I forgot how much more Dark Souls 2 lets you bling up.
There's more pics if you click ^
That's my cleric that I'm farthest with on the PC version. I have a swordsman on PS3 that's a decent bit further. The cleric has like 3 healing spells with 8 total uses and another 8 estus flasks on top of that so as long as you take it slow it's pretty hard to die. Having a heavier shield is useful too and the mace smashes through armor and zaps flesh so you never have to worry about not doing damage. Let me tell you, it's a boring fucking build.