This is discussion archived from a time before the current discussion method was installed.
Working Title: rename P Wing Effect (post-The Great Crash): From YKTTW
- Terra's Morph ability in Final Fantasy VI boosts her magic power exponentially when used - but once used, it takes about a dozen fights to "recharge" it to the point where it's worth using again, meaning that many players end up never using it - especially since, by the time it becomes available, the rest of the party can use magic too.
I think this falls more under Awesome, but Impractical. Too Awesome to Use is more about one-time-use items than costly spells.
Sniffnoy: No, I would say this is Too Awesome to Use. It's not simply "it's too expensive to be useful" or "it doesn't do enough", because it does do enough, and the resource it consumes is specific to itself - it doesn't eat up your MP. The reason you don't use it is because you are saving it for when you really need it. It's not one-use, but the long recharge time results in the same effect of saving it for when it's "necessary".
Mightysamurai: Speaking of Magic The Gathering, I remember obtaining and holding onto all three "Kaldra" artifacts from the Mirrodin block long after Mirrodin cards were considered out of date on the outside chance that a new card or deck design would come out that made them useful. When I finally gave up and sold them, their trade-in value had long since gone down the tubes.
CAD: Gah, I still need to get around to re-writing this. It's a bummer the good version got nuked and replaced with the bad one.
CAD: Okay, that's it. I'm re-rewriting this once and for all.
Fallingwater: quoting from an example:
The trademark Heart Artifact from Doom 3: Resurrection of Evil could stop time, turn the player invincible, and boost the damage of their weapon all at once. It was such a cool effect that the player is commonly tempted to conserve the artifact's energy and rarely use it, even though it could be recharged just about everywhere.
^^^ is this not highly subjective? I know I sure as hell found a lot of use for the artifact, and many reviewers praised it as a very useful item and used it often.
Real life example: The Japanese in WW 2 more or less hoarded their battleships for a decisive surface fight that never actually wound up happening. By the time they got to the point of desperation, the best use they had for the largest battleship humanity has ever built was as improvised land-based artillery. ^^^^ This is known as the "Fleet in Being" strategy - a battle fleet that the enemy is worried about makes him plan for what the battle fleet might do, and thus expend defenses on guarding against such actions. The nature of combat is such that if the battle fleet acts, even if they succeed, they may be so damaged in the process that they're out of combat for weeks or months - once you've used your battle fleet, the enemy doesn't have to worry about it for some time to come and has a free hand.
It's a useful form of sea denial for a combatant that has some naval power, but not enough to exercise sea control. It didn't work so well for Japan because in WW 2 they were facing an opponent that could have lost every single aircraft carrier at the Battle of Midway and still had more fleet carriers by the end of the year than Japan.
To qote from the section of the article that talks about refilling the heart pot in Cave Story:
"You can only get more potions if you wait until after the Labyrinth to get her potion"
This is not true at all. I myself got it before the labyrinth and was still able to refill it.
Prfnoff: The Cave Story example was too long and full of natter. I had to cut it down from this:
- The Heart Pots you receive from Jenka in Cave Story would certainly fall into this category as well. This troper never bothered to use it (or even remember he had it) until the final boss battle.
- This troper was so afraid to waste it that he forgot he even had it by the time he beat the game. He died a lot on the end.
- This becomes less the case when you realize that you can always go back to Jenka to get another, and the temptation to use it breaks even more when you're on the Hell level.
- However, immediately after getting the first one comes a LONG period where you can't return to Sand Zone to get another. How long? There's six bosses inbetween the next cutscene after getting the life pot and the next time you'll be able to talk to Jenka, including the two hardest non-final bosses in the game (Monster X and the Core). After that, there's two levels with one optional miniboss between them, dumping you in the very non-dangerous area where all of the endgame plot goes on and which contains a teleporter that can lead you back to Jenka, a pathetic sideboss if you're going for the hard ending, and then you enter final cave, a hard level which leads to the final three bosses (and as a miniboss if you're after the hard ending), which then immediately funnels you into the Bonus Level of Hell with its two bosses (the second having four forms). So you can fight, at most, 5 bosses using the heart jar (and the fifth requires you to traverse Last Cave twice, pointless as the level is harder than the miniboss), out of 14 bosses fought after obtaining it.
