Gaming Demons' Souls explanation

[Digeman]

Hey guys! A while ago i bought Dark souls for the PC and really liked it for its atmosphere and awesome game mechanics (and yes even the difficulty). However what got me to stop playing Dark souls (at least for a while) was the fact that i had completely missleveled my character apparently to the type of weapons i was using. I was completely oblivious to what stat went together with which weapon, i had also no idea about what weapon scaling meant (still don't really understand it), and finally i also had no idea how to upgrade and what to upgrade too etc (didn't want to upgrade mindlessly and find out i did it "wrong". Now alot of this is just because the game really doesn't tell you anything about anything, which i can understand somewhat why they made the game like that. Now to the point..

I took a break from dark souls and finally started playing demons' souls. Thing is, this game also has a really poor explanation and bad menu setup, so much so that i'm in the same seat as i was in Dark souls. I don't know what weapon levels which, i don't know what stat goes well with what, etc.

Now i've been to the wikis, and have been reading there for quite a while, but i have to say that they're pretty bulky and still leave alot to be desired, at least for the questions i have.

So my point is, is anyone out there please willing to shed some light into how the stats work in demon souls, how i can actually see what levels up which, and other good to know info. I'm specifically talking about demon souls in this scenario, but will probably ask a little about dark souls in the future ;P

Any help is really apreciated and thanks for reading through this hefty text (from all the wiki reading i can feel your pain!)

 

[Foxi4]

So my point is, is anyone out there please willing to shed some light into how the stats work in demon souls, how i can actually see what levels up which, and other good to know info. I'm specifically talking about demon souls in this scenario, but will probably ask a little about dark souls in the future ;P

Any help is really apreciated and thanks for reading through this hefty text (from all the wiki reading i can feel your pain!)

Okay. The basic idea behind Demon's Souls is that you... kill demons to get their souls... yeah.

You can be either in your Body form (more HP, weaker attack) or in Soul form (less HP, higher attack), the diifference being that the first can summon Phantoms or be invaded by Phantoms, but that's not a huge game changer. As you kill demons, you collect their souls, which are displayed on a counter in the lower right-hand corner of the screen. Those souls are your currency for everything in the game, from weapon upgrades to skill upgrades. If you get killed, you loose all your souls, but fret not! You leave a bloodstain. If after respawning you manage to pick up that bloodstain, you will regain all your souls... if you lose again, you lose them for good, so weigh your chances and return once you know you can safetly recover them. Remember that the drop point is not directly where you died but around the place where you were 10 seconds earlier, which is usually far away from the actual danger, making it a worthy investment to backtrack.

Now, I'm not sure how far in you are, but what I will tell you is that after defeating your first "defeatable" boss (technically you can defeat the Vanguard and you get nifty stuff for it, but it's insanely difficult), the Phalanx (hint - fire spells, fire bombs and turpentine) you use the Archstone to move to the Nexus. There, you meet the Black Maiden and the Monumental who give you the very basic idea of what you're supposed to do.

From there, you have two options of spending souls - by upgrading skills (what they upgrade is shown in the dialogue window and your focus should be different depending on what build you're making, but seeing that you don't know the ropes yet, just go all-out fighter or all-out mage) by talking to the Black Maiden or by upgrading your weapons.

The former requires only souls. Each upgrade also counts as rising your Soul Level, which is relevant when it comes to summoning (or being invaded by) Phantoms of all sorts, the latter requires additional resources in the form of Hardstone, Sharpstone, specialized elemental stones or boss demon souls (which you should NOT spend by the way - it's a huge waste!).

Now, the idea is to grind your way like a maniac through hordes of enemies upgrading the skills that you find relevant to your gameplay style (like hammers or maces? Go for strength! Like fighting quick? Go for a curved sword and pump points into dexterity!) - upgrading the base stats will improve your Attack and Defense, both physical and magical as well as your stamina and elemental resistance (all can be seen in the dialogue window, as the changes are not set in stone). As you play, your equipment deteriorates and it will break if its condition falls below 30%, so stay on-top of that and spend souls to repair it periodically or you'll find yourself in a pinch!

Once you are confident in a given area, you progress to the next larger demon area, slay the monster (there's usually a trick to it - statistics alone will not help) and continue grinding until you feel confident enough again. Keep your stats high, your weapon as upgraded as possible and forge your own way to play this game - it's a part of the fun.

I'll share you my build. I started with the knight, initially using the starter Long Sword, but I've moved on passed that when I found my first curved sword, the scimitar. I've upgraded it to lvl.5 or 6 now and I'm really happy with the fast response time. Most of my points went into Strength, Vitality, Dexterity and Luck, but I've also assigned a few to other skills when necessary, avoiding only the magic-related ones as I'm making a mostly-melee build.

 

[Digeman]

Thanks for the response! I've actually put in like 30 hours into dark souls and now about 3 hours to demons souls and defeated 2 bosses already in the game =D I do like fighting quick so i did go for Dex this time (spent a shitload of points in strength on dark souls, which was apparently a complete waste). My question is though where in the menu you can see what weapon benefits from which stat? Since there probably are a lot of weapons in the game, i wanna be able to try'em out first and if i like their feel, i'll build my character to whatever needs to be "built". I've got about 20 dex right now on demons souls, and like 12 strength, and now i'm noticing that most weapons require quite some strength actually, and even some shields too. So my question becomes then if i should continue on Dex now, or should i start pumping levels into strentgth?

And another thing, i should not waste boss demon souls on upgrading weapons you mean? Thanks for the help!

 

[Foxi4]

Thanks for the response! I've actually put in like 30 hours into dark souls and now about 3 hours to demons souls and defeated 2 bosses already in the game =D I do like fighting quick so i did go for Dex this time (spent a shitload of points in strength on dark souls, which was apparently a complete waste). My question is though where in the menu you can see what weapon benefits from which stat? Since there probably are a lot of weapons in the game, i wanna be able to try'em out first and if i like their feel, i'll build my character to whatever needs to be "built". I've got about 20 dex right now on demons souls, and like 12 strength, and now i'm noticing that most weapons require quite some strength actually, and even some shields too. So my question becomes then if i should continue on Dex now, or should i start pumping levels into strentgth?

And another thing, i should not waste boss demon souls on upgrading weapons you mean? Thanks for the help!

The window you're most interested in is the window which shows what stats you need to wield a given weapon - you can access it by selecting a weapon in the inventory and pressing the Square button. The basic idea is that heavy weapons like axes, double-handed swords, hammers, clubs and the sort benefit from Strength which adds to their damage modifier. Quick weapons such as curved swords or daggers benefit from Dexterity in the same fashion (although it is pretty decieving as both strength and dexterity increase physical attack, so mix and match!). It's a pretty complex system so it's worth to have a look at the weapon's sheet and check what rankings it has for given stats as those rankings determine the bonus you can get - consult this page for details.

The general idea is that Strength increases your physical attack, Dexterity increases your physical attack, Endurence increases your stamina, Luck increases your chances of getting rare drops, Vitality increases your total HP, Intelligence increases your max MP, Magic increases your magical attack and Faith increases your magical defense. All stats will increase your physical defense, so you always get stronger no matter how you build your character, which basically means that you should focus on the more utilitarian tasks such as offense, health, mana or drop rates rather than defense itself.

As for the titular demon's souls, you can spend them (consume them, really) to get a lot of normal souls, but it's not recommended. The special blacksmith hidden in the second world will be able to fuse those souls into given weapons to create unique, soul-based weapons which is why you should keep them and leave them for later crafting - only consume the generic souls, like the "Unknown Hero" ones that you find on your way.

 

[T-hug]

I'm playing it right now too nearly finished my first run SL55 add me if you want to coop I'm going for Platinum so will be on while.
Also the sequel has just kinda been announced Sony/From Soft PS4 exclusive. It's called Destiny of Spirits I was going to do a news post about it but can't as am on my Vita :/

Oh and in DS don't invest in luck it is a dead stat I started as a royal and haven't put a single point in it and have been doing just fine.

EDIT

So it turns out Destiny of Spirits is an unrelated f2p Vita game! The disappointment is strong in this one!