HCB Apollo PAIN+

addam delivers with what I would argue is the holy grail of this game. Some would say that Skorpius is the fight but to me it lacks the purity of this encounter. Any time a fight forces a weapon upon you it loses a little of the PAIN focus.

This was genuinely my first victory under these conditions so it is a little ropey but what the hey.

Conditions:
CMNUR+ *naturally*
Apollo *takes and deals half damage*
Hera's Chalice *negates the taking half damage by slowly draining your health*
PAIN+ *no magic, relics or items, just to spice things up a little*

Stage 1. Grabs and kicks, nothing to see here
Stage 2. Grabs. As I allude to in the captions it is all about the timing/postioning. Barrier abuse provokes taunts and you really want the HCB to be taunting when you go for a grab. You only need three grabs so you don't need to rush it. Pick your moment and make it count. After that dog kicks.
Stage 3. You've got to really work to land ground grabs in this stage so I went the safe route of ascension to air grabs. The range of air OS *grab* is alarming, if you can nick them with ascension then you can land a grab as well, you gotta love that. In stage 3 you don't really need to worry about the whelps, they're not coming anywhere near as fast as in previous stages and they'll only hurt you if you're standing still. If you've got a Satyr nearby taunting and a whelp closing in then you can guarantee you'll have time to launch and pursue before the whelp is stationary long enough to explode.

The first few times you get to Stage 3 then you're probably going to get your candy ass gift wrapped and handed back to you but it really is as simple as running at the barriers. That and keeping your eyes on at least three enemies at all times. Ascension will get you out of trouble if the HCB charges at you whilst rising up but there is a moment between i-frames kicking in and the window that you can cancel the move. If you risk a launch when the HCB isn't fully occupied you risk being interrupted by a vicious charge.

All in all it is a great fight and one that I love. PAIN+ adds the fuller flavour, anything else is just a boots-fest.

Category:

Gaming

Tags:

• God
• War
• Apollo
• Cerberus
• Breeder
• Glory
• Hole
• Satyr
• Foursome
• PAIN+
• NUR+
• Barrier
• Self
• Abuse

[Eilos]

Well fuck.

[addaminsain]

@Eilos Is that so?

[BigVEE]

S1 - Trim that fat, brah. Trim it good.

S2 - 0:15 Might have suited your aims better to let him keep pushing you until he was along the wall (but near enough) or ass against the wall so you could 3x OS without starting the process over again.

0:38 Pretty close to what is desired. HCB is a bit close and the angle isn't quite right for repeated application while being safe.

1:10 Thought you might try to show how to safely bait while HCB taunts, but instead 'close call finish'.

[addaminsain]

@BigVEE

S2 Finish, I'm fine with taking a chance when you're only taking a minute for this stage of the fight

S3 Opening. You're probably right, there might have been time for at least one OS right at the get-go but I was working to the gameplan of ground OS for S2 and airrape for S3. Lucky this isn't GoW eh?

Interesting point about the invisible walls, I'd not really thought about it, just taken it as how it had to be.

[addaminsain]

@BigVee

Rob us of the invisible walls and away goes taunt provocation, for the large part but in comes trapkills. OH got made virtually useless so we'd be down to Valour and CG under these conditions.

Perhaps a low invisible wall so we could use an elevated knockback but that would turn the fight into a joke.

4:30 yup, sticking to the plan

Spirit whoring, I'm sure I had a good reason for doing it at the time, much like when I waded in with the Cestus on my ApoloMAX vid.

[franchiseboy83]

Excellent show brah'

Perhaps it would be in the best interest to keep S2 Satyr alive until S3 as to avoid the third Satyr from ever appearing?

[addaminsain]

@franchiseboy83 Doing so would actually take longer.

[BigVEE]

@addaminsain >trade invisible wall with AI boundary property for ring-out

Such is the way of things.

>middle ground with both properties

>joke fight

You bet.

>good reason

A place to turn on the music and roll credits?

[BigVEE]

@addaminsain >lucky to not be GoW1

0 damage air grabs.

[BigVEE]

2:12 Maybe Kratos should take a feather from the cap of the Batman and do a double chokeslam, eh?

4:04 Easy street unlocked.

4:30 Stil insisting on air OS, eh? I suppose he was right at the verge of death.

I suppose the remainder of HCB's life is small enough and you would want to show his actual defeat at video's end.

4:55 Opting to show this approach despite the settings? Time to turn on the NFL FOX theme *hohoho*.

[BigVEE]

2:04 Those invisible wall antics. Imagine how simple this fight could be with that aspect removed. One could retreat to the other side (for some reason or other), possible get the HCB over (unlikely), make the Whelps stampede on over, rob Satyrs of their wall antics for the most part (allow them that for the bars part only), easy ring-outs for Satyrs (possibly us too if not careful), etc. I just loathe the invisible walls for these occassions.

[BigVEE]

S3 - 1:30 Excellent opening. Just a bit more set-up and the Satyr might have been ready for 3x OS while the other Satyr dicked around next to HCB well away from 'aggro range'.

*looks again*

Actually...it might have already been fine to go ahead with 3x OS from where you were prior to T into air OS...This said despite the other Satyr going mobile.

1:44 So begins the process of leading them by the nose and getting them Chokeslams in.

1:57 Suits me fine.