Eternal

Member
 View Profile  See their activity

  • Content count

    22

  • Joined

  • Last visited

  • Days Won

    3

Everything posted by Eternal

  1. Hello everyone! This is my first post here on NG+, but I'm excited to be able to share this project with this community. I've been out of the modding scene for the past few years aside from some minor projects, mostly due to work and real life stuff consuming the vast majority of my time and energy. I was working on FFTA2 for the most part until I stumbled upon the FFXII (PC) modding community. To that end, I was able to work with some of the many talented folks who are working hard on making tools and doing research on XII's inner workings. With their help, I was able to create the first difficulty/rebalancing mod for FFXII, called The Struggle for Freedom (SFF), designed for The Zodiac Age on PC, for English-speaking communities. XII, and Ivalice in general, hold a very special place in my heart. FFT was one of the first RPGs I ever played, and XII was the first numbered FF I ever finished. Even when I was younger, I always thought XII had a lot of potential and wanted to mess around with it. Why did First Aid have to suck? Why did all Black Magick have to feel the same? And why do those three invisible items added in IZJS not have models? And further, why can't every character feel unique, like they do in other FF games? Those are all some of the founding things I wanted to change with this mod, among many other changes. Here's what the biggest changes are: Enemies have 2x HP and a 1.3x boost to their other stats, making them hit harder, faster, and actually able to survive for a bit longer, without making enemies super tanky and feeling like a drag. Many enemies now use abilities that people have never even seen them use before because of the added survivability. If you use the default version of the mod, each character is assigned a set role and License Board to give them a unique role within the party. Vaan is fast and excels at evasion and combos, Fran is able to wield offensive magicks, Balthier is the best item-user, etc. There are two versions of each board for each character- a Struggle Board, and a Freedom Board. Struggle Boards are linear and have set growth, similar to FFX's Sphere Grid and FFXIII's Crystarium, and Freedom Boards are more open, similar to XII's original License Boards. For those not wanting set roles, there is also a version of the mod included that has the original 12 jobs and the PS2 version of the License Boards. Espers are now far more useful and, if you use the default SFF boards, are assigned to each character. Each character gets two Espers, each having very different playstyles and abilities that compliment their summoner, and Espers have completely revamped AI to take advantage of their skillsets. For example, Belias excels at helping Basch tank by using Bubble/Decoy on him while Belias uses magick, and Adrammelech uses Hastega/Slowga/Blindga and Thunder magicks to aid Vaan. Many abilities have been completely revamped to either fill a new niche, or to be more useful. Equipment- primarily weapons- have been greatly rebalanced. The three invisible items now have models and are more balanced to be on par with other late-game weaponry, and are now available through the Bazaar (albeit requiring rare Loot). Most late-game weaponry within each category is competitive with each other. For example, the Arcturus has enhanced Range compared to other Guns, the Fomalhaut has an increased Critical Hit Rate compared to other Guns, and the Mithuna has the highest raw Attack of all Guns. Character stats have been revamped to better fit a character's role. For example, Basch now has some of the best VIT/HP in the game as befitting his role as a tank, whereas Vaan is the fastest, and Fran has the highest Magick. What will happen in future versions? Currently, FFXII modding is still very much in its infancy. There's many things we can't do just yet, and even things like editing text is very time-consuming. To that end, there are some minor text inaccuracies and other very small bugs that are being slowly but surely snipped for future versions. We're also working on a Treasure Chest Editor, which will hopefully be done within the next few weeks. Once that's completed, treasure chests will be a 100% spawn, 100% set item, and will no longer respawn, much like traditional FF treasure chests. Those chests will have set items, generally the rarest item that would have normally been found in that chest to begin with. AI is currently not editable for enemies. Hopefully, in future versions, we'll be able to make enemy AI more interesting. I think that covers most of the bigger things... I would definitely add, however, to read the Readme/Master Guide included with the mod download prior to playing. It has a variety of useful information, as well as accurate info about Abilities/Equipment/Items that can't be found in-game at the moment due to text modding limitations. SFF isn't perfect, but I hope that it'll allow people to enjoy XII in a new way. A lot of love went into making SFF, and I'm excited to share it with others who love Ivalice as well. If anyone has any questions or feedback, feel free to ping me on Discord (eternal248#1817) or shoot me a message here. I try to be as responsive as possible, and I'd love to hear from you guys! This is my first post here, so if I've done anything wrong, just let me know and I'll fix whatever I need to. Thank you! Download it here.
  2. 1.7 of SFF has been released on the Nexus (link below). It's a very large update and will likely be the last large content update, with future updates focusing on balance tweaks and small changes. There are several large changes, but some of the major ones are the following: -Axes/Hammers no longer deal randomized damage. -Rods and Crossbows are more useful now, with the latter now being able to Combo and ignore Weather. -The Hunt Club sidequest is now far more interesting, has been completely revamped, and is how the player obtains the Wyrmhero Blade. -Holy is far better now, dealing AoE damage with a chance of inflicting Stop, similar to FFXIV. -Treasures have been completely revamped- all 1600+ chests now have the chest's rare item as the Diamond Armlet's common item, making those wearing the DA more likely to find genuinely good, rare treasure. -Many enemies with one 3% Steal have had Steal rates increased to reduce tedium. -Protect/Shell/Regen last longer, making them more viable early game. -For those playing with Struggle/Freedom boards, Penelo has been buffed to be a better caster and survive longer. -There are many other changes- be sure to check the changelog on the Nexus! I've put my heart and soul into this project, and I hope that everyone who has played it, is playing it, or will come to play it enjoys the world of Ivalice, improved. A full 1.7 changelog can be viewed here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1dvvnTsHiJk-bP-WDkXU_MHql37uiMjEU8L0sSzqctRo/edit?usp=sharing 1.7 can be downloaded here: https://mega.nz/#!aLJV1CqC!_hmF2k-AsOwtmNrGacCseId46eRtBrYrNtqq3ML9TT4 I'm sure that certain numbers will need to be changed in the future, but that just comes with the territory, so feedback is greatly appreciated!
  3. The good thing is that it's on sale a lot these days. There was just a really good sale for it during the Steam Winter Sale where it was like 50-60% off. I'm sure it'll come back on sale again soon, probably during the Spring sale (if not earlier).
  4. Hey NGPlus community, and happy New Year! It's been a while, but I've released a few big updates since the last time I posted on here. SFF is currently at 1.6.2, and I figured it was time to update you all! This will (hopefully) be one of the last updates, as SFF is more or less where I want it to be. Future updates will primarily focus on bugfixes and balance issues. There are many, many changes, but here are the biggest changes made since 1.5: Quickening shortcuts have been removed from the Struggle boards, since they weren't adding much to the game, and they were just causing confusion and frustration for people missing out on some stuff late-game. Hand-Bombs have become Knuckles, which allow the player to see Unarmed animations and actually use (pseudo) Unarmed combat more often. Also, each character now begins with Brawler learned, allowing for True Unarmed gameplay runs. The Brawler License has become Master Thief, giving the character the ability to have more accurate Steals, and allowing them to Steal two things at once sometimes. It's basically the Thief's Cuffs, without the need to sacrifice an Accessory slot. Wither/Addle have been removed and have been replaced with Blitz/Erase, the former dealing AoE physical damage and the latter removing every status- good and bad- from a single target. Most Technicks have been completely retouched in some way. Numerology now deals percentile damage to enemies in an AoE, Traveler bestows Haste/Float/Vanish on the user, First Aid restores 15% HP now, etc. Five-Star Trophy Hunts now have 100% drops, making it more worth the player's while to seek them out. Certain enemies have been rebalanced, with many late-game enemies receiving careful nerfs to make them less tedious fights. Some weapons have been changed around to have more use, such as the Platinum Sword becoming the Liquid Steel, adding a Water physical option mid-game. Accessories have been reworked, with many giving DEF/RES or additional effects to make them more universally useful. Aquaga is now usable, replacing Shock. Gravity/Graviga have become Quake/Quakega, and Vanishga has become Gravity. Bio/Scourge are back to being Non-Elemental and inflicting debuffs. Reverse (which became basically useless) has been replaced with Drainga. Decoy lasts longer now. Many shops have been edited, allowing things like Teleport Stones and Serums to be purchased earlier. Black Orbs now drop from enemies as normal items, allowing you to collect them more easily, while still being able to pick up the Orbs via pressing X as you could before. Guests now come with the Ignore Traps Augment, making them unable to accidentally trip traps. It can be found here!
  5. Hey Hart, my apologies, I usually update the main post but I apparently forgot, heh. I was actually going to post that there's a fix for the fix (some folks have had issues with character limits in regards to the file name in 1.5.1). I'm at work, so I can't access it at the moment, but the 1.5.2 update is the one you'll be wanting to go for and is on the Nexus (if you just search for FFXII Struggle for Freedom Nexus it should pop right up). I'll be updating the main post when I get home with the most corrected and updated link so it's on here as well. I'm not sure what the policy is for linking to modding sites outside of here, so I don't want to step on any toes by linking to the Nexus page. Thanks for your interest, let me know how your playthrough goes! I'm always looking for feedback. Update: Here's the latest update.
  6. Apologies for the noise, everyone. A fellow modder noticed that some of the enemy changes I made for 1.5 didn't take, so this is a corrected version. Not a huge deal, it mostly just affects early-game enemies at Garamsythe and Barheim. It can be downloaded here.
  7. Sorry for the triple post. Version 1.5 is out and is probably one of the bigger changes to the overall game since 1.0. Essentially, almost every weapon has been retouched in some way to make them more tactically viable. This opens up an array of different builds you can try out depending on which version of the mod you're playing. A full changelog can be found here on Google Docs. The mod itself can be downloaded here on Mega.nz. I look forward to seeing what stuff will be broken, haha. As always, let me know if you have any feedback or such. Looking forward to it!
  8. Apologies for the double post, but SFF 1.4 is out! A full changelog can be found below, but the update can be downloaded here: https://mega.nz/#!Hf40GaSQ!q_Uz5dZ_uxHCY1FHbOfGYazyVYGnaEzuVEvjL1yD8Rs Changelog: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1uOQG4JCTF4njgFNPXxO31B8iSVBb2wWxmfl1OiqVaRM/edit?usp=sharing
  9. Hey there Intri, thanks for your post! In regards to the Quickening shortcuts, it's meant to be a huge tradeoff. You either get to cheese the first half of the game's bosses with Quickenings and sacrifice some power later on, or you be patient and wait until late-game to get your Quickenings (which are still amazing at that point, especially as finishers, because they're free, uninterruptable attacks). Much like in IZJS where choosing your jobs had permanent and heavy ramifications, so too here is choosing when to take that power. At its core, SFF (and the Struggle board in particular) emphasizes using strategy to destroy your foes, and Quickening spam runs counter to that. Honestly, I'd love to completely change the Quickening system to make them more similar to traditional Limit Breaks, but there's a great amount of hardcoding behind them that doesn't make them viable at the moment. In regards to Mimic Queen, she's probably one of the most straightforward bosses in the game. Probably even moreso compared to Firemane, as he can Poison and Oil you. Most people don't need anywhere near 80 Potions to beat it. Barheim itself is probably worse than the Mimic Queen, at least in my own opinion. The key to Mimic Queen is making sure your gear is as up to date as possible and fighting everything you come across beforehand to get the LP for said gear. Silver Bow, Mage Masher, and especially Balthier's latest Gun will make short work of it. Guns in particular are important against Mimics as they bypass their decently high Defense. Fran can also use Fire on the Mimic Queen repeatedly to try and Oil it, which will make future Fire casts inflict 3x damage. Overall, keeping Basch alive is also crucial as he adds some DPS to the fight. The biggest trick the Queen has is Breath of Life, which restores 5% of her HP. If you're playing too defensively, she'll likely come close to at least nulling most of the damage you do, which is part of the reason why keeping Basch alive is important. On the topic of First Aid, in very early SFF builds, it restored 15% HP. The challenge then became that it was making Potions and Cure spells useless in comparison. To that end, First Aid was dropped to 10%. First Aid isn't meant to be used in battle. It's meant to be set as a low-priority Gambit to heal between fights. And remember, multiple characters can use it, so it can patch you up pretty quickly between fights to conserve items and MP. For fights though, you're definitely going to want to use items or Cure.
  10. Great conversation, guys! SFF has been updated to 1.3 and can be found here, as well as a full changelog: https://www.nexusmods.com/finalfantasy12/mods/59 As far as Yiazmat is concerned, I was tempted to curb his HP, but I feel that would kind of defeat what he was known for. He's dangerous in other ways now though, and he's much harder to cheese. As for Reverse, Reverse only works on enemies now, so you can't cheese fights with it any more. Decoy has also been slightly changed, acting as a buff now with better accuracy. It's not broken any more however, as it can't be combined with Reverse.
  11. Hey folks, update 1.3 will likely be released Friday. Here's what's on the changelog so far. Overall, not a huge update like 1.4 will likely be, but this should fix a few bugs and balance issues that were plaguing previous versions. 1.3 Changelog: -The PS2 License Board can now be used without issue. -A version of the mod has been included that rebalances each of the 12 original jobs for TZA's dual job system. A Readme has been included with details on each of the jobs, and the old Tweaked 12 Jobs version is being phased out. -Demon Wall (Strong) now drops a Demonsbane. -Lindbur Wolf now has the Assassin's Dagger as a Drop, rather than the Chopper found in prior versions. -White Robes and Black Robes have been rebalanced and no longer boost elements, rather, White Robes focuses more on Resistance and Black Robes focuses more on Magick. -Seitengrat's stats are no longer bugged. -Kumbha now no longer ignores Licenses. -Ardor has had a slight increase in power. -Darkga's animation has been reverted to increase the speed of the spell. -Dark/Darkra/Darkga have had their power increased to match their original TZA levels. -Dark/Darkra/Darkga have had their MP decreased to match their original TZA levels. -Dark/Darkra/Darkga now have 6 AoE, rather than 8 (Dark/Darkga) and 4 (Darkra). -Dark Mote is now AoE, to match the regular Dark spell. -Decoy now has 100% accuracy. -Painflare's animation has been changed to properly be AoE.
  12. That's definitely very weird, since I haven't encountered that, nor has anyone else who's been playing through it. I really wish I could be of more help, but my only suggestion would be to uninstall, reinstall, and then repatch the mod, but I'm not sure if that would fix it.
  13. @Cross: I'd argue that he's a little more gimmicky now than he was before, mostly out of necessity due to some new mechanics IZJS/TZA introduces that make the player able to cheese the fight. That being said, it's nothing terribly frustrating (and it's something you'd likely be doing anyways), but you'll know what I'm talking about when/if you ever fight him, haha. @Joelback03: Unfortunately, as of right now, you're the first person reporting that bug. I'm not sure why it would do that, as nothing was changed with the Clan Hall or even Clan Centurio itself. I think it might be an isolated incident. Have you had freezing issues in other places? Also, did you make sure to replace the FileSizeTable file as noted in the Readme?
  14. Hey everyone! My apologies for the delayed reply, I've been out of town the past week with awful internet. @Dr. Letha: I'm glad you're enjoying everything so far! In regards to Barheim, Barheim was an awful area to balance, haha. There's a lot going on between the Mimics, being stuck in there, the Undead, etc. I -think- if you're super risky you can get Blizzard from the Estersand Village prior to Barheim, but I'm not 100% certain on that. In regards to the Quickenings, it's kind of a compromise because of a few things: 1. Quickenings are super powerful and game breaking early on. Because Quickenings are necessary especially late-game to finish off tough enemies, I couldn't just nerf them because then they'd be useless later on as finishers. 2. I wanted people to have to choose what was more important to them and give them some control over how difficult things are, when. If you pick the Quickenings early, you're going to have an easier early/mid-game and a tougher late-game. If you pick the Quickenings later, you'll have a tougher early-game, but that's balanced out by having more options late-game. If you want to be really hardcore, you'll never take any Quickening Licenses, so you won't have Quickenings or a Bonus Board. In regards to the Second Job, the original idea was to have the post-Quickening Licenses act as that Second Job, but I figured it'd make things too easy. I'd love to have a set Second Job for everyone, but everyone already gets a pretty large amount of Licenses, so giving them even more would make things far too easy and make people a little too similar to one another, IMO. In regards to Vossler, he definitely got an upgrade. (Don't forget to Steal from him!) That being said, Basch really helps, as does Belias. In fact, that fight is a great tutorial for Belias, since Belias' magicks pierce Vossler's Reflect. He may not do a lot of damage, but Belias will keep Basch alive and very healthy while still doing some free damage to Vossler. That's a trend- human enemies that were previously very weak are now incredibly strong. They were pushovers in Vanilla, but here, they act as actual bosses. @Cross: Yiazmat's HP hasn't been doubled. It was originally, but I reverted it back. Why? Well, for one, I didn't want to risk there being any bugs with him. If HP or MP is set too high, it reduces it to 1 due to overflow. Imagine that- fighting Yiazmat and him going down in one hit, haha. Also, more HP doesn't necessarily mean a tougher fight, especially when it comes to that. Yiazmat has a few dirty new tricks to make cheesing the fight a lot harder, but doubling his HP just would've made it more tedious. In regards to Evasion, Evasion is more-or-less the same as it was before. I can't edit what Augments enemies have, so I can't really remove the Augment many late-game enemies have to ignore Evasion. That's why late-game, Vaan is more about Speed and DPS/debuffing as opposed to earlier in the game where he's focused on Speed and Evasion. Same with Basch- early-game he's great with a Shield but late-game, he's more about using Greatswords and such. It's also why his late-game Shields give secondary effects as opposed to just more Evasion. Ensanguined Shield gives him Auto: Lure, Shell Shield is good for Auto: Shell, etc.
  15. I'll be honest, I'm not sure yet. Treasure stuff is mostly still being figured out. I kinda want to make each chest an actual chest, like the ones found in Raithwall's Tomb, but that'd be silly, haha.
  16. Yeah, that's the plan right now. The challenging part is that as of right now I have no idea how many free Respawn IDs there are, but I know that there are already at bare minimum 92 slots already used by the game. I'm sure we'll figure something out.
  17. So, we just made some developments tonight about treasure editing that makes things infinitely more difficult. To give you some backstory, each item that doesn't respawn is assigned an ID between 1 and 254. This is how items like Silence can appear in two locations, but disappear once you pick it up at one of the locations- they share the same ID between locations. In order to make an item respawn, it needs its Respawn ID set to something below 255. Essentially what this means is that, as of what we know right now, we can only make up to 254 treasure chests not respawn. Otherwise, if you pick up an item with the same Respawn ID, it makes the other treasure associated with that ID disappear, and I bet that's how they did the Zodiac Spear trick in the PS2 version. We aren't sure at the moment just how many treasures currently have unique Respawn IDs, but it sounds like it would be very difficult at the moment to make every treasure not able to respawn as we thought we could do before. We're still digging into it, but that's where things stand as of about an hour ago.
  18. Hey there Leer! Great question! The majority of late game enemies have been tested, with the exception of some super late game stuff, namely due to me hating things like the Great Crystal and such. They're in process of being tested by myself and others as we speak. That being said, there are plenty of ways to tactically take them down a few pegs. Fun fact- enemy stats (mostly) cap at 99, and a lot of them as such can't get a full 1.3x boost because a large majority of the superbosses are already very close to that number. Will I likely have to make readjustments in the future? Of course, nothing is ever perfect. For now though, things are pretty much where they should be. In regards to HP, certain enemies such as Yiazmat and Hell Wyrm didn't even get an HP boost (because that'd be ridiculous), and things like Behemoth King didn't get the full 2x HP boost just to ensure they're not tedious to fight. EDIT: I also agree with you normally on number patches. I was actually pretty shocked when I tested initially, because by doing 2x HP and 1.3x stats, everything was basically where it should have been! It felt very natural to play, and I was absolutely shocked. I was expecting to have to spend a lot more time tweaking everything. That being said, there's a lot more than just number changes here!
  19. Haha, thanks! I appreciate it! In regards to Vaan, he's actually a tank, just not in the usual way. Early/mid-game, Vaan is an Evade Tank, similar to how it can be done in FFT. Vaan gets access to some early Shields, Main Gauche, and has exclusive access to the Jade Collar, further boosting his Evade. One of Vaan's final Ninja Blades also gives him evasion almost comparable to the Main Gauche. Late-game, there are a lot of enemies that ignore evasion. That's the point where Vaan kind of evolves and takes on a new role- DPS. Vaan is hands down the fastest party member in the game and can debuff his enemies quickly with his array of Daggers. Late-game, he gets the Iga/Koga Ninja Blade combo to Oil the enemy and then blast them with Fire Elemental strikes, and the Mesa for Auto: Haste. Mesa + Thief's Cap + Berserk + Germinas Boots = Vaan attacking almost instantly, and fairly hard. He doesn't strike as hard as Basch, but with Vaan it's death by a thousand cuts. Sometimes literally. Vaan also gets Drain to steal enemy HP to help keep his HP topped off and Reverse, allowing him to soften enemies up for Penelo's healing spells to deal heavy damage to them. As far as squishiness is concerned, with enemies doing more damage now, that's something that'll be commonplace. My general advice to people is to Gambit First Aid ASAP. First Aid restores a flat 10% of HP, and it's a great way to top your HP off between fights while conserving items and MP. First Aid is particularly useful in Garamsythe and Barheim, where you're somewhat trapped and may not have a lot of Gil to play around with. Later on, buffs and debuffs are vital. Sometimes a casting of Blind is worth its cost in Cures, and Protect (and Shell, for most boss fights) is particularly important. Basch makes for a decent emergency healer/buffer, and Penelo can easily keep everyone's Protect topped off. Penelo with a Healing Rod to Regen everyone is a great way of keeping HP topped off as well. SFF rewards out-of-the-box thinking, so it pays to use things you may not have in Vanilla. Thanks again for your feedback! I appreciate it, and I look forward to hearing more about your playthrough!
  20. Thanks! Had I known there was an affiliate link, I'd have just used that to begin with, haha. Apologies about that. As far as the mod itself, AI is a tricky thing right now. XII has some very weird quirks regarding AI, but the people working on going through XII's coding are slowly figuring it out. At the moment though, the AI isn't particularly terrible except in a few small cases.
  21. For those who want to play it, but don't really have the money to pay full price, XII: TZA is on sale for 50% off on Humble Bundle. https://www.humblebundle.com/store/final-fantasy-xii-the-zodiac-age
  22. Thanks! I'm just happy that it's something we were able to make. A Dummy, the timing is rather unfortunate, since you just missed a fairly decent deal on it on Steam via the Summer Sale. That being said, the FF games get discounted pretty often on there, so I'm sure there'll be another sale on it soon!

Affiliates

Other Resources