Breath of Fire 4 - 0 Exp Challenge Part 3: Kahn

Channel:

MoogleBoss

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Published on November 4, 2015 6:11:14 PM ● Video Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iNjhZ9M6vEo

Game:

Breath of Fire IV (2000)

Duration: 3:21

1,150 views

14

Challenge playlist:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLbSv8zSDR9c3ilm03NGBn_GGmnY7aukpm

I thought the playlist link said "n00b GG" for a second.

This is the first battle against Kahn, whom the game features as a recurring boss as well as something of a comic relief villain. While I could downplay the challenge he poses and just call him a joke boss and leave it at that, he's really just one of the many gimmicky bosses you face in the first two chapters of the game. As long as the gimmick is figured out, the entire battle can be cheesed. There are exceptions to this rule, but they only serve to prove the rule.

BoF4 features mechanics wholly different from those of BoF3, with many new things to take notice of, in spite of both games being on the PSX. In this video, I strongly recommend paying attention to the order in which characters take turns attacking. There are some things that are obvious to everyone who has played BoF4 for even a short period of time. That a fast character will perform their action after the slow one if you choose them to execute their actions in that way, and also apparently that chances to combo (with skills only) increase when a) the difference in speed between the two allies is minimal, b) the slower character goes before the fast one. This is why a normal BoF4 game really motivates the training of fast characters, perhaps even moreso than BoF3 with its EX-turn system (because EX-turns hardly matter anywhere outside of boss battles, which aren't rarely ended in 1-2 turns either).

Now what this video showcases is a speed vs. turn order discrepancy far more striking than anything I've shown in my BoF3 0 exp challenge.

Compare my units' agility stats (taken from the first part of the video) to the enemy's agility:

Nina - 19
Ershin - 10
Cray - 4
Ryu - 0

Kahn (I) - 40

If you remember the Dragon Zombie fight in my previous BoF challenge, I had a 0 speed Garr outspeed the ~10 spd boss for reasons entirely unexplainable, yet possible and repeatable as seen by anyone playing the game at length.

In this recording, you see all my characters consistently (with some exceptions) outspeeding the 40 speed Kahn, clearly faster than all of their total agility combined in fact. Even 0 spd Ryu often outspeeds the moderately speedy Kahn (with levelups, it wouldn't be too hard to have at least Nina outspeed him in a normal game).

What's the answer? The master Rwolf, the very first master in the game and a moderate option for mages and characters who can afford to sacrifice some physical power for a bit more AP earlygame (such as an Ershin trained to become an endgame caster). It's known that Rwolf raises the chances of units ambushing the enemy party in random battles, but an additional effect that remains uninvestigated yet still indisputable is the temporary in-battle speed increase Rwolf grants, clearly impacting turn order in a very direct way.

I have always wondered how substantial Rwolf's increase on agility is. Is it a +10 difference or something otherwise modest? A modifier like 1.5x? The fact that 0 spd Ryu apprenticed under Rwolf consistently outspeeds Kahn seems to point that the latter isn't the case. However, the exact mechanics remain unknown this late in 2015, so make of this what you will. The first turn, when Kahn uses Shout, he outspeeds the party (if he went last, Shout connecting and negating further attacks would mean nothing, but then I have no idea if BoF4 has some sort of equivalent to priority attacks in Pokemon or indeed Nina's priority healing in the first BoF game for the SNES).

Now, for Kahn. He always starts the battle by using Shout, followed by Focus next turn, and the rest you never know. Ryu and Ershin are the two characters with higher then average chances of learning enemy skills in this game, so both of them should be guarding hoping to learn Focus right away. One of them might as well use it the next turn and hope to get some damage in.

Kahn will sometimes guard, doing nothing threatening, but gathering power for his eventual strike and reducing the damage done unto him as you'd expect from a guarding character. If he guards enough, he can OHKO folks. Boosting people's defence can prevent said OHKOs; however, you need 5 defence boosts to cap defence, which is way more than the 2 Rainbow Trouts necessary to max physical attack, so it seems like a waste of turn. It appears a more efficient choice to simply revive the fallen character instead; experience shows Cray has good chances of withstanding the boosted hit, and Ershin can occasionally do the same.

My method of attacking here is using Shadowwalk with Cray (learnt from the chapter 1 Army Bats ASAP) and having somebody restore Cray's AP. He's the primary recipient of Rainbow Trouts, followed by whoever learns Focus (Ershin in this case).

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