I discovered today how to cancel the end lag on most items.
For example: All you have to do to cancel the end lag on the hammer is, use the hammer and as it's smashing down press the Quick Equip button. It will still have smashed down but cancelled the ending animation. It can even be done so quickly, that there would be no smashing effect.
It works for: Bow Bombs (although pretty quick anyways) Hookshot Fire Rod Ice Rod Sand Rod Hammer (It also works for Hint Glasses, but instead will take them off during the 'putting on' animation. So Link will not be wearing them during the animation)
You can also cancel the end lag by using Select and switching out the item with something else, but it's useless as it's not any faster.
Similar to the Armos room skip but instead with a soldier, you stand up against the bottom/top staircase (probably depending on what the soldier is closer to at the time) and have them run into you. After you are invinicible and the enemy is running in your body you Tornado Rod. You should get OoB and land on the tiny ledge. I'd like to note that the Soldier should be slightly above you on the staircase for this to work.
After you get on the ledge, run to the very bottom and stand underneath the floor above you. All you need to do is T-rod and you'll clip through the platform above you.
Tornado Rod around that spot and have the crow hit you at your peak height. Link will glitch and transfer to the floor above him. You'll land on this platform specifically:
For some reason, Link gets transferred to the floor above him if he gets hurt at that height from a crow. You can do it slightly away from that spot and Link will be on 5F but do the falling animation instantly.
Videos! Because it's easier to understand them, and I know Rheault will ask for them later. I don't have one for Hyrule Castle though; I didn't even try it too much =p
A few days ago I found a damage technique with the crow to move up floors, but then I found a way to use it with bombs thus finding a new use for Bomb Boosting. It requires you to be in an area where you can fall from floor to floor like ToH. You stand somewhere that is close to the ceiling, place a bomb and t-rod as it's close to exploding. You'll be damaged in the air but also transfer to the floor above you. It can be used to clip through floors and skip some things in ToH.
I was testing it with Nice Bombs the whole time not thinking it would make a difference, but then later found out it did! I didn't know it but, Nice Bombs were making it easier to be hit at a higher point in your Tornado Rod flight. Normal Bombs have a shorter hitbox, so you can't get hit high enough for most of the skips to work. It is still possible to transfer to the next floor with Normal Bombs, but you won't clip through the floor. Out of all of the skips only 2 were possible with Normal Bombs. But even still, here are all the possible spots with Normal Bombs AND Nice Bombs.
NOTE: All locations work with Nice Bombs. This is meant to show what works with Normal Bombs and what only works with Nice Bombs.
Although completely useless (only included for completeness), You can clip from 1F to 2F by standing on the chest on the center platform on 1F and performing a Bomb Boost.
Using it on top of the small key platform near the edge, you can clip into 4F in the area pictured. You can even do it near the center of the platform and clip into the wall on 4F. From there you can T-rod up onto the 5F platform to avoid hammering down the Mole.
Using it on either the red or blue pillars in that spot, you'll be clipped into the wall on 5F. From there you can skip the Stalfos fight by simply using the T-Rod and landing on the ledge above you.
NOTE: If you walk towards the Stalfos, their bodies will stay lying on the ground. Walking into one or hitting one with your sword will wake up that specific Stalfos. You can defeat them one by one this way and have the rising platform work and activate the portal like normal. If you walk towards the door after, it will close then re-open really quickly. The mini boss music will also start playing and will be overlapping the normal dungeon music until you leave the actual dungeon. Even more odd is, once the music is overlapping and you walk through the door in 7F, the fanfare music for defeating a mini boss will play. After that, no music will be playing. The entire dungeon will be silent except for the sound effects.
Alternatively, instead of hitting the lying Stalfos, you can walk to the door which will then close and the fight will activate normally.
Throwing a bomb on top of the chest in the room and t-rodding will Bomb Boost you into 9F. It's useless as you can only skip the Flying Tile fight with Nice Bombs by Bomb Boosting into 8F.
Using it on the platform with the Hardhat Beetles, you can clip into the platform with the small key. There is no void to fall into once inside and you can t-rod on top.
NOTE: Failing to land on 3F and then landing back on 2F causes a graphical glitch where everything on 1F becomes invisible. All you can see is the sky background of the dungeon. This graphical glitch is still achievable with Normal Bombs.
You can use it on lots of different spots on the blue/red pillars and you'll get clipped into the fairy room that is 8F. This is a perfect opportunity to then restore some of your hearts if you haven't already after doing multiple Bomb Boosts.
NOTE: Failing to land in the fairy room and falling back down to 7F causes the rising platform on 6F to disappear. There will be a black hole where it was and you can actually fall through it and land on 5F. This platform glitch is still achievable with Normal Bombs.
On the ledge you T-rodded on to, you can then do another Bomb Boost and get on to the cage floor on 10F. This could potentially be faster than switching out to the hammer to hit one of the Moles.
Just so there is no confusion, I edited my last post will all the updated info on the bomb boosting in ToH. I separated Normal Bomb/Nice Bomb locations and even found some new glitchy thing with it!
Those Stalfos are fun. If you hit them with something that kills them in one hit (Like a hammer) when they're still down, they'll get up, and then walking at you won't hurt you, and anything, even weapons that deal no damage will kill them.
I have no idea how that would be useful, but it's something to keep in mind, in addition to the semi-Dharkstare skip (Since both do weird things with enemy health)
It's worth noting that I found an alternative way to do this (And it's apparently slightly less exact): You can throw a bomb to a higher platform in some cases, and then T-Rod yourself. You can get the same boost, but it's usable at different places.
For example, it let's us be very, VERY close to getting from 1F to 2F (Maybe Nice Bombs?), and you can get from 10F to 11F without lowering the mole (You can throw your bomb on the mole platform)
Messing around some more with the Bomb Boosting in ToH, I found a quicker and a lot safer way to skip floors 3-6. It requires you to only have to do the Bomb Boost on 3F thus making this method less risky.
(I only used 6F because I found it easier to position myself. You can just use 5F's and it will be the same location).
When walking over to that spot, it's possible to walk too far and clip outside. If you do that accidentally, you'll fall. Luckily though, if you do clip outside, you can quickly walk back where you came from and avoid falling. I wouldn't worry too much about clipping outside as the set up for this is pretty easy.
But anyways, once in that spot you can t-rod and land on 6F on the bottom floor. Quickly T-rod again to land on the top platform because if you take too long, you'll fall into void.
Sadly, you can't land on the top wall of 7F as you could the others because above you in 8F, there is no floor. BUT, I believe there still is a way to move up the floors from here. You can walk along the inside of the walls in 7F and can walk far enough out of them to clip outside. I have a theory that you could be clipped in a wall and be standing on one of the blue/red pillars against the wall. Shoot at one of the switches to raise the pillar to gain some height OoB. From there, clip to the outside and immediately T-rod to land on the next wall. This could potentially work as 7F is a special floor that is possible to get to 2 different floors (8F,9F).
I played a bit with it just now and managed to get all the way up to 9F without moving much from that one corner. I'll try to see if I can get further.
EDIT: Made it to 10F. That one is useless unless we are able to get up higher.
It saves approximately 35-40 seconds over the route with the Crow Skip. He timed different routes (including one that skipped doing the 10F switches room) and this one ended up being the fastest. (One that was clipping back inbound was about the same, but you still had to do the tiles room and.... yeah no Kappa)
With this recent stuff and the trick that Linkshot found to skip part of 1F, it is now possible to beat Tower Of Hera without merging a single time. This means that we can beat ToH before we even enter Eastern Palace.
I think it'd be interesting to see if the game actually checks for the Pendant of Courage when going for MS. (It most likely does. Both ToC cutscene and Lorule Castle entrance check for all 7 Paintings, despite Thieves' being mandatory due to Sand Rod) Of course, that would need HoG to be beaten without merge too. How many spots need merging there? Just the second room? (Tho, do note, no HoG skipskip due to no Boots)
Any reason Anwonu kept pausing(meaning just standing there) for so long? Was he taking his time, or there another special trick that needs to be done.
He needed to wait for the stamina meter to fill up enough to use the Tornado Rod again.
Also, you guys are breaking this game too fast D: Every time I learn a new trick, I come back and find that another one has been found. Great job though :P
Of course, that would need HoG to be beaten without merge too. How many spots need merging there? Just the second room? (Tho, do note, no HoG skipskip due to no Boots)
Without Boots, there are a few places that require merge:
Second room, to reach Bubbles room. Reaching the switch that spawns the 3rd Small Key (Before Miniboss) Going through the lower level of the pre-Boss room to reach the final Small Key
You could skip either one of the last two by finding a setup for the old skip that doesn't require merging the wall to line up the Armos.
When you release the spin attack, it will hit the spinny spiky thing and it will recoil. Because Link is standing close to a ledge, the recoil will cause him to jump in the air. If you time it correctly, the bomb will explode at that exact moment and the explosion will damage Link and push him south over the little railing blocking you.
Turtle Rock skip. Skips getting two keys, getting the boss key, and doing the old trick to access another room to hit a switch. In Any%, it saves a minute and a half. I haven't timed out the old 100% route, but you can dash slide onto the Hylian Shield platform from that ledge, which saves even more time.
This is the first glitch I've found that will be really useful in runs (only other thing being bomb boosts for the bridge we hookshot clip across and big bomb heart piece skip), and I was so sure about Turtle Rock being breakable, so it felt really validating to just go in and break it.
You can use the statue to Recoil Jump and skip the puzzle with a boost. Most likely works with other positions for the statue (to reduce pushing time).
@Viskiv: Wow man, that's awesome! :D I didn't think Bombrodding would work on non ToH-esque dungeons. Does that mean this will work on any platform above Link?
@Rheault: Nice! I knew Recoil BB would be useful somewhere else. The gargoyle statues are perfect set ups for some potential skips elsewhere.
@Nick: lol, wasn't it decided that Bombrodding all the way up to the boss door wouldn't be much faster than the normal route?
@Weegee: So far the T-Rock BombRod has no uses elsewhere. There was an idea to do it in the Boss Door room in Dark Palace (To get on top of one of the platform railings, then merge or dash or something right to the door to skip hitting the four light things in upper floors), but seems the railing is too high or something.
