How, if only the Vampire Killer, Dominus or Alucard can defeat Dracula, did Nathan Graves defeat Dracula with only the Hunter Whip?
And this is why Nathan got retconned.
At first. Circle of the Moon was put back in the timeline as a Gaiden Game. That wasn't the reason for its removal anyway.
Per some Zelda WMG on similar issues: Dracula wasn't at full power because he never got the sacrifice, just some of it from the ritual in the full moon. Due to his only partial resurrection, he can be killed by more mundane weapons. Alternately, same way you can kill him with just subweapons.
It's not clear if the Hunter Whip and Vampire Killer aren't just two names for the same thing. Other Castlevania games have referred to the Vampire Killer by a different name (such as the Mystic Whip), and it's rarely been called the Vampire Killer in-game. The Baldwins in this game are descendants of John Morris from Castlevania: Bloodlines, and he was using the Vampire Killer in that game.
Circle of the Moon takes place 84 years before Bloodlines, try again.
Reflecting on what is explained to us in the introduction of Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia, as well as the fact that Castlevania: Circle of the Moon, were it to be part of the official canon, takes place a mere 33 years after Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, perhaps the Hunter Whip was a method employed by one of the many organizations that were formed in response to the disappearance of Richter Belmont. With that in mind, an in-universe reason that could apply for why the Hunter Whip stays strictly within the bounds of Circle of the Moon is that, like most of the other organizations alluded to in Order of Ecclesia's opening, that whip was considered a failure in producing satisfactory results. Now, this troper knows what people may be thinking: "Why would that be, when the Hunter Whip was clearly able to stop Dracula in the game?" Maybe Nathan's life after his victory over Dracula was tragically short-lived, and the only conclusion that the Baldwins could come to was that the Hunter Whip was involved in that, similar to how the overuse of the Vampire Killer whip would eventually play a role in John Morris' death after Castlevania: Bloodlines. After all, despite having only the Vampire Killer as his primary weapon throughout the entirety of his game, John never showed signs/symptoms of succumbing to the toll that overusing that whip took upon his body until some time after defeating Dracula. Who's to say that the same couldn't happen with Nathan and the Hunter Whip?
The underlying issue(pride? A sense of needing to be superior?) is why they had something to grab onto; the fact he didn't get the whip made those feelings boil up, but they were always there and if he was given the whip he'd likely be just as susceptible.
You can slide continuously, but you need a specific magic item to be able to run. How is this even possible?
