Build help ?

I am still playing this game because it's amazing but all the characters I have used are strength melee builds. I am not asking for the best build because none exists but I want some ideas on builds that do not completely rely on a strong weapon and heavy armour. Any ideas are welcome. Thanks !

You do a 40/40 str\dex build, leaves you able to use most of the weapons there. 40 vit, 45 end. A lot to play with there.

AnCapaillMor wrote:You do a 40/40 str\dex build, leaves you able to use most of the weapons there. 40 vit, 45 end. A lot to play with there.

I said not relying completely on melee weapons.

Hey bud, welcome to the forum.  
May I suggest these exquisite links, and enjoy your stay.

For tha Love of Castings

How to go about making a caster

Eyelidless wrote:

AnCapaillMor wrote:You do a 40/40 str\dex build, leaves you able to use most of the weapons there. 40 vit, 45 end. A lot to play with there.

I said not relying completely on melee weapons.

Ah ok thought you meant strength weapons. Shave a few points off strength and put them into attunement and use the pyro spells, pyro isn't stat based however dex decreases cast time. Pyro's good for mixing it up and ending fights.

A lot of "quality" builds go 27/40 and that's a lot more doable.  Still, there are a lot of common variants that don't use heavy weapons:

- Quality:  Basically 27/40 as above, with the rest in VIT/END.  There are only a few weapons in the game you can't use this way, and if you 2h something you'll get nearly max scaling from it at +15.  Great for those C/C scaling weapons.  At a slightly higher SL can be devastating with a buff.

- Dexterity with Pyromancy:  45 dex maxes cast speed and ~40 maxes weapon scaling, so pretty good synergy.  Go to 16 or 19 attunement for 4-5 slots.  You obviously use a pyro glove, but weapons tend to be standard DEX far such as Falchion, Winged Spear, Balder Side Sword, Great Scythe, or daggers/rapiers.  This is one of the stronger builds overall due to its versatility and effective melee options.  You can get 40 END and 40 or 50 VIT and still be ~SL 100 too.  You also have the option of fast-roll with decent poise or medium-roll with great poise.  Overall a good setup.

- Faith + something:  Get to 30 faith, grab a copy or two of WoG, maybe a TWoP, maybe great magic barrier.  At medium soul levels, use an elemental weapon, though you could just as easily simply stat up either STR or DEX again too.  If you get into SL 100 to 120 range, time to use buffs on a +15 weapon that is getting good scaling.

- Straight INT:  This build uses moonlight butterfly horn, moonlight great sword, and an array of good sorceries (often including dark magic).  It's versatile in that you have excellent melee and ranged damage, although is vulnerable to the somewhat rare great magic barrier and magic shield type spells.  Regardless, this offers boatloads of potential damage, poke, and even some stunlock.  One good backup elemental and you're good to go.  Similar to faith, you have good buff options if you have enough stats to scale a weapon up.

- VIT Gouge:  Slap on Mask of Mother, RoFaP, 40 endurance, and nearly maxed vitality.  Use an elemental weapon obviously, you won't have many stats left for other things.  Your 2nd ring can be anything from havels to hornet to leo.  This isn't rocket science.

- Troll:  Pick an annoying theme and an annoying place to do it, and harass people there.  Example: anti-poison ring + anti poison gear + rusted iron ring with poison throwing knives, dung pies, and a good backstabbing weapon in lower blighttown.

- Pure STR:  You probably know the drill on this already.  STR, VIT, END.

Each of these general classes have quite a few options within them, and as you get higher SL you gradually become all of them at once.  However, these are the general gists.

thanks guys I think I am going to try a pyro/dex build then maybe a sorcerer build.

Haven't seen many people use Winged Spear, but the other choices I completely agree with.

Do you have a level in mind, or do you mainly do PvP or PvE?  If pvp do you invade/host/darkmoon/forest hunter?

Winged spear is a personal preference of mine, but the demon's spear is probably better unless you buff with something reasonably strong.  I forgot to mention katanas which are also obviously great dex weapons.  Still, at low str high dex you can effectively 1H or 2H the winged spear, buff it, and it's slightly longer/stronger than usual spear.  It doesn't have the range of, say, dragonslayer spear or demon's spear or pike, but its stat requirements aren't as high as either and it CAN outdamage demon's if buffed AFAIK.

Most spears are pretty good when wielded properly.  Poke/roll, kick/poke, leo trade w/ buff...really not much to them as long as you remember to not get so spammy you get parried and remember that kick is a good move that they have.

LunarFog wrote:If you want to go build-shopping there are a few people who have pretty lengthy build depositoriums. Here's mine personally, and I don't know how to find it, but ArchMage has a pretty good one too.

https://soulswiki.forumotion.com/t16781-lunarfog-build-collection

https://soulswiki.forumotion.com/t22092-the-archmages-magical-realm-of-interesting-builds

I believe this is what you mentioned?

Also, I have quite a few builds that focus not on strength and heavy armor. Here are some of my most effective builds from my stockpile I have going.

Halberd, longsword, comp bow http://mmdks.com/2wd2
Battle Mage http://mmdks.com/2q5v
DMB buff build with massive health, poise, and fast roll http://mmdks.com/2ry4

this build would mainly be for pve with a little pve involved and soul level would be around sl100

Nothing is more fun in pve (I assume you meant "a little pvp mixed in") than running through the  game blasting stuff with magic/castings imo.

If you have 60 soul arrows, 42 Forces, etcetcetc....its hard not to have fun.

Oh, go for 30 Homing Crystal Soul Masses and a bow or Aveyln....that's as good as pve gets imo.