So I was told that as long as I stand behind the pile of wood to kill the two Ganado in the village, that the second wave would spawn at the far end.

That worked. They spawned. Two other questions I have

1. What causes the cutscene to trigger after throwing the grenade down the ladder? Do all the ganado just spawn there or do they pile there to take turns climbing up the ladder?

2. Someone told me you could pick up the pendant before it drops into the pile of poo (read: without shooting the lid down) in the next area. Is that possible?

also

3. Next to the ganado throwing the dynamite after the boulder, would shooting the tripwire to the mine be any faster since it's a more direct line to the final door?

For question 1, after running into the house, they're trying to get in and the ladder through the window is the only way into the house to 'get you.' As for the second question, I've never heard of that actually being a thing.

I'd just run the regular way because shooting would mean you'd have to stop, pop, and keep going rather than making a B line for the door.

It is possible to get the pendant without shooting the beam, you just need to be really quick about pressing the action button. I'll mess around with it later.

1. From my experience, the ganado that spawn outside the house once you enter begin to walk/run towards the ladder to the 2nd floor window as it is the closest path to your location. There's a number of kills associated triggering the cutscene, the lowest I have got is 16.

2. Not sure, never tried it but I don't think it's possible.

From what I've tried:

2. isn't possible. If it is, I'll be really interested, but as far as I know, it isn't. I don't even think you need the pearl pendant, anyway - unless it's part of a new strat that I don't know about???

you grab the pearl pendant for NG runs

2. You can get the clean Pearl Pendant while it's flying down. But it's almost a frame perfect thingy, so not really useful for Single segmented runs. I just tested it~

3. You are not on the same level with the trap. So you actually have to aim at it. Which is slower in the end, I guess. Running around the small house is not really a big deal. Actually you have to make a pretty weird turn if you wanna enter it.