Death HP4444
Death is, without a doubt, the toughest boss you've yet faced. But as with other boss fights, having a solid game plan will help out immensely. Above anything else, your focus should be evasion of Death's attacks. He's capable of dealing massive damage with every hit, and if you're not careful you can get yourself caught in some pretty nasty combos. One of Death's most common attacks starts when he creates a wall of chains surrounding himself. His scythe will bounce between the walls of the chains, threatening to damage you as it does. You can retreat outside of the walls and attack the clasped hands to end the attack, or you can dare to go inside the walls and attack Death while he stands still. Before making your decision, take note of the speed of the spinning scythe. If it's flying around quickly, don't bother trying to attack Death. Just focus on destroying the cage to move on to a more vulnerable attack pattern. Another deadly attack to watch for follows Death's creation of four holes that surround him. In clockwise order, starting from the top left, hands will reach out and grab your character. You can avoid the attack by staying to the far left or right of Death, but it's almost inevitable that you'll at some point be nabbed. If you do nothing, you'll take a huge hit from Death. However, if you call out your partner, he or she will automatically attack the hands that are grabbing you, eventually freeing you. Whenever you see Death summon the four holes, we recommend switching to Charlotte. If she gets grabbed, it's much easier for Jonathan to break the hands holding Charlotte in place. Death will also deliver some attacks by hand, which you'll have to watch out for when he's not executing one of the aforementioned proxy attacks. If Death swoops down and starts hovering on either side of you, stand in place and be ready to double jump at the last second. It may take a few times getting hit before you get the timing down, but rest assured that this is the best way to deal with the attack. For another attack, Death will move upwards and float over you. To dodge this attack, simply move left or right. Of course, you'll do all this while dealing with death's small sickles. Fortunately, you can destroy them with a good swipe of your weapon (for this we recommend a sweeping sword, like the Royal Sword—you can get it from Wind). You'll also want to watch out for Death's changing color. He'll switch between black and white robes, and each color lets you know that he's vulnerable (and resistant) to different things. When death is dressed in black, he has a resistance to physical attacks. As such, all of Jonathan's sub-weapon attacks will be useless, and even his main weapon attacks will have reduced effect. Try out Charlotte and see if she does better (this depends on the weapons you have). Conversely, when Death is dressed in white he becomes more vulnerable to physical attacks and gains resistance to magic attacks. Without a doubt, Jonathan is the better character to use against this form. We recommend fighting with the Dart sub-weapon, as it uses very little MP and is capable of dealing solid damage if you hit the center of Death.
Stella & Loretta HP2500
Equip Charlotte with the Sanctuary spell before heading into the boss room to face Stella and Loretta. The goal of this battle is not to defeat the sisters, but rather to cure them of their vampirism. The Sanctuary spell will do the trick, but it has a very long startup time. You'll need to find a way you can trigger the spell and keep from getting hit while the spell prepares. Use Jonathan as your main character and equip him with the Stonewall spell if you've got it (it's found in the Forest of Doom portrait stage). The two sisters will float around unleashing various attacks. Stella focuses mostly on melee attacks with her sword while Loretta prepares massive magic attacks that hit anything in front of her. Lure the sisters to one side of the room and wait for Loretta to trigger one of her long-winded magic attacks. As it prepares, run under the spell to get behind the sisters, and make your way to the opposite end of the room. Once there, call out Charlotte to begin the Sanctuary spell while retaining control of Jonathan. It's up to Jonathan to play defense. Leave Charlotte in the corner and move forward a bit with Jonathan without scrolling your partner off the screen (the spell will reset if you do). Use Jonathan as a distraction to keep Stella away from Charlotte. We recommend using the Stonewall sub-weapon and simply standing in place to absorb the hits as they come. Loretta will usually finish her first magic attack (the one you ran under) before Charlotte is finished with her spell, leaving her open to start another. If Loretta gets off another magic attack, it's probably worth it to sacrifice some of Jonathan's HP to absorb the hits, jumping straight into the spell to ensure that Charlotte does not get hit.
Belmont HP5000
The battle with Richter is pretty tough because all of his attacks deal massive damage. As well, he's difficult to avoid as he brings the fight right to your face, constantly pushing you towards the corners of the room. However, come to the battle prepared and you'll be able to deal with Richter easily. Still, one slip and it could mean goodbye for your chance at unlocking the Vampire Killer's power. I recommend fighting Richter with the Nebula whip and one of two sub-weapons, the Paper Airplane or the mastered Shuriken. You can find the Nebula at the top of a tower in Dracula's Castle, just west of the tower that leads you to the Nation of Fools portrait. The Shuriken sub-weapon can be purchased from Vincent for a cool 1,000 gold (that's cheap!), though for it to be really effective you'll want to master the skill first. The Paper Airplane does much less damage than the Shuriken but also uses much less MP—theoretically, it's the better weapon, but it'll take much longer to defeat Richter. And since fighting Richter longer means more chances for you to mess up, we think the Shuriken is best. The key to defeating Richter is to stay as far away as possible. Jump and launch Shuriken attacks from a distance, trying to get the aiming so that you get the maximum number of hits from the sub-weapon (it's capable of hitting four or five time with just one throw). When you run out of MP, resort to jumping attacks from the Nebula whip. Jump away from Richter and launch the whip as you travel up into the air. By the time you land, the attack should have ended, letting you move around without stopping to recoil your whip. Go back to Shuriken attacks when you've got the MP, using Nebula strikes only to buy time. Richter will give up eventually, and when he does you'll be rewarded with the true power of the Vampire Killer. We recommend clearing this challenge sooner than later—the Vampire Killer is a great weapon that's going to help a lot.
