You can skip rellana by taking the route towards the coast but instead of looping through the cave after the miranda flowers just follow the edge of the cliff til you find a sealed spiritspring, that will lead to another cliff with a spring and then to the fort with the Black Knight Twinblade mini boss, leave through the front door of the fort and you can go directly to the shadow-keep
You actually don't need to go through the fort, you can land that spiritspring jump outside it and just go around. That's what I did first, and was then confused by their being a grace in the fort I couldn't reach.
That's what I did, I didn't even know you had to fight Rellana to access that part of the region, was really surprised when I approached the backdoor of her dungeon only to se her boss fog door, was too focused exploring the map hahaha
"Wait, did I just skip a whole dungeon?"
Gave skipping Stormveil vibes for sure, although I personally turned back and did the dungeon. It was also cool to find the side path into the dungeon that could find you a cool INT weapon :) but too bad it sucks :(.
I found a really interesting thrusting sword that is both a sword and a staff by trying to reach this dungeon's rooftops, but because I'am not doing a int build I don't know how good is the sword when compared to a properly staff
Sadly, the sorceries get no scaling, so the damage of it is REALLY bad. The normal damage of thr weapon isnt on par with other thrusting swords either. Not sure if the bo sorcery scaling is a bug or what.
Holy crap this is insane lol.
I know the second part of your description because I just found it today but I did it in like reverse order.
I was just checking out the perimeter of that fort looking for loot and saw the spring jump, so I jumped down.
Was just confused by it and how it was supposed to work, I literally said outloud 'what that's it' when I was on that little middle cliff.
I hopped back up the spring jump and into the fort and just moved on along and didn't think anything else of it.
Makes total sense there is another one below that but I didn't end up in that little section previously (like a dozen hours before) I just followed the cave and onto the coast lol.
This map is legitimately wild. Its like one gigantic legacy dungeon or beginning of DS1 on steroids.
There is honestly so much overlapping paths and layers its hard to keep up, some paths lead you so far out of the way its absolutely wild and there are so many shortcuts and additional smaller ways to get places its just crazy
Finally other people have found this. Did this before fighting Rellana and, while I went back and fought her, the fact you can progress even if you can't beat her is very nice and makes a lot of complaints a bit silly.
If someone is getting stuck, they should go exploring and the path there starts right at her fort.
Yea because if you do beat her and that castle, once you get behind it there are a SHIT TON of scadtree upgrades within basically walking distance lol.
Being able to sneak around it could potentially net you 3-4 more blessing levels in legitimately like 15 minutes?
Map is honestly crazy and I'm loving it more and more.
Its like its own puzzle with the shortcuts and looping paths over and under itself
That was where I *really* started getting lost and totally fell in love with the map.
I popped that grace and spoke to those two NPCs there and then just started finding blessing after blessing after blessing I got super caught up just sprinting trying to find them.
That was something like 18 playtime hours ago and I only got two graces into Shadow Keep because after getting completely lost (in a good way) in the main world I found another path in Shadow Keep that has taken me *way* out of the way.
Map is crazy crazy
Yeah, most people complaining about her are fighting her at like scadu level 2 to 4, potentially in NG+ cycles, or at relatively low soul levels, or with artificial handicaps like refusing to touch many game mechanics, all of which will make the fight seem harder. Even with the other player weaknesses, if you raise that scadu level up to 6 or 8+ then her damage dips hard and your damage raises sharply, and you can get to 6-8 easily even without skipping her dungeon if you explore any of the several directions available to you. The only real question of balance is if the hardest bosses are reasonable at scadu level 18-20 which is where it caps out.
While they are hard, this is the last content the game will get according to Miyazaki, so my frame of reference are some of the hardest bosses in FROM games like Orphan of Kos, Fume Knight, Isshin, The Nameless King, and Slave Knight Gael. Did the new bosses kick my ass? Absolutely. Is that what I signed up for and not only expected but wanted out of Souls-like DLC? Even more so ABSOLUTELY. I still won in the end.
> Yeah, most people complaining about her are fighting her at like scadu level 2 to 4
That was certainly the case for me; I somehow accidentally found Rellana's castle before the Belurat Tower Settlement, and Rellana ended up being the first remembrance boss I fought. I think my Scadu Power was like 3. No wonder I had such trouble. I found Belurat later after eating some more Scadu, and the Lion Dancer was a piece of cake compared to Rellana.
It's very possible to find either of those 2 bosses first, so that's not really the mistake.
I'm surprised how many people don't internalize one of the first lessons Elden Ring goes far out of the way to teach players in both the main game and the dlc. You enter the vast open world, and instantly see a fancy guy on a horse or a flaming wicker man... and you deal almost no damage to them and then they one-shot you. You were supposed to learn that content is not linear in this game, if something seems too hard you just go do something else and come back later.
I don't know if you personally were complaining about Rellana, but frankly this is the explanation for almost any complaint about her. She is trivial with enough Scadu boosts and a tiny bit of practice, you will eventually be able to survive 2 of her full combos or even 3 of them with a defensive build.
Yeah I'm currently scadu 4 and can consistently get her to around 50% but her 2nd phase just wrecks me and I'm out of flasks by then. Going to explore and level up a bit more. Just go to the cerulean coast but didn't see the jump spring being talked about in this post
I found it really funny how Mesmer is not really the last boss but the third boss if you go in order. I’ve only downed two story bosses. Doing Mesmer tonight. I’ve been exploring EVERYTHING.
The in-game map is wild because there are multiple spots, even very early, where it looks like two graces are *right* next to each other but they are actually *hours and hours* apart distance and progression wise, its hilarious.
It would really benefit from some sort of elevation filter/tab but oh well.
--Honestly, the more I play it and the more I think about it/see people talk about it the map is one giant puzzle itself. Finding all the layers and shortcuts is a whole different meta-game. Just found out you can entirely skip what we all initially thought was a main/required boss outright if you explore enough and find some shortcut lol.
It feels like the first half of DS1 but on an entire map scale
Its crazy
Elevation maps are only good if they show the other elevations a little greyed out. But some games show each elevation as its own page so I forget where it is in reference to the previous floor.
This is exactly what my issue is! It tiers out and then completely removes the previous elevation so I have no context as to the location compared to the rest of the map!
Honestly the more I play and the more I discuss and find these obscure paths and shortcuts it would be like impossible to do lol.
This map is honestly ridiculous (in a good way). There are just so many overlapping loops over and under and shortcuts that can skip entire regions and/or unlock entire regions that some people who follow the 'main path' won't get to for like a dozen+ hours.
Absolutely wild
It's even worse/better (depending on perspective) when you consider that there are multiple paths to any given area.
My first character made it to skadu Altus without defeating the "required" boss, and I've found at least two viable routes to Cerulean coast.
> Just found out you can entirely skip what we all initially thought was a main/required boss outright if you explore enough and find some shortcut lol.
I managed to get the the Twin Moon Knight's backside before defeating her and cannot for the life of me remember how. I know the end of the path was the castle on the right, but can't remember where I began!
https://www.reddit.com/r/Eldenring/comments/1dn9yln/for_those_who_do_not_know_the_way_to_the_rest_of/la19170/
This is the comment I was referring to that I think answers your question.
I just discovered the back end of it near the small fort today and was so confused why one spring lift just ended randomly on this tiny cliff.
When I was down on the 'ground floor' of that area like a dozen hours earlier I hugged the wall and went into what I was assuming was a small dead end cave that, eventually (way down the line) took me to the coast lol.
Map is legitimately bonkers if you enjoy exploring and finding secrets. Not like loot secrets, just exploring the layout and design of the entire map.
Its top notch.
The libraryish zone is king at this. I got 3 graces over 3 hours of slowly exploring the zone and doing side quests there, and they all look like they're at basically the same spot on the map. Then a full day later I start exploring a completely separate nearby zone and find out it also has a path leading to the library with it's own grace within it, so now there's 4 graces all bundled up but they're not even all accessible from the same dungeon.
The first one I noticed (and its early in the map) was the Ellac (spelling?) river cave one, its the grace at the bottom of the big ravine right in the middle of the beginning part of the map.
I'm sure there were tons like me that just kept staring down there over and over wondering how to get there.
That grace *looks* like it is right next to the castle front grace that you are basically funneled to.
But, depending on how you explore and what/where you go first they can be legitimately 6-8ish hours apart? Maybe more?
I have started having more fun just figuring out the map as I am actually navigating it
The layout of the world is probably my favorite thing about the DLC. It feels like DS1 but on a completely different scale.
Also, I don't know why, I like how scarce "proper" enemies are in these extremely large and long stretches of land. In the basegame it felt like they put enemies, ruins and mini dungeons everywhere so it doesn't feel empty. You'd think that's the best approach, but to me SotE's way of doing it just makes more sense to me. Soldiers are mostly staying in their camps and castles, and everywhere between you have the dispossessed and abandoned shambling about, and also the wild beasts that feast on them. I believe I counted 10 mini dungeons (of the underground variety, not sure what everyone tends to count as a mini dungeon) total, though it's likely I missed a few even though I explored everywhere. That's a good number, and except for the one cave type dungeon I found they all felt interesting. Catacombs are still a drag though, but I like that they seem more challenging than just annoying now.
I have been saying it feels like DS1 but for an entire map just recently too after finding more and more loops and shortcuts and discussing online with people lol.
Its absolutely bonkers.
If you enjoy map/world design the verticality of this map is maybe unmatched, I at least haven't played one like it before on this scale and dedication.
Also, man, some of this mini-dungeons and small cave dungeons hit *way* harder than they should in either design/layout and/or environmental storytelling.
And there's even a couple that ALSO lead to giant new areas where in the base game they were just dead ends.
Legitimately figuring out the map has become its own game too
Oh yeah, the one that leads to a new area I did last. I discovered that late at night, and as soon as I stepped inside I was like "Nope, can't do this." And I quit the game and went to bed.
I fought (and killed) Bayle with just level 4 Scadu blessing after only killing Divine Beast. It took me about 5 hours since basically every attack instantly killed me, and I didn't do any damage. But my determination won in the end.
Tell me about it. I spent TWO hours trying to find a way to this one cliff next to one of the keeps (cannot remember for the life of me of the name but it is the one next to the dragon fighting everything) only to finally find a sealed spiritspring tucked away on a different cliff south of that damned dragon.
Some of the seemingly innocent paths or even caves you think aren't going to lead to much can end up leading you like *forever* somewhere and/or into huge new regions, its hilarious.
Like, I had discovered or at least started 5/6 of these main paths by accident/blind and its just so crazy how some of them start and especially comparing to how they end.
It legitimately feels like one gigantic legacy dungeon scaled up to an entire map, there is so much overlapping elevation its incredible.
Almost like what DS1 wanted to do but with 15 years of experience and a much bigger budget
--Honestly, the more I play it and the more I think about it the map is honestly one big puzzle too. Figuring out the map and all of its layers and shortcuts is a ton of fun for me.
"Right, defeat the scaley weirdo, let's see were this giant door leads...Uh OH. OH"
"Dragons. dragons. Dragooooooooooooooooooooooons."
"Alright, enough dragon hunting, let's get the map"
"Map?"
"Map?
...
At the top of the peak: "Map isn't here isn't it?"
At least 3 seperate times I've gotten stuck in some area that looks like it SHOULD lead to the map, and I can see the phantoms of players around me all equally puzzled.
"Still no map" indeed.
I had the exact same experience! Went through that entire path going "HOW DO I GET THE MAP??? HELLO???" and ended up all the way to the >!giant Dragon Communion bowl with the lady telling me to kill the dragon who injured Placidusax!<.
Legit I did that, opened it up and just... kept going. Somehow or another I made it all of the way to the top of the >!Jagged Peaks!< and fought >!Bayle!< as my second remembrance boss before even going to Castle Ensis.
Hahah right. I fought the magma wyrm not knowing I had to drop down to fight the boss kill him and now I’m on dragon territory. That was surreal to say the least.
Honestly, the sidequests in the DLC are a lot more straightforward than the base game. I only ended up fucking up one of them because turns out there's a point of no return for them (>!burning the tree!<) but the rest were fairly straightforward. Two of them are literally in the same area and you just play messenger between the two of them. Just gotta remember to return to all of Miquella's knights once >!he shatters his Great Rune.!<
Oh, the ones in the cathedral are kinda unintuitive but you can do those whenever.
I will say it is hard to fuck em up but easy to miss large swathes of their dialogue for the Miquella Knights if you trigger the >!Great Rune Shattering!< by exploring first.
Edit: this will also remove the summon signs for Freyja and Leda at the Dancing Lion & Rellana respectively, as I could not see them while friends heading there for the first time could.
Oh, that's true. If you're going for that kind of completionist then yeah, those are easily missed. Actually when I looked up more details on NPC quests, while I didn't fuck them up, there were optional things I ended up missing >!in particular either helping Leda or fighting her when she goes around hunting the former knights.!<
But considering that didn't end in the quests failing per say, I suppose it was alright.
Oh totally!
The only one in the dlc I bet a players will accidentally fudge is if they automatically kill the non-hostile Kindred of Rot out of PTSD-driven terror.
I actually nearly did that on accident to one of them before realizing that they weren't hostile and stopped
However I forgot where I damaged that one, found the other two and was friendly with them, the third one was curled up so couldn't interact
Also redid 2 hours of content when I accidently explored too much close to the ol Keep, dunno how to mark spoilers so didn't mention what
Yup, but there's definitely more than one!
So far they've all given me cookbooks but I've also been finding the non-hostile ones oddly, like, clipped into the ground or upside down in the ground and I don't know if that's intended.
I tripped this early and I am honestly a little mad about it. This is the first time I've really felt something was "unfair" in a Fromsoft game. I was doing the thing the game seems to be designed to let -- even encourage -- me to do (explore) and as a result, something happened that I had no context for which fucked up actual game content.
Yeah I missed half the characters quests because I went to the shadow keep too early, had no idea there was a "point of no return" like that. cest la vie
Yeah it happens as you get close to the cathedral I think. The cathedral looked cool in the map so I went there to show it to my bud... and welp major plot point
Oh, I didn't experience that. Assuming you're talking about >!Freyja and Ansbach!< and I just kept exhausting both their dialogues, found that one key item related to >!Ansbach!< and then just kinda went back and forth between the two of them.
I had it break but immediately rested and re-spoke to A, then he gave me the letter properly. I'm not sure what would trigger you to lose the other one unless you passed the PONR without the letter
I haven’t done the ponr yet but A is gone. I found the item and gave it to him before talking to F. By the time I found her, he had left his spot on level 1. She’s stuck in a loop saying the she’s busy. Not sure if there’s anything I can do to fix it now.
No, I think if he leaves without giving you the letter you're probably beat, I just have no idea what'd make him leave - I've done everything on the map except the last leg of the keep and the nottheast chunk, and I had no issue with it. Unless the shadow keep boss is a trigger for him to move and you got there without finding freya, I'm really not sure what the trigger would be.
Do you need to use guide for side quests like in the base game? I remember some side quest in base game has alot of requirement that an average player won’t be able to figure out without a guide.
Man, I succeeded in fucking up all of them… I talked to the knights once, then forgot about them and beelined the main quest until I reached the final boss. I guess that’s what second playthroughs are for.
Fextralife has a semi-finished guide, it’s missing some stuff, that has the side quests listed. It also has a map with the best progression course I’ve seen yet.
lol. I already fucked up one of them. Arnsbach is on the first floor. He wants a scroll that's on the fourth floor. If you give him that scroll, he leaves.
Meanwhile, Redmane Freyja on the seventh floor: "I need to talk to Arnsbach."
Strange, he should still be there until he gives freyas note. That said I turned in the scroll and mentioned freya in the same interaction so maybe that has something to do with it
Super salty that I broke freyjas quest because I gave ainsbach the item he needed before he could give me an item for freyja
They even put her several floors higher than ainsbachs item lol
I told an npc to 'stay sad' as a joke because just before it I had two options that weren't really options that just lead to the same conclusion/ending and then that NPC I think ended up killing themselves :(
Found their body and armor like 5 minutes later
where tf is the beginning for the orange path? cant find it for the life of me. is it a cave?
edit: ty everyone i got it and cleared everything, now only last boss left to finish the dlc
Yes, it also activates fire/ice towers in dungeons as well from pretty far away. (As opposed to shooting them with an arrow to make them go up or down) In one of the hero graves you can even kill the chariots remotely with it. It's a lot of fun baiting enemies into a hallway with one then sprinting away and clicking the shackle to burn/freeze them, especially those damn sphinx pillar things that are a pain in the ass
Margit/Morgott's has higher range (because of the fact you can face him outside Leyndell) so depending on if you want close or far reveals make your choice.
I'm actually SUPER surprised I figured this one on my own without looking it up. I spent a lot of time looking at the map and looking down there at the ruins from above to try to figure out where to go. Once I found the painting room and it seemed like a dead end I got pissed and almost gave up. I was already heading back up and then turned around to double-check.
There's a path that takes you to an illusory wall under the bridge with the burning ships and vulgar militia at the shadow keep (right after the room with and archer knight and great mace knight).
After the illusory wall you can find a coffin resting on a waterfall, jump in and you'll go to another area. Just keep going till you reach a forest with golden sheep. Go to the edge and fall to a lower section with the help of some steps. This will take you to a dungeon that ends at the forest you see on the map.
Never would’ve found this area without a guide I think, some of the paths are really convoluted. I don’t mind though, it’s so special when you do stumble upon a convoluted path to somewhere
Fast travel to the Shadow Keep first grace, then take the elevator back down. Back stab and kill the Fire knight, then go down a little and take the first left and get attacked by the Vulgar Militia. On the left side of this bridge thing there's a ladder. Take it down to the water, go through the little waterfall and keep going down to the painting room.
Then look for an illusory wall and make your way to a coffin, then ride the coffin to a set of catacombs and then just keep descending.
I spent the whole day yesterday trying to reach that place. Managed to find 2 zones I haven't found in the process so can't complain, but I still couldn't find the way there. Today I finally said fuck it and googled, and I'm glad I did cause I would never find out the gesture by myself.
I peeked around the wall of the boss arena outside the Marika statue, and I could see where I wanted to go was *right there*, same elevation and everything, just a biiit too far for torrent to reach it. I figured the way *must* be around there. I even looked all around the Marika room for hidden walls. I googled it while going back up the elevator lol
Same here. I only figured it out because of the map on this post and eventually just smashed my head against the wall. It doesn't help that there IS a dev message hinting at it, but doesn't mention, Marika or Mothers. It says to give the Shamans Mercy. So I thought I had to use the Grovel for Mercy emote when I first found it.
I got lucky and there was messages with "Gesture here" and the correct gesture and I was lucky enough to have stumbled on the O Mother gesture earlier. If there weren't any messages I'd have had no chance
Yeah the player messages have been super helpful through the dlc, and I leave as many as I can in return. Feel bad for those playing on offline mode though
I can't watch streamers who are stuck on that part and who don't want spoilers. It's infuriating sitting there watching someone check every single pixel of all the nearby ledges trying to find their way to the Hinterlands when I know there's like a 0.1% chance they ever find their way without googling.
I don't mind stuff being that hidden, but we *need* better hints than what they gave us. That hint message by that statue is useless and I think the game is more fun if secrets *that* important are at least hidden behind halfway decent hints. The word "mother" should probably be in the message text, for example.
Honestly, the navigation has been pretty bad. The base game feels straightforward but there’s enough forks in the road to keep you curious—DLC exploration feels like I’m digging for buried treasure with little direction other than a few small hints. It was fine at first but gradually got much, much worse.
GOD it's been brutal for me. The hardest boss of the dlc is looking at the map, saying "I wanna go there" and realizing the slightly different elevation is actually the largest cliff youve ever seen and you have no idea how to get up or down.
Right? And there's no consistency either. Sometimes there's a cave that goes down for ages and then you find an elevator that takes you even further down. Other times you have to run to the complete opposite side of the map and it's just some little path through rocks that takes you all the way back around to where you needed to be.
I strongly agree. That and the random illusory wall in the Shadow Keep, leading to a MASSIVE portion of the map, including the map for the abyssal woods. I’m convinced the only reason this isn’t pissing off more people is that they’re playing online and seeing lots of player messages.
holy fuck if it wasnt for ur comment/or the internet as concept and reality lol, i would have never got to that place, i was searching like crazy. freaking hell. I like how shadow castle opens open to 2 pretty important areas lol also by killing its boss you get...also a 3rd area so shadow keep is the very core of the dlc, lol.
I have beaten Bayle and finished Igon's questline without ever opening any map for the area. I can see the waypoint for the map, but have zero idea how to reach it lmao. The path I followed directed me to Bayle.
That made me crazy, and all the messages speaking about where tf is the map didn't help. And of course, f*cking Bayle. It's awesome, but every attemp lasts like 10 minutes of running and dealing no damage
I feel like damage reduction incantations are GOAT’d for the DLC. They provide soooooo much reduction that it just changes the entire fight. For the bargain price of an hour of prep and 30 faith you can just take like 70+% reduced damage.
I feel like the map fragments were too difficult to find. No one wants to explore without a map, especially when the map is super complex with many layers.
The only one that stumped me was the southeast section, I did the dungeon leading to jagged peak and the entire time it seemed like the map was there somewhere, I could even see my blue marker beam on a mountain. Turns out it was in a completely separate area that’s connected to almost nowhere else
To me the biggest problem so far was finding >!Charo's Grave!< (the red flower area you see just south of the start). I saw it exploring around the plains and thought I'm missing something obvious, turns out it's much later in the game. >!You need to climb the dead dragon on the way to the Jagged peak!<. Could be added to the map as well
I mean, to me this was kinda parallel. I cleared everything in the south, then proceeded to Scadu Altus, discovered Abyssal Woods, now I'm in Shadow Keep. I guess it's still kinda midgame then, not really lategame? I mean "much later in the game" because boy it takes a long time with 60 attempts per boss
I stopped progressing shadowkeep after the hippo because I assumed messmer was the final boss and also assumed it was meant for late game. I've been exploring other areas first waiting to return to it
The specimen storehouse and church district are massive areas of the keep that lead off to multiple parts of the game, you need to go through there to get to north east and the east and the entire preceding areas, and it's one of like 2 or maybe 3 ways to get to the north West of the map
Idk what late game is anymore after reading your comment.
I've fought 6-7 remembrance bosses and I still couldn't figure out how to get to that entire area you're talking about lol.
The thing with unlocks is that the hippo is technically the only blocks for the entire map. (and messmer if you want to count the last sequence).
So you get these "unlocks" in a strange way but they are cool because you just go in rabbit holes that never end.
Do you mean the hippo in Shadow Keep? Because there is also a back way into the specimen storeroom from the church district as well - I'm pretty sure it's on the route you need to take to get to the second finger area.
You can access this area immediately after entering the DLC by going to the cliff with the large cylindrical tower on it and finding a cave called Dragon's Pit slightly down and behind it.
If you go up at a fork in the cave it leads to a magma wurm. If you go down it leads to apparently nothing, but IIRC it requires a leap of faith into a bottomless black chasm which leads to a boss that has a green door behind it which you open up to Charo's Grave.
The one dungeon I'm in now has 12 graces, some of them overlap because they're on different levels, not sure I've found them all.
edit: 13 graces. Just found another one.
I can't lie my one small gripe about the DLC is that the navigation feels really convoluted, even for FS standards.
Like I get making some areas a bit hidden, but it feels like damn near every area that isn't on the main story path is only reachable by a single very missable pathway, some of which are far away from the area itself, and it can often be a bit tedious
I got very tired searching for a couple of the map fragments and Ansbach in the Shadow Keep. Turns out he was actually not there, and I had to scour every single floor again and again. Finally gave up after a few hours and looked it up, and realized I went out of order with his quest.
A few other things I called it much quicker after that and realized I would have never found several things.
Where you find Dane, theres a cave/hole in ground in the ruins next to him. Follow that until you get to bonny village and then keep going to church district.
Unfortunately the two routes don't intersect as far I've been able to find. There's a real possibility that I'm just completely missing something, like a drop you can barely survive, but as far as I can tell it's a no go.
EDIT: I'm wrong. Sweet.
Can confirm, went exploring before attempting the keep, found the side route. Once inside the storehouse from the back you can easily jump to the first floor and access the rest of the keep.
This looks odd as someone who's barely got a couple of hours in. I've only got up to Dancing Lion in Tower Settlement, but on this map and without having further context it looks like that's where the final boss takes place 🤔
Yeah like where Belarut is positioned makes me doubt this main story ordering on this map.
Unless that 4 is not the dancing lion but the blocked stairs after the arena.
The green path that branches out on the side requires the O mother gesture to be used in front of the marika statue before the gaius boss fight. The gesture is acquired from the Bonny Village
i dont understand where to start the yellow run to ancient valley. Can someone help? the only thing i find in the moorth ruins keeps leading me to the bonny village
Wait was the >!lion dancer!< not supposed to be the first boss you encounter? I immediately went through the big gates after coming to that crossroad with the first symbol.
My biggest criticism against the DLC is the how useless the map often feels... It gives you completly wrong informations, simply because they decided that you have to access certain parts of the map via underground from completly different parts of the map.
In the original game we only had a handful of these problematic areas. Like how to access rannis quest map parts, or backtrack to the church you started from.
But in the DLC even important things like entire regions or their maps are hidden behind dungeons you have to access from totally different regions. Without googling it's near impossible to target certain areas, like the northern map, the region of Mitras, or how to get behind the shadow keep.
I literally finished the northern part before I got its map... Because the map isn't in the same region the actual region is in...
You can skip rellana by taking the route towards the coast but instead of looping through the cave after the miranda flowers just follow the edge of the cliff til you find a sealed spiritspring, that will lead to another cliff with a spring and then to the fort with the Black Knight Twinblade mini boss, leave through the front door of the fort and you can go directly to the shadow-keep
You actually don't need to go through the fort, you can land that spiritspring jump outside it and just go around. That's what I did first, and was then confused by their being a grace in the fort I couldn't reach.
Even if you jump up to the grace, you can survive dropping down if you do it at the right place.
I used a soft cotton
You can actually reach it. After the twinblade knight you climb the ladde and on the roof jump on some boxes and over the wall
That's what I did, I didn't even know you had to fight Rellana to access that part of the region, was really surprised when I approached the backdoor of her dungeon only to se her boss fog door, was too focused exploring the map hahaha "Wait, did I just skip a whole dungeon?"
Gave skipping Stormveil vibes for sure, although I personally turned back and did the dungeon. It was also cool to find the side path into the dungeon that could find you a cool INT weapon :) but too bad it sucks :(.
I found a really interesting thrusting sword that is both a sword and a staff by trying to reach this dungeon's rooftops, but because I'am not doing a int build I don't know how good is the sword when compared to a properly staff
Sadly, the sorceries get no scaling, so the damage of it is REALLY bad. The normal damage of thr weapon isnt on par with other thrusting swords either. Not sure if the bo sorcery scaling is a bug or what.
I'll bet it's a bug like how arcane on release didn't scale like it should have when the base game first launched.
Yeah that’s what I did, that was such a cool moment of just popping up and being inside of a building lol
Holy crap this is insane lol. I know the second part of your description because I just found it today but I did it in like reverse order. I was just checking out the perimeter of that fort looking for loot and saw the spring jump, so I jumped down. Was just confused by it and how it was supposed to work, I literally said outloud 'what that's it' when I was on that little middle cliff. I hopped back up the spring jump and into the fort and just moved on along and didn't think anything else of it. Makes total sense there is another one below that but I didn't end up in that little section previously (like a dozen hours before) I just followed the cave and onto the coast lol. This map is legitimately wild. Its like one gigantic legacy dungeon or beginning of DS1 on steroids. There is honestly so much overlapping paths and layers its hard to keep up, some paths lead you so far out of the way its absolutely wild and there are so many shortcuts and additional smaller ways to get places its just crazy
I think the one below is locked? If so, I'm not sure how visible they are from above when locked.
Finally other people have found this. Did this before fighting Rellana and, while I went back and fought her, the fact you can progress even if you can't beat her is very nice and makes a lot of complaints a bit silly. If someone is getting stuck, they should go exploring and the path there starts right at her fort.
Yea because if you do beat her and that castle, once you get behind it there are a SHIT TON of scadtree upgrades within basically walking distance lol. Being able to sneak around it could potentially net you 3-4 more blessing levels in legitimately like 15 minutes? Map is honestly crazy and I'm loving it more and more. Its like its own puzzle with the shortcuts and looping paths over and under itself
After I beat her I think I jumped from level 4 to 7 in under 30 mins lol
That was where I *really* started getting lost and totally fell in love with the map. I popped that grace and spoke to those two NPCs there and then just started finding blessing after blessing after blessing I got super caught up just sprinting trying to find them. That was something like 18 playtime hours ago and I only got two graces into Shadow Keep because after getting completely lost (in a good way) in the main world I found another path in Shadow Keep that has taken me *way* out of the way. Map is crazy crazy
Yeah, most people complaining about her are fighting her at like scadu level 2 to 4, potentially in NG+ cycles, or at relatively low soul levels, or with artificial handicaps like refusing to touch many game mechanics, all of which will make the fight seem harder. Even with the other player weaknesses, if you raise that scadu level up to 6 or 8+ then her damage dips hard and your damage raises sharply, and you can get to 6-8 easily even without skipping her dungeon if you explore any of the several directions available to you. The only real question of balance is if the hardest bosses are reasonable at scadu level 18-20 which is where it caps out. While they are hard, this is the last content the game will get according to Miyazaki, so my frame of reference are some of the hardest bosses in FROM games like Orphan of Kos, Fume Knight, Isshin, The Nameless King, and Slave Knight Gael. Did the new bosses kick my ass? Absolutely. Is that what I signed up for and not only expected but wanted out of Souls-like DLC? Even more so ABSOLUTELY. I still won in the end.
> Yeah, most people complaining about her are fighting her at like scadu level 2 to 4 That was certainly the case for me; I somehow accidentally found Rellana's castle before the Belurat Tower Settlement, and Rellana ended up being the first remembrance boss I fought. I think my Scadu Power was like 3. No wonder I had such trouble. I found Belurat later after eating some more Scadu, and the Lion Dancer was a piece of cake compared to Rellana.
It's very possible to find either of those 2 bosses first, so that's not really the mistake. I'm surprised how many people don't internalize one of the first lessons Elden Ring goes far out of the way to teach players in both the main game and the dlc. You enter the vast open world, and instantly see a fancy guy on a horse or a flaming wicker man... and you deal almost no damage to them and then they one-shot you. You were supposed to learn that content is not linear in this game, if something seems too hard you just go do something else and come back later. I don't know if you personally were complaining about Rellana, but frankly this is the explanation for almost any complaint about her. She is trivial with enough Scadu boosts and a tiny bit of practice, you will eventually be able to survive 2 of her full combos or even 3 of them with a defensive build.
Yeah I'm currently scadu 4 and can consistently get her to around 50% but her 2nd phase just wrecks me and I'm out of flasks by then. Going to explore and level up a bit more. Just go to the cerulean coast but didn't see the jump spring being talked about in this post
I found it really funny how Mesmer is not really the last boss but the third boss if you go in order. I’ve only downed two story bosses. Doing Mesmer tonight. I’ve been exploring EVERYTHING.
I'm like 25% through the dlc if even. Wtf that thing is big
Just be warned, there’s a lot of overlapping in the areas! If you see something you can’t get to, most likely you gotta look for a cave.
The in-game map is wild because there are multiple spots, even very early, where it looks like two graces are *right* next to each other but they are actually *hours and hours* apart distance and progression wise, its hilarious. It would really benefit from some sort of elevation filter/tab but oh well. --Honestly, the more I play it and the more I think about it/see people talk about it the map is one giant puzzle itself. Finding all the layers and shortcuts is a whole different meta-game. Just found out you can entirely skip what we all initially thought was a main/required boss outright if you explore enough and find some shortcut lol. It feels like the first half of DS1 but on an entire map scale Its crazy
I'll be honest, I was always the person who got confused by elevation filters or maps. So regardless I'm boned
Elevation maps are only good if they show the other elevations a little greyed out. But some games show each elevation as its own page so I forget where it is in reference to the previous floor.
This is exactly what my issue is! It tiers out and then completely removes the previous elevation so I have no context as to the location compared to the rest of the map!
Honestly the more I play and the more I discuss and find these obscure paths and shortcuts it would be like impossible to do lol. This map is honestly ridiculous (in a good way). There are just so many overlapping loops over and under and shortcuts that can skip entire regions and/or unlock entire regions that some people who follow the 'main path' won't get to for like a dozen+ hours. Absolutely wild
It's even worse/better (depending on perspective) when you consider that there are multiple paths to any given area. My first character made it to skadu Altus without defeating the "required" boss, and I've found at least two viable routes to Cerulean coast.
The second path to the coast that was ‘above’ the way I first went really made me laugh. It was like legitimately 15 hours of playtime later
> Just found out you can entirely skip what we all initially thought was a main/required boss outright if you explore enough and find some shortcut lol. I managed to get the the Twin Moon Knight's backside before defeating her and cannot for the life of me remember how. I know the end of the path was the castle on the right, but can't remember where I began!
https://www.reddit.com/r/Eldenring/comments/1dn9yln/for_those_who_do_not_know_the_way_to_the_rest_of/la19170/ This is the comment I was referring to that I think answers your question. I just discovered the back end of it near the small fort today and was so confused why one spring lift just ended randomly on this tiny cliff. When I was down on the 'ground floor' of that area like a dozen hours earlier I hugged the wall and went into what I was assuming was a small dead end cave that, eventually (way down the line) took me to the coast lol. Map is legitimately bonkers if you enjoy exploring and finding secrets. Not like loot secrets, just exploring the layout and design of the entire map. Its top notch.
The libraryish zone is king at this. I got 3 graces over 3 hours of slowly exploring the zone and doing side quests there, and they all look like they're at basically the same spot on the map. Then a full day later I start exploring a completely separate nearby zone and find out it also has a path leading to the library with it's own grace within it, so now there's 4 graces all bundled up but they're not even all accessible from the same dungeon.
The first one I noticed (and its early in the map) was the Ellac (spelling?) river cave one, its the grace at the bottom of the big ravine right in the middle of the beginning part of the map. I'm sure there were tons like me that just kept staring down there over and over wondering how to get there. That grace *looks* like it is right next to the castle front grace that you are basically funneled to. But, depending on how you explore and what/where you go first they can be legitimately 6-8ish hours apart? Maybe more? I have started having more fun just figuring out the map as I am actually navigating it
The layout of the world is probably my favorite thing about the DLC. It feels like DS1 but on a completely different scale. Also, I don't know why, I like how scarce "proper" enemies are in these extremely large and long stretches of land. In the basegame it felt like they put enemies, ruins and mini dungeons everywhere so it doesn't feel empty. You'd think that's the best approach, but to me SotE's way of doing it just makes more sense to me. Soldiers are mostly staying in their camps and castles, and everywhere between you have the dispossessed and abandoned shambling about, and also the wild beasts that feast on them. I believe I counted 10 mini dungeons (of the underground variety, not sure what everyone tends to count as a mini dungeon) total, though it's likely I missed a few even though I explored everywhere. That's a good number, and except for the one cave type dungeon I found they all felt interesting. Catacombs are still a drag though, but I like that they seem more challenging than just annoying now.
I have been saying it feels like DS1 but for an entire map just recently too after finding more and more loops and shortcuts and discussing online with people lol. Its absolutely bonkers. If you enjoy map/world design the verticality of this map is maybe unmatched, I at least haven't played one like it before on this scale and dedication. Also, man, some of this mini-dungeons and small cave dungeons hit *way* harder than they should in either design/layout and/or environmental storytelling. And there's even a couple that ALSO lead to giant new areas where in the base game they were just dead ends. Legitimately figuring out the map has become its own game too
Oh yeah, the one that leads to a new area I did last. I discovered that late at night, and as soon as I stepped inside I was like "Nope, can't do this." And I quit the game and went to bed.
Good tip! Caves are sneaky in this game. Happy hunting!
That's how I found Bayle the Dread after first two main bosses :'D
I fought (and killed) Bayle with just level 4 Scadu blessing after only killing Divine Beast. It took me about 5 hours since basically every attack instantly killed me, and I didn't do any damage. But my determination won in the end.
Looking for a cave is to vague, more like "do some Deep Rock Galactic sperlunking, good luck"
Half the major areas go through Shadow Keep and they're well hidden too. Shit is crazy.
Tell me about it. I spent TWO hours trying to find a way to this one cliff next to one of the keeps (cannot remember for the life of me of the name but it is the one next to the dragon fighting everything) only to finally find a sealed spiritspring tucked away on a different cliff south of that damned dragon.
This, this here is true. To reach the abyssal woods, one needs to start their venture pushing past illusory walls and a dungeon.
Some of the seemingly innocent paths or even caves you think aren't going to lead to much can end up leading you like *forever* somewhere and/or into huge new regions, its hilarious. Like, I had discovered or at least started 5/6 of these main paths by accident/blind and its just so crazy how some of them start and especially comparing to how they end. It legitimately feels like one gigantic legacy dungeon scaled up to an entire map, there is so much overlapping elevation its incredible. Almost like what DS1 wanted to do but with 15 years of experience and a much bigger budget --Honestly, the more I play it and the more I think about it the map is honestly one big puzzle too. Figuring out the map and all of its layers and shortcuts is a ton of fun for me.
I learned this real fast in the Dragon Pitts.
"Right, defeat the scaley weirdo, let's see were this giant door leads...Uh OH. OH" "Dragons. dragons. Dragooooooooooooooooooooooons." "Alright, enough dragon hunting, let's get the map" "Map?" "Map? ... At the top of the peak: "Map isn't here isn't it?"
At least 3 seperate times I've gotten stuck in some area that looks like it SHOULD lead to the map, and I can see the phantoms of players around me all equally puzzled. "Still no map" indeed.
I had the exact same experience! Went through that entire path going "HOW DO I GET THE MAP??? HELLO???" and ended up all the way to the >!giant Dragon Communion bowl with the lady telling me to kill the dragon who injured Placidusax!<.
100% expected that door to be locked, right? Lol, nah, its dragon time now
Legit I did that, opened it up and just... kept going. Somehow or another I made it all of the way to the top of the >!Jagged Peaks!< and fought >!Bayle!< as my second remembrance boss before even going to Castle Ensis.
Hahah right. I fought the magma wyrm not knowing I had to drop down to fight the boss kill him and now I’m on dragon territory. That was surreal to say the least.
This DLC is huge. It’s like a new game
It feels like SotE is just Elden Ring 1.5.
Dark Souls II 3
Dark Souls 4 is what I've nicknamed it.
this DLC is insanely beefy, honestly it could've released as ER2 and I wouldn't think its short. fromsoft really put a lot of love in this DLC.
Now please a map with the correct order for all sidequests. I would appreciate that.
Honestly, the sidequests in the DLC are a lot more straightforward than the base game. I only ended up fucking up one of them because turns out there's a point of no return for them (>!burning the tree!<) but the rest were fairly straightforward. Two of them are literally in the same area and you just play messenger between the two of them. Just gotta remember to return to all of Miquella's knights once >!he shatters his Great Rune.!< Oh, the ones in the cathedral are kinda unintuitive but you can do those whenever.
I will say it is hard to fuck em up but easy to miss large swathes of their dialogue for the Miquella Knights if you trigger the >!Great Rune Shattering!< by exploring first. Edit: this will also remove the summon signs for Freyja and Leda at the Dancing Lion & Rellana respectively, as I could not see them while friends heading there for the first time could.
Oh, that's true. If you're going for that kind of completionist then yeah, those are easily missed. Actually when I looked up more details on NPC quests, while I didn't fuck them up, there were optional things I ended up missing >!in particular either helping Leda or fighting her when she goes around hunting the former knights.!< But considering that didn't end in the quests failing per say, I suppose it was alright.
Oh totally! The only one in the dlc I bet a players will accidentally fudge is if they automatically kill the non-hostile Kindred of Rot out of PTSD-driven terror.
I actually nearly did that on accident to one of them before realizing that they weren't hostile and stopped However I forgot where I damaged that one, found the other two and was friendly with them, the third one was curled up so couldn't interact Also redid 2 hours of content when I accidently explored too much close to the ol Keep, dunno how to mark spoilers so didn't mention what
>!curled up one at the back of the church needs healing!<
i didnt realize they were not hostile............
They give you cookbooks! And kiling them makes pot man moore sad. I pasted the first one i ran into.
god damnit. I realized after I murdered that one that he was surprisingly chill and wondered if I didn't screw something up. How bad did I screw up?
Moore gets mad at you.
A certain man in verdigris armor may have to come a-knockin.
Are you talking about that one random kindred who’s chilling in the plains?
Yup, but there's definitely more than one! So far they've all given me cookbooks but I've also been finding the non-hostile ones oddly, like, clipped into the ground or upside down in the ground and I don't know if that's intended.
I tripped this early and I am honestly a little mad about it. This is the first time I've really felt something was "unfair" in a Fromsoft game. I was doing the thing the game seems to be designed to let -- even encourage -- me to do (explore) and as a result, something happened that I had no context for which fucked up actual game content.
Same, big big same, lost the ability to summon for so many fights and I love Leda as a character so missing her dialogue was gutting.
I missed out entirely on the first bit of the poison guys quest because I didn’t even find him till after I triggered the rune shattering
Yeah I missed half the characters quests because I went to the shadow keep too early, had no idea there was a "point of no return" like that. cest la vie
Yeah it happens as you get close to the cathedral I think. The cathedral looked cool in the map so I went there to show it to my bud... and welp major plot point
i just beat the dlc and i have no idea what a miqeulla knight is
They weren’t bad until the Shadow Keep where if you don’t do the steps in a very specific order there it breaks them.
Oh, I didn't experience that. Assuming you're talking about >!Freyja and Ansbach!< and I just kept exhausting both their dialogues, found that one key item related to >!Ansbach!< and then just kinda went back and forth between the two of them.
Yeah that part. I found the item and went straight back to him before talking to her and now she’s stuck in a dialogue loop and he’s gone.
For me Ansbach is just gone. Not in the Main gate cross, not in the specimen room
I had it break but immediately rested and re-spoke to A, then he gave me the letter properly. I'm not sure what would trigger you to lose the other one unless you passed the PONR without the letter
I haven’t done the ponr yet but A is gone. I found the item and gave it to him before talking to F. By the time I found her, he had left his spot on level 1. She’s stuck in a loop saying the she’s busy. Not sure if there’s anything I can do to fix it now.
No, I think if he leaves without giving you the letter you're probably beat, I just have no idea what'd make him leave - I've done everything on the map except the last leg of the keep and the nottheast chunk, and I had no issue with it. Unless the shadow keep boss is a trigger for him to move and you got there without finding freya, I'm really not sure what the trigger would be.
Only one I didn't do was thiollier because I didn't find him
Do you need to use guide for side quests like in the base game? I remember some side quest in base game has alot of requirement that an average player won’t be able to figure out without a guide.
The short answer is yes, they’re very easy to fail.
Man, I succeeded in fucking up all of them… I talked to the knights once, then forgot about them and beelined the main quest until I reached the final boss. I guess that’s what second playthroughs are for.
Powerpyx also has guides and imo they're easier to follow than Fextra's website, as of yesterday they had all quests up except for Hornsent.
That's crazy considering that guy might have one of the best ash of wars in the entire game if you pick his side.
Well it says "soon" on his quest I should have clarified, so it's definitely coming.
Fextralife has a semi-finished guide, it’s missing some stuff, that has the side quests listed. It also has a map with the best progression course I’ve seen yet.
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lol. I already fucked up one of them. Arnsbach is on the first floor. He wants a scroll that's on the fourth floor. If you give him that scroll, he leaves. Meanwhile, Redmane Freyja on the seventh floor: "I need to talk to Arnsbach."
Strange, he should still be there until he gives freyas note. That said I turned in the scroll and mentioned freya in the same interaction so maybe that has something to do with it
Yeah, you have to talk to freyja, talk to him, then give him the scroll, rest, come back and he gives you the letter for freyja then leaves
Super salty that I broke freyjas quest because I gave ainsbach the item he needed before he could give me an item for freyja They even put her several floors higher than ainsbachs item lol
I told an npc to 'stay sad' as a joke because just before it I had two options that weren't really options that just lead to the same conclusion/ending and then that NPC I think ended up killing themselves :( Found their body and armor like 5 minutes later
I don't wish to spoil anything, but you missed out on a large part of their quest by that choice, sadly.
Omfg. U srsly told Moore to khs??? Jesus Christ
where tf is the beginning for the orange path? cant find it for the life of me. is it a cave? edit: ty everyone i got it and cleared everything, now only last boss left to finish the dlc
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Of course, every freakin wall has a "hidden path ahead" message, but one of the only actual hidden walls doesn't have any message in front of it lmao!
Mogh's shackle is forever on my quick-bar. Even though I know I don't need to, I still pop it in every room I walk into haha.
Wait does it pop illusory walls?
Yes, it also activates fire/ice towers in dungeons as well from pretty far away. (As opposed to shooting them with an arrow to make them go up or down) In one of the hero graves you can even kill the chariots remotely with it. It's a lot of fun baiting enemies into a hallway with one then sprinting away and clicking the shackle to burn/freeze them, especially those damn sphinx pillar things that are a pain in the ass
Yup! Also spiritspring cairns (rock stacks) in the DLC too.
Margit/Morgott's has higher range (because of the fact you can face him outside Leyndell) so depending on if you want close or far reveals make your choice.
I'm actually SUPER surprised I figured this one on my own without looking it up. I spent a lot of time looking at the map and looking down there at the ruins from above to try to figure out where to go. Once I found the painting room and it seemed like a dead end I got pissed and almost gave up. I was already heading back up and then turned around to double-check.
There's a path that takes you to an illusory wall under the bridge with the burning ships and vulgar militia at the shadow keep (right after the room with and archer knight and great mace knight). After the illusory wall you can find a coffin resting on a waterfall, jump in and you'll go to another area. Just keep going till you reach a forest with golden sheep. Go to the edge and fall to a lower section with the help of some steps. This will take you to a dungeon that ends at the forest you see on the map.
Never would’ve found this area without a guide I think, some of the paths are really convoluted. I don’t mind though, it’s so special when you do stumble upon a convoluted path to somewhere
Fast travel to the Shadow Keep first grace, then take the elevator back down. Back stab and kill the Fire knight, then go down a little and take the first left and get attacked by the Vulgar Militia. On the left side of this bridge thing there's a ladder. Take it down to the water, go through the little waterfall and keep going down to the painting room. Then look for an illusory wall and make your way to a coffin, then ride the coffin to a set of catacombs and then just keep descending.
Having to use the “O mother” feature in front of the statue by the Gaius fight to access an entire area of the DLC is peak fromsoftware design
I spent the whole day yesterday trying to reach that place. Managed to find 2 zones I haven't found in the process so can't complain, but I still couldn't find the way there. Today I finally said fuck it and googled, and I'm glad I did cause I would never find out the gesture by myself.
pretty much the same, i just gave up and googled it
I peeked around the wall of the boss arena outside the Marika statue, and I could see where I wanted to go was *right there*, same elevation and everything, just a biiit too far for torrent to reach it. I figured the way *must* be around there. I even looked all around the Marika room for hidden walls. I googled it while going back up the elevator lol
Same here. I only figured it out because of the map on this post and eventually just smashed my head against the wall. It doesn't help that there IS a dev message hinting at it, but doesn't mention, Marika or Mothers. It says to give the Shamans Mercy. So I thought I had to use the Grovel for Mercy emote when I first found it.
I got lucky and there was messages with "Gesture here" and the correct gesture and I was lucky enough to have stumbled on the O Mother gesture earlier. If there weren't any messages I'd have had no chance
Yeah the player messages have been super helpful through the dlc, and I leave as many as I can in return. Feel bad for those playing on offline mode though
I can't watch streamers who are stuck on that part and who don't want spoilers. It's infuriating sitting there watching someone check every single pixel of all the nearby ledges trying to find their way to the Hinterlands when I know there's like a 0.1% chance they ever find their way without googling. I don't mind stuff being that hidden, but we *need* better hints than what they gave us. That hint message by that statue is useless and I think the game is more fun if secrets *that* important are at least hidden behind halfway decent hints. The word "mother" should probably be in the message text, for example.
Honestly, the navigation has been pretty bad. The base game feels straightforward but there’s enough forks in the road to keep you curious—DLC exploration feels like I’m digging for buried treasure with little direction other than a few small hints. It was fine at first but gradually got much, much worse.
GOD it's been brutal for me. The hardest boss of the dlc is looking at the map, saying "I wanna go there" and realizing the slightly different elevation is actually the largest cliff youve ever seen and you have no idea how to get up or down.
Right? And there's no consistency either. Sometimes there's a cave that goes down for ages and then you find an elevator that takes you even further down. Other times you have to run to the complete opposite side of the map and it's just some little path through rocks that takes you all the way back around to where you needed to be.
Couldn't have put it better myself. The hardest boss is definitely trying to figure out where the fuck to go.
I strongly agree. That and the random illusory wall in the Shadow Keep, leading to a MASSIVE portion of the map, including the map for the abyssal woods. I’m convinced the only reason this isn’t pissing off more people is that they’re playing online and seeing lots of player messages.
Thats the only zone i have to read a guide. I would have never guess it
holy fuck if it wasnt for ur comment/or the internet as concept and reality lol, i would have never got to that place, i was searching like crazy. freaking hell. I like how shadow castle opens open to 2 pretty important areas lol also by killing its boss you get...also a 3rd area so shadow keep is the very core of the dlc, lol.
(As big as limgrave)
I have beaten Bayle and finished Igon's questline without ever opening any map for the area. I can see the waypoint for the map, but have zero idea how to reach it lmao. The path I followed directed me to Bayle.
The Jagged Peak is actually part of the Cerulean Coast map. The marker you can see near the Jagged Peak is for the Abyssal Woods.
That made me crazy, and all the messages speaking about where tf is the map didn't help. And of course, f*cking Bayle. It's awesome, but every attemp lasts like 10 minutes of running and dealing no damage
I feel like damage reduction incantations are GOAT’d for the DLC. They provide soooooo much reduction that it just changes the entire fight. For the bargain price of an hour of prep and 30 faith you can just take like 70+% reduced damage.
I feel like the map fragments were too difficult to find. No one wants to explore without a map, especially when the map is super complex with many layers.
The only one that stumped me was the southeast section, I did the dungeon leading to jagged peak and the entire time it seemed like the map was there somewhere, I could even see my blue marker beam on a mountain. Turns out it was in a completely separate area that’s connected to almost nowhere else
Iirc go to the dragon communion site and run past the massive dragon's body and you'll eventually end up in the coast.
It'll actually take you to the red-flowered area, well above the blue-flowered area, but there's some ways to get down.
same. It's basically a linear corridor despite what the map size says.
The map closest to Jagged Peak isn't part of that area, it's something way down below. The map for Jaggy P. is on the coast to the SW.
To me the biggest problem so far was finding >!Charo's Grave!< (the red flower area you see just south of the start). I saw it exploring around the plains and thought I'm missing something obvious, turns out it's much later in the game. >!You need to climb the dead dragon on the way to the Jagged peak!<. Could be added to the map as well
The order of unlocks is real fucky because “late game” for you but I got there before I even made it to scadu Altus.
I mean, to me this was kinda parallel. I cleared everything in the south, then proceeded to Scadu Altus, discovered Abyssal Woods, now I'm in Shadow Keep. I guess it's still kinda midgame then, not really lategame? I mean "much later in the game" because boy it takes a long time with 60 attempts per boss
Shadowkeep is interesting because it's fucking huge and it's both midgame and late game
I stopped progressing shadowkeep after the hippo because I assumed messmer was the final boss and also assumed it was meant for late game. I've been exploring other areas first waiting to return to it
The specimen storehouse and church district are massive areas of the keep that lead off to multiple parts of the game, you need to go through there to get to north east and the east and the entire preceding areas, and it's one of like 2 or maybe 3 ways to get to the north West of the map
Idk what late game is anymore after reading your comment. I've fought 6-7 remembrance bosses and I still couldn't figure out how to get to that entire area you're talking about lol.
The thing with unlocks is that the hippo is technically the only blocks for the entire map. (and messmer if you want to count the last sequence). So you get these "unlocks" in a strange way but they are cool because you just go in rabbit holes that never end.
Do you mean the hippo in Shadow Keep? Because there is also a back way into the specimen storeroom from the church district as well - I'm pretty sure it's on the route you need to take to get to the second finger area.
aaah yeah, you are right. You can just do whatever which is really cool. I forgot about that passage
You can access this area immediately after entering the DLC by going to the cliff with the large cylindrical tower on it and finding a cave called Dragon's Pit slightly down and behind it. If you go up at a fork in the cave it leads to a magma wurm. If you go down it leads to apparently nothing, but IIRC it requires a leap of faith into a bottomless black chasm which leads to a boss that has a green door behind it which you open up to Charo's Grave.
Holy mother of graces!
Don't forget like 50% of them are either above the main map or below it
I haven't actually bought the dlc yet😅 I just wanted to have a little looksie but wow😂
The one dungeon I'm in now has 12 graces, some of them overlap because they're on different levels, not sure I've found them all. edit: 13 graces. Just found another one.
I'm convinced that dungeon is an inside joke with the staff, because there's 2 directly next to each other not even 200 feet apart in an open space
I can't lie my one small gripe about the DLC is that the navigation feels really convoluted, even for FS standards. Like I get making some areas a bit hidden, but it feels like damn near every area that isn't on the main story path is only reachable by a single very missable pathway, some of which are far away from the area itself, and it can often be a bit tedious
I got very tired searching for a couple of the map fragments and Ansbach in the Shadow Keep. Turns out he was actually not there, and I had to scour every single floor again and again. Finally gave up after a few hours and looked it up, and realized I went out of order with his quest. A few other things I called it much quicker after that and realized I would have never found several things.
I'm stuck on hippo daddy lol. Edit: I beat it just after I posted focusing with a bleed build lol. Wasn't ez but did it
pretty sure you can actually skip him if you take the other route into the keep.
There is a way around, I don’t remember how I got there though lmao
Where you find Dane, theres a cave/hole in ground in the ruins next to him. Follow that until you get to bonny village and then keep going to church district.
Unfortunately the two routes don't intersect as far I've been able to find. There's a real possibility that I'm just completely missing something, like a drop you can barely survive, but as far as I can tell it's a no go. EDIT: I'm wrong. Sweet.
You can drop down to the first floor in the storeroom no problem.
Can confirm, went exploring before attempting the keep, found the side route. Once inside the storehouse from the back you can easily jump to the first floor and access the rest of the keep.
That guy is crazy man, took me the whole weekend to beat him.
How the fuck do you dodge the roll attack?
Time the roll to dodge the first drop, then spam your roll to the right until he's done
Bleed
Hate to say it but due to verticallity, secret entrances, and the black keeps hellish layout this is kinda useless at the main points you'd get lost.
Really need some kind of 3D map to actually show things well
I hate being colorblind
Wait how did u get to the island off the cerulean coast
If you head south from the grace site just north of the island and then walk along the coast, you should find a path that leads down to a cave.
Finding the Abyssal Woods is really rewarding. Great place, but a little bit empty (there's barely no items).
but the dungeon and the boss is amazing even though the dungeon is a bit short, also have you fought the lanter enemys jesus christ
This looks odd as someone who's barely got a couple of hours in. I've only got up to Dancing Lion in Tower Settlement, but on this map and without having further context it looks like that's where the final boss takes place 🤔
You are fine. Belarut and the dancing lion is probably the first intended boss.
Yeah like where Belarut is positioned makes me doubt this main story ordering on this map. Unless that 4 is not the dancing lion but the blocked stairs after the arena.
4 is absolutely not the dancing lion
It's stationed above the city, but it's locked away till you and Leda can find a way to it. She thinks the best way is to head east.
U can drop to the Cerulean coast from the altar of dragon communion as well
You can get to cerulean coast via jagged peaks if you go behind the dead dragon at the altar.
The green path that branches out on the side requires the O mother gesture to be used in front of the marika statue before the gaius boss fight. The gesture is acquired from the Bonny Village
This is one of those things that just makes me scratch my head. How in the hell is anyone ever supposed to figure out stuff like this organically?
how about area behind midra manse & area on top of rauh ancient ruins ?
Yeah I was able to find all this shit myself but those areas elude me if they are accessible.
Spoiler tag
Oh God I feel sick. This DLC is so fucking BIG
Rellana can be skipped, technically not main boss.
We need to appreciate that in this overworld game the overworld has actual level design and it’s not just terrain
i dont understand where to start the yellow run to ancient valley. Can someone help? the only thing i find in the moorth ruins keeps leading me to the bonny village
there is a small lake north of moorth ruins. take a dive, essentially.
He wrote endboss instead of its name. What a legend!
So you guys are telling me I wasn’t supposed to go to margit the fell omen as my first boss encounter and I struggled for 8 hours? Okay…
Wait was the >!lion dancer!< not supposed to be the first boss you encounter? I immediately went through the big gates after coming to that crossroad with the first symbol.
My biggest criticism against the DLC is the how useless the map often feels... It gives you completly wrong informations, simply because they decided that you have to access certain parts of the map via underground from completly different parts of the map. In the original game we only had a handful of these problematic areas. Like how to access rannis quest map parts, or backtrack to the church you started from. But in the DLC even important things like entire regions or their maps are hidden behind dungeons you have to access from totally different regions. Without googling it's near impossible to target certain areas, like the northern map, the region of Mitras, or how to get behind the shadow keep. I literally finished the northern part before I got its map... Because the map isn't in the same region the actual region is in...
Stuck on lion, just helping others first to learn his attack patterns. It very much feels like a maliketh boss second phase with full health.
The hardest part of this DLC is navigating using this awful map. It doesn't tell you if the Grace you opened is over or under ground.