Dark Souls III Enemy Randomization

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If randomize_enemies in your Dark Souls 3 player config YAML is enabled, bosses, minibosses and basic enemies will be shuffled with themselves respectively.

To further customize enemy randomization beyond that, there is a section called random_enemy_preset.

This tutorial will show all the ways how to configure that preset.

Table of Contents

The Basics

There are two main ways to assign an enemy to be randomized: individual enemy assignments to target a singular enemy placement and setting up Pools to target a category of enemies.

Custom pools are recommended unless you specifically want to single out one enemy placement.

All bosses also have their own category, so individual assignment is not necessary in those cases.

Be aware of correct indentation of your YAML file. Every example in this document will need to be nested under the random_enemy_preset: section.

Disable the preset by leaving just empty brackets {}. Like usual with YAML, you can add comments by using #.

For further examples, check out the "presets" folder of the standalone randomizer.

Individual Assignments

Individual enemy assignment is in contrast to a pool, where you cannot target individual enemies but rather a category.

This overrides pools and any other configuration will usually ignore progression and can possibly cause you to have to fight Yhorm the Giant without Storm Ruler.

You use it in the Enemies section by selecting a specific enemy using its unique ID, or its specific name followed by its ID.

See the '/randomizer/preset/Template.txt' file of the static randomizer for all available IDs.

There are also some special target names available for individual assignments:

Pools

A pool is a collection of enemies. A pool can both be a randomization target and an eligible group of random enemies to be drawn from for randomization. See Enemy Categories for all available pools.

Pool assignment generally respects progression, like requiring Storm Ruler to be accessible before Yhorm the Giant.

By default, using a boss as another boss, or a miniboss as another miniboss, takes the source enemy out of the default pool for that category, so each enemy will still be used once if possible. However, the enemy can still appear more than once if used in a custom pool.

Pool Groups

Pools can be joined into a pool group by joining several names, separated by a semicolon. 

# All basic enemies are just different hollows now
Basic:
- Weight: 100
  Pool: Hollow Soldiers; Large Hollow Soldiers

RandomByType

By default, selection will be random across all eligible enemies. In our example above it would select from:

and

However this would make it more likely to select a regular soldier instead of a large one (5 out of 8), just because there are fewer entries in the latter category.

You can specify RandomByType: true to select randomly from the list itself (Hollow Soldiers, Large Hollow Soldiers) and make our previous example a true 50/50 split. 

# All basic enemies are just different hollows now
Basic:
- Weight: 100
  Pool: Hollow Soldiers; Large Hollow Soldiers
  RandomByType: true # To make it truly 50/50 between the categories

Weights

Weights can be used to select multiple different outcomes within a pool, weighted to give different probabilities each.

Weights don't necessarily have to add up to 100, but doing it that way makes estimating probabilities very intuitive. 

Boss:
- Weight: 79 # 79% of bosses will still be bosses
  Pool: default
- Weight: 20 # Replace 20% of all bosses with minibosses
  Pool: Miniboss
- Weight: 1 # Replace 1% of all bosses with regular enemies. It's always funny
  Pool: Basic

Be aware that weights will not work in the Enemies section.

Settings

Boss

This setting indicates which enemies can be used as sources for bosses. By default, this is the pool of all 29 bosses. 

Boss:
- Weight: 80
  Pool: default
- Weight: 20 # Replace 20% of all bosses with minibosses
  Pool: Miniboss

Miniboss

This setting indicates which enemies can be used as sources for minibosses. By default, this is the pool of all 32 minibosses (including duplicates). 

Miniboss:
- Weight: 80
  Pool: default
- Weight: 20 # Replace 20% of all minibosses with bosses
  Pool: Boss

Basic

This setting indicates which enemies can be used as sources for all other enemies, so non-bosses and non-minibosses. By default, this is the pool of all ~2000 basic enemies (including duplicates). 

Basic:
- Weight: 94
  Pool: default
- Weight: 5 # Replace 5% of all basic enemies with minibosses
  Pool: Miniboss
- Weight: 1 # Replace 1% of all basic enemies with bosses
  Pool: Boss

BuffBasicEnemiesAsBosses

If enabled, this causes basic enemies to become a lot stronger when randomized into the slot of a boss. 

Boss:
- Weight: 100 # All bosses are just basic enemies...
  Pool: Basic

BuffBasicEnemiesAsBosses: true # ...but they are strong

Enemies

Under the Enemies: setting you can add more nuanced replacements of random enemies. There are two ways you can adjust enemies: 

Enemies:
  # Replace only the very first Ravenous Crystal Lizard with the final boss
  Ravenous Crystal Lizard 4000380: Lords of Cinder
  
  # Replace all regular soldiers with skeletons or small crabs
  Hollow Soldiers: Skeletons; Lesser Crab
  
  # Knights remain knights, but variants (i.e. weapons) are still shuffled within the category
  High Wall Lothric Knight: High Wall Lothric Knight

DontRandomize

A semicolon-separated list of enemies or enemy types to not randomize (assign to themselves). It is taken out of its default pool and also custom pools in this case, but it can still be assigned to individual enemies. 

DontRandomize: Iudex Gundyr # Iudex Gundyr will be at his vanilla location

Boss:
- Weight: 100
  Pool: default # Boss slots other than Iudex Gundyr will never become him

RemoveSource

A semicolon-separated list of enemies or enemy types to remove from all pools. It can still be assigned to individual enemies. This is overridden by DontRandomize directives. 

# Remove the most annoying enemies from all pools
RemoveSource: Bridge Darkeater Midir; Ancient Wyvern Mob; Curse-rotted Greatwood; High Lord Wolnir; Carthus Sandworm

OopsAll

Assigning an enemy or a pool to OopsAll sets all pools to that specific enemy or category of enemy. This can still be overridden using individual enemy assginments, but otherwise every enemy is replaced by this setting. 

# This run suddenly got very spooky
OopsAll: Skeletons

Enemy Categories

The following enemy category pools are available: