Hello! This patch is a change-up to the game in order to make John B. Castin' a more viable character as an ally rather than only being a desirable party leader. Along with that, there's also some minor touch-ups to Ark's skills.
MEDITATE
Meditates's downsides were not worth it later in the game, so I've decided to tweak it.
-Attack and defense cap of 10 removed; now halves attack and defense.
-Meditate spell now has a cooldown of 5 turns.
SPELLBOOK
Spellbook was okay before, but really only had any practical use when John was the leader and had the time to gather up all that Max MP. In an attempt to make a random John ally more worth it, it's been buffed a whole lot.
First, here are the nerfs:
-Spellbook now has a cooldown of 7 turns. Upped from 2.
-Spellbook now costs a flat 12% MP to use.
Here are the buffs:
-LUCK now factors in very heavily to spell learning chance. (10 LUCK should give you a static 20% chance to always learn the Spellbook's used spell, and that's without factoring in John's Max Mp.)
-Spellbook will replenish all party members for 7 MP multiplied by how many Elixirs are currently being held.
-Spellbook will replenish all party members for 4 MP multiplied by how many Mana UP potions are currently being held.
-Spellbook will replenish all party members for 1 MP multiplied by how many Potions are currently being held.
-Before casting the random spell, John will cast a low-damaging elemental defense-ignoring spell for each unique elemental resist he has.
-Before casting the random spell, John will cast a low-damaging non-elemental defense-ignoring spell if he has prepared.
-Eletection makes him cast all four elemental spells at once. These stack with the ones cast from the resists.
-Having the Lucky status effect will make John always learn the spell.
-Having Agnosia will make John always learn the spell. However, he will lose 1 attack and 2 defense after doing so.
(Please note that the two above effects do not apply for Super Spells!)
To go along with the Agnosia change, the Fog spell has been made to require 75% MP and HP to cast.
The goal with these Spellbook changes is to turn an early John ally into a spell dump who you can build to be a strong, consistent attacker along with lots of utility, and a late game John ally as an asset to be a constant source of MP given you have the items.
ARK
I also wanted to make the Persevere and Purify combo a bit more unique:
-Persevere no longer prevents death and removes mana costs. Instead, it gives Ark a 50% damage resist and 20% HP regeneration.
-Purify will now 100% remove Persevere when used.
-Persevere now lasts for 5 turns instead of 3.
-Purify now only heals based on half of Ark's Max HP.
Overall, consistent damage resists appear to be stronger in the game's balance, and I would like to make Ark less of a one trick pony.
BUG FIXES AND TWEAKS:
-Crouch Down's removal on hit is now 50% instead of 100%.
-Crouch Down can now be between 3 and 5 turns. Upper from between 3 and 4 turns.
-Made Pained Pray give 50% MP.
-Fixed Pained Pray's description.
-Fixed Wake's description.
-Omni-Orb has been heavily buffed. It now does 3 attacks instead of 1, each doing 10 damage that ignores defense along with the main portion that takes defense into account. Also, the main formula is now 30% stronger. The hope is that this item is now more viable for late game bosses, particularly getting past their damage caps.
-Elixir Pump now requires 10 MP and will no longer bump up HP even if no Max MP is present.
-Dark Shield was super broken before. Now it works as a fourth Resist stage that is immune to all dark status effects. Acid and wipes don't remove it.