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Posted: 8/10/2012 7:34 PM
Post subject: Chapter 18 complete, now with encode!
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Toothache
Active player (279)
Joined: 4/30/2009
Posts: 791
Lucky TAS of 2013
Chapter 18: http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/1036205231/FE6%20TAS%20v5.vbm Encode: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=US1409SVVrw This is the second Ilia chapter, and shows the effects that flying has, not only in clearing the map quickly, but avoiding enemy movement. Turn 1: Roy triggers the C support, and Thany picks him up and advances. Lalum dances, and Miledy rescues her out of the way, preventing the enemies from moving or reaching her. Thany advances over the river to again prevent AI movement Turn 2: Thany advances north. On the enemy phase, Thany crits a mercenary, and kills one of the pegasus knights that come down, with the Slim Sword. Turn 3: Roy takes all the weapons, and is dropped. Because Thany has low health here, she causes the nearby shamans to attack her rather than Roy, making his survival trivial (he only has to dodge the boss Purge attack, and a berserk priest). Turn 4: Thany re-equips and is only able to reach with the Javelin. She wouldn't be able to even crit him, in fact, without the support, so it came at just the right time. Current sword wexp level is 39, so only need to get at least 12 more in the next chapter. The Slim Sword is only down to 7 uses, so I'll need to get an Iron Sword from someone.
Posted: 8/10/2012 8:18 PM
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Paused
Joined: 5/9/2005
Posts: 752
Nice to see you on such a roll.
Posted: 8/10/2012 9:45 PM
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Vykan12
Player (100)
Joined: 3/20/2008
Posts: 466
Location: Montreal, Quebec, Canada
With the exception of C19 and C22, the remaining chapters are very trivial.
Posted: 8/10/2012 10:10 PM
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cheetah_7071
Former player
Joined: 5/29/2006
Posts: 200
It is kinda neat that this game is so much front-heavy than the other two GBA games.
Posted: 8/13/2012 4:56 AM
Post subject: Chapter 19 complete: now with encode!
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Toothache
Active player (279)
Joined: 4/30/2009
Posts: 791
Lucky TAS of 2013
Chapter 19: http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/1764149396/FE6%20TAS%20v5.vbm Encode: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h1s4hNot25k A short, but very annoying chapter. Turn 1: Very busy turn here. Chad is deployed for his sight range, since Warp is limited up to line of sight. He moves next to Percival. Alan gives Percival a Javelin. Miledy moves one space right. Thany grabs Roy, and Lance gives her an Iron Sword. Meanwhile, Chad is rescue dropped by Percival and Cecilia. Thany is danced, and Warped as far as Chad can see (Niime takes the Hammerne and Warp staves from Miledy). Thany moves far to the east, and Zealot rescues Chad. At the end of the turn, Percival, Cecilia, and Zealot all occupy the same square. This makes the enemy pegasus knights attack Cecilia only, and given that she holds an Aircalibur tome, which does critical damage to flying units, she can OHKO every one except the promoted falcoknight. Meanwhile, Thany uses an Iron Sword to finally grind her way to D Swords, taking a hit down to low HP and gaining HP/Luk level up. Lance is put to sleep by the druid. Turn 2: Percival finishes the falcoknight. Thany equips the Killer Lance and drops Roy. With her low HP, the enemies all go for her except the Silver Lance Paladin, which Roy is forced to dodge. Thany crits two cavaliers and dodges all the remaining enemies. Percival is now put to sleep. Turn 3: Thany finishes off the boss with the Killer Lance. Roy seizes. Everything is all set for the rest of the game now, there's no real requirements other than optimising the remaining chapters. The next two bosses both require the Armorslayer for a OHKO so the sword rank came at just the right time.
Posted: 8/14/2012 3:05 AM
(Edited: 7/8/2013 1:58 AM)
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Vykan12
Player (100)
Joined: 3/20/2008
Posts: 466
Location: Montreal, Quebec, Canada
I was bored so I TASed C10 & 11B as well as Sacae Route while differing as little as possible in terms of Toothache’s TAS in terms of unit stats, levels, items, etc. So now I can safely say every chapter in the game has been TASed in some way :P Chapter 10B Turn 1: Thany positions herself on the wall in order to avoid making a bunch of enemies move on EP. This is also true of future turns. Turn 3: I switch to a 1 range weapon so Thany doesn’t counter the archer. She also needs to be hit by the archer so that enemies ignore Roy later on. Overall notes: The wyvern following Thany around the map is Miledy. I can’t seem to recruit her, so I just leave her alone. I could kill her, but then I wouldn’t be able to recruit her in C13. Chapter 11B Turn 1: Since Elphin is auto-deployed and I have only 1 flier, I can’t stealth the chapter. Instead, I have Marcus beeline south while Thany takes out the remaining moving enemies. Zealot rescues Roy on turn 1 so he can do a hand-off to Thany next turn. This allows Thany a PP crit here. Turn 2: If the ballista hits Thany, she gets 1HKOed, so I have to find a different way to weaken her before dropping Roy. Instead, I have her hit by the archer at 2 range next turn. Turn 3: Zealot has to move away 2 spaces, otherwise the ballista will go for him instead of Thany. Overall notes: It might be better to forego using Zealot at all, but I’m too lazy to re-do this :P Chapter 17 (Sacae Route) Turn 1: I need Thany to kill 3 wyverns with a javelin, so it’s better for Miledy to hand off Roy to her on turn 2. Chapter 18 (Sacae Route) Turn 1: Once again Thany has to go Roy-less on turn 1 to clear away a bunch of pesky enemies. Percival is fielded so he can rescue Miledy (and thus keep her alive) once she hands off Roy to Thany. EP is a nightmare since Thany has to specifically get hit by a nomadic trooper (and not a nomad) while dodging all the other bow attacks. I settle for letting Thany miss against 2 enemies because it’s really that annoying. Turn 2: Getting Roy to survive was also extremely annoying. Chapter 19 (Sacae Route) Turn 1: Since there’s a lot going on; Igrene moves to within range of some nomads, Zealot & Marcus crit a couple nomads, Percival moves closer to some wyverns, Thany sets up for a dance, Sue & Shin crit some nomads of their own, the rest is obvious. On EP Igrene has to land 3 consecutive crits since she doesn’t double. Turn 2: Marcus clears the path for Percival, who carefully moves within range of a few wyverns (but outside the range of a javelin wyvern). Cecilia, Shin & Sue and Lalum move to just outside the edge of a wyvern’s range. Turn 3: A cool graphical glitch occurs due to the way I moved the cursor before ending the previous turn (watch the vbm and you’ll figure it out). Percival finishes cleaning up, Thany hits the wall with a silver lance, a bunch of other units advance towards the wall I’m trying to break. Turn 4: Shin lands a longbow kill on the SM so he won’t bother Thany once she passes the wall. Cecilia hands Roy off to Thany and hits the wall, Sue trades for the hero bow and finishes off the wall, Thany advances. Turn 5: I have to move Shin over so he won’t draw 1-2 range attacks through the wall. Thany equips a KL and drops Roy below her. It would’ve been better to either crit the boss or disarm Thany, but the EP was so brutal I accepted Thany’s non-fatal boss-hit. Overall notes: I allowed the use of Shin & Sue since raising them is mandatory for accessing Sacae route. I gave them 10/1 average stats in everything except str/skl/spd/res, where I gave them 10/1 maximum stats. Chapter 20 (Sacae Route) Turn 1: A lot going on here. Sue kills a warrior so that Chad can be rescue-dropped in a spot where he can reveal the boss without using a torch. Meanwhile, Ward rescues Roy and sacrifices himself so Roy will be refreshed in a farther position. This allows me to warp him far enough to seize. The rest is just a standard warpskip strat.
Posted: 8/15/2012 11:23 AM
Post subject: Chapter 20 complete: now with encode!
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Toothache
Active player (279)
Joined: 4/30/2009
Posts: 791
Lucky TAS of 2013
Chapter 20: http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/501073379/FE6%20TAS%20v5.vbm Encode: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_5NlVywIOHc This is the final Ilia chapter, and only 2 away from the fastest ending of the game. Thankfully, it also very short and easy. Turn 1: Deselecting Merlinus and Marcus in preps means I could deploy Oujay and Niime without having to reposition them. Thany equips Iron Sword (she actually needs the avoid on EP) and takes the Armorslayer from Oujay, picking up Roy and moving her full distance. Lalum dances, and is rescued by Miledy. Niime warps Thany near to the boss. Thany drops Roy in seize range. Niime is rescued by Cecilia, and I chose to have Percival drop her to avoid a ballista attack. The positions of the drop here and Miledy's position is important. It makes the enemies on the far left shift more RNs, allowing Thany and Niime to dodge all the long range staves that come their way (the ballista has a mere 2 hit). The Iron Sword was needed otherwise the sniper would OHKO Thany with the RNs I needed (28 hit with no AS penalty vs 69+3 hit result, anything else she could equip would tank her avoid too much). As for the staves, Niime only faces a mere 37 hit each, but Thany has a more difficult 77 hit berserk to avoid. Turn 2: I need to have Niime use the Hammerne to make her level up here, giving her one more Magic increase for next chapter (this improves her warp range by 1, and gives a significant saving in the huge chapter 21). She gains HP/Mag/Spd, but it's faster to take the 3 stats here given I need no manipulation for both her level up and the Armorslayer critical. Miledy trades Warp back to Niime before Thany kills the boss and gains the first blank level up. In total, I am at 46:38 in terms of the length of the TAS at the end of this chapter. If all goes well, I am looking at finishing Chapter 22 in a time below 55 minutes. Chapter 21 is easy albeit long, and as for Chapter 22, that's a little more complex, given what I need to do in order to finish. Expect those coming soon!
Posted: 8/18/2012 8:46 AM
Post subject: Chapter 21 complete: now with encode!
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Toothache
Active player (279)
Joined: 4/30/2009
Posts: 791
Lucky TAS of 2013
Chapter 21: http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/1580896688/FE6%20TAS%20v5.vbm Encode: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sILIwRrLr28 Second to last chapter, and it's huge!! But thankfully, easy to strategise. Turn 1: Thany collects a Javelin from Percival, and picks up Roy and stops on the edge of the mountain. Lalum dances, and is rescued. Miledy trades Yodel the Silence Staff, and rescues him. Niime warps Thany as far south as possible, and is rescued herself. Thany advances completely south too, out of range of the nearby Bishop, equipping the Killer Lance. Enemies move but none can reach the player units. Turn 2: Thany advances near to the throne. Unfortunately, I can't avoid triggering a bunch of wyverns this time, which extends the enemy phase a little longer. Thany dodges the sage's Bolting. Turn 3: Thany drops Roy. On the enemy phase, Roy is attacked by one knight, Thany crits the other, and Roy dodges the Bolting Sage. The other units have been rescued just out of range of the other two sages that approached the start position. Turn 4: Thany nabs the kill on Murdock with the Armorslayer. Roy seizes. Unfortunately, this ending cutscene is not skippable, so I flick through it as quickly as possible, finishing with Roy collecting the Sword of Seals and promoting. Yes the long delay after the promotion is also unskippable. Almost done now, just the final chapter to go. The time so far is 49:45, so definitely on course for sub 55, not sure how far into the credits I'll be able to end the input yet, but I'm sure I'll find out soon.
Posted: 8/20/2012 11:24 AM
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Toothache
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Joined: 4/30/2009
Posts: 791
Lucky TAS of 2013
Well, turns out my eagerness to finish is a little premature. In order to avoid the full minute of RNG manipulation, I have to save-reset the game in order to reset the RNG back to the starting string. If I did this at the end of ch21, however, it would change the stats of some enemies to be more awkward to deal with, so I find the best option is to reset at the end of ch20. This will make the ch21 strategy relatively unchanged, just dealing with a different set of RNs for the few combats in this chapter. Vykan did test ahead and found that the final kill on Zephiel (~70 hit, 2% crit) happens much much sooner, so it more than makes up for the time spent resetting.
Posted: 9/12/2012 9:03 PM
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cheetah_7071
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Joined: 5/29/2006
Posts: 200
Have you hit some sort of snag? I was thinking you were only a week or two from polishing this off.
Posted: 9/13/2012 10:11 AM
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Toothache
Active player (279)
Joined: 4/30/2009
Posts: 791
Lucky TAS of 2013
I was, but there was a bunch I wasn't happy with, and besides, I found a new approach for ch1 - skipping the 5k gold village. http://tasvideos.org/userfiles/info/1164405243357114 Turn 1: I only move Lance to stop the nearby Fighter from walking into him. Marcus scoops up Roy and equips the Silver Lance, which can OHKO all three enemies that attack him on EP. Turn 2: It's faster to crit the fighter here and deal with the EP with the Iron Sword, as before. Turn 3: Drop Roy here, he crits the second fighter with the Rapier. Turn 4: Silver Lance crit on the boss. Seize. Skipping the village has so far saved me 502 frames. I will save even more in the future as Alan and Lance will no longer level up in ch7. I can make up the cash deficit by selling a few items (Lockpick, Wyrmslayer and a single Vulnerary makes for 5g short of what I need, so a low use weapon can be sold to fix that).
Posted: 9/13/2012 7:48 PM
(Edited: 9/16/2012 12:35 AM)
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Joined: 5/9/2005
Posts: 752
Your kidding... 15 seconds from the end, you find an improvement 15 seconds in? This restart 5 now? Edit; Wasn't trying to imply he should or should not submit what he has; just find it amusing 4 restarts in, where a runner would hope he has picked up on every little detail, he finds something new in, what must be one of the most infuriating places, the start... when he is at the end. God speed toothache.
Posted: 9/15/2012 10:18 AM
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ais523
Editor, Player (44)
Joined: 7/11/2010
Posts: 1029
FWIW, I fully support Toothache's decision here. I'm one of those people who's interested in how low a game can be taken and what it takes to do that; I don't really like the concept of TASes that are merely "good enough". ("Best currently known but probably not perfect" is a different matter; loads of TASes are like that, and there's not much you can do about it.)
Posted: 9/15/2012 10:26 AM
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amaurea
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Joined: 2/19/2007
Posts: 424
Location: UK
If it were me, I would wait for v2 to incorporate that improvement. "Release early, release often" makes sense in open source software because having something out there increases exposure, makes it possible for others to submit their own improvements, and decreases the chance of the project disappearing before anything is produced. I think the same arguments work just as well for TASing. And there is no shame in saying "Known improvements: Towards the end of this TAS I discovered a possible improvement in the first chapter. This may save about 10 seconds, and I'm planning to include it in a future improvement of the TAS". Other reasons for going through the whole TAS for each iteration is that you may hit upon other snags in the remaining parts of the game, and it is best to know about them now rather than hitting them after a restart, forcing you to restart yet again. But of course, it is your work, and the most important thing is that you have fun doing it. And perhaps redoing is less work than I imagine it to be.
Posted: 9/15/2012 11:32 PM
(Edited: 9/16/2012 8:48 PM)
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Vykan12
Player (100)
Joined: 3/20/2008
Posts: 466
Location: Montreal, Quebec, Canada
He's not really re-doing the entire run. C1 was an exception since the new strategy is easy to work in (just have to do a longer RN burn for Roy's level-up at the beginning of C2). The remaining changes are mostly hex editing better trades.
Posted: 9/16/2012 6:03 PM
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Toothache
Active player (279)
Joined: 4/30/2009
Posts: 791
Lucky TAS of 2013
I did a bit of experimenting during Ch3 to see whether I could get a better level up on Roy, and forget it. The RNG is just too much against me getting Def, on top of Thany's javelin attacks and level up. So, once again, I'll have to take a bad level up here and get Roy to L4 in order to give him the 7 Def I need to luck manipulate the enemies in chs14 and 19. There's also the possibility I don't need 7 Def if Thany doesn't get a single Def level up (she gets one in ch6). Otherwise, everything hexed in fine through chapter 3 (I redid ch2 completely so I could ensure I got the RNG to line back up with the same position as before, cost ~50 frames), up til Alan's attack in turn 5, so I can recorrect those few actions and finish up to ch4, where I'll be managing items more carefully to get the shopping done easier. Alan will need to empty his inventory which saves me going through Merlinus for most of the items (one Hand Axe will end up in his stash since I will buy 6 items and Alan only has 5 slots - Slim Sword, 3 Javelins, and 2 Hand Axes). I can even empty them onto Roy since the Iron Sword can be in storage for Thany later, and the Javelin will always be useful in these early maps (the Iron Lance will go back to Lance in ch7, directly from Roy, so it's all good and cuts down on trades). All in all improvements are being inserted, so I'll give a further update once I at least hex up to ch6.
Posted: 10/11/2012 9:39 AM
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Toothache
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Joined: 4/30/2009
Posts: 791
Lucky TAS of 2013
Chapters 1-6: http://tasvideos.org/userfiles/info/1785624209076983 So, I've got this far. Most of this will look fairly familiar, with the exception of chapter 1. Marcus ends up gaining more exp which throws off the RNG state for chapter 6, requiring a complete redo there. I have managed to optimise carefully the item situation, with Merlinus only getting a single item from the first shopping spree, and Thany only having Javelins on hand for Chapters 6 and 7 (she only uses javelins there) so she will have the inventory space for the key shopping. Since Marcus' level up threw off the RNs for Ch6, Thany ends up gaining different level ups - first, Str/Skl, then Str/Skl/Spd/Luk/Def. I hope the extra Def does not affect the strategies for Ch14 and 19, it will only be a minor issue to change the level up there since it was on PP. Otherwise I've actually used less RNs in total but if needs be I can catch up during Ch7. Direct hexing won't be possible unless that happens, but I will have plenty of room for it if needs be. In total, I'm 743 frames ahead of v5. The improvements may not seem as huge but they are all coming from both better RNG manipulation and item optimisation mainly. The general strategies are unchanged as of now, most of those are pretty hard to improve further if possible.
Posted: 10/11/2012 7:02 PM
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cheetah_7071
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Joined: 5/29/2006
Posts: 200
Glad to see this didn't die right on the edge of completion. You do intend to catch up the RNG in chapter 7, accept that that's probably 20 frames slower than rerecording everything, and moving on to hexing stuff in, right?
Posted: 10/19/2012 10:43 PM
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Toothache
Active player (279)
Joined: 4/30/2009
Posts: 791
Lucky TAS of 2013
So, I've got as far as Chapter 12. Things were going fairly well, but then I've run across an annoying issue. Turns out in v5 Marcus had gained a bunch of Res, which I've somehow managed to avoid this time around with his different level up points. Anyway, Marcus would need to gain at least 2 Res to avoid triggering a Sleep Staff Priest in Ch12. Now I just have to figure out the best points to gain those level ups. He does need +4 Skl and +2 Str over the 4 levels he gains (getting to 11 Str before ch8), so I don't have much leeway, but I'll do what I can. I'll throw a new WIP out once I've changed those levels and completed Ch12.
Posted: 10/20/2012 1:41 AM
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Vykan12
Player (100)
Joined: 3/20/2008
Posts: 466
Location: Montreal, Quebec, Canada
You're going to run into even more issues like that down the road, possibly even more serious. I don't know why you've decided to do v6 from scratch but I think you're better off staying as true as possible to the RNG sequence of v5. Wherever there's a long RN burn gives an opportunity to re-align the sequence and hex editing can continue.
Posted: 10/29/2012 3:55 PM
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Toothache
Active player (279)
Joined: 4/30/2009
Posts: 791
Lucky TAS of 2013
Chapters 1-8: http://tasvideos.org/userfiles/info/2190948529388978 So, I've had a pain in the arse finding the places where I could make the changes needed for Marcus to gain Res without losing time. Chapter 7: Marcus gets the Hammer here so I don't worry about it next chapter. Zealot takes one extra kill than usual since it changes the level up point for Marcus and allow me to get better Skl/Res level ups. Otherwise, this strat is barely unchanged from v5. Lance and Alan avoid levelling up which saves time too. Chapter 8: Turn 1: Marcus has to do a double attack in order to get an early enough level up with Str/Skl/Res. He does crit on EP though. Trades are done to plan ahead for later chapters. Roy is grabbed by Thany. Turn 2: Thany and Zealot advance. Marcus grabs a bunch of kills. Lilina is killed on EP finally to avoid the gaiden. Turn 3: Thany levels up with the armour kill, Marcus advances and kills stuff on EP. Turn 4: Marcus kills the archer on PP, and a soldier and archer on EP. Turn 5: More advancement and kills. Turn 6: Marcus grabs an armour kill on PP. On EP, Marcus gets HP/Str/Skl/Res level up. Turn 7: Thany moves into position to kill the armour on EP. Marcus moves only 7 spaces to avoid triggering the Aircalibur mage. Turn 8: Simple advancement. Turn 9: Marcus kills the Killer Lance armour. Have to drop Roy here, which allows Thany to double the mage (would take too long to get a crit, so a double counter attack is used instead). Turn 10: Everyone advances. Thieves appear. Turn 11: Roy and Thany block Cath's route north, removing the generic thief. Marcus advances only 7 spaces to avoid triggering the mage near the chests. Turn 12: Marcus ignores the boss to take on the mage and collect the whip. Cath is killed. Turn 13: Advance towards the whip chest. Roy is picked up again. Turn 14: Elysian Whip get. Roy is dropped outside of the boss' attack range. Turn 15: Marcus can Hammer KO the boss. Thany promotes at L12 as before. Roy seize. With all the optimisations and minor strategy changes, the run is now 1999 frames ahead of v5 at this point. More and more will certainly follow at this rate. It's not possible to directly hex stuff yet as the RN state is actually way behind that of v5, but I'll certainly catch up soon enough (Ch21 and 22 can be certainly hexed given that a reset happens after ch20). Stay tuned for more updates, the next few chapters are relatively easy and it won't get interesting again until Ch12 is done.
Posted: 10/29/2012 5:21 PM
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cheetah_7071
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Joined: 5/29/2006
Posts: 200
I just hope the next time you find 30 seconds of improvement in chapter one you don't decide to restart all the way over again despite just having to crit Idoun to finish.
Posted: 10/29/2012 11:33 PM
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Toothache
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Joined: 4/30/2009
Posts: 791
Lucky TAS of 2013
cheetah 7071 wrote:
I just hope the next time you find 30 seconds of improvement in chapter one you don't decide to restart all the way over again despite just having to crit Idoun to finish.
Actually I did finish v5, but that actually helped me in planning any improvements in future runs given what trades I may need and there was a lot of optimisations I found in hindsight that I felt needed to be added. Basically, I wasn't willing to settle for second best. Sure the run has taken a long time to do (over 2 years now), but I'd rather submit the most optimal run I can find rather than something I know could be better.
Posted: 12/9/2012 7:32 PM
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Toothache
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Joined: 4/30/2009
Posts: 791
Lucky TAS of 2013
http://tasvideos.org/userfiles/info/3104903528487029 There's only slight improvements from here on, but I did manage to find a new improvement over the previous chapters: you can skip the cutscenes at the end of chapters, going straight to the save screen after seizing. Hexed this in the chapters I'd missed so far, and then caught my way up to the end of Chapter 17. Total improvements of 2471 frames. Pretty happy with the end result, the remaining chapters are going to go by very smoothly now given they are all flier skips (except for Ch22). EDIT: Turns out I end up 1 wexp short of being able to use D swords by the time I need it with this approach. Back to the drawing board methinks. I use a lot more RNs than before in ch16, this misses the Slim Sword boss kill on the ch17 boss, so I may need to rethink my approach there.
Posted: 12/10/2012 7:18 PM
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Toothache
Active player (279)
Joined: 4/30/2009
Posts: 791
Lucky TAS of 2013
http://tasvideos.org/userfiles/info/3126900157178143 I have redone Ch16 and 17 to allow some changes. Firstly, Thany gets to reach D Swords in time, as I've not lost any Wexp now. Second, I have synced up the RNG to the previous version, allowing me to finish the Ch17 boss with Slim Sword. Even managed to save another 104 frames with this revision, total saving now of 2575 frames over v5. Next few chapters should fly by, with only Ch22 needing a bit more thought. I think I'll not post any more WIPs from this point, so watch out for the submission coming soon!!
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