Bonfireside Chat 137: Ashina Castle
Added 2019-06-02 17:38:13 +0000 UTCThis episode takes us through Ashina Castle, starting at the Blazing Bull and culminating in a rematch with Genichiro to secure the Divine Heir Kuro. Then we get a big lore dump, and learn the true mission of the game.
This is fair warning that we are beyond the spoiler wall, since it's impossible to talk about some things here without putting them in end-game context.
Comments
The 2 snake eyes and Orin mini bosses cough when they get poisoned and give a large opening it also keeps their posture from regenerating which is nice with Orin. It's hard to do till you get the piercing or lazulite version tho unless you use firecrackers also.
Ashby Shifflett
2020-09-28 01:00:15 +0000 UTCJust wanted to say thank you Gary and Kole for all your hard work; I have been following you guys for years and you both have been objective and fun. Thanks again!
Astral11
2019-06-10 18:31:52 +0000 UTCIf you still want to do a Buddhism/Shinto episode, please try to get in contact with u/sarumaro. He's made some incredible posts that have greatly added to my enjoyment of the story https://www.reddit.com/r/Sekiro/comments/be13vx/sekiro_history_and_folklore_buddhist_holy_or_not/?utm_source=reddit-android
Johnathan Vassar
2019-06-06 06:18:06 +0000 UTCA completely pedantic and pointless point (the best kind). In the Genichiro cutscene after defeating him it seems clear in the Japanese (not that that's necessarily the 'ultimate' meaning or anything) that he's not referring to his mother when he says 'for her sake'. In Japanese the sentence prior is like 'ashina no tame' (for Ashina's sake). Then the next sentence, translated as 'her' says 'sono tame' - for that purpose. So safe to say the 'she' is Ashina. I think the English translation refers to Ashina as she a few times too.
Matthew Turnbull
2019-06-05 12:36:42 +0000 UTCBfsc - the coolest part about the castle to me is just how much the game opens up. It’s ridiculous really. You can pretty much go anywhere you want. I remember talking to others on my first play through and literally nobody I talked to had beaten the same bosses/ mid bosses or gone to the same areas as I did and that was really neat. Then the world wraps around (not each individual areas so much but the entire world) on itself so much it’s pretty surreal. There are quite a few undead parish to firelink shrine moments in this game that I really hope you guys didn’t miss and were able to appreciate because it’s a piece of art really - A lot of ppl complained about the bull. I had no issues with it. It killed me once or twice , all you have to do is chase it around and smack it on the ass. You literally run around in circles chasing its butt and it’s a very simple fight. - So with the mini boss up the Ashina Castle stairs that has all the gun men around him...what I did naturally as I always do is I looked for a way to get a stealth attack on him. I did what Kole mentioned in passing. I went to the roofs. The gunmen enemies are two hit kills each. I already had a knack for using the shuriken then the follow up attack immediately afterwards that closes the distance between you and your target. So imagine this because it’s beautiful and believe it or not just happened naturally. I went to the roofs. Listened to the speech. Then went around the backside of the General on the roofs. I jumped down and got an air death blow on the General draining one of his bars. This attack animation is long. It gives you time to lock onto your next target. So after his death blow I locked into the closest gun man and threw a shuriken, closed the distance, hit him once, then got a death blow. You also cannot be hit during death blows. So I did the same to the next. Locked on, shuriken, closed distance, death blow, rinse and repeat for all the gun men. So this is how it looked and felt. I jumped at the end of the speech, death blow, ninja star, death blow , ninja star death blow, and went in a circle clearing all the gun men until the General with one health bar was all that was left and I hadn’t even been hit. It was magnificent and one of the ingenious ways of killing that made me love this game. I wish you guys were able to experience what I did. You could also just do it the Dave Klein way and throw shuriken from a distance to kill all the gun men as they only take two or three to die. - The nightjars are specifically Isshins personal ninjas so they’re enemy placement later in the game matters. - Again I apologize but have to wholeheartedly disagree about prosthetics and their upgrades. Oil and fire barrel slaughters the General mini bosses and mister seven spears. Then the monkey axe with the first upgrade is perfect for the nightjar. You do 3 heavy swings in a row without being able to be staggered, it immediately depleted their posture and basically turned them into 1 hit KOs for me. I could take up to 3 on at a time thanks to that. You just had to be willing to eat a bit of vitality damage. - Once in the castle, after you fight the two elites and have to go into the ceiling to get around the locked door...there is a Gachiin candy up there. So think of that candy as a rat spy sitting up in the ceiling watching the elites. - The sabimaru is specifically useful on the enemies in the divine dragons world. The Okami warriors. One hit pretty much kills them. It’s also useful on the snake eyes mini bosses as they are descendants of the Okami warriors from the divine realm - Somebody probably pointed this out but when it came to black hat you were both talking about the same skill. Projected force is in a skill tree not from black hat, it does both things you guys mentioned with different prosthetics. The skill from black hat is the anti air death blow. - Those cannoniers you guys mentioned are actually from the sunken valley. If you notice they’re all bandaged up just like the sunken valley clans men (who are not susceptible to the sabimaru btw) and you can find these guys again in the poison pool. Also there’s one before the ogre. What in the hell are they doing here you might wonder. Well so do I lol. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that there are also nightjars in the sunken valley for some reason - There are two easy ways to beat the elite mini boss. One is to literally run in circles always to his left and hit him after he dies his attack. His attacks will never hit you if you run right by his left side. Another way is the mist raven feathers. You use that as soon as he attacks and you end up behind him to land some hits. Very easy. - I agree with just about everything you guys said about Genichiro, I’d just like to add that he seems to be the perfect boss to need to be able to beat before going on with the second more spread half of the game. - About Kuro’s coughing. If you open the window next to him in the library he will thank you but only if you do it before you speak to him. Random rare dialogue. He’ll also recognize the Hirata bell if you haven’t used it yet. Also random and useless
Jessie joy
2019-06-05 07:04:48 +0000 UTCI really wish that emblems just replenished. I'd experiment a lot more if that were the case. And vis a vis grinding, I don't do it. The odiousness I'm reporting is mostly from people grousing in the slack. -GB
Duckfeed.tv
2019-06-05 00:20:29 +0000 UTCIMPORTANT BFSC NOTICE TO YOU MY FRIENDS.......the old lady is not associated with mibu balloons as you can also use a jizu statue or a dragon blood droplet to get the dialogue and items from her. She specifically wants you to pray with her and that’s exactly what you do. By that I mean when you use (mibu balloons, jizu statue, dragon blood droplets) you take a prayer stance and that is why she reacts to these things(: hope this was something new Ps the “eel warriors “ are actually Okami warriors. Those are the ppl that are weak to sabimaru.
Jessie joy
2019-06-04 22:08:22 +0000 UTCInteresting you all brought up grinding for coin/items. I was listening to that part while in fact farming a late game upgrade item. Took less than 10 minutes. Obviously as you all stated, everyone will have a different tolerance for grinding but I’ve certainly spent much more time killing Phalanxes in the Painted World to get my Endurance where I wanted it. Speaking of the Shinobi tools, after a break from the game for a bit I’ve come back and decided to avoid using the shuriken or the firecrackers (unless it’s a fight like lady butterfly). I’ve found that once you don’t feel the need to use the more obviously helpful tools, some of the weirder ones can be pretty fun. Not necessarily very often, just fun and cool to use. Feels pretty cool to feather mist away from an enemy to counter attack, or wreck somebody’s posture with the loaded umbrella while poison eats at their vitality. The big thing though being confident you’ll be fine if you run out of spirit emblems during a fight, which clearly won’t apply to everyone
Eli Leslie
2019-06-04 21:05:38 +0000 UTCSee also: "If you shinobi by now" to the tune of "If you don't know me by now" by Simply Red. Jesus.
Lewis Shaw
2019-06-04 19:20:50 +0000 UTCSo I actually decided to throw a shuriken at the underwater Headless, expecting some big fish miniboss to surface. Instead, the Headless' name popped up and the music started playing, so I flipped out and tried swimming away. I didn't see what killed me, but after fighting it underwater, I'm pretty sure I got hit with all of its seeking shots without seeing them. It ended up being the only Headless I killed before giving up on the game, mostly because I didn't need to re-up Divine Confetti to harm it (I ran out for most other fights).
Sid Menon
2019-06-04 16:54:18 +0000 UTCThe first encounter with a Nightjar divebomber to me is one of the most shockingly hilarious moments in gaming. All signs point to danger accompanying strange new sounds, and it is a strange sound indeed, but nothing at this point has conditioned us to look up for a threat. The last thing we expect while we freeze and look around for the source of this unsettling new sound is to be fucking obliterated by what might as well be an asteroid for all we can learn about it in the split second it takes to kill us. I couldn't help but laugh out loud and chuckle for a few minutes. It's been my favorite death so far. Just as satisfying was learning to use the mist Raven Feather to avoid the asteroid attack, then punishing them for their outrageous attempt on my life. It helps steel the nerves against the enemies around the corner and their ability to close distance. I'm on NG+2 now and have still never successfully pulled off a lightning reversal against Genichiro even though I breeze past him now. I also never tried. Maybe it was RNGesus watching over me but he never landed a lightning attack so I never felt the imperative to learn, and while he was so committed to a move that was largely ineffective against me I was able to dispatch him easily enough when I finally reached the stage where he would use it. Incedentally, I found Wolf to be even more dangerous to aquatic enemies than he is to terrestrial ones. I struggled to dispatch a Headless on land, but it felt like a breeze underwater because Wolf can close range so quickly. It's so interesting, the variety of responses to a given encounter in From games. One player's miniboss can be another player's Moby Dick. I remember watching in frustration as my brother in law breezed through Dancer of the BV while I would continue to bash my head against her for days. Good times.
Bird.wav
2019-06-04 10:39:48 +0000 UTCSince getting this game, I keep having 'Ashina is a punk rocker, Ashina is a punk rocker, Ashiiina iiiis a punk rocker now' go through my brain.
Lewis Shaw
2019-06-04 04:52:43 +0000 UTCIn my first play, I had gone through every branch and done everything I knew I could do before Geni, so I had to sort of resolve myself. It took a couple of hours for sure and I was cranky. But, though the balance was off, it's probably the boss I came closest to experiencing the artorias effect a lot of people are getting from many of the bosses. -GB
Duckfeed.tv
2019-06-04 00:06:04 +0000 UTCThe lightning counter was really cool when I could do it, but often like Gary I was stuck in an action queuing that locked me into something else, I found that happened a lot in this game and it's more unforgiving than other From games for that. I was surprised at how positive it sounded like you were about that fight from the trouble and time it took the 1st time. I also beat it on the 2nd or 3rd try on my 2nd playthru but again can't remove the memory of the 1st. "this will only be a moment" HA, it took me HOURS. If my 1st experience with Genichiro could have felt like the one on my 2nd playthru I would have felt way more positive overall. Also I literally couldn't double-tap my left index finger fast enough for Jinsuke 1st time out. I cheesed him with Sabimaru. 2nd time I tried holding just the left side of the controller and using my right hand to deflect and was able to get it a better, but was still too awkward/fast. I guess I'm just getting too old? (Fuck me I guess right?)
Limowreck
2019-06-03 23:44:51 +0000 UTCThat lightning counter seems like some real cilantro effect. I did it perfectly every time just from instinct somehow, never even thought about it. This isn’t a brag, the game kicked my ass in plenty of other ways. Just interesting how that works, From finds your weakness.
Joelle
2019-06-03 19:12:45 +0000 UTCI think they both do! But without the ability to block terror, I've never been able to bait the Shichimon into jumping, and by that point, I might as well just throw it back in their face with projected force.
Duckfeed.tv
2019-06-03 18:35:38 +0000 UTCBlack Hat Badger also sells the anti-air deathblow skill. Sounds like you guys may have mixed up projected force with that skill as it also trivializes the Shichimon Warrior fights.
MikAC108
2019-06-03 17:19:31 +0000 UTCThere's actually a different tool tip that we mention, but I can't find the exact phrasing right now. But yeah, the lightning hoppers are susceptible.
Duckfeed.tv
2019-06-02 21:21:28 +0000 UTCThe Okami clan are actually those blue guardian ladies in Fountainhead, and the Sabimaru totally wrecks their shit
Michael McCormick
2019-06-02 20:56:23 +0000 UTCKuro does blow the Reed whistle the first time you get close to the roof before the fight with Genichiro. It’s very easy to miss and I didn’t notice it at first because I was scrambling away from all the enemies. when I heard it I assumed it was an enemy noise and it happened right before the cutscene that plays before the fight and I’m pretty sure it doesn’t play the next time you run up there until a NG. but upon further playthroughs I’ve noticed it’s the reed whistle. it’s a weird detail since it’s so easy to miss and so inconsequential
Karl Germ
2019-06-02 20:51:37 +0000 UTCI can’t remember what video I saw it on but it pointed out a really cool moment between the two cutscenes for both Genichiro fights. In the first fight, when wolf reaches for his swords he stumbles through drawing it. The second time he confidently draws it, ready to throw down. The first time wolf fights him, wolf is rusty and off his game. The second time they meet wolf has resharpened his abilities and he faces genichiro as an equal. I didn’t notice it at first but on my second play through I thought it was a cool, subtle character moment.
iropati
2019-06-02 20:48:20 +0000 UTC
