After that brief spike of excitement at FromSoftware announcing Shadow of the Erdtree, it's been back to the long, lonely wait for more Elden Ring news. Just yesterday, though, we got another major balance patch, 1.10, further fiddling with what's felt like the developer's most malleable sandbox to date. The full changes are as follows:
It's interesting to me how FromSoft's adjusted poise here, the long-running, slightly infamous Souls stat that helps you take an attack without flinching, potentially grunting through enemies' weaker hits to deliver your own heavy hitters. All weapon attacks and some spells now have a greater chance of breaking poise, effectively nerfing the stat, but the patch also buffs the poise and damage resistance of some of those long wind-up, poise-thirsty abilities. You won't be basic attack spamming through an enemy's hits, then, but maybe you can still blast your way through with an ultra-greatsword, slow-swinging Ashes of War.
The critical hit buffs, particularly with the more generous backstab angle, gives me nightmares of laggy, Dark Souls 1 teleport backstabbing, but Elden Ring's online is much more stable all-around, and I don't think that's going to be a danger here.
It makes sense to see Quick Step and Bloodhound Step take a hit again, if only in PvP. Once upon a time, the latter was my crutch against final boss Elden Beast, though it seems really annoying to deal with in PvP. And this is a largely PvP-focused update overall: OP single-player exploits like the OG Hoarfrost Stomp got taken care of right out of the gate, so now it's just time to water the garden of Elden Ring's still pretty vibrant PvP scene.
That's something that really stands out to me, how much post-launch balance
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