Fight Strategies

Explanation

Each battle in Okami, whether it be caused by a scripted trigger, a devil gate, or a demon scroll, includes a predetermined selection of enemies. While the enemies spawn in random locations within the battle barrier, we can still construct set strategies for each fight to defeat every enemy quickly and efficiently.

Common Tools

• Divine Instrument (DI) - Ammy's basic attack in general. In most categories, Reflectors or Glaives are used, while Rosaries are rarely used as the main weapon.
  • When using glaives, it is often preferred to use charged aerial glaive attacks, as the landing hitbox has 4 hits dealing multiplied damage. This can be combo'd into a sub-weapon attack. Reflectors are generally better used on the ground, as their aerial attack stalls Ammy and has poor range.
• Sub-weapon (SW) - Ammy's secondary attack. In categories which use a SW, the Life Beads (from Crimson Helm) or Tundra Beads (purchased for NG+ saves) are used due to their extremely high burst damage at close range.
• Power Slash (PS) - As a responsive brush technique able to deal damage to multiple targets at once, PS sees a great deal of use in all categories. It is also the most common Floral Finisher by far, for NG AB and Top Dog.
• Cherry Bomb (CB) - A more challenging brush power which deals massive damage to adjacent targets. CB's see a great deal of use, especially against single targets. Many enemies which are immune or resistant to PS can be damaged or made vulnerable by CB. The primary downside is the skill required to consistently hit a moving target with the potentially-delayed explosion.
• Exorcism Slips (Small/Medium/Large) (S/M/L Slips or ExS/M/L) - Battle items which hit all targets in the battle regardless of distance or visibility. Many enemies can be hit by slips even when immune to all other sources of damage, though some enemies are not damaged by them until made vulnerable some other way. They are used pervasively in runs, limited primarily by their scarcity in NG.
• Steel Fist Sake (SFS) - A battle item which significantly increases the damage of DI, SW, and CB, but not PS. These see a great deal of use when slips are not efficient or effective. SFS + CB's is an extremely common strategy in NG runs.
• Gold Dust - An optional item which permanently increases the power of most weapons by about 30-40%. In categories where slips and SFS are more scarce, such as NG AB or Top Dog, gold dust sees limited use. It can be acquired from many sources, but is usually purchased in Agata Forest, as that is the cheapest and fastest source.
• Inkfinity Stone - A battle item which grants unlimited ink for 60 seconds, not including cutscenes. Used in and out of fights when a large number of brush techniques are used.
• Ink Praise Upgrade - In and out of battle, using praise to upgrade Ammy's ink capacity can be used to refill when low or empty on ink. This can be used as a substitute for Inkfinity Stones in some cases.
• String of Beads - A NG+ exclusive reward for collecting all 100 Stray beads, this Holy Artifact grants a 10x damage multiplier, invincibility, and unlimited ink, making most fights in NG+ runs trivial.
• Clearing the results screen - When both normal and boss fights end, the results screen can be cleared roughly 1 second faster by pressing the pause or bark buttons, depending on the version. Runners generally mash the button to clear as soon as possible.
• Building Dash - At the end of most fights, there is some downtime before the results screen clears. During this time, you can dash in circles to build gold dash. If the fight ends with a cutscene, you can jump before the cutscene starts to store Ammy's dash.
• Miscellaneous Techniques
  • Covering with Ink - Both NPC's and enemies can be covered with ink by drawing a single stroke over them, as long as that stroke isn't straight and horizontal enough to be recognized as Power Slash. Usually a short up/down stroke is used. This causes many enemies to start a special animation where they shake off the ink. In battle, this is only really useful against Yellow Imps, where it prevents them from digging underground immediately, and makes them vulnerable to Cherry Bomb. It can also be used on Mushi's Mom when digging the turnips, as it provides an equal 4 second stall to PS'ing the pot on her head.
  • Dot Trees - Bloom gives Ammy the ability to grow trees by drawing a dot on Bloom-able ground. This consumes one ink pot, and up to 3 trees can be grown at once. They disappear after a few seconds. When they grow, the trees will deal a small amount of damage to enemies on top of them. The trees also have solid collision, and can be air-tackle-bounced off of. This technique is almost useless, though it does allow you to instantly stun enemy cherry blossoms without having to reflect their fruit.
  • Ink Bullet - The Snarling Beast, Seven Strike, and Eighth Wonder grant Ammy this Brush Technique when they are equipped. By drawing dots on enemies, they will be hit for a tiny amount of damage. Multiple bullets can be drawn, increasing the ink cost. Because of the extremely low damage output, this technique is virtually useless, except for being the fastest way of hitting Orochi in the Moon Cave at the very start of the fight. This saves a fraction of a second compared with PS to start the cutscene where Orochi loses his invincible barrier.