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Highly Evolved
NES is the only one I'd consider speedrunning at the moment.

Segment 1

http://www.twitch.tv/darkwing_duck_sda/c/3240810

Segment 2

http://www.twitch.tv/darkwing_duck_sda/c/3240819
Edit history:
Heidrage: 2013-11-14 12:13:46 pm
Willing to teach you the impossible
If you are doing segmented, you might wanna look into the GBC version. You can get max level hero, warrior, or fighter at right after romly (second major city) if i remember correctly.

And movement and text are WAY faster. few name changes but over all the same.
Highly Evolved
It plays different and I didn't like the game when I played it.
Highly Evolved
Well, quite a change up in the attempts since I posted a couple weeks ago.

First the bad news.

I've been stymied in the third segment for various reasons.  Finally got a segment I felt not retched to keep, and then quite unexpectedly got a really good 4th segment when I made the decision to save at Dhama before doing the Kandar ver. 2 battle for reasons I'll get into.  Shortens the segment, and I did it with about an 18 minute cushion, meaning if I do the Kandar cave faster than that in a later segment, I've picked up time.

However, in my infinite wisdom, I forgot to record the segment.  In addition, I wasn't terribly happy with some of the level ups in the third segment I was recording, so I kept the other save after segment 2 instead of copying it into the next save in case I couldn't get through the Pyramid.  Thus I have to go back to segment 3.  Those previous two good segment times are for naught.

Now the good news.

The reason I'm saving before Kandar in the fourth segment is that there is an easy way to get a metal slime battle (one simiac and one metal slime to be precise) coming out of a save.  The problem was that the battle RNG itself isn't as easy to manipulate.  There are several different results based on what I think is heavily influence by the number of rounds each battle has, which places you somewhere else on the RNG giving you different battles.  I've come across at least nine different battle results if attacking as if you held the action button down with a turbo controller, and each battle result can send you to a different battle result on the next reset depending on how the results of the previous battle (not attacking by holding A down).

Took several hours, but I found a repeating pattern of two battles where I get a metal slime kill every time.  This would be faster than a straight grind in the tower, even if I do it as a single segment with reset segment (if that makes sense).  I'm not terribly high on 15 straight segments of one battle grinding, and doing it all in one segment would count the save time and game load time, but I think it would look cooler to see that manipulation on console anyway, so I'll probably do it that way since SS with resets are allowed now.

The concern is that the battle pattern will not be repeatable when I return to this segment due to the likely different stat values my characters will have when I actually get a segment 3 and segment 4 recorded properly.  However, should that be the case, I'm sure a new pattern will emerge and all it takes is charting out the results to find a pattern that is repeatable with all battles resulting in metal slime kills.

In summary, I'm back to the same spot I was two weeks ago, but have a new routing strategy that will take a lot of time off the run.
HELLO!
I did some work trying to track down the RNG for this game, since I keep watching Darkwing's streams and I find interesting the whole puzzle he's working on.

All I've been able to do though is to confirm what we already knew: this game is pretty deterministic.  It's not like some games, where there's an RNG memory address or two that continuously cycles, and gets read when needed.  There are a few memory addresses that just count up though, by varying amounts.  Nothing that "looks random" though.

So my current theory is that the 'rng' is some sort of lookup table based on these numbers, and the reason battles are deterministic is that they don't cycle during battles.

That lends itself to some possibilities of why DWD gets different 'loops' of battle patterns.  Is something being saved in the SRAM that's involved here?  At this point some serious disassembling would be needed and I'm not prepared to do that yet.
Highly Evolved
Well, I'm unsure how this is all going to go once a full run is made.  Seems like the more I learn about it, the more confused I become.

On segment 4, with some significant results from it.  Maybe the next segmented run has no unexpected battles.
Highly Evolved
Well...the manipulation in this run is making this run quite a bit different than it used to be.

Right now, it appears I'll have a minimum 9 or maximum 10 segments solely for one metal slime or metal babble battle. 

I'm currently looking at around 4 hours for completion of the segmented run.  Total amount of segments should be around 20 or so.
It's not pretty to have such short segments, but then the grinding segments are always the least interesting parts of JRPG speedruns.  I hope you get through the metal slaying soon, so you can go rid the world of jazz hands.
Edit history:
presjpolk: 2014-03-20 08:53:34 am
HELLO!
See I disagree. I think having short segments in this way *is* pretty, because it's the product of careful study of the game.

Process matters, I think.
SGL Scrublord
Its different in a game like this, where equipment can't overcome raw experience gain. Like the Prez sez, its might seem odd but it displays a mastery of the game's programming. Its impressive in that regard for sure and cuts down on needless battles. Plus having grinded it out the hard way, it can take a long time to see those little metal jackasses, and then they run. Manipulation is key here.
I suppose part of my aesthetic ideal of RPG speedruns is having a vastly underpowered party squeak by against overwhelming odds, even in the grinding segments.  That happened in the previous run (thirty minutes in the Tower of Dhama, at level twelve, yikes).  On the other hand, another part of said ideal is using deep and arcane knowledge of the game to exploit it, so I can't complain there.

Of course, speed trumps all.  I think I even urged DWD on-stream to ditch the Dhama slimes in favor of some long-shot Metal Babbles.
Highly Evolved
Well...it's finished.  Need to work on submission stuff and all that.

According to my timing, I got 3:31:35.  That was not my goal of sub 4:30 when I revisited this game, but it'll do.  Roll Eyes
Learning to Stream
Quote from Darkwing Duck:
Well...it's finished.  Need to work on submission stuff and all that.

According to my timing, I got 3:31:35.  That was not my goal of sub 4:30 when I revisited this game, but it'll do.  Roll Eyes



Or redo the last segment ^^ C'mon baby! 3:30 is possible if the RNG Gods favor you! [I hope.. I missed the damn last segment that won x.x;;]
Professional Second Banana
'Grats!

DW3 RTA next?
Hooray!  I had no inkling that so much time could be taken off this record.  I was expecting a 30-40 minute improvement, not a 100 minute one!
Highly Evolved
I just took a look at my times and forgot to update segment 3 with the time I actually get.  I believe I was unsure if I would be able to keep the segment and forgot to adjust when I completed segment 4.

Thus, my time is four minutes and fifty seconds faster, resulting in a time of 3:26:45
Managed to 5:26:46 RTA after messing around with the route for entirely too long: http://www.twitch.tv/everhate/c/5297059
(Maybe this will inspire DWD to stop slacking and submit his improved segmented run :p )

Route uses 2 fighters, 1 wizard. (Stock soldier used with 2 fighters until I reach kanave, as the wiz would be dead weight)
1 set of bomb crags, rushes to pyramid to get golden claw + death warp out.
Kill Kandar 1 for xp with shiny new equipment (alternative is another set of bomb crags. bit of a tossup but kandar is more consistent)
Linear stuff to ship
Soo for staff of thunder, invis herb, poison moth powder
Grinding to wizard 21 for bikill done on metal slimes then orochi loops (I choose to use jipang for 1 set of slimes before going to tower, because 8-slime formation is more rare but more profitable with powders)
Class change wizard to sage
Proceed in whatever order through remainder of game, as the orb collecting can be done in any order.

Obviously a lot of little things, but that's the basic overview if anyone else wanted to get started on this. Definitely a lot more time to be saved, though 5:30 was my first benchmark goal to hit, so at least I've gotten that far.
With some help from DWD, this is now down to 4:49:27 for RTA/Single Segment with resets: http://www.twitch.tv/everhate/c/5488124

I (accidentally) ended up with a good metal slime grind fight 2 steps outside Dhama that had 2 metal slimes, resulting in a kill pretty much every fight off a save/reset. Still uses 2x fighter + wizard but now skips Kandar 1 in favor of metal slimes and gets Bikill/sage before doing Kandar 2.

Definitely still more time to come off of this one with more attempts/discoveries.
Edit history:
Darkwing Duck: 2014-11-17 03:50:13 pm
Highly Evolved
Everhate was lucky in that metal slime encounter.  In the future, a metal slime encounter like that is NOT guaranteed, so before the run, you have to set one up.

The easiest, albeit time intensive, is to refresh the encounters by saving on a different file.  It appears saving randomizes both step and encounter numbers on each message speed.  So basically, you have to save on a file you won't be using (I've been saving on file 3), test battles starting at Dhama (I use file 2), and if you don't get a battle you like, re-save on file 3.  Erasing and restarting on the file shouldn't change the expected outcomes from changing message speed on another file, so that enounter should be repeatable when you get there on an actual attempt. 

I haven't had a chance to fully verify this yet, as I haven't found a battle equivalent to what Everhate has, but I will continue to test this at some point.
Learning to Stream
Congratulations to KissMyAfroCard who has now taken his DWIII RTA down to a sub 4hrs with a 3h54m24s run almost 12hrs ago!

http://www.twitch.tv/kissmyafrocard/v/3902390

Looks like the competition is really heating up with more and more people playing this now and a second known Sub 4hr run! [Everhate having a 3h52m run]
Learning to Stream
Congrats to Darkwing Duck who has now cracked the sub 4.

http://www.twitch.tv/darkwing_duck_sda/v/3927582

3h55m19m run!

Incredible Bomb Crag luck sadly offset by a nearly 2 minute detour for a new Wizard Ring after it crumbled very early on during a trolling session. x.x;;

Otherwise a solid run and pushing things down further and further.


With 3 Primary Candidates doing Sub-4, who will be the next to snag the WR mantle... or will a newcomer join in and take the crown? Only time will tell! [Stares at DWIII cart]
Learning to Stream
Congratulations to Darkwing Duck who now not only has a second Sub 4hr run, but NOW the WR with a phenomenal 3h51m40s run!! [Even several crappy starts and average Bomb Crag luck could NOT stop this run from succeeding!

http://www.twitch.tv/darkwing_duck_sda/v/3944142

Amazing what the past 10 days have brought to this awesome RPG!
Learning to Stream
KissMyAfroCard decided he wasn't going to go downtown, he was gonna get in on some Bruno Mars and Mark Ronson goodness and he brought the Uptown Funk to DWIII in the wee hours of the morning!

Congrats to KMAC who really funked it up with a new WR of 3h46m25s in the very competitive Dragon Warrior III arena!

http://www.twitch.tv/kissmyafrocard/v/3983654
Learning to Stream
NesCardinality now enters the fray and begins the slow grind towards Sub-4 with a current PB of 4h24m47s.

http://www.twitch.tv/nescardinality/b/646176525

Nice to see so many people going at this fine game!
Learning to Stream
And NesCardinality continues the quest for sub 4, with a new time of 4h03m37s on April 21st [didn't notice until now]. Will we have a 4th entrant into the sub 4hr club soon?

http://www.twitch.tv/nescardinality/b/652075593