thzfunnymzn

Hmmm. Rods were mainly there for better synergy with Maduin, but fair enough.

This was going to be a post about how stupidly powerful Gau's Adamantite Rage is. 9999 damage to Inferno, cripples every Narshe encounter save for Hot Wheels + Low Rider and Nastidon x2, the latter of which is solved with Muddle anyways.

Instead, what happens? Right as I'm about to enter the doorway to Mog?

Pincer! Low Rider x2, Wizard x2. Attack, attack, Stop, Magic, Stop, Zombie, death. Couldn't even Warp out since Edgar is Stop'd right as I use a Warp Whistle.

- _ -

So, basically, Pincer = Game Over. I....I'm not sure if it's because I'm "underleveled" for the Narshe Mines or if this is just going to be a thing from now on. I'm going to go buy a Gale Hairpin & Back Guard (haven't bought those in years) and hope this is just a "Narshe Mines is meant for lvl.25 characters" thing. If this keeps up, though, I'll chalk it up as a 4th thing that needs to be looked after for NHT (alongside Hell Angel, Phunbaba, and Phantom Train).

Considering how much I'm relying on Gau's Adamantite Rage to carry me through the Narshe Mines, perhaps it is just an underleveled thing. Maybe NHT is hard enough to force the soft level barriers of the various dungeons. * shrug * We'll see.

Enter Narshe Mines.

Get pincer'd by Hot Wheels and Low Rider.

Wipe before I can execute any command.

- _ -

"OK, I have Gau now, let's use the new 'Leap Anywhere' function to quickly & easily grab all but a few Rages, plus steal me a Magic Bone for his physical offense"

* 50 Game Overs later *

OK, treat everything like a full-fledged mini-boss or boss fight, especially Colossus. Be prepared to run whenever a Phoenix Cave fight turn south b/c my lvl.20 team cannot win these fights with bad luck. Punishers wreck face now, why do they wreck face now?

>_<

It's nothing I can't handle, but I'm going to have to treat the WoR with respect now if I'm too win smoothly (finally). It was my failure to respect NHT that got me killed. (Plz give us a mid-game Bone that isn't a rare steal in a late-WoR dungeon; that was annoying.)

Kinda worried about Unicorn Edgar though. Edgar's an unmatched tank in NHT, but his low vigor, speed, and stamina (Cover%) are all very noticeable. : / Definitely wouldn't go pure Unicorn in normal BNW, probably shoot for more 10/10 or 12/8 Unicorn:Siren. He does have unparalleled HP in NHT, but I'm not sure how well I can leverage that.

Also kinda worried about HP/MP Terra, but that may have just been me trying to use her at lvl.18 without respecting NHT. We'll see.

***

On a lighter note, I learned that Cover will, in fact, Cover allies on the other side of a pincer. I also got to witness Celes & Edgar both Cover the same attack (didn't pay attention to who took the damage). Fun stuffs. Cover seems more useful now that I've got actual HP & defenses, though for la-de-da-dolling along just collecting stuff, it was more just there rather than anything real serious.

OK, so, grab Mog, then do Owzer's. Going to have fun with the new Rune Edge + Falchion combo, plus old standards like Mogoon that I haven't played in a while. : )

They could drop Mystery Eggs. Or Ethers. Or Stat Hats. Or something else either silly or justba nice consumable.

Nowea's got good advice.

In general, I'd first increase a character's HP and, if applicable, MP. After that, consider what you primarily wantband focus on that, while maybe splashing a secondary stat and keeping your HP and MP up.

Vigor and Magic have no soft caps. Speed's soft cap is however fast your own hands and mind can comfortably handle, though only Shadow has any real potential to get out of control speed. Stamina has the reverse of a soft cap; each point of stamina is better than the last; problem is that stamina ain't that hot of a stat unless its paired with HP.

On 3/19/2018 at 7:33 AM, BTB said:

 Any "rage"-type status will prevent covering, including dance. I suppose the dance part can be revisited if it's a big deal.

Ouch. I had been hoping for a Cover-Counter Maduin Mog that used Punisher, Hero Ring, and Black Belt while dancing something like Forest Suite for better all-purpose party support tank. But if Dance disallows Cover, that doesn't work.

I ask to re-consider this. Mog has and has had a lot of trouble pulling together all his tools into a powerful whole throughout BNW's life. Dance (and X-Magic) in particular. I'm not seeing any benefit to disallowing a potentially unique set-up for Mog, especially because I highly doubt it'll be op or anything.

!R(GJ2F!@FQ@#TN!(TR!G

SINCE WHEN WAS PHUNBABA THIS STRONG!!!!!!

In the end, I only beat him using kaizo strats (aka, save states). Part of my problem was learning the hard way that BTB recently changed Phunbaba's script to favor an all-in offensive tactic. But...the other half of the problem is that Phunbaba is a luck-based fight at fair levels. : / I had to luck-out with the glitched Hurricane that only blows away one party member, leaving me a full team for Phunbaba. I also had to get lucky with how often Phunbaba attacked Terra, since Fire 2 - didn't have Fire 3 b/c underleveled, : ( - was my best offense, with Bum Rush in second. Also had to get lucky in who was kept after Hurricane, esp. for any poor unfortunate soul who tries to do this without the "Randomly keep 3 party members"  glitch.

Phunbaba, alongside Hell Angel & Soul Train, have been the only battles so far that I felt have been totally and completely luck-based. Everything else has been beatable with the correct strategy, even Dadaluma and Atma.

Whelp, now I can finish sweeping the WoR before going into Owzer's.

Got the Falcon. After the nightmare I just went through, everything here was a breeze. Only death was b/c I decided to play around with the Tentacles. (Double speed with lots of enemies is honestly somewhat scary. Most of my trouble was me dorking around with elemental attacks though).

Places

Characters

Nothings set in stone, but I think the first things I do in the WoR after my initial sweep of everything is to clear Owzer's Mansion, then get Cyan and clear his Soul, and then finish up Narshe. The first to Strago, Relm, and Starlet. Second and third are so that I can esper reset asap - former to use Phantom Celes & vig Cyan (both with lots of Alex), latter to use Terrato Sabin. Oh, and I'll start using Gau and Mog now that I have Fenrir and Palidor.

2 hours ago, JohnFuklaw said:

Another thing that feels like it's a little poorly defined is Terrato Sabin

I'll nitpick and say that Terrato Sabin looks like he makes a solid bulky hyb Sabin, as opposed to Golem + Stray which is more "frail". He's got the all-important HP for front-row attacking, he's got beefy Mantra / Golem summons, and he can afford a few Stray ELs to beef up Chakra. Have yet to try it, but I'm personally more attracted to Terrato Sabin as a "support tank" build for Sabin, rather than Stray Sabin.

This is jut me nitpicking. Carry on. : )

Whelp, tried the stam-Locke / vig-Sabin / HPMP-Terra team on Floating Continent. Most of the continent was a lesson in why 600+ HP = win. Easy peasy IAF without having to worry about Relm or Cover. Choke points were IAF boss and Atma. Forgot Ocean Claws first time for IAF boss so I wiped. Otherwise, easy peasy.

Atma, however..............

....is impossible without either Rerise spam or a team fully decked out in Amulet + White Cape. And the former is still a tricky luck-shot. (OK, technically, I also have to try out Forest Suite as an option too. It's unreliable, but maybe it can work without the other two?). Simply impossible. I tried. I can get past the initial Flare Star + Mind Blast, but without the clutch of either Seraph + Rerise spam or a team fully decked out in status immunity relics, I simply get trapped in a Remedy / Cure 2 loop. I can slowly deal damage with Suplex, Break, or Kunai, but he simply lays on the hurt FAR too fast, even when Slowed, and Mind Blast comes RIGHT as I finished recovering from the previous.

Mind you, this is the new Rerise, which revives at 200-500 HP. Not sure if old Rerise would've cut it.

Last thing to try is Forest Suite without Rerise or mass status immunity. Maybe Mog can clutch it. If not, well, this is a lesson in why turtling = win in BNW. Lots of HP ELs + status immunity relics + Rerise = invincible. (Mass status immunity relics = win is one of the major reasons for why I don't think stamina is really equal in importance to the other stats. It's nice, sure, but when push comes to shove, HP and relics are far more reliable).

(OK, ok, so friggin' huge damage also is very important. Not sure it's as important as the turtling that I mentioned. Having Relm's Sketch / Ice Rod as my dps in lieu of Suplex would be nice, but without Rerise, I don't think it'd be enough to clutch a victory unless I got lucky).

***

Should also mention that Kirin Locke, like Unicorn Edgar, is a weak link against Atma too. Too much of his utility (MP) is locked into the WoR & Icebrand is only so-so against high p.def foes with only 25% proc rate. Forgot to use Cover, but honestly, not sure how much of a difference that would've made, since aside from Shadow, no one member of my team is particularly lacking in the bulk department. (That, and Atma's not scary b/c of his physicals but b/c of his magic). Maybe I'll replace him with Mog.

*******

EDIT: Oh, my precious Harvester and status immunity relics! I'm never leaving you again!

Harvester kicked Atma's butt, Mog MVP. (Locke was replaced). This has been a lesson in BNW's status game.

Honestly, it's a little unfair of me to rant so much about stamina in the WoB, when it's still low. But you know what? I think my point will still stand in the WoR anyways. Reliability > unreliability. Harvester & relics > stamina evasion. Guess I should test Myria & Atma (KT) with primarily stamina as my status defense?

***

Thinking about it for five minutes, stamina's defensive benefits are really backloaded. Not the regen ticks; those more rely on the character having actual HP. But Stamina's contribution to status evade only really matters on endgame set-ups that really, really stack it. Kinda like how defense gets more and more valuable the higher and higher you go. Like, going from 96 -> 112 stamina is HUGE in terms of how much garbage you can dodge. Going from 48 -> 64 however? Meh, whatever.

Perhaps if early & mid-game stuff status / gravity garbage had lower accuracy? Mind Blast might've been more tolerable without Harvester / mass immunity if I could rely on one of my heavy stamina dudes actually evading the statuses thrown my way. As is, I had Kirin Locke, Unicorn/Carbunkl Terra, Maduin Mog, & Unicorn Edgar all go at it. None of them could reliably dodge Rasp, Grav Bomb, Quartr, Mind Blast, what have you.

Also, forgot to mention that I'm loving how I can dodge Flare now. Stacking mg.eva actually proves useful for once. : )

*******

EDIT 2: After owning Atma with Harvester, I should probably back-up and retract my statements about Locke & Edgar being weak links in the Atma fight. Edgar's Cover performed admirably for what its job was worth, especially since Golem balanced now & Shadow had no time for Smoke Bombs. With Harvester support, I could've set Locke up for Cover + Counter with an Icebrand and, I think, gotten good results.

Holy good night, Atma is insane! Took me six or seven tries to finally put that booger down, and even then, only by the skin of my teeth. (Lvl.18 IAF, Lvl.20 Atma, vigCeles/Relm/stamEdgar)

Even when Slowed, he gets two turns for every one that my party gets. Maybe that's what everything else was getting and I'm only just now noticing it because of how crazy Atma's script is. Doesn't help that I'm playing extra macho and the only relevant status relics I have are Jewel Ring, Fairy Ring, and White Cape. Low HP hurts.

Atma's supposed to have new script about Dispelling his power as he charges it, right? I completely forgot about that. >_> Also, when does Atma re-set Haste on himself? I think knowing both of those would've helped me a little bit. (For the fights that managed to get that far).

Not Atma

Atma

Characters

"Hey, guys, I got an idea. How about I miss Slow on Heartfire."

"Uh, Terra, that's..."

Fireballs and meteors rain from above. Team dies.

***

"Blargh. Brains."

"Well, don't that just beat all. Mog and Gau have turned into zombies."

"Eh, let them sleep it off in the castle. They'll be fine in the morning."

"Uh, you sure about that Edgar? You sure they won't try and eat someone's brains?"

"Trust me, they'll be fine. Sleeping cures everything."

***

Oh, and Kirin Cyan's mighty 635 HP right as we prepare for the Floating Continent. ; _ ; (Normally, he'd have 770)

Finished Imperial Banquet.

"Return scum! I challenge you to a duel!"

Cyan Dispatches him for 1900 damage.

"Maybe you can handle the espers."

Lol.

***

Used Locke, Terra, Edgar, Setzer for the Sealed Gate, lvl.15. Everyone's running heavy HP builds, so I've got 450 - 550 HP across the board.

Was an interesting run. Got slammed with statuses much more than normal thanks to double speed. Antares had to be Muddled to avoid Glare spam, and Muddle, Berserk, and Blind all proved annoying. Nothing deadly though; still a breather dungeon. I normally buy Spirit Ring x4 for this dungeon & Daryl's Tomb, but I'm restricting how many status immunity relics I allow myself (only one of each, sans the 2nd Ribbon in Kefka's Tower) so as to see just how useful stamina's status evade really is. (Should be testing this without NHT, but >_> ) I had precious few methods of nulling Zombie (Seraph equip included), though thankfully, I didn't see that status a lot of it.

Phalanx boss went down to BioBlaster spam.

Cave to the Sealed Gate is the first dungeon where I can safely Cover/Counter. Decked out Edgar for max defense and a Fire Lance. Only !Halberd (Phalanx) did significant damage. Edgar is significantly tankier than Terra & Locke (Locke less so); he face-tanked some halberds for Locke. Course, this cave is a breather dungeon more focused on statuses; Floating Continent may prove a better test of Cover/Counter in NHT. Haven't tested Cover/Counter Cyan here. Not super interested in doing so either, will probably just wait until the Murasame & Floating Continent.

At first, I had Locke dual-wield Flametongue with Demonsbane. Then I noticed that Demonsbane insta-kills undead anyways, so I didn't bother.

Terra & Setzer did normal stuff. Heals, Fire 2, and Blackjack spam.

***

I'm probably going to cheese Ultros III's broken script with an Elec Sword for the upteenth time, so I'll post again after I finish the Floating Continent.

* blush * Why, thank you.

***

Aaaand...IMF, clear. Lvl 15 after Cranes. No Cover/Counter used; too dangerous. OTOH, Morning Star Celes just keeps getting better. Number 024 aside, I'd put her on par with Cyan for the IMF. She needs to stick with Runic for 024 though. (Dispatch melted Number 024. 1650 damage a blow. That's almost as much as summoning an esper on a weakness. I think this is one area where "Bushido gets stronger with BPow" goes a little too far). Locke just abused the new Mug mechanics, proc'ing a lot of Bolt 2 casts while he was at it. Sabin & Cyan did Sabin & Cyan stuff. Used a lot of Dried Meats.

Stupid Mine Cart nearly wiped me. Jerk x4 spammed AoE Ice, killing Cyan, and then smacked Locke to take him down. Sabin had to reduce them to one then carefully Phoenix Down back up. Number 128 was also pretty nuts with how many turns he got; I'd have been in trouble without Golem + Ocean Claws. Cranes, first round, straight up OHKO'd Setzer & Locke before I could move. >_< gg Cranes. Second round, Locke got heavy armor, I summoned Golem, Suplexed (Slowed) one, and then they were manageable with Ocean Claws & Storm Blade. Cyan just summoned Kirin and ran moral support.

Sabin is still MVP. Carries clutch victories, doesn't die thanks to Life Bell (best user of Life Bell), good speed for both turn count & initial ATB gauge, and Suplex / Ocean Claws. Despite the weaker 1.9 Golem, equipping Stat Stick / Magic Cube to summon Golem in the boss fights here is still useful. Golem prevents 024's muddle strike, and since 024 mostly relies on magic, Golem should stay up for a while. (Or for the whole time, if you're melting 024 with Dispatch). Number 128 and the Cranes can now wear down Golem pretty quickly, but it does give some breathing room in the opening of the fight.

Morning Star Celes was fun. Probably still a little weak for the Zozo arc (see my Ice comments on Fighter / Dadaluma above), but once she starts getting levels, Ramuh ELs, and the Power Glove, she'll do solid damage. Cyan's stronger, Sabin will outdamage her even without the Power Glove, and both Figaro Bros. have better AoE, but blast it, it was fun actually letting General Celes deliver a meaningful physical beatdown in the WoB. Course, I'm going to have to use Esper Reset if I'm to try out Phantom Celes, but oh well.

Abusing the new Mug mechanics was amusing. Locke would sometimes get in 4 hits before anyone else moved, including some Bolt 2 casts. Even KO'd a high defense Defender once thanks to his number of attacks. Lol. His elemental blade options allowed him to outperform Cyan for Ifrit & Shiva, 024, and Cranes. Though I had Cyan summon Kirin, which somewhat balances things out a bit.

Cyan didn't wow me as much, especially near the end, but I think it's subjective; he didn't have cool new toys to play with, nor was he ever the biggest damage dealer (except for 024). NHT also appears to hit him the hardest; again, probably not objectively true, just looks that way. Kirin Cyan is normally nigh invincible by the mid-/end-point of the IMF. In NHT, he still hasn't reached the point of invincibility. I suspect he'll pick up some steam once he can stack more HP ELs and learns Dragon though.

***

Gau & Mog are running WoR builds, so they won't be active players in the WoB. Setzer, despite running a stam build, will probably go heavy Seraph at first, so I might use him later in the WoB. Edgar can finally start stacking Unicorn ELs, though I'm concerned that I've passed the point of the game where I need a hyper-dedicated Cover specialist. We'll see. For now, it's just some breather dungeons with the Cave to the Sealed Gate and the Imperial Banquet.

Ultros down. Sabin for MVP again. Fire Dance clears rats. Self-berserk + Fire Claw = roasted octopus appetizer at the Opera House. Life Bell kept Sabin alive. Cyan & Locke were mostly there for moral support; Sabin could've solo'd Ultros. Hanging outside the IMF now at lvl.12 (Sabin's at 13).

OTOH, double speed randoms are rough. My best defense right now is a good offense - kill anything with nasty AoEs el pronto and Muddle stuff. Not quite going full-on glass cannon though. Also, I have to beware of jerks who counterattack the Fight command (Dragonflies, Trilium recolors). I sometimes have to wait a minute before using Blitz/Bushido just to insure that Locke/Celes attack other dudes first, minimizing how much time enemies are on-screen. Doesn't always work; sometimes, Locke fails to Throw his Full Moons, or I get pincer'd, or the AI just decides to spam powerful AoE magic. Chickenlip x5 would've been brutal if Chickenlips weren't so weak: they got, like, a million moves to my one move. >_< Onion Kid x5 killed me for this very reason; got too greedy stealing everything, then WHAM!, Sabin gets Muddled right as I input the Fire Dance command. >_< Dogs and soldiers ain't much better; they hit like trucks.

I'm not sure if I can safely use Cover yet. Double speed randoms are just too rough. Furthermore, I'm not sure there's a point in using it yet. No one member of my party can stand up to a concentrated physical onslaught right now, especially thanks to these reduced HP gains, so there's little point re-directing physicals to one member. (Normally, Cyan would be nearing 475 HP with heavy armor. Now, he's still short of 400 HP, still lacks a shield, and gets hit twice as often.) I tried some Cover/Counter with Morning Star Celes, but those dogs nearly killed her first turn for even thinking about it. She didn't even counterattack, nor did she need to cover Mr. back-row-high-evade Locke. >_<

OTOH, if most characters struggle to use Cover/Counter effectively, it might mean Unicorn Edgar is unchallenged in his role as a good Cover tank. >_> At the very least, HP+50% Gungnir is still going to be awesome. When I get there.

Oh, HP/MP gains still say "HP+30", etc, etc. Might want to fix that.

***

Morning Star Celes is nice. Even with Power Glove and Ramuh ELs, it falls short of OHKOing randoms except for small fry (Bugger, Chickenlip, etc) unlike Edgar, Sabin, and Cyan. It's nice to have even decent offense though. Morning Star + Scimitar is cute, but I don't think it'll hold up for the IMF (too much high defense). Oh well. Hey, @BTB , have you considered having Fighters not counter Magic? That way, Celes' Ice can actually hammer their weakness without overkill retaliation? Could even make Dadaluma weak to Ice as well as not countering Magic. Doubt it'll do much compared to just using Edgar, but at least Celes gets some reward for using her special skill set. Sides, Dadaluma not countering Magic kinda makes some sense Lore-wise.

W00t! Dadaluma down, second try, average level (lvl.10)! Feel rather good about that one.

W00t! Game should be easier from here on out. IMF will still be difficult, and the Ultros III - IV - IAF sequence will be a hump, but otherwise, I'm not predicting major resistance until the endgame.
 

Dadaluma

Randoms

Builds

Aren't the only Quake users the Chickenlip, Gargoyle, and Weedula line of enemies (and Earth Dragon)? Just don't Sketch them. Granted, it's frustrating that Sketch sketches something so detrimental, but that's a whole 'nother tangent for another day.

If it means anything, I'll personally chime in that I think "randomly kill" is pretty irrelevant on a lategame weapon like Doom Darts. Sure, Doom Darts x2 has a 75% kill rate. Except Setzer can just cast Doom, or better yet, summon Shoat; it ain't like the darts themselves are hitting terribly hard anyways. Not to mention X-Zone, Cleave, Mog's own Shoat & Doom, vig Mog's Doomstick (which does hit hard & will likely hit first in any given random), Gogo's X-Zone & Cleave, amidst various other powerful AoE, status control, and single target attacks by your other party members relative to the WoR enemies. Kefka's has stronger foes, but IIRC, many of them resist Doom; that, and Setzer gets Fixed Dice anyways.

Nodachi I guess could use more love though? * shrug * I mostly just use it for the increase in damage to Bushido.

Eh, thinking about it more, I'm not sure how much I really want to debate against someone's actual experience with the new X-Mog. That, and looking over the WoR again, I think the only real area where I can complain about X-Magic is in X-Quake's usability against Kefka's Tower bosses; X-Break possibly needs something to, though it's still perfectly usable in various areas of the WoR. All of the recent changes have given X-Mog a lot more utility than I've been willing to admit, and Quake's certainly got more uses than I've been willing to admit. (My preference for large MP pools may also be coloring my opinion, which is unfair to X-Mog).

So...maybe pay attention to those Drain/Reflect ideas above. But X-Mog's natural disasters (attacks) don't really need much, if at all.

See post below

On 1/18/2018 at 6:08 PM, Lockirby2 said:

 For maybe half the game total, you can park the airship right next to where you want to enter.  Other overworld travels tend to be short, unnecessary to repeat, and/or skippable by chocobo.

Re-arrange the terrain of the WoR such that you can't simply park right next to the dungeon you wish to enter, but must do some overworld travel? >_>

I'm not surprised to see Sabin at the top. He carries the early game alongside his brother, has superb tools for the late WoB (Golem, Slow + Muddle Suplex) that continue to be useful in the WoR, and then snags his ultimate blitz quite early. Simple, easy to use, but very strong; great for newbies. Veterans love him too, with things like Chakra, elemental claws + berserk, or a Terrato build. From his introduction with beating down Vargas & Ultros and his scenario being the most important, all the way through the mid-WoR, he's superb. He only really "falls apart" for the final dungeon. Even then, he's not bad, just reduced to merely average.

Still tempted to switch my vote to him. Only holding back b/c I dislike stam Sabin. >_>

Surprised Locke's so much lower than last time. Would figure he'd still be quite high, thanks to being the game's best healer. Not surprised to see Celes so high up. Am surprised to see Terra so high up. Maybe it's because I haven't played Omega Terra, but I've never considered Terra a contender for MVP.

Some serious military mismanagement if the rank-and-file soldiers aren't being properly informed about these vicious dogs & properly trained in handling them.

...Oh, wait. I bet it was Kefka who purposely didn't tell them. Probably killed several people in mid-level management to insure that the memo never passed on to the rank-and-file. And I bet he did it all out of petty vengeance for when he cast magic on one of those dogs and got bit in response. It all makes sense now.

17 hours ago, BTB said:

The multiple-party setup has nothing that affects warping, and while you cannot warp out of the Phoenix Cave in vanilla, we enabled it in Brave New World. And you can warp put of Kefka's Tower in either case.

I remember playthroughs where I could not warp out of the Phoenix Cave. Was that changed recently?