Appropriate sends and lag chaining tips

Guide created by Cozypocket and Tolkerism to help with reading sends to send appropriate amounts and to help lag chain

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1cdk0KBqP1Cscb_hHvKsq5MtMVAy1-psDngPnKT3UJmI/edit?usp=sharing

Cards Commentary for 7:24 V-Hard Speedrun

Mastering VS. Easy

For those trying to master Easy difficulty for TA here are my findings.

Every stage has a cycle and it is normally the same:

- Every stage will start by flattening their stack. Which means that every stage will give you anywhere from 2-8 seconds of doing nothing but flattening depending on the starting setup. They will always flatten down to 5 lines at the beginning
- After that every stage will wait a set amount of time before doing anything. for the first 4 stages they wait 5 seconds and from there they wait 1 seconds less until they dont wait at all.
- That means for a Lakitu stage: if the setup is that they need 6 seconds to flatten everything, they will not do anything significant until the 11 second mark.
- It takes 2 seconds to kill in Easy. (of topped off uninterrupted time) and 1 Second for garbage to fall, so 3 seconds total
- if while flattening there is a clear, they will continue flattening into the newly cleared lines as well! (except if it was the last block of the downstack)
- Garbage that blocks their path to downstack, will make them stop attempting to downstack and go directly to clearing. THIS FORGOES THE WAIT TIME!
- If they are clearing and they happen to clear your garbage along with their random panel clears they will do an additional panel clear. Same thing applies if they make a combo.
- They tend to clear whatever is closer to their cursor

Now that all the info is layed out, this is where the strategies come into play! There are 3 factors to keep in mind. When the AI is flattening, when the AI is clearing, and **how quickly you can send 7 lines.** <- thats the most important one

Every stage strategy is dependent on the start setup so I will list those here.

These are general rules but timing can change depending on block setup:

**5 Blocks to down stack: 8-10 seconds**
**4 Blocks to down stack: 6-8 seconds**
**3 Blocks to down stack: 4-6 seconds**
**2 Blocks to down stack: 2-4 seconds**
**1 Block to down stack: 2 seconds**

Strategies for each Stage:

**Lakitu:** If you get a long down stack timer 8-10 seconds you want to time your 7 lines to fall anywhere between the 10-12 seconds times. Anything earlier also works!
If you got a shorter time, 2-4 seconds, you will want to try to send your trash at 15 for a 17 second kill. Here sending earlier will VERY LIKELY result in a clear

Now if you get the awkward 4-8 second window, this is where the cheese strat comes in, you can send  aquick combo to block the downstack (you need to see where the hole to downstack is to send either a 4 or two 4's
Then since the AI will immediatly go to clearing, send 6 lines as quickly as possible (or 5 if you had a 7 line start)
for the kill. This is higher level and requires the ability to see the opponent.

The pattern for Lakitu is to flatten, do 2 clears and then repeat.

Strategy for the first 5 stages is the same.

You can apply this to Bumpty, Poochy, Flying Wiggler and Froggy.

**Bumpty:** Flatten 2/3 clears, flatten repeat,

**Poochy:** Flatten, 2 clears, flatten repeat

**Wiggler:** Flatten, 2 clears, flatten repeat

**Froggy:** flatten, 2/3 clears, flatten repeat <- Froggy waits 4 seconds instead of 5

For the next 2 stages, Strategies are slightly different since the wait time is shorter so your window to kill changes.

Here it reverses, if they have a short time: you want to time your 7 lines close to the 10 seconds. to give them time to do both their clears.
If they have a longer time, now you want to try to go for the cheese strats, as this will force them to clear quickly which will make you have the upper hand on the rotation.

**Blargg:** flatten, 2 clears, flatten repeat

**Lunge Fish:** Flatten, 3 clears, flatten repeat****

for the last 3 stages strategy also changes:

Here you might need to send 8 lines for some of them as they can clear up to 12 blocks on their rotation
You want on quick flatten setups to start your chain immediately but build it slowly so they clear the upper blocks while your chain in going.
However for slower setups you want to first cheese with a block to block their flattening and then take your time to build after they clear the block.
These enemies do **NOT** wait after they flatten.

**Raphael the Raven:** Flatten. 4 clears, flatten repeat

**Hookbill:** Flatten. 4/5 clears, flatten repeat

**Naval Plant:** Flatten 4 clears, flatten PRIORITIZES GARBAGE CLEAR



Ideal send: start with and 8 or a 9 combo that leads to an x3 with a 5 and do a separate 8 or 9 combo on the side different from the first you did.




Best of luck and I hope you guys can master easy.

My Experts Guide to VS

If you have the confidence to manipulate the panels to your liking, but don’t know how to efficiently win against the various CPUs, then this guide is for you. I have seen the various modes of this game be difficult to optimize for even the best players in the community.

Below are my approaches to each of the game levels in VS based on my past experiences with the game. These strats work best when you have the ability to make chains as fast as you want. As the leaderboards suggest, these methods have served me well. Still, almost nothing in this game is 100% consistent (even when RNG manipulation is a thing, which will be covered in a future guide, but working it out for Panel de Pon is currently a higher priority) so feel free to experiment.

One thing is certain, though: it’s faster to create two rows of garbage at a time than just one.

Protip: if you feel that your initial chain is short of a kill, spam combos on top of your attack to fill in the gap. You cannot die while the screen is shaking and the screen shake from the new combo garbage on screen is minimal. This is good practice to do after your initial attack, anyway, so long as you wait for the garbage indicators to disappear before starting your next attack. Otherwise, your combo garbage from the first chain will not land until your second chain finishes.
Protip2: The faster you are able to make chains (especially via "Lag Chains," aka what this game calls “Time Lag”—see the ingame tutorial), the less garbage you will need since the opponents won’t be able to clear as many panels. In addition, the more combos you are able to make during your chain, the smaller your chain needs to be.

--Easy & Normal

Your goal should be to make something resembling an x5 chain and three rows of combo garbage. I have found that 7 lines of garbage is a good number to aim for if you are able to go as fast as possible. (This is mostly because the starting stack is 
always configured to fill 5 full rows.) Take more time than 15 seconds, and you will need more lines. This is generally the way you approach V-Hard and here is the place you should practice it.

The particular importance of three lines of combo garbage is explained in the V-Hard section.

--Hard

-Stage 01 Lakitu through Stage 06 Gargantua Blargg – x4 chain + three rows of combo garbage
6 lines is the sweet spot for this area as the natural rise of the stack can fill in an extra line before these opponents can clear enough out.

-Stage 07 Lunge Fish & Stage 08 Raphael the Raven – x5 chain + three rows of combo garbage
These foes are fast enough to flatten the stack to five lines with some consistency and may even have time to raise their stack afterwards.

-Stage 019 Hookbill the Koopa through Stage 12 Bowser – x4 chain + three rows of combo garbage
These foes will raise their stack two rows at the beginning. If these foes weren't fast enough at making clears, you could always win with 5 lines. It's not always possible.

--V-Hard

-Stage 01 – x6 chain + three rows of combo garbage
In my experience, it takes anywhere from 5-9 lines of garbage to kill these foes in a majority of these stage layouts. I have found that 7 lines is a good number to aim for. However, since Lakitu does not raise his stack at the very beginning, extra rows may be required. Personally, I go for 8 rows.
The three rows of combo garbage are important for when, not if, the opponents manage to clear some of your garbage. Those combo garbage blocks will, mostly, fall on top of the chain garbage. When your opponent clears them, they will turn into regular panels that the CPU will look for first (since they prioritize the top of the screen for matches) and, considering they will have largely been working on the bottom of the screen, they will likely not have time to get to the top before they die.
When you’re building the rows of combo garbage, you simply have to keep in mind that multiple combos of 4-in-a-row during a chain simply fall next to each other and will not stack. Since 4-combos are the easiest combos to come by for most during a chain, I recommend starting your chain with at least a 5-combo.

-Stage 02 Bumpty through Stage 06 – x5 chain + three rows of combo garbage
From here, the CPU’s normal tactic is to raise their stack two rows, flatten their stack, and then start making clears top to bottom left to right. These foes are just slow enough overall that 7 rows of garbage will generally result in a kill.

-Stage 07 & Stage 08 – x6 chain + three rows of combo garbage
These foes… not so much. By the time you get around to making the typical chain, these foes can be fast enough at clearing things that their stack is too low for the standard chain to kill—that is, if they don’t simply flatten their stack at the start and then raise it three rows before getting to work. The extra row of chain is typically necessary if they do the same tactic as the previous stages. These two stages are much more unpredictable than the six previous.

-Stage 09 through Stage 12 – x4 chain + three rows of combo garbage
From this point onward, two significant things happen to the CPUs’ tactics. First and foremost, these foes actually know how to chain and will waste A LOT of your time if they are able to start chaining. You can mitigate the odds of this by dropping your chain earlier. Secondly, these foes raise their stack three rows at the start of every match, also reducing slightly the amount of garbage you need to send.
Expect minutes of your life to be lost on a single stage at this point, especially on Kamek and Bowser. Their movement patterns and ability to chain feel particularly unfair sometimes. The sooner you can drop garbage of any worth on top of them, the better off you are more likely to be.


Again, this is my personal guideline that is far from fool-proof. Feel free to experiment and see what works for you.

Useful Memory (WRAM) Addresses

006496	Player 1 Stop Time (two bytes)
006498	Player 2 Stop Time (two bytes)
00946A	Player 2 CPU Level
009466	Player 2 CPU On (1), Off (0)
001A74	RNG Value (four bytes)
001A7E	VS CPU Speed

V-Hard mid-advanced tips

By now most of you already know how to chain and combo weave into your chains. If this is something you do not know how to do, I'd suggest you learn and practice that first before attempting this strategy.
You should also know how to setup lag chains or implement them while you do not need to be adept it helps.

For V-hard stages, spend the first 8-9 seconds building as much as you can, when it comes to both chains and combos, try to be more combo heavy than chain heavy, try to cap at x6 for chains. After that wait 3 seconds and send a combo at 11-12 seconds to ensure the kill. Just 1 combo will do.



Ideally you will send an x4 with a 9 combo or an 8 but no 4's on the other combos, so as to have 4 lines of combo garbage and 3 chain combo garbage for a total of 7 lines. this for the first 4 stages

For Frog Blarg and Fish you might want to send an x5 just for safety, these guys clear quickly and if you catch them on the low you will need more lines and they will clear on you

tehn Raph onwards try to stick to the x4 with 3 additional lines for a total of 6



Timings:

If you are short, you might want to work on your initial attack on those first 9 seconds to ensure you get a big enough attack, dont be afraid to chain big if you need to.

You will see many kills between 10-14 if you first send is good and 15 if your back up is good.

If they are clearing empty blocks you will see clears at 17-19 and if they clear your garbage once you should be done in 21 seconds.

Getting that consistent start for the first 9 seconds is crucial for this strategy which is why combo weaving is essential and lag chaining is very desired

CardsOfTheHeart

Bbforky

Tolkerism

Tetris Attack

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USA / NTSC

EUR / PAL

Easy

Normal

Hard

V-Hard

Easy - V-Hard

30,000 points

99,999 points

Game Level

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Endless Score

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Naam	Auteur
Appropriate sends and lag chaining tips	Tolkerism 2 years ago
Cards Commentary for 7:24 V-Hard Speedrun	Bbforky 8 years ago
Mastering VS. Easy	Tolkerism 9 months ago
My Experts Guide to VS	CardsOfTheHeart 4 years ago
Useful Memory (WRAM) Addresses	CardsOfTheHeart 8 years ago
V-Hard mid-advanced tips	Tolkerism 2 years ago