Once was lost, but now am DEAD
I’ll do this one
a little differently. It’ll be one long post, and it’ll be split up into a few
different smaller pieces, since I went through a few different thought patterns
throughout this battle.
Lost Sinner is
found inside Sinner’s Rise. This is a small, but difficult area. You have to
take out a bunch of crossbow-men (sounds easy, but trying to take out four in
the same room is tough), then you descend an elevator, and get to the real
bitch of the matter. A watery temple-looking area (not THE Water Temple, of
course) that’s populated by only two kinds of enemies: large, hulking beasts
with big tails, and big, slamming arms; and also those delightful exploding
hollow bastards, (you know, the ones that follow you, then explode when they
get close, completely draining your stamina/life). And hey, sometimes they like
to hide under the water!
Once you get
through here, you find the fog gate. Walk through this, and you’re treated to a
cool cut-scene of a ragged, malnourished prisoner (or, probably, a sinner) with
her arms in wooden shackles, sitting on the floor. He’s got what looks like a
metal mask (kinda like the one from the Metal Health album cover) on,
and there’s a strange bug hanging from one of the eye sockets of this mask. It
wriggles inside the mask, and seemingly gives this prisoner/sinner
Artorias-like sword skills. She (yes, the Lost Sinner is a woman! I didn't know this until recently, but the boss soul states such!) wields a giant blade, and boy does she know how
to use it.
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| Lost Sinner, or Big Foot? |
THE FIRST NIGHT (deaths 1-11):
Firstly, this
room she is in is DARK. It’s a large round room, so space isn’t a problem, but
barely being able to see her and her dark clothes, is. There are no less than
eight player messages urging you to bring a torch, but that’s a bit tedious.
You would need to kill the crossbow hollows, then light the torch, go down that
elevator, and make a mad dash through that water area. I will try to bring a
lit torch to her room to see if I can light it somehow.
The Sinner is
very aggressive, and dodges often. All her sword strikes are
blockable/dodgeable, but she gives you a VERY small window to attack back. You
can, and probably should, spend several minutes just blocking, strafing, and learning
her attacks and her tells. She has a forward thrust, a few side-to-side slicing
attacks, an overhead attack, and she’ll also jump in the air. Again, they are all
easy enough to dodge, but the Sinner hops around so much, it’s tough to block
an attack, then get a hit in before she jumps back. And damn, I really need to try to
bring a torch into the room.
USING A TORCH (death 12):
After several more attempts, I decided it was time to light this room. I was able to bring a lit torch into the room, and it certainly will
make a nice difference. Too bad there doesn’t seem to be a sconce to light it.
I got killed pretty quickly on that attempt, so I guess it’ll stay dark.
My major gripe
with this battle is the lock-on. She’s very easy to lose when you’re locked-on,
because she either gets far enough away, or she jumps in the air. Once this
happens, it’s very easy to lose both your orientation, and her. It’s very
frustrating too. At least twice I’ve died because I was locked-on, then I lost
the lock-on, and wasn’t sure where she was. She would then reintroduce herself to
me via her sword. And she is relentless, too. It’s insane. This is shaping up to
be my most defensive Souls battle ever. I hide behind my shield way too much.
As aggressive as she is, I’m that passive. I’m practically glued to my shield. I’m
gonna try just two-handing my halberd and dodging all her attacks instead of
using my shield.
TWO-HANDING SILLINESS (death 13):
Yeah, fuck that.
WEAPON CHANGE (deaths 14 & 15):
I was up until 3:04AM the first night I tried fighting her. I did discover (as I pointed out in my second Gargoyles post) that my halberd is just too slow. I upgraded to that +4 longsword, and tried a few more times. Definitely makes a big difference. I can get more attacks in, and it takes less stamina. The damage output is basically the same. I have three dark pine resins, and I’m going to use those. Lost Sinner death counts sits at 15. Yikes.LIGHTING THE DAMN ROOM (deaths 16-18):
A few nights after my original failures, I tried again. Firstly, I must admit, I figured out how to bring light into her light-eviscerating domain of dark bullshit (I think it's called) by accident-on-purpose. I was browsing YouTube videos that Gamesrader put up of individual boss strategies. I was only watching the ones I've already beaten. Why was I watching strategies on bosses I've already beaten? I told you, I'm obsessed! Anyway, I was watching the video for ol' Flexy, and I saw on the side, they had one for Lost Sinner. I debated a moment, and thought, what the hell. I'm sure it won't really help me. Might as well take a look-see. While it didn't give me any help strategy-wise, they do tell you how to light up her room. If I can redeem myself, I WAS planning on checking out the two small rooms that sit up the stairs past her fog gate, I swear. Also, a friend gave me the hint about those rooms as well, so let's just call it a collaborative effort. Anyway, with her room nice and bright, I immediately realized something: my lock-on problems I was having, which I had originally though were more on the technical bug side, were, in fact, tied 100% into the fact that I was losing her lock-on because IT WAS TOO DARK. Makes sense, duh. With the room brightened, I NEVER lose the lock-on (well, except when he leaps high in the air, but that's easy to dodge anyway) now. It's great.But alas, she still killed me three times. I tried getting a little more aggressive, but I still find it difficult to get good hits on. I always revert back to soaking up her attacks with my shield, then not having stamina to do anything else. Not much else to add yet, but I do plan on killing this bastard soon. I didn't play last night, but I plan on playing again either tonight/tomorrow morning. I'm currently in Harvest Valley (after killing the Skeleton Lords), and I'm torn between continuing forward through this poison-laden hell hole, or steeling my resolve and going back to fight this Sinner until I kill her.
FOR THE WIN! (deaths 19-21, and victory):
I woke up early this morning (although I meant to wake up at 5AM, but I fell back asleep, so I started playing at 6:21) to play, and my main goal was to take down the Lost Sinner. Well, after three deaths, on my fourth attempt, I was victorious! Feels good, too. I realized I had to become more aggressive. Can't kill an enemy without attacking, right? And oddly enough, I found the battle a bit easier once I became more aggressive. Generally I just held my shield up, and rolled towards her, provoking her to attack. Depending on her attack, I would attack. If she did a forward thrust, she always jumped after that, and I had a difficult time hitting her before she jumped. So if she did a forward thrust, I would just hang back, and wait. She did a variety of other swinging attacks that can be rolled into, then she can be attacked after that. Sometimes she will jump away, but you can hit her first, so she takes the damage AND puts some distance between you and her. It was a tough a battle, and required a good amount of patience and a general knowledge of her attacks (remember I mentioned spending time just learning her tells? Helps immensely). That's all I can really say about it. I'll finish this long post with a few quick bullet points:- Lifegems are great for this battle, but if you run out (as I did this morning), you CAN heal with an Estus Flask, but it's tough. Best time to use one is when she jumps in the air, occasionally she'll land clear on the other side of the room, then she'll swing a few times. This give ample time to heal, but you kind of have to predict it first. I had a VERY close call with an Estus this morning, can't believe I got it in in time. Man, NOTHING is more nerve-wracking then trying to use an Estus during a battle like this
- I still blocked with my shield, but FAR less. It was probably 50/50 between using my shield and rolling
- I started the winning battle with aromatic ooze. It didn't make a huge difference, but added around 50 pts of damage to my attacks until it wore out. I also know dark pine resin does similar extra damage. If you're having trouble, try using a weapon buff
- I tried using poison throwing knives. Yeah, don't bother
- Watch out for her overhead attack. That thing eats stamina for breakfast
- Finally, something I meant to write about at the beginning. From Software trolled us gamers nicely with the bonfire that you respawn at if you die. Usually bonfires are bastions of safety, right? WRONG! This one has three crossbow-men standing right next to it, who give you about .5 seconds before shooting you with crossbow bolts. Several times I would get attacked, because after I died to Lost Sinner, I would put the controller down to make a note, or just for a tiny break, but then I'd have to scramble to grab it and run down the ladder, because I was getting pelted by bolts. Happened way more than it should have.
- I just spent about ten minutes replacing all of the he/his/him with she/her/her, because I thought Sinner was a man, but it is definitely not. Sinner is a female. Very intriguing...
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| The killing blow (to me) |
Times I died: 21
Difficulty: 8.5/10
Overall rating: 7.5/10
RATS! RATS! RATS!
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BOSS SOUL DESCRIPTION: "...prisoner of Sinner's Rise; The Lost Sinner eternally punishes herself for the sins of her past."
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| Lost Sinner's Sword |
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