Final Fantasy Hacktics

Quote from: Bonesy on December 11, 2022, 11:16:57 pmGrats on the trailer. Do you have any plans to make more information available besides the Update Posts and whatever's on the Discord?

I think I will likely also be posting the updates as Twitter threads in the future, as well having some updates that are in video form on the youtube channel. I'm open to hearing suggestions though! I really did not know the project would have so many eyes on it and so I'm a smidge underprepared haha

There is definitely a crossing of wires happening when you patch your attack.out and tactext stuff if you're getting entries like Kthgt! I would recommend keeping your TacText changes saved in a separate .tactext file and always opening that rather than ever opening from a patched image. You will also have to repatch your text every time you make attack.out changes since it contains some text like job names and the like (and I have a feeling you aren't re-ripping your attack.out to make edits to it every time you do text modifications)

I've never heard of a bug like this before! What I would recommend is patching your story modifications on to a fresh image to see if the problem persists (then you know that stuff is the culprit).

Though, I find this very unlikely. I assume you've also made changes with FFTacText and/or the Attack.Out editor, either of these is more likely in my mind. In those cases I'd recommend doing the same as I said above but for those, then you can isolate the problem and work from there

TACTICS COMBO

Tactics Combo is the name of the skillset of the Hero job class, unique to the main character, Maine. Tactics Combo allows you to perform multiple actions in a single turn by working your way up Combo Levels. A combo can be a maximum of 3 actions, but can be stopped early when you need them to. Being able to choose from and use multiple skills in one turn by following certain conditions makes Maine a very interesting character to play from a strategic standpoint.


The description for the ability Light Spear, a level 1 combo skill

How does it work?
At each stage of the combo you can only select learned skills from the Tactics Combo set that are available at the level of combo you are currently in. Light Spear, Sonic Thrust, and Nova are the 3 skills available at Combo Level 1. You are at Combo Level 1 when you begin your turn, and any skill used in the Tactics Combo skillset will advance that level by 1. At combo level 2 and 3, the abilities available to you in the selection menu will change to the appropriate skills. Your combo will end after level 3 or if another Act selection outside of Tactics Combo is made.


The abilities you have available to you at Combo Level 2

What if I want to perform actions outside of the Tactics Combo skillset?
You can Move before, during, or after your combo begins. Using Attack or an ability from another skillset will end your combo and your turn will continue as normal. Using Wait will end your turn as normal. Wait-ing in the middle of a combo allows you to conserve your CT as if you had taken no action! This can be a great way to move up in the turn order while still making a difference on the battlefield.

Will Maine be like 3 times the level of his teammates if he's taking like 3 times as many actions?
No! Skills from Tactics Combo at combo levels 1 and 2 will not cause Maine to gain EXP or JP. This can be used to your advantage and disadvantage, low level challenge runs are common in this game and this is a way to maintain a lower level while still making meaningful actions in battle. Be careful not to end up with a Maine who is a significantly lower level than your party though!


The description for the ability Light Spear Cannon, a level 3 combo skill

So how many skills are we working with here?
In the chapter 1 release there will be 9 skills in the Tactics Combo skillset! But Maine is the main character of our story, and like Ramza I anticipate that he will gain more skills as the story moves forward.

I'm a FFT modder as well and I don't understand how you did this
I'm taking the opportunity to speak a little on how this was implemented, and I will for all updates where there is something of note to say about it! If you want to get into the real nitty gritty, feel free to chat with me in this topic here or on the Discord channel.
There is an ASM that I built that repurposes some flags from the FFTPatcher that allow me to note what level of combo the skill is. There is an extra check that was added to the decision of what abilities are shown in the skillset menu in battle, and in some very specific moments the game is overwriting key battle stats for the unit after combo skill uses that allow them to continue performing actions after using one (particularly 0x0186/0187/0188, Currently Units Turn, Movement Taken, and Action Taken respectively). A little deviation is taken for these abilities results as well, seeing an action as "missed" rather than "successful" or "successful and killed" prevents EXP/JP gain effectively (even if the action did succeed in hitting or scoring a KO!)

Thank you for joining me for Update 1! Next week I will be doing an update about Classic Mode as voted on by the FFH Discord!

Bug Fixes
When I fix some major bugs, I'll report them here! I hope you get a kick out of seeing the peek behind the curtain (and help motivate me to fix bugs pls)
Chapter 1 Bugs / Adjustments INDEX:
Naked Serensward Squire
Blood Suck is Tinker
Revert New Poison / Regen
Leviathan Map Fix

Old - Pre Chapter 1 release
Until the release of chapter 1 of the mod, I will be trying to post weekly updates about the project and its progress.

This first post will link to the various replies that I will make in this topic concerning each of the updates. Feel free to respond to them and discuss them here, or on the FFH Discord channel in #reach-the-future!

INDEX:
Update 1: Tactics Combo In-Depth Explanation
Update 2: Classic Mode Sneak Peek

    

Quote from: kerryrhema on November 30, 2022, 10:56:30 pmPerhaps there is a behind the scenes different game ID for FFT TLW and as such a different text file name is required?

I believe it is TLW2 instead of SCUS at the beginning of the name!

Hey Eldrethor, I tried recreating your issue to the best of my ability (though I was not building on a TLW base) but was unable to! Setting 0Cf's animation to 07 00 00 and then having the settings I have in the picture I've attached made my unit do a weapon strike. Maybe try matching some of these flags one at a time on yours until you see what makes the change? Or maybe double check everything you have set, it's possible that you thought you made a change that you didn't actually patch.

Every battle should be listed in the ENTD section of the FFTPatcher, if you're having trouble finding some you can ask and hopefully someone will answer in a timely fashion. They should all be labelled properly.

Which ENTD's are you having trouble finding? The Deep Dungeon one's on the PSP are labelled pretty well as far as I can tell.

Switchback, Palings, Oubliette, Catacombs, Hollow, Stair and Crevasse are entries 0E0 -> 0FC
Voyage is 0D5 -> 0D8
Interstice 0C9 -> 0CC
Terminus 0B1 -> 0B4

They do seem a little unorganized but that is just how they are stored in the game!

Quote from: Ramza108 on October 16, 2022, 07:45:05 amHello!  FFT is one of the best games EVER and I'm ecstatic at the thought of playing The Lion War hack with all of its cool features. 

I have a problem though.  I am a mac user and I'm not sure of any legitimate way to patch load this file with the psx copy.  It appears there are few options for patching the file reliably...  Are there any resources that might prove helpful here?  Thanks for all your hard work!

Hey! The Lion War can be applied to a vanilla image of FFT using a program like PPF-O-Matic (not in the FFTPatcher Suite), but I'm not sure it will work on a mac. There are online options though, trying searching for and using Rom Patcher JS. Good luck!

The sound desync and the effects playing at unusual speeds (either too slow or too fast to compensate) is normal for the android and PSP versions. Only the PSX (PS1) version has everything as it should be in terms of speed.

This isn't something that's been tackled by anyone unfortunately! Unique units have always maintained their appearance, and you would need a fairly in depth ASM hack for something like this, and more Unit and Wldface space if you wanted unique units to have their own versions of each generic sprite

I'm glad your initial issue was resolved!

Quote from: ActionMan000 on August 13, 2022, 04:38:10 pmIn TacText, I wanted to use the word "Thunderous" in one of my abilities, but the "Th" doesn't show up with the Ability name in the Roster screen. There are spaces to indicate something should be there, but the letters aren't showing up. I'm not sure what causes that.

TacText will often squeeze together common letter pairings like 'Th' and save them as a single character to save space, so it sounds like a problem with that! I would recommend joining the FFH Discord and asking Glain about it, he is the one that is currently maintaining the FFTPatcher Suite for us (and we're very lucky to have him!).

My only guess as to the fix would be to make sure you are patching the text last? Maybe you're overwriting some font data somewhere with an ASM hack or some other import.

For names not appearing in certain places I would recommend two things,
1. Ensure you are using the latest FFTPatcher suite, the latest version is .494 https://ffhacktics.com/smf/index.php?topic=7163.0

2. If the problem persists, I would recommend download the FFText Editor spreadsheet. Make your edits there, export the TacText file (Add-ins -> export .fftext), open it in the latest FFTacText (selecting no to open missing files from ISO), then apply. With this method make sure that you unselect 'Export Card.out 2' in the FFText Editor settings tabs.

If you are still having problems after that, there is something else going on!

For the skillsets having mastered abilities, it kind of sounds to me like you may be setting their skillsets in their ENTD entries, and maybe not in their Job's skillset field? Make sure the Job has the skillset set in the Jobs tab of FFTP, and that when those guys join that they have their primary skillsets set to FF <Job's>. The reason I think this may be the case is when a unit is assigned a skillset that is not their base job or a generic skillset, the game makes all the skills be autolearned.

Quote from: CONMAN on July 13, 2022, 08:59:39 pmI believe ArmoredKori made a map with several states for Jumza with many changing heights.

He sure did! I'm not sure how much it changed the file size, but it was done with only UV animations (tiles changing to transparent after a few frames) that then revealed to another set of tiles underneath, and I changed the Terrain of the map using event instructions in the mid battle events (Load and SaveTileData)!!

CONMAN those snow maps are honestly gorgeous! Thank you for posting them! I know I personally would love to use them in the future.

I know you've mentioned not liking the throne room in the past, but it's a really cool concept! And I don't think it would need much to look super polished, you should be proud of it

In something like the Inflict Statuses tab, you've pressed on something under one of the entries that says (for example) In use by X items/abilities: (ability / item using it). Clicking on the X, which is the number of things that use it will highlight those entries in yellow on the list. It doesn't effect anything other than showing you those entries in yellow!

Please post here the Unit and wldface images you're trying to import! I'll double check to see if they are the proper format for importing

If anyone wants an example of what kind of info that Kori is looking for, and of his remarkable talent as a map maker, here is a map (and its fun gimmick) that was made for me and my upcoming mod, FFT: Reach The Future!

The Concept
I approached Kori with this concept: A 9 sliced arena surrounded by water, where the platforms can switch between being up (starting position), and falling down into the water (dropping in the units below). I wanted it to be shrine-like, very clean and having kind of a mystical feeling, appropriate for the battle I had planned happening there. I knew that the main mechanic of the map I could handle on the eventing side (dropping units into water dynamically during a fight), so I just needed a map that would allow me to do it!

The Reference
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FlF7vzEurLg
I used to play Genshin Impact, and the idea for the arena that I wanted to create was 100% based on the Oceanid boss fight from the game. I showed this to Kori, and of course being the excellent game designer he is, he decided to iterate on the design a bit and refine it to work better with FFT. The platforms would be lower in the corners, raising in height towards the center, and there would be steps on some of the sides leading up.
FFT's Leviathan
This map is intended to be a shrine to Leviathan, essentially the summon from Tactics, so I wanted there to be some kind of water serpent iconography to really send that home. I think what we landed on was adding in the image of Leviathan from Revenant Wings? It worked, and looked great!

The End Result
You can see Kori's stream-work process in the videos on his youtube channel here!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VbF1pjFNiG0 (Part 1)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=34Gd733HqE0 (Part 2)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ocOSy8NuMYc (Part 3)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j-513sgpGqQ (Part 4)

It turned out looking great, and the in game events and battle for it turned out just as I imagined them! I will update this post with evidence of that once I release my mod to the public, for now, just trust me

Thank you Kori for making this map for me, it's always a pleasure working with you