Basic Information
- Max HP: 2000
- Weight Class: Floating
- Threat Level: Medium
- Damage Affinity: Normal
- Armor Hits: 2
- Devil Trigger Armor Hits: 7
Overview
The floating masks. A ghost looking enemy that is characterized by its unique floating movement and big scissors that it uses for attack and defense. It has a lot of HP and appears in groups, but has a weakpoint and opts to take a defensive approach to combat making Death Scissors not all that threatening unless they overrun you.
Attacks & Quirks
Death Scissors is a floating enemy that typically fights at close range. It can be knocked away or knocked up or downwards, but it will stay at a constant altitude unless it moves on its own. It can also phase through walls and floors making it capable of fighting you anywhere.
The Death Scissors‘ actions and attack patterns change depending on the state of its scissors. It will fight differently if its scissors are broken in half so this makes it a demon with 2 stances: Full Scissors mode and Half Scissors mode.
All of the Death Scissors attacks can be parried. Parrying exposes its Weakpoint: this is where the mask momentarily becomes red. If you shoot the mask while it turns red, you can kill the Death Scissors instantly.
In both Full Scissors mode and Half Scissors mode, the Death Scissors can guard against your attacks. It tries to fish for a parry & counter-attack against you and when triggered, it lashes out with a wide swinging spin attack while you are still reeling. But if it blocks too much the scissors can break and it’ll change modes. In both modes, it can also move into walls and floors to teleport to a wall near you, or the floor directly underneath you for a surface surprise attack.
In Full Scissors mode the Death Scissors uses slow and wide area attacks. There’s a swinging area of effect attack, a rushing stab & U-turn attack and an approach and snip attack it can do from far. It also has a special is a drill attack.
In Half Scissors mode, the Death Scissors becomes more aggressive and uses faster attacks. There’s a fast triple stab attack that is favors doing, and 2 variations of area of effect swings with the half scissors. it exposes its weakpoint in the middle of the triple stab attack.
If you break its scissors completely, the Death Scissors will try to summon another full scissors, but leave its weakpoint exposed the whole time. This is the easiest time to hit the weakpoint and it usually means that the fight is over if its scissors breaks.
When the Death Scissors dies, it may leave behind its final attack. This is where the scissors flies upwards and lands directly on top of you even though the Death Scissors is gone. You’ve probably gotten hit by this, and felt either confused or stupid. This final attack will not occur if you kill the Death Scissors via its weakpoint or if it was the last enemy left in the battle(?).
Slightly more specialized knowledge, but the Full Scissors mode’s drill attack has special properties when you fight Death Scissors in Mission 3 or Secret Mission 7 specifically: the drill attack is shorter, but it can chain it multiple times.
Strategy for Fighting Death Scissors
Death Scissors is an enemy that gives you a number of ways to approach it. Namely, breaking its scissors, parrying its attacks or fighting it while matching its altitude. Since the Death Scissors can guard your attacks, it tends to be less aggressive if you’re more aggressive and vice versa.
You can parry all of the Death Scissors attacks to expose its weakpoint and kill it instantly with a gunshot. Let it attack you and then react with an attack of your own and parry it. Do this if you want to end them fast. Take note that there are less parry windows if you are more aggressive.
If a blocking Death Scissors parries you and is readying its counter-attack swing, you need to use an evasive/defensive option to get out unscathed. In some cases when you get parried, you are close enough to just Enemy Step and jump off the Death Scissors before it’s counter swing hits you. But if you are too far or too low, you need to get out of the way with a double jump, or a character specific option.
When you make a Death Scissors guard a lot, the scissors will break after withstanding a certain amount of damage. But you can also use special guard break moves on it to make quick work of the scissors. It’s better if you keep them closer to ground level if you are aiming for this, since most of the special guard breaking moves are performed while standing on the ground.
You can use the Death Scissors to fight really high up in the sky if you are consistent with your Enemy Step jump canceling. This makes the enemy really fun to fight with characters that have a lot of moves while airborne.
Below are some character specific highlights for engaging Death Scissors. Emphasis on moves useful for parrying or guard break.
Nero Strategy
Nero can Snatch these enemies as long as they aren’t blocking. If you are attacking it while it is guarding and it tries to parry and counter you, use Snatch to pull it out of its counter attempt after the clash.
You can Buster them after they expose their weakpoint. Sucker punch them to kill them in 1 hit. You can also Hold them at this point for a tough meat shield.
If you manage to ‘down’ the Death Scissors with moves that cause knockback, knockdown or launch, you can Buster them while they are reeling (This animation looks like they are drowsy, with 1 hand off the scissors). This works even if they have a full scissors. For easy methods of doing this, use the DT Activation animation to pop them out of their guards, or use Charge Shot the moment they try to attack you. Then when they look like they are ‘down’, you can finish them with a Buster. If you strike them too many times when they are in this animation they can tech/ukemi out of it and you can miss your chance so be careful.
For parrying, use Split, Shuffle or Aerial Combo. After you expose the weakpoint, you can finish them with a Blue Rose Shot.
For guard break, use Maximum Bet as long as they aren’t too high.
Dante Strategy
Dante can use groups of these enemies to fight at max altitude if you are consistent with your jump canceling and aerial combat skills.
If you are attacking it in the air while it is guarding and it tries to parry and counter you, use Trickster actions to get out of the way.
For parrying, use DSD Helm Breaker, Cerberus Revolver, Ice Age, Pole Play, Long Barrel, Revolution, Balrog Flint Wheel. Once the weakpoint has been exposed, finish them off with any kind of gunfire.
For guard break, use DSD Stinger while in DT, Cavalier Air Combo B, Double Kalina Ann Cascade, Dr. Faust Red Shot held down, Sin Devil Trigger SDT Combo, Sin Stinger, The Ombra.
Death Scissors also cannot block against Cerberus Crystal, Thunder Clap, Percussion and Sin Devil Trigger The Luce.
Vergil Strategy
Since these enemies can block, Vergil can have trouble embedding summoned swords in them which locks him out of his Air Trick teleport. Also given his relatively low number of air moves, these enemies can make him feel a bit more constrained compared to other characters.
The easiest time to embed a summoned sword into this enemy is right when it spawns. Other than that, try to embed a summon sword when they are attacking, or after they parry you and are doing their counter-attack. Both of these methods have risks involved so if you rely on Air Trick, it may be more consistent to instead play patiently, and go for a parry or guard break.
If you are attacking it in the air while it is guarding and it tries to parry and counter you, use can Trick Up then use Air Taunt for safety. You can also use Trick Down, but this is a 2 direction move that’s not easy to input cleanly in a pinch, making it a more risky option. A more bold option is to quickly embed a summon sword after the clash and Air Trick to the enemy, them jump off of them with Enemy Step to continue fighting in the air. Just be careful of other nearby Death Scissors blocking the summoned sword embed attempt.
For parrying, use Beowulf Flush jumps, Rising Dragon, Mirage Edge Helm Breaker, Stinger. Once you have exposed the weakpoint, finish them with a basic Mirage Blade Shot.
For guard break, use Yamato Void Slash, Beowulf Kick 13 or Mirage Edge Over Drive. Just don’t let them move too high up.
V Strategy
This enemy gives you a lot of time to read your book and farm Devil Trigger. If you want to be aggressive with your familiars make sure to call them back in reaction to the Death Scissors parry and counter-attack.
For parrying, use Shadow attacks, specifically Arbiter and Guillotine. If you manage to expose its weakpoint, finish it off with a Griffon Shot. But given how the familiars move on their own and have a bit of delay before attacking, parrying might not be the best approach here.
For guard break, call Nightmare down.
Danger Case: How This Demon Can Kill You
While not the most dangerous enemy in the game, they can kill you if you make mistakes or can’t read their attacks. Letting it go into Devil Trigger and then getting stabbed repeatedly with a half of a scissors can shave away your HP bar.
You can also get knowledge checked if you engage with them aggressively, but don’t know what to do when it parries you and you keep eating counter-attacks. This can happen a lot with Vergil, mostly because the Death Scissors’ blocking and floating can make him feel a bit constricted.
Death Scissors can also gang up on you. There are times when a parry was triggered on one you aren’t even targeting, then you get hit from behind. If you have bad luck, the one you are targeting can also trigger a parry just after that and you can get combo-ed.
This is one of DMC5‘s most fun enemy types, but you need to watch them attentively and listen to the audio cues they give to engage them safely and stylishly.