Author Topic: Theory of Bullet Pattern Types  (Read 2024 times)

Theory of Bullet Pattern Types
« on: November 26, 2010, 11:02:34 AM »
Hello to you all!
Now that I believe I've finally found a community that is 99% danmaku, I will post my year-long observation on certain bullet types, from my own experience.

Note that this is just a theory of mine. There are probably stuff missing that I have not thought of. As such, suggestions will be greatly appreciated.

The reason why a new Touhou game may seem challenging on Normal when you finished Lunatics might be because ZUN puts in new tricks and patterns, and sometimes, places a greater emphasis on certain bullet pattern types.

As such, being able to master a certain pattern type can easily get you through most spellcards of similar pattern types, because you are comfortable with the card in question and can feel the flow of the card immediately and clear it as such. Similarly, not getting the grasp of certain cards may also mean some cards of similar bullet types will be more difficult to capture. On the bright side, you can skillgrind a card of similar pattern type to get a grasp of it.

Of couse, some patterns can be a mixture of more than 1 bullet pattern type.

So here are the bullet pattern types, my method of conquering them, and their examples:

Simple Density Bullets
As the name implies, just density and perhaps some understanding of the card. But mostly dense and slow. These require fundamental sense of danmaku to do. One of the simpler pattern types to accomplish.
Examples include:
Knockout In Three Steps Sumizone Perfect Cherry Blossom, Secretly Inherited Art Of Danmaku

Speed Bullets
Fast bullets. Generally requires skill and practise. A player has to be able to read fast to react.
Examples include:
Tengu Hidden Within Leaves, Scarlet Meister, and Great Fairy Wars in general. Seihou Syuusou Gyoku too for those interested.

Streaming Bullets
Bullets that stream and pressure you to the corner. Needs understanding of the bullets and guts, and timing to escape the pressure.
Examples include:
Kaguya's 3rd Last Spells, Mortality - Deadly Dance, 'The post-Momizi BS fairies'

Mixed-Speed Bullets
Mixture of fast and slow bullets. Generally on higher levels, one should pay attention to the fast bullets and subconsciously dodge the slower bullets.Pay more attention to the area 1-3 character-space above their own characters.
Examples include:
Letty's Table Turning, Chen's Kimontonkou, Orin's Needles of Yore, Vague Recollection of Kinkaku-ji

Speed-Dense Bullets
Mixed speeds, density, wow! It seems to need more concentration than other patterns. And skill in general.
Examples include:
Peerless Wind God, The Bow of Genzanmi Yorimasa

Pre-emptive Trapping Bullets
Bullets that give you some time to prepare by moving upwards so that you can 'buy time to react'. When the bullets are released, you move down along with the bullets, and hence you have more time to find holes and escape. If you do not, you may find yourself trapped by a wall of seeminly impermeable bullets.
Examples include:
Heavenly Net Sandbag, Virtue of Wind God, Saruta Cross

Heavily-Diagonal/Awkward Angle Bullets
Probably includes the laser of later games. generally difficult to read. Some may find this extremely fun. Needs practise to read.
Examples include:
Many of Patchy's cards, Storm on Mt Ooe, Double Black Death Butterfly, Dragon Palace Messenger's Swimming Shot, Undefined Fantastic Object (the final spellcard)

Bottom-up Bullets
Generally not too fast bullets, but the come from behind. If you can split focus for both below and above you, it should help greatly.
Examples include:
Shoot the Little Moon, Human Sword - Eternal Truth

Omnidirectional Bullets
Bullets that come from 0-pi degrees, sometimes coming from the BACK! Normally very hard patterns, but after I started to pay full attention on my character and dodge by reaction, my capture rate improved tremendously.
Examples include:
Mysterious Powers and Disrupting Spirits, Greatest Treasure, Erratic Cat Step

Trick Patterns
The fun patterns! These may seem hard on first glance, but after sitting back and thinking, you have found a way to trivialize the problem! Or at least make it MUCH easier to capture. I like to use these patterns to show that Touhou can be an 'IQ Game in addition to its arcade difficulty'.
Examples include:
Double Spoiler 12-1 (my favourite example), Sinking Anchor , Ancient Duper, Fantasy Heaven
... and much, much more

May add if there are more ideas in stock. This is still in my opinion and can be subject to change. I have limited concentration (unlinke maybe Naut and Heatbreaker who are leet) so I do need some of these tricks to help me.
I hope this might help people out there.
To those aiming to progress in Danmaku: GL, HF!
« Last Edit: November 26, 2010, 11:04:41 AM by kakefumi »

Drake

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Re: Theory of Bullet Pattern Types
« Reply #1 on: November 26, 2010, 02:39:51 PM »
Quote
Naut
Quote
Doesn't have limited concentration
hahaha.jpg

While your list is pretty nice, some of the examples I don't quite agree with, or could also be grouped in different/multiple types. In addition, I don't think that some types (obviously including trick/memo types) can't really be practiced by playing other patterns of the same type.

But good list nonetheless.

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