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So..how hard are the hard time attacks?


PhantomFear94

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Finished this recently, and I didn't have too much trouble with any of the colossi except for #3 (Gaius has always been a tremendous pain in the butt). He's the only one where you need to have a pretty tight run and mistakes will cost you dearly (I couldn't kill him if I fell off when I was attacking a vital). For what it's worth, I never used the sword jump to beat him on Hard Time Attack - I did it the normal way, and had about 4 seconds to spare.

 

I was pretty lucky with Avion because it tossed me off after I destroyed one of the vitals on the wings and I flew back and somehow managed to grab the tail in the best possible spot, so I just destroyed that vital and ran to the other wing with about a minute and a half to spare. I can see how that would be frustrating though - you don't get a lot of time.

 

It's not too hard overall. Definitely achievable with enough persistence by anyone. Only tricky one is #3 - plan your routes and tackle the easier vitals before hitting the ones it will take forever to climb from.

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I feel like most of the difficulty of TA comes in to how much the colossus shakes. Occasionally some of them will just spend ages shaking if you don't get the stab rhythm going correctly, which can make it impossible to actually get the kill.

 

#15 trolled me heavily yesterday, when I couldn't actually get onto his hand - he'd pull away before I could get a grip on what little fur was accessible; and he trolled me during the speedrun, when I burned through four stamina bars on the one sigil on his chest because he just wouldn't stop shaking long enough for me to get a stabilizing stab.

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9 hours ago, Slain087 said:

I feel like most of the difficulty of TA comes in to how much the colossus shakes. Occasionally some of them will just spend ages shaking if you don't get the stab rhythm going correctly, which can make it impossible to actually get the kill.

 

#15 trolled me heavily yesterday, when I couldn't actually get onto his hand - he'd pull away before I could get a grip on what little fur was accessible; and he trolled me during the speedrun, when I burned through four stamina bars on the one sigil on his chest because he just wouldn't stop shaking long enough for me to get a stabilizing stab.

 

I had this issue with #15 too; weirdly it happened to me less on hard than normal? Might be psychological. 

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12 hours ago, Slain087 said:

I feel like most of the difficulty of TA comes in to how much the colossus shakes. Occasionally some of them will just spend ages shaking if you don't get the stab rhythm going correctly, which can make it impossible to actually get the kill.

 

#15 trolled me heavily yesterday, when I couldn't actually get onto his hand - he'd pull away before I could get a grip on what little fur was accessible; and he trolled me during the speedrun, when I burned through four stamina bars on the one sigil on his chest because he just wouldn't stop shaking long enough for me to get a stabilizing stab.

 

You can learn how to plant youself (like where to locate yourself near the sigil) and he shakes you less or not at all...

sadly i saw that tip only after TA and HTA.

Edited by SnizelPS
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On 2/22/2018 at 7:09 AM, phantomfear9494 said:

The only other one that caused me issues was Celosia (#11).  Strategy is easy but time is quite tight considering how much he bucks.   When the AI is in your favour, you can do it with 1m 30s left, when it isn't its very tight on time.

 

I thought the two smaller Colossi were going to be nightmares, but it turns out that they have some finicky "spots" that you can plant yourself on to pretty much unintentionally cheese them (11 is a little easier to find than 14's, as 11's is around his narrow back side with a fairly large area where you can be while 14's is a smidgen off center from his sigil, but is fairly hard to locate). If you successfully find said spots, they completely forget where they are it seems, and will either just stand still letting you stab them, or will refuse to buck you off but just do these weird little sprints in short bursts that don't seem to affect your balance. In my HTA run, I accidentally landed on both upon first jumping on their backs, and was able to complete both on first try with several minutes still on the clock.

 

Finished the HTA portion a couple minutes ago, and the only two that gave me fits were ones I don't see talked about much. Avion (as said) and Dirge (sand worm that you shoot in the eye, while riding around on Argo). Dirge wasn't difficult, but he's the only colossus in the game where you can't really manipulate the AI, and his "second phase" where he goes nuts and makes it his dying wish to t-bone Argo with his spikes makes it both hard to keep up with him, and in several tries I nearly burned out the entire time limit just trying to find him after the first vital point was destroyed. Really tight with time, and it's the only colossus that actually had me with one eye on the action and one eye on the timer as it ticked down, since it seemed so much could go wrong compared to the others.

 

All in all, Avion was the only one that took me about 10 tries to do, Dirge took me about 5, Gaius took a couple "half hearted attempts" where I got REALLY greedy and fell off him but overall the first full attempt I was able to complete him, and I died once on colossus #8 (the one that has a trophy tied to killing him before he flips back over) because I was insanely careless and died during his little mustard gas attack. All of the others were first try (even Malus who I fell off of, and was still able to beat it with a little over 2 minutes to spare). Now the grind of doing it again on normal.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I have tried and failed so many times on #3 HTA I'm getting close to giving up.  I've definitely spent more time on this one than all of the others combined.  The only other one I haven't been able to do yet is #12, which for some reason is giving me issues.  I keep trying to jump on its belly and missing when it gets up on the platforms.  I might just need to put it down for awhile and come back later.

 

EDIT: So naturally, as soon as I come on here and vent, I go back and knock both of them out.  I finally did #3 in 5:48.  Broke the wrist guard, did it in the order arm -> torso -> head.  Not the order I would honestly recommend but it worked for me this time!

 

Edited by jh7459
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On 3/11/2018 at 8:57 PM, jh7459 said:

I have tried and failed so many times on #3 HTA I'm getting close to giving up.  I've definitely spent more time on this one than all of the others combined.  The only other one I haven't been able to do yet is #12, which for some reason is giving me issues.  I keep trying to jump on its belly and missing when it gets up on the platforms.  I might just need to put it down for awhile and come back later.

 

EDIT: So naturally, as soon as I come on here and vent, I go back and knock both of them out.  I finally did #3 in 5:48.  Broke the wrist guard, did it in the order arm -> torso -> head.  Not the order I would honestly recommend but it worked for me this time!

 

arm-->torso-->head does sound odd...

easiest way is go for head, fall down to torso and jump from torso to hand.

But hey, if it worked for you, that's all that matters haha :D

Edited by SnizelPS
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23 hours ago, SnizelPS said:

arm-->torso-->head does sound odd...

easiest way is go for head, fall down to torso and jump from torso to hand.

But hey, if it worked for you, that's all that matters haha :D

LOL yeah.  I got up to the back and he stuck his left arm out like he sometimes does so I went for the spot there.  Ran out of stamina while climbing back up the arm, fell off, got lucky, and landed on the torso platform.  Jumped on the right arm again and then up to the head.  I'm just glad I'm done and don't have to do it again! 

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For anyone doing #3 on HTA, I recommend following PowerPyx's resist the wrist route (i.e. don't break guard, end of sword, jump over to leg, jump back to arm).  You only get 1 chance to do this but it only take 30-40 seconds to set up again.   He shakes about 2-3 times less if his wrist guard isn't broken, made it a walk in the park. 

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  • 2 months later...

the hard time attacks on the PS4 version were 100x easier than the PS3 version. maybe tweaked controls? more time maybe? (didnt compare this one), something definitely changed though. the 3rd colossus was a huge pain on ps3 and took many tries and hours to get everything done right, but this time around it took just 3 tries (the first try i went down the right arm for the weak point because the guide SAYS right, when its actually left but my fault for not paying more attention anyway).  i breezed through all of them and managed to finish a playthrough on hard in around 4 to 5 hours. # 15 also gave me the most trouble for some odd reason, either the AI didnt act like it should when knocking down the structures or id keep falling down like a fool.

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  • 3 years later...
  • 5 months later...
On 11.6.2018 at 3:30 PM, Atom1cMoose said:

Maybe tweaked controls? more time maybe? (didnt compare this one), something definitely changed though.

 

They appear so easy because you did the PS3 version and your knowledge helps too. I did the same (PS3 in November 21) and now I am flying through the PS4 version (PS4 January 22).

They added time to the time attacks. #3 got +1.5 minutes (from 5:00 to 6:30 on hard). And I feel like the controls are a bit more forgiving/precise. I don’t know.

 

Even Gaius (#3 - Sword guy) is now easy.
Tip #1 is to let him slam his sword into the ground, jump on it, hold onto the side. Then jump from his sword to the leg, climb up to the hip and then jump back to the arm.
Tip #2 is to wait on his right shoulder, until he bends over. Then run to his head and stab him 2 full times. Don’t get greedy! Go back to the right shoulder and repeat.

After the spot on the head disappears, go back to his left shoulder, regenerate your stamina and wait until he bends over again. Go to his right arm. Do this in one go.
After that climb back to his right shoulder, regenerate your stamina and wait again until he bends over. Then let yourself drop to his lower back and you should have enough time to stab the belly spot.

Both tips essential to beat hard time attack.

 

It took me the longest to figure out how to stop him from shaking - it is right shoulder!

With experience they are so easy. But I earned that experience. I am on my 10th? playthrough and I am having so much fun. I feel like this is my reward for earning the Platinum on the PS3 version.

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