Pokemon Platinum Glitchless FAQ

      Pokemon Platinum Glitchless FAQ

Q: What are you playing on, it is emulator?
A: No, I'm playing on a DS (phat) with a capture board installed allowing me to record game footage

Q: Why do you choose Piplup?
A: Because I think Empoleon is the fastest way to beat this game.

Q: Is Chimchar not better? I thought the record used Infernape
A: It does. Currently both are well capable of getting the record, but I still think Empoleon is better.
Basically Chimchar/Monferno has a much better early game than Piplup/Prinplup, but Empoleon has a much better late game than Infernape. Chimchar runs are more consistent to get going because of the better early game, but I believe at the top end of runs, Empoleon will end up getting a better time.

Q: Is your PB with Piplup?
A: Yes.

Q: Do you have any route changes/improvements since your PB?
A: Yes. I'm using an entirely different seed, which has quite a few improvements in itself
1) Less time is spent manipulating the RNG to get the desired Piplup. Saves about 10 seconds.
2) The Piplup has better stats. The old Piplup was 24/27/28/29/23/29, the new one is 23/30/31/30/31/31.

The bigger route difference is that I'm fighting less optional trainers for experience, which while it saves a significant amount of time, also makes the early game a touch harder. I've cut out 2 trainers between Mars and Gardenia (saves roughly a minute), and another before Maylene (saves roughly 30 seconds). This experience is made up for by getting an extra Rare Candy before Wake (costs roughly 35 seconds).

Also a number of smaller changes throughout, including that I'm not longer teaching Flash Cannon, fighting Rival 3 with Prinplup leading, the option of higher risk taking strats with Torrent in the late game, and the manip path at the start obviously being different.

Q: Why do you keep resetting and changing the time?
A: I need to use a specific time in order to use RNG manipulation, so I set the clock in such a way that I can use it.
 The timer counts down to when I need to reset for the correct second.

Q: What is RNG?
A: Random Number Generator, the thing that determines everything random within the game, such as stats, encounters and pokerus.

Q: What is RNG Manipulation?
A: RNG manipulation is used in this speedrun, which involves resetting on a specific second starting from a specific time, and hitting the correct frame for the correct seed after resetting. This allows for manipulating of the wild encounters, and Piplup's starting stats

Q: What causes the resets?
A: I missed the initial seed. There are 2 ways to check to see if I hit the right seed, one is to check my Trainer ID which should be 8229, and the other is to check to movements of the NPCs outside my house. Checking Trainer ID is faster for resets, but obviously takes a few seconds. The RNG for the seed advances every frame, so it is a frame perfect trick

Q: Why don't you check Piplup's stats? What are Piplup's stats like?
A: Piplup's starting stats are the same every time RNG manipulation is used, and also quite decent using RNG manipulation, but not perfect. The reason for this is because there are a limited amount of seeds you can RNG manipulate for, as you are manipulating so many things, it's literally a game limitation how good they can be.
The Piplups IVs are 23 HP, 30 Att, 31 Def, 30 SP Att, 31 SP Def, 31 Speed with a Mild nature.

Q: Why is your movement so strange at the start of the run?
A: This is to manipulate encounters. You can't just find a seed that gets no encounters with a perfect Piplup by just running straight through (again, game limitation; there isn't one), so I need to do specific movement to manipulate the RNG so that I can avoid these encounters

Q: What encounters will you get?
A: I will catch a Kricketot (for Metronome held item) and a Starly (For Fly) on Route 201 and then a Bidoof (For Cut/Rock Smash) on Route 202. All other HMs are given to Empoleon (It ends the game with Surf/Waterfall/Strength/Rock Climb)

Q: Krickeot for Metronome? What does that mean?
A: Metronome is a held item, Kricketot's have a 5% chance to hold one. In this run, I have also manipulated one to show up which does.

Q: What does Metronome do?
A: It increases the damage output by an additional 10% for each consecutive time you use a move. So 1.1x, 1.2x, 1.3x etc up to 2x. This may not seem like a lot, but it makes a big difference in the early game. Most notably on Rival 2, you do 3 damage to Turtwig instead of 2 per hit, and end up doing 5 (which saves like 6 turns since he has 29 HP), are able to OHKO Gardenia's Roserade, and numerous other occasions where it saves 1 turn, and/or eliminates what would be damage ranges without it.

Q: So why don't you just manipulate everything in the game?
A: There are multiple RNGs at play, and not all of them can be controlled the same way. Battle RNG for example, advances just about every frame, including lag frames, making it totally unpredictable.

Q: Is there anything else in the game you manipulate?
A: Yes! Pokerus is obtained off the Double Fight in Jubilife City after Roark.

Q: Why do you play as the girl?
A: The counterpart talks less to you if you are the girl. See: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G9pD4oLiFyo

Q: Why do you name yourself and Piplup 'I'?
A: Because it's faster to name them one character for text purposes, and the letter 'I' gives a nice spin as if the game was self-narrating

Q: So what is your goal time?
A: First step is to get the Emperor back on his throne.

Q: What is WR?
A: http://www.speedrun.com/pkmnplat

Q: What is with those split icons? What does A and C mean?
A: This is a grading system for all of my splits. I'm sure you are familiar with grades, A+ being the best then going down from there. So the idea is, if the split has an A+ next to it, my time there was really good and would be very difficult to beat. If it's a C though for example, it was quite poor, and I should be able to save time there pretty easily.

This way, everyone watching has more accurate information on where I can save time, and where I should be making up time. Also that all time loss is not equal, as losing time vs an A+ split isn't really that bad, whereas losing time vs a C split is really bad. It'll probably take a while for a lot of people watching to pick up the meaning so I will appreciate everyone who explains how this works (correctly) in chat to new people.