Tides of Destiny Question
7 years ago
Pennsylvania, USA

Hello, I'm new and interested in speed running games that would seem to be improbable in terms of length. A standard grind could turn this game from 20-30 hours. My question is essentially if there is anyone I talk to on this forum about Tides of Destiny? I don't see any posts and there aren't any defined rules So I was hoping this could be noticed by a moderator or something.

Essentially I have the basis for what could become a speed run guide. But in terms of rules I wasn't sure if it would be viable. Basically I looking to discuss this topic in terms of validity or if there could be a special category involved. If anyone reads this please reply in kind. Thanks very much

Illinois, USA

Hello. I have just found your comment. I am possibly looking into running this game as well, as it is one of my all-time favorite games. I am new to speed running, and I would very much be interested in connecting with you to work on starting a little community for this game. Message me if you get a chance. I would love to work on strategies with you. I look forward to your reply. Thanks.

Pennsylvania, USA

I have a few notes, but I cannot seem to find a way to make this game speed run friendly. There is so much I've yet to figure out. The grinding is the biggest hurdle. Not to mention the story requests. But I'd be glad to share with you everything I know just from play testing and working on different strategies.

Brazil

Sorry I didn't replied this before. I actually forgot that src has a forum part =p Right now, I only have a few notes and maps for dungeon with routes, up to wind temple IIRC. I stopped "routing" stuff there because getting past monsters that 2-3HKO you is tough. If you want, I can share those. Sincerely, probably not that useful for a run; it's mostly flags to keep the story going, routes to go through a dungeon (pretty messy), and some "maybe"s around (get this weapon? buy/sell that? etc.).

Also, I just googled, and it seems to have a speedrun on nico: Didn't watch, and who knows if I'll ever do, but it's there for those interested =p

Finally, and I don't know if there's already an answer out there, but I once was able to clip through a blue barrier: The place I did it was pretty useless, but it'd probably be useful in other places if replicable.

Illinois, USA

Hey, I'm sorry I haven't responded to this thread in a bit, but last month was quite busy for me. But, on the plus side, I managed to route this game and got it down to (with my initial attempt including pauses for notetaking) 30 hours. I made a second attempt, revising my notes, and I was able to get to the Water Shrine within 15 hours, but because of college, I've been busy and haven't finished this run. I can post my note document for you guys to take a look at. I have a bunch of hyperlinks for chapters in the document, but I used OpenOffice, so I hope the hyperlinks still work for Microsoft Word. If you guys want to go over my notes, maybe make some suggestions or possibly test the run out, I hope that'll be a great step to making a complete run of this game. I'll go ahead and post my document in the resources section of the website for you all.

Illinois, USA

Hey, I'm sorry, I actually put my notes in the "Guides" section, not the "Resources" one. Also, I just had to Copy Paste the notes since they didn't have a way for me to attach a file from what I could find.

Pennsylvania, USA

I haven't visited lately, but I have managed to go from my initial 28 hour and 21 minute run to 21 hours, 51 minutes, and 55 seconds. I'm still trying to try for something optimal as with my notes I did some re-routing too. I will say I'd like to add some notes of my own. I can't edit any of your notes though. I do have some alternate people you can get to 6 FP pretty easily as well to compare strategies.

Much like Maerwen, you can give Electra cheap cloth, yarn etc. that you'll have a bunch of and since they usually both frequent the mansion both are easy to find. Elena is also pretty easy to do...granted if she's awake. Scrap Metal, iron, etc. are easy to obtain since you see her on multiple occasions for Orb upgrades and various main story quests. If you get Elena to 6 FP she'll give you axe and hammer recipes as well as the sky hammer. For both the Hammer and the Katana sets, you can pull off 3 dash attacks in a row. As far as I know, no other types of weapons can be done more than one time. I would also suggest Mikoto as you can obtain a cheap fishing pole fairly early on, catch a bunch of fish and fry them.

I'll try and get something for a guide together. I've been testing Anwonwu's barrier skips to try and do as few trapdoor fights as possible.

Illinois, USA

Hey, I haven't gotten a chance to do any more practicing in a bit since I've been kind of preoccupied. But I had two major questions/suggestions for you guys. In my current run I've been doing, I'm at a save file where I'm stuck trying to beat Oblitigator. I've got a Wind Rod and some Katana (I think it might be Yaksha, but I can't recall right now...). I'm pretty low level for this fight, I think in the mid 20's, although I don't remember for sure right now. I also have a Golem tamed as well as a Blue Troll and a Farie from the Water Shrine. The Wind Rod is by far the fastest at dealing damage, but I'm low enough level that I run out of RP well into the fight. I'm concerned with trying to grind either materials for food or levels. I get either one or two shot by the boss as well, which doesn't help. So, I would love if you guys had any thoughts on how to deal with the Oblitigator well, as he is by far giving me the most trouble of any boss (Other than obviously the Masked Man). Also, the other question/suggestion I had was regarding the Wishing Festival. In my notes I had written earlier, I had said to go for either money, friendship points, or some materials, but I actually had a thought. In my current run, I got 10 random food items, and that item ended up being Boiled Gyoza, which has an HP Absorption effect. That has been really effective in certain tough encounters. However, right now the big issue is with RP in the higher level boss fights. I looked up to see if there were different items that gave an RP bonus, and there are quite a few that give Auto RP Recovery, namely Mixed Juice which gives RP Auto Recovery +50. I'll test it out and see if it works well tomorrow or sometime soon, but for now I just wanted to let you guys know some of my thoughts. If you guys have any thoughts or strategies, let me know.

Illinois, USA

Hey, Anwonu, do you mind linking that Japanese speedrun on nico? I just googled for it, and I can't find it.

Also, I just looked at your flag, and I can see that you're Brazilian. That's really cool. My dad is actually from Sau Paulo originally. Anyway, I just thought you mind find that interesting.

Illinois, USA

Okay, so after messing with the Lantern Festival, I have come to the following conclusions for how it all works:

1.) After making 3 separate save files, one the day before the festival, one right before it comes time to choose a wish, and one right after choosing a wish and going to bed to get it to come true, I have discovered that a.) the options for what wish to pick is generated at the beginning of the day, since loading the file right before picking doesn't change the options, but loading the file the day before does, and b.) the food items you get are determined once you make the wish, not upon waking up the next day, since loading the file after choosing the "Eat More" wish does not give you new food items, but loading the file before making the wish, picking "Eat More" again, and going to bed again does give you new items.

2.) There is a wide range of food items you can get, some with good stat boosts, others with not so good ones. However, after getting and testing Royal Curry, which gives a Strength +70 boost, going to Verde Island to test out the new stats (which had gone from 24 to 174), I was one-shotting most things, but after a while the buff went away, meaning it's temporary. It could, however, be used during a boss fight to help speed things along, and you get 9 of them, which is really good.

3.) Because you have to either get lucky or make a save before the festival day in order to secure the Eat More wish option, it is really, extremely slow, taking (after making Ymir run around to kill time quickly with his limited supply of RP) easily 10 minutes of sitting around doing nothing until it is time to make an attempt at the wish and see if you got the right option. Thus, it may or may not be a very viable strategy, although if trying to beat boss fights and get through the game with as little grinding as possible will also take a really long time (either through grinding or sitting there slowly dwindling bosses' HP), it may be potentially quicker to do the wish trick in order to get some help rather than trying to take bosses out slowly or sitting and level grinding.

4.) I didn't manage to get the Mixed Juice item in my testing (I've been at it for a while and got tired for the day). but I did get an item that gave me RP Auto Recovery +12 (I'm pretty sure it was Strawberry Milk). I stood at Verde Island swinging my Katana around to lower my RP, then drank one, and it looks like it works on a periodic timer. After a 5-10 or so second interval, it refills the RP count by the number it is based on (so for the Strawberry Milk, it was +12), and it does that I think it was 5 different times, and then the buff goes away. I also checked my file where I was at the Oblitigator boss, and I am level 20, with about 400 total RP. Two combos with the Wind Rod took away about 45 RP, and with the Mixed Juice, you'd be getting back 50 every 5-ish seconds, for 5 or so times, giving a total of 250 recovered RP over one item. This is pretty decent, but I'm just not 100% sure if it's worth the attempted setup.

5.) The items that seem to be worth the most to sell in this game are food items, and this Lantern Festival strat might be a good way to get some early cash. If you can get the Mixed Juice and/or some Royal Curry, and then sell the other stack(s) of food you get, depending on what it is, you might be able to get some really decent cash. Or, depending on the items you get, you could use them for heath during dungeons. Either way, that's just another added benefit to this strat to think about.

Anyway, I hope this gives a little bit of help for any potential stats to speed up the run. If you guys have any questions or thoughts on this little idea, please let me know. I would love to figure out a way to get a run to be sub 20 hours, so I could go ahead and get a run recorded and published. So, any comments you guys have, let me know. Thanks!

Pennsylvania, USA

Hey I came back after a long hiatus. After some testing I went through a few different options. The first method I did involved kitchen recipes. Now since I started this file, and it was already beaten. I can't say for certain, but I believe these to be basic kitchen recipes. It involves bamboo rice and mushroom rice with a cooking skill of 12 & 21. Since you can cook dishes 20 levels over you should be able to make enough bamboo rice to offset the mushroom rice when you make it. But for this experiment let's go with Bamboo Rice. Mushrooms can be a bit tougher to come by, however if you do happen to revitalize spring island by placing rune spirits there or doing the same with summer and fall bamboo shoots and mushrooms will grow naturally along with weeds and different colored grasses to give to Violet if you're doing her as a friend for the end boss. However it's more likely to get bamboo shoots grow over mushrooms If grinding you can sell both for a profit. 290 gold for bamboo rice against buying rice at the general store for 200 gold is 90 gold profit, and mushroom rice is 330 gold for a 130 gold profit. Both items give you 20+ strength and 10+ water defense. This does stack so you can end up with say +20 water defense or +40 strength. The effect goes for 60 seconds. Now for hp and rp recovery bamboo rice gives you 120 hp and 130 rp. Mushroom rice gives you 160 hp and 150 rp. So for instance let's say you spent 1000 gold for 5 rice you have 5 bamboo rice dishes for a potential 600 hp recovery and 650 rp recovery over 5 minutes. If you are using 45 rp every two combos you can do 14 combos with bamboo rice. With mushroom rice at five dishes is 750 rp recovery giving you an additional 2 combos at 16. If you can conceivably make 10 dishes double the combos from 14 to 28 and 16 to 32 respectively.

However, I think it may be more feasible for you if you're doing strawberry milk to switch to Orange Juice. For one, it's one less ingredient and it's a lot earlier to get in the game and easier to get. I'm assuming you're growing strawberries and either making or buying milk which seems to be more time consuming then going to the general store, buying 10 oranges for 1000 gold and making 10 orange juices. The orange juice also sells for 260 gold vs the 200 you pay netting a 60 gold profit. which I agree is the only reason I could see making strawberry milk which nets 285 gold profit on selling. Other than that they have the same effects of +12 auto rp recovery and +10 water defense.

As for Oblitegator, I recommend bringing three monsters from your barn or to capture three blood panthers/tortoises or a combination of both in water shrine as shield fodder. It doesn't help that the arena is small, but enemy boss A.I. tends to go after monsters more than you. I managed to get very lucky in my run. He took a lot time doing push-ups and working out throughout most of the battle as I ran around and took pot-shots at him. He's really more of a challenge when he gets into rage mode at half health. The window of opportunity has to be a frame or so during his push-ups. He's faster and charges more frequently.

My advice during this is run around him. Think like Ali. You gotta float like a butterfly and sting like a bee. Or in this case run around in circles and attack his back side. The best way to do that is when he does his combo move where he punches, kicks, send that spike move at you and rolls toward you. If you can get around him you can unleash on him. If a monster is still alive, the best scenario is he goes after it with the combo and you've got free range to go to town. But honestly, the best way to go about the battle is run around and take 1-2 shots at him, wash, rinse, repeat.

As for the festival, I can never seem to get a consistent set of wishes. The problem is that aren't available every time and the game probably uses a random generator to choose what wishes are available the morning of the festival. So you have to save the night before, wait about all day and hope that it gives you One of the 8 possible things you might want like wishing to use magic better for higher magic skills, food, weapons, Golem abilities, etc. or you have to reset and try again. I've reset like 5 times once to get a decent 24 hour run once. At some point you gotta decide yep this is a real time any% category.

Anyways if you have anymore questions let me know. Shoot me your email or something though as I haven't visited here for 6 months. I have more notes than I know what to do with as I've tried routing a sub-20 run for so long and with all the late game crap. The last 1/4 of the game with the wind shrine and masked man which takes probably like 6--8 hours depending how much the game hates you is maddening. OHKO'S, constant backtracking, and with how under-levelled you are...yeah Tides of Destiny got less and less fun each time lol.

Illinois, USA

Hey. It's nice to hear from you guys again. It's been a while. I haven't gotten around to practicing recently since college started.

So what I was thinking was honestly not doing any form of farming at all. Since it takes time for you to tame the right monsters, revive the islands, and wait for the right crop to grow, I'd been skipping it. Plus, if you don't work on making food items yourself, it's one less crafting based skill to level grind.

That's why I was trying to come up with ways to get items much faster, hence the Lantern Festival. And honestly, In my first initial routing run, I got around 32 hours I think (I can't remember for 100% sure), and by the time I got to the Oblitigator (sans Lantern Festival strat), I was at around 22 hours in or so. With the Lanturn festival strat, I am actually only 16 hours in and at the Oblitigator, and I'm actually a higher level (since I had to do a bit of time killing waiting for the Lanturn Festival to start, I did some level grinding). I also think that it helps that I was able to be a bit more optimized in my movement and material gathering, but still, that's a good 6 hour difference.

I'll try to do a bit more practicing and routing during Winter Break, but right now I've got too many projects and stuff to work on. Anyway, it was great hearing from you, and if you have any other thoughts, let me know!

Pennsylvania, USA

I can honestly say I never did any farming. Cooking items I found wasn't too time consuming, given the right stuff. I think cooking for me was a life saver in certain jams. But I also did a fishing strategy early. Since in order for you to beat the game, you have to fish on the snow island for bronze, silver, and gold pond smelt and give it to the statues and then go get the key, I worked to get a either a beginner's or intermediate pole after getting the cheap pole from Joe. Throughout the game I would cook basic fish dishes early on for health/rp recovery to set myself up to create better recipes later. I can't quite remember is the lantern festival a one level buffer or a 5 level buffer? If you don't mind me asking what level are you at Oblitegator I'm venturing it's mid-high 20's.

Illinois, USA

Hey. Sorry for the slightly late reply.

If you're referring to the "I wish I was stronger" option for the Lantern Festival, I just tested it, and it's actually 3 level ups. And as for what level I'm at for the Oblitigator fight, I'm actually at level 21. I know, quite low, but I tried as much as possible to avoid level grinding since it takes time. Although I did do a little more than my initial playthrough. But avoiding level grinding and trying to find another way to power up for boss fights was exactly why I've been exploring the Lantern Festival.

At the Oblitigator fight, at level 21, my in-game playtime is sitting at 9:28, although I actually have my stopwatch number at 8:23:00 (rounded), which seems off...

Either way, I managed to get to the Oblitigator in under 10 hours. My equipment is Pumpkin Head, Wind Rod, Fleet Foot, a Tear Pendant, a Courage Badge, a Wind Ring, and 6 Seafood Pizza (which is +40 to Intelligence damage), and 7 Milk Pudding (which is +20 to Max HP). I also have Basara (Katana with 18 ATK, Para ATK 10%, Para Resist). My forging skill is 12, and I have the Advanced Forge. That's my loadout on my current file.

Game stats
Followers
21
Runs
15
Players
7
Recent runs
Latest threads