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sirsystemerrorAt the start of World 3, Antlion was roadkill. Old doesn't reduce enemy strength on SNES so it wasn't a total walkover, but it was still easy. Helps that Comet is unaffected by level (Sonic Wave lowers it).
I got Magic Song. Then I used Teleport!! This took me outside of Ghido's Cave and opened the world back up early. Of course, I didn't want to do too much without Lenna. It primarily meant getting the last few Bard songs early for what they're worth, and being able to return to Lix to get cheap items again. I danced a bit in Regole after this, mostly to make up the deficit of not being able to get the Flame Shield. And yes, you can enter Mirage even with random encounters off.
Gargoyles were most easily handled with haste/slow and utterly ruining them with the Chicken Knife. They were also very open to Love Song.
I reset until I sneaked by all the on-field enemies in the Pyramid. There was one that was unavoidable, and surprisingly, the Mummies were actually a pain. I had to use some Phoenix Downs before Bartz could sing Requiem twice. Appropriately enough, Bartz mastered Bard after this fight. I switched him to Chemist, although it would really only have worth when I returned.
Melusine is vulnerable to stop. I used Love Song along with the spell Stop itself, and had Krile dancing with the Chicken Knife. I bought a Lamia's Tiara at Mirage to increase the chances of it showing up.
The second trip into the Pyramid went well. This was also another spot with an infinite grind opportunity if I felt like it or needed it: the Aspises. As with prior things, I just fought each group once. Double Requiem was very effective here, as was the Apollo Harp. Against the non-undead enemies, confusion worked. The Mecha Heads were especially vulnerable and sometimes would just destroy themselves with a Strong Fight. Faris got to level 6 Time Mage at this point, so I switched her to Chemist and Bartz to Time Mage. Everyone was level 22 after I got done here.
Next was an early trip into the void. I bought Reset before entering. Calofisteri had a rare steal that I wanted. I got it without too much hassle and some use of Reset.
I would not yet be fighting Omega, but eventually. Apanda, however, wiped me! Wind Slash still hurts!! It took a bit of luck to get through this.
The Alte Roites could use Circle, which is where Reset came in handy. They went down in a single Sword Dance. As for the Jura Avises, I used Hero Song to try to increase the odds of X-Zone working on them, but if not, several Sword Dances still worked.
In addition to the Rainbow Dress, I picked up several other useful accessories in there. Lenna mastered Dancer when going through this mess, so I changed her job to Bard for a bit. After leaving, I fed the first Magic Pot in Phoenix Tower so Bartz could get L6 Time Mage. I'll get back to that. Lenna was a Time Mage, Bartz was a Dancer, Krile was a Chemist, and Faris was a Bard.
The Island Shrine had two more monsters in boxes. Covert was straightforward, but I made sure to fight a Prototype instead of a Mecha Head to get a Dark Matter drop. It wasn't tough, but after a Sword Dance that barely didn't kill, Comet did two digit damage. That's the problem with the spell, heavily affected by magic defense.
This guy turned out to be one of the harder bosses! Most of it was self-inflicted though: I wanted a Dark Matter steal from all the targets. I took advantage of the Half Elixir !Mix (restores all MP, Hi Potion+Ether) and had Time Mage Lenna use the Thief Knife with Quick.
For Fork Tower, Bard and Chemist went to Minotaur, with !Drink and !Dance respectively, and Time Mage and Dancer went right, with Equip Ribbons and !Time. It may seem like an unusual setup, but Omniscient is vulnerable to Stop. Lenna wore the Reflect Ring here; I can get another, but it's after sub access. Strategy was simple: Stop and !Dance. He can't reset (or use Flare) when stopped. Powering up and smashing was the order of the day against Minotaur. I just made sure to switch out the Chicken Knife. Lamia's Tiara boosted Sword Dance odds too, so.
The rest of the optional bosses went smoothly. Odin took some Sword Dance luck but that was about it. The three little pigs got sliced by Odin out of the lamp. Leviathan is a dragon so Apollo's Harp slaughtered him; I wore the three Coral Rings I had but he never used Tidal Wave. Bahamut is not a dragon, but he also can't resist a good Love Song. I thought of many ideas for Gogo, but I settled on just Kiss of Blessing and killing. Can never resist some good mime murder.
I didn't fight the wall traps in Phoenix Tower, although if I did, it'd be one per floor. The randomness of them compared to other fixed encounters put me off, and I felt I had enough AP anyway. Against the pots, I could use the Wonder Wand if the first Elixir wasn't accepted.
I had a nice chunk of change to spend when all was said and done: 474444 gil to be exact. Hermes Sandals are still nice to have for NeoExdeath because of Dispel, so I bought three. And an extra Coral Ring just in case. Topped up on Hi Potions and got a chunk of Phoenix Downs. I sat on Flame Rings.
Just need to finish things off, starting with Omega. You either have a tool to deal with it or you don't. And I had the tools to crush it for once: actually, Love Song is probably the intended solution to avoid the counters given the code. Still is bad design since this is never hinted at in game anywhere. At this point, everyone had mastered Bard. Everyone went in with !Sing. I opened with Speed Song on Lenna and having everyone else sing Love Song until I had built up enough to comfortably and permanently lock the robot down - doing that was certainly not the intended solution, but honestly? Screw Omega. Then I could have Lenna sing Hero Song while Faris used !Dance and the other two kept it locked down. The robot never got a chance to move! The video is boring but it's there.
Azulmagia was beaten down with !Dance. If I wanted to optimize, I'd have added Venom Rod breaks. Catastrophe killed me in a funny way: I was cycling the Wonder Wand for later, taking advantage of its pathological hatred for float status and wearing a Wall Ring. Holy reflected and hit the Wall Ring user. Oops. I got the Elf Cape drop from Halicarn second try, very nice. Also just a beatdown. I wore Coral Ring for Twin Tania. Haste, Slow, kill (with !Dance).
What's that? I have Berserk access, so Shinryu should be easy? Well, yes. But I didn't need that. The setup was Lenna Bard/!Time, Bartz Chemist/!MIx, Krile !Dance/!Time, and Faris Time Mage/!Mix. Coral Rings let me survive the opening Tidal Wave. Every time one of the girls' turns came up, they would use Quick: Lenna and Faris both had Gold Hairpins for this. The !Mix users raised the attackers' levels. Apollo's Harp and Chicken !Dance did the damage. Shinryu got two turns after its opening move: a Fight that killed Krile, and a Thunder that did half of everyone's max HP due to the weakness from Coral Ring. In other words, not enough. Here it is in video form.
For Necro, Death Potions killed the barriers. The usual killed him. I had saved one Jura Avis earlier, however. I used this and the status bug to give everyone Ribbon (everyone but Krile had learned Equip Ribbon) and Angel Ring resistances (went out and got four) before final Exdeath. The stage was set for an ass-kicking.
With everyone immune to White Hole, I took full advantage of the first phase of Exdeath. I had Lenna pump everyone's stats with !Sing. I had eight Dragon Fangs. Everyone got a Dragon's Kiss and the non-Chemists got a Giant Drink mix; Bartz himself just drank one. I drained Exdeath's MP, slowed him, and began the beatdown. He didn't last long.
When NeoExdeath appeared, things got ugly. The girls all had !Time. After a couple queued Sword Dances went off, Faris used Quick followed by Bahamut from the Lamp and...X-Zone, mostly because I forgot Elemental Power earlier. But it landed on the back part ("Exiled to the Rift"), so, lol? Lenna started massacring the Grand Crosser with Apollo's Harp. Krile...tried to Sword Dance, but I had buffed so much that the damage was overflowing! I had to have her attack normally! Faris kept using the Lamp and eventually started breaking rods.
All in all, I killed NED before any parts could move!! Video here.
All in all, this was an interesting challenge. Wouldn't exactly call it hard, however. Hopefully it managed to be entertaining anyway. Thanks for reading.
Index
I got Magic Song. Then I used Teleport!! This took me outside of Ghido's Cave and opened the world back up early. Of course, I didn't want to do too much without Lenna. It primarily meant getting the last few Bard songs early for what they're worth, and being able to return to Lix to get cheap items again. I danced a bit in Regole after this, mostly to make up the deficit of not being able to get the Flame Shield. And yes, you can enter Mirage even with random encounters off.
Gargoyles were most easily handled with haste/slow and utterly ruining them with the Chicken Knife. They were also very open to Love Song.
I reset until I sneaked by all the on-field enemies in the Pyramid. There was one that was unavoidable, and surprisingly, the Mummies were actually a pain. I had to use some Phoenix Downs before Bartz could sing Requiem twice. Appropriately enough, Bartz mastered Bard after this fight. I switched him to Chemist, although it would really only have worth when I returned.
Melusine is vulnerable to stop. I used Love Song along with the spell Stop itself, and had Krile dancing with the Chicken Knife. I bought a Lamia's Tiara at Mirage to increase the chances of it showing up.
The second trip into the Pyramid went well. This was also another spot with an infinite grind opportunity if I felt like it or needed it: the Aspises. As with prior things, I just fought each group once. Double Requiem was very effective here, as was the Apollo Harp. Against the non-undead enemies, confusion worked. The Mecha Heads were especially vulnerable and sometimes would just destroy themselves with a Strong Fight. Faris got to level 6 Time Mage at this point, so I switched her to Chemist and Bartz to Time Mage. Everyone was level 22 after I got done here.
Next was an early trip into the void. I bought Reset before entering. Calofisteri had a rare steal that I wanted. I got it without too much hassle and some use of Reset.
I would not yet be fighting Omega, but eventually. Apanda, however, wiped me! Wind Slash still hurts!! It took a bit of luck to get through this.
The Alte Roites could use Circle, which is where Reset came in handy. They went down in a single Sword Dance. As for the Jura Avises, I used Hero Song to try to increase the odds of X-Zone working on them, but if not, several Sword Dances still worked.
In addition to the Rainbow Dress, I picked up several other useful accessories in there. Lenna mastered Dancer when going through this mess, so I changed her job to Bard for a bit. After leaving, I fed the first Magic Pot in Phoenix Tower so Bartz could get L6 Time Mage. I'll get back to that. Lenna was a Time Mage, Bartz was a Dancer, Krile was a Chemist, and Faris was a Bard.
The Island Shrine had two more monsters in boxes. Covert was straightforward, but I made sure to fight a Prototype instead of a Mecha Head to get a Dark Matter drop. It wasn't tough, but after a Sword Dance that barely didn't kill, Comet did two digit damage. That's the problem with the spell, heavily affected by magic defense.
This guy turned out to be one of the harder bosses! Most of it was self-inflicted though: I wanted a Dark Matter steal from all the targets. I took advantage of the Half Elixir !Mix (restores all MP, Hi Potion+Ether) and had Time Mage Lenna use the Thief Knife with Quick.
For Fork Tower, Bard and Chemist went to Minotaur, with !Drink and !Dance respectively, and Time Mage and Dancer went right, with Equip Ribbons and !Time. It may seem like an unusual setup, but Omniscient is vulnerable to Stop. Lenna wore the Reflect Ring here; I can get another, but it's after sub access. Strategy was simple: Stop and !Dance. He can't reset (or use Flare) when stopped. Powering up and smashing was the order of the day against Minotaur. I just made sure to switch out the Chicken Knife. Lamia's Tiara boosted Sword Dance odds too, so.
The rest of the optional bosses went smoothly. Odin took some Sword Dance luck but that was about it. The three little pigs got sliced by Odin out of the lamp. Leviathan is a dragon so Apollo's Harp slaughtered him; I wore the three Coral Rings I had but he never used Tidal Wave. Bahamut is not a dragon, but he also can't resist a good Love Song. I thought of many ideas for Gogo, but I settled on just Kiss of Blessing and killing. Can never resist some good mime murder.
I didn't fight the wall traps in Phoenix Tower, although if I did, it'd be one per floor. The randomness of them compared to other fixed encounters put me off, and I felt I had enough AP anyway. Against the pots, I could use the Wonder Wand if the first Elixir wasn't accepted.
I had a nice chunk of change to spend when all was said and done: 474444 gil to be exact. Hermes Sandals are still nice to have for NeoExdeath because of Dispel, so I bought three. And an extra Coral Ring just in case. Topped up on Hi Potions and got a chunk of Phoenix Downs. I sat on Flame Rings.
Just need to finish things off, starting with Omega. You either have a tool to deal with it or you don't. And I had the tools to crush it for once: actually, Love Song is probably the intended solution to avoid the counters given the code. Still is bad design since this is never hinted at in game anywhere. At this point, everyone had mastered Bard. Everyone went in with !Sing. I opened with Speed Song on Lenna and having everyone else sing Love Song until I had built up enough to comfortably and permanently lock the robot down - doing that was certainly not the intended solution, but honestly? Screw Omega. Then I could have Lenna sing Hero Song while Faris used !Dance and the other two kept it locked down. The robot never got a chance to move! The video is boring but it's there.
Azulmagia was beaten down with !Dance. If I wanted to optimize, I'd have added Venom Rod breaks. Catastrophe killed me in a funny way: I was cycling the Wonder Wand for later, taking advantage of its pathological hatred for float status and wearing a Wall Ring. Holy reflected and hit the Wall Ring user. Oops. I got the Elf Cape drop from Halicarn second try, very nice. Also just a beatdown. I wore Coral Ring for Twin Tania. Haste, Slow, kill (with !Dance).
What's that? I have Berserk access, so Shinryu should be easy? Well, yes. But I didn't need that. The setup was Lenna Bard/!Time, Bartz Chemist/!MIx, Krile !Dance/!Time, and Faris Time Mage/!Mix. Coral Rings let me survive the opening Tidal Wave. Every time one of the girls' turns came up, they would use Quick: Lenna and Faris both had Gold Hairpins for this. The !Mix users raised the attackers' levels. Apollo's Harp and Chicken !Dance did the damage. Shinryu got two turns after its opening move: a Fight that killed Krile, and a Thunder that did half of everyone's max HP due to the weakness from Coral Ring. In other words, not enough. Here it is in video form.
For Necro, Death Potions killed the barriers. The usual killed him. I had saved one Jura Avis earlier, however. I used this and the status bug to give everyone Ribbon (everyone but Krile had learned Equip Ribbon) and Angel Ring resistances (went out and got four) before final Exdeath. The stage was set for an ass-kicking.
With everyone immune to White Hole, I took full advantage of the first phase of Exdeath. I had Lenna pump everyone's stats with !Sing. I had eight Dragon Fangs. Everyone got a Dragon's Kiss and the non-Chemists got a Giant Drink mix; Bartz himself just drank one. I drained Exdeath's MP, slowed him, and began the beatdown. He didn't last long.
When NeoExdeath appeared, things got ugly. The girls all had !Time. After a couple queued Sword Dances went off, Faris used Quick followed by Bahamut from the Lamp and...X-Zone, mostly because I forgot Elemental Power earlier. But it landed on the back part ("Exiled to the Rift"), so, lol? Lenna started massacring the Grand Crosser with Apollo's Harp. Krile...tried to Sword Dance, but I had buffed so much that the damage was overflowing! I had to have her attack normally! Faris kept using the Lamp and eventually started breaking rods.
All in all, I killed NED before any parts could move!! Video here.
All in all, this was an interesting challenge. Wouldn't exactly call it hard, however. Hopefully it managed to be entertaining anyway. Thanks for reading.
Index
