Secret of Mana: Equipment Overhaul

[Timbo]

The Purpose of this hack is to re-balance equipment so that every piece to eliminate redundancies and to make each piece useful until the next upgrade point. A secondary goal was to eliminate much of the game's grinding. Secret of Mana is a multiplayer game. Killing a single enemy repeatedly is not a great way to entertain your friends and family.

Apply this patch to an unheadered rom:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/5qd24ok0ifqwtb0/Equipment%20Overhaul%200.1.7z?dl=0

I'm looking for feedback and playtesting. I want to hear what people think about the changes and what I should do differently. I'll submit it to the site properly one I know they it's bug free.

A full changelog is provided in the zip file.

Design Choices:

Spoiler

- The Wisdom Bonus Bug is fixed. The game now properly adds Wisdom bonuses to equipment.
- I moved some items around in the late to end of game shops to eliminate redundancies.
- Several end of game rare items are now purchaseable. Since most of the end game equipment is only relatively same-ish, Neko now most of it at the Grand Palace. Small adjustments were made to make sure that each piece was relatively equal in terms of value.
- Almost all monster drops were nerfed down to consumable items. There are a few exceptions to this rule.
- All three characters get a unique headwear, bodywear, and armwear item. These items are dropped by enemies in the Pure Land and Mana Fortress.
- A handful of Griffin Hands and Ice Thugs now appear in the Mana Fortress to prevent items from becoming permanently missable.
- Weapon Orbs are now dropped by Grand Palace enemies but only while they are in the Mana Fortress.

[close]

Credits:

Spoiler

Kethinov - For showing me where all of the item and shop data is and figuring out that weapon orbs from enemy chests only drop in the Mana Fortress.
Mziab - For helping me understand the difference between hi and lo rom.
Mop - For helping me find the Mana Fortress enemy spawn data.
Regrs - For explaining how to fix the Wisdom Bonus Bug.

[close]

[Thanatos-Zero]

I have a suggestion. How about giving Lvl 9 weapons (except the Sword of Mana) a stronger boost in power and effects?
I once used the editor with some success to alter weapons in a way, that they are much more enjoyable to use.
But damn does the editor make the ROM files big.

[Timbo]

For now, I'm planning to parse out my hacks piecemeal. While enemy Weapon Orbs treasure drops are a part of this hack, weapons are not. There will be an Omni-hack at some point though.

That said, there is a weapon hack on the horizon. Before that can happen I need to track down a copy of either Zhade's or Moppu's Monster Weapon Affinity bugfix