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Robert Stewart

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    Serenes Forest's Teehee Thread

    in Forum Games

    Posted

    Big news: I have a Steam Deck

    I haven't actually played on it much, but I've been having fun(?) messing around to get random games working.

    Official Steam games are usually easy, but I've also managed to get the Geofront Trails From Zero translation working, plus Battle Moon Wars. Not that I expect anyone here to know what that is.

    What is your favorite FE artstyle?

    in General Fire Emblem

    Posted · Edited by Robert Stewart

    I'm not really sure why all Kaga games are lumped in one portrait style. FE3/4 are similar, but FE5 and BSFE are very much their own thing. Not to mention the NES games.

    Map style is also not really the same between the games. FE3 is very different from FE4 and 5, and 4 and 5 are also arguably quite different. Even FE1 and 2 have noticeably different map styles, most notable with castle maps and mountains.

    For portrait I'll say "other" since FE5 isn't a choice.

    I'll go with GBA for the animations. You can't beat their goofy charm. Definitely has the most fun crits of anything.

    For maps I'll say "Other" again, this time as a stand in for FE3. IDK why, I just think they have a really nice look. I especially like the purple tint on all the indoor maps.

    Serenes Forest's Teehee Thread

    in Forum Games

    Posted

    6 minutes ago, Green06 said:

    So characters can use any Holy weapon, no matter what class, as long as they have Major blood?

    No

    Mage knights have a sword rank, and knight lord has a lance rank.

    Seliph is the only unit who can inherit the Gae Bolg and use it. Well, besides Altena, anyway.

    So it turns out Jealousy was a bug

    in NES and SNES Era

    Posted · Edited by Robert Stewart

    Most people probably know about FE4's love system. Many people may also be aware of a "Jealousy" mechanic which is part of it.

    The way it works is described on SF. But in short:

    • If a female unit A is standing next to male unit B and female unit C, and
    • C has higher priority with Unit B than unit A does, then
    • Unit C will receive +5 love points with Unit B, while Unit A will get 0.

    The mechanic is occasionally, useful, but the priority system seems a bit odd. It changes based on whether you've reset the game, and the "normal" way it works is based on recruitment order rather than character relationships. Edain/Lachesis have a higher priority with Lewyn than Erinys or Sylvia? What were the game makers thinking here?

    Well, it turns out they weren't thinking. It was a bug the whole time.

    FE4 calculates adjacent growth bonuses in more or less the following way:

    • For every female unit A, check if some other unit B is
      1. Less than 1 space away
      2. Is not female.
      3. Apply the adjacent bonus if both conditions passed

    This mostly works, but the developers forgot to reset a variable between steps one and two which is supposed to hold a pointer to Unit A between steps 1 and 2. This means that if Unit A happens to be next to a female unit C, all future distance checks will actually use the position of Unit C for checking distance.

    A pseudocode example maybe illustrates this better:

    Spoiler 
    
unit* self, other, tmp;
while (self = getNextFemaleUnit()) {
  int offset = MAX_UNIT_POS;
  while (offset > 0 && other = unitList[offset]) {
      if (getDistance(self, other) < 2) {
          tmp = self;
          self = other;
          int id = getUnitId(self);
          if (!isFemale(id)) {
              self = temp;
              applyBonus(self, other);
          }
      }
      offset--;
  }
}

     

    So, yeah. It was a bug all along.

    FE4 Bachelor's Edition

    in Fan Projects

    Posted

    This is a hack which removes FE4’s fixed Gen 1 pairings (Sigurd/Deirdre and Quan/Ethlyn). This allows Sigurd/Quan to be fathers for other children, and for other male units to be fathers for Seliph/Leif/Altena.

    Some info which may be useful:

    Deirdre and Ethlyn's love bases and growths
    Spoiler

     

    Deirdre’s Bases:
    With Lewyn/Beowulf: 120
    With Claude: 0
    With everyone else: 100

    Deirdre’s Growth per Turn:
    With Claude: 0
    With everyone else: 5

    I didn’t have a good reference to use for Deirdre’s growths or bases. Her bases are very high because she really only has one chapter where she can be paired, but I also didn’t want it to be too easy to get her accidentally paired.

    Claude has 0 base/growth because he joins after Deirdre leaves. Pairing Claude/Deirdre is still possible through another method.

    Ethlyn’s Bases:
    With Claude: 180
    With Chulainn/Lewyn/Beowulf: 120
    With Sigurd: -1
    With everyone else: 50

    Ethlyn’s Growths:
    With Claude: 10
    With Chulainn/Lewyn/Beowulf: 4
    With Jamke: 3
    With Sigurd: -5
    With everyone else: 2

     

    I used Finn’s growths as a reference since he’s around for mostly the same time period as Ethlyn is.

    It’s not (supposed to be) possible to pair Sigurd and Ethlyn. Hopefully I don’t need to explain why…

    Sigurd and Quan's love bases and growths
    Spoiler

     

    Sigurd’s Bases:
    With Deirdre: 100
    With Ethyln: -1
    With everyone else, I copied Naoise’s bases.

    Quan’s bases:
    With Deirdre: 100
    With Ethlyn: 50
    With everyone else, I copied Finn’s bases.

    Sigurd’s Growths:
    With Deirdre: 5
    With Ethlyn: -5
    With everyone else, I copied Naoise’s growths.

    Quan’s growths:
    With Deirdre: 100
    With Ethlyn: 50
    With everyone else, I copied Finn’s growths.

     

     

    These should probably be tables but IDK how to make those. :V

    I’m too lazy to calculate bases and growths for all possible children. Maybe I’ll do it later.

    What happens is Deirdre/Ethlyn are unpaired:

    Default pairings
    Spoiler

     

    If Gen 1 ends with Deirdre or Ethlyn unpaired, they are forced into a pairing with the first available male unit.

    For Deirdre, she will be paired with Sigurd if he is also unpaired, otherwise all other male characters are checked in reverse of their approximate recruitment order.

    For Ethyln, she will be paired with Quan if he is also unpaired, otherwise all other male characters(besides Sigurd) are checked in reverse of their approximate recruitment order.

     

     

    A few gameplay tweaks were made to accommodate the new pairings.

    • Gáe Bolg can now be inherited in the same way as Forseti and the Valkyrie staff.
    • One of the Steel Lances in the Chapter 8 Vendor was moved to Altena’s starting inventory, to avoid a case where she winds up without a weapon.
    • Tyrfing is still obtained in Chapter 10, but the Palmark even is now activated by Sigurd’s primary child.

    Patches for headered and unheadered roms may be found on Github.

    Caveat: I haven’t tested this all the way through, because I’m lazy. I used a modified save to test inheritance + all of Gen 2, and I did some testing from the Prologue - Chapter 3. I think that should cover everything I need to, but it’s possible I missed something.

    This may be a relatively small change in the end, but I hope everyone has some fun with it.

    Why is FE3 always forgotten?

    in NES and SNES Era

    Posted

    Probably because there are remakes of both books, and it's the oldest game on the SNES. I think if most people see there's a newer version of some game available, they'll assume it's better and prefer that one.

    Lots of people also don't seem to know about the gameplay/other differences between FE1/3B1/11 and FE3B2/12. For the same reason that most people think Echoes renders FE2 irrelevant, I think most people would just assume FE3 is similarly made "irrelevant" by its remakes.

    FYIW this is most likely an English fandom specific thing - IIRC FE3 was the best selling game in the series prior to Awakening.

    Possible Nationwide U.S Feight Rail Strike

    in Serious Discussion

    Posted · Edited by Robert Stewart

    The Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way Employees Division has voted to reject the current agreement. This is the first union to reject the negotiated deal. Apparently it's also the 3rd largest union in the current set of negotiations.

    They could strike as early as November 19th.

    Edit: SMART-MD and NFCO have accepted the agreement. (Remember that SMART-TD is considered a separate union)

    Are the "bad" units really that bad?

    in Fire Emblem: Binding Blade

    Posted · Edited by Robert Stewart

    Any unit can be made into a usable unit if you give them a bunch of favoritism, feed them kills, arena grind them, etc. The difference between "good" and "bad" units are that good ones don't require much or any investment to be useful, while bad units require so much that it outweighs their usefulness.

    Your grinded Wolt actually has lower strength and only a bit more speed than a base level Igrene. Not sure that Klein is your best benchmark for a good unit, I think he's generally considered underwhelming. If you compare Igrene's averages vs Wolt's, even at level 20/20 his stats aren't much better than hers. In fact his Res will be notably worse. This isn't even comparing to the nomads who usually have better stats and higher movement.

    A grinded Sophia will still not be any better than a decent Raigh or Niime. Actually she probably can't be as useful as Niime since it's going to be hard for her to reach Niime's A staff rank.

    Best Decade of FE

    in General Fire Emblem

    Posted

    By right I should say 00s since my favorite (FE3) came out in that time, and I like pretty much all of them...but I personally got in to the series in the 00s, or at least with the games from that era, so I guess I'll go with that.

    It's funny that Thracia released so late in the 90s that it's almost included in the 00s list. Its retail version actually did release in the year 2000. 😛

    Serenes Forest's Teehee Thread

    in Forum Games

    Posted

    4 minutes ago, Acacia Sgt said:

    Langrisser... I've been curious about those games. Maybe one day.

    Having played 1/2 of Der Langrisser and less than 1/4 of this remake I can give the games a soft recommendation? Just don't go in expecting much of a challenge. (Allegedly the original version of L2 is actually challenging, but I can't vouch for it)

    It kinda sucks that most of the rest of the series doesn't have translation patches. (4 does, but 3/5 only have translated script dumps)

    Serenes Forest's Teehee Thread

    in Forum Games

    Posted

    Unrelated to anything else: A couple days ago the Langrisser 1/2 remake was on sale for <$20 on the eShop, which is about what I thought it was worth based on my experience with the demo. So I decided to grab it despite my issues with the presentation.

    I've been going through the Langrisser 1 bits and mostly enjoying it? The game is kind of a cakewalk(enemies being suicidal, enemy mages wasting MP casting earth spells against flying units, etc), but having played Der Langrisser I wasn't really expecting a challenge. I'm more or less enjoying things. The original/light route story is nothing to write a home about, and the "Imperial" route kinda isn't either, but I was still caught off guard by it's ending at least.

    I've also been listening to some of the old arranged versions of the OST...

    Spoiler

     

     

    ...and tbh I'm kind of tempted to drop the $10 for the DLC that has all the arranged soundtracks, even if it is a bit of a moneygrab. 😬

    I can't help it, I just like mid-90's CD game soundtracks too much. They have the same energy as the PCE Falcom games. 😅

    Serenes Forest's Teehee Thread

    in Forum Games

    Posted

    17 minutes ago, Sooks said:

    This was spoiled at the beginning of the chapter but (Cold Steel 3 spoilers)

      Reveal hidden contents

    CROSSBELL HYPE LETS GOOO

    And… NOOOOO WE DONT GET TO LISTEN TO CROSSBELL MUSIC LIKE IN THE DIVERTISSEMENT OF THE LAST GAME, 0/10 WORST GAME EVER MADE

    I just wanted to jam out to

     again was that so much to ask? I mean, I guess it wouldn’t have fit tonally, but boo.

     

    At least the songs they do give you are good!

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