Incline Elminage Gothic (former Japan only dungeon crawler)

[Exbelion]

"The Ancient Caves.
This place used to be called a 'Seal of Evil'.
...In the darkness you will see only white lines" - another figure

now that is how you do cryptic writing. wow. i doff my cap to the localization team/person.

I dont understand why the king wants the masters dead, they arent evil at all and the final master rarely attacks...

 

[aweigh]

i would do it in a heart beat. the textures are out for anyone to use... the extractor someone made for the PC version extracts everything, including the dungeon wall textures.

i have never tried this but maybe one could simply switch the wall textures from other dungeons with the ones from the CotA's. the images might have specific headers/etc, though, and it probably won't work.

ironically enough, on PSP the ppsspp emulator has a very user-friendly texture replacement tool built right into the Emulator. I have spent hours replacing textures from various sources to-and-fro in PPSSPP, specifically w/ elminage games.

i've put the PC textures on the psp elminage games, heh, including switching monster art. of course the PC ver. monster textures are too big, and i lack the skills to compress them appropriately, so the game crashed soon after, but it works.

on PC i have previously used:

- ninjaripper
- uMod

however it was a long, long time ago. @court also has experience ripping textures from Wiz-clones; he ripped some textures from wiz empire 2 now that i recall.

wiz empire 1 and 3 (1=pc, 3=psp) feature built-in wireframe mode. the mode for wiz empire 1 looks very, very rough though but of course it is a game from 1998.

the psp game of wiz empire 3 tho looks aaaaamaaaaazing in wireframe. someday we will get around to translating that one too, heh. someday

 

[aweigh]

 

[aweigh]

-


-

 

[aweigh]

Exbelion

the only thing holding those two up is soon over with. empire 1's definitely someday, someday getting finished as the npc dialog script is helly's hands already. empire 3 however will require way more tech know-how, as the npc dialog is compressed/encrypted and i don't know how to make it "normal" in order to translate it... and am too lazy to learn / teach myself how to.

here's the current ver. of wiz empire 1 (run the game's .exe under Windows 98 compatability mode, and if you don't want to change your comp's region to Japan then download/utilize "AppLocale" in order for its font to look good): http://frd.li/d4b8ba12388aec01771dfac215c9c3dc

that ver's from august 2016, and while i've tinkered w/ it off and on since then until helly finishes translating the npc words and shit it's basically "as is". note: i have finished this version/game without any problems, just so you know. it's not that hard. (the game is hard; i mean finishing it like this...)

here's the last WIP edited iso of wiz emp 3 that i remember uploading somewhere... i can't remember the progress on this copy, but if i uploaded it then i am more than sure that it had most, if not all, the "not-dialog" text done (or the important parts): http://frd.li/76c64b7a4127d32e

I also have copies of elminage 2 and 3 with basically "everything except the npc dialog" in english if you want to play 'em. i can send those via PM.

 

[aweigh]

DON'T forget about the option of playing the PS1 remasters of wiz scenarios 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 in "classic mode":

- clean wireframe graffix
- 8 bit enemy sprites

however no option to disable the great orchestral score that they added, but that is no problem whatsoever.
BELOW VIDEO IS OF PS1'S PROVING GROUNDS RUNNING IN WIREFRAME MODE:




this video below is simply one i had lying around i think is very cool. I played through about half of wiz scenario 5 on a NEC-PC 98 emulator using emulated floppy disks. I had already finished it on ps1 and on snes though so i burnt out.

it looks better than the apple II and DOS (and other releases) because the NEC PC 98 was a jap PC that came with a high-tech dedicated chip for drawing anti-aliased KANJI characters, so the game's wireframe lines and text looks crisp, clean and beautiful.

the NEC PC 98 versions of wiz scenarios 1-5 (they're in english, btw) are the graphics whore's preferred versions!

 

[Exbelion]

i would do it in a heart beat. the textures are out for anyone to use... the extractor someone made for the PC version extracts everything, including the dungeon wall textures.

i have never tried this but maybe one could simply switch the wall textures from other dungeons with the ones from the CotA's. the images might have specific headers/etc, though, and it probably won't work.

ironically enough, on PSP the ppsspp emulator has a very user-friendly texture replacement tool built right into the Emulator. I have spent hours replacing textures from various sources to-and-fro in PPSSPP, specifically w/ elminage games.

i've put the PC textures on the psp elminage games, heh, including switching monster art. of course the PC ver. monster textures are too big, and i lack the skills to compress them appropriately, so the game crashed soon after, but it works.

on PC i have previously used:

- ninjaripper
- uMod

however it was a long, long time ago. @court also has experience ripping textures from Wiz-clones; he ripped some textures from wiz empire 2 now that i recall.

wiz empire 1 and 3 (1=pc, 3=psp) feature built-in wireframe mode. the mode for wiz empire 1 looks very, very rough though but of course it is a game from 1998.

the psp game of wiz empire 3 tho looks aaaaamaaaaazing in wireframe. someday we will get around to translating that one too, heh. someday

Oh yes please! I am dying to play Wizardry 3 on my PSP, but its on full japanese
You truly are amazing, specially since you do this by yourself :D

 

[aweigh]

check out this video of me playing wiz scenario 1 on the nec pc 98 emulator, it even has option for audible MOTHERFUCKING DISK ACCESS YESSS

 

[aweigh]

Oh yes please! I am dying to play Wizardry 3 on my PSP

go for it man, use the firedrop link i just made. little help from a jap wiki and you'll finish it fine. Wiz Emp 3 is easier to play/finish than emp 1 and emp 2: slightly easier enemies overall, and the dungeons are noticeably less ambitious (especially compared to the dizzying heights Starfish tapped with their dungeons in Empire 2).

after Emp 3 on psp, Starfish's final Wiz game was Wizardry ASTERISK released on nintendo DS and it will almost certainly never be translated as it is unbelievably difficult to work with. nothing encrypted or compressed; simply massive, massssive amounts of tedious work required to edit it that is not "normal".

it's an unofficial "empire 4" game basically as it utilizes basically every single aspect / gameplay element of empire 1 -3 games. Same year as Asterisk came out, Starfish released Elminage original (though it was simply named Elminage) on ps2... rest is history.

 

[aweigh]

here's my current "version" of elmi: gothic 3DS remix rom, with a shit-load of of the eng-language files from the PC ver. crammed into it...

NOTE: all of the equipped items i show in the video are items that are new to the 3ds ver; they're not items i modded.


i don't post links for this one, or elmi 2 and 3, not because of "concerns" but because of the upload sizes. this 3ds remix rom alone is 1.2 gb... if anyone wants it PM me with a link to a good free site i can login and upload it and i'll do it.

wiz empire 1 WIP and wiz empire 3 PSP (not so much WIP) are each, (each one i mean), only 120~140 MB ! so you see, it is no problem posting those links.

 

[Haplo]

In the 16th floor of the Tower you will find a sword, "Soul Eater Sword", which when "invoked" its SP property grants the char access to 3 "levels" of 3 MP's of SUMMONING contracting. 3 3's. i had my newly minted Fighter (previously the lord) use it, and that's how i grinded my way to poke-capturing some fools. Note that I lowered the resistances that were 100% (belial, for example) to 95%, simply because i think it's bad design as it necessitates having a brawler to clean hit.

95% still proved to be hours of grinding. BTW, makes me wonder: do actual summoners have better chances of contracting? my fighter, via his soul eater sword granted Contracting powers, seemed to contract at the same rate a summoner would. What exactly do summoners have then that's so hot? Spirit pact, i suppose, to create OP chars, which is fun.

never tried out Therion skill, really.

Aweigh, I don't believe Summoners have a better chance of contracting. What they do have, are 7 spell levels with 9 slots each, which equates to many more attempts per session. Note that Summoner level is very important. For those enemies with highest Summon resist you really want to be at least 10 levels above the enemy (when you "only" have to beat their resistance twice, instead of 3-4 times).

Spirit Pact is great, but you don't really need a dedicated character for that. You can use a level 1 Summoner from the tavern to convert your Summons to adventurers. It's actually a waste of an Ex Skill slot on the main party members.

But the most important thing the Summoners have is perhaps the most OP High Mastery skill: Blood Oath. It modifies the level of the summoned monster (and everything that affects). It starts with like 30% boost to monster levels and caps at.. 1221,5%. Imagine a Stargazer with her level 160 multiplied by 12. That would make her.... level 1920? Or a Belial... level 152 x 12 ends with 1824. His AC could drop below -650 if the game even supports such numbers.
Of course in normal gameplay you won't reach 1000%+ modifiers. But even 50-100% is a HUGE boost. Summoner boosted Gaia is stronger then many Ibag Tower monsters. And you can get him so much sooner...
Low AC, of course (no AC decrease ability), but a huge health pool, 4 x 2 attacks and deadly accuracy. Fast too. Also nearly impossible to behead, which is priceless at the tower, although vulnerable to other status effects. The biggest damage contributor in my party, by far.

Therion I didn't try either. The high cost combined with not-too-impressive description didn't led me to decide not to waste an Ex-Skill slot on that.

 

[aweigh]

Haplo

many thanks for the explenation. what you say makes total sense.

something to keep in mind, though: enemies (especially in ibag's tower) will make judicious use of SUMMON JUDGEMENT, the monster-only (non-hereditary; i.e. doesn't matter if your Spirit Pact'ed monster has this skill it will never spawn on a Monster-Adventurer).

SUMMON JUDGEMENT immediately banishes/slays whatever summon is currently on-screen and it was the very first time that I concretely, acutely understood the gigantic chasm in "quality" between my beloved ninja's REPLICATE and having a summoner party...

- a ninja can only spend all of his SP once per "adventure", as creating his summoned clone depletes his SP stock.
- when the ninja's clone dies, be it from turning to ash (your resurrection spells failed) or he/she was banished by an enemy's SUMMON JUDGEMENT ex-skill...
- ...that's it, buddy. Gotta go back to town and rest, or gulp down a MAGIC HERB if you have a Servant/Herbalist in your party in order to recharge the SP and summon the clone again.

Other than that fatal flaw, though, the way I see it ninjas and summoners are mutually exclusive. If i'm making a ninja group i'm picking REPLICATE, simply because it breaks down in practical terms as having a 2nd copy of your party's ninja, except CPU-controlled (acts like a summon, basically), with aaaaaaaaalllllll that entails:

* ninja clone spawns with about 40% (give or take) of the total sum of the original ninja's "stats". every number, the ninja clone has 40% of it.

* ninja clone spawns with the exact same gear loadout that the original ninja had equipped in that moment. Yes, this means 2x the amount of over-powered ninja weaponry beheading enemies.

...but, alas, as i mentioned, only 1 copy and it is frail. very frail. Having massive quantities of summons to keep calling and using them as shields is a magnificent strategy that only a true Summoner can employ.


NOTE: here's a super cheesy tactic to "break" encounters, to a degree....



- Have your best summon up and ready, and know what you're facing beforehand. Be sure that this summon you have up will be good/deal damage/etc versus whatever the encounter ahead is gonna be.

- SOMEONE IN PARTY MUST HAVE "ABSOLUTE BARRIER". Only a Lord or a Cleric can pick Absolute Barrier, btw.

- Encounter begins.

- Activate order queueing, then if you want to play it completely safe simply have the Absolute Barrier guy go after the summon's action. Or, instead:

- Order it so that your fastest char uses a buffing spell (Orath/Soreckh/Rapoolfei/Miracle) or, a debuff, whatever...
- ...then the 2nd character to act is ABSOLUTE BARRIER guy. Everyone else defends.

if it goes as planned your fast-character will throw the buff/debuff, the summon will take its turn action, and your guy will throw up ABOSLUTE BARRIER before, i repeat: before the enemy takes an action against your party.

obviously this tactic is not that useful versus god-type post-game bosses who have literally, game-breaking Attribute Scores, but against annoying encounters...?

it is fucking priceless to set up 1 or 2 rounds of a buff and a debuff (or 2 buffs, or 2 debuffs, whatever), without enemy interference. Then in the 3rd round, buffed (or the enemy debuffed), your party STRIKES!

BTW, lol, it took me MONTHS to figure out the way to use Abso Barrier! I thought it was useless because it would always trigger immediately and then nothing would happen during the round. My gawd, i was so dumb. Turns out it has to be used with the order queueing option, otherwise it will always trigger as fast as your party's first turn action (which 90% of the time is immediately).

 

[Dorarnae]

yeah wire frame is the way to go for wiz empire 3 and the dark spire hehe.

 

[aweigh]

whoever watches all 7 mins will be immensely rewarded. it's a secret what it is

 

[BlackGoat]

Ibag, men.

So, where's the best place to grind Kiss of the Goddess traps? I've been using the hallway near the staircase on the first floor of Ishmag

 

[Exbelion]

Ibag, men.

So, where's the best place to grind Kiss of the Goddess traps? I've been using the hallway near the staircase on the first floor of Ishmag

There are many of those traps on the Royal Tomb

 

[BlackGoat]

Ibag so far so good..

 

[aweigh]

BlackGoat

 

[Exbelion]

Ibag so far so good..

You are still on the "easy" parts of the tower, be on your guard, Ibag Tower could be easily the hardest experience on a dungeon crawler after Wizardry IV-Return of Werdna

 

[aweigh]

BlackGoat

btw, almost no one knows this but 1 of the 3 ways to change a dragonewt's breath element, and really the only practical one (the other two require an almost impossible to get item that must be stolen, and the 3rd option is loot dropped from an ibag's tower enemy which is too late for anyone to give a shit about their breath element):

- the item DEVIL CLUB's SP invocation changes the breath element of the char using it to DARK BREATH. Obviously the character has to be Dragonewt race, and this Dragonewt has to be one of the classes that can equip the Devil Club, so:

good news, devil club is universal! it's cursed (obviously).

benefit of having dark element breath is that the DARK SEAL(s), versions Regular, +1, +2, and and +3 (there is no +4 version of the holy/dark seals) Increase their respective attribute element % by almost TWICE what the other "regular element" Charms do.

- a normal dark seal raises the % of the dark attrib. ATK by almost twice what a normal flame/ice/thunder charm raise their respective elements. this proportionality carries over the successive seal/charm upgrades; which is why unlike holy/dark seals there are actuallly +4 charms for fire/ice/thunder.

plus there's a rainbow charm in ibag's tower that raises all attribute elements to 200%.

now, the benefit of having DARK BREATH is good:

- majority of NON-DEVIL, and NON-UNDEAD/GHOST type enemies will almost never, EVER feature much Dark resistance; especially compared to the fire resistance almost all enemies will come packing soon enough.

drawback...:

- devils, undead and ghosts (although of these 3 types only Devils matter) will sometimes even nullify or absorb your new Dark Breath.

tl;dr you'll inflict more DMG with the Dark Breath on majority of the game's enemies, and the devil club can be found way early, like, near around the time the royal Tomb opens up.



EDIT: I've actually never tested this but i seem tor ecall in earlier Elmi games (i.e. elmi: Original) that dark breath comes with % chance to "behead" the enemy? can't remember if it's a seperate, ENEMY-only breath, called death breath i think.

if this is legit, which i doubt, (for Gothic i mean), then imagine a Ninja-Dragonewt using devil club to change to dark breath hahahaha...

doubt this is in Gothic though, and p. sure the thing i'm remembering is enemy-only death breath.

 

[aweigh]

oh, and inside cave of the ancients (pretty sure the only place it drops) you can get rare drops of HIGH KING's SWORD.

why is that EXTREMELY GOOD? because the SP effect of the HKS's increases char's hit point maximum by a dice roll of something like 3 d8's.

i remember grinding HKS's inside CotA's, can't remember the floors but i remember it was around floors 2-4 or so, but could be whole cave; accumulated grand total of 4 of the swords.

used all four on a char and saved/reloaded until each one of the 4 sp-uses granted 20+ hit points. hehe. An extra 70-100+ hit points is absolutely nothing to scoff at my friend!

especially for low VIT chars lagging behind HP-wise. I think HKS's drop in Ibag's as well but obviously it's much safer/easier to grind enemies inside CoatA.

EDIT: BEFORE I FORGET--

- THE PLACE WITH THE ABSOLUTE MOST AMOUNT OF "KISS OF THE GODDESS" TRAPS IS THE SANCTUM, 1st FLOOR.

the one w/ Cyclonus. you know which one. Specifically 1st - 3rd floors, though the entire dungeon has an absurd % to spawn that trap on every single floor.

grinding levels (and thus accumulating de-aging KotG traps) on 1st floor of the Sanctum was something I always do when necessary. it's perfectly laid out to make a "run" or "lap" of the 1st floor super fast, diomante, repeat et al.

I remember getting between 2 ~ 4 KotG traps in 1 "lap".

 

[BlackGoat]

This fucking guy

 

[aweigh]

lol oh man. i'm glad you've finally met everybody's best friend <3 Skillving! he is the true tester of parties, not that jedi-wannabe who challenges you. want to know the quickest/optimal way of dealing with Skillving? he's very susceptible to CONFUSION. not only will that make sure he doesn't decimate ur party but remember that:

- ANY status ailment inflicts an armor class penalty (it raises it) on an enemy, EXCEPT for Silence and Poison. Sleep, Confusion, Charm, Paralysis and Petrification ALL raise the enemy's armor class (i.e. lowers their defense) by varying amounts.
- i.e. confusing Skillving makes him easier to hit, and it skyrockets the party's survivability.

I recommend using the Order Queueing option in the 1st round and:

• * 1st char = char w/ highest AGI value + access to confusion spell and/or a confusion-enchanted weapon (though high-AGI chars tend to usually not be good at the latter

• * 2nd char = use your lord/cleric's ABSOLUTE BARRIER; the round thus ends, and hopefully the high-AGI char landed the confusion. if not, then repeat until the char w/ ABSO. BARRIER's skill points run out. (can be restored by a Servant/Herbalist's usage of Magic Herb).

ALTERNATIVELY...

• * 1st char = high-LVL HUNTER char w/ Confusion-enchanted weaponry + utilizing his/her's LIGHTNING STRIKE ability

• * 2nd/3rd/4th/5th/6th chars = everybody else DEFEND the char with the highest-possible chance of landing confusion, either via weapon/spell.

defense command lowers char's AC by -4 if in front row, and by -10 if in back-row. point of this alternate strategy is to maximize chances of the char w/ highest chance to land that confusion on Skillving actually SURVIVES his opening salvo of attacks. The combo probabilities of: that Hunter (the 1st char) and his confusion-weapon strike + (protected by everyone else)'s char w/ the confusion spell/etc is real good odds. REMEMBER to make sure the chars defending the confusion-caster/whatever go *BEFORE* he/she goes so that this char is defended by everybody else as quickly as possible.

• WHATEVER YOU DO: DO NOT POISON SKILLVING_. He has Drunken Fist ex-skill which when poisoned his STR increases by godlike levels. This means if using the Lightning Strike strategy then...

• ...MAKE SURE THAT HUNTER ISNT A FUCKING WEREBEAST! that werebeast 20% to inflict poison will ALWAYS, ALWAYS, ALWAYS POISON HIM BECAUSE...

• -skillving has NEGATIVE resistance to poison. LOL

 

[aweigh]

Excuse the google-engrish but i wanted to copy/paste a quick list of most of the useful SP-items and also a quick list of the most useful Battle Use-items, so i'm copy/pasting this shit straight from google-translated Jap Wiki. The names of shit will look weird but it's not hard to figure out:

SP release in use †

• demonic wings : The personality changes to "evil"
• Shuriken: Agility 1 UP
• Muramasa: strength of strength 1UP
• Bad mind: Faith 1 DOWN
• Oogami Tags: Physical strength 1 UP
• Magical Gun Bore Annius: User's Mobility Completely -- no fucking clue what this is. i can check the game files and manually compile a list but... i don't want to --
• Spirit books: Everyone's MP complete -- probably means ghostly Book --

• Hermit's Knife: Change to Occupation "Ninja"
• Philosopher's stone: Change to occupation "alchemist"
• Power medal: occupation Change job at random
• Mirage Shield: Change occupation randomly
  
  THEY FORGOT TO ADD THE FUCKING DEVIL CLUB. heh. Neither of these 2 lists is 100% complete, btw. You can probably name at least 3 items with sp/effect right now that aren't listed here, like high king's sword for example.
  
  POWER AXE (gotten by killing boss of Volcano) raises STR +1 for example. drops in post-game dungeons as well. Just pointing out that this is not a complete listing by any means.

▲
Magical effect in use †

• The sword of Australian thunder: Jiakara
• Franberge: Mabalado (drops at the Basil 3 floor of Igudra Church)
• Frozen sword: La Glass
• Clausoras: Eroma
• Ryuken: Pamdoun --NOTE: took time to edit this entry because this is a Stealable-only Instrument that is used by the Master of Nothing inside CotA's and you only have 1 chance at stealing it--
• Rain four light: Zeonadar
• Wind Release: Mahama
• Yashiki Hime: Rabinemu
• Witch of Death: Entelquista
• Sheep's silver pouch: Saidori
• Maid of the female papal: Zomperi
• Pope Mace: Eroad
• Myeolnir: ELOMA
• Filed: Filed
• Lysepide: Lisepide
• Mandragora Club: Raroid
• Lover's bow: Lapinto
• Fairy bow: Las Corek
• Raiko Whip: Jiacalado
• Devil's claw: Zeonadar (stealing from Empusa)
• Gravity Ring: Alguise
• Black scriptures: Missamine
• White scripture: Philia
• Azott: Lloyd (steals from Master Alchemist)
• Spirit of the Demon Spirit: Hernam -- NOTE: LOOOL sorry this one is too fucked up... this is the DEMON SPEAR, and it casts ELNAM --
• Shadow of the Shadow: Macaracha
• Helmet of metastasis: Tio mente (only during battle)
• Midsummer Gable: Maballado
• Ring of recovery: Rafiliyma (dropped at Nga Nga Magi volcano)

▲
Innocent Equipment †

• Innocent Series
  • Innocent Sword
  • Innocent shield
  • Innocent Cloak
  • Innocent Belt
• Horn of unicorn
• Mirage Reims
• Mirage Shield
• Energy flux

 

[Exbelion]

This fucking guy

My favorite monster design in the entire game, the second is Drath Gloria; and yeah, fuck him! :D