Zelda Breath of the Wild - Advice/Help thread

[Tanooki]

That scary guy is the Hinox and they can be. I took the slower approach on that, ran him around that mound he's next repeatedly. He never could get one shot in throwing stuff as he does. I'd stop, pop him in the eye with an arrow which temporarily cripples him in pain and then went nuts with the sword or just threw freebie bombs, wash rinse repeat. The trickier one at least I've done as of yet is the castle skeleton one with the hylian shield, nowhere to hide, just run run run.

[+-^CrossBow^-]

Was finally able to get through the Spring of Wisdom part. Just stood on a big rock in the water close to the middle of the bay and waited and waited....a really long time... But eventually the dragon showed up like Falkor from the Never Ending Story. When he was close enough, I shot him with a fire arrow....got frozen...lost a few hearts.... But there was a shiny new Dragon scale in the water near another rock just a short swim away.

 

Also I've noticed that shooting stars seem to happen in the presence of the dragons. So I was able to track that down and get that pretty quickly as well. What are the star fragments for?

[Gentlegamer]

Shooting stars happen on nights with a full moon when you are high up in elevation.

 

Star Fragments are used for upgrade material.

[+-^CrossBow^-]

Shooting stars happen on nights with a full moon when you are high up in elevation.

 

Star Fragments are used for upgrade material.

 

Okay Full moon I can see...but high elevation? No... I was literally standing on a large boulder in the water near the middle of the Bay at the foot of the mountain. I was looking towards the West when I saw the shooting star and the star fragment landed at the foot of the entrance to the bay to the west. No high elevation at all in any of it.

[Austin]

I don't think high elevation is a requirement for shooting stars to occur. I have seen a couple where I was about as low as you can get on the terrain.

 

Question: What are they used for in terms of upgrades? I have always just sold them.

[Andromeda Stardust]

i havent gotten any star frags but a lot of gear requires them for level 3-4 upgrades. According to the guide, most lvl4 upgrades are so expensive/rare drops, that its hardly worth paying the 10000 ! Rupees to unlock the final fairy. Sorry desert fairy, not worth the grind to unlock you...

[Austin]

You're missing out (and you're making a way bigger deal out of the "grind" than it is--you probably have 20,000+ rupees worth of stuff on you already and you don't even realize it).

[Gentlegamer]

I don't think high elevation is a requirement for shooting stars to occur. I have seen a couple where I was about as low as you can get on the terrain.

 

Question: What are they used for in terms of upgrades? I have always just sold them.

 

Ancient Armor, Wild Set, Circlets, and the Twilight and Wind sets (from amiibos) require star fragments to upgrade.

[Gentlegamer]

i havent gotten any star frags but a lot of gear requires them for level 3-4 upgrades. According to the guide, most lvl4 upgrades are so expensive/rare drops, that its hardly worth paying the 10000 ! Rupees to unlock the final fairy. Sorry desert fairy, not worth the grind to unlock you...

 

Kill every deer, bull, and wolf you see. They drop Raw Prime and Raw Gourmet meet, combine 5 of each and they sell from 210-450 rupees each.

[+-^CrossBow^-]

i havent gotten any star frags but a lot of gear requires them for level 3-4 upgrades. According to the guide, most lvl4 upgrades are so expensive/rare drops, that its hardly worth paying the 10000 ! Rupees to unlock the final fairy. Sorry desert fairy, not worth the grind to unlock you...

See the Desert Fairy was the second one I unlocked. The Great Fairy near the Akklala however it is spelled region, was the latest one I've unlocked.

[Tanooki]

He's right thought that 10K fairy isn't worth it in general practice. I think it's more of an achievement fairy if anything. If you've basically done it all, have a lot of spoils lying around and eating up your space then you cash it out and then bother with such lavish extras as none of it is necessary at all. Realistically speaking tier 1 is enough, and if you're some overkill fun sucking speed runner, you go in with stock gear in under an hour and pull the game off. For normal types tier1 is really a good choice, tier 2 is very helpful too, but after that it's getting into 'after the game (ganon dies)' type stuff to stretch out the hours of enjoyment with slow grinding goals to do.

[Andromeda Stardust]

He's right thought that 10K fairy isn't worth it in general practice. I think it's more of an achievement fairy if anything. If you've basically done it all, have a lot of spoils lying around and eating up your space then you cash it out and then bother with such lavish extras as none of it is necessary at all. Realistically speaking tier 1 is enough, and if you're some overkill fun sucking speed runner, you go in with stock gear in under an hour and pull the game off. For normal types tier1 is really a good choice, tier 2 is very helpful too, but after that it's getting into 'after the game (ganon dies)' type stuff to stretch out the hours of enjoyment with slow grinding goals to do.

My goal was to get the entire Ancient Set leveled up to minimum 2 stars each before I fight Ganon. Stupid me upgraded the Cuirass to level 3 and now I gotta grind a bit more to afford enough cores and gears to unlock the full set. Guardians are already becoming pushovers now, headshot with shock arrow cancels the beam, hack and slash with the master sword, then headshot when it starts charging the beam again. The 500 Guardian Stalkers I can defeat almost immediately and the 1500 HP stalkers take a bit longer. It shouldn't take long to grind enough loot to earn the set. Currently I've got the Ancient Cuirass level 3 at +18 defs, amber earrings at +18 def, and the Hylian trousers at level 3 +12, totaling +48 defense.

 

I already have more than half the Shrines in the game now. I think Calamity Ganon is gonna be a pussy by the time I finally get around to him. I swear, this is the first game I've ever played where the daily grind is as fun as completing main objectives.

 

 

Kill every deer, bull, and wolf you see. They drop Raw Prime and Raw Gourmet meet, combine 5 of each and they sell from 210-450 rupees each.

I would say use them for food, but once you level up to 10 to 15 hearts, finding "hearty" ingredients levels up your meter to full every time so no real need anymore to waste prime meat on heart restoring meals. Don't stack hearty ingredients, just cooking them alone works wonders. Two hearty +3 meals is better than one hearty +6 meal. Know where to pick up hearty ingredients in the field and stock up from time to time.

 

Still, the fastest way to gold farm in the game is just to break every piece of ore you see while exploring and collect the ore it drops. It is faster than hunting wildlife I think. There's a metric ton of luminous stones in the game and they sell for 70 rupees a piece. Many Shrines and Fairies have ore deposites nearby for fast travel, and they respawn regularly. Rubies and Sapphires are nice too if you find them in the wild. Goron Volcano region is a gold mine for rare gems, but you can farm Luminous Ore almost anywhere.

 

There's also a gemstone shop in Tarry Town (I won't spoil it, but completing the Tarry Town side quest is one helluva adventure in and of itself, possibly one of the longer side quests in the game, and very satisfying to complete it) but the prices are 4x the sell price of all gems, which are mainly only good for caching in on the rupees unless you want to upgrade all your Gerudo jewelery. I think I've upgraded all of it as far as I can that doesn't require star fragments, and possibly could have sold all the gemstones required to forge the jewelery for 5 figures at least. Currently the level 3 Amber earrings at +18 are my highest defense boosting headdress.

 

You're missing out (and you're making a way bigger deal out of the "grind" than it is--you probably have 20,000+ rupees worth of stuff on you already and you don't even realize it).

Yeah but I run the risk of selling something I'll need later if I just unload every single item I have. For instance, I've unloaded much overstock in monster parts to the Fang and Bone salesman (and what the hell does the horse armor do?), now am running short of a few fairy upgrade items. Ancient tech parts I'd be foolish to give away or sell until I collect all the gear I need from the Akkla Ancient Tech lab.

 

Especially if I sell armor and shit that I can't get back except through a certain guy in Tarry Town, who, if he's like other shops, will likely swindle my ass for 4x the resell price to buy it back. And the resell price does not increase after you've applied fairy upgrades. That said, I can safely sell the worn trousers, worn shirt for 15 rupee each (or the DLC Switch Tshirt but I kinda like it), and the warm doublet for slightly more, which was indispensable early in the game before I started buying the Rito gear.

 

But isn't collecting all loot part of the fun of the game?

[Atariboy]

Zelda just got patched on both platforms.

 

I have no way to ascertain this with certainty, but it seems to run more consistently on the Wii U now. Still getting drops, but the frequency seems less after a quick 20 minute tour.

 

Then again, maybe I'm just fooling myself. Hopefully Digital Foundry puts it through its paces and gives us some concrete frame rate numbers.

Edited March 31, 2017 by Atariboy

[Tanooki]

I'd argue the grind (which usually is almost never the case) is better than the end result. That's not to diminish the end of the game as it's a solid set of battles with a solid outcome for such a franchise as Zelda, but the rewards of the exploration and the rest trump the end product by a long mile. Maybe it should or shouldn't be that way, I don't know, but it's not a painful slog, like ever. It's like the anti-RPG, anti-MMO, anti-skyrim etc in that essence. As people say, they proved you can do an open world game that doesn't eventually beat you down with the issues people tend to overlook in the short term and may not hit before they move onto the next game. Again why I said, they keep Zelda like this, it's my happy favored franchise again instead of where I had left it from 1 purchase away from total abandonment.

[Gentlegamer]

I want a core set of weapons that aren't brittle, and some actual dungeons and not just Portal chambers.

[Austin]

@kosmic - SELL YOUR CRAP, MAN...

...you're over thinking it.

I want a core set of weapons that aren't brittle, and some actual dungeons and not just Portal chambers.

Agreed. I had a crap-ton of fun with this game, but I would have preferred more specific dungeons in place of a lot of the shrines. The closest we got (asides from the divine beasts) were the labyrinths, and they were literally just 3D mazes. Eh.. OK, cool, but not exactly "epic".

I really think Nintendo either rushed that part, or decided the game's most interesting parts were going to consist of the general exploration. And if that's true, then I would concur that the exploration is the most interesting part of the game (it's one of the things that has kept me coming back even after completing the game).

[Tanooki]

Ahh the shrines are fine, they add real value. The dungeons though, I can see how people used to Zelda could get upset if they don't look at it how Nintendo structured it, but in the classic sense. If you go classic, you have a battle to enter the front door, then an enemy-less rubiks cube of sorts to activate terminals to whomp on a boss and that's it. As Nintendo designed it, the entrance into the battle from at least the point of the regional head giving you the pop up quest is the start of the dungeon, some may argue as bitchy as Zora's Domain on the whole is, just entering the long run up to their domain would be part of it too as it's hard. It's just about perspective. I think given the scores and comments, more people than not were fed up with the crusty old style of the game as it got very drawn out, canned, and tired. Huge open areas with little to them but eye candy and lots and lots of walking or Epona riding to then do something trivial, enter a huge expanse of a dungeon that takes considerable time, and then a repeat boss of past generations. it got stale, but some are fine wit stale as it's a conservative safe comfortable blanket approach you can snuggle up into and feel safe as you know generally what to expect. This game pulled a 180 and torched the Snuggie. This game is definitely about wide walking/gliding searching exploration to really discover the world. Between the giant towers, far reaching labyrinths, odd puzzles to get many shrines just to appear, Link's failed memories and the rest it begs you to be an explorer.

[Andromeda Stardust]

@kosmic - SELL YOUR CRAP, MAN...

 

...you're over thinking it.

I do. A lot of junk has left my hands. Now if only I could cash in my ancient screws and springs for some gears and cores, which I'm currently running short on to upgrade my ancient armor.

 

But much of the rarer harder to find stuff is necessary for Fairy upgrades, so proceed with caution. I did happen to find the peddler in Tarry Town who slls back "lost" items for a premium. Premium as in 4000 rupees for certain one-shot armor located in Shrine chests. No thanks dude; I'll find it myself. Coincidentally, he also had the worn shirt and trousers that I sold back long ago in Karikikko village.

 

Agreed. I had a crap-ton of fun with this game, but I would have preferred more specific dungeons in place of a lot of the shrines. The closest we got (asides from the divine beasts) were the labyrinths, and they were literally just 3D mazes. Eh.. OK, cool, but not exactly "epic".

 

I really think Nintendo either rushed that part, or decided the game's most interesting parts were going to consist of the general exploration. And if that's true, then I would concur that the exploration is the most interesting part of the game (it's one of the things that has kept me coming back even after completing the game).

Do you not consider the Divine Beasts to be dungeons in the classical sense? A large network of mazes and puzzles, levers that tilt the entire dungeon or large chunks of it, with minimal baddies sprinkled in (mostly malice goo and the occasional guardian scout), chests, terminals to unlock, and a bad-ass blight ganon boss at the end, who grants a heart container upon defeat? That sounds like a dungeon in the classical sense to me. There are four of them in the game.

 

The main difference here is you don't even need the bosses to beat the game, but they add value to the adventure. I could go in and whup Ganon's ass right now if I wanted to, but having too much fun exploring the game. Only a few places have Shrine quests gotton super annoying. Even the dark woods went surprisingly smoothly.

 

In a much smaller sense, the Shrines in the Great Plateau which grant runes are comparible to traditional Zelda games where each dungeon offers some ability that allows you to explore more of the world. Nintendo could have made the castle impenetrable such that you needed all four divine beasts plus the master sword to fully open the path to Ganon, but they chose not to do so. Maybe this would be in line with past Zelda series games, requiring all dungeons to complete before unlockng the final boss, but it is clear they chose to allow gamers to follow their own pace.

 

I do think an any % four divine beasts plus master sword speed run would be worthy of a watch. Shrines pursued and the precise order of events would require careful planning and leave much room for optimization.

[Austin]

Yeah but I run the risk of selling something I'll need later if I just unload every single item I have. For instance, I've unloaded much overstock in monster parts to the Fang and Bone salesman (and what the hell does the horse armor do?), now am running short of a few fairy upgrade items. Ancient tech parts I'd be foolish to give away or sell until I collect all the gear I need from the Akkla Ancient Tech lab.

 

It depends on what your priorities are. If you want to go from a measly 30 or 40-something on your armor stat to 80-something, then unlocking the level 4 fairy is wise.

 

The items from Fang & Bone are pretty much useless outside of the Dark Link costume, and even that's only good after a certain time at night (9PM I think?). Sell your monster parts at normal shops and get actual money for them. It's fun to get stuff from Fang & Bone, sure, but it's kind of wasteful.

 

As I mentioned previously, it's no point in being worried "you are going to need something for later". Aside from the dragon scales, horns, and star fragments, just about everything is easily obtainable through your usual exploration and combat. The sooner you have the fourth fountain unlocked, the more you can build another stash of items (more of which you will need for the level 4 upgrades).

[Tanooki]

Check this out: https://www.engadget.com/2017/03/31/zelda-breath-of-the-wild-patch-improves-docked-switch-perform/

 

Framerate in Zelda fixed overall, notably so for docked mode FPS picky types have been complaining about. Clips run on one long chain with 1.1.0 vs 1.1.1 running the same pieces and you can really see the change.

[Andromeda Stardust]

 

It depends on what your priorities are. If you want to go from a measly 30 or 40-something on your armor stat to 80-something, then unlocking the level 4 fairy is wise.

 

The items from Fang & Bone are pretty much useless outside of the Dark Link costume, and even that's only good after a certain time at night (9PM I think?). Sell your monster parts at normal shops and get actual money for them. It's fun to get stuff from Fang & Bone, sure, but it's kind of wasteful.

 

As I mentioned previously, it's no point in being worried "you are going to need something for later". Aside from the dragon scales, horns, and star fragments, just about everything is easily obtainable through your usual exploration and combat. The sooner you have the fourth fountain unlocked, the more you can build another stash of items (more of which you will need for the level 4 upgrades).

I think I'm done grinding for now. I now have 76 Shrines and counting, 15 hearts and maxed out Stamina wheels. My primary goal being to obtain all the Ancient Tech Armor from the Akkala Tech lab upgraded to level 2 minimum, and I've done that now. I started by wiping out all of the combat shrines I've unlocked so far, then I went hunting for the Guardians. I cleaned up a couple guardians over by the Tech lab and on the beach, then headed to Hyrule field to clean house. I was mostly using the Master Sword when available, and I already had the level 2 Diamond Circlet and level 3 Ancient Cuirass. As soon as I collected enough ancient cores and gears, I purchased the pants but could only upgrade to level 1 at that time. So I cleaned up Hyrule field and that northeast shrine labyrinth. I still can't get perfect guard down pat, but when holding your shield, you will perfectly deflect the beams destroying the guardian in one hit if you have the Goron Divine Beast tamed. You can do this up to three times. Neat! I cleaned up so much loot in Hyrule field and the hidden chamber below the maze, that I was able to afford the complete outfit and upgrade to level 2 head, level 3 body, and level 3 boots, with the ancient proficiency. That's 48 defense +3 guardian resist up, and all ancient tech weapons deal more damage with the suit. If I combine those with Mighty Fruit meals cooked from 3 or 5 mighty bananas, this gives me offense +2 or +3, making the Guardians and quite possibly Ganon almost a pushover. And I've been using stasis now to freeze the guardians before they laser my ass for close combat. I'm only taking 3-4 hearts per laser hit, making me all but immune to their attacks. Suddenly Guardians aren't so tough anymore.

 

Is it possible to over-grind the game such that the final fight will become underwhelming? I feel like I am ready despite having one more divine beast (desert camel) to tame. And I hear it gives me the power to call upon lightning anytime after I defeat lightning blight Ganon. It will be fun to use it on the final Calamity Ganon boss...

[Austin]

Is it possible to over-grind the game such that the final fight will become underwhelming? I feel like I am ready despite having one more divine beast (desert camel) to tame. And I hear it gives me the power to call upon lightning anytime after I defeat lightning blight Ganon. It will be fun to use it on the final Calamity Ganon boss...

 

I think the final fight is probably going to be underwhelming no matter how beefy your character is.

 

The ability you gain from the camel is a lightning attack that does lots of damage and stuns enemies. Three time use, then it takes about five minutes to recharge. Good for large, difficult enemies (Lynels, I'm looking at you).

[LidLikesIntellivision]

I beated the game today.

I had around 15 hearts, and almost 3 stamina rings.

 

Exploration wasn't too exciting anymore and I hadn't any big goal before Gannon but I wanted to find one more memory. Since its location was hard to find, I searched on the internet, recovered memories (I think every memory, not sure) and went to defeat final boss.

 

Final fight and ending were bad, imo. Now, I may take some time before returning to the game and trying to get more of it.

[Andromeda Stardust]

You're missing out (and you're making a way bigger deal out of the "grind" than it is--you probably have 20,000+ rupees worth of stuff on you already and you don't even realize it).

~11,000 for all my gems and half my screws (100 out of 200+), springs (50 out of 100+), and shafts (20 out of 50). Enough to completely unlock all remaining fairies...

 

Is it possible to over-grind the game such that the final fight will become underwhelming? I feel like I am ready despite having one more divine beast (desert camel) to tame. And I hear it gives me the power to call upon lightning anytime after I defeat lightning blight Ganon. It will be fun to use it on the final Calamity Ganon boss...

Bit of an update: Now at 80 Shrines (16x hearts and maxed out 3x stamina wheels), 4 divine beasts tamed with laser sights set on Hyrule castle, and all 4 fairy fountains plus the horse fairy unlocked. I had a bunch of gems in my inventory as well as over 200 ancient screws and 100 ancient springs. I unloaded all my gems and half of my screws, springs, and 20 out of 50 shafts to afford the 10,000 rupees to unlock the last desert fairy.

 

Now for the tragic part. After manually saving the game, I actually slain my horse in front of the horse fountain to see what he would do. His response made me sad though, but he respawned my horse. Not to be deterred, I slain my horse again and he revived him in exchange for an Endura carrot. I repeated this act four more times to see if the game would punish animal abusers, but nope. Just revive any lost or slain horse for the price of one Endura carrot. Killing wildlife for food and slaying horses for spite, yep PETA would be proud of Nintendo yet they have been surprisingly quiet. Anyway I felt really guilty about what I did so I backed up to where I saved before I killed my horse...

 

I still need four more ancient cores to level up my ancient headdress to three stars. Not surprisingly, nothing I have capable of upgrading to level four yet. Most of the best armor requires shooting star fragments and stuff which I have never found throughout the entire game so far. Come to think of it, I may have seen one or two shooting stars the entire game, and never managed to collect any fragments. Each piece of ancient armor requires 1x star frag and 2x giant ancient cores to upgrade to level four. Currently I have 4 giant ancient cores and no star fragments. That would give me a whopping +84 defense and make me practically invulnerable to Guardian attacks, if I could max out the set.

 

Finally I must say the Yiga Boss fight had a bit of comic relief at the end of the battle. I won't spoil it for you.

[Atariboy]

Digital Foundry released their video covering the new patch for both versions.