Patch: Doggy Miss Bugfix

i never considered this a bug, but rather Square's way of accounting for what is an arbitrary order of operations, so as to not lopsidedly "credit" the dog for an overwhelming and unfair number of blocks.

that is, if Protection A can randomly block 25% of attacks, and Protection B can randomly block 25% of attacks, somebody with both protections in place actually has four categories of dodges (or lack thereof):
i. Nothing blocks the attack (9/16)
ii. Only Protection A blocks the attack (3/16)
iii. Only Protection B blocks the attack (3/16)
iv. Both Protection A and B would've blocked the attack (1/16)

the question becomes: how do we divvy up credit for the overlapping Category (iv)?  the game can't well test Protection A's and Protection B's blocking of the attack simultaneously; it has to test ONE of those things first.  maybe we decide the first check alphabetically, by dice roll, by drawing straws, zodiac sign, etc.  whatever the method, it's a bit arbitrary as to who or what goes first.  and yet because the game's code is _fixed_, that entity is going to be checked first for EVERY applicable attack on that target!  so when an attack gets blocked -- by ANY means -- that first-checked entity gets a lion's share of the credit, even though other methods of protection were just as deserving.

Square attempts to more equitably distribute the credit for blockage by putting all blocking methods with animations into an eligible "pool", then randomly choosing between these animations.  the math may not be precise, but at least they're spreading the credit around.

from what i'm reading, your patch says that equipment/relics should never be in the "pool" with Dog/Golem, and always apportions credit to whichever would-be blocker of the attack has the good fortune of being checked first.

that happens to be the dog.  but what inherently makes Interceptor more worthy of credit for Category (iv) than a big, shiny shield or a three-foot (3-centimeter actual size; objects in Match.com profile are further than they appear) broadsword?  don't some enemy attacks come in above the waist?  is a pooch truly the first line of defense against all physical threats, or would it vary with their placement or the flow of battle?  again, Square's coders had to pick *some* Protection Method to check first; it just as easily could have been the character's evasion.  in that case, would it be fair to credit gear for the many attacks the dog might have blocked?

with a fixed order of operations, somebody's a' getting snubbed -- until a random "pool" or some method of accounting for overlapping block chances is introduced.  and that's what Square does!  the merging of weapon/equipment/relic and dog/Golem block animations into the eligible pool at C2/23CB seems pretty deliberate to me, so it's hard to call a bug.

i won't deny that Square's method is somewhat crude in how animation-possessing gear gets elevated above non-animated gear.  however, it's a bit of a shorthand: if gear can visually parry/block/dodge an attack, it can get credit for the missing.  if Square assigned a high Evade/MBlock rate to a piece of gear, they're likely to also attach an animation to it, and thus make it eligible for credit.  a more precise and nuanced way than a simple random roll would probably check the Evade stats of all gear that gets put into the block animations pool, and scale the occurrence of their animations accordingly.  however, such a function would be closer to 1200 bytes, and the source of many migraines. ;P

so Square went with lesser of the evils, and decided to randomly, evenly apportion credit between eligible blockers.  imperfect, but fairer than arbitrarily favoring whichever one was checked first in the ROM code.

Interceptor claiming credit for every last miss in Category (iv) turns him from a ninja's humble companion into one of those prancing AKC dogs with the lustrous coat of fur and the needlessly perfect posture.  that is, an insufferable twat who wouldn't last 2 minutes on an actual battlefield.  he'd go from Best in Show to First in Grave!

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EDIT: but i spose that if one views the dog as a persistently earlier line of defense than any gear, it does make sense to have his animation prioritized over equipment's rather than considered side-by-side.

challenge implications are turning Shadow into a counterattack machine, yet having Golem get used up more quickly on attacks that weren't a threat to you to begin with.