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I'm just going to throw out some ideas.
Out of curiosity, can you transfer this momentum outside of the castle? Possibly by saving and quitting or something similar?
I assume it was already confirmed that the momentum can't be regained after grabbing a star. Perhaps BLJ into a chuckya and preserve momentum after being thrown (probably not useful.) Maybe BLJ into a painting of a world we normally can't get good speed in and be able to preserve it. Hyperspeed in BoB exit, out into WF, preserve momentum into WF stage?
Through keydoors?
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Great find. Unfortunately it doesn't appear to be faster.
Kill dragon, make peace, kill serpent, go straight to belaine, prisoner gives rune
Telaine king + Belaine prison as compared to Padal prosa + Telaine prosa
We also need B Agility and B Protect in Padal. Unfortunately the current route seems best.
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I really think this run should be done on the SNES version.
If I recall correctly there is boss mode and a 100 round mode. (actually endless, but could be defined as ending at round 100). It's been a long time since I've played though.
Doing combos in vs (boss) mode can place horizontal or vertical rows of enemies on your opponents and lower the ceiling. You have to get completely crushed to lose, not quite like Tetris.
From GameFAQs - On the SNES game, highlight 'VS' and press Left + Start to access the hardest mode.
I think a SNES boss mode run on hardest mode would probably make the best run.
I also think the music is better on the SNES version. =p
EDIT: They might ruin the music in boss mode on the hardest difficulty. =/
Sample Gameplay in SNES boss mode.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MSCP1NV3D70&feature=related
One more thing. Regardless of NES/SNES it seems to me like it would be strategic to pump the down button at specific frames while doing other actions, or in between actions in order to make bombs fall faster. This would surely speed up Bisqwit's WIP if it works. It may very well not work though.
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Kyrsimys wrote:
So the goal is to reach 1000 in-game hours? I'd rather see the goal being achieving the maximum score, 1000 in-game hours is pretty damn arbitrary.
I personally think maximum time is a better goal for this particular movie.
EDIT: currently about 1/250th of the way through the submission, and it looks optimized so far.
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Synx, most users only post when there is new information relevant to the run.
This run will not be done for months, you may not see another update for weeks or over a month. (MrGrunz just happens to bring a lot to discuss recently in the Majoras Mask thread.)
Feel absolutely free to follow discussion, comment on discussion, ask questions, or provide your own discussions, but asking for progress and bumping are somewhat frowned upon (and annoying to read through) unless there hasn't been discussion in weeks.
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I would start out by saying that much of the direction of the site takes has to do with the community, and I am somewhat disappointed with the community in the way this incident has derailed.
I will start by addressing mz's comments, and I will conclude with some statements about the status of this community right now.
mz wrote:
-Elitist judging system [.......] And let's not talk about waiting 65 months to see a run accepted
The judging system has to have standards. Judges need to thoroughly review movies and make sure the adhere to what this site stands for. I would always hope that the site represents the best in tool assisted videos. If someone used a hack or modified an .avi to beat it faster than possible, and we called this a TAS, we would be sorely mistaken, and this would take away from our site image. We would appear to be hacking games as opposed to speedrunning them perfectly. There must be standards in place to uphold the quality of the site.
mz wrote:
-Bisqwit. I think he'd rather have another MTV interview for himself instead of having a community the size of YouTube.
This is completely inaccurate, it is quite obvious with the way Bisqwit conducts himself that he is not in this for fame.
mz wrote:
Thanks to this we only have published TASes for the most popular games, the encodes for more complex systems take years to appear on the website
Sometimes movies are published based on demand. This is due to the community. The encodes for more complex systems are much harder for the encoders to produce well. Punky Skunk for example has problems with audio synchronization. The game files are also much larger and much harder to come by. It is also much harder and much more unfamiliar for the encoders to encode much complex systems. This is why this problem occurs. It has been stated that we could use more quality encoders who can publish movies that adhere to the site guidelines for the more difficult systems.
mz wrote:
the website is more static than most 1998 FrontPage sites, the community is completely separated from the real website (forum/real website... Most new people don't even know there are so many people behind those TASes), our TASes a lot of times receive more comments on sites like YouTube instead of ours, because it's much harder for a newbie to leave comments here, etc etc.
I can see what you mean by this. It isn't terrible the way it is now, but it could definitely be better. This is a legitimate claim. You should offer some constructive criticism instead of insulting the work people have put into it.
mz wrote:
I've been personally annoyed by him: it took him more than a year to accept PCSX or at least show interest, he doesn't want to accept runs with hacks in them (like that finished Resident Evil 3 TAS or Metal Gear Solid...)
Bisqwit doesn't keep up with what is going on at the site too much lately. He has gone so far as to state that he wants the community to begin to take hold of the site and continue development so he becomes less required. The runs with hacks brings up a huge issue of verification. It has to be made sure that the game runs as close as it can to how it would on the actual console. This site does not 'use hacks to speedrun', so some standards must be created, and very possibly this took longer than it should have. I don't know the entire history of the incidence, but Bisqwit doesn't read every thread so it is very possible that many things were not directly brought to his attention.
mz wrote:
And he should be the one making the changes needed by this community to be more alive, and not just this elitist soon to be dead thing
It isn't really Bisqwit's responsibility to progress this community. The amount of time Bisqwit has already devoted to the progression of this site is astronomical. He has stated he wants less to do with the site in the future. I find it quite ridiculous that you would so blatantly insult the individual who has created and raised this community. You may have issues with the current condition of this website, and you may have problems with Bisqwit's standards, but I find it outrageous that you would insult him as an individual. Bisqwit tries to enforce reasonable and reliable standards for the community to abide by. If the entire community made a movement to adjust Bisqwit's standards, I'm sure he would comply. I'm sure that everyone who frequents these forums is thankful that the community Bisqwit created is still here today, regardless of policy.
To conclude.
mz, everyone here recognizes and respects that you are the main reason we currently have PSX TASes on the workbench. You had to jump a few hurdles, and I'm sure it was frustrating to have an emulator you considered fully functional so highly critiqued by the site requirements. Some of your claims have legitimacy, but it would benefit discussion more if you could state them more objectively without frustration. Constructive criticism will produce a better site. Flaming leads to flaming (as we've just witnessed), constructive criticism often leads to constructive solutions. Can we all at least turn this discussion into constructive criticism.
What I'm clearly hearing is the following
1: We are short on quality encoders.
2: We are short on active judges.
3: We are short on people who develop and improve the site.
Part of your solution seems to be to lower the standards. I don't think this is the mentality we want the site to begin to take.
We definitely need more people to do all these things. It is not the current 'staff's responsibility to do these things. They all volunteer, you can't ask a time requirement out of them. It is easily obvious that we need more active volunteers to contribute to the site if we want to fix these problems. That falls on the community as a whole.
This community definitely needs to begin to take some direction in progressing towards the future and squabbling amongst ourselves does not improve things.
I can't honestly see how it could be beneficial to flame someone who has put so much work into an emulator for this site. Could we at least try to maintain some tact amongst the people who make significant contributions to the website.
I was sorry to see this discussion derail so poorly. I had hoped the community would have worked through this incident a bit more maturely. This is why I posted.
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Great run from beginning to end. It definitely appears you were thorough with saving the occasional frame. 4 minutes is quite an impressive improvement.
Many thanks to ShinyDoofy (and anyone else if I don't recall) for the periodic encodes.
9.2/9.7
These new finds are really nice. For a while I was afraid I was going to be bored by an epic amount of repetitive bomb hovers. MrGrunz's OoB skips keep getting better.
How extensively will a 2/3 gain on explosives help the rupee route and amount of bomb shop trips?
I'm really excited to see all of this in action some day.
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I watched some of the movie. It was about as expected. No runs on this site should ever be done at 49%. They should all be done in frame advance to produce optimal results.
That being said, this run provides a sample run to gauge what a well run TAS of this may look like. Making progress is one step closer to getting this run published.
I have interest in doing this game in the future. I would definitely emphasize the idea that the run should probably be done on the NES version primarily because of the L+R glitch (Demonstration in threads below). If anyone wants to work on this run I'd be happy to collaborate.
Relevant Ys 3 Topics:
http://tasvideos.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=4763http://tasvideos.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=3866http://tasvideos.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2081
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I am going to update this post with new information I find during my quick run through with Lux/Lejes this week.
I will test fighting that trick later. It seems fairly important to be able to kill it to have money early game if at all possible. It would replace an apprentice battle.
Valsu should be the apprentice, he can be killed with B Power, defend, attack, attack. It does not look feasible to kill him without a B Power unless we can defend, crit, defend crit. No B Protect needed though.
The ring in Pandam isn't far off track (6k)
The Ice cloak is exactly 20 steps off the path both ways (5k)
(640 frames + x)
The Telaine treasure room (15s away from the Moon Rune) has 8400 gold in 3 items and an M Water and a few potion 2's (probably not necessary) on top of that.
EDIT:
Lejes is most certainly the character we want to main. Lux and Olvan are literally unable to survive Gorsia's double hit magic spells at the level required. Strategic F. Shield and M Water is the only way to survive until he runs out of magic. We need 9 potn 3's and at least 3 M Waters to guarantee we can win.
The threshold level is around Lux = 23 which requires around 25 S Brains. Hopefully that amount of grinding won't take longer than 15 minutes. I really don't think it should. One short battle takes around 1200 frames = 20 seconds or so.
I don't recall if I mentioned that the new plan is to stock up on 9 vacuums in Tiffana 2-3 times. There are S Brains around Luze and S Brains around Brush. I'm not sure how close the ones around Brush extend towards Bilthem.
We HAVE to be level 21 to steal gear, perhaps this is the minimum level threshold. Olvan = 32600, Kamil = 26200, Lejes = 14260, Valsu = 14260, Esuna = 19350. This is 92410 if we steal from everyone but Valsu. This puts us quite close to the needed 129k.
EDIT2: Old Test Run up to Wind Rune (pretty much)
http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/1478841859/7th%20Saga%2C%20Lux%20-%20Brantu.smv
Huge long Post of Route (Will make into a new post when complete.)
Lemele-
(Manipulate Wilme to Bonro Weapon Shop)
Start - (30 XP, 200 Gold)
Collect: Lemele Castle Opal, Mirror
Collect: Potion1 in town
Purchase 2xB Power (0 Gold)
Rablesk-
Collect: Potion1
Save at inn
Castle Aran-
Collect: Opal
Die (Must set trick first attack to petrify here.)
Rablesk-
Collect: Pr Seed
Collect: Whistle
Sell: 2x Opal
Buy: B Protect, 3x Potion1
Gold = 40
Castle Aran-
Whistle Romus (Level: 3)
Collect: Power Seed (All seeds given to Lux shortly after collection.)
Cave of Earth-
Collect: A Seed
Kill Trick, get Emerald drop (Costs 1xMirror, 1xB Power) (Level: 4)
Kill Pison (Costs 5x Potn1, 1 B Power, 1 B Protect)(Level: 5)
Bonro-
Gain's House
House of Healing
Tavern
Weapon/Armor Shop
Recruit Wilme
House by Dock
Gain's House
Collect: Map
Zellis-
Recruit Brantu in Inn
Melenam Cave-
Collect: Wind Rune
Enter Melenam-
Wind Rune Rablesk-
Sell: Emerald
Sell: Coat
Purchase: 2x B Protect (200)
Wind Rune Lemele-
Purchase: 5x B Power (500)
Purchase: 9x Potn2 (900)
Purchase: 5x Potn1 (100)(More or less)
(Be sure to use ALL of these vs Red Pison)
Wind Rune Melenam-
Exit out other side.
Cave-
Kill Red Pison (Use all potions)(Level 8)
(Costs 2 B Power, 2 B Protect, All Potions.)
Let Wilme Die
Collect: M Water
Eygus-
Set Valsu (Lv. 13) to Patrof as Sage moves.
Pell-
Step in and out of town.
Guntz-
Collect: P Seed
Talk to elder (Max-1) times.
Wind Rune to Pell-
Recruit Digger Quose in Tavern.
Wind Rune to Guntz-
Collect: Water Rune
Patrof-
Enter Dungeon
Patrof Dungeon-
Collect: A Seed
Collect: Pr Seed
Collect: Recovery
Patrof Castle-
Fight Valsu
(Use 1 B Power, 2 remaining)
Wind Rune to Entrance
Bone-
Recruit Perole
Collect: A Seed
Wind Rune Bonro-
Boat to Pandam
Pandam-
Wind Rune to Entrance
Exit
Brush-
Enter/Exit
Tiffana-
Purchase 9 Vacuums
Wind Rune to Brush-
Engage and Vacuum 9 S Brains while walking towards Bilthem
(Level = 15)
Walk the other 1/2 of the path to Bilthem, Enter town
Wind Rune to Tiffana-
Purchase 9 Vacuums
Wind Rune to Tiffana/Brush-
Engage and Vacuum 9 S Brains while walking around Tiffana/Brush
(Level = 18)
Wind Rune to Tiffana- (Takes as much time as if we walked into town.)
Purchase 9 Vacuums
Purchase 1 M Water
Wind Rune to Tiffana/Brush-
Engage and Vacuum 9 S Brains while walking around Tiffana/Brush
(Level = 20)
Wind Rune to Pell-
Kill 2x Brain (Manipulate 2x Recovery)
Kill 2x Brain (Manipulate 2x Recovery)
*Apprentice Responses Change* (Esuna?/Kamil/Olvan = Join)
Kill 2x Brain (Manipulate 2x Recovery)
(Level = 21)
Somewhere before Serpent
-------
Can Recruit Esuna (Lv. 22)*
Can Bonro Weapon/Armor Shop*
Can Steal Esuna's Gear*
Recruit Kamil (Lv. 22)
-------
Wind Rune to Pandam-
Collect:Ring
Wind Rune to Entrance
Padal-
Purchase: 8 B Agility (to hold spot in inventory later?)
Purchase: 7 Potion2
Purchase: 8 B Protect
Collect: Recovery (Check which first)
Activate Prosa (Say no.) (Check which first)
Wind Rune to Tiffana-
Exit
Baran Castle-
Collect: Potion2
Collect: Recovery
Collect: Ice Cloak
Kill Serpent (Costs 2 B Power.)
(Let Kamil Die.)
M Water Kamil
Collect: Sapphire
Wind Rune to Padal-
Exit
Telaine-
Walk to Prosa (Around the left?)
Collect: Moon Rune
Wind Rune to entrance
Cave of Beore-
Exit to Luze
Luze-
Kill Dragon (No items)
(Do not check pedestal)
Sky Rune must be in Olvan or Esuna's* possession.
-------
Can Bonro Weapon/Armor Shop*
Can Recruit Esuna (Lv. 22)*
Can Steal Esuna's Gear*
Recruit Olvan (Lv. 22)
Collect: Sky Rune
-------
Wind Rune to Bilthem-
Collect: Exigate
Doros Castle-
Collect: Amulet
Collect: Star
Collect: V Seed
Collect: Potn2
Collect: M Water
Collect: Harp
Kill Doros
(Costs 4-5 Potn2, 2 B Agility)
(Let Olvan Die.)
M Water Olvan
Wind Rune Brush-
Fortune Teller Rarsa (100 G)
Brantu - Flying Machine
Valenca -
Exit
Cave of Kapel -
(Loss of Magic)
Exit
Guanta -
Enter/Exit
Cave of Silence -
Collect: M Water
Kill M Pison (costs nothing)
(Let Olvan Die.)
Collect: Moonlight
Exigate
M Water Olvan
Recruit Lejes
Wind Rune Guanta-
Exit
Gorfun-
Kill Monmo (Minimal Cost, lots of time.)
Kill Gariso (Costs: 2 B Agility, 4-5 Potn 2)
Pharano-
Collect: Emerald
Collect: Recovery
Purchase: 8 B Power
Purchase: Max Potion 2
Purchase: Max Potion 3
Ligena:
(Manipulate Airship)
Melenam:
Get Lux a tuneup
Exit
Palsu:
Sell: Lejes’s Gear
Sell: Emerald
Purchase: Max Gear minus Kryn (129k)
Melenam:
Tour Lab
Talk to one person on the way out.
Exit/Reenter Town
Kill Foma (costs 2-3 Potn3)
Airship:
Purchase: Max Potn3
Purchase: 4 B Agility
Purchase: 3 M Water
Collect: Agility Seed
Barrier Cave:
Kill Goron
Kill Griffan
Talk to Saro
Death Warp (lose half gold)
Airship:
Purchase Max Potion 3
Village: Collect Runes
Gorfun:
Kill Gorsia
Sometime after vacuuming S Brains:
Wind Rune Bonro- (tested more optimal than purchasing earlier because of item scrolling for vacuums)
Purchase: (For Gear Steals) FireAx (70) x2 + PetrST (180) + PsyteAR (700) x2 + SilkRB (800) + XtriSH (70) x2 + scarf (1200)
After M Pison
*Apprentice Responses Change* (Esuna?/Lejes = Join)
List of shops we will make purchases at: Lemele, Rablesk, Rablesk, Lemele, Tiffana, Tiffana, Tiffana, Padal, Bonro (weapon/armor), Pharano, Palsu (Weapon/Armor Shop), Airship (Post Foma), Airship (Post Griffan)
Nitrodon - "location changes occur every 4-11 battles (uniformly randomly) plus twice throughout the game Eygus and Pandam/Dowaine depending on character (and possibly North Tower, I haven't checked that)" Value at 5121
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Nitrodon and I had a fairly lengthy discussion regarding the money issue.
To beat Gorsia with Lux/Olvan required approximately level 25 and 165k gold. I will soon test the possibility of beating Gorsia with Lux/Lejes. It requires approximately 129k. This is assuming max gear minus Lux's weapon purchase in both cases.
The reason Lejes may be more useful than Olvan is because the Immo robe gives an extra 20% magic resistance which is the main killer late game.
We need to brainstorm how to get money. After Griffan with the current route (including about 35 S Brains to get to level 26 estimated.) we have only 45,000 gold.
Good sources of money include tricks (all types.) After Pison it is speculated that we may be able to kill the trick at level 4 with a mirror, which would result in 5k gold (emerald) off the start for all early game B Powers/B Protects. We should be overleveled enough after S Brains to kill all king tricks after that segment (It may require a B Power, not sure.) They can drop emeralds. (5k) Looting the treasure room in Telaine should net a fair amount of money. In Gariso's castle is a FortSW which sells for 12.5k. Olvan and Kamil can be recruited at any point in order to steal their gear. We would need to purchase weak gear to replace it with. Olvan's gear at level 22 actually sells for about 30k, so this is highly useful. Perhaps we could recruit Olvan, recruit Kamil, and then recruit Lejes and be well on our way.
I'm thinking a mid-game trip to Lemele/Rablesk/Bonro/Zellis weapon/armor shops will be necessary to purchase this gear. We could restock on B Powers/B Protects before Red Pison anyway. Wind rune from Melenam wouldn't waste much time.
I'm thinking in our run we should be liberal with item choices while shopping if necessary. We should minimize the number of shopping trips, but we should forget about optimal points to purchase things early to save a few frames of item selections where the amount needed in the future is unknown. I think that is a corner that needs to be cut to minimize the amount of extra items purchased.
Recoveries may be necessary late game. I'm thinking we would need max potion 3, max potion 2, and a number of recoveries in order to beat Goron/Griffan/Gorsia in one trip. Otherwise we would have to talk to Saro, die, buy stuff at the airship and walk back. This may only take 2 minutes though. Collecting 9 recoveries would take about 5 Brain fights and a bunch of sidetracking throughout the game. It may be best to do max potion 3 and make an extra trip back to the airship. This is probably highly worth accurately testing later.
Nitrodon also mentioned recruiting the apprentice after being cursed, thank you for making sure it was brought up though, I was not aware of it earlier.
Next step: See if Lux/Lejes is more capable, if for only the reason of being cheaper.
EDIT: Those items in the post below were mentioned, but the Amulet will be in use by Lejes
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7th Saga seems pretty linear, honestly. The battle entry and fighting has to be brute forced as well as the stats upon leveling, but at the end of the day we can just level up one extra time if we don't quite make the stat cut. The routing is fairly straightforward once you work on it for a while.
Anyone have any input on Secret of Mana in this regard?
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A no damage run wouldn't really be that entertaining compared to a regular speedrun. In the case where it provides more of a challenge or more entertainment it is ok, but I don't think it is a good goal for this game.
Almost surely the NES version would want to be run because of the L+R glitch.
http://tasvideos.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=4763
This game is actually on my to do list in the future probably after I/we finish 7th Saga in a few months. I would be willing to collaborate though if you wanted.
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eternaljwh wrote:
Does Remote Control-boy hand it o'er if Lux is dead, or is that the event that doesn't care? Going that way might be required to get quick Sky...but I'm just brainstorming.
I was informed that you can't get past Bone until you get both the Water Rune and the Star Rune. I can double check this later.
If Lux is dead the partner will get the remote control. Pandam appears to me to be the better starting position than Dowaine, in which case keeping Lux alive is better. Dowaine seems quite far out of the way, I will check this later when it is more pertinent.
This route requires Bone -> Bonro -> Pandam -> Bilthem -> Brush and Pandam -> Telaine routing.
(Pandam->Bilthem and Pandam->Brush may be slightly faster, haven't tested.)
The other route requires Bone->Cave of Milto->Dowaine->Telaine, Telaine to Bilthem, and Bilthem to Brush walks.
(Luze is assumed from Telaine, Padal from Telaine, and Serpent Tower from Brush in both cases.)
In other news, I'm looking into beating Monmo without magic (B Fires perhaps?, really depends how overleveled we are I guess.), it eliminates the need to talk to anyone in Guanta. We get magic back upon reaching the past in this case. The game froze on me once using the moonlight against gariso having no magic, I'm not sure if it was a game glitch or an emulator glitch. It worked the remaining times though.
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Oh god, more runs need ridiculous techno.
Pretty action packed run. Short and fast paced, with very quick movements. Not sure how optimal the movement was (I'm not too familiar with the game mechanics), but it looked pretty good.
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Definitely a worthy submission. The early portion of the run was extremely engaging. It seemed like you put a substantial focus on entertainment at the beginning. Boomer Kuwanger was a great level to watch.
Up through Boomer Kuwanger I thought the run was awesome. Afterwards I felt you missed entertainment potential more often. There was nothing bad by any stretch, I just had higher expectations after the first few levels were so stylistically well done.
There were many great entertainment choices, but there was definitely possibility for many more. I feel like weapons could have been used extremely creatively. The run was seriously high quality, I just saw the potential for greatness.
I understand you put a lot of time into learning the game mechanics. I also understand lag was an issue, so I'm sure it was difficult to keep the run entertaining while working for frame perfection.
9/9.2
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I did some fairly serious work on this game before dropping it.
This run is not too bad, but it is far from optimal.
Spindizzy is a much more advanced level structure, the run is far more interesting, but much more lengthy. There are 23 levels on the hardest difficulty. I would estimate a completed run to be about 25-30 minutes.
Getting on the rail in Gargoyle would save time. Corners aren't turned as tightly as they can be much of the time. You can get going pretty ridiculous speeds and still maintain a fair amount of control under TAS conditions.
You should always weave out as far as possible before turning a corner, because it takes time to begin to accelerate in the new direction.
The run is not really tightly optimized and I believe there are multiple level paths which could have been done better.
Here is 10.5 Levels of my run, which is not tightly optimized, but I believe the quality is significantly better than this run.
The first couple levels aren't too well done in my run.
http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/482693612/Half%20Pyramidia.smv
If there was interest for this run I would resume work on it.
If you are interested in improving this, please feel free to contact me.
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I just tested about every variation I could think of for the Sky Rune. Lux with Wilme as a partner, no matter what level they are always appear to always get the Sky Rune stolen. Fortunately we don't have to check the altar for the apprentice to have it in their possession, but now we have to manipulate the apprentice somewhere.
I tried literally many permutations of Doros, initiating Prosa, killing Serpent, collecting Moon Rune, and then killing the Dragon. I picked up a crystal sometimes, sometimes I didn't. I set my level to 8 and then to 50. The Sky Rune got stolen every single time.
I have to try a few more permutations involving the Dragon first to see where Prosa goes. In all the other permutations he starts in Padal then goes to Telaine. To initiate the Serpent quest you must talk to him once (you can say no, it's faster.) It seems faster to talk to him in Padal and then get the rune in Telaine (as opposed to not talking to him, going to Telaine, going to Zellis, and then going to Telaine again.)
so to update the locations visited list: Pandam, Brush, Bilthem, Telaine, Padal, Luze, Serpent Tower.
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Run thus far
Fight/Exp/Total Exp
Start 30 30
Romus* 528 558
(Level 3)
OneFight 66 624
(Level 4)
Pison* 264 888
Lejes/Esuna 320 1208
(Level 5, Recruit level 6 Wilme)
Red Pison* 2203 3411
(Kill Wilme, pick up M Water, Level 8)
PatrofLejes* 832 4243
(Level 9, Wilme still dead from Red Pison.)
Red Pison is difficult, but doable with many potions. Lejes is really easy.
* = required fight
In Bone, it appears to be fastest keeping Lux alive and going to Bonro->Pandam. This bypasses the cave and Dowaine, thus we cannot use the kid to manipulate money (It's not much money per time anyway.). I will investigate if money will be an issue though.
Dragon (Sky Rune), Serpent (Moon Rune effectively), and Doros (Light Rune) are the next three bosses.
Map: http://www.gamefaqs.com/console/snes/file/563501/35032
I believe the only places we HAVE to visit (I think?) are Pandam, Bilthem, Brush, Serpent Tower, Luze, and [Padal OR Telaine (probably Padal?)].
I would speculate that the Sky Rune being stolen is dependent on what order the bosses are killed in. Dragon probably has to be killed first, but I will investigate this. Regardless of whether we are trying to recruit an apprentice afterwards, there is a 10 second 'fail music' if we don't grab it there.
The FAQs seem to recommend Dragon->Serpent->Doros in terms of weakest to strongest.
Every boss from now on can be fought with B Power, Star Rune, and B Agility. Mirrors may be helpful for the Dragon and Serpent, and harps may be useful for Doros. (Can mirrors petrify bosses? I doubt it, but I'll check later.)
Prosa's task for the moon rune must be initiated (not sure exactly what the trigger is yet) before we kill Serpent. Going to Zellis is a waste of time.
Gamefaqs -
"Commander Prosa will normally be [in Padal]. He has the Moon Rune
and will offer it to you in exchange for a task. His daughter has been
kidnapped by the wicked Serpent, so if you free her he'll give it to you
(see chapter 5). Prosa will not be here if war is declared or if peace
is made. If Belaine and Telaine are at war, find him in Telaine Castle.
If peace is made, he'll go home to Polasu (far to the northwest). Also,
if you have already defeated Serpent, he will offer you a different
quest. He needs you to go find Pegim. Pegim can be found in Zellis."
I have a pretty detailed spreadsheet I added onto Healblade's for calculating apprentice stats with the Elnard boost at various levels among other things.
Seed Plan: __ = Skip, ?? = Not sure yet.
Protect Seeds are EXTREMELY necessary.
Power Seeds are Quite necessary.
Agility Seeds - I don't really know how much of a difference one seed makes when we do luck manipulation.
Vitality Seeds - 4 HP is not much at the end of the game.
Magic Seeds - The only time magic will be used offensively is the Monmo fight (B Fires will probably be used as well.) We will see if magic attacks by bosses become worse later in the run though.
Intelligence Seeds - MP is not necessary enough to matter most likely.
Pr Seed: Search the small nook straight E of the entrance to Rablesk
P Seed: Chest in Aran Castle (where Romus is) [~20s]
A Seed: Chest in Cave of Earth (where Pison is)
Pr Seed: Chest in Melenam
P Seed: Search the table in front of the elder in Guntz
A Seed: Chest in Cavern under Patrof (on the way to evil apprentice)
Pr Seed: Chest in Cavern under Patrof
P Seed: Chest in Patrof Castle (where evil apprentice is)
A Seed: Chest in basement of NE building in Bone
__M Seed: Chest in Grime Tower (Olvan gets this early)
__V Seed: Chest in Grime Tower (Olvan gets this early)
__A Seed: Chest in basement of Olvan's father's house in Pang
V Seed: Chest in Cave to Boere (on the way to Luze)
Pr Seed: Chest in Cave to Boere (on the way to Luze)
__I Seed: Chest in Cave of Laosu (W of Padal)
__I Seed: Chest in Baran Castle (where Serpent is)
V Seed: Chest in Bilthem Castle (where Doros is)
__A Seed: Chest in North Tower (can go to Grime Tower from here)
(Haven't routed beyond here yet. Will update this in the future.)
M Seed: Chest in Cave of Kapel (on the way to Bugask)
Pr Seed: Chest in Cave of Silence (where M-Pison is)
??P Seed: Chest in basement of present-day Gorfun (where Gariso is)
A Seed: Search SE corner of engine room in Airship after crash
M Seed: Chest in Barrier Cave (where Saro is)
??P Seed: Chest in Barrier Cave (where Saro is)
??P Seed: Chest in past-day Gorfun (where Gorsia is)
Figuring out whether to use seeds on Lux or end game Olvan will be difficult.
Goals for now:
Figure out what the chain of events is where I get the Sky Rune from the pedestal and Prosa is in the optimal position [Padal or Telaine?]. Figure out if I can feasibly kill S Brains with Lux alone or figure out the optimal method of leveling until Lux can kill them. Figure out what apprentice/s is/are best for this segment and what level is required to fight the last boss in the segment. I'm probably going to want to kill the apprentice and M Water them back at the end of each fight. It saves ~0.75 S Brain fights per boss. I should have a decent amount of money at this point to make a purchasing run for this segment. There are various chests 10 seconds out of the way with over 1k gold worth in them, or I could kill a trick.
Nitrodon (or someone else) - Do you have the address for the apprentice holding the Sky Rune, so that I can see when it gets set?
If anyone has any ideas feel free to toss them up.
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My thought has always been it's interesting to demonstrate tricks such as quick camera changing and switching stars very quickly, but they should not become the standard of the run. If you find an interesting spot to do it, feel free to do so. Don't use it wherever you're looking for something to do.
On that note, I fully support the creation of a 70 star BLJless run especially since the upcoming 120 star run will shatter most of the natural gameplay (which is equally good and bad.) The quality of gameplay in the WIP is also very good. I look forward to seeing future progress.
