FFR: Solo Blue Mage Part I
Mar. 27th, 2025 09:32 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sirsystemerrorAccording to Ozmo in an interview, the Blue Mage was one of the most obvious picks for a new job to add to Final Fantasy Renaissance. These wielders of monster abilities have appeared in various forms throughout the series from 5-11, with more sporadic appearances later like in Stranger of Paradise and in various side-games. It was one of the jobs I was most looking forward to playing, having saved it for my second casual. It ended up disappointing, I hate to say it. Hopefully, this solo report will at least be fun and interesting! It was one I wanted to do anyway for a while.
I was tempted to name this solo after the Lone Ranger, but I decided on Shanoa instead. Hailing from the Castlevania series, she dresses in blue and uses abilities obtained from monsters. Felt like a neat place to reach into.
Blue Mage is very similar to Red Mage in terms of equipment, with both having a good equipment draw (including Chain). They are also similar statistically, although Blue is guaranteed an INT growth on every level up and has higher averages. Considering INT boosts spell damage by (INT÷2)% and adds (INT×2.5) to spell accuracy, getting a point of it every level is a very good thing.
Also, fair warning: don't expect to see classic Blue Mage spells in their skillset like White Wind, Goblin Punch, or Mighty Guard. There are 26 enemy skills in vanilla Final Fantasy 1 and the FFR Blue Mage gets 24 of them spread across their eight levels of magic, for better or worse design. The only two unavailable to them are INK and TORNADO.
Because most of the enemy spells only show up later in the game, FFR scatters these "trainers" throughout the game to give your Blue Mages the opportunity to learn magic much sooner. A good bit of design sense for the most part. The monsters will ambush you and immediately use their spell. There's one in a very dumb location, but I'll get to that one when it's relevant.
This was not a carbon copy of the regular enemy CEREBUS. It had 96HP compared to the standard's 192, and less stats in general. It seemed a lot less likely to use SCORCH later in the battle. I had to get Shanoa to level 2 and have her chug some HEAL potions during the battle to survive this, but with that, she obtained her first spell.
Now, there is one big flaw with FFR's spell learning that I should mention before going any further: there is an element of luck involved. See, you only have a CHANCE to learn a spell. This is apparently lifted from FF11 (a favorite of Ozmo's) and is extremely stupid. No other game in the series puts Blue Magic learning up to a coinflip, for very good reason. The only ways to improve your odds are by leveling up or by using their LIMIT after promotion. Hopefully, Shanoa being a solo character would prevent this from being a frustration, and being the only target helps too. It's only a minor annoyance for these trainer battles, but there are some spells which you can only learn from random encounters.
There! First spell learned! SCORCH is as basic a spell as they come, and the first of five fire-elemental AoEs in the game. It has a base effectivity of 14. As a point of comparison, the FIRE spell has 20. So it's weaker, but hits everything. It would be good enough in the Marsh Cave at least.
There was a second spell to pick up that was too difficult as-is: the guard near the Mystic Key locked rooms had a NITEMARE. Again, this only had 100HP. It was much more difficult to beat for far less, though: it still got 3-hits which could easily destroy Shanoa. Not only that, but the spell it uses is SNORTING, a single target spell that inflicts darkness. Darkness is not a good status in FF1. It increases accuracy and helps the Dark Knight in FFR, but it wouldn't have a big effect. I was just at the point where it was enough to cause problems though, and unlike CEREBUS, the NITEMARE could use SNORTING in the battle.
It took a few attempts to make it over to Pravoka. Once I was there, though? Area of effect spells are not something you would normally have access to in vanilla FF1 at this point. Some classes in FFR do, and Blue Mage being one of them, Shanoa ended it on the first turn. Even if it weren't for this, Chain made all their attacks deal 1 damage.
Now, there were two L2 spells I could access at this point. A man in Pravoka offered to let me fight a BigEYE for the FLASH spell - hey, I guess there's a familiar one here after all. As you might expect, it inflicts darkness on all enemies. It had 101HP. Shanoa could actually defeat it because it didn't hit hard, but I wanted to keep the spell menu sorted.
Meanwhile, over in the Dwarves' Cave, there was an AGAMA with HEAT available. This one has 148HP, and unfortunately, it had a small chance to use HEAT afterwards. Shanoa couldn't win this. Not yet.
So it was time for a Silver Sword grind. KYZOKUs were the target, of course. This would also gain some levels, which would help out.
While trying to reset for stats on level 7 - the game was being unusually stubborn to give me a 1/4 STR gain - Shanoa ran into a lone OddEYE on the ocean. I immediately took advantage: I had her cast SCORCH for little damage, and as I hoped, it used GAZE! This paralyzed her, and once she recovered, she knocked it down. Another one learned!
GAZE cannot be learned through an NPC trainer. It is a L1 status-elemental spell that inflicts paralysis on one target with a +0 accuracy modifier. Compare to HOLD at L3, which has +64 accuracy. It's worse, but at a lower level and paralysis is deadly no matter where it comes from.
The proper level came shortly after that, and Shanoa got her sword.
What a difference, and sheesh! Calm down! This easily got her the spell. HEAT's base effectivity is 24. I beat the NITEMARE for its spell. I doubted I would ever use SNORTING, but it's the completionism that counts. I forgot about FLASH for a while.x
Elfland had even more NPC monsters to fight. The elf near the magic shops brought out a R.HYDRA with 91HP. Its CREMATE has a base power of 48. Compare it to the L3 FIR2 which has 60, and this is a little sad. It can still get the job done, however. It hurt Shanoa bad, especially considering it used it again in the battle, but two swings from the Silver Sword brought it down.
The Elf Castle had two more. Someone throwing out an EYE might seem scary, but all it uses is STARE. Few FF1 players have likely seen this: it's used exclusively by EYE, and only after GLANCE, SQUINT, and GAZE in its skill script. For something that requires you to drag out a fight against the thing, it's nothing special. 34 base power and non-elemental. It's hard to find a use for this: there are enemies who resist most elements, yes, but that's what the Blue Mage's sword skills are for.
I had to gain another level before going to my next destination: there was one more in the castle, but there was no problem with letting this one sit, permanently if need be. Because that destination was the Peninsula of Power!
FrWOLFs FROST is identical to CREMATE in power, just in the ice element instead. There is also no NPC that uses one, so I may as well grab it now because I can! CREMATE blasted the dogs away. My winning run was pretty sick: two of them survived, so it was down to turn order. One moved...and missed! Shanoa finished them off from there and got her shiny new spell.
That nearly got her another level. And on the way back, she hit 1 to the next level exactly. With that, I couldn't help but do a bit of flexing by gaining that level from the second NPC trainer in the Elf Castle. He carried a MANTICOR. These battles always give 1GP and 1XP.
I normally hesitate to call anything useless. Even things like FEAR have their purpose in weird variants. But STINGER really pushes the line. It targets all enemies and inflicts poison. In NES FF1, poison damage is not percentage-based. It instead deals 2 damage per turn. This spell is also L3! This is absolutely not worth it! I didn't even write its HP down, I think it was eighty something?
One more was available, in the Northwest Castle. It was the first of the Dragon Sages, just a flashy title for the ones who carry around dragons. Unlike some of the previous enemies, this one is indeed an unnerfed Frost D: as far as I can tell, it had 200HP exactly the same. Taking on an enemy from the midgame was going to be tricky. But I had a plan for this one.
They are not immune to the status element. Once I landed a GAZE, that was it. A few swings brought it down. And better yet, Shanoa learned its spell on the first try!
If you were worrying that Blue Magic is simply worse versions of Black Magic, let BLIZZARD ease your fears. It is L4 and has a base power of 100! ICE2 only has 80. This is a fantastic spell when the enemies don't resist it.
That was everything I could do before the Marsh Cave except maybe grind a bit more for it if I wanted. I was going to anyway for the Earth Cave just to help against the legions of the damned in there, and I'd be leveling on the Peninsula. But I decided I'd try to make it through before that. I got Shanoa to level 11 since she was close enough to it, and went in.
The first go was one of the strangest Marsh Caves I've ever had. I ran into four BONE/CRAWL groups, and Shanoa survived three of them (including once when the CRAWL got to attack). The last one finally got her, unfortunately. The second attempt ended at the WIZARDs. The third somehow died to spiders and slimes. I was fighting throughout the cave, because this was a character who could get stuff done.
The strategy against the WIZARDs was to use BLIZZARD. They may resist the ice element, but it's strong enough to take chunks out of them anyway, potentially enough to do it in two blasts.
The way out was very quiet. I was actually hoping to encounter some stunning undead: this was one character where I wasn't as worried about them. If Shanoa went first, she would simply end them with CREMATE. But it was all GARGOYLEs and other stuff that were easy to beat. Some finally did appear on B1, but it was on a chance to strike first. I went for the guaranteed RUN instead of the guaranteed kill for some reason.
ASTOS one-shot Shanoa the first go at the battle. She one-shot him the second time around. Fair is fair.
I didn't bother going back to the Marsh Cave for the Silver Bracelet. Sometimes I'll try if the character needs the money or in party setups, but that Silver Sword was otherwise the last piece of equipment that Shanoa needed to spend money on. She wasn't going to be buying her magic, just items and the BOTTLE.
Melmond had two new NPC trainers: one with a PERILISK and one with a SAURIA. They appeared to have standard stats. Both used an instant kill move that were the remaining L4 spells: SQUINT and GLANCE respectively. The former is death-elemental KO, the latter is stone-elemental petrify. After a lot of resets to resist the instant death, I got the first of these then used it after more resets to get the second. Note that in FF1, Poison and Stone were one and the same. They've been disentangled in FFR, but this only affects two enemies: CARBUNCLE (weak to death and not poison) and COCTRICE (resists stone but not poison). So, basically irrelevant.
If it's between the two, GLANCE is preferred due to its +5 accuracy bonus. And uh, it's actually always going to be GLANCE: almost everything that resists one resists the other. The things that only SQUINT works on are COCTRICE, Frost D, WIZARD, and both KARYs.
Something entirely new was waiting for me in Crescent Lake. ZoneEATER cast SWIRL, a spell that was originally non-elemental and exclusive to CHAOS. In FFR, it has the new water element and the same 128 base power. It was weak to the time element, which I had no means to exploit. So instead, I just one-shot it with GLANCE.
Oh, wow! I wasn't expecting that! There's another NPC trainer in Crescent who owns a PHANTOM. Its GLARE is yet another instant death attack, this one in the time element. In the original game, it existed solely to be resisted by CHAOS: nothing else did. A small handful of extra ones in FFR also do, but they're class exclusive. You can one shot anything else as long as you beat a magic defense roll. I was just fooling around trying to beat it with CREMATE and fully expecting to demonstrate the infamous "Needs more data" message that tells you when you fail the ability learn. But Shanoa learned it. She doesn't actually have the spell charges to cast it yet because it's L6, but it's there for when she does.
One advantage of playing this character is that I could actually do better than usual down here. Most classes would have to hit RUN at the sight of the undead hordes, COCTRICEs, etc. Shanoa could instead attack them. CREMATE wiped out the zombie type enemies (IMAGEs occasionally survived), BLIZZARD beat the COCTRICEs. I even had SWIRL to wash away WIZARDs! This was better than risking a run attempt that might not even work.
It's still the Earth Cave though, so it still took multiple attempts to get through. Turn order is still a fickle thing. And the first time I reached the VAMPIRE, he DAZZLEd and killed Shanoa on the spot.
Ah, here's that horrendous piece of game design. On my winning run no less! VAMPIRE hit Shanoa with DAZZLE, which she resisted before killing him. Then there it is, no DAZZLE for her. The next opportunity to learn it would be in Mirage Tower. At least it's no big loss: it's a L6 spell, status-elemental with +32 accuracy. It's just a stronger GAZE, and still not as good as HOLD (and it's higher level).
After making it back, I went and got the ROD after refreshing. There was a big one waiting in the Titan's Tunnel behind the eponymous monster!
JIMERA uses an ability called STONE. This was originally known as POISON on the NES version, and was renamed to not be identical to the Gas D's infamous breath attack. It hits all enemies at +5 accuracy and attempts to inflict petrify on them! And with the improved spell accuracy, it has a strong chance of working indeed. This spell is absurd, and it's L5! If you know when to employ it, it's one of the best spells in the Blue Mage's arsenal.
Why 1HP, by the way? Should've mentioned it earlier, but if you die to an NPC monster, you don't game over. You just get booted back to the map with everyone at 1HP. JIMERA could be GLAREd at, but it was also weak to SWIRL. I had to do this a couple of times because of an unexpected and suboptimal level-up. One time after, I did get the failed to learn message. Keep in mind that Shanoa was level 16 here, having long since started to learn L5 spells. The odds of learning a spell are completely opaque, by the way.
So it was back into the Earth Cave after gaining level 17 and making sure it was a good one. My first attempt that made it down to B4 was a weird mirror of my first attempt at the Marsh Cave. This time, it was four COCTRICE groups that showed up. Three were frozen to death until the fourth finally got her.
I took this shot a little later. This guy is massive bait, and who I was alluding to earlier when I said most of the NPCs with monsters were in sensible locations. There's a reason why I showed Shanoa being one-shot by the ZoneEATER's SWIRL: BLAZE has the same 128 power. Remember, they move first in an ambush, so you can't set up AFIR to protect against this in a party setting, which will end up way in the hole on healing. And you may just fail to learn it, because of wonderful game design!
There is a VERY good reason why you don't have to put up with this in any* official game in the series. I know Ozmo loves his FF11, but no. This is one piece of game design that should've stayed there.
And for a solo, it meant spending more time on B4 than necessary. He is not worth it! Especially when I can just kill LICH instantly with GLARE! I was actually surprised at how quickly the Earth Cave cooperated here. My second attempt that made it to B4 made it through, fourth or fifth overall. Not going to complain!
Well, Blue Mage has been doing all right for itself so far. Level 17 is fairly low for a solo at this point. But of course I'm going to get more levels for the Ice Cave, and for spellcasting/learning purposes.
First leg of the game down. Click over to see what's next.
Next | Index
*FFT. Certain high-level magic can be learned Blue Mage style if an enemy caster hits you with it, but you can of course learn it naturally. But Ultima and Zodiac, which are exclusive to this, are guaranteed learns. So it's fine there. Not fine here!
I was tempted to name this solo after the Lone Ranger, but I decided on Shanoa instead. Hailing from the Castlevania series, she dresses in blue and uses abilities obtained from monsters. Felt like a neat place to reach into.
Blue Mage is very similar to Red Mage in terms of equipment, with both having a good equipment draw (including Chain). They are also similar statistically, although Blue is guaranteed an INT growth on every level up and has higher averages. Considering INT boosts spell damage by (INT÷2)% and adds (INT×2.5) to spell accuracy, getting a point of it every level is a very good thing.
Also, fair warning: don't expect to see classic Blue Mage spells in their skillset like White Wind, Goblin Punch, or Mighty Guard. There are 26 enemy skills in vanilla Final Fantasy 1 and the FFR Blue Mage gets 24 of them spread across their eight levels of magic, for better or worse design. The only two unavailable to them are INK and TORNADO.
Because most of the enemy spells only show up later in the game, FFR scatters these "trainers" throughout the game to give your Blue Mages the opportunity to learn magic much sooner. A good bit of design sense for the most part. The monsters will ambush you and immediately use their spell. There's one in a very dumb location, but I'll get to that one when it's relevant.
This was not a carbon copy of the regular enemy CEREBUS. It had 96HP compared to the standard's 192, and less stats in general. It seemed a lot less likely to use SCORCH later in the battle. I had to get Shanoa to level 2 and have her chug some HEAL potions during the battle to survive this, but with that, she obtained her first spell.
Now, there is one big flaw with FFR's spell learning that I should mention before going any further: there is an element of luck involved. See, you only have a CHANCE to learn a spell. This is apparently lifted from FF11 (a favorite of Ozmo's) and is extremely stupid. No other game in the series puts Blue Magic learning up to a coinflip, for very good reason. The only ways to improve your odds are by leveling up or by using their LIMIT after promotion. Hopefully, Shanoa being a solo character would prevent this from being a frustration, and being the only target helps too. It's only a minor annoyance for these trainer battles, but there are some spells which you can only learn from random encounters.
There! First spell learned! SCORCH is as basic a spell as they come, and the first of five fire-elemental AoEs in the game. It has a base effectivity of 14. As a point of comparison, the FIRE spell has 20. So it's weaker, but hits everything. It would be good enough in the Marsh Cave at least.
There was a second spell to pick up that was too difficult as-is: the guard near the Mystic Key locked rooms had a NITEMARE. Again, this only had 100HP. It was much more difficult to beat for far less, though: it still got 3-hits which could easily destroy Shanoa. Not only that, but the spell it uses is SNORTING, a single target spell that inflicts darkness. Darkness is not a good status in FF1. It increases accuracy and helps the Dark Knight in FFR, but it wouldn't have a big effect. I was just at the point where it was enough to cause problems though, and unlike CEREBUS, the NITEMARE could use SNORTING in the battle.
It took a few attempts to make it over to Pravoka. Once I was there, though? Area of effect spells are not something you would normally have access to in vanilla FF1 at this point. Some classes in FFR do, and Blue Mage being one of them, Shanoa ended it on the first turn. Even if it weren't for this, Chain made all their attacks deal 1 damage.
Now, there were two L2 spells I could access at this point. A man in Pravoka offered to let me fight a BigEYE for the FLASH spell - hey, I guess there's a familiar one here after all. As you might expect, it inflicts darkness on all enemies. It had 101HP. Shanoa could actually defeat it because it didn't hit hard, but I wanted to keep the spell menu sorted.
Meanwhile, over in the Dwarves' Cave, there was an AGAMA with HEAT available. This one has 148HP, and unfortunately, it had a small chance to use HEAT afterwards. Shanoa couldn't win this. Not yet.
So it was time for a Silver Sword grind. KYZOKUs were the target, of course. This would also gain some levels, which would help out.
While trying to reset for stats on level 7 - the game was being unusually stubborn to give me a 1/4 STR gain - Shanoa ran into a lone OddEYE on the ocean. I immediately took advantage: I had her cast SCORCH for little damage, and as I hoped, it used GAZE! This paralyzed her, and once she recovered, she knocked it down. Another one learned!
GAZE cannot be learned through an NPC trainer. It is a L1 status-elemental spell that inflicts paralysis on one target with a +0 accuracy modifier. Compare to HOLD at L3, which has +64 accuracy. It's worse, but at a lower level and paralysis is deadly no matter where it comes from.
The proper level came shortly after that, and Shanoa got her sword.
What a difference, and sheesh! Calm down! This easily got her the spell. HEAT's base effectivity is 24. I beat the NITEMARE for its spell. I doubted I would ever use SNORTING, but it's the completionism that counts. I forgot about FLASH for a while.x
Elfland had even more NPC monsters to fight. The elf near the magic shops brought out a R.HYDRA with 91HP. Its CREMATE has a base power of 48. Compare it to the L3 FIR2 which has 60, and this is a little sad. It can still get the job done, however. It hurt Shanoa bad, especially considering it used it again in the battle, but two swings from the Silver Sword brought it down.
The Elf Castle had two more. Someone throwing out an EYE might seem scary, but all it uses is STARE. Few FF1 players have likely seen this: it's used exclusively by EYE, and only after GLANCE, SQUINT, and GAZE in its skill script. For something that requires you to drag out a fight against the thing, it's nothing special. 34 base power and non-elemental. It's hard to find a use for this: there are enemies who resist most elements, yes, but that's what the Blue Mage's sword skills are for.
I had to gain another level before going to my next destination: there was one more in the castle, but there was no problem with letting this one sit, permanently if need be. Because that destination was the Peninsula of Power!
FrWOLFs FROST is identical to CREMATE in power, just in the ice element instead. There is also no NPC that uses one, so I may as well grab it now because I can! CREMATE blasted the dogs away. My winning run was pretty sick: two of them survived, so it was down to turn order. One moved...and missed! Shanoa finished them off from there and got her shiny new spell.
That nearly got her another level. And on the way back, she hit 1 to the next level exactly. With that, I couldn't help but do a bit of flexing by gaining that level from the second NPC trainer in the Elf Castle. He carried a MANTICOR. These battles always give 1GP and 1XP.
I normally hesitate to call anything useless. Even things like FEAR have their purpose in weird variants. But STINGER really pushes the line. It targets all enemies and inflicts poison. In NES FF1, poison damage is not percentage-based. It instead deals 2 damage per turn. This spell is also L3! This is absolutely not worth it! I didn't even write its HP down, I think it was eighty something?
One more was available, in the Northwest Castle. It was the first of the Dragon Sages, just a flashy title for the ones who carry around dragons. Unlike some of the previous enemies, this one is indeed an unnerfed Frost D: as far as I can tell, it had 200HP exactly the same. Taking on an enemy from the midgame was going to be tricky. But I had a plan for this one.
They are not immune to the status element. Once I landed a GAZE, that was it. A few swings brought it down. And better yet, Shanoa learned its spell on the first try!
If you were worrying that Blue Magic is simply worse versions of Black Magic, let BLIZZARD ease your fears. It is L4 and has a base power of 100! ICE2 only has 80. This is a fantastic spell when the enemies don't resist it.
That was everything I could do before the Marsh Cave except maybe grind a bit more for it if I wanted. I was going to anyway for the Earth Cave just to help against the legions of the damned in there, and I'd be leveling on the Peninsula. But I decided I'd try to make it through before that. I got Shanoa to level 11 since she was close enough to it, and went in.
The first go was one of the strangest Marsh Caves I've ever had. I ran into four BONE/CRAWL groups, and Shanoa survived three of them (including once when the CRAWL got to attack). The last one finally got her, unfortunately. The second attempt ended at the WIZARDs. The third somehow died to spiders and slimes. I was fighting throughout the cave, because this was a character who could get stuff done.
The strategy against the WIZARDs was to use BLIZZARD. They may resist the ice element, but it's strong enough to take chunks out of them anyway, potentially enough to do it in two blasts.
The way out was very quiet. I was actually hoping to encounter some stunning undead: this was one character where I wasn't as worried about them. If Shanoa went first, she would simply end them with CREMATE. But it was all GARGOYLEs and other stuff that were easy to beat. Some finally did appear on B1, but it was on a chance to strike first. I went for the guaranteed RUN instead of the guaranteed kill for some reason.
ASTOS one-shot Shanoa the first go at the battle. She one-shot him the second time around. Fair is fair.
I didn't bother going back to the Marsh Cave for the Silver Bracelet. Sometimes I'll try if the character needs the money or in party setups, but that Silver Sword was otherwise the last piece of equipment that Shanoa needed to spend money on. She wasn't going to be buying her magic, just items and the BOTTLE.
Melmond had two new NPC trainers: one with a PERILISK and one with a SAURIA. They appeared to have standard stats. Both used an instant kill move that were the remaining L4 spells: SQUINT and GLANCE respectively. The former is death-elemental KO, the latter is stone-elemental petrify. After a lot of resets to resist the instant death, I got the first of these then used it after more resets to get the second. Note that in FF1, Poison and Stone were one and the same. They've been disentangled in FFR, but this only affects two enemies: CARBUNCLE (weak to death and not poison) and COCTRICE (resists stone but not poison). So, basically irrelevant.
If it's between the two, GLANCE is preferred due to its +5 accuracy bonus. And uh, it's actually always going to be GLANCE: almost everything that resists one resists the other. The things that only SQUINT works on are COCTRICE, Frost D, WIZARD, and both KARYs.
Something entirely new was waiting for me in Crescent Lake. ZoneEATER cast SWIRL, a spell that was originally non-elemental and exclusive to CHAOS. In FFR, it has the new water element and the same 128 base power. It was weak to the time element, which I had no means to exploit. So instead, I just one-shot it with GLANCE.
Oh, wow! I wasn't expecting that! There's another NPC trainer in Crescent who owns a PHANTOM. Its GLARE is yet another instant death attack, this one in the time element. In the original game, it existed solely to be resisted by CHAOS: nothing else did. A small handful of extra ones in FFR also do, but they're class exclusive. You can one shot anything else as long as you beat a magic defense roll. I was just fooling around trying to beat it with CREMATE and fully expecting to demonstrate the infamous "Needs more data" message that tells you when you fail the ability learn. But Shanoa learned it. She doesn't actually have the spell charges to cast it yet because it's L6, but it's there for when she does.
One advantage of playing this character is that I could actually do better than usual down here. Most classes would have to hit RUN at the sight of the undead hordes, COCTRICEs, etc. Shanoa could instead attack them. CREMATE wiped out the zombie type enemies (IMAGEs occasionally survived), BLIZZARD beat the COCTRICEs. I even had SWIRL to wash away WIZARDs! This was better than risking a run attempt that might not even work.
It's still the Earth Cave though, so it still took multiple attempts to get through. Turn order is still a fickle thing. And the first time I reached the VAMPIRE, he DAZZLEd and killed Shanoa on the spot.
Ah, here's that horrendous piece of game design. On my winning run no less! VAMPIRE hit Shanoa with DAZZLE, which she resisted before killing him. Then there it is, no DAZZLE for her. The next opportunity to learn it would be in Mirage Tower. At least it's no big loss: it's a L6 spell, status-elemental with +32 accuracy. It's just a stronger GAZE, and still not as good as HOLD (and it's higher level).
After making it back, I went and got the ROD after refreshing. There was a big one waiting in the Titan's Tunnel behind the eponymous monster!
JIMERA uses an ability called STONE. This was originally known as POISON on the NES version, and was renamed to not be identical to the Gas D's infamous breath attack. It hits all enemies at +5 accuracy and attempts to inflict petrify on them! And with the improved spell accuracy, it has a strong chance of working indeed. This spell is absurd, and it's L5! If you know when to employ it, it's one of the best spells in the Blue Mage's arsenal.
Why 1HP, by the way? Should've mentioned it earlier, but if you die to an NPC monster, you don't game over. You just get booted back to the map with everyone at 1HP. JIMERA could be GLAREd at, but it was also weak to SWIRL. I had to do this a couple of times because of an unexpected and suboptimal level-up. One time after, I did get the failed to learn message. Keep in mind that Shanoa was level 16 here, having long since started to learn L5 spells. The odds of learning a spell are completely opaque, by the way.
So it was back into the Earth Cave after gaining level 17 and making sure it was a good one. My first attempt that made it down to B4 was a weird mirror of my first attempt at the Marsh Cave. This time, it was four COCTRICE groups that showed up. Three were frozen to death until the fourth finally got her.
I took this shot a little later. This guy is massive bait, and who I was alluding to earlier when I said most of the NPCs with monsters were in sensible locations. There's a reason why I showed Shanoa being one-shot by the ZoneEATER's SWIRL: BLAZE has the same 128 power. Remember, they move first in an ambush, so you can't set up AFIR to protect against this in a party setting, which will end up way in the hole on healing. And you may just fail to learn it, because of wonderful game design!
There is a VERY good reason why you don't have to put up with this in any* official game in the series. I know Ozmo loves his FF11, but no. This is one piece of game design that should've stayed there.
And for a solo, it meant spending more time on B4 than necessary. He is not worth it! Especially when I can just kill LICH instantly with GLARE! I was actually surprised at how quickly the Earth Cave cooperated here. My second attempt that made it to B4 made it through, fourth or fifth overall. Not going to complain!
Well, Blue Mage has been doing all right for itself so far. Level 17 is fairly low for a solo at this point. But of course I'm going to get more levels for the Ice Cave, and for spellcasting/learning purposes.
First leg of the game down. Click over to see what's next.
Next | Index
*FFT. Certain high-level magic can be learned Blue Mage style if an enemy caster hits you with it, but you can of course learn it naturally. But Ultima and Zodiac, which are exclusive to this, are guaranteed learns. So it's fine there. Not fine here!
