Touhou Danmaku Hell - Success and Failure Stories

[gamercal]

Holy ...
I think I'm 'getting' UFO normal finally.
I can get about 2 red UFO's from the first stage, ending with 2 greens and then having about 3 lives more at the beginning of stage 3. If I wouldn't have died stupidly THREE TIMES at Kogasa, maybe I have a chance? The stages in UFO are also way harder than the other games for some reason.

Also, I just got to Murasa with nothing left, and I actually got to her 3rd spellcard without dying at all.
I am surprised :D.

About the most you can get from stage 1 is 3 red and one green summon. I start with a multi (since I found out you could get away with that), then summon a red shortly after (green changer + blue section). Get rid of the blue one there obviously lol. You can then get to Nazrin with one red token and one changer on-screen (get that during the fight obviously). Summon a red as soon as you beat her, but leave the other changer one around until after the UFO is cleared. You can get a green from the large fairies then, and end the stage still with two green tokens. That gives you 3 1/3 Bombs and 3 1/4 lives going into stage 2.

It's hard to put into words, so if I can get a better 1cc I will probably upload it at some point to show it (I'm not happy with most of my stage 6 run especially, beyond capturing the last spell it was pretty awful).

If you're good enough and don't have to bomb during stage 2, you can max out your bombs (well, fill the stars and have 2/3 of a bomb excess, which does get kept) and have 4 lives, by spamming green UFO's throughout the whole stage. The main tricky part to that is getting the UFO's around Kogasa, since you will likely need to get the second green one during her non-spell. For stage 3 you would then spam red UFO's obviously (you can leave stage 2 with up to 2 left, making it easy to summon at the start), which I think can take you to about 6 lives at the end of the stage if you don't die.

I think the stages appear harder than they actually are, mostly because of trying to summon the UFO's constantly. You have to be at certain places to get the changer ones of the right colour, and the game does its best to block your efforts. ESPECIALLY in stages 4 and 5 (and the extra stage... dear god). If the colours you need for a single-colour UFO aren't on the screen at the time, I would try and get a multi-colour one where possible - giving two changer UFOs out really helps, as well as clearing the screen of crap

Well done for getting that far with Murasa though! The non-spells are really fun, the first spell is pretty easy once you figure out how it's done... but the second spell is awful unless you're ReimuB or SanaeA with their homing shots :S.

Don't get too complacent with getting through to there though, the last two stages are much harder... well, stage 6 itself isn't, but Byakuren is really nasty!

[Yonowaaru]

Did a SanaeA run just now, got up to Byakuren's Star Maelstrom.
Man, that card was already hard on easy, save for this one with all the double star shots....
I pretty much did horrible at Murasa, not bombing and losing about 2 lives, then Syou went pretty well, actually capturing her last spellcard. ( I wouldn't even have tried normally, but I didn't have anything left. Stage 5 isn't too bad, it's just that there's a lot of transparent red bullets and a lot of power and point thingies so it's hard to see which is what. Makai butterfly isn't really too much harder, it's just faster and a bit narrower. I'll try again sometime tomorrow.

[gamercal]

Ah, you suffered the same problem as me with Murasa. First encounter was a breeze (I had lives left at least though, so when I died at the third spell it wasn't over), but every time after that is pain...

Sanae A is awesome. If I'm going to go for another 1cc character anytime soon, it's that combo.

Maelstorm is horrendous. I've almost captured it a few times, but it's the one spell in all of normal that I haven't captured at least once... terrible spell.

Stage 5 in itself is not that bad, but trying to gather UFO tokens in amongst the spam is extremely difficult. I guess with how powerful a tool the UFO's are it makes sense that they are tough to get hold of though!

Awesome job with Shou's last card though, that one is really tough :S.

Makai Butterfly is really easy I find, so I'm glad you got that one . There's a lot for you to get still though after Maelstorm... one really hard non-spell, Devil's Recitation (argh! Still one of the more doable cards to me for some reason), then Air Scroll (really tricky, but with Sanae you might find it easier to actually hit her) and Flying whatever it's called. You WILL need/want at least two spare lives for that last one, as the HP of the spell is FREAKING HUGE and she's immune to fire during a bomb. The bombs (or at least Marisa's Spark) didn't even clear the bullets for me either, so... yeah.

[cheez8]

Speaking of UFO... ugh, Shou is terrible. I experienced most of her attacks for the first time just now, but I have a feeling she's going to be incredibly annoying in later runs. I had four lives when I got to her, and she managed to take them all. Still, the rest of the game is surprisingly easy, at least with Sanae B. I'm actually pretty surprised at how quickly the first three or four stages became second nature to me; I just downloaded UFO yesterday.

[Yonowaaru]

I actually got to Murasa with like, 8 lives today, but then I went to the gym and after I got back, I was like really tired and only got up to the nonspell before Devil's recitation.

Shou is just.....
I am sometimes pretty good at the Pagoda attack, Vajra is horrible, so is absolute Justice, but then Demon of Purification is like, really easy... I guess I'll just try again....


*Edit: New SanaeA run, got up to St. Nikou's Scroll, but I died quite a lot on Murasa and Shou, I got to Byakuren with 3 lives.

[cheez8]

Still haven't made it past Shou yet. Nonspells aside, her most annoying attack by far is the green laser clock. (Sorry, but I don't have a translated version, so I don't know the spell names.) If there is an easy way to clear that one, I don't know of it... It seems that almost all of her attacks can wall you. I've been walled by the green laser clock, the attack with the vertical lasers (although that's sort of the point of the attack to begin with), and even her final spell, where I ended up at the bottom of the screen after dodging and a single bullet chased me to the left of the screen until I died. And then there are her nonspells... ugh.

[Yonowaaru]

Are you playing on normal?

Btw:

-The green Laser clock (It's called Most Valuable Vajra) is indeed hard. Try doing it non-focused, or just bomb it if it's too hard.

-The final spell is, as I find it, easiest when you stay at the bottom.
Try doing that.

[cheez8]

Yep. I pretty much always play on Normal, except occasionally I'll start playing certain games on Hard if I feel like it.

As for the laser clock, yeah, I have been doing it unfocused, but I'm still usually barely able to keep up with the rotation, and either die from the lasers or from one of the red shots since I'm too busy trying to keep up with the lasers. And since I've only reached that attack one time with a bomb (and always without an extra life), I haven't been able to bomb it, for the most part.

I've only managed to reach the final spell once, and yes, I did try to stay near the bottom on that one, but what ended up happening was that after a few waves, I had to dodge towards the bottom of the screen, and a laser immediately trapped me there. There was a distance about the size of a bullet between the laser and the bottom of the screen left for me to maneuver in. Naturally, a single stray bullet decided it would be a good time to move horizontally across that entire area. Yaaay.

Oh, and by the way: Is Shou's second nonspell aimed in any way? Because there have been a couple times where it seems like that attack is aimed directly at me, but another time I tried to see if I could stream it and ended up positioning myself in front of a laser instead.

[gamercal]

It doesn't feel aimed to me, but I could easily be mistaken there.

Who are you using by the way? I guess I never have any problem with not keeping ahead of the lasers cause I use Marisa, but if you're using Reimu then I could see why you would have a problem. Might be an idea just to bomb the card and get it out of the way. (Assuming you can keep one for it!)

Maybe you just need to work on getting more resources from UFO's during the stages? So as to give yourself more lives and such to work with... I dunno, if you're not stupid like me with them this game does give you more than enough resources to work on. Which sorta mitigates its difficulty lol.

[RobinLSL]

A few additions to the current Shou discussion!

-second non-spell definitely isn't aimed. I really think there's too much randomness in it, sometimes it's easy and sometimes it's almost impossible (talking about Lunatic though the basic principles still apply)
-there's no real reason to stay at the bottom for the last spell. Just try and stay high enough so that you always have a little room to dodge downards when needed. Anyway, one basic idea which made me progress a lot for this attack is to try and move to the spaces where there are no bullets. Don't just stand there and dodge, make it so that you have to dodge much less!
- Vajra (the rotating laser thing) is always annoying. Do your best at keeping up, try to focus as little as possible. Also, the lasers are aimed in a very weird way, I think the intersection point of the lasers might move towards you or something like that. Anyway what this really means is that if you use the same movement, the attack will be generally the same so you can memorize it (even unconsciously!)

-DON'T USE MARISA!!! Unless you want to give yourself some extra challenge.

[gamercal]

Well too bad, I used Marisa anyhow <_<. I like Sanae as well, but I am just most comfortable with Marisa in pretty much every Touhou game. Now that I've played with her so much, I have come to just about rely on her speed when it comes to knowing when and how I need to move to dodge stuff...

[cheez8]

A few additions to the current Shou discussion!

-second non-spell definitely isn't aimed. I really think there's too much randomness in it, sometimes it's easy and sometimes it's almost impossible (talking about Lunatic though the basic principles still apply)
-there's no real reason to stay at the bottom for the last spell. Just try and stay high enough so that you always have a little room to dodge downards when needed. Anyway, one basic idea which made me progress a lot for this attack is to try and move to the spaces where there are no bullets. Don't just stand there and dodge, make it so that you have to dodge much less!
- Vajra (the rotating laser thing) is always annoying. Do your best at keeping up, try to focus as little as possible. Also, the lasers are aimed in a very weird way, I think the intersection point of the lasers might move towards you or something like that. Anyway what this really means is that if you use the same movement, the attack will be generally the same so you can memorize it (even unconsciously!)

-DON'T USE MARISA!!! Unless you want to give yourself some extra challenge.

-Alright, thanks for clearing that up about her second non-spell. I've been confused about that after a few times where every wave of lasers managed to go exactly through the point where I was.
-Yeah, once I get back to her final spell, I'll definitely avoid being so close to the bottom. Hopefully I'll have better resources in later runs, too, although I'm taking a bit of a break to catch up on real life right now.
-Actually, I think I figured out exactly how Vajra is aimed: every so often, a red "spell circle" thing will appear wherever your character is, and after a few seconds, one of the lasers will move so that the center of the circle is its new axis, so to speak. (Assuming I'm using the right word, I can't tell if that's right at the moment.) Then the second laser moves to the second circle, then the first laser moves to the third circle, and so on. Still, I haven't made it there too often, so hopefully I'll be able to develop a strategy for it eventually.
-Nope, I don't usually use Marisa. I've played most often as Sanae B; for some reason Sanae seems to control a lot more smoothly than the others. I have played as Marisa a few times, but the larger hitbox and higher focused speed definitely did not help matters. Plus, Sanae's bombs in general are just plain better, especially for UFO collecting.

[RobinLSL]

RRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGGGGEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

against Fairy Wars

C1 no bombs is just too hard. Freaking stage 2 Sunny, WHY MUST ALL YOUR ATTACKS HAVE SO MUCH HP?? Why is Yellow Deflection absolute BS? Why are your other spells so RANDOM???

RRRRRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

[gamercal]

FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF I CANNOT 1CC SA NORMAL, LIKE EVER.

I've been trying for a while now, and it's really getting to me. I can't even beat Utsuho, regardless of the millions of tries I take at it. Hell, I only once managed to get to Heaven and Hell Meltdown, out of at least 10 tries in this recent attempt, that's how bad it is.

I've been trying various combinations to see what I get on most with. Reimu/Yukari is the obvious one (since I traditionally play with Marisa, and Reimu/Yukari best mimics that high-powered frontal assault), but literally every video I've seen outside of Robin's ones uses that combination, and honestly it puts me off using it. (The fact that it is Reimu doesn't help either, I still have an irrational hatred for her lol). I tried Marisa/Patchy cause I liked the combo so much when I first played, but I can't seem to use it well anymore... I can't even clear stage 5 after 6 continues with that combo, it's just terrible. (Also Satori is a bitch, bringing back my MOST HATED SPELL CARD EVER UGH WHY DID YOU HAVE TO USE PRINCESS UNDINE)

Natori is a really interesting one. Some stuff is REALLY hard with her because of the delayed fire and stuff, but her deathbomb is pretty much the best thing ever, essentially giving you two bombs for the price of one (or a half if you survive the second one). She often takes a really long time to dispel cards though, and that is awkward...

So the one I tried again today was Marisa/Alice... and despite my first thoughts that actually went surprisingly well. It took a bit of getting used to, and I really hate how spread/concentrated fire feels like it's the wrong way round, but it was genuinely fun to use her dolls. The bomb is quite frankly terrible compared to Nitori (or most of Reimu's options), but there's a LOT of them, and that sometimes helps more. You also get those bombs back faster obviously, since power items are worth more (double? Can't be, you get thirds of a power unit and stuff). It's hard to aim the fire well, but when it hits it's pretty strong, and the spread fire is awesome for clearing stages.

But regardless of character choice I literally cannot beat Utsuho, and it's really really annoying me now. Cause I can't even practice the stage... at least when I had this problem with Byakuren I EVENTUALLY beat her after like 20 goes, so that I could practice the spells...

[Cup]

If you're getting frustrated, I'd just bite the bullet and use ReimuA. The character shot types seem more unbalanced in SA then any other touhou and ReimuA stands far above everyone else. I can beat normal using ReimuA with ease, but any other shot type I try normally means death by stage 5. Whatever problems you're having with SA will most likely be solved by using her.

At the very least you can beat Utsuho and practice a bit before you try someone else. I'd probably say ReimuC is the next in line.

I'm surprised you're struggling with Utsuho though, I find her to be one of the easiest stage six bosses, especially after what we have to go though to get past stage 5. I had a much, much harder time with Hijiri. Oh well, Touhou's weird like that.

[RobinLSL]

SA Rage

If you want to keep using MariAri (which is fine IMO) then autobomb more.

A doll makes quite a strong bomb if and only if you plant it right on the boss's face (almost).

Remember which attacks cause you much pain and, as soon as the attack starts, drop a bomb on the boss's face. If you have lots of power/are feeling lazy/really really hate the attack in question, drop a second one!

edit: I just watch my replay of Lunatic MariAri, and yeah , MANY autobombs were used. 2 on midboss Yuugi's spell, 2 on Yuugi's last non-spell, THREE for the second appearance of cat Orin, as many as possible for Orin's spells (had run out of power at that point :p) and another two for Utsuho's first spell.

[gamercal]

I will bear that in mind. I guess most of the time I'm too much towards the "must capture and not bomb unless I'm dying" type of thing, and that gets me into trouble a fair bit. I also guess that most of the time I find when I start getting low on power it becomes very very difficult to capture stuff, and that generally cascades into death. We will learn eventually

I am perhaps more interested in UFO still as it stands though. Mostly because I've been going into the Extra Stage (only unlocked with MarisaA atm cause that will forever be my most preferred playstyle)... and jesus hell it's tough. ESPECIALLY compared to EoSD, for some reason most of that extra stage was easy for me <_<. I've nailed the first half down when I'm not an idiot now, even with the huge fairy spam just before Kogasa. Kogasa herself is mixed, and I rarely capture all the cards, but I can do it. But the second half... what on EARTH do you actually do there? I get trapped way too much in the "maze" section, losing 2 bombs (and often a life cause I ran out of bombs) there on average. The return of the fairy spam is alright, sort of. I can just about handle that. Then the yin yangs... I know the IDEA for most of it, but how in gods name do you clear the final 3 or so waves without walling yourself? It just seems impossible to me.

Nue is pretty awesome though. I'm fine with the first spell, I think I've learned my method for doing the second spell, third spell probably shouldn't even be there cause it's stupid easy, and after a bomb I can handle the fourth one. The non-spells up till there are generally ok, but I often have to bomb the third one cause my movement on impulse is not always the most accurate...

Then I get to danmaku chimera, and man... the card is awesome, but I either do it really well or I TOTALLY fail. Record is 1/3 - the 2 fails have had THREE deaths (failed to bomb pretty much all three times). It looks so simple in theory though! I guess I just need more practice with the precision involved.

Other than that I only got to the green UFO card once and totally failed it, not quite sure how I'm gonna handle that one yet. But first I need to learn how to handle the second half of the stage itself :(

EDIT: Quick addition based on today's brief go. I rarely ever seem to get to Nue with more than 2 lives intact, with all of my deaths basically coming in the final part of the stage. But I AM learning, and some of the spam is getting more doable now.

I've now managed to capture all of Nue's cards up until the green UFO card (I had to - I had no bombs going into the fight last time, and I didn't get one until the bomb piece after card 5). I then bombed once on the green card and managed to find a sort of system after that - I was usually able to destroy one green UFO to give myself space between the lasers, so that helped a lot.

The seventh spell card threw me, but that was pretty much solely because I had never fought it before. I know how to lure her to where you want her, I just wasn't good at the execution first time. One that will get better with practice. The rainbow UFO's though... uuuuuuuuuuuuugh lost 2 lives on that, ending my run. THAT one is going to be hell to try and do, I can just feel it. Probably one of those cards I will bomb twice on and STILL die, almost all the time. Those clusters are one of my biggest weaknesses ever...

(This isn't really a "help me" post as such, I just felt like keeping track of progress somewhere lol)

EDIT #2: Nooooooooo last spell card :(. Well I had one laser anyhow so it's not like I stood a chance of clearing it... stupid survival card stripping me of my 2 spare lives >_<

That survival card is a right bitch. The last phase of it is much harder than I thought it would be... the second phase is also really annoying. It's because of the vertical movement - for some reason I can't seem to gauge vertical transitions that well. The UFO cards are still causing me a lot of pain - I captured the green one in my last run but the rainbow one... god. I have NO idea how I captured that the second time I played it lol. For some reason I also just about always seem to die to the blue UFO card too - I never have any bombs left for it unless I died earlier in the fight, and I just can't quite kill the UFO in time with lasers around.

Still... progress I guess?

[Yonowaaru]

I finally unlocked Extra Level in Fairy Wars.
The first half of the stage isn't too bad, I could probably get to the midboss with about 4 lives, though the midbosses? I just have no idea what to do because of all the firecomets, and I lose all my lives...
Any hints?

Okay, so:

The green bullet start is doable with just freezing
The fast green bullets are annoying, I often die here and restart
The fast red bullets are pretty easy too
The green bullets before the midboss is also annoying, I usually bomb here
The overwhelming lot of bullets is actually really easy and gets me usually 1/2 bombs and a life

Midbosses:
The first attack is not too bad, though there's not a lot of time to charge, so I sometimes still die
The second attack is easier, though still not a whole lot of time to charge
The last attack is doable, though I need practice

Then, the knives... Also not a lot of time to charge, I need more practice here too
Then, fast green bullets again, not too much harder?
After that, the undodgeable red bullets, a bit harder because at the end there's fairies at opposite sides so it's really hard to be on time
Then, green bullet with yellow comet swarm, really hard, need more practice.
And last, the spreading fairies with green/ yellow comet bullets.

I haven't gotten further, but I assume Marisa is after those?
Hints, again?

[RobinLSL]

For their last attack, you want to move UP

The other two are supposed to be easy... I just stay under Lily, freeze every non-fireball bullet and just dodge the fireballs... don't know what to say if you can't dodge the fireballs!

[gamercal]

OK FINALLY GEEZ.

Nue went down lol.

I'm at the point now where if I don't do anything stupid I can beat the first 6 or so spell cards without any trouble at all. Well, the green UFO one is a bitch but if I have enough power it's pretty good still, and I'm definitely getting much better at beating it.

Undefined Darkness... is annoying. I thought I had it at first, but the more I play it the more difficult it seems to become. I captured it this run but it took so much effort and luck that it's unbelievable. The fact that you can't really move during bombing with MarisaA too means you may as well just die if you have to bomb... almost.

Rainbow UFO is still evil, but I have managed to capture it about 3 times now. The first time with only 1 power too o.o - but usually I die/bomb/some combination to get through it.

The survival card still kills me... but I'm much closer to taking it now. First phase I can do easily when I pay attention, second phase I'm learning (somehow translating the same motion from horizontal to vertical is very difficult :S), and the last phase doesn't catch me until right at the death of the card. So MAYBE I will capture it soon :o

Then Grudge Bow... well, let's just leave it at me going into the spell with 2 spare lives and two bombs and coming out the other side with only 1 bomb left (which I promptly used in the last phase right as she was dying cause I didn't expect it - where's the sound?).

BUT WE ARE DONE. A replay may go up on my channel eventually, although I both want to improve the run a little and get my 1cc of Normal done first. Overall though, success!

[RobinLSL]

Gratz :D

[gamercal]

Thanks, I've been trying for like 4 days at that now lol. I've played Kogasa's first spell card almost 120 times <_<

[Yonowaaru]

ALMOST beat Suwako.
Her spells are really easy for the most past, though I hate her first survival card.
The second one isn't too bad, you just need to see a clear path
I ended with having bombed misaguji-sama a few times, she had less than 1/4 of her HP left, and I would've had another life were it not because I suck at Moriya's Iron Ring and lost a stupid life at Suwa Wars. Oh well, I'll win next time.

*Edit: And then, there was Flandre

She's not too bad, really.
The first time I got to her with ReimuA, I got there with 3 lives and a bomb
Cranberry trap is hard, though it seems to be easier when you start a bit more upwards.
Laevatein is really easy once you know it, I captured it on this run.
Four of a kind isn't too bad, but it's easy to get stuck.
The same is with Kagome, Kagome (What does that actually mean?), but that one is a bit easier
Maze of Love absolutely sucks, am I actually supposed to do that unfocused or what?
Starbrow Break is the same, difficulty is between Kagome
Cadiatropic (The one with refraction) is for some reason really easy, I captured it on my first run
And then I died on the second wave of Counter Clock, which was a stupid death, really.

Any hints?

[gamercal]

Maze of love is awful. I guess with ReimuA you could probably go round the maze itself but you'll PROBABLY have to do it unfocused. I was sorta working out a way of doing it with MarisaA by sticking entirely to the bottom, but I ended up moving on after beating her a couple of times and uploading the video lol.

For Cranberry Trap the thing I said in my video was "to work your way from the middle to the bottom, then back up to the middle as the next wave starts". Remember that you can stream the last part of each wave.

Four of a kind is awesome, but I can see why you would struggle with Reimu's low attack power. Really about the only difficulty comes from the blue spheres though, which awkwardly two of the Flan's fire.

Kagome (I think it's some sort of board game, I dunno) is generally tolerable as long as you make sure you aren't avoiding more than one wave at a time. Don't wait for her to fire the next set if you can safely move through the current one.

For Starbow Break, staying glued to the bottom is a disadvantage because the faster waves often overlap with the slower ones. If you want to be cheap there's a safe spot in the top left corner that you only have to inch out of once every few waves (I've never used it, so I forget which one it is), but for clearing it normally the best I can say is trust your hitbox!

Catadioptric is a pain in the ass, if you genuinely find that one easy then all power to you... although I bet Reimu's homing is most of the reason why

For counter clock, the only difficult part is avoiding the red spheres in the second wave. Obviously you need to move to the bottom right corner during that wave, but the fast moving diagonal waves can be tricky to dodge. Otherwise it's really simple, as you can sit in the middle during the third wave and the lasers shouldn't hit you.

Aaaaaaaaaaand it's a whole other ball game when it comes to the survival card and stuff lol. Well, for the first half of the survival card I've always lured Flandre to the bottom right corner, then bottom left. The clones for me start appearing once I have her at the bottom left, and from there I seem to circle round and there's always a gap for me. For the second phase you mostly need to know what each coloured wave does, and as with Kagome make sure you're only avoiding one wave at a time. It gets really hard at the end though <_<

And for QED your guess is as good as mine, I totally flop on that card xD

Hope that helps, even though I use solely Marisa A for this fight ^_^

[RobinLSL]

Finally!! Fairy Wars C1 beaten without bombs.

Oh my god this took so much time, patience and rage. My heart was beating super hard at the end, it's been a long time since I was so happy for beating something Touhou related. I even almost captured the final card!

Only C2 left now.