I don't know if this is already known - I couldn't see it anywhere. Anyway, I remember reading somewhere that the Phazon Beam takes on the properties of the beam you've got selected, which means the Dark Beam variant has the Entangler particles, the Annihilator variant stuns, and the Light variant slightly homes. I wasn't sure about this, so I tried it. Obviously, Entangler and stun have no effect on Dark Samus, so this is what I discovered:
Firstly, you have to have enough ammo for a charged shot even though it doesn't use any ammo unless you mess up, so I Annihilate the six Ingworm Caches on the way out of the Sky Temple to make sure - if you have no ammo, even though the beam is charged you won't collect the Phazon. Anyway, while locked on to Dark Samus 4, as you probably know, when the shield expands you automatically aim upwards to collect the Phazon, and then the auto-lock slowly corrects your view back downwards again.
With the Light Beam selected, the Phazon Beam takes on the slight homing ability of the Lightblast, and so you can release the shot earlier than normal - before the auto-lock has fully reset - and it will still hit. This may not save any time during the fight, as I'm not sure if hitting her actually interrupts her sequence or makes her do different things. However, the very last hit is a slight time-saver, because since you can release it more quickly due to its slight homing ability, you finish the game slightly more quickly.
Also, I discovered that she will only take a small amount of damage when moving around after dropping the Phazon shield, then she'll go back to Phazon shield mode again. You can deal the required damage with 2 (normal) or 4 (hard) Dark Beam shots, one fully charged shot or any Charge Combo. On Hard, I noticed that the fully charged Dark shot takes too long to do the damage required to put her back into shield mode, as the Entangler slowly damages over time, so a perfectly-timed Super Missile is probably the best option at this point.
In any case, the Light Beam definitely seems to be the way to go when shooting Phazon through her shield.
EDIT: Something minor I've noticed about Grenchlers is that their shell's health is counted separately from their body's health, and although Dark Grenchler shells are stronger, their bodies are weaker. If you can set a Dark Grenchler on fire, it'll die very quickly, maybe still wearing its shell, even on Hard! This must be because the burn drains its body's health, ignoring the shell.
Firstly, you have to have enough ammo for a charged shot even though it doesn't use any ammo unless you mess up, so I Annihilate the six Ingworm Caches on the way out of the Sky Temple to make sure - if you have no ammo, even though the beam is charged you won't collect the Phazon. Anyway, while locked on to Dark Samus 4, as you probably know, when the shield expands you automatically aim upwards to collect the Phazon, and then the auto-lock slowly corrects your view back downwards again.
With the Light Beam selected, the Phazon Beam takes on the slight homing ability of the Lightblast, and so you can release the shot earlier than normal - before the auto-lock has fully reset - and it will still hit. This may not save any time during the fight, as I'm not sure if hitting her actually interrupts her sequence or makes her do different things. However, the very last hit is a slight time-saver, because since you can release it more quickly due to its slight homing ability, you finish the game slightly more quickly.
Also, I discovered that she will only take a small amount of damage when moving around after dropping the Phazon shield, then she'll go back to Phazon shield mode again. You can deal the required damage with 2 (normal) or 4 (hard) Dark Beam shots, one fully charged shot or any Charge Combo. On Hard, I noticed that the fully charged Dark shot takes too long to do the damage required to put her back into shield mode, as the Entangler slowly damages over time, so a perfectly-timed Super Missile is probably the best option at this point.
In any case, the Light Beam definitely seems to be the way to go when shooting Phazon through her shield.
EDIT: Something minor I've noticed about Grenchlers is that their shell's health is counted separately from their body's health, and although Dark Grenchler shells are stronger, their bodies are weaker. If you can set a Dark Grenchler on fire, it'll die very quickly, maybe still wearing its shell, even on Hard! This must be because the burn drains its body's health, ignoring the shell.
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