Aye, this subject has been driving me nuts. Sometimes it seems to work, and sometimes it doesn't. I was using an eye in the blighttown swamp and none of the people who invaded me had phantoms (at least, not the ones who messaged me back), but about a day after that I read a post from this forum about someone who had black phantom ogres in their swamp. Not sure if it was me causing it, though.

I'm starting to wonder if not all of the people who are getting the messages are actually being affected by it. I remember a few times where I've seen a gravelord sign without any warnings about a gravelord, and I also remember getting the warnings but not being able to find a gravelord sign, though that one could be chalked up to the guy hiding. I've never personally had black phantoms enemies, though.

I'm starting to suspect that everyone in the proper level range can see the sign and invade as a Spirit of Vengeance, but only a select few are actually cursed by the Gravelord. If this is how it works then this really wrecks the risk/reward balance of using the Eye, and pretty much unhinges the usefulness of the covenant. I wish From would get their shit together and just make a public statement as to (a) EXACTLY how this covenant was designed to work from the get-go, and (b) whether it is functioning properly in its current state. A promise of an impending patch to rectify any remaining issues would also go a long way, as this is one of my last MAJOR gripes about Dark Souls multiplayer. With as much potential as it has, this covenant NEEDS to work properly; the game as a whole suffers without it.

I have been using Eyes od Death today for about 3 hours and I had zero invasions from them. No feedback whatsoever about spawning monsters in other worlds, nothing. In fact, it could have worked for all I know, just nobody invaded me. I find this Cov very disappointing because they're no incentive for me to use an item which has an effect I can't see, and there's no incentive for infected players to invade me since they can just quit and relog, assuming the extra monsters part actually works. And then, there is the level restriction for invasions, so it could be that a player is infected but can never invade my world...

From what I understand after watching that video of the black phantoms and doing a bit of reading is that those are just new enemy placements after 1.05 and unrelated to the Grave Lord Covenant. I haven't read of, seen or experienced my game world becoming populated by difficult enemies, or noticed any change in the standard monsters and I have been infected by Grave Lord servants on 3-4 occasions for varying lengths of time. Other player accounts echo my own experience and confirm that the Grave Lord Covenant is currently not performing as written, and remains in this state after 1.05. I would love to be proven wrong here, anybody?

Hmm...

If FROM checks this forum at all, I'm sure they know about the issues. The eyes seem to have some very complicated coding going on under the hood, and whatever is wrong with them is probably just as complicated.

I almost wonder if it's not the eyes themselves, but a server issue? Wasn't the gravelord item working just fine in the pre-release demos?


On a different matter, the more I use them the more I think more than three people are affected, but only up to three can invade at once. In addition, I've had several complaints from other players about attempted invasions failing several times in a row. My own attempts at invading a gravelord have failed about half the time.

Seeing as how they don't even have a English language site or rep, I highly doubt they do check this forum. Complaints and fixes are probably coming from the Japanese community only. I can only hope they're finding the same issues we are.

Yeah I don't think they check this forum tbh, but I hope i'm wrong.

Anyhow, I thought about it and I got a lot of invasions (really really more than usual) in the catacombs yesterday while using the Eyes of Death, but they were all Dark Spirits and not Spirits of Vengeance. I had the same guys invade me for 5 or 6 times in a row, so could it be that the Eyes did work and that they changed "Spirit of Vengeance" to "Dark Spirit" ? I doubt it but that could explain it.

Also, I know my sign is roaming with me every 30sec or so, but I wonder, if a player find it and invade me through the gravelord sign, does he spawn at the last known position of the sign or at predefined spawn points, just like regular invasions ? That's something that bothered me because if they spawn at regular spawn points then it's even harder to tell the eyes are working...

Last night I was in catacombs and put an eye for 45 minutes. Two inveders come and Ive got two new eyes. This means I fought against infected invaders. I sent a massage to them to confirm me if they experianced hardest enemies and red phantoms. And the answer was no. I believe invaders have seen Gravelord sign and invaded, but their world was not infected. More, they looked extremely surpriced (misjudged white from GL sign) when came in my world. Meaning, no infection, GL sign and unexpected invasion in Gravelord world.

I was farming Darkwraiths last night in New Londo when I got a message saying that "disasters would be gone after the defeat of the Gravelord Servant." Nothing changed, no new enemies appeared, and I never saw a soul sign anywhere. I finished my farming run, used a Homeward Bone, and warped back to the Firelink Shrine dejectedly. Failed again. :/

@ Gahrsim:
The catacombs are a good place to be invaded if you go in at the right level. To my knowledge infected players still invade as spirits of vengeance, and not dark spirits. Either way, if you didn't get eyes of death for killing them, they weren't infected players.

Story-wise, it would be unfair if getting retribution on a gravelord for making your life miserable was considered an evil act, hence the spirit of vengeance as opposed to dark spirit. Bear in mind, this is just the way I see it.

The invader will appear at the blue phantom spawning point, not where your gravelord sign was last. It's a good thing for them, otherwise I could hang out by a bonfire all day and kill them as they spawn.


@Al1000:
Misjudged the gravelord for a white sign? That's very odd, but I guess if you're in a hurry and not paying attention it's possible. Especially since the place is naturally dark, so the black mist effect wouldn't be as noticeable.

That being said, I have experienced an odd bug just recently. I tried summoning one person (a white phantom), and instead got a completely different person (a gold phantom with a different name and gear), and shortly afterwards the game said 'summoning failed'. I wonder if something similar could happen to a gravelord sign?

The lack of stronger enemies isn't surprising. I'm still trying to figure out what causes them to appear in the first place. I almost wonder if the Eye of Death is only supposed to infect 3 people, but for some reason it's hitting far more people? If it's only coded to infect 3 players, would it end up as 3 of those players get the phantoms, 3 others get the warnings, and 3 others get the signs? This is meaningless speculation on my part, since I know nothing about programming or servers. Interesting to think about, though.


@TzarChasm:
I've had that several times before. It's at the point where if I get the warning, I don't even bother looking for a sign. Of course, it could be because the person was hiding because they thought they'd get souls if you died. Ah well...

I really do think that what is happening is that when a Gravelord lays his sign down, a handful of people—maybe only the supposed 3—are cursed with powerful monsters invading their game. However, ANY player in the proper zone and level range, not just the ones who are truly afflicted, are warned of the Gravelord and allowed to invade and kill him. This may have been intentional, as a way of allowing less-experienced players to escape the Gravelord curse if they found it impossible to proceed in their level or kill their tormentor. That's just speculation, though.

Well, this is disappointing as hell, I guess I'm gonna have to go darkwraith instead.

I tried putting my sign down in new londo at the red priest guy thinking the ghosts would fuck people up, but nothing happened. I went afk and had lunch and came back and nothing had happened.

The gravelord sign appears wherever you're standing. Since you hid yours so far into the level, that's probably why you weren't invaded.

As far as I've been able to determine, infected players dying in their world won't give you souls. That being the case, there's no reason to hide your soul sign. A far better tactic would be to hang out in the beginning of the level, essentially saying "you can either deal with me, or deal with shittons of OP monsters". That's assuming there are monsters in their world, of course.

Last night I spent a miserable six hours farming a single Titanite Slab, during which time I received two messages saying that "Disasters will be gone following the defeat of the Gravelord Servant." The first time was at the end of one of my runs, so I cast Homeward and returned a few minutes later via the shortcut. No sooner than I dropped into the pit did I receive the second message. This time I finished the run before scouring the ENTIRE zone for any hint of the Gravelord's sign. Despite seeing no messages indicating that he/she had either been defeated or moved on, I never found the sign even after going over every square inch of the zone, and not one abnormal enemy appeared. This whole covenant has gone from the aspect of the game that excited me the most to little more than a sick joke. How pathetic.

The undead berg is no longer a fair place for PVP, while the japanese guys were a patch ahead, I had all these fair cool one on one fights, no special weapons, no BS.

I'm getting nailed by super phantoms with kirks armor, big hat logan's hat, lightning katanas, you name it. I can't farm a damn thing or inflict any damage whatsoever.

I spent quiet awhile in that area getting invaded and than running around naked dodging their attacks for 10minutes before disconnecting my router or just quiting game if i was far ahead of them.

They are so lame lol.

I did have one naked fist fight with a guy who eventually let me knock him off a the bridge coming toward the Blacksmith area. That was fun. Otherwise I just did my absolute best to waste their time.

Welcome to dark souls, where < SL 120 is nothing but a grief fest of exploiters.

My level 18, fully-legit beginning character of level 18 was invaded by some cockflute who said he was level 6 and talked worlds of shit to me after tearing my head off in a single hit with his Quelaag's Furysword +5. Yeah, even after patch 1.05 nerfed a lot of hax and cheesy tactics I still won't play 95% of the game in bodily form. I can finish the game without kindling more than a bonfire or two along the whole way, so why bother? I'll just save my Humanity until I get to the Kiln or the Painted World, and hope for some honorable PvP instead.

Disappointing, but such is life.

I think it's safe to conclude you have the worst luck when it comes to gravelords. There's nothing I can do to help you...

The gravelord covenant is bugged in an oddly specific manner. I don't know what causes it, but the results seem to be that it's either "splitting" the effects or not applying the entire eye of death effect to the people it does hit. For example, you're getting messages when there are no gravelord signs, and I've seen gravelord signs when there are no messages.

Whatever the case, I'm sure you've mentioned it enough that if anyone important where to actually check this thread, they'd get the message. -_-;

I get that, but you're doing yourself a disservice. Co-op is too much fun, and usually if you're heading through levels they don't have so much opportunity to invade you. Gravelords get a special short end of the stick, we need to stay where we are in these areas... just had some guy with a dragon head, despite being so much stronger then me he ran around, threw poisoned daggers, used only his head to attack me. He won, but it took like 6 minutes... sent him some hate mail after, told him he was the biggest coward I'd fought all day. And it's true, I had some great, fair fights. He could have killed me easily and he was STILL forced to cheat and run away to heal on a few occasions.

I take it back though, the parish is way harder. With the berg, outside the bonfire you have a small area that every character who uses that bonfire must pass every time. Frustration towards black phantoms aside, I was still earning eyes as time went on. For a low level gravelord, that's the place. Put them right outside the door to the bonfire, I did catch two blue invaders at once at one time, but the rest have been every 5-10 minutes.

I'm losing them in the parish. If you're going to try the parish, don't use the start, place them in the level where it meets the path to the blacksmith... maybe you'll have more luck?

@Saphiron: That's excellent advice. Personally, when I'm laying any kind of soul sign down I try to put them in areas players frequently go through, preferably near a bonfire and away from dangerous enemies.

In my case though, once someone does invade I try to stay as mobile as possible. I'm no good against multiple opponents, so there's no reason to make it easy for another one to sneak in.

My favorite place for using an eye of death is in the blighttown swamp, right by the bonfire before queelag. There's so many people invading, I almost wonder if they'd rather fight me than deal with that place.

I apologize if vocalizing my frustration here and, like many others present, sharing my personal experiences with the covenant has offended you. I guess I've nothing further to contribute here.



I would disagree, respectfully. I don't care at all for co-op. I've summoned people twice in Dark Souls and found it to be a needless frustration, as I have to waste my flasks to heal them at inopportune moments, and boss difficulty scales so aggressively with phantoms' presence that the game is always easier to finish solo. Then again, I've had a PS3 since launch and I have an empty friend list because I don't like other people enough to give a damn about playing with them. For me, Demon's/Dark Souls are about two things only: finishing the game with new builds and strategies again and again, and invading and sabotaging other people to the best of my ability. Nothing else matters to me.

Ah, a griefer huh? Stay away from me and my eye farming, lol. I've met enough of those today.

Just thought I would note this.
I tried the eyes in the sewers at level 122. I got invaded by some reds but a infected person invaded me 4 times.
It was the same person and he invaded me almost right away after the 2nd time.I killed him 3 times and the last time he killed me. I got 3 eyes and he got one when he killed me. He didn't say if black phantoms came though he ignored me...=[.

After a week trying and testing gravelord, it seems to me the eyes are completely erratic. Today, I used eyes in the Archives, nothing happened after 10, and then I use one, in less than a minute I get invaded by 2 spirit of vengeance AND a Dark Spirit. It was funny (I lost, obviously, since they made a little gang). I messaged the guys asking if extra enemies spawned into their world, so far no answer.

I will go to the Kiln and try during this playthrough, if nothing conclusive happens I'll go back to Darkmoon.

My apologies Tzar, I've been on edge lately. This is probably the only thread you can post your experiences in. I'll try to help if possible, and in the end the whole point of this is to compile information. Quite frankly it defeats the purpose if I turn you away.

@dualsworddude: Yes, the same person can invade you multiple times via your sign, without a waiting period even. It's a great way to get more eyes. Of course, they can keep trying until they finally succeed, so they'll get you eventually.

@Gahrsim: The best times to use an eye of death are when there are plenty of people on, and you'll want to be in the same level range as them. I haven't figured out the best way to gauge server activity yet, but lately I've been using the 'player ghosts' to determine good spots for gravelording.
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I've had a hard time getting messages back from people when it comes to the black phantom enemies. Not too surprising, since it's generally assumed the gravelord covenant is supposed to be a trolling/griefing covenant. This does make it hard to put all the pieces together, though.

Last night I went to Darkroot garden. I finished level and Sif. After reurning to the bonfire near door which leads to the garden, I have received gravelord massage "Disasters are now present in your world and will not leave until the Gravelord is defeated". I never found the summon sign, nor ever got a message that the Gravelord was killed. I did not notice difference in my world, becouse it was cleared from enemies. There were no additional enemies at all. Just dark forest. Strange. Any comments?

Certainly. Even if you've killed the boss in your world, you can still be affected by a gravelord curse. This is because you're the one who'll be invading their world, so the only boss that needs to be alive is theirs.

As you may have noticed, the eyes of death are buggy right now. Some people are getting the warning messages but not the soul signs or enemies, some people are getting the signs but nothing else, and some poor bastards get the enemies and no way to invade the gravelord. Sometimes more than one thing happens, like I once got the warnings and a soul sign, which was nice. No enemies though.

If you've any interest in the covenant, proceed with this in mind.

I've got two ps3's and two copies of dark souls, I think i'll try infecting myself sometime and see what I can observe. Probably easiest to make a new character and skip tarus demon, then get in the gravelord cov and attempt to infect a new char of the same level.

Do you think I should sync white signs, and when I can see the other chars white sign remove it and place down the gravelord? Or just place the eye down and wait?

Well, this is a rare opportunity! Whatever help you can provide will be most appreciated.

You can use the white soapstone even while using an eye of death, though this carries with it the risk that you'll be summoned, which will nullify your gravelord curse. I'd try to make both characters an unusual level for the area, to reduce the odds that someone else could interfere. After that, you've definitely got a good idea going. Do let me know what you find!

Alright just got both chars up to about level 50.

Tried it twice so far.

First time:

Player1 used eye of death, Player2 saw the gravelord sign almost immediately. There was no message of warning, and were not able to find any powerful enemies anywhere in the level. The sign updates position pretty quick, every 10 seconds or so. Took two tries for an invasion to work, and player1 got the eye of death like expected. Player1 then jumped off a cliff, and immeditely player2 saw the gravelord defeated message.

Attempt 2 didn't work, there is probably a cooldown period where you can't re-curse the same player.

@Crazy9000:

You have my undivided attention.

The update speed appears faster than I initially thought. 10 seconds or so... if that's consistent across the board, that could explain the high number of failures when attempting to invade a gravelord compared to a static soul sign, since catching one just a few seconds too late and you'd be using a sign that's expired.

I knew the messages were a bit sketchy, but this sheds light on an interesting phenomenon I'll have to study later. Apparently, even though not all infected players get the warning messages, I've been seeing a lot of posts around here about 'gravelord died' messages with no warning of there being one in the first place. I've had such things myself. I wonder if that's the one message that does work?

Speaking of which, if you ever find yourself with the time would you like to try that? In a situation like attempt 2, if the gravelord suicides would player2 still get the message?

This is immensely helpful. Please tell me as you find more! I'll update the first post to reflect this new information. Would you like credit?

The gravelord sign just says "gravelord", and doesn't give a PSN account. Also when you activate it, it says "searching for world of gravelord to invade", or something similar. This makes me suspect activating the sign is more like using an "eye orb" item, and the frequent updates *shouldn't* affect the invasion.

I was surprised by the frequency that the sign updated as well. I had my gf follow me all around the level, and through the darkroot garden. The sign kept refreshing, was pretty neat to see it keep popping up right before she reached where it was.

I'll do some more testing tonight and see if I can find anything new. There's a pretty big exploit for me having both ps3's... with unlimited invasion attempts, I can get as many eyes as I have patience for. I'll try suiciding after it stops working and see what happens, didn't think of trying that.

I don't need any credit, I think of it more like a wiki with contributions .

If i make it so the gravelord can see player2's soul sign before casting the eye of death, it doesn't seem to work at all. Maybe you can only infect other servers? That may explain why it's a bit buggy.

If the gravelord suicides in that case, player2 does not see any message.

Thanks for doing this research. I will try not to place a sign down when I see other summon signs and report what type of invader I get.