~Hakurei Shrine~ > Help Me, Eirin!
How to get to grips with Touhou - general hints, tips and advice!
Sakurei:
Except LNB isn't mastery of anything. True, not many people on this board are capable of it, but "mastering" a shmup is something nobody will ever do. Not the mention the gap between LNB and a good scorerun are massive. There is still a _lot_ of a gap between someone like me who can barely LNB some games and someone like chum or cactu who're capable of good scoreruns.
but everything else you've said is right. The bombs are a resource you're given - so use them unless you want to clear with a condition. Not using them when you just want to 1cc is counterproductive.
BT:
--- Quote from: Sakurei on December 25, 2013, 08:47:42 PM ---Except LNB isn't mastery of anything. True, not many people on this board are capable of it, but "mastering" a shmup is something nobody will ever do. Not the mention the gap between LNB and a good scorerun are massive. There is still a _lot_ of a gap between someone like me who can barely LNB some games and someone like chum or cactu who're capable of good scoreruns.
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Eh, don't compare mastering something to being "perfect" at it. Usually mastering something means being an expert and knowing something from top to bottom. For the most part, all of the games have their masters - they're usually the ones getting WR-level scores. But C. Angel's standards are not as high as mine, so he sees LNB runs as a mark of mastery because it means someone knew the game enough to beat it without bombs. (this isn't always the case since you can have minimal knowledge of the game and just be really good at dodging, which isn't really mastery)
--- Quote from: uc9 on December 25, 2013, 01:09:54 AM ---Oh just a general tip, don't know if it's been mentioned before, but I'm a new player to the franchise and a thing I have noticed is that I tended to have a over reliance on bombs. When in lower difficulties it is fine, but for lunatic this habit will really mess you over. If you are new to touhou and are starting to get the hang of it turn down the number of bombs you have so that you can learn how to dodge better. You're going to get your butt kicked to the next town constantly, but it will help you in the long run on how to predict bullet movement and how to dodge.
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About the bomb thing, it's interesting, because usually new players complain that they don't use their bombs - and discover that they need to learn resource management a few months in. Players need a good balance. Bombspam is bad, I guess, would be your point.
uc9:
--- Quote from: C.Angel on December 25, 2013, 05:33:05 PM ---I'd say that advice applies more to training Stage Practice runs. Aside from EoSD, you get enough lives there that you can ignore bombing for the most part, which allows you to easily try finding paths through places you have problems with, or at least identify points you're not confident about and should consider bombing at if things don't go your way. Trying that with full runs is counterproductive, though. You have much less lives and limited continues. I'd understand credit feeding through an arcade shmup, but here you have Stage Practice to do your training.
That said, bombing is an important aspect you should learn doing properly if you're still striving for a 1cc. Bombs are an important resource you have no excuse for not using. Short of doing no-bomb runs, of course, but doing that is several times harder than plain clears. LNB is a mark of mastery few can achieve for a reason. Also, if you progress naturally, there should be less and less places that scare you into bombing. If over-reliance on bombs is an issue, maybe you're trying to bite off a bigger chunk than you can swallow. Panic bombing is actually a VERY useful skill that can help you a lot if you're still striving for your first clear on a higher difficulty.
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Yeah I know; bombs are important and practice mode is important. When I first tried lunatic I was going, "lol just use a bomb". Practice mode with no bombs and one life really helped me learn to dodge and not just bomb spam. If you can clear all the stages in practice mode without bombs or dying then the story mode is a lot easier to get through.
A lot of people that I have known that have tried touhou and quit do so cause the vast majority of other video games don't ever teach the player about hitboxes or resource management due to them just having the player resort to spamming to win. Most games don't ever teach the player how to dodge, what a hitbox is or they have a generic dodge button you press. That is something every game should at least attempt to make the player aware, but apparently very few video games even attempt to make the player understand how to dodge.
So yeah, totally agree with you, but if someone is new to the franchise like me then practice mode with no bombs and only one continue is a really great way to learn how to play if they have never before played any sort of bullet hell games.
Oh:
--- Quote from: C.Angel on December 25, 2013, 05:33:05 PM ---LNB is a mark of mastery few can achieve for a reason.
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The western community is more obsessed with fandom than the actual games. Anyone can LNB provided they practice rigorously, and it does not signify mastery in a game. I feel like the community does not want to put in the time it takes to reach a decent level of play, and rather just label common achievements such as LNBs as high-level play.
But if it's UFO LNB than you sir are a superplayer
So just play more, improvements will be easily visible if you put in the time.
Mino ☆:
To me, LNB symbolizes a basic ability of Lunatic survival. It's not the greatest thing in the world, but it still takes time to get to. At least it did for me. For most games, you need the ability and knowledge to capture many parts of the game without the ability to bombspam everything. I would definitely say that being able to do a good LNB in a game is beneficial for scoring in that game. Cactu, who has great survival of EoSD (and started out doing LNB runs), is capable of really high scoring on Lunatic mode, which really calls for that type of good survival play.
As Sakurei said, there's no "mastery" of any game. Especially Touhou, a land of optimization.
To "master" a game, you'd have to be good in survival and scoring in all difficulties in all shottypes and etc. in that game. Like HS is to PCB or Shin is to UFO. We'll probably not see someone like that in the west for a long while.
To be honest, I think it's great to just let the community go with the flow. Let those who want to achieve go forward. I didn't even think I would ever even play for score. But now things have changed. I plan to score myself, once I'm done with PCB LNNN. (And once I'm used to this new monitor).