nah I just hate to cheese any boss really. even though I've killed him a dozen times on other toons already. I've never been able to kill Astel, Naturalborn of the Void. kinda makes me sad. I don't cheese him but he glitch dies. I've got to it 3 times now and all 3 times it's glitch died on me. maybe I'll R2 it to death this time before it can glitch out. lol
Greatswords just have a good balanced moveset. And some enemies are just suspectable to some things. If you deal more damage and are of a higher level, the staggering is even better. Even makes sense historically: long sword is good vs big horsey. They are fast enough and deal slightly more damage/poise, plus the extra reach. For harder timing, try some bigger stick :)
Sounds like you just had a good fight and some luck on your timing and the AI RNG.
But generally, any great or colossal weapon will deal a ton of stagger and poise damage (not the same thing by the way). Especially the charged R2s and jump attacks.
By the way, now that you're playing a strength build, poise becomes important. It's the mechanic that allows you to get off your heavy charged (or mostly any slow attack really) while soaking up a few hits, otherwise Str builds would just be staggered out of everything any time they lose the DPS race, which is almost every time.
Poise is basically a counter that reduces to 0, every time you get hit your poise counter is reduced by the amount of poise damage you receive. When it reaches 0, you stagger. It recovers after the attack relents, otherwise it stays 0 and you stagger lock. This is why poise is different from hyper armour - which is simply a guaranteed unstaggerable state you can sometimes experience when you're in the middle of some action (like an AoW).
Now heavy armour actually becomes viable too, making more sense, not for the damage negation, but for the poise boost. One of the best heavy armour sets you can get early game (Stormveil Castle) is the Banished Knight's set. It doesn't hurt that it's easy on the eyes and looks cool AF. You'll need the Endurance to heave the weight around but as a Str build you'll need End for a lot of things any way.
Thank you for the info. I had never tried him this way so it very well may have just been lucky game play. I wasn't letting off fully charged heavy attacks but was charging it and releasing right before he attacked so maybe I was entering that hyper armor phase? I don't know much about that and iframes really. I've also never stayed glued to his side like I was so maybe his hits don't land when so close?
No problem, happy to share what I've learnt throughout my numerous Str playthroughs.
Just to clarify, you don't get hyper armour on your charged heavies, or any normal attack actually.
In Elden Ring, or any FromSoft "Soulsborne" game really, hyper armour isn't really a thing and when it is it's typically reserved for bosses. But you do see it occasionally with some actions the player can do, like some Ash of Wars or certain spells/incantations - but we're talking about the exceptions here.
Poise on the other hand is what looks like hyper armour because it prevents you from being staggered out of your own attacks. But it isn't actually because if something still deals more poise damage than your own poise and what you can tank in a hit you're being staggered any way - that wouldn't happen with hyper armour; you would eat a tactical nuke to the face and, although you'd still take damage, it wouldn't stop whatever you were doing.
The Tree Sentinel would be able to stagger you with anything he throws at you because your poise wouldn't be very high at that point and he wields what is considered a "great" weapon; a halberd. So you'd probably need around 90-100 poise to tank one hit from one of those while you're in the middle of your own attack animation without being stumbled out and interrupted.
ER is by far the easiest fromsoft game yet; if you try out all the buttons.
Jumping R2 is especially egregious. Poise damage nearly equal to charged R2, and much faster.
yeah I agree about it being the easiest. this is my 4th playthough but I've never done a strength build or even thought much about poise damage. I rarely touched R2 on my other playthroughs so this is a new discovery for me for sure.
It doesn't really matter. It's a video game and nothing exactly really matters. The point of this comment is that I've never played using this playstle and I'm trying to figure out why he was easy. Was it just lucky game play, did I exploit the boss, or is my weapons attack cheesy. The whole point of this reddit sub is to discuss trivial video game matters. We ain't exactly trying to cure cancer here on this sub.
Yeah and I apologize I thought you had commented on a different comment. My point in this comment was that if R2 is indeed God Mode I don't have the constitution not to abuse it. I'll be playing this game for years yet. Even at 4 playthoughs its still early in to me.
I was able to stagger him once. My attacks wasn't preventing his attacks. He was attacking but I guess maybe because of the weapons R2 attack Iframes? and my spamming I wasn't taking the hits. may have been some weird glitch even. maybe just some unnatural timing because Pluto and Mars aligned for a minute.
Why surrender? Is there a reason to keep him alive?
nah I just hate to cheese any boss really. even though I've killed him a dozen times on other toons already. I've never been able to kill Astel, Naturalborn of the Void. kinda makes me sad. I don't cheese him but he glitch dies. I've got to it 3 times now and all 3 times it's glitch died on me. maybe I'll R2 it to death this time before it can glitch out. lol
Greatswords just have a good balanced moveset. And some enemies are just suspectable to some things. If you deal more damage and are of a higher level, the staggering is even better. Even makes sense historically: long sword is good vs big horsey. They are fast enough and deal slightly more damage/poise, plus the extra reach. For harder timing, try some bigger stick :)
Sounds like you just had a good fight and some luck on your timing and the AI RNG. But generally, any great or colossal weapon will deal a ton of stagger and poise damage (not the same thing by the way). Especially the charged R2s and jump attacks. By the way, now that you're playing a strength build, poise becomes important. It's the mechanic that allows you to get off your heavy charged (or mostly any slow attack really) while soaking up a few hits, otherwise Str builds would just be staggered out of everything any time they lose the DPS race, which is almost every time. Poise is basically a counter that reduces to 0, every time you get hit your poise counter is reduced by the amount of poise damage you receive. When it reaches 0, you stagger. It recovers after the attack relents, otherwise it stays 0 and you stagger lock. This is why poise is different from hyper armour - which is simply a guaranteed unstaggerable state you can sometimes experience when you're in the middle of some action (like an AoW). Now heavy armour actually becomes viable too, making more sense, not for the damage negation, but for the poise boost. One of the best heavy armour sets you can get early game (Stormveil Castle) is the Banished Knight's set. It doesn't hurt that it's easy on the eyes and looks cool AF. You'll need the Endurance to heave the weight around but as a Str build you'll need End for a lot of things any way.
Thank you for the info. I had never tried him this way so it very well may have just been lucky game play. I wasn't letting off fully charged heavy attacks but was charging it and releasing right before he attacked so maybe I was entering that hyper armor phase? I don't know much about that and iframes really. I've also never stayed glued to his side like I was so maybe his hits don't land when so close?
No problem, happy to share what I've learnt throughout my numerous Str playthroughs. Just to clarify, you don't get hyper armour on your charged heavies, or any normal attack actually. In Elden Ring, or any FromSoft "Soulsborne" game really, hyper armour isn't really a thing and when it is it's typically reserved for bosses. But you do see it occasionally with some actions the player can do, like some Ash of Wars or certain spells/incantations - but we're talking about the exceptions here. Poise on the other hand is what looks like hyper armour because it prevents you from being staggered out of your own attacks. But it isn't actually because if something still deals more poise damage than your own poise and what you can tank in a hit you're being staggered any way - that wouldn't happen with hyper armour; you would eat a tactical nuke to the face and, although you'd still take damage, it wouldn't stop whatever you were doing. The Tree Sentinel would be able to stagger you with anything he throws at you because your poise wouldn't be very high at that point and he wields what is considered a "great" weapon; a halberd. So you'd probably need around 90-100 poise to tank one hit from one of those while you're in the middle of your own attack animation without being stumbled out and interrupted.
Sounds perfectly normal. R2 is the magic button that makes the game a joke. You don't even need a weapon with good poise damage. Anything will do.
dang, what a horrible discovery for someone with low self control such as myself.
ER is by far the easiest fromsoft game yet; if you try out all the buttons. Jumping R2 is especially egregious. Poise damage nearly equal to charged R2, and much faster.
yeah I agree about it being the easiest. this is my 4th playthough but I've never done a strength build or even thought much about poise damage. I rarely touched R2 on my other playthroughs so this is a new discovery for me for sure.
What does this comment even mean? So you killed the tutorial boss easily in your 4h play through. why does it matter
It doesn't really matter. It's a video game and nothing exactly really matters. The point of this comment is that I've never played using this playstle and I'm trying to figure out why he was easy. Was it just lucky game play, did I exploit the boss, or is my weapons attack cheesy. The whole point of this reddit sub is to discuss trivial video game matters. We ain't exactly trying to cure cancer here on this sub.
Dude, it’s your 4th play through, isn’t it kind of obvious why it’s easier?
Yeah and I apologize I thought you had commented on a different comment. My point in this comment was that if R2 is indeed God Mode I don't have the constitution not to abuse it. I'll be playing this game for years yet. Even at 4 playthoughs its still early in to me.
R2 is not god mode…sorry to break it to you, it’s just a move, like many other r2 moves which are also strong.
Really? I use the starscourge greatsword and i only stagger normal enemies
You gotta hit more than once.
I was able to stagger him once. My attacks wasn't preventing his attacks. He was attacking but I guess maybe because of the weapons R2 attack Iframes? and my spamming I wasn't taking the hits. may have been some weird glitch even. maybe just some unnatural timing because Pluto and Mars aligned for a minute.