SL 3 Sorcerer playthrough (video w/commentary)

I'm doing a level 3 sorcerer playthrough and am uploading my progress on Youtube for those that want to see what an sl 3 sorcerer is capable of. I've already done an SL 5 naked run but wanted to try something difficult but a bit more interesting.

Why Sorcerer? They are far weaker out of the box than a Pyromancer. Pyro's get 10 vit, 11 end, 12 str and have a total of 84 stat points at level 1. That doesn't even count the fact that they get the use of a pyro glove that doesn't require scaling for it's damage(or ability to attune any pyro spell) and a pretty good starting set of armor. Sorcerers get 8 vit, 8 end and 9 str and have a total of 82 stat points at level 3. Their magic damage relies on int scaling but since I'm not leveling up it will remain at 15, which also limits the spells I can even use in the first place.

Basically I'm running around trying to maximize my damage using the items that boost sorcery and seeing what kind of havoc a level 3 sorcerer can cause. To make things tougher I'm also not allowing myself to use any items that boost health, stamina or weight limits. In short that means no rofap, havel's ring, dwgr or tiny being's ring. That means I'm going through the whole game with 8 vit/8end. Oh and I'm also limiting my melee weapon to the starting dagger(upgraded of course) so I have to rely on my magic most of the time.

I'm up to episode 4 already so anyone interested can check it out.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JajbSi_wBqE

Gotta give you a +1 on that. I'll be checking them out for sure.

I like the idea, I agree with your first point about it being harder than SL1 playthrough, looking forward to watching your tactics and how you have to adjust to make the most of the class' starting abilities

Who the heck gave you a negative rating?

Been watching and enjoying. I'm liking the pace of this playthrough much more than the semi-speedrun you did before, though it was pretty amazing too.

Keep them coming!

There are always haters out there .

As far as the difficulty goes, I'm trying to convince people that an sl 1 pyro is not the "end all be it" of difficulty runs. Pyro is one of only 3 classes that get the equivalent of 84 points at level 1. And pyromancy in general is just ridiculously overpowered since you basically upgrade it like a weapon.

Well I'm watching it so far (only on part two) but the hyper mode tearstone and bellowing crest ring combo is interesting.

Also I've never done the parish gate that way. Ever Or the dragon using free aim there either. Gonna try those out when (if) i do another playthrough.

one thing I just picked up on though, you mention you have to buy the crest of artorias to fight hydra, when you don't have to just saying And you presume you have to kill stray demon to get rusted iron ring... yeah, live commenting on your playthrough is messing your thoughts up a bit evidently

Oh yeah, and thanks for the tip about Hidden Body vs. Capra's doggies. I mentioned somewhere on the forum the other day (I gave you credit, of course:D ).

Aha, I'm pretty sure you're gonna have to parry/ riposte Gwyn to death this time! I don't think there's any other useful melee weapons vs Gwyn at 9 Str/ 11 Dex, and I doubt Soul Arrows will do the trick either. Although... you do have 3 slots, maybe 90 Soul Arrows would do it!

Good luck! I'll watch for sure.

BLA1NE wrote:Aha, I'm pretty sure you're gonna have to parry/ riposte Gwyn to death this time! I don't think there's any other useful melee weapons vs Gwyn at 9 Str/ 11 Dex, and I doubt Soul Arrows will do the trick either. Although... you do have 3 slots, maybe 90 Soul Arrows would do it!

Good luck! I'll watch for sure.

Yep I think parrying him will be my only option as he's far too aggressive to let me get away with firing soul arrows at him. I could have theoretically two handed a spear or other longsword but I chose to limit myself to the starting dagger. Gwyn is going to be a very interesting fight but I'm thinking if I use great magic shield I can handle the first swing of his weapon and parry the 2nd for safety reasons.

Serious_Much wrote:Well I'm watching it so far (only on part two) but the hyper mode tearstone and bellowing crest ring combo is interesting.

Also I've never done the parish gate that way. Ever Or the dragon using free aim there either. Gonna try those out when (if) i do another playthrough.

one thing I just picked up on though, you mention you have to buy the crest of artorias to fight hydra, when you don't have to just saying And you presume you have to kill stray demon to get rusted iron ring... yeah, live commenting on your playthrough is messing your thoughts up a bit evidently

Ya it was my first attempt at commentary and looking back I did screw up a few times, but it would be so much work to try to fix it I just let it ride. I think I was trying to say "you don't need to get the crest of artorias" as I obviously never did, must have came out wrong. Also you're right on the Stray Demon comment, I caught that later, the main thing I was trying to get across is you never really need to use the rusted iron ring if you learn to run through the swamp/water switching 1h to 2h and the hydra is simple enough.

I dont even care about the errors lol, because its a good run

Your usage of hidden body is awesome btw, whenever I've used sorcery it's always been me saving it to cannon on bosses with, but the way you're using sorceries like hidden body and even reg. magic weapon to turn dagger into something viable.. It's great.

and the shortcuts! the shortcuts. I didnt even know you could go on left side of giant rat ramp, or jump onto the butcher.. I probably won't use the second one, but that first skips out the entire depths as a level to just a boss fight.

vageta31 wrote:Yep I think parrying him will be my only option as he's far too aggressive to let me get away with firing soul arrows at him. I could have theoretically two handed a spear or other longsword but I chose to limit myself to the starting dagger. Gwyn is going to be a very interesting fight but I'm thinking if I use great magic shield I can handle the first swing of his weapon and parry the 2nd for safety reasons.

Yeah, that sounds like a good plan.

Just watched the video, I liked the commentary. I don't think it was a good idea to kill the undead merchant, though... It could have been useful for you to get another heater, to upgrade along the fire path for Gwyn. And I'd have recommended a Warrior's Round Shield upgraded to magic for the 4 Kings.

http://darksoulswiki.wikispaces.com/Heater+Shield
http://darksoulswiki.wikispaces.com/Warrior%27s+Round+Shield

My two favorite shields in the game, btw, and you can wield them both!

But hey, it's your playthrough! Looking forward to seeing more.

Oh, and I recommend the Maiden set, when you get it. The chest, especially--upgraded, it has 46 defense for 2 weight!

Edit: oh damn, 4 episodes already, I hadn't realized! I'll go watch the others.

BLA1NE wrote:

vageta31 wrote:Yep I think parrying him will be my only option as he's far too aggressive to let me get away with firing soul arrows at him. I could have theoretically two handed a spear or other longsword but I chose to limit myself to the starting dagger. Gwyn is going to be a very interesting fight but I'm thinking if I use great magic shield I can handle the first swing of his weapon and parry the 2nd for safety reasons.

Yeah, that sounds like a good plan.

Just watched the video, I liked the commentary. I don't think it was a good idea to kill the undead merchant, though... It could have been useful for you to get another heater, to upgrade along the fire path for Gwyn. And I'd have recommended a Warrior's Round Shield upgraded to magic for the 4 Kings.

http://darksoulswiki.wikispaces.com/Heater+Shield
http://darksoulswiki.wikispaces.com/Warrior%27s+Round+Shield

My two favorite shields in the game, btw, and you can wield them both!

But hey, it's your playthrough! Looking forward to seeing more.

Oh, and I recommend the Maiden set, when you get it. The chest, especially--upgraded, it has 46 defense for 2 weight!

Edit: oh damn, 4 episodes already, I hadn't realized! I'll go watch the others.

You're probably right about killing the merchant, or at least I could have bought a 2nd heater shield. For 4 Kings my plan was to farm the darkwraiths and pick up a dark hand to use as my 2nd offhand shield. It only weighs 0.5 and gives 80 to magic/fire/lightning so I could easily swap to it if 4 kings try to use their magic attacks.

Hmm I hadn't really thought about the maiden set but perhaps it is worth getting for the chest piece, thanks for the heads up.

Yep I'm 4 episodes in and have enough footage for the 5th which I'll probably upload later. I started last week but forgot to mention it on this board. I tend to hang out at gamefaqs most often but I know that there are quite a few people on this board that probably don't. I've seen an almost unanimous agreement that the commentary was a welcome addition and had I known that I'd have done it for my naked run as well. Who would have thought that people would actually want to hear me blather on for 20 mins at a time .

Serious_Much wrote:I dont even care about the errors lol, because its a good run

Your usage of hidden body is awesome btw, whenever I've used sorcery it's always been me saving it to cannon on bosses with, but the way you're using sorceries like hidden body and even reg. magic weapon to turn dagger into something viable.. It's great.

and the shortcuts! the shortcuts. I didnt even know you could go on left side of giant rat ramp, or jump onto the butcher.. I probably won't use the second one, but that first skips out the entire depths as a level to just a boss fight.

You make a great point on my use of magic. The problem I have with most games is that you can become powerful so quick that most of the lower level spells/items/skills are mostly wasted. In a game like Skyrim you have tons and tons of skills and perks to use... and yet you can beat the game just mashing your sword button and not using any magic, stealth, etc... What I'm finding fun about this playthrough is that I actually have really good uses for most of my spells, and in fact some situations would be very difficult without them. It's made me look at the game with a different mindset.

I'm glad you're finding the shortcuts helpful. This is a game where everyone tends to have their own method for doing things and there are just so many different ways to accomplish the same goal. I'm sure there are a ton of shortcuts out there that I'm not even aware of so it's good to hear people are learning something. It's part of the reason I actually post up my videos.

Thanks for taking the time to put these videos together - Only seen the first part but brilliant to watch and i will no doubt watch the rest today (Heh i am on holiday from work).

Inspiring to watch someone with skill and knowledge play this game as i myself am a clueless nub who has been stuck in the middle of Blightown for almost a week.

Now that i think about it i best just watch up until you get to a point where i am so as not to spoil the game for myself - Although i am finding it hard to ignore that you killed the undead merchant and he dropped the weapon i am wanting to use (Must resit temptation to go back and do the same now)

I'm glad you're enjoying it, for someone new to the game it probably seems amazing to watch someone that's experienced. Take heart though as if you put in enough time you'll be surprised at how good you will get at the game. You're probably right about watching too much of the playthrough in areas you haven't been as it might ruin some of the surprise and fun. The good thing is though that after you complete an area you can come back and watch to see if there was some shortcut or other tactic you might have missed or not thought of.


As far as the undead merchant goes, I killed him so I didn't have to buy the residence key from him. It's not a problem to kill him so long as you get everything you need. Other than a few items you really aren't missing anything with him gone. He has cheap arrows and sells repair powder, other than that you will find much better gear in the game. I only had to buy the heater shield as it was specifically the only shield I could use in this playthrough that gave me 100% physical protection and required less than 9 str. I also picked up a couple extra dagger so I could upgrade them in various ways.


If you've got everything you want from him then feel free to waste him. The only other way to get the Uchigatana is not something you're likely to figure out without researching it.

Watching it and loving it. Makes me feel so bad because all my chars died so much more than you lol. Why dont you use any of the gold hemmed set? It seems perfecr for your char. Its got great defense and low weight plus great resistances.

Also I have to thank you for informing me that the fire thrower in sens become smuch easier after the patch. Im stilling running offline, no patches and I still have to time my runs up there really precisely or I die. Now I just got to figure out how to patch my game to make it easier.

Serious_Much wrote: ...free aim...

if i remember well you can aim with the bow and then switch to catalyst and the spell will go where you had aimed.
i remember using this technique in demons souls to clear the boulder in the dragon boss after firelurker. Havent tried this on dark souls though... sounds interesting!

btw... vageta 31, awesome vids, and i love the commentary. Thanks for taking the time to make them!

Just watched all four... can't wait to see how you tackle some of the later bosses. I do have to say though... that damage output w/ the dragon ring, crown, and red ring is quite impressive. Well thought out.

Robotech wrote:

Serious_Much wrote: ...free aim...

if i remember well you can aim with the bow and then switch to catalyst and the spell will go where you had aimed.

Interesting! I'm gonna try that as soon as I get home.

callipygias wrote:

Robotech wrote:

Serious_Much wrote: ...free aim...

if i remember well you can aim with the bow and then switch to catalyst and the spell will go where you had aimed.

Interesting! I'm gonna try that as soon as I get home.

i just tested it. still works

Awesome vids, and a lot of new interesting things!
I must tell you I removed my cat ring to watch them from beginning to end, while I usually listen to most of the playthrough videos and just watch some parts

DoughGuy wrote:Watching it and loving it. Makes me feel so bad because all my chars died so much more than you lol. Why dont you use any of the gold hemmed set? It seems perfecr for your char. Its got great defense and low weight plus great resistances.

Also I have to thank you for informing me that the fire thrower in sens become smuch easier after the patch. Im stilling running offline, no patches and I still have to time my runs up there really precisely or I die. Now I just got to figure out how to patch my game to make it easier.

Then as you probably noticed I wasn't attempting to time it at all. I was just running up like I always do and not one bomb got near me. I do tend to "run" everywhere so that probably helps with his lack of targeting somewhat, but the patch definitely made it easier.
Also the reason I don't use the gold hemmed armor is that it was nerfed in one of the patches and isn't as good as it was prepatch. They significantly weakened it so other than using it for swamp runs it's not all that great anymore. Even if it was I'm wearing the knight gauntlets and hollow leggings for their poise which stops me from being insta-interrupted if I get even the slightest nudge during casting.

aceluby wrote:Just watched all four... can't wait to see how you tackle some of the later bosses. I do have to say though... that damage output w/ the dragon ring, crown, and red ring is quite impressive. Well thought out.

Well it was just sort of an experiment to see what I could get out of the lower level spells. I could have theoretically used power within to boost it more, but I didn't want to use the pyro glove and it doesn't play well with red tearstone ring. Trying to get power within and red tearstone ring to work simultaneously would have lasted about 4 seconds since it constantly drains your health. Since you can keep in hyper mode indefinitely it was a better choice.