DMC3 - Agni & Rudra Useage Guide

A guide to using my personal favourite weapon in Devil May Cry 3, Agni & Rudra. I'll be writing this under the assumption that you've at the very least already bought all the moves for it and, prefereably, have beaten the game at least once and have a decent understanding of DMC3's mechanics.

Overview

Agni & Rudra are a pair of demons who have the form of swords with heads on the base of the hilt. Agni is the red sword and can control fire, while Rudra is the blue sword and can control wind.

The pair of demons were charged with guarding a huge gate in Temen-ni-Gru, but when Dante defeats them, they recognise his strength and ask him to take them with him. Despite Dante insisting that the only way he'll bring them with him is if the pair remain silent, they do speak up during certain moves which we'll cover below.

In gameplay terms, A&R is a very up-close-and-personal style weapon, with their attacks having middling range at best. They excel when paired with the Swordmaster style, since the moves you gain help to cover the weaknesses the weapon would otherwise have. However they can, in my opinion, function as an excellent 'main weapon' since the multitude of ways you can combo an enemy with lots of different moves help build style quite quickly on their own and the possibilities grow further when combining A&R's strengths with another weapon.

Techniques

In this move list, I'll be listing a triangle/Y press as A

• Agni & Rudra Combo I - A, A, A, A, A

  Basic, easy to use combo. The first four attacks cover space in front of you while the final attack can strikes enemies behind and to the side of you. It should be noted that the length of this combo can make it hard to get to the final hit without getting interrupted.
  This combo can be used quite safely against a single enemy and does a decent amount of damage. In addition, its forward movement and many hits until you reach the knockdown hit mean that it can be used against a stunned boss like Vergil to get lots of hits in without him getting pushed too far away.
  

• Agni & Rudra Combo II - A, Pause, A, A

  Despite this combo having a pause in it, it's Agni & Rudra's quickest combo to finish by a long shot. It also does a good amount of damage, but it is very linear - it focuses on enemies directly in front of you.
  Due to the speed of this combo, it is reasonably safe to use when in a crowd, especially since the hits are so close together - this means you can jump cancel out if an enemy starts to attack you from a different direction. Also, the second hit has a wider range on it compared to a lot of Agni & Rudra's attacks.
  

• Agni & Rudra Combo III - A, Pause, A, Pause, A

  This combo takes about as long to complete as combo 1 but can be considered slightly more useful. Not only do you get the wide cone attack of the A-pause-A attack, but the final attack after the second pause also has an even wider range of quick slashes - they cover most of the space in front of you. This is a good combo to use often for a number of reasons - large range in front of Dante, and the final kicking attack after the fast slashes also causes a lot of hitstun. In addition, in one-on-one battles, this combo can be mashed to go crazy.
  

• Million Slash - Crazy Agni & Rudra III

  This crazy combo is easy to pull off due to the length of time that the fast slashes in combo III stay out for, giving you plenty of time to mash the attack button to get this going. You throw out a huge number of slashes, which can be extended by continuing to mash the attack button, which is finished with a large horizontal slash with lots of knockback capability. This combo does a large amount of damage as well as feeling great to pull off.
  When performing the combo, Agni and Rudra will shout and laugh. When Dante performs the final slash, he shouts "Silence!".
  

• Jet Stream - Lock on + forward + A

  Jet Stream might be A&R's most interesting combo. Like Rebellion's Stinger, it's a gap closing move, but it works quite differently. Rather than using the momentum of an attack to move forward, Jet Stream has Dante run towards whatever enemy he's facing ready to attack. The lock on doesn't correct Dante's run a huge amount, so make sure you're facing the enemy you're locked on to before going for Jet Stream. Once Dante runs close enough to the enemy, the Jet Stream attack will start. Again unlike Stinger, levelling this move up doesn't just increase its range, but it instead unlocks extensions for the move. By holding A when using this move, you can use more attacks. You can also refrain from using the extensions by letting go of A at any time. The first part of the attack is a double slash, the second part is another double slash, and the final part is a wide horizontal knockdown move similar to the final attack of Million Slash. Dante will also continue running while the attacks are happening, making sure you're right in the enemy's face for the next attack.
  To maximise combo potential on light enemies that are easy to knock back, it might be a good idea to stop holding A before the final hit comes out and cancel to a different combo instead to ensure you stay close and can continue to rank up your style meter.
  

• Whirlwind - Lock on + backward + A

  Very similar to Rebellion's High Time, this is a launching move that can be held to have Dante follow the enemy into the air. There's no much to say about this one - good range in front of Dante but not much in terms of horizontal range, can be cancelled into guns for juggling purposes, all the same fun stuff as High Time. It's a little slower than High Time though, but also hits twice on the ground, and the hold version of this move also hits a third time once you're in the air, boosting your style by a little more.
  

• Aerial Cross - A in the air

  A single crossed-sword slash with both swords that does good damage and some knockback. This can be cancelled into Air Hike in order to go into more air options as well - very useful when killing the pillars in the Leviathan Heart fight.
  

• Air Hike - Jump while in the air

  Needs no explanation; Agni & Rudra make great use of Air Hike so don't forget that it's in your arsenal.

Swordmaster Style

In this move list, I'll be listing a circle/B press as B
Swordmaster style plays extremely well with Agni & Rudra. All the moves you gain are useful and complement the regular moveset in meaningful ways. Level 2 of Swordmaster will grant Crawler, and level 3 will grant Twister and its follow-ups.

• Crossed Swords - B

  A very useful attack for A&R, it grants you quick access to a knockdown attack. Not only does this attack come out quickly and deal good knockback, it also comes out quickly so can be thrown into any combo to knock an enemy down and make things safer to retreat. The range is also a little bit larger than the final attacks of Million slash and Jet Stream. All around, a very useful move.
  

• Sky Dance - B in mid-air

  The coolest aerial rave-type move in the game, this one does lots of hits in the air before plumetting to the ground while doing a spinning move that hits all the way down. When Dante reaches the ground, he'll follow up with a wide slash that hits all around the front of Dante. All around a great move, you can also cancel the aerial combo into an Aerial Cross at any time to still do plenty of damage and stay in the air as well.
  

• Crawler - Lock on + forward + B

  A proectile-type attack that provides A&R with a much-needed ranged option. It fires a slow moving path of fire pushed along with Rudra's win in a straight line across the ground. The fire is very linear and Dante is slow to recover after firing it, but the little hitstun it causes lets you chase the fire towards the enemy with a Jet Stream to rack up some damage on slower enemies.
  When throwing out a crawler, Agni can be heard saying "Die!" while Rudra will shout "Oh yeah!".
  

• Twister - Lock on + backward+ B

  This is the reason you use Swordmaster with A&R - this move is nuts. It comes out very quickly and has a huge hitbox that completely surrounds Dante, and does good hitstun too. Not only this, but the damage you can do off this move is ludicrous if you use its followups correctly. A great panic move to throw out if enemies are creeping up on you while you're trying to do a combo.
  During this move, Agni shouts "Ashes to ashes!"
  

• Tempest - Crazy Twister

  Twister gets crazy! If you thought the utility of Twister was great, Tempest is a dream come true. More damage, more range, more hitstun... Dante even takes to the sky while performing it to help avoid damage! All these bonuses come at a cost - Tempest can be quite tricky to activate due to the short time that Twister is active. To get to Tempest more reliably, it is recommended that you mash B as hard as possible during a different attack's animation in order to cram in as many presses as you can before Twister comes out - this way, you can more easily reach the required number of button presses to trigger the crazy combo.
  In addition, you can extend the Dante's spin without the flames by mashing A when Tempest starts to inflict massive damage. This is handly against juggled enemies and tall bosses like Beowulf.

Using Agni & Rudra Effectively

I've found that when using Swordmaster style, getting in deep with a crowd with A&R can be very rewarding. Locking on to an enemy in the centre of a group and charging in with a Jet Stream cancelled into a Tempest after the first few hits does huge damage, separates the crowd somewhat and can rank up your style into the S levels if you catch enough enemies.
Another important point to remember when using A&R is that you have opions to cause knockback available to you at almost all times. Without Swordmaster, using the launcher move Whirlwind causes a good amount of knockback, but Crossed Swords in Swordmaster style is your go-to for slamming enemies to the ground or into walls quickly.
In terms of weapons to pair with Agni & Rudra, all of them work well, but I'd recommend against pairing them with Rebellion because there's a lot of overlap in their moves, especially in Swordmaster.

[Look at Pittbert!]

Love to see this

[Karl]

Agni & Rudra are so cool. My personal favourite as well.