Touhou Accomplishments Mk. II

[nintendonut888]

VoWG lunatic capture the third! Nothing is quite as awesome as not only capturing this card after the music synchs perfectly the whole battle, making some harrowing dodges in the final 20 seconds, hearing the spell card capture cue sound, AND getting an extend from the card bonus.

[LHCling]

Perfect Stage 5 (stage portion) of IN Lunatic. All Spell Cards captured, save for "Idling Wave", which I accidentally panic-bombed on because I thought I was walled.

Circles coming from many directions suck.

_{Also, it's not much of an achievement, but surviving against Reimu for PoFV Lunatic for 2:30 would be another milestone for me.}
...damn, this makes me want to beat the MoF Hard ReimuA WR so badly now, just to see how long my score would hold up.

I mean, come on:

Fuck year, new world record (MoF Extra ReimuA).

http://replays.gensokyou.org/download.php?id=3959

Phar
Score: 982,731,920
Date: 2009/07/14
Time: 01:11

Suddenly:

coa
Score: 983,104,110
Date: 2009/07/15
Time: 13:06

Really tempting me.
Reading through coa's various comments, it is advisable to not lose any faith (yes, even 10 or 100) during the stage.

Also, something about the two survival Spell Cards "Red Frog" and "Suwa War". He seems to complain about an "imperfect" bullet clear bonus (i.e. Faith-related) for "Suwa War" or something to that effect. I suck at translating sentences. Somebody else can try:

開幕が若干安かったり、少し赤蛙の誘導ミスったりと細かい所は色々ありますが、ほぼベストと言っていい内容で繋がってくれました。
高い時には大抵｢風雨｣とか｢諏訪大戦｣がキツいんですが、何とか凌ぐ事ができました。
?ってかよく諏訪大戦死ななかったなｗ

[Phar]

Reading through coa's various comments, it is advisable to not lose any faith (yes, even 10 or 100) during the stage.

Also, something about the two survival Spell Cards "Red Frog" and "Suwa War". He seems to complain about an "imperfect" bullet clear bonus (i.e. Faith-related) for "Suwa War" or something to that effect. I suck at translating sentences. Somebody else can try:

開幕が若干安かったり、少し赤蛙の誘導ミスったりと細かい所は色々ありますが、ほぼベストと言っていい内容で繋がってくれました。
高い時には大抵｢風雨｣とか｢諏訪大戦｣がキツいんですが、何とか凌ぐ事ができました。
?ってかよく諏訪大戦死ななかったなｗ

coa's competitive as heck, so this is not really surprising. He was pretty quick about it this time, though. For Extra, losing some 10-100 faith or even points during the stage isn't really that important (though it's obviously better not to), it's mostly not ending a card/non-card at just the right moment and/or with Suwako at exactly the right spot that can be lethal to your score. My run was pretty sub-optimal in that respect. coa says in his comment he often has a hard time during froggy braves the elements and suwa war. I'm glad to see I'm not the only one; I lost count of how often a near-perfect run was ended by either of those. :V

[LHCling]

coa's competitive as heck, so this is not really surprising. He was pretty quick about it this time, though. For Extra, losing some 10-100 faith or even points during the stage isn't really that important (though it's obviously better not to), it's mostly not ending a card/non-card at just the right moment and/or with Suwako at exactly the right spot that can be lethal to your score. My run was pretty sub-optimal in that respect. coa says in his comment he often has a hard time during froggy braves the elements and suwa war. I'm glad to see I'm not the only one; I lost count of how often a near-perfect run was ended by either of those. :V

Counting that you have an extra 100 Faith from the start of Mid-Boss Kanako (you lost a bit before this if I recall); you could easily add about 100-150k to your score. I emphasized on 10 a bit too much I would think. The exact value I haven't been bothered to calculate yet, but it should be somewhere around there.

Saw the bolded part, and noted it in your replay. Also, I've had first-hand experience with it myself for MoF ReimuA Hard. The only thing that I hate about ending Spells / normal attacks at the right time is just that; you have to get it at the right time. I know the windows, but they're pretty damn small, and require luck (since the boss could theoretically stay at the top of the screen as opposed to moving down a bit). Also, crossed out a part which is essential, since you (at this point) need to gather as much Faith as possible during Attack Phases.

I'll have to watch his new replay to see which parts he touched up on.

...reading through coa's comment more thoroughly, I can see it now. That's what I get for skimming over something that isn't my native language, and something that I haven't constantly practiced.

Also, I should say that both "Froggy Braves the Elements" and "Suwa War" can perform walls / boxes on you, due to the random factor of the Spell Card. Especially "Suwa War". Hate them so much.
I must also commend you on your method of scoring for "Red Frog". Definitely something new, and very possible if you plan it out right.

[Yukkuri]

Am I the only one who thinks Mountain of Faith normal is easier then Mountain of Faith Easy?

I'm talking about the spell card.

I'm 1/1 on Normal and around 0/5 on Easy. The best I've managed to do is 2 bombs.

XD I'm 1/7 on easy and 2/2 on normal.

[lmagus]

I'm 0/12 on easy and 0/5 on normal :s

[Zengar Zombolt]

I have 2/10 on Easy and 0/6 on Normal, but that's because I bomb the hell out of the previous spellcard and reach MoF with low power, while in Easy I can capture it consistently.

[Phar]

Counting that you have an extra 100 Faith from the start of Mid-Boss Kanako (you lost a bit before this if I recall); you could easily add about 100-150k to your score. I emphasized on 10 a bit too much I would think. The exact value I haven't been bothered to calculate yet, but it should be somewhere around there.

Thing is, the faith you get from clearing Kanako's opener and her 1st (this one especially) and 3rd spells deviates in the hundreds, depending on luck. So in comparison, a loss (gain) of 100 faith during the stage isn't that significant anymore, because if you're lucky (unlucky), that faith is completely compensated (lost) in this phase anyway. And during Suwako, the deviations are even far greater.

Anyway, I watched coa's replay. Some notes:

- His stage run is nigh flawless. I don't think I've ever had that much faith/points at the start of the boss.
- He never seems to wait for Suwako to move to the center in the zig-zag non-cards, even though this seems like a pretty important faith source to me.
- He takes his time at Rings of Death (or whatever it's called). I'm still unsure on which ring it is most ideal to clear it, but waiting never seemed to give a significant faith advantage to me.
- He missed Suwako for a bit at the card with the homing green bullets (probably lost around 100k in points).
- He missed Suwako a lot during Froggy Braves the Elements. I'd estimate this cost him around 300k in points.
- The faith-loss at Red Frog he talked about seems fairly insignificant to me.
- At Suwa War, he has about 150k more than I had, despite starting Suwako with 300k more than me and having more faith throughout the battle.

I think with a truly perfect run you could maybe still reach 984 million, but you'd be pretty damn close to the theoretical limit (unless some completely new strategy is devised, of course, which seems unlikely at this point).

[Azinth]

Just captured Hourai Jewel in stage practice, though I have no idea how I did it since I still suck at it.  I guess I just managed to be in the right place at the right time for the entire duration of the card.  Unfortunately, in a fabulously derptastic moment, I forgot to save the replay. 

Also got Imperishable Shooting.  It only took 92 tries with the Ghost team and about 170 overall, which is relatively painless.  The card actually wasn't that bad after I found a better strategy for the fourth wave, which I'd always found nearly impossible until now.  Turns out I was just doing it wrong the whole time. 

And off-topic rant while I'm here:  Am I the only one who finds that IN has some of the stupidest and most unenjoyable spellcards/attacks ever?  Like, almost half of my least favorite Touhou moments can probably be found in this game.  Namely:  Hourai Jewel, Imperishable Shooting, Profound Field, Hourai Elixer, Fantasy Heaven, Blink, several of Eirin's cards, and a few nonspells (namely, Mystia's last, Eirin's second, and Marisa's second).  Fortunately I can forgive it because a.) Most of them are bonus attacks, and thus I don't have to see them unless I really want to and b.) aside from these horrible parts, the rest of the game is awesome.

[Drake]

PCB Extra 2 lives lost.

Just a note, has anyone noticed Veronica's Youtube account closed?

[lmagus]

I did.. noticed it today actually

you can still watch mine if you want

http://www.youtube.com/user/lmagus

=P

[nintendonut888]

I noticed it yesterday when I tried to watch her perfect Kanako battle.

[Drake]

Just got even farther on Orin. Up to Needle Mountain.

But I think I'll try my hand at the VSync path even for SA. I've had at least four instances where I press the bomb button in advance and die anyways. As in, four out of seven extra lives. Which also potentially prevented me from another extra life.

[Sapz]

Is it just me, or is Reimu C by far the most impractical and/or useless shot type in SA? I've been going through Satori's cards in Hard mode and though none of the others seem really as good all around as Reimu A, they all seem to have at least some situations where they do really well - Reimu B has pretty powerful homing, Marisa A has high shotgunning power, Marisa B is good on those spellcards where you have to manoeuvre around bosses as well as being pretty good on stages, Marisa C takes down bosses pretty fast and has the safety bomb thing... but aside from having a pretty decent bomb, I can't find any redeeming feature about Reimu C. The speed boost gets me killed more often than it actually helps and having to reposition your options every time you unfocus gets annoying really fast.

Am I missing something here, or is it really that bad?

[Drake]

She's good for TAS runs. Other than that I have no idea lol

[Azinth]

Is it just me, or is Reimu C by far the most impractical and/or useless shot type in SA?

Well actually, she's probably the second best shottype in the game for survival-based play after ReimuA, if only because her really high-damage bomb.  Stand right ontop of the enemy for its duration and you can pretty much oneshot any attack in the game except Utsuho's first and last two cards.  Her focus shot also does decent damage, though not as good as ReimuA (so the hard-to-use shottype does worse damage than the easy-to-use one?  lol ZUN).

[LHCling]

@ReimuC:

Good for those short, quick dodges that you do when you're boxed. If you can manipulate the options well enough, you should be able to clear the stages quite easily. Also, ridiculous shotgun bomb.

Thing is, the faith you get from clearing Kanako's opener and her 1st (this one especially) and 3rd spells deviates in the hundreds, depending on luck. So in comparison, a loss (gain) of 100 faith during the stage isn't that significant anymore, because if you're lucky (unlucky), that faith is completely compensated (lost) in this phase anyway. And during Suwako, the deviations are even far greater.

The difference of 100 (several times over it seems) is significant, as seen with this progression from your (current) replay and coa's:
415660;417320;424160;431500;436000
415800;417560;424360;431750;436560

The gap slowly widens (i.e. he got better clear bonuses than you); with the final large jump being Kanako's 3rd Spell Card. I'm not sure whether that would be just luck, or there's something extra within, seeing that the "spiral" appears to be random on Kanako's 3rd Spell Card.

- His stage run is nigh flawless. I don't think I've ever had that much faith/points at the start of the boss.
- He never seems to wait for Suwako to move to the center in the zig-zag non-cards, even though this seems like a pretty important faith source to me.
- He takes his time at Rings of Death (or whatever it's called). I'm still unsure on which ring it is most ideal to clear it, but waiting never seemed to give a significant faith advantage to me.
- He missed Suwako for a bit at the card with the homing green bullets (probably lost around 100k in points).
- He missed Suwako a lot during Froggy Braves the Elements. I'd estimate this cost him around 300k in points.
- The faith-loss at Red Frog he talked about seems fairly insignificant to me.
- At Suwa War, he has about 150k more than I had, despite starting Suwako with 300k more than me and having more faith throughout the battle.

-Nigh-flawless Stage run indeed. He seems to wait a bit (longer) before deathbombing the two fairy "trio"'s. That should add about 100 Faith each time. You can see where I'm going with the small numbers.
-Not sure why he doesn't wait a bit on those phases. Maybe it's insignificant, or he forgot? I'll have to check both replays (gets boring holding ctrl down constantly, and rewatching again and again...) to see if there's an actual significant difference.
-For "Iron Rings", it's a compromise between Spell Card Bonus and Faith. I myself don't know which ring to end it on. If you're (still) unsure, then just count the number of rings which fire before he finishes. Each ring does give a rather large (a few hundred?) amount of Faith though...
-Missing during Spell Cards happens. Significant regardless.
-Faith-loss during "Red Frog" ranged in the few hundreds if I remember. It had something to do with the remaining bullets flying off-screen or something when it disperses.
-This last point means that he messed up during Suwako, probably during the points you raised where he missed.

Overall, it's entirely possible to beat his score again. You should focus on (even if it's luck-based or not) "maximizing" Faith before Suwako.
Let's go! HRtP Hard! Video!

...just pray that I don't die a few billion times.

[nintendonut888]

I beat HRtP hard Makai route on a random run last night. :V It was very close, but it was fun as hell. More people need to give HRtP a chance.

[Phar]

The difference of 100 (several times over it seems) is significant, as seen with this progression from your (current) replay and coa's:
415660;417320;424160;431500;436000
415800;417560;424360;431750;436560

The gap slowly widens (i.e. he got better clear bonuses than you); with the final large jump being Kanako's 3rd Spell Card. I'm not sure whether that would be just luck, or there's something extra within, seeing that the "spiral" appears to be random on Kanako's 3rd Spell Card.

If anything, it proves a single 100 faith loss during the stage isn't that significant. There'd be a 460 difference instead of 560 in the end. Point being that, unless you aim for absolute perfection, the 100 wouldn't make a significant difference in the long run - you easily lose much more than that just due to slight imperfections in timing during the bosses.

The gap widens so much because he had pretty much perfect timing/luck on everything. Timing is essential on the 3rd card; you would ideally end it exactly when the stream hits the bottom. I was way too late here, hence the big difference. I also noticed coa directs the 2nd and 3rd waves a bit away from the edge, which is slightly more efficient as it seems you can catch a few extra bullets that go for the corners of the closer edge that way.

[?lice Bl?ckb?rn]

And off-topic rant while I'm here:  Am I the only one who finds that IN has some of the stupidest and most unenjoyable spellcards/attacks ever?  Like, almost half of my least favorite Touhou moments can probably be found in this game.  Namely:  Hourai Jewel, Imperishable Shooting, Profound Field, Hourai Elixer, Fantasy Heaven, Blink, several of Eirin's cards, and a few nonspells (namely, Mystia's last, Eirin's second, and Marisa's second).  Fortunately I can forgive it because a.) Most of them are bonus attacks, and thus I don't have to see them unless I really want to and b.) aside from these horrible parts, the rest of the game is awesome.

Hourai Jewel sucks. Like, it really sucks. REALLY REALLY SUCKS, and is quite easily my least-favourite card in the series (though Source of Rains is doing its best to compete with it). Basically it seems a lot of the patterns in IN seem to be a lot more dependent on the concept of having seen them before, sometimes up to even fairly ridiculous micromemorization (see: Keine, Hourai Jewel, etc), except for the early half of the Kaguya battle which just sucks. Horribly.

Imperishable Shooting is a lot of fun, though, even though it's too easy now :/

Just a note, has anyone noticed Veronica's Youtube account closed?

Yeah, she said she was doing that. Not sure if she wants any public mention of why, though.

[N-Forza]

I absolutely destroyed IN Easy with the Border Team. I didn't lose a life until stage 5 and had both my lives and my bombs maxed out at one point. I lost a bunch of lives on 6 because it was my first time playing through it and I got careless too, but it felt good to finally get to Kaguya.

And then I played Extra and managed to capture one of Keine's spellcards in one shot.

[lmagus]

I got to Aya on MoF Hard.
But after watching some 1cc Hard replays, I think I can do it.. I'll try really hard to finish it this weekend. I learnt a lot of things.

Edit: really helped. Just got to Sanae boss on Hard

[LHCling]

1cc HRtP Hard both paths. Only Heaven / Makai recorded so far. *prays for good video data*

Sariel is quite easy still... perhaps something will happen when I go Lunatic?
For some reason, I have so much trouble against Konngara. No idea why.

[nintendonut888]

I liken Sariel and Konngara to extra and final bosses respectively. Konngara takes a lot of legitimate skill to defeat, while Sariel, while still hard, can be memorized and made much easier.

[LHCling]

I liken Sariel and Konngara to extra and final bosses respectively. Konngara takes a lot of legitimate skill to defeat, while Sariel, while still hard, can be memorized and made much easier.

Well, I'll never (truly) know until I go for Lunatic~. Sariel's difficulty does vary greatly by how often she shifts attack phases though.

Oh, yes, lol-death at Stage 1, among others. I didn't even bother to restart...  >_>

Horrible run in terms of score. Then again, it's Heaven / Makai.
*waits for processing*

EDIT: Part 1 is up. Go watch my humiliation. _{Contains HQ, use that format, yadda yadda yadda...}

...and Part 2 up.

[nintendonut888]

*spits to side*

I know what you're all thinking: You used the crowslut, who makes the AI bug out like crazy. To that I say: So what? It's not as though it's cheating. If you don't bug out the AI, it will completely dominate you.

See, there's something I realized during my two week venture to 1cc PoDD lunatic: The game may be hard as balls, but it's...honest. That may sound corny, but really. The AI will never go easy on you. At the same time, this means that it is always possible to beat it on your first try. Whether it's your first or your tenth try, your chances will be the same. PoFV has the AI from stage 6 on be extremely cruel, and will only lighten up once you die at least once. That sickens me; the game feels like it's patronizing you, so even if you win it feels like the game LET you win.

I know I can't call this a 1cc that has the amount of effort put into it a lunatic deserves (this was on my first try after I raged from failing a hard run with Reimu). However, it is nonetheless a 1cc that ZUN intended to be done. Maybe I'll come back one day and actually use a character that has to face the AI for real, but I wouldn't count on it. I recall someone saying that after a 1cc with Aya they felt very empty. I disagree: It feels GREAT to fuck up the AI that taunts you at every turn.

[?q]

Is it just me, or is Reimu C by far the most impractical and/or useless shot type in SA? I've been going through Satori's cards in Hard mode and though none of the others seem really as good all around as Reimu A, they all seem to have at least some situations where they do really well - Reimu B has pretty powerful homing, Marisa A has high shotgunning power, Marisa B is good on those spellcards where you have to manoeuvre around bosses as well as being pretty good on stages, Marisa C takes down bosses pretty fast and has the safety bomb thing... but aside from having a pretty decent bomb, I can't find any redeeming feature about Reimu C. The speed boost gets me killed more often than it actually helps and having to reposition your options every time you unfocus gets annoying really fast.

Am I missing something here, or is it really that bad?

Yes, you're missing that the bolded is inaccurate.  ReimuC has sheer power on its side both in its options and bombs; ReimuB/MarisaC have neither.  ReimuB is the worst shot type in the game, easily.

The boosted speed is a pointless and total liability though.

@donut and PoFV:  Which is why you play Match Mode instead.
Also, Medicine is easier to use than Aya and just as broken.
If you want a "legitimate" 1cc Lunatic, try it with Sikieiki.

[Sodium]

Oh, you forgot MarisaB's sheer shot gunning power with It's Wood Shot at 3-3.95 power. But that requires planning and a bomb to use normally, unless you can shotgun constantly for some reason(Hell's Tomahawk has you close enough to Okuu right?)

MarisaC is the second worst shot type because EVERYTHING it can do, ReimuA does better. Oh, and all Marisa shot types are inherently inferior to Reimu ones(minus ReimuB) because Marisa's hitbox is huge.

ReimuB sucks because it's homing with horrible homing. Yeah.

Oh yeah, I 1cc'd MoF LUNATIC WITH MARISABUGGED. OBVLEGITCLEAR

...Well, not really. I got to VoWG, and because that card is fun, I tried doing it legitly. It didn't work because MarisaB is a flaming pile of crap.

[Sapz]

Hmm, I see... good points about the SA shot types; I guess ReimuC just doesn't really fit my playing style. Objectively better she may be compared to, say, MarisaC, but I still find myself doing way better with her than with ReimuC. I'm no good at planning which way my options should be pointing, I perform much better when I'm able to unfocus and focus as often as I want with as few complications as possible.

MarisaC is the second worst shot type because EVERYTHING it can do, ReimuA does better. Oh, and all Marisa shot types are inherently inferior to Reimu ones(minus ReimuB) because Marisa's hitbox is huge.

While I'd agree that MarisaC is really inferior to ReimuA, I have to say I like MarisaC's bomb more. Though I'm unsure about actual damage, they both have similar screen-clearing effects, and while you don't get all the grazing opportunities with MarisaC, you get the awesome safety thing going on instead. You have to react quickly with ReimuA's bomb, but with MarisaC, you could go into a difficult spellcard, pull out the bomb straight away when things look bad, not get hit, get half the power back and get the spell card capture bonus anyway. Reimu A, you pull out a bomb in the same situation, you lose a whole power point and don't get the spell bonus. On top of that, MarisaC's bomb potentially keeps you safe for a hell of a lot longer.

...She's still not that great, though. <_<

ReimuB sucks because it's homing with horrible homing. Yeah.

I find Reimu B works a lot better when you treat it not so much as a homing type rather than a forward shot type, except that you sometimes do damage even when you should be missing, if you see what I mean.

And on another note, after many, many battles against Satori, I can finally say that I have beaten every spell card in every game on Easy, Normal and Hard mode.

[Suikama]

Had one of those wierd runs where you catpure everything hard and fail everything easy. Captured Catwalk, Needle Mountian, and Rekindling, all for the first time, while at the same time failing Spleen Eater and a bunch of easy nonspells.