FFVII Remake: Intergrade Yuffie DLC Announced

[ForceStealer]

So...give the phase shifts independent health bars so you don't waste valuable resources like everyone is saying...

And they're the ones that programmed the amount of damage a staggered enemy takes. If it was OP they could adjust it without wasting the player's limit break because they happened to use it when the boss was 2HP over the phase change.

 

[Makoeyes987]

The HP Bar tells you when to stop.

If the HP Bar flashes the stop symbol indicating you've hit the limit of damage, step back. Take the time to heal, buff or do anything else. The game gives you warning that a shift is about to happen.

I mean, they could give another health bar but the same thing would happen. You'd proceed to empty it, it'd freeze until the stagger ended and the phase shift happened, and you'd have a new full health bar. People would end up doing the same thing in terms of accidentally getting carried away pouring on the pain.

 

[ForceStealer]

Yeah, once you've already hit it. You could hit that on the first hit out of your 20-some hit limit break or ATB combo you've already entered.

I mean, they could give another health bar but the same thing would happen. You'd proceed to empty it, it'd freeze until the stagger ended and the phase shift happened, and you'd have a new full health bar. People would end up doing the same thing in terms of accidentally getting carried away pouring on the pain.

No, that would actually be an accident that's on the player. As it is you have no way of knowing in advance when you're going to hit the change.

 

[Makoeyes987]

So the same problem would happen anyway.

You'd empty their "first" HP bar with your super combo or attack, continue with your curbstomp combo, the boss would exit stagger and a new full HP bar replaces the one you overshot and emptied.

It's the same situation, just displayed with a different HUD.

 

[ForceStealer]

No, because if the healthbar you're on is clearly just about to empty (and there are obviously additional health bars to go), you're not gonna unload everything like you do when they still have 5/8ths of a bar full.

 

[Makoeyes987]

Okay, so if you're not going to unload all your attacks with a separate health bar you're being mindful of, don't do that same thing when you see the single health bar above the enemy flashing it's sign that you can't deplete HP anymore.

The player is ultimately required to pay attention to the health bar to know when to hold back in either case.

 

[ForceStealer]

Mako. What are you not understanding here. The flashing sign on the healthbar doesn't show up until you've already past the change and can't do damage. There is no forewarning as to where the change actually is.

 

[Makoeyes987]

Mako. What are you not understanding here. The flashing sign on the healthbar doesn't show up until you've already past the change and can't do damage. There is no forewarning as to where the change actually is.

Okay but that still can happen even with a separate health bar. You can easily take an enemy's entire health gauge down to less than half of its value in a single strong stagger at the start of a fight. You'd still end up in a situation in your example where, mid-stagger, the boss's life gauge goes to zero in the middle of your attacks, and you'd have to pull back.

This is because if they implement your idea of giving each phase separate life bars, those life bars would still scale in size/HP value according to each appropriate phase of the fight. So the first bar would be small, able to be depleted by a good single stagger combo. The second would be larger, and the third would have the highest pool of HP.

You would still be confronted with the possibility of accidentally "overspending" ATB because you simply could be too strong in the first or second phase of the fight. And I do not see how that's a big deal, because at worst you were deprived of giving the boss a more thorough beating. You were winning anyways, so it's not like you, the player were cheated.

It just seems like a "win more" situation. If you're losing a boss battle, it's highly unlikely you're going to be in a position where you're blowing out a boss's HP bar in it's first phase to the point it has to stop you from continuing. You're the aggressor. That battle scenario happens when you're kicking it's ass. So this "fix" seems like a way of turning a winning situation into a total blowout or flawless victory.

Keep in mind that you can't see an enemy's revenge value in KH2/3 either. You can easily get caught in a situation of overextension and punishment because you went too far with your attack combos or commands.

 

[ForceStealer]

It would still make it so that the "overspending" would be your fault. Not just the game pulling the rug out from under your combo with no warning.

 

[Makoeyes987]

I don't see how that's not the case already.

The game "pulling the rug" from under you in that scenario is to prevent you from steamrolling the boss fight because you're so good, you could easily just overwhelm the boss. You're winning. This is a game balance akin to Revenge. You don't get to see a Revenge value either, it's so it can keep you on your toes and punish you for overextension/aggression.

If you're that worried about overspending ATB, simply hold back. Watch the HP bar and if you see you're getting close to the half-way mark, stick to square attacks. I can't think of a situation this ATB loss results in losing a fight.

The other option the game can do is freeze you midbattle ala Weiss's boss fight. You'll be frozen mid-animation as the enemy shifts and your attacks/commands zero out as you proceed with the fight.

 

[Tetsujin]

The way it currently is I find myself holding back with limit breaks until directly after an explicit phase shift because I don't want to run the danger of starting one and then the first hit of the LB is the one that triggers the shift resulting in wasted damage output.
An indicator on the health bar that tells you when a new phase occurs would definitely help with that.

Also Mako, this is nothing like KH's revenge value at all. It's phase shifts at fixed points in the battle after depleting a certain amount of HP (which is also a thing in KH btw except KH doesn't have cutscene transitions that interrupt you and the likes)

 

[ForceStealer]

As I said, if stagger damage is so extreme that the player would faceroll a boss without it throwing up a brick wall with no warning and costing you things you were saving for THIS specific element of the mechanic with no benefit - then you should fix the stagger calculations. The entire system is built around saving all of your hardest-hitting attacks for when the enemy is staggered. To block that from happening at set (but nonetheless arbitrary) HP boundaries runs completely counter to that.

If you're that worried about overspending ATB, simply hold back. Watch the HP bar and if you see you're getting close to the half-way mark, stick to square attacks. I can't think of a situation this ATB loss results in losing a fight.

Losing ATB charges can be frustrating, but obviously the real crime here is Limit Breaks, which you are unlikely to get again in the same fight unless you have a real attrition thing going, or final Summon attacks. Which are extra annoying to be cheated out of since you don't have control over when they go off.

The other option the game can do is freeze you midbattle ala Weiss's boss fight. You'll be frozen mid-animation as the enemy shifts and your attacks/commands zero out as you proceed with the fight.

Yes, this is also an acceptable solution. I noticed that the Scarlet fight does it too, but the fights in the main game don't do this. It still cheats you out of the stagger you worked for, but at LEAST it doesn't mean a limit break does ZERO damage because of a no-warning phase change.

 

[Makoeyes987]

As I said, if stagger damage is so extreme that the player would faceroll a boss without it throwing up a brick wall with no warning and costing you things you were saving for THIS specific element of the mechanic with no benefit - then you should fix the stagger calculations. The entire system is built around saving all of your hardest-hitting attacks for when the enemy is staggered. To block that from happening at set (but nonetheless arbitrary) HP boundaries runs completely counter to that.

How is that arbitrary or counter to stagger?

Game balance dictates also keeping the game bosses competent and able to not be infinite'd into next Tuesday. Most well done and designed action games give bosses a revenge mechanic of some sort, to prevent players from comboing the enemy and giving them no chance of reprisal.

The only game I can think of that utilizes stagger like you're advocating is FFXIII, and that's because it's not an action game. It's ATB at it's core. So you can stagger and pummel the vulnerable enemy to your heart's content and even launch them. It encourages that gameplay.

But a game with action elements simply cannot be balanced if it allows the player to steamroll a boss as if it's a punchbag.

Losing ATB charges can be frustrating, but obviously the real crime here is Limit Breaks, which you are unlikely to get again in the same fight unless you have a real attrition thing going, or final Summon attacks. Which are extra annoying to be cheated out of since you don't have control over when they go off.

It's frustrating but so are plenty of other gameplay elements. The game isn't going to work in the player's favor entirely. I find it frustrating how you can be interrupted casting magic, especially in Hard Mode where MP is scarce, and the interruption still costs you the MP. But, that's a consequence, the game is going to be adversarial at some points.

Yes, this is also an acceptable solution. I noticed that the Scarlet fight does it too, but the fights in the main game don't do this. It still cheats you out of the stagger you worked for, but at LEAST it doesn't mean a limit break does ZERO damage because of a no-warning phase change.

I think that's a better outcome too, although I can imagine this not working for all fights such as ones where the phase shift is attached to a cutscene and all that. But that probably is the direction they'll go.

 

[ForceStealer]

You keep approaching this from the angle of a player just completely in control of the game from top to bottom and this phase change is the only thing preventing the game from being 5 hours long. What is much more common, especially on a first playthrough, is that you fought tooth and nail for that stagger, and long enough that getting it took you almost all the way to the end of this unmarked phase, all while barely keeping your party up and in fighting shape. Maybe the fight already had a phase change so you have even less reason to expect another. You finally manage to get that stagger bar filled, and unleash the limit breaks you've been clinging to through the fight, only to have them be completely and utterly blocked, without any way to know you were up against a phase change, and their stagger bar resets to zero, AND you lose the whole limit bar. That's shitty.

Having your spell cast be interrupted can be annoying, but it's just one spell cast. Not nearly as momentous as a limit break or Summon finale. And at least he spell is being interrupted by an enemy actually attacking, and not just some invisible wall.

 

[Tetsujin]

How is that arbitrary or counter to stagger?

Game balance dictates also keeping the game bosses competent and able to not be infinite'd into next Tuesday. Most well done and designed action games give bosses a revenge mechanic of some sort, to prevent players from comboing the enemy and giving them no chance of reprisal.

Again though, this is not a revenge mechanic. VIIR's combat system already doesn't let you endlessly wail on an enemy the way you can in KH to begin with.

It's literally just getting interrupted by having cutscenes and such to punctuate phase transitions. You get punished for not knowing in advance when a phase transition occurs, nothing else. If I use a limit break and the boss is 1HP away from triggering a phase transition that I wasn't aware of, my LB will do a whopping 1HP damage.

 

[Makoeyes987]

Again though, this is not a revenge mechanic. VIIR's combat system already doesn't let you endlessly wail on an enemy the way you can in KH to begin with.

I mean. It sorta is. It's a mechanic that prevents bosses from being stagger-locked and steamrolled. It keeps the boss battles flowing at a specific pace to prevent players from just overwhelming and bypassing the boss's struggle.

It's literally just getting interrupted by having cutscenes and such to punctuate phase transitions. You get punished for not knowing in advance when a phase transition occurs, nothing else. If I use a limit break and the boss is 1HP away from triggering a phase transition that I wasn't aware of, my LB will do a whopping 1HP damage.

Don't use limit breaks early in the fight. That's a simple strategic decision to make to avoid DPS waste. Phase shifts happen 90% of the time when a boss's HP is near the half way mark. Sometimes it's the 25% and then 50% mark. An observation to keep in mind as well.

Yes, the boss fight interruption is to prevent high leveled and sophisticated players who've figured out weaknesses and exploits in the boss, from getting to easily defeat the boss with no pushback.

I honestly don't get how players think this is somehow "unfair." You are winning when this happens. The tide is in your favor.

The only fight I can imagine this being truly problematic for, is Hell House. Because Hell House is coupled with long ass cutscenes and it
Just makes the already long boss fight even longer.

You keep approaching this from the angle of a player just completely in control of the game from top to bottom and this phase change is the only thing preventing the game from being 5 hours long. What is much more common, especially on a first playthrough, is that you fought tooth and nail for that stagger, and long enough that getting it took you almost all the way to the end of this unmarked phase, all while barely keeping your party up and in fighting shape. Maybe the fight already had a phase change so you have even less reason to expect another. You finally manage to get that stagger bar filled, and unleash the limit breaks you've been clinging to through the fight, only to have them be completely and utterly blocked, without any way to know you were up against a phase change, and their stagger bar resets to zero, AND you lose the whole limit bar. That's shitty.

Then don't use your Limit or Summon early in the fight!

I don't understand how this is so unfair. Like, that's the most rational and obvious strategic decision to make once you learn of the mechanic's function. Save your load for the final push of the fight.

And if you're in that desperate of a first playthrough situation where you're barely hanging on and pushing the boss into it's first stagger, then it's highly unlikely your DPS is to the point you overflow the damage into the next phase. How are you simultaneously on the edge of defeat but also able to blow out a boss's early HP guage?

You have to seriously damage a boss by a hard percentage to get that marker to appear. And that's extremely rare in a first newbie player playthrough. If it happens, they're highly leveled or skilled.

Having your spell cast be interrupted can be annoying, but it's just one spell cast. Not nearly as momentous as a limit break or Summon finale. And at least he spell is being interrupted by an enemy actually attacking, and not just some invisible wall.

I'd argue that's worst given hard mode and the scarcity of MP. That can be the difference between an Arise or a Life.

 

[Odysseus]

Best solution would be to just not have the phase shift until after the stagger bar runs out, if they won't indicate when the phase is going to transition.

 

[Tetsujin]

I mean. It sorta is. It's a mechanic that prevents bosses from being stagger-locked and steamrolled. It keeps the boss battles flowing at a specific pace to prevent players from just overwhelming and bypassing the boss's struggle.

No it's not. You cannot stagger-lock bosses to begin with. The stagger status has a brief window of time and afterwards the stagger bar resets.
It also doesn't have anything to do with stagger. Phase transitions will occur regardless of the boss being staggered or not so I don't know why stagger is even relevant to this. Coincidentally staggering a boss right before a transition just makes it even more frustrating because you just get punished for bad timing.
The phase transitions are just something that occurs at set points to alter a boss's attack patterns. The game doesn't stop you from doing damage for balance reasons, it stops you because "hey, I wanna play a cutscene now, can you please not?"

If a boss is 1HP away from a phase transition and my LB that could've done, let's say, 1000HP damage does only 1HP damage, but using the LB right after the phase transition would've still given me the full 1000HP damage, then why not just let me do the 1000HP damage to begin with and just let it bleed into the phase transition? My damage is getting cock-blocked for no reason other than "shoulda anticipated a phase shift!" even though bosses are all over the place, some have 1 phase, some have 2, 3 or 4.

 

[ForceStealer]

No it's not. You cannot stagger-lock bosses to begin with. The stagger status has a brief window of time and afterwards the stagger bar resets.

Yes, I wanted to say this too, but thought maybe there was something about the combat that I didn't know, because I was pretty sure staggering just gives you a window to do extra damage, there is no stagger-locking.

I'd argue that's worst given hard mode and the scarcity of MP. That can be the difference between an Arise or a Life.

No, because it isn't arbitrary, an enemy actually attacking interrupted your spell. Also, you chose to be on Hard mode.

How are you simultaneously on the edge of defeat but also able to blow out a boss's early HP guage?

Are you....completely unfamiliar with the entire concept of a limit break? That's like...the definition.

 

[Makoeyes987]

No it's not. You cannot stagger-lock bosses to begin with. The stagger status has a brief window of time and afterwards the stagger bar resets.
It also doesn't have anything to do with stagger. Phase transitions will occur regardless of the boss being staggered or not so I don't know why stagger is even relevant to this. Coincidentally staggering a boss right before a transition just makes it even more frustrating because you just get punished for bad timing.

It's not a literal stagger lock, I'm referring to the player getting the early stagger, where in 99% of the boss fights in this game, a skilled and high leveled Tifa, Aerith and Cloud team can raise the stagger percentage to past 300%, and empty the HP bar without the boss getting a chance to retaliate.

Stagger can, if unchecked, be exploited to completely overwhelm a boss and leave it mostly dead before the fight begins. This is easily demonstrable in fights against non-phased bosses with moderately skilled players.

The phase transitions are just something that occurs at set points to alter a boss's attack patterns. The game doesn't stop you from doing damage for balance reasons, it stops you because "hey, I wanna play a cutscene now, can you please not?"

That is also 100% game balance reasons. If it weren't, the game designers would simply let you drain the boss's HP bar in the fight until the cutscenes played back to back, and then the enemy would fall over dead because their HP flag would determine "death." They 100% made it an intentional obstacle to prevent players overwhelming the enemy. If they didn't care, the mechanic wouldn't exist.

If a boss is 1HP away from a phase transition and my LB that could've done, let's say, 1000HP damage does only 1HP damage, but using the LB right after the phase transition would've still given me the full 1000HP damage, then why not just let me do the 1000HP damage to begin with and just let it bleed into the phase transition? My damage is getting cock-blocked for no reason other than "shoulda anticipated a phase shift!" even though bosses are all over the place, some have 1 phase, some have 2, 3 or 4.

Why are you using a limit break early in the fight? Save it. This is basic strategy.

If you're not saving your Limit Breaks, you're either in a desperate situation and you used it to save yourself from death, push the fight forward and save your ATB... Which it succeeded in it's purpose.

Or you made a careless choice. The risk of early limit break usage is potential DPS loss. That's the risk and reward. Why does the game have to make it that much easier for players to win more?

 

[ForceStealer]

Why are you using a limit break early in the fight? Save it. This is basic strategy.

No, the entire thrust of what the combat is normally training you to do is to save your high-damage attacks for a STAGGER, not the end of a fight. You don't know if you'll get a stagger you need at the end of the fight, but you do have a stagger NOW. The game's other systems tell you to pour on the damage while you have that window. Or, to use your logic, if I already got their health bar so low, why do I need a stagger or a limit break? Seems like it should be more useful if I'm struggling early.

It has nothing to do with making it easier to "win more," and everything to do with rewarding the use of the iconic attacks that the game is encouraging their use for. If it's too easy to melt a boss with a limit break without them making your limit breaks worthless, then that's an issue to address in your design.

 

[Makoeyes987]

No, the entire thrust of what the combat is normally training you to do is to save your high-damage attacks for a STAGGER, not the end of a fight. You don't know if you'll get a stagger you need at the end of the fight, but you do have a stagger NOW. The game's other systems tell you to pour on the damage while you have that window.

It has nothing to do with making it easier to "win more," and everything to do with rewarding the use of the iconic attacks that the game is encouraging their use for.

I'm lost. If you know bosses have phases, and you've built a limit break but you're still in the first phase and achieved stagger... Why would you blow your limit in a situation that could potentially see it wasted? How is that a rational training behavior response from the game? The only option aside from shifting the game balance further into players favor, would be making bosses more tanky and require more damage to get across the dilemma of burst damage at the start of the fight. But clearly they avoided that solution by hard limiting the pace of boss fights.

You can pour the damage on while holding onto your trump card for when it is time for the final push. That's basic RPG/action gameplay strategy.

I compare this to Revenge because this is highly similar in concept. Not literally the same, but in concept.

If you get greedy and pour on your best combos/magic/abilities on a boss early that is already vulnerable and nowhere near death, then if they lunge out and strike you with a supermove, or cancel out of your combo, you were punished for that greed. You don't overextend your resources/attacks/etc when you know the fight isn't near the end. You pace it out.

 

[ForceStealer]

How are unable to grasp that you could struggle but still get to the end of a phase transition? All your normal attacks still do damage that could totally eventually get you to the cusp of a transition if you had enough trouble getting the stagger. If they don't want you doing too much damage in a stagger too early in the fight, why even LET you stagger them? This isn't about making the fights easier, even a genuinely difficult fight that's a challenge for everyone could be challenging without bullshitting you out of a limit break for no real reason. In fact, I believe we've already highlighted that the Weiss fight DOES THAT AND IS BETTER FOR IT.

 

[Makoeyes987]

How are unable to grasp that you could struggle but still get to the end of a phase transition? All your normal attacks still do damage that could totally eventually get you to the cusp of a transition if you had enough trouble getting the stagger. If they don't want you doing too much damage in a stagger too early in the fight, why even LET you stagger them? This isn't about making the fights easier, even a genuinely difficult fight that's a challenge for everyone could be challenging without bullshitting you out of a limit break for no real reason. In fact, I believe we've already highlighted that the Weiss fight DOES THAT AND IS BETTER FOR IT.

Okay that can happen. But, that's not the most common dynamic of pressure vs aggression in a normal boss fight.

And bending battle design to that highly specific underdog/new player circumstance where you merely lose a free limit break, results in simply making bosses brittle and easy to overwhelm via first stagger. The combat and difficulty level of the game is one of the best in FF I feel, and I can sorta tell that such a balance shake up would easily be exploitable simply because Tifa, Aerith and Cloud could cheese most fights or at least drop them down to a 1/4th of their max HP in one stagger. That's without limit breaks.

... Hell, in your example of perfection that discards phase shifts which limit a player... You can beat Weiss in less than 2 minutes before he even goes into half his whole fight. He can die within first stagger if the player is prepared and aggressive.

This is demonstrated with Bahamut and Pride and Joy as well. Stagger can enable you to simply crush bosses even if they're stronger. I'm pretty positive the designers simply don't want that kind of speedrun faceroll boss battle design for their main story bosses.

 

[ForceStealer]

So for a given fight that you want to be so hard: make stagger weaker, or make it harder to inflict stagger. Don't just say "NOPE, your attack doesn't work for no reason other than we say so at this arbitrary and unmarked amount of HP :3 And you won't get the chance to use it back either, asshole."

You're saying it's completely fine to exploit stagger and melt HP bars as long as it's IN ZE PREVIOUSLY APPROVED HP ZONES.