============================================================================== ___ _ _ ___ _ | __(_)_ _ __ _| | | __|__ _ _ _| |_ __ _ ___ _ _ | _|| | ' \/ _` | | | _|/ _` | ' \ _/ _` (_-<| || | |_| |_|_||_\__,_|_| |_| \__,_|_||_\__\__,_/__/ \_, | |__/ __ _____ ___ \ \/ /_ _|_ _| > < | | | | /_/\_\___|___| I N T E R N A T I O N A L Z O D I A C J O B S Y S T E M WEAK MODE GUIDE By _Kuresuna_ Version 1.0, 4th July, 2010 ============================================================================== This guide is copyright © 2010 Kresna Susila. Permission is granted to use this guide for personal use only. It cannot be sold or be used commercially and cannot be copied or reproduced except for personal use without my written permission. You cannot host this guide on your personal site without first asking me. All trademarks and copyrights contained in this document are owned by their respective trademark and copyright holders. Permission is granted to host this document at: www.fftogether.com If you wish to use the guide for anything other than personal use or wish to host it on your site, send me an email at: kresna[dot]faq[a-in-circle]gmail[dot]com Obviously, removing and replacing because you're not a bot. ============================================================================== About This Guide [AbThGu] ============================================================================== Final Fantasy XII is an amazing game, and with the International edition came an even better game. Added to the international release was Weak Mode, a mode of game-play where your characters start and stay at their lowest levels. Players of the original XII might recognize this to be similar to a low level game, or 122333 game. The concept is the same, except your characters don't need to have fireflies equipped most of the time and you are restricted to the classes, and therefore the skills, you can use. This makes for an interesting take on a low level game. Instead of having all characters as carbon copies of one another, the player has to make important choices on their classes and their roles in combat. The game becomes more strategic to most people as instead of powering up your characters and boosting your HP through levels, you will find that most weapons will deal very little damage. Weak mode is a fun game-play mode and is usually not any more different to a regular game, it just requires a higher degree of strategy and a bit of time to collect items you need. Some parts of this game do get a bit difficult, but not impossible, and if you like a good challenge then weak-mode is for you. This guide is a full walkthrough of Weak Mode and assists you in collecting all the worth while one time items and spells along the course of your journey. It also has strategies for bosses and marks, suggested order to complete certain tasks and recommended Bazaar items. I will assume that you have played the game before, as you must complete trial mode to access weak-mode, and have a sound knowledge of the game-play mechanics. This is by no means at all the only way to play Weak Mode, but a guide for those who may be having trouble or like to power through. If you want to play differently or diverge from the guide then that is fine, but it may be troublesome if you don't have a spell or item that I use later on. However, the aim of any game is to have fun so do play it according to how you like. People who wish to take their own path may find the boss and Mark strategies very useful. Anyway, on to the guide ;) ============================================================================== Table of Contents [TaOfCo] ============================================================================== Use the search function of your reader or browser to jump to the section you're interested in. Paste the text and brackets and hit search! ========================================================= | | | About This Guide ............................. [AbThGu] | | Table of Contents ............................ [TaOfCo] | | Tips & Tricks ................................ [TiPaTr] | | Characters & Class ........................... [ChAnCl] | | --- | | Walkthrough .................................. [WaThGh] | | - Before The Garamsythe Waterway ............ [BtGaWa] | | - On Our Way To The Marquis ................. [OnWaMa] | | - To Jahara We March! ....................... [ToJaMa] | | - Catching Up On Hunts ...................... [CaUpHu] | | - Toward Archadia! .......................... [ToWaRc] | | - Gathering Rare Items ...................... [GaRaIt] | | - Catching Up On More Hunts ................. [CaUpHu] | | - The Great Crystal and Beyond .............. [TgCaBe] | | - Walking to the Heavens .................... [WaThHe] | | - The Final Battle .......................... [ThFiBa] | | --- | | Optional Content ............................. [OpTcOn] | | - Mark Hunts ................................ [MaRhUn] | | - Espers .................................... [EsPsRe] | | About the Author ............................. [AbThAu] | | Version History .............................. [VeRhIs] | | Thanks and Credits ........................... [ThAcRe] | | | ========================================================= ============================================================================== Tips & Tricks [TiPaTr] ============================================================================== In Weak Mode there are a few things that help out a great deal in the late game that most players should be aware of. There are things that have been changed from the original Final Fantasy XII that should really be taken advantage of, and here are some general tips. Below are a few things that new players, or veterans to the original, should know. 1. CHESTS RESPAWN BY MOVING 1 MAP AWAY! Yes, it really deserved all caps. This must be one of the biggest improvements in the game and saves so much time and headaches. To respawn a chest you just have to move to an adjacent map and back. Of course, some are still one time only and most only have a chance of appearing, but it is still a lot faster. 2. Abuse L1 turbo button. Pressing L1 toggles the speed of the game from normal speed to 4x the normal. Most of the time the 4x won't actually be smooth unless you are in a small area, but if you need to grind for a chest or item, then killing all the enemies and only having one active party member makes it run faster which saves you time. 3. Plan your license boards. Weapon licenses for the most part are useless and you don't need every armour license on your way to victory. The augments are the ones that really come in handy, being able to increase your max HP, magic damage and battle speed. Potions healing for more lets you keep up with the damage you take by equipping the Pheasant Netsuke, and MP reducing augments keep you casting for longer. If you don't need something in particular, don't bother getting it, simple as that. You will want Blood Sword A, and you will want all the Remedy Lores, so think ahead. 4. Use the "Change Equipment Trick." If you change a character's equipment after they have completed an action or skill then change it once more, that character won't have any recovery time from their skill to hinder the casting of the next spell or attack. Using this, you can get a lot more attacks in than your enemy, but it takes more time. You shouldn't need to use this, but in case you do, it's there. 5. Abuse status effects. They are a great tool to your success in Weak Mode. Spells like Sleep and Blind can make a battle win or lose, and Oil lets you dish out some insane damage. Reverse, once you get it, greatly reduces the difficulty level of the game. ============================================================================== Characters & Class [ChAnCl] ============================================================================== In Weak Mode, your characters will stay at their lowest levels throughout the entire game and monsters will not give any EXP. This means that you won't get any HP or MP bonuses from leveling up and your stats will be very low. At their lowest levels, your characters will have the following stats without any equipment: Vaan - Level 1 Balthier - Level 2 Fran - Level 2 ------------------ ------------------ ------------------ HP: 82~83 HP: 101~105 HP: 84~89 MP: 30~33 MP: 34~39 MP: 44~50 Strength: 23 Strength: 25 Strength: 23 Mag Power: 22 Mag Power: 18 Mag Power: 20 Vitality: 24 Vitality: 24 Vitality: 26 Speed: 24 Speed: 24 Speed: 23 Basch - Level 3 Ashe - Level 3 Penelo - Level 3 ------------------ ------------------ ------------------ HP: 139~146 HP: 99~106 HP: 64~66 MP: 31~38 MP: 56~65 MP: 38~41 Strength: 26 Strength: 22 Strength: 20 Mag Power: 21 Mag Power: 25 Mag Power: 21 Vitality: 20 Vitality: 24 Vitality: 23 Speed: 23 Speed: 23 Speed: 24 You may think that the difference in these stats is minimum and it dosn't really make that much of a difference, but really, your characters will not be getting any level ups to increase their stats so your decision should be a wise one. We wouldn't want to make, say, Balthier a black mage, when Ashe has far more Mag Power than he would ever have. If you don't want to select your classes based on their best stats and want to pick freely, thats perfectly okay. You will still be able to beat everything with Balthier as a Black Mage. The classes that I believe to best suit a Weak Mode game are the following: Machinist ------------------ You absolutely must have a Machinist on your team. They will be your main damage dealer for this game. There is no doubt that you'll want this class. Guns ignore defence when doing damage and Wyrmfire shot + Oil will be a very strong combination for the entire game. They are also able to use Light Armour which can give you an extra 1,600 HP. White Mage ------------------ The buffs a White Mage can give make them an excellent choice. Though red mage gets some of their spells, it's best to have a white mage on your team anyway. Even though your MP will be low without a lot of mystic armour, using a buff at the right time can really make a battle flow easier. Reverse and Decoy are also helpful spells and it means you simply have another person to cast it. Black Mage ------------------ There will be some points in the game when your gunner is ineffective because he or she cannot deal enough damage per hit. This is where your Black Mage comes in. With the best mystic armour and staff you can reach 70+ Mag Power and with oil, you can deal 17,000+ damage on monsters with Firaga. I highly recommend you have a Black Mage as places like the deeper Henne Mines would be hell without one. Shikari/Hunter ------------------ The Hunter is an excellent class. They get a lot of HP Augments, and can use the Fomalhaut after The Great Crystal. Untill then they make a good decoy with the Main Gauche + Demon Shield and their high HP means that they'll be able to take a fair few hits. The Shikari No Nagsa F also has a high instant KO chance if you have the patience and time to get it. They are another class to use Light Armour, giving them +1,600 HP. This class is highly recommended. Knight ------------------ Knights may not seem like the best choice at first, but when you realise just how useful the Blood Sword A is with its 100% confusion you'll be glad you picked one. They can also use the Zodiac Escutcheon, the best normal shield in the game. Even though they have low HP when compared to a Hunter, they usually make your front-line team because of the Blood Sword. Red Mage ------------------ While a Red Mage lacks the spells that other classes get, they are the only class in the game to get dark magic, including Death. It can come in handy in some parts of the game and it's a back-up character to use decoy and reverse. Over all, if you need two people to deal magic damage, then red mage is your best bet, but most of the time they will be sitting in the side lines. It is entirely possible to win this game using classes other than described above, but those are the ones I do recommend. Whatever you do, do not go into this mode without a Machinist. You're free to pick the classes you want, but I will write this guide with the above classes in mind. Now that we've decided the classes we will use, let's plan out which characters will be what class. This isn't required, but it dosn't hurt to have the extra Mag Power or Speed for a class, and it definitely helps not having Balthier as a Machinist or Hunter. Again, feel free to assign how you see fit because this is just a recommendation. ------------------ Vaan - Red Mage Though he has the lowest MP, Vaan has the second highest Mag Power. ------------------ Balthier - Knight OR Hunter His second highest HP and Strength make him good at either of these classes. Don't make him a mage as he has a low MP pool and dismal Mag Power. Slow attack speed with guns make him more suited as a Knight, however. ------------------ Fran - Machinist All around stats make Fran a good Machinist, as guns do not rely on their character's stats. ------------------ Basch - Knight OR Hunter High HP suitable for a Hunter but high STR that lets you do some additional damage with swords in the late game, which makes him good at being a Knight too. ------------------ Ashe - Black Mage Very high Mag Power makes her a great black mage, along with her high MP. She is The single best character to be this class. Remember that you won't reach 99 Mag Power as any character as you cannot level up. ------------------ Penelo - White Mage Third best Mag Power and a decent amount of MP. Penelo has very little HP so it isn't such a big sacrifice giving her the lowest HP class in the game. ------------------ The classes that I will pick are: Vaan - Red Mage Balthier - Knight Fran - Machinist Basch - Hunter Ashe - Black Mage Penelo - White Mage With our classes picked and planned, we can now start and enjoy the game! ============================================================================== Walkthrough [WaThGh] ============================================================================== I have laid out the guide in a simple manner. Each section of the guide has the following lay out: ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ [] ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Items we will find: Items we will buy: Loot to collect: - Items that I believe are - Items I recommend we - We will collect of use to us, or are a buy in that portion certain loot to get notable one time only of the game. some great Bazaar item. goods. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ This guide also has most of the one time chests along the way as I like to be a bit of a perfectionist. If there is a skill you know you won't use and you don't mind having an incomplete item list then go ahead and skip it. Most items we pick up will be useful in one way or another though and it is better to be safe than sorry by having the items incase you need them than not having them at all. The guide also refers to the English translation of names, items and jobs. You can use an english map to find your way around to the locations I specify. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Before The Garamsythe Waterway [BtGaWa] ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Items we will find: Items we will buy: - Blind - Dark - Silence - Oil - Poison - Decoy - Firefly - Mage's Monograph - Flame Staff ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ If you havn't read the tips and tricks section I recommend you atleast skim through it. Play the game untill you take control of Vaan, visit Migelo and accept the mark in the Sandsea. When you can, change Vaan to the class of choice, I picked Red Mage. Make your way to the east gate and save. Slay your first mark, use a potion if you need to. Don't bother killing monsters for LP in the Estersand. When you can control Vaan after going back to the East Gate you should be near the clan hall. Ask the Bangaa to let you in and sign up with Montblanc and get the 3 potions from him. On your way to the south gate, accept the Thextera mark and speak to gatsly then report about the Rouge Tomato to Tomaj. Speak with Dalan and make your way to the Giza Plains, be sure to touch the teleport crystal. -------- NOTE: -------- I should make this clear now. There is no reason to not open a chest in this game. Most players probably know this but if not, you do now. The chest near the entrance to Dalans place wont change anything in the game and you should loot everything in sight. -------- When you get Penelo in your party at the Nomad Village you now have a good moment to gather some LP and money. Don't forget to buy a map at the Moogle and you might aswell select Penelo's class now, White mage for me. Getting LP here is a good idea because you have two party members, which makes killing the monsters slightly easier. Chain Wolves in the Estersand and try and build a large chain, though their loots don't sell for a lot we need all the money we can get. You can also find the Blind spell in the area to the right side of Toam Hills before you set off to the Estersand. In the Yardang Labyrinth near Nalbina, you can find the silence spell and in the Sand-swept Naze, just off the ledge from the entrance from the Labyrinth, you can find the Poison spell. While you are grinding for LP don't be afraid to use Potions. Wolves can drop them and if you pick up all the chests you see you'll have no worries keeping a healthy stock. Also, it might be best to touch the warp crystal in Nalbina and the South Bank Village so we don't have to later on, though this will break your chain. While you are in the Sand-swept Naze be careful of the Nekhbet rare game which can spawn on entry, don't bother killing coctrices, just chain the wolves. Once you collect 99 Wolf Pelts from chaining, sell them off at the NPC in Nalbina and chain again. We want to buy a large supply of phoenix downs for chaining Dustia. Lets do a bit of math: Phoenix downs cost 200 Gil each, so to get 99 we would need 19,800 Gil. Wolf Pelts sell for 41 Gil each and a stack of 99 sells for 4,059 Gil. Wind Stones sell for 35 Gil each and a stack of 99 sells for 3,465 Gil. This means we could sell 5 stacks of 99 Wolf Pelts to reach 99 phoenix downs, but we don't really need that many as we'll get more money from Dustia. From selling near 200 Wolf Pelts we will have over 8,000 Gil and that will let us buy around 40 phoenix downs. Wolves will also drop Wind Stones and so you may get anywhere from 50 to 90 stones per 99 Wolf Pelts you sell, giving you that extra few thousand Gil. Once you've collected atleast 8,000 Gil, though you should have over 10,000 from the Wind Stones aswell, it is then time to move on from the Estersand. Take a trip from Nalbina, where you sold your loot, back to Rabanastre and pick up the Firefly from the outpost on your way. Once in Rabanastre, go to the west gate and save your game. Exit out to the Westersand and make your way to Thextera. -------- Thextera -------- He shouldn't be too hard to kill, he can hit hard but try and make Vaan the target for his attacks, with Penelo using potions on who ever needs them. His attacks can cause poison which you should cure, as its just one more thing to take down your HP. -------- If you had made Vaan a Hunter, then you may want to scroll down to where you can get the gladius, its not nessecary to get it now but you can with penelo still in your party. Once you've beaten Thextera, finish the sun stone quest and meet Dalan. Penelo will leave your party and this is what we want as with Penelo gone, the NPC outside of Nalbina will sell phoenix downs. Don't go into the sewers yet, there is still some things we should do. Head off to Nalbina and buy as many phoenix downs as you can, the more the better as we will be Dustia Chaining with these. Before the sewers this is the earliest you can buy phoenix down, so be sure to stock a lot of them. Once you have all you need you can head back to the Rabanastre West Gate and save. -------- Dustia Chaining -------- Dustia chaining is a method of gathering large amounts of LP and money by chaining the rare game monster Dustia. Being undead, it can be killed with a phoenix down, and can be respawned straight away if you leave the screen before the EXP/LP message pops up. Below will outline this technique in depth if you have never done this before. 1. Exit west to the Galtea Downs and stand next to the entrance of the Corridor of Sand. Get Vaan's HP below 10% of his maximum by selecting attack, then pressing L1 or R1 to target yourself. If you think your next attack will kill Vaan, unequip your weapon. 2. Set your battle speed to slow and battle mode to wait if you havn't done this using active before. 3. Walk into the Corridor of Sand and wait for Dustia to appear beside you. 4. Wait for his HP bar to appear then select a phoenix down from your item menu. When you have to select your target, press L1 or R1 and select Dustia as your target so you use the phoenix down on him. 5. When he dies, collect any loot bag that falls then zone quickly before the EXP/LP popup appears. 6. Dustia will respawn when you enter the Corridor of Sand again, rinse and repeat untill you run out of phoenix downs. If you've never done this, the first few times you might die, or you might not be able to collect the loot bag before the EXP/LP popup. If this is the case, here are some tips to make this easier. - Place Phoenix Downs at the top of your item list to make it go faster. - Always try to pick up the loot from Dustia's front, never from the side or back. - When Dustia dies, as soon as you see the loot bag, press Circle to bring up the menu. The bag will hit the ground but Dustia's death animation will pause, giving you time to pick it up instead of waiting for it to fall. - Walk back to the zone line a bit before Dustia spawns so he appears closer to it, giving you more time to escape. - If you think you can't make the loot bag and get out, don't try and pick it up! It is not worth breaking your chain to pick up a single bag when you'll collect more as the chain goes on. -------- After your first batch of Phoenix Downs, you should have around 50+ Books of Orgain and a few Flame Staves. If you didn't get atleast 40 books you may want to reload your game and try again. Now we have to go back to Nalbina to get more Phoenix Downs. We can go the safe way through Rabanastre but that breaks our chain, you can save if you chose to do that. If not, it is possible to get back to Nalbina without saving, walking into a Vaan-only-area or killing any monsters and not break our chain. It is a bit dangerous though, but it has the better rewards. First heal to full HP using potions, you may want to buy some HP lisences. Keep your battle speed on slow, then make your way to the west exit of Galtea Downs, south of The Midfault and the south east exit of Shimmering Horizons to the Giza plains. You will end up in Starfall Field and can go east to the Crystal Glade to the Giza South Bank. Here, take the east exit to the Estersand and north east to Nalbina Fortress. Don't be tempted to touch a save point if you do this! It will reset your chain and you might of well gone through Rabanastre. Once you reach the merchant at Nalbina, sell all your books of Orgain and all but 1 flame staff. Flame staves increase fire damage, so we want one for our Black Mage. Buy 99 Phoenix Downs and make your way back to the Corridor of Sand to start chaining again. Chain Dustia untill you have 30 or so Phoenix Downs remaining. By this time you will have 90+ Books of Orgain and a fair few flame staves. We don't need to go on as the books and staves will give us enough money to buy what we need and we have enough LP to last us a while. Heal, go back to Rabanastre and save your game. Here we just have to do a few more things before we can go to the sewers. Head to the Magick Shop and buy Dark then talk to the Magick Merchant 24 more times to unlock the Mage's Monograph. Sell your Book of Orgain and Flame staves but remember to keep one staff and buy the monograph from the Bazaar. You will still have 50,000+ Gil left over. Go to The Sandsea and complete the Thextera hunt by talking to Gatsly then make your way to the Muthru Bazaar and talk to him there to unlock the Hunter's Monograph. You can buy it now if you want but it isn't required any time soon. Talk to the Clan Shop owner and buy both Oil and Decoy, these will be staple spells cast by your mages throughout the game. This is everything we need to do before we enter the sewers, so now we can finaly continue with the game. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ On Our Way To The Marquis [OnWaMa] ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Items we will find: Items we will buy: Loot to collect: - Elixir - Thunder - 3 x Green Liquid - Mace (Optional) - Imobilize - 4 x Water Stone - Longsword (Optional) - Protect - 2 x Fish Scale - Orrachea Armlet - Shell - 3 x Dark Stone - Tourmaline Ring - Blizzard - Battle Harness - Vega - Gladius - Water - Numerology - Disable - Sleep - Great Serpentskin (!!) - Jade Collar ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Upon entering the sewers you can take the left path to a dead end with a chance of a chest at its end that can contain a Mace. If you have a red mage then you may as well try for this chest but it isn't really required. Flee your way to the palace and kill Razor Fin in the North Spur Sluiceway if you find it, he isn't any trouble. In the palace, pick up the chest that contains the Elixir. Play the game normaly up untill Fran and Balthier join your party. Select their classes and teach them some HP Augments, leave around 200 LP spare to buy weapon, skill and armour lisences. By this point my Fran and Balthier each had around 1,000 max HP. Set your gambits how you like them and run through untill you meet Amalia and beat the Imperials. For the Flans, if you have a red mage abuse the Dark spell and make fran constantly cast Fire - It'll be over before it begun. Kill things as you make your way to Firemane, collecting LP as you go means you won't have to grind for any later on. In the No. 10 Channel near the entrance to the Central Waterway Control is a chest that can contain a longsword, if you have a knight I recommend you pick it up, the chest also contains gil and Hi-Potions. -------- Firemane -------- Save before you take the boss. Firemane isn't hard, silence him with your Red Mage if possible and abuse Dark. Everyone else should just attack him and heal if nessecary. If Amalia dies don't bother using a Phoenix Down, she's too much of a burden anyway like all the guests you will encounter. Bushfire can cause Poison but antidotes fix that - A really straight forward battle. -------- When you are thrown into Nalbina Dungeon just beat up the Bangaa and get to The Confiscatory. Pick up the Orrachea Armlet, Tourmaline Ring and Gil then save your game. Run through The Black Watch as killing the Imperials just isn't worth the trouble and the chests arn't anything worth while. With Guest Basch in your party turn on the power and save your game. At the store, buy weapons for the classes you havn't got weapons for yet and buy the spells Thunder and Imobilize. Don't bother buying any Gambits untill we're out of the Barheim Passage. In this room is also a chest with 2510 Gil that you might as well loot. Once you're ready carry on through Barheim Passage, picking up the map in the Great Eastern Passage and killing all the Battery Mimics along the way. Take a turn off to Opt. Sector 36 and grab the chest with the Battle Harness. Make your way to the save before the Mimic Queen boss while collecting all the chests as you go. When you fight Flans try and collect atleast 3 Green Liquid and 4 Water Stones, you usually can collect them all before leaving Opt Sector 37 and Special Opt Sector 3. Keep them and don't sell them yet. -------- Mimic Queen -------- Save before the Mimic Queen room and prepare yourself for the boss. When you enter cast Oil and Silence on the boss if you have a Red Mage at this point and constantly use Dark with said mage. If not, just hammer away with Fran's Fire and everyone's physical attacks. Focus everything on the Mimic Queen and don't bother reviving Basch if he dies. Another easy boss and soon you'll be on your way to Rabanastre. -------- When you get out of Barheim Passage go north one map to the Banks of the Nebra and get 2 Fish Scales from the Ichthon enemies, they are a 55% steal and 40% drop so it won't take long at all. Once you have those go back to Rabanastre and get Basch, Balthier and Fran back on your team - Don't forget to pick Basch's Class! While you're in the Sandsea you may aswell accept the Flowering Cactoid and Wraith Marks, we will do them soon. Once you're ready let's do some shopping. Head off to the gambit shop and buy all the Foe HP, Foe Status, Ally HP, Ally MP, Ally Status, Self HP, Self MP and Self Gambits. The total cost of them all will only leave you 13,000 odd Gil poorer. Go to the Clan Hall after and talk to Montblanc to be recognised for being a Hedge Knight and obtain 2 Warp Motes and 2 Teleport Stones, there is also no reason why you should not accept the Cluckatrice and Rocktoise Marks. When done, save your game at the West Gate. If you have decided to have a Hunter on your team then now is a great time to get the Gladius, a strong wind elemental dagger. If you plan on having a Hunter but have yet to let Penelo or Ashe join your party, no worries, you can still obtain it for later. Keep in mind that the shortest path to the Gladius on the Hunter's Lisence Board costs 215 LP, normaly you would have enough remaining after buying some HP Augments on the Lisence Board. -------- Stealing the Gladius -------- This method of getting the Gladius was created by InfinyGodslayer and involves a clever way to avoid taking damage and dying. Gladius is a strong dagger weapon that can be stolen from the Rare Game Monster Lindbur Wolf in the Westersand - Shimmering Horizons, in the small area below the Galtea Downs. Lindbur Wolf also only appears after you have chained 20 or more Wolves in the Westersand. The only requirement is that you have a character with Steal and at least 400+ Max HP. The method for stealing the Gladius is as follows: 1. Chain 20 Wolves in the Westersand then make your way to Shimmering Horizons from Galtea Downs to the area where Lindbur Wolf spawns. - If you are having trouble chaining Wolves, Galtea Downs only contains Wolves and Cactoids so you can easily clear out the area and loop to the Corridor of Sand, to The Midfault and back to Galtea Downs. - Try and make the last two required kills for the wolves in the area that Lindbur Wolf spawns so you don't have to deal with his lackeys. 2. When you see Lindbur Wolf set your battle speed to slow and construct your party to consist of 2 characters, one being the character with Steal and 400+ HP and the other being anyone you wish, from here on referenced as thief and backup. 3. Order your thief to steal from lindbur wolf and swap control to your backup character. When you hear the sound of your thief stealing hold R2 and run to the zone line BUT DON'T ZONE YET, stand as close as you can to it. 4. Your thief will be hit by Eerie Soundwave and take around 400 damage then run to where you are at the zone line, Lindbur Wolf will follow you. 5. Just as he raises his head for an attack zone to Galtea Downs with your backup character and heal your thief. Set the battle speed to the fastest setting and control your thief. 6. Walk back into the Shimmering Horizons with your thief and keep pressing the circle button, if you did it right then the command menu will appear but Lindbur Wolf will be completely or partially transparent. 7. Command your thief to steal and swap to your backup character who should move close to the zone line. 8. When you hear the sound of the steal zone back to Galtea Downs. Lindbur Wolf will have used Eerie Soundwave but the animation will not finish in time and both your characters will take no damage. 9. Swap control to your thief and heal if necessary then repeat steps 6 to 9 until you get your gladius. If you want, you can press circle to bring up the command menu just as you hear the sound of your thief stealing so that you can pause to view the combat log to see if you got the Gladius. It is a 3% steal so this may take a bit of time, but usually no longer than 10 minutes once you've spawned him. Once again, InfinyGodslayer came up with this method so all credits to him! -------- With our new found Gladius it is time to take on the Flowering Cactoid and Wraith Marks. Both of these will be a breeze with this weapon and you should have no trouble at all. Collect the reward and be sure to speak to Dantro twice so we won't have to see him later. Once done, go see Montblanc and get your reward for being a Rear Guard, 3 Remedies and 2 Teleport Stones. When all of this is compleated you can make your way to Bhujerba and buy any weapons or armour you may need. Stop at the magic shop and buy Protect, Shell and Blizzard to add to your list of useful spells. Don't bother with Charge from the Technick shop as your MP will be too low for it to be useful. With all your shopping taken care of you can make your way into the mines. In the Lhusu Mines be sure to pick up Numerology from the Transitway 1 and collect atleast 3 Dark Stones from the Skeletons and Skull Defenders. You will probably have enough by the time you reach Ba'Gamnan and friends. If Lamont dies along the way don't bother resurrecting him. Your guest's low HP and low damage really only make them good item throwers. When you meet Ba'Gamnan just escape back to the entrance, we don't need the LP from them and it is just a waste of time. Ensure that the residents of Bhujerba know that BASCH LIVES! and not to listen to ondors lies then have your first visit with the Marquis to be thrown onto the Leviathan. Make your way to the Central Brig Access but don't forget to pick up Sleep in the bottom right room of the Starboard Section and the two Reflectga Motes in the Large Freight Stores. There is also infuse here but it saves time picking it up in the Ogir-Yensa. -------- Hold up! -------- Stop just before the Central Brig Access and check your inventory. By this point in the game I happen to have 3 Dispel Motes and 1 Aeroga Mote in there and I currently have no clue where they came from. I'm suspecting either Lamont or Vossler give them to you when they join but I wasn't paying attention. If you're playing through this and know /when/ you get them then an email would be appreciated, the same goes for if you reach this point and /don't/ have them in your inventory. Credit will be given to those who find the source of these mysterious Motes. -------- When you are ready enter the room and fight the imperials. An easy way to win this fight is to enter with only one active character with high Mag Power and imedietly Flee to the side of the room. Most of the imperials will come over to you and you will be able to take some out with your Aeroga Mote and bring the rest into critical. Take care of the normal soldiers and mages before the Judges and you will do fine, heal when you need to. Saving Ashe is next, along with stocking up on status curative items, weapons and armour if you need to. Buy a Vega and the spells Water and Disable as they will come in use. Pick a job for Ashe, collect the System Access Key and save your game - My Ashe is a Black Mage. Don't forget the Flame Staff that we got back at Rabanastre as it will boost your fire damage. Head back to the Port Section of the ship and escape from all the enemies you encounter. Penelo will join and Vossler will leave. -------- Judge Ghis -------- Ahead is Judge Ghis who is very easy to deal with. Walking into the battle use a warp mote on the Imperials behind you when you start. Ghis won't deal alot of damage and you can inflict blind and silence if you're lucky. I say lucky because now you start to feel how bad the accuracy of status skills become untill you get an Indigo Pendant. Once you defeat him you will be taken back to Bhujerba. -------- Before we see the Marquis, though, we want to complete some more Hunts. Accept the bill for the Nidhogg Mark and speak to the petitioner, as well as the petitioner for the Rocktoise Mark then make your way back to the mines. Nidhogg first, he can be blinded so wait near the zone line untill his shell wears off. Hit him hard with your Hunter and use Fire with your Black and Red Mage and he's no trouble. Rocktoise isn't much harder as you can blind him aswell and the Gladius your Hunter should have will deal 400+ damage a hit. If things get out of hand, though, Rocktoise can be put to sleep but you probably won't need to go that far. Be sure to collect your rewards from each Mark. You will receive Gil, a Rose Corsage and a Balaclava for Nidhogg aswell as the Great Serpentskin(!!). DO NOT SELL THIS ITEM! If you sell this then we miss out on a chance to get an easy Golden Amulet so be 100% certain you're not going to sell it. From the Rocktoise you get Gil, 2 Hi-Potions and a Survival Vest. Talk to Pilika twice and accept his diary side quest, pick it up at the Technick store and give it to him. When he asks if you read it say no to get a Jade Collar which will be very useful in the course of this game. The other option only gives you a bangle but its amusing to see how he reacts. Now we have compleated everything we should do here, its time to make our acquaintance with the Marquis yet again and be taken to the Westersand. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ To Jahara We March! [ToJaMa] ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Items we will find: Items we will buy: Loot to collect: - Diamond Armlet - Arcturus - 1 x Yensa Scale - 2 x Golden Amulet - Capella - 1 x Salamand Halcyon - Sight Unseeing - Vega - 2 x Wyvern Wing - Turtleshell Choker - Aqua Shot - 2 x Yensa Fin - Eksir Berries - Silent Shot - Embroidered Tippet - Aero - Dispel - Cura - Vanish - Raise - Elixir - Shade's of Black - Blood Sword - Hastega Mote - Shell Shield - Beserker - Serpent Rod ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Stock up on curative items and buy any new armours you need and prepare to do two things before entering the Ogir-Yensa. Head to the Shimmering Horizons and zone to the top left exit of the map to the Windtrace Dunes. On this section of the map at the edge of the cliff is a chest that appears 25% of the time and contains a guaranteed Diamond Armlet, keep entering untill you get the chest then go back to Rabanastre. In the Sandsea, accept the Bill for the Wyvern Lord and SPEAK TO THE PETITIONER! You need to accept this Mark to farm the ingredients for the Arcturus, it will help you greatly throughout the rest of the game. Once you have accepted the Mark you can go back to the Westersand and onto the Ogir-Yensa. Infuse can be found at Platform 1 - East Tanks when you enter, along with Sleep if you didn't pick it up earlier. Certainly pick up the maps there too. Kill everything that moves as you make your way to the Platform 1 - Refinery and collect the Golden Amulet at the top centre of the W shaped platform on your map. Always have a Golden Amulet equipped on someone because it doubles the amount of LP you get which means less grind as you play. Go to the Primary Tank Complex and pick up Reflect from a platform at the bottom right, near the entrance to the East Junction. From there, enter the Zertinan Caverns from the Central Junction and pick up Sight Unseeing in the Canopy of Clay then exit to the Nam-Yensa Withering Shores. At the end of the platform is a Turtleshell Choker. After this you can backtrack and save at the Yensa Border Tunnel. Now that we have saved here we will begin a tedious and long grind for the Arcturus, we need 3 different things to complete this weapon. While collecting the loot for the Arcturus we will also complete the Bazaar items for the Capella and Silent Shot aswell as the Vega and Aqua Shot. The goods are as follows: --------------------------------------------------------------------- | Name | Late-model Rifle | Marksman's Delight | Rain of Tears | |------|----------------------|--------------------|------------------| | Cost | 8,000 Gil | 550 Gil | 800 Gil | |------|----------------------|--------------------|------------------| | Need | 1 x Salamand Halcyon | 1 x Green Liquid | 1 x Yensa Scale | | | 2 x Wyvern Wing | 2 x Fish Scale | 3 x Green Liquid | | | 2 x Yensa Fin | 3 x Dark Stone | 4 x Water Stone | |------|----------------------|--------------------|------------------| | Get | 1 x Arcturus | 1 x Capella | 1 x Vega | | | | 1 x Silent Shot | 1 x Aqua Shot | --------------------------------------------------------------------- If you have been following this walkthrough then you will already have all the Green Liquids, Fish Scales, Dark Stones and Water Stones you need. You will get many, many Yensa Scales as you try and get the loot for the Arcturus. This may take a few hours, so take breaks in between. First we will go after the Yensa Fins, exit west from the Yensa Border Tunnel and walk to the small island connected by two bridges. On that island two Yensa enemies will spawn, and a Yensa Fin is a 5% Poach or a 20% Monograph drop with the Mage's Monograph. This is why we bought the Mage's Monograph in Rabanastre. If you don't get any, run to the Ogir Yensa's South Tank Approach and back and try again as this is faster than soft resetting. You can steal Yensa Scales at a 55% chance aswell, but we will get many later so we don't need to do this. Next on our list is the Salamand Halcyon. The only way to get this is from a rare steal or drop from Salamand Entite and its a 3% chance both ways. We stand no chance with fighting it and stealing is the better option anyway, so that's our plan. The Salamand Entite only appears in the Ogir-Yensa Primary Tank Complex and Central Junction and only when it is sunny with no clouds, though occasionaly when it is a sandstorm. To guarantee your chances of one, make sure it is a sunny day. Kill Vossler off first because he is useless then make your way to either area when it is sunny and try and find the Entite. Make sure you check every area of both maps as it dosn't spawn in a fixed possition and moves slowly around. Once you find it, only have one character out and set your battle speed to the slowest setting. Steal from the Entite, then escape and zone one map to reset its agro. Keep repeating this untill you have the Salamand Halcyon. -------- Note -------- Stealing can be tedious. Remember, this is a 3% steal so odds say you might get one every 33-34 steals. Understand probability: You have the same chance of getting one each time you steal, which means it could take a few minutes or a few hours to get these loots. It requires time, persistance and luck to pull through. It took me 15 minutes to get the Salamand Halcyon but your mileage may vary. Good luck. -------- Now that you have the Salamand Halcyon it is time to do the side quest for the Eksir Berries. Blind the Urutan Eater then let your party go all out, your Hunter with its Gladius will be the main damage dealer. Finish the quest and get the berries then save and make your way to the Trail of Fading Warmth. Stop by at the Demesne of the Sandqueen and pick up Balance at the end of the broken wooden bridge. When you reach the Trail of Fading Warmth, stock up on Hi-Potions from Dyce and buy the Aero, Cura and Raise Spells. Buy any other items you may be low on then head to the Tomb of Raithwall -------- Garuda -------- Another very easy boss fight. Use the Eksir Berries on Garuda and constantly use Dark with your Red Mage. You can blind Garuda even to make this easy boss even more of a walk in the park. If your black mage isn't doing anything, cast fire. -------- Having defeated Garuda you can now save at the crystal near the Tomb to prepare yourself for the long road ahead: Stealing the Wyvern Wings. Head on over to the Simoon Bluff and watch out for the traps at the entrance. If you want to complete your item list there is a free Embroidered Tippet at the end of the two silo's. Make sure you kill every monster, including Vossler :P, but keep the Wyvern Lord alive. Once the area is clear of all enemies it makes things easier as the game won't lag when you press L1 and having one member on your team active at a time helps this too. Once the area is clear, arrange your team so that someone with steal is in your active party then order them to steal from the Wyvern Lord, run back to the entrance and zone, then steal again. This person may want to have a bangle equipped so its easier to see the traps at the entrance. The Wyvern Lord will hit you every time you try to steal so make sure you are healthy with potions before going in. Once again, Wyvern Wing's are a 3% steal and you need 2 (two), yes two, of them without thiefs cuffs. If you thought Salamand Halcyon is bad then this will take the cake for now. Thankfuly, L1 makes this much faster than it would otherwise be. You may find yourself here for an hour or two, but again it all comes down to luck. The enemies may respawn on the first few entries so clear them out each time - It really speeds up the process. Once you have both Wyvern Wings, congratulations, give yourself a pat on the back. You will also have a large stock of Yensa Scale. Certainly save your game now, it would be horrible if the power went out and you had to collect them all again. Talk to Dyce and sell all your Wyvern Wing, Yensa Fin, Yensa Scale, Water Stone, Dark Stone, Green liquid, Fish Scale and Salamand Halcyon then buy the weapons in the Bazaar. The Arcturus will last you untill you beat Cid in Archadies so it is a very valuable weapon for your team and the different ammo certainly come in handy. The last thing we need to do here for now is to defeat the Wyvern Lord before moving onto the tomb. -------- Tip -------- If you are not using an elemental shot, always use silent shot. It is non elemental and has the same power as onion shot, but has the added bonus of being able to inflict silence which makes it better over all. -------- -------- Demon Walls -------- Save again then head off into the Tomb ensuring that your Machinist is in your active party (Why wouldn't it be?). We will be defeating both Demon Walls. Your Machinist will be the main dealer and could take out both on its own due to its sheer power, but our problem is spells like blind and telega. This is the only reason we need other people, to throw eye drops and take the wrath of the spells that they throw towards you. The first Demon Wall is the hardest of the two, but that isn't really saying anything as you'll probably be laughing at its pathetic excuse for a boss. Heal at the save crystal before you head in though as the status effects will cripple your party. The second Demon wall might as well be a regular enemy. 3 shots from your Arcturus and your other members pounding away is all it will take. -------- The actual tomb itself is a walk in the park. Just remember to pick up Dispel at the top of the Royal Passage and Vanish at the bottom, there is also a Hastega Mote in the Southfall Passage. In the Cloister of Flame before Belias, pick up the Blood Sword and Phoenix Down then heal and prepare your party. -------- Belias -------- This isn't going to last long, Machinist with Arcturus and Aqua Shot. 4 hits from that gun and he's down before he can move. Once he is defeated, pick up Shade's of Black and an Elixir in his little room before finishing the tomb. One last thing, give Belias to your Knight, an extra Potion Lore is worth more than the other options you have, which are none. -------- -------- Vossler -------- Continue untill you fight Vossler, who is no real challenge. My fran was a Machinist so she got a free Beserk and tore him to shreds. If you need to, use your remaining warp mote on the Imperials. Another joke fight. -------- Back in Rabanastre your first stop will be to Montblanc, who will reward you with Gil, Electrum, a Warp Mote, 2 Arcana and 2 Teleport Stones. Go to the Sandsea after and accept the Enkelados and Croakadile Marks then make your way to the Weapon Shop and complete the Wyvern Lord hunt to get Gil, a useless Elfin Bow and a Shell Shield. Walk to the South Gate then use the teleport crystal to go to the Estersand, we are going to do the Barheim Key side quest. Speak to Dantro's Wife to give her the Cactus Flower then leave and enter the Village. Cross the river and do the side quest for Dran to get the Wyrmfire Shot and Gil. While in the North Bank Village buy the Mosphoran Map and in the South Bank Village buy the Estersand Map. Talk to Dantro's Wife and collect the Semclam Shells, you MUST collect 5, 2 in the Village and 3 in the Banks of the Nebra. Give them to his wife and go to the Outpost. Here you need to collect 2 Nebralim, collect them and make your way to the Village again and give them to Dantro's Wife. Cross the river and pick up 3 Valeblossom Dew in the Broken Sands aswell as the chest with the Beserker near the top left corner of the map. The Beserker is a great accessory as it will give the person permanent beserk status so teach the lisence to your Machinist and equip it, you will be using this for most of the game. Go north still to the Mosphoran Highwastes and touch the teleport crystal. Pick up a set of Thief's Cuffs near the exit to the North West then teleport back to the Estersand. Give Dantro's Wife the Valeblossom Dew and the Great Serpentskin then leave and re-enter the village. Talk to her one last time and go around the back of the house. The Recovering Traveler should be a moogle and will give you a Golden Amulet for your troubles. If it was a Hume then you didn't get all the items, and if it was a Bangaa then you didn't give her the Great Serpentskin. We could go to the Barheim Passage right now but we don't really need the stuff there just yet. Teleport to Rabanstre and save your game then head south to the Nomad Village. Collect Regen from the chest in the Cockatrice pen and speak to the petitioner for the Croakadile hunt. Wyrmfire shot + Beserker will destroy it so go back and get your rewards of Gil, a Serpent Rod and a Teleport Stone. Now it is just a matter of running to Jahara and killing things on the way as there are no more items or chests of interest. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Catching Up On Hunts [CaUpHu] ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Items we will find: Items we will buy: - Pheasant Netsuke - Fira - Golden Amulet - Main Gauche - Haste - Esuna - Bonecrusher - Thundara - 2 x Amber Armlet - 3 x Black Belt - Sluice Gate Key - Blizzara - Multiscale - Curaga - Koga Blade - Darkra - Tumulus - Traveler - Indigo Pendant - Diamond Shield - Horakhty's Flame - Bubble - Blackened Fragment - Feather of the Flock - Meteorite B - Phobos Glaze - 2 x Elixir ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ In Jahara we will do a few things. First buy a map from the moogle and touch the crystal then finish all the story elements in Jahara, but don't leave yet. At the shop here buy Fira, a Main Gauche and new armour. At the back of The Elderknoll is a chest with a Pheasant Netsuke, collect it then talk to the petitioner for the Enkelados hunt. When you are ready you can make your way to The Shred from The Greensnake in the Ozmone Plain. If you havn't already, equip the Main Gauche on your hunter, as the effectivity of the Gladius has run it's course, and turn off Larsa's Potion Gambit. You may also want to equip the Jade Collar on your Hunter to boost evasion even more. You have to kill all the Wu enemies in The Shred, leave then enter again to make Enkelados appear. Equip Aqua shot and try and disable him as your Hunter tanks with Main Gauche. If your Red Mage dies, swap to your Black Mage and just blind him, use decoy on your Hunter. Go back to Jahara and complete the hunt to get some Gil, an ether and a third Golden Amulet. You may aswell take your free chocobo and ride it to the Golmore Jungle. -------- Collecting War Funds -------- This is a good place to restock on Gil as you may be running a bit low and it is a lot faster than chaining Dustia. Have someone with Foe: HP = 100% -> Steal and your Machinist with Beserker. Along the entrance to the left and right of Paths of Chained Light are Panthers that you can steal and loot Coeurl Pelts from. Your Machinist will go on a rampage and you will quickly rack up a large chain. When you've killed all the Panthers simply Zone twice to the Ozmone Plain and back. Once you get 99 Pelts from stealing and slaughter you can sell them to the Moogle in the Eyrut Village. You may want to do this twice or so to give you a good 100,000 Gil. It won't take long at all. -------- Once you are satisfied with the amount of Gil that you have collected, pick up the map and finish the story sequences in the Eyrut Village. There is Haste at the end of Fane of the Path. Buy Esuna and Thundara at the Moogle and you may aswell pick up the map, its only 60 Gil. If you bought new armour at Jahara then don't bother getting more now, though do pick up 3 Black Belts for Tiamat. Get on a chocobo and ride it to the Henne Mines. There are only two things that are even remotely interesting, those being the map and Bonecrusher at the end of the Phase 1 Dig, so pick those up. Just kill everything for Gil and LP as you make your way to the Teleport Crystal, leaving a wake of chaos in your path. -------- Tiamat -------- Another very easy boss. Use Silence Shot with your Machinist in beserk and decoy your Hunter. If he casts Disablega then equip Black Belts on all your active characters. It will go by very quickly, no trouble at all. -------- When he is defeated, make your way to The Parting Glade and pick up the Amber Armlet then save your game when ready. -------- Elder Wyrm -------- This guy has some tricks up his sleeve, most dangerous being Spore Fall. Walk into the battle with the Jade Collar + Main Guache + Best Shield on your Hunter. Unequip the Beserker from your Machinist for the start of the battle and set your Black Mage with Ally: -> Decoy and Foe: Any -> Fira. Equip Wyrmfire Shot on your Machinist and try and learn all 3 Remedy Lores as you'll need them for Spore Fall. It may also be a good idea to have a potion throwing gambit on Larsa or your Hunter to keep your hunter alive when he gets hit and some Phoenix Down gambits incase something goes wrong. Enter when ready. Start out by ordering your Machinist to kill the two Treants and once they are down, equip the Beserker and control your Hunter. With your Hunter, run around to the other side of Elder Wyrm so you're away from your Machinist and Black Mage, we don't want them hit by Spore Fall. If you run out of decoy status stand in range of your Black Mage, then walk back to where you were, away from your party. When Elder Wyrm casts Spore Fall unequip the Beserker from your Machinist and throw a Remedy if you have one, if not just use individual curative items to recover. If you don't have a few Remedies then just get Larsa to throw the items and keep your Beserker on, he's useless for anything else. In this battle your Machinist will deal 3,700 to 4,000 a hit with its gun. As long as you keep your Hunter at a distance and let him take Spore Fall then you will have no problem. He only got to cast it once before he went down for me but if he does it again its just a case of throwing a remedy then tanking some more. -------- Pick up the 9872 gil in the Elder Wyrm room (9x8 = 72, *face palm*) then just take a casual stroll to Mt. Bur-Omisace. Buy Curaga, Blizzara, Darkra and Traveler then buy some new Light Armour for your Hunter and Machinist and some Mystic Armour for your Black Mage, also buy a Diamond Shield for your Hunter. Buy the maps from the Moogle then visit the Grand Kiltias and save your game. Now is a great time to take some time out from the story and complete some of the Hunts, as we'll get some good items and unlock good things in the Clan Shop. If you have been going back to do hunts yourself then thats great, but if not, no worries as we'll catch up on everything we can here before moving on. Note than you can keep going on with the story without doing these hunts, but you can get some really helpful items, including the Indigo Pendant. If you're not so keen on doing some Hunts, atleast do them untill you get the Indigo Pendant because it's an amazing Item. If you have been following along so far then we would of completed 9 Hunts. So let's outline what we would like to do: 1. Complete 1 more Hunt to unlock the Headhunter Rank so we can accept the antlion Mark. 2. Complete 2 more Hunts to unlock Ethers in the Clan Shop, these make life so much easier. 3. Murder every other available Hunt because thats what we do. With our path set out before us our journey is clear: We must hunt. Teleport back to Rabanastre and meet Montblanc, he will give you 3 High Potions, 2 Teleport Stones and some gil, accept the Gil Snapper Hunt while you are there. Walk to the Sandsea and accept all the Marks you can, they should be: White Mousse, Ring Wyrm, Marilith, Ixtab, Feral Retriever. One last thing to do before we hunt these foul beasts is to check the number of teleport stones we have as we can't buy any yet. We can walk, but having Teleport Stones saves a lot of time. We need 2 for Ixtab, to get to Jahara, the mark and back, 1 for Antlion, to get back from the mines, and about 4 for traveling to near places, like the Westersand, to save a bit of time. At the least you need 3, but more is nice. Now it is time to take on all these Marks! Once you beat your first mark on this list you should then accept the Ant Lion hunt from Montblanc to get the Indigo Pendant. You can complete them in any order, but here is the order that I completed them in: -------- White Mousse -------- The White Mousse is a very easy mark to do, which gives us a very easy Indigo Pendant that makes every other mark a walk in the part. He spawns in the flat open area in the West Sluice Control of the Garamsythe Waterway. Equip Wyrmfire shot on your Beserker Machinist and let your Black Mage cast Fira while decoying your Hunter. Don't worry about oil, he's immune to it. The battle might take a bit but he'll go down with no trouble. If someone dies just use a phoenix down and when your Black Mage is low on MP, use an Ether - We'll be able to buy replacments soon. When he gets into critical he'll start spamming Watera, but keep your Hunter away and you'll survive. As a reward you get some Gil, a useless Burning Bow and the Sluice Gate Key. -------- Once you've done your first Mark from your list, go back to Montblanc for your Headhunter congratulations, 2 Ethers and 2 Teleport Stones. Accept the Marks for Orthros, Trickster and Antlion then go to Bhujerba, we're finaly going to get the Indigo Pendant. Speak to the Antlion petitioner then just run into the Mines. When you are at the Site 2 gate just run to Site 3. Here we can pick up 3 one off items, a Multiscale in the bottom left room and the Koga Blade and a Tumulus in the top left. With the help of your Beserked Machinist you should be able to get them while slaying the enemies. Once you're done in site 3 just flee your way to the Transitway 2, its not worth fighting these enemies. Talk to Kait and save your game. At the entrance to Site 9, behind a cart, is the Indigo Pendant. That's all we are really here for as the Antlion is a bit too powerful for us yet. Equip the Indigo Pendant on your Black Mage then teleport back to Rabanastre and let us continue to slay more Marks. If you don't already know, the Indigo Pendant makes status effecting spells hit 100% of the time unless the target has Shell status, which halves that chance, this is awsome for our low Mag-Power Mages. -------- Ring Wyrm -------- Ring Wyrm only appears in the Westersand - Windtraced Dunes when there is a sand storm. Have Wyrmfire shot equipped, decoy on your Hunter and have a blind Gambit on your Black Mage, as it will always hit with the Indigo Pendant unless your foe has Shell, which halves the chance. When you see him, Dispel Protect and let your Black Mage and Machinist do the rest. 7,500 Damage from your Machinist will take him down quick. Though he does cast restore, which gives him Ignore Evade, your Blind should keep his attacks scarce. Your rewards are some Gil, a Moon Ring and an Icebrand. -------- -------- Marilith -------- Enter the Zertinan Caverns from the Westersand - Shimmering Horizons to be in Invitation to Heresy. In the largest open area of this map are some holes in the wall that are letting light through and two Speartongue enemies. This is where Marilith spawns but you have to wait around 5-6 minutes so press triangle, make a coffee then come back for the fight. If you pause using triangle the time still goes by, so don't worry. Have Aqua Shot on your Machinist. Again, Decoy Hunter, but this time use Water instead of Fira to do damage. You can also inflict Blind and Silence so put them at the top of your gambit list. He ignores evade untill he hits critical HP, which makes his blinded self even more stupid. You'll get some Gil, a Serpent Eye and 3 Teleport Stones as a reward. -------- -------- Ixtab -------- He's at the Phase 1 Shaft in the Henne Mines where you found the Map. Just equip Silent Shot on your Machinist and let it hit away. It can cast doom but its not a problem, just let that character die to revive or use a Remedy. Don't forget to pick up your reward of some Gil, an Ether and a Soul Powder. -------- -------- Orthros -------- Go to the Southern Sluiceway and prepare yourself before making a party of all female characters, which you need to spawn Orthros. On your Red and Black Mage try and learn as many MP reducing Augments as possible, aswell as the Warmage Augment on both boards. Equip your Black Mage with the Indigo Pendant and set the gambits for Foe: Any -> Sleep and Foe: Any -> Fira. For your Red Mage just give them the Fira Gambit and Hi-Potion gambits higher up. Swap your party to all females, then swap in all your Mages, including White Mage. Cast Dispel on Orthros then swap your White Mage for your Hunter and watch as you slowly kill him. If you don't have enough Ethers to deplete his HP then take out your Machinist and do it the hard way, though you may want to just spam Mist Quickenings untill he's dead if it comes down to it. It took me 6 Ethers to have enough MP to finish him. If he confuses someone with Mythril Bubbles then be sure to cure that as it is pretty annoying. You can also Blind him if need be. Your rewards will be some Gil, Horakhty's Flame and an Unpurified Ether. Samal will also give you the Blackened Fragment. -------- -------- Gil Snapper -------- To get to the Gil Snapper in the Tracks of the Beast in the wet Giza Plains you must knock over 6 Withered Trees. You can find them at the Throne Road, Nomad Village, Gizas North Bank, Toam Hills, Starfall Field and the Crystal Glade. Then you can enter Tracks of the Beast from the Gizas South Bank and find the Gil Snapper after speaking to the petitioner. When you enter Tracks of the Beast it has to be a thunder storm for the Gil Snapper to appear so keep leaving and entering untill your clan mate tells you it is there. Equip Wyrmfire shot on your Machinist with Beserker as usual, Blind + Silence + Fira gambits on your Black Mage and Decoy your Hunter. Dispel him before you start then just watch him die - A very straight forward battle. Bansat can also inflict Imobilize. When he is in critical HP it'll take a while to actually kill him, hang in there though and you'll win. Once you've won collect the Feather of the Flock from the Urn then go back to the Nomad Village. -------- Now is a good time to get a certain item we will need later on to defeat the Bomb King, a Meteorite B. Equip someone with the Diamond Armlet then walk north into the Throne Road. If you can see a chest a bit in the distance then pick it up, and if it isn't a Meteorite B then zone back and do it again untill you get it. You have a 2.8% chance to get one every time you go into the Throne Road. You don't need one, but having one helps a lot and it dosn't take too long. -------- Feral Retriever -------- Found on the Spine of the Icewyrm, the Feral Retriever can give you many bad status effects. Use your Black Mage for Blind and Decoy and use Fira, even though it only does half damage our staff helps us do a bit more. Silent Shot on your Machinist will give him Silence and just keep your characters healthy as you beat him down. He dosn't have much health so don't worry about a long battle. If he casts Balance then he will absoloutly shatter the person it was cast on. Hopfuly you can have him down before that, or just keep your Hunter away. Your reward is some Gil, a Hunting Crossbow and 2 Teleport Crystals. -------- Teleport back to Rabanastre. For some reason it was now the dry season for me in the Giza, however I talked to the Weather Eye about 5 times before I wrote the Gil Snapper Hunt to make sure it would be a permanent wet season. I'm not sure exactly when it changed back, but my guess would be some time after the Feral Retriever. Since it was the dry in Giza I also completed the Cluckatrice Hunt and got my reward for the Gil Snapper hunt. You can wait for the Dry too if you'd like, but you'll still have enough hunts completed to unlock the Riskbreaker clan rank and all its items. -------- Cluckatrice -------- Can be found in the Gizas North Bank after killing everything then leaving and returning. The fight is a joke with your Machinist. You get some Gil, an Amber Armlet and a Rainbow Egg as your prize. -------- While the Giza is still dry report back for the Gil Snapper hunt to get some Gil and Phobos Glaze, you may aswell also give the ring from the Croakadile Hunt back. Once done, warp to the Muthru Bazaar and buy Bubble, Drain and around 40 Ethers. Visit Montblanc again to get 2 X-Potions, 7 Teleport Stones, 2 Hi-Ethers and 2 Elixirs. Check your Clan Primer. You should have completed all of the first 17 Hunts and have 18 and 19 not yet slain. Don't talk to Gurdy about the Trickster untill we actually need to defeat it because it makes that map dangerous. You should also be a Riskbreaker and may feel like some Vagrant Story. When you're ready teleport back to Mt. Bur-Omisace and save your game. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Toward Archadia! [ToWaRc] ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Items we will find: | Items we will buy: - Death - Sage Ring | - Aeroga - Revive - 3 x Elixir | - Confuse - 2 x Tourmaline Ring - Gillie Boots | - Firaga - Battle Harness - Charm | - Thundaga - Ice Shield - Float ---------------------- - Countdown - Blindga - Shell Shield - 2 x Hastega Mote - Megalixir - 2 x Ruby Ring - Sakura-saezuri - Gil Toss - Ashura - 1000 Needles - Holy Mote ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Head off to the Karydine Glacier in Mt. Bur-Omisace and look at the end of the long thing part of the map to find Death. As you go to the Stillshrine of Miriam collect Revive at the end of the Spine of the Icewyrm. At the Shrine you will find 2 Tourmaline Rings and a Battle Harness in the Walk of Sky, and an Ice Shield near the Teleport Crystal. Save your game. Complete the Stillshrine as you normaly would, picking up Countdown in the Ward of Velitation, also be careful of the Dragon Aevis' there, they can pack a punch. Don't worry about the Crystalbug though as that gun is quite the potent killing machine. There is a secret area in the wall to the right of where the Darkmare spawns, so kill it and try and walk through that wall. Eventually the wall will become transparent and you can walk through. Before you enter the room at the top of this stair, make sure you only have one character out and that they are not important. When you walk into that room there will be a Confuse and Beserk trap on the same tile, so thats why you only wanted one active party member. Don't bother with the Oilings and run up to the chest with the same character as there is yet another beserk and confusion trap. They will probably die from the Oilings but that's okay, swap someone else in, get the chest and get out, you'll get another Shell Shield. As you make your way along the Walk of Prescience pick up the Ruby Ring at the end of the middle path. Don't bother fighting the bombs either as they are resistant to guns. At the bottom right hand corner of the Walk of Reason you can find a guaranteed Ashura. You can save when you can, before you fight... -------- Vinuskar -------- I didn't even bother saving, he's too easy. Your gun will do obscene damage to him and his Sword Dance only hit me for 450-ish damage. With all Potion Lores you can heal for far more than that with a Hi-Potion. Once he is dead pick up your Sage Ring prize and turn the last statue. Collect the map then save your game once more. -------- -------- Mateus -------- This battle can be easy or can be your first real challenge in this game. The easy way is to make sure you have a Headband equipped on both your Hunter and Machinist, aswell as a Golden Helm on your Knight. Equip your Hunter with his dodging equipment and put your next best shield on your Knight, don't forget the Jade Collar for your Hunter. Equip the Dawn Shard on your Machinist, yup, it isn't the beserker, aswell as the Silent Shot and since we don't really need anything unique on our Knight you may aswell give him the Pheasant Netsuke. Teach your Hunter as many potion lores as you can and have a healthy stock of Hi-Potions. Set both your Hunter and Knight's gambits to Ally: HP < 70% -> Hi-Potion. Their next gambits should be Foe: Nearest Visible -> Attack. Arrange the party so it is just your Knight and Hunter then walk into the battle. When your Knight and Hunter are being targeted by all of the Ice Azers put your Machinist in your active party and control it. Walk your machinist away from the large mass of glowing objects and command her to keep attacking Mateus. The real problem if you're unprepared here is the spam of Blizzard that the Azers give you but your Machinist will take 0 damage from them due to the Dawn Shard and your other two will take very minimal damage. The only thing to watch out for is Sap from Blizzaja that you have to manualy cure with a Remedy. Other than that the damage output isn't spectacular and you'll have no problems keeping up with healing. If you're not confident you can survive the Blizzard spam then you can try and pull off a large enough Quickening chain at the start. When defeated you can collect the loot in the same map, an Elixir and Bubble Mote. You can also teach him to who you'd like to. I'd recommend to your Hunter as this gives it Gil Toss, which really helps a lot for most of the end game bosses. You may be tempted to give it to your Knight, but don't. Your Mag-Power is low and the only thing you would use is Esuna and we have a White Mage and Remedies for that. Trust me - you want Gil Toss. -------- When ready, continue with the story and get the Sword of Kings, then teleport back to Mt. Bur-Omisace. Restock on any items you need and buy atleast 20 Remedies for future tough encounters, then save your game and prepare for the next boss. -------- Judge Bergan -------- The Imperials that start behind you will be no match for your Machinist's Furry. Dispel Bergan at the start then Blind him. If lucky you can steal a Ruby Ring from him. I recommend trying as it is annoying trying to get more than 2 later on - I stole it on my first try. Reset if you don't get it then he can talk to your Machinist. He'll go down fast so no worries here. -------- With Bergan down collect the Stone of the Condemmer from the Nu Mou outside the Hall of the Light. Use the teleport crystal to warp to the Mosphoran Highwastes and buy the Aeroga spell aswell as some new Light Armour and Mystic Armour for your Machinist, Hunter and Black Mage. We are now set to make our way to the Salikawood. Collect the free Gillie Boots at the top path of the Trail of Sky-flung Stone then make your way to the Halny Crossing, where a one time Elixir chest spawns 80% of the time. If you don't find the chest then keep zoning untill you do. Now that we are in the Salikawood we will make our way to Moogle Boss and pick up the map urn at the Trunkwall Road. When Moogle Boss asks you to find the slackers go ahead and chastise the ones at the Trunkwall Road and the Path of Hours. Leave the Moogles in the Garden of Decay for last and don't chastise them yet, go to the Quietened Trace and save your game. There is also Charm in the same map, in the south dead end. Let's fight the optional King Bomb boss while we're here, though you can do it later if you'd like. -------- King Bomb -------- The King Bomb can be a real problem and pain, but if you have a Meteorite B to inflict Disease then you don't have to worry about his Renew. Make sure that your Hunter at least has 3 Mist Quickenings, and try and get your Knight 3 if you can. Teach one of your Mages who has some Ether Lores 3 of their Mist Quickenings too then enter the battle with those three characters. Get someone to use the Meteorite B on the King Bomb to inflict Disease then start a Quickening Chain. After the chain has finished, use your Mage to throw an ether at your Hunter then start another. It took me two 10-12 Chain Mist Quickenings to kill him, if you've only got a slither of HP left then your Beserk Machinist with Aqua Shot can deal 900 damage a hit. -------- Being done with him, save your game and collect the last Moogles then follow them to the finished gate. Talk to Moogle Boss one last time to get a Sash for your efforts, then lets treck across the Phon Coast. When you reach the Hunters' Camp you should buy Confuse and Firaga as they are both awsome spells and Firaga is extremely powerful with the right setup. Also buy around 40 Bacchus's Wine and some armour for whoever needs it then save your game and run to the Tchita Uplands. You can collect the 16 chests in the The Vaddu Strand if you'd like but they're all pretty useless items. When in the Tchita Uplands, first make your way to the Oliphzak Rise and pick up Float behind the large Shrine building thing. Make your way to The Chosen Path then talk to the kid and accept the Hunt. Save your game and walk to the Sochen Cave Palace, picking up Blindga in the Fields of Eternity around the side of the broken Shrine building thing. Save when prompted and make your way to the boss. -------- Mandragora/Onion/Alraune/Pumpkin/Topstalk -------- The only thing hard about this battle is keeping your characters from not being crippled too much by pollen. Walking into this battle with Antidote and Alarm Clock gambits on your hunter along with the usual Decoy and Hi-Potion Gambit works well. Have Wyrmfire Shot and oil them all but the Pumpkin Star and Onion Queen as they are immune. They don't actually hit for too much damage and you can control them easily as they tend to always be appart. Wyrmfire Shot will end this quick but annoying battle. -------- There is a Hastega Mote in the center of The Acolyte's Burden so pick that up with the gil on the right side. This crystal bug is also no problem so save and move on. Pick up the Shock Mote on the other side of the fork in the road at the Mirror of the Soul and pick up the Map Urn to the right side, proceed to go north from the right side to the Falls of Time. Here we will do the puzzle to unlock the small room in the Mirror of the Soul to get the Sakura-saezuri and 1000 Needles aswell as a Megalixir. ________________________________ From the right side of the Falls of | | Time head south to the Mirror of the | ########################### | Soul, then go to the far left side | # # | and enter the falls of time, still | # ############ # | on the left enter Destiny's March. | # # # # # | Continue in a clockwise spiral, | # # # # | getting closer and closer to the | # ######################## # | center of the Falls of Time. A | # # | rough mud map would look something | ############################## | like this: |________________________________| Once you've done that you can get your Sakura-saezuri, 1000 Needles and a much deserved Megalixir. I'd recommend you save your game now beause the next boss can be a bit tough. -------- Ahriman -------- This is one annoying boss. He's difficult because he never sits still enough for you to deal damage to him as most of the time he's warping around making clones, and he's resistant to guns to boot. Thankfuly they have low HP and we can Disable them. Have your Red Mage with the Indigo Pendent and the gambit Foe: HP < 1,000 -> Disable so that you can deal with them as they appear. Also give him a decoy gambit for your Hunter further down the list. We basicaly have to use the same strategy we did on the King Bomb so equip your weapons with the highest attack power. Throw ethers at your hunter and let him start the chain each time. Make sure 100% that the Ahriman you use the Quickening on is the real Ahriman. The real one has a slight motion blur effect around it when you zoom in, so make sure you pick the right one. This will be a long battle and you may not even need to use your gambits. He does have some annoying spells like doom and Imobilizga but remedies take care of that. Just focus on Quickenings because it's just a tedious boss who's resistant to everything you can throw. When he's dead, collect your loot of an Elixir, Phoenix down, Cura Mote, X-Potion and Bubble Mote. You can now walk to Archades. -------- While you are here equip Vaan with the Diamond Armlet and open all the chests you see. Who knows, you might get lucky and get a rare Meteorite. Talk to the Lucky Man and do the Bag O' Coin scenes to get into Archades. Buy the maps from the Moogle in the Technick Shop then lets do some shopping. Buy the Thundaga spell from the Magick Shop then buy some new Light Armour and Mystic Armour as usual and anything else you need. Do the stupid Chop quest thing and save your game at the teleport crystal, tell the man he knows where to go. Now that we are in The Draklor Laboratory we are almost done with the Acturus. The guards will be no problem and they also drop Hi-Potions and are easy to chain. When you flick the switch in Rm 6703 West, you can go to the very bottom left room of floor 67 for a guanteed Claymore. Treck through Draklor at your own pace and save at the save point after the Reddas Cutscene on Floor 70. In the room to the right of the save crystal are two chests. One contains Gil Toss, a great Technick, and the other contains either Gil, a Reverse Mote or an Aeroga Mote. This is the single best place to farm Reverse Motes in the entire game. If you want to spend your time to get 99 Motes here, go ahead but you don't need to to beat all the content. Maybe for Trial Mode you'd want them but not in the main game. I didn't bother because the reverse spell is fine for the most part. -------- Dr. Cid -------- Cid isn't too hard, he hits for about 400 damage with his gun and his rooks are easy to dispatch. Beserker Machinist while you stand around healing is pretty much the entire fight. There is a Holy and Hastega Mote in the room so pick them both up before it's over. Give your Hunter the Pheasant Netsuke for this battle as you can't dodge his attacks. For the first part, let your Machinist destroy the rooks while you take damage and heal. When the rooks are down cast dispel on Cid and make your Hunter the only active person in your party. He'll use S-27 Tokamak which will hit for around 700, nothing a Hi-Potion can't fix. Pull out your Machinist and Black Mage then blow him away with attacks and spells. Healing when you need to, he's slow so you won't have to much. It'll be over soon. -------- After some story sequences you'll be in the Port of Balfomheim, which opens up to us many opertunities, including the Cerobi Steppe with its rich treasures. Thats where our next destination is. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Gathering Rare Items [GaRaIt] ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Items we will find: Items we will buy: Loot to collect: 2 x Dueling Mask - Curaja - 3 x Vampyr Fang 2 x Mirage Vest - Blizzaga - 15 x Dark Crystal Lordly Robes - Darkga - 2 x Solid Stone Circlet - All Monographs - 3 x Blood-stained Necklace Fomalhaut - Blood Sword A - 2 x Death's-Head Sage Ring - Nihopalaoa - 3 x Leo Gem ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ First off, in Balfonheim we should buy a few items. Stock up on restorative items and the brand new X-potion, carry atleast 40 of them just in case. At the Magick Shop buy Curaja, Blizzaga and Darkga and at Dyce buy as many Teleport Stones as you can. I tend to use Dyce as the place to restock on them as he's near a teleport crystal. Buy the maps from the moogle and save at the teleport crystal and prepare for a huge amount of grind. Here are our objectives and why we should spend time doing them: 1. Gather Armour from the Cerobi Steppe We will be getting 2 Mirage Vests, 2 Dueling Masks, 1 Lordly Robe and 1 Circlet. Yes, we can get a Dueling Mask and Mirage Vest later in the game but getting to them without some already is a pain, and its really helpful to have them now. We only need 1 Lordly Robe and Circlet because only our Black Mage needs the Mag Power and we'll find another set later for our White or Red. Not to mention the huge advantage in Defence that these armours give, there's almost no reason not to get them. Well, almost, it'll take a large amount of time and patience but it is very, very worth it. 2. Get a Fomalhaut from the Cerobi Steppe We can get one later in the Henne Mines, but thats after we've killed most of the things we'd need it for. We can use it up untill after the Great Crystal, at which point we'll get the Aldebaran Y for our Machinist and at that point our Hunter can equip it, making this a very good thing to have. 3. Get all the remaining Monographs With all the Monographs, loot gathering becomes much easier and we can make a bit more of a living on the side. Also some items are Monograph Drops only so it is a good idea to be prepared with them all so you don't waste time later. 4. Get the Blood Sword A This weapon takes a while to get as Vampyr Fangs are a bit rare and Abysteels are hard to kill. The other ingredients are easy enough to get so we don't have to worry about that, but this is a very useful weapon to have. We could of gotten it after we got the Indigo Pendant, but we didn't need it as you can see from getting this far, so we saved outself the trouble and get it now when its easier. 5. Create a Nihopalaoa in the Bazaar This is an amazing accessory. With a Remedy we can cripple so many monsters and marks, and some parts of this mode would be really hard without one. It was possible for us to obtain it when we reached Eryut Village, but like the Blood Sword A, we didn't need it and saved it untill a more convenient time. It becomes infinitly useful at the end of the game. -------- Whoa whoa whoa -------- Okay, don't be intimidated by the Cerobi Steppe. Yes, the chests are really time consuming to get, but if you don't want to spend hours trying to zone for an item there is another way to get them 100% of the time. This is the RNG Method developed by FF12GrandMaster. You should look up his FAQ if you want to save yourself 10 hours of repetativness. That method will guarantee you the items and save lots of frustration. Ofcourse, you can get the items the old fashioned way, on my first Weak Mode game I used the old way and spent 8-10 hours getting these items. This time to save time I used the RNG method but it didn't feel as rewarding personaly to me. Regardless, you don't hack the items in so they are legidimate. Don't feel bad using this method as I compleatly understand how tedious it is to get these items the normal way, just feel good that you saved time. If you're a masochist then you can get them the traditional way as I explain below, if you want to just use the RNG method by FF12GrandMaster then you may want to check the chest locations below. Again, I have obtained them the traditional way before so the times are accurate. It is very, very, very time consuming. -------- This will be long, tiresome and very tedious, especialy the chest grinding at Cerobi Steppe. I recommend you take breaks in between long sessions or take a few days at it. It'll probably take a few hours to get the Cerobi Steppe chests alone but atleast the rest is slightly more interesting. When you're make your way to the save point at the Cerobi Steppe. Note that there is supposed to be a chest just outside Balfonheim that contains a Claymore. In every other playthrough of this I've had it was there, but in this one it just won't appear, but its spawn rate is 100%. I suspect that if you collect the Claymore in Draklor then it will make the Claymore chest here not appear. Anyway, I recommend you take a Chocobo across the shortcut in the South Liavell Hills to The Northsward and ride it to the Journey's Rest. Now that you are at the save point in Journey's Rest we can start grinding for the items. Always remember, use L1 turbo and only use 1 character. I'll start with the Dueling Mask because it is the closest, then work towards items that are further away. Always have the Diamond Armlet equipped on the person who will open the chests. ALWAYS SAVE AFTER YOU GET ONE! You do not want to lose the time it took. -------- Chance to get -------- Every item that we will try to get has the following chances of appearing, containing an item and containing the item we want. These are just statistics for these particular chests to put it into perspective at how hard they are to get. There are other chests that have a 10% spawn rate, but we're not going to try and get those. Spawn Rate: 20% Item Rate: 20% Rare Item (with DA): 5% Chance per visit: 0.2% Chance per opening of chest: 1% Average visits: 500 Average opened chests: 100 Average number of Knot of Rust: 20 Understand that these are NOT guaranteed visit, chests opened and Knot of Rust statistics, they are the AVERAGE so you may take longer or less time to get the item you want. For example, to get my first Dueling Mask took me 2 hours and 10 minutes of focused zoning. I gathered over 40 Knots of rust and estimate around 900 visits. Each chest you open also has an 80% to contain 1 to 100 Gil. I believe the Gil system for these chests acts like a percentage system. For example, if you open a chest and it contains 98 gil that means that the RNG was at 98%, which would of given you the Dueling Mask 20% of the time, or 1/5 96~100 gil you get from a chest. Just another thing you can use to track your averages, if you get 5 lots of 96~100 gil in the chest then you've averaged out what it would take to get 1 rare item. -------- -------- Dueling Mask -------- Chest Location: Cerobi Steppe/Crossfield Walk just outside of Journey's Rest and look right. There will Be a Wyrm and a rock very close to where you are. Walk up to the rock and look on the right side for the chest. -------- -------- Mirage Vest + Fomalhaut -------- Chest Location: Cerobi Steppe/Feddik River Mirage Vest: Enter from The Northsward and if you can see a chest in the distance then that is it. You do not have to move from where you are when you enter the Feddik River to see the chest, so if you don't see one just zone. Fomalhaut: Enter from the Crossfield and walk up to the rocks that look like an L or <. There is a chance that a chest can spawn in the dip in the L shape, THAT IS NOT THE CEST. Look over the L rock into the centre of the map. It can appear in the middle of the grassy field. It looks something like this: # # # #C ! # The map will look something like the above with # being solid objects and the C being the chest that is NOT the one we want. the ! is the chest that has the Fomalhaut. The most efficient way to get both of these chests is to walk from either the Crossfield to The Northsward or the other way around, and back, opening both chests every time you go through. You only want one Fomalhaut but 2 Mirage Vests so don't forget to stop walking the entire track once you get the gun. -------- -------- Circlet + Lordy Robes -------- Chest Location: Circlet: Cerobi Steppe/Crossfield Lordly Robes: Cerobi Steppe/The Northsward Circlet: Enter the Crossfield from The Northsward. If you can see a chest in the distance then that is the one that contains the Circlet. If you can't see it zone untill you do so you get an idea of where it is. You do not have to move from where you appear from zoning to see this chest. Lordly Robes: This chest is a bit harder to find. At the top left corner of The Northsward is a section of land that is like a cliff. There is a rock at the bottom of the cliff. Sometimes a chest spawns at the top edge of the cliff, THIS ISNT THE CHEST WE WANT. We want the chest that spawns at the bottom of the cliff - it is touching the base of it, so walk along the base untill you see one at the bottom of the cliff. It is the only chest at the base of this cliff, so if you see a chest that is touching the base then that is it. It is quickest to zone for both of these chests at the same time as the exit to the Crossfield is the closest zone line from The Northsward's Lordly Robes. It also dosn't take long to just look for the Circlet chest. -------- *** From this point on I will assume your Hunter, Machinist and Black Mage *** *** will always have the Dueling Masks, Mirage Vests, Circlet and Lordly *** *** Robes equipped. *** Once you have all the equiptment, congratulations. Give yourself a pat on the back then equip them. Our next stop is to Rabanastre to get the Monographs for better loot drops so teleport there when ready. The remaining Monographs are: - Hunter's Monograph Cost: 18,000 Gil From Gatsly after completing the Thextera Hunt. - Knight's Monograph Cost: 19,000 Gil Talk to a weapon Merchant 30 times. - Warmage's Monograph Cost: 20,000 Gil Read the Hunt board 20 times. - Scholar's Monograph Cost: 22,000 Gil Talk to a armour Merchant 15 times. - Dragoon's Monograph Cost: 22,000 Gil Read the Hunt board 40 times. - Sage's Monograph Cost: 25,000 Gil Talk to any Merchant 100 times. They will cost a grand total of 126,000 Gil so be preapred for a large hole in your wallet. It won't be too hard to replace as you can chain Panthers in the Golomore Jungle if everything else fails. Once you have them all then great, it is time to get the Blood Sword A. -------- Blood Sword A -------- Bazaar name: Crimson Blade Need: 15 x Dark Crystal Cost: 4,444 Gil 2 x Solid Stone Get: Blood Sword A 3 x Vampyr Fang Dark Crystals and Solid Stones are very easy to get but it is the Vampyr Fangs that prove to be quite the challenge in Weak Mode. Abysteels can drop them both with and without the Monograph, but it is a 1% drop without. You can also steal them from some types. Basicaly, there are 3 different types of Abysteel in the game, A, B and C. Type B is the best as we can steal them only from type B with a 6% chance with Thief's Cuffs and get them at a 15% Monograph drop rate. There is an easy way to get to a small room with a few type B Abysteels. Warp to Eyrut Village and save your game. Keep going south untill you are in The Feywood/Walk of Flitting Rifts, then go south one more map to the Walk of Dancing Shadow. At the top left hand corner of this map is an enterance to The Henne Mines and in the room are some Abysteels. You must be sure you are prepared before going in there. Just as a note, you will also find a second Sage Ring in this room. First of all, your team will consist of your Hunter, Black Mage and White Mage so get them in your party. Equip your Hunter with his evasion gear and Jade Armlet aswell as the Mirage Vest and Dueling Mask if you havn't already. Your Black Mage will have the Indigo Pendent aswell as the Circlet and Lordly Robes equipped and the Flame Staff as a weapon. For your White Mage just give it the next best Mystic Armour you have and equip the Sage Ring as an Accessory. Now set your gambits like so: Hunter: Ally: any -> Phoenix Down Ally: HP < 70% -> Hi-Potion If your Hunter is Vaan, Balthier or Fran: Foe: any -> Steal Black Mage: Note: is the name of your hunter. Foe: any -> Sleep Foe: any -> Blind Ally: -> Decoy Foe: any -> Firaga (10,000+ DMG with Oil!) White Mage: Ally: -> Decoy Foe: any -> Oil Ally: MP < 40% -> Ether If you have the Warmage augment on your Black Mage (and you certainly should), then it will never run out of MP. The MP Augment is for your White Mage. Walk into the room with your Hunter out and Decoyed then try and lure one of the two Abysteel's at the entrance to you. Your mages will sleep and kill it. Yes, your White Mage will hit with Oil if you have decent armour, but if not then you might want to put it in your Black Mage's Gambits. At the end of the room is the third and last Abysteel so kill it the same way. Once they are all dead then walk to the Walk of Flitting Rifts and back to spawn them again. Keep doing this untill you get all 3 Vampyr Fangs. On your way back to Eyrut Village stop at The Rustling Chapel and kill every enemy on this map, including respawns. Once they've all been deafeated then Dark Skeletons will begin to spawn. This saves us time later on when we get the loot for the Nihopalaoa as we can get Death's-Head from them. We only need 2 so kill the Dark Skeletons untill you've got what we came for. Sadly, they do not drop Dark Crystals. Once in Eyrut, warp to Mosphoran and exit to the North East, to the Rays of Ashen Light. Here around the shrine are Clay Golems, which have a high chance of dropping Solid Stones, get two and teleport to the Lhusu Mines. There are many enemies that drop Dark Crystals and you might even have enough already, if not however then I find that Vampyrs in the Lhusu Mines are quick and easy. From the teleport crystal, go one map east to the Transitway 1 and kill the Vampyrs. When you've done, you can now sell the items you needed and buy yourself the Blood Sword A. -------- -------- Nihopalaoa -------- Bazaar name: Cursed Necklace Need: 3 x Blood-stained Necklace Cost: 28,000 Gil 3 x Leo Gem Get: Nihopalaoa 2 x Death's-Head If you have been following along the FAQ then you will already have the two Death's-Head that you need, so all that remains is the Leo Gem and the Blood-stained Necklace. You can get these in any order but I will do the Necklace's first. Warp to the Westersand and save your game then walk to the Zertinan Caverns and make your way to the save point - We will be fighting Adrammelech. -------- Adrammelech -------- At this point in the game he's easy. Have your Hunter with the Pheasant Netsuke and your Black Mage spamming Decoy on your Hunter and Blizzaga on Adrammelech. Your machinist should have the Beserker, Fomalhaut and Silent Shot as per usual. The Shambling Corpse's are no big deal as your Machinist will take them out. Have your Hunter with Hi-Potion Gambits and you're good to go. He can inflict Sap but it isn't a bother as you can cure it with a Remedy. If you bothered to get the Armour from Cerobi Steppe like I recommended then he should be doing around 700 damage with his Thundaja, which can also inflict Stop. After a certain amount of damage he'll put up Paling so only your Black Mage can hit him untill it runs out. It will be over before that, however, so don't worry about a long battle. If you're getting thrown around by his Thunder-based skills you can equip the Diamond Armlet. Once he is dead, don't forget to stick around and kill the Shambling Corpse's for their Blood-stained Necklace's. Adrammelech isn't too useful skill wise on the Characters I chose, my choices being Shades of Black for my Hunter, Hand- Bomb's 2 for my Black Mage or a Battle Lore and Souleater for my White Mage. I picked Black Mage for no reason, all those skills are useless. -------- Leo Gems are last and probably the most time consuming to get as they are a rare steal from Dinosaur-type and some Wyvern enemies. Let's go to the East Gate of Rabanastre. I have found that Wild Saurian is the fastest way to get multiple Leo Gems. Using the one in the Dalmasca Estersand/The Stepping, steal from it with Thief's Cuffs then flee to the Yardang Labyrinth and back. Again, this is a 6% steal with the Thief's Cuffs so it will take some time, though the monster is much quicker to walk to so it'll take much less than the Wyvern Wings. Once you have all the items, sell them and buy your awesome Nihopalaoa. -------- ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Catching Up On More Hunts [CaUpHu] ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Items we will find/buy: - Expose - 2 x Elixir - Silent Shot - Iga Blade - Warp - Aqua Shot - Bubble Belt - Opal Ring - Bravery - Site 11 Key - Cross Scale - Protectga - Deimos Clay - Giant's Helmet - White Mask - Lightning Arrows - Mythril - Silencega - Gillie Boots - Calipers - Hermes Sandals - Carmagnole - 6 x Hi-Ether - Soul of Thamasa - Arc Scale - Adamantite - Einherjarium - Toxify - Lead Bolts - Save The Queen - Kagenui - Halberd - Stink Bombs - Scathe Mote - Aegis Shield - Putrid Liquid - Shear - Dragon Scale - Syphon - Fumarole - Minerva Bustier - Reverse - Cameo Belt - Teleport Stone - Mythril Blade - Stun Bombs - Jade Collar - Gaia Rod - Faith - Platinum Shield - Black Robes - Holy Mote - Wyrmfire Shot ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ This section will be dedicated to finishing all the Hunts possible at the moment. These are all the Hunts that are available after finishing Draklor and the Trickster and Antlion hunts that we didn't finish when we got them. Now that we have the Fomalhaut, Dueling Mask, Mirage Vest, Circlet and Lordly Robes we can handle them easier. If you do not want to do these Hunts then you will be missing out on an oppertunity to get the Reverse spell, which is infinitly useful in Weak Mode. I like to use the Phon Coast as my base for accepting Marks because the bill board is right next to the teleport crystal, though you can use anywhere you'd like with a board. Warp to a bill board then accept all the hunts you can, they will be: - Vorpal Bunny - Darksteel - Atomos - Overlord - Mindflayer - Vyraal - Roblon - Goliath - Bloodwing - Lindwyrm - Braegh - Deathscythe Once accepted go and see Montblanc, who will give you your rewards for doing certain tasks. The rewards are a some Gil and a Mallet. Proceed to accept the Carrot Mark then save your game and prepare for a lot of killing rare one-of-a -kind endangered monsters. All of these marks gives us 32 hunts that we can complete, and we need to beat 32 to unlock the Knight of the Round clan rank and unlock Reverse in the clan shop. I highly recommend you complete these hunts as hard as some of them may be because with the right strategy they can all be defeated. The order you complete them in dosn't matter but some of them do give better rewards which can help you for the later Marks. Feel free to follow me or do them in your prefered order. I start with the Antlion and Trickster because I feel like they are unfinished business then do them in the order they appear in the Clan Primer. Throughout most of these I will assume your Gambits for your Hunter and Black Mage are similar to this bellow: Hunter: Ally: any -> Phoenix Down Ally: HP <70% -> Hi-Potion or Ally: HP < 50% -> X-Potion Ally: any -> Remedy or Ally: any -> Eye Drops + Ally: any -> Chronos Tear + Ally: -> Echo Herbs Black Mage: Self: MP < 30% -> Ether Ally: -> Decoy Foe: any -> Foe: any -> Throughout all of these marks I will also assume that you have a healthy stock of Hi-Potions, X-Potions, Remedies, Bacchus's Wine and Ethers. You will also need all Remedy Lores on your Hunter atleast. The damage you deal and take will also be based on the armour and weapon we got in Cerobbi Steppe, so if you didn't bother getting them then you'll have a hard time. If you are ever having trouble with any of these battles apply shell and protect to your characters, this guide assume you don't use it unless I specificaly mention it. -------- Ant Lion -------- Warp to the Lhusu Mines and make your way to the dead end at site 9. He is there with lots of Killer Mantis's. Have your Machinist with Silent Shot and the Beserker, Hunter with his dodging equiptment and Black Mage with the Indigo Pendent. Decoy your hunter and have your Black Mage with an Aeroga Gambit ready. Set your battle speed to slow. When you enter the battle order your Black Mage to use a Warp Mote, which you should have from hunting all those Panthers, on the group of Killer Mantis's. Try and get as many as possible so you can eliminate them quickly. Once they are all taken care of you can then set the battle speed to the fastest and watch your gambits do the rest. Just make sure that the Hunter isn't close to the rest of your team so that he is the only one that can be hit by Flatten. At < 50% HP he ignores evade so you can equip your Pheasant Netsuke on your Hunter. When he casts Enrage his attacks have 0 CT, but don't worry. You'll take little damage with your armour and you'll heal for a truck load. When it is dead, pick up Expose in the room you fought it and the Iga Blade on the way back to the save point along the wall. Go back and speak to the petitioner to get some Gil, a Bubble Belt and a Sickle-Blade. After that, go to the Phon Coast and get the key next to The Man Who Fell. We are now done with this Hunt. -------- -------- Trickster -------- This thing is annoying, it casts Paling at low HP and then it starts spamming Choco-Comet, which will eat your party. Thankfuly we can Blind it so start off by doing that. Once done just set your Black Mage's Gambit's to throw potions and decoy your hunter while you let your Machinist eat away slowly with Silent Shot + Beserker. When he casts White Wind, swap out your Machinist for your Knight with the Blood Sword A (Because it has a high attack) and unleash the biggest Quickening Chain you can, hopfuly killing it before it puts up its Paling. If it uses Paling then you just have to wait it out, healing the dead with Phoenix downs, untill you can use some more quickenings. His attacks can inflict Doom but Remedies will take care of that. Get your reward of some Gil and Deimos Clay. Sell the Clay, Horakhty's Flame and Phobos Glaze to unlock the Morbid Urn in the Bazaar, though we won't ever be needing it for anything. Buy it if you want but I'd save it untill you have money to burn. -------- -------- Vorpal Bunny -------- An easy mark, find it at the Golmore Jungle/The Rusting Chapel. It is hidden in the ground like some similar monsters so you have to walk up to it for it to appear. When it appears, throw a Bacchus's Wine at it and let your Black Mage blind it. Watch as it dies at the hand of your Machinist. Bring the Rabbit's Tail back to the petitioner to get some Gil, Lightning Arrows and a set of Gillie Boots. -------- -------- Mindflayer -------- The guy even tells you where it is: Phase 1 Dig, you need full MP when you enter for it to appear though, so only treck through with your Hunter and Machinist. He is at the very south portion of the map. When you see him, throw a Bacchus's Wine and get your Black Mage out to Blind. Let your Machinist take him down slowly while your Black Mage deals out 1.3k damage with Firaga. Firaga will be your biggest damage dealer as he is resistant to Guns. You should only need to Beserk him once but if he gets out of it you may want to use a Quickening Chain to finish him off as he can cast Soul Etude, which heals him to full HP. He does have a large array of spells, but under Beserk you don't have to worry about a single one of them. Back in Jahara you will get some Gil and a Carmagnole for your deeds. -------- -------- Bloodwing -------- Buy lots of Chrono's Tear and Remedies before doing this hunt. While we do the Bloodwing hunt we may aswell find all the one time items that we can in the Barheim Passage. If you've been following this Walkthrough like a bible then this will be your first time entering the Passage since we fought the Mimic Queen, so don't forget to touch the Teleport Crystal. The traps in this place suck, so use Libra. At the end of Special Op. Sector 5 is an Arc Scale, so pick that up. On a trap at the path north of the entrance to the East-West Bypass is Toxify, it is possible to pick it up without setting off the trap, you just have to be very careful. Just as a note, at the entrance to The Zeviah Span there is a chest near a lamp post that has a 90% spawn rate and 50% chance to contain an item, with half that to get a Bubble Mote. It is almost a 25% chance to get one per entry, which is pretty damn high. We don't really need Bubble Motes, but if you feel like you do, you may want to come here. The Zeviah Span map is pretty much split into 3 lanes, the side two being broken up into sections. When you enter, get the Barheim Candle from the top part of the Right lane then make your way to the very bottom of the center lane and use the path to get to the small isolated area in the right lane to get a Kagenui at the top portion and a Scathe Mote at the bottom. The last treasure here is the Shear Technick, located in the isolated part of the centre lane, you have to get it by entering from the West Annex. In the West Annex is a Guaranteed Fumarole. It is located at the end of a branch in the path to the south east of the map. At the south east, the path splits left and right. Going left will take you to the Fomarole, but watch out for all the traps. Set your battle speed to slow, run in and get it with one character, then run straight away to the Terminus No. 7 Adjunct. Yes, you will be crippled by status effects and you will meet the Bloodwing on the way, but with the Specters there it isn't worth fighting yet. At the dead end of Terminus No. 7 Adjunct. is a Cameo belt that spawns 25% of the time, you want this. Set your battle speed to the fastest then save your game, soft reset to get rid of all the monsters that no doubt followed you. Once you're back in the game, only have your Hunter out with the Nihopalaoa equipped. Walk back to the west Annex and use a Chronos Tear to inflict Stop on all the enemies you encounter untill you get to Bloodwing, then throw a Remedy at him - This is where the mark actually starts. The Remedy will inflict Disease, Imobilise, Silence and Blind. Walk your Hunter out of Melee range of it and pull out your Hunter and Black Mage. Your Hunter should now have the Pheasent's Netsuke equipped so that you can heal from any attacks that you take, while your Machinist has the usual and your Black Mage spams Decoy and Firaga. He can blind with Flash, which you should only bother healing on your Machinist. With 5k Damage from your Machinist and a good 3k from your Black Mage with the odd 10-11k Critical hit, his 41k odd hp will go down very quickly. Once it is dead I didn't bother killing the enemies back, just ran all the way back to the Teleport Crystal and warpped back to the Estersand. Get your Gil, Stun Bombs and Vampyr Fang reward. -------- -------- Atomos -------- This must be a joke fight. He's in the northern part of the Northern Skirts of the Mosphoran Highwaste. Just Nihopalaoa on your Hunter + Remedy and this thing has more status effects than a cat has hair. Blind, Disable, Disease, Imobilise - Need I say more? Infact, you could beat this guy with just your Knight + Blood Sword A as he isn't immune to confuse. He's a push over. If you even need tips for dealing damage, use Silent Shot as it is non-elemental because he halves all elements. Your rewards are some Gil, a Gaia Rod and a Platinum Shield. -------- -------- Roblon -------- We need lots of Chronos Tear for this mark too, so stock up! Because we're entering yet another new area, let's loot the place of all the rich resources it holds. First, teleport to the Salika Wood and save, then walk to the save point at the Nabreus Deadlands, save again. Our goal is to get to the Teleport Crystal and get as much of the one time items as possible. Have only your Hunter and set the game speed to slow, then get the map in the top left corner of the Vale of Lingering Sorrow. Once obtained, get the Holy Mote from the bottom right corner of Echos of the Past. At the top right of The Slumbermead is a Mythril Blade. Go to The Fog Mutters and pick up the Elixir near the entrance and the Vaccine near the exit to Overlooking Eternity as well as the Gil behind the rock in the middle then walk to the Succor Midst Sorrow. Heal up your Hunter and make sure he is in a healthy condition. This Crystal Bug is very hard. If you don't have a Mag Res of atleast 50+ on each of your characters then it will destroy you. When you touch it, walk a small distance away and bring out your Machinist and Black Mage. Walk your Hunter back to the Crystal and if you stand the right distance away, only he'll be hit by the spells. It will do a lot of damage and you will need to heal, not only that, it also casts restore a lot. If you can do more damage than he can restore (3k+ with Machinist, 1K+ with Black Mage) then you can eventually take it out. Save your game here then go north to the Lifeless Strand. At the very north center part of this map is a secret path that leads to the Warp spell and at the part jutting south near the top right zone line is an Opal Ring that only appears 25% of the time, be sure to keep zoning untill you get it. Once you have it, go to the Field of the Fallen Lord, in the top centre is a Cross Scale. Head back and save your game for the last time before this Mark. This guy is really annoying too, he casts magic and hits really hard. But the main problem isn't him - It is all the Dead Bones around him. Their damage will range from 100-500, and although not that big, when you have 5 attacking at once it really adds up. This is why we have Chronos Tear, to stop them. Equip the Nihopalaoa on your Hunter and the Bubble Belt on your Machinist as well as Aqua Shot, your Black Mage should have the Pheasent's Netsuke. Turn your Hunter's Gambits off and have your Black Mage's Gambits set to Ally: -> Decoy and Ally:HP < 70% -> X-Potion. Your Machinist should only have the Gambit Foe: Highest Max HP -> Attack. When you are at Overlooking Eternity, prepare yourself by setting the battle speed to the slowest and only having your Hunter out. This battle is 100% about crowd control. As you walk up the slope use a Chronos Tear on any Dead Bones that appear, in all there should be about 5 or 6, so it won't be too much. When you reach the top, walk to the far side of the hill and use a Remedy on Roblon. He'll target your Hunter but will get inflicted by Blind. Pull out your Machinist and Black Mage and watch your HP levels as your Machinist deals a constant 6K+ Damage. It isn't much, but over time he'll wither down - Don't forget to set battle speed up to the highest setting, else you'll die when he reaches critical. Eventually the Dead Bones will be cured of stop and come to attack, just throw another Chronos Tear with your Hunter and stay cured with your Black Mage. This is pretty much the entire fight, his Magic will do some damage and you can swap in elemental halving equiptment if you feel you need to. Try and resurect the dead with your Black Mage so your Machinist can constantly attack but if your Black Mage dies, you don't have much of a choice. In critical he will get 0 CT and has damage reduction, you'll only deal 2k. I beat him without having to toss any Gil, but if you feel the need, Gil Toss away. This battle may take a few tries, but stay calm and throw those Chronos Tears and you should be fine. As a reward, collect your Gil, Giant's Helmet and Mythril. -------- -------- Braegh -------- Compared to the last battle, this one is like fighting a regular enemy. Teleport to the Salika Wood and save your game. Silent Shot on your Beserked Machinist and prepare the Nihopalaoa on your Hunter, Black Mage should be ready to spam Blizzaga. He is in the Corridor of Ages. When you see it, throw a Remedy then pull out your other characters and swap back to the Pheasent's Netsuke, don't even bother getting out of your chair to make a coffee as the fight will be over just as quickly as it started. Get your Gil, Caliper and Hi-Ether rewards. -------- -------- Darksteel -------- An easy Mark, found in Temptation Eluded of Sochen. Walk in there and use a Remedy with your Hunter and Nihopalaoa then let your Machinist attack with Beserker and Silent Shot, and Black Mage use Firaga and Decoy your Hunter, who will run out of its range to kite it. The only long ranged skill it has is Darkra, which is only used at critical, and since the Remedy inflicts Disease we don't have to worry about that. If he uses Purify just throw another Remedy and when you're not throwing Remedies, heal with the Pheasent's Netsuke. Poison from the Remedy will also do some insane damage. He never hit me at all at any time in the entire battle however. Rewards are Gil, Lead Bolts and Adamantite. -------- -------- Vyraal -------- This beast is located at The Northsward in the Cerobbi Steppe. You can take a Chocobo there from Balfonheim Port to make it much quicker. When you get there make sure your party consists of your Hunter, Knight and Machinist. Your Machinist will have Silent Shot and the Beserker as usual and your Knight will be using the new Blood Sword A and the Bubble Belt. Your hunter will be using his best evasive gear, that means a Jade Collar instead of the Pheasent's Netsuke. Before you go to fight him, however, decoy your Hunter with a Mage and equip the Nihopalaoa to throw a Remedy when the battle first starts. This will inflict Blind, Slow, Silence, Sleep and Confuse. If the battle ever gets out of hand you can use your Red or Black Mage and the Indigo Pendent to sleep him while you recover, or throw a Alarm Clock with the Nihopalaoa. This battle is long and drawn out, but with Blind and a constant confuse you should be able to survive his attacks. Use your Hunter for healing while your Machinist and Knight constantly pound away. Sadly, he can use Restore so you'll just have to keep at it untill you beat him. At critical HP he will use Magick Barrier, but since we arn't attacking with magic this is no big deal. Once it is dead go and claim your rewards of some more Gil, a Halberd, an Aegis Shield and a Dragon Scale. -------- -------- Lindwyrm -------- Found only in the Garden of Life's Circle in the Tchita Uplands when it is cloudy, so keep entering and exiting from the Phon Coast untill the weather is how we want it. Your team will consist of your Hunter with the Pheasent's Netsuke, Machinist with Wyrmfire Shot and Beserker and Black Mage with Indigo Pendent. He isn't immune to Blind, Sleep, Slow or Silence so you can use a Remedy or your Black Mage to cripple him. Use Firaga to deal the most damage you can with your Flame Staff. Silence prevents his spells and Blind protects against his physical hits so you certainly want these. Slow does help untill he gains 0 CT and Sleep is to take a breather if you need to bring your forces back together and heal. Take it slow, there is no rush and you can always Sleep him and spam Magic if that is your thing. All in all not too hard if you abuse his weaknesses, but he can use restore which will be very annoying. Stone Breath can also petrify if it hits so just cure it with a Golden Needle from your Hunter. At critical HP he will get Damage Reduction so you can use Gil Toss or let your Magic take him out. Pick up your well deserved Gil, a Minerva Bustier and a Hi-Ether. -------- -------- Overlord -------- This battle can be easy or he can one hit your entire party. Best be prepared with the right battle set up. You can find him in Doubt Abandoned in Sochen. When you've found him you may want you buff your Hunter, Machinist and Knight with Shell and Protect and have your Knight with the Blood Sword A, Hunter with Nihopalaoa and Machinist with Aqua Shot and Beserker. Throw a Remedy to start to inflict Blind, Slow, Silence, Confuse and Disease then pull out your Machinist and Knight, change to the Pheasent's Netsuke and see how it pans out. If he gets a Pyromania that hits your party you will suffer heavy damage. Rage is also a dangerous skill so be prepared to try this battle a few times if you can't win it quickly. When he has around a 1/3 of his health you can try to kill him with a large Quickening to increase your odds of survival, but you probably won't know because of Disease. Your reward is some Gil, 2 Hi-Ethers and a Teleport Stone. -------- -------- Goliath and Deathscythe -------- Since these two marks are in the same location, I find it easiest to do them both at the same time. Speak to the Petitioners and teleport yourself to the Nabreus Deadlands, then save your game. Make your way north east to the entrance to the Necrohol of Nabudis, before you enter, make sure you only have your Hunter out and Libra active. Avoid the Traps and when you are in a safe area, pull out your Machinist and Black Mage to take care of the Bakanmy. Goliath is in the same room so make sure to stay clear of him, the room is the Hall of Slumbering Might. They may overwhelm you so be sure to be prepared with Phoenix Downs. When they are all defeated, equip the Ruby Rings on your Machinist and Hunter and, if you have any, equip the Mirror Mail on your Knight. If you have a Knight out then turn his gambits off, aswell as the Gambits for your Hunter. Set the Gambits for your Machinist to attack and walk into range. When you approach Goliath make sure you stay out of Melee range. Once your Machinist can hit him, camp all your characters there for the fight. He will start by using Magick Barrier and uses it constantly throughout the fight. He can't hit you if you stay at the right distance, too close and he'll lunge when he has low HP. Watch out, I thought I was far away enough only to have him Lunge at me and take our my Hunter - Moral of the story is to stay as far back as your Machinist shoots from. It'll be a long fight as only your Machinist will deal damage, It would be good if we could reflect of of ourselves with our Black Mage for extra damage, but sadly his Magick Barrier prevents this. Be sure to use Silent Shot as he halves all elements. As we have just entered the Necrohol I will guide you through collecting all the loot aswell. First, in a bottom left corner of the Hall of Slumbering Might is another Jade Collar. Next, in a room in the bottom part of the Hall of the Ivory Covenant is the Faith Spell - You want this! In the Cloister of the Highborn is where we fight Deathsycthe, so let's beat him up first before we loot this place. Hit a character of yours down to less than 10% health then enter the Cloister of the Highborn. Swap that character back and pull out your Machinist with Beserker and Silent shot, Hunter with Nihopalaoa and Evasion gear and Black Mage with anything you want. Deathscythe will spawn so instantly throw a Bacchu's Wine when you can with your Black Mage, and throw a Remedy with your Hunter. If you can, walk just out of range and let your Black Mage take it out slowly with Firaga, and your Machinist's Guns. Equip the Pheasent's Netsuke on your Hunter when you are done. Once it gets to Critical HP then Beserk will run off, before it does though use the biggest quickening chain you can, you might take it out. If it isn't dead and it put up Pailing then just let your Black Mage finish the Job. If he manages to inflict stop you have Chronos Tears to fix the problem. Once he is defeated you may want to leave and save your game, then come back for the rest of the loot. In the Cloister of the Highborn is a dead end that leads to the top center of the room and in a small room to the left of that is a chest that contains the Black Robes, it is located at the bottom of the room. At the very top part of this corridor is another room that has a 3% chance to appear and contains an Ensanguined Shield, this is the only one in the game, so you'll have to keep zoning if you want it, I'd recommend you get it later. At the bottom left corner of the top section of this map is also the hidden Baknamy Merchant, buy a Wyrmfire Shot, Silent Shot and Aqua Shot from him. Going back to near the left portion of the bottom half of this map is a room to the left that has the Bravery Spell. Moving onto the Cloister of Distant Song now, the only things we want are Protectga, which is in the dead end to the long corridor to the left of the map that you will find near where you enter, and a White Mask, which is in a room at the very bottom left of the map. Last is the Hall of Effulgent Light, which has another two items of interest. These are Silencega and Hermes Sandals, both hidden at the very top portion of the map, in a secret room leading south. The Hermes Sandals only spawn at a 25% chance so you don't have to get them, but it saves time if you get it now. That's all of our loot collecting for now, be prepared to exit from the Hall of Effulgent Light and save your game at the Teleport Crystal in the Salika Wood. You've done a job well done! Now just warp back to Nalbina to collect your extra rewards of some Gil, 2 Hi-Ethers, a Soul of Thamasa, Einherjarium and a Save The Queen. -------- -------- Carrot -------- Speak to the Petitioner then prepare yourself in the Salikawood and walk to the Sun-dappled Path but don't kill anything along the way or the Mark will not spawn. To prepare for this mark, get your White Mage out to cast Bravery on your Machinist, who has the Beserker, and cast bubble on your Hunter. Bubble prevents Disease and doubles your Hunters HP. Also equip the Silent Shot on your Machinist. Carrot ignores evade so use the Pheasents Netsuke on your Hunter to heal for more. When you reach him, cast Dispel with your White Mage then swap it out for your Black Mage, who will throw Remedies at your Hunter when required and spam Firaga when not. Your Machinist should deal decent damage with Beserk and Silent Shot, Silent Shot also inflicting Silence which will make Carrot remove it with Purify, which grants you a lot of extra hits. Be sure to have Decoy up at all times, and control your Hunter to be on the other side of Carrot than your Machinist and Black Mage. He'll use Growing Threat after a while, which is your cue to unleash the biggest quickening chain you can. A 6 hit from my Black Mage alone did 20K+ damage, he'll be dead for sure. If you don't manage to beat him, don't worry, he is quite the formidable foe, just reload your game and try again. Return to collect your reward of some Gil, Stink Bombs and Putrid Liquid. Also talk to Jovy. If you have completed all the Nalbina hunts he will reward you with some back story, an Elixir and a Knot of Rust. -------- Congratulations on your completion of all 32 Hunts! Now it is time to go to Rabanastre and collect your well earned Reverse and Syphon from the Clan Shop. Reverse is an amazing spell which we will abuse in the up coming bosses and Hunts, it is an absoloute must for a Weak Mode game and it wasn't that hard to get now, was it? Now that you have reverse there is a new strategy that comes into play, using Decoy and Reverse on a character, which lets you stay alive a lot easier in harder dungeons and bosses. From here on, if you have trouble with a boss or room of enemies, try that strategy, though all boss stragergies will be compiled without it, unless I specificaly say so. Save your game, give yourself a pat on the back, have a nice night out then prepare yourself for the next part of the story. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ The Great Crystal and Beyond [TgCaBe] ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Items we will find: | Items we will buy: Loot to collect: - Embroidered Tippet | - Aldebaran Y - 2 x Emperor Scale - X-Potion | - Mud Shot - 3 x Silver Liquid - 2 x Spirit of Lowtown | - Shock - 8 x Earth Crystal - Dispelga | - Bubble Belt ---------------------------------------------------- - Defender - Cloud Staff - Hastega Mote - Reflectga - Thief's Cap - Pheasent's Netsuke - Sash - Holy Rod - Sweep - Aegis Shield - Gold Hairpin - Ruby Ring - Sleepga - Ninja Gear - Beserker - Elixir - Gaia Gear - Cura Mote - Amber Armlet - Reverse Mote - Bubble Mote - Hermes Sandals ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Stock up on 99 X-Potions, 99 Hi-Potions, 99 Remedies and 99 Ethers, also get any other items you think you'd need, then warp to Eruyt Village and save. Walk your way to Antiquity's End in The Feywood, collecting the map at the Walk of Stolen Truths. There is also a chest that spawns 25% of the time in Antiquity's End, near the west entrance, that contains a guaranteed Embroidered Tippet, useless but a trophy none the less. Save your game and prepare for the boss. -------- Rafflesia -------- To start, use a Nihopalaoa and Remedy with your Hunter, then switch to the Pheasents Netsuke to inflict Slow, Silence, Blind and Sap. Let your Machinist deal damage with Silent Shot and Beserker - Your Black Mage is alomst useless here. If you want, pull out your most damaging characters and do the biggest quickening chain you can which will take off a huge chunk of it's HP, then just heal status effects with your Hunter and let your Machinist take it home. I let my Knight deal out 500 damage a hit with the Blood Sword A take some time in the front lines, while my Black Mage sat it out on the bench. Sometimes you'll get unlucky with this boss and he'll just keep inflicting status's that you won't be able to heal. If that happens, try again, but for most players, you'll have this in the bag. Before you move on, in the boss room is two one time only chests that contain an X-Potion and Spirit of Lowtown respectively. -------- Moving on to the White Magick's Embrace, find the Map and Dispelga, which is located near a large pillar in the center-ish of the map. There is also a chest on this map that has a guaranteed Golden Amulet, it is at a dead end near the southern exit. The party that I used to transverse this changed to my Knight instead of Black Mage, as the Blood Sword A really cripples most of the monsters here and lets you take no damage, as they'll cancel their attack most of the time to target themselves. As we do the puzzle to get to Giruvegan, collect the Bubble Belt in the center of the Ice Field of Clearsight. There is also a Defender near the bottom right hand corner of The Edge of Reason, and the Reflectga spell there aswell, so collect them. Summon Belias then make your way to Giruvegan, save your game then prepare for... -------- Daedalus -------- He isn't a problem, use your Knight with his best gear and Blood Sword A, and your Machinist with Beserker and Silent Shot. Your Hunter is healing and support, though you probably won't be using Remedies as he can only be inflicted by Silence. The trick is to let your Knight attack and inflict confuse, which cuts down his turn count by a lot, while your Machinist takes him down. As an alternative, you can also equip the Nihopalaoa and Smelling Salts, and a Foe: Nearest -> Smelling Salts gambit to inflict even more confusion. When he's dead, be sure to save your game and restock on items if you need to before we move on. -------- Now our path to The Great Crystal is clear, simply keep pressing forward to the next save crystal in The Haamilkah Water-Steps. There are only three items worth collecting on the way, on your way to the Chthes Gate Stone is a map and on the same platform is a guaranteed Sash, in The Trimahla Water-Steps. When you are at The Aadha Water-Steps, there is a Guaranteed Aegis shield near the bottom left of the map. Last of all, before the save point is Sleepga, so pick that up. Once you have saved, move on to the Gate of Fire and collect the next three items, which are all located at different corners of the map. They are an Elixir, Amber Armlet and Spirit of Lowtown. -------- Tyrant -------- This battle can have the potential to be difficult, or it can be one of the easiest battles in this game. You can use your usual Tank-And-Spank strategy with your Knight confusing with Blood Sword A, Machinist shooting and Hunter Healing with potions, or there is an easier way. Make your party consist of your Hunter, White Mage and Black Mage. Set your gambits as follows: Black Mage: Ally: MP < 30 -> Ether Ally: -> Decoy Foe: Any -> Blizzaga White Mage: Must be wearing Indigo Pendant! Foe: Any -> Confuse Hunter: Ally: Any -> Phoenix Down Ally: HP < 70% -> Hi-Potion When you enter the battle, cast Dispel with your White Mage and make sure that your Hunter is under decoy. Also make sure that your White Mage is wearing our Indigo Pendant. Once Dispel has been cast, just watch as your party slowly destroys this boss while taking no, or very little, damage. Credit goes to FF12GM's Video on this strategy, I would of gone with Tank-And-Spank if not for it. I recommend you go back and save as the next part can be a bit dangerous. -------- When you've saved and warped into The Great Crystal, you might think that we can blast through with our Machinist + Beserker, get the loot, kill the boss and get the hell out. Well, sadly, most of the monsters here love spamming horrible status effects, and our lone Machinist, even with our Black Mage, can not do enough damage to stop them from attacking atleast once. It is therefore my philosophy that we set our battle speed to slow and run through each room while collecting all the loot. I'm not going to give you a map of this part, and the names are just to damn confusing so I'll tell you what loot you can find along the way and you can use a map from a different place to get your way through, making sure you collect the loots if that's what you want. The loots you can collect are a Cloud Staff, Thief's Cap, Holy Rod, Gold Hairpin, Ninja Gear and Gaia Gear. When you get there, save at the Crystal Core. -------- Shemhazai -------- Shemhazai has the ability to inflict Disease with it's regular attacks which can seriously cripple your party. You should buff your characters with bubble before this fight, and add it to your Black Mage's Gambits. You can also buff your party with Shell and Protect if you'd like, but you probably won't be recasting in the middle of the battle. You can use your White Mage if you'd like but your Black Mage should have more HP, and to me that matters most. Either way, whatever mage you choose you'll have Bubble. Your party will be Machinist, Hunter and Black Mage. Machinist will have the Silent Shot and Beserker, as usual, Hunter will have the Pheasent's Netsuke and be using X-Potions or Hi-Potions to heal, aswell as an Echo Herbs Gambit as Shemhazai's attacks can inflict that too, and your Black Mage will have Ether, Decoy and Bubble Gambits. Don't forget to set your battle speed back to the fastest setting! Just watch as your gambits do the job. When he gets to Critical HP he'll take a lot less damage, so you can take him out with a Quickening if you are lazy. Collect the Reverse Mote and Hastega Mote in the boss room then let's give the esper to our Hunter. Yes, I highly recommend giving it to your Hunter, don't even ask me why if you can't see for yourself, just do it, you need it. -------- Now that we have the Treaty Blade we can do a few things before moving onto The Pharos. First, equip your Arcturus on your Hunter with Silent Shot and set his gambits to have Attack in there somewhere. We now have two people on our team who can deal good damage with guns, and our mages arn't too bad either. What we want now, however, is more fire power - We're going to try and make the Aldebaran Y, the best gun in IZJS. Before we can do that we need to finish the events where Reddas joins our party. -------- Creating the Aldebaran Y -------- This gun is the best gun in IZJS and is a great addition to our team. Let us look at its statistics: Aldebaran Y CT: 50 (like all guns) Critical Chance: 10% (double all guns) Attack: 66 (14 higher than Fomalhaut) Evage: 25% (all guns are 10%) It is a lot better than the Fomalhaut, dealing around 25% more damage and having double the critical rate. We want this gun as our Machinist will become a god against things that don't have Gun Resistance. Let us look at the Bazaar recipe for this weapon: ---------------------------- This weapon will take a fair bit of time | Name | Mudslinger | to make, but with the right stragergies |------|---------------------| we can cut down this time significantly. | Cost | 120,000 Gil | Our main problem has been the Emperor |------|---------------------| Scales, as there are only 2 ways in the | Need | 8 x Earth Crystal | game to get them. The first way involves | | 2 x Emperor Scale | fighting Archaeoaevis and hoping to god | | 3 x Silver Liquid | you get them to drop. The Archaeoaevis in |------|---------------------| IZJS have been buffed up a significant | Get | Aldebaran Y | amount, so we've waited untill this far in | | Mud Shot | the game so that we can steal them from ---------------------------- the Deathgaze Mark. We could of gotten this gun earlier, but we didn't /need/ it so coming back to it now, we've made it easier for ourselves. Earth Crystals are not a problem and Silver Liquid can be collected easier, and now that we can fight Deathgaze we can get the Emperor Scales too. So, let us make haste towards this great weapon. One last thing: This will take time so put the coffee on now before you get involved. 2 x Emperor Scale -------- Why not get the hardest part out of the way first? Accept the Deathgaze hunt then speak to the petitioner in any Aerodome. You need to ride the airship constantly untill he appears on board. Just keep taking the private cabin option as you'll be transported to the deck if he does appear. This can take a very long time so don't worry. It took me 10 minutes the first time and about an hour the second. Once you've got him to spawn though, we can get our Scales. Just as a note, this time I got Deathgaze to spawn on my first airship ride. xD Now, here is the strategy to steal Emperor Scales without taking any damage. Be sure to follow it down to the very last command as every step of it is important. Your party will consist of your White Mage, Black Mage and either Fran, Balthier or Vaan, or anyone with Steal. Credit to this Technique goes to mauriciochioro of Youtube. 1. Arrange your party and turn off your gambits for those three people. Kill Reddas then equip the Thief's Cuffs on your Thief. 2. Stand at the top of the stepps, note how there is a flat area near the top of the steps? That is the "Safe Zone" and Deathgaze cannot reach you if you stand there. Stand on the Safe Zone. 3. Control your White Mage to charge Dispel on the Safe Zone, and when fully charged, run up to the top of the stairs and as soon as you touch the top deck, run back down, you should cast on the small section of the stairs between the top deck and the Safe Zone. 4. Control your Black Mage and charge a spell that can inflict damage, Fira should be fine. When fully charged, do the same as you did with your White Mage, Deathgaze will target you with a skill but if you made it to the safe zone in time he won't be able to reach you to cast it. 5. Swap to your Thief and charge a steal, stand on the Safe Zone and press the L1 key for turbo, watch and count around 25-28 blinks of Reddas' KO Icon then turn off L1 Turbo and watch Deathgaze. 6. He will stop targetting your Black Mage and cast Renew on himself, which will give you a short window of opertunity to run up there with your Thief and steal, then run back down without being targeted or take damage. 7. Enter the Cabin then exit back to the Deck and start from step 3 untill you steal 2 Emperor Scales. Once you have 2 Emperor Scales, congratulations, you don't have to kill him now, and I won't cover it in this section, look at the optional part below for stratergies if you want to, however. Talk to the lady in the Cabin and say that you'd like a private room to wait it out, then save your game when you get back on land. 3 x Silver Liquid -------- Warp to the Nabreus Deadlands then make your party consist of Black Mage, White or Red Mage and Hunter. Equip your Hunter with Evasion gear and your White Mage with the Indigo Pendant then set your gambits to: White Mage: Foe: Any -> Oil Ally: -> Decoy Black Mage Ally: MP < 30 -> Ether Foe: Any -> Firaga Hunter Ally: HP < 70% -> Hi-Potion Reddas Gambits off Walk to The Slumbermead and look to your right as soon as you enter from the Succor Midst Sorrow. There will be a large rock like structure protruding from the ground, and a small rock pillar off to the side of it. Walk to the pillar to spawn a Foobar, your gambits will take it out quickly. Walk one map north of the Teleport Crystal then walk back to quickly respawn the Foobar, keep doing this untill you get your 3 Silver Liquids. 8 x Earth Crystal -------- Easy to get, you might want to put a gun on your Hunter and control your Knight to get used to the standard setup that we'll be using for most of our dungeon crawling. Just warp to the Lhusu Mines and slay the Killer Mantis' in Site 9 untill you get enough. You can also steal to speed things up. They are a 55% steal and 25% drop. Now you should have everything for the Aldebaran Y! Sell the items, buy the gun and equip it on your Machinist and give the Fomalhaut to your Hunter. We also get Mud shot, which is the only Earth Elemental shot in the game. -------- Now that we have the Aldebaran Y there's just one more thing we should do before we head off to the Pharos. Stock up on 99 of all the usual items, and buy 99 Dispel Motes. To get Dispel Motes, warp to Balfonheim then take an airship to Bhujerba. Onboard, one of the shops will sell them. You can only buy them once you get the Treaty Blade so now is a good time for us to stock up. Once you are ready, take the Strahl to the Ridorana Cataract then save. The Monsters here are not that much of a challenge and with our two gunners we can mow them down as we make our way to the Pharos. There are only 3 things we want here, first get the map from the top left portion of the Colesseum then walk from the Colosseum to the City of Other Days. There will be a chest not far from when you get out of the Colosseum that contains another Pheasent's Netsuke. The last chest is in the Path of Hidden Blessing and is just before the boss, past the save point, it contains a Sweep. Save your game and prepare for... -------- Hydro -------- As a note, you can use the same strategy that you used on Tyrant here, but it might take a bit longer than what I'm going to suggest. Your party is your Knight, Hunter and Machinist. Open with your Hunter throwing a Remedy with the Nihopalaoa to inflict Slow, Confuse and Oil. Your Knight will just hit away with the Blood Sword A. Change your shot to Wyrmfire Shot on both gunners and watch as it dies, don't forget to remove Nihopalaoa. Forget Reddas, he's useless anyway and will probably die before long. -------- In the boss room, Those Who Thirst Not, are 4 chests that can spawn. Only 1 of them has a 100% Spawn rate, so you'll want to zone back and fouth untill you get all the items. They are your third Ruby Ring, another Beserker, Cura Mote and a Bubble Mote. Certainly be sure to touch the Teleport Crystal in The Wellspring. An interesting thing to note here is that your Red Mage can kill things with extremely high accuracy using the Death spell here. I don't have a list of enemies that are immune to Death in the Pharos, but I'm assuming not many so you can use this to your advantage. Basicaly, have your Red Mage on your team with Syphon and Death and you should be good to go. Personally, I use both my gunners and my Kight, but you can swap one for the Red Mage if that's your thing. Anyway, while you are putting a Black Orb into each of the pedestals, collect the map at the end of the corridor to the south, and get the Hermes Sandals infront of the boss room. I equipped them on my Knight as the extra speed helps me land confusion before the enemy gets a turn. When you're ready, prepare yourself for the boss. -------- Pandaemonium -------- A strange thing about this boss is that you can inflict Oil but it is immune to Fire, so oil actually does nothing. My party consisted of my Machinist and Hunter with guns and Silent Shot and Knight with Blood Sword A. Again, you could possibly use the Tyrant strategy here but I just go all out. Blood Sword A confuses enough for it to not hit much anyway. Keep Reddas without attacking gambits so that he can sit back and throw curative items to cure Stone and Blind. Start the battle by using a Dispel Mote to remove Protect, then just wither away at his HP and heal when you need to. He will put up Paling and there is nothing you can do but wait it out. -------- Once you've beaten the boss it is your last chance before we scale the Pharos to stock up on items. Do get 99 of each healing item and do get 99 Remedies, it might not go astray to get 99 Ethers too, depending on your use of mages. You should also buy the best armour you can for your Knight, if you use it. The Magic Shop at Balfonheim also carries Shock and Arise now, though you'll probably only want Shock. When you are ready, save your game and be prepared for The Pharos at Ridorana. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Walking to the Heavens [WaThHe] ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Items we will find: - Demon Shield - Reflectga Mote - Hastega Mote - Dragon Helm - Opal Ring - Ardor - Chaperon - Quasimodo Boots - Antares - Scathe Mote - Minerva Bustier - Flare - 2 x Elixir - Zeus Mace - Ultima Blade - Gungnir - Gastrophetes S - Dark Matter - Holy - Dragon Mail - Megalixir - Perseus Bow - Sash - Black Mask - Muramasa ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Use the Way Stone and warp to the 1st Flight. There are two chests that we can get guaranteed stuff from here, when you walk out of the room and see the pillar of water, keep going north on your map to the dead end and hit it to find a hidden area with a Demon Shield. The next item is behind a Brainpan near the right side of the map and contains a Dragon Helm. On the 2nd there are another two items that we can get, guaranteed. The first is a Chaperon and is hidden near the center of the map, behind a Fools Facade. There are two ways to get to it, but it dosn't matter which way you go to find it. The next item we can't reach yet, it is a Perseus Bow and we'll get it in a bit. There are also two items on the 3rd Flight that we can't reach yet but we will back track for these in a moment. Onto the 4th Flight, there is a Elixir in a hidden room on the left side of the map and a Scate Mote in a room that is like the mirror image of the room on the left, on the right side of the map. Collect them, then back track killing all the Deidar that you see, so we can collect the hidden loot on the 2nd and 3rd Flight. Across the Red Bridge on the 3rd Flight is a Gungnir and the Holy spell, and on the 2nd Flight is a Perseus Bow. On your way back up to the top of the 4th Flight you will almost be guaranteed an encounter with Vishno, the rare game that spawns from killing Deidar. Kill it, because you have a 1% chance of getting a Ribbon from him. 1%?! I hear you say, well guys, you have to be in it to win it, and when the ticket is free you may aswell try. Save your game at Horizon's Break then head on up to Horizon's Cusp, there are two guaranteed chests here that contain a Reflectga Mote and a Black Mask, just before the boss room. Enter the door and get ready for a boss. -------- Slyt -------- Wow, all I can say is that this boss is the easiest boss in the entire game. For laughs, only have your Knight out with the Nihopalaoa, then throw a Handkerchief. Take our your Machinist with the Beserker + Aldebaran Y + Wyrmfire shot and look at that beautiful damage. Just as an example, I two shot this thing, around 40k first, then a critical hit for 65K+. Just... damn. -------- When you are ready, use the Way Stone and save at the Second Ascent. We have to pick something to sacrifice here, I went with Magicks as our Hunter and Machinist can easily pull us through, and our use of items is a good enough substitute anyway - On a side note, I like the purple colour. The next chests are in places that are a bit hard to describe, so I will be fairly general with their locations. You also may not be interested in all of them, so just take what you want and move on. The Crusaders are fairly hard to hit with your Knight + Blood Sword A aswell, so consider the Camo Belt. Station of Banishment -------- - Opal Ring - Bottom center of the map - Quasimodo Boots - Top right of the map - Minerva Bustier - Top left of the map Station of Suffering -------- - Zeus Mace - Bottom left corner of map - Gastrophetes S - Top left-ish, at the end of a slim dead end that leads to the center - Map Urn - Top left, but have to reach it from a corridor from the right side Station of Ascension -------- - Dragon Mail - Bottom left corner of the map - Gil Toss (Only if you didn't get it in Draklor) - Bottom right of the center loop of the map - Sash - Top right, at the end of one of the slim dead end corridors Once you have reached the Reach of the Damned, save and make your way up to the next floor, collecting the Muramasa and Hastega Mote before the boss door. When you think you are ready, open the door to fight the boss. -------- Fenrir -------- Another boss that you can oil, but is immune to fire damage. Use Mudshot on your Machinist + Beserker + Aldebaran Y, Silent Shot on your Hunter and heal with your Knight and Reddas. If things get out of hand or people are dying, you can use the Nihopalaoa + Alarm clock to put the boss to sleep so that you can recover. Open up with a Dispel Mote aswell and use one every time he casts a buff. He can be trouble as he hits hard, and if you didn't seal magic you can use reverse and decoy, but it shouldn't take a lot of effort to see him die. -------- When you are done, get back what was stolen from you and go up the lift to the next floor. It is probably a good idea to save here before using the next Way Stone. On the next floor you will want to use your Red Mage with Death, as the Bombs are resillient towards guns. Here, I'll just direct you through the different coloured way stones to get all the loot and make it to the next set of floors. First pick the Black Sigil to warp to a new section of the map. Here you will want to find the Fool's Facade to find two chests and a hidden Green Sigil, Flare and Antares. Use the Green Sigil, then use the Red one at the end of the next portion of the map. There is a chest with White Robes near the Green Sigil that you warp and a chest behind it that contains the spell Ardor. You will be on a small island part of the map with a chest once you touch the Red Sigil, it contains the Ultima Blade. Now pick The Sigil that corresponds to the thing you sacrificed not too long ago. Head north from here to find another Fool's Facade with a Way Stone at its end. Touch it to be warped to a lift. In one of the corners of this small part of the map is a chest with an Elixir so get that item. There is also a Way Stone you should touch to be warpped back to the start, so you can collect the map for this part of the dungeon. Use the lift and let's go to floor 90. -------- Hashmal -------- The best way to go about this battle is to simply Tank and Spank. Best party consists of your Machinist, Black Mage and Hunter. Use guns and Silent Shot with your Hunter with a Remedy gambit as Hashmal can inflict Disease. Your Black Mage should have the gambits: Self: MP < 30% -> Ether Ally: -> Decoy Ally: -> Reverse Foe: Any -> Aeroga When he casts Quakeja just heal or revive if need be and wait the battle out. His damage is really low and with Decoy and Reverse it's another coffee break from the treck. I gave Hashmal to my Knight as there isn't anything worth while on any of the other lisence boards and the spells are alright, even if you might only ever cast them once because of your low MP. -------- On your way up the Empyrean Ravel you'll find a chest that contains a Dark Matter, collect it as it is a great asset to Weak Mode. If you are lucky there will be a chest directly under it that spawns 3% of the time and is repetable which contains another Dark Matter. After the cut scene, back track and you will find another chest, this one contains a Megalixir, very nice. Again, there is a respawnable chest with a 3% chance to spawn and guaranteed chance of a Megalixir that you can farm here. If you really want, you can save at the crystal ahead and soft reset to farm the chests, getting an item every 16 or so odd soft resets. Save at the crystal and move on, prepare for the next boss and awesome cut scenes. -------- Judge Gabranth -------- A very, very easy battle. Nihopalaoa + Remedy from your Hunter and equip your Hunter and Machinist with Wyrmfire Shot. I don't even need to say anything more, he's just that easy. After the cutscene in the middle, just throw one more. -------- -------- Doctor Cid -------- The same as with Gabranth, you can cast Oil on him so do that with your Hunter then keep your Wyrmfire Shots on. He can hit hard with his guns at around 700 damage+ so you might want to swap your Knight for your Black Mage and use Decoy + Reverse on your Hunter. Don't forget to swap back to the Pheasent's Netsuke once you're done with the Nihopalaoa! I would recommend the Decoy + Reverse strategy with Oil + Wyrmfire Shot + Firaga. Part way he will summon Famfrit, which makes this strategy even more awesome as Famfrit is not immune to oil, and he's also weak to it to boot. Don't forget to use Dispel to remove their buffs. Over all, Reverse and Decoy are what saves you here and their combined Fire Weakness can be exploited quite easily. No, seriously, Oil + Fire Weakness + Wyrmfire Shot really, really, really makes this battle a walk in the park. Also, give Famfrit to your Black Mage, the boost in HP is amazing. -------- Congratulations on beating the longest dungeon in this game! We're almost at the end now, so I suppose you better hold on then! ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ The Final Battle [ThFiBa] ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Items we will find: - Dark Matter ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Now for the final few boss fights in the game to finish the story. Save here for sure as once you are on the Bahamut you cannot return, and I'm sure you don't want that. For those who just want to say they've beaten the story in Weak Mode, then this section is for you, but for those who want to be able to brag all the optional content to your friends, there are sections dedicated to beating them at the end of this chapter. Back at Balfonheim, restock on all your items and buy any spells you want. Make your way to the Aerodome and save your game again, why not. Take the Strahl to the Bahamut and watch the scenes, then pick up the chest to obtain a Dark Matter. I won't bother guiding you to anything other then that here as everything can't be kept anyway. Make your way to the Center of the Bahamut, your guns will make quick work of any of the Imperials that you meet. Buff your party as much as you want before you touch the Lift Controls, then prepare to fight Gabranth for the last time. -------- Judge Gabranth -------- The best way to take him down is to use your Black Mage, Hunter and Machinist. Decoy and Reverse your Hunter, Nihopalaoa + Remedy with your Hunter to inflict Silence, Blind and Slow, then just let your party shoot him down. After half of his health is gone, throw another Remedy. He casts Renew to heal himself to full HP after the cutscene, which sucks, but it does nothing but prolong an easy battle. After the end of the battle, heal and rebuff then prepare yourself once again. -------- -------- Vayne -------- Start with Nihopalaoa + Remedy with your Hunter as usual to inflict Blind, Sap and Silence. Another place where Decoy + Reverse is helpful, so get your Black Mage to cast it on your Hunter, who most probably has the most HP. Again, after the cutscene at 50% HP he'll lose all his negative statuses and gain Haste. Remedy him again and use a Dispel Mote to take out Haste. Force of Will will probably KO your Black Mage, so you might want to cast Reverse on everyone instead of just your Hunter. On a side note, it looks 110% awesome. -------- -------- Vayne Novus -------- This battle can be hard. The Sephira can inflict Immobilise with their hits and Vayne can hit for a lot of damage. My strategy is to take our the Sephira first, then take out Vayne. My gambits and party were: Black Mage: Self: MP < 30% -> Ether Ally: Any -> Reverse Foe: Any -> Firaga <- Keep this off untill all the Spira are gone. Hunter: Ally: Any -> Phoenix Down Ally: Any -> Remedy Foe: Low/Max HP -> Attack Machinist: (Without Beserker! Equip something else like Bubble Belt) Foe: Low/Max HP -> Attack First, Dispel Vayne with a mote then let your gambits take care of the Sephira while you keep reverse up. When it's just Vayne left use Nihopalaoa and Remedy as always to inflict Slow and Oil, using Wyrmfire Shot and Firaga to take him out. When Vayne does his talking cutscene he'll get all his buffs back so Dispel and recast yours. He does cast Magic Barrier, but your guns are your main damage dealer anyway. -------- -------- The Undying -------- Another possibly hard battle. The main problem here is the damage that he does which will reach a few thousand. You will want every one of your characters with Reverse on at all times, so leave your gambits similar to the previous battle. Be sure that when he casts Magick Barrier you turn of Firaga however as it just wastes MP. The thing you have to be good at in this battle is recovering from whatever happens to your party when he attacks and you don't have Reverse Active. You will want Bubble Belts on your Machinist and Hunter, and Indigo Pendent on the Black Mage to ensure that Reverse does indeed hit its mark. If he manages to kill someone, throw a phoenix down with your Hunter and swap to the Pheasent's Netsuke for maximum effect. If all of your characters die then God Bless, try your best to get reverse up with one of your other mages to revive your dead reserves. He does have Renew, which sucks, a lot, big time, and he does Paling and the like, which is best just to wait out. To be honest though, it shouldn't take too long. All in all, this battle revolves around luck and skill, but with everyone coverd by Reverse, you should be okay. -------- Once you have defeated the boss. Congratulations, put your feet up and enjoy the credits - You've just beaten Weak Mode. ============================================================================== Optional Content [OpTcOn] ============================================================================== This game features a lot of optional content that will leave you playing for hours to come, something I really love about it. We havn't defeated all the Mark hunts or collected all the Espers, havn't gotten every spell and skill or every sky pirate's den figure, if that's your thing. This next section of the guide will cover just that, all the optional content in the game that we can do in Weak Mode. Though this area is still under construction, it won't be empty for long. I have defeated all espers but Zordiac and defeated all the Marks, so it is coming, just in the next update. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Mark Hunts [MaRhUn] ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Espers [EsPsRe] ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ ============================================================================== About the Author [AbThAu] ============================================================================== I love playing video games and have played them since I was a child. Starting in the PSX era I didn't get access to a NES or SNES like other people, but appreciate the games nonetheless. The Final Fantasy games to me were a great series and when FFX was released for the PS2 I was amazed at the graphics, voices, animations, everything. As the years went by however I started picking up more detail on games and appreciating them a lot more. Looking back on the games I played I realised depth that had never been there as a child, replaying them and finding new things developers put in the game, listening to the music that set the scenes and moods. I enjoyed games more, good games, games that were well made and a lot of time and effort clearly went into constructing it. With the release of Final Fantasy XII I had found an amazing game. Deep in terms of story, amazing graphics, great voice acting, a huge, open, deep world designed to let you explore - It was almost perfect. Then, the international release came about and it was even better, though the restriction on language put me off buying or playing it. Fast forward a few years and FFGriever had created a patch to convert the game to the english language. I was hooked. Never before had I ever played a game this much, the amount of time I spent on this single game suprised me, but nothing compelled me to really stop. There wasn't a need to anyway, as I never got a next generation PS3 or Xbox or Wii and even though there are some good games on them, most are just subpar at best. When Final Fantasy XIII was released I began to appreciate this XII even more than I had, it was truly something special. Sometime while playing my first Weak Mode game I thought of making a FAQ, but I was already part way through, so I said I would on the consecutive game. I never thought of writing a FAQ before as the time and effort it took seemed to be beyond what I had, but I loved this game so much I did. The result is what you have hopefully read. With my job and various other life commitments it took time to get it done, but I am very pleased with the over all result. I hope that you all enjoyed reading it as much as I did writing, and enjoyed the game to the fullest. If you like this FAQ, you can recommend it to people by clicking the link at the top of the GameFAQs page above, and if you want, send me an email with any questions unanswered, praise, disappointment, what ever you feel. Though, if you do, treat me how you would like to be treated and be polite! Send to: kresna[dot]faq[a-in-circle]gmail[dot]com Again, you're not a bot, are you? This was my first FAQ ever, and who knows, more might come for my other favourite titles. For now, however, my time will be spent fixing and adding to this one to make it the best I possibly can. Thank you for reading my Walkthrough and I hope you all enjoyed it! Kresna ============================================================================== Version History [VeRhIs] ============================================================================== Version 1.0, 4th of July, 2010: - Initial release, main story completed. ============================================================================== Thanks and Credits [ThAcRe] ============================================================================== Thanks goes out to all the following people, who've helped out in one way or another, and to those who I appreciate for doing various things: - Myself, for spending countless hours of my time on this FAQ. - Megan, for always being there and being supportive, thank you. - FF12GrandMaster, your videos are great, and your knowledge vast. The work you put into the RNG is amazing. - flak76e, being a great person on the Boards, entertaining videos and being friendly in general. - InfinyGodslayer, more great videos and knowledge, being a great person to talk to. - All you cool people on the regular and IZJS FFXII Boards at GameFAQs, for being cool. - The old Square Enix, and the old Square Soft, for making great games such as this, sorry it had to come to a grinding halt. - You, for taking your time to read my work! Thank you! I hope I didn't miss anyone out, but anyone who was involved, I do appreciate it, really. Thanks everyone!