Secret of Evermore (SNES)

2013-12-12 07:44:11 pm

Speed > Safety

Always nice to have more people running this game. Wish you the best of luck with your practice and eventual attempts. Feel free to ask questions here, in a PM, or finding just about any of us on twitch. Smiley

TheAngryPanda

2013-12-13 11:07:43 am

Speed > Safety

http://pastebin.com/i88Affqj

This will be updated somewhat regularly in the next few days. If anyone wants to do visual tutorials for each (make sure they're well done please and VERY clear about things) that would be awesome as it would save me a ton of time in the future. My only way of creating a tutorial is just TAS'ing one together then recording and uploading the movie, not quite the same effect as an actual person doing it. I could do more pictures, but they'd get quite boring after a while.

Also, this FAQ is not meant to be short and cute by any means, it is summarized in-depth details of my own TAS notes. Expect to do some reading...

DLDarklink

2013-12-13 02:45:58 pm

...

i've noticed this sentence in the FAQ at the Defend part:

- Great for learning the game -

That is really good to know thumbsup

Because I wasn't sure on how to get back at the game... I planned doing a few runs to memorize the route and get a PB and continue with the No Defend route, but I -was- afraid of getting lazy with the defend route Tongue

I also think it's good to know for new players, they might look at Meta's stream and get confused over the fact why he's not getting Defend etc.

About the visual tutorials: do you mean Youtube vids, Twitch highlights, both or something else? Tongue

TheAngryPanda

2013-12-13 03:05:15 pm

Speed > Safety

Youtube or Twitch preferably. But if there's something else that's better for someone, that'd be fine.

Scettles

2013-12-13 07:52:27 pm

I plan on doing a casual play through of this game tonight just to learn it again. Not gonna try any of these cools strats yet as i haven't really seen them... cept for spell casting. and some of the clipping through rocks like in Act1. might try the maze skip too. we shall see! wish me luck. excited to be playing this game Smiley

Scettles

2013-12-13 07:54:01 pm

does anyone have a youtube link on exactly how to do the stuff where max attack/defense out, i do wanna learn that tonight or at least the general idea.

TheAngryPanda

2013-12-13 08:01:55 pm

Speed > Safety

Watch Crawek's WR run for how to do the Underflow/Invincibility Glitch (you do both at the same time, by the way).

http://www.twitch.tv/crawek/c/3113989

There are no video tutorials on how to do things specifically because most people just asked Meta/Lamb/whoever to just show them on stream and it was never highlighted. Most of those people stopped running the game once they figured out it's a lot harder/brutal than it looks, even at easier paces. Regardless, you can find just about everything required for the run in any WR video. Good luck with your practice. Smiley

MetaSigma

2013-12-14 05:24:03 am

Evermore Extrodinare ᕦ(° Д°)ᕤ

There is a very big reason this game gets hyped and then people quit on it Tongue

That's how absurdly hard it starts getting the more you play it and the more you tried to do everything.

TheAngryPanda

Edit history:

TheAngryPanda: 2013-12-14 01:00:49 pm

TheAngryPanda: 2013-12-14 08:41:22 am

2013-12-14 08:35:43 am

Speed > Safety

IF anyone's curious as to how the dog picking things up turned out: http://tasvideos.org/forum/viewtopic.php?p=361072#361072

I'm not happy. So next up on the testing block is the Thraxx cutscene skip, hopefully we end up with better results... I'm not sure WHEN I'm gonna mess with it, but it will either be very soon or after AGDQ.

I'm pretty sure I'm not missing anything either. Using the boy isn't possible because he's zombie'd, the dog would have to walk for X frames (X being the amount required to make it past the maggot) but X is always greater that the saved frames from Quicksand Area (read: pointless and annoying), and changing up Bugmuck offputs patters of enemies as well as certain energy timings that ultimately end up being 1 frame slower than the previous routes path through there. I guess the bright side of this is that if for whatever crazy reason the Thraxx cutscene skip doesn't save time, I'm back in Act 2 getting Atlas Glitch.

Speaking of Act 2, how about everyone put your heads together and help me figure out something:

In the TAS, I can obtain 75 vinegar from a 75 jewel drop, however... for the additional cost of some investment time (unknown at the moment) I can get Tiny to throw his rock to Eastern Beach and open up the Call Bead container there (at least I think it's CB's, could be wrong, and if so... that's pretty hilarious). If this happens, I could get 75 CBs + whatever I obtain from other chests throughout the rest of the run. So this brings up an interesting theory obviously, CAN we do the entire game with just CB's post-Act 1? I think we can. And I'm posting this here because the more people looking at it, the better, this COULD eventually affect real-time runs as well.

(Beat Act 1, 14 minutes grind, whatever...)
Somehow acquire money for Tapestries for Tiny and have Tiny chunk rock. I could technically do this as soon as I'm in Act 2 on Eastern Beach by manipulating the 2 Mad Monks to each drop 75 jewels, but there's probably a more elegant solution. So this is our set up, now to compare routes:

75 Sting method:
need 7 8x casts + 2 more multicasts (probably 8x) for Aqua and Verm. (yes, you need level 3, specifically because of Aquagoths high MDEF, but this is arguable)
on top of this, we have a double down time of picking up water near the river. (this likely would cancel out with manipulating the 75 jewel drop close enough to the CB container on Eastern Beach)

75 CB method:
need 4 8x casts on Aqua and 3 8x casts on verm. (potentially, this is technically a worst case scenario, obviously things will be adjusted for optimal frame saves in a TAS)

-----Damage Range-----
Aqua:
4 8x = 1568 - 3136 (overkill of 636, which is quite a fair amount above the average damage of 588 for each 8x, so in a real-time run, we'd do 4 8x and hope for the best)
A note about this is that you pick up additional beads throughout the route to buffer any issues you may have (including healing), assuming this ever becomes possible in real-time.

Verm:
3 8x = 1800 - 3576 (overkill of 151, much closer and very difficult to manage, real-time would HAVE to be a 4x)
So at this point, we're at 7 8x casts (56 CBs), 8 (64 CBs) if you're using the assumption of real-time for comparison. This means for all our trouble we've saved 2 (or 1) 8x worth of frames. So what do you guys think? Is there something I'm missing? Why might this not work? etc... Could really use the extra input considering how massive of a change this would be.

Also, we get at least 4 extra beads to play with if needed. I could also manipulate one of those to be a 40 drop as well. I can ALSO manipulate sewer green blobs to drop CB's but that is a lot of time wasted on the fade-away of the item drop after picking it up. But we have a spare 19 already.

we have MORE screen transitions in Nobilia AND have to manipulate the 75 jewel drop near the CB container on Eastern Beach. I think the transitions are going to be where any major issues are at.

edit: This is shot down because you need Levitated to get Tiny to throw the rock to Eastern Beach. GA confirmed this in a post later in the thread.

In other news, I may revisit 100% to see what some of the more recent discoveries can do for it. So if you're planning to learn that, be prepared for minor changes. I doubt anything major will be altered.

IF anyone's curious as to how the dog picking things up turned out: http://tasvideos.org/forum/viewtopic.php?p=361072#361072

I'm not happy. So next up on the testing block is the Thraxx cutscene skip, hopefully we end up with better results... I'm not sure WHEN I'm gonna mess with it, but it will either be very soon or after AGDQ.

I'm pretty sure I'm not missing anything either. Using the boy isn't possible because he's zombie'd, the dog would have to walk for X frames (X being the amount required to make it past the maggot) but X is always greater that the saved frames from Quicksand Area (read: pointless and annoying), and changing up Bugmuck offputs patters of enemies as well as certain energy timings that ultimately end up being 1 frame slower than the previous routes path through there. I guess the bright side of this is that if for whatever crazy reason the Thraxx cutscene skip doesn't save time, I'm back in Act 2 getting Atlas Glitch.

Speaking of Act 2, how about everyone put your heads together and help me figure out something:

[s]In the TAS, I can obtain 75 vinegar from a 75 jewel drop, however... for the additional cost of some investment time (unknown at the moment) I can get Tiny to throw his rock to Eastern Beach and open up the Call Bead container there (at least I think it's CB's, could be wrong, and if so... that's pretty hilarious). If this happens, I could get 75 CBs + whatever I obtain from other chests throughout the rest of the run. So this brings up an interesting theory obviously, CAN we do the entire game with just CB's post-Act 1? I think we can. And I'm posting this here because the more people looking at it, the better, this COULD eventually affect real-time runs as well.

(Beat Act 1, 14 minutes grind, whatever...)
Somehow acquire money for Tapestries for Tiny and have Tiny chunk rock. I could technically do this as soon as I'm in Act 2 on Eastern Beach by manipulating the 2 Mad Monks to each drop 75 jewels, but there's probably a more elegant solution. So this is our set up, now to compare routes:

75 Sting method:
need 7 8x casts + 2 more multicasts (probably 8x) for Aqua and Verm. (yes, you need level 3, specifically because of Aquagoths high MDEF, but this is arguable)
on top of this, we have a double down time of picking up water near the river. (this likely would cancel out with manipulating the 75 jewel drop close enough to the CB container on Eastern Beach)

75 CB method:
need 4 8x casts on Aqua and 3 8x casts on verm. (potentially, this is technically a worst case scenario, obviously things will be adjusted for optimal frame saves in a TAS)

-----Damage Range----- 
Aqua:
4 8x = 1568 - 3136 (overkill of 636, which is quite a fair amount above the average damage of 588 for each 8x, so in a real-time run, we'd do 4 8x and hope for the best)
A note about this is that you pick up additional beads throughout the route to buffer any issues you may have (including healing), assuming this ever becomes possible in real-time.

Verm:
3 8x = 1800 - 3576 (overkill of 151, much closer and very difficult to manage, real-time would HAVE to be a 4x)
So at this point, we're at 7 8x casts (56 CBs), 8 (64 CBs) if you're using the assumption of real-time for comparison. This means for all our trouble we've saved 2 (or 1) 8x worth of frames. So what do you guys think? Is there something I'm missing? Why might this not work? etc... Could really use the extra input considering how massive of a change this would be.

Also, we get at least 4 extra beads to play with if needed. I could also manipulate one of those to be a 40 drop as well. I can ALSO manipulate sewer green blobs to drop CB's but that is a lot of time wasted on the fade-away of the item drop after picking it up. But we have a spare 19 already.

we have MORE screen transitions in Nobilia AND have to manipulate the 75 jewel drop near the CB container on Eastern Beach. I think the transitions are going to be where any major issues are at.
[/s]
edit: This is shot down because you need Levitated to get Tiny to throw the rock to Eastern Beach. GA confirmed this in a post later in the thread.

In other news, I may revisit 100% to see what some of the more recent discoveries can do for it. So if you're planning to learn that, be prepared for minor changes. I doubt anything major will be altered.

GreenAmbler

2013-12-14 12:06:27 pm

I am pretty sure you can't manipulate the gourd/pot/chest pickups like you do with ingredient pickups, although I haven't tried since it was first discovered so I might be wrong. Also not sure if the enemies would walk close enough to those pots, I know they won't walk on the bridge over the ditch so I'm not sure if this would be the same. But most importantly, don't you need Levitate for Tiny to throw the rock? Unless you're talking about 100%

TheAngryPanda

Edit history:

TheAngryPanda: 2013-12-14 12:55:43 pm

TheAngryPanda: 2013-12-14 12:47:11 pm

TheAngryPanda: 2013-12-14 12:42:20 pm

TheAngryPanda: 2013-12-14 12:36:18 pm

2013-12-14 12:21:48 pm

Speed > Safety

I thought you could have either, if that's the case, I can still pull this off later in the game regardless if needed. Unfortunately, i haven't gotten around to testing all of the above, thus why I'm asking people. I don't recall if anyone tested picking up 75 jewels then something from a chest or anything like that. It's possible I've skimmed over it though. Or, if anyone knows 100% for sure if you can or not, that'd be awesome. The more stuff we disprove to be possible, the closer we get to having a perfect route.

As for how to get to the container, I was going to use the dog to trigger the 75 jewel pickup while the boy was near the container, which ultimately removes any issues with timing. But if it doesn't work, then I guess we can always stick to Sting instead for the TAS. Either way I'm gonna be happy.

If this doesn't work, I'm curious as to where we might be able to abuse the dog triggering things at within the other Acts since we mostly run with the boy in Acts 2 and 3. I'm drawing a blank where it might be useful for us since it still stops the boy, which means that we'd have to already be running as the dog to make it worth it. Ruins might have a couple places, I think mids is more or less locked down aside from maybe the entrance to Rimsala. Oglin Tunnel doesn't really have much unless I can activate a teleporter and switch to boy to have him teleport in place instead of walking to one (doing the same for the dog if on the boy instead). Act 3 I might be able to "split" the characters to gain a bit of time that way. Act 4 is basically already figured out entirely.

Act 1 post-thraxx doesn't seem to have much either honestly. Which ultimately means that out of everything found recently, the thraxx cutscene skip is basically all that hasn't been tested in Act 1 (for the TAS). Sad

edit: Actually, the dog could probably trigger the village cutscene. However, it may end up being much slower compared to letting the boy do it instead because of the travel distance the boy would have to overcome to get to his position for the cutscene. However, this might have a problem tied into it, the dog has it's own conversation event with that guard I think... Gonna have to test this as well now.

I think I might cut out the call bead at volcano entrance for Magmar... hopefully this won't cause problems later. That definitely stretches the limits though on damage allowances for Magmar's fight. I'm starting to think we could actually do this in real-time as well depending on how the damage range comes out since real-time has more HB to play with than the TAS (meaning you hit level 3 earlier and get 2 more level 3 Hardball than the TAS does).

Essentially, each storm is 40-81 damage on Magmar. I think we could do without it technically, but the safety for minimal time loss puts this down as one of those "once you can't save time anywhere else" things. The TAS is definitely losing the extra bead on Magmar, but that raises the question of if I should save it and use it as I'm coming into the Eastern Beach area to obtain the 75 vinegar then and there instead of waiting until later. Arguably, this means I could start casting Sting's at each transition as soon as I grind out water drops from enemies in the desert. Tempting, but I'm not sure it's worth the time wasted getting the extra bead.

I thought you could have either, if that's the case, I can still pull this off later in the game regardless if needed. Unfortunately, i haven't gotten around to testing all of the above, thus why I'm asking people. I don't recall if anyone tested picking up 75 jewels then something from a chest or anything like that. It's possible I've skimmed over it though. Or, if anyone knows 100% for sure if you can or not, that'd be awesome. The more stuff we disprove to be possible, the closer we get to having a perfect route.

As for how to get to the container, I was going to use the dog to trigger the 75 jewel pickup while the boy was near the container, which ultimately removes any issues with timing. But if it doesn't work, then I guess we can always stick to Sting instead for the TAS. Either way I'm gonna be happy.

If this doesn't work, I'm curious as to where we might be able to abuse the dog triggering things at within the other Acts since we mostly run with the boy in Acts 2 and 3. I'm drawing a blank where it might be useful for us since it still stops the boy, which means that we'd have to already be running as the dog to make it worth it. Ruins might have a couple places, I think mids is more or less locked down aside from maybe the entrance to Rimsala. Oglin Tunnel doesn't really have much unless I can activate a teleporter and switch to boy to have him teleport in place instead of walking to one (doing the same for the dog if on the boy instead). Act 3 I might be able to "split" the characters to gain a bit of time that way. Act 4 is basically already figured out entirely.

Act 1 post-thraxx doesn't seem to have much either honestly. Which ultimately means that out of everything found recently, the thraxx cutscene skip is basically all that hasn't been tested in Act 1 (for the TAS). :(

edit: Actually, the dog could probably trigger the village cutscene. However, it may end up being much slower compared to letting the boy do it instead because of the travel distance the boy would have to overcome to get to his position for the cutscene. However, this might have a problem tied into it, the dog has it's own conversation event with that guard I think... Gonna have to test this as well now.

I think I might cut out the call bead at volcano entrance for Magmar... hopefully this won't cause problems later. That definitely stretches the limits though on damage allowances for Magmar's fight. I'm starting to think we could actually do this in real-time as well depending on how the damage range comes out since real-time has more HB to play with than the TAS (meaning you hit level 3 earlier and get 2 more level 3 Hardball than the TAS does).

Essentially, each storm is 40-81 damage on Magmar. I think we could do without it technically, but the safety for minimal time loss puts this down as one of those "once you can't save time anywhere else" things. The TAS is definitely losing the extra bead on Magmar, but that raises the question of if I should save it and use it as I'm coming into the Eastern Beach area to obtain the 75 vinegar then and there instead of waiting until later. Arguably, this means I could start casting Sting's at each transition as soon as I grind out water drops from enemies in the desert. Tempting, but I'm not sure it's worth the time wasted getting the extra bead.

GreenAmbler

Edit history:

GreenAmbler: 2013-12-14 01:01:49 pm

2013-12-14 12:52:10 pm

Confirming that you need Levitate to get Tiny there.

If the Dog Pickups are not useful in act 1 it probably isn't gonna be used. Most of the switches just force the other character to do their super slow walk all the way to the trigger point, like with teleporters, or Blimp Skip. I think if the both characters have a programmed response for the trigger, it doesn't matter who triggers it. The Dog can trigger the Spear throwing for Megataur door but I don't think that's helpful. For Fire Eyes cutscene, the Dog can already trigger it by running into the doorway so I'm not sure what the benefit would be. Also if you switch to the Boy as you talk to an NPC with the Dog, you trigger the Boy conversation response. But I can't think of any real uses, maybe in 100%.

Actually I can't really remember what I tested for the Pickup manipulation, I think I actually tried 2 enemy drops. Really not sure if pots could be used, either Drop>Pot or Pot>Drop. Or maybe even Pot>Pot with a character switch/dog pickup. Not that I know any uses for any scenario

Confirming that you need Levitate to get Tiny there.

If the Dog Pickups are not useful in act 1 it probably isn't gonna be used. Most of the switches just force the other character to do their super slow walk all the way to the trigger point, like with teleporters, or Blimp Skip. I think if the both characters have a programmed response for the trigger, it doesn't matter who triggers it. The Dog can trigger the Spear throwing for Megataur door but I don't think that's helpful. For Fire Eyes cutscene, the Dog can already trigger it by running into the doorway so I'm not sure what the benefit would be. Also if you switch to the Boy as you talk to an NPC with the Dog, you trigger the Boy conversation response. But I can't think of any real uses, maybe in 100%.

Actually I can't really remember what I tested for the Pickup manipulation, I think I actually tried 2 enemy drops. Really not sure if pots could be used, either Drop>Pot or Pot>Drop. Or maybe even Pot>Pot with a character switch/dog pickup. Not that I know any uses for any scenario

TheAngryPanda

Edit history:

TheAngryPanda: 2013-12-14 01:08:40 pm

2013-12-14 12:59:37 pm

Speed > Safety

Alright, so 75 CBs is shot down by the levitate thing, good to know. I'd still like to find out if we can get enemy drops to affect containers. I'm trying to hunt down a spot on an old TAS to test this, but haven't really come up with anything yet.

What about in Act 3?

I was thinking we could have the dog go "trade" the Amulet of Annihilation while the boy heads towards the exit to the left. This should work, correct? It's a decent bit quicker to say the least.

GreenAmbler

Edit history:

GreenAmbler: 2013-12-15 07:01:17 am

2013-12-14 01:17:14 pm

Yeah I've thought about that, should save some frames I suppose.

assassin17

2013-12-15 02:44:00 pm

I love YaBB 1G - SP1!

Generally speaking, pots can be manipulated, unless they have a pre-incrementor, which means a fixed quantity of the item therein. No idea whether it works with this Dog pick-up variation.

GreenAmbler

2013-12-22 09:01:45 am

Looked into the drop manipulation a bit. Dog Pickups don't seem to matter, a pickup is a pickup. Couldn't get the pre-incrementor pots to affect drops (or visa versa), and as such, pot>pot doesn't do anything. Drop>Pot does work for pots with Quantity 1, getting an amount that exceeds the max number will result in "Cannot carry anymore ____" (no pickup). However, you CAN pickup 90 Call Beads in the Pyramid from the pot next to Stone Cobras this way, so that strategy should still be viable

Drop>drop only worked with Money for me (drops for the room I tested were: Nectar, Biscuit, and 50j. Maybe ingredients could still be manipulated). Getting 2 50 jewel drops resulted in actually getting 50+1, I'm not sure what causes the 1j, I'm guessing it would actually have been 100 but the quantity probably rolls back to 1 at triple digits. So if I'm right you could probably get 2.5 worth of cash drop from 2 drops if the drop amount<50. Probably useless since TAS only needs cash drops during plants and route is so precise already.

Also most likely useless for the same reason, I got attacked by the mosquito and immediately hit by plant #3, the mosquito recoil had me facing left so the plant attack pushed me backwards towards the plant. Just mentioning for the off chance you can find any uses for recoil manipulation. And another mosquito thing, sometimes the mosquito near the North exit of first screen goes close enough to cause the Boy's AI to run downwards when setting up the dog, not sure if this could be used without net time loss

Looked into the drop manipulation a bit. Dog Pickups don't seem to matter, a pickup is a pickup. Couldn't get the pre-incrementor pots to affect drops (or visa versa), and as such, pot>pot doesn't do anything. Drop>Pot does work for pots with Quantity 1, getting an amount that exceeds the max number will result in "Cannot carry anymore ____" (no pickup). However, you CAN pickup 90 Call Beads in the Pyramid from the pot next to Stone Cobras this way, so that strategy should still be viable

Drop>drop only worked with Money for me (drops for the room I tested were: Nectar, Biscuit, and 50j. Maybe ingredients could still be manipulated). Getting 2 50 jewel drops resulted in actually getting 50+1, I'm not sure what causes the 1j, I'm guessing it would actually have been 100 but the quantity probably rolls back to 1 at triple digits. So if I'm right you could probably get 2.5 worth of cash drop from 2 drops if the drop amount<50. Probably useless since TAS only needs cash drops during plants and route is so precise already.

Also most likely useless for the same reason, I got attacked by the mosquito and immediately hit by plant #3, the mosquito recoil had me facing left so the plant attack pushed me backwards towards the plant. Just mentioning for the off chance you can find any uses for recoil manipulation. And another mosquito thing, sometimes the mosquito near the North exit of first screen goes close enough to cause the Boy's AI to run downwards when setting up the dog, not sure if this could be used without net time loss

TheAngryPanda

2013-12-22 12:19:21 pm

Speed > Safety

Wait wait... drop > drop worked? I couldn't get that to work in the desert with the 45j drops previously, which would be amazingly beneficial for water farming in order to abuse Sting. But at the same time, pointless if you're saying I can grab 90 beads off that enemy by the wings/bead containers in mids lower. Either way, very much appreciate the testing as always. I'll have to look into what's ultimately going to be faster overall, but I think it's safe to say beads will be the way to go here if it's 2 less 8x casts...

In other news, has anyone ACTUALLY tried and COMPLETED a 100% run with the newest route? I'm unaware of any times if this has been done and I'd really enjoy watching the attempt in order to fine tune things even further as well as back up and make it safer for marathon routing. And I don't mean some hybridized version of new and old routes, I mean the new one I made from the one Lemon and I reworked a long time ago, the only thing that can really be mixed together from the old routes is the market planning... everything else is tied to something else, unfortunately.

Wait wait... drop > drop worked? I couldn't get that to work in the desert with the 45j drops previously, which would be amazingly beneficial for water farming in order to abuse Sting. But at the same time, pointless if you're saying I can grab 90 beads off that enemy by the wings/bead containers in mids lower. Either way, very much appreciate the testing as always. I'll have to look into what's ultimately going to be faster overall, but I think it's safe to say beads will be the way to go here if it's 2 less 8x casts...

In other news, has anyone ACTUALLY tried and COMPLETED a 100% run with the newest route? I'm unaware of any times if this has been done and I'd really enjoy watching the attempt in order to fine tune things even further as well as back up and make it safer for marathon routing. And I don't mean some hybridized version of new and old routes, I mean the new one I made from the one Lemon and I reworked a long time ago, the only thing that can really be mixed together from the old routes is the market planning... everything else is tied to something else, unfortunately.

GreenAmbler

2013-12-22 12:29:27 pm

Sorry I guess that was confusing, the only way drop>drop worked was with the two cash drops. Haven't tested a room with ingredient drops so I don't know if they work.

TheAngryPanda

2013-12-22 12:33:00 pm

Speed > Safety

Oh, I see what you mean now, okay. Makes sense.

MetaSigma

2013-12-22 02:20:02 pm

Evermore Extrodinare ᕦ(° Д°)ᕤ

Lambchop and myself will be learning the newest 100% route. I'm currently doing any% recorded attempts and I'm getting my execution back which is great. It's a slow process but I def see a new WR coming. Just gotta put in the attempts Smiley

CrAwEk

2013-12-25 05:08:50 am

Merry Christmas Smiley

DLDarklink

2013-12-29 04:56:21 pm

...

i've done some practicing today, Act 2 to be precise Smiley

at the end i was only 2-3 seconds slower than Crawek ^^ (that happened 3 times in a row) but it is still somewhat based on luck (Blimp Skip, me not falling in pits) Hopefully I can continue the practice on Act 3 soon and get a nice PB run afterwards Cheesy

GreenAmbler

2014-01-04 07:18:36 am

Well I understand how Thraxx damage works a bit better, not sure if Panda already figured this out. Was messing around on a "new game +" savestate and noticed I was doing more than 999 on Thraxx heart with melee damage. I knew that damage increased as you attacked the heart more, but I never realized that they were two separate damages stacking together. So, there's the normal damage you do which is in a predictable RNG range PLUS added damage which can range between 1 and X, with X being a number that seems to increase with each successive hit. So that's why Thraxx damage is so random; it's basically TWICE the RNG of any other enemy.

Also, this is surely irrelevant to speedruns, but another weird thing I noticed with my savestate with the "NG+" setup is that casting Speed immediately results in "Speed has worn off" message without ever actually activating the Speed status. I know I tried to use Speed in my Underflow setup but it didn't work how I wanted to so I gave up. Now, even after dying and restarting and keeping all my underflows, I STILL can't cast Speed and obtain the status. I'm guessing it had something to do with having too many statuses at once, I think I casted Speed last and may have also gotten a Plague, but that was awhile ago and I forget.

Speed underflow was a bit before my time, but what was the best way to perform? I want a better NG+ savestate for my own entertainment purposes

Well I understand how Thraxx damage works a bit better, not sure if Panda already figured this out. Was messing around on a "new game +" savestate and noticed I was doing more than 999 on Thraxx heart with melee damage. I knew that damage increased as you attacked the heart more, but I never realized that they were two separate damages stacking together. So, there's the normal damage you do which is in a predictable RNG range PLUS added damage which can range between 1 and X, with X being a number that seems to increase with each successive hit. So that's why Thraxx damage is so random; it's basically TWICE the RNG of any other enemy.

Also, this is surely irrelevant to speedruns, but another weird thing I noticed with my savestate with the "NG+" setup is that casting Speed immediately results in "Speed has worn off" message without ever actually activating the Speed status. I know I tried to use Speed in my Underflow setup but it didn't work how I wanted to so I gave up. Now, even after dying and restarting and keeping all my underflows, I STILL can't cast Speed and obtain the status. I'm guessing it had something to do with having too many statuses at once, I think I casted Speed last and may have also gotten a Plague, but that was awhile ago and I forget.

Speed underflow was a bit before my time, but what was the best way to perform? I want a better NG+ savestate for my own entertainment purposes

TheAngryPanda

2014-01-04 07:52:33 am

Speed > Safety

Speed underflow is pointless because you can no longer hit anything. It was also cut because it was incredibly slow and the Jade Disk is a much better/faster alternative for time cost >> benefit. It works the same way as the others do though.

As for Thraxx, yeah, the two variable damage factors are why I consider that fight to be the hardest boss in the game when running it at the bare minimums for maximum speed (10 HB is basically hitting both high damage ranges on all but 1 of your HB's AND happening to be on a "good" frame for RNG to have the max damage amp used). The interesting thing about Thraxx, however, is that the cage impacts damage on the heart... What this means is that by hitting the cage you add damage to the heart's pool of incoming attacks, by timing this to coincide with HB's and other forms of attack, you can stack up to 16 things hitting the heart at once. Unfortunately, this is slower than the current TAS method (9x HB). The current method has the dog pop the cage open while the boy controls the AI of the dog via positioning manipulation on certain frames (read: RNG, for RNG, to get better RNG, so your RNG damage amp is better RNG... or simply put, a pain in the ass) which places the dog near the heart's cage hitbox while inside the heart area in order to deal upwards of 550+ damage on the next attack pattern (8x + dog attack). On this following attack pattern, the dog is manipulating the boy via positioning and attacking from various frame points (there are variances instead of individual frames because of lag here introduced by the game simply having a TON of things going on, this happens in real-time too when people's "select" input isn't read during the zombie boy method, albeit quite rare). All in all, Thraxx is a monster RNG fight and a total nightmare for the TAS, which is why it's on hold until post-AGDQ 2014.

If you want a super detailed post just for your own entertainment GA, I can send you a PM of some notes when I'm back home later. Let me know.

Speed underflow is pointless because you can no longer hit anything. It was also cut because it was incredibly slow and the Jade Disk is a much better/faster alternative for time cost >> benefit. It works the same way as the others do though.

As for Thraxx, yeah, the two variable damage factors are why I consider that fight to be the hardest boss in the game when running it at the bare minimums for maximum speed (10 HB is basically hitting both high damage ranges on all but 1 of your HB's AND happening to be on a "good" frame for RNG to have the max damage amp used). The interesting thing about Thraxx, however, is that the cage impacts damage on the heart... What this means is that by hitting the cage you add damage to the heart's pool of incoming attacks, by timing this to coincide with HB's and other forms of attack, you can stack up to 16 things hitting the heart at once. Unfortunately, this is slower than the current TAS method (9x HB). The current method has the dog pop the cage open while the boy controls the AI of the dog via positioning manipulation on certain frames (read: RNG, for RNG, to get better RNG, so your RNG damage amp is better RNG... or simply put, a pain in the ass) which places the dog near the heart's cage hitbox while inside the heart area in order to deal upwards of 550+ damage on the next attack pattern (8x + dog attack). On this following attack pattern, the dog is manipulating the boy via positioning and attacking from various frame points (there are variances instead of individual frames because of lag here introduced by the game simply having a TON of things going on, this happens in real-time too when people's "select" input isn't read during the zombie boy method, albeit quite rare). All in all, Thraxx is a monster RNG fight and a total nightmare for the TAS, which is why it's on hold until post-AGDQ 2014.

If you want a super detailed post just for your own entertainment GA, I can send you a PM of some notes when I'm back home later. Let me know.

GreenAmbler

2014-01-04 09:00:17 am

Alright yeah, I understood most of that already but just didn't know exactly how the damage was calculated. I assumed the two factors were somehow multiplied together instead of being completely separate until added together. I can't imagine have to work all that out on the TAS, you are clearly a miracle worker haha

Yeah I remember the Speed underflow always made it so I couldn't hit, but I thought I remembered hearing there was a way to level it or use it multiple times to get more useful stats?. Do you know at what hit% amount makes it so you can't hit? Is it just past 100? If nothing else, I could just underflow thousands of time until it's finally in a more ideal range Smiley