Digimon World 3 WR - 6:27:34

After over 100 In-Game hours, 370+ attempts and 5 weeks of grinding I finally managed to get the WR in Digimon World 3 Any% back! Kotemon is now back on top of the leaderboards and will likely stay for a little while, too.
I want to give you all a little summary of how I think each individual split went throughout this run and where I think some timesaves could be found.
Keep in mind: While I do call some splits "bad" despite them still being faster than the Guilmon WR or at least tied with it, Kotemon and Guilmon have different strengths and weaknesses. I can save a min on the Guilmon run and still have a bad split, but I can also lose 2 min and still have a phenomenal split as the routes work differently from one another.

1. Central Park Exit:
Pretty good start. The first encounter was a Vegiemon who increases the Blast Gauge by ~50%, making for a potentially quick MasterTyrannomon battle. Training went well, but the stats were a little bad as my Strength was 8 points below what it could've been and my Defense was almost maxed out. I try to shoot for low Defense values so that the Blast Gauge fills up quicker. Encounters were nice.
Pace: -4 seconds (Saved 4 seconds)

2. MasterTyrannomon:
A few more encounters than I would've personally liked here. Dinohumon was acquired at ~8:00 into the split which is fairly late, but I still managed to save some time compared to PB. Could've gotten one or two less encounters for a good split here as we also got 2 extra encounters right before the bossfight. MasterTyrannomon himself was a straight forward fight. Quick blast and all Blade Twister hits landed.
Pace: -55 seconds (Saved 51 seconds)

3. Seiryu Leader:
Despite the extra encounters I did not manage to get a TNT Ball by the end of this split. The rest went well, Seiryu Leader went just as planned.
Pace: -1:27min (Saved 32 seconds)

4. Keith:
Phenomenal encounter rate throughout this whole split. Didn't end up getting Frost Cutter but that's fine as I don't bank on it anymore anyway. Training went really really well, too. The Speed stat was higher than normal and Strength was super good as well. The fight went well, only one Evade on Triceramon, the rest was fine. No TNT Ball however which means I had to make sure to grind on the Sepikmon Mask split. The first gold split throughout the run.
Pace: -2:11min (Saved 44 seconds)

5. Bulbmon:
Encounters were fine, just about average. My PB split here was pretty good so losing less than a minute to it was nice to see. The fight itself went really well due to Power Plug + good Strength.
Pace: -1:24min (Lost 47 seconds)

6. Sepikmon Mask:
This is were my early game luck started to turn a little bit. My PB already had a bad split with a 2nd try TNT Ball (Which was nice), but this time I got more encounters than usual as well as a 7th try TNT Ball (With a drop rate of 18.75%). This gave me a slight lead in terms of EXP which ended up mattering a little bit considering the encounters I had on the Digi-Egg split, though more on that later. It still lost me some time however. Overall: Slightly high encounter rate and 7th try on TNT Ball.
Pace: -51 seconds (Lost 33 seconds)

7. Suzaku Leader:
Very short split that can vary a lot though. Good encounter rate before Suzaku Leader and phenomenal Suzaku Leader considering I got ambushed by Woodmon. ShogunGekomon played along which was nice, too. Second gold split this run.
Pace: -1:22min (Saved 31 seconds)

8. Digi-Egg of Sincerety:
Probably the longest split in the whole run. After 7 minutes of cutscenes there were more encounters than usual on the way to Phoenix Bay, however DemiDevimon dropped Dark Power 1 which is essential as any Elemental Power is required to finish this run in a timely manner. Getting this made me confident that this run could actually get somewhere. On top of that I also got Water Power 1 which obsoleted the Dark Power as it is the best elemental Power I can reasonably obtain during a run. Another highlight was the Strength Kotemon had as I was able to one shot Seadramon which is only a thing in less than 10% of the runs (Based of the runs I had that is), yet the higher encounter rate nulled that aspect as I still managed to lose time due to getting many encounters and those being the weaker versions of possible encounters in most of the cases making the EXP from the TNT Ball grind worth it for Lv 15. This was supposed to be a guaranteed timesave of up to 3 minutes, but RNG had different plans.
Pace: -1:11min (Lost 11 seconds)

9. Counter Crest:
The split every DW3 runner dreads. No attempt can actually be called a run until you leave this split. Counter Crest has a 6.25% chance to drop. This means many runs will come to an end here as you can't reasonably get a WR paced run out of this split if it takes you more than 10 attempts to get this item. In my case I got CC within 7 fights which is slow, but more than I could ask for. Would've wished for a faster CC, but this ended up being good enough. On top of that the Strength and Speed Training both went very well and I managed to hit very good numbers for Strength helping me in the long run.
Pace: -3:05min (Saved 1:56min)

10. Fake Byakko Leader:
Pretty slow split. This mainly comes down to getting a few encounters (For example Airdramon) while alos not having the best of fights against Numemon. After making a missclick that could've cost me 45 seconds + (Running instead of healing) Kotemon actually evaded Numemons attack preventing this split from getting even worse than it already was in the first place. I planned on saving a minute on this split, but once again it didn't end up happening.
Pace: -2:31min (Lost 34 seconds)

11. Real Byakko Leader:
Good split, not much more I can say. Encounters were very nice, the fight went well and I didn't get frozen by Mamemon. I did lose 47 seconds, but this split was nearly perfect in my PB so I expected to lose some time here.
Pace: -1:44min (Lost 47 seconds)

12. HiAndromon:
Pretty straight forward split as well. Got a few encounters as usual and hit both Counters that were necessary on HiAndromon.
Pace: -1:41min (Lost 3 seconds)

13. WaruMonzaemon:
This split was dreadful. Starting with a missplay that lead into me having to revive Kotemon, followed by more trolling from Mamemon and a high amount of encounters + a HeartBreakAttack from WaruMonzaemon himself. Wasn't expecting to save any time, but definitely didn't expect to lose this much here. This is were I thought my luck was running out.
Pace: +12 seconds (Lost 1:53min)

14. Datamon:
The first fight against the A.O.A. Ambusher went bad as Monzaemon blocked my first counter, however the encounter rate + the high amount of EXP I got prior to this allowed me to unlock Kyukimon without much effort. Ended up killing a few enemies with my high Strength stat as well as getting a perfect Datamon fight.
Pace: -45 seconds (Saved 57 seconds)

15. Staff Pass:
This split is where Guilmon starts being better than Kotemon for a while. Guilmon can one shot most enemies you encounter here while Kotemon still needs 2 turns or 1 hit + 1 counter to get past fights, making this a lot slower. Overall not to bad of a split, however I forgot to do a shopping menu in Suzaku City which saved me 30 seconds on this split, but lost me 50 on the next one.
Pace: +7 seconds (Lost 52 seconds)

16. Game Master:
Here is a weird one. I always thought that Guilmon has the advantage on this split. Turns out however that the high HP that Kotemon has actually helps out tremendously IF you have an Elemental Power at this point in the run. Due to his naturally higher Defense stat Kotemon will almost always be less than 50 HP off of killing the enemies in the Admin Center with a single counter. Getting an Elemental Power helps with this issue as it bridges the gap on those 50 remaining HP making him on par with Guilmon. The higher HP allows me to heal less with Kotemon as well speeding up fights even further.
Now the split: All went well until I got crit a few times. I forgot the shop for Life Disks in the previous split meaning I had to do it here. I thought this would take well over 2 minutes and was planning on ending the run right then and there, but I decided not to and it turned out that doing the shop there only takes ~55 seconds. It doesn't even lose 30 seconds compared to doing it later! With that I ended up getting solid fight as well as a really good Game Master fight with no Helter Skelter and a quick Gargoylemon. The past part however: Minotarumon dropped Machine Power 2! This helped quite a bit on the upcomming splits.
Pace: -1:57min (Saved 2:04min)

17. Bulbmon 2:
This one should've been a clear timesave for Guilmon as well, but Machine Power 2 along with getting a favorable amount of encounters helped make this the third gold of this run! Super good split for Kotemon, something that won't be matched for quite a while. Bulbmon was a little iffy, but worked out fine in the end.
Pace: -4:45min (Saved 2:48min)

18. Qing Long Chief:
Pretty much perfect split for Kotemon. Did lose some time to gold due to extra encounters, though that wasn't a bad thing as I was slightly behind on levels for Kyukimon anyway. The fight was perfect as I managed to get the Death Plug setup just the way I wanted it to.
Pace: -5:49min (Saved 1:04min)

19. Zhu Que Chief:
Pretty much perfect one again. Really good overall. Only two downsides were Snimon evading a counter and forgetting Flamberge which isn't that big of a deal anyway. East Sector encounters were crazy low.
Pace: -7:55min (Saved 2:06min)

20: Digi-Egg of Knowledge:
A super short split that went well. One MarineDevimon that died instantly to a counter and no ShogunGekomon encounter. Nice split.
Pace: -7:59min (Saved 4 seconds)

21: Genbu Leader:
Another long split though this went well except for two things. Mojyamon used Ice Shower instead of attacking. Along with that Gryphonmon killed Kotemon by evading and attacking a lot without me being able to run away losing at least a minute, if not more. However the same Gryphonmon that lost a minute dropped us a WIND POWER S!!! This item has a 1.25% chance or 1/64 in other words. Wind Power S is one of the best accessories that could drop in the run making many counters even more potent.
Pace: -7:17min (Lost 42 seconds)

22: Ice Witch:
Good split. Despite losing a minute this was a decent split as Blade Twister was already acquired at this point, but another Mojyamon and some other encounters slowed it down.
Pace: -6:09min (Lost 1:08min)

23: Fire Knight:
Got an encounter and missstepped once into a trap. The fight was fine as SkullMeramon was the only one stalling for 2 turns, the rest went well.
Pace: -6:49min (Saved 40 seconds)

24: Dark Knight:
Got another encounter towards the end of the split losing me some time. Along with that I lost some time on the fight due to Vilemon being weird. Overall a very good split.
Pace: -7:45min (Saved 56 seconds)

25: Bai Hu Chief:
Extraordinally strong split. Really good encounter rates, no hick ups along the way. Only the fight was a little slow, I could've easily saved 2 minutes if Gryphonmon wouldn't have been a mean bird once again. Still a pretty good split, far better than I would've expected considering this fight.
Pace: -7:41min (Lost 4 seconds)

26: Xuan Wu Chief:
Encounter rate was fine, however the fight was pretty slow. Boltmon survived a counter by evading it, same goes with SkullMammothmon. Puppetmon went fine though, I used a Guard Plug to play it safe. Probably wasn't necessary, but I had a free turn anyway. Overall bad split, but not the worst possible.
Pace: -7:43min (Saved 2 seconds)

27: MAGAMI President:
Ran into an Overflow glitch on the first Puppetmon as I didn't pay attention to Kotemon's health. Lost a minute to this ordeal as Renamon blasted to this and got us stuck in a long animation. All other fights went really well and we even got a one shot on Raidenmon. Very nice split aside from the hiccup towards the beginning of the Admin Center.
Pace: -6:01min (Lost 1:42min)

28: Enter Gunslinger:
I went for more Speed Training than usual as I left a few TP in the tank after the Game Master training. The final Speed stat after training was 712, which is higher than usual! I usually aim for 650+, 700+ is desired however. This speed stat allowed fleeing of encounters more easily and for a good position on Gunslinger. Encounters were not very low, but not overly terrible.
Pace: -5:41min (Lost 20 seconds)

29: Metal Solider 1:
This is where this run took another big turn. Only a single encounter which died quickly. Infermon was a one shot and Apokarimon got crit by Blade Twister saving another turn.
Pace: -6:47min (Saved 1:06min)

30: Metal Solider 2:
INCREDIBLE split. On my last PB I ran into 7(!) encounters, one of which taking a whole minute. This time there was not a single one! The Infermon got once again one shot and Apokarimon took 2 Blade Twisters. Another gold split, the 4th one this run.
Pace: -10:53min (Saved 4:06min)

31: Lord Megadeath:
The split was good. I made sure to swap out Wind Power S back for Water Power 1 to make sure I don't overdamage Galacticmon and doing it here is the same as doing it later except for me being able to ues a loading screen to mask some of the animations. The fight went really well despite a weak setup. The goal in this fight is to get a Death Plug set up with 4 Mach Plugs and 2 Power Plugs. I only managed to go for 3 Mach Plugs and 1 Power Plug, however that was fine as we didn't waste any time dying. Blade Twister took care of this fight, blocking every hit on Suijinmon wasn't optimal, but 2 Blade Twisters took care of it. Raijinmon took 3 turns instead of 2, but that was worth it.
Pace: -11:35min (Saved 42 seconds)

32: Galacticmon
The final split. The final fight. This decides everything. The Power setup (2 Power Plugs and a Guard Plug) went perfectly. The Speed setup went with 3 Mach Plugs at first, for safety reasons I went for 4 however. Along with the high Speed stat I was able to finish the fight in a quick manner. Only losing 23 seconds is phenomenal considering a 10 minute split for Galacticmon is very very good.
Pace: -11:12 (Lost 23 seconds)

And that's it! The run clocked in at 6:27:34 and is now the new World Record! Just in time for my university to start as well as I now won't have nearly as much time that I can dedicate to this.
I'm once again thankful for everyone who's been joining me on this journey and thank YOU for reading this :)
Take care and have a good one

-desa