Dynasty Warriors 5 - Legend of Cao Pi (Hard)

Описание: "I am Cow Pee."

Cao Pi's moveset has quite a lot of openings in it. Most of his charges take too long to get off even with a Medium weight weapon. His C5 is great but about 75% of the time I try it, something pokes me out of it. His C3 has an awkward attack range too. About the only thing that felt safe was using his Jump Charge, but that's punishing if you whiff.

Guan Du is pretty rough for a starting stage on Hard. Mostly because, on Hard, Guan Yu won't defeat Yan Liang and can even BE defeated by him if left alone too long. He retreats back awfully quickly after seeing a green smudge off in the distance he instantly identifies as his brother. Yuan Shao's forces all have high morale and it pretty much only increases as the stage goes on, so it's vital that you maintain your own by protecting Bai Ma and Yan Jin. That's the Defense Base Xiahou Dun is guarding and the fort Cao Cao is in. Somehow Bai Ma can still get taken even if Cao Cao and Guan Yu are actively fighting inside of it, hell if I know how that works. So first order of business is to take out Wen Chou to protect Xiahou Dun's side, then book it over to Guan Yu and finish killing Yan Liang (at least he gets him down to about 40% health). After that it's a rush to take down high morale officers ASAP until Wu Chao opens, then you need to go take it immediately and go back to defending Yan Jin and Guan Du Castle that is almost certainly under attack by now. If Yuan Shao's army is still going strong and you're struggling, then he'll initiate a charge even if Wu Chao was taken, so you need to make sure morale is up for when Cao Cao charges as well or he'll get annihilated. I failed this stage twice when trying to do this and that's how I lost one of the times lol. Also, I read in an event unlocking guide that Zhen Ji can defect if you're playing as Cao Pi and take Wu Chao, but that didn't happen. Oh well, we still got the cutscene just for running into her.

Chi Bi is the complete opposite of Guan Du. It's a cakewalk. Cao Pi starts very close to Huang Gai's spawn, and can trigger him early by getting on the boat Zhou Tai is at. Defeating him early just causes Zhuge Liang to leave right away and gets your morale soaring so you steamroll the enemy. The cutscene for this stage triggers at the start.

Jie Ting mostly goes smooth, so long as you're fast enough to take over the foot of the mountain and isolate Ma Su. Jiang Wei starts moving out in Hyper Mode and can be deadly, but a Musou Rage can turn the tides on him. Zhen Ji says a line about going to the summit and the game says she is...but then she just didn't for me. Which is annoying because triggering the cutscene for this stage is having both her and Cao Pi on the summit together and she just stopped right before getting there. I dunno what made her AI break there, but oh well. Nothing I could do.

Wu Zhang Plains is often a final stage, so Cao Pi gets a rare 4-star difficulty version of it. Of course it's still hard when playing like this. Zhuge Liang is relentless with his assault, his officers are all high morale and will punch through your lines, it's practically impossible to keep everyone alive at this early a level. Zhong Hui can go down in less than a minute if you don't immediately rush over to him, and you really want him to survive so you get the morale boost from the catapults. Also, some of Jiang Wei's troops will move up and they'll keep pressing in even after Zhuge Liang dies, I lost this stage once because a few of his troops (and no officers) took over the main camp after Sima Yi left. Brilliant move, buddy. That's why I make it a point to kill them all in this run. Also, Yue Ying and her Juggernauts can be quite the pain, the juggernauts will hit you and set you on fire with a long stun animation, then she'll juggle you so you take a lot of damage. After dealing with that, I went back with my army to make sure they were there to advance with me. I didn't think it'd take them so long to follow after me, but apparently their AI is set to go after EVERY base before approaching Jiang Wei. Next time I know to take them all over with them lol.

Finally we have He Fei Castle, which isn't as relentless as WZP, but can still be rough when Sima Yi calls on the army to fall back. Everyone you hadn't defeated before that point will almost certainly be max morale and charging into the castle. Fortunately your forces hold them off for quite a while, definitely long enough to defeat the northwest ambush and get Cao Pi and Zhen Ji to launch their charge on Sun Quan. I tried to defeat them all because I wanted to save Sima Yi and the others so they could help against Sun Quan, but it took too long to reach them and not a one survived lol. Should have just stuck to charging Sun Quan, but oh well, not like he was going anywhere.

0:00 - Battle of Guan Du
29:37 - Battle of Chi Bi
53:20 - Battle of Jie Ting
1:14:58 - Battle of Wu Zhang Plains
1:52:09 - Battle of He Fei Castle