Final Fantasy Hacktics

Quote from: reinoe on April 22, 2013, 07:53:57 pmI misspoke when I went on about lowering their power.  I believe you proposed, and the community overall accepted, the notion that Magic Guns should be made "nether guns" so that they can't be abused by Pilgrimage.  And they also won't kick Spellcasters in the nutz

Aye.  The nice thing about the nether formula is that spellcasters can more comfortably increase Fury than decrease Faith to reduce damage.  At the same time, increasing Fury exposes the spellcasters to physical damage.  It's a tradeoff that has not since been considered.  This will also keep the spellguns effective against 40-40 derp teams without elemental or oil protection.

Quote from: CT5Holy on April 22, 2013, 07:21:14 pm
Gaignun: being nitpicky, but your analogy would be more accurate if you said Fei Long or Cammy - Yun got nerfed a while back IIRC.

Yeah, you're right.  The Yun I spoke of was before the 2012 patch.  Turns out they're going to nerf Cammy, too, though!

The current version of magic guns is like Yun in Super Street Fighter 4 Arcade Edition: you can dabble with other characters, but you pick Yun by default if you are serious about winning.  This makes the meta-game too simple: you're either Yun or anti-Yun.

From here, I think it is best if we nerf the big offenders (e.g. magic guns, quickening, hidden knife), and buff many other things (e.g. time magick, ninjutsu, low-tier equipment) so that there is more than one big contender in the meta-game.  In my opinion, the ratio of viable to nonviable equipment and skills in Arena is currently around 1:3.  I would like to make that ratio 3:1.  This is why most of my posts call for buffs.

How straightforward is it to make Transparent cancel the affected unit's P-EV and M-EV?  If Transparent cancels all evasion, then I would be a little more comfortable with letting Hidden Knife stick around.  We could also create new skills that apply Transparent offensively to help take down units that stack EV.

Yeah, so that a dancer would not be performing Nameless Dance when the opposing party gets its next turn, allowing the opposing party to cleanse ailments.

Making Dance like Lore surely would make the AI less stupid about cleansing status ailments.  There's nothing like going into battle with Eye Drops and Esuna only to witness your AI refuse to cleanse Blind because an enemy dancer won't stop dancing.  I support the motion to make Dance like Lore.

On the subject of Blind, I think it is time we give Blind (and, by extension, Silence) a CT.   The AI refuses to cleanse Blind even at the best of times since its decision-making process is insensitive to hit rates.  If Orochimaru Fang is implemented (12 WP Ninjatou that inflicts Blind at 50%), then melee builds without Angel Rings are going to be nonviable in a tournament setting.

I spend 15~30 minutes per team by playing around with the team design tool.  Each team attempts to exploit a particular skill or skill set.  Most teams fail.  If I cannot find a way to exploit a particular skill well (e.g. Demi, Solution, Heretic), I usually complain about it in the balance thread.

The exception is before tournaments, when I spend hours playtesting teams, trying to find the most broken combinations possible.

Poison is good at forcing the opposing team to reapply Regen.  It's also a fallback spell if the opposing team is using White Robes and Thief Hats.  It's pretty weak, but it has a purpose.

We could replace Poison with Oil (and change Fire's status effect to something else... preferably Poison), but then I really wouldn't want Oil buffed.  Oil already makes many spells 1HKO, and, more worryingly, Oil overrides elemental resistances.  Giving Oil another effect will overload it.  I believe it is better to create a new status effect that cancels M-Ev and/or locks reaction abilities.

I think Maintenance fits the Chemist's skill set best as a Movement ability, even though it sounds silly.

I have (yet) another (fabulous) idea!  (In truth, I'm just bored.)  How comfortable would people feel if we gave first-tier Demi an AoE of 2?  With average damage clocking in at 100~125, and with damage being unboostable, it has the destructive output of first-tier Fire on a 15-MA caster.  Fire also adds Oil, costs half as much JP, and works with Oil.

Now, of course, Demi is better in other ways.  Demi:

• is on a skill set with support abilities


• has one less CT


• is equally usable by jobs of any base MA

so I don't mean to compare Demi and Fire on damage alone.

Why do I propose this?  For two reasons:

1. To promote balanced absorption strategies

Demi has a short CT, making it a useful method of healing, and it doesn't add nasty ailments like tier 1 black magick.  It is balanced because teams that will rely on party-wide Demi absorption will need to pass up on M-Ev, leaving them exposed to hostile magick.

2. To weaken damage-reduction strategies

By damage-reduction strategies, I mean the use of Overwhelm, (Magic) Defend UP, and perfumes.  Defensive strategies rustle my jimmies because they drag out matches.  Demi and status ailments are the sole two counters to these strategies.  Demi is unique in that it is the only "status-formula" skill that deals direct damage.  I feel an urge to promote this feature.  Now, I'm not suggesting that we break the game by buffing Demi's damage to the point of absurdity.  I'm suggesting that we allow it to be used in more ways (here, wide-area, simultaneous damage and healing in mild quantities.)  With more teams using Time Magick for their Haste and damage support, defensive strategies become that much less attractive.

Is an AoE of 2 too good?  Perhaps.  If I had it my way, I'd increase its AoE to 2 and leave it at that, but if there is dissenting opinion, I am willing to increase its cost of use in another way to compensate.  Increasing its MP cost, for example, will pre-emptively nerf teams that try to stack armour and spam Demi.

Equip Armor is certainly the most useful, but I'm still not convinced that it's worth 700 JP.  Allow me to run through a case example:

1. Female Priest wearing clothes
345 HP, 182 MP
Black Hood (+110 HP, +50 MP)
Silk Robe (+110 HP, +50 MP)

2. Female Priest wearing armour
360 HP, 82 MP
Crystal Helmet (+120 HP, Immune: Don't Act)
Diamond Armor (+115 HP, Immune: Berserk, Darkness, Poison, Don't Move)

Armour certainly offers excellent HP, but clothes can, too!  The featured armour offers +15 HP.  Overwhelm, by comparison, offers +86 HP.  Armour's real feature is its status protection.  However, by buying into that feature, you pass up on MP.  Status protection is worth more than MP, but I don't think it's worth 700 JP more.

Quote from: The Damned on March 12, 2013, 05:31:27 amThat said, very well. Let us "go" with the 100% hit rate that Wall now if we give it CT 0 even though Iron Will would still exist for low Faith users, which is hardly attractive when Chivalry might keep its for-some-reason instant Reraise ability.

I'm sure that wouldn't turn out to be obnoxious at all. [/sarcasm]

I don't think it will be any more obnoxious than Cherche and Setiemson.  As long as Wall costs more MP than Dispel Magic (which will also get an AoE of 1), Wall will have a viable counter.

Here are two JP modifications to throw on the pile:

Maintenance: 100 JP -> 0 JP
Maintenance is dramatically underpowered for a support ability.  Giving up your support ability for break protection is costly enough.

Equip Armor: 450 JP -> 250 JP
Equip Armor's 450 JP cost is from a time when clothes were much weaker than armour.  Now, clothes and armour are on approximately equal footing; it is appropriate to make their JP costs reflect that.  Keep in mind that mage classes, who find Equip Armor most attractive, must spend an additional 250 JP unlocking the Paladin skill set, which they will likely not use in any further capacity, for this ability.

Quotethe AI seems to tend to focus specifically on a Projectile Guard unit if it has a projectile weapon.

Are you sure about this?  The AI tends to attack the target that suffers the most damage.  In your tests, were the targets with Projectile Guard also the targets that suffer the most damage?

Quote from: Dokurider on March 01, 2013, 09:09:34 am
1. I've been meaning to say this for a while now, but giving Bizen Boat will do absolutely nothing to curb it's so called 'abuse' for the simple fact that the AI will use Bizen Boat to interrupt spells. While said caster is Charging. Meaning they can't evade. Making adding M-Ev completely and utter worthless.

Making Bizen Boat take M-Ev is meant to reduce collateral damage.

Quote from: Dokurider on March 01, 2013, 09:09:34 amThe simple fact is that Half of MP is not a support of mages. Not for a type of unit that can easily get all the MP it could ever need. So I don't know what you're worried about. Besides, lowering it's cost will do nothing. It's already incredibly cheap as is. It could be free and it'll still be just as unused.

To add, Half of MP is not an attractive support for any clothes wearers, either, especially if we're about to slap an MP bonus on most clothes.  Armour support is the only unit type that gets much use out of it.  Furthermore, considering that this unit type has nearly the lowest base MA in the game, it will likely not be using its host skill set, Summon Magick, whose skills' formulae are mostly all MA*X.  If we're going to tweak Half of MP, we had best start off by moving it to another skill set.  Time Magick is the best choice.

Without Hidden Knife, I'd say Kagesougi is "very good," like Raise 2 or Haste 2.   

Go ahead and scratch Valkyries from my list of maps.  If memory serves me right, I threw that list together in one evening.  Valkyries is that long, twisty map with a height difference, right?

As for your Mediator suggestions, I say:

YES to splitting Refute
YES to adding Hush (if there's a skill slot to spare)
NO to lowering base HP
NO to raising C-EV

Were there any others?

Quote from: The Damned on February 24, 2013, 07:24:38 pm1. Kagesougi "ambivalence"

3. Hidden Knife still needing a nerf:

These issues are related.  Kagesougi is nasty when it's paired with Hidden Knife.  Without Hidden Knife, you can guard against Kagesougi with P-EV (in addition to status-resistant armour as you can now).  Are people still against removing "Always: Transparent" from Hidden Knife?  We do have Concentrate now, after all.

Titan is a poor man's Cyclops.  It costs half as much JP and 10 fewer MP, but it doesn't add Blind and doesn't work on floating targets.  Its damage cannot be boosted with headgear and is easily halved by Thief Hats, too.  What will make matters worse is that Float may become more common once Time Mages receive buffs.

What the Earth element lacks is reliability.  I suggest that we make Titan ignore M-EV for that reason.  Considering that Float effectively grants 100% M-EV against it, having it ignore M-EV won't break the game.

I'm for it if it has a low proc rate (33%).  It will make for a nice, reliable counter to 40 Brave 40 Faith teams.

FFMaster has the final say, of course.  FFMaster: would you mind throwing together a list of changes you'll go ahead with in 1.39 before actually going ahead with them?  A lot of propositions were tossed around in the "1.39 changes" thread, so there will need to be some pruning.  If you'd like assistance, I can maintain a list of changes featuring hard numbers so people can look at them and ask for tweaks. 

Quote from: TrueLight on January 25, 2013, 01:47:05 pm
No, the only things that apply are faith(caster & target), innocent, faith(status), zodiac compatibility and MA to an extent.

I support making Raise 2 take M-EV, then.  People won't have to swear by Flash Hats when playing with Cursed Rings.

Also, can we change Defense Armlet to Oven Mitt and give it an appropriate sprite?  There aren't enough cooking references in Kitchen Stadium Arena.

Does M-EV apply when using Raise 2 on dead units?

Also, is anyone comfortable with letting EV apply when performing?

Quote from: BarrenAnd perhaps a status gun as well. If anything that can replace mythril gun it can be a gun that inflicts status.

I don't mind this suggestion.  Make it proc something silly, like Innocent or Faith.

Quote from: Gaignun on January 16, 2013, 12:40:10 pm
How feasible is creating a status effect that locks the Attack command?  If specialty skills like Solution are tough to use because the AI would sooner attack, then we could slap this status effect on a new bag to prevent the AI from attacking.

I'm scratching my quote here to propose something that's equally effective, yet is much easier to realise: implement a bag that heals on hit.

This is one of those things that looks stupid on paper, but has a real purpose: it takes the attack command away from the wearer.  For reasons unbeknownst to me, the AI likes to smack opponents even when there's no reason to.  By implementing a healing weapon that is usable by all classes (ie. a bag), players can forcibly prevent any unit from attacking.  For example, Mediators use abilities like Solution when they have literally no other form of offense available.  If you want a Mediator to spam Solution, you need to deprive that Mediator of all offensive abilities, including the attack command.  Unfortunately, Mediators do not have access to a healing weapon, so you can't pull this off without Equip Magegear or Equip Heavy Blade.

We don't even need a new bag for this.  Simply make one of the existing bags heal on hit.  The H and P Bags are the best candidates.

In the interest of making "Innocent" strategies effective, it is also worthwhile to go ahead with The Damned's proposal of splitting Refute into two abilities.  A Mediator with Refute attempts to remove the Innocent status on friendly Flash Hat wearers.  This is problematic for teams that try to use a Mediator for Solution and an Innocent Ninja for -ton skills.