From Software 'n such

[Obscura]

I actually reached that fight a few days ago, but haven't even given it a serious attempt yet.
From people's reports, it sounds like I should just stay away as long as possible.

EDIT: I just randomly watched one of the many Facebook ads for this game, and was a little surprised by the English voice acting. The game defaults to Japanese, and I didn't even realise anything else was an option.
It feels very apt due to the setting, but I always really liked the English voice acting in pretty much all the Souls games. Did anyone here try the English voices, and if so, how do they stack up?

When the game launched the first time, it immediately gave me a pop-up saying "weeb voices are default because if you buy this you're probs a weeb" and the first thing I did was went in the menu to change them to English. The English voices seemed fine to me, but I rarely notice voice acting good or bad, so I might not be the best judge.

[Blinge]

Hahah I did that. Infinite stamina life.

English VA? Squires playing with them, I took the weeb option.

English has MY NAAAAAAME
which will be a meme, or should be..

[Obscura]

Needs music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PGNiXGX2nLU

[Sumez]

So weeby to play something with the voices it was originally designed for

[Obscura]

Listening to a language you don't understand because it was the original is really weeb, yes.

[Steamflogger Boss]

God tier bait.

[wgogh]

Listening to a language you don't understand because it was the original is really weeb, yes.

Listening to a language I don't understand because it was the original was how I learned english.
Just saying, non native english speakers might have a different point of view about that.

[Blinge]

oof them cyan robed guys don't fuck around.

Also I had a couple of gos at headless but jesus F I have no idea what to do.
Is it as simple as taking a suppressant?

Gonna leave that one for a while I guess..
I'd prefer a cryptic hint than a straight answer, by the by...

Also as for the request by the medical chap

Spoiler

I don't wanna send that guy to him! Seems like something wolf boi wouldn't do!

[Durandal]

oof them cyan robed guys don't fuck around.

Also I had a couple of gos at headless but jesus F I have no idea what to do.
Is it as simple as taking a suppressant?

Gonna leave that one for a while I guess..
I'd prefer a cryptic hint than a straight answer, by the by...

As the crystal shines
Eat the magic spaghetti
Do not grow witless

[Blinge]

haha amazing!

Spoiler

an EEL? y/n?

[Sumez]

No, something a little more

Spoiler

festive

(check item descriptions)

[Blinge]

Oh. hm.

Spoiler

Thought I'd already tried the confetti. Maybe i died too quick to see its effect

Okay, I thought

Spoiler

elite dressing gown bitch boi in the dojo

was one of the hardest minibosses I'd met so far, but on my 3rd attempt I realised you just have to triple tap block as soon as he moves in the slightest pixel, haha!

Aaand now I've met Genchiro again. omfg this fight is so amazing nerdgasm I'm so rock hard for this game I'm done for the day.
Tomorrow, tomorrow..

[Necronopticous]

Headless is hard even with all the bells & whistles that help you fight him. There is really no way around learning to deflect all of his weird attacks. I do not recommend using any consumable resources against him until you are feeling confident there. It took me many tries. I posted a video on my YouTube if you get curious but there is a prosthetic tool spoiler in it.

[Sumez]

Couldn't find any other lose ends, so yesterday I had to engage that one boss fight everyone has been complaining about. (Ashina Castle boss)

And honestly, he's not that bad.

It definitely took a lot of tries, but it probably felt worse than it was due to how long winded the fight is. The fact that you can quite easily block pretty much all of his attacks makes it extremely manageable.

I started out trying a few different aggressive tactics, and experimenting with a bunch of different prosthetic weapons, none of which made a difference. But at the end I settled for just playing completely defensive, which took a little patience, but made the fight quite easy. For anyone who cares, here's what I did:

Spoiler

For the first two deathblows I just block every incoming attack, tapping the button now and then to deflect what I can. It's hard to really get any damage back at him at this point since he will block almost anything. You can try to side-step some of his attacks and get back at him, but it's pretty risky.
Instead just wait for him to do his unblockable grab attack, which is extremely easy to see coming, as he will start out running at you, trying to push you into a wall (oh yeah, keep your back free). Just stop blocking and move backwards until you are at a safe distance, but still close enough to hit him, and have at him with your strongest attack while he's busy missing with his grab. This will most likely stun him, allowing you to get a few more hits in.

He will only take a little damage every time, but with enough patience you can get him down to half a lifebar without taking any damage yourself. At this point his posture regeneration will be severely damaged, and you can just wail at him even while he's blocking Basically just keep doing aforementioned defensive strategy, but launch an attack at pretty much any time he's not doing anything you need to block. This will quickly take him into the deathblow state.
Just repeat the process for the second deathblow, and you should have a lot of gourds left for the second phase.

The second phase is a lot more dangerous, but honestly it's also a lot easier, faster, and more fun.
He will be less defensive, so you can pretty much repeat the strategy used to take down his posture on the previous phase and you will quite often get a damaging hit in. You just gotta watch out for his "kanji attacks", which I found was very hard to read. I still can't tell which is a grab, a sweep or a thrust, so it's better just to get out of the way. He also has a really fast unblockable grab, which is very hard to see coming, and feels a little unfair.
However, he will also very frequently do his lightning attack, which is very easy to anticipate, and very easy to dodge. Even countering a single one of those will do a ton of damage to him, so I guess if you are running low on health you can just go on the defense and wait for him to throw one of these at you.

I still think the game's "mid-bosses" are by far the most frustrating part. All the "story bosses" so far have been super manageable.

[Sumez]

Okay, I thought

Spoiler

elite dressing gown bitch boi in the dojo

was one of the hardest minibosses I'd met so far, but on my 3rd attempt I realised you just have to triple tap block as soon as he moves in the slightest pixel, haha!

For this one, I just poisoned him and let his lifebar dwindle until he couldn't restore his posture, and then just let him wail on me.

[rapoon]

Couldn't find any other lose ends, so yesterday I had to engage that one boss fight everyone has been complaining about. (Ashina Castle boss)

And honestly, he's not that bad.

It definitely took a lot of tries, but it probably felt worse than it was due to how long winded the fight is. The fact that you can quite easily block pretty much all of his attacks makes it extremely manageable.

I started out trying a few different aggressive tactics, and experimenting with a bunch of different prosthetic weapons, none of which made a difference. But at the end I settled for just playing completely defensive, which took a little patience, but made the fight quite easy. For anyone who cares, here's what I did:

Spoiler

For the first two deathblows I just block every incoming attack, tapping the button now and then to deflect what I can. It's hard to really get any damage back at him at this point since he will block almost anything. You can try to side-step some of his attacks and get back at him, but it's pretty risky.
Instead just wait for him to do his unblockable grab attack, which is extremely easy to see coming, as he will start out running at you, trying to push you into a wall (oh yeah, keep your back free). Just stop blocking and move backwards until you are at a safe distance, but still close enough to hit him, and have at him with your strongest attack while he's busy missing with his grab. This will most likely stun him, allowing you to get a few more hits in.

He will only take a little damage every time, but with enough patience you can get him down to half a lifebar without taking any damage yourself. At this point his posture regeneration will be severely damaged, and you can just wail at him even while he's blocking Basically just keep doing aforementioned defensive strategy, but launch an attack at pretty much any time he's not doing anything you need to block. This will quickly take him into the deathblow state.
Just repeat the process for the second deathblow, and you should have a lot of gourds left for the second phase.

The second phase is a lot more dangerous, but honestly it's also a lot easier, faster, and more fun.
He will be less defensive, so you can pretty much repeat the strategy used to take down his posture on the previous phase and you will quite often get a damaging hit in. You just gotta watch out for his "kanji attacks", which I found was very hard to read. I still can't tell which is a grab, a sweep or a thrust, so it's better just to get out of the way. He also has a really fast unblockable grab, which is very hard to see coming, and feels a little unfair.
However, he will also very frequently do his lightning attack, which is very easy to anticipate, and very easy to dodge. Even countering a single one of those will do a ton of damage to him, so I guess if you are running low on health you can just go on the defense and wait for him to throw one of these at you.

I still think the game's "mid-bosses" are by far the most frustrating part. All the "story bosses" so far has been super manageable.

Spoiler

My favorite part of the Genshiro fight was how varied his movesets were from fight to fight. He has 3 perilous attacks, I saw him perform the grab you mentioned, maybe twice..
since I've beaten him, I watched a few videos of other players taking him down. one guy got him in a corner and mashed r1 and beat the shit out him.
I'm a little confused, if you're holding down block you're taking posture damage, not dealing any..... there are a lot of vids showing people trying this tactic and going into the red within 10 - 20 seconds of the fight; particularly if he kicks or does his jumping bow attack (that attack alone is half your posture). personally, I used bloodborne tactics and dodged 90% of the time.

I agree the third phase is faster and more fun, but sure as shit isn't easier. the lighting attack is very easy to read and dodge, but harder to pull a reversal on. Anytime I tried to heal, he'd cross the screen with a thrust, so I just healed after a reversal. The duration is definitely the biggest contributing factor to it's difficulty.

[Sumez]

Spoiler

My favorite part of the Genshiro fight was how varied his movesets were from fight to fight. He has 3 perilous attacks, I saw him perform the grab you mentioned, maybe twice..

Spoiler

It's kind of weird, because the first few times I fought him, his pattern would also be very different, but once I started forming a strategy, he would mostly repeat the same few moves. What he does is very much in reaction to what you are doing, and I could never get him to repeat any of his other perilious moves consistently enough to predict them. The sweep would come unexpectedly maybe once per battle, so I never got to counter it even once. Meanwhile he would repeat attempting grab to no end. If you follow the strategy I wrote above (stay close and block), he definitely will!
I never figured out what entices him to perform the sweep or the jump followed by a thrust, so they were never frequent enough for me to rely on.

More curiously though, I've found the subweapons only worked once, and when I came back they weren't as effective. Not sure what I did different. More specifically I was able to easily poison him the first time I tried (by getting attacks in while he can't block), but I could never get it to work after that. Also, the first time I tried the spear, it would damage him even while he's blocking, but subsequently I couldn't get that working again either.

I'm a little confused, if you're holding down block you're taking posture damage, not dealing any..... there are a lot of vids showing people trying this tactic and going into the red within 10 - 20 seconds of the fight;

You need to actively attack him to effectively damage his posture, but as long as he's attacking you it won't be able to recover at all, so the main idea is just to keep him busy at all times once his health gets low enough (pretty standard approach for this game it seems).
The damage done to your posture as you block attacks is rarely serious. He's not aggressive enough for it to push you over as long as your health is above 50%. Your posture recovers faster while you're blocking (opposite of Souls), and by tapping block as he attacks you'll most likely reflect enough attacks to prevent too much posture damage (it won't give any openings for retaliating though).

the lighting attack is very easy to read and dodge, but harder to pull a reversal on. Anytime I tried to heal, he'd cross the screen with a thrust, so I just healed after a reversal. The duration is definitely the biggest contributing factor to it's difficulty.

As long as you don't jump to the sides (evading the lightning entirely), the window for pressing R1 is really large and hard to fail. And even if you don't fail it, you still won't take damage as long as you are in the air as it connects.

[Sumez]

Went back to a few older posts to dig up some untouched points:

If there's never a reason not to pick up loot, then why have to hold a button, it could just fly to you automatically, even after a brief delay.

There's a tiny advantage with the money balloon items, since they don't apply to enemies dropping money, but the money you pick up (unlike the loot balloon).
So you can clear out an entire area of enemies without picking up anything, pop a balloon and then vacuum up all the moneys for the bonus.

My only real issue with the game is this dragon rot rubbish.
[...]
I actually don't understand what the point of this mechanic is, i.e. what was the fun gameplay meant to be derived from it?

Anyone feel like touching on this? I don't get it either.
So you find the cure to the rot very early on, but I haven't even used it once, as I don't see the point, mechanically. The consumable you use to do it is somewhat rare, and I know that the next time I run into a boss that kills me 20 times in a row everyone will just contract the rot again anyway.
Having a low chance of "unseed aid" really doesn't feel like something that's worth gambling for since even from the outset, the chance of receiving it is only like 20-30% or something?
What I do is just making sure to invest all of my money before entering any boss fight, and if my exp bar is close to hitting one more skill point, I'll kill a few dudes until it rolls over. That way my frankly inevitable death won't have any consequences.

I guess it's this game's counterpart to "humanity", but it comes across as even more useless.
I imagine there might be some sort of story relatated implication though? Maybe related to the game's endings. So far no one has died on me.

[Durandal]

There seem to be some exceptions for NPCs contracting Dragonrot on your death, since

Spoiler

I've died god knows how often in my attempts to beat Genichiro but nobody wound up getting teh dragonaids. I guess if you die in a major boss fight it doesn't really count to Dragonrot spread

[Sumez]

Can disprove. I think pretty much every dragonrot spread I've caused has been during a boss fight, including at least two major ones. Makes sense too, as that's where you are most likely to die.

In fact,

Spoiler

after my very first attempt at Genchiro, I immediately got like three new dragonrot notifications (about people I haven't even met)

[Necronopticous]

I finished the game for the first time earlier tonight. Here’s what you need to know about Dragonrot:

1) Despite what the game tells you, your NPCs will not die to my knowledge, even if left with the disease.

2) The affected NPCs will be prevented from giving you dialogs. This can block typical Souls-style time/situation sensitive questlines until cured.

3) The different endings of Sekiro are highly contingent on NPC questlines.

4) There are far more than enough Dragon’s Blood Droplets in the game to cure the disease freely. I cleared it after nearly every part where I got stuck and died a lot and I ended with 10 to spare.

Hope this helps. Honestly, you don’t have to worry about it much unless you are really trying to push questlines forward, seek out lore, or target a specific ending.

[rapoon]

Spoiler

It's kind of weird, because the first few times I fought him, his pattern would also be very different, but once I started forming a strategy, he would mostly repeat the same few moves. What he does is very much in reaction to what you are doing, and I could never get him to repeat any of his other perilious moves consistently enough to predict them. The sweep would come unexpectedly maybe once per battle, so I never got to counter it even once. Meanwhile he would repeat attempting grab to no end. If you follow the strategy I wrote above (stay close and block), he definitely will!
I never figured out what entices him to perform the sweep or the jump followed by a thrust, so they were never frequent enough for me to rely on.

More curiously though, I've found the subweapons only worked once, and when I came back they weren't as effective. Not sure what I did different. More specifically I was able to easily poison him the first time I tried (by getting attacks in while he can't block), but I could never get it to work after that. Also, the first time I tried the spear, it would damage him even while he's blocking, but subsequently I couldn't get that working again either.

It's entirely random what perilous attack he performs after the jump, and half the time he'll do nothing at all. Also, firecrackers work but there's a brief cool down before he'll respond to them.

You need to actively attack him to effectively damage his posture, but as long as he's attacking you it won't be able to recover at all, so the main idea is just to keep him busy at all times once his health gets low enough (pretty standard approach for this game it seems). The damage done to your posture as you block attacks is rarely serious. He's not aggressive enough for it to push you over as long as your health is above 50%. Your posture recovers faster while you're blocking (opposite of Souls), and by tapping block as he attacks you'll most likely reflect enough attacks to prevent too much posture damage (it won't give any openings for retaliating though).

You've clarified that you were also doing a lot of deflecting as well which makes sense; I got the impression you were doing nothing but blocking. yes, your posture recovers more quickly when block but it's not instant; there needs to be several seconds of not being attacked before it begins to reduce. as far as him not being aggressive, I distinctly remember several fights where he performed the 7-hit combo and after the push, he immediately transitioned into his aerial bow attack. posture = red, in my experiece. anyways, it's been fun watching vids of people taking him out. there's quite a few different strategies now.

As long as you don't jump to the sides (evading the lightning entirely), the window for pressing R1 is really large and hard to fail. And even if you don't fail it, you still won't take damage as long as you are in the air as it connects.

He's got three lightning attacks. that's pretty ballsy not to jump to the side; the overhead attack will hit you even if you're in the air.

[rapoon]

Took out

Spoiler

4 monkeys last night. Bit of a joke

Headed to sunken valley and was dismayed to see another

Spoiler

Snake Eyes lurking about. Gave me far less trouble than the other in the depths. If they land it, their perilous attack is a mother fucker.

[Blinge]

Harr Harr, On 3rd attempt I beat

Spoiler

Genichiro in the tower

And was ready to suck my own dick but then *that* happened.

Headless and Sashimi warrior or w/e are a bit fucking annoying tbh.
The slowdown effect for heady boy just makes me want to fck it off for later, again.

[Necronopticous]

Harr Harr, On 3rd attempt I beat

Spoiler

Genichiro in the tower

It only took me two, but I had already spent hours

Spoiler

beating him in the tutorial

so I had plenty of practice.

[Sumez]

Harr Harr, On 3rd attempt I beat

Spoiler

Genichiro in the tower

And was ready to suck my own dick but then *that* happened.

Spoiler

Does that mean you just reached the second form, or did you genuinely beat him on the third attempt?

[Blinge]

The former m8

[Illyrian]

Spoiler

So i decided that a Fromsoft game wasn't going to 'beat' me and started playing again. After doing some side stuff and beating some extra minibosses I came back to Genichiro in the Pagoda again and finally put him down after what must have been 50 attempts.

I also realised i had not bought a single ashina combat upgrade so I was basically just with upgraded stealth and prosthetics. After getting some combat upgrades as well the fight finally got done.

I still say it is too tough for where it is in the game though given it is the second proper boss only.

Really glad I came back and did it though!

[Sumez]

If this was only the second "proper" boss for you, you must have missed something.
Have you been to Hirata Estate?

[Illyrian]

If this was only the second "proper" boss for you, you must have missed something.
Have you been to Hirata Estate?

Yeah but you don't get 'Shinobi Execution' for killing the drunk guy and the door after his fight arena is locked.

I am talking about fights you get the execution message for.