says and talk about what you're doing specifically.

In short this game could rise up to challenge the exalted trio of Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2 (Co-op), Vanquish (Execution), and Star Ocean 4 (Time Investment + Challenge) platinums; and what could be more fitting for one of the hardest games ever made.

I'll start with this: the only trophy you can get offline is all magic spells since you have to get to rank 2 in the Bellkeeper's covenant for the spell "Hidden Weapon." If you try doing this with a high SL character it probably will take a very long time, but with around an SL 80 I was able to get all 30 in about 3 hours, just staying in the vicinity of Belfry Luna. At low SL the competition is pretty meager right now so I had about an 80% success rate in combat and about 1/6th of the invasions just ended by default without me having to lift a finger. You can probably just sit outside the Belfry Luna, AFK with the ring on and successfully get this trophy. You also get an endless supply of titanite chunks, good for 6000 souls a pop.

The other thing you're recommended to do online is maxing out the sunlight covenant, I'll write a separate guide on how to do this efficiently but even doing it inefficiently shouldn't take you overly long.

Finally did the Smelter keeping Lucatiel alive (summoning random phantoms), took around 35 attempts/15 or so disconnects to prevent the boss dying/7 effigies. Smelter took around 30 or so attempts as a phantom to figure out his attack pattern; the second dodge in the 3 hit combo is about a tenth of a second window, but it is possible to avoid it. The boom is what screws people up the most; but that's actually by far the easiest thing to avoid in the fight. Overall Smelts is like 60-20, even with me knowing how to "tank" him; the same can not be said for hosts/phantoms. Basically you just straight up have to get lucky with his attack pattern that he doesn't explode on Lucatiel's face too many times; and you have to do a shitload of damage in a short time period. I did manage to get to the point where the game locked me out unless I used my bone of order to "restore connections to other worlds," sorry From if this asinine quest is completely random and unreliable without an utterly perfect setup and at least one extremely well versed player.

Random Dark Souls people are actually quite helpful if you message them, managed to get a dude to do Sinner (Lucatiel mode) with me after assisting him as a phantom and another guy was helping with Smelts early on, though neither of us were good at the fight at that point; he just did a shitload of damage.

Smelter's difficulty is such that the range of summons for him is around 50 soul levels. It's quite possible to farm around 2-3 million souls before you're out of summoning range (and you'll always get the souls because of the basic enemies).

@fredchuckdave: Smelter was by far the most difficult boss for me(I haven't finished the game yet, I'm at the final area with bonfires though). Though, Dark Lurker seems pretty tough. Though for me it was his neutral overhead smashes. The combos, jump, and explosions I found very easy to dodge.

Also, from what I've found on these quests, you can summon Lucatiel for Smelter, Sinner, The Rotten, and Flexile Sentry, but you only need to summon her for three of them to complete her quest.

And I asked this in the other thread but since you seem to have remade the thread, I'll ask again. Where are you seeing alternate sources for the spells that are deep into covenants? I'm sitting here farming Dragon Guardian for the Heirs of Sunlight now since you said that's the only one that would need to be maxed, but I'm curious where the other spells come from, even if their a couple playthroughs off.

@yi_orange: On NG++ after you clear the Royal Crypt I think (possibly just Twin Dragonriders) the chancellor will sell you several of the max covenant spells; the exceptions are Hidden Weapon (30 successful Bellkeeper invasions) and Sunlight Spear (30 successful Gold Phantom summons, easy if you're at low SL fighting Flexile Sentry, time consuming otherwise).

For Smelter his roar is his "tell," right when it transitions to the second tone is when you should roll to the right; if he goes up in the air then you just wait another quarter second or so.

Darklurker is the Algalon equivalent, not quite the hardest but you have limited attempts. Haven't fought the Ancient Dragon yet.

Supposedly with Lucatiel it is 3 out of 4, but the guide contradicts itself so I'll probably do the Rotten as well; should be doable solo but I might see if there's any SL 130ish people around, considering that's how many soul levels I've gotten from doing Smelter Runs for 3-4 hours as a gold phantom, even losing 210k souls along the way.

I've been wondering if it's gonna be possible to platinum this one without going online (like Dark Souls). I'm probably missing something but it seems like you need to grind several of the covenants to get all the spells etc, and there doesn't seem like there's any way to grind "insignias" offline.

@ares42: It is possible, it just takes 15 or so playthroughs; you'll need maybe 8 or so hours online to do the two required ones. You only have to max out one covenant, if you free Mephistopheles (basically) he'll invade you 5 times and you'll fight a lot more than that over the course of the game, good enough to max out the Way of the Blue covenant.

@fredchuckdave: Bleh, I didn't do the bell stuff yet. That's gonna be annoying.

Also, sunlight is easy to farm with the dragon. He's a joke of a boss and a lot of people seem to be doing him.

If you need/want help with The Rotten I'm level 134.

@yi_orange: Oh cool beans, are you on PS3? I'll be on in around 4 hours or so.

For Bellkeeper make a new character (mine was a sorc) and get him to around SL 50-80ish, just sit outside the Belfry Luna door with the ring on and it'll take like 3 or 4 hours; really easy to kill the host most of the time (albeit the best player I've seen in PvP was actually during one of those invasions). If you don't want to participate you can just afk right there for like 15ish hours and you'll probably have 30 chunks by then; about 1/5th of the summons will end before you have to lift a finger.

@fredchuckdave: Yeah, PSN is YI-Orange. I'm gonna get another chunk of levels when I finish grinding sunlight medals, but I doubt it will put me out of range.

And you don't need to get all the spells on one character? Weird. I'll see if I can do some bell stuff with this guy first, but if it doesn't work I guess I'll make a new guy.

@yi_orange: Soul History is sort of what matters, I'm around 1.4 million I think (my first character finished at 2.5 million); but it'll be an interesting experiment to see if we can co-op. You do have to get all the spells on one character (as far as I know) but it's going to take a long time to get hidden weapon on any high level character, also the guys you'll be fighting will have much better builds for it.

I also have to do Mirror Knight and Ancient Guardian/Watcher with shitty Blue Sword guy (official name); if you wanted to try just co-oping a bunch through Shaded Woods/Brightstone/Drangleic/Shrine/Royal Crypts as well; it worked remarkably well for me with completely random people yesterday but they were probably closer to my soul history.

No clue if it's possible to summon non-NPCs for the Giant King but we could try that too (like, summon you in Forest of the Giants then level transition).

I put this in another thread but it's more applicable here. It seems like you can get Hidden Weapon offline or if you are at too high of a Soul Level to do it quickly and at any point in the game. There's an NPC red phantom in the Belfry Sol area that appears sometimes. Apparently he counts as killing an invader. You need to kill him 20 or 30 times, I'm still iffy on the requirements for ranking up. It's slower than doing the covenant properly, but you can do it whenever. He's over by that tower with the ladder inside and he respawns infinitely. You may have to go back to the bonfire a few times before he shows up though. I did the PvP for a while when I was a lower level and finished off rank 2 by fighting this guy.

@fredchuckdave: Oh, I'm at 2.47 million. If you can still summon me I'd be game to help out with stuff. I'm working on Lucatiel now.

So has anyone burned an effigy yet? How long does it last, does it have a timer you can see somewhere? Does it block ALL invasions(even covenant)?

I'm on 360 and currently a silver member but might want to go gold again in the future and have zero intention of PvPing, trying to avoid having to reach back and unhook my ethernet cable every time I want to play. There are plenty of effigies in the game(especially for a second playthrough where I already know the bosses) so I think as long as the effigies last a couple hours, I know when they expire(even a message saying you are invadable again would work), and block everything they'll work just fine.

1.6 million isn't close enough to 2.5 million evidently; maybe could have made it work with dual sunlight covenant. The rings of sacrifice in this game are great for saving effigies.

@drxlecter: I burned an effigy. Not sure how long they last, but I can say this- I burnt one, traveled around to some different areas and did some different things, came back maybe an hour or two later, and the effect was still listed.

@itwastuesday: How was it listed? as a status at the bonfire? It won't seem to let me try to burn one since I am in offline mode.

Lucatiel trophy gotten, I'm one of the 0.07% evidently; probably the only one who didn't have a pre-release copy.

Also got Benhart's trophy, certainly much easier than Lucatiel. Looking Glass Knight is quite difficult with a melee character without an ideal build but evidently pretty easy if you summon. McDuff finally gave me his slab too; so just like 100 hours of stuff left to do to get all the spells.

@fredchuckdave: How did you get McDuff to give you his stuff? A lot of the guides say to spend 14,000 souls, but I did that and he gave me nothing. Does it have to be 14,000 spent on upgrading weapons? Cause I just bought stuff. I seem to have missed a few giveaways from people like the armorer in Majula. There's seems to be a window to get that stuff.

How many of the spells/hexes/pyromancies are locked behind the covenant tiers? That seems like that thing that would stop me from going for a Platinum.

@theblue: For my first character it seems to be straight up bugged out, for my second guy I spent the souls but he kept his "active" dialogue; after getting to the Dragon Aerie I upgraded a weapon to +10 and then after that he gave me a Titanite Slab/trophy popped. No clue how it triggers.

@strainedeyes: Only Sunlight Spear/Hidden Weapon, the others can be gotten in NG++ from the Chancellor after you're almost done with the game.

Ancient Dragon is about 40-0 as a gold phantom so far, though we did get him to like 70% once; you make around 25k souls on the way to the boss door and get better at fighting the hardest regular enemies in the series so it's pretty fun.

You're a crazy dude :) Escort missions against DS bosses? No thank you!

@ethanielrain: You're a wiser man than I. Though I am happy I at least "mastered" Smelter for future playthroughs/not skipping him early sometimes, granted if I don't fight him for a while that dodge timing is rough.

So if I wanted to get all the trophies using only one character, I'll have to max both the Sunlight Covenant and the Belfry Covenant?

Huh, the dodge timing isn't really that bad. I can pretty consistently dodge him, the only problem is that with the way i play any hit means i'm dead, especially with his immolation thing going. But the basic idea is to be as close to him as possible and dodge around to the left of him, or his right, and do it so that you end up really close behind him, his attacks shouldn't hit there. In fact, this works for most large enemies, Looking Glass Knight was pretty similar too. But yeah, any time i screwed up even slightly i was dead, cause i started a swordsman and never put a single point into health, so that stat was at 5 the whole time.

The Lucatiel trophy is gonna suck without help. I have to use an ascetic for all the bosses excpet the 2 guards. I took a run at Flexile Sentry and she died with him at half health. I'm sitting around 2.5 million soul memory if anyone's around there and can give me a hand. I need to do Flexile, Rotten, and Sinner for Lucatiel. Looking Glass Knight and the second to last boss for Bernhart.

Yeah, I already beat two of her four before learning how to do this quest. You only need to summon her three times to fulfill it, so I will probably use the ascetic in no-man's warf, seems like the easiest one to bump up to NG+ level.

Hmm, I'm at an impasse. I'm sitting on my first character whom I've invested 60+ hours into, defeating all bosses barring the dragon. If I were to do the NPC side stories that I missed, I'd have to do them on NG+, right? Which I'm sure is a lot more difficult than simply getting it right the first time. But if I were to make a new character, I'd have to go through the process of leveling up some of the covenants I have already invested in. (dragon's/sunbros/pilgrims of dark). Is the step-up in difficulty between NG and NG+ so jarring that I'd just be better off doing their side quests in NG?

I don't know about the ramp up, haven't tried it yet. But in addition to enemies having more health and doing more damage, there are also new enemies and changes. For example the boss of No-Man's Warf now has two other enemies in the room with him in NG+.

Instead of starting over, and if you don't want to do a full NG+ run just for the trophies, you can burn ascetics to reset the bosses you need and summon the NPC. Several people have gotten these trophies post-game. Obviously the negative to this is that burning an ascetic will respawn everything in that area to NG+ difficulty, but you won't have to invest all the time into a second playthrough.

Would that allow me to backtrack with certain NPCs? Lucatiel, for example, requires to be kept alive in 3 (4?) boss fights. So if I were to face those bosses again, keeping her alive, would she offer up more dialogue?

I haven't done it myself, but based on this walkthrough, as long as you have not talked to her in Aldia's Keep (because she disappears after) you can still go back and replay the boss fights to meet the requirements.

Do you need to do all 4 boss fights with Lucatiel to get the trophy or can you just do 3 like I've seen suggested?

Edit: I can confirm that you only need to do 3, I beat Flexile Sentry, Sinner, and Rotten with her and got the trophy in Aldia's Keep.

Hmm. I might be able to get that trophy, then. I didn't even realize she was in Aldia's Keep.

That being said, I'm still probably going to roll another character at some point. Heck, I might just bite the bullet and go for a new game, now that I know to actually summon the NPCs. The notion of doing NG++ against the sentry, or NG+ against the Smelter Demon, scares me.

Does anyone know for the all Sorcery/Miracle etc. trophies if they have to be on a single character? Or is it like the first one where it's based on all of your characters? I want to know cause I started rolling with a new character but I really don't feel like ranking the covenants up again.

@theblue: Its all on one, just like it was the last game. And same with Demon's. It has never been across all your characters. To get the one for all hexes for example, you have to have them all on that character.

@sterling: Aw really? I coulda swore I read that it was across all of your characters in Dark Souls 1. Bummer.

I used an ascetic and went for Looking Glass Knight with Bernhart, but Bernhart died near the end and the other guy I summoned finished the boss. Now I need to do it with another ascetic...god dammit.

@yi_orange: Yeah you have to DC in those circumstances, or organize with the particular phantom you summon; but if you DC too much the game doesn't let you participate in the online unless you use a bone of order (you can still see messages); dunno how close I was to getting locked out again before Smelter finally went down (we killed him in maybe 40 seconds and Luca was still at like 20% hp) but it couldn't have been too far off.

People do seem to be pretty receptive to helping though, I think that's relatively neat.

I used an ascetic to up No-Man's Warf and after several attempts at keeping Lucatiel alive and not finding another player's summon sign I finally stumbled across one on my like 5th attempt. I died on our first attempt but I managed to find his summon sign again and we took out the Flexile Sentry and his two annoying cronies with Lucatiel alive and well!

I was also being summoned to the Belfry at the same time I was working through NG+ style Ward, and got enough material to up my Bastard Sword to +10.

So happy to have that off my shoulders. I still have two bosses with her that I have not fought yet, so I don't need to ascetic for the Sinner and I can go back to playing normally.

I was able to keep Lucatiel alive for the Smelter Demon, im glad i skipped him....woould of been terrible at NG+ difficulty. Also used an ascetic at No Mans Wharf and got through the Flexible Senty thanks to a kind summon. Now its either try the Flexible Sentry at NG++ difficulty or try the Lost Sinner fight, but man I still gonna have to go through the real NG+ to get the last Pyromancy i need and a NG++ Sinner. So two questions: If i just went to NG+ will the boss progress still carry over or is it possible for someone to drop a spell for a moment just to pop that trophy?

@thebunnyhunter: You can only destroy spells, not actually drop them on the ground.

Uh progress on the Lucatiel quest will carry over... Chuck answered the spell question. If you use an Ascetic to raise the level of an area it still goes up in NG+. So if you had fire level 3 in Sinner's area it is going to be level 4 in NG+. Personally I strongly advise never using an Ascetic until you have farmed every mob to the point they stop spawning. Otherwise you are just ripping yourself off of some souls. Not to mention I am not sure it is that advisable anyway, you may inadvertently create a boss wall for yourself. You should only do it if you REALLY need to do it.

So I kept Benhart alive for Watcher/Keeper, the congregation, and Looking Glass Knight, but when I talk to him in the memory he won't give me his sword.

Also, I've kept Lucatiel alive for The Rotten and Flexile Sentry, just need The Sinner, but definitely gonna need help. She dies quick.

@yi_orange: I've read some people have had the same issue. It seems like he needs to be in the Giant Lord fight? Or perhaps the congregation doesn't count? I don't know there's still a lot of misinformation out there.

As for Lucatiel, have you tried using the Redeye ring? I've been wondering if it's helpful or not keeping them alive through the fights. It seems like it would be essential.

So are any of you guys going to try and get all the armour or gear? I kind of want the rings you get from a no death or no bonfire playthrough but it's gonna take so much planning and practice.

So I'm pretty sure Watcher/Keeper doesn't count for Benny. I know 100% I had him alive at the end of that fight as well as the Mirror Knight, so I went back and ascetic'd the congregation fight and did it with him. 3 wins, right? But he wouldn't give me his stuff. So I went back and ascetic'd the congregation AGAIN, and did it again, and then he gave me his set. It's a really easy boss so that's the one I'd recommend doing.

I just started NG+ and doing Lucatiel's quest, just beat Flexile Sentry with her. I missed her trophy on my first NG. It wasn't too hard, I use Great Resonant Soul so the boss died real quick, the 2 adds were honestly a bigger threat.

Don't know about getting +3 for every convenant though, 500 player kills would take forever. I already +3'd Sunbros, Dragonbros and Darkbro. For all the others, you can get the spells from the chancellor on NG++, right?

@mosespippy: Doing no bonfire right now; 20 minute walkbacks to the Iron Keep are a blast (have to go through like 4 weapons too). Interesting bug: the Gutter is presently flashing like a strobe light, on and off every 2-3 seconds, lighting up the whole area and getting dark again. I did get a Mastodon Halberd so that's pretty nice to go with my regular Halberd.

No deaths is doable since Memory of Vammar is optional, just would be very tedious/would probably not be able to experiment as much.

@yi_orange: I had that happen too, then went and killed the Giant Lord while he was alive and he gave it to me after that.

I'm actually trying a no-death run right now, sort of casually on NG+ at SL 170 with a hex/melee build. I summoned a dude in the forest at the very beginning and we cleared Pursuer at the first optional encounter straight on through the Last Giant in like 10 minutes, it was pretty awesome. I went and did No Man's Wharf, including Lucatiel's quest and getting Carhillion, so now I'm at Lost Bastille with no deaths as of yet, but I skipped Old Dragonslayer. I just know that if and when I die, it's going to be a fall. But it seems totally doable even on NG+ with a hex build, especially with summons. But I'll have to see how some of the later stuff shakes out, but it's very easy to snipe/cheese most difficult areas, like Dragon's Keep, and in the Aerie you can straight up skip all the dragons.

No bonfires sounds like fun too, but no deaths and no bonfires at the same time is probably a huge nightmare, because with a regular no bonfire run you can just die with a ring of protection on and respawn with repaired stuff, and you can still light bonfires for checkpoints. May try that on NG++.