I've beaten the dance lion first try only spamming Blasphemous Blade Ashe of War while my Mimic Tear constantly drew Aggro 

The broken builds are still broken 

I felt that Bloodborne wasn't that hard, to be honest, and I had never played shieldless before. I guess it depends on the player.

I was specifically referring to Des/DS/DS2, since some DS3 DLC bosses are already BB-influenced without offering the gameplay to match. But even in DS3 you can have fun learning stuff instead of being cheap-shotted all the time.

That's not to say this is the case for ALL SOTE bosses, mind, a lot of them can be tough but very fair (Divine Beast, the spoiler bosses at the tower, etc.) but others... are not.

Yep. I'm gonna change up my build and see if it'll help once I find a larval tear for safety incase I fuck things up. I suppose I am being to stubbron, it looks like duel weilding Strength builds do real well in the DLC. Might try that instead. 

Playing defensively is not cheesing, but anyways. I'll give some reason to you here about fast paced meele builds being weaker than defensive builds

But this is inherited from base game. ER makes strength build stronger than dexterity builds, because of how important poise breaking is. High STR builds when done right allow more free stats to put in VIG and END, which makes a sound difference. Also you can punish enemies stronger when breaking their poise and inflicting hits. The same holds true to enemies who attack you, when you're tank they will have hard time delivering punishing combos 

This was always true in the base game. After 6 playstroughs and can say DEX-focused builds are the weakest in the game. This must be more evident in the DLC when the enemies are stronger and more punishing 

However you don't need to go full DEX. DEX-INT and DEX-ARC, or even DEX-FAI are all strong and viable. You can still be a fast meele fighter, but you will need to understand the weakness of this kind of playstyle and learn how to solve them

Full caster magic Builds are viable for this DLC as well, although they definitely will feel less overpowered compared to the base game where you can wreck-comet-azured most of bosses

Melania is a perfect boss fight same deal as Rellana. So fun to learn, hard but with plenty of room for you to observe the fight and see from your mistakes and it's completely fair. Just killed her and I got that rush of "He'll yeah!" Instead of the relief "it's finally over" feeling like there was with mamy DLC bosses. I hope for Elden Ring 2 they follow that approach to boss design and finally fix there camera or keep large bosses out of enclosed spaces. DragonLord Placidusax is an excellent example of a large boss having a good arena for the camera to work properly, he's a pain in the ass but a fair pain in the ass.

Beat my first Furnace Golem. Took me 6 tries. This guy's pretty big which can mess with the camera. You definitely need some strong fire damage reduction. I used a fire defense incantation plus a talisman that boosts fire resistance. If you don't have strong resistance you will get one-shotted or at best two-shotted  

Also, this guy really takes small damage from regular attacks, so I changed to a Marika's Hammer to helped me break the Golem instance. 2 critical hits are enough to kill him 

Bloodborne was the easiest for me, it matched my playstyle too perfectly.

IT's needed for a quest line and a pair of boss fights. you find two of the horns, then go to the quest giver and they take you to a third horn where you do more quest resulting in a pair of boss fights. Don't wanna spoil too much. 

Yeah, General Gaius annoyed me, too. I guess I got lucky because I did beat him but he's the only boss in the DLC I don't feel like I ever properly LEARNED and defeated. I was kinda getting there (When to dodge right, when to dodge left, etc) but I felt like I was VERY far away from actually besting him. I got two stance breaks, and each one I was able to chunk a BUNCH of health off thanks to having a big hitty bonky stick of poke (The Greatsword with Lion's Claw). 

I am super worried about trying to fight that boss with magic or something. HE's too fast, gives you no room, and even with medium roll he's always RIGHT on top of you with NO room to heal or cast spells, just poke or jump attack. That was the one boss in the DLC I genuinely hated even after beating him. DURING many fights I got frustrated, but I usually ended up loving the boss once I learned from my mistakes. Messmer was an amazing example of this. And Rellana. 

That's kind of the point. If you think this is a problem then you're completely missing the point of the game. 

Elden Ring gives you SO many tools to succeed and so many options to play with your build or try new things or take a different approach. Like Hiku keeps saying, if you actually learn the game and get better through various means, it's insanely rewarding. 

I'm not a gatekeeping 'git gud' style player but you really do have to LEARN the game to get good at the game. That's been the philosophy since day one. The games are hard but the difficulty isn't the point, overcoming he challenge is the point. There's a subtle distinction there. In Elden Ring's case, that often means learning what style works best for you. What tools are best. They give you hundreds of weapons, dozens of summons, dozens of ashes of war, dozens of spells, and virtually limitless build variety. 

If you're finding it too hard it's because you're either not engaging with the game's mechanics and are being stubborn or you're just not learning from your mistakes. 

I'm NOT good at these games but even I have managed to persist and get through every boss in the DLC save the final one (just got to that boss about an hour ago so I'm going to wait a bit and come back because it is in fact QUITE the challenge.) I have tools at my disposal. I know how I want to play but if my tank/paladin character isn't winning the fight for me, I'm not going to say the boss is designed poorly. That's on me. And that's kind of the point. 

Bad take. If you don't like it, that's fine. Stop playing the game wrong and blaming the game for it. 

A pair of boss fights? I only fought one after blowing on the third horn...

There's another. go back to the throne where the guy was. Not a hard fight but it's a boss :P