How to get unwinnable.

[Felis]

A possible way to get a save unwinnable:

1. Act normally until you get the Cloak.
2. Die near the charm shop.
3. Slash your shade to go to the Blue Lake (very tricky, you need to parry with it once and down slash twice to get enough height)
4. Go to City of Tears from Blue Lake, then go to Ancient Basin.
5. Go left, pay the Geo and sit on the Bench.

Now, this save is unwinnable.
You can't go back as you don't have Mantis Claw;
You can't go to the Stag Station as you don't have double jump (and the shade location does not allow you to do so either)
You can't get the double jump as you don't have Mantis Claw and super dash.

[Zanice DG]

Maybe I'm mistaken but I think step 3 is impossible without the mantis claw. Have you seen evidence that it is possible in the current version of the game?

[GenSec39]

Originally posted by Zanice DG:

Maybe I'm mistaken but I think step 3 is impossible without the mantis claw. Have you seen evidence that it is possible in the current version of the game?

- possible. Seen this trick not so long ago, so I suppose it is related to current verison.

[Shucks]

You dont need super dash to get to the double jump, pretty sure you can downward slash on the spikes across. You probably do need the Mantis Claw though.

[Phirestar]

Originally posted by AsseT:

You dont need super dash to get to the double jump, pretty sure you can downward slash on the spikes across. You probably do need the Mantis Claw though.

Yes, you can do that; Crystal Heart isn’t required to reach Monarch Wings, but Mantis Claw definitely is.

As for the rest of this situation, I’d say that while it might be possible to pull off - I personally haven’t tried doing Blue Lake skip without the Mantis Claw, so I don’t know for sure - the actual chance of someone doing this naturally on a blind playthrough is probably 0%. I think only people that know about it will be able to do it.

Not a big issue, but still pretty interesting to hear. With how complex Hallownest’s layout is, and the fact that Team Cherry actively implemented skips, a softlock like this was inevitably going to get past all the testing.

[Darc Vader]

Am I misremembering something? I thought the elevator between Resting Grounds and East City of Tears had to be unlocked from the City side before it’s usable from Resting Grounds.

[Phirestar]

Originally posted by Darc Vader:

Am I misremembering something? I thought the elevator between Resting Grounds and East City of Tears had to be unlocked from the City side before it’s usable from Resting Grounds.

You’re thinking of the elevator from the City Storerooms that leads up to the Crossroads, which has a toll box at the bottom.

The Blue Lake skip (with Mantis Claw) is used in speedruns to reach Watcher Knights, because it’s faster than going through the Soul Sanctum or taking the tram from Deepnest.

[Felis]

Originally posted by Zanice DG:

Maybe I'm mistaken but I think step 3 is impossible without the mantis claw. Have you seen evidence that it is possible in the current version of the game?

I have managed to do so (with slowed down speed and many trials) and did see someone do it in a speedrun.
The trick is, first you need to get 66 souls for two spells, then jump twice near the shop to get the shade high enough, then jump the third time and collision on the shade. After so, immediately down slash, you should be able to parry with the shade.After you are about to fall, use a spell to keep height a little longer for the shade to move upward, then down slash on the shade, do the spell - down slash again, if you are lucky and do it right, you should have enough height to dash to the blue lake.

[Fredrikorex]

I mean yeah if you really go out of your way to do that skip you could basically ruin that save game, no sane person would do that on their first playthrough though.

Been playing with randomizer myself and there are situations where it's possible to do simular things which is why it's suggested to use bench warp with it, most of the time it's enough for me to warp to last used bench with is basically a reload of the save.

[Blook]

I believe you CAN actually get out of that situation: pogo on the spikes to the end of the crystal dash path and then die at then end, use your shade to bounce up and onto the end platform, beat Broken Vessel and get double jump, go to stag station at palace grounds.

[Felis]

Originally posted by Agent Clyde:

I believe you CAN actually get out of that situation: pogo on the spikes to the end of the crystal dash path and then die at then end, use your shade to bounce up and onto the end platform, beat Broken Vessel and get double jump, go to stag station at palace grounds.

No, firstly, the shade will be on the cliff and it won't notice you, then, even if you managed to beat the Broken Vessel, the path to the wing still needs Mantis Claw.

[Blook]

Originally posted by Felis:

Originally posted by Agent Clyde:

I believe you CAN actually get out of that situation: pogo on the spikes to the end of the crystal dash path and then die at then end, use your shade to bounce up and onto the end platform, beat Broken Vessel and get double jump, go to stag station at palace grounds.

No, firstly, the shade will be on the cliff and it won't notice you, then, even if you managed to beat the Broken Vessel, the path to the wing still needs Mantis Claw.

I've actually done the first part before with shade pogoing at the crystal dash section.

I looked at a playthrough and the entire lead up to broken vessel doesn't require Mantis Claw (except for seemingly one point, but you can pogo off a shell thing in the environment to get up then). After the fight though there is 1 jump before monarch wings that you're supposed to use Mantis Claw on, and it doesn't look very cheesable. There is one shell thing in the environment you might be able to gain some height with, but it's low. If you bought longnail, that might be just enough to get you up and over, but I kind of doubt it. There's no way to get hit in the room, but I think I remember a thread somewhere that mentioned a frame-perfect trick where you get hit on the same frame you go into another room, so you get hit in one room but the hit doesn't register until you're in a different room. It wasn't used here so that might just not be possible with this room transition, but there's a chance.

So if it is possible, to do it, you would:
1. Die at the end of the spikes, after pogoing along them the whole way, then use your shade to get up to the top of the ledge there.
2. Do the route to Broken Vessel normally, then for the last jump use the environment shell object to bounce slightly higher.
3. Break open the shortcut wall and beat Broken Vessel.
4. Die to a shadow creeper to the right of the boss battle.
5. Take damage from your shade while you go into the next room, so your new shade spawns in the next room.
6. Pogo off your shade to do the 1 jump you need to get to Monarch Wings.

[Blook]

If nothing else, if you played on a version before the Lifeblood update, there's an easy to perform glitch called p-float that would let you do it with no problems