Black target knight
FromSoft games are notoriously difficult. The first Elden Ring had a lot of very difficult zones and battles. But it seems that Shadow of the Erdtree has broken a significant number of players, even old veterans.
I was actually quite surprised to see this, considering most players gave FromSoft some degree of leeway, but Shadow of the Ertree reviews currently place the game on “Mixed” on Steam, a far cry from Elden Ring’s ” Very Positive”, the The reason for this is that it is…too difficult.
Almost every negative review mentions the difficulty, with players complaining that their stats or level don’t protect them from 2-3 shots by early enemies. Some don’t like it, others say it’s so bad they just quit. Here is a small selection of many of these reviews:
- “The gameplay makes the game hard to recommend – spastic bosses with jerky roll-catch movements and a plethora of physically nonsensical moves make the bosses in this DLC hard to stomach….As someone who beats all Fromsoft games with shrouded Lvl1- characters for fun (including the base game) I am discontinuing this.”
- “Although the world design and colors are very nice and also many enemy designs, there is a big problem with balancing, but at the moment even at 60 power you will be shot in half by almost any enemy that is not pure fodder .”
- “I really want to like this DLC, but those enemies and boss fights are the worst parts of the entire game. I’m honestly surprised that whoever tested this approved the golden hippo boss fight.”
- “I was able to beat it, but the bosses were so overpowered and aggressive that even maxing out the Scadutree fragments didn’t make it any easier.”
With the latter, I definitely don’t believe anyone is “maxing out” on Scadutree Fragments 24 hours after release, but the overall sentiment is extremely similar in almost all of these negative reviews (although some complain about performance).
Shadow of the Erdtree
I…sorry, I don’t agree with this. I am not a hardcore Souls player, and I too got 2-3 shots when I started Erdtree, just like people at level 700. That’s exactly how it starts, and after 45+ hours I’ve defeated every boss I previously thought was was impossible. There are a lot of things that go into beating these tough battles, and I just don’t think people are taking the time to do that because again, it’s barely been a day since the official launch. My recommendations:
- I definitely don’t believe people found all the Scadutree Fragments and Spirit Ashes in the available zones in this short amount of time. It’s day two. Overwhelmingly, this will make a difference, even though you will still take significant damage.
- Matching talismans to damage type is incredibly important here, and can be the one thing that makes a fight bearable, even more so than before.
- You may need to change your build. Just because you relied on certain go-to moves or strategies in the base game doesn’t mean you can now brute force your way through things. The same goes for Spirit Ashes, as some may now be more valuable than others, and you need to significantly strengthen them to be useful. Also be sure to take advantage of the sometimes hard-to-spot NPC ally summons during bosses.
- Some bosses you shouldn’t be fighting right now. Not at all. There’s no reason to kill the infamous Blackgaol Knight now, no matter how close he is to the start. There is no reason to take on the giant fireman as he will kill 99.99% of players 100% for a long time. Come. Back. Later on.
If you quit Shadow of the Erdtree now, that’s your right, but I just don’t think most of these people are patient enough. I also wondered if I would be able to make any progress at all during the review period due to an embargo because it was so difficult, but slowly over time I figured it out, I got stronger, I changed my tactics, I did it. And if I can do it, you can do it too, I believe in you.
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Pick up my science fiction novels Herokiller series And The Earthborn Trilogy.