Custom Status: Brave or Shy?

[C-Dude]

I've decided to combine Life3 and Float into one status (mostly because I'm mad at how limited Float is in FF6, and how obtuse my attempt to make it relevant with Chasms was).
This frees up the Life3 bit for a new status.

Monsters can't block it and neither can relics/equipment.  Which raises the question, which is a better fit?

* Brave
Would bypass the damage division in calculation like Terra's Morph does, or perhaps throw in a x2 so that the two can stack.

* Shy
Would add an additional "divide by two" in damage calculation, cutting normal attacks in half (and making Morph Terra do only normal damage).  This status would use the red skin palette.


Both would be removable with Dispel.  I can't do both.  What are your thoughts?

[Cecil188]

Both seem overpowered, if I'm being honest. Bravely Default has a similar set of skills called Full Leverage and Low Leverage, and I abused those to make things feasible, which would otherwise be party wipes. And they both come with downsides in that they affect the entire field(and thus taking half damage means you also deal half damage). A buff that is strictly for the party's benefit would be quite powerful, unless the enemies use it quite commonly as well.

If I had to pick one, I'd probably pick Brave. Shy seems too similar to Protect and Shell, and assuming it works on nearly everything and reduces damage by half, it sounds objectively superior to Protect and Shell, with the latter buffs only being used in conjunction with Shy. Furthermore, Brave could be balanced by making it do some other fraction of damage, like 5/4 instead of x2.

[C-Dude]

I think you misunderstood "Shy". It's a debuff, it would reduce the target's damage output by 1/2. While that is somewhat similar to Shell/Safe, it is target-oriented rather than self-oriented. It would also probably be a single-target spell.

I did come up with a way to make monsters block the status, though. I can use the Suplex special effect and the "Block Suplex" flag, since I removed that restriction from the actual Suplex and it is otherwise unused. There's no way to protect the players from it, but at least some bosses would be able to resist the spell.

I'm leaning towards Shy, mainly because the red palette makes the character look like they're blushing (Celes even uses it on that first scene on the Blackjack).

[Cecil188]

That sounds a lot different than I had imagined. Though if it's a debuff, any single target boss vulnerable to it would make Shy even more powerful in that instance than if it were a buff, since applying it to the boss would be equivalent to applying the analogous buff to all four characters in turn. Thus, I suspect any boss that's only one entity would have to be immune to it, and then it would just exist on the heap of various status ailments that aren't worth using in bosses ever because they're all immune to it. Or, if you did make them vulnerable to it, it would be so overpowering that it would be a problem in its own right.

As a debuff, it would probably be better than the analogous buff in randoms, however. Shy as a debuff against the player would also be a decent way to reign in the damage that players do endgame, since a lot of things just generally devolve into "explode the enemy."

[PowerPanda]

The Brave status sounds a lot like the Valor spell from the GBA version. The Shy status has been around in previous FF games, and was called "Curse". Though, Curse status would halve both defense AND attack.

[Lockirby2]

That sounds a lot different than I had imagined. Though if it's a debuff, any single target boss vulnerable to it would make Shy even more powerful in that instance than if it were a buff, since applying it to the boss would be equivalent to applying the analogous buff to all four characters in turn. Thus, I suspect any boss that's only one entity would have to be immune to it, and then it would just exist on the heap of various status ailments that aren't worth using in bosses ever because they're all immune to it. Or, if you did make them vulnerable to it, it would be so overpowering that it would be a problem in its own right.

As a debuff, it would probably be better than the analogous buff in randoms, however. Shy as a debuff against the player would also be a decent way to reign in the damage that players do endgame, since a lot of things just generally devolve into "explode the enemy."

Normally, I'd agree that this is pretty OP, but C-Dude's hack philosophy is to make status effects so powerful that they compete with simply dealing damage (despite the fact that "explode the boss" is as viable as it ever was in vanilla).  Almost every boss can be incapacitated or defeated in a single spell cast with the right status effect, and on the buff side you have things like an easily accessible full-party image spell, Runic that lasts forever, and full-party Safe/Shell that are more effective than in vanilla.

Although its effect is certainly powerful, Shy would fit right into ReCast without modification IMO.  For any other hack, I'd hope for it to be implemented more like Octopath (maybe 10% or 20% reduction and it only lasts a couple turns).