sirsystemerror | FF3 Solo Red Mage (NES) Part III

I forgot how the Titan fight went, but I believe it was simply kill him before he killed me. Thankfully, he has low magic power, so Flare doesn't hurt too badly.

The Ancient's Labyrinth was a pain, and several enemies needed to be Silenced. Among them were this guy and a Great Daemon enemy, who summons Unne Clones repeatedly. They use similar attacks to the real deal, meaning those WWinds are suddenly very dangerous. Especially when there can be up to five of them in the fight at once!

The good news is, there's Crystal equipment here! Ulillilia can equip it! For a game that is very stingy on what classes that can equip, Red Wizard being able to use these is nothing short of a miracle. The helmet in particular was very welcome, as he'd been using the Mythril Helmet for most of the game.

It was a pain...a real struggle to get through. But once I hit this guy and landed the poison, I'd have a Ribbon to play around with. Making things a lot easier, except when Slepnirs here become involved. Their Toad spell seems to override immunity to it.

But after this, it was smooth sailing. Getting back wasn't too hard, I just had him start in the front with Tyrfing and Ice Shield. If one of these guys showed up, use dual Tyrfings and kill him ASAP. If not, fall back and start attacking. Meant a lot of row correcting since the switch sticks after battle, but this was the best way through.

I took Ulillillia up and down Sylx Tower after this, only using 3 HiPotions in the process. He encountered no dragons along the way. Besides the jerks at the base, the only real threat were the Qum Qums, which he moved into the front row and attacked for. Everything else couldn't touch him. I then went for Eureka and its bosses.

Amon was easy. He was first weak to lightning (took two guesses), then both his WallChanges resulted in a Fire weakness. Kunoichi was even easier. Physical besides her MindBlast special, neither of which could hit.

Now, General actually could hit. It wasn't for much, mind you. I would've had Ulillillia use the Magic Shield strategy, but every enemy from here on out resists every element in the game, because good game design. In any case, I was hitting more often than him and could heal, so as slow as it was, he would eventually seal the deal.

Ulillillia had to be in the front row for Guardian due to his Cure2, though kept the sword and shield setup. That aside, he was no big deal. Scylla, he needed to use all four of his Barriers for, but she fell too. Hopefully, I don't regret using them!! Although the only boss coming up where they might be desired is Echidna.

Hey, guess we know where a solo game tends to end up if you only get the levels you need. That said, that sucky guide says that White Mage can win at level 70ish, but Black Mage and Monk both "need" 99. They both need a lot of Elixirs and Turtle Shells, allegedly, too. Ulillillia the only "possible" Red Mage has gotten this far without use of a single Elixir, and hasn't had too much trouble.

But yeah, I think I'll be fine!!

Maybe.

Okay, screw this guy. Seriously. I can't stick out in the back and defend either, since he resists all elements because good game design. In the meantime, I decided that one way or another I was going to kill a dragon. And I did so by turning on autohold, turbo, and running back and forth at the top floor while listening to music.

This started up as I found one. This Green Dragon has 10000HP, which doesn't matter as it died in two Breaks due to having no immunity.

I ended up fighting three of them in the end. He gained 885600EXP in the process of searching for them, hitting Level 82. Oh, and I did savestate at the top floor. Nothing to prove by making that walk a second time, since nothing was going to kill Ulillillia and he was going to kill them, eventually. With 24 in stock, I moved forward.

Oh, and just to repeat, that sucky guide tells you to savestate when you run into one and kill it. And reload and try to kill it in a different way if it drops a piece of Onion equipment. Seriously. I'll just quote it.

Once you meet a Dragon, save in a savestate, and kill it. If it drops an Elixir, you can leave. If he drops an Onion Equipment, load the state and kill him differently(refer to me and OnionKid2002s FEOK FAQ).

Yeah. What the hell.

Zande wasn't too bad. Ulillillia went to the front row with his swords. He needed to use a couple Elixirs and I believe some Cure2 on the side, but it was otherwise this fight was not that big a concern.

Full disclosure: I did use savestates in the Dark World, but only before the start of each crystal guardian fight. I only needed to do reloads on Echidna (which I reloaded from the top of the tower for) or if I messed up the menuing and triggered a bug, but still.

There needs to be a way around 2-Headed Dragon. The only thing I can do is use TurtleShells: guess I unfortunately need them after all. By checking the memory at address 7598, I found I actually only needed nine of them for Ulillillia to reach near the ceiling, ten if I want him to hit it. I gave myself the five extra ones rather than going down and farming, because enough of this game is enough. I also tested White Shirt vs. Crystal Armor, and the amount of healing was nearly identical, thus I went with the higher defense option.

Then attack from the back row with sword and shield, and for god's sake, don't go into the equipment sidebar! The moment that happens, a bug triggers, and all the bonuses from Protect and Haste vanish. Otherwise, heal with Cure2 as needed, and use Elixir when low on health and out of magic.

I got him down to 18330 when I had to use my first Elixir, and 6669 for the second. Tedious, but easy with the right tools. Unlike every random in the Dark World which was simply tedious but easy.

Cerberus was easy, using one attack repeatedly which Ulillillia resisted. It only did 500-900 each time. The Red Wizard had enough Cure2s left so that he didn't need to use another Elixir.

Its regular-enemy palette swap, Garm, was notable for being one of the few things that could threaten Ulillillia here. A Mute could solve it, though.

I have 5 GodsWines, having gotten one as a drop somewhere. Ulillillia can use three max, and it quickly became clear that due to this thing's Drain spell, he wasn't going anywhere without at least one. Check out this thing's spells, which it uses in order.

Quake-Brak2-Drain-Meteo-Death-Flare-Drain-Meteo

I had to play Echidna carefully. Cure2 was out of the question: its damaging spells deal way too much, and there's too many of them in a row. The big black spells could do 2500-3500, and Drain could do 2000 at max. I played to the routine as best I could. In the end, after several tries, I ended up winning. After using eight Elixirs! Only 12 left. Hope I have enough.

Luckily, Ahriman was MUCH easier. Ulillillia only had to use one Elixir here, though I yolo'd a bit more than I should've, as shown here. Here's the spells it uses.

Meteo-Flame-Quake-Blizzard-Meteo-Thunder-Quake-Cure2

Meteo hurt as before, Flame and Blizzard were fun tickles that did single to double digit damage, and Quake and Thunder hurt, but did less than 1000.

So this is it. Level 83. Ulillillia has 11 Elixirs left. Is that enough for DarkCloud? He slapped on the Crystal Gear, because the boss uses nothing but FlareWave. Better to have the extra magic defense. He guzzled the three wine, and...

Umm...guys? I think I'm going to be okay, and that farming those Elixirs from the Dragons wasn't necessary. He traded blows with DarkCloud as it FlareWaved him repeatedly.

And indeed, in the end, Ulillillia finished the beast with six in stock.

Summary of this? Screw Cave of Darkness, and screw the entire endgame sequence. Two instances where my usual tactics failed, and I was left with the usual problems. I thought Ulillillia was going to have problems at the end, but it really didn't materialize. Even though his offense was low, it really didn't matter on the randoms when they could never damage him! A sword and a shield, what a novel combination. Cure2 was often enough for healing whenever it was needed, and being able to equip the Crystal equipment helped!

Stronger weapons could've made a difference in one or two places, especially on bosses, but either way, plinking from the back row was the way to go. Weapon selection in this game is quite limited, not just in what you can get but what jobs can equip. Kind of a shame, really, but one that didn't bother Ulillillia as much as it could've.

I might try one of the later crystal jobs next in this game, unsure which one. But man. The last dungeon run of Final Fantasy III was not well thought out at all. They're way too long, there are no save points in this game, and the bosses resisting all elements is pretty stupid. Everything else was worth it. But I might have to move onto the remake soon enough, because the gameplay in the original can only be taken so far.

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