So here we are, standing on the overworld. We know the dungeons we should hit, the items we should look for, and what to do when we find encounters. Now we have to figure out how to get around the world. That means it’s time to discuss routing.
¶ Routing Your Path
A common question from new players is, “what’s the best route through the game?” That is a question that, of course, entirely depends on what dungeons are on, what flags are clicked, and what you need to do. There are some broad points in the early game that we can suggest, though.
Step 1: Hit Coneria. Buy magic, check gear, check for the key item in the shop. This should be your standard route, and if you’ve practiced it’ll take you between 45 seconds and a minute to check the shops, buy what you need, and get going out of town.
- There is a school of thought that you don’t need to check the shop for the key item on your first visit to Coneria because you likely won’t have the money to buy it. There are others, though, that prefer to check it so that, assuming the item isn’t there, they won’t have to worry about it in the future. The final decision is really up to your gut as you’re playing.
Step 2: Go to the Temple of Fiends (ToF). This is the earliest dungeon of the game and it’s scaled for a party that may not have many (or any) levels under their belt. Depending on your experience scaling (and we’ll talk about scaling in more detail later) defeating Garland could get you up to Level 3 or 4, which is more than enough for the next location we’re going to. You’ll also get to save Princess Sara which, turning her in, nets you two key items (from her and the Coneria’s King).
- Note that most flagsets have “Early King” clicked on in the Maps tab of the randomizer. This means you could visit the King before going to save the Princess. In most instances, though, you’re better off not going for his item until you’ve defeated Garland and saved the princess. This is to avoid a “double dip” when it is likely unnecessary.
Step 3: Go to Pravoka. Even if the King and/or the Princess have given you an item to turn into the Dwarves (the adamant and the TNT), you will still need to check on the pirates at Pravoka and see what their leader, Bikke, has for you. There’s a good chance it’s the ship, which you need to navigate the inner sea, and if Bikke has the canoe, then you have more places around the inner sea you could check. There’s also Level 2 spells waiting for you there (in most flagsets), which you will need anyway. And, yes, you need to check the shop for the key item that could be for sale there.
Step 4: Are We Stuck on the Inner Sea? We have to now determine where to go, and this is dependent on our available vehicles and access points:
- If you have a way to get out of the inner sea, such as the canoe and the floater (the combination of which are needed to access the airship desert and then raise that ship) then the whole world is open to you and the next step should be getting in the air as quickly as possible.
- If you have the ship, but no way into the air, Elfland should be your next stop. Level 3 and Level 4 magic are there, as well as possibly the shop item. This also puts you within proximity to Marsh Cave, which may well be an incentive location. The chance that you’ll have to clear Marsh, one way or another, is high, so be ready for that.
- That said, if you have the canoe at this point, you have the option to either head towards (a) Marsh or (b) Ice and Volcano. Levels and magic are important factors in this decision (you certainly want good magic before attempting this). Even after fighting Garland and Bikke you aren’t really at the level intended for Volcano or Ice so those could be difficult dungeons to clear. That said, in a race situation where you might want to get an advantage over your opponent, an early dive into either of these dungeons could prove judicious. Plus, if you’re in this area you can also check the Sages at Crescent for their item (which is likely set to free via the Maps tab on the randomizer site), and that’s yet another town you could check for the stop item.
Past this early part of the game where you should go should be determined by three factors:
- Key Items: The randomizer will set the seed with some amount of “logic”. Every seed is beatable, as per the randomizer’s logic, so if you have certain key items it is sensible to “chase” those items to see where they lead.
- Incentives and Density: Depending on what locations are incentivized, how many loose items may be in your pool, and what game mode you’re playing (specifically if you’re playing Shard Hunt) you might want to hit dungeons that have a high chance of having what you need. Key items are essential to progressing through the game, but you might also need to check a lot of boxes. Dungeons with more chest (aka “chest density”) are good targets, especially if those dungeons also have a key item in them waiting for you.
- Proximity: If you have a couple of different dungeons you could check, and both of them seem like viable options, go for the one closest to you. Speed is essential, especially in a race setting, so you’ll want to head to dungeons near you that are solid targets for your goals. Proximity, often, is key.
Also note that when in dungeons, WARP and EXIT can be your friends. WARP takes you back a single floor transition in the dungeon while EXIT takes you completely out of the dungeon. Both can, and should, be abused. There are key points where you should WARP, if you can, while exploring dungeons:
- Ice Cave: The drop down floor (the one with all the holes) can be routed more efficiently if you have WARP since you can drop into a hole (ideally the one between all three boxes on that floor) and then WARP back up, standing on that hole, allowing you to check all three without doing the full loop of the dungeon.
- Ordeals: If you use WARP in this dungeon it’ll take you back to the previous teleporter. When you’re navigating the pillar maze, if you take a wrong turn simply WARP back and try a different option.
Plus, any dungeon that is only a single floor (like Waterfall, most of the NPC castles and NPC caves, and just about any town) can be left quickly via WARP or EXIT. In most cases, it’s faster to magic out than to walk out of a location.
- WARP Routing Infographic [PNG] (contributed by Lifereboot)
![WARP Routing Infographic [PNG]](/maps/warp_routing_infographic.png){kind=link}
¶ Map Edits
The vanilla map for Final Fantasy is fairly narrow and linear. Coneria lacks a passage over to Dwarf Cave by land. A river blocks passage south from Dwarf Cave towards Northwest Castle and Marsh. The two river systems around Volcano aren’t connected. While this worked for the original game, with its very straightforward progression, it proved rather limiting for the flow of the game in the early days of the randomizer. The devs, in their wisdom, began adding in map edits for the vanilla map, allowing for new routes through the game (and, thus, allowing for more randomization of what transport items could be where). These edits include:
- Early Open Progression: Opens up a path around the mountains between Coneria and Dwarf Cave, and also connects the two river systems by the Volcano.
- Extended Open Progression: Removes a single river tile between Dwarf Cave and Northwest castle, allowing walking access between the two areas (and further south).
- Northern Docks: Adds docks to both the Onrac continent and Mirage Tower’s desert, meaning these areas are now accessible by ship as well as the air.
- Ryukahn Desert Dock: Adds a dock to the airship’s desert area, such that the ship (without the canoe) can now access and raise the airship (if you have the floater).
- Bahamut Cardia Dock: Adds a dock to Bahamut’s island, making this small landmass accessible by sea (and not just by air).
- Lefein River Dock: Extends a river down from the lake north of Lefein, allowing docking at this section of the continent (if you have the canoe).
- Bridge to Lefein: Adds a bridge (and a couple of extra tiles of land) from the peninsula north of Pravoka to the southern tip of the Lefein region, granting early access to Lefeinish town.
- Gaia Mountain Pass: Removes a couple of tiles of mountain from the southern mass around Gaia, freeing its people to wander the land (and letting players in without the airship).
- Highway to Ordeals: Adds a passage through the mountains via land such that Ordeals can be accessed from the rest of the Lefeinish continent by land.
- River to Melmond: Adds a river through the mountains blocking Melmond off from the rest of the Southern Continent, allowing (with the canoe) access to this section of the landmass as well.
All of these edits are listed on the Mode & World tabs, and can be clicked on for the vanilla map (but are hidden and turned off if a procgen map is used).
Additionally, along with these overworld edits there are two important map edits that should be discussed for routing purposes:
- Titan’s Trove: This edit moves the Titan over in his tunnel by one square and edits his cave’s map slightly. With this edit on, players will have to have the Ruby to access the Titan’s treasure trove, which is important to note if the Titan’s Trove incentive is turned on.
- Bahamut’s Horde: This edit makes duplicates of all the chests spread around the Cardia Islands (the dragon caves) in between Onrac and Ordeals. These duplicated chests share their contents with the other versions on the islands (aka, they are “linked chests”) so if you check them in one location they will be empty in the other. This is useful if you can check Bahamut early (perhaps for class change) and can check all of these treasures at once. Also useful when the Cardia Islands incentive is turned on.
These edits add more space and movement for the game, so make sure you know which of these are on in the flags so you know where you can go as soon as possible just in case you have to.
¶ Advanced Concepts
¶ Dungeon Routing
When you’re looking for more speed in your randomizer play, one of the most effective ways to pick up time is to know how to route your path through dungeons. Final Fantasy (and thus FFR) is quirky because not every tile in the game can lead to a fight. When you’re going through dungeons (and on the overworld as well) you want to try and minimize the number of fights you take as every fight means a delay of at least a few seconds (for the fight to start, commands to be entered, fights to be fled from or fought, etc.). It’s best to know what tiles are “safe” and what routes are good to take:
- Use the Doors: The tiles directly in front of doors, on both sides of a room, cannot have encounters. In fact in all but a few minor instances, every inside wall with a door in it is completely safe. They’re programmed to not increase the step counter and that means you can never get into a fight on these tiles.
- Lava is Your Friend: Even though lava (and frost) titles in the game damage your party, it also cannot get encounters. That means that while you’ll take some damage walking on lava, you’re better off doing that then getting slowed down by fights. It’s the faster and safer option. Just make sure to heal up when you step off and have a long run of unsafe tiles after.
- Spike Tiles Are Oddly Safe: Although you will get into a fight any time you step on an enemy spike tile these tiles also do not increase the step counter. Especially when you’re looking to get into a grind, using these tiles can be effective because you can’t get anything other than the expected fight on these tiles.
- Maximize River Steps: Out on the overworld, you cannot get into a fight when stepping onto, and off of, rivers. You can go back and forth between a river and land all day and never get in a fight. Use rivers when you can to save steps, and especially pay attention to one tile crossings, as well as corners, so that you can step on and then off in a desired direction to get two free steps at a time.
The FFR community has spent a lot (too much?) time analyzing routes and we’ve put together maps of all the best routes so that anyone can know the best paths through locations to get the fewest fights possible. When you’re first learning the game it’s best just to focus on fundamentals, but once you’re ready to pick up speed pay attention to your route. You’ll be amazed how much time you can save.
¶ Entrance, Town, and Floor Shuffle
Although the default way to play FFR keeps all the dungeons, towns, and other locations in their normal spots on the map, it is possible to turn on shuffling for these locations. Two variants, and a few extra options, exist that should be noted as they will dynamically and drastically change the flow of the game (and, thus, may change your routing around the map as well).
- Entrance Shuffle: This flag takes all the non-Town entrances and shuffles them together. Volcano could be at Matoya’s Cave. Marsh Cave could be at Mirage Tower. The logic of the game will ensure that the items you need are within access in the dungeons you can enter, but the challenge of the game will likely increase. Thankfully, by default, this flag also keeps a few “safe” locations around the starting area so that you can at least get your feet under you before taking a dive into the deep end.
- Allow Unsafe Start takes away this imposed safety net for Entrance Shuffle, leaving no insurance of easy places to explore at the start of the game.
- Include Dead Ends takes two Cardia Island caves, which have nothing in them at all, and mixes those into the pool of locations as well. Normally these two locations (entrances that are often called “Cardia Tiny” and “Cardia Double-Top” due to where they are on the overworld map) are kept out of Entrance Shuffle.
- Floors can be added into the mix as well, meaning that dungeon entrances won’t always tell you what comes next after the first floor. A floor of Earth Cave could lead into a floor of Sea Shrine, and then maybe Kary’s floor after that. With Floor shuffle on, you will need to fully explore each entrance to truly know what may be down there.
- Deep ToFR (meaning “Deep Temple of Fiends Revisited”) allows for ToFR to be a floor deep within a dungeon. By default Entrance Shuffle keeps ToFR at a shallow, first floor point, but if you’re interested in an even greater challenge, Deep ToFR could put the final dungeon somewhere further down, possibly even deep, deep down at the bottom of a tall tower.
- Town Shuffle: This flag takes all the Towns (but not dungeons) and mixes them together. Gaia could be at Pravoka. Elfland could be at Lefein. You won’t know until you check, and considering there are some key item checks in towns (like Bikke and the Gaia Fairy) and the shop item could be for sale anywhere, you’ll need to keep track of what towns are where so you know where to go for progression.
- Include Coneria puts the starting town, Coneria, into the shuffled pool. By default the game keeps Coneria as a safe town, always in its normal location, but you can change that and remove this safety net if you so choose.
- Mix All Entrances together is a flag that says, “we don’t care if it’s a dungeon entrance or a town entrance; anything can be anywhere.” Pravoka location could be a dungeon. Volcano could be a town. You have to dive in to find out.
- Deep Towns: Towns are normally kept shallow, at the top of their respective entrances (whatever that might be). With Deep Towns on, though, Towns can be anywhere, at any level, of a dungeon. Note, this flag does require Floor Shuffle to be enabled as well, but once it is, you could have towns buried deep at the bottom of a long exploration.
Note that when using Town Shuffle, the towns are colored to the location they've moved to:
- Blue is Pravoka entrance (pirates and water)
- Green is Crescent Lake (massive forest)
- Pink is Elfland (elves like pink, apparently)
- Red is Melmond (scorched earth)
- Soft Blue is Onrac (major ocean port with subamrine dock)
- Brown is Gaia (land locked)
- Purple is Lefein (to match the color of the locals garments)