Posts for FractalFusion

Posted: 10/3/2019 7:07 AM

FractalFusion

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merrp wrote:

- When do I get X Attacks, for Maxie/Norman?

Water is special type so you would get and use X Special, like you are already doing. I put stat stages for the physical types (for which you use X Attacks) in case it comes in handy for anything, but, looking at the strategy, it doesn't seem to be the case.

merrp wrote:

Also I'm not sure if I can get into Torrent range for the Admin fight *and* also have Maxie's Mightyena not knock me out first turn.

Oh, fair enough. Then replace "water gun (torrent)" with Mud Shot. It is also OHKO without crit and no Torrent is needed now. BTW, the crit tackle on Zubat requires some luck; it needs to be a 97%+ crit which is 1/64 chance.

Posted: 10/3/2019 2:59 AM

FractalFusion

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After analyzing the stats during battle as well as Water Gun / Mud Shot usage, I am pretty sure that it is better not to get Strength or Secret Power. Neither of them seem to achieve a whole lot (all they seem to do is turn three crits into non-crits (Edit: I mean Strength eliminates three messages, could be crit messages or super effective messages)). Also, if you skip the hiker in Rusturf Tunnel, you can do the whole thing post-Team Aqua without running out of PP. I'll post a custom encode using my Lua script with the stats pasted on as a reference when I get around to it. Edit: Link to video Here is the custom encode showing the stats of Mudkip/Marshtomp as well as all the enemy Pokemon. I also put down the damage values (before crit/stab/type) for various attacks, stat stages, and for physical types whether the badge stat boost is present. Note that despite the coloring, Mud-Slap will never get STAB (at least, during the time when it is normally used), whereas Mud Shot and Water Gun will always get STAB. I used this to make a Water Gun / Mud Shot PP count, and found that if you skip the Hiker in Rusturf Tunnel, you have just enough to use without needing to refresh PP or learn another move, after Team Aqua in Slateport:

Pokefan
Plusle: mudshot  1
Minun: mudshot  2

Pokefan
Minun: mudshot  3
Plusle: mudshot  4

Brendan
Slugma: mudshot  5
Grovyle: tackle/mudshot   6
Wingull: tackle

Triathlete
Magnemite: watergun  1

Psychic
Abra: tackle

Wally
Ralts: watergun   2

Youngster
Zigzagoon: watergun 3
Gulpin: mudshot  7

Wattson
Voltorb: mudshot  8
Electrike: mudshot  9
Magneton: mudshot  10
Manectric: mudshot  11

Hiker
Geodude: watergun  4
Numel: watergun  5

2x solrock: 2x watergun  7

(Hiker)
(Geodude: watergun)
(Geodude: watergun)
(Machop: watergun)

Magma
Numel: watergun     8   * (strength saves a message)
Zubat: watergun (torrent)  9

Magma Admin
Numel: watergun    10   * (strength saves a message)
Poochyena: watergun (torrent)  11
Zubat: crit tackle    * (strength saves a message)
Numel: watergun   12

Magma Leader
Mightyena: watergun (torrent)   13
Zubat: watergun (torrent)   14
Camerupt: watergun   15

Flannery
Numel: mudshot 13
Slugma: watergun 16
Camerupt: watergun 17
Torkoal: watergun 18

Cooltrainer
Swellow: 2x watergun  20

Cooltrainer
Spinda: tackle, mudshot  13

Cooltrainer
Zangoose: tackle, mudshot 14

Norman
Spinda: watergun  21
Vigoroth: watergun 22
Linoone: watergun 23
Slaking: 2x watergun 25

Posted: 9/28/2019 11:59 PM

FractalFusion

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merrp wrote:

Also, what exactly is going on in that part of the video? Is it faster to enter a map on fadeout?

The next area will not load until the music fades out (unless the next area's music is the same as what is currently playing). So getting off/on the bike to fade the music before actually getting there saves some time.

Posted: 9/28/2019 9:26 PM

FractalFusion

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Is there a way to reroute it so you don't have to go through Strength and the Hiker there? You can get HP Up (if you need it) by biking from Mauville City there and back, and from Meteor Falls you can bike back the way you came to get to Mt. Chimney. Something else to improve: When you get the bike, there is a way to manipulate the music to reduce fadeout delays when switching to a new area, such as this part in the published TAS.

Posted: 9/28/2019 6:53 AM

FractalFusion

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Hello merrp, Sorry, I'm so busy these days that I can barely find time to do anything regarding Pokemon Emerald. Regarding paths:

IIRC, it's a little faster to get closer to Brendan here.

You can talk to Mom from the left, which adds a "turn frame" but you take two less steps.

I think talking to Norman like this is faster.

You can avoid a turn frame in Granite Cave if you enter the first ladder as shown above.

Talking to the Pomeg Berry man from below saves a step. I also noticed a few places where you make a turn and then press A on the very next frame (like turning to talk to someone). IIRC it saves a frame to approach the trigger (for pressing A) head on instead of turning into it, whenever possible. It's very small though. Avoiding encounters on the bike: Taking a couple extra bike steps (by going back and forth) is better than slowing down/bonking, IIRC. That's what I did in my Pokemon Ruby TAS. Regarding strategies: - I hope you don't mind me discussing strategies. - I am aware of the two crit max Tackles on Grovyle since you did it in an earlier WIP. If it really is 1/256 chance for both, that's brutal :( If you can get at least the first crit Tackle, you can use Mud Shot for the second. How much does crit Mud Shot do? - I noticed you got Strength, but don't use it a whole lot, so I wonder if it's necessary to even take that route. I'm trying to figure out what it's for. It saves SE messages against Numel, but other than that, I'm not sure. Is it possible to replace the Strength on Slaking with a non-crit Water Gun? - Would it be faster to not do the double battle (last battle before ACE) and just fight them individually? There are a lot of things going against double battles vs two single battles; that came up in the Pokemon Gen 4 TASes and a lot of it applies to Pokemon Gen 3 as well. - Could you remind me why you need two extra Pokemon (other than Marshtomp and Abra)? If you did double corruption, would you be able to get away with one extra Pokemon instead of two? By the way, is it all right if you post the bk2 of your WIP, and the Lua script you used? I'm interested in knowing how it works.

Posted: 9/24/2019 6:01 AM

FractalFusion

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Warp wrote:

Suppose one hose can fill the container in 1 hour. Another hose can fill it in 4 hours. A third hose in 9 hours. A fourth hose in 16 hours, and so on and so forth (going through the square numbers). How long does it take to fill the container if you use this infinite amount of hoses all at the same time?

Well, we just get 1+1/4+1/9+1/16+... = pi²/6, the number of containers filled per hour. So to fill one container, it takes 6/pi² hours, or approximately 36.5 minutes.

Warp wrote:

Which reminds me of: What's the answer to the problem posed in xkcd #356?

According to explain xkcd, the question comes from a "Google Labs Aptitude Test" in 2004:

Randall explained in a speech at Google five days before this comic was released, that he was nerd sniped, in a way, by that problem in this test (see problem 10 on page 2), and got quite irritated when he ultimately found that it was actually a modern physics research problem, requiring very advanced math, far more complicated than the other puzzles.

The answer is 4/pi - 1/2, but unfortunately I cannot begin to explain to you how to get this value, even if I wanted to.

Posted: 9/18/2019 8:33 AM

FractalFusion

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I have some comments about your WIP (such as a couple more shorter paths and about battle strategies) but I have no time to talk about them right now. Maybe in a couple days.

Posted: 9/16/2019 2:53 AM

FractalFusion

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It's good that you don't have to wait at the teleporters now (not that I know how RNG works in this game). Only downside is now you hear 31.68s less of gameplay music.

Posted: 9/12/2019 3:31 AM

FractalFusion

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merrp wrote:

- Using an Elixir. This is what I originally did for the double corruption method, but you can't use an Elixir on an Egg.

Oh, too bad. Well, it was worth a try anyway. What does the Elixir even do when you use it on a move whose max PP is 0? Give you 1 out of 0 PP?

merrp wrote:

Not yet tried, probably a bad idea: - Performing a second corruption to corrupt the first move's PP to a nonzero value.

I don't think that is even possible. If I understand it correctly, corruption only affects the last (most significant) byte of each block of four bytes, and Move 1's PP is the first byte of a block of four. Edit: Is it not possible to use a Leppa Berry or Ether instead of Elixir?

Posted: 9/1/2019 5:11 PM

FractalFusion

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How about writing instruction code in the box names (the boxes where you store Pokemon), like in the Pokemon Crystal and Pokemon Silver TASes? I checked, and you can use the same characters as when naming Pokemon, and you get 8 characters per box name even on JP version. Though I'm not sure where it would be located in memory.

Posted: 8/31/2019 8:28 AM

FractalFusion

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merrp wrote:

Is there an optimal route drawn out somewhere?

For the two I mentioned, the way to go through optimally (which was not in your video) would be: ~18:04:

~33:23:

Also another two: ~12:53

~17:58

There are also similar paths that can be shortened at around 4:38, 8:09, 8:15, 18:09, 18:17, 18:54 and 33:25. Other things: - IIRC, at 6:35, it is faster to talk to Norman on his right (player facing left). It's in the published TAS. - Once you get the bike, it is possible to take advantage of sound fadeouts to reduce the length of some screen transitions. Also in the published TAS. Edit: Another thought. Is it possible to set up ACE by writing instruction code in held mail instead of in the nicknames of a lot of Poochyena?

Posted: 8/30/2019 8:03 AM

FractalFusion

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Hm, interesting run. Some comments: - It seems like you take longer paths in Granite Cave (~18:04) and after leaving Mauville Gym (~33:23) here. - You mentioned saving frames (waiting for Wally tutorial Ralts) by waiting in the Youngster battle, so it scrolls at 2 RNG cycles per frame. I think you can scroll it faster by running near the spinner at ~6:22 and in the grass, so it scrolls at least 2 cycles per frame from rerolling the spinner duration every frame, and you get free grass rolls (and possibly others). - If I understand the data corruption correctly, you are setting up 0x10 HP EVs and 0x31 Attack EVs so you can make the game think you have the move 0x3110 when you corrupt the PID. Would Pokerus be helpful here, to cut down on the extra fights (and maybe collect less Protein)? Pokerus check occurs after every battle (regardless of result) and you just need RNG value of 4000xxxx/8000xxxx/C000xxxx , though it might be hard to find. - Is double corruption necessary? Would it be possible just by corrupting PID instead of both PID and TID? (Bad eggs can still use moves, and move #1 is not affected by the changed PID.) - Have you considered whether other forms of data corruption are possible to get move 0x3110? Looking at the data substructures seems to indicate that it is possible to have an experience of 0x3110 and turn it into move #3 using corruption.

Posted: 8/30/2019 2:26 AM

FractalFusion

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0xCFE3 would be in System Bus. You can also access it from WRAM using 0x0FE3. System Bus 0xC000-0xDFFF corresponds to WRAM 0x0000-0x1FFF. Edit: The top number is the size of the region. E.g. WRAM size is 0x2000; System Bus size is 0x10000. Edit 2: Oh, I forgot you were talking about GBC, not GB. In that case WRAM has size 0x8000; there are 4 different 0x2000 banks in WRAM. At any given time, one of them is loaded in System Bus 0xC000-0xDFFF.

Posted: 8/27/2019 3:53 AM

FractalFusion

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nighthowl589 already translated it in the Youtube video's comments.

Posted: 8/22/2019 6:16 AM

FractalFusion

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Hello merrp. I have a few comments about your WIP. - Your video seems to indicate that the RNG value is always seeded at 0 and goes through the formula: seed × [41C64E6D] + [6073] without being reseeded at any point in this TAS. Is that true in Pokemon Emerald? I haven't done Emerald for a while so I may be confusing it with Ruby/Sapphire/Fire Red/Leaf Green. - What is the Lua script you are using? Do you have a way to indicate things like critical hits? - 2:15: It is faster to talk to the girl instead of walking up beside her. (It might not matter because of the delays.) - 5:20: IIRC it is faster to walk over and talk to Mom to get the running shoes. - You definitely have to beat Brawly to activate Norman's gym. (Unless you mean to say that Norman's gym is skippable all together in this exploit.) I'll say more if anything else comes to mind.

Posted: 8/20/2019 5:58 AM

FractalFusion

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Hello MUGG. I don't know how much Japanese you are intending to learn, but I'll make a few notes as far as how I understand Japanese (keep in mind that I am not a native speaker of Japanese). I don't watch One Piece, so I don't know what the context is behind these sentences.

MUGG wrote:

desu = It is

Desu (です) doesn't always mean "(it) is". It is true that desu can be used as a polite replacement for da (だ) (both which approximately mean "(it) is"), but unlike all other forms of the copula da/desu, desu can also be used as a polite marker in general (e.g. atsui desu (暑いです) "(it) is hot", shinai desu (しないです) "(I) don't do"), in which case it doesn't replace anything.

MUGG wrote:

mō = more

Only when it comes before a noun denoting a small quantity, or a count word; otherwise it means "already" or (when negative) "anymore".

MUGG wrote:

Shōrai = in the future

The difference between shōrai (将来) and mirai (未来), both which you have probably heard and both which mean future, is that shōrai refers to future prospects or something anticipated in the near future (which is what the example you gave does), whereas mirai is more general and often refers to the unknown.

MUGG wrote:

na = not

Only when it follows a verb in its base form (like how unaru (唸る) is).

MUGG wrote:

Bushi no haji ... This isn't becoming of a samurai.

I don't know the context, but I don't expect "isn't becoming" or "unbecoming" as a translation for haji (恥), as opposed to something like "shameful" or "disgraceful". In English, "unbecoming" means something slightly different (more like "inappropriate").

Posted: 8/8/2019 5:03 AM

FractalFusion

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Warp wrote:

blackpenredpen recently dealt in a youtube video with what could be considered a challenge. He first gave a simplified version of the challenge: 1/(3*4) + (1*2)/(3*4*5) + (1*2*3)/(3*4*5*6) + (1*2*3*4)/(3*4*5*6*7) + ... = ? Then he gave the original challenge, which was: 17/(75*76) + (17*18)/(75*76*77) + (17*18*19)/(75*76*77*78) + (17*18*19*20)/(75*76*77*78*79) + ... = ?

Telescoping sums is the way to go, for this and similar questions. However, there is a way to do the original challenge (and the simplified version) that is better than in the blackpenredpen video. The way he does it, he uses partial fractions to rewrite 1/(n*(n+1)*(n+2)) as (1/2)[1/n - 2/(n+1) + 1/(n+2)], for which the terms cancel by telescoping sums. While this is very useful in general, you would not want to do this on the original challenge, which has 59 fractions! The key is to note that each term has consecutive numbers multiplied together in the denominator. Thus we only need to decompose 2/(n*(n+1)*(n+2)) = 1/(n*(n+1)) - 1/((n+1)*(n+2)), which telescopes. So on the simplified version, we would have: 1/(3*4) + (1*2)/(3*4*5) + (1*2*3)/(3*4*5*6) + (1*2*3*4)/(3*4*5*6*7) + ... = 2/(2*3*4) + 2/(3*4*5) + 2/(4*5*6) + ... = 1/(2*3) - 1/(3*4) + 1/(3*4) - 1/(4*5) + ... = 1/6. This can be applied to the original challenge as well: 17/(75*76) + (17*18)/(75*76*77) + (17*18*19)/(75*76*77*78) + (17*18*19*20)/(75*76*77*78*79) + ... = (17*18*...*74)[1/(18*19*...*76) + 1/(19*20*...*77) + ... ] = (17*18*...*74)(1/58)[1/(18*19*...*75) - 1/(19*20*...*76) + 1/(19*20*...*76) - 1/(20*21*...*77) + ...] = (17*18*...*74)(1/58)[1/(18*19*...*75)] = 17/(58*75) = 17/4350, which is way faster than trying to find a 59-fraction partial fraction decomposition.

Posted: 7/25/2019 11:34 PM

FractalFusion

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NxCy wrote:

A plane has 100 seats, numbered from 1 to 100. The 100 passengers board the plane in numerical order, i.e. the passenger whose seat is number 1 boards first, then the passenger whose seat is number 2 boards the plane and so on. The first passenger chooses a seat at random and sits there. For all the remaining passengers, if their seat is not taken, they take their own seat, otherwise they choose a seat at random from the remaining vacant seats. What is the probability that the final passenger sits in his own seat?

For this problem, it's not too hard to find the answer. The answer is 1/2, as follows: At some point, someone other than the last person will choose either seat 1 or 100. If seat 100 is chosen, then the last person does not take their own seat. Otherwise, if seat 1 is chosen by the kth (possibly 1st) passenger, then there is some sequence (possibly of length 1 or 2) where person 1 sits in seat i1, whose person sits in seat i2, ..., whose person sits in seat k, whose person sits in seat 1, and all intervening seats are filled with their corresponding passengers. In that case, the remaining passengers take their seats, and so the last person takes their own seat. Since seats 1 and 100 when open can be chosen with equal probability at all stages, then the answer is 1/2.

Posted: 7/22/2019 8:26 AM

FractalFusion

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So the game wasn't broken enough the first time around. Now we have game-breaking glitches leading to more game-breaking glitches. Nice improvement by the way.

Posted: 7/22/2019 8:19 AM

FractalFusion

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Challenger wrote:

Actually it's Gravity Man's stage music in this game.

Yeah, I figured that's what they were trying for. Though personally it sounds really off even from Gravity Man's MM5 stage music, which is why I didn't say it earlier.

Posted: 7/18/2019 8:16 PM

FractalFusion

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Link to video More interesting than I expected. It has a weird Rush Coil glitch and also Quick Man's stage as well (complete with lasers). Strangely enough, Wave Man's stage music in this game doesn't sound anything like Wave Man's stage music in MM5.

Posted: 6/4/2019 6:53 AM

FractalFusion

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Encode: Link to video

Posted: 6/2/2019 7:45 AM

FractalFusion

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I've heard of this game before (mainly from Youtubers willing to suffer through it). Some level solutions are pretty interesting but for a TAS it's no problem. I noticed that this game is on the libTAS non-compatibility list, yet you were able to run this in libTAS. Even though the only version available is the Steam version, you were able to add a file to trick it into not connecting with Steam. Do you know if it is possible to use this trick to run other Steam games in libTAS?

Posted: 6/2/2019 6:43 AM

FractalFusion

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Nice! I didn't expect this much of an improvement over the other TASes. Anyway, I made a 4-way comparison of Pitfall TASes on TASVideos: Link to video The four TASes are: - Top left: This submission - Bottom left: Lobsterzelda's first Pitfall submission - Top right: pozzum's perfect Pitfall (no deaths, 114000 pts) - Bottom right: My any% TAS from 2012 I also included a display showing the current room number as well as treasures collected and the room number of the next treasure. By the way, video dumping seems to be wrong for Atari 2600. I noticed while encoding that even though this submission is 65388 frames (ending at the last jump), the last jump in the raw video dump ends at 65303 instead, as if the video started at 60fps and was converted to 59.923fps, instead of starting at 59.923fps in the first place (I assume 59.923fps is supposed to be the correct framerate for Atari 2600).

Posted: 6/1/2019 8:12 AM

FractalFusion

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p4wn3r wrote:

A category consists of a collection of objects, and for each pair of objects, a set of morphisms between them.

I never really understood what category theory is supposed to be. Isn't a morphism just a "function", and an object just a "set"? Now I suppose the difference is that a function is a map from a set to another, whereas object and morphism are mathematical things that no one can make any assumptions about; the morphisms from A to B are literally defined by the elements comprising Mor(A,B) and nothing else. OK, I oversimplified a bit. There are some rules you have to follow, and p4wn3r already described them above. Also, composition has to be associative. I'll give this question a try. So consider the morphisms from A to A, defined solely by the elements comprising Mor(A,A). I'm assuming that a morphism f in Mor(A,A) is invertible if there exists a morphism h in Mor(A,A) such that h◦f=f◦h=id_A; h is unique and denoted f^-1. So to show that invertible morphisms form a group, three of the properties are automatically satisfied (associativity, identity, invertibility) so all we need is to show closure. If f and g are invertible, then so is g◦f, since (g◦f)◦(f^-1◦g^-1) = g◦(f◦f^-1)◦g^-1 = g◦id_A◦g^-1 = g◦g^-1 = id_A and the other way around, likewise. So invertible morphisms of Mor(A,A) form a group denoted Aut(A). Now consider isomorphic objects A and B; that is, there exists h in Mor(A,B) such that there exists some g in Mor(B,A) with g◦h=id_A and h◦g=id_B; g is unique and denoted h^-1. ("Isomorphic" here has no meaning beyond this; objects A and B are just objects with no further specifications.) Let f be an invertible morphism in Mor(A,A), and consider h◦f◦h^-1. By the property of composition, this is a morphism of Mor(B,B). Is it invertible? It sure is, since h◦f^-1◦h^-1 is also a morphism in Mor(B,B), and h◦f◦h^-1◦h◦f^-1◦h^-1 works out to id_B (and the other way around, likewise). So h◦f◦h^-1 is an invertible morphism in Mor(B,B). Now that we have that, we now define the function α: Aut(A)→Aut(B), α(f)=h◦f◦h^-1. We will prove that α is a group isomorphism (we are now getting back into the more familiar notion of isomorphism). First, α is one-to-one, since if α(f) = α(g), then h◦f◦h^-1 = h◦g◦h^-1, and by left composing by h^-1 and right composing by h, we get f=g. Second, α is onto, since for any morphism g in Aut(B), h^-1◦g◦h is in Aut(A) (for similar reasons as to why h◦f◦h^-1 is in Aut(B)), and α(h^-1◦g◦h) = h◦h^-1◦g◦h◦h^-1 = g. Finally, α is a homomorphism, since α(g◦f) = h◦g◦f◦h^-1 = h◦g◦h^-1◦h◦f◦h^-1 = α(g)◦α(f). Therefore, α is a group isomorphism, and so Aut(A) and Aut(B) are isomorphic as groups. ... OK, that did feel like a lot of "abstract nonsense". Yet it feels like something I went through over and over during my university studies.