Official Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree Thread - 10/10 IGN, 10/10 GS, 95 Meta - Game of the Year. Best DLC oif All Time.

[-GD-X★ 7,978]

anyone who's on the fence about the difficulty can breathe a sigh of relief. there are so many broken builds (hell, i have made some of my own), and the latest patch should make it more approachable. shiiiii you can get two extra summons for the final boss (if you do several quests). i was able to beat the boss without them, so i can imagine how much easier the final fight is with them.

[JonDnD 2,818]

4 minutes ago, Remij said:

Trust me, I'd be bitching if the game ran like it does it that video on my PC  

 

My shit is smooth  

No you wouldnt 

[-GD-X★ 7,978]

Impenetrable thorns is so broken. I destroyed

Spoiler

midra lord of “limp” flame

 In like a minute with it. That’s the last of the mainline bosses for me. The rest are just recycled ones. 

[Casual 756]

Sitting outside of the final boss room. Will tackle that tonight. 
 

Otherwise I’m basically done. Have 19 Scadutree Fragment upgrades and 9 spirit upgrades. Got an extra fragment so I guess I missed two. Maybe I’ll look them up later (hopefully it’s one of the 2x locations). Pretty sure I completed all the big stuff, did a quick look at the main bosses and definitely got all those done, nothing obviously missing map wise. I didn’t do any quests except the finger dude, I’ll probably look more into those on my next playthrough but I’ve never really cared to do quests in these games unless there’s meaningful content locked behind them. 
 

Had a great time overall, probably around 30 hours, maybe a bit less.
 

The biggest upgrade over the base game is still the world. I loved the open world in Elden Ring but it didn’t quite have that Souls feeling of exploration. This one definitely did, so many oh shit moments when you find a shortcut and it brings you somewhere you were trying to get 3 hours ago. The world is way more interconnected and layered. 
 

I didn’t mess around with too many of the new weapon types yet but I liked the Great Katanas a lot. Ended up using one as one of my main weapons (along with Messmers spear, and of course old trust Malikeths). Got my eyes on a couple other weapons I’d like to try on NG+ - mostly that Shadow Sunflower and Euporia. 

Some light spoilers:

 

Spoiler

I wish there were one or two more legacy dungeons. Belarut, Ensis and Shadow Keep felt like the only proper ones and they were all in the first half of the DLC (though seems like some others are doing Shadow Keep later). I know they technically categorize Midra’s Mance as a legacy but it wasn’t long enough imo . 
 

This is made up for somewhat by the world being denser and more connected. There’s definitely a few areas in the world that felt underutilized though - hinterlands was beautiful but not much there, as an example. 
 

I also personally wasn’t a fan of the Abyssal Woods but can appreciate what they were trying to do and it’s a nice change of pace if nothing else 

I didn’t find the difficulty bad at all. My main complaint would actually be that pretty much everything but the bosses was too easy. Didn’t seem to be much danger in the normal enemies. 

Edited Friday at 10:25 PM by Casual

[-GD-X★ 7,978]

Just now, Casual said:

Sitting outside of the final boss room. Will tackle that tonight. 
 

Otherwise I’m basically done. Have 19 Scadutree Fragment upgrades and 9 spirit upgrades. Got an extra fragment so I guess I missed two. Maybe I’ll look them up later (hopefully it’s one of the 2x locations). Pretty sure I completed all the big stuff, did a quick look at the main bosses and definitely got all those done, nothing obviously missing map wise. I didn’t do any quests except the finger dude, I’ll probably look more into those on my next playthrough but I’ve never really cared to do quests in these games unless there’s meaningful content locked behind them. 
 

Had a great time overall, probably around 30 hours, maybe a bit less.
 

The biggest upgrade over the base game is still the world. I loved the open world in Elden Ring but it didn’t quite have that Souls feeling of exploration. This one definitely did, so many oh shit moments when you find a shortcut and it brings you somewhere you were trying to get 3 hours ago. The world is way more interconnected and layered. 
 

I didn’t mess around with too many of the new weapon types yet but I liked the Great Katanas a lot. Ended up using one as one of my main weapons (along with Messmers spear, and of course old trust Malikeths). Got my eyes on a couple other weapons I’d like to try on NG+ - mostly that Shadow Sunflower and Euporia. 

Some light spoilers:

 

  Hide contents

I wish there were one or two more legacy dungeons. Belarut, Ensis and Shadow Keep felt like the only proper ones and they were all in the first half of the DLC (though seems like some others are doing Shadow Keep later). I know they technically categorize Midra’s Mance as a legacy but it wasn’t long enough imo . 
 

This is made up for somewhat by the world being denser and more connected. There’s definitely a few areas in the world that felt underutilized though - hinterlands was beautiful but not much there, as an example. 
 

I also personally wasn’t a fan of the Abyssal Woods but can appreciate what they were trying to do and it’s a nice change of pace if nothing else 

I didn’t find the difficulty bad at all. My main complaint would actually be that pretty much everything but the bosses was too easy. Didn’t seem to be much danger in the normal enemies. 

i felt a spike in difficulty when i entered the dlc with 0 scadutree fragments. once i had like 4, the main enemies felt easy to kill (but still packed a punch, just not a 1 or 2 shot kill lol). as for the bosses, they were challenging...until i started hunting more scadutrees. some became too easy. there's one "hard" one i had accidentally skipped, in the middle of the campaign, and killed him in like 30 seconds.  the worst fight is the one, just before the final battle. ridiculously easy. i was like, "that's it?!" as for the world....wow! i really loved exploring it, since it didn't feel bloated like the base game. the scadutree fragments/ashes definitely gave an incentive to explore every nook and cranny. also, the 3 questlines i did OWNED! i wish i had done all of them, though. i'll eventually replay this.

[Casual 756]

3 minutes ago, -GD-X said:

i felt a spike in difficulty when i entered the dlc with 0 scadutree fragments. once i had like 4, the main enemies felt easy to kill (but still packed a punch, just not a 1 or 2 shot kill lol). as for the bosses, they were challenging...until i started hunting more scadutrees. some became too easy. there's one "hard" one i had accidentally skipped, in the middle of the campaign, and killed him in like 30 seconds.  the worst fight is the one, just before the final battle. ridiculously easy. i was like, "that's it?!" as for the world....wow! i really loved exploring it, since it didn't feel bloated like the base game. the scadutree fragments/ashes definitely gave an incentive to explore every nook and cranny. also, the 3 questlines i did OWNED! i wish i had done all of them, though. i'll eventually replay this.

Yeah agreed on the second to last boss. Messmer was still the hardest for me…the main dragon dude also took me a handful of tries. 

[-GD-X★ 7,978]

10 minutes ago, Casual said:

Yeah agreed on the second to last boss. Messmer was still the hardest for me…the main dragon dude also took me a handful of tries. 

Messmer is just an all-around amazing fight. Though, I’ve seen dudes make builds so broken, that their mimic can solo him  but as a fair fight, he was cool af. Very challenging, even after mastering his movement pattern in phase 2. 

[-GD-X★ 7,978]

holy shit. and i thought impenetrable thorns were broken af.

 

 

 

edit: i sooooo gotta try this faith builds are the GOAT lol.

[Hot Sauce 2,759]

Beat it. Whew lawd that last boss. I must have put 100 attempts into that guy. I've been using a Nagi with Unsheathe up until this point, but the punish windows are so small and few and far between on him that being just out of range of an attack is just so heartbreaking that I swapped to Backhand Blade. The distance on the charged R2 was what I was going for, but Blind Spot and the speed of those things turned missed punishes into 3 hits a lot of the time. Love those things and can't wait to do a NG+ run with them to see what I was missing.

 

Thought the DLC was really good. There's a good 4-5 bosses I'd put into a top 20 list of Fromsoft bosses and probably 2 of those would be in my top 10. A good number of fluff and re-skin bosses but not nearly as bad as the base game so the highs stand out a lot more to me.

 

I think the world is fucking gorgeous and stumbling upon an area while exploring feels incredible, but I didn't like how empty the whole thing felt and the convoluted nature of discovering areas means you find areas that are well past the point of relevance. The base game was so dense with little encounters, puzzles, etc. until the giants area and in the DLC so many of the areas are just devoid of everything including monsters. I think there's a path through the game where you alternate between legacy dungeons and overworld areas that provides a nice contrast and breather that additionally sets you up really well for Shadowtree Fragments, but doing the first three big legacy dungeons in a row and then going to empty area after empty area just makes the back half of the game feel pretty meh. I was so overleveled when I finally found the Cerulean Coast that even though that place had a dungeon with a boss people were having difficulty with I was in and out of there in like 20 minutes.

 

I think it'll be a really enjoyable NG+ and new toon experience because you don't have to go searching for the Shadowtree Fragments in NG+ and can just blast through the overworld areas and enjoy the scenery, while new toons can knock the bosses out in an order that makes sense now that I have an idea of what's a better order for them. When I beat Elden Ring's base game I knew I was done and wasn't going to go back to it, but beating the DLC all I can think about is doing it again and that's really the best praise I can give a game.

[-GD-X★ 7,978]

9 hours ago, Hot Sauce said:

Beat it. Whew lawd that last boss. I must have put 100 attempts into that guy. I've been using a Nagi with Unsheathe up until this point, but the punish windows are so small and few and far between on him that being just out of range of an attack is just so heartbreaking that I swapped to Backhand Blade. The distance on the charged R2 was what I was going for, but Blind Spot and the speed of those things turned missed punishes into 3 hits a lot of the time. Love those things and can't wait to do a NG+ run with them to see what I was missing.

 

Thought the DLC was really good. There's a good 4-5 bosses I'd put into a top 20 list of Fromsoft bosses and probably 2 of those would be in my top 10. A good number of fluff and re-skin bosses but not nearly as bad as the base game so the highs stand out a lot more to me.

 

I think the world is fucking gorgeous and stumbling upon an area while exploring feels incredible, but I didn't like how empty the whole thing felt and the convoluted nature of discovering areas means you find areas that are well past the point of relevance. The base game was so dense with little encounters, puzzles, etc. until the giants area and in the DLC so many of the areas are just devoid of everything including monsters. I think there's a path through the game where you alternate between legacy dungeons and overworld areas that provides a nice contrast and breather that additionally sets you up really well for Shadowtree Fragments, but doing the first three big legacy dungeons in a row and then going to empty area after empty area just makes the back half of the game feel pretty meh. I was so overleveled when I finally found the Cerulean Coast that even though that place had a dungeon with a boss people were having difficulty with I was in and out of there in like 20 minutes.

 

I think it'll be a really enjoyable NG+ and new toon experience because you don't have to go searching for the Shadowtree Fragments in NG+ and can just blast through the overworld areas and enjoy the scenery, while new toons can knock the bosses out in an order that makes sense now that I have an idea of what's a better order for them. When I beat Elden Ring's base game I knew I was done and wasn't going to go back to it, but beating the DLC all I can think about is doing it again and that's really the best praise I can give a game.

Yeah, I would love to do the dlc again. I’ll wait a few months, since I put a lot of work on hold to be able to beat the base game again, along with the dlc, on Steam (my original level 350 character is on PlayStation). 
 

edit: great review 

[Tears of the Cows 1,284]

On 2024-06-28 at 7:10 PM, -GD-X said:

holy shit. and i thought impenetrable thorns were broken af.

 

 

 

edit: i sooooo gotta try this faith builds are the GOAT lol.

Just got back from vacation. Gonna respect and destroy the DLC with ease lmfao. I’m gonna disable my Xbox from wifi and make sure I do not get an update  

Edited 14 hours ago by Tears of the Cows

[-GD-X★ 7,978]

7 hours ago, Tears of the Cows said:

Just got back from vacation. Gonna respect and destroy the DLC with ease lmfao. I’m gonna disable my Xbox from wifi and make sure I do not get an update  

Ha! Nice! Make sure you get as many scadutree fragments/ashes as you can. They have a great influence on your character’s damage output/input in the expansion. I think you can get up to level 12 (tops out at 20) without fighting a single boss. The ashes buff your summons. I think you can hit 5 or 6 before a boss fight (tops out at 10)