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Can someone give me a really basic explanation about Quickenings? I only have one, and it's "Red Spiral" for Vaan. Sometimes I do it and it takes less damage than a regular attack, and sometimes it takes 3000+ damage.

Here's what usually happens: The Quickening screen shows up, and I see the prompt to press R2. I press R2 and some words start shuffling at the bottom. The timer runs to zero. The booklet says "By pressing the proper button combinations within the allotted time, you will be able to perform multiple attacks." This sounds to me like Tidus' and Auron's Overdrives, but I don't see anything to indicate which buttons to push or when. Help?

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You don't scare me, you talking blobs of oozing slop! I am impervious to pain!

Here's the skinny, just press the triangle button when the quickening screen shows up to execute the Red Spiral. I'm not sure if you can chain a single quickening, but pressing R2 will 'shuffle' the commands, which can give you a mist charge, a mist charge lets you use the quickening again. Your best bet is to try and get Vaan another quickening, and when you get a second character (well second and third, but I won't spoil it for ya) teach one of them a quickening. Mist chains are an effective technique and can net you some XP really quick when Vaan is solo at the beginning of the game. Just keep trying and you'll get the hang of it.

Edit

I forgot, when you use the shuffle command (R2) you have to press triangle when the mist charge is shown in white, or you won't do it. The technique should appear in white when it is usable, grey when it isn't. Just shuffle until you get mist charge to show up in white, then quickly press triangle, and use another quickening.

This post has been edited by Nytecrawla on 24th November 2006 07:56

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This is a webcomic and gaming blog where I rant about nonsense. Enjoy.

I was a soldier, now I just play one in video games.

AND, you only press triangle if that's the button that shows up in full colour beside the word. If you don't see it, pressing it won't do anything.

Later, when you have quickenings on other characters, you'll be pressing square or x, depending.

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I had an old signature. Now I've changed it.

R2 shuffles through your other current party members' quickenings, and you press the corresponding button (X, Triangle, O) to "chain" it. Chaining can result in "concurrences" depending on the levels of the ones you use. I believe three first-level quickenings results in an "Inferno" fire-elemental concurrence after the timer is up. There are various others, but you have to get those through learning new quickenings.

And for as stupid as some people find quickenings, they should still be learned -- they augment your MP twice and four times the normal size.

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It's gonna be a glorious day
I feel my luck can change

One thing I still don't get is how damage is calculated. I unleashed a massive 10-hit combo last night, including a few level 3 quickenings and topped off with "Cataclysm" or something like that, all for 8000 or so damage. Very nice. But I only had about 5 hits with only one or two level 2 quickenings once and did the same amount of damage.

Better yet, when I first got quickenings, I did about 4000 with a single one, at level 1.

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"Judge not a man by his thoughts and words, but by
the quality and quantity of liquor in his possession
and the likelyhood of him sharing."

Ya know? I really don't get the algorithms for Quickening damage either. It seems to be random to tell the truth. There have been instances when I smack opponents for 8000+ and then there are times when I haven't broken 1500. In one case I actually got a concurrence (which is really 12's version of a limit break) and did less damage than when I used a quartet of standard quickenings.

The reason I used triangle in my first post is that the party leader usually defaults to triangle for his/her quickenings, and my thinking was that he was still using only Vaan at this point. Maybe I assumed too much but thanks for clearing it up a little more everyone.

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This is a webcomic and gaming blog where I rant about nonsense. Enjoy.

I was a soldier, now I just play one in video games.

actually, concurances are just so you can hit multiple people, there is NO other reason.

Quickening's strength depends on:
Character strength
Level
and of course, what level quickening it is (Pyroclasm will do more damage than say, feral strike)


and of course, concurances only happen after a certain amount of quickenings (3 level ones is an Inferno, 7 lvl ones is a Cataclysm)

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Aujourdhui a commence avec toi.

Well I'm even more confused now. I managed to get 18 in a row, quite a feat (the concurrence (I suppose that's what it is...) was called luminescence, for those wondering.) Enemy's kaput, for sure, right? Not so. 6000 damage. Only. Earlier, I got 12 or so hits (ark blast, or something like that...) and did a whopping 41k damage (that's when I learned the 9999 cap wasn't in effect in XII )

What the heck? These were on the same enemies, and I know I've used lv3 quickenings at least a few times with each character during that combo...

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"Judge not a man by his thoughts and words, but by
the quality and quantity of liquor in his possession
and the likelyhood of him sharing."

It depends on what the boss has for defense, too, especially if they have protect or shell on. I also cast dispel first before doing any quickenings.

I don't understand it much either.

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I had an old signature. Now I've changed it.

Now that I look up the Mechanism FAQ, it appears that this is the regular hit and concurrence formula:

Quote (Quickening Formula)

DMG = RANDOM(1~POW) x RANDOM(1~STR)

Quote (Concurrence Formula)

POW x Enemy Level

So, yeah, random through and through.

This post has been edited by Shotgunnova on 30th November 2006 12:27

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It's gonna be a glorious day
I feel my luck can change

Quote (Silverlance @ 29th November 2006 09:58)

Well I'm even more confused now. I managed to get 18 in a row, quite a feat (the concurrence (I suppose that's what it is...) was called luminescence, for those wondering.) Enemy's kaput, for sure, right? Not so. 6000 damage. Only. Earlier, I got 12 or so hits (ark blast, or something like that...) and did a whopping 41k damage (that's when I learned the 9999 cap wasn't in effect in XII )

What the heck? These were on the same enemies, and I know I've used lv3 quickenings at least a few times with each character during that combo...

well, also Ark Blast is a much more powerful concurrence than luminescence

the list is as follows

Name Power quickenings needed
Inferno - 90 3 lv 1
Cataclysm - 110 7 lv 1
Torrent - 130 2 lv 1, 3 lv 2
Windburst - 155 5 lv 2
Luminescence - 175 5 lv 3
Ark Blast - 205 2 lv 1, 2 lv 2, 2 lv 3
White out - 215 3 lv 1, 3 lv 2, 3 lv 3
Black Hole - 253 4 lv 1, 4 lv 2, 4 lv 3

Edit

chart is screwed up

This post has been edited by dont chocobos rule? on 21st December 2006 20:24

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Aujourdhui a commence avec toi.