Delete PSPs and Rebirths, real Atlus stank hours. This localisation kind of sucks, lol.

I have a bunch of ridiculously specific questions about Tactics Ogre My Beloved, that I cannot find on search engines (DDG and Searx) or in the LUCT faq/guide. I also looked at Warren Report and Coffee Potato on youtube, no dice. If you know about it pls tell me, or embarrass me by showing me links to the answers!

  • Why do Ninjas suck so bad at magic? Three damage from a FireBurn on a fire-elemented Ninja to a wind-elemented Eagleman of the same level???

  • Actually what's a good strat for Ninjas generally? They're so frail.

  • What governs whether or not spells like Thunder or Acid are single-tile target or five-tile targeting? I have two Valkyries with Thunder, and one casts for five tiles, the other for one tile...

SOLVED: Area of Effect for spells in SFC/PSX/SS is governed by the Intelligence stat, apparently. Above 64 gives five tiles, above 128 gives 13, according to GameFAQs. My earth-aligned Denim has 89 INT, yet while his Acid is five-tile, his Thunder is single tile. Fake.

  • Is there a way to influence or change alignment, or is it just random and fixed?

  • Does loyalty affect a unit's stats or anything?

  • What even governs accuracy, just generally? Also is the RNG completely goofy?

  • How do you turn off those fucking spell dialogues during training???

  • Why is Canopus such a heroic chad who cannot be stopped and MVP every time??? stalin-heart

THINGS I HAVE UNCOVERED BY WATCHING RANDOM VIDEOS:

  • While stat increases are random on level, there is a Skill system that grants a unit "points" in that skill, i.e. Missile, Utility, Melee etc. Basically units get better at using attacks or spells or etc the more they use em. This may account for why my Ninjas and also Valkyries are trash shrug-outta-hecks

  • If you walk back and forth over non-City locations you can get random battles. I want more Lizardmen so this is handy.

Also if anybody knows how to make PCSX derived emulators (PCSX-R, for example) load Tactics Ogre saves? The PlayStation version apparently fails to load saves from thirdparty memory cards that use compression, and Tactics Ogre on PCSX-ReArmed also fails to load saves it created. If you have any info on the PlayStation version's turbojank code, please hmu. I actually suspect that the game has poor coding overall, since the Super Famicom english translation is buggy despite being by a known group, and the PlayStation version seems hokey too. (hangs briefly during turns, aforementioned save issues, goofy text box formatting)

  • NephewAlphaBravo [he/him]
    hexbear
    4
    edit-2
    9 days ago

    My earth-aligned Denim has 89 INT, yet while his Acid is five-tile, his Thunder is single tile.

    I know enough ogre battle to know that acid is an earth spell, and that air and earth are opposing elements, so maybe his alignment is buffing acid and weakening thunder

    • ashinadash [she/her, comrade/them]
      hexagon
      hexbear
      2
      9 days ago

      yea and yet my one Valkyrie that casts Thunder for a single tile is Wind-aligned... according to this post it shakes out between Int/Ment threshhold, caster element, weather and terrain, which is a lot lol

      • NephewAlphaBravo [he/him]
        hexbear
        2
        9 days ago

        this is why tactics games intimidate me, and I'm not exactly shy about complex games lmao

        • ashinadash [she/her, comrade/them]
          hexagon
          hexbear
          2
          9 days ago

          Fwiw it's not real hard to play, it was a super famicom game after all. A ton goes on under the hood but you don't need to know the game's guts inside and out, it's fairly accessible imo, particularly the newer versions with less stinky UI :)

    • ashinadash [she/her, comrade/them]
      hexagon
      hexbear
      2
      10 days ago

      It did, and they added a forgiving countdown timer prior to permadeath!!! Unacceptable, my Tactics Ogre should be paddling my ass at all times. /s (I have the PSP version installed for the future as well)

  • Thallo [she/her, he/him]
    hexbear
    3
    10 days ago

    I didn't use ninjas too often but when I did, I used them as harass/executioners.

    They're highly mobile, so they can stay out of range and not take damage. They have high melee damage, so I use spells to soften enemies up, and when the enemy is low enough for a kill, I'd move in and take it. It's important that you know you can get the kill because they really can't take a counter attack.

    I felt the same about Valkyries, but I used them anyway because they're fucking cool.

    • ashinadash [she/her, comrade/them]
      hexagon
      hexbear
      1
      9 days ago

      I think mine just need more training, but it is handy to set em on a roof and hurl shuriken or cast aoe attack magic, rip red mage guy in Griate u will be missed packwatch

      I guess Ninja and Valkyrie are sort of inverted, where Ninja are fragile and more range-focused versus Valkyries who can get in with a spear. This game fucks big-cool

  • CarbonScored [any]
    hexbear
    2
    10 days ago

    I'm only familiar with the GBA versions, alas. To be honest it never even occurred to me they'd be on other consoles.. time to look for some roms.

  • bigboopballs [he/him]
    hexbear
    2
    10 days ago

    I wish those Tactics RPG style games weren't so slow to play. You spend so much time watching each character take their turn.

    • ProfessorOwl_PhD [any]
      hexbear
      3
      edit-2
      9 days ago

      The recent remake has a fastforward function that makes this much more tolerable - it still gets a bit tiresome when there are a dozen enemies shuffling around slightly, but most of the time it's not a bother.

    • ashinadash [she/her, comrade/them]
      hexagon
      hexbear
      1
      10 days ago

      I'd argue emulator fastforward is great for that, but there should be a function to skip enemy animations or turns altogether. At least it's not like Shining Force where it has "instance" battle animations..

      Doesn't bug me though, I find the CPU turns are nail-bitingly tense lol

      • AssortedBiscuits [they/them]
        hexbear
        3
        10 days ago

        I'd argue emulator fastforward is great for that, but there should be a function to skip enemy animations or turns altogether.

        SRPGs need a "skip animations except for crits/specials/last hit of boss" option. No one wants to see animations of mooks doing chip damage to your completely optimized party with BIS gear, but it also sucks for people to skip out on seeing crit animation, which tends to be more impressive. I don't think this should be too hard to implement since the game keeps track of when crits or specials trigger.

        Shining Force

        Each player turn takes like 10 minutes if you use those 3-tile AOE spells. The AOE healing and AOE buff spells are really bad because you want to use the spells on your entire party, which means seeing all 12 members go through the same animation. And it's technically not even animation since they're not even moving.

        • ashinadash [she/her, comrade/them]
          hexagon
          hexbear
          2
          10 days ago

          No one wants to see animations of mooks doing chip damage

          Actually whenever I order a basic Soldier to throw a rock down a hill, I'm always on the edge of my seat murmurring "Cmon cmon, hit!!" decoy

          Lol @ 10min Shining Force turns though, amazing.

          • AssortedBiscuits [they/them]
            hexbear
            2
            edit-2
            10 days ago

            Now that I think about it, Shining Force didn't have player/enemy turns. If you count an entire turn based on the party leader and the action of everyone else after, yeah, 10 minute turns aren't that unusual.