Hollow Knight ► 5 ADVANCED Combat Tips 

Enemy Compendium: hollowknight.fandom.com/wiki/Category:Enemies_(Hollow_Knight) Also 8:11 I highlighted the wrong charms, fuck's sake.

Tip 1: Hit bad guys. Tip 2: Don’t get hit by bad guys. Tip 3: Keep your controller charged.

“None of the tips are correct or guaranteed to help you out” Listen, Rusty. If I’m going to fail at this game I’m going to do it the right way. By implementing these tips.

I'd like to add 'be patient' to the list. If your ass is being handed to you on a silver platter, calm down, observe where the next attack is coming from and act accordingly. Make sure you can dodge properly before dealing damage to the boss because in a slugfest where you trade hit for hit, you almost always lose. Most bosses will come to you, trying to beat you to a pulp themselves and that is when you strike, just make sure you dodge as well.

something that a lot of newcomers to the game arent aware of is that wayward compass excels in combat usage. you find yourself using it more in boss fights than any other charm and is CRIMINALLY underrated for its one charm notch cost. MUST. HAVE.

"Your next new obsession." I got this game for my boyfriend. I ended up being the hardcore Hollow Knight fan out of the two of us. ROFL. I ended up finishing the game first, too. He still hasn't. I have over 175 hours clocked into this game, and he has 6 hours. To newcomers: RUSTY does indeed mean this... Your next new obsession. Welcome to the Hollow Knight fandom. Once you're in, you're hooked.

Learning to just casually step out of the way in order to dodge an attack is definitely vital. It's not even about precise movement; you just get much much better insight in how to defeat a boss if your own movement isn't too erratic, and you don't want to need to worry about attacks that aren't anywhere near you. The further away you move from one attack, the more likely it becomes that you get hit by another you weren't even really looking at.

as a speedruner and a ps4 owner this makes me really happy

Rusty in a nutshell: Boss rankings and Boss tips

one thing on charms: dont get hung up on sticking to that one "perfect" build. some combos are super situational or require a very specific playstyle, but acan be devastating. case in point: defenders crest + spore shroom + shape of unn + deep focus + grubsong + starward shell. your primary attack is the HUGE cloud of stench you release while healing 2 masks of damage. augmented by facetanking damage for free gas, staying mobile while healing, and the fact that the invinciblity after a hit pasts longer, that it takes you to focus again. PS: the AoD cloud lingers 4.1s, doing propably 70 damage in total. and the clouds stack!

A tip I found myself. Don’t try healing at one health, you will die. Heal at 3 health. If you have soul, and are missing health and are in an opportunity where you can heal such as platforming or just exploring, HEAL. You have no idea how fast you can go from five masks to none

WTF Thought this was only a calming ambience channel I'm kidding but it's been a long time

8:00 if you're someone who enjoys projectiles but doesn't enjoy spell builds, may I recommend the following (very late game charm build only really good for the pantheons) Grubberfly charm build: Quick slash, Longnail/Sharp Shadow, Grubberfly's Elegy, Lifeblood Core. The Grubberfly charm isn't deactivated by taking damage with Lifeblood masks, so the core can give you access to three points of damage in leeway before you reach the next cocoon or bench. (In the case of the pantheons, both! You could start each checkpoint with at least 5 masks of leeway early on with no repercussions. I personally dont have the 11th notch, so I use Lifeblood heart. It works equally well though!) Long story short this charm build turns you into Megaman for 2-3 hits before you can't take any more damage or risk having to focus, while still giving you some non Grubberfly utility after the fact with either sharp shadow to dodge more stuff reliably with shade cloak, or longnail to revert to a slightly weaker nail charm build.

Rusty: to any of you with a PS plus membership you are getting this game free this month! Me: I'm 4 different soul abilities ahead of you.

My tip: Never underestimate the utility of nail arts. While it is mid game the great slash is one of the most addictive and useful moves in the knight’s arsenal which gives a 2.5x damage hit, has the length of MoP and two long nails, and keeps you in air. The cyclone slash while often forgotten deals up to .75 hits 7 times (x5.25 ndmg)a massive amount able to kill all basic colosseum enemies that the great slash can’t deal with on top of having the length of one long nail. Mashing swaps fast fall to slow fall, increases deploy time and hence more attacks. Dash slash is honestly kinda garbage other than basic but narrow spacing (x2.5 ndmg) Nail Master Glory will double the speed of recharge for the cost of only one charm notch. Cons: You can’t dash during an attack You can’t cancel an attack Dash slash exists Shields counter it excluding markoth resets after a spell *Can’t pogo during charge or animation* Strength does not apply to nail arts Pros Destroys most flying enemies in one great slash Is useful for half of the bosses Counters markoth and radiance Out reaches sly’s phase 2 attack Is only 800 geo for all of the needed things NMG is cheap Colosseum becomes a joke Helps with teleporting enemies like soul tyrant, markoth, no eyes, NKG, and Hornet Prot Slows down time with great slash Is super flashy Using an art resets aerial moves It pairs well with the passive build as it is cheap and lets you deal consistent 52.5 damage bursts while your minions cover for you. Edit if you crystal dash through a loading zone then charge a nail art there is a small visual glitch that shows a ring

Having beaten the game 112% AND being almost done with all bosses on radiant, I will ABSOLUTELY watch the video. I just love your content Rusty.

hollow knight combat do be pretty epic

what i can also recommend is the "i can't really play the game but i want to see all the content" charm build (and i still failed to get past 110%) i used to be a nail-charm guy, but for the pantheons (especially when soul-bound) i took quick+deep focus and shape of unn. depending on who i fight i add longnail/sharp shadow/soul catcher you can always heal, almost no matter what the enemies are doing, and you heal a lot

Hey, I came from 2 years later. Silksong is still not out. Bye.

You should talk about how silksong 100 has to do with the weavers

I wish I knew that Brooding Mawlek tip sooner, died thrice trying to show off to a friend lol

3 years later... that intro is adorable

While I didn't actually sequence break, I definitely gathered a few items out of the normal order. After getting dash, wall jump, and super dash, I skipped desolate dive and the soul sanctum completely and went straight for the acid ability to nullify acid damage. This means that I visited the royal waterways much earlier than most people probably attempted this area. Then I went back to the soul sanctum, and afterwards I got double jump to explore almost every area that I could. Exploration is more fun for me than boss fights, so I preferred this aspect.

“Your next new obsession” me who 100%ed the game in 3 days and got the platinum trophy: you have no idea how right you were

you never cease to amaze me with the quality of your videos. Keep going, man! I really enjoy your content and can only imagine what you'll be coming out with once Silksong releases.

Quirell really be like: ah, me know this!

keep it up, you're genuinely fun to watch

This will be very helpful seeing as I’m planning to 112% this game.

I personally love watching the longer videos and your streams, you're funny and you have a wonderful voice

thank u! I've picked the game thanks to PS plus and pretty much fell in love with it, with 100+ hours of gameplay already. And I was obsessively watching your guides in the process, they've saved my ass more times than I can count. Imagine my delight when I was checking the channel for charm advice for the traitor lord fight and discovering a beautiful brand new video!

Btw, if you just stand still in front of Mantis Traitor you only need to dash through his forward dash. Just a little tip that makes the fight 100x times easier!

0:27 "What will likey be your next new obsession" Crap, your right.

Your videos are powering me through this game.

"Your next obsession" thats an understatement

I just discovered your channel and wondered when will your next upload will be and here i am. Thanks!

hey rusty you made me feel a ton better about the fireball skips i was feeling down about not knowing how to do them and you said something about them during this video and it just made me feel more secure about it so thank you!

The fact that he made silksong coming out soon jokes three years ago still pins me We are still waiting

Anyway else feel the gut-wrenching pain in Rusty’s voice during that intro...?

It's fascinating, I'm seeing so many people suggesting builds, and so far no two are exactly the same! My own: sharp shadow, Mark of pride, shape of unn, spore shroom, grub song, and then usually soul catcher but I change that sometimes for unbreakable heart or whatever. Two free notches is a nice amount.

I'm on 105 percent and found the game through the psplus membership, your account among others have helped me already and I absolutely love the game so far

Thanks for the content. Good advice and your videos have been pretty informative

Love the video. I picked the game up for PS+ and was totally not expecting such an amazing game. Almost wrote it off in the beginning and now i cant get enough.

One of the many things that I have gotten better at over the years is my strategy against the big shield enemies in the city of tears. It went from hitting them after a double swing, to constantly jumping over them getting one attack on their head or back, to hitting their shield and then pogoing twice on their head and then getting a third swing in their face while falling and then hitting the shield again right as I land then repeating.

After some great hours of gaming, I finally bested the PoH and "Platined" the game. One of the best games from PS Plus that I ever got. Love those souls/hollow knight kinds of games, hope we get more of them in the future. The Surge was a good time too. I can totally see why you guys are obsessed with this game for 3 years now lol

thanks for that! it rlly helped me out on gameplay and im making a lot of progress now.

I got the game on ps+ last week and already have 37 hours on the game and trying to kill the radiance. You’ve been a major help over my time. Thank you Rusty

My go-to (non-overcharm) build is Unbreakable Strength, Quick Slash, Spell Twister, and Shaman Stone. When I am overcharming, I usually forgo either Unbreakable Strength or Quick Slash and replace them with a 2-notch charm or two 1-notch charms, then use Soul Eater.

A helpful thing I like to do whenever I start a new save file is get an early completed mask shard without even touching Greenpath (especially if I'm playing a Steelsoul run). You're able to get 5 grubs throughout the crossroads by either normal means or pogo'ing (which prompts the Grubfather to give you a mask shard), you can pogo off of a flying enemy to get the shard sitting in the area above where you either need wall jump or double jump to get to, you can get to the brooding mawlek fight early by pogo'ing off the spikes (which rewards a mask shard) and then finally you just buy the last one from Sly.

Nice work! That helped me out so much👍👍

Wtf I swear I was subbed. Maybe I just watched your stuff so much it was permanently in my recommendations for a while? Oh well subbed now.

I have no words to describe this game. As soon as I saw that it was free on PSN I was interested, but I had no idea how much I was going to fall in love with this game. I completed it in a week, I have 60 hours and 105%, I intend to platinum but King of the nightmare Grim is driving me crazy, besides I haven't even started the pantheons yet. Rusty, I love your videos and I always use them if I need any tips, thanks for the content.

Thank you i used a lot of your guides to help me when i was stuck

After pausing the video on a frame in which the brooding mawlek was in the air, I am now scarred to learn that it has a butthole

Thanks, Love your vids. Got this with PS Plus. Already 20 hours in, great game. Just figured out how to charge dash then cyclone slash. Also I love spore shroom + Defenders Crest combo because I'm lazy lol.

Finally! More hollow knight stuff!

You're doing gods work Rusty I've been trying to get my lil bro to get Hollow Knight for literal months n now he has it

Yeah I did get Hollow Knight for free a week ago, that's not only how I found this channel but also how I spent way to many hours on this game and am now getting way to hyped for Silksong! (Also thanks for the awesome tips! I'll try to use them in my gameplay!)

This man has the best segues in the business.

This is really good. You deserve more geo.

Me just getting to deepnest and now regretting killing on eof the gurpards of the door so this stuff can probably help me

Thanks for the info it really helped.

The nail Smith looks a hell of a lot like heracross from pokemon!! Nice!

Hey Rusty, I love your vids

My tip (mainly for platforming but also for combat) is that down pogo and walljump reset your dash and your double jump, so you can use them multiple times while airborne

Playing through this game a second time on ps4 i managed a pretty laid back swarm build. Needs some work still for bosses, but for exploration and mobs like In the COF it works pretty well. Weaversong, grubsong, glowing womb, quick focus and sporeshroom. I tried switching out sporeshroom for defenders crest to work with glowing womb but it didn't feel like it was doing as much damage in the COF so I took sporeshroom to leave little damage clouds while I heal

Man I'm pumped that this game is coming to PSPlus users. Definitely a game that more people need to be made aware of!

Yay! New Rusty vid! Ima go hunker down with the compendium of number values of damage and compile even more useless info on this game... because I'm insane.

I'm so waiting for the next hollow knight dude

You're not wrong. I've been playin it every opportunity i have for as long as i can

This video is very helpfull for newer players and some even for older players

Such a good vodeo, i knew akl the things before and got all the achievements yesterday (i have to flex somewhere xD) so it doesnt help me now but extremly good video covering more anvanced techniches!!!

Got the game through ps plus. Evolved into my all time favourite.

you did this too late, but I watched almost all of your previous videos... you helped me get the platinum so thank you

I literally just found this game out of the blue and..... my god I’m so in love with it this is probably the only game where i am emotionally attached to

Adnanced tips "just step away" Thx a lot

Thank you I didn’t know it was free I almost missed

All hail Hollow Lord Rusty 🙌🏼

So, Rusty, My current build regularly consists of: Quick focus Quick slash Gathering swarm Unbreakable Greed Wayward compass since I have 0 sense of direction I may have 1 more charm, but I don't remember lol. Edit: changed the name to quick slash. Thanks, Kristóf!

I beat hollow knight yesterday and now I'm trying to get the dream no more ending. Also yesterday I watched your get gud vid and saw that it was made 9 months and realized that your prediction was wrong. Either way keep it up , I just subscribed and turned on notifications so... Yeah

im a big fan of the math thing. i always calculate how many hits a boss needs, how many staggers (helps you gage how far I got if I kept failing) and how many hits after the last stagger to kill it. sometimes i literally count my hits lol it also helps if you want to decide to fight a boss before or after a nail upgrade. some increase in health as you upgrade your nail but depending on the increase it might actually require significantly less hits.

0:22 you're goddamn right. I want more now.

This boutta be a popular video

I’ve already spent over 30 hours on my first run- but it’s definitely building my overall skill 😂

I liked the Fyremoth skin you use occasionally in this video. Dunno if this meant to be a little hint or something, but I'm like 90% sure that's like an early Fyremoth skin build

Ngl once I got hollow knight from ps plus I instantly fell in love it was pretty difficult at first the I got the hang of it just a lot of exploring

Rusty to support your tips can you maybe do a boss rush or something

I got this game free on ps earlier this month and Just beat the hollow knight 19ish hours into the game, now I’m trying to 100% it. This game is seriously amazing, never expected it to be as long and have as much depth as it does.

8:37 I've acctualy done this, for NKG I just trow shape of unn, quick focus and deep focus IT's pretty good for healing in the flame pillars attack.

My favorite build is Quick Focus, Long Nail,Quick slash and Soul Catcher. Called it the Battlemage.

Despite only getting it with ps plus I've already clocked in 50 hours and 96 percent. And I can confirm the first tip video that I watched near the start of my game really helped.

8:11 you highlighted the wrong charms This was very important information you needed to know I’m sure

I got hollowknight on ps plus but when you said we will get it I thought you meant silksong came out too and my heart dropped

Sped through the game and I'm at the pantheon of hallownest in three weeks of having it:)

I tried playing hollow knight in the past but my fear of bugs prevented me from playing but now I can play it normally so thankyou for the guide.

this game is fucking brilliant , only just started playing couple weeks ago and i’m hooked

I put the game in the library when it was available without knowing anything about it and started playing it a month ago. Totally addicted, it was hard, challenging and full of surprises and decisions. A masterpiece. Now the sad note. I'm in the trial of sage and I can't progress despite having everything. I don't get how it seems like a lot of people just destroys some bosses that I so struggle with. I can't tell how sad it makes me feel to think this: being 38 and feeling like my reflexes are starting to be not good enough. I want that platinum trophy so bad.

I played the game for the first time and I started enjoying it for hours.

I got it in Ps Plus and I'm obsessed

I got it free for ps plus and I just finished steel soul thanks a lot you helped

Got it the day it came out on ps+. What a great game 50h on it already. I’m just missing the last 2 pantheons for the platinum.