Messages

631

Slick News / Re: Pandora's Box sees the light of day once again

« on: March 17, 2011, 04:53:03 PM »

It's hard to wage war without a complete barrel roll... oh wait.



 
There was a post referencing this pic:


Here's the other one that was not mentioned:


Are the treasures supposed to suck in the 2nd trek in this cave? IIRC, they were better in the first run (Phoenix Down? I cannot recall... it was better than a Potion)



 
Why does the Abolisher's Beak attack use the Wrench animation? I was expecting a Rod or Brush or some logical animation for that attack.


Also, I swear that Blitz command execution runs on a much longer delay than I remember... regardless of a correct blitz input.

 
In the uncontrollable Cyan battles, he operates as if he had the Black Belt relic (counterattack after taking a physical hit), but it doesn't appear that he any form of it equipped. Did I miss something here?

 
Apparently I cannot get "Flawless Victory" if I heal in battle before killing all the monsters (Banon's Health). Also, I can't get it if Interceptor blocks an attack. Mind you, all party members proceed to laugh as usual (since they have not taken any damage).

There's some sort of delay after the battle is won... for the EXP message. I remember the last message (GP) would have a delay before you'd exit out of the battle.

 
Usage of Steal and taking 0 damage (from the StillGoing monsters) doesn't invoke the flawless victory code.

632

Final Fantasy V Research & Development / Re: FF5 Bugs & Glitches

« on: March 17, 2011, 12:04:19 AM »

I've compiled the posts into one post so you can feel free to clean up the duplicate.

Original reply:

In other news, Judgment Staff/Staff of Light also deals double damage with !Jump and gets no damage penalty from !Rapid Fire :p

I'll have to look into it... is this FF5 or FF5A specific?

I fooled around with weapon-related oddities yesterday. I was most surprisd that the Twin Lance dealt double damage with !Jump it's a lance, it makes sense, but it's otherwise such a unique weapon I hadn't expected it to work LIKE a Lance with !Jump. It useless since !Jump removes it's double damage feature so you don't win any damage with !Jump, but still fun.

I'll look into that... but my guess is that's it's someone's goof on that (blame TOSE for port fail).

The Blood Sword is such a strange weapon. It's a magic spell through the !Fight command; it's power isn't reduced by !Rapid Fire, nor is it increased by Sword Dance or !Focus. I half-expected the Blood Sword to share the Staves affinity for double-damage sources (since they are both magical damage routines), but 'tis not the case.

The aforementioned Staffs run different code than the Blood Sword... the Blood Sword itself follows its own set of coding... so that's to be expected.

  - 2nd reply

In other news, Judgment Staff/Staff of Light also deals double damage with !Jump and gets no damage penalty from !Rapid Fire :p

Ok... I've confirmed it with FF5 and FF5A Euro (it'll apply to the US version probably as well). As I've said before... those two weapons use a different algo, so they share the same problem. The Staffs themselves deal less damage against Shell... I forget if other weapons follow that lead (I believe there are some).

I fooled around with weapon-related oddities yesterday. I was most surprisd that the Twin Lance dealt double damage with !Jump it's a lance, it makes sense, but it's otherwise such a unique weapon I hadn't expected it to work LIKE a Lance with !Jump. It useless since !Jump removes it's double damage feature so you don't win any damage with !Jump, but still fun.

Twin Lance has the Spears property, so it's consistent in the 2x damage... while Double Lance itself is only Fight specific...

Hey, if you want a fun related bug/feature... the Twin Lance doesn't cause the Necromancer to counter. It has a physical (Protect) and magic counter (Shell), but it doesn't trigger either.

  - 3rd reply
Actually... all Rods, Judgment Staff+Light Staff, AND the Sage Staff ignore the attack reduction for Rapid Fire. It's simple to the fact in that the calculation for damage reduction is specifically geared towards weapons or specifically against Defense... not Magic Defense. This is also why the Blood Sword is consistent with this.

Also... this wasn't actually obvious when digging... but the Dragoon Spear shares the same attribute as the Man Eater in the attack algo... this is why they have the same 2x Jump damage property. I think it has to do with lumping them in the racial damage component... they just forgot that the Man Eater isn't a spear...

- 4th reply
Sage Staff actually adheres to the 1/2 attack power rule ONLY against undead... seriously?

Also... huge doc errata. You CAN dish critical hits via Jump (assuming the weapon you equip has a chance to dish a critical hit). The damage dealt is there, but there's no visual cue to show for it. Had fun doing this with the Tempest Katana and Yoichi's Bow.

 
Crossed out the error.

  - 5th reply

Sage Staff actually adheres to the 1/2 attack power rule ONLY against undead... seriously?

That statement was tested on FF5. Apparently this behavior is "fixed" in FF5A (both US+Euro versions) as in it deals full damage instead of half damage.

 
Jumping for critical hits was tested in FF5A and it works!

 
Never mind... there is no bug with undead and the Sage Staff in FF5... :-/


  - 6th reply
The Light Staff, Judgement Staff, AND the Blood Sword are all back row compatible by design. Since they use magic defense as part of the calculations and "magic" based attacks ignore row, those weapons are back row compatible. They do not necessarily need the back row bit set. FF5A does not inform you of this for the Blood Sword though. FF5 also doesn't tell you that the Light+Judgment Staff are back row compatible.

Also, my guess to the primary reason why the Rune Bell isn't backward compatible in FF5 as stated is because it is following the Rune weapon type coding... which always takes back row into account. The weapon might have the bit set but the game won't take that into account.

 
FF5A uses the same Rune weapon rules as FF5, so telling you that it is back row compatible is not entirely correct.

A minor nitpick, but the Gaia Hammer in FF5A doesn't tell you the weapon is back row compatible.

  - First Post after the post merging
With regards to the Regen status. Are we sure it's Regen that supposed to be applied and not some other status? In any case, the monsters you have listed (with the exception of the Genji Shield Gilgamesh) are the only ones with that attribute.

Also, I'm unsure if the FF5A doc is correct about the Fairy Bow. 0x72 is for Creatures and this weapon doesn't deal with them. It is more likely to be 0x35. Even if that's not exactly the case, it does operate correctly as far as I can tell....

  - 2nd Edit after bleh
According the the FF5A doc, the Mace of Zeus is stated to use 0x3A (meaning it uses the Long Reach Axes) algo. This is not correct. It's supposed to be 0x34, the Axe algo. Even in its description in FF5A does not mention it to be back row compatible.

Also.... apparently the Fairy Bow attack property is correct, but it technically is not the one that should be used... which I don't think it matters too much but still noteworthy.

633

Final Fantasy IV Research & Development / Monster Formations Used In Chests

« on: March 16, 2011, 01:06:26 AM »

There's a lump of formations that are exclusively for chest monsters... but I don't recall monster formation 0x1C5 used.... anyone want to figure this out? It seems to be a monster that would have been used in the Tower of Babil Eblan or Underground (Falcon) route...

634

Final Fantasy V Research & Development / Re: FF5 Bugs & Glitches

« on: March 14, 2011, 03:16:17 PM »

- I guess it's important to note that the Pantera battle works fine in the SFamicom game

Yea... I did the tests to make a proper comparison. Both US+Euro versions of FF5A exhibit the same bug. I'm just convinced the monster is using the Stalker code to execute... which is why that monster is a complete fail.

- When one or more character(s) Hide(s) and the remaining party is a Zombie, the entire battlefield is unable to fight. It's not like !Jump where the character comes down regardless, a character can remain !Hidden for as long as he or she wants. In FFVI, there are no free run-aways; when one character is gone (via Sneeze/Snort or the like) and the rest is a Zombie, it's Game Over. So I still say bug.

Well... you have to remember that is a command that has been partly inherited from FF4... and Hide has many hidden bugs that would make one rage. For instance, you can cast Sylph in FF4A and a hidden Edward would receive healing... I mean.. there are states where someone has forgotten to test (there's also the Psycho Edward bug, but that's for another day).

Whenever someone here says; I've seen this bug, let's roll, I take that as a confirmed. We're not in this business to lie. We're in this business for the ladiez. I mean the truth. If a video is found that'd be nice, but I'd still try to reproduce it myself.

Yea... although finding all the bugs can drive a person mad... mad I say!

Another form of sloppy coding that's not really a bug but still has major effects on the battlefield is that FFV loves to start at static ATB values. When you set Berserk or Confuse in-battle, the ATB is reset to that character's start value. This is also why you can fight such as fights as Archeoaevis and the Pages in the Library and never have them use any move; every time they call a new monster, that monster starts with a fresh ATB bar that has the entire way to go. Since you're already half-way with most characters, you'll always outspeed them and can destroy that form before it takes a move. The next creature befalls the same fate. Stuff like that isn't a bug, I think, when looking at the definition of the world, but it's certainly poorly executed.

It's worth noticing these things in the progression of a battle engine between the series... and wondering WTF were they smoking sometimes. Of course partly some of these things were not totally finished....

As for the document itself, I feel a good example of how it (hopefully) can turn out is like Master ZED's Bugs 'nd Glitches guide for FFVI. It became a fairly big document, and the weigth of it eventually discouraged ZED from updating the thing when that faithful One-Hundred-Something Bugs topic was posted on mnrogar's forum back in the day.
With that document I mind, I think it's best that we set up some sort of WIP document that Jorgur initiated in the first post of the forum (good idea!). Seeing the size of ZED's document however, I think it's suboptimal to embed it in the first post of this topic. I'd personally rather see a quick free wiki we all have access to, or a Google document or something. Since I've never done anything like that, any input or experience on the subject is welcome.

Here's ZED's example:
http://masterzed.cavesofnarshe.com/GameDocs/ff3bug.txt

Jorgur asks about the scope of the document, let me post my thoughts:
Bugs and stuff is fun for a tremendous amount of players. Some can be used for gain (Vampire bug, item duplication, stuff like that), others are better avoided (game freezing bugs, for instance) and most others deal with tremendously niche scenarios that are just fun to read about. While the majority of the posters on this forum are code monkeys, not everybody is. I think that showing were the code makes a mistake and listing possible patches or CodeBreaker fixes will alienate a large catagory of casual readers. Again, I think ZED's got a good vibe going on when he describes the cause in such a way my friends would understand the problem and its cause.

Writing the document is always more painful than reading the intricacies. I'm sure someone will get around to writing it up in a doc. A wiki is only prone to the users that "think" they know what's going on.

635

Final Fantasy V Research & Development / Re: FF5 Bugs & Glitches

« on: March 14, 2011, 01:10:50 PM »

If you can exploit a "feature", it's a bug. 

636

Final Fantasy V Research & Development / Re: FF5 Bugs & Glitches

« on: March 14, 2011, 11:43:46 AM »

- Dunno about Panthera in the EU release. I have no info on the Euro version whatsoever, that may be a fun game to pick up when the 1.1 battle strategy guide is done and the bugs 'nd glitches project is a little more advanced.

I've looked into this... there's only a few possible explanations that I can gather.

1) The formation used for this battle is not consistent with the original. Some formations are set up for a special purpose (generally hard-coded), so whatever the formation the monster is using is not from the original set. Of course... it's just possible that the current formation didn't have that special coding set...

2) If I'm reading the algo doc correctly... it may or may not be a typo, but the code that is used to check if the original/real monster is dead is "different" than the one the Stalker uses... but that doesn't exactly explain the lack of use of "Escape" in the battle script.

3) The most logical conclusion to me for that code being executed is that the monster is running the Stalker code bit check instead of its own. This could easily be overlooked in testing (since it is not a common formation and found once in a run). This is hinted by the monster's death (No Clue) which the original Stalker clones execute upon the real one's death. The problem is that the code is probably "simplistic" that the check is "if not real Stalker, kill self" and that the monsters (including the real Pantera) follows in that execution of that script.

- Bah, I still say the Rune Chime needs its own formula, but lumping together of stuff can hardly be called a bug. It's just so widely illogical, I'm tempted to include a chapter "Batshit insane" in the Bugs 'nd Glitches document just to list those things we can't in good conscious call a bug, but want to anyway :p

I guess, but the Rune weaponry is underrated... but on the other hand, if the Rune Edge had the Swordblade compatibility... it would really really rock hard.

- I see your point about the Cursed Shld and the Wonder Wand, but there is an important difference. In a normal game, you can obtain one Cursed Shld maximum. But since the Wonder Wand can be stolen from Exdeath and equipped mid-battle, you can obtain two (in the SFamicom and PSX games) or 99 (in the GBA games). Either limit the Wonder Wand to a single weapon, or somehow keep track of the maximum of 8 Wonder Wands in use.

I consider the Wonder Wand pretty niche and doesn't quite deserve that much attention.... this is the Wonder Wand after all.

- Added the !Control + run behavior in the list, unconfirmed as of yet

I believe the Mover thing has happened to me once (I like Control, but the FF6 version is far more fun).

- A very popular feature is the fact that !Hide + Zombie = win. When one character Hides and the rest is a Zombie, the fight will just go on. This can be used to your advantage via Wall Rings and weapons that randomly cast spells to win all battles. When one characters Hides and the other three are petrified or knocked out, the game will have you escape. I strongly feel that this should have been the case with Zombies as well, since Zombies count as 'dead' just like KO and Stone, and it's a filthy way of winning battles. Thoughts?

Zombies are technically "dead" for head counting purposes, but they are still targets on the field of play (for attacking themselves and others) so unless the cowardly one would like his/her brains being extracted... I think it's fine as is. Zombies want braaaaains!

-  I'm also including the fact that the quasi-physicals used by Ramuh, Sandworm, Exdeath, etc. do not remove Sleep/Confuse/Singing is a bug. My theory is that they wanted to create a physical attack that did not allow counters, and the rest was just unintended. !Sing is strategically superior versus Exdeath already since he can be so easily walled before he gets into the nasty stuff and the stat boosts carry over to the Neo Exdeath fight. Now, Exdeath is even incapable of smacking a Singing character back to reality like a measly Nut Eater does.

It's a quick fix for something that was inherently broken in the original... but there are better ways to code the damned thing that didn't have to come to this... I would say.

637

General Discussion / Re: Gamefaqs + eternal stupidity

« on: March 13, 2011, 03:04:26 PM »

I swear the VeghEsther "bot" is either probing for info, or is simply just "special".

638

Final Fantasy V Research & Development / Re: FF5 Bugs & Glitches

« on: March 13, 2011, 12:42:32 PM »

• Panthera's intended Stalker-like behavior instead causes it to self-terminate FFVA

Does this happen to both FF5A versions? Chances are the Euro version would have corrected that...

• Knives/Bows/Whips parameter bug. Now in orange because I'd like to re-evaluate the cause and effects of the bug, and the effects of the proposed fix. While the current formula seems wonky, the balance between the weapon groups seems fine to me. From what I understand, the proposed fix would about double their power on a character with equal Strength/Agility, making a Knife way stronger than a Sword. I'm not convinced that was really the intention, but I have no info at this point.

I get the feeling knives should be weaker than a sword if you're facing targets with low defense (like some sort of mage-type monster vs something like the Golems). Knives would then rule because of !Rapid Fire, which seems to make sense to me I guess.

• Odin's Zantetsuken appears to carve up Heavy targets when released from a Magic Lamp; most fun versus Neo Exdeath

It might be running through some different code or taking the item's properties (ignore heavies since most of the summons should work outright) or some clear oversight.

• Aqua Breath and Big Wave/Tsunamie (!Gaia attacks) are non-elemental rather than Water-elemental

Given that Aqua Breath works on a different formula (Desert monster killer), I can forgive that. Big Wave/Tsunami may be a holdover from FF4 in a sense... so Leviathan ends up being the natural water elemental... I think?

• !Hide protects you long after you return FFVSNES
• !Jump protects you long after you return FFVSNES

Sounds like some bad targeting coding... has happened a bit in variations (FF4 had a few when fighting Kain, FF6 has the jumping frogs and Super Ball I think).

• Kill yourself on the first turn of Quick may morph items held FFVSNES

Never seen this, but sounds like fun. If we can get the Bloody Shield this way, it would be really cool.

• Have a Ninja throw an empty slot (and some other stuff) to obtain 00-1 = 255 of a certain handheld item FFVSNES

I'm not sure how you'd reproduce that.

• Attack that set Zombie may strike a character who used !Hide FFVSNES
• Zombie-setting attacks that strike dead Angel Ring characters revive instead

The latter sounds like a feature, not a bug. ;)

• All-Berserker team can't run; Chicken Knife's !Flee will stop you from doing damage for the rest of the fight FFVSNES

My guess is that you are never meant to run away if everyone has some sort of uncontrollable status (Charm, Sleep, Paralysis, Berserk), so the execution of !Flee must screw with that behavior.

• Rune Chime works like other Rune Weapons

But... I like it!

• Rune Bow deals no damage, one-handed, randomly sets Silence...?

I think it's intentional, but I'm trying to recall what circumstances you would want to use it... it smell of the Tower of Magic useful....

• Brave Blade/Chicken Knife's Goblin Punch remains 255/0 even when listed Battle Power changes

I guess that's some oversight, but considering it is trying to reference the base number.. not the final number, it makes sense.

• Staff can be double-gripped

One aspect of dbl gripping is using the Knight's STR stat (but why do that when you can go barehanded?) :P

• Multiple Wonder Wands use a single byte to keep track to which spells to use next

Well, if one allowed many Cursed Shields in FF6, you wouldn't be wanting easy curse dispelling right? :P

• Gilgamesh may not appear versus Necrophobe even when all (known) criteria have been met (unconfirmed)

My only guess is if you're tampering with the Berserk/counter code, you might must event data bits being set. That would explain that brother that haunts the innards of the Temple of Sands or whatever... that wouldn't go away until he's "officially" killed.

• Disrupt the Werewolves' ceremony by blocking their path; they'll go crazy

Don't stop them from praying for you!

639

Final Fantasy V Research & Development / Re: FF5 Bugs & Glitches

« on: March 12, 2011, 07:54:50 PM »

- Observe

It was supposed to report MP IIRC, in addition to HP/weakness.

- MP bug

Switching classes while @ full MP would not retain full MP if the class increased the Magic Power of the character (like Knight->Summoner).

- timer?

2 different types:
1) There's a hidden timer at work when you must dual fight the bosses at the Tower of Power+Magic. It's supposed to be paused while in the menu, but in FF5A, the timer keeps going... so by the time you are ready, exiting the menu will cause game over.
2) Reset/Return doesn't reset the timer to when you started the battle. This is only applicable to FF5A US... FF5A Euro has it fixed. I assume the Jap version has two revisions.

Unfinished
- Swdslap

IIRC, it ignores the regular rules of a physical attack (like knocking a confused target to normal... kinda like FF4's Aim actually).

Out of battle:
- Desert of the Streaming Sands has no moving overworld tiles FFVA

It was mentioned somewhere it was swapped with other tiles... hence the issue.

- Garula appears where he shouldn't (near Carwen)

Seriously? Must be a tile battle location issue...

Monster behavior:
- Famed Mimic Gogo's AI script goes haywire upon aggro FFVA

I don't remember that happening... but that's probably because I do the standard way (it is interesting when you try to go after him anyways).

- Panthera's intended Stalker-like behavior instead causes it to self-terminate FFVA

I'm trying to recall which battle this is...

- Lots of bugs that can be caused by the fact that bits are set in-battle with a counter-attack, and these counter-attacks can be prevented by various means. Ramuh, Sekhmet, Archeoaevis, Exdeath all have troubles here. !Rapid Fire's last two hits don't provoke counters, the Monk's Counter ability doesn't provoke counters, casting less than all spells off of your own character doesn't provoke counters, weapon-induced MT magical attacks (Wind Slash katana, Gaia Hammer) don't provoke counters on all but the initial target of the physical attack, the list goes on. Also something with Chaos Cannon, I don't know the specifics.

I think FF6 addresses this better than FF5 (which was also an improvement when it comes to FF4) as counters are concerned. The evolution of the battle engine is notable. The counter issue with !Rapid Fire has to do with "poor enough" coding to simply deal with two-weapons (Ninja ability).

- Regen isn't set for Dragon Flower, Dragon Pod, Exdeath, Genji Shield Gilgamesh

I don't recall any monster having that attribute... so if it was meant to be there, it's an oversight.

- Monster MP is a complete clusterfuck. Feed a monster with more than 9999 MP an Ether, and it resets to 9999. Give a monster with maximum 10 MP an Ether, and it'll get enough to cast Flash.

I'd swear that the MP a monster had was almost always random. One time it would work.. other times it wouldn't... and from the same monster (the Forest of Mua monsters seemed to exhibit that the most).

Attack behavior:
- Vampire deals (maximum HP - current HP) damage rather than half that FFVA

I think it's a welcomed change... although it works against ???? so I guess that depends on how you feel about it.

- Mix elemental properties (Resist Fire, etc.) and elemental up (Elemental Might) are removed upon equipment change

I believe that was always some sort of issue when the equip via item screen in all the SNES FF versions... probably less so in FF6. A fun bug to exploit in FF4 was the Avenger Sword temporarily having the same properties of the previously equipped weapon (like the Blood Sword or the Ragnarok) when swapping weapons in battle.

- Casting Phoenix without the necessary MP (through !Dualcast, for instance), the firebird is stopped but the revival is not

IIRC, the best part about Phoenix was full maxMP on revival.

- The Chemist's !Recover doesn't cure Petrify, though it should

Really? Hmmm...

- Pre-set Mute and in-battle cast Mute allow different things (Blue magic)

Blue (Monster) Magic seemed to always follow a different set of rules in FF5 (like FF4) so I guess that has changed in FF6.

- Negative Magic Power overflow (underflow?) bug: when giving Berserkers a Thornlet, the game will treat the Berserker as having a massive amount of Magic Power (99?). Fun with the Gaia Hammer and stuff. FFVSNES

Nice. Titan would be proud.

Item behavior:
- Staff of Light/Judgment Staff deals double damage with !Mug

Is that against a Holy elemental enemy? Just checking.

- Mirage Vest renews Image upon equipment change.

Yea... explained earlier.

- A lot of weapons have strange side-effects because of lazy or strange coding. Man-Eater deals double damage with !Jump, two out of four Bells function like Long Reach Axes (Gaia Bell) or Front Row-only Rune weapons (Rune Bell).

Well... the Rune Bell is actually a very awesome weapon (Tinkerbell is better, like the Chicken Knife, but way more inconsistent). The critical hit is required to keep it on par with all the better swords+knives of the game... including the Chicken Knife+Ragnarok/Apocalypse.

640

General Discussion / Re: Gamefaqs + eternal stupidity

« on: March 12, 2011, 02:56:08 PM »

I can make a few demos of stuff that's actually different in FF4ET (although there might be a post somewhere around here documenting the minutia). That is if anyone is actually interested.

641

General Discussion / Re: Gamefaqs + eternal stupidity

« on: March 12, 2011, 02:38:53 PM »

It starts with him comparing ZeromusEG in FF4A being what was similar to FF4ET.. which is not even close to the truth. Sure ZeromusEG was similar to Zeromus, but the attacks dealt were a little more dramatic than what he made it out to be. The FF4A ZeromusEG is a poor facsimile to anything other than a poor battle script written in my bathroom toilet.

Coral Sword is metallic. It's the Piggy's Stick (that replaced the Mythril Sword) that was non-metallic.

Meeple does reference a japanese site that discussed it, but there was more to it that just what the site made references to.

642

General Discussion / Re: Happy Birthday Dragonsbrethren!

« on: March 12, 2011, 02:33:53 PM »

Happy bday man! Now where the hell have ya been?

643

General Discussion / Re: Gamefaqs + eternal stupidity

« on: March 11, 2011, 10:58:45 PM »

http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/554041-final-fantasy-iii/58293254

I cannot believe what Meeple just said... but bah.

644

Final Fantasy V Research & Development / Re: Wanted: Bounty Hunters

« on: March 11, 2011, 04:30:26 PM »

It's not in any normal monster formations for a particular area... but F236-F237 is the for first related monster chest IIRC.

 
F449-F450 for the guns.

645

Game Modification Station / Re: New FF4 Hack Announcement

« on: March 10, 2011, 08:12:29 PM »

Here's a few other notable changes... the Bard Robe now gives +3 Wis and Will. I have also reworked the Ribbon.. "this holy Ribbon" will give you Holy resistance but there's also a tradeoff by removal of some stat resistance. There's too many stat boosting tweaks I've made... so I guess it's a matter of getting to that point to find out. Also... Yoichi Arrows now do not suck.