Brigandine Grand Edition...

[quick brown fox]

I've only finished my Leonia run (had a team "grind"-ed to death, packing almost all LVL30s (Lyonesse, Dogal, Kiloph) including monsters, yet still had difficulties with Bulnoil) and started my New Almekia at Hard with Grand Battle patch and immediately broke my alliance with Caerleon. I was expecting to be overwhelmed with pressure from Caerleon (and Norgard/Esgares), but seriously, New Almekia is just plain broken; IMO the most difficult country to use is still Esgares followed by Iscalio.

Anyway, enough narration. Here's my feedback on the 'Grand Battle' patch:

- For people saying that the hit/crit rates are skewed when they have applied the patch (or maybe due to Hard mode?); I haven't felt it, I crit as much as the AI and their hit rates still follow the mechanics similar to the human player.

- The magically appearing Lv1 Salamanders/Fafnirs/Bahamuts are scary to behold, but in practice they are not much imbalanced and can actually be an AI liability. Being Lv1 means that, except for their class-up bonuses in ATK and DEF, their STR/INT/AGI are still underdeveloped yet they still cost 110-120 RP. They have hit/evasion rates almost similar to that of a low leveled dragon, and thus are not that difficult to kill (and they give great EXP to boot).

- The Lv1 Lucifers/Liliths remains intimidating, but not as much as one would expect. Due to their class ups, these tend to be much more aggressive in going to the front lines. Since their HP and AGI are not yet developed, they are actually easier to kill than expected.

- However, the BIGGEST gameplay impact of are the nonstop Stat Ups that are applied to the enemies. I feel wretched seeing the White Wolf packing such high STR values making his ATK around 380, and his INT and AGI around 130-ish, with 9 Rune Area and 450 Rune Power... at LV22. And I'm not even mentioning the others yet. When I got Millet after I've defeated Esgares, she can cast two Meteor Dooms at LV20 and had so much godly stats (much better than any of my LV30 knights) that I refused to use her since it feels too much of a cheat.

As much as I've said that I'm liking the difficulty patch, I think this indiscriminate stat up needs to be replaced. I don't mind fighting LV30 enemy knights in a death match, but when my LV30 Champions have only 25% hit rate against a LV20+ Gereint/Bagdemagus due to their steroids-induced high AGI (they hit back much harder too), and then the enemy Coel heals 270+ HP at LV22 (due to high INT), the game's balance feels too much tampered for comfort.

Seriously, I'd much prefer the AI getting global +250 EXP each turn from the get-go than this. I'd prefer fighting a proper Lv25 Brangien than a Lv15 one which hits and evades like a Lv25.

TL;DR opinions on Grand Battle patch:
- Random monster class-UPs are fine.
- AI having more Mana per turn is actually a great idea
- Enemy knights having random +HP/+MP/+STR/INT/AGI/+RP/+RA per turn feels too much tampering of balance. Please consider changing to +EXP each turn, even including monsters.

Once again, thanks for all your hard work.

[Rovole]

- For people saying that the hit/crit rates are skewed when they have applied the patch (or maybe due to Hard mode?); I haven't felt it, I crit as much as the AI and their hit rates still follow the mechanics similar to the human player.
Seriously, I'd much prefer the AI getting global +250 EXP each turn from the get-go than this. I'd prefer fighting a proper Lv25 Brangien than a Lv15 one which hits and evades like a Lv25...

Could just be confirmation bias on our part, we'd need actually tallied hits/crits compared to projected percentage hit/crit rates. It is a common go-to method of boosting AI competence with minimal effort, though.

...-Enemy knights having random +HP/+MP/+STR/INT/AGI/+RP/+RA per turn feels too much tampering of balance. Please consider changing to +EXP each turn, even including monsters.

This was discussed early in the thread, and the main problem with this is that there is no existing architecture to implement this sort of thing. The grand battle patch is more of a hack than a true mod, modifying existing strings of code with different values is one thing, implementing entirely new ones is another entirely, though it seems that existing +stat routines are just a step away from becoming +exp routines as well. If exp itself can't be allotted out, maybe an outright +level to go with the boosted stats can even things out.

This seems to have been mentioned multiple times throughout the thread, the main issue is not whether or not this is a good idea, but how to go about implementing it. Keep in mind that the entire workload burden is placed on a single man's shoulders, so be mindful of how much you ask for.

[quick brown fox]

This was discussed early in the thread, and the main problem with this is that there is no existing architecture to implement this sort of thing. The grand battle patch is more of a hack than a true mod, modifying existing strings of code with different values is one thing, implementing entirely new ones is another entirely, though it seems that existing +stat routines are just a step away from becoming +exp routines as well. If exp itself can't be allotted out, maybe an outright +level to go with the boosted stats can even things out.

This seems to have been mentioned multiple times throughout the thread, the main issue is not whether or not this is a good idea, but how to go about implementing it. Keep in mind that the entire workload burden is placed on a single man's shoulders, so be mindful of how much you ask for.

Seems like I missed that post on the difficulty of implementing +EXP to the units. I don't know much about coding myself, but the Grand Battle patch had, at first sight, overwhelming changes on the enemy AI stat acquisition that made it seem that giving +EXP should be a piece of cake. It's not like I requested for an improved AI, new monster classes, or anything, but if the repeated posts on requesting +EXP on enemy countries sounds like I'm undermining the difficulty and time-consumption of the task then sorry for the misunderstanding.

If the enemy can obtain +stats by implementing the existing use-item routines then maybe we can utilize the "+100 or +200 EXP"-quest routines obtained during those specific quests and implement it per turn on all COM knights? I don't know what I'm talking about by the way.

I actually can't pinpoint why the extremely buffed stats of the enemy bother me so much; maybe because I don't like the feeling that such +stats are "unobtainable" by the human player. Part of the charm of Brigandine is it engulfs all the countries within its own mechanics; an AI enemy country also battles it out with another AI enemy country similar to how the human player fights one, and what the player can obtain can also be obtained by the AI, which BGE improves upon by the enemy AI being able to also send knights to quests.

[Rovole]

I actually can't pinpoint why the extremely buffed stats of the enemy bother me so much; maybe because I don't like the feeling that such +stats are "unobtainable" by the human player. Part of the charm of Brigandine is it engulfs all the countries within its own mechanics; an AI enemy country also battles it out with another AI enemy country similar to how the human player fights one, and what the player can obtain can also be obtained by the AI, which BGE improves upon by the enemy AI being able to also send knights to quests.

I agree with the general sentiment expressed here, its not exactly "fair" the way the AI is boosted. Least of all that there is no cap on how strong their knights can eventually become. If the AI gains levels faster instead, there are clear limits on what the AI can achieve and these limits are ones the player themselves can realistically reach on their own effort. Keep in mind that the grand battle patch, though, is completely optional. The game as it stands features several unique scenarios that reshuffle the six-nation gameplay that we take for granted, and may provide that bit of extra challenge you're itching for without risking the rough-edges of a fanmade hardmode hack.

Personally, I'm interested in exploring the unused addresses for certain values like monsters, items, quests, and knight slots for hidden goodies. Mayhaps there is an unused "experience potion" that is exactly what we're looking for. I doubt it though; when the original devs realized that they couldn't fit their game on a single disc anymore, they must have done a second-pass of the data and cleaned up anything that was taking up unwarranted space, especially since the two discs are basically dupes of each other with a few details changed.

[HwitVlf]

Mirsa, I don't know if you ever got an answer. As far as I know, there's nothing broken in the Grand Battle patch so that's probably the one you want.

duredure, nothing was changed in hit/critical odds. Do you know that if you can only move 1 hex (ie you're surrounded) you are more likely to miss and to receive critical hits? The AI uses that tactic often and it may account for what you're seeing. I haven't dug through the damage/hit routines thoroughly, but I seriously doubt they give bonuses to COM enemies. Everything I've looked at doesn't have a player bias. One of the reasons it was hard to inject extra EXP into enemy units is because everything in the game uses the exact same "EXP+ per action" routine. Even COM vs COM battles appear to be played out hit by hit like a real battle, giving EXP after each action.

Harablo, I think knight level only plays a factor in which squads act first during a battle. As far as I know, the "which invader takes precedence" is decided randomly during a normal game. In multiplayer, there's a "turn order" setting; it might affect that.

quick brown fox, thanks for the feedback. I played through on Caerleon and still didn't find the enemies especially challenging. It just required an adapted strategy compared to normal. Basically, I had to play more defensively, use more units with ranged skills and go after enemy knights more aggressively to force retreats. Because enemies only get one boost per organization phase, timing is crucial. If you dally about they will get too strong. I look at it as a "sliding time limit" rather than the original "fixed limit".

This was just something I threw together on request. I spent a day tracing the EXP routine and there are ways to implement EXP+, but I just simply don't have the time. I didn't want to make the mod dependent on my translation so it becomes much harder to find an unused area to insert new code. Honestly, I have doubts that higher level knight/creatures would make a significant difficulty difference anyway. The small stat boosts from level ups are just not enough to counter the "human advantage".

Rovole, BGE is the sloppiest, most inefficient game I've ever seen. There are double copies of all kinds of data. I don't know how many members of E3 Staff continued on with Hearty Robin, but it seems like many aspects of GE were just plastered inefficiently over the original LoF by people who didn't really get how LoF was working. For example, there are segments of Japanese text that appear in LoF and are still in the data in GE, but are set to no longer appear in game. I don't know if it was error (using the 'end-text' tag instead of the 'next line' tag) or if an editor decided to block some lines and just didn't bother to remove the text. I pretty sure the game could have easily fit on a single disk if they had wanted to.

[Rovole]

Rovole, BGE is the sloppiest, most inefficient game I've ever seen. There are double copies of all kinds of data. I don't know how many members of E3 Staff continued on with Hearty Robin, but it seems like many aspects of GE were just plastered inefficiently over the original LoF by people who didn't really get how LoF was working. For example, there are segments of Japanese text that appear in LoF and are still in the data in GE, but are set to no longer appear in game. I don't know if it was error (using the 'end-text' tag instead of the 'next line' tag) or if an editor decided to block some lines and just didn't bother to remove the text. I pretty sure the game could have easily fit on a single disk if they had wanted to.

haha wow, I bet they didn't think they'd ever have the quality of their work discovered, much less owned up to. What about the digital re-release Brigandine got on the (Japanese) psn? Is there even a copy of the digital version out there on the net? I can understand if there might not be, since Sony keeps a tight leash on their soft, and firmware, and makes it hard to copy things they don't want copied. I had to mod my console hardware just to be able to have more than 4 characters in demon's souls.

Resident evil 2 on the n64 was lauded as an achievement in data compression. One can only imagine the hoops Capcom jumped through to get their game on a single cartridge, and keep in mind cartridge technology was less advanced than the plastic squares we have now. I suppose thats one reason why Capcom is still around, though struggling, and Hearty Robin is not.

[HwitVlf]

Does anyone know how to contact Dryst who ran Forsena.org? I hope nothing bad happened to him.

[Harablo]

Aside from his game faqs account that im not sure if he checks or not, cant find anything else.
Game Faqs account: MadMonarchVoard

[Tony0075]

If there is a way to do away with the monster hp issue when u don't have enough castles that would be great !! I game Leonia like 12 salamanders at level 20 and because they have 2 castles left the idiots deleted them !!!

[HwitVlf]

HwitVlf I am amazed by your progress in this project. The last time I replied this post was. What? Two years ago I think. But I regularly check the updates from time to time.

I'm very satisfied with the update that is already available. But will probably wait for the final version to really play the game all the way. While I tested it. I cound not avoid to notice that the Demons were translated as Imp, Archdemons as Siren, and Lucifer was Arch Seraph even had its Sprite color changed. I'm not very familiar with japanese but I do know that the kana in the game could be romanized to Rushiferu. And its clearly a fallen angel (considering that it is Light and Dark at the same time). Weird enough, Lilith remained the same.  I wound like to know the reason for the change?

Anyway. Thanks for your effort and I'm still looking forward to your next patch.

Ha, so you're saying you want me to name something Rushiferu? I'm a bit weary of answering questions about why I changed some names since it's already been discussed pretty extensively. But to answer your question, there were several reasons. One of the main ones being there were three creatures in the game named after synonyms for satan (Satan Lucifer Shaitan). That may work for Japanese who really have no idea what the English names  mean, but for a European audience it's a bad choice that waters down the name's impact. Second, I don't think the game was trying to say the angel line ended 'fallen', but as mandated by taoist cliche principles both the angel and demon lines ended in nearly identical black/white yin/yang creatures. That may feel 'meaningful' to Japanese taoist spiritualism, but having the two strongest units in the game end up nearly identical was a bad choice gameplay-wise and it lost its spiritual impact for a large part of the western audience who have a long history of "good versus evil" as opposed to "evil completes good". My belief is that these changes, though further from literally accurate, make the "feeling" more accurate to the original for a western audience.

It's a common practice for companies to completely change names when translating a game- precisely for the kind of reasons I've mentioned. Atlus changed lots of names when translating LoF. If someone has a reason why a name I used is inferior to the 100% literal, I'm happy to consider it. But if it just boils down to "OMG that's not what Atlus called it", I have trouble taking it seriously. Am I right? Who knows, but all I can do is use my best judgement.