FF1 No Items Part II
Sep. 19th, 2019 09:29 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sirsystemerrorSo the three midgame dungeons stood before me. So which to go to? It was fairly obvious after some thinking about it: Ice Cave first. Another rarity. Gurgu Volcano is out, I actually probably want to handle that as late as possible due to all the lava. And the main draw of Ordeals is all the spellcasting items you can get along the way. This party's restrictions bar that as well.
I mean going by the initial proposition I guess I could allow the offensive spellcasting items. We'll see if I need them, but I'm going to try to make this a full on no DRINK/ITEMS challenge. If I can make it this far, anyway.
First things first of course, pick up the CANOE. Showing off a bit more of the Thief sprite, too.
My first trip to the Ice Cave saw about this much damage on everyone before getting there. Spent all of Buff's CURE spells to heal up before heading inside.
Oh goddamn it.
As usual I will want to RUN from as much as possble. I can gain levels when I need to on the overworld. Fighting in dungeons is not ideal unless I hit something I can't run into, and this was about one of the worst things possible.
My next run in also immediately met WIZARDs, though only three. They went down easily enough. It was very smooth sailing for a while, even though Buff ended up getting knocked down to 3HP at one point. Used up a lot of spells, so whether or not I could complete it was in doubt.
And then it didn't matter I got ambushed and Buff instantly died. Surprisingly though, this was the only encounter with them I ever had during runs of this place. Not complaining about that aspect.
I did try to keep going, but ended up running into this unrunnable group. These three didn't have the power to take it out, so that was a reset. That's one downside of the Thief for now: another RM or a Fighter would've been able to handle it. The next run in met up with Frost Ds, and of course have to consider those FrWOLFs can also sling ice as well.
Well I have an easy solution to that. Both WMs picked up AICE for use. They've plenty of spells charges and there's nothing that can poison in the Ice Cave, so I was free to use it whenever they showed up. I also got to level 14, as that'd give an addition level 1 charge to everyone.
I also made another pickup here, though it was of minimal help. Not like level 2 is seriously cramped for White Magic anyway, at least.
Of course I got the classic when I first got to employ AICE: getting ruined by turn order anyway. Then I was utterly ruined by that happening again and What dying.
My next run in got yet another Frost D group, but this time, I was able to get off AICE before they attacked...then got out of there before they attacked anyway. Still, I was in very good shape before reaching the pit.
Escaped from the spike without incident. More Frost D madness happened after that, ouch!
But I made it through to the EYE with this much in stock.
The first two turns went well, insofar that it decided to only do a GLANCE that did nothing and a weak physical. What's attacks, however, didn't end up doing as much as I would've liked.
Bad news, he got SQUINTed on the next turn. Good news, Buff sealed the deal.
Okay. Now to get out of here. I got two quick encounters after the spike, which crippled my magic stocks further. I was completely out of CUREs, had only two charges of level 5, and Mend was out of level 3 charges. I knew I had to save Gard's though instead of using them on CUR2, in case of an emergency...
Like this!!!!! The FrWOLF was able to get off its blast before I got up AICE, but HEL2 mostly countered it out. FIR2 did a nice chunk of damage to the FrGIANT as well as killing the wolf, and I was able to physical it down from there without too much incident, Mend of all people proving she's no slouch either and getting the kill. 162/201/208 left after that.
Most dangerous encounter after that was a set of FrWOLFs!!! But, I retreated right away. I ran from a pack of undead, and...
Got out!
I just needed to get back from there. I had Buff use his last CUR2 charge on himself, and fought some of the weak enemies on land outside to cast HEL2.
It came close, but I made it to the boat safely! The danger was mostly over from there, and indeed, I had no problems getting to Melmond to heal up.
I picked up the Airship and went to Ordeals with it. Probably would've been a bit better to sail there, but eh. Made it,
Ordeals itself went...shockingly smoothly?! My first encounter was against MEDUSAs who I got away from without incident.
Next up was a ZomBULL who the WMs were having nothing of. Both got high rolled HRM2s to get rid of it in one round
R.GOYLES showed up a couple times. Each time I got up AFIR before they could move, though each time they also didn't use FIR2 either. I ran from the NITEMAREs on the first round, too.
I picked this up since it was only a few steps out of my way and would save me a bit of backtracking later. Forgot the Ice Sword was right there, which would've saved me some more.
And as for the Zombie D, Gard did 128, Mend dealt 69, Buff did a pitiful 48 with FIR2, and What's 49 finished it in one round. Nothing accousted me on the few steps remaining, so that was that!
As usual in this run I have to make it back, and...I ran into complications. Definitely regretting not using the ship now! To restate, just like with Poison, I have no way to heal Stone aside from the SOFT spell. Still given how well that went, I pressed on anyway. I just had to.
Buff went down along the way too - just took tons of damage even with full health in one fight, nothing I could do. Leaving only the WMs. But they were able to keep it together, getting me back to the airship.
I healed at Coneria and changed class. Because I made it at level 14 too, What could start gaining spell charges right away! Or he would, if he wasn't petrified. Knights and Ninjas start gaining charges at level 15, gaining 1 each every odd level from there with a cap of 4. But in order for him to become active again, I need to get the White Wizards to at least level 16 so they can use SOFT.
Before this, I decided to run the Waterfall. This would get me my first Ribbon. Actually getting there was the hardest part! The fights in the river hit insanely hard. You might not notice it in normal play because you can just items and heal, easy-peasy. But here with limited healing, it was. Those encounters were going to be an issue on the way out too.
Once I got inside, it was relatively safe. In terms of direct damage faced, anyway. Had to run away from these guys. Also I ended up knocking down the response rate after this, been slipping on capturing text boxes.
There we go, but perhaps more than that though was the Defense sword. This is arguably the best weapon for RW: 30/35 offenses. Catclaw might crit more and have the same Hit%, but it's also 8 points of attack weaker and much more expensive. Not worth it. Naturally I can't use this for its RUSE cast.
The walk out thankfully posed no issues, and neither did the river run: NAOCHO is one of the tamest things you can face there.
How to gain levels now? I settled outside of Gaia. There's no real huge obnoxious group encounteres there like there are outside Crescent Lake. There's very little status to worry about there too: just poison from WYVERNs. Still right next to a town. And the fights pay out well in general.
The Defense made a world of difference here. Buff was finally doing respectable damage! The whole processes didn't take nearly as long as I thought it might.
And there! Another purchase you rarely see.
Next was to get enough solo levels on What to catch him up. A bit of firewalking got rid of the others.
The same location worked well - and it helps that Ninja can equip the Defense too. It's not his best weapon, and RW is going to prefer having it instead, but for this grinding it's the best choice. It went smoothly, and I actually got him further ahead of the pack just to separate his and Buff's levels further.
I got him FAST as I intended - the huge big point of taking him. Now that he was up and class changed, it was time to give him everything I could with all the gear he could now equip.
First up was buying him a ProRing, for an extra 7 absorb. The others could wait on that, since there's plenty of freebies. After that was a dip back into the Ice Cave to grab the Ice Armor and Ice Shield. Ninjas can't equip the Dragon/Aegis or Opal equipment, so these (and Flame) are the best it gets - still the second best of any class. I ideally would've gotten the shield the first trip in, but I just wanted to get out of there ASAP and not take the extra two steps. I got Exit to facilitate this and make these trips a bit easier.
I picked up the Flame Sword along the way. It was just going to be for a short while, but it was technically better than the Great Axe he was using. It was right there too and I was past the point where I was worried, so I got it!
I had a run-in with MAGEs along the way. The WWs have LIFE, but you can still see the big problem instant death presents. It dumps me all the way in the hole on healing a character.
Besides these, I took the chance to clean out more of the chests besides the ones in question, at least those that didn't have consumables inside. Aside from that incident, none of the encounters posed a threat, getting out of them before any serious danger if any.
The next thing to do was get the Ice Sword from Ordeals - it's better than the Flame Sword with 29/25 offense compared to its 26/20. This would be What's weapon for a bit. The MEDUSAs did show up and do their thing, but they hit the WW without SOFT, so that was only mildly inconvenient. MANCATs also showed up, but Gard went first and stopped them with AFIR.
Excellent. I got the Zeus Gauntlet too, still sitting on the choice whether to allow non-healing ITEMS. I passed it to What since he can equip it, giving Buff the ProRing I had purchased instead.
From here on out is when Ninja finally starts to become more useful. Still offensively weaker than the other two physical classes, but finally coming into its own - as niche as that is. We'll see if my insane theory to employ one pays off moving forward.
Next | Index
I mean going by the initial proposition I guess I could allow the offensive spellcasting items. We'll see if I need them, but I'm going to try to make this a full on no DRINK/ITEMS challenge. If I can make it this far, anyway.
First things first of course, pick up the CANOE. Showing off a bit more of the Thief sprite, too.
My first trip to the Ice Cave saw about this much damage on everyone before getting there. Spent all of Buff's CURE spells to heal up before heading inside.
Oh goddamn it.
As usual I will want to RUN from as much as possble. I can gain levels when I need to on the overworld. Fighting in dungeons is not ideal unless I hit something I can't run into, and this was about one of the worst things possible.
My next run in also immediately met WIZARDs, though only three. They went down easily enough. It was very smooth sailing for a while, even though Buff ended up getting knocked down to 3HP at one point. Used up a lot of spells, so whether or not I could complete it was in doubt.
And then it didn't matter I got ambushed and Buff instantly died. Surprisingly though, this was the only encounter with them I ever had during runs of this place. Not complaining about that aspect.
I did try to keep going, but ended up running into this unrunnable group. These three didn't have the power to take it out, so that was a reset. That's one downside of the Thief for now: another RM or a Fighter would've been able to handle it. The next run in met up with Frost Ds, and of course have to consider those FrWOLFs can also sling ice as well.
Well I have an easy solution to that. Both WMs picked up AICE for use. They've plenty of spells charges and there's nothing that can poison in the Ice Cave, so I was free to use it whenever they showed up. I also got to level 14, as that'd give an addition level 1 charge to everyone.
I also made another pickup here, though it was of minimal help. Not like level 2 is seriously cramped for White Magic anyway, at least.
Of course I got the classic when I first got to employ AICE: getting ruined by turn order anyway. Then I was utterly ruined by that happening again and What dying.
My next run in got yet another Frost D group, but this time, I was able to get off AICE before they attacked...then got out of there before they attacked anyway. Still, I was in very good shape before reaching the pit.
Escaped from the spike without incident. More Frost D madness happened after that, ouch!
But I made it through to the EYE with this much in stock.
The first two turns went well, insofar that it decided to only do a GLANCE that did nothing and a weak physical. What's attacks, however, didn't end up doing as much as I would've liked.
Bad news, he got SQUINTed on the next turn. Good news, Buff sealed the deal.
Okay. Now to get out of here. I got two quick encounters after the spike, which crippled my magic stocks further. I was completely out of CUREs, had only two charges of level 5, and Mend was out of level 3 charges. I knew I had to save Gard's though instead of using them on CUR2, in case of an emergency...
Like this!!!!! The FrWOLF was able to get off its blast before I got up AICE, but HEL2 mostly countered it out. FIR2 did a nice chunk of damage to the FrGIANT as well as killing the wolf, and I was able to physical it down from there without too much incident, Mend of all people proving she's no slouch either and getting the kill. 162/201/208 left after that.
Most dangerous encounter after that was a set of FrWOLFs!!! But, I retreated right away. I ran from a pack of undead, and...
Got out!
I just needed to get back from there. I had Buff use his last CUR2 charge on himself, and fought some of the weak enemies on land outside to cast HEL2.
It came close, but I made it to the boat safely! The danger was mostly over from there, and indeed, I had no problems getting to Melmond to heal up.
I picked up the Airship and went to Ordeals with it. Probably would've been a bit better to sail there, but eh. Made it,
Ordeals itself went...shockingly smoothly?! My first encounter was against MEDUSAs who I got away from without incident.
Next up was a ZomBULL who the WMs were having nothing of. Both got high rolled HRM2s to get rid of it in one round
R.GOYLES showed up a couple times. Each time I got up AFIR before they could move, though each time they also didn't use FIR2 either. I ran from the NITEMAREs on the first round, too.
I picked this up since it was only a few steps out of my way and would save me a bit of backtracking later. Forgot the Ice Sword was right there, which would've saved me some more.
And as for the Zombie D, Gard did 128, Mend dealt 69, Buff did a pitiful 48 with FIR2, and What's 49 finished it in one round. Nothing accousted me on the few steps remaining, so that was that!
As usual in this run I have to make it back, and...I ran into complications. Definitely regretting not using the ship now! To restate, just like with Poison, I have no way to heal Stone aside from the SOFT spell. Still given how well that went, I pressed on anyway. I just had to.
Buff went down along the way too - just took tons of damage even with full health in one fight, nothing I could do. Leaving only the WMs. But they were able to keep it together, getting me back to the airship.
I healed at Coneria and changed class. Because I made it at level 14 too, What could start gaining spell charges right away! Or he would, if he wasn't petrified. Knights and Ninjas start gaining charges at level 15, gaining 1 each every odd level from there with a cap of 4. But in order for him to become active again, I need to get the White Wizards to at least level 16 so they can use SOFT.
Before this, I decided to run the Waterfall. This would get me my first Ribbon. Actually getting there was the hardest part! The fights in the river hit insanely hard. You might not notice it in normal play because you can just items and heal, easy-peasy. But here with limited healing, it was. Those encounters were going to be an issue on the way out too.
Once I got inside, it was relatively safe. In terms of direct damage faced, anyway. Had to run away from these guys. Also I ended up knocking down the response rate after this, been slipping on capturing text boxes.
There we go, but perhaps more than that though was the Defense sword. This is arguably the best weapon for RW: 30/35 offenses. Catclaw might crit more and have the same Hit%, but it's also 8 points of attack weaker and much more expensive. Not worth it. Naturally I can't use this for its RUSE cast.
The walk out thankfully posed no issues, and neither did the river run: NAOCHO is one of the tamest things you can face there.
How to gain levels now? I settled outside of Gaia. There's no real huge obnoxious group encounteres there like there are outside Crescent Lake. There's very little status to worry about there too: just poison from WYVERNs. Still right next to a town. And the fights pay out well in general.
The Defense made a world of difference here. Buff was finally doing respectable damage! The whole processes didn't take nearly as long as I thought it might.
And there! Another purchase you rarely see.
Next was to get enough solo levels on What to catch him up. A bit of firewalking got rid of the others.
The same location worked well - and it helps that Ninja can equip the Defense too. It's not his best weapon, and RW is going to prefer having it instead, but for this grinding it's the best choice. It went smoothly, and I actually got him further ahead of the pack just to separate his and Buff's levels further.
I got him FAST as I intended - the huge big point of taking him. Now that he was up and class changed, it was time to give him everything I could with all the gear he could now equip.
First up was buying him a ProRing, for an extra 7 absorb. The others could wait on that, since there's plenty of freebies. After that was a dip back into the Ice Cave to grab the Ice Armor and Ice Shield. Ninjas can't equip the Dragon/Aegis or Opal equipment, so these (and Flame) are the best it gets - still the second best of any class. I ideally would've gotten the shield the first trip in, but I just wanted to get out of there ASAP and not take the extra two steps. I got Exit to facilitate this and make these trips a bit easier.
I picked up the Flame Sword along the way. It was just going to be for a short while, but it was technically better than the Great Axe he was using. It was right there too and I was past the point where I was worried, so I got it!
I had a run-in with MAGEs along the way. The WWs have LIFE, but you can still see the big problem instant death presents. It dumps me all the way in the hole on healing a character.
Besides these, I took the chance to clean out more of the chests besides the ones in question, at least those that didn't have consumables inside. Aside from that incident, none of the encounters posed a threat, getting out of them before any serious danger if any.
The next thing to do was get the Ice Sword from Ordeals - it's better than the Flame Sword with 29/25 offense compared to its 26/20. This would be What's weapon for a bit. The MEDUSAs did show up and do their thing, but they hit the WW without SOFT, so that was only mildly inconvenient. MANCATs also showed up, but Gard went first and stopped them with AFIR.
Excellent. I got the Zeus Gauntlet too, still sitting on the choice whether to allow non-healing ITEMS. I passed it to What since he can equip it, giving Buff the ProRing I had purchased instead.
From here on out is when Ninja finally starts to become more useful. Still offensively weaker than the other two physical classes, but finally coming into its own - as niche as that is. We'll see if my insane theory to employ one pays off moving forward.
Next | Index
