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hk-treacle-tactics · 5 months

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🔥 Troupe Master Grimm 🔥

The hot dad himself! remember to bow at the start. (just tilt the joystick down to look at the floor.)

Tactics Tool Belt: (link to tactics glossary here) Visual cue, Acrobatics, Walk don't run

Dance Moves

Sky Drill

Grimm: appears in midair in a drill shape, shoots down towards you, then dashes toward you on the ground.

You: big jump, then either 1) go towards where he came from or 2) smack him in the head.

Fire Bats

Grimm: standing straight, opens his cloak at a right angle, and three fire bats fly out! pew, pew pew!

You: big jump, then dash towards him.

If you get too close to him before he fires off all the bats, he’ll teleport behind you, then fire off one more bat.

Cloak Swoosh

Grimm: 1. leans away, then slashes towards you with a big C-shaped downward swipe. 2. makes another C-shaped swipe upwards, then rains fireballs from above.

You: walk away until he swipes upwards, then walk back to where you started.

if you have shade cloak: dash through him, then walk back to where you started. easier to manage the distance that way.

Visual cue: The difference between the start of Fire Bats and Cloak Swoosh can be hard to tell at first! with Fire Bats, he’s standing up tall, and with Cloak Swoosh, he’s leaning away in an S-shaped posture. S for Swoosh.

Ground Spikes

Grimm: appears in an A shape, looking up. twisty spikes appear on the ground.

You: walk just a step or two to get in between two spikes. The spikes don't cause damage until they get tall.

Balloon Time

Grimm: appears in midair in a big balloon shape and starts emitting fireballs in all directions.

You: 1. get in position, then 2. jump in a loop to navigate the fireballs.

Acrobatics: This one’s complicated, i won’t lie! but it’s doable. I’ll explain the process from the left side, but you can do the same on the right side as well.

1. get in position: as soon as the balloon appears, go stand about ¼ of the way from the left wall of the arena. Standing in that spot on the floor, you only need to pay attention to three fireball lanes.

fireballs will come down the lanes in stacks, in one of five possible patterns: 100, 110, 101, 011, 001

2. jump in a loop: as the fireballs come towards you, jump up and slightly to the left. as you reach the top of the jump, go towards the right, so that you jump in a 0-shaped path and land where you started. depending on the fireball pattern, you’ll either do a big jump or a small jump for your loop.

for 011: do a big jump. for 101 and 001 : do a small jump by briefly tapping the jump button (I didn’t even know you could jump just a little until i met Grimm!). for 100 and 110, just stay still.

Grimm will do Balloon Time three times: when his health is at ¾, ½, and ¼ left. it’s a nice way to track how much health he has.

Other actions (nothing you need to do):

Scuttle: Sometimes if you’re too close to him, Grimm will scuttle away before resuming his attack.

Stagger: Grimm will burst into a cloud of black bats, one with big red eyes (that’s him).

Healing Spots

during Ground Spikes.

during Fire Bats: if you have Shape of Unn, you can wiggle under the bats! or if you do a big jump over the first bat, you can heal when you land on the ground- the second and third bats fly over you, aiming for where you were during your jump.

Hitting Spots

during Fire Bats: once you hop over the bats, you can get a couple hits in before he disappears.

during Sky Drill: slash down as he lunges under you.

during Ground Spikes: fire off a spell towards him.

Recommended Charms

Shape of Unn, for healing during Fire Bats

Stalwart Shell, for surviving Balloon Time

Extras

If you bow to him at the start, the grimmkin will clap for you! If you hit him instead, he’ll yell at you and give you an extra Balloon Time for your insolence. if you brought weaverlings, make sure to scoot away so they don’t hit him either.

#hollow knight #hollow knight boss guides #troupe master grimm #hk treacle tactics #grimm #boss guides

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hk-treacle-tactics · 5 months

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🔮 Charm Belt 🔮

Charms are a clumsy bug’s best friend! here are my favorites, categorized by how they help, followed by tips for how to get them asap, and my favorite loadouts at the end.

Passive damage: the less you have to hit the boss, the better.

Grimmchild: I fucking love Grimmchild!!! An invincible little buddy who does all the work of aiming and hitting the boss for you, so you can focus on surviving. I named mine Treacle.

Weaversong: More little buddies! they’re extra helpful in some situations where Treacle isn’t ideal, and vice versa. I named mine Miku, Marute, and Maybe.

Defender’s Crest: Smelly yet effective! a fart cloud that does one point of damage at a time doesn’t seem like much, but it adds up.

Spore Shroom: a bigger smelly cloud that appears when you focus and lingers for a bit! you can bait enemies into standing in the spore cloud.

Thorns of Agony: Automatically hit back! sometimes it throws off my rhythm, though.

Dreamshield: the the shield deals contact damage! swinging with your nail also does a shield bash.

Sharp Shadow: Dashing through an enemy deals damage! dual-purpose dodging and attacking. makes your dash longer, which is sometimes good and sometimes not.

Healing upgrades: makes healing easier.

Honey Heart: The actual name of this charm is Hiveblood! For every hit you take, if you can manage to not get hit for the next 10 seconds, the damage is healed without you having to do anything. Also helps make bosses that do two masks of damage less deadly.

Shape of Unn: Wiggle time!!! when focusing, become a little slug that can scoot around on the ground and avoid attacks.

Quick Focus: Focus faster! get extra heals in where you didn’t have time to before.

Extra soul: so you can heal when you need to!

Grubsong: holy SHIT grubsong is incredibly useful, easy to get, and cheap to wear. Gives you soul every time you get hit. also has a great synergy with weaversong.

Soul Catcher: More soul for each hit! Soul Eater is also good, but usually takes more notches than I can spare.

Protection upgrades: take more hits without dying.

Unbreakable Heart: Two more masks! what else is there to say.

Stalwart shell: extra invulnerable time after you get hit! good for getting your bearings again or against rapid-fire attacks.

Dreamshield (again): can block a lot of projectiles! full list here.

Extra hits: honestly this is just for my buddy quick slash.

Quick slash: get more hits in, get more soul! also, hopefully, finish the fight faster.

SYNERGIES:

grubsong + weaversong: weavers can get soul from hitting enemies. i’d die without this.

grubsong + honey heart: slow but endless soul refills.

Wallet upgrades: it helps to have money.

gathering swarm

unbreakable greed

Movement upgrades: situationally useful!

shape of unn

sharp shadow

dashmaster

sprintmaster

❗ Warnings/dissuasions ❗

Baldur shell: it sucks. i wish it didn’t. i have never figured out how to use it effectively. what’s the point of stopping damage if it stops your focus too?

Glowing womb: i love these little suckers, but they make soul management very difficult.

Lifeblood charms: these take up too many slots for the limited benefit they provide. can be situationally useful for the “learning the dance” portion of boss battles.

Good charms, in the order you can get them

✨ from the start of the game:

after opening Sly's shop:

Gathering swarm (sly's shop)

Stalwart shell (sly's shop)

after beating False Knight:

Soul catcher (ancestral mound)

after beating Hornet in Greenpath (getting mothwing cloak):

Thorns of agony (platforming challenge in greenpath)

Quick focus (salubra's shop)

Fragile heart, fragile greed* (leg eater's shop) *: if you’re swimming with cash, you can replace these when you inevitably die with them equipped! otherwise, just hold onto them for now, or come back later. also helpful to buy if you’re just a couple charms away from a notch at salubra’s shop.

after getting the Mantis Claw:

Grubsong (from grubfather after 10 grubs)

Spore Shroom (platforming challenge in fungal wastes)

Dashmaster (platforming challenge in fungal wastes)

✨ the path branches a little here! the next four sections can go in any order.

after getting the Dive spell:

Defender’s crest (fight dung defender in the waterways)

Quick slash (it’s in kingdom’s edge, though…)

Soul eater (resting grounds)

after getting the Lumafly lantern:

Weaversong (it’s in deepnest. requires getting past a couple stalking devouts + small platforming challenge)

Sprintmaster (crystal peak)

after getting the Dream Nail:

Dreamshield (resting grounds)

Grimmchild* (from grimm after lighting the nightmare lantern) *: need crystal heart before they can start spewing fireballs.

Unbreakable greed (costs 9000 geo from divine! whew. get this one first, though, to help you save up for the other unbreakables.)

Unbreakable heart (12000 geo from divine. yeah.)

after getting Crystal heart:

Isma’s tear -> shape of unn (lake of unn)

✨ and then, after getting crystal heart:

after getting monarch wings:

Honey heart (fight hive knight in the hive)

after getting shade cloak (requires monarch wings):

Sharp shadow (in deepnest near the hot spring)

My favorite charm loadouts

The Best of the Best: Grimmchild, Honey Heart, Weaversong, Grubsong, Shape of Unn.

i wear this charm loadout everywhere. i wear it for walking around. i wear it to trials and pantheons. i wear it in real life.

my beloved charms!!! the collar photo is at my actual work in 2019, and the pocket is from today (Jan 2024). weaversong's lost its threads, but honestly they're all looking pretty good, considering that i've been wearing them constantly on my hollow knight hoodie pocket since Nov 2019.

The Healy Panic: Grimmchild, Grubsong, Weaversong, Stalwart shell, Quick focus, Sprintmaster.

(more to be added soon!)

#hollow knight #charms #hollow knight boss guides #hk treacle tactics #not actually a boss guide

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hk-treacle-tactics · 5 months

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📝 Planning Ahead 📝

if you haven’t started playing yet, here are some things that will make your little bug life easier. as I do another playthrough, I'll add more to this list if I find something useful!

get grubsong as fast as possible. find ten grubs (list of all grub locations at this link), then go visit grubfather and he’ll give it to you. you can get this charm quite early and it’s incredibly, incredibly useful.

simple key: you can get one from sly. DON’T use it on the very enticing door east of dirtmouth, that’s just Jiji’s house! save it to get into the waterways so you can get defender's crest asap. if you already used this one, there’s a second one in the room below the city storerooms stag station. if you already used that one, there is a third key, but. pale lurker has it. and if you used THAT one, there’s one more key inside a dead mawlurk deep in ancient basin.

recommended initial path: fight the false knight, then go through greenpath and fight hornet, then go to the fungal wastes and get the mantis claw. opportunities open up immensely once you have the mantis claw.

Don’t fight grey prince zote. you can rescue zote in greenpath and deepnest, even fight him in the coliseum, but DONT. FIGHT. GREY PRINCE ZOTE. IN BRETTA’S BASEMENT. you don’t get penalized for not fighting him, but if you beat him he shows up in your godhome pantheons (sage, hallownest) to ruin your day. he’s not worth it. don’t fight grey prince zote.

#hollow knight #hk treacle tactics #basics #planning ahead #not actually a boss guide

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hk-treacle-tactics · 5 months

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✨ Basic Tactics ✨

Core Tactics

Learn the dance Thanks to Grimm for teaching me this! many many fights in Hallownest are a sort of murderous dance. you learn the steps that your opponent will take, and how you can respond to them. then you practice your steps until it’s second nature, and then you look for opportunities to attack. In other words: first figure out how to survive, and then figure out how to fight back.

Let it cook Sometimes your cerebellum just needs to simmer on it! go do something else and come back, or put down the game for the night and come back tomorrow.

Additional Tactics

These ones aren’t universal, but are still useful in many situations! you don’t need to read all of them now. organized in alphabetical order so I can use this post as a glossary, star rating is for how broadly applicable they are.

Acrobatics ⭐ In addition to knowing the dance moves, sometimes there’s a certain jumping, dashing, or platforming trick that will help with a fight.

Audio cue ⭐ There are a few bosses that have an important audio cue, usually to alert you to what’s happening offscreen or in a visually cluttered arena. (I’ll keep my advice visual in general, though!)

Distance management ⭐⭐⭐ For many bosses, you can keep them acting predictably if you can stay a certain distance away. traitor lord is my #1 example of this. this guy fucking sucks unless you keep exactly one dash away from his ass, and then he becomes manageable.

Don’t get cornered ⭐⭐⭐ with few exceptions, you don’t want to loiter in the corners of a boss arena. my default standing location is not the exact middle or all the way to the side, but about ¼ of the way into the arena.

Drop spiders ⭐⭐ You should drop weaverlings on this boss from above! often goes with “hidey hole”.

Heal during staggers ⭐⭐⭐ WHAT IS A STAGGER? if you deal enough damage to a boss in a short amount of time (amount and time varies by boss), they’ll stop attacking you for a few moments, with a visible “whew!” sort of animation. this is called a “stagger”. if you manage to stagger a boss: great job! HEAL IMMEDIATELY. unless you’re already very comfortable with this boss, don’t waste your time trying to get a few potshots.

Hidey hole ⭐⭐ Some arenas have really good hidey holes for healing and/or avoiding attacks.

Kill them first ⭐ for most bosses, waiting and being cautious is a good idea, but for some bosses, it’s better to try to kill them as fast as you can. Often goes with “randomness issue”.

Lair action ⭐⭐ Sometimes the boss isn’t the only thing trying to kick your ass- there’s also spikes, falling rocks, swarming minions, or other background problems.

No children ⭐ Always a sad one! sometimes your beloved charms/children/minions cause more problems than they solve and you should really leave them at home.

Randomness issue ⭐ Some bosses have notably random/unpredictable moves. (I really struggle with these.)

Run towards your problems ⭐⭐⭐ this one was an eye-opener for me! there are a LOT of long-range attacks for which the best option is to dash or walk towards the problem. for soul master, the way to avoid the projectiles is to dash towards him, going under the orange blob. similarly for hornet, when she’s coming at you from the sky, scoot towards her on the ground, and you’ll duck under her as she’s passing over you.

Soul management ⭐⭐ It’s always a good idea to keep an eye on your soul meter, but some bosses are extra tough about soul management. Examples include: you can’t get soul as easily as usual, or there’s a very specific window in which you can heal, or you need to use spells for something.

Treacle heckle ⭐⭐ Similar to drop spiders, sometimes the best(?) way to deal damage is to position yourself so that your grimmchild will hit the boss for you.

Visual cue ⭐⭐ All dance moves will have visual cues, this is a video game! but some of them are especially notable. If there was some visual cue that I struggled to recognize at first, but really helped once i noticed it, I’ll point it out.

Void management ⭐ These are usually late-game toughies with attacks that have a huge range, where you can only avoid them by using your shade cloak. Often goes with “distance management” and “run towards your problems”.

Walk don’t run ⭐⭐ It makes sense to want to run as fast as you can to avoid an attack, but sometimes walking slowly/carefully will really keep you out of trouble.

#hollow knight #hollow knight boss guides #basics #hk treacle tactics #not actually a boss guide

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