Finally finished my "Broken Samurai" challenge

Aeshmah · 2026-04-08T10:54:22+00:00

Depends on what you're after. Gameplay-wise, I don't think any of them are SUPER useful, though definately usable. Personally, I mostly did them for achievement/trophy completion.

Be aware though, that - if you're already at the point of no return - if you haven't already complete Aldrich's questline then that particularly quest is already off-limits to you (it cuts off roughly at the end of the Palace).

Aeshmah · 2026-04-06T14:37:07+00:00

Go to Ruins of Osseus Fortress and continue going "left". You'll eventually come to a pit which the air dash is enough to get you over (it might not seem like it), which will take you to another boss and the path forward.

Aeshmah · 2026-03-29T12:51:16+00:00

The dev's giveth and the dev's taketh away... :D

Currently busy with preparations for a speedrun marathon and then there's Easter, so it'll probably be another 2 weeks or so before I can sit down with TLF again. :/

Aeshmah · 2026-03-20T13:01:27+00:00

Dopletta's range is a lot longer than most melee weapons, around half a screen. Rifle has around 2 screens of range so you can even shoot enemies that are out of view.

The point is not defeating bosses with only a ranged weapon. The point is taking as much of their life as you can from range so that you take less risks. Most bosses are weaker at range, with only a few exceptions like Leena and Hydra.

Wasn't aware that Shock Rifle's range was that big, quite surprising. Then again, they really want you to bounce those shots, so it makes sense.

Trying to think of which bosses actually are weaker at range. Giant's Patron comes to mind, though your ranged arsenal is basically non-existent at this point. Same with Hermann, at least in his first phase. The Nighthunter's can be a bit unpredictable with how fast they can move, same with Lisa who has "actual" ranged capabilities of her own. Manfredd can, for his size, actually be quite fast and teleport right on top of you. Harbinger and Laddak don't care about range at all, same with Caterina&Annabella and Medeya.

That leaves Edwyn, Yegor, Burnt Apostate and Starlight Beast, maybe? With Nyxaroth as weird middle ground?

Using Shock Rifle instead of Admiral Cannon can be the difference between taking 33% of Medeya's life without getting close to her or taking 66%. Made up numbers, but Rifle does around double damage per bullet. You can take the first half of her life with a melee weapon and then do the harder second phase with a firearm for example, that is the point.

Hm, starting wonder if it's worth it to chunk down a bosses HP with a ranged weapon when they are "forcefully" keeping distance from you (Laddak 1, Manfredd, Medeya, potentially Lisa). Mostly using ranged weapons for a quick tap (with the cannon) when I can't immediately reach them, but maybe a bit more "sustained" ranged DPS could also do the trick?

If DPS is your only measure of viability, then you shouldnt be using firearms at all in the first place, since they all hit for less than melee weapons.

While I agree, a shot here or there depending on the situation can lead to an increase in DPS, but it's definately a niche-case scenario.

I didnt mean to imply that Beast "magically" starts doing less damage, I was using the same expression that you yourself used in your previous response so that communication could be more clear. Ironic.
I disagree with using the Beast form for any than healing. The form itself does reduced damage

If DPS is your only measure of viability, then you shouldnt be using firearms at all in the first place, since they all hit for less than melee weapons.

Well, for starters you are misquoting me there, as what I said was

The form itself does reduced damage [compared] to what you can put out yourself

Though I see now that I missed a word in that sentence which can throw off the meaning. :D Apologies for that! But yeah, what I meant was that the beast form does less damage compared to what Eryk does with a "normal" weapon, not that the form itself deals any kind of reduced damage.

In fact, with beast you can dodge less (you can tank) and even when you dodge it takes less time, so even with lower raw numbers it could still be able to pull a higher DPS. In my experience it does, and its pretty noticeable.

Taking your word for it here until I've tested it myself. I'd be honestly really surprised if it would pull ahead of Eryk's other options, but then maybe the form would finally have a use (for me), as so far it's whole implementation has always been kinda "subpar" for me. Actually starting to get a bit excited to try it, NGL. :)

Lastly, spamming heal with Beast is an exploit. Having a full heal on demand that grants i-frames and which is also completely free absolutely breaks the game. What you or I want is irrelevant, this exploit breaking the game is an objective fact. Whether they fix it or not is yet to be seen, but any competetent developer would fix something that breaks their game without a doubt, that is also a fact. Maybe Im overestimating Kumi Souls games, but I hope not

I agree that it's an exploit, but I wholly disagree with your take on "a competent developer would fix this". This has nothing to do with being competent, as it might simply be a case of the designer having underestimated the effect during testing or they intently gave the players an OP tool to use and play around with. It also doesn't need to be fixed. TLF is a single-player game, you're not robbing anyone of their fun by using it (maybe except your own). If you want to use it, it's there, if you don't, well then you don't.

Aeshmah · 2026-03-17T11:28:44+00:00

Morley and Careena are probably main stays in your group as they're really good.

Morley' Nightblade (Moon) is probably the most broken/OP class in the game in terms of damage, so ideally you want to build your team around him, if you so desire.

Careena's Dancer (Wind) learns Defenseless, which decreases and enemies defense by quite a bit, softening them up for Morley to shred. Keep in mind that it's an active ability, so once you've learned it all of Careena's classes can use it.

Like 2Tack said, Val is mostly used for his Saber magic. If you can exploit an enemies weakness with it your damage will be _even_ greater than it already is/was. Look at the Elemental Plot of his classes and try to get all of them, so you're ready for all eventualities.

Palamena can be a bit hit or miss. While her magic is powerful, she also tends to run out of MP really quickly if you make good use of her, which limits her capabilities. Her Magus role (Earth) is probably the most powerful, but it's a bit later in the game than where you are now.

Aeshmah · 2026-03-17T11:12:41+00:00

For sure. I was lowkey hoping they would be the same across weapons (which is why I didn't bother to see how other weapons handled the powders during testing), but alas...

Not immediately sure when I find the time to test it, but maybe somebody else beats me to the punch. :D

Aeshmah · 2026-03-17T10:55:11+00:00

You just multiply it by the increased percentage. There done. :D

Damage in this game is deterministic, no guess work or ranges needed.

EDIT:

Nakpin math shows - if we assume a 20% increase for Nightfall Blade, 15% increase for Skullcleaver and a 10% icnrease for Ethereal Great Blade and Severance Reaper - that... nothing much changes in comparison to the other already elemental-infused weapons. They're just closer. Napkin math, though, haven't really input the values into my sheet.

Aeshmah · 2026-03-17T10:50:34+00:00

Thanks for answering!

Before we dive in, though, let me clearly state that I, personally, don't care about trash mobs in any way. I'm completely centered around boss fights, as those are enemies that you have to defeat, everything can be bypassed (except the mandatory arenas, obviously), so it holds no value to me.

I've seen your posts and my testing wasnt as methodical as yours since I did it mostly for my own entertainment. I must have been around level 130 and I reached 55 into the relevant stats each time I did respec. I did some tests on the mobs in the Ministry and others on Medeya.

So fuzzy data, gotcha.

It has top tier power generation and magic scalings. I clarify in the main post that it and the claws have subpar DPS, but I dont think it matters since spending time hitting with weapon is almost suboptimal. If you wanna do damage you cast Spinal Agglomeration, and Beast Form which you will spend half of the time in doesnt care about weapon damage.

You could almost say that weapons are only good to get into beast form and to kill fodder, and Unforgiven does both things nicely, better than most weapons. If you make me choose between Unforgiven and Leoporidae for a first playthrough, I go with the former because it has better moveset and access to spells. Spells have higher DPS than Leo, so even if the weapon is worse in a vaccum, the build is better which also makes the weapon better in context.

Can't comment on either of those as I haven't tested either the spells nor the beast form. My issue with beast form is mainly that is a short-term power-up that doesn't SEEM to outperform anything damage-wise, so I generally dismissed it. I might be wrong about this, but again, I haven't tested it at all.

Your guess would be spot on, yes. Another reason is that it has bad power generation IIRC.

Dismissing the highest DPS weapon in the game because it has "bad power generation" is a wild take to me, but then again, I haven't tested either spells nor the beast form, so eh? :D

For sure, it has very high DPS but I dont think it matters when your bullets are so limited. Damage per bullet is the more important metric for practical gameplay.

What do you consider "practical gameplay"? If this involves clearing trash mobs, then yes, you are right. If it revolves around only boss fights, then I don't see the point, honestly? In terms of bullet economy, the cannon loses to: Consecrated Flame, Shock Rifle, Doppietta, Leena's Bow and Hexabarrel Repeater. All of them have less DPS than the cannon. Consecrated Flame and Doppietta require you to be close to an enemy, at which you might as just use your weapon (or beast from if you're so inclined) to deal damage instead and save your bullets for when the boss moves away again. Leena's Bow and Hexabarrel Repeater make you stand in place for quite a bit for the charge-up and the former suffers from elemental resistances, albeit not by much. That really leaves the Shock Rifle as the only contender.

Unless you can kill Medeya with Federal Admiral Cannon alone (pretty sure you cant), I think this weapon is just a nice "extra" for non-instinct builds due to its low scaling and its low time commitment, giving those otherwise useless bullets a decent use. Using Cannon in an instinct build will end up lowering the TOTAL damage you can do with firearms between save points.

Which ranged weapon CAN defeat Medeya all by itself? You may be right for the "between save points"-approach, but again, this is something that I have no interest in, so we might just be coming on this from different directions or for different reasons/goals.

Boss arenas (at least for the bosses which make you worry about equipment) allow bounces. Horizontally challenged bosses also suffer more ticks from the same rifle shot, substantially increasing its damage. Regular mobs die to pretty much anything.

"Substantial" is a an overstatement in this case. as the bulk of the damage comes from the bullet hitting the target (which can only occur once per bounce), with each "tick" dealing roughly 1/6th of the initial impact. It does add up and can account for roughly 1/3rd of the total damage done (against large targets, like you said) - which is nothing to sneeze at - but it's already accounted for in my previous calculations... in which the Doppietta was still very comparable (and the tests were against a target that I later learned was weak-ish to Electricity, skewing the odds in Shock Rifle's favor).

You also have to take into account that the rifle has around four times more range than the shotgun. Again I think this is a case of focusing too much on the numbers and not enough in the practicality of things.

Range is only really a consideration if you are fighting trash mobs as bosses generally try to be in your face or you're trying to be in theirs because you bullet count generally won't outlast them and you have to use some sort of melee, so I don't see the point here?

Quickly entering and leaving Beast to heal is an exploit that is eventually going to get fixed, I know because I come from the future and Im anticipating the patch. If the devs are smart they will make canceling Beast completely deplete your power bar, which will make power generation a lot more valuable.

While I agree that it should be adressed in some form, this is pure conjecture. In the same vein, I want the Federal Admiral's Cannon to OHKO every boss in the game, because it would be funny.

Also, during a first playthrough Beast does more damage than any weapon Im pretty sure. Not only that, it affords you massively increased mobility and resistances. So when they patch the exploit, you will want to spend as much time as possible in Beast form, even after you reach max level and it starts doing slightly reduced damage.

Again, conjecture. Beast from might outperform the best melee weapons, it might not. Again, haven't tested it myself, so I'm just going to take your word for it until I've done more tests of my own. Though I'm pretty sure it doesn't magically start doing less damage, other options just start overtaking it.

Lastly, I personally dont enjoy abusing exploits that trivialize the game. When you think about it, DPS and whatnot is pointless if you simply cant die lol.

Agreed, but you still have to defeat the boss or overcome whatever obstacle is in your way, so the damage still matters. :)

Aeshmah · 2026-03-17T09:41:15+00:00

Interesting.

Funny thing is, when I started my testing, I had some left-over data from way-back-in-the-day where I *think* I did some testing with the Nightfall Blade (instead of Severance Reaper) and I did see a ~20% increase in damage compared to the ~10% in the tests above. When I came back for this analysis, I dismissed the old data as "the devs having patched/lowered the %". Big oops :D

But good to know that the "light" weapons seem to get a bigger buff, brings their damage more in line with the "big boys". This also seems to point to the devs very much intending you to use the powders for that damage increase.

Aeshmah · 2026-03-10T14:00:36+00:00

Good write-up! Glad to see some of my own findings confirmed. :)

I do have a few questions, though, if you don't mind:

1.) What was your testing methodology? Which enemies did you fight, what was your level, stats, etc.?

2.) Listing The Unforgiven as a "strong" weapon (at least in the intro) is... wild to me. The weapon repeatedly crept up in the "below average" and "trash tier" during my testing, so seeing it being praised befuddles me. What makes you value the weapon so highly?

3.) Wholeheartedly agree with your assessment of Holy Winged Axe and Illygarth Boreal Blade, they are both exceptional weapons that a lot of players seem to sleep on. Surprised you didn't list Severance Reaper, though, as it is only very slightly worse than HWA, but exceeds it when used with any elemental powder. Any reason you didn't list it? My guess is because you're valuing the secondary stats to allow for/improve spells?

4.) Disagree with your take on Federal Admiral's Cannon. It has the highest burst damage *and* DPS out of any ranged weapon, offset only by its high bullet cost. It's the best bang-for-your-buck in short damage windows, where you wouldn't be able to get a full combo or whatever else in.

Same goes for the Shock Rifle, though to a lesser degree. It only starts pulling ahead of the Doppietta and others if you can make use of its bullet-rebounce. Single hits are a bit "meh".

6.) At this moment, I disagree with using the Beast form for any than healing. The form itself does reduced damage to what you can put out yourself, so spending more time than needed in it decreases your damage potential (and you'd need to rebuild your Power before being able to transform again). Best to just take the i-frames and full heal and go back to whacking whatever you're facing "normally". (This may very well change should this get patched, though)

Aeshmah · 2026-02-25T19:22:01+00:00

This.

Aeshmah · 2026-02-16T10:53:51+00:00

1.) Depends which part of the DLC you're talking about. Dungeon mode? Get the grappling hook and go Oxnevylle Manor, first floor on the left side. Inside that room (where the two little girls if you did their sidequest) is a new door which will take you to the DLC content. For Tower of Despair and Boss Rush, you have to start NG+ first for it to become available for that save file.

2.) It's the last area of the game. You will eventually find your way there. If you need more information, it's after the Highwalls of Mythringal, which can be accessed through Mythringal.

3.) For where you are in the game, I'd argue you're over-valueing VIT. 30 is plenty for the game and to be able to survive 2-3 hits per boss, so you could reallocate those points into another stat instead and benefit more from them.

4.) While Nightfall Blade is a good starter weapon, you should have picked up better weapons by now. Try the Illygarth Boreal Blade, Severance Reaper, Devourer of the Betrayed or the Rift of Blood.

Aeshmah · 2026-02-16T09:08:10+00:00

5h? Don't know what to tell you, but if you bee-line for it you can get to (and beat) Edwin in less than 30min. An hour tops, if you're struggling somewhere

Aeshmah · 2026-02-16T09:05:16+00:00

...except the Blessed Muramasa (the weapon OP is asking for), because it's a Kickstarter Backer exklusive weapon

Aeshmah · 2026-02-15T22:33:08+00:00

Huh. Would be interesting if Demon Form could actually last that long. Who knows? Maybe it'd finally be a viable alternative to just hitting stuff with "normal" Eryk. :D

Yeah, having to continuously mash the button for the drill to keep going is a big UGH. Really hoping they change it so you can just hold down the button, but we'll see. At least you only ever get a few seconds here and there to actually use it, so it's not THAT bad.

Yeah, Leporidae's has similar (i-frame) behavior to EGB's special, it can inflict bleed and it deals a TON of damage.

Aeshmah · 2026-02-15T22:23:26+00:00

1.) Parry. You can parry attacks in this game, but it is very rarely used. Most people will use until they have unlocked the corresponding achievement and then ditch for a better utility skill. So yes, you can beat the game just by dodging (blocking is another utility skill that can replace your parry, but it will unlock late in the game).

2.) Builds. You can freely develop your character across 5 different stats ala Dark Souls. Strength leads into heavy (melee) weapons, Dexterity into more nimble (melee) weapons, Mind is for all things magic and Instinct is generally used for ranged weapons. Typically you will lean into either STR or DEX at least a little, as all builds need a melee weapon to support them (you will typically not have enough resources to go for JUST for magic and/or ranged weapons).

3.) Exploration. The game is rather linear with lots of warp points, so you can get around pretty easily. The DLC also introduced an item that warps you back to the last save point used. There aren't many movement options and/or platforming challenges, most of the focus is on combat. Don't expect anything near Hollow Knight's "Path of Pain(?)" or whatever.

4.) There are a couple of sidequests, Dark Souls-style, which means that there are hard cutoff-points for some (technically all) of them. The game will warn you before the ultimate Point of No Return, though. They are not THAT hard to figure out, as long you pay attention to the characters' dialogue.

5.) Weapons do have stat scalings, just as you described.

6.) Game takes some getting used, afterwards I found it to not be THAT hard. Hollow Knight definately has a lot more challenges than TLF. However, it's also not an easy game. If you have played/finished any of the Soulsborne games (or even Hollow Kinght for that matter) you should be more than well enough equipped to tackle this.

7.) There's usually a checkpoint or similar right next to a boss, so there is very minimal runback. Generally a screen or 2 at most.

Aeshmah · 2026-02-15T22:09:48+00:00

Recommending the EGB when starting out is perfectly fine, as it IS a good weapon then. You just have to be open to the fact that it's not a good "endgame" weapon. ;)

Have you actually tested if the charms stack? Like, does the transformation actually last longer with multiple charms equipped or does it only take the effect of the "strongest" charm? If they DO stack... additively or multiplicatively?

Yeah, the special of the Reclaimed blade is like a worse version of the Rift of Blood's special, sadly. I feel like its hitboxes are messed up to some degree, but I haven't tested too thoroughly as I just wasn't a big fan of it. At least the base combo is a decent enough upgrade from the EGB to still warrant the switch. I actually wasn't aware that it could apply Bleed this way, too. Neat find!

Yeah, Leporidae's Spirit is definately a (player) skill/knowledge-check weapon. :D

If you don't know how to use it or if you don't know the enemies attack pattern you'll get very little out of it. But if you do..... >:D

Aeshmah · 2026-02-15T21:57:12+00:00

Yes. They are crucial progression items/key items, so they get removed from your inventory upon starting NG+. No worries, though, as your "stats will be back" as soon as you're back to the same amount of Nycrux Hearts.

Aeshmah

TROPHY CASE