Yeah I'm playing randomized Arrange mode. I've always loved adding the random element challenge to games so I'll have to make the most of what I get and make it work. The 4 randomized rank ups to choose from are pretty nice, so it's likely I won't get screwed over too bad, but I would like to try a hardcore randomizer where I get no choice at all, just add the sources and see what I got.
Dropping SP could be neat to prevent overleveling and thus overpowering bosses easily. I'm at Mt. Nibel Armour Keeper right now and so far haven't done any grinding except backtracking a bit for some enemy skills I missed, and morphing some stuff. But I'm not running from any encounters either. So far I haven't had too much trouble with any bosses. Everything feels pretty well balanced, harder bosses really pushing the limits of my characters.
So if you'll drop SP and have all characters rank up at the same spots I don't think you should bother adding a visual for who is which rank.
Fair enough, but it might be nice to keep track anyway.
Is there a way to respec characters? It's np if there isn't - was just curious. Can't wait for the new version!
Not at present, there are new modding frameworks in development that would allow for savemap editing via field instructions that could make a respec possible. I had the prototype for testing a while back and was able to make it work. When it's released I can add it to that version as a feature.
I believe you can respec once you reach disc 3. One of the airmen crew in the Highwind lets you.
It's not really a re-spec, that was a rank reset but the stats spent remain. It was like a debug thing for problems caused by changing the way ranks are tracked.
So I'm at Rocket town, approaching Wutai, Temple of the Ancients, and end of disc 1, and got some questions..
How rough is getting my materia back if I land in Wutai?
Should I try my luck at the Battle Square on disc 1? I guess Cloud's Omnislash has been moved somewhere else?
Is TotA a really hard dungeon? I read some scary comments earlier
And any thoughts on if I should use the Phoenix Down at the end of disc 1? How are the scenes after she should be gone? Don't spoil much but did you enjoy them? I kinda want to see how it plays out but on the other hand I think it'd just feel like she shouldn't be there and it might be too weird not being sad/angry about her.
I specced enemies to account for not having any Materia, so they should be a bit more forgiving than they were in vanilla (flashbacks to the bird's Thunder attack).
Battle Square actually has different rewards for various parts of the game, just like in vanilla. The time periods are: pre-bronco, after-bronco, and after-Highwind. The enemy encounters also change along with the prize set. Omnislash is no longer obtained from any of them in NT though, that's grabbed from a certain scene on Disc 3.
Temple of the Ancients can be a slight step up, but all the enemies in there are weak to an element called 'Hidden' which you can attach to weapons using Elemental + a non-elemental Materia. A lot of their attacks are Holy element as well, so you can reduce that using Elemental + Restore/Revive (these Materia carry Holy element in NT).
The minibosses in the treasure chests can be a bit much, the Hex-Eyes in particular were overtuned for a long time. If they're proving tricky, remember that Summons ignore magic defence and can apply a useful status ailment.
The bosses in Temple are also a fair bit different to what they were in vanilla; my advice is to stock up on plenty of Softs and to try Wait or Recommended ATB as Active ATB can make those fights very dicey.
As for the phoenix down, the scenes following that are all fully coded up so it won't be like how it was doing it with a gameshark. As for whether you should or not, that's up to you but the Highwind offers a debug toggle in case you change your mind later.