Messages

2566

Gaming Discussion / Random FF and FF6 Questions

« on: April 22, 2008, 08:15:21 PM »

For FF, has evasion been deciphered yet? I suspect by now that the game's battle mechanics has been fully dissected.... yes?

For FF6, is FF3USME back to being usable again? I remember many boards ago that the latest version was buggy... is that still the case?

Edit: Also, has there been any sort of effort to write a patch for Gogo's command list to expand it so that every possible command and perhaps future added commands to be listed and be selectable? I know FF3USHT suffers from this problem IIRC.

2567

Final Fantasy IV Research & Development / Re: Shadow Party Stats

« on: April 22, 2008, 06:10:28 PM »

Bit 6 in the class id is NOT set when equipping a long-range weapon to either hand. I still don't know what it's used for.

Equipping a long-range weapon in Edge's left-hand has strange behavior. It doesn't set bit 5 if you have a short-range weapon in his right-hand. If the right-hand is empty or has a long-range weapon, however, then the bit is set. For his right-hand, as soon as you equip a long-range weapon, it does set bit 5. You can see this behavior if Edge has two swords in his hands, and you equip a boomerang in his left-hand and move him to the back row. He'll still do half damage, compared to if you equip a boomerang in his right-hand and stick him in the back row. So although he's ambidextrous, apparently he's still right-hand dominant.    Also, I tested bows and arrows with Cecil, and the bit is only set once both the bow and arrow are equipped (hands don't matter).

I've confirmed that once you remove the weapon, bit 5 stays set. Unless the character leaves your party, it's stuck. Which is actually beneficial, considering you can then use short-range weapons in the back row.

Ok, I believe I have confirmed that behavior for Edge.

The only part that doesn't make sense is for left-handed people. I suspect the algo checks for handedness first (ambidexterous defaults to right handed). That would make a lot more sense.

Try see if bit 6 is either the "no critical hit" bit or metallic bit... that's all I can think of at the top of my head.

The only character that doesn't fit this is Edward.. so I'm kinda at a loss at the moment for ideas.

It would help if you kindly give all the weapon/armor info for those character profiles that have that bit set.. there's usually something in common with them all that I simply can't think off at the top of my head.

2568

Final Fantasy IV Research & Development / Re: Immunity, Darkness Elemental, and Critical Hits

« on: April 22, 2008, 08:30:23 AM »

Ok, I've gotten around to testing FF4A and Immunity.. and apparently the base attack power is 21, down from 25 in FF4.

I've updated the attack algo while I was at it...

2569

Final Fantasy IV Research & Development / Re: Shadow Party Stats

« on: April 22, 2008, 06:49:00 AM »

I forgot to mention that the Silence Staff also prevents critical hits, which is also worth testing against.

2570

Gaming Discussion / FF4 - Why The Heroine/Minerva Robe Isn't Bad

« on: April 22, 2008, 12:18:32 AM »

I did some thinking about this piece of equipment, and tried to be critical on the both sides of the issue.

I've concluded that this piece of armor is underrated, and perhaps undervalued by most people (and you could've figure that from the title).

Let's look deeper into the details  and the women that can equip this robe.

Here's a look at some end game armor...

Heroine/Minerva Robe:
20 defense
40% evade
5 magic defense
5% magic evade
+15 Str, Agi, Vit
-15 Wis, Will

resistant vs paralysis

White Robe:
18 defense
10% evade
10 magic defense
6% magic evade
+15 Will

resistant vs blind
resistant against spirits and undead

Sorceror/Light Robe:
12 defense
10% evade
9 magic defense
9% magic evade
+5 Wis, Will

resistant vs lightning
resistant against undead

I'm not going to include Porom's FF4A's Lord's Robe because it's actually the best combo with the Hero Shield (in terms of overpoweredness).

On the pure basis that Rydia could equip the White Robe if she was still the Younger version... it would make this an interesting argument, but let's not worry about that detail too much (Rydia's best equipment in FF4A is overpowered anyways).

If you look over the equipment, they are evenly matched in different aspects. The Heroine Robe primarily converts a decent spellcaster into more of a fighting machine. The White Robe provides a nice compromise of defense increases plus Will Power boosts with decent resistances (so Rosa/Porom will be 100% effective for healing). The Sorceror's Robe provides the best balance of magic evasion and magic boosts which tends to help (Younger) Rydia realize her potential.

There are a few things that are overrated about some of the equipment. Here's some point worth pondering:

The White Robe has resistances vs blind... but that's useless since no monster in the Lunar Subterrain use a blind attack. Even worse is that there are no Spirit monsters past the Tower of Babil (heading towards the underground) and that the undead you actually meet are virtually harmless while in the back row. Sure they poison you, but that's because you have a lower level than they do! Also consider this.. if you are maxing Rosa or Porom's (or even Rydia) stats to level 99, this stat boost is useless. This isn't quite applicable for those that don't level/stat max.

The Sorceror's Robe is the weakest of your defense options... 10% evade means that you will require Cecil to cover her (either by wasting a turn or letting him be the physical damage shield).  Unless you are using FF4A's Hero Shield (or not abusing the Shield trick), the girls will stay relatively frail physically.

The Heroine's Robe has the weakest magic defense and naturally remove a magic evade multiplier because of the reduction in both magic stats. However, there are outside factors when you consider the characters that can use it... so let's analyze the girls, shall we?

Rydia:
Best stat growth options past level 70:
+3 Str, Agi, Wis, Will
+2 Str, Vit, Wis, Will

If you plan on making her stronger , the Heroine Robe can serve that purpose. This becomes less effective over time as her important stats can be gained at a far greater rate than Vitality, which has the least impact. The Heroine Robe still provides excellent protection for defense, even though her magic defense multiplier (and magic power) can take a nose dive.. but that can be countered by using the classic Tiara (Gold Hairpin).. which does benefit Rydia the most since Wisdom powers most magic. However, let's put this in perspective.

Let's assume Rydia has a setup similar to this:

Note: These are legitmate possible final stats.

(base stats)
level 99
Str 99
Agi 96
Vit 50
Wis 99
Will 99

19x attack multiplier
12x defense multiplier
9x magic defense multiplier

With the equipment set:
Dragon Whip
Golden Hairpin
Heroine Robe
Protect Ring

The stats come out like this..

@ level 99
Str 99
Agi 99
Vit 85
Wis 89
Will 79

19x 103 attack, 99% hit rate
12x 79 defense, 65% evade
8x 27 magic defense, 45% magic evade

Ok, so you've lost a magic defense multiplier and some magic power, but you still have gained the following..

Resistance vs Dragons and a crapload of evade.

You lose a spell multiplier of 2x in the process, but you may be surprised that you aren't missing that much when it comes to dealing damage.

Meteo will do 9999 damage regardless of the monster's magic defense past a certain point (89 Wisdom is way above than you'll ever need for this spell), so that's not weakened.
Flare will not consistantly do 9999 damage on enemies with virtually magic defense (Flare has a spell base power of 400.. so when you consider 25 to be the maximum, it's not that great a loss). Flare will still do mediocre vs monsters with high magic defense anyways.
Bahamut will do a bit better (since it has a spell base power of 480) and won't ever consistantly do 9999 damage on Behemoths either.

I could probably compute the numbers, but the difference is like at most ~1000 points of damage. If you're really THAT concerned, just drop the whip for the Stardust Rod anyways, and you don't miss that much to begin with!

With another character, such as Rosa (and/or Porom).. there's a bigger discrepancy...

Rosa:
Best stat growth options past level 70:
+1 all
+2 Str, Will
+2 Str, Wis, Will (Porom only)

Rosa's final stats are superior to Porom's for the most part (primarily for  Str and Vit).

Rosa's final growth really sucks, and needs massive help... plus her magic defense growth is slower than molasses. The same idea can be done for Rosa like it did for Rydia, but with even greater benefits...

(base stats)
@ level 99
81 Str
57 Agi
67 Vit
47 Wis
99 Will

14x attack multiplier
7x defense multiplier
5x magic defense multiplier

With the equipment set:
Artemis Arrows
Elven Bow
Golden Hairpin
Heroine Robe
Protect Ring

The stats come out like this..

@ level 99
Str 96
Agi 72
Vit 97
Wis 47
Will 84

17x 124 attack, 99% hit rate
9x 85 defense, 65% evade
6x 27 magic defense, 40% magic evade

In addition to having an increased magic defense multiplier (there is no way to do this w/o increasing the Agility and compensating for the losses to Wisdom.. you also don't want to trade the Protect Ring for the Rune Ring for elemental resistance reasons), she gets the additional benefit of killing dragons and mages just as effectively while being decently fast (not great, but better than shit).

The most important part of Rosa's role is healing, and in looking at it closely, she does lose some healing potentency.

3 * 288 (Cure4's base power) * 1 (worst case) / 5 (split damage) = 172
3 * 288 (Cure4's base power) * 3/2 (best case) / 5 (split damage) = 259

So, here's the tradeoff... lose potentially 172-259 points of healing, or have an above average Rosa who is decently fast, can kick ass (she'd be slightly better than Rydia), becomes very versatile in killing the majority of the monsters in the Lunar Subterrain (and subsequently can kick ass in the Lunar Ruins from FF4A), gets resistance to dragon attacks, evade lots of physical damage, and gets the extra magic defense point to boot.

So, I rest my case. Please feel free to question to debate the differences in detail, but if you think the Heroine/Minvera Robe sucks, you haven't really looked into its effectiveness in the game. The results will shock and surprise you nicely.

Note that magic defense is somewhat overrated given what monsters use on you... the magic defense multiplier has a significantly greater impact in damage taking due to magic defense in this game (even though it is countered somewhat in FF4A, its impact is not that great when you consider what my magic damage algo says).

2571

Final Fantasy IV Research & Development / Re: Shadow Party Stats

« on: April 21, 2008, 09:52:21 PM »

The "back row bit" has gotta be two bits. You can test this with Edge and Boomerangs...  one of the bits is set, even after you remove the weapon on the hand it was equipped on. Once the back row bits are set on both hands, both weapons instantly become back row compatible.

Rosa starts with a Bow+Arrow combo initially. Changing the set to something else initially is an easier method of testing this with either Bow or Arrow.

Two bits are needed.. one for each hand.

2572

Final Fantasy IV Research & Development / Re: Shadow Party Stats

« on: April 21, 2008, 08:13:54 PM »

102F is related to escaping. The data there is modified when using Porom's Cry command. My thought is that it is some type of internal "Luck" stat, that is used when determining whether the party can escape, and maybe other times.

AFAIK, Cry seems to reduce the time to run in half, and the behavior is stackable (up to a point).

The ability to run away AFAIK is either tied to Agility and/or Level.

They could be related to the other equipment bits. Since they're buggy it's difficult to test. However, the 102D-F data comes from within the character stats; the bits that control metallic/throwable/etc. are stored within the equipment data, meaning they are calculated from the equipment. It's unlikely that equipment data would be stored within the character stat data. This is why I think those three bytes may be some internal "Luck" stat, or something to that effect.

You can easily test it believe it or not. Since they are buggy, just compare the data from before/after equipping stuff. The bug happens to be that the no-critical hit bit and back row bit doesn't revert when removed.

Some examples:

Dwarf Axe - no crit + back row
Arrows or Bows - back row
Boomerangs - back row
Whip - no crit + back row

Note that the back row detail requires 2 bits. A bow and arrow combo sets boths bits required for the back row check. I wrote specifically on how the back row check works.. if you need to test it out for yourself.

The back row check is like this (perhaps I need to write it in a separate thread):

1) Check if character is in back row and/or target is in back row
2) If true, determine the number of weapons equipped
3a) If there is 1, check if weapon is back row compatible
3b) If there is 2, check if both weapons are back row compatible (this includes Bow+Arrow combos)
4) If false, reduce hit rate by 1/2, repeat reduction if target is considered in the back row (stackable)

Since the back row bit is not unset when deequiping non-back row compatible weapons, you can check the bits for the bug and therefore determine the changes in the Shadow Data.

2573

Gaming Discussion / FF4A - ZeromusEG Stupidity

« on: April 21, 2008, 06:07:36 PM »

When ZeromusEG is nearing death, all attacks will be countered by a self-healing spell that heals him 1/3 of the current HP. It is actually possible that this script may make him virtually invincible... if and only if you deal less damage than it is healing. This isn't factoring Grimore abuse, but it's worth thinking about here.

2574

Final Fantasy IV Research & Development / Re: Dark Wave Command

« on: April 21, 2008, 06:01:00 PM »

I did an interesting test with this command. If a character has a maximum of 7 HP or less, this command will not reduce a point of HP from the attack. Unlike timed Poison damage that has a minimum of 1 HP loss, this command has no minimum (so HP loss can be at 0).

So if you want this command to be used on a very low HP gaining character, this is an awesome command to add.

2575

Final Fantasy IV Research & Development / Re: Shadow Party Stats

« on: April 21, 2008, 05:13:35 PM »

From the info that was quoted from the docs...

[spoiler]1000   *character id/handedness
1001   *class id/row properties
1002   level
1003-6   current status anomalies
1007-8   current hp
1009-A   maximum hp
100B-C   current mp
100D-E   maximum mp
100F   *base strength
1010   *base agility
1011   *base vitality
1012   *base wisdom
1013   *base willpower
1014   *modified strength
1015   modified agility
1016   *modified vitality
1017   modified wisdom
1018   modified willpower
1019   attack elemental
101A   *attack strong vs. creature types***
101B   physical attack multiplier
101C   physical attack percent
101D   physical attack base
101E   attack status 1***
101F   attack status 2***
1020   elements weak vs***
1021   elements very weak vs***
1022   magical defense multiplier
1023   magical defense percent
1024   magical defense base
1025   elemental defense (if immunity bit wasn't set)***
1026   elemental defense (if immunity bit was set)***
1027   *defense strong vs. creature types***
1028   physical defense multiplier
1029   physical defense percent
102A   physical defense base
102B   status immunity 1***
102C   status immunity 2***
102D-F   ?
1030   *helmet
1031   *armor
1032   *gauntlet
1033   *right-hand item
1034   *right-hand quantity
1035   *left-hand item
1036   *left-hand quantity
1037-9   *experience
103A   ?
103B   speed modifier. lower = faster. for autobattles, starts at 01; otherwise
      starts at 10. slow adds +08, (upper bound 20) haste adds -3 (lower bound 0C)
103C   ?
103D-F   *experience to level up
[/spoiler]

102D-F is most likely status immunities for the other stuff (Egg, Defense, Reflect, etc)... which AFAIK don't have a resistance to begin with.

On the other hand, those locations and/or 103A and 103C are the info revolving around the other equipment bits.

I'm talking about the bits that control back row compat, metallic, throwable... which I've also mentioned that some of those bits (no critical hits, back row compatible weapon) are buggy.

2576

Final Fantasy IV Research & Development / Re: Attack of the SwordRats

« on: April 20, 2008, 09:10:27 AM »

I eventually came back to this idea, and I believe I found a solution. I've learned a lot about ASM since I first tried it, and I now know how to write code to check whether all monster slots are full/alive. However, since the Call/Alert spell effects summon a monster to slot 2, it doesn't work for all the enemy sets that only have one kind of monster. I could change the subroutine for these effects (so that they summon to slot 1), but they're a little complicated, so instead I came up with the idea to do a full revive on a monster that has died. Normally you can't target those enemies (except if you target them right before they die, as FF4 experience-harvesters know), but I know enough ASM to target a full-revive spell (e.g. spell AC, Remedy) at a slot for an enemy that has already died. I plan on incorporating this into my hack, and I'll post here when I write the subroutine and test it fully.

To quote myself:

. . . but anyone that figures out a solution gets a 

Don't mind if I do

AFAIK, The the revive (Recover in FF2US) spell (spell 171) that monsters use has to change its targeting to target every group and the other monsters revive.

This occurs with the following bosses: Magus Sisters, CPU+Defender+Attacker, Baigan+Arms

This spell always succeeds, even when the defined hit rate is 0 (skips that check most likely) and revives those that are dead in said slots. I'm not entirely sure if all groups have to be filled with something though.

Note that the revived monster is considered a new monster, and that will factor into the EXP.

2577

Final Fantasy IV Research & Development / Re: Status Priorities

« on: April 18, 2008, 07:33:50 PM »

Updated Stop info, most of which can be found here: http://slickproductions.org/forum/index.php?topic=495.0

Stuff includes what statuses are affected by Haste and Slow and how they are affected.

2578

Final Fantasy IV Research & Development / Re: Agility and ATB Speed - Theory of Relativity

« on: April 18, 2008, 07:28:00 PM »

Ok, well testing was done and these are the results:

Count status does is not affected by Slow or Haste, only Stop.

2579

Gaming Discussion / Re: FF4A European Font Replacement Bugs

« on: April 18, 2008, 07:08:34 PM »

I guess you haven't heard of the updated patch.

Ummm, what? I've read this 6 times, and I can't make out the intent of what you were trying to say.

Fixed. Everyone has their moments. What was most disappointing was a lack of a link...

2580

Gaming Discussion / Re: FF4A European Font Replacement Bugs

« on: April 18, 2008, 05:36:31 PM »

I plead ignorance since I got the patch from RHDN.