Dark Souls Tier 4 Revision

[Sir_Ovens]

Yes, another one. Only difference is this time, 4-C is staying. I'm just changing the level of tier 4.

Back in March, I made a blog detailing why tier 4 Dark Souls works. In said blog, I explained how the leveling system works and why Souls = AP. As such, the linking of the flame necessitating the sacrifice of one's soul is an important part of keeping the tier 4 tier.

That being said, I think we are too generous with who we give out this tier to.

Soul of Cinder
The Soul of Cinder is the defender of the First Flame and is powered directly by it. It is also the First Flame that takes away the sun when it fades completely. As such, I think the Soul of Cinder should be straight up 4-C. Its current 4-B rating needs to go, as it doesn't make sense that the Soul of Cinder would have the combined strength of every past Lord of Cinder since their souls were literally burnt up as fuel to keep the fire going. If SoC had that kind of power, the First Flame wouldn't need to be rekindled.

Lords of Cinder
There are only 8 Lords of Cinder that we know of. The 5 in the third game, both protagonists in the first and second games, and Gwyn himself. I will talk about Gwyn later. When Ashen One goes to fight SoC, he absorbs the souls of the 5 LoCs in the game. As such, I think it is safe to assume that each one of them contains 1/5th the power required to fight SoC. In conclusion, they should be Low 4-C.

Gwyn
Gwyn should be At least Low 4-C, likely 4-C as he was stated to have an unusually powerful soul and achieved LoC status even after splitting his soul between the 4 Kings and Seath the Scaleless. There is also no indication that one becomes weaker when they link the flame, so I don't think he needs two keys.

With the above being said, I would also like to re-tier Dark Souls 2's god tiers. Nashandra is stated to be 1/4th the spawn of Manus, as a final boss, she would scale to Bearer, who will be Low 4-C. As such, Manus should be At least 6-C, likely Low 6-B, possibly Low 4-C+ himself since he would likely upscale, but the Dark Soul has been stated to increase in strength over time so Nashandra would likely be much stronger compared to her father.

That is all for now.

 

[DarkDragonMedeus]

This seems fine.

 

[XSOULOFCINDERX]

That seems legit, but I feel like we're missing some stuff. I can't quite put my Finger on it...

 

[Antvasima]

This is probably fine, yes.

 

[Mr. Bambu]

Ovens, I think you're missing the crucial fact that all Lords of Cinder still invariably have their souls after their time in the Kiln. This is proven by Aldrich, Yhorm, etc, all still having their souls, and by lore all still capable of going and rekindling the kiln again. Whatever the kiln does, it doesn't destroy souls- we have no idea how its fueling system works. But it clearly doesn't outright consume or destroy souls.

Based on this, I'm against the revision. The current tiering makes more sense, I think, though how we explain the Soul of Cinder being simultaneously a culmination of every single Lord of Cinder while also accepting that said Lords of Cinder are boss fights in the same game is weird. I do think the Lord Souls need some revisions, I'm not particularly against the idea of Manus being upgraded based on your observation but the tier "Low 4-C+" is a nono to me.

 

[Sir_Ovens]

There is always Sir Sun Man's calculation of the sun being powered for thousands of years being 5-A. I feel like that is an acceptable compromise since I'm fairly certain LoCs should not scale to SoC.

 

[Mr. Bambu]

link it, fool

 

[Sir_Ovens]

Here it is.

 

[Sir_Ovens]

I would also like to hear Sir sun man's thoughts on the matter, since he had also planned a similar downgrade.

 

[Overlord775]

"Since Lord Gwyn, the first Lord of Cinder, many exalted lords have linked the First Flame, and it is their very souls that have manifested themselves as defender of the flame." - Soul of the Lords
So no, the Soul of Cinder is composed of the souls of all past Lord of Cinders

Why wouldn't Gwyn be full 4-C ? Like, he linked the fired and all

Also, for Natashia, that's a weird story. The dark grows stronger as time passes, with there have been so much time in-between DS1 and DS2 that the names of legendary heroes have been forgotten, so saying that Natashia is stronger than Manus himself isn't farfetched

 

[Mr. Bambu]

Regarding the calc: I think it would need to be at least doubled given that the man says thousands but only accounts for one thousand years.

 

[Sir_sun_man]

hmm i never really though of soul of cinder that way but yeah the 4C rating makes sense for him
as for the lords of cinder and people who scale to them they should be 5-A going by the lords of cinder fueling the flame and the sun for at least 1000 years
also lord of hollows should probobly recive an at least 4-C rating as he not only gained the power of SoC after taking its soul but also consumed the flame on top of that

 

[Sir_sun_man]

it doesn't outright destory a soul no but it does drain it we see that in gwyn soul "Lord Gwyn bequeathed most of his power to the Gods, and burned as cinder for the First Flame, but even so, Lord Gwyn's soul is a powerful thing indeed" it cleary is seen that a soul gets drain at the very least when linking the flame

 

[Sir_sun_man]

we also have to talk about the great lords nito and the witch both of them should be around 5-A due to scaling to one another and the witch having lore statements that put the chaos flame(and thouse her) at 5-A as the demon prince in the ringed city was able to fight lorian and survive

 

[Mr. Bambu]

My thoughts:

The calc isn't great. I'll repeat my words on that calc- specific time is never really given, ever, throughout the entire series. The calc is as shot in the dark as possible. I think 4-C is a safer estimate by just working with keeping the sun in existence, rather than calculating energy-per-year or what have you.

In regards to the Kiln draining souls: sure. But they clearly regain their souls at some point. As the Lords of Cinder have their souls again later, and are capable of rekindling the flame with their souls once more.

Both Nito and Izalith should scale to Lords of Cinder, aye.

 

[Antvasima]

Mr. Bambu:

So what do you think that we should do here?

 

[Antvasima]

@DMUA @Monarch_Laciel @Wokistan @SinsofMan @SheevShezarrine @ArgosaxDespair

Are you willing to give some input here?

 

[DMUA]

The fact that I can be pinged in threads now is something I feel will give me endless agony

That said, I have always felt that it didn't make sense to say the fire just constantly needed more powerful people to fuel it, as opposed to just simple entropy withering away at the fuel they do have, so I do agree withe everyone who linked the flame just being plain 4-C

Dunno if that's actually contradicted in lore because I haven't explored Dark Souls lore in a long time but

Either way, I think I'll stop talking about how I shouldn't be on knowledgeable members and actually go to remove myself from knowledgeable members

 

[Antvasima]

Okay. Thank you for the input.

Only staff members can use the @Username command though. If regular members use it, it does not create a notification.

 

[Mr. Bambu]

"That said, I have always felt that it didn't make sense to say the fire just constantly needed more powerful people to fuel it, as opposed to just simple entropy withering away at the fuel they do have, so I do agree withe everyone who linked the flame just being plain 4-C"

It kind of explains itself via the Soul of Cinder. The defender of the flame ensures stronger and stronger people are needed to fuel it.

 

[Sir_sun_man]

well we do know the minimum amount of time from framt that being at least 1000 years aka how long gwyn has been in firelink

 

[Overlord775]

We don't know if Gwyn is the ecception or the rule

beside, them litterally keeping the sun in existance makes more sense to me than them keeping the nuclear fission going, so they shoudl stay 4-C

 

[Sir_Ovens]

Then there is the small issue of Manus scaling to Nashandra.

 

[Overlord775]

Also, for Nashandra, that's a weird story. The dark grows stronger as time passes, with there have been so much time in-between DS1 and DS2 that the names of legendary heroes and gods have been forgotten, so saying that Nashandra is stronger than Manus himself isn't farfetched

 

[Sir_Ovens]

I mean being split into 4 would at least mean that Manus would at least be more or less equal to Nashandra by the second game as she was 1/4th his power when she split off.

 

[Overlord775]

i don't see why after thousands upon thousands of years of growth we would assume that she could only be 4x stronger

 

[Tyranno223]

Nashandra was referred to as the weakest shard of Manus, and wasn't implied to have in anyway surpassed her "father".

 

[Overlord775]

she was the weakest shard when they first split off from Manus, also the other shardd would have also have grown in power

 

[XSOULOFCINDERX]

So where do we put Lord of Hollows Ashen One? We all agree that he's the God-Tier of the Verse right?

 

[Mr. Bambu]

Manus isn't the totality of the Dark, keep in mind. If Darkness got much stronger, that doesn't mean Manus or his shards grew exponentially stronger.

And yeah, Ashen One would be the strongest until the next Lord of Cinder, basically.

 

[XSOULOFCINDERX]

Not Base Ashen One, Lord of Hollows Ashen One. The one that Absorbed the First Flame.

 

[Overlord775]

Manus isn't the totality of the Dark, keep in mind. If Darkness got much stronger, that doesn't mean Manus or his shards grew exponentially stronger.

As pigmy lord he did have a subtancial portion of the Dark Soul, so he and his shards would get much stronger as time passes

 

[Mr. Bambu]

Not Base Ashen One, Lord of Hollows Ashen One. The one that Absorbed the First Flame.

Right. But the series is a cycle. The Flame will get rekindled and in all likelihood will have another Soul of Cinder, meaning eventually someone stronger than Ashen One would come along. So in current lore, yes, he's the god tier.

 

[Mr. Bambu]

As pigmy lord he did have a subtancial portion of the Dark Soul, so he and his shards would get much stronger as time passes

I don't recall him being a pygmy lord?

 

[DMUA]

But the series is a cycle. The Flame will get rekindled and in all likelihood will have another Soul of Cinder, meaning eventually someone stronger than Ashen One would come along.

Actually, not only was it stated to be the last game, but I'm pretty sure it's implied they just ran out at some point

The series is a cycle, but the main theme is the pain of that cycle, dying again and again and having so many hollow out because they don't even know what they're fighting for. Constantly, they have to find more and more fuel, fragments of it even like with the unkindled of the third game, just to try and keep the first flame alit.

Eventually it reaches the point where the end of the series is just two people, you and slave knight gael, fighting in a wasteland of nothing.

 

[Mr. Bambu]

It was stated this was the last game Miyazaki would work on. He said if somebody asked him in a few years if they could make a Dark Souls 4, he'd consider it. Which means there could be a successor and, in lore, there's no real reason to assume there wouldn't be.

Okay?

Sure, I suppose.

 

[DMUA]

I mean it doesn't really change anything tierwise I just figured I'd say it

 

[Overlord775]

So

4-C for Nito and Izalith
At least 4-C for SoC, since he can fight the Ashen One after he defeated 4 Lords of Cinder and Gael, who had most if not all of the Dark Souls since he ate the Pigmin Lords
At least 4-C Ashen One
Possibly 4-C Manus

Right ?

 

[Mr. Bambu]

Here's my suggestions.

• Ashen One, Gael, and Soul of Cinder remain as they are, though bumping them down to "At least 4-C, likely High 4-C" would be favorable- I doubt 4-B's legitimacy.
• Nito and Izalith become 4-C
• Four Kings and Seath all gain "possibly 4-C" for bearing a fragment of Gwyn's Soul.
• Manus gains "likely 4-C" via backscaling from Nashandra.

 

[XSOULOFCINDERX]

Btw we really need to address the weird scaling of DS3, what with The Abyss Watchers being early game and Aldrich and Yhorm only being three bosses after them.