Joined: 7/26/2006
Posts: 53
From what I've learned from playing the GBA version, leveling up stats depends on the scale of the skill being put into affect (or being affected) Using swap as an example, if you use this skill on the lower monsters so that the hp&mp swapped is about 3 and 0 respectively, the hp and mp stats (not sure about mp going up, it has been awhile) will go up at the end of the battle. EDIT: Basically, the more hp lost, from 1000 to 3 for example, the greater the chance of leveling up that stat I'm not sure how other stats can be improved but I know that the swap method is the fastest for leveling hp up, even though you could just manipulate the monsters to miss anyway.
Former player
Joined: 3/30/2004
Posts: 1354
Location: Heather's imagination
/*- wrote:
the games leveling your stats up (such as weapons) seems a little fixed... or maybe its the experience system works like SotN... the more experience, the less you gain from weak enemies.
Enemies have levels or something equivalent that tells the game whether to let you increase skills over a certain point against them. Your party members have this hidden statistic too. So it's true you need to fight harder enemies in order to get credit for the encounter. Anyway, bare hands = dead bosses, until you get Blood Sword, then the boss just dies from that. So use Puncher Guy who Casts Spells for most of your party (= Maria and Guy probably) and Sworder guy for one guy (= Firionel probably) + Lionhart when he returns.
someone is out there who will like you. take off your mask so they can find you faster. I support the new Nekketsu Kouha Kunio-kun.
Former player
Joined: 10/27/2004
Posts: 518
if fists = dead bosses (ogres raped me like a prag, so i never made it to chimera) then random encounters become the biggest problem (for GBA, as best i can tell). is there a way to avoid them entirely or should just aiming for a quick getaway be better? i know for a few early boss battles i beat my characters up and leveled them against weak overworld monsters (and used ming wu to heal us before the next battle). but what would be a balance between overkill and being too weak to go on? i only ask because the bosses seem to be very powerful when first met opposed to when later met and they're just as clumsy as the next. what i mean by that is that the land turtle seems more aggressive and direct when first met, but his follow ups are clumsy and lacking (and i didnt level up my defenses or armor much either... if at all to be very honest). i could say the same for a few others as well... maybe just a meaningless observation or maybe the game makes them more dynamic for those IMPORTANT encounters. dunno... more ramblings maybe... access to the memory viewer and such could be able to confirm this id think, but im useless at such stuff. i dont doubt critical hits could be manipulated... or can they with fists? its been so long since i looked at these games. im just afraid that some of those boss attacks might be completely unavoidable (like some attacks are in FF5... at least according to algorithms). Boco, you seem very well versed in these games... im amazed you havent presented WIPs or anything like an algorithm guide. and no, im not kissing ur ass... just wondering.
Ambassador, Experienced player (708)
Joined: 7/17/2004
Posts: 985
Location: The FLOATING CASTLE
random encounters become the biggest problem (for GBA, as best i can tell). is there a way to avoid them entirely or should just aiming for a quick getaway be better?
Read the rest of this thread, I have discovered ways to avoid encounters.
Former player
Joined: 10/27/2004
Posts: 518
does that apply to the GBA port? because i thought those strats were just for the NES port.
Former player
Joined: 3/30/2004
Posts: 1354
Location: Heather's imagination
The GBA one will be slow anyway. Despite easier enemies and bosses you can't get multiple Blood Swords and can't get a Blood Sword or a Drain spell early.
someone is out there who will like you. take off your mask so they can find you faster. I support the new Nekketsu Kouha Kunio-kun.
Joined: 7/28/2005
Posts: 83
Location: Montreal, Canada
From having played through the GBA release, although I'm not sure how useful it would be in a speedrun, the teleport spell is frighteningly effective at insta-killing bosses. For the first half of the game the spell pretty much never missed against bosses, and until the last few bosses it would work after a few tries; I'm sure this can be luck manipulated for every boss not technically immune to it (shows as healing for 0 HP instead of missing).
N._Harmonik
She/Her
Joined: 8/27/2006
Posts: 502
Location: Canada
I just thought of something... If someone does do the GBA version, would they be able to do Soul of Rebirth in the same run as well?
Why, oh, why do I even <i>try</i> to understand my own species?
Former player
Joined: 10/27/2004
Posts: 518
its possible, but all SoR characters are how they were when they died. meaning if you wanted ming-wu's armor and weapons for the game, he'd be pretty much defenseless. though im not sure how much this will factor in to a TAS.
Joined: 1/13/2007
Posts: 340
the infamous "Swap" spell is the ultimate in health and mp aining. Cast swap when low o mp to get lo lealt. use mp up to heal. repeat. it's insane. But late game, if you level insanely, you then have to manip away all random encounters, because your level will go DOWN after the battle(!)
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Joined: 9/27/2004
Posts: 650
Location: Canada
/*- wrote:
maybe this should all be moved to the GBA one though, since doing the NES would be quite boring unless theres something huge to exploit.
Arise, thread, from the grave.
-The Wall Bug: The animation for any spell blocked by Wall goes off even though the spell fails. However, the animation of death spells removes monsters from combat, so any monster who has such a spell blocked by Wall will die, up to and including the final boss. And since Wall is a buff spell, monsters don't resist it. Since Wall only blocks black magic, this works with Toad, Break, Death, and Warp. Note that the spells need to be the same level or lower than the Wall you create, or they'll be handled normally.
So, the enemies that are immune to instant death spells like toad and warp (which, as it turns out, are pretty few to begin with) can be killed with this glitch. This means the only thing you really need is (maybe) someone with huge evade to stand in the front row (and run if you can't carry enough potions), someone with wall, and someone to cast murder spells. Probably can be all one character. I am uncertain if this works in the GBA port. But it does mean any boss can be killed without having to worry about things like fighting.
Former player
Joined: 9/24/2004
Posts: 177
It'd probably actually be best if you used two characters, or at the very least keep 2 characters alive for awhile - you'll almost certainly need to "powerlevel" your shields (so you'll have enough Evade to avoid attacks) and your Wall spell (so that your murder spell won't ever pass it by in levels), and the attack/cancel trick doesn't work if the person you're trying to attack/cancel with is your last attacker. With that setup, your "murder spell" user should be that last person (unless you decide to go one person period), since s/he'll never need to powerlevel anything. Your first person then will be both your front line dual shield wielder, as well as your waller.
Ambassador, Experienced player (708)
Joined: 7/17/2004
Posts: 985
Location: The FLOATING CASTLE
You need two characters to power-level, but the second char can be killed off afterward. However, I think it might be good to keep two chars alive. Two chars could use wall and then the murder spell to end boss fights in one turn. So the boss doesn't get a chance to attack. Also, battle skips require healing and two chars can get more hp to lose and more mp to use cure. Depending on how well luck can be manipulated, it may not be necessary to power up shields. It shouldn't be difficult to keep the wall level high enough. If you really have to you can also unlearn and relearn the murder spell to reset its level.
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Joined: 9/27/2004
Posts: 650
Location: Canada
I guess the one snag is that afaik you can only get a wall tome from Mysidia and I think it costs 5000 gold. I guess you would have to go down there sometime before fighting the red soul. Warp can be bought from Salamand or Mysidia, but you can also get Toad from Captains, wandering around Fynn. The other spells can't be gotten until later, I think the next opportunity is in the Coliseum from Sorcerers.
TheAxeMan wrote:
Also, battle skips require healing and two chars can get more hp to lose and more mp to use cure.
I was thinking about this, if you get one character poisoned at some point, someone would always be low on HP before a battle starts, so cure spell is always useful. Does the battle skip also work with ethers? If not, it still allows for a lot more skipping than just filling up on potion. It would be more expensive than just using potions, but might be a good idea later on when the dungeons get longer. Edit: Forced fights: -Land turtle: Exit spell treasure MIAB (maybe can skip it, might be useful) Kill with Minwu's exit spell or Ice or Swap maybe manipulate Mythril Shield drop -Sergeant: Guards mythril Kill with Minwu's exit spell or Swap maybe manipulate Mythril (Helm/Axe/Armor/Bow) drop -Adamantoise: guards goddess bell Kill with SouthWind from B3 or Exit maybe manipulate Diamond Shield drop -Borghen: after adamantoise Kill with Exit, or maybe punching with a third character manipulate hi-potion drop -Red Soul: guards Egil's Torch Kill with wall and warp/toad -Pirates x8: get the ship not too sure. 45 hp each -Chimera x3-4: guards pool of life not too sure. Casts blaze (ice shields?) -Lamia Queen: Fake Hylda Kill with wall and warp/toad Drops protect ring, gold hairpin, ribbon -Behemoth: Coliseum Kill with wall and warp/toad -Gottos: Retake Phyn Kill with wall and warp/toad -Gigan Rhino x1-4?: Guards Black mask Kill with wall and warp/toad -Barrel Worm: Inside Leviathan Kill with wall and warp/toad -Fire Gigas: Mysidian Tower Kill with wall and warp/toad Drops flame sword/armor and confuse tome, may be too late to be useful -Ice Gigas: Mysidian Tower Kill with wall and warp/toad Drops Ice Brand, SouthWind, Stop Tome -Thunder Gigas Kill with wall and warp/toad Drops Wizard's Robe/Black Robe (!) Tornado Boss 'rush': -Royal guard x3-4? no idea. -Royal Guard x3-4? no idea. -Emperor, Royal Guardx2, Wood Golem no idea. Jade/Pandemonium: I can't remember how many of the fights in here are forced. I'm pretty sure all the bosses are optional for treasure. But I think they're all singles so wall & warp/toad Final Boss: Emperor Kill with wall and warp/toad
Experienced player (918)
Joined: 9/18/2008
Posts: 153
Location: Japan
I found a glitch to corrupt (first) savedata, but this probably wouldn't lead to drastic improvement. Anyway, I will write what I know for reference. First, spellbooks can also be used as two-handed weapons. To do so, equip a spellbook as an item, encounter an enemy, and exchange your weapon for the spellbook. The effects of spellbooks vary, and some of them make the game freeze after chacacters attack with them. But spellbook of Fire is very strong (it works like Blood Sword). And, if a character fights using a kind of spellbooks, the skill of another character (after him) is trained. So, if the 2nd-4th character does it, the memory out of range will be changed. By the way, savedata ($6300-) exists right after skill data ($6200-). So we can corrupt savedata using spellbooks. Here is the table of spellbooks to corrupt savedata:
# Spell Skill                                   TargetAddress
Fire    magic[0] of next character              $6310
Stun    magic[0] of next character              $6310
Minimum magic resistance of next character      $6332             # freeze
Blink   ? of next character                     $633A
Esna    axe of next next character              $630C,$634C
Forg    spear of next next next character       $6308,$6348,$6388 # freeze
Wall    spear of next next next character       $6308,$6348,$6388 # freeze
Clouda  spear of next next next character       $6308,$6348,$6388 # freeze
Toad    spear of next next next character       $6308,$6348,$6388 # freeze
Haste   spear of next next next character       $6308,$6348,$6388 # freeze
With these books above, we can modify the addresses below:
$6308   Chokobo state (1:exist, 2:riding, 3:permanent)
$6309   Chokobo x
$630C   passenger ship state (2 or above:can be taken, even:route1 odd:route2)
$630D   passenger ship x
$6310   player x in the overworld
$6311   player y in the overworld
$6332   chest flags
$6333   chest flags
$633A   chest flags
$633B   chest flags
$6348   event flags
$6349   event flags
$634C   event flags
$634D   event flags
$6388   keyword
$6389   keyword
But, this game checks the sum of savedata on reset. So, we need to adjust the sum, modifying multiple values. savedata is considered valid when: * sav[0x02FE] == 0x5A (this condition is fulfilled when you do save once) * sum(sav) == 0xFF To adjust the sum, attack/cancel trick will be useful. Well, we can indeed modify savedata, but the values are treated as skill levels, so the format of value is limited. For x/y in the overworld, I think we can modify only y in practice. Permanent Chokobo may be useful, but it doesn't disable encounters. We can use passenger ship as usual ship. To do so, modify the ship state, and simultaneously push <start> when you take the ship. This is well-known as "menu glitch". We can modify some event flags, but I think they are not so useful. We can get some keywords, but I think it is not so useful. By the way, if you write an item-id to keyword area and "ask" about it, it looks like the "keyword" works as "item". But in fact, the "keyword" doesn't change any event flag, so it's useless. Overall, I think this glitch is not so useful for now. We can go to Dist by passenger ship, but it seems that we need to finish all events after all. Here is the movie performing this glitch (modifying y in the overworld): http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/1142883529/SaveGlitch.fm2
Post subject: now with video
Joined: 11/22/2004
Posts: 1468
Location: Rotterdam, The Netherlands
TaoTao wrote:
Here is the movie performing this glitch (modifying y in the overworld): http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/1142883529/SaveGlitch.fm2
Actually, this looks great. Just the fact that attacking with certain tomes does absurd damage at low levels will be a great help. Nice find! Here's a video for those who are curious: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=edH3qCkEUKw
Post subject: Re: now with video
Experienced player (918)
Joined: 9/18/2008
Posts: 153
Location: Japan
Dada wrote:
Actually, this looks great. Just the fact that attacking with certain tomes does absurd damage at low levels will be a great help. Nice find! Here's a video for those who are curious: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=edH3qCkEUKw
Thank you for encoding! Well, spellbook of Fire is very strong, but it often misses after mid-game. If you use it, you may need to train Strength. And, it refers an insane address as skill-level, so you may need to consider about it.
Experienced player (918)
Joined: 9/18/2008
Posts: 153
Location: Japan
I will mention about another glitch called "45-floor bug" (FF3j also has this bug). If you go up/down stairs in a kind of dungeon, the stack of CPU continues to grow, and finally, you can't go up/down stairs. If you do a "heavy" process in this condition, the stack overflows and the game will be freezed. I think it would be difficult to predict the effect of this glitch (the NMI address of this game is $0100). 45-floor bug is inspected by Fazz (Japanese), and he says we can cause 45-floor bug in dungeons such as: * we can enter by events (eg. Arena of Palamecia, Base of Altair, Phin Castle) * has multiple entrance (eg. Cave of Bofsk) I tested for Base of Altair and Cave of Bofsk, and confirmed the bug occurs. I think we need to encounter an enemy to make the stack overflow. I couldn't cause stack overflow in Altair. Here is the movie performing this glitch (in Cave of Bofsk): http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/350006923/Floor45.fm2 This movie causes a reset on old PPU, a freeze on new PPU. I don't know the detail of PPU, sorry.
Experienced player (918)
Joined: 9/18/2008
Posts: 153
Location: Japan
If we can modify $6012 or $6312, we will be able to achieve a great improvement. If you modify $6012 to 0xD5 (or 0x01, ...) by cheat, Jade Portal appears. And, savedata is almost a copy of $6000-$62FF. So, If we can modify $6012 or $6312, we can skip most event. But we can't modify $6312 by spellbook glitch, so I don't know whether it is possible. If you can manage to let the 4th character equip the item 0xFE (かめん), you can modify $6312 using spellbook glitch. But this is originally a keyword, not an item. So we can't get this as an item usually. And, we can't equip it (even as an item) via the menu. Or, it's possible that you can modify $6312 with 45-floor bug. But I don't know even the probability of it.
Experienced player (918)
Joined: 9/18/2008
Posts: 153
Location: Japan
I put some lua scripts. Checking savedata:
Language: lua

emu = emu or FCEU local SAV_BASE = 0x6300 local SAV_SIZE = 0x0300 function sav_chk(n) local base = SAV_BASE + SAV_SIZE*n local sum = 0 for addr = base, base+SAV_SIZE-1 do sum = sum + memory.readbyte(addr) end sum = bit.band(sum, 0xFF) local chk = memory.readbyte(base+SAV_SIZE-2) return sum, chk end function draw() for i = 0, 3 do local sum, chk = sav_chk(i) local chk_str = "OK" if chk ~= 0x5A then chk_str = "NG" end gui.text(64*i, 0, string.format( "%d:%02X(%s)", i, sum, chk_str )) end end gui.register(draw)
Watching stack pointer:
Language: lua

emu = emu or FCEU local VIEW_SIZE = 8 local GUI_ALPHA = 0.8 local DRAW_SP_X = 0 local DRAW_SP_Y = 0 function draw() gui.opacity(GUI_ALPHA) local sp = 0x0100 + memory.getregister("s") local view = {} for i = 1, VIEW_SIZE do view[i] = memory.readbyte(sp+i) end gui.text(DRAW_SP_X, DRAW_SP_Y, string.format( "stack $%04X: %02X %02X %02X %02X %02X %02X %02X %02X", sp, view[1], view[2], view[3], view[4], view[5], view[6], view[7], view[8] )) end gui.register(draw)
Joined: 11/22/2004
Posts: 1468
Location: Rotterdam, The Netherlands
This is very interesting. Hope you can find some way to break this game to our advantage. I had no idea these bugs existed--FF3j in particular always seemed like a rather solid game to me. I'll try reading that Japanese page you linked to. Maybe I can find something that will make me interested in running FF3j again. I made a short speedrun test of it a long time ago but decided to stop working on it because the battles were too difficult to manipulate.
Active player (434)
Joined: 9/27/2004
Posts: 650
Location: Canada
Wow, TaoTao all of this is is pretty amazing. Keep up the good work!
This movie causes a reset on old PPU, a freeze on new PPU. I don't know the detail of PPU, sorry.
As far as I know, old ppu is more accurate.
Player (202)
Joined: 1/24/2011
Posts: 108
I've been playing around with this one for a few weeks now. It's actually one of my favorite FF games (I know, I'm in the minority...) and it's the only one from the pre-Sony generation that doesn't have a TAS run on the site yet. As pointed out earlier in the thread, it's possible to avoid all random battles in this game. There are a few ways of doing this (in order, from fastest to slowest): -On the overworld, you can save and power cycle, which resets the step counter. The disadvantage of this is that the first battle on the list is only a few steps from the start. By resetting 5 frames after a power cycle, you can skip the 800+ frame intro and go right to the loading screen. -Also on the overworld, on the step before a battle, you can save, exit the menu, take a step, and reset, which skips the battle but doesn't reset the step counter. This is slower than a power-cycle, because you have to exit the menu and take a step before resetting. -Using potions advances the step counter for some reason, and can be used to skip battles in dungeons. This is faster than entering a fight and running, but you also have to factor in the time spent getting potions. -You can also advance the step counter by using healing spells, but spells only advance the step counter when they actually heal damage. Thus, you have to find a way to damage your party members in order to use this technique. Since I'm not planning on fighting any random battles if I can help it, this isn't going to be particularly useful. Concerning the glitches TaoTao pointed out, the spellbook equip glitch can save a lot of time in battles, but at this point, I don't think any of the memory corruption effects can save time. The problem is the fact that you need two characters using spellbooks to alter the memory (one to change the value you want, and another to change another value in order to correct the checksum) and this can take a lot of time in battle. It might save time going from Altea to Semmite Falls and Salamand, but given the time it takes to execute the glitch, I can't imagine it would be substantial. As for the 45 floor glitch, all I can do with it is crash the game at this point. I'm not sure if there's anything else you can do with it... Sadly, this game does not take kindly to sequence breaks. I've tried going to Dist early by stealing a boat, but it doesn't accomplish anything or move the story along from that point. Same thing with the Tropical Island. I'm going to try skipping the Pirate battle and Leviathan, but I can't say that I'm particularly optimistic. Right now, it's looking like the entire game will have to be played. Here's what the route for my test run looks like right now: Lose the battle against the Black Knights, buy 8 potions in Altea, walk to Fynn. Get the Ring from Scott and the three potions in his room and walk back to Altea. Get Mingwu and the Canoe, sell the Ether he's carrying and buy a Fire Spellbook, take the boat from Palm to Poft, and the Airship from Poft to Semmite Falls (this MIGHT be a place to use the spellbook glitch to warp, but I doubt it would save time). Go through Semmite Falls, defeat the Sergeant in one turn with the Fire Spellbook, get the Mithril, and use Mingwu's Teleport spell to escape. Walk/sail/canoe to Fynn and fight 5 Captains for Fire Bows (this might be able to be done later... I'll have to investigate that). Canoe back to Altea and give the Mithril to the guy in the Weapon Shop, then get my next mission from Hilda. Walk/sail back to Poft and take the airship to Bafsk. Buy 8* potions in the item shop, then enter the sewers, talk to the Black Knight, get the pass, and warp out. Walk/sail back to Altair via Poft, making sure to unequip Mingwu's Fire Spellbook during the last menu screen. Talk to Hilda, lose Mingwu, learn about the Goddess Bell, and buy 17* potions at the item shop. Walk/sail to Salamand via Poft, talk to Yozef, get him on the team, and buy a Teleport Spellbook at the magic shop. Walk to Semmite Falls again, teach Frionel the Teleport spell in the menu screen while skipping a battle, get the ice sled, and teleport out. Walk/canoe up to the snowfields and sled to the Snow Cave. MAYBE get the South Wind item (for the Pirate battle, if it's faster than getting the Mage Staff later). Give Yozef the Fire Spellbook and beat the Adamantoise, get the Goddess Bell, beat Borghen, and get Yozef buried under rocks. Walk/canoe to Poft and take the airship to Kashuon. Enter Kashuon, get Gordon in the party, give him the Fire Spellbook, beat the Red Soul, get Egil's Torch, and warp out. Re-enter Kashuon, get the Sunflame, and warp out again. Walk south to the Chocobo forest, wrangle a Chocobo, and trot south to the Dreadnought. Get stuck at the Dreadnought because of the stupid inventory limit and the stupidly large number of battles, especially when combined with Kashuon. ...And that's where my test run is stuck I'm trying to figure out which way would be faster: -Riding the Chocobo back to Bafsk instead of going straight to the Dreadnought, stocking up on potions, walking back to the Chocobo Forest, and riding to the Dreadnought. or... -Saying "screw it!" and jumping headfirst into the Dreadnought, running from battles after the potions run dry. There's also a third option, but it might screw things up down the line: -Riding the Chocobo back to Poft, buying potions, stealing the ship, and sailing to the Dreadnought. The downside is that you can't re-enter the ship after you've stolen it without using the Spellbook glitch to modify the save data, and that involves buying the Esuna spellbook in Bafsk and successfully changing the ship value and checksum (something which I haven't been successful at yet). *It would be faster to buy 25 potions at Bafsk instead of 8 at Bafsk and 17 at Altea, except that buying 25 potions somehow changes the NPC movements in the town. This is something else to explore once I figure out the larger issues of this run...
Rayas wrote:
Dunno if I'm really clear. I need to drink more.
<br>
adelikat wrote:
The idea was to kill off my family to avoid lost time to them getting sick and other inconvenient things.
Joined: 12/11/2010
Posts: 60
Wait, how do you steal the ship? Or do you mean the airship? Edit: Oh wow that makes this game semi-interesting. Since Minwu is way better than any other fourth character up to and including the final guy, is there some way to avoid losing him permanently?
Player (202)
Joined: 1/24/2011
Posts: 108
MrTickles wrote:
Wait, how do you steal the ship? Or do you mean the airship? Edit: Oh wow that makes this game semi-interesting. Since Minwu is way better than any other fourth character up to and including the final guy, is there some way to avoid losing him permanently?
Stealing the ship is easy: filling it with narcotics and getting it across the border is the hard part. You just have to enter the menu screen on the same frame as you step onto the ship (after paying the toll, of course). The controls will glitch out for a few seconds, and after that, you'll have full control of the ship. The only downside is that, without modifying the save data using the spellbook glitch, you can't get back on the ship once you disembark. It isn't possible to steal the airship this way: you can enter the menu, but the game enters an infinite loop and hangs before you can get control. Regarding Minwu, I don't think it's possible to keep him in the party past Bafsk, since there's no way to skip the event in which he leaves. FF2 is not kind to sequence breakers: the keyword system makes it especially hard to do things out of order. Luckily, since almost all of the battles are going to be won using the spellbook glitch, it doesn't particularly matter WHO the 4th character is, just that there's somebody alive in that slot. For the three battles that can't be won in one turn using the glitch, one (the 8 Pirates) is going to be won using either the South Wind or Mage Staff (whichever is faster to get), one (the final battle) is going to be won using the Wall/Teleport glitch, and one (the battle with the Emperor and his buddies) I'll figure out when I get there, but it might be a combination of Mage Staff, Spellbook, Wall/Teleport, and a lot of luck manipulation. Right now I'm trying to figure out if it's possible to manipulate one of the Magicians on the Dreadnought to drop a Mage Staff without getting any of my party members killed in the process. I wrote a bot that systematically uses every possible button combination when entering random battles, but after thousands of iterations, no Mage Staffs have dropped. This is made much more difficult by the fact that Magicians never appear alone: they always have a Panther or a Soldier (or any combination thereof) hanging out with them. Thus, I need to manipulate a Magician battle with only one companion AND a spellbook hit AND a regular hit AND no enemy attacks AND a Mage Staff drop. I'm not going to say that it's impossible to do, but given the way the RNG and item drop systems work, I'm not banking on it at this time. For my test run, I'm thinking about grabbing the South Wind in the Snow Cave for the Pirate battle instead, and maybe getting the Mage Staff in the Dist cavern for the first Emperor battle. I'm also playing around with the idea of killing off one or more of my party members. I can't remember if the game automatically resurrects your fallen comrades or not, but it might save time in battle, especially if I end up having to run from a bunch of battles inside the stupid Dreadnought. If they do get resurrected at plot-important events, then it would probably be worth it to kill them off, since I only need more than one party member for two battles, and they're both towards the end of the game. Having only one party member would save time on command entry when running from battle, but it might make it harder to manipulate a successful escape. If they don't get automatically resurrected, then it would probably be a waste of time, since I'd have to find a shrine and get them resurrected there. Since party members are coming and going all the time, it would be easy to have a dead 3-member party when someone leaves, so the game must have some sort of way to prevent that from happening, right? I also want to try to avoid having to grind for Fire Bows at Fynn and instead get them on the Dreadnought, where there are already a bunch of Captains running around. I can manipulate the Sergeant to drop Mithril gear, and the Adamantoise to drop a Diamond Shield, but I'm not sure if it would be enough Gil to buy enough potions and Airship tickets to get me up to the Dreadnought. Time will tell, I suppose...
Rayas wrote:
Dunno if I'm really clear. I need to drink more.
<br>
adelikat wrote:
The idea was to kill off my family to avoid lost time to them getting sick and other inconvenient things.