These are my notes for the Final Fantasy IV Any% Credits Warp with Music speedrun. This is not the standard credits warp run. The standard one is much simpler inventory-wise, but it does lock up after the end of the credits and there is no music. These notes will instead lead to a fully-functional ending with music and no freezing (though it does briefly stutter). That said, all credits warp routes suffer from an approximate 50% chance of not working at all each time, so nobody actually runs them. This guide is mostly kept around as documentation.
While I am very familiar with the game and the speedrun, I am nonetheless nowhere near being the world record holder in this category or any other, so there are almost certainly faster ways to do things. That said, I do periodically update this document as new techniques and strategies are discovered, so if you follow them, you're probably not doomed to be perilously slow.
While these are largely my personal notes used when I actually run the game, a number of people have been using them to learn the run, so I will briefly go over some of the more general concepts that apply to the run. However, the notes will almost certainly still assume you are generally familiar with some of the techniques used speedrunning the game (such as item duplication and run buffering). If you are unfamiliar with these, there are other resources on this site that you may wish to examine.
Unfortunately, as it turns out, levels matter a lot in this run. As such, there is a lot of research into the best ways to allocate experience throughout the run. Experience is primarily manipulated using the following facts:
The "perfect" path is a matter of personal preference and is always up for debate. I make my recommendations throughout this guide, but there are many ways to skin a cat, and you're welcome to develop your own path that suits your playing style better. That said, the experience path is a lot more forgiving in this category than it is in the Any% No64 run. You'll still want to keep in mind the following point:
In these notes, I am following the same experience path as in my No64 notes to keep things consistent. However, that isn't necessary, and there are other ways to handle it. Consult some of the other guides for more information.
Another important aspect of any NoCW run is inventory management. You end up with a very full inventory and the exact locations of some of the items will be important by the end of the run. This guide makes some recommendations, but ultimately, you will need to come up with an inventory management scheme you're comfortable with.
You have the option of using the Mimic Glitch (AKA Carrot/TrashCan) to defeat Milon and/or Milon Z. Learning these is beyond the scope of this guide, but it may be useful to know that you only need to pick up the Carrot or move the TrashCan to the top of the inventory if you intend to utilize these strategies.
This guide makes the assumption that you are following along from start to finish. Menuing instructions assume that your characters are already equipped as per the guide, and won't list equipment that is staying the same. If you attempt to join in the middle, you may miss this or similar points.
This guide uses the following conventions:
The following resources should prove invaluable to either help during a run or to help you learn the run in the first place:
Begin the game. During the introduction, you may wish to hold down B+Right+Down immediately before the battle with the Raven, in an attempt to avoid the Raven's attack. This is known as the BRD or BIRD skip. It may or may not work for you, depending on the awesomeness of your mashing. Finish the introduction and gain control.
If you're on seed 92, be sure to take at least one extra step before you finish the introduction sequence.
Pick up the Tent (the rightmost chest) on Castle Baron 1F and then head to Cecil's room in the left tower to finish the introduction.
Walk to the chocobo forest, optionally pick up the Carrot, capture a yellow chocobo, and ride to the Misty Cave.
Walk through the cave until you reach the boss.
D.Mist turns to mist.
Continue with Fight and Jump until D.Mist falls. There is a small chance (just under 1%) of a third cycle, depending on damage rolls. Note that you are duplicating both Kain and Cecil's shields. While doing so, do not reuse the same initial slot.
After the battle, exit the cave and head toward Mist. When you approach the last tile before the town, hold left, and then hold X. When the menu opens, release the keys, and then use the Tent. After the night is over, and Cecil lowers his arm, begin to hold right, and almost immediately after, begin to hold X (while continuing to hold right). Once the menu is open, you can release the keys.
Walk past the village tiles, and then enter Mist from the right side. Head to the weapon shop.
Head to the northwest house, enter the fireplace, and pick up the Tiara from the first chest and Change (rod) from the chest at the end of the long passage. Exit the house and trigger the cut scene.
Attempt to rearrange your inventory during the animations. Change rows at the end for fist-pump swag strats.
If you are using a step route, this is when you need to start watching which steps you get encounters on.
Continue to Kaipo in the middle of the desert. Enter the town and trigger the cut scene.
NPC movement may seem random, but it's actually reasonably deterministic during this portion of the game. Assuming you walk perfectly and don't stand around, the NPCs will always be in the same location from run to run. This will remain true until Fabul. Learn where the NPCs will be and optimize your walking accordingly.
After the soldiers are dead, simply twiddle your thumbs until the Officer retreats.
Visit Rosa in the northeast house. Mash with B to avoid talking to Rosa repeatedly. Afterward, leave the house.
Just before exiting the town (immediately after emerging from the door in the wall), take one step to the right, and then go down.
Head north to the cave and enter the Watery Pass.
Walk through the first part of the cave, recruit Tellah, and then continue to the end of the cave. In the last room, pick up Darkness (sword) and exit the cave.
Enter the other cave and proceed until you meet Octomamm.
The following turn order assumes nothing goes particularly badly. Depending on how the battle actually flows, you may need to have Tellah revive Rydia with Life1 or cure the party with Cure2. Research suggests it is optimal for Tellah to stop himself on his third turn, but you can delay this if you need to cure. If Tellah gets any additional turns after casting Stop, it's easiest to just Parry.
At this point, just continue the pattern until Octomamm dies.
Immediately after the battle, open the menu.
Exit the cave and enter Damcyan. Head to the top of the castle, watch the scene, and then take the hovercraft to the Antlion cave.
Follow the path to the second room. You may take either the left or right path, but the right path feels better to me. Your mileage may vary. Once in the second room, pick up the chest on the right side with a Life.
Take the secret passage in the second room and make your way to Antlion's Nest and engage Antlion.
Depending on damage rolls, Cecil may be able to Fight on his last turn instead of Parrying. He can do anywhere from 0-70 damage, with a median value of 54.
Walk out of the cave, board the hovercraft, and return to Kaipo, making sure to park directly to the left of the town.
Head to the house in the northeast corner of town and use the SandRuby on Rosa.
During the night, Edward will loudly play his harp and an angry monster who was just trying to sleep will attack.
You can simply hold the A button for the duration of the fight.
It's a common misconception that it's the Dancing (dagger) that makes this fight consistent. It's actually the fact that Edward is being placed in the middle slot, which offers a 25% accuracy bonus. Since the harp is a back row-compatible weapon in the American release, these factors combine to give him perfect accuracy. It also means Edward is back row-glitched, so even if you switch to the dagger, he retains his perfect accuracy. You may have seen a video of Edward and WaterHag trading misses. This is primarily a problem on the Japanese version or on the PlayStation version, where the harp is not back row-compatible, reducing Edward's accuracy substantially. In that case, you either want him in the front row or you can use the Dancing (dagger). Either way, it's irrelevant for this run.
After waking up, leave the town, making sure to take a step to the left immediately before exiting.
Take the hovercraft to the entrance of Mt.Hobs, parking directly to the left of the entrance.
This choice of parking location is not optional, and is actually critical to the glitch used later. If you park somewhere else, you will probably be unable to finish your run.
Climb the mountain and meet Yang at the top.
During Yang's solo battle, you can potentially manipulate yourself out of a longer battle by checking the damage rolls against this chart and pausing for a short while if you get a bad first kick.
Once you have done 800 damage, you can stop attacking. At that point, heal or parry until Yang's turn.
After the battle, continue to the other side of the mountain. Continue downward and then head east to Fabul.
Head to the King's Room and offer to help. (Do not mash the B button during this dialogue.)
If for whatever reason you are unable to do the duplication in this fight, you can do it in either of the upcoming two fights.
Walk to the Inn and watch the scenes.
Head down the stairs and make your way to the exit. After leaving Fabul, head for the ship to the east.
Walk east into Mysidia and go to the armor shop on the left.
Head to the House of Wishes and talk to the elder. After the scene, head to the item shop on the right side of town.
You might opt to buy a second stack of Cure2 for extra safety.
Exit the town and head east to Mt.Ordeals.
If you are intending to use the Mimic (Carrot) strategy to defeat Milon, ensure that Porom gets hurt on the way up the mountain. This can be done either by an enemy (e.g. during a back attack) or by your own violent hands.
Climb the mountain until you reach the summit.
Once on the summit, continue until you are even with the final bridge.
If you are going to use the Mimic (Carrot) strategy, you should not equip or heal Porom. You do need to equip Change on Palom and Tellah, however.
If the twins cast Comet or if your Flare rolls are horrendous, Cecil should probably give up on attacking, and you should instead just expect to use Twin a third time. You can still try, though. Sometimes it works out.
If your Porom is at full health, you should probably just abort and click that Twin tab instead.
At this point, Milon should screech "Go, my children!" Cecil's next turn should arrive before Palom uses the Cure2.
This strategy is incredibly timing-sensitive. There are many ways it can go wrong, and the only way to really get good at this strategy is to practice it over and over. Porom's first run buffer has an incredibly short window, and in my experience, you must slightly anticipate it unless you have excellent reaction times. Regarding Tellah casting Stop, you may have better success if you have him wait a second or two before casting, but that never works for me.
Walk across the bridge and engage Milon Z.
Cecil should Fight and everyone else should use Cure2 on Milon Z.
It's unlikely you'll need to heal, but if you do, you have plenty of Life or Cure2 potions.
The experience path assumes one character (specifically Porom) dies here. If you're close to finishing the battle and everyone is still alive, you may want to kill someone to keep your experience path intact (doesn't matter who). To be honest, though, it doesn't really matter for this route, as the experience path is a lot more forgiving. It's also okay if more than one person dies.
Cecil should execute this action as the damage from Milon Z.'s attack disappears. If he gets another turn, he should Parry immediately. Some people recommend a Run Buffer as well, though I haven't personally needed that.
Tellah's menu should pop up before Palom uses the TrashCan, leaving you plenty of time to do any necessary inventory management.
The experience path assumes one character dies here (specifically Porom). Since you brutally murdered her by casting Ice-2, that problem is solved. It isn't a problem if more people die, either.
After the battle, enter the tomb and watch the scene.
After the scenes, descend the mountain and head to the chocobo forest. Catch a yellow chocobo and travel back to Mysidia.
When you release the chocobo, check if you had a good chocobo using the yellow chocobo image. The top pixel of the chocobo should not be in one of the red areas. If you did get a bad chocobo, it's not the end of the world. You will have a chance to fix it later, though it will cost you some time.
Talk to the elder, and then head to Baron via the Serpent Road.
Go to the back of the Inn and talk to Yang.
If either Cecil or Palom are unable to kill their respective Guards, Tellah should cast Virus.
It's actually possible to trigger the end of battle earlier than that message, but the timing necessary to do so is not consistent, so it's pretty much TAS-only.
After the scenes, head to the Baron weapon and armor shop.
Enter the Old Water-way and continue until just before the Baigan battle on Castle Baron 1F.
Move on to challenge Baigan.
If you have the opportunity, any inventory management you do should probably begin to focus on setting up your inventory for the glitch. Refer to the Golbez section for more details on item placement.
Head to the throne room to fight Kainazzo.
Do not mash X during the scenes, unless you're looking to mercy kill your run. In particular, once you're on the airship, pressing X at the wrong time will cause the game to lock up. Stick to A or B (or some other button) instead.
After the scenes, fly to Toroia and enter the castle. Visit Edward on the left side of the castle, use an Ether1 on Tellah and then cast Exit.
Head north to the Chocobo Village, catch a black chocobo, and fly to Cave Magnes.
Head through the cave until you reach the crystal room.
Talk to the Dark Elf. After the scene, talk to him again.
After the battle, get the crystal, leave the room, and cast Exit.
Take the black chocobo back to the Chocobo Village and then get another black chocobo. Land according to the black chocobo image, and then walk the rest of the way to Toroia.
For landing your black chocobo, any of the tiles in the "Safe Zone" on the image is acceptable, but if you are on a step route, you want to land in a very particular spot. Particularly, you want to land roughly where the image says "Safe Zone". Essentially, when you walk to the left, you should be walking one tile above the break in the forest, and you will end up at the topmost tile of the Toroian Castle.
Talk to the clerics, cast Exit, and board your airship.
After Golbez is done taunting you, go up a floor and head to the chest with Fire.
Continue to the top of the tower.
Killing Yang is essential to ensuring a level 19 Kain with this experience path, but keeping Tellah alive is more important (for hopefully obvious reasons).
Enter the door, watch the scene, talk to Kain and then finally watch the next scene.
Kain should be level 19 at this time. If he (for whatever reason) is only level 18, after the first two jumps, have him alternate between Fight and Jump.
The timing on this fight is very sensitive. Don't hold A to fight unless directed to do so.
At this point, Valvalis transforms into her tornado form.
If the damage rolls were decent, Kain can Fight on his last turn instead of Jumping. If Valvalis still doesn't die, just continue the normal pattern. She won't have much HP left at this point.
After the scenes, leave the castle and take the airship to Silvera, which is almost due west.
Afterward, fly to Agart.
This is your last chance to fix your yellow chocobo if you got a bad one. Head to the Chocobo Forest outside of Baron and keep getting yellow chocobos until you get a good one.
Use Magma on the well. Afterward, fly to the Underworld.
At this point, you need to enter the castle and observe 63 screen transitions before talking to the King. When you first arrive in the throne room, your count is 3. You need to go back down the stairs and back up the stairs a total of 30 times to get your count up to 63. If you don't do this correctly, you will not be going to glitchland today.
If you have more than one blue and one orange doll remaining at this point, you need to do whatever it takes to eliminate the others. Only do the following once there are two dolls remaining.
If you accidentally trigger the big doll, immediately change rows, have Kain Jump, and have Cecil keep himself healed with Cure2 potions. If you're lucky, you won't trigger the damage range that results in the dolls splitting again. (It's based on damage, not on time.)
Your primary focus is setting up your inventory for the glitch. By the end of the fight, your inventory should match the following:
| ↓ Eighth Row ↓ | |
| (any) | FireClaw x13 |
| FireClaw x151 | FireClaw x3 |
| IceClaw x99 | Rod x1 |
| IceClaw x255 | IceClaw x53 |
| Change x123 | Paladin x21 |
| Silver x34 | Paladin x20 |
| Silver x38 | Paladin x23 |
| Silver x72 | Paladin x24 |
| Silver x50 | Paladin x25 |
| Silver x94 | Paladin x17 |
| Thunder x10 | Paladin x22 |
| Silver x79 | Paladin x18 |
| Silver x72 | Paladin x19 |
| Silver x88 | Paladin x26 |
| Change x96 | Change x201 |
| Shadow (shield) x10 | (empty) |
| (any) | (any) |
| ↑ Bottom of Inventory ↑ | |
After the scenes, immediately cast Warp, do not get the crystal, and then exit the crystal room.
Go left until you reach the Mage Room.
Go left to the trigger tile.
Look down, press A, and pray.
If this works, it will take a few seconds, so give it a bit before you give up.
