UGH GAP YOUKAI

[Punisher]

So lately, I've been relentless striking down Phantasm in Youyoumu. I got a game with everything unlocked, but whatever. Recent events involving Yukari have haunted me, and I figured I'd try to beat Phantasm. Keep in mind I can only do Normal mode. Moving on, this gap hag has been giving me problems. I can only do well as SakuyaA. Yes, terrible shot, cry about it, but I make it further into the fight than with anyone else. I can only make it to Balance of Motion and Stillness with most chars, but with SakuyaA, I can get to Double Black Death Butterfly. Obviously, my bane would be Yukari's Spiriting Away. Anyone got any decent advice on this spellcard as SakuyaA? I could use a hand with the former card, as well.

[XephyrEnigma]

Ask about the various spellcards here.

[Thanuris]

http://www.shrinemaiden.org/forum/index.php/topic,10829.0.html

Yukari's Spiriting Away has no tricks, it's just misdirection and dodging (let her shoot, move to the side, repeat until dead)

And Xanadu of Straight and Curve is just dodging, you need to learn the bubbles hitboxes

[Drake]

Not that this really has anything to do with actually beating Phantasm, but the secondary reason SakuyaA is discouraged is that her damage is piddly unless you're spamming bombs. She does get a lot of them and you should be using them when necessary, but it doesn't excuse her shot output. The primary reason, is that she's a hand-holding character. Her homing discourages you from actually learning stages and specific patterns, while as mentioned, her bombs let people cheese their way through a significant portion of the game. ReimuA does homing too, but the behaviour of the homing is what makes the difference. I wouldn't say she's a bad character, but she isn't a good character for new players to use for long periods of time, I'd say. The reason you can't get further with other characters is probably because you aren't used to actually aiming at enemies and following patterns and stuff, which you're really going to have to learn eventually anyways. Using other perfectly usable characters doesn't usually impede you from getting far once you play them a few times, unless their shot is just difficult to handle or they're objectively worse in terms of damage or to a lesser extent, hitbox size. Having a forward-focus shot isn't "difficult to handle" and usually it's a stronger damage output, so yeah.

[Zil]

I wouldn't say that there's no trick to Yukari's Spirting Away. Personally I do the same pattern of movement every time, essentially: When at the bottom of the screen, and she tries to appear on top of me, I move diagonally upward (we'll say I went up/right, just for the example). When she fires danmaku, I move sideways (in this case left) to avoid the big bullets, ending up directly above Yukari. From there dodging the butterflies is easy, just let them go past. Then Yukari tries to appear on me again, and I move down, shooting her while backing up. When she fires again, I move right. The butterflies should be coming at me diagonally from here, and again, I just let them pass. She'll follow me again, and I just repeat the process, only this time it will be a "mirror" of the first pattern. Doing it like this lets you shoot Yukari without needing homing bullets. (Note that for some reason, this is much harder to execute against Ran's "Princess Tenko")

As for shot type, it's basically like Drake said. At the very least I'd switch to Reimu A. She also has homing, but some normal forward shots as well, which IIRC make her do more damge than Sakuya as long as you are under the boss. Not to mention Reimu has a smaller hitbox and more managable movement speed while focused. If you do best as Sakuya A then you must be doing something wierd.

And as for Double Death Butterfly, my best advice would be to not jam yourself against the back wall. You need to be able to see the upward bullets returning from off the screen. Even if you can't dodge this, it should only take one bomb to get through. (unless you're a wimpy character like Sakuya A)

[MTSranger]

As for shot type, it's basically like Drake said. At the very least I'd switch to Reimu A. She also has homing, but some normal forward shots as well, which IIRC make her do more damge than Sakuya as long as you are under the boss. Not to mention Reimu has a smaller hitbox and more managable movement speed while focused. If you do best as Sakuya A then you must be doing something wierd.

ReimuA is easier to control - yes. I mean, come on, Sakuya's focus speed is freaking fast and her hitbox is bigger too.
SakuyaA does a lot of hand holding - yes. I got my first lunatic 1cc with her after all :V
ReimuA does more damage - NO, unless you got 2 amulet to hit her, in skinny bosses like Alice where SakuyaA at far range would actually miss half of the shots (literally! How did ZUN let that through?). Yukari has a pretty fat hitbox, so all shots from SakuyaA would hit, making her stronger than ReimuA.

I guess my suggestion is also to practice with other characters.
Some things are particularly hard to break through (tight dodging, etc) if you are using the difficult-to-control SakuyaA.

[Punisher]

Well I believe I've overcome this obstacle, and I've captured it twice, but the second time, she became tangible RIGHT ON TOP OF ME as soon as I captured it, ending up in me getting Pichunned. ._.

But now I have a new roadblock! In the form of Boundary of Humans and Youkai! I got to this card with two spare lives left, and ended up getting killed over and over on it. I've been told to bomb every time the ring moves, but I think I'll be pulled out of the circle. Any tips on this one, now?

[nintendonut888]

Aah, Ran/Yukari's survival card. I have an analogy to help with this one. Have you ever concentrated on a ceiling fan and realized that by following one blade you can see it through the blur? This spell card works on a similar principle. Even though it looks like so much is going on, there's really just two big things going on: There are two large waves of bullets moving down, and two other large waves moving sideways. If you can learn to expand your vision (difficult I realize, but a necessary skill), you will see everything as just two big attacks, and you will only be dodging one bullet at a time. All you have to do is move quickly to avoid the ring, and dodging everything will come easily.

[Drake]

I've been told to bomb every time the ring moves

Rofl, don't listen to anyone who actually tells you to bomb every possible thing as a strategy to beat a card. It's really just a matter of memorization; once you know where the ring is moving, you just have to dodge the bullet lines. Also, you never have to dodge past more than two lines at a time to stay inside the ring, so you can effectively ignore a lot of the card. The ring moves like 9, 3, 7, 6, 5 if you look at a numpad. However, knowing that you only need to dodge through two lines in a wall, the steps are as such:
- When the ring starts moving, move right through the one line of bullets, and up to the top-right. A diagonal line of bullets then comes down, dodge it.
- Ring moves, another diagonal line comes from the right, dodge it and move downwards. The bottom wall has two lines; only cross one. You can also move two lines to the left without the ring hitting you.
- As the ring moves again, you zigzag to the top-left. Move one (the remaining one) line left, two lines up (a new one forms while you waited) and move up the empty space, then two lines left.
- You should be underneath the top wall, in the middle of the left wall, and the ring is grazing you. Ring starts moving, move two lines right, cross the middle and another two lines right.
- Move back through two lines to the left and dodge the remainder of the card.

Of course explaining it sounds a lot harder than it actually is when you've figured it out.

[Zil]

Aside from my obligatory statement that this question could have been asked in the spellcard help thread, (and would probobly get more attention there too,) I think I'll just mention that the last phase of the attack is much harder than the main body. I'm not sure if that part's static, but if someone else knows, that would probobly make for good advice. And yeah, never use "bomb every time it moves" as a strategy. It is true, however, that if the spell is really kicking your ass, you can at some points stay completely outside the circle, beyond the big needles. You'll have to bomb again when it moves back in your direction, but at least then you're using your bombs economically.

[I have no name]

Bombing every time the circle moves is viable for a first clear I'd say, I did it at 90 FPS because I had resources to burn and I didn't want to fail horribly by combo deathing.

I don't get why people keep saying Sakuya is hard to control, I really don't see that (this is coming from someone who cleared PoFV normal NFNG* with Aya though, so don't take it at face value)

The other good shot type to use would be ReimuB I'd say, it makes Dakini's Heavenly Procession a breeze if you stay under Ran unfocused.

*no focus no gauge

[Zil]

this is coming from someone who cleared PoFV normal NFNG* with Aya though, so don't take it at face value)

I might point out that Aya seems to cause the AI to derp it's way to hell. I 1cced Lunatic with her before I could even manage a normal 1cc with other characters. Medicine has this affect as well, though to a lesser extent. Not trying to detract from the accomplishment, just saying using Aya is alot easier than you'd think. (Well maybe that does detract from the accomplishment...)