Final Fantasy XIII Speedrun

2010-08-17 04:33:50 am

Whichever way you look at it, retrying until Barthandelus doesn't cast Thanatosian Laughter is going to be faster than not, whether you can survive it or not. The only problem with having as low health as I do at this point is the apparent lack of AI for Barthandelus, making the lasers focus firing on one character to kill it off every now and then, while shooting equally on all characters at another time. The biggest problem is of course that it takes alot of time to get it right. I've made it through the battle three times, but none without retrying. I suppose it's going to be easier than Aster Protoflorian was for me though, even though both of them rely largely on being lucky.

I didn't expect Bravera to be worth it, seeing as it seems to last a very short amount of time, even with a Role level 5 Synergist and Boon. Unfortunately I'm not sure whether or not Jinx actually interacts with debuffs cast by another character, I guess you'd have to try it out.

I've never used a deceptisol to get past that part with the soldiers, but if I did I guess I could try at least getting Enthunder on Sazh and Blitzing down the Bulwarker first, if I can do that I should have no problems dealing with the two soldiers after that.

To kill the Behemoth, I simply cast Vigilance and Enfire on Fang and Sazh in Bully, (Together with Haste and Bravery of course) and switch to a Devastation paradigm to make sure Vanille stacks up Deprotect and Imperil. And then I just Blitz away, maybe a quick switch to Aggression if I get an opportunity to do so, just to speed up the process. I'll be using a Fortisol I guess for this battle though, since I've got a spare one.

Whichever way you look at it, retrying until Barthandelus doesn't cast Thanatosian Laughter is going to be faster than not, whether you can survive it or not. The only problem with having as low health as I do at this point is the apparent lack of AI for Barthandelus, making the lasers focus firing on one character to kill it off every now and then, while shooting equally on all characters at another time. The biggest problem is of course that it takes alot of time to get it right. I've made it through the battle three times, but none without retrying. I suppose it's going to be easier than Aster Protoflorian was for me though, even though both of them rely largely on being lucky.

I didn't expect Bravera to be worth it, seeing as it seems to last a very short amount of time, even with a Role level 5 Synergist and Boon. Unfortunately I'm not sure whether or not Jinx actually interacts with debuffs cast by another character, I guess you'd have to try it out.

I've never used a deceptisol to get past that part with the soldiers, but if I did I guess I could try at least getting Enthunder on Sazh and Blitzing down the Bulwarker first, if I can do that I should have no problems dealing with the two soldiers after that.

To kill the Behemoth, I simply cast Vigilance and Enfire on Fang and Sazh in Bully, (Together with Haste and Bravery of course) and switch to a Devastation paradigm to make sure Vanille stacks up Deprotect and Imperil. And then I just Blitz away, maybe a quick switch to Aggression if I get an opportunity to do so, just to speed up the process. I'll be using a Fortisol I guess for this battle though, since I've got a spare one.

Arrow

2010-08-18 12:57:38 am

Now a hit show on the CW

Hate to keep bugging you about minor things, but I'm trying to plan out how many platinum ingots would be ideal to farm, and I've got a couple more questions: When did you star your three Warrior's Wrists, and did you have to buy one of them as well (I'm assuming so, because I only have two)?

Also, does anyone know if magic (the stat) increases the effectiveness of heals?

Zealie

Edit history:

Zealie: 2010-08-18 01:46:50 am

Zealie: 2010-08-18 01:44:30 am

Zealie: 2010-08-18 01:43:48 am

Zealie: 2010-08-18 01:40:53 am

2010-08-18 01:36:24 am

As far as I know magic does increase effectiveness of heals.
At least in my experience it looked like vanille healed a lot better whenever I casted faith(ra) on her.

[edit] just tested it and faithra made the heals 50% more effective. So yes it's official now.
[edit2] I thought why not give more detailed info, although it's probably useless... with 1715 magic cure healed for around 660 on average. and with 2785 magic it was around 820. So I think it's some exponential equation. Also this is NOT with the 'improved cure' weapon.

sportlov

2010-08-18 08:17:16 am

I guess you should aim for one Platinum Ingot per Adamantortoise, a farm segment takes about a minute, and you should probably try and see what kind of stats you gain from killing different amounts. I needed five of them to be able to kill Proudclad 2 in 2 staggers. (One to heal full and another to kill it) If you go all out offensive you might not need as many, but I'd imagine you'll have alot of problems surviving Orphan's Cradle and the Narthex in doing so.

I upgraded the first Brawler's Wristband I got to a Warrior's in chapter 8, I then star'd it on the Palamecia. I bought one in Mah'habarra as soon as they became available, and star'd it. Which is after the first Boxed Phalanx. I also star'd the one from the Gurangatch as soon as I finished that to make Mushussu and Penangalann alot faster and easier.

Now I'm planning on dismantling the Godess's favor for a Scarletite (Power Glove level 9) and if I have excess money from Adamantortoise farming I'll buy more from the Motherlode and upgrade the other Wristbands. I'll also use the 6 Particle Accelerators from the treasure ball in Edenhall to star level the Power Glove found next to the save in Edenhall. This should give me four Power Gloves hopefully, and since I'll be going for extra accessory slots I should be able to equip them all. Vanille will most likely also be equipped with three Sorcerer's Mark bought from B&W outfitters for 10 000 gil each, I wont bother upgrading these though, I can't imagine it'll make up for the time spent in the shop.

The big question to me though, is how many Incentive Chips can you get to drop from the soldiers from chapter 7 onward, and how will this affect how early you can upgrade the strength armors?

I guess you should aim for one Platinum Ingot per Adamantortoise, a farm segment takes about a minute, and you should probably try and see what kind of stats you gain from killing different amounts. I needed five of them to be able to kill Proudclad 2 in 2 staggers. (One to heal full and another to kill it) If you go all out offensive you might not need as many, but I'd imagine you'll have alot of problems surviving Orphan's Cradle and the Narthex in doing so.

I upgraded the first Brawler's Wristband I got to a Warrior's in chapter 8, I then star'd it on the Palamecia. I bought one in Mah'habarra as soon as they became available, and star'd it. Which is after the first Boxed Phalanx. I also star'd the one from the Gurangatch as soon as I finished that to make Mushussu and Penangalann alot faster and easier.

Now I'm planning on dismantling the Godess's favor for a Scarletite (Power Glove level 9) and if I have excess money from Adamantortoise farming I'll buy more from the Motherlode and upgrade the other Wristbands. I'll also use the 6 Particle Accelerators from the treasure ball in Edenhall to star level the Power Glove found next to the save in Edenhall. This should give me four Power Gloves hopefully, and since I'll be going for extra accessory slots I should be able to equip them all. Vanille will most likely also be equipped with three Sorcerer's Mark bought from B&W outfitters for 10 000 gil each, I wont bother upgrading these though, I can't imagine it'll make up for the time spent in the shop.

The big question to me though, is how many Incentive Chips can you get to drop from the soldiers from chapter 7 onward, and how will this affect how early you can upgrade the strength armors?

Arrow

Edit history:

Arrow: 2010-08-18 01:31:47 pm

2010-08-18 01:25:47 pm

Now a hit show on the CW

Yeah, that's a good point about the incentive chips. I've been keeping track of all the fights that have a chance of dropping them in my notes, so that I can try to manipulate them while making my recorded run...much easier than trying to manipulate shrouds, anyway >_<

And the whole reason I was asking about whether mag affects healing was because I was trying to decide if there was any point in having +magic acc. on Vanille from Ch. 12 onwards. But since it does (looks to be roughly 10 magic for 1 extra point of healing, probably modified by your RL bonus), and Vanille's the only healer in the party, it's probably still a good idea. If nothing else, I guess it will make her Sab spells do more damage too, so it's not a complete waste.

Something else I was considering is whether it might be worth it to fight the Immortal in the Tesseracts to pick up the Weirding Glyph, Adamant Bangle, Scarletite, and Elixir. I'm not there yet to see how long the detour takes, but the "value" of the Glyph and Scarletite alone make it a more profitable encounter than fighting an extra Adamantoise, to say nothing of the bangle and elixir.

Yeah, that's a good point about the incentive chips. I've been keeping track of all the fights that have a chance of dropping them in my notes, so that I can try to manipulate them while making my recorded run...much easier than trying to manipulate shrouds, anyway >_<

And the whole reason I was asking about whether mag affects healing was because I was trying to decide if there was any point in having +magic acc. on Vanille from Ch. 12 onwards. But since it does (looks to be roughly 10 magic for 1 extra point of healing, probably modified by your RL bonus), and Vanille's the only healer in the party, it's probably still a good idea. If nothing else, I guess it will make her Sab spells do more damage too, so it's not a complete waste.

Something else I was considering is whether it might be worth it to fight the Immortal in the Tesseracts to pick up the Weirding Glyph, Adamant Bangle, Scarletite, and Elixir. I'm not there yet to see how long the detour takes, but the "value" of the Glyph and Scarletite alone make it a more profitable encounter than fighting an extra Adamantoise, to say nothing of the bangle and elixir.

sportlov

2010-08-18 03:21:34 pm

You can buy a Scarletite from the Platinum Ingot you'd get from the Adamantortoise, you most likely wont need the bangle, and losing out on an accessory slot for more health for the last seven battles in the game might lose you alot of the time it'd take to kill the Adamantortoise another time.

The Immortal would probably take about as long to kill as an Adamantortoise would do with saving, and there's alot of running and teleporting to get the items in the treasure balls unfortunately. At this point you'd gain about 50 magic from the Weirding Glyph, since it would probably be advisable to pick up a Sorcerer's Mark to use meanwhile.

I wont say it's not worth it, but I'd ask myself how much I'd need the items, and whether or not it's worth the potential loss of time. (Battles between the Immortal and Adamantortoise are going to be a little longer I guess) and the loss of about 35 000 CP at that point.

I would probably kill the Adamantortoise five or six times and kill off all the bosses until the end to see what kind of battle durations are possible at that point. Then I would go for 3 or 4 to see what kind of difference it makes to the last seven or so battles in the game. It would probably be the easiest way to determine how many times you want to kill off the thing.

You can buy a Scarletite from the Platinum Ingot you'd get from the Adamantortoise, you most likely wont need the bangle, and losing out on an accessory slot for more health for the last seven battles in the game might lose you alot of the time it'd take to kill the Adamantortoise another time.

The Immortal would probably take about as long to kill as an Adamantortoise would do with saving, and there's alot of running and teleporting to get the items in the treasure balls unfortunately. At this point you'd gain about 50 magic from the Weirding Glyph, since it would probably be advisable to pick up a Sorcerer's Mark to use meanwhile.

I wont say it's not worth it, but I'd ask myself how much I'd need the items, and whether or not it's worth the potential loss of time. (Battles between the Immortal and Adamantortoise are going to be a little longer I guess) and the loss of about 35 000 CP at that point.

I would probably kill the Adamantortoise five or six times and kill off all the bosses until the end to see what kind of battle durations are possible at that point. Then I would go for 3 or 4 to see what kind of difference it makes to the last seven or so battles in the game. It would probably be the easiest way to determine how many times you want to kill off the thing.

najzere

2010-08-18 04:00:34 pm

Here are the important Medic ability calculations:

Cure: Magic × 0.20 + 100
Cura: Magic × 0.18 + 100
Curasa: LHP × 0.15 + LHP × Magic ÷ 10,000
Curaja: LHP × 0.12 + LHP × Magic ÷ 10,000

Note: LHP (Lost HP) represents the target's missing HP (Max HP - Current HP)

As you can see, Magic plays an important part in all restorative spell calculations. At some point, Cure and Cura (static amounts) become more efficient than Curasa and Curaja—as the target's HP approaches its maximum amount. If your leader is the Medic, you'll have to eyeball it, but the AI will choose the best spell for you automatically, unless the target takes damage after the AI can't change the spell. The Improved Cure and Improved Cure II (from Vanille's Healer's Staff) adds a 10% or 20% boost after calculation, respectively.

For Vanille's Saboteur abilities, Magic is also used in the damage calculation, but not in chance to hit, which is obviously more important.

Non-Death abilities: Magic × 0.30
Death: Magic × 4.00

Except for Death, you don't do much damage with Saboteur abilities—they're much more useful for debuffing and stagger maintenance.

Here are the important Medic ability calculations:
[list]
[*][b]Cure[/b]: Magic × 0.20 + 100
[*][b]Cura[/b]: Magic × 0.18 + 100
[*][b]Curasa[/b]: LHP × 0.15 + LHP × Magic ÷ 10,000
[*][b]Curaja[/b]: LHP × 0.12 + LHP × Magic ÷ 10,000
[/list]           [size="10"][i]Note: LHP (Lost HP) represents the target's missing HP (Max HP - Current HP)[/i][/size]

As you can see, Magic plays an important part in all restorative spell calculations. At some point, Cure and Cura (static amounts) become more efficient than Curasa and Curaja—as the target's HP approaches its maximum amount. If your leader is the Medic, you'll have to eyeball it, but the AI will choose the best spell for you automatically, unless the target takes damage after the AI can't change the spell. The Improved Cure and Improved Cure II (from Vanille's Healer's Staff) adds a 10% or 20% boost after calculation, respectively.

For Vanille's Saboteur abilities, Magic is also used in the damage calculation, but not in chance to hit, which is obviously more important.
[list]
[*][b]Non-Death abilities[/b]: Magic × 0.30
[*][b]Death[/b]: Magic × 4.00
[/list]Except for Death, you don't do much damage with Saboteur abilities—they're much more useful for debuffing and stagger maintenance.

Arrow

Edit history:

Arrow: 2010-08-18 06:19:01 pm

2010-08-18 04:31:15 pm

Now a hit show on the CW

Wow, maybe the magic really isn't worth it then. If Vanille had 500 base magic (just an estimate, not sure how much she would have by Orphan), her Cure would be healing for 200 per tick, whereas even if you equipped her with, say, a Sorcerer's Mark and Weirding Glpyh, her heals would only be bumped up to 250 each. With a RL4 bonus, I think this would only come to about 258 vs 322.5 - not a huge difference. I feel like it would be more useful to give her a health bangle (which would hopefully mean less healing needed) or something else...maybe even a Watchman's Amulet for the Positive Effect ability. I've also started wondering if it might be worth it to upgrade her Belladonna Wand to a Malboro for the slightly better stats and Imp. Debuffing 2.

EDIT: Thinking about it some more, now I'm leaning towards a final setup like this (assuming three acc. slots on every character):
Sazh: Maxed/close to maxed Hyades, Adamant Bangle, Power Glove, Power Glove
Vanille: Belladonna Wand, Sorcerer's Mark, Weirding Glyph, and either another Sorc. Mark or a Watchman's Amulet
Fang: Maxed/close to maxed Venus Gospel, Power Glove, Power Glove, Warrior's Wrist (switched out for Speed Sash on the fights I need Instant Stagger for)

Sazh will probably be hitting 99,999 with full chain gauge and debuffs, so the adamant bangle will give him some extra survivability as well as Damage Wall.
Vanille will get a small boost for her healing as well as Magic Wall (will experiment with usefulness of Positive Effect).
Fang: High strength, Physical Wall.

If survivability is an issue, I still have the Diamond Bangle I can toss on someone. Also, this is assuming I do kill the Immortal. It's vulnerable to Death, so it won't really waste much more time than Adamantoise farming. The scarletite would normally cost 100,000 gil, and I would need one to upgrade a sorcerer's glyph. So making the money to buy two scarletite (plus buy/upgrade a sorcerer's mark) would actually require two Adamantoise kills, vs. the single Immortal...and again, that's not even counting the fact that I get a free Adamant Bangle and Elixir, that would be impossible to obtain otherwise. The only advantage additional Adamantoise farming has over killing the Immortal is the extra CP, but we'll see how much of that I actually need. Right now, I'm judging the number of Adamantoise kills I'll need solely on the number of Platinum Ingots I want - not CP. Right now, I'm thinking it will end up being around three kills, but I'll find out for certain later tonight when I have time to sit down and figure out how much total money I need to spend to upgrade the weapons and accs.

Wow, maybe the magic really isn't worth it then. If Vanille had 500 base magic (just an estimate, not sure how much she would have by Orphan), her Cure would be healing for 200 per tick, whereas even if you equipped her with, say, a Sorcerer's Mark and Weirding Glpyh, her heals would only be bumped up to 250 each. With a RL4 bonus, I think this would only come to about 258 vs 322.5 - not a huge difference. I feel like it would be more useful to give her a health bangle (which would hopefully mean less healing needed) or something else...maybe even a Watchman's Amulet for the Positive Effect ability. I've also started wondering if it might be worth it to upgrade her Belladonna Wand to a Malboro for the slightly better stats and Imp. Debuffing 2.

EDIT: Thinking about it some more, now I'm leaning towards a final setup like this (assuming three acc. slots on every character):
Sazh: Maxed/close to maxed Hyades, Adamant Bangle, Power Glove, Power Glove
Vanille: Belladonna Wand, Sorcerer's Mark, Weirding Glyph, and either another Sorc. Mark or a Watchman's Amulet
Fang: Maxed/close to maxed Venus Gospel, Power Glove, Power Glove, Warrior's Wrist (switched out for Speed Sash on the fights I need Instant Stagger for)

Sazh will probably be hitting 99,999 with full chain gauge and debuffs, so the adamant bangle will give him some extra survivability as well as Damage Wall.
Vanille will get a small boost for her healing as well as Magic Wall (will experiment with usefulness of Positive Effect).
Fang: High strength, Physical Wall.

If survivability is an issue, I still have the Diamond Bangle I can toss on someone. Also, this is assuming I do kill the Immortal. It's vulnerable to Death, so it won't really waste much more time than Adamantoise farming. The scarletite would normally cost 100,000 gil, and I would need one to upgrade a sorcerer's glyph. So making the money to buy two scarletite (plus buy/upgrade a sorcerer's mark) would actually require two Adamantoise kills, vs. the single Immortal...and again, that's not even counting the fact that I get a free Adamant Bangle and Elixir, that would be impossible to obtain otherwise. The [i]only[/i] advantage additional Adamantoise farming has over killing the Immortal is the extra CP, but we'll see how much of that I actually need. Right now, I'm judging the number of Adamantoise kills I'll need solely on the number of Platinum Ingots I want - not CP. Right now, I'm thinking it will end up being around three kills, but I'll find out for certain later tonight when I have time to sit down and figure out how much total money I need to spend to upgrade the weapons and accs.

najzere

2010-08-19 12:37:13 am

Not that I was speedrunning, but since you're rewarded for finishing battles quickly, I did tended to go with Vanille in the Saboteur role and gave her Belladonna/Malboro for better debuffing. I found it sped up my battles by contributing to the stagger and increasing my Commando/Ravager's damage. I'm interested to see what everyone's final party will consist of and how close I came picking a fast party based on my unscientific observations.

Also, I love seeing this thread staying alive, especially for such a long game. Keep up the great work everyone!

Arrow

Edit history:

Arrow: 2010-08-26 03:58:18 am

Arrow: 2010-08-26 03:57:46 am

Arrow: 2010-08-26 03:57:06 am

2010-08-26 03:46:58 am

Now a hit show on the CW

Quick progress update: I'm working on chapter 13 now, so it shouldn't be much longer until I'm finished with the test run and can start recording...although I'll also need to go through my notes and figure out exactly how many shrouds I need total, and whether I can get all of them from just required fight drops, or if I'll need to add a couple fights in chapter 3 and 4. Anyway, not going to worry about that yet. Five battles left...

EDIT: Almost forgot - when I was doing my Adamantoise farming (I settled on three Ingots, btw), I actually managed to have a Trap drop from one of my kills. I'm definitely not going to count on this happening during the actual run, but if one does drop during one of my many, many attempts at a usable segment, I think I'll go ahead and keep the segment and use it towards upgrading the Venus Gospel (after Wladislaus, as I still need to instant stagger him), since it actually gets significant stat increases in its ultimate form, unlike the Hyades.

sportlov

2010-08-26 02:35:18 pm

I just finished the Adamantoise farming myself, and had two Trapezohedrons drop in as many Ingots, which kinda sucked since I didn't want them. It even took me seven kills to get my first Platinum Ingot to drop, and it didn't show any signs of increase at that point. So I'm currently figuring out how much I need to buy and sell during the next part before Proudclad 2.

I've finished the game once, and failed on Orphan 1 (Forgot to pick up Shell and Protect.) in the last couple of weeks, and I must say I'm pretty much settled with everything at this point, except the Crystarium unfortunately. I need to figure this one out, seeing which Crystariums give the biggest time boost.

The last bosses take 99 999 damage from Fang anyway for me pretty much right after the stagger (Cold Blood with Cerberus paradigm) so I absolutely wont need to upgrade my Venus Gospel further than to star level at least, but I'm also using only strength armors. Either way I have no gil left at that point either.

The biggest concerns of mine now is whether or not I can kill Tiamat Eliminator in one stagger only, and how to get Orphan 1 under 3:30. Otherwise I'm pretty much settled to go with this. Unfortunately I wont be able to play anything this weekend, but as soon as I can I will probably finish the game in about two days or so.

Killing the Adamantoise takes less than a minute if you don't down it with a summon, 7 seconds for the fight and so on. I would not try killing the Immortal, I can not see how that saves any time at all, the armors are useless and you'll lose time by waiting with buying a Scarletite anyway.

I settled for summoning on the Adamantoise when killing it, but I took less than 90 seconds per segment anyway.

I'm soon finished, but I would have no idea where to start if I were to redo the game again. I haven't even made any notes. I would probably try to improve my time somewhere down the lane, but for now I'm going to settle for what I get in this run.

I reached Orphan with a very promising time tonight when I played through to make sure I had enough gil and CP to reach the end of the game, and I'm sure I'll enjoy watching Arrow's run as soon as it's finished. It's a shame it's not a more competative game, it's long, but speed running it has been very fun and surprising for me. Getting the timer down this low is something I could never have imagined before I found this topic.

I'll post the time of all my bosses as soon as I'm finished with the game Arrow, if you want to have something to compare to. All of them are improved (Some vastly) compared to G__AnakinRPG's times. I'm very excited to see how much you can improve on the boss battles I think I've mastered at this point.

I'll post again after the weekend, hopefully I'll finish the game next week as well!

I just finished the Adamantoise farming myself, and had two Trapezohedrons drop in as many Ingots, which kinda sucked since I didn't want them. It even took me seven kills to get my first Platinum Ingot to drop, and it didn't show any signs of increase at that point. So I'm currently figuring out how much I need to buy and sell during the next part before Proudclad 2.

I've finished the game once, and failed on Orphan 1 (Forgot to pick up Shell and Protect.) in the last couple of weeks, and I must say I'm pretty much settled with everything at this point, except the Crystarium unfortunately. I need to figure this one out, seeing which Crystariums give the biggest time boost.

The last bosses take 99 999 damage from Fang anyway for me pretty much right after the stagger (Cold Blood with Cerberus paradigm) so I absolutely wont need to upgrade my Venus Gospel further than to star level at least, but I'm also using only strength armors. Either way I have no gil left at that point either.

The biggest concerns of mine now is whether or not I can kill Tiamat Eliminator in one stagger only, and how to get Orphan 1 under 3:30. Otherwise I'm pretty much settled to go with this. Unfortunately I wont be able to play anything this weekend, but as soon as I can I will probably finish the game in about two days or so.

Killing the Adamantoise takes less than a minute if you don't down it with a summon, 7 seconds for the fight and so on. I would not try killing the Immortal, I can not see how that saves any time at all, the armors are useless and you'll lose time by waiting with buying a Scarletite anyway.

I settled for summoning on the Adamantoise when killing it, but I took less than 90 seconds per segment anyway.

I'm soon finished, but I would have no idea where to start if I were to redo the game again. I haven't even made any notes. I would probably try to improve my time somewhere down the lane, but for now I'm going to settle for what I get in this run.

I reached Orphan with a very promising time tonight when I played through to make sure I had enough gil and CP to reach the end of the game, and I'm sure I'll enjoy watching Arrow's run as soon as it's finished. It's a shame it's not a more competative game, it's long, but speed running it has been very fun and surprising for me. Getting the timer down this low is something I could never have imagined before I found this topic.

I'll post the time of all my bosses as soon as I'm finished with the game Arrow, if you want to have something to compare to. All of them are improved (Some vastly) compared to G__AnakinRPG's times. I'm very excited to see how much you can improve on the boss battles I think I've mastered at this point.

I'll post again after the weekend, hopefully I'll finish the game next week as well!

Jukebox_Hero

2010-08-26 11:17:09 pm

Just a boy and his digimon

Hey, guys. Finally finished reading this whole thread so I could make sure I didn't suggest anything that hadn't been suggested. I'm a huge final fantasy fanboy (because I love pretty cutscenes and convoluted storylines). I thought XIII was great and would love to contribute to this thread however I can.
Arrow, you said you had trouble with the Shiva twins. I think sportlov already made some suggestions about this, but I'd like to add, in case you weren't aware, that I believe that you can raise their gestalt meter faster by using steelguard just as they use their attack. If you defend perfectly as they attack, I think it also defends you for more.
You also complained about the dreadnought fight and wrecking ball killing you. My strategy for dreadnoughts was to fill them with debuffs and yata-lock them. If a dreadnought has a bunch of debuffs on, it won't attack you. It will spend a long time casting "steamclean", which will very slowly remove its debuffs. It is very vulnerable while doing this.
You asked if there was any way to improve your strategy against Dahaka. My suggestion would be to use a fortisol in addition to aegisol so that you can have Sazh focus on dps rather than taking the time to buff everyone. Also, everyone is immediately hasted, so maybe this would help you bring him down to 2 staggers. Your call as to whether he is worth using a fortisol or if you are saving them for harder bosses. But perhaps you could try to farm fortisols/aegisols in place of deceptisols if you ever have the option to try, since you can restart the fight and get your deceptisol back. I probably would avoid going out of my way for deceptisols for this reason.
You never mentioned, but I assume that you are also choosing your attacks rather than auto-battle in situations where the commands aren't going to be "attack-attack-attack-attack". Because, the game likes to make things pretty and, if the enemy is weak to ice and has no resistance to water, the game will choose "watera, blizzara, watera blizzara", as opposed to just "blizzara, blizzara, blizzara, blizzara", because it doesn't look as nice to see the same spell 4 times. So, you could do a little more damage if you chose the correct attack 4x in a row.

Quote from Arrow:

Wow, maybe the magic really isn't worth it then... I've also started wondering if it might be worth it to upgrade her Belladonna Wand to a Malboro for the slightly better stats and Imp. Debuffing 2.

I would advise against this. First, you said that the magic boost wouldn't make a difference, then you said you might consider this for stats and improved debuffing. So, if the stats don't make a difference, then you are mostly doing it for the improved debuffing. I don't think this will make much of a difference in terms of normal debuffs. It would mostly be useful in terms of increasing chance of Death succeeding. If Death doesn't work, you could remedy it by resetting. However, if you feel that you need to reduce the amount of resets, then, by all means, preserve your sanity. If you are taking on the effort to speedrun this game, then I respect your effort and don't want to drive you crazy. I just feel that you could either grind less for money if you don't have to spend money on this, or you can use the gil that you would have spent on this elsewhere.

I understand that a lot of my suggestions are easier said than done or are just so common sense that they haven't been mentioned, but I figured I would say them in case they help at all.

Hey, guys. Finally finished reading this whole thread so I could make sure I didn't suggest anything that hadn't been suggested. I'm a huge final fantasy fanboy (because I love pretty cutscenes and convoluted storylines). I thought XIII was great and would love to contribute to this thread however I can. 
Arrow, you said you had trouble with the Shiva twins. I think sportlov already made some suggestions about this, but I'd like to add, in case you weren't aware, that I believe that you can raise their gestalt meter faster by using steelguard just as they use their attack. If you defend perfectly as they attack, I think it also defends you for more.
You also complained about the dreadnought fight and wrecking ball killing you. My strategy for dreadnoughts was to fill them with debuffs and yata-lock them. If a dreadnought has a bunch of debuffs on, it won't attack you. It will spend a long time casting "steamclean", which will very slowly remove its debuffs. It is very vulnerable while doing this. 
You asked if there was any way to improve your strategy against Dahaka. My suggestion would be to use a fortisol in addition to aegisol so that you can have Sazh focus on dps rather than taking the time to buff everyone. Also, everyone is immediately hasted, so maybe this would help you bring him down to 2 staggers. Your call as to whether he is worth using a fortisol or if you are saving them for harder bosses. But perhaps you could try to farm fortisols/aegisols in place of deceptisols if you ever have the option to try, since you can restart the fight and get your deceptisol back. I probably would avoid going out of my way for deceptisols for this reason. 
You never mentioned, but I assume that you are also choosing your attacks rather than auto-battle in situations where the commands aren't going to be "attack-attack-attack-attack". Because, the game likes to make things pretty and, if the enemy is weak to ice and has no resistance to water, the game will choose "watera, blizzara, watera blizzara", as opposed to just "blizzara, blizzara, blizzara, blizzara", because it doesn't look as nice to see the same spell 4 times. So, you could do a little more damage if you chose the correct attack 4x in a row.

[quote="Arrow"]Wow, maybe the magic really isn't worth it then... I've also started wondering if it might be worth it to upgrade her Belladonna Wand to a Malboro for the slightly better stats and Imp. Debuffing 2.
[/quote]
I would advise against this. First, you said that the magic boost wouldn't make a difference, then you said you might consider this for stats and improved debuffing. So, if the stats don't make a difference, then you are mostly doing it for the improved debuffing. I don't think this will make much of a difference in terms of normal debuffs. It would mostly be useful in terms of increasing chance of Death succeeding. If Death doesn't work, you could remedy it by resetting. However, if you feel that you need to reduce the amount of resets, then, by all means, preserve your sanity. If you are taking on the effort to speedrun this game, then I respect your effort and don't want to drive you crazy. I just feel that you could either grind less for money if you don't have to spend money on this, or you can use the gil that you would have spent on this elsewhere.

I understand that a lot of my suggestions are easier said than done or are just so common sense that they haven't been mentioned, but I figured I would say them in case they help at all.

Arrow

Edit history:

Arrow: 2010-08-27 12:31:14 am

2010-08-27 12:30:01 am

Now a hit show on the CW

Quote from Jukebox_Hero:

Arrow, you said you had trouble with the Shiva twins. I think sportlov already made some suggestions about this, but I'd like to add, in case you weren't aware, that I believe that you can raise their gestalt meter faster by using steelguard just as they use their attack. If you defend perfectly as they attack, I think it also defends you for more.

I don't think I ever had "trouble" with them, exactly, I just didn't think there were any ways to make the fight significantly faster, which I was obviously wrong about.

Quote:

You also complained about the dreadnought fight and wrecking ball killing you. My strategy for dreadnoughts was to fill them with debuffs and yata-lock them. If a dreadnought has a bunch of debuffs on, it won't attack you. It will spend a long time casting "steamclean", which will very slowly remove its debuffs. It is very vulnerable while doing this.

Yeah, I noticed this as well, although if I remember right, it always uses the wrecking ball before the first steamclean during phase 2. It's been a long time since I worked on that fight, but I feel relatively confident that I'll be able to manage it alright...just need lots of patience for restarts.

Quote:

You asked if there was any way to improve your strategy against Dahaka. My suggestion would be to use a fortisol in addition to aegisol so that you can have Sazh focus on dps rather than taking the time to buff everyone. Also, everyone is immediately hasted, so maybe this would help you bring him down to 2 staggers. Your call as to whether he is worth using a fortisol or if you are saving them for harder bosses. But perhaps you could try to farm fortisols/aegisols in place of deceptisols if you ever have the option to try, since you can restart the fight and get your deceptisol back. I probably would avoid going out of my way for deceptisols for this reason.

I don't know if having haste (and bravery, etc.) from the start would actually make much of a difference, since Dahaka seemed to always cast right around 50% stagger no matter what. I'll definitely try it if I have the extra fortisol, though. Also, I'm planning to have a different equipment setup during my recorded attempt, which should make the fight a bit easier as well.

Quote:

You never mentioned, but I assume that you are also choosing your attacks rather than auto-battle in situations where the commands aren't going to be "attack-attack-attack-attack". Because, the game likes to make things pretty and, if the enemy is weak to ice and has no resistance to water, the game will choose "watera, blizzara, watera blizzara", as opposed to just "blizzara, blizzara, blizzara, blizzara", because it doesn't look as nice to see the same spell 4 times. So, you could do a little more damage if you chose the correct attack 4x in a row.

Actually, the reason auto-attack will alternate spells in the situation you described has nothing to do with making it look pretty. It's actually because Rav spells get a slight bonus (can't remember if it's chain or damage) when they're alternated like that. In the case of enemy weaknesses, however, many times I'm going to be manually selecting the spells anyway, to avoid having to use libra (or wait for the AI to determine the weaknesses).

Quote:

I would advise against this. First, you said that the magic boost wouldn't make a difference, then you said you might consider this for stats and improved debuffing. So, if the stats don't make a difference, then you are mostly doing it for the improved debuffing. I don't think this will make much of a difference in terms of normal debuffs. It would mostly be useful in terms of increasing chance of Death succeeding. If Death doesn't work, you could remedy it by resetting. However, if you feel that you need to reduce the amount of resets, then, by all means, preserve your sanity.

I agree, it definitely sounded a bit contradictory for me to say that about the stats. I guess my initial reaction was based on how little Magic boosts healing specifically, but when I was considering upgrading the Belladonna Wand, I was thinking about it not just increasing healing, but also her Rav and Com damage. At any rate, I've already changed my mind about upgrading the wand. Improved Debuffing doesn't actually increase the chance of Death working, as Death isn't technically a debuff (even though it's in the Sab tree).

Thanks for your comments Jukebox Hero (he had stars in his eyes), I appreciate your support Smiley

Quote:

Killing the Adamantoise takes less than a minute if you don't down it with a summon, 7 seconds for the fight and so on. I would not try killing the Immortal, I can not see how that saves any time at all, the armors are useless and you'll lose time by waiting with buying a Scarletite anyway.

For the actual recorded run, I won't be using summons (but I did for my test run, to conserve sanity). With Aurora Scarf on Vanille (and Sazh as Syn), I can get anywhere from 0-4 casts, depending on how long the Adamantoise takes to stomp, and whether the first stomp misses or not. This will be with Fang in party as Sab, so I have a minimum chance of 2% per cast, maximum of 4% if she happens to land Slow AND Curse on the enemy.

Still haven't made up my mind about the Immortal. If I don't get the scarletite and weirding glyph from him, then I'm probably going to need an extra Adamantoise kill anyway to afford everything, so I don't think it will lose time. I'll definitely be trying the last boss with and without the glyph and adamant bangle to see if it makes any discernible difference, though.

[quote="Jukebox_Hero"]Arrow, you said you had trouble with the Shiva twins. I think sportlov already made some suggestions about this, but I'd like to add, in case you weren't aware, that I believe that you can raise their gestalt meter faster by using steelguard just as they use their attack. If you defend perfectly as they attack, I think it also defends you for more.[/quote]
I don't think I ever had "trouble" with them, exactly, I just didn't think there were any ways to make the fight significantly faster, which I was obviously wrong about.

[quote]You also complained about the dreadnought fight and wrecking ball killing you. My strategy for dreadnoughts was to fill them with debuffs and yata-lock them. If a dreadnought has a bunch of debuffs on, it won't attack you. It will spend a long time casting "steamclean", which will very slowly remove its debuffs. It is very vulnerable while doing this.[/quote]
Yeah, I noticed this as well, although if I remember right, it always uses the wrecking ball before the first steamclean during phase 2. It's been a long time since I worked on that fight, but I feel relatively confident that I'll be able to manage it alright...just need lots of patience for restarts.

[quote]You asked if there was any way to improve your strategy against Dahaka. My suggestion would be to use a fortisol in addition to aegisol so that you can have Sazh focus on dps rather than taking the time to buff everyone. Also, everyone is immediately hasted, so maybe this would help you bring him down to 2 staggers. Your call as to whether he is worth using a fortisol or if you are saving them for harder bosses. But perhaps you could try to farm fortisols/aegisols in place of deceptisols if you ever have the option to try, since you can restart the fight and get your deceptisol back. I probably would avoid going out of my way for deceptisols for this reason.[/quote]
I don't know if having haste (and bravery, etc.) from the start would actually make much of a difference, since Dahaka seemed to always cast right around 50% stagger no matter what. I'll definitely try it if I have the extra fortisol, though. Also, I'm planning to have a different equipment setup during my recorded attempt, which should make the fight a bit easier as well.

[quote]You never mentioned, but I assume that you are also choosing your attacks rather than auto-battle in situations where the commands aren't going to be "attack-attack-attack-attack". Because, the game likes to make things pretty and, if the enemy is weak to ice and has no resistance to water, the game will choose "watera, blizzara, watera blizzara", as opposed to just "blizzara, blizzara, blizzara, blizzara", because it doesn't look as nice to see the same spell 4 times. So, you could do a little more damage if you chose the correct attack 4x in a row.[/quote]
Actually, the reason auto-attack will alternate spells in the situation you described has nothing to do with making it look pretty. It's actually because Rav spells get a slight bonus (can't remember if it's chain or damage) when they're alternated like that. In the case of enemy weaknesses, however, many times I'm going to be manually selecting the spells anyway, to avoid having to use libra (or wait for the AI to determine the weaknesses).

[quote]I would advise against this. First, you said that the magic boost wouldn't make a difference, then you said you might consider this for stats and improved debuffing. So, if the stats don't make a difference, then you are mostly doing it for the improved debuffing. I don't think this will make much of a difference in terms of normal debuffs. It would mostly be useful in terms of increasing chance of Death succeeding. If Death doesn't work, you could remedy it by resetting. However, if you feel that you need to reduce the amount of resets, then, by all means, preserve your sanity.[/quote]
I agree, it definitely sounded a bit contradictory for me to say that about the stats. I guess my initial reaction was based on how little Magic boosts healing specifically, but when I was considering upgrading the Belladonna Wand, I was thinking about it not just increasing healing, but also her Rav and Com damage. At any rate, I've already changed my mind about upgrading the wand. Improved Debuffing doesn't actually increase the chance of Death working, as Death isn't technically a debuff (even though it's in the Sab tree).

Thanks for your comments Jukebox Hero (he had stars in his eyes), I appreciate your support :)

[quote]Killing the Adamantoise takes less than a minute if you don't down it with a summon, 7 seconds for the fight and so on. I would not try killing the Immortal, I can not see how that saves any time at all, the armors are useless and you'll lose time by waiting with buying a Scarletite anyway.[/quote]
For the actual recorded run, I won't be using summons (but I did for my test run, to conserve sanity). With Aurora Scarf on Vanille (and Sazh as Syn), I can get anywhere from 0-4 casts, depending on how long the Adamantoise takes to stomp, and whether the first stomp misses or not. This will be with Fang in party as Sab, so I have a minimum chance of 2% per cast, maximum of 4% if she happens to land Slow AND Curse on the enemy.

Still haven't made up my mind about the Immortal. If I don't get the scarletite and weirding glyph from him, then I'm probably going to need an extra Adamantoise kill anyway to afford everything, so I don't think it will lose time. I'll definitely be trying the last boss with and without the glyph and adamant bangle to see if it makes any discernible difference, though.

sportlov

Edit history:

sportlov: 2010-08-27 12:37:47 am

2010-08-27 12:37:09 am

Quote:

I don't know if having haste (and bravery, etc.) from the start would actually make much of a difference, since Dahaka seemed to always cast right around 50% stagger no matter what. I'll definitely try it if I have the extra fortisol, though. Also, I'm planning to have a different equipment setup during my recorded attempt, which should make the fight a bit easier as well.

If you're talking about big attacks, it's quite possible to avoid all of them and stagger twice before even casting anything but single target spells.

I noticed in the beginning that I would, on the enemies there, gain about 1% on the chain gauge per spell by alternating between two. This is probably subject to chain resistance though.

I wouldn't upgrade anything on Vanille either, unfortunately strength seems way more effective in boosting damage than magic. By the end of the game I'll have one Commando role and one Ravager for her anyway, the rest is just Medic and Sabatour.

I wont be killing the Immortal, and that discerns our playthroughs I guess. We'll have to compare times on the battles between Proudclad 2 and Orphan, I might just get very surprised.

PS. You can't debuff a standing Adamantoise unfortunately.

[quote]I don't know if having haste (and bravery, etc.) from the start would actually make much of a difference, since Dahaka seemed to always cast right around 50% stagger no matter what. I'll definitely try it if I have the extra fortisol, though. Also, I'm planning to have a different equipment setup during my recorded attempt, which should make the fight a bit easier as well.[/quote]

If you're talking about big attacks, it's quite possible to avoid all of them and stagger twice before even casting anything but single target spells.

I noticed in the beginning that I would, on the enemies there, gain about 1% on the chain gauge per spell by alternating between two. This is probably subject to chain resistance though.

I wouldn't upgrade anything on Vanille either, unfortunately strength seems way more effective in boosting damage than magic. By the end of the game I'll have one Commando role and one Ravager for her anyway, the rest is just Medic and Sabatour.

I wont be killing the Immortal, and that discerns our playthroughs I guess. We'll have to compare times on the battles between Proudclad 2 and Orphan, I might just get very surprised.

PS. You can't debuff a standing Adamantoise unfortunately.

Arrow

2010-08-28 01:21:11 am

Now a hit show on the CW

Quote from sportlov:

If you're talking about big attacks, it's quite possible to avoid all of them and stagger twice before even casting anything but single target spells.

I remember you mentioning that before, but were you able to find a consistent method to pull this off, or was it just a 1 in 1000 chance kind of thing? I think I only ever had one attempt in which he didn't cast Foul Utterance before the first stagger, and he still did Fulminous Firestorm before the second.

Quote:

I wouldn't upgrade anything on Vanille either, unfortunately strength seems way more effective in boosting damage than magic. By the end of the game I'll have one Commando role and one Ravager for her anyway, the rest is just Medic and Sabatour.

I'm probably going to keep picking up Rav stats and abilities with her after I get Med up to RL4. I also went ahead and picked up Ruin, since I figured it would do more damage for her than Attack would while in Com.

Quote:

You can't debuff a standing Adamantoise unfortunately.

Doh! You're right about this, although apparently Curse does have a small chance to work pre-stagger.

At any rate, I'm already having second thoughts about the Immortal. Not so much because of the time it may or may not waste, but because I realized it will have to be in the same segment as dodging that big robot guy who blocks the path to the save right before Wladislaus. Getting both to happen swiftly in the same segment would be asking a lot, and I'm not sure if I'm patient enough for that.

Also, I couldn't believe what a joke Jabberwocky and Bandersnatch were. Here I am trying to get Fang to land an instant stagger, when I realize "Hmmm...my regular Flamestrikes have already brought Jabberwocky down to half health in just 30 seconds." So it looks like I'm only going to be bothering to use it for Wladislaus.

[quote="sportlov"]If you're talking about big attacks, it's quite possible to avoid all of them and stagger twice before even casting anything but single target spells.[/quote]
I remember you mentioning that before, but were you able to find a consistent method to pull this off, or was it just a 1 in 1000 chance kind of thing? I think I only ever had one attempt in which he didn't cast Foul Utterance before the first stagger, and he still did Fulminous Firestorm before the second.

[quote]I wouldn't upgrade anything on Vanille either, unfortunately strength seems way more effective in boosting damage than magic. By the end of the game I'll have one Commando role and one Ravager for her anyway, the rest is just Medic and Sabatour.[/quote]
I'm probably going to keep picking up Rav stats and abilities with her after I get Med up to RL4. I also went ahead and picked up Ruin, since I figured it would do more damage for her than Attack would while in Com.

[quote]You can't debuff a standing Adamantoise unfortunately.[/quote]
Doh! You're right about this, although apparently Curse does have a small chance to work pre-stagger.

At any rate, I'm already having second thoughts about the Immortal. Not so much because of the time it may or may not waste, but because I realized it will have to be in the same segment as dodging that big robot guy who blocks the path to the save right before Wladislaus. Getting both to happen swiftly in the same segment would be asking a lot, and I'm not sure if I'm patient enough for that.

Also, I couldn't believe what a joke Jabberwocky and Bandersnatch were. Here I am trying to get Fang to land an instant stagger, when I realize "Hmmm...my regular Flamestrikes have already brought Jabberwocky down to half health in just 30 seconds." So it looks like I'm only going to be bothering to use it for Wladislaus.

sportlov

2010-08-28 02:31:21 am

Wladislaus actually only takes about 30-40 seconds without instant stagger as well, it's a very small time saver indeed. One Blitz is enough to kill it after instant-stagger hits though, which looks pretty cool.

But does Vanille actually use Ruin? She would, even though she had twice the amount of magic than strength use Attack when I played through earlier.

I'm pretty consistant with killing Dahaka, sometimes it takes five tries to get it right, and other times I can do it five times in a row, there are many small factors that make a difference overall. It's nowhere near as random as Barthandelus on the bridge, I'd actually say it's about as random as killing Proudclad 1 in 1:30 without problems.

Did you get Sparkstrike for Sazh? I skipped it because I thought the animations of strikes were too long, so I've used only Fire and Thunder with him. (I've got Aerora and Flamestrike too, I don't think you can skip them.) I guess I didn't consider the fact that I'd have over 2000 strength at this point when I did though, stupid me. I'll have to play around with that.

Wladislaus actually only takes about 30-40 seconds without instant stagger as well, it's a very small time saver indeed. One Blitz is enough to kill it after instant-stagger hits though, which looks pretty cool.

But does Vanille actually use Ruin? She would, even though she had twice the amount of magic than strength use Attack when I played through earlier.

I'm pretty consistant with killing Dahaka, sometimes it takes five tries to get it right, and other times I can do it five times in a row, there are many small factors that make a difference overall. It's nowhere near as random as Barthandelus on the bridge, I'd actually say it's about as random as killing Proudclad 1 in 1:30 without problems.

Did you get Sparkstrike for Sazh? I skipped it because I thought the animations of strikes were too long, so I've used only Fire and Thunder with him. (I've got Aerora and Flamestrike too, I don't think you can skip them.) I guess I didn't consider the fact that I'd have over 2000 strength at this point when I did though, stupid me. I'll have to play around with that.

Jukebox_Hero

2010-08-28 08:48:48 am

Just a boy and his digimon

Ahh, sorry, I should have checked my facts before I assumed that it would have been better to cast the same spell 4 times in a row.

Also, I know that you might not really have much variability in when you use your summons, since, from what I've gathered, you're mostly just going to be using them to get Odin's zantetsuken on things, but I also thought I'd remind that, when a summon is cast and then leaves, it revives every party member that was fallen and brings every party member to full health (at least, my summons always did). So, this could be quicker than a phoenix down. Just thought I'd say, because I know G__anakinRPG suggested getting phoenix downs just in case things got rough, but a quick summon/dismiss might be faster/more effective, since it can do two at once along with a full heal. I know you mentioned that you were going to use summons to defend against power attacks, so maybe this happens anyway, but I just thought I'd throw it out there. Figured that, if there was any chest you went out of your way to get that had a phoenix down, then maybe rethinking and relying on summons could save you a minute here or there, even if you never actually needed to use summon/heal. However, this is under the assumption that you have enough TP and ethers to do such a thing, which is probably a bad assumption, though I assume you wouldn't be dying too frquently in attempts that you intended to keep anyway.

Quote from Arrow:

Thanks for your comments Jukebox Hero (he had stars in his eyes), I appreciate your support Smiley

And thanks for getting the reference Wink

Quote from sportlov:

But does Vanille actually use Ruin? She would, even though she had twice the amount of magic than strength use Attack when I played through earlier.

This may seem stupid, but is it possible that she would actually do more damage with attack than with ruin? I'm not sure exactly how her damage is calculated, but her attack does hit three times for every hit, while ruin obviously only hits once. This means that ruin might actually be 2/3 as powerful if she has twice as much magic as strength. I'm treating it as if there is a perfect ratio of damage to every point in magic/strength, and there isn't, but I don't know your actual numbers. It's possible "twice as much" was an underexaggeration and she actually has a lot more than that, which would invalidate my argument, but I'm just going to take what you said literally for argument's sake. It's also possible that they divide the strength of each hit, but I remember that (at least in the beginning of the game, when everyone first gets their weapons) she seemed to be doing the highest dps of any of the starting characters because she hit the most.

Ahh, sorry, I should have checked my facts before I assumed that it would have been better to cast the same spell 4 times in a row.

Also, I know that you might not really have much variability in when you use your summons, since, from what I've gathered, you're mostly just going to be using them to get Odin's zantetsuken on things, but I also thought I'd remind that, when a summon is cast and then leaves, it revives every party member that was fallen and brings every party member to full health (at least, my summons always did). So, this could be quicker than a phoenix down. Just thought I'd say, because I know G__anakinRPG suggested getting phoenix downs just in case things got rough, but a quick summon/dismiss might be faster/more effective, since it can do two at once along with a full heal. I know you mentioned that you were going to use summons to defend against power attacks, so maybe this happens anyway, but I just thought I'd throw it out there. Figured that, if there was any chest you went out of your way to get that had a phoenix down, then maybe rethinking and relying on summons could save you a minute here or there, even if you never actually needed to use summon/heal. However, this is under the assumption that you have enough TP and ethers to do such a thing, which is probably a bad assumption, though I assume you wouldn't be dying too frquently in attempts that you intended to keep anyway.

[quote="Arrow"]Thanks for your comments Jukebox Hero (he had stars in his eyes), I appreciate your support :) [/quote]
And thanks for getting the reference ;)

[quote="sportlov"]
But does Vanille actually use Ruin? She would, even though she had twice the amount of magic than strength use Attack when I played through earlier.[/quote]
This may seem stupid, but is it possible that she would actually do more damage with attack than with ruin? I'm not sure exactly how her damage is calculated, but her attack does hit three times for every hit, while ruin obviously only hits once. This means that ruin might actually be 2/3 as powerful if she has twice as much magic as strength. I'm treating it as if there is a perfect ratio of damage to every point in magic/strength, and there isn't, but I don't know your actual numbers. It's possible "twice as much" was an underexaggeration and she actually has a lot more than that, which would invalidate my argument, but I'm just going to take what you said literally for argument's sake. It's also possible that they divide the strength of each hit, but I remember that (at least in the beginning of the game, when everyone first gets their weapons) she seemed to be doing the highest dps of any of the starting characters because she hit the most.

najzere

2010-08-28 10:43:39 am

As far as I know, damage is calculated based on the action you select, not the animation. So Vanille's Attack will be her Strength × 1.2, regardless of how it looks like three whips are hitting the enemy. I also thought she did great damage when she first showed up, though not three times as good as Hope, but maybe it was due to her having one more ATB segment? Or maybe her weapon was already slightly higher level? Vanille and Hope's Strength start out the same and so does the strength of their starting weapons, so I dunno.

As far as Attack versus Ruin, Ruin's multiplier is slightly lower (1.0 instead of 1.2), it's 5% more random (meaning lower low end damage), and Ruin has higher chance of being interrupted. However, Vanille's Magic so far outpaces her Strength that it's still much better, especially the further into the game you get as the discrepancy widens.

I also wanted to ask, are the runners considering using Random: Instant Chain with Sazh's Cold Blood? You only need two Gestalt items to get the ability and it's checked 17 times during Cold Blood for an 8.5% chance of hitting (.5% × 17). I guess it would depend on your equipment set up (I think someone already is using Procyons for part of the game?) and how you were going to attempt battles. It only works on enemies under level 50, so no bosses, plus you'd have to take into consideration how far into a segment you are, since I'm sure you don't want to have to redo every segment 12 times just based on this one tactic. Just a thought, maybe it'll speed a battle or two up for you.

As far as I know, damage is calculated based on the action you select, not the animation. So Vanille's Attack will be her Strength × 1.2, regardless of how it looks like three whips are hitting the enemy. I also thought she did great damage when she first showed up, though not three times as good as Hope, but maybe it was due to her having one more ATB segment? Or maybe her weapon was already slightly higher level? Vanille and Hope's Strength start out the same and so does the strength of their starting weapons, so I dunno.

As far as Attack versus Ruin, Ruin's multiplier is slightly lower (1.0 instead of 1.2), it's 5% more random (meaning lower low end damage), and Ruin has higher chance of being interrupted. However, Vanille's Magic so far outpaces her Strength that it's still much better, especially the further into the game you get as the discrepancy widens.

I also wanted to ask, are the runners considering using Random: Instant Chain with Sazh's Cold Blood? You only need two Gestalt items to get the ability and it's checked 17 times during Cold Blood for an 8.5% chance of hitting (.5% × 17). I guess it would depend on your equipment set up (I think someone already is using Procyons for part of the game?) and how you were going to attempt battles. It only works on enemies under level 50, so no bosses, plus you'd have to take into consideration how far into a segment you are, since I'm sure you don't want to have to redo every segment 12 times just based on this one tactic. Just a thought, maybe it'll speed a battle or two up for you.

VorpalEdge

Edit history:

VorpalEdge: 2010-08-28 01:09:06 pm

2010-08-28 11:11:00 am

welcome to the machine

Quote from najzere:

I also wanted to ask, are the runners considering using Random: Instant Chain with Sazh's Cold Blood? You only need two Gestalt items to get the ability and it's checked 17 times during Cold Blood for an 8.5% chance of hitting (.5% × 17).

You're doing probability wrong. If it hit 200 times, would it be absolutely guaranteed to go off?

The odds of cold blood not triggering instant chain are .995^17 = ~.9183. Therefore, the chance that it will trigger it is 1 - .9183 = .0817, or 8.17%.

sportlov

2010-08-28 12:31:52 pm

Vanille will do less damage with attack, I tried using her as my main character to determine whether or not Ruin is stronger than Attack.

Other than that, every Phoenix Down should be sold for maximum profit, since it's not at all hard to go through the whole game without one character dying, not to mention it wastes way too much time in either case.

Since you don't want to have the Speed Sash or Pryocons equipped by the end of the game, we're looking at a ~1400 strength loss (Hyades Magnums and a Power Glove) to accomodate for Random: Instant Chain. It's also a time waste having to re-equip the weapons and armor, looking how most non-boss battles are already between 30 and 45 seconds long. I can not see Random: Instant Chain being worth shooting for except for maybe Wladislaus, but you'd want to use Fang for that since for me at least I'll only lose 120 strength at that point, I'll have to do the battle with and without Instant-stagger to see which one is faster.

The battles that were initially considered using these were the forced Behemoth King battle, but due to circumstances I chose not to in my playthrough at least, I managed the battle in 31 seconds anyway. The other one was Wladislaus, this takes about 40 to 45 seconds (Less?) without instant stagger, and should take less than 10 seconds with it I guess. (I may be overly optimistic on this one.)

Vanille will do less damage with attack, I tried using her as my main character to determine whether or not Ruin is stronger than Attack.

Other than that, every Phoenix Down should be sold for maximum profit, since it's not at all hard to go through the whole game without one character dying, not to mention it wastes way too much time in either case.

Since you don't want to have the Speed Sash or Pryocons equipped by the end of the game, we're looking at a ~1400 strength loss (Hyades Magnums and a Power Glove) to accomodate for Random: Instant Chain. It's also a time waste having to re-equip the weapons and armor, looking how most non-boss battles are already between 30 and 45 seconds long. I can not see Random: Instant Chain being worth shooting for except for maybe Wladislaus, but you'd want to use Fang for that since for me at least I'll only lose 120 strength at that point, I'll have to do the battle with and without Instant-stagger to see which one is faster.

The battles that were initially considered using these were the forced Behemoth King battle, but due to circumstances I chose not to in my playthrough at least, I managed the battle in 31 seconds anyway. The other one was Wladislaus, this takes about 40 to 45 seconds (Less?) without instant stagger, and should take less than 10 seconds with it I guess. (I may be overly optimistic on this one.)

najzere

2010-08-28 01:48:16 pm

The problem with using it with Fang is there's only one check per attack, so it will take you forever to get it. You should be getting Instant Chain roughly 1 in 12 times with Sazh as opposed to 1 in 200 times with anyone else (VorpalEdge can correct my math if that's wrong ;P). Definitely doable, but you don't want to drive yourself nuts either.

Arrow

Edit history:

Arrow: 2010-08-28 02:45:04 pm

Arrow: 2010-08-28 02:42:53 pm

2010-08-28 02:40:25 pm

Now a hit show on the CW

You're thinking of Cold Blood as an individual attack, though, and not taking into consideration how long the animation takes. In the time it takes for him to finish one cast, Fang will probably have attacked anywhere from 5-10 times. This is still less "chances" than Cold Blood will have had to proc the instant stagger, but you also have to consider that if it were to proc, say, on the first or second hit with Cold Blood, you would then have to wait for the animation to finish before using Blitz (or whatever), whereas if Fang procs it on her first or second hit, you can make your next move immediately. Either way, the odds don't really matter. This is a segmented run, so I can simply restart until luck swings in my favor. And, as sportlov pointed out, there's only two fights I'm probably going to be using it on: Wladislaus and the Behemoth King in chapter 12. The absolute earliest I can use it is Chapter 11 (when you're able to buy Speed Sashes), and the only fights it would potentially save time on are the Taejin's Tower missions, which are preemptable anyway.

Quote:

But does Vanille actually use Ruin? She would, even though she had twice the amount of magic than strength use Attack when I played through earlier.

This is probably because of the same reason AI will alternate spells - because of a small chain bonus for alternating. Either way, even if she's only using Ruin half the time, that's still twice as much damage per hit, and worth picking up, imo.

EDIT: Wait, are you saying she wouldn't use ruin at all? That's...really bizarre. I'll watch her closely to see if she uses it.

You're thinking of Cold Blood as an individual attack, though, and not taking into consideration how long the animation takes. In the time it takes for him to finish one cast, Fang will probably have attacked anywhere from 5-10 times. This is still less "chances" than Cold Blood will have had to proc the instant stagger, but you also have to consider that if it were to proc, say, on the first or second hit with Cold Blood, you would then have to wait for the animation to finish before using Blitz (or whatever), whereas if Fang procs it on her first or second hit, you can make your next move immediately. Either way, the odds don't really matter. This is a segmented run, so I can simply restart until luck swings in my favor. And, as sportlov pointed out, there's only two fights I'm probably going to be using it on: Wladislaus and the Behemoth King in chapter 12. The absolute earliest I can use it is Chapter 11 (when you're able to buy Speed Sashes), and the only fights it would potentially save time on are the Taejin's Tower missions, which are preemptable anyway.

[quote]But does Vanille actually use Ruin? She would, even though she had twice the amount of magic than strength use Attack when I played through earlier.[/quote]
This is probably because of the same reason AI will alternate spells - because of a small chain bonus for alternating. Either way, even if she's only using Ruin half the time, that's still twice as much damage per hit, and worth picking up, imo.

EDIT: Wait, are you saying she wouldn't use ruin [i]at all[/i]? That's...really bizarre. I'll watch her closely to see if she uses it.

najzere

Edit history:

najzere: 2010-08-28 05:31:26 pm

2010-08-28 04:19:40 pm

Make sure the enemy doesn't have magic resistance, because the AI won't cast Ruin if it knows that. Or if the enemy has ~~Debrave~~ Deshell.

Arrow

2010-08-28 05:14:44 pm

Now a hit show on the CW

None of the bosses after Wladislaus have different magic/physical resistances, so I think the enemy being afflicted by deprotect and not deshell is probably the most likely candidate.

sportlov

2010-09-04 10:48:39 am

Hey everyone, I just finished up my playthrough of this game and I thought I'd share my thoughts. I rushed from Wladislaus to the end of the game, and actually didn't even retry the final bosses, but just went with the first battle I had. I might want to improve on these last fifteen minutes of the game, since I'm sure I could shave off another minute or so.

The finish time is much lower than I would ever have expected when I started playing, and when I read through G__AnakinRPG's speedrun guide.

His tactics seemed pretty solid, and except for the excessive farming on Pulse it looked like I would follow it to the word when I started.

My biggest concern is that I had done no planning prior to starting this, which lead to having to improve everything from upgrading to crystarium and which items to actually get.

I realise now by the end of it that I should've prioritized alot differently in the crystariums of the characters to unlock key abilites much earlier. One of the biggest examples of this is how I unlocked Jeopardize and the Role Levels in Sazh's commando paradigm right before Proudclad, when I could've had them all the way through Gran Pulse.

And to the most interesting part of course, the most important parts I missed that I believe would take off at least thirty minutes on my time would be:

Skipping treasures that include detours and extra battles, I picked up alot of these that took up over a minute each.

Not taking Ethersols nor fighting battles that guard Ethersol treasure balls.

Replaying until enemies dropped favourable items and at favourable times, this would include everything from Paraffin Oils and Perfect Conductors to Phoenix Downs and Incentive Chips.

Getting shrouds as you progress in the first few chapters. I spent almost ten minutes only to get Fortisols in Chapter 2.

Planning the usage of Crystarium to match the upcoming battles instead of only focusing on getting what you need for the last few battles of the game. Like getting Commando nodes for Sazh instead of focusing on Cold Blood, when you can't get that before you revisit Cocoon anyway.

Also plan how much CP you need to have at certain key points, I had to fight several extra battles I didn't want to in order to get Launch for Lightning before the first Behemoth in Gapra Whitewood when I could've had just fought the slimes earlier that take five seconds to kill for better CP.

Make Paradigm decks that allow you to do more than one part at a time without having to switch between them.

Plan your battles well, and use more potions and Renew techniques instead of Medic Paradigms.

Better menu handling, I stuttered alot in the menu and the Crystarium, and oftenly equipped the wrong items to characters. Also plan which character needs which item at what point, so you don't need to re-equip and de-equip characters at all times.

I also used Hopes crystarium points before Alexander, which actually took longer to do than fighting Alexander without using them. Though I managed to only max out Snows Commando paradigm in Palumpolum and then never touch his Crystarium again.

Don't save everywhere. I used alot of saves, alot more than I should have. And towards the end I probably didn't play ten minutes without saving in between. Every save costs me alot of time.

I settled alot for "good" times on battles, when I had done better in the past while testplaying the part. I could've had saved 30 seconds of battle duration at least on the three last bosses only if I redid that part a couple of times more.

Make sure the first cast of death connects on every enemy it would be used for, this should save several minutes over my time.

While reading through how many mistakes I made isn't very interesting, the point I'm trying to make is that proper planning would save alot of time over not planning what to do at all.
Either way I'm very proud of my time, since G__AnakinRPG's 9:58 is the best time I knew of when I started, and actually at this point as well.

My final save after Orphan at this point clocks in at 006:46:54, which would be about three hours and twelve minutes faster than G__AnakinRPG was when he wrote his speedguide. I wouldn't have believed I could do this when I started, and I want to thank everyone who helped me and answered my questions. I would've loved to have it recorded of course, so I wouldn't forget so fast what I had done at different points. I might write down what I remember doing at different points before I forget it, since I'm most likely going to want to improve on this somewhere down the lane. If I do I'll aim for less than six hours.

I think I'll be taking a break from playing Final Fantasy XIII now!

Hey everyone, I just finished up my playthrough of this game and I thought I'd share my thoughts. I rushed from Wladislaus to the end of the game, and actually didn't even retry the final bosses, but just went with the first battle I had. I might want to improve on these last fifteen minutes of the game, since I'm sure I could shave off another minute or so.

The finish time is much lower than I would ever have expected when I started playing, and when I read through G__AnakinRPG's speedrun guide.

His tactics seemed pretty solid, and except for the excessive farming on Pulse it looked like I would follow it to the word when I started.

My biggest concern is that I had done no planning prior to starting this, which lead to having to improve everything from upgrading to crystarium and which items to actually get.

I realise now by the end of it that I should've prioritized alot differently in the crystariums of the characters to unlock key abilites much earlier. One of the biggest examples of this is how I unlocked Jeopardize and the Role Levels in Sazh's commando paradigm right before Proudclad, when I could've had them all the way through Gran Pulse.

And to the most interesting part of course, the most important parts I missed that I believe would take off at least thirty minutes on my time would be:

Skipping treasures that include detours and extra battles, I picked up alot of these that took up over a minute each.

Not taking Ethersols nor fighting battles that guard Ethersol treasure balls.

Replaying until enemies dropped favourable items and at favourable times, this would include everything from Paraffin Oils and Perfect Conductors to Phoenix Downs and Incentive Chips.

Getting shrouds as you progress in the first few chapters. I spent almost ten minutes only to get Fortisols in Chapter 2.

Planning the usage of Crystarium to match the upcoming battles instead of only focusing on getting what you need for the last few battles of the game. Like getting Commando nodes for Sazh instead of focusing on Cold Blood, when you can't get that before you revisit Cocoon anyway.

Also plan how much CP you need to have at certain key points, I had to fight several extra battles I didn't want to in order to get Launch for Lightning before the first Behemoth in Gapra Whitewood when I could've had just fought the slimes earlier that take five seconds to kill for better CP.

Make Paradigm decks that allow you to do more than one part at a time without having to switch between them.

Plan your battles well, and use more potions and Renew techniques instead of Medic Paradigms.

Better menu handling, I stuttered alot in the menu and the Crystarium, and oftenly equipped the wrong items to characters. Also plan which character needs which item at what point, so you don't need to re-equip and de-equip characters at all times.

I also used Hopes crystarium points before Alexander, which actually took longer to do than fighting Alexander without using them. Though I managed to only max out Snows Commando paradigm in Palumpolum and then never touch his Crystarium again.

Don't save everywhere. I used alot of saves, alot more than I should have. And towards the end I probably didn't play ten minutes without saving in between. Every save costs me alot of time.

I settled alot for "good" times on battles, when I had done better in the past while testplaying the part. I could've had saved 30 seconds of battle duration at least on the three last bosses only if I redid that part a couple of times more.

Make sure the first cast of death connects on every enemy it would be used for, this should save several minutes over my time.

While reading through how many mistakes I made isn't very interesting, the point I'm trying to make is that proper planning would save alot of time over not planning what to do at all.
Either way I'm very proud of my time, since G__AnakinRPG's 9:58 is the best time I knew of when I started, and actually at this point as well.

My final save after Orphan at this point clocks in at 006:46:54, which would be about three hours and twelve minutes faster than G__AnakinRPG was when he wrote his speedguide. I wouldn't have believed I could do this when I started, and I want to thank everyone who helped me and answered my questions. I would've loved to have it recorded of course, so I wouldn't forget so fast what I had done at different points. I might write down what I remember doing at different points before I forget it, since I'm most likely going to want to improve on this somewhere down the lane. If I do I'll aim for less than six hours.

I think I'll be taking a break from playing Final Fantasy XIII now!