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Active player (384)
Joined: 12/23/2010
Posts: 30
Location: Japan
The damage glitch just allows me to charge weapon level to higher than 8 which is the limit in the glitchless playthrough. So the damage is limited. If there're ways to give more than 999 damage, the run would be faster. (You can see the charge level surge by watching a RAM 0x7EE01B.) [quote mklip2001]There may also still be use for spells too... for instance, aren't Moon Energy and Lunar Boost really good spells for the final battle? [/quote] The Moon Energy can be useful. Actually, I've used that spell in my previous run to beat Mana Beast quickly. Whether really faster or not is still controversial, for the graphical effect is very long. But I didn't think of the Lunar Boost. Thank you for remiding me! I'll try. (Oh, "equip" is similar to "furnish" in usage. Now I learned.)
Current project: Another Mana Series?
Player (70)
Joined: 8/24/2004
Posts: 2562
Location: Sweden
Won't Dryad's powers be best at the mana beast? I mean, to cast both sabres, in addition with the other magics, such as the lunar power, and maybe the speed up thing with Gnome? Though Dryad might be to low on level to be very efficient, and the animation is quite long to get the mana sword.
Skilled player (1637)
Joined: 11/15/2004
Posts: 2202
Location: Killjoy
Finally watched this. Great work - it is easy to tell how much more optimized this version is. One question - some times you walk out of the dwarf cave, other times you use the rope. Why the change?
Sage advice from a friend of Jim: So put your tinfoil hat back in the closet, open your eyes to the truth, and realize that the government is in fact causing austismal cancer with it's 9/11 fluoride vaccinations of your water supply.
Active player (384)
Joined: 12/23/2010
Posts: 30
Location: Japan
Highness wrote:
Won't Dryad's powers be best at the mana beast? I mean, to cast both sabres, in addition with the other magics, such as the lunar power,
1.Even if the hero's strength gets enhanced, the actual max damage he can deal is limited according to the calculations below. [Strength] * ([Weapon charge level] / 2) = [Power] (Maximum 999) [Power] - [Enemy defense] = [Damage] Mana beast has 450 defense points. So unless it is a critical hit, the maximum damage is around 550. But a critical hit doubles this [Damage]. Using Lunar magic alone, the hero can deal 999 damage. 2.Using "weapon charge level glitch" (I always use this when fighting against bosses), the charge level increases by 1 per a frame. Without the power enhancing magics, the needed charge level to deal 999 damage (with a critical hit) is around 60. Even the strength gets doubled with the mana power or something, it can save only 30 frames per one attack, losing many frames by its graphical effect. So I don't think the magics are useful, but still controversial.
Highness wrote:
and maybe the speed up thing with Gnome?
Speed up magic just enhances the evade & hit rate. Other status seem to be unchanged.
Darkkobold wrote:
One question - some times you walk out of the dwarf cave, other times you use the rope. Why the change?
It is simply because I cannot use the rope according to the game programs. The rope is available only when the players enter the dungeons through the entry points. Anyway, thank you for watching;) I'll try the best!
Current project: Another Mana Series?
Joined: 4/1/2010
Posts: 90
Touch-me wrote:
I found a new glitch to go through the walls. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LXe70vhWo9k http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/125086920/SOM_Wallthrough_glitch.smv If you attack a rope-pole when someone (player or enemy) is casting a spell, a player character temporarily gets able to run through the walls. Using this glitch, some frames can be saved. And I'll upload my new wip until rescuing Flammie. Used this glitch twice to save only 20 frames. http://dehacked.2y.net/microstorage.php/info/1433631459/TAS_SOM_WIP.smv
I guess I should have pointed this out more clearly in my last posts, since I found this already too ^^; Glad you found it though. On a sidenote: Depending on how you set the AI, the PC-Controlled-Chars tend to back off from enemies very fast in a diagonal direction. They can also back of while you are unable to control your character on your own while hitting a pole, making a very fast travel through walls.
Player (244)
Joined: 8/6/2006
Posts: 784
Location: Connecticut, USA
Has anyone taken the time to figure out the game's drop mechanics? Someone by the name of CelesDestiny posted what they claimed to be the rundown a few years ago, but it doesn't seem quite right and it doesn't really go over the rate for getting the chest to drop in the first place (e.g. people have claimed to have gotten weapon orbs from end-game enemies at level 99, which goes against point #2).
CelesDestiny wrote:
Some enemies, like the fishes, do not drop treasures at all For all others applies a loot table: - There is always a common and a rare treasure, consisting of two of the following: Item, GP, equipment, weapon orb (the orb becomes a candy if no more orbs of that type can be obtained) - There are 0-3 traps within the table, notice that mimic box and shadow zero are considered as traps If a treasure is on screen: 1. Checks if the enemy has a trap within its loot table, otherwise proceed to 4. 2. Checks for the Lv of the char who opens it. If it is at least 3 levels higher than the enemy's, no treasure will appear - the higher your Lv, the less it will be a trap 3. If there are different traps on the table, one is chosen randomly 4. If there are no traps or you are lucky enough, the item is rolled (probabilities always: common 88%, rare 12%)
I'd be interested to see a nice formula for the drop rates, but once you factor in everything, it seems like it might end up being a task. Some enemies apparently drop up to three different items as well, so there may not be one nice formula throughout the game. EDIT: OK, looks like the chances for the chest itself to drop is ridiculously easy to find. The address mentioned earlier in the thread was off a little bit, but with some searching I was able to find it.
Player (244)
Joined: 8/6/2006
Posts: 784
Location: Connecticut, USA
http://pastebin.com/3YdnNL2T Here's a chunk of code that I only partially understand (mostly because of familiar memory addresses). From what I can understand, the first block is the RNG going through its cycle and the last block is putting a Candy in my inventory from the chest. In between there's gotta be some clue as to how the game chose to give me a Candy instead of the "rarer" drop, 4GP. Of course, the answer might be buried in some subroutine that isn't written out there... I hate to ask for help like this, but I'm really stuck because I don't understand enough to really get what I want. It's frustrating. Any help is appreciated though!
Player (244)
Joined: 8/6/2006
Posts: 784
Location: Connecticut, USA
http://pastebin.com/17FDpPBL Reading disassembly isn't my thing, so I made this lua script. In its current form, it only works for whatever enemy's chest you want it to work for (in this case, the Lullabud's chest). But basically, if you stand next to a chest that a Lullabud has dropped and leave this script running for a long period of time (e.g. overnight), you'll get a pretty damn good approximation of the drop rates of a chest. From what I've seen so far, the drop rate of the "rare" item from this chest is 4%, which goes against the claim that's been floating around. Interesting stuff! EDIT: Oops, I wasn't waiting long enough in between the reloading of states. Apparently the number of frames it takes for the game to register which item you got from a chest varies depending on when you open it... the script was of course missing some of the grabs, so I modified it. Now it waits longer in between frames and also checks the common item as well (which is stronger than just checking one, which I had before). And also, it looks like the % is closer to 12. Oops.
Former player
Joined: 2/19/2007
Posts: 424
Location: UK
ElectroSpecter wrote:
http://pastebin.com/3YdnNL2T Here's a chunk of code that I only partially understand (mostly because of familiar memory addresses). From what I can understand, the first block is the RNG going through its cycle and the last block is putting a Candy in my inventory from the chest. In between there's gotta be some clue as to how the game chose to give me a Candy instead of the "rarer" drop, 4GP. Of course, the answer might be buried in some subroutine that isn't written out there...
It's too bad you only have the parts that actually were executed, and not disassembly of the rest. The branch that did not happen (I.e. the 4GP part) won't be a part of this, though the logic leading to not taking that part will be there. Do you have a disassembly of the relevant regions of the rom too?
Player (244)
Joined: 8/6/2006
Posts: 784
Location: Connecticut, USA
amaurea wrote:
It's too bad you only have the parts that actually were executed, and not disassembly of the rest. The branch that did not happen (I.e. the 4GP part) won't be a part of this, though the logic leading to not taking that part will be there. Do you have a disassembly of the relevant regions of the rom too?
http://pastebin.com/nnzxq0nG I grabbed that from the ROM when I wasn't opening a chest, so it calls the x value and uses it to look at $7ECC05 instead of $7ECC48 like it did before. Probably would mess the game up somehow if actually executed. Digressions aside though, it doesn't look like it skipped too much important stuff. A quick skim over tells me that there's no real major branching going on, so it's not what I'm looking for (I think all it's doing is checking to see if I have room in my inventory for Candy or something). But who knows, 65c816 isn't my first language :p I don't have great intuition on what else I could look for either. There are about 10 - 15 frames after pressing B at a chest where the game could potentially be deciding what's in the chest; it doesn't have to be the same frame that it actually gives me the item.
Former player
Joined: 2/19/2007
Posts: 424
Location: UK
Ok, I had a go at this, but without a memory and rom viewer, I can't be sure of much. I have annotated your trace with my hypothesis of what is happening. It is pretty similar to what you said, so this might not be very useful. http://pastebin.com/DAaj1kqu
Player (244)
Joined: 8/6/2006
Posts: 784
Location: Connecticut, USA
Ah cool! Yeah it looks like there's nothing much of interest going on there.
This looks like it might be looking for a free spot
in the inventory (which is pretty small, just B places).
Yeah, the game only lets you carry 4 Candies, and if this trace is used for other items as well it makes sense for B to be a maximum because the number of items you can carry of each type varies, and I don't think it ever goes past 11.
The $652E branch. Which is an alternative loop to the
earlier one. Different kind of item?
Hm, I'll look into this. On another note, I left the fixed lua script running overnight. After 154620 trials (attempts on 154620 consecutive frames), the same chest gave me a rare item 16993 times, which is very close to 11%. However, the length of time it takes in between opening the chest and determining what item you get varies depending on which frame you open the chest. Because of this, I'm wondering if this has skewed my results. For example:
Frame 1000: Hit B to start opening
Frame 1001: Save state
Frame 1013: Get a common item, reload state

Frame 1001: Hit B to start opening
[this time it only takes 12 frames]
Frame 1013: Get a common item.
It's hard to say without understanding how the RNG affects drops whether this is giving me a "unique" copy of a common item, or the "same" one. If it gave me a rare on the same frame, it's still inconclusive because it doesn't rule out the above scenario if / when it occurs.
Former player
Joined: 2/19/2007
Posts: 424
Location: UK
ElectroSpecter wrote:
Ah cool! Yeah it looks like there's nothing much of interest going on there.
Well, I think some interesting stuff i happening here. But the big unknown is the value of the x register, which plays an important role here. So a trace starting a bit earlier would have been nice.
This looks like it might be looking for a free spot
in the inventory (which is pretty small, just B places).
Yeah, the game only lets you carry 4 Candies, and if this trace is used for other items as well it makes sense for B to be a maximum because the number of items you can carry of each type varies, and I don't think it ever goes past 11.
Ok, that is a strong indication that the 2 upper bits of the inventory entry are used to store the number of items of that type. That also means that the limit of 4 candies would be a lot of work to remove if someone wanted to hack the game.
The $652E branch. Which is an alternative loop to the
earlier one. Different kind of item?
Hm, I'll look into this.
Could this be for the different inventory menus? I.e. weapons, consumables, magic, etc.?
HHS
Active player (282)
Joined: 10/8/2006
Posts: 356
Dear children, I am sorry for not having had the opportunity to respond before, but I am here with you right now. At D03A50 is the chest table. There is one entry for each of the 84 enemy types. Each entry consists of five bytes. The first byte indicates the chance that a chest appears, in 64ths. The second byte has two nibbles. The lowest nibble is the necessary level of the Analyze spell that will disarm the trap. The highest nibble tells if you can escape the trap. The player's agility must be more than eight times that value, otherwise the trap will be triggered half the time. Bit 3 through 5 of the third byte indicates the rare item rate, in 64ths. If the top two bits equal 0, then the chest contains money. If they equal 1, then the chest contains an item. If they equal 2, the common item is money and the rare item is an item. If they equal 3, the common item is an item and the rare item is money. The fourth byte indicates the common item or money amount, and the fifth byte indicates the rare item or money amount. Item types are: 1 - 20: Hats 22 - 41: Sweaters 43 - 62: Mittens 64 - 75: Sweets 128 - 135: Balls The upper three bits of each byte at 7ECC48 has the number of sweets. If they are 0, you have eight sweets. You can raise the limit by changing the byte at C0655A.
Player (244)
Joined: 8/6/2006
Posts: 784
Location: Connecticut, USA
HHS, thank you for this valuable chunk of data! It helps me a lot and I'm sure it will be useful to others as well. I'll really process the post tomorrow when I'm not as tired. It will be interesting to see how close my script estimated. Big edit: All right, let's see if I'm getting this whole thing correct. I pulled the first entry from the chest table, which looks like a Rabite. So I have:
Rabite        08 10 f8 40 04 
08: There's a 12.5% chance of the chest dropping.
10: Analyze spell must be at least lv. 0 to disarm a trap
    Agility must be > 8*1 to avoid a trap (but you start at 15 agl)
F8: Or 11111000
    111 = 7, so 7/64 = 10.9375% for a rare (!)
    11 -> common is an item, rare item is money
40: 64 = the first of the sweets = Candy
04: Amount of gold dropped
So it looks like my script did a pretty good job of estimating the rare item %age (assuming I did the bit calculations up there correctly; I just take 111 in binary and convert it to decimal, right?). I'm also wondering about the trap thing. To clarify, you either get hit with a trap 50% of the time or not at all, depending on your agility? People have thrown around claims that the chance gets less when you level (which is sort of ambiguous and may lead one to believe that the chance goes down for every level you gain).
HHS
Active player (282)
Joined: 10/8/2006
Posts: 356
Yes, that's correct.
Player (244)
Joined: 8/6/2006
Posts: 784
Location: Connecticut, USA
Hm, one more question. Often, the first byte in the enemy's data is 84. How is this interpreted? From what I've seen so far, the drop rate of these enemies seems about the same as almost everything else (~4%). It looks like maybe the game is adding 128 ($80) to the value for whatever reason, but the drop rate still stays at 4%?
HHS
Active player (282)
Joined: 10/8/2006
Posts: 356
If bit 7 is set, it's a chest that doesn't feel comfortable near people.
Joined: 4/1/2010
Posts: 90
*digs thread out* Hiho, recently I decided to speedrun SoM casually on console, and I have a few questions of which I couldn't find any specific answers so far. It would be nice if someone could tell me where to find the information 1) I know, that an enemy can be strong(halves power)/weak(doubles power) against certain elemental attacks from HHS' post. -- Do the enemies only have one weakness/strength, or can they have multiple? -- Is there a chart of which enemy is weak/strong against which magic? 2) I was looking for a "power chart" / table for the various spells. I know they are not used in the TAS anymore, but for a RTA that would still be very useful. I'm looking for: -- The relative "power" (formulas?) of various spells -- The "power" gain of the spells when they level up? -- The "magic defense" (if that exists) of bosses The main idea I have is simply, that I try to determine whether concentrating on 2/3 spell-schools could be more worthwhile than using the "strong" element against certain bosses. (Example: Use Gnome against the Ice Gigas because it leads to a levelup of Gnome earlier which makes later bosses be defeated faster/easier in exchange for taking a bit longer on the Ice Gigas) Also, I'm keep going back and reading Touch-Mes description of the item glitch. I'm not sure whether I fully understand it by now - so, if anyone has a simple description or example of use I'd be happy to read it ^^ Thank you
HHS
Active player (282)
Joined: 10/8/2006
Posts: 356
-- Do the enemies only have one weakness/strength, or can they have multiple?
They have at most one strength, and they are then weak against the opposite element. Moon and Mana don't have opposite elements, and therefore no enemies are weak against them.
-- Is there a chart of which enemy is weak/strong against which magic?
I can make a list. Rabite: None Buzz Bee: Mana Mushboom: Mana Chobin Hood: None Lullabud: Mana Iffish: Water Kid Goblin: Earth Eye Spy: Water Green Drop: None Specter: Dark Blat: None Goblin: Earth Water Thug: Water Polter Chair: Mana Ma Goblin: Earth Dark Funk: Fire Crawler: Mana Ice Thug: Water Zombie: Dark Kimono Bird: Air Silktail: None Nemesis Owl: Air Pebbler: Earth Pumpkin Bomb: Mana Steamed Crab: None Chess Knight: Mana Wizard Eye: Water Howler: None Robit Foot: None LA Funk: Water Grave Bat: Dark Werewolf: Moon Shadow X3: Dark Evil Sword: Moon Tomato Man: Fire Mystic Book: None Sand Stinger: Earth Mad Mallard: None Emberman: Fire Red Drop: Fire Eggatrice: Earth Bomb Bee: Fire Mushgloom: Mana Trap Flower: Mana Dinofish: Water Mimic Box: Moon Shadow X1: Dark Kimono Wizard: Air Ghost: Dark Metal Crawler: Mana Spider Legs: Earth Weepy Eye: Light Shellblast: Water Beast Zombie: Dark Ghoul: Dark Imp: Dark Blue Drop: Water Marmablue: Moon Fierce Head: Dark Griffin Hand: Water Needlion: Earth Metal Crab: None Armored Man: None Shadow X2: Dark Eggplant Man: None Captain Duck: None Nitro Pumpkin: Mana Turtlance: Water Tsunami: Water Basilisk: Earth Gremlin: Dark Steelpion: Earth Dark Ninja: None Whimper: Light Heck Hound: Dark Fiend Head: Dark National Scar: Dark Dark Stalker: Dark Dark Knight: Dark Shape Shifter: None Wolf Lord: Dark Doom Sword: None Terminator: Light Master Ninja: None Mantis Ant: Earth Wall Face: Air Tropicallo: Mana Minotaur: Earth Spikey Tiger: Fire Jabberwocky: Water Spring Beak: Air Frost Gigas: Water Snap Dragon: Water Mech Rider: None Doom's Wall: Dark Vampire: Dark Metal Mantis: None Mech Rider (2nd fight): None Kilroy: None Gorgon Bull: Earth Brambler: Mana Boreal Face: Mana Great Viper: Earth Lime Slime: Water Blue Spike: None Chamber's Eye: Air Hydra: Water Aegagropilon: Mana Hexas: None Kettle Kin: None Tonpole: Water Mech Rider (3rd fight): None Snow Dragon: Water Fire Gigas: Fire Red Dragon: Fire Axe Beak: Fire Blue Dragon: Air Buffy: Dark Dark Lich: Dark Biting Lizard: Water Dragon Worm: Earth Dread Slime: Light Thunder Gigas: Air Doom's Eye: Dark Mana Beast: Mana
-- The relative "power" (formulas?) of various spells -- The "power" gain of the spells when they level up? -- The "magic defense" (if that exists) of bosses
http://www.mediafire.com/?y932dr95y5bwkwp Formulae are given on this page: http://tasvideos.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=425&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=420
Joined: 4/1/2010
Posts: 90
That's awesome, thank you for your work :) I read there, "Force = (Accuracy+Spell's strength)*(1+Spell level/2)" Is there also a chart for the "Spell's strength" value? I mean, Gnomes Earth Slide seems to do more damage then the jewel-y attack. Or is that the same number like the mana cost?
HHS
Active player (282)
Joined: 10/8/2006
Posts: 356
Look at the Spells section in the file I just posted. Earth Slide has a strength value of 61, and Gem Missile has 43. This is the number to put into the formula.
Joined: 4/1/2010
Posts: 90
Honestly, I can't find a spells section. Is it because I use open office and there are tabs I don't see? Edit: Sorry, for some reason I had another document in my download manager still and opened that - thanks again, I now have everything I need I guess :)
Joined: 4/1/2010
Posts: 90
Hiho, sorry to bother you again - but can you explain to me what exactly happens when using the easter egg? (A+L -> R 39 times, then don't push A or L, anything else doesn't matter, and press R again. I noticed, that the game completely stops except for the music. It may be a bit of a stretch, but I've seen weirder things turning out to be useful ^^... In any case, holding any of the buttons, will make the game execute the action right after the NAS disappears. Not useful for a TAS, but in case a useful trick gets discovered, which requires 3 characters to execute an action at the same time this would be an option for a RTA. (There is already a glitch where walking through a "move-transition" with multiple characters at the same time results in 2-3 moves instead of only 1, so this could be used there... But it isn't useful anywhere currently ^^)
HHS
Active player (282)
Joined: 10/8/2006
Posts: 356
Before it checks various other buttons, it increments the counter ($7e002b) if R was pressed, and the currently held buttons are R, A and L (on controller 1, and assuming the default button configuration), and no script is running. Then, on every frame, after moving the characters, it checks if the counter equals 39. If you're a town, the counter is just reset. If you're not in a town, and R is currently held, and L, A, X are not held, NAS is shown for 64 frames, and the counter is reset. As for buttons, they are reset at the following times: - When they are processed - When fading out or in, or if Flammie is on screen, or there's a transition, or a level 8 spell is being executed - When a player leaves the game (only on that controller) - When a script or transition starts - When a script ends - When the sword is taken from the lake - When leaving the menu
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