Hey everyone, Since I put a hold on speedrunning i stopped updating the routes page, and i kinda want to start helping out again with that, but i dont really know the route as well as i used to ( plus it changed just as i left)

If anyone can give me a brief outline of the route (not a TON of detail, just the main points of the route), id be happy to start revamping those sheets again!

:)

ps. ffzOnlyTunic

Well, I don't think there are too many changes since you left. But I guess I'll list the main changes since the original SJ route just to make sure?

The first thing is the possibility of owl skip after moblin. When you get in front of the chest for the tail key, if you're not clipped into the chest, and came up from below, on the left half of it(I find this works best for me), if you press A+B+Start+Select in a way that it opens the chest as you're pressing those 4 buttons, and you buffer those 4 buttons AGAIN out of that S+Q menu to skip the text, then buffer down to walk straight down, you should be able to get low enough that by holding down the whole time, you'll walk off the screen as the owl appears, but before his text starts.

Flock Clip after bow wow to get to D2

In D2 there is a strategy to get the bracelet without killing the ghosts by standing in the doorway until both ghosts are within one tile of the doorway and slashing and standing still causing them to appear on the otherside of the room and run off the screen despawning and completing the room, saving probably 1 second.

After D3 you head right instead of up the stairs to get to animal village right away as we now skip ocarina and skip returning bow wow for the most optimal route.

You then do the walrus skip in whatever method you want(Obviously I suggest mine to eliminate the small chance you end up on a subpixel combination that ruins whatever method of escape you usually use) After you get past the Walrus, you need to enter the cave to the right of the screen with Lanmola on it to unlock your menu and items from doing Walrus Skip.

After you get the flippers you go straight to D5 since you don't get the ocarina, you don't need mambo.

D5 is a bit different without mambo. After the first key you walk back and kill the 2 helmasaur. After you get the BK you fall in the pit to warp to the stairs, then go through the water again. The easiest route is to go down+right below the first 2 bloopers, jump up to the ceiling before the next screen and then hold down+right again to get under the next 2 bloopers, then jump up out of the water after you get passed them. Once out of the water you go down a screen, then right and you should know the way back to the beginning of the dungeon to go get the hookshot. After you get the hookshot, you have to walk back again, so make sure you have sword equipped to destroy the crystal, then equip hookshot so you can kill the helmasaur quickly. It 1 shots them from behind or the sides, and 2 shots the front of their face since it steals the mask first shot. Then continue to the boss like normal.

In D6, it's possible to avoid the 2nd super jump by not opening the chest before the 1st super jump then flock clipping on the keyblock the screen below, going up and getting the key. I haven't noticed a big difference in the timing between that method and the 2nd super jump method due to having to pick up the 2 pots, and equip sword, vs keeping your equips(also makes for quicker equips going into dog fight) and flock clipping and going up an extra screen. Timing them myself, they were very similar in time depending on how quickly you got the super jump, still the chance of you soft locking if you're not careful that way though.

After D6, since you don't have mambo, you need to go down a screen and talk to the owl, then fall off the edge into the water, go left a screen, then swim up the 1 wide river, and swim up all the way until you reach the stairs near the d4 keyhole area and just go left on your way to rooster skip. There is an alternate path to the left at one point to get onto ground quicker up the river and run straight up, but in all my testing, it was always faster to just swim up the river.

Rooster skip is a little different with bow wow, as there's now a bit of a chance that he blocks your hookshots; so it's a little frustrating, but not as bad as it seems at first. You just have to get over thoughts of worrying about him. Worrying about him getting in your way screws you up more often than he actually gets in the way.

Once you get to D8 entrance, make sure that bow wow eats the moblin on the screen with the phone house before you do the bomb trigger. If he won't eat him right away, move onto the d8 entrance screen and then back onto the moblin screen to have him eat the moblin right away like every time. Then you're able to do the bomb trigger without worrying about it failing. Oh yea, in D8, no more blaino skip, so you go down right away, kill blaino, go up, SJ, get rod, jump down and go through portal back to the beginning of D8 at that point. After D8, you have to walk out of the turtle head, right and down the ledge, going through the swamp to head to tal tal heights and get to D7.

In D7, after you break the 3rd pillar, do NOT shoot a bomb arrow at the wall, just drop a bomb to open the wall, since arrows will make it so you can't do the bomb trigger. Then do a bomb trigger going down into the screen below. It will activate the pillar falling, then you just move the blocks to your left, go left and down, around and up to the boss key skip to finish the dungeon like usual.

After D4 instrument, outside you need to go down the stairs beside D4 and walk your way to the windfish egg. At the windfish egg you need to do a bomb trigger going into the screen with the egg so that you activate the cutscene without the ocarina.

I don't think I'm missing anything? Sorry if it's a little over detailed but I assume that covers all the changes? I dunno how much of the detail is necessary or how many of those things are necessary, but I'm sure you can decide what is needed or not. There alternate routes as well that lose some potential time like returning bow wow and getting ocarina, or not doing owl skip.

Edit: LOL Seeing the post on the page, I MAYYY have written a BIT much?

Thanks Clude :) I'll get to working on that Wednesday maybe. If anyone else sees something important that has changed be sure to let me know

You can also add in a pretty neat safe strat. Returning BowWow after D2 costs around 34 seconds, but makes for an easier Rooster skip and deletes the chance of softlocking at Walrus skip (so no subpixel setup) + you don't have to go into the desert cave before fighting Lanmola (saves about 7 seconds I think). It also makes PoP routing for D5/D6 much easier. Returning BowWow + getting Ocarina+Manbo after D2 is about 1:10 slower from my timing (could be wrong though, but definitely slower).

Also returning BowWow after D2 in S&Q basically loses no time at all, because you can S&Q after the FishKey skipping the desert owl and some backtracking.

One day I will find my notes on this issue, but I calculated a total NET difference in time between Return BowWow + Ocarina vs Keep BowWow + no Ocarina to be around 15s. (IE the WR route is slow by 15s compared to other routes).

Things to keep in mind timing wise: -Lack of D6 PoP [non-WR route] -Hard to control D5 PoP [non-WR route] -Guaranteed Walrus Skip (no buffering, no menu lock) [WR Route] -General overworld movement between the routes -Something about cookies -Being able to Mambo in D5 (at least the second mambo is faster) (All these things were mentioned by SG)

In summation: I like the route that I used in the WR as it's safer and leads to much fewer resets. I highly recommend it to ALL runners of this game, new and seasoned. This is all I will say on the matter. I do not want to have a full-blown discussion/argument/discourse/proof/dick-measurement/rant/philosophical deliberation etc. on this issue.

I just want to reply to confirm a lot of what Zorlax is saying, in that Keeping Bow-Wow and Skipping Ocarina is closer to a 15-30 second save(after talking with Zorlax about it the other week)

I've found it closer to 30 seconds than 15 personally because Getting PoP in D5 is actually pretty consistent. Also, D6 PoP is possible pending a good armos maze where Bow Wow eats pretty few things. But I count that as not happening when calculating the time saves/losses from ocarina skip route.

The only thing I don't agree with is that it leads to fewer resets, cause there's no reason you should need to reset from Walrus skip at this point anymore.

Bow Wow does make rooster skip a tiny bit more dangerous. It's not as bad as people think usually though once you're able to not worry about him during your rooster skip.

I still stand by skipping ocarina as the best route since the only downside I see overall is the rooster skip danger.

Lol I'm not asking which route is best, i just want to know which one to write down on the spreadsheet :)

Currently, the majority of people use the ocarina skip route, so that's probably the route to write down?

Alright fair enough.

Currently, WR uses Ocarina route, so probably write that one down?

[Being seriously now, guys, I think both would be good as I think one is "easier" to learn than the other. People learning from a scratch, ie the spreadsheet, could benefit from learning the easier route.]

I agree with Zorlax. Returning BowWow +Ocarina is probably the best safe strat at the moment and much easier if you're starting out.

However I would put the optimal route (Dog/no Ocarina) on the spreadsheet. If someone does a video tutorial for the new route, I would highly suggest doing the safe route there. Many new runners will learn the run by watching a tutorial, so they start off with the easy route. That's my opinion. (But of course we can also just put both routes on the spreadsheet)