mm6_no_damage

MEGA MAN 6 NO DAMAGE

This is my second challenge of the Classic Mega Man series to beat each game deathless. Mega Man 8 was the previous one (check the bottom for a YT video describing the MM8 route & run)

RULES:
- No damage of any kind
- No deaths
- Single segment, no longer than 15 minutes of break
- No content skips or major glitches (irrelevant for this game)
- Pausing allowed for all weapon swaps. Good faith rule for not abusing pauses for avoiding hits. Swapping weapons or swapping to Jet Suit as part of the strategy is perfectly reasonable

ROUTE:
Update 1:
Decided to put Tomahawk Man first, then the rest of the route is the same. Tomahawk is fought with Buster anyways, and his stage is fine without the other weapons. The minibosses are a little slower but not more dangerous. Silver Tomahawk weapon for Wind/Flame Man stages is nice too.

Original:
The route is the standard speedrun route, Wind Man first, then follow weakness order. However, there were many other considerations.

First off, Tomahawk Man is the most difficult fight easily. His weakness is Plant Barrier, which requires being very close to him and highly risks damage with the way his patterns work. He is fought with Buster, which would make it an attractive prospect to do his stage & fight him first. However, the current strategy is to have Jet Suit as an option for some of his more unstable patterns - Tomahawk Man can do a short hop that clears a little less than half the screen, but does not give you an opportunity to slide under him. Further, unlike some other Robot Masters, you can't jump over him reliably, most notably because he is standing while attacking while others walk towards you.

Because Jet Suit helps tremendously in some situations to dodge, Plant Man (which yields Jet Suit) should be fought prior to Tomahawk Man. However Plant Man's stage highly benefits from Flame Blast for the Gorilla Tank minibosses, and though Plant Man himself is certainly fightable with Buster only, Blizzard Attack is certainly better.

This means that starting at Flame Man is an option, but Wind Man's stage itself, although not terribly difficult, has some difficulties with the Cannonpellers and Cyber Gabyoalls (notably the 4th screen), whereas Flame Man is fairly consistent. A general theme of this challenge (no damage runs) is to try to prioritize the difficult parts of the route as early as possible, and Wind Man's stage is slightly more difficult than Flame Man's stage.

The other option was to start at either Knight Man or Centaur Man, and although they can be attractive prospects most notably for their weapons, it offsets fighting Tomahawk Man later. Further, Yamato Man is somewhat challenging himself, which is directly after Tomahawk.  And although Knight Crusher and Centaur Flash are good, the strategy for 8 robots without them is very reasonable. Centaur Flash gets most of its usage in some castle stages later.

In sum, it makes most sense to start at Wind Man, which is a very clearable stage with Buster only and a better stage to reset on. The benefits from having Flame Blast for the majority of 8 robots is huge. The downside is that Tomahawk Man is 5th, but the positives outweigh the negatives.

HARDEST SECTIONS:
Tomahawk Man fight - highly variable in attacks. His two standing attacks telegraph similarly, but require different timings. As mentioned above, Tomahawk Man can do both large and small jumps, which get very hard to navigate
Yamato Man fight - much less hard than Tomahawk but still is a problem, since his jumps can vary. Often the fight is over very fast, or its a struggle to dodge
Power Piston - theoretically not hard, but bad patterns on rock spawns can yield very difficult to dodge situations. The boss can often be in unfavorable position for dealing damage to it
X3 stage - hard at first, will likely get easier over time. The combination of Pooker & Fire Telly enemies can be hard to navigate
Refights - will be hard in every challenge


PAST DAMAGELESS RUNS:
Mega Man 8: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rChvLsyqU3M