

Ye Olde Grand Changelogge

This list details the majority of the changes in NT, listing Content and Gameplay.
Needless to say, there may be spoilers for those who haven't played/finished FF7
in the past, and for NT-specific surprises, so read at your own risk.

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\\Features & Utilities//
-------------------------

\\Extended Save Points//

-) NT has expanded the scripts used by Save Points to offer some new options and conveniences
	for the player. When coming into contact with a Save Point, a new set of text boxes
	will appear listing several commands and options. From there you can either use the
	Save Point as normal by opening the Party Menu and selecting Save, or you can activate
	some of the special options by pressing the other buttons.

	The features available are listed below:

	Quick Tent: L1/'Page-Up'
	This checks your inventory for a Tent and then automatically uses it, saving you the
	bother of looking for it in your Item Menu.

	Rank-Up: L2/'Camera'
	This takes the player to the Rank-Up/SP screen where they can spend their accumulated
	SP and upgrade their character's stats. A more detailed explanation is given under the
	'Rank Up/SP System' entry in this text file. Note that Rank-Up is not available until
	shortly after leaving Midgar.

	Toggle Battle Music Type: R1/'Page-Down'
	This toggles the music behaviour for random battles between using the default battle
	theme or retaining the currently playing Field music instead.

	Toggle Random Battle: R2/'Target'
	Random battles begone! If you're looking to explore an area without being hassled by
	random encounters then this option disables them. Note that boss battles and fixed
	encounters will still occur; world map battles will also still occur.

	Check SP: Square/'Switch'
	This allows you to check your party's currently accumulated SP totals. If you have
	more than 200 for any character, then it's worth visiting the Rank Up screen to buy
	a stat upgrade for them. More info on Ranks and SP can be found under it's related
	entry further down. Again, this feature isn't available until shortly after leaving
	Midgar.

	Open Menu: Triangle/'Menu'
	Same as before, just opens the party menu and allows you to save, etc.

	Continue: OK/'Confirm'
	Closes the Extended Save Menu.


\\SP System//

-) The SP System is the way in which stat-progression is handled in the NT Mod.
	Rather than gaining stats through leveling, characters will accrue SP which can then be
	spent on customising the development of your characters. With each Rank purchased, 			characters will gain a flat upgrade of +5 to every stat in addition to the player's
	chosen upgrades.

	An example of a Rank upgrade is shown below; there are four choices unique to each 		character:

	\\Base Gain//
	+5 Strength, Vitality, Magic, Spirit, Dexterity, Luck

	Additional Gain: Player's Choice
	Set #1: +10 Strength/Vitality, +5 Spirit
	Set #2: +10 Strength/Spirit, +5 Magic
	Set #3: +10 Strength/Luck, +5 Dexterity
	Set #4: +10 Magic/Dexterity, +5 Vitality

	So choosing Set #1 will result in the character's stats increasing by:
	+15 Strength
	+15 Vitality
	+5 Magic
	+10 Spirit
	+5 Dexterity
	+5 Luck
	
	SP is accrued through battles, with stronger enemies later in the game giving more SP
	than earlier, weaker enemies. Each rank also costs 200SP, with some being unlocked by
	default for characters that join later in the game. Only 255SP can be stored on each
	character, so make sure to spend SP at a Save Point whenever you have more than 200SP.

	The SP System becomes available shortly after leaving Midgar, after which it can
	be accessed/checked using Save Points. SP can still be gained while playing up
	to this point, and will be available for use immediately when it is unlocked.

	tl;dr - Kill dudes, get SP, buy Sources, use Sources.



-------------------------------------------
\\Gameplay Balancing & Equipment Changes//
-------------------------------------------


\\Magic/Materia//

-) Materia: AP needed to Master
	You may notice that common Materia can have either the same or greater overall AP
	requirement to master than the rare pieces like Mega-All or Double-Cut. This was
	done because common pieces can actually sell for exorbitant amounts of gil once
	Mastered (not just All Materia). Another reason was to cut down end-game grinding
	to an absolute minimum; you'll be able to Master and distribute Materia like
	Double-Cut much faster than was possible in the vanilla game. However, there's
	restrictions on certain Materia which is covered below.


-) Materia: Single-Star
	As part of the large-scale balancing, a number of Materia in NT have had their
	levels and AP requirements adjusted. However, some have been taken a step further
	and set to only have 1 level and to already be Mastered when you find them.

	There can be several reasons for this depending on the Materia. In the case of
	Pre-Emptive, EXP Plus, Gil Plus, Enemy Away, Enemy Lure, Chocobo Lure, and
	several other 'effect' Materia their effects aren't particularly game-breaking
	and so were changed to give their full effect as a QoL change.

	Other Materia such as Summons and Final Attack, however, have been changed to 1-Star
	in order to restrict their availability and, in some cases, their number of uses.
	In most cases, these Materia will be unique and the only one of their kind in the
	entire game. This was done for balancing reasons, and to make potent Materia feel
	more of a unique resource.

	All Summon Materia drop as a mastered 1-Star; this means they can only be used once
	in battle (unless Mime is used) and only one copy of them exists in the playthrough.
	This is to compensate the boosted properties of summon spells, which ignore MDEF and
	can inflict a status ailment (100% chance). Quadra Magic can also circumvent the usage
	limit and allow for 5x Casts per battle.

	Materia with potent effects like W-Item and Mime drop as mastered in order to keep
	only one copy of them in the playthrough. This is to help encourage variety in the
	party set-up instead of having three characters with all the same end-game commands.
	The affected Materia are Mime, Speed/Magic/Luck/HP/MP Plus, W-Magic/Item/Summon,
	and Final Attack.

	Master Magic/Command/Summon are available in NT, from Bugenhagen's Observatory like 	before. But instead of consuming all the required Mastered Materia, you will retain
	your Materia when meeting the requirements for Master Magic/Command/Summon; this process
	can only be done once however.


-) Cover + Counter + Sneak Attack
	In the default game, these have a %-based chance to trigger that increases
	incrementally on each Level, up until they reach 100% at Master. However,
	for NT the chances of these Materia effects triggering has been adjusted.
	For counter-based Materia, the chance starts at 10% (down from 20%) and rises
	by 10% each time for a max of 50%. For Cover, it's the same but starts at 20%
	and has one less star (this was because a 10% Cover Materia wasn't proccing
	often enough early-game to be that useful).

	This is a counter-measure against the 'automated' set-ups that ran rampant in
	older builds. Cover can still proc at 100% though if you equip at least two copies
	of the Materia onto a character, assuming you have the extra slot(s) to spare.
	Counter Attack works differently in that each separate Materia has their own
	separate chance to proc; so having 5 mastered Counter Attack in vanilla meant
	5 100% chances to counter-attack which is very tricky to balance against.

	It's not all bad news, though. Counter Attack's AP requirements are very low
	meaning you can quickly build it up for more consistent use and/or get multiple
	copies of it floating about. Also, Sneak Attack was adjusted so that it now procs
	100% of the time when Mastered, as opposed to the original game's annoying 80%.

	Quick list on affected Materia:
	-) Cover
	-) Counter Attack
	-) Command Counter
	-) Magic Counter
	-) Sneak Attack


-) Plus Materia
	Plus Materia exist as unique drops that can raise a character's attributes by a fixed
	25% for their related stat. These Materia are unique as their effects stack and can
	quickly break stat progression.


-) Spell Strength
	The spell list has been heavily tweaked to try and ensure that more spells are more useful
	throughout all levels, with adjustments to base power, MP cost, and effects implemented.
	To make room for new spells, some older obsolete ones were condensed down or removed:

	-) Cure
	These had their base power boosted heavily for NT as a common complaint was that
	MBarrier made them a waste of MP next to the improved healing items like Potion
	and Hi-Potion. They're now powerful enough to heal through MBarrier for a reasonable
	amount even if split across the whole party or casted by a low-Magic character.

	-) Regen
	One of the strongest healing spells in the game with the right set-up, Regen was
	now requires 70 MP to cast. It has been restored to Slot 3 on the Restorative Materia
	due to Magic Counter + Cure3 being a more desirable combo.

	-) Life
	During playthroughs, I'd rarely find use for the Revive Materia as it tended to have
	a high MP Cost vs. something that could be done quickly with an item so for NT,
	Life has been buffed to revive a KO'd character with 50% of their MaxHP instead of
	the same 25% that a Phoenix Down offers.

	-) Mini & Frog = Lagomorph
	In order to create space for new spells, I condensed certain spells down and combined
	their effects into one. In the case of Transform Materia, I decided to combine Mini
	and Frog into the same spell which helps differentiate it from Frog Song and the
	two Frog/Mini inflicting items Shrivel and Impaler.

	-) Status Magic = Fixed Chance
	In the default game, status magic has varying chances between spells; in NT, the chance
	has been made the same for all spells (roughly 80%, not accounting for the effects of
	Level difference between the caster & target).

	-) Debarrier & Dispel
	This has been improved to handle later enemies using the Shield and Peerless statuses,
	able to bypass the immunity of even Peerless to get rid of protection effects.
	They cost less MP and their Materia has less penalties than before, so always keep
	Destruct Materia handy on your set-ups. Dispel has also been tweaked and will now affect:
	
	Sadness, Fury, Haste, Slow, Stop, Regen, Barrier, MBarrier, Reflect, Dual-Drain, Shield,
	Death Sentence, Manipulate, Peerless, Death Force, Resist, and 'Lucky Girl' (auto-crits).
	Expect to see enemies making use of all these statuses throughout the game.

	-) Death + Remove
	On the Destruct Materia, the Death spell was replaced instead with the Remove spell as
	they both had the same function. The reason I chose Remove over Death was because it
	has a unique spell animation. This freed up space for another new spell.

	-) Elemental Magic
	From Fire1 to Flare, all these spells have had their base power and MP cost adjusted.
	Early spells like Fire1 will cost more MP to cast than vanilla but have a slightly
	higher base power to compensate. As you progress up the tiers of magic, the ratio
	between base power and MP increases in the player's favour, with stronger spells
	costing less MP to cast than before. This is to tackle the imbalance between physical
	and magical formulas; the idea is that a spell which has a cost should always be
	slightly ahead of a 'free' physical attack in terms of raw damage.

	For the Contain spells, all four were given the same base power and a 10% chance
	to proc their status ailment, with Flare given a chance to inflict Dual-Drain.

	-) Full Cure = Renew
	This has adopted the effects of Angel Whisper, an enemy skill that was replaced with
	a new entry. Full Cure will now, in addition to fully healing a character, also restore
	their status and revive them from KO if applicable. The name was changed to better reflect
	its new effect.

	-) Hydro, Pearl, and Ultima
	Two new end-game spells specced to be similar to Contain magic, Hydro and Pearl cover
	the water and holy elements with Hydro proccing Sleep and Pearl proccing Death. Both
	were placed onto Ultima's Materia, which was renamed to 'Planet Materia'. Ultima's
	base power is the highest of any player spell in the game and will ignore split
	damage through its innate target-all, but has no other special effects.

	-) Poisona => Osmose
	Replacing the situational Poisona is Osmose, a spell that appears in Slot 1 of the
	Heal Materia. This is a handy solution to MP problems that players can encounter if
	they blow through all their Ethers and need an extra MP dose midway through a long fight.
	Osmose will drain MP from the target, and costs 3MP to cast (usually returning
	somewhere upwards of 50-80MP depending on the caster's Magic stat and the target's
	Magic Defence).

	This however means that Magic Hammer now has a duplicate function, so that Enemy Skill
	was changed slightly (these changes are further down)


	-) Summon Magic
	A tough set of spells to balance, in NT these have been made one-use only through their
	Materia so they can only be used once per battle (unless Mime is being used). This and
	their higher MP cost is to compensate for their high base-power, 100% status-ailment
	proc, and their ability to ignore Magic Defence. Unless the enemy is resistant to the
	element, you'll always see a return from Summon Magic and they make for great panic
	buttons or as a way to open a battle and lay down some damage + an important status
	like Shiva's Slow.

	A quick-list of each Summon:
	Choco/Mog: Both forms inflict Confusion, instead of Stop.
	Shiva: Inflicts Slow
	Ifrit: Inflicts Berserk
	Ramuh: Inflicts Paralysis
	Titan: Inflicts Petrify
	Odin: Inflicts Death (damage from Gunge Lance only) Non-Elemental
	Leviathan: Inflicts Silence
	Bahamut: Debarrier Effect, Shout Element
	Kjata: Fire, Ice, Lightning, Earth element
	Alexander: Inflicts Stop
	Phoenix: Revives party from KO
	Neo-Bahamut: Inflicts Dual-Drain, Shout element
	Hades: Inflicts Sleep, Poison, Confu, Silence, Slow, Frog, Mini, Paralysis - Poison Element
	Typhon: Inflicts Mini, Wind element
	Bahamut ZERO: Dispel effect, Shout element
	Knights of Round: 13 Hits, Non-Elemental

	
	-) Enemy Skills
	Some changes were made here to cover some of the remaining gaps in the spell list and also
	to get rid of clashes with 'duplicate' spells in the regular Magic list. Some of the more
	useless ones that didn't have a unique spell animation were replaced with new ones.

	Frog Song: Less reliable, higher MP Cost

	L5 Suicide: Same effect, but easier to calculate

	Vital Hammer: Drains HP instead of MP

	White Wind: Costs more MP than before, and no longer cures status ailments.
	Can be Reflected.

	Big Guard: Single-target, gives Sadness + Wall + Reflect. Adding Reflect makes this skill
	more of a double-edged sword. MP cost was increased.

	Mustard Bomb: Fire-skill, which inflicts Dual-Drain & Haste.

	Antipode: Replaces Flamethrower, this is a Fire/Ice element skill that hits all targets
	and can inflict Slow; this gives the player early access to the status in addition to
	Shiva and Added Effect with Time.

	Laser: No longer a clone of Demi2, this skill inflicts damage equal to 1/3 of the MaxHP
	of the target rather than the current HP. Can kill a target.

	Elemental Skills: These bridge the gap between Tier II and Tier III elemental spells as 	well as covering some of the rarer elements like Water and Holy. They include the familiar
	Beta, Aqualung, and Trine; new additions are Magnitude8 (Earth) and Alpha (Holy).
	Magic Breath was also changed to be Wind Elemental for this purpose.

	Chocobuckle: This skill has been changed from it's largely useless Escapes formula
	to be a straight-up early Wind skill. It has 16 base power with a chance to inflict
	Confusion. Every chocobo in the game has had its level adjusted so you can now
	learn this E. Skill from any set of Chocobo tracks provided you have L5 Suicide.

	Deathcharge: A late-game Skill that deals heavy damage to your party but fills the Limit
	gauges of the other characters (not the caster). It also dispels most positive statuses
	so it should be used with caution.

	Shadow Flare: Changed to use the 'Hidden' element which has been set up to act as a
	counter to Holy, Shadow Flare ignores magic defence and can inflict KO. Reflectable.

	Pandora's Box: The second Hidden-element Skill, Box also ignores defence and has a
	high MP Cost but its special effect is that it will hit everything on the field,
	including the player party. Reflectable, which can cause some chaos.


\\Character Equipment//

-) Weapons, Armour, and Accessories
	NT's equipment lists have gone through a thorough overhaul with every piece having a
	more focused use and effect. Each new weapon you find won't be a straight upgrade to
	the previous one, but rather a different alternative that can help you create specific
	builds for clearing out an area, or dealing with a problematic boss.


-) Cloud's Weapons
	As an 'all-rounder', Cloud's weapons give a wide range of stat boosts to help him fulfil
	various roles such as frontline fighter, mage, tank, support, etc. His starting weapon
	has a higher base power than a lot of his other early-game swords, until you reach
	Cosmo Canyon.


-) Barret's Weapons
	While his Long Range weapons are very accurate, they have no crit modifier, rarely offer
	stat bonuses, and are slightly behind his short range weapons in terms of base power.
	On the flip-side, his short range weapons are inaccurate though boast a high-crit
	modifier and bonuses to various stats. Later, he'll get access to cannon-type
	weapons like Microlaser and A.M. Cannon that act as a middle-ground between them.
	

-) Tifa's Weapons
	As a predominantly melee fighter, Tifa's weapons have decent accuracy and higher crit
	modifiers. Her standard weapon list alternates between small boosts to auxiliary stats
	and a larger boost to the Dexterity stat. Her starting weapon has been refashioned into
	a late-game Triple AP weapon, with her Metal Knuckle replacing it as the default weapon.


-) Aeris' Weapons
	Not typically a melee fighter, Aeris has a mix of 'stat sticks' and unique healing weapons
	that restore HP instead of dealing damage. Some of these also confer positive statuses
	such as Barrier or even Shield. She'll start the game with a 'Restore Rod' which recovers
	the target's HP, replacing the Mythril Rod. Her Guard Stick was converted into a Triple AP
	weapon and is acquired later.


-) Red XIII's Weapons
	As the other all-rounder, Red's weapons also cover a lot of different stats but have
	a tendency to carry Dexterity bonuses. He has good crit modifiers, and functional
	accuracy on them with plenty of unique effects to choose from.


-) Yuffie's Weapons
	Speed and Magic are the two common themes for Yuffie's weapons, with a few additional
	options to inflict statuses or elemental damage. She has above average accuracy and
	all of her weapons are long-range, but the stat gains are quite linear and you'll
	find it tough to raise her defensive attributes.

	On the other hand, she can make use of some innate elemental damage from Wind Slash
	and Twin Viper (Poison) to deal double damage against enemies that are weak to those
	elements, with Viper inflicting the poison status as well.


-) Cait Sith's Weapons
	Boasting the highest crit modifiers on his weapons, he also has the lowest base accuracy
	meaning his naturally high Luck has to carry some of the weight where his bad Dex can't.
	He's got some chunky stat bonuses for Luck and defence on his early weapons, and a few 		options to raise Magic here and there.


-) Vincent's Weapons
	While nothing special in terms of accuracy or crit modifiers, Vincent's long-range guns
	enjoy decent Magic boosts and a range of status ailments that they can inflict on enemies.
	Among the statuses he can inflict are Slow, Silence, Slow-Numb (gradual petrify), and Fury
	which reduces enemy accuracy by 30%.


-) Cid's Weapons
	Joining late, a lot of Cid's weapons are quite powerful with a high crit modifier which is
	countered by a lower accuracy. His primary stat gains are to Vitality and Luck, with the 		rest being a mix of elemental, status-ailment, and other special effects such as the 		Trident with its innate Lighting/Water element damage and the Viper Halberd.


-) Sephiroth's Masamune
	The Masamune can now be crafted and used as an alternate Ultimate Weapon for any character
	by the player. It sports 255% accuracy with a 255% crit modifier meaning it will always
	land a critical hit. It's also non-elemental, so it'll hit through Shield and other 	elemental resistances.


-) Armour & Accessories
	More variety was introduced to the effects and stat gains offered by auxiliary equipment,
	with changes made to stat bonuses, available slots, innate elemental/status protection,
	and special effects like 'Zombie'.


-) Items
	A full overhaul of item effects was carried out, with the aim of turning largely
	useless items like Potions into viable mainstays that will be useful for much longer.
	Starting off, Potions now restore 300HP in-battle which means they continue to be
	useful through a large section of Disc 1 as an alternative to Cure when MBarrier is
	in use or for topping up HP cheaply.

	Some status-healing items were also condensed down to make room for new items, but also
	to make them much more useful throughout the game. Echo Screens were combined with the
	badly placed Eye Drops item to make Echo Drops that heal Silence and Darkness.
	Cornucopia also took on Maiden's Kiss' effect to heal Frog & Mini, leaving space to make
	a new item that heals Confu & Berserk, two nasty statuses that were missing from the
	original status-healing item list and which could only be healed by Remedy (or a hit,
	in the case of Confusion).

	Attack items were also brought more in line and should be useful around the time that
	they are obtained. But for balancing reasons, the multi-target effect of many status
	inducing items were changed to be single-target instead. This includes Light Curtain,
	Spider Web, etc. Some new ones are also in there, such as Dirty Bombs (a fan favourite)
	and Lucky Pill.


\\Enemies & Bosses//

-) Enemy Stats & Weaknesses
	Rather than just tweaking these based on a % of their original values, every enemy was
	fine-tuned to present a reasonable threat to parties on a normal curve of progression.
	Everything from Level to Evasion was adjusted to spread out the effectiveness of
	different tactics.

	Elemental and defensive strengths/weaknesses have been made far more consistent across
	different enemy types:

	Machines: Weak to Bolt & Water, Resists Poison
	Beasts/Bugs: Weak to Fire & Ice
	Flying: Weak to Wind & Gravity, Resists Earth
	Large/Heavy: Weak to Earth, Resists Gravity & Wind
	Humans: Weak to Poison
	Demonic/Jenova: Weak to Holy, Resists Hidden
	
	You'll also find that some types like Machines will have higher Defence than Magic Defence
	while smaller enemies will be more vulnerable to physical attacks while elemental monsters
	like Bomb or Bottomswell will have their resistances adjusted to account for their
	elemental affinity. The idea with all this is that you can quickly discern a new enemy's
	weaknesses and adjust tactics on the fly for blind runs.
	

-) Enemy Attacks
	To accompany the adjusted stats, every enemy attack was reviewed and some new ones were
	added to their arsenal. You'll be dealing with new and unusual effects like Dual-Drain,
	Resist, and unique damage formulas that were normally reserved for special weapons or
	rare attacks. These attacks have been picked to best compliment the monster using them
	and the other enemies that might be in the formation.


-) Enemy AI
	A core component in any balance adjustment to enemies is the AI; in a lot of cases,
	enemies will have smarter AI that will avoid knocking off statuses like Sleep and
	try to apply statuses to characters that don't already have them. Boss AI was also
	generally tweaked either to make them more aggressive or to pace out their attacks
	to account for increased power (Dyne being a good example, in order to avoid a
	scenario where the player becomes trapped in a healing cycle).

	You'll also be encountering unusual twists in AI, such as attacks that will decrease
	MaxMP, flags being set to nullify Restorative, Manipulation, and others.


-) New Enemies
	There's a host of new enemies to be found in NT. Some are bosses blocking special
	treasure, or which are part of new/adjusted events you'll find either in the story
	or as a part of new sidequests. There's also new random enemies in most of the areas
	in the game to keep players on their toes.