Secret of Mana

StingerPA

Edit history:

StingerPA: 2014-02-05 10:05:38 pm

StingerPA: 2014-02-05 03:54:25 pm

2014-02-05 03:16:13 pm

According to the damage and hit rate formulas, you'd have about a 71% chance to hit Dragon Worm. Your damage will max at 909 against him, so that leaves 111 HP to spare to get a 4 hit kill. Since you'd probably get a low damage roll, it would probably end up being 5 hits.

The Sprite would preferably be leveled up to lvl 2 by great viper, fyi.

Here are some tables with hit percentages against each boss (separate tables for 1p2c and 1 Controller). I've included the ones that we use magic spam against just for reference if we start discussing if we want to use overcharges instead. I took the agility levels from my 1p2c theory tas, and from Crow's 1 Controller run last night. 1 Controller will vary a little bit because of extra kills and that leads to different values given by the experience glitch later, but it should provide a good idea of what to expect on these bosses.

Code:

Boss		Hit%	HP	Max Damage	# of Hits	Average to kill
Mantis Ant	100%	150			
Tropicallo	100%	315			
Spikey Tiger	100%	520	999		1		1
Tonpole		100%	600	999		1		1
Fire Gigas	100%	850	999		1		1
Wall Face	62%	920	984		1		1.61
Kilroy		63%	900	988		1		1.59
Jabberwocky	63%	950	987		1		1.59
Spring Beak	63%	720	999		1		1.59
Great Viper	100%	1330	999		2		2
Mech Rider	64%	980	990		1		1.56
Boreal Face	65%	1100	986		2		3.08
Frost Gigas	65%	1140	962		2		3.08
Minotaur	65%	1200	978		2		3.08
Doom's Wall	65%	1180	966		2		3.08
Vampire		66%	2550	979		3		4.55
Metal Mantis	67%	1220	984		2		2.99
Mech Rider 2	68%	1258	984		2		2.94
Aegagropilon	68%	3016	984		4		5.88
Snap Dragon	68%	1215	894		2		2.94
Hexas		70%	3465	918		4		5.71
Mech Rider	70%	4327	882		5		7.14
Buffy		71%	4200	899		5		7.04
Dread Slime	72%	5000	799		7		9.72
Dark Lich	73%	6666	799		9		12.33
Mana Beast	76%	9990	549		19		25

Code:

Attacker	Boss		Hit%	HP	Max Damage	# of Hits	Average to kill
Boy		Mantis Ant	100%	150			
Boy		Tropicallo	100%	315			
Boy		Spikey Tiger	100%	520	999		1	
Boy		Tonpole		100%	600	999		1	
Boy		Fire Gigas	100%	850	999		1	
Boy		Wall Face	61%	920	984		1		1.64
Boy		Kilroy		62%	900	988		1		1.61
Boy		Jabberwocky	62%	950	987		1		1.61
Boy		Pebblers	63%	186	986		1		1.59
Boy		Spring Beak	63%	720	999		1		1.59
Boy		Great Viper	100%	1330	999		2		2.00
Boy		Mech Rider	64%	980	990		1		1.56
Boy		Boreal Face	64%	
Sprite		Boreal Face	61%	1100	986		2		3.20
Boy		Frost Gigas	65%
Sprite		Frost Gigas	61%	1140	962		2		3.18
Boy		Minotaur	65%	
Sprite		Minotaur	62%	1200	978		2		3.15
Boy		Doom's Wall	65%
Sprite		Doom's Wall	62%	1180	966		2		3.15
Boy		Vampire		66%
Sprite		Vampire		62%	2550	979		3		4.69
Boy		Metal Mantis	67%	
Sprite		Metal Mantis	63%	1220	984		2		3.08
Boy		Mech Rider 2	67%	
Sprite		Mech Rider 2	63%	1259	984		2		3.08
Boy		Lime Slime	68%	
Sprite		Lime Slime	69%	3470	967		4		5.84
Boy		Blue Spike	68%	
Sprite		Blue Spike	69%	1980	945		3		4.38
Boy		Gorgon Bull	68%	
Sprite		Gorgon Bull	69%	2470	941		3		4.38
Boy		Aegagropilon	69%
Sprite		Aegagropilon	69%	3016	984		4		5.80
Boy		Snap Dragon	70%	
Sprite		Snap Dragon	69%	1215	894		2		2.88
Boy		Hexas		70%
Sprite		Hexas		69%	3465	918		4		5.76
Boy		Mech Rider 3	71%	
Sprite		Mech Rider 3	70%	4328	882		5		7.09
Boy		Dragon Worm	71%
Sprite		Dragon Worm	70%	3525	908		4		5.67
Boy		Snow Dragon	72%	
Sprite		Snow Dragon	70%	2800	910		4		5.63
Boy		Axe Beak	73%	
Sprite		Axe Beak	70%	2800	910		4		5.60
Boy		Red Dragon	73%	
Sprite		Red Dragon	71%	3000	910		4		5.56
Boy		Thunder Gigas	74%
Sprite		Thunder Gigas	71%	4462	908		5		6.90
Boy		Blue Dragon	74%
Sprite		Blue Dragon	71%	3200	910		4		5.52
Boy		Buffy		75%
Sprite		Buffy		71%	4200	899		5		6.85
Boy		Dread Slime	75%
Sprite		Dread Slime	71%	5000	799		7		9.60
Boy		Dark Lich	76%
Sprite		Dark Lich	72%	6666	799		9		12.17
Boy		Mana Beast	76%	
Sprite		Mana Beast	72%	9990	549		19		25.69

According to the damage and hit rate formulas, you'd have about a 71% chance to hit Dragon Worm. Your damage will max at 909 against him, so that leaves 111 HP to spare to get a 4 hit kill.  Since you'd probably get a low damage roll, it would probably end up being 5 hits.

The Sprite would preferably be leveled up to lvl 2 by great viper, fyi.

Here are some tables with hit percentages against each boss (separate tables for 1p2c and 1 Controller).  I've included the ones that we use magic spam against just for reference if we start discussing if we want to use overcharges instead.  I took the agility levels from my 1p2c theory tas, and from Crow's 1 Controller run last night.  1 Controller will vary a little bit because of extra kills and that leads to different values given by the experience glitch later, but it should provide a good idea of what to expect on these bosses.

[code]Boss		Hit%	HP	Max Damage	# of Hits	Average to kill
Mantis Ant	100%	150			
Tropicallo	100%	315			
Spikey Tiger	100%	520	999		1		1
Tonpole		100%	600	999		1		1
Fire Gigas	100%	850	999		1		1
Wall Face	62%	920	984		1		1.61
Kilroy		63%	900	988		1		1.59
Jabberwocky	63%	950	987		1		1.59
Spring Beak	63%	720	999		1		1.59
Great Viper	100%	1330	999		2		2
Mech Rider	64%	980	990		1		1.56
Boreal Face	65%	1100	986		2		3.08
Frost Gigas	65%	1140	962		2		3.08
Minotaur	65%	1200	978		2		3.08
Doom's Wall	65%	1180	966		2		3.08
Vampire		66%	2550	979		3		4.55
Metal Mantis	67%	1220	984		2		2.99
Mech Rider 2	68%	1258	984		2		2.94
Aegagropilon	68%	3016	984		4		5.88
Snap Dragon	68%	1215	894		2		2.94
Hexas		70%	3465	918		4		5.71
Mech Rider	70%	4327	882		5		7.14
Buffy		71%	4200	899		5		7.04
Dread Slime	72%	5000	799		7		9.72
Dark Lich	73%	6666	799		9		12.33
Mana Beast	76%	9990	549		19		25
[/code]

[code]Attacker	Boss		Hit%	HP	Max Damage	# of Hits	Average to kill
Boy		Mantis Ant	100%	150			
Boy		Tropicallo	100%	315			
Boy		Spikey Tiger	100%	520	999		1	
Boy		Tonpole		100%	600	999		1	
Boy		Fire Gigas	100%	850	999		1	
Boy		Wall Face	61%	920	984		1		1.64
Boy		Kilroy		62%	900	988		1		1.61
Boy		Jabberwocky	62%	950	987		1		1.61
Boy		Pebblers	63%	186	986		1		1.59
Boy		Spring Beak	63%	720	999		1		1.59
Boy		Great Viper	100%	1330	999		2		2.00
Boy		Mech Rider	64%	980	990		1		1.56
Boy		Boreal Face	64%	
Sprite		Boreal Face	61%	1100	986		2		3.20
Boy		Frost Gigas	65%
Sprite		Frost Gigas	61%	1140	962		2		3.18
Boy		Minotaur	65%	
Sprite		Minotaur	62%	1200	978		2		3.15
Boy		Doom's Wall	65%
Sprite		Doom's Wall	62%	1180	966		2		3.15
Boy		Vampire		66%
Sprite		Vampire		62%	2550	979		3		4.69
Boy		Metal Mantis	67%	
Sprite		Metal Mantis	63%	1220	984		2		3.08
Boy		Mech Rider 2	67%	
Sprite		Mech Rider 2	63%	1259	984		2		3.08
Boy		Lime Slime	68%	
Sprite		Lime Slime	69%	3470	967		4		5.84
Boy		Blue Spike	68%	
Sprite		Blue Spike	69%	1980	945		3		4.38
Boy		Gorgon Bull	68%	
Sprite		Gorgon Bull	69%	2470	941		3		4.38
Boy		Aegagropilon	69%
Sprite		Aegagropilon	69%	3016	984		4		5.80
Boy		Snap Dragon	70%	
Sprite		Snap Dragon	69%	1215	894		2		2.88
Boy		Hexas		70%
Sprite		Hexas		69%	3465	918		4		5.76
Boy		Mech Rider 3	71%	
Sprite		Mech Rider 3	70%	4328	882		5		7.09
Boy		Dragon Worm	71%
Sprite		Dragon Worm	70%	3525	908		4		5.67
Boy		Snow Dragon	72%	
Sprite		Snow Dragon	70%	2800	910		4		5.63
Boy		Axe Beak	73%	
Sprite		Axe Beak	70%	2800	910		4		5.60
Boy		Red Dragon	73%	
Sprite		Red Dragon	71%	3000	910		4		5.56
Boy		Thunder Gigas	74%
Sprite		Thunder Gigas	71%	4462	908		5		6.90
Boy		Blue Dragon	74%
Sprite		Blue Dragon	71%	3200	910		4		5.52
Boy		Buffy		75%
Sprite		Buffy		71%	4200	899		5		6.85
Boy		Dread Slime	75%
Sprite		Dread Slime	71%	5000	799		7		9.60
Boy		Dark Lich	76%
Sprite		Dark Lich	72%	6666	799		9		12.17
Boy		Mana Beast	76%	
Sprite		Mana Beast	72%	9990	549		19		25.69
[/code]

Crow!

Edit history:

Crow!: 2014-02-06 11:05:44 am

2014-02-06 11:04:09 am

What's that gemma?

Thanks for the data, Stinger.

I'm giving up on using WCG on the Dragon Worm. The success rate for landing a hit in a given 60-second period is far too low. Here are some notes on optimizations while trying:

The amount of menu time that swapping weapons to lock in a particular charge level costs is huge. It's four item rings' worth of change (since magic is on the opposite side from weapons), two swaps, and an extra action grid access per WCG attempt.

Meanwhile, it turns out there's two acceptable zones in charge levels for dealing max damage. From what I'm seeing, I think that the effective charge level of your attack is the actual charge level mod 128 - so, if it takes too long to line up a WCG hit with the sword, I can wait another second and a half or so and then swing.

Gem Missile is better than Slow Down. Gem missile imposes a delay as the Worm takes damage, thereby inflicting more stun per cast. This reduces the amount of time the Worm has to wreck your day while you're waiting to gain control of the Boy.

When Dragon Worm eats a character, you have to stop casting spells on him. Until his whole consuming animation is completed, the eaten character will not be released.

The list of things that can go wrong while trying to land a hit is just far too large. A spell of any sort on the Girl delays your ability to do anything useful for 5 seconds, during which time he can do other stuff. A spell of any sort on the Sprite stops your lockdown and lets him do other stuff. A spell on the boy while the boy is attacking (which is likely, since the boy will probably be the closest character to the Worm) negates the WCG attempt altogether, as does the Worm moving directly at the boy while he's trying to swing.

When the Worm is allowed to do "other stuff", the absolute worst thing he can do is move away. If he goes off screen, the Boy drops his charge. You then have to wait until he returns to the screen and try all over again.

To land a hit, you essentially need exactly the following to happen:

- The Worm targets the Girl or the Boy with a status effect spell as he approaches.
- That status effect spell must fail.
- Land Slide on the Girl will cause sufficient delay that the Sprite will be unable to get a stun lock.
- Eating any character means the Sprite needs to abandon the stun lock.
- The Worm does not do any subsequent spells, and does not eat a character, and remains in a position where the Boy can aggro on it, until the Sprite's spells' animations begin.
- As you swap to the Boy's control, the Worm either moves away then returns, or casts spells on targets other than the boy, or casts Land Slide on the Boy.
- If the Boy is targeted with a status effect spell, the Boy will lose his Lucid Barrier, at which point he can't hit the Worm
- If the Boy is targeted with Land Slide, the Worm must subsequently move away and then return,
- If the Worm moves away without immediately returning, he will at some point cast a status effect spell while away, which will negate the Lucid Barrier.
- As you move toward the worm, he must cast a status effect spell which gets blocked by Lucid Barrier.
- Land Slide is not blocked by Lucid Barrier
- If the Worm moves away, see the above note on moving away without returning.
- If the Worm moves toward the Boy, he will be eaten, which will interrupt the Boy's attack despite not doing damage.

Wall can prevent Land Slide from being a problem, but it also means being unable to cast Lucid Barrier on the Boy, which means being unable to hit the Worm.

Thanks for the data, Stinger.

I'm giving up on using WCG on the Dragon Worm.  The success rate for landing a hit in a given 60-second period is far too low.  Here are some notes on optimizations while trying:

The amount of menu time that swapping weapons to lock in a particular charge level costs is huge.  It's four item rings' worth of change (since magic is on the opposite side from weapons), two swaps, and an extra action grid access per WCG attempt.

Meanwhile, it turns out there's two acceptable zones in charge levels for dealing max damage.  From what I'm seeing, I think that the effective charge level of your attack is the actual charge level mod 128 - so, if it takes too long to line up a WCG hit with the sword, I can wait another second and a half or so and then swing.

Gem Missile is better than Slow Down.  Gem missile imposes a delay as the Worm takes damage, thereby inflicting more stun per cast.  This reduces the amount of time the Worm has to wreck your day while you're waiting to gain control of the Boy.

When Dragon Worm eats a character, you have to stop casting spells on him.  Until his whole consuming animation is completed, the eaten character will not be released.

The list of things that can go wrong while trying to land a hit is just far too large.  A spell of any sort on the Girl delays your ability to do anything useful for 5 seconds, during which time he can do other stuff.  A spell of any sort on the Sprite stops your lockdown and lets him do other stuff.  A spell on the boy while the boy is attacking (which is likely, since the boy will probably be the closest character to the Worm) negates the WCG attempt altogether, as does the Worm moving directly at the boy while he's trying to swing.

When the Worm is allowed to do "other stuff", the absolute worst thing he can do is move away.  If he goes off screen, the Boy drops his charge.  You then have to wait until he returns to the screen and try all over again.

To land a hit, you essentially need exactly the following to happen:

- The Worm targets the Girl or the Boy with a status effect spell as he approaches.
  - That status effect spell must fail.
  - Land Slide on the Girl will cause sufficient delay that the Sprite will be unable to get a stun lock.
  - Eating any character means the Sprite needs to abandon the stun lock.
- The Worm does not do any subsequent spells, and does not eat a character, and remains in a position where the Boy can aggro on it, until the Sprite's spells' animations begin.
- As you swap to the Boy's control, the Worm either moves away then returns, or casts spells on targets other than the boy, or casts Land Slide on the Boy.
  - If the Boy is targeted with a status effect spell, the Boy will lose his Lucid Barrier, at which point he can't hit the Worm
  - If the Boy is targeted with Land Slide, the Worm must subsequently move away and then return, 
  - If the Worm moves away without immediately returning, he will at some point cast a status effect spell while away, which will negate the Lucid Barrier.
- As you move toward the worm, he must cast a status effect spell which gets blocked by Lucid Barrier.
  - Land Slide is not blocked by Lucid Barrier
  - If the Worm moves away, see the above note on moving away without returning.
  - If the Worm moves toward the Boy, he will be eaten, which will interrupt the Boy's attack despite not doing damage.

Wall can prevent Land Slide from being a problem, but it also means being unable to cast Lucid Barrier on the Boy, which means being unable to hit the Worm.

Yagamoth

Edit history:

Yagamoth: 2014-02-07 11:38:47 am

Yagamoth: 2014-02-07 11:37:56 am

Yagamoth: 2014-02-07 11:24:40 am

2014-02-06 01:02:15 pm

INTJ

Hm... I'm pretty sure double Midge Mallet to swap gain control over the charge attack should work. So that should be an option too

============================================

While lurking in Woolricks channel I saw some interesting tactic for Hexas. I'll try it out whether I can make it consistent in some way.

Ok, short explanation:
What Woolrick did, was keep the Sprite in front and simply heal him, while repeatedly using overcharged normal slashes.

I used a bit more of a specific strategy just now:
- Barrel the Girl, run her into Hexas -> Set up the overcharge with the help of the Sprite instead
- While setting up the overcharge, walk past hexas, so you are right behind her (Girl still stands in front of Hexas)
- The AI Girl will not move as long as she is alive, so you don't have to worry about that
- Normal slash
- Command the AI Girl to cast cure repeatedly
- Keep normal slashing
- Be ready to use a medical herb in case of Engulfed in flames (cure usually removes it)
- The Girl can tank one hit. If she does get hurt, simply heal her with the Sprite

I do not know whether this strategy is reliable yet. But it just worked 3 out of 3 times. If you think about it - the setup takes a bit longer, but it seems a lot faster.

Hm... I'm pretty sure double Midge Mallet to swap gain control over the charge attack should work. So that should be an option too

============================================

While lurking in Woolricks channel I saw some interesting tactic for Hexas. I'll try it out whether I can make it consistent in some way.

Ok, short explanation:
What Woolrick did, was keep the Sprite in front and simply heal him, while repeatedly using overcharged normal slashes.

I used a bit more of a specific strategy just now:
- Barrel the Girl, run her into Hexas -> Set up the overcharge with the help of the Sprite instead
- While setting up the overcharge, walk past hexas, so you are right behind her (Girl still stands in front of Hexas)
- The AI Girl will not move as long as she is alive, so you don't have to worry about that
- Normal slash
- Command the AI Girl to cast cure repeatedly
- Keep normal slashing
- Be ready to use a medical herb in case of Engulfed in flames (cure usually removes it)
- The Girl can tank one hit. If she does get hurt, simply heal her with the Sprite

I do not know whether this strategy is reliable yet. But it just worked 3 out of 3 times. If you think about it - the setup takes a bit longer, but it seems a lot faster.

Crow!

Edit history:

Crow!: 2014-02-09 09:16:14 am

Crow!: 2014-02-08 12:01:45 pm

Crow!: 2014-02-08 11:34:43 am

2014-02-08 11:16:38 am

What's that gemma?

Some notes on Stinger's recent 1p1c run:

Take the Magic Rope chest from the center, rather than from the right side. Taking it from the right tends to get the goblins desynched with each other.

If you get into an emergency situation (like at the beginning of the Underground Palace), don't be afraid to just have the Sprite cast magic. So long as you have some magic levels to gain, the time cost is minimal. (In fact, a single extra Freeze cast prior to the Upper Land translates directly into one fewer Freeze cast vs the Pebblers).

You dropped the overcharge vs Jabberwocky because you dashed. Dashing makes all AI drop aggro (subject to frame rules; trying and failing to run up stairs will sometimes drop aggro and sometimes not). Also, once you had control of the girl again, you should have gone back to casting Speed Down.

You don't need to walk that far upward vs Springbeak. So long as any portion of Springbeak's feet are visible when the pause screen's camera is pulled upward, you're able to target him.

Practice using the Whip. Once you're used to its hitboxes, it makes Howlers so much easier to deal with.

Don't go for the preemptive MP usage glitch except for your last batch of casts for a boss. It delays subsequent MP restorations, so there is no time gained except for the last batch of spells.

Wall Glitch: Your first two hits on the boy were lucky; the Sprite was not far enough to the right. Your fourth hit could have gone wrong if the enemy had chosen to attack the Boy and thereby deny the Sprite credit for the kill. On your fifth attempt, your second item ring call was in the correct position.

If you decide to stick with skipping the Midge Mallet, it may be worth it to check whether the Lazuri Ring alone is enough to make the Sprite too durable for the Shadow X fight. The 5 points of intelligence is a big deal for both the Wall Glitch and for the Lime Slime fight. You're pulling up the equipment ring already anyway to unequip the boy.

When casting Lucid Barrier in the Grand Palace, cast it on the whole party. It tends to help vs Doom Swords and Gremlins.

Vs Hexas, if you want the boy to move up, you can equivalently move Hexas down. Hexas doesn't just move toward you, she also squirms around randomly, so ultimately any direction you try to move the girl is a direction that Hexas will move too.

Start of Dread Slime fight: you didn't move the girl upward enough after the wall cast; this allowed the Sprite to slip out of the trap. The AIs refused to release their attacks later on in the fight because the Slime was so far away from them because the girl was so far downward after you fixed the positioning (no fault of your own there, the slime was too big to get back into proper position), so you have to use select to release the attacks.

If Thanatos vanishes, unless he's close to death, wait for him to reappear before casting again. Thanatos's transparent effect causes massive lag.

During the mana beast's physical attacks, de-aggro the AIs by dashing. This reduces lag, and they will not hold their charge through the whole attack cycle anyway so there's no advantage to be gained by leaving them alone.

Some notes on Stinger's recent 1p1c run:

Take the Magic Rope chest from the center, rather than from the right side.  Taking it from the right tends to get the goblins desynched with each other.

If you get into an emergency situation (like at the beginning of the Underground Palace), don't be afraid to just have the Sprite cast magic.  So long as you have some magic levels to gain, the time cost is minimal.  (In fact, a single extra Freeze cast prior to the Upper Land translates directly into one fewer Freeze cast vs the Pebblers).

You dropped the overcharge vs Jabberwocky because you dashed. Dashing makes all AI drop aggro (subject to frame rules; trying and failing to run up stairs will sometimes drop aggro and sometimes not).  Also, once you had control of the girl again, you should have gone back to casting Speed Down.

You don't need to walk that far upward vs Springbeak.  So long as any portion of Springbeak's feet are visible when the pause screen's camera is pulled upward, you're able to target him.

Practice using the Whip.  Once you're used to its hitboxes, it makes Howlers so much easier to deal with.

Don't go for the preemptive MP usage glitch except for your last batch of casts for a boss.  It delays subsequent MP restorations, so there is no time gained except for the last batch of spells.

Wall Glitch: Your first two hits on the boy were lucky; the Sprite was not far enough to the right.  Your fourth hit could have gone wrong if the enemy had chosen to attack the Boy and thereby deny the Sprite credit for the kill.  On your fifth attempt, your second item ring call was in the correct position.

If you decide to stick with skipping the Midge Mallet, it may be worth it to check whether the Lazuri Ring alone is enough to make the Sprite too durable for the Shadow X fight.  The 5 points of intelligence is a big deal for both the Wall Glitch and for the Lime Slime fight.  You're pulling up the equipment ring already anyway to unequip the boy.

When casting Lucid Barrier in the Grand Palace, cast it on the whole party.  It tends to help vs Doom Swords and Gremlins.

Vs Hexas, if you want the boy to move up, you can equivalently move Hexas down.  Hexas doesn't just move toward you, she also squirms around randomly, so ultimately any direction you try to move the girl is a direction that Hexas will move too.

Start of Dread Slime fight: you didn't move the girl upward enough after the wall cast; this allowed the Sprite to slip out of the trap.  The AIs refused to release their attacks later on in the fight because the Slime was so far away from them because the girl was so far downward after you fixed the positioning (no fault of your own there, the slime was too big to get back into proper position), so you have to use select to release the attacks.

If Thanatos vanishes, unless he's close to death, wait for him to reappear before casting again.  Thanatos's transparent effect causes massive lag.

During the mana beast's physical attacks, de-aggro the AIs by dashing.  This reduces lag, and they will not hold their charge through the whole attack cycle anyway so there's no advantage to be gained by leaving them alone.

StingerPA

2014-02-24 10:40:33 pm

I had an idea today for a new Mantis Ant technique. I did a quick stream where I demonstrated it and compared it to the strat we currently use for him. I'm estimating it to save about 4 seconds optimally, but it does introduce more RNG to the fight. The reason it works is that it means you have less downtime between swings, and are able to swing basically every time your stamina meter gets to 100%. The only problem is RNG block from the Mantis, and we might want to look further into this to see if it can be made more dependable.

http://www.twitch.tv/stingerpa/b/506203482

Looks like my audio balance was a bit off, but you can kinda hear me in the background.

Yagamoth

2014-02-25 04:10:11 am

INTJ

One potential argument against using this might be, that the difference in the Mantis Ant fight might affect the rng for the Tropicallo. But that's a really farfetched thought. Also, I don't like the rng ^^;... If you come up with a solid strategy to implement this, that would be neat Smiley

StingerPA

2014-02-28 05:57:59 pm

Here's a new setup to get the initial equipment trashing for 1 Controller pretty quickly. Technically it's a little slower than just doing the old setup because you're moving to a point to set the screen properly, but it works very well. The only warning for this is you shouldn't dash diagonally or left/right, otherwise that offsets the X position, and will keep you from aligning properly. Also, don't swap characters on the screen because the AI will dash to catch up to you, and if you swap to an AI character, you might end up on the wrong pixel. This shouldn't be a problem though, because optimally you want to keep control of the boy through this entire screen.

Screenshots are provided below for the positioning. Basically, you will move to the right of the steps beside Neko and press against the right edge, then move up the stairs, and press left into the corner underneath the flowers. This puts you in position to trash your equipment and duplicate everything.

Here's a new setup to get the initial equipment trashing for 1 Controller pretty quickly.  Technically it's a little slower than just doing the old setup because you're moving to a point to set the screen properly, but it works very well.  The only warning for this is you shouldn't dash diagonally or left/right, otherwise that offsets the X position, and will keep you from aligning properly.  Also, don't swap characters on the screen because the AI will dash to catch up to you, and if you swap to an AI character, you might end up on the wrong pixel.  This shouldn't be a problem though, because optimally you want to keep control of the boy through this entire screen.

Screenshots are provided below for the positioning. Basically, you will move to the right of the steps beside Neko and press against the right edge, then move up the stairs, and press left into the corner underneath the flowers.  This puts you in position to trash your equipment and duplicate everything.

[hidden][IMG]http://i.imgur.com/P9h2k3w.png[/IMG][/hidden]

[hidden][IMG]http://i.imgur.com/aZkfeTr.png[/IMG][/hidden]

Yagamoth

2014-02-28 08:11:38 pm

INTJ

On the question whether this could be useful for 1p2c: I don't think so. My idea was initially, that we simply don't equip/stock up on items before this point so we wouldn't double dip the menus. However, the bracelet from the dwarven village gives strength... So yeah, not really an option. It could be useful for a marathon run though

I like the setup, but I'm not sure about all those restrictions ^^

StingerPA

2014-03-05 01:33:31 am

A few things from my runs today:

The new mantis ant strategy works very well, although it can go badly. I had only a couple of fights end up slower than the old method, and I got more sub 5 fights (on last explosion) than I've ever gotten in all the time I've run this game.

The new setup for the equipment trashing was a little weird. I'm not sure where or even if it was actually going wrong, but it seemed a little off to me at times.

Midge Mallet is a lot faster for one simple reason: Thunder Gigas. With the midge mallet, you can actually keep him stunlocked the entire fight, which is impossible without it. I saved almost 3 minutes on that split alone, and it only takes 1 minute to get it from Gaia's Navel.

Crow!

2014-03-05 05:29:45 am

What's that gemma?

From what I've seen in the demonstration video and from your attempts, it seems like the second and third hits on the Ant always go well, then the fourth and onward carry risk. Perhaps the hits on the Ant could go like this:

1. Initial hit on Ant.
2. Trade hits with the Ant.
3. Attack as soon as you've recovered from the hit (this and 2. are as in Stinger's post above)
4. Walk to the side of the Ant, dodge the attack, and score a hit (as per the old strategy)
5. Walk below the Ant, trade as in step 2.
6. Attack as soon as you've recovered as in step 3.
7. Walk to the side of the Ant, as in step 4.
8. See step 3.
9. See step 4.

So, rather than having 8 hits which are delayed a half second, we have only 2 delayed hits, saving 3 seconds reliably (I hope).

I'll note that you might be able to stun lock Thunder Gigas despite not having the Mallet by using Gem Missile as your last spell against him before using a Walnut, as this spell both stuns for longer and causes MP regeneration to be faster. But I also think that the Mallet is faster regardless.

Your mallet dopple strat is too safe, I think. If you drill some, you can consistently survive while having malleted all three characters from the start.

Against Wagatermelon, use curatives if necessary to prevent the character he's attacking from being knocked back, not to prevent damage (say, from a target that's already on the ground asleep anyway). Him swapping targets (and therefore swapping who you're doing the WCG with) costs a lot of time, whereas the damage of his spells aren't nearly as dangerous to a 1c run as it is to a 2c run.

That Luna Skip was unfortunate.

I'm uncertain whether bothering with the Mallet is profitable for fights where you have level 4 magic (Snow Dragon, Axe Beak), but it's definitely not for fights where you have level 5 or higher (atm only Lava Dragon).

If you ever feel the need to play greedy and fail to refresh Wall vs Dread Slime, at least take the precaution of keeping the Girl facing downward. That way she doesn't get knocked downward and get the AIs to de-aggro.

From what I've seen in the demonstration video and from your attempts, it seems like the second and third hits on the Ant always go well, then the fourth and onward carry risk.  Perhaps the hits on the Ant could go like this:

1. Initial hit on Ant.
2. Trade hits with the Ant.
3. Attack as soon as you've recovered from the hit (this and 2. are as in Stinger's post above)
4. Walk to the side of the Ant, dodge the attack, and score a hit (as per the old strategy)
5. Walk below the Ant, trade as in step 2.
6. Attack as soon as you've recovered as in step 3.
7. Walk to the side of the Ant, as in step 4.
8. See step 3.
9. See step 4.

So, rather than having 8 hits which are delayed a half second, we have only 2 delayed hits, saving 3 seconds reliably (I hope).

I'll note that you might be able to stun lock Thunder Gigas despite not having the Mallet by using Gem Missile as your last spell against him before using a Walnut, as this spell both stuns for longer and causes MP regeneration to be faster.  But I also think that the Mallet is faster regardless.

Your mallet dopple strat is too safe, I think.  If you drill some, you can consistently survive while having malleted all three characters from the start.

Against Wagatermelon, use curatives if necessary to prevent the character he's attacking from being knocked back, not to prevent damage (say, from a target that's already on the ground asleep anyway).  Him swapping targets (and therefore swapping who you're doing the WCG with) costs a lot of time, whereas the damage of his spells aren't nearly as dangerous to a 1c run as it is to a 2c run.

That Luna Skip was unfortunate.

I'm uncertain whether bothering with the Mallet is profitable for fights where you have level 4 magic (Snow Dragon, Axe Beak), but it's definitely not for fights where you have level 5 or higher (atm only Lava Dragon).

If you ever feel the need to play greedy and fail to refresh Wall vs Dread Slime, at least take the precaution of keeping the Girl facing downward.  That way she doesn't get knocked downward and get the AIs to de-aggro.

StingerPA

Edit history:

StingerPA: 2014-03-05 04:45:56 pm

StingerPA: 2014-03-05 04:45:30 pm

2014-03-05 12:51:48 pm

Don't judge it from the demonstration video I did. It wasn't very good because it had a set RNG every time since I loaded the same savestate. My attempts yesterday were a lot more indicative of how it would go during runs, and I was actually surprised at how easy it was.

For casting gem missile on Thunder Gigas, you'd actually need the last two hits to be gem missile, otherwise it doesn't count as a chain and you still get the slow MP regen.

My dopples fight was definitely slow. I hadn't done the fight with midge mallet and gold city armor in about 8 months, and I was bad back then anyways. I'll do a bit more testing since it appears you can take a few hits on the pygmied girl/sprite.

I would probably only use midge mallet for Dragon Worm and Thunder Gigas. All the other bosses don't gain almost anything from the minor boost of being pygmied.

Edit: By extension, I won't use the midge mallet on the wall glitch anymore. It actually threw off one of my hits because I got in position too quickly, and hit the Dark Knight before he got his wall up.

Don't judge it from the demonstration video I did.  It wasn't very good because it had a set RNG every time since I loaded the same savestate.  My attempts yesterday were a lot more indicative of how it would go during runs, and I was actually surprised at how easy it was.

For casting gem missile on Thunder Gigas, you'd actually need the last two hits to be gem missile, otherwise it doesn't count as a chain and you still get the slow MP regen.

My dopples fight was definitely slow.  I hadn't done the fight with midge mallet and gold city armor in about 8 months, and I was bad back then anyways.  I'll do a bit more testing since it appears you can take a few hits on the pygmied girl/sprite.

I would probably only use midge mallet for Dragon Worm and Thunder Gigas.  All the other bosses don't gain almost anything from the minor boost of being pygmied.

Edit:  By extension, I won't use the midge mallet on the wall glitch anymore.  It actually threw off one of my hits because I got in position too quickly, and hit the Dark Knight before he got his wall up.

StingerPA

2014-03-06 02:57:31 pm

I did a few more tests today for 1 controller. Saving at the Water Palace after Jabberwocky and resetting is slower than walking out.

For the Wind Palace, I tested several things, including using the magic rope to move a cutscene to the beginning. First of all, the order you should do things is talk to Grandpa, then seal the seed. It's about a quarter of a second faster to do it that way. As for the magic rope, the girl needs to be on the item ring (which she should be anyways because of walnuts during the Spring Beak fight), and she also needs to be the one controlled after Spring Beak. If both of these conditions are met, then use the magic rope before sealing the Wind Seed, and it saves just over 1 second. If you don't have both of those, such as you're controlling the boy/sprite, or the girl is still on the magic menu from Jabberwocky, then just walk out of there.

Crow!

Edit history:

Crow!: 2014-03-06 06:33:38 pm

2014-03-06 06:33:15 pm

What's that gemma?

Rope delaying the seed sealing event works in the Wind Palace? Wouldn't have guessed that. Most of the other seeds result in a ~20 second lockout when you do. I'm guessing the difference is that the seed exists in the place the rope teleports you to (since it's the same room).

StingerPA

Edit history:

StingerPA: 2014-03-07 05:22:15 pm

2014-03-07 05:22:04 pm

Two softlocks on today's two runs. The first one was a new one that I hadn't seen before. After I killed Snow Dragon, I decided to get another Lumina cast in, so while the death animation was going, I opened up the menu and cast lucid barrier. This managed to softlock the game. The next one was on Blue Spike, and this was previously known, just very rare. The boy killed Blue Spike just as he began eating the barreled girl, and the game was unable to revert the girl from the being eaten state, so it locked up trying to do so.

Also, I had an idea during the run that actually came from me screwing up. Instead of farming Silktails for experience, could we farm pebblers with Freeze instead? We'd still kill a few silktails, but it would make it much easier to get the necessary experience for level 13. That, and pebblers give 34 more exp than silktails, meaning we'd have to kill less of them. We'd have to kill a few more things before arriving in the upper lands, but since everything in that area gives the sprite 4 weapon experience, it wouldn't slow us down much. By my calculations, we could kill 2 pebblers, leave, go back in, kill all 3, and kill a total of 7 silktails, and that would put us at level 13 including some assumed kills from the early areas.

Two softlocks on today's two runs.  The first one was a new one that I hadn't seen before.  After I killed Snow Dragon, I decided to get another Lumina cast in, so while the death animation was going, I opened up the menu and cast lucid barrier.  This managed to softlock the game.  The next one was on Blue Spike, and this was previously known, just very rare.  The boy killed Blue Spike just as he began eating the barreled girl, and the game was unable to revert the girl from the being eaten state, so it locked up trying to do so.

Also, I had an idea during the run that actually came from me screwing up.  Instead of farming Silktails for experience, could we farm pebblers with Freeze instead?  We'd still kill a few silktails, but it would make it much easier to get the necessary experience for level 13.  That, and pebblers give 34 more exp than silktails, meaning we'd have to kill less of them.  We'd have to kill a few more things before arriving in the upper lands, but since everything in that area gives the sprite 4 weapon experience, it wouldn't slow us down much.  By my calculations, we could kill 2 pebblers, leave, go back in, kill all 3, and kill a total of 7 silktails, and that would put us at level 13 including some assumed kills from the early areas.

Crow!

Edit history:

Crow!: 2014-03-08 08:22:27 am

Crow!: 2014-03-08 08:15:41 am

Crow!: 2014-03-08 08:05:30 am

Crow!: 2014-03-08 08:05:22 am

Crow!: 2014-03-08 08:03:38 am

Crow!: 2014-03-08 08:03:17 am

2014-03-08 08:02:48 am

What's that gemma?

Seiken had a similar problem with the Lava Dragon in the current (here's crossing my fingers for my run making it through the backlog soon) SDA run. Check part six, 9 minutes in to the video.

Killing things with magic doesn't generate weapon experience. If there's a sufficiently fast way to get the Sprite the experience he needs by Boreal Face, then maybe killing extra things with magic would work out.

I don't think doing two extra screen transitions to kill specifically those Pebblers that are in the Moogle Village would make sense, though. There's already a few Pebblers (and Crawlers) in and around the Matango cave that would be nice / not out of the way to kill via magic. Another possibility: Pebblers are weak against Sylphid, which we need to level up anyway; some Matango cave Pebblers could be Thunderbolt-ed and/or Air Blast-ed.

StingerPA

Edit history:

StingerPA: 2014-03-08 07:09:26 pm

2014-03-08 05:51:30 pm

Good point on the pebblers on the way. We could kill the ones in the earth slide crystal orb room instead. I think we could route the kills properly. If the sprite gets credit for the 7 silktail kills, he would need 11 kills in the early areas. I can come up with several easy ones since everything gives the same amount of exp. The boy's kills only give 1 weapon exp to the sprite, so he's not too useful there. We could consider more casts of stone saber on the sprite to basically double damage on his hits. Casting that at certain times could be quick. He can one shot flowers that way after getting the upgraded axe.

Edit: I just went through the possible list, and I'm coming up with 19 enemies that wouldn't take us out of the way at all. We kill some of these already, but specifically routing for these could help a lot. Just as a general idea, if we kill 11, the sprite needs all 7 silktail kills to level up. Past that point, each additional kill in the early areas means the sprite needs one less full kill on the silktails.

Good point on the pebblers on the way.  We could kill the ones in the earth slide crystal orb room instead.  I think we could route the kills properly.  If the sprite gets credit for the 7 silktail kills, he would need 11 kills in the early areas.  I can come up with several easy ones since everything gives the same amount of exp.  The boy's kills only give 1 weapon exp to the sprite, so he's not too useful there. We could consider more casts of stone saber on the sprite to basically double damage on his hits.  Casting that at certain times could be quick.  He can one shot flowers that way after getting the upgraded axe.

Edit: I just went through the possible list, and I'm coming up with 19 enemies that wouldn't take us out of the way at all.  We kill some of these already, but specifically routing for these could help a lot.  Just as a general idea, if we kill 11, the sprite needs all 7 silktail kills to level up.  Past that point, each additional kill in the early areas means the sprite needs one less full kill on the silktails.

MASTER-88

Edit history:

MASTER-88: 2014-03-13 03:25:33 pm

MASTER-88: 2014-03-13 03:24:41 pm

2014-03-13 03:23:51 pm

Master-88

One little tip 1p 1 controlls runs?

Aegagropilon could be done undine freeze only. If you are fast enought you have find time kill him before he use wall. I just look stingerPA live game he lost a lot time with this boss. I personally always use undine against him my casual play and no trouble kill him with this way. I think its could be worth try it in speedrun too.

Undine freeze working also very well against Buffy & Darklich. Its nearly as effect as lumina IMO. Undine freeze is quick magic and its really useful against most bosses if levels are high enought. I just always kill those bosses used undine freeze only with my casual gaming. Though my levels are 6-7. 4-5 could be enought one and at least worth trying.

StingerPA

Edit history:

StingerPA: 2014-03-13 11:25:07 pm

2014-03-13 11:02:31 pm

Quote from MASTER-88:

One little tip 1p 1 controlls runs?

Aegagropilon could be done undine freeze only. If you are fast enought you have find time kill him before he use wall. I just look stingerPA live game he lost a lot time with this boss. I personally always use undine against him my casual play and no trouble kill him with this way. I think its could be worth try it in speedrun too.

Undine freeze working also very well against Buffy & Darklich. Its nearly as effect as lumina IMO. Undine freeze is quick magic and its really useful against most bosses if levels are high enought. I just always kill those bosses used undine freeze only with my casual gaming. Though my levels are 6-7. 4-5 could be enought one and at least worth trying.

Good idea on Aegagropilon. I think that would save a ton of time on the route, even if the overcharges were done perfectly. I actually thought for some reason that he didn't take much damage from magic, so I never bothered to try. It takes 4 casts of Freeze to reach 999 damage, so optimally you would enter the fight as the girl, the Boy's AI will cause him to slash and do ~40 damage, then cast 3 sets of 4 Freezes to finish him off (40+999+999+999=3037, and watermelon has 3016 HP). I timed it against the co-op record, and only lost 30 seconds against a perfect 2 controller watermelon fight. With all the bursts he casts, there's almost no chance of AI overcharges going perfectly, and even then, we'd be hard pressed to even tie Freeze casting.

Using Freeze on Buffy and Dark Lich, though, isn't quite as simple. Old strats used to use Freeze on them, and switching to Lumina saved about 3 minutes on those 2 splits which is well worth the extra casts done in Pure Lands. They both have really high magic defense, and you need Freeze to be a really high level to hit them for enough damage (even including overcharge hit attempts).

Also, 3:11:49 is now the time to beat in 1 controller. Amazing start, but it had a rough mid game.

[quote="MASTER-88"]One little tip 1p 1 controlls runs?

Aegagropilon could be done undine freeze only. If you are fast enought you have find time kill him before he use wall. I just look stingerPA live game he lost a lot time with this boss. I personally always use undine against him my casual play and no trouble kill him with this way. I think its could be worth try it in speedrun too.

Undine freeze working also very well against Buffy & Darklich. Its nearly as effect as lumina IMO. Undine freeze is quick magic and its really useful against most bosses if levels are high enought. I just always kill those bosses used undine freeze only with my casual gaming. Though my levels are 6-7. 4-5 could be enought one and at least worth trying.[/quote]
Good idea on Aegagropilon.  I think that would save a ton of time on the route, even if the overcharges were done perfectly.  I actually thought for some reason that he didn't take much damage from magic, so I never bothered to try.  It takes 4 casts of Freeze to reach 999 damage, so optimally you would enter the fight as the girl, the Boy's AI will cause him to slash and do ~40 damage, then cast 3 sets of 4 Freezes to finish him off (40+999+999+999=3037, and watermelon has 3016 HP).  I timed it against the co-op record, and only lost 30 seconds against a perfect 2 controller watermelon fight.  With all the bursts he casts, there's almost no chance of AI overcharges going perfectly, and even then, we'd be hard pressed to even tie Freeze casting.

Using Freeze on Buffy and Dark Lich, though, isn't quite as simple.  Old strats used to use Freeze on them, and switching to Lumina saved about 3 minutes on those 2 splits which is well worth the extra casts done in Pure Lands.  They both have really high magic defense, and you need Freeze to be a really high level to hit them for enough damage (even including overcharge hit attempts).

Also, 3:11:49 is now the time to beat in 1 controller.  Amazing start, but it had a rough mid game.

Crow!

Edit history:

Crow!: 2014-03-14 09:02:56 am

2014-03-14 09:00:47 am

What's that gemma?

The rule is: a spell that an enemy isn't weak against has a power proportional to (spell level + 2), while a spell that the enemy is weak against is proportional to ((spell level + 2) * 2). So when we cast level 3 Lumina, it's like we're casting level 8 Freeze, while the level 4 Lumina we cast vs Thanatos is like level 10 Freeze (which doesn't even exist).

Incidentally, since apparently Watermelon has bad magic defense, it is also an opportunity to level up spells for Pureland. Level 2 and 3 magic do worthwhile damage. So, entering the fight with the Sprite pygmied allows for Land Slide to be used (cast it in batches of 5+5), or also Thunderbolt (my instinct says to level it up to 3 then switch over to Land Slide, 8 casts per cycle should be fine).

Yagamoth

2014-03-14 09:13:03 am

INTJ

Huh... Nice thought, I never considered spellcasting the watermlon because of the Wall it usually puts up... Also I never knew that he had low magic defense, plus AI overcharge is actually really easy against him... Nice catch Smiley

StingerPA

2014-03-14 11:51:54 am

One thing we should take into account is that if we don't kill him quickly enough, he can still put his wall up. That would force us to do the last bits of damage with overcharges.

MASTER-88

2014-03-14 03:18:20 pm

Master-88

That also pretty ironic i use undine freeze strategy my first playthough several years ago. My magic levels was much higher than speedrunners. But yeah that look this is good way in future runs too. Undine freeze is also most useful magic i just mostly use that magic most bosses into game.

BTW im not never are speedrunning this game. Just beat game several times casual playing. I am really glad if i find some really useful things. I love watch your streams.

Yagamoth

2014-03-14 03:53:17 pm

INTJ

I love the input of various people. It's not rare that a non-runner has some valuable input on things that we simply miss Smiley

StingerPA

Edit history:

StingerPA: 2014-03-14 10:00:40 pm

2014-03-14 09:29:21 pm

Back to 1p2c, I've done some testing on the new hexas strategy. Optimally, the new strat during the fight is 10 seconds faster than the old strat. I've re-evaluated the menus, and Yaga's suggestion seems to be the best option, switching weapons around after Joch's Trials. Basically, starting after the barrier skip at the trials, the weapon switches will go:

Girl -> axe
Sprite -> sword
Girl -> whip

This would set us up for the rest of the game. For watermelon, the girl would now be used as the meatshield in front of him instead of the sprite. The sprite would be left invisible during the grand palace skip. Before Hexas, the boy should use the menu to go into the item ring and use the barrel on the girl (used to be the sprite barreling himself). After this, the menus are basically the exact same as before, just reversed with the girl and sprite. The girl will now be the one spell locking buffy, and the sprite will swap the sword and spear around.

After all of the menu reworking, this seems to be roughly equal to the old menus, mostly due to the girl already being on the spell menu for the Mana Beast fight.

Now for the strat itself, it's a bit more difficult in execution, and I'm struggling to keep the girl from dying every time only using her spells to keep her safe. I'm having more luck using the sprite to give her healing items like candies and medical herbs to keep her in place. I'm also having trouble keeping her from moving away from hexas every time. Other than that, it looks like a good alternative strat. Time to get used to new menus, especially in the mana fortress with the sprite doing all of the weapon swaps.

Edit: An additional thing to note is that since the Sprite has the sword, we would need to swap it back to the girl for the Pandora Barrier Skip. It would add about 6 seconds to the menus to do that, and the pandora skip saves 7 seconds over going to the lofty mountains. I'll be going to the lofty mountains from now on since that'll be safer and less risky than going for the pandora skip since we don't entirely understand the mechanics of why it doesn't work sometimes.

Back to 1p2c, I've done some testing on the new hexas strategy.  Optimally, the new strat during the fight is 10 seconds faster than the old strat.  I've re-evaluated the menus, and Yaga's suggestion seems to be the best option, switching weapons around after Joch's Trials.  Basically, starting after the barrier skip at the trials, the weapon switches will go:

Girl -> axe
Sprite -> sword
Girl -> whip

This would set us up for the rest of the game.  For watermelon, the girl would now be used as the meatshield in front of him instead of the sprite.  The sprite would be left invisible during the grand palace skip.  Before Hexas, the boy should use the menu to go into the item ring and use the barrel on the girl (used to be the sprite barreling himself).  After this, the menus are basically the exact same as before, just reversed with the girl and sprite.  The girl will now be the one spell locking buffy, and the sprite will swap the sword and spear around.

After all of the menu reworking, this seems to be roughly equal to the old menus, mostly due to the girl already being on the spell menu for the Mana Beast fight.

Now for the strat itself, it's a bit more difficult in execution, and I'm struggling to keep the girl from dying every time only using her spells to keep her safe.  I'm having more luck using the sprite to give her healing items like candies and medical herbs to keep her in place.  I'm also having trouble keeping her from moving away from hexas every time.  Other than that, it looks like a good alternative strat.  Time to get used to new menus, especially in the mana fortress with the sprite doing all of the weapon swaps.

Edit: An additional thing to note is that since the Sprite has the sword, we would need to swap it back to the girl for the Pandora Barrier Skip.  It would add about 6 seconds to the menus to do that, and the pandora skip saves 7 seconds over going to the lofty mountains.  I'll be going to the lofty mountains from now on since that'll be safer and less risky than going for the pandora skip since we don't entirely understand the mechanics of why it doesn't work sometimes.

Crow!

Edit history:

Crow!: 2014-03-15 08:25:39 pm

2014-03-15 08:24:19 pm

What's that gemma?

I'm trying to decide whether taking the Mana Seeds is worth it.

Here are the magic damage formulae, coutesy HHS (as usual)

Quote:

If magic evade rate is greater than Random*101, DefPower = MagicDef+Random*MagicDef/16, otherwise DefPower = MagicEva*MagicDef/80
Accuracy is equal to wisdom for the woman's spells, and intelligence for the sprite's spells
Hit rate = Accuracy/4 + spell's hit rate
Force = (Accuracy+Spell's strength)*(1+Spell level/2).
If hit rate is greater than Random*101, Power = (Mana power squared+Force)*(1+Random/16), otherwise Power = Hit rate*Force/100.
If target is strong against the spell, attack power is halved, and if it's weak against the spell, attack power is doubled. Everyone is weak against any spell that has positive effects. The power is then divided by the number of targets.
Damage equals Power - DefPower, but not less than 1.

So, mana seeds grant a flat amount of damage, which scales as the square of the number of seeds collected, except for "missed" casts. I have no idea what spells' accuracies are like. Its effect is doubled for elemental weaknesses.

Against Minotaur, taking the dark mana seed is the difference between dealing 32-34 damage and dealing 50-53 bonus damage per spell cast (for a difference of 18-19).
- I generally cast 12 spells against Minotaur, so it's 216-234 damage over the course of the fight, assuming no "misses". That's about 1 spell cast.

Against Watermelon, taking both seeds versus taking none is a difference of dealing 16-17 damage and dealing 36-38 per spell cast (for a difference of 20-21).
- In my most recent Watermelon fight, I cast 23 damaging spells, so taking both seeds granted me 460-483 additional damage, which is like 3 or so spell casts.

Estimating in my head how long it takes to collect two seeds and how long it takes to cast 4 spells, I think taking the seeds is going to be a little bit slower than leaving them alone. The difference is going to be mere seconds, however.

I'm trying to decide whether taking the Mana Seeds is worth it.

Here are the magic damage formulae, coutesy HHS (as usual)

[quote]If magic evade rate is greater than Random*101, DefPower = MagicDef+Random*MagicDef/16, otherwise DefPower = MagicEva*MagicDef/80 
Accuracy is equal to wisdom for the woman's spells, and intelligence for the sprite's spells 
Hit rate = Accuracy/4 + spell's hit rate 
Force = (Accuracy+Spell's strength)*(1+Spell level/2). 
If hit rate is greater than Random*101, Power = (Mana power squared+Force)*(1+Random/16), otherwise Power = Hit rate*Force/100. 
If target is strong against the spell, attack power is halved, and if it's weak against the spell, attack power is doubled. Everyone is weak against any spell that has positive effects. The power is then divided by the number of targets. 
Damage equals Power - DefPower, but not less than 1.[/quote]

So, mana seeds grant a flat amount of damage, which scales as the square of the number of seeds collected, except for "missed" casts. I have no idea what spells' accuracies are like.  Its effect is doubled for elemental weaknesses.

Against Minotaur, taking the dark mana seed is the difference between dealing 32-34 damage and dealing 50-53 bonus damage per spell cast (for a difference of 18-19).
- I generally cast 12 spells against Minotaur, so it's 216-234 damage over the course of the fight, assuming no "misses".  That's about 1 spell cast.

Against Watermelon, taking both seeds versus taking none is a difference of dealing 16-17 damage and dealing 36-38 per spell cast (for a difference of 20-21).
- In my most recent Watermelon fight, I cast 23 damaging spells, so taking both seeds granted me 460-483 additional damage, which is like 3 or so spell casts.

Estimating in my head how long it takes to collect two seeds and how long it takes to cast 4 spells, I think taking the seeds is going to be a little bit slower than leaving them alone.  The difference is going to be mere seconds, however.