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Print Page - Darkness/Holy elemental attacks
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Library of the Ancients => Final Fantasy IV Research & Development => Topic started by: Deathlike2 on February 01, 2008, 09:42:41 PM
Title: Darkness/Holy elemental attacks
Post by: Deathlike2 on February 01, 2008, 09:42:41 PM
Other than Cecil's Shadow weaponry and Holy+Meteo, what monster attacks are Darkness/Holy based?
Title: Re: Darkness/Holy elemental attacks
Post by: Dragonsbrethren on February 02, 2008, 06:22:20 AM
Cecil has the monopoly on dark-elemental attacks, he gets the dark knight equipment obviously and the crystal in the final battle. Other than those nothing uses dark.
Here's a list of everything holy:
Holy
Meteo
W.Meteo
And I thought you might like this one: D(ark).Breath is fire-elemental.
Title: Re: Darkness/Holy elemental attacks
Post by: Deathlike2 on February 02, 2008, 11:09:24 AM
Cecil has the monopoly on dark-elemental attacks, he gets the dark knight equipment obviously and the crystal in the final battle. Other than those nothing uses dark.
Hmmm, I never really thought of the crystal being a Darkness attack (although, stupid Golbez/Cecil confuses the issue).
Quote
Here's a list of everything holy:
Holy
Meteo
W.Meteo
I felt like that was the big duh.
Just checking, but this entire list includes FF4A right? It's relative to what I need to know. I get the strange feeling that Darkness elemental resistance is useless on the Vishnu Vest.
Quote
And I thought you might like this one: D(ark).Breath is fire-elemental.
You know that's just evil. That's just as fucked up as Blaze is (I had a tough time at one point in my mind to register that as an Ice attack).
Title: Re: Darkness/Holy elemental attacks
Post by: Dragonsbrethren on February 02, 2008, 11:59:11 AM
Just checking, but this entire list includes FF4A right? It's relative to what I need to know. I get the strange feeling that Darkness elemental resistance is useless on the Vishnu Vest.
As far as I know nothing was changed in FF4A, so this should still be relevant. I wouldn't doubt it a bit if they gave you a useless resistance, that's just the way FF4A is.
Just checking, but this entire list includes FF4A right? It's relative to what I need to know. I get the strange feeling that Darkness elemental resistance is useless on the Vishnu Vest.
As far as I know nothing was changed in FF4A, so this should still be relevant. I wouldn't doubt it a bit if they gave you a useless resistance, that's just the way FF4A is.
I forgot to mention Caesar's Plate also resists Darkness...
You know that's just evil. That's just as fucked up as Blaze is (I had a tough time at one point in my mind to register that as an Ice attack).
Perhaps why they localized Blaze as "Frost" in FF5A.
Hmm.. I'm trying to recall if it was Dragon's Breath (Dark Elf was a Dragon) or Dark Breath... no matter. The image it used for the attack was ice...
Title: Re: Darkness/Holy elemental attacks
Post by: Dragonsbrethren on February 02, 2008, 12:15:00 PM
Back when all I had to go on was FF2us I assumed the "D." stood for Dragon, but the attack name is Dark Breath.
Title: Re: Darkness/Holy elemental attacks
Post by: Entroper on February 02, 2008, 01:04:32 PM
That's actually worse than Blaze. At least Blaze was blue fire, so it vaguely made sense in some kind of bizzare way.
Title: Re: Darkness/Holy elemental attacks
Post by: Dragonsbrethren on February 02, 2008, 01:13:47 PM
Speaking of blue fire, Blaze's unimaginative name in Easy Type is "Blue Flame."
Title: Re: Darkness/Holy elemental attacks
Post by: Deathlike2 on February 02, 2008, 02:07:59 PM
"Blue" really fucks things up.. since it seemed to be rewritten for one monster... the Blue Dragon.
Title: Re: Darkness/Holy elemental attacks
Post by: Deathlike2 on March 19, 2008, 01:59:44 AM
Refer to this thread for the basis of what I'm going to say: http://slickproductions.org/forum/index.php?topic=401.0
If the armor bit is set to have protection vs holy, you are weak against the Darkness elemental. If the armor bit is set to have protection vs Darkness, you are weak against Holy.
This new info explains why both bits are set in this instance.
This info will explain why the game engine isn't using this bit... enemies were meant to have elemental attacks. The problem with it was that if you were able to protection to both stats for magical reasons, it would hurt you for physical attacks, just like Ice+Fire equipment.
The entire Dark Knight's equipment was most likely meant to be resistant to Holy (this means he was weak vs Darkness), which also means extra pain vs Zombies (they were to attack with the Darkness elemental).. and that also probably meant that the Paladin's initial equipment was meant to be resistant to Darkness (which means weak vs Holy), making Cecil very resistant vs all of the undead at Mt. Ordeals, although all of the equipment has resistance vs Undead, so it's almost irrelevent. Then again, Holy attacks/spells would rape the Paladin...
It is the same logic that the Fire Shield has you weak vs Fire and resistant to Ice and the Ice Shield has you weak vs Ice and resistant to Fire.
This behavior is probably completely fixed in FF4A.
Title: Re: Darkness/Holy elemental attacks
Post by: Dragonsbrethren on March 19, 2008, 01:51:06 PM
I never knew holy and dark worked like that, it makes sense though. Currently in my hack the dark knight gear resists dark because that just made sense to me, although I can't argue with your reasoning about making him weak to zombie attacks...hmm, his equipment might be getting an overhaul.
Title: Re: Darkness/Holy elemental attacks
Post by: Deathlike2 on March 19, 2008, 02:40:27 PM
I never knew holy and dark worked like that, it makes sense though. Currently in my hack the dark knight gear resists dark because that just made sense to me, although I can't argue with your reasoning about making him weak to zombie attacks...hmm, his equipment might be getting an overhaul.
Well, both bits are set in FF4A primarily to get in Holy resistance, but Scan would have confused people and give them shock because that message that they are weak vs Darkness would confuse/scare the people (the same people who can't figure out why the Dark Elf hurts them 9999 damage).
Title: Re: Darkness/Holy elemental attacks
Post by: Paladin on March 19, 2008, 02:50:47 PM
:hmm:
While I don't disagree with the proposal of having Dark Cecil take more damage vs. Undead enemies (with the oddness of his armor being "Holy" resistant)...
To me...the logic of having a Dark Knight take Less damage vs. the Undead/Darkness-Weilding monsters makes sense, and at the same time being weak vs. Holy.
Likewise to have the Paladin weak vs. Darkness and strong vs. Holy...also seems to make sense.
This was the behavior I have written in the TODO for my next hack...
Having it the other way around would make for a more interesting twist...
Title: Re: Darkness/Holy elemental attacks
Post by: Deathlike2 on March 19, 2008, 02:54:59 PM
While I don't disagree with the proposal of having Dark Cecil take more damage vs. Undead enemies (with the oddness of his armor being "Holy" resistant)...
To me...the logic of having a Dark Knight take Less damage vs. the Undead/Darkness-Weilding monsters makes sense, and at the same time being weak vs. Holy.
Likewise to have the Paladin weak vs. Darkness and strong vs. Holy...also seems to make sense.
This was the behavior I have written in the TODO for my next hack...
Having it the other way around would make for a more interesting twist...
Yes, but you would have a tough time explaining that Fire Shields being weak vs Fire. The whole design was probably original intended behavior. I know it's totally ironic that "Holy" attacks are favorable my projected Dark Knight's equipment set, but that's how the elemental property on equipment is behaving.
The intention was to make Cecil totally useless vs Undead to a significant degree (even critical hits won't save him).
Title: Re: Darkness/Holy elemental attacks
Post by: Paladin on March 19, 2008, 03:08:45 PM
I agree with the poor naming of the Fire and Ice defensive equipment.
The name "Fire Shield" implicitly connotes "defense against fire" to me, not "defense against ice".
The only logical way to explain the concept as it's used is somewhat obtuse...It is as though the the Fire Shield is somehow innately "hot" and when hit with an ice attack it's "heat" nulls out the ice effect, but hitting it with a fire attack compounds it's nature and causes pain to the wielder (it gets too hot).
I almost want to flip the bits on them so that the "Fire" shield and armor provide defense against fire and weakness to Ice. Same for the Ice equipment. Simply to make the names more implicitly easy to understand in the former context I explained.
Title: Re: Darkness/Holy elemental attacks
Post by: Deathlike2 on March 19, 2008, 03:21:46 PM
Personally, I just live with the fact that the name is what it is, depending on the game and its consistancy. A number of games do something along those lines...
The best alternative would simply just rename the equipment and/or swap the internal bits and item drops.
Title: Re: Darkness/Holy elemental attacks
Post by: Phoenix on March 19, 2008, 06:59:53 PM
Quote
I agree with the poor naming of the Fire and Ice defensive equipment.
The name "Fire Shield" implicitly connotes "defense against fire" to me, not "defense against ice".
I agree, and have always thought this behavior strange. I think I'll switch it in my hack, too. It makes sense to me for Dark Knights to be resistant to dark attacks and Paladins to be resistant to holy attacks. Maybe that's just the way my brain works, but I think I'll add that behavior in too (not that it makes that much difference in the overall game, but it's the principle of the thing). :finger:
Edit: Sorry for that, I quoted Paladin to make it clearer who I was agreeing with
Title: Re: Darkness/Holy elemental attacks
Post by: Deathlike2 on March 19, 2008, 07:40:13 PM
I agree, and have always thought this behavior strange. I think I'll switch it in my hack, too. It makes sense to me for Dark Knights to be resistant to dark attacks and Paladins to be resistant to holy attacks. Maybe that's just the way my brain works, but I think I'll add that behavior in too (not that it makes that much difference in the overall game, but it's the principle of the thing). :finger:
Agree with who?
This is one of the few games where having a complete set of elemental equipment is detrimental to self while under Charm...
Oh well...
Title: Re: Darkness/Holy elemental attacks
Post by: Dragonsbrethren on March 20, 2008, 08:03:12 AM
The names of the fire and ice armor always made sense to me, it's FF6 that threw a wrench in the works and got them backwards.
Title: Re: Darkness/Holy elemental attacks
Post by: Deathlike2 on March 20, 2008, 08:44:31 AM
The names of the fire and ice armor always made sense to me, it's FF6 that threw a wrench in the works and got them backwards.
FF5's Flame/Ice Shield is consistant with FF6 though...
Title: Re: Darkness/Holy elemental attacks
Post by: Dragonsbrethren on March 20, 2008, 09:14:18 AM
Is it? I completely forgot about FF5's elemental shields. FF2 is also backwards, flame armor resisting fire... :bah:
FF1, FF3, and FF4 are consistent with each other though.
Title: Re: Darkness/Holy elemental attacks
Post by: Deathlike2 on March 20, 2008, 09:18:05 AM
Well, the Thunder Shield in FF5 is consistant with FF4... although that's probably because you can buy it.
With that said, I just adhere to how the game determines as consistant behavior.. which AFAIK is the case. Sometimes it is kinda annoying to compare vs other games.
Title: Re: Darkness/Holy elemental attacks
Post by: Paladin on March 20, 2008, 02:28:22 PM
Well...if we're talking about the games in their unaltered forms then the naming conventions the programmers decided upon is fair enough to me as well.
However in terms of a hack, that makes it my opportunity to tell the developer to slag off... :finger:
IMHO, I like the implicit nature of the logic I mentioned earlier. However I've taken to emulating the idea put forth in FF4 with the Diamond Armor/Shield/Helmet/Gauntlet/Ring which resists Lightning-elemental attack. I'm going to name Fire-Resistant equipment "Ruby" and Ice-Resistant equipment "Sapphire" in my hacks. To be a little more creative and to subtly suggest the usage. It's not obvious that the Diamond equipment resists Lightning but it is consistent in that behavior. That and it's interesting to picture Ruby Mail or a Sapphire Shield.
I've also decided upon making some armor for the paladin Holy (or I prefer "Light Elemental" as seen in the Seiken Densetsu series -- going to make that name change) resistant and all dark equipment for the dark knight darkness resistant. Which means I'm going to have to make monsters that attack with the darkness attribute (probably zombies, namely). That way the dark knight will be ineffective vs. zombies but they really won't hurt him either...meh. However that means sometimes the paladin would get his ass handed to him by zombies...oh well...that's just a challenge I guess :tongue:
I'll have to make some enemies strike with the "Light" element early on to give the dark knight something to worry about :tongue: ...and likewise, enemies that attack with "Darkness" later on for the Paladin...and Rosa. She's probably going to get some equipment that will resist holy as well. Like the "Light Robe", I mean shouldn't that resist Light Elemental attacks? I guess the Black Robe should logically resist darkness...
Lots of planning...and work to do in front of the hex editor...especially with enemies and magic to make the Darkness element actually useful... For some reason I've always liked the idea of "Darkness" vs. "Light" in terms of "Elemental Power"...
Great discussion...this has given me a lot of ideas for making my hack(s) much more interesting.
Title: Re: Darkness/Holy elemental attacks
Post by: Entroper on March 20, 2008, 07:57:11 PM
This is why I'm keeping resistances/immunities/weaknesses/etc. as orthogonal as possible in the OF engine. Too much confusion otherwise. :eek: