Coinless Challenge

The objective of the coinless challenge is to get as many Power Stars in Super Mario 64 as possible while collecting no coins. The use of frame perfect pausing to delay the coin counter going up or using a multiple of 256 to save the coin score as zero does not count as coinless.

Stars

All Power Stars that are not 100 Coin Stars or Red Coin Stars are obtainable in this challenge except for the case of Snowman's Lost His Head which is obtainable on a single star basis, but not a full game run. This is because you need to complete the star Frosty Slide for 8 Red Coins before you can select the Snowman's Lost His Head star and that is the only star he spawns.

Stars that require non-trivial workarounds include:

• CCM - Slip Slidin' Away and Big Penguin Race: Mario can use the baby penguin to clip through the mountain to reach the cabin from the side, avoiding the coins near the entrance. An alternative, RTA viable method is to have Mario dive between a rock and floor to clip through the mountain.
• SSL - Pyramid Puzzle: Mario can collect the secrets without touching their coins by only touching the very top of the secret's hitbox.
• BoB - Behind Chain Chomp's Gate: Performing a Bob-omb clip allows Mario to go behind the gate without releasing the Chain Chomp, where a red coin would be inadvertently collected.

There also is one workaround that is TAS only:

• BoB - Mario Wings to the Sky: PU movement can be used to reach the first 4 secrets before the coins near them become tangible. Premature cloning can then be used to render one of the coins near the 5th secret inert so Mario can enter the secret's hitbox without entering the hitbox of a coin.