Godmaster's out, and with that comes a feature I've been waiting for patiently, and that is - the ability the re-fight any boss, at any time, at will. And out of all the bosses in the game, the one I've wanted to re-fight the most has always been Nightmare King Grimm.
NKG is a probably the single hardest boss in the game, or at least a close contender. He's also easily my favourite boss in the game. That's why I've decided to make this post, a somewhat comprehensive guide on not only beating NKG, but wiping the floor with him.
Charm Setup
Probably no big surprise here, but you're best off using charms like Fragile Strength and Quick Focus (latter only if you're not doing Radiant.) Fragile Strength will never break in any pantheon nor boss in Godhome, and that 50% extra damage speaks for itself. Other of my favourites include Steady Body and Longnail. Not as important, but still handy and make pulling off consecutive hits or pogos easier.
Also keep in mind to overcharm yourself if you're doing radiant, since at that difficulty you're gonna get one-shot no matter what. If you don't know what overcharming is, if you have a free charm notch and you repeatedly try to put on a charm that you don't have enough notches for, the charm finally ends up getting equipped but you enter overcharmed mode, which makes you take double damage. I'm not sure how many people know about this feature, and it's something I only learned recently after Godmaster came out, so I'm putting this here just in case.
The Gist Of It
There are two ways to fight NKG:
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The slower, safer way: stay to the middle of the arena.
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The faster, riskier way: stay to the edge of the arena.
I'll be describing how to deal with each attack using each playstyle. I'll try to list as many methods as possible, to let you pick whichever one you feel most comfortable with.
The Actual Guide
Flame Spawner: This is the attack where he stays midair, puffs up, and starts shooting a volley of fireorbs left and right. The reason I'm covering this first is because of an important detail: he'll only do this attack once for every 25% HP he loses. You can use this to track your progress on the fight. Simple enough.
There's very little theory to dodging the volley, you just need a bunch of precise jumps. Though, note that you should be moving slightly along the direction of the bullets when you're jumping up, and moving back towards grim when you start falling back down. This circular movement will give you slightly more reaction time and wiggle room, since the seperate walls of fireballs don't have much space between them.
You'll stagger this boss every 13 hits. If you're not doing radiant, you can heal 3 masks here with quick focus, 2 without. If you don't have to heal, attack the bat with the glowy eye for some extra damage. Note that with a Pure Nail and Fragile Strength, the stagger and Flame Spawner will happen basically one after another.
Cape Spikes: The attack where a bunch of spikes emerge from the ground after a short windup.
You can give yourself slightly more reaction time to the spikes by jumping, but this is not recommended if you don't have full health, since this attack gives you a perfect time window to heal 1 mask, with or without Quick Focus.
Firebats: The attack where he teleports away from you and fires 4 firebats.
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If at middle of arena, you can dash to him inbetween the bats and easily get in two hits. If you get into melee range of him too early, he'll teleport to the opposite side of the arena and fire two bats simultaneously, one high, one low, which converge together at mid-height. Time it such that you're only getting close to him after the second bat to actually get those 2 hits on him.
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If at the edge, chances are he'll appear far away from you, so you might only get 1 hit in after the dash. This is the only attack where staying at the edge nets possibly nets you less hits on the boss.
EDIT: Special thanks to /u/Lord_Strudel for pointing out a mistake in my understanding of the boss. This point should now properly reflect how the attack works.
Dive Dash: The attack where he spawns in mid-air, dives down, then dashes in your direction again.
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If at middle of arena, the safest way to deal with this attack is to jump over and go alongside his side-dash. Double jump, and then right before he finishes the attack and disappears, he'll perk his head up for a split second. That's your time to pogo and get a hit in. It can be tricky at first, but you'll get used to the timing after a couple tries. Otherwise, the easier way is to hit/pogo him right after the dive, and jump over the dash/land on whichever side he didn't side-dash to.
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If at the edge, you can get two hits in with this attack, since his side-dash will be shorter. Pogo him after the dive, go along his side-dash, double jump, and pogo again right before he disappears (when he perks his head up.) EDIT: It seems possible to get in three hits here. Hit him when he lands, pogo him mid-dash, double jump, and pogo his head at the end like normal.
Dash Uppercut: The attack where he spawns on the ground, swipes at you, uppercuts right after, and sends fireballs from up above.
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If at middle of arena, you can simply move away and dodge the swipe, and hit him once right before he uppercuts. Alternatively, you can jump and pogo off his swipe, which is way trickier to do, but allows you to turn 180 mid-air and hit him a second time while he's mid-uppercut. The fireballs can be dodged by simply walking away, or dashing with i-frames at the proper time.
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If at the edge, getting the second hit in is easier, since he won't move as much away because of the edge of the arena.
Flame Pillar: The attack where he stays in midair, while four pillars of fire emerge where you're standing, one after another.
This attack has the same strategy no matter where you are in the arena: The first two pillars should be far away from him, third pillar should be close to him, and the last pillar should spawn basically right underneath him. You can get as much as 6 hits in during this attack: while slowly inching towards him, two attacks after short-hops, then while underneath him two up-attacks, and then after the fourth pillar spawns underneath him, two hits after short-hops, from the other side. You should be careful when approaching him if he spawns on the very edge of the arena though, since then you'll have no space to move to after the fourth pillar spawns. Attack a few times less, and then you can simply i-frame dash through the pillars to get back on the safe side. This is the attack you want him to do the most. It's a lot of quick damage.
And that's basically it. NKG really is my favourite boss in Hollow Knight, there are plenty of ways to go about each attack, each varying in efficiency and difficulty. I've managed to kill him without using any charms and on Radiant, myself, which was a nice challenge. This was a lot of fun to figure out and write down, and hopefully it also proves useful to anybody planning to take him on themselves.
Submitted August 26, 2018 at 04:10AM by Michae333 https://ift.tt/2MvDEHH
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