Final Fantasy XIII Speedrun

2010-07-17 03:46:11 am

To clarify, when I say poison, I mean poison + normally game play attacking with Fang as leader. Or would it be faster to use blitz, trusting the AI to inflict poison, which might not work quickly enough to be worth it.

Arrow

2010-07-17 04:10:09 am

Now a hit show on the CW

If the plan is to upgrade the Pleiades AND Taming Pole, I feel like it would probably still be a good idea to do the Bhakti quest. But I'll have a better idea of how much money I will need and how much I'll have just from selling weapons/accessories when I reach Eden.

For Orphan, I would definitely think it better to have Sazh as the leader. I would just restart the segment if Poison didn't land. I can't remember...are you able to switch party members between phases if you pause/retry during the fight, or does it force you to start from the beginning? It would be nice to be able to switch Vanille as party leader for the last phase to use Death, but it's not worth it if she would have to be leader for all three phases.

G__AnakinRPG

2010-07-17 04:37:40 am

You can start and retry, but for the last part only, it would so not be worth it because there are about 7 cutscenes you have to skip and the fight, even at low levels, takes less than 2 minutes.

sportlov

2010-07-18 08:26:10 am

It would seem as though most enemies in the first few chapters are able to drop shrouds, and using the saves available in chapter 2, it would seem like you would be able to force a shroud drop from every forced encounter.

One thing I'm wondering though, is if it's possible to get more than one shroud from a single combat. Namely if a fight against two Pantherons would be able to net 2 fortisols, or a fight against a Pantheron and a Zwerg Scandroid could net a fortisol and a deceptisol.

Other than that it should be possible to for example:

Start from chapter 2 save, kill the Pantheron for B&W outfitters and a fortisol (1). (Don't know about this one, I've had it drop fangs and such though, should be possible.) Go for the one in the center of the same room, (2) and run to the mark. Save as soon as you enter Snow. Fight the forced fight, (3) and enter Lightning (I think you get a deceptisol for free here as long as you don't have one.), fight the monsters guarding the Gladius (4) and enter Snow. Fight the forced combat for a fortisol (5). Enter Vanille and fight the monsters guarding the treasure ball for a deceptisol (1) and open the treasure for a fortisol (6). There should be a save after the Pantherons, I might be wrong on that one though. Forced fight with Snow, Vanille and Hope, I don't know about shrouds here (7) and Lightnings up again. Fight the Ghouls guarding the Power Wristband for a fortisol and go up the stairs. I don't know if the Ghast on the top is required, but he can drop a shroud at least, should be worth it. Save after.

There are plenty of saves around here, and even though saving costs you about 30 seconds on the Playstation at least, it should allow being able to force a shroud from every fight. It's of course possible to farm more deceptisols from the Zwerg Scandroids roaming the area, but the question is how many you really need, and if it's not better to farm them in Chapter 3 like G__AnakinRPG suggested.
I farmed fortisols like the Speed guide recommended, but I was able to force 3 deceptisols and 1 fortisol from the segment between the beginning of chapter 2 until right before Anima without saving once, in just a couple of hours of trying.

On an unrelated note, since I had a spare fortisol I used one on Anima, clearing the fight in 56 seconds with one potion blitzing the arms right after it's sweeping attack on Snow. It's probably possible to kill it off faster than 1:59 without a fortisol, but it's the best I managed with a fortisol in about 5 tries at least. Might be worth noting.
The Manasvin Warmech can be killed in under a minute by staggering it just as it casts Crystal rain (2 rounds of Aggression and one of Tri-disaster.) Using 2 different Relentless Assault or Aggression paradigms probably would cut a couple of seconds as well, since you can kill it during the end of the first stagger and every 2 rounds I changed paradigms, a fortisol would only save around 10-15 seconds here. The time listed in the Speed guide was 1:29 I believe.
The best I managed on the Garuda Interceptor was 1:21, but starting off in Tri-disaster is probably going to end up being faster than that. I duplicated Tri-disaster and Relentless Assault before the forced Behemoth fight.
I'm quite sure that the enemies before Shiva net a small amount of CP, so I killed off all the easy ones (2 first and 2 in the end) in hopes of getting some extra, and the Eidolon fight only took me 1:19 using Ravager and Sentinel. Of course these aren't perfect times, but it's something closer to what you'd want compared to the one's in the Speed guide, you might want to look it over G__AnakinRPG.

Quote from Arrow:

Haha, I don't know about eight, but getting under nine hours is my goal right now. I'm planning to record a run to submit here on SDA as soon as I finish up my test run, hopefully in the next couple weeks.

Seeing how much time I was able to save compared to G__AnakinRPG's times in his speed guide only up to chapter 4 (It's amazing to have something to go after, and I've followed it mostly from the start), if that fashion continues through the game, and faster route planning is possible, I would say close to 8 hours at least would be very possible.

Quote from Arrow:

If the plan is to upgrade the Pleiades AND Taming Pole, I feel like it would probably still be a good idea to do the Bhakti quest.

If I'm not mistaken, the partial questreward from Bhakti, when running quickly over Pulse includes 10 deceptisols as well.

Thanks again for the replies and the Speed guide, they're being of great help for me as well. I hope I can add something valuable to the discussion at least!

Cheers!

It would seem as though most enemies in the first few chapters are able to drop shrouds, and using the saves available in chapter 2, it would seem like you would be able to force a shroud drop from every forced encounter.

One thing I'm wondering though, is if it's possible to get more than one shroud from a single combat. Namely if a fight against two Pantherons would be able to net 2 fortisols, or a fight against a Pantheron and a Zwerg Scandroid could net a fortisol and a deceptisol.

Other than that it should be possible to for example:

Start from chapter 2 save, kill the Pantheron for B&W outfitters and a fortisol (1). (Don't know about this one, I've had it drop fangs and such though, should be possible.) Go for the one in the center of the same room, (2) and run to the mark. Save as soon as you enter Snow. Fight the forced fight, (3) and enter Lightning (I think you get a deceptisol for free here as long as you don't have one.), fight the monsters guarding the Gladius (4) and enter Snow. Fight the forced combat for a fortisol (5). Enter Vanille and fight the monsters guarding the treasure ball for a deceptisol (1) and open the treasure for a fortisol (6). There should be a save after the Pantherons, I might be wrong on that one though. Forced fight with Snow, Vanille and Hope, I don't know about shrouds here (7) and Lightnings up again. Fight the Ghouls guarding the Power Wristband for a fortisol and go up the stairs. I don't know if the Ghast on the top is required, but he can drop a shroud at least, should be worth it. Save after.

There are plenty of saves around here, and even though saving costs you about 30 seconds on the Playstation at least, it should allow being able to force a shroud from every fight. It's of course possible to farm more deceptisols from the Zwerg Scandroids roaming the area, but the question is how many you really need, and if it's not better to farm them in Chapter 3 like G__AnakinRPG suggested.
I farmed fortisols like the Speed guide recommended, but I was able to force 3 deceptisols and 1 fortisol from the segment between the beginning of chapter 2 until right before Anima without saving once, in just a couple of hours of trying.

On an unrelated note, since I had a spare fortisol I used one on Anima, clearing the fight in 56 seconds with one potion blitzing the arms right after it's sweeping attack on Snow. It's probably possible to kill it off faster than 1:59 without a fortisol, but it's the best I managed with a fortisol in about 5 tries at least. Might be worth noting.
The Manasvin Warmech can be killed in under a minute by staggering it just as it casts Crystal rain (2 rounds of Aggression and one of Tri-disaster.) Using 2 different Relentless Assault or Aggression paradigms probably would cut a couple of seconds as well, since you can kill it during the end of the first stagger and every 2 rounds I changed paradigms, a fortisol would only save around 10-15 seconds here. The time listed in the Speed guide was 1:29 I believe.
The best I managed on the Garuda Interceptor was 1:21, but starting off in Tri-disaster is probably going to end up being faster than that. I duplicated Tri-disaster and Relentless Assault before the forced Behemoth fight.
I'm quite sure that the enemies before Shiva net a small amount of CP, so I killed off all the easy ones (2 first and 2 in the end) in hopes of getting some extra, and the Eidolon fight only took me 1:19 using Ravager and Sentinel. Of course these aren't perfect times, but it's something closer to what you'd want compared to the one's in the Speed guide, you might want to look it over G__AnakinRPG.

[quote=Arrow]Haha, I don't know about eight, but getting under nine hours is my goal right now. I'm planning to record a run to submit here on SDA as soon as I finish up my test run, hopefully in the next couple weeks.[/quote]

Seeing how much time I was able to save compared to G__AnakinRPG's times in his speed guide only up to chapter 4 (It's amazing to have something to go after, and I've followed it mostly from the start), if that fashion continues through the game, and faster route planning is possible, I would say close to 8 hours at least would be very possible.

[quote=Arrow]If the plan is to upgrade the Pleiades AND Taming Pole, I feel like it would probably still be a good idea to do the Bhakti quest.[/quote]

If I'm not mistaken, the partial questreward from Bhakti, when running quickly over Pulse includes 10 deceptisols as well.

Thanks again for the replies and the Speed guide, they're being of great help for me as well. I hope I can add something valuable to the discussion at least!

Cheers!

G__AnakinRPG

2010-07-18 09:47:46 pm

Shroud drops are group based: All groups of enemies can drop 1 shroud of a certain type. (Group can be one or ten enemies, groups are just approachable battles).

Arrow

2010-07-19 06:34:45 am

Now a hit show on the CW

Quote from sportlov:

On an unrelated note, since I had a spare fortisol I used one on Anima, clearing the fight in 56 seconds with one potion blitzing the arms right after it's sweeping attack on Snow. It's probably possible to kill it off faster than 1:59 without a fortisol, but it's the best I managed with a fortisol in about 5 tries at least. Might be worth noting.

I also used a fortisol, but opted to ignore the arms completely (requires a lot of luck and at least two potions). I didn't record my fight time though.

Quote:

The Manasvin Warmech can be killed in under a minute by staggering it just as it casts Crystal rain (2 rounds of Aggression and one of Tri-disaster.) Using 2 different Relentless Assault or Aggression paradigms probably would cut a couple of seconds as well, since you can kill it during the end of the first stagger and every 2 rounds I changed paradigms, a fortisol would only save around 10-15 seconds here. The time listed in the Speed guide was 1:29 I believe.

I wrote this out earlier in the topic, but this was basically the exact strategy I used. I decided that a fortisol wouldn't be worth it because it would make timing the stagger interruption a lot more difficult.

Quote:

I'm quite sure that the enemies before Shiva net a small amount of CP, so I killed off all the easy ones (2 first and 2 in the end) in hopes of getting some extra

Again, from earlier in this thread: "The first time you do it, you will have to fight six soldiers in a row, however if you restart during the soldier fight OR the eidolon fight, you will only have to face three soldiers. Also, if you choose to fight the soldiers, only the first three will actually give you CP (probably since those are the only ones that "respawn" when you retry. Therefore, since it's a forced encounter, and it takes them a while to kill you anyway, I decided the best thing to do here was go ahead and kill the first three soldiers for the easy CP, and then let the next three kill me."

Quote:

If I'm not mistaken, the partial questreward from Bhakti, when running quickly over Pulse includes 10 deceptisols as well.

Yes, although I doubt I'll need that many for the rest of the game. Still, it would probably allow for less Deceptisol farming earlier in the game (I have three remaining right now, heading into Oerba), plus it would give me the freedom of just letting my deceptisols expire while enemy dodging, rather than entering battles and retrying to reclaim them, which would save some time. And even if the Deceptisols and money aren't incentive enough, you also get CP from the parts which are guarded by enemies, which is always useful Wink

I finally finished all the missions in Taejin's Tower and will begin working on Dahaka tomorrow (which shouldn't be too difficult). In case anyone cares, I only had to use two deceptisols for the missions. The first three can be preempted normally, and my fastest Vetala strategy actually depended on not preempting, although I did need to use an Aegisol - I think I still have enough remaining to hold me over until Chapter 13.

Anakin: I'm not sure how thoroughly you read the topic, but I just want to make sure you know that I farmed about 280,000 less CP than you recommended in your speed guide, so some of these fights are a little more involved than they probably were for you Tongue

[quote="sportlov"]
On an unrelated note, since I had a spare fortisol I used one on Anima, clearing the fight in 56 seconds with one potion blitzing the arms right after it's sweeping attack on Snow. It's probably possible to kill it off faster than 1:59 without a fortisol, but it's the best I managed with a fortisol in about 5 tries at least. Might be worth noting.[/quote]
I also used a fortisol, but opted to ignore the arms completely (requires a lot of luck and at least two potions). I didn't record my fight time though.

[quote]The Manasvin Warmech can be killed in under a minute by staggering it just as it casts Crystal rain (2 rounds of Aggression and one of Tri-disaster.) Using 2 different Relentless Assault or Aggression paradigms probably would cut a couple of seconds as well, since you can kill it during the end of the first stagger and every 2 rounds I changed paradigms, a fortisol would only save around 10-15 seconds here. The time listed in the Speed guide was 1:29 I believe.[/quote]
I wrote this out earlier in the topic, but this was basically the exact strategy I used. I decided that a fortisol wouldn't be worth it because it would make timing the stagger interruption a lot more difficult.

[quote]I'm quite sure that the enemies before Shiva net a small amount of CP, so I killed off all the easy ones (2 first and 2 in the end) in hopes of getting some extra[/quote]
Again, from earlier in this thread: "The first time you do it, you will have to fight six soldiers in a row, however if you restart during the soldier fight OR the eidolon fight, you will only have to face three soldiers. Also, if you choose to fight the soldiers, only the first three will actually give you CP (probably since those are the only ones that "respawn" when you retry. Therefore, since it's a forced encounter, and it takes them a while to kill you anyway, I decided the best thing to do here was go ahead and kill the first three soldiers for the easy CP, and then let the next three kill me."

[quote]If I'm not mistaken, the partial questreward from Bhakti, when running quickly over Pulse includes 10 deceptisols as well.[/quote]
Yes, although I doubt I'll need that many for the rest of the game. Still, it would probably allow for less Deceptisol farming earlier in the game (I have three remaining right now, heading into Oerba), plus it would give me the freedom of just letting my deceptisols expire while enemy dodging, rather than entering battles and retrying to reclaim them, which would save some time. And even if the Deceptisols and money aren't incentive enough, you also get CP from the parts which are guarded by enemies, which is always useful ;)

I finally finished all the missions in Taejin's Tower and will begin working on Dahaka tomorrow (which shouldn't be too difficult). In case anyone cares, I only had to use two deceptisols for the missions. The first three can be preempted normally, and my fastest Vetala strategy actually depended on [i]not[/i] preempting, although I did need to use an Aegisol - I think I still have enough remaining to hold me over until Chapter 13.

Anakin: I'm not sure how thoroughly you read the topic, but I just want to make sure you know that I farmed about 280,000 less CP than you recommended in your speed guide, so some of these fights are a little more involved than they probably were for you :P

sportlov

2010-07-19 07:00:18 am

Quote from Arrow:

also used a fortisol, but opted to ignore the arms completely (requires a lot of luck and at least two potions). I didn't record my fight time though.

Since the arms attacks knock you back a little, and you would have to use another potion, I suspect blitzing the body to get rid of the arms to be about as fast as focusing on the body. Focusing the body might be a couple of seconds faster though.

I'm sorry I missed what you had written earlier about chapter 3, it's been a while since I read the topic through, but I'll reread it now, especially as I'm starting on chapter 4 the next time I sit down to play.

Also, the Vespid with the two birds can easily be pre-empted as well without a deceptisol, so if the Gelatitan can be pre-empted without using a deceptisol as well, I guess only the Cie'th one will need a deceptisol. I'm not sure how many deceptisols you'd need then, but it seems to me like 2-3 would be enough to get you through Oerba. And those can be gotten without fighting any unnecessary battles I guess.

[quote=Arrow] also used a fortisol, but opted to ignore the arms completely (requires a lot of luck and at least two potions). I didn't record my fight time though.[/quote]

Since the arms attacks knock you back a little, and you would have to use another potion, I suspect blitzing the body to get rid of the arms to be about as fast as focusing on the body. Focusing the body might be a couple of seconds faster though.

I'm sorry I missed what you had written earlier about chapter 3, it's been a while since I read the topic through, but I'll reread it now, especially as I'm starting on chapter 4 the next time I sit down to play.

Also, the Vespid with the two birds can easily be pre-empted as well without a deceptisol, so if the Gelatitan can be pre-empted without using a deceptisol as well, I guess only the Cie'th one will need a deceptisol. I'm not sure how many deceptisols you'd need then, but it seems to me like 2-3 would be enough to get you through Oerba. And those can be gotten without fighting any unnecessary battles I guess.

Arrow

Edit history:

Arrow: 2010-07-21 01:38:23 am

2010-07-21 12:23:25 am

Now a hit show on the CW

Quote from sportlov:

I'm sorry I missed what you had written earlier about chapter 3, it's been a while since I read the topic through, but I'll reread it now, especially as I'm starting on chapter 4 the next time I sit down to play.

Part way through chapter 4 is actually when I stopped posting my super detailed notes in this thread, because I didn't think there were enough people following my progress at the time that could give useful feedback. I've still been keeping extremely detailed notes about CP spending/fight strategies/shroud drops/etc. on my computer, so if you have any questions about anything, feel free to ask.

Quote:

Also, the Vespid with the two birds can easily be pre-empted as well without a deceptisol, so if the Gelatitan can be pre-empted without using a deceptisol as well, I guess only the Cie'th one will need a deceptisol. I'm not sure how many deceptisols you'd need then, but it seems to me like 2-3 would be enough to get you through Oerba. And those can be gotten without fighting any unnecessary battles I guess.

I didn't have much luck preempting the vespid, but admitedly, I didn't try as much as I could have. So I'll take your word for it that it's possible.

Having an incredibly difficult time with Dahaka. Not farming the extra CP Anakin did may not have made a major difference on the missions, but it makes a rather huge difference on a boss with over 2 million health Tongue

With my current strategy, I'm fairly certain that I can down the boss in three staggers, if I'm extremely lucky (and patient), which isn't as fast (or reliable) as I'd like, so I'm open to any suggestions.

My current strategy is thus:
Party: Sazh, Fang, Vanille
PD: Syn/Sab/Sab, Rav/Rav/Rav, Rav/Sen/Med, Com/Com/Rav, Com/Com/Sab, Com/Com/Med
Equipment: Sazh: Tungsten B, Warrior's Wrist 8, Fang: Silver B, Warrior's Wrist 1, Vanille: Diamond B, Entite Ring
Start fight with Aegisol. Use haste on all three party members, then manually cast Bravery/Enfire on Sazh and Fang. Boss will usually start fight with a party wide spell like Fira, taking everyone down to half health, but occasionally he'll use a single target spell. After buffing, boss will hopefully have all three debuffs (Slow, Imperl, Deprotect) on him, but at the very least he MUST have Slow. Immediately switch to Rav/Sen/Med, as he usually does Foul Utterance around this time, which will one-shot anyone in the party if they do not have near-full health and a Sen. However, this is unpredictable, as occasionally he will continue casting spells longer than usual, or use claw swipes (I've managed once to get him to the first stagger without him using Foul Utterance, but this was literally once out of a hundred attempts). After foul utterance, immediately switch to Rav/Rav/Rav, and then to Com/Com/Rav as soon as he's close to stagger, to slow the gauge down. Once staggered, I alternate between Com/Com/Rav and Com/Com/Med every two rounds, or Com/Com/Sab if the boss still needs one of the debuffs. Once stagger ends (boss should have over a third of his health taken down), switch to Rav/Rav/Rav. Boss will resume casting spells and partway to stagger (again, 99 out of 100 times) will cast Fulminous Firestorm, so switch to Rav/Sen/Med as soon as he begins casting (will kill everyone, otherwise). This is where most of my attempts begin having major problems, assuming I survived up to the first stagger. After the Firestorm, everyone is at low health, and haste wears off. If he casts Firaga right away, everyone dies (even if I stay in Rav/Sen/Med). If not, I try to get everyone up to around 75% health and then switch back to Syn/Sab/Sab to reapply buffs/debuffs. If I can survive this long, then it's just a matter of switching back to Rav/Rav/Rav to stagger, and then repeating the first stagger pattern. After this stagger ends, it's theoretically just a matter of repeating the same process as in phase 2. Very few attempts get this far, though, and the ones that do are usually ruined by Diluvial Plague, which deals high damage and mass-debuffs everyone. Provided I can avoid this and have fully buffed/debuffed staggers, I should be able to kill him during the third stagger (I've had one attempt so far where I managed to make it to the third stagger, but came just short of killing him because not everyone was buffed (I ended up getting killed shortly after the stagger ended, because I forwent healing to try to do more dps).

So, as I said, I'm at a bit of a loss as to what I can do to possibly improve my time (or at least improve my survival rate). A few options...could possibly work Brynhildr into the fight (I've tried this, and it didn't seem any more effective than without). I could upgrade my accessories, although I doubt this would make a big enough difference to dramatically effect the fight. I could also try spending more CP to see how much of a difference that makes. I farmed five of the Behemoth King groups, but have only been using the CP from three of them, so I have about 14,000 CP I could mess around with, although I don't really have any major/game changing abilities within easy reach. Any ideas?

[quote="sportlov"]I'm sorry I missed what you had written earlier about chapter 3, it's been a while since I read the topic through, but I'll reread it now, especially as I'm starting on chapter 4 the next time I sit down to play.[/quote]
Part way through chapter 4 is actually when I stopped posting my super detailed notes in this thread, because I didn't think there were enough people following my progress at the time that could give useful feedback. I've still been keeping extremely detailed notes about CP spending/fight strategies/shroud drops/etc. on my computer, so if you have any questions about anything, feel free to ask.

[quote]Also, the Vespid with the two birds can easily be pre-empted as well without a deceptisol, so if the Gelatitan can be pre-empted without using a deceptisol as well, I guess only the Cie'th one will need a deceptisol. I'm not sure how many deceptisols you'd need then, but it seems to me like 2-3 would be enough to get you through Oerba. And those can be gotten without fighting any unnecessary battles I guess.
[/quote]
I didn't have much luck preempting the vespid, but admitedly, I didn't try as much as I could have. So I'll take your word for it that it's possible.

Having an incredibly difficult time with Dahaka. Not farming the extra CP Anakin did may not have made a major difference on the missions, but it makes a rather huge difference on a boss with over 2 million health :P With my current strategy, I'm fairly certain that I can down the boss in three staggers, if I'm extremely lucky (and patient), which isn't as fast (or reliable) as I'd like, so I'm open to any suggestions.

My current strategy is thus:
Party: Sazh, Fang, Vanille
PD: Syn/Sab/Sab, Rav/Rav/Rav, Rav/Sen/Med, Com/Com/Rav, Com/Com/Sab, Com/Com/Med
Equipment: Sazh: Tungsten B, Warrior's Wrist 8, Fang: Silver B, Warrior's Wrist 1, Vanille: Diamond B, Entite Ring
Start fight with Aegisol. Use haste on all three party members, then manually cast Bravery/Enfire on Sazh and Fang. Boss will usually start fight with a party wide spell like Fira, taking everyone down to half health, but occasionally he'll use a single target spell. After buffing, boss will hopefully have all three debuffs (Slow, Imperl, Deprotect) on him, but at the very least he MUST have Slow. Immediately switch to Rav/Sen/Med, as he usually does Foul Utterance around this time, which will one-shot anyone in the party if they do not have near-full health and a Sen. However, this is unpredictable, as occasionally he will continue casting spells longer than usual, or use claw swipes (I've managed once to get him to the first stagger without him using Foul Utterance, but this was literally once out of a hundred attempts). After foul utterance, immediately switch to Rav/Rav/Rav, and then to Com/Com/Rav as soon as he's close to stagger, to slow the gauge down. Once staggered, I alternate between Com/Com/Rav and Com/Com/Med every two rounds, or Com/Com/Sab if the boss still needs one of the debuffs. Once stagger ends (boss should have over a third of his health taken down), switch to Rav/Rav/Rav. Boss will resume casting spells and partway to stagger (again, 99 out of 100 times) will cast Fulminous Firestorm, so switch to Rav/Sen/Med as soon as he begins casting (will kill everyone, otherwise). This is where most of my attempts begin having major problems, assuming I survived up to the first stagger. After the Firestorm, everyone is at low health, and haste wears off. If he casts Firaga right away, everyone dies (even if I stay in Rav/Sen/Med). If not, I try to get everyone up to around 75% health and then switch back to Syn/Sab/Sab to reapply buffs/debuffs. If I can survive this long, then it's just a matter of switching back to Rav/Rav/Rav to stagger, and then repeating the first stagger pattern. After this stagger ends, it's theoretically just a matter of repeating the same process as in phase 2. Very few attempts get this far, though, and the ones that do are usually ruined by Diluvial Plague, which deals high damage and mass-debuffs everyone. Provided I can avoid this and have fully buffed/debuffed staggers, I should be able to kill him during the third stagger (I've had one attempt so far where I managed to make it to the third stagger, but came just short of killing him because not everyone was buffed (I ended up getting killed shortly after the stagger ended, because I forwent healing to try to do more dps).

So, as I said, I'm at a bit of a loss as to what I can do to possibly improve my time (or at least improve my survival rate). A few options...could possibly work Brynhildr into the fight (I've tried this, and it didn't seem any more effective than without). I could upgrade my accessories, although I doubt this would make a big enough difference to dramatically effect the fight. I could also try spending more CP to see how much of a difference that makes. I farmed five of the Behemoth King groups, but have only been using the CP from three of them, so I have about 14,000 CP I could mess around with, although I don't really have any major/game changing abilities within easy reach. Any ideas?

G__AnakinRPG

2010-07-21 01:28:32 am

Your best bet for Dahaka is stagger cancel. All of his big attacks have long charge times, so you have enough time to switch to a RAV paradigm in the middle. Otherwise, don't stagger him until he does that. I imagine that canceling his attack will delay it later so that he doesn't use it the moment he gets up.

Edit: Dahaka has been beaten in the secondary roles only challenge with No upgrades. This should be possible.

Arrow

2010-07-22 04:59:29 am

Now a hit show on the CW

I hadn't heard about that secondary roles challenge. Sounds...tedious, lol.

The problem with stagger canceling Dahaka is that he almost always begins casting his big attacks when the chain gauge is about half full. And while, yes, the spells do have long cast times, even with everyone hasted and in Tri-disaster, he'll still finish casting before you stagger him.

I just wish the fight wasn't so inconsistent. If there was a reliable way to manipulate him to not use his big attacks (or at least prolong it enough to stagger cancel), the fight would be cake. Every time I do manage to avoid even one of the attacks, I can typically get him close to 50% after the first stagger, which would make a two-stagger fight within reach. There's lots of other randomness to deal with too...whether all of your debuffs land before the first paradigm shift, whether they run out during a stagger, whether you have to spend more time in a med paradigm because of his attack and target choices...sometimes he'll even get up off the ground and begin casting again before the stagger wears off, which really blows my mind and infuriates me.

After spending many hours on him over the past three days, I finally decided to cave in and spend a little extra CP (simulating 4 Behemoth King kills now instead of 3). After doing so, I managed to get a three stagger fight in less than a half hour of trying. I'm definitely not satisfied with this. I feel like with a lot more patience, I could eventually get him down with my original setup, especially if I upgrade some of my strength or HP accessories (my reason for not doing so is because I first need to determine which of them I'll be using later in the run). On the other hand, if using the extra CP would make a two-stagger fight possible, I almost think that it would be definitely worth fighting the extra Behemoth King group, since it takes only a little longer than the time that would be saved on Dahaka. At any rate, this is something I'll deliberate after I finish my test run. I may return to my Dahaka save in the future to experiment some more, but for now I'd really just like to move on.

I chose to activate the Apex elevator after the Dahaka fight so I could grab the Collector's Catalog on the seventh tier. This detour eats up a fair amount of time (I would guess at least two minutes), but I think it's more than worth it. The Catalog itself sells for 50,000 gil, but it gets better than that. With a Mnar Stone, it can be upgraded to a Connoisseur Catalog, which sells for a whopping 125,000 gil. The Mnar Stone only costs 60,000 gil, so the total profit would be 65,000 gil. Not bad for a two minute detour, especially if it makes cutting out the Bhakti quest more viable. Alternately, there's a Mnar Stone in Sulyya Springs that could be picked up to make the Catalog even more profitable, however it would require fighting a couple extra fights.

Did a quick run through of Oerba just to get my bearings. It looks like there may be another unskippable fight on the bridge to Bart 2 I didn't account for, but I'll mess around with it more tomorrow to see if I can find a way around it.

I hadn't heard about that secondary roles challenge. Sounds...tedious, lol.

The problem with stagger canceling Dahaka is that he almost always begins casting his big attacks when the chain gauge is about half full. And while, yes, the spells do have long cast times, even with everyone hasted and in Tri-disaster, he'll still finish casting before you stagger him.

I just wish the fight wasn't so inconsistent. If there was a reliable way to manipulate him to not use his big attacks (or at least prolong it enough to stagger cancel), the fight would be cake. Every time I [i]do[/i] manage to avoid even one of the attacks, I can typically get him close to 50% after the first stagger, which would make a two-stagger fight within reach. There's lots of other randomness to deal with too...whether all of your debuffs land before the first paradigm shift, whether they run out during a stagger, whether you have to spend more time in a med paradigm because of his attack and target choices...sometimes he'll even get up off the ground and begin casting again [i]before the stagger wears off[/i], which really blows my mind and infuriates me.

After spending many hours on him over the past three days, I finally decided to cave in and spend a little extra CP (simulating 4 Behemoth King kills now instead of 3). After doing so, I managed to get a three stagger fight in less than a half hour of trying. I'm definitely not satisfied with this. I feel like with a lot more patience, I could eventually get him down with my original setup, especially if I upgrade some of my strength or HP accessories (my reason for not doing so is because I first need to determine which of them I'll be using later in the run). On the other hand, if using the extra CP would make a two-stagger fight possible, I almost think that it would be definitely worth fighting the extra Behemoth King group, since it takes only a little longer than the time that would be saved on Dahaka. At any rate, this is something I'll deliberate after I finish my test run. I may return to my Dahaka save in the future to experiment some more, but for now I'd really just like to move on.

I chose to activate the Apex elevator after the Dahaka fight so I could grab the Collector's Catalog on the seventh tier. This detour eats up a fair amount of time (I would guess at least two minutes), but I think it's more than worth it. The Catalog itself sells for 50,000 gil, but it gets better than that. With a Mnar Stone, it can be upgraded to a Connoisseur Catalog, which sells for a whopping 125,000 gil. The Mnar Stone only costs 60,000 gil, so the total profit would be 65,000 gil. Not bad for a two minute detour, especially if it makes cutting out the Bhakti quest more viable. Alternately, there's a Mnar Stone in Sulyya Springs that could be picked up to make the Catalog even more profitable, however it would require fighting a couple extra fights.

Did a quick run through of Oerba just to get my bearings. It looks like there may be another unskippable fight on the bridge to Bart 2 I didn't account for, but I'll mess around with it more tomorrow to see if I can find a way around it.

G__AnakinRPG

2010-07-22 05:38:48 am

That fight is unskippable and very, very difficult. Another reason to get CP is to have at least 1 -ga level spell to knock the seekers into the air.

sportlov

2010-07-22 10:37:20 am

Hey G__AnakinRPG, I noticed on several occassions in your guide you mentioned picking up Phoenix downs from treasures, are these picked up for profit, or do you anticipate one would need them to raise characters further into the game?

Being as I've never upgraded anything before claiming the Taming Pole before, I realise how much of a difference it makes to have upgraded accessories, even with my characters being weaker than I've had them be before.

I'm saved right before the Aster Protoflorian now with exactly two hours on the clock, and I'm contemplating whether to use Odin on the fight on the elevator, on the boss itself or on both fights using the Ethersol I picked up just as I was about to save.

I notice my characters are probably weaker than yours were at this point, and I'm missing the second accessory slot on Lightning, but I still managed to kill the Aster Protoflorian when trying the boss yesterday in exactly 3:39 (Same as in your guide I believe), without using Odin. I suppose getting both water and thunder weaknesses would ease up the fight considerably, but I'm not sure I'm willing to try until that happens.
My lack of planning is starting to show at this point though, since I didn't have enough CP to get launch before the first Behemoth and had to fight an extra battle. If anyone has the amount of CP gained from the required battles for any part of the game and is willing to share them, I'd be very grateful. Of course this might be too much to ask, but I'll stay optimistic and ask anyway.

Reading your comments on Taejin's Tower Arrow, makes me worry about how I will fare at that point, but hopefully the excess of shrouds I've managed to manipulate from forced fights thus far will come in handy at that point.
Thanks again G__AnakinRPG for the great guide you've supplied, it's a very good landmark for what combats to fight, and where to cut the segments of the game. I noticed you were missing a target time for Dreadnaught though, I got 2:44 on my timer, but it's quite possibly improvable of course. I'm just throwing it in there.

Thanks again guys for finding me a reason to play through this game a third time!

Cheers!

Hey G__AnakinRPG, I noticed on several occassions in your guide you mentioned picking up Phoenix downs from treasures, are these picked up for profit, or do you anticipate one would need them to raise characters further into the game?

Being as I've never upgraded anything before claiming the Taming Pole before, I realise how much of a difference it makes to have upgraded accessories, even with my characters being weaker than I've had them be before.

I'm saved right before the Aster Protoflorian now with exactly two hours on the clock, and I'm contemplating whether to use Odin on the fight on the elevator, on the boss itself or on both fights using the Ethersol I picked up just as I was about to save.

I notice my characters are probably weaker than yours were at this point, and I'm missing the second accessory slot on Lightning, but I still managed to kill the Aster Protoflorian when trying the boss yesterday in exactly 3:39 (Same as in your guide I believe), without using Odin. I suppose getting both water and thunder weaknesses would ease up the fight considerably, but I'm not sure I'm willing to try until that happens.
My lack of planning is starting to show at this point though, since I didn't have enough CP to get launch before the first Behemoth and had to fight an extra battle. If anyone has the amount of CP gained from the required battles for any part of the game and is willing to share them, I'd be very grateful. Of course this might be too much to ask, but I'll stay optimistic and ask anyway.

Reading your comments on Taejin's Tower Arrow, makes me worry about how I will fare at that point, but hopefully the excess of shrouds I've managed to manipulate from forced fights thus far will come in handy at that point.
Thanks again G__AnakinRPG for the great guide you've supplied, it's a very good landmark for what combats to fight, and where to cut the segments of the game. I noticed you were missing a target time for Dreadnaught though, I got 2:44 on my timer, but it's quite possibly improvable of course. I'm just throwing it in there.

Thanks again guys for finding me a reason to play through this game a third time!

Cheers!

G__AnakinRPG

2010-07-22 10:13:17 pm

Having phoenix downs is always useful in this game since things are a little less predictable. But, to be honest, planning how many you need would save a small amount of time.

Arrow

2010-07-23 04:09:22 am

Now a hit show on the CW

Quote from sportlov:

I'm saved right before the Aster Protoflorian now with exactly two hours on the clock, and I'm contemplating whether to use Odin on the fight on the elevator, on the boss itself or on both fights using the Ethersol I picked up just as I was about to save.

I contemplated the same things. Both fights are not overly difficult without Odin, but using it would save a bit of time (however, to make the most of it on Aster, you would need to get him to do lightning, then water, whereas without they can be in either order). In my test run, I ended up just not using it for either fight, because I wasn't sure if I might need the TP for something in the near future. Since I don't, I'll probably opt to use it on the elevator fight in my actual run, but I'll play around with it a little more when I get to that point.

Quote:

My lack of planning is starting to show at this point though, since I didn't have enough CP to get launch before the first Behemoth and had to fight an extra battle. If anyone has the amount of CP gained from the required battles for any part of the game and is willing to share them, I'd be very grateful. Of course this might be too much to ask, but I'll stay optimistic and ask anyway.

I can give you all the required battle CP tallies for any chapter you like.
The only required fight in chapter 6 is Enki/Enlil (1000).
Chapter 7's required fights are 307, 960, 960, 218, 160, 1800.
Chapter 8's only required fight (that gives CP) is the Midlight Reaper (1500).
However, I did fight quite a few extra battles beyond those for various items and to ensure that Sazh would have enough CP for Blitz and Haste before the Midlight Reaper. If you find yourself a bit behind in Chapter 8, the group of five Zwerg Metrodroids is really quick and easy to grind CP from. Just make sure to prioritize getting Blitz for Sazh, and you can just kill the whole group in three rounds or so. Let me know as you progress if you need more info.

Quote:

Reading your comments on Taejin's Tower Arrow, makes me worry about how I will fare at that point, but hopefully the excess of shrouds I've managed to manipulate from forced fights thus far will come in handy at that point.

The only shrouds I used in Taejin's Tower were an Ethersol between Gelatatin and Ambling Bellows (used Odin on both fights), a Deceptisol for Mushussu (which you said was unnecessary), an Aegisol for Vetala, a Deceptisol for Penangelan, and an Aegisol for Dahaka. I don't think you'll need more than that, unless you're anticipating having even less CP than I did.

Quote:

Having phoenix downs is always useful in this game since things are a little less predictable. But, to be honest, planning how many you need would save a small amount of time.

I definitely haven't needed as many as I picked up, but I have used a few here and there. It's definitely a good idea to have some just in case. Ideally, you should manipulate fights so that no one dies, but even when someone does, frequently it's still possible to salvage the fight and get a decent time.

Didn't have much time to work on my run today, but I did trek back to Sulyya Springs with one of my Taejin's Tower saves to see how hard that fight guarding the Mnar Stone is. It's HARD. I don't think it would be possible for my party at that point without at the very least using Odin (which would mean an extra ethersol, since I need it for the very next fight as well), but even when summoning, my party leader will usually end up getting killed before they can be healed, forcing an arise before I can gestalt. I haven't written this possibility off completely. The CP gain here would be nice (and probably enough to be able to go back to just three Behemoth King fights), and you also get a Water Charm to sell (or upgrade to a Twenty-sided Die, but that would require the Mnar Stone and sort of defeat the purpose :P).

Unfortunately, I don't have a way to accurately test the fight, since my nearest save is way back at the beginning of Mah'habara. Sportlov, when you get to Sulyya Springs, it would be helpful for me if you could try that battle a few times and let me know how it goes for you.

[quote="sportlov"]
I'm saved right before the Aster Protoflorian now with exactly two hours on the clock, and I'm contemplating whether to use Odin on the fight on the elevator, on the boss itself or on both fights using the Ethersol I picked up just as I was about to save.[/quote]
I contemplated the same things. Both fights are not overly difficult without Odin, but using it would save a bit of time (however, to make the most of it on Aster, you would need to get him to do lightning, then water, whereas without they can be in either order). In my test run, I ended up just not using it for either fight, because I wasn't sure if I might need the TP for something in the near future. Since I don't, I'll probably opt to use it on the elevator fight in my actual run, but I'll play around with it a little more when I get to that point.

[quote]My lack of planning is starting to show at this point though, since I didn't have enough CP to get launch before the first Behemoth and had to fight an extra battle. If anyone has the amount of CP gained from the required battles for any part of the game and is willing to share them, I'd be very grateful. Of course this might be too much to ask, but I'll stay optimistic and ask anyway.[/quote]
I can give you all the required battle CP tallies for any chapter you like.
The only required fight in chapter 6 is Enki/Enlil (1000).
Chapter 7's required fights are 307, 960, 960, 218, 160, 1800.
Chapter 8's only required fight (that gives CP) is the Midlight Reaper (1500).
However, I did fight quite a few extra battles beyond those for various items and to ensure that Sazh would have enough CP for Blitz and Haste before the Midlight Reaper. If you find yourself a bit behind in Chapter 8, the group of five Zwerg Metrodroids is really quick and easy to grind CP from. Just make sure to prioritize getting Blitz for Sazh, and you can just kill the whole group in three rounds or so. Let me know as you progress if you need more info.

[quote]Reading your comments on Taejin's Tower Arrow, makes me worry about how I will fare at that point, but hopefully the excess of shrouds I've managed to manipulate from forced fights thus far will come in handy at that point.[/quote]
The only shrouds I used in Taejin's Tower were an Ethersol between Gelatatin and Ambling Bellows (used Odin on both fights), a Deceptisol for Mushussu (which you said was unnecessary), an Aegisol for Vetala, a Deceptisol for Penangelan, and an Aegisol for Dahaka. I don't think you'll need more than that, unless you're anticipating having even less CP than I did.

[quote]Having phoenix downs is always useful in this game since things are a little less predictable.  But, to be honest, planning how many you need would save a small amount of time.[/quote]
I definitely haven't needed as many as I picked up, but I have used a few here and there. It's definitely a good idea to have some just in case. Ideally, you should manipulate fights so that no one dies, but even when someone does, frequently it's still possible to salvage the fight and get a decent time.

Didn't have much time to work on my run today, but I did trek back to Sulyya Springs with one of my Taejin's Tower saves to see how hard that fight guarding the Mnar Stone is. It's HARD. I don't think it would be possible for my party at that point without at the very least using Odin (which would mean an extra ethersol, since I need it for the very next fight as well), but even when summoning, my party leader will usually end up getting killed before they can be healed, forcing an arise before I can gestalt. I haven't written this possibility off completely. The CP gain here would be nice (and probably enough to be able to go back to just three Behemoth King fights), and you also get a Water Charm to sell (or upgrade to a Twenty-sided Die, but that would require the Mnar Stone and sort of defeat the purpose :P).

Unfortunately, I don't have a way to accurately test the fight, since my nearest save is way back at the beginning of Mah'habara. Sportlov, when you get to Sulyya Springs, it would be helpful for me if you could try that battle a few times and let me know how it goes for you.

Arrow

Edit history:

Arrow: 2010-07-24 06:38:39 pm

2010-07-24 05:18:32 pm

Now a hit show on the CW

Alright, it looks like I should have around 350,000 gil in Oerba without doing the Bhakti quest, so I think I should be able to skip it. Quick question about upgrading: in the speed guide, you use Turbojets to upgrade the Taming Pole. Wouldn't Perfect Conductors be more efficient?

EDIT: Also, I recalculated my CP, and I should still have enough to pick up Death before the Adamanchelid in Chapter 13. Unfortunately, I think I'll be about 4000 short to have it before the required Behemoth King fight, which is the earliest fight I would like to use it for...but I should still be able to do that fight relatively quickly (maybe an Instant Stagger).

najzere

2010-07-24 06:24:00 pm

Component	Experience	Cost in Gil	Exp per Gil
Turbojet	212	840	.252
Perfect Conductor	751	1,600	.469
Particle Accelerator	4,800	10,000	.480
Ultracompact Reactor	40,000	50,000	.800

The better ones are more expensive, but it requires less trips to the shop as even with 99 Perfect Conductors, that only gives you 74,349 experience (223,047 with 3x multiplier) and most weapons take about 50,000 to max at Tier 1 and 450,000 to max at Tier 2. Particle Accelerators and Ultracompact Reactors probably won't be available though, since you would have to go way out of your way to do Mission 7 to get R&D Depot. Perfect Conductors are available at Lenora's Garage though, as are Superconductors, which are also better than Turbojets.

[table]
[tr][td][b][u]Component[/u][/b][/td][td][b][u]Experience[/u][/b][/td][td][b][u]Cost in Gil[/u][/b][/td][td][b][u]Exp per Gil[/u][/b][/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Turbojet[/td][td][center]212[/center][/td][td][center]840[/center][/td][td][center].252[/center][/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Perfect Conductor[/td][td][center]751[/center][/td][td][center]1,600[/center][/td][td][center].469[/center][/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Particle Accelerator[/td][td][center]4,800[/center][/td][td][center]10,000[/center][/td][td][center].480[/center][/td][/tr]
[tr][td]Ultracompact Reactor[/td][td][center]40,000[/center][/td][td][center]50,000[/center][/td][td][center].800[/center][/td][/tr]
[/table]

The better ones are more expensive, but it requires less trips to the shop as even with 99 Perfect Conductors, that only gives you 74,349 experience (223,047 with 3x multiplier) and most weapons take about 50,000 to max at Tier 1 and 450,000 to max at Tier 2. Particle Accelerators and Ultracompact Reactors probably won't be available though, since you would have to go way out of your way to do Mission 7 to get R&D Depot. Perfect Conductors are available at Lenora's Garage though, as are Superconductors, which are also better than Turbojets.

G__AnakinRPG

2010-07-24 07:46:42 pm

At the time I did not know about superconductors. I just did Turbojets with everything.

sportlov

2010-07-25 10:29:15 am

I just killed the Aster Protoflorian, I had severely bad luck by the end of the fight and missed 2 full attacks with Lightning and the boss being on less than 5000 health. Ended with a time of 3:22, having spent no points at all in the Medic crystarium, due to lack of fighting thus far. I anticipate using a Magician's Mark on Hope and two star'd Power Wristbands on Lightning, it would full well be possible to finish the boss off in one stagger if all hits with Lightning connect.

Having 2 Slash & Burn paradigms also helped since it helps skip Lightnings backflip before attacking in half of the attacks.

This is also the first time I used a Medic paradigm, although some well placed potions might obsolete the paradigm in that fight as well, especially if killed in one stagger.

I decided to pick up the Pryocons to see if I can use the Stagger Maintenance they come with to help kill off Enki and Enlil in one stagger each, I'm not sure what Stagger Maintenance is, but hopefully it works as an augment to the bonuses of playing a commando.
The instant stagger is bound to come in handy as well, as Arrow would prove.

When would the conductor components become available, I'm thinking Mah'habara, but someone who knows might want to share with me.

I just killed the Aster Protoflorian, I had severely bad luck by the end of the fight and missed 2 full attacks with Lightning and the boss being on less than 5000 health. Ended with a time of 3:22, having spent no points at all in the Medic crystarium, due to lack of fighting thus far. I anticipate using a Magician's Mark on Hope and two star'd Power Wristbands on Lightning, it would full well be possible to finish the boss off in one stagger if all hits with Lightning connect.

Having 2 Slash & Burn paradigms also helped since it helps skip Lightnings backflip before attacking in half of the attacks.

This is also the first time I used a Medic paradigm, although some well placed potions might obsolete the paradigm in that fight as well, especially if killed in one stagger.

I decided to pick up the Pryocons to see if I can use the Stagger Maintenance they come with to help kill off Enki and Enlil in one stagger each, I'm not sure what Stagger Maintenance is, but hopefully it works as an augment to the bonuses of playing a commando.
The instant stagger is bound to come in handy as well, as Arrow would prove.

When would the conductor components become available, I'm thinking Mah'habara, but someone who knows might want to share with me.

najzere

2010-07-25 12:26:52 pm

Stagger Maintenance extends the stagger duration by 10% or, if you upgrade the Procyons to the Betelgeuse Customs, to 30%. If you're close to killing it one stagger, it might be the little push you need.

sportlov

2010-07-25 01:31:26 pm

Quote from najzere:

Stagger Maintenance extends the stagger duration by 10% or, if you upgrade the Procyons to the Betelgeuse Customs, to 30%. If you're close to killing it one stagger, it might be the little push you need.

That is really nice to know.
With Pryocons, both Enki and Enlil went down in one stagger each, even though I had spent my CP in Sab instead of Rav on Vanille and Syn on Sazh and was missing Thunder on either character, some paradigm switching with double Slash & Burn made sure they went down in two minutes. Only had to use one potion as well!

I'm a little more than 30 minutes ahead of G__AnakinRPG's times in the Speed guide he wrote at this point, so I'll be aiming for nine hours or less at this point.

The detour for the Pryocons is about a minute, but due to the nature of the fight involved I decided to put in an extra save in that segment. So it's about 1 minute 30 seconds of a detour for me, I can't say whether or not I think it's worth it at this point, but it does help in the boss fight of this chapter, so I'm happy.

[quote="najzere"]
Stagger Maintenance extends the stagger duration by 10% or, if you upgrade the Procyons to the Betelgeuse Customs, to 30%. If you're close to killing it one stagger, it might be the little push you need.
[/quote]

That is really nice to know.
With Pryocons, both Enki and Enlil went down in one stagger each, even though I had spent my CP in Sab instead of Rav on Vanille and Syn on Sazh and was missing Thunder on either character, some paradigm switching with double Slash & Burn made sure they went down in two minutes. Only had to use one potion as well!

I'm a little more than 30 minutes ahead of G__AnakinRPG's times in the Speed guide he wrote at this point, so I'll be aiming for nine hours or less at this point.

The detour for the Pryocons is about a minute, but due to the nature of the fight involved I decided to put in an extra save in that segment. So it's about 1 minute 30 seconds of a detour for me, I can't say whether or not I think it's worth it at this point, but it does help in the boss fight of this chapter, so I'm happy.

Arrow

2010-07-25 03:48:11 pm

Now a hit show on the CW

Quote from najzere:

Particle Accelerators and Ultracompact Reactors probably won't be available though, since you would have to go way out of your way to do Mission 7 to get R&D Depot.

Yeah, Mission 7 isn't going to happen. I would have to do missions 1-3 first, not to mention making the long detour to the Yaschas Massif. So it seems that the Superconductor is slightly more efficient than the Perfect Conductor, except that since you can only hold 99 of any component, you can only spend 39,600 exp at one time with Supers (before modifier) vs. 74,349 with Perfects. I'll have to take this into consideration while doing my upgrades. Some of the upgrading will be held off until chapter 13 when I have more items to sell, but I definitely want to upgrade the Pleiades to Hyades so I only have to deal with Silk Tiger instead of Paper. I may just star the Taming Pole prior to the Bart 2 fight, but I'll mess around with it a bit more before making my final decision.

Quote from sportlov:

Quote from najzere:

Stagger Maintenance extends the stagger duration by 10% or, if you upgrade the Procyons to the Betelgeuse Customs, to 30%. If you're close to killing it one stagger, it might be the little push you need.

That is really nice to know.
With Pryocons, both Enki and Enlil went down in one stagger each, even though I had spent my CP in Sab instead of Rav on Vanille and Syn on Sazh and was missing Thunder on either character, some paradigm switching with double Slash & Burn made sure they went down in two minutes. Only had to use one potion as well!

The detour for the Pryocons is about a minute, but due to the nature of the fight involved I decided to put in an extra save in that segment. So it's about 1 minute 30 seconds of a detour for me, I can't say whether or not I think it's worth it at this point, but it does help in the boss fight of this chapter, so I'm happy.

Just wanted to point out that I picked up the Procyons as well. Besides the ability to potentially use Instant Stagger later in the run, my thinking here was that if Stagger Maintenance allows me to get off even one extra attack during the stagger, that trumps the slight strength/magic stat advantage any other weapon might have. This is the same reason why I chose to get the Axis Blade for Lightning (one extra attack every few turns > slightly higher stats).

It turns out that I've never actually needed to do an Instant Stagger with Sazh, though, and probably never will. Firstly, the earliest you can gain the ability is chapter 11, when you are able to buy Speed Sashes. However, this is unnecessary as you will get one as a reward from one of the Taejin's Tower missions, and there's no fights between the start of Chapter 11 and then that you can't preempt. After Taejin's Tower, you'll be getting the Taming Pole for Fang which allows her to do the Instant Stagger, while Sazh can safely switch to his much higher dps Hyades. Long story short, while there are fights I plan to use it on (Bandersnatch/Jabberwocky, Wladislaus), it's probably going to be Fang doing the Instant Stagger, not Sazh.

Backing up for a second, I just wanted to add that my plan for Chapter 6 right now is to run through the whole chapter up to the save right before the boss in one segment. There's only one battle, and most of the enemy dodging is fairly easy (grabbing the Doctor's Code is probably the part where I'm most likely to mess up). Sportlov, I'd be curious to know your equipment setup for Enki/Enlil. I'm fairly certain I downed both in one stagger, but I had to use a lot of potions (at least three).

Also, did you end up using Odin for your Aster fight?

Quote:

When would the conductor components become available, I'm thinking Mah'habara, but someone who knows might want to share with me.

Yes, part way through Mah'habara.

[quote="najzere"]
Particle Accelerators and Ultracompact Reactors probably won't be available though, since you would have to go way out of your way to do Mission 7 to get R&D Depot.[/quote]
Yeah, Mission 7 isn't going to happen. I would have to do missions 1-3 first, not to mention making the [i]long[/i] detour to the Yaschas Massif. So it seems that the Superconductor is slightly more efficient than the Perfect Conductor, except that since you can only hold 99 of any component, you can only spend 39,600 exp at one time with Supers (before modifier) vs. 74,349 with Perfects. I'll have to take this into consideration while doing my upgrades. Some of the upgrading will be held off until chapter 13 when I have more items to sell, but I definitely want to upgrade the Pleiades to Hyades so I only have to deal with Silk Tiger instead of Paper. I may just star the Taming Pole prior to the Bart 2 fight, but I'll mess around with it a bit more before making my final decision.

[quote="sportlov"]
[quote="najzere"]
Stagger Maintenance extends the stagger duration by 10% or, if you upgrade the Procyons to the Betelgeuse Customs, to 30%. If you're close to killing it one stagger, it might be the little push you need.
[/quote]

That is really nice to know.
With Pryocons, both Enki and Enlil went down in one stagger each, even though I had spent my CP in Sab instead of Rav on Vanille and Syn on Sazh and was missing Thunder on either character, some paradigm switching with double Slash & Burn made sure they went down in two minutes. Only had to use one potion as well!

The detour for the Pryocons is about a minute, but due to the nature of the fight involved I decided to put in an extra save in that segment. So it's about 1 minute 30 seconds of a detour for me, I can't say whether or not I think it's worth it at this point, but it does help in the boss fight of this chapter, so I'm happy.[/quote]

Just wanted to point out that I picked up the Procyons as well. Besides the ability to potentially use Instant Stagger later in the run, my thinking here was that if Stagger Maintenance allows me to get off even one extra attack during the stagger, that trumps the slight strength/magic stat advantage any other weapon might have. This is the same reason why I chose to get the Axis Blade for Lightning (one extra attack every few turns > slightly higher stats).

It turns out that I've never actually needed to do an Instant Stagger with Sazh, though, and probably never will. Firstly, the earliest you can gain the ability is chapter 11, when you are able to buy Speed Sashes. However, this is unnecessary as you will get one as a reward from one of the Taejin's Tower missions, and there's no fights between the start of Chapter 11 and then that you can't preempt. After Taejin's Tower, you'll be getting the Taming Pole for Fang which allows [i]her[/i] to do the Instant Stagger, while Sazh can safely switch to his much higher dps Hyades. Long story short, while there are fights I plan to use it on (Bandersnatch/Jabberwocky, Wladislaus), it's probably going to be Fang doing the Instant Stagger, not Sazh.

Backing up for a second, I just wanted to add that my plan for Chapter 6 right now is to run through the whole chapter up to the save right before the boss in one segment. There's only one battle, and most of the enemy dodging is fairly easy (grabbing the Doctor's Code is probably the part where I'm most likely to mess up). Sportlov, I'd be curious to know your equipment setup for Enki/Enlil. I'm fairly certain I downed both in one stagger, but I had to use a lot of potions (at least three).

Also, did you end up using Odin for your Aster fight?

[quote]
When would the conductor components become available, I'm thinking Mah'habara, but someone who knows might want to share with me.[/quote]
Yes, part way through Mah'habara.

sportlov

2010-07-25 04:26:25 pm

I didn't use Odin for Aster Protoflorian, I used it on the fight prior to it, since I had such a high fail rate without it. It only saves a couple of seconds there, but it ensures I get to fight the Aster Protoflorian. I had some problems with the Aster Protoflorian until I gave up the medic paradigm and used a potion after each efflorence attack, and only healed up the bombs. From there I just took the first fight where it did the right weakness shifts.
I suppose with more aggressive playing it would be possible to kill it in less than three minutes, and using Odin could speed up the process further, but it requires certain order of weakness, and since Zantetsuken is so weak at this point, and the animation so long it's most likely faster to just kill it with (Up+X/Right+X*2). I might look into it another time, but I don't think I've got a save right there any more.

Doing chapter 6 in one go is of course going to be preferrable, but I had to use CP, buy a power wristband and make new paradigms every time I failed on the Flandragoras, so I decided to just through in a save right after the Belladonna Wand since I was lazy, and the part before is easy enough to warrant being done on the first try.
Funny enough I find the Gremlin's at the doctors code really easy to dodge. (Go in the middle so they see you and quickly latch onto the left wall while they try to get you in the middle, repeat on the way out, or if they didn't manage to regroup yet, just run out.)
The one's I had the most problem with, not because it's hard to dodge, but because I love to just run through and not have to lure them out or anything, is the last Gremlin pack (About seven or so of them) before the weather zone.

I was gonna say the same thing about instant stagger actually, but I seem to have erased it from my last message. As you say though, it might save more time than it takes to get it anyway, it might even make up for it on Enki/Enlil alone.

For Enki/Enlil I went with Belladonna/Magician's on Vanille and Pryocons/Star'd wristband on Sazh. Vanille had up to poison in Sab and up to fire in Rav, Sazh had just about short of Overwhelm in Rav and the rest in Syn. Aegisol/Fortisol used.

Start the fight with Undermine (Sab/Rav), cast one of each debuff on the yellow one. Make sure at least two hit, deshell and deprotect are a winner, but any combination goes. Switch to dualcasting, do one round of water and switch to Slash & Burn (Rav/Com). Two rounds in Slash & Burn and a quick switch to a second Slash & Burn, one more round of this and switch to Divide & Conquer (Sab/Com) since it's gonna use Bellow. Recast debuffs, one of each and hope two or more hits. Slash & Burn with paradigm switches until dead. By this time your characters should be about dead, so switch to Undermine for the second and debuff the blue one. Use a potion and recast any buffs that didn't connect. Switch to Slash & Burn and do the same thing until Bellow, switch to Divide & Conquer and cast one of each buff, recast any that missed. Slash & Burn with switching until dead, the Vigilance from the Aegisol should keep it from hitting you most of the times.

It seems I wrote a full guide there, I might just have overdone it.

Anyway, back to chapter 7.

I didn't use Odin for Aster Protoflorian, I used it on the fight prior to it, since I had such a high fail rate without it. It only saves a couple of seconds there, but it ensures I get to fight the Aster Protoflorian. I had some problems with the Aster Protoflorian until I gave up the medic paradigm and used a potion after each efflorence attack, and only healed up the bombs. From there I just took the first fight where it did the right weakness shifts.
I suppose with more aggressive playing it would be possible to kill it in less than three minutes, and using Odin could speed up the process further, but it requires certain order of weakness, and since Zantetsuken is so weak at this point, and the animation so long it's most likely faster to just kill it with (Up+X/Right+X*2). I might look into it another time, but I don't think I've got a save right there any more.

Doing chapter 6 in one go is of course going to be preferrable, but I had to use CP, buy a power wristband and make new paradigms every time I failed on the Flandragoras, so I decided to just through in a save right after the Belladonna Wand since I was lazy, and the part before is easy enough to warrant being done on the first try.
Funny enough I find the Gremlin's at the doctors code really easy to dodge. (Go in the middle so they see you and quickly latch onto the left wall while they try to get you in the middle, repeat on the way out, or if they didn't manage to regroup yet, just run out.)
The one's I had the most problem with, not because it's hard to dodge, but because I love to just run through and not have to lure them out or anything, is the last Gremlin pack (About seven or so of them) before the weather zone.

I was gonna say the same thing about instant stagger actually, but I seem to have erased it from my last message. As you say though, it might save more time than it takes to get it anyway, it might even make up for it on Enki/Enlil alone.

For Enki/Enlil I went with Belladonna/Magician's on Vanille and Pryocons/Star'd wristband on Sazh. Vanille had up to poison in Sab and up to fire in Rav, Sazh had just about short of Overwhelm in Rav and the rest in Syn. Aegisol/Fortisol used.

Start the fight with Undermine (Sab/Rav), cast one of each debuff on the yellow one. Make sure at least two hit, deshell and deprotect are a winner, but any combination goes. Switch to dualcasting, do one round of water and switch to Slash & Burn (Rav/Com). Two rounds in Slash & Burn and a quick switch to a second Slash & Burn, one more round of this and switch to Divide & Conquer (Sab/Com) since it's gonna use Bellow. Recast debuffs, one of each and hope two or more hits. Slash & Burn with paradigm switches until dead. By this time your characters should be about dead, so switch to Undermine for the second and debuff the blue one. Use a potion and recast any buffs that didn't connect. Switch to Slash & Burn and do the same thing until Bellow, switch to Divide & Conquer and cast one of each buff, recast any that missed. Slash & Burn with switching until dead, the Vigilance from the Aegisol should keep it from hitting you most of the times.

It seems I wrote a full guide there, I might just have overdone it.

Anyway, back to chapter 7.

Arrow

2010-07-25 06:45:46 pm

Now a hit show on the CW

Alright, so I'm currently planning to star both the Taming Pole and Pleiades, upgrade the Pleiades to the Hyades, and then throw 99 Perfects on it with a 3x multiplier. Going to test how this fairs on Bart 2, and I'll make changes if need be.

Also, it is possible to get around that seeker fight on the bridge. You can lure both of them over to the right and then just barely squeeze by on the left. Hard, but doable. So, skipping the Bhakti quest, the only fights I'll have in Oerba are the Vetala guarding the Taming Pole and Bart 2.

By the way, this is the first time I've ever used the Hyades Magnums, and I have to say I find the sound it makes when you blitz to be hilarious. Will definitely make the coming boss fights a bit more entertaining.

Sportlov - I never upgraded that Power Wristband, so that's probably why you've been having slightly better luck on Aster and Enki/Enlil than I did. Definitely something I'll consider for the recorded run.

sportlov

2010-07-26 05:53:32 am

I upgraded the first Power Wristband right after the Dreadnaught, it helped somewhat with the forced fights up to and including the Aster Protoflorian. For chapter 6 I bought and upgraded another one for Sazh to use on Enki/Enlil, but I suppose I could've used the one I had used on Lightning instead. Now in chapter 7 I suppose the only forced fight before the first encounter with the Ushumgal Subjugator is the one with Snow in gestalt mode, so the only use I could think of for the second one at this point is the second encounter with the same bosses second encounter. I believe that in Hope's house you can with a small sacrifice get a Brawler's Wristband, which could obsolete the use of the second Power Wristband I'd gotten. The only thing I can think of is equipping several characters, but if the Brawler's Wristband becomes available for purchase before the Palamecia, I suppose one Power Wristband should pretty much get you through from chapter 2 until the acquisition of the Brawler's Wristband.

How many deceptisols would you anticipate you'd need for the rest of the game now that you don't get the ones from Bhakti? I'm just thinking because I'm pretty sure I'll have to use some in chapter 7, and I was pretty much going with saving one or two for Pulse. And then to make sure I used my last one on Penanggalan or such. (+spelling)

Now if it's possible to gather enough gil to star both the Hyades and Venus Gospel without any help from Bhakti, and you don't really lose anything from not having the deceptisols.

I'm not sure of where on Cocoon you'd need deceptisols, but I'd anticipate I'd have a hard time skipping the soldiers in the beginning without one, even though everything else should be fairly easy. I'm mostly concerned about outside of Eden hall and parts of Orphan's cradle though, I guess even with the deceptisol trick you'd want at least two left at this point. One could be used to pre-emptive the Megrim Thresher with two Sacrifices, I had a hard time with those when I played last, and the other I would use to skip the fights between the first Wladislaus and the Tiamat (Exterminator, Annihilator, Subjugator or whichever it is).

What kind of health are you anticipating Sazh will end up with in the different parts, I'm thinking mostly about survival in the Proudclad fights and Jabberwocky/Bandersnatch (Breath of the beast). I guess he'll end up with about 2000 to 2500, which would be managable, but any less I would think to be problematic at least, maybe I'm wrong though.

I upgraded the first Power Wristband right after the Dreadnaught, it helped somewhat with the forced fights up to and including the Aster Protoflorian. For chapter 6 I bought and upgraded another one for Sazh to use on Enki/Enlil, but I suppose I could've used the one I had used on Lightning instead. Now in chapter 7 I suppose the only forced fight before the first encounter with the Ushumgal Subjugator is the one with Snow in gestalt mode, so the only use I could think of for the second one at this point is the second encounter with the same bosses second encounter. I believe that in Hope's house you can with a small sacrifice get a Brawler's Wristband, which could obsolete the use of the second Power Wristband I'd gotten. The only thing I can think of is equipping several characters, but if the Brawler's Wristband becomes available for purchase before the Palamecia, I suppose one Power Wristband should pretty much get you through from chapter 2 until the acquisition of the Brawler's Wristband.

How many deceptisols would you anticipate you'd need for the rest of the game now that you don't get the ones from Bhakti? I'm just thinking because I'm pretty sure I'll have to use some in chapter 7, and I was pretty much going with saving one or two for Pulse. And then to make sure I used my last one on Penanggalan or such. (+spelling)

Now if it's possible to gather enough gil to star both the Hyades and Venus Gospel without any help from Bhakti, and you don't really lose anything from not having the deceptisols.

I'm not sure of where on Cocoon you'd need deceptisols, but I'd anticipate I'd have a hard time skipping the soldiers in the beginning without one, even though everything else should be fairly easy. I'm mostly concerned about outside of Eden hall and parts of Orphan's cradle though, I guess even with the deceptisol trick you'd want at least two left at this point. One could be used to pre-emptive the Megrim Thresher with two Sacrifices, I had a hard time with those when I played last, and the other I would use to skip the fights between the first Wladislaus and the Tiamat (Exterminator, Annihilator, Subjugator or whichever it is).

What kind of health are you anticipating Sazh will end up with in the different parts, I'm thinking mostly about survival in the Proudclad fights and Jabberwocky/Bandersnatch (Breath of the beast). I guess he'll end up with about 2000 to 2500, which would be managable, but any less I would think to be problematic at least, maybe I'm wrong though.

Arrow

2010-07-26 04:03:13 pm

Now a hit show on the CW

Quote from sportlov:

How many deceptisols would you anticipate you'd need for the rest of the game now that you don't get the ones from Bhakti? I'm just thinking because I'm pretty sure I'll have to use some in chapter 7, and I was pretty much going with saving one or two for Pulse. And then to make sure I used my last one on Penanggalan or such. (+spelling)

I'm not sure of where on Cocoon you'd need deceptisols, but I'd anticipate I'd have a hard time skipping the soldiers in the beginning without one, even though everything else should be fairly easy. I'm mostly concerned about outside of Eden hall and parts of Orphan's cradle though, I guess even with the deceptisol trick you'd want at least two left at this point. One could be used to pre-emptive the Megrim Thresher with two Sacrifices, I had a hard time with those when I played last, and the other I would use to skip the fights between the first Wladislaus and the Tiamat (Exterminator, Annihilator, Subjugator or whichever it is).

I'm going to have two heading into Chapter 12, which I figure should be enough to hold me over until Chapter 13, where I can buy more if needed.

Quote:

What kind of health are you anticipating Sazh will end up with in the different parts, I'm thinking mostly about survival in the Proudclad fights and Jabberwocky/Bandersnatch (Breath of the beast). I guess he'll end up with about 2000 to 2500, which would be managable, but any less I would think to be problematic at least, maybe I'm wrong though.

Right now he's sitting at a little under 1500 for Bart 2 (with Hyades and Diamond Bangle equipped), and I'll probably upgrade that (or buy another bangle) before Proudclad 2.

Going to be attempting Bart without shrouds right now (I need to hold on to the ones I have for Proudclad) so wish me luck.

[quote="sportlov"]
How many deceptisols would you anticipate you'd need for the rest of the game now that you don't get the ones from Bhakti? I'm just thinking because I'm pretty sure I'll have to use some in chapter 7, and I was pretty much going with saving one or two for Pulse. And then to make sure I used my last one on Penanggalan or such. (+spelling)

I'm not sure of where on Cocoon you'd need deceptisols, but I'd anticipate I'd have a hard time skipping the soldiers in the beginning without one, even though everything else should be fairly easy. I'm mostly concerned about outside of Eden hall and parts of Orphan's cradle though, I guess even with the deceptisol trick you'd want at least two left at this point. One could be used to pre-emptive the Megrim Thresher with two Sacrifices, I had a hard time with those when I played last, and the other I would use to skip the fights between the first Wladislaus and the Tiamat (Exterminator, Annihilator, Subjugator or whichever it is).[/quote]
I'm going to have two heading into Chapter 12, which I figure should be enough to hold me over until Chapter 13, where I can buy more if needed.

[quote]What kind of health are you anticipating Sazh will end up with in the different parts, I'm thinking mostly about survival in the Proudclad fights and Jabberwocky/Bandersnatch (Breath of the beast). I guess he'll end up with about 2000 to 2500, which would be managable, but any less I would think to be problematic at least, maybe I'm wrong though.
[/quote]
Right now he's sitting at a little under 1500 for Bart 2 (with Hyades and Diamond Bangle equipped), and I'll probably upgrade that (or buy another bangle) before Proudclad 2.

Going to be attempting Bart without shrouds right now (I need to hold on to the ones I have for Proudclad) so wish me luck.