For the Sake of Ashina

~The future of FtSoA~

To all those asking about Ultimate Owl, I would like to tell you that it will not be happening, at least not from me. It's not an exaggeration to say that Sekiro was my life for a time, it was an outlet to pour my creative ideas into, and back then I had the time and passion to go into meticulous detail, detail so small that most players won't ever notice, but it was enough that I would.

That same passion now has another outlet, I'm joining the military and beginning my career in engineering, and I know I'll have to give the same heart and soul to these endeavors that I once did for Sekiro.

With some officiality I'm declaring, my development for FtSoA is at a likely permanent end. Maybe I'll come back to it in like 8 years?

Somber note aside, if any modders are reading this I would like to state: my mod's files are free to use (pls credit me tho), and if anyone wants to create a spin-off mod they absolutely can!

(P. S. if anyone wants to try and make an Ultimate Owl, I'd be glad to help out, Discord is the best place to DM me :p)

Version 1. 4. 24:

Now is much more versatile in its usage, instead of spending all the emblems on the unsheath, it costs 1 emblem on the unsheath, 1 emblem for each set of double slashes, and 1 emblem on the follow-up, and the follow-up can be cancelled into at any point after the unsheath. You are able to choose to use the combat art with only the unsheath and follow-up slash to only spend 2 emblems total. You can use the unsheath, all 3 double slashes and the follow-up, and any combination in between. The double slashes also have been buffed so they're more worth their emblem cost. When emblemless, the double slashes are non-existent and the unsheath and follow-up slashes do not stagger much and do not have piercing/dark damage. The usheath deals the most stagger but the least damage, and the follow-up deals a bit more damage than the double slashes, so it can be prudent to skip the double slashes if you're about to run out of emblems mid-way through the combat art. I had a lot of fun making this One Mind both strong and with a higher skill ceiling, I hope you enjoy!

Ashina Cross:

Now costs 3 emblems. Increased posture damage. Slightly increased L1 and prosthetic cancel frames.

Firecrackers:

Now costs 3 emblems. Chasing slice no longer removes sword buffs.

ShadowRush/Fall:

Now costs 1 emblem on the vault and 1 emblem on the descending whirlwind slash, so the player can now choose to be emblem efficient if they want to use ShadowRush and do mid-air R1s, or deal more damage with higher stagger using ShadowFall. The player can also use ShadowFall's vault with a mid-air prosthetic without worrying about spending 2 emblems on the vault.

DragonFlash:

Now costs 2 emblems. Re-added the projectile to the uncharged version, but its stagger is minimal, it will not interrupt an enemies' animation. The projectile was initially removed because it caused issues with enemies having trouble guarding 2 hitboxes at once, but this appears to be a perfect middle ground.

Praying Strikes:

Increased cancel frames. Added Mushin Strikes, similar to Mushin Monk, the player can use a prosthetic follow-up after the last hit of Praying Strikes (not exorcism, regular praying strikes).

Loaded and Cleaving spears - 1 emblem

Spiral Spear/Gouging Spear - 2 emblems

Flaming Spears - 3 emblems

Bloodsmoke - 5 emblems

Puppeteer - 6 emblems

Bestowal - 7 emblems

SpiritFalls:

Reverted to vanilla, where they're an infinite use, emblem consuming version of sugars. I made this change as I believed this blended better with the regenerating emblems mechanic.

Player Misc changes:

Added better/more accurate footstep vfx to a whole bunch of player animations that no one will ever notice.

The player can now not go from sprinting to a stationary L1 instantly, because physics. You will now still play the sprinting L1 animation for a moment after letting go of sprint.

Removed the small windows in the R1 string where there's infinite turnspeed and replaced it with a more modest set turn speed, this should not be noticeable for anyone unless they're trying to cheese bosses by turning around mid R1 so they don't block it.

Lightning reversal no longer removes your sword buff.

Added an item that lets you toggle on/off a version of another mod of mine Attacks Can Deflect. (https://www.nexusmods.com/sekiro/mods/1129)

Version 1. 4. 2b is out! A simple update, several bugs (Sakura Dance/Ultimate Mortal Draw >:)) have been fixed, as well as added polish.

Bug with the Samurai General's uppercut missing a hitbox fixed.

Rare bug where Nightjar Slash had the wrong R1 follow-up.

Bug where Geni can be looped with counter-slashes if the player uses Hidden Tooth at the very beginning, his opener on the rooftop fight is no longer always the same, however.

Added the first changes to the UI! So far it is a retexture of menu selections with the objectively best color scheme that also happened to be the color scheme that suits the theme of the mod, Red foreground on a Black background. A Main Menu replacer is planned as well.

Ema can now consecutively dodge praying strikes.

Enemies in the air can now play the "falling to the ground" stagger when hit by higher hitstuns.

Emblem regeneration has been moved to every 6 deflects.

Flame Vent projectile logic has been revamped, now the projectile is decays in strength over distance, but increases in size. Fire flame vents' effective range is very short, but Lazulite flame vents have much greater range and damage, but deliver lesser stagger and linger less. Emblem cost reduced to 4.

Isshin Ashina now backsteps and strafes when the player revives. He will no longer attempt to Ashina Cross as a heal punish if he has greater than 30% posture buildup.

Increased the speed the player can attack out of special deflect animations (Isshin's ichimonji/Geni's floating passage etc...)

The left side BlowBack-Medium deflect animation's R1 follow-up is now the 2nd stage upward slash.

Isshin, Geni, and Ema now play grunt sound effects when guarding, deflecting, or dodging.

The version 1. 4. 1 follow-up update has been released! This update addresses bugs and adds much needed polish to the anniversary update, such as the bug where enemies in the main game could sometimes load in with vanilla Ai, and Ultimate Mortal Draw's VFX not spawning outside Ashina, and Isshin Ashina standing still in neutral stance after being poisoned.

Enemies now have unique sound effects when deflecting causes posture break, special reactions, or when a large weapon is recoiling from deflection.

Isshin, Geni, and Ema now have a system where they can guard or dodge a continuous attack, and they will hold off on counterattacking until the attack is finished with the combo, currently the player's only continuous attack string that functions with this is sabimaru, if the player does not commit to it and stops the combo halfway, they will counterattack after checking that it is safe to do so. Ema and Isshin can now dodge and immediately start guarding a continuous attack if they cannot feasibly dodge the next attack in said string.

Armored Warrior has gotten a light rework, he should string together his moveset much more efficiently without returning to neutral of his own accord very often, yet still be slow and fairly easy to beat, also fixed the bug with being able to be posture broken despite deflecting the last hit of his rampage.

Okamis now have been polished, and had a decent rework of their lightning mechanics, lightning VFX visibly strikes them a bit before they unleash said lightni

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