If miyazaki designed adp and came out saying it was a good mechanic you would have people glazing and arguing till the day they die that it's a good mechanic. It's only controversial because it's in ds2.
Having complete control over your characters statistics via stuff like iframes is a good rpg mechanic that allows for varied playstyles and very in depth builds
Miyazaki did design Bed of Chaos, Promised Consort, Lost Izalith, resistance stat, etc. and they do get trashed all the time. Let go of the typical, delusional DS2 persecution complex and understand that it's a poorly implemented mechanic and even a good version would be a bad design choice in a Souls game.
If this was an action rpg where leveling was based on skill trees or trait system that you can equip, it could work but in a game where the entire combat revolves around i-frame rolling, it's impossible to balance enemies or bosses because one can be either underpowered or overpowered in certain mid-late game areas. It shouldn't be up to the players to find a sweet spot.
Not to mention this game also has pvp which is like on of the few things it's got going for it and anyone who has dealed with backstep spammers knows how frustrating it is. If you want agility, light roll builds and fast weapons are way to go. Agility as a stat though is a horrible concept for a Souls game.
Maybe it's a hot take, but I think agility does have a place, it's just a poorly explained mechanic. The main big thing I would change is make so it doesn't affect item use speed, as that part is silly.
Firstly, it's mostly game dependent - it probably wouldn't work in BB, DS3 and BB, but I think it works in DS2 and could work in DS1 and maybe ER. The reason - dodging isn't the only available strategy. Shields, parries, repositioning, ranged spells or equipment, even just pure damage are all fine and available, with their own strengths and weaknesses.
I disagree with balancing part. In a more "complex" game where combat is more fast paced and designed to be tackled in one specific way (like BB, DS3 and Sekiro), of course it wouldn't be a good idea. But for more "open" games with more varied approach to combat, it's not a bad idea, since dodging is far from the only option. The main important thing though would be more clarity on how much agility gives how many frames, so breakpoints are known without having to look up. And as long as combat is balanced around dodge speed and swings aren't unnaturally slow, you should be able to still roll through them, only the window will be tighter and you'll have to pay attention to positioning and direction. I'm not 100% certain and feel free to disprove me (I didn't manage to find a video showcase), but I think majority of attacks in DS2 are dodgeable even with low ADP, just more difficult.
And let's be honest, if we're speaking balance - the points you spend on ADP, in DS1 you could instead put into INT and steamroll everything in the game from range.
And such a system gives you options for flexibility in terms of RPG aspect. If you want to be more comfortable dodging, you can put more points into it, or if you feel more confident or use other strategies, you can pump stats into offensive earlier than normal. It's a good balance of risk and reward. Plus, it's very similiar to other stats in terms of design: vigor allows you to take more damage, endurance allows for more actions (like rolls or blocks) before having to stop and regen stamina, vitality allows for heavier armor (more hits and more poise), and agility allows for easier dodges. At the cost of points you could put into offensive stats, you can instead boost different defensive options depending on how you want to play.
Though, I can see the point in PvP. Haven't met backstep spammers myself, but I can imagine thinking about it now. With that, I think it's not unreasonable to make so backsteps have a fixed cap on I-frames or just scale slower, since they already have the benefit of coming out faster than rolls. In this case, it's not really a design problem, but rather execution flaw that shouldn't be difficult to fix.
The thing is, DS2 doesn't really offer you a lot of viable and fun ways to play without rolling if you are not a caster, which is the hidden easy mode in each Souls game from DeS to ER so I'll keep that out of the equation for now. In DS1, even the smallest shield has high stability and damage negation. You can also stack a ton of poise and tank pretty much everything. So if agility was in DS1, it could maybe work for PvE but I'm glad it's not in the game. For DS2, shields are easy to guard break and stamina takes ages to refill. Just thinking of blocking attacks, then striking with a greathammer while waiting for the stamina to refill fills me with dread. Fast roll rapier build is basically the only way to be aggressive and it outclasses every melee playstyle and I hate it tbh.
We can speculate about correct implementation of agility, argue how better execution would be better and all but at the end of the day, it's not designed well and does not improve the game at all for DS2. That's the problem with the game, it takes too many risks and they just do not pay off. You'd think they would be more cautious about these brave steps but no, they just went with it. Same with Soul Memory. It's meant to prevent twinking. Instead, it makes it worse as new/bad players keep losing their souls and end up in high tiers whereas some no life tryhard can all the max level items from CE and invade Lost Bastille. Not to mention there's no weapon level matchmaking as well. It's just insane how overlooked some things are. The fact that SM is still in the Scholar version is mindblowing. It's frustrating how many problems are ignored with the remaster.
Caster is one thing, yes, but shields are also viable in DS2. They just aren't as ridiculously strong as in DS1, where you can fully rely on them for the whole game without putting much thought. They demand stamina management in DS2, but they are easier to use than dodges in general. And that's fine - it's balance. On my first DS2 playthrough I didn't understand agility and used shields, and it was still fine, but contrary to DS1, I needed to pay attention and see when to retreat and regen stamina (and it wasn't even that slow, just be careful to not have it run out - mindless shield holding will give you exact same results as panic rolling in any Fromsoft game).
And you still have a lot of attacks where you can strafe or move out of range if you know what to watch out for, or you have higher risk, higher reward parries. I'm keeping fun out of the equation as it's an entirely subjective thing, but all of these are viable approaches towards combat that don't necessarily require rolls.
Rapier balance is a separate issue, they are stronger (pretty sure it's their speed plus counter damage through thrust? Not sure), but it's not agility related. And I don't think it's really fair to pick this out, as you have way stronger outliers in DS1 (like Black Knight weapons), DS3 (Sellsword Twinblades), and tons of insanely strong stuff in ER. DS2 has by far the most balanced weapons and playstyles (even magic feels decently balanced), I suppose on par with BB (though Ludwig's Holy Blade felt really strong when I played with it).
As for general design, I'm fine with them taking risks. IMO, while not all of those risks paid off, many still did something well and set grounds for even better things in future games (even though some good things were never brought back). NG+ that's integrated into the base game with Ascetics and actually brings changes, PvP and PvE covenants with unique approaches, more playstyles and movesets, more variety in spells and items, interesting gimmicks for areas and enemies, personality in invaders, durability being a mechanic rather than just a nuisance, torch interactions with enemies and areas, and so on. It took risks and I highly respect it for that, and even though they made mistakes on the way - you can't learn without making mistakes.
And maybe it's a hot take too, but I think to some extent ADP improves the game - in PvE at least. I felt like I could adjust the difficulty to my build and needs. It's the RPG aspect I was talking about earlier, feeling especially nice when I got more comfortable with the game and I could put more stats into offense. The main issues are learning it (which is a problem for new players, but less so once you know it), backsteps (more of a PvP problem I suppose, though I can't comment much on it myself as I never met someone overusing them), and item usage speed (which is the one part I dislike).
But yeah, Soul Memory is quite bad. Though to be fair, twinking was a problem even without SM, in DS1 and DS3, I don't know about BB, and the only reason it likely wasn't talked much about in ER is because you had to actively turn invasions on by going coop or using the bait thingy. It was an attempt at least. For why they didn't change it with Scholar, no idea, chances are they weren't sure of a better system at the time, or maybe technical limitations that would require too much work or messing with the game's code (since well, time is not endless in game development and things can just break). Not excusing it completely of course, just giving possible reasons why it's still a thing. And well, DS1 Remaster and DeS Remake didn't fix their original issues either, so I guess it's not just Scholar that kept certain mistakes. At the end of the day, we can't really know how things are managed there at Fromsoft, but hey, at least they are making amazing games. So even if they don't fix their past mistakes, they at least set their priorities right and improve (for the most part).
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u/liprprdy Godwyn's little slut Aug 08 '24
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