Shadow Hearts NTSC-U - Imbroglio v5.15

Hello and welcome!

This is my difficulty modification for the first Shadow Hearts I named 'Imbroglio'. It changes enemies making them have more health, agility, strength and magic. In addition there's been changes to different character abilities. Also, characters learn their 3 last skills way later (when Alice learned 'Arc' before at 35 levelled now she learns it 70 levelled instead).

NOTE: I lowered the required level for the 3 last character abilities starting with v1.1. From there on Alice learns Arc 63 levelled (level requirements are x 1.8 of the original).

The mod is currently v5.15 with lots of different changes. See the other messages on this thread where I have listed changes.

In this mod you are required to be higher level than before in order to progress in the game. Increased experience and cash from enemies will help in that. You have better chances at the final boss the higher level you are and the more sidequests you have completed. It is recommended to do the final boss maxed out (99 lvl).

I wasn't able to find the values for the scaling enemies from the code so those remain unchanged unless some helpful person will be able to help me in that. Fortunately those are only the Fusion battles and the Malice lowering battles (and also the scaled Fox Face if you dare facing him).

Give my mod a go if you feel like it. 

You need to have the original disc image of Shadow Hearts NTSC-U. Then patch that image with the file from the zip using 'ppf-o-matic' tool.

Here's the download link:

http://www.mediafire.com/file/xbayt2cir9x3hwr/shadow_hearts_ntsc-u_imbroglio_5.15.ppf.zip

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Here are the previous versions if you want to try these instead, however the newer version is improved.

http://www.mediafire.com/file/btrqetthbt6pps8/shadow_hearts_ntsc-u_imbroglio_5.10.ppf.zip

http://www.mediafire.com/file/28hjr7j1xf6pwrs/shadow_hearts_ntsc-u_imbroglio_4.95.ppf.zip

http://www.mediafire.com/file/rs53a4n5wm39btg/shadow_hearts_ntsc-u_imbroglio_4.90.ppf.zip

http://www.mediafire.com/file/8tvxje59ngfw0j7/shadow_hearts_ntsc-u_imbroglio_4.85.ppf.zip

http://www.mediafire.com/file/nf54wpx8d6yhwa4/shadow_hearts_ntsc-u_imbroglio_4.75.ppf.zip

http://www.mediafire.com/file/80js0bq4zuuah2t/shadow_hearts_ntsc-u_imbroglio_4.70.ppf.zip

http://www.mediafire.com/file/3ilt03wmowfrtjt/shadow_hearts_ntsc-u_imbroglio_4.50.ppf.zip

http://www.mediafire.com/file/fywo38fgrd4qsf5/shadow_hearts_ntsc-u_imbroglio_4.20.ppf.zip

http://www.mediafire.com/file/u26z6kas7wmvyf2/shadow_hearts_ntsc-u_imbroglio_4.10.ppf.zip

http://www.mediafire.com/file/bdjk9l3cart4z02/shadow_hearts_ntsc-u_imbroglio_4.00.ppf.zip

http://www.mediafire.com/file/w06upwl2nphu95n/shadow_hearts_ntsc-u_imbroglio_3.80.ppf.zip

http://www.mediafire.com/file/nuhkxil1rnhxt6x/shadow_hearts_ntsc-u_imbroglio_3.70.ppf.zip

http://www.mediafire.com/file/u6he7v0f6vh3c8q/shadow_hearts_ntsc-u_imbroglio_3.65.ppf.zip

http://www.mediafire.com/file/0j1795z22gvu1ph/shadow_hearts_ntsc-u_imbroglio_3.60.ppf.zip

http://www.mediafire.com/file/7z8zuh68w7j5qt2/shadow_hearts_ntsc-u_imbroglio_3.50.ppf.zip

http://www.mediafire.com/file/pjgt3ituu7und2q/shadow_hearts_ntsc-u_imbroglio_3.20.zip

http://www.mediafire.com/file/segzg7cpdte0am8/shadow_hearts_ntsc-u_imbroglio_3.15.zip

http://www.mediafire.com/file/9tgdrwzeh75syoc/shadow_hearts_ntsc-u_imbroglio_3.1.zip

http://www.mediafire.com/file/bco0n5alyhfjdco/shadow_hearts_ntsc-u_imbroglio_3.0.zip

http://www.mediafire.com/file/kcgc88ahhvqb65p/shadow_hearts_ntsc-u_imbroglio_2.0.zip

http://www.mediafire.com/file/b4i3qdspqr3bypd/shadow_hearts_ntsc-u_imbroglio_1.3.zip

http://www.mediafire.com/file/qkbhz4zgzzsmvcb/shadow_hearts_ntsc-u_imbroglio_1.2.zip

http://www.mediafire.com/file/4aku2ftbd7dvdm8/shadow_hearts_ntsc-u_imbroglio_1.1.zip

http://www.mediafire.com/file/see5y0jrhxgjsr8/shadow_hearts_ntsc-u_imbroglio_1_0.zip

Thanks for the rep guys^^

I forgot to mention the enemies also have higher agility. I updated the info to my first message.

Awesome. I just did a bunch of box-searching for my old ps2 games and have all the shadowhearts games. That's cool it looks like you've made mods for all of them. Have to try them out when i have time. 

19 hours ago, vhatever said:

Awesome. I just did a bunch of box-searching for my old ps2 games and have all the shadowhearts games. That's cool it looks like you've made mods for all of them. Have to try them out when i have time. 

Hey, thanks a lot for the interest! Give them a go if you feel like it ^^ Shadow Hearts is my favorite RPG series and they hold a big place in my heart, that's why I've made mod for all of them. I've been thinking about modding Koudelka too but that game seems really hard to mod. At least I can't find the enemy data in that game.

4 hours ago, zedorfed66 said:

Hey, thanks a lot for the interest! Give them a go if you feel like it ^^ Shadow Hearts is my favorite RPG series and they hold a big place in my heart, that's why I've made mod for all of them. I've been thinking about modding Koudelka too but that game seems really hard to mod. At least I can't find the enemy data in that game.

Koudelka is a hot mess of a game in terms of....everything

If you manage to make it work (especially if you remove the idiotic RNG) I will make you an altar

16 hours ago, ronlyn said:

Koudelka is a hot mess of a game in terms of....everything

 

If you manage to make it work (especially if you remove the idiotic RNG) I will make you an altar

Lol. Koudelka has its' charms in the whole dark evil setting and all. And actually I don't have the same complaints about the game most people do. For example I don't care about the slower paced gameplay (due to technical stuff). The problems are pretty much all on the modding end. I'll probably totally skip Koudelka in my list of projects and focus on something else instead.

On 7/11/2019 at 1:14 PM, zedorfed66 said:

Hey, thanks a lot for the interest! Give them a go if you feel like it ^^ Shadow Hearts is my favorite RPG series and they hold a big place in my heart, that's why I've made mod for all of them. I've been thinking about modding Koudelka too but that game seems really hard to mod. At least I can't find the enemy data in that game.

Ya, I certainly plan to try them all out eventually here. Obviously having all the games for the PS2, I was also a fan of the series back in the day. Koudelka I only played once at someone else's house it seemed absolutely nothing like the shadowhearts games, though it was funny when the characters would suddenly break out into this expansive professor-like dialogue about whether Immanuel Kant's position X was in agreement with Voltaire's position on Y.

On 13.7.2019 at 8:50 AM, vhatever said:

Ya, I certainly plan to try them all out eventually here. Obviously having all the games for the PS2, I was also a fan of the series back in the day. Koudelka I only played once at someone else's house it seemed absolutely nothing like the shadowhearts games, though it was funny when the characters would suddenly break out into this expansive professor-like dialogue about whether Immanuel Kant's position X was in agreement with Voltaire's position on Y.

Lol. It seems all the old school horror games tended to have weird dialogue at least in some point. I guess the whole weirdness makes them more scary.

Hello once again @zedorfed66 , I just wanted to ask: Would be any issues if I played your mod as first playthrough? I just download the game and I have never touched any game of the Shadow Hearts trilogy (just heard/saw gameplay and after touching Kouldelka's....interesting mechanics I just gave up on the series).

On 28.8.2019 at 4:07 AM, ronlyn said:

Hello once again @zedorfed66 , I just wanted to ask: Would be any issues if I played your mod as first playthrough? I just download the game and I have never touched any game of the Shadow Hearts trylogy (just heard/saw gameplay and after touching Kouldelka's....interesting mechanics I just gave up on the series).

Hey, ronlyn. 

This is not an extremely hard modification. Just somewhat challenging (like my other Shadow Hearts mods) while still being fun to play so there shouldn't be much problems. The last bosses can get more brutal if you've gotten used to power level since they're supposed to be done maxed. Then again you can still use the 'Seal' items to power up (which are not required to beat the game at lv 99).

4 hours ago, zedorfed66 said:

Hey, ronlyn. 

This is not an extremely hard modification. Just somewhat challenging (like my other Shadow Hearts mods) while still being fun to play so there shouldn't be much problems. The last bosses can get more brutal if you've gotten used to power level since they're supposed to be done maxed. Then again you can still use the 'Seal' items to power up (which are not required to beat the game at lv 99).

Well then, I'm gonna treat myself with this on the weekend (I got excited from this whole series after reading The Dark Id's kouldelka LP, which I appreciated since I'm not touching that game any day soon...)

1 hour ago, ronlyn said:

Well then, I'm gonna treat myself with this on the weekend (I got excited from this whole series after reading The Dark Id's kouldelka LP, which I appreciated since I'm not touching that game any day soon...)

Have fun!

Came back after playing a bit. @zedorfed66 you should really nerf/balance the enemy output:

- In the prologue Yuri got straight out nuke by two imps using wind shear. Had to reset and try again and luckily one decided to attack

-  There's no reason to use regular Yuri since Death Emperor grants stats upon activation and sometimes you need them WAY TOO MUCH to 2 turns KO enemies rather than 3 turns them (something important since once Alice becomes part of the team, her ass will get whopped by virtually anything)

- Since agility is also up the charts, sometimes I found everyone and my grandma killing Alice before even getting Yuri to act. That's outright BS

- The fight against Rage Tiger last long enough to lose control of Yuri if you dare to use Death Emperor to reduce/inflict more damage, meaning you can lose against what I see as a tutorial battle

For real, unless you expect me to grind to like lvl 5/6 in the plains the game feels really unfair

EDIT: Items can get you so far since I check and yeah, they can be bought in the next location but at the same time, I expend way more that I win per battle, so I'm not sure this will pan out very well

5 hours ago, ronlyn said:

Came back after playing a bit. @zedorfed66 you should really nerf/balance the enemy output:

- In the prologue Yuri got straight out nuke by two imps using wind shear. Had to reset and try again and luckily one decided to attack

-  There's no reason to use regular Yuri since Death Emperor grants stats upon activation and sometimes you need them WAY TOO MUCH to 2 turns KO enemies rather than 3 turns them (something important since once Alice becomes part of the team, her ass will get whopped by virtually anything)

- Since agility is also up the charts, sometimes I found everyone and my grandma killing Alice before even getting Yuri to act. That's outright BS

- The fight against Rage Tiger last long enough to lose control of Yuri if you dare to use Death Emperor to reduce/inflict more damage, meaning you can lose against what I see as a tutorial battle

 

For real, unless you expect me to grind to like lvl 5/6 in the plains the game feels really unfair

EDIT: Items can get you so far since I check and yeah, they can be bought in the next location but at the same time, I expend way more that I win per battle, so I'm not sure this will pan out very well

Alice is the squishiest party member followed by Zhuzhen so yeah she'll be taking a lot of beating in this mod sadly :(((. You're supposed to be lvl 5 before entering the Raging Tiger boss. Overall there's some leveling required here and there. You will also need to be buying more items throughout the game since enemies and bosses take longer to defeat. I'm sorry if you feel overwhelmed by that. Magic overall is more powerful than basic attacks so you might be able to one shot some foes with Yuri's fusion monsters' magic spells. And it's pretty much always better to have Yuri transformed since it gives him extra stats.

It has been almost two months since I dared to play this (and get frustrated at the balance) so this time, I will play the entire deal if only because I really want a mod that offers a fair challenge without devolving into mindless grinding or cheap bosses:

Train: The Wind shears can actually live up to their names and tear you apart if you're so unlucky to get four of those in the face, besides that everything's ok until Bacon blows the duo to...

The Plains: And this is where everything goes down the drain. Alice will get her ass KO by virtually any enemy that decides to do multiple hits almost all the time until she hits lvl 3. Yuri can ORKO bats and spiders while the wolfs are 2RKO all the time you spend here grinding but since you're grinding mostly because of Alice so better pray she gets lucky on these fights. I suggest reduce the local fauna's attack since the only concern is that the RNG decides to be a dick and send two enemies against Ms.Elliot. Once both reach lvl 5, Yuri gets bodied by Fox Face and fight Ranging Tiger in the graveyard which was actually fun.

Zhaoyang Village: after the scenes, we get to experience a problem with the enemies: These formations expect you to have Zhuzhen in the team, so better get cracking and get him since otherwise Alice with eat dirt and Yuri will follow suit since he gets locked in a healing cycle. Once the old man is with you the next section is rather tame since ogre flame-dance will trounce everything and with the new economy you can actually spam that like it's nothing. Poison and Confuse are status effects you will see here and I feel poison could be boost to actually matter since 1-3 hp per turn is kind of hilarious. The status protection gear in the shop could also have their price lowered since wasting almost 3000 per item is kind of impossible to think off when you have to worry about your supplies.

Hell Cats: I think you forgot to buff them since they only took two casts of Flying Stones to end the battle.  

Felinus: OMG this thing needs more testing and not because her damage input but because of her dumb agility: Is quite possible to have the darn cat two turn you and toss two wind slash to kill both Alice and Zhuzhen and probably leave Yuri on death's door. Tornado was quite amazing since it means Yuri could tank three turns before healing was in dire need. I went lvl 8 here.

Yamaraha Earth: After the cat everyone reach lvl 9 and Zhuzhen learned Fire Edge which was used against this boss. This one actually feels more fair since he does give you breath room to get yourself up and do some damage unlike that demon cat and while he can two turn you every now and then, since the second one is a physical attack it will only down one party member.

More of this later but right now things are looking grim for my sanity

23 hours ago, ronlyn said:

It has been almost two months since I dared to play this (and get frustrated at the balance) so this time, I will play the entire deal if only because I really want a mod that offers a fair challenge without devolving into mindless grinding or cheap bosses:

Train: The Wind shears can actually live up to their names and tear you apart if you're so unlucky to get four of those in the face, besides that everything's ok until Bacon blows the duo to...

The Plains: And this is where everything goes down the drain. Alice will get her ass KO by virtually any enemy that decides to do multiple hits almost all the time until she hits lvl 3. Yuri can ORKO bats and spiders while the wolfs are 2RKO all the time you spend here grinding but since you're grinding mostly because of Alice so better pray she gets lucky on these fights. I suggest reduce the local fauna's attack since the only concern is that the RNG decides to be a dick and send two enemies against Ms.Elliot. Once both reach lvl 5, Yuri gets bodied by Fox Face and fight Ranging Tiger in the graveyard which was actually fun.

Zhaoyang Village: after the scenes, we get to experience a problem with the enemies: These formations expect you to have Zhuzhen in the team, so better get cracking and get him since otherwise Alice with eat dirt and Yuri will follow suit since he gets locked in a healing cycle. Once the old man is with you the next section is rather tame since ogre flame-dance will trounce everything and with the new economy you can actually spam that like it's nothing. Poison and Confuse are status effects you will see here and I feel poison could be boost to actually matter since 1-3 hp per turn is kind of hilarious. The status protection gear in the shop could also have their price lowered since wasting almost 3000 per item is kind of impossible to think off when you have to worry about your supplies.

Hell Cats: I think you forgot to buff them since they only took two casts of Flying Stones to end the battle.  

Felinus: OMG this thing needs more testing and not because her damage input but because of her dumb agility: Is quite possible to have the darn cat two turn you and toss two wind slash to kill both Alice and Zhuzhen and probably leave Yuri on death's door. Tornado was quite amazing since it means Yuri could tank three turns before healing was in dire need. I went lvl 8 here.

Yamaraha Earth: After the cat everyone reach lvl 9 and Zhuzhen learned Fire Edge which was used against this boss. This one actually feels more fair since he does give you breath room to get yourself up and do some damage unlike that demon cat and while he can two turn you every now and then, since the second one is a physical attack it will only down one party member.

More of this later but right now things are looking grim for my sanity

Hi again Ronlyn and thank you for giving my mod a whirl!

I'll try to answer to everything you have pointed out while trying to help at the same time.

Siberian Express:

There are never 4 Wind Shears in one group in the train. It's always either 1 or 2. Yuri should be fine as a by-passer.

Plains:

Lvl 1 Alice will always be able to survive with at least 1 HP even if the 'Vampire Bat' (the strongest enemy in the area) happens to hit with critical.

As long as you have full health and mana before the fights you will be able to survive every time as long as you play correctly. Even as only Yuri and Alice. If you run the game on PCSX2 you can test this out by making a save state after a surprise attack. I have tested this in every single area of the game. As long as you have the best weapons/armor at that point you won't see a game over screen. However there are all of these things to take in consideration along with being on correct levels and having enough items if you need to use them.

Zhaoyang Village:

I decided not to buff the health of the 'Hellcats' since I thought of them as children compared to the rest of the enemies. Yuri will be able to one shot the 'Green Flyer' enemies with his Earth element monster's magic spell. Which you should be doing especially before you get Zhuzhen on your party.

I wanted to keep the game experience as close to the original as possible without changing status effects / shop prices or anything like that. It is also my way of respecting the vision of the people who created this game. You are not expected to buy any protective accessories at Zhaoyang Village other than Bandannas. Later on in the game you will be able to buy way more freely. Just measure what things are more important or if you want you can alternatively grind until you are able to buy everything.

It is optimal to fight the 'Felinus' boss at lvl9 (same as Yamaraja).

I'm sorry for making you feel awful while playing through my mod. I hope you will start liking it more if you decide to continue another time.

-Zed

3 hours ago, zedorfed66 said:

Hi again Ronlyn and thank you for giving my mod a whirl!

I'll try to answer to everything you have pointed out while trying to help at the same time.

 

Siberian Express:

There are never 4 Wind Shears in one group in the train. It's always either 1 or 2. Yuri should be fine as a by-passer.

 

Plains:

Lvl 1 Alice will always be able to survive with at least 1 HP even if the 'Vampire Bat' (the strongest enemy in the area) happens to hit with critical.

As long as you have full health and mana before the fights you will be able to survive every time as long as you play correctly. Even as only Yuri and Alice. If you run the game on PCSX2 you can test this out by making a save state after a surprise attack. I have tested this in every single area of the game. As long as you have the best weapons/armor at that point you won't see a game over screen. However there are all of these things to take in consideration along with being on correct levels and having enough items if you need to use them.

 

Zhaoyang Village:

I decided not to buff the health of the 'Hellcats' since I thought of them as children compared to the rest of the enemies. Yuri will be able to one shot the 'Green Flyer' enemies with his Earth element monster's magic spell. Which you should be doing especially before you get Zhuzhen on your party.

I wanted to keep the game experience as close to the original as possible without changing status effects / shop prices or anything like that. It is also my way of respecting the vision of the people who created this game. You are not expected to buy any protective accessories at Zhaoyang Village other than Bandannas. Later on in the game you will be able to buy way more freely. Just measure what things are more important or if you want you can alternatively grind until you are able to buy everything.

It is optimal to fight the 'Felinus' boss at lvl9 (same as Yamaraja).

 

I'm sorry for making you feel awful while playing through my mod. I hope you will start liking it more if you decide to continue another time.

-Zed

Don't worry about me getting loud with your mod: It means you're doing something amazing but that needs tweaks here and there since otherwise I would just ignore the whole deal altogether

Now with my replies:

- Train: I was speaking of their wind move that they spammed the very first time I played the mod until I was right back ay the start screen. It was kind of unfortunate 

- Plains: Went back and you're right on that front. That place is still awful since Alice needs to get lucky to not get targeted by two foes and the enemies comes in packs of 2-3

- Zhaoyang: I'm okay with all that is there.

If is not too much to ask: You don't have anything like a readme or at least a short list with suggestions about which level You should reach a boss/dungeon?

More feedback:

- Sewers: Once again I rush the whole place to avoid getting rekt before Margarete. Tested the boss and I found lvl 13 for everyone to be the rule. Shot out for the 3 bats and 2 spiders enemy formation which can AND will destroy everyone not named Yuri if three or four enemies focus their efforts on someone (which is actually prone to happen since the AI seems competent enough to target someone's near death) and you cannot get rid of the real threats (bats) in one turn which means you will eat SIX fireballs before killing one until Blessed Light is a thing (Alice lvl 11 BTW). Margarete's Grenade can 2HKO them along the spiders but one must pray for them to ignored her weakness against said fireballs.

The blue and green frogs are hard but since they come three at max even if they kill someone you can recover from that. Farmed frogs for Man eater's fusion in hopes that it means something against the next boss (spoilers: It wasn't worth the effort).

Red and Blue kappas: This trio was actually quite funny since the lackeys were quite resilient with their healing spell and if you're feeling feisty, you can use death emperor and drain their mp to avoid said tactics. I like this one if only because there are options 

- Beast Dog: lvl 13 in tow, I went offensive with Man eater casting his water spell while the girls support the fish man and got myself killed since the water fusions kind of sucks in general in the entire trilogy. Next try I went ranging tiger with aqua edge and everything went smooth since the mutt didn't two turn to spam his fire breath with the new levels I got.

- Dalian: The blue frogs are back in packs of three and with their light affinity it means it's time to farm for heaven's fiend which is really easy with both Margarete and Zhuzhen using their AoE spells to clean house. The Yellow kappas were completely avoided since even at lvl 14 the assholes would normally stomp even Yuri and you need to endure six of their attacks before you can take them out. However I do admit I didn't try using heaven's fiend since I went directly to fight the boss after getting it (not much to say about fusion fights) so I'm gonna test them later. 

Yamaraha-Earth at lvl 14: Surprisingly enough, the problem wasn't survive the strange thing even with it getting two turns since everyone could survive a double shockwave or one shockwave and one cast of flying stones. but physicals are quite dangerous if only because they are RNG dependent in terms of how much hits you will get. The real issue is that the goddamn asshole avoided SIXTEEN spells (4 from Margarete and 12 from Zhuzhen) it doesn't help that the darn thing refuses to die (I counted the damage I deal and it went well over 1000 hp).

Really, it would be nice to know at the very least which are the levels you expect someone to reach these bosses since me testing out per level is dragging me down

EDIT: 2nd attempt was a success and the only real change was that he decided to avoid two grenades and three ogre flamedances instead of half of them. Went ahead and use my calculator and the final result was 1432 which means that thing has 1400 hp (+600 compared to his vanilla self). I can foreseen in the future that heaven's fiend will be my go to fusion until basically endgame because AoE healing is a must most of the time. This also make Alice irrelevant in most bosses since single target healing is not very appealing with a lot of money to toss in thera/mana leafs and her sanity is basically the worst (which is a problem with longer bosses).

12 hours ago, ronlyn said:

More feedback:

- Sewers: Once again I rush the whole place to avoid getting rekt before Margarete. Tested the boss and I found lvl 13 for everyone to be the rule. Shot out for the 3 bats and 2 spiders enemy formation which can AND will destroy everyone not named Yuri if three or four enemies focus their efforts on someone (which is actually prone to happen since the AI seems competent enough to target someone's near death) and you cannot get rid of the real threats (bats) in one turn which means you will eat SIX fireballs before killing one until Blessed Light is a thing (Alice lvl 11 BTW). Margarete's Grenade can 2HKO them along the spiders but one must pray for them to ignored her weakness against said fireballs.

The blue and green frogs are hard but since they come three at max even if they kill someone you can recover from that. Farmed frogs for Man eater's fusion in hopes that it means something against the next boss (spoilers: It wasn't worth the effort).

Red and Blue kappas: This trio was actually quite funny since the lackeys were quite resilient with their healing spell and if you're feeling feisty, you can use death emperor and drain their mp to avoid said tactics. I like this one if only because there are options 

- Beast Dog: lvl 13 in tow, I went offensive with Man eater casting his water spell while the girls support the fish man and got myself killed since the water fusions kind of sucks in general in the entire trilogy. Next try I went ranging tiger with aqua edge and everything went smooth since the mutt didn't two turn to spam his fire breath with the new levels I got.

- Dalian: The blue frogs are back in packs of three and with their light affinity it means it's time to farm for heaven's fiend which is really easy with both Margarete and Zhuzhen using their AoE spells to clean house. The Yellow kappas were completely avoided since even at lvl 14 the assholes would normally stomp even Yuri and you need to endure six of their attacks before you can take them out. However I do admit I didn't try using heaven's fiend since I went directly to fight the boss after getting it (not much to say about fusion fights) so I'm gonna test them later. 

Yamaraha-Earth at lvl 14: Surprisingly enough, the problem wasn't survive the strange thing even with it getting two turns since everyone could survive a double shockwave or one shockwave and one cast of flying stones. but physicals are quite dangerous if only because they are RNG dependent in terms of how much hits you will get. The real issue is that the goddamn asshole avoided SIXTEEN spells (4 from Margarete and 12 from Zhuzhen) it doesn't help that the darn thing refuses to die (I counted the damage I deal and it went well over 1000 hp).

Really, it would be nice to know at the very least which are the levels you expect someone to reach these bosses since me testing out per level is dragging me down

EDIT: 2nd attempt was a success and the only real change was that he decided to avoid two grenades and three ogre flamedances instead of half of them. Went ahead and use my calculator and the final result was 1432 which means that thing has 1400 hp (+600 compared to his vanilla self). I can foreseen in the future that heaven's fiend will be my go to fusion until basically endgame because AoE healing is a must most of the time. This also make Alice irrelevant in most bosses since single target healing is not very appealing with a lot of money to toss in thera/mana leafs and her sanity is basically the worst (which is a problem with longer bosses).

Hey again.

Looks like you've made some good progress. You're way lower level than what is intended at this point. But if you're fine with that don't let it bother you. It's simply just the optimal level before taking on the bosses, nothing too serious. The bosses' HP is often multiplied by 1.5 (which was the case with Yamaraja) and sometimes by 2.

Here are the suggested levels before entering the bosses:

Plains: 5
Zhaoyang Village: 9
Fengtian Sewers: 16
Dalian: 18
Smuggler's Ship: 20
Trials 1: 20
Trials 2: 22
Trials 3: 22
Kowloon Fortress: 27
Kuihai Tower: 38
Bistritz: 41
Blue Castle: 44
Rouen: 49
Orphanage: 55
Mental Hospital: 60
Nemeton Underground: 70
Doll House & Float 1: 79
Cave Temple & Float 2: 89
Ancient Ruins & float 3: 99

Basically when everyone on your team is at these levels it's optimal to take the next boss. I upped the exp and cash received in all the areas. In some more and in some less. Especially in the areas where you need to level up more you will receive more than in some other areas.

But yeah, you don't necessarily need to be in those levels. And you're right, 'Heaven's Fiend' is very important fusion on Yuri early on. Alice will also be very important later on with her 'Gospel' and 'Arc' spells. This is basically the game where you want to have Yuri and Alice on your party until the end. Halley is the default for 3rd and is probably the best choice since he also has revive and healing spell and also 'Black Hole'. He is simply the best for 3rd but other choices may work as well.

9 hours ago, zedorfed66 said:

Here are the suggested levels before entering the bosses:

Plains: 5
Zhaoyang Village: 9
Fengtian Sewers: 16
Dalian: 18
Smuggler's Ship: 20
Trials 1: 20
Trials 2: 22
Trials 3: 22
Kowloon Fortress: 27
Kuihai Tower: 38
Bistritz: 41
Blue Castle: 44
Rouen: 49
Orphanage: 55
Mental Hospital: 60
Nemeton Underground: 70
Doll House & Float 1: 79
Cave Temple & Float 2: 89
Ancient Ruins & float 3: 99

Thanks, I will keep this in mind when I get to farm for levels and such. There are two problems I've found so far in all locations:

The agility stat: Enemies are dangerous enough with their new damage output and endurance, let alone the fact that now I can't even get a full round of turns with my team because some enemies gets turns in between my actions which irks me to no end (Zhuzhen for example, has really low agility and thus gets his turn way too late most of the time). I think you can dial down the agility and up the enemy's hp in order to ensure that the player can properly fight against the monsters and further remove the player's ability to erase the enemies in one round.

EXP vs effort ratio: The three Kappa Gods in Dalian give 300 exp per fight and you will suffer a lot more with them than the three blue frogs which gives 270 exp per fight. In the end I just save stated and only engaged those frogs since they are easier to deal with and the kappas are jerks in general. Bump their exp from 100 to 160 per kill to ensure the player get an proper reward for dealing with them while farming.

Back to the game:

- Smuggler's Boat: I didn't remove Zhuzhen's accessories so I went ahead and just used two rosewood bracelets against Li Li. The fire wisps or whatever the hell they're called were quite the pain in the ass for the first reason explain above: If a party member dies in the middle of the fight you cannot get back up because you will get torched to death before everyone's get on top form. You could argue that I'm just behind in levels but the thing is... I won't spend around half an hour fighting the same two enemies formations to met the required level since it just the agility that causing problems not their damage or their hp. 

- Li Li's back-to-back: First form has 900 hp (+400 compare to vanilla). I took my time farming to lvl 16 (Yuri/Margarete) and lvl 15 for Alice to these fights while also getting enough fire souls to unlock Inferno. Everyone on the back row, Yuri went Heaven's fiend and spammed Exorcist Arrow and occasionally Sacred Remedy when Li Li got two turns. Alice was my secondary damage dealer and backup healer and Margarete just did her best to top everyone's HP/MP to ensure I ended the fight in good shape.

Second form has 1100 hp (+400 to vanilla). Same tactics except I needed two turns to heal everyone's HP/MP and SP when half way though the deal. She got a turn every two of mine which means being alive was my priority and damage was secondary until sanity was dropping low. I enyoyed this for all that is worth. 

Making the characters always get turns before the enemies removes the challenge from fights to the point of making them boring imo. The normal encounters already have 3x their original hp, starting from Smuggler's Boat 4x and the late game enemies 6x. As long as you're in high enough levels you will find the normal foes bearable. However one is still able to play the mod on lower levels but with added challenge. In the suggested levels the enemies with highest agl get the initiative as often as the player's character with highest agl value. I wanted to make it this way. I'm sorry if it bothers you. In low levels the foes also deal more damage and they'll be able to one shot party members if they happen to get crits with their basics.

On 26/11/2019 at 11:05 AM, zedorfed66 said:

Making the characters always get turns before the enemies removes the challenge from fights to the point of making them boring imo. The normal encounters already have 3x their original hp, starting from Smuggler's Boat 4x and the late game enemies 6x. As long as you're in high enough levels you will find the normal foes bearable. However one is still able to play the mod on lower levels but with added challenge. In the suggested levels the enemies with highest agl get the initiative as often as the player's character with highest agl value. I wanted to make it this way. I'm sorry if it bothers you. In low levels the foes also deal more damage and they'll be able to one shot party members if they happen to get crits with their basics.

I can accept this on enemies since it means you have to be on your toes all the time or you will get wipe out. However when bosses get two turns...Let me first post the whole ordeal until finish off Wugui in the Ancient Temple and you will understand:

- Shanghai 1st visit & Zhuzhen Solo adventure: I had to redo the whole Dalian act since I needed some levels on Yuri of all people (lvl 14 Zhuzhen can survive two water blasts from the kappas if he manages to reach 50 S.Def with accessories and equipment). Lvl 18 for Yuri/Margarete and 17 for Zhuzhen and Alice after redo the whole fiasco with the squid lady. The kappas could potentially two turn Zhuzhen but I can accept this since only attacking when he's on full hp it's the way to go. Wugui pulled off a trap card and send the old man to the shadow realm. 

-Wugui 1 vs 1: Unlike his father, Yuri had to grab a Flash Badge from the Silent Peddler back in Dalian since Wugui would otherwise double turn his ass every now and then and two 3-hit comboes from the stretchy man means death so playing defensively while Inferno punch him into a paste was the call here. 

- Temple Ruins - First Trial: Went ahead and fully upgrade Yuri & Margarete's weapons since I know the straight up bullshit this dungeon brings. Yuri & Zhuzhen's adventures were quite fun if only because Man dragon straight up wash the floor with the pythons here. However Zhuzhen almost catch up with Yuri in terms of levels because it seems the enemy AI has a weird predilection for the first slot (Yuri) and he was death before Zhuzhen could cast the last spell to end the battle.

- Temple Ruins - Second Trial: Margo carried the "team" so hard it hurts. I hope the ones responsible for this dungeon die in a fire while their ability to open doors are disable inside a building.

Temple Ruins - Last Trial: Just fight off two random battles since I was really tired of this horrible dungeon and the bosses were honestly the easy part (EXCEPT FOR ONE DETAIL).

- Xieshi, Baigu & Qinngu: These three are fairly challenging (lvl 20 before doing every single one of these) and I actually would have enjoyed the deal...If they didn't get two consecutive turns every three turns and decided that it was fair to spam their AoE spell to murder the party for shit and giggles. The only who didn't pull that off was Quinngu and only because I decided to screw the system and equip Flash Badges on Yuri & Zhuzhen.

- Yamaraha War: This guy was acceptable since once again Flash Badges save the day. Zhuzhen was up to use gold hourglasses and support, Margarete and Yuri went full physical on the dude while occasionally healing anyone below 120 hp.

EDIT: Since I'm reaching out the climax of the first half I must ask: At which level do you suggest tackling the pit fights? 

4 hours ago, ronlyn said:

I can accept this on enemies since it means you have to be on your toes all the time or you will get wipe out. However when bosses get two turns...Let me first post the whole ordeal until finish off Wugui in the Ancient Temple and you will understand:

- Shanghai 1st visit & Zhuzhen Solo adventure: I had to redo the whole Dalian act since I needed some levels on Yuri of all people (lvl 14 Zhuzhen can survive two water blasts from the kappas if he manages to reach 50 S.Def with accessories and equipment). Lvl 18 for Yuri/Margarete and 17 for Zhuzhen and Alice after redo the whole fiasco with the squid lady. The kappas could potentially two turn Zhuzhen but I can accept this since only attacking when he's on full hp it's the way to go. Wugui pulled off a trap card and send the old man to the shadow realm. 

-Wugui 1 vs 1: Unlike his father, Yuri had to grab a Flash Badge from the Silent Peddler back in Dalian since Wugui would otherwise double turn his ass every now and then and two 3-hit comboes from the stretchy man means death so playing defensively while Inferno punch him into a paste was the call here. 

- Temple Ruins - First Trial: Went ahead and fully upgrade Yuri & Margarete's weapons since I know the straight up bullshit this dungeon brings. Yuri & Zhuzhen's adventures were quite fun if only because Man dragon straight up wash the floor with the pythons here. However Zhuzhen almost catch up with Yuri in terms of levels because it seems the enemy AI has a weird predilection for the first slot (Yuri) and he was death before Zhuzhen could cast the last spell to end the battle.

- Temple Ruins - Second Trial: Margo carried the "team" so hard it hurts. I hope the ones responsible for this dungeon die in a fire while their ability to open doors are disable inside a building.

Temple Ruins - Last Trial: Just fight off two random battles since I was really tired of this horrible dungeon and the bosses were honestly the easy part (EXCEPT FOR ONE DETAIL).

- Xieshi, Baigu & Qinngu: These three are fairly challenging (lvl 20 before doing every single one of these) and I actually would have enjoyed the deal...If they didn't get two consecutive turns every three turns and decided that it was fair to spam their AoE spell to murder the party for shit and giggles. The only who didn't pull that off was Quinngu and only because I decided to screw the system and equip Flash Badges on Yuri & Zhuzhen.

- Yamaraha War: This guy was acceptable since once again Flash Badges save the day. Zhuzhen was up to use gold hourglasses and support, Margarete and Yuri went full physical on the dude while occasionally healing anyone below 120 hp.

EDIT: Since I'm reaching out the climax of the first half I must ask: At which level do you suggest tackling the pit fights? 

Hey. Well done. I hope you don't feel too bad about using the Flash Badges. I've never used them but they seem to help if you're lower than the recommended levels.

I think you can do the Shanghai pit fights immediately when they become available. I'm not completely sure about that tbh but that's what I think. You must do them before entering Kuihai Tower if I remember correctly. You should be able to do them at least at that point.

Here with some more input (and a nice treat):

- Shanghai's pit fights - I feel these were left untouched since I didn't need to redo anything at all which is kind of underwhelming but the other option is to fight against turbo jacket enemies and with this setup the other two party members have an actual chance of beating the whole thing

 - Kowloon's - My god this place was quite the spooky thing with the setting looking like an old horror movie and enemies that will whoop the crap out of you if not at full hp. Margo learns Snipe on the way up to the boss and that skill straight up makes her a keeper for the rest of the game since being able to delete someone without suffering a lot (most single enemies here had around 1000 hp which takes 4-5 turns to deplete taking healing into account) is golden and the new economy means she will spam that rifle until I get something better.

- Wugui - The fight was intense and I finally put my brain to work and setup fraps so here you have it:

Since this knucklefuck can absorb even Snipe (IDK why since that move is non elemental and you know, a bullet to the face) Margo went full DPS on the stretchy Man while Yuri fused into Heaven's Fiend to support the team (with wall of resistance pto ensure he survives two nightmares at 300 hp minimum). Zhuzhen went ahead and played support here since he's kind of useless without offensive magic. The frames dropped at a point and I missed two input which was almost lethal but I took the win there.

I really enjoyed that video, well done ^^

That dungeon is one creepy place with exceptionally tough enemies.

About the pit fights. That's weird. They should be challenging at least to some degree. Some of the enemies remained untouched (mainly the different versions of Wind Shear) but most of them are from the main campaign with the more recent ones being tougher. LiLi is the toughest of the bunch. I did a test run with Zhuzhen and he's only able to beat her after Kowloon (about lvl 27). But I'm pretty sure Yuri is able to beat her at about 22 leveled.

5 hours ago, zedorfed66 said:

I really enjoyed that video, well done ^^

That dungeon is one creepy place with exceptionally tough enemies.

About the pit fights. That's weird. They should be challenging at least to some degree. Some of the enemies remained untouched (mainly the different versions of Wind Shear) but most of them are from the main campaign with the more recent ones being tougher. LiLi is the toughest of the bunch. I did a test run with Zhuzhen and he's only able to beat her after Kowloon (about lvl 27). But I'm pretty sure Yuri is able to beat her at about 22 leveled.

Flash Badge + Iron Clogs: +5-7 levels worth of agility to that character (+10 -12 without Iron Clogs and Golden hourglasses) and  Zhuzhen can spam Corpse Arms and proc paralysis on critical rings (can be done with a coral larial) and those inmune to that can be done with relative ease using Life sucker. Margarete went full 360 no scoope with the above combo and that's all.

Other notes:

- Zhuzhen didnt learn Fire serpent at lvl 32 and Margo didnt grab On Switch at lvl 28. I guess You must reach europe to have those.

- Poor tornado doesnt have any reason to be used at all: Most earth enemies can be killed fast or Margarete can snipe them to death

- I like how acupuncture is pretty much needed to keep up with the damage race...which is why I hate how generic most ítems are (the last interesting weapon was margo's type 94 with the confuse proc).

All of these brings the next question: Can you edit things outside of enemy stats?

21 hours ago, ronlyn said:

Flash Badge + Iron Clogs: +5-7 levels worth of agility to that character (+10 -12 without Iron Clogs and Golden hourglasses) and  Zhuzhen can spam Corpse Arms and proc paralysis on critical rings (can be done with a coral larial) and those inmune to that can be done with relative ease using Life sucker. Margarete went full 360 no scoope with the above combo and that's all.

Other notes:

- Zhuzhen didnt learn Fire serpent at lvl 32 and Margo didnt grab On Switch at lvl 28. I guess You must reach europe to have those.

- Poor tornado doesnt have any reason to be used at all: Most earth enemies can be killed fast or Margarete can snipe them to death

- I like how acupuncture is pretty much needed to keep up with the damage race...which is why I hate how generic most ítems are (the last interesting weapon was margo's type 94 with the confuse proc).

All of these brings the next question: Can you edit things outside of enemy stats?

 

There's tons of little items with effects in Shadow Hearts that i have never even used. Flash Badges happen to be one of them. None of the items should make this mod overly easy since the enemies have dramatically higher stats. And since players need to be pretty much maxed out at the end I wanted to leave options for those who keep having hard time.

I did some other changes than just up the enemy stats. I made the characters learn their 3 last abilities later in the game (multiplied levels by 2). Those that would learn ability at lvl 32 will learn it at lvl 64. I also changed Sandalphon fusion's Revive ability (ring and spell status). These changes are listed in my original post.

I'm not very good at modding these games tbh. Shadow Hearts series is super easy to mod overall. Every value is clear and easily accessible in the game iso. But like I have stated before I prefer to have these games as close to the originals as possible with only game-breaking stuff addressed. I think these games are very well designed overall (even this 1st Shadow Hearts).

On 4/12/2019 at 3:49 PM, zedorfed66 said:

There's tons of little items with effects in Shadow Hearts that i have never even used. Flash Badges happen to be one of them. None of the items should make this mod overly easy since the enemies have dramatically higher stats. And since players need to be pretty much maxed out at the end I wanted to leave options for those who keep having hard time.

I actually support you in this decision if only because agility is one if not the most important stat in this game: Being able to reduce grinding time is quite amazing since most people don't have time or patience to grind like crazy to the level marks you gave there (I still have shivers remembering the time lost in the sewers). 

On 4/12/2019 at 3:49 PM, zedorfed66 said:

I did some other changes than just up the enemy stats. I made the characters learn their 3 last abilities later in the game (multiplied levels by 2). Those that would learn ability at lvl 32 will learn it at lvl 64. I also changed Sandalphon fusion's Revive ability (ring and spell status). These changes are listed in my original post.

@zedorfed66 you REALLY need to pull out a changelog about this stuff since it´s kind of important. And in the topic of spells I can already tell this is going to bite some characters in their ass in the midgame: Alice is fine since now Gospel is arguably the best buff in the game prior to the final fusion and Margo can actually put to use Snipe against mobs since their stats can justify killing them fast before being horribly killed by them. 

Zhuzhen however will arguably sucks even more here than vanilla because his spells are more focused on crowd control and his other half of spells are locked until the endgame (Fury serpent at lvl 62.....after the mental hospital. To make it worse he's locked with some of the worst spells since they don't scale in damage while Halley has access to all his stuff as soon as he joins and only needs to unlock his top nuke spells at endgame which is more appropriated), Nourishing Potion won't be replacing any healer soon with that MP cost and Scirocco Blast is nice but not enough to save him from the bench. I suggest to reschedule his spells to get them early since NOBODY will use him at the final boss (or bonus dungeons) so might as well make him useful before that.

On 4/12/2019 at 3:49 PM, zedorfed66 said:

I'm not very good at modding these games tbh. Shadow Hearts series is super easy to mod overall. Every value is clear and easily accessible in the game iso. But like I have stated before I prefer to have these games as close to the originals as possible with only game-breaking stuff addressed. I think these games are very well designed overall (even this 1st Shadow Hearts).

I know your sentiment but the original is not exactly the best in a lot of things (Like the 324 items to affect the judgement ring with the same use between them. The second game remove those for a reason) and enhancing that experience could potentially bring back this game to the highlights (I'm really amazed this game bombed like it did: FFX was great but this one is on par with it and I LOVE FFX). Hell, if you need help I would like to help you with this.

Leaving this aside, back to the gameplay I finally finish the Asia Section of the game

- Kuihai Tower: Get ready to spend a LONG time here since getting to lvl 38 (I didn't) is quite a slog since the enemies are a threat but you can just buy 99 Thera/Mana seeds and 99 tents since you will have money to throw everywhere at this point. Excellent place to use the pedometer and unlock even the 5000 steps price

- Dehuai:

This fight was a warm up for what it comes: Flash badges ensure the little sage cannot outpace me but still I need to be on the ball since two AoE spells will kill the team. Offensive wise just use Inferno with aqua edge since Margo's damage is lacking and you won't get Bazooka until later

- Yamahara Calamity:

NOW this is a quite enjoyable challenge worth of an end boss: This pal over here is sporting around 7000 hp which means you will be stuck with him for a LOOOOONG time (32 minutes in my case) full of nerve-wrecking decisions. Here's how it went down:

- Everyone's in the back row since going Leroy Jenkins will get you killed fast.

- Yuri with Heaven's Fiend is a must, no questions asked.

- Between Margo and Alice just pick the latter since even if Margo make things go faster, you need to survive multiple AoE attacks and Gospel can help you mitigate a good chunk of damage and even let you go full offensive in a turn.

- Protect against Silence and Petrification ASAP.

After all that, the game strategy was as follow: The first half of the battle I used a hourglass with Yuri and after that Zhuzhen was designated as the time master lobbing those without fail since missing a sacred remedy can cost you the whole thing, Alice went ahead and used Gospel on Zhuzhen and herself in that order to make sure both are always under it's effects (-30% physical and magic damage is quite amazing and the judgement ring for it is one of the most easy in the game).

After all that, it's up to Yamaraha to decide how I will proceed: If he uses Crimson Flame or Shockwave Yuri will pop a sacred remedy and Zhuzhen will toss a life sucker and if he blow someone with a physical combo or petrification Yuri will go with Exorcist arrow followed by Zhuzhen. Alice in the meantime before Gospel runs out will toss seeds like candy since you wanna avoid getting low on SP later in the fight since once he's down to 50% hp he will spam AoE like crazy and you won't be able to hold the fortress so better be prepared beforehand and heal MP/SP when it hits the half mark.

And with this, we're in Europe baby. More later

7 hours ago, ronlyn said:

 

Congrats on beating the Asia section! Cool vids, I gave them likes.

Other than the changes in enemy stats there's no other changes than allies learning their 3 last spells later (levels multiplied by 2) and the change in Sandalphon's Revive skill.

Actually Zhuzhen's 'Corpse Arm' AOE will be useful in his mid-game. I wanted to push the last 3 abilities for endgame since it starts with Alice's Arc and it's way too soon for her to learn it 35 levelled. The ideal level to face Amon in the last storyline dungeon before Float is 70 so I saw this as a clear sign that players should aim to be at that level before facing him. And since the last ability learned is Keith's 'Gift' which he learns at 49 levelled in the original it was clear I wanted to double the level amount. The enemies in Nemeton Underground should prove to be rather difficult so it's only natural to level some to keep up with the game.

In my opinion the different in-battle effect items only add to the gameplay. If they were to be taken off the game would feel more bland. It works in Covenant cause the battle system is more fast paced and interesting. In SH2 you will be using more different buffs and effects in the form of different Crest Magic and Fusions where in SH1 you will be only using the set character abilities and 1 Fusion monster per battle.

I guess Shadow Hearts came a bit under marketed and without a doubt FFX overshadowed it with a heavy hand. I find Shadow Hearts story to be excellent with Yuri as one if not the best characters I've experienced in a videogame.

After playing some more, I can say with confidence that early europe is not that bad....if you enjoy mindless grinding.

- Prague & Bistritz first visit: The forced battle against two birdman is fine and once I got access to the next tier of healing items, spamming magic can be done with more freedom. Still your best bet is to GTFO of all random encounter until the next party member joins since this duo has 70/30 chance of getting killed by random dogs with human hands in their mouths and birds that thanks for reading their bestiary entry won't leave my nightmares (Shadow Hearts knows how to get you scared for sure).

- Blue Castle: Same deal as before until Keith joins the party. He's a welcome addition because I feel more comfortable with his judgement ring, his spells are quite useful and since MP is not a problem with all the money you get tossed in your lap all the time I will drop Hecatoncheire like crazy.

- Tindalos: Poor Kevin doesn't know how fusion works since being a putrid dog wouldn't be my first pick. Since he doesn't go for status effects, I was free to use coral/jade lariats which is nice because this one only think of doing a BBQ with your team and maybe use deathblow to take 75% of your health. Blood Sucker is amazing to avoid losing a turn while healing. 

- Blue Castle's eternal stairs: I just did some cardio here using the pedometer while climbing. Enemies were meh and I'm grateful for that. Farmed until lvl 40 but the boss at the end destroyed my team for a unknown reason (*cough*ZHUZHEN*cough*) so I went back and farmed until lvl 42. 

- Rude Hero: Went into the fight expecting high damage and he didn't disappoint: 450 - 500 to Keith and 360 - 400 to both Alice and Zhuzhen in the back row. Alice big flaw finally starts to appear: Outside of using Gospel and Holy edge, she's just a nuisance and with the new thera roots 300/360 hp healing you for a good chunk of your HP, she's just there filling space and I don't seeing her getting any better until lvl 70 (I would gladly gave up her resurrection spell for a more potent healing spell to keep up with the new damage flying around or maybe let her regain Advent earlier so she can at least do some damage).

-Fox Face: It's more of a interactive story scene than a proper battle. Just make sure to keep your hp above 300 and you're golden

On 6/12/2019 at 12:59 PM, zedorfed66 said:

In my opinion the different in-battle effect items only add to the gameplay. If they were to be taken off the game would feel more bland. It works in Covenant cause the battle system is more fast paced and interesting. In SH2 you will be using more different buffs and effects in the form of different Crest Magic and Fusions where in SH1 you will be only using the set character abilities and 1 Fusion monster per battle.

They would add something to the gameplay if some of them weren't just outright useless since the risk/reward ratio is not worth it (Monkey Paw is rather crummy for what it offers with things like the mind's eye existing , Dice of Caesar has the chance of give a boost to the healer/support and not the your DPS machine and the bronze Arrow/Dagger are superfluous when their party wide equivalent are available rather soon and you won't need them before that).  I would fill chests with those items with seals since after lvl 80 and forward everyone's growths slows down and you will start using those items to bring everyone up to date (Zhuzhen is the only reason I grind all the time: his agility sucks balls and him getting left in the dust is quite aggravating).

On 6/12/2019 at 12:59 PM, zedorfed66 said:

I guess Shadow Hearts came a bit under marketed and without a doubt FFX overshadowed it with a heavy hand. I find Shadow Hearts story to be excellent with Yuri as one if not the best characters I've experienced in a videogame.

This is the understatement of the century: FFX has his moments but this one has been one hell of a ride all the way until now and the gameplay is the only drawback and not by much really

Well done with the ongoing quest for Bacon. I apologize for giving the wrong idea before. There indeed is some grinding suggested to be done in every area. I hope it's not too big of a burden. I wanted to ramp the suggested level for final boss to 99 instead of the 50ish of the original.

Alice is actually very useful in fights cause of her Gospel ability. Without it 'Rudie' will kill your characters with his 3-hit combo if he happens to crit even if you're in the suggested levels. Alice and Zhuzhen should be ok in battles if you have Gospel or some other defensive spell in effect.

The in-battle effect items have the pro you can have their effects without having to equip your characters with additional accessories. You can only have 3 accessories on your characters afterall. I really didn't want to change any of them. Some of them are more useful than others and players can have the freedom to choose what they wanna use.

Sorry for the LONG wait, took a break since grinding takes a tool on your mind after a while.

- Prague's Bathroom: Olga got her ass whopped really easy and the only notable thing about it is that even with a light weakness Alice manages to deal less damage than Yuri using his punches which is kinda sad since you can throw punches forever.

- 2nd Tier fusion monsters: Went ahead and used every opposite level 1 fusion since this is the last time I'm using them. The AI is really dumb in these fight so unless you managed to change that this is just a formality (Charon boosted his special attack and decided to attack me physically next turn and died without tossing a spell)  

- Rouen: Decided to roll with Yuri/Zhuzhen/Keith since this game shoves Alice everywhere and it's nice to not just do that for once. Grinding is easy enough but there's a problem in terms of balance: Yuri and his lvl 2 fusions outright removes any reason to have Zhuzhen in the party at all (High damage, AoE spells, 36 mp per cast vs 55 with Zhuzhen best spell and worse of all, Yuri has access to all the elements which means he can snipe weaknesses). I always say this but let me say it again for enphasis: Shadow Hearts sucks at balancing things and the problem with this mod is that those problems become more pronounced earlier which is sad.

- Olga Round 2:  Decided to record this one because who knows if this is Zhuzhen's last time in the spotlight. Old Flash badges are here to save me some grinding time, Keith goes on the offensive dealing between 320 and 370 damage per turn (if I don't fail the ring), Yuri goes Baldo for healing and 350 - 400 hp damage with nova when he has the chance. Zhuzhen goes support since Corpse Arms does 260 damage with a perfect ring and I need to keep that gold hourglass mojo going.

Gonna take a wild guess and say that the orphanage will crash me into another wall until some grinding is done.

Hey again.

It's fine, just relax and take your time. It's only a game afterall

Yuri is supposed to be like Zhuzhen's big bro in late game. He's basically the number 1 character so he's better than everyone else. This was less of the case in Covenant and you could actually leave him out of the party in that.

Like I stated in my first post I wasn't able to modify the scaling enemies. So basically all Graveyard business is completely the same as in the original, save for Seraphic Radiance (thank god!). I felt a bit anxious for a while for not being able to mod the scalers, but it is what it is.

Character skills are more powerful the later they're learned. Zhuzhen learns 'Corpse Arm' early on so it's powerful at the time he gets it but in comparison is less powerful than Keith's 5th ability since Keith learns 'Hecatoncheire' in way later levels. Some characters in the game are more late-game than others and their abilities are good for different purposes.

35 minutes ago, zedorfed66 said:

Yuri is supposed to be like Zhuzhen's big bro in late game.

Yuri is the Jack of all trades character here and I can accept him being good in a lot of things but the problem is that he's perfect: Even if Alice gets Arc later on I'm gonna make a wild guess and say Yuri will still trump her in the healing department (the daugther of a bishop who spend years in training got hee job robbed by her lover winging it). 

Margo is not in the same train since she got a suprisingly reliable instant kill and Keith has a hp absorb skill which thankfully Yuri doesnt hey access somehow.

Can you change spells? There are single Target versions of the tier 2 spells Yuri use and would be nice to have a protagonist who doesnt invalidate all his companions

1 hour ago, ronlyn said:

Yuri is the Jack of all trades character here and I can accept him being good in a lot of things but the problem is that he's perfect: Even if Alice gets Arc later on I'm gonna make a wild guess and say Yuri will still trump her in the healing department (the daugther of a bishop who spend years in training got hee job robbed by her lover winging it). 

Margo is not in the same train since she got a suprisingly reliable instant kill and Keith has a hp absorb skill which thankfully Yuri doesnt hey access somehow.

Can you change spells? There are single Target versions of the tier 2 spells Yuri use and would be nice to have a protagonist who doesnt invalidate all his companions

Yuri was simply made the star of this show. He would actually best Alice's Arc with his Sandalphon fusion's Revive which would heal and revive everyone to full health. I made a change to that so it no longer heals to full health. He also has group instakill with his 3rd tier Dark and Light fusions so Halley wouldn't be better than him either with his 'Black Hole'. He also has a version of blood suck with his Seraphic Radiance fusion (life steal + group heal). I actually like it this way. There's always Shadow Hearts: Covenant if you want a more balanced Yuri (LOL).

Zhuzhen specializes with his group magic spells and when maxed out has the highest magic defense. Then again he is not as good as Halley in late since he doesn't have group instakill. Halley also has revive to full health which is why he is recommended in the final party with Yuri and Alice.

Short update in terms of gameplay if only because there's a big rant incoming:

- Orphanage: Halley joins the gang and we visit this place, only to find two enemies to grind here and as always, things are kind of boring since Yuri's Flare and Margo's Grenade wipes the floor with everything in sight with the proper equipment. Only Earth soul left to max out.

- Jack: Is quite suprising to find out a dude with a knife and a oedipux complex can murder you faster than a arcane witch but here we are. Yuri goes Ifrit to punch the lights out of him, Halley heals when needed and Margarete is our secondary attacker/healer. He goes down after a few minutes.

- Mammon: Ahhhh the big old bug is back to torment our souls. Yuri switch to Baldo for healing, Halley use air edge on Malkovich and then spam Strong Earth/Healing when needed. Finally, Ms. Zelle goes full barrage on this abomination. Was kind of aggravated by that healing at the end but thankfully it was death a minute later (BTW, for those twelve or so dudes who played Koudelka, here's a nice callback to that game).

- Calios Mental Hospital: Zhuzhen replaces Margo here (I must admit, later on after the whole breakdown I feel both could have switch places and things would have been partially better but not by a lot). Enemies here will destroy you if not careful (Dogs with hands as mouths and ladies with brains in a stick? Those are just for show, the giants bugs are the real deal -_-lll ). First problem here with the grinding: Those Monks Earrings just give a 20% boost in exp which is not a lot and people like Zhuzhen or Keith needs the levels more than anyone to stay relevant. Can you change it so those things give double exp or at least 50%?

This would be the time where I would post about the next two bosses but I must stop there because there's a lot of BS in here: Raussan can be beaten with a lvl 60 team outside of the suggested party, but the last round agains Olga is straight up BS all the way until I left for my sanity: I went with the suggested level and it's pretty clear you didn't test this outside of going in with Yuri/Halley/Alice (or maybe you went in with a different level) because Zhuzhen lags behind too much and the boss gets a turn every two of mine, which wouldn't been so bad if this one wasnt a boss that has only a 25% chance of going against one person while the other 75% of the time will AoE everyone to death since Yuri cannot keep up with Grace, Halley is the only one that can do some damage in a reasonable timeframe (Corpse Arms does 250 - 270 per cast......to a boss which has at minimum more than 10000 hp) and Zhuzhen can help so much before getting nuked along the rest of the party.

And no: If the answer for this is "Bring Alice or die" it's just plain and simple bad choice of your end since I wanna use every party member and the mod should not punish me because of it.

Hey again and Merry Christmas! I hope you had a fun one and nothing else is bothering you save for my troublesome mod here ;P

I tried entering the Arcane fight with Zhuzhen lvl 55 and I can say it could be beaten on those levels but it wouldn't be fun since you would be using all your time playing super duper defensively. I'll be leveling him to 60 and try again just for the sake of the test. Then again I'm wondering why would wouldn't you be using Alice in bosses when she has a perfect kit designed for them? It's like trying to make things harder than they should be. I believe it's canon to try going with Alice anyway since you get extra dialogue before the boss. But yeah I'll be leveling Zhuzhen and seeing how it goes.

1 hour ago, zedorfed66 said:

tried entering the Arcane fight with Zhuzhen lvl 55 and I can say it could be beaten on those levels but it wouldn't be fun since you would be using all your time playing super duper defensively. I'll be leveling him to 60 and try again just for the sake of the test. Then again I'm wondering why would wouldn't you be using Alice in bosses when she has a perfect kit designed for them? It's like trying to make things harder than they should be. I believe it's canon to try going with Alice anyway since you get extra dialogue before the boss. But yeah I'll be leveling Zhuzhen and seeing how it goes.

 I like Ms.Elliot and her kit but there are some glaring problems with her in this mod:

- Her healing is not what it used to be in Europe and can be easily replaced with thera roots

- Like Zhuzhen, her agility really lags behing (at lvl 60 she has 74 and the old man 71)  and like the start of the game, if all enemies decided to rush them after the other two party members do their stuff they will die without a jiff

- Visit the graveyard every four - five fights since getting malice in the red slot is quite fast with the new grinding around gets annoying and I rather avoid that kind of deal when I can (AKA toss her ass into the bench)

- Gospel is only a great deal against bosses but in normal combat she's just garbage in general (even Zhuzhen can contribute a little since he can AoE with his spells) and you deal with more random encounters here than vanilla.

And now, back to the normal schedule:

- Raussan: Went ahead and try out a magical approach by going Dragner using ice breath while Halley do his best with Aqua Blade. Zhuzhen was actually quite amazing here not because of his magic but because he can tank two Blaze without any healing in-between using berserker earrings for more HP. Raussan has a rather simple AI that spam Silence against a poor sap (Halley in this case) and Blaze next turn so getting heal was really easy to manage. 

- Olga Round 3: Ahhh this hellhole of a fight. Had to repeat Raussan whole fight since Halley leaves the team after that and I need him to wear a Flash Badge along the others to ensure Olga doesnt get a lot of turns (without flash badges the turns would go: Olga > Yuri > Halley > Olga > Zhuzhen > Yuri > Olga > Halley > Olga > Zhuzhen, repeat this from 1st Yuri and this is with the whole team at lvl 60). I also took the red herring and exchange Yuri's crucifix with Halley's Warlock earrings to ensure he could top everyone's hp with Grace (Poison was actually a blessing in disguise since losing 25 hp per turn wont kill anyone with 800 hp).

Offensive wise, Halley had to pull Air shot and Yuri could squeeze a Nova every once in a while. Zhuzhen went support and keep up everyone's hp. Another reason why this is better than him going aggresive: Olga's Mind Assault with her new stats can absorb ALL MP from anyone and her priority is the character with the highest MP (Which means the order was Zhuzhen > Halley > Yuri) so avoiding that was an extra weight to this trainwreck of a battle (The second Mind Assault turn wasnt planned: I was 100% bonned if she went ahead and toss a spell at me).

Rest in piss horrible thing, I hope your death was a painful one

Here I am once again, with more feedback:

- Nemeton Monastery: Rolling with Yuri/Alice/Keith since they haven't see the light of the day in weeks. Enemies were really easy to manage with Yuri nuking everything with his fusions spells and Keith cleaning up the floor using his shining, new 100% instant death proc sword Jiru (I fact, I could reliable hit all three hit zones with a flash badge + coral lariat so I went ahead and killed Yuri once he reached lvl 70 so the kids would catch up). Alice as always just sits there and watch the slaugther since she can't do shit with blessed light being a weak light spell and advent stuck at an amazingly rude lvl 96.

- Albert Simon: This fight was so-so and here's why: First Phase is fine and all dandy stuff and I decided to pull Gospel to start the next phase with a good advantage. Amon makes his appearance and demon eyes straight up does 650 - 700 damage to Yuri....with Gospel on him. Next thing I see is the game over screen because the boss take a turn every two turns of mine which is really bad when he decides to use the end twice since Alice won't reach in time to stop him for killing everyone except Yuri after using a Thera extract. Next go I completely disregard Gospel as useless since you either be at full hp for Demon Eyes/The End or you die.

Thank god I decided to bring some Thera Extracts from the silent merchant otherwise Amon would stall the fight and this game punish you for playing defensively with sanity evetually running out. I suggest you reduce Amon's Demon Eyes output to deal 550 - 600 damage once Gospel is on the table so the player isn't forced to pop out a Thera extract to avoid a KO and that spell has an actual use in that battle (You could argue that I must have alot of unused step to buy more of those but you should not wall the player with this kind of stuff since you can get the final tier of restoring items legitimately AFTER defeating Amon).

I will edit this later since I'm gonna suggest a new spell list because it's really dumb to have characters like Alice suck this much with this new difficulty.

EDIT: As promised here's a new list of spells for everyone except Yuri now that the only thing left are the final dungeon and the bonus dungeons:

Ms.Elliot is quite amazing in the first half with the game actually encouraging the use of her spells. Once Europe rolls in however she goes from hero to zero in a hurry with her only offensive spell not doing enough numbers and her healing being outpaced by the third tier of restorative items in hand. Getting Advent inbetween The orphanage and the mental hospital let her contribute in the random battles by doing a good amount of damage and this is counter balanced by the fact she will always go after the enemy roster which means she needs to survive the enemy outslaught before firing the spell at all. The mp cost means she won't be using it in a boss battle since she got more important things to do like protecting the party with gospel or healing. Arc remains the same and Resurrection was put last since by that point you start to need full hp revives.

The old man has the 2nd best crow control after Yuri which means he needs his spells earlier than anyone. Getting Fury Serpent after dealing with Mammon means he can be used against Raussan in the mental hospital and do some real damage along Halley while Yuri takes care of the healing. Thunder Roar helps a lot in nemeton against the enemy encounters there since none of them resist the spell (and Inverse is actually weak against it). His final spell is gotten earlier than anyone in the party to ensure the old man has a edge in the cave temple. The real drawback of him is that after that he starts declining into the bench since the rest of the gang gets better toys than him and magic is easily outclassed by physical damage any day.

Not a lot of changes for Margarete: On Switch and Snipe can carry her from most of the mid game and I put her last two spells earlier to ensure she can actually use them before becoming an item bot for Yuri

The biggest changes are for our dracula expy here. I don't really remember having problems in neither The Blue Castle or Rouen because I just nuked everything with Hecatoncheire and Corpse Arms. Pushing the former for later means you cannot just wing it in there and can actually make wise use of Larva to shut down the most dangerous enemy in the screen. Apsaras and Gift are just there so no reasoning from moving those further outside of me being fancy.

Finally, Halley is basically a magical Yuri with no fusion to rely on so of course he outclass every other mage in the team. Not anymore: All his spell were moved further into the endgame to make sure you have to choose between a early screen clearer (Zhuzhen) or a Late bloomer (Halley).

This is my take on the case of these poor saps being quite disjointed with the new difficulty curve. 

Happy New Year everyone, I'm back with more feedback:

- Dollhouse: Before setting foot there, I went ahead and looted every single location with side-quests outside of the bonus dungeons and changed a good chuck of my lottery tickets for seals of speed so the team wasn't filled by three decent characters, two garbage party members who can barely stand on their two legs and the almighty god that is Yuri ( and Alice wasn't in the first group if you wanna know). This place is amazing for going in and deal with the enemies which are quite challenging but please don't grind here, 6000 extra xp per fight doesnt excuse the +400 extra hp the enemies in this place are sporting, go to the neameton catacombs instead.

Orb Chaos: I love this fight which is something really refreshing after having all these badly design bosses lately. The thing will start the battle buffing himself with two random buffs and while this happens you better make sure to pop out Gospel and whatever buff you want since the next 4-5 turns this baby will kick the crap out of you and missing a heal means death. After that he goes back to rebuff himself so your best tactic is to ensure you have a nice damage output all the time (even if it means leaving someone eating dirt for a turn or two) to end this as soon as possible.

The masks: Okay, IDK what happen in here but poor Grail Mask got screw in the buff department because holy cow that poor thing died way too fast. Other than this peculiar thing, the other three masks are quite challenging and worth of being optional because you're getting kicked around if you come here below lvl 75 (And even then just watch the videos).

Atman (Good Ending): This fight was the dullest thing I have ever experienced in this mod. A will power + crucifix will ensure that Alice doesn't get tagged with some nasty stuff (even by his rather hilarious special move with really clunky CGI) and the dumb thing doesn't use AoE spells enough to avoid a messy death by Demon Lasers to the face. A sad thing since I was expecting a better thing after the masks. Alas, another one to the pile I guess

Happy new year to you too!

I tried getting Grail stronger but I just couldn't. I guess he's designed to be a pushover compared to the others. He can still be a challenging one "non-Grailed" (he can be beaten right after you get Yuri back if I recall).

You are a very critical type. I guess we are kinda the opposites. But I still try to take all your negatives as advice and see if there's something to update. However I made so sure I had pretty much everything settled when I released this I haven't encountered anything I'd like to change based on your feedback. I don't like changing the ability orders or the character stats or anything like that. I don't intend to make mods like that. I stand by my opinion that this game is well balanced even after the changes I've made to the enemies. But yeah that's just my opinion. Imo it's clever to have characters with power and ability differences.

7 hours ago, zedorfed66 said:

Happy new year to you too!

I tried getting Grail stronger but I just couldn't. I guess he's designed to be a pushover compared to the others. He can still be a challenging one "non-Grailed" (he can be beaten right after you get Yuri back if I recall).

Well, I guess it's more a thing of the game being hard-coded into him becoming useless for the sake of story

7 hours ago, zedorfed66 said:

You are a very critical type. I guess we are kinda the opposites. But I still try to take all your negatives as advice and see if there's something to update. However I made so sure I had pretty much everything settled when I released this I haven't encountered anything I'd like to change based on your feedback. I don't like changing the ability orders or the character stats or anything like that. I don't intend to make mods like that.

I guess several years dealing with people (and mods) where feedback just get ignored does that to you. In terms of the spells it's more of a thing about progress and keeping things fresh: You don't get anything new until the endgame basically and if the battles are tiresome, it's even more boring doing the same things again and again (Even Yuri gets hit by this since the game doesn't do a good job showing off his fusions since the fire/light/dark element fusions are the way to go until Amon/Seraphic Radiance are a thing. Water/Earth/Wind are there for show and I try my best to avoid that situation).

On the characters stats I do admit I was very harsh on that one since you can use all the seals gotten until now (including those for malice clearing rewards) and spend all you tickets in Europe on seals from the get-got to solve many of my complains immediately (In fact, I got a notepad with all the seals I used to accomplish that. Will put that on the next update).

7 hours ago, zedorfed66 said:

I stand by my opinion that this game is well balanced even after the changes I've made to the enemies. But yeah that's just my opinion. Imo it's clever to have characters with power and ability differences.

The problem is that you don't get to play with the other half of the party members unique abilities until they are easily forgettable (Alice's Advent wasn't exactly of much used in the vanilla game less here when you get it at the very end, Zhuzhen spells are what makes the character anything outside of just a worse item bot, Margarete & Keith are fine since they can instant kill stuff and that won't get old in this mod and Halley is generally the best spell caster only because he comes with a whole array of elemental spells).

Ok, here I am with A LOT of stuff so let's go:

After the last boss, I went ahead and invest every single ticket I got outside of those to unlock the final lottery into seals to reduce any grinding outside of getting everyone on the same levels. Here are the results:

(To be clear, I only used seals on Margarete, Keith and Halley because I'm kind of perfectionist but outside of that, just count the absurd amounts of seals to ensure both Zhuzhen and Alice weren't left in the dust by the rest of the gang. I guess now I know why you suggest Halley since he's a Magic Yuri without any of the drawbacks of his fellow magic users).

- The Float: Since this place was designed around the idea of going back and forth between this place and the bonus dungeons the difficulty of the random encounter goes from "reasonable" to "hellish" if you dare to go further after killing a boss...or at least it's supposed to be like that, the reality is that these encounters are the best EXP farming place you will ever found since if you try to do the same on the bonus dungeons you will get smashed for just 4000-5000 more exp which is not worth two extra turns of fighting per encounter (and you will fight A LOT).

- Soul Block: Light element boss means Czernobog and Zhuzhen are on the case. One particular thing I found and abused in this battle is the little quirk about revived party members: If you wait until the next round and revive the death one with your second character (Example: Zhuzhen dies, we don't revive him immediately but next turn before the boss act), said party member gets his turn before the boss and can heal himself to avoid death. It's kind of nice to know these little things wherever in the original the poor eldritch abomination was death at the fifth turn.   

- Cherubim: Since the darn thing absorb any kind of magic damage, I dusted Forron out of his retirement and both him and Malkovich went ham on his ass with Ms.Elliot on her invariable spot as healer. I'm grateful about him not being a slog since his dynamic was plain bad.

Hate: This boss was the perfect example of this mod's new spell list: Yuri cannot longer patch up everyone to full without use of a warlock ring, which would have been the perfect opportunity to use Advent since Yuri is fast enough to not have need for a Flash Badge and use the small jug/seven eyes mask/crucifix combo to reduce  the magical damage received along Sanctuary (+30% M.defense) while our white mage does the DPS....if Alice didn't learn that thing at lvl 96. So yeah...let's once again throw her white rear into the support role and never let her do something else unlike the rest of the cast (The last time she used Blessed Light and mean something was waaaay back with Li Li, Here? Not worth the effort).

Seraphim: This boss was dope. I almost got wiped at the end but I managed to survive and take the win (even with the fatal framedrop that happens because of his low-res rainbow spell). Tried out Halley here and got pretty pissed because the boss somehow can avoid a darn black hole (Really, I can understand bosses with physical evasion since those are free, but dodging a magic spell means you didn't only lose that character's turn but also the mana expended. Double Whammy since you also need more effort to ensure the move hit at the critical spot for max damage) so Ms.Gertrude went in to double tap that meaty boy. But the real MVP was Alice with her new vitality from seals who's capable of tank a turn of physical punishment.

Seraphic Radiance: This battle is basically a stat check for Yuri - He needs at least 850 hp and enough defenses to take 400 damage per turn to avoid getting himself into a healing cycle until he runs out of items. First phase is Old Ben Hyuga punching you in the face for 250 hp per turn, like any loving parent would. Since magic is kind of hard to keep on in the 2nd phase I went ahead and busted Demon Rays until he switched into the bronze soul himself. In the 2nd phase I decided to pop some third keys to both reduce the tedium and time spend on this battle (One could argue I just chicken out but on the other hand, I didn't had to deal with 20+ minutes of a slog since if you meet the requirement at the beginning you won't die unless you miss the healing ring and seraphic radiance doesn't bother with status effects so no deep strats outside of walling on it until death).

Only three bosses before the end of this mod

Hey. Great vids as usual. Thanks for updating your progress on my mod here at every turn. i really appreciate it.

Don't worry about using Third Keys, it's not chickening out or anything. Especially in late game it's more than fair to use them. I was thinking about that Cherubim boss. He went down very quickly. And I mean VERY. I lowered his HP from 10 000 to 7500 since I thought it took a bit too long to beat him, but I might have to fight him again to see if changing back to the original hp would be better. Another thing I noticed is he's supposed to use 'Divine Punishment' just like Seraphim after him. I guess you just got lucky there lol. I gotta do some testing when I'm in the mood for it.

I guess in the original players pass level 50 before entering the final stages so characters have learned their final abilities already. I've been thinking about making the 3 last abilities learnable a bit sooner than before. Yes, I guess you're right about the characters learning the 3 last abilities a bit too late. Thanks for the food for thought. This is how you change things  I've been trying different things and I thought making characters learn their 3 last abilities 'x1.8' times later instead of 'x2' would be perfect. So Alice would learn Arc 63 levelled instead of 70. It's too harsh to force players to be 70 levelled before facing Amon (and unnecessary). And the first final ability would be Margarete's 'Divine Bomber' and she would learn it 83 levelled. The very last character ability is Keith's 'Gift' and he would learn it 88 levelled.

Hey Ronlyn, I hope you read this before continuing with the mod. I just updated to v1.1. Now the characters learn their 3 last abilities sooner as I mentioned in my previous message. So go grab my newest patch asap!

Same to all you other Rude Heroes out there, go get v1.1 if you feel like it.

-Zed

6 hours ago, zedorfed66 said:

Hey. Great vids as usual. Thanks for updating your progress on my mod here at every turn. i really appreciate it.

Don't worry about using Third Keys, it's not chickening out or anything. Especially in late game it's more than fair to use them. I was thinking about that Cherubim boss. He went down very quickly. And I mean VERY. I lowered his HP from 10 000 to 7500 since I thought it took a bit too long to beat him, but I might have to fight him again to see if changing back to the original hp would be better. Another thing I noticed is he's supposed to use 'Divine Punishment' just like Seraphim after him. I guess you just got lucky there lol. I gotta do some testing when I'm in the mood for it.

I guess in the original players pass level 50 before entering the final stages so characters have learned their final abilities already. I've been thinking about making the 3 last abilities learnable a bit sooner than before. Yes, I guess you're right about the characters learning the 3 last abilities a bit too late. Thanks for the food for thought. This is how you change things  I've been trying different things and I thought making characters learn their 3 last abilities 'x1.8' times later instead of 'x2' would be perfect. So Alice would learn Arc 63 levelled instead of 70. It's too harsh to force players to be 70 levelled before facing Amon (and unnecessary). And the first final ability would be Margarete's 'Divine Bomber' and she would learn it 83 levelled. The very last character ability is Keith's 'Gift' and he would learn it 88 levelled.

5 hours ago, zedorfed66 said:

Hey Ronlyn, I hope you read this before continuing with the mod. I just updated to v1.1. Now the characters learn their 3 last abilities sooner as I mentioned in my previous message. So go grab my newest patch asap!

Same to all you other Rude Heroes out there, go get v1.1 if you feel like it.

-Zed

Good to know I made a change even if a small one. so... with the new spell list we would have this:

                  ============================
Alice Elliot
============================
Spell           Effect                MP    Level Learned

Cure            Heals small amount     6    initial spell
of HP (one)
Holy Edge       Adds Light class to    8          7
P-atk (one)
Blessed Light   Light class damage    22         11
(one)
Wish            Cure all statuses     15         21
(one)
Gospel          Raise allies' P-def   40         28
and S-def 30% (one)
Arc             Fully restore HP      80         63
(all)
Resurrection    Revive w/ full HP     65         73
(one)
Advent          Great Light damage    120        86
(all)
                 =========================
                        Zhuzhen Liu 
                 =========================

Spell           Effect                MP    Level Learned

Ogre Flamedance Fire Class damage     15    initial spell
(all)
Scirocco Blast  Adds Fire Class to     8          7
P-atk (one)
Nourishing      Restore HP + Cure     35          12
Potion          paralysis (one)
Life Sucker     Dark Class attack     30          17
+ Silence (one)
Corpse Arm      Earth Class attack    55          23
+ paralyze (all)
Fury Serpent    Water Class attack    70          55
(all)
Thunder Roar    Wind Class attack     90          70
(all)
Flames of Fudo  Fire Class attack     120         84
(all)
                ================================
                       Margarete G. Zelle 
                ================================

Spell           Effect                MP    Level Learned

Grenade         Water Class attack    20    initial spell
(all)
Aqua Edge       Adds Water Class to    8    initial spell
P-atk (one)
Scout           Reveal enemy stats     1         13
Snipe           Non-class attack      38         19
(one)
Pain Killer     Cure all status       20         22
ailments (one)
On Switch       Non-class S-atk       65         50
(one)
Bazooka         Water Class attack    95         68
(all)
Diving Bomber   Fire Class attack     120        83
(all)
                ===============================
                        Keith Valentine 
                ===============================

Spell           Effect                MP    Level Learned

Drain Touch     Dark Class attack +   15    initial spell
Drain some HP (one)
Earth Edge      Adds Earth Class to    8    initial spell
P-atk (one)
Bat Dance       Wind Class attack     33    initial spell
(all)
Blood Sucker    Dark Class attack +   54    initial spell
Drain HP (one)
Hecatoncheire   Earth Class attack    70    initial spell
(all)
Apsaras         Water Class attack    80         66
(all) + Cure Status
(all)
Larva           Earth Class attack    96         77
+ psn/para/silence (one)
Gift            Dark Class attack     120        88
(all)
                 =============================
                        Halley Brancket 
                 =============================

Spell           Effect                MP    Level Learned

Healing         Restore HP (one)      20    initial spell
Air Edge        Add Wind Class to      8    initial spell
P-atk (one)
Strong Earth    Earth Class attack +  40    initial spell
petrify (one)
Aqua Blade      Water Class attack +  50    initial spell
poison (one)
Air Shot        Wind Class attack +   60    initial spell
confusion  (one)
Black Hole      Dark Class attack +   75          65
Death (all)
Reviver         Revive with full HP   65          75
Shock Max       Non-Class attack      120         85

I love it: Now you can get all the things between dealing with sidequests and farming for the bosses inside The Float. In fact, your timing was so perfect that I decided to screw the plans I had with The Messiah (First Final Boss) and do it another way to ensure Alice get the spotlight with her shiny new spell.

Stay tuned, I'm posting footage about the encounters on the bonus dungeons and the endgame soon.

Ok, another quick update on the mod. v1.2 Changes Olga 3's agility value from 156 to 130 (turning the sketchy Beach more into mainstream). I also tested the Cherubim battle, however the boss seemed fine with 7500 HP so I didn't touch that. I wouldn't be surprised if there was nothing else to change tbh. I made sure v1.0 had pretty much everything covered.

AAAAAAAAAND DONE!!! Here's some feedback for the finale:

- Pit Fights: Halley went for his ultimate armor and I must say, you're coming to this place after dealing with seraphic radiance since that diamond ring really helps against the mobs here (maybe not against mammon as much but the rest get cockblocked by it).

- Scapegoat: My god this thing is annoying with his ability to dodge anything from the 3rd party member (Yuri for some reason never miss his spells now that I think of it. Weird). This is the last time Halley will see the light of day since the final bosses needs a specific setup and he's kind of ruin it

Messiah: since v1.2 is a thing now, I went ahead and grind until everyone hits lvl 86 for comparison sake and because of Advent (could have gone lvl 88 but there's no reason to farm for a ultimate skill for a character with little use for it). Albert´s new pokemon is quite annoying since we cannot brute force the thing and bypass his really dangerous 2nd phase, so healing must be a thing all the time and sadly Halley don't make the donuts here (Alice needs to get her turn 2nd and Halley/Margarete are two points faster than her thus unusable) so the options are Zhuzhen and Keith and the last one can tank stuff with his high HP and doesn't need a berserk earring to have more than 800 hp thus can use that accessory to boost his defenses. 

I decided to test Seraphic Radiance before the finale and I discover something horrible: For Tomorrow boost every single attribute by 30/36% including speed, which has the same effect as equipping a flash badge, meaning the judgement ring will go balls fast and that's kind of bad when you need precision for some moves, so yeah...good thing I died at some point to erase that thing.

Meta God: Final boss here, and he needs a real strategy to not find yourself dealing with Albert once again. The abyss spells are AoE elemental spells of each kind that does good chunks of damage and needs to be tank with the ultimate armors yes or yes, Judgement Time not only deal damage but also deletes mp which is really bad when Yuri is the secondary healer and his mp is on the low side and nine springs/physical attacks are just a free turn for everyone.

Turn wise, Yuri will use the stack of third keys I got here to deal around 1150 per turn (2280 - 2300 with a moon swallow added) and use For the Children when Alice in unavailable for Arc, Alice will do her job and Keith is just there to provide item support either healing MP/SP and toss Moon swallows to accelerate things. A good battle overall and it doesnt feel like I cheese it with the items used here. 

I will put a review of my whole ordeal later. For now I need to test some other things

Congrats on beating the mod!!!

Those characters with less than half the agility of a boss tend to miss their abilities and basics a lot of times. So it simply has to do with agility values. And yeah Seraphic's boost does horrible things. Need to have something to reduce judgement speed if you decide to use it.

Awesome work! I have just started playing with this mod, so far so good.

I started a lets play and wrote about it on my blog

https://shadowheartsorigins.blogspot.com/2020/05/shadow-hearts-ps2-lets-play-with.html

will be posting weekly videos and will write a written review / summary for each section.

Sadly no commentary in the video but I will maybe make a video review summary once I beat the game.

Thanks again!

3 hours ago, ScottyTheVideoGamer said:

Awesome work! I have just started playing with this mod, so far so good.

I started a lets play and wrote about it on my blog

https://shadowheartsorigins.blogspot.com/2020/05/shadow-hearts-ps2-lets-play-with.html

will be posting weekly videos and will write a written review / summary for each section.

Sadly no commentary in the video but I will maybe make a video review summary once I beat the game.

Thanks again!

 

Hey thanks a lot! Hope you'll have great time

Shadow Hearts PS2 Lets Play With Imbroglio Difficulty Mod Part 2 (Zhaoyang Village)

Video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3BEnTGZP1is

Blog:

https://shadowheartsorigins.blogspot.com/2020/05/shadow-hearts-ps2-lets-play-with_27.html

Hope you all enjoy watching! This was where things started to get tuff!

23 hours ago, ScottyTheVideoGamer said:

Shadow Hearts PS2 Lets Play With Imbroglio Difficulty Mod Part 2 (Zhaoyang Village)

Video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3BEnTGZP1is

Blog:

https://shadowheartsorigins.blogspot.com/2020/05/shadow-hearts-ps2-lets-play-with_27.html

Hope you all enjoy watching! This was where things started to get tuff!

Hey, thanks a lot for these videos. I hope you're doing well in life right now with the pandemia going on. I wish these games would only have positive effect on people and that they wouldn't curse at my mod for being annoying or too hard. I primarily make these mods the way I enjoy playing these games myself. 

I watched your video and your emphasis on playing extra safe caught my attention. That works well in bosses in general (you did really well in Felinus & Yamaraja) but may result in deaths in normal encounters where you should be playing more aggressively in encounters where you need to take care of the enemies fast. It also saves time to take care of the normal encounters faster since you'll be fighting a lot. You could try using Yuri's fusion magic as it has great effect on certain enemies. For example you could've one shot either the Zombie or Green Flyer enemies with the Earth element's (Flying Stones was it?) magic. I noticed you got better hang of hitting perfects with Zhuzhen's magic later on in the video so great props for that ^^. Also the Malice lowering fights grant you items if you do them before the door has opened (red Malice level).

I love this mod so far and I felt like to have this is perfect for the SH series. It feels pretty professional.

My only real dislike for the series in general was that it can be too easy and this mod certainly fixes that.

From where stats etc.... to even what items or tactics used didn't overly matter (unless speedrunning/rushing through).

But now it does on all levels what fusion, items, formation, equipment and tactics everything matters now.

There was a slight learning curve from having beaten the game multiple times to having to adapt to this mod rather than using what was quick and easy normally.

Also slight adaption to playing it on pcsx2 first time whereas before always played on original ps2 or ps3. Took a bit to improve the timings of the judgement ring.

I have almost finished Asia will have a lot of footage to organise but I feel like I have grown.

I really enjoyed the boss in Dalian and li li on the boat and as I go in further in the game the tactics continue to be even more important.

One question is it possible to disable getting ambushed? because I kind of feel like it is not as needed because from my experience it either happens early into an area when I'm grinding/going through which is like an automatic gameover and when it happens later it feels like i just saved less than a minute ago might as well reset. 

anyways i really hope you keep up the great work enjoying sh1 and i look forward to covenant with the patch afterwards! 

3 hours ago, ScottyTheVideoGamer said:

I love this mod so far and I felt like to have this is perfect for the SH series. It feels pretty professional.

My only real dislike for the series in general was that it can be too easy and this mod certainly fixes that.

From where stats etc.... to even what items or tactics used didn't overly matter (unless speedrunning/rushing through).

But now it does on all levels what fusion, items, formation, equipment and tactics everything matters now.

There was a slight learning curve from having beaten the game multiple times to having to adapt to this mod rather than using what was quick and easy normally.

Also slight adaption to playing it on pcsx2 first time whereas before always played on original ps2 or ps3. Took a bit to improve the timings of the judgement ring.

I have almost finished Asia will have a lot of footage to organise but I feel like I have grown.

I really enjoyed the boss in Dalian and li li on the boat and as I go in further in the game the tactics continue to be even more important.

 

One question is it possible to disable getting ambushed? because I kind of feel like it is not as needed because from my experience it either happens early into an area when I'm grinding/going through which is like an automatic gameover and when it happens later it feels like i just saved less than a minute ago might as well reset. 

 

anyways i really hope you keep up the great work enjoying sh1 and i look forward to covenant with the patch afterwards! 

Hey again. i hope your weekend's been going well. I'm glad you're liking my mod in most areas. There's some learning to do with this mod for sure. I had to relearn the game myself and especially Covenant which has lots of customization in different ways. I know the back attacks can feel tedious and I'm sorry about that. In Covenant and FtNW there's an item that prevents ambushes which is called "Warning Device". I'm pretty sure it's in 1st Shadow Hearts too but I'm not 100% sure. I hope you enjoy playing through the rest of my mod.

Anything in life can provide an opportunity, I certainly wouldn't have gotten so far so soon in SH1 with the mod, I'm up to Kowloon Fortress (just leveling up a bit pre boss)

There is the warning device in SH1 although if not mistaken you get that quite late in the game, would there be any way to move it earlier into a chest or shop? Because I think it would give the mod that extra bit of accessibility to players in general where it becomes more the player responsibility of doing well. Granted I know I probably got quite unlucky early on especially in Zhaoyang with the back attacks. It didn't bother me that much and it has happened much less since. Although I felt that it could have turned away other players, where I really think that this mod deserves to be played much more.

It is a different experience now, I am even items like B. Tortoise Fang, Gold Hourglass and i even equipped the Flash Badge for a boss fight. Things I never really did while playing normally and its nice experimenting with items and equipment that never really gets used during a normal play through.

22 hours ago, ScottyTheVideoGamer said:

Anything in life can provide an opportunity, I certainly wouldn't have gotten so far so soon in SH1 with the mod, I'm up to Kowloon Fortress (just leveling up a bit pre boss)

 

There is the warning device in SH1 although if not mistaken you get that quite late in the game, would there be any way to move it earlier into a chest or shop? Because I think it would give the mod that extra bit of accessibility to players in general where it becomes more the player responsibility of doing well. Granted I know I probably got quite unlucky early on especially in Zhaoyang with the back attacks. It didn't bother me that much and it has happened much less since. Although I felt that it could have turned away other players, where I really think that this mod deserves to be played much more.

 

It is a different experience now, I am even items like B. Tortoise Fang, Gold Hourglass and i even equipped the Flash Badge for a boss fight. Things I never really did while playing normally and its nice experimenting with items and equipment that never really gets used during a normal play through.

I don't personally like the idea of changing the point where you get the Warning Device. I think the back attacks are important part of the game and I haven't had much trouble with them. I'm glad you like to experiment with the items and such. And I hope you enjoy the rest of the mod. I've updated this mod to version 1.3 btw. That is a small agl fix for the enemies, check my message below to find out more.

Hey guys,

I've updated this mod to v1.3. This is a small agility value update for enemies with (x 1.55 + 1) form. Now these enemies' agl values go with x 1.6 multiplier instead. This changes the values so some enemies are less agile, some a bit more and some remain the same. I did some more testing and this is what I wanted to do.

I want to thank all of you for playing through my mods. See ya!

Shadow Hearts PS2 Lets Play With Imbroglio Difficulty Mod Part 3 (Fengtian)

Video:

Blog: https://shadowheartsorigins.blogspot.com/2020/06/shadow-hearts-ps2-lets-play-with.html

I also do various posts about Shadow Hearts in general in case if anyone is interested and today I have updated an old post on my blog where I talked about what ideas for games that I have for Shadow Hearts if it ever makes a comeback you can find it there: https://shadowheartsorigins.blogspot.com/2020/04/what-i-would-like-to-see-for-shadow.html 

Enjoy!

18 hours ago, zedorfed66 said:

Hey guys,

I've updated this mod to v1.3. This is a small agility value update for enemies with (x 1.55 + 1) form. Now these enemies' agl values go with x 1.6 multiplier instead. This changes the values so some enemies are less agile, some a bit more and some remain the same. I did some more testing and this is what I wanted to do.

I want to thank all of you for playing through my mods. See ya!

Cool! I will try it out probably after finishing Asia part as I am in Kuihai Tower at the moment. 

Keep it up!

Great thanks for these vids. They are funny and it's interesting to see how you tackle my mod ^^

Just wondering after beating Dehuai there is no way back to Shanghai correct? Forgot to do a couple of things in SHanghai although if its not possible it doesn't matter too much.

Granted I have been playing through the game with a couple of notes rather than a guide

anyways it is going well hope to beat asia part soon then onto europe then i'll have a lot of footage to organise!

On 7.6.2020 at 6:15 PM, ScottyTheVideoGamer said:

Just wondering after beating Dehuai there is no way back to Shanghai correct? Forgot to do a couple of things in SHanghai although if its not possible it doesn't matter too much.

Granted I have been playing through the game with a couple of notes rather than a guide

anyways it is going well hope to beat asia part soon then onto europe then i'll have a lot of footage to organise!

Yes that's true. Once you leave Asia there's no way back at any point. So make sure to grab the Erotic Book from Kuihai Yower so u can get Seraphic Radiance and also do the Pitfights if you want to do them. Good luck with the videos and rest of the mod.

23 hours ago, ScottyTheVideoGamer said:

Hey thanks for another great video!

I read your blog post about the inconsisties of the experience rates in battles. In these Shadow Hearts mods some areas give more exp than others for a reason. For example in the sewer dungeon you needed to gain 7 levels to be in the recommended levels for the start of the next area. While in Dalian you only need to farm 2 levels. This is why Fengtian sewers give 3x the og exp while Dalian 2x. And the recommended levels are not something I've made up from my head but are from the code based on the agility levels of the characters. And since the exp increase in battles is forced and something I wouldn't add if it wasn't required I don't up the exp gained from bosses as it is. It also helps in keeping players from gaining too much exp in one battle and also doesn't enforce the thought of having to have all party members alive before making the finishing blow.

This is my reasoning and the design choice i chose for the 3 Shadow Hearts games. Looking forward to your next video btw, and I liked all of your videos on youtube ^^.

Awesome thanks very much for your likes very much appreciated.

I was conflicted with the exp because i see what you were doing and i thought that, it was sense of reward it felt strange at first. Honestly I don't mind as much now.

Still loving the mod anyways, thanks for your save it helped for that 10 mins i forgot to record was able to get the team equipment etc... almost identical so at least it wont look too strange.

I am actually doing final sidequests etc... beat albert simon earlier today, on course for good ending also, I may either combine parts or upload more frequent once i beat the game, i have a lot of footage to go through!

1 hour ago, ScottyTheVideoGamer said:

Awesome thanks very much for your likes very much appreciated.

I was conflicted with the exp because i see what you were doing and i thought that, it was sense of reward it felt strange at first. Honestly I don't mind as much now.

Still loving the mod anyways, thanks for your save it helped for that 10 mins i forgot to record was able to get the team equipment etc... almost identical so at least it wont look too strange.

I am actually doing final sidequests etc... beat albert simon earlier today, on course for good ending also, I may either combine parts or upload more frequent once i beat the game, i have a lot of footage to go through!

 

Hey thanks for another video! So you're that far already  I hope you've had fun time playing through this mod.

Have beaten the mod but since had issues with my editing software XD. Was using shotcut but it kept crashing no matter what all of a sudden and now I'm trying olive so hopefully I can resume uploading this week..

Really enjoyed the mod, it brought a fresh new experience for Shadow Hearts

Anyways how do you play covenant with pcsx2 if so what settings?

Thanks

On 30.6.2020 at 7:43 PM, ScottyTheVideoGamer said:

Have beaten the mod but since had issues with my editing software XD. Was using shotcut but it kept crashing no matter what all of a sudden and now I'm trying olive so hopefully I can resume uploading this week..

Really enjoyed the mod, it brought a fresh new experience for Shadow Hearts

Anyways how do you play covenant with pcsx2 if so what settings?

Thanks

Hey again.

I'm glad you enjoyed my mod. For Covenant you'll want to be using hardware option for the video plugin and then you should be pretty much set. You'll also be wanting to have the last options in Round Mode and Clamping Mode in EE/IOP and VUs in Video Core GS Settings. Then again this is pretty much the standard for most games. There are some earlier versions of PCSX2 that make the game freeze after fights but in some the game works like a dream. Haven't tried the newest version of PCSX2 but it might work well with that one too. I've been playing the game with v1.2.1 and in that there shouldn't be any crashes. Then again I keep getting stuck in the past and don't have patience to test new things. So the newest version might be the best.

Mr. Zerdorf,

Your mod looks interesting! I have looked a couple times over the years for the enemy data for the Shadows Hearts games in the US-NTSC iso and never had much luck making any sense of it (though me Hex-Fu ain't great).  Where did you find/make sense of the enemy stats?

2 hours ago, tacticalcraptical said:

Mr. Zerdorf,

Your mod looks interesting! I have looked a couple times over the years for the enemy data for the Shadows Hearts games in the US-NTSC iso and never had much luck making any sense of it (though me Hex-Fu ain't great).  Where did you find/make sense of the enemy stats?

Hey tacticalcraptical.

I hope you've kept yourself safe and that you're having a good day.

I'll try to help you understand how the enemy stats are stored in Shadow Hearts NTSC-U. Let's look at 'Yamaraja: Earth', the final boss of Zhaoyang village.

The enemy values associated with the boss start at address B38244EA. Here's what comes up:

_________________________________________________________________________________________________________

2C 01 90 01 11 12 3C 00 1D 00 12 00 12 00 00 00

2C 01 - HP value which is 300 here.

90 01 - MP value which is 400.

11 12 - 11 being the agility value which is 17 and I forgot what 12 was for.

3C 00 - Strength value which in this case is 60.

1D 00 - Magic value which is 29 here.

12 00 - Defense value (18)

00 00 - Magic def value (0)

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________

This stuff is often differently stored in other games so you'll need to do some research before you'll be able to figure out how and where the data is stored. You can for example use Cheat Engine to figure out how much health enemies have and possibly find out other stats too. Then search for the values with hex editor. This data is stored as hex values so you'll need to convert them to hexa from decimals. You can use windows calculator to do this. One thing to note is the data is stored "upside down". 256 in decimals is 100 in hexa and it's stored as 00 01 instead of 01 00.

This is great, thank you for the explanation.  I am looking into trying to learn some hexidecimal editing. So is this found in just opening the straight ISO with a hex editor or a specific file within the ISO?

4 hours ago, tacticalcraptical said:

This is great, thank you for the explanation.  I am looking into trying to learn some hexidecimal editing. So is this found in just opening the straight ISO with a hex editor or a specific file within the ISO?

Hey, no probs. Shadow Hearts is one of those games that are very easy to mod. Just access the image file directly using a hex editor.

Hello again, I am playing the mod and I am just past the Mental Hospital and on level 56. I have noticed that I do not have some of the skills that it seems like I should have and I have skills that it seems like I shouldn't based in the list you posted on the previous page of this thread.  Did the levels the characters learn skills at change at some point?  Do you have a more up to date list if so?

Thanks!

17 hours ago, tacticalcraptical said:

Hello again, I am playing the mod and I am just past the Mental Hospital and on level 56. I have noticed that I do not have some of the skills that it seems like I should have and I have skills that it seems like I shouldn't based in the list you posted on the previous page of this thread.  Did the levels the characters learn skills at change at some point?  Do you have a more up to date list if so?

Thanks!

What abilities do your characters have? This mod changes the levels the last 3 skills are obtained. The last 3 skills are obtained x 1.8 of their original levels. So for example Alice learns Arc at level 63 instead of 35. If your characters have learned some skills earlier they shouldn't have I'd like to know since I don't think there should be a problem like that.

The ability list the other guy posted here is obsolete since back then I had the chars learn their last 3 abilities x 2 later while now it's x 1.8. I'm too lazy to make a complete list. You can check out the ability list here and then just multiply the last 3 abilities by 1.8.

https://www.ign.com/faqs/2003/shadow-hearts-level-and-skill-listfaq-433738

11 hours ago, zedorfed66 said:

The ability list the other guy posted here is obsolete since back then I had the chars learn their last 3 abilities x 2 later while now it's x 1.8. I'm too lazy to make a complete list. You can check out the ability list here and then just multiply the last 3 abilities by 1.8.

https://www.ign.com/faqs/2003/shadow-hearts-level-and-skill-listfaq-433738

GOT YOU HOMIE:

                  ============================
Alice Elliot
============================
Spell           Effect                MP    Level Learned

Cure            Heals small amount     6    initial spell
of HP (one)
Holy Edge       Adds Light class to    8          7
P-atk (one)
Blessed Light   Light class damage    22         11
(one)
Wish            Cure all statuses     15         21
(one)
Gospel          Raise allies' P-def   40         28
and S-def 30% (one)
Arc             Fully restore HP      80         63
(all)
Resurrection    Revive w/ full HP     65         73
(one)
Advent          Great Light damage    120        86
(all)
                 =========================
                        Zhuzhen Liu 
                 =========================

Spell           Effect                MP    Level Learned

Ogre Flamedance Fire Class damage     15    initial spell
(all)
Scirocco Blast  Adds Fire Class to     8          7
P-atk (one)
Nourishing      Restore HP + Cure     35          12
Potion          paralysis (one)
Life Sucker     Dark Class attack     30          17
+ Silence (one)
Corpse Arm      Earth Class attack    55          23
+ paralyze (all)
Fury Serpent    Water Class attack    70          55
(all)
Thunder Roar    Wind Class attack     90          70
(all)
Flames of Fudo  Fire Class attack     120         84
(all)
                ================================
                       Margarete G. Zelle 
                ================================

Spell           Effect                MP    Level Learned

Grenade         Water Class attack    20    initial spell
(all)
Aqua Edge       Adds Water Class to    8    initial spell
P-atk (one)
Scout           Reveal enemy stats     1         13
Snipe           Non-class attack      38         19
(one)
Pain Killer     Cure all status       20         22
ailments (one)
On Switch       Non-class S-atk       65         50
(one)
Bazooka         Water Class attack    95         68
(all)
Diving Bomber   Fire Class attack     120        83
(all)
                ===============================
                        Keith Valentine 
                ===============================

Spell           Effect                MP    Level Learned

Drain Touch     Dark Class attack +   15    initial spell
Drain some HP (one)
Earth Edge      Adds Earth Class to    8    initial spell
P-atk (one)
Bat Dance       Wind Class attack     33    initial spell
(all)
Blood Sucker    Dark Class attack +   54    initial spell
Drain HP (one)
Hecatoncheire   Earth Class attack    70    initial spell
(all)
Apsaras         Water Class attack    80         66
(all) + Cure Status
(all)
Larva           Earth Class attack    96         77
+ psn/para/silence (one)
Gift            Dark Class attack     120        88
(all)
                 =============================
                        Halley Brancket 
                 =============================

Spell           Effect                MP    Level Learned

Healing         Restore HP (one)      20    initial spell
Air Edge        Add Wind Class to      8    initial spell
P-atk (one)
Strong Earth    Earth Class attack +  40    initial spell
petrify (one)
Aqua Blade      Water Class attack +  50    initial spell
poison (one)
Air Shot        Wind Class attack +   60    initial spell
confusion  (one)
Black Hole      Dark Class attack +   75          65
Death (all)
Reviver         Revive with full HP   65          75
Shock Max       Non-Class attack      120         85

15 hours ago, ronlyn said:

GOT YOU HOMIE:

  Reveal hidden contents

                  ============================
Alice Elliot
============================
Spell           Effect                MP    Level Learned

Cure            Heals small amount     6    initial spell
of HP (one)
Holy Edge       Adds Light class to    8          7
P-atk (one)
Blessed Light   Light class damage    22         11
(one)
Wish            Cure all statuses     15         21
(one)
Gospel          Raise allies' P-def   40         28
and S-def 30% (one)
Arc             Fully restore HP      80         63
(all)
Resurrection    Revive w/ full HP     65         73
(one)
Advent          Great Light damage    120        86
(all)
                 =========================
                        Zhuzhen Liu 
                 =========================

Spell           Effect                MP    Level Learned

Ogre Flamedance Fire Class damage     15    initial spell
(all)
Scirocco Blast  Adds Fire Class to     8          7
P-atk (one)
Nourishing      Restore HP + Cure     35          12
Potion          paralysis (one)
Life Sucker     Dark Class attack     30          17
+ Silence (one)
Corpse Arm      Earth Class attack    55          23
+ paralyze (all)
Fury Serpent    Water Class attack    70          55
(all)
Thunder Roar    Wind Class attack     90          70
(all)
Flames of Fudo  Fire Class attack     120         84
(all)
                ================================
                       Margarete G. Zelle 
                ================================

Spell           Effect                MP    Level Learned

Grenade         Water Class attack    20    initial spell
(all)
Aqua Edge       Adds Water Class to    8    initial spell
P-atk (one)
Scout           Reveal enemy stats     1         13
Snipe           Non-class attack      38         19
(one)
Pain Killer     Cure all status       20         22
ailments (one)
On Switch       Non-class S-atk       65         50
(one)
Bazooka         Water Class attack    95         68
(all)
Diving Bomber   Fire Class attack     120        83
(all)
                ===============================
                        Keith Valentine 
                ===============================

Spell           Effect                MP    Level Learned

Drain Touch     Dark Class attack +   15    initial spell
Drain some HP (one)
Earth Edge      Adds Earth Class to    8    initial spell
P-atk (one)
Bat Dance       Wind Class attack     33    initial spell
(all)
Blood Sucker    Dark Class attack +   54    initial spell
Drain HP (one)
Hecatoncheire   Earth Class attack    70    initial spell
(all)
Apsaras         Water Class attack    80         66
(all) + Cure Status
(all)
Larva           Earth Class attack    96         77
+ psn/para/silence (one)
Gift            Dark Class attack     120        88
(all)
                 =============================
                        Halley Brancket 
                 =============================

Spell           Effect                MP    Level Learned

Healing         Restore HP (one)      20    initial spell
Air Edge        Add Wind Class to      8    initial spell
P-atk (one)
Strong Earth    Earth Class attack +  40    initial spell
petrify (one)
Aqua Blade      Water Class attack +  50    initial spell
poison (one)
Air Shot        Wind Class attack +   60    initial spell
confusion  (one)
Black Hole      Dark Class attack +   75          65
Death (all)
Reviver         Revive with full HP   65          75
Shock Max       Non-Class attack      120         85

Hey thanks Ronlyn. This is great 

Well, the main thing I noticed is that your list says that Keith should have started with "Larva" and learn "Hecatoncheire" at 58 but I already have Hecatoncheire but not Larva.

On 26.10.2020 at 3:43 PM, tacticalcraptical said:

Well, the main thing I noticed is that your list says that Keith should have started with "Larva" and learn "Hecatoncheire" at 58 but I already have Hecatoncheire but not Larva.

Bad Ronlyn, bad

Keith's Hecatoncheire is 5th ability so he learns it at lvl 31

Apsaras lvl 67

Larva lvl 77

Gift lvl 88

This is great, thanks folks!  I finished the mod.  Thanks again for the time you took to create the mod and I look forward to the SH2 and 3 mods!

7 hours ago, tacticalcraptical said:

This is great, thanks folks!  I finished the mod.  Thanks again for the time you took to create the mod and I look forward to the SH2 and 3 mods!

Hey, thanks for playing through my SH1 mod. Hope you like my SH2 and SH3 mods as well.

Just wanted to chime in and say for the most part, I'm enjoying this mod a lot. Just discovered it a few days ago and decided to replay the game despite beating it last year. The only thing I really don't like is the increase to enemy's agility. Makes some fights completely rng and out of your control, which just takes away from the excitement of the challenge and makes for a much more frustrating experience instead imo. On the Beast Dog right now, and just had him use Fire Breath twice in succession, back to back, wiping out my party entirely.

Gonna keep at it however, and just wanted to let you know I've been enjoying this mod for the most part anyway. Thank you so much for this.

On 21/02/2023 at 5:49 AM, Star said:

Just wanted to chime in and say for the most part, I'm enjoying this mod a lot. Just discovered it a few days ago and decided to replay the game despite beating it last year. The only thing I really don't like is the increase to enemy's agility. Makes some fights completely rng and out of your control, which just takes away from the excitement of the challenge and makes for a much more frustrating experience instead imo. On the Beast Dog right now, and just had him use Fire Breath twice in succession, back to back, wiping out my party entirely.

Gonna keep at it however, and just wanted to let you know I've been enjoying this mod for the most part anyway. Thank you so much for this.

heya hows it going. im sorry about not being able to work on these mods the same way as before. this mod is pretty good but it still has some faults that i acknowledge. im still putting time into modding but it's not as much as before. i'm currently working on bettering my covenant mod but yeah i really dunno if it's ever coming out since it's coming together so slowly. basically in this 1st Shadow Hearts it's best for bosses to get a turn after 2 player character turns. that way also their evasion is right on point (enemy evasion goes hand in hand with agility stat). idk if it's always like that in this version but i also see some other faults i may never be able to correct.

i hope you're having fun with the mod the way it is now though

7 hours ago, zedorfed66 said:

heya hows it going. im sorry about not being able to work on these mods the same way as before. this mod is pretty good but it still has some faults that i acknowledge. im still putting time into modding but it's not as much as before. i'm currently working on bettering my covenant mod but yeah i really dunno if it's ever coming out since it's coming together so slowly. basically in this 1st Shadow Hearts it's best for bosses to get a turn after 2 player character turns. that way also their evasion is right on point (enemy evasion goes hand in hand with agility stat). idk if it's always like that in this version but i also see some other faults i may never be able to correct.

i hope you're having fun with the mod the way it is now though

I definitely am, for the most part, but now I'm stuck on Yamaraja Wind lol. He starts off with 2 turns, I get 2 turns, and he gets another 2 turns, I get a turn, and he gets another 2 turns. I thought I was set after unlocking Heaven's Fiend, but he's having way too many turns way too frequently. I do like that you have to grind a lot more, because before I never had an incentive to grind battles or farm up souls, so it's fun in that sense. But the agility definitely just makes the difficulty overkill with how rng it can play out sometimes, particularly on bosses.

I love the challenge though!!! I'll just have to grind out some more levels it seems. =P I also like how much more valuable Zhuzhen has become with this mod, as well as acupuncture, both of which I had ignored in my previous playthrough. x)

Also I hope everything in your life is going well!!! I truly appreciate your mods, I love challenges in the games I sink my time into so this is seriously exciting and fun!

On 22/02/2023 at 10:51 PM, Star said:

I definitely am, for the most part, but now I'm stuck on Yamaraja Wind lol. He starts off with 2 turns, I get 2 turns, and he gets another 2 turns, I get a turn, and he gets another 2 turns. I thought I was set after unlocking Heaven's Fiend, but he's having way too many turns way too frequently. I do like that you have to grind a lot more, because before I never had an incentive to grind battles or farm up souls, so it's fun in that sense. But the agility definitely just makes the difficulty overkill with how rng it can play out sometimes, particularly on bosses.

I love the challenge though!!! I'll just have to grind out some more levels it seems. =P I also like how much more valuable Zhuzhen has become with this mod, as well as acupuncture, both of which I had ignored in my previous playthrough. x)

Also I hope everything in your life is going well!!! I truly appreciate your mods, I love challenges in the games I sink my time into so this is seriously exciting and fun!

Life is what it is, i try to get through it. I've also put out Final Fantasy VIII hard mod I put a lot of effort into. If you like the game give it a try if you feel like it. Cya!

@zedorfed66 I would like to ask you some questions about your modding process over discord.
My discord is Dawnbomb#3408
Even if your really late to seeing this message, i will still be interested. Hope to hear from you.

On 25/03/2023 at 2:09 PM, dawnbomb said:

@zedorfed66 I would like to ask you some questions about your modding process over discord.
My discord is Dawnbomb#3408
Even if your really late to seeing this message, i will still be interested. Hope to hear from you.

Hey hope you're having a good day. My "modding process" is nothing special. just simple stuff mostly having to do with changing enemy stats tbh. I'm at grassroot level when it comes to modding these games.

Im aware, i would still like to chat. I want to know where the tables are, and interview you about your methods. I'm making a tool that might work with shadow hearts, and i'm willing enough to put some time into making shadow hearts tools for you if i can get enough information about the game.

55 minutes ago, dawnbomb said:

Im aware, i would still like to chat. I want to know where the tables are, and interview you about your methods. I'm making a tool that might work with shadow hearts, and i'm willing enough to put some time into making shadow hearts tools for you if i can get enough information about the game.

I'm sorry but it would be too much work for my current situation. I only now realize how little i want to put time into requests like these. I wish you good luck in your projects and good health though.

Hi yaaas, it's Zed with new version of Imbroglio! This new release (v2.0) is the definitive edition and better than v1.3 in every way. So give it a go! Here's the update summary in a nutshell:

- Probability of side effects from Fusion and character abilities decreased to 40% of og (etc. instakills and others)

- Changes to random encounter enemies and bosses, making them better (especially giving them more magic power as the story progresses)

- Exp and Cash gain is more even now (Up to Zhaoyang village og exp & cash, from Fengtian sewers to Kowloon Fortress 2x, from Kuihai Tower to Blue Castle 4x, from Rouen to Nemeton Monastery 6x. Optional dungeons same 6x, The Float 7x for having a bit more demanding enemies. Last portion of Float is weird so that goes with 5x exp and cash with enemies having less health)

- Halley's 'Healing' ability gains more healing power. Seraphic Radiance's 'For Tomorrow' more healing and attack power. Sandalphon's 'Revive' healing increased from previous version.

Good! Now I'll start working on better version of SH:FtnW. It'll take a long time so I'm not sure if and when that's coming out though!!!
 

I'm sorry for praising this version of the mod so high. I set the values of some late bosses too high and the random encounters in europe have too high magic stat in general. I'm gonna come up with new version of this mod at some point that's gonna be way better. I'm gonna tune the europe enemies strength up and lessen the magic. I'm changing Zhuzhen Margarete and Keith into characters that're able to take on later bosses with Yuri all having their pros and cons with different character combos. I'm doing the testing on final boss right now and I see I had it tuned too high. There will be lots of changes for the better in next version overall.

Hi again NGPlus! I've come up with new version of this mod. v3.0 is very important update as it will make Zhuzhen, Margarete and Keith potent characters in later battles and bosses with the abilities that will damage enemies and heal the party. These abilities are different elements so they will inflict more damage on certain enemies while healing some characters more and some less. I will go more on details below. There are lots of other changes too.

So details? Here we go!

______________________________________________________________

Zhuzhen:

'Thunder Roar' - Zhuzhen learns this ability 70 levelled. It will be Zhuzhen's damage/party heal spell. It is Earth element so it will damage Wind element more and Earth less. It heals Halley more and Keith less.

Margarete:

'Bazooka' - Margarete learns this ability 68 levelled. It will be Margarete's damage/party heal spell. It is Wind element so it will damage Earth element more and Wind less. It heals Keith more and Halley less.

Keith:

'Apsaras' - Keith learns this ability 67 levelled. It will be Keith's damage/party heal spell. It is Water element so it will damage Fire element more and Water less. It heals Zhuzhen more and Margarete less. Ailment removal was taken off from this ability.

Halley:

'Healing' - This will be his ultimate single target healing spell that has its' healing power doubled. It is Fire element so it will heal Margarete more and Zhuzhen less.

Alice:

'Arc' - Alice learns this ability 63 levelled. It has been changed the way it doesn't heal whole life but partially based on Alice's Int stat. It is Light element so it will heal Dark element more and Light less. The good thing about this ability is that it can't miss since you don't target enemy with it.

Yuri:

Amon's 'The End' - I've added party heal to this ability in addition to the damage so Amon will be more usable. This ability remains Almighty so it will damage all enemies and heal everyone the same amount. It has damage increased as well.
______________________________________________________________

Other changes from previous version:

- Margarete's 'Diving Bomber' is now Almighty attack and it has its' damage decreased.

- Keith's 'Bat Dance' has its' damage increased and mp requirement doubled. Keith's 'Gift' has its' death success decreased. I forgot to change that in previous version. 

- Halley's 'Shock Max' has its' damage increased.

- Yuri's lvl 3 Earth and Water element fusions have their healing power doubled. Seraphic Radiance's 'For Tomorrow' has its' damage and healing increased. Sandalphon's 'Revive' has its' healing power increased

- I tuned Europe's enemies' magic stat too high so they go down a bit. However their strength goes up. 1.7 x agility was too high in late so it's x 1.5 now. Some dungeons' enemies have higher HP than others though they give more exp and cash. I've taken careful look at exp and cash amounts and they should reflect more on how demanding the battles are.

______________________________________________________________

I hope I didn't forget anything. I will come back with new version if I see something I want to change. I try to make these mods as perfect as possible cause this is my favorite series. I want to thank everyone who give my mods a go, it means a lot to me. See ya!

Hiya! Small but important update on this mod. v3.1 switches places between Zhuzhen's 'Corpse Arm' and 'Thunder Roar'. He now learns Thunder Roar at lvl 23 and Corpse Arm at lvl 70. Corpse Arm is now his earth element damage/party heal ability while Thunder Roar regains the wind element and previously Corpse Arm's chance of getting enemy paralyzed. Corpse Arm's paralyze chance was removed with this change. This change also adds variety with Zhuzhen not having same element party damage as Keith at the start of Blue Castle. Keith's 'Bat Dance' remains at same power as in v3.0 so he still has earth and wind option early.

This change takes effect immediately so there's no need to start over or anything. Have fun!

Small fix: forgot to put mention of Paralyze chance in Thunder Roar description. It's fixed in v3.15.

I'm sorry about the frequent updates lately but I gotta do this. I feel nerfing Margarete's Diving Bomber wasn't a good idea since it's her only powerful all-enemy ability. So v3.20 reverts that ability back to og damage. The element remains non-element though so it's useful vs all foes.

Hey zedorfed, im really enjoying the Mod but I have an issue. As soon as I got to europe after defeating Calamity, some of the ingame sounds stopped working. Specificly when I click an item to use such as a tent, when I open a chest, but most annoyingly of all, the sounds the ring makes when you do attacks or use items. Is there anyway to fix it? I tried 2 different ISO's, and if i load a save from China the sounds work again.

I am using latest PCSX2 with default plugins.

Updating to PCSX2 1.7 fixed all my issues!

5 hours ago, twigglypuff said:

Hey zedorfed, im really enjoying the Mod but I have an issue. As soon as I got to europe after defeating Calamity, some of the ingame sounds stopped working. Specificly when I click an item to use such as a tent, when I open a chest, but most annoyingly of all, the sounds the ring makes when you do attacks or use items. Is there anyway to fix it? I tried 2 different ISO's, and if i load a save from China the sounds work again.

I am using latest PCSX2 with default plugins.

 

Updating to PCSX2 1.7 fixed all my issues!

Haha glad you got things under control! Hope you'll enjoy the rest of the journey. I use PCSX2 v1.2.1 on all Shadow Hearts games and they all run well. I appreciate all feedback. They give me outlook from other people's perspectives and not just mine. They also may make me think if I should change stuff even if I think the mod is in good standing. I'm currently working on my Shadow Hearts 3 mod but I've been sawing back and forth thinking on how to handle the dungeon exp and other enemy stats stuff. But I'm making progress everytime I work on it.

On 12/27/2023 at 10:53 PM, zedorfed66 said:

Haha glad you got things under control! Hope you'll enjoy the rest of the journey. I use PCSX2 v1.2.1 on all Shadow Hearts games and they all run well. I appreciate all feedback. They give me outlook from other people's perspectives and not just mine. They also may make me think if I should change stuff even if I think the mod is in good standing. I'm currently working on my Shadow Hearts 3 mod but I've been sawing back and forth thinking on how to handle the dungeon exp and other enemy stats stuff. But I'm making progress everytime I work on it.

Its been a wild ride, definitely the best shadow hearts one experience. Like i said playing on 1.7 solved every single issue. Im currently grinding to 99 on the float so I can go beat Seraphim + ben and get seraphic radiance to fight final boss. Still a bit to go, only level 83 lol. After i finish this im gonna go straight into your SH2 mod. Sadly SH3 aint it for me. No Yuri = No play.

12 hours ago, twigglypuff said:

Its been a wild ride, definitely the best shadow hearts one experience. Like i said playing on 1.7 solved every single issue. Im currently grinding to 99 on the float so I can go beat Seraphim + ben and get seraphic radiance to fight final boss. Still a bit to go, only level 83 lol. After i finish this im gonna go straight into your SH2 mod. Sadly SH3 aint it for me. No Yuri = No play.

Wow you've really blasted through sh1 fast  i know where ur coming from with not wanting to play ftnw. It IS kinda different. It still has demand though and I like it too so I'll be working on that. I really put lots of effort into this sh1 mod. Maybe even more than for Covenant by now so I'll gladly take any critic about these mods and especially the Covenant one. Happy new years to you and the rest btw! Hopefully next year's gonna be better than 2023 was.

53 minutes ago, zedorfed66 said:

Wow you've really blasted through sh1 fast  i know where ur coming from with not wanting to play ftnw. It IS kinda different. It still has demand though and I like it too so I'll be working on that. I really put lots of effort into this sh1 mod. Maybe even more than for Covenant by now so I'll gladly take any critic about these mods and especially the Covenant one. Happy new years to you and the rest btw! Hopefully next year's gonna be better than 2023 was.

Happy new years to you too! Yeah I blasted thru it because i love SH1 and ur mod is fantastic. The most hilarious part of the mod for me was the final bosses. I ended up killing both of them in 1 hit.

Seraphic Radiance -> For everyone -> Silver hand -> Monkey Paw -> 5th key killed Messiah
Seraphic Radiance -> For everyone -> Silver hand -> Monkey Paw -> 7th key killed Metagod

Metagod died before my 7th key even finished, cuz Yuri was hitting for 999 with each attack lmao.

I already started your Godslayer Mod, i forgot how much more advanced of a game SH2 is comapred to one haha.

5 hours ago, twigglypuff said:

Happy new years to you too! Yeah I blasted thru it because i love SH1 and ur mod is fantastic. The most hilarious part of the mod for me was the final bosses. I ended up killing both of them in 1 hit.

Seraphic Radiance -> For everyone -> Silver hand -> Monkey Paw -> 5th key killed Messiah
Seraphic Radiance -> For everyone -> Silver hand -> Monkey Paw -> 7th key killed Metagod

Metagod died before my 7th key even finished, cuz Yuri was hitting for 999 with each attack lmao.

I already started your Godslayer Mod, i forgot how much more advanced of a game SH2 is comapred to one haha.

Yeah I've heard before how op the items in sh1 can be. I havent used those myself. I used 3rd keys cause they're purchasable. I might make some adjustments at some point. Thanks for the feedback and enjoy Covenant!

11 minutes ago, zedorfed66 said:

Yeah I've heard before how op the items in sh1 can be. I havent used those myself. I used 3rd keys cause they're purchasable. I might make some adjustments at some point. Thanks for the feedback and enjoy Covenant!

Sorry for another quick reply. I looked up the items of Shadow Hearts and it's only the Silver Hand that kills it all making user hit everytime. The other applied things only work so efficiently cause you hit everytime using that item. I might change that item's name and make it give mana for all party members for example. I'm sorry for being so clumsy and realizing this just now.

21 hours ago, zedorfed66 said:

Sorry for another quick reply. I looked up the items of Shadow Hearts and it's only the Silver Hand that kills it all making user hit everytime. The other applied things only work so efficiently cause you hit everytime using that item. I might change that item's name and make it give mana for all party members for example. I'm sorry for being so clumsy and realizing this just now.

haha yup! Silver hand is the answer here, because executing key to success + 7th key is not easy to do well, but silver hand makes it a garuntee. I am enjoying SH:C so far, I'm about to fight the SG Italy HQ Boss. SH:C feels so good to play.

2 hours ago, twigglypuff said:

haha yup! Silver hand is the answer here, because executing key to success + 7th key is not easy to do well, but silver hand makes it a garuntee. I am enjoying SH:C so far, I'm about to fight the SG Italy HQ Boss. SH:C feels so good to play.

Thanks for playing through my Covenant mod! All the best for the new year for you and the rest of the community! <3

Hello. Here I sneak a new update for Imbroglio. v3.5 rebalances the random encounter enemies stats, exp and cash between Shanghai and Calios Mental Hospital to make them better. I took careful look at the exp amounts and changed them based on the enemies stats. Most enemies now grant more exp & cash than before and some enemies that appear in smaller groups have more agility. Blue Castle enemies have a bit lower strength and magic but more health. Increased stats also increase the exp & cash. There's also another change that has to do with Silver Hand Item. Silver Hand now ups strength and magic for 5 turns on 1 character. This should prevent the cheese of late bosses.

Hi and sorry for taking so long. v3.60 is continuation to previous patch that ups boss experience and cash from Shanghai onwards to reflect the stats. I've been hesitant to up boss exp in this game cause the cap is a bit over 65 000. So now most optional and Float bosses go with 65k exp.

Hello. For some reason Sergeants in Shanghai ended up giving too little exp and cash. v3.65 ups them.

Looks like the exp and cash raise on Sergeants wasn't enough. v3.70 raises them a bit more. It should be good now.

After playing through the beginning I felt like update was in place. v3.80 ups the exp and cash amounts from the bosses before Shanghai. I wonder why I hadn't done that before but it's fixed with this patch. I'll continue through the rest of the game to see if there's more things to fix. I suspect very little is off with this mod the way it stands at this point though.

New Shadow Hearts update. I noticed I had set random encounter enemy exp and cash grant too high so v4.00 lowers it starting from Shanghai onwards until Mental Hospital. After that everything remains the same as before. This should add some levelling accomplishment feeling so rewards aren't coming too hard on conveyor belt.

Hello! It seems I lowered the exp and cash of the enemies of Blue Castle a bit too much in previous update. v4.10 ups them a bit. Kuihai Tower enemies get a raise as well to contrast this change since they're connected.

Hello again peeps, it's another patch for Imbroglio. It was bothering me that Drain Touch remained unused with Keith already having Blood Sucker learned when you get him. So now Drain Touch is as powerful as Blood Sucker was before and you will learn Blood Sucker as a more powerful version at lvl 50. Drain Touch costs 40 MP and Blood Sucker 80. Keith's Larva power increased the way it is a bit more powerful than Blood Sucker. Another change is Halley's 120MP costing ultimate power increased to make up for being single target spell.

Hello again, it's time for an important patch for sh1!

I've made several changes for v4.50. The biggest being the dark element fusion monsters. Before they had the MP draining ability. But this combats against challenge making the enemies lose MP. In SH1 enemies can run out of MP forcing them to abandon MP abilities and using physicals only. v4.50 changes these MP draining abilities into HP drains. Death Emperor's new ability is called 'Life Drain' costing 50 MP draining small amount of HP, Charon's 'Vampiric Pillage' costing 100 MP draining medium amount of HP and Czernobog's 'The Great Feast' costing 150 MP draining large amount of HP. These abilities cost lots of MP but I've tested them and they're on line with the other fusions. Dark element fusions are powerful forms that deal good physical damage, have magic buff and take more healing from Light element magic. With these changes Czernobog can be used all the way to the final boss as an option to the other fusions.

I've also done some fine tuning on several bosses: Beast Dog, Yamaraja: Wind & Olga 2 HP up a bit. Orphanage bosses, Mental Hospital bosses & Nemeton bosses HP and agility up a bit. Another small change: Badger Devil stats, Exp & Cash rewards down to go better with the game dialogue.

Forgot to mention the drains are dark element, so they work best vs light element enemy and worst on dark.

Hello! An Exp & Cash rewards balancing update. v4.70 reduces the Exp & Cash of Nemeton Ruins random encounter enemies by a bit to make up for increased Rausan and Olga Exp. Doll House enemies Exp & Cash decreased by a bit as well. Cave Temple and Ancient Ruins enemies Exp & Cash increased. The Float enemies Exp & Cash decreased a bit except 'Emptiness' enemy which gets Exp & Cash boost. I made the changes looking at each enemy individually, for example in Doll House now 'Spanky' is 5x Exp, 'Ghoul' 6x and 'Ghouler' 7x.

Hello people and thanks for all the downloads of my mods all these years. It means a lot to me <3

v4.75 is a small patch that makes characters learn their element Edge skills 1 level sooner. With this change Zhuzhen gets his Fire Edge at lvl 8 instead of level 9 when Water Yamaraja has already been beaten… Duh I shouldve made this change way sooner. Oh well better late than never.

Another small patch. I think I had overtuned the 4 Masks a bit. v4.85 lowers their strength and magic the way they're meant to be fought in Nemeton Monastery Ruins after Alice gets her Arc at lvl 63.

Hey again. v4.90 is a fine tuning patch for couple of character spells. Margarete's 'On Switch' power increased and Keith's 'Larva' power decreased. Now they both go with x 1.5 multiplier like Halley's 'Shock Max'.

Sorry for the patch bombardment. v4.95 lowers the cost of Seraphic Radiance's 'For The Children' ultimate spell from 200 MP to 160 MP. It's cause I upped 'For Tomorrow' before and that ability heals party where 'For The Children' doesn't.

Hello! I consider this an important patch. v5.10 adds health restoring effect to Margarete's 'Pain Killer' ability. In addition to curing all ailments like before now it heals for between 'Nourishing Potion's' good and perfect inputs. So if Zhuzhen misses his perfects it restores a bit more. 'Pain Killer' is now non-elemental ability making it restore equal amount of life to all characters where Zhuzhen's ability is Light restoring more to Dark element and less to Light. 'Pain Killer' now costs 40 MP and can also be used outside of battles. Yes, no more need to keep using those pesky Thera items while leveling Keith and Margarete. It's especially useful in the Dehuai fight where you need that 200 HP on Marge that Thera Seeds can't always accomplish.

I regret setting 'Pain Killer' to non-element. There should be payoff for using the Light element so v5.15 changes 'Pain Killer' to Light element making it heal Dark element more and Light less. Everything else stays the same.