Oceiros and a Painted World

 Man, Oceiros is not easy on a caster.

I've come to the conclusion that I just need to swap to a melee weapon in the second phase and stay under the boss as much as I can, as that seems to be the safest place, but he gets really fast when he goes into phase 2.

I think what's so strange about the fight is that the first phase of Oceiros is profoundly easy - you pelt him with Great Heavy Soul Arrows and he basically gets one attack in before he goes into the second phase. But that second phase is relentless.

I've also finally entered the Painted World of Ariandel. I got to the room with the unnamed girl who paints the new world (I've heard her referred to as "Ari") and now have the big woodsy area. I managed to clear that out but was out of both kinds of Estus flask and out of FP when I got to the two Millwood Knights guarding the basement of Ariendel's chapel, so I ran past them but died to the bloodsucking locust people when I tried to run through. I don't totally remember how to open the door there, or if there's a shortcut I can get to go back to the bonfire. Anyway, I lost over 40k souls when I didn't make it back there, which was frustrating.

Supposedly I've hit a hard cap for the Court Sorcerer's Staff intelligence buff (and then actually spent some more levels on Intelligence because I didn't realize that). I need to figure out if there's any way I can continue to boost my damage, or if I really just need to invest future levels in survival.

One of the frustrating things is that the melee weapon I invested levels in to get the stats for it is the Moonlight Greatsword, which you can transpose off of Oceiros. I've gotten him down to about 20% several times, but there are very few chances to heal in his second phase and his hits take off about 50% of my health.

Oceiros is such a key boss - while technically he's optional, he is a prerequisite to get Champion Gundyr, the Ancient Wyvern, and the Nameless King. I mean, I intend to get every boss down, but it does feel like I hit a bit of a bottleneck.