Levels/dungeons/bosses which give you problems even on multiple playthroughs

[axman36]

Metal Gear Solid 2, Solidus' choke sequence. Absolutely impossible without turbo on the hardest difficulty. If you attempt it without turbo, your finger will be feeling incredible pain after the failed thirty tries.

How did I forget this one?

[Bananamatic]

I think I have just found my new hated boss.

Yeah, he has 5x the range you do, both mid and high attacks, and he splits in FIVE. YES, HE SPLITS. And you can't approach the clones because the only attack they use is used constantly and it covers every height.
Cheapest fucking piece of shit in this entire game and probably the only cheap boss. If he only didn't fucking split in five even after he knocks you back.

[Iryan]

Given the format of the game, this probably doesn't count, but...

Lady Vashj and Kael'thas Sunstrider in WoW, pre 30% nerf. Mainly because 10+ of the 25 people sucked.  :V


More fittingly, the robot battle in the sapce stage of Sparkster (NES) was always good at delivering me a savage beatdown...

[?q]

Then it gets worse again when they both go insane.

I can't say I agree...

Oddly, I don't have a lot of good contributions to this topic...  Bongo Bongo (TLoZ: Ocarina of Time) is probably the best one, since I always wind up getting knocked off the platform.

If I wanted to broaden the scope of the topic I would say Classic Mode on Intense in SSBB.  Brawl completely threw away the absolutely serviceable Events, Classic, and All-Star formats from Melee in favor of blatant fanservice, and thus Classic Mode is effectively luckgarbage.  If you have to fight the 10 Ness/Lucas Team (in New Pork City) for Stage 4, you may as well start over.

Also, The Battlefield Fortress in The Subspace Emissary.  That was where I finally had to stop my Intense No Continues No Stickers run, because after a while getting one-shotted by Autolances gets old.

[Krimmydoodle]

On the note of Brawl, when my roommate and I were grinding out Lunatic Intense boss battles, we simply could not figure out how to fight Porky effectively.  Unpredictable son of a bitch.

[Azinth]

Back when I played Diablo II a lot, the Throne of Destruction on Hell Difficulty was always an absolute nightmare because of those goddamn wraiths.  Their lightning bolts could hit for about 30-70% percent of your health apiece and could come off-screen completely without warning.  So many cheap deaths. ;_;  And I was using the broken as hell Summon-Necromancer, who has it way easier against them than most.

And then there was the Maggot Lair.  If you were careful, it wasn't really that deadly aside from the occasional scarab pack, but the tight corridors always made for a tedious slow grind.

[Kanako Yasaka]

Natural Dancer from Persona 3, only hard boss in that game IMO.
Gracious and Glorious from Bayonetta. (They're normal enemies, but they're difficult enough to be minibosses)
Stair Bridge in Valkyrie Sky. (don't play it anymore but still)
THE S-LICENSE TEST FROM MML2 FUCK

[axman36]

Metal Gear Solid 3, the part where you had to snipe the C3 on the bridge.

"There are two C3s. A LITTLE MORE TO THE LEFT!"
"Hehe, I'll just use the D-pad with it's lesser sensitivity..."
*D-pad does nothing*
"OMGWTF!? Well, guess I'm going to have to use my joystick then...."
*Aiming reticule goes FAR past the C3*
"No! To the right!"
"Damn it! Okay okay, let's try it again."
*Aiming reticule flies past the right*
"Screw it all!"
*Fires crazily while moving to the left*
"Nice shot! Now go get the other one over there!"
"... Crap, forgot about that one."
*Shadohog makes it passed the bridge*


And then after you do it you realize how pointless blowing up the bridge was...

[Krimmydoodle]

Summon-Necromancer

Maggot Lair

Fuck that shit.  I always made a sorc friend open a town portal to the Maggot quest item.  No way in hell I'm doing that, especially with a necro.

[ebarrett]

Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup has a bunch of these.

Slime:6 is always a nightmare. Open level, high-level jellies are much faster than you, you're running around half-naked and half-in-reserve-gear, and people made so much fun of the Royal Jelly being the biggest wuss in the game that the developers turned it into a disproportionally terrifying wuss.

Gehenna:7 and Cocytus:7 can go easy on you but there's always the chance the RNG will drop a ton of fiends on you at the worst possible moment and then you're tormented 3 or 4 times in a single turn for two turns in a row. Funtimes, running around the Hells with single-digit HP.

The Tomb. Oh lord the Tomb. I never lost a character there, and I know pretty much all the tricks to it, but you just don't mess around in the Tomb.

Oh, and Norris/Boris/Margery tag team on early branches. I've had it happen on Snake:1, Snake:2, Swamp:3 - I mean what the hell. This only happens to me, apparently. :<

[LHCling]

Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup has a bunch of these.

Sigmund for 'ling rush kill.

[Ionasal kkll Solciel]

Ah-

There's Raki, in Ar tonelico II (U/C unpatched), the optional battles.  After about five times, think FFV Odin on steroids.  You have an extremely limited time to critically damage her before the game craps out on you (quite literally), and she gets stronger with each battle.  Unless you execute Replakia right off and get a powerful Red Magic, you stand no chance.  And you need to do this over a dozen times for 100%.

[theshirn]

So remember when I said Uzuki and Kariya before?

Yeah, last night I got up to them again.  This is my Hard Mode Level 1 playthrough.

...let's just say it took a few tries.  Quite a few.

[axman36]

Ya know, it's odd, I had a much harder time with the first fight against them than the second.

I had the same pins the second fight as well...

[theshirn]

For some reason, even though they have more health the second time, they don't attack quite as relentlessly (and they're supposed to be berzerk?).  Still, though, I expect it'll take a good few tries when I get there.

[Garlyle]

Rage-inducing things on a game's second playthrough, huh?  Hmm.

I'm nominating Mega Man Battle Network Transmission.  And GOD DAMN FUCKING BRIGHTMAN.  It has taken me until my fourth playthrough of this damn game to figure out a half-decent way of killing him, and it still basically -requires- me to take hits.  It is not cool.
(For the uninitiated, attacking him at any point when he's not attacking [which frankly you have to in order to not get hit by his attacks because they're either fast or bitchy-homing] causes him to guard and counterattack, meaning you need to double-attack him, usually with your buster than an actual attack.  However, the delay on your actual attacks means his counterattacks will hit you... etc. etc.)

Actually most of Transmission can be an ass even on later playthroughs, but I'm slowly figuring out tricks for getting through a lot of stuff.

[Sen]

Kingdom Hearts II - The second Demyx fight. God damn water clones.

Final Fantasy X - Third Seymour battle. Near the end, it boils down to "how much did I grind" and "please please please please PLEASE DON'T USE TOTAL ANNIHILATION." And his Zombie status/Full-Heal strategy, Holy Water items are expensive, fuck.

Final Fantasy X-2 - Not a boss, but the CommSphere watching segment in Chapter 4. I DON'T WANT TO SPEND FOUR HOURS WATCHING PEOPLE MOVE AROUND JUST FOR THE EXTRA PERCENT BUT I HAVE TO RRRRRRRRGH.

TWEWY - The vs. Megumi and possesed!Shiki battle. Hoooooly hell, what. The revisitied battle for the Secret Reports is just ridiculous.

Pokemon - Chuck (Gold/Silver/Crystal) and Maylen or whatever the third Sinnoh Gym Leader's name is. The Pokemon I use tend to all be hideously weak in the Defense department, so the Fighting-type Gyms just tear me apart.


There's probably more but I can't remember :V

[Zengar Zombolt]

Norris/Boris/Margery tag team

what
I mean it, what
My worst problems are the catacomb and a mass of Shadow Dragons I always end up meeting on its entirety almost every time I wander through the last floor of the Vaults.

[Helion]

Back when I played Diablo II a lot, the Throne of Destruction on Hell Difficulty was always an absolute nightmare because of those goddamn wraiths.  Their lightning bolts could hit for about 30-70% percent of your health apiece and could come off-screen completely without warning.

*cough cough* LISTER THE TORMENTOR *cough cough*

As for FFX's Seymour Flux. Lower his health a bit then use Aeon Overdrives to deplete what's left or to parry TA. I always kept overdrive bars full for boss battles, so basically what happened was that I annihilated anything just with them. After every character had a turn, of course.

[Garlyle]

Final Fantasy X-2 - Not a boss, but the CommSphere watching segment in Chapter 4. I DON'T WANT TO SPEND FOUR HOURS WATCHING PEOPLE MOVE AROUND JUST FOR THE EXTRA PERCENT BUT I HAVE TO RRRRRRRRGH.

Try manipulating it to get the result you want.  Fffffffffffffffff (I want another Ragnarok damnit!) - though anything with the words "Via Infinito" involved is way more rage-inducing than that to me [Anyone wanna try to go get that move from the Mega Tonberry?  IT'LL BE FUN ]

[?q]

TWEWY - The vs. Megumi and possesed!Shiki battle. Hoooooly hell, what. The revisitied battle for the Secret Reports is just ridiculous.

Kitaniji was basically the other hard boss battle, at least on Ultimate.  He's also the only challenging fight on Final Time Attack, FWIW.

Now that I've been convinced to play Cave Story, the Core definitely fits this list.  Making it so that you can barely damage a boss that likes attacking from all sides and shooting -20 beams after pinning you to the wall is a biiiiit much.

[Bananamatic]

As for FFX's Seymour Flux. Lower his health a bit then use Aeon Overdrives to deplete what's left or to parry TA. I always kept overdrive bars full for boss battles, so basically what happened was that I annihilated anything just with them. After every character had a turn, of course.

I don't see what's hard about him.
Kimahri kicks ass here both because of Mighty Guard and the strength boost, 5x Cheer will piss on Cross Cleave(and his HP) and Shell allows you to survive TA which is easily predicted(and his AI is fixed, so he can't spam it)

[ebarrett]

what
I mean it, what

34318 | Snake:1 | Entered Level 1 of the Snake Pit
 34325 | Snake:1 | Got an ichor-stained halberd
 34394 | Snake:1 | Reached skill 9 in Fighting
 34945 | Snake:1 | Noticed Xtahua
 34970 | Snake:1 | Defeated Xtahua
 35202 | Snake:1 | Reached skill 4 in Conjurations
 35317 | Snake:1 | Reached XP level 14. HP: 120/120 MP: 23/29
 35372 | Snake:1 | Noticed Boris
 35397 | Snake:1 | Reached XP level 13. HP: 178/228 MP: 28/29
 35402 | Snake:1 | Defeated Boris
 35402 | Snake:1 | Reached XP level 14. HP: 120/120 MP: 29/29
 35436 | Snake:1 | Reached skill 7 in Spellcasting
 35506 | Snake:1 | Reached skill 13 in Earth Magic
 36307 | Snake:1 | Reached skill 14 in Staves
 36323 | Snake:1 | Reached skill 6 in Armour
 36477 | Snake:1 | Reached skill 4 in Evocations
 36904 | Snake:2 | Noticed Boris
 36945 | Snake:2 | Noticed Norris
 37508 | Snake:2 | Got a heavily runed banded mail
 37509 | Snake:2 | Identified the +0 banded mail of Esocihew (You found it on level 2 of the Snake Pit)
 37509 | Snake:2 | Identified the +6,+3 halberd "Oxirhobb" (You found it on level 1 of the Snake Pit)
 37646 | Snake:2 | Noticed Margery
 37824 | Snake:2 | :: ESCAPE

[GMOFucker: Makin' GMOs To Fuck 'Em]

TWEWY - The vs. Megumi and possesed!Shiki battle. Hoooooly hell, what. The revisitied battle for the Secret Reports is just ridiculous.

Wait, what? I haven't played TWEWY in ages but last I recall Megumi's attacks were really easy to dodge or were at least somewhat exploitable in his pattern. The top screen part of the battle is a huge pain, though.

[Ionasal kkll Solciel]

Kingdom Hearts II - The second Demyx fight. God damn water clones.

Triangle is your friend.  Wild Dance should take out all but one or two, then you can just mop it up with a bit of Thunder.

Back on topic, the mission in C&C4 where you have to down Colonel James' GST as it passes overhead.  Practically the only effective way to win is to start out as Offense, and take out all the Crawlers and at least three of the AA turrets.  Then you have to switch to Defense and build up Laser units and defensive structures, with Rocket reinforcement to handle the incoming aircraft (since Viper Turrets can't target air).  Even with this, it's more a matter of luck than anything, since another Crawler will appear somewhere on the map once the GST arrives proper, and if you don't deal with that too, you get inundated with tanks, Wolves, and once, I even had to deal with two Mammoth Tanks.

Did I mention the GST has 30000 HP (which a Crawler is a minuscule fraction of - and those take forever to kill normally) of which you need to deal 95% in damage to; if you don't play at least Skirmishes, you're basically stuck with weaker Type I units when the GDI Crawlers are at least Type II (meaning even their Crawlers fight), and even possibly Type III (due to the Mammoth Tanks); and you're timed?

[Tamer Anode/Cathode]

Back on topic, the mission in C&C4 where you have to down Colonel James' GST as it passes overhead.  Practically the only effective way to win is to start out as Offense, and take out all the Crawlers and at least three of the AA turrets.  Then you have to switch to Defense and build up Laser units and defensive structures, with Rocket reinforcement to handle the incoming aircraft (since Viper Turrets can't target air).  Even with this, it's more a matter of luck than anything, since another Crawler will appear somewhere on the map once the GST arrives proper, and if you don't deal with that too, you get inundated with tanks, Wolves, and once, I even had to deal with two Mammoth Tanks.

I only managed to take out 1-2 of the Crawlers and stuck with Offense Class for the whole mission. Send out a bunch of Mantises/Stealth Tanks to shoot down the aircraft escorting the GST, then churn out Scorpions. Cheap as hell, yeah, but it worked. Unless you're playing on Hard difficulty, which in that case, got nothin'.

If we're going to talk about hard C&C missions, there's Red Revolution from RA2 which I mentioned earlier, the GDI hospital mission from the original game (stupid civilians), and Croatia and Operation Stiletto in C&C3.

[theshirn]

Wait, what? I haven't played TWEWY in ages but last I recall Megumi's attacks were really easy to dodge or were at least somewhat exploitable in his pattern. The top screen part of the battle is a huge pain, though.

I never had too much trouble with him.  But augh, Beat sucks.

Hey, Uzuki and Kariya only took me four tries the second time!  Go me!

Of course, that means next storyline boss is Sho Redux.

Aw, crap.

[Ionasal kkll Solciel]

Isn't that just a survival boss?

Well, he's Taboo, so the main problem is knowing when to swap between Neku and Beat.

[theshirn]

Isn't that just a survival boss?

Yes.  Yes, it is.

It'll probably take a few tries.

EDIT:  Best I could get was 7 seconds.  Most of them ended in 3.  Bloody HELL.

Konishi was first-try, as were Megumi/Shiki and Dragon!Megumi take 1.  Final form, though...WOW did that take a lot of tries.  Especially because two of his attacks were instant-kills.  Zetta fun times, though!

[Ionasal kkll Solciel]

*blinks*

Please tell me you aren't trying this at Level 1 Hard, are you?  I see very little way you could only last three seconds against a boss that doesn't even attack very fast unless you have very few HP.