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FF5: Four Berserkers / Berserker SCC
Aug. 28th, 2023 05:13 pmSo in the Twitter days of the fiesta, there was a secret option called !Blame. It was named in honor of the late great Everhate, a speedrunner who was notorious for his bad luck (and memetically, spreading it: "Blame Everhate."). He did a fiesta in 2015 with Berserker Risk, and got four of them. He actually completed it, too! It's still up on his Twitch channel. I tried a !Blame run back in the day, but computer issues and life stuff got in the way. Always meant to go back to it, but there's no way to do it on the current iteration of the fiesta.
Except Upgrade (you can only use the most recent job you've unlocked, but any of the abilities from previous jobs) with BERSERKER RISK, and not upgrading at all once Berserker is hit. There's reasons to play this on SFC, GBA, and Pixel Remaster. First has the underflow glitch. Second has speedup and you can use Chicken Knife. Third might make fixes and has experience boosting, but I ruled out paying for it. So I went GBA. That said, I had only a 97.7% chance (plus the natural odds of a Berserker, I ran it on no 750 to increase the odds) of being able to do this run without a job fair. I would totally blame Everhate if I had to. First was Thief, which would've been nice if I was interested in giving them abilities. Second was the BERSERKER I sought. Let's do it!
I started instantly, as in, from New Game when our hero, named in honor of the man himself, is still named ?. I got to Lv8 before Wing Raptor, but it remained uninteresting because the Berserkers killed it before it went into defense mode. Karlabos was also splattered, and both even with two characters lacking weapons. I got Dagger drops in the Ship Graveyard to rectify it before Siren. No problems from her, Magisa/Forza, or Garula. For wild Garula, simple attacks worked before it fled.
W1 has a trio of obstacles for a pure Berserker team and the first is Liquid Flame. Always counters and moves into a different form when attacked. Blaze in particular will four-shot the party, no questions asked. So that means grinding. Disregarding luck, this challenge is like 90% grinding and 10% setup. I settled on 23 before heading into the Fire Ship. Eyedrops were important here in case of Crew Dust Flashing. Beat the boss with only Lenna downed and completed the escape.
Dhorme Chimera couldn't win before I did. I beat Jackanapes with hammers then went to the Ancient Library. Ifrit was easy. The trick with Byblos is to outdamage his counter-Drains. Besides leveling, using Mythril Hammers (the Gauche was fine) reduced his defense enough to make enough of a difference. With the ship, hammers killed the Skull Eater. I farmed up four Death Scythes and killed Minidragons with them to break defense (Ramuh also got beat).
But now it was time for the big Sandworm/Sol Cannon grind. I tried a few spots and ultimately settled on Black Flames. They're relatively nonthreatening and give a good amount of experience and gil. I hit level 41, earning over 600000 gil in the process. Enough for 4 copies of all the rings! Angel Rings were the most important. With Plumed Hats for maximum magic evasion with them, I began the struggle.
Due to bad code, you have a 1/7 chance of hitting Sandworm in this battle: there's three holes, three Sandworm positions (which redirect onto holes), and one actual target. The big exception is 2013 where it'll always attack the front and Sandworm is always considered to be in the front row, but that version has its own problems. It took like thirty to forty tries? I experimented with weapons, settling on Death Sickles after seeing a video that used them (in spite of their death spells triggering double the counters). But eventually, it was done!
Prototype, Crayclaw, and Adamantoise were all run over effortlessly. The little guns before the cannon even more so: the Launchers only do percent-based damage and rely on confusion, but Berserkers can't be confused. Flame Rings laughed at the other one. The Cannon by contrast was first try. Guess I was wrong, only really awful for a solo Berserker. Angel Rings neutralized aging status and gave magic evasion.
From here on out, it would be relatively smooth sailing until the final boss. Archaeoavis didn't use enough percent damage attacks to win. The Puroburos eventually just ran out of MP; Mage Mashers stopped their spells when they could. Titan and Manticore were easy. Ran through Gilgamesh 1 and 2. Tyrannosaurus was a matter of taking off Death Sickles and hoping he didn't kill with ???. I upgraded equipment and went into Drakenvale. No problems there, the first Death Sickle swing felled the Dragon Pod. Kept them off throughout, naturally.
Grinded out my Reflect Rings without resetting which got the Berserkers to level 44. Atomos actually failed to kill anyone until the end and didn't get to drag Faris anywhere. Tore through Ghido's Cave and the Forest of Moore. Death Sickles for the Crystals. No chance of Gil Turtle, by the way: I'd need to level them up enough to survive a 3500+ damage Earth Shaker and get that far in the first place. Which, I guess I could've done, but didn't feel like it. I wore Reflect Rings for Exdeath and did well.
Needed to spend time running to power up the Chicken Knife after obtaining it - this is another reason I usually don't take it.. After the Pyramid (which was also mostly running) and running through Melusine, I went to Mirage and then into the Void. It was a detour and I wasn't quite ready to beat the game yet, but there was stuff to get. Namely, steals. My targets were Aegis Shields from Gorgimeras, Bone Mails for Necromancers, and Thor's Hammers from Death Claws. Not even Quadzerker has problems with Calofisteri. Apanda was also defeated handily. I barely beat Azulmagia and then Catostrophe was simple. For Halicarn, I reloaded for the rare Aegis Shield steal. No problem there: Reflect Rings stopped the mega Holys and once I was untoaded I wrecked them. Coral Rings for Twin Tania.
Took forever to get the steals, needless to say. So forever that I eventually just hacked them in to grease the wheels of time because this fiesta was on a time limit to finish (end of August, it was the 27th at the time). I actually had to quicksave out of the Void because I'd run out of Hi-Potions! Can't really grind in there because of that. My next goal was to reach a high enough level to beat the game. Which is like, in the 70s at the very least to start taking shots at NED. Everhate himself went to high 80s, and was on SNES with the Gaia Hammer magic underflow bug. I saw mid-80s for another strat on PR. This would be the one reason to play on Pixel Remaster, since that has built-in experience boosting. Just snapping my fingers and maxing it felt like too much. Of course, everything else I could make use of was on the table.
The overworld was the ideal grind spot, so I used this resource to check my options. Near Kelb seemed promising: the two common encounters give 1100, the semirare gives 825, and the rare still gives 600. Consistency was key, and none of the encounters are particularly dangerous.
Once I got 71, I went in. Actually no problems from the enemies this time, no hi-potions and only a few Elixirs used. I beat Gilgamesh 5 and Necrophobe, getting the Genji equipment in the process. But before I mingled with Exdeath, I decided to go after Shinryu. Omega is of course, overdesigned trash and impossible to even damage with this team (it is very very hypothetically possible to survive).
I farmed up four Ice Shields, the hard way, mind you. They drop from Belphegors. Equipment across all was Thor's Hammer (best damage, can't use Chicken Knife since you can run), Ice Shield (absorbs Snowstorm), Diamond Helm (stops Lightning), Bone Mail (absorbs Roulette), and Coral Ring (stops Tidal Wave/Atomic Ray). Then it was a matter of running the fight until they killed Shinryu before Maelstrom into physical/Lightning killed them. It eventually happened.
There are various strategies for fighting Neo Exdeath with Quadzerkers. For SFC, the underflow bug is abused. One strategy I saw was zombies wielding Death Sickles to act as healers. But anyway, 71 wasn't enough despite an old guide saying 65ish. Probably technically possible - actually, someone on SA said they did it mid-70s after. So I just grinded more. At about level 75 I figured, what am I trying to prove? Plus I'm still on the clock. Well, PR lets you increase enemy experience values, so that's what I did to accelerate things. I ended up going to 97, mostly in case I'm dumb enough to try and see how far this can go into Sealed Temple. Then it was just back into the void to try until I win.
It was very possible to do the other stuff, by the way. Mage Mashers and luck beat Omniscient and that's about the only obstacle I'd have, high or low level. I figured there wasn't too much point, however. It was going to be a hilarious stomp no matter what.
The setup was to use Status Bug to get Bone Mail and Angel Ring resistances. I wore Reflect Rings. I could've farmed/put in Mirage Vests but I didn't feel like it, so instead the actual armor worn was Black Garbs. Aegis Shields for shields and Thor's Hammers for weapons. Except Faris. She got the Chicken Knife, had Genji Shield status bugged, and wore the Genji Armor.
Would you believe it was second try? I can't. First I stopped when a Meteor got off near the end of the tree phase. But then I simply won. There's definitely a luck factor involved in this fight even at high levels. I just got lucky to see it very fast.
So yeah. Even if it involved a lot of greasing the wheels of time with speedup and experience boosting, I've completed a Quadzerker run in FF5 from start to finish. It's a lot more doable than solo. Glad I finally got it done.
Index
Except Upgrade (you can only use the most recent job you've unlocked, but any of the abilities from previous jobs) with BERSERKER RISK, and not upgrading at all once Berserker is hit. There's reasons to play this on SFC, GBA, and Pixel Remaster. First has the underflow glitch. Second has speedup and you can use Chicken Knife. Third might make fixes and has experience boosting, but I ruled out paying for it. So I went GBA. That said, I had only a 97.7% chance (plus the natural odds of a Berserker, I ran it on no 750 to increase the odds) of being able to do this run without a job fair. I would totally blame Everhate if I had to. First was Thief, which would've been nice if I was interested in giving them abilities. Second was the BERSERKER I sought. Let's do it!
I started instantly, as in, from New Game when our hero, named in honor of the man himself, is still named ?. I got to Lv8 before Wing Raptor, but it remained uninteresting because the Berserkers killed it before it went into defense mode. Karlabos was also splattered, and both even with two characters lacking weapons. I got Dagger drops in the Ship Graveyard to rectify it before Siren. No problems from her, Magisa/Forza, or Garula. For wild Garula, simple attacks worked before it fled.
W1 has a trio of obstacles for a pure Berserker team and the first is Liquid Flame. Always counters and moves into a different form when attacked. Blaze in particular will four-shot the party, no questions asked. So that means grinding. Disregarding luck, this challenge is like 90% grinding and 10% setup. I settled on 23 before heading into the Fire Ship. Eyedrops were important here in case of Crew Dust Flashing. Beat the boss with only Lenna downed and completed the escape.
Dhorme Chimera couldn't win before I did. I beat Jackanapes with hammers then went to the Ancient Library. Ifrit was easy. The trick with Byblos is to outdamage his counter-Drains. Besides leveling, using Mythril Hammers (the Gauche was fine) reduced his defense enough to make enough of a difference. With the ship, hammers killed the Skull Eater. I farmed up four Death Scythes and killed Minidragons with them to break defense (Ramuh also got beat).
But now it was time for the big Sandworm/Sol Cannon grind. I tried a few spots and ultimately settled on Black Flames. They're relatively nonthreatening and give a good amount of experience and gil. I hit level 41, earning over 600000 gil in the process. Enough for 4 copies of all the rings! Angel Rings were the most important. With Plumed Hats for maximum magic evasion with them, I began the struggle.
Due to bad code, you have a 1/7 chance of hitting Sandworm in this battle: there's three holes, three Sandworm positions (which redirect onto holes), and one actual target. The big exception is 2013 where it'll always attack the front and Sandworm is always considered to be in the front row, but that version has its own problems. It took like thirty to forty tries? I experimented with weapons, settling on Death Sickles after seeing a video that used them (in spite of their death spells triggering double the counters). But eventually, it was done!
Prototype, Crayclaw, and Adamantoise were all run over effortlessly. The little guns before the cannon even more so: the Launchers only do percent-based damage and rely on confusion, but Berserkers can't be confused. Flame Rings laughed at the other one. The Cannon by contrast was first try. Guess I was wrong, only really awful for a solo Berserker. Angel Rings neutralized aging status and gave magic evasion.
From here on out, it would be relatively smooth sailing until the final boss. Archaeoavis didn't use enough percent damage attacks to win. The Puroburos eventually just ran out of MP; Mage Mashers stopped their spells when they could. Titan and Manticore were easy. Ran through Gilgamesh 1 and 2. Tyrannosaurus was a matter of taking off Death Sickles and hoping he didn't kill with ???. I upgraded equipment and went into Drakenvale. No problems there, the first Death Sickle swing felled the Dragon Pod. Kept them off throughout, naturally.
Grinded out my Reflect Rings without resetting which got the Berserkers to level 44. Atomos actually failed to kill anyone until the end and didn't get to drag Faris anywhere. Tore through Ghido's Cave and the Forest of Moore. Death Sickles for the Crystals. No chance of Gil Turtle, by the way: I'd need to level them up enough to survive a 3500+ damage Earth Shaker and get that far in the first place. Which, I guess I could've done, but didn't feel like it. I wore Reflect Rings for Exdeath and did well.
Needed to spend time running to power up the Chicken Knife after obtaining it - this is another reason I usually don't take it.. After the Pyramid (which was also mostly running) and running through Melusine, I went to Mirage and then into the Void. It was a detour and I wasn't quite ready to beat the game yet, but there was stuff to get. Namely, steals. My targets were Aegis Shields from Gorgimeras, Bone Mails for Necromancers, and Thor's Hammers from Death Claws. Not even Quadzerker has problems with Calofisteri. Apanda was also defeated handily. I barely beat Azulmagia and then Catostrophe was simple. For Halicarn, I reloaded for the rare Aegis Shield steal. No problem there: Reflect Rings stopped the mega Holys and once I was untoaded I wrecked them. Coral Rings for Twin Tania.
Took forever to get the steals, needless to say. So forever that I eventually just hacked them in to grease the wheels of time because this fiesta was on a time limit to finish (end of August, it was the 27th at the time). I actually had to quicksave out of the Void because I'd run out of Hi-Potions! Can't really grind in there because of that. My next goal was to reach a high enough level to beat the game. Which is like, in the 70s at the very least to start taking shots at NED. Everhate himself went to high 80s, and was on SNES with the Gaia Hammer magic underflow bug. I saw mid-80s for another strat on PR. This would be the one reason to play on Pixel Remaster, since that has built-in experience boosting. Just snapping my fingers and maxing it felt like too much. Of course, everything else I could make use of was on the table.
The overworld was the ideal grind spot, so I used this resource to check my options. Near Kelb seemed promising: the two common encounters give 1100, the semirare gives 825, and the rare still gives 600. Consistency was key, and none of the encounters are particularly dangerous.
Once I got 71, I went in. Actually no problems from the enemies this time, no hi-potions and only a few Elixirs used. I beat Gilgamesh 5 and Necrophobe, getting the Genji equipment in the process. But before I mingled with Exdeath, I decided to go after Shinryu. Omega is of course, overdesigned trash and impossible to even damage with this team (it is very very hypothetically possible to survive).
I farmed up four Ice Shields, the hard way, mind you. They drop from Belphegors. Equipment across all was Thor's Hammer (best damage, can't use Chicken Knife since you can run), Ice Shield (absorbs Snowstorm), Diamond Helm (stops Lightning), Bone Mail (absorbs Roulette), and Coral Ring (stops Tidal Wave/Atomic Ray). Then it was a matter of running the fight until they killed Shinryu before Maelstrom into physical/Lightning killed them. It eventually happened.
There are various strategies for fighting Neo Exdeath with Quadzerkers. For SFC, the underflow bug is abused. One strategy I saw was zombies wielding Death Sickles to act as healers. But anyway, 71 wasn't enough despite an old guide saying 65ish. Probably technically possible - actually, someone on SA said they did it mid-70s after. So I just grinded more. At about level 75 I figured, what am I trying to prove? Plus I'm still on the clock. Well, PR lets you increase enemy experience values, so that's what I did to accelerate things. I ended up going to 97, mostly in case I'm dumb enough to try and see how far this can go into Sealed Temple. Then it was just back into the void to try until I win.
It was very possible to do the other stuff, by the way. Mage Mashers and luck beat Omniscient and that's about the only obstacle I'd have, high or low level. I figured there wasn't too much point, however. It was going to be a hilarious stomp no matter what.
The setup was to use Status Bug to get Bone Mail and Angel Ring resistances. I wore Reflect Rings. I could've farmed/put in Mirage Vests but I didn't feel like it, so instead the actual armor worn was Black Garbs. Aegis Shields for shields and Thor's Hammers for weapons. Except Faris. She got the Chicken Knife, had Genji Shield status bugged, and wore the Genji Armor.
Would you believe it was second try? I can't. First I stopped when a Meteor got off near the end of the tree phase. But then I simply won. There's definitely a luck factor involved in this fight even at high levels. I just got lucky to see it very fast.
So yeah. Even if it involved a lot of greasing the wheels of time with speedup and experience boosting, I've completed a Quadzerker run in FF5 from start to finish. It's a lot more doable than solo. Glad I finally got it done.
Index
