Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice (topic now 200% easier to find)

For what it’s worth, these are the kinds of progress reports that are best left behind spoiler tags in the first couple weeks. They don’t hold any value except for people already past that point. Not a big deal but also not much point to it either so it evens out!

I find I’m the opposite. Once I pass the frustration threshold I slowly wear it down and become a machine at it. The thing that kills it for me is usually the run back if there is any.

Which is why Seven Spears is such a pain in the ass. You can get to him fairly easily, but good Lord it takes forever. I supposed I could try to just run straight at his face, grapple someplace and hope for the reset, but odds are I’ll take a bunch of damage and I feel like he’s one of those guys that you want all your healing and health for.

Butterfly was perfect in that I just ran down a hall and was back in it. Same for Hole Dude. One enemy in the way that you can kill before they do anything is fine.

I feel like I’m getting rot essence for characters I haven’t even met yet? That goddamn bull is driving me crazy. I feel like I know the right strategy, but all that goes right out the window once the fight starts.

Does anyone else have a problem with accidentally clicking in the thumbsticks during tense action sequences in games like these? I don’t know how many times I’ve died by accidentally toggling crouch or screwing with the targeting that way.

I guess that’s a neat trick. It’s not necessary, though. You can just block his stuff and dodge the unblockable. Eventually his poise will break. You don’t even have to hit him, but I did get a few swings in to speed it up.

This game goes a long way towards proving my suspicion that I’d love the Souls series much more if it lacked the enemy-filled boss runs. I’m having so much more fun on the encounters where I can just get back into the fight in a matter of seconds without something that basically amounts to a long loading screen with a healing item tax.

Here’s my turn to wonder if we’re playing the same game. His full string nearly maxes out my posture meter, and he starts back up before it goes down. I tried it at least 20 times. Parrying and jumping on his head was the only solution.

I mean, I guess you don’t need the jump if you have all the parries down. Blocking definitely does not work.

Also: this game has so many damn minibosses. They’re awesome and all, but I’m nearly exhausted.

Yeah I was parrying a lot. I just kinda spammed the block button and got most of them.

Also I beat Saze in 40 seconds on my first attempt. So I think I’ve used up all my Sekiro luck.

I think I saved it. I’ll upload.

So quad-bow shot is the lamest thing.

It breaks my immersion so hard. Really most of the bow stuff in this fight does, but this is just too much.
“He has a machine gun or something, whatever. Hope you were dodging.”

I still haven’t figured out if you can get multiple parries off one button press. Like if the second attack is fast enough the game just gives you both of them. I can’t tell. Maybe I’m pressing the button without noticing it.

I’d like to see some alternative strategies on that guy. Once I understood what he was trying to do, I couldn’t not fight him with a clean set of parries.

Yeah I’m not sure but I have a habit of kinda spamming block so I think that’s why I beat Saze so easily and it also worked well in that other fight.

saze

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z27nAeV5XpA

other thing

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u3BUA7lX6vM

Even after I learned how to block that he’d still surprise me occasionally and get the first one or two hits in. At least you can recover if you take a breath and block for the remaining shots.

I just had a fight where he did it 3 times in a row. I couldn’t really do anything, eventually I lost most of my health over the course of 12 arrows.

And it just feels dumb. Its bad enough he has a magical bow that appears in his hands while he’s wielding a sword, but then it fires like a machinegun. It just feels silly and mechanically it’s annoying in a fight that’s otherwise interesting.

That first parry was absolutely remarkable. Pure reaction speed from a single glint. Well done.

On the other fight, umm… how is your posture going down that fast just standing there without even blocking? What the hell?

[EDIT] Okay I just tried it, seems normal. I never noticed that before.

I’m not sure about the poise drop. I was so focused on what he was doing I wasn’t even looking at it, which I guess is how he got me that one time.

I didn’t use any items though. Maybe there’s a skill? I think I’ve crafted 3 bead thingies, but those are just amount of poise and not recovery I think.

Edit: oh ok, cool

It does seem to start going down immediately sometimes. Maybe when the last attack was parried instead of blocked. Normally it takes 1-2 seconds to start dropping. I never noticed that either.

The loading screen tooltip says blocking will speed up posture recovery but that doesn’t seem to be the case. It will be a lot easier to walk around.

It’s so strange that where I’m at I can just wander off and do random shit in places that I have no reason to be at.

I mean it’s sort of cool, but at the same time the game is pretty story-driven and it feels off for me to be “Well, I’d love to rescue you, kid, but I found this creepy underground world…” Weirder yet to pass through the castle he’s in and just wander into the wilderness randomly.

“He’ll come rescue me.”
in the background you see the Shinobi running out of the castle into a forest

Heh, with Saze, i just Naruto ran around him in a circle. He always misses you with his draw attack, then you get free attacks on him.

It’s perhaps not as fast, but it’s definitely ready and foolproof.

I fought the guy in the well, and he killed me a few times, but like Shiva, i missed the drop attack once… And in that fight, i was just like “screw it.”

And i beat his ass bad. After that, I just decided to not worry about him, and just go at him hard. Killed him the next try by just beating on him and periodically deflecting.

There is a lot to be said for going at an enemy with no intention of winning. You try shit you normally wouldn’t and sometimes it works incredibly well.

I’m honestly not sure how I feel about how spamming attack and/or the block button is often the best strategy.

That goes against the precision action game side of my brain, but it lines up well with the overpowered beat ‘em up side of my brain.

Things have really started to click now that I’m not panicking all the time. I was having trouble recognizing what was a grab or thrust or sweep. The visual queues tell you everything you need to know once you’re focused enough to pay attention to them.

A recently discovered Shinobi Tool has helped out quite a bit too. I use it to open attacks, or break a lull in combat. Helps me keep the pressure on.

edit: the third skill tree I found Ashina Arts is where grinding for skill points is going to yield dramatic power increase. These skills are all jaw droppers. It’s easy to miss (at least it was for me, I had to backtrack a bit to find it), so keep an eye out if you haven’t found it yet.

I wish I could replay that fight in the training area. It was so fast, and so much fun.