I do the same, but the aggression is still the same. Of course this doesn't stop me. If you're on PC around lvl 168 don't be surprised to see Moonrithyll joined by another carian knight with a thrusting shield. I like to troll, and have a laugh. If I win then that's great, but I'm okay if I don't. I need to start invading the shadow keep, and be a fire knight.
The truth is, Jon, that FromsSoft devs are gankers. They have constructed a game that glorifies and skews to the Host and everything else is secondary. It makes sense: most people will not invade. But they might GET invaded. And if a large part of your market gets soured on PvP, then you'll be dealing with a lot of angry customers. I hope FromSoftware can outgrow this mindset, because I think the invasion system is the most innovative, immersive and fun part of all their games since Miyazaki took the helm. All the pieces are there: armor, weapons, and the world. But its like you say: they're not even trying. Imagine what we'd get if they did!
I highly doubt From Software's intent was to glorify ganking. I believe they simply just don't play PvP at all, or at most very little. You have to understand that PvP has been a thing in their games since Demon's Souls and it has largely been unchanged since then. Think about it. Implementing a PvP system that was designed for games with controlled and linear level design and then using that same PvP system for a gigantic open world game is bound to bring out some issues. I think ultimately it comes down to From's somewhat antiquated game design. They have never struck me as malicious in any way.
if they really were gankers, you'd think the fromsoft devs would have made the multiplayer functionality better for co-op players, instead of a mod being the best option for everyone on pc
I was there when Reds cried sooooo hard the Giants Seed was "op" and they couldn't then run and hide behind enemies. Lol. Every invader I have had since day one of Elden Ring, has never given my friends nor I the ones. Two might step aside to watch, but the invader always runs and lives in the hosts game. I don't think people really have half a mind in how things really should be balanced. And it really shows.
That's just conspirational rambling. The game wasn't constructed around multiplayer and coop, they made a pve game and added the multiplayer system after that. invasions since DS3 skews toward the host, that's just a response to the many complains people had about twinkers. You need to understand that gankers are like 0,1% of the coop players, the vast majority of coop players don't really want to be invaded. Pvp players isn't a large part of the market, it's likely around 5% of players. The invasion system will never go back to what is was previously, solo host invasions will never be used again.
@@ni9274 I love From games since day one. What you just said is no excuse. DS3, objectively had the best multiplayer not only in PVP but in coop. Limiting coop to only three was buns. And limiting PVP to max two invades was cheeks. Facts are facts.
People who accuse others of "yapping" tend to have little to no attention span, an aversion to long form debate/content is a common symptom of brain rot.
What keeps me going is the simple fact that it is consistently a unique experience, even going into multiplayer. Invasions without a doubt are what hold me on this game. I might not be the best at it but that’s not what’s important, it’s about having those memorable moments. For example, I once invaded a team of three people expecting a full on gank squad, I managed to eliminate one of the summons and suddenly another invader joins in. A couple minutes pass and I’m thinking where is this dude, out of nowhere there’s great arrows sniping the host and summon. With his help we were able to defeat them. I look around trying to find my teammate and I just barely see his character doing a jumping emote about half a mile away! These are the kind of events that keep me coming back.
Last night I had an absolute gem of and invader. My bf and I had just defeated the Ulcerated Tree Spirit in Stormveil Castle's basement. We were admiring the ... um head... when our red friend arrived. There were geared up just like me, giant sword + cloth garb (I'm using blue dancer on my newish wretch). Through emotes and motions the invader communicated they wanted an naked duel. We obliged, and followed their lead when they wanted to then fight with shields ect... we spent a good 30 minutes down there fight clubbing with our new friend. It ended in the invader re-equipping their sword. They challenged my bf first, and took him out. Then it was just me and the invader. We were evenly matched, but I was doing just a little better. When he was about at half health, he stopped. We exchanged a few more emotes and then he severed. It was just the most fun unique experience, and if our red friend finds their way to this video and reads this comment, you are a treasure! Thank you for the interesting night!
fun invasions are always the best, messing around with the host and cooperators using the mimic veil, emote dance parties in front of a fog wall, pretending to be friendly before one shotting everyone. such a shame that nowadays none of that is possible because 90% of invasions are against ganks
You and I are one mind on this topic pretty much. I came into the series during DS3 and was enamored by the multiplayer system, and it was the primary reason I played. I had a fucking blast with coop, invasions, and everything else. I went back and played the prior titles and enjoyed what they offered as well, like Gravelording in DS1. Theres no other game with multiplayer like the Souls series and I so desperately wish there was. But here we are now with Elden Ring, and it seems FROM really doesnt care anymore for multiplayer, and makes slight changes just to keep the riffraff quiet so they can focus on the broader general audience who will play the game once and then leave it. I played DS3 for a long time after beating it because the multiplayer had so much to offer, but Elden Ring offers much much less with no indication for change.
We need an invasion game made by another studio. Not a “souls like”, just a multiplayer PvPvE invasion game with sword and sorcery. I’d go crazy for it.
there's some overlap between the invasion mechanic and extraction shooters like tarkov or dark and darker, if one of those made an actual single player campaign, with invasions in mind, it could compete
it fails to even think unless it is MMORPG with some sort of subscription based / ultra p2w / ultra grind korean type stuff. No investors would support. The way they think is "But first how much money will we get ?"
I think that the game you are describing is at odds with itself and can't exist as the focus of a mainstream title. Which is unfortunate, because I feel similarly as you do. The rush of invading, or being invaded, is a unique and unparalleled experience. But the experience of invasions is fundamentally unequal. @10:00 I agree: key to the experience is that the invadee is an unwilling participant, whereas the invader is seeking the engagement. Two willing participants drives optimal game design towards a focused PvP game with balanced matchmaking. Two unwilling participants drives a focused PvE game with offline or co-op play and a separate opt-in PVP experience. Mismatched participants are an inherent contradiction. A game about invasions must both be entirely structured around fostering invasions and completely focused on attracting & retaining players to be invaded, and will _never_ see wider popularity because the experience is fundamentally alienating to a critical portion of the player base. Games are voluntarily played, and that is antithetical to the experience of invasions. Being invaded is a rush because someone is stopping you from attaining your objective. Invading is a rush because you are hunting someone trying to escape you. Without those motivations, it's just a poorly balanced PVP game. There are games that attempt to balance these contradictions, but they will never see mainstream success. I see the same in calls for the open-world full PVP MMO gamers clamor for but nearly every attempt has failed or been pushed into extreme niche status. What we want isn't a game - it's an experience - and that experience does not neatly fit into what games are.
That's both very insightful and something I've thought a lot about. I usually frame the issue in my mind as "the game you want does not exist" because no matter what the game does or how much it tries, games are an imperfect translation or attempt of a desired experience. It's this impossible contradiction that disallows perfection in exchange for limitless potential. Any game *could* be the greatest thing you've ever experienced, but your experience is impossible to quantify, or sometimes even accurately capture, because what people want out of them will vary to such a degree that getting voluntary cooperation (as this sort of experience requires) is so difficult to manage.
Can't wait for a seamless video man. I've been trying invasions this week and I'm genuinely surprised. Not only did I have trouble believing seamless would incorporate invasions after mechanically rendering the game easier (it's literally cheating, I suppose), but the fact that so many players seem to allow invasions to happen on their session has left me sort of wondering if there's any reason to invade vanilla now (not to mention how it made me reconsider the nature of optional invasions, which I'm otherwise firmly against). However, the game feels split in half. I will boot vanilla for random coop, which seamless cannot match because it's partially designed to circumvent everything that's random about coop (duh), but on the other hand I'm now consistently booting seamless for invasions. If done in large numbers (and >100k players on Steam to potentially pool from every day is no joke), Fromsoft will surely get the message that the playerbase is being split in smaller pieces because their system is unappealing, and invasions are clearly not the root cause of that (and yes, I know Miyazaki has already commented on it). So... you've said a lot about vanilla, so I wonder what you might have to say about seamless invasions.
Invasions are enabled by default in the settings and many people cannot into ini files so they let the default settings go. I’ve lost a grand total of 2 times and won like 36. They have 0 grasp of the PvP mechanics.
@@PseudoNym13 you literally need to enter a password in the .ini to be able to play the mod. I also don't find much difference in the skill of the average host between vanilla and seamless, the main difference made is in MUCH better latency and better balance (invaders have access to rune arcs, full flasks, torrent, spirit summons etc.).
@@PseudoNym13 This has been my basic assumption as well. The reason why I'm not 100% convinced is that the ini file is being edited for the password, right? So players know enough about that. Otherwise everyone would be entering random sessions, which, to my understanding, is not a thing. But I didn't spend more than a few minutes testing that. Perhaps the 0/1 invasion values are confusing to typical PC users? I dunno, that might be possible, even though it's on the mod page, together with all the other info. I have invaded some solo people at graces, which I also speculate are players having trouble connecting, so maybe this relates to lack of knowledge about the ini file. I also did not spot any info on spawn frequency and, using the ini file to show levels, I also find that the matchmaking is iffy, with my character very often being slightly above host level, though this might be happening more often at vanilla than we might think as well. There's probably info on this on the discord, I'm guessing. And yes, an invader is way more dangerous in seamless. They go in with full heals and a rune arc - this means that every typical group either frame traps the invader for a kill or they likely lose a battle of attrition against a player with superior knowledge, particularly when it comes to unexpected hardswaps.
I like the 1 V 3 in invasions. Its fun. As an invader I think you having the disadvantage is a good thing. Because of the premise of it. Its opening the gate to allow assistance in that allows the invader to come, so its always gonna be at minimum a 1 v 2. I agree about the taunters tongue because i loved setting up scenes for invaders where i was like some bad ass boss sitting on a throne or at the end of a large bridge. Like yeah. Im the boss now. So they def need to fix to taunters tongue. And i actually like the colleseum but something about duels at raya lucaria that had some sort of difference to it that i miss doing that now. But that might of just been the moment itself and not just the gameplay.
I'm a solo indie dev working on a game with combat inspired by the souls games, and one of the biggest roadblocks I have for pvp has been the monetary cost for supporting it. It's obviously not the only reason why we don't see a lot of games do Fromsoft style pvp,but it's likely a major one.
That's an interesting perspective. Is the cost mostly centered around server costs or just the development time to implement and maintain a P2P networking system? I don't know much about game development but have gotten a strong impression doing what FromSoft does, however jank, isn't exactly easy.
@@emotionaljonxvx it's both, though it depends on the team,it's not easy to implement multiplayer, and multiplayer drastically increases the difficulty of development, and pvp more so (accurate replication and cheating become even bigger deals), but I know for me the cost of servers for the matchmaking aspect is the main issue (since I have friends and other projects I'm on to copy notes from 😅)
Lies of P went the Sekiro route without multiplayer, and it is a fantastic game one of the best I've played last year. Lords of The Fallen kinda sucks, but some people love it.
I disagree after the numerous improvements they made in the past year the game is actually way better than eldenring in some ways like customization/fashion, seamless coop, actually really good and fun pvp, and in my opinion more creative and fun magic system.
Don't even know why they bothered adding Multiplayer in Lords of The Fallen, it's just broken to the point of being unplayable. Anyone who claims to enjoy that is coping, it's essentially non functional with more than one opponent.
Agreed 100%, just GET. OVER. IT. Elden ring pvp has it's problems, we need people to talk about it. EVERYONE BY NOW TALKED ABOUT IT. It's becoming exhausting to listen to the same video over and over. Every elden ring content creator has talked about elden ring multiplayer problems from day 1 and the point everyone makes it's always the same. Everyone who needed to get the message got it by now, the game it's 2 years old. Getting over it it's not a matter of ignoring the games problems, it's a matter of self respect. It's becoming impossible not to accuse you of yapping.
As someone with thousands of hours in every single soulsborne game thanks entirely to invasions/pvp, they had the opportunity to take the multiplayer experience, which they refined in DS3, to a whole new level. And instead they just...didn't? I can't even wrap my head around it either. I stopped playing for nearly 2 years and came back recently to PVP related bugs that have existed since launch. They have been releasing frequent patches as of the DLC release which is great and all, but I can't help but feel it's too little too late. With the insane success of ER, the game should have had this level of support years ago.
With enough time and quantity critique becomes just whining. Willingly submitting yourself to garbage and then whining about it just a bad look, and the argument "there's nothing else like it" just makes this even more stupid, like - "This pile of poop is very bad but the other piles of poop are even worse so I would rather eat this pile of poop". "It's very bad, I will continue to play it and tell you how bad it is". Bro we know its bad, that's why we don't play it. This whole thing could be summarized to - Bad netcode, bad matchmaking, bad implementation, old and restrictive engine, all around toxic experience on both ends, if you are still playing it for some reason and not even having fun doing it then rethink your life choices.
Now that elden ring PvP is bad and theyre not gonna make another souls game in a few years I have nothing else to do with this series I've poured thousands of hours in. I shouldve just chosen to get good at shooter games like everybody else
i play pvp in dark souls 3 every day like a ganker you are the ones who have so little patience to wait 5 minutes to find a match that has the potential to last 30 minutes or more 😂 and dark souls 3 as always is the best in its class There is a lot more activity than elden ring and you guys should stop complaining and go back to dark souls 3 if you miss better pvp so much ...
@@2HandHangerDunksOnlyUseless? If you’re not playing PvP for fun you’re wasting your time. Only 0.0001% of players will ever become good enough at multiplayer games to make money off them.
The reason the multiplayer is terrible is because the developers are led by a man who has, with each iteration of the mechanic, opted for sacrificing the enjoyment factor of this aspect of the games in favor of some nebulous artistic ideal. FromSoft either can't see or doesn't want to accept that their invasion mechanic has failed and needs to either be redesigned or scrapped altogether. The co-op also suffers due to their refusal to update their netcode and stop thinking of co-op as this separate game mode you can just turn on and off whenevery THEY feel like you should be allowed to have it.
@lususnaturae881 Weird pedantic nonsense. The devs failing to make the mechanic good is the same as the mechanic itself failing. I'd ask what you're on about, but you likely wouldn't be able to explain coherently.
Do like G9, put together a video to Bandi Namco and have it transcribed/translated to Japanese. There's evidence it has worked in the past. G9 is finishing one now. Not just a video, a thought out letter too. The more interest they see the better. The combat fixes down to the exact code change are often included. It should be easy to implement if they actually know what we want. Make sure you guys pretty much agree with what needs changing so they're not confused. Pretty sure we're all on the same page though.
I'd be fine if the system was like... 1 host + 1 cooperator = 1 invader, and 1 host + 2 cooperators = 2 invaders. Dark souls invasions were so much better both from an invader pov as well as a consumer of pvp content on youtube/twitch. And ive always hated the ash if war system. In dark souls you could see someone using a weapon and know what it could do. In Elden Ring its like "okay he has a greatsword... Aaaaand hes shooting lasers".
I've been playing over and over since launch and I only go online to do the invasions for Varre, then I'm back offline for the rest of the game. I don't even want to see ghosts, blood stains, or messages. I have no desire to play co-op, PvP, or invade/defend. I'm a collector, not a competitor. I need actual rewards to motivate me, not my skills, build, or internet speed being better than some random. I'd play co-op and PvP all day to grind some new items, but not just to run around fighting nobodies for nothing.
@@ricklubbers1526 I know, but it's faster to do three invasions right away than get all the way to the summon. I've also been playing since launch, so I've always just invaded as soon as I get the fingers. It was ingrained before the patch added him. Lol
The main complaint I have with elden ring PvP is the fact you must opt into invasions as a solo host. 1v1’s are the best fights imo especially considering the amount of AOE bs you see in 1v3’s. I’m also sick of level 100+ invasions in general, since a majority of the time I’m thrown into a blender where the only realistic chance I’d have of winning is creating a build with either near one-shot potential or using a very meta build. In DS3 I was able to use a lot of mediocre weapons and still see general success invading since my chances of catching a 1v1 or even 2v2-3 were far higher. Meanwhile in Elden ring it’s about a 90 percent chance you’re invading a 3 man party as a solo invader. It got dull real quick
Covenants would solve that issue, most of the game you can't be invaded solo but there would be some areas that have invaders or maybe even a player boss like in DeS and DS3.
Counterpoint regarding the critique about opt-out of seamless: Bloodborne was technically opt-out as well, and yet, that still worked, its main negative factors being the nonexistent game balance coming from bloodgems, the absolute wack matchmaking(literally can't find a friend using the same password for 10+ minutes) and the lack of almost any criteria to finding hosts to invade other than player level. Put some trust in the opt-out system, besides, there's plenty of players who don't read the txt and fail to realize they have an opt-out option lmao
I tried invade on lv 35 character on the other day. All I got is dual curved sword and I met with someone who has DLC weapon and 1-shot me/ met with gank of 3 people using taunter's tongue sit and wait to gank with all the spells and incantations. I was like ok now im really done. no more invasion.
I question the people that think this is a worthwhile endeavor to begin with. If someone's idea of fun is going around ruining someone's else fun(while minding their own business) then they oughta be met with a gang. Basically saying "Something terrible happened to me while I was attempting to do something terrible to someone else. Shame on them". I don't see the problem ha. Imagine doing this in the real world. Run up on somebody and start a fight for no reason. You'll probably get jumped then too.
@@The_Gamers_Gamer Invading isn't exactly about ruining peoples fun. If my goal was to ruin your fun I would just chainsaw glitch every fight or do some glitch that bricks your console/pc. I'm trying to have fun myself and sort of roleplay as an obstacle/mini boss that the players must overcome, but all multiplayer should seek to be balanced, even if the teams in it are somewhat asymmetrical. If you have ever played or looked at left 4 dead 2 multiplayer, there is a mode where you get to play as the 'special infected' and hunt down the main players stopping them from progressing through the level. Invasions are a similar concept, its somewhat asymmetrical multiplayer, but that doesn't mean it shouldn't be balanced to ensure fair play. One team is trying to get to the end of the level and safe zone, or in ER's case the boss room, and the other team is trying to stop or hinder their progress with the help of the games mobs. I think you are overly hostile towards invaders and misunderstand the motivation to invade, we aren't trying to ruin your whole day we are just enjoying a unique asymmetrical multiplayer experience that isn't offered very much elsewhere.
Sadly, I nearly abandoned ER multiplayer at this point. Arena is boring and invasions are ass due to the many reasons already discussed to death by everyone. I only log in once in a while, do some PvP, then realize how little fun Im having and then I go back to my other games. As you said, ER just doesnt hit the sweetspot like DS3 did in its prime. I sometimes come back to DS3 and its still great but since everyone is playing ER now, it just isnt the same if that makes sense. Personally I think ER will stay the way it is and not improve multiplayer at all since that would require a major rework of basicly all systems in place with a ton of new major content needed to bring it on par with previous titles if that is even possible at this point. I hope Im wrong but I dont think I am ... its really frustrating to see them literally evolve backwards when it comes to multiplayer.
I disagree I think lords of the fallen definitely meets the bar when it comes to achieving the balance of immersive and fun single player and really fun and good multi-player and pvp. The only thing it's really missing is an arena and having higher player limit because right now it only has 3 people per world
What you want is a fighting game. That’s it. Years ago you max upgraded a weapon in a souls game for the first time and two shot another player. You’ve been chasing that rush ever since. It’s not happening again
It’s not yapping, it’s just dedication to the topic. We (all dedicated people to the topic) all feel this way. I personally (kinda like you) am trying other fromsoft games now that ER kinda failed me. I’d love to see invasions from other games than ER while we wait for stuff to change.
8:02 It's all fractured as you mentioned. True enough Ranni in the story trailer says it. "And so, we inhabit a fractured world." It's too poetic. Since there are no covenants in ER like in DS3, I opted to farming enemy armors and weapons. I would roleplay as the NPC enemies of that particular area I'm invading, even changing the name to the appropriate enemy type, 'Divine Beast' etc. Edit: But it got me thinking, we do have a purpose to invade. Bloody Finger comes from Varre, he wants to make a Pureblood Knight out of the Tarnished. Recusant Finger meanwhile comes from joining Volcano Manor. These two are technically 'covenants' without the unique rewards.
ER was my first, so I don't "get" it. I understand Co-op and PvP. Play with people or against people. I don't understand why invasions are necessary. I get that people enjoy the randomness and competition, but it doesn't make sense to outsiders. Most other multiplayer games didn't have uninvited intruders to spice things up. I don't think it enhanced or expanded the base game at all. Varres quest just feels like an annoying task I have to do to progress and not a fun and exciting game mode. Volcano Manor didn't make sense, I have to go to a specific location and travel through time and space to kill someone? Why bother if they're not even on our world or timeline? All of the contracts could've just been there, or put them behind a fog wall. Even the in game invasions don't make sense. I'm playing offline, so why am I getting invaded by Nerijus 10 minutes after I start the game? Why do I meet Edgar in the flesh twice, but he has to teleport in from another world to attack me. Same thing with Varre, talk to and interact with him multiple times, but I have to go to another dimension to kill him later. It just feels like it was shoehorned into the base game to make people aware of multiplayer.
@@WyattStrange I understand it now, but for non Dark Souls players, that's so different than average multiplayer. I would totally grind all of multiplayer to get covenant specific items, coliseums specific items, I'd co-op, invade, help co-opers and help invaders until I had everything, but I'd probably just go play with it all offline once I got it. I've been playing almost non-stop for two and a half years and 99% of it has been offline, single player. I just don't care about fighting randoms. I don't really play any other online or multiplayer games, so I don't get the appeal of queuing over and over again, when I can just go kill stuff non-stop.
@@WyattStrange I get that. It is definitely unique. I appreciate that multiplayer is what keeps Fromsoft games alive after launch, and I do hope they continue to improve it, even if I'll never or very rarely use it.
@@WyattStrangeSouls games would be much more fun if both invasions and co-op were equally balanced. If you have co-op teammates throughout the whole game, you should have an equal number of invaders to balance it out. 3v1 is pure babysitting 😂 blues should be completely replaced with mad phantoms at this point. It’s easier than ever to find a co-op partner to play through the entire game with, making blues a tool for ganking only.
Ds3 invasions mean a lot to me, I spent a lot of time making lore characters and builds and invading certain areas. the chaos was always so exciting, denying blues their precious concord or the insane player counts. really depressing to see the state er’s multiplayer is in but I appreciate videos like these and the community’s dedication, keep expressing that love for an underrated system, hopefully something will come of it
Ive got maybe 400-500 invasions in seamless now and Id say that due to it not having a taunters tongue it is less toxic. The skill level is also alot lower. I win more than 90% of invasions there as opposed to less than 50%(probably alot less) in vanilla meta level range. In reality putting down clueless pveers gets old fast, but its still better than constantly facing toxic ganks. Plus pokemon battles are fun too. I think that what seamless needs is an arena for the pveers to practice pvp (also it would be nice for everyone because of better latency) and a less toxic version of taunters tongue.
Spirit summons in open world is the thing I like most about seamless. Idk why that isn't a thing in the base game, blocking them in multiplayers serves no purpose.
@@anitaremenarova6662 Indeed, its fun to see how different ashes fare against different enemies and if you have a buddy or get an invader, against other ashes and also how different ashes can help differently in different legacy dungeons against invaders. In overworld in my opinion your best chance would probably be the mimic tear, with equipment slots stacked with buffs, consumables and other stuff, weapons with bleed or/and hyper armour or staff and/or seal with having equiped ranged aoe and targeted spells and incantations. These are the hardest and most cancerous to deal with when already fighting multiple opponents. I speak from having personal experience of having to suffer through some of these instances. I once faced a 4 man team who all called out mimics who were stacking buffs on top of buffs, and slinging so many hefty pots that i couldnt even see them needless to say it was the most cancerous and unwinnable fight I had ever fought in any version of elden ring, so please dont over do it.
Very understandable and well thought out. I haven't engaged with fromsoft multiplayer since ds3 for most of the reasons you said over several of your videos, but was also thinking about trying seamless co op. Btw, have you talked to to or heard any opinions from other PvP content creators like yourself? Do they share most of tour concerns? I've watched like 2 steelvosky vids where he was reacting to your content like right away.
I think most PVP-focused creators are on the same page. I’m in more-or-less direct contact with a number of smaller creators through a couple discords, and I’ve had good interactions with some larger creator. The issues are pretty universal in my mind, and while everyone might have their own way of wanting them solved, the sentiment seems to be united. At least, from my perspective.
I think in Elden Ring they stripped back many aspects to go ham on boss difficulty. Like the levels in Elden ring, while really fun are also really simple. Barely any interesting enemy setups. Just some tough enemies. They removed solo host invasions to reduce the stress on solo hosts. They did everything to ensure that every aspect except the boss fights were easier. Honestly my PvE goto is Elden Ring, so I do some rare PvP, but I sometimes play DS purely for PvE.
I finally have come to the conclusion that the only winning move is just not playing. After SOTE ruined the pvp, i have uninstalled and gone back to dank souls 3 for that pvp itch.
This guy gets it. Pvp has deteriorated a substantial amount. It used to be a central and integral part of the game. Honestly I feel it's one of the big things that catapult the series to where it is today. Now it feels like an afterthought. It's cultivated a weird culture of "don't interrupt our chill session" instead of, "this is just a part of the game" and it sucks. It's not without any positive though. When every match is a 3 v 1 spam fest you get petty good but God this feels like a shell of what they had started to build :/ especially with all the lore they have, WHY ARE THERE NO COVENANTS?! LIKE, HELLO?? Still, I hope they give pvp more love and care in the next title. Great video dude.
You have perfectly encapsulated my issues with the multiplayer. As much as I say there's places to take my time and business, I have to admit the game is entirely irreplaceable. Which is why it is so frustrating that FS just ignore/neglect their game's long term lifeline (at least imo). I can't replace the game or franchise, but ultimately for me, breaks are gonna be necessary with this game. Which isn't entirely new to me, taking breaks from these games is something I have done a bit to prevent being totally burned out. But I feel more compelled take breaks on this one more often than I did with the previous titles. For me I think it's due to the way build making is now with the minimal payoffs for risks taken (looking at you Arteria Leaf and similar items), and how time consuming it is to gather every component of your build and then put everything together. It genuinely is not much less time consuming than certain MMO grinds I've subjected myself to in the past. It sucks because I enjoy these games and I really want to enjoy elden ring more, but it feels like they either aren't hungry enough anymore, or perhaps their hunger has blinded them and clouded their judgment.
I mean, it makes sense from a business standpoint. They don't gain anything by ensuring a consistent playerbase, all you need to do is buy the game or DLC once.
To break the negativity streak, perhaps some invasions in a previous game you actually enjoy? People say all the time that the other games remain active, and I personally can confirm that DS3 is active across midlevel. Maybe you could talk about the mechanics and builds you like from the previous games so you don’t pigeonhole yourself as just being here to rehash ER complaints we’ve heard since 2022. That sounds a bit harsh now that I’ve written it out but I mean no ill will. ER disappointed me as well but it’s also just not very interesting or healthy to hyperfixate on a game you don’t even like very much, a la Jeenine. At the very least I’m glad you’re trying Seamless and will hopefully have a good experience that you can focus on instead of what we got in the base game.
Thanks for making these vids and giving us a voice Jon. I feel bad for all the new elden ring players that never got to experience the old multiplayer formula. They literally have no idea what they missed out on. The culture of Dark Souls era pvp and the community was incredible. You really had to be there. So many great times and memories. So many great creators made their debut and became talking heads for the community. And now they are dead by daylight streamersor have moved on entirely, because of ER and its barebones multiplayer features.
I think you'll enjoy invading on the Seamless Coop mod. If what I'm led to believe is correct, the way the matchmaking works is when you invade, you get sent to a party that has a player that is at your rune/soul level. For example, I invade at lvl 95, If the party I invade has a host at 85 and a cooperator at 95 then I'll be matchmade against them because the party member with the highest level matches my own. It'll make it impossible to go against a party with an overleveled phantom (If I'm right, correct me anyone if I'm wrong). I don't believe it takes into account the weapon upgrade level, but I've been having fun the past week invading.
Anyone okay with ER multiplayer has simply not experienced previous souls games, they *DOWNGRADED* so much from DS3 it's unreal. Not innovating is one thing but they quite literally went backwards and actively made the experience much worse both for open world and arena.
Hey so I've been watching your channel quite a bit lately. I'm not gonna fake it I am absolutely in the camp of I don't like invasions it is not for me, but I understand why you and other people like it. I have played since Dark Souls 1 and have played every game since Demon Souls, The Dark Souls Trilogy, Bloodborne, and Elden Ring. Dark Souls 1 I did one invasion was confused, and that was it. Dark Souls 2 and 3 I had done many invasions and a lot of getting invaded with Dark Souls 3 being the most I ever spent on invasion, and I'll admit it was Scott Jund who got me to give invasions and allow invasions on. I stuck with it for hundreds of hours, but ultimately in the end I just didn't care for it. My view was invasion mechanic is here to stay, and I'll deal with whatever it throws my way. I came across some of your videos, and listened to your points. I still do not like invasions, but do see why you and other people in your comments like it. I then began to ask why Fromsoft/Miyazaki continue to sideline Invasions from game to game, and especially in Elden Ring. PURE SPECULATION on my part, but I think it's a dichotomy between what a player thinks is a good invasion and what Miyazaki had always wanted invasions to be. Brining up his original quote, "my vision of invasions wasn't to introduce player killing - its more akin to a strong enemy, being controlled by a human. That's the vision I wanted to achieve. If there wasn't the system message pop up that said a dark spirit has invaded, the game-play experience should be similar to an offline single player game with a very strong enemy popping up randomly. They don't speak, it could be perhaps a very smart AI. That was the vision. What I wanted to create was not a PvP match, but fearsome enemies roaming the world." Miyazaki qoute from some redditor name DL1943 (Seems legit and what I remember). I genuinely speculate that in Demon Souls or even Dark Souls 1 the invasion mechanic would have been if they could iron out all the bumps and edges allowing the invader to control an enemy. The issue is mapping and animating inputs to not make controlling an enemy utterly jank, so the best thing they did was simple allow player control of their character while invading. It's simpler the mechanics are already there, and the lack of foresight to twinking or any invader gimmick would have been caught in basic testing had they truly invested in the player invader mechanic. Dark Souls 2 was pretty much not worked on by Miyazaki, but the consistent invader update in 2, 3 and Elden Ring has always been focus on the arena something that encourages the removal of player player killing to a separate game mode. By Dark Souls 2 and even 3 the invasion mechanic had been pretty much set into stone so they reiterate on it while trying to stay true to the original vision which was just to keep nerfing the invader till essentially where they are now in Elden Ring at their weakest state. Just some crackpot theory I find compelling. Either way while again I still do no like invasions I respect your fervor for it, and Fromsoft continuing to ignore invasions will result in the souls like series by Fromsoft losing a unique part of it that has been there from the beginning.
You've got the reasons for invasions down, yeah. They want you to suffer and have a bad time so that the Host gets an enhanced experience. They're outsourcing their invasion AI to players and then hamstringing them. It's complete garbage. Either remove them or give players an opt-out setting and give them more offline NPC invasions to compensate.
@@hoked2194 In what way? Do you even know what it is you're responding to? Must be one of those dudes I hear who's just unreasonably hostile to people for no reason. Sup there mister Unicorn. Nice to finally meet one of you out in the wild.
That is an interesting quote, but it does not paint the entire picture for the intentions of invasions nor multiplayer by extension. _I have also heard that some of the meaning has been lost in translation too, but until we can find the original quote it will be hard to verify._ Back in 2010, Eurogamer published their interview with Hidetaka Miyazaki under an article called "Souls Survivor". After detailing how a real life experience with transient interactions inspired the transient nature of multiplayer, Miyazaki stated the following: _"It's a simple concept. But you don't know whom you will meet. Maybe the next person will be an enemy. That kind of encounter forms part of the larger storyline. There are constant surprises... the blue phantom that's helped you get through an area might, out of nowhere, turn into a black phantom that will kill you just as you're almost clear. Demon's Souls isn't like other RPGs. We've made a different storyline for every player. That's what the network's for; that's what the phantoms are."_ _"We made a game where rather than [giving players] a simple Game Over, we make them come back to an ephemeral existence as a phantom with less health, and this encourages people to co-operate in multiplayer. A darker existence as a Black Phantom has an even stronger incentive. Because you can both co-operate and aggravate through the unique multiplayer system, even if 100 players are role-playing, they will all have different experiences. Whether you behave as friend or foe is down to a person's character."_ Here it is clear that invaders (and co-operators) were never meant to simply be just another high level enemy (nor ally). They are each players with their own story, all role-playing with uniquely different experiences. This is the original vision, and this is what drew me and likely many players such as myself in.
@@SV-X Huh, thanks for the clarification, that makes me think (Give me some leeway here I'm on very few hours of sleep I got 2 days before a major med school exam so studying all I can on very few hours of sleep). So I watched Illusionary Wall, and he does a lot of in-depth game mechanic analysis. My only issue with what you explained is wouldn't it be incredibly easy to achieve that goal? Like if the goal was to make invaders and summons players with their own stories that can be friend or foe at any given moment with you left to wonder... then just remove summons, make only invaders, allow invaders to attack the mobs, but also reward invaders for killing the host or helping the host kill the boss. Like is my two hours of sleep making me simplify things too much, or is this not a perfect way to accomplish that goal. You can have someone invade with goals you are unsure of help you through the entire level defeating enemies, and then proceed to backstab murder you right before you enter the boss room? Something like the mound makers. It would give players who grew to hate their host an opportunity to kill them for their cowardice or their interference with a dual against another questionable invader. Heck to a new player it might make them think you had some hidden lore beef with the other character that invaded. Honestly this just sounds so cool.
Was doing a dual weilding Banished knight cosplay and decided to try out colleseum. Girst thing I encountered was a player with a running attack meta build that I couldn't punish because of how they've kep greatswords at the same slow pace as DS1. Never trying PvP again, when I beat the game again i'm going to let this game go and go back to DS3, DS2, and D1. The ER fans love to advocate colleseum as a way to silence criticism of invasions, but colleseum is both not as immersive, and even more unbearable.
@@DreyfusLagoon i play pvp in dark souls 3 every day like a ganker you are the ones who have so little patience to wait 5 minutes to find a match that has the potential to last 30 minutes or more 😂 and dark souls 3 as always is the best in its class There is a lot more activity than elden ring and you guys should stop complaining and go back to dark souls 3 if you miss better pvp so much ...
@@ismaellucas960 dude I’m not complaining it’s a genuine question. I’m wondering if I should pivot back to ds3 but I don’t want to do it if the mp isn’t super active.
about pvp as a ds3 player and a normal skilled invader when the ER first came out it was disappointing how unbalanced the pvp was but now looking back at it I changed my mind it was okay for ER pvp to be messy as it was along the spirit of game and sprit of adventuring yes they should fix gliches and bugs but since they tried to fix the pvp and dropping the 1.0.9 patch that changed everything, ER pvp is in a limbo ds3 pvp was technical and calculated, a glorious rock paper scissors that work beautifully, but trying to mimic in ER, a game fundamentally different in both spirit and mechanics has put ER in weird spot now elden ring pvp is not that technical to try hone your skills as much as you can, nor it is that "anime" so you won't take it that seriously when you win or lose
I completely understand your frustration. Elden is my first true entry into the souls series (not my first souls like tho that would sekiro which is the reason i event started playing elden ring). The depth of customization is breath taking you can almost build anything, the one flaw i do feel you can clearly tell it wasnt built for multiplayer, multiplayer is just an add on. Honestly some of the choices just seem questionable. There is literally no real reason to ever pvp none zero giltch nada and dont tell me you can get rune arcs because honestly those inconsequential at best. You can't share equipment between your own characters which makes building a whole new character and trying a different build just a completely tideous event. Crafting is tideous which is fine during the main story but ive beaten the story why cant i purchase stuff with runes like i cant for 4 of bolouses. There are so many of the design choices that honestly i have to question because its like they are intentionally trying to frustrate me.
There's also another thing sorry for this being so long but it's just been on my chest. Recently there was a twitch rivals tournament for ER great showmanship of skill between content creators. The only issue is 90% of them were wearing the samething. This is just a not pick of mine but honestly its like watching a street fighter tournament and every picked RYU or something. There was no variation and I'm not blaming them the truth is there can be no variation in pvp if you don't have poise you're gonna get wrecked. Now I'm not saying poise is a bad system no, what I am saying is that if you wanna be competitive you have no real choice in armor you'll lose a lot of you go for fashion. Why can't there be an overlay, maybe they want your armor to convey exactly what your stat def and poise are to the enemy (I doubt it since this is mostly a single player game I don't think they thought that far ahead). Why can't their be a real alter system that can change the colors to colors that already exist in the world or have apre approved list. Or why can't there be a talisman that gives you the weight of a bull goat and poise of bullgoat but not the def stats. Sigh there's so many ways they could go but it's just bitter disappointment over and over again the more I think about it.
Jon, i think this is as good as its gonna get. Miyazaki was asked if ER was his ideal RPG, and said "its close".. Now i think he's being meticulous, in order to avoid hurting sales of potential games. But i think this really is it for him. ER is a monster of game that took a very long time to develop. I think he put all of his chips in here. However, for them not to implement all of DS3's recipe into the pvp, leaves a lore gap in the mystery behind where they stand on their multiplayer experience. And the DLC makes this more clear now than it was at release. So many of the ashes and weapons are over-the top busted.. This shows a lack, to zero play testing of atleast this element of the game. Steelovsky said in one of his react video towards yours: "i think there is a communication issue".. There is no way to directly contact Fromsoft. Theyre not leaving open a direct line for feedback. I dont know what to say. I tjink this shows they are now minimally imterested
Elden ring without latency extending the range of the other's attacks would be a dream, then I can finally play around spacing and have time to punish without their early I-frames kicking in.
I figured if I’d just block every host doing scumlord stuff then the pvp would actually be enjoyable; I was right. Though having to block 40+ first step hankers and colosseum int/arc gank wizards a day is annoying, it helps view the pvp more positively. Currently, only problems I run into ego wise is blood/poison Guts CS teabagging cause they swapped 4 variations of the same weapon in a 3 minute altercation.
Good emotional video Jonh, I am always happy to see that you uploaded a new video I always watch it as soon as possible because I really like the pvp of dark souls 3 and I play it every day the whole day is active, but only for that reason I watch your videos (sometimes even repeated, I watch them several times) I like the pvp of dark souls 3 so much that I watch your videos even though I don't play elden ring haha, your reflections only make me more grateful for what I have in dark souls 3... 🤭
I'll start by saying that I'm terrible at English, if there are horrible mistakes I apologize in advance. I couldn't agree more with what you say, but I would like to add one thing. I come from a very long experience of great commitment on the competitive side in souls, mainly on ds2, which in terms of competitive aspect was the most refined title in terms of game mechanics. ds2 is so well built, with the possibility of canceling animations and a series of other aspects, that it inserted a seed of ambition and imagination in me many years ago. this fantasy is the idea of sooner or later seeing a more professional aspect starting from that gaming base, such as competitive. I'm talking about eSports, starting from the Souls game formula. a type of game that does not exist in any way on the eSoprts side, but which would have everything it takes to become one. obviously I know that the from titles are designed for a pve aspect, but I think the level was high enough to allow this fantasy for some fans like me. the hope I have, as mentioned in the video, is that a development house outside of from can create something refined enough, starting from this base, to give birth to a game category of this kind (elden souls try hard online) ahahaah, or something like that, I say this because I would like it to be something more discussed within the community and I wanted to know other people's opinions on the matter, sorry again for the terrible English, I helped myself with Google Translate 😳
I don’t understand the need or desire to play a single player game with other others. Keep worrying about that and watch the souls series go further down the tubes. Especially the PvP.
If a host already has a phantom and they aren’t using taunters tongue, there should be 2 invaders and no blues. If they’re using taunters tongue then a blue should help the host and 2 invaders can join. Am i wrong?
i feel like the next gen souls game is gonna be 1. og dark souls world/level design 2. bloodborne equipment/magic variety 3. changeable ashes of war, modifiable armor, crafting 4. guard counters, quicksteps, other shit to reward aggressive playstyle
Elden ring's pve feels like a jack of all traits master of none. We have a shitton of stuff, but the stuff isnt that good aside from a couple. Elden ring's pvp feels the same in a way. It's going onto so many directions but all of the directions are meh. It has big movement, slow combat, fast combat, anime covershooter stuff, and so on. But the things between those arent flashed out. The movement feels floaty and weird most the time, slow combat is too slow compared to fast combat, anime covershooter insane shit isnt working out and is too easy to play, and the balance is atrocious even now. I think if fromsoft or namco would have playtesters that actually play the pvp like oroboro or fighting cowboy (which we know they invited to previous events like AC6 or SoTE). I'd also wanna see how from would make a pure pvp focused game
Yeah I hate how for a long time there was a bug where summon signs could just lock you in an area and make you unable to do anything else but summon. And of course the invasion system being so one-sided most the time with nearly everyone having op dlc gear at level 40.
Everything made sense etc. Although I'm a little confused with the DS3 take, I remember Albino put out a scathing critique of it in 2016 comparing it to ds2. I thought ds2 was considered the pinnacle of DS MP.
Dealing with the crap netcode in colosseum duels is already starting to get to me again, I'm thinking I might try making a new character on seamless co-op and trying out invasions and being invaded while solo, should make for an interesting experience
I believe once fromsoft realised ER was going to be mainstream they cut the covenants, removed online items and toned down invasions by reducing the player limit because so many more people would be complaining about invasions as well as the difficulty of the game in general. I so wish fromsoft would do anything to improve invasions or even the arena that's been abandoned, but it seems to be set in stone now. Maybe improved pvp in bloodborne remake?
Only did invsions to do varre's quest. Had a lightening infused heavy weapon,the omen cleaver I think, that could 3 shot other players till I came to a mage type character. He was killing invaders with ease, took almost no damage from hits, seemed to have infinite potions, could outsprint you. No intention of doing pvp again - it is bull.
I disliked the pvp in this game since day 1. The desyncing issues on release killed my interest in it on day one and then the lack of improvements further buried any interest. I tried the arena for a week and got bored quickly. I've been pvping in these games since 2009 and Elden Ring is worse than Demon's Souls (due to the fact that among many things, Demons Souls was still novel, invasions were a brand new concept and there was no established meta level so fight clubs and duels could be found at all levels.) I held out hope that they would add covenants and larger match making in SotE, but it just seems they're not interested in continuing pvp in these games anymore. On the plus side, I do still enjoy the co-op in short bursts, but because you don't get to traverse a lot of the game with other players and you pretty much just fight bosses, I get bored after a little while. This is especially so at meta level, you just fight the same handful of bosses over and over. Demons Souls, Dark Souls, and Bloodborne were overall better online experiences
The situation saddens me because all of the combat system is based of the idea that the player will 1v1 a single opponent. That’s why few double bosses are ever celebrated, and why complaints of enemy spam are so common. It becomes so very exciting when that one opponent is also a player. Throw in some incentive rewards and now I’m hooked
Now that elden ring is 2 years old and everyone has gotten to play the dlc, its time to preserve the longevity of the game, aka, 6 player limits and solo invasions. They know damn well everyone wants this. They can literally keep elden ring alive for YEARS just by implementing this
I mean, its true, the older games are OK to go back to for muliplayer dude. Accept that you can play them and have fun. I still play ds2 multiplayer and theres a reason theres till thousands playing
Well I'm glad someone is making multiplayer complaints vids like these otherwise FS would think the game in this current state is a monumental success and won't even think to improve the lackluster multiplayer experience. The reason I bought ER+DLC IS NOT FOR THE PVE experience I bought it only for the soul-like multiplayer experience which till this day remains unique to soul-like games made from FromSoft. The first disappointing thing I noticed about the game after I beat it was the dismal multiplayer experience without covenants and a very disappointing 4 player online limit. Before I purchased the game last year I read how great the game was from reviews and was expecting a fantastic multiplayer experience with covenants and a 6-8 player online limit. But unfortunately to my dismay I found myself getting bored of ER lackluster PVP experience unlike it's DS3 predecessor that I quit playing the game and start playing other games. I still held onto hope that the DLC would address these issues with multiplayer but once again I'm disappointed in FS laziness in regards to ER multiplayer design. If the game's multiplayer design really does end up like this indefinitely then this would be the last multiplayer game I purchase from FromSoft.
While I disagree with the idea that DS3 lacked identity, I can definitely understand the conclusion since its identity was contextual. But damn was multiplayer so much fun in a vacuum as much as in stark comparison.
mostly I dabble in a bit of pvp and I continue playing in the context of increasingly challenging pve runs. my last most realistic hope for pvp in this series is better designed arenas. I totally agree, I think there is a big opportunity out there for a publisher who can refine the pvp in a souls like series. The asymmetrical chaos and dread of invasions is a unique and captivating experience. Elden ring was a great game but when I play I also can't help but feel remorse for what it might have been. I personally do like that it was open world, but I just feel like not all areas got the same level of attention and love that limgrave got. Limgrave to me is still the best area in the game, even after the dlc unfortunately.
I was so ready for this to be another video of a toxic invader pretending to just invade for the love of the game while using the same overtuned and boring tactics and equipment as every other invader I run into then complain about ganking and overleveled summons for 10-20mins, but it wasn't and thats a breath of fresh air I can appreciate. I have a pretty unique perspective on invasions because before elden ring I was never a big fan of fromsoft games outside of a bit of DS3 but by the same token I put way too many hours into solo elden ring and coop to help others get through the game. Funny enough alot of the whining I hear done about invasions in elden ring are echoed in how the invasions work in the gambit gamemode in destiny 2: invaders complaining about the amount of resources the 4 stack they're invading has while the 4 stack is complaining about the few buffs the invader has to help them win the 1v4 they just walked into but the playing field is pretty even if you drop your bias (unfortunately the netcode is dogshit in destiny as well lol). Gambit is my main mode, I love the invasion system because its a change of pace and that Pvevp invites hybrid build crafting when the sandbox has ok balance but by the same token only dealing with invasions in gambit and not regular pve is a boon because it'd be insufferable to deal with when you're just in the pve to relax with friends and complete goals so with that in mind I think invaders should be more open minded to the idea of invasions being an optional toggle because it would remove the need of the taunters tongue, it would show they're thinking about the multi-player side of the the game, and it would give them room to experiment with stuff like allowing you to summon after an area boss is dead, a new unique form of covenants, a more fleshed out multi-player system so pvp soulslike enthusiasts have WAY more to do that isn't just colosseum or invading players who want nothing to do with you so they gank and do everything they can think of to get under an invaders skin, and if it's a toggle that's off by default it would mean you're only invading WILLING participants so there's significantly less chance you'll run into things the average invader complains about. The bottom line is whether you like it or not these are multi-player games so more thought and care should go into the multi-player. That goes for invasions, arena pvp, reasons to interact with the multi-player systems, and overall balance in said multi-player systems. It should be rewarding if you play it well but can't play it well when half the community is using the same equipment and tactics over and over that doesn't take alot of skill to combat, just proper build crafting, spacing, timing, and patience. I mean I'm no pvp god but you can only run into so many lobotomite invaders that spam LT or magic (then hide behind enemies when they get punished for it) without learning the timing to deal with all of it effectively and getting tired of trying to play nice while they're just spamming away and trying to waste your time or even worse being toxic while doing so. Like I said, just some things to be open minded about, I'm no game dev or expert on game design.
Considering that in the game, invaders and gankers have no real love lost between them, it would make only sense to implement covenants and/or some form of war zone for the mother of all in game grudge matches that has been cooking for years now. I'm sure both sides have frustrations, so why not let us have fun venting them by embracing the disdain to pvp to our hearts content while feeling the sweet, soothing balm of getting to really go for it.
Smite is the closest thing to the souls play style imo the only thing is it's objective based but you can create as many builds as you want and there's plenty of characters to use with different spells and abilities
as cool as the open world concept was for elden ring i really hope the next souls game is more traditional and linear,because once you get to your second playthrough on er you kinda realize how pointless the majority of caves and side dungeons are in terms of it being worth actually going and doing them
i only play Elden ring for pvp. if the pvp didint exist id play something else. the pvp is the most fun and has the most replayability. im really really upset at the state of pvp in elden ring. ive been playing Nioh2 instead because it has better combat better bosses better character creator. nioh 2 has fully voice acted cutscenes. the only thing its missing is proper pvp. elden ring isnt the hardest game. elden ring doesn't have the most complex combat. elden ring doesn't have the best open world to explore. elden ring only has pvp for me. if the invasion mechanics dont get improved than ima play something that actually has good multiplayer.
I can’t say this for a fact but I just don’t think they themselves (the devs) just aren’t pvpers, Miyazaki even said that he needs help to beat these game because he finds them hard. I dont think someone like that would have first hand experience in the pvp scene and the difficulties of it (I’m not talking about the connections and latency bc it’s ass especially if your on pc like myself) so yeah the game NEEDS fixing however it just probably won’t happen which sucks
Imo the argument you made was seamless, there is almost no reason to use the multiplayer modes the last nail in the coffin for multiplayer was the blow up of the “Lure” community
I have been addicted to souls pvp ever since I played demons souls back in 2010 I agree with everything but I just want to say it's kind of crazy how every single souls game has one issue that keeps it from being the greatest of all time Demons souls had moon grass and low player count Ds1 had lagstabs and passive poise meta Ds2 had soul memory and terrible bosses Ds3 hated mages (I'm a mage always have been) Elden ring ignored covenants and has boring arenas With all of its problems ER is still the peak for me, but I mostly do 2v2 arena I also share your dream of a 100 person souls pvp zone I don't know if they will ever get it perfect, but they always mess SOMETHING up
I do cosplay builds and invade with those. It makes the host and summons act a little nicer, and pulls the toxicity waaaayy down
This is why I like doing full pot throwing invasions. Sometimes the host and summons will join me and we have a nice game of dodgeball
Bruv, let me borrow your hosts. It does not matter what I do, mine just kill on sight... -,-
I do the same, but the aggression is still the same. Of course this doesn't stop me. If you're on PC around lvl 168 don't be surprised to see Moonrithyll joined by another carian knight with a thrusting shield. I like to troll, and have a laugh. If I win then that's great, but I'm okay if I don't. I need to start invading the shadow keep, and be a fire knight.
Lol, not me. I get no such special treatment no matter who I cosplay as
That sounds like a dream come true. Meta, meme, or theme build doesn't matter since I can't even get off a wave before I get rushed.
The truth is, Jon, that FromsSoft devs are gankers. They have constructed a game that glorifies and skews to the Host and everything else is secondary. It makes sense: most people will not invade. But they might GET invaded. And if a large part of your market gets soured on PvP, then you'll be dealing with a lot of angry customers. I hope FromSoftware can outgrow this mindset, because I think the invasion system is the most innovative, immersive and fun part of all their games since Miyazaki took the helm. All the pieces are there: armor, weapons, and the world. But its like you say: they're not even trying. Imagine what we'd get if they did!
I highly doubt From Software's intent was to glorify ganking. I believe they simply just don't play PvP at all, or at most very little. You have to understand that PvP has been a thing in their games since Demon's Souls and it has largely been unchanged since then. Think about it. Implementing a PvP system that was designed for games with controlled and linear level design and then using that same PvP system for a gigantic open world game is bound to bring out some issues. I think ultimately it comes down to From's somewhat antiquated game design. They have never struck me as malicious in any way.
if they really were gankers, you'd think the fromsoft devs would have made the multiplayer functionality better for co-op players, instead of a mod being the best option for everyone on pc
I was there when Reds cried sooooo hard the Giants Seed was "op" and they couldn't then run and hide behind enemies. Lol. Every invader I have had since day one of Elden Ring, has never given my friends nor I the ones. Two might step aside to watch, but the invader always runs and lives in the hosts game. I don't think people really have half a mind in how things really should be balanced. And it really shows.
That's just conspirational rambling. The game wasn't constructed around multiplayer and coop, they made a pve game and added the multiplayer system after that.
invasions since DS3 skews toward the host, that's just a response to the many complains people had about twinkers.
You need to understand that gankers are like 0,1% of the coop players, the vast majority of coop players don't really want to be invaded.
Pvp players isn't a large part of the market, it's likely around 5% of players.
The invasion system will never go back to what is was previously, solo host invasions will never be used again.
@@ni9274 I love From games since day one. What you just said is no excuse. DS3, objectively had the best multiplayer not only in PVP but in coop. Limiting coop to only three was buns. And limiting PVP to max two invades was cheeks. Facts are facts.
People who accuse others of "yapping" tend to have little to no attention span, an aversion to long form debate/content is a common symptom of brain rot.
What keeps me going is the simple fact that it is consistently a unique experience, even going into multiplayer. Invasions without a doubt are what hold me on this game. I might not be the best at it but that’s not what’s important, it’s about having those memorable moments. For example, I once invaded a team of three people expecting a full on gank squad, I managed to eliminate one of the summons and suddenly another invader joins in. A couple minutes pass and I’m thinking where is this dude, out of nowhere there’s great arrows sniping the host and summon. With his help we were able to defeat them. I look around trying to find my teammate and I just barely see his character doing a jumping emote about half a mile away! These are the kind of events that keep me coming back.
To quote count ymir sadly there was never any hope for redemption when the roots of the world are mired in madness
Last night I had an absolute gem of and invader. My bf and I had just defeated the Ulcerated Tree Spirit in Stormveil Castle's basement. We were admiring the ... um head... when our red friend arrived. There were geared up just like me, giant sword + cloth garb (I'm using blue dancer on my newish wretch). Through emotes and motions the invader communicated they wanted an naked duel. We obliged, and followed their lead when they wanted to then fight with shields ect... we spent a good 30 minutes down there fight clubbing with our new friend. It ended in the invader re-equipping their sword. They challenged my bf first, and took him out. Then it was just me and the invader. We were evenly matched, but I was doing just a little better. When he was about at half health, he stopped. We exchanged a few more emotes and then he severed. It was just the most fun unique experience, and if our red friend finds their way to this video and reads this comment, you are a treasure! Thank you for the interesting night!
fun invasions are always the best, messing around with the host and cooperators using the mimic veil, emote dance parties in front of a fog wall, pretending to be friendly before one shotting everyone.
such a shame that nowadays none of that is possible because 90% of invasions are against ganks
You and I are one mind on this topic pretty much. I came into the series during DS3 and was enamored by the multiplayer system, and it was the primary reason I played. I had a fucking blast with coop, invasions, and everything else. I went back and played the prior titles and enjoyed what they offered as well, like Gravelording in DS1. Theres no other game with multiplayer like the Souls series and I so desperately wish there was. But here we are now with Elden Ring, and it seems FROM really doesnt care anymore for multiplayer, and makes slight changes just to keep the riffraff quiet so they can focus on the broader general audience who will play the game once and then leave it. I played DS3 for a long time after beating it because the multiplayer had so much to offer, but Elden Ring offers much much less with no indication for change.
We need an invasion game made by another studio. Not a “souls like”, just a multiplayer PvPvE invasion game with sword and sorcery. I’d go crazy for it.
there's some overlap between the invasion mechanic and extraction shooters like tarkov or dark and darker, if one of those made an actual single player campaign, with invasions in mind, it could compete
Agreed
play world of warcraft son
it fails to even think unless it is MMORPG with some sort of subscription based / ultra p2w / ultra grind korean type stuff. No investors would support. The way they think is "But first how much money will we get ?"
I know that this is a horde game, but Vermintide 2 is getting a versus mode where it is like asymmetrical pvpve with sword and sorcery
They even had 6 players on dark souls remastered
I think that the game you are describing is at odds with itself and can't exist as the focus of a mainstream title. Which is unfortunate, because I feel similarly as you do. The rush of invading, or being invaded, is a unique and unparalleled experience. But the experience of invasions is fundamentally unequal. @10:00 I agree: key to the experience is that the invadee is an unwilling participant, whereas the invader is seeking the engagement.
Two willing participants drives optimal game design towards a focused PvP game with balanced matchmaking.
Two unwilling participants drives a focused PvE game with offline or co-op play and a separate opt-in PVP experience.
Mismatched participants are an inherent contradiction. A game about invasions must both be entirely structured around fostering invasions and completely focused on attracting & retaining players to be invaded, and will _never_ see wider popularity because the experience is fundamentally alienating to a critical portion of the player base. Games are voluntarily played, and that is antithetical to the experience of invasions.
Being invaded is a rush because someone is stopping you from attaining your objective. Invading is a rush because you are hunting someone trying to escape you. Without those motivations, it's just a poorly balanced PVP game.
There are games that attempt to balance these contradictions, but they will never see mainstream success. I see the same in calls for the open-world full PVP MMO gamers clamor for but nearly every attempt has failed or been pushed into extreme niche status. What we want isn't a game - it's an experience - and that experience does not neatly fit into what games are.
That's both very insightful and something I've thought a lot about.
I usually frame the issue in my mind as "the game you want does not exist" because no matter what the game does or how much it tries, games are an imperfect translation or attempt of a desired experience. It's this impossible contradiction that disallows perfection in exchange for limitless potential.
Any game *could* be the greatest thing you've ever experienced, but your experience is impossible to quantify, or sometimes even accurately capture, because what people want out of them will vary to such a degree that getting voluntary cooperation (as this sort of experience requires) is so difficult to manage.
Can't wait for a seamless video man. I've been trying invasions this week and I'm genuinely surprised. Not only did I have trouble believing seamless would incorporate invasions after mechanically rendering the game easier (it's literally cheating, I suppose), but the fact that so many players seem to allow invasions to happen on their session has left me sort of wondering if there's any reason to invade vanilla now (not to mention how it made me reconsider the nature of optional invasions, which I'm otherwise firmly against).
However, the game feels split in half. I will boot vanilla for random coop, which seamless cannot match because it's partially designed to circumvent everything that's random about coop (duh), but on the other hand I'm now consistently booting seamless for invasions. If done in large numbers (and >100k players on Steam to potentially pool from every day is no joke), Fromsoft will surely get the message that the playerbase is being split in smaller pieces because their system is unappealing, and invasions are clearly not the root cause of that (and yes, I know Miyazaki has already commented on it).
So... you've said a lot about vanilla, so I wonder what you might have to say about seamless invasions.
Invasions are enabled by default in the settings and many people cannot into ini files so they let the default settings go. I’ve lost a grand total of 2 times and won like 36. They have 0 grasp of the PvP mechanics.
@@PseudoNym13 you literally need to enter a password in the .ini to be able to play the mod. I also don't find much difference in the skill of the average host between vanilla and seamless, the main difference made is in MUCH better latency and better balance (invaders have access to rune arcs, full flasks, torrent, spirit summons etc.).
@@PseudoNym13 This has been my basic assumption as well. The reason why I'm not 100% convinced is that the ini file is being edited for the password, right? So players know enough about that. Otherwise everyone would be entering random sessions, which, to my understanding, is not a thing. But I didn't spend more than a few minutes testing that. Perhaps the 0/1 invasion values are confusing to typical PC users? I dunno, that might be possible, even though it's on the mod page, together with all the other info. I have invaded some solo people at graces, which I also speculate are players having trouble connecting, so maybe this relates to lack of knowledge about the ini file.
I also did not spot any info on spawn frequency and, using the ini file to show levels, I also find that the matchmaking is iffy, with my character very often being slightly above host level, though this might be happening more often at vanilla than we might think as well. There's probably info on this on the discord, I'm guessing.
And yes, an invader is way more dangerous in seamless. They go in with full heals and a rune arc - this means that every typical group either frame traps the invader for a kill or they likely lose a battle of attrition against a player with superior knowledge, particularly when it comes to unexpected hardswaps.
I like the 1 V 3 in invasions. Its fun. As an invader I think you having the disadvantage is a good thing. Because of the premise of it. Its opening the gate to allow assistance in that allows the invader to come, so its always gonna be at minimum a 1 v 2. I agree about the taunters tongue because i loved setting up scenes for invaders where i was like some bad ass boss sitting on a throne or at the end of a large bridge. Like yeah. Im the boss now. So they def need to fix to taunters tongue. And i actually like the colleseum but something about duels at raya lucaria that had some sort of difference to it that i miss doing that now. But that might of just been the moment itself and not just the gameplay.
As an invader you've always been at a disadvantage (since ds2) elden ring has taken it simply too far so now neither side is actually enjoying it
I'm a solo indie dev working on a game with combat inspired by the souls games, and one of the biggest roadblocks I have for pvp has been the monetary cost for supporting it. It's obviously not the only reason why we don't see a lot of games do Fromsoft style pvp,but it's likely a major one.
That's an interesting perspective. Is the cost mostly centered around server costs or just the development time to implement and maintain a P2P networking system? I don't know much about game development but have gotten a strong impression doing what FromSoft does, however jank, isn't exactly easy.
@@emotionaljonxvx it's both, though it depends on the team,it's not easy to implement multiplayer, and multiplayer drastically increases the difficulty of development, and pvp more so (accurate replication and cheating become even bigger deals), but I know for me the cost of servers for the matchmaking aspect is the main issue (since I have friends and other projects I'm on to copy notes from 😅)
Lies of P went the Sekiro route without multiplayer, and it is a fantastic game one of the best I've played last year. Lords of The Fallen kinda sucks, but some people love it.
You mean it doesn't have multiplayer
Sure! Bring her up ❤
I disagree after the numerous improvements they made in the past year the game is actually way better than eldenring in some ways like customization/fashion, seamless coop, actually really good and fun pvp, and in my opinion more creative and fun magic system.
Don't even know why they bothered adding Multiplayer in Lords of The Fallen, it's just broken to the point of being unplayable. Anyone who claims to enjoy that is coping, it's essentially non functional with more than one opponent.
Agreed 100%, just GET. OVER. IT. Elden ring pvp has it's problems, we need people to talk about it. EVERYONE BY NOW TALKED ABOUT IT. It's becoming exhausting to listen to the same video over and over. Every elden ring content creator has talked about elden ring multiplayer problems from day 1 and the point everyone makes it's always the same. Everyone who needed to get the message got it by now, the game it's 2 years old. Getting over it it's not a matter of ignoring the games problems, it's a matter of self respect. It's becoming impossible not to accuse you of yapping.
I'm glad emotional jon has a very helpful outlet to process his emotions
As someone with thousands of hours in every single soulsborne game thanks entirely to invasions/pvp, they had the opportunity to take the multiplayer experience, which they refined in DS3, to a whole new level. And instead they just...didn't? I can't even wrap my head around it either. I stopped playing for nearly 2 years and came back recently to PVP related bugs that have existed since launch. They have been releasing frequent patches as of the DLC release which is great and all, but I can't help but feel it's too little too late. With the insane success of ER, the game should have had this level of support years ago.
Souls multiplayer peaked in DS3.
With enough time and quantity critique becomes just whining. Willingly submitting yourself to garbage and then whining about it just a bad look, and the argument "there's nothing else like it" just makes this even more stupid, like - "This pile of poop is very bad but the other piles of poop are even worse so I would rather eat this pile of poop".
"It's very bad, I will continue to play it and tell you how bad it is". Bro we know its bad, that's why we don't play it. This whole thing could be summarized to - Bad netcode, bad matchmaking, bad implementation, old and restrictive engine, all around toxic experience on both ends, if you are still playing it for some reason and not even having fun doing it then rethink your life choices.
Now that elden ring PvP is bad and theyre not gonna make another souls game in a few years I have nothing else to do with this series I've poured thousands of hours in. I shouldve just chosen to get good at shooter games like everybody else
That’s one of the biggest curses in the world. Being good at something completely useless.
i play pvp in dark souls 3 every day like a ganker you are the ones who have so little patience to wait 5 minutes to find a match that has the potential to last 30 minutes or more 😂 and dark souls 3 as always is the best in its class There is a lot more activity than elden ring and you guys should stop complaining and go back to dark souls 3 if you miss better pvp so much ...
@@2HandHangerDunksOnlyhaha yeah He says it as if he were a superior human for being good at pvp
@@ismaellucas960 bro you really need to check your ego goddamn. I bet youre really, REALLY fun at parties
@@2HandHangerDunksOnlyUseless? If you’re not playing PvP for fun you’re wasting your time. Only 0.0001% of players will ever become good enough at multiplayer games to make money off them.
The reason the multiplayer is terrible is because the developers are led by a man who has, with each iteration of the mechanic, opted for sacrificing the enjoyment factor of this aspect of the games in favor of some nebulous artistic ideal.
FromSoft either can't see or doesn't want to accept that their invasion mechanic has failed and needs to either be redesigned or scrapped altogether.
The co-op also suffers due to their refusal to update their netcode and stop thinking of co-op as this separate game mode you can just turn on and off whenevery THEY feel like you should be allowed to have it.
Invasions haven't failed, they have failed invasions. What are you on about.
@lususnaturae881 Weird pedantic nonsense. The devs failing to make the mechanic good is the same as the mechanic itself failing. I'd ask what you're on about, but you likely wouldn't be able to explain coherently.
Do like G9, put together a video to Bandi Namco and have it transcribed/translated to Japanese. There's evidence it has worked in the past. G9 is finishing one now. Not just a video, a thought out letter too. The more interest they see the better. The combat fixes down to the exact code change are often included. It should be easy to implement if they actually know what we want. Make sure you guys pretty much agree with what needs changing so they're not confused. Pretty sure we're all on the same page though.
I'd be fine if the system was like... 1 host + 1 cooperator = 1 invader, and 1 host + 2 cooperators = 2 invaders.
Dark souls invasions were so much better both from an invader pov as well as a consumer of pvp content on youtube/twitch.
And ive always hated the ash if war system. In dark souls you could see someone using a weapon and know what it could do. In Elden Ring its like "okay he has a greatsword... Aaaaand hes shooting lasers".
I've been playing over and over since launch and I only go online to do the invasions for Varre, then I'm back offline for the rest of the game. I don't even want to see ghosts, blood stains, or messages.
I have no desire to play co-op, PvP, or invade/defend. I'm a collector, not a competitor. I need actual rewards to motivate me, not my skills, build, or internet speed being better than some random. I'd play co-op and PvP all day to grind some new items, but not just to run around fighting nobodies for nothing.
You can do that quest offline. There's an NPC invasion in Altus Plateau for the Varre quest.
@@ricklubbers1526 I know, but it's faster to do three invasions right away than get all the way to the summon. I've also been playing since launch, so I've always just invaded as soon as I get the fingers. It was ingrained before the patch added him. Lol
The main complaint I have with elden ring PvP is the fact you must opt into invasions as a solo host. 1v1’s are the best fights imo especially considering the amount of AOE bs you see in 1v3’s. I’m also sick of level 100+ invasions in general, since a majority of the time I’m thrown into a blender where the only realistic chance I’d have of winning is creating a build with either near one-shot potential or using a very meta build. In DS3 I was able to use a lot of mediocre weapons and still see general success invading since my chances of catching a 1v1 or even 2v2-3 were far higher. Meanwhile in Elden ring it’s about a 90 percent chance you’re invading a 3 man party as a solo invader. It got dull real quick
Covenants would solve that issue, most of the game you can't be invaded solo but there would be some areas that have invaders or maybe even a player boss like in DeS and DS3.
Counterpoint regarding the critique about opt-out of seamless: Bloodborne was technically opt-out as well, and yet, that still worked, its main negative factors being the nonexistent game balance coming from bloodgems, the absolute wack matchmaking(literally can't find a friend using the same password for 10+ minutes) and the lack of almost any criteria to finding hosts to invade other than player level.
Put some trust in the opt-out system, besides, there's plenty of players who don't read the txt and fail to realize they have an opt-out option lmao
I thought dlc would have me playing for atleast another year.. nope I'm actually thinking about putting this game to the side
I tried invade on lv 35 character on the other day. All I got is dual curved sword and I met with someone who has DLC weapon and 1-shot me/ met with gank of 3 people using taunter's tongue sit and wait to gank with all the spells and incantations. I was like ok now im really done. no more invasion.
I question the people that think this is a worthwhile endeavor to begin with. If someone's idea of fun is going around ruining someone's else fun(while minding their own business) then they oughta be met with a gang. Basically saying "Something terrible happened to me while I was attempting to do something terrible to someone else. Shame on them". I don't see the problem ha. Imagine doing this in the real world. Run up on somebody and start a fight for no reason. You'll probably get jumped then too.
@@The_Gamers_Gamer Invading isn't exactly about ruining peoples fun. If my goal was to ruin your fun I would just chainsaw glitch every fight or do some glitch that bricks your console/pc. I'm trying to have fun myself and sort of roleplay as an obstacle/mini boss that the players must overcome, but all multiplayer should seek to be balanced, even if the teams in it are somewhat asymmetrical. If you have ever played or looked at left 4 dead 2 multiplayer, there is a mode where you get to play as the 'special infected' and hunt down the main players stopping them from progressing through the level. Invasions are a similar concept, its somewhat asymmetrical multiplayer, but that doesn't mean it shouldn't be balanced to ensure fair play. One team is trying to get to the end of the level and safe zone, or in ER's case the boss room, and the other team is trying to stop or hinder their progress with the help of the games mobs. I think you are overly hostile towards invaders and misunderstand the motivation to invade, we aren't trying to ruin your whole day we are just enjoying a unique asymmetrical multiplayer experience that isn't offered very much elsewhere.
Sadly, I nearly abandoned ER multiplayer at this point. Arena is boring and invasions are ass due to the many reasons already discussed to death by everyone. I only log in once in a while, do some PvP, then realize how little fun Im having and then I go back to my other games. As you said, ER just doesnt hit the sweetspot like DS3 did in its prime. I sometimes come back to DS3 and its still great but since everyone is playing ER now, it just isnt the same if that makes sense. Personally I think ER will stay the way it is and not improve multiplayer at all since that would require a major rework of basicly all systems in place with a ton of new major content needed to bring it on par with previous titles if that is even possible at this point. I hope Im wrong but I dont think I am ... its really frustrating to see them literally evolve backwards when it comes to multiplayer.
I disagree I think lords of the fallen definitely meets the bar when it comes to achieving the balance of immersive and fun single player and really fun and good multi-player and pvp. The only thing it's really missing is an arena and having higher player limit because right now it only has 3 people per world
The only thing it’s missing is good net code. Somehow the online latency in LOTF is worse than in Elden Ring.
@crackededge9351 it's actually alot better now because they have added a few updates that drastically improved the online stability for invading
What you want is a fighting game. That’s it. Years ago you max upgraded a weapon in a souls game for the first time and two shot another player. You’ve been chasing that rush ever since. It’s not happening again
It’s not yapping, it’s just dedication to the topic. We (all dedicated people to the topic) all feel this way. I personally (kinda like you) am trying other fromsoft games now that ER kinda failed me. I’d love to see invasions from other games than ER while we wait for stuff to change.
8:02 It's all fractured as you mentioned. True enough Ranni in the story trailer says it. "And so, we inhabit a fractured world." It's too poetic.
Since there are no covenants in ER like in DS3, I opted to farming enemy armors and weapons. I would roleplay as the NPC enemies of that particular area I'm invading, even changing the name to the appropriate enemy type, 'Divine Beast' etc.
Edit: But it got me thinking, we do have a purpose to invade. Bloody Finger comes from Varre, he wants to make a Pureblood Knight out of the Tarnished. Recusant Finger meanwhile comes from joining Volcano Manor. These two are technically 'covenants' without the unique rewards.
I have edited this comment because this man no longer deserves my engagement or respect.
ER was my first, so I don't "get" it. I understand Co-op and PvP. Play with people or against people. I don't understand why invasions are necessary. I get that people enjoy the randomness and competition, but it doesn't make sense to outsiders. Most other multiplayer games didn't have uninvited intruders to spice things up.
I don't think it enhanced or expanded the base game at all. Varres quest just feels like an annoying task I have to do to progress and not a fun and exciting game mode. Volcano Manor didn't make sense, I have to go to a specific location and travel through time and space to kill someone? Why bother if they're not even on our world or timeline? All of the contracts could've just been there, or put them behind a fog wall.
Even the in game invasions don't make sense. I'm playing offline, so why am I getting invaded by Nerijus 10 minutes after I start the game? Why do I meet Edgar in the flesh twice, but he has to teleport in from another world to attack me. Same thing with Varre, talk to and interact with him multiple times, but I have to go to another dimension to kill him later. It just feels like it was shoehorned into the base game to make people aware of multiplayer.
@@WyattStrange I understand it now, but for non Dark Souls players, that's so different than average multiplayer. I would totally grind all of multiplayer to get covenant specific items, coliseums specific items, I'd co-op, invade, help co-opers and help invaders until I had everything, but I'd probably just go play with it all offline once I got it. I've been playing almost non-stop for two and a half years and 99% of it has been offline, single player. I just don't care about fighting randoms. I don't really play any other online or multiplayer games, so I don't get the appeal of queuing over and over again, when I can just go kill stuff non-stop.
@@WyattStrange I get that. It is definitely unique. I appreciate that multiplayer is what keeps Fromsoft games alive after launch, and I do hope they continue to improve it, even if I'll never or very rarely use it.
@@WyattStrangeSouls games would be much more fun if both invasions and co-op were equally balanced. If you have co-op teammates throughout the whole game, you should have an equal number of invaders to balance it out. 3v1 is pure babysitting 😂 blues should be completely replaced with mad phantoms at this point. It’s easier than ever to find a co-op partner to play through the entire game with, making blues a tool for ganking only.
Ds3 invasions mean a lot to me, I spent a lot of time making lore characters and builds and invading certain areas. the chaos was always so exciting, denying blues their precious concord or the insane player counts. really depressing to see the state er’s multiplayer is in but I appreciate videos like these and the community’s dedication, keep expressing that love for an underrated system, hopefully something will come of it
Ive got maybe 400-500 invasions in seamless now and Id say that due to it not having a taunters tongue it is less toxic. The skill level is also alot lower. I win more than 90% of invasions there as opposed to less than 50%(probably alot less) in vanilla meta level range. In reality putting down clueless pveers gets old fast, but its still better than constantly facing toxic ganks. Plus pokemon battles are fun too. I think that what seamless needs is an arena for the pveers to practice pvp (also it would be nice for everyone because of better latency) and a less toxic version of taunters tongue.
Spirit summons in open world is the thing I like most about seamless. Idk why that isn't a thing in the base game, blocking them in multiplayers serves no purpose.
@@anitaremenarova6662 Indeed, its fun to see how different ashes fare against different enemies and if you have a buddy or get an invader, against other ashes and also how different ashes can help differently in different legacy dungeons against invaders. In overworld in my opinion your best chance would probably be the mimic tear, with equipment slots stacked with buffs, consumables and other stuff, weapons with bleed or/and hyper armour or staff and/or seal with having equiped ranged aoe and targeted spells and incantations. These are the hardest and most cancerous to deal with when already fighting multiple opponents. I speak from having personal experience of having to suffer through some of these instances. I once faced a 4 man team who all called out mimics who were stacking buffs on top of buffs, and slinging so many hefty pots that i couldnt even see them needless to say it was the most cancerous and unwinnable fight I had ever fought in any version of elden ring, so please dont over do it.
Very understandable and well thought out. I haven't engaged with fromsoft multiplayer since ds3 for most of the reasons you said over several of your videos, but was also thinking about trying seamless co op. Btw, have you talked to to or heard any opinions from other PvP content creators like yourself? Do they share most of tour concerns? I've watched like 2 steelvosky vids where he was reacting to your content like right away.
I think most PVP-focused creators are on the same page. I’m in more-or-less direct contact with a number of smaller creators through a couple discords, and I’ve had good interactions with some larger creator. The issues are pretty universal in my mind, and while everyone might have their own way of wanting them solved, the sentiment seems to be united. At least, from my perspective.
I think in Elden Ring they stripped back many aspects to go ham on boss difficulty.
Like the levels in Elden ring, while really fun are also really simple. Barely any interesting enemy setups. Just some tough enemies.
They removed solo host invasions to reduce the stress on solo hosts. They did everything to ensure that every aspect except the boss fights were easier.
Honestly my PvE goto is Elden Ring, so I do some rare PvP, but I sometimes play DS purely for PvE.
I finally have come to the conclusion that the only winning move is just not playing. After SOTE ruined the pvp, i have uninstalled and gone back to dank souls 3 for that pvp itch.
Good done dude
This guy gets it. Pvp has deteriorated a substantial amount. It used to be a central and integral part of the game. Honestly I feel it's one of the big things that catapult the series to where it is today. Now it feels like an afterthought. It's cultivated a weird culture of "don't interrupt our chill session" instead of, "this is just a part of the game" and it sucks. It's not without any positive though. When every match is a 3 v 1 spam fest you get petty good but God this feels like a shell of what they had started to build :/ especially with all the lore they have, WHY ARE THERE NO COVENANTS?! LIKE, HELLO?? Still, I hope they give pvp more love and care in the next title. Great video dude.
Yeah so many factions in lore and no covenants just feels like purposeful sabotage to pvp.
3:43 OH THANK GOD
That was the most frustrating fight I have ever witnessed lmao
You have perfectly encapsulated my issues with the multiplayer. As much as I say there's places to take my time and business, I have to admit the game is entirely irreplaceable. Which is why it is so frustrating that FS just ignore/neglect their game's long term lifeline (at least imo).
I can't replace the game or franchise, but ultimately for me, breaks are gonna be necessary with this game. Which isn't entirely new to me, taking breaks from these games is something I have done a bit to prevent being totally burned out. But I feel more compelled take breaks on this one more often than I did with the previous titles.
For me I think it's due to the way build making is now with the minimal payoffs for risks taken (looking at you Arteria Leaf and similar items), and how time consuming it is to gather every component of your build and then put everything together.
It genuinely is not much less time consuming than certain MMO grinds I've subjected myself to in the past.
It sucks because I enjoy these games and I really want to enjoy elden ring more, but it feels like they either aren't hungry enough anymore, or perhaps their hunger has blinded them and clouded their judgment.
I mean, it makes sense from a business standpoint. They don't gain anything by ensuring a consistent playerbase, all you need to do is buy the game or DLC once.
To break the negativity streak, perhaps some invasions in a previous game you actually enjoy? People say all the time that the other games remain active, and I personally can confirm that DS3 is active across midlevel.
Maybe you could talk about the mechanics and builds you like from the previous games so you don’t pigeonhole yourself as just being here to rehash ER complaints we’ve heard since 2022. That sounds a bit harsh now that I’ve written it out but I mean no ill will. ER disappointed me as well but it’s also just not very interesting or healthy to hyperfixate on a game you don’t even like very much, a la Jeenine.
At the very least I’m glad you’re trying Seamless and will hopefully have a good experience that you can focus on instead of what we got in the base game.
👁️
Thanks for making these vids and giving us a voice Jon. I feel bad for all the new elden ring players that never got to experience the old multiplayer formula. They literally have no idea what they missed out on. The culture of Dark Souls era pvp and the community was incredible. You really had to be there. So many great times and memories. So many great creators made their debut and became talking heads for the community. And now they are dead by daylight streamersor have moved on entirely, because of ER and its barebones multiplayer features.
I think you'll enjoy invading on the Seamless Coop mod. If what I'm led to believe is correct, the way the matchmaking works is when you invade, you get sent to a party that has a player that is at your rune/soul level. For example, I invade at lvl 95, If the party I invade has a host at 85 and a cooperator at 95 then I'll be matchmade against them because the party member with the highest level matches my own. It'll make it impossible to go against a party with an overleveled phantom (If I'm right, correct me anyone if I'm wrong). I don't believe it takes into account the weapon upgrade level, but I've been having fun the past week invading.
Anyone okay with ER multiplayer has simply not experienced previous souls games, they *DOWNGRADED* so much from DS3 it's unreal. Not innovating is one thing but they quite literally went backwards and actively made the experience much worse both for open world and arena.
I’m not an native English speaker and I watch your clips to improve my vocabulary. Thanks, I like your content very much!! ♡
Hey so I've been watching your channel quite a bit lately. I'm not gonna fake it I am absolutely in the camp of I don't like invasions it is not for me, but I understand why you and other people like it. I have played since Dark Souls 1 and have played every game since Demon Souls, The Dark Souls Trilogy, Bloodborne, and Elden Ring. Dark Souls 1 I did one invasion was confused, and that was it. Dark Souls 2 and 3 I had done many invasions and a lot of getting invaded with Dark Souls 3 being the most I ever spent on invasion, and I'll admit it was Scott Jund who got me to give invasions and allow invasions on. I stuck with it for hundreds of hours, but ultimately in the end I just didn't care for it. My view was invasion mechanic is here to stay, and I'll deal with whatever it throws my way.
I came across some of your videos, and listened to your points. I still do not like invasions, but do see why you and other people in your comments like it. I then began to ask why Fromsoft/Miyazaki continue to sideline Invasions from game to game, and especially in Elden Ring. PURE SPECULATION on my part, but I think it's a dichotomy between what a player thinks is a good invasion and what Miyazaki had always wanted invasions to be. Brining up his original quote,
"my vision of invasions wasn't to introduce player killing - its more akin to a strong enemy, being controlled by a human. That's the vision I wanted to achieve. If there wasn't the system message pop up that said a dark spirit has invaded, the game-play experience should be similar to an offline single player game with a very strong enemy popping up randomly. They don't speak, it could be perhaps a very smart AI. That was the vision. What I wanted to create was not a PvP match, but fearsome enemies roaming the world." Miyazaki qoute from some redditor name DL1943 (Seems legit and what I remember).
I genuinely speculate that in Demon Souls or even Dark Souls 1 the invasion mechanic would have been if they could iron out all the bumps and edges allowing the invader to control an enemy. The issue is mapping and animating inputs to not make controlling an enemy utterly jank, so the best thing they did was simple allow player control of their character while invading. It's simpler the mechanics are already there, and the lack of foresight to twinking or any invader gimmick would have been caught in basic testing had they truly invested in the player invader mechanic. Dark Souls 2 was pretty much not worked on by Miyazaki, but the consistent invader update in 2, 3 and Elden Ring has always been focus on the arena something that encourages the removal of player player killing to a separate game mode. By Dark Souls 2 and even 3 the invasion mechanic had been pretty much set into stone so they reiterate on it while trying to stay true to the original vision which was just to keep nerfing the invader till essentially where they are now in Elden Ring at their weakest state. Just some crackpot theory I find compelling.
Either way while again I still do no like invasions I respect your fervor for it, and Fromsoft continuing to ignore invasions will result in the souls like series by Fromsoft losing a unique part of it that has been there from the beginning.
You've got the reasons for invasions down, yeah. They want you to suffer and have a bad time so that the Host gets an enhanced experience. They're outsourcing their invasion AI to players and then hamstringing them. It's complete garbage. Either remove them or give players an opt-out setting and give them more offline NPC invasions to compensate.
@@anthonypedraza3017 Delusional cope 😂
@@hoked2194 In what way? Do you even know what it is you're responding to? Must be one of those dudes I hear who's just unreasonably hostile to people for no reason. Sup there mister Unicorn. Nice to finally meet one of you out in the wild.
That is an interesting quote, but it does not paint the entire picture for the intentions of invasions nor multiplayer by extension. _I have also heard that some of the meaning has been lost in translation too, but until we can find the original quote it will be hard to verify._ Back in 2010, Eurogamer published their interview with Hidetaka Miyazaki under an article called "Souls Survivor". After detailing how a real life experience with transient interactions inspired the transient nature of multiplayer, Miyazaki stated the following:
_"It's a simple concept. But you don't know whom you will meet. Maybe the next person will be an enemy. That kind of encounter forms part of the larger storyline. There are constant surprises... the blue phantom that's helped you get through an area might, out of nowhere, turn into a black phantom that will kill you just as you're almost clear. Demon's Souls isn't like other RPGs. We've made a different storyline for every player. That's what the network's for; that's what the phantoms are."_
_"We made a game where rather than [giving players] a simple Game Over, we make them come back to an ephemeral existence as a phantom with less health, and this encourages people to co-operate in multiplayer. A darker existence as a Black Phantom has an even stronger incentive. Because you can both co-operate and aggravate through the unique multiplayer system, even if 100 players are role-playing, they will all have different experiences. Whether you behave as friend or foe is down to a person's character."_
Here it is clear that invaders (and co-operators) were never meant to simply be just another high level enemy (nor ally). They are each players with their own story, all role-playing with uniquely different experiences. This is the original vision, and this is what drew me and likely many players such as myself in.
@@SV-X Huh, thanks for the clarification, that makes me think (Give me some leeway here I'm on very few hours of sleep I got 2 days before a major med school exam so studying all I can on very few hours of sleep).
So I watched Illusionary Wall, and he does a lot of in-depth game mechanic analysis. My only issue with what you explained is wouldn't it be incredibly easy to achieve that goal? Like if the goal was to make invaders and summons players with their own stories that can be friend or foe at any given moment with you left to wonder... then just remove summons, make only invaders, allow invaders to attack the mobs, but also reward invaders for killing the host or helping the host kill the boss.
Like is my two hours of sleep making me simplify things too much, or is this not a perfect way to accomplish that goal. You can have someone invade with goals you are unsure of help you through the entire level defeating enemies, and then proceed to backstab murder you right before you enter the boss room? Something like the mound makers.
It would give players who grew to hate their host an opportunity to kill them for their cowardice or their interference with a dual against another questionable invader. Heck to a new player it might make them think you had some hidden lore beef with the other character that invaded. Honestly this just sounds so cool.
Was doing a dual weilding Banished knight cosplay and decided to try out colleseum. Girst thing I encountered was a player with a running attack meta build that I couldn't punish because of how they've kep greatswords at the same slow pace as DS1. Never trying PvP again, when I beat the game again i'm going to let this game go and go back to DS3, DS2, and D1. The ER fans love to advocate colleseum as a way to silence criticism of invasions, but colleseum is both not as immersive, and even more unbearable.
I just decided to replay ds3 and i must say it is definitely better than Elden ring
Have you tried mp? Is it active?
This might be a good thing to do
@@DreyfusLagoon i play pvp in dark souls 3 every day like a ganker you are the ones who have so little patience to wait 5 minutes to find a match that has the potential to last 30 minutes or more 😂 and dark souls 3 as always is the best in its class There is a lot more activity than elden ring and you guys should stop complaining and go back to dark souls 3 if you miss better pvp so much ...
@@ismaellucas960 dude I’m not complaining it’s a genuine question. I’m wondering if I should pivot back to ds3 but I don’t want to do it if the mp isn’t super active.
yeah the pvp is way better, but the game itself is probably their worst.
about pvp as a ds3 player and a normal skilled invader when the ER first came out it was disappointing how unbalanced the pvp was but now looking back at it I changed my mind
it was okay for ER pvp to be messy as it was along the spirit of game and sprit of adventuring
yes they should fix gliches and bugs but since they tried to fix the pvp and dropping the 1.0.9 patch that changed everything, ER pvp is in a limbo
ds3 pvp was technical and calculated, a glorious rock paper scissors that work beautifully, but trying to mimic in ER, a game fundamentally different in both spirit and mechanics has put ER in weird spot
now elden ring pvp is not that technical to try hone your skills as much as you can, nor it is that "anime" so you won't take it that seriously when you win or lose
I completely understand your frustration. Elden is my first true entry into the souls series (not my first souls like tho that would sekiro which is the reason i event started playing elden ring). The depth of customization is breath taking you can almost build anything, the one flaw i do feel you can clearly tell it wasnt built for multiplayer, multiplayer is just an add on. Honestly some of the choices just seem questionable. There is literally no real reason to ever pvp none zero giltch nada and dont tell me you can get rune arcs because honestly those inconsequential at best. You can't share equipment between your own characters which makes building a whole new character and trying a different build just a completely tideous event. Crafting is tideous which is fine during the main story but ive beaten the story why cant i purchase stuff with runes like i cant for 4 of bolouses. There are so many of the design choices that honestly i have to question because its like they are intentionally trying to frustrate me.
There's also another thing sorry for this being so long but it's just been on my chest. Recently there was a twitch rivals tournament for ER great showmanship of skill between content creators. The only issue is 90% of them were wearing the samething. This is just a not pick of mine but honestly its like watching a street fighter tournament and every picked RYU or something. There was no variation and I'm not blaming them the truth is there can be no variation in pvp if you don't have poise you're gonna get wrecked. Now I'm not saying poise is a bad system no, what I am saying is that if you wanna be competitive you have no real choice in armor you'll lose a lot of you go for fashion. Why can't there be an overlay, maybe they want your armor to convey exactly what your stat def and poise are to the enemy (I doubt it since this is mostly a single player game I don't think they thought that far ahead). Why can't their be a real alter system that can change the colors to colors that already exist in the world or have apre approved list. Or why can't there be a talisman that gives you the weight of a bull goat and poise of bullgoat but not the def stats. Sigh there's so many ways they could go but it's just bitter disappointment over and over again the more I think about it.
Jon, i think this is as good as its gonna get.
Miyazaki was asked if ER was his ideal RPG, and said "its close".. Now i think he's being meticulous, in order to avoid hurting sales of potential games.
But i think this really is it for him.
ER is a monster of game that took a very long time to develop. I think he put all of his chips in here.
However, for them not to implement all of DS3's recipe into the pvp, leaves a lore gap in the mystery behind where they stand on their multiplayer experience. And the DLC makes this more clear now than it was at release.
So many of the ashes and weapons are over-the top busted.. This shows a lack, to zero play testing of atleast this element of the game.
Steelovsky said in one of his react video towards yours: "i think there is a communication issue"..
There is no way to directly contact Fromsoft. Theyre not leaving open a direct line for feedback.
I dont know what to say. I tjink this shows they are now minimally imterested
Elden ring without latency extending the range of the other's attacks would be a dream, then I can finally play around spacing and have time to punish without their early I-frames kicking in.
Jesus Christ I just said to myself ‘I wonder if emotional Jon has a new video out’
I wonder how devs feel when a multiplayer mod does most of the work for you.
I figured if I’d just block every host doing scumlord stuff then the pvp would actually be enjoyable; I was right. Though having to block 40+ first step hankers and colosseum int/arc gank wizards a day is annoying, it helps view the pvp more positively. Currently, only problems I run into ego wise is blood/poison Guts CS teabagging cause they swapped 4 variations of the same weapon in a 3 minute altercation.
Good emotional video Jonh, I am always happy to see that you uploaded a new video I always watch it as soon as possible because I really like the pvp of dark souls 3 and I play it every day the whole day is active, but only for that reason I watch your videos (sometimes even repeated, I watch them several times) I like the pvp of dark souls 3 so much that I watch your videos even though I don't play elden ring haha, your reflections only make me more grateful for what I have in dark souls 3... 🤭
I'll start by saying that I'm terrible at English, if there are horrible mistakes I apologize in advance. I couldn't agree more with what you say, but I would like to add one thing. I come from a very long experience of great commitment on the competitive side in souls, mainly on ds2, which in terms of competitive aspect was the most refined title in terms of game mechanics. ds2 is so well built, with the possibility of canceling animations and a series of other aspects, that it inserted a seed of ambition and imagination in me many years ago. this fantasy is the idea of sooner or later seeing a more professional aspect starting from that gaming base, such as competitive. I'm talking about eSports, starting from the Souls game formula. a type of game that does not exist in any way on the eSoprts side, but which would have everything it takes to become one. obviously I know that the from titles are designed for a pve aspect, but I think the level was high enough to allow this fantasy for some fans like me. the hope I have, as mentioned in the video, is that a development house outside of from can create something refined enough, starting from this base, to give birth to a game category of this kind (elden souls try hard online) ahahaah, or something like that, I say this because I would like it to be something more discussed within the community and I wanted to know other people's opinions on the matter, sorry again for the terrible English, I helped myself with Google Translate 😳
I don’t understand the need or desire to play a single player game with other others. Keep worrying about that and watch the souls series go further down the tubes. Especially the PvP.
If a host already has a phantom and they aren’t using taunters tongue, there should be 2 invaders and no blues. If they’re using taunters tongue then a blue should help the host and 2 invaders can join. Am i wrong?
i feel like the next gen souls game is gonna be
1. og dark souls world/level design
2. bloodborne equipment/magic variety
3. changeable ashes of war, modifiable armor, crafting
4. guard counters, quicksteps, other shit to reward aggressive playstyle
Elden ring's pve feels like a jack of all traits master of none. We have a shitton of stuff, but the stuff isnt that good aside from a couple.
Elden ring's pvp feels the same in a way. It's going onto so many directions but all of the directions are meh. It has big movement, slow combat, fast combat, anime covershooter stuff, and so on. But the things between those arent flashed out. The movement feels floaty and weird most the time, slow combat is too slow compared to fast combat, anime covershooter insane shit isnt working out and is too easy to play, and the balance is atrocious even now. I think if fromsoft or namco would have playtesters that actually play the pvp like oroboro or fighting cowboy (which we know they invited to previous events like AC6 or SoTE).
I'd also wanna see how from would make a pure pvp focused game
Yeah I hate how for a long time there was a bug where summon signs could just lock you in an area and make you unable to do anything else but summon. And of course the invasion system being so one-sided most the time with nearly everyone having op dlc gear at level 40.
Yes! Finally someone who gets me! This vídeo was a treat not gonna lie...
Everything made sense etc. Although I'm a little confused with the DS3 take, I remember Albino put out a scathing critique of it in 2016 comparing it to ds2. I thought ds2 was considered the pinnacle of DS MP.
To this day I am getting more invasions in Dark Souls 3 than Elden Ring. 💀
same. more activity somehow on semaless or ds3
Dealing with the crap netcode in colosseum duels is already starting to get to me again, I'm thinking I might try making a new character on seamless co-op and trying out invasions and being invaded while solo, should make for an interesting experience
I believe once fromsoft realised ER was going to be mainstream they cut the covenants, removed online items and toned down invasions by reducing the player limit because so many more people would be complaining about invasions as well as the difficulty of the game in general.
I so wish fromsoft would do anything to improve invasions or even the arena that's been abandoned, but it seems to be set in stone now. Maybe improved pvp in bloodborne remake?
Only did invsions to do varre's quest. Had a lightening infused heavy weapon,the omen cleaver I think, that could 3 shot other players till I came to a mage type character. He was killing invaders with ease, took almost no damage from hits, seemed to have infinite potions, could outsprint you. No intention of doing pvp again - it is bull.
I disliked the pvp in this game since day 1. The desyncing issues on release killed my interest in it on day one and then the lack of improvements further buried any interest. I tried the arena for a week and got bored quickly. I've been pvping in these games since 2009 and Elden Ring is worse than Demon's Souls (due to the fact that among many things, Demons Souls was still novel, invasions were a brand new concept and there was no established meta level so fight clubs and duels could be found at all levels.)
I held out hope that they would add covenants and larger match making in SotE, but it just seems they're not interested in continuing pvp in these games anymore. On the plus side, I do still enjoy the co-op in short bursts, but because you don't get to traverse a lot of the game with other players and you pretty much just fight bosses, I get bored after a little while. This is especially so at meta level, you just fight the same handful of bosses over and over. Demons Souls, Dark Souls, and Bloodborne were overall better online experiences
i just think the lag is unbearable
The situation saddens me because all of the combat system is based of the idea that the player will 1v1 a single opponent. That’s why few double bosses are ever celebrated, and why complaints of enemy spam are so common. It becomes so very exciting when that one opponent is also a player. Throw in some incentive rewards and now I’m hooked
“It is what it is “never hurt sm.I feel you Jon.
But to be honest I just keep having wishful thinking and that these hard times will only make me a better player if I can adapt
Let's just pray they brought pvp back in nioh 3
this netcode in 2024 is not it
Now that elden ring is 2 years old and everyone has gotten to play the dlc, its time to preserve the longevity of the game, aka, 6 player limits and solo invasions. They know damn well everyone wants this. They can literally keep elden ring alive for YEARS just by implementing this
I mean, its true, the older games are OK to go back to for muliplayer dude. Accept that you can play them and have fun. I still play ds2 multiplayer and theres a reason theres till thousands playing
ER was a letdown for me and my friends. We buy Fromsoft games due to the multiplayer part of it and ER was a downgrade from DkS 2 and 3.
Well I'm glad someone is making multiplayer complaints vids like these otherwise FS would think the game in this current state is a monumental success and won't even think to improve the lackluster multiplayer experience. The reason I bought ER+DLC IS NOT FOR THE PVE experience I bought it only for the soul-like multiplayer experience which till this day remains unique to soul-like games made from FromSoft. The first disappointing thing I noticed about the game after I beat it was the dismal multiplayer experience without covenants and a very disappointing 4 player online limit. Before I purchased the game last year I read how great the game was from reviews and was expecting a fantastic multiplayer experience with covenants and a 6-8 player online limit. But unfortunately to my dismay I found myself getting bored of ER lackluster PVP experience unlike it's DS3 predecessor that I quit playing the game and start playing other games. I still held onto hope that the DLC would address these issues with multiplayer but once again I'm disappointed in FS laziness in regards to ER multiplayer design. If the game's multiplayer design really does end up like this indefinitely then this would be the last multiplayer game I purchase from FromSoft.
While I disagree with the idea that DS3 lacked identity, I can definitely understand the conclusion since its identity was contextual. But damn was multiplayer so much fun in a vacuum as much as in stark comparison.
Dark Souls 3 PVP beats the hell out of Elden Ring PVP in every way to where even the net code is leagues beyond Elden Rings somehow.
Maybe it's time for a community ds3 gank/fight club event so more people can understand what we are missing
mostly I dabble in a bit of pvp and I continue playing in the context of increasingly challenging pve runs. my last most realistic hope for pvp in this series is better designed arenas. I totally agree, I think there is a big opportunity out there for a publisher who can refine the pvp in a souls like series. The asymmetrical chaos and dread of invasions is a unique and captivating experience. Elden ring was a great game but when I play I also can't help but feel remorse for what it might have been. I personally do like that it was open world, but I just feel like not all areas got the same level of attention and love that limgrave got. Limgrave to me is still the best area in the game, even after the dlc unfortunately.
took like 6 minuets to finally ask the question from the title lol
Jon you are our elden ring pvp flagship. We need you to tell them they need to do better
I was so ready for this to be another video of a toxic invader pretending to just invade for the love of the game while using the same overtuned and boring tactics and equipment as every other invader I run into then complain about ganking and overleveled summons for 10-20mins, but it wasn't and thats a breath of fresh air I can appreciate. I have a pretty unique perspective on invasions because before elden ring I was never a big fan of fromsoft games outside of a bit of DS3 but by the same token I put way too many hours into solo elden ring and coop to help others get through the game. Funny enough alot of the whining I hear done about invasions in elden ring are echoed in how the invasions work in the gambit gamemode in destiny 2: invaders complaining about the amount of resources the 4 stack they're invading has while the 4 stack is complaining about the few buffs the invader has to help them win the 1v4 they just walked into but the playing field is pretty even if you drop your bias (unfortunately the netcode is dogshit in destiny as well lol). Gambit is my main mode, I love the invasion system because its a change of pace and that Pvevp invites hybrid build crafting when the sandbox has ok balance but by the same token only dealing with invasions in gambit and not regular pve is a boon because it'd be insufferable to deal with when you're just in the pve to relax with friends and complete goals so with that in mind I think invaders should be more open minded to the idea of invasions being an optional toggle because it would remove the need of the taunters tongue, it would show they're thinking about the multi-player side of the the game, and it would give them room to experiment with stuff like allowing you to summon after an area boss is dead, a new unique form of covenants, a more fleshed out multi-player system so pvp soulslike enthusiasts have WAY more to do that isn't just colosseum or invading players who want nothing to do with you so they gank and do everything they can think of to get under an invaders skin, and if it's a toggle that's off by default it would mean you're only invading WILLING participants so there's significantly less chance you'll run into things the average invader complains about. The bottom line is whether you like it or not these are multi-player games so more thought and care should go into the multi-player. That goes for invasions, arena pvp, reasons to interact with the multi-player systems, and overall balance in said multi-player systems. It should be rewarding if you play it well but can't play it well when half the community is using the same equipment and tactics over and over that doesn't take alot of skill to combat, just proper build crafting, spacing, timing, and patience. I mean I'm no pvp god but you can only run into so many lobotomite invaders that spam LT or magic (then hide behind enemies when they get punished for it) without learning the timing to deal with all of it effectively and getting tired of trying to play nice while they're just spamming away and trying to waste your time or even worse being toxic while doing so. Like I said, just some things to be open minded about, I'm no game dev or expert on game design.
Considering that in the game, invaders and gankers have no real love lost between them, it would make only sense to implement covenants and/or some form of war zone for the mother of all in game grudge matches that has been cooking for years now. I'm sure both sides have frustrations, so why not let us have fun venting them by embracing the disdain to pvp to our hearts content while feeling the sweet, soothing balm of getting to really go for it.
Smite is the closest thing to the souls play style imo the only thing is it's objective based but you can create as many builds as you want and there's plenty of characters to use with different spells and abilities
Keep at it! Hopefully, Fromsoft will do something because this is just sad. The DLC was a completely wasted opportunity.
as cool as the open world concept was for elden ring i really hope the next souls game is more traditional and linear,because once you get to your second playthrough on er you kinda realize how pointless the majority of caves and side dungeons are in terms of it being worth actually going and doing them
i only play Elden ring for pvp. if the pvp didint exist id play something else. the pvp is the most fun and has the most replayability. im really really upset at the state of pvp in elden ring. ive been playing Nioh2 instead because it has better combat better bosses better character creator. nioh 2 has fully voice acted cutscenes. the only thing its missing is proper pvp. elden ring isnt the hardest game. elden ring doesn't have the most complex combat. elden ring doesn't have the best open world to explore. elden ring only has pvp for me. if the invasion mechanics dont get improved than ima play something that actually has good multiplayer.
I can’t say this for a fact but I just don’t think they themselves (the devs) just aren’t pvpers, Miyazaki even said that he needs help to beat these game because he finds them hard. I dont think someone like that would have first hand experience in the pvp scene and the difficulties of it (I’m not talking about the connections and latency bc it’s ass especially if your on pc like myself) so yeah the game NEEDS fixing however it just probably won’t happen which sucks
Preach
anybody who invaded in ds3 feels you 100%
Imo the argument you made was seamless, there is almost no reason to use the multiplayer modes the last nail in the coffin for multiplayer was the blow up of the “Lure” community
What chest armor is that? I don't recognize it. Is it a mod?
I have been addicted to souls pvp ever since I played demons souls back in 2010
I agree with everything but I just want to say it's kind of crazy how every single souls game has one issue that keeps it from being the greatest of all time
Demons souls had moon grass and low player count
Ds1 had lagstabs and passive poise meta
Ds2 had soul memory and terrible bosses
Ds3 hated mages (I'm a mage always have been)
Elden ring ignored covenants and has boring arenas
With all of its problems ER is still the peak for me, but I mostly do 2v2 arena
I also share your dream of a 100 person souls pvp zone
I don't know if they will ever get it perfect, but they always mess SOMETHING up
Genuinely great critique