[Grimoire LD]

Hello, I'm Grimoire LD (Also known as LastingDawn , Xu Yuan, or Three Pendants in some other hacking circles) and these past few months I have been doing an indepth exploration of Final Fantasy IV (II US SNES) since it is my favorite game on the SNES. I've mapped out all of the Character Commands and with the help of old info. from a fellow named Yousei have also mapped out all Spell Routines (except for the Audiovisual effect call spells, I need to get back to that one day) and can mod each pretty freely to my own liking.

I've created quite a fair number of new commands and spell routines (with the help of Chillyfeez) and have even added a new gameplay mechanic off of a broken section of data that would attempt (and sometimes fail) to slowly petrify a foe with gradual petrification on a weapon. The issue with this code originally is that it could sporadically freeze the game. So I took the main base of it and altered it to instead that when Calcify (Gradual Petrification) from a Weapon (in the right hand) is inflicted, then to look at the assigned weapon... If it is one of ten weapons, the game will run through a special RNG, see if the RNG is below 50 and if it is to run the unique weapon's routine.

For instance... the Shadow Blade, the second Dark Sword now has a chance to use Dark Wave when you normally attack with it, damaging all enemies as if you had used the command yourself.

This is to give a bit more variety to FFIV's... fairly blase equipment system and mix things up a bit.

You can find the entire catalogue of my FFIV work (well most of it, not all) on this page. Though I think I will also post the patches on RHDN's forums.

I will copy/paste the description of this patch from slickproductions...

It uses Vivify93's absolutely awesome ProjectII Patch as a base for several reasons...

One, treasure put in all of its proper spots.
Two, better translation.
Three, bug fixes.
Four, general improvements.

This patch includes the mods Imbued Weapons and ItemLord.

In addition is the changing of several weapons stats to reflect their new purposes.

The Poison Claw loses Poison and is now the "Martial Claw" when you attack with it is has a chance to use Kick.

The Change Rod now has Immense physical power for a Caster's weapon of that level and randomly uses Recall.

The Silver Staff is now the Scholar Staff that can be bought for a princely sum at the Silvera Weapon Shop, it can randomly use ItemLord.

The Darkness Blade (called Shadow in the normal FFIV translations,, confusing) can use Dark Wave and when used from a weapon it curiously does not reduce HP.

The Ancient Sword's power has been immensely upgraded. Its ability is a powerful Regen. So you have to be careful when and how you use it, it has lost Curse though.

The Silver Knife is now the Thief's Knife which can be found lying around as always, it goes without saying its ability is Steal.

The Medusa Blade (broken piece of junk... entire point of this hack anyhow...) has been replaced by the Coral Sword, which is a rare drop from Baron Fighters. But they've had their drop table changed so it may be worth grinding for. Its power is on par with the other Elemental Swords and we know that Lightning rules the day in the Tower of Babil.

The Ragnarok now has Focus as its ability so using it can be a double edged sword, you may stall yourself for several turns in a row.

On the other hand this hack introduces the Dark Crystal Sword. A copy of the Crystal Sword (Ragnarok) but two handed (yep, really created it there...). Its ability is Dark Wave, which can be Very useful late game and with the added bonus of not losing any life when its used. The Dark Crystal Sword is obtained along with the Ragnarok so you can mix and match as you please, per the situation.

Last but not least the Charmer's Harp becomes the Siren's Harp... I bet you can guess what it will do (Hint: It's Sing). Taking a cue from Paladin's old mod, Rydia can equip Harps as well so it is worth holding onto this for her return.

As for character changes... there's only been one.

Edward has lost Salve(now (Item)Lord and it now belongs to Cid.

I should give a brief synopsis of what ItemLord does... ItemLord will read the first usable item in your inventory and split it, it can be used on Friend or Foe. Single, in case you want that powerful attack magic item to focus on a single target, or multiple for when you're in a bit of trouble and everyone could use a bit of healing or if you're down to your last man and a mass Life Potion can turn the tides. ItemLord is used in this because Salve will only target whoever it is currently targeting and use that assigned item spell on it. Default that is a use of a Cure Potion for deficient amount of healing, granted in Project II it's a cure potion for Cure3 Potion healing, but... it would be on the enemy.

I decided to give it to Cid because you might Actually need it when he's in the party, rather than breezing through the Dark Knight portion of the game with yet another useless skill.

And without further ado, here is the patch...

Keep in mind it must be a v1.1 and Unheadered! (I made this mistake too many times.)

And please, give me your thoughts on it!

FFIV-Imbued Weapons.ips
January 10, 2014, 06:02:09 pm - (Auto Merged - Double Posts are not allowed before 7 days.)I've now started to put some of my older (by "older" in this case, I mean 2 days...) custom routines into patches.

This one includes Katana Soul, better known to FF Fans as Draw Out/Iaido/Sword Spirit/whatever you please.

This changes Dart into Katana Soul, meaning that you cannot throw Anything anymore. But it does mean that each Katana (save Short/Kunai) and the Cleaver (Spoon)  has its own special "Draw Out" ability.

The abilities are as follows...

Middle/Ashura - Cast Dragon Breath on All Targets (Does 25% of your max life to all enemies)
Long/Kotetsu - Cast Heat Ray on All Targets (A decent Fire Attack, doesn't suffer from Split Damage)
Ninja/Kikuichi - Cast Osmose on All Targets (and absorb the total of their lost MP.)
Murasame - Cast Absorb on All Targets (Absorb gives the targets 1/3 of their Current HP back.)
Masamune - Cast Haste on All Targets.
Spoon/Knife/Cleaver - Cast Big Bang on All Targets.

Now since this is trying to replicate FFT, there is a 50% chance (not accurate to FFT, I know) that when you use a Soul Sword you will lose it.

Here's a couple of pictures this time around...





Same patching rules as the first post. Again using Project II as a base.

Katana Soul.ips

January 10, 2014, 10:20:09 pm - (Auto Merged - Double Posts are not allowed before 7 days.)
In the Patch you will see that Dark Knight Cecil starts with a Break Skill and 50 MP, he will gain more as you level. He'll learn the last one at Level 20.

In addition, Tellah can now use Swords and will learn the Break Skills when he relearns all of his spells on Mt. Ordeals.

Paladin Cecil will have a much slower time of obtaining the Break Skills again, learning the first one at 24 and the last one at 40.

Cecil and Tellah are the only two that will be able to use Break Skills in this patch. (of course as the patch is aimed at modders you can do whatever you want with it, heh.)


Everything has a cost, and the cost this time was the Sylph Formula. This means that Sylph's effect has been changed as well. The effect is now a more powerful Osmose (you weren't spending MP to use it anyhow...)

In addition because of the new Break Skills, five spells had to be replaced...

Hold - Seal Break (Lowers Target's Magic Defense by 1/4)
Armor - Power Break (Lowers Target's Attack by 1/4)
Safe - Speed Break (Increases Target's Speed Rating by 1/4, generally making it half as powerful as Slow)
Dispel/Curse - Armor Break (Lowers Target's Defense by 1/4)
Sight - Mind Break (Lowers Target's Spell Power by 1/4)


Not huge losses, I should hope. I do hope the new Battle Skills were worth it.

Break Skill Patch








January 11, 2014, 02:25:19 pm - (Auto Merged - Double Posts are not allowed before 7 days.)When I first thought of this project I cynically said "Geomancy? For what? The three types of cave that you visit endlessly through the game?" And though there are a Lot of caves, there's also a fair amount of other dungeon types with different backgrounds, so I decided to take advantage of it.

This command replaces Peep/Study and uses every last byte Peep/Study had to offer to make it work. This command, as true to Geomancy in FFIII NES, reads the battle background and will use an ability in correspondence. Because of space limitations several backgrounds share the same Geomancy effect unfortunately. The majority of moves are enemy only spells, but this patch also adds in two new spells. CalmWind for the Field and AirBlade for Forests, Deserts, Beaches, and Mountains. Like FFIII however there is a 35% chance upon use that it will Backfire, self destructing the User and dealing the User's HP damage to the enemies.







Now what you can expect from this patch... Rydia will be given the Geomancy skill in this patch in replacement of White Magic (in-battle. She will still learn Cure as a child and you can use it outside of battle.) and will have it throughout the game. This was a difficult decision. I wanted to give Geomancy to a character with staying power, my initial thought was Rosa, but she's not with you in one or two Geomancy unique areas (Watery Caves comes to mind) my other thought was Cecil, but that just seemed a bit out of character for him, so in the end I went with Rydia. Aside from Rosa she is with Cecil for the most time, Kain has large gaps of being gone and Edge joins pretty late into the fray.





The battlefields that represent which effect will be used are as follows.

CalmWind (Puts all enemies to sleep) - Field
AirBlade (Deals Wind Elemental Damage) - Forests, Mountains, Indoors, Beach, Desert
ColdMist (Deals Low Ice Elemental Damage) - Caves with Rivers, Moon, On Board Ship
Big Wave (Deals 1/4 of target's life to target.) - Watery Caves
(Enemy) Quake (Deals High Damage)- Caves with Holes
Breath (Causes a multitude of stats effects) - Sylph Cave/Feymarch
Thunder  (Deals 1/4 of target's life to target. Lightning Elemental) - Towers and Giant
Random Choice - Lunar Caverns, Lunar Core, Underworld, Zeromus, Night Battle (in case a hacker wanted to give Edward Geo.)

And that is that! As always, please give me your thoughts on these.

FFIV-Geomancy.ips
January 12, 2014, 08:44:33 pm - (Auto Merged - Double Posts are not allowed before 7 days.)
This next patch aims to be more akin to FFIII DS's Sing and therefore will make Sing:

A - Target All Allies.
B - Use a Spell dependent on the Harp Equipped (Note: If spells have 0 Power from the weapon they cannot be used successfully from the Item Menu, (there may be exceptions) but can be easily used for other purposes. Which is what this routine is built upon)
C - Will raise the Party's Attack by 5.

Now because FFIII is the theme, this tries its best to try and mimic the effects from the FFIII DS's Harps because of this there are now three new harps in replacement of two axes (will use the empty slot that was used as the Dark Crystal Sword in my other patch as well)


Sing Effect -
Madhura Harp - Casts Protect
Dream Harp - Casts Remedy (10% Max HP recovery)
Apollo Harp - Casts Shell
Loki Harp - Casts Haste
Lamia Harp - Casts Angelic(Music) - Restores a small amount of MP per cast.


Paladin Cecil will be able to Sing and equip Harps (only because I'm out of usable spots to give it to anyone else and Kain singing is a little silly...ier than Cecil.) and I plan on each of my patches being stackable.) so don't throw those Harps away when Edward leaves!

You will be able to get Loki Harps as Uncommon and Rare drops from Moon enemies.

[BRPXQZME]

Okay, you get another post. This one’s on me.

[Mirby]

These are all pretty damn cool, man.

[Vanya]

To quote one of my clients. "Impressive!!"

[Grimoire LD]

Thanks fellows! Only now do I realize I Forgot to include my Sing-Harp Dependent patch in... honestly, it wasn't my best work. I can improve it, if not functionally, then at least code wise with a lot cleaner of a code script, from this very hack, in fact. This hack takes the same idea as the Sing Patch and turns it on its head.

First, here is the Sing-Harp Dependent Patch for interested parties, fixed up and good as new! This will act as (mostly) intended. This will add +05 Attack Power to Slot 1, 2, and 3, and the Singer. Meaning if the Singer is occupying any of those spots he or she will receive the Bonus twice, for a +10 Bonus to Attack Power.


FFIII DS Style Sing + FFIII NES Style Cheer

Now for the cream of the crop is the addition of Magic Weapons! This is probably my best work yet and it will allow a modder (with the aid of an editor hopefully, like FF4kster)  to add any spell to a Weapon, and there will be a 25% chance of that spell activating that Spell with a Weapon Attack!

Now there are a few... oddities... to this whole process.

First, the damage you deal is not 100% accurate to what you're Actually dealing. It's ordinarily a little more. and I'm not sure how it is calculated. I know that it's not ignoring the Weapon Damage or the Spell.(though for curing or buffing spells things get a little strange.)

Second, when a Spell Misses its target the normal weapon damage swing may show elsewhere, most likely on another enemy. However the damage will show on the enemy you are properly aiming towards.

Thirdly, this is only Single Target enemies. Anything more would have been a bit too powerful in my opinion.

Fourthly - Curing Spells will Not Work Period. They are turned into Damage, even spell formulas that don't ordinarily do damage deal a small amount of damage, interestingly enough. This does have interesting applications... say you combine my Sing-Harp Dependent Hack with this patch, you would see that yes, Edward is casting beneficial spells on the foe, but what you might find interesting, especially with the Dream Harp in particular. Instead of recovering 1/10 of their Max HP, you're actually Dealing 1/10 of their Max HP. This also applies to Party Members. Granted you Can attack say... Kain with the Madhura Harp and cast Protect on him (if you're lucky), you would hurt him a bit and Protect would deal an extra damage or 2, but it would effect him as if he were hit by the spell.

Fifthly - The damage dealt is dependent on your own Wisdom and Will. The Weapon's Spell Power itself is not taken into account. This means that attacking with the Ice Rod for instance may be more beneficial in the hopes of activating the Magic Weapon  instead of a mediocre spell multiplier from the Weapon itself, as shown here...





This hack is very easy to utilize. Nothing other than targeting in it is hardcoded, so you can have it use any spell you like.

Here's a few more pictures of it in action.







FFIV-Magic Weapons

And here's the patch!

As always, any complaints, comments, or questions regarding my patches, post them here.

[bradzx]

It is will work if I patch all of them in 1?

[Grimoire LD]

 It *should*. All of my patches have been made so one can be placed on top of the other, though because of the amount of changes that were done to equipment for Imbued Weapons, you might want to apply that one last, just in case the others try to get rid of some fairly essential data to having that work properly.
January 21, 2014, 02:50:03 pm - (Auto Merged - Double Posts are not allowed before 7 days.)It always annoyed me that Kain's entire backstory in the Scenario Guide is about him caring for the last living Dragon in Baron, yet not once, in any release, does he ever talk about Dragons or that the Dragoon Corps were known as Dragon Riders. While I can't make Kain a Dragon Rider, I can at least give him Something to do with Dragons and I always felt that in FFIV actions speak louder than words, so I gave him a command that will allow Kain to soothe the hearts of wounded dragons and allow them to Retreat without harm. In thanks they impart their wisdom to Kain and will teach him either a new Dragon Skill or a White Magic spell.

I am proud to say that my attempt to have Kain learn spells from All Wounded Dragons is a resounding success! Thanks to Chillyfeez's code and the mass amount of space that Recall gave me I managed to include a unique entry for nine dragons and the rest are handled with a Level Algorithm.


Kain will now have a unique command called "Dragon Speech" in which he will try to soothe and tame wounded dragons.


If the Dragon is not in critical, this message will appear. Signifying that it must be weakened further until it can be reasoned with.


If the Dragon is in Critical and this command is used, it will impart knowledge to Kain and will Retreat from battle.


In the Wind Drake's Case it is Reis' Wind or "WindR" which will restore 1/3 of all party member's HP.



This patch will add three new dragons (replacing the "rare enemies" on the Three-Step Peninsula). One in the Overworld, two in the Underworld. Wind Dragon, Sol Dragon, and Great Dragon (WndDragn, SolDragn, GrtDragn)

The Wind Dragon can be challenged in the forests around Troia and yields the spell Reis' Wind, which will restore 1/3 of everyone's current HP.



The Sol Dragon is fought in the Underworld and teaches the spell Cyclone, which is an Air Elemental Magic Attack.



The Great Dragon is fought in somewhat rare encounters in both the Sylph Cave and Sealed Cave and can impart the situationally useful Dragon Breath.



The MecDragon (formerly known as D. Machin) is no longer in just the Giant of Babil (or else Kain could never fight it) but is the 1/64 chance in the area outside of Baron (and yet I've Still run into it three times) and will likely need a Siren to locate. It teaches the powerful Lancet skill which will turn Kain's ordinary attack into a Drain attack, restoring half of the damage that he inflicted.



Finally the Red Dragon can also be found not just in the Lunar Subterrane but on the Moon's Surface itself, and the Red Dragon gives the mighty Sky Rave skill, which is a powerful Holy and Air elemental attack on all foes.





The other Dragons teach White Magic and are merely meant to supplement Kain where as the Five Main Dragons all are given ample opportunity to challenge.

Green D. - Teaches Blink (Underworld/Tower of Babil 2)
Silver D.- Teaches Esuna (Lunar Subterrane)
Yellow D.- Teaches Haste (Underworld (3-Step Peninsula)) - Siren, likely
Wyvern   - Teaches White (Boss)
Blue D.  - Teaches Bersk (Lunar Subterrane)
Gold D.  - Teaches Slow  (Lunar Subterrane)
Clapper  - Teaches Charm (Cave of Summon Monsters)
Pale Dim - Teaches Exit   (Boss)

Things you can expect in this patch -

New Foes in various areas. Refer to above for locations.

A completely new and unique way for Kain to learn Spells.

Several enemies and bosses received minor changes to compensate the new skills and what was replaced in order for them.

All characters lost Venom and Weak/Gale and Edge lost Image.

FuSoYa and Tellah share the same spell sets.

Kain will gain MP up until Level 40.

With all of this in mind, I hope you enjoy the patch!

FFIV-Dragon Speak Patch

[DrROBschiz]

HOLY COW at some of the patches you guys have made

Consider me VERY IMPRESSED

I always found the 4 to be one of the weaker games gameplay wise since most spells and equipment were boring/useless

You are adding some much needed variety and Flare. I feel inspired to make a Mega Patch with all of these updates!

That said are there any plans to bring all of these awesome changes to the PSP version? Sorry! Had to try :p

[vivify93]

Thank you for choosing Project II to use as a base, Grimoire LD! I'm very happy for that.

I would just like to point out again that Project II isn't a retranslation, it's a rewrite. I cannot translate anything and know extremely little written Japanese. (As a matter of fact, I can only read "a", "ru", and "no", and I forget which writing system I can read them for.)

[Grimoire LD]

HOLY COW at some of the patches you guys have made

Consider me VERY IMPRESSED

I always found the 4 to be one of the weaker games gameplay wise since most spells and equipment were boring/useless

You are adding some much needed variety and Flare. I feel inspired to make a Mega Patch with all of these updates!

That said are there any plans to bring all of these awesome changes to the PSP version? Sorry! Had to try :p

I love FFIV to death, my personal favorite in the series, but I am not blind to its Glaring flaws, and they are as you mentioned... A fair amount of useless spells, fairly boring equipment, and a non randomized AI (that one is my biggest problem with FFIV. Much of this is fixed in FFIV DS... then unfixed in other iterations of the game (FFIV Complete Collection for instance).

I thought I could make some modest (and not so modest) improvements on a game that has a Lot of potential, but doesn't live up to 100% of it.

If you do make a Mega-Patch please let me know how everything syncs together. In theory it should work out fine (for the most part, I talked about the Harps and Dark Crystal Sword before). I am making this all for an overhaul of the game itself (Mostly every command will be changed, several pieces of equipment will add special effects that are not so obvious. For instance, the Scholar's Cap will give Item Lore from FFIII making Damage Items deal double their default damage and the Chemist Ring will have HP healing items restore double their normal amount)

Enemies will be reworked and rebalanced (With the DS version as a template) and I hope the end experience will be more fulfilling overall.

Also, I love Complete Collection, I'm sure it has a lot of neat things to use which wasn't available way back when (like... space) but unfortunately nothing is known about that version of the game.

@Vivify93 - Ahem... yes, I meant rewrite haha. As I said while you were making Project II it's the closest thing we can use as a base from a proper hacking stance (as in our knowledge).

[DrROBschiz]

I love FFIV to death, my personal favorite in the series, but I am not blind to its Glaring flaws, and they are as you mentioned... A fair amount of useless spells, fairly boring equipment, and a non randomized AI (that one is my biggest problem with FFIV. Much of this is fixed in FFIV DS... then unfixed in other iterations of the game (FFIV Complete Collection for instance).

I thought I could make some modest (and not so modest) improvements on a game that has a Lot of potential, but doesn't live up to 100% of it.

If you do make a Mega-Patch please let me know how everything syncs together. In theory it should work out fine (for the most part, I talked about the Harps and Dark Crystal Sword before). I am making this all for an overhaul of the game itself (Mostly every command will be changed, several pieces of equipment will add special effects that are not so obvious. For instance, the Scholar's Cap will give Item Lore from FFIII making Damage Items deal double their default damage and the Chemist Ring will have HP healing items restore double their normal amount)

Enemies will be reworked and rebalanced (With the DS version as a template) and I hope the end experience will be more fulfilling overall.

Also, I love Complete Collection, I'm sure it has a lot of neat things to use which wasn't available way back when (like... space) but unfortunately nothing is known about that version of the game.

@Vivify93 - Ahem... yes, I meant rewrite haha. As I said while you were making Project II it's the closest thing we can use as a base from a proper hacking stance (as in our knowledge).

UPDATE: Just made the build today. Just started my playthrough and the game boots and runs properly so far. Ill have more info as I progress! Cross your fingers!

I will! I haven't had much time to play with all of this as of yet but it will get done!

Its a shame the PSP romhacking scene is still so small. I feel like its the next step up from SNES as there are so many great games and updates. Hopefully it will become popular enough and get some toolsets since I feel like a lot of its games would age very very well. Especially with updates and the presence of a very easy to use and cross platform emulator

[Grimoire LD]

Well it got past the starting screen, that is good news indeed.

I do believe when computers get a little stronger PSP hacking will become more widespread. So far though the emulators out there are still a bit imperfect, and last I checked there is no memory editor on them. I could be wrong on that one since I haven't checked for one in a very long time.

[Zoinkity]

That's some mighty fine work ;*)

The dragon-charming-blue-mage bit is particularly cute.  About time he interacted with dragons at all.

[Grimoire LD]

Thanks! Since then I've created several more abilities, but no patches as I feel they aren't really large enough to warrant patches.

Coat Hammer -
Cid coats his hammer into certain chemical compounds whose original restorative properties have been corrupted.
 This is an ability for Cid and when used it looks at the first item in your inventory. If it is most status healing items (save Diet Food or Remedy) it will consume the item, reverse the effect (sort of like that accessory in FFXII) and apply that effect to Cid's normal attack (e.g. Use an Antidote and his weapons will inflict Poison on Hit). I thought it a more useful integration than FFIV:DS's Upgrade which only applies an element based on an attack item used.

And several changes to Kick, Gird, and Brace. Kick will deal double damage if equipped with no Armor (FFI reference as a Monk is stronger with no armor equipped). Focus can now hit the back row for full damage and doesn't suffer defense penalties any longer, Gird will Change your defense to your Level similar to FFI. If you have the Master's Headband though it will also add your current Agility to the defense bonus.

[Thanatos-Zero]

Kudos to you Grimoire LD.

While I am more of a Final Fantasy V fanboy, I really like what you did with Final Fantasy IV.^^

Keep up the good work.

[Grimoire LD]

Thanks Thanatos-Zero! I love FFV as well and have been wondering how difficult it would be to hack that game (the documentation I put into FFIV has been absolutely immense from every spell routine to every command routine including several bug fixes, I have been around that system a fair amount), but for the moment my interest lies with FFIV.

Also DrROBSchiz, I tried to do exactly what you did and... I think you might notice a few problems sooner or later...

But tonight has been completely devoted to fixing these problems and this post will contain a link to a Combo Patch! Which will include...

Various Bug Fixes! Including Infinite Arrow Fix, Monster Evasion/Magical Evasion, Fixed worthless spellbook check which does nothing except prevent different school of magic spells from being added to assign spellbook slot. (As far as I could make out)

Dark Knight/Paladin Cecil has Battle Skills
Kain can learn Spells from Wounded Dragons
Rydia has lost White Magic but has learned Geomancy
There is a chance on hit that certain Weapons will use specific Commands on Hit (e.g. Thief's Knife can use Steal)
There is a chance on hit that if the Weapon has magic that it will be used in addition to a normal attack. In this it is important to note it uses the character's Wisdom/Will rather than the Weapon's innate version.
Tellah can use Swords as to make his ability to use Battle Skills make sense.

Cry will reduce all Magic Evasion by the amount of Porom's Will.
Yang now has Fury which will cast Berserk on him when he uses it.
Cid now has Item Lord, which will look for the first usable item the player has and can make it hit a single target (for those powerful Attack Magic spells) or can be used to to split an item, in case of an Ether or Cure Potion for instance.
Songs now used are dependent on the Harp equipped, in addition Paladin Cecil can equip Harps and has Bardsong, and every Song you Sing will raise the attack of most of the party!

Rosa will, instead of Aim, have ArrowBarrage. Depending on her strength she may use 3 or even 4 normal attacks!
Finally, Edge can use Katanas that are in the inventory to unleash their power with a chance that they will break upon use with the Katana Soul command.

This is a combination of all of my patches thus far and a little extra. If you're looking for one complete package than here it is!

Will these changes make the game easier? Almost without a doubt, but that is because these are parts of what's for my real project and now that I have the preliminary work done you may look forward to seeing the progress on that in the main Personal Projects thread which will make the new abilities invaluable to one's survival.

And this isn't all! You can think of these as a "taste" or a demo rather of what you can expect in the main project.

FFIV-Combo Patch

[DrROBschiz]

Fantastic!

And you were right I did run into a few bugs here and there

Regarding Project II - There is a small typo where Package is misspelled upon entering Mist Village

The largest being the Battle Skill patch. It would should Cecil as learning them but the command never appeared on the menu.

Love the weapon mods but Nuke on the Dark Sword is a bit overkill dont ya think?

MageDart is fantastic with the rod and makes it a useful but not overpowered choice for mages.


Geomancy is a mixed bag. having instead death on failure seems like a harsh punishment. There must be a better more diverse way to implement this awesome idea!

Some ideas I have

- Have geomancy scale closer to individual stats so as to not be so overpowered early in the game
- Have it fail to activate on failure wasting a turn. May have the success rate tied to a stat or equipment
- Have several geomancys per environment that occur at random (maybe 3 different ones) to add variety and chance.

Ill update and rebuild the rom with the new combo patch and continue impressions!

[Grimoire LD]

Fantastic!

And you were right I did run into a few bugs here and there

Regarding Project II - There is a small typo where Package is misspelled upon entering Mist Village

The largest being the Battle Skill patch. It would should Cecil as learning them but the command never appeared on the menu.

Ah, that might have *something* to do with the direction in which you patched everything. I seemed to not have a clear grasp on how much a patch would change default matters, which is why a combo patch was the preferable option.

Love the weapon mods but Nuke on the Dark Sword is a bit overkill dont ya think?

Haha! That is a remnant of testing that I forgot to remove. You'll notice that it is changed to Armor Break in the Combo Patch.

MageDart is fantastic with the rod and makes it a useful but not overpowered choice for mages.

I fully agree, I was surprised to see the damage it dealt was fair, but not too much as to make it the only choice, but not too little to make it too powerful.

Geomancy is a mixed bag. having instead death on failure seems like a harsh punishment. There must be a better more diverse way to implement this awesome idea!

Some ideas I have

- Have geomancy scale closer to individual stats so as to not be so overpowered early in the game
- Have it fail to activate on failure wasting a turn. May have the success rate tied to a stat or equipment
- Have several geomancys per environment that occur at random (maybe 3 different ones) to add variety and chance.


Ill update and rebuild the rom with the new combo patch and continue impressions!

Geomancy is only , that is on the Field, at its best at the start of the game. Unfortunately I was strapped for space and barely managed to include all of that, so while at first there was a grander plan in mind for Geomancy the limited space trumped this. Now Backfire is a reference to FFIII and was the only thing I could think of at the time (no normal spell formula uses an ability which deals damage to the player. Let me look at the code and see if I can't think of anything else with the space available...

Let's see... the normal routine ends at B1, mine ends at AA... that gives me 7 bytes to work with. I Might be able to instead link the failed Geomancy to Dark Wave, dealing physical damage at the expense of 1/8 of Rydia's HP.

Would that work better then?

[DrROBschiz]

It would be better I suppose.

So tricky when everything is so limited!

Still having fun with it though. Ill be able to test the combo patch over the weekend and provide as much feedback as I can.

Still cool how much can be done within the confines of the game. Really need someone to make tools for all the psp remakes at some point though ; p

[Grimoire LD]

Indeed, if I had unlimited space I could do anything my heart desired (except for target specific foes with abilities that Aren't Fight or Spells...) but I am always in the confines of the original command length. Not to say I don't know where the pointer addresses are, I do, but I'm very wary on actually messing with any of that unless I am pointing it towards the very small section of empty space at the end of the bank (As I did with the Magic Weapons routine).

The PSP version would be a fantastic building block, most certainly. My only issue with that might be making a good sprite editor but that is the one thing that FFIV is Still missing when FFVI, a vastly more complicated game, has a dedicated sprite editor.

I also just now uploaded a new version of the patch. It has only one fix. I forgot to change the name of Pyro's new spell ID to Pyro. It still has default "VenomGas" name, despite everything else about it being Pyro. Not a big deal really.