First WIP:
Link to video
Some details are in the comments of the video.
Edit: I finished Vargas. I did the first possible desperation attack, but somehow, I lost 1 seconds compared to Erokky's run. I used the same commands (1 Autocrossbow, 2 Fire and attacks) so it's not a matter of spending more time in submenus. I'm wondering if it's because of the emulator differences.
I also lost one second because Vargas cast Doom Fist one second later in my run :( But maybe I can manipulate that.
Edit+: I managed to skip both Gale Cut and Doom Fist, nice! :)
Joined: 11/17/2005
Posts: 278
Location: Massachusetts, USA
Looks good so far. I checked out the Lobo's battle script and it looks like this:
If random ally's level is >= 7 (random if multiple)
Battle / Special / Nothing
Special / Nothing / Nothing
EndIf and Reset Targets
Battle
End turn
loop script
Which can't be correct. The way to interpret this "if anyone's level is >= 7, attack them 0-2 times, then hit an unrelated (potentially the same) random target with fight". But I never see the Lobo taking triple turns. Nor does the level targeting thing seem to work. (FF3usME might be incorrect.) What the Lobo seems to be doing instead is:
Battle / Special / Nothing
Special / Nothing / Nothing
End turn
Battle
End turn
loop script
So it's no mystery why you were able to skip the Lobo's turn by attacking on a specific frame. The attack script choose nothing twice and returned. However, in your WIP one of the Lobos does attack. (And so does the Marshall, but that sort of can't be helped.) Theoretically a boss battle in which none of them get a turn is possible.
Mt. Koltz was solid. I assume you need all the xp for something? Or just getting Terra to level 12 for the magic route?
If you're willing to fight encounters now then maybe grab the ThunderRod early? You've got Edgar and I noticed that you were already xbow'ing all those 3x Crawly formations. Cons: no sprint shoes for those ~50 steps. Pros: you seem to be wanting the xp for something and it makes Locke's scenario faster.
Joined: 11/17/2005
Posts: 278
Location: Massachusetts, USA
keylie knows this, but if anyone following this run is wondering why the Marshall kind of has to get a turn in, but the 2x Lobo don't...
First off there are only 16 "ways" to start a battle. I'm referring the preemptive / side status (if allowed) and the initial ATB gauges. This is due to a frame rule in the pixelation animation. In the Whelk battle we saw the shell's initial ATB being manipulated favorably so that the head never got a chance to hide. The same could be done to the Marshall so that he dies before he gets his first turn. Then the Lobos could be manipulated in-battle such that the RNG chooses "nothing, nothing" for them. That would give us the fastest possible battle. Each time the enemy attacks it costs about 30 frames. In keylie's run two enemy attacks happen.
But each manipulation costs time. Each of the 16 ATB possibilities are reached by waiting n*16 frames before initiating the battle. (This battle might be special because it is initiated with the A button.) So if manipulating the Marshall's ATB doesn't just fall into place with 0-1 delays then it's not worth it to try. And with the Lobos you need a character ready to act who can sit in the item menu for 1-10 frames. Again pretty much just to save 20 frames. So although keylie's Marshall battle isn't perfect, it might be the best possible given the RNG.
Also even if 10-30 frames could be saved in the Marshall fight, forget about it. This game does not hex edit or splice at all. He'd have to redo an excellent Mt Koltz and he said he's in the Lete River. And future runs might have the RNG in a different spot before starting that battle anyway.
Mt. Koltz was solid. I assume you need all the xp for something? Or just getting Terra to level 12 for the magic route?
Well, that was a really really tough decision. I ended up Vargas with level 7/8/9 so that Sabin joins at level 10. The next time I will gain XP in on the minecart, and I fear that I can miss this extra level for some boss battles. I really don't know actually.
Catastrophe wrote:
If you're willing to fight encounters now then maybe grab the ThunderRod early? You've got Edgar and I noticed that you were already xbow'ing all those 3x Crawly formations. Cons: no sprint shoes for those ~50 steps. Pros: you seem to be wanting the xp for something and it makes Locke's scenario faster.
When you first arrive in the cave, there is no thunder rod in the chest. I will try to grab the ThunderRod with Locke just before TunnelArmor and use it against him, but it is possible that a DA is faster (and I can steal the Air Lancet).
Catastrophe wrote:
But each manipulation costs time. Each of the 16 ATB possibilities are reached by waiting n*16 frames before initiating the battle. (This battle might be special because it is initiated with the A button.) So if manipulating the Marshall's ATB doesn't just fall into place with 0-1 delays then it's not worth it to try. And with the Lobos you need a character ready to act who can sit in the item menu for 1-10 frames. Again pretty much just to save 20 frames. So although keylie's Marshall battle isn't perfect, it might be the best possible given the RNG.
Yeah, you have to wait each time for 4 frames before getting another ATB configuration. The problem I had with this fight is that I have to manipulate criticals. Mog is always the first to act and we need a critical from him. Here is what can happen:
- I crit with Mog and Lobo attacks
- I manipulate Mog's attack so that the next Lobo skip his turn. Unfortunately, Mog's attack is never a critical
- I use item menu or whatever to manipulate Lobo, but then I'm very late in the fight, and the Marshal has enough time to attack twice
To continue Catastrophe's comments on battle manipulation, you have normally access to 15 ATB startup out of 60, which I can frame rule. To modify the frame rule, there are multiple ways:
- go in and out of the menu (very costly)
- delay the win of a previous battle (e.g. the XP win message)
- add lag frames when escaping a previous battle (escape for a very long time, go to submenus)
- delay the naming of a character
A few things i'm wondering about:
Taking more than 2 steps in the forest outside narshe.
Allowing mtek to do tek laser before crossbow (delays his 2nd turn).
The NPC block in South Figaro (might be part of manipulating river?).
Also i'm fairly sure you could get less battles in narshe area in general with a better encounter route, but it's hard to say how that would affect the rest of the run and you're doing this from clear RAM anyway.
Leveling in south fig cave/koltz surprises me when you're able to do crits at will, but I run the game not TAS it. D:
edit: I just realized that keylie is kilaye, now I feel dumb lol.
Taking more than 2 steps in the forest outside narshe.
It doesn't matter. All the grass that is situated south-west of the forest has the same encounter increment counter (high) as the forest or the desert. As soon as I enter the forest, whatever route I take is the same.
LCC wrote:
Allowing mtek to do tek laser before crossbow (delays his 2nd turn).
Yeah, it was quite bad. It is not possible to do Autocrossbow before one MTek has his turn, but I could try to get a Metal Kick instead. I also can set battle speed to 1 to make them act faster, actually. Might save time.
LCC wrote:
The NPC block in South Figaro (might be part of manipulating river?).
I wasn't block by any NPC in SF, unless you're talking about the shop. Is the NPC in the shop sometimes elsewhere?
LCC wrote:
Also i'm fairly sure you could get less battles in narshe area in general with a better encounter route, but it's hard to say how that would affect the rest of the run and you're doing this from clear RAM anyway.
Yeah, I cannot do anything about the encounter route in a TAS, as a reset counts toward the total time. I tried to save/reset in the middle of Mt. Kolts, but it only saved one battle, and I need to save at least two battles to save time, because the intro sequence in ff6 is very long :(
LCC wrote:
Leveling in south fig cave/koltz surprises me when you're able to do crits at will, but I run the game not TAS it. D:
Well, I can do crits but desperation attacks are very dependent on the level of the caster. I'm afraid that some boss fights would take much more time if my DAs are weaker.
Anyway, now I'm at the Ultros 1 fight and I really need the mithril pike :( So I'm gonna start again from the Mog fight and I will try to level up one level lower (ending Vargas at level 6/7/8) and see how it goes.
At south fig i am referring to the pause in movement that appeared to be to wait for the npcs to move out of the way. The exit out of town also uses more steps than needed. All of this could be to set up preemptives but it seems like it could be done better when I look at it.
edit: after rewatching it doesn't look like you paused at all actually, i must have been seeing things.
As for the battles in the grass outside narshe, i am doing some monitoring of the threat value and it is still incrementing it by 96 with each step even through to the desert. The strange thing is that AFTER getting an encounter, each step then increments it by 192 clear back to narshe. This might mean that it doesn't check to update the zone's encounter rate until after a battle. The forest always goes up by 192 regardless though.
I do not see any pause in South Figaro. But yeah, I think I went up too far when exiting the town.
Thanks for the info about the encounter rate. This is quite strange indeed.
You can get the wrong monster groups too:
http://www.romhacking.net/hacks/621/
My favorite is to combine it with another bug, slap on Charm Bangle, and see Leafers and Dark Winds in the desert near WoR Tzen.
So, I started over from Mog fight. Here are the improvements:
- Took the Mithril Pike and the Mithril Shield. Mithril Pike will be helpful for Ultros 1 at least
- Better MTek fight, I got one Metal Kick quite early
- Waited during the castle submersion to manipulate the Lete River. This is where the counter increased the fastest (one unit per 2 frames). I computed how much time I had to wait based on the previous run. I waited a little less as a safety measure
- I only leveled up Terra to level 6. I fought all 3 crawly battles because I really needed the money, and Locke escaped two of them so Terra got to level 6. No battle was fought in Mt. Kolts.
- Vargas was a little better I think due to the DA been done a little earlier. Also, because of the low level, I needed Locke to do a critical to kill the bears, which made the fight more complicated. I had to start over once because Sabin ATB was very low :(
- When arrived to the Hideout, the NPC blocked the way up :(( However, after that, I didn't have to wait a single frame to manipulate the Lete River, so I guess without the bad NPC I would have to wait anyway. I didn't have time to go on the save point, but this is not much of a time loss. Also, I think that in general, getting the genji glove early is not worth it.
After Vargas, I'm 25s ahead of Erokky's TAS. Before the Lete River, I'm 47s ahead of Erokk's TAS.
Now I have to pray for Ultros fight. With the mithril pike but with one level less, I don't think I can do a perfect fight (i.e. killing with the DA as soon as it unlocks). I may have to level up Terra during the fights on the river.
Pony Fantasy VI has a glitch in when you defeat Rizopas too quickly, more Piranhas appear, but appear all black.
PF6 you get the Unicorn esper early on so give it to Luna so she can learn Bolt.
Bloom can use Tools, Luna and AJ have horseshoes already so you don't need more than one. So do Luna before Bloom.
Winged Shoes, Scooter and Rainbow Band makes you run in the hack.
Tia casting spells does not trigger the "Terra used magic" cutscene.
In PF6, Joker Doom has to be used multiple times to defeat late game bosses.
The Phantom Train boss yield 2 Magic AP.
I finished Ultros 1 without any level up. I lost about 4s compared to the optimal fight, which is not bad considering Terra is two levels lower than on Erokky's TAS meaning her DA deals 250 less damage. Edgar is also 2 levels lower and everyone else is one level lower. This should not be a problem for the next bosses, but I fear I can loose time on some fights during Sabin's scenario. I'm currently 71s ahead of Erokky's TAS.
Mind you, it'd be awesome if there would be subtitles to explain some of the stuff you're doing.
Yeah, I will do that.
Sabin scenario is finished. 399s ahead of Erokky's TAS. Encode is following. I ran into Templars and Soldiers on the Veldt :(
Edit: WIP5
Link to video
I tend to wait for whole movies instead of watching WIPs, but the freeze-frame for WIP 7 just had me sputtering in astonishment for like 5 seconds. WHY does Celes have a Generic Moogle Name™? (Don't answer, I don't want it spoiled.)
Joined: 12/8/2012
Posts: 706
Location: Missouri, USA
FANTASTIC work so far. Keep it up, Keylie!
"But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him." - 1 Corinthians 2:9
