r/darksouls • u/fanficologist-neo • 20h ago
Question Do I ever 'catch up' in damage?
Been rocking a +5 claymore in the blighttown, and the club troll-looking thing took like 2 backstabs or 7-8 normal hits to kill. I killed the spider lady, got back to Andre to upgrade to a +10 claymore, and peeked into the the fun house fortress.
The snake guys still take a lot of hits to kill, and with their wide swings, how fast they chew through stamina when blocking, plus the narrow pathways, it feels like I'm back to square one. I either learn to parry them, or die.
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u/J33NO 14h ago
Sorry in advance if you know this already but make sure you understand how scaling works. The Claymore has a "C" scaling for both strength and dexterity which means to take advantage of it you need to keep increasing both stats. I think they call it a Quality build weapon where you want your strength and dex to be near the same level. Other weapons will have a different scaling such as "A" for strength and "C" for dex which means you can stop leveling dex and focus on your strength stat. The scaling leter determines how much bonus damage you get from that stat.
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u/nosamplesplease 1h ago
Yeah, but no. Until your weapon is +15 there is zero reason to be investing in weapon stats. Weapon upgrade give so much better bang for your buck. Up until then you should be leveling, strength, endurance, attunement.
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u/Frostwake 20h ago
There are a few different things to consider.
- What are your stats? Claymore scales from Strength and Dexterity. If you haven't leveled those up much, it's probably a good idea to do that when you can.
- Swapping between one handing and two handing will make your life a lot easier. As soon as you hold the Claymore two handed, you get a 50% boost in Strength, which should result in a big damage bonus. Plus, two handed attacks are better at staggering and breaking shields, which creates more openings for your attacks and overall faster kills.
- Additionally, understanding your entire weapon's moveset is important. In tight corridors, for example, the Claymore's strong attacks are thrusts with great reach. Even without learning how to parry, you can perform a strong attack from a decent distance, take a few steps back and repeat. Thrust attacks get even better when you connect with them during the enemy's attack animations, boosting your damage even further.
- Learning how to parry is a good idea, in general. Learning the basics is very easy and you can practice in a bunch of different earlier places with weaker enemies. Learning how to parry now will make your life in these types of games much better.
- Dark Souls and other games of this type are supposed to be challenging. You'll probably never reach a point where you'll be one shotting everything (with a few exceptions). Sen's Fortress is supposed to be particularly challenging, as even in the lore/story it's supposed to be a proving grounds to make sure only the strong get to the other side.
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u/Crimson-Prestige 6h ago
The man-serpent enemies are pretty tough regardless of what weapon you use, you can parry them to death though.
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u/WinnerOk9732 20h ago
there are some weapons that make the game pretty easy, by far one of the best weapons in the game is the black knight halberd. But pretty much all the black knight weapons are really good. If you have one you should try using it, they are a rare drop, but they make the game a cakewalk
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u/SpindriftPrime 20h ago
What's your strength and dex looking like? Are you putting much into them?
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u/fanficologist-neo 20h ago
I followed recommendation on a previous post I made and got 27/24/17/10 in my stats.
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u/as_it_was_written 19h ago
Which stats are those? Str/dex/int/fth? Vit/end/str/dex?
If it's the former, the common recommendation to level str to 27 is based on two-handing the weapon. Since you're one-handing it, you'll probably want to aim for 40 str and dex by the end of the game. Dipping into magic as well along the way will make your damage fall behind unless you use that magic to buff your weapon.
If it's the latter, you're neglecting weapon scaling almost entirely, which will also make your damage fall behind unless you're compensating for it somehow.
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u/fanficologist-neo 19h ago
It's the latter. I've been told to put just enough offensive stats to use my weapon and dump everything into VIT and then END until I have 30 each.
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u/as_it_was_written 17h ago
That's certainly a way to play the game, but it requires a lot of patience during the slump where your damage falls behind if you're using a weapon that relies on scaling to do good damage.
(The C/C scaling on the Claymore may look underwhelming, but it really adds up since it gets a significant damage boost from two separate stats. If it were to do reasonable damage with the bare minimum stats this far into the game, it would end up too overpowered when you actually built for it.)
If you want more damage, you can safely pause putting points into vit in favor of str/dex imo. I finished my first playthrough with less vit than you have already.
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u/Mattyb2851 18h ago
There’s your problem. Try leveling strength to 27 and two hand it. You’ll see a big pump. Even now, you should go back to firelink and practice learning the whole moveset on the hollows there
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u/V2xel 17h ago
the claymore scales equally with strength and dexterity. it has alright base damage but needs some extra scaling from damage stats to work well without an infusion. don’t neglect any stats, get strength up to 27 and dex to 40. the advice you heard would moreso apply to lower level characters rather than ones you plan on completing the game with
1
u/Shadovan 18h ago
Better advice is to level Vit and End until you’re comfortable with your health and stamina, then level damage stats, bumping up your Vit and End further when you fee you need to.
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u/as_it_was_written 17h ago
Or just level them in parallel once you've reached the minimum requirements for your equipment. As long as you meet those requirements, there's really no need to focus exclusively on a couple of stats at the expense of others that you know you want to level as well.
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u/Clean_Emotion5797 20h ago
Any +10 weapon for this point of the game should get the job done. Claymore has a very versatile moveset, it's not just the damage.
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u/Immediate_Stable 20h ago
The snake guys do have a lot of HP. But your Claymore is plenty strong (+10 is a little bit above expectations at that moment) , and you'll notice it in the following areas actually.
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u/fanficologist-neo 20h ago
Idk, seeing 61 on a normal swing of my +10 weapon doesn't feel good.
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u/Justice4light 17h ago
That’s a little low. You need to get your strength up. If you can get through Sens you should have enough souls to get there. But it’s going to take a lot of backstabbing with this number
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u/vasheroo 20h ago
Sounds like you have no scaling. Claymore can probably be slapped on most builds and do very well. Even maxing the non scaling elementals will do well in NG.
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u/Eggu-kun 20h ago
Snake guys arr deceptively easy to backstab strafe to their right
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u/fanficologist-neo 19h ago
Not for me when they're standing on a narrow path with giant swinging axes.
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u/Justice4light 17h ago
Use a bow to bait that guy and he’ll get hit by the pendulum most of the time
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u/MisplacedMutagen 15h ago
Your stats are too low. I saw you had 10 dex? Not gonna cut it. You want the sweet scaling bonus
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u/Black_Hole_parallax 14h ago
I often go through Tomb of the Giants to get the Large Divine Ember. My +9 Divine weapons usually kill the noodles in 2 or 3 hits.
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u/Floatingpenguin87 14h ago
Big tip for Tanky enemies, sprint around them and backstab. Feels good, works great
1
u/Training-Equal-7647 13h ago
From blighttown onwards there seems to be a consistent increase in enemy hp, nothing much to do other than leveling up your stats and upgrading your weapon.
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u/Sleepiest_Spider 11h ago
Your weapon should be +10 by Blighttown.
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u/Thin-Nerve6367 21m ago
+5 for Blighttown is a little low honestly. That's probably your main issue
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u/Obelion_ 19h ago
Second claymore is supposed to be two handed, one handed moveset imo is just too slow. Not saying you can't one hand for certain opponents but if you absolutely always one hand maybe a weapon that's intended for one hand like straight swords or spears is more for you.
If you two hand your STR is multiplied by 1.5 so if you pump to 27 STR and two hand you are already at soft cap, then get AGI and you do lots of damage.
Also the blight town big guys just are tanky.
1
u/ResidenceZero 18h ago
You should be trying to raise your damage stats more, because the problem right now is more than likely that your scaling is lagging behind. That's where most of your damage is gonna come from anyways.
You should drop your shield and two hand your claymore, for the extra stats.
Also sounds like you're trying to hide behind a shield a lot, which works I guess. It takes some of the fun out of the game for people though.
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u/Subject-Creme 20h ago
Farm the leech in Blight town for materials
Or buy material from merchant in Sen fortress
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u/fanficologist-neo 20h ago
Afaik, the leeches only drop large titanite for +6 to +10 weapon, and I already farmed for that.
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u/Subject-Creme 18h ago
Ah, the next upgrade from 11-15 will require you to kill an NPC (if you want it before O&S)
Go down to New Londo
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u/Least_Bet4662 20h ago
What do you realistically want? Claymore isn't some ultra strength weapon like the club or Zwi.
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u/fanficologist-neo 20h ago
Idk, I just want the weapon I went out of my way to grind for upgrades to do more than 60 damage per swing.
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u/dks3hypeoverload Black Iron Alliance 20h ago
+10 Claymore should be more effective than that in my experience, even without much stat investment. What are your stats like? Either way learning to parry the snake guys will definitely make the area way easier as you said.