Mini-guide

[BalefulFrog]

This game is too obscure for it to be worth the effort to make a full guide, however, there’s very little out there for guidance so I wanted to give some pointers by making this mini-guide.

 

The roadmap is quite flexible - you can do any stage in any order. You may want to do this as it might feel repetitive to play the same campaign twice in a row. Note that the trophies listed for each section assume that you follow the written order; if you do a different order, some will unlock in different stages. If anything needs clarifying or is incorrect, be sure to let me know. Read any of my comments below in case I've made a modification.

 

Roadmap

Stage 1: Castle Hammerwatch Medium + Co-op at the end

Castle Hammerwatch is the first campaign. You need to beat it on medium with no crutches on (toggleable through the modifiers menu when starting the campaign). Trophies are not stackable, so the medium difficulty trophies will not pop if you are playing on hard. Before you start the final boss (by going through a portal on floor 12), you will want a second player to join so you can get ‘The Co-op Dragon’ without having to do a full multiplayer campaign. Either host the game online and find someone to join, or press the options button on another controller to join. ‘Not Alone’ seems to only pop for online co-op, so you may be required to do this at some time.

 

Trophies: The Queen, The Knight, The Lich, The Dragon, Not Alone, The Co-op Dragon.

 

Stage 2: Castle Hammerwatch Hard + Missables

You need to beat the campaign again on hard (again without crutches), while getting all the missable secrets. You can freely move within acts (sets of 3 floors: 1-3, 4-6, 7-9, 10-12) but not between acts. Before fighting the boss of each act, make sure you have all the secrets that belong to that act. Use this excellent steam guide for all of the secrets: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=171395205. Make sure not to use the 'Portal! (No return)' secret as this will cause you to miss the floor 1 & 2 secrets. You need to get all the planks since you need to have all of them at the end of the campaign to unlock the 'Survivalist' trophy.

 

Trophies: The Hard Queen, The Hard Knight, The Hard Lich, The Hard Dragon, Harvesting, The Heist, Earth & Void, Doomed Space Marine, Survivalist, Midway, The Grisly Combination.

 

Stage 3: Temple of the Sun Medium + Co-op at the end + Secrets

You need to beat the other campaign, Temple of the Sun, on medium with no crutches. Again, you will want a second player to join just before the final boss to get the co-op trophy. The final boss begins when you go through the red portal in the top area of the outside area. The secrets in this campaign aren’t missable, except for maybe one, so you can get these after beating the final boss. Use this steam guide for the secrets: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=314688049

The one that might be missable is ‘Do it like Jones’. Read the guide for this secret when you first reach Temple Floor 2 so you know what to do.

 

Trophies: The Dune Sharks, The Frost Sorcerer, The Sun Guardian, Do it like Jones, Serious Pickup, Daniel the Traveler, Desert Zone…, Pyramid of Fear, Temple of the Sun, Full House, The Co-op Sun Guardian.

 

Stage 4: Temple of the Sun Hard

You need to beat this campaign again on hard with no crutches.

 

Trophies: The Hard Dune Sharks, The Hard Frost Sorcerer, The Hard Sun Guardian.

 

Stage 5: Survival

In this mode, you start with a fresh character and have to mine crystals by attacking them to buy upgrades in the shop. See the ‘Survival’ section of the Castle Hammerwatch steam guide above for the shop location. Progressively harder enemies will spawn all around the map, and eventually the boss himself will come to face you. The Survival mode is bugged in the playstation version as the circle’s warning you of incoming stalactites may not appear. Additionally, you cannot exit the shop in online co-op as the non-host will have their game freeze. You will almost certainly want to abuse some bugs to get these done, otherwise prepare for a lot of frustration.

 

General notes

The ranger is a good character for this mode. You will want to unlock their second ability (the vine one) as this is very useful for getting out of situations where you may be cornered or surrounded. Apart from that, you will mostly want to buy damage upgrades, piercing upgrades and extra lives.

 

The game is prone to crashing if too many enemies are on the screen. If at any point you are camping, try to go out and about during the stalactite gaps to lure enemies over and kill them. If you have been camping for a long time and are going to an area you haven’t been to, move very slowly to make sure you don’t load too many enemies at once and crash the game.

 

Strategies/bug abusing

Playing legitimate

This is obviously the most difficult strategy. The main method to avoid the invisible stalactites is to get an understanding of how the bug works. When the screen shakes, nearby circles usually show up if you are still-ish, but distant ones very rarely do. So, whenever the screen shakes, try to stay in the same location if you can’t see any circles, or, move just outside the circle if one appears on top of you. You should start by running around the map and farming crystals. Eventually, it will become too chaotic, so at a certain point you will want to camp below the crystal below the boss where no stalactites fall. Prepare to lose ~1 hours work in a second if you try to do this legitimately.

 

Using online to get infinite lives

Host an online survival game. Play as usual until you get 1000 crystals. Once you do, go to the shop. In the shop, invite the player, get them to buy an extra life and then leave. Then, invite the player again. They will have their crystals reset, so they can buy a life again. Repeat this until you have enough lives to feel comfortable. Do this again when you have collected more than 1000 crystals in total (this way the joining player will be able to buy >1 life per join) and buy >99 lives. This should make the mode very easy as you can play fairly carelessly.

 

Using online to have a stacked character

Host a private online game. Invite a player while in the starting room that has the life. They should be able to join using a character that has already been upgraded from a campaign. The non-host should hide in the room with the shop portal, while the other player plays normally. This trophy will pop for both players, so either player can be the host. Note that you cannot go to the shop as this will freeze the game for the non-host when you leave, so you need to do this with the starting lives only.

 

Using local to build a stacked character

Start a local survival game with only 1 character. Once you are in the game, join with another controller using the options button. Make note of which character slot you use to join. Play normally until you get 800 crystals. Then, go to the shop and buy a health upgrade for the second player. Leave the shop. Use an ability as the second player and quit while you have less than full mana. Load the survival back up, and make the second player join again using options. Select the same character. This character should now have retained that upgrade and crystals from. From now on, this second player will keep crystals and shop upgrades between runs. Keep having attempts, mining crystals, and buying upgrades. You will likely keep failing but this second player will accumulate upgrades and keep getting stronger each run. Eventually, the second player will be strong enough to carry the whole run. Note that crystals are saved for the second player, so you can play a few runs to gather crystals and then buy lots of lives on the run which you are going to give a serious attempt.

 

You will need to do this on medium with no crutches, hard with no crutches, and in co-op. Note that in online co-op, you cannot leave the shop nor join mid-game, so the infinite life strategy will not work for the co-op trophy. Similarly to the campaign, a local co-op player can join mid-game if you are not playing an online game, meaning that they can join right before the boss is killed to pop the co-op trophy. However, this is only applicable if you are doing it legitimately as the local player cannot join if you are using the infinite life strategy (online required), and the other strategies already involve 2 players to begin with.

 

Trophies: Crystal Lich, Hard Crystal Lich, The Co-op Crystal Lich.

 

Stage 6: Grind/cleanup

Money

Load your save from the medium Castle Hammerwatch campaign. You should be in the room with the dragon. If not, you will need to start a new campaign and reach this stage (you can do it on easy with all crutches to make it quicker). When in this room, go upwards and collect all the crystals and as much gold in between as practical. Then, quit and reload the save. Repeat this until the trophy(ies) pop.

 

Kills

If you haven’t already got these, there is an AFK way to do them. Start a new Castle Hammerwatch campaign as the thief on easy and with all crutches on. Use the ‘Portal! (No return)’ secret from this campaign’s steam guide above. Go across the bridge to the west (you will have to go up and around eastward first). Do not destroy any bat spawners. Head up from the bridge on the western side. There should be a cluster of 3 bat spawners above and 1 below. Stand in between these groups with your back against the void. Hold down the attack button. Make sure that all spawners are active and that you are safely killing the mobs. Once you’re comfortable that you can go on forever, leave the attack button pressed (elastic band, balance controller with button pressed on table etc.). This trophy will pop eventually (may take a few hours).

 

Combo

These can easily be done using the ‘Kills’ strategy above. Follow that, but buy the ‘Combo’ upgrade from a combo vendor beforehand.

 

Trophies: Affluent, Rich, Half-Millionaire, Mass murder, Massacre, Genocide, Combo Killer!, Combo Master!

Edited November 6, 2021 by BalefulFrog
Extra spacing at top removed

[Joe Dubz]

Absolutely incredible job you did with the all-encompassing mini guide you made here, @BalefulFrog! Bravo ???

 

I'm very happy for you that you were able to figure out that sweet trick with the crystals with P2... That has undoubtedly been the plat blocker for most! Well played and nice to see you now as the faster acheiver for the game ?

[starcrunch061]

Hmmm. So there’s a local MP trick for the stupid Lich? Good to know.