Breath of Fire

2010-03-25 06:39:40 pm

D:

Quote from japanzaman:

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.

That item is useless, then. D:<

I realize that my last paragraph was hard to read, so I'll try to rephrase it. I eventually got the F.Stn from Frog, and decided that I wasn't likely to improve upon my recording despite my mistakes. I now have a lucky-but-sloppy segment for Knight that I am trying to beat. I have no intention of trying to get the F.Stn from him. It is definitely bad enough without that. Smiley

japanzaman

2010-03-25 09:31:53 pm

Yeah, Knight was amazingly difficult to clear in my SS. I think he uses recover around 80% of the time, so even if you get a good fight most attempts will end right there. How much HP you got from your level ups also plays a part. You probably got around 45, but you could end up with as low as 42 or as much as 50 if you were really lucky. Sometimes that can play a big part as it gives you some more wiggle room to take chances. Also, on occasion I have had Hero get enough agility from his level ups to move ahead of Knight, which pretty much removes all risk from the battle. But I'm guessing that didn't happen for you, as it rarely did for me.

I'm actually pretty interested in your run and how some things that other people may not notice are playing out, such as Hero's ACT (which can really screw up things if it's too high for the Gremlin and Cloud battles) and other little details. Usually by the end of the Knight fight I can tell if Hero is going to break 85 HP or not by Cloud, which really helps with that fight.

If you have the time, post some of your keeper segments so I can see what's going and perhaps offer some opinion that could be handy and help you plan more efficiently. Now that I'm taking a break, I need something to do. Grin

Yeah, Knight was amazingly difficult to clear in my SS. I think he uses recover around 80% of the time, so even if you get a good fight most attempts will end right there. How much HP you got from your level ups also plays a part. You probably got around 45, but you could end up with as low as 42 or as much as 50 if you were really lucky. Sometimes that can play a big part as it gives you some more wiggle room to take chances. Also, on occasion I have had Hero get enough agility from his level ups to move ahead of Knight, which pretty much removes all risk from the battle. But I'm guessing that didn't happen for you, as it rarely did for me.

I'm actually pretty interested in your run and how some things that other people may not notice are playing out, such as Hero's ACT (which can really screw up things if it's too high for the Gremlin and Cloud battles) and other little details. Usually by the end of the Knight fight I can tell if Hero is going to break 85 HP or not by Cloud, which really helps with that fight.

If you have the time, post some of your keeper segments so I can see what's going and perhaps offer some opinion that could be handy and help you plan more efficiently. Now that I'm taking a break, I need something to do. ;D

japanzaman

2010-03-28 05:14:18 am

So how's this for an update...

I beat the single segment in 5:26:00~, completely on a whim and without any cheat sheets. However, two problems:

1) Lots of mistakes. Mostly small, but three really big stupid ones. I calculate I lost about 4:00 minutes in mistakes- quite a lot.

2) My capture didn't work out too well. I was using Imovie to capture through my video camera and things didn't turn out very well. There weren't any problems with the small segments, but I failed to anticipate how much stress recording a five hour plus video on my old notebook was going to cause. The video looks choppy in several areas, and there were two moments of just general weirdness with the video and sound in the early part of the run.

The other technical issue is that the video file is corrupted and doesn't display the time properly. I can view the original file on VLC but it has to be repaired just to view it, and even then the timer stops at around the four minute mark. The framerate also wasn't done properly and wound up at 30 instead of the 29.97, with a resolution of 640X480 instead of the NTSC standard.

All these things considered, I really don't think this video is submittable. However, I also don't think I'd get any better results by trying again with the means I have at my disposal. I'm not buying a DVD recorder to make just one run, and I really don't see myself running any other games. I'll probably just load the video I have on youtube (if I can get Imovie to cooperate with that file) and perhaps start a thread in the casual speed running section.

At least my soul can finally rest in peace now that I beat this damn game in under 5.5 hours!

So how's this for an update...

I beat the single segment in 5:26:00~, completely on a whim and without any cheat sheets. However, two problems:

1) Lots of mistakes. Mostly small, but three really big stupid ones. I calculate I lost about 4:00 minutes in mistakes- quite a lot.

2) My capture didn't work out too well. I was using Imovie to capture through my video camera and things didn't turn out very well. There weren't any problems with the small segments, but I failed to anticipate how much stress recording a five hour plus video on my old notebook was going to cause. The video looks choppy in several areas, and there were two moments of just general weirdness with the video and sound in the early part of the run.

The other technical issue is that the video file is corrupted and doesn't display the time properly. I can view the original file on VLC but it has to be repaired just to view it, and even then the timer stops at around the four minute mark. The framerate also wasn't done properly and wound up at 30 instead of the 29.97, with a resolution of 640X480 instead of the NTSC standard.

All these things considered, I really don't think this video is submittable. However, I also don't think I'd get any better results by trying again with the means I have at my disposal. I'm not buying a DVD recorder to make just one run, and I really don't see myself running any other games. I'll probably just load the video I have on youtube (if I can get Imovie to cooperate with that file) and perhaps start a thread in the casual speed running section.

At least my soul can finally rest in peace now that I beat this damn game in under 5.5 hours!

__sdfg

2010-03-29 10:57:19 pm

D:

Nice time for a single-segment. You might be able to improve on it, given that you say you had a few major mistakes, but I'd say it's still impressive.

As far as the video goes, if you ever change your mind about submitting it, you could try posting a clip in the tech support forum, and see if anyone has any suggestions for getting a better recording and/or cleaning up the existing one. The SNES has a native resolution of 320x240, so recording at 640x480 should be fine. The framerate could be an issue, though. You'll need some way to deinterlace the video, and getting frames at the wrong rate will complicate that.

For my run... I'm currently putting in 55-60 hours a week at work, so it might be a little while before I get back to doing that. Sad

japanzaman

2010-03-30 01:32:20 am

Yeah, I know jack-nil about decoding/encoding and don't really want any part of it, to be totally honest. I did manage to get Imovie to import the big file (took close to seven hours) and have started spitting out segments to load on Youtube. I'll post a link once all the clips are up, but you could also just go to the previous link I posted and find what I've got so far easily from there. It appears somebody already has anyway.

Axel Ryman

2010-03-30 02:13:37 am

We all scream for Eyes Cream

I'll check it out later on. Seeing how you got the problem fixed, this might not be useful, but for future reference you should go for an external hard drive and have the video save directly to it while recording. Saves computer space and works better than having it save directly to the internal hard drive.

japanzaman

2010-03-30 09:19:37 pm

Quote:

You might be able to improve on it, given that you say you had a few major mistakes...

Funny thing about that, actually. I compared my time with my previous run where I made it to Jade and to my surprise there wasn't much of a difference (~20 sec). That was with a run that didn't have any big mistakes, though there were some small ones every here and there. Given how long this run takes, it's easy for little things to accumulate over time. I could spend a few more weeks and finally get another successful run that's cleaner, and it could easily wind up slower. Not exactly encouraging.

japanzaman

2010-04-01 02:05:45 am

Got it all loaded finally. You can see the entire playlist here:
http://www.youtube.com/user/jpanzaman#grid/user/F3E294718AEC82EB

All the details are in the comments section. Enjoy!

DoubleThink

2010-04-01 05:37:07 am

There's a word for that

I think you were too hard on yourself in regard to how much time you lost in places, e.g. against Mothro. Your final time sets a good target, and shows that sub 5 for a segmented time should definitely be attainable on console Shocked

__sdfg

2010-04-11 12:19:37 am

D:

So, I was pretty happy with how this turned out:

Unfortunately, there are some video quality glitches that I need to go sort out in the tech support forum. Hopefully, I won't have to trash this.

I have not had the chance to watch your run yet, japanzaman, but now that I have this segment (hopefully) out of the way, I should have the chance to do so. I have all the FLVs grabbed, so it's just a matter of sitting down and watching them.

DoubleThink

2010-04-11 05:00:24 am

There's a word for that

The Knight fight worked out really well, especially the ending, and those level ups were AMAZING. Abominable luck on that NPC at the end though. I really hope you can keep what you've done so far Sad

japanzaman

2010-04-11 05:29:50 pm

Good videos! I can't comment on video quality from a youtube link, so I'll leave it to you to sort through that stuff.

As far as the videos:

Your Knight fight went about as well as it probably could have. I counted three extra attacks (Cntr or slam), plus your F.Stn and B.Stn timed out pretty much perfectly. Getting through that fight with him using only one T.Bolt is something in itself. Your HP looks average, but won't hinder you. Getting 56 makes the Wizard battle much easier if you're going to try and tease a Life2 out of him. Plus, if you're doing death abuse I guess you don't want a freakishly stout hero Grin

I saw two walking mistakes when walking with Nina, but they probably lost you a total of two seconds or less, so no need to worry about that. Your method of making purchases with Hero and then using the moat to leave Windia is better than what I was doing. You probably picked up 10 sec on me there. One of the reasons I never liked saving in Romero was because of that guy who can block the door. Still, you don't have a choice so you'll just have to accept that kind of minor bad luck if you manage to get freakishly lucky like you did with the Knight. Not quite sure why you put Sr1 in the back row. Even if you don't plan on healing, you can get through the Morte and Mortea battles without him back there. I guess death abuse throws another wrinkle into the mix and you want to your chances as high as possible.

I'm glad you're taking your time with this and pushing for really good times, as I think the end result will be pretty good. If you can keep this segment you'll have cleared two of the tougher parts and will probably start making more progress through the game, which will be much funner. Agility wise, you might end up having to use the StrawHT on Bo to bring him in front of Hero for the Wisp fight, especially if Hero gets 3 or more in the next level up at Wizard. Unless you were going to do something else, of course...

Good videos! I can't comment on video quality from a youtube link, so I'll leave it to you to sort through that stuff.

As far as the videos:

Your Knight fight went about as well as it probably could have. I counted three extra attacks (Cntr or slam), plus your F.Stn and B.Stn timed out pretty much perfectly. Getting through that fight with him using only one T.Bolt is something in itself. Your HP looks average, but won't hinder you. Getting 56 makes the Wizard battle much easier if you're going to try and tease a Life2 out of him. Plus, if you're doing death abuse I guess you don't want a freakishly stout hero ;D

I saw two walking mistakes when walking with Nina, but they probably lost you a total of two seconds or less, so no need to worry about that. Your method of making purchases with Hero and then using the moat to leave Windia is better than what I was doing. You probably picked up 10 sec on me there. One of the reasons I never liked saving in Romero was because of that guy who can block the door. Still, you don't have a choice so you'll just have to accept that kind of minor bad luck if you manage to get freakishly lucky like you did with the Knight. Not quite sure why you put Sr1 in the back row. Even if you don't plan on healing, you can get through the Morte and Mortea battles without him back there. I guess death abuse throws another wrinkle into the mix and you want to your chances as high as possible.

I'm glad you're taking your time with this and pushing for really good times, as I think the end result will be pretty good. If you can keep this segment you'll have cleared two of the tougher parts and will probably start making more progress through the game, which will be much funner. Agility wise, you might end up having to use the StrawHT on Bo to bring him in front of Hero for the Wisp fight, especially if Hero gets 3 or more in the next level up at Wizard. Unless you were going to do something else, of course...

__sdfg

2010-04-24 07:20:03 pm

D:

Update.

I have nothing to add, other than that it took me more attempts to get Nina and Sr-1 to die in the last two turns of the Mortea fight than I thought it would. I think I might have been better off leaving Sr-1 in the front row, as japanzaman suggested, but it eventually worked out. I lost some time because the soldiers didn't do enough damage against Morte in the first two rounds, and I had to have Sr-2 contribute an extra attack, but I don't think I'm willing to sit through another 40-50 attempts to save two seconds.

japanzaman

2010-04-25 04:47:04 pm

Exactly. There is no reason to toss a successful attempt for 2 seconds. No segment will ever be perfect, so as long as you meet the basic goals for a segment and keep mistakes down to a minimum you should be fine for now. Once you start on the AB, things change, however.

DoubleThink

2010-04-25 10:16:54 pm

There's a word for that

Unless I state otherwise you can just imagine me posting ":D Cheesy

:D" whenever you upload a new segment from now on. Great battles again this time, you've got this first part of the game down really well.

__sdfg

2010-05-02 11:31:02 pm

D:

Upgrading to Lucid Lynx over the weekend has caused my capture setup to pull a reverse Rockin' the Suburbs. Sorry, folks, progress may get even slower. :/

japanzaman

2010-05-19 09:33:06 pm

Quote:

Upgrading to Lucid Lynx over the weekend has caused my capture setup to pull a reverse Rockin' the Suburbs. Sorry, folks, progress may get even slower. :/

So have you managed to get your setup fixed yet or have you put this little project on hold for a while? If it's a technical issue I'm sure there are plenty of people here who could help you get it fixed.

__sdfg

2010-05-20 11:12:33 pm

D:

I sort of have it working now. I hope the weekly critical deadlines at work go away soon. :/

I was hoping to put up a few segments at once, but I'm currently trying to decide if I want to accept this in spite of the obvious time-waster during the General fight, or try again. I think I want to try again, but I might change my mind if future attempts go poorly.

DoubleThink

2010-05-21 01:19:38 am

There's a word for that

Did you actually mean to change rows or was all that row stuff done by accident? It sort of looks like you put Ryu in front to encourage the General to attack him so that everyone can survive the fight.

Otherwise the segment is really, really excellent again, and I wouldn't lose sleep over it.

japanzaman

2010-05-21 08:43:48 pm

Obviously not technically perfect, but probably as good as you'll get and definitely acceptable. Getting the death segments to work out can be tricky, so a loss of five seconds shouldn't ruin an otherwise good attempt. I say give it a few more goes and see if you can't top this time. Sometimes a slam or cntr from Hero in the forced encounters can speed things up quite nicely, so there's definitely a chance for improvement. However, given how much has to fall into place for things to work out, I would be perfectly fine with the segment you just uploaded. Keep chuggin!

__sdfg

Edit history:

__sdfg: 2010-05-22 01:21:52 pm

2010-05-22 01:16:13 pm

D:

Bo died in about half of my fights with the General. Given that he almost always starts the fight with more HP than anyone else, I decided that his position was drawing too much fire, and that I should try moving him to the back and see if that helped. It did, but I wasted a couple seconds equivocating. However, after making a few more attempts, and throwing out one where I beat General 10 seconds sooner because I only drew a single WarHog for my encounter, I decided to keep this attempt and move on.

The next segment is close to trivial luck-wise... currently looking at inventory management and realizing that I'm going to need an actual plan pretty soon...

japanzaman

2010-05-22 07:55:34 pm

Yeah, inventory management needs to be addressed. Mrbl3's, Mrbl 1, and Life2 are the ones you want up top. You'll be doing shopping in Prima and Auria, so I would make adjustments at those points.

__sdfg

2010-06-18 09:28:31 pm

D:

Went through Agua. I plan to take this if no-one objects. It could have been about six seconds faster if I had done the last fight better. I don't know how long it will take me to get luck that good again, though.

Also, I uploaded some less interesting segments here (#5) and here (#7).

japanzaman

2010-06-19 05:15:58 am

I guess you should keep this, though I don't know why you used that last Acorn unless you were just trying to make sure that Hero died by not using defense. Or was that just a mistake?

Either way, it's up to you whether or not to go with it. If this was the best time you've managed to get so far and you don't see yourself bettering it, then by all means move on and do your best to keep the rest of the segments clean. There are far more difficult segments waiting, so no need to destroy yourself over this part of the game.

DoubleThink

2010-06-19 08:22:47 am

There's a word for that

The time lost from messing with the Acorn is very minor, I'm more worried that it might be needed later D: The Wisp battle was brilliant.

Not too long until Gremlin now Cheesy