Any one else feel like Inner Isshin is just cheap?

[Aelin Galathynius]

I really enjoyed Inner Geni and Father, both felt like a good but fair challenge.

Inner Isshin in the other hand. Once I got to phase 2 I had so much trouble telling the difference between his sweeps and his thrusts that I kept dodging when I should be jumping and jumping when I should be dodging. The attacks look too similar.

Every other enemy in the game follows the simple rule of sword held out to side = sweep, sword hilt drawn back to stomach = thrust then Inner Isshin just throws this out of the window with his spear.

Not to mention the flowers obscure the animations to make it harder still to tell what he's doing, I usually deal with that by pulling him over near the bridge where the ground is bare but after getting knocked off the edge in phase 3 yesterday I opted to avoid that today.

Anybody else feel like that fight is just designed to be frustrating rather than fun?

[𝕊𝕠𝕡𝕙𝕚𝕒]

your entire argument makes no sense because he is same boss compare to regular ishin the only diffrence is he has 2 new atacks ( Mortal blade worldwind - Phase 1 and Sweep followed by either thrust or single hit ) each one ez to recognize.

[bAllu]

git gud at beating sword saint lol, aint much to talk about here

[Xaphnir]

There's no variation in the new attack that forces you to decide between jumping and anything else.

You avoid the first two hits with a jump and a midair deflect, then the final one is either a Dragon Flash or a thrust. And here's the secret to dealing with this part: the timing for using mikiri for the thrust or using dodge iframes to avoid the Dragon Flash is exactly the same, so you can respond to both variants of the attack in exactly the same way.

Originally posted by 🎮 D U S T 🎮:

your entire argument makes no sense because he is same boss compare to regular ishin the only diffrence is he has 2 new atacks ( Mortal blade worldwind - Phase 1 and Sweep followed by either thrust or single hit ) each one ez to recognize.

He does have one additional new move in phase 1: he can counter with an uppercut after blocking (not deflecting) one of your attacks. I will say this one feels kind of cheap due to how fast it is (the vast majority of people will not be capable of reacting fast enough to avoid it, if it's even humanly possible to do so), but unless you're going for no damage it doesn't matter that much due to how little damage it does.

[FTZ35]

Originally posted by Xaphnir:

There's no variation in the new attack that forces you to decide between jumping and anything else.

You avoid the first two hits with a jump and a midair deflect, then the final one is either a Dragon Flash or a thrust. And here's the secret to dealing with this part: the timing for using mikiri for the thrust or using dodge iframes to avoid the Dragon Flash is exactly the same, so you can respond to both variants of the attack in exactly the same way.

Originally posted by 🎮 D U S T 🎮:

your entire argument makes no sense because he is same boss compare to regular ishin the only diffrence is he has 2 new atacks ( Mortal blade worldwind - Phase 1 and Sweep followed by either thrust or single hit ) each one ez to recognize.

He does have one additional new move in phase 1: he can counter with an uppercut after blocking (not deflecting) one of your attacks. I will say this one feels kind of cheap due to how fast it is (the vast majority of people will not be capable of reacting fast enough to avoid it, if it's even humanly possible to do so), but unless you're going for no damage it doesn't matter that much due to how little damage it does.

Ok so about the first point: you don't even need a midair deflect, you can just jump backwards on the sweep and then the followup will miss you. The dodge forward part is correct though.
As for the second part. the reason that move is so hard to anticipate is because he uses it after a block instead of a deflect, Normally you would continue to attack after a block but you get hit immediately instead.
So the easiest solution is to prevent him from using that move by forcing him to deflect whenever he would normally block. You can do that by thrusting.
E.g. after a mikiri counter you can do one attack which will hit him but he will block the second, so make your second attack a thrust instead to force the deflect.

[Artek [General]]

Nope. Experienced none of your issues. He's pretty much a superior Sword Saitn with some moves buffed and like 1-2 new ones.

That being said there are some things about him that do feel... A little bit too much, i guess?

His new and improved mortal draw is a completely new form of attacking that can't be avoided by conventional means that the game teached you for the other 99% of the game:
He first slashes his immediate vicinity, then a magical follow up clears out the outer ring in a huge range.
If you try to deflect the initial swing (bad idea, but it was possible before even with cheap damage) - Sekiro gets knocked back into the outer ring, and then gets hit by outer ring in a staggered state, unable to escape. The follow up comes faster than Sekiro recovers and can do anything.
This one is avoided through pure positioning: you learn the range of inner ring, stand outside, then immediately go in before the outer follow up.
That, or you use Mist Raven to just bypass inner ring and stay inside anyway.

In 2nd phase i experienced no issues with differentiating his swings at all, but he does learns a new move - that new OP swipe, immediately followed up by upward swing that launches him in the air (while potentially hitting Sekiro, if he tried to go counter-kick), and then followed with either Dragon Flash or Thrust.
The weird thing with this one, is that i'm not sure what form of countering it the devs intended. Eventually i learned the COOL way of countering it - i learned how to time it just right to counter-kick him, while launching myself away avoiding the follow up anti-air swing and then either deflect Flash or Mikiri the thrust. So ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ cool.

Outside of these 2 weirdos the only difference i feel is that he's a little bit more agressive and a little bit more trigger happy, showering me with bullets whenever i try to chug my gourd.
I absolutely love that fight though. Probably my favorite boss in the entire game.

[Xaphnir]

Originally posted by FTZ35:

Ok so about the first point: you don't even need a midair deflect, you can just jump backwards on the sweep and then the followup will miss you.

Yeah, you can do that, too, though midair deflect does posture damage and lands you in a better position. Certainly more reliable to dodge backwards if you're not confident.

[FTZ35]

Originally posted by Xaphnir:

Originally posted by FTZ35:

Ok so about the first point: you don't even need a midair deflect, you can just jump backwards on the sweep and then the followup will miss you.

Yeah, you can do that, too, though midair deflect does posture damage and lands you in a better position. Certainly more reliable to dodge backwards if you're not confident.

I said jump backwards, not dodge backwards. If anything it requires less confidence as you don't have to time your midair deflect.