Ever since the Elden Ring DLC, Shadow of the Erdtree, came out, there has been a media frenzy—from normal players to high-profile streamers, everyone complaining about how hard the Elden Ring DLC actually is. And don't get me wrong, we all know how challenging Souls-like games tend to be and how tough Elden Ring was at times. But saying the DLC is harder than the base game or that they're intentionally making it harder to generate controversy is just a load of BS that many fans can see through.
Elden Ring wasn't a hard game to begin with—it was open-world, gave you the ability to level up, explore any area you wanted, and come back stronger. But if you chose to get stuck at one boss fight for 5 hours, under-leveled, then you can't complain about the boss difficulty. The same is happening in the DLC. Many Elden Lords, even 150-something characters, thought they could just pay for the DLC, steamroll through the bosses, and act like it's no big deal.
Does that even make sense to you? If the base game was challenging and the creators knew you'd be a pro by the time you entered the DLC, why would they make the bosses easier? And let's be real, no boss is inherently easy or hard—it all depends on your play style. The game has given you plenty of resources. So much so that many players are resorting to summon runs, where they summon help and do everything they can to make those summons stronger, kind of like Pokémon.
The Scadutree Fragments have helped many players so much that a lot of them regret using them as they were practically steamrolling through the bosses on their first try. So, the game isn't hard—it's the person playing the game who's lazy or, even worse, too proud to let go of their ego, make a new build, and try again!