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ZFP Version 1.1 - Getting Fixed

Started by Zareb, April 24, 2012, 10:43:18 pm

Zareb

April 24, 2012, 10:43:18 pm Last Edit: May 11, 2012, 08:07:09 pm by Zareb
2012-05-11:  Working on a new release; may be a while.
Now your blood travels through the veins of our history
It bursts forth in boiling black clouds from the wrists of kings

Solifuge

In the process of checking this out... looks like a lot of work went into this!

After rocking through the Oribonne Monestary fight, I'm having a pretty rough time with the Gariland fight... I think it's the lack of heals and starting with a suboptimal party makeup. This seems very item-dependant, even more than vanilla FFT; in the Gariland fight, it seemed that all the NPCs all had swords/armor, and I went in with a mix of Swords/Daggers and Robes/Clothes/Armor. Since all of the Trainee skills are close to 95% failure rate due to the new equations, having caster-items really didn't do much for me. I like the universal item-use, but you could use some starting healing items, or else that first fight could be impossible if you're unlucky enough to get mostly daggers/clothes on your initial characters.

I'll share more thoughts as I go. Very excited to check the rest of this out!

Zareb

Quote from: Solifuge on April 24, 2012, 11:54:17 pm
In the process of checking this out... looks like a lot of work went into this!

After rocking through the Oribonne Monestary fight, I'm having a pretty rough time with the Gariland fight... I think it's the lack of heals and starting with a suboptimal party makeup. This seems very item-dependant, even more than vanilla FFT; in the Gariland fight, it seemed that all the NPCs all had swords/armor, and I went in with a mix of Swords/Daggers and Robes/Clothes/Armor. Since all of the Trainee skills are close to 95% failure rate due to the new equations, having caster-items really didn't do much for me. I like the universal item-use, but you could use some starting healing items, or else that first fight could be impossible if you're unlucky enough to get mostly daggers/clothes on your initial characters.

I'll share more thoughts as I go. Very excited to check the rest of this out!



I'm happy to see you're enjoying it thus far.... adding some potions to the starter inventory will be a great idea, and the reason why the Trainee abilities fail often is partially due to the new equations, but mostly due to the low level nature of the party and the low stat multipliers of the Trainee job.  The multiplier hack I used for the hit chance formulae is fairly recent, so changes to the values will most-likely happen soon enough.  After a few days, with enough suggestions, I will release a new version of the patch full of fixes.

Oh, and the items are set, not random, so just use the Trainees with the "better" equipment set-ups for the first fight.  Use Delita as your meat-shield, and keep Ramza back for healing with Moral Support. :) 
Now your blood travels through the veins of our history
It bursts forth in boiling black clouds from the wrists of kings

Zareb

2012-04-25 EDIT: The PPF download has been taken down due to the nature of the next version's changes.  Those who already downloaded my patch will have to start a new game and party with the new version of it, which will be uploaded within the next day or so.  Sorry for the inconvenience.
Now your blood travels through the veins of our history
It bursts forth in boiling black clouds from the wrists of kings

Joseph Strife

Well gonna give this a try, looks interesting, waiting ofr you to post the PPF file. :D
Gaffgarion: It's in the contract!
Ramza: Does your contract says: "When you find a former squire, that now is a Holy knight that has kidnapped a princess, in a bridge by a waterfall fighting a brigade you are supposed to kill everybody that helps him!"
Gaffgarion: ... Sure!
Ramza: ... Let me see your contract...
Gaffgarion: ... No...


Zareb

Quote from: Joseph Strife on April 25, 2012, 05:14:24 pm
Well gonna give this a try, looks interesting, waiting ofr you to post the PPF file. :D


I appreciate your kind words, Joseph Strife.  I ran into some RL stuff earlier, and now I'm cooking dinner, but the PPF should be up by no later than two hours from now. :)
Now your blood travels through the veins of our history
It bursts forth in boiling black clouds from the wrists of kings

Joseph Strife

Gaffgarion: It's in the contract!
Ramza: Does your contract says: "When you find a former squire, that now is a Holy knight that has kidnapped a princess, in a bridge by a waterfall fighting a brigade you are supposed to kill everybody that helps him!"
Gaffgarion: ... Sure!
Ramza: ... Let me see your contract...
Gaffgarion: ... No...


Zareb

Now your blood travels through the veins of our history
It bursts forth in boiling black clouds from the wrists of kings

Joseph Strife

Gaffgarion: It's in the contract!
Ramza: Does your contract says: "When you find a former squire, that now is a Holy knight that has kidnapped a princess, in a bridge by a waterfall fighting a brigade you are supposed to kill everybody that helps him!"
Gaffgarion: ... Sure!
Ramza: ... Let me see your contract...
Gaffgarion: ... No...


Zareb

Now your blood travels through the veins of our history
It bursts forth in boiling black clouds from the wrists of kings

Joseph Strife

I will, i'm trying to find a better emulator do run on my notebook, but i think that won't take long, will let you know what i think soon.
Gaffgarion: It's in the contract!
Ramza: Does your contract says: "When you find a former squire, that now is a Holy knight that has kidnapped a princess, in a bridge by a waterfall fighting a brigade you are supposed to kill everybody that helps him!"
Gaffgarion: ... Sure!
Ramza: ... Let me see your contract...
Gaffgarion: ... No...


Zareb

Quote from: Joseph Strife on April 26, 2012, 04:59:29 pm
I will, i'm trying to find a better emulator do run on my notebook, but i think that won't take long, will let you know what i think soon.


No rush. :)
Now your blood travels through the veins of our history
It bursts forth in boiling black clouds from the wrists of kings

The Damned

(Okay, downloaded this, but I likely won't be able to play any time soon, especially with how my computer's been acting--again--as of late.)

Hmmm, this looks interesting. I can understand why you might not want to release more detailed information about what you've changed, but I think it would best if you at least spaced what you have released so that it's easier to read, especially since you're not even using either list function.


That said, I have a query or two about the universal item use and item limitation (for players):

1. First and firstmost, have you noticed any glitches with these, either by themselves or used in tandem? I ask this partly because all I've heard about was problems with them, even when Razele was around to actually respond to things, hence most people's hesitance with using them as far as I'm aware.

2. Secondly, when it comes to Civilian job, would you mind explaining its "purpose" more? I somewhat get why it's the way it is given the obvious connection to the small amount of abilities available to it and to available everyone, but I don't really understand why that works or is necessary. As such, if you could explain that (even if just in PMs), then I would appreciative.

Additionally, need it remain open/available for job selection to accomplish its task if its stats are so abysmal? (Are we talking vanilla Calculator level here? Or even worse?) Or did you merely want to have 20 jobs around still? And give people a masochistic option if they wanted one?


Thanks. Good luck with this.
"Sorrow cannot be abolished. It is meaningless to try." - FFX's Yunalesca

"Good and evil are relative, but being a dick cannot be allowed." - Oglaf's Thaumaturge in "The Abyss"

"Well, see, the real magic isn't believing in yourself. The real magic is manipulating people by telling them to believe in themselves. The more you believe, the less you check facts."  - Oglaf's Vanka in "Conviction"

Zareb

Quote from: The Damned on April 27, 2012, 07:40:52 pm
(Okay, downloaded this, but I likely won't be able to play any time soon, especially with how my computer's been acting--again--as of late.)

Hmmm, this looks interesting. I can understand why you might not want to release more detailed information about what you've changed, but I think it would best if you at least spaced what you have released so that it's easier to read, especially since you're not even using either list function.


That said, I have a query or two about the universal item use and item limitation (for players):

1. First and firstmost, have you noticed any glitches with these, either by themselves or used in tandem? I ask this partly because all I've heard about was problems with them, even when Razele was around to actually respond to things, hence most people's hesitance with using them as far as I'm aware.

2. Secondly, when it comes to Civilian job, would you mind explaining its "purpose" more? I somewhat get why it's the way it is given the obvious connection to the small amount of abilities available to it and to available everyone, but I don't really understand why that works or is necessary. As such, if you could explain that (even if just in PMs), then I would appreciative.

Additionally, need it remain open/available for job selection to accomplish its task if its stats are so abysmal? (Are we talking vanilla Calculator level here? Or even worse?) Or did you merely want to have 20 jobs around still? And give people a masochistic option if they wanted one?


Thanks. Good luck with this.


I've found that as long as the Civilian job is accessible by units and its abilities have been learned, its ability set can be used universally with no issues during battle.  If the Civilian job is unreachable, then its ability set, "Consumables", is unavailable to players.  Since Consumables is universal, I felt that it was necessary to discourage the usage of the Civilian itself by reducing its overall stats and available equipment.  It would be kind of stupid to have Consumables as a primary if you could simply have it as a tertiary.  I would remove the job itself and just have its ability set available for use, if I could... maybe FDC will figure something out someday.  Lol.

I felt that Consumables would work better if I reduced the amount of item types available.  The ASM hack that I am using restricts the usage of each item type to X amount of times during battle (I limited it to five each).  If I still included Antidotes, Eye Drops, and all of the other single-status-reducing items, I feel that the ability set itself would be too worthy for its current universal status.  I don't want people to rely on Consumables to get them through a battle; I want Consumables to be a backup when times are tough.

The Civilian's stats are so bad that even if you were to use one in battle, everything else would probably get a turn before it and finish it off quickly.  The numbers I apply to growths, multipliers and ability formulas follow a system I've created, and let's just say that the Civilian's are the lowest of the low available.  I appreciate you taking the time to read everything and even download my patch to play for yourself.  Also, thanks for the spacing tip... I implemented it as soon as I read it.  Sorry for the possibility of straining your eyes, heh.
Now your blood travels through the veins of our history
It bursts forth in boiling black clouds from the wrists of kings

The Damned

(No problem with the spacing tip. It wasn't a huge problem, at least to me, but something I figured would help a bit, especially since it's something I didn't think of myself when I made a thread for my patch.)

Well, that was quick. Then again, I was running errands for the past hour.

I see. That's somewhat I expected, but it's still...unfortunate to hear, though it shouldn't affect still having 20 jobs....

I wonder about something, though. What you further define "unreachable"? Do you just mean not open? Or no longer on the job wheel at all? Having not played the patch yet and it not being all that clear in the initial post, especially since you say that it's auto-learned by everyone except for Ramza, I'm guessing Civilian is still automatically open alongside Squire/Trainee from the very beginning?

Thanks for the reply.
"Sorrow cannot be abolished. It is meaningless to try." - FFX's Yunalesca

"Good and evil are relative, but being a dick cannot be allowed." - Oglaf's Thaumaturge in "The Abyss"

"Well, see, the real magic isn't believing in yourself. The real magic is manipulating people by telling them to believe in themselves. The more you believe, the less you check facts."  - Oglaf's Vanka in "Conviction"

Zareb

Quote from: The Damned on April 27, 2012, 09:15:15 pm
(No problem with the spacing tip. It wasn't a huge problem, at least to me, but something I figured would help a bit, especially since it's something I didn't think of myself when I made a thread for my patch.)

Well, that was quick. Then again, I was running errands for the past hour.

I see. That's somewhat I expected, but it's still...unfortunate to hear, though it shouldn't affect still having 20 jobs....

I wonder about something, though. What you further define "unreachable"? Do you just mean not open? Or no longer on the job wheel at all? Having not played the patch yet and it not being all that clear in the initial post, especially since you say that it's auto-learned by everyone except for Ramza, I'm guessing Civilian is still automatically open alongside Squire/Trainee from the very beginning?

Thanks for the reply.


Sorry, I meant that its abilities aren't learned by Ramza from the get-go, so you have to train them manually once you're able to access the Formation screen. 

I'm a long-winded typer, so it's easy for me to lose people when I'm trying to explain something.  My apologies.  Consumables is still available to every human during battle, regardless if the job is unlocked or not.  However: if its abilities haven't been learned by a particular unit, then said unit won't be able to use those abilities during battle; it wouldn't matter if they were being accessed through a primary, secondary or tertiary version of Consumables.

I just got out of school for the summer break, so I won't be doing a whole lot other than playing TF2, watching Castle and editing my hack, so expect quick replies.  Heh.
Now your blood travels through the veins of our history
It bursts forth in boiling black clouds from the wrists of kings

The Damned

(Oh, I wasn't lost by the long-windedness. Trust me, that's not long-winded to me.)

I see--outside of the position of Civilian, though that's rather unimportant.

Hmmm...perhaps, solution-wise, there might be some way to inflict auto-mastery of it as with Mime so that one never has to bother with learning it manually or it being unreachable, even it's still "around" in the background. Then again, some people might like the challenge and it's not like Mime doesn't have its own annoyances with all that hard-coding....

Thanks for the clarification.

NEVERMIND EDIT: It just occurred to me that Mime comes "auto-mastered" probably solely because it has no abilities, as opposed to a mere three. Oh well. Still, my idiocy aside, maybe there's some way....
"Sorrow cannot be abolished. It is meaningless to try." - FFX's Yunalesca

"Good and evil are relative, but being a dick cannot be allowed." - Oglaf's Thaumaturge in "The Abyss"

"Well, see, the real magic isn't believing in yourself. The real magic is manipulating people by telling them to believe in themselves. The more you believe, the less you check facts."  - Oglaf's Vanka in "Conviction"

Zareb

Quote from: The Damned on April 27, 2012, 09:39:19 pm
(Oh, I wasn't lost by the long-windedness. Trust me, that's not long-winded to me.)

I see--outside of the position of Civilian, though that's rather unimportant.

Hmmm...perhaps, solution-wise, there might be some way to inflict auto-mastery of it as with Mime so that one never has to bother with learning it manually or it being unreachable, even it's still "around" in the background. Then again, some people might like the challenge and it's not like Mime doesn't have its own annoyances with all that hard-coding....

Thanks for the clarification.


I'm sure that there will be a deranged lunatic or three that will attempt to seriously use Civilians.... and I'd love to see if said lunatics could actually beat even late chapter one with a party of them. 

However, if there was such a fix for the job, I would totally implement it.  If you have any further questions, I'll be happy to answer them to the best of my ability.  Again, thanks for checking out my patch!


QuoteNEVERMIND EDIT: It just occurred to me that Mime comes "auto-mastered" probably solely because it has no abilities, as opposed to a mere three. Oh well. Still, my idiocy aside, maybe there's some way....


Meh, we all slip at some point; it's not a big deal.  The more that I think about it, the more I think that I may like for the Civilian to remain the way that it is.  I like watching people challenge themselves. :)
Now your blood travels through the veins of our history
It bursts forth in boiling black clouds from the wrists of kings

formerdeathcorps

April 30, 2012, 07:09:00 am #18 Last Edit: April 30, 2012, 07:37:43 am by formerdeathcorps
All right, after a few hours of playtesting:

Orbonne:
As easy as always, though Agrias pulling 2 100% stops was surprising.  I don't want to see what Wiegraf looks like.  The clerics seem to be terrible at healing or adding status effects though, but since the enemy rangers are just as bad at adding status effects, I'm not complaining.  (As a side note, you probably want to change the EVTCHR so Alicia enters as a priest sprite and not a knight sprite.)

Gariland:
I got lucky with two consecutive instances of 6% quick going off, but besides that, this was easy.  The higher evasion takes a bit to get used to, but it's not too bad.

Mandalia:
As long as I have Moral Support, Algus will destroy everyone.  The trainees with Two Hands and Two Swords are minor pests but because the entire enemy squad is physical, I can simply station Algus and then Ramza at the chokepoint.  Despite an accidental KO of one of my units, Desperate Prayer actually worked (the second time, at least).  Overall, this was a good mission and I commend the maker for putting that trainee ahead of the group so that Algus would be entrapped for a second turn.  That's pretty clever.

Sweegy:
The first somewhat difficult battle.  Algus' bow wreaks havoc, but everyone else is subject to the mercy of ranged monsters (because I didn't bother with training outside of the storyline battles).  I noticed Algus was pulling a heavy amount of criticals; did you change the base critical rate?  Delita pulled another crit...on a bomb...which then...blew up.  Thankfully, only Delita died for his stupidity, but Goblins with 5 move pulling 1HKOs seems a bit harsh when I only have trainees attacking within their counterattacking range.  I managed to beat the Goblin, but only after the goblin knocked out 2 trainees.

Dorter I:
Despite the reputation in FFT vanilla as being hard, this was surprisingly easy.  I simply used pyromania (a very fast and nice spell) to quickly eliminate the warrior.  Algus' and Delita still have the old attack unit on the roof AI, but that unit thankfully is not raining death from above.  HOwever, since Algus has a longbow, their detour still worked to my advantage.  Anyhow, killing their warrior was the least of my troubles; the crossbowmen quickly reduced my lead attacker to critical HP.  Hiding her away in a place I thought was safe, she got struck by their bolts anyhow, though it did lure the crossbowmen in.  She stayed down for the rest of the match; my only remaining weapons were Algus' attacks and pyromania, which was just barely enough to avoid a permanent loss on my part.

Sand Rats:
This is the first actually difficult mission.  The main reason is that the pistoleer with blitz, who frequently pulls 1HKOs.  I personally think Blitz is broken as an attack.  I did notice that you tried to give us some mercy by ensuring that his first turn would be spent gunning down one of his own allies.  As noted previously, I came in minimally prepared, with only two ranged units.  In theory, this was an impossible match to win head on, so I exploited the AI.  While using Algus' corpse (hey, at least it's better than him as "Moral Support") to block the entrance (and placing 3 units around him), I eliminated their blitz spammer, leaving the warriors stuck looking at units they could not attack.  Meanwhile, Delita dueled the trainee with the fire rod, only to miss 6 consecutive strikes.  Finally, with the knights dead, I deployed Ramza to clean up Delita's fight, only to find Ramza floored by Unstable Signet.  That move looked broken when I first examined it, but now realizing it can only be used while critical, it's probably fair.  In any case, Delita finally got a hit in to end the match.

Miluda I:
My first attempt without further training was disastrous.  Spirit Strike on those mystics was lethal while only Algus could match their damage output.

Training:
When you only have mostly trainees, facing more than 1 goblin is a death sentence!  Thus, the only battle I could complete was Igros to Mandalia.  Discharge proved its use as a general purpose monster slayer and sleep a useful goblin incapacitator.

Miluda I (v2):
With a mystic of my own and a female stentor, this battle proved too easy.  Ice Strike (which is also fairly broken) did much more than my sword and bypassed P-EV (useful against the units with Parry).  The Stentor, although slow and relatively immobile, was still an able striker.  Once I lured Miluda into the cluster of bodies (which functioned as a large positional barrier because of low jump) that composed the middle plank of the fort, she died in 2 shots to discharge in the rain.

Miluda II:
There's a bug that makes this mission nearly impossible.  Namely, the enemy lancers with 7 PA average 231 off Harrier's Shot because the formula is actually PA * [(PA + 15) / 2] * RN{1...5}.  Needless to say, that's a 1HKO and given their mobility and relatively high SPD, I could not complete this mission.  I personally suggest changing that formula to (PA + 10) * RN{1...5}.


BATTLE.BIN
0x122D98
CE3822A4
0x122DAC
5912060C
0x122DF8
04008384
00000000
40180300


Overall:
This patch clearly has seen a lot of work.  All the menus are renamed and you even changed the Zodiacs to include a chart with color.  Then there's the lengthy instructions on the reward bags as well as the changes to Alazam's Intro text.
However, the mechanical balance early is heavily tilted against using any kind of status magic because it can't hit.  The AI doesn't know the difference and will spam spells on their clerics like protect, despite the 27% hit chance.  There's also the broken skills I named above that need to be fixed.
Monsters are fairly extreme right now.  Chocobos are useless except for their 36 HP heal, but no one would be foolish enough to give a wounded chocobo a free turn.  Their low HP makes them easy 1HKO targets for a whole host of attacks. The same is true of uribos, but they have 11 base SPD and can double/triple turn most units.  Panthers are terrible and do virtually no damage or status.  Meanwhile, Goblins deal crazy amounts of physical damage and have counter while skeletons have a strong (and instant) long-range attack and force me to focus fire (because of the annoying MP Switch + Move-MP Up) combo.  However, only Goblin is actually broken because of how easily they pull 1HKOs.

There's been some talk of removing innate 2H from stentor.  To be honest, it's the only good reason right now to use a main class stentor; everything else about their skills isn't worth using due to the low hit chance.
The destruction of the will is the rape of the mind.
The dogmas of every era are nothing but the fantasies of those in power; their dreams are our waking nightmares.

Zareb

Quote from: formerdeathcorps on April 30, 2012, 07:09:00 am
All right, after a few hours of playtesting:

Orbonne:
As easy as always, though Agrias pulling 2 100% stops was surprising.  I don't want to see what Wiegraf looks like.  The clerics seem to be terrible at healing or adding status effects though, but since the enemy rangers are just as bad at adding status effects, I'm not complaining.  (As a side note, you probably want to change the EVTCHR so Alicia enters as a priest sprite and not a knight sprite.)

Gariland:
I got lucky with two consecutive instances of 6% quick going off, but besides that, this was easy.  The higher evasion takes a bit to get used to, but it's not too bad.

Mandalia:
As long as I have Moral Support, Algus will destroy everyone.  The trainees with Two Hands and Two Swords are minor pests but because the entire enemy squad is physical, I can simply station Algus and then Ramza at the chokepoint.  Despite an accidental KO of one of my units, Desperate Prayer actually worked (the second time, at least).  Overall, this was a good mission and I commend the maker for putting that trainee ahead of the group so that Algus would be entrapped for a second turn.  That's pretty clever.

Sweegy:
The first somewhat difficult battle.  Algus' bow wreaks havoc, but everyone else is subject to the mercy of ranged monsters (because I didn't bother with training outside of the storyline battles).  I noticed Algus was pulling a heavy amount of criticals; did you change the base critical rate?  Delita pulled another crit...on a bomb...which then...blew up.  Thankfully, only Delita died for his stupidity, but Goblins with 5 move pulling 1HKOs seems a bit harsh when I only have trainees attacking within their counterattacking range.  I managed to beat the Goblin, but only after the goblin knocked out 2 trainees.

Dorter I:
Despite the reputation in FFT vanilla as being hard, this was surprisingly easy.  I simply used pyromania (a very fast and nice spell) to quickly eliminate the warrior.  Algus' and Delita still have the old attack unit on the roof AI, but that unit thankfully is not raining death from above.  HOwever, since Algus has a longbow, their detour still worked to my advantage.  Anyhow, killing their warrior was the least of my troubles; the crossbowmen quickly reduced my lead attacker to critical HP.  Hiding her away in a place I thought was safe, she got struck by their bolts anyhow, though it did lure the crossbowmen in.  She stayed down for the rest of the match; my only remaining weapons were Algus' attacks and pyromania, which was just barely enough to avoid a permanent loss on my part.

Sand Rats:
This is the first actually difficult mission.  The main reason is that the pistoleer with blitz, who frequently pulls 1HKOs.  I personally think Blitz is broken as an attack.  I did notice that you tried to give us some mercy by ensuring that his first turn would be spent gunning down one of his own allies.  As noted previously, I came in minimally prepared, with only two ranged units.  In theory, this was an impossible match to win head on, so I exploited the AI.  While using Algus' corpse (hey, at least it's better than him as "Moral Support") to block the entrance (and placing 3 units around him), I eliminated their blitz spammer, leaving the warriors stuck looking at units they could not attack.  Meanwhile, Delita dueled the trainee with the fire rod, only to miss 6 consecutive strikes.  Finally, with the knights dead, I deployed Ramza to clean up Delita's fight, only to find Ramza floored by Unstable Signet.  That move looked broken when I first examined it, but now realizing it can only be used while critical, it's probably fair.  In any case, Delita finally got a hit in to end the match.

Miluda I:
My first attempt without further training was disastrous.  Spirit Strike on those mystics was lethal while only Algus could match their damage output.

Training:
When you only have mostly trainees, facing more than 1 goblin is a death sentence!  Thus, the only battle I could complete was Igros to Mandalia.  Discharge proved its use as a general purpose monster slayer and sleep a useful goblin incapacitator.

Miluda I (v2):
With a mystic of my own and a female stentor, this battle proved too easy.  Ice Strike (which is also fairly broken) did much more than my sword and bypassed P-EV (useful against the units with Parry).  The Stentor, although slow and relatively immobile, was still an able striker.  Once I lured Miluda into the cluster of bodies (which functioned as a large positional barrier because of low jump) that composed the middle plank of the fort, she died in 2 shots to discharge in the rain.

Miluda II:
There's a bug that makes this mission nearly impossible.  Namely, the enemy lancers with 7 PA average 231 off Harrier's Shot because the formula is actually PA * [(PA + 15) / 2] * RN{1...5}.  Needless to say, that's a 1HKO and given their mobility and relatively high SPD, I could not complete this mission.  I personally suggest changing that formula to (PA + 10) * RN{1...5}.


BATTLE.BIN
0x122D98
CE3822A4
0x122DAC
5912060C
0x122DF8
04008384
00000000
40180300


Overall:
This patch clearly has seen a lot of work.  All the menus are renamed and you even changed the Zodiacs to include a chart with color.  Then there's the lengthy instructions on the reward bags as well as the changes to Alazam's Intro text.
However, the mechanical balance early is heavily tilted against using any kind of status magic because it can't hit.  The AI doesn't know the difference and will spam spells on their clerics like protect, despite the 27% hit chance.  There's also the broken skills I named above that need to be fixed.
Monsters are fairly extreme right now.  Chocobos are useless except for their 36 HP heal, but no one would be foolish enough to give a wounded chocobo a free turn.  Their low HP makes them easy 1HKO targets for a whole host of attacks. The same is true of uribos, but they have 11 base SPD and can double/triple turn most units.  Panthers are terrible and do virtually no damage or status.  Meanwhile, Goblins deal crazy amounts of physical damage and have counter while skeletons have a strong (and instant) long-range attack and force me to focus fire (because of the annoying MP Switch + Move-MP Up) combo.  However, only Goblin is actually broken because of how easily they pull 1HKOs.

There's been some talk of removing innate 2H from stentor.  To be honest, it's the only good reason right now to use a main class stentor; everything else about their skills isn't worth using due to the low hit chance.


I fell asleep earlier by accident, so I apologize for my abrupt exit.  I really appreciate thoroughly playing my patch, FDC, and I'm sorry that you had to deal with the high JP costs.

Gariland:
I'm planning on adjusting all types of the evasion for the next release.  As for the low hit chance of Cry for Help (that Quick ability), it's intended.

Mandalia:
Bows are going to be nerfed damage-wise, but due to all of the other changes that will be happening for the next release, I don't think that I should touch this battle.  I appreciate you identifying that little "trap" I threw in there; I tried to make things a bit more interesting due to the battle itself being the final Trainee-only encounter.

Sweegy:
Goblins will be nerfed.  As for the Skeleton family, they're staying the way that they are due to their innate Undead status.  In my patch, there are plenty of counters for Undead, so I had to beef them up.  I changed the base critical chance rate to 15%.  I never intended for Goblins to be as deadly as they currently are, but then again, I wasn't very careful with considering the lower levels of my patch.

Dorter I:
Yeah, I know, you were probably expecting a new level of Hell for this one, but I still wanted to have some Trainees kicking around and since bows were so effective... yeah.  Lol.  The damage nerfs will make crossbows function similarly to how they used to in vanilla.

Sand Rats:
After the fixes, this battle should still provide a moderate amount of difficulty and a lot less headache.

Miluda I:
I'm going to try some new formulas for the Mystic damage abilities, but with the way they currently are, I may just scrap the job and replace it with something else.  Stentors and other low-Speed units will have their Speed boosted by two or three points, and every other job will change accordingly for balance's sake.

Training:
I didn't want for random battles to be a cakewalk any longer, but really, Goblins dealing as much damage as they do will be a simple fix.  Cats are meant to be weak, but their main attack will be beefed up a little bit.  They have no elemental weaknesses and walk around with innate Treasure Hunter, so they're not really meant to be a viable damage choice; just support, I'm afraid.  Also, tier 1 cats have a "reliable" (questionable now, due to the new formulas I'm using) resurrection ability.

Miluda II:
Yeah, that new formula will be used for sure; it definitely looks a whole lot better than the crappy old one I had to use... I just didn't expect for it to bug-up like that.  Most of this mission will remain the same, as it is an assassination mission (you only have to KO one unit, so regular generics will be more powerful than normal).


With all ability, item and job descriptions, I tried to include as much information as I possibly could whilst retaining a new look and watching how much space I use in FFTacText.  Chimp mentioned that I should incorporate some "flavour" text (lore on weapons, etc.), but there really wasn't ANY room left for that kind of stuff.

For the abilities, I think most of my problem stems from me trying to use every ability slot possible and staying away from accidentally duplicating abilities.  Unfortunately, I lost sight on a bigger problem.  However, my most troubling concern are the zodiac signs.  The hit chances vary way too much when the compat is either bad or good, and much more so when it's worst or best.  So, I may just make everybody share the same zodiac sign until a more useful fix is implemented.

Thanks again for sinking as much time as you did into my patch and conducting a thorough analysis on the things that need to be changed the most.  I hope that you at least had some fun blasting enemies away with Pyromania (one spell that probably won't change too much, since it is the only Psionic damage option)!
Now your blood travels through the veins of our history
It bursts forth in boiling black clouds from the wrists of kings