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[Karkov]

Yeah, sad to say but there were a couple of issues I had with Dark Souls II myself.  The level design was definitely one of them, along with the "stop respawning" thing.  I get that it was to stop people from farming, but they had already added the Soul Memory mechanic for PvP, so I don't understand what would've been so terrible about letting people farm.

But on the whole level design issue, I feel like the fact that everything was spread out more felt like you had more of a journey that you actually went through.  I feel as though that took away from the Dark Souls setting though, how everything was close together but felt so far away because of the trials you had to go through.  Also, because they put everything so ridiculously far away from each other, fast travel was basically used constantly, which was something you had to gain in Dark Souls 1.

Another gripe is that every weapon only has 10 attacks.  There were a couple of weapons in DkS1 that had more animations than others, and I wish that that had transferred over.  As is, you can expect every weapon to have two regular swings, two strong attacks, and then two/two for two-handing it, and then two more attacks if you do a running attack, depending on how many hands you're using (I suppose there's more if you include rolling attacks, but those always seem such a waste).  I feel like it sort of made combat more limited than it used to be.

I think the ending lacked a little; it just didn't feel as strong as DkS1.

Good things about the game include having ridiculously fast PvP times, no more of this "well you might be getting invaded, you might not," thing.  Combat's still fun even though it feels more limited.  Miracles and casting are much more valid options than they used to be, they used to be limited to buffing or high level casting (or WotG).  Still a fun first playthrough.  There are PvE covenants for once, and every rank of everything actually has a reward (Poor Gravelords).  Boss designs were pretty fun, albeit much easier than the first.

All in all, I think they nailed Covenants and PvP (although hexes need to be nerfed somethin' awful), could've spent more time into world/boss design, and could've probably toned down the overworld being so hard while making them always respawn.  Also maybe add a little bit to the weapons so I had more things to play with.

[Jelle]

Well I figured out why I was doing so badly with this character. Apparently dex scaling is awful now, unless you decide to go for bleed or poison? Blegh, seems awfully restricting. Honestly dex heavy setups seem kinda gimped this way.

Oh well I have a soul vessel, I can try something completely different. I heard mundane weapons are lulzy, think I'll try that. 

[Facekillz058]

Are you sure its not your weapons that don't scale well?

[Jelle]

No no, it appears dex scales up damage only half as fast as str. The upside it also increases poison and bleed. Even with a good dex scaling weapon, the damage increase isn't stellar.

[Sindain]

The Gutter is basically Upper Blighttown.

To be fair, Blighttown is basically 5-1 and 5-2 mashed together.

Well I figured out why I was doing so badly with this character. Apparently dex scaling is awful now, unless you decide to go for bleed or poison? Blegh, seems awfully restricting. Honestly dex heavy setups seem kinda gimped this way.

Oh well I have a soul vessel, I can try something completely different. I heard mundane weapons are lulzy, think I'll try that. 

Yeah dex is kinda sadly lame right now. Even worse since bleed is no longer the crazy damage it once was and they removed bleed from most weapons; The only curved sword that bleeds is the falchion and none of the katannas bleed.

[Farce]

I liked the Gutter.  I did it without a torch, and it was pretty Doom 3, which was cool.

I think my favorite area is the Doors of Pharros, though, horrible rats notwithstanding.

[WillowLuman]

The Gutter wasn't bad per se, it lacked horrible annoying enemies for the most part, it just looked very familiar. Black Gulch, on the other hand, had a much more original aesthetic, but was highly annoying. I only ever died to the boss there, but those statue things are a real pain in the ass.

[Jelle]

The gutter seemed...weird I don't know. You can tell they wanted it to resemble upper blighttown, but the design didn't make much sense to me. The dark and the resounding heartbeat gave it a cool atmosphere though.

I just wonder what's up with all the wooden furniture encased in the murky stalagmites. Why did the people of drangleic throw all that stuff down there. 
Also there has to be a story behind those statues. Those darn statues. They appear in smaller number at the doors of pharros to. Why were they thrown down there to be forgotten. Has to be some meaning to them!

[Ozyton]

Are you two-handing your weapons? Two-handing your weapons only doubles your str, not your dex.

[GrizzlyAdamz]

Actually, I've heard both dex /&/ strength have lost their niche. Ranty video

[Ozyton]

I'm watching the video now, and as someone who loves melee in games that have it... I am rather discouraged =<

[Jelle]

It's a bit of a long winded rant but the facts are there. Elemental weapons >> physical weapons. What's the point of getting either str or dex, if going elemental nets you more weapon damage and strong spells on top of that. It is indeed rather backwards.

[Sindain]

Actually, I've heard both dex /&/ strength have lost their niche. Ranty video

As I've mentioned a few times my first build was a pure dex build, 50 in dex before I even got higher than 15 in anything else, and I've had slightly different results then him. From what I've seen elemental infusions universally have higher AR than a physical build (even on something like the Blacksteel Katana) but I've found physical builds pull out in front on some weapons when it comes to real damage due to how damage is calculated with multiple types. Of course, having this little of a difference is inexcusable anyway, and on most of my weapons (all of which are B or higher scaling) I'm getting like 80-100 points of damage for those 44 points I put in dex.

Really what I think is a pretty important part that he touched on but didn't really focus on were the changes to the buffs. In DaS non scaling build where pretty popular because their weapons did nearly the same damage as a scaling weapon and they saved tons of  points they could instead put into vigor and end; But physical builds where still able to pull out in front on damage because they could get just enough int for CMW and get a really large boost to AR. Now the buff changes make it so elemental weapons just don't have any disadvantages compared to physical ones. (Though it does make buffs more for the builds that get them, it was kinda silly that buffs where best for non-caster builds)

[Girlinhat]

I admit I've seen a lot of the same trend continuing.  Dark Souls 2 seems to be more "fast roll everywhere and throw magic, scoff at those melee guys" more than anything else.  Shields and physical damage got nerfed, and there's magic everywhere.

[nenjin]

I admit I've seen a lot of the same trend continuing.  Dark Souls 2 seems to be more "fast roll everywhere and throw magic, scoff at those melee guys" more than anything else.  Shields and physical damage got nerfed, and there's magic everywhere.

Shields nerfed how? In general I've felt more confident in my shield as a mostly pure melee than I ever did in DS1. But I assume you're talking PvP.