IceBurnerIt's cold and there are penguins.Registered Userregular
edited June 2008
My thought on the biggest flaw in FFTA2 is "So the DS also doesn't have enough horsepower to rival the PSX and have decent AI?"
Enemies still do completely random stupid crap instead of tearing me a new back door like they would in FFT. Even on hard mode, FFTA2 isn't hard, just dangerous enough that I can't distractedly play while reading a book or something as I could in FFTA
My thought on the biggest flaw in FFTA2 is "So the DS also doesn't have enough horsepower to rival the PSX and have decent AI?"
None of the FFT games have had spectacular AI.
I never said they had spectacular AI, but at least FFT's knew how to go for the jugular. FFT-A & A2 are less intelligent about killing you than most NES games where the enemy patterns consisted of "run to the left".
All the differences between this game and Tactics Ogre just makes me really want Atlus to make a DS Tactics Ogre. I loved Knights of Lodis so much.
Did you play the original Tactics Ogre?
Perhaps any of the other Ogre Battle games?
I ask because, while Knights of Lodis was good, it was missing some of that Ogre Battle charm. Same problem with Ogre Battle 64.
And don't hold your breath. Rumor has it that Matsuno is working on a game for the Wii, and another rumor is that that game is an Ogre Battle game. But I wouldn't get too excited. Square owns the property, and we all know how they view "niche" games.
That's weird, I'm pretty sure in FFTA Sleep didn't count as harming.
Are you kidding me? Use common sense i mean when you sleep don't gigantic bunnies shake their ass in your face so you are charmed and asleep, and you go out and commit violent crimes against your friends?
Yea their choice of what breaks specific laws is quite.....frustrating/cockmonger like.
Oh my gosh they made the laws entirely optional and simply reward you for following them and you're all still complaining?
You people are never happy.
If you follow the law, you get rewarded. If you break the law, you can't revive KO'd teammates. Personally I have no problem with the new law system but I can see how people would still rather not have to deal with it at all
Right.
Because there's nothing like a trial... say, for your clan, that would end instantly the moment you break a law. Even if it's due to a game bug.
Actually most people are cool with it. There's only 2 or 3 people who really don't like em and are very vocal about it.
I think it's the obsessive-compulsive/perfectionist types (myself included!) that are vocal about it, especially the bit where laws can be broken outside of your control (your confused character casts a forbidden spell, etc.). Normally there aren't all that many of us ... but something about strategy-RPGs attracts a lot of us. I think it has to do with tons of numbers being involved, item/loot collection, and wanting to min/max everything to perfection, including winning every battle and getting every random loot drop, including ones from the law bonus, etc.
That said, while I am very much OCD ... even I can appreciate the law system being far more forgiving this time around. As long as I can supress my OCD urges, yeah I'm pretty much cool with it.
I think it also has to do with how stupid some of the laws are. I have no problem with "Don't use fire!" or "No reactionary skills!" as I have control over that shit. I was afraid of the no knockback law due to criticals, but I found a way to work around that.
I did, however, just get a law which is essentially impossible to work around with out pure luck. The law?
"Missing with an action is forbidden"
...So first thing I do? Attack the enemy with a 90 something chance to hit. Miss. Law broken.
Yeah, that's a bitch. Guess you don't get some shitty loot that round.
If all it is is shitty loot, then there's not quite a point in the entire system is there? And even if it is shitty loot, that does not change the fact that a law that is decided by random chance is a horrifically bad idea.
I don't even care that much, it just annoys me. Which is about the only conceivable reason I can imagine the system is in the game. To be a slight annoyance.
Even that one isn't too bad. Most of the time if you attack from the rear, you've got a 99% chance to hit.
I was attacking from the rear. 95% chance each time. Still missed three times... despite the statistic implausbility. Didn't care enough to bother restarting the mission or anything though.
Did you get the bonus to boost your accuracy? I also overlevelled my characters a bunch because of one story mode mission with some 700 HP boss that gave me trouble. That would help too.
Terrendos on
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IceBurnerIt's cold and there are penguins.Registered Userregular
edited June 2008
"Don't miss" likes to pop up during Clan Trials, making it an automatic failure scenario based upon random circumstance. This means you may or may not have wasted your time and 10 CP based upon pure chance, every single turn.
Where's the strategy in "hope to get lucky?". There are a few ways to guarantee 100% hit, but it means everyone on your team has to be a Hume or Viera Archer, or everyone must have perfect normal accuracy & attack from behind. Both of these were obviously not the developer's intent since the higher levels of the trial require completion in 3-4 turns, and invalidating all but two races is obviously game-breaking.
Tactics Ogre managed decent AI on GBA. There's no excuse for this any longer. I'm calling the law system for what it is and always has been, an excuse not to spend the money on improving shit-poor AI.
Breaking the law in a Clan Trial does not mean you lose the Clan Trial.
I can not stress this enough. Let's see here, there was that one trial where it told me to kill people however I wanted then gave me a law not to use Fire, Ice, or Lightning. Broke that law. Passed that trial.
Then there was the trial that told me to kill 6 enemies. Faeries. The law was not to miss. Despite always having a 90% chance to hit I missed constantly. Broke that law. Passed that trial.
Are the presence of traps on any given map random when a battle loads, or are there always traps on specific maps? I fought a battle on a map that ended up having traps, so the next time I fought there, I used my Libra privilege and nothing turned up. Which sucked, because I opened up a treasure chest that turned out to be a mimic. Why that doesn't count as a trap, I have no idea.
As far as that cooking quest with the rabbits goes - the instructions are vague and killing a mob doesn't necessarily equate to collecting it for food. If, when you killed one of the rabbits, the killer said something like, "That should do for one serving, lets get another!" then I'd totally be with everybody saying the equivalent of RTFM in response to people having trouble. Then you'd say that the mission would be far too easy, but it already is, even if the instructions are no help at all.
I think that there are exceptions. If it explicitly says "while upholding the law" in the description of the trial, then breaking it will result in failure. If it doesn't say that, you can break the laws to your heart's content.
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IceBurnerIt's cold and there are penguins.Registered Userregular
edited June 2008
Interesting that there are such directly conflicting reports.
If you don't like the law system enough that you are making long posts bitching about it on an Internet forum then why are you even playing this game? Go trade it in now while you'll still get something worth trading it in for. Laws and judges are important to the world of FFTA, so they kept them and made them far less intrusive. Is this keeping you from enjoying an awesome game? Then don't play it since you're not enjoying it.
Breaking the law in a Clan Trial does not mean you lose the Clan Trial.
I can not stress this enough. Let's see here, there was that one trial where it told me to kill people however I wanted then gave me a law not to use Fire, Ice, or Lightning. Broke that law. Passed that trial.
Then there was the trial that told me to kill 6 enemies. Faeries. The law was not to miss. Despite always having a 90% chance to hit I missed constantly. Broke that law. Passed that trial.
This is true and a very good point. However, be careful because some trials say 'Defeat all enemies while upholding the law', which is a bugger.
I like the laws. Gives the game another level of challenge. I've never known why 'I'm an obsessive perfectionist' is supposed to be a valid criticism of a game.
Then there was the trial that told me to kill 6 enemies. Faeries. The law was not to miss. Despite always having a 90% chance to hit I missed constantly. Broke that law. Passed that trial.
This is really starting to annoy me. Even with Agility+ (increased chance to hit) and attacking from behind putting my hit% at 99, im still missing more than once per battle. And then the enemy will try one of those "massive damage but reduced chance to hit" attacks, from the front, at like 26% and hit every time.
Keep in mind that you don't automatically fail a trial if you fail the law. I've gotten - and failed - "don't miss" on a couple of occasions; it ends up not being a problem at all. The trials where you must follow the stated law are the non-random ones where the law is included in the text of the trial description (i.e. "kill 4 enemies in 4 rounds without using ranged attacks.")
Breaking the law in a Clan Trial does not mean you lose the Clan Trial.
I can not stress this enough. Let's see here, there was that one trial where it told me to kill people however I wanted then gave me a law not to use Fire, Ice, or Lightning. Broke that law. Passed that trial.
Then there was the trial that told me to kill 6 enemies. Faeries. The law was not to miss. Despite always having a 90% chance to hit I missed constantly. Broke that law. Passed that trial.
There is a clan trial early on which specifically says "Kill 6 enemies without breaking the law". You fail that one if you break the law.
But yeah, otherwise it doesn't matter.
You perfectionists are going to get really pissed when you play some later missions with "No harming lower level characters" and all your dudes are already high level.
With a the law forbidding stuff like Tinker and Illusionists.
I'm sorely tempted to screw the law, bring in my Tinker, use Silver Disc, blind them all (if not reset) and then put them all to sleep with my awesome Green/Red Mage.
Pata on
Episode 5: Mecha-World, Mecha-nisim, Mecha-beasts
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IceBurnerIt's cold and there are penguins.Registered Userregular
If you don't like the law system enough that you are making long posts bitching about it on an Internet forum then why are you even playing this game? Go trade it in now while you'll still get something worth trading it in for. Laws and judges are important to the world of FFTA, so they kept them and made them far less intrusive. Is this keeping you from enjoying an awesome game? Then don't play it since you're not enjoying it.
Hah, I love it! I belch in retort.
Game's a rental, I'm trying it out, I'm finding it lacking and it is going back. It's not the FFTA2 praise thread or the "I love every game discussed here" forum, so if you can't handle that I suggest a time out for self-reflection.
It's hardly the same team or even era, but I know this company has put forth greater effort in the past and it's not so much of a stretch to want them to live up to their own standard. There are people fine with this, and I'm glad they're satisfied. There's also a good lot of people dissatisfied and it's not terribly bright to suggest that they've no right to speak their minds.
IceBurnerIt's cold and there are penguins.Registered Userregular
edited June 2008
RE: How would the game be better without Laws
I seem to recall that system resources are finite and that AI tends to consume them. I'd rather whatever system resources and development time were used for the law system, space in the DS card, CPU cycles given to checking whether they've been violated, etc. were given over to the lookup tables and condition evaluations needed for a game that might actually be challenging without pumping up enemies and evaluating arbitrary limits in hopes of getting the carrot on the stick.
I seem to recall that system resources are finite and that AI tends to consume them. I'd rather whatever system resources and development time were used for the law system, space in the DS card, CPU cycles given to checking whether they've been violated, etc. were given over to the lookup tables and condition evaluations needed for a game that might actually be challenging without pumping up enemies and evaluating arbitrary limits in hopes of getting the carrot on the stick.
That's what bugs me about it the most.
Why exactly, does the moronic leap of "improve the AI = remove the laws" have to be made?
Can't instead, you simply say "I wish the A.I was better" instead of saying "the laws stole the AI" because FFT, which lacked laws, didn't have any better AI.
The AI was moronic.
The FFT games have all been more "RPG" then "Stratagy" look at series it spun off from.
So, I've failed this "Wanted: Sidekick" quest about 5 times now. I've got six guys around level 25 now and it's a rank 15. What type of guy does this blithering idiot want?
Posts
Enemies still do completely random stupid crap instead of tearing me a new back door like they would in FFT. Even on hard mode, FFTA2 isn't hard, just dangerous enough that I can't distractedly play while reading a book or something as I could in FFTA
PSN: theIceBurner, IceBurnerEU, IceBurner-JP | X-Link Kai: TheIceBurner
Dragon's Dogma: 192 Warrior Linty | 80 Strider Alicia | 32 Mage Terra
None of the FFT games have had spectacular AI.
I thought so too. Oh well.
PSN: theIceBurner, IceBurnerEU, IceBurner-JP | X-Link Kai: TheIceBurner
Dragon's Dogma: 192 Warrior Linty | 80 Strider Alicia | 32 Mage Terra
PSN: theIceBurner, IceBurnerEU, IceBurner-JP | X-Link Kai: TheIceBurner
Dragon's Dogma: 192 Warrior Linty | 80 Strider Alicia | 32 Mage Terra
I've played all of em
Are you kidding me? Use common sense i mean when you sleep don't gigantic bunnies shake their ass in your face so you are charmed and asleep, and you go out and commit violent crimes against your friends?
Yea their choice of what breaks specific laws is quite.....frustrating/cockmonger like.
SC2: XxKhrushchev.539
Right.
Because there's nothing like a trial... say, for your clan, that would end instantly the moment you break a law. Even if it's due to a game bug.
Nope.
None of that shit in this game, I tell you what.
I think it's the obsessive-compulsive/perfectionist types (myself included!) that are vocal about it, especially the bit where laws can be broken outside of your control (your confused character casts a forbidden spell, etc.). Normally there aren't all that many of us ... but something about strategy-RPGs attracts a lot of us. I think it has to do with tons of numbers being involved, item/loot collection, and wanting to min/max everything to perfection, including winning every battle and getting every random loot drop, including ones from the law bonus, etc.
That said, while I am very much OCD ... even I can appreciate the law system being far more forgiving this time around. As long as I can supress my OCD urges, yeah I'm pretty much cool with it.
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I did, however, just get a law which is essentially impossible to work around with out pure luck. The law?
"Missing with an action is forbidden"
...So first thing I do? Attack the enemy with a 90 something chance to hit. Miss. Law broken.
If all it is is shitty loot, then there's not quite a point in the entire system is there? And even if it is shitty loot, that does not change the fact that a law that is decided by random chance is a horrifically bad idea.
I don't even care that much, it just annoys me. Which is about the only conceivable reason I can imagine the system is in the game. To be a slight annoyance.
I was attacking from the rear. 95% chance each time. Still missed three times... despite the statistic implausbility. Didn't care enough to bother restarting the mission or anything though.
Where's the strategy in "hope to get lucky?". There are a few ways to guarantee 100% hit, but it means everyone on your team has to be a Hume or Viera Archer, or everyone must have perfect normal accuracy & attack from behind. Both of these were obviously not the developer's intent since the higher levels of the trial require completion in 3-4 turns, and invalidating all but two races is obviously game-breaking.
Tactics Ogre managed decent AI on GBA. There's no excuse for this any longer. I'm calling the law system for what it is and always has been, an excuse not to spend the money on improving shit-poor AI.
PSN: theIceBurner, IceBurnerEU, IceBurner-JP | X-Link Kai: TheIceBurner
Dragon's Dogma: 192 Warrior Linty | 80 Strider Alicia | 32 Mage Terra
I can not stress this enough. Let's see here, there was that one trial where it told me to kill people however I wanted then gave me a law not to use Fire, Ice, or Lightning. Broke that law. Passed that trial.
Then there was the trial that told me to kill 6 enemies. Faeries. The law was not to miss. Despite always having a 90% chance to hit I missed constantly. Broke that law. Passed that trial.
As far as that cooking quest with the rabbits goes - the instructions are vague and killing a mob doesn't necessarily equate to collecting it for food. If, when you killed one of the rabbits, the killer said something like, "That should do for one serving, lets get another!" then I'd totally be with everybody saying the equivalent of RTFM in response to people having trouble. Then you'd say that the mission would be far too easy, but it already is, even if the instructions are no help at all.
PSN: theIceBurner, IceBurnerEU, IceBurner-JP | X-Link Kai: TheIceBurner
Dragon's Dogma: 192 Warrior Linty | 80 Strider Alicia | 32 Mage Terra
I mean, come on, if you played the games you've noticed that. :P
This is true and a very good point. However, be careful because some trials say 'Defeat all enemies while upholding the law', which is a bugger.
I like the laws. Gives the game another level of challenge. I've never known why 'I'm an obsessive perfectionist' is supposed to be a valid criticism of a game.
This is really starting to annoy me. Even with Agility+ (increased chance to hit) and attacking from behind putting my hit% at 99, im still missing more than once per battle. And then the enemy will try one of those "massive damage but reduced chance to hit" attacks, from the front, at like 26% and hit every time.
There is a clan trial early on which specifically says "Kill 6 enemies without breaking the law". You fail that one if you break the law.
But yeah, otherwise it doesn't matter.
You perfectionists are going to get really pissed when you play some later missions with "No harming lower level characters" and all your dudes are already high level.
7 gunners.
Surrounding you.
With a the law forbidding stuff like Tinker and Illusionists.
Game's a rental, I'm trying it out, I'm finding it lacking and it is going back. It's not the FFTA2 praise thread or the "I love every game discussed here" forum, so if you can't handle that I suggest a time out for self-reflection.
It's hardly the same team or even era, but I know this company has put forth greater effort in the past and it's not so much of a stretch to want them to live up to their own standard. There are people fine with this, and I'm glad they're satisfied. There's also a good lot of people dissatisfied and it's not terribly bright to suggest that they've no right to speak their minds.
PSN: theIceBurner, IceBurnerEU, IceBurner-JP | X-Link Kai: TheIceBurner
Dragon's Dogma: 192 Warrior Linty | 80 Strider Alicia | 32 Mage Terra
Unless it's one of the Clan Trials where breaking the law specifically does mean you fail.
Laws suck. The game would be much better without them.
Just admit it. You hate fun. And teddy bears. And spaghetti.
It takes virtually nothing to prompt long posts on an internet forum.
Ah well, Matsuno has moved on, if only I'd realized that was the sign to do so as well.
PSN: theIceBurner, IceBurnerEU, IceBurner-JP | X-Link Kai: TheIceBurner
Dragon's Dogma: 192 Warrior Linty | 80 Strider Alicia | 32 Mage Terra
Guess what, you don't have to take those trials! They're optional sidequests on a completely different segment of the quest listings.
How would the game be better? They add an optional challenge to the majority of battles, and you get rewarded for them.
I seem to recall that system resources are finite and that AI tends to consume them. I'd rather whatever system resources and development time were used for the law system, space in the DS card, CPU cycles given to checking whether they've been violated, etc. were given over to the lookup tables and condition evaluations needed for a game that might actually be challenging without pumping up enemies and evaluating arbitrary limits in hopes of getting the carrot on the stick.
That's what bugs me about it the most.
PSN: theIceBurner, IceBurnerEU, IceBurner-JP | X-Link Kai: TheIceBurner
Dragon's Dogma: 192 Warrior Linty | 80 Strider Alicia | 32 Mage Terra
Why exactly, does the moronic leap of "improve the AI = remove the laws" have to be made?
Can't instead, you simply say "I wish the A.I was better" instead of saying "the laws stole the AI" because FFT, which lacked laws, didn't have any better AI.
The AI was moronic.
The FFT games have all been more "RPG" then "Stratagy" look at series it spun off from.