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25th & 10th Anniversary Challenge

#11
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(08-03-2019, 06:11 PM)PowerPanda Wrote: (1) Seems fine, as long as they're limited to once per battle.
(2) What's the reasoning behind this? Beware of making things hard just for the sake of being hard.
(3) Your hack is all about small sprites for ALL of the monsters, right? If so, I'd make their in-battle graphics the same as the overworld graphics.
(4) I'd hate it. This is the final boss; it's when you're supposed to use all of your strongest abilities and go all out. It's not the time to get clever with battle mechanics. Now, if you wanted to call the code that forces team member cycling every turn, rather than just during tier transitions, that would be fine. Just be aware that the code does a lot more than just removing characters. It resets your one-summon per battle and desperation attack counter. I can't remember if it also adds to Terra's morph supply, or if that was someone else's patch.

(1) Yeah, I didn't change anything about summoning, but I've got a patch that makes magic and physical use the same damage calculation.  This makes magic a lot less potent than it is in Vanilla, and the summons are rather lackluster as a result.  I figured making them a free cast would make them worth using during battle.


(2) I made TekLaser steal HP because of changes to the opening and the magitek menu: Terra is the only one who knows Heal Force and neither of the Gesthalian soldiers had any self-healing, so I set TekLaser up as a Drain with the Revenge spell flag.  The spell Drain works in the same way; it does more and more damage the more health is missing.  It's my hope that players would be wowed by this power, and then stunned when it's used against them during the drop to the Floating Continent.  To be fair, TekLaser doesn't do any damage if the enemy is at full health (encouraging the defeat of one enemy at a time) and it is susceptible to Runic (encouraging the use of Celes on the Floating Continent, which has more plot implications).

My hack has lots of ways to cheese fights anyway, so I don't think it's wildly unfair.


(3) It's more about reducing the art clash between the player sprites and the monsters.  I tried to make all human enemies somewhat resemble the player characters.  I'm torn on the Warring Triad, though, because they are the gods of magic and unlike monsters and espers they don't appear to have ever been human.  Also, I'm having trouble with FF3SE; it won't let me export the images for Goddess or Poltergeist, which is going to make preparing replacements for them a challenge.


(4) Hmm... I was just trying to think of some clever ideas for Kefka because the fight seemed pretty mild on my second playthrough.  Cyan basically just chopped Kefka to bits... even bypassed the boss death animation; he died with a purple flash like a flan.  Maybe I'll just have him punish cheese strategies.
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#12
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Quote:(4) Hmm... I was just trying to think of some clever ideas for Kefka because the fight seemed pretty mild on my second playthrough.  Cyan basically just chopped Kefka to bits... even bypassed the boss death animation; he died with a purple flash like a flan.  Maybe I'll just have him punish cheese strategies.

This tend to happen to bosses that dies to a counter attack, the boss animation doesn't play. If that's what happening in your hack, there's a fix:

Code:
Counter Attack fix (for bosses)
-------------------------------

Prevent Bosses to die like a normal monster due to counter attacks.
This fix make sure Bosses use their death animation even after a counter attack.

Free space used: C2/6469 (C2/6669 with header).

Original code:
C2/4C9D: BD 69 32     LDA $3269,X (Load pointer to monster counter script)  
C2/4CA0: 30 0F        BMI $4CB1

Modified code:
C2/4C9D:  20 69 64   JSR $6469 (Change 6469 to any free space in C2 of your choice)
C2/4CA0:  F0 0F      BEQ $4CB1
----
C2/6469: BD 69 32    LDA $3269,X (Load pointer to monster counter script)
C2/646C: 1A          INC
C2/646D: 60          RTS

Uses 5 bytes.

Info taken from Imzogelmo on Mnrogar forums:
http://mnrogar.slickproductions.org/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=416&sid=87b68edc939e151f2b977d7851fb5bf4
(dead link)



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  • C-Dude (09-05-2019), PowerPanda (08-04-2019)

#13
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(08-03-2019, 06:56 PM)C- Dude Wrote: (2) I made TekLaser steal HP because of changes to the opening and the magitek menu: Terra is the only one who knows Heal Force and neither of the Gesthalian soldiers had any self-healing, so I set TekLaser up as a Drain with the Revenge spell flag.  The spell Drain works in the same way; it does more and more damage the more health is missing.  It's my hope that players would be wowed by this power, and then stunned when it's used against them during the drop to the Floating Continent.  To be fair, TekLaser doesn't do any damage if the enemy is at full health (encouraging the defeat of one enemy at a time) and it is susceptible to Runic (encouraging the use of Celes on the Floating Continent, which has more plot implications).

My hack has lots of ways to cheese fights anyway, so I don't think it's wildly unfair.

This sounds like a very complex solution for a very simple problem (Gesthalian soldiers do not have self-healing). In a game like Final Fantasy Tactics, where enemies and players have the same amount of HP, something like this would work. However, in FF6, where enemies have 2-10x the HP of players, all this does is cause cheap, unavoidable deaths if the gods of RNG hate you. I'd recommend using the flag for Demi/Quartr/W Wind instead, and set it to drain.


Projects:
FFVI: Divergent Paths (Completed) - a complete storyline and gameplay hack of FF6 that adds Leo as a playable character
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#14
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I've toned down the use of Tek Laser (it basically doesn't show up for enemies with more than 1000 HP, its last hurrah is the IAF assault), as well as rendered it reflectable to let players plan for it in parties that don't have the Runic option. Still testing other changes.

There is something I need from you PowerPanda, and you said if I needed something for the project I should ask here. I want to change Possess into a spell-trigger command (a la Shock or Health) calling spell EC (formerly Fire Wall). I can't seem to get it to work, though. I tried to tweak B-Run's Cover command for the slot, but that doesn't seem to do anything. Copying Shock's structure with a different spell ID didn't seem to work either.

I know you successfully changed Possess into Morph for your hack's imp; do you have any pointers?
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#15
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(09-10-2019, 07:31 PM)C-Dude Wrote: I've toned down the use of Tek Laser (it basically doesn't show up for enemies with more than 1000 HP, its last hurrah is the IAF assault), as well as rendered it reflectable to let players plan for it in parties that don't have the Runic option.  Still testing other changes.

There is something I need from you PowerPanda, and you said if I needed something for the project I should ask here.  I want to change Possess into a spell-trigger command (a la Shock or Health) calling spell EC (formerly Fire Wall).  I can't seem to get it to work, though.  I tried to tweak B-Run's Cover command for the slot, but that doesn't seem to do anything.  Copying Shock's structure with a different spell ID didn't seem to work either.

I know you successfully changed Possess into Morph for your hack's imp; do you have any pointers?

So I actually re-purposed Health, not Possess. It was in the early days of my hacking, and I couldn't get Possess to work. It would auto kill the target and the caster no matter what I did. Now that I know a bit more, here is what I would try:

Code:
Possess
C2/17E5: A9 EC        LDA #$EC (Load Fire Wall)
C2/17E7: 85 B6        STA $B6 (Set Spell/animation)
C2/17E9: A9 05        LDA #$05
C2/17EB: 80 ??        BRA $1765 (Jump backwards to $1765. Don't remember how to calculate bytes jumping backwards at the moment)
C2/17ED: EA EA EA    NOP
C2/17F0: EA EA        NOP
C2/17F2: EA EA        NOP
C2/17F4: EA EA        NOP
Divergent Paths has unfortunately stalled out again. I have started a second job as a "Game Breaker" (aka Balancer) for the Board Game Publisher AEG, and it is taking all of my former free time. I love FFVI, but I've gotta be putting the effort forward on the hobby that actually pays. There's a huge push right now to get our games to the manufacturer in China before (A) the new plastic tariffs kick in, and (B) Chinese New Year shuts down production for a month. Hopefully, once the summer rush dies down a bit, I can dedicate at least 1 day a week to working on this project instead of others.


Projects:
FFVI: Divergent Paths (Completed) - a complete storyline and gameplay hack of FF6 that adds Leo as a playable character
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#16
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Thank you, PowerPanda.  I need the command mostly for flavor: I had set Leo to use Blitz and Bushido but then I realized that ruins the fake-out that he might join the party.  I'm trying to set up a suitably usable command to bring that uncertainty back into the mix: if I can get Cover to work in some capacity I'll try some event editing to swap him with Locke during Thamasa, otherwise I'll put some cool attack like Riot Blade in there.

Career definitely comes before hobby, so there's no reason to lament that you can't work on your FF6 project.  Thank you for all the help you've given thus far on my tweak of your first hack, it truly is appreciated.

EDIT: It worked!  I applied B-Run's 'Cover' special to Pep Up and had Fire Wall call it.
Here's exactly what needs to be changed about Possess to make it work like Pray/Shock.
Code:
PowerPanda's Possess Spell Call
Possess
C2/17E5: A9 EC        LDA #$EC (Load Fire Wall)
C2/17E7: 85 B6        STA $B6 (Set Spell/animation)
C2/17E9: A9 05        LDA #$05
C2/17EB: 82 7A FF     BRL $1765 (Jump backwards h86 to $1765.)
C2/17EE: EA EA
(Off limits, used by Assassin's Sketch fix)
C2/17F0-C2/17F6     DO NOT CHANGE

(Data - indexed by command # 0 thru 1Dh)
C2/27A6: 04   (Possess) [was 81]
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#17
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Can anyone tell me where I can find the Battle introduction animation pointers?  The little gestures each individual character plays out before battle starts?

I'm thinking about rearranging some actor IDs when I move into phase 3 of my hack, and I don't want to use the vanilla intros.  For instance, if I move Gau to Actor $0C, I don't want him to flicker in like Gogo.

I seem to recall somebody talking about this recently, but I can't find the thread, or the info on the wiki.  I must be searching with the wrong terms.
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#18
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Character intro animations are in the battle event script. You can swap the pointers below to get characters to have different animations. The relevant asm code is at C1/FEB9. Note that the last two items in the list are actually hard-coded to be for magitek characters and wounded/petrified characters, respectively. Gestahl never uses an intro animation and the green soldier actually uses the same intro as the brown soldier.

Code:
D0/9842: 0E                       clear animations
D0/9843: 12                       animations for each actor
D0/9844: 7B 98                    actor 0 (Terra) at $987B
D0/9846: 94 98                    actor 1 (Locke) at $9894
D0/9848: C4 98                    actor 2 (Cyan) at $98C4
D0/984A: F4 98                    actor 3 (Shadow) at $98F4
D0/984C: 1B 99                    actor 4 (Edgar) at $991B
D0/984E: 3B 99                    actor 5 (Sabin) at $993B
D0/9850: 63 99                    actor 6 (Celes) at $9963
D0/9852: 85 99                    actor 7 (Strago) at $9985
D0/9854: B5 99                    actor 8 (Relm) at $99B5
D0/9856: F5 99                    actor 9 (Setzer) at $99F5
D0/9858: 26 9A                    actor 10 (Mog) at $9A26
D0/985A: 61 9A                    actor 11 (Gau) at $9A61
D0/985C: 8B 9A                    actor 12 (Gogo) at $9A8B
D0/985E: D3 9A                    actor 13 (Umaro) at $9AD3
D0/9860: F4 98                    actor 14 (Brown Soldier) at $98F4
D0/9862: 51 9B                    actor 15 (Imp) at $9B51
D0/9864: 7B 98                    actor 16 (Leo) at $987B
D0/9866: 94 98                    actor 17 (Banon) at $9894
D0/9868: C4 98                    actor 18 (Esper Terra) at $98C4
D0/986A: F4 98                    actor 19 (Merchant) at $98F4
D0/986C: 1B 99                    actor 20 (Ghost) at $991B
D0/986E: 3B 99                    actor 21 (Kefka) at $993B
D0/9870: 90 9B                    actor 22 (Gestahl) at $9B90
D0/9872: 76 98                    actor 23 (Green Soldier) at $9876
D0/9874: 0F                       execute animations
D0/9875: FF                       end of script

Valid pointers are:

Code:
9876: Pre-drawn (Wounded/Petrified Characters)
987B: Terra, Leo
9894: Locke, Banon
98C4: Cyan, Esper Terra
98F4: Shadow, Brown/Green Soldier, Merchant
991B: Edgar, Ghost
993B: Sabin, Kefka
9963: Celes
9985: Strago
99B5: Relm
99F5: Setzer
9A26: Mog
9A61: Gau
9A8B: Gogo
9AD3: Umaro
9B22: Unused
9B51: Imp
9B5A: Unused (monster 1)
9B63: Unused (monster 2)
9B6C: Unused (monster 3)
9B75: Unused (monster 4)
9B7E: Unused (monster 5)
9B87: Unused (monster 6)
9B90: Magitek (also Gestahl)

I had never noticed that there is an unused intro animation at 9B22. I'm not sure what that was meant for but it seems to work okay.
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#19
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Thank you, Everything. I've been considering ditching Gogo and promoting Banon to a playable character, but as a concept he works better in a slot that can equip espers and learn its own magic. I was considering move Gau to the 'party mage' slot (which I changed from Gogo to Umaro) and bumping Umaro into the 'perplexing mage' slot (as far as I can tell, the Gogo magic list in my hack seems to be built from the team's learnsets, but built based on Gogo's level. It's... intriguing).

This information will help me to explore that properly down the line, I've copied it down so I don't lose it again.
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#20
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Working hard to hit that deadline, PowerPanda!

I need some input, though. I'm struggling trying to decide what to do with Banon regarding the Thamasa incident.

If he goes along to Thamasa, I can have Locke wander off after Celes. This would give Banon a little more level and Esper growth, as he only becomes available to the player AFTER the Cave of Phantom Beasts (If I don't send him to Thamasa, he is then immediately unavailable again until the Floating Continent). This option also gives Banon the opportunity to build rapport with Interceptor at Leo's funeral, which helps support his World of Ruin recruitment. It will, however, be a great deal more complex than the alternative: if I add Banon to Thamasa I'd feel the need to switch him out after the burning house and send Leo with Terra to Crescent Mountain, which would mean a more labor-intensive text and event adjustment.

However... it's not out of character for Banon to disregard the search for the espers and stay in Vector to negotiate the ceasefire. If I leave him in Vector, I only have to add him to two scenes (wandering the Vector streets post-dinner and arriving in Thamasa post-Kefka). This would be resoundingly easy to code in the event script, but again would make Banon basically unplayable until the end of the World of Balance.

Don't need a fast answer: I've got more WoR recruitment cleanup to do and I still need to script and animate a scene in Kohlingen.
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