hmsong

That's an excellent idea, but I have no idea how to do that. I know how to reduce the cast time for each spells, but I don't know how to make Speed Up decrease the cast time for the target character. And this seems like one of those "things that don't exist in vanilla" that praetarius5018 said before, so that is even more difficult to do. The only thing I can do is change the existing logics that's already present in the game. And even that depends on if I already know what I'm looking for. @praetarius5018 I don't know if you're still willing to help me, but if you are, would you please tell me the values for the usage items? (consumables and magic items) I'm guessing they are 2 bytes, since there are more than 256 items, if you included equipments. I'm intending on making a new item shop patch, but I don't even know which values goes with which items, so I can't even search for anything.

I really am sorry. How do I make up? I don't think too many people downloaded my patch (which I confirmed is down now). And people generally post link (just like how a guy sent me a link), rather than pass around the patch via attachment. Also, I advertised your Sin of Mana patch in my balance patch, but should I not advertise the bug-fix patch? I was intending on doing that for the next update, but I'll not do that if you don't want me to.

That's true. I'll get rid if it. I hope you accept my sincere apologies. I'm sorry. Also, if you wanted that bug patch to disappear, why not just get rid of the link? Isn't that in your power, as the original creator? (not that I would want you to)

Vanilla Energy Ball was: B5 00 62 0D 01 41 06 B4 09 40 00 00 00 40 32 00 00 <<--- 32 is where $D19BF7 was. I figured 32 represented the 50% or something. And my balance patch has: B5 00 62 0D 01 41 07 96 08 40 54 54 00 00 00 00 00 (all stat up) So if I were to apply your bug fix patch after my balance patch was applied, would that overwrite the all stat up (meaning, canceling the stat up), or would Energy Ball have all stat up + crit up? Obviously, I prefer the bug patch to cancel out the stat up, but I can't tell. I don't have a save file with Energy Ball. So the bug-fix fixes Kevin from stacking the power. Does it also fix Kevin's werewolf form not getting the stat up from level ups? Maybe I'm misunderstanding something. So if I change $D2:C9AF to 00, that would make the werewolf form's attack power and non-werewolf form to be the same power? (aka making werewolf form meaningless, at least in terms of damage output)

First, thank you for answering my question. It's too bad that I don't have the skills to fix any of the bugs. I'm so sad. I would like to learn how to do these. Any recommendation on where to start? A guide? A specific app? Any help would be appreciated. Second, LOL!! Shields ultimately don't have any actual practical purpose in the game? (due to bug) Yikes. But I loved your sarcastic comment. Thanks for that. That was funny. Third, someone today emailed me a link to your long-time-ago work: http://ngplus.net/InsaneDifficultyArchive/www.insanedifficulty.com/board/index567c.html?/topic/6274-fix-only-patch/ I took a look at the patch using IPSPeek, and my god, I didn't understand any of it (seemed very complicated). This is way way beyond anything I can do. Having said that, some questions: Regarding Energy Ball critical hit, I know that after the bug fix from your patch makes the crit to 50%, but how do does that work? I know that you made Sin of Mana into 10%. I'm guessing you adjust the crit at $D19BF7, but I also remember you telling me that Energy Ball ignores what crit rate you had before, and sets it to 50%. So let's say I adjusted D19BF7 tp 0A (which is 10%, which is the same as Sin of Mana -- I don't know where you adjusted for Sin of Mana, since it doesn't seem like you adjusted anything in D19BF7). Now, let's say Hawkeye has Luck of 18 (so your bug-fix patch will make his crit rate to 20%, right?). So, if I were to cast Energy Ball to Hawkeye, would his crit hit rate actually go DOWN to 10%? I don't know what that means. Were there cases where you can reach max level stats early or something? You said in one of the posts: So, does the bug-fix patch (not Sin of Mana patch) fix any of the Kevin bugs? I'm not sure which one you meant by "regular hack" in the 2nd paragraph and "my fix" at the end. Are you referring to Sin of Mana hack or bug-fix hack? Which auto-power up are you talking about? The one where Kevin can stack his werewolf powerup? Or the one you mentioned as "(I removed it in the regular hack)"? Whew, that was a lot.

Damn, I have no idea how to use a debugger. Or even know what it is (I googled it, but I don't really understand it). I mean, it's obviously for hacking (or to analyze the game), but I have no idea how to go about that. Are there any quick fixes for the following bugs? Critical not working Dex not working Spell casting wait time can be canceled with the Pause button. Burn status effect not working I'm sure there are more bugs, but I don't know any. Also, do vanilla shields do anything, other than raising the EVA stat? I heard that they resist certain elements or something (all the element shields sold in Forcena), but I couldn't exactly test that. Or maybe they're supposed to, but that's not working due to yet another bug? Thanks in advance. And I'm sorry to bother you all the time.

@praetarius5018 I wanted to avoid starting another topic, so I'm continuing from here. I released a balance patch several days ago, and some people have asked if I can release a patch that only fixes the bugs, but not change anything else. They made a good point, so I'd like to do that (in fact, since I'm done with the balance patch, I'll just focus on the bug fixes -- at least, the ones I can fix with my limited skills). Starting with what you told me -- Kevin's unlimited strength (that seems to be the most critical game-breaker). Could you please help me with that? What do I do to fix that? I know that Kevin can be powered up infinitely using the Wind Drum in his werewolf form. You also told me that Kevin doesn't get stat boost if he levels up in his werewolf form. Are those two bugs one of the same? (as in, if you fix one, you fix the other)

I'm sorry if someone asked this already, but will Sin of Mana patch work with Trials of Mana? (the official English Rom that was ripped from 2019, and not the fan-translated version) I heard that Trials of Mana has better translation, so I figured I'll give that a try, but with Sin of Mana patch. I just don't know if it'll work though.

Hmm. you mentioned this before too, but I don't exactly know what a debugger is. I know what a debug room is (it was in gamefaqs.com), but I don't' think you're referring to that. How would I use a debugger to create a running in battle patch? Or is that something more... advanced than all the stuff I did? Am I just going over my head? Yeah, you're right about the Y button. That would indeed be annoying. I figured making it Y+B (like Sin of Mana) would be even more difficult than it already was, but I suppose if I had the skills to program the stuff that didn't already exist in the game, I wouldn't have that problem with just assigning buttons to stuff. Now that I think about it, I'm sure you have mixed feeling about teaching me about the battle run tweak. I mean, it's one of the signature features of Sin of Mana -- I'm sure you wouldn't want to give that away. Sorry for asking about that.

Okay, so far, I made hacks for stat balance, magic balance, and the enemies don't counter attack every time you use a screen freezing attack spell. I'm sorry to ask you (again), but would you help me to create the "run on the battle" hack? That always bothered me, since the AI allies were able to run, but your controlled characters couldn't. I know Sin of Mana used B for running, and Y for the tech (Y was unused in battle, so that was a brilliant idea). I intend on doing the same thing. Obviously, this is your idea from Sin of Mana, so unless you give me your permission, I will not release the hack to the public. But I still want it for my own private use. I have a feeling that this is going to be one of those "bigger code changes". I'll learn how to use asar. It can't be that hard to learn.

Wait, seriously? That's all it takes? Just 3 bytes? Holy crap. I can't help but ask. How do you know all this? Were you one of the creators for the original game or something? Hot damn. How can you possibly know which address contains what? I mean, I can open up a game in hex editor to see the addresses and values, but I have no idea what any of the codes mean, nor which address does what. And I definitely can't create something that didn't already exist in the game (such as Sin of Mana's awesome equipment tweaks). Btw, which program do you use to create IPS files? Right now, I use hex editor (HxD) to open up a ROM, and manually change the codes, then use Lunar to create the IPS, but I have a feeling that it's a very ineffective way to create a IPS file (and way too many possibilities of errors).

@praetarius5018 Thank you so much. Thanks to you, I was able to create my own balance-tweak patch (for vanilla). Obviously, nowhere near as deep as Sin of Mana (I just changed the spell list and stats, so that some of the crappy class won't be as crappy as before). I truly appreciate everything you taught me. I know you already did this for Sin of Mana, but if I intended on creating a patch for enemies NOT countering any freezing screen techs, would you be willing to help? I feel like that's the biggest drawback of the original game, since it made half of the magic and all techs useless.

Yeesh. Super happy funtimes sounds... rough. I think I'll go back to doing something less painful, like hitting my own balls with a rock. Haha. Soon, I intend on releasing some class-balance patches (for vanilla) on Romhacking.net. Would it be alright if I were to promote your hack? No, I'm not going to post your patch or anything. I'm simply going to post the link to your site, assuming you give me your permission. I think your hack should be more well known.

Some questions regarding Sin of Mana Misc folder... Would "bonusfight__BlackRabite_Bigieu_DKS" patch work on vanilla? Or does that only work with Sin of Mana? "super_happy_funtimes" -- I can't really tell what this does. The description wasn't very... descriptive. And would that work with vanilla? "skippable_spell_animation" -- would this work with vanilla? I'm sorry that I'm asking questions regarding vanilla, even though this is specifically Sin of Mana forum. But the patches were from Sin, so I thought I should ask here.

Can anyone tell me which address (in the ROM) contains the stats for magic spells? For example, the power of the spell, the element of the spell (ex: Unicorn Head, summon Great Demon, etc), the deciding stat of the spell (ex: does INT decide the power of Marduk or Demon Breath?), and the mp cost. I'm trying to create a tweak patch through hex editor, but I don't know the address nor which values I should look at. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks in advance.

To all contributors of Sin of Mana: Have you guys thought about releasing separate category-patches? For example, you have have one patch for bug fixes (ex: Energy Ball not working, Kevin's Pressure Point stacking, Luck/AGI not working, etc), and you can have another patch for "quality" (ex: ability to run in battle, passive MP regen, Kevin/Hawk no longer doing absurd double hits, etc), and another patch for balance (class balance, skill changes, enemy boss behaviors, etc), equipment mods (including everyone using shield slot), and other things under "misc". That way, people can CHOOSE certain things they want to apply. Of course, I'm assuming some (or all) patches will share certain features (ex: macros that you used to make this patch). I thought it would be very neat to have such thing.

Wait, VIT gives only extra 1.5 HP? That's it? Jesus, that sucks. At least VIT increases natural durability. Or does it?

Wait, 20%? That was the vanilla default critical hit rate if critical worked?! I thought it'd be [stat/255], which is 2~8%. Jesus. I thought Sin of Mana's Energy Ball increase was a bit small (10%), but 50% is definitely too much. Or is it that Energy Ball adds to the already existing crit hit rate? (so if default is 3%, then Energy Ball would add to the existing, hence becoming 13%?)

Also, doesn't the level affect the strength of the attack? I mean, I know that VIT works that way -- When you level up, you get HP boost (let's just say 5), and if you increase VIT, you get another HP boost (let's just say 6). So if you level up and increase VIT with that level up, you'd get 11 HP boost. Doesn't Str/Agi/Int/Pie work that way too? Or does level not affect anything except HP?

Oh wow, I did not know the damaging calculation was that complicated. Thanks for the explanation. I need to do some calculation to see what kind of damage that certain skills do. But yeah, it seems that attack spells in this game (vanilla) is completely obsolete, esp before awesome spells like Power Up (Lise's Star Lancer was always my fav class). And SoM's spells were too powerful. Finding balance in a game is such a difficult and delicate process.

I'm sorry if this was already asked, but let me ask you. Specifically, this is about what was said in Sin of Mana's document regarding vanilla. I read in the Sin of Mana document that Kevin's level up is bugged if he gets leveled up in wolf form. So if Kevin levels up in his wolf form, his "stat up" from the level up is permanently missed? I don't quite understand what that means. In the Sin of Mana document, it said that Kevin's wolf form attack bonus can be stacked to absurd level. What does that mean? How is that done? I'm guessing it involves Pressure Point. Isn't Pressure Point basically the same thing as Power Up spell? How is that stackable? Does saber spell give any extra attack bonus, even against the non-weak enemies? The document implied that, but I didn't see any difference in power output between regular attack and saber spell buffed attack, against non-weak enemies.

Thank you for answering my previous questions. I truly appreciate your help. I noticed something while looking at the spell codes (and have questions). Specifically, about the "power multiplier" and "power addition". It seems they all have at least have "6" for the multiplier (ex: Dia Missile is 06 0A and Unicorn is 16 00), so does that mean that "6" for damaging spell is the weakest (equivalent to 0 in power), and the numbers below that have different effect? For example, Half Vanish has 02 00 in the same bytes, but we all know that it has "half the current HP" effect, and not power based. For the first number, I'm guessing 0 = INT, 1 = PIE, and 2 = AGI. But looking at the Throw Item stats, even the weakest has "7" for the power multiplier. So does that mean that in terms of pure power potential, even the weakest Throw Item (buyable Dart has 27 0A) has higher power than Diamond Missile? (06 0A) The difference in power between Hawk's Throw Weapon is very small, relatively. I mean, Shuriken (1MP) has 27 14, while Axe Bomber (6MP) has 27 32. That doesn't make sense, so am I missing something? Or is this another of vanilla's many balance problems? For the "power addition", I don't see any value bigger than 3C (Ancient, which has the multiplier of F -- the highest). So does that mean if it's 40 or above, it will have different effect? For power, is there ever a case where [the skill with higher power multiplier] is weaker than [the skill with lower multiplier but higher power addition]? ex: Grenade Bomb has 27 3C (7*3C = 1A4), and Earthquake has 08 0F (8*0F = 78). For skills that do multi-target, how does the power distribution work? (for vanilla). For example, I'm sure I saw Lise's Marduke (19 14) does less damage than Carlie's Great Demon (19 0A), even on single target. As always, thank you so much for taking the time to answer my rather... novice questions.

Oh. Based on your tone, I guess someone else requested this too, and the discussion went badly. Too bad. I'd sure like to see what happened in the discussion, but I suppose tracking down that discussion might be tough. Well, thanks anyways. As always, I really appreciate your help.

Okay, I took a look at the codes, and I learned a lot. Thank you. Few observations (and some questions based on those observations): Does Holy Ball and Saint Beam uses PIE instead of INT for its damage output? It seems to use something other than INT for damage output, but I can't tell what that is. I'm simply guessing it's PIE. Demon Breath is actually Fire elem [and is supposed to have Burn SE]. I thought it would be Dark elem. As you said, none of the summons nor traps have elements. You were right. Hawk's ninjutsu uses INT for damage? Aw man. That sucks. Apparently, Poison Breath and Flame Breath are non-element. Since there's no Burn SE (not even in Sin of Mana), this makes Flame Breath absolutely inferior to Poison Breath. Apparently, some of Duran's Lv2/3 special melee attacks have element properties. Crescent is apparently Dark elem, and Axe Bomber is non-element. Black Rain uses AGI for damage. Seriously, thank you so much. I learned so much. Oh, so the defense against spells that use INT (such as Diamond Missile) is also dependent on INT stat? And the same for PIE spells (such as Holy Ball)? Then spells such as Mind Up raises "magic attack and defense", whereas Magic Shield only raises Magic Defense. How does that work? Then what about AGI skills? (such as throw items) Does the defense use AGI stat?

Ah, okay. If they're in order, then it shouldn't be a problem to find the address. Thanks for your help. I need to play around with it.