[FF7PC-98/Steam] New Threat Mod (v2.0.999992)

[RecklessPrudence]

Okay, stupid question: The OP talks about a readme, that I've seen others in the last twenty pages or so refer to, but I couldn't find a link to it - I wanted to read up on the differences between New Threat and standard FF7. Is it all handled with the in-game documentation now? Even the bits that people have been talking about where it says where weapons and materia and stuff have been relocated to? If so, that's impressive! If not, whereabouts can I grab the readme to have a look at it before I fire New Threat up?

 

[Sega Chief]

Encountered an issue with this NPC here. "Rank Up" does not actually do anything and acts similarly to "Forget it", I just get to control Cloud again.

Not sure what's wrong with him, his scripts seem OK like the others. I'll get to the bottom of it though.

Okay, stupid question: The OP talks about a readme, that I've seen others in the last twenty pages or so refer to, but I couldn't find a link to it - I wanted to read up on the differences between New Threat and standard FF7. Is it all handled with the in-game documentation now? Even the bits that people have been talking about where it says where weapons and materia and stuff have been relocated to? If so, that's impressive! If not, whereabouts can I grab the readme to have a look at it before I fire New Threat up?

It should all be in the documentation folder. But here's a pastebin of the readme: https://pastebin.com/XFS5rHeF

 

[watermelon]

Haven't played this mod in a long time so I thought I'd do a fresh playthrough on 1.5 arrange.  I don't remember ever having trouble with the Bottomswell fight before, but this guy seems like he can't be poisoned, confused, paralyzed, silenced, or even slowed.  Inflicting fury works alright, but there doesn't seem to be many options available to you if Aeris gets turned into a frog, since your only access to a frog cure seems to be her level 2 limit (couldn't find any item or materia for it up to this point) and a single random vaccine I picked up somewhere.  Pretty unexpected difficulty spike, unless I'm missing something.

Still, great mod.  Lots of fun.

 

[MoCheese]

Very small text bug:

When you can return to Midgar via the Sector 5 key and I assume after Meteor is falling, and go to the small town where Aeris' house is. The one house that has the kid with the money hidden in the drawers and the Turtle's Paradise poster. There's a guy up there who's text box is all jumbled. Words cut off midway and all that. Don't remember what specifically was said but I can go look if ya need me to.

 

[Sega Chief]

That's an Arrange-specific battle that replaces Bottomswell on that mode; the Frog status is a problem as there's no status healing items for it by that point of the game so that'll be taken off his attacks in the next patch.

Very small text bug:

When you can return to Midgar via the Sector 5 key and I assume after Meteor is falling, and go to the small town where Aeris' house is. The one house that has the kid with the money hidden in the drawers and the Turtle's Paradise poster. There's a guy up there who's text box is all jumbled. Words cut off midway and all that. Don't remember what specifically was said but I can go look if ya need me to.

I'll just check the field, there's not a lot of text up there.

 

[Insight]

Havent seen it explicity: What is the difference between 1.4 and 1.5? Will there be other versions as well? Are you finished or just bug-fixing for now? =)

 

[watermelon]

That's an Arrange-specific battle that replaces Bottomswell on that mode; the Frog status is a problem as there's no status healing items for it by that point of the game so that'll be taken off his attacks in the next patch.

Alright thanks, good to know I wasn't overlooking something.  I did manage to beat him, the only problem was it required some grinding to get Aeris her Planet Protector limit and to get enough AP to have bolt 2.  If you manage to get Peerless up right at the start of the battle, you can sorta blitzkrieg him down so you can completely skip his frog casting/tail whipping stage.  Also was this the intended reward or did you accidentally add a zero or something?

 

[Sega Chief]

Alright thanks, good to know I wasn't overlooking something.  I did manage to beat him, the only problem was it required some grinding to get Aeris her Planet Protector limit and to get enough AP to have bolt 2.  If you manage to get Peerless up right at the start of the battle, you can sorta blitzkrieg him down so you can completely skip his frog casting/tail whipping stage.  Also was this the intended reward or did you accidentally add a zero or something?

No, that's his old Disc 3 rewards when that particular enemy was used in Dark Cave. It missed initial fixes because the fight itself wasn't being loaded in Arrange Mode; it'll be sorted out in the next patch.

Havent seen it explicity: What is the difference between 1.4 and 1.5? Will there be other versions as well? Are you finished or just bug-fixing for now? =)

This is the last major version outside of bug fixes and adjustments. The differences between 1.4 and 1.5 aren't drastic, but Arrange Mode was made available and I reworked a lot of the bosses, particularly on Disc 2/3.

 

[Sega Chief]

I've fixed up the majority of the reported issues; here's what I've got so far:

-) Wrong triggers for Pillar in Dark Cave (game moment 1998 instead of 1620)
-) Triple AP growth missing from some weapons
-) Venus Gospel, Drain HP flag
-) KOTR attack name fix (may appear slightly off-centre; best I could do)
-) Jormungandr EXP/AP/Gil values fixed & Frog removed from attacks
-) Various text alignment problems
-) Rank Up option fixed on 3rd NPC in Temple of the Ancients

I've been looking at the Arrange bosses a bit more and I'm going to give them a quick once over before I (finally) lay the mod to rest. It'll mostly be balancing tweaks, like removing Rufus' immunity to poison or bringing in a more interesting change to them. Feedback on Arrange bosses would be appreciated.

I was also thinking about making good on an earlier promise in remixing the Materia and Equipment placements in Arrange as well. What do you think?

 

[RecklessPrudence]

It should all be in the documentation folder. But here's a pastebin of the readme: https://pastebin.com/XFS5rHeF

Ah, okay - I had only downloaded the IRO, not the zip that had the documentation in it. Would it be okay for you to upload a documentation-only zip, to go with the IRO? Or would that just add one more thing to maintain, and anyone who's not as dumb as me would just download the zip for the documention?

 

[Bowser9]

Remixing the Materia and Equipment placements would be great. Freshen up resource management.

 

[Pendulum Swing]

I was also thinking about making good on an earlier promise in remixing the Materia and Equipment placements in Arrange as well. What do you think?

Do you mean making that as part of that separate patch with the increased stat changes on Materia? I loved that thing back when I played 1.35.

Also, Vincent appears in this scene even though I have yet to actually recruit him:

 

[setafd]

I'm playing 1.5 on Arrange and was honestly sad not to find under the Gold Saucer

Spoiler

X-ATM Scorpion when tracking down Dyne. Where'd my dude go?

 

[Sega Chief]

Ah, okay - I had only downloaded the IRO, not the zip that had the documentation in it. Would it be okay for you to upload a documentation-only zip, to go with the IRO? Or would that just add one more thing to maintain, and anyone who's not as dumb as me would just download the zip for the documention?

I'll put the documentation into a separate download.

Do you mean making that as part of that separate patch with the increased stat changes on Materia? I loved that thing back when I played 1.35.

Also, Vincent appears in this scene even though I have yet to actually recruit him:

I'll add a check to him there.

I'm playing 1.5 on Arrange and was honestly sad not to find under the Gold Saucer

Spoiler

X-ATM Scorpion when tracking down Dyne. Where'd my dude go?

Your dude has relocated from the prison to another location; you'll bump into him sooner or later.

 

[Sega Chief]

Patches are up.

 

[setafd]

I feel more at ease now, thank you Sega Chief

e: maybe you should edit today's date onto the headers in the OP!

 

[FlyingPoodle]

Hey SC, will you update your emergency patch to the latest version please?  I too have the "not enough disk space" error message when patching. Thanks.

 

[MoCheese]

I am by no means done the mod as I've been on a bit of a break from it, but in regards to the two major questions there, I do have some thoughts.

Materia Placement: I think by and large, it seems pretty on point. Everything that you gain, when you gain it seems fair and balanced. There were a couple of times when I was a little disappointed but that's probably due more to my play style than it is bad balance. The only real "issue" I suppose we could call it I could raise is more philosophical than anything else. I'm not even sure if this is a negative or a positive but between the Materia you get from finding new teammates and the Materia you find on the ground throughout the world, I don't think there is ever a single time in which you can buy Materia in a store that you don't already have? Again, I don't even know if I would consider this a positive or a negative, especially since this is considered a "poverty mod" as you put it, but I suppose something is lost if you never find new Materia in stores when you first arrive there? Of course if you are low on funds perpetually throughout the first Disc buying new Materia seems like a stretch to fit in there, but you could counter argue it makes what little Gil you do have on hand all the more valuable. There's a good point and counter point either way and I really don't know where I fall on this personally, and I'm sure most people don't care either, but it is something to potentially think about.

Difficulty: As I said I am not finished the 1.5 Arranged play through quite yet, so this is by no means a full picture. However, one thought has been ringing through my mind so far. Other than a few moments here and there, by and large... uhh, has the mod gotten easier since 1.4? Looking at my video times so far, the time of the fights have gone down pretty substantially almost across the board. Other than a few fights that felt the same or harder, Lich being the best example for me specifically, the bosses have felt easier this go around. I'm doubting that's because I've somehow improved my game that much from 1.4 to 1.5. I'd actually go so far as to say there have been some regular enemy encounters that I've been more threatened by compared to their boss. The bosses feel like they have less health, but they feel like they deal more damage. So what's the story here? Has this mod become easier overall? Did I really change it up that much? A combination of both? Something else? Curious about the thoughts on this one.

 

[Sega Chief]

Hey SC, will you update your emergency patch to the latest version please?  I too have the "not enough disk space" error message when patching. Thanks.

I'll upload them the now.

I am by no means done the mod as I've been on a bit of a break from it, but in regards to the two major questions there, I do have some thoughts.

Materia Placement: I think by and large, it seems pretty on point. Everything that you gain, when you gain it seems fair and balanced. There were a couple of times when I was a little disappointed but that's probably due more to my play style than it is bad balance. The only real "issue" I suppose we could call it I could raise is more philosophical than anything else. I'm not even sure if this is a negative or a positive but between the Materia you get from finding new teammates and the Materia you find on the ground throughout the world, I don't think there is ever a single time in which you can buy Materia in a store that you don't already have? Again, I don't even know if I would consider this a positive or a negative, especially since this is considered a "poverty mod" as you put it, but I suppose something is lost if you never find new Materia in stores when you first arrive there? Of course if you are low on funds perpetually throughout the first Disc buying new Materia seems like a stretch to fit in there, but you could counter argue it makes what little Gil you do have on hand all the more valuable. There's a good point and counter point either way and I really don't know where I fall on this personally, and I'm sure most people don't care either, but it is something to potentially think about.

Difficulty: As I said I am not finished the 1.5 Arranged play through quite yet, so this is by no means a full picture. However, one thought has been ringing through my mind so far. Other than a few moments here and there, by and large... uhh, has the mod gotten easier since 1.4? Looking at my video times so far, the time of the fights have gone down pretty substantially almost across the board. Other than a few fights that felt the same or harder, Lich being the best example for me specifically, the bosses have felt easier this go around. I'm doubting that's because I've somehow improved my game that much from 1.4 to 1.5. I'd actually go so far as to say there have been some regular enemy encounters that I've been more threatened by compared to their boss. The bosses feel like they have less health, but they feel like they deal more damage. So what's the story here? Has this mod become easier overall? Did I really change it up that much? A combination of both? Something else? Curious about the thoughts on this one.

Boss HP was dropped by a chunk before the mod went up so the fights are likely faster. If you're familiar with a boss' weaknesses beforehand as well then that'll drastically cut down the length of a fight.

Gil has become a little too liberal considering that everything has been set up to be found or comes pre-equipped + reductions in fees like the Choco Lure and Gold Saucer tickets. I'll see about changing that for arrange at least.

 

[MoCheese]

Boss HP was dropped by a chunk before the mod went up so the fights are likely faster. If you're familiar with a boss' weaknesses beforehand as well then that'll drastically cut down the length of a fight.

Gil has become a little too liberal considering that everything has been set up to be found or comes pre-equipped + reductions in fees like the Choco Lure and Gold Saucer tickets. I'll see about changing that for arrange at least.

That was a 1.4 thing reduction? Oh, well there you go then.

As for Gil, I don't think I would put it as Gil being "too liberal" rather than I would put it not having a ton to spend it on. With the way stats and Rank Up's work in this mod it's not a guarantee that you're going to rush to the Weapons store to upgrade when you hit a new town like you would in vanilla. For example, take Cloud and let's say you're going to make him a Mage in your play through. Well before you ever get out of Midgar, if you know where to look. You can have Cloud with either a Mythril Sabre which increases the Magic stat or a Hardedge that increases both defensive stats by a good chunk, a piece of armour that has sky high defenses for the start of the game in the Iron Bangle, and a Star Pendant to push his Magic higher and protect against Silence. That's pretty damn good. You won't have a ton of Materia slots or links but it won't be needed so early. Getting Materia that is powerful enough to always have on is much fewer and further between in New Threat compared to vanilla, so it's not a stretch at all to just take that Mythril Sabre/Hardedge, Iron Bangle, Star Pendant combo all the way through the first Disc alone. I did just that. It works the same for physical fighters too. My Red only changed weapons once on the entire Disc because it was more about stats than it was linked slots for Materia, because he basically only needed one link. He wasn't going to be casting anything besides the odd support spell or the Summon he was using for the linked Elemental attacks perhaps so I just looked at stats. So in the end, you're right. Between Gil not being spent on Materia and rarely on Weapons or Armours, there's not a ton to do with it. Items will always be bought off course, but other than that, yeah that's it. Adding more things to buy instead of reducing Gil amounts may not be best indeed now that it's been put that way.

I dunno, knowing this mod from 1.4 I knew to save the Gil as much as I could, so I never had troubles coming up with anything if I truly needed it. Arranged is certainly geared towards the experienced NT player, so you could reduce Gil amounts a little if you wanted. I suppose I just miss the feeling of hitting a new town and seeing what it has. "Kid in a candy store" type deal, you know?