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A deeper dive into the character and the playthrough
Marisa is the more recent of the two main protagonists in the Touhou Project series, being present in every main series game since Touhou 3. She's a self-styled "Ordinary Magician" who, in contrast to Reimu whose position and power comes partly from the Hakurei bloodline, has to work hard for everything she does. As a "mere" human, she has to try much harder to get the same sort of results that Reimu or many other characters in the series do. That said, there's no denying that it pays off for her in terms of power.
As a reflection of this, Marisa starts the game with a simple Wand of Sparking and has to make her way up from there. Unlike most other characters, she'll have to find or make a lot of her weapons. Plus, she'll have to spend a whole lot of time gathering fallen stars in the early game! On the other hand, she does get the Last Prism during the Lunar Events, so maybe it's all worth it in the end. Plus that broom is really nothing to sneeze at.
In the Touhou games this is more of a straight-firing magic bomb, rather than a homing attack. However, the exact name match was too good to pass up and I wanted her to start out with a very low tier weapon. You'll have to use that wand for quite some time, even longer if you don't want to waste stars, but such is the life of an ordinary magician I suppose. At least it pierces. You should probably pick a Corruption world, really.
Marisa starts the game with a Mana Cloak.
This will be particularly useful during the early game, offering some extra damage that Marisa sorely needs. It's no slouch later on, either, where the mana regen remains useful well into hardmode. As for why Marisa gets it? She uses stars. She uses stars a lot. Doesn't really need another reason, honestly. I used it for this spell card name because "reverie" felt appropriate to the mana restoring effect.
Marisa starts the game with duplication of Strange Brews already researched
I was on the fence about this, but her portrait for Touhou 16 has basically identical looking potion bottles on her belt and I did want to slip at least ONE potion thing in here. It seems fairly appropriate, as well; highly potent, but of somewhat dubious origin. These should function as a decent mana source throughout the game, especially if you don't usually run out your mana and just need something for emergencies to keep the damage going.
The broom is an incredibly iconic part of Marisa's kit; she's had it since her first appearance as a boss in Story of Eastern Wonderland (Touhou 2). As such, I wanted her to get her hands on it as early as possible. But how to do that without horribly breaking the game? Well, she's locked out of all other movement options which can cause problems in tight spaces, and her weaponry is pretty heavily restricted until she gets to hardmode. Still, this is a very powerful perk, especially if you are willing to put in the time and hard work to collect stars. Which you better be, if you selected this playthrough.
Unless you just want to blast everything to pieces for a laugh, in which case by all means give yourself this and the Last Prism at the start of the game and go nuts.
Marisa may use the Star Cannon and the Super Star Shooter
If it shoots stars, it goes in Marisa's kit. They're kind of her signature danmaku when facing her as an enemy. Plus, having to get the Super Star Shooter off an itinerant shopkeeper who sells weird stuff seems appropriate. I quite like these weapons for Marisa, too, since she has to collect the stars to use them...
Marisa may duplicate Fallen Stars upon defeating Plantera
...at least until she unlocks this ability. She seems perfectly capable of generating stars by the truckload when I'm trying to beat this stupid spell card, so this seems reasonable. That's a lie, I've never actually attempted that game on Hard or higher difficulty, so I've only played against an easier version with a different name. That's bad enough for me...for now, anyway.
Regardless, I'm sure you're sick of collecting the damn things by now, so I figured I'd give you a bit of a break. Aren't I nice?
Marisa may use the Meteor Staff
Marisa's got a pretty big space theme going on; it's not just stars, as you'll see a little more of later down. Although it is mostly stars. And the occasional giant laser. The Perseids are a well-known meteor shower, so named because they appear to be coming from the constellation Perseus.
Access to the Meteor Staff marks a turning point for Marisa; it's reliably craftable immediately on entering hardmode with minimal farming, and it's a decent weapon against all three mechanical bosses.
Marisa may use the Flamethrower and Elf Melter
This one's sourced from Double Dealing Character (Touhou 14) where her Mini-Hakkero (basically a magical furnace thing) spontaneously turns into a flamethrower. Finding nothing suspicious about this (at least if you pick this shot type), she sets off to roast a bunch of youkai without much regard to the consequences.
You might not get a huge amount of use out of these, but they'll likely be useful for fending off non-boss enemies well into the lategame...if you can farm up enough gel, that is. It'll probably get a lot more use if you lean into the ranged side of Marisa's loadout, so if you get a Super Star Shooter early it'll be a decent backup option to avoid wasting stars, especially underground.
Marisa may use the Daedalus Stormbow, but may only fire it with Holy Arrows.
This is a classic overpowered weapon combo that got nerfed in Terraria 1.4, but is still fairly strong. It takes more work to maintain than the Meteor Staff and offers less precision, but probably better overall performance. As for why Marisa gets it? I think I already answered this. It's under this spell card because it feels like the right name for it; it's called the Daedalus Stormbow for a reason, you know. Besides, the storm of stars raining down from the heavens feels like a Marisa-like effect. It ain't magic if it ain't flashy, after all.
Well, I guess it's a ranged attack, not a magic attack, but shush.
Marisa may use the Toxic Flask
This can't be good for the environment, no matter what the spell card says. Hopefully magic waste is more biodegradable than the nuclear variety.Ah yes, Marisa's iconic giant fuckoff laser. Sadly not multicolored, but then it wasn't when she used it in Imperishable Night anyway. Besides, we'll get to that later. As another iconic piece of Marisa's kit, it's offered much earlier than you'd normally get it but with the restriction that you have to hold down the attack button until the laser peters out on its own. Still, there's no denying that it's a powerful option at this stage in the game.
Marisa may use all weapons crafted with Nebula Fragments
Like I said above, she's a heavily space-themed character and the star shots are only part of it. This seemed like an appropriate perk to offer, given this. It seems great, right? Just go take down the Nebula Pillar with whatever you have on hand, and it's almost like you're not playing the challenge any more at all. But that wouldn't be a good payoff for all the work she's had to put in so far, would it? Fueling her cannon star by star, struggling to move in enclosed areas, using a tiny little spark projectile to take down bosses...no, she must have something else up her sleeve, surely.
Marisa receives a Last Prism upon destroying two Celestial Pillars
This will of course be no surprise to anyone who is already familiar with Marisa. There's even an argument that the Last Prism weapon is a partial reference to her and her famously destructive rainbow lasers. A worthy payoff for making it this far; it should, with proper preparation, let you laser down the remaining pillars and the Moon Lord with less fuss than even a regular playthrough of the game. And that's basically why people play Marisa in Touhou, so that seems fair enough to me. What? Faster movement speed and superior firepower? Shush. Again. Also I guess some people care about the characters for reasons other than their in-game statistics? Weird, right?
Anyway, enjoy the giant rainbow death beam. You've earned it.
Notes about items and features from mods that may enhance the experience if used.
Under construction, but check out Gensokyo mod; I'll add details on how that works with Reimu in the future.