To be fair, I don't comment that kinda stuff - everyone can play how they please, doesn't bother me-

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-but having played through a few times, I would actually tend to agree about summons now. First play was a blind 'get through using whatever strongest stuff you got', and it was great, but imo, the summons really broke a lot of bosses, like, completely trivialised them due to not being agro'd on you. Even if I just used Loretta, the fact the boss would take the time to run across an arena to go and hit her would give me an insane amount of space and time to do anything I wanted. Heal? Sure. Status effect items, why not. Rebuff? Easy.

I'm currently playing through with no shield and no bell/npc summons, and I am having a lot more fun with many bosses, and it's making them a lot more memorable, due to really having to nail their movesets (imo, which is the crux of games like this, dark souls, monster hunter, etc - it's like a precise dance of reactions and learning, and the satisfaction from nailing a boss (tbh even regular enemies at points) is unparalleled in gaming, imo.

That being said, you do you, play however you want to - but I am gonna say that I found (and am still finding) playing without summons is the optimum experience - but If you find it really tough, maybe do it on a later play through like I am, as then you have a base understanding of the game, mechanics, iframe/parry windows, etc and can build on that, rather than struggling with the core tenets of the game and then making it tougher on yourself by denying certain mechanics.