EarthBound

2008-09-12 01:46:42 pm

Maybe. Instead of buying them, just use the sugar you find at random, no matter how little. Aside from that, I don't remember, is it only sugar that works?

Mickey_Mage

Edit history:

Mickey_Mage: 2008-09-12 03:22:58 pm

2008-09-12 03:06:44 pm

Glitching EB 1 flying man at a time

Yeah, I believe the way the glitch works is with any condiment (but isn't that hard to get most condiments from enemies?). Plus, we're skipping as many fights as we possibly can, so we'd more than likely have to buy the condiments, which would be out of the way (actually, more time consuming than anything once you talk to the person).

@sdfg: Oh, sorry, I forgot about those locations. You'd still have to have sugar prior to going there, and the room to hold both, which sometimes you're kind of short on, so that could pose somewhat of a problem, too...

Also, it would take a lot of manipulation to get a good stat increase from one, wouldn't it (along with getting a good segment as well)?

Guardian Garr

2008-09-12 03:32:33 pm

Quote from Mickey_Mage:

Yeah, I believe the way the glitch works is with any condiment (but isn't that hard to get most condiments from enemies?). Plus, we're skipping as many fights as we possibly can, so we'd more than likely have to buy the condiments, which would be out of the way (actually, more time consuming than anything once you talk to the person).

@sdfg: Oh, sorry, I forgot about those locations. You'd still have to have sugar prior to going there, and the room to hold both, which sometimes you're kind of short on, so that could pose somewhat of a problem, too...

Also, it would take a lot of manipulation to get a good stat increase from one, wouldn't it (along with getting a good segment as well)?

Well, I am just saying. I am sure there is a present or two that doesn't stray your path. That way, in a fight if you can at all possibly do it if you think that your player has nothing that they can do, to use the condiment(s).

__sdfg

2008-09-12 03:41:48 pm

D:

From what I've read (since I never bothered with the Rock candy glitch myself), any condiment will work, but Sugar packets and Jars of delisauce increase your stats by 2 instead of by 1.
The main thing to manipulate would be which stat you increased. If you wanted a significant boost, though, you'd probably have to bite the bullet and plan on wasting a good portion of your condiments on other stats.
According to EBDB, the only gift box with a condiment is in one of the houses in Dalaam (it gives you a Jar of delisauce). There are a few enemies with non-terrible (1 in 8 or even 1 in 4) drop rates, but otherwise, you have to buy them.

Personally, I'd prefer to redo the segments until you have so few encounters that the boost wouldn't matter. I also think a minimalist approach would make the run more watchable. *shrug*

Floogal

2008-09-12 07:27:59 pm

Using Rock Candies aren't worth the time, even if one were to ignore the time spent acquiring them. Here's the rundown on the general effects of consuming a Rock Candy with a good condiment:

Speed +2:
- Multibottle Rockets do about 48 more damage on average.
- Enemy dodge rate for PSI Rockin & physicals decrease 0.4%

Guts +2:
- SMAAAASH! rate & mortal-hit survival rate both increase by 0.4%
- odds of becoming sunstroke'd every 20 seconds in the desert decreases by 6.7%

Luck +2:
- Dodge rate for luck-based effects increases by 2.5%

Vitality +2:
- Max HP increases by 30

IQ +2:
- Max PP increases by 10 (20 for Ness after Magicant)

As you can see, only the Vitality and IQ increases have any significant impact without doing the trick a LOT of times. And if you're concerned with HP/PP management, you're better off replacing the Sugar+Rock Candy trick with the Salt+Brain Food trick. In case you didn't know, Brain Food Lunches give 100% HP & PP recovery when with a good condiment. Poo gets the 100% recovery without needing a condiment.

Ah, I've just had a thought. If you use a Skip Sandwich mid-battle, you'll still get the speed boost after the fight. Now, maybe we could grab any old condiments & a single Skip Sandwich, and use them periodically throughout the game whenever someone has a free turn in battle? Don't bother matching up good condiments -- that only increases the speed boost by 20% (10->12 and 20->24 for normal & DX varieties, respectively).

Using Rock Candies aren't worth the time, even if one were to ignore the time spent acquiring them.  Here's the rundown on the general effects of consuming a Rock Candy with a good condiment:

Speed +2:
- Multibottle Rockets do about 48 more damage on average.
- Enemy dodge rate for PSI Rockin & physicals decrease 0.4%

Guts +2:
- SMAAAASH! rate & mortal-hit survival rate both increase by 0.4%
- odds of becoming sunstroke'd every 20 seconds in the desert decreases by 6.7%

Luck +2:
- Dodge rate for luck-based effects increases by 2.5%

Vitality +2:
- Max HP increases by 30

IQ +2:
- Max PP increases by 10 (20 for Ness after Magicant)

As you can see, only the Vitality and IQ increases have any significant impact without doing the trick a LOT of times.  And if you're concerned with HP/PP management, you're better off replacing the Sugar+Rock Candy trick with the Salt+Brain Food trick.  In case you didn't know, Brain Food Lunches give 100% HP & PP recovery when with a good condiment.  Poo gets the 100% recovery without needing a condiment.

Ah, I've just had a thought.  If you use a Skip Sandwich mid-battle, you'll still get the speed boost after the fight.  Now, maybe we could grab any old condiments & a single Skip Sandwich, and use them periodically throughout the game whenever someone has a free turn in battle?  Don't bother matching up good condiments -- that only increases the speed boost by 20% (10->12 and 20->24 for normal & DX varieties, respectively).

Mickey_Mage

2008-09-12 08:19:00 pm

Glitching EB 1 flying man at a time

Guts wouldn't be all that useful for most bosses anyway, since BBRs and MBRs are pretty much all we use after we can buy them. I know it's useful for enemies but, cutting down on the amount of battles makes that pointless too.

And besides, what are the probabilities of getting each one, or is it completely random?

I do like the idea of using skip sandwiches during battles and with a condiment, but we still have to think about the low budget we have at the beginning of the game, and where we can buy the most skip sandwiches and actually be able to use them as soon as possible, without wasting the money and space for nothing (we can buy them before going in the monkey cave at the drugstore, but how much room would we have during that time, usually?). Adding to that a condiment too, that's probably too much room. _sdfg already has to switch items around and such to even make room for people half the time in the run. The condiments would be the best idea for the DX skip sandwiches, maybe. I know they don't cost much, but there's no need to use too much money, especially since battles will be, for the most part, far and inbetween in a good speedrun.

Guts wouldn't be all that useful for most bosses anyway, since BBRs and MBRs are pretty much all we use after we can buy them. I know it's useful for enemies but, cutting down on the amount of battles makes that pointless too.

And besides, what are the probabilities of getting each one, or is it completely random?

I do like the idea of using skip sandwiches during battles and with a condiment, but we still have to think about the low budget we have at the beginning of the game, and where we can buy the most skip sandwiches and actually be able to use them as soon as possible, without wasting the money and space for nothing (we can buy them before going in the monkey cave at the drugstore, but how much room would we have during that time, usually?). Adding to that a condiment too, that's probably too much room. _sdfg already has to switch items around and such to even make room for people half the time in the run. The condiments would be the best idea for the DX skip sandwiches, maybe. I know they don't cost much, but there's no need to use too much money, especially since battles will be, for the most part, far and inbetween in a good speedrun.

Floogal

2008-09-13 12:38:40 am

I think you misunderstood my post. Let me start over.

The so-called "Rock Candy glitch" is actually just a specific example of the more general "Condiment glitch." It's not just Rock Candies that can be duplicated at the cost of condiments -- any condiment-compatible food works. This includes Brain Food Lunches, Pizzas, Magic Truffles, Lucky Sandwiches, and Skip Sandwiches.

So we only need one Skip Sandwich (DX), and then a bunch of condiments.

I don't think it's worth it to detour for a shop to buy the sandwiches. See here for Skip Sandwich and Skip Sandwich DX locations. For the ordinary variety, they should probably just be consumed out-of-battle like normal. But the DX one found in Threed (hardly a detour at all) can be held onto until condiments can be acquired later.

Besides the Jar of Delisauce in Dalaam, there are no condiments to be found. Fighting random encounters is not worth it, unless it's an instant-win. So that leaves buying them. I recommend waiting until Scaraba -- the condiment dealer is not out of the way, $4 per Tin of Cocoa should be chump change by that point in the game, and inventory space should be more manageable.

After that point, whenever there's a fight and someone would just waste their turn defending, instead have that person use the sandwich. Due to the condiment glitch, only the Jar of Cocoa will be used up, and the Skip Sandwich DX will remain.

Now, I'm not suggesting that this strategy is to be used all the time, and that condiments should be stocked up on every time it's possible. I'm just saying we could use it a few times, as the condiment person in Scaraba & the Skip Sandwich DX in Threed are virtually no detour at all.

Some experiments with the Skip Sandwich:
- It doesn't matter who you use the Skip Sandwich on (well, it probably wouldn't work on someone who's KO'd...).
- You can't stack their times. Using a new one resets the running time, instead of adding to it.
- If you successfully teleport mid-speed burst, you'll keep the remaining speed burst. Note the running timer keeps going during the teleport animation. If you mess up a teleport (everyone is blackened), you'll instantly lose whatever running time you had remaining.
- Despite everyone appearing to hustle more, you don't actually get any speed increase on weird terrain -- waist-deep water, head-deep water, ropes/ladders, staircases, Lost Underworld "shrinkage".
- I tried calling Mach Pizza or buying a Fresh Egg both before & after using a Skip Sandwich. Apparently, the skip sandwich uses a different timer variable, as there were no conflicts.
- If you save & quit, you'll have lost your speed burst when you continue your save file.

As an alternative to Skip Sandwiches, we could abuse Salt Packets & the Brain Food Lunch we get in Dalaam/Monkey Caves. Once again, we can stock up on the condiments in Scaraba, and then spam offensive PSI in random encounters, having one person use the lunches to recover the PP during battle.

Anyways, I should really look over the proposed route before suggesting more stuff, but it doesn't hurt to throw stuff out there.

I think you misunderstood my post.  Let me start over.

The so-called "Rock Candy glitch" is actually just a specific example of the more general "Condiment glitch."  It's not just Rock Candies that can be duplicated at the cost of condiments -- any condiment-compatible food works.  This includes Brain Food Lunches, Pizzas, Magic Truffles, Lucky Sandwiches, and Skip Sandwiches.

So we only need one Skip Sandwich (DX), and then a bunch of condiments.

I don't think it's worth it to detour for a shop to buy the sandwiches.  See here for [url=http://starmen.net/mother2/ebdb/items.php?item=224]Skip Sandwich[/url] and [url=http://starmen.net/mother2/ebdb/items.php?item=225]Skip Sandwich DX[/url] locations.  For the ordinary variety, they should probably just be consumed out-of-battle like normal.  But the DX one found in Threed (hardly a detour at all) can be held onto until condiments can be acquired later.

Besides the Jar of Delisauce in Dalaam, there are no condiments to be found.  Fighting random encounters is not worth it, unless it's an instant-win.  So that leaves buying them.  I recommend waiting until Scaraba -- the condiment dealer is not out of the way, $4 per Tin of Cocoa should be chump change by that point in the game, and inventory space should be more manageable.

After that point, whenever there's a fight and someone would just waste their turn defending, instead have that person use the sandwich.  Due to the condiment glitch, only the Jar of Cocoa will be used up, and the Skip Sandwich DX will remain.

Now, I'm not suggesting that this strategy is to be used all the time, and that condiments should be stocked up on every time it's possible.  I'm just saying we could use it a few times, as the condiment person in Scaraba & the Skip Sandwich DX in Threed are virtually no detour at all.

Some experiments with the Skip Sandwich:
- It doesn't matter who you use the Skip Sandwich on (well, it probably wouldn't work on someone who's KO'd...).
- You can't stack their times.  Using a new one resets the running time, instead of adding to it.
- If you successfully teleport mid-speed burst, you'll keep the remaining speed burst.  Note the running timer keeps going during the teleport animation.  If you mess up a teleport (everyone is blackened), you'll instantly lose whatever running time you had remaining.
- Despite everyone appearing to hustle more, you don't actually get any speed increase on weird terrain -- waist-deep water, head-deep water, ropes/ladders, staircases, Lost Underworld "shrinkage".
- I tried calling Mach Pizza or buying a Fresh Egg both before & after using a Skip Sandwich.  Apparently, the skip sandwich uses a different timer variable, as there were no conflicts.
- If you save & quit, you'll have lost your speed burst when you continue your save file.

As an alternative to Skip Sandwiches, we could abuse Salt Packets & the Brain Food Lunch we get in Dalaam/Monkey Caves.  Once again, we can stock up on the condiments in Scaraba, and then spam offensive PSI in random encounters, having one person use the lunches to recover the PP during battle.

Anyways, I should really look over the proposed route before suggesting more stuff, but it doesn't hurt to throw stuff out there.

__sdfg

2008-09-13 07:49:30 am

D:

The Skip Sandwich DX from Threed gets used up dodging Sentry Robots. However, in my last run, I bought a Skip Sandwich DX at the shop in Toto so I could sprint through the last room in the pyramid. Since we need to save before Kraken and the museum phone is tied up by Mr. Spoon, the run's going to be stopping in that shop anyway.

Alternatively, you could just buy a bunch of Skip Sandwich DXes at the shop and not have to worry about using them in battle. If you cut down on your weapon and bracelet purchases, you should be able to spare a few hundred dollars at this point.

Mickey_Mage

2008-09-13 09:47:56 am

Glitching EB 1 flying man at a time

Actually, floogal, you never mentioned once in your post that ANY condiment compatible food will give you this glitch. You mentioned doing it with a Skip Sandwich, but that didn't exactly indicate to me what the glitch actually was (and what the other foods were, either)... Since you didn't explain it as the "condiment" glitch, I just assumed it worked with only Rock Candy, as that's the only name I've ever heard it go by, too.

Guardian Garr

2008-09-13 11:37:57 pm

Maybe I could help with this run from time to time? Not actually do it, but find routes that might seem quick? Don't expect anything to immediate, I newly acquired work and I don't know what I will do in between.

__sdfg

2008-09-15 10:52:06 am

D:

If you like, you can look over the various routes discussed in this thread and suggest possible improvements.

Floogal

2008-09-26 03:11:44 pm

Just a new resource to help with planning. Warning -- over 1 MB in size.

__sdfg

2008-10-12 09:56:51 pm

D:

Givin' this the ol' bump to say that I'm actually working on this. I'm in Twoson and I've saved in the bus station after investing in Apple Kid's research. The total video time for the segments I've recorded is just under 33:00, which puts me four minutes ahead of Evil_Ninja and a couple minutes ahead of my emulated run. The current estimated date for finishing is sometime next summer, given how school's been going.

And... away!

Dude-face

2008-12-02 01:36:47 am

Any progress on this one?

ffdude1906

2008-12-02 07:51:03 am

I hope so, i'd love to see an improvement on this run, this game is amazing

__sdfg

2008-12-02 10:25:12 am

D:

I've been slowly working on it. I'm currently in Dusty Dunes, just before the mine. I think that's about a third of the way through, both in terms of segment count and run time.

The current plan is to focus on not failing my classes until finals are over, then buy a lot of caffeine and play as much as I possibly can. Hopefully, I'll be able to get the run done before the next semester starts in mid-January.

Mickey_Mage

2008-12-02 05:55:14 pm

Glitching EB 1 flying man at a time

Take your time. We all know this game is very frustrating at certain areas. By the way, what's your time up to this point?

__sdfg

2008-12-02 07:14:16 pm

D:

I'm at 1:44:31. This includes the naming and stuff at the beginning of the game, as well as about 12 seconds of loading at the beginning of each segment. Evil_Ninja's time at this point in his video was 2:19:18, but he took care of Milky Well before leaving Saturn Valley and I didn't.

Some stupid bumping-into-things snuck its way into some/many of the segments. I'm hoping my luck made up for it. I wasn't able to match the speed of those segments in subsequent attempts, at least.

Dude-Face

2008-12-02 10:55:30 pm

Out of curiosity, why'd you decide to save Milky Well for later?

Mickey_Mage

2008-12-03 01:33:09 am

Glitching EB 1 flying man at a time

There's a glitch where most of the enemies won't attack you, even if you haven't beaten Trillionage yet. If I remember correctly from his test run, only the Ranboobs attacked him. The rest of them ran away for some reason.

A lot of time is saved later, too, because you can one hit kill Trillionage with a MBR.

Floogal

2008-12-03 09:01:20 pm

It's not a glitch:

Enemies will run away from you under the following circumstances:
- Some event flag is set (because a sanctuary boss was killed): always
- Sum of your levels > enemy's level*10: always
- Sum of your levels > enemy's level*8: 75%
- Sum of your levels > enemy's level*6: 50%

Enemy levels in Milky Well:
- Struttin' Evil Mushroom: 17
- Tough Mobile Sprout: 21
- Ranboob: 24

Your party's levels should be more than high enough when you return to scare away at least a few, on average.

Mickey_Mage

2008-12-04 07:03:55 pm

Glitching EB 1 flying man at a time

Well, I know that rule too, but it's just weird for something like that to still apply this much later in the game...

__sdfg

Edit history:

__sdfg: 2008-12-05 03:01:03 pm

2008-12-05 11:07:18 am

D:

Venting:

My target time for the mole cave segment was 11:30. I thought this would be cutting it fairly tight, since my best time on the emulator was 13:00, but I thought that if I worked hard enough, I might be able to get down there. Yesterday, while I was playing, I got some ridiculous luck and completed the segment in 11:11. However, while this was happening, not one, but two of my housemates wandered into my room and struck up a conversation with me, causing me to get distracted and do some blatantly stupid things (pick up the Guts capsule, heal Ness when I meant to heal Paula, etc.). Now I have an even more ridiculous target time.

*grumble, grumble, damn kids, grumble grumble...*

EDIT: Never mind, finally got it down to 10:55 and a couple semi-excusable mistakes (trying to get a Thirsty Coil Snake to disappear, then fighting it anyway; tapping the A button too quickly and "using" the Bicycle when I was trying to move it into Paula's inventory). I'm gonna go take a nap now.

Venting:

My target time for the mole cave segment was 11:30.  I thought this would be cutting it fairly tight, since my best time on the emulator was 13:00, but I thought that if I worked hard enough, I might be able to get down there.  Yesterday, while I was playing, I got some ridiculous luck and completed the segment in 11:11.  However, while this was happening, not one, but two of my housemates wandered into my room and struck up a conversation with me, causing me to get distracted and do some blatantly stupid things (pick up the Guts capsule, heal Ness when I meant to heal Paula, etc.).  Now I have an [i]even more[/i] ridiculous target time.

*grumble, grumble, damn kids, grumble grumble...*

EDIT:  Never mind, finally got it down to 10:55 and a couple semi-excusable mistakes (trying to get a Thirsty Coil Snake to disappear, then fighting it anyway; tapping the A button too quickly and "using" the Bicycle when I was trying to move it into Paula's inventory).  I'm gonna go take a nap now.

kbw

2008-12-10 09:06:19 pm

Just so you know, lurkers are watching you progress Smiley

don't give up and I can't wait for this run!

jam287

2008-12-12 02:59:34 am

I am looking forward to this. I enjoyed the unposted run very much so I can't wait for a better one.