praetarius5018

Lufia 2 - Age of the Sinistrals

130 posts in this topic

I think the optional bosses need some more polishing, though.

Looking at the code, the Egg Dragon seems pretty bland and generic compared to the Sinistrals. But he should be the hardest and most thought-out boss battle instead.

Also the Master: So he has 19980 HP, eh? Are there any moves/skills comparable to Fatal Blow to any non-Dekar chars?

And there's no real way to survive even one Stardust Blow of a Gold Dragon I think.

 

And the skill reset really is way too penalizing. In a mod with its main feature being all these new spells I really want to have fun with it and test the hell out of it. But the way it is now I instead fear to do anything wrong because I don't want to do a mistake. At least considering the endgame party - however, considering 3 of them are in the party against Gordovan Gades every skill for them feels like a chore I'll totally regret later on.

Does it at least reset the Divine Shrine stat boosts, too, so that I can get them again? Because such a permanent penalty just is way too much overkill.

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12 hours ago, praetarius5018 said:

I meant more in the sense that rank4/5 are similar in relative power but have different "roles"; like Flash4 is more a healer while 5 is more a damage dealer, etc.

Oh yeah, I've noticed that the master rank and rank four capsule monsters have both been useful. I flip them around if I need extra cover fire. Like when I lost Laxus, I swapped to capsule monsters that had attack all moves since Selan was all alone on that front now.

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11 hours ago, Artemis said:

Does it at least reset the Divine Shrine stat boosts, too, so that I can get them again? Because such a permanent penalty just is way too much overkill.

Divine Shrine and stat potions get reset too. So don't step onto that panel/drink those potions until you got your final set up. I find the ocean is a great place to grind for money to test out skill sets. Just sic the phoenix on those whales and watch em cry.

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I redid the game on hard mode, and made it up to the three towers pre Doom Island. A few thoughts: 

Spoiler

Gades' boss fight seemed to have way too much hp/last too long. I liked the Resist being needed and the general flow going back and forth since you were sacrificing your much needed boosts to keep surviving. Guy just dragged it out way too long personally.

Amon, I stopped there because I'm just confused as to how his fight works. If I hit him he gets healed? I think he might have too many moves? Like a whole party wide attack twice in a row seems pretty unfair. Gades at least had a turn to charge up his schtick, but Amon just busts out his whenever. I'm pretty close to level 99 with everyone but Artea too, so I dunno what to do now.

With my capsule monsters, I don't find em to survive long/at all in end game so I'm just rolling with the dark dragon who instantly wipes random fights with Eliminator. The others fell to the wayside compared to his skills. 

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Well, you've access to all spell/skill shops before the stat boost event, so if you knew about it being a problem you could have reset just before.

I found different CMs useful for different bosses; dark is least useful against the Sinistrals.
I'd go with rank 4 light as the most useful CM in the final boss rush.

Against randoms - dark or fire, yes, but not really against bosses.
Dark does no damage there, fire dies in a hurry.

Gades

Spoiler

weak to light, resists shadow, thunder, ice
280 / 350 AGL, slightly outspeeds Guy unless he's basically maxed AGL

his battle plan relies on his powerful Destructo-Wave; it has "split damage" = more damage the fewer targets live
so he tries to thin your ranks with devastation and octostrike before going for the finishing blow of Undead -> Destructo-Wave

turn 1
Devastation, massive damage to bottom-left party member (chooses random victim if this spot is dead), MUST be guarding (remember that guard is only effective if you are faster)
        non-guarding takes too much damage thanks to row + base damage

turn 2
Destructo-Wave, split SOIL damage but very high, ignore rows; if ATP buff is positive base power increases dramatically (2.4k -> 3.8k)

turn 3-5 randomly uses:
-Octostrike, 8 random normal attacks
-Undead, boosts his ATP, DFP and AGL; next turn skips forward to turn 2
-Curse, drop target to 1 HP and 100% chance for poison
-Deathblow vs all, 35% paralysis, pierce reflect, 1200 power, physical/dark

loop back to turn1

you can cancel the Undead boost either with resist or any debuff that lowers ATP

Amon

Spoiler

drains non-elemental and fire, weak to ice
he has 700 AGL on normal or almost 900 on hard

Mr. Chaos has (ironically) a very strict script

his battle plan resolves around confusion, obviously, both for the characters as well as the player:
going first (except against the wind cm), so no hope to react, just predict
reflect on everyone
perfect confusion stat
impossible moves (reflect spells off self to the other party is a FF thing, not Lufia, here reflect goes back to the caster)
fake moves (those in quotes, they pretend to be regular spells but have quite different properties)

turn1:
1. Black Chaos - reflect on everyone
2. Chaos Wave, 666 magic power, 40% confusion, pierce reflect

turn 2:
1. self-reflected single-target "Thunder" OR "Firebird" (you legitimately can't do that, those are fake skills that play the reflect animation on him and then use a reflect piercing skill)
2. Galactic Lancer, either ST or MT; you need 2 Swordsplitter + 2 Forcefields or similar to survive the ST version on hard

turn3
1. MT Firebird: intended to get reflected for heal
2. selects one target that has no confusion (8 tries), then either:
-"Confuse": inflicts sleep, poison, paralysis, silent, confusion 35% chance each and death 15% chance
-Mind Game: just adds the confused flag + drains IP, no question asked, confuse immunity does not apply

loop back to turn1

Erim

Spoiler

weak to thunder
AGL is low, you should 100% outspeed her

she doesn't really want to fight, so she just kills one character per turn

turn0 (not repeated)
target CM, kills it; though the wind cm may be able to dodge

turn1
S.F., hits party and has 60% chance of death

turn2
Vanish against top-left hero, 1200 magic power, status effects death, sleep, paralysis, poison 100%

turn3
Energy Break against top-right hero, deal target's maxHP*2 + 200 magic damage

turn4
Fry against bottom left hero with 1500 INT

turn5
Divine Weapon against bottom right hero, 7x attack, yes on the same target

turn6
Dark Fry, high split damage to party

loop back to turn1

Daos

Spoiler

weak to water

mostly as vanilla except trades Dragon for Reduce and normal attack is now Absorb

Guard Daos

Spoiler

neutral to all elements
max AGL

he's no real plan besides aoe spam but likes his little bit of boss banter
he takes a few hints from Lufia3's final boss Zalbak
attacks are against the whole party unless noted

turn1
"Mortals...just perish!" - does nothing, last round of mercy

turn66 (either you die or him):
"This ends now!" - drops his own HP to 1
Meteor
Dark Fry
Pantheon

if he drops below 50%, once:
"We're not done yet!" - does nothing
Resist
Fake
Clarity ["news" wasn't a spell that exists]

turn2,7,12,..
Dread (lower DFP)
Dark Fry, physical
Hopeless Scream, target one hero, HP to 1, MP to 0, IP to 0

turn6,11,16,...
spirit force, can poison and confuse
Reduce, against one, dark magic damage, cancel mirrors
dark reflect (Daos' move)

otherwise 3 actions as follows:
1. action, randomly regular tier2 magic:
-Bolt
-Fireball
-Vortex
-Blizzard

2. action, randomly:
-Drain (HP)
-Absorb (MP)
-Quake: 200 dmg for all
-Stun vs one
-Buster Attack: 600 power, physical, no split

3. action, randomly:
-Crakamdite, hit-all (200+INT) power magic with split
-normal attack vs all
-Destroy vs all
-flash vs one
-Devastation vs all, 30% paralysis, pierce reflect, 850 power, physical/dark

keeping the cm alive might be worth a lot as it weakens his aoe damage

 

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Fortunately I haven't grabbed the stat ups yet, was just giving some of my thoughts on how the Sinistrals were playing out for me. 

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I tried resetting skills in merix and the game crashed + restarted, then gets frozen when trying to boot up a save :/ save state fixes it but still trying to see if there's any way to get around this as my last save state was a while before the crash, any ideas?

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Nope, was a brand new version of the game. It's all good, I didn't need it, I liked the extra challenge. Just beat the egg dragon! 

 

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Finally beaten the game, LV99, better equips and without see the strategies,
I used 1 save state because guard daos killed me, he put his AGL so high, make the endless battle depends of luck and if maxim can save the day using the pearl equipment IP.
Maybe it's more easy using any different strategy, I used mainly Bunny sword with selan and arty IP 1/4HP, and trying to survive,
in the vanilla game I never use Miracles and here a lot lol
My valoration it's a good hack, I prefer less dificulty and the enhancements you did, the game's actually requires know everything of everything,
and the difficulty goes "start a bit hard, turn easier using blue chest equipment after Gruberik, you reach the final battle and it's brutal, so there's a part of the game that isn't hard at all"
 

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V8

  • skill reset now only subtracts stats gained from skills
  • doubled monster item drop rate
  • edited EggDragon's AI & stats
  • fixed HP overflow through healing
  • reduced Guard Daos' ATP and INT from 800 to 760
  • reduced Master's HP from 19980 to 9980
  • fixed Demise targetting themselves after Mirror
  • reduced Copper Dragon's HP from 4800 to 4000
  • reduced Copper Dragon's Cinder Blast power from 1200 to 1100
  • increased Copper Dragon's ATP from 860 to 880
  • reduced Silver Dragon's HP from 5600 to 4500
  • reduced Silver Dragon's Cinder Blast power from 1400 to 1120
  • reduced Silver Dragon's ATP from 904 to 880
  • reduced Gold Dragon's HP from 6500 to 5000
  • reduced Gold Dragon's ATP from 952 to 880
  • increased Gold Dragon's INT from 560 to 640
  • reduced Gold Dragon's Stardust power from 1600 to 1140
  • changed 2 Lion boss fight into 1 Trick Lion + 1 Fake Lion; each uses their namesake spell and drops same ring if beaten first
  • Trick Ring now increases STR by 30 instead of ATP by 10
  • Fake Ring now increases AGL by 20 instead of ATP by 10
  • Uni Jewel now increases DFP by 30 and HP by 35 instead of ATP by 50
  • Uni Jewel has now IP Meltdown instead of Dash
  • Unicorn (fish) now has a chance to drop Uni Jewel
  • Revive Armor grants +40 maxHP
  • Holy Robe grants +20 maxHP
  • Muscle ring grants +10 maxHP
  • Old Shield grants +30 maxHP
  • Tough Glove grants +15 maxHP
  • Holy Wings grants +25 maxMP
  • Magic Bikini grants +50 maxMP
  • Cut-All ATP multiplier reduced from x0.8 to x0.75
  • Turmoil ATP multiplier increased from x0.5 to x0.6, MP cost increased from 10 to 14
  • Blitz MP cost from 25 to 33
  • Darkness ATP multiplier reduced from x2 to x1.25
  • Darkhole magic power increased from 1200 to 1350
  • Meteor magic power increased from 2x INT to 2.25x INT
  • Clarity INT buff increased from 15% to 20%
  • Dread now debuffs DFP and MGR by 10% instead of only DFP
  • reworked %HP damage IPs to be independant of row, DFP and variance
  • reduced Fatal Blow IP from 1/2 HP damage to 1/3
  • increased Battlecry IP from 1/6 HP damage to 1/5
  • increased Ax attack IP from 1/8 HP damage to 1/6
  • increased Devastation IP from 1/8 HP damage to 1/6

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skill reset now only subtracts stats gained from skills

Awesome!

However, I thought of something: How about instead of Merix choose one of the gamblers in the VIP room to be the skill resetter?

That not only gives a decent narrative reason for why it's so expensive, but also give the VIP room itself some more meaning.

Besides, it makes you thinking more about what to choose during the mid-game - which is just exactly what you want, anyway, right?^_^

Quote

reduced Gold Dragon's Stardust power from 1600 to 1140

Did you change Stardust Blow from neutral to light-elemental? If not, you should do so because then there's the Apollo Shield which greatly reduces the damage and makes that attack way less unfair - and actually survivable.

Quote

Uni Jewel has now IP Meltdown instead of Dash

Actually I'm not that fond of this change. Because Dash is also the special attack of the unicorn/narwhal fishes. Like they dash/charge at you and ram their horn right into you. Meltdown just seems too random and artificial.

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I think Merix is better since you can buy the Warp spell there, so less chance to get yourself stuck there.
Also it comes shortly after the 1st Gades fight where you may have just loaded all the spells you could find on your party to beat him.

I didn't change the element of Stardust Blow.

Dash at that point wouldn't be too useful, you've access to regular skills that deal comparable damage without using IP you want for more important skills.

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I honestly don't care about the gem itself.
I just needed another item that has access to a ATP debuff IP and saw that the Uni Jewel wasn't obtainable.
So I just added it and slapped the first ATP debuff on it that wasn't Swordsplitter.
That's all there is to it.

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The problem is all the stones which are based on specific enemies also have the corresponding IP move which is based on said enemy's special move. Therefore, the Uni Jewel breaking this established pattern just feels wrong.

Another established pattern is that these kind of debuff moves are exclusive to headgear items.

So this feels totally off as it breaks two patterns of how items and IP moves are designed.

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So, what about Spido Jewel's Debuff IP?
I can't put that on my head.

Or Fury & Angry Rings with Dread (DFP down)

Btw. having Uni Jewel give Dash IP would currently also break the stone pattern ¬¬

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Dread may be a debuff, but it's also a spell and therefore goes into ring territory. Spiderweb is an odd case, yeah, however all the jewel IP moves are based on an enemy move - including Uni Jewel and Unicorn's Dash. And while Spiderweb is a debuff, it's nevertheless not in the same playground as the regular debuffs like Meltdown. The jewels are a melting pot for all kinds of behaviours effect-wise (including Tarantula's Spiderweb debuff), but with the restriction that there's an corresponding enemy move named the same.

 

So my suggestion to be consistent with it: Give Uni Jewel the Dash IP move, but with the Meltdown debuff effect instead of its regular effect.

Sounds random and silly? Actually no, because a lot of these stone moves behave very differently from the corresponding enemy move. Just look at Gorgon Rock's Ax Attack which, despite sharing the name, just is a completely different move. Therefore Dash as debuff would be perfectly fine and absolutely in-line with the game's conventions.

Edited by Artemis

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No other item, however, a few other enemies and capsule monsters have it.

 

Another thing: The timing when the true final boss battle starts seems a bit off. It would work way better if the battle starts later - like when the actual force clash happens. So that the final battle actually IS that clash of energy waves. I'd say the best moment is after Maxim says "Now! Do it now!". That is, if it's feasible to start the battle during these animations.

Edited by Artemis

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Some more questions about the standard non-retry modus:

This is more like a rebalance hack instead of a difficulty hack, right?

So how would you say is the difficulty curve? Both in comparison to vanilla as well as in itself? With the latter I mean e. g. how do Tarantula or Gordovan Gades compare to Fire Dragon, Ghost ship or Tank regarding the difficulty?

Also how difficult would you say Egg Dragon is compared to the Sinistrals and especially compared to Guard Daos? (This question goes for both Start and Retry.)

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less rebalance, more extra content (skills, final bosses that actually put up a fight)

the difficulty curve should be still like vanilla just a step or 2 higher (I went through every single enemy and increased stats and power of special moves by a certain percentage).
Tarantula and early Gades should still be the top candidates for hardest boss fight before the final.
I'd guess the effect is actually stronger here than in vanilla for Tarantula as it still suffers from a massive case of early game = lack of options (especially no AC)

hard mode increases enemy damage before defense so the effect will just become bigger as the game goes on (same for damage reduction for player)

If I had to order the final bosses by difficulty I'd say:
Egg Dragon > Guard Daos > Amon > Erim > Gades > Daos

Daos isn't really a boss, more like a warm up before the real boss.
I mean I didn't really have anything to work with for him.
Gades, Amon and especially Erim (because of her L3 Iria battle) have a lot of material to work with from Lufia 1-3.
But Daos?
He orders his minions around (who are beaten at this point), has his S.F., casts high tier spells, Dark Reflector/Scary Memory and has a crippling weakness to gambling.
Dunno, if I ever get around to a V9 I'll probably stretch the lore around him a lot to make him more interesting.

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I'll probably stretch the lore around him a lot to make him more interesting

Can you imagine to also alter events in the game? Like adding new scenes.

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