FINAL FANTASY 8
CHARACTER SETUP GUIDE
by: Vice President Treill Hearmiton
[email protected]
=================
Version History
=================
Version 1.0
-Completed the whole fact and submitted it. Minor errors on
info regarding myself and the people who helped me.
Version 1.1
-Revised the informations and my email address.
Version 1.2
-Put up some additions regarding devouring secrets
TABLE OF CONTENTS
I. DISCLAIMER
II. CREDIT
III. INTRODUCTION
IV. WHY A CHARACTER SETUP GUIDE?
V. PROCEDURE
A.BASIC JUNCTIONING
B.HOW TO DEVELOP YOUR CHARACTERS
B.1. FIRST/SECOND DISC GUIDE
B.2. THIRD DISC GUIDE
C.MAXIMIZING YOUR STATS
D.MISCELLANOUS JUNCTIONING
E.WHERE TO GET YOUR MAGIC
F.MISCELLANOUS ABILITIES/COMMANDS
VI.OUTRO
==========
DISCLAIMER
==========
You may not use anything from this faq whatsoever for your own or claim
it as your own. If you want to use some info within my faq, then email
me or at least give me credit on your work. I don't demand you to email
me for the permission. This faq is for free distribution and I didn't
make this for any other purposes aside to distribute what I know. So
feel free to ask me permission or to get info from this but give me
credit. Well better off to email me at least I know who got my info.
You know what would happen to you if you ever plagarize any faq.
Please do not make any profit with this. If any of you got this
through any kind of payment then you have been had for this faq
is for free. You may print this as long as it stays the same,
meaning no alterations whatsoever. Also if I may add lastly for
emphasis...DON'T DO ANYTHING WITH THE CONTENTS OF THIS FAQ
WITHOUT MY PERMISSION. Salamat (thanks in our native tongue).
*if you have time please visit this address:
http://www.neopets.com/refer.phtml?username=pick2r3squ3
*that is if you have time. tnx!
======
CREDIT
======
These are thanks for those who helped me with this faq. Without
them, this would never have been a success.
marleone: (
[email protected])
For helping me out mostly in the game. Thanks for leveling up
my characters when I'm too drowsy to do so. ^_^
rm2k: (
[email protected])
For telling me how to defeat Malboros while watching your favorite
TV show. For telling me about the Rosetta Stone hidden in Cheryl's
Shop.
Smoon: (
[email protected])
For the information on Obel Lake Mystery and Shumi Village Sidequest
2.
Scott Ong: (
[email protected])
For the information on the organ at Ultimecia's Castle. I've been
dying
to know what's it for.
Cjayc: (www.gamefaqs.com)
For maintining a beautiful treasure trove of gaming info. Also for
posting my faq.
Square: (www.squaresoft.com)
For developing a great game.
ahiya elster:(
[email protected])
For telling me about the Devouring system
============
INTRODUCTION
============
Hi! I'm Vice President Treill Hearmiton (vpth for short) and this is
my first time ever to write a faq so please...please bear with me.
This guide is all about how to setup your favorite character in final
fantasy 8 (or all of them) from magic to junction to weapons. Well
for some it would seem to be out of hand but I saw that there are
many people out there who just played the game, leveled every
character to 100 (which is so damn easy; I mean you could get to
level 100 even if your still at disc one and even before your first
ever mission as a SeeD) and junctioned magics to stats and be
contented with it. Also there are people who just play it straight
out. Well this guide will help players to achieve the best
character he can create with the best stats that the game can
offer. I hope you all find this very helpful.
============================
WHY A CHARACTER SETUP GUIDE?
============================
There are many reasons why I wrote this guide and these are:
[1] To help FF8 players build up their chracters to their liking
[2] To cover many questions on how to get CERTAIN items (not all;
I'm not going to list them all)
[3] Taking care of GF's (which also means powering you up)
[4] To laugh at Ultima and Omega Weapon (well Ultima is a piece of
cake really but if you want to laugh...)
=========
PROCEDURE
=========
This is similar to powering up with pluses (i.e. Str Bonus Vit Bonus)
but the difference is that you can do this even if your characters are
at the maximum level. Also you can have magic junctioned at every stats
and I mean EVERY stats including the speed, luck and even evasion! Hit
Junction you really don't need especially with Squall as his gunblades
always has 255% hit and it comes in three GF's namely Diablos,
Pandemona, and Eden. Now...onwards!
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BASIC JUNCTIONING
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STRENGTH JUNCTION
Strength junction means you junction a magic (i.e. Ultima) to your
strength and thus increasing its value. They come with GF's:
=Ifrit
=Shiva
=Pandemona
=Brothers
=Cerberus
You can also use the Str-J scroll that can be bought in petshops.
VITALITY JUNCTION
Vitality junction is the ability to junction magic in your vitality
increasing your defense. The higher the vitality, the lesser the
physical damage will be inflicted on your character. Vit-J ability
comes with the GF's:
=Quezacoatl
=Shiva
=Carbuncle
Or you can use a Vit-J Scroll to learn this ability. Vit-J Scroll can
be bought in petshops.
MAGIC JUNCTION
Magic juction is an ability that enables you to junction a magic to you
magic status. Increasing the value of your magic is important as they
affect two things namely: the strength of your spells and the success
rate of the draw command. The higher the magic the more spells that you
can draw. For example, Squall has a magic of 80 and Zell has a magic of
22. Squall can draw successfully from an enemy almost always getting 9
of the spell while Zell has a slim chance of being successful and if he
is successful, he'll only acquire a measly 1 or 2 of the said spell.
Now Mag-J comes with GF's:
=Quezacoatl
=Siren
=Diablos
=Carbuncle
=Leviathan
=Cerberus
Or you can use a Mag-J scroll available only at petshops.
SPIRIT JUNCTION
Spirit Junction is an ability that allows your character to strengthen
his/her spirit by equipping (junctioning) a magic on the slot. Spirit
is the Defense against the Dark Ar..errr, defense against magic. They
come from the GF's:
=Shiva
=Brothers
=Leviathan
=Cerberus
=Alexander
Man! It's really boring to type and type the same phrases. Well: Spr-J,
buy, petshops...Yahoo! (makes sense?). Well if you've found Str-J scroll
and you can't find this one, you really shouldn't be playing the game.
SPEED JUNCTION
Care to guess what it does? Anyway this great ability comes from the
GF's:
=Pandemona
=Cerberus
=Eden
Or you can use the very rare Spd-J Scroll. These scrolls are rare
(well not as rare as the Aegis Amulet). One you can get by mugging
Cerberus when you fight him and one from the the Lunatic Pandora. It's
in the screen where Laguna accidentally pushed a rock on an Esthar
soldier (not the bombing incident). In Zell and Squall's scenario, it's
in the screen below the save point (use move-find ability; before the
mechanical boss). There's a hole on the left side
wall. Examine it to get the scroll.
EVASION JUNCTION
Well, pretty easy to guess. The higher the amount, the higher the
chance to avoid enemy attacks. I don't know if this also includes
magical attacks. Could someone please tell me. My email is
[email protected]. Tnx. Anyways, an evasion of 25%-30% is high
already as it will evade most attacks though not 100% guaranteed.
And this is the only stat that cannot be boosted up to 255% because
there are no items that increases the value of this. The only GF's
that has this wondrous ability are:
=Cactuar
=Eden
You can also use the very rare, though not hard to acquire, Aegis
Amulet. To get this material, encounter the UFO and defeat it before
your last encounter to get the Pupu card.
HIT JUNCTION
Hit junction is an ability that enables you to increase your hit rate
by equipping magic on it. Hit-J comes with the GF's:
=Diablos
=Cerberus
=Eden
There are no items that will give you this ability so I suggest that
you never remove this from your GF's.
LUCK JUNCTION
Luck junction is an ability that allows magic to be juinctioned to
your luck. Luck may seem to be useless for most players but as this
guide's purpose is to FULLY EQUIP your characters with all the stats,
it is compulsary in my side that I write it down here (hey! maybe I can
convince you that luck is somehow useful). Well, for one thing, luck
determines the ofteness that Odin and Gilgamesh would appear. The higher
the luck, the more often Odin and Gilgamesh would appear. Also luck
determines the items that you get after battles. Well, allover, luck
is at a 50-50 situation in usefulness. You would really want to get a
Power Generator from Blitz but you don't want Odin or Gilgamesh ruining
your every battle? GF's that has this ability are:
=Cactuar
=Eden
Or of course you can use a Luck-J scroll. Like the Spd-J scroll,
Luck-J scroll cannot be bought from a petshop or any other shop.
You can only get this by Mugging Odin and by doing the other
Obel Lake Mystery.
This info I learned from Smoon. Thanks a bunch.
Go to the Eldbeak Peninsula north of Balamb continent. There you'll
see a stone which reads TRETIMEASUREATMINOFFDEISLE. If you remove
the word TIME OFF from this gibberish, you'll get Treasure at Minde
Isle! Now fly over to Minde Island south of Esthar and wander around
to get a Luck-J scroll.
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HOW TO DEVELOP YOUR CHARACTERS
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
FIRST/SECOND DISC GUIDE
This is how to boost your characters' stats before getting all the
GF's. Why before getting all the GF's? You need the later GF's
(i.e. Doomtrain and onwards) abilities to forge the materials you
will be needing for powering up your characters. Here's how it goes:
=Basically, you need to stay as low leveled as possible (man! I could
use a Degenerator trap from FF Tactics). How to be low leveled is as
follows:
***do not engage in battles that will give you experience. Examples are
Random battles. To learn GF abilities without Exp, go to Cactuar Island.
If you're still in the first disc learn only the necessary ones like
Mug, Str Bonus, Mag Bonus, HP Bonus. Do not use the same characters as
they will surely gain Exp and thus level up. Nothing you can do with
the main character but don't worry, we have a plan for him later.
***if in disc 2 and you want to learn say, Recover or Tonberry's Shop
Abilities, Call Shop, Haggle, Familiar, Sell-High; a measly 700 AP
all in all (*pant*pant*), go to the training center of Balamb garden
and encounter with a T-Rexaur [you could really tell that it's him with
that smile on his face =)]. Equip the LVL Down ability from GF Tonberry
and level him down to level 1 and the kill him. You get a measly exp but
the AP is still 10. You can also do this with other enemies.
***the true development of your character begins when you gain control
of Balamb Garden. But this is much better if you're in disc three and
got a hold of Ragnarok. Just in case you want to pound off your enemies
like hell, then do this:
With the access to almost every part of the map (except of course the
islands closests to heaven and hell and the Esthar Region), you can
boost your characters'stats even before your battle with Fujin and
Raijin, though not to the maximum. You can't max out your stats till
disc three. Here's what you do:
[1] Get Odin and Tonberry. Stock on Death, Triple, and Full-Life spells
from these GF's. This is the best way to get them easily. For Odin and
Tonberry to have these spells in their draw inventory, Squall would
have to be at least level 30. Don't worry with his level. As I have
said, we have a plan for him.
[2] Now that you have these two GF's, go master the bonuses (Str Bonuses,
Vit Bonuses, Mag Bonus, Spr Bonus, and HP Bonus using the strategy above
in developing GF abilities)
[3] Equip your desired stat to increase. There are five bonuses and the
maximum ability slots that you can get here is up to three only. I
suggest that you use Str Bonus, Vit Bonus/Mag Bonus, and Spr Bonus. HP
Bonus will be easy later so don't bother.
[4] At disc 2 (before the whole Balamb incident), you must have the
GF's Shiva, Quezacoatl, Ifrit (man! if you can't get this GF, might
as well play Mario again), Siren, Diablos, Carbuncle, Brothers,
Leviathan, Odin and Tonberry. Now you have all the GF's that have the
bonuses, with Stat-Atk-J and Stat-Def-J2x, Elem-Atk
and Elem-Def-J2x.
[5] Equip all the GF's on ONE character and let that character kill
the remaining two.
[6] Junction magics to your stats:
==Full-Life to HP
==Triple to Strength
==Meltdown to Vitality
==Any strong spell to Magic
==Any strong spell to Spirit
==Haste to Speed
==Any magic to Hit
==Death to Stat-Atk
==Any spell on Stat-Def (say, life and esuna or reflect)
==Elem-Def and Elem-Atk: doesn't really matter as you already
have death but you could use Blizzaga on Elem-Atk to strengthen
yourself against T-Rexaur
[7] Now go to the training center and level up your character from
the very easy opponents (Grat and T-Rexaur). With your weapon,
dealing instant death almost a hundred percent, this will be a piece
of cake. Your HP would not go down that easy since you've got
Full-Life equipped (remember, from the very kind Tonberry King). You
could also get death from Tonberries (not the king) instead from
Odin. Focus on drawing Triple from Odin. You can also go to other
parts of the map which you find suitable enough for your leveling
process. You could go to Trabia Region and fight in the forests there.
Sometimes you'll encounter a Snow Lion. You'll get large exp and 10
AP for defeating him but I think the death junction won't work on
him. Or you can go to the Centra and fight in forests there.
Sometimes you'll encounter Ruby Dragon there, though at a lower level,
he'll give a decent amount of exp and 14 AP!
[8] Now I suggest that you level up first your other characters. Kill
Squall first as the level of the monsters depend on his level.
[9] If you don't want to powerup now, then go on with the story, do
not gain levels (don't do this whole scam), and proceed till you're at
disc three with Ragnarok. If you want to power up early on, then follow
this guide. You'll all get to maximize your stats in the end.
DISC THREE GUIDE
This whole is about on how to maximize your character to the fullest,
not just powering him/her up. First things first on maximizing
your characters:
=Get the Solomon's ring in Tears Point before going to Lunar Base.
This is very important. If you don't have this, then don't read any
further.
=Have Raganarok. Get on with the story and when you have Ragnarok...
it's show time!!
=Get GF Cactuar. To get him, go to the Cactuar Island South East part
of Esthar and East of Edea's house. You'll find it very easily. It's
an island near the wide desert (Kashkabald Desert) south of Esthar.
There you'll see a green thing popping out of different locations on
the island. Go to where he comes out and an encounter starts.
=Get Bahamut. Your main character's level should be the basis of
Bahamut's level so no need to worry, unless Squall is at level 100
and your other characters are still at a very low level. You'll
really have a hard time. But anyway, if you feel like you can't take
on Bahamut, get the Rosetta Stone from the Esthar shop (the one that
never opens; just keep on going in there [persistent costumer eh!]
and they'll eventually give you Rosetta Stone. note: you don't have
to leave the store to get the stone) and use it on of your GF's to
learn the Abilityx4. That's the purpose of getting Bahamut.
=Get 6 Malboro Tentacles, 6 Remedy +, and 6 Steel Pipes. To get these:
Malboro tentacles
You need to steal it from them or win it from them. But the problem
is you need to be sane (unBAD BREATHED) to mug him, much more kill him.
Malboros at level 100 have high HP amounting to about 140,000 to
160,000! So how do you kill him without calling Odin for help or
Gilgamesh? Read on:
Basically, almost all status ailments can be inflicted to a character
who has been Bad Breathed. You have confuse, sleep, poison, and even
petrification. To prevent these annoying ASSETS you need to do the
following:
[1] Learn Stat-Def-J4x from GF's Cerberus and Doomtrain. Learn them
without gaining exp from Cactuars.
[2] Get Pain spells, Confuse spells, Break spells, and Sleep spells.
Confuse spells can be drawn from Belhemel in the regions of Galbadia.
Break spells can be drawn from Cockatrices on cliffs of Grandidi Forest
(the huge forest North of Esthar). Sleep spells can be drawn from Grat
at the Training Center of Balamb. Pain spells are rather hard to find
but they can be Refined from Curse Spikes. 1 will yield 5 Pains. But
if you want, you could draw them from Elnoyles (monsters that have a
closeness to Elvoret). These monsters are hard to find in random
encounters in Esthar region (note: must have finished the Lunar Cry
incident) but in Esthar City, you can find him and can always encounter
him as much as you want. To find Elnoyle in Esthar City, land Ragnarok
on the Esthar Hangar and continue to the next screen. Here you'll meet
some Esthar people, one who is laughing due to insanity and the others
talking about what happened to Esthar. Go to the right. Here you'll
see a save point and a place where you can heal. Continue to the right
till you reach an intersecrtion of four. It should somehow look like
this:
Left: passable
Right: Going to Elnoyle
==: broken airway |= =|
|= =|
left |= =| right
|= =|
=================================== =============================
----------------------------------- -----------------------------
from Ragnarok to Shopping Mall
----------------------------------- -----------------------------
heh heh! My younger sister could have done better but its the best
that I can afford to do. Anyways, go to the right and then you'll reach
another screen. When you reach this screen, you'll find a T formed
intersection. Go right and you'll see a black man sitting by the
corridor. Talk to him and he'll say "Hee hee hee!" Then you'll fight
Elnoyle.
In your fight with this joker, draw Pains from him and Holy! At least
you don't have to go to the Islands closest to heaven and hell and draw
them there (hooo! *sweat* *sweat*). If you Mug him, you'll get a
Moonstone which is necessary for creating weapons later. If you defeat
him, he'll drop an Energy Crystal. No sweat! Unlike if you battle a
Ruby dragon, you'll have to survive his damn attacks (especially Breath!
Damn! **encounter, Ruby, breath, toasty!!!**) and he seldom drops an
Energy Crystal. Well, Elnoyle maybe devastating in some aspects but at
least an instant death attack can be used on him (remember the death
magic junction to Stat-Atk-J?). With that you'll have no problem with
him. He gives large exp especially at level 100 and 18 AP! (but not
close to cactuars). Anyway, now that you have all the necessary
spells, it's time to fight Marlboro, I mean Malboro.
DEFEATING MALBORO
Junction Pain, Sleep, Confuse, and Break on your character with the
Stat-Def-J4x. For the other one with only Stat-Def-J2x, junction Pain
and Confuse. Now encounter with Malboro. He'll usually have the first
turn as his speed is great. He'll initially cast Bad Breath first.
When he casts Bad Breath the character not junctioned with sleep in
status defense will fall asleep and be counted for petrification.
The other two will only be berserked and slowed. Just let the two
attack. Berserk increases your strength thus dealing major damage to
Malboro. Now, equip Auto-Haste with the one who has Cerberus and he
won't be slowed down. That character will be so fast that Malboro
won't have another turn to attack. I equipped Squall (at level 100
with strength of 180) with Cerberus, Auto-Haste, and the status
defenses. I didn't even have to trigger the R1 button coz my
gunblade's attacks deal 9999 damage! I didn't even lift a finger or
press a button to kill Malboros. With this setup, you'll be getting
100 Malboro Tentacles in no time, get the Blue Magic Bad Breath,
create Quistis's ultimate weapon (Save the Queen), and get Doomtrain.
Remedy +
To get these, you need to learn Alexander's Med LVL up ability. Buy
Remedies from shops and convert them to become Remedy +.
Steel Pipes
To get these, mug a Wendigo (headless green and flesh monsters that
dreams of being a player in NBA) in the forests of Galbadia and in
the District Prison. Or you can refine them from Elastoid cards.
1:1 is the ratio.
=Get Tonberry if you still haven't got him. You will need his shop
skills to be able to maximize your stats.
=Get Eden. Draw him from Ultima Weapon in the Deep Sea Deposit. You'll
be needing his GFAbl Med RF. You can choose to get Eden later when
you're at level 100 or you may want him early on. But if you want a
good fight with Ultima Weapon, then, level up to 100.
==========================================================================
Now that you have all that you need for maximizing you characters, let us
begin the set-up.
==========================================================================
First thing that you need to do is junction Bahamut to the character
you want to powerup. Let's take Squall for our sample.
Junctioned GF's Junctioned Magic
=Shiva HP=Full-Life Spd=Triple
=Carbuncle Str=Ultima Eva=Haste
=Cerberus Vit=Meltdown Hit=None (already 255%)
=Cactuar Mag=Holy Luck=whatever (Aura)
=Tonberry Spr=Reflect
=Bahamut
Commands: Abilities:
Attack Str Bonus
Item Vit Bonus
Draw Mag Bonus
Spr Bonus
Junctioned Magic to Elements Junctioned Magic to Status
Elem-Atk=Blizzaga Status-Atk=Death
Elem-Def=Thundaga Status-Def=Pain
Firaga Sleep
Confuse
Break
With this setup you can easily grind almost every enemy in the Island
closest to hell. Why Island closest to Hell only? Well, the enemies
here are far better than the enemies in Island closest to Heaven.
They give better exp, better AP, and you can get some of the materials
youll be needing for learning Blue Magic and remodeling weapons.
The idea of this setup is to powerup your character (in this case it's
Squall) with the help of the bonuses. The spells junctioned are quite
hard to find unless you want to roam around the two islands (heaven
and hell) drawing pitiful 3 or 5 spells each. I will explain later
where to get them without having the trouble of drawing from the
draw points. And you don't have to waste 5,000 gil to draw Ultima!
(well, it's not a waste really but the time that you use to go back
and forth to Shumi Village...). The purpose of Ultima in the Str
junction is for your character to have the best strength stat that
he can have at this point of the game. You cannot add Bahamut's
Str+60% to his abilities since you need every slot for the Bonuses.
Full-Life has the same purpose as Ultima but obviously, its for
boosting up your HP. Same for Meltdown since it is the second best
vitality junction spell next to Ultima. Holy is not the best bet for
your Magic Stat but you need the other spells for stats that are
imperative to boost as high as possible. Do not junction Pain here
though its value would increase at least by 30 points. You need it
for Status Defense Junction. Reflect is the best for Spirit
(meaning next best to Ultima; since Ultima is the best for all the
Stats, except HP). Triple is for boosting up your speed. You can use
it on Evasion or Speed. Speed is needed to get a higher chance of
getting the first turn. Your ATB will be so fast you'll feel that
you're the only one who has a turn. You can interchange Speed from
Evasion depending on your needs and wants. If you want
to avoid most attacks, then boost up your evasion with Triple. If
you want to gain speed, then junction Triple on your speed.
Blizzaga's purpose is for the dragon type enemies (well, not all
of them are dragon types and not all of them are weak with cold;
actually it's just the T-Rexaur that's the aim of Blizzaga). Since
dragon type enemies such as Hexadragon and Ruby dragon absorb fire,
and Grendels are strong against thunder. So Blizzaga or other
Elements can junctioned here but I found Blizzaga to be the most
suitable because enemies here are either weak or damaged normally
with this spell. As for the other elements, I have still not tested
them yet. Firaga and Thundaga for Elemental defense is necessary for
those attacks based on these elements. Most of the enemies here attack
with these elements (i.e. Grendel's Breath are thunder based so Thundaga
will nullify them; Hexadragon attacks with Firaga so Firaga on Elem-Def
will nullify it). These are for precautionary measures so that you'll
only have to deal with physical attacks and non-elemental spells and
attacks, such as Meteor, Ruby's Breath and Hexa's Breath. The status
attack Death deals almost a hundred percent. Junction 100 Deaths on
your Status Atk to get a higher chance of sending your enemies to
oblivion. There are 6 types of enemies found in the Island closest to
Hell and these are:
Ruby Dragon=cute red dragons that likes to toast your party first then
teaches you astronomy by raining you with meteors.
Malboro=again, cute green plant like monster with a big mouth
(and I do mean BIG!) that never brushes its teeth. I think even a
drum of mouthwash won't even get rid of that Bad Breath.
Hexadragon=uncute, gray, six-legged dragons that likes to stare at
your party (not much a threat unless you stare back at him and let
him squash your party)
Grendels=much like a cross-breed between a frog and dragon. Comes in
one or two. Two can deal major damage to your party especially if your
Vitality is not that high but not much of a threat.
Blue Dragon=green deformed dragons that is very gentle to your party
(believe me! He's the easisest).
T-Rexaur=dinosaurs ready for a Kodak moment. Strong especially that
damn tail of his. Can be easily killed with
DEATHpunch/blade/whip/bullet/nunchaku/projectile. Strong but not much
of an opponent. Start praying if you don't have a healer and your
DEATHpunch/blade/whip/bullet/nunchaku/projectile doesn't take effect
in about five to seven turns, as he can kill a whole party with two
swipes of that monstrous tail of his.
Of the six monsters given, three of which are affected by Status
attack junction:Death. These are T-Rexaur, Blue Dragon, and Grendels.
The purpose of this junction is to eliminate enemies in an instant,
granting instant victory and an easy way to gain levels. Though, the
other three are not affeceted by this instant death method, it is not
necessary (though you wish you could just kill them all in one blow ^_^).
Hexadragon are not that hard to beat. You'll only have a hard time
mincing a 60,000 HP dragon. But all in all, he's not lethal. Unlike Ruby
and Malboro. Ruby Dragon, you'll have to kill him normally or use limits
(*cough...cough...de...cough...gen...tor...cough*).Malboros are not that
hard. Being protected from that annoying Bad Breath is the key to win a
battle with Malboro. That is the purpose of the Status Defense setup
above. Once you have this, just wait how Malboro will wish for his
death.With all that said and done, level up your characters like
there's no tomorrow!
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MAXIMIZING YOUR STATS
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Key to maximizing your stats lies on four main GF's: Carbuncle,
Doomtrain, Tonberry, and Eden. That's why it is very important to
get the Solomon's Ring from Tear's Point before going to the
Lunar Base. You cannot get it after Lunatic Pandora lies on top of
Tear's Point. Now what you have to do:
=Learn Tonberry's Haggle, Sell-High, Call Shop, and Familiar. Haggle
is for discount at shops, Sell-High is pretty obvious, Call Shop
is for your convenience and Familiar is for buying rare items at shops.
=Learn Carbuncle's Recover Med-Ref
=Learn Doomtrain's Forbid Med-RF. You'll see why.
=Learn Eden's GFAbl Med-RF. Later I'll explain.
This method I'm going to write is only for HP stat up to Spirit stat.
Speed and Luck has a different and tedious method (I think tedious is
an understatement). Anyway here's how it goes:
[1] Buy Tents from shops and use the Recover Med-RF ability to convert
them to Mega-Potions.
[2] Sell the Mega-Potions at shops (7500 gil a piece)
[3] Repeat steps 1 and 2 until you have gotten the desired amount of
money that you need.
[4] With the new found business of buy and sell and after being
rich in no time, buy from Esthar Petshop any of these:
Giant's Ring
Power Wrist
Force Armlet
Magic Crown
Vit-J Scroll
(note: Orichalcon, Vit+40%, cannot be bought and can only be acquired
through refinement of Vit-J Scroll)
[5] Buy your choice of stat booster (stat booster corresponds to the
stat that you want to maximize; i.e. if you want to maximize strength
first, buy Power Wrists, for HP, buy Giant's Ring etc). Get 100 of
this (YES! You got it! 100. And it doesn't stop there).
[6] Refine them into their higher versions using Eden's GFAbl Med-RF
10 Giant's Ring=1 Gaea's Ring
10 Power Wrist=1 Hyper Wrist
10 Force Armlet=1 Magic Armlet
10 Magic Crown= 1 Hypno Crown
10 Vit-J Scroll=1 Orichalcon
10 Orichalcon=1 Adamantine
[7] Now that you've done this, refine these new items into permanent
stat booster using Doomtrain's ForbidMed Ref:
10 Gaea's Rings=1 HP up
10 Hyper Wrists=1 Str up
10 Magic Armlets=1 Spr up
10 Hypno Crowns=1 Mag up
10 Adamantines=1 Vit up
[8] Repeat this process until you've reached the maximum or your
desired statistics for your characters.
Obviously, you'll be needing a lot of money for this powering up. Just
to give you a hint on how much money you're going to spend here: Each
item that you need to refine (Giant's Ring, Power Wrist etc.) costs
15000 gil a piece except Vit-J Scroll which costs around 5000 gil.
To get a single stat booster, you'll be needing 15000000 gil. To
get to maximum you'll be needing more than a hundred of these.
If you want your base stat to be at 255, meaning 255 Strength,
255 Magic etc you'll be needing over 500 of one stat booster for
all characters. I haven't done this for all my characters but I
have done this for my best three characters namely Squall, Irvine
and Zell. If you find this not necessary (boosting up your
character's stat to maximum) then just boost them up till you can
achieve 255 of the stats with a junctioned magic (i.e. boost your
character's to a point where you'll only have to equip a magic to
adjust it to 255. No more [stat name here]+20/40/60/80% on your
ability). With this you can have all the slots on your ability for
other necessary abilities such as Mug, Auto-Haste, and the lot.
Note: the purpose of powering up your characters from the start or
upon getting Cactuar GF and using the bonuses is to save time and
money for this tedious work. Imagine boosting up your character with
a base stat below 100! I mean, you'll really going to have to sit a
long time raising your money.
_________________________
/Speed and Luck boostings/
To Boost up your Speed and Luck, you'll be needing a lot of patience,
hardwork, and time to achieve this. Alright, if you don't want to be
stuck up on this game for a long time, I don't recommend that you do
this as these are not that imporant unlike the offensive and defensive
stats. But if you want to brag about having these at high values, well
it's much of a crowning achievement. I have only done this for three
of my characters (again they are Irvine, Squall, and Zell). They are
not maxed to 255 (I still have sanity) but my speed is at 207 for Squall,
187 for Irvine and 190 for Zell. Now my Luck I didn't bother to increase
but there is a method of increasing. This is one of the most tiring, time
consuming and well, insane (but not as insane as to creating a Holy War).
Now for the insanity process:
#Speed ups#
These can be refined using Doomtrain's Forbid Med-RF. There are several
materials that can be refined to Spd ups:
2 Aegis Amulet
1 Hundred Needle's
50 Jet Engines
5 Rocket Engines
Note: these are all equal to one Spd up
Where to get these items:
-=Aegis Amulets=-
To get these you must battle with Behemoth roaming around the Esthar
continent or at the Deep Sea Deposit. I suggest that you battle them
at the Deep Sea Deposit as there is a place there (the third screen
after the big machine where you have the option of lettinfg Zell handle
the situation) where you can battle it at certain points of the room.
There would be three battles each time you re-enter the room. Here you
can stock up on Barriers which when you refine with Eden's GFAbil Med-RF
will yield an Aegis Amulet. Too bad you can only stock 100 of these in
your inventory since you cannot refine them into Aegis Amulets right
away. You'll have to kill Ultima Weapon and draw Eden. When Ultima
Weapon is dead, the fixed encounters stops for each level beyond the
Steam Pressure Machine. Anyway, if you really want to stock up on
Barriers here without defeating Ultima Weapon, continue playing on to
disc 4 and draw Eden from Tiamat. Then go to the Deep Sea Deposit
and encounter Behemoths there.
-=Jet Engine=-
This is even more unpractical. The fact that you can't get a Jet Engine
almost always proves that this method of refining is really a no-go.
Anyways, I will explain just in case a player with guts would feel the
challenge and go with the whole ordeal.
There are only three ways to get a Jet Engine and believe me,
they are not easy:
=Fight and defeat Tri-Point in Ultimecia's Castle
=Fight and kill Cactuars. If you are lucky (Luck boosting anyone?)
you'll eventually receive a Jet Engine.
=Refine 40 Tri-Point cards (as if they're not rare;don't you just
hate Square for making things so hard in most of their RPG's?)
Unfortunately these are the only known methods to refine a Jet Engine.
-=Rocket Engine=-
Whew! It's so hard typing and I've only one idea to promote. I'm bored
typing so here goes: Cactuar...yields Jet...48 years...beard 10 feet
long...10 Jet...1 Rocket. Makes sense?
-=Hundred Needles=-
Well, you could say that this is the most practical way of getting
a Spd up. The ratio is 1:1. Well sounds good enough. Far better
than Aegis Amulets, and far, far, far, far, far better than
Accelerators/Jet Engine/Rocket Engine (wonder why Square made such
a method so near impossible to achieve. Square is evil!! Well how
much more if there were no alternative methods aside from Jet Engine?)
Well, you won't have to sit on your couch all day long to get a single
Spd up with this method. Actually it would take you about 15 minutes or
lesser only! Wow! What a relief. Well all you need to do is to go to
Cactuar Isle located southeast of Esthar, fight Cactuars there, stock
up on Cactus Thorns up to 100, refine them into one Hundred Needles
using Eden's GFAbL Med-RF then finally refine the Hundred Needle to a
Spd up using Doomtrain's Forbid Med-RF. YAY!
#Luck ups#
Sheesh! I'm tired of warning you people out there that this is a
tedious blah blah....
Onwards!!
To get a Luck up, you'll only have to follow one sole method. One but
very much the same with the Hundred Needle method. I guess this is a
little bit harder than the Hundred Needle method. Why do I say that
it's a little bit tiring than Hundred Needle? Read on.
(I'll give it step by step)
Luck up acquiring method:
[1] Win or Mug Curse Spikes from Tri-Faces. You can also win them from
Malboros. Forbidden also drops them by twos.
[2] Refine 100 of them using Siren's Tool-RF ability into Dark Matter
(Siren must be at level 100 to be able to do this).
[3] Refine a Dark Matter into a Luck-J Scroll using Eden's GFAbl Med-RF.
[4] Refine a Luck-J Scroll into one Luck up using Doomtrain's
Forbid Med-RF.
Note: This is much more difficult than Hundred Needles because you will
have to steal from Tri-Faces in order to get a Curse Spike at a higher
rate. If you just kill a Tri-Face without mugging it, the chances of
getting a Curse Spike is very low. You'll get Poison Powders instead.
Note 2: You can fight Tri-Faces in the first screen beyond the Steam
Pressure Machine (where a save point lies). Like the Behemoth, they
are encountered at fixed points in the room.
So that's it! That's all there is that is needed to know of creating
stat boosters which will max up your characters statistics.
OTHER STATISTICS JUNCTIONING
There are statistics that only a few GF's cover. These are Speed,
Evasion, Hit and Luck. Among these, Evasion is the rarest as it is
only given by Cactuar. Luck is comes with the GF's Cactuar and Eden.
Speed comes from Pandemona, Cerberus and Eden while Hit is given by
three GF's: Eden, Pandemona and Diablos.
It would be a shame to your characters if they can't have all these.
So here's how you can get them:
Spd-J Scroll
No problem with this since you can easily mug this from Cerberus and
get it from Lunatic Pandora. But let's say that you forgot to mug
Cerberus and didn't get a Spd-J Scroll at Lunatic Pandora and you're
already in Disc 4. Here's what you'll do. Encounter with Cactuars in
Cactuar Island and stock up on Cactus Thorns. Get 100 and refine it to
a Hundred Needles using GFAbl Med-RF. Then refine it to Spd up using
Forbid Med-RF. Then convert it to Spd-J Scroll using GFAbl Med-RF.
You need 2 Spd ups to get 1 Spd-J Scroll.
Luck
Again no problem with this since you can get two of this. The first,
you can Mug from Odin. The other one is the clue to Minde Island
(see above for details). Even if you forgot to Mug Odin, you can still
get one with the side quest. If you want it the hardway then refine a
Dark Matter with GFAbl Med-RF and you'll get a Luck-J Scroll.
Hit
This cannot be acquired through any items so don't let your GF's forget
this or else it will be lost forever.
Evasion
The sole stat that can only be acquired from only one GF: Cactuar.
Anyway, this allows your caharacter to dodge enemy attacks more
efficiently. I'm telling you, an evasion of 25%-30% is high already
as most enemies will have a slim chance of hitting you. Don't dream
of raising it to 255%. It is impossible. Anyway, the item to get and
use in order for your other GF's to learn this is the Aegis Amulet
which is dropped by the UFO? (NOT PUPU!; he drops Pupu card if you
give 5 Elixirs or an Acclerator if you kill him). You have one so
that's two GF's each with Evasion junction. To get another Aegis
Amulet, stock 50 Barriers dropped by Behemoths. Refine these into
1 Aegis Amulet using GFAbl Med-RF.
So that's it you have all your statistics maxed or raised to your
will, every one have junctioned magics to each of the statistics.
What's missing?
ELEMENTAL/STATUS DEFENSE JUNCTIONING
This may not be that useful but if you just want your characters to
have every single slot for magic to be junctioned (like me!) then
you can do this.
Elemental defense is quite important especially when dealing with
strong enemies like Ruby Dragon, Hexadragon, or other Bosses. This
can minimize the amount of damage incurred to you by elemental
attacks. Also with this, you will only have to focus on defending
against some unblockable spells (such as Ultima or Meteor), strong
attacks (such as Ruby's Breath or Tiamat's Dark Flare) and Physical
attacks. Sometimes, if you're really in trouble, elemental defense
saves you by letting you absorb the element you are junctioned with.
I remember when I was battling Ruby Dragon and he Breathed on me.
Squall was way low on HP (about 900)and my other characters were KO'd.
Then Ruby cast Firaga on Squall. I was relieved that it healed me
around 4000+ HP because his next attack after that was Meteor. Well,
I didn't manage to kill Ruby coz I was afraid he would breath on me
again and I remembered that I haven't saved for quite a while before
that battle. Lucky me! =)
Status Defense
Status defense is your sole ally against those annoying confuse, break,
blind, poison ailments. These can be very serious especially if you're
not that ready. You could end up killing your own characters. Or you
could end up helpless against an enemy ("Hahahahaha!", says Malboro).
Actually the only things that you should worry about these ailments
are poison, confuse, break, sleep, sudden death and stop. These can
be a major problem. They can cause you to kill your other party
memebers, forbid you to act, kill you instantly, or kill you slowly.
You'll be needing this especially when fighting Malboros. You'll be
needing his tentacles and to get his tentacles, you'll need to cream
him (unless Odin showed pity on you).
WHERE TO GET THEM
Actually they come from several GF's. But what you really need is
the StatDefx4 and ElemDefx4. They come from three GF's only. Cerberus
carries St-Def-Jx4, Alexander carries Elem-Def-Jx4 and Doomtrain
carries both. Upon acquiring all the GF's, you will have two of
each equipped for your characters. Where will you get another one
of those?
Elem-DefJx4
This can be acquired by using an item called Elem-Guard. Elem-Guard
can be acquired by defeating Krysta, the boss from Ultimecia Castle.
You only get one without refining. If you are the type of player
that wants to complete all (and I mean all!) and don't want to waste
your one and only Elem Guard because you keep it as a collection then
do not fear. You can still get one but I'll tell you, it's damn hard!
First, battle with Snow Lion in the regions of Trabia. Do not mug him
as he will only give you Healing Mails. You must acquire from him an
item called Silver Armor. This item is it's rarest dropped. The most
frequent is the North Wind, the next is Healing Mail and then
Silver Mail. Equip Rare-Item to increase you chances of getting this.
Once you have acquired 10 Silver Armors, refine them into a Gold Armor
using GFAbl Med-RF. Well, after that, this going to be bloody
*sweat sweat*, acquire 10 Gold Armors and refine it to 1 Diamond Armor.
Get 5 of these pain in the @$$ and refine it to one Elem Guard. YAY!
Well, would you sacrifice your sole Elem Guard or stick to your pride?
I say, TO HELL WITH PRIDE!
St-Def-Jx4
This is quite easy than Elem Guard. I think Square did this because
you can't refine practically anything in the game into a Status Guard.
The only way to get this is to have a PocketStation, play it, get a
Ribbon, then refine it to 1 Status Guard. Well, there are two easy
ways of getting this one. First defeat Tiamat at Ultimecia's Castle
or do the second Shumi Village Sidequest. This is quite harder than
the first one. You'll have to go in and out of the village.
Also this info I learned again from Smoon. Again, super thanks!
When you go back to the village (after receiving a lousy Phoenix Pinion)
you'll find the attendant of the Elder working on the Laguna's Statue.
He'll be asking for some other assistance. So go to the Elder. He will
suggest for the Moomba outside. Go and talk to the Moomba. Then go to
the Elder and he will say that they will need another hand. Go to the
artisan whose house is next to the pond beside the workshop. He will
stubbornly refuse so you'll have no choice but to leave. Now you need
to convince the artisan to work. Remember Grease Monkey at FH? He used
to work with the artisan. So go to FH and go to the extreme right of
the town. There you'll find Grease Monkey. The moomba doll there will
respond to you since you came from Shumi Village. Grease Monkey will
then be amazed and starts to ask you about what's happening in Shumi
Village. You'll then relate about the artisan not working on the
statue. Grease Monkey will then hand you the Moomba doll. Go back to
Shumi Village and go to the artisan's house. The Moomba doll will start
to speak with Grease Monkey's voice scolding the artisan about his
attitude. After that talk to the artisan and he will be convinced to
work on the statue. See them at the workshop if you want then go to
the Elder and he will then hand you a Status Guard.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
WHERE TO GET YOUR MAGICS
------------------------------------------------------------------------
There are many spells that can be junctioned to your statistics.
Examples are the elements: Fire, Blizzard, Thunder. Some are of higher
versions of these simple spells. Other powerful spells that you ought
to get are Ultima, Meteor, Triple, Holy, Flare, Tornado etc. Simple
spells can be easily acquired by drawing form enemies or by refining
them from items. However, powerful spells such as mentioned above are
very hard to acquire especially stocking up to 100 for your characters.
There are free spells roaming arouind the Islands Closest to Heaven and
Hell but you wouldn't want to get 3 or 4 of the spells. Well unless your
up to drawing spells from draw points on the isalnds then go for it.
This is just an alternative method for stocking up spells more easily and
efficiently. Start! ^_^
What Spells would you want to have?
Among the magics that you would want to get are those that are truly
devastating and a real stat booster. Here is a list of advanced spells:
Flare=non-Elemental damage damage against one enemy
Holy=the only holy magic in the game (aside from GF Alexander).
Deals holy to one enemy (obvious isn't it)
Tornado=wind damage against all enemies. Stronger than Aero.
Quake=earth damage against all enemies
Meteor=non-elemental damage against all enemies. Hits multiple times.
Ultima=big non-elemental damage against all enemies. Strongest spell
in the game.
Aura=enables you to use Limit Breaks more often even outside the
critical condition.
Full-Life=revives a fallen character and restores him/her to full HP.
Pain=inflicts Darkness, Poison, and Silence status.
Triple=enables you to cast 3 spells in one turn.
These spells are found in the Islands closest to Heaven and Hell except
Pain. The other spells that are available in the game are not as strong
as these here in the list. Ultima is the best bet for every statistics
except for Speed and Evasion. Triple is best for these. While for the rest,
it is Ultima, you may want to have more plans for it to strengthen
yourself more. One purpose of this guide is to allow you to junction
Ultima to other stats aside to your strength stat (or you choice but
occassionally, players place Ultima to their strength). With the
method of maximizing your stats, you can control your magic junctioning
not always inclining on using your powerful spells to your stats. Of
course you'll be needing this, but wouldn't you want to junction Ultima
to your Elemental defense? It is a great help really. You can nullify
all elemental attacks and with your high vitality (because of Vit ups)
and high Spirit (because of Spr ups), enemy attacks are a joke
(well, don't expect Gravija; it's evil!). It may seem pointless to some
like drawing your magic, stocking them up to 100 then not using them for
junction. Again, these spells may lead you to your desired maximum stats.
If you don't want to tire yourself on maximizing your characters base
statistics (meaning even w/o a spell junctioned, your stats are still
at 255), then you can junction them to get 255. As I have suggested
above, you can power up your characters up to a point that when you
junction one of your spells, you can reach 255. Let me give an example.
I have Rinoa with a base strength of 180. Normally, without the aid of
the Str Bonus and the Str ups, my base strength would be around 70-90
(I didn't check but it is around this value). With a base of 180, if I
junction a Meteor here, I will have an exact 255 strength. See. Your
spells are of great use to you especially to those who doesn't want to
go to the whole ordeal of maximizing every single stat of a character
(even with a single character, it's tiresome. But not as tiresome as
that of FF7 getting sources).
Anyway, here are the ways of acquiring your spells (easier methods
than drawing them from draw points on Islands Closest to Heaven and
Hell).
Flare
This may seem difficult to you but you'll have to bear this. Actually
it's not that hard. There are many ways of acquiring them:
[1] Refine them from Flare stones. 1:1 using Ifrit's F Mag-RF
[2] Refine them from Inferno Fangs usually dropped by Ruby Dragons
or seldom dropped by Hexadragons. Ratio is 1:20 through F Mag-RF
[3] This is quite risky but it is the easiest way. Your Magic stat
must be at least 90 here to be faster and easier. First engage an
encounter with Ruby Dragon. With regards with the dragon's first
attack will be the cue whether you should run or stay. If he breaths
on you, then you're history. But if he uses Firaga or Meteor, then
stay. Oh! And junction 100 Firagas on your elemental junction to
avoid Firaga. After his first attack (or whoever comes first; you or
him) immediately summon Doomtrain. This will inflict several statuses
on the dragon making him asleep, confused, darkened, Vit 0 and viloa!
You can draw from him without him knowing ^_^.
Holy
Wow! This even easier than flare. And you don't have to worry about
pesky breaths. Any way here're are how:
[1] Refine them from Holy Stones using Siren's L Mag-RF
[2] Refine them from Moonstone again with Siren's L Mag-RF. Ratio
is 1:20
[3] Holy can be drawn from Elnoyle. Elnoyle is one of the monsters
that have extreme amounts of HP (I think they have over 90,000 if
at level 100). Also Elnoyles are very rare to encounter from random
battles. You may think that it is difficult. Think again! Remember
where you got Pain magics? Go back there and encounter him
(in Esthar. see the diagram above). Elnoyles are a piece of cake.
Aside that you can draw from him Holy, you can also Mug from him
Moonstone. Get the idea? Draw, mug and you'll have Holy magics
faster than you can say Quid...
Tornado</pre><pre id="faqspan-2">
Well, not much of a strong spell but it raises your stats pretty well
at the beginning of the game. Here are the methods on how you can get it:
[1] Refine from Windmill using Quezacoatl's T Mag-RF. Ratio is 1:20
[2] Refine from Aeros using Alexander's High Mag-RF. Ratio is 10:1
[3] Draw them from Thrustaevis found on the continent of Galbadia
near Deling City.
Quake
Strong earth based magic that affects all enemies. Doesn't work against
flying critters. Like Tornado, it is a great stat booster early in the
game. Here are the ways of acquiring it:
[1] Refined from Dino Bones dropped occassionally by T-Rexaur.
Ratio is 1:20
[2] Draw them from T-Rexaur. Put him to sleep first by junctioning
sleep on your status attack then draw from him.
Meteor
This can only be gotten from refining by Bahamut's Forbid Mag-RF or by
drawing. Not very easy to acquire. Here's how:
[1] Refine Star Fragments seldom dropped by T-Rexaurs and Iron Giants.
Ratio is 1:5.
[2] Well, pretty much the same with Flare. I don't want to repeat it
again so just refer to the strategy above on how to acquire Flare from
Ruby Dragons.
Aura
The only enemy that you'll encounter who has this spell is Seifer in
your last battle with him in Lunatic Pandora (Fujin talked normally
there! I found it cute). Anyway, to obtain this spell:
[1] Refine them from Aura stone using Leviathan's Supt Mag-RF.
Ratio is 1:1.
[2] Refine them from Fury Fragments dropped seldom by Blue Dragons
and Grendels. Ratio is 1:5
[3] To acquire Aura stones easier, buy Power Wrists, Hypno Crowns,
Force Armlets from the Esthar petshop and convert them to Aura Stones.
Ratio is 1:10. Then refine them into Auras.
[4] Steel Pipes refine into 1 Aura Stone. Refine it to Aura.
Full-Life
The best raising spell and the second best to Ultima on HP junctioning.
This one is quite hard to get from refinement but easier from drawing.
Read on:
[1] Refine Regen Rings dropped by Toramas on the regions of Esthar, by
Mesmerize on Trabia region and by Chimeras on Island Closest to Heaven
using Siren's L Mag-RF. Ratio is 1:20.
[2] Refine Phoenix Spirit using L Mag-RF. To get a Phoenix Spirit,
refine 20 Phoenix Pinions using GFAbl Med-RF. To create a Phoenix Pinion
refine 3 Mega-Phoenix with Tool-RF. Mega-Phoenix can be bought at
Johnny's Shop in Esthar.
[3] Draw from the Tonberry King. Squall must be at level 30 and above
when you battle him because the spell won't be availabe unless Tonberry
King's level is at 30 and above. Enemies consider Squall's level as the
basis of their level. If Squall is at level 100 then the enemies would
be at level 100 also.This is the easiest method of acquiring Full-Life
spells early in the game since you can acquire him once you get Balamb
Garden to be mobile and thus battle with him. Regen ring is hard to
acquire from Mesmerizes as they drop Mesmerize Blades more often.
Pain
Not much of a devastating spell but it is a good magic to junction
especially on Magic as it even surpasses Meteor. It inflicts Darkness,
Silence, and Poison on a target. It is better off to be at your status
defense. Here's how you can acquire it:
[1] Refine a Curse Spike using Diablos's ST Mag-RF.
[2] Draw from Elnoyles. Refer to method on how to defeat Malboros above.
[3] Draw from high level Granaldos. It was the boss at the training
system after the SeeD ball. You'll see him again when the faction
incident occurs in Balamb Garden. There are instances that you can draw
from him Pain but I think it considers your level. You can also meet
him in Ultimecia's Castle.
Triple
A real speed and hit booster. It is the only spell in the game which
surpasses Ultima in a certain statistic. Triple can be acquired from:
[1] Refine Rocket Engines (hell yeah! Like I'm going to do it!) using
Diablos' Time Mag-RF. Ratio is 1:50.
[2] Refine Three Stars (again, hell yeah!). Ratio is 1:100.
[3] Draw from Cerberus. This is not a really good option. He can be
pretty annoying since he casts three spells all at once when he has
triple status. Also he casts berserk leading you to attack him than
draw from him. Also you would want to focus on mugging the very useful
Spd-J from him than drawing Triple. Just follow method no. 4 below.
[4] Draw from Odin. Well this is the, what can I call it--most
practical way to get Triple as you won't have to sacrifice your good
items for the spell. Anyway, the reward for refining Three Stars are
good but, you would't want your hard earned precious non-refinable
item just be transformed to a spell that can be acquired through
another easier and lesser hassle method?
Ultima
Practically the most powerful spell and the best magic to junction to
any of your stat that you want to raise. Ultima is very hard to earn
and quite expensive (5,000 gil per draw at the Shumi Village). The
only ways to acquire Ultima (aside from drawpoints allover the world) are:
[1] Refine from Ultima Stones using Forbid Mag-RF. Ratio is 1:1.
[2] Refine from Energy Crystals dropped often by Elnoyles or seldom
dropped by Ruby Dragons. Ratio is 1:3.
[3] Refine Dark Matters. Ratio is 1:100.
[4] Draw from Ultima and Omega Weapons. (really, would you be doing
this? I mean the whole point of being strong is to defeat these monsters
and you're going to get from them what will make you strong?
Pointless if you get what I mean)
Note: I prefer method number two since Elnoyles are very easy to defeat
and you're guaranteed to get at least 2 to 3 Energy Crystal after every
battle. Unlike Dark Matter which you'll have to refine from 100 Curse
Spikes, you'll have to find Tri-Faces (as they are main sources of this),
mug them and if not the first try, the second or the third. Usually they
will give you 6 of these but that amounts only to 1 Ultima per Curse Spike.
Also Tri-Faces are hard to locate at the Island closest to Heaven.
If you want, you can find Forbiddens in Grandidi Forest but I doubt
you'll get it easily as they seldom drop it. Also try Malboros. But they
often drop Malboro Tentacles. So your best bet is the Energy Crystal
refinement method. You'll get large exp with defeating the Elnoyle,
huge AP (18) plus the other spells that you can get from him
(Holy and Pain).
------------------------------------------------------------------------
MISCELLANOUS ABILITIES/COMMANDS
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Aside from these junctionings and powering up, you may want to get a
couple of abilities that are very helpful in your battles. Some of
these occur only on one or two GF's. Or some, none at all. You may
wonder what are these for. Some of these abilities are not that good
since you won't be needing them after powering up your characters.
What you'll be needing are those that can really help you with your
battles. Some of the examples of these are Auto-Haste, Recover, Revive,
Devour etc.
Where to get these:
Auto-Haste
It is one of the most useful ability that can be equipped in your
ability slot. Haste will double your speed up thus making your ATB
fill faster. With this speed, plus your strength (tnx to your powering up),
you don't have to select any other option again but attack and just
press X button hold it down and see how enemies fall to their doom
(hehe ^_^). Also the good thing about Auto-Haste is that it cannot be
prevented by its counterpart spells, such as slow and stop. The only
thing that can make Auto-Haste disappear is Dispel. Auto-Haste last so
long as your battle lasts. Not like an ordinary haste spell that wears
off within a few minutes. This will enable you to attck at least 3 times
in a row with Omega Weapon and 9 attack turns for all your characters.
I remember when I was battling him, he only had the turn to cast a Meteor,
a Medigo Flame and a Terra Break with this speed. I was lucky I had
one last person standing up on Terra Break. Well, Omega didn't shoot
him enough to get killed. HEHEHE!Auto-Haste comes only from Cerberus
by learning all his speed junction abilities. The other way of getting
an Accelerator is through refinement. Refine 100 Lightweights with the
use of GFAbl Med-RF. Lightweights can be acquired from Vysages
(enemies who comes with Lefty and Righty. They can be found in the
Great Salt Lake before your first time of going to Esthar. But I don't
know if that place is accessible after getting Ragnarok or if at Disc 4.
Anyway, there's an alternate place where you can encounter this trio.
Fly your Ragnarok in Timber or Winhill. If you're near Winhill fly
over there, if at Timber then go to Timber. When at Winhill, just fly
over the cliff going towards Timber. You'll see a terrain that is
between the cliffs forming a V shape. Wander there and you'll fight the
trio 100% (stay on the non-grassy land). From Timber, go a little ways
southwest and you'll find this spot. Anyway, you'll have to mug Vysage
to get Lightweights 100%. Of course it drops it but scarcely. Not to
worry, he gives 6 of these.
Revive
Another useful ability especially if fighting against tough bosses
such as Ultima and Omega, or other tough opponents such as Ruby and
others that can almost kill one or two character in one or two
consecutive attacks. Revive from the name itself revives a fallen
character and gives back his/her full health. Much like Full-Life
but the goodness is no magic wasted! YAY! Anyway, Revive comes from
Alexander for 200 AP. This can also be acquired through refining and
for the first time, it's not hard! You don't have to fight enemies.
You don't have to mug enemies. You don't have to spend 15000000 gil
for one. You don't have to sit there, hours and hours trying to get
one by luck. All you need to do is buy, refine and refine. That's it!
You'll be needing Tonberry's Familiar for this, Call Shop for
convinience and a little bit of patience. Patience is for waiting for
Johnny's shop in Esthar to open for you. Call Shop is for easy access
for the shop. Johnny's shop, even though opened for you once, will no
be opened forever if your at the Shopping Mall. But with Call Shop,
Johnny can't do a thing but sell you his goodies. Anyway Familiar is
there so that you can buy his rare products one of which is the
Mega-Phoenix. Buy 3 of these and refine them to get 1 Phoenix Pinion
using Tool-RF. Then refine 20 of the Phoenix Pinion to get a
Phoenix Spirit which will enable you to learn Revive.
Recover
After sitting comfortably on your chair while creating a Phoenix
Spirit, another major pain comes along. But though, this is quite
hard, you'll want it badly because the reward is something very
very useful. Recover is an ability that enables your character to
regain full health again without any expense. This comes only from
the GF Leviathan. Again, I am warning you that this is quite a task.
You can choose not to worry about this if you will. You have been
warned for about 3 times now. What you'll be needing to learn this
fantastic ability is an item called Healing Ring. The item sounds
very familiar and too common but it's not. You can't get this
anywhere free. Unlike Status Guard or Elem Guard that can be won in
the boss fights in Ultimecia's Castle. This little tyke can only be
acquired from refinement. Okay, what you need to get a Healing ring is
just one type of item: Whisper. Now, it would seem to be okay still.
Whisper can be acquired from Adamantoises (those cute tortoises along
the beaches of Long Horn Isle). Well, the problem is they rarely appear
there and when they do appear, there are chaces that you'll get another
item instead of Whisper. You can mug him if you want but he'll likely to
give you an Orichalcon. If he gives you a Whisper, he'll drop two of it.
The best way to get this is to level down these heck of a tortoise using
LVL Down then Mug or defeat them. Remember, encounter with this is very
rare and I advice you not to engage with it if you don't feel that it's
not worth your time.
Treatment
An instant Esuna for everyone. Treatment comes from the GF Siren. Not
really handy but in times, it can help as much. To get this ability,
collect 100 Dragon Fangs from one of your consistent fans in the Island
Closest to Hell: Grendel. He drops this mostly so you won't have trouble.
Just leveling up your characters to 100 and you'll have the same time
100 of these. Anyway, refine these to get Med Kit using GFAbl Med-RF.
Devour
Well, a pretty handy ability if you don't want to go through all those
buying and refining for power ups (but I would still recommend you to
just refine for power ups. Why? read on). Devour enables you to have
a bonus point on a certain stat if you have devoured the right enemy.
I don't know which enemy to devour or not to devour. So if any of
you knows, please tell me *^_^* I will give you credit for it.
Devour comes with the GF Eden.
NOTE: The enemies that you have to eat are the following:
1) T-Rexaur for Strength
2) Ruby Dragon for HP
3) Adamantoise for Vitality
4) Malboro for Spirit
5) Behemoth for Magic
Auto-Reflect
Not much of a useful ability. By the time you have this, you'll be
laughing at spells that can be reflected. It cannot reflect those other
powerful spells such as Ultima an Meteor (since when did Ultima became
reflectable?). Not much of a use and a waste of slot for your GF
abilities. anyway to get this trough refinement, collect
100 Dragon Skin and refine it to 1 Glow Curtain. Or get 20 Magic Armlets
and refine them to get one. This comes with GF Carbuncle.
Auto-Protect
Again, not much of a use especially if your vitality is high already.
A waste of slot for your GF's and on your abilities. To get this you
need a Steel Curtain. To get one, refine 20 Adamantines. This comes
with the GF Bahamut.
Auto-Shell
Not much of use. Comes from GF Doomtrain and can be refined by
collecting 100 Malboro Tentacles and convert them to 1 Moon Curtain.
Moon Curtain allows you to learn Auto-Shell and is quite useful for
magic based enemies. But all in all, not really useful.
Cover
An ability that enables your character to cover another one being
attacked and sustain the damage. Not much of a use except for Omega's
Terra Break. Well I like better cover in FF VII as it covers
automatically. You don't have to command them. To get this, well this
is insane I'm telling you. To get this refine 5 Holy Wars!!!!!!!
I don't know why Square would do something like this. I'd rather go
for the 5 Holy Wars than a lousy Knight's Code. Anyway you can get
this from Brothers.
Counter
Comes with Carbuncle and as for the description, the name says it all.
To get this through refinement, Get 2 Glow Curatains and refine them
to 1 Monk's Code. But I like Counter-Attack from FF7 better
(I think I'm beginning to be very biased).
Ability4x
A very useful ability and doesn't need to be equipped to function.
Ability4x comes only with the GF Bahamut. He's the only GF that has
this and it's a shame that not all your characters can have this
wonderful bonus; not if you know what you're going to get. One of
the hardest things to acquire in this game through refining but if you
know where to find a free one (2 actually) then you won't have to
sit your butt again refining. One you can get from Cheryl's shop
(again, the one that never opens). Just talk and talk and talk to the
shop and you'll eventually be given a gift. Note that the only gift
you'll be given is the Rosetta Stone. If somehow you got another kind
of item then maybe your at Johnny's or there is another gift that Cheryl
gives. But as far as I know, that's the only thing you can get. The
other one can be gotten from Ultimecia's Castle after solving the
floodgate mystery and the purpose of the Organ. To see the details,
see Scott Ong's FF8 faq. Tnx to him I learned about this.
So check out his faq.
OUTRO
Well, that's about it! Now that you've maximized almost all of your
characters statistics, got every slot of junctionable magic
junctioned already with the most powerful spells, got the best
abilities in the game, then maybe you'll be quite proud of your
achievement (I know. I am too). Anyway here ends my faq and hopefully,
it was of great help to you all people out there. Thanks for
taking time to read my faq.
Copyright2002 vpth
this faq can be found in the following sites:
www.gamefaqs.com
www.neoseeker.com
