So I have just legitimately created a starting save file where each character has all stats as 14. I did notice that when you input the code you start at the temple! Not sure if that would have to be a different category. Here are my reasons for why it should at least be allowed.

1. Unfortunately I have found through my testing that Intelligence and Agility combined influence your queue order, your hit rate, your evasion, and possibly running. The one with the worse stat consistently gets slammed more than the others. 2.Sometimes I do not feel like submitting to the RNG gods.
2. Everyone can be on the same playing field with these starting codes.
3. Community expansion would be more easily achieved due to easier access.
4. The time difference between starting at the temple compared to the normal start seems to be around 15-20 seconds when I tested in favor of the temple so not a great difference, but it does exist.
5. This state was legitimately created in about 1 hour and a 30 minutes of rolling over and over again, so no cheating of any sort was involved.
6. Also with these all 14 starting stats shorter times should be possible, refining the game further (maybe).
7. Nice to have the characters have actual names

Let me talk about the PITA that is the passwords in Swords and Serpents. Now I understand why as a small child I could never figure it out. And why maybe sometimes I would rather get something close to good with the rolling rather than input it all in.

1. The name needs to be the included in order for a character password to be valid. Ex: name of IAGO with Password xxxPASSxxx.
2. The Game Password somehow uses the other passwords to generate it. This means that if you create 3 all 14 stat characters, but then later want to replace one with the other character you CANNOT. The Game Password will not be accepted.
3. However the order of the characters can be changed and it will still be valid.ex: Order of IAGO, MASK vs MASK, IAGO.

IAGO: 7TTTC6T7? Magician

MASK: BBBBV7CC? Magician

AJAX: HCCCV6C9K Thief

ERIN G???M72G? Thief

GAME PASS QJALS???3ZNUJ?

Thoughts?

You are correct that INT and AGI affect Initiative. The exact formula is: AGI + INT + Weapon Initiative + random[0,9] Monsters just use their initiative stat + random[0,9]

So you can still get screwed by RNG on turn order even with the best stats.

In addition, anywhere from 12-14 STR does the exact same thing. There's not another change until 16 STR.

As for using passwords: I don't think that's a can of worms we want to open. -Starting at the temple is already a no from me, since that's a time advantage you otherwise wouldn't have. -If character creation counted for time I might be a little more open to this, but as much as it sucks to have to roll the characters up every time, it's the only way to legitimately start a new game, and you have to consciously make the choice of whether to sacrifice a few points of stats to get a run started a bit sooner.

Less serious things: -Not everyone wants to use those 4 names. -If anyone wants to experiment with other parties, they still have to roll the characters themselves. Then we have the issue of whether their passwords are legit.

"In addition, anywhere from 12-14 STR does the exact same thing. There's not another change until 16 STR."

Str is just for attack right?

"AGI + INT + Weapon Initiative + random[0,9]"

Lol you are telling me the equipped Weapon itself changes that queue order? Was not expecting that. What is the Weapon Initiative? Is that the "Effectiveness" listed in the weapon section here: https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/nes/587676-swords-and-serpents/faqs/21153 ?

"If character creation counted for time I might be a little more open to this, but as much as it sucks to have to roll the characters up every time, it's the only way to legitimately start a new game"

Right. This is why I am thinking it might need a new category. The difference is less than half a minute looks like though.

"Not everyone wants to use those 4 names"

The reason I chose those default names is because when you choose to "continue" it prefills those names. Also easier to identify which character got what. So for the sake of input speed that would be faster. Otherwise I would have ALL very vulgar names for sure!

"If anyone wants to experiment with other parties, they still have to roll the characters themselves. "

Yes. That is how that would work.

"Then we have the issue of whether their passwords are legit."

Well it is kind of bothersome to check I guess. But once a set of codes is verified they should be good moving forward. I am not thinking there is going to be much variation here considering that the speedrunners for Any% all use this setup anyway. I did create a set a of videos of the creation and verification from a hard reset. Also...I am not expecting people to be rushing to create a set of codes with all 14 stats. It was...interesting. Not sure if I am right, but each stat has 12 possibles in a set of 3. So that would be like (1/12)^3, then you have to do that 4 separate times. So like (1/12)^3 +(1/12)^3 + (1/12)^3 + (1/12)^3 = 1/6912 probability of creating a party with all 14 stats. So this is not something to be done casually by any means.

However I will say that the starting state of the characters and party are no different from a brand new party. Standard class equipment, 0 exp, rank 1.

Also keep in mind that if a brand new party uses the party suicide move "Last Resort" on the first tile of the game you immediately go to the Temple.

Thanks for the feedback.

Here is what a run with this passcode set looks like. All forced enounters hit, all locked doors need to be unlocked, all spells need to be learned. Also the glitch boss ending works as well.

The Efficiency of a weapon is actually pretty misleading. Efficiency is simply the weapon's Initiative + To-Hit. Why they wanted to combine them, I don't know, but I'm guessing most people would think that Efficiency = Accuracy.

To illustrate this, let's take the starting weapons (Staff for Magician, Dagger for Thief, Sword for Fighter). Staff and Dagger both have Efficiency of 11, Sword has Efficiency of 10. All have Damage Class of 4. The Staff actually has a To-Hit of 4, and Initiative of 7. It's damage is 2d2, or 2-4 damage. The Dagger has a To-Hit of 3, and Initiative of 8. It's damage is 1d4, or 1-4 damage. The Sword has a To-Hit of 4, and Initiative of 6. It's damage is 2d2, or 2-4 damage.

Sadly, the game doesn't tell you any of this. I found an old post on Speed Demos Archive that was able to gather a lot of good info from, and using that was able to find where all the equipment data was stored in RAM so I could make a list of everything. Some weapons are...much worse than they appear.

I made a post in the other thread you made pertaining to stats and combat formulas and stuff.

I'll post my spreadsheet here once I get a chance to clean it up and make it readable to people who aren't me ;)

What does "To-Hit" really mean? I was messing around with some weapons and some seem quite a bit better than others. Like the Red Staff and the Silver Sword both seem great. I guess that would mean they both have high Weapon Initiative?

Also do you understand the stacking of spells? As far as how it works and interacts with other spells? It seems like you can stack Strength 3 times, but I do not know if it has any effect beyond that. Deadeye kind of seems to effect the one hit kill ability of the Thief, but I have no idea if it stacks and it seems like it may not be as good as it sounds. I would rather use Strength over Deadeye.

Also is there a better guide somewhere on what weapons drop from what enemies? The gamefaqs guides do not seem complete. I saw the Silver Sword drop in Floor 2 maybe from a whitish zombie?. Also Snakes drop the Silver Sword. Think a snake also dropped a Red Staff. Death Dagger I think on Floor 5 too. And the guide does not show that.

To-Hit means accuracy.

Strength and Deadeye do not stack on top of themselves. Casting the spell on the same character beyond the first cast has no apparent effect (except maybe refreshing duration...though I've never had a combat last long enough to see it wear off, so I don't know if it even has a duration)

The only thing we know about drops is from the first FAQ listed on GameFAQs, which describes each enemy as being able to drop from a certain treasure class. From what they have listed, Death Daggers can drop on floor 5. Silver Swords aren't available until floor 4, and Red Staves until floor 6. Whether their list is accurate is unknown, but as of right now it seems to be a decent approximation, if nothing else.

I cleaned up and reviewed my recordings for all Floor 2 attempts and I never got a Silver Sword. I got a Sword, Broadsword, and a Long Sword. Must have been wishful thinking.

How ever, I did just do some testing on drops. I will be putting that on a different thread.