Nothing is true, everything is permitted.

My first playthrough I don’t use a guide. I did that on my first playthrough of ds1 and it wasn’t as fun. It just made it tedious for me to keep checking maps and stuff.

On subsequent playthroughs I’ll look up what I missed.

After the first playthrough, I’ll usually pick a theme. Eg: strength guy, sorcery dude, “I bet a tower shield and spear would work”. I don’t really respec or switch to another theme, but I might start over if it turns out it sucks.

I don’t really use summons unless I get really stuck, which is pretty rare. I used ashes a couple times in ER, but I kind of got decision paralysis about which ones to use. Jellyfish is solid, and so is mimic tear and black knife. There are probably other good ones but since I didn’t use them much I don’t know.

Now I’m thinking of doing a like summon focused run…

Personally I like to do this:

No spoilers or looking anything up for the first play through.

Play solo and no summons for bosses (it just breaks the boss patterns and makes them stupid easy)

Use items the moment you find a “non standard”enemy that’s weak to them.

Always upgrade stamina first.

And finally:

Take your damn time with the first run and enjoy combing over everything with a fine brush.

Those are really the only “rules” that I like to stick with to maximize my enjoyment of souls games.

I love to coop souls games and usually have a blast, especially when getting invaded but I do find I get a more satisfying experience playing them solo and taking my time exploring at my own pace and learning the boss patterns.

Blind first playthrough, check and explore everything.

On subsequent playthroughs run past everything and maximize/respec into a new build. Almost always choose a new weapon and try to make it work, even if it sucks.

Repeat.

No shields. No ugly armor. Fashion souls for the win

Not hard and fast “rules”, but what I’ve done in every soulslike so far is:

• Melee only, not even ranged weapons to pull enemies, either I lure them via spacing or I deal with the group.
• No spells, not even any utility spells.
• No consumable soul items. I tend to naturally hoard anyway, and this prevents me from getting overlevelled while exploring thoroughly.
• No multiplayer or summons, I prefer to learn bosses solo and get the full experience.
• Try to beat every boss available.
• No guides, ofc, although I discuss the game with my friends in discord, and they help me not miss any particularly easy-to-miss bosses. They’ll let me fail NPC questlines and such organically though, as they should.
• I also pretty much always end up with the biggest bonk I can find, but that’s not a rule, just my preferred playstyle lol.

Have played through pretty much every From Soft Soulslike this way, and this is just the playstyle I organically gravitated to for my first playthroughs. Has been the most fun for me, personally.

Usually I just impose a level limit so I fit into a particular PvP bracket. Like, I like invading at Morne Castle, but you don’t end up there if you’re too much higher than RL30.

The only game where this rule is uselsss is DS2 (well, that and Sekiro for not having MP at all) where the level and weapon upgrades do not matter. Just that dumbass soul memory BS.

First run through an area, every enemy must die.

Explore everything, spend at least a minute in each intersection trying to figure out which way to go first. Get it wrong every time.

I always look for the biggest, most ridiculous greatsword imaginable and exclusively use it for the rest of the game, even if it sucks. Not sure why, I’ve just always done it. I don’t like hammers or axes though. Only swords, and only massive two handed ones. If the biggest sword is a magical sword, looks like I’m levelling intelligence/faith/whatever it needs. Needless to say, my Elden Ring playthroughs always start by making a beeline to Caelid to grab GUGS. Then when I enter the DLC I get the Ancient Meteoric Ore Greatsword as soon as I can. DS3? GUGS then FUGS. DS1? Zwei right out of the gate. Not sure why, it’s just always how I play these games.

No summons, no guides and no magic/ranged.