Shadow of The Erdtree wasn't that hard, despite everything I'd heard

I should head this up by saying that Shadow of The Erdtree is brilliant. I think I might prefer it to the base game when compared start to finish, and it's definitely (imo) better than most of From Software's standalone games, despite being an expansion.

But I'm not gonna lie, it really wasn't as hard as I was led to believe by this subreddit, the Steam reviews, and Twitter. After reading everyone's complaints/ concerns/ masochistic whoops of joy, I wondered how reviewers got through it with limited time honestly.

Well, probably because it's fine? Yeah, it's harder in general than the base game. But I wouldn't say it's harder than Sekiro, or the Old Hunters DLC for Bloodborne for that matter. I started Shadow of The Erdtree on Saturday morning, and I cleared the entire map and almost every single remembrance/ boss by Sunday night, after approximately 20-25 hours.

Granted, I went in on a base character (so not NG+) who was a completionist character I played with after release. So level 175, everything unlocked, etc. And I wasn't playing a super hard build or anything (Greatsword and greatshield) but even still. Don't think I got 'stuck' even once.

I wasn't getting 'two shot' by anything except transitional AoE attacks, I didn't get stuck on Blackgaol Knight for three hours - though I did use his sword and armour set immediately, sorry pal - and I certainly don't think the DLC and its bosses are 'too hard'.

I've seen complaints that bosses are unstaggerable, don't have healing or attack windows, or don't have weaknesses, and all of it is untrue. I don't want to spoil major bosses, but half the remembrances have actual weaknesses. All of them are staggerable, and I know that because I staggered every single one of them, often multiple times in the same fight.

I should stress - I consider myself barely above average at these games. Malenia killed me 50+ times at launch, so did Starscourge Radahn, and so did Malekith. So far there's only two bosses in Shadow of The Erdtree to even cross 20 attempts.

Honestly, I think too many people aren't using enough of the new upgrades, aren't trying out new talismans, and aren't using enough resist items/ talismans. Because the TLDR is that I'm average at this game, and I haven't struggled more with the DLC than I do with the base game.

Aside from the final boss, who is truly bonkers.