Is the Water Rondo still missable?

Just wondering if there has been a water battle zone added in the WoR or not to get mog's dance?

The Water Rondo is indeed still miss-able.

Hmm ok good to know. And underwater battle in the WoR would be nice for people who miss the dance, but I understand not really having a good way of adding the underwater battle to the WoR. The GbA version solved this by adding a battle when you take the ferry between South Figaro and Nikeah, but then again the added content in the gba version is forced and pretty bad.

If there were room, a fight against a non-Esper Leviathan with a Doomgaze-like mechanic in which the creature flees in the first several encounters would be a reasonable thing to put in; failing that, maybe move Blue-D to a Phunbaba-like encounter where the party needs to fend it off, in order to introduce the dragons, and something else interesting might go in the bottom of the Ancient Castle? You'd need dialogue explaining how there's some way of getting from the ocean to the Ancient Castle if you just had Blue-D flee there, and there's no room for that either. This is just spitballing, but while the QoL improvement would be nice, there's no room for an extra sprite (so it'd have to use an existing enemy) and there's no room in the event bank, I think, so it's a moot question.

Ebot's Rock just resurfaced... maybe part of it could be underwater. Ooh, put a timer on the Hidon battle like with Emerald WEAPON

How difficult would it be to just trigger a random encounter each time someone takes the ferry between Nikeah and South Figaro in the World of Ruin after getting the Falcon? Have it take place underwater and you have an easy way to acquire the dance. Could even have some NPCs pointing to recent monster attacks on sea travel to lead players to it, making it a neat little hidden secret if you missed the dance in the WoB

Any chance maybe of having some random location be considered water tiles?  Such as Dinosaur Woods, or putting a random oasis in the middle of the desert?

maybe the dragon in ancient castle could be a water map?

It wouldn't have to necessarily be somewhere underwater for the Water Rondo dance, the Lete River and Barren Falls backgrounds are also both considered water areas for getting Water Rondo. (Though it's not actually possible to have Mog fight at Barren Falls.)
So it could be more natural to have a riverside area somewhere, or maybe have a repeatable "waterfall" that you could jump off of for getting Water Rondo.
Though the River background does have that raft glued to it at all times, and I can't think of anywhere that a waterfall could fit in that you would even have a reason to jump down from.

If adding a new background was possible, I'd actually like to see the WoR above ground Serpent Trench be more of a wetlands/marsh type area for getting Water Rondo, since it was completely underwater before so I'd imagine it would still be really wet around there. (Plus Mobliz is even shown as being flooded in WoR.)

Other simpler ideas I could see working is just setting Zozo as a "water zone" since it's always raining there, or even just have Mog start with it outright since you don't get him until you have the airship anyway.

I like the ideas for just having some places on the WoR map count as Water, or just letting Mog start with it. Sound like simple but elegant solutions that shouldn't require crazy programming (but what do I know of FFVI programming).

I especially like the idea of Serpent Trench being more of a wetlands areas. Makes a lot of sense.

Hey, if someone wants to make a marsh background that looks decent, we'll use it.

I like the serpent trench idea. Giving it to mog at the start might be a bit strange since you use mog in the beginning of the game when you first meet locke.

What about something like the image found at the link below (but without the train)?  What format would be best?

Huh, nice. That is a good swamp background. All ready there in the Phantom Forest, no? Remove the train, and splatter it around the Serpent Trench. Could even keep the train if we want to designate some forest in the WoR as the Phantom Forest.

Adding a background would require finding space for the background tile graphics, and for a new background tilemap, as well as relocating and extending the pointer tables for those two sets of data. Not saying it's impossible, just a fair bit of work. How much free space does BNW still have, anyway?

Are you considering adding a set of "swamp" tiles to the WoR world map tileset, too?

Rolling with idea... Only the forest south of mobliz becomes swamp, and get rid of the chocobo stable if it's still there.  You now have the phantom forest in the WoR close to a devastated Mobliz.  Foreboding yet fitting sight as you approach the city the first time if you happen to catch a battle there.

This should make identifying which parts of the code need to change reference from forest to swamp easier and pretty limited.  Then the bigger issue is the space for battle background.

On 8/17/2017 at 2:07 PM, SuperHario said:

What about something like the image found at the link below (but without the train)?  What format would be best?

 

 

I remember a similar background to this during the esper world flashback when geshtal steals the baby. It's similar to this except without the train. I wonder if that would work.

I would prefer the Phantom Forest stays unique. There are swamp backgrounds from other FF games that could be appropriated.

Another option is to teach the dance via event somewhere/from someone.

3 hours ago, seibaby said:

Another option is to teach the dance via event somewhere/from someone.

Ultros is kind of the obvious choice here.

3 hours ago, BTB said:

Ultros is kind of the obvious choice here.

"See, just put your tentacles up because you were born this way kupo"

Talk to Ultros to spar with him for a bit, in an underwater arena? Sort of like Spekkio fights in CT.

1 hour ago, Nowea said:

"See, just put your tentacles up because you were born this way kupo"

Ultros getting his portrait taken, and teaching dance moves. Ultros is a rather cultured creature I'll say.

Eh, an Ultros battle to teach Water Rondo in the WoR seems rather forced.  If any battle does it, Blue-D makes the most sense, but then it's missable if you don't bring Mog along for the fight.

Probably better to stick with the marsh/swamp idea and just use the background from when Terra is kidnapped by Gestahl. That way you don't have to worry about adding a new background if space is an issue.

I do like the idea of ultros being an optional replayable boss similar to spekko though. Maybe he can grow in strength based on the parties average level or something.

The background you're talking about, SuperHario, is unfortunately not a battle background. I like the idea of the trench becoming wetlands too, but in order to do it right, it needs a new battle background at least and ideally new overworld map tiles, too. At that point it'd make more sense to add beaches, although with expansion, both are possible. Nice ideas but probably best to store in the 2.0 locker along with other expansion stuff.

I agree it makes no sense for Ultros to fight you underwater if he's hanging out in the Colosseum. They don't even have a pool.

Hm...what about having an enemy that uses Dance? If the background changes to underwater, and you then win the battle, perhaps Mog could learn Water Rondo that way.

Edit: The solution is obvious. Rematch with Ultros, Ultros uses Dance. If you win, you get to respec (at a cost).

Is there anywhere in the WoR where it'd be logical to use the current Underwater battle background?

2 hours ago, seibaby said:

They don't even have a pool.

You can't prove that, that crazy old man is eccentric as hell. There's definitely a VIP suite upstairs somewhere where he kicks back with Ziegfried and some glasses of scotch.

Can I just say that a cut-scene with Ultros teaching Mg the Water Rondo would be hilarious and fit in with Ultros' role as comic relief?

I'm not familiar with exactly what makes a 'battle background', but at least that background to which I refer is coded into the software already.  What type of changes have to be made to convert it to be battle compatible?

Q2: And if Ultros is a battle, why not have Siegfried sell you the EL respec? Lends a bit more prestige to it.  Could nix the 1st time discount for a lower flat rate from $50-75K.  

For Colosseum in general, could have Ultros just be a vendor who takes a fee for the transaction, maybe $10K per trade.  He could also just sell water rondo for $10K too, as well as a new unique item - Octopus Ink.  It's like using a rod as an item, where it gives a free cast of a water elemental spell, as well as setting Blind status. Other NPCs could sell other rare items, Slim Jims and Snake Oils, particularly, giving you reason to have to explore the environs.

Found this link regarding battle backgrounds:

http://www.ff6hacking.com/wiki/doku.php?id=sprite:bgs

A different idea is to put a few tiles  in the Cave to the Ancient Castle that battle on Serpent Trench backgrounds; maybe around the treasure chests in the second room or around the save point in the third room (can battles happen here?).

Could also have the first part of Cyan's Dream be a water background.  It has a bit of an Escherian waterfall aspect to it.  It's still missable, but no reason not to just to throw a twist in.

Cave to the Ancient Castle being a "water" area is honestly not a bad idea. IIRC, it even plays the Serpent Trench music. Sides, there's more than enough "Cave" dungeons in the WoR. Might as well let one of them be a "Water" dungeon.

Also a lot simpler of a solution than adding in new cutscenes and such.

All the more reason for a future version to expand the ROM.

Mog could always start off with the Water Rondo already learned, its not a big deal to start off with one and saves a lot of hassle. if Mog already starts with a dance just replace it with Water Rondo.

(EDIT)

Maybe when everyone fell from the Falcon at the end of WoB Mog falls into the sea. he explains this somehow when you find him and automatically begins the WoR with it.