Solo White Mage

Holy geez. I'm attempting the Solo White Mage quest. I'm basically making this thread so I can post my progress (read: spam and postcount). Also, encouragement helps me do boring and insane stuff like this.

So far, I'm just at Pravoka. I need to gain a couple of levels before going after the ship. Note how I'm too lazy to crop out the desktop. Anyway, I don't intend on using savestates or game genie. Any thoughts?

First of all, you are a crazy nutty guy. That is an insane quest to take up... if it's even possible Is Pravoka the actual town that you get the ship at? If so, you seem to be at level 4, and just beating Garland with that level and only that character is EXTREMELY insane. Good luck, you seem to have a good start!

will take a while, should be rewarding if you manage to finish it though!

That is unbelievably hardcore. Make sure o keep posting updates and screenshots, 'cause this has me interested.

I have two bits of adVice:

#1: gimme that Mac.

#2: find the screenshot button for your emulator. saves on file size, and we don't have to look at your whole desktop.

and then a comment...

IT CANNOT BE DONE! if by some chance you DO finish it... well, I shall worship you as my (secondary, below Karnov) god.

I like to see his whole desktop. Dashboard gives me a VisualGasm.

Luke, next time I'll crop it, I swear. RockNES' screen shot format confuses me. I was just extra special lazy.
Roth, yes, I beat Garland at Level 4.

And yes, I will keep you all updated in my struggles.

I'm now in Level 7, and though I have not yet gone to Elftown, I have the ship. I'll post screens when something more interesting than fighting Sharks happens. Maybe when I go for the crown, at level 10 or something. I'll give you all the status screen/fighting Mages/getting crown combo. I should be there tomorrow sometime.

Astos ought to be an excercise in patience.

I'll gladly answer any queries you may have. But for the basics: Ruse is stackable, and 99 Heal potions is a constant Goal.

Edit:

I went ahead to Elftown, and picked up some new armor. Then I realized I never even equipped the Cloth Armor. Ah well, it sucks anyway.
Here's me being fairly close to level 8. I seem to be able to do Ogres pretty well. So I'll stick with them until at least level 10.

Editx2: Not only did I bother to crop the first pic, but I've resaved them both as .gifs. I could go lower quality even, but uh. I'm lazy.

I'm impressed.
OSG/OMG/OMFG has actually discovered an even difficult way to play 'Final Fantasy'.

I've heard stories of players going through as "4" white mages, but never just "1".
I bet a single "thief" would be hard to do also. The thief is about as weak as a white mage in combat, but with the added discomfort of not being able to use magic. Well, at least the thief was always that weak when I played.

You'll probably have to MAX out to the highest possible level in order to beat the final confontation. The last dungeon and "Chaos" - tough situation.

if he manages to keep his evade up..

That my friend is INSANE. Especially on the NES version. Your doing pretty good though keep it up man. Hope you get through.

Zen, I imagine the solo Theif being the hardest way to play the game. Actually, on scond thought, at least the theif can actually run.

Anyway, check it out lads:

I got bored of leveling up, so I decided to go for it. I failed twice, but the third time...

I got the crown. You didn't think I would do it, but I did it. I imagine the Astos fight will take hour(s).

Here's a picture of what it looks like to kill a Wizard with one white mage.

hahaha, victoly!

Prepare the congraturations.

I managed to get the crystal. The Astos fight took about 35 minutes.

I've done the stupid irritating hunt-and find quest, and I have given the TNT to Nerrick. I've filled out my spells including such indispensable gems as FEAR and HRM2.

Now I can (somewhat) comfortably POWer levelâ€¦

I've only done 3 or 4 fights like this, because it is time consuming. Here's the deal:
It takes a few tries to get to the 'POWer peninsula'. Then I use a tent, reset, and get into a fight. If it is vs any Trolls with the Zombulls, I have to reset again. The Goal is to fight 3 or 4 Zombulls here, with 0 Trolls, and get off my first cast of ruse quickly. One ruse is enough to get my evade high enough that they don't kill me right away, and then I can use it again. Then they're pretty likely to miss, so I just use Harm 2 a few times, win, and use a tent again. It's around 4 resets until I get a fight I like, and 1/3 fights are successes. But when I level up, my STR HAS to go up. Or else I reset. That adds another 2-5 resets (depending on the level). I'd like AGI to go up as well, but I'm not a machine, so I don't reset for that too. Anyway, after I use the tent, it's back to Pravoka to refill on heals, tents and rock the Inn.

Like I said, I've just started on this. Maybe I'll go to level 20? More likely I'll get bored and move on. Usually, my best laid plans are all based on how much patience I have.

I can't wait until I get the Defense sword, heal staff and mage staff. Leveling will be a breeze then. Fewer town stops.

IT sounds like there is alot of strategy to this. Very good for the brain. You will probably be the ONLY one ever to complete this.

I need an update on this OSG! Get any further with the hardcore leveling up technique?

I'm only in level 13. Haven't had much time lately. But now that the College Teachears are on strike, I'll be able to spend some more time on it. Maybe I'll just press on until I have some tools to make leveling faster.

Update?

Sure thing.

Since the teacher's stike ended, I've been too swamped to play, but I have defeated Lich before I got back to school. Next stop is Castle of Ordeals for the Zeus Gauntlet, then the Ice Cave to (attempt) to survive my way to the Airship.

A whole month for a whole not a lot of progress. I'm the greatest!

I haven't even FF1 yet, even though I have it (no, I don't know what's wrong with me), and this looks harshly difficult. I am used to other RPG's, though, and just the talk about it sounds like a hard endeavor. I'm going to have to get that game out of the attic now; I have a Goal to work towards!

Now that I'm playing the game, and seeing how hard some of it is with 4 characters, & the weaknesses of the White Mage, I can only conclude that OSG also stands for--
ONE STUDLEY GAMER
I'm currently mucking about in Elfland gaining levels. How is this solo quest going?

I thought that One Sexy Guy and ONE STUDLEY GAMER were pretty much synonomous. Just look at young Jimmy from The Wizard. He was an uber gamer, and that tramp Candi Licious was all over him during the bathtub scene.

Wait a minute... that wasn't the Wizard...

Ah, never mind.

Slow and studly.

I succeded in getting the Tail, the Zeus Gauntlet and the Heal Staff. It took a few tries because of those mean ol Sorcerers and R.Goyles. Next on the to-do list is the unsavory Ice Cave. I will not enjoy it. So I haven't attempted it yet :D

For the record, this is what it looks like when you kill a Zombie Dragon:

As a newbie to this game, just the sight of that dragon scares the crap out of me, although my quest has gotten a little easier since I've picked up the copper bracelets for the mages.
Keep up the good work...

This took hours of trial & failure until I broke down and used the encounter list to avoid enemeis that were sure death. Which is a lot of them.

Damn you, ice cave.

It's just unfathomable to me how many hours this must be taking you. Crap, with the 4 characters I've spent hours and hours and I'm only at the town of Melmond/Earth cave gaining levels.
All bow to this White Mage Conquerage!
*EDIT* 'Cause I'm trying hard not to double-post, but I noticed on an earlier screen shot you were fighting ZomBulls at Level 12. I'm at Level 22 (just finished the Gurgu Volcano) and haven't even seen these monsters yet. I'm assuming it has to do with this "POWer peninsula" you're talking about. Where is that? Leveling up where I'm at is awfully slow (forest area around Crescent Lake).
Never mind. Found it, and I don't need it now anyway, because I twarted the ice cave and got the floater. It's still a good place to level up, though.
Damn ice cave mages. I can see now why that took you forever.

First update in like a month. I got to play today. yays.

And I killed Kary on my first try. I have to figure out a way to save up for the bottle, now. I guess I could go treasure crawling for all the boxes I skipped in all the levels.

Kary went down to MUTE, and about 4 RUSE spells, then just used Thor's Gauntlet a whole lot.

So... things getting a little bit easier, then?

Good lord. I thought I'd made the game harder by doing the volcano before the ice cave...just as I thought, I should have waited.
If you can manage to afford the ProRing, and get in a battle with that Eye that guards the Floater box over & over again, another good way to level up. But it sure would be sticky with the Solo White Mage.
Thanks for the update! I thought you'd given up!

I plan on leveling up on the Agama, in the volcano. they give 1000 or so less exp, but they have no dangerous spells.

Yeah. When I can play, it's going well.

Yeah. Forgot about the Eye's every-so-often GLANCE spell. I guess that would have a way of screwing up a Solo White Mage's Sundays.
~EDIT, so I don't double-post~
I know you're out there lurking in the dark, OSG. Update, or too much "drunken badminton?"

Summertime, and the living's easy.

Although I'm still working on it, it's tricky to get motivated fighting Agamas for hours. I try my luck with Kraken when I hit level 30. Or maybe sooner, if I get too bored. Even though my ~monthly update is always small, at least I haven't quit ;)

I plan on playing intermittently all day before work. That's 8 whole hours away.

Wow. And I just noticed the promotion ! Solo White Wizard seems to have filled out some spells. Good job!

And as such, I got to level 38, and went to kick the hell out of Kraken. I died on the way once, because I forgot which enemies you can run from, and which ones you couldn't.

But it was smooth sailing. Kraken was a pushover ;)

Those blue scorpions (ahh, I know they're called something else in the water shrine; where's my beastiary?) must have been a royal blue pain.
Did the mermaids shun you because you were a party of one?

No, baby, there's plenty of White Mage to go around.
Also, I want to get this over with. The end is near. All orbs: done.

The Air level was simple business. Run away from everything, and pump Tiamat full of FADE. I even ran into WarMech, but of course, ran away. Because I don't want to be turned into a pile of dust.

Two things left to do. Get to level 50, and take on the last level. Should be interesting to see how many times I get mashed on the way to Chaos.

Let alone facing Chaos himself; I wonder if the RUN command works when you battle him?!
Yeah, right...good luck! At least the leveling up shouldn't be giving you too much of a problem now. This thread never fails to impress.

Sadly, no. But curiously, like any other monster, if you had enough casts of FEAR land, you can make him run. I beleive 4 charges of FEAR make him run 100% of the time at level 50. Sadly, though, it's a pretty slim chance that FEAR will work. (1/256? Or something?)

Wow... you have infinitely more patience than I do.

I can't help thinking how great a feature this would have been on The OSG.

Amazing work though, I can hardly beat the first boss with a full team.

So yesterday I built myself up to level 50 then went onto the last level.
I got wasted about 20 times on the 3rd floor by Gas Dragons, and one or two times against the Phantom. Once I got past that, it was smooth sailing. I got up to the Masmune, took it, and cast EXIT to save with it.

Now I plan to go back with the sword, and do much better on the fiends on the way so I have more magic for Chaos. Almost done, wish me luck ;)

Good Luck man Good Luck!

Good luck, indeed. That EXIT spell must be getting to be a favorite by now!
Oh, I forgot; how was the going with all the Vampires in the desert tower?
(I just love memory loss; I completed this game only about 3 months ago and already I can't remember the name of that tower).
Yes. EXIT is key.
I only ran into one group of Vampires, and I beleive I ran or I would have used HRM3. So no problems. And it's the Mirage tower, but that's not important.

I don't think you need luck at this point; just an ounce more patience, of which you apparently have gallons.

We need to start making up a commemorative plaque or something.

Yes. And maybe OSG could write a novel about his exploits with this Solo quest. Or at the very least, a FAQ.

I'm done. It took a lot of tries. The big problem is that Chaos uses CUR4 now and again, so you have to string together a lot of lucky hits in between his cures. Dying against him isn't really a problem. I just fought until I was out of curing magic, eventually died and tried again a few times. It was just a matter of patience.

Y HALLO THAR GARLAND

I managed to actually get a snap of me doing damage for a change. It's tricky because I'm pressing print screen in real time.

I tried to get the 'terminated' dialogue, but missed. So here's Chaos crumbling.

So that's it, I guess. Any questions? :D

Good job OSG! I wonder could you beat the game with just a Warrior?

I've done a solo Black Belt and solo Fighter. They were easier.

You're my hero, OSG! Good job bro. That took awhile, but it seems to have paid off with all that patience. Shit, great job man!

Indeed, good job. And there were some doubters in this thread!
Any other wicked "test your skills to the limit" game ideas? 8)

Haha, thanks guys ;D

I'm working on a low-level FF3 (FF6j) right now. Again. This is my fourth try. The farthest I've gotten was just into the World of Ruin, then my saves got erased.

Otherwise, I'm thinking of trying Zelda II: The Adventure of Link without leveling up certain skills. beating the game with level 1 life, level 1 sword or level 1 magic would be tricky...

Or maybe I'll just dive into a solo Red Mage quest. But I do want a break.

That break, and your new Final Fantasy Champion rank, are well-deserved.
Wouldn't a Solo Thief be harder? I don't know the skills of all the characters yet, as I've only finished the game that one time (still working on Dawn Of Souls), I've just heard the thief can be pretty sticky to use.
Indeed, if you go for that Zelda II: The Adventure of Link experience, and complete it, you've got to be the most patient soul on earth! Zelda II: The Adventure of Link is tricky with the magic/skills you do acquire in the game by default!

Wow! I have trouble with a team of 4, let alone 1! Good job man.

That break, and your new Final Fantasy Champion rank, are well-deserved.
Wouldn't a Solo Thief be harder?
Haha, wow. Uh, thanks Luke?

I think Theif would be the hardest. That's exactly why I don't want to do it :P

Ah, I'll probably get around to doing that one too. Just because I'm a sucker for FF1.

Dude, I can't even beat Chaos with a full party (really should load up my game and try again sometime...) and you did it with one character, a damn white mage at that.

You deserve the title.

Otherwise, I'm thinking of trying Zelda II: The Adventure of Link without leveling up certain skills. beating the game with level 1 life, level 1 sword or level 1 magic would be tricky...
.

Not Tricky but impossible.

I also offer my CONGRAAADULATIONS to OSG, our resident Final Fantasy Champion.

impressive

I told my friends about this and they didn't believe me, so I copied the thread to them