Paper Mario Dark Star Edition: Tutankoopa EX Fight with Triple Curse (9x)

The first EX Boss to be cleared on 9x! Tutankoopa EX has 100 Base HP, scaling up to 900, and has 1 Defense. The base attack of his Shell Toss is 8 (scaling to 72), and the base attack of his Magic is 10 (scaling to 90). The magic also hits the partner with damage value of 1 (scaling to 9). He can still hit himself with his magic though, and that's also a base damage value of 1 (scaling to 9). The first turn he's able to move, Tutankoopa will call in a Golden Chomp. These have 15 Base HP (scaling to 135), 8 Attack (scaling to 72), and 5 Defense. Only 1 Golden Chomp can be out at a time. Tutankoopa received several changes between his original fight in Chapter 2 and his EX Fight. First, you'll see that he now has 10 Shells that he can toss instead of only 3. He's also far less likely to hit himself with his magic. In the case of this video, he only hits himself on his 2nd magic usage, which is programmed to occur unless it would KO him. He can now throw 1 Shell the same turn he calls in a Golden Chomp, or 2 Shells in the same turn if unable to call in a Golden Chomp. In addition, we also lose 3 FP every round that Tutankoopa is able to move. The Golden Chomps move slowly with their attack, but they can still fake out with said attack, and can do so multiple times. The most apparent change though lies in Tutankoopa's Curses. He had them in his fight in Chapter 2 as well, but there are 3 of them now instead of only 2. The first one triggers when he falls below 75% HP, and it cuts Mario's Max HP in half (odd values round down). The second one triggers when he falls below 50% HP, and it decreases Mario's stats. Either his Defense decreases by 3, or his Attack AND Defense decrease by 1 each. I got the former case in this video, but I don't know what determines it. The third and final curse triggers when he falls below 30% HP, and it will cut Mario's Max HP in half again. Because of these curses, a Max HP of 1 is not viable on 9x. This is because cutting a Max HP of 1 in half results in a new HP Stat of 0. Having a Max HP of 0 just instantly KOs you, with even Life Shrooms useless. However, a Max HP of 5 is enough to deal with both HP Reduction Curses. Fortunately, Tutankoopa is affected by Stop, making Stellar Nova Time Out a valuable means to effectively wipe out half his HP before he even gets his first action. Although Stop only works once, that's all we need to make Stellar Nova a viable part of this strategy. We can ignore the Golden Chomp entirely since KO'ing Tutankoopa will KO them as well. Flower Coins is the best strategy here. The loss of 3 FP every round is not prevented by having Weather Shield equipped, since it's not considered an environmental effect. However, this loss does not transfer to our coins. This means that with Flower Coins, we can play with maximum efficiency and not have to worry about running out of FP. We open with Stellar Nova Time Out so we can push the damage right away. From there, Mega Bounce and Hustle Spell spam as much as possible. We need to hit around 5 Perfect Hustle Spells, but the fact that it takes place at the start means failing there isn't painful. Once Tutankoopa recovers, we play more methodically, but we use all the means to survive attacks that we have on hand. We need at least 2 means of survival against attacks among the options of Miracle, Last Chance, and a Life Shroom. This is one fight where it is viable to run both Power Rush and Mega Rush. I don't do this with pure 1 HP builds because Mega Rush overrides Power Rush (just like how Mega Saver overrides Danger Saver). But in this fight, 1 HP is not being exclusively relied on. Power Rush helps during the portion after Tutankoopa recovers from Stop, but before he cuts our HP in half the second time. Once he falls under 30% HP though, we have both Mega Rush and Perfect Rush together. That said, we do start the fight with 1/5 HP because Mega Saver gives us a lower cost than Perfect Saver + Danger Saver. There is a change you can make to this build that gets through this fight faster, but with more risk. You can swap out Feeling Fine, Power Rush, and Danger Saver in exchange for Quick Change. This gives you 1 extra Hustle Spell to work with and allows for more damage earlier at the cost of lower damage in the middle section. That option gets through the fight faster; however, if you fail to block for the partner, the fight spirals out of control and you just lose. This strategy that uses Feeling Fine is a little slower, but it's also more consistent and also takes error with partner blocking out of the equation. As a note: Starting with a Max HP of 1 can work on 6x difficulty. In fact, you can completely wipe the floor with Tutankoopa on 6x with this strategy, bypassing his curses entirely. Just make sure you dodge a couple rounds of attacks first before you unleash Stellar Nova Time Out.