Posts for Toothache

Posted: 7/26/2009 9:00 PM

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Toothache

Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Active player (276)

Joined: 4/30/2009
Posts: 791

Yep, that is Stage 6. Stage 5 is a pain in the butt. My main concern comes from the fact that there are several places where I can take damage to save time. This doesn't seem too bad to begin with, since I get a second HP Up at the same time as levelling Dragon Frye to L3 (this will be helpful for parts of Stage 7 and the Ornah fight, since the Fire attacks take down the blob things in one hit and DF's fireball can be quickly fired in Ornah's direction without taking damage from his ground flame attack.) Anyway, back to Stage 5 itself. Like I said, there are a lot of places where I can take damage to speed through the level. The boulders in the first part do somewhere between 1/4 and 1/2 of a health bar, and with 5 health bars to play with, I can finish the first part with about 3 1/2 health bars left in an optimal time. The second part is where it gets tricky, since there are flames that come up from the lava in several places, and each one of these does a full health bar's worth of damage. Not to mention the eyeballs that shoot fireballs at you, and are only temporarily disabled rather than destroyed by attacks, meaning you have to rush through the parts where there are both eyeballs and flame pits. There are simply too many parts where just taking the hit and rushing past will save time, and not enough health to deal with them all, which means I may be spending several parts pausing and attacking rather than just hopping through. Most of the health recovery potions are off the beaten path as well, although there are two on your route, giving me a total of 7 to play with without costing time (the first is next to the second TLU, the second one is on the way to the third TLU). You have to go to where the second Thunder Level Up is to activate a fairy platform to get you into the second part of the stage anyway, so it isn't much of a side-trek. This stage will probably take many retries as I determine the best places to take damage and how much health I can save for the later parts of the level. And this is all before I even get to the boss. I can beat the boss in normal play without taking a hit though, it is an easy boss to deal with but it has a hell of a lot of HP. Another thought is that the side-trek to get the third Thunder Level Up should be ignored since it isn't required to go there normally, and it is a dangerous part with a lot of the giant mole-men that love to teleport right on top of Alisia's position. This leaves the Stage 7 TLU as the best option for the final level up, because I don't frankly know where the Stage 6 TLU is (if there is one) and I want to rush through that stage quickly. L7 Thunder should be enough for the Stage 5 and 6 bosses though, since Thunder Raven can take care of the guns for me (her charge can be manipulated to be full as soon as the guns appear, so I would have no delay in her attack and just concentrate on using as many Rolling Thunder attacks on the boss itself.) I'm about half-way through planning the second half of Stage 5 at the minute, I'll test if I need to save my health for the boss and decide how much of the stage I would need to redo to preserve health for that purpose. Not fun, but perhaps necessary. Oh, and thanks for the support guys :-)

Posted: 7/25/2009 2:32 PM

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Toothache

Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Active player (276)

Joined: 4/30/2009
Posts: 791

I am disappointed at the lack of Tetris, but otherwise a yes vote from me

Posted: 7/23/2009 10:40 PM

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Toothache

Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Active player (276)

Joined: 4/30/2009
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The more I watch those special stages, the more I think there might be room for improvement. I'm probably thinking about it too much, but maybe not. For example, at the end of special stage 2, the last two sets of 12 blue spheres occur right next to each other. Pardon my crappy paint skills here:

This has probably been tested, and I haven't tested it myself, but on paper it looks faster. My understanding of the special stages is that they are done to get as few rings as possible, mainly to reduce the length of the score count-up at the end of the stage, but surely it would be faster to accept a few rings in order to travel a shorter distance overall? Besides, there wont be that much difference between the speed of a 5 ring count-up and a 2 ring count-up, for example. I'm probably just splitting hairs, but I still cant shake the notion that the special stages don't all follow the most optimal route and there is room for improvement. With it being a somewhat 3D area it is understandably harder to plan for, but not impossible.

Posted: 7/22/2009 9:44 AM

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Toothache

Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Active player (276)

Joined: 4/30/2009
Posts: 791

ventuz wrote:

I think making "Battle message" to FAST was unnecessary.

The battle messages can be skipped faster when the bar is set to fast. So yes, it was probably necessary, even though there are few battle messages throughout the entire game.

Posted: 7/22/2009 7:58 AM

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Toothache

Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Active player (276)

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Stage 4: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S_g0mPFlnIo I think I will leave in the levelling of Thunder Raven since it is not out of the way much and it can do a fair bit of damage to the Stage 5 and 6 bosses. I've probably lost 4 seconds taking TR to L3, which isn't that much at all really, and it did help having it active during the latter part of Stage 2. Stage 5 is my least favourite stage, and the boss is pretty tough too. I can have max level Thunder Power by the time I reach the boss however, which will be significant and mean I need to rely a lot less on the summon monsters. Although, the Stage 5 boss has the second highest boss HP in the game next to Balder, so every little will help. I want to minimise switching though.

Posted: 7/19/2009 4:24 PM

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Toothache

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I'd love to see it but I cant get PCSX to run on this ancient machine of mine. Any chance of an encode? :-D

Posted: 7/18/2009 1:41 PM

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Toothache

Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Active player (276)

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Any chance of an encode of the GS fight? :) Great news, keep it up guys and gals.

Posted: 7/14/2009 11:34 AM

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Toothache

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Having done it myself, I know full well what you are talking about. All you need is good timing and a bit of patience, you can eventually hit the right frame.

Posted: 7/14/2009 10:10 AM

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Toothache

Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Active player (276)

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Stage 3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-LyZBnHFfQc I have an interesting dilemma here. Here I show the Stage 3 boss being killed without the use of Thunder Raven. However, it may be faster to ignore the Thunder Level Up in 1-3, power up Thunder Raven (since TR is great to use in Stage 6 boss battle especially as well) and continue one Thunder Level behind, grabbing the final TLU in Stage 7 (since it is the least out of the way of the final few, Stage 6 is a maze and I want to take the quickest path through that place). I may even be able to ignore that altogether and just stick with L7 Thunder for Stage 7 boss, Ornah and Balder. There's a lot to consider, and I'm nowhere near done working on this. What power ups to get, what monsters to use, I havent got all the answers yet. But I'll find out, that is for sure!! Again, feedback and suggestions greatly appreciated.

Posted: 7/13/2009 12:10 PM

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Toothache

Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Active player (276)

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Its an improvement, and still looks great. You have a yes vote from me :-)

Posted: 7/12/2009 1:45 PM

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Toothache

Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Active player (276)

Joined: 4/30/2009
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Well, I have some good news and some annoying news (at least, annoying for me). The good news is that I only have to kill the three brain-like creatures to beat the boss, which means I can ignore most of the cannons and just concentrate on those. The annoying news is that it may be slower to use Thunder Raven at all, which means I'll have to redo everything from the midpoint of L2 onwards (before I get the Level Up of that stage). I can even consider forgoing the Thunder Level Up in 1-3 in theory since that takes the longest to get, although that will make things interesting for the Stage 2 Boss (the sub-boss always is forced through two phases before finally dying on the third). There's a lot to consider, and not getting some powerups early will obviously lead to a faster stage time, the problem will be when it comes to dealing with the bosses. I can ignore one Thunder Level Up altogether since there are 8 in total and I only need 7 for max power. The furthest one away is either the 1-3 TLU or the one in Stage 5-1, and the one in Stage 7 is pretty out the way as well. I will stick with my original plan for now, I have the Stage 3 boss more or less done now, just a few more optimisations. Stage 4 is very short, so that shouldnt take long to do.

Posted: 7/12/2009 10:09 AM

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Toothache

Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Active player (276)

Joined: 4/30/2009
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It isnt 1/8192 if you know which specific frames to hit. I take it you didnt read the Smogon article on the Emerald RNG carefully enough. With the right tool, RNG Reporter, you can discover which frames give you a shiny Pokemon based on your ID and Secret ID, and use an accurate timer or stopwatch to aid in hitting that frame. It works for resetting legendaries, as well as capturing wild Pokemon and breeding.

Posted: 7/12/2009 10:04 AM

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Toothache

Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Active player (276)

Joined: 4/30/2009
Posts: 791

In short, yes.

Posted: 7/11/2009 8:38 PM

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Toothache

Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Active player (276)

Joined: 4/30/2009
Posts: 791

Awesome job, yes vote from me :-)

Posted: 7/8/2009 9:55 PM

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Toothache

Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Active player (276)

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Well, maybe that is too loose of a description. You actually can make use of a flashcart to 'trade' the Pokemon's save data between an emulator and the real thing. There are tools to assist this process as well, although I must admit I dont understand this process as well as I should. Long story short - emulators can be used if you have the right equipment and knowhow. Again, that information should be easy to come by, but I'd start with familiarising yourself with the process first before making things too complicated :-)

Posted: 7/8/2009 9:48 PM

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Toothache

Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Active player (276)

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What sanity? :-) Also it is possible to use an emulator and trade off to a cart, there are users who do this already for some of the much later frame requirements (like some spreads can require you to wait for 3 days after a reset, so an emulator helps there). Honestly, look at the Emerald thread, and if you need some specific help you can always come to the Smogon IRC channel. It seems a lot to take in at first, but once you get the hang of it it is really quite simple. There are programs to aid finding the right spread as well, so you dont have to scroll through huge spreadsheets any more.

Posted: 7/8/2009 9:37 PM

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Toothache

Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Active player (276)

Joined: 4/30/2009
Posts: 791

All you need to do is press A on a specific frame, for the most part. It isnt that hard to do at all, and it is extremely feasible for the real games. As a mod at Smogon, I'm privy to the ins and outs of the Emerald RNG, and it has been well known for quite some time the Emerald RNG was easy to manipulate, it has only been within the last half a year that the knowledge was discovered and then shared with the community at large. I'd be more than happy to assist you if you want to capture or breed your own shinies.

Posted: 7/8/2009 8:01 PM

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Toothache

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I care. Nice to see you took my suggestion on board, SS 7 looked especially great since that is usually a mad scramble for rings :-) Also, I agree with upthorn that it would be more efficient to grab the special stages as they come. Super Sonic probably wont save any time across Chemical Plant, so maybe a 5 or even 4 SS route across EHZ would be best, picking up 1 or 2 in CPZ, and perhaps the final one in ARZ. I think the only way to test how efficient Super Sonic would be is to start working from the start of CPZ with Super Sonic available and see how much time (if any) can be saved, and eliminate that from the 7 SS route. CPZ2 is probably the first point where SS can save significant time though.

Posted: 7/7/2009 9:50 PM

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Toothache

Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Active player (276)

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If my understanding of the random encounter avoidance process is correct, you cant avoid every single encounter, even with adjusting movement between walking and running, and the menu trick. Wouldnt it make more sense to make use of these unavoidable random encounters to build up Cloud's Limit Bar, assuming you can manipulate the enemies to get a surprise attack or two on Cloud for that purpose?

Posted: 7/6/2009 6:27 PM

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Toothache

Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Active player (276)

Joined: 4/30/2009
Posts: 791

Big vote of yes from me.

Posted: 7/6/2009 3:16 PM

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Toothache

Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Active player (276)

Joined: 4/30/2009
Posts: 791

There is a bonus of 50,000 points for collecting all the rings on a stage (I have done it myself, on EH1 at least.) I wonder what a TAS of an all-rings run would look like

Posted: 7/6/2009 7:05 AM

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Toothache

Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Active player (276)

Joined: 4/30/2009
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Rather than aiming to get all rings that come, you should also aim to get the exact amount required for the emerald. Say if the amount needed was 140, then aim for 70 for each of Sonic and Tails, should give you a much faster ring count-up at the end of the stage.

Posted: 7/4/2009 9:01 PM

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Toothache

Experienced Forum User, Published Author, Active player (276)

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Hmm, I got it to play entirely from the start to the end in FCEUX after conversion with no problem. I used FCEUX 2.1.1-interim The run itself looks great, and it is a huge improvement over the previous so I gave it a Yes vote.