• Welcome to Final Fantasy Hacktics. Please login or sign up.
 

R/S/M Ability Effects

Started by Pickle Girl Fanboy, March 11, 2011, 12:15:16 pm

Pickle Girl Fanboy

March 11, 2011, 12:15:16 pm Last Edit: March 22, 2011, 11:25:47 am by Pickle Girl Fanboy
All info in spoiler is now in the attached *.txt, but I'm keeping it just so the quotes make sense and have a context.

Reaction Abilities

-Bonus Reactions
*A Save
*MA Save
*Speed Save
*Sunken State
*Caution
*Dragon Spirit
*Regenerator
*Brave Up
*Face Up
*MP Restore
*HP Restore
*Critical Quick

-Counter Reactions
*Meatbone Slash
*Counter Magic
*Counter Tackle
*Counter Flood
*Absorb Used MP
*Gilgame Heart
*Reflect (does nothing)
*Auto Potion
*Counter
*(nothing) (0x1BB)
*Distribute
*MP Switch
*Damage Split

-Evasion Reactions
*Weapon Guard
*Finger Guard
*Abandon
*Catch
*Blade Grasp
*Arrow Guard
*Hamedo


Reaction Abilities Assessment

-Bonus Reactions
*A Save.  Should increase PA by 1 to 3 depending how much HP damage you took.
*MA Save.  Should increase MA by 1 to 3 depending how much HP damage you took.
*Speed Save.  Should increase Speed by 1 to 3 depending how much HP damage you took.
*Sunken State.  Abusable but otherwise useless.  Just give us Auto-Haste, or add haste when you take HP damage.
*Caution.  Not very useful.  Another Auto-(buff) could be cool, or you can go with one of Razele's ideas.  Personally, I like an ability that reduces the enemy's Faith by 3 to 9 when you take Magic Damage.
*Dragon Spirit.  Useful if a unit can heal itself when it revives.  I can't think of anything better.
*Regenerator.  Sort of useful with a defensive set-up.  Auto-Regen is better.
*Brave Up.  Should increase Brave by 3 to 9 depending on how much HP damage you took.
*Face Up.  Should increase Faith by 3 to 9 depending on how much HP damage you took.
*MP Restore.  Useless.  Your mages will die before they hit critical.  This should restore MP in the amount of HP damage taken.
*HP Restore.  Somewhat broken, especially for high maximum HP units with defensive supports and statuses.  I can't think of any ways to make it subtler.
*Critical Quick.  Abusable, but useless when playing fair or when your AI is stupid.  An ability that increments your CT by 10 to 30 depending on how much HP damage you take is cooler.  This plus Flee or Blood Lust will make you think twice before attacking a distant enemy.

-Counter Reactions
*Meatbone Slash.  When an attack causes Critical, the unit damages it's attacker in the amount of it's (the unit doing the reaction) maximum HP.  Not often useful.  I think it should become Reflect Damage, from Vagrant Story, "Reflects 40% of damage, does not reduce damage received, works versus all HP damage attacks," except that it should return some other portion of the damage received, like maybe Brave/100%.  This is Damage Split's offensive-minded cousin.
*Counter Magic. Fine as is, but there aren't too many mages in most battles.  Could use Absorb MP's effect.
*Counter Tackle.  I can't think of anything, except I think this counters with whatever ability is in Dash's position.  If it does, then this is already modifiable, though it might be less painful to allow the modders to specify which ability they want to counter with.
*Counter Flood.  Fine.
*Absorb Used MP.  Useless, needs to be bundled with Counter Magic to make both of them useful, or it should work like Celes's Runic in FF6 and prevent a spell from landing along with absorbing it's MP.  Hell, why not do both, we need more Magic reactions anyways, right?
*Gilgame Heart.  Utterly useless.  Could be useful if bundled with Catch and a bunch of other useless abilities, but Catch belongs with Arrow Guard.
*Reflect.  It's supposed to add reflect when a unit is hit with a magic spell, but it does nothing.  I think it is better as Always: Reflect, AKA Auto-Reflect.
*Auto Potion.  Needs to be modifiable so anyone can decide what type of potion it uses.
*Counter.  Fine.
*(nothing) (0x1BB).  Return any negative statuses inflicted on yourself onto their caster, without removing them yourself?
*Distribute.  Rarely useful in Vanilla, due to it's rarity and stupid AI.  I withhold judgment until I see, say, a Chocobo with Distribute.
*MP Switch.  Broken when used with Move MP Up.  If someone fixes it so deals damage to HP once an attack reduces a unit's MP to zero, then it will be fine.
*Damage Split.  Very useful for units with high maximum HP, and in conjunction with Defense Up and Magic Defense Up and Regen.

-Evasion Reactions
*Weapon Guard.  It's effect is Add Weapon Evasion To Total Physical Evasion At Front And Sides.  It's fine as it is, except that Barehanded units should have a formula for calculating weapon evasion.  I recommend PA*2 or PA+Speed, perhaps multiplied by (Current HP / Max HP) or ((MaxHP-CurHP)/MaxHP) so it triggers more often the higher or lower a barehanded unit's HP.
*Finger Guard.  There should be a flag that marks an ability as finger-guardable, if we're retaining it's status as an anti-talk Evasion Reaction.  It would be really handy if this was the Talk Skill flag (is there a Talk Skill flag?  I don't remember.)
*Abandon.  Fine as it is.  It's effect is All Evasion Percentages Doubled.  I think it also doubles Magic Evasion too.
--Fun Fact: the Defending Status temporarily causes the same All Evasion Percentages Doubled effect as Abandon.
*Catch.  With it, you catch items thrown at you and add them to your inventory.  I think it applies to both Throw and Item, so it can help you or hurt you.  It's effect should be bundled with a less useful Evasion Reaction, like Arrow Guard, and it's ability slot should be removed for something else, like maybe something to switch places with an enemy when it deals HP damage to you.
*Blade Grasp.  Evade attacks marked as Counter-graspable at a unit's Brave/100.  Way, way overpowered.  There are several fixes for this, but everyone has their own idea, so whatever weapons it blocks should be modifiable through FFTPatcher.
*Arrow Guard.  It blocks arrows, enough said.  It can use Catch's effect, along with the ability to block Guns along with Bows and Crossbows.
*Hamedo.  Preempt an enemies attack with one of your own.  I have no idea what to do with it, but I don't like any of the proposed solutions.  Maybe the attack portion of Hamedo should be half or a third as strong.


Support Abilities

Equip Armor
Equip Shield
Equip Sword
Equip Katana
Equip Crossbow
Equip Spear
Equip Axe
Equip Gun

Half of MP
Gained JP-UP
Gained EXP-UP
Attack UP
Defense UP
Magic Att. UP
Magic Def. UP
Concentrate

Train
Secret Hunt
Martial Arts
Monster Talk
Throw Item
Maintenance
Two Hands
Two Swords

Monster Skill
Defend
Equip Change
(nothing) (0x1E1)

Short Charge
Non-charge


Support Abilities Assessment

-Equipment supports
Equip Armor
Equip Shield
Equip Sword
Equip Katana
Equip Crossbow
Equip Spear
Equip Axe
Equip Gun

Half of MP
Gained JP-UP
Gained EXP-UP
Attack UP
Defense UP
Magic Att. UP
Magic Def. UP
Concentrate

Train
Secret Hunt
Martial Arts
Monster Talk
Throw Item
Maintenance
Two Hands
Two Swords

Monster Skill
Defend
Equip Change
(nothing) (0x1E1)

Short Charge
Non-charge


Movement Abilities

*Move +1
*Move +2
*Move +3
*Jump +1
*Jump +2
*Jump +3
*Ignore Height (Unit can jump to any vertical height, regardless of Jump stat.  Has no effect on Lancer's Jump command.)
*Move-HP Up (Unit recovers (Max HP / 10) per panel moved, unless afflicted with Berserk, Confusion, or Blood Suck status.) (Check Status Effect flags.)
*Move-MP Up (Unit recovers (Max MP / 10) per panel moved, unless afflicted with Berserk, Confusion, or Blood Suck status.) (Check Status Effect flags.)
*Move-Get Exp (Unit gains 1 Exp. per panel moved, unless afflicted with Berserk, Confusion, or Blood Suck status.) (Check Status Effect flags.)
*Move-Get Jp (Unit gains 2 JP per panel moved, unless afflicted with Berserk, Confusion, or Blood Suck status.) (Check Status Effect flags.)
*Cannot enter water (Cannot move or stop on water panels.)
*Teleport (Unit can move from one panel to another unoccupied/non-obstacle/movement-allowable panel regardless of anything between these two panels.  Chance of success is 100% within Move range and decreases 10% per panel out of that range.) (What I mean by movement-allowable is that units that Cannot Enter Water can't teleport to water panels.)
*Teleport 2 (Unit can move from one panel to another unoccupied/non-obstacle/movement-allowable panel regardless of anything between these two panels.  Chance of success is 100%) (What I mean by movement-allowable is that units that Cannot Enter Water can't teleport to water panels.
*Any Weather (Removes 2x Move penalty when moving through marsh panels when it's raining.  Also nullifies weather-related elemental bonuses if the caster has this ability equipped, which can be good or bad, but is mostly bad - this is not a defensive ability.)
*Any Ground (Removes 2x Move penalty when moving through flowing water.)
*Move in Water (Unit can move and stop on surface of water; water is treated like normal ground.)
*Walk on Water (Ignore water depth; all water is treated like it is 1h deep, regardless of actual depth.)
*Move on Lava (Unit can move and stop on lava; lava is treated as normal ground.)
*Move Underwater (Unit can move and stop in water up to 3h deep without penalty.  Do not know if unit can also act.)
*Float (Unit floats 1h above the ground.  Unit can move and stop over lava squares.  I don't know if it allows you to move and stop over water squares if Cannot Enter Water is also equipped.)
*Fly (Fly over all height differences, enemies, and obstacles.  Also nullifies fall damage.)
*Silent Walk (Unit will not trigger traps?  Unit starts battle with Transparent status?) (Investigate.)
*Move-Find Item (Unit can extract hidden items from booby-trapped panels without triggering the traps unless item is already gone.)
(nothing) (0x1FE)
(nothing) (0x1FF)


Movement Abilities Assessments

-Move Through Obstacles Abilities
*We need Teleport for monsters.  Teleport 2 is debatable, because nearly the same effect can be achieved by giving a unit Teleport and a move of 9, unless the animation is different.  If there is not animation difference, Teleport 2 could be better off as a human support or movement ability similar in use to Defend and Equip Change, as per the conventional wisdom.  If you do follow this path, then Teleport should remain a Movement ability.  The precedent is set by Reaction-Support Hybrids like Weapon Guard and Abandon, and it would kind of suck if your mages had to sacrifice Half MP or Short Charge for Teleport.
*Fly is needed for Flying monsters.
*Ignore Height can be removed.  I like it's effect though, which could be interesting if modified so it allows infinite horizontal jumping.  This effect will fit well with one of Razele's proposed Supports or Movements; perhaps Flee, a Movement ability which increases movement as a unit's HP drops.  Infinite vertical jumping could be triggered in Flee when a unit is critical.  An offensive Movement ability that uses this same effect could also be intersting, one for Ninja or Lancer maybe.  Razele's Blood Lust, which boosts Move when enemies with low HP are near, or when an enemy is Critical anywhere on the battlefield.
*NOTE: One effect that FFT lacks is the ability to move through enemies as if they were allies.  This effect alone does not warrant an ability, but it must be bundled with other effects.  Flee is a good candidate, along with the unnamed offensive Movement ability for Ninja or Lancer.
*The suggestions above would leave humans with only one option for moving through obstacles: Teleport rebuilt like Defend and Equip Change.  There would still be several combinations that allow increased movement in specific tactical situations, but there will be no redundancy or obsolescence left in this set of Movement abilities.

-Float
*Float is needed by some Monsters.  It should have Fly's Negate Fall Damage effect, if it doesn't already.  And considering it allows a unit to move through and stop on Lava, we can remove Move On Lava and bundle Move On Lava's effect into another ability.

-Terrain Abilities
*Any Weather has two effects, neither of which warrants a Movement ability.  The first effect, Negate Marsh/Rain Move Penalty, is better off bundled with the Negate Flowing Water Penalty effect of Any Ground.  The second effect deserves a paragraph of it's own.
*The Negate Weather-Related Elemental Bonuses effect of Any Weather affects the person who has it equipped when they cast spells.  If we had more weather effects which reduce elemental damage (or if a variety of elemental attacks weren't available to any class that has elemental attacks), this would be useful, but right now it hurts more than it helps.  There are 3 things you can do with it:
1. Create more weather effects and make them available on more battlefields.  Sandstorm (reduce Wind, improve Earth), Windstorm (improve Wind, reduce Earth), Heat Wave or Drought (improve Fire, Reduce Water and Ice), Shadow or Midnight or Darkness or Unhallowed Ground or Evil Aspect  - (improve Dark, reduce Holy), Dawn or Noon or Aura or Holy Ground (reduce Dark, improve Holy).
2. Reduce the variety of elemental spells available to specific classes, spread the elements out among more classes.
3. Make Negate Weather-Related Elemental Bonuses into a defensive ability - make it affect the unit who has it equipped when that unit is targeted by a spell, not when that unit casts a spell.
4. Semi-related: make Weather-Related Elemental Bonuses affect all abilities.  I think they currently only affect Magical abilities.
*Any Ground is useless.  It's Negate Flowing Water Move Penalty effect is only slightly useful on a handful of maps.  Combined with the Negate Marsh/Rain Move Penalty effect, Any Ground is almost useful.  I suggest you remove Any Ground and bundle it's effect with another ability.
*Move On Lava's should be removed and it's effect bundled with another ability, or perhaps an item.  It's difficult to decide what ability or effect to bundle it with, because all other similar abilities deal with water.  It could be useful with an effect that prevents traps from triggering and with the Find Buried Item effect, if only because they're both rarely useful except very specific and unpredictable circumstances.  Or you could make Move on Lava grant bonuses like when a unit stands on Lava - an Ifrit is a likely candidate.

--Water Terrain abilities
*Move in Water is mis-named.  It's effect, which allows you to move and stop on the surface of water, as if it's normal ground, should be called Walk On Water.  Whatever you call it, this ability is useful for both humans and monsters, and it requires no additional effects, unless I'm mistaken in my belief that it ignores the Flowing Water Penalty and the Marsh/Rain Penalty.
*Walk on Water is also mis-named.  It's effect - ignore water depth; treat all water like it is 1h deep regardless of actual depth - isn't nearly as useful as Move in Water, so it should include Negate Marsh/Rain Move Penalty and Negate Flowing Water Move Penalty.  It shouldn't be removed, because it's useful for monsters and humans, and will be more so if these effects are added to it.
*Move Underwater, which allows a unit to move and stop in 3h deep water without penalty, is the most useless ability in the game.  There is only one battlefield with 3h water - the battle at Bethla Sluice - and if you have time to go pearl diving then you've already won the battle.  Unless someone makes 95% water battlefields with 3h deep water mazes, this ability is completely useless.  It should be retained, and it's effect bundled with Walk on Water.
*Cannot enter water should be retained, though it's a shame that you must waste an entire inherent ability slot to use it.

-Move + and Jump + Abilities
*Razele has many good ideas here, so I will not discuss these abilities until I have better ideas.
*A common thread runs through Razele's ideas.  He believes that these abilities should grant bonuses to Move depending on the circumstances of the battle.  He also believes there should only be one ability that boosts Jump, and that ability also should boost Move depending on a unit's elevation.

-Others
*Silent Walk has two effects, I think.  The first effect, Starting Status:Transparent, can be discarded.  The second effect, Do Not Trigger Trap Panels, which I'm not sure if it's really here, is better off with Move Find Item.
*Move Find Item.  You need it for treasure hunting, but holy crap does it hurt to waste a slot on it.  Bundle some other effects here - like Do Not Trigger Trap Panels, Move on Lava (maybe), and some other turds - and it can be useful in normal battles.
*Move Get HP.  Somewhat useful, much more so for units with high maximum HP.  Keep it.
*Move Get MP.  It's broken until someone makes MP Switch deal damage to HP once an attack reduces a unit's MP to zero.  You should still keep it.
*Move EXP Up, move this effect to Move Find Item, if only to make Move Find Item suck less in normal battle.  It will also make path-hunting in the Deep Dungeon more productive.
*Move JP Up.  Move it to Move Find Item.


All facts taken from the Battle Mechanics Guide.

My thoughts

I will try to make every ability useful within the framework of Vanilla FFT.  Nevertheless, there are many things not present in FFT which are good ideas.  Water-units, with abilities that grant bonuses in water, for instance, are missing from FFT.

If you want organize this the same way you reorganized formulas, then the first thing you should do is decide what effects you want each R/S/M ability to grant, and then softcode (unhardcode) them so they can be toggled to any R/S/M slot.  This will require a bit of modification of FFTPatcher because, to my knowledge, there aren't enough flags currently available for modification in FFTPatcher - they must be turned on and off by manually, by hex editor.  This, and the lack of HP/MP modification for Shields should be a priority.  Every part of all blocks of data currently known should be editable in FFTPatcher, whether or not we know what they are.

I don't think that level of modifiability is needed for most patches, but since I'm not doing any of the work, do what you think is best.

RavenOfRazgriz

ALMA allows for adding HP and MP to Shields, Weapons, etc. along with some basic manipulation of Support Abilities.  Pokeytax also already found the code to modify to manipulate where R/S/M can be equipped and such.

FDC's Formula Hack, when completed, will be relocated a lot of flags between boxes in FFTPatcher to allow you to have a pretty solid amount of customization with Reaction Triggers.  There's a drop down in FFTPatcher that's supposed to allow you to toggle things to any R/S/M slot... but as far as I know, it currently doesn't work.

As for your propositions, I disagree with a large number, but I'll work from a coding perspective instead of a design one.  Having X-Save skills modify value based on damage would be doable, but you'd need to set HP bounds and perform a loop to get the value, etc.  You can already modify these with very basic hex editing that possibly could be incorporated into FFTPatcher in the form of drop menus.  In fact, one of Pokeytax's older hacks allows for pretty fluid modding of all the X-Save abilities, though the boost values themselves remain constant.  Auto-X R/S/M are also easily doable by using ALMA then disabling the R/S/M's actual code if you want them, the latter being one of the things Pokeytax is working on.  FDC's working on MP Switch allowing overflow damage and on a Return Status Reaction.

Reflect... is actually not in any way intended to interact with the Reflect status.  The code for it that exists is actually similar to Counter Magic - in fact, like a Magic Hamedo, ignoring their spell and sending it back at them.  Square likely stopped coding it when realizing both how retarded this is and how Counter Magic already fills almost the exact same role without being dumb.  Though, if you want Auto-Reflect, pop on some ALMA.

Finger Guard - FDC's Formula Hack will be including a Talk Skill flag, though in the final version it won't be compatible with MultiHit, Draw Out, Geomancy, and a couple other random things for technical reasons not related to those skills' current hardcoding.

It's hard to comment on your Movement stuff because you constantly bring up things like FFMaster's Flee that are themselves questionable.  Though, Ignore Height and Teleport 2 can technically be tossed since you can easily just give units that use those incredible Move and Jump.  Your thought with Walk on Water is essentially what I'm doing to it, dumping Any Ground and Any Weather on it (for the most part), creating a single ability that's essentially Float without the Floating.

Really, unless you want to make all Movement abilities incredibly situational and based on the current battle (meh), they're very niche, which is why I switched to a double Support structure a long time ago, because I hate situational garbage.

The Damned

March 12, 2011, 02:11:28 am #2 Last Edit: March 12, 2011, 05:52:48 pm by The Damned
(Damn. I wanted to be the first respond, but I just had to go for that walk, to the bank and then get distracted by Syfy and Predator: The Musical. Sadface.)

While it's...noble to want to make everything useful and I'm sure is something that most of us have considered at least few times, some things just have to die for one reason or another, whether its due to being overpowered POS that can't be "fixed" for generics or just being too weak.

Let's look at your suggestions--I must admit that I'm surprised you didn't do any comments for the supports given that some of them are clearly overpowered:

1. X-Save: MA-Save, (P)A-Save and Speed Save are quite powerful as they are; Speed Save is quite overpowered as it is. Your suggested changes to all three makes them even more able to be abused. Hell, your suggested change to Speed Save possibly adding 2 or 3 speed is broken. Your solution to Critical Quick is the current (necessary) solution to Speed Save, actually.

2. Sunken State and Caution: I don't think they're quite as useless as you say they are. They just don't matter much when 2HKO and OHKOing units is so easy as it is like a lot of these skills.

3. Dragon Spirit: I'd argue that it's overpowered since anyone that will use it pretty much will always have healing. Otherwise, people would just use the crutch that is Angel Ring.

4. Regenerator: I'd argue that Auto-Regen would be overpowered, especially in the Reaction ability slot.

5. MP Restore: A "Blood Magic" solution is indeed pretty elegant, though it makes it even more advantageous for spell-casters to whore Equip Armor, which is already the most useful Equip skill.

6. HP Restore: Yeah, it's likely one of those abilities that just has to die. The "critical only Reactions" tend to be troublesome as a whole.

7. Meatbone Slash and Damage Split: Considering that Damage Split is already overpowered, I don't see why you want to make a "Damage Split Lite".

8. Counter Magic and Absorb Used MP: I could see combining them just because Absorb Used MP is kind of useless. A Runic ability seems like it would be a bit much, though, if Hamedo is any example.

9. Counter Tackle: Yeah, what it reacts to is directly tied to Dash's slot. As such, it's the easiest the Reaction ability to change.

10. Gilgame Heart: Yes, I think it's beyond saving since either it's stupidly underpowered or, if you reverse its abilities to have it affect Gil instead of HP, it becomes the most broken reaction in the game, even past MP Switch and Hamedo.

11. Distribute: Then you'll like my Chocobos (maybe).

12. MP Switch: MP Switch is just broken in general. Ethers, Chakra and Move-MP Up just make it worse.

13. Weapon Guard: Here is something else we disagree on. There's no reason that bare-handed units should benefit from Weapon Guard, especially if those barehanded units are Monks. (Bastards.) Weapon breaking/stealing, if you keep it around, should be a valid tactic and it's not like Shields don't exist. If you want to take out things with your bare fists from the get go, then you should have to risk getting your face bashed in more than other units.

14. Finger Guard: There already is a "Talk Skill" flag in a way: formula 2A. Finger Guard reacts to that (and only that) IIRC, which is how I'm trying to buff Finger Guard myself.

15. Abandon: Lol, what? Abandon is pretty stupid as it is, especially since it should be a Support anyway. Its essentially "EVADE UP", where the "UP" is 100% compared to the 25% or 33% that other UP abilities do. It would have to be lowered to 50% and even then that might still be too much.

16. Catch and Arrow Guard: I can see combining Arrow Guard and Catch, though I'm sure some might argue that Arrow Guard already blocks too much (especially if you allow it to block gun shots as well), but given how narrow Catch is.... Having it Catch Items would only help Undead and would otherwise make it more useless to generics.

17. Hamedo: Preempting attacks, even if it didn't "replace" them, would still be overpowered, especially since the AI can't see reactions. So there would still be nothing stopping you from slapping it on a unit and have that unit continually be "bait" by having it perpetually maintain the lowest amount of health, which glass cannons already tend to do.

18. Equip Armor: Perhaps the only Equip skill that comes close to being "overpowered". I've admittedly been somewhat tempted to either get rid of it entirely or have Helms be separate, but the latter doesn't seem to solve very much or make much sense. I think part of the reason it might seem so overpowered compared to the other Equip skills is because it's the only equip skill to allow the equipping of two different equipment pieces and there's a large HP disparity among physical units and magical classes that this becomes a "necessary" solution when you're not forced to use Short Charge for a spell-casting mage.

19. Half of MP: Honestly, I think this needs to reduce by less than half since it's rather silly with some magical abilities, though it might not exactly be overpowered just because spell-casters tend to be underwhelming still without Short Charge or Magic Attack UP. In fact, it only tends to be a problem innately, so maybe it's fine.

20. (Magic) Attack UP and (Magic) Defend UP: I'd argue that they need to increase or decrease damage by the same amount rather than the Defend UP abilities being superior to the Attack UP ones. There are surely some people who would argue this differently, though.

21. Concentrate: Arguably overpowered, at least with innate Martial Arts, Two Swords and/or Two Hands around.

22. Martial Arts: Needs to die a horrible death.

23. Two Hands and Two Swords: Need to not be basically "double your attack damage" supports.

24. Monster Skill: It is completely useless with what we can affect with FFTPatcher, especially with the ARH around now to allow us to make abilities Critical only among other things.

25. Teleport and Teleport 2: We don't need it for monsters, really, since just giving them extremely high move would essentially solve the same thing in almost all cases. (Although that does allow us to make Teleport 2 entirely different now that I realize it....)

26. Ignore Height: Hunh. For some reason, I never really realized here either that giving a unit extremely high Jump would suffice on most maps. Hmm...I suppose I can just kill it entirely since Fly obviates it entirely.

27. Float (movement): As much as I like Float, it's actually not needed on monsters since you just give all of them Innate Float status and there's only one map with freaking Lava on it.

28. Terrain Abilities: Any improvements to these are easier said than done, especially since they involve actual map tile interaction, which is still extremely difficult/tedious, if not impossible,  to affect at present. With ALMA, though Move on Lava can easily become a "Fireeater" ability, though that's more a Support than a Movement.

29. Water Terrain Abilities: Less problematic to affect given that, outside of Move Underwater, they all have uses beyond the name change. With regards to Cannot Enter Water, you can potentially use ALMA to just make sure that the monsters you don't want able to move in water can get an ability that has Cannot Enter Water attached to it. That wouldn't waste an inherent ability slot; you could do the same for Move on Lava, actually.

30. Move +X and Jump +X Abilities: Honestly, besides Move +1, you can probably kill all of these since Move +2 and Move +3 obviate Move +1 completely and both Fly and Ignore Height just murder all the Jump +X abilities. Hell, Jump +1 dies miserable death to Auto-Float as well.

31. Silent Walk and Move-Find Item: IIRC, Move-Find Item already allows you to ignore traps. It's actually not all that bad as it is.

32. Move-Get EXP and Move-Get JP: Eh, I guess I could see combining these with Move-Find Item, though that might actually cause some people to want to use Move-Find Item even less.

Quote from: RavenOfRazgriz on March 11, 2011, 09:17:40 pm
FDC's Formula Hack, when completed, will be relocated a lot of flags between boxes in FFTPatcher to allow you to have a pretty solid amount of customization with Reaction Triggers.  There's a drop down in FFTPatcher that's supposed to allow you to toggle things to any R/S/M slot... but as far as I know, it currently doesn't work.


Yeah, it doesn't work, unfortunately. You can toggle it, but like Ignore Attack, it doesn't change anything at present.

Quote from: RavenOfRazgriz on March 11, 2011, 09:17:40 pmFDC's working on MP Switch allowing overflow damage and on a Return Status Reaction.


That's good to know.

Quote from: RavenOfRazgriz on March 11, 2011, 09:17:40 pmReflect... is actually not in any way intended to interact with the Reflect status.  The code for it that exists is actually similar to Counter Magic - in fact, like a Magic Hamedo, ignoring their spell and sending it back at them.  Square likely stopped coding it when realizing both how retarded this is and how Counter Magic already fills almost the exact same role without being dumb.


Haha! Really? That's what Reflect is supposed to be? Magic Hamedo? Good to see that sometimes even Square can realize something is busted.

Quote from: RavenOfRazgriz on March 11, 2011, 09:17:40 pmFinger Guard - FDC's Formula Hack will be including a Talk Skill flag, though in the final version it won't be compatible with MultiHit, Draw Out, Geomancy, and a couple other random things for technical reasons not related to those skills' current hardcoding.


Also good to know.
"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"

RavenOfRazgriz

Quote from: The Damned on March 12, 2011, 02:11:28 am
(Damn. I wanted to be the first respond, but I just had to go for that walk, to the bank and then get distracted by Syfy and Predator: The Musical. Sadface.)


Well that's how the cookie crumbles, sorry bro.

Though reading this thread again makes me realize I can actually further merge / break down my R/S/Ms despite the fact I still can't even fill the space I have so far... heh.

pokeytax

March 12, 2011, 08:46:37 am #4 Last Edit: March 12, 2011, 11:49:21 am by pokeytax
I'm trying to make abilities moddable to any R/S/M slot when possible, and even moddable to any byte value when possible. I can see value in assigning MFI to, say, Chemists or Monster Talk to Ramza and then scrapping the dedicated slot for something else. I'll go through the supports when fdc is done (although crud like Gained Exp-Up is already done).

The terrain related movement abilities are coded ridiculously though, I know a lot of it is animation but jeez!

How does Counter Tackle work, exactly? Has anyone experimented with changing what's in the Dash slot much? I'm guessing it's limited to targeting that enemy, but if it could be cloned or something that might be a useful way to provide some customization to reactions. I'm not sure what the formula hack will provide to Reactions either.
  • Modding version: PSX

Zaen

Actually, jump +X can be useful. FFM has a formula hack for Jump that makes the jump stat affect it.
"Oh, God!! The Hokuten!!" ~Guard, Sand Rat Cellar

The Damned

*facepalms*

I really need to fucking proofread things.

Quote from: Zaen on March 12, 2011, 10:30:19 am
Actually, jump +X can be useful. FFM has a formula hack for Jump that makes the jump stat affect it.


Eh, I'm aware of its existence, but I'd rather stick with Spears strengthening Jump, personally. Besides, all that does is make Ignore Height even more useless while at the same time meaning that you have to be absolutely use that you don't use the "ghetto" Ignore Height solution since other Jump will start doing absurd damage.

Quote from: pokeytax on March 12, 2011, 08:46:37 amHow does Counter Tackle work, exactly? Has anyone experimented with changing what's in the Dash slot much? I'm guessing it's limited to targeting that enemy, but if it could be cloned or something that might be a useful way to provide some customization to reactions. I'm not sure what the formula hack will provide to Reactions either.


I'm pretty sure it does exactly whatever is in the Dash slot does, but when I messed around with it somewhat extensively like a year ago, it was all just targeting the enemy.

However, I'm certain it doesn't have to target that enemy given Eternal's "Thor's Wrath" reaction in his patch. I was under the impression that it used the Counter Tackle reaction slot, so perhaps it would indeed be quite useful for trying to emulate.

But, hey, I don't know anything about coding still, so I'm probably just rambling again....
"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"

Eternal

It uses whatever's in Dash's slot, and on counter, if the enemy can be targetted by that attack, it'll use it, even if it's not one panel away (to my knowledge).
  • Modding version: PSX & WotL
"You, no less human than we? Ha! Now there's a beastly thought. You've been less than we from the moment your baseborn father fell upon your mother in whatever gutter saw you sired! You've been chattel since you came into the world drenched in common blood!"
  • Discord username: eternal248#1817

formerdeathcorps

March 14, 2011, 08:40:41 am #8 Last Edit: March 14, 2011, 04:09:10 pm by formerdeathcorps
One thing should be noted: hacking R/S/M cannot be separate from the rest of the hack.  If anything, it is the crowning part of any hack since the players will analyze this to great detail.  Hence, you might as well code in some big goals since that's the only way to make a non-arbitrary implementation.

In quotes is my plan below (I intend to merge Movements and Supports):

Quote
A Save (Keep...though limit is 5 or 25%)
M Save (Keep...though limit is 5 or 25%, Fa%)
Speed Save (Keep...though limit is 4 or 25%)
Sunken State (Keep...though Transparent increases base accuracy by 25% for magic and physicals)
Caution (Lowers Brave by 10, only works if BR > 20, Fixed 50%)
Dragon Spirit (Keep, but only if activated by Fa% chance and critical HP)
Regenerator (Keep, Fa%; this will add the empty status, S-Regen which heals HP and MP, but will share Regen's CT timer)
Brave Up (Keep, only because I boosted it to +10, Fixed 50%)
Faith Up (Keep, only because I boosted it to +10, Fixed 50%)
HP Restore (Keep, but I will make this Fa%)
Matra Counter (Replaces MP Restore; switches HP and MP of the user if HP is at critical)
Critical Quick (Keep...change to Fa%)
Bonecrusher (Keep)
Counter Magic (Keep...though beserked mages shouldn't be able to use it, Fa%)
Counter Slash (Overrides Counter Tackle, remade so it'll only activate against attacks hamedo reacts against, but would function like counter at 1.5x damage...will add a 33 CT penalty to this though)
Counter Flood (Keep...though a 20 CT penalty will be added)
Absorb Used MP (Keep...Fa% chance, but allows self-healing)
Faith Down (Replaces Gilgame Heart; lowers faith by 10 when hit by magic, Fixed 50%)
Reflect (Will actually add reflect if hit by magic, Fa%)
Auto Potion (Keep...though there should be a 25 CT penalty)
Counter (Keep...though a 20 CT penalty will be added)
Last Berserk (Overrides blank; if unit is critical, add haste and berserk.)
Distribute (Keep, at Fa% chance, on self-healing as well)
MP Switch (Keep...though I will add a check so that if Damage > curMP, the excess damage goes to HP...otherwise, it's really broken, Fa%)
Damage Split (Keep...though a 10 MP penalty will be added)
Weapon Guard (Keep, but boosted so that C/W-EV works as M-EV too...as for barehanded units getting extra evasion from Weapon Guard...that's unneeded, just give them abandon instead)
Status Guard (Renamed Finger Guard...with customization in my formula hack, Fa%)
Abandon (Rework...have it set C-EV to 60% [recall I'm using Zodiac's global C-EV hack])
Counter Status (Replaces Catch; if unit has any negative status that doesn't disable reactions, Fa% chance to give one to the enemy who physically attacks you.)
Sharihadori (Keep, but nerfed...will block only melee weapons)
Range Guard (Renamed Arrow Guard, but boosted to catch thrown items and block gunshots)
Hamedo (Keep, but add 25 CT penalty and change preemption to first strike)
Equip X (Keep...though I already changed that in my hack so Equip Bow = Equip Crossbow + Bow, Equip Sword = Equip Sword + Knight Sword, Equip Axe = Equip Axe + Flail, Equip Katana = Equip Katana + Ninjato...As for equip armor, I'd rather have armor reduce speed and move [and just have all humans have 4 base move]...a fast swordmaster in armor still will have less HP than a knight while his speed advantage is cut, though likely that would only work if knights started with higher innate SP [which isn't really unreasonable...knights in the medieval era had to be able to move flexibly in armor]...I will renorm axe/flail damage when I rewrite the weapon formulas so Equip Axe/Flail actually wouldn't be a stupid idea...though I probably will delete the ninjato as a distinct weapon type...so I might be able to get an extra support spot out of this)
Half of MP (Keep)
Turbo MP (Replaced Gained JP UP; doubles magic cost and damage for non-status spells that use MA...may be difficult to hack properly)
Blood Magic (Replaced Gained EXP UP; Uses twice the MP cost of a spell in HP in place of MP costs)
XXX UP (Keep)
Concentrate (Keep...most of the people arguing for this being OP tend to also stack innate supports in their hack, or aren't applying hacks that make blind/abandon override it...that or they place way too much a premium on certainty)
Furrer's Art (Merges Secret Hunt/Train since one affects dead monsters and the other affects critical monsters.)
Martial Arts (Keep...do not make it innate on monk, unless you change the fist formula via hacking to PA * Y * Brave / 100)
Authority (Merges Monster Skill/Talk into one skill with 3 effects: A) Allows any talk skill to affect monsters; B) Allows humans riding monsters to use all 4 monster skills as a third skillset [this is the hardest to hack]; C) Makes units immune to critical/knockback...note, my hack will apply SRH and make monsters not even require monster skill to have 4 attacks)
Throw Item (Keep, but also boosts throw range by 2; note that base throw range =  JMP / 2 in my hack, though I intend to make a set of aerodynamic weapons that go farther/hit harder)
Two XXX (Keep...2 Hands is now 1.5x power [this is how I'm remaking Knight Swords], 2 Swords is now at base 75% accuracy)
Pierce (Replaces Secret Hunt; FFM's idea of boosting all damage...by 20% to final damage if the target has any positive status, ignores the effect of Protect/Shell/DEFUP/MADEF/Defender on target)
Guard (Replaces Monster Skill; Reduces all incoming damage...by 20% to final damage if self has any negative status, ignores the effect of Berserk/ATKUP/MATUP/Vehemence on attacker)
Vehemence (Overrides Blank Support 1; Toned down to a 33% boost.)
Equip Change (Gains Maintenance's effect + null stat breaks...if I can think of how, I might implement a pseudo-Paradigm Shift system that lets you change the other Support/Reaction ability of the unit as well...if you then use ALMA to tie skills to supports [or vice-versa] it should be possible to create attacks dependent on having Support X and Reaction Y)
Defender (Replaces Defend [have a Warn skill that adds Defend to all allies in my hack...don't need it]; Cuts damage taken/dealt by 33%.)
Energy Save (Replaces Maintenance; if unit only attacks or only moves, CT is reset to 40.)
Short Charge (Keep...but should include dances...see Charge for more details)
Non-Charge (Keep...cuts power/accuracy in half)
Time Flow (Overrides Blank Support 2; All positive status effects [as well as DS and Dead...this may be harder to hack] last 50% longer.  All negative status effects last 50% shorter.  Status effects that do not end are not affected by this...recall my hack makes poison infinite, S-Regen share Regen's timer, Innocent/Faith share timers, Slow/Haste share timers, DS/Re-Raise share timers, and Astra[Wall]/Curse[Evil Looking] share timers, meaning that 4 extra timers can be added...tentatively these are intended for Confuse/Berserk.)
Infinite Energy (Overrides Blank Support 3; Ignores CT checks for counter abilities...enemy only)
Move +1 (Move +1/Fly)
Move +2 (Move +1/Jump +1/Float)
Move +3 (Move +2/Initial: Transparent)
Jump +1 (Jump +1/Always: Defend [which now reduces enemy base hit to 75%...overriding concentrate])
Jump +2 (Jump +1/Speed +1/Move-Find Item)
Jump +3 (Jump +2/Move on Water/Lava/Any Weather...note, for each point of jump greater than 4, you add 1 range to bows/crossbows; if jump > 5, minimum range = 1)
Move-HP UP (Keep...Move-cancel Poison, Oil, Blind [may be hard to hack])
Move-MP UP (Keep...Move-cancel Addle, Berserk, Undead [may be hard to hack])
Draw Out (Replaces Ignore Height; Allows use of draw out [innate on Swordmaster and Alchemist]; only Alchemists can use without breaking katanas...doing this gives Swordmaster two skillsets)
Charge (Replaces Move-Get EXP; Allows use of charge [innate on Archer]; Archers can use at half CT...doing this gives Archer two skillsets)
Item (Replaces Move-Get JP; Allows use of item [chemist is being deleted]; Alchemists can damage enemies with Potion/Hi-Potion/X-Potion/Ether/Hi-Ether ONLY)
Throw (Replaces Move-Find Item; Allows use of throw [innate on Jugglers and Alchemists]; Jugglers deal 1.5x damage with throw...in short, Alchemist gets 3 skillsets: Draw Out, Item, and Throw)
Jump (Replaces Any Ground; Allows use of jump [innate on Lancers]; Lance users deal 1.5x damage while mounted...doing this gives Lancer gets two skillsets...note Jump is now JMP dependent [CT = 30 / JMP], but takes 25% recoil)
Point Blank (Replaces Walk on Water; Applies only to ranged weapons: under 3 range--1.5x damage)
Spell Forcing (Replaces Move in Water; Proc status/weapon proc at 100%...enemy only)
Soul Trace (Replaces Move on Lava; Xif's idea...multiply final accuracy by 1.25.)
Move-Vitalize (Replaces Move Underwater; Replaces Heals 1/8th of maxHP and maxMP to a unit only if he moves the maximum distance and acts [probably AI only].)
Cannot Enter Water (Keep...only because some monsters have it)
Teleport (Keep...with FFM's hacks of course...I'll probably restrict it to no more than 3 squares beyond base move.)
Teleport II (Keep...enemy only)
Flee (Replaces Float; FFM's idea...should add 3 move though, and activate on critical, frog, chicken, berserk; add ignore height always)
Elemental (Replaces Fly; Allows use of geomancy [innate Geomancer]; boost by the element of the tile's corresponding geomancy...doing this gives Geomancer two skillsets)
Quick Boost (Replaces Silent Walk; difference in effective SP [SP after haste/slow] between attacker and defender determines the counter chance on any Br% reaction where the reaction % is (50 + Diff * 10)% capped at 10 and 90, respectively.  Also, C-EV is replaced by effective SP + 15.....overridden by abandon, of course.  Lastly, effective hit is increased by Diff * 10.)

I'm not replacing the last slot just yet because I'm likely going to code more weather effects into the game (but that's WAY later than my current project)...and doing so would mean retaining Any Weather (which negates weather effects) while removing the effect from Jump +3.  As for what these effects are...
1) Make 3 or 4 weather types: Thunderstorm (adds hail), Sandstorm, Snowstorm, and maybe Umbra.  (Note, ice = water in my hack.)
2) Decouple weather from map and tie it to time of year instead, though certain maps (like Zeakden) should always have one type of weather.
3) Make the gradations of weather actually mean something.  Ditto with time of day.  There are currently 5 in FFT for gradations and 2 times of day (day/night).
1 = Nothing
2 = Light
3 = Medium
4 = Heavy
5 = Super
4) Day should boost fire and holy (1.25x).  Night (permanent status of the DD) should weaken holy and accuracy of all non-magic attacks (not just bows) by 25% while strengthening dark by 25%.  Furthermore, if hackable, I intend to make a Fog of WAr status at night by making all the enemy's stats appear as ??? while not actually having stats over max (and speaking of that...another small hack would be to make it so human units with ??? stats because of the ??? flag can have stats exceeding 999 HP/MP).  Day loses its fire boosts to inclement weather, however.
5) Light anything should just boost wind by 25%.  Medium anything weakens the corresponding element (so Rain/Snow weakens Fire and Sandstorm induces Fog of War [and the corresponding accuracy loss]).  Heavy strengthens the corresponding element (so Thunderstorm boosts lightning, Snowstorm boosts ice, and sandstorm adds a DoT to all units on the map at 1/16th of maxHP, while units with float take 1/8th of maxHP).  Super corresponds to special effects (so Thunderstorm generates hail DoT that deals 1/6th maxHP damage at 50% base chance to each unit, with S-EV allowing evasion to this, while being on a lower elevation tile [meaning there's  tile directly above you] shields you completely from the effect, Snowstorm now causes all passable natural terrain tiles to cost 2 movement to traverse, and sandstorm's DoT intensifies to 1/8th of maxHP, while units with float take 3/16th of maxHP)  Note...these effects do nothing if you're indoors.

I intend to make Brave and Faith double-edged without using Fury.  Namely, base critical rate is BR / 4, base proc rate is FA / 4 + 10, C-EV is base + (55 - BR) / 3, and other evades is normal if BR < 55 and base + (55 - BR) / 3 otherwise.  In short, high brave means recklessness = poor evasion, but higher critical and reaction chance.  High faith = more spell/status procs = easier to take deal magical status/damage.  Note that this tilts the numbers still towards higher Fa and Br, but the risks are now greater.
6) Umbra is a special DD/Lucavi aura.  It doesn't use weather gradations, but is meant to be the evil feeling Ramza gets when he fights the Lucavi.  As such, it distorts the effect of faith and brave so that any deviation from the average is punished...but only on the player's squad.  In short, it takes the minimum between unFa/Fa and unBr/Br whenever the player acts to favor the AI (namely on player reactions, criticals, procs, and Fa/unFa or Fury/unFury healing/positive status for the player, damage/negative status against the AI) and the maximum between unFa/Fa and unBr/Br whenever the Lucavi act to favor themselves (namely on their reactions, criticals, procs, and formulas).  Essentially, the check in the code is on the team of the unit (which is why the DD and Lucavi battles will not contain 3+ sides).
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.

Pickle Girl Fanboy

March 22, 2011, 11:29:00 am #9 Last Edit: May 05, 2011, 05:34:34 pm by Pickle Girl Fanboy
Bump for new stuff, check out the text document.  All the movement abilities that I think are worth keeping are reorganized, and a bunch of new ideas are thrown in.  I'd love some feedback on those ones.

Description of support effects is halfway done, but the ideas for them are almost done.  Ditto reactions.

FWI, there's a lot of tl;dr on my part in this thread.  Beware.

EDIT

More R/S/M ideas, this time from Ogre Battle - March of the Black Queen and Tactics Ogre - the Knight of Lodis.
*Beastmaster
**Add (x) PA to all monsters within (y) squares.
(look up more effects from those games)