sirsystemerror | FFZZ 1.5 [TH/RM/WM/BM] Part II

So. Titan's Tunnel is no longer just a gateway, so to speak. It's now a long, winding path that you have to traverse. That right there is a "shortcut", which is actually probably more of a detour since it's lined with spiked tiles.

Heading back in, and taking a nice, lightly-guarded shortcut through on floor 3...I almost run into disaster on floor 4, but crisis averted.

Now here's a great find. Shadow Armor is a fantastic piece of equipment for Thieves and Black Belts, 25 defense and 5 weight. Together with the Bandit Helmet, it puts Sofis just two points of defense below T-Hawk. With his higher evasion, I decide to have him take point.

For Lich, I start by having T-Hawk throw up XBAR and Sullla put up XDTH. Plus hastes Sofis, who goes to work as best he can. Magic stocks were drained, so no TMPR, but I made sure to save up the important levels, and unloaded it at him.

This is why these levels (low 20s) aren't actually so absurd for this point of the game in this hack. XXXX is much how it is in vanilla. It's Death-elemental, and instantly kills anything under 300HP that doesn't resist the element. Except in this hack, it's multitarget! Don't have XDTH? Well, then you better hope you have the HP to survive it.

Plus eventually gets the kill. Beyond Lich are two treasures chests; one has some money in it, the other has this, which casts ICE.

Onto Crescent. You can't actually come here until after you give the RUBY to the Titan, otherwise one will inexplicably be blocking here too. HEL3 is what it is. Same for EXIT, only you can also cast it in battle to escape. HLY2 is a BP 40 attack, VOID actually works now and will nullify the resistances of anything not resistant to Time. For now, we can only get the H-ones. Of course, EXIT is in our future.

LIT3 and BANE are same-y to their original incarnation. FLAR is a BP 100 fire attack. Literally thanks to me (used it on Lich in an earlier beta to great abuse), it's BW only. Same for STUN, which is non-elemental and inflicts a nasty array of statuses on anything under 300HP. It's non-elemental, so if you're below 300HP, you're getting hit.

This is also where Red's options start to become more limited. He can't get anything now; after class change, he can choose between HLY2, EXIT, FLAR, and LIT3. But while we're talking about that...Ordeals is not an option. See, you actually need the CROWN to go there. It's how it's coded in the game. Under ordinary circumstances, this never pops up, since the CROWN is a mandatory item. But the LUTE was the treasure of the Marsh Cave, remember? We get the CROWN after beating KARY. So, yeah.

The going to the Volcano itself is rough. The enemies have a nasty habit of getting a surprise round, leading to several precarious spots.

As for the Volcano itself...yeah. Less lava.

And plenty of annoying, unrunnable encounters, such as this one right here - making a return from the Earth Cave because why not? If Sullla goes down, I have to make the trip across the river from hell twice again to get him back up. Ugh. Isn't there a better way?

Well, yes. Ice Cave first is more than possible, but highly not-recommended. But big deal, I say. Comparatively, you can get to the Ice Cave easily just by docking your ship at this port in the inner sea.

Only in ROMhacks can SORCERERs be a sight for sore eyes. They just die to attacks and LIT2, usually wasting turns on TRANCE instead of insta-killing you. Meanwhile, the bastards in the back are...well, bastards. Resistant to all elements but Time, they buff up with FAST and throw some annoying attacks your way, including the petrifying GLANCE. They were among the enemies polluting the river too. They can't surprise you, but you can't run from them.

The second room in the Ice Cave has been changed to a maze. My first attempt met an end when I tried to take a shortcut through the winding third room, meeting the (Evil)EYE on the way who proceeded to tear me a new one. That's one of the few complaints I have about this hack. Almost all of the shortcuts you see are in reality spiked deathtraps.

Though I just plow through for now and ignore the side-diversions, I do take the time to pick up the goodies that are along the way. The Magic Shield is a shield for the Mage classes, and the Axis Shield, while we'll only be able to use it after class change, is quite good. Both resist Fire and Ice.

Against the EYE proper, I throw down XDTH and proceed to blast him with everything I have. T-Hawk snuffs it, but the others manage to take it down.

There's no need to loop back though - WARP takes us right out of the pit. A second casting to dodge a spike with 2 SAURIAs and 6 FrWOLFs, then it's just a merry trek to the exit stairs. Second try, not so bad.

With the Airship comes access to the northern continents, and Level 7 and 8 spells. I only pick up CUR4 and HEL3 for the time being. Due to the shops being scattered about, no pictures of them now

Into the Volcano...this Rain Staff casts FOG2 when used in battle. Very, very useful for many parties.

Red Ds guard some of the nicer treasures as in vanilla, though other things are around. They die extremely quickly to BLZD. The good news about this trek is that I survive up till the boss. The bad news is, I run short on potions, so I have to head directly to KARY and plan a second trip.

KARY retains her vulnerability to status-elemental attacks in this hack, though she's simply vulnerable instead of weak to it. I forgo clever plans of this nature and simply defeat her with steroid-enhanced violence

The CROWN is the primary reward for this, but there's also a Zeus Gauntlet in the four chests behind her.

On the way to Ordeals...wipe!! These are M.SLIMES, which take a cue from Dragon Quest. Unlike Dragon Quest though, these things prefer to sit around, pump themselves up, and kill you. They do have a low morale though and so would run in-theory, and pay out 10000XP apiece

Ordeals itself is much, much more nasty than vanilla. Most of the threats in the latter are instant kills. Most of the threats in this hack are unrunnable and dangerous encounters. Instead of the Zombie Dragons, you have to go through four fights at the end. The first of these isn't worth talking about. The second is the EvilEYE and its GHOSTs again. This is followed by a Red D and Ice D

And finally, what are now called the Death Ds. A pair of FIR3s and a HLY2 put this one to rest.

We're all grown up, now. The most notable thing about our class change is that Sofis can now equip a SIlver Axe we had in our inventory, which has a sick 30 Attack. Axes in this hack generally have high power and crit rates, but low accuracy. Sofis has naturally high accuacy though, so this is simply the best weapon for him for the time being.

Back into the three midgame dungeons to clean them out. There's not much in the Ice Cave to note, except an exploit I only now noticed - that is apparently known and intentional. You can fall in the upper right hole, WARP out to stand back on it, and walk directly to the FLOATER. You can do this in vanilla too, but it's irrelevant due to WARP only being accessible after class change.

The Coward Staff casts RUN! when used as an item. Why this is not stated in the readme, when the name makes it obvious, I have no clue.

Two of the better finds in the Volcano include two ProRings, and the Red Sword. The former are still the excellent death-stopping equipment we all know and love, though now have some competition with some of the other accessories. The Red Sword is 25-strength, +25-acc, 25%-crit rate blade exclusive to the Red Mage and Wizard. It casts SLOW when used as an item.

The treasures in Ordeals are guarded by some nasty-ass spikes, but they're worth it. The Black Shield is exclusive to the Ninja and Black Wizard, and protects against status, poison, earth, fire, and death. The Light Axe is a disgustingly good weapon for this stage of the game. The third-strongest in terms of raw power, yielding only to the XCalber and Masmune. With a 40% crit rate and casting HRM2 when used as an item, its only weakness is +18 accuracy. Pretty irrelevant for Sofis

Carnage.

The caravan is now hidden in the desert, and can't be landed on to boot. On the way back, STUN proves its worth. These guys are dicks. You can't run from this encounter, but Plus C was able to weaken them, lock them down with STUN, and clean up all by himself.

Next | Index