This week I focused on enhancing all armor to the max, with the exception of the amiibo-exclusive pieces, because those are too expansive at the moment. But at least I've completed my collection of the latter, where I now have all the amiibo pieces that can be gotten from the currently available amiibo:
Enhancing them will be a painful grinding process, however, because you need a Star Fragment on every single step, where I would need to collect over 50 of them to complete this. And that doesn't even include the unreleased amiibo with the Fierce Deity and
Skyward Sword tunics. I would have enough gems for everything, but the Star Fragments are just very rare and require you to get out of your current way to get them. I suppose, Nintendo chose them, because they can also be gotten from certain amiibo, but that's probably even rarer than finding them in the game.
Of course you can just "save scam" the whole amiibo thing and reload your last savegame, until the amiibo give you what you want. That way you can get all the exclusive items within four days, even shorter if you're willing to mess with the internal clock of the Wii U. However, I personally like having an incentive / excuse to use the amiibo on a daily basis, where I will keep using them for the chance of getting more Star Fragments and more of the exclusive weapons.
Part of the problem is that all the jewelry in the game already takes quite some Star Fragments for enhancing and I prioritized them over the amiibo stuff, because they come with special effects. (It's a shame, though, that they don't enable set bonuses. With some gear, where the helmet is ugly, e.g. the Ancient Armor, it would be nice, if you could use the jewelry as an alternative without losing the set bonus, especially since these items are so expansive.)
But all the "normal" armor and jewelry in the game now reads a nice red "Cannot Enhance" in the Great Fairy upgrade screen. For this I had to collect various materials all over the world, where I also discovered some new things on my way.
Part 1: Smotherwing Butterflies and Red Lizalfos Tails
This is where I left off this blog last Sunday. I went to the Death Mountain area to collect Red Lizalfos Tails for upgrading the Flamebreaker Armor set. But I also needed many Smotherwing Butterflies, which turned out to be the bigger problem. But it also turned out to be a good use of food and potions with the stealth effect, because you want to wear said Flamebreaker Armor in the area and therefore can't use the full Stealth Gear. The stealth effect does help a lot with collecting insects and critters, where you can even approach them normally without them fleeing.
The Smotherwing Butterflies are also really hard to spot due to the many particle effects around the burning areas. But I've mentioned this before and at least it gives the Sheikah Sensor+ something to do. Though, I've lately been using it to target treasure chests, which kind of feels like having the Compass sound from
Link's Awakening. And it certain areas it makes you go from one chest to the next...
Well, I did find a couple of Igneo Talus on my travels through Death Mountain, but otherwise not all that much. What disappointed me that there doesn't seem to be anything on any of the giant rocks around the volcano. Whenever I see a giant rock, I want to climb it in the hopes of finding a Korok or something else on top. Or at least a position from where I can spot something else. But it seems like none of the sharp rocks around Death Mountain are actually worth the trouble...
Part 2: Stealthfin Trouts
This had me all over the place at first, because I didn't have the Stealthfin Trout in my Hyrule Compendium yet and didn't know, where to look for it. My first instinct was to look around Zora's Domain, because there are many ponds with various fish around the area. But I didn't have any luck with this, so my next stop was Lake Floria, where I haven't fully explored the whole area yet. And in both cases I accidentally stumbled over a Stone Talus, but luckily I'm looking for these guys as well to complete the "Medal of Honor" quests.
I've also stumbled over the Shoda Sah Shrine, while exploring Lake Floria, where you have the "Impeccable Timing" puzzle. It's not very difficult, but you can also use Cryonis to solve this one, if the orbs land in the water. I've also had a nice Silver Lynel fight above the area and also could make some shots at Farosh. Both of this would come in handy later, because I needed their materials as well, but again I didn't have any luck with finding Stealthfin Trouts.
I already did have some in my inventory, though, which I had gotten from Octoroks, amiibo and maybe even from where they actually can be found. So far I was under the wrong impression that you can't take pictures of materials that you have dropped on the ground, but I tried this again just to be sure... and it does work. Maybe, when I tried this early in the game, I used gems or other items that can't be "scanned", which is why I thought that you can only take pictures of materials, when you find them in the wild. But it doesn't really matter, what matters that I now could target Stealthfin Trouts and could get more information from the Hyrule Compendium.
Since I was taking pictures of dead fish on the ground, I also used this as an opportunity to neatly arrange them all for my Compendium:
So far all my pictures of fish have been very bad, because it's hard to get a clear shot of them in the water, but now I have them all in similar clear shots, which looks nice and adds a system to the Compendium. Getting nice shots of everything will certainly be a later task in this game.
Well, the Stealthin Trouts actually seem quite rare, even with the Sheikah Sensor and the Hyrule Compendium I only could find some at Lake Saria next to the Kuhn Sidajj Shrine. You can just enter and exit the shrine to have more of them spawn, so ultimately this spot was enough to upgrade my Stealth Armor set.
While checking the waters around the Great Hyrule Forest, I also made my first visit to Mekar Island...
And what's up with this place? At night an army of Stal enemies spawns there, but it doesn't seem like you can get anything from it. There's not even a Korok there, or at least I couldn't find one. Maybe I'm missing something crucial here, maybe this place is just for fun, I don't know yet.
Part 3: Swift Violets and Yellow Lizalfos Tails
To enhance the Rubber Armor set I needed some Yellow Lizalfos Tails and to upgrade the Sand and Snow Beats I needed many Swift Violets. To hit two birds with one stone, I decided to go to the north part of the desert, where you can find both.
Afterwards I decided to visit the Yiga Clan Hideout again, where I haven't been there since my third day of playing the game. I remember, how I pushed myself through the whole thing with only five hearts, because I couldn't find a shrine in the area to go back there quickly later on. Well, there actually is one right in front of the hideout, I just missed it back in the day, because the three Yiga Archers were chasing me right through the entrance, so I didn't look back. Today these guys are some of the simplest and easiest enemies in the game, but early in the game they still gave me enough trouble to not explore the area and to miss this important short cut...
Well, it's the Sho Dantu Shrine with the very nice "Two Bombs" puzzle, which is one of the few puzzles in the game that make use of having two different bombs at the same time.
The Yiga Clan Hideout is now empty, though. I was hoping that I could fight my way through it this time, but that's probably something that I will do when replaying the game.
Interlude: The Sheikah Heirloom
Whenever I go upgrade my armor, I usually do that with the Great Fairy at Kakariko Village, because I like her the best and you can also find a Goddess Statue in the village to trade your Spirit Orbs. So, it's practical. Another reason might have been that I still was drawn to the area, because I hadn't solved the whole "Sheikah Heirloom" riddle, where there's still another shrine near the Great Fairy. I just couldn't figure out what to do to get the orb from Impa.
But for some reason I now managed to trigger a series of sidequests in the village that led to getting the orb... I'm not exactly sure, what triggered it, but it started with the "Journal of Various Worries". But I did read this journal various times before and nothing ever happened. So, I suppose, the actual trigger was showing Lasli some fireflies at night, which I hadn't done before. Afterwards I also could do a little sidequests for the arrow shop girl, where so far I never noticed a red exclamation mark above her and I did buy arrows several times in her shop. But finishing this then finally led to sidequests, where the orb got stolen from under Paya's nose. (I really like her character, because her crush for "Master Link" is simply adorable.) And with this I finally could enter the shrine and receive Lakna Rokee's Blessing:
I liked, how this little storyline was linked to the Yiga, because the timing couldn't have been better after my latest visit to their hideout. And to learn that the mother of Cotta and Koko is actually dead, makes it really sad, how the girls believe that "mommy is still playing hide and seek". That's dark.
Part 4: Lynel Guts
Other than some Star Fragments for the jewelry, I then was only missing Lynel Guts and various dragon parts to upgrade the Barbarian Armor set and the Champion's Tunic. It's a shame, how I haven't been using the latter ever since the early game, because upgrading it was simply too expansive...
I saved dealing with the three dragons for last, so the next step was Lynel hunting. And by now I'm having a blast dueling with Silver Lynels. Those guys are a good challenge and it's a lot of fun to fight them, once you mastered the combat in this game. And what better place to do this than where my journey began with the Lynels at Oseira Plains?
Well, by now every Lynel spot other than Ploymus Mountain and the Hyrule Castle Gatehouses seems to hold a Silver Lynel, which makes me wonder, how I will get my hands on all the weaker Lynel weapons for the Compendium... So, ultimately it doesn't really matter, which spot to chose for a Lynel fight, I just go back to the grasslands out of sentiment. And for some reason I never explored the mountains on the top, probably because there were some Guardians crawling around it.
In fact when I first left the Great Plateau, I was aiming towards the Stalry Plateau, but than evaded towards the Taobab Grassland (where you can find the Ganon Horse), because I thought I spotted a live Guardian on the hills. And this seemed right, but by now those guys aren't an issue anymore. No limits! Also, I got a Five-Shot Burst Savage Lynel Bow from fighting them earlier and I have over 500 Shock Arrows by now, where the combination of the two is very effective on Guardians. I've only used Ancient Arrows once or twice in this game...
Well, I climbed Mount Granajh, where you can find the "Secret of the Snowy Peaks" Shine Quest. And this one was a little awkward. Because of the puddles of ice water I thought that I had to use Cryonis to solve this somehow, e.g. by lifting a large snow ball with the rune. But this didn't work. And the fact that you can only do this puzzle at a certain time of day, didn't make it any less awkward. There are other Shrine Quests like this one, but there you had a Sheikah Tower or some other Travel Gates nearby to get back there during the right time. Here you didn't even know at what time the pedestal activates. You had to wait for it...
Also, I've already noticed this during the "Ancient Rito Song" Shrine Quest, but the sun does shine from the north in this game and not from the south, which is really weird. Almost as Nintendo had altered the way of the sun just to fit these silly puzzles... But at least Suma Sahma's Blessing was mine for the taking. Only ten shrines left!
Afterwards I was exploring the area around the South Lomei Labyrinth. I've completed the labyrinth earlier in the game, but I avoided the hills around it at the time, because there were Guardians up there, which again aren't an obstacle anymore. Because I was still on the hunt after Lynels, I set the Coliseum as my next destination, which you could spot on the horizon...
I then cleared the whole Coliseum, where I worked my way from the top to the bottom with the Silver Lynel, but I didn't find anything major, only a chest of Bomb Arrows and a Korok... I kind of expected more from this, maybe even a shrine popping up after defeating all the enemies. But at least it's a nice source of all elemental melee weapons, even the Lynel is using a Flame Blade instead of the usual Lynel weapons, where the otherwise tiny sword looks gigantic on him.
Part 5: Dragon Parts
All that now was left to enhance my (non-amiibo) armor collection were various parts from the three dragons, mostly the horn. And before this I wasn't even aware that you could target different parts for different materials. You can even get their claws, where so far I haven't found any usage for them. The game keeps telling you that all of the dragon parts have other uses than cooking or selling them. And I suspect that there still might be some valuable piece of armor in the game, which I haven't found yet and which will need the claws for enhancing. Or there might be some other use for these dragon parts that I haven't discovered yet...
In any case it's a good idea to collect as many of all body parts as possible. Mostly I kept running into
Farosh, who hangs out at Lake Hylia, Lake Floria and even the Gerudo Highlands. Lake Floria seems to be the easiest place to hit it, where you can get quite close at the source, where it dives in and out.
Naydra seems to be the most complicated one or I haven't found a quick way to farm its bodyparts yet. It does seem to go in a circle starting at Mount Lanayru, through the Lanayru Promenade and the over Lanayru Bay. I haven't seen Naydra anywhere else yet, but hitting it around Mount Lanayru sometimes resulted in the bodypart landing in the far distance (somewhere at Lanayru Promenade), where I lost it a couple of times.
Probably the easiest to farm should be
Dinraal, where you just have to wait for it at night on the Tabantha Great Bridge above the Tanagar Canyone Golf Course:
Apropos golf... I was also looking for Dinraal around Akkala, where I found a similar golf course in the north of the area, where you have to shoot a rock with Stasis into a hole. And this took forever to get right. You don't have to score a "hole-in-one" and you can even push the rock to its destination, but it's still easy to lose, because the rocks will roll down the grass hill. And this was quite frustrating. I do enjoy these Korok puzzles, because they can be done fast. This didn't apply to this one, though. There is even a similar hole at Lanayru Tower, but this one didn't give me a Korok, where all my efforts to the the rock into the whole were for nothing. Maybe I did something wrong, I don't know, but I had to mark this spot on my map with a leaf for now...
So, this was my journey about upgrading all the main armor. For the amiibo gear I will need dozens of Star Fragments and this will probably take forever, where it's also not under my control to find them, since it's based on random events. In the next days I will instead focus on finding the remaining Sheikah Shrines. There are still some nooks, where I haven't been yet, so this could be fun.
As a start, I went around the southern Shoreline over Aris Beach, Martha's Landing and the Komo Shoreline, but I didn't have any luck finding any new shrines there. But at least I keep finding lots of treasure chests with the Sheikah Sensor...
Current Progress:
Main Quests: 15/15- Side Quests: 71/76
- Shrine Quests: 39/42
- Shrines: 110/120
- Koroks: 400/900
- Talus: 22/40
- Hinox: 22/40
Molduga: 4/4- Map Rate: 56.16%
