Weapon Randomization

As of v0.81, weapon randomization is a selectable setting. Weapon randomization takes the interesting properties of weapons in FFV and creates a system of randomizing the weapons in such a way that adheres to both the general power structure of the original game's weapons, but drastically changes up the opportunities and potential for weapons to be much more of a forefront in fighting strategy, past weapon strength.

How it works

Almost every weapon in the game is first replaced with a generic 'base' of that weapon, and the weapon preserves its power. For example, a Knife is a main weapon type, so something like the Dagger or the Kunai is stripped of any properties besides being a Knife, but retains its power.

Then, one of the following modifications occurs:

AbilityAn ability is granted on that weapon instead of attacking
SpellA spell is granted with the weapon upon attacking or using as an item, depending on the weapon type
KillerA weapon will do additional damage on contact upon attacking for an enemy type
ElementalA weapon grants “elemental power” boost for all elements

Because the original weapons are “replaced” with the new weapons, the new weapons will follow all reward tiering and pricing of the original. For example, the Ragnarok is a high tier weapon with a large price value. Whatever weapon the Ragnarok turned into, say a Meteo Sword, will be used for a basis of the tier and price of the new weapon, but an adjustment is later made according to the weapon randomization chart.

Weapon power is static per randomized weapon. Each type of weapon (Knife, Sword, Whip) has some varying qualities that are consistent, and each weapon type has a bonus attack.

As part of this randomization system, each weapon type was given qualities that differentiate it. More is explained in the below sections:

Weapon TypeModifications
Knife, Sword, Knightsword, Axe, KatanaSpell chance upon action/attacking
HarpSpell instead of action/attacking
FlailEnemy skill chance upon action/attacking
Spear, Whip, BowKiller weapons
BellAbility use upon action/attacking
StaffWhite Magic only spell upon acting, infinite use in battle
RodBlack Magic only spell upon acting, breakable in battle
All weapon typesElemental

Refer to this page for a list of weapon details

Modification Types

Elemental Weapon

Each weapon type can have 1 elemental weapon appear. An elemental weapon yields the same elemental bonus that the base game's Rune Bell does, which is a boost to the following elements:

Element
Fire
Cold
Wind
Lightning
Poison
Earth
Holy

Ability

When an ability is granted to a Bell weapon, that weapon loses the ability to perform a normal attack action, and instead performs the ability action instead. As a salient example, the Dancing Dagger does this in the base game - the action is Dance instead of a normal attack. Abilities are purely randomly chosen, regardless of tiering.

The following abilities are valid for this modification:

  • Guard, BuildUp, Mantra, Escape, Steal, Capture, Jump, DrgnSwd, Image, GilToss, Slash, Animals, X-Fight, Conjure, Terrain, Analyze, Dance, Flirt, Tame

Spell

When a spell is granted to a weapon, that weapon will gain a chance of using the associated spell when attacking. Rods and Staves are special cases. Spells are chosen with a system that adheres to reward tiering (when selected as a setting), meaning more powerful spells will appear on higher tier items. Spell modifications are the most common type of weapon modification.

For Knives, Swords, Knightswords, Axes, Katanas

The following magic types are valid for these weapons:

  • White, Black, Time, Blue

These weapons will not break upon attacking, and cannot be used as items from the menu in battle. All support spells (all White magic spells besides Holy, support Time Magic) and the L2/L3/L4/L5 Blue Magic* have a 100% chance of triggering after attacking. All other spells have a 33% chance of triggering after attacking. Actions that take place after attacking are single target only.

* L2/L3/L4/L5 Blue Magic are still subject to level checks, but they will always land if the level check passes

For Harps

Harps are the same as above, but have a 100% success rate on all spell usage, and no physical attack occurs when attacking. For example, the Mighty Guard Harp, upon attacking, will cast single target Mighty Guard 100% of the time, without performing a physical attack.

For Flails

Flails are the same as above, with a flat 33% chance for all weapons of casting special Enemy Magic only. These are special abilities only seen on enemies. Some of the higher tiers abilities are very powerful, granting access to Zombie status effects.

For Rods

Rods can be granted Black magic & Holy only. Rods work similarly to vanilla FFV - rods can be broken (used from the item menu on the weapon slot) in battle for 100% success of casting, with multi-target options when available for the spell. Equipping a rod and attacking grants the same 33% system above (for attack spells).

For Staves

Rods can be granted White magic (less Holy) only. Staves are usable from the item menu on the weapon slot in battle, and will not break upon being used. Equipping a staff and attacking grants the same 100% system above (for support spells).

Killer

When a killer designation is granted to a weapon (Spear, Bow, Whip), that weapon scores additional damage indefinitely on matching enemy types. The types are:

NameEnemy Type
ZombUndead
ToadArchaeToad
BeastBeast/Creature
AvisAerial/Avis
DrgnDragon
HeavyHeavy (bosses, strong enemies)
DesrtDesert
HumanHuman
OmniAll of the above

Additional details

  • The distribution of weapons by weapon types is preserved from the base game. In other words, the number of unique swords in the base game matches the number of unique swords after applying randomization. This is both a design choice and a technical limitation, where each weapon has a specific animation associated with it (in a way that is more complex than changing an index or a byte).
  • The Brave Blade, Chicken Knife, and Excailbur are removed from this weapon randomization process due to their highly unique qualities (hardcoded in the base game with their IDs), and are therefore not available in the game with weapon randomization applied.
  • The randomizer will attempt to reroll (up to a 100 times per weapon) to avoid duplicate weapon types & modification combinations. In other words, it is unlikely to see a pure duplicate for modifications. This is not implying that you will only get 1 of a weapon in a seed only - it's stating that the same bonus won't appear twice on the same weapon type. For example - if Fire3 is placed on a Sword (say, the Epee replacement), Fire3 will not appear on a different sword replacement (say, Mythril Sword, or Broad Sword). In other words, you should not see multiple inventory slots for the same weapon type and bonus, but you can get more than 1 of a particular weapon (like normal).
  • For everyone's sanity, attacking hit percentages for Axes, Staves and Rods were improved for randomized weapons.
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