Post by Kiggy on Mar 18, 2011 4:33:55 GMT -5
DISCLAIMER: I mostly play hard so this is from pure memory which fits Hard the most. I will edit the differences if any are required.[/b]
1) Side of the castle.
The very quickest and only possible path honestly for a soloing Charlotte or Yoko is up the side of the side of the castle. Just after the intial few enemies near the draw bridge you can jump up to a point that you see a Slogra and spiked wall with platforms heading up. The pendulums and such up there are harder of course while you're on hard. More appearing or them being faster. The best chance of learning the jumps I'd say is with Simon, Fuma or Maria due to them having smaller hit boxs then others. I personally still can fail it with other characters besides Maria, etc..
The main thing you gotta remember is any of the red or other oddly colored platforms (from the stone castle wall) are breakable and jumping up and down on them lessens the breaking time. I'd personally advise doing a backdash jump then double jump up on the platform until you get use to it too. Essentially if you backdash and jump not long after you go up into the air and a double jump will get you up to the next platform. This allows you to slide out without hitting your head.
Note if you successfully climb the side you WILL have gotten TWIN BEE which is the secret item of this level. If you can't do the scaling read the second path maybe you're a character that can do that! If you scaled the building fine you can read path three since both 1 and 2 intersect at 3.
2) Shanoa Magnets
So you didn't make it up the side of the castle or are just not bothering taking up those breakable platforms from a Yoko or Charlotte. Well after the Dullahan, you'll go through a Warg, zombie and if on hard one Slogra infested hallway and the start of the popular Symphony of the Night. Now just as you head up a small set of stairs to a spot where you can see Shanoa Magnets, this is a secret way to the top of the castle if you can get up there. Now this path was primarily meant for Shanoa, but Julius can jump off of these just the same if you know how to magnet whip. (Julius guide)
However, there is other ways to get up here. Any jumpkicking character can actually make it up here but only one can each game unless really well timed, if they don't have yorick skulls to assist them. Refer to the shortcuts for that. (Both of them are different ways to do this.)
Now you're up here you'll have to take out the volley of enemies. Will be two Gurkha Masters, one slogra for the first batch (on hard- think the slogra is missing on normal?), then two bone pillars and a leraije waiting on the stairs, careful as she sometimes leap on you just as you get to jump up. (berserker mail is a pain if that happens.) After that there is two paths, one leading to the third water of life in the level and the other path leads to what seems to be a dead end. (after you take out one gaibon and a nova skeleton.) But alas, this is NOT a dead end, if you hit the right corner wall up in the top it'll break to reveal a painting that takes you to the top of the castle which links you up with the first path. Both residing now at the top of the castle.
3) Castle Top / Boss Room Doors (right and left)
Whether you scaled the side of the castle or you used the painting, you're at the very top of the castle now. You'll be standing just above beef curry and to your right will be the third purple chest. Now you'll have to take out two Gaibons and three Slogras (Slogras -can- be bypassed, but Gaibons will follow you into the boss room even.) and if you're on Hard there will be a third Gaibon as you enter in the top of the castle. Now you'll have a few options, to do a series of door opens and through fire tricks to get to the right boss room door. Drop to go all around to the left side, which will also allow you to open up path 4 for anyone who can't do the former two. It's very simple honestly once you get a pattern down but you're facing three paths now that you're inside the castle, UP which you can see has pendulums, that way is only if you ended up going the longest possible way through. (path 5)
The right path will lead you to open the door for the fire trap that you'll need to successfully go through to get to the right boss room BUT WAIT! If you don't go to the bottom path and open the door from the lever there, the door by the boss room is not open. So unless you're Soma when you do this, you can't get back and must go to the right boss room door. Now once you open the boss room door, you go back up to where the other door is and jump to the right of it. Now the timing is very different on normal and hard.
Normal: Wait until the fire goes out, drop into that crevice where the fire is going and then walk off that soon as the second one goes out, this gives you enough time to stop and drop again, as the second fire usually lasts too long for how you time it on Hard. And on hard, the first fire starts too fast to do this unless you jump there and I believe you can duck the fire, but never tried it.
Hard: Wait until the first fire is out, but like SOON as it is out make sure you're going, once it is use your double jump when you're inbetween the two fire traps and this will delay it enough for the second to go out.
Now that you got timing, make sure you're ready to push to the left so you can land by the boss room door, now this door is locked so you can't go through or bypassed the fire but if you drop down one more level you'll see a lever, this opens it up for others so not everyone has to go through the fire. Now you can enter the boss room from here. Though if you end up missing the timing and landing down on the fire, or decide to go open up path 4 for another player, just drop down but if you want purple chest, get the fourth purple chest in the level right now. Then drop all the way down, kill or bypass the Slogra and flip the lever opening up Path 4 for anyone who needed it or wanted it. Then continue on to the left over the spikes and through the spittle bone platforms. This'll lead you at the very top to the left boss room door, or if you take the left path, you'll head upon a breakable wall which leads to spikes, pendulums but the final purple chest in this stage.
4) Through slogra + gaibon door
Okay so you couldn't scale it and you couldn't use the magnets or bats or any of the major shortcuts (or even those who scaled the side broke platforms for you.) this specific path is only workable if you have someone who goes all way around in path 5, or those who have made it to the castle top to open the door for you.
After a long truck pass the big rock that is breakable to see a tasty meat inside and pass where Death takes your weapons in Symphony of the Night (which on hard has a Gaibon floating there to get ya), you head up the platform stairs and now you'll need to head to the far left passed nova skeletons. There will be one Gaibon near a gold chest passed some spikes, once he is dead and you go up platforms to the next level you'll see a golden door if someone drops down to open the door, you can head to the left boss room door from here. Skipping almost 40% or more of the stage. This is a great thing if you can't scale as Charlotte or Yoko and still want a shortcut, IF, others notice or are nice enough to do so.
5) Longest way through pendulums
Okay so you can't get through the Slogra+Gaibon door as no one is there to open it, now you gotta advance through the last stretch of the castle. To do this you gotta head over to the right of the path 4 door, now you'll need to pass the fire trap (I believe on normal this is not there.) which is simple you wait for it to go out and jump over the hole where the fire is coming up. Kill the bone pillars and flip the lever. This will activate the platform you see below and open the door to the last stretch of the castle. Now in general you have a push button that puts out the fire that is directly above the platform you just activates. If you have two going through this, they can stand on the button while you are up there and let you down to the book and such. If not, you have a couple options, take a hit and jump through the fire.
If you're Soma, you can throw a puppet down and it'll go through the fire safely taking you through after it trades places.
Remember the fire trap? If you had to get through that (which on normal I think it is not there but I rarely go this far on normal), then you can wait for it to go out. Soon as it does, drop down and then go to the right to dodge the fire as it goes up. This is a safe way if you got a timing down as usually, timing is key on most any kind of trap.
Finally, if you can't do any of that or don't want to. You gotta track it around the path 4 door and back over to where the platform you activated was.
Now most of this path is pretty linear with a few turn offs mostly for item chests. So I'm not gonna walk you a step by step through that but once you're up by the Gaibon Water of Life which if you're heading to the boss cannot be missed.
Now you're facing the fire trap and to your right a Gurkha Master. You have two options here. If you don't wanna go all the way to the left boss room door, you have to go the longest possible way through the pendulums. Which is where this is going to tell ya! Go pass that gurkha master and you'll come to a high drop off, you drop down and you've got to I believe go through the pendulums (maybe you could go high up and drop back down to this side but I have only gone this longest way twice.~Besides this is to mention how to get through the pendulums, not how to get back up.~). There is the final water of life here and once you get to the pendulums, you have to slide through and jump. If you do any other combination you're likely to get hit. I've only gotten through safely once and that was after our forum admin here Areku (and a good friend of mine) told us in a party that you gotta slide under the one and then jump it. I got through both unscathed using that logic.
Now if you've gotten through them, you're on the four path location. Up heading back, right heading to open the door near the fire trap, down to open the right side boss door and left to head outside the castle. (If no one scaled the side or used the painting to get the third purple chest you have to go out here and take care of the gaibons at the very least.) To read more about the castle top and the fire timing, read the third path as now essentially, you're at the castle top.
1) Bat Jump[/color]
Okay so I mentioned in Path 2 that you could do other ways besides Julius and Shanoa to get up. That any character with a jump kick could get up and more than one if timed right.
Essentially you see three bats next to the Magnet if you're the first to go through (and no one hit them with Globus or anything else that could have possibly made it to them.), you can jump up there and jumpkick off them as they pass by and get up.
On Normal I've never successfully pulled this off as I only did it on hard and the bats are much slower on normal.
On Hard, you just run to the hole, jump up and jump again then dive kick soon as the bats are under you and then jump up to the stairs up top. Only jump kick once as you kill them with it most of the time if not all the time, plus they'd be gone for a second jump.
It takes timing and practice but if you time it well enough. Me and my one friend did it three-four times in a row together. We ran at the same time and jumped up at the same time, then jump kicked off the bats and landed together.
2) Skull Jump
A few ways you can do this if you aren't skilled with a skull or don't have much practice with skull jumping. You can use the Medusa Head to help. What you do, is jump up into the hole, then use a yorick skull, it'll bounce down off the wall and land directly below you in most every case for the most part. If it's not max, it'll be harder but while you're holding the medusa head here, you let go then dive kick soon as its under you. This will give you plenty of height to get up to the area as long as you don't get too antsy or run out of mp.
The alternative is to jump kick off a skull as it is below the hole, then do it slowly enough that it gets height and jump kick again. This can be done up to four jumps before it vanishes, so get as much as you think you may need in those four jumps but don't jump kick too fast or you'll keep it to the ground. I can sometimes make it first jump kick if I timed it right, others will need two.
If you really want to get up if you jump kick and time it by throwing a puppet up there, it'll work too. I prefer to do it just the yorick way, its easier than the puppet for me but its another option.
3) Skull Jump Assist
Okay so you can now make it up the Shanoa shortcut with Soma, but you got a friend who can jump kick that wants up.
A way that takes a lot of mp but is usually the easiest if your friend is at least somewhat use to jump kicking. You jump up in the whole, medusa head, drop a yorick which should land straight down about 7 out of 10 times. THis will give them a free jump kick on it then if they are fast enough and then as they get above you, you drop another and they can double skull jump up there. This is the most effective way if they can't get enough height with one skull or kick it just as it gets under the whole.
A third option besides just throwing one out for them (which is the second option.) is on the left side above the whole backdash tight to the wall and throw a skull, it'll throw it down the whole and if they catch it, it'll be enough to get up if they can get height with it, sometimes if you keep throwing they can catch another one like the medusa way.
4) Right Door Locked, Soma Can Do It![/b]
Not really a shortcut but this is helpful for a few ways.
1) Everyone jumped down by the right boss room door without opening the boss room lever to open the door to the boss room door.
2) You're soloing for some odd reason with Soma going the long way or you forgot to hit the boss room door.
What you do is jump up in the small narrow corridor, medusa head. Then you throw a yorick skull and jump kick up on it, and then you should be too high in most cases with this if you had good timing, so you'll want to let go just a bit of the medusa head and lock it back up so you can bounce one more skull off the wall and then jump kick on it up to the boss room door lever. This is a life saver if everyone forgets the lever or by chance two people hit it, opening, then closing it.
1) Above the Dullahan, side of the castle
So you're wanting all purple chests. This is possible to get if you don't want to scale the side as well, you only need to bypass or take out the Slogra at the top of the first few jumps, drop grab the purple chest and then drop down by the Dullahan to continue on into the castle deeper. Through the Warg/Zombie infested hallways.
2) Shanoa / Candlestick Chest[/color]
There is a one shot way you can get this with anyone who can jumpkick (again Soma's Yorick can do this just fine but alone without yorick, it's a one shot way.), you have to jump kick off the candlestick move to the left while doing it and then double jump up through a small hole to get to this chest. It is only in the longer path, but if you're going the long way (which is what order these are in.), it is technically the second purple chest you can possible come by.
I'm pretty sure there is a Shanoa magnet here but I never go this way with Shanoa, ever. I'm not sure and honestly until I quickly ran through the level, I didn't even notice it until I was in the boss room. Ironically, then I saw it I'm pretty sure. So if she can, maybe Julius can too, not sure where exactly it was positioned.
Honestly though, unless you can't take a shortcut, its just simpler to get the other three purple chests (1, 3 and 4. Maybe 5 if you get a timing down.) and beat the boss, then repeat. It'll take you longer to hoof it to this one then just shortcutting the level.
3) Top Castle Chest
As stated on path 3. Soon as you make it to the to of the castle from the painting or side, you should see this one. I shouldn't have to tell you how to get it unless you by chance come from the longest path which means you'll have to go outside of the castle from the pendulums which is to the left once you get passed all the pendulums when you get to a three path turn off. (technically four but you wouldn't need to know to go back as you won't!)
4) Right Boss Purple Chest
If you're at the right boss room door. You will have seen this one in a small crevice, now Soma can safely get this as he can yorick back up with a good timing. Or he can jump out, throw a puppet and get back up if you wanna stay on the right side of the boss. (which has the safest platforms and most dodging possiblities.) I believe Alucard can use mist and Richter use his spin kick to get back up too. It is even possible to do a side dive kick at the right exact spot to get back up, I have never mastered this technique, it pretty much is like Alucard's mist but more precise timing and any jumpkick character can do it but I have to spend like 2-4 minutes just to get it to come off with constant attempts.
If you want this and can't do any of that, you'll need to drop down, get it and head to the left boss room door.
5) Left Boss Purple Chest
Now you can wait until the boss is dead and go out the left door in the boss room, then head left to a breakable wall and these pendulum/spike traps to get to it. Or if you happen to have gone the long way to the boss and used the left side anyways, you can stop off by it. It's got a bad timing and I've done it a few times successfully but I rarely bother with it.
1) Left side, below the shanoa magnets[/color]
This is in a breakable wall down near the Merman, it is far left next to the merman. It is a hidden area in Symphony of the Night as well. This will contain the first water of life that is accessible here. If you're all going up the shortcut, it might be nice to grab these. Those who scale the walls cannot get water of lives and there is only one along the way with the Shanoa Magnet path.
2) Right side, below the shanoa magnets
As I said "it might be nice to grab these." There is a second one directly to the right of this area, all you have to do is jump over a pendulum to get to it and back. It's simply, easy to miss if you're not really looking and zoomed is close but if you found the breakable wall one just go directly right not changing levels at all.
3) Shanoa Magnet Water of Life[/color]
This one is mentioned in path 2. Though it is just above the lerajie in the upper path when the path branches, it's a dead end with only just a water of life.
4) Gaibon water of life
It is mentioned in path 5 near the end of the stretch and is possible to get from path 3 as well if you don't drop in the fire traps first. Go to your right and kill the gaibon so he does not follow. Now grab the water of life and head back to whatever path you were on! It's technically out of the way when going from the castle top, why I mentioned there is none on the way if you scale the castle wall but this isn't too far.
5) Pendulum Water of life
This one is the longest possible way of path 5. It is in a point of no return unless you skull jump back (too high to get back), so I often do not see many getting this. But if by chance you go the longest way, you should pick it up if you don't have it.
Gaibon
Considering these were bosses in Symphony of the Night as a tag team duo, I put this section here just to say somethings for them. Gaibon seems rather weak to lightning. Maria's baby kittens, I mean white tigers. Shanoa's Acerbatus. The ones at the very top if timed right you can hit them with Summon Gunman as Charlotte. Two spells take them to their second form, and their second form takes two more. So four spells per gaibon.
The first form is very simply based he flies around and when you're close enough he fires five fireballs at you. One after the other in a row, you can use this to your advantage though. You can bounce off of the fireballs of this form which allows you to get up face to face if you're someone like Alucard or such. You can destory them too with anything.
His second form you gotta watch out for as the flames do not let you jump on them, and if you berserk it is an instant kill far as I've seen. Soon as they die, they tend to puff out a flame blast just to try to kill you at the last second. I swear its like clock work.
Note like Imps and such, Gaibons WILL follow you. So do kill them or they will hurt you in the boss battle or hurt others. I swear, it's the biggest annoyance of all time is when Gaibons flood the boss battle. It gets people killed trying to avoid the boss' flies and the gaibons. KILL them if you aggro them.
(GUARDIAN SOUL~ It's a familiar and unlike other familiars, the Gaibon is a pissed off one, least when its maxed. It's not like the white dragon that it attacks when you do, it attacks every few seconds and at whatever it can possible reach. It's on roids! Best familiar, least IMO.)
Slogra
The tag team boy from Symphony of the Night. He gets carried around by Gaibon and dropped on your head in that game, here he just is an annoying jerk. It seems holy does a lot of damage against him. Not sure exactly the weaknesses but it seems to do very well. I use things like Maria's Hymn, Shanoa's Acerbatus(not sure if its just raw power or what but it does good if it hits them multiple times, one spell can knock it into its second form.), R. Fireball to shotgun at him. Up close you'll do like 50-60 dmg per fireball maxed out and all five can take a slogra out both forms in 3-4 uses. IF all hit.
The issue with Slogras are they hit head on, so distance is your best usage. The first form is his Spear Form, he walks back and forth can can charge, then throw a fireball out of his spear (which can be blocked by any hit really.). His second attack with the spear is he lunges forward and stabs you. Once you hit him enough he'll toss his spear and all he does is the same motion. No fireballs, and he head butt you instead of impaling with his spear. No big difference.
(BULLET SOUL~ It's just the Javalin subweapon pretty much.)
You would think this boss is a big ass joke since he is chained up and sitting in the middle of the battlefield. The fault is....his flies hurt like a mofo. Lucky for all of us he is very pattern based, you learn the pattern and you are set. The objective of this boss is to knock all his body parts off and then finally destory the torso. Benefiting for all of us, is that each body part has a different 'hit point' counter on it. So valmanways can hit about ten-twenty spots if you are positioned right. Charlotte's R. Summon Skeleton can do like 800 or so damage if hit right. It's easy to do damage and kill him but without the patterns you're gonna get hurt hard.
His flies have a very solid pattern. They only ever do three things.
DO NOTE: His right foot will hurt you, so you need to slide under it if you're on his left side, wanting back to the right and I've only had this issue with Alucard but the left foot tends to hit Alucard too.
Wall O' Flies
He summons three swarms of flies from top, middle and bottom. If you're on the bottom right, closest to beelzebub, platform. You usually have to either duck under the middle, then jump over the bottom row. Or if it comes middle second and bottom first. Jump over the bottom and then land to duck under the middle. It's very pattern based. You watch which comes first to know which to do first.
The next thing you gotta remember is besides this attack, the hardest to dodge of them all, nothing really hits you from this bottom right platform. The huge swarm doesn't hit you here even if you stand in nearly 100% instances. There is a few exceptions where I've been hit but its rare.
Shield O' Flies
When you first go in he'll have tons of flies swarming around him to 'block' some attacks and keep you back from him. They will go away but they are dangerous to the touch and if you do not kill them fast enough they will tighten together and then fly towards you, trying to directly hit you. No exceptions. It's easy to wipe out with anything thats multiple hit. Globus (Shanoa), Ricchocet Rock (sp? / The Whip Users minus Simon), R. Summon Skeleton (Charlotte), Dragon (Maria's water dragon spell.), Soul Steal (Alucard), and so on. Valmanway too can if you have miser rings. Think maybe even without, I really only blended him once I got miser rings. Gergoth's beam or Fish Head souls due well too against them.
Do note, that when he first starts the shield swarm, two of the flies will be able to hit you on the middle right platform, so if you berserk, don't stand too close to the edge until they pass.
Swarm O' Flies
This is the most common of his fly minions. One thing I'll say though, if you get in his swarm and get combo hit, be ready to use a super potion it hurts like a bitch. If you're Maria or Jonathan, hit the right bumper and guard if you're gonna take a hit, least make it half damage! But you're better off not getting hit of course, then trying to tank.
The pattern with this is, it always hits top, middle, and bottom. So if it spawns on the top first, dodge its transition and get to the top. As it WON'T come back to the top until it hits the middle and bottom and restarts a new swarm.
Though as stated in the Wall of flies you can stay on the bottom right, closest to beelzebub, platform and the swarm completely misses you in every instance, there is a very few times that it hit me there. You don't have to duck to dodge it either really. I stay up and taunt with Charlotte half the time while waiting for it to pass.
-- Shanoa --
Notice the magnet up by his face? She can use that to dodge the flies easy enough. Latch on to it so you face him (can use your weapon towards him and cast spells to him), now anytime a fly swarm or wall comes, you can use your control stick and if you time it right, dodge every single hit. I usually get hit once or twice with Shanoa MAX when I don't leave this magnet.
Her best Glyph against them is the confedore(sp?), the rapiers. I'm dealing like 50-70 damage to beelzebub per hit with them. So I advise using them against him. Globus to clear the shield away if it gets in your way after the intial shield. (I Back dash cancel globus on the middle platform until the flies vanish, then latch onto the magnet and rape him. xP)
-- Soma --
If you're aiming the valmanways at him, make sure you are medusa heading nearly tight to his arm, so you hit his torso, arms, face, every possible spot you can in one go. It should hit about 10 or so spots at least. This will cause him to be like drowned in numbers. If you have miser rings or val+1s, you're gonna be raping him faster than any other weapon. Even if it doesn't do as much you're hitting about 10+ hits every second. Doing much more than anything else.
-- Alucard --
Only things I've personally come across is using Heaven's Swords. Two of them for the special. You can stand on the edge of the middle platform and use the special which will cause nearly 10+ or so hits with it. Doing low I believe but still pretty good damage if you have miser rings at least like myself.
Another tactic is using like Alucard's Sword + Moon Rod. With the alucard sword +1 I jump and swing twice at his feet while soul stealing them and the moon rod is good for the special since it goes a distance. I don't remember the damage as I rarely used it myself.
If you don't have any of that, the Daybreak isn't so bad on him since you can jump and attack twice fast. It's slow but its doable long as you learn to dodge from the above mentioned attacks.
-- Whip Users --
The Ricochet Rock is the best possible subweapon if you have it (sorry Simon), if you back dash it on the middle platform you'll usually end up hitting the bottom left platform and bouncing back hitting the bottom right or such eventually, hitting many times. Usually taking out the shield of flies if aimed somewhat right.
The VERY best thing they can do is Blood Cross or Holy Cross. It does massive damage. My Julius and my friend's Soma killed him in 2-3 duel crushes on hard with little to no other effort from us. As my Julius is under powered and so is my friend's Soma right now. (New player) It's about all they can really do besides throwing the bible mostly.
-- Charlotte --
Stand on the bottom right, closest to beelzebub, platform and jump up summon the R. Summon Skeleton upon his hand, it'll go up his arm, hit his face/torso, drop down and hit his feet as well. Should hit anywhere from like 5-10 hits I believe if I saw it right. Its her boss killer spell, and heavy hitter spell. It makes Charlotte a lovely choice.
-- Yoko --
Same as Charlotte really just use the Holy Lightning with exception of if you feel gusty, do it from his feet so it goes up and hits more spots but his arm to his other arm does good damage too.
-- Maria --
Dragon is wonderful for raping the shield of flies and the white tiger seems to do the most damage with Maria. If you aim it right it will hit from his head down to his feet. Once his feet are gone and such I tend to do the dragon more to hit his arms and torso instead of his torso only. I believe the Hymn probably would do most damage but it's foolish to use that. Remember that she has the right bumper guard if you KNOW you can't dodge like the wall of flies, hit the right bumper and let it do half damage so you don't have to take the full amount.
BULLET SOUL: His soul summons in a fly at level 1, believe at level 2 you have 2. Then like at level 4-5 you have 3, etc.. I think it maxes at about 5 flies? It's been awhile since I used it but they have limited range but they will hit an enemy and keep going, good for hitting a few enemies or a boss with multiple hit points. It doesn't do a lot of damage but it can be useful on some stages, much better than some boss souls. *coughBRAUNERcough*
Everyone spawns together. No unique spawn points.
[/b][/center][/size]Paths
1) Side of the castle.
The very quickest and only possible path honestly for a soloing Charlotte or Yoko is up the side of the side of the castle. Just after the intial few enemies near the draw bridge you can jump up to a point that you see a Slogra and spiked wall with platforms heading up. The pendulums and such up there are harder of course while you're on hard. More appearing or them being faster. The best chance of learning the jumps I'd say is with Simon, Fuma or Maria due to them having smaller hit boxs then others. I personally still can fail it with other characters besides Maria, etc..
The main thing you gotta remember is any of the red or other oddly colored platforms (from the stone castle wall) are breakable and jumping up and down on them lessens the breaking time. I'd personally advise doing a backdash jump then double jump up on the platform until you get use to it too. Essentially if you backdash and jump not long after you go up into the air and a double jump will get you up to the next platform. This allows you to slide out without hitting your head.
Note if you successfully climb the side you WILL have gotten TWIN BEE which is the secret item of this level. If you can't do the scaling read the second path maybe you're a character that can do that! If you scaled the building fine you can read path three since both 1 and 2 intersect at 3.
2) Shanoa Magnets
So you didn't make it up the side of the castle or are just not bothering taking up those breakable platforms from a Yoko or Charlotte. Well after the Dullahan, you'll go through a Warg, zombie and if on hard one Slogra infested hallway and the start of the popular Symphony of the Night. Now just as you head up a small set of stairs to a spot where you can see Shanoa Magnets, this is a secret way to the top of the castle if you can get up there. Now this path was primarily meant for Shanoa, but Julius can jump off of these just the same if you know how to magnet whip. (Julius guide)
However, there is other ways to get up here. Any jumpkicking character can actually make it up here but only one can each game unless really well timed, if they don't have yorick skulls to assist them. Refer to the shortcuts for that. (Both of them are different ways to do this.)
Now you're up here you'll have to take out the volley of enemies. Will be two Gurkha Masters, one slogra for the first batch (on hard- think the slogra is missing on normal?), then two bone pillars and a leraije waiting on the stairs, careful as she sometimes leap on you just as you get to jump up. (berserker mail is a pain if that happens.) After that there is two paths, one leading to the third water of life in the level and the other path leads to what seems to be a dead end. (after you take out one gaibon and a nova skeleton.) But alas, this is NOT a dead end, if you hit the right corner wall up in the top it'll break to reveal a painting that takes you to the top of the castle which links you up with the first path. Both residing now at the top of the castle.
3) Castle Top / Boss Room Doors (right and left)
Whether you scaled the side of the castle or you used the painting, you're at the very top of the castle now. You'll be standing just above beef curry and to your right will be the third purple chest. Now you'll have to take out two Gaibons and three Slogras (Slogras -can- be bypassed, but Gaibons will follow you into the boss room even.) and if you're on Hard there will be a third Gaibon as you enter in the top of the castle. Now you'll have a few options, to do a series of door opens and through fire tricks to get to the right boss room door. Drop to go all around to the left side, which will also allow you to open up path 4 for anyone who can't do the former two. It's very simple honestly once you get a pattern down but you're facing three paths now that you're inside the castle, UP which you can see has pendulums, that way is only if you ended up going the longest possible way through. (path 5)
The right path will lead you to open the door for the fire trap that you'll need to successfully go through to get to the right boss room BUT WAIT! If you don't go to the bottom path and open the door from the lever there, the door by the boss room is not open. So unless you're Soma when you do this, you can't get back and must go to the right boss room door. Now once you open the boss room door, you go back up to where the other door is and jump to the right of it. Now the timing is very different on normal and hard.
Normal: Wait until the fire goes out, drop into that crevice where the fire is going and then walk off that soon as the second one goes out, this gives you enough time to stop and drop again, as the second fire usually lasts too long for how you time it on Hard. And on hard, the first fire starts too fast to do this unless you jump there and I believe you can duck the fire, but never tried it.
Hard: Wait until the first fire is out, but like SOON as it is out make sure you're going, once it is use your double jump when you're inbetween the two fire traps and this will delay it enough for the second to go out.
Now that you got timing, make sure you're ready to push to the left so you can land by the boss room door, now this door is locked so you can't go through or bypassed the fire but if you drop down one more level you'll see a lever, this opens it up for others so not everyone has to go through the fire. Now you can enter the boss room from here. Though if you end up missing the timing and landing down on the fire, or decide to go open up path 4 for another player, just drop down but if you want purple chest, get the fourth purple chest in the level right now. Then drop all the way down, kill or bypass the Slogra and flip the lever opening up Path 4 for anyone who needed it or wanted it. Then continue on to the left over the spikes and through the spittle bone platforms. This'll lead you at the very top to the left boss room door, or if you take the left path, you'll head upon a breakable wall which leads to spikes, pendulums but the final purple chest in this stage.
4) Through slogra + gaibon door
Okay so you couldn't scale it and you couldn't use the magnets or bats or any of the major shortcuts (or even those who scaled the side broke platforms for you.) this specific path is only workable if you have someone who goes all way around in path 5, or those who have made it to the castle top to open the door for you.
After a long truck pass the big rock that is breakable to see a tasty meat inside and pass where Death takes your weapons in Symphony of the Night (which on hard has a Gaibon floating there to get ya), you head up the platform stairs and now you'll need to head to the far left passed nova skeletons. There will be one Gaibon near a gold chest passed some spikes, once he is dead and you go up platforms to the next level you'll see a golden door if someone drops down to open the door, you can head to the left boss room door from here. Skipping almost 40% or more of the stage. This is a great thing if you can't scale as Charlotte or Yoko and still want a shortcut, IF, others notice or are nice enough to do so.
5) Longest way through pendulums
Okay so you can't get through the Slogra+Gaibon door as no one is there to open it, now you gotta advance through the last stretch of the castle. To do this you gotta head over to the right of the path 4 door, now you'll need to pass the fire trap (I believe on normal this is not there.) which is simple you wait for it to go out and jump over the hole where the fire is coming up. Kill the bone pillars and flip the lever. This will activate the platform you see below and open the door to the last stretch of the castle. Now in general you have a push button that puts out the fire that is directly above the platform you just activates. If you have two going through this, they can stand on the button while you are up there and let you down to the book and such. If not, you have a couple options, take a hit and jump through the fire.
If you're Soma, you can throw a puppet down and it'll go through the fire safely taking you through after it trades places.
Remember the fire trap? If you had to get through that (which on normal I think it is not there but I rarely go this far on normal), then you can wait for it to go out. Soon as it does, drop down and then go to the right to dodge the fire as it goes up. This is a safe way if you got a timing down as usually, timing is key on most any kind of trap.
Finally, if you can't do any of that or don't want to. You gotta track it around the path 4 door and back over to where the platform you activated was.
Now most of this path is pretty linear with a few turn offs mostly for item chests. So I'm not gonna walk you a step by step through that but once you're up by the Gaibon Water of Life which if you're heading to the boss cannot be missed.
Now you're facing the fire trap and to your right a Gurkha Master. You have two options here. If you don't wanna go all the way to the left boss room door, you have to go the longest possible way through the pendulums. Which is where this is going to tell ya! Go pass that gurkha master and you'll come to a high drop off, you drop down and you've got to I believe go through the pendulums (maybe you could go high up and drop back down to this side but I have only gone this longest way twice.~Besides this is to mention how to get through the pendulums, not how to get back up.~). There is the final water of life here and once you get to the pendulums, you have to slide through and jump. If you do any other combination you're likely to get hit. I've only gotten through safely once and that was after our forum admin here Areku (and a good friend of mine) told us in a party that you gotta slide under the one and then jump it. I got through both unscathed using that logic.
Now if you've gotten through them, you're on the four path location. Up heading back, right heading to open the door near the fire trap, down to open the right side boss door and left to head outside the castle. (If no one scaled the side or used the painting to get the third purple chest you have to go out here and take care of the gaibons at the very least.) To read more about the castle top and the fire timing, read the third path as now essentially, you're at the castle top.
Shortcuts
1) Bat Jump[/color]
Okay so I mentioned in Path 2 that you could do other ways besides Julius and Shanoa to get up. That any character with a jump kick could get up and more than one if timed right.
Essentially you see three bats next to the Magnet if you're the first to go through (and no one hit them with Globus or anything else that could have possibly made it to them.), you can jump up there and jumpkick off them as they pass by and get up.
On Normal I've never successfully pulled this off as I only did it on hard and the bats are much slower on normal.
On Hard, you just run to the hole, jump up and jump again then dive kick soon as the bats are under you and then jump up to the stairs up top. Only jump kick once as you kill them with it most of the time if not all the time, plus they'd be gone for a second jump.
It takes timing and practice but if you time it well enough. Me and my one friend did it three-four times in a row together. We ran at the same time and jumped up at the same time, then jump kicked off the bats and landed together.
2) Skull Jump
A few ways you can do this if you aren't skilled with a skull or don't have much practice with skull jumping. You can use the Medusa Head to help. What you do, is jump up into the hole, then use a yorick skull, it'll bounce down off the wall and land directly below you in most every case for the most part. If it's not max, it'll be harder but while you're holding the medusa head here, you let go then dive kick soon as its under you. This will give you plenty of height to get up to the area as long as you don't get too antsy or run out of mp.
The alternative is to jump kick off a skull as it is below the hole, then do it slowly enough that it gets height and jump kick again. This can be done up to four jumps before it vanishes, so get as much as you think you may need in those four jumps but don't jump kick too fast or you'll keep it to the ground. I can sometimes make it first jump kick if I timed it right, others will need two.
If you really want to get up if you jump kick and time it by throwing a puppet up there, it'll work too. I prefer to do it just the yorick way, its easier than the puppet for me but its another option.
3) Skull Jump Assist
Okay so you can now make it up the Shanoa shortcut with Soma, but you got a friend who can jump kick that wants up.
A way that takes a lot of mp but is usually the easiest if your friend is at least somewhat use to jump kicking. You jump up in the whole, medusa head, drop a yorick which should land straight down about 7 out of 10 times. THis will give them a free jump kick on it then if they are fast enough and then as they get above you, you drop another and they can double skull jump up there. This is the most effective way if they can't get enough height with one skull or kick it just as it gets under the whole.
A third option besides just throwing one out for them (which is the second option.) is on the left side above the whole backdash tight to the wall and throw a skull, it'll throw it down the whole and if they catch it, it'll be enough to get up if they can get height with it, sometimes if you keep throwing they can catch another one like the medusa way.
4) Right Door Locked, Soma Can Do It![/b]
Not really a shortcut but this is helpful for a few ways.
1) Everyone jumped down by the right boss room door without opening the boss room lever to open the door to the boss room door.
2) You're soloing for some odd reason with Soma going the long way or you forgot to hit the boss room door.
What you do is jump up in the small narrow corridor, medusa head. Then you throw a yorick skull and jump kick up on it, and then you should be too high in most cases with this if you had good timing, so you'll want to let go just a bit of the medusa head and lock it back up so you can bounce one more skull off the wall and then jump kick on it up to the boss room door lever. This is a life saver if everyone forgets the lever or by chance two people hit it, opening, then closing it.
Purple Chests ( 5 )
1) Above the Dullahan, side of the castle
So you're wanting all purple chests. This is possible to get if you don't want to scale the side as well, you only need to bypass or take out the Slogra at the top of the first few jumps, drop grab the purple chest and then drop down by the Dullahan to continue on into the castle deeper. Through the Warg/Zombie infested hallways.
2) Shanoa / Candlestick Chest[/color]
There is a one shot way you can get this with anyone who can jumpkick (again Soma's Yorick can do this just fine but alone without yorick, it's a one shot way.), you have to jump kick off the candlestick move to the left while doing it and then double jump up through a small hole to get to this chest. It is only in the longer path, but if you're going the long way (which is what order these are in.), it is technically the second purple chest you can possible come by.
I'm pretty sure there is a Shanoa magnet here but I never go this way with Shanoa, ever. I'm not sure and honestly until I quickly ran through the level, I didn't even notice it until I was in the boss room. Ironically, then I saw it I'm pretty sure. So if she can, maybe Julius can too, not sure where exactly it was positioned.
Honestly though, unless you can't take a shortcut, its just simpler to get the other three purple chests (1, 3 and 4. Maybe 5 if you get a timing down.) and beat the boss, then repeat. It'll take you longer to hoof it to this one then just shortcutting the level.
3) Top Castle Chest
As stated on path 3. Soon as you make it to the to of the castle from the painting or side, you should see this one. I shouldn't have to tell you how to get it unless you by chance come from the longest path which means you'll have to go outside of the castle from the pendulums which is to the left once you get passed all the pendulums when you get to a three path turn off. (technically four but you wouldn't need to know to go back as you won't!)
4) Right Boss Purple Chest
If you're at the right boss room door. You will have seen this one in a small crevice, now Soma can safely get this as he can yorick back up with a good timing. Or he can jump out, throw a puppet and get back up if you wanna stay on the right side of the boss. (which has the safest platforms and most dodging possiblities.) I believe Alucard can use mist and Richter use his spin kick to get back up too. It is even possible to do a side dive kick at the right exact spot to get back up, I have never mastered this technique, it pretty much is like Alucard's mist but more precise timing and any jumpkick character can do it but I have to spend like 2-4 minutes just to get it to come off with constant attempts.
If you want this and can't do any of that, you'll need to drop down, get it and head to the left boss room door.
5) Left Boss Purple Chest
Now you can wait until the boss is dead and go out the left door in the boss room, then head left to a breakable wall and these pendulum/spike traps to get to it. Or if you happen to have gone the long way to the boss and used the left side anyways, you can stop off by it. It's got a bad timing and I've done it a few times successfully but I rarely bother with it.
Water of Life ( 5 )
1) Left side, below the shanoa magnets[/color]
This is in a breakable wall down near the Merman, it is far left next to the merman. It is a hidden area in Symphony of the Night as well. This will contain the first water of life that is accessible here. If you're all going up the shortcut, it might be nice to grab these. Those who scale the walls cannot get water of lives and there is only one along the way with the Shanoa Magnet path.
2) Right side, below the shanoa magnets
As I said "it might be nice to grab these." There is a second one directly to the right of this area, all you have to do is jump over a pendulum to get to it and back. It's simply, easy to miss if you're not really looking and zoomed is close but if you found the breakable wall one just go directly right not changing levels at all.
3) Shanoa Magnet Water of Life[/color]
This one is mentioned in path 2. Though it is just above the lerajie in the upper path when the path branches, it's a dead end with only just a water of life.
4) Gaibon water of life
It is mentioned in path 5 near the end of the stretch and is possible to get from path 3 as well if you don't drop in the fire traps first. Go to your right and kill the gaibon so he does not follow. Now grab the water of life and head back to whatever path you were on! It's technically out of the way when going from the castle top, why I mentioned there is none on the way if you scale the castle wall but this isn't too far.
5) Pendulum Water of life
This one is the longest possible way of path 5. It is in a point of no return unless you skull jump back (too high to get back), so I often do not see many getting this. But if by chance you go the longest way, you should pick it up if you don't have it.
Enemy Tactics
Gaibon
Considering these were bosses in Symphony of the Night as a tag team duo, I put this section here just to say somethings for them. Gaibon seems rather weak to lightning. Maria's baby kittens, I mean white tigers. Shanoa's Acerbatus. The ones at the very top if timed right you can hit them with Summon Gunman as Charlotte. Two spells take them to their second form, and their second form takes two more. So four spells per gaibon.
The first form is very simply based he flies around and when you're close enough he fires five fireballs at you. One after the other in a row, you can use this to your advantage though. You can bounce off of the fireballs of this form which allows you to get up face to face if you're someone like Alucard or such. You can destory them too with anything.
His second form you gotta watch out for as the flames do not let you jump on them, and if you berserk it is an instant kill far as I've seen. Soon as they die, they tend to puff out a flame blast just to try to kill you at the last second. I swear its like clock work.
Note like Imps and such, Gaibons WILL follow you. So do kill them or they will hurt you in the boss battle or hurt others. I swear, it's the biggest annoyance of all time is when Gaibons flood the boss battle. It gets people killed trying to avoid the boss' flies and the gaibons. KILL them if you aggro them.
(GUARDIAN SOUL~ It's a familiar and unlike other familiars, the Gaibon is a pissed off one, least when its maxed. It's not like the white dragon that it attacks when you do, it attacks every few seconds and at whatever it can possible reach. It's on roids! Best familiar, least IMO.)
Slogra
The tag team boy from Symphony of the Night. He gets carried around by Gaibon and dropped on your head in that game, here he just is an annoying jerk. It seems holy does a lot of damage against him. Not sure exactly the weaknesses but it seems to do very well. I use things like Maria's Hymn, Shanoa's Acerbatus(not sure if its just raw power or what but it does good if it hits them multiple times, one spell can knock it into its second form.), R. Fireball to shotgun at him. Up close you'll do like 50-60 dmg per fireball maxed out and all five can take a slogra out both forms in 3-4 uses. IF all hit.
The issue with Slogras are they hit head on, so distance is your best usage. The first form is his Spear Form, he walks back and forth can can charge, then throw a fireball out of his spear (which can be blocked by any hit really.). His second attack with the spear is he lunges forward and stabs you. Once you hit him enough he'll toss his spear and all he does is the same motion. No fireballs, and he head butt you instead of impaling with his spear. No big difference.
(BULLET SOUL~ It's just the Javalin subweapon pretty much.)
BOSS ALERT: Beelzebub
You would think this boss is a big ass joke since he is chained up and sitting in the middle of the battlefield. The fault is....his flies hurt like a mofo. Lucky for all of us he is very pattern based, you learn the pattern and you are set. The objective of this boss is to knock all his body parts off and then finally destory the torso. Benefiting for all of us, is that each body part has a different 'hit point' counter on it. So valmanways can hit about ten-twenty spots if you are positioned right. Charlotte's R. Summon Skeleton can do like 800 or so damage if hit right. It's easy to do damage and kill him but without the patterns you're gonna get hurt hard.
His flies have a very solid pattern. They only ever do three things.
DO NOTE: His right foot will hurt you, so you need to slide under it if you're on his left side, wanting back to the right and I've only had this issue with Alucard but the left foot tends to hit Alucard too.
Wall O' Flies
He summons three swarms of flies from top, middle and bottom. If you're on the bottom right, closest to beelzebub, platform. You usually have to either duck under the middle, then jump over the bottom row. Or if it comes middle second and bottom first. Jump over the bottom and then land to duck under the middle. It's very pattern based. You watch which comes first to know which to do first.
The next thing you gotta remember is besides this attack, the hardest to dodge of them all, nothing really hits you from this bottom right platform. The huge swarm doesn't hit you here even if you stand in nearly 100% instances. There is a few exceptions where I've been hit but its rare.
Shield O' Flies
When you first go in he'll have tons of flies swarming around him to 'block' some attacks and keep you back from him. They will go away but they are dangerous to the touch and if you do not kill them fast enough they will tighten together and then fly towards you, trying to directly hit you. No exceptions. It's easy to wipe out with anything thats multiple hit. Globus (Shanoa), Ricchocet Rock (sp? / The Whip Users minus Simon), R. Summon Skeleton (Charlotte), Dragon (Maria's water dragon spell.), Soul Steal (Alucard), and so on. Valmanway too can if you have miser rings. Think maybe even without, I really only blended him once I got miser rings. Gergoth's beam or Fish Head souls due well too against them.
Do note, that when he first starts the shield swarm, two of the flies will be able to hit you on the middle right platform, so if you berserk, don't stand too close to the edge until they pass.
Swarm O' Flies
This is the most common of his fly minions. One thing I'll say though, if you get in his swarm and get combo hit, be ready to use a super potion it hurts like a bitch. If you're Maria or Jonathan, hit the right bumper and guard if you're gonna take a hit, least make it half damage! But you're better off not getting hit of course, then trying to tank.
The pattern with this is, it always hits top, middle, and bottom. So if it spawns on the top first, dodge its transition and get to the top. As it WON'T come back to the top until it hits the middle and bottom and restarts a new swarm.
Though as stated in the Wall of flies you can stay on the bottom right, closest to beelzebub, platform and the swarm completely misses you in every instance, there is a very few times that it hit me there. You don't have to duck to dodge it either really. I stay up and taunt with Charlotte half the time while waiting for it to pass.
-- Shanoa --
Notice the magnet up by his face? She can use that to dodge the flies easy enough. Latch on to it so you face him (can use your weapon towards him and cast spells to him), now anytime a fly swarm or wall comes, you can use your control stick and if you time it right, dodge every single hit. I usually get hit once or twice with Shanoa MAX when I don't leave this magnet.
Her best Glyph against them is the confedore(sp?), the rapiers. I'm dealing like 50-70 damage to beelzebub per hit with them. So I advise using them against him. Globus to clear the shield away if it gets in your way after the intial shield. (I Back dash cancel globus on the middle platform until the flies vanish, then latch onto the magnet and rape him. xP)
-- Soma --
If you're aiming the valmanways at him, make sure you are medusa heading nearly tight to his arm, so you hit his torso, arms, face, every possible spot you can in one go. It should hit about 10 or so spots at least. This will cause him to be like drowned in numbers. If you have miser rings or val+1s, you're gonna be raping him faster than any other weapon. Even if it doesn't do as much you're hitting about 10+ hits every second. Doing much more than anything else.
-- Alucard --
Only things I've personally come across is using Heaven's Swords. Two of them for the special. You can stand on the edge of the middle platform and use the special which will cause nearly 10+ or so hits with it. Doing low I believe but still pretty good damage if you have miser rings at least like myself.
Another tactic is using like Alucard's Sword + Moon Rod. With the alucard sword +1 I jump and swing twice at his feet while soul stealing them and the moon rod is good for the special since it goes a distance. I don't remember the damage as I rarely used it myself.
If you don't have any of that, the Daybreak isn't so bad on him since you can jump and attack twice fast. It's slow but its doable long as you learn to dodge from the above mentioned attacks.
-- Whip Users --
The Ricochet Rock is the best possible subweapon if you have it (sorry Simon), if you back dash it on the middle platform you'll usually end up hitting the bottom left platform and bouncing back hitting the bottom right or such eventually, hitting many times. Usually taking out the shield of flies if aimed somewhat right.
The VERY best thing they can do is Blood Cross or Holy Cross. It does massive damage. My Julius and my friend's Soma killed him in 2-3 duel crushes on hard with little to no other effort from us. As my Julius is under powered and so is my friend's Soma right now. (New player) It's about all they can really do besides throwing the bible mostly.
-- Charlotte --
Stand on the bottom right, closest to beelzebub, platform and jump up summon the R. Summon Skeleton upon his hand, it'll go up his arm, hit his face/torso, drop down and hit his feet as well. Should hit anywhere from like 5-10 hits I believe if I saw it right. Its her boss killer spell, and heavy hitter spell. It makes Charlotte a lovely choice.
-- Yoko --
Same as Charlotte really just use the Holy Lightning with exception of if you feel gusty, do it from his feet so it goes up and hits more spots but his arm to his other arm does good damage too.
-- Maria --
Dragon is wonderful for raping the shield of flies and the white tiger seems to do the most damage with Maria. If you aim it right it will hit from his head down to his feet. Once his feet are gone and such I tend to do the dragon more to hit his arms and torso instead of his torso only. I believe the Hymn probably would do most damage but it's foolish to use that. Remember that she has the right bumper guard if you KNOW you can't dodge like the wall of flies, hit the right bumper and let it do half damage so you don't have to take the full amount.
BULLET SOUL: His soul summons in a fly at level 1, believe at level 2 you have 2. Then like at level 4-5 you have 3, etc.. I think it maxes at about 5 flies? It's been awhile since I used it but they have limited range but they will hit an enemy and keep going, good for hitting a few enemies or a boss with multiple hit points. It doesn't do a lot of damage but it can be useful on some stages, much better than some boss souls. *coughBRAUNERcough*
