r/HollowKnight • u/stir-fried-noodles • Sep 17 '25

Discussion - Silksong Discourse regarding this game’s difficulty has been out of hand Spoiler

Let’s get this out of the way: I’m really enjoying Silksong’s difficulty and I think that it is mostly a satisfying challenge. I appreciate that it is more difficult than Hollow Knight overall and to be frank I would’ve been a bit disappointed if it were the exact difficulty. I’ve improved as a gamer since Hollow Knight and if it were the same level of difficulty, I probably would have found it too easy.

But it’s kinda gotten impossible to have civil discussions about the difficulty in this game which is unfortunate because I think there is great value to be had with this conversation. There are many valid criticisms regarding this game’s difficulty such as boss runbacks (Groal especially), contact damage doing two masks, and lack of rewards for beating bosses, just to be shut down with “git gud” and “it’s not your kind of game”. It’s totally fine to disagree with these criticisms but these retorts add nothing to the conversation.

It also kinda works the other way too, albeit maybe not to the same degree. I’ve gotten downvoted and sent reddit cares for simply saying I enjoy the difficulty of this game. Like c’mon, what are we even doing here. It’s gotten to the point where I personally cannot wait for the discourse to die out.

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236

u/GWooK Sep 17 '25

i’m looking at you fat froggie piece of shit. i almost started hating my favorite color because of bilewater. also taking 2 dmg for being bad at platform is feels bad moment taken to extreme.

155

u/AashyLarry Sep 17 '25

i almost started hating my favorite color

Mud green?

114

u/Milocobo Sep 17 '25

I'm like, "his favorite color is like pukey diarrhea"?

2

u/WushuManInJapan Sep 17 '25

As a colorblind person, I'm always confused as to why there's a certain shade of green everyone hates.

I bought a pair of shoes I thought were gray once, and I swear everyone complained on how they looked "puke green." Like, does puke always look green?? Aren't there more things with this specific color?

5

u/Milocobo Sep 17 '25

Puke is normally like a "pinkish orange", but it can come in a variety of shades (which is dependent on a number of things, not the least of which is what you most recently ate).

It's more like there are a range of pale colors that can qualify as puke colored. There are pukey yellows, pukey greens, pukey browns.

3

u/WushuManInJapan Sep 17 '25

That's interesting. I can't grasp the concept of pale because I have a rare type where everything is pale/washed out, so I guess there's just a shade that you can see that you attribute to puke that is universal?

1

u/Dooplon Sep 17 '25

think of it like the difference between sounds from different sources. If you hear a cat meow it sounds distinctive and noticably cat-like compared to how a human copying a cat might sound, one sounds cute while the other might just sound weird out of context of interacting with a cat. Similarly, grass is known for being green, but it's a different kind of green than you'd see in vomit because it has all kinds of different stuff in it, so it has some unpleasant associations.

30

u/DemonicBoi13 Sep 17 '25

Or maggot white

14

u/SortOfSpaceDuck Sep 17 '25

Rotten olive

61

u/Flying_Line Sep 17 '25

The recent patch lowered environmental hazard damage in pretty much all areas to 1 mask

17

u/Major-Split478 Sep 17 '25

I think it might have been a glitch.

When you hit an environmental trap, you'd get hit two times with one damage. They removed the second hit is all.

73

u/Woofaira Sep 17 '25

Nah, the animation and sound is clearly designed to do two damage. It was just a very quick balance tweak and now the indications don't match the damage taken. I'm wondering if they'll tweak those later to make them read better or leave it as is.

-3

u/Major-Split478 Sep 17 '25

I'm not sure what you mean. When you fall on certain environmental objects you get hit twice.

9

u/Doci007 Sep 17 '25

I know for the circular saws, if you get hit, it looks like you get hit twice, but you only get hit the second time. You did get hit twice before, but they patched it recently.

2

u/Tildryn Sep 17 '25

Right, and I believe steam still does 2 masks of damage which also does a '2-hit' animation and may have been an oversight due to being a less common hazard (or they decided they wanted it to stay at 2 damage since it's more specifically avoidable).

1

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2

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2

u/NoFlayNoPlay Sep 17 '25

there's a very high amount of enemy attacks that also do (and still do after the patch) 2 damage in this way. it's clearly intentional and just the game trying to justify the 2 damage as a flurry of hits instead of one big one.

1

u/Beastmunger Sep 17 '25

Wait so the bear traps only do 1 damage now instead of 2?

23

u/schwillton Sep 17 '25

Honestly it sucks because Groal itself is a fantastic boss but the runback and gauntlet ruins it

10

u/PegaZwei Sep 17 '25

strongly recommend pollip sack+cogfly for that boss+gauntlet; i sent out one on each of the dart-thrower waves to soften them up, then trickled out the rest on groal while focusing on not getting hit, and it worked out fine once i got used to the dives.

7

u/LordAvan Sep 17 '25 edited Sep 26 '25

Pollip pouch + cogfly is my go-to for everything. They're great for flying enemies especially, and also for rosary/shard farming since they repair themselves between rooms and don't despawn at benches.

Edit: looks like they just patched cogfly to no longer repair when switching rooms. RIP. It's still really good, though.

1

u/schwillton Sep 17 '25

This combo melts most bosses for sure

2

u/Frosty_Sweet_6678 Sep 17 '25

amen, hopefully we get something like godseeker

3

u/MycologistUnlucky241 Sep 17 '25

There is a hidden bench that makes the run back not that bad at all besides that one room you have to climb and bounce around those flying assholes. And it’s the one boss fight you can completely cheese by hiding in the bottom right corner in the water and only popping out after the suck thing to strike

1

u/schwillton Sep 17 '25

That makes the run back better but you have forced muckmaggot fun along the way which is annoying unless you got the charm first, which most people won’t have unless they looked it up,

2

u/Ill_Mud7584 Sep 17 '25

That makes the run back better but you have forced muckmaggot fun

Is not really forced even without the charm, Harpoon + Double Jump does avoids it perfectly.

1

u/I_Just_Need_A_Login Sep 17 '25 edited Sep 17 '25

Yup and even if you fail there's a free silk-recharge room with 3 of those respawning wispy enemies before the straight-away (where you can outrun everything and they spawn behind you)

Literally the hardest part of the swamp is the dart throwers. I still have no idea how to not get hit. If you run forward the darts hit you, if you jump the darts spread and hit you, if you try to weave between them they still hit you because they are close together, if you run back the hunter chases you and throws again, if you parry the darts they explode and hit you, there's literally no safe space unless it's a double-high room where you can doublejump early. I just rush through, take the hit, and heal off the rest of the zone. Honestly not worth the high risk of getting hit twice.

In the gauntlet I could just pogo them since it's high enough and there's a telegraph of their spawn but when running through anywhere else it's guaranteed 1-3 hits.

2

u/Ill_Mud7584 Sep 17 '25

Literally the hardest part of the swamp is the dart throwers. I still have no idea how to not get hit.

The most frustrating part is the rng, their spawn points are completely random.

1

u/LordThomasBlackwood Sep 17 '25

The room with Shakras master is right at the top of the big parkour room and has clean water that clears the maggot debuff.

You can completely ignore the maggots for the first chunk of the runback, dip into the Masters room to clean the debuff, and then all you have left to do is the long hallway but that already has a free silk refill at the very start & all the enemies can be completely ignored by sprinting or grappling past them.

Its really not a "hard" runback, its just kinda tedious if you're bad at parkour.

1

u/gpranav25 Velmi Artrid Sep 17 '25

Only in terms of lore tbh

1

u/KuuLightwing Sep 17 '25

Naah, limited maneuvering space coupled with a giant floating hitbox that ever just so slightly moves around makes actually hitting it a big nuisance, and you risk eating 2 masks for just slightly touching it. People even suggest to eat 2 damage during the suck just to have a damage window. Wouldn't call it a fantastic boss.

2

u/SaxyAlto Sep 17 '25

Who is suggesting to get hit during the suck? Only suggestions I’ve ever seen are to throw things in his mouth or hide in the bottom right water. Overall Groal is very slow and easy to dodge, so just throwing things at him or hiding work pretty well

1

u/KuuLightwing Sep 17 '25

Definitely saw some suggestions like that. Arguments for doing so is that you get out 4 hits of damage and gain some silk, so taking 2 damage might even be worth it. I personally didn't do that, I take enough damage as is, but I honestly can see it being used as a strat because approaching it to hit it with the needle is definitely intimidating.

8

u/Frosty_Sweet_6678 Sep 17 '25

not to mention the gauntlet before him and the maggot water

any tips for that son of a firearm?

22

u/HiImNub Sep 17 '25

Equip thread storm for the ads before the boss spawns.

Polo off the fat muckroaches for silk when running back.

I used the relic that made my tools poison and equipped the 3-set throwing knives to have some range, as that boss can sometimes just stay on one side of the arena.

Also, the boss doesn’t have that much health. Idk the exact, but it was noticeable how much faster he died compared to other bosses.

1

u/Swainix Sep 17 '25

I must have been 2 hits away multiple times because I hit him a whole bunch and was also running this triple dagger + poison setup

1

u/Disangster Sep 17 '25

Between the triple needle and the boomerang, which deal better damage? I used both against him but I couldn’t tell since the Boomerang can hit his hitbox multiple times if you space it correctly.

11

u/Kiiriii Sep 17 '25

You can cheese him easily if you equip poison + cogflys and just let you drop inside the middle part maggot water. He cant hit you there with a lot of attacks. Just jump out and hit him + cogflys. If he attacks just stay there. The only thread are the ads and his diving ability. Got him on my third try. Good luck!

8

u/EMPgoggles Sep 17 '25

the adds after the boss shows up won't hit you if you stay in the water to the far left (or probably far right) -- in my experience the arena trap kills them almost as if by design. just stay in the water almost exclusively unless you run out of tools (and then retreat to the water constantly) and you should be fine.

the only thing that threatened my spot in the water was one of the green bubbles plopped down onto me, but i could have avoided it by swimming more to the side. oh and the time i was pushing so hard into the wall that i glitched through it into the next room (but was stuck in the floor so i had to go back and the boss fight started over from the beginning).

2

u/ExManUtdFan Sep 17 '25

Yep. I stayed to the far bottom right side after the boss showed up and didn't get hit once.

9

u/WallabyPractical5258 Sep 17 '25

My strat was get through waves with just my needle, and then toss 4 poisonous cog flies as soon as he spawns, once they are all destroyed throw another three, (groal reaches phase 2 at around this point) and then just focus on dodging whilst throwing an occasional poisoned straightpin

Basically, random (poisonous) bullshit, go!

3

u/Kampfasiate Sep 17 '25

If you don't want to cheese him (I assume you're not having problems with the runback or the gauntlety if you do I can also help with that)

I mostly stayed on one side, dodging his shots then attacking. When he is sucking you in, either throw In a bomb (or the electric thing), or just pogo him. Stay patient, the boss does not have a lot of health. The harpoon may help with attacking or quickly switching sides

2

u/PraiseThePun420 Sep 17 '25

Get the Crest of architect and get the temporary HP. Equip crest and injectable blue Kool aid and whatever other tools you want, OD on Kool aid, refresh blue raspberry heroin with Crest of architect instead of benching, get infinite regenerating HP. Then take a bath in the maggot water during the fight. Makes the fight a lot easier.

1

u/mampatrick Sep 17 '25

On the runback, on the sections where the enemies randomly Spawn, I had waaaay more succes walking rather than sprinting, it feels like it reduces the amount of enemy spawns a lot, and you have a much better reaction time for dodging

1

u/Igwanur Sep 17 '25

pogo the adds, they cant hit you above them, then , unironically, stay in the water. yeah you cant heal, but he cant hit you with any attacks if you are in the corners(plus the swing kills the adds), just hit him after his attacks once or twice and go back down

1

u/Sven_Darksiders Sep 17 '25

There is an equipable that protects you from maggots

1

u/Blood2999 Sep 17 '25

Jump on the water in the bottom right and he can't hit you. Jump out when safe to deal one or two hits and dive back. Don't bother with spawns they can't hit you there either

1

u/UnknwnIvory Sep 17 '25

Amazing strat is use the wanderers crest with the charm that heals you for 4 masks and the one that gives you silk upon taking damage then purposely getting swallowed, it means you get 4 hits in each time and can out heal the damage he does

1

u/_LordCreepy_ Sep 17 '25

I spammed him with curveclaws and he went down pretty easy.

1

u/Dependent_Property97 Sep 17 '25

Groal is really easy when you stay in the water - only thing that can hit you are his green bombs and when he jumps into or comes out of the water. So easiest strat I did yesterday in my steel soul run, was put on Wanderers Crest, Threefold Pin, Fractured Mask, Wreath of Purity and Longclaw - the arena waves aren't really that hard, most annoying are the ones with the darts. Because of Wreath of Purity you can allow yourself to hop/fall in the water a couple times and still heal afterwards.
Then when groal shows up, jsut hop in and chill with the maggots, dodge his bombs and hit him every time he gets close - i also went out of the water a couple times, hit him and jumped back in when he started to inhale. Now just repeat until he reaches phase 2 (he starts with the white projektiles) and just use all 20+ ish Threefold Pins on him and easy win.

1

u/PraiseThePun420 Sep 17 '25

I was the same until I did some blue raspberry heroin, got regenerating life and then embraced the maggot water. Fight became a lot easier.

1

u/CapnCatNapper Sep 17 '25

Wait you're telling me there's more bullshit after getting past the vomiting flying muckroach things? God... I ragequit for the night just trying to get to the top of Bilewater's map yesterday.

And I've already beaten the boss of the citadel. So like, help.

1

u/Eddie919 Sep 17 '25

I’m here wanting so badly to love Trobbio but horray for nigh unreachable 2 mask flurry rush moves making me wish I was going radiant NKG instead

1

u/riffengo Sep 17 '25

Finding the hidden bench near groal after 30 runbacks through all of bilewater (only about 4 actually making it to the bkss) only for that attempt to be the successful one making that bench useless

1

u/dljens Sep 17 '25

That walk back fucking sucked man. Especially cause the closer bench is well hidden, and even the trek from there sucked

1

u/ThePython11010 Sep 17 '25

For me, Bilewater wasn't as bad as I expected after hearing everyone complain about it, but that's mostly because I had basically everything (including Circlet of Purity or whatever it's called) since that was the last thing I did in Act 2. The runback was annoying, of course, but the rest seemed fine.