Breath of Fire

2010-03-09 07:52:11 pm

D:

[url=http://www.msu.edu/~singergr/Runthrough plan v1.doc]This[/url] is what my plan looks like, for reference. There's some stuff that isn't filled in yet, but I figure it isn't worth setting that up in advance of the actual run since I'm going to need some practice for every segment on the console anyway. The worst-case scenario is that I discover something I don't like halfway through the run and start over. :|

Also, though I tried to clean up the document before posting, I apologize in advance for any lingering inaccuracies, cursing, or jokes that only make sense to myself.

japanzaman

Edit history:

japanzaman: 2010-03-10 08:41:57 am

2010-03-10 12:37:56 am

I'll check it out tonight when I've got some time and comment on parts that I'm knowledgeable about. My only advice would be to do a test run following your plan on an emulator from start to finish and make notes along the way like I did about items, gold, etc... I might have gone a little overboard but I've found the information useful when tweaking my run. Sometimes you assume you did something a certain way when you were planning when you actually didn't- easy to do when you are running through the game multiple times. If you've already done so, then my apologies sir. Grin

Okay- looked over the first half and pretty solid stuff. You had a few things in there I didn't know, which is always kind of fun. Some things that came to my attention:

-could skip the healing after Frog. You'd only be getting 15 HP back at the most unless a level 2 battle is much different than a level 1 one
-Hold off on first Mrbl3 in Agua segment until after riding first floating platform to equip ThiefCl/Bracelet and Mrbl3 again at once.
-Sandworm should be done in around 1:30~ if possible, though death abuse does complicate things
-I cleared Cloud with AB in 1:40 in about 100 tries with about 5% success rate. If you end up using AB, there's something to shoot for
you can do without Shin for Toad, but you'll use 2 extra Mrbl1. I doubt the AB will make up for the extra time warpinig and walking, but I could be wrong. I cleared him in 2:05 without Shin, so your time would have to be VERY fast to clear that.
-I think you could manipulate and M.Drop from one of those ship encounters before Squid
-interesting strategy for Slime X. I Use B.Rang and AtkUp Ryu and Shin then Mrbl1 with Ryu twice before going to AB. I wonder if the extra damage against the big guy is worth sacrificing the spread damage in the first two rounds...
-I do believe taking a right at the first intersection and then immediately turning upward is a little faster than taking a left at the first floor of the volcano by about 8 steps or so
-I would save after warping back from getting the Oil rather than doing it just before FlowerX (about 8 seconds faster)
-Cut out the save in Tunlan after speaking to his mother in Gramor and warping. There's just no need to do it.
-Keeping Ryu alive in the Horntoad fight is going to be TOUGH with just one heal. It's hard enough to keep Shin alive with a single heal on AB. Perhaps manipulate the Life2 from FlowerX if you're running short of those?
-It will be day when you arrive in Tunlan.
-I would check whether or not you can use death abuse in the gas marsh. Perhaps you can, but I seem to remember somebody mentioning that dying only warps you back to the cave entrance
-Consider having Nina alive for the Mothra fight just in the beginning for AtkUp on Shin along with Ryu. I tested this battle quite extensively and the success rate was much higher with an AtkUp Shin and dragon Ryu on AB for that fight. I bought a Life in Auria to revive Nina just to cast that spell, then a quick poison takes her down so she doesn't slow the battle down.
-You have the chance to use a healing Spring in Tock before the Cerl fight, but if Ryu dies in the Mote battle you could just have him run into an encounter on the overworld map and be warped instantly to Carmen as the battle would end immediately. Not sure if this would save you any time but your party would be healed.
-In the room after Sara you definitely want to go North. South is at least 10 seconds longer, if not more.
-You shouldn't have to use any Acorn on Ryu before the Goda fight as he should be healed after the Drogen cut scene.

Oh, starting over half way through is just another day for me. Now doing that after the DarkDR...

I'll check it out tonight when I've got some time and comment on parts that I'm knowledgeable about. My only advice would be to do a test run following your plan on an emulator from start to finish and make notes along the way like I did about items, gold, etc... I might have gone a little overboard but I've found the information useful when tweaking my run. Sometimes you assume you did something a certain way when you were planning when you actually didn't- easy to do when you are running through the game multiple times. If you've already done so, then my apologies sir. ;D

Okay- looked over the first half and pretty solid stuff. You had a few things in there I didn't know, which is always kind of fun. Some things that came to my attention:

-could skip the healing after Frog. You'd only be getting 15 HP back at the most unless a level 2 battle is much different than a level 1 one
-Hold off on first Mrbl3 in Agua segment until after riding first floating platform to equip ThiefCl/Bracelet and Mrbl3 again at once.
-Sandworm should be done in around 1:30~ if possible, though death abuse does complicate things
-I cleared Cloud with AB in 1:40 in about 100 tries with about 5% success rate. If you end up using AB, there's something to shoot for
you can do without Shin for Toad, but you'll use 2 extra Mrbl1. I doubt the AB will make up for the extra time warpinig and walking, but I could be wrong. I cleared him in 2:05 without Shin, so your time would have to be VERY fast to clear that.
-I think you could manipulate and M.Drop from one of those ship encounters before Squid
-interesting strategy for Slime X. I Use B.Rang and AtkUp Ryu and Shin then Mrbl1 with Ryu twice before going to AB. I wonder if the extra damage against the big guy is worth sacrificing the spread damage in the first two rounds...
-I do believe taking a right at the first intersection and then immediately turning upward is a little faster than taking a left at the first floor of the volcano by about 8 steps or so
-I would save after warping back from getting the Oil rather than doing it just before FlowerX (about 8 seconds faster)
-Cut out the save in Tunlan after speaking to his mother in Gramor and warping. There's just no need to do it.
-Keeping Ryu alive in the Horntoad fight is going to be TOUGH with just one heal. It's hard enough to keep Shin alive with a single heal on AB. Perhaps manipulate the Life2 from FlowerX if you're running short of those?
-It will be day when you arrive in Tunlan.
-I would check whether or not you can use death abuse in the gas marsh. Perhaps you can, but I seem to remember somebody mentioning that dying only warps you back to the cave entrance
-Consider having Nina alive for the Mothra fight just in the beginning for AtkUp on Shin along with Ryu. I tested this battle quite extensively and the success rate was much higher with an AtkUp Shin and dragon Ryu on AB for that fight. I bought a Life in Auria to revive Nina just to cast that spell, then a quick poison takes her down so she doesn't slow the battle down.
-You have the chance to use a healing Spring in Tock before the Cerl fight, but if Ryu dies in the Mote battle you could just have him run into an encounter on the overworld map and be warped instantly to Carmen as the battle would end immediately. Not sure if this would save you any time but your party would be healed.
-In the room after Sara you definitely want to go North. South is at least 10 seconds longer, if not more.
-You shouldn't have to use any Acorn on Ryu before the Goda fight as he should be healed after the Drogen cut scene.

Oh, starting over half way through is just another day for me. Now doing that after the DarkDR...

__sdfg

2010-03-10 10:35:00 pm

D:

I don't want to do another emulator test run because I've already done two and half of them and it's getting old. Smiley

If I finish the run and I'm happy with it, I'll submit it. If I decide I'm not happy with it, I'll probably have learned more doing a real attempt than I would have on a test run.

Unfortunately, my laptop doesn't seem to want to record from the line input on Ubuntu 9.10, so it might be a while until I can get anything done on a console. Anyway, on to your comments.

Quote from japanzaman:

-could skip the healing after Frog. You'd only be getting 15 HP back at the most unless a level 2 battle is much different than a level 1 one

You are probably right. I had that in there so that I would be starting with a little more HP against Knight, but it should not make much of a difference (I just heal one or two turns earlier without it).

Quote:

-Hold off on first Mrbl3 in Agua segment until after riding first floating platform to equip ThiefCl/Bracelet and Mrbl3 again at once.

Sounds reasonable. I know I was using the first Mrbl3 around there in my test runs, but I also picked up more equipment (...because it was a test run), so I didn't notice how well it aligns with the Mrbl3 points.

Quote:

-Sandworm should be done in around 1:30~ if possible, though death abuse does complicate things
-I cleared Cloud with AB in 1:40 in about 100 tries with about 5% success rate. If you end up using AB, there's something to shoot for

Wow, those are fast times. Seems like I'll be doing a lot of attempts.

Quote:

you can do without Shin for Toad, but you'll use 2 extra Mrbl1. I doubt the AB will make up for the extra time warpinig and walking, but I could be wrong. I cleared him in 2:05 without Shin, so your time would have to be VERY fast to clear that.

I was shooting for 2:00 with Shin, and 6 Mrbl1s total. I can look at using more Mrbl1s if I need to do that to keep from getting slowed down.

Quote:

-I think you could manipulate and M.Drop from one of those ship encounters before Squid

The Archers have a less than 2% chance of dropping an M.Drop. I would try for it if I thought the extra Mrbl1s I could buy with that would help the run significantly, but I don't think they will give me more than a few seconds.

Quote:

-interesting strategy for Slime X. I Use B.Rang and AtkUp Ryu and Shin then Mrbl1 with Ryu twice before going to AB. I wonder if the extra damage against the big guy is worth sacrificing the spread damage in the first two rounds...

Your strategy is about as fast, and uses fewer Mrbl1s. I actually found it fastest to have Ryu use 3 Mrbl1s to clear out the smaller slimes completely, while the rest of my party defended. At that point, pulling out FlmDr gave me a chance to heal Ryu without needing Ox or Nina alive. I was getting close to 1:30 like that.

Quote:

-I do believe taking a right at the first intersection and then immediately turning upward is a little faster than taking a left at the first floor of the volcano by about 8 steps or so

You are probably right. I had a line in my notes saying to check this, and I thought I had, but I apparently did not.

Quote:

-I would save after warping back from getting the Oil rather than doing it just before FlowerX (about 8 seconds faster)

Yes. I don't know why I wasn't planning to do that.

Quote:

-Cut out the save in Tunlan after speaking to his mother in Gramor and warping. There's just no need to do it.

It depends on how much trouble I have with HornToad. Saving after a warp adds maybe 5 seconds to the run. If I don't save there, I have to fight HornToad, sit through the cutscenes in Tunlan, and then navigate the tower/swamp in the same segment. I don't know if I trust myself to walk around that far without making any mistakes; having a shorter segment lets me work harder on optimizing HornToad. On the other hand, I guess the HornToad fight is at the very beginning of the segment, so I could just throw out any segments where I don't beat HornToad within the time I want. I'll think about it.

Quote:

-Keeping Ryu alive in the Horntoad fight is going to be TOUGH with just one heal. It's hard enough to keep Shin alive with a single heal on AB. Perhaps manipulate the Life2 from FlowerX if you're running short of those?

I don't plan on using any Life2s/Cures/etc. until I get to Mote.

If you haven't seen it already, check out Novalia Spirit's monster guide. According to that, in the first phase of the battle, HornToad has a 50% chance of using a "special" attack, which is the same as his usual attack except that it always targets the player on the left. If I put Ryu on the far right, I can keep him alive. It is tough, but I can keep him alive.

Quote:

-It will be day when you arrive in Tunlan.

Yeah, I don't think I've had it any other way.

Quote:

-I would check whether or not you can use death abuse in the gas marsh. Perhaps you can, but I seem to remember somebody mentioning that dying only warps you back to the cave entrance
-Consider having Nina alive for the Mothra fight just in the beginning for AtkUp on Shin along with Ryu. I tested this battle quite extensively and the success rate was much higher with an AtkUp Shin and dragon Ryu on AB for that fight. I bought a Life in Auria to revive Nina just to cast that spell, then a quick poison takes her down so she doesn't slow the battle down.

Dying in the marsh moves you to the dragon shrine in town, even if you haven't saved there. The problem is with Exit: it takes you to the same side of the marsh that you entered on, so you can't use it after you get Mogu.

Also, death abuse gives me Nina back. All I have to do after that is get Mothro to Rub her out.

Quote:

-You have the chance to use a healing Spring in Tock before the Cerl fight, but if Ryu dies in the Mote battle you could just have him run into an encounter on the overworld map and be warped instantly to Carmen as the battle would end immediately. Not sure if this would save you any time but your party would be healed.

Hmm, I hadn't thought of this. I'll have to time it and see. My instinct is that it saves time, but it's a fairly short walk, and the fadeins/fadeouts in this game are deceptively slow.

Quote:

-In the room after Sara you definitely want to go North. South is at least 10 seconds longer, if not more.

Yeah, I had determined that the north route is a lot faster if you execute it at all well. It's rough not being able to see, though.

Quote:

-You shouldn't have to use any Acorn on Ryu before the Goda fight as he should be healed after the Drogen cut scene.

That was where I put that line? Oops. I knew I was missing some Acorns in that segment when I put the plan together, but it was after Goda and not before.

Quote:

Oh, starting over half way through is just another day for me. Now doing that after the DarkDR...

Oh, wow. D:

I don't want to do another emulator test run because I've already done two and half of them and it's getting old. :)  If I finish the run and I'm happy with it, I'll submit it.  If I decide I'm not happy with it, I'll probably have learned more doing a real attempt than I would have on a test run.

Unfortunately, my laptop doesn't seem to want to record from the line input on Ubuntu 9.10, so it might be a while until I can get anything done on a console.  Anyway, on to your comments.

[quote="japanzaman"]-could skip the healing after Frog. You'd only be getting 15 HP back at the most unless a level 2 battle is much different than a level 1 one[/quote]
You are probably right.  I had that in there so that I would be starting with a little more HP against Knight, but it should not make much of a difference (I just heal one or two turns earlier without it).

[quote]-Hold off on first Mrbl3 in Agua segment until after riding first floating platform to equip ThiefCl/Bracelet and Mrbl3 again at once.[/quote]
Sounds reasonable.  I know I was using the first Mrbl3 around there in my test runs, but I also picked up more equipment (...because it was a test run), so I didn't notice how well it aligns with the Mrbl3 points.

[quote]-Sandworm should be done in around 1:30~ if possible, though death abuse does complicate things
-I cleared Cloud with AB in 1:40 in about 100 tries with about 5% success rate. If you end up using AB, there's something to shoot for[/quote]
Wow, those are fast times.  Seems like I'll be doing a lot of attempts.

[quote]you can do without Shin for Toad, but you'll use 2 extra Mrbl1. I doubt the AB will make up for the extra time warpinig and walking, but I could be wrong. I cleared him in 2:05 without Shin, so your time would have to be VERY fast to clear that.[/quote]
I was shooting for 2:00 with Shin, and 6 Mrbl1s total.  I can look at using more Mrbl1s if I need to do that to keep from getting slowed down.

[quote]-I think you could manipulate and M.Drop from one of those ship encounters before Squid[/quote]
The Archers have a less than 2% chance of dropping an M.Drop.  I would try for it if I thought the extra Mrbl1s I could buy with that would help the run significantly, but I don't think they will give me more than a few seconds.

[quote]-interesting strategy for Slime X. I Use B.Rang and AtkUp Ryu and Shin then Mrbl1 with Ryu twice before going to AB. I wonder if the extra damage against the big guy is worth sacrificing the spread damage in the first two rounds...[/quote]
Your strategy is about as fast, and uses fewer Mrbl1s.  I actually found it fastest to have Ryu use 3 Mrbl1s to clear out the smaller slimes completely, while the rest of my party defended.  At that point, pulling out FlmDr gave me a chance to heal Ryu without needing Ox or Nina alive.  I was getting close to 1:30 like that.

[quote]-I do believe taking a right at the first intersection and then immediately turning upward is a little faster than taking a left at the first floor of the volcano by about 8 steps or so[/quote]
You are probably right.  I had a line in my notes saying to check this, and I thought I had, but I apparently did not.

[quote]-I would save after warping back from getting the Oil rather than doing it just before FlowerX (about 8 seconds faster)[/quote]
Yes.  I don't know why I wasn't planning to do that.

[quote]-Cut out the save in Tunlan after speaking to his mother in Gramor and warping. There's just no need to do it.[/quote]
It depends on how much trouble I have with HornToad.  Saving after a warp adds maybe 5 seconds to the run.  If I don't save there, I have to fight HornToad, sit through the cutscenes in Tunlan, and then navigate the tower/swamp in the same segment.  I don't know if I trust myself to walk around that far without making any mistakes; having a shorter segment lets me work harder on optimizing HornToad.  On the other hand, I guess the HornToad fight [i]is[/i] at the very beginning of the segment, so I could just throw out any segments where I don't beat HornToad within the time I want.  I'll think about it.

[quote]-Keeping Ryu alive in the Horntoad fight is going to be TOUGH with just one heal. It's hard enough to keep Shin alive with a single heal on AB. Perhaps manipulate the Life2 from FlowerX if you're running short of those?[/quote]
I don't plan on using any Life2s/Cures/etc. until I get to Mote.

If you haven't seen it already, check out Novalia Spirit's [url=http://www.gamefaqs.com/console/snes/file/563529/51306]monster guide[/url].  According to that, in the first phase of the battle, HornToad has a 50% chance of using a "special" attack, which is the same as his usual attack except that it always targets the player on the left.  If I put Ryu on the far right, I can keep him alive.  It is tough, but I can keep him alive.

[quote]-It will be day when you arrive in Tunlan.[/quote]
Yeah, I don't think I've had it any other way.

[quote]-I would check whether or not you can use death abuse in the gas marsh. Perhaps you can, but I seem to remember somebody mentioning that dying only warps you back to the cave entrance
-Consider having Nina alive for the Mothra fight just in the beginning for AtkUp on Shin along with Ryu. I tested this battle quite extensively and the success rate was much higher with an AtkUp Shin and dragon Ryu on AB for that fight. I bought a Life in Auria to revive Nina just to cast that spell, then a quick poison takes her down so she doesn't slow the battle down.[/quote]
Dying in the marsh moves you to the dragon shrine in town, even if you haven't saved there.  The problem is with Exit:  it takes you to the same side of the marsh that you entered on, so you can't use it after you get Mogu.

Also, death abuse gives me Nina back.  All I have to do after that is get Mothro to Rub her out.

[quote]-You have the chance to use a healing Spring in Tock before the Cerl fight, but if Ryu dies in the Mote battle you could just have him run into an encounter on the overworld map and be warped instantly to Carmen as the battle would end immediately. Not sure if this would save you any time but your party would be healed.[/quote]
Hmm, I hadn't thought of this.  I'll have to time it and see.  My instinct is that it saves time, but it's a fairly short walk, and the fadeins/fadeouts in this game are deceptively slow.

[quote]-In the room after Sara you definitely want to go North. South is at least 10 seconds longer, if not more.[/quote]
Yeah, I had determined that the north route is a lot faster if you execute it at all well.  It's rough not being able to see, though.

[quote]-You shouldn't have to use any Acorn on Ryu before the Goda fight as he should be healed after the Drogen cut scene.[/quote]
[i]That[/i] was where I put that line?  Oops.  I knew I was missing some Acorns in that segment when I put the plan together, but it was after Goda and not before.

[quote]Oh, starting over half way through is just another day for me. Now doing that after the DarkDR...[/quote]
Oh, wow.  D:

japanzaman

2010-03-11 02:04:38 am

Quote:

The Archers have a less than 2% chance of dropping an M.Drop.

Tell me about it. Still, if you need the extra cash it could be well worth your time. Better than trying for 22K on the DarkDR in my opinion.

I also think, in retrospect, that doing slime X in your way is a little faster, perhaps by ten to twenty seconds if things go well. The problem with that segment is the Grimfowl, which I hate with a passion. Hard to make a good segment out of that part of the game Angry

Oh, and I didn't mean that I had restarted after the DarkDR... I meant that I would never think of doing that! Shocked

DoubleThink

2010-03-11 02:08:06 am

There's a word for that

Obviously I haven't done any real planning for this, so the only stuff I can think of is stuff I've already mentioned, like doing some extra damage before Ryu transforms to save a turn of Angi or having Gobi try Ebb during the first round of the Morteo fight to see if it saves a turn or something.

I can appreciate the level of planning that's gone into this, but I do wish the battles weren't so simplistic Sad

It doesn't help that the SNES battle menu slows things down a lot. Is there a Mrbl1 fight somewhere where Bleu could be at all useful?

__sdfg

2010-03-11 07:10:39 am

D:

Quote from japanzaman:

Quote:

The Archers have a less than 2% chance of dropping an M.Drop.

Tell me about it. Still, if you need the extra cash it could be well worth your time. Better than trying for 22K on the DarkDR in my opinion.

My spreadsheet currently shows that if I sell the Dart and one other item (I'm 1G short after the Dart), I can afford all the Mrbl1s I've planned for. Things might go better or worse over the course of the whole run than what the spreadsheet says, but I think it should be pretty close.

Now, one other idea would be to segment between Squid and Octo. That would cost me some time, but I might be able to make it back by optimizing the death abuse before Octo (which means this idea doesn't apply as much to your run, sadly). Having done that, I could try to get an M.Drop from both segments. The money from two extra M.Drops would let me use Mrbl1s in at least one other fight. It depends on whether I can justify the saving or not, though. I haven't planned on getting the M.Drop from the volcano because I think 12 seconds costs too much time, so these M.Drops would have to be effectively free. :|

Quote:

I also think, in retrospect, that doing slime X in your way is a little faster, perhaps by ten to twenty seconds if things go well. The problem with that segment is the Grimfowl, which I hate with a passion. Hard to make a good segment out of that part of the game Angry

Which way is my way, using Mrbl1s with Shin and FlmDr to take down most of the little guys, or having the party defend while Ryu takes them all down? When I tested it yesterday, the latter way seemed faster initially, but it evened out when I had to wait for FlmDr to come up while the big guy was out. You seem to test battles a lot more thoroughly than I do, so I value your input here.

Quote:

Oh, and I didn't mean that I had restarted after the DarkDR... I meant that I would never think of doing that! Shocked

Oh, good. *phew*

Quote from DoubleThink:

Obviously I haven't done any real planning for this, so the only stuff I can think of is stuff I've already mentioned, like doing some extra damage before Ryu transforms to save a turn of Angi or having Gobi try Ebb during the first round of the Morteo fight to see if it saves a turn or something.

I can appreciate the level of planning that's gone into this, but I do wish the battles weren't so simplistic Sad

It doesn't help that the SNES battle menu slows things down a lot. Is there a Mrbl1 fight somewhere where Bleu could be at all useful?

Yeah, I can look at one-turn things like that while I'm running, and see how they affect the times of the battles overall.

Bleu, unfortunately, is not useful for much other than Exit. She doesn't get to a high enough level to learn her really useful magic, and at the time you pick her up, doing 80-100 HP damage with an attack that you have to wade through a couple menus to get to just isn't worth it. I had planned on using her against Pincher before japanzaman introduced me to Mrbl1s, if that makes you feel better.

[quote="japanzaman"]
[quote]The Archers have a less than 2% chance of dropping an M.Drop.  [/quote]

Tell me about it. Still, if you need the extra cash it could be well worth your time. Better than trying for 22K on the DarkDR in my opinion.[/quote]
My spreadsheet currently shows that if I sell the Dart and one other item (I'm 1G short after the Dart), I can afford all the Mrbl1s I've planned for.  Things might go better or worse over the course of the whole run than what the spreadsheet says, but I think it should be pretty close.

Now, one other idea would be to segment between Squid and Octo.  That would cost me some time, but I might be able to make it back by optimizing the death abuse before Octo (which means this idea doesn't apply as much to your run, sadly).  Having done that, I could try to get an M.Drop from both segments.  The money from two extra M.Drops would let me use Mrbl1s in at least one other fight.  It depends on whether I can justify the saving or not, though.  I haven't planned on getting the M.Drop from the volcano because I think 12 seconds costs too much time, so these M.Drops would have to be effectively free. :|

[quote]I also think, in retrospect, that doing slime X in your way is a little faster, perhaps by ten to twenty seconds if things go well. The problem with that segment is the Grimfowl, which I hate with a passion. Hard to make a good segment out of that part of the game >:([/quote]
Which way is my way, using Mrbl1s with Shin and FlmDr to take down most of the little guys, or having the party defend while Ryu takes them all down?  When I tested it yesterday, the latter way seemed faster initially, but it evened out when I had to wait for FlmDr to come up while the big guy was out.  You seem to test battles a lot more thoroughly than I do, so I value your input here.

[quote]Oh, and I didn't mean that I had restarted after the DarkDR... I meant that I would never think of doing that! :o[/quote]
Oh, good. *phew*

[quote="DoubleThink"]
Obviously I haven't done any real planning for this, so the only stuff I can think of is stuff I've already mentioned, like doing some extra damage before Ryu transforms to save a turn of Angi or having Gobi try Ebb during the first round of the Morteo fight to see if it saves a turn or something.

I can appreciate the level of planning that's gone into this, but I do wish the battles weren't so simplistic :( It doesn't help that the SNES battle menu slows things down a lot. Is there a Mrbl1 fight somewhere where Bleu could be at all useful?
[/quote]
Yeah, I can look at one-turn things like that while I'm running, and see how they affect the times of the battles overall.

Bleu, unfortunately, is not useful for much other than Exit.  She doesn't get to a high enough level to learn her really useful magic, and at the time you pick her up, doing 80-100 HP damage with an attack that you have to wade through a couple menus to get to just isn't worth it.  I had planned on using her against Pincher before japanzaman introduced me to Mrbl1s, if that makes you feel better.

japanzaman

2010-03-11 08:18:05 pm

I never used FlmDgn against Slime X, but am now wishing I had. Could have chopped off 15 seconds easy.

Now in Tunlan going for DarkDR. 800+ tries and still no luck. Angry

I've seen everything else about 5 times now, though.

I now officially hate this game.

japanzaman

2010-03-11 11:02:18 pm

And #974...

Seriously, sdfg, you'd have to be out of your mind to even consider trying for that at the second price. I think the odds are a little different on the first couple of purchases, because this took way longer than I had anticipated (expected 400-600). It could easily be 1000 before you even see one, and I don't think you want to sit through another 1000 if that one doesn't come through. Perhaps I was a little unlucky, but 800~1200 attempts seems like a safe bet. Now off to celebrate and take a few days break from this goddam game! Grin

__sdfg

2010-03-11 11:51:28 pm

D:

Maybe if I get enough failed attempts, I can invite people over for a "Not Getting the DarkDR Party," or I can charge admission to watch me not get the DarkDR live and in person. I dunno yet.

Also... hmm. I'm worried about saying this given the timing, but it would be worse not to say it, and it might not be an issue anyway.

You do know that you can get out of the menus by hitting select once rather than B several times, right? I want to make sure, and I don't want to hold on you in case you didn't know that. If it's just this one segment, I don't think it's an issue (and I forget if you're recording this for real or just doing a test run).

japanzaman

2010-03-12 12:45:44 am

Well, there goes that!!! Shocked

I'm going to finish this run as a test run and see how it goes. I won't submit it obviously, and I'll go back and calculate how much was lost to my STUPIDITY. You know, I think I remembered playing this game way back and actually knowing that, now that you mention it. Either way, I'll consider this chance to give you some concrete goals to shoot for in the battles. I won't be going through all that again, so it looks like it's up to you to make this run happen. Yours was going to be faster anyway.

Now off to go kill myself (no, not really :-\)

(really)

Axel Ryman

2010-03-12 01:02:18 am

We all scream for Eyes Cream

Quote from __sdfg:

Maybe if I get enough failed attempts, I can invite people over for a "Not Getting the DarkDR Party," or I can charge admission to watch me not get the DarkDR live and in person. I dunno yet.

If you're old enough, make it so people take a shot(of alcohol of course) whenever you fail. Ok maybe not, bad idea in the long run.

Now that I think about it, the Obelisk will be insane since you'll most likely have to do it in one segment since IIRC there is no save point inside.

__sdfg

2010-03-12 06:58:11 am

D:

Quote from japanzaman:

Well, there goes that!!! Shocked

I'm going to finish this run as a test run and see how it goes. I won't submit it obviously, and I'll go back and calculate how much was lost to my STUPIDITY. You know, I think I remembered playing this game way back and actually knowing that, now that you mention it. Either way, I'll consider this chance to give you some concrete goals to shoot for in the battles. I won't be going through all that again, so it looks like it's up to you to make this run happen. Yours was going to be faster anyway.

Now off to go kill myself (no, not really :-\)

(really)

Oh, crap, no. I'm sorry I didn't point this out a month ago. D:

I don't want you to give up on this, because judging from the pace you were going, you could probably stop hating the game and record another full run before I even get up to the DarkDR segment. Also, you've suggested things for the run that I would never have noticed myself. Don't get down on yourself for something that probably affects the length of the run by less than a minute.

Quote from Axel Ryman:

Now that I think about it, the Obelisk will be insane since you'll most likely have to do it in one segment since IIRC there is no save point inside.

You are correct about the lack of a save point. However, you have Agni at that point in the game, so the battles aren't that challenging. Luck plays a part for sure (at least without the EarthRB), but I don't think it'll be nearly as frustrating as going for the DarkDR. It might require more time to run, but it won't be as painful.

[quote="japanzaman"]
Well, there goes that!!! :o

I'm going to finish this run as a test run and see how it goes. I won't submit it obviously, and I'll go back and calculate how much was lost to my STUPIDITY. You know, I think I remembered playing this game way back and actually knowing that, now that you mention it. Either way, I'll consider this  chance to give you some concrete goals to shoot for in the battles. I won't be going through all that again, so it looks like it's up to you to make this run happen. Yours was going to be faster anyway.

Now off to go kill myself (no, not really :-\)

(really)
[/quote]
Oh, crap, no.  I'm sorry I didn't point this out a month ago. D:

I don't want you to give up on this, because judging from the pace you were going, you could probably stop hating the game and record another full run before I even get up to the DarkDR segment.  Also, you've suggested things for the run that I would never have noticed myself.  Don't get down on yourself for something that probably affects the length of the run by less than a minute.

[quote="Axel Ryman"]
Now that I think about it, the Obelisk will be insane since you'll most likely have to do it in one segment since IIRC there is no save point inside.
[/quote]
You are correct about the lack of a save point.  However, you have Agni at that point in the game, so the battles aren't that challenging.  Luck plays a part for sure (at least without the EarthRB), but I don't think it'll be nearly as frustrating as going for the DarkDR.  It might require more time to run, but it won't be as painful.

__sdfg

2010-03-13 10:59:48 pm

D:

Ugh. I understand how hard it is to get the F.Stn from Frog now.

Product of ~50 attempts and ~4 1/2 hours of recording today:

Going to try some more tomorrow and see if I can do the same thing, except with the drop and without that one wall bump. After that, dunno if I'll give up and go on to the next segment or not. :|

DoubleThink

2010-03-14 03:56:27 am

There's a word for that

What a shame, that was some really awesome Strength growth Sad

I guess it's not worth losing sleep over, and I do so badly want to see a Breath of Fire __ run on this site.

japanzaman

2010-03-14 05:23:52 am

So I'm back, and still not quite sure what I want to do. Haven't touched the game in a few days, and still not sure I want to finish my run or not. Time is only a marginal part, as it only amounts for about a minute. The problem is that it's really hard to justify not having something so basic and simple in a so called speed run. I may finish it out, but I don't know how motivated I can be to finish something that's so thoroughly flawed for at least half the run.

I've still got the videos from what I have done, so if there's any particular part or battle you'd like to see I can load it up on youtube fairly easily.

Your Frog fight looked good, but as I suspected getting the F.Stn drop to go along with a nice pre-Frog battle isn't all that easy. Just finishing Frog quickly takes a bit of luck, as you've probably discovered. Still, as long as you're segmenting this run you really don't have an excuse not to get it, as it saves you about twenty seconds in the Knight fight.

Thanks for the encouragement, by the way. I'm starting to feel like I'm just a little too stupid to be attempting something this complicated. Undecided

So I'm back, and still not quite sure what I want to do. Haven't touched the game in a few days, and still not sure I want to finish my run or not. Time is only a marginal part, as it only amounts for about a minute. The problem is that it's really hard to justify not having something so basic and simple in a so called speed run. I may finish it out, but I don't know how motivated I can be to finish something that's so thoroughly flawed for at least half the run.

I've still got the videos from what I have done, so if there's any particular part or battle you'd like to see I can load it up on youtube fairly easily.

Your Frog fight looked good, but as I suspected getting the F.Stn drop to go along with a nice pre-Frog battle isn't all that easy. Just finishing Frog quickly takes a bit of luck, as you've probably discovered. Still, as long as you're segmenting this run you really don't have an excuse not to get it, as it saves you about twenty seconds in the Knight fight.

Thanks for the encouragement, by the way. I'm starting to feel like I'm just a little too stupid to be attempting something this complicated. :-\

MetaSigma

2010-03-15 01:35:51 pm

Evermore Extrodinare ᕦ(° Д°)ᕤ

Here is the thing, you could submit it, and who knows it MIGHT be let through, and then someone will watch it and improve upon it. At the very least you can know that your hard work created a BoF on this site or atleast an ATTEMPT upon it. I as well wish to see it be on this site.

japanzaman

2010-03-15 05:15:30 pm

It might be, but I don't think I could bring myself to ever look at it as those mistakes would be just too glaring Undecided

Oh, and my time up until Gust was 2:55:00~, with mistakes. Doesn't look like I was going to crack the five hour mark, but I wasn't really expecting to anyway.

__sdfg

2010-03-15 09:07:56 pm

D:

Hmm, yeah, that puts you about 7:30 behind Janus's test run. You would've gained three or four minutes fighting Mote, but he beat Bain before going to Gust, so you would have lost most of that in the end. On the other hand, this means that you made it pretty close to a TAS that abused, death, so...

japanzaman

2010-03-16 06:47:33 am

Well, now you've got an idea what's possible. Like I said, I estimated losing 7 minutes or so to death abuse, so that number seems like it's in the right ballpark. I had some pretty decent fights where I could have made time up on Janus's run. I would have lost even more time than you estimated however, due to extra saves, which would have easily put me over the 5:00:00 mark. Still, that means you've got a pretty good chance to crack it if you do everything right.

japanzaman

2010-03-17 08:37:24 pm

Okay, so I've made a fateful decision: segmented run is cancelled. Just too ugly to justify spending even more time on. Plus, being a non-death abuse run it would have to be perfect to even have a chance of getting accepted.

So there's that. Cry

But...

I've been working on something a little, well, crazier. I'm starting to think No Save single segment now, but I don't want to sacrifice anything (mrbl3 timing, limited shopping and inn runs, etc.). I've got a pretty solid route planned that gives me enough flexibility to make adjustments in the face of moderate bad luck. Really bad luck, however, and I'm screwed. I will also be making use of the GODDAM select button.

Sticky points: Frog and Knight (luckily they're at the beginning), Mote, Avian, Jade

The first two are just annoying as it will take some resets to get by them. Mote presents the biggest challenge as he is just flat out tough to beat without DarkDR. I need 24 Mrbl1 to take him down, plus some extra gear (FlameAR, WorldAR, CursedHT). This battle is so late in the run, I'll be happy if I can just beat him using only one M.Drop and a Life2. Avian is also a little dangerous if he chooses to slam me at the wrong time. Jade is the final potential stumbling block- if he decides to throw Shock out at me, I have to have a way to recover so I need an M.Drop there as well. Two shocks... let's not even go there.

I have to get BoltDr as soon as possible for this plan to work, so the route is a little different than the segmented one. I also get some extra stuff before Auria so I can buy extra Mrbl1's to use against Cloud, since he's a little too dangerous to AB. There's also quite a bit of tiny changes spread throughout the run, mostly to help reduce the chance of dying.

I estimate a perfectly executed SS could get around 5:30:00~, as I'd make up 10 minutes or so over a Segmented run by avoiding saving. I'm not using death abuse since it involves making a save and it would be impossible to prove that the run was done in a single segment otherwise.

Obviously, I don't expect to go a full 5+ hours without making a mistake here and there. I won't quit the attempt just because I had a wall bump, mistimed a mrbl3, etc. Now if I warp to a wrong town, forget to equip something like the B.Rang- then maybe.

I'm still not certain I can really pull this off, as getting 7 free hours to do this is kind of tough with work and all. Still, don't think I've abandoned ship just yet! I've got to redeem myself for the SS debacle.

Okay, so I've made a fateful decision: segmented run is cancelled. Just too ugly to justify spending even more time on. Plus, being a non-death abuse run it would have to be perfect to even have a chance of getting accepted.

So there's that. :'(

But...

I've been working on something a little, well, crazier. I'm starting to think No Save single segment now, but I don't want to sacrifice anything (mrbl3 timing, limited shopping and inn runs, etc.). I've got a pretty solid route planned that gives me enough flexibility to make adjustments in the face of moderate bad luck. Really bad luck, however, and I'm screwed. I will also be making use of the GODDAM select button.

Sticky points: Frog and Knight (luckily they're at the beginning), Mote, Avian, Jade

The first two are just annoying as it will take some resets to get by them. Mote presents the biggest challenge as he is just flat out tough to beat without DarkDR. I need 24 Mrbl1 to take him down, plus some extra gear (FlameAR, WorldAR, CursedHT). This battle is so late in the run, I'll be happy if I can just beat him using only one M.Drop and a Life2. Avian is also a little dangerous if he chooses to slam me at the wrong time. Jade is the final potential stumbling block- if he decides to throw Shock out at me, I have to have a way to recover so I need an M.Drop there as well. Two shocks... let's not even go there.

I have to get BoltDr as soon as possible for this plan to work, so the route is a little different than the segmented one. I also get some extra stuff before Auria so I can buy extra Mrbl1's to use against Cloud, since he's a little too dangerous to AB. There's also quite a bit of tiny changes spread throughout the run, mostly to help reduce the chance of dying.

I estimate a perfectly executed SS could get around 5:30:00~, as I'd make up 10 minutes or so over a Segmented run by avoiding saving. I'm not using death abuse since it involves making a save and it would be impossible to prove that the run was done in a single segment otherwise.

Obviously, I don't expect to go a full 5+ hours without making a mistake here and there. I won't quit the attempt just because I had a wall bump, mistimed a mrbl3, etc. Now if I warp to a wrong town, forget to equip something like the B.Rang- then maybe.

I'm still not certain I can really pull this off, as getting 7 free hours to do this is kind of tough with work and all. Still, don't think I've abandoned ship just yet! I've got to redeem myself for the SS debacle.

__sdfg

2010-03-18 07:10:47 am

D:

Wow, I don't think I'd have the energy for a single-segment run.

Some thoughts:

5:30 sounds reasonable. Most of the run is stuff that can't really be sped up or slowed down (walking, cutscenes, etc).
I'd add Gremlin as another sticking point. I've always had bad luck with him, anyway.
You probably will want to go through Bain ASAP for this run, as you mentioned. You might also consider whether to go for some of the more out-of-the-way equipment in an effort to make the fights reliable. I'm thinking specifically of whether going to Agua for the LifeAR/FlameSH/IcyDR might be worth the two or three minutes it takes to get them. The unfortunate thing with that, though, is that the IcyDR isn't nearly as good as the DarkDR, so you're not going to make too much of that time back -- the question is how likely you are to complete the run without them. I suppose it might not be bad if you heal more than I usually do. You will always have the potential for luck to kill a run, though.
I would expect some mistakes in a single-segment run. I can't seem to avoid them in a segmented run.
You could make Shock a non-issue with Jade by getting the TideHT from the inn in Prima. It adds nothing to your DEF, though, so I don't know if that would make the battle easier or harder.

Wow, I don't think I'd have the energy for a single-segment run.

Some thoughts:
[list]
[li]5:30 sounds reasonable.  Most of the run is stuff that can't really be sped up or slowed down (walking, cutscenes, etc).
[/li][li]I'd add Gremlin as another sticking point.  I've always had bad luck with him, anyway.[/li]
[li]You probably will want to go through Bain ASAP for this run, as you mentioned.  You might also consider whether to go for some of the more out-of-the-way equipment in an effort to make the fights reliable.  I'm thinking specifically of whether going to Agua for the LifeAR/FlameSH/IcyDR might be worth the two or three minutes it takes to get them.  The unfortunate thing with that, though, is that the IcyDR isn't nearly as good as the DarkDR, so you're not going to make too much of that time back -- the question is how likely you are to complete the run without them.  I suppose it might not be bad if you heal more than I usually do. :)  You will always have the potential for luck to kill a run, though.[/li]
[li]I would expect some mistakes in a single-segment run.  I can't seem to avoid them in a segmented run. :P[/li]
[li]You could make Shock a non-issue with Jade by getting the TideHT from the inn in Prima.  It adds nothing to your DEF, though, so I don't know if that would make the battle easier or harder. :-\[/li]
[/list]

japanzaman

2010-03-18 08:21:56 am

Hmmm... I had been selling that TideHT, but if it can make Shock a non issue, then it's pretty much settled that I'll use it. From my experience Jade likes to use shock about 1/10 times, but I've also had battles where he never once used it. Still, I can make up the money fairly easily so no problem there. It'll also make Mote easier as I now have two M.Drop to make use of.

For some reason, Gremlin is fairly easy for me. Keeping the Acorn/Fry rhythm is the tough part, but if everybody is Forted nobody should get two shotted. Nina doesn't have to survive that battle anyway, so if it's a choice between her or Bo, Bo all the way.

As for LifeAR and IcyDr, they won't help me enough to justify going out of my way to get them. Without DarkDR, Shin is pretty much just a meat tank, and I can grab a PowerDR in Spring before I fight Mote that works just about as well. Defense isn't an issue with Ryu as he does just fine with the DragonHT. Mote and Avian are the only real problems, but Cloud can be dangerous if he decides to hammer me with Devastate like he did in one of my practice runs. I can handle 3, but 4 is a problem. Like I said, really bad luck is usually game over for me. Honestly, it just comes down to how many physical attacks I can get out of Mote. The more he does, the better my battle goes.

I won't get a chance to make a real attempt until next week, when I have some free time in the evening. Until then I'll keep practicing certain segments as I still have trouble remembering certain menu sequences and when to combine things with my Mrbl3.

Energy? Who needs that? 8)

Hmmm... I had been selling that TideHT, but if it can make Shock a non issue, then it's pretty much settled that I'll use it. From my experience Jade likes to use shock about 1/10 times, but I've also had battles where he never once used it. Still, I can make up the money fairly easily so no problem there. It'll also make Mote easier as I now have two M.Drop to make use of.

For some reason, Gremlin is fairly easy for me. Keeping the Acorn/Fry rhythm is the tough part, but if everybody is Forted nobody should get two shotted. Nina doesn't have to survive that battle anyway, so if it's a choice between her or Bo, Bo all the way.

As for LifeAR and IcyDr, they won't help me enough to justify going out of my way to get them. Without DarkDR, Shin is pretty much just a meat tank, and I can grab a PowerDR in Spring before I fight Mote that works just about as well. Defense isn't an issue with Ryu as he does just fine with the DragonHT. Mote and Avian are the only real problems, but Cloud can be dangerous if he decides to hammer me with Devastate like he did in one of my practice runs. I can handle 3, but 4 is a problem. Like I said, really bad luck is usually game over for me. Honestly, it just comes down to how many physical attacks I can get out of Mote. The more he does, the better my battle goes.

I won't get a chance to make a real attempt until next week, when I have some free time in the evening. Until then I'll keep practicing certain segments as I still have trouble remembering certain menu sequences and when to combine things with my Mrbl3.

Energy? Who needs that? 8)

japanzaman

2010-03-22 07:48:00 am

This could be my final update for a while. Got all the way to Jade in the single segment. Then got Shocked. Twice. As much as I'd like to keep punishing myself, I think I need a break from this stuff. Maybe I'll get the time and energy to take this on again, but for now I'm giving this thing a rest. Good luck with your run sdfg! I'll be rooting for you. I'll probably still be lurking around, and I'll be happy to provide my "expertise" should anybody else think of attempting what I decided was just way too much for my sanity.
8)

__sdfg

2010-03-24 11:57:14 pm

D:

Wow, this game just doesn't want you to beat it. Sad

I agree that you deserve a break. Five hours is a long time to commit to playing a video game continuously, and to get cheated near the end twice just kills.

I am sort of making progress, but it is very slow because I've been putting in longer-than-usual hours at work. I eventually beat Frog in about the same time as the segment I posted, only with the F.Stn at the end. There were also a few ugly movement mistakes in that attempt, but after 60 more attempts where I couldn't get even close to the same luck. I'm currently working on a similar situation with Knight: in one of my early attempts, I beat him in about 2:36 (menu pop-up to victory notification, leveling not included), but I had a couple menu glitches late in the run because it was only the second time I'd gotten that far. This time has proven pretty hard to duplicate so far.

japanzaman

2010-03-25 08:18:22 am

Yeah, I tested out the TideHT but it appears the Shock protection only works on the GBA edition, as it didn't seem to have any effect when I tested it in the Jade and Mothra battles. Unfortunately, I got so pissed off after the Jade incident I got rid of all my cheat sheets and tossed my SNES in the closet. Who knows when I'll be back at this, if at all. Then again, I've already written this game off so many times, I'll probably be back at it sooner or later Grin

Honestly, though, I could probably do this entire run by memory if I had to, I've done it so many times on the emulator. But I'm forgetting more and more by the day Cry

Getting the F.Stn from Knight isn't quite as big of a deal as from Frog, as it only saves you a round (10 sec). Honestly, you probably aren't going to win that battle fast and get the F.Stn, so I'd give Knight a few more decent attempts and then move on if it doesn't happen. You'll have plenty more areas to torture yourself over, trust me.