Pokota
He/Him
Joined: 2/5/2014
Posts: 779
Question. what does NG+ bring to the table that a fresh game doesn't? I know cards and levels carry over but why do NG+ since we already would need a verification movie that gets those cards and levels for it?
Adventures in Lua When did I get a vest?
Player (43)
Joined: 1/7/2016
Posts: 51
Pokota wrote:
Question. what does NG+ bring to the table that a fresh game doesn't? I know cards and levels carry over but why do NG+ since we already would need a verification movie that gets those cards and levels for it?
All it is is the game just done faster in a few ways, we can get this card combo called Conjure Mana that restores all of the spells that everyone has to the their strongest, which makes everything go by extremely fast. So that would just be getting to the boss fight in Gringotts, Ron cast or flee, doesn't matter as long as he doesn't crit, use Conjure Mana and then BAM! just crit everything basically. The only thing that would probably have to be done is have a Weak Point combo available to use against Basilisk and have Fawkes crit with us hitting for damage. Weak Point would be needed because the fight could take longer if we don't hit for damage in consecutive turns, I mean that could be manipulated but might be longer than just using Weak Point. Here is the latest run of it, literally done yesterday: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z6B2Z3E378c
Skilled player (1737)
Joined: 9/17/2009
Posts: 4979
Location: ̶C̶a̶n̶a̶d̶a̶ "Kanatah"
1. A possible improvement would be somehow manipulate the RNG for the gnome throwing minigame. I'm not sure how feasible it would be to even test which starting RNG value gives the best tosses for Ron in a row, but I'm aware the for some reason, even if there's only a single input frame difference at the very beginning of the game, makes Ron's toss distance quite different. 2. Not exactly an improvement, but I noticed that enemies seems to stop spawning after the Weeping willow fight "cutscene", until you reach the school itself. I tried finding some flag for it, but failed. If there were some ways to "preserve" this no-spawn state, it would make manipulating npcs a bit easier. 3. Is there anything that can kill you in the overworld like the ad nauseum curse miniquest from the first game? Not sure how relevant to the run it would be, but just curious. 4. Outside cards, combinations, enemy folio and levels, what constitutes as "100%" for this game?
Player (43)
Joined: 1/7/2016
Posts: 51
jlun2 wrote:
1. A possible improvement would be somehow manipulate the RNG for the gnome throwing minigame. I'm not sure how feasible it would be to even test which starting RNG value gives the best tosses for Ron in a row, but I'm aware the for some reason, even if there's only a single input frame difference at the very beginning of the game, makes Ron's toss distance quite different. 2. Not exactly an improvement, but I noticed that enemies seems to stop spawning after the Weeping willow fight "cutscene", until you reach the school itself. I tried finding some flag for it, but failed. If there were some ways to "preserve" this no-spawn state, it would make manipulating npcs a bit easier. 3. Is there anything that can kill you in the overworld like the ad nauseum curse miniquest from the first game? Not sure how relevant to the run it would be, but just curious. 4. Outside cards, combinations, enemy folio and levels, what constitutes as "100%" for this game?
1. I don't know how much that can be improved, but could be looked into. 2. Yes, that is true. That is also true for some reason when you are going down right from the school entrance to go to Quidditch in the first area, where the school is. I have never understood why. 3. There is not a way to die in the overworld that I know of. 4. That's all you need cards, combos, levels, and full Folio Bruti (pretty sure that's what it is called).
Skilled player (1737)
Joined: 9/17/2009
Posts: 4979
Location: ̶C̶a̶n̶a̶d̶a̶ "Kanatah"
Some notes: 1. Not sure how feasible it would be, but deathwarp at Gringotts vault could save some time if there's any enemies that can actually kill you in 1 turn or 2. 2. Probably should check if death warping after the end of Herblogy class to the 3rd floor would save time rather than walking to Defence Against Dark Arts 3. The RNG seems to advance at the DADA minigame. Wonder if it can be used to manipulate the golden snitch without wasting time. 4. Probably nothing to do with the run, but right after the snitch game, the equipment screen actually shows Ron being sick Unfortunately, it also disables encounters until you reach Hagrid. Is there any way to get into a battle with Ron being sick? 5. Can't skip going to detention cutscene by pausing. Enemy encounters are disabled as well, and the dungeons shortcut is locked. 6. Can't skip recruiting Hermonie and Ron to the party. Dungeons shortcut is locked, and pressing start crashes like most other times. 7. You can skip the snake cutscene oddly. Press Start right before the trigger, then go to equip and hold B. Right after the equip screen exits hold Start. This skips the cutscene(s), and allows you to walk to the exit. https://youtu.be/riX5_eaLP5M 8. Can't skip petrified cat cutscene. Pausing doesn't work, and no enemies will appear. Doesn't appear to be able to walk around either. 9. Trying to pause at Prof. Binn's class cutscene gave http://imgur.com/emFUdT8 Gonna test some more a bit. How's testing the dialogue boxes so far?
Player (43)
Joined: 1/7/2016
Posts: 51
Going on a few of your points: 1. None of the enemies are fast enough to do anything. 2. I don't think that there are any creatures that are fast/strong enough to do that, but can be looked into as I don't remember all of the creatures there. 3. Potentially could be. 4. No there is not. 5. You can't skip the detention cutscene as it does not update the quest to going to detention. 7. Does this go to all of the snake cutscenes? Or just the two in the hall? I have not had any time to work on that. But someone has run on the French version so I will count and compare to English when I get the chance.
Skilled player (1737)
Joined: 9/17/2009
Posts: 4979
Location: ̶C̶a̶n̶a̶d̶a̶ "Kanatah"
1. The snake dialogue trick skips all of the dialogue up to the cat. https://youtu.be/riX5_eaLP5M 2. Probably completely pointless, but if Colin gets petrified, the magic book sidequest skips him, and you can get said book directly from Ginny. 3. At the potions class section, if you go back to the classroom, enemies would appear. 4. For some reason, even if I have Harry, Hermonie and Ron together, duelling is still 1v1 5. Can't skip chasing after Justin. However, I noticed that if you press "Start", then selected "Trade Cards", then hold "B" to go back, the screen goes white. Pressing "A" to go to equip crashes/have interesting effects. Memory corruption maybe? Here's the input file for it; it's derived from your movie, so a savestate from some point before should work to get there quickly. http://tasvideos.org/userfiles/info/38395423352086837 This also happens to an extent with other times when pausing before a trigger, but they usually weren't like that.
Player (43)
Joined: 1/7/2016
Posts: 51
1. That is amazing. I need to learn that for RTA. 2. It is pointless, though used to be used in RTA. The one cutscene that I really want to be able to skip is the Snape cutscene going to the Slytherin Common Room when under the Polyjuice Potion. This is just from quick testing Text boxes: Harry's Room English US: 37 English UK: 37 French: 43 Dutch: 40 Spanish: 37 Italian: 37 Netherlands: 42 Swedish: 39 Danish: 40 Portuguese: 40 So I guess based on these numbers, not saying that they will keep the same pattern throughout the game though, we have 4 languages to work with.
Skilled player (1737)
Joined: 9/17/2009
Posts: 4979
Location: ̶C̶a̶n̶a̶d̶a̶ "Kanatah"
SuperMonkeypotato wrote:
1. That is amazing. I need to learn that for RTA. 2. It is pointless, though used to be used in RTA. The one cutscene that I really want to be able to skip is the Snape cutscene going to the Slytherin Common Room when under the Polyjuice Potion. This is just from quick testing Text boxes: Harry's Room English US: 37 English UK: 37 French: 43 Dutch: 40 Spanish: 37 Italian: 37 Netherlands: 42 Swedish: 39 Danish: 40 Portuguese: 40 So I guess based on these numbers, not saying that they will keep the same pattern throughout the game though, we have 4 languages to work with.
Nice. Btw, after going through the run again, I think that snake bit was the last cutscene skip. 1. Can't seem to skip Snape before the common room. Pausing doesn't seem to work for it. 2. Can't skip the valentine's poem. Pausing doesn't seem to work for it. 3. Can't really skip going to Aragog, but at least if you use that trick (Going to Trade Card then exit) multiple times, it will take you to Aragog while still in menu, where you can then save the game there (even if normally not allowed to save before the battle). It's also faster to go through it as intended anyways. 4. Using cheats to bypass the above will immediately bring you to Aragog, which means you still have to fight him. 5. Can't skip the part right after spider boss. Not like that it matters much. 6. If you deathwarped to the hospital ward without going to Myrtle, it won't trigger anything. Also, can't seem to skip McGonagall's cutscene. 7. You showed a video of skipping the cutscene where you split with Lockheart & Ron, but I highly doubt it's feasible whatsoever. Maybe with some insane luck manip? 8. You can skip that 1 dialogue box right before Ginny by pressing start, but not sure if that'd even help. I think that's about it. I wished there were more, but I wasn't able to skip any more.
Player (43)
Joined: 1/7/2016
Posts: 51
That's fine. Just its time to start reworking the run then. I wasn't overly worried about trying to change the language for this before we got a chance to finish. I will still work on it as we work through, since I am going to work with those 4 only. That will be so much faster than all 10. And the whole skipping the cutscene down in the chamber is much, much slower. Don't worry about it.
Player (43)
Joined: 1/7/2016
Posts: 51
I'll have to recount to make sure, but through getting sent to Knockturn Alley, English is the fastest, but I was testing this late at night and probably miscounted. I'll check again later, but for now English is the fastest, though there are some points where Spanish and Italian have a text box or two less, so there is potential for one of them to be faster in the end. Will update more when I get further through the game, or if the difference becomes too large.
Player (43)
Joined: 1/7/2016
Posts: 51
I am going delusional counting textboxes, but from what I am counting English is fastest. I don't know exact numbers, probably should be having something count A presses, but I apparently love to make things harder on myself.
Skilled player (1737)
Joined: 9/17/2009
Posts: 4979
Location: ̶C̶a̶n̶a̶d̶a̶ "Kanatah"
1. If you pressed "A" at the very last frame of the pixie minigame, the sound effect for charging the wand lasts until you save the game. 2. Every 1 "A" button press causes 1 lag during the pixie minigame, but it also increments the RNG by 3. Also this means not pressing anything except moving the wand around saves time to due lag reduction. 3. The snitch for the first quidditch match appears to use these addresses
SystemID GB
03D0	d	u	0	WRAM	x
03D4	d	u	0	WRAM	y
Copy this and save as a .wch file to use. 4. It appears to snitch always appear at the top left for the first game (unless I missed something). The RNG determines bludger spawns along with the direction and destination the snitch will go to. 2 ways to manipulate it include delaying 3 frames in the overworld, or wasting 1 frame in the pixie minigame by pressing A. It seems making the snitch head downright towards the center-ish while Harry moves up left is fastest for the first match.
Player (43)
Joined: 1/7/2016
Posts: 51
jlun2 wrote:
1. If you pressed "A" at the very last frame of the pixie minigame, the sound effect for charging the wand lasts until you save the game. 2. Every 1 "A" button press causes 1 lag during the pixie minigame, but it also increments the RNG by 3. Also this means not pressing anything except moving the wand around saves time to due lag reduction. 3. The snitch for the first quidditch match appears to use these addresses
SystemID GB
03D0	d	u	0	WRAM	x
03D4	d	u	0	WRAM	y
Copy this and save as a .wch file to use. 4. It appears to snitch always appear at the top left for the first game (unless I missed something). The RNG determines bludger spawns along with the direction and destination the snitch will go to. 2 ways to manipulate it include delaying 3 frames in the overworld, or wasting 1 frame in the pixie minigame by pressing A. It seems making the snitch head downright towards the center-ish while Harry moves up left is fastest for the first match.
1. I have had this happen before in an RTA run, super annoying to deal with. The snitch always appears in the top left for every game. I did notice the RNG change by 3 in the pixie game, but I had no idea the lag. Hoping to make some decent progress this week maybe find something to make things easier with the deathwarp, don't like wasting that many frames to die slowly.
Skilled player (1737)
Joined: 9/17/2009
Posts: 4979
Location: ̶C̶a̶n̶a̶d̶a̶ "Kanatah"
Seems the best way to get through for the first round is to immediately roll the ball at the highest speed (not sure if fastest is best, gonna check slower speeds), then move the head in such a way so that it knocks down all the pins, AND make sure the pins fall quickly. I managed to get a difference of 100 frames from 1st strike to the 2nd strike due to faster falling animation. While I believe I messed up the Y speed, at least I can confirm the ball's speed is 0x0B70 in IWRAM. I thought 0x0A10 was Y, but for some reason is 0 for the 2nd throw.
Skilled player (1737)
Joined: 9/17/2009
Posts: 4979
Location: ̶C̶a̶n̶a̶d̶a̶ "Kanatah"
1. Skipping the snake dialogue allows enemies to continue to spawn, allowing you to die and warp to the ward. This has no effect outside allowing you to trigger the cat scene on the north side of the room. Thanks SuperMonkeypotato for noticing this. 2. Not sure if it applies to other rooms, but entering Hagrids Hut 3 frames later than "optimal" on the way to asking him about lilies causes his inside cabin to load a bit faster. 3. Grabbing the History of Magic book allows a brief moment where you can still walk, allowing you to move a bit after pressing A. 4. Just posting this here, but I noticed the critical damage from delaying does not seem to advance RNG differently than hitting without critical. Given it's possible to manipulate the delay by delaying the previous menu, I wonder could a "small" improvement be made by shortening the delay in the earlier fights?
Joined: 6/1/2017
Posts: 2
This game is actually what got me into the movies. tempocams
Player (43)
Joined: 1/7/2016
Posts: 51
So I have come up with an improvement to the TAS, though it will require some more RNG manip. I think that, so long as it doesn't take too many frames, we can have Ron die in the Footman fight in Gringotts so that he doesn't level, being at 1 health if we get into an encounter. So once we leave the vault, we manip an encounter with 2 Green bats and a Green rat. The rat is able to preemptively attack, so it can attack Ron and kill him right away, then all we would have to do is manip a Green bat to crit Harry, which would do 40+ damage and the other bat hit at all and that will kill Harry. This strat will save some time over leaving Gringotts by walking because it will send you to a building in Diagon Alley close to the bookstore that we are going to anyway. The only thing is that Ron will still be at level 1, which isn't that big of an issue because his damage ranges for the next fight are the same from the current TAS. There is also one movement change that will save about 5 seconds over the current TAS as well. I will post if there are any more things that I can find that are of any use.
Skilled player (1737)
Joined: 9/17/2009
Posts: 4979
Location: ̶C̶a̶n̶a̶d̶a̶ "Kanatah"
How did it go so far? Also what emulator would it be using? It appears the current run doesn't sync for BizHawk 2.3.1, but it may be possible to resync it. I do wonder if that memory corruption glitch from trying to skip a cutscene would still work on the latest version.
Player (43)
Joined: 1/7/2016
Posts: 51
I was using 2.2.1, but I am going to be starting over though. So I'll just get the latest release. I prefer to start over again after stopping from loss of motivation. Either we need to wait a few frames before starting a new game on game select screen or waste more frames somewhere else from I have gathered so far.
Skilled player (1737)
Joined: 9/17/2009
Posts: 4979
Location: ̶C̶a̶n̶a̶d̶a̶ "Kanatah"
From attempting to sync the published run to 2.3.1, the following locations desync: 1. Harry's room 2. Ron's house on arrival 3, 4. Right before the gnome toss, during dialogue. These desyncs are caused by a difference in lag. By the time the gnome toss is reached, at least 2-4 frames have been wasted due to additional lag, and the run then desyncs due to same RNG, but timer is different by 2. Edit: After the gnome toss, RNG is off by 2. It further diverges by the bank, but at least the "time spent" timer is rather close: http://tasvideos.org/userfiles/info/53578226177494078
Skilled player (1737)
Joined: 9/17/2009
Posts: 4979
Location: ̶C̶a̶n̶a̶d̶a̶ "Kanatah"
Just came back to this for a bit; apparently BizHawk 2.3.2 GamBatte desyncs different than the previous, so going to use the latest. I tried making a spreadsheet for the gnome toss, and noticed something while attempting: 1. Holding Up for different amounts of frames affects Ron 2. RNG (0x0E3E, WRAM) doesn't seem to change on Harry 3. Pretty positive even if the same RNG and frame was reached on Ron's turn, he might still use a different move. So it's likely a different address. 4. Right now, this is the current run: This has a total delay of 2592 frames. The most feasible way to affect Gnome toss RNG seems to be: a) Pausing at different times in gnome pull b) Doing different things in gnome pull c) Delaying pressing A at the last instruction menu for gnome toss.
Skilled player (1737)
Joined: 9/17/2009
Posts: 4979
Location: ̶C̶a̶n̶a̶d̶a̶ "Kanatah"
I'm not sure if there's a table of monster IDs and area IDs along with where each monster appears. Apparently for the NPCs Doxy Queen, Emerald Firecrab and Dark Goblin.
The issue is that we don't actually know where they spawn and we need to see if we can find them in the game somewhere otherwise the full 100% for the game isn't possible.
So if anyone knows anything about them, please post. Edit: Found the address for Folio Bruti; it's in System Bus, and addresses are 0xCE4B to 0xCE56. Each bit is a flag for if the npc has been checked before. By sitting them to all 0xFF, I managed to get a picture of the above NPCs:
Pokota
He/Him
Joined: 2/5/2014
Posts: 779
(got me wanting to play through this again) They're not listed on TCRF as "unused enemies" and the description for the Emerald Firecrab looks familiar enough that I might have seen it as a child (but the description is shared with the other firecrabs, so I may just be conflating memories here) EDIT: This thought occurred to me while I was at work, but are the enemies defined in formations that are then assigned to the maps to draw from for the Encounters, as opposed to the maps saying "build an encounter from 3 of these creatures"?
Adventures in Lua When did I get a vest?
Pokota
He/Him
Joined: 2/5/2014
Posts: 779
We have the Folio Bruti addresses; do we have the addresses for the Folio Magi and Folio Triplicus as well? I'd prefer not to duplicate work already done if I can avoid it (I'm putting together a "casual" 100% helper/hud script; everything I need beyond the Folios I can find from simple memory searching) EDIT: actually the folio bruti has two states like pokemon's pokedex, do we have the addresses for "seen but not scanned" as well? Or does it use the same range?
Adventures in Lua When did I get a vest?