HSUP B TCELES - Let's Play FF1! Again!

Edward at all times. Tellah isn't an incorrect answer, either.

Fun fact: Edward actually has the best chance at becoming the strongest character in the game.

See, after level 70, stat distribution becomes semi-random - instead of being guaranteed growth on some areas every few levels, there are about six or so different possible level ups a character can have, ranging from -1 to +4 in each stat, that the game chooses whenever they jump up another level. Edward is unique in that he's the only one that has the chance at +4 to every single stat (most have +3 or some +2's), meaning that careful save-scumming can lead to him guaranteed maxing everything out well before you hit the level cap - which doesn't mean much in the case of wisdom/intelligence since he can't spellcast, but with a decent bow he can hit pretty damn hard.

Tellah, meanwhile, is the only character guaranteed to lose stats before reaching that point, notably in strength and vitality (which I think I've actually seen hit 0 at one point, but it was a long time ago when I ground him up that high). Add onto that a pitiful 90 MP total that exhausts itself after any major spell use, and I'd say he's the strongest contender for weakest character in the game.

You just destroyed my world, Pappy. I knew about the stat thing but I had no idea how it applied to Edward.

Bonus fun fact: Dark Knight Cecil is slightly faster than Edge, and hits almost as hard (provided you can find him a good weapon, of course). His HP sucks, though - only caps around 5,000 HP or so - but he's a pretty solid character for the most part.

Also, if you level FuSoYa up really high, he actually starts to grow MP! At least, I think so - it's been a while since I fiddled around with this stat growth stuff.

I'm playing Dawn of Souls now for some reason. It will probably not last, but for now, HIT, TAKE, HEAL, and BURN are on a quest to save the world... somehow!

Is HIT a Warrior, or a Monk? I'm wondering if you're using the same ol' stereotyped (and apparently half crap on NES) FFI group I usually use, or Ol' Punchyman.

My current team in NES FFI's WARR, JACK, CLER, and WIZA. The biggest change I did to my usual crowd was replace "Not Dawn of Souls" Thief with "Definitely awesomely busted" NES Red Mage. I always loved the feathered cap and cape combo.

A monk.

dawn of souls is the gba one, right?

Uh.... *pop*

So is that in the original, the GBA, or both? I quite enjoyed using secretly-awesome endgame Edward on the GBA, but I didn't notice anything wonky with his stats like that. Interesting.

The original, yes. Not sure about the GBA version though, but if it's the same as the original then you should see nearly the exact same stat curves when you grind characters into the high double digits. Here's some more info if you're curious.

Man, I wish I still had the screenshot of Golbez's level 99 stats, from back when I hacked him in and power leveled him - it would've made your head explode. (From memory: ~4,500 HP, 60-70 Strength, Vitality & Speed, 40-50 Will and 90 Wisdom. Can equip armor as strong as the Genji equipment, and a whole bunch of weapons I believe - I remember him swinging around a Rune Axe, but I don't remember if I had to resort to trickery to do so.)

Some crazy fools translated FF1 into Latin.

The new battle themes that have been added in the various remakes of Final Fantasy 1 originated from the Wonderswan Color version (the first remake of FF1), which featured some fairly primitive almost-NES chiptune quality sound. You can hear the boss battle starting at about 1:56 of this video. If you search around Youtube, you can also find the Wonderswan versions of the other battle themes. Maybe not 100% NES-style, but a pretty close approximation.

Of course, I hadn't read up through the part of this LP where Brick explains that Thf and WhM are actually good in this version of the game. And that I'm essentially handicapping myself with RdM. But whatever; they've got style.

I may have to play less in order to not burn out, though. I just got to the outer ocean, and am starting to feel like, ok, why am I playing this game where I get attacked every three steps in the overworld forest before trudging through obtuse dungeons made of boxes? Again? I worry that I enjoy this more in theory than in practice.

Maybe I need to temper the repetition with some good sequence-breaking. Is there any good FAQ for the kind of stuff Brick pulled in his first LP, without having to skim through that whole thread?

Edwards stats may not suck, but the character Edward sucks. Tellah is worse as far as gameplay, but dude has one foot in the grave, so I can't hold it against him.

Considering how low my post count is in this forum, I think I have a surprise for you. I did that. Except I named them BIMY and JIMY, and I didn't earn your bonus points (or take any screenshots).

That run also informed this clarification I made a bit later.

Ok, I did some quick research and answered my own question, so I'll post what I found for posterity. I guess I'll lightly spoiler it for anyone who hasn't read Bricks first LP?

Early game: nothing much to do but optional power-leveling at the PNEOP.
After Astos/key/TNT: can visit Crescent Lake for nice equipment, but that's about it.
After rubu/rod/Lich/canoe: game breaks open.
- Raid Castle of Ordeals for treasure and Rat Tail
- Raid Ice Cave for treasure and Floater, get airpship
- Raid Cardia Islands for cash and class change if desired
- Raid Waterfall cave for treasure and Cube
- Get bottle from caravan, and Oxale from Gaia
- Raid top half of Sea Shrine for treasure and Slab
- Translate slab, get Chime from Lefein.
- Raid Mirage Tower and Sky Castle for tons of treasure, Bane Sword Tiamat to death.

At this point any party should be outfitted like tiny gods and you can knock off the remaining two fiends at your leisure, possibly by tripping over them.

That is awesome and how I will play this game from now on!

Aw, I missed the poor, poor Thief's adventures.

Then again, I'd long since figured out how futile that particular quest would be.

♪♪ Battle ♪♪
Zach is now clearing two hits with his Rapier...


...but as you can see, Percy is closing in on his third. I won't swear to this, but it looks like Percy's going to stay a step ahead of Zach in number of hits, as befits his added nimbleness.

I provide BlBelt for comparison here, as a reminder that he's not pulling his weight yet. I'll leave that Nunchaku on until he gets his second hit, then see how he does unarmed.


This level-up doesn't put him close, of course.


♪♪ Matoya's Cave ♪♪
Crossing the new bridge and heading north brings us to Matoya's Cave. The player is now treated to a little scene of Matoya stumbling around blind, complete with a painful *thwack* sound effect when she falls over or bumps into something. Mistaking us for the local police or perhaps her therapist, she complains a bit about her missing crystal eye, then decides to stand perfectly still in one spot for us to return.


While she's yammering on I raid her treasure chests (a couple Potions and an Antidote) and converse with her brooms. Not only do they still speak backwards, but they now do so in a singsong tone. Man I wish more FF games had talking brooms.


The brooms teach the player how to bring up the overworld map by pressing B and Select. On the NES it had to be a combination of buttons because Start was your main menu and Select was your party formation screen. DoS puts the formation on the min menu to begin with, so they could have simply stuck the map on naked ol' Select. I guess they left the button combo in for old time's sake.

The map is much more colorful now, and can be zoomed in to show finer detail. It also keeps track of all the locations you've visited, so it's very unlikely you'll ever get lost. Actually, including an in-game map in the first place was pretty progressive of FF1. At the time is was more traditional for RPGs to come with a fold-out paper map in the box -- and FF1 did indeed come with one -- but if you lost the insert or bought your copy secondhand you were shit out of luck.

The most recent game I can remember coming with a map insert is Lufia 2 on SNES. Anyway, you'd better believe we ruined all our maps with dozens of folds, unfolds and refolds over the years.


♪♪ Town ♪♪
After a lengthy hike Zach and the boys arrive in Pravoka which, as always, is being overrun by pirates. Mohawk Man here is so flabbergasted that he has seemingly forgotten that one rarely loots or pillages something one already owns.


We intend to take care of this pirate sitation, but it's been a rough trip. So first: a good night's sleep. Did I mention DoS now comes complete with a neat little animation of your dudes crawling into bed, then waking up and doing a happy "Good morning!" dance? because they totally do that. And it's totally boss.

L2 black magic is pretty mhheeh. No real reason to buy Blizzard, since Thunder will hold Ika over until better stuff becomes available. Slow and Dark kind of serve the same purpose -- they take the edge off of strong physical attacks -- but those attacks will be landing on Zach's armor anyway so why bother. Temper raises an ally's ATK and actually works in this game. Plus it's stackable! I don't have enough to get it right now, though; I'll come back for it when I decide I need it. (Which might be never, considering how powerful this party's attacks are going to be anyway.)

Percy will be able to learn Temper too, if he promotes. Imagine round one of a tough fight: Ika castes Haste on BlBelt, Percy casts Temper, BlBelt uses a spellcasting item to gain Saber. Then, next round, he knocks some bitch's daddy into orbit. My god it will be glorious. Your day will come, BlBelt.


Over at the weapon shop, Zach and Percy both upgrade to Scimitars. The big boost here is ACC; with this equipped, Percy is within spitting distance of his third hit.


One of the biggest changes in DoS is the addition of all these new items. Ethers are relatively cheap, stretching Ika's usefulness even further. Phoenix Downs are plentiful too, so death isn't the enormous setback it was in the NES version. They can even be used in combat!


I somehow managed to goof in Cornelia and buy Zach Leather Armor instead of the far superior Chain Mail. Oops. Now that he's properly equipped he'll be able to do a far better job meatshielding, which will actually be important in the next big fight.

He also gets a Leather Shield here, pumping up his DEF even more. Carrying so much heavy gear causes his EVA to drop considerably, but he doesn't really care about that; he's got the DEF and the HP to handle most anything.


I can't even decide which of these lines is cornier. Maybe... both of them.


♪♪ Battle ♪♪
The pirates all have dramatically increased ACC now, and miss far less often. Their HP has also been quadrupled.

As you can see, neither of these buffs do them any good: Zach's DEF soaks up most of the damage and everyone but BlBelt can kill one in a single hit.


♪♪ Sailing Ship ♪♪
Nine pirates later we earn L6 and a ship!


There will come a point where I'll quit keeping such a careful watch on Percy and BlBelt's stats upon leveling up. Note, though, that Percy can get three hits now with his Scimitar, and that BlBelt is very close to that magic 32 ACC.


Tradition dictates our first stop with the ship be the free cash laying around in the Dwarf Cave, which isn't called the Dwarf Cave anymore. So we sail across the sea to the north, and dock at this here port.


Percy's third hit chops an Ogre just about in half. He and Zach are about keeping equal with damage; what Zach lacks in hits he makes up in ATK.


Unfortunately the Ogre lands a parting blow on Ika, sending him into the dirt.

♪♪ Matoya's Cave ♪♪
im in ur mt duergar, stealin ur lootz

See you later, midget-chumps!

...well, okay, let's talk to a few of them. Maybe these dwarves are somehow... radder than the dwarves in the original.


Oh hell the damn yes.

NES FF1 had dwarves, but they kinda sucked. FF4 had awesome "Lali-ho!" dwarves, but other than their catch phrase they didn't stand out from any other NPC in the game. FF9 upped the ante by giving dwarves awesome faux-Scottish accents, but they screwed up the translation and said "Rally ho!" instead.


DoS gets the best of both worlds! I therefore declare Mt. Duergar to have the best dwarves in the FF series.

As always, we're clued in to the two quests available here: come back when we have 1) explosive powder and 2) a magic unbreakable rock. Check and check, little dudes. See you in a bit.

Also awesome about Mt. Duergar: you can hear a constant "ka-chnk! ka-chnk!" as you wander around, giving the sense that someone is actually mining. Atmosphere? In my FF1? It's more likely than you --

ONE MEME PER UPDATE BRICKROAD YOU ARE OVER YOUR LIMIT DONT PUSH IT.

Whoops, sorry. Well, better get Ika back to town; he's startin' to stink.


Percy can help us out there, too: he's faster than most of his pals, and tends to act first... plus he really is better at running away than the rest of the gang. Good thing, too, since without Ika's spells it's unlikely we could topple this Ogre and the posse-formerly-known-as-CREEPs.

Now that Ika's good as new, Dancing Girl tells us we should head over to the Western Keep. All in good time, little lady; we've got elves to hook up with first.


♪♪ Game Over ♪♪
lollerogres

Okay I got cocky and picked one more fight than I should have. Upon dying I instinctively reached for my Load State button, which I figured would bring me back to where I last saved at the Cornelia Inn. Except... it brought me back to the beginning of this update instead. Whoops! Looks like someone's been forgetting to double up their saves.

So then I figured I'd just reset the emulator and reload the battery save. Whoops! Looks like opening that state completely borked all the battery saves I'd made since! Back to L4 with me! Grumble.

This only cost me about ten minutes of playing, and Ika didn't die this time around, so in this new alternate reality my guys are back to equal EXP.


Status ailments now cause cute little icons to hover above the afflicted's head, and using the proper item to cure them on the menu even comes with a little animation. Fun!


OddEYEs are now Bigeyes. They still can't do anything but stun you (which is what it's doing to Zach in this shot), and now they look freaky as shit. It's like a floating spaghetti monster with bug eyes. Ew.

But hey -- L7!


That's enough to give BlBelt a second hit. Let's take his Nunchaku off and see how he does.


♪♪ Battle ♪♪
HOLY WTF, BATMAN!! Four hits? That's even better than I was expecting!

In the NES version a Bl.BELT's DAMAGE was calculated differently than other classes, as long as they were unarmed: it was simply twice their level. Two points of DAMAGE per level ain't too shabby.

In DoS, though, it looks as though their ATK stays the same while their number of hits is calculated differently. BlBelt is getting twice as many hits as he ought to be. I guess unarmed Monks gain one hit per 16 ACC rather than 32 like everyone else.

However it works, BlBelt is now hitting harder than Zach and Percy combined... and that's before factoring in the chance for criticals.

I TOLD YOU ABOUT MONKS. I TO--

WHAT DID I SAY ABOUT MEMES, BRICKROAD. NO DINNER.

Beware, though: the "Optimal" option on the equipment screen is pretty dumb, and only factors in ATK and DEF. If you try to use it with your Monk it will slap a Nunchaku on him so fast his head will spin. This is why cool kids never use that option.


♪♪ Town ♪♪
Arriving in Elfheim, everyone seems to be butthurt about their sleeping prince. Geez, people! "Find my glasses!" "I need a bomb!" "Wake up our prince!" "Find my crown!"

If only all these problems were related, somehow, it would simplify my life quite a bit.


L-l-lucky!!

♪♪ Shop ♪♪
Though spell charges were done away with, mages still have to be leveled high enough to use certain levels of magic. Ika has enough MP to cast Thundara, and enough gil to afford it, but he's not experienced enough to learn it just yet.

(And you thought I was leveling up too quickly. Shows what you know!)


The elves no longer sell Silver Swords... which are called Mythril Swords now anyway. So no fantasi-magical boost for Zach this time around.

The Saber is a worthy purchase, but only for Percy. Those three points of ATK are paid for dearly with a hard hit to ACC. Zach will stick with the Scimitar until he can find something not quite so heavy.


The shops are as dumb as the equipment screen. Despite appearances, Copper Armlets are not equal to Leather Armor. They don't offer a DEF boost, but the increased EVA is worth the price.

My plan for damage mitigation is usually to make my guys take turns in the top slot, but that won't be necessary with this team. Zach will sit in the top spot with all his heavy armor, which is where most of the damage in the game will end up. Percy and BlBelt will probably rotate quite a bit, though, so those second-slot hits don't add up over the course of a dungeon.

Enemy Target Calculation Refresher Course
When monsters pick a target to attack, they do so randomly... but their selection is weighted towards heroes near the top of the screen. It breaks down like this:

1st Guy = 50%
2nd Guy = 25%
3rd Guy = 12.5%
4th Guy = 12.5%

As far as I can tell these numbers hold true in DoS.


I... forget what I was doing on the ocean here, but it showcases a new trait in DoS: monsters sometimes drop items.

Well, let's take Dancing Girl's advice and check out the haps over at the Western Keep.


On the way we top L8, and Ika reaches Magic Level 3. When we go back to Elfheim he'll be able to learn Thundara!


Zounds! L9 as well! Nobody gets anything especially cool at this level though.

♪♪ The Ruined Castle ♪♪
All that's in this Keep is a kindly old king who wants his magic crown back. I'm sure he's a fine, upstanding gentleman with no sinister motives whatsoever. In fact, I bet if a THIEF were to wander in here all alone he would welcome him with open arms rather than, say, cast RUB on him over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over...


The walk here actually took a lot out of them, so the gang camps outside of King Niceguy's mansion. The rest will refill Zach and BlBelt's HPs but not cure their Poison, so they need to watch themselves on the trek back.

(Turns out the king didn't have a guest room. There was one room in the east wing he wouldn't let us into, and we asked if it was full of FUKT corpses, but he said no, he had never met anyone named FUKT, and he had certainly not killed ten thousand of him.)


Going in search of the crown requires the Thundara spell and a few Antidotes, in case anyone gets snakebit. Percy's sick of suckin' the poison out.


...of course after buying all that the gang couldn't afford an Inn stay. Whoops. Winning one fight on the overworld does the trick (and bumps everyone up to L10), but as you can see I was in pretty bad shape when I got back. Heh heh.

If you're gonna cut it, cut it close.

BRICKROAD YOU ARE THE ONLY PERSON WHO SAYS THAT SO IT DOES NOT COUNT AS A MEME.


Ika's incredible INT-fueled Thundara spell? Yeah. Hot to death. You never see LIT2 hit this hard or this consistently in the NES version.


♪♪ Main Theme ♪♪
And with that, the gang arrives at the Marsh Cave in search of some rusty ol' crown. What horrors await them inside? Find out next time!

(Hint: It's not ZOIDBERGs.)

(Okay it's totally ZOIDBERGs. But they're not called that anymore.)

(Okay they were never really called that. Whatever.)

Next: "Hmph! You're not even as attractive as I thought you'd be..."

This was clearly a typo and you meant to post this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=euRaT0V5bSk

Well I was trying to be all authentic an' junk, but yeah, that other one is pretty kickass all over the place.

Sorry Brick, this is the same as the NES version. A level 1 unarmed Bl.BELT with a puny ACC of 5 can still get 2 Hits (for 2 damage) on the local IMPs. They get 2 extra attacks per 32, not 1 per 16.
And I fully expect you to immediately go make a party of 4 Bl.BELTs to test this like I just did.

Yeah well you people have not let me use a Bl.BELT in over two years so how am I supposed to remember piddly little details like that, huh?

Something seems suspiciously familiar about King Niceguy.

The remixed church music is ~glorious~.

I NEVER KNEW THIS!