DL Segmented '24 explanation

Alpha Mods:
Flail: 10 area
Vipers: 10 speed
Vulcan: 6 speed, 4 ammo
Mines: 1 ammo, 9 area
B6: 10 area
Silencer: 10 area
Rifle: 10 speed
Holoshield: 10 speed
Turrets: 5 speed, 5 ammo
Nova: 10 ammo

Key:
R = Restart - mission was done from the restart challenge menu
L = Load - mission was loaded into every time, using the ship entry cutscene to tick down the IGT simulating the challenge intro cutscene
N = Natural - mission was accessed naturally from a previous challenge or loaded into with all introductory cutscenes playing (notated as N+L)

0 / Boot Camp + Containment Suite / n/a
This entire first section resembles RTA in many ways, though it still remains one of the more under-labbed sections of the category. The goal in the first room is to charge as soon as possible, so I trust the Viper ricochets to clear the enemies once they spawn (the trigger is slightly ahead of where I charge), and then perform a charge endlag cancel via opening the quick-select with Triangle, allowing me to instantly jump out of the charge onto the teleporter. The spacing for this charge is deceptively tight, with very little room to execute the double jump before hitting the stairs. Conveniently, I was able to switch to the Vulcan right as I landed on the tele, making the next room a little smoother. There's likely a frame or two to save with a better landing on the front edge of the teleporter.

The second room is a simple fight sequence where waves of enemies spawn in after killing a certain amount beforehand, but the actual *rate* of enemy spawns appears to be RNG dependent. I charge directly forward to hit the spawn trigger as soon as I can (it's just on the other side of that light bridge) and then hope for favourable spawns as I clear out the enemies. This attempt was markedly faster than some of my other tries, but I still lack a full understanding of what makes the spawns tick. After the cutscene, I set up my weapon switches for Advanced Qualifier and enter the tele as soon as possible.

Containment Suite has new movement which I specifically labbed out prior to making the segmented. The trigger for the Al cutscene extends out of the doorframe, so I space my charges to hit it with a hyperstrike, saving a few tenths over doing the normal strat. I was able to do the same with the Clank cutscene, although this is a much slimmer timesave in comparison. The movement to the shuttle is fairly even between either walking and charging out of the wrench swing.

1 / Advanced Qualifier / ~13.683 N
The goal of this mission is to deactivate the turret shield via bot EMP and destroy it - therefore you need to get your bots to the end at the same time as you. Bots will respawn once the in-game timer hits 10 seconds and there is a viable position for it to spawn next to you, so getting to the turret at 10s is the goal. You can abuse the teleporting mud surface on the first square platform and warp directly to the turret, but it only works at certain points/depths of the platform *and* you must contact the ground at a speed slower than charge-speed for a certain amount of time before it gives you the correct (...incorrect?) warp position.

This is fine in an IL setting, but in full-game you have introductory cutscenes which *count towards in-game time*, immediately setting you at a time deficit to make it over to the square platform. This was proven to still be barely possible with the old hyperstack method over the mud, but that requires two menu opens - I was able to work out an airswing version which only utilises one menu state cancel. Ordinarily, you would try to aim for the right side of the platform as it's closer, but with the airswing that requires a favourable wrench throw lock-on which sends you parallel with the edge. The left side of the platform teleports you correctly at a shallower 'depth', curiously enough, which meant I was able to use an easier forward throw to the platform and then charge along it to the earliest warp point. I adjust myself as I fall in the mud to try and prevent one of the bots from spawning beside me, meaning the spawn is instead delayed until I appear next to the turret. The Rifle one-shots the turret and fires instantly, making it the best weapon for the job here.

I did not record the IGT for this mission, so the listed number is an estimate.

2 / Valley of Heroes / 9.566 R
The first traversal stage in the run. There are three components to this mission: the instant re-charge as I land from the first charge, the charge endlag cancel onto the slanted ledge into a favourable charge angle parallel to the wall, and the hyperstrike angle into launchpad. This run is practically perfect - I later tried a landing lag cancel using the same principles as an endlag cancel after charge 2 to speed up the third charge, but that changes the charge spacing in a way that makes the route slower overall.

(I should have pulled out the rifle on the launchpad to set up the next mission)

3 / On the Prowl / 8.983 R
The first RTA 8-second time for OTP. Having to deal with the weapon switches mid-run while also getting the instant/quick re-charges and perfect charge angle for the flail cancel doesn't help here. The end trigger for this mission is placed diagonally to the pen where the landstalker is, meaning it juts out of the slanted wall very slightly - enough for Ratchet to barely clip the edge and complete the mission from the outside.

This is probably the best mission in the entire run.

4 / All Aboard the Landstalker / 11.033 R
A variation of the IL strat is used here to get to the turret, bypassing the first Nova shot and charging around the stone walls. While the IL uses menu state cancels, this uses flail cancels - much more difficult because of the rapid switching needed for quick execution, and because the fucking landstalker gives you weapon lock-on meaning you have to take a very awkward charge angle in order to avoid getting your momentum eaten. The second flail cancel needs a straight angle, otherwise your hyperstrike will either hit the invis wall above the mud or you'll smack into the stone wall on the other side instead.

The midair Nova shot barely hits both orbs, and the landing position from the momentum stored single jump has ideal charge spacing, allowing for consecutive quick charges up the hill without needing to cancel any manually. The last flail cancel is done with the wrench so that the flail can be pulled out for a 'hyperstrike', conserving it for Rise Up.

I really wanted a 10, but it's not worth going for second barriers in this run and wasting several hours when the actual real-time payoff is so minimal. There's a few other instances in the run where I cut my losses knowing that I'm going to go insane spending hours for a few frames.

5 / Rise Up / 20.883 R
First arena mission. All but one of the initial zombies need to die before the swarmers spawn; Wave 2 activates when the second last swarmer is killed; Wave 3 activates when all the middle zombies are killed; the dropship spawns when all 5 of those spaced zombies die; Wave 4 starts when the dropship is shot; Wave 5 starts when 4 of the spaced zombies die, and then the mission finishes when all zombies are dead.

There's frames to shave here, but arena missions were a lower priority for frame optimisation compared to all other mission types.

6 / Alien Soil / 24.850 N+L
To simulate a real run with the two opening cutscenes, I loaded the file on each attempt. As the timer runs during both of these, it means the bots will respawn at the orbs quicker than if I did it out of a restart (assuming I spliced the run in like it was the first attempt). This is far more arduous than just restarting mission, but it's nearly a second of timesave *and* more accurate, so it's worth doing.

I stand in a particular position to spawn both bots right beside the spot they hack the orbs from, and then clip inside to kill the spawners as soon as the bots are done hacking. You don't need to kill many of the spawners jumping up from underneath before the dropship spawns, so it's just about timing the rifle shot to kill the ship quickly.

I think the bots could have started hacking quicker, but I don't really care.

7 / Sarathos Sprint / 10.300 R
The way the leviathan attacks you depends on when you enter its line of sight, so it's a lot of resetting just trying to get the ideal attack pattern where it only slightly walks forward before shooting. Positioning is also key, as I need to be high enough when I start the airswing to reach the end trigger. You also don't need to state cancel for this particular airswing due to how quickly it damages you.

8 / Where the Leviathans Roam / 12.400 R
I found a new strat for this mission while looking in Replanetizer in testing - I didn't realise the centre bar of that pillar was standable material until then. To land on it more consistently, I flail-wrenched so that I stalled on the bar's surface once I contacted it, instead of trying to land directly on it (which usually resulted in sliding due to the bar's angle and the speed I had). You can then walk directly up the pillar and safely jump around to where we'd normally stack towards. This cuts out a few hyperstacks, reducing it to only two plus a ledgegrab.

If you mash Triangle hard enough, you can skip the controls pop-up for the Puma by getting out just barely beforehand. To prevent myself going insane doing this out of planet reload every time, we're just going to pretend I did that.

9 / King of the Leviathans / 43.600 N
Standing still and mashing Hacker Ray immediately latches the bot onto the orb quicker, as their natural spawn position is further forward than when they move by your side (which only happens once Ratchet moves). The rest of the mission is just a waiting game until the last orb is hacked, which immediately spawns the King Leviathan. It dies in one shot of the Silencer, so we fire straight down as it rises up from the mud to complete the mission.

10 / Infiltrate the Cathedral / 23.933 R
Most of the airswings in this run require multiple enemy hits before throwing the wrench, as your conserved speed multiplies each time you're damaged. Saving time with airswings is mostly centred around taking damage quickly and consecutively; here, I walk to the right slightly before charging, manipulating the guards into standing still instead of running towards me. This provides a chance for the two guards' shots to be offset enough that Ratchet's invulnerability frames from the first tick of damage wear off before the second shot hits.

The approach angle to the final platform is also important, but I generally just tried to aim to the left of the hacker orbs and hoped the bots spawned in favourable spots.

11 / Introducing Shellshock / 24.983 R
In this run I've utilised 'act tuning', a game feature which reduces the health of bosses after dying to them a certain amount of times - it persists through new Challenge Mode files in the PS3 ports of the original quadrilogy, making it technically run legal (though it's not used by anyone in real-time No LC runs at the moment). The setups for the act tunes in this game are time consuming and somewhat esoteric, but I decided to do them in this segmented because I wanted to give myself an interesting routing challenge and to show off what potential optimal boss-kill strats could arise from it. Shellshock is act tuned via dying to his attacks 10 times in the Showdown with Shellshock mission, which also tunes the two other encounters earlier in the planet.

The cutscene plays once both Ratchet and the bots are within a certain area. Shellshock is able to be damaged while it's playing, so I pre-fire a rocket into the ground right as the bots cross into the trigger. Due to the act tuning reducing his health drastically, the combined splash damage is enough to complete the fight immediately and begin the enemy sequence. Destroying the first dropship spawns the first box; destroying the second dropship spawns box 2; killing one enemy in that box spawns box 3 (similarly with box 4).

This is the only mission with a mid-challenge cutscene, which forces me to load a fresh file whenever I hit it as it only activates once, but can be restarted before that point.

12 / Enemies are Such a Grind / 11.933 R
The strat used for this mission is a refined version of doesthisusername's old 0:14 WR back in 2017, instead of the mine clip through the orange wall. The initial mine clip is easier in either of the angled corners of the door, and the setup into the flail cancel is a little better with a slight angle adjustment from manually cancelling the charge with the flail first. This flail cancel double jump is fairly tight and the timesave is minimal, so I don't think this is a viable strat for actual runs.

13 / Infiltrate the Cathedral, Part 2 / 27.500 R
The swarmers at the start of the mission have seemingly random actions - they will either try to walk/bite immediately or do a little jump instead. The bots will also choose random targets, meaning most attempts die quickly due to the first swarmer getting sniped before it can bite. Combine that with the optimal strat being a short charge directly into the bite hitbox, which requires a precise angle going across the swarmer's body diagonally... this mission fucking sucks lol

After you get the first damage cancel, you're relying on a quick second hit to give you enough speed to execute the rest of the airswing. I use a risky airswing climb near the doorframe and then pivot left before the bots can respawn up by the turret, then gain a little more height before moving towards the left edge of the orb platform. The aim is to get the bots to respawn on the higher platform instead of the pathway where the cycloids are, then latch them onto the orbs while travelling back to the opposite doorframe where you can slide up to safety. You have very little leeway before your speed disappears entirely - it's probably not an exaggeration to call this the hardest airswing in the run.

14 / Shellshock Returns! / 16.966 R
Very simple mission. The flail cancel at the beginning gets the bots into the aren slightly quicker as they follow Ratchet without slowing. A couple of sniper shots decimates Shellshock's act tuned health, and then it's just gambling on quick box drops until a 16 happens.

15 / Fight to the Cathedral / 10.483 R
Another simple mission. The clip out is quicker than the flail cancel to the top of the arena, and then direct charge lines are used to get to the end trigger. As the last charge falls short of reaching the trigger, I use an endlag cancel to my advantage by jumping immediately out of it *and* switching to the Silencer for the next mission.

16 / Showdown with Shellshock / 13.516 N+L
The final Shellshock phase spawns once Ratchet and the bots are in the back corner of the arena, so the goal is to make it there before the 10 second respawn timer. I loaded the file for each attempt so that the bot timer was run-accurate, but otherwise this level resembles the IL WR. With Shellshock's act tuned health, you're able to kill him much quicker by firing rockets up into the high tunnels instead of waiting for him to come out into the Nova's line of sight.

17 / Manic Speed Demon / 23.500 R
Absolutely fucking insane time bro. The first two enemies must be killed before the other enemies come out of the mud; at 8 total enemies dead, the dropship spawns, which I kill from behind the arena with rocket splash damage rather than the rifle, activating the next wave of enemies out of the lava; all but one of the troopers out of the lava + box drop + swarmers out of the lava need to die before the second dropship + box spawns. The dropship and most of the blade balls need to die before the final four boxes start to drop, which is where most runs end up dying due to wildly inconsistent box drop times. Most of that just came from the top of my head so maybe there's something wrong in that idk we ball

This IGT beats the next best time by .280, which is absurd for such an optimised arena level. There is a minor weapon switching inconsistency while waiting for the second dropship; I instinctively used the quick switch rather than manually switching to rifle like I should've, but there's no real timeloss or gain there.

18 / The Tower of Power / 25.050 R
Like with Infiltrate 2, a charge into a swarmer bite is the fastest way to begin an airswing here. Unlike the prior mission, I use strafing with a weapon out to walk into the radius where the swarmer attacks, walk back very slightly, and then charge into it as the hitbox comes out. The airswing path is relatively straightforward; by going entirely above the two square platforms in the open area, you can bypass the combat sequence raising the platforms out of the mud - normally avoiding it softlocks the mission. I end the airswing by switching to the Flail with R2 quick select as not to accidentally change my angle. 10 enemies must be killed before the dropship spawns; the dropship needs to be destroyed before the rest of the enemies spawn. They jump up from random positions around the arena, and this attempt gets very favourable spawns in condensed in one corner right at the end.

19 / Climb the Tower of Power / 26.933 R
A flail cancel into charge cancel double jump is probably the quickest way over to the turrets - the most important thing is entering their activation radius as soon as possible, although their activation speed is random. After getting hit, I try to position my wrench throw so that it just grazes the edge of the wall next to the incline, allowing me to begin my airswing chain by nearly immediately ascending up the slope of the arena.

Once I'm high enough, I pivot around to try and hit the trigger which spawns the Executioner and Leviathan, which juts out slightly from the edge of the tower's peak. One of them needs to die before the first dropship spawns; the first dropship needs to die before the second dropship spawns; the second dropship must die before the enemies jump up from the edge; all but two(?) of the enemies must die before the final two boxes spawn; all the swarmers in both boxes need to die before the mission ends.

20 / Return to the Deathbowl / 5.716 R
This mission is an exercise in quick weapon switching. The first charge is flail cancelled so that the spacing for the second charge into flail cancel hyperstrike is better, and then the charge after the hyperstrike needs to end with the correct spacing so that you don't get any slowdown off the edge of the ice arena before hyperstriking. This particular spacing is modelled after a TAS of this mission that doesthisusername did back in 2017.

21 / Landstalker Stalkin' / 33.416 L
This mission was done out of a load to ensure the bot respawns were accurate - and considering this is one of the hardest missions in the game this was a stupid fucking decision and I should have tapped out of it sooner.

The first bot travels along a set line as it paths to the first node, but how fast it arrives there depends on where it is when you tell it to latch on - and since the bots like to move around randomly shooting the swarmers, you're hoping that it syncs with the pathing line quickly enough to ensure a good respawn time & position for node 3.

The movement to the second node needs to be done before 10 seconds have passed... sort of. The bot respawn can be delayed by taking a charge line more rightwards than a direct beeline, which spawns it on the elevated area next to the node rather than in the gap to the left. It's less likely to die from landstalker or turret attacks when it spawns up here as well.

I have to get to node 3 before the first bot finishes turning the crank, as it'll instantly respawn next to me once it's done. The movement I usually did was a flail cancel off the node 2 platform into mine clip, but I fumbled it slightly - though this ended up helping me as I was in the perfect position for the bot to respawn once I turned around near the node.

The cutscene after node 2 is completed causes Ratchet's movement to lock during the fade-in, and if it activates during charge endlag it can hinder your run as you're unable to re-charge. This was a decent outcome and the state cancel after the cutscene gave me great charge spacing to the final node. I was unable to find any consistency with firing just one mine into the crowd of missile launchers, as there's an extra two to the left which *will* hit you if you manually turn the crank. If all the missile launchers are cleared, turning the crank isn't that much of a risk as latching on quickly will cause you to complete the node before the Laser Backs can fire at you.

22 / As the Wrench Turns / 30.983 L
Similarly with the last mission, bot respawns are a huge component of this mission, necessitating a load for every attempt.

Killing the first two airborne troopers makes the bot pathing up the stairs slightly smoother - I need the bot to latch onto that crank as soon as possible so I can navigate to node 2 before the first 10s timer elapses. The respawn for node 3 is a delicate balancing act; I cannot be too deep into the alley between 3 and 4, or the bot will respawn too deeply for it to get to node 3 in time to sync with my final node turn. I hit the sweetspot respawn point, and then charge to node 4 and clear out some of the turrets, turning around as I hit the launchpad so that the bot can respawn right beside me at 20s on the lower level instead of the higher level. I then turn the final node manually and hope I don't get bodied by any troopers which spawn.

23 / Labyrinth of Death / 10.783 R
To complete this mission quickly, both bots must be hacking the second orb of each side simultaneously, with the end trigger activating in the interior part of the *last* orb to complete. When you tell a bot to hack or path to a node, it will move at a set speed that is slower than its maximum possible speed, so we need to find solutions to get the bots to move quicker and then tell them to hack once they're closer to their target.

To get both bots hacking as quickly as possible, we charge immediately into the pit, abusing their rubberbanding speed both to get by your side and to lock onto enemies in order to launch them down the slope, with the first bot being set to the rightmost orbs and the second bot sliding into place on the left side. This requires good positioning in the back corner of the pit and a lot of luck for the correct bot rubberbanding to occur.

I had to splice in another endscreen because I was so dumbfounded at how quickly I got this attempt that I forgot to continue to Node Overload before ending the recording.

24 / Node Overload / 40.100 R
This mission is mostly based on the speed of your first bot, and the survival of your second bot. Jumping backwards will sometimes raise the bot right next to the first node; you then have to make sure your second bot is raised and hasn't eaten too much damage from the landstalker, while also ensuring that it actually latches onto node 2 as there's two different lines it can take (one will often fail to get the bot to the node).

I stand at the back of node 3 and only tell it to the turn the node once I'm sure it has respawned next to me, otherwise it tends to take a weird line away from the node and then back again. For node 4, ideally the bot respawns ahead of you and latches onto the node while it's still close to you (moving too far away will prevent it from starting the turning animation, and if it's lingering too long before turning it might die from enemy fire).

I attempt to stand in the right spot for a favourable node 5 respawn so that it syncs up with my manual node 6 turn. The respawn's good, but I do linger for a tiny bit longer than I should before charging to the final node - however this attempt in particular was also far less laggy than usual on this final charge, so maybe that worked to my advantage...? All similar attempts to this were far slower RTA than this run, so I decided 39 wasn't worth going for as it's likely it could've ended up slower than this run.

25 / Refinery Ambush / 34.966 R
Charging deeper into the room causes the bots to rubberband to you, and with good positioning and ideal hacker ray input timing on the first 2 nodes you can get a 34.

26 / Chains of Villainy / 12.483 R
I was deeply unsatisfied with all of the RTA strats which only gave me 13, so I found a new Nova sequence for the first two orbs. Firing the Nova while hugging the left edge of the bridge at a certain point somehow still connects with the orb, meaning we can now charge immediately out of the landstalker and still destroy the first two nodes with ideal Nova shot timings. Orbs 3 and 4 can also be done perfectly by firing as you crest the ledge over the acid and holding R1 the whole time, causing you to fire mid-charge to the fourth orb.

27 / Static Deathtrap / 58.116 R
All but two of the first two waves of ledge enemies must die before the third wave spawns; all of the third wave must die (not the final spawn on the left though) before the two boxes drop; the two boxes must die before the dropship spawns; the dropship must be destroyed before the next few waves of ledge enemies and the reapers spawn; the reapers aren't as necessary as the ledge enemies when it comes to spawning the turrets, as all the ledge enemies must die before the first turret box drops; I do not know what causes the three swarmer box drops afterwards actually lol it's never been a big factor since you're killing the turrets as soon as possible anyway; the third swarmer box drop must die before the next two sets of ledge enemies + the middle box drops; all ledge enemies and box enemies must die before the final wave spawns; all troopers spawned in the final wave must die before the mission completes.

I got a 57 early on, but it uses the laggier method of looking at the whole arena at once (necessary as you need to visually see the troopers shatter into ice before they're considered dead) instead of the spin method. I'm sure you can 57 with the spin method too, but it's a tougher task and this mission is extremely frustrating to grind.

28 / Marathon / 27.716 R
After latching the bot onto the first node, a forward mine clip on the wall is ideal to get to the other nodes quicker - it's really fucking annoying to forward mine clip a slanted wall and get a charge out of it without jumping! If your respawns are good, the bots should path onto nodes 2 and 3 without many issues, though sometimes swarmers and the leviathan can block the bot from reaching node 3.

The flail cancel hyperstrike into double jump into charge cancel falling neutral double jump is diabolical. The angle for the flail cancel is frustratingly precise, with most attempts just sliding into the teleporting mud. You also need to look down to mitigate the lag from the barrels exploding, which is slightly disorienting, and then switch to Nova for correct weapon conservation right before hitting the node. I used Beta Ravager here as Alpha tended to bounce away and completely miss the enemies, and since this was done before I found infinite ravager I chose this as my singular ravager usage for the run.

29 / Reactor Battle / 2.800 R
To act tune Reactor, you need to frame perfectly kill him as you die >5 times. I would love it if someone put boss act tuning into racman for me pls thanks

Charging forward before firing the Nova means it'll damage Reactor slightly quicker. A flail is needed to kill him as a single Nova shot doesn't quite do enough damage.

30 / Lost and Found / 23.833 R
! TOXIC STRAT ALERT ! After realising that the dropship method was only going to get me a 24 at best, I tried the swarmers... and it turned out to be significantly quicker, while also far more annoying to set up as the spawns are 'random' (based on the time you enter their spawn trigger, which you can't perfectly replicate every time). I use the strafe method as done in The Tower of Power, but this time charging away from the bite hitbox as swarmers at this point in the game snap quickly enough to hit Ratchet as he's charging away.

After many failed attempts due to the trooper continuing to hit me on the crank, I took a small timeloss to flail the ground mid-airswing (since you can substitute wrench swings with flail swings) before latching onto the node.

31 / Space Ace / 59.116 R
The first IL WR in this run. This was a fantastic attempt where everything went right after a shaky beginning.

Pack 1 and 2 went about average (the leftwards shot scanning can be much better). Pack 3 was bad, and normally I'd reset after knocking the trooper so far to the left, but the recovery was quick enough to continue moving to 4 without turning the ship too far left/right. Pack 4 was great, with the missiles cleaning up the troopers without any issues. Pack 5 was average to good (you can get more favourable spawns allowing you to kill the Executioner very early and letting the missiles kill the troopers as you fly back). Pack 6 was phenomenal, with great aim on the cannon blasts and a lucky kill on the Executioner as I moved away to Pack 7.

I bumped a pillar while moving backwards, but it didn't really stall me as I needed to turn in place anyway to clear out the mediocre spread. Pack 8 I put a ton of trust in the missiles to clean up, with a *very* late final missile killing the last enemy. I hit another pillar at Pack 9 which probably did lose me time, but the clear was exceptionally quick to compensate. Pack 10 I basically did a drive-by and trusted the missiles again to kill the Executioner. Pack 11 I got saved by amazing cannon spread on the troopers and all of my missiles hitting the Executioner to compensate for my bad aim, and Pack 12 again went fairly well in a similar fashion.

32 / Power Up! / 15.266 R
I really wanted a quicker RTA airswing here when first labbing them out, but there wasn't any way to gain height without climbing up very slowly on the exterior walls... until I got an attempt which slid up *the trooper itself* to barely gain enough height to reach the end trigger. Some precise aim is needed to gain the height and then get a quick turnaround on the airswing, which needs to give you the right lock-on to take you in the right direction. The timing when it comes to dropping the airswing and doing the hyperstrike into the end trigger is unintuitively awkward.

33 / Let the Light Shine Through / 38.683 R
Destroying the dropship is what triggers the troopers to jump up from the ledge; then the biggest challenge in this mission is getting the first trooper to actually shoot you and not your bots. Getting the first damage cancel itself from the cycloid isn't too difficult on its own, but sometimes it'll be too high for the laser to reach you.

Even though it takes slightly longer, climbing up the right side of the asteroid tends to let you continue your airswing more often than the left side, which gives you better charge spacing. I don't get a slide after crossing the rock at the corner and instead stall, but this works out well as I had more speed during the flail redirect into the node room, allowing me to turn the node right away.

34 / Hoverbike or Bust / 24.650 L+N
As with Alien Soil, accurate bot respawns are critical here and requires a very tedious load for every attempt, but the end result of this was totally worth the time spent.

Charging past the first turret rubberbands the bots closer to you, letting them hack the orbs a little quicker. You then need to haul ass to the second turret before the bots respawn so that the EMP throwing bot can respawn on the ground level next to the turret, and then ensure the other bot is following you up the slope before tapping EMP at the right point for it to skyfuck that shit right ontop of the turret. I also charge past the third turret to give it favourable rubberbanding before telling it to hack, and then stand in the middle of the two turrets as the bots won't keep hacking if you're too far away from them.

35 / Seek and Destroy / 10.250 L
To prove you can get really good times without a mission restart, I did this out of a load... but I'm not sure why I bothered...

The first rocket needs to be fairly far right to catch the drones as they're slightly ahead of where they'd be out of a typical restart. I fire the second rocket once I've squared up with the tunnel again, walking directly backwards out of the no-spawn zone and hitting the lights in the green tunnel to explode the rocket as soon as possible.

36 / The Turn On / 35.916 R
Similarly, I could have done this out of a load to get accurate bot respawns, but it doesn't really matter as the bot is typically going to follow you correctly down the tunnel if you're on the right pace.

There's a slight angle where you can charge straight up the hoverbike pad, but it's difficult to get consistently while also getting the hoverbike get-on prompt. The Laser Backs and turrets can block you from activating the first node, so you may need to make a slight heads-up adjustment to get the prompt to appear. To speed up the turnaround on the second node, hitting the barrier bounces you backwards and in the right direction to keep on moving.

The jump off the turret has many different outcomes, but this one landed me right on the node despite giving me a bit more airtime than I would have liked. I would like to try and spice up this level again, but it seems the current route is about as fast as it'll get for now.

37 / Blast of Fresh Air / ~40.000 L
Again, bot respawns are crucial here. Rubberbanding the first bot to the destroy node while also standing in the right place as the 10s mark hits for your second bot to respawn is a tough balancing act. The charge done at the beginning of the level will typically stick one bot behind the pillar, offsetting it from the other bot enough that it will respawn instead of pathing naturally to you.

The bombs will only successfully plant once the bot salutes you after it's done putting it down, and it will only salute if it either gets close enough to you or if enough time passes while it's moving towards you. Ratchet's positioning is therefore key when it comes to missions like these, as standing too far away once a bot finishes planting just means it bleeds travel time before it does the salute animation. I attempt to stand at a point where both bots will salute me at the same time to offset one of them completing the bomb quicker than the other.

For some reason, the IGT timer has a tendency to not stop correctly during the endscreen of this mission. Working it out manually gives me about exactly 40 seconds, so I decided that 39 wasn't worth it especially since this attempt had favourable lag as well.

38 / Murphy's Law / 34.550 R
While 33 is the IL WR, I'm not too sure whether it's possible with the mods I use for this run as the Silencer section is much slower with 10 area mods.

All the enemies coming out of the lava at first must die to spawn the second set of enemies; similarly the second set of enemies must die to switch to Flail; box drops are dependent on how quickly the last box is killed, with the last one switching you to Mines; the leviathan must die and the box must die to switch to Vulcan; the dropship must die for the box to the right to drop; the box must die to switch to Silencer; the leviathans must die for the Reaper to spawn; the Reaper must die for the Laser Backs to spawn; the second box drop is dependent on killing the first; the second Laser Back must die to switch to Vipers; the first Executioner must die for the third one to drop (the second is independent); all Executioners must die for the mission to complete. Something like that I'm just saying words whenever I talk about arenas tbh

39 / Air Drop / 2:16.050 R
lol

40 / Eviscerator Battle / 3.350 R
Act tuning Eviscerator is easier, as you only need to die at any point after it dies rather than relying on a frame perfect death.

Eviscerator also has a death animation if it is killed with any weapon other than the Nova. It's faster to do a bit of damage with Flail, switch and fire Nova, and then do damage with a wrench hyperstrike right before the Nova connects with it so that you can bypass the animation. There's likely an even faster way to kill it which results in a 2 RTA, but I wasn't able to find it during any testing.

41 / Junking the Jammers / 42.750 R
The final four jammers are the only big chokepoint for this mission. The landstalker can only destroy them with the mortars, including their splash damage. To reduce travel time, it's optimal to cut to the left of the turret, snipe the rightmost jammer with splash, and then use the same principle to destroy the final jammer from behind. There's only a narrow sweetspot where the mortars won't lock onto the jammer and hit the central pillar while also avoiding lock-on from the turret at the back of the ring.

The jammers *can* be destroyed by falling meteors, which do cause splash damage when they hit the ground. The IL WR somehow gets this 1/10000 chance of a meteor landing right next to the backmost jammer, but I'm not keen on spending a year grinding for that just to save two seconds.

42 / Energy Collector / 28.733 R
While bot respawns are an element of this level, loading doesn't really change anything as the second bot will nearly always path to the node correctly and complete its crank before you do.

To rise the first bot up to the first node quickly, I turn to the right and then pivot left at the peak of the launchpad, which rubberbands the bot upwards, allowing me to charge away towards node 2 as I latch it onto the node without fear of it getting stuck underneath the platform. I don't take a direct path to node 3 as I still want to ensure the 10s respawn happens while the bot is moderately close to node 2, and I can't be too far away from node 3 once the first bot completes its crank otherwise it'll respawn too far out in the distance and I'll finish the final node too quickly. The B6 is used to clear the turrets as it cleanly destroys them without killing the troopers, which will spawn Executioners once they're dead. Both nodes 3 and 4 complete at the same time; this attempt is satisfactory, but I feel like there's something quicker for those two nodes that I'm not really thinking about (and no, the airswing does not seem to be faster in testing).

43 / Shields Up! / 45.833 R
When the hovership moves close to the orbs, it'll automatically try to latch both of the bots onto them without a prompt (you'll see one of the orbs flash red very slightly if you have a good eye). Hitting regroup after that invisible prompt finishes makes one bot begin to hack the closest line-of-sight orb to the hovership from a distance while the other bot recalculates which orb it's pathing towards.

To make both bots hack an equal number of orbs, I move forwards before hitting regroup so that the first bot starts hacking on the left side of the middle corner while the second bot takes the right side. The second bot is again moving slower than its max speed, but the hovership is able to push it faster and squash it down towards the ground so it can reach its hacking position quicker. To get a 45, you have to ensure that both bots continue their long distance hacks when crossing over to the second corner, which is more consistent when you're near the corner they're about to path to. Once I see the first bot begin to hack the left corner, I have to cut through the generator towards the right corner so the second bot can also execute the long distance hack. From there I need to clear out enemies while reducing lag; enemies won't load in if you're far away, so I stick near the back-right corner as to reduce the threats by the first bot in the left corner (the turrets in the middle are the only thing posing a danger to it as a result).

44 / Shield Survival / 9.933 R
This is a difficult arena with a lot of precision necessary to get a 9. The first dropship and some of the swarmers must die to spawn the second dropship and both of the boxes on the first edge; both boxes and the second dropship must die to spawn the third dropship on the next edge; the third dropship must die to spawn the swarmers and troopers on the edge; all of the troopers and swarmers must die to spawn the fourth dropship on the final edge; the dropship must die to spawn the two Executioner boxes and the final dropship; all three of those must die to complete the level.

The first box drop needs to fall quickly so that the swarmers and dropship can die in one precise rocket. Similarly, the next two boxes also need to be quick for another one-rocket clear. The third dropship just needs some good aim, but the troopers need a delayed shot of the B6 to clear them right as the last trooper spawns so that I can simultaneously set up for dropship 4's rocket. Dropship 5 requires good box drops and a semi-precise rocket to clear all three at once.

Previously, it was thought that you needed to switch alpha mods on the Silencer mid-run to shoot the final two rockets in time, but I was able to get a 9 with 10 area mods on both the B6 and the Silencer.

45 / Jail Break / 6.983 R
Normally, clipping through the fence and doing one of the many climb methods up the right gate pillar ends up with rather similar results (a mid 7 at best), but I was able to innovate a slightly different, yet much quicker method of instaclipping with the mines which requires a jump out of charge cancel/falling neutral to execute.

Mines tend to fire with a slight upwards arc before landing down on the ground, but while either in an endlag state or while airborne and facing forward, mines will follow Ratchet's momentum instead and shoot straight out from the launcher. Here, I do a tiny jump as I fire the mine so that it lands almost immediately on top of me, allowing Ratchet to walk through the orange wall and charge straight into the Executioner activation trigger. Favourable box drops meant I was able to get the first RTA 6, almost exactly six years after achieving it with hyperstacks.

46 / Total Control / 39.266 R
Juggling the bot's respawn positions while also being far enough ahead to hit the end trigger before or during the final cutscene is the aim of this level. When pathing to the first node, I tap the dpad as late as possible so that the bot is practically right on the node and doesn't need to slowly travel to it. Getting out of the Puma and charging is faster than driving it, so I get out near the second node and time my charge so that the cutscene plays while I'm still airborne, state cancelling me at the end. The bot also respawns close enough to the node that it finishes turning right as I get near node 3, which in turn syncs up for my final charge into the doorframe.

For some reason, double jumping at a particular angle up the magramp will clip you into the doorframe, allowing Ratchet to hit the end trigger before the cutscene plays. I reach the end trigger as the fade-in to the cutscene happens, which is about as optimal as you can hope for.

47 / Leave No Man Behind / 9.100 R
I still don't understand this mission, but this time is quite good regardless. I use the charge cancel endlag to place the mine slightly quicker at the lip of the door, then charge cancel to the left side of the magramp. Where Ratchet's looking seems to determine what happens when you attempt to jump off the ring of the pipe to demagnetise, and facing this angle gave me more consistency when it came to jumping up and over the ring onto the roof of the pipe (there's no collision between these two bits, but there's also a sizeable gap requiring good double jump timing and positioning to stand on the roof properly). I walk slightly so I'm above the orange wall as the hitbox extends out of bounds, and then charge cancel hyperstrike so I don't bonk on the lamps or the rings jutting out from the top of the pipe.

48 / Showdown in Delta Block / 5.583 R
This is where I initially discovered the better instaclip method while seeking an RTA 5. After the falling neutral double jump, shooting the mine at the right time while descending will fire it right at the door where Ratchet will land, giving him a chance to pass through the door and charge into the trigger. This instaclip saves half a second over landing and performing a normal forward mine clip.

49 / Swarmer Surprise / 54.966 R
The second IL WR in this run...??? Somehow I got this before getting any 55s?

Killing the first line of swarmers up to the back-most corner one spawns the dropship; killing all the successive swarmers and dropships will spawn the first set of lava swarmers; killing the first line + 2 will spawn the next set on the other edge of the arena; killing *that* first line + 2 spawns the rectangular set of dropping swarmers; killing at least all but 2 of the dropping swarmers spawns the final wave of lava swarmers; killing all of them switches to the B6; killing all blade balls in that round begins the box drop wave; keeping pace with the box drops and killing all of the enemies finishes the mission. Or so they say

50 / Accelerator / 38.000 R
I don't really want to explain this mission, you're on your own.

I accidentally discovered infinite ravager while doing this and it threw me off so hard that I just didn't want to bother grinding for another frame for a 37. There is also the most egregious weapon switching mistake where I wasn't able to switch to Nova during the downtime between Laser Backs, but thankfully that's probably the only bad inaccuracy in the run.

51 / Ace Hardlight Battle / 3.600 N
Ace is act tuned by dying during the fadeout to endscreen after you kill him, which is easy to do in the lava. This mission is also done naturally out of the cutscene because you can switch to Nova slightly quicker as a result. In an ideal world, you would be able to switch to Nova at the end of Accelerator and simply hold R1, but that would require some very heads-up prediction skills for the final zombie kills that I'm not sure anyone could feasibly perform (I know this is a segmented, but some level of accuracy is what I'm going for here).

52 / The Grinding Chase / 6.116 R
With 10 area mods, double charging is extremely slow as it requires the lengthy flail swing animation to finish before you can input a charge. You can cancel that animation however with a wrench swing, which finishes slightly faster; though I still wasn't successfully able to perform a triple charge flail cancel directly into the trigger, so a hyperstack seems to be a necessary evil here. Maybe it's possible with more calculated double charge and flail cancel timings, but this route ruins your hands after like 20-30 mins of attempts.

53 / Running the Gauntlet / 11.966 R
The first RTA route 11. As it turns out, the airswing momentum you get from the further ahead barrel is *just* enough to carry you in a direct line to the end trigger, where you can hyperstrike into charge over the lip of the bridge. Unfortunately, the charge spacing to that barrel is absolutely horrendous, necessitating some manual charge cancels to clear out the barrels on the inside line of the ring.

54 / Prison Break / 12.533 R
The third IL WR in this run! After getting a 19 with the basic RTA route, it still felt extremely sluggish and slow as the clips weren't able to be instaclipped, nor did the magramp feel fast, nor did the charge spacing make any sense at all. During my initial attempts I did try what ScaRee dubbed as 'Talented Clip' since I remembered his guide, but didn't give it a proper shot as I thought there'd be too many hyperstacks to make it worthwhile.

While trying to grind down to a 33, however, I gave his strat another whirl and found out that it was possible to get the missile sweetspot and reduce the stack count to 3 relatively quickly, already beating the regular strat by a second or so. I was able to hone this even further and get a 12 with 3 stacks before optimising my beginning movement into the clip slightly with a jump and cutting down my stack count to 2 with a precise angle and spacing out my hyperstrike timings. This level turned from one of the most awkward watches into a neat outside the box strat obsoleting the IL strat's original OoB climb entirely, so big thanks to ScaRee for his talent in finding this route in the first place.

55 / Escape / 44.983 R
The fourth IL WR in this run. It's strange how sloppy this attempt looks despite knowing it was fairly fast while performing it.

The first two boxes and the turret require you to get close, but it's ideal to dip away as soon as you've fired enough shots for the turret to die. Both the boxes at the bottom right can be hit in one shot if you're fortunate. The first high stack is a heavy reset point, and you do need to ascend somewhat high to ensure your shots don't explode before they reach the boxes; from a distance you can then try and snipe out some of the barrels surrounding the second turret, as they do more damage than your basic cannon shots or missiles, and then pivot so that you're travelling across the third turret's platform and destroying it with missiles as you look upwards to the batch of three nearby. Breaking at least two of those three is necessary, but it is possible to get all 3 with precise shots. Fourth turret is awkward as you need to travel far enough forward to hit the furthest box but then 180 immediately the shot, hitting the remaining box as you ascend to the second high stack. I did miss one of the boxes next to this turret and somehow recovered without any real timeloss. The second high stack is easier to scan compared to the first one as you need to crest over the top of the battlements to get to the fifth turret.

The fifth turret generally dies without issue if you keep spamming shots and missiles at it directly and just dip underneath the overhang once you're able to. The two boxes before turret 6 can be tricky as shots will get eaten by the spikes on the ledge of the ring. Turret 7 nearly instantly dies once you destroy its barrels, and the lag as a result is practically unavoidable - we can use this to our advantage to shoot more precisely while hitting all five of the lined-up boxes. You need to move forward to hit the next two boxes on the lower level as the shots have a tendency to not reach if you're behind where the sixth turret's corpse is, and then pivoting to shoot the seventh turret while ascending to the final high stack is optimal. In this run I get a ludicrous final high stack, with all four boxes popping right away allowing me to beeline straight to turrets 8 and 9, which both die fairly quickly - I could have gone faster on turret 9 if my splash damage was able to hit the two barrels behind it.

56 / Destroy the East Generator / 39.200 L+N
The cutscene at the beginning counts towards the bot timer, so this is done out of load to ensure the respawns are accurate.

Getting out of bounds before 10 seconds is the only critical part of this level that you can really control. You're able to clip through this wall without dying as it's slightly slanted, and you're within radius of the destroy nodes so they can be toggled from underneath as your bots respawn next to you out of bounds. When the bots reach the generator room, they're launched into the air as they squeeze through the floor, which inconsistently places them by the nodes at different times as they can be flung in a few directions. To toggle the backmost node, you need to jump out into the void and then jump back to get the prompt to appear on the dpad.

This attempt overall definitely isn't the best possible outcome, but you're throwing every run to a roulette hoping the second bot reaches its node timely enough. The salute principle also still applies here, and the bots will move towards you despite not being able to actually reach your side (they salute after a certain point). However, you can cut off the last bot's pathing by standing directly in front of the generator from underneath in line with the destroy node, causing it to salute quicker as it physically can't move through the generator.

57 / Destroy the West Generator / 42.850 R
Like with East Generator, this mission takes advantage of a sloped mine clip to peek out of the first hallway, which is at the same height as the post-elevator room. Two hyperstacks are necessary to make it over to the other side. To make it to the generator room we forego the casual path in favour of an out of bounds on the doorframe, which has a solid layer underneath we can charge off. With proper hyperstrike spacing, it's possible to make it to the room in three stacks. At the 20s mark the second bot respawn occurs once we land in the room, putting them right beside the destroy nodes.

There is an alternate strat where the casual path is used to enter the generator room, but it requires an extra mine clip with tighter timing to make it before the respawn occurs *and* the Laser Backs spawn within the room, causing extreme lag which is super hard to reduce while keeping your bots alive. I think a refined version of that strat is probably the endgame for this level, but I don't really know where to begin with working out the lag and consistent Laser Back mitigation while also keeping track of the bots.

58 / Destroy the Central Core / 42.950 R
To clip out of bounds, I line up with the corner groove and do a flail cancel wrench throw to ascend up the wall, then double jump into place and switch to the mines. The weapon has a physical hitbox which also influences Ratchet slightly, and as you build up speed while falling in between the wire and the wall you can be forced out without dying. A state cancel is necessary to slow down enough to land back in the room.

The first 10s respawn should ideally happen with the bots away from the turret so they don't try to fight it and die. Normally you have plenty of leeway to make it to the generator room in the next 10 seconds, but I opted to try and respawn the bots on the opposite edge of the room as that seemed to give me more consistency in getting them to respawn by my side rather than pathing to absurd places all over the room. This worked out perfectly, with the regular strat of freezing the turret enemy (killing it spawns more waves) and holoshielding the turret remaining unchanged from a typical RTA run. A 42.xxx is the best possible result for the generator missions assuming a respawn at 20 seconds, and I'm pleased that I was able to finally get one on this mission with this strat after only getting 43s for ages.

59 / Defeat Gleeman Vox / 19.433 R
To get Vox to hurry over to his second phase suit quicker, it's optimal to cross the gap and then corral him to the back side of the platform while simultaneously knocking down his health so that he can be killed with one Nova shot at the end.

A flail cancel into Nova shot into flail slam is a quick burst of damage to kick things off, and then repeatedly slamming with a switch to Nova again is the quickest way to push him down to the HP you need. Vox will only move once his attack ends, which requires the beam to cross over Ratchet twice; you can trick Vox into fulfilling the first cross by charging away *just* as it reaches Ratchet the first time, meaning he'll keep sweeping his beam in the same direction and then finish his attack once it crosses him for real the second time (you can dip underneath it if you're in the middle of a flail slam too).

I haven't been able to find a way to act tune Vox, but that would likely open up the potential for an 18 with these flail mods, as it fires too slowly to risk an ultra quick beam cross strat.

With a well-timed Nova shot, the run is complete and the timer ends when the HUD disappears for the first time.