Viktor Vaughn wrote on Oct 3^rd, 2014 at 11:50am:

DS1, here's a breakdown of that sword.  To determine a better weapon, you first want to understand how parameter bonuses work.  The wiki has pretty much all of the weapons listed, but yes, there's much better weapons than that sword it would seem from reading.

For example, a standard claymore will outperform the Drake sword at +10 reinforcement.

In DS2, you can also reinforce weapons/armor which strengthens them (improves their stats), and then there are also specialized types of reinforcement like magic/lightining/fire/dark, but sometimes specializing a weapon to property will affect it's other properties (i.e. adding dark damage to a staff may prevent you from casting miracles with it).  I suggest checking the wiki before adding a specific property to any weapon to make sure there aren't unintended effects you don't want (usually it applies to caster sticks).

Now go start farming for Titanite. 

Another fun thing is there are two rings in DS2 that only matter for PvP (they make your equipped weapons invisible).  You have to beat the game without dying to get 1, or beat it without using a bonfire to get the other.  I wonder if anyone will/has pull off getting both at once, that would be pretty slick. 

This guy is crazy, only shield run, no bonfire runs, lol.

Just finished my first playthru of DS2.  game is a masterpiece.

- full clear of each level, including all optional bosses
- zero peeks at wikis
- all 3 'crowns' DLC packs completed (these are fucking hard by the way)

...533 deaths.  lol, awesome.  I know people in DDO who cry like babies if they die even once.  Their heads would literally explode if they tried this game.  good thing they can fall back on having vaginas for an excuse.

NIN wrote on Nov 22^nd, 2014 at 9:18pm:

You've played DS1?

They fucked the katana weapons up in DS2. Only main gripe.

Viktor Vaughn wrote on Nov 24^th, 2014 at 11:52am:

No. I'm just saying that shit sucked.