Priscilla's dagger guide

Today I'm going to write a guide on how to obtain Priscilla's dagger. Firstly you need to fight your way through the Painted World to the final room - which is accessed via the lower-bridge underneath the sleeping poison dragon. Once inside you will encounter Priscilla the Halfbreed, she looks like a giant white cat woman. To get the dagger you must successfully cut her tail off, though this can be tricky as its so small and she moves around quite a lot in addition to turning invisible.

Once you've thrown the first strike she will usually activate her invisibility spell, at this point you want to start moving around the arena as she will be trying to swing at you with her scythe which inflicts bleed damage. Keep moving around and trying to stay on the side with more snow on the floor as you will be able to see her footprints as she approaches you. When she's within range use some spells such as pyromancy (i.e. fire whip with a large AoE or just a standard fireball) to hit her. Within a few hits she will usually become visible, but be careful not to kill her by keeping a close eye on her health bar. Now try to circle around behind her to get a strike on her tail - you will see that its rather small but persist at it. Shes typically most vulnerable after she has done a power attack with her scythe and you will have plenty of time to get behind her and cut that tail off. Lock-on makes this more difficult as you cannot sprint so freely, so be sure to take this off temporarily before trying to circle around behind her. Once you successfully get the tail off you will see it appear on the floor as a shining drop - run over and grab it before finishing her.

Hope this helps and if you're still having difficult write a comment and I'll try to help out further :)

You will also receive Priscilla's soul at the end of the battle and receive an achievement/trophy. Unlike other boss souls Priscilla's soul can only be used to forge one unique weapon - the lifehunt scythe. This is an average weapon although it does have a high bleeding bonus (500 I think). Forge this using a +10 scythe, or if you don't have one a halberd +10.

The dagger itself appears to have quite good stats (including the 500 bleed bonus), however I didn't use it during my game. I think rogue classes would benefit from this weapon the most, as its arguably one of the strongest speed weapons in the game and has an excellent bleed effect.

New Version Update Live

The new update i outlined in my last post is now live. I just put dark souls in for the first time in a while (due to playing skyrim rather a lot recently) and loaded up one of my characters. Although it didn't actually prompt me for the update like it usually does with other games it should still be active. One easy way to check it to visit a bonfire and see whether the req. souls box is filled in. If you lack the required souls to level up then it will be highlighted red. If you remember before this box was left blank so this is an indication that your game has been updated.

NEW PATCH/UPDATE (v.1.04) FOR DARK SOULS!! - ***READ***

WOW! Well i just got back from my weekend away and found out some very exciting news - theres a new patch coming to dark souls which will resolve a number of issues such as balancing, drop rates, weapon damage; but perhaps most importantly of all - MULTIPLAYER!!

Update v.1.04 has been released in Japan already and will be coming to Europe and the USA "soon" according to a number of leading game sites. I've posted the full list of changes below, highlighted what i believe to be some major changes and written comments afterwards summing them up and how i think they will affect the game.


"Translated by Brett (twitch.tv/thebrett)

Taken from in-game testing / jp wiki notes (http://w.livedoor.jp/project_dark)


Magic Changes:

1. Pyro Glove nerfed from 270 to 230. - Oh well not too much of a big deal, only a slight change in power which can be made up for by improving your pyro glove at a trainer such as Quelana. 
2. You can see resonance signs now.
3. Vow of Silence range increased.
4. Homing Soul Mass and other pursuit style spells nerfed. - Not sure how much they will be nerfed by as it didn't give specific details but this kinda sucks as i was about to begin putting some serious hours into my sorcery character. Oh well, i guess the homing was kinda overpowered, let's hope its not too much of a big change! 
5. Magic Shield and Strong Magic Shield duration lowered.
6. Tranquil Walk of Peace and other Slow duration reduced to ~10 secs. Effect supposedly changed from 100% encumbrance to 50%.
7. Iron Flesh effectiveness nerfed. - Oh well, didn't use it much anyway but i did hear one of the major strategies for defeating the final boss entailed using this pyromancy spell... To be honest it slows you down SO much that i found it pretty useless.

Status Changes:

1. Initial weight increased
2. Humanity Item drop rate increased from 10 to 210 - WTF!!??? ARE YOU KIDDING ME??! Well i knew humanity was a pretty rare drop from enemies but sheesh! this is gunna be crazy - its been multiplied by 21 times!!! This is a big change and will mean using humanity won't be nearly as much of a big deal. Brilliant change in my opinion, finally we'll be able to use some humanity to increase our item discovery rates whilst running around, and take part in the online community a bit more.
3. Medium roll recovery faster? (unclear and unconfirmed)

Equipment Changes:

1. Reported some weapon scaling gets improved at higher normal upgrades (+15 uchi dex scaling goes to A)
2. Some scaling reported as changing from A to S with higher upgrades
3. Normal upgrade path buffed by ~10%
4. Lightning path nerfed slightly (~5%) - Not enough of a nerf in my opinion, lightning weapons in this game are totally unscaled, their stats are far beyond that of all the other elements, essentially rendering things like fire or crystal useless. Meh.
5. Grant scaling changed?
6. Gold-hemmed nerfed, still un-upgraded
7. Dust skirt nerfed hard
8. Silver Knights, Sun, Hollow Soldier’s Shield and other medium shield stability nerfed to ~70 at max upgrades to improve Great Shield viability.
9. Crystal Ring Shield scaling drastically nerfed. Does around ~200 +-50 - OH SNAP! I was just getting used to my 700s with the Captain America shield! Oh well, it had to be coming, that thing was a total weapon of mass destruction and definitely unscaled. Will still be useful but you'll have to do a bit more close quarters fighting too now... not much of a big deal really (?).
10. Dragon Greatsword buffed from 360 to 390.

Combat Changes:

1. Lock-on acquisition range increased.
2. Lock-on changing/switching got easier.
3. Ring of Fog users can now be locked on. - HAHA! suck it noobs. No more invaders who are invisible and can't be locked on. They'll take their punishment now.

PVE Changes:

1. Damage reduced on some mobs?
2. HP lowered on some mobs?
3. Bosses drop Humanity and Homeward Bones
4. Ghosts and Skeletons give souls now. - sweet!
5. Twinkling Titanite drop rate improved. - sweeter!
6. Some mobs may have added drops (Pyromancer dropping Lantern? Unconfirmed).

Online Changes:

1. You can see resonance signs.
2. Some invasion restrictions possibly changed? Darkwraith upperlimit confirmed as unchanged.
3. Amount of souls the Master of the game gains changed.
4. Cracked Eye Orbs no longer get consumed on failure. Confirmed

Other Changes:

1. Official Guide nerfed.
2. Lowered requirements for Sunbro covenenant (requirements moved from 50 to 25. 3/4 assists should do the trick) - MASSIVE CHANGE! finally its viable to join the warrior of sunlight covenant without having to have a ridiculously high faith stat of 50! This means that with the minimum starting faith stat of 8, you can help only a few people online as a white phantom to defeat their area boss and solaire will let you in!! This is excellent news for people looking to get that achievement(/trophy), and also getting all the miracle spells. Note that you'll still need to donate 10 medals of sunlight to get all the miracles from this covenant though AND the soul of the final boss (thats right new game + unfortunately).
3. Fixed some freeze issues.
4. Lvl up screen displays souls needed properly now.
5. Dragon-head glitch, snuggly, and magic shield glitches fixed. - suck it noobs! no more soul glitching to reach level 1,000,000. Didn't know there was a snuggly glitch but whatever! fixing any glitches has to be a good thing, and forces those mugs to go through the same pain as the rest of us hard working dark soulers!!
6. Fixed a bug where your inputs come out 1 second later. - Not sure if you guys noticed this during combat but i certainly did! This could definitely provide you with an extra edge during a close fight!
7. Fixed a bug where the second solaire event wont progress.
8. Fixed a bug where feeding frampt a titanite stone then going over 99 resulted in having zero.
9. Fixed some specific map areas where you’d get stuck or be unable to progress.
10. Changed some english subtitles on the overseas port.

Merchant stock updates:

1. Male Undead Merchant: Also sells bottomless box.
2. Female Undead Merchant: Sells Arrows / Crossbolts.
3. Andrei: Sells Arrows / Crossbolts.
4. Domnhal of Xena: Sells Arrows / Crossbolts, Master Key - WOW! no longer do you have to start the game with the master key as a perk!!! its now available to everyone (for a price no doubt) from Xena, in case you didn't know this is the Welsh merchant who can first be found in front of the door in the depths to blighttown, OR later near firelink shrine sitting next to the skeleton which had the ring of sacrafice on it at the bottom of the aquaduct that leads to undead burg.
5. iant Blacksmith (Fapsmith): Sells Arrows / Crossbolts, Small Titanite Shards, Large Tit Shards, Twinkling (8000 per, inf amount), Green Shards, Repair box, upgrade boxes - Sweet Jesus this is good news!! i spent hours farming for this stuff!! Although its 8k each thats not such a big deal, i dont mind paying that amount as the clam farming methods took a LOT longer. This means we can finally upgrade our gear which requires twinkling titanite without too much concern.
6. amos: Arrows / Crossbolts, Small Tit, Large tit, Repair box / upgrade boxes.
7. Ingwood: Sells Transient Curses."

(Source: http://trendygamers.com/2011/11/02/dark-souls-patch-1-04-information/)


As you can see this is quite a substantial update and will bring some significant changes to the offline and online game. Although not all of the multiplayer improvements have been listed here there are undoubtedly a number of background changes they will be making. More specifically - we shouldn't experience so much difficulty in finding a world to invade or summoning players to help defeat area bosses (or vice versa).


Thanks for reading everyone as always and i'd like to say thanks to Lee for recently filling me in on some of the storyline i previously didn't understand, as some of you may know i have been playing the game for around 110 hours now and am still learning some of the basics haha!


Peace.

Hidden fire keeper soul - New Londo Ruins

Hey everyone as i just came accross this fire keeper soul in my NG+ i thought it would be cool to share it with you all in case you missed it.

As you're coming into New Londo Ruins you will cross two narrow wooden bridges. Be sure to have some transient curses before you go across both bridges as you will encounter ghosts and won't be able to hurt them without using a transient curse. You can find two of these by looting a corpse inside a large jug before you cross the first bridge (near two sitting undead), from the witch merchant in the aqueduct near Firelink Shrine, or occasionally dropped by the ghosts themselves.

Once you've crossed both bridges turn right and then work your way into the bottom right corner of the first area. You will see the fire keeper soul shining on a corpse across a stretch of water. The way to get to it is by crossing a narrow bit of bridge under the water. You will know when you're in the right place as the shining corpse will be directly in front of you and you'll have to go underneath an archway.

BEWARE - when you cross the narrow bridge a ghost will appear behind you and two more in front of you. You can turn around and make your way back into the open area to fight them as this is easier but be careful not to fall off the bridge when trying to get around the ghost which spawns behind you!

Good luck and enjoy another estus upgrade!

Covetous silver serpent ring location!

Hi everyone, as a couple of you have asked me where I found the covetous silver serpent ring lately I thought I'd upload a brief guide on where to find it here.

First of all this ring is perhaps one of the most useful in the game as it increases the amount of souls from every single enemy you defeat - its perfect for grinding with, and just running from A to B farming extra souls. Remember to unequip it before entering a boss battle though as you will want other more defensive rings on for those!

The ring is found in the Tomb of The Giants - this can be accessed via the Catacombs and after defeating the Pinwheel boss. Climb the ladder at the back-right of his giant coffin (the Pinwheel arena) and you will be plunged into the darkness.
Note: the cast light sorcery available by freeing the maiden from the golden golem behind where you encountered the first hydra is essential here as it lights up the area well. Or you can wait until after Patches the Hyena kicks you into the pit and find the skull lantern - although this requires one hand to hold and leaves you without a shield. Be careful if you're using this to light your path as the giant skeletons can inflict a lot of damage, and the skull lantern has a very low physical damage reduction %. 

Progress through the Tomb of the Giants until you get to the area with the dog-like giant skeletons. Nearby you will find an archer shooting at you and then a small slope leading down. You'll be able to spot the ring from here - it's a glowing white light emitting from a corpse on top of a ledge. The only way to get up there is to run and jump, this is best done by removing your armour, or equipping lighter armour to gain more speed. Beware as there are a few enemies in the area so clear them up first and also be careful of the 6 or so skeleton towers which spawn when you pick up ring. You can run away from these, but they will drop down and follow you, so don't open the menu and forget they're there!

As I stated before, this ring is great for farming souls to help you level up your character. One particularly good place to do this is behind the sealed door in Darkroot Basin, where you will find members of the Cat Covenant. With this ring equipped they will drop far more souls than before. One word of warning I would give players is not to level up too much, especially if you like to play co-op online as you can only be matched with players +/- 10% of your level.

Weapon ascension, auxillary effects, and parameter bonuses explained!

Hey everyone, since I started playing Dark Souls I've been trying to figure out exactly what all the auxiliary effects and parameter bonuses actually mean for weapons and armour and I thought it would be useful for me to post them here in a list format in case there are things people don't fully understand yet.
There are three main categories to explain, which are listed below:

1. Weapon ascension:
In order to ascend weapons you need to visit a blacksmith with the correct materials, have an applicable weapon, and make sure the blacksmith has the correct ember. For enchanting advanced weapons such as occult weaponry, you will need to ascend an ordinary weapon to +5 in it's respective element and then you will be able to ascend it to +0 of the weapon you are attempting to make. For example: If you want an occult weapon you must first ascend an ordinary weapon to +5 divine, then visit the blacksmith near the Undead Chapel after giving him the dark ember. He will be able to create an occult weapon which can be progressed to +5.
You can also recycle weapons at any blacksmith, for example if you have a fire longsword, you will be able to transfer it to its previous state, i.e. longsword +5 or +10 or whatever it was on before you ascended it. Beware that although sometimes weapons appear to increase in damage when you recycle them it can actually make them weaker in the long-run, as they may not have yet been upgraded to their full potential with that given element.

Note: some sets of armour cannot be upgraded such as Havel's armour or other sets of armour forged using boss souls. This is usually because they come fully upgraded and already have very good stats, therefore upgrading it any more would cause an unbalance in the game.

Whilst upgrading shields to +1, +2 etc. may not actually increase the physical reduction % etc. it DOES increase the stability stat - this is particularly important as the higher your stability stat is, the less your stamina you will lose when you are hit with your shield raised. If you have a powerful shield AND a high stability stat you will be able to receive a huge amount of hits before being staggered. This can be a viable tactic for replacing stamina regenerating items such as green blossom/grass crest shield explained earlier in this blog.

2. Auxiliary effects:
i. bleed: bleeding is represented by the brown splotch mark in the bottom left of the auxiliary effects box. This increases your damage with some weapons after a certain amount of blows. I.e. By using the bandit's knife (300 bleeding effect), on your third successive strike it will deal significantly more damage than the first two. Other weapons which have a higher bleed effect may not require as many hits to deal bonus damage, i.e. the lifehunt scythe.

ii. poison/toxic: poison comes attached to some weapons, however you can also purchase poison throwing knives and arrows from the witch merchant in the aqueduct near Firelink Shrine (in the passage towards the depths behind some bars). Poison inflicts damage over an extended period once inflicted and will ultimately kill the infected opponent. However it won't always work after only a couple of hits so you may need to strike them a few more times to actually poison them. It's particularly useful when trying to kill strong enemies from a distance by using poison arrows (see the 'how to defeat two black knight archers in Anor Londo' guide).

iii. divine: divine basically puts down the skeletons in the catacombs for good - they won't restructure themselves once you've killed them with a divine weapon.

iv. occult: as far as i can tell occult deals more damage to some covenant members, i.e. the princess's guard; although many people have different opinions on this. The main thing to note about occult weapons is once they have been upgraded to +5 the physical damage will be greater than that of a +5 divine weapon, so if you're going for pure strength then occult is not a bad way to go.

3. Parameter bonuses:
Parameter bonuses are the most significant thing mentioned here. Every weapon and shield in the game has a parameter bonus rank which is graded below the attack information in the item screen. These vary from '-' (which is nothing) to S rank. Most weapons will have Cs and Ds, however you will come across the odd weapon or two with an A/S rank - don't underestimate these weapons as they can become far more powerful than weapons with '-' in the parameter box. The drake sword for example has '-' across all boxes, this means that although it is a powerful from near the beginning of the game when your stats are low, you don't receive any increase in damage when leveling up like you would with other weapons which have grades. Therefore, eventually a weapon with a C rank in strength would outmatch the drake sword.

There are four sub-categories to the parameter bonuses: strength, dexterity, intelligence and faith. If a weapon has an A rank in dexterity for example, when you level up at a bonfire you will see that by putting a skill point into dexterity it will increase your attack damage by around 3 or 4 with that weapon. This is why increasing your intelligence increases your sorcery damage whilst using a catalyst too; as you will be able to see the sorcerer's catalyst has an A rank in intelligence. I tested an S rank weapon at the bonfire recently, and each time I put a skill point into dexterity the attack damage was increasing by 3/4 alternatively.

Find a favourite weapon and start putting skill points into it in order to increase your attack damage whilst using it, but don't be under the impression that putting skill points into strength always increases your attack damage - it doesn't!!