"Placeholder Sign [I can't think of a name]" (Spell Card Help Topic IV)

[Lepetit89]

Nazrin's last Spellcard is static, so you'll want to pick a path that suits you best. In general, there are two things you'll want to consider: How safe a path is and at what time Nazrin is not being protected by the crystals. In other words, stay in the middle when she's not hiding. More than anything, try not to move too far ahead, bullets will spawn on top of you. The good news is, the card can be done moving only horizontally, so it's not too bad.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U4BjAS8Vb-o#t=2m33s is an example of one path.

Stage 2 past the Midboss depends a lot on what UFOs you picked up during the part before Kogasa.
When I went through the Stage, I entered with 0 UFOs, went for multicolour first, then green and entered Kogasa with 2 green UFOs in stock. After the battle with Kogasa, I'd summon one green UFO immediately, fill it, then shoot it down along with ALL orbs - don't let any slip past you. The two huge fairies after that can be shot down immediately. If you follow this route, take care of the one on the left-hand side first. Pick up the UFOs when they turn green, summon the UFO, shoot down some orbs until the UFO is full. Once the huge fairies appear, launch a Bomb and pick up a red UFO following the destruction of the UFO. After that, just stream everything.

It's hard to give actual advice for UFO since a lot depends on which UFO route you're going for.
If it helps, this run didn't have any mistakes during the stage part, so it's probably better than lengthy descriptions since it features exactly what I wrote down above:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=psHgOcrDa-8

[Puffy]

Pretty good strategies! from inspection, you make it seem easy especially for stage 2. Yeah, it i will need to learn to use ufo's properly, and not be too reckless in trying to get them.

But sometimes i feel like they sit there floating around and when they go past its not the colours i want. I'll mainly go for Red UFO's, and at certain parts pick the blue one/rainbow (prime examples are stage 3 and 4)

[Zil]

The UFO tokens follow static paths, so can find ways to take advantage of most of them. If they're the wrong colour as they go past, try destroying the enemy that drops it at a different time. Also there are more subtle things that you might not know, like the token dropped by a destroyed UFO starts on that UFO's colour, and Rainbow UFOs drop tokens that start on the same colour as the third token you picked up to summon the Rainbow UFO, etc.

[Elysia]

I need to work out which scenes aren't pure bullshit on 90FPS. I want to unlock Extra on this score.dat but I still have 11 captures to go.

List of scenes I have yet to clear:

5-5
6-1, 6-2, 6-6, 6-8
7-1, 7-2, 7-3
8-3, 8-4, 8-5, 8-6, 8-7
9-1, 9-2, 9-4
10-2, 10-3, 10-4, 10-5, 10-6, 10-8

Any suggestions?

EDIT: Cleared 10-2. That was hilariously easy, I don't know why I didn't get that ages ago.

[Chuckolator]

I need to work out which scenes aren't pure bullshit on 90FPS.

And Kinkaku-ji wasn't? >_>

6-6, 6-8, 7-3, 8-6, 10-2 don't seem all that hard to me on 60FPS, they shouldn't take too long for someone who can do 9-6.

[Zil]

I just went and tried 6-1, 6-2, and 7-2. 6-1 was quite easy, though you just have to kind of hope she doesn't dance around right in your face. 6-2 was annoying. Only the last wave seemed hard, though you can just get lucky a few times if that's what it takes. 7-2 also seemed pretty easy, though as always, there's some luck involved. I can upload the replays if you want, but I'm assuming the strategies are apparent. I'll just mention that in 7-2 Remilia adds a row even if you miss, or take a picture before she transforms, which isn't immediately obvious.

I also attempted 6-6 but that was too hellish.

[Zengeku]

Any suggestions?

Mokoturtles,mokoturtles,mokoturtles ~ 

[Dunamis Halberd]

My friend just 1cc'd Ten Desires. He still have some problems with Miko's Laser of Seventeen Articles though.
He also said that he couldn't do Miko's nonspell(the one with "Playtime's Over!") correctly.
So...any suggestions? Comment about his overall performance would also be appreciated.

Ah, and here's his replay.

[Elysia]

My friend just 1cc'd Ten Desires. He still have some problems with Miko's Laser of Seventeen Articles though.
He also said that he couldn't do Miko's nonspell(the one with "Playtime's Over!") correctly.
So...any suggestions? Comment about his overall performance would also be appreciated.

Ah, and here's his replay.

Maybe it's just me but I can't download the replay. I keep trying and keep getting a screen of gibberish where the download prompt should be. Re-uploading it might help.

For the nonspell, don't forget that you can move vertically, especially for the blue wave. For LoSA, try to get between lasers that have a lot of room between them.

Beyond that, though, there really isn't much to those two attacks other than "read and dodge". In a serious run, I usually bomb or trance them.

[Zil]

I was able to download it. It was mostly fine aside from some strategic mistakes, and the Miko fight was a disaster.

In general, whenever you bomb, you should stand on top of the boss to absorb more spirits. He seemed to get kinda close to the boss then stop, so I don't if knew about it or what, but he should just stand on the boss.

He seemed to kill all of the spirit fairies first, then trance right before the spirits disappeared. There's really no point in that, he should trance as he kills the fairies, so they die faster and he can begin charging the next trance immediately. He also tranced in some bad places. In stage 2 he may as well have saved it for the fairies right before Kyouku if he isn't going to trance any of Kyouku's cards. In stage 3 he should have just saved it for the fairies after Kogasa.

At Yoshika's first spell, he should've stopped shooting when he went right so the wisps don't heal her. There was also no reason to bomb. It's better to time it out than bomb. The same applies for her last spell, which doesn't even give you anything for capturing it.

In stage 5 he should memorize where the enemies appear and kill them as soon as possible. He should've been able to charge another trance in the begginning but he let the fairies live too long. He probably should have bombed Tojiko's spell to be sure he didn't lose his trance before the end.

He tranced for no reason at the begginning of stage 6, and against Miko he should have bombed more. He lost five or six lives in a row without using any bombs, whereas you can simply bomb/trance every single thing and lose only one or two lives.

Laser of Seventeen Articles actually didn't seem to be much of problem for him. He just screwed up right before it ended.

Also he should be playing hard mode. He had only one death before stage 6, and four or five lives is enough to beat stage 6 on any difficulty without even looking at the screen.

[nicholashin]

Lately I've been working on MoF stage 4 NORMAL since it kills me so much
I am having a lot of problems in both stage and the boss ><
How to do the "waterfall" parts? And momizi is just super hard, I can't even dodge it  :ohdear:
The part when three pellet-spam fairies, I have troubles get below the 2nd and 3rd ones so I have to bomb them = =
For Aya, non-spells are OK, I can do them :p
But the spells T_T
The first one always wall me even though I stand close to Aya to give more space -.-
The second one is OK, it is pretty fun and I have captured it before.
The third one....I actually captured it once, which surprised me, but not by any way consistent, it is "JUST DODGE" anyway...
And the final one is just.......I tried focus and unfocus movement through the rice bullet, but I always get killed =.=
In fact, I even have to continue on one PRACTICE run =.=
Thank you for your advice

[Seppo Hovi]

You have the wrong approach. When playing MoF for survival, you don't dodge stuff. You bomb stuff.

Here's a no-death stage 4-replay, where the only things dodged are the noncards.

[Zengeku]

You have the wrong approach. When playing MoF for survival, you don't dodge stuff. You bomb stuff.

It depends on what you want really. If all you want is to be able to say that you cleared the game without continues then yes, you can bomb everything and clear the game without a hazzle. Drake demonstrated that very well once. But unless your goal is simply clearing the game to say that you've done it then I can't recommend that approach.

What you really should be doing is to capture everything that you can and give the hard stuff a proper chance. You shouldn't just bomb through it. Anyone can do that. My advice is that you should only bomb when you are about to get hit. Don't rely on planned bombs since just hitting a win-button is not going to make you improve.

Of course if something is providing a massive wall that kills with 100% consistency then there is no shame in bombing it. That's what they're there for. However, all i'm saying is that telling a person to bomb-spam his way through MoF isn't good advice.

@Nicholasshin.
Can we see a replay? I'm interested in seeing just how you handle Stage 4 so if you've got an average Stage 4 replay lying around or if you could make one, it would make helping you easier.

[Buu]

*asking for advice*

I don't know if I'm good enough to give advice but perhaps you can make some use of it.

When one of those waterfall parts come, stand on one side of the screen and slowly stream to the other, if you're about to hit either side or one of those light blue bullet waves, do a quick move into the direction you were streaming to and then stream to the other side. I'm not sure how exactly to explain it, you just gotta practice it. Though I can tell you that it doesn't always work for me either so if it comes down to it, bomb it away.

Momiji might be quite menacing on first glance but once you played her a few times, it's not that hard. Don't quote me on that but I think the patterns are static (at least the huge ball rings should be) so make sure that you're in the middle/more to the right when she appears as the first huge ring will fly to the bottom left; stream the fairies before accordingly. Otherwise it's basically just left-right-left-right while avoiding the small bullets. Don't squeeze yourself to the bottom of the screen, try to stay a bit more above so that you can retreat if you notice one of the gaps closing in. Dodge, go back up, look for the next gap, rinse and repeat. Bit of practice and she becomes easy.

The three fairies spawning the small star pellets I can't really help you with, that's pure dodging. Try to stay beneath one until you got rid of her and slowly move to the next one. Alternatively just shoot down the first one and stay in the middle.

Aya's spells on the other hand are a bit more difficult. Her first one seems to be way easier on Hard than Normal as you don't get walled that easily. Standing near her is a good idea, give yourself enough space to slowly move to the bottom if the path ahead is blocked so that you got enough time to look for another gap to fit through. Don't let yourself get walled to the bottom.

Her second one I have problems myself, heh. But you seem to have the hang of it so it's okay.

For the third one I'd advise you to hog the left bottom quarter of the screen. Kinda a bit more towards the middle of the screen so that you can - as always - retreat should there be too much raining down at once. Pure dodging too, keep at it!

For the last one, wait until the wall bullets close in on you, slip through them on either side, go through the horizontal pellet line and repeat the same over and over. Generally you don't want to dodge both waves at the same time so if possible, try to get through the pellets first and then the walls. You might want to move towards Aya to dodge through the pellets once the pattern gets a bit denser. Dodge the arrows, pellets, arrows, pellets and so on. Easy-peasy once you got it down. Going through the walls unfocused is what I do all the time but it's not needed as you're quick enough focused to slip through them too. Whatever floats your boat.

Also, as a survival player I'd advise against bombing through every spell. There's no fun in playing if you cheese yourself through the actual challenges. Learn the patterns, dodge and if you think you don't stand a chance, then you can still bomb. But don't be a lamer and cheat through everything. =P

Hope you could make some use of my methods. I'm not a pro myself but any help can do I suppose.

[Baiken]

Dragon's Necklace, Normal.

Any pointers?

[Ridley 64]

Dragon's Necklace, Normal.

Any pointers?

Aggressive dodging (moving up when possible) really helps since it's easy to get walled by lasers and bullets if you stay at the bottom. Probably don't want to go too high up though, since the lasers are harder to read while they're overlapping. This might help.

[Baiken]

Aggressive dodging (moving up when possible) really helps since it's easy to get walled by lasers and bullets if you stay at the bottom. Probably don't want to go too high up though, since the lasers are harder to read while they're overlapping. This might help.

Thanks, captured it just two tries later.

I'd say that it was 50% luck involved though.

[Makai Butterfly]

I need help on Scarlet Netherworld aka Needle Hell.  I have serious trouble reading this spell even after facing it dozens of times.  The Lunatic version looks much easier to me for some reason (I'm sure it isn't).

[チソウ タイゼン]

Uuu~
Taizen Chisou Returns to Double Spoiler: This Time It's A Bunch Of Crap

And this is at 60FPS :fail:

Okay, so, here are some trouble spots:

All of stage five (except Electrified Nyuudou, which I never cleared in my old file [despite clearing every other one in my old file])
Most of stage four, such as all of Nitori's attacks (not Water Carpet) and Rabies Bite.
Japanese Poison Spider, and.... something else from stage three.

I'm wondering how the hell I got to stage eight last time :getdown:

[Chalros22]

I need help on Scarlet Netherworld aka Needle Hell.  I have serious trouble reading this spell even after facing it dozens of times.  The Lunatic version looks much easier to me for some reason (I'm sure it isn't).

Well, for me moving from normal to hard I found it easier to read due to the bullets forming more concrete "lanes" but harder to execute dodges due to overall higher bullet density. I don't think I ever saw Lunatic though but it's possible that it may be more defined than Hard.

[BT]

Normal is hard because the needles are fast.

Lunatic is hard if you lose focus because the needles are slow enough but come from every direction. Also, knives.

[Buu]

Question about Apology "The Needles of Yore and the Vengeful Spirits in Pain" dafuq this name is long on lunatic.

Is there an easy way to clear this spell that doesn't involve hectic movement from one quarter of the screen to the other where I'm standing at when the ghost wheels appear? On Hard it's simple enough to wait for the sound when they spawn and then move the size of one of those wheels to the direction that offers more space while dodging the needles but on lunatic they're a tad faster and I can't read that quickly (it's difficult to see the wheels as is already).

I reckon seeing a few people doing it with barely moving in replays before, is there some trick to it?

[Puffy]

Could anyone use MS paint and identify where the safespot for Ichirin's first non-spell is exactly? I keep getting close to it, somewhere under her right eye.

[Zengeku]

Question about Apology "The Needles of Yore and the Vengeful Spirits in Pain" dafuq this name is long on lunatic.

The wheels are aimed in pairs of two. The first thing you'll want to do is to sit under Orin, then as she fires the first set of wheels, move out of their way. Then listen for the sound of wheels getting spawned. For every 2 waves of wheels fired, their aim is reset. Take that into account and move out of their way. When you know this, all you are left to worry about is the bullets that can be quite tricky to dodge at times but there is no trick there, you'll just have to dodge them.

[Zetzumarshen]

Could anyone use MS paint and identify where the safespot for Ichirin's first non-spell is exactly? I keep getting close to it, somewhere under her right eye.

Note that I only have some experience in Lunatic and almost none in lower difficulty settings. Though from little experience in lower difficulty setting, the general location of safespot is still the same, but the size of it is larger substantially, making it somewhat safer and easier to milk graze.


The cutscene safespot.

The Ichirin safespot.

[Star King]

I need help on Scarlet Netherworld aka Needle Hell.  I have serious trouble reading this spell even after facing it dozens of times.  The Lunatic version looks much easier to me for some reason (I'm sure it isn't).

If the first couple of needles of the criss-crossing ones miss all of them will if you don't move. So first go somewhere where the faster straight ones won't hit you (tons of room), then somewhere where the criss-crossing ones won't, rinse and repeat.

[Elysia]

Is there any trick to dodging the 6th and 7th waves of Bar of the Ten Kings?

When I did the card at 60 FPS I just read and dodged in the middle, but at 90 FPS I'd have to get stupidly lucky. I'm hoping there's some easier way of doing these, kind of like every other wave of the card.

[Ridley 64]

Is there any trick to dodging the 6th and 7th waves of Bar of the Ten Kings?

There's this. I was never able to do it this way, but it's a lot less random than dodging in the middle.

[Zil]

This might be a bit safer. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wt33jl176S8#t=2m20s

Stream the whole thing. No dodging needed. It works on the earlier waves too.

[Lepetit89]

It's actually possible to stay and dodge in the middle? Wow, I think I only did that maybe three times before I figured it wasn't the safest way, especially having to do it twice in succession. Kind of  wanted that extra bit of safety with a minute's worth of photos before you even get to the difficult part.