Breath of Fire 3 - 0 Exp Run Part 18: Arch Mage
Ойындар
Well, it looks like time has come for me to reveal my trump card for the endgame of this challenge.
Challenge playlist:
• Breath of Fire 3 - 0 E...
Arch Mage... One of the game's two optional superbosses, defeating whom painlessly requires reaching rather high stat benchmarks, ones definitely out of reach for a 0 exp run without stat boosters. Why exactly are we here again?
Right, the ArchMage drops a Holy Avenger, a holy-elemental devil-slaying (secondary property) dagger equippable by Ryu and Rei. Not only is it Rei's strongest weapon, but Arwan, a boss Ryu has to fight next in order to advance the story, is weak to both the holy element AND devilslaying weaponry, what with being the Devil-type, which results in 4x damage (to be sure, the power also noticeably goes down compared to, say, the GooKingSword we've been occasionally pulling out ever since the Faerie Village became available). Ryu absolutely needs the weapon to progress in this challenge.
So how is beating ArchMage in such strict challenge settings possible? Without the exploit showcased here, I'd say your chances of success astronomical without save states, and the latter would involve rigging a high damage roll+a critical hit on a 999 pwr (after boosters of whatever sort) character and likely also a crit in Weretiger from Rei whose power has also been boosted to the maximum possible (don't think he can cap it in this challenge though, but I'm not 100% sure).
So, the exploit then, what is it? It involves using the move Berserk, normally taught by the master Giotto. Since no levelling occurs in this run, we have to learn it from the most menacing wielder imaginable - Berserkr, another superboss in this game. I beat him many times to get multiple Rufad Spears for example, but in general, his lack of recovery makes him much easier to beat than ArchMage, and it's really impossible for him to beat you assuming you have a good enough stock of Ammonia with you.
Berserk functions as a customisable Weretiger that can be attached to any character. It's sometimes cited as an argument against Rei's uniqueness in the game - anyone can replicate his Weretiger performance with this skill, and even do so before Rei rejoins the party. However, on the third turn of the move being used (counting the one when you used it, sadly), the berserked character will be KO'd automatically. What happens if this character is holding a Soul Gem however (ManlyClothes don't seem to work, much to my chagrin), is that they are revived, their attack still benefiting from the Berserk status but, miraculously, you are once again under full control of their actions. For players not playing this challenge, this means using Shadowwalk and Aura off tripled attack, which is surely a lot of joy, but for our purposes, using Triple Blow and Blitz is also quite effective.
There are things to be aware of here, however. For one, if the character is killed "for real" by an enemy afterwards, or even if they receive a stat boost like Vodka Shot, their Berserk effect will be lost. I also haven't had any luck in combining Berserk with Last Resort, but perhaps I wasn't trying hard enough - either way, it seems a bit superfluous because only Focus and iirc Celerity (can anyone confirm this bit? It's been a few years since I tested this) can help you break the 999 Pwr limit.
The reason why we have to go to such lengths to win here is ArchMage's highly potent recovery that occurs every single turn. With a "mere" 3K HP, the superboss recovers 1,5K at the end of each turn, so outdamaging that healing is virtually impossible for a low-level party. If you want to beat ArchMage in two turns, you have to do at least 2,250 damage on average; otherwise, your party may not see the moment where the boss finally falls.
Surviving in this fight is tricky with the boss being fast and very destructive with magic. His AI is as simple as it gets - 50% Mjollnir, 50% Mind Sword. Mjollnir is cancelled by thunder protection, but there's only Thunder Ring in this game until the Sample bosses where you can a second one. Thunder inoculation + 1x Ivory Charm also supplies full protection. So every Mjollnir turn is a turn we have free to unfold our strategy. Mind Sword is worse - it's a physical attack that uses the caster's Int stat instead of their pwr stat. As such, it can be dodged. Rei, Ryu and Garr, all apprenticed under Meryleep, would have 35%, 18% and 14% dodge respectively. Since my Garr is under D'lonzo for more accuracy, it's just 9% (he still dodged it thrice in a row on one attempt; it failed in the end).
(out of space, see comments for a continuation)
Пікірлер: 29
Logic would have you put Rei in the front and pray he dodges everything, but it's not enough - and losing characters has a harsh cost in making sure we *will* fail to succeed because we need everyone alive and slowly accumulating the buffs. So in the end, Rei utilises his naturally high speed stat to outspeed the boss, which he can accomplish with just 1 Speed casting if given dual Speed Boots. 62,5% of all attacks will target Rei, so there's a good chance Rei will keep Garr and Ryu alive until they buff up and then unleash their attacks for the kill (on 8th-9th turn). Since Ryu has a slightly better AP score than Garr (enabling two uses of Triple Blow), he's the Berserker here. Garr will be using Last Resort in the meantime, buffing up his attack and defence, then using Focus twice to deal twice the damage the following turn. You'd think doubling Ryu's damage would be more beneficial, but only the first strike of Triple Blow receives the boost. Garr uses Blitz to attack instead taking into account his nearly nonexistent AP score, and all three hits (for 1,5x regular dmg) will receive the boost from 2x Focus. The party just barely defeats the ArchMage in one turn after 7 turns of setup. We get our Holy Avenger! Alternatively, Arch Mage can be run out of AP. In just 30 hours, too! I do think this is a good deal funner to do though.
@lorddoomer501
4 жыл бұрын
Yeah, well that battle is easy once you have fireshield...or que Bof equivalent to absorb fire damage. The berserker is a lot tougher...
Some of the best music in the psx library
This video wasn't in my subbox, what a shame. RESPECT FOR THIS
That's a lot of vodka without a chaser
@metalspinda9594
Жыл бұрын
lolol
"Alternatively, Arch Mage can be run out of AP. In just 30 hours, too!" Well, that's 1 and 1/4th day so... Yeah. That'd be interesting... Not sure how anyone found out about that (boredom? Checked his AP?) Also, you forgot a word in the description so it says "A Ryu has to fight next" instead of "a BOSS Ryu has to fight next". Never seen this guy before (because I can't find the damn game anywhere...) so it was interesting to see something 'new' (well, new for ME. Not for others maybe. But as someone who haven't played the game, it's new for me!) I'm guessing a normal leveled party (I have no idea what level you'd need to be here, around 50+?) would be able to beat him in 1 turn without much effort?
@MoogleBoss
9 жыл бұрын
Kainmaster I have the best proofreaders on KZread! Not sure about 1, but 2-3 definitely. An overlevelled party that invested in the right stats can probably rout him in 1 turn if all three get EX-turns. The average party enters the last dungeon of the game at around lv. 30-32, more if the player likes grinding or gets lost repeatedly. On my regular runs of the game, only Ryu ever reaches lv. 40 before the final battle.
Haha this is an INSANE challenge ! congratz dude :D PS: how did you manage to obtain 0 XP at the end of the fights ?
@NightSprinter
3 ай бұрын
Most likely he used an Action Replag code to prevent EXP gaining.
Aren't these guys drunk from all the vodka shots?
i spent a few hours using the lavaman exploit leveled the heck out of my characters, spent a bunch more hours steeling power foods from hobogoblins in the facotry, everyone is level 55, over 400 in strength, figured id march right in and kill the arch mage and got my ass handed to me and you did it on level 1 lol. though i only tried once, definitely need to copy some thunder rings and come back and try this again
@MoogleBoss
8 жыл бұрын
+JOE FPOC Stealing stat boosters definitely is NOT a good investment of one's time. I do agree that Arch Mage is a challenge in himself without any restrictions like lv. 1 etc.
@JoeFpoc
8 жыл бұрын
to be honest i was actually loitering around the factory looking for gold eggs to load up on money but ran into the hobogoblins 20 times more then the eggs so just loaded up on the power foods. but like you said it doesnt really matter when everything he does 1 hit kills my characters
@JoeFpoc
8 жыл бұрын
+MoogleBoss so went after this guy last night. he really isnt that hard, used a few strength boosting spells on ryu, transformed into the kaiser dragon and one hit with aura killed him. i actually thought the berzerker was more of a pain in the ass then the archmage was. next on the agenda is the gooking sword.... god help me
@MoogleBoss
8 жыл бұрын
Zerker is generally easier to kill because no regeneration, but yeah, Kaiser Ryu destroys Arch Mage with a little help from his friends and, like, the Focus skill.
@JoeFpoc
8 жыл бұрын
the problem i had with berzerker was when he goes berzerk at the end, i was pretty much out of mp and had 2 dead characters, second you revive one he shoots him right back down. ended up having to use a hourglass to get my character back up. but i learned from my mistakes i try to save ryu's mp til hes half way down in health and just hit him with nina's crappy spells and gars pyrokinosis, however you spell it.
So you don't really re-equip Soul Gem mid battle? Interesting
Also, forgot to ask: how come Garr keeps taking 5 damage per turn?
@MoogleBoss
9 жыл бұрын
Kainmaster His strongest spear is cursed and causes him to receive 1/20th of his max HP in damage after each turn ends. It doesn't matter here because any attack that connects will kill him regardless.
@airiakizuki5592
6 жыл бұрын
I prefer the Holy elemental spear thats a drop from Bersrker. Its a right bitch to get it to drop though.
@sagegang7439
6 жыл бұрын
mike hutchinson what's the point when you have the best spear in the game, and isn't based off of elemental damage?
@MrSmegheneghan
4 жыл бұрын
@@sagegang7439 Presumably for the same reason as why the Holy Avenger is useful - 150 ATK on the Beast Spear is pretty damn good, but if an enemy is weak to Holy, Rufad's Spear would have 208 ATK against that enemy, making it the better choice. It can cast Shield when used as an item, which is always handy for the longer fights. And, whilst this isn't _as_ fancy considering the Speed formation is a thing, Rufad's Spear is _far_ lighter than the Beast Spear, which could help Garr with acting before the enemy or even with EX turns with other similar equipment.
game genie...
So, maybe I’m dumb here but… Wouldn’t it have been much faster and easier to skip berserk on Ryu, and instead of his berserk rounds attacking (since the archmage heals the damage making it a waste) spend that time buffing Garr…. Or did the berserk do something I missed?
@MoogleBoss
Жыл бұрын
It does, check the description.
Bro ive done some crazy shit like overtraining beyd so he can one shot zig and defeat the game with only peco but who the fuck is crazy enough to do this bro like u need to be on that shit
Fix your damn aspect ratio.