If you have progressed in the main story of The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, then you know that beating each of the four main dungeons gives you access to a new sage avatar you can summon almost anywhere. But what the game doesn’t make immediately apparent is that there exists an extra fifth sage you can unlock by visiting one of the thunderhead islands above the Faron region and completing its associated quests in the Depths. This sage comes in the form of Mineru, a Zonai whose spirit resides in a large construct mech that you build for her and control. While undeniably cool, Mineru’s construct is tricky to make proper use of. This guide will cover some tips on how you can utilize the Vow of Mineru in Tears of the Kingdom.
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Controlling Mineru’s construct
#1 Traversing with Mineru
At nearly any time you have Mineru out, you can walk up to her construct and press A to control it directly. As you might expect, the construct moves fairly slowly by default, so traveling long distances with it won’t do you much good. Instead, Mineru shines more in places with dangerous terrain. Not only does her construct negate any fall damage you may have otherwise taken, but it can also safely traverse gloom, lava, and other harmful substances. Oftentimes, this completely eliminates the need to use vehicles or other unconventional means of travel when confronted with these hazards.
Additionally, you can augment the construct’s movement abilities using a few specific Zonai devices, namely the fan and rocket. When pressing the run button while on the construct, you can choose to fuse objects on either of its hands or its back much like Link can with his weapons and shields. Hitting the run button and then the Y button when near a fan or rocket will attach that item to its back. With the fan equipped, pressing Y will allow the construct to move a bit faster while consuming more of your Zonai energy. On the other hand, the rocket can lift the construct up to higher places much like it can with Link when attached to a shield.
Note that whenever you move or do anything while controlling the construct, your Zonai energy meter will gradually decrease. Because of this, it helps to have either Zonai charges or a high number of Energy Wells when controlling it. That way, you can do more with the construct without worrying so much about the energy meter.
Screenshot via PC Invasion
#2 Controlling the construct’s arms
As mentioned before, the construct can fuse most weapons and items to its hands, with the left hand assigned to the L button and the right hand assigned to the R button. You cannot, however, do this with objects that have already been fused. So, for example, you can equip one hand with either a Bokoblin Horn or a broadsword, but not both at the same time.
Most of the time, hitting either L or R will cause the construct to do a melee swipe with the corresponding arm. Normally, these melee attacks have a long recovery animation that you have to wait through before acting again. But by alternating between the L and R buttons, you can chain up to three melee swipes in quick succession.
If you attach a ranged Zonai device of some kind, whether it be a cannon, an emitter weapon, or a hydrant, the melee attack for that arm will be replaced by an aiming feature. Hitting the button assigned with that arm will let players aim the Zonai device’s associated projectile with the right stick, giving them more versatility when using Zonai devices from afar.
For more menial tasks like mining ore, the construct’s arms can prove quite useful. The arms by themselves don’t have a durability stat, giving players a safe, risk-free method for busting up smaller ore deposits. Of course, the items and weapons you attach to the arms still have durability, but at the very least, you don’t have to risk any of Link’s currently equipped weapons. In more niche cases, attaching cannons helps with destroying the large rocks you can find in caves, and attaching a hydrant makes cleaning up the gunk in the Lanayru region basically effortless.
#3 Combat with the construct
Mineru’s construct may seem like a natural powerhouse in combat, but it’s actually pretty easy to get overwhelmed while riding it due to how slow and lumbering its movement and attacks are. At the very least, the construct can negate most enemy attacks by bringing up a shield with the ZL button. However, if enemies keep repeatedly hitting the shield, it will temporarily break, leaving you open to attack. Fortunately, the construct can parry enemy attacks just like Link’s shields can. By holding ZL and then hitting A right as an enemy attack lands, you can give yourself the breathing room necessary to strike back.
While the construct can easily stand up to most mob enemies and certain minibosses like the Hinox, it tends to fare less well against higher-level mob enemies. Against the silver variants of Bokoblins and other similar monsters, the construct’s melee strikes and even the ranged Zonai devices don’t do much damage on their own. To make matters worse, every melee strike from the construct will send these enemies ragdolling away, making it tedious to land consistent hits on them.
In these situations, I often found it best to pin these enemies up against a wall, preventing them from flying away. This allowed me to repeatedly land three-hit combo strikes and basically leave them helpless until they were defeated, at least when no other enemies were around. In places with water or cliffs, the construct fares even better, as even just a single melee strike can send many enemies careening to their doom. And if melee attacks don’t cut it, then Link can still fire arrows while on the construct, useful for when it doesn’t have any ranged Zonai devices equipped.
#4 Getting off of the construct
While Mineru’s construct can prove useful as you progress through Tears of the Kingdom, it works best as a complement rather than a substitute for Link’s abilities. So whenever you need to hop off the construct, you can hit the jump button before pressing A to dismount. A bit clunky, for sure, but you’ll likely build the muscle memory for it over time.
Screenshot via PC Invasion
