As someone who does non-TAS runs of this game, is that method of beating the boss (by seemingly quickly pausing and unpausing during a bomb explosion, I think?) viable for non-TAS runs? If so, that would dramatically change my route for the game.
EDIT: Never mind, it looks like it actually just blasts the final boss with infinite megaton bombs.
Ha, my bad. I never even noticed I had a PM in my inbox. I'll look and see if my glitchless no math notes are in a somewhat readable format.
Also, I have no plans to do a TAS myself, mainly because I have never TASed before and have no idea how to do it, and I simply don't have the time due to my current personal situation.
My new segmented speed run is up on SDA. The timing was changed to 3:33:15 since SDA changed how runs are timed when you can't see the timer at the end of the game. The difference between the 3:33:15 time and the 3:38:25 is mostly due to loading times counted for the in-game timer but not for SDA purposes since they are at the beginning and end of segments.
So, who's ready to do a TAS? :)
There is no Charge +6. The archer abilities are Charge +1, +2, +3, +4, +5, +7, +10, and +20. Maybe it was Charge +7?
Also, as I mentioned before, you should just go for critical hits instead of using Charge. Critical hits can nearly do double damage of a normal hit.
EDIT: Also, you mentioned that you were maybe 10 minutes ahead of the time in the walkthrough. That walkthrough mentioned his best time through chapter one as 1 hour 50 minutes. My segmented run gets through chapter one in 1:11:08, so it sounds like you are quite a bit behind.
I should also ask...are you doing this TAS to get it on TASVideos or are you just doing it for your own personal enjoyment? I ask because if you do a TAS using very old outdated strats and the final time is much worse than known records, there's no way the TAS would get published here.
I was going to say, don't use the gamefaqs speed walkthrough, it is VERY outdated. I think that walkthrough says that sub-7 hours is highly unlikely, whereas my latest segmented run for SDA is 3:38:25 and the fastest RTA by Claude is 3:58:26.
Your goal of never allowing allies to miss and never allowing enemies to hit won't really save you much time unless you have strategies to win battles as quickly as possible. Plus, you really need to manipulate critical hits, there's no excuse not to do so in a TAS.
I'm curious about this "charge-6" on Miluda, what do you mean by that? There is no "charge-6" ability in FFT as far as I am aware. Also, certain guests cannot be manipulated. Boco is programmed to run away all the time, that's why you couldn't manipulate him to hit the Black Goblin.
Just a quick update for a new target time for the TAS:
I finished recording my new segmented run yesterday. My final time is around 3:38:25. I've highlighted all of the segments on my twitch channel if anyone wants to check them out:
http://www.twitch.tv/chessjerksda
If you don't mind my asking, what is your plan? Are you simply going for fastest time, or are you thinking of sacrificing speed for entertainment in some fashion? Are you grinding to Math Skill ala my segmented run, or could it be faster to go without Math Skill in the long run if the grinding takes too long?
Interesting...
Just to update, I have been working on a another (!) new segmented route based on a lot of input from TheClaude's RTA attempts. I am up to the waterfall battle in chapter 2 and I am already over 17 minutes faster than my 4:22 segmented run. Since the RTA record is still 4:08:12 (as far as I know) and my best splits for my 4:15:00 RTA add up to around 4:02:00 or so, this segmented run will easily be sub 4 hours, possibly even sub 3:50.
I figure an excellent TAS could be 3:30 or so, but who knows?
However, since my son will be born next week, I will probably not have much to work on this in the near future.
So much negativity...
I know I haven't posted much around these parts, but why would you make a TAS like this only to post submission comments like that?
I don't know if anyone is still working on this, but here's an update on what's happened recently.
The current US version RTA best time is now 4:08:12 by TheClaude on twitch. I have also been recently streaming on twitch, but my best RTA time is only 4:19:54. I have plans in the near future to update my segmented run again with a target of sub 4 hours.
I definitely recommend checking out his and my twitch pages if you want to see what's going on.
I understand the concept of TASing, but I haven't ever attempted it myself outside of using savestates in pSX to try and see how the RNG can be manipulated.
Now that the rules for acceptance seem to be changing, I suppose a run like my unassisted Calculator run would get accepted after all (unless I'm misinterpreting the changes that are being made).
Maybe I should learn how to TAS and do it myself...
Another update: my unassisted run was posted recently:
http://speeddemosarchive.com/FinalFantasyTactics.html
Ignore the time listed of 4:17, the SDA admins acknowledged they made an error with the timing. The correct time is 4:22:16.
Is anyone still thinking of a TAS of this?
Maybe something like this would work:
Start with all three females with high Faith
Get them and Ramza to level two Chemist at Gariland
Turn them all into Wizards, glitch Wizard, learn Bolt 2, Flare and Magic Attack UP
Get all to level two Wizard at Mandalia
Turn them all into Time Mages with Black Magic, glitch Time Mage, learn Quick, Demi, Demi 2, Meteor, Short Charge, and Teleport
Get them all to level two Time Mage at Sweegy
Turn them all back to Wizards with Summon, glitch Summoner, learn Ramuh and Half MP
Use these death machines to burn through the game quickly. (setup is Wizard/Summon/nothing/Magic Attack UP/Teleport)
Use Ramza by himself in assassination battles if one spell is enough to win
Recruit Mustadio and use him as a naked decoy if needed
Recruit Orlandu if needed
Switch to Time Magic as needed by Zodiac beasts
OK, if Math Skill shouldn't be used, are there enough entertainment possibilities for a 6 hour run? Would that have a chance at acceptance?
Also, what kinds of things would be considered "entertainment"? Killing enemies by knocking them off of roofs? Redirecting enemy spells onto other enemies? Using unusual ability combinations to win battles (e.g. Priest with Jump)?
The only problem with just doing a run is that I'd hate for someone to spend months on a 4 hour Math Skill run similar to my unassisted run and have it get rejected due to lack of entertainment/repetitiveness.
EDIT:
You know, my unassisted runs can be the "starting point".
Yes ofcourse. Just really the obvious things though.
-Crits always, unless unnecessary.
Definitely.
-Attack enemies based on CT. (Make it so the enemies don't really get turns).
Makes sense.
- Once we get agrias, abuse crush punch (atleast I beleive that's the one), so all hits are instant death.
The main problem here is Agrias is slow, so usually she will go after the enemies, whereas a Ninja would normally go before the enemy. Unless you can somehow get her an Excalibur or the perfume that grants Haste, I don't see this as a viable strategy.
- Manipulate enemies to walk into death traps. Such as abusing flare/death in the non calc run.
I'm assuming you mean having the enemies walk into your spells (and not using the traps on certain battlefields that inflict Death Sentence)? Does that mean you are thinking of using a party with magic users? I'm not sure how that jives with your previous point about not letting the enemy get turns, since it's very difficult to go first and cast a spell before the enemy moves.
- Using our guests as an advantage and killing them when necessary to save turns/time.
Of course.
That's just the basics though really. I have a good strategy for the sand rat level which consist of abusing who goes first, blocking them all inside, then using either flare/death. Though (even though it wasnt flare/death, was pretty much the same), i tested this on v1.3 so it works out pretty good. think the spell was cyclone that I used, that ended up killing them all very fast.
Summon Magic should be even better in that battle. Manipulate high Faith/good Zodiac compatibility on all the enemies and they should all die in one summon.
If we can, we can also abuse charm in this.
Abuse charm? Are you talking about purely for entertainment purposes, since why charm an enemy when you can kill them instead?
General battle strategies are good to have, but I think we need to work on some specifics. Some of them have been tossed around in this thread, but I don't think any conclusions have been reached.
I think we need to start with:
1. What is the goal? Lowest time without Math Skill? Lowest time by any means? Lowest time with the most entertainment?
2. What party will be used to accomplish that goal? Solo Ramza would likely be fastest most of the time (mostly due to only having to set up one character for battle), but it might not always be feasible.
EDIT: Something else that just occurred to me: How long are all of the unskippable cutscenes in this game? That might give us an idea of the potential time for this run.