Mixed in with this is me dunking on vanilla's plot and thinking out loud about things I'd like to do in a mod, don't take it too seriously.
Narshe
Big fan of the expedited game start. I've played through this part of the game so many times it bores me to death, though the argument could be made that changing things up (as in ROTDS) makes it interesting enough to keep one awake. If you're going the expedited route, I would make the troopers actual magitek knights or the imperial equivalent of special forces to really hammer home how great the advantage of magic is and what the resistance is up against.
You don't see much of Narshe right now, but it is tiny.
Post-Narshe to South Figaro
Nothing really to say here. I wish that Edgar's tools were different from vanilla. After verifying that auto-crossbow is better than vanilla attack in most cases, I moved his commands around so tools is at top, and just held A to win. I did have to move Terra to the back and heal periodically, but it wasn't too different from vanilla.
Speaking of auto-crossbow, here is Edgar's spiritual brother:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tbKGjRoSofA
Plot Sperging:
I haven't replayed FF6 in years, it's painful how much the plot sucks. Edgar is an engineer, but also an inept womanizer, but also a king, but also working with the resistance, but also politically adept. Typical JRPG thing where instead of developing a character around one or two major personality traits and giving them nuance in their interactions with each other, they instead keep tacking shit onto the character. Making Edgar a sort of politically/socially blind engineer who uses his inherited wealth to make contraptions would be more interesting. Having women - seeking his wealth - hit on him and making him take everything they say 100% literally would be hilarious. Maybe put a bunch of aging actresses and noblewomen fresh out of money in his foyer, complaining that they can't figure him out and plotting against one another.
Figaro troops capturing Terra and Locke and being ready to turn them in to the empire until Kefka does his thing and poisons his goodwill with Edgar and Figaro would be better characterization than making all the Good Guys™ support the rebels because of course they do, they're the good guys.
Also why does Terra have any socialization whatsoever given that she was raised by the empire since she was a baby? Even without memories she should be a walking basket case of institutionalization.
The cave to South Figaro was more straight forward, which is a blessing. Pretty easy too.
South Figaro to the party split
The racoon enemies who counter everything with heal and are weak to fire is a definite improvement to vanilla.
South Figaro is pretty much unchanged. The new relic situation is nice, as is the armor. I settled on maximum defenses and evasions and used that until it stopped working (Sabin's scenario).
It's probably a limitation of the engine but it really seems like there's not much going on in South Figaro. It's basically a village. Removing the walls and having the town go up to the edge of the screen and seem to continue would at least provide the illusion of a large port city, as would a larger dock area with shady mob types lurking around the edges getting paid to do nothing.
I had to retreat from Mount Kolt and level up for a bit. I probably did too much. I'm annoyed that I need to wait until 1/3 of the way through the game to get espers.
Sabin is a better character than Edgar, because he just has a few things that define him and you get to watch him and the other characters bounce off one another. Lifting weights, conditioning, and martial arts sparring would make him the ADHD kid to my idea for a revised Asperger's Edgar.
I'd prefer that Blitzes get a menu, you select one, and then they either warm up to execution or they have a cool down until Blitz can be used again (several turns, ideally, though it should depend on the Blitz). I think there's a hack for that at FF6hacking.com. As it is, they're broken once you get the controller inputs down.
Sabin vs Vargas seems like a riff on 90s anime, such as DBZ. Vargas being blown away instead of KO'd would give you an opening for a return appearance, possibly in the WoR or coliseum. Though if you do that, the final confrontation should take place on a bridge or cliff edge as per JRPG tropes.
Returner's hideout is small, and in the middle of nowhere. No evidence of communication infrastructure (message pigeons, fire/smoke signals, heliographs). Pretty much nothing going on here. Only emergency exit is in a raging river - very good planning lol, good job Bannon! With that level of incompetence, I wonder if Bannon's first name is Steve? Given that we need to escort his dumb ass, it's a shame we don't see him die later.
Lete (Lethe?) River was a little tough, but not too bad. Just scraped by a few times, but it's hardly an issue given that I can just go outside and level up.
The boss fight was fun and a nice change of pace from vanilla. Spicy dialog, counters, but still manageable. Ultros is a much better character than Edgar, and I'd rather escort him than Bannon.
Terra's Party
The tonberry caught me by surprise and resulted in a TPK. Annoying at first, but funny in hindsight. I'll check back later and scan them to see if I could have beaten them or stolen good loot and ran away.
The rearranged cave was nice, got to meet the moogles and found a bit of treasure.
In my experience few people do things for the greater good, or for the good of anyone but themselves. Making Bannon more of a douchebag - a wannabe Machiavelli with delusions of grandeur, a lot of money grifted from people suffering under the empire, and alcohol fueled pseudo-charisma - would be par for the course regarding dissident politics. Maybe make him order the remaining returners in the "hideout" to fight to the last man against the approaching imperials, while he does the unfortunate but necessary duty of running away with the pretty girl and her bodyguards to save his own ass.
Locke's Party
I'm disappointed we didn't get to see what Locke was doing to hinder the empire, or who was in charge of the force that took South Figaro. The disguise thing was pretty boring, same as vanilla. Planting a Returner pamphlet on a sleeping guard and making a false report to an officer while posing as an informant would be funnier, and more in line with Locke being a rogue.
Celes would be more interesting if she wanted to simply escape the empire for personal reasons or to be free, rather than due to war crimes. She was raised by the empire after all, you'd think she wouldn't have a context for what is good or evil or a well-formed personality outside of what the empire needed her to do. I have no idea what her personal reasons would be, maybe she just didn't give a shit about war and the empire anymore and wanted to do something more interesting, or live a life like a normal young woman.
Why does the rich guy have manacles bolted into a wall and a save point in his hidden basement passage? Maybe add some interactive objects in the nearby bookcases, like a copy of the Lusty Argonian Maid or 50 Shades of Lavender. Would explain why the empire could blackmail him.
The hidden passage should be a sewer access, with dialog from Locke and Celes where they express disgust about walking in muck. Maybe something from Locke like "I've crawled through worse. Do you want to go back and be executed?" By the same token, the enemies therein could be sewer critters, and "oozes" if you know what I mean, rather than imperials.
Speaking of Locke, his personality would be much more interesting (and his responses to the thief jibes) if he were actually 99.99% thief and 0.01% treasure hunter. Same with the Rachel flashback later - if he were unironically breaking and entering into some forbidden dungeon guarded by the undead and he for some insane reason decided to bring his girlfriend along, his guilt at her being hurt by say a spell shot at Locke would make much more sense, as would her parents contempt. Or you could play it for laughs, and make Locke totally unable to understand what he did wrong. Locke should also be much more shifty and untrustworthy, looking around for things to steal while in enemy areas and getting blamed for the party's belongings going missing.
Is there a reason why the enemies in the South Figaro underground passage don't give experience? I couldn't backtrack to get experience, and they dealt too much damage too fast, so I was forced to run from every battle. The treasure chest fight was good too, as was the lack of a ribbon that early in the game.
Outside of South Figaro, I couldn't level up because I can't easily kill most enemies with 2 party members and Ice. I did a bit of leveling in the cave before fighting Tunnel Armor, but I died a few times in that fight until I switched Celes's commands around so her topmost command was Runic. Then I held A to win, periodically letting Locke heal and using a remedy on Celes once when the enemy squeezed in a sleep spell on Celes. I also had to rejigger my armor setup to maximize magic evasion, especially for Celes.
Pre-Esper game would be more fun if there were more utility items (like Grenades in FF7), especially offensive ones. There aren't many options and it's frustrating dealing with the lack of magic. I like the innate dual wield and two-hands of various weapons.
Altogether it's worth playing so far, thanks for all the hard work and I'll post again after I complete more of the game.
General Critiques So Far
No sidequests so far. Wouldn't mind a few small optional dungeons, and maybe even harder ones I can revisit later or in a NG+ to get magicite.
The existing areas aren't expanded much with new stuff to find and areas to explore.
No new rare "Run Away For Now" encounters meant to be fought later.