This TAS is really cool! Have you considered doing the E4 run?
Yeah I think I will in the future. I think that category should be done of Leaf Green by the way, because Sandshrew and Vulpix don't have Intimidate ability (unlike Ekans and Growlithe, that would be the Pokemon you would catch on Fire Red). Intimidate ability makes a battle slower due to the animation.
Edit: well, both Ekans and Growlithe have 2 different abilites, so I could just encounter an Ekans /Growlithe that doesnt have intimidate ability. Still, it would be better to use Leaf Green just to have a TAS of this version too.
Well that's pretty good. It would be good to use a different version for the other run. Would this run have been slower with leaf green?
Fire Red and Leaf Green are equally fast for any%. Not in the 'Well, they're basically the same game' sense, in the any% path there are literally no differences you care about, and IIRC cries don't take different amounts of time like they did in RBY.
If top half of RNG 2 mod 1600 is less than 344, you get an encounter.
It's just a small difference but, I'm pretty sure RNG 2 mod 1600 has to be less than 343, not 344. (Found a value which mod 1600 was 343, and didnt get an encounter, then I found one with 342, and I did).
Actually, In cave / water it's different. I had an estimation done, but didn't exactly calculate the formula. I'll probably do this soon.
Also, in MT Moon, depending, if you're on B2, wild encounter rate is even lower.
Anyway, I made a modified version of FractalFusion's RNG viewer that has some extra functionalities that helped me a lot during the TAS. I hope he doesn't mind if I release this:
http://www.mediafire.com/download/k0948frvuv13wka/pokemon3rdgenscript_RNG.lua
Right now it only tells you when your next encounter will be if you're on the grass (I'll try to include caves, water later).
Edit: this is weird, I have been finding some RNG values that sometimes give you a wild encounter, and sometimes they don't. I can't really understand how the game determines wild encounters. Seems like for grass, if RNG mod 1600 is really low, its always a wild encounter, if it's really high, then it never is a wild encounter, but if it's around 340-350, a wild encounter can happen or not.
I believe each area has its own encounter rate. I'm not linking to databases of it for the same reason we don't link to ROMs, but you should be able to find dumps of it if you look around.
I believe each area has its own encounter rate. I'm not linking to databases of it for the same reason we don't link to ROMs, but you should be able to find dumps of it if you look around.
yeah I found those encounter rates. But still I can't determine what is the exact formula for wild encounters (rate- depending). I know how it is approximately, and I know some RNG values which always would work, and some of them which would never work, but there are still some of them I'm not sure how they work.
For grass for example, it's as if RNG mod 1600 is lower than 336, then you get wild encounter, if it's higher than 343, you don't, but if it's between 336 and 343, you could get them or not.
Unfortunately I'm too late to point this out before the run was published, but I noticed a place where a tiny bit of time could be saved by better movement. It's the room at the top of the tower in Lavender Town, with all the Rocket Grunts. Since the grunts walk off the bottom of the screen when you win against them, it's faster to go up the middle and eat some [!]s than to talk to each one, as both you and the grunts have to walk fewer tiles.
I haven't actually measured it to make sure, but here's a comparison. The TAS:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d4p-YN1FXEo&t=1h04m08s
Speedrun that goes up the middle:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XuFfLtX4rWA&t=1h16m04s
Unfortunately I'm too late to point this out before the run was published, but I noticed a place where a tiny bit of time could be saved by better movement. It's the room at the top of the tower in Lavender Town, with all the Rocket Grunts. Since the grunts walk off the bottom of the screen when you win against them, it's faster to go up the middle and eat some [!]s than to talk to each one, as both you and the grunts have to walk fewer tiles.
I haven't actually measured it to make sure, but here's a comparison. The TAS:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d4p-YN1FXEo&t=1h04m08s
Speedrun that goes up the middle:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XuFfLtX4rWA&t=1h16m04s
I'm afraid you're right, what you say saves around 1, 1.5 seconds.
I believe each area has its own encounter rate. I'm not linking to databases of it for the same reason we don't link to ROMs, but you should be able to find dumps of it if you look around.
yeah I found those encounter rates. But still I can't determine what is the exact formula for wild encounters (rate- depending). I know how it is approximately, and I know some RNG values which always would work, and some of them which would never work, but there are still some of them I'm not sure how they work.
For grass for example, it's as if RNG mod 1600 is lower than 336, then you get wild encounter, if it's higher than 343, you don't, but if it's between 336 and 343, you could get them or not.
No, I meant area as in Route 1, Route 2, etc. Anyway, I just checked; the encounter rate for grass encounters is the same in all the numbered routes except Route 21, where it's lower. (It varies somewhat in non-numbered areas; for instance, Viridian Forest has a lower encounter rate than the numbered routes.)
I believe each area has its own encounter rate. I'm not linking to databases of it for the same reason we don't link to ROMs, but you should be able to find dumps of it if you look around.
yeah I found those encounter rates. But still I can't determine what is the exact formula for wild encounters (rate- depending). I know how it is approximately, and I know some RNG values which always would work, and some of them which would never work, but there are still some of them I'm not sure how they work.
For grass for example, it's as if RNG mod 1600 is lower than 336, then you get wild encounter, if it's higher than 343, you don't, but if it's between 336 and 343, you could get them or not.
No, I meant area as in Route 1, Route 2, etc. Anyway, I just checked; the encounter rate for grass encounters is the same in all the numbered routes except Route 21, where it's lower. (It varies somewhat in non-numbered areas; for instance, Viridian Forest has a lower encounter rate than the numbered routes.)
Yeah I understood what you were talking about, I actually checked what were the encounter rates for every route, cave, dungeon, etc. With "grass" I actually meant every Route except that Route 21 (Tangela's route I believe?). But yeah, saying "grass" for that wasn't the best since there is a Route exception, and places like Viridian Forest have a lower encounter as well.
I did a testrun using Clefairy/Clefable (start from Mt. Moon), and so far it seems likely to be faster than using the Squirtle line all the way. More testing is needed.
The idea is to catch Lv. 12 Clefairy at Mt. Moon, evolve it immediately with Moon Stone, and teach it Mega Punch, Mega Kick, and Water Pulse (when those moves are available). Along with Pound, and collecting PP-restoring items, this will carry Clefable a long way. As far as I know, the PP-restoring items that are available with little delay are:
- Vermilion City: Max Ether 5 south and 1 west of Pokecenter (hidden)
- Rock Tunnel: Max Ether north of Picnicker Sofia
- Rocket Hideout: Max Ether in B4F west room (same area as Lift Key grunt)
- Pokemon Tower (Lavender): Elixir in dead end west of 4F east stairway
- Cycling Road: Max Elixir near bottom (hidden)
- Pokemon Mansion (Cinnabar): Elixir in NE room of B1F (hidden)
- Victory Road: Max Elixir in one of the statue maze dead ends (hidden)
From my testing, Clefable saves a few critical-hit messages compared to mkdasher's TAS, and even gives OHKO on a couple Pokemon which are 2HKO. The late stage is still unclear, though. Most likely, Clefable will need to be given at least one more move, either Blizzard or Fire Blast. Metronome is too far out of the way and likely has too much expected luck-manipulation delay to be worth it.
Would you be using Charmander up to that point, or does it lose too much time at Brock compared to Squirtle?
It's a pity you don't get an ability boost; I'm a little surprised that a Clefable does more damage than a Wartortle in Torrent. I guess one advantage is that you have a better STAB type.
Another thing I was wondering about is whether Return would be worth it as a main damage move (it's not very far out of the way, apparently in the guard house south of Lavender). Clefairy's base happiness is 140, giving a base power of 56 just starting out, and it will only go up as the game goes on (going up by 1 base power every 640 steps on average and approximately 1 on every level gain), given that the Clefable is in your team all the time. The question would be as to whether you'd have built up 24 base power boosts by the time you reached Lavender Town (you can pick them up in advance); I can certainly believe you could, though. (Also, it has 20 PP, the same as Mega Punch, so you could just learn one over the other as a PP refresh and get the base power upgrade at the same time.)
You could always get Metronome when you go to Cinnabar Island for the Blaine fight. It would be late in the run, but personally I think the entertainment value of seeing Clefable use Metronome into the perfect answering move would be worth it.
I still remember one time, playing Blue, my last Pokémon against Giovanni in Silph Co. was a high-level Electabuzz I had traded for, with Metronome. Last turn before it faints from poison, I try to use Thunderpunch. It ignores me and uses Metronome into Horn Drill to OHKO Giovanni's last Pokémon.
I am planning to do a Route 2 TAS. I waited since FractalFusion said about Clefairy's strat, which I didn't think about. I guess for Round 2 Clefable would be slower since you have to do Elite 4 twice. I'm still not sure about any% since I haven't tested myself.
Planning where to catch some of the pokemon is going to take time I guess though.
Well, standard Round 2 strategy for non-TAS runs is to catch Zapdos and use that throughout the postgame; you don't use Blastoise during the second Elite 4 battle in a realtime run anyway, so that wouldn't be a reason not to use Clefairy.
However, I can believe that the TAS route might be different from the realtime route due to the ability to get better luck in the battles; it might be that the time cost to get Zapdos wouldn't be worth it in a TAS.
Well, standard Round 2 strategy for non-TAS runs is to catch Zapdos and use that throughout the postgame; you don't use Blastoise during the second Elite 4 battle in a realtime run anyway, so that wouldn't be a reason not to use Clefairy.
However, I can believe that the TAS route might be different from the realtime route due to the ability to get better luck in the battles; it might be that the time cost to get Zapdos wouldn't be worth it in a TAS.
yeah, Zapdos was alredy out of my route. And because of having to battle elite 4 twice, Clefable is not an option for me for the main pokemon.
The only pokemon I thought of using after was Machoke, but I didn't see how to get past Agatha with it, so I'm pretty sure I'll have to go with Blastoise anyway.
My plan is to catch 56 pokemon, and evolving Clefairy into Clefable, since you have to get a Moon Stone anyway on Rocket Hideout, and I would use the moon stone just when I open the bag for something else. That plus the starter and evolutions would get me the 60 neede pokemon.
I'm going to use LeafGreen since any% was already on FireRed, and it isn't any faster / slower.
I found this when someone uploaded the recent FR/LG TAS to Nicovideo: http://no2.pic.bz/document/appear/encount-fl.html
It has information on FR/LG encounters (there are also pages on Ruby/Sapphire encounters and on Emerald encounters).
Translation:
Rate of encountering Pokemon for FR/LG
In FR/LG, 15 types of encounter number (01・02・03・04・05・06・07・08・09・0A・0E・14・15・19・3C) exist. It determines whether Pokemon is encountered or not, as described next.
A=(8-(encounter number/10))*256
B=1280
The following modifications:
- Black Flute -> 2x A, 0.5x B
- White Flute -> 0.5x A, 1.5x B
- Lead Pokemon holds Cleanse Tag -> 4/3x A, 2/3x B
- Lead Pokemon has Stench -> 2x A, 0.5x B
- Lead Pokemon has Illuminate -> 0.5x A, 2x B
Divide A and B by 256, and then, if X is less than A, and if random number from 0 to 99 is greater than or equal to B, then there is no encounter.
C=encounter number
- riding bike -> 0.8x C
C=(C*Y*16)/200)
- Black Flute -> 0.5x C
- White Flute -> 1.5x C
- Lead Pokemon holds Cleanse Tag -> 2/3x C
- Lead Pokemon has Stench -> 2x C, 0.5x B [*]
- Lead Pokemon has Illuminate -> 0.5x C, 2x B [**]
If C is greater than or equal to 1600, set C to 1600. If random number from 0 to 1599 is smaller than C, then there is encounter.
X: Number of steps taken with possibility of encounter.
Y: During calculation for A and B, if there is no encounter, add to the sum total the encounter number of the map. [?]
After encountering a Pokemon, or when changing map, X and Y reset to 0.
[*] I suppose this is an error; meant to say 0.5x C.
[**] I suppose this is an error; meant to say 2x C.
From what I gather, A and B represent the initial phase. A/256 represents the number of steps which determine encounter by the universal RNG (for 0x3C=60, this gives A/256=2, so 1 step) and B/256=5 represents 5% chance of encounter in this phase.
After this initial phase, C/1600 represents the chance of encounter. Here it uses the special encounter RNG that advances only by step. It is influenced by Y in the above formula. I don't know exactly how Y works though, but it may explain what mkdasher found (that a wild encounter may or may not occur for a RNG mod 1600 that is around 340-350). Note that if C=0x3C=60 and Y=70, then C*Y*16/200=336.
I wonder if using Clefairy/Clefable would be faster in the first generation games as well.
Post #352705
aruka did a good job of Pokemon Blue TAS (mostly glitchless) using Nidoking line. I doubt that Clefable line would be faster. In Gen. 1, Pound and Mega Punch are long-delay attacks, so that would hurt Clefable in the long run. Horn Drill and Fissure are extremely useful (because OHKO attacks are based on Speed in Gen. 1, not level), but Clefable does not learn them whereas Nidoking can learn them.
By the way, since the formula of when getting wild encounters was inaccurate, I checked the RNG seeds again. Now I can confirm it is POSSIBLE to get till Brock with 0 encounters.
Still, this seed is slower than the one I used, since 2 pokemon need to be caught anyway, and with the other seed you can cut extra grass on Route 1 (not possible with the 0 encounter seed because you'd be getting an encounter on Viridian City, which is useless).
