The purpose of this mod is to revitalize this old gem of a game.

While not a hardtype mod, the difficulty is somewhat increased due to the removal of the bonus roulette, which was present after boss fights in the original game. As a result, your stats will remain at their initial values - 100 STR, 100 INT, 100 AGL - unless you increase them through consumables such as Elixirs and wines.

This is a long-term project and now the focus is to lay a solid foundation for the mod. The difficulty rebalance will be done in later versions, after players provide feedback on how hard or easy is v1.00, and once I have a definite idea of how I'm going to tackle this aspect.

Project Design, Hacking, Programming: the_E_y_Es

Programming, Tool development: Valendian

Additional Programming: Rosto

Download version 1.03

Apply the patch on Vagrant Story(U).bin

Features include:

Teleportation is free

Analyze spell hitrate is 100%

Heal spell restores 75 HP, ignores armor

2-Handed weapons are stronger

 Break Arts are more powerful

Staff Break Arts now use INT instead of STR

Crossbows get a 10% hitrate bonus to melee

New hitrate for Exorcism/Banish

Manabreaker gem no longer blocks friendly spells

Traps can kill Ashley

Bonus roulette removed

Training dummies removed

Escapeway area removed

New enemies

New enemy attacks

New Polearm grip

And much more.

Homepage: vszenith.wordpress.com

Nice one mate, I look forward to checking it out. Always happy to see more hard mode or rebalance projects. Cheers for the effort!

This actually looks pretty dope, and this is coming from someone who never played the original. I might give this a whirl.

I had trouble with the original so a rebalance would be great.

I was unable to continue with the original game when I found myself always using the same cheap tactics. Felt forced to drop it cause of boredom.
A shame, since I can't stop hearing the game is a master-piece "and I know it is".
Maybe the problem was me, that once I found those cheap tricks, started to use them.

Same happens with FFT/FF8, you can't just ignore them and say "I will do fair play and don't do that", the existence of those exploits is kind of irritating.

Does the auto-healing buff still cancel on damage?

On 15/09/2017 at 3:35 AM, MysticLord said:

Does the auto-healing buff still cancel on damage?

IIRC, it cancels when a spell is cast on Ashley. That hasn't changed. It heals like 5x faster, though.

@SquaresoftThe cheap tactics are being addressed. I agree they were a problem in the original.

Here's the link to the development playlist.

The mod has come a long way since my last post. Check the OP for the updated content list and previews.

I need to get to downloading this mod. Would it be possible to play through the whole game? Or should I just keep an eye on it until you're done? 

2 hours ago, velsper said:

I need to get to downloading this mod. Would it be possible to play through the whole game? Or should I just keep an eye on it until you're done? 

Right now it's not playable from start to finish, as some areas are still being worked on. I intend to release v1.0 by the end of January, so I'd say wait for that.

Nice, This looks fantastic!

One of my favourite games of old, but was a bit too easy. It's great that someone with the know-how is making a mod like this, I'll be waiting patiently for the 1.0 release

Thanks for the effort!

I may be missing something obvious, but where is the download link to this mod? Can't wait for the completed version, this game's one awesome masterpiece.

6 hours ago, coffee potato said:

I may be missing something obvious, but where is the download link to this mod? Can't wait for the completed version, this game's one awesome masterpiece.

There was a link for the demo, but I can't recommend it at this point. The finished version should be out by the end of January.

Yeah, this game is nearly perfect in my eyes. Probably the only one I'd put this much effort into.

37 minutes ago, the_E_y_Es_o_0 said:

There was a link for the demo, but I can't recommend it at this point. The finished version should be out by the end of January.

 

Yeah, this game is nearly perfect in my eyes. Probably the only one I'd put this much effort into.

Gotcha, I can't wait! These last few months have been like a constant Christmas of mod releases of basically the best of everything ever. 

By the way, do You mind if I do a sort of blind test run series on this? I oten blind test run mods as a hobby, figured it'd be best to ask first. Funnily enough I was looking for an excuse to do a run of this for a while, it's hands down one of my favorites on the PS1. It always seemed funny to me that of all things, VS was what they referenced more than anything in Tactics Ogre, which is what I do tests of most of the time. 

1 hour ago, coffee potato said:

By the way, do You mind if I do a sort of blind test run series on this? I oten blind test run mods as a hobby, figured it'd be best to ask first. Funnily enough I was looking for an excuse to do a run of this for a while, it's hands down one of my favorites on the PS1. It always seemed funny to me that of all things, VS was what they referenced more than anything in Tactics Ogre, which is what I do tests of most of the time. 

Not at all. If you're familiar with the original game, you shouldn't have too much trouble with the mod. And I appreciate all the feedback I can get. VS has always been a niche title, I'm glad there are people willing to re-experience it after all this time. I do hope you have a grasp of the underlying mechanics, though; otherwise you might find it too difficult. TBH the game never did a really good job of conveying some things to the player (how to deal damage effectively, for instance). In any case, I welcome the interest, so yeah feel free to do your thing if you feel like it.

14 hours ago, the_E_y_Es_o_0 said:

Not at all. If you're familiar with the original game, you shouldn't have too much trouble with the mod. And I appreciate all the feedback I can get. VS has always been a niche title, I'm glad there are people willing to re-experience it after all this time. I do hope you have a grasp of the underlying mechanics, though; otherwise you might find it too difficult. TBH the game never did a really good job of conveying some things to the player (how to deal damage effectively, for instance). In any case, I welcome the interest, so yeah feel free to do your thing if you feel like it.

That I do, it's something I have gone back to time and time again, and was actually introduced to it originally a few years ago when a pretty well known Dark Souls guy suddenly made a series on it. The decision to buy it came dang near instantly. As for the damage mechanics, they may be a tad out there, but it's incredible to see a game actually go out of it's way to show that these armored soldiers and monster units are actually protected by their respective armors. At any rate, looking forward to it!

Follow-up question! Would you also like some feedback from a player who goes into the mod knowing nothing about Vagrant Story? Or is this more of a mod for veterans?

2 hours ago, Regdren said:

Follow-up question! Would you also like some feedback from a player who goes into the mod knowing nothing about Vagrant Story? Or is this more of a mod for veterans?

Sure, that'd be interesting. I didn't think someone's first playthrough would be through my mod, I wonder how that could turn out. One thing is you won't have a basis for comparison, so you won't know what I added from what was already there. Although that's not really an issue since you can always go back and play the original game. More importantly, I hope you enjoy the story and music which are stellar even by today's standards.

You could say the mod is for veterans in the sense that it adresses some long-time issues people had with the game. It's not so much a hardtype mod as it's a rebalance mod. My main goal was to make it more playable and interesting, instead of just harder; I wouldn't want people to drop it because of difficulty. I can't say it will be a walk in the park for you but I suppose I could give you some directions if you're struggling too much. There are only a few basic rules to understand, anyway.

So when it goes up, where will the link be?

On 25/01/2018 at 9:00 PM, coffee potato said:

So when it goes up, where will the link be?

I'll put in the OP.

For those wondering about the release date, I expect to finish the mod in a month's time or so. Rebalancing is a slow process, and if I were to rush it the quality would suffer.

If you want to get your hands on the current build, this patch includes what I've done so far:

(link removed)

Apply it with Ppf-o-matic on a clean (US) rom.

I've just beaten Duane with this mod. Looks very challenging so far! Love the increased drop rates (currently equipped with hagane guisarme & scorpion) and increased monster power (dragon dealing 250+ damage with tail attack is nuts, not a fan of random status effects tho). The mod is fantastic, keep developing it please!

On 18/03/2018 at 8:42 AM, kotpeter said:

I've just beaten Duane with this mod. Looks very challenging so far! Love the increased drop rates (currently equipped with hagane guisarme & scorpion) and increased monster power (dragon dealing 250+ damage with tail attack is nuts, not a fan of random status effects tho). The mod is fantastic, keep developing it please!

Glad to hear it! Make sure to experiment with break arts, they're a lot more useful now. The final build should be out soon.

So, I've just passed Snowfly Forest. The lizards are tough, I'm looking for a reliable way to deal some 20+ damage per hit to them (tried polearm + gem, sword + gem, break-arts for both, no results so far). No hints please, I'll figure it out myself

A couple of questions: 

1) Do I have to start a new game once a final build is out?

2) Have you considered rebalancing/revamping offensive chains? Due to heavy shot and life drain presence (for fighters specifically, I know that there're other chains for mages), I think that they lack a bit of variety.

3) How about adding RISK to magic usage? (equal to MP usage for example?) Investing in INT heavily seems a bit OP if you know where to look for certain spells (especially that you gain now single-hit spells in addition to AoE) and have a suitable weapon to chain MP.

By the way, I've just encountered a bug: when I defeat the Air dragon (the one after Earth elemental fight), I get teleported to Godhands workshop and cannot move there. Hopefully it gets fixed before release.

31 minutes ago, kotpeter said:

By the way, I've just encountered a bug: when I defeat the Air dragon (the one after Earth elemental fight), I get teleported to Godhands workshop and cannot move there. Hopefully it gets fixed before release.

Found the problem, thanks for pointing it out. If you'd like a temporary solution, try skipping the cutscene which plays after defeating the Sky Dragon. That should find you right back in the boss room and you can proceed normally. I'll address your other questions as soon as I'm able.

Thanks for the hint!

Also, after I defeated Lich I teleported back to wine cellar (blackmarket savepoint). The door was marked as closed on the mini-map, but I was able to open it. However, I haven't found neither monster, nor a closed chest inside. Possibly a bug as well.

3 hours ago, kotpeter said:

Also, after I defeated Lich I teleported back to wine cellar (blackmarket savepoint). The door was marked as closed on the mini-map, but I was able to open it. However, I haven't found neither monster, nor a closed chest inside. Possibly a bug as well.

Fixed it. Thanks for reporting the bugs, it is really useful to me. Also, I'd ask you something if you don't mind: whenever there' a story cutscene let it play out in full, so I can be sure that I didn't break anything else.

After the Limestone Quarry area the rebalancing is unfinished, so you might experience some oddities/inconsistencies.

I've added a link in the OP for the demo build. It fixes the problems found so far, and adds the following system changes:

DYING BODY cancels STR-UP; Ashley cannot cast Herakles on himself.
DYING HEAD cancels INT-UP; Ashley cannot cast Enlighten on himself.*
DYING LEGS cancels AGL-UP; Ashley cannot cast Invigorate on himself.

*'Dying head' means you're also Silenced, so you wouldn't be able to cast spells anyway. But now even an ally (like Sydney) wouldn't be able to cast Enlighten on Ashley in this situation.

I wanted to make the "dying" mechanic more relevant, and I think this adds some welcome complexity into the combat system.

Edit: Fixed the demo link on the OP.

Any update to the mod?

6 hours ago, kotpeter said:

Any update to the mod?

Not for a while. It's kind of low priority at the moment. Although I still work on it when I have the time.

This mod seems amazingly nifty so far, thank You man!

(If You feel like watching a bumbling idiot try to remember all the mechanics in play here, this is the link. Audio was fixed partway through, still unclear why it was kind of imbalanced. https://youtu.be/f99yHLdr3P8 

4 hours ago, coffee potato said:

(If You feel like watching a bumbling idiot try to remember all the mechanics in play here, this is the link. Audio was fixed partway through, still unclear why it was kind of imbalanced. https://youtu.be/f99yHLdr3P8 

Haha, this is great. I see you're quite the talker, it was very entertaining. It's also the first video of someone playing the mod other than myself. Watching that segment I already see a few things that can be smoothed out. Like the room with the Mimic; I could probably remove one of the Silver Wolves. It's also fun to follow the live chat, I enjoyed that too.

The latest version of the mod should be completable, although I haven't finished my playthrough. The Great Cathedral and some of the 2nd-play areas have not been rebalanced yet. But as you've mentioned, I've already added some post-game content to play with. It was better to acommodate that stuff early on, for design reasons as well as space limitations.

Your emulator doesn't seem to like save states too much. I didn't know using them could cause slowdown.

A couple of people mentioned losing all the equipment stored in the container while playing the mod. If it does happen to you, let me know.

This mod is ON FIRE!!!!!!!!!!!!

My feedback so far: the drop rate is PERFECT. I'm having a blast puzzling over how to forge higher-level stuff without the game being an insane farm-fest. I never pursued equipment beyond hagane in the original game for two reasons: kill me now amounts of farming, and also, Ashley was overpowered with hagane so there was no incentive to keep going. Which brings me to...

The difficulty level: perfect.

In vanilla, I loathed two-handed weapons because they were so slow and shields are awesome.

I was able to play the game using my vanilla play style up until the battle with Rozencrantz - fortunately I found a video of him being defeated in the mod with a great sword which inspired me to try it, otherwise I never would have been able to kill him with a one-handed sword. I would chain 30 hits, but because the connect rate of the attack was so low, I kept pushing him to the brink of death and he'd keep recovering all of his health. Great sword solved that problem.

I also typically used to use a crossbow for fighting the evil class, but once I fought Lich and he used Surging Balm, the only solution to that problem was to assemble a great sword named Liches Get Stitches, which disposed of him promptly. Good bolts for crossbows can only hold one gem, and without being able to quickly raise affinities with a training dummy, crossbows now feel a bit obsolete.

My initial concern with the great sword was that the whole mod would become "greatsword or die," but as I continued playing, that doesn't seem to be the case. I like to use a wide variety of weapons, and the mod is consistently challenging me to change my playing style, which is awesome! That's exactly what the original game could have done better.

I'm so happy there are now worthy adversaries to push me deeper into the equipment system.

The magic rebalance is to DIE for. I hardly ever used magic in vanilla because it wasn't practical.

Thanks again for making this mod! I remember ages ago when the stat editor came out and praying someone would eventually make one. I was bored out of nowhere the other day and was like, "Let's see if anyone made a Vagrant Story mod!" and holy crap. New lease on life.

This morning, I made it to the minotaur zombie and encountered a glitch. After I "killed" him, he stopped moving, Ashley was able to continue attacking and dealing normal damage, but lost the ability to chain attacks (once minotaur was dead). I reset everything, killed him again. This time, a Hand of Light dropped (um, SWEET), but nothing else, and the minotaur became frozen, Ashley couldn't chain, and I could deal out damage infinitely. I was able to leave the room and save. This isn't gamebreaking - my only concern is, was the minotaur supposed to drop any sigils or anything else that would prevent me from progressing further in the game?

Also question: I saw there's a little bit of endgame/postgame content to be added? When the mod is updated, will I be able to continue using the save file I'm building now?

Hello blackcat777. I seem to remember you from the gamefaqs board? Or it could have been somewhere else. Let's see...

4 hours ago, blackcat777 said:

I was able to play the game using my vanilla play style up until the battle with Rozencrantz - fortunately I found a video of him being defeated in the mod with a great sword which inspired me to try it, otherwise I never would have been able to kill him with a one-handed sword. I would chain 30 hits, but because the connect rate of the attack was so low, I kept pushing him to the brink of death and he'd keep recovering all of his health. Great sword solved that problem.

Wow, you have some respectable chaining skills. I'll have to look into the Rosencrantz battle, it's supposed to be viable with a 1-H weapon as well.

4 hours ago, blackcat777 said:

I also typically used to use a crossbow for fighting the evil class, but once I fought Lich and he used Surging Balm, the only solution to that problem was to assemble a great sword named Liches Get Stitches, which disposed of him promptly. Good bolts for crossbows can only hold one gem, and without being able to quickly raise affinities with a training dummy, crossbows now feel a bit obsolete.

Hmm, this is worth a thought. In the past I've considered increasing the gem capacity of some bolts to 2 or 3 gems like the other weapons' grips. At the time I thought it would break the game, but now I just might give it a try. Cool weapon name, btw.

4 hours ago, blackcat777 said:

I'm so happy there are now worthy adversaries to push me deeper into the equipment system.

This is really gratifying to hear.

4 hours ago, blackcat777 said:

Thanks again for making this mod! I remember ages ago when the stat editor came out and praying someone would eventually make one. I was bored out of nowhere the other day and was like, "Let's see if anyone made a Vagrant Story mod!" and holy crap. New lease on life.

Ah, the stat editor. That simple tool was my entry point into modding the game. It was more user-friendly than the almighty VSTools, which was a little overwhelming for me back then. Without the stat editor to ease me into the game data files, this project would never exist. I hope JayC can check out the mod sometime and see what he set in motion with that little program.

4 hours ago, blackcat777 said:

This morning, I made it to the minotaur zombie and encountered a glitch. After I "killed" him, he stopped moving, Ashley was able to continue attacking and dealing normal damage, but lost the ability to chain attacks (once minotaur was dead). I reset everything, killed him again. This time, a Hand of Light dropped (um, SWEET), but nothing else, and the minotaur became frozen, Ashley couldn't chain, and I could deal out damage infinitely. I was able to leave the room and save. This isn't gamebreaking - my only concern is, was the minotaur supposed to drop any sigils or anything else that would prevent me from progressing further in the game?

Just to be sure, this is the Minotaur Zombie at the Gallows, Wine Cellar; not the Minotaur Lord at Temple of Kiltia, correct? Ok, I'll look into it. He doesn't drop any sigils or keys, so you should be able to continue the game normally. I think I know what the problem is, as I've seen this exact bug happen before.

4 hours ago, blackcat777 said:

Also question: I saw there's a little bit of endgame/postgame content to be added? When the mod is updated, will I be able to continue using the save file I'm building now?

Yes, any save files you might have will be fully compatible with later versions of the mod. So you can invest in your file without worries.

I'm glad to know I could spark some enthusiasm with the mod, that was my goal after all. And from what you've mentioned, I think my intentions were translated sucessfully into it. Instead of going all out in the difficulty level, I wanted something enjoyable and interesting. Thanks for the feedback!

Quote

I'll have to look into the Rosencrantz battle, it's supposed to be viable with a 1-H weapon as well.

Can I ask how much HP he has (or is that cheating)? I could take him down about ~830 HP before he would heal. The Manabreaker gem (+20% chance of hitting) helped slightly and I might have been able to wreck him eventually that way with a one-handed sword. There was just no way to raise my attack sufficiently with a one-handed sword to deal enough damage before risk became too high. I had a pretty good blade with decent human affinity, too.

I don't think the fight with him needs to be modified, however - I was the one who had to evolve or die. I beat him in a snap with the great sword, and it was a cool moment that made me realize I had to think outside of the box.

Quote

In the past I've considered increasing the gem capacity of some bolts to 2 or 3 gems like the other weapons' grips. At the time I thought it would break the game, but now I just might give it a try.

I'm only at 55% map completion and I don't have the best bows yet, so I will weigh in again once I'm done. I never noticed in vanilla that bows had only one slot with them, but I always used the training dummies for affinity boosts and that must have been enough to compensate.

Also, I like that the two-handed weapons have become more viable, they never inspired me to use them much in the first!

Quote

Minotaur Zombie at the Gallows, Wine Cellar

Yes. I kept my Hand of Light and the save file appears unscathed.

Quote

Instead of going all out in the difficulty level, I wanted something enjoyable and interesting.

You nailed it. VS is one of my favorite games of all times, and my biggest gripe has always been that the system is SOOOOO complex, but if you take the time to get all the equipment, there's essentially nothing to do with it because everything can be one-shotted before then. Sometimes I would spend three hours trying to get a single Holy Win to drop, and it's like, "This sword is the best thing ever... but I've already killed everyone."

To elaborate on the drop rate, I think it's really perfect where it is because it's not excessive (considering the inventory cap, too). The roulette aspect of the drop is still there so you have to try a bit to get things you want. But I've also gotten drops that I have NEVER seen before, and it's giving me the freedom to play around with some of the more obscure nuances. This is the first time ever, in the bazillion times I've beaten the game, that I've taken crafting silver armor seriously. I'm also saving all my wood shields and wondering if a damascus dread shield would be humanly possible. Items still have to be stored intelligently with the container elements, so it's making me think more tactically about crafting, and I can try to plan for things that before only maybe a turbo controller could have done while actually having fun.

Also, THANK YOU FOR REMOVING THE ESCAPEWAY!! Yes, that was me at Gamefaqs.

1 hour ago, blackcat777 said:

Can I ask how much HP he has (or is that cheating)? I could take him down about ~830 HP before he would heal. The Manabreaker gem (+20% chance of hitting) helped slightly and I might have been able to wreck him eventually that way with a one-handed sword. There was just no way to raise my attack sufficiently with a one-handed sword to deal enough damage before risk became too high. I had a pretty good blade with decent human affinity, too.

He has 950 HP. Another tricky thing about Rosencrantz is that he's immune to all magic, so you can't Analyze him to check his stats. So in terms of possible weaknesses, you're in the dark. If you ever face him again, I'd suggest using the Invigorate spell to increase your AGL and thus your % chance to hit (if you haven't done so). And like you mentioned, the Braveheart gem is useful here. 

Keep in mind that your weapon's affinity affects damage a lot more than its Class (Human, in this case). So maybe pick an affinity, use gems and enchanter spells to increase it as high as possible, then look for a bodypart that's vulnerable to it.

Of course, it's very easy for me to say all this, since I know everything about the mod...

2 hours ago, blackcat777 said:

I don't think the fight with him needs to be modified, however - I was the one who had to evolve or die. I beat him in a snap with the great sword, and it was a cool moment that made me realize I had to think outside of the box.

I hear ya. I did want to have a few bumps in the road, and Rosencrantz is definitely one of them.

2 hours ago, blackcat777 said:

Also, I like that the two-handed weapons have become more viable, they never inspired me to use them much in the first!

I'm partial towards Great Axes and Polearms, myself. 

2 hours ago, blackcat777 said:

You nailed it. VS is one of my favorite games of all times, and my biggest gripe has always been that the system is SOOOOO complex, but if you take the time to get all the equipment, there's essentially nothing to do with it because everything can be one-shotted before then. Sometimes I would spend three hours trying to get a single Holy Win to drop, and it's like, "This sword is the best thing ever... but I've already killed everyone."

Ha. I never liked that once you finish IMB3, you're done with the game. It's a culmination, but also kind of a bummer. In terms of power level, nothing can resist you at this point. The coolest weapons (the Rhomphaias, the Holy Win) are here, not to mention a full set of Hoplite armor. As for boss fights, everything is dead. So from now on it's entirely up you to come up with new challenges and stuff to do. I've already taken a few measures to extend the life of the game beyond IMB3. There are more to come with the next iteration of the mod.

2 hours ago, blackcat777 said:

To elaborate on the drop rate, I think it's really perfect where it is because it's not excessive (considering the inventory cap, too). The roulette aspect of the drop is still there so you have to try a bit to get things you want. But I've also gotten drops that I have NEVER seen before, and it's giving me the freedom to play around with some of the more obscure nuances. This is the first time ever, in the bazillion times I've beaten the game, that I've taken crafting silver armor seriously. I'm also saving all my wood shields and wondering if a damascus dread shield would be humanly possible. Items still have to be stored intelligently with the container elements, so it's making me think more tactically about crafting, and I can try to plan for things that before only maybe a turbo controller could have done while actually having fun.

This is really cool, and very motivating for me to hear. Awesome.

2 hours ago, blackcat777 said:

Also, THANK YOU FOR REMOVING THE ESCAPEWAY!! Yes, that was me at Gamefaqs.

Haha, no problem.

I cleared the game! (The Cathedral was lulz. )

All my loot remained intact with no issues upon starting a second playthrough.

I am dying to get to Godhands, but should I wait for the next version of the mod to keep playing? I forget how far in I have to play before it becomes accessible, and if lots of other cool rood-inverse-only areas are accessible before that, I'd rather wait and suffer appropriately for the treasures they contain.

I also kept a save just outside the Cathedral on the first playthrough.

FWIW, the phantoms in the Temple of Kiltia were LOTS of fun to fight. I love how magic and affinities are rebalanced. I never had to bother with elemental stuff before.

I am scared but excited to see what happens to the last boss's final form.

Congrats! That was pretty fast, too. Did anything give you trouble, besides Rosencrantz and the Lich?

The next version of the mod will take a while. A few months, at least. So I'd say go ahead and play.

Since you're focused on Godhands, you could simply ignore the other NG+ areas. It would go something like this: once you defeat the Ogre at Abandoned Mines B1, return to Town Center West, cross the river, go to Glacialdra Kirk Ruins and open the Rood Inverse door. Enter it and navigate the segment of Undercity West that leads you to The Crumbling Market (check my yt channel for "path to gold key - no escapeway"). Collect the Gold key, then go back to TCW and proceed normally to Snowfly Forest, then Rosencrantz. From there it's a sprint to Abandoned Mines B2. Once you defeat the Sky Dragon, the exit will take you to The Crumbling Market again, by the save point with the Dullahan. Now go ahead to Tears from Empty Sockets, there's a door locked with the Gold key. Enter it and one of the paths will take you to Godhands.

If by fast, you mean I clocked an embarrassing amount of playtime hours over the weekend...

There were other enemies that I had to try different things to beat them, like the various flying gremlins where it makes sense only to hit them with magic. I never ever used magic in vanilla. But none of that was troubling. With Rosencrantz, I was just insanely fixated on defeating him with a single handed sword... because I always did it that way, I guess??

Kali (or is it Asura? whoever is at the bottom of Kiltia on the way to the cathedral) went down easily. Maybe in part because there are so many organic opportunities to raise human affinity? I had really high stats.

When does Ashley pick up AGL up? I somehow missed that on this playthrough.

Thanks for the directions!

Have you given any thought to when the game drops grimoires to learn higher level magic? Or was this worked into the mod somewhat already? My last playthrough was maybe 4 years ago, so when items drop are fuzzy. I enjoyed the somewhat limited magic offerings in the mod - in vanilla, did grimoire avalanche, foudre, etc., not drop until the Cathedral? In the Cathedral, the game also gave another grimoire flamme drop, which took me up to flame sphere level 3. Not sure what your thoughts on level 3 magic on the first playthrough were? In the modded portion of the game, having easily affordable magic - but a limited variety of low level spells - was balanced really well.

Not sure if this is even possible or desirable, but have you given any thought to changing the stats of the various metals for equipment? Another reason I never pursued damascus was that the stat difference did not make it remotely worth the effort. The difference with silver being weaker but having higher affinities, or leather being skewed to magic, is interesting in theory, but useless in practice.

On 17/07/2018 at 10:17 PM, blackcat777 said:

When does Ashley pick up AGL up? I somehow missed that on this playthrough.

It's inside the chest at Forest River, Snowfly Forest. Thankfully you can just teleport there and collect it, it's easier than navigating that place...

As for the Warlock spells, I followed the pattern laid out by the original game, with Elemental bosses giving out the AoE spells (like Flame Sphere, Thunderburst, etc.). The only difference is now they also drop their respective single-target spells. For example, the Water Elemental drops both the Avalanche and Aqua Blast grimoires. In the original you had to farm those single-target spells from enemies like the Phantom or the Dark Eye.

I haven't touched the Great Cathedral yet, but on principle I'm ok with the extra grimoires you find there. I'll have to playtest it to know for sure, but I'll probably keep them where they are.

On 17/07/2018 at 10:17 PM, blackcat777 said:

Not sure if this is even possible or desirable, but have you given any thought to changing the stats of the various metals for equipment? Another reason I never pursued damascus was that the stat difference did not make it remotely worth the effort. The difference with silver being weaker but having higher affinities, or leather being skewed to magic, is interesting in theory, but useless in practice.

I thought of tweaking the STR/INT/AGL difference between materials, but I don't really know where that is located within the rom. I think there is some potential in that, although I'm not sure what I'd actually do with it. Maybe try and make the materials more distinct in their properties.

It's cool that you were able to finish the 1st playthrough of the mod, you're the first person to report doing so. Thanks for playing. =)

Excuse me, I was trying to access the demo build but Mega says I need a decryption key? 

1 hour ago, velsper said:

Excuse me, I was trying to access the demo build but Mega says I need a decryption key? 

Hmm, try copy/pasting this link: https://mega.nz/#!BRFUmQoS!TlzldgUbL_M02Bm58XU6ug_kfUEF9oBNo-AfAugdZoc

I really ought to remove the key requirement; there's no need for that...

It worked. Thanks a lot.

I'm on my third playthrough... It has been about 5 years since my last playthrough BUT:

Did you change some of the enemy spawns for the postgame, and for Iron Maiden B2 after clearing it the second time??? I'm pretty sure there were never three enemies in any given room, but I love it. Liches everywhere. Liches in the beginning of the game when I went to farm leather. Changed placement of the Last Crusader spawns?

Asura's final form, did you tweak that? I remember PLOWING through her in the past, and I had to try multiple setups to find which element would reach which body part... extremely fun fight.

I also liked the little rumble that spawns outside the door of Godhands. Did you change the drops? The liches in white used to drop Radial Surge... if I remember correctly. Maybe they still do and I just didn't get one. Also on the subject of these guys -

With the increased armor drop rate, the only drop that seems SLIGHTLY broken is one of the white robed liches dropping damascus plate armor. I say this because, being outside Godhands, this is easily farmable, and there is a rare drop of it already down somewhere in the Iron Maiden.

At the end of my second playthrough, Ashley had full hagane dread everything, plus a damascus hoplite glove... and damascus dread armor. Damascus dread armor was only possible because of the lich outside Godhands - otherwise the powering up of all other armors was equally available and I had to make my choices carefully.

I currently have a damascus jamadhar, wakizashi, and sage's cane. The drop rate for the Last Crusader weapons seems fun and fair - on three runs of Iron Maiden, I won one each time. It's not too easy (the loot down there can quickly break the game), but it's not stupid like how I used to have to spend three hours for a single drop. It gives me more time to play with crafting things I never thought imaginable.

Crossbows are definitely sadly grossly underpowered and I don't use them. A third gem slot wouldn't hurt, especially when you consider other weapons can be built with spiral hilt and spiral pole.

I don't know if vanilla Iron Maiden had high level leather drops, but I LOVE getting those occasionally. I'm working toward a set of hoplite leather armor -

Have you given thought to the balance of wood and leather drops? Enemy drops early game seem a little less frequent than midgame/late game. Leather bone helms are the only things I have to actively farm (and probably long boots, I'm just not that far in my farming quest yet). Wood shields are pretty scant, too. I have a wooden kite shield, and that's it. I'm trying to level up my wood shields before combining them with the few damascus shields the game drops.

Also: the escapeway. LMAO. I thought the timed portion of Mines B2 was the Escapeway for some reason, and I missed it on my first playthrough (umm, wow, I was rusty). The actual Escapeway I had no issues with. With the Escapeway taken out, is it possible to get 100% map completion? I was stuck at 97% for my second playthrough - but again - I suck at maps and missed an entire dungeon my first time around, so.

I have mixed feelings about the map of Iron Maiden B2 becoming visible!

There was only one other bug I noticed: when Ashley is chaining, casting, or using an item, and if he's fighting Dullahan/Last Crusader type of enemy, you'll hear the "chunk chunk chunk" sound effect of the enemy running during those animations. I think it only happens for the enemies that can warp off the screen, I noticed it first in Temple of Kiltia and later in Iron Maiden.

I know it's not finished yet, but the patch is already 11/10, would play again, in fact, I'm still replaying. I also have some ultimate pieces of silver armor accumulated just because, and I imagine they would look quite stylish.

Another random though: the first time I played, I wasn't sure if I had the mod until I went into the room in the beginning expecting a chest, and found the mimic. When the box moved, I screamed. Excellent touch.

I downloaded the mod, just a lil' nitpick, there's no version number on the file; so I can't be visually sure on what version this is.

On 24/07/2018 at 10:18 PM, blackcat777 said:

Did you change some of the enemy spawns for the postgame, and for Iron Maiden B2 after clearing it the second time??? I'm pretty sure there were never three enemies in any given room, but I love it. Liches everywhere. Liches in the beginning of the game when I went to farm leather. Changed placement of the Last Crusader spawns?

Some post-game spawns replace old ones, yes. The IMB2 post game encounters (the locked room battles) should spawn after defeating Asura, but I don't remember having three enemies in a single room, unless you mean three Shriekers. If you mean anything other than those, I have to fix it.

BTW, did you ever happen to find regular enemies appearing alongside any of the bosses in IMB2? The bosses should be by themselves (ofc), but I've had this bug in the past and I'm wondering if it's still there.

On 24/07/2018 at 10:18 PM, blackcat777 said:

Asura's final form, did you tweak that? I remember PLOWING through her in the past, and I had to try multiple setups to find which element would reach which body part... extremely fun fight.

Rebalancing Asura was pretty simple, actually. Once I gave her Marlene's Ring (in the original only her Time Trial version had it equipped), her stats were at the level I wanted. After that I just tweaked her spells, special attacks, turn speed, etc. Good to know she's still beatable. I was afraid her healing move would complicate things too much.

On 24/07/2018 at 10:18 PM, blackcat777 said:

I also liked the little rumble that spawns outside the door of Godhands. Did you change the drops? The liches in white used to drop Radial Surge... if I remember correctly. Maybe they still do and I just didn't get one.

Hmm, I think you're misremembering, the Death enemies outside of Godhands used to drop Elixir of Queens/Mages in vanilla. I just kept the same drops.

On 24/07/2018 at 10:18 PM, blackcat777 said:

Also on the subject of these guys -

With the increased armor drop rate, the only drop that seems SLIGHTLY broken is one of the white robed liches dropping damascus plate armor. I say this because, being outside Godhands, this is easily farmable, and there is a rare drop of it already down somewhere in the Iron Maiden.

If you can check it for me -- is it a (D)Plate Mail or (D)Brigandine outside of Godhands? If it's a Brigandine and you were still able to forge a (D)Dread Armor with relative ease, then I'll need to reduce this drop or change it to something else.

On 24/07/2018 at 10:18 PM, blackcat777 said:

I currently have a damascus jamadhar, wakizashi, and sage's cane. The drop rate for the Last Crusader weapons seems fun and fair - on three runs of Iron Maiden, I won one each time. It's not too easy (the loot down there can quickly break the game), but it's not stupid like how I used to have to spend three hours for a single drop. It gives me more time to play with crafting things I never thought imaginable.

This is something I'm definitely interest in -- I wouldn't want the loot in IMB2/B3 to be too much, too easy. Have you encountered the Blood Lizards in IMB3? I might have to nerf their equipment.

On 24/07/2018 at 10:18 PM, blackcat777 said:

Crossbows are definitely sadly grossly underpowered and I don't use them. A third gem slot wouldn't hurt, especially when you consider other weapons can be built with spiral hilt and spiral pole.

Noted. I'll add it on the next update.

On 24/07/2018 at 10:18 PM, blackcat777 said:

I don't know if vanilla Iron Maiden had high level leather drops, but I LOVE getting those occasionally. I'm working toward a set of hoplite leather armor -

Those are mine. I added them to make leather equipment more viable. IMO the Liches were the ideal choice for them. I'm also partial to hoplite leather, like you. If you're going that route, IIRC you can simply farm (L)Armets and (L)Brigandines and combine those to get the rest.

On 24/07/2018 at 10:18 PM, blackcat777 said:

Have you given thought to the balance of wood and leather drops? Enemy drops early game seem a little less frequent than midgame/late game. Leather bone helms are the only things I have to actively farm (and probably long boots, I'm just not that far in my farming quest yet).

I'll have to check those. I think you're probably right, their % is lower.

On 24/07/2018 at 10:18 PM, blackcat777 said:

Wood shields are pretty scant, too. I have a wooden kite shield, and that's it. I'm trying to level up my wood shields before combining them with the few damascus shields the game drops.

Yep, that's something I'm currently addressing for the next version. High level wood shields are kind of rare/exotic IMO, so I'm trying to place them in a tasteful way.

On 24/07/2018 at 10:18 PM, blackcat777 said:

Also: the escapeway. LMAO. I thought the timed portion of Mines B2 was the Escapeway for some reason, and I missed it on my first playthrough (umm, wow, I was rusty). The actual Escapeway I had no issues with. With the Escapeway taken out, is it possible to get 100% map completion? I was stuck at 97% for my second playthrough - but again - I suck at maps and missed an entire dungeon my first time around, so.

The % completion remains a mystery to even myself... I'm surprised you were able to reach 97%. That's probably because I repurposed so much of the Escapeway data for other areas. By that logic, if I can repurpose all of it then 100% map completion should be attainable.

On 24/07/2018 at 10:18 PM, blackcat777 said:

I have mixed feelings about the map of Iron Maiden B2 becoming visible!

As do I. I included it to encourage exploration in that area. But I suppose it does subtract a bit from the lore. Depending on the feedback I get, I might revert it to normal.

On 24/07/2018 at 10:18 PM, blackcat777 said:

There was only one other bug I noticed: when Ashley is chaining, casting, or using an item, and if he's fighting Dullahan/Last Crusader type of enemy, you'll hear the "chunk chunk chunk" sound effect of the enemy running during those animations. I think it only happens for the enemies that can warp off the screen, I noticed it first in Temple of Kiltia and later in Iron Maiden.

Ah, you noticed. It's a side-effect of giving teleportation to enemies who aren't supposed to have it. In this case, the Last Crusader. Admittely, I did it for the cool factor; but once the novelty wears off, you're still left with this annoying "chunk chunk chunk" (nice onomatopeia, btw). So, if by the time the next update is ready I don't have a solution to this, I'll restore their movement parameters to normal, as in no more teleporting.

On 24/07/2018 at 10:18 PM, blackcat777 said:

I know it's not finished yet, but the patch is already 11/10, would play again, in fact, I'm still replaying. I also have some ultimate pieces of silver armor accumulated just because, and I imagine they would look quite stylish.

Glad to hear. I had my doubts if anyone would actually uncover the post-game content and all the little touches I've added; it's no fun for me if it goes by unnoticed. But you've put those thoughts to rest, so thanks again for playing.

On 24/07/2018 at 10:18 PM, blackcat777 said:

Another random though: the first time I played, I wasn't sure if I had the mod until I went into the room in the beginning expecting a chest, and found the mimic. When the box moved, I screamed. Excellent touch.

Hah, gotcha.

1 hour ago, Cross said:

I downloaded the mod, just a lil' nitpick, there's no version number on the file; so I can't be visually sure on what version this is.

The one in the OP is the latest version; I'll add a version number to it to avoid confusion.

Edit: done. The current version is VS_0.9.ppf. Link updated in the OP.

Oops, double post.

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Some post-game spawns replace old ones, yes. The IMB2 post game encounters (the locked room battles) should spawn after defeating Asura, but I don't remember having three enemies in a single room, unless you mean three Shriekers. If you mean anything other than those, I have to fix it.

BTW, did you ever happen to find regular enemies appearing alongside any of the bosses in IMB2? The bosses should be by themselves (ofc), but I've had this bug in the past and I'm wondering if it's still there.

When you first enter IMB2 and go straight for about ten screens, in each big locked room in which there was previously a boss, now spawns a big enemy plus two liches, after clearing Iron Maiden for the first time. One of the locked boss rooms now spawns a single last crusader (NICE touch) and no liches. If you want me to take notes on which rooms specifically, I'll be heading through the dungeon again today/tomorrow/Monday sometime, so I can do that. All the rooms with three enemies spawn two extra liches. Did you intend for the two liches to replace the single enemy?

In the room outside Godhands, two liches in white and a Last Crusader spawn together.

But seeing three high-level enemies together in a room gave me the same thrills of unlocking legendary dark knight mode in DMC4, so it's not a complaint.
 

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Rebalancing Asura was pretty simple, actually. Once I gave her Marlene's Ring (in the original only her Time Trial version had it equipped), her stats were at the level I wanted. After that I just tweaked her spells, special attacks, turn speed, etc. Good to know she's still beatable. I was afraid her healing move would complicate things too much.

 

I thought it was brilliant. It wasn't a bloody fight to the death where one false timing would kill me - I had to look at ALL my equipment, check everything, and see what buffs I needed and what strategy I could cobble together. It was a thinking battle, which essentially tested my knowledge of how to use the gear I had. 10/10

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If you can check it for me -- is it a (D)Plate Mail or (D)Brigandine outside of Godhands? If it's a Brigandine and you were still able to forge a (D)Dread Armor with relative ease, then I'll need to reduce this drop or change it to something else.

 

Ok... This is weird. I just went to see what they drop. I am pre-iron maiden, and one drops a (D) Brigadine and the other drops (L) Wizard Robe.

However, I know 100% post-iron maiden one of them dropped a (S) Plate Mail and I swear to god the other dropped a (D) Plate Mail. Farming in that spot was how I made (S) Jazeraint Armor, because lower level silver armor is a little easier to come by... and that spot was yielding SOMETHING gratuituously damascus because I had to specifically farm two pieces in that spot to put the rest of my inventory to use to make (D) Dread armor.

I was shocked to see the leather drop just now because I know I was farming twin pieces of silver and damascus body armor on my last file. The only difference is that the Last Crusader isn't here yet, so I'll check this out as soon as I clear Iron Maiden again. I don't know if the Last Crusader appearing bugged them out?

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This is something I'm definitely interest in -- I wouldn't want the loot in IMB2/B3 to be too much, too easy. Have you encountered the Blood Lizards in IMB3? I might have to nerf their equipment.

 

They only spawn at < 150 HP (I double checked this), but their own HP levels are laughably low. Another thing to possibly consider would be raising their stats/HP and making it extremely dangerous to win some loot? After clearing IMB2, right before the exit... it would raise the stakes a lot. I would probably be greedy and die a few times.

I won three (D) Pole Axes from them and want a (D) Brandestoc. BUT. Here's the snag, it's not as broken as it seems - by that point in the game, I had almost 90 dragon affinity on a (H) Brandestoc. I had gotten two (D) Voulges from boxes - not even from an organic drop - until that point. If there are no training dummies, and I want a (D) Brandestoc with my affinities, the only choice is to downgrade my (H) Brandestoc, and take the insanely long route of converting that into a (D) Pole Axe. (D) Brandestoc is another one of the game's worst challenges. Other (D) Polearms, and other necessary components, like (D) Katana and (D) Langdebeve are so incredibly complicated to craft, that I'm still on my third playthrough and nowhere near actualizing a (D) Brandestoc WITH the affinities I've built up through my playthroughs.

I mean, the alternative is to just scrap my old polearm and make a new one with drops from the blood lizards, losing all my affinities, BUT, who plays a Vagrant Story mod and makes Hoplite Leather just to cheap out on the Brandestoc? The lack of training dummy forces me to cheap out or go hard, so there's lots of existing built-in challenge, even with some help from the Blood Lizards. The increased drop rate is also an incentive to try and figure out how to take the long way, like the game rewards you for experimenting instead of punishing you. But it's still pretty punishing!

I may have to do a 4th playthrough focused on just the (D) dread shield and (D) brandestoc.

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Those are mine. I added them to make leather equipment more viable. IMO the Liches were the ideal choice for them. I'm also partial to hoplite leather, like you. If you're going that route, IIRC you can simply farm (L)Armets and (L)Brigandines and combine those to get the rest.

What I also like about these leather drops is the frequency of them - I end up with *just* enough in my inventory where I am like, "Do I take this next big step toward hoplite leather, or do I combine this with silver for some damascus armor?" The balance is awesome and they remain in high value.

Quote

Ah, you noticed. It's a side-effect of giving teleportation to enemies who aren't supposed to have it. In this case, the Last Crusader. Admittely, I did it for the cool factor; but once the novelty wears off, you're still left with this annoying "chunk chunk chunk" (nice onomatopeia, btw). So, if by the time the next update is ready I don't have a solution to this, I'll restore their movement parameters to normal, as in no more teleporting.

 

There were a few battles where I was pleasantly challenged because of the teleportation (especially in Temple of Kiltia), so I'd personally choose having the challenge with a bug than no challenge.

I'll get back to you with instances of triple-enemy weirdness and see if those drops are different.

8 hours ago, blackcat777 said:

When you first enter IMB2 and go straight for about ten screens, in each big locked room in which there was previously a boss, now spawns a big enemy plus two liches, after clearing Iron Maiden for the first time. One of the locked boss rooms now spawns a single last crusader (NICE touch) and no liches. If you want me to take notes on which rooms specifically, I'll be heading through the dungeon again today/tomorrow/Monday sometime, so I can do that. All the rooms with three enemies spawn two extra liches. Did you intend for the two liches to replace the single enemy?

Just a quick reply to this, as I'm very keen on getting those locked rooms working correctly. From what you're telling me, I don't think they are. Here's a run-down of what you should find in each of those rooms, after you clear IMB2/B3 for the 1st time:

Ordeal by Fire: https://imgur.com/0CLE5JH

Pressing: https://imgur.com/xQs0ED8

The Saw: https://imgur.com/3TPYkan

The Shin-Vice: https://imgur.com/J7rDtJk

If you're getting different mobs, then something's up. So yeah, if you can take notes of what you find in each of those 4 rooms, I'd appreciate it. And also any other triple encounters you find in IMB2. The one outside of Godhands is intentional, so no worries there.

Edit: found the problem. The bosses are respawning every time you enter those rooms. What a mess. I'll put up a fix asap.

Edit2: that should do it. Link updated in the OP. Current build is v0.91. Apply the patch to a clean rom.

@blackcat777To clarify, after applying the patch you'll probably have to fight those big enemies one more time, in their respective locked rooms. That'll set the flag that makes them stop respawning. You'll notice that they drop sigils, now. Those are for opening the Time Trials in the Keep. Don't use them, as the TTs are currently out of service. You'd probably get stuck in an empty room, or some other weird situation.

One another thing I forgot to mention about spawns is that the dragon boss in the very last room of IMB1 continuously respawns, and always drops an Elixir of Sages (so Ashley is well-educated these days).

I cleared all of Iron Maiden for the first time on this playthrough and trekked back to Godhands.

I did not take screenshots, but pre-Iron Maiden, outside Godhands, Death closest to the door dropped the (D) Brigadine and the one further back dropped the (L) Wizard Robe.

Post-Iron Maiden (*Last Crusader did not spawn with them this time... weird?), the Death closest to the door dropped a (S) Plate Mail, and the one further back dropped a (D) Brigadine.

I'm going to clear it again and see if anything changes. Let me know if there are any other drops you would like me to check.

After leaving my fight with the two liches, I warped to Crumbling Market and this guy popped up. He dropped a Muramasa like the one who should have spawned outside Godhands. Not sure if he was supposed to be here, but thought I'd post a sighting. Like bigfoot, but with better loot.

On 28/07/2018 at 5:42 PM, blackcat777 said:

They only spawn at < 150 HP (I double checked this), but their own HP levels are laughably low. Another thing to possibly consider would be raising their stats/HP and making it extremely dangerous to win some loot? After clearing IMB2, right before the exit... it would raise the stakes a lot. I would probably be greedy and die a few times.

Sounds like I didn't rebalance their stats. There's still work to be done in IMB2/B3, and other NG+ dungeons like Forgotten Pathway, etc.

On 28/07/2018 at 5:42 PM, blackcat777 said:

I won three (D) Pole Axes from them and want a (D) Brandestoc. BUT. Here's the snag, it's not as broken as it seems - by that point in the game, I had almost 90 dragon affinity on a (H) Brandestoc. I had gotten two (D) Voulges from boxes - not even from an organic drop - until that point. If there are no training dummies, and I want a (D) Brandestoc with my affinities, the only choice is to downgrade my (H) Brandestoc, and take the insanely long route of converting that into a (D) Pole Axe. (D) Brandestoc is another one of the game's worst challenges. Other (D) Polearms, and other necessary components, like (D) Katana and (D) Langdebeve are so incredibly complicated to craft, that I'm still on my third playthrough and nowhere near actualizing a (D) Brandestoc WITH the affinities I've built up through my playthroughs.

I mean, the alternative is to just scrap my old polearm and make a new one with drops from the blood lizards, losing all my affinities, BUT, who plays a Vagrant Story mod and makes Hoplite Leather just to cheap out on the Brandestoc? The lack of training dummy forces me to cheap out or go hard, so there's lots of existing built-in challenge, even with some help from the Blood Lizards. The increased drop rate is also an incentive to try and figure out how to take the long way, like the game rewards you for experimenting instead of punishing you. But it's still pretty punishing!

I was thinking of restoring one dummy in particular, the affinities one. I'd place it inside of Godhands, but I'm still undecided if I should do it. Like you said, their absence adds another level of challenge. TBH I don't know how I feel about "ultimate weapons" anymore, and whether I should facilitate their creation or not. Right now, if you want any increase to your weapons' classes or affinities you must get it from actual enemies out in the field. I like that notion.

On 28/07/2018 at 5:42 PM, blackcat777 said:

What I also like about these leather drops is the frequency of them - I end up with *just* enough in my inventory where I am like, "Do I take this next big step toward hoplite leather, or do I combine this with silver for some damascus armor?" The balance is awesome and they remain in high value.

Good to hear. I'm starting to think there is a % drop chance that is ideal, or at least a range that tends to work best.

On 28/07/2018 at 5:42 PM, blackcat777 said:

There were a few battles where I was pleasantly challenged because of the teleportation (especially in Temple of Kiltia), so I'd personally choose having the challenge with a bug than no challenge.

Noted. I guess I should weight the pros and cons in each situation. The whole Last Crusader teleporting was made for that Temple of Kiltia boss fight; later I applied it to other Crusaders. So it makes sense that you liked that one in particular.

3 hours ago, blackcat777 said:

One another thing I forgot to mention about spawns is that the dragon boss in the very last room of IMB1 continuously respawns, and always drops an Elixir of Sages (so Ashley is well-educated these days).

I noticed. >_> The latest patch (v.091) should fix that.

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I cleared all of Iron Maiden for the first time on this playthrough and trekked back to Godhands.

I did not take screenshots, but pre-Iron Maiden, outside Godhands, Death closest to the door dropped the (D) Brigadine and the one further back dropped the (L) Wizard Robe.

Yep, that's it.

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Post-Iron Maiden (*Last Crusader did not spawn with them this time... weird?), the Death closest to the door dropped a (S) Plate Mail, and the one further back dropped a (D) Brigadine.

That Last Crusader (and a couple of others) appears at different locations depending on where you are in the game. IOW, before you reach a certain place (or point in the story), it appears at site A. After that, it moves to site B. I like playing around with such things, and that's something I intend to expand on for the next version of the mod. Like having enemies move around the dungeon, or even migrate across different regions. IMO it would add another level of authenticity to the world, make it more interesting and less static.

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I'm going to clear it again and see if anything changes. Let me know if there are any other drops you would like me to check.

Thanks!

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After leaving my fight with the two liches, I warped to Crumbling Market and this guy popped up. He dropped a Muramasa like the one who should have spawned outside Godhands. Not sure if he was supposed to be here, but thought I'd post a sighting. Like bigfoot, but with better loot.

Aye, it's all part of the plan.  There is one LC sighting that is more obscure, I wonder if you'll find it.

Thanks for indulging my nitpick.  I'll try out the mod once I get the chance.

Everything was fine till I saw a new mod I swear.

I'm the same sometimes, so you're definitely not alone there. So many mods, so little time.

Can you give me some tips on the second boss battle? Its like the gargoyle asses in DS1 all over again. only this little shit hits all body parts and kills me in one hit.

EDIT: Oh god, finally beat him, just had to rush my dps a bit.

UPDATE:

Okay I'm at the Golem boss right now, I'm wondering how I'm gonna dish out some damage to this son of a bitch, I just died from him and was dealing 13 damage on his body and 1 on all other body parts...is there a trick here?

6 hours ago, Cross said:

Okay I'm at the Golem boss right now, I'm wondering how I'm gonna dish out some damage to this son of a bitch, I just died from him and was dealing 13 damage on his body and 1 on all other body parts...is there a trick here?

Make sure you Degenerate him, that will help taking him down. Try using a Blunt weapon, he's weak against that.

You'll soon get a spell (Analyze) that lets you view the enemy's stats and plan your strategy accordingly. I'm considering making that spell available earlier, to avoid these situations.

The thing about Degenerate is...I don't seem to feel or see that it works, I tried degen-ing the lizardmen but I still get hit pretty hard, up to a 100. Dunno if my armor is the culprit but I seem to have lower defense even when I degenerate an enemy.

1 hour ago, Cross said:

The thing about Degenerate is...I don't seem to feel or see that it works, I tried degen-ing the lizardmen but I still get hit pretty hard, up to a 100. Dunno if my armor is the culprit but I seem to have lower defense even when I degenerate an enemy.

The enemies' base damage was increased for the mod, and IIRC those Lizardmen carry 2-handed weapons which are quite powerful. So even if you apply a partial decrease to their STR, their damage multiplier and their arsenal are against you. So don't count on Degenerate for taking less damage, but for dealing more damage to the opponent's weakened defense.

Ofc, depending on the feedback I get, I might reduce the damage multiplier for enemies.

2 hours ago, the_E_y_Es_o_0 said:

The enemies' base damage was increased for the mod, and IIRC those Lizardmen carry 2-handed weapons which are quite powerful. So even if you apply a partial decrease to their STR, their damage multiplier and their arsenal are against you. So don't count on Degenerate for taking less damage, but for dealing more damage to the opponent's weakened defense.

Oh I see, I thought it only affected the attack strength of enemies. I don't actually know the game inside-out, sorry. Also is agility tied to accuracy? I dunno what to do with my shit accuracy with the body of the golem using my Pink-something (forgot the name of the club), is it just because the body is far above me that I have low accuracy on it -- or is there anything I can do to increase it? Your mod feels Dark Souls-ish, take this as a compliment.

2 hours ago, Cross said:

Oh I see, I thought it only affected the attack strength of enemies. I don't actually know the game inside-out, sorry.

No problem. Out of curiosity, are you new to the game or revisiting?

2 hours ago, Cross said:

Also is agility tied to accuracy? I dunno what to do with my shit accuracy with the body of the golem using my Pink-something (forgot the name of the club), is it just because the body is far above me that I have low accuracy on it -- or is there anything I can do to increase it?

Yes. Agility and Risk determine your % chance to hit something. High AGL and low Risk will increase the %, low AGL and high Risk will diminish it. This applies to the enemy's hit % as well.

Since you can't boost your AGL through magic yet, just keep your Risk low using Vera Roots, and attach the Braveheart gem to your weapon's grip, if possible. It raises your hit % by 20%. Very useful.

The distance between Ashley and his target doesn't affect his chance to hit it. Either something is inside your weapon's range or isn't. So you don't have to worry about that.

2 hours ago, Cross said:

Your mod feels Dark Souls-ish, take this as a compliment.

You're the second person to say that. Thanks.

30 minutes ago, the_E_y_Es_o_0 said:

No problem. Out of curiosity, are you new to the game or revisiting?

I'm a returning player, but I got lost in the forest maze...didn't read a guide and just, well...left it.

30 minutes ago, the_E_y_Es_o_0 said:

Yes. Agility and Risk determine your % chance to hit something. High AGL and low Risk will increase the %, low AGL and high Risk will diminish it. This applies to the enemy's hit % as well.

Since you can't boost your AGL through magic yet, just keep your Risk low using Vera Roots, and attach the Braveheart gem to your weapon's grip, if possible. It raises your hit % by 20%. Very useful.

The distance between Ashley and his target doesn't affect his chance to hit it. Either something is inside your weapon's range or isn't. So you don't have to worry about that.

I knew about Risk, but had to be sure about Agility. I planned to go with heavy equipment...but I guess boss fights are centered more on rushing DPS than ever. Right, distance isn't an issue...I got Braveheart on my shield tho, but, I'll try to change my grips. I never knew that the grips where the ones with slots.

For the early first playthrough, I ran with a Raging Ache setup. The unsurvivable boss hits forced me to get *really* good at timing those defense skills that recover a fraction of HP; that small fraction of HP recovered guaranteed Ashley will hit hard with Raging Ache. It's even easier to rack up damage if you chain well. The low HP & high risk means certain death if your timing is off... but... those are the moments I'm feeling alive and/or like a riskbreaker. Or like OMG THIS MOD PUT ME ON THE EDGE OF MY SEAT!

Once more gear becomes available, Ashley's options for strategies multiply, which I thought unfolded smoothly into the game progression. The entire mod isn't a matter of life-or-death timing... and certain bosses with frequent parries and healing abilities require other strategies. I'm a huge fan of how the mod requires you to try different strategies.

@Cross - Do you have certain weapons dedicated to certain affinities? I find that extremely helpful, too. I still always swear my head off and use a map when I'm in the Snowfly Forest.

@blackcat777 for the moment I have some of the starting weapons, but I haven't used them to gain some stats for the weapons themselves. I haven't played again, yet. I'm juggling between; making a game, playing SRW A, and playing this hack.

EDIT: Thank god I got that giant hammer in the locked room. How much HP does this second fucking dragon have? He hits harder than any of the other bosses so far...and damn that tail attack, one shot and I'm dead, if I don't avoid it (which is 90% of the time).

On 05/08/2018 at 9:08 AM, Cross said:

EDIT: Thank god I got that giant hammer in the locked room. How much HP does this second fucking dragon have? He hits harder than any of the other bosses so far...and damn that tail attack, one shot and I'm dead, if I don't avoid it (which is 90% of the time).

Sorry I didn't see this before. The Sanctum Dragon has 850 HP. It might be a bit excessive, TBH. The one-shot thing is intentional, however. Kind of a skill check.

I've made an optional patch that gives Ashley the Tier 3 Warlock spells (Tornado, Acid Flow, Gravity, etc). Here's how it works:

Explosion Lv4 becomes Tornado
Thunderburst Lv4 becomes Thunderbolt
Flame Sphere Lv4 becomes Fire Storm
Gaea Strike Lv4 becomes Gravity
Avalanche Lv4 becomes Acid Flow
Radial Surge Lv4 becomes Judgment
Meteor Lv4 becomes Apocalypse

link: https://mega.nz/#!gIUQ1YpB!27WFQsehyMbkwtAlwtvGG0u1K64gf8sxCTsoUgwRI2Q

Ooooh... that is absurdly cool. Thank you.

I'm running into a problem patching the game. When I select the ISO and ppf in ppf-o-matic and click Apply, it says it can't open the specified image file.

I also tried with another rom that had 2 files; .mdf and .mds which worked fine as the vanilla game but when I applied the patch it would crash when starting a new game or loading an existing save.

If you need to know I'm playing with ePSXe, I have the latest version of the mod and ppf-o-matic.

Edit: I've also tried using ePSXe's ppf auto-load to no avail.

3 hours ago, Maedroth said:

I'm running into a problem patching the game. When I select the ISO and ppf in ppf-o-matic and click Apply, it says it can't open the specified image file.

I also tried with another rom that had 2 files; .mdf and .mds which worked fine as the vanilla game but when I applied the patch it would crash when starting a new game or loading an existing save.

If you need to know I'm playing with ePSXe, I have the latest version of the mod and ppf-o-matic.

 

Edit: I've also tried using ePSXe's ppf auto-load to no avail.

The patch is designed for a .bin file, so .mdf is no good. But if you're using Vagrant Story(U).bin, it should work. Does the rom load and play normally without the patch? Is it the US version of the game? If yes to both, then I'm not sure what is the issue. Have you tried opening some other psx ISO with ppf-o-matic, just to see if it recognizes it?

8 hours ago, the_E_y_Es_o_0 said:

The patch is designed for a .bin file

Ah, I was using a .ISO.

I've now acquired a .bin and it works.

Thank you for your help.

57 minutes ago, Maedroth said:

Ah, I was using a .ISO.

I've now acquired a .bin and it works.

Thank you for your help.

No problem. Hope you enjoy the mod.

This mod looks amazing! I'm looking to try this out as soon as I get some time and give feedback. 

One question: My biggest gripe with this game was that there's no shortcut to change weapons or skip straight to that menu at the very least. Any chance something like that would be feasible in this mod? 

On 13/11/2018 at 4:25 PM, Jazz-Man said:

This mod looks amazing! I'm looking to try this out as soon as I get some time and give feedback. 

One question: My biggest gripe with this game was that there's no shortcut to change weapons or skip straight to that menu at the very least. Any chance something like that would be feasible in this mod? 

That's the biggest dream of any VS fanboy, myself included. I don't know if it's possible, since I lack coding/programming knowledge. I imagine it would be a fairly involved task to implement it. The straight-to-menu thing does sound more feasible, but again I'd have to enlist the help of someone with the necessary skills. I still dream of learning code just to try and make it happen one day.

Loving the mod. So much so that I've completed my first play-through with it and am on my way through a second.

I'm particularly liking the quicken spell, it's let me clear a few gaps that shouldn't be crossed, at least not at the time I'm crossing.
So far, it has allowed me to cross the gap that forms in the room with the first ghost, the gap in the room with the cloudstone before fighting the dragon and the river in the town straight after fighting Duane.

The second gap I mentioned, after going through and beating the dragon, I went back to where you fight the Golem as I hadn't done that and he wasn't there. I'm just wondering if this will break anything. It seems fine so far though.

4 hours ago, Maedroth said:

Loving the mod. So much so that I've completed my first play-through with it and am on my way through a second.

I'm particularly liking the quicken spell, it's let me clear a few gaps that shouldn't be crossed, at least not at the time I'm crossing.
So far, it has allowed me to cross the gap that forms in the room with the first ghost, the gap in the room with the cloudstone before fighting the dragon and the river in the town straight after fighting Duane.

The second gap I mentioned, after going through and beating the dragon, I went back to where you fight the Golem as I hadn't done that and he wasn't there. I'm just wondering if this will break anything. It seems fine so far though.

Sequence breaking in VS?! Well damn... those are some unforeseen applications of the Quicken spell. I did wonder if the Town Center river could be cleared, I guess it can. Does that mean you skipped Abandoned Mines B1 entirely? As for the Sanctum river, I never thought of crossing it before the Golem fight. Did you land on the inactive cloudstone on the other side? In any case, what surprises me the most is that you jumped the abyss in The Lamenting Mother, Catacombs. It just seems impossible to me. Now I have to try it myself...

To be honest, I'm not sure what the ramifications are for bypassing segments of the game. My first thought is you might miss some flags that spawn enemies and perhaps even bosses. For one thing, I'm pretty sure the Ogre boss fight in AMB1 triggers some Crimson Blades in Town Center West. So if you think the area is a little empty, it's probably that. With that said, I'm curious as to how a non-linear, sequence break'd playthrough would hold up. I take it you're still progressing, and haven't got stuck? Do keep me posted, as I haven't got any feedback on this aspect.

Glad you're enjoying it, too. Makes it all worth it.

After jumping the river in TCW, I proceeded as normal to the scene with Guildenenstern and Sydney, then went back to AMB1 for the sake of map completion and ran into problems.

Upon entering The Battle's Beginning, the doors locked as normal and the cutscene played as if to show the Wyvern but the Wyvern didn't appear so I couldn't leave. I reloaded and went into AMB1 from where you come out after the Ogre. When entering Traitor's Parting from behind, the same thing happened with no Ogre appearing and Ashley was rooted to the spot and couldn't do anything except reset.

The soldiers in TCW appeared as normal and the cloudstone across the river activated though.

For the sake of finding out more on how far you can go with sequence breaking, I will continue and keep you posted.

I see. Looks like you missed out on those bosses, then. IIRC you can go around the Wyvern room, but without the Hyacinth Sigil you can't fully explore the area.

Thanks for the update, I wonder how far you'll be able to go.

Hi!, I'm stopping by to say that I love your mod so far! I'm at the Snowfly forest and I'm having a ball!!

13 hours ago, topopox said:

Hi!, I'm stopping by to say that I love your mod so far! I'm at the Snowfly forest and I'm having a ball!!

Glad to hear it. Seems you've registered just to tell me that? I'm flattered, haha.

On 13/12/2018 at 1:42 PM, the_E_y_Es_o_0 said:

Glad to hear it. Seems you've registered just to tell me that? I'm flattered, haha.

Hey no prob man!

I'm actually interested in donating for support! I really like this project!

Merry Christmas!

Quick question:

What's the purpose of removing the Escapeway area? I haven't played this game in years, so I don't remember anything about it. Was it problematic for some reason? Isn't it just a shortcut locked behind a Rood Inverse door? Thanks.

16 hours ago, topopox said:

Hey no prob man!

I'm actually interested in donating for support! I really like this project!

Merry Christmas!

A Merry Christmas to you as well. I intend to put up links for those interested in donating, along with an official site for the mod. Nothing fancy, just a basic wordpress blog for my updates and stuff. It should be up in the next month. In the meantime, just have fun and report any problems you have with the mod.

2 hours ago, Hyphen-B said:

Quick question:

What's the purpose of removing the Escapeway area? I haven't played this game in years, so I don't remember anything about it. Was it problematic for some reason? Isn't it just a shortcut locked behind a Rood Inverse door? Thanks.

Nothing really wrong with it. It's just that I decided the data space which the Escapeway occupied was better used in favor of other areas (mostly Temple of Kiltia). That way I could expand ToK's enemy roster and add more encounters to its rooms. I had all these cool ideas, but not the bytes to accomodate them. So I thought, Escapeway is a pretty lousy area. No bosses, and all its enemies are recycled copies from other places. A more subjective point, its location is a bit annoying; merely an obstacle to get the Gold Key. Finally, after removing it I thought the new progression felt more natural than the original, so that kind of cemented my decision. To the point that even if I didn't need the extra space, I'd still remove the Escapeway because it's just better without it.

Relevant vid: 

Ah okay, that makes sense. I'm excited to play this mod. I always like to try out things that are made by people with a thorough understanding of the game they're working with, which you definitely have. To that end, I actually have another question. What do you guys use to run VS?

I've tried the Mednafen libretro cores - Beetle PSX and Beetle PSX HW - but they always hang when I get to the quake in the Chamber of Fear. My guess is that it has something to do with the level geometry changing, but I'm a total layman so I really have no idea. ePSXe seems to handle that event just fine, but I'd really prefer to not use ePSXe if I don't have to.

11 hours ago, Hyphen-B said:

Ah okay, that makes sense. I'm excited to play this mod. I always like to try out things that are made by people with a thorough understanding of the game they're working with, which you definitely have. To that end, I actually have another question. What do you guys use to run VS?

I've tried the Mednafen libretro cores - Beetle PSX and Beetle PSX HW - but they always hang when I get to the quake in the Chamber of Fear. My guess is that it has something to do with the level geometry changing, but I'm a total layman so I really have no idea. ePSXe seems to handle that event just fine, but I'd really prefer to not use ePSXe if I don't have to.

Personally I use epsxe. Ofc, pcsx also works, but it's too barebones for my tastes. I've been told that the mod is not compatible with the PS Vita, so I assume that's not an option.

One user at gamefaqs said Retroarch runs the mod just fine, although I don't know what core he was using. I could try to find out if you're interested.

Yeah that'd be great if you wouldn't mind. He might've been using the PCSX ReARMed core which works fine, but, like you said, is pretty barebones and only outputs a software render at native resolution. I'll keep experimenting and see if I can't get Beetle to work; it's really accurate and has a lot of cool features. If not I can always go back to Ol' Reliable aka ePSXe  Thanks!

Tried a few different things so far. Seems like it's only the Beetle core that doesn't like the scene transition in Chamber of Fear, the one after Ashley says "This is a big one!". Works fine in the base game, but that room + Zenith causes the emulator to hang. No idea what might be causing this, since other emulators don't have a problem with it. Additionally, if I get past that transition on the PCSX core, save, then swap to Beetle, going back to that room after the transition has occurred will still cause a hang. Not a big deal, since I can just switch cores if I ever need to be in that room. Just thought it was interesting.

47 minutes ago, Hyphen-B said:

Tried a few different things so far. Seems like it's only the Beetle core that doesn't like the scene transition in Chamber of Fear, the one after Ashley says "This is a big one!". 

This is where the game crash on ps vita. 

Mod works with retroarch pcsx rearmed on switch. 

4 hours ago, Hyphen-B said:

Seems like it's only the Beetle core that doesn't like the scene transition in Chamber of Fear, the one after Ashley says "This is a big one!". Works fine in the base game, but that room + Zenith causes the emulator to hang.

4 hours ago, Rounard said:

This is where the game crash on ps vita.

This is useful information, thanks to both of you. I'm going to try and recreate the bug on my side, so I can work on it. I have some ideas of what the problem might be.

Anyone else gotten to the Zombie Minotaur yet? He won't die even if I reduce his HP to 0. He just kind of stands around like a dummy and doesn't do anything 

22 minutes ago, Hyphen-B said:

Anyone else gotten to the Zombie Minotaur yet? He won't die even if I reduce his HP to 0. He just kind of stands around like a dummy and doesn't do anything 

Lol, embarassing... I think someone else reported the same problem. I'll look into it. Been kind of busy but I hope to have some free time soon.

No sweat, I'm loving the mod so far.

Patch updated (version 0.92). link: https://mega.nz/#!NJ8XxIAK!XO0QEHtryrItrpdaua_Ye_istuzuR0oI8M24OxP-Xl8

A brief summary of the changes from last version:

- fixed Minotaur Zombie bug

- workaround for Chamber of Fear freeze (needs testing)

- Last Crusaders no longer teleport

- numerous rebalance tweaks in several areas

- Break Arts no longer deal variable damage

- IMB2/B3 map is invisible again, like in the original

I'm unable to test the Chamber of Fear bug atm, if someone could do it for me I'd be grateful.

Made this account just to reply here and tell you how I absolutely LOVE the -idea- behind what you are doing.

Mind you, I would love what you're -doing- if only I could get it to work

I got double sure the .bin I got is US, and I'm using the program you linked, it tells me that all is fine and dandy when I patch the file, but when I get into the game itself, none of the changes seem present, well, except for the fact that the mobs in the "this is a big one" room are glitched and don't aggro on me, in stead, they freeze in place and refuse to die whenever I hit them. Otherwise they just fly/run around like blind little puppies, it's almost cute.

Been trying the 0.92 version, could you perhaps reupload the 0.91 version so I can see if it has the same issue? Would be great, love your work and THANK YOU SO DAMN MUCH for reviving this great little gem!

5 hours ago, KarotConCarne said:

Made this account just to reply here and tell you how I absolutely LOVE the -idea- behind what you are doing.

Mind you, I would love what you're -doing- if only I could get it to work

I got double sure the .bin I got is US, and I'm using the program you linked, it tells me that all is fine and dandy when I patch the file, but when I get into the game itself, none of the changes seem present, well, except for the fact that the mobs in the "this is a big one" room are glitched and don't aggro on me, in stead, they freeze in place and refuse to die whenever I hit them. Otherwise they just fly/run around like blind little puppies, it's almost cute.

 

Been trying the 0.92 version, could you perhaps reupload the 0.91 version so I can see if it has the same issue? Would be great, love your work and THANK YOU SO DAMN MUCH for reviving this great little gem!

I had a feeling something was off with that file. The previous patch was about 7 MB, while 0.92 was only 230KB or so.

I remade the 0.92 patch and now it has the appropriate size (7 MB). Do try it before falling back to 0.91. Here's both patches, just in case:

VS_0.92: https://mega.nz/#!FBUVRCAZ!Eu11axAb2113G5ZENdLcATw0MYtXTqcF5IBN7GaBMBo

VS_0.91: https://mega.nz/#!EZ9lUaRY!8Rn2e3ql4poajKZR4dgQIJDmNL83p81ozl1MU5kR9Uc

I really wonder why that room is so problematic. For now I think I'll revert my changes to it and leave it exactly as in the original.

You truuly are doing Tzeentch's work, my friend.

Alas, there must be some foul curse cast upon the 9.2 version, since according to the patcher, it is not a valid ppf file.

The 9.1 version works, though, and I'm instantly in love with it. The early mimic definitely caught me off guard, my thoughts at the moment were "wait, that chest was on the other side of the rooOHGODWHATTHEFFFF"... and then the mino killed me in one shot. Glorious, just glorious

Glad you're enjoying it. There will be more to come in the future.

Could you try this one for me? https://mega.nz/#!BJE0CArB!jKmShKc-s7JScHC_xHyGE-Ux2MNFnTuaUIt8X_HXnHM

Aparently third time's really the charm, since it works.

Anything you'd like me to check?

Heyo, 

Started a brand new game with this mod last night (beta ver 0.92) and the Zombie Minotaur boss spawns along with the normal one. He pretty much one shots me. 

I'm using RetroArch with the PSCX-ReARMed r22 core ver 1.7.5 on Windows 10.

I used the file from the mega.z link in the first post. 

Hope this helps. Thanks for your time and hard work. 

Have you used the newest 0.92? Yesterday we had 3 versions flying around one after another

Also, make quadruple sure you're isntalling on a fresh unmodded .bin file.

He's right, there is a problem. I'll fix it right away.

Ok, this should work. It also restores the chest that spawns with the Minotaur Zombie, with the (D)Circle Shield inside.

https://mega.nz/#!YJkTRaia!XmhUktzMSH9G0MpB6uOrDInmq41sFBaHGndat5o5xOs

Just tested the fight and the chest. Both seem to work.  Thank you very much for addressing this super quick. 

You're awesome.

16 minutes ago, mooses8d said:

Just tested the fight and the chest. Both seem to work.  Thank you very much for addressing this super quick. 

 

You're awesome.

Thanks. I have my moments.  

A little progress update, and my plans for the mod in the near future:

Yesterday I finished rebalancing Guildenstern, so all 1st play content is done. For the New Game+ areas, I had already rebalanced the normal enemies, which means there's only the bosses of Forgotten Pathway, Snowfly Forest East and IMB2 left to do. That brings me to the point I want to address: while the Rebalance mod is nearly complete, its sucessor, Zenith, is still at its infancy. So my intention is, when I finish Rebalance, I'll release Zenith instead.

I'll explain. The main fact is the newborn Zenith is already head and shoulders above the latest version of Rebalance. TBH, it makes the latter look a bit ridiculous.

What are the differences between the two? The focus of Zenith is on world building, namely the addition of enemies and encounters to all areas, and transforming them over time. Like the old saying goes, you never step in the same river twice. All this I had mentioned already in the original thread at gamefaqs. What I hadn't mentioned is that the mod also includes a new rebalance of spells, two-handed weapons and Break Arts, the removal of the enemies' "thought bubble", and a number of miscellaneous changes I can't possibly list here. It also does away with the noobishness that's still found in Rebalance. Like having Last Crusaders all over the place, or bosses with super-immunities -- typical bad design by someone who was besottted with what he could do, not minding if he should.

In short, one of the reasons for moving onto Zenith is the improvement in design quality. But most importantly for me, it's also much more organized internally (in terms of data), which makes a world of difference when modifying it. Valendian's teachings really paid off in this aspect; now I have a much better platform to work with. It's probably the main reason I want to perform this upgrade.

Finally, there is the question of timeframe. You might be wondering, why not finish the new mod before releasing it? The truth is, considering the workload required to give one area the "Zenith treatment", it will take approximately 2 years minimum to get even close to completion. That's assuming I can work on it every day. To be fair I'm surprised myself with how high my standards got, and how far I can run with this idea.

As for the present state of Zenith, I'll discuss it when it's time to release it. Which means Soon™.

I am so pumped. This is the most magical news ever.

I'm happy to playtest whenever you need someone to playtest something.

Thank you for being awesome.

17 hours ago, blackcat777 said:

I'm happy to playtest whenever you need someone to playtest something.

Good to hear. There will be a workbuild prior to release, I'll send it your way when the time comes.

Thanks to all you guys for the testing and continued support.

Not sure if this is due to the mod, but I currently cannot combine two Mjolnirs to form a Griever, oddly enough. 

6 hours ago, Jazz-Man said:

Not sure if this is due to the mod, but I currently cannot combine two Mjolnirs to form a Griever, oddly enough. 

Yes, that's intentional. I changed a few of the combinations, sometimes to enable upgrades, sometimes to disable them. In this case, you'll have to acquire a Griever from an enemy in the field. Barring that, you can also use lateral combinations with other weapon categories to somehow produce a Griever. I did the same thing with the Double Blade; you can no longer forge it with the Balbriggan + Sabre Halberd combination. The reason for these changes was the new power level of those weapons -- considering how early (and easily) you could make them, they obsoleted other weapons before they really should, and threw a wrench in the balance of things.

OTOH, I enabled some early upgrades that weren't possible in the original. Examples:

Wizard Staff + Clergy Rod = Summoner Baton (previously Wizard Staff)

Spear + Glaive = Scorpion (previously Spear)

Etc. The next update will include similar changes, such as Guisarme + Large Crescent = Sabre Halberd (previously Guisarme). Even so, I don't intend to rework too much of the combinations; just make things more fun and balanced overall.

From the discussion thread at GameFaqs:

"So I've decided not to release the next build just yet. It will be a long while until it becomes a coherent whole, and I don't want to hand over some patchwork mess to you guys. Moreover, there are some glaring issues with balance and difficulty that I need to address -- boss fights, especially. Damage multipliers, stats, everything really. Even drop rates; because I increased them, they interrupt the gameplay too much. The mod needs a top to bottom revision.

My suggestion is to forget about this project for the time being. I will leave its current version (0.92) available on ngplus.net, although it's very dated and not representative of future releases. This topic can stay open (if anyone cares to bump it), but I don't really plan to provide updates on what I'm doing. So there will be some radio silence from me in the coming months.

I realize I'm going back on my word, but it's all for the best. The longer the wait, the better the final product will be. In the meanwhile, go check the awesome NES mods at romhacking.net. Like Rogue Dawn and Dragoon X Omega II. Great stuff.

I'll catch you guys later, then."

So this is goodbye for now. Thanks to all who supported the project. I will return with Zenith when it's done, and hopefully it will be worthy of its name. See you all later.

As in Dark Souls: one mistake on minotaur - and you SUCK. Go to save point, loser!

Amazing...

Yeah, the Minotaur is too powerful in the current version. Bosses in general. The next update will fix that problem.

Also, the changes made to blade combinations will be unmade. Like this one:

On 12/03/2019 at 5:55 AM, Jazz-Man said:

Not sure if this is due to the mod, but I currently cannot combine two Mjolnirs to form a Griever, oddly enough. 

Might as well post the last video update:

Release date: probably early next year.

New site: https://vszenith.wordpress.com/

Thanks for the update. So exciting!

Hi, news about this mod? I really want to play again Vagrant Story, but at the same difficult isn't exciting anymore and I love this game 

Im so sad im playing the vanilla in my phone i cant have ppf omatic to prove that mod

Oops! That page can’t be found.

In downloads

How can I try this? 

I know this game and mechanics like the back of my hand it is so easy I want a challenge.

3 hours ago, hitakoh@gmail.com said:

How can I try this? 

I know this game and mechanics like the back of my hand it is so easy I want a challenge.

I have found it thx for the mod.

The minotaur js a good challenge, the first dragon too, other bosses were quite easy. I am at the end of the first mine, just got back to town after the troll boss. I have 2 videos. I'll post them on YouTube tomorrow and you could see for yourself if it can help you. I will come back here to give the links. My gameplay could help you balance things out.

21 hours ago, hitakoh@gmail.com said:

I have found it thx for the mod.

The minotaur js a good challenge, the first dragon too, other bosses were quite easy. I am at the end of the first mine, just got back to town after the troll boss. I have 2 videos. I'll post them on YouTube tomorrow and you could see for yourself if it can help you. I will come back here to give the links. My gameplay could help you balance things out.

As promised. My videos of yesterday. I messed up part 1 resolution but you can still use it for balancing purpose.

Part 1

part 2

The crab gave me a headache, I am tired tonight and my timing were offs. That thing hit me for 100% of the hp looks like it is an effect no matter what is my defense. I equipped a staff and fought the thing from out of range with fire and it was quite easy after all. Still died two times to that thing. It is on my video part 3. It ll be available tomorrow evening. Other bosses  were ok. I am now at the second workshop.

@hitakoh@gmail.com To be clear, the version you're playing is the old Rebalance Mod, not Zenith. Zenith can't be found online yet.

As you've noticed, some of the boss fights are all but broken. That's one of the reasons I removed the download link.

Rebalance was merely my first attempt at hacking the game and I don't recommend playing it. When Zenith is ready later this year I'll make it available in this topic.

8 hours ago, the_E_y_Es_o_0 said:

@hitakoh@gmail.com To be clear, the version you're playing is the old Rebalance Mod, not Zenith. Zenith can't be found online yet.

As you've noticed, some of the boss fights are all but broken. That's one of the reasons I removed the download link.

Rebalance was merely my first attempt at hacking the game and I don't recommend playing it. When Zenith is ready later this year I'll make it available in this topic.

I thought it was that thanks for letting me know. I don't know if it is still like that in Zenith but I felt like the drop rate is very high.

Pleeeeeeaseeee finish this mod! 

Vagrant is life!

Hi everyone

I'm really really excited to play this mod, when it will come out i'll try to share it as much as i can in the italian gaming website, cause it's a waste that just a few amount of people are going to know and enjoy it!

Wish you the best! @the_E_y_Es_o_0

Zenith v1.00 will be released in the next few days.

If someone would like to help by playtesting it, drop me a message and I'll provide the link.

Edit: version 1.00 is ready. Check the opening post for the download link.

It's better to not add the italian translation mod right?

29 minutes ago, DarrenGordom said:

It's better to not add the italian translation mod right?

I don't think it would break anything, TBH. I've had reports of the Russian translation being compatible with the now defunct Rebalance mod. So it's worth a try.

7 hours ago, the_E_y_Es_o_0 said:

I don't think it would break anything, TBH. I've had reports of the Russian translation being compatible with the now defunct Rebalance mod. So it's worth a try.

I remember i played the rebalance mod with the italian translation and it was fine, of course the new weapon and ability would not be translated, but it's ok. So maybe i'll add first the translation and after the zenith.

Thank u for the info <3

Hi! I started my run today, i was wondering, the difficult in early game is not different compared to the vanilla? There's almost no damage cause by the wolves (around 7\8). I beat Dullahan pretty quick, he didn't had the chance to hit me. 

DullahanD

Dullahan

From the OP: "The difficulty rebalance will be done in later versions, after players provide feedback on how hard or easy is v1.00, and once I have a definite idea of how I'm going to tackle this aspect."

Right now, I'm interested in how the removal of the bonus roulette will affect the difficulty, as well as the new mechanic of "if your HP reaches 0, you die" instead of healing yourself back to life with Defense chains.

If the early game is still easy, that will be adjusted later. Do tell me how hard or easy the rest of the game feels, because that info will be taken into account when I begin the difficulty rebalance.

So I reached the first Dragon, i beat him pretty easily, but he almost killed me with his first magic attack, which is fine, cause if u go under his neck, he's not gonna use it anymore. I noticed in general that the enemy's (boss and minions) physical attacks are really weak (so far), except for the critical attack (the only way to risk dying) but the chance of an enemy critical attack is low too. In my opinion the cooldown attack for most of the enemies is too high compared to Ashley, it makes sense if it's a zombie, cause they're usually slow, but a Lizardman should be pretty quick. I can do several actions (plus combos) before being attacked too. Anyway this is just the first part of the game, after the Dragon, things are gonna be harder, I'll let u know.

P.s. I really like that Attack spells and break arts are now useful, plus the removal of the cloud when an enemy attacks. 

1 hour ago, DarrenGordom said:

So I reached the first Dragon, i beat him pretty easily, but he almost killed me with his first magic attack, which is fine, cause if u go under his neck, he's not gonna use it anymore.

I see. The Dragon breath was already powerful in the original and now with a low-stats Ashley it must be near-fatal, even with a shield. For the record, are you increasing your stats with Elixirs or are you keeping your base stats of 100 STR/100 INT/100 AGL? Just so I know.

1 hour ago, DarrenGordom said:

In my opinion the cooldown attack for most of the enemies is too high compared to Ashley, it makes sense if it's a zombie, cause they're usually slow, but a Lizardman should be pretty quick. I can do several actions (plus combos) before being attacked too.

Yes, I agree. The cooldown is something that can be easily reduced, although some enemies will always be slower than others. This will definitely be tweaked in the following updates.

1 hour ago, DarrenGordom said:

P.s. I really like that Attack spells and break arts are now useful, plus the removal of the cloud when an enemy attacks. 

Glad to hear it.

Thanks for the feedback, this is the kind of stuff that will be useful for me later on.

I think the "almost oneshots" are good in the game, I dont feel that im in danger often, especially against physical enemies since it is unlikely they will kill you, except with critical shots. Personally, I didnt really feel the need to use the "defence ability" in the vanilla game, so I hope that i will have to learn them to finish the game.

Anyway I used 3 elixirs, now i have 102 str\100 int\103 agi and 255 hp, I think I'm not gonna use any other elixirs, but if u think it's good i will restart the game without using it at all. I saved after i killed the dragon, i will play a bit more later.

1 hour ago, DarrenGordom said:

I think I'm not gonna use any other elixirs, but if u think it's good i will restart the game without using it at all.

No need, just play it however you prefer.

So I just beat the Ogre (Boss), really easy using prostasia and degenerate, his attack damage is around 60 so it's just a matter of time in terms of killing him (i'm playing without a shield, no stat upgrade and leather equipment). He used just physical attacks so it's not really dangerous, I remember it was a bit more fun in the rebalance mod. He basically has the weakness of almost all the enemies on this game, high cooldown and not a very high damage considering he is a boss.

The Fire Elemental with Pyro Guard and degenerate was a good challenge, he was about to kill me cause of his strong spell but draining his mp and healing urself is enough to beat him.

Duane was really weak, pretty useless boss, not challenging. I remember the battle with him in the rebalance mod and it was really good, he killed me 4 or 5 times (I'm not really good with the defense abilities)

The Wyvern was like the Dragon, but more reistent to my attacks, so if it doesn't attack u with the magical attack ur pretty safe.

Orcs and Orcs leader are decent enemies, annoying enough lol

So you got through Snowfly Forest without problems?

So the crab was easy, no trouble at all, prostasia, degenerate and hitting his claws is enough, his attacks are decent but not very dangerous.

Earth Dragon is weak too, Acid breath oneshotted me a couple times, but i think it's normal cause i'm not upgrading my equipment and my stat, anyway is not a real problem cause like the other dragons, u just need to go under his neck to avoid his spells, still his physical attacks are useless.

Grissmon and Dark Crusader, well the only problem is Grisso's eletric attack, but it doesn't oneshot so u just need to heal urself and kill him first and then the crusade after (easy)

 Basically in the snowly forest, minions are more dangerous than bosses lol

So i'm not a great player, but after u learn the combos and how to use the spells properly, the game is really easy.

Edit2:

I think i will wait until the update of the mod to restart my run, cause in my opinion whoever finished the vanilla game won't have any problems finishing it with the mod if the difficulty is not rebalanced. Hope that what i've so far helps. Maybe i'll reach the Iron Maiden just to see how hard it is

Earth Dragon

Thanks for the feedback, I'll be sure to tweak the bosses in the coming updates. Seems that the issues are mainly the high cooldown and weak offense (physical especially). Glad you didn't experience any bugs or crashes.

So I think that the magical attacks are almost perfect. Phisycal attacks need a huge upgrade, and yes, cooldown too. Anyway when i beat Grissom and the Crusader, the game stopped working, blackscreen (as soon as the cutscene started). But it could be an isolated case, so i will try to beat Grissom again and let u know.

As soon as u will update the mod i will test it

Ps.

The amount of Vera Roots and Vera bulbs is perfect. But the amount of Cure roots and Cure bulbs that u have is massive, considering that u have 100 Mp and the heal spell costs just 5mp

42 minutes ago, DarrenGordom said:

So I think that the magical attacks are almost perfect. Phisycal attacks need a huge upgrade, and yes, cooldown too. Anyway when i beat Grissom and the Crusader, the game stopped working, blackscreen (as soon as the cutscene started). But it could be an isolated case, so i will try to beat Grissom again and let u know.

 

I've had several reports of that same bug -- it's probably being caused by Grissom's character model. I gave him a different weapon, a Summoner Baton, instead of his original Wizard Staff. Even though it runs fine on my end, at least 3 other people had the game freeze in this boss fight, sometimes before the cutscene, sometimes after it. I'll put a patch out as soon as I can.

If it's not too much to ask, can you keep a save file of your game in this area? In the "Forest River" savepoint, before the boss fight. That way you could perhaps test it again when the patch is available.

No problem, I will keep the save file. 

So I tried again, and again blackscreen, gonna wait for the patch, eventually if i wanna skip that point i need to go with the vanilla version and re-add the patch after that cutscene.

Anyway Idk if this is normal, my damage against the Abdomen of the Dark Crusader was 26, he used Prostasia on him, and my Damage was still 26. Prostasia should upgrade all the equipment, that mean's that the Dark Crusader is "naked"? Shouldn't my attack be reduced?

7 hours ago, DarrenGordom said:

Anyway Idk if this is normal, my damage against the Abdomen of the Dark Crusader was 26, he used Prostasia on him, and my Damage was still 26. Prostasia should upgrade all the equipment, that mean's that the Dark Crusader is "naked"? Shouldn't my attack be reduced?

Yes, he has no armor equipped. It makes sense, if you think about it. Like the Dullahan, he's an animated suit of armor, so wearing armor on his armor... well.

Unless you do like Xzibit and go "Yo dawg, we put an armor in your armor...", etcetera.

33 minutes ago, the_E_y_Es_o_0 said:

Yes, he has no armor equipped. It makes sense, if you think about it. Like the Dullahan, he's an animated suit of armor, so wearing armor on his armor... well.

Unless you do like Xzibit and go "Yo dawg, we put an armor in your armor...", etcetera.

Hahahaha ok that's what I though, but to be sure i asked cause it could be a bug ?

Is the Dark Crusader able to use Herakles too?

4 hours ago, DarrenGordom said:

Is the Dark Crusader able to use Herakles too?

Not that one, no.

On the topic of Prostasia, if a Crusader is equipped with an accessory, casting Prostasia will boost the accessory's stats. In that case it might reduce the damage dealt to him. IIRC the Last Crusader boss at Temple of Kiltia is an example of this.

The next patch - v1.01 - will fix the Grissom bug and the enemy Encyclopaedia, which is broken atm. v1.02 will focus on bosses rebalancing.

Edit: Now that I think about it, if we put armor on his armor he can protect his protection. Which is good.

hahahaha So do u want Prostasia to be more effective on the Dark Crusader? I think it's a good idea, cause it doesn't make sense to use Prostasia just to upgrade ur weapon.

Anyway I noticed that the topic on Gamefaqs is more alive, i think i will switch there

up: when u can check the on gamefaqs, i think i found another bug

up2: Never mind, it was caused by the save state

v1.01 is live. This one should be bug-free.

Oh my god, so I'm so excited to start this!!

Is there anything you specifically want feedback from while I play it? Thank you for your years of hard work.

Hi there just started playing the mod again, i had previously played 0.91 and complete is and am now playing 1.00 with the door fix so you could call it 1.01 i suppose.

in the previous version i thought that the rozencrantz fight was too difficult as he would constantly heal and you couldnt analyze him

but this time around i beat him on my first try and he didnt heal once, i dont know if that is due to him not being able to heal or i just got lucky

I would say that the healing of rozencrantz in the last patch was too much but if he cant heal in this one then that is good.

whilst it isn't lore friendly i would suggest that you should be able to analyze both rozencrantz and sydney, just to aid gameplay, but i can see an argument for keeping them un-analyzable.

Also duane and grissom it said that the hit% on analyze for them was 0% which wasnt true as i could analyse them so that is a bug i suppose.

Could i ask if the combination tables have been reverted back to the original ones? i tried to combine a spear and a glaive but i didnt get a scorpion, just a spear.

Would you be able to post a change log detailing all the changes you have made to the base game? i understand that you want to leave it as a mystery but it would be nice to know where to find the new stuff, and know how everything has changed, it would be up to the user to not spoil themselves and i wouldn't want to miss any of your changes!

also do you have any plans to introduce more dyeing effects to enemies other than killing the legs or wings for 50% movement?

thank you so much for your amazing work

On 10/02/2021 at 10:04 AM, vsisgood said:

in the previous version i thought that the rozencrantz fight was too difficult as he would constantly heal and you couldnt analyze him

but this time around i beat him on my first try and he didnt heal once, i dont know if that is due to him not being able to heal or i just got lucky

I would say that the healing of rozencrantz in the last patch was too much but if he cant heal in this one then that is good.

 

I guess you just got lucky, because he is still able to heal himself.

Since you reached Rosencrantz, I assume you got through Snowfly Forest - did you have any issues with the Grissom boss fight? Some people have reported problems with the cutscenes there.

On 10/02/2021 at 10:04 AM, vsisgood said:

Also duane and grissom it said that the hit% on analyze for them was 0% which wasnt true as i could analyse them so that is a bug i suppose.

Interesting. I will look into that.

On 10/02/2021 at 10:04 AM, vsisgood said:

Could i ask if the combination tables have been reverted back to the original ones? i tried to combine a spear and a glaive but i didnt get a scorpion, just a spear.

Yes, I reverted the combination tables. In the case of Spear + Glaive = Scorpion, I might put that back into the next version, along with Wizard Staff + Clergy Rod = Summoner Baton.

On 10/02/2021 at 10:04 AM, vsisgood said:

Would you be able to post a change log detailing all the changes you have made to the base game? i understand that you want to leave it as a mystery but it would be nice to know where to find the new stuff, and know how everything has changed, it would be up to the user to not spoil themselves and i wouldn't want to miss any of your changes!

Sure. I'm still writing the changelog but it will be available soon.

On 10/02/2021 at 10:04 AM, vsisgood said:

also do you have any plans to introduce more dyeing effects to enemies other than killing the legs or wings for 50% movement?

Not right now, but it is a possibility in the future. This is a common request so I will try to implement something.

Thanks for playing!

On 18/01/2021 at 12:46 AM, blackcat777 said:

Oh my god, so I'm so excited to start this!!

Is there anything you specifically want feedback from while I play it? Thank you for your years of hard work.

Hello, sorry for the late reply. If you're playing the mod, do tell me what you think of the difficulty, especially in later areas. With the roulette removed, the gap between Ashley's stats and the enemies becomes quite considerable as you progress. In the next update I will nerf Guildenstern's 2nd form, as it's just too powerful for a base stats playthrough.

Also, if you experience any problems with cutscenes, tell me where it happened and what emulator you are using. Thanks!

v1.02 is now available on the 1st page. Changes are:

Fixed a door exit at Hallowed Hope, Sanctum.

Fixed cutscene problems at Limestone Quarry and Great Cathedral.

Lich, Lich Lord and Death enemies are less powerful.

2-Handed Break Arts have been rebalanced.

Break Arts kill requirements have been reduced.

Just finished the regular run and i'm excited to check iron maiden B2...

one thing i found myself wondering is if the editor programs have a clear flag to alter monster stats based on how many times the game is finished, since the game already has a flag tracking the clears

anyway, good job pal,

, fighting lichs sure felt more dangerous

tnx for making this

edit. as for dificulty, guildenstern always oneshot me with his special moves unless i had a shield...while this could be a problem in dificulty for some, i see it more as a strat issue. "Get a shield up before the big kaboom or die"

Version 1.03 is available on the front page.

Because of time constraints, I will no longer update this topic. Those who are interested in Zenith can follow the thread at gamefaqs and/or visit the project's site.

Thank you all for your continued support!