TWWHD THEORIES

TWWHD THEORIES

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SUMMARY:
1) Forbidden Woods Boss Key Skip (FOUND)
2) Helmaroc Cutscene Cancel (POSSIBLE BUT INCONSISTENT)
3) Leafless Dragon Roost Cavern Boss Key Skip
4) Wind Temple Boss Key Skip
5) Nayru's Pearl w/o KoRL
6) Medli Skip
7) FoF Wallet Early
8) TAS Leaf Skip (FOUND)
9) RTA Bombs Skip (FOUND)
10) Puppet Ganon Skip (FOUND EXCEPT FOR ANY%)
11) Savage Floor 30 Elephant Statue Skip
12) Helmaroc RNG Removal (UNLIKELY AFTER MORE RESEARCHS)
13) TotG Bow Skip
14) Stonewatcher/Savage w/o Power Bracelets
15) Cliff Plateau Cave Skip (FOUND)
16) Texture Glitch

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1) Forbidden Woods Boss Key Skip (FOUND: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dvDRN0CpV8E)

Old description:
There is one known way to skip this boss key, involving an insane fairy hover to reach a ledge we can clip through: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VLdBbKcgHo8
However, this will never be consistent and will never be included into runs.
Currently, we have to get the boss key normally, which can be very slow depending on the category. Some categories can't even savewarp in FW, forcing us to do slow strats to get that boss key (can't do the boss key clip, have to fight the moblins).

This boss key skip would save a huge amount of time. The problem is, that room is really solid, and the only ledges that are clippeable with ledge clips/ roll clips are all very high above the boss door, unreachable without a hover.
In the room, there are 2 torches, fairies, sticks, morths and green chus to use. Only 2 ways to clip OoB with item sliding are known, but they both clip you very far OoB: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkyPHTU8U98 and ???

If we could get storage, we would be able to skip this bk by simply rolling into the right side of the door (see SD speedruns).



2) Helmaroc Cutscene Cancel

At the top of FF2, there's a loading zone that leads to the Helmaroc fight. Before the Helmaroc fight starts, there's a cutscene that has a very important property: it changes Link's animation set, which means it allows us to watch endgame cutscenes. As such, skipping the cutscene would lead to a dead-end.
Once you've watched that cutscene once, you will have animation set 2. Trying to re-enter the Helmaroc fight with animation set 2 crashes because the cutscene tries to start again and the beginning of it requires animation set 1 (I assume?). This is where the problem lies.

There are several ways to skip cutscenes that are past a loading, but they all involve dying as you trigger the loading zone. One method is to take damage and slide into the loading zone (no knockback, like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J5NkZKSa9M8 ). The other is to go under the loading zone and bomb boost into it (like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gd76NYI0l5I ). As of now we don't have a way to use either of these methods on that particular loading zone.

If you could skip the cutscene past the loading, you would be able to re-enter the Helmaroc fight without crashing. This would allow us to skip Hyrule 1 in 100%, since the only reason we go to Hyrule 1 in that category is to get the Master Sword, to get the Hammer before entering the Helmaroc fight, to defeat him and get the heart container. If we could do this trick, we would leave TotG after beating Gohdan without going to Hyrule 1, do door clip and helmaroc skip, and when leaving Hyrule 2 (or later), we would get the Skull Hammer, do the magic trick to re-enter the fight, defeat Helmaroc, get the heart container, then enter the room where the EMS cutscene took place. The cutscene doesn't play again and we can just savewarp to Windfall.

Good to know tricks:
 - Door Clip: https://youtu.be/LNzTBt9RaVo
 - Boat Climb (FF3 only): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VcHcGsI2YkQ and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yoMG9JR1MkM

Note: It doesn't matter if the method you find requires hookshot or what not, it would still be useful.

Upate: This is possible by getting hit by a miniblin into the loading zone, but not consistent enough for runs.



3) Leafless Dragon Roost Cavern Boss Key Skip

There are 2 known ways to skip the boss key in this dungeon. The first uses the leaf and is used in AD, the 2nd involves reaching the top of the door frame (it is very easy to clip through once up there): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hwHWm4Fba9c
It is technically possible to item slide from the grapple bar to the the door frame BUT it is too precise to perform without a data viewer.
Another theory is to clip OoB in that spot (https://gyazo.com/29c1758147019af078efb54e2213d318) and item slide to the loading zone. However, staying OoB there while item sliding is also way too precise.

With storage, this boss key skip would be easy (see SD speedruns)

A new bk skip for this dungeon could very well make 1 trip DRC fast for AD and 100% (especially AD).



4) Wind Temple Boss Key Skip

It is possible to skip that boss key by fairy hovering: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7F_oGzXawgk
It is also possible to skip it by bringing Makar down and getting rid of the song stone: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o4qTY7_Hui8

Both of these methods are slow/inconsistent.
Nap42 tried several things in that room without success: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xAcFNuliT9A
The warp pot jump storage doesn't work because it doesn't give enough height sadly.

This boss key skip wouldn't save as much time as the 2 other above, but would still be a nice discovery and timesave. Just like both bk skips above, storage would make it trivial.



5) Nayru's Pearl w/o KoRL

In current speedruns, we bomb the wall leading to Jabun's Cave by entering KoRL. The trigger for obtaining Nayru's Pearl is actually breaking the wall leading to the cave and not entering the cave directly (we can already clip inside the cave, but the cutscene won't start).

If we could break that wall without entering KoRL, we would be able to skip Hyrule 1 by abusing savewarping flags. We would obtain Nayru's Pearl before beating FF1 and before spawning KoRL to avoid fixing the flags, then we would raise TotG (still before beating FF1), and then beat TotG. Once we enter the portal after Gohdan, we would be able to savewarp back to Outset, and then finally do FF1. Luckily, we could then do EMS with layer manip, it seems optimal, and get the hammer after Hyrule 2. The only unfortunate part is that the Spoils Bag will be required to go back to FF1 after TotG, but that should still be faster than Hyrule 1.

It is possible to island hop with a bomb in hand to break the first part of the wall w/o KoRL (TAS-only). The problem (even for TAS) comes from the other 2 parts. If you leave the quadrant the wall reforms, so we can't do the same island hop. We need to find a way without leaving the quadrant.

In SD, Nayru's Pearl w/o KoRL is possible thanks to Door Cancel, so general storage would solve this. It is actually extremely hard: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O_N4Zm9a83w

(This trick would also allow the game to be beaten without going to Hyrule 2 by using a really weird, complicated and, to be fair, completely useless route: https://pastebin.com/EjaRDsAU )

Edit: We might have a way to break the 2nd wall without KoRL without leaving the quadrant (not confirmed): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lo8fKGZr7fU
Consequently, we can also break the 3rd wall in the same way. However, the highest wall is still TAS-only to break without KoRL, so it still doesn't have any implication for RTA runs.

Due to unforeseen routing complications, skipping Hyrule 1 in AD would require getting the spoils bag instead, making this not necessarely a lot faster, hard to say now.



6) Medli Skip

Medli is actually skippeable in most of the Earth Temple:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PdtJLxrDjc8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m_7hucDDIfg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ajNKU3konKk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GVnozSXVxls (very hard)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tKG0oReinOc

As such, the only places where we still need Medli are:
	- To break the Song Stone blocking the way into the Earth Temple
	- In the First Room, to place Medli on one of the switches

If we could clip the Song Stone we could enter ET early. The only known way to clip it requires the hookshot (using a L-slide), so it's only doable in FIT categories (there is a vid somewhere but can't find it anymore). If we could reach the top of the song stone we could clip through with item sliding, just like we can clip through the one in Wind Temple: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBQIgnA3wIs
Unfortunately, that room has almost nothing for us to work with, only 2 torches.

Secondly, if we could enter ET early, there would still be a roadblock. We cannot currently get past the 1st room without her.
There are some theories though. It turns out frozen moblins actually work to press down the switches. That room is skippeable without Medli using a Tingle Balloon, which we don't have in HD: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BSovj8qzDYQ

Unfortunately for FIT categories, hookshotting a moblin while wearing iron boots doesn't bring the moblin to you, but you to the moblin (it's dumb). The other idea would be to perform a moblin slide (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CWi3Mx8zdqw) in order to get enough speed to jump directly to the platform with him. Unfortunately, Gym tried to TAS that and he could never get a high enough jump, and also moblin sliding has never been performed in HD before, making us think that it was patched.

If a way around both these issues were found, we would skip learning EGL, a trip to DRI, playing the EGL to Medli and the very long cutscene with her, and the series of cutscenes on Headstone Island before entering ET.

Note that Makar Skip is not on this list. The reason for this is that we need to use Makar in two rooms in WT in order to plant some trees to unlock doors. Unlocking those doors without Makar seems way more impossible with current knowledge.



7) FoF Wallet Early

In 100% Speedruns, because we perform Outset Escape to skip some of the prologue cutscenes, we have to get the Wallet located in the fairy fountain in the Forest of Fairies before beating FF1 to avoid a crash. Currently, we go to FF1, then get bombs in FF1, leave the pirate ship to spawn on Windfall and then superswim away to Outset just for that one wallet, then to immediately go back to FF1.

We enter the forest of fairies without the sword using this trick: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=En2UsSp00wM
And we use the bombs to break the boulder.

Instead of using the bombs, we can technically get inside using the deku leaf, but it is really hard: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8FL7fAMptY

If we could clip that boulder with absolutely nothing but the grappling hook, it would be a very nice timesave for hundo, since that would skip an entire trip to Outset, and also allow some nice routing options around the Full Moon Picture iirc, allowing us to get the Spoils Bag before obtaining the DX Pictobox, which allows us to do the Pig Minigame while waiting on Anton and Garrickson, saving even more time.

If you are wondering why we don't simply item slide over the walls that delimit FoF to get OoB (they look pretty low), it's because there are invisible walls all around the area and so they are actually much higher that you might think.



8) TAS Leaf Skip (FOUND)

It is possible to perform EMS without the Deku Leaf no problem. It is also possible to skip the Trials without the Deku Leaf (and it's even doable RTA): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8WvKG34QO4k
And we can skip PG without the Deku Leaf using the bow (TAS-only): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uLy8pNuhTKA

The only remaining room that is an issue without the Deku Leaf is the Phantom Ganon room in Ganon's Tower, the room where you are supposed to shoot him with a light arrow. If we skip the deku leaf, we are also skipping magic, and so we wouldn't be able to shoot light arrows. Leaf Skip requires us to skip Phantom Ganon.

We know 2 big tricks in that room, that seem like they have to be useful for this:
- We can parry Phantom Ganon from his ground attack to land on one of the door frames on the side: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tk-3Tox2Kjw
This allows us to get more height. From there it is possible to ledge clip/roll clip OoB and leaf to the loading zone, but obviously we can't do that if we want to skip the deku leaf.
- We can clip the wall that blocks the loading zone leading to the Final Staircase, using a very interesting clipping method: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bxGokICnhcU
To perform this kind of clip, you need to hang at a ledge you cannot climb. Then tap right/left and immediately after hold up. Link will start sliding along the ledge which will allow him to go further on the sides than he is supposed to. In the end you will successfully be able to climb up and clip through. Clipping method found by Kazooie: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_0b6CIzoirE
Once you climb up, you can easily get crushed if you are not careful. But a jumpslash/sidehop/backflip will work to reach the loading zone from the top of the wall safely.

Now, let me tell you that the door frames in that room are higher than the top of the wall. Well, let's just item slide from one of the door frames to the wall and the deku leaf is skipped then!
Unfortunately, such an item slide has never been performed in practice. It looks possible, but it's looking to be very precise. The angle your item slide must have isn't very good, and the wall you are aiming for has a shape that tries to push you off.
Make sure to have the data viewer up if you are trying it!!

Update: MrAlberto proved the item slide is possible. Thus the TAS will skip the deku leaf.



9) RTA Bombs Skip (FOUND)

Old description:
The only required use of the Bombs in any% is for taking damage for Morth Hover. Puppet Ganon Skip without Bombs being definitely a TAS-only trick, skipping the bombs would require us to perform Morth Hover or Fairy Hover using some other damage source. The only known damage source that would work in theory is fall damage. There is a known way to start a hover with fall damage in the PG Room, but then getting to the platform requires almost perfect hovering. Killing the morth or destroying the fairy pots would also need to be done during the hover since you wouldn't have enough time to do it before. This requires a very precise bow shot. Also, just setting up the morth or the pots perfectly and dying with the perfect angle is hard enough.

Make this RTA-viable and we might do it. We would lose time because of no Deku Tree CS Skip, but no more FCP Hop and no more getting bombs which is kind of slow.

New notes: Several known ways to take fall damage have been found, but all of them require jumping, sidehopping or jumpslashing, which makes the morth move. As such the morth hover with fall damage involves a lot of RNG.

Thrown pots can in theory also deal damage to Link, but there is no known way to be fast enough to achieve that: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gpl-8i5U-kk
There is a glitch with frozen morths that can make them deal knockback to Link, but no damage, so it isn't possible to use that to start a hover: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fGo0ff3xZRQ

Update: The bombs are now skipped RTA



10) Puppet Ganon Skip (FOUND EXCEPT FOR ANY%)

All current methods of Puppet Ganon Skip involve zombie hovering.
Through the years, several other ideas have arised to skip that boss that would be easier, but all have failed:

- Warp Pot early: If you could open the warp pot at the top early, you would be able to skip the fight. A fire arrow could do the job. Unfortunately, it doesn't look like the fire arrow can open the warp pot through the floor. Also, no angle seem to allow for such a shot, even if you clip OoB.
You also can NOT hover directly to the warp pot, even with perfect TAS mashing

- Oddshot: By item sliding backwards with iron boots, you can get the camera to sink very far OoB. By then using the hookshot you can actually shoot very far underground. If we could somehow do a weirdshot but very far upward instead of downward (we would then call it an oddshot), we would be able to hookshot the last platform from the bottom floor, skipping PG in AD and 100%.
This is a bit of a stretch since oddshots/item climbs are rather rare and situational. But it would be the absolute best if that was possible.
With current knowledge, oddshots are only possible using a slope, which there are none of in that room. If you do PG CS skip, you would have acces to Zelda's bed which has slopes, but still, to get high oddshots you need to charge speed far away from the slope, which doesn't seem possible

Update: Joaish made the warp pot snipe possible by applying an idea from Demon in the original game that did not work there but luckily works in HD, due to differences in the way the pot and moths load. Unfortunately this PG Skip still requires hookshot. The next step is finding a way to skip PG in any% that's easier than the zombie hover, or making the zombie hover easier. One way this could happen is if you find a way to clip OoB in PG's room without the hookshot.



11) Savage Floor 30 Elephant Statue Skip

The Elephant Statue in Savage Floor 30 requires the Mirror Shield to break. If we could somehow skip that requirement, we would be able to obtain the Hero's Charm without the Mirror Shield, which means we would be able to clear the Savage Labyrinth in one trip before obtaining the Mirror Shield. That has the potential to save time in 100%, by allowing a MASSIVE reroute to get the Triforce before beating FF2, in order to skip the Courtyard cutscene and the Tetra -> Zelda Transformation cutscene (those cutscenes are conveniently skipped with early Triforce). Without this trick, 100% with Early Triforce loses around 7mins to having to go through the first 30 floors of Savage twice, making it not worth it.

Unfortunately, the elephant statue voids you out when you get inside it, making this trick unlikely to happen.

New Note: a way to clip past that statue was found using a weirdshot. Unfortunately, that doesn't solve the problem since the hookshot is an even later item than the mirror shield.



12) Helmaroc RNG Removal

In SD, using Storage, it is possible to go back inside the tower once the fight has entered its second phase: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3K-zOVrUY1I
Doing that allows you to fight Helmaroc inside the tower, since Helmaroc will always try to be at around the same height as you when it lands, making him able to go inside the tower as well. By standing on the jail cell, Helmaroc will be unable to peck at you, making him stuck into running towards you. You can then use the Skull Hammer repeatedly to get rid of him. That completely avoids all RNG in the fight.
As of now, we don't know any way to clip OoB once the fight has entered the 2nd phase. If it were possible, we would be able to go back inside the tower from the outside (walls are only one way solid) and do that strat to avoid all RNG.

The only way to skip Helmaroc once the fight has entered phase 2 is to do a bomb boost above the spikes (no good setup during phase 2 unfortunately, but there is a setup pre-phase 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J8CMn_h6Uqo). That gives us access to more places to find a clip OoB. Obviously, we would rather not have to do such a trick to find the clip, but we should take what we can get.

Update: Some researchs from people like bowserisbored have gotten as a result that Helmaroc acts differently in HD when found inside the tower. Thus removing the RNG by clipping into the tower might not happen in the same way. A way to clip down there was found but requires glitchless helmaroc skip.



13) TotG Bow Skip

This is more of a curiosity than a timesave. In TotG, we need to lead 3 statues into the main room in order to progress further into the dungeon. With the 2nd Statue, we are supposed to obtain the bow by defeating the miniboss, and then shoot an eye switch in order to reveal some platforms, allowing us to cross the void with the statue.

Gohdan can actually be defeated without the bow by using bombs (it's really hard and would ever only be useful in a TAS, and even then I'm not sure). As such, the only bow requirement in TotG is that one eye switch. If we could skip that requirement, we would be able to beat TotG without the bow, which means we would be able to beat TotG without beating the miniboss (pre-EMS). That would allow us to beat TotG before ever having obtained a sword, and so we would be able to make the Hyrule 1 Master Sword our first sword. A great meme!

Using chest storage, we can skip that requirement: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eMm1xf2wfAA
In HD, we can do a little bit more than half of the skip without storage: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sapghyOX25o
However, I have never been able to get the statue past the first pillar.



14) Stonewatcher/Savage w/o Power Bracelets

Same as above, this wouldn't really be that useful. Thanks to item sliding, it is possible to obtain almost the entire Triforce before even going to any Hyrule. The only two places where this is not possible yet are Stonewatcher and Savage. This is because we currently need the Power Bracelets to enter both places, and to obtain the Power Bracelets we need ice arrows, which can only be obtained with the Light Arrows in Ganon's Tower or the Fire and Ice Arrows from the M&C cutscene. Both require going to Hyrule in the first place.

Stonewatcher w/o Power Bracelets seems really unlikely, due to the headstone immediately crushing you when you get inside it.
Savaghe w/o Power Bracelets seems more doable. This looks really close but unfortunately it looks like the slope isn't steep enough: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h2-C5RCl-ck

With storage and door cancel, both would be possible.

Note: entering the savage labyrinth early with an island hop is likely possible, but any island hop like that won't be viable.



15) Cliff Plateau Cave Skip (FOUND: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Lr-jT4gNW4)

Old description:
This would save almost 1 minute in 100% speedruns. Find a way to get on the higher cliff plateau island without having to go through the cave, which would skip it entirely since there is nothing important in there.

Any leads? You can island hop but nobody wants to do it because it is VERY precise. You can item slide from the platform but it's hard, inconsistent and slow because you have to get rid of the wizzrobes or else they mess up your angle. The only idea I've heard of is to find a way to hookshot the chest early, but no weirdshot have been found as of yet.

New note: An oddshot has been found! However, it is still very unreliable right now.



16) Texture Glitch

Texture Glitch is a very weird glitch that can be achieved using the store and respawn position cheat made by dragonbane, which is to this day still not understood.

This can be consistently achieved in Forsaken Fortress 1, by storing your position on top of the hero's sword, reloading the area (by voiding-out for exemple), then using restore position. After the bokoblin cutscene, defeat the bokoblin and void-out. This will cause Texture Glitch.

While in Texture Glitch, textures are all black. Only some actors are still loaded. Some doors cannot be opened (such as large doors and dungeon doors). This state persists through loading zones. The first meeting with KoRL consistently crashes, the game also is very unstable and seems to randomly crash on the overwolrd.

Why do we want to understand this glitch? Because the one and only Hyrule Barrier doesn't load if you are in Hyrule with this glitch. Which means you can simply walk through the barrier and enter Ganon's Tower. Savewarping crashes the game but fixes the glitch, so it would be a working Barrier Skip.

It could be that the cheat is at fault, BUT this should NOT be deemed as such without proof.

How to get the glitch (not completely optimal): https://youtu.be/lRU2nIwRRQQ
Some very cool looking footage with this glitch:
https://youtu.be/i0s4SgQ8OZE
https://youtu.be/cMwKvgCr5iQ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9S-8J3osYns
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lp7DtbkpLi0