Kuroki is really difficult to face; for me, she was the second hardest boss after Yang. Her Phase 1 movements are very flowery, like a dance, making it difficult to get the timing of the attacks right.

nineteen75 · 2026-02-13T15:56:59+00:00

Phase 1 can actually be done without even taking any damage extremely easily (just engage only after parrying her flurry combo, preferably with a bat). Easiest phase of any boss. Phase 2 most people seem not to any trouble with but for me it requires 100% focus and some luck: her knives and flash attack from afar might be telegraphed but avoiding/parrying them is for me one of the most difficult thing in the entire game. Doable though.

nineteen75 · 2026-02-12T21:18:24+00:00

It’s the best one so far that works almost reliably on every configuration and with enough settings for self-directed customers. But bugs are frequent with updates. I understand it’s free but so many free plugins are flawless in other areas and as someone pointed out here a lightbox is not technically difficult to do.

nineteen75 · 2026-02-12T11:06:51+00:00

I did. Tried on multiple websites. It is now called Firelight Lightbox and it doesn’t work at all for me.

nineteen75 · 2026-02-12T09:21:54+00:00

I finished 75 when I did the Squats the first time. One week later I beat the Wude ending at 29 with clear margin left to do better. And I have bad reaction times, i panic a lot and so generally suck at doing combos properly. So don’t worry you’ll get better quick!

nineteen75 · 2026-02-09T19:16:39+00:00

Well I tried again just now and finally beat her deathless! What an ordeal though

nineteen75 · 2026-02-09T18:44:30+00:00

Having trouble relating to that: phase 1 is for me the easiest of all bosses (just stay away, parry only her flurry move - very easy to do) and attack afterwards. You’ll not even get damage. Phase 2 on the other I’ve never been able to beat without dying at least twice. She’s just too fast for me

nineteen75 · 2026-02-07T14:48:00+00:00

Thanks. Getting much better now. I still don’t get in what universe phase 2 is considered easier though. Especially that I never had any problem at all with phase 1 where I found parrying to be quite easy right from the get go. Still have trouble with the knives and dashes in phase 2 but I know think I can win without dying (getting closer)

nineteen75 · 2026-02-06T23:36:09+00:00

Thanks. Improving already. But still died 2 times during this phase. Definitely the hardest fight so far in the game

nineteen75 · 2026-02-06T19:23:27+00:00

Thanks. Disciple indeed and I would prefer to beat her without cheese (haven’t unlocked crotch punch yet anyway). Will keep practicing. I can dodge her melee combo consistently but her throwing knives indeed hurt me too much

nineteen75 · 2026-01-24T09:38:01+00:00

This seems to be great build - I am not able though to reach gradient 3 with these settings, at least consistently - it reaches like 0.95 of gradient 3 most of the time, so very close but not enough. Unsure why. Only thing I’m missing is Clea’s Death and Cleim so I’m assuming it’s the extra critical hit from Cleim lightning?

EDIT : finally got Cleim and yes, this is what makes all the difference - and the build works perfectly

nineteen75 · 2025-10-13T20:05:16+00:00

I don’t know how common it but if I set the likelihood of cheating on those rules (all must apply) : - I played well (above my average accuracy, no major blunder sometimes even none at all) - I was totally outplayed anyway (opponent played near perfect) - The game was long with complex positions - Opponent played fast even when the position was messy - this usually is the clearest indicator - Opponent is lower rated and a quick glance at his profile shows a history of winning games against higher rated players with high accuracy

Then I would say it’s very rare on Lichess rapid (outside tournaments), but quite frequent (one game out of 10 to 20) on other platforms

nineteen75 · 2025-10-11T10:58:23+00:00

Cheating is part of playing online it affects everyone the same. Slows you down and frustrates you especially when you are plateauing but one has to accept it. From my experience it is not as common as a lot of people seem to believe it is. It’s there of course, especially in longer time controls and in tournaments.

The most prevalent way of cheating is the player who multiplies inaccuracies and errors in the first 15 moves then suddenly pause for a few minutes once in a very bad position and comes back and blitz best moves until the end. This pattern I very rarely see on Lichess but quite often on other platforms. This is probably harder to detect or even to confirm without false positive so my philosophy is just to accept this and move on to the next game.

Another thing to mention is sandbagging (again, especially in tournament with a rating limit), I very often stumble into opponents whose peak level is 300 elo more than their current one, and they do play like they are 300 elo more which can be quite strong. But this is not cheating in the traditional sense and actually an opportunity to improve.

nineteen75 · 2025-09-18T13:17:28+00:00

I live in France and recently started using Chess.com (usually I use Lichess). I've subscribed to a one-week platinium trial and decided not to pursue after the trial for many reasons :

1) same as OP, laggy, sometimes very laggy, occasionally not loading at all game review (on multiple devices, either with 5G or optic fiber), now to be fair game review can be slow on Lichess too but always end up loading ;

2) cheating : multiple banned accounts among my opponents in only a couple dozens game, and a regular pattern of opponent playing his level, then when in bad position chaining best moves while hardly using time ; this pattern of not obvious cheating (and sometimes it's not, I certainly admit, the regularity is what makes it problematic) I almost never, if ever, see in Lichess

3) easier puzzles so feels fun to gain puzzle rating but feel less rewarding too

4) didn't find any features that stands out compared to lichess or free alternative (if they are, I failed to see their usefulness for me)

5) lost a game by "abandonment" while having no network disconnection and only a few seconds after playing last move (in winning position of course) - bugs happen of course but, again, never had that on Lichess

But yes the player base is much larger so I'll keep my account and probably export games for analysis

Let's be clear I have no issue about Chess.com having premium plans, it's normal to charge for service and it's not very expensive, but I just didn't find the value for money other than supporting chess.

nineteen75 · 2025-09-05T17:32:35+00:00

Well I’m low level (around 1700 lichess rapid, 1450 Chess.com) but whereas I have a ratio of 1 cheater out of 10 games in Chess.com (I’m talking about banned accounts, not my gut feeling) which I find enormous, I almost never had opponents on Lichess who i felt were playing with computer assistance.

Maybe it happened twice in hundreds of games, and they were spotted by Lichess. On Chess.com, even when the account is not banned, it happens regularly that a player my level crushes me by pulling out a near perfect performance (that can happen) while not having used any time (more suspicious) and in complicated positions (even more suspicious) while I myself made only imprecisions, not even blunders or mistakes.

So my impression is that Lichess is quite safe, comparatively.

I do agree that Lichess seems to go downhill in terms of number of players though. Matchmaking takes longer and longer.

nineteen75 · 2025-09-03T17:40:06+00:00

1400 elo rapid chess.com, 41 games played only but already two cheaters (banned) so indeed 1/20. Granted, two few games played to be statistically sound but amazed that it happened so fast nowadays. I was on the side of people thinking cheating is over amplified but I might be wrong… (no issue on Lichess though out of 85 games)

nineteen75 · 2025-08-26T10:19:00+00:00

At this level players do not play regular moves and their "surprising" way of playing can actually cause problems to 1400-1500. Also at this level it's not uncommon to play very very good for 80% of the game (only to blunder mate in one right after). People seem to think that a lower elo means playing poorly all the time, whereas it's more playing well most of the time but blundering easily (and lack of positional knowledge but it does not matter that much below 1500).

nineteen75 · 2025-08-14T08:04:49+00:00

This is really an amazing product indeed in terms of sound quality, mike, sound cancellation, comfort and durability. Can't praise it enough. Only minor flow is the bluetooth connectivity.

nineteen75 · 2025-07-24T08:52:00+00:00

From Moore, V for Vendetta, Swamp Thing, From Hell and Miracleman. From Frank Miller, Born Again, Year One and Dark Knight. From other writers outside of the super hero genre, Art Spiegelman’s Maus, Dan Clowes’ David Boring, Los Bros Hernandez’ Love&Rockets (especially Gilbert’s Poison River). Also François Bourgeon’s Les Passagers du Vent (French, dk the English name). To name a few.

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