http://replays.gensokyou.org/download.php?id=6594
There, a PoFV lunatic run to show how FUN this game is. Isn't it great to know that dying more than once on any opponent means you have a zero percent chance of victory because low scoring me can't even reach the 50 million extend?
Just watched the replay. Let's go through what you're doing wrong. Get comfortable because this is going to be a long post. :V
- Your first move in any situation is to go to the bottom center and try to dodge everything from there. This is probably the worst thing you can do in PoFV; the bottom is a freakin' deathtrap. Move
up as much as you can, and when under pressure (something that will happen more and more as you go through the stages), move in a U-shape to avoid staying in the bottom, and most importantly, from being pushed into the corners. When under
heavy pressure on the sides, dodge
up until you go past the point where the bullets can aim at your general direction.
- You're trying to basically stay in place and dodge everything that comes at you, because you're a top player, and your raw skill should be enough for anything, right? Wrong, because this way you must dodge 90% of the bullets generated. What you must do is actively chase down
every single spirit, activate them and blow them up. Activated spirits are easier to destroy and reflect all cancellable bullets in a quite wide area around it; destroying/reflecting bullets and spirits is what fills your gauge and increases your score; you do the math.
- You're never using L1s, which, for most characters, complement their scope and helps destroying activated spirits (and fairies) which would be otherwise out of range (or which you are deliberately leaving behind for your L1s to destroy while you chase down something else on the other side of the screen). Reimu's amulets will
bounce a few times while destroying enemies before fizzling out, which means that they cover more or less half the screen every time; they'll also go behind you to hit activated spirits that could otherwise explode at you from weird positions.
- If there's something hard to dodge coming your way and you have at least two bars of gauge, you're not supposed to try to dodge it. L2 away and reposition yourself (you'll probably be backing off while charging). Notice that "hard" isn't a fixed amount; you can be very liberal with L2s in rounds 1-5 (more on that in a moment), the same way you must be constantly evaluating your chances vs. every single wave Shiki throws at you because while everything can be considered "hard" you can't just expect to L2 your way through all of it.
- If it's early in a round (or if it's an early round) and you see a dense bullet "formation" which you can't figure out how to reflect through fairies/spirit destruction in half a second, run up to it while charging a L2. You'll gain back some reasonable amount of gauge, score a bunch of points, and raise your charge attack counter by one, which will help you later in the round, even if just a little. Word is that your gauge also starts filling faster the more you use L2s and above.
- The reverse to the above is, never use a L2 if there's not much to be destroyed around and you're not at risk of being hit. You're just wasting gauge.
- Never use L3s. NEVER. It has more or less the same effect as a L2 vs. the AI (nothing), and the increased destruction radius on your side doesn't get even close to compensating the extra gauge wasted. Two L2s are ALWAYS better. The only exception to this is, of course, when you absolutely need to panic-bomb. But being forced into panic-bombing with more than 2 bars of gauge is a bad sign and shows you've been managing your resources in a less-than-optimal way; it's often a sign that you should have used a L2 a few moments earlier.
-
MACRODODGE goddamnit
Some other thoughts:
>> you should be at around 20 million points by the time you enter stage 6. if you're not, you're playing too defensively; there's still time to recover, though.
>> the 90 million points extend is
extremely hard to get if you don't die more than once during each of stages 6-7-8, and very hard even if you do.
>> the 70 million points extend should come naturally, though, unless you're getting ridiculously lucky with Reimu and winning the later rounds too quickly. but then you aren't needing it :V
>> do your best vs. first-round Shikieiki; it's impossible to win, but it's also possible to make more than 10 million points in about one minute and a half if you get lucky.
tl;dr; pretend you're Santa and the spirits are the chimneys
