How best to play DS2

Seeing as there are so many people on here who insist DS2 is the best game of the series and I'm about to start my second playthrough, I'm curious what people think are the most fun ways to play. Will try to do anything that is mentioned in this thread.

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Make sure you level adaptability. Any class is viable pretty much. Magic is actually well balanced unlike 1 where it's OP and 3 where it's garbage. I just played as a knight with a broadsword my first run through, but it was still really fun. Especially two handing without a shield.

vanquisher's seal
>that stupid nerf it got because of the roll punch

get to 99 agility as fast as you can by leveling adp. A lot of basic weapons are very viable, like the mace

Ignore shields for anything but parrying.
The game throws a 100% block shield less than an hour in or something and there's pretty much no incentive to do anything but hold l1 the entire time.

>Magic is actually well balanced unlike 1 where it's OP and 3 where it's garbage
More specifically, Sorcery is well balanced. Miracles in 2 are nothing special and Pyromancy was fucking gutted.

Never bothered levelling adaptability in my first playthrough since I thought it was the equivalent of "Res" in DS1 which was useless. I'll give it a go.

My main memories of DS2 are often thinking "oh this looks like a cool area" but then being quite annoyed by the area itself, and the bosses being terrible. I want to try and stay underlevelled for the bosses, but the mobs of enemies in the world are tougher than any of the bosses, so unsure how viable this is. Curious if anyone has an ideal "level guide" for this.

Dump your first 10 levels into ADP because it's mandatory
Level one damage stat you think you'l enjoy
The game showers you in souls and upgrade materials, so by the end you'll reach the soft cap in every stat and have like 20 weapons maxed out. So your choices really don't matter honestly.

I've never used a shield in any of the Dark Souls games, even before I knew anything about the games and two of my bros were introducing me to it saying "hey use a shield" I was telling them to fuck off. I hadn't even heard of the series before that.

best way to play the game is to uninstall this heap of shit.

Adaptability controls how many iframes you have while rolling and the speed of the estus sipping animation.

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pure mage is fun
ds2 is the one game in the souls series where any build is viable just play what you like

Uninstall and play a good game instead.

It's so fucking unfair that DS2 is such a bad game but it's also the only DS game with big tits and hot girls in it

baste

I'm open minded and willing to give it a second try. Just one play through of a game in my literal favourite gaming series is not enough of a fair chance.

Any level guide would be useless for the first half of the game because the first 4 "paths" of levels to the 4 major bosses can be completed in any order.

Doesn't Scholar of the First Sin do nothing but chuck 500 unnecessary pursuers around every corner?
That's like the only major difference I can remember it having

>Seeing as there are so many people on here who insist DS2 is the best game of the series
There really aren't. It was just in response to people who think DS2 is the worst, which it isn't. Which just evolved into shitposting about it being the best, because that's the only way to discuss Souls games here.

Alright everybody, I've just started the game.
In the tutorial section, is there anything important I'm missing if I just skip it? I can't be bothered to go through all these fog gates and defeat a bunch of basic enemies if there's no great items for me to pick up.
Cheers lads.

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The best advice I think I can give is that darrk souls 2 was made with the intention that every build has access to a ranged weapon. I think the game becomes a lot better when you realize that.

3 > 2, and basically every other souls game > 3, so...
(Havent played des though)

more power to you but there's no need to rush if you don't want to, the tutorial isn't really big. If you already know every mechanic it's safe to skip it.

There's nothing important in the tutorial area except the dagger, and that's only important if you actually want the dagger.

Which area is the best to head to first guys?

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There's nothing useful in terms of items there but I think you have to go through one of the fog gates to get to the bird nest you can drop items for exchange in

Level Adaptability until you reach 96 AGI. If you decide to use magic, Attunement also boosts AGI. If you still get hit mid-roll with 96 AGI, level ADP till you get to 105. Blocking isn't super good in this game, but it still is nice to have a shield.

Forest obviously

get ADP to 40 as soon as possible because ADP is now the stat that governs the ifames when rolling. Not Current Equip Load vs Max Equip Load.

Dark Souls 3 removes this bad change

Aye cheers guys, I don't especially want the dagger and I know the mechanics already. I was worried some super important item was in there.

Which area should I head to first from Majula?

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Forest of Fallen Giants is the best "first level" material. But Heide's Tower of Flame and the well are also options. Make sure you get the silvercat ring before doing the well.

Generally you want to do Forest of the Fallen Giants first for the Ring of Blades, beyond that it doesn't really matter.

Hope you enjoy your second playthrough user

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caster builds suck ass on the DLC, just completed frigid outskirts as a hexer and it was completely miserable so you may want to respec some shit around when you start these

Is it even possible to get to the bottom of the well as your first location?
As in like, no upgrading health or buying silvercat ring, just spamming lifegems

Also, note that there are 5 main "exits" to Majula, not including the one you came in from. Make sure you look closely and don't miss anything.

I'm not sure. But it's definitely possible to do after farming a bit in one of the other paths, even without beating any bosses. I'm pretty sure I killed Royal Rat vanguard as the first boss in one of my playthroughs.

I remember the green rhinoceros impish fat guys being pretty difficult but I just realised now their AI is so easy to manipulate into being harmless.
Is this true of the rest of the enemies? Can i make Shrine of Amana (whatever it's called) easy with some cheesy strat?
Also why is the emerald herald (and DS2 girls in general) so much hotter than girls in the other games? This is absurd, B-Team are horny boys?

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You need a lot of VIG to survive the first fall unassisted, so no.
Honestly, I'm not even sure it's possible even with the silvercat ring at base VIG, but I've never actually tried.

I'm pretty sure it is, at least if you're taking the optimal path with the smallest jumps, and healing to full health in between jumps.

Shrine of Amana is hell no matter what
You did remember to grab the Spell Quartz Ring +2 after Mirror Knight, right? not that it even helps

I'm not going to level up my VIG for a while, so I'll let you know if it's possible with base VIG once I buy the Silvercat Ring.
I started as Knight because I liked the armor set, so my current VIG is 12.

There are a couple of other enemies you can cheese similarly, but for the most part, no. At least not aside from the usual strafe behind into backstab maneuver that you can do in every souls game.

You don't need that much VIG to survive the drop if you do it naked. Silvercat and high VIG just makes it easier.

I did not pick up that ring desu.
Jesus I fucking hated that area. Was sort of satisfying to finish but it didn't outweigh the annoyance of all the cheap tricks it pulled on me.
And THEN it gives you such a shitty boss? My main issue with DS2 is that the areas are so much harder than the bosses that the bosses lose all their edge. You're meant to start a boss encounter thinking "oh shit what's going to happen" but in DS2 you breathe a sigh of relief because the bosses are all so simple compared to the levels themselves.

>at least if you're taking the optimal path with the smallest jumps
The problem is the first jump, where there's only one possible platform to jump to and it's very far down.

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I don't know about you but I was taking damage even with my shield up. Then I would run out of stamina and get hit for full unmitigated damage