An idea for non-glitched Sephiroth limits

[Touph Guy]

Okay, I've just started modding FFVII recently - so forgive this question if it is idiotic.
I'm using Scorpicus' Sephiroth Patch, and, like many other people over the past three years, am getting irritated by the broken limit breaks.
What I'm asking is if there is any way to replace the limit breaks with regular battle animations - i.e; instead of Omnislash, Sephiroth would cast Heartless Angel, using the regular magic casting animation. I know that attack animations can be replaced with Proud Clod/Wallmarket (I think) and limit animations with Libre, but I haven't found any information about the animations of the characters performing the limit break.

Once again, forgive me if this is undoable, as I'm rather obviously a complete n00b.

[jeffdamann]

sorry for posting this in your thread with no info to help you, but I also wonder if we can add sephiroth into the 9th char slot and inject a model into a certain location of the game and make him available as a special character through some sort of quest?

[Kudistos Megistos]

I think that what your sugesting is impossible but not ridiculous.

Read this:

http://forums.qhimm.com/index.php?topic=8195.0

It's been a very long time since I did any modding, but AFAIK changing animations for limit breaks to animations used by enemy attacks falls under:

animation indexes can not go "backwards". ie, Light Shell cannot look like Cure because Cure's absolute animation index is less than the increase Light Shell's index gives. Light Shell's absolute animation index limits are 04E-14D inclusive.

[Touph Guy]

Thanks for that clarification - although my initial question still hasn't been answered.
While there is ample documentation on the animations of the attack special effects, the animations I seeks to change are that of the characters'.
What I'm asking is that even if the attack animation cannot be changed, is there any way to change the LIMIT animation?
As in, have Braver simply result in the same animation as that of a regular sword slash, instead of using its own animation.

[nfitc1]

It's probably not possible. You should try it anyway. Get LiBrE and set his animation to FFh and see what happens.

PS - Kudistos, are your tests over yet? You coming back to us now?

[Bosola]

Ugh. I'm ill and groggy. Let me try and explain nevertheless.

First, the animation system. You will likely know that there are more than 255 possible animations. But the animation index only goes up to FF(hex). How does FF7 work around this? By adding an offset to the 'relative' index, depending on the 'class' of attack used.

Let's say, that items have nothing added, and spells have, I dunno, 60 added.

So, the relative index for Potion would be zero, and the relative index for Cure is zero too. The 'absolute' indexes, respectively, are 0+0 (=0) and 0 + 60 (=60).

If you changed the relative index for Potion to sixty, though...

(60+0 = 60) ... it would look like Cure.

But I can only use a rel. index of up to 255. If I want to use the animations beyond (255+0) - say, the animations of enemy attacks, I need the game to properly use spells (up to 255 + 60), not just items.

And WallMarket does just that. Go to Initial Data > CharacterGrowth and change the attacks used for each limit to spells. Let Sephiroth use one of the 'empty' spell slots for his limit. This will allow you to access everything but limit and item animations.



Now, use my spreadsheet to find the relative index for the spell / summon / e.skill / enemy attack anim you fancy.

A caveat, though - F0 / DE (depending on the version) is the Heartless angel anim, but the 'angel' model won't appear unless you're on disc three.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going back to bed.
 ------------


Now, a technical discussion - do we yet know if item anims come before limit animations?

[Kudistos Megistos]

PS - Kudistos, are your tests over yet? You coming back to us now?

Not until the end of next week. I've actually voluntarily given up my internet connection at home until they've finished.

[halkun]

Then how are you... uhhh... I think I have some bad news there Kudistos


== EDIT ==
ohhh, at home

[Touph Guy]

Sorry for being so thick, but this is the first time I've actually tried to edit attacks.
Whenever I replace a limit break with a spell in Wallmarket (empty or otherwise), the limit becomes inaccessible ingame.
If I try to edit the limit in Libre without changing the attack in Wallmarket (which is the only way I can have the limit remain accessible) the only things that visibly change are the camera angles and sound effects. The attack also doesn't do any damage.

I've probably overlooked something major.

[Bosola]

I've never had a chance to replace a limit with a spell, so it may just not function. I haven't yet tried it out.

As for using Libre, I'm afraid I'm not sure what it is you're doing. If you're editing Cloud's limits and having Sephiroth perform them, there'll always be significant issues. Especially as damage display is linked to specific frames of the animations.

[nfitc1]

Now, a technical discussion - do we yet know if item anims come before limit animations?

I hadn't considered checking. Item indexes range from 0 - 45h. What happens if it's pushed beyond that?........It starts using Attack animations! This means that my assumption about Attack animations being the absolute base was incorrect. It seems that item animations come first in the line (Try changing Megalixer's animation to 60h and prepare to laugh ). At least, this is the way it is on the PC version. I'm guessing that the PSX might behave similarly.

[Touph Guy]

What I'm trying to do is find any way for a Sephiroth Cloud replacement to have functional limits, whether they would be new attacks, fixed versions of the current ones or anything else that would allow the attacks to not cause massive animation weirdness. I don't think anything short of new animations will allow Sephiroth to properly perform Cloud's limit breaks, so I'm trying to replace them with alternate attacks.
As for what I did in Libre, I replaced the available data fields for Braver with those of Fire3 as an experiment. Needless to say, it didn't work.

If there is any way to have functional limits of any kind, even if they are just castings of Ultima or summons, it would be better than the broken ones currently available.

EDIT: I managed to make a modified limit selectable - replacing Braver with Bahamut ZERO. However, when the bar was filled, the attack showed up as Finishing Touch, and could only be targeted at Cloud/Sephiroth. The game also crashed upon activating the attack. This is particularly odd because Finishing Touch is not named as such in my EXE, KERNEL.bin or KERNEL2.bin, so I have no idea where the game pulled that data from.

EDIT2: In Wallmarket, replacing one of Sephiroth's limits with any other character's limits (e.g Catastrophe) works, and the attack functions, however the animations are just as screwed as when Cloud's regular limits are used. Why can I replace a limit with another limit, but not with a regular attack?

[Bosola]

Just saw this post.

Firstly, you can't just pull the animation indexes from Fire into Braver's anim field. You need to apply offsets. The indexes are purely relative to each class of attack. Index 0 creates a cure spell when invoked by magic, chocomog when invoked by summon, and braver by a limit break. We're not sure where limit indexes sit, so don't yet know what offset you'd need to apply to the limit indexes. It's possible the limit absolute indeces come later than the spell ones, so you wouldn't be able to use magic animations in the first place.

Using unusual animations will likely cause no damage to be displayed. The damage counter is linked to particular frames of particular animations. Just doing damage isn't enough to prompt its appearance. Try making braver multi-hit to see what I mean: more than one hit's damage is dealt, but only one damage count is shown. Mismatching an actor to an animation will often mean no damage counts get displayed.

As for Braver / Bahamut Zero: you must be clearer when describing your actions. Did you do this in Wallmarket? How? By changing Braver attack data? By altering limit selection in character growth? We can't help you if you're going to be so nebulous and unspecific.