Is anyone interested in tackling this bad boy? I have no idea how the numbers crunch in this game yet, but I'll do some reasearch and report back what I find. As far as gameplan goes, it's pretty simple:
- Get the Prince of Cannock
- Lake Cave/Silver key? (I can't remember if you need it or not)
- Get the Mirror & Princess
- Tower of Wind/get Cloak of Wind
- Lianport/get the Ship (requires you to fight two Gremlins)
- Lighthouse/Star Crest (four Gremlins this time)
- Osterfair/Moon Crest (fight a Saber Lion)
- Fire Shrine/Sun Crest
- Zahan/Golden Key
- Wellgarth/Jailor's Key & Watergate Key
- Hamlin/Water Crest (two Ozwargs)
- Tuhn to unlock Watergate
- Tower of the Moon/Moon Fragment
- Sea Cave/Eye of Malroth (two Evil Clowns)
- Beran to warp to Rhone Cave/Life Crest
- Back outside to Island Monolith/Charm of Rubiss
- Back through Rhone Cave/Thunder Sword & Erdrick's Armor? (dunno if you'll need them or not)
- Rhone Plateau to Hargon's Castle (five bosses - Atlas, Pazuzu, Zarlox, Hargon, Malroth)
EDIT: I did some tooling around with the luck manipulation, since it's the meat & potatoes of the run.
Random encounters:
can be manipulated the same way as in DW1 - just stop moving briefly right before you get to the tile with the enemy and you'll skip it.
Enemy types
If you're constantly moving on the maps, you'll enounter the same enemy group every time. Only by pausing then waiting for the next encounter could I get a different group.
Critical Hits
The damage calculator seems to be time-based, and refreshes every time the selection arrow flashes on and off. The damage wouldn't change during the frames in between. I haven't been able to get any criticals yet.
Item Drops
I have no idea. I refreshed a save state that was taken right as I landed the last blow of the last enemy about 100 times, but I didn't get anything. It's probably pre-determined when you encounter enemies if they actually drop an item or not.
Any help with these issues would be greately appreciated. I'll update the information whenever I learn more.
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If you can control the combat that well, then you are set. Of course you also need to manipulate the enemies to be weak and stupid. I would guess the first fight will be metal slimes in the wind tower? Level up there enough to get the ship, then hunt metal babbles near Tuhn. If you plan on dying to warp back to a save point, you'll have to either revive your companions or leave them dead. Reviving gets expensive fast if you need gold for other things, you'd be better off investing in wings of wyvern. But you'll probably need to level enough for return and outside. Do you have any plans for getting gold or experience? In an RPG timeattack, this is generally more important than the route.
Have you confirmed that you can put Malroth to sleep? If not, it's not the end of the world, as you can levelup very very quickly by beating metal babbles. I'm sure it's possible on everyone else (except maybe the metal babbles themselves). Also, if you do figure out how to manipulate drops, your ultimate weapon will be Sword of Destruction--get it from a drop and nullify the curse with luck manipulation. Drop manipulation may also be very helpful to build up money, just sell some lucrative drops and buy whatever you want. There's also the Golden Card which is easily obtained from the lottery, this might be helpful if you need to buy things. Forget what else is in the lottery, but some of it may be useful.
malroth is suceptable to chance's confusion and sleep effects so theres a good chance you can beat him that way
(thats how I was able to beat him the first time)
Somehow I doubt it. But I don't know for sure so I'll have to get (or hack up) a endgame savestate somewhere and check it out.
All of the status ailments from Chance are unblockable. You can use it as an instant win for the first 3 bosses - it can summon something terrifying that makes all your allies pass out and makes the bosses run away. But yeah, it'll take forever to level up to get the spell, so the point is moot.
As far as gold is concerned, Metal Babbles give 255 (the maximum possible for one enemy) so I'd be able to buy a Falcon Sword or two. I think I'm going to skip weapons and armor altogether for the first half of the run, unless I'm going to need some for beating Metal Slimes and the Gremlins, which remains to be seen right now.
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gold shouldnt be a problem once you get to the clown fight -the one where you get the staff of thunder.
you can sell the staff for 32000gp and then fight him again and get another one. you can keep doing this indefinately
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As far as gold is concerned, Metal Babbles give 255 (the maximum possible for one enemy) so I'd be able to buy a Falcon Sword or two.
25K for a Falcon sword, so about 100 metal babbles!! Now if when fighting those metal babbles you can manipulate drops for Mysterious hats (15k each) or dragon potions (7.5K each), then you're in business. I think you can get other high-price item drops, but you'll probably be fighting metal babbles anyway. Also, to make falcon sword worthwhile you'd have to either be able to manipulate critical hits or get to a pretty high level. Maybe if you use defense a lot or manipulated stats on levelup. But still, I think you'd be better off with sword of destruction or thunder sword on your first guy. Maybe the second can get falcon sword, but you could just cast fireball.
you can sell the staff for 32000gp and then fight him again and get another one. you can keep doing this indefinately
Well, I don't mean to keep shooting people down, but this requires saving your game, turning the power off and reloading. Is this even possible in a timeattack? Without doing this you can only sell it once, and only for 19500 anyway. You may want to do this anyway, unless you have more turns than magic on the fights you'll do. Also, one thing to consider is how you'll raise the 2000 for jailor's key. I guess if you don't buy armor up to this point it's no problem. Do you plan on playing the lottery? Lottery tickets are in several chests and also dropped, you can get one golden card to reduce the price on everything and then wizard rings which sell for 1875 each. You may want to keep one, then manipulate it so it never vanishes.
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yeah, i forgot that you have to save the game for that. but still selling it for 19000 should be more than enough to buy all the required items you need
25K for a Falcon sword, so about 100 metal babbles!! Now if when fighting those metal babbles you can manipulate drops for Mysterious hats (15k each) or dragon potions (7.5K each), then you're in business.
Doh, you're right. No one would want to watch me kill 100 Metal Babbles, unless they were full parties of 7 or 8 and I slaughter them all with criticals without any running away (that would rock). I don't think they appear more than two or three per battle, anyway.
Without doing this you can only sell it once, and only for 19500 anyway.
I'm not sure if hard resets are allowed. Can the movie even record it? I think I will get the staff and sell it anyway. It's almost enough for a shield of strength (yay, free Healmore spell).
Also, one thing to consider is how you'll raise the 2000 for jailor's key.
Since I already plan to fight a bunch of Metal Slimes, I can try to get them to drop an Iron Helmet, which sells for 2363 gold. That way I won't have to bother fighting Lizard Flies for a Lottery Ticket. On the other hand, that Gold Card could come in handy if I wanted to buy a Shield of Strength or some other protective armor.
I have a question... do you have to leave the name space blank in the beginning? Your allies get names no matter what, so I figured I could add a personal touch and name the hero. Would my movie become obsolete by someone who was only faster because they skipped the name?
I don't think it would. There was a post somewhere in the Super Metroid thread about this. Bisqwit weighed in on it a couple of posts down, here.
As I understand it, there would have to be more substantive improvements than just not naming the hero for your movie to get displaced.
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do you have to leave the name space blank in the beginning?
Read acmlm's submission for DW1 about how he picked his name. Pretty interesting, definitely worth checking here.
I forgot what metal slimes dropped, if you can get helms from them you'll be set. You could get the lottery ticket for the golden card as a free gift from an item shop. Will wings speed up anything? There's definitely chances to get it from treasure too, just not sure where.
Hmm, I tried my hand at luck manipulation. I used a save state at a point just before delivering the last command to start the final battle round. In varying the delay from that point, I was able to get 2 instances of critical hits and once instance of a treasure chest (although it had only extra gold in it). It took me a while to find the right frame for getting the chest, but a single case is insufficient to draw conclusions as to the typical frequency of getting a chest.
For treasure chest manipulation, this is the latest possible point for a save-state.. waiting until the last-round commands have started executing is exactly too late. I have verified this by using the debugger and examining the code where it determines if you will get a chest.
(For those curious, it is at offset $117E3 in the ROM... if the branch there isn't taken, you will get a treasure chest (provided there's room for an item in any player's inventory). Made for a nice GG code :). Anyway, the source for randomness in this particular case is the RAM location $32. The randomness algorithm used is a CRC-16 iterator at CPU address $C3AB (or ROM offset $3C3BB). Location $32 holds the low byte of the CRC value. This routine seems to be called many times during battle, so there appears to be no way of determining outcomes before-hand.)
As for ensuring an item in the chest, I don't know if this can also be manipulated in the same way.
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does the name affect you leveling up in this game? i know dw1, you stats for each level are determined by the name you choose. is that the case in dw2. if so then you could determine which name would give the best stats. if stats do vary, then you can use luck manipulation to give you the best possible stats for each level.
Hmm, I tried my hand at luck manipulation. I used a save state at a point just before delivering the last command to start the final battle round.
Really? Where exactly did you save it? Yesterday I did something similar using a high-level party and managed to vary the damage, but not a single critical hit over the span of delaying 120 frames. Yes, I tested every single one, from 0 to 120. My save state was exactly at the first frame you can input to confirm your enemy target and start the battle round. Is that too late?
Pusing directionals didn't seem to affect anything, I got the same result as if I had just waited the equal amount of frames.
In varying the delay from that point, I was able to get 2 instances of critical hits and once instance of a treasure chest (although it had only extra gold in it).
I'm pretty sure this is a bug. You won't get anything from the chest if you already have the dropped item in your inventory. It's not extra gold, either, it's just the gold you won from beating the enemies.
(For those curious, it is at offset $117E3 in the ROM... if the branch there isn't taken, you will get a treasure chest (provided there's room for an item in any player's inventory). Made for a nice GG code :). Anyway, the source for randomness in this particular case is the RAM location $32. The randomness algorithm used is a CRC-16 iterator at CPU address $C3AB (or ROM offset $3C3BB). Location $32 holds the low byte of the CRC value. This routine seems to be called many times during battle, so there appears to be no way of determining outcomes before-hand.)
As for ensuring an item in the chest, I don't know if this can also be manipulated in the same way.
Wow, I have no idea what you just said. I appreciate all this information, though. :D
adelikat wrote:
if stats do vary, then you can use luck manipulation to give you the best possible stats for each level.
I'm pretty sure the stat upgrades are static. I made a chart many many years ago for all three characters that show what bonuses they got at each level-up, and I tested it on a later play-through and it was exactly the same.
I'll use the chart again during my test-run (which I'll start once we figure out how to manipulate criticals and item drops) and see if it holds up.
My save was an old one from just after getting the princess in the party, in the town where she was restored, with levels 9, 9, and 5 for the characters, respectively. The fight was with a magician and a magidrakee.
As far as looking for a long time, I can sympathize. =} I looked at the first 75 or so frames and got a little bored, so I tried some random ones. The critical hits were at frames 162 and 172..176. One of the characters missed at frame 181, which caused the battle not to end. The chest was at frames 196 and 197. All lucky guesses.. there may be more between 75 and those numbers. Also, I did not create that state with giving orders as soon as possible.. just at normal speed (was getting the hang of things.. haven't made movies before :). So, it looks like it could take up to 5-6 seconds to get stuff sometimes. x_x
The too-late point is the frame after you've given the last command for the battle-ending round and then you watch your commands being carried out and enemy responses, etc. You can wait as long as you want before giving that last command. It sounds like your state was OK.
Hmm, I was wondering why you just got gold sometimes from the chest, thanks. It did give extra gold, though. In the many times I didn't get a chest, I was getting like 16-20 gold and with the chest, I was getting like 30+.
The tech stuff was for anyone that could make sense of it, so they could check it out for themselves, if so inclined. =)
--Edit--
In reference to getting drops, I should have mentioned that there is a probability modifier that can take on 4 different values. It didn't change during my testing, so it's probably something set outside of battle (although I haven't checked). The modifiers yield effective probabilities of 1/8, 1/16, 1/32, and 1/128. In my test, it was the 1/16 value.
While working on my FFMQ run yesterday, I suddenly remembered something that may help out in luck manipulation in this game.
If you set the message speed to the slowest setting, it enables you to manually advance each message and action in battle. Now, since it's so easy to manipulate every aspect of every battle in FFMQ thanks to the manually-advanced action windows, maybe DW2 will be the same. It's definitely worth checking out.
An added bonus to speed setting 8 is, coupled with turbo or ASAP button presses, the messages go faster than speed setting 1!
Ah, I tried that just now in Dragon Warrior 2, setting the text speed to Slow:
No change at all in dialogs, but battle speed is perfectly controllable ... no auto advance, and can be a little faster than Fast. Luck can now be manipulated by waiting between full moves (just not between "attacked" and the damage, for example). Even the gold (and probably item drop) can be manipulated after defeating the last enemy, so that's definitely good!
I realize now I was originally thinking of Dragon Warrior 3 (which has a 1-8 speed setting), but DW2 on slow works the same way.
Good, this should help things out a LOT. Do you plan to take up the project, Acmlm?
This is no good at all in Dragon Warrior 1, all text is slowed down by 3x with no possible skipping.
So far, I made a Dragon Warrior 2 movie that goes from the beginning to the Tower of Wind:
0:00:06 - Start new game
0:03:27 - Intro over, I can finally move! I took the chest and equipped the sword, but maybe it's not needed ... some NPC's also got in the way
0:04:32 - Talked to the king at Cannock (1st required step for getting the prince)
0:05:44 - Spring of Bravery (2nd)
0:06:59 - Talked to the king at Midenhall (3rd)
0:07:43 - Talked to the prince, he joins
0:08:23 - Entered the cave in the shrine
0:09:31 - Got the Mirror of Ra
0:10:31 - Transformed the princess back, she joins. Went to the save point, then sold a leather armor so I could buy wings
0:11:55 - Got into the Tower of Wind
0:04:32 - Talked to the king at Cannock (1st required step for getting the prince)
0:05:44 - Spring of Bravery (2nd)
0:06:59 - Talked to the king at Midenhall (3rd)
0:07:43 - Talked to the prince, he joins
Hey, guess what? You can go straight to Leftwyne after speaking to the old man in the Spring of Bravery and the Prince will be there. You don't have to go all the way back to Midenhall.
I have no idea if any progress has been made on this game, but since the last post was last year I doubt it. I started experimenting with the game, and I'm currently testing a "minimum" run (i.e. not actually recording, but using tons of save states and reloads to attempt to make it through the game with a minimum of equipment and levels to see what's feasible) and thus far I managed, albeit with great difficulty, to defeat the two gremlins needed to get the ship. So here's what I discovered so far:
The game seems to have a similar engine to Dragon Warrior IV, and I'm under the impression that tactics for that game will work here, for the most part.
Playing on slow message speed allows a timeable pause, which seems to work for some but not all things.
- Once the party's final battle command is selected, the actions, but not the targets or results of the monsters, are selected. For instance, once the last party command is selected, the decision of if the monsters will attack, cast a specific spell or use a special ability, are decided from the beginning.
- If a monster attacks, the pause in between "monster attacks" and "does X damage to party member Y" doesn't seem to affect the outcome; only the pause BEFORE (the one ending the previous action) affects this.
- Spells affecting the entire party follow the above rule for the first person being attacked (the hero usually, but could be someone else if hero is dead or otherwise not targetable by the spell, such as SLEEP when he's already asleep); the subsequent targets can have the outcome manipulated by the pause just before they're named (e.g. if a gremlin casts sleep, once there's the flash of light on-screen and the message that gremlin is casting sleep, the first target's sleep-or-no variable is already determined and it's too late to change it. However, following that person's outcome, the game gives another pause. THIS pause can be timed to affect which side of the sleep-or-no coin hits the second time around).
- Some attacks, such as the gremlin breathing fire, are guaranteed hits (but then anyone who's played the game knows this). However, I think most if not all "required" battles have possible harmless outcomes (I beat the two gremlins by reloading until they would either both cast sleep or attack and miss).
- The hardest obligatory fight, therefore, I think, is the four Gremlins fight for the Star Crest. I think that since I can now pick the order of the forced battles, at least for the sake of this test I'm going to do that fight last (i.e. before journeying to Rhone) and see how far that gets me.
I am slightly versed in computer programming and do know enough about computer logic to understand some programming (i.e. I fully understood adelikat's explanation of the critical hit routine) but I currently have no idea how to fish this information out starting from scratch. I'll take another look once I have a better idea on how I'm going to attack a submittable run, but I'll likely need a certain degree of help in this matter, which would be greatly appreciated.
In any case, I now attempt the other forced battles. Wish me luck!
Whoa, THIS is weird. I was consulting an item list on GameFAQs in order to find out which easily-gotten items would sell for enough for a Jailer's Key, and in a Q&A section at the end I came across this gem:
6) For some strange reason all the crests were in my inventory when the game
started, why?
It happens from time to time. I have no idea why, but it is quite a time
saver!
I've never heard of this before. Does anyone know what this is and if there's a way to exploit it? I'm under the impression it might be one of those bugs that can only happen once someone's gotten a certain way into the game or some such nonsense, and it may make this run less interesting, but damn if that wouldn't be a hell of a bug to exploit. The document I found it in is here:
http://db.gamefaqs.com/console/nes/file/dragon_warrior_2_lists.txt
FYI: I just got the sun and moon crests; now that the Prince of Cannock knows Fireball fights are considerably easier, thank god.
