Shovel Knight

2014-06-26 11:44:54 pm

Ruling the cosmos!

I couldn't tell you, but I have to ask something. I was talking to Mr. K earlier, and he said that you can select which relic you have equipped on the Wii U's gamepad screen, so you don't have to pause like you would have to in the Steam version. Can you do that on the 3DS version as well? If you can, then the Wii U and 3DS versions should be completely faster than the Steam version.

Liquid

2014-06-26 11:55:59 pm

I'm routing out this game for 100%, and I'll upload a list of the collectables on here when I'm finished with that. I'll be out this weekend, so that will be happening next week.

100% interests me mostly due to almost every item having some use in this category. There are some very cool skips in this game, most of which utilize the Propeller Dagger. That being said, I found some skips for the Dust Knuckles, Phase Locket, and the Mobile Gear as well.

There are two back-to-back skips in the Tinker Knight's Stage I found that uses the Mobile Gear to bypass an auto scrolling section. It's pretty easy, too. In the big room filled with spikes that carries you through on a big platform, you can just drop a Mobile Gear on the spikes, hop over the wall, and repeat to roll through the entire room. Just watch out for the vicious flying thing in the first half of the room. May not be worth grabbing the Gear for any%, but it's a solid time save if you're grabbing the Gear anyways.

Ganrokh

2014-06-27 12:00:01 am

Correct, on the 3DS version you can switch relics on the fly just by tapping a relic on the bottom screen. It's pretty much second nature to me, I couldn't imagine having to pause on the Steam version every time to switch a relic.

I also avoided soft-locking phase 2 Tinker Knight this time by not touching the left side of the screen when I defeated phase 1. Weird bug.

Copilot

2014-06-27 12:03:19 am

Ruling the cosmos!

That's pretty great, actually. To be honest, I feel like the only difference between any% and 100% is getting a the extra stuff that's useless, because it's looking like we might end up getting a lot of the items in any%. I'm writing this under the assumption that you didn't read the rest of the thread very thoroughly, which is understandable, it's long. But the Flying Dagger is something that we'll be getting in any%, as it's too useful. We were also looking at the Mobile Gear because it OHKO's Tinker Knight first phase, but this skip makes it sound like we have to get it. Other things we were considering include the Dust Knuckles, because it's ability to phase through enemies is invaluable, the Fiery Wand, because it can very effectively deal with bosses, and the Phasing Locket, because it has the potential to allow more skips due to it's property of cancelling your downward momentum when used in the air.

Also, if you look above, somewhere, Mr. K has a spreadsheet set up listing all of the upgrades and how much they cost.

That's pretty great, actually. To be honest, I feel like the only difference between any% and 100% is getting a the extra stuff that's useless, because it's looking like we might end up getting a lot of the items in any%. I'm writing this under the assumption that you didn't read the rest of the thread very thoroughly, which is understandable, it's long. But the Flying Dagger is something that we'll be getting in any%, as it's too useful. We were also looking at the Mobile Gear because it OHKO's Tinker Knight first phase, but this skip makes it sound like we have to get it. Other things we were considering include the Dust Knuckles, because it's ability to phase through enemies is invaluable, the Fiery Wand, because it can very effectively deal with bosses, and the Phasing Locket, because it has the potential to allow more skips due to it's property of cancelling your downward momentum when used in the air.

Also, if you look above, somewhere, Mr. K has a spreadsheet set up listing all of the upgrades and how much they cost.

Copilot

2014-06-27 12:07:18 am

Ruling the cosmos!

But anyway Liquid, any skips that you find using the items could be useful in any categories, so if you have a way to record any skips you find, please do, all the help we can get is amazing.

Mr. K

Edit history:

Mr. K: 2014-06-27 12:17:18 am

Mr. K: 2014-06-27 12:14:38 am

Mr. K: 2014-06-27 12:11:57 am

Mr. K: 2014-06-27 12:09:17 am

Mr. K: 2014-06-27 12:09:08 am

2014-06-27 12:08:56 am

Yes

Regarding the Tinker Knight soft lock, it happens if you land on the exact same frame that he hits the ground:

Please turn down the volume on your computer speakers before watching this came out a bit too loud:

YCG confirmed on Twitter this bug will be patched at the next opportunity. Also if you're on the far left side of the screen you don't fall down when Tinker Knight crashes the floor on Wii U/3DS I believe so try and avoid being in the very far left corner.

Regarding relic switching: YCG has mentioned a desire to add an update to switching relics with buttons with a future update, but for the time being 3DS and Wii U have an advantage over the steam release.

Edit: I'll work on spreadsheets for song scrolls, item collection, and in-game timer research done over the weekend

Liquid

2014-06-27 12:10:42 am

Those spreadsheets are going to be extremely helpful. Thanks to Mr. K.

I'm sifting through the thread right now, and it's really cool to hear that so many of the items will see use in any%. I'll most likely run both categories. Right now I'm finding all the Music Sheets. If you guys need help finding anything in the game, hit me up.

I'll update with any skips I find whenever I can. Hopefully this thread blows up by the time I get back on Canada Day.

Copilot

Edit history:

Copilot: 2014-06-27 01:56:00 am

2014-06-27 01:54:30 am

Ruling the cosmos!

Here we go, I actually got the quick kill this time. This clip is also good, because you can see that he has a chance of hitting you while you're going over to the right, but that doesn't interfere with getting the quick kill, and is RNG, so it won't always happen, but it can, and won't matter much in the end.

You can also see that I did have to adjust my trajectory very early to account for his jumping, but I'm not yet sure if when he jumps is random or based on a time cycle, but if it's random then getting this kill consistently will be a giant pain.

Laqr

2014-06-27 02:08:59 am

Otherwise known as Sake__

Finishing my casual run tomorrow; I'll start looking through routing asap after. Which relics are we currently expecting to pickup within the respective stage at the moment, if any? I'm not really seeing this in the thread.

Copilot

2014-06-27 02:17:13 am

Ruling the cosmos!

We've been talking about that the whole time. If you look at my post that's the thick paragraph a little ways up on this page, I summarize everything we've talked about in relation to that topic.

NME

2014-06-27 02:50:05 am

Finished the casual run last night. Immediate thought while playing was that the fiery wand is almost always the weapon of choice, with occasional switches to anchor.

As discussed, the traversal options with knux, mobile gear (bleh), and phase are intriguing. Sort of imagine mobile gear being used like the ice platform in Mega Man X in that it will be for specific skips and, in this case, that Tinker OHKO.

Excited to be out in front of a game as its being broken down and optimized. Great work already all.

Copilot

2014-06-27 02:59:31 am

Ruling the cosmos!

Just started routing King Knight's stage a bit, and I can say that he seems almost impossible to beat with the low health and without the Flare Wand (I've apparently been calling it by the wrong name), so I think it's definitely a must get. And it'll probably help the Specter Knight fight quite a bit as well, given how mobile he is. Plus, I don't see the Phasing Locket as being that useful unless we find something extremely massive. Money's tight in this part of the game anyway, and we only have just enough to spend. What I'm doing is using the 1000 gold from Black Knight to get the Flare Wand, and then the 1500 from King Knight, as well as another 1000 from breaking 4 or 5 checkpoints in the stage, in order to get the meal first meal ticket from the Goatician and a magic upgrade. After that I'm thinking the money from Specter Knight and anything I get from the dream sequence (and if I fall short from the dream sequence, then I can get more in Mole Knight's checkpoints) to get the dust knuckles out of Mole Knight's stage, and after that just save money for getting more magic upgrades and maybe the charge slash if that proves to be worthwhile. After that all we really need is the Flying Dagger and the Mobile Gear, which we'd get more than enough money for just from the bosses.

Sound good?

Just started routing King Knight's stage a bit, and I can say that he seems almost impossible to beat with the low health and without the Flare Wand (I've apparently been calling it by the wrong name), so I think it's definitely a must get. And it'll probably help the Specter Knight fight quite a bit as well, given how mobile he is. Plus, I don't see the Phasing Locket as being that useful unless we find something extremely massive. Money's tight in this part of the game anyway, and we only have just enough to spend. What I'm doing is using the 1000 gold from Black Knight to get the Flare Wand, and then the 1500 from King Knight, as well as another 1000 from breaking 4 or 5 checkpoints in the stage, in order to get the meal first meal ticket from the Goatician and a magic upgrade. After that I'm thinking the money from Specter Knight and anything I get from the dream sequence (and if I fall short from the dream sequence, then I can get more in Mole Knight's checkpoints) to get the dust knuckles out of Mole Knight's stage, and after that just save money for getting more magic upgrades and maybe the charge slash if that proves to be worthwhile. After that all we really need is the Flying Dagger and the Mobile Gear, which we'd get more than enough money for just from the bosses.

Sound good?

Copilot

2014-06-27 03:26:48 am

Ruling the cosmos!

Okay, now that I think about it more, I think te Charge Slash might not end up being a good investment. It jut costs way too much, and right now it's looking like getting it will require the sacrifice of either a magic upgrade or time through collecting extra gold. What I'm shooting for is getting the second and third magic upgrades just after the second dream sequence, which would be about 6000 gold in itself, it we would have to get about 15000 or so gold just in that second area just to get the charge slash on top of the magic upgrades, and honestly, the flare wand makes up for any damage we might miss out from the charge slash.

CaptainNeuro

Edit history:

CaptainNeuro: 2014-06-27 03:29:43 am

2014-06-27 03:28:37 am

The Belligerent One

The shovel charge move seems situational at best, from what I've played with. Outside of having a slightly longer reach to to chug through large sets of 1x1 blocks ever so slightly quicker, though, it does nothing special, especially when you take the decreased mobility while charging into account. It's not worth the investment in any% as you're probably so tight on money anyway. It just feels like either an unnecessary trip back to the town or needless delaying of prop to me.

I can still see the locket being potentially very useful, but you'd be playing a completely different playstyle as it eats up too much magic to make the wand alongside it really viable. I think it still deserves a lot of looking into, though, especially earlier on before you have dagger.

As for the King fight, I've noticed he's very, very susceptible to pogoing in the corners. At that point the only real worry is confetti which isn't hard to avoid, even with him stomping about. It's the Spectre Knight that gives me issues, but the fire wand and a little bit of good luck with avoiding the scythe's (quite possibly fourth dimensional and non-euclidian) hitbox makes it painless enough.

The shovel charge move seems situational at best, from what I've played with. Outside of having a slightly longer reach to to chug through large sets of 1x1 blocks ever so slightly quicker, though, it does nothing special, especially when you take the decreased mobility while charging into account. It's not worth the investment in any% as you're probably so tight on money anyway. It just feels like either an unnecessary trip back to the town or needless delaying of prop to me.

I can still see the locket being potentially very useful, but you'd be playing a completely different playstyle as it eats up too much magic to make the wand alongside it really viable. I think it still deserves a lot of looking into, though, especially earlier on before you have dagger.

As for the King fight, I've noticed he's very, very susceptible to pogoing in the corners. At that point the only real worry is confetti which isn't hard to avoid, even with him stomping about. It's the Spectre Knight that gives me issues, but the fire wand and a little bit of good luck with avoiding the scythe's (quite possibly fourth dimensional and non-euclidian) hitbox makes it painless enough.

Copilot

Edit history:

Copilot: 2014-06-27 03:47:25 am

2014-06-27 03:47:15 am

Ruling the cosmos!

I can see where you're coming from with the locket. It can potentially speed up levels massively, whereas the flare wand only speeds up boss fights, for the most part. I still have my doubts about it, mostly out of how short the invulnerability is, but it has potential.

As for the King fight, pogoing is really slow, most because of how high you jump. I've found that wailing on him rapidly tends to drop his health down a lot quicker. About 60% of the way through the fight, he does a move where he dashes across the screen, and I save my magic for that part, since the extended range in godlike. After that I just continue to wail on him and spam fireballs, I think he might have patterns, I'm too busy not noticing him. And I usually finish that fight before he even goes into the animation to spawn the confetti, so that shouldn't be a problem.

Quote:

the scythe's (quite possibly fourth dimensional and non-euclidian) hitbox

Also this is a great line.

barinelg

2014-06-27 03:58:23 am

I trip over my own feet in game.

Ok here's my first level routing. Just placing it here for a general location and for people to review and see if there's anything worthwhile or worth noting. I didn't really get any money during the run, and a few hits/semi-blah boss fight, but yeah.

Copilot

2014-06-27 04:08:22 am

Ruling the cosmos!

Seems solid. The first level's really simple, there really isn't much to do with it, just little optimizations here and there. The only real big part of that level is the Black Knight fight, but even what happened with you there I would say is actually say is pretty good, I'd be okay with something like that.

Edralo Orunitia

2014-06-27 04:13:45 am

Yeah nice video. Here's some of the optimisations I can think of :

At 0:18, isn't it better to break the block while jumping to not be stopped? (if yes, maybe do so all the time, like on 1:06 with the upper block to destroy)

0:33 Maybe pogo the checkpoint to get to the platform faster?

And at 1:01, on this screen you can skip the ladders by jumping

Copilot

2014-06-27 04:15:13 am

Ruling the cosmos!

Quote:

0:33 Maybe pogo the checkpoint to get to the platform faster?

Trust me, I've tried a lot, doesn't work.

Quote:

And at 1:01, on this screen you can skip the ladders by jumping

I agree with this, it bothered me. Also, jump when you get on ladders to fall almost instantly, significantly faster.

barinelg

2014-06-27 04:19:04 am

I trip over my own feet in game.

Quote from Edralo Orunitia:

At 0:18, isn't it better to break the block while jumping to not be stopped? (if yes, maybe do so all the time, like on 1:06 with the upper block to destroy)

I'll give it a shot.

Quote:

0:33 Maybe pogo the checkpoint to get to the platform faster?

Yeah I tried it a lot too. It doesn't work. I was hopeful though.

Quote:

And at 1:01, on this screen you can skip the ladders by jumping

For some reason I didn't think to try just jumping. Appreciate the tip. Smiley

barinelg

2014-06-27 04:22:38 am

I trip over my own feet in game.

Quote from Edralo Orunitia:

At 0:18, isn't it better to break the block while jumping to not be stopped? (if yes, maybe do so all the time, like on 1:06 with the upper block to destroy)

Ok you were correct; this is much faster.

Captainneuro

2014-06-27 04:48:37 am

I can get around about 2:42 on the first levelwith an apicultural black knight, I think. The run is very similar to that video with some tweaks. For instance, if you pogo chain after the checkpoint 2, you can skip that entire ladder climb.

I'll get a video up tonight after work. I'm pretty confident that 2:40 should be EASY after perfecting the corraling BK to the corner for a quick kill.

Jaguar King

Edit history:

Jaguar King: 2014-06-27 06:17:19 am

Jaguar King: 2014-06-27 06:16:13 am

Jaguar King: 2014-06-27 06:14:57 am

Jaguar King: 2014-06-27 06:14:42 am

2014-06-27 06:14:13 am

so this is spector stage as fast as I can, just to give you an idea how to play this. keep in mind its not fully optimized yet and the boss fight is horrible

NintendoSuicide

2014-06-27 11:43:42 am

Wow I am surprised to already see so many strats out for this game, only having been out for a day (two if you were a backer). Then again, this IS SDA.

I have a couple of notes from my attempts to speedrun last night I definitely think could help to share. Not everything is optimized for low-end of any%, just a "this feels pretty well for mid-level running w/o use of glitches and exploits".

There were five items that I found help either with quick boss kills, or easy area skips. Phase Locket (for obvious reasons), the Anchor (helps primarily against Propeller Knight, Black Knight 2, and Enchantress when they are out of reach), the Ground gear (obvious OHKO w/ Tinker Knight, as well as a bypass for the spiked horizontal autoscroll segment of his stage), Knuckle Duster (to bypass larger enemies and the armored knights), and Propeller Blade (for dashing "exploits"). Most of these aren't needed during their respective stages except for maybe Knuckle Duster, Propeller Blade, and the Anchor (since those three do not require going too far out of the way to get) you can get them in the village for about 3,500 gold instead of 3,000. The merchant has them in his inventory after you beat a stage regardless if you find him or not.
I also found that the silver armor upgrade worked well in place of getting the charged attack, as all you have to do is get two consecutive pogos on anything and you immediately have a fully charged attack without the speed reduction of the charged blade ability. Since it does a full pip worth of damage to bosses rather than your standard half pip with regular attack, it definitely helps to get in a quick extra hit against bosses like Enchantress 2 (bounce on her head till she dashes, then on the way down, use the charged attack for a full pip hit), Mole Knight, and especially Polar Knight. That replaces the need for any of the upgrades aside the ground strike, which is helpful but not as necessary.
For a more high risk strat, the speed armor may be more of an ideal speedrun item to get. I have not tested it yet, so I don't know how well of a speed boost it gives.

Since the game gives you two or three Meal Tickets, it'd be an easy pick up to use the catapult to the village from the later stages and pick all of them up in one go, as well as 1 to 3 magic upgrades (I found 2 to be a lucky number for my run, 50 magic points total). It's about a 3-5 minute detour, but definitely helps with the safe strat runs when you don't feel confident about only having 4 health.

Since money is tight in the game, I found that if you know you can get through some sections without worrying about dying, it's worth the risk to destroy some checkpoints as you go through the stages to get some extra gold.

I'm definitely going to stream some Shovel Knight tonight to continue to optimize as much as I can, but I'll definitely keep tabs in here as well.

Wow I am surprised to already see so many strats out for this game, only having been out for a day (two if you were a backer). Then again, this IS SDA.

I have a couple of notes from my attempts to speedrun last night I definitely think could help to share. Not everything is optimized for low-end of any%, just a "this feels pretty well for mid-level running w/o use of glitches and exploits".

There were five items that I found help either with quick boss kills, or easy area skips.  Phase Locket (for obvious reasons), the Anchor (helps primarily against Propeller Knight, Black Knight 2, and Enchantress when they are out of reach), the Ground gear (obvious OHKO w/ Tinker Knight, as well as a bypass for the spiked horizontal autoscroll segment of his stage), Knuckle Duster (to bypass larger enemies and the armored knights), and Propeller Blade (for dashing "exploits"). Most of these aren't needed during their respective stages except for maybe Knuckle Duster, Propeller Blade, and the Anchor (since those three do not require going too far out of the way to get) you can get them in the village for about 3,500 gold instead of 3,000. The merchant has them in his inventory after you beat a stage regardless if you find him or not.
I also found that the silver armor upgrade worked well in place of getting the charged attack, as all you have to do is get two consecutive pogos on anything and you immediately have a fully charged attack without the speed reduction of the charged blade ability. Since it does a full pip worth of damage to bosses rather than your standard half pip with regular attack, it definitely helps to get in a quick extra hit against bosses like Enchantress 2 (bounce on her head till she dashes, then on the way down, use the charged attack for a full pip hit), Mole Knight, and especially Polar Knight. That replaces the need for any of the upgrades aside the ground strike, which is helpful but not as necessary. 
For a more high risk strat, the speed armor may be more of an ideal speedrun item to get. I have not tested it yet, so I don't know how well of a speed boost it gives.

Since the game gives you two or three Meal Tickets, it'd be an easy pick up to use the catapult to the village from the later stages and pick all of them up in one go, as well as 1 to 3 magic upgrades (I found 2 to be a lucky number for my run, 50 magic points total). It's about a 3-5 minute detour, but definitely helps with the safe strat runs when you don't feel confident about only having 4 health.

Since money is tight in the game, I found that if you know you can get through some sections without worrying about dying, it's worth the risk to destroy some checkpoints as you go through the stages to get some extra gold.

I'm definitely going to stream some Shovel Knight tonight to continue to optimize as much as I can, but I'll definitely keep tabs in here as well.

Copilot

2014-06-27 11:54:10 am

Ruling the cosmos!

Alright, so I'm basically just going to be routing this game all day, nothin' but. I might or might not finish it today, but I'll get as far as I can. I'll be busy all of tomorrow, so I won't have time for this, but from Sunday on I'll be putting every bit of free time I have into this game, so hopefully I'll start having optimized runs out in a few days. And if y'all want, I can post my strats for each individual stage on Youtube and send it y'all's way, or I can at least do the strats for the boss fights.

Also, at NintendoSuicide, I agree with the use of the Dynamo Armor, but overall pogoing tends to be slower, so we probably won't be pogoing much on bosses anyway. I can dig how it'd be useful on Enchantress 2, but I think with creative use of the Flying Dagger we can combo her infinitely anyway. As for the Axe, that should also be under heavy consideration, as it does help the fights your mentioned by a siginificant amount. The only problem I have with it is that it is expensive to use, it requires quite a bit of magic, possibly making it impractical, and on some of those fights, particularly Propeller Knight, I'm sure we could kill him before use of the item would become necessary, but we'll see when we get there.

Also, if you care, my idea for the meal tickets was to make a return trip to the Village after the first two dream sequences, buying one meal ticket the first time and one magic upgrade, and then another one after the second dream sequence buying two magic upgrades and spending that one last meal ticket. I feel like two trips wouldn't slow down the run too much, and it would give us more than enough magic to afford to use the Dagger whenever we need to, and 7 life is pretty good, I'd say.

Alright, so I'm basically just going to be routing this game all day, nothin' but. I might or might not finish it today, but I'll get as far as I can. I'll be busy all of tomorrow, so I won't have time for this, but from Sunday on I'll be putting every bit of free time I have into this game, so hopefully I'll start having optimized runs out in a few days. And if y'all want, I can post my strats for each individual stage on Youtube and send it y'all's way, or I can at least do the strats for the boss fights.

Also, at NintendoSuicide, I agree with the use of the Dynamo Armor, but overall pogoing tends to be slower, so we probably won't be pogoing much on bosses anyway. I can dig how it'd be useful on Enchantress 2, but I think with creative use of the Flying Dagger we can combo her infinitely anyway. As for the Axe, that should also be under heavy consideration, as it does help the fights your mentioned by a siginificant amount. The only problem I have with it is that it is expensive to use, it requires quite a bit of magic, possibly making it impractical, and on some of those fights, particularly Propeller Knight, I'm sure we could kill him before use of the item would become necessary, but we'll see when we get there.

Also, if you care, my idea for the meal tickets was to make a return trip to the Village after the first two dream sequences, buying one meal ticket the first time and one magic upgrade, and then another one after the second dream sequence buying two magic upgrades and spending that one last meal ticket. I feel like two trips wouldn't slow down the run too much, and it would give us more than enough magic to afford to use the Dagger whenever we need to, and 7 life is pretty good, I'd say.