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                             FINAL FANTASY VIII
                               POWER UP GUIDE
                                Version: 5.0
                            Written by: Aya Brea

Gosh, there're way too many FAQs on this game already why am I writing this one
you ask? Well, mine's totally different. I will show you how to SERIOUSLY power
up your characters and believe me, it works! If you're the type who's obsessed
with insanely high stats so you can laugh at the boss' Ultima spell as it's only
doing ~200 to every member in your party, then this guide is for you!

BTW, this is written based on the US version of the game. Some features may
differ from the Japanese version (such as button configuration for example) or
the European (PAL) version of the game.

  - Revision
  - Credits
  - About me
  - Introduction
  - Final Fantasy VIII
  - Frequently Asked Questions
  - Objective
  - Why bother?
  - Where do I start?
  - Mandatory fights
  - Critical Guardian Forces
  - Preparation
  - Training
      - Quistis + friend
      - Other characters
      - Before disk 3
  - Want even higher stats?
      - Steal/Find Sources
      - Make Sources
      - Eating enemies
  - My stats
  - Some tips and tricks
  - Character overviews
      - Squall Leonhart
      - Quistis Trepe
      - Zell Dincht
      - Rinoa Heartilly
      - Selphie Tilmitt
      - Irvine Kinneas
      - Seifer Almasy
      - Edea Kramer
      - Laguna Loire
      - Kiros Seagul
      - Ward Zaback
  - Step-by-step power-up walkthrough
      - DISC 1
          - It begins
          - Lava bath anyone?
          - Dollet me
          - Voulez-vous coucher avec moi ce soir?
          - Whoohoo, our first mission!
          - Triple Triad Bonanza
          - I know where it's at
          - Owls + Trains = Timber resistance group
          - Things to do #1
          - I know where it's at part 2
          - Gardening Galbadian style
          - I choo choo choose Deling City
          - The known Tomb of the Unknown King
          - Things to do #2
          - Sorceresscide
      - DISC 2
          - Win a hill
          - Is cheapness contagious?
          - Haha, missed me by a mile... NOT!
          - We're the train-stealers
          - Is that a rocket in your pocket or are you just happy to
            see me?
          - The hanging garden of Balamb
          - Do you like fish?
          - Top of the Pops
          - Things to do #3
              - New GFs
              - Shumi Village
              - Chocobo Forests
              - CC Quest
              - Winhill
              - Lotsa AP
              - Collecting Spells
              - Other
          - Silence of the (Ba)lamb
          - My heart will go on
          - Boom boom boom boom, the Garden goes boom
      - DISC 3
          - Taxicab Confessions V: A witch's secret
          - To be scorched, or not to be scorched
          - Seedy... I mean SeeD ship
          - Salt Lake City? Yup, I've been there
          - And then a hero comes along..
          - Scarred for life
          - Things to do #4
          - Gateway to the moon
          - The box in the sky
          - Vixen or tramp?
          - Eyes on me
          - 2gether
          - Acquiring Cactuar
          - Acquiring Bahamut
          - Complete your collection... nearly!
          - Mmmmmm, Rosetta Stones.... *Drool*
          - Acquiring Eden - Alternative!
          - Yikes! I have a Chocobo in my pocket!!! <<<NEW!!!>>>
          - Whoa! Careful with that... what do you call that thing
          - Abra Kadabra
              - Basic Junctions
              - Elemental Junctions
              - Status Junctions
          - The limiting factor.
      - DISC 3 (continued)
              - Say you'll be there
              - Mission impossible
              - Sacrifice
      - DISC 4
              - Which is the witchiest?
              - Other optional stuff
              - GF customization
              - Cheap Omega tricks
  - Miscellaneous


UPDATE - Welcome to version 5.0 of the Power-Up Guide. This is a milestone as
it's been almost 7 years since the first draft hit the streets and it's still
going strong. So I decided to honor this with an update. It's actually turned
out to be more of a re-write than an update, as many sections were completely
re-written, added or updated. Currently the walkthrough has been updated to the
end of disk 2, intro re-written and format changed until that point. Also the
walkthrough has been expanded to include all quests and missable items, complete
directions for each area so you no longer have to refer to another walkthrough
just to get through the game.

What's to come - Completing the walkthrough, extending the disk 4 walkthrough
for the last dungeon, complete the rest of the format changes and a section on
stats maxing near the end of the walkthrough. Also will be adding in new
questions, updating character profiles and planning to move them to the end.
Having them before the walkthrough makes little sense. I will also make the
sections stand out more in the next update.

V5.0 10/Sep/2006
  - Removal of previous revision data
  - Updated/re-written the walkthrough until the end of disk 2 to include all
quests, giving clear directions and correcting questionable facts (Tonberry).
  - Rewritten intro and several beginning sections, making it clearer and more
concise. Also removed info that sounded contradictory.
  - Changed the format to meet the 79 character limit, instead of 69.
  - Removed several sections that does little for this guide except taking space
  - Changed many strategies during the course of the walkthrough making it more
streamlined. For example, using Break for forced battles instead of LV Down.
  - Added a new section near the start that lists all mandatory fights in the
game and ways to avoid gaining EXP.

V1.0 11/Oct/1999
  - First draft was released

* Happy Matt <Happy_Matt@msn.com> because he was the first person who
  told me about this idea of powering up your characters. (Yup, he
  has to come before Squaresoft and that..) If I had to write down
  every single thing that he helped me on, it would take up this
  whole page! So let's just say thanks for all the tips, strategies
  and for being my friend. And enjoy your games! :-)
* Squaresoft/Square EA for developing this well polished phenomenon
  and porting it over to the US shores so promptly. (Using the term
* Cephiroth <cephiroth@yahoo.com> for the X-ATM092 strategy on his
  guide and some other stuff.
* Scott Ong <kangning@mbox5.singnet.com.sg> for his long and detailed
  walkthroughs that I had to refer to during the boring bits of the
  game (like Ultimecia's Castle.)
* GameFaqs for giving me a place to put this FAQ and being such an
  exciting site.
* Viki <FeralNoa@aol.com> for the Devour list as well as many other
  stuff. And thanks for writing to me via e-mail everyday. :-)
* Allan Mills <holywhippet@hotmail.com> for the corrections and info
  on Angelo
* Ed Asano (aka Qualera) <qualera@early.com> for the info on Angelo,
  corrections on Julia and the encouragement. Oh and a whole lot of
  other stuff liek Laguna's team LV100 stats etc... :)
* Adrian Dutkiewicz <soundshock834@yahoo.com> for the Gil trick and
  some other notes
* Tam Tran <xuanha99@hotmail.com> for the Gil trick
* Linda Villanueva <linda.villanueva@tcgs.co.travis.tx.us> for the
  way to get pass the bit in the X-ATM092 chase where the ground
* John Calvin <jexer@hotmail.com> for discarding unwanted magic trick
* Joe Pirozzo <jpirozzo@usa.net> for data on Devour
* Eekeric@aol.com for the Demi/Devour strategy
* Weilun <tionghui@singnet.com.sg> for corrections and the detailed
  explanation of devour
* jay sar <vodka_81@yahoo.com> for the information on Break
* EdwChang@aol.com for more information on Zell and Rinoa's Limit
* Duncan Day-Myron <wombat_84@hotmail.com> for the Rosetta Stone
  trick #2
* DarkHoly17@aol.com for the info on mugging Seifer.
* Ken Ho <warlock@asia.com> for the alternate Diablos strategy.
* Mokona (Souma) <souma@primus.com.au> for the ways of getting good
  spells early
* Vincent Merken <vincent.merken@luc.ac.be> for correcting my French
* Flanker358@aol.com for pointing out the reference of the Brothers
  GF and telling me a decent way of using the Excalipur in FFV.
* EDIelectric@aol.com for the locations of 2 Sources.
* Another Gamer <gamer777@hotmail.com> for the alternate Angel Wing
* Christian Groff (aka COSMIC KNIGHT) <epoch@texas.net> for the
  advice on using items to learn GF abilities
* Voltroneo@Hotmail.com for fighting Cactuars in disc 2 and getting
  Meltdown early
* Colin Pentney (aka Salivator) <salivator@hotmail.com> for Seifer's
  level 100 stats and "Taming the Ruby Dragon" trick
* Matt <The200sx@aol.com> for Selphie's Slots trick
* David Seo <deranged85@hotmail.com> for the trick on getting
  Pandemona's card early
* Ronny Boen <boenb@rocketmail.com> for the trick on getting Pulse
  Ammo in disc 2
* Jonathan Ng <j6ng@engmail.uwaterloo.ca> for corrections on the
  Revive command and Full-Life.
* Zachary Lim <bio_freak90@hotmail.com> for the trick on getting the
  last Rosetta Stone.
* -Skrybe- <skrybe@hotmail.com> for the Angel Wing and Slot lists, as
  well as Seifer's Limit Breaks.
* Iaian Ross <hyuga_ricdeau@hotmail.com> for the use of Zombie,
  clarifications on Squall's Limit enders and more. Thanks "Citan" :)
* TunzVic@aol.com for the query on Odin.
* XP39C@aol.com for getting the Lion Heart in disc 1 trick.
* nofear33" <nofear33@clara.co.uk> for some tips
* Treylane47@aol.com for corrections and the "Steal" tip
* Kaze Yagami<yagami@pacific.net.sg> who was the one who started the
  whole Legend of Armageddon Fist! *Bow*
* Stephanus Rudiyanto Natari <s_rudiyanton@mailcity.com> for info on
  GF Phoenix
* Macaw <tomt@f1.net.au> for the Devour side effect and Malboro
* Asekeria (ICQ # 20922748) for a bit about Behemoth
* Niek <niek_maasdijk@hotmail.com> for the extra Rosetta Stone in
  Balamb Garden, disc 2
* Mega Moth <timomoth@yahoo.com> for the ways of getting Rinoa's
  Angelo skills quickly
* Brad White <bm-white@telus.net> for getting Flares in disc 2
* <BJinNCwAW@aol.com> for corrections.
* Franz G. Pascobillo <clashing_harmonica@hotmail.com> for the info
  on HP dropping in between battles.
* Katman <cgalli@teleline.es> for the fun Scan info and a few other
  strategies. :)
* <yang1@altavista.net> for a lot of useful infomation, such as an
  insight on Eden's identity and the Eden/Tiamat trick.
* Ankhorial, an admin at FFOnline, who is the one who discovered the
  Eden/Tiamat trick.
* Ian Wee <brenanne@cyberway.com.sg> for clearing up the Irvine's
  ammo quest for us all... and about Zell's Duel magazines
* James Wennberg <tanar_ri_zande@yahoo.com> for telling me about
  Grand-Calamity Symphony and the strategy on fighting Edea in disc 2
* J.T.Kauffman <stormwalker@hotmail.com> for his Chocobo World
  Pocketstation FAQ. It's really good as it provides basic
  PocketStation care tips as well as specific game related info.
* Charles Leung for sending me a Pocketstation
* Catherine Fletcher <digimitch@prodigy.net> for the item glitch
* <DAX552@aol.com> for the idea of automatically powering up with a
  Turbo Pad
* Aaditya V. Rangan <rangan@math.berkeley.edu> for the macro-
  refinement trick
* EXCALIBUR <tomo_ciel@hotmail.com> for the info on Shiva's alternate
  summon animation
* Efrem Orizzonte <efroriz@hotmail.com> for the info on Laguna's quest
  and Lunatic Pandora
* Brian Lennon (Edge) <bowie_knife@hotmail.com> for the alternate way of
  getting the QoC cards and about Diablos
* Ali Sufian Mughal <venom20001@excite.com> for the info on getting
  Dragon Fangs
* <jjtoth@vcu.edu> for info on getting the Spd-Ups with turbo
* Gregory Colombo <gcolombo@uni.uiuc.edu> for info on the Direct rule
* Marl Lieberman <lman@flashmail.com> for another bug
* A big thanks to many of the regulars at the FF8 message board at gfaqs. A big
hello out to Vil, Sister, Frozen Josh, PositronCannon, Sir Elan, Ubiquitous,
Staci and anyone else that hangs around there that I've forgotten, as they have
helped me getting the facts right.
* Anyone I missed
* Everyone else for their support!

Hello all and welcome to the one and only, the original Final Fantasy FFVIII
Power-up Guide. I must admit, the name's kinda dumb but it's always the contents
that are important so hopefully you won't be disappointed. In this guide, I will
give a detailed description of the procedure used to power up every single
(permanent of course) member of your team with surprising results (ie, 255
Strength with ONLY 100 Meteors junctioned to Strength.) Also, I will throw in an
"special walkthrough" that will detail a step-by-step procedure of how to
successfully get through the first 2 and half discs while coping with one of the
many temptations the game has on you to do one of the no-nos. Happy fantasies!

It is assumed that you (the reader) know all the basic controls of the game. It
is also an advantage to have played through the game once before reading (and
following) my guide, especially the walkthrough, as certain places may require
perfect precision to succeed without major mistakes. I recommend that you play
through the game "normally" first, then try out my instructions after you've
completed the game and want some more. In previous versions of this guide I have
only detailed quests that relates to this subject. However the latest updates
will "upgrade" the walkthrough to include missable treasures as well as detailed
instructions to navigate through the game.

WARNING WARNING! These procedures can be very time consuming and sometimes
boring and tedious. It's not too difficult though, as long as you know what
you're doing. This is for all those players who got all the characters in FFVII
really high stats by morphing enemies into Sources, or the obsessed players who
used the "level up then down" trick in FFT to get god-like stats. Be forewarned
of what you're looking at. Like I've said, I recommend that you complete the
game normally first before attempting this procedure.

Final Fantasy VIII is the eighth instalment to the legendary RPG series that
dominated the RPG market and fashion trends. Unlike your everyday RPG series,
every single member of the FF series has a unique battle/skill system, and
unique characters. FFVIII is no different, upgrading the innovative but ain't-
as-good-as-it-sounds Materia system in FFVII with the classic Esper system in
FFVI and the interesting but out of date job system in FFV/FFT to form the new
GF and Junction system that promises fully customizable characters.

Although the menu/item/skill/spell names needs a lot more work (it reminds me of
the item names in BOF1!!) the translation as a whole is extremely well done.
Exceptionally humorous too!

Square has obviously been outdone themselves in the sound and graphics
department, I'm not exceptionally impressed with the story. The new
Draw/GF/Junction system makes the game a lot more fun and you'll always be on
your toes to looks for more and newer spells and GFs. Enjoy!

Alright, I realized that my FAQs sucked as no one would ask those questions
anyway. I'm working on a list of more practical questions.

This is against everything you've been taught in RPG school or years of your
personal experience but.. In FFVIII, you want to fight as LITTLE as possible,
which translates into NOT gaining levels. Before you send me hate mails please
listen to my explanation.

You might (or might not) have noticed that the enemies in FFVIII takes the SaGa
turn so that they level up as you do. You'll almost never run into exceptionally
weak enemies. As enemies level up, they gain new attacks, new spells (and
increase their Draw list too) and gains higher stats. However, the enemies gains
stats a LOT faster than you do (ie, a level or two doesn't make too much
difference in terms of power) so you'll find yourself weaker and weaker and the
enemies stronger and stronger as you progress through the game. And by the time
you get to the bonus bosses like Ultima and Omega Weapons, your stats might be
way too low to even think of challenging them, or they'll mop the floor with

You may object and say that there are always Junctions to rely on. Yes you're
right, Junctions are very important in this game BUT Junctions can only do so
much. For example, Ultima is the best spell to junction to most of your stats.
Even with 100 Ultimas, you'll only be able to raise your Strength by 100 points
while the maximum is 255. There are Character Abilities though, like Str +60%
that can bring your Strength up to 255 without too much problem, but you can
only equip up to 4 Character Abilities max (and it's extremely rare too.) You'll
have a few problems with this. One is that Str +60% is extremely rare, so you'll
have to stick to Str +40% most of the time (which may or may not bring your Str
up to 255) but the other problem is more serious. There are about 6 very
important stats that you need (HP, Str, Vit, Mag, Spr and Spd) but you can only
equip 3 or 4 stat boosts, and since your other stats are so low, you'll have a
hard time getting high values in every category. Not to mention there are other
Character and/or Party Abilities that you many want to equip, such as Mug, Enc-
None or Move-Find. By boosting your "base" stats, you will be able to reach much
higher stats combined with junctions and freeing up your slots that can be
devoted to more "fun" abilities.

I hope everyone understands this idea.

Sure, how do you get high stats without fighting enemies? Well, I don't know if
you had noticed but you can teach certain GFs "Bonus" abilities. These include
HP, Str, Vit, Mag and Spr. How do these skills work? When you equip one of these
and you gain a level, the respective stat will be boosted by 1 point, on top of
any regular stats boosts you might get at level up (except for HP Bonus, which
gives you an extra 30HP.) Like I've said, a couple of levels don't differ too
much since the game is way to stingy at regular stats boosts at level up. You'll
gain about 60 or so HP and 1 point of Str/Vit/Mag etc.. once every 2-5 levels!
(Some other stats are even rarer, such as Speed or Luck.) What difference does
one point make? Not much if you just got it once, but if you start equipping the
Bonus abilities at LV20 and power yourself up to LV100, that's gonna make an 80
point difference! Wow! That's almost another 100 Ultimas!

However, you'll only have access to these abilities quite a bit into the game.
With a little bit of planning, patience and luck, you could start this as soon
as halfway through disk 2. For convenience and accessibility, I recommend for
late disk 3. Yes, that's almost 3 disks without gaining any levels, but as
you'll see by the step-by-step walkthrough, it's really quite simple!

Well, to tell you the truth, this is not something I'd recommend that you do
everyday since it can get quite tedious, especially if this is your first game.
However, getting all the boosts in your stats makes the optional bosses a whole
lot easier. Getting high stats might be a joy in it itself, to laugh at the
boss' spells as if they're insect bites or killing them in 2 rounds.

There are a few ways of getting rid of encounters or not gaining experience.
Every point of EXP counts, remember that!

1) Running away
Possibly the easiest option, running away is easy to do and you won't get any
experience. However, if you plan to run away, make sure that you DON'T do any
sort of damage to the enemies, since the run system in FFVIII has been improved
so that you'll gain partial experience if you've done some damage to the

One side effect with running away is that by not fighting enemies, your SeeD
level may fall which causes you to receive less Gil, which isn't important as
there are many ways of making a buck. Also during the Dollet mission, running
away can cause you to receive penalties to your SeeD rank, but you will find a
couple of tips in the walkthrough that will help you to get what you can. A more
pronounced disadvantage of running away is not receiving any crucial AP for your
GF to gain abilities, and no loot dropped, which brings us to...

2) Card the enemies
You can learn the unique Card command from your first GF, Quezacotl. This is an
extremely useful command to use when you have to fight. The advantage of this is
that you WILL get the AP AND can pick up dropped items from enemies, and you
will NOT gain any EXP! What's even better is that you'll get an extra card which
can be changed into items via Quezacotl's Card Mod ability. The disadvantage is,
of course, it's sometimes more fuss than it's worth.

Because of this, choose to learn the Card command first, it's worth 40AP and
isn't very hard to learn. (Simply defeating Ifrit will give you 20AP!) Anyway,
you don't really need the Boost skill at that point in the game so choose Card
first, then Boost.

The Card command follows classic Pokeball mechanics. Yes, if you've played any
Pokemon games you'll know that the chance of success is inversely proportional
to the enemy's HP. The lower the enemy's HP, the more likely you're to succeed.
You should Scan the enemy first to see its current HP, then predict how many
attacks by certain members is enough to weaken it. It's ideal if an enemy is
down to a quarter or less of its total HP, but you can start tp get decent
chances at around half of its health, though you can very rarely card an
opponent with perfect health. Do NOT forget to equip the Card command like I do
occasionally though, as you'll leave yourself in a sticky situation. Don't get
discouraged if you are constantly getting the "Miss" sign, as persevering is
better than doing too much damage.

To weaken them, you can try a few different ways. I like to use normal attacks.
Squall's attack is the best since as it has the "trigger" feature, and you can
do a weak or a strong attack as you desire. His attack is also very reliable
since it will NEVER do a critical hit (as you can use the trigger to do 150% of
damage with every attack anyway, so he doesn't need one) so you won't end up
killing it with a critical. Gunblades also never miss (even under "Blind"
which is a definite plus.

Also, other member's regular attacks works too. You generally should not
junction spells to your Elemental-Attack since the creature may be weak against
it and you'll do too much damage. I always keep one member's Strength junction-
free to do really weak attacks if I need it (like against Geezards.)

Spells ain't a bad idea either. GFs are the same. Try to keep a collection of
different spells in stock. Weaker GFs like Siren are also quite good at this if
you need a weak attack. Also, you may or may not want to use Boost, depending on
the situation.

The BEST method I've found is to use Quistis' Limit Break Micro Missile. The
beauty of Micro Missile is that it's a gravity elemental attack so it can NEVER
kill an enemy. Also, unlike other attacks, gravity attacks removes a portion of
a target's current HP. The effect of Micro Missile varies though, but it's for
the better. It depends on how serious Quistis or your party's condition is (ie,
party member down, suffering from negative status, low HP) and it can remove
from 50% to 93.75% of its current HP, which makes it absolutely perfect for
carding enemies. Just keep Quistis in critical (ie, HP is in yellow and she's
kneeling down) and use Micro Missile on the enemies in the beginning of the
battle while another character use the Card command. Keep some Phoenix
Downs/Life spells in stock just in case she dies.

Note: The maximum damage it can do is 9999, so against enemies with higher HP,
Quistis has to use it multiple times before the enemy's HP is low enough. A
handful of enemies are resistant towards Gravity attacks, mainly bosses.

Keep in mind. Some enemies cannot be carded. These includes bosses and human
troops. Basically any normal enemy that does not have a card, except for
Elnoyles. Card doesn't work on it for some reason.

3) Diablos
Sometimes not encountering any enemies is the best option, since the random
encounter can be annoying at times. Diablos offers 2 crucial abilities and they
are Enc-Half and Enc-None. You must learn the former before the latter becomes
available. Enc-Half costs only 30AP (easy peasy) but Enc-None costs a whopping
100AP! (And it's nothing compared to the 200AP needed for Mug!) Because of this,
it's best to challenge Diablos as soon as possible (ie, right after receiving
the Magic Lamp from Cid.) He's well worth the effort you put into fighting him
and gets some of the most useful abilities in the game! And believe me, he's
powerless if you know how to fight him!

You'll be able to get Enc-Half easily but Enc-None takes longer. Use the Card
trick above or save the boss' AP for them. Then equip Enc-None and you'll never
have to be bothered with random encounters again! (Although since you don't
fight, you'll earn no AP for all your GFs, and you'll miss out certain useful
abilities such as Mug. So de-equip the skill occasionally and Card some

4) Tonberry
Ok, you will gain some EXP with this method but it's VERY little! You can use
Tonberry's LV Down command to weaken enemies and defeat them that way. Each LV
Down halves their level, keep doing it until their levels drops to 1, then kill
them. You'll gain 1-3 EXP for your team. This is great for the encounters that
you cannot run away from and cannot be carded. (Such as enemy soldiers in
Laguna's scenario.)

Opposed to common believes, Tonberry can be acquired as early as when you have
control of the mobile Balamb Garden in Disc 2!!! You don't need to acquire Odin
to get Tonberry either, as Odin tends to ruin the party.

5) Other vehicles
Another way of traveling without encountering anything is to travel in vehicles
(for some reason, all of them are painfully slow!) You can get access to cars
fairly early in the game, but they cost a bit of money and you have to refuel
them at regular intervals. You can catch trains too, to travel to another city
quickly but you don't seem to be able to catch any trains in the first half of
the game except for story purposes. Balamb Garden is also quite a convenient
vehicle since it can cross the ocean. And last (and the least!) are Chocobos.
You'll only gain access to riding the chocs after Balamb Garden takes off, so
you won't have that much use for it.

You won't encounter any enemies while traveling in vehicles, but they're only
available on the world map.

6) Terminate your own team members
The EXP earned from enemies in this game is not shared by the party, in layman's
terms whatever EXP you get at the end, everyone in your team gets the same. So
essentially it's like you're getting the EXP 3 times. By keeping 2 of the other
party members dead or petrified, you're effectively cutting it down by a third!

7) Break
Thanks to jay sar <vodka_81@yahoo.com> for this trick
Battles will end if the enemies are petrified also, but any damage that you've
caused it will contribute toward some EXP. So what you need to do is cast Break
straight outta the bottle, and if it succeed and you've just got yourself a home
run. Also note that petrifying earns you zero AP, so only use this for enemies
that you don't care about.

You can get Breaks easily by refining Cockatrice Pinions and Softs with Diablos'
ST Mag-RF.

Other notes and tips
  - Well, I guess you all know that the character who strikes the killing blow
will get more EXP than the others. This is true however, nobody seems to get any
extra EXP if the enemy is killed by a summoned GF! So use this to your advantage
when you're fighting enemies when you don't have any other options. It doesn't
stop you from gaining EXP but at least you won't gain any extras.

  - Appropriately enough, if you used a GF to do the killing blow, that GF will
gain the extra EXP bonus after the battle.

  - You should know by now that the bosses in FFVIII won't give you any EXP,
which is a pleasant sign, and they (usually) give you a ton of AP that your GFs
sorely needs! Try selecting an expensive ability before fighting the boss so you
won't waste some of its AP.

  - GFs WILL gain FULL AP and EXP when junctioned to a dead member, even though
it makes no sense. EXP however is spread amongst the GFs junctioned to the same
character, for example, if you have 3 GFs junctioned to 1 party member (whether
they're dead or alive), each of them will receive one third EXP.

  - Spread out your GFs among your characters as equally as possible. Try to
make sure everyone received the important junction abilities. Try not to double
up on -J abilities if you can help it. For example, if you gave someone
Quezacotl, don't put Siren on them because Mag-J is doubled up.

This section will itemize all forced encounters for disk 1, 2 and 3. I will also
describe all alternatives for avoiding, minimizing or manipulating experience.

Disk 1
Dollet mission - 2x G-Soldier
               - 2x G-Soldier
               - 1x G-Soldier
               - 1x G-Soldier
               - 1x Anacondour

In the Dollet mission sequence, you have an ally in Seifer, a powerful and non
permanent party member. What you need to do is kill off Squall and Zell, let
Seifer handle all EXP. You can also use the Card command to turn Anacondour into
a card, but it's not necessary.

Timber mission - 2x G-Soldier, ~184EXP

This is the only forced fight in Timber that you cannot escape from. If you wish
to receive no EXP, refine some Break spells from ST Mag-RF (Diablos) using
but if you don't have it, get Selphie to critical HP and take a spin on her
Slots. You can get Breaks for FREE here. If you don't mind a little EXP, kill
off 2 of your characters and have the third summon a GF to kill them.

Second Laguna scenario - 1x Esthar Soldier, ~65EXP
                         3x Esthar Soldier, ~200EXP
                         1x Esthar Soldier, 0EXP

The first 2 fights are forced at the beginning of the scenario. You can cast
Break on them to avoid any EXP, or kill of 2 of your party members and have the
third summon GF. There will be up to 5 mandatory fights at the end of the
scenario. If you've set all the traps however, it will eliminate 4 fights and
the last forced fight won't give you any EXP.

Disk 2
Prison - 2x G-Soldier, ~134EXP

There's only 1 mandatory fight in here and that's the one with solo Zell getting
the weapons back. A few casts of Break will take care of it with no EXP.
Otherwise you'll have to summon GF.

You may run into other mandatory fights at the scene where Zell gets chased
but as long as you move in a clockwise manner as soon as possible, the guard
will narrowly miss you.

Missile Base - 1x Base Leader, 2x Base Soldier, ~360EXP

There's only 1 forced fight here, as you can avoid all other encounters by using
your mouth to do the talking. 360EXP is a bit harsh and Break doesn't work
against these soldiers. Make sure you use a GF to kill them otherwise you'll
receive extra EXP as penalties.

Clash with Galbadia Garden - 4x Paratropper, ~521EXP

They give way too much EXP. Casting Break on them is probably the best option,
although they love throwing Silence around. An alternative would be to use
Tonberry's LV Down command until they're LV1 then kill them. This way you're
reducing the EXP gained to single digits.

More coming on the next update.

Critical Guardian Forces
I'm going to list all the GFs that are important for powering up.

Ifrit is your third GF and is gained within the first mission, the Fire Cavern.
Ifrit holds the Str Bonus ability, but you need to learn Str+20% and Str+40% as

Siren is also gained very early. She is drawable from Elvoret in the Dollet
mission. Do not forgot to get Siren because your second chance won't be until
the last dungeon. Siren has Mag Bonus, and has the prerequistites Mag+20% and

Brothers is acquired from the Tomb of the Unknown King and will become available
when your visit Deling City for the very first time, although for story purposes
it's not a requirement that you need to obtain Brothers. Brothers offers HP
Bonus, and has the overwhelmingly expensive HP+40% and HP+80% as prerequisites.

Carbuncle is available near the very end of disk 1. You must draw Carbuncle from
either Iguions while fighting them, otherwise your second chance is the last
dungeon. Carbuncle has Vit Bonus, with Vit+20% and Vit+40% as prerequisites.

Leviathan is acquired about half way through disk 2 and you can draw this GF
from NORG at Balamb Garden. Leviathan has Spr Bonus, and like always, Spr+20%
and Spr+40% are required as prerequisites.

GF Cautuar is on Cactuar's Island of course, with a tiny green thing that pops
out of the sand occasionally. You need to have gotten the Ragnarok, which mean
this GF is not available until late disk 3. The best thing about Cactuar is that
it comes with all 5 of the bonus abilities LEARNED!! Which saves you time having
to learning it from other GFs (they costs 100AP each and all of them requires 2
prerequisite skills.)

This GF also requires Ragnarok and can be gotten around the same time as GF
Cactuar. Head to Deep Sea Research Centre aka Battleship Island, which is not
on the map but you can get there by heading Ragnarock towards the south-wester
corner of the map. Look around and you should find some structure that looks
kinda like an oil refinery. Land the ship on it (kinda tricky, look for the
shadow.) Head towards the doorway and you'll be in a large room with a glowing
cylinder. Choose to stay and move ONLY when the lights goes out, or you'll be
attacked by some enemies.

Anyway, when you read the tube, you'll be asked a series of questions, so answer
them correctly. You'll fight against Bahamut after 2 Ruby Dragons!! (For more
strategy, look in the walkthrough.) Defeat it (not that hard, but you should
spend sometime drawing Full-Life from it) and you'll be able to get the king of
all dragons as your very own pet! While Bahamut may not offer any "Bonus"
abilities, it comes with the as-good-as-it-gets Abilityx4 skill, which allows
your character to equip up to 4 Character/Party Abilities!

You've got a choice to make now. You've got 5 different bonus abilities for 5
important stats but you can only equip 4 of them at once. Anyhow, I have a few
suggestions here on how to develop your characters.

All round character
This is intended for a balanced character who's good in every category. Equip:
       * Str Bonus
       * Vit Bonus
       * Mag Bonus
       * Spr Bonus

And ditch HP, since HP is an easy one to Junction it to max. This is the most
popular method as it develops a very nice, very balanced character. HP is mostly
unnecessary as with high Vit/Spr, it's mostly for aesthetic purposes.

Customized character for max HP
The idea of this method is to max out everyone's HP at 9999 with just 100 Full-
Life (which increases it by 4800) junctioned to HP. Everyone's base HP (with no
bonus) at LV100 is between 3600 and 4100, depending on the character. We want to
equip HP Bonus for JUST enough levels to get the character's HP over 5200, so
that when we junction 100 Full-Life, the undisputed all-round spell for HP, we
have everyone at 9999HP without having to waste an extra slot on an HP+??%
ability. 9999HP makes a big difference, as it enbles you to execute Limit Breaks
at anything less than 3200HP and also certain attacks late game will do 9998
damage. And having it all and STILL have 4 slots intact is a great benefit.

Here's a list of all character's base HP at LV100 and how many levels they need
to equip HP Bonus to achieve 5200HP.

               Base LV100 HP     LV of HP Bonus Needed      LV Remaining
Squall             4187                 38 *                     54
Quistis            3883                 48 *                     43
Zell               4018                 41 *                     50
Rinoa              4181                 38 *                     50
Selphie            3680                 51 **                    40
Irvine             4120                 36 ***                   50

* Squall/Quistis/Zell/Rinoa all have single digit HP remainders in this
  What this means is thay if you use just ONE HP Up item on them, you can reduce
  the levels required by 1 and still max their HP. For example, you can equip HP
  Bonus for 37 levels instead of 38 for Squall, use 1 HP Up and still max his HP
  at 9999, due to the fact that the difference from max after 37 levels is only
  a single digit, and the 10HP from HP Up will cover it.

** Selphie has a remainder of 20, which means if you use 2 HP Up items you can
   reduce her required level down to just 50.

*** Irvine has no remainders. After 36 levels he will have exactly 5200HP.

For the other 3 Bonus abilities I recommend that you take Vit and Spr, as they
are very important for your characters' defensive capabilities, and either Str
or Mag all the way, depending on what your character specializes in. Squall,
Zell and Irvine would benefit from Str as their Limit Breaks are physical, where
as Selphie and to a lesser extent, Quistis, requires high Mag. Rinoa and Quistis
however, benefit from a balanced build. Also, once you have leveled up the
number of times required for max HP, the rest of the levels can be devoted to
the stat that you have sacrificed, as further advancement in HP will go to waste
as the max you can get to is 9999.

For example, if I was to build Irvine using this method. I would equip him with
HP/Str/Vit/Spr Bonus for 36 levels. That is, until he reaches LV49 (since he
starts at LV13), then I would switch HP Bonus for the Mag Bonus ability. This
would complete Irvine with 9999HP when Full-Life is junctioned, very high
Str/Vit/Spr from the full bonus, plus an extra 50 points in Mag, which still
makes a big difference.

Stats maxer's choice
Recently, it has hit me that each level with the HP Bonus ability equipped gives
you can extra 30HP. However, all other types of further powering up, whether
it's by making HP Up items or devouring, only nets you 10HP. On the other hand,
the all core stats (Str, Vit, Mag and Spr) nets you 1 point whether it's though
the "Bonus" abilities, devouring or stats-up items. I came to the conclusion
that the HP Bonus ability is worth *3* times as much as the core stats
You might say that HP is not very important as it's easy to max through
junctions and character abilities, and anything more than 5200HP will go to
waste once you junction Full-Life to it. This is correct, however, some players
may want to devote the time to max all base stats so the "good" junction spells
can be used elsewhere. With this theory in mind, for stats maxers who wants to
eventually max everything anyway, why not gain HP 3 times as fast?

Besides, HP is something that will take the most time because it has such a high
maximum, you can refine 100 HP Up items and it will only increase it by 1000.
Anyone who has even TRIED maxing HP in FFX will tell ya it's hard work and
believe me when I say it as I'm only at 70000+ and counting. ;) So getting the
"nasty" work outta the way may preserve you some sanity in the long run.

Doing this means that you will have to sacrifice almost 100 points in 1 core
stat, or a combination of them. Put some consideration on which one you want to
sacrifice. One way to look at it is with the "customized character" method,
sacrificing either Str or Mag, whichever will have the least effect on your
character's performance, for example Str for Selphie, Mag for Zell etc. Another
method, since players who choose this option would want to max everything
is to sacrifice the stat that is the easiest to gain back.

Partial Bonus
There may come a time during the course of your game where you may have gathered
too much EXP and will be forced to gain a level no matter what. By following the
walkthrough, it is definitely possible to get through the game without gaining a
single level. However, according to some FF8 vets, when it comes to managing
time efficiently, sometimes it is better in the long run to gain a couple of
levels. A few levels lost here and there can be made up by spending an hour
modding stats-up items or playing cards to make up the difference, instead of
spending HOURS stubbornly avoiding EXP through running away, AP farming and
especially carding. Of course, the end result comes down to you, the player. I
definitely see a good point in that statement, however, I am stubborn by nature
and I just find leveling up with the bonus skills the easiest way to get stats
boosts. However, as long as you don't go overboard at leveling up, it may
workout for you in the long run.

In those cases where you will receive enough EXP to level up, simply equip
whatever Bonus abilities that you have at time. Ifrit, Siren, Brother, Carbuncle
and Leviathan can be acquired relatively early in the game and provides 1 Bonus
ability each. Even if you could only equip 2 or 3 of these abilities, it will
save you some time at the end when you have to make it up.

Rosetta Stone
You will hear a LOT about Rosetta Stones in this guide, and for good reasons.
Rosetta Stones are a rare item which can be modded to and from several other
very rare very useful items, with Shaman Stones and Dark Matter being some of
them. However, another use for the Rosetta Stone is that it will teach any GF
the extremely useful Abilityx4 ability. This is important because only 1 GF,
Bahamut, naturally gains this ability, and to utilize the powering up process to
the fullest you need to be able to equip 4 abilities.

There are several points in the game where a Rosetta Stone or its equivalent
will become available, and these will all be chronicled in the walkthrough in
good detail. You can gain a Rosetta Stone as early as beginning of disk 2 at the
prison. You only really need ONE extra Rosetta Stone to be able to power up 2
characters at the same time, however, anymore will enable up to all 6 of your
characters to carry 4 abilities at the same time, and any more can be modded
into other useful items for other powering up purposes.

Because of this, I'd say, keep 'em coming boys. The walkthrough will leave no
Rosetta Stone unturned. ;)

The ideal time to start training would be late disk 3, after you have received
the Ragnarok and gotten Rinoa back permanently. This is because this is the
first time where you can access the full world map with a full party. This would
also be the first time where you can access GF Cactuar and Bahamut. Other
advantages of starting it here is that you can access Island Closest to Hell,
ironically, a heaven for EXP and also you would have received all the crucial
Bonus abilities, allowing you to expediate your training by powering up 2
characters at the same time.

These are the starting levels for all 6 party members. If you have no leveled
them up through the game, and it is possible, these are the character levels you
should have:
         Squall   LV7             Zell   LV8
         Quistis  LV8             Irvine LV13
         Selphie  LV8             Rinoa  LV11

In previous versions of this guide, I suggested using either Squall or Quistis
as your first character to be built up, then move onto the rest of the
characters. This section used to be pretty long yet most of it was about nothing
and had some contradictary info. So, I'm going to tidy it up. I'm no longer
recommending Squall since Quistis is just so much better and leveling 2
characters at a time should be the norm.

Quistis + friend
We are going to train just 2 characters first. One of them will be Quistis, and
one other character of your choice. Kill off the third character so that he/she
won't receive any EXP as a result of the fighting. You also need to have learned
the corresponding Bonus ability for GFs Ifrit, Siren, Brothers, Carbuncle and
Leviathan. You also need to fetch GF Cactuar and Bahamut, as well as having used
a Rosetta Stone on a GF of your choice, giving you 2 GFs with Abilityx4.

The idea place to level your characters the quickest is the Island Closest to
Hell. Heaven also works, but the enemies on Hell are generally worth more EXP on
average. These places are chosen because the enemies that you meet here are
always at LV100, where as enemies that you meet anywhere else are relative to
your party's average level. The enemies on the ICTH also have a habit of
dropping very rare loot, such as Energy Crystals or Inferno Fang, which is
always a bonus. By beating enemies that are dozens of levels stronger,
your characters would gain EXP very fast. You might think that such high level
enemies will squish your party like bugs, but that's where the junction system
shines the most.

You will need to junction your characters very carefully, and junction all your
best spells to the defensive attributes will be very important. Spread out your
GFs between the 3 characters, this is to spread out the amount of EXP that they
gain. Put Cactuar, Alexander and Cerberus on Quistis, along with a GF with
Abilityx4 (Bahamut or not) as well as one with the Vit-J/HP-J ability. Cactuar
will supply the 4 ??? Bonus abilities of your choice and also provides Eva-J and
Luck-J. Cerberus is important for Spd-J, Spr-J and ST-Defx4, while Alexander has
Elem-Defx4, although some of these abilities may take a lot of AP to learn,
nothing a little time spent fighting Cactuars can't fix. The other character
needs to junction Ifrit/Siren/Brothers/Carbuncle/Leviathan and a GF with
Abilityx4. These GFs will provide all the other important junction abilities.
Now you can place the remaining GFs junctioned to the dead character, so they
can receive more EXP.

First of all we're going to give the best abilities and magic on Quistis, as
she's the one responsible at doing the killing. Her offensive stats are
irrelevant, but you need to have her decked out in defense. Make Spd, Vit and
Spr a priority, junction your best spells to it. Second priority goes to HP, Eva
and Luck. Str and Mag doesn't matter, so you're free to put Ultima, if you have
it, to one of the ther stats. Also important are ST and Elem-Def.

Status Junction                   Elemental Junction
A: Death or <whatever>            A: <none>
D: Confuse                        D: Flare
D: Berserk                        D: Firaga
D: Death                          D: Shell
D: Break                          D: Protect

Status is crucial but elemental ain't as important. You can get ST-Def x4 from
Cerberus and Doomtrain. It's a must that you have ST-Def x4 as you'll come
across Malboros and Blue Dragons. Malboro's Bad Breath can give you really nasty
status like Confuse, Poison, Berserk, Petrifying, Blind, Silence etc.
Junctioning the above spells will make Bad Breath mildly harmful, the only
negative status that's a pain is Sleep. Just wait 'til it hits you with its acid
attack and use Siren's Treatment command if you need it. The Blue Dragon
likes to cast Death and Break occasionally, killing anyone without protection in
one hit.

Elemental isn't that important when you boost your Spirit. You should be
protected against Fire but all the other ones ain't all that important.

None thing of note: Ruby Dragon's Breath is NOT Fire elemental! Also, it's
considered a physical attack so you need high Vit to survive it. However,
because one of your characters' knocked out, it should tame the dragon's AI so
it avoids using strong attacks like Meteor and Breath.

Junction the best spells to all attributes for the second character. Your second
character is not going to go on the offensive, but to support Quistis should
anything go wrong. So give her Treatment command and Life spells for
If Quistis falls, it is up to the second character to revive her ASAP otherwise
it's game over. Make sure you save often too.

Basically what you need to do is go into battle with Quistis in critical, the
second character should keep his/her HP as high as possible. As soon as Quistis
gets her turn, tap to get the > to show up and immediately select Degenerator.
The beauty of Degenerator is that it's a 100% success instant death spell that
works on anything not immune. Most of the enemies that you meet on the Island
Closest to Hell are solitary but very powerful, such as Malboro, Ruby Dragon and
T-Rexaur. Degenerator will get rid of them just like that. *Click fingers* You
may occasionally run into 2 Grendels that may be troublesome, as Degenerator
will only get rid of one. This is where Quistis' other skill shines, LV? Death.
You might say that POS isn't worth anything. You might be right, however, LV?
Death has a multiplier of between 5-1, and LV100 is a multiplier of 1, 2, 4 and
5. This means LV? Death has an 80% chance of success against double Grendel
battles and targets both of them.

Other characters
Once your first 2 characters gets to level 100, make a team of Quistis and 2
other un-powered characters and equip the 4 "Bonus" abilities and start the
process again. You're allowed level 100 characters in the team though, as they
won't gain any EXP any more and the game isn't as risky any more since the level
100 character can revive the weak character if they die. Repeat until all 6
characters are level 100.

Before disk 3
You can start powering up your characters halfway through disk 2, after you've
received Leviathan. You also needed to have gotten a Rosetta Stone from playing
cards in the prison. Having to acquire enough AP to learn all the prerequisites
and the ??? Bonus abilities can be tough, but remember you can encounter
Cactuars in the desert, and a handful of battles should be enough for you.

Equip the character you would like to level up with 4 ??? Bonus abilities. Give
them the best junctions and junction 100 Death to their ST-Atk. You also need to
have acquired GF Tonberry and equip the LV Up command on your character. Go to
the Centra region, the spot outside of Edea's House is not bad. Now run around
in the forests. The enemies you encounter here are weak and are susceptible to
Death. You need to level them up as much as you can then kill them. If you
encounter Grand Mantis here, they can give you some good EXP.

There are some benefits of having at least 1 high level character at this point
in game. Certain enemies, especially bosses, during the course of the game have
VERY good VERY rare spells that you can draw, but only at high level. For
example, Cerberus at the end of disk 2 has Triples up for grabs at LV30+. Having
just 1 LV100 characters in your team will enable you to stock up. This is
especially good since you won't be getting Odin so your stock of Triples are

Whether you decide to do this is up to you. Personally I can't recommend this,
since the EXP you get is a lot lower than ICTH, having to level them up makes it
a slow process and only being able to do it one at a time makes the process even
slower. If you are going to do this, just build up 1 character so you can access
some high level spells but wait til disk 3 for a faster way.

Turbo Trick - Automatic Powering Up and Item Gain!!! ----------------
|             AKA "Do it all night long!"                           |
|                                                                   |
| Thanks to quite a few people for this trick. Also, this trick is  |
| for people with a Turbo Controller only (PC or PSX).              |
|                                                                   |
| This is the standard "wrap a rubber band on the stick and watch   |
| them go" trick that works for many games. You need a pad with the |
| Rapid Fire function. But before doing that, you need to prepare.  |
|                                                                   |
| Junction yourselves properly, including all the Bonus skills when |
| you are powering up. Junction 100x Drains in your ST-Atk just to  |
| be safe. Now find somewhere with some weaker enemies (such as the |
| areas in Centra region) and wrap a rubber band around the left    |
| stick so Squall runs in circles. Set the turbo on the action      |
| button and you are done! Go to sleep or school or whatever, when  |
| you come back, you'll be a LOT more stronger and you'll have      |
| plenty of items in your inventory.                                |
|                                                                   |
| You can also use this trick to get specific items, such as        |
| Cactuar Thorns required to refine into Spd-Ups. Junction Speed    |
| attributes and Initiative. Check back every hour or so to do the  |
| conversion, and you're done! This can also be used to get other   |
| items you want with minimum effort. Pretty neat if you ask me.    |

You should have really high stats after the intensive training. (If you want to
see what I got, they're in the character's section.) If you want even higher
stats, it's going to be difficult from now on. There are a few choices for these
too, but none of them are really efficient/convenient.

1) Steal/Find Sources
Those items that raise certain character's stats are back! (Although
they've been renamed into [something]-Ups.) Some bosses carry them
and can be won/stolen from them.

  - Raijin is the best example of this. You can win/steal Str-Ups
from him during all 3 fights with him in the game. Remember if you
steal, you cannot win anything, if you wanna to win from him you
cannot steal. Sometimes the quantity varies depending on it you
mugged them or won them.

  - There's also a Str-Up in the prison.

  - You can mug 2 Magic-Ups from the left orbs where you fight NORG.
A Spr-Up is available for steal on the right orb.

  - According to EDIelectric@aol.com, you can steal 2 Str-Ups from
the left portion of Mobile Type 8 and 2 Vit-Ups from the right.

Anybody know any other bosses that drop or carry these wonderful
Sources? Please e-mail me if you do.

2) Make your own Sources
This is easier said than done. Doomtrain's Forbid Med-RF ability can
turn some items into stats boosting Sources. Here's all of them:
         1x  Gaea's Ring     => HP-Up
         10x Hyper Wrist     => Str-Up
         1x  Monk's Code     => Str-Up
         5x  Adamantine      => Vit-Up
         1x  Knight's Code   => Vit-Up
         10x Royal Crown     => Mag-Up
         10x Magic Armlet    => Spr-Up
         1x  Hundred Needles => Spd-Up
         2x  Aegis Amulet    => Spd-Up
         5x  Rocket Engine   => Spd-Up
         50x Jet Engine      => Spd-Up
         50x Accelerator     => Spd-Up
         1x  Luck-J Scroll   => Luck-Up

There are many more. As you can see, all of them require really rare
items. I think you can win a Gaea's Ring from Jumbo Cactuar that can
be made into an HP-Up. Most of them can be made from Eden's GFAbl
Med-RF, like this:
         10x  Giant's Ring    => Gaea's Ring
         10x  Power Wrist     => Hyper Wrist
         10x  Orihalcon       => Adamantine
         10x  Force Armlet    => Magic Armlet
         10x  Hypno Crown     => Royal Crown
         10x  Accelerator     => Rocket Engine
         100x Lightweights    => Rocket Engine
         100x Cactuar Thorn   => Hundred Needle

Most of these ingredients can be bought from Esthar Pet Shop although
it's 15000 Gil a pop, and you'll need 100 of them to make ONE
Source!!! Very expensive! I've saved up all my money for 80 hours and
all I could afford was ONE Source!!! You can win some of these items
from enemies occasionally (I think the Behemoths may drop Power
Wrists on rare occasions.) Anyhow, thanks to the readers, you can use
an easy trick to get all the money you want!

|Thanks to Adrian Dutkiewicz <soundshock834@yahoo.com> and Tam Tran |
|<xuanha99@hotmail.com> for this awesome trick!                     |
|                                                                   |
|You must have gotten Carbuncle's Recover Med-RF for this to work.  |
|Tonberry's Haggle, Sell High and Call Shop are exceptionally useful|
|here too!                                                          |
|                                                                   |
|What you need to do is to purchase 100 Tents. With Recover Med-RF, |
|you can refine 4 of them into 1 Mega-Potion. Cottages works exactly|
|the same way except the ratio is 2:1. Get 100 of both for faster   |
|returns! Now sell all your Mega-Potions for truck loads of profits!|
|                                                                   |
|Now let's do the calculations (assumed that you have both Sell High|
|and Haggle skills.) 100 Tents costs 75,000 Gil, 100 Cottages are   |
|twice as expensive. So total cost is 225,000 Gil. They can be      |
|refined into a total of 75 Mega-Potions, each fetches 7500 Gil each|
|at a shop which makes 562,500 Gil! Profit = 337,500 Gil! Repeat as |
|often as desired! Oh yeah, use Tonberry's Call Shop makes this     |
|trick extremely convenient.                                        |

With the easy cash trick above, you can make as many Sources as you
want, however, there are still 2 problems. The first one is that it's
still quite a slow process since they cost way too much already in
the first place! You need 1,500,000 Gil to make a single Str-Up, so
you need to do the trick about 5 times for each Source, and it can
get really confusing after a while. (I remember how I bought 100
Giant's Rings then didn't know what I did but I lost them all!)

The other problem is that you can only refine HP, Str, Mag and Spr-
Ups from this method. Vit-Ups CAN be made by turning Vit-J Scrolls
(bought in Timber Pet Shop) into Orihalcons, then into Adamantines
and then finally into Vit-Ups. The rarer Spd and Luck-Ups requires
extremely rare NON-store bought items (ie, Accelerators) so they
cannot be refined no matter how much money you have. (At least none
that I know of. Although there is a possibility that some of the
ingredients needed might able to be refined from another Menu Ability
with store bought items.)

You can steal a Luck-J Scroll from Odin and find another from doing
the Lake Obel quest, but I'd rather let one of my GF learn Luck-J.
Anyway, I can see one item that's (in theory) reasonably easy to
earn, that is the Adamantines. Get into a fight with the Adamantoises
(they come in 2s I think) and defeating (not mugging) them will net
you 2 of them! (You may need high level Adamantoises or I was just
very lucky.)

3) Eating enemies
Thanks to Happy Matt for this one. It was quite a long time ago when
he told me that Eden's Devour command can be used to raise your
stats. Ok, finally got the list, thanks to Happy Matt and Viki.
         Ruby Dragon -> Max HP+10
         T-Rexaur    -> Strength+1
         Adamantoise -> Vitality+1
         Behemoth    -> Magic+1
         Malboro     -> Spirit+1
        *Pupu        -> Speed+1
       **Rinoa       -> HP+10

* Devouring Pupu's rather pointless, as you'll never be able to get
its card. A pretty big sacrifice.

** That's during the Adel battle, where she's on the enemy side of
the battlefield. However, your game will end when Rinoa dies anyway,
making this another useless Devour. (I can't remember who told me
about these 2 first, sorry.....)

NEW! Thanks to all who sent me a feedback on Devour, now it is
possible to Devour an enemy easily. Like the Card command, the lower
the enemy's HP, the higher the success rate. (Thanks to Joe Pirozzo,
Eekeric@aol.com and about a million other people, actually, more like
a multiple of a million.)

However, that's still only half of the story, as the HP of the
character who's trying Devour the enemy will also come in play.
Basically, it works like the instant death spells from the older FFs,
but instead of comparing levels, Devour compares you and the enemy's
current HP. So, the enemy has more HP than you, you'll be put to a
disadvantage, but if your HP is higher, it becomes reasonably easy to
succeed with Devour. (~5 tries if you do it right.) Thanks to Weilun
for the explanations.

Eekeric@aol.com sent in this strategy:
Keep casting Demi with all 3 characters until it starts doing less
than 9999 damage, then revert to Diablos summon and let one character
try out the Devour command. I must admit, Demi is an extremely useful
spell here since all enemies on the good Devour list has an insane
amount of HP. Careful with Diablos though, as even though the damage
is gravity elemental, it can still kill an enemy since it works based
on an enemy's maximum HP.

One thing I'd like to point out is that the Ruby Dragons are not
worth the effort to eat, since they have some of the highest HP and
defence in the game and attacks like Meteor and Breath can drive you
nuts. Do the infinite credit trick and refine HP-Ups there is MUCH

NOTE! Macaw just told me that he got penalized for Devouring a
Malboro. It did 1000 damage to Squall and inflicted him with all the
status ailments. Hmm, I really don't know why this is happening
because I always successfully gain a point of Spirit when I eat
Malboros. Could this be a rare even when the Devour back fires?

NOTE2!!! No it's not 'cuz the Malboro is of a low level. That was on
the Island Closest to Hell, all enemies are level 100!

NOTE3!!! To fix this random Malboro misfire, try junctioning various
status magic to ST-Def.

4) Any others?

No, don't get so excited yet, it's not what you think. Anyway, it was
a while ago that "Souma" wrote in suggesting that I should put up a
section on how many battles I fought, ran away, game time and other
stats. I thought it was a great idea but never got around to do it,
so here it is, a brand new section.

I've gathered 2 sets of data, the first one is right before starting
to power up my characters. It's right after the event in disc 3 in
Sorceress Memorial after getting Rinoa back. Just take note that I
have a habit of leaving the game on when I need to fix dinner and
stuff like that, and I also spent a lot of time playing cards.

Time: 55:06                       SeeD rank: 15

---Battle report---
Walked: 2,156,631                 Battles: 392
Won:    313                       Escaped: 79

---Character report---
Character          Enemies killed       KO'd      EXP 'til next level
Squall                   56              18              382
Zell                     20               7              322
Quistis                  46               5              500*
Seifer                   87               0               -
Selphie                 127               1              239
Rinoa                    29               2              600
Irvine                    8               0              621
Edea                     91               0               -
* Quistis didn't gain a single point of EXP!

Now here are my stats after powering up (note I did spend some time
on Devour.) I ditched Character report for this though.

Time: 73:08

---Battle report---
Walked: 2,439,831                 Battles: 694
Won:    614                       Escaped: 80

-> Magic
I think most spells are best Stocked and Junctioned, not cast since
all spells are limited. Certain spells are really common though, like
the basic elementary spells and healing ones so you can use these
without having to hold back. If you're really hungry on spells, try
refining them from the menu. The best spells like Ultima, Meteor,
Triple etc. shouldn't be cast at all, since they're much better when
junctioned and your Limit Breaks are more powerful.

I know many of you likes to cast Double/Triple on yourselves but keep
in mind that this is only one way of beating bosses, and not a very
efficient way at that. Most magic are considerably weaker than all
character's Limit Breaks and are barely stronger than a regular
attack (if you junction yourselves properly that it.) If you're one
of these types, I recommend that you try another approach since this
strategy will not work at all against later bosses, since they have
insanely high Spirit and even your best damage-dealing spell
(Ultima/Meteor) can only do so much, not to mention that they're
extremely rare and you're getting weaker with each casting.

-> Draw
This is VERY important! You should always have the Draw command
available on all characters and check every enemy you come across for
new spells. You should spend some time drawing from the bosses too,
since they tend to have really good spells. Try to get 100 of them on
at least one character if you can. Don't be afraid to draw from most
bosses since they're really not that dangerous (gosh, I was drawing
Ultimas from Ultima Weapon! 290 of them!) and you can draw Cure
spells or Life spells from most of them so you won't have much
trouble healing your characters. Against bosses with status changing
attacks, they usually have Esuna. I don't know about you guys but I'm
the greedy type who always tries to get as much as I can carry. The
better spells works nicely in your junctions and puts you ahead of
your enemies. So if you're having problems, maybe it's because you're
not drawing enough spells.

-> More on spells
Since you cannot level up, the enemy's draw collection will not
expand, which makes drawing from bosses essential to getting good
spells early. Another really good (and convenient) way of getting
spells is to refine them from the menu (thank god these never fail,
unlike SO2.) You can win items from enemies (by carding them) and
changing cards into items and get even more spell "ingredients". Menu
abilities like I Mag-RF or L Mag-RF (or in short, all of them) are
essential but thankfully, they're quite cheap to learn. Try to spend
some time trying out some all of these, as you can find some real
bargain deals! Try to look out for the items that can be bought in
stores or won easily, or can be changed into with cards. Some items
like Softs or Tents can be refined into Break and Curaga spells,
respectively, which are decent junction spells early in the game and
are quite affordable. Also, learning Quezacotl's Mid Mag-RF can turn
crap spells like Fire and Cure into fairly decent -ra spells, and
it's a great way of disposing weak spells to free up slots later in
the game.

-> Cards
I don't know about you guys but I like the card game a lot and it's
also rather important aspect of the game since many of them can be
refined into really great items! Make sure you have a look at what
cards can be turned into what items. So when you win a card game,
you'll know which cards to pick. You should pick one that you don't
have (if there's a rare card, then definitely pick that one!) or a
one that can be made into a decent item. Cards like Bite Bugs and
Funguars are essentially useless, as they can only be refined into
more crap items that plagues your inventory. Also, I do not recommend
that you refine a rare card, as it'll be lost forever. (You could if
you don't care about the cards though.) Play cards often to improve
your skill, and always look for cards that you don't have, especially
rare ones.

If you don't like the card game, you can also get a lot of decent
cards to refine into items by carding the enemies.

-> More on cards
If you're the type who plays the card games in every town, you'd
noticed that there are some rules that are just a plain pain in the
butt!!! (Random, Sudden Death etc.) Try not to keep the card rules
from spreading except for the friendly Open rule. Try abolishing
rules that you don't like. Actually, I'd rather get rid of every rule
there is except for Open. Yes, some of the rules can be a lot of fun
and strategic (ie, Random, Open, Same and Plus is a good
combination.) But you'd want to win most of the time right? All the
extra rules are interesting but all of them put you a step away from
a sure victory.

Since you'll be winning most of the time, try challenging the Queen
of Cards often, so to modify the trade rule. Diff and All are both
excellent for players who are on the winning streak or simply
mastered the game (like me) so you can gather cards more quickly.
Direct is crap though, it often makes you LOSE rare cards so try not
let it spread. Also, certain cards will be completely impossible to
turn over if their weak sides are concealed (ie, Seifer's card placed
to the top-left slot) and therefore, impossible to win it under the
Direct rule. If you must play a Direct game, don't use rare cards
(but it's a decent rule if you want to loose a specific card.)

-> Rarer cards
Very occasionally when you card an enemy, you'd get a completely
different card! This is normal so don't freak out when your Funguar
turns into a Biggs, Wedge Card. Remember that bosses cannot be
carded? This is one way of getting your hands on the rarer boss
cards. Now if you look in the card menu, every boss card should have
2 monster names to the bottom right of the screen. This indicates
which monsters can turn into that particular boss card on rare

-> Menu Abilities
I think Menu Abilities are some of the best skills a GF can learn,
since it opens up a huge window of possibility where you can make
almost every item and magic with them, and most of these abilities
can complement each other to turn some crap items into useful
items/spells. However it becomes a pain in the butt when you want to
get a _specific_ item/spell and don't know where to start. Well, as
I've recently discovered, you can get a *full* list of the
ingredients needed and its products from the tutorial menu, but only
when you've learnt that specific skill. Neat feature huh?

-> GF
Like magic, summoning GFs ain't crucial in the success of this game,
although they can be useful in certain situations. The GF command is
useful, however, when you want to protect a character from attacks.
Let them summon a GF and it can absorb the damage for that character
if they get hit. In the mean time, have the other character cast Cure
on them. Remember that even though the GF's HP is put over the
character's, healing spells will heal the team member rather than the
GF. Also, always make use of the Boost ability if you can.

Try not to summon GFs that often later in the game, not even Eden.
Most bosses have really powerful attacks later in the game and are
really fast. GF's HP maxes out at 9999 and cannot be healed in battle
via any convenient way. Most of them can only deal up to 9999 damage,
not to mention you had to wait a while for them to get there. The GFs
are however, useful when you just KNOW that your character is going
to get KO'd (like via Omega's 9999 damage attack) so let your
character summon the GF and it'll take the pain for you.

The most useful GF is Doomtrain (IMO) and is worth the effort to
summon it in almost all battles. Cerberus is nice if you like spells,
Cactuar is nice since his attack is independent of the target's
defence while Eden is a big damage maker! Of course, try getting
their Compatibility with their master to 1000.

-> GF Management
Ah, here's an important task. You should choose an ability for the GF
to learn rather than letting them do whatever they want to. They'll
always learn the GF Abilities if you don't choose one for them, which
are among the least useful of the bunch. If a GF has the Boost
ability, then it's _usually_ a good idea to have them learn it first
since it's cheap and it's quite useful. However, you should switch to
Junction Abilities afterwards, then Character/Party. It really
depends on the GF. For example, Shiva has a bunch of useless skills,
nothing too great so let her learn Boost first, then Str or Vit-J,
since you should really boost your characters' stats with them. (And
because her other skills are not very useful.) Siren however, has a
really good Party Ability - Move-Find so you should start with that
one. As for Diablos, it's all about Character/Party Abilities, and
his Menu ones don't suck either. However, when you get to Tonberry,
you'll want his menu abilities such as Familiar and Call Shop first.
Use your own judgement. You should get all the useful abilities
before getting all the GF abilities like GFHP +10%. Check up on them
regularly to see how they're doing too.

-> Limit Break
(I prefer to call them desperation attacks or specials.)
You should try these often. They're only usable when your HP are low
(or with Aura) but keeping them alive isn't really a problem, if
junctioned spells into your Vit/Spr, you'll take very little damage
from attacks so you'll be able to stay in critical status longer. If
they're in danger then heal them, but you don't have to do it
immediately when their HP becomes critical. During bosses, you should
spend all your time Drawing spells from it then when your HP gets
low, dispatch them with your Limit Breaks. (That's why you don't
really need attack spells or GF summons all that much.)

To use Limit Breaks easily, repeatedly tap the O button to switch
between characters when your HP is low (or with Aura) and you'll
eventually get the triangle that signifies a Limit is available.

-> Quistis' Blue Magic
Anyway, you'll be evading encounters if you follow my guide, so how
are you supposed to get the items for her to her new Blue Magic?
Well, if you card an enemy, they can still drop an item. Also, if
you're keen card player like I am, you can also get those items by
using the card Mod Menu Ability. Some of them are really easy to get
your hands on, such as trading Gesper's card for a Black Hole. Some
of the better ones may require up to 10 cards! Such as 10 Behemoth's
into one Barrier or 10 Ruby Dragon's into one Inferno Fang.

-> Weapon upgrade
One thing I wanna get it straight is that you do NOT need to have
read a specific magazine that the weapon you wish to upgrade is
detailed in. Those magazines' purposes are to only indicate what
materials are needed for what weapon models. If you have all the
material a certain weapon requires, that weapon model will become
available when you enter a Junk Shop. For example, if you have 1
Adamantine, 12 Pulse Ammo and 4 Dragon Fang, you can instantly opt to
upgrade Squall's Revolver into a Lion Heart without ever touching the
first edition of Weapon Monthly. However, if you only have 11 Pulse
Ammo in your inventory instead of 12, you will not even see the Lion
Heart in the menu.

I don't recommend that you upgrade your weapon every time a better
one becomes available, since most of them differ very slightly in
power and hit rate. The only character who should modify his weapon
regularly is Squall since he gets a new move when he changes his
weapon. For all other characters it's a waste of ingredients. You
should however, upgrade their weapons when their most powerful model
is available.

-> Reviving
I always use Life instead of Full-Life since Full-Life is a rare
spell, and also, if you bring back a party member with Life or a
Phoenix Down, their status instantly becomes critical which means
they can use Limit Breaks easily. According to Jonathan Ng,
Alexander's Revive actually brings them to full HP, but since it's
free, use that one if you have it. (Actually, I prefer the Magic
command since it's much more versatile.)

-> Speed over defence
For some of the bosses, it's actually better to have a higher Speed
than Vitality/Spirit (ie, save the slot for Spd +20% instead of Vit
+40% or something.) The reason behind this is that certain bosses
like Ultima Weapon can kill you in one hit regardless of your
HP/defence anyway, so it's pointless having a huge defence with no
speed. Most bosses of this type has powerful attacks too so if your
defence is too low, it can also be hazardous. However, if you follow
my guide, you should get decent defence levels even without Character
Ability boosts (like 190+ etc.) Also, you may want to use Quistis'
Mighty Guard that gives you every positive status imaginable. Her
White Wind and Selphie's Full Cure are also extremely useful,
especially to deal with Square's trademark, the "down to 1HP attack".
When all fails, use a Holy War (Drink).

-> Stock or Cast?
Normally, it's a good idea to Cast a drawn spell so you don't have to
use up your stock, however, keep in mind that casting a drawn spell
directly works differently than if you casted it from your stock.
There seems to be a lot of randomness involved with casting a drawn
spell, as the damage can spread over a wide range! Casting a drawn
Cure for example, with a character with Mag of 8 can heal from 30 to
500+ points of damage! So if you need stable damage/healing, stick to
the magic command with stocked spells.

Two spells have a very strange effect when you cast a drawn spell,
and they are Demi and Full-Life. Demi will sometimes do less (MUCH
less) than 1/4 of the target's current HP, sometimes as low as 10%.
Full-Life will not always bring the target back to full HP, so it has
the effect of the scrub version: Life.

-> Some words on ST-Atk
ST-Atk is a great asset given by a chosen few GFs, they let you add a
deadly status ailment to your attacks. Though not all status are
effective against certain enemies, choosing the right one can mean
turning a hideously powerful monster into a harmless machine that you
can draw spells from. Remember however, a status will NOT be
inflicted if the weapon was used for a Limit Break attack (Squall's
Renzokuken for example.) Here's a recommendation of what's they best
spells to junction:
  - Sleep: My personal favourite! Works on more enemies than any of
the below and make them helpless for fairly long time, perfect for
drawing spells! Even better is that you can cast spells on them or
summon GFs without having to wake them up!
  - Drain: This acts almost like Regen, as every time you attack, you
get some HP back! You'll be immortal as long as you keep attacking!
Oh yeah, beware of undeads to, as you'll actually lose HP! This works
exceptionally well though, as the more damage you can inflict, the
more you can absorb!
  - Death: Instant death, we all like that don't we? Anyway, it's not
as good as it is in theory since many of the more powerful enemies
are immune to Instant Deaths and is useless on bosses. Works well on
weaker enemies.
  - Break: If this was FFVII, Break'd be 100 times more useful since
most of the powerful enemies can be turned to stone. However in
FFVIII, Break is even lousier than Death, works on weaker enemies
  - Silence: Not too shabby but many of the enemies don't cast spells
very often and many of the powerful ones are immune. Works nicely on
soldiers though. But then again, you can just summon Siren.

All other status are not as helpful. Ones like Stop or Slow may seem
extremely powerful as but keep in mind that those spells works on
almost NONE of the enemies! (Stop in particular!)

-> Arms for the poor
If you don't want to spend 100 Gil to rest at the inn, no sweat,
here's an easier (and actually more convenient) way of healing
yourselves. Put Selphie in the team and lower her HP to critical. Get
into a fight and cast Full Cure from her Slots. It will heal all your
HP and status, and since MP is absent from this FF, it means you're
as good as new!

-> Spell disposal!!
Thanks to John Calvin <jexer@hotmail.com> for this trick
It's a wonder that so many FFVIII players (including myself) didn't
discover that there was a way of discarding unwanted spells! Anyway,
what you do is go to the Magic menu and select Exchange. Highlight
the spell you wanna dispose of and press the Square button. A message
will pop up asking if you want to discard the spell. Select Yes and
voila! Gone! Neat trick huh? (Actually, selecting "Use" does the
same. Thanks to Weilun <tionghui@singnet.com.sg> for the correction.)

-> Draw Points get paid
As you've already know, Draw Points will recover after a "while". How
long is a while? It seems that (certain?) Draw Points recovers every
time you receive your SeeD salary. I may be wrong though, but
sometimes when I drew from a Draw Point and gets paid when I walk
away, it magically recovers!

Of course, certain Draw Points will not recover at all. If it turns
blue instead of white then it cannot be recovered. If it's a spell

that seems to be way too advanced for that period in the game then
it's probably non-recoverable.

-> Draw Points: Overworld or underworld?
The Draw Points on the field map are completely different. First off,
the field map Draw Points are spherical shaped, while the over world
Draw Points "exists" over a part of the land. (Meaning that they have
no material form.)

Also, overworld Draw Points are completely invisible, even equipping
Siren's Move-Find ability won't show their whereabouts. They usually
occupy coastal areas, edges of mountains and various other "corners"
of the world, so search those places if you're keen.

Finally, the over world Draw Points are extremely inefficient because
the most number of spells you can draw from it at one time is 5
charges! (I usually get 1!!) Compare that with 15 for field map Draw
Points and 9 per round in combat (unlimited.)

-> Gravity is NOT GF-friendly
Gravity type attacks can never kill you right? Yes, but only if
you're a human. What do you mean you ask? Well, the problem lies when
a character is summoning a GF. Apparently, the game uses the
summoner's current HP and NOT the GF's, so if your character has a
very high current HP and your GF has relatively low current HP, it
can actually kill them! However, if your character has low HP while
the GF has high HP, the damage are comparable to bug bites.

-> Vitality Zero or Spirit Zero?
I guess you all have heard of the Vitality Zero status (shown in
battle by a purple tint.) Anyway, that's misleading as magic defence
(ie, Spirit) is also lowered! Try summoning Doomtrain twice in a row,
you'll notice that the damage dealt by the second summon has been
raised significantly.

-> A good combo
Try junctioning 100 Drains to your ST-Atk and equip the Darkside
command. Use it and not only will you deal 3 times the usual damage,
you'll also gain drain a huge amount of HP. I've forgotten who told
me about this though, sorry...

The only flaw to this trick is that you'll never recover to your full
HP. Remember that the penalties for using Darkside (lose 10% HP)
takes place AFTER the attack, so you'll always end up with only 90%
of your total HP.

-> You have been deceived!
Well I'm not sure if you guys ever heard about this thing saying that
all monster's levels are determined by Squall's level. That's WRONG!!
*Gasp* Yup that right, the enemy's levels are determined by the
_average_ of your (active?) party member's levels, or so it seems,
because when I levelled up Quistis and not Squall, the enemy's levels
are a LOT higher than Squall's. This is just an estimated prediction
though so don't quote me on this, but it's a pretty good estimate I'd
have to say. (The regular deviations in enemy levels are still there

-> To draw, or not to draw
The field map Draw Points seems to have 3 states. The "empty" state
where the ball is colorless. There seems to be 2 drawable states
though, "full" and "semi-full". In its "full" state, the orb is
filled completely with vibrant purple colored stripes. The "semi-
full" state seems to have a very faint tint of purple color and less
number of stripes. Sometimes it's very hard to tell whether a Draw
Point is "empty" or "semi-full", since the purple present in "semi-
full" Draw Points is very vague.

The difference between "full" and "semi-full" Draw Point is the
number of spells you can draw. You always seem to get 2 or 3 charges
if you draw from a "semi-full" draw point, but the "full" states
gives you a minimum of 6 to a maximum of 15. The fast recovering Draw
Points (like the ones in the Shumi Village) seems to yield "semi-
full" Draw Points more often than not.

-> Gain skills even quicker
Christian Groff <epoch@texas.net> suggested to learn certain skills
with items and not AP, which is a really good idea. Here's a list he
sent me:

Steel Pipe: SumMag +10%
Star Fragment: SumMag +20%
Energy Crystal: SumMag +30%
Samantha Soul: SumMag +40% (for Bahamut, Doomtrain and Eden)
Healing Mail: GFHP +10%
Silver Mail: GFHP +20%
Gold Mail: GFHP +30%
Diamond Armor: GFHP +40% (for Bahamut, Doomtrain and Eden)
Healing Ring: Recover (Leviathan)
Phoenix Spirit: Revive (Alexander)
Gambler Spirit: Card (Quezacotl)
Bomb Spirit: Kamikaze (Cactuar)
Knight's Code: Cover (Brothers)
Monk's Code: Counter (Carbuncle)

You can also use these items to teach a GF an ability that it wouldn't normally
learn. For example, the Card command is learned only by Quezacotl, but you can
teach it to a GF of your choice. Since some FF8 players swear by the Card
command, it may actually be a good idea, as you'll card enemies MUCH faster.

There are many more items out there that lets you learn new skills,
so search for them. Note however, there are no items to aid learning
Menu Abilities.

-> What to unlearn
and use them to help a GF forget an ability. All GFs can learn 22
skills at once, but you need to free up slots in order to learn new
ones with items. This is important because you need to split your GFs
six ways right before fighting Ultimecia, and you'll need enough -J
abilities for all your major attributes for all characters. So here's
my recommendation on what to forget:

  * If a GF has Elem-Defx2 or ST-Defx2, forget Elem-Def or ST-Def
won't hurt, since having multiple ones won't grant any special
effects. -Defx4 abilities acts in a similar way.
  * If you always pair together certain GFs, you get forget the Item,
GF, Magic and Draw commands on one GF, since every GF has those 4
  * When a GF's max HP is already 9999, forget a GFHP+??% probably
won't lower it by much. (Especially for the GFs near the end.)
  * If you never summon a GF, you might want to forget their GFHP+??%
or SumMag+??% skills. At LV100, most GFs reach the 9999 damage cap anyway,
especially with Boost, so if you're desperate for slots, taking off a 10% or 20%
won't do anything to lower the damage.
  * You might want to delete the "Bonus" skills after you're done
with them.
  * You may want to forget any HP, Str, Vit, Mag or Spr+20% if you
have 40%, since a 40% is enough to raise the stats to max after
powering up. (You can even delete Bahamut's Str and Mag+40% since it
has +60% available.)
  * I personally don't like Elem-Atk very much so... (More than 6 GFs
have that next-to-trash ability anyway.)

However, do NOT delete any Menu Abilities or other unique and
otherwise irreplaceable skills, such as the Devour command or Auto-
Haste etc. Don't forget any "rare" skills either, like anything that
boosts Hit, Evade, Luck or Speed.

-> Another good combo
Thanks to Iaian Ross <hyuga_ricdeau@hotmail.com> for this trick.
This is a good use for the "useless" Zombie spells. Junction 100
Zombies to your ST-Atk and it will turn enemies into undeads.
Afterwards, any reviving method will kill them in one hit, like Life
spells, Phoenix Downs and the best of all, the Revive command ('cuz
it's free.) This is a good way of dealing really high HP/powerful
enemies like the ones on the Island Closest to Hell.

-> Perhaps the best combo of all...
It's (of course) critical status + Aura status!!! That way, your
character will have a 90% chance of executing their best Limit Breaks
(if they're random.) I've tried this on Zell when facing Omega Weapon
and all four Duels came in 12 seconds!!! (No need to say, I trashed
Omega and flushed him down the loo.)

Anyway, try this out on the other characters, you'll almost be
guaranteed to execute Lion Heart, Wishing Star, The End, Mighty Guard
that grants everyone Aura and a slow Shot bar for Irvine.

-> Rules are made to be broken
Thanks to Viki for the info on this.

You should all know about he "5th trade rule" by now, it's the "Null"
rule. (This tip used to be in the "Misc." section.) However, there
was more to that rule than a pointless no trading game. Well, playing
a Null game has the effect of completely deleting ALL rules in that
region!!!!! The guy by the sea in Balamb used this rule before the
Fire Cavern event, and playing a game with him has made the Open rule
disappear (and I had to pay the Queen 30000 Smackers to re-establish
it in Balamb.)

The Null trade rule, is however, potentially really useful since it
has the power of nullify all those horrible rules in Space, Centra,
Trabia, Dollet etc... But I myself have only seen that rule once.
Does anyone know how to make the Null rule appear in other regions?

-> Rule transfer tips
I'm not sure if anyone knows this already but I've just found this
out last night. Spreading a rule in another region also has the
effect of spreading the trade rule from the original region, if it
has been established.

For example, play the Queen in Balamb to change the trade rule to
"All" then play many many games to make the rule stay. (Ask the Queen
about the trade rule in the region and she should say "Blah blah will
spread throughout the region." If she says something else, then it
means it still hasn't gained a solid ground, and will dissappear over
time.) Now when you get to Timber (Galbadia region) and play a card
game, end up spreading the Open rule, and the "All" trade rull will
also be spread!!! So before you leave Balamb, make sure the "All"
rule (or "Diff") stays for good, as you will want to spread the Open
rule from Balamb to all major regions, and therefore, making the
world much more tradable for us!

-> Steal and not Mug
Thanks to Treylane47@aol.com for this trick

Well, this sure helps if you wanna steal something but don't want the
EXP. Simply give the Mug command to someone wil relatively low Hit%
(Zell with his worst weapon) and cast Blind on him. His Hit% will be
massively reduced that he almost never hits, but using the Mug
command still allows a chance to steal. Of yeah, never try this with
someone who's weapon has a 255% Hit.

-> Something you may find useful

I don't know if you know this but the Invincible status (effects of
Hero, Holy War or Invincible Moon) will instantly negate all negative
statuses your character had been inflicted. It does not seem to
negate positive statuses though (whoohoo!!), at least not Haste, Aura
and Float. (Protect and Shell won't make any difference anyway.) This
might be useful when fighting against Malboros, execute Rinoa's
Invincible Moon will cure all your party's ailments. However, remember that once
you are invincible, you can't apply a positive status on top of it, eg, Haste,
Aura, even Angel Wing! Make sure you slap up all you need before going

-> Fun Scan trick. :)
Thanks to Katman <cgalli@teleline.es>

If you thought Scanning Rinoa in Adel's fight was fun, get a hold of
this. Most players don't realise that you can cast Scan on your own
party members. As a result, you can read some interesting info on the
playable characters. For example:

Uses enemy magic she has learned. Attacks with a whip when in danger.

Cool huh? I'm gonna list all 9 playable character's info here later.
Thanks for this fun trick. :)

-> Card and item glitch? Very likely. ;)
Thanks to Catherine Fletcher <digimitch@prodigy.net> for this

   "I would also like to submit a question/cheat that needs no Game
    Shark or something like that. I own both PC and Playstation
    version of FF8. When i'm playing a previously saved game, and end
    it by getting a Game Over, not by turning off the system, i
    create a new game. When i do this it randomly selects many useful
    items and cards. For instance, it gave me "Gambler", "Vit-J",
    etc. to teach my GFs abilities with out getting AP. The cards it
    would like give me 44 Fuijin and Raijin cards and 50 Behemoths.
    These are just a few cards. whe i win cards like MiniMog, it will
    give me like 5 MiniMogs intead of 1. This glitch/cheat works for
    both systems(PC/PS). My question was, do you think this is just a
    glitch or could it be a real cheat?"

I think it's a glitch. I haven't tried it out though.

Marl Lieberman <lman@flashmail.com> also reported starting a new game
with maximum time and Gil. It's likely to be another bug.

-> Gain stats-boosts... the easy way.
Thanks to Aaditya V. Rangan <rangan@math.berkeley.edu>

Basically, to avoid the tedious process of making money and refining
sources manually, just use a programmable pad. I don't expect many of
us gamers to have one though.

Anyway, you'll probably have to do this in 2 steps. First step is to
program the pad with a macro that will refine the potions and sell
them for a high profit. Do this for an hour or two and then carry on
with the second step, which will be purchasing ingredients and
refining them into the stats-boost of your choice. All very technical
stuff, I guess people like me, who's still trying to work the stone
wheel, should not tempt with the advanced technology such as this.

-> Queen-of-Cards Cards... the easy way? Perhaps....
Thanks to Brian Lennon <bowie_knife@hotmail.com>

   "I discovered a new trick that I actually think you haven't heard of
    before. This makes the Queen of Cards Quest MUCH easier. Ok, when
    she's in Balamb, you gotta lose 4 of your rare cards to her in one
    game. Then, wait until she goes to Dollet. Talk to her and she'll
    ask you for a certain card. Keep offering to play until she makes
    the DIRECT rule. Lose the card she wants, but gain one of your rare
    cards back. Now, instead of moving to another region, she'll ask you
    for another card!!! Repeat this until you lose Alexander. Then,
    fetch Doomtrain, give that to her, get the other cards, and it'll be
    done WITHOUT having to chase her all over the world!!!

This sounds really weird, but according to Brian, it works... Of
course, I know what you are thinking of right now and YES THE DIRECT
RULE STICKS after you are done. Quite a messy situation to put
yourself in if you ask me. The choice is yours. Whether you want to
chase the Queen around the world and resetting lots to get what you
want (which I actually prefer) or do it the easy way with a serious
drawback, it's your call. You can probably get all the card you want
from the Dollet region before starting this trick though.

More tips comin' up.

Like my previous FAQs, I'll detail each character in this section,
with their strengths, weaknesses, Limit Breaks and some other stuff.
BTW, if you were wondering about the stats my characters had, they're
in this section.

I've found out something quite interesting from this second time
through the game. The character's stats at level 100 will always be
the same! So it seems that this game uses fixed level up stats boosts
instead of random ones like in most other RPGs.

The one on the left is my "test run" score and the one on the right
is my best score, also the maximum you can get from equipping the
Bonus abilities. Note only HP, Str, Vit, Mag and Spr have the MAX
values, since all the other ones don't change. MAX HP is calculated
since I never equip HP Bonus.

(Note all stats are of the character at level 100 with their BEST
weapon, meaning higher Str and Hit. Also, none of them are junctioned
in any way.)

---Squall Leonhart---
HP        4187       6977
Str        162        170         Spd       37
Vit        124        134         Luck      22
Mag        130        138         Eva        3%
Spr        117        129         Hit      255%

Comments on stats: Squall usually has the crappiest stats since
you'll be forced to use him the most in the whole game, while his
Limits are one of the best. He gets fairly good stats if you manage
to not gain a level at all. His Str is decent. All his gunblades has
255 Hit rate though, meaning his normal attacks will never miss.

Limit Break: Renzokuken
When this is used, Squall will rush to his target and slash them
anywhere from 4 to 8 times. A bar pops up at the bottom of the screen
and green "waves" will start to flow from the right to the left, each
of them represents a gunblade attack. You're supposed to pull the
trigger (ie, the R1 button) at the exact time as the wave reaches the
box near the left, and a "hit" will register, meaning that single
attack will do 1.5 times of normal damage. (Very much like his normal
attack.) Otherwise you'll miss and get no damage bonus for that
single hit (and likely to screw up the timing of your next attack. I
can never get the remaining hits right when I miss the timing.)
You'll get the "Perfect" message if you timed every hit right, but it
doesn't mean anything in terms of combat.

I think each hit does about as much damage as his normal attack, or
perhaps slightly more. His Limits are dependent on Squall's Strength.
Note this is non-elemental even if you've junctioned spells into his

Randomly after executing the 4-8 hits, Squall may execute a finishing
blow. Note the chance of Squall executing his finishing blow will NOT
increase if you get a "Perfect" for the initial Renzokuken hits, it's
just random. Squall will start the game with his most basic finishing
blow, Rough Divide and the rest can be gained from upgrading his
gunblades. Note however, not all models of the gunblade come with a
finishing blow, just some of them.

The initial Renzokuken hits are single targeted but a couple of his
finishing blows can hit all enemies on screen.

         Gunblade model           Finishing blow
         Revolver         =>      Rough Divide
         Shear Trigger    =>      Fated Circle
         [Other models]   =>      Blasting Zone
         Lion Heart       =>      Lion Heart (aka End of Heart)

Ok, execuse me everyone, but the gunblade theory I had last time was
TOTALLY wrong! Thanks to Iaian Ross <hyuga_ricdeau@hotmail.com> who
informed me about this.

Anyway, it seems that whenever you upgrade Squall's gunblade, he'll
gain the finishers that model grants AND all the finishers below it.
In other words, Squall does not learn the finishers but the gunblades
comes with certain finishers learned. For example, Squall upgrade his
Revolver to a Cutting Trigger (skipping the Shear Trigger), he'll be
able to use not only Rough Divide and Blasting Zone, but Fated Circle
as well, since the Cutting Trigger is more advanced than the Shear

Because of this, the theory of increasing the chances of executing
Lion Heart by upgrading the Revolver to a Lion Heart and thus trying
not to learn Fated Circle or Blasting Zone would not work. Sorry if
the previous theory gave anyone any trouble.

Note: Fated Circle and Blasting Zone hits all enemies, however, if
enemies are affected by Sleep prior to Renzokuken, the enemies which
Renzokuken was not targeted on but was hurt by either of the above
finishers will NOT wake up!

-Rough Divide-
This is what Squall used on Seifer in the intro FMV. Squall runs
towards his target while while sliding the blade across the ground,
then he leaps into the air bringing up rocks and a huge vertical
shock wave damaging the enemy. This looks pretty cool but does more
damage of that of a regular Renzokuken hit. Critical happen often
with this!

-Fated Circle-
Squall will leap into the air and spins around with his blade on his
way down, forming a ring shaped sonic boom-like force that cuts all
enemies, then explodes into flames. Not a very powerful move, but
stronger than a Renzokuken hit.

-Blasting Zone-
Gosh this takes ages! Squall gets surrounded by a whirlwind-like
force field as he extends his gunblade up into the air. A vertical
beam force lengthens from the blade and extends out all the way into
space, then Squall brings his blade down as strong gale hurts all
enemies. I don't like this very much as it only does slightly more
damage than Fated Circle but lower than Rough Divide, and takes ages
to animate. Extremely pointless but seems to be the finisher that
gets triggered the most in the long run.

-Lion Heart-
This was originally named "End of Heart" in the Japanese version
which was a much better name. Squall rushes to the enemy and
uppercuts them into the air, then leaps into the air and beats them
up with 16 hits of his gunblade, ending with a flashy diagonal
strike. Then the enemy drops back to the ground.

This is the most powerful attack in the whole game. Squall executes
exactly 16 hits (thanks to Qualera) and each hit usually does 9999
damage. (Less against enemies with REALLY high defence, but the
damage never really goes below 9000 per hit.) Can kill most bosses in
one hit except Omega Weapon and the last form of the last boss. Note
there's an extra hit when the enemy drops back onto the ground
afterwards, making it a total of 17 hits!!!

---Quistis Trepe---
HP        3883       6643
Str        161        163         Spd       34
Vit        118        122         Luck      21
Mag        132        134         Eva        3%
Spr        121        126         Hit      107%

Comments on stats: Quistis has the worst overall stats of the group
it seems but since her Limit Breaks are some of the best, Quistis
stands out in the game as the best character, IMO. Very pretty too,
and looks a LOT like Aya! :-)

Limit Break: Blue Magic
I've always loved Blue Magic in the series. Blue Magic started all
the way back in FFV where it's the specialty of Blue Mages, since
they can only learn new spells through being hit by it, the game
balances them out by giving them the ability to use better equipment.
In FFVI, only Strago the Blue Mage can use Blue spells (Lores) and he
has a few decent ones like Grand Train, but it still made him a less
useful character. In FFVII, Blue spells were named Enemy Skills and
can be learnt by the corresponding materia. They were really useful
though, especially in the Battle Arena since they count as YELLOW
materia, not Green, so you'll still be able to use spells when your
Green materia breaks.

Anyway, Quistis's Blue Magic are a bit different since she does not
learn them by being hit as the enemy casts them like in the previous
fantasies, instead, you have to use certain items that can be won or
stolen from enemies on her. Some of her better ones are really hard
to get though (Ray Bomb, Shockwave Pulsar, Mighty Guard, Homing Laser
etc.) Blue spells have always worked in strange ways so even though a
certain attack is generally more powerful, another attack may do more
damage than it under certain circumstances.

There are a few great things about Quistis' Blue magic too, because
she has a great variety of them and she has one for every situation
(ie, multi-target attack, instant death, elemental, status, gravity
elemental, healing and defence!) Her spells are also extremely
dependable, and she's the ONLY character who has non-random Limit
Breaks. The disadvantage of it is that she has the least damage

Note: None of Quistis' damage dealing Blue Magic (except Gatling Gun)
can be blocked, meaning the damage cannot be halved by both Protect
and Shell. Likewise, no Blue Magic can be reflected. Also, despite
that they're enemy skills, they work NOTHING like the enemy's
version. I'll describe the differences (if any) below.

-Laser Eye-
Used by: Belhelmel has it as a counter attack
Learnt from: None, initial spell

Quistis starts the game with this. She turns away from the enemy then
release a green beam of laser from her eyes and hurts the enemy. It's
fairly weak (~200 damage at the start of the game but can get a bit
stronger.) It's cool to watch though and actually does fairly decent
damage if you power Quistis up.

I think the Belhelmels only use this as a counter attack.

-Ultra Wave-
Used by: Caterchipiller
Learnt from: Spider Web

Defeat Catachipillers nets you this, they're really common. You can
also get it from changing Catachipiller's card into it.

Quistis damages all enemies with pink spiral waves that pop out from
her body. This damages all enemies and does 300+ damage near the
start but I think Laser Eye is generally more powerful.

Used by: Cockatrice

Learnt from: Coral Fragment

I think steal/defeating Cockatrices can get you this. I got it by
trading Creeps' card for it.

Quistis released countless golden lighting bolts from her body and
fries all enemies, looks a lot like Vincent's Limit Break in FFVII.
Kinda weak if you ask me though. This is like Trine from FFVII, which
is weaker than Beta (Fire Breath) and Aqualung (Aqua Breath). I
usually don't bother with this as even against robots, her other
attacks does more damage.

-Level ? Death-
Used by: Torama, Omega Weapon (LV5 Death)
Learnt from: Cursed Spike

Steal/win from Tri-Face, or occasionally dropped by Malboros. It's
easier to trade Tri-Face's card for it since those enemies appear
later in the game.

Not a good one at all! A reaper appears and smacks the enemies with
its scythe and either kills it in one hit or has no effect. Thank god
this is the only level-something Blue spell as I hated them. This is
strange since the level multiplier can vary, from 5 to 1, depending
on Quistis and your party's condition. I used it when I was powering
yeah, try this on those Fastitocalons.)

The enemy's version has a fixed multiplier, ie, LV5 Death.

Used by: Gesper
Learnt from: Black Hole
Win from Gespars or trade its card for it.

A large bubble surrounds the enemy and pulls it into a dimensional
portal and is never seen again. This is the second best instant death
spell in the game (next to Selphie's The End of course) as it works
on ALL normal enemies, even really powerful ones like Iron Giants,
Ruby Dragons and Behemoths. I've never seen it miss except for the
Tonberries and I don't think it works on bosses though.

Iaian Ross said that the Gespars does indeed use this attack, but
only when you drag the battle on for over 5 minutes. Also, it not
only kills a character, but it removes them from battle, unable to be
revived (like Kamazaki.)

-Aqua Breath-
Used by: Grand Mantis, Chimera
Learnt from: Water Crystal
Win from Chimeras or trade 1 Fastitocalon or 5 Fastitocalon-F's card
for it.

Quistis sends streams of water bubbles at all enemies. This is a
classic Blue spell and works fairly well too. It does really good
damage, even Leviathan's Tsunami with Boost seems to be weaker! Get
this early in the game by trading cards for it and it'll be Quistis'
strongest attack for a while. (Water elemental.)

Grand Mantis' version will cause Silence as well. Chimera has the
normal version alright.

-Micro Missile-
Used by: GIM52A
Learnt from: Missile
Defeat or steal from GIM52A

Quistis extends her arms forward and sends out many missiles that
comes in on the enemy. This works very different to most spells as
it's a gravity type spell, in that it will take out a portion of the
target's current HP. The effect may vary though, from 50%, 75%, 87.5%
and eventually 93.75%!!! However, the maximum damage this attack does
is 9999 versus enemies with very high HP. Note some enemies are not a
target of gravity type spells so this will score a miss on them
instead. This is certainly one of her better spells.

Used by: Gayla (??), Tri-Face
Learnt from: Mystery Fluid
Defeat Gaylas or trade its card for it.

Quistis turns away and a patch of sizzling liquid comes out of no
where and burns the enemy. I don't use this too often but this will
do light damage to an enemy but can also give them negative status.
However, you won't deal a status ailment to the enemy every time you
use this. I've only gotten the Poison status from this, but I assume
there are more when Quistis/party's condition worsens. I've also seen
Vitality Zero.

I don't think the enemy's version causes a status, but it's much more
damaging (about 4000+ at times!)

-Gatling Gun-
Used by: SAM08G (Actually, Quistis used this in an FMV in Disc 1)
Learnt from: Running Fire
Defeat/steal from SAM08G or Iron Giants, or trade SAM08G's card for

This is like the gun Quistis used to shoot down X-ATM092 in the FMV
after the Dollet mission. The damage it does it very good and it's
non-elemental, but only targets one enemy. Sometimes it does really
crappy damage and I've just found out why. It appears that Gatling
Gun's damage is based on Quistis' Str and not Mag, I didn't junction
spells to her Str so this attack was really weak when I used it.
However, if you do junction good spells this is VERY powerful!

This is strange since it's the only Blue spell that is subject to a
barrier, Protect can halve Gatling Gun's damage.

-Fire Breath-
Used by: Ruby Dragon
Learnt from: Inferno Fang
Defeat Ruby Dragons or trade 10 of its card for it.

I've only used this once. It looks just like the Breath attack the
Ruby Dragon uses and is just as powerful. I think this is fire
elemental but the dragon's version isn't for some reason. Burns all

This is Fire elemental while the Ruby Dragon's version is both non
elemental and physical (ie, is affected by Protect, not Shell.)

-Bad Breath-
Used by: Malboro, (Geezard)
Learnt from: Malboro's Tentacle
Defeat/steal from Malboros or trade 4 of its card for it.

Quistis sends a breath of foul looking dark gas that sweeps all
enemies. The effect is multiple status ailments on enemies but can
vary depending on her condition. It can inflict Poison, Silence,
Stop, Blind, Sleep, Slow, Doom (Death Sentence), Petrifying, Confuse
and Berserk. Maybe Curse as well. I'm not too sure about Vitality
Zero though. I use this on annoying enemies and paralyze them so I
can draw from them.

NOTE! If Quistis' condition is really bad (ie, below 1% health,
status etc) Bad Breath will kill all the enemies (vulnerable to death
attacks) in one hit!!!!! Which does the same thing as LV1 Death (LV?
Death at its best!)

Geezard has a Bad Breath attack as well, but it's completely
different, as it deals damage rarely a status, it also looks very

-White Wind-
Used by: Adamantoise
Learnt from: Whisper
Steal from high level Adamantoise

Soothing wind blows out of nowhere and surrounds the team. This is
the second best healing spell in the game (and again, next to
Selphie's Full-Cure, which is the best) and comes really useful in
later fights, makes Quistis a very useful character. This works
differently than all its previous incarnations in that is cures the
difference between Quistis' current HP and her maximum HP. For
example, Quistis has only 1 HP left and her maximum HP is 9999, White
Wind heals 9998 to all members in your party. It does NOT cure status
ailments though, like it did in FFVI and FFVII.

This is different from Adamantoise's version because they can heal
about 5000+ damage when they're at FULL HEALTH!!

-Homing Laser-
Used by: Mobile Type 8, Elastoids
Learnt from: Laser Cannon
Steal from the Mobile Type 8 boss. I think you may also steal from
Elastoids for it too.

Quistis releases 3 beams of laser that homes in on the enemy. I got
this really late but I wasn't disappointed, as the Mobile Type 8 boss
has this attack but it's really weak. It can do about 7000-9999
damage (later in the game) but only works on one enemy. I like to use
this on Adel at the start of Disc 4 when you HAVE to use a single
target attack on her.

-Mighty Guard-
Used by: Iron Giant, Behemoth
Learnt from: Barrier
Steal/kill Behemoths or trade 10 of its card for it.

A translucent blue globe envelops each character in the team. This is
the best Final Fantasy Blue spell at it's best! The effects of this
spell will also vary. It will only put Protect and Shell on all
members at its early stages, but Regen is present when Quistis is
hurt bad, then Float and Haste are a bit rarer. The most useful
status (and rarest) is Aura, effectively giving your team defensive,
offensive and speed advantage over the enemies. You'll be using this
spell a lot later in the game, especially against bosses like Omega
and Ultima Weapon.

The Iron Giant's version will only give them Protect and Shell.

Used by: X-ATM092
Learnt from: Power Generator
Steal from high level Blitz WITHOUT the Rare Item ability. REALLY
rare! (I was extremely lucky and got this on my first try, YAY!) I
heard you can pick on up in Lunatic Pandora if you did something in
Laguna's second scenario.

Steam pops up from the back of Quistis' head as she emits a laser
from her eye and sweeps it across all enemies. The ground below the
enemies turns gold and calls forth a massive explosion that sends all
foes into the air and back again.

Uhh.. This spell is really disappointing as after all the hard work
getting a Power Generator, you come to find out that it's not all
that good! The damage is only medium, about 4000-8000 on all enemies
later in the game, and is sometimes not as strong as Aqua/Fire

-Shockwave Pulsar-
Used by: Griever
Learnt from: Dark Matter
Collect 100 Cursed Spikes and use Siren's Tool-RF Menu Ability to
make it into a Dark Matter. Siren MUST be at LV100.

All enemies gets trapped inside a white sphere where is gets lifted
into another dimension and gets hurt by a dark energy blast. This is
Quistis' best spell and one of the few attacks in the game capable to
doing 5 digit damage. Usually around 12000 but if she has really good
stats this can do well over 23,000! Ok ok, this is way less than the
200,000 or so that Squall or Zell can do at times, but it's really

---Zell Dincht---
HP         4018      6778
Str         163       164         Spd       35
Vit         122       125         Luck      20
Mag         132       134         Eva        3%
Spr         116       119         Hit      103%

Comments on stats: Zell's one of the better ones. He's very strong
and gets good HP, Vitality and Strength. His Magic is also pretty
good but has low Spirit.

Limit Break: Duel
Zell uses a mixture of that of Sabin's (FFVI) Blitz and Tifa's
(FFVII) Limit Breaks. Like that of Sabin, you must press certain
buttons in a certain order to execute the move, each move has a
different combination. However, like that of Tifa, Zell can chain
together multiple martial arts attacks together, forming a long chain
of deadly combos. You're given a time limit to munch in the
combinations required for Duel and the chain combo ends either when
the timer reaches zero, or when a finishing blow is executed.

Zell's Duel has 4 different time intervals, and as his condition
worsens, his chance of getting a longer interval increases. Duel can
last around 4, 6, 9 or 12 seconds. He'll start with Punch Rush for
the 4 and 6 second version but will use Booya first if he gets the 9
or 12 second version, so don't expect the same moves to can be linked
after them.

Note however, only certain moves can link after another and certain
moves only links after a certain combination of moves (finishing
blows are one of them.) For example, Mach Kick can always link after
Dolphin Blow but Heel Drop cannot. Meteor Strike can link after
Dolphin Blow only if Mach Kick was done before Dolphin Blow. These
combinations of moves are sometimes quite confusing and I don't
recommend you memorize every single link. To help you, the game gives
you a list of the moves that can be linked after the move you're
currently executing and their combinations, but you'll take less time
if you knew which attack to do without having to look at it. Try
practice this until you have come up with a certain pattern of the
moves that you like, or try to recognize any "loops" (ie, 2 or 3
attacks that links into each other and can be repeated."

Zell's Limit Break has the highest damage potential (yes even higher
than Squall's Lion Heart finishing blow) but it all comes down to
skill - memorizing few of the critical links and a quick tapper.)
Practice makes perfect!

Zell starts the game with 4 basic attacks and 1 finishing blow. He
can learn the rest from reading Combat King magazines found
throughout the world or bought in Esthar.

-Punch Rush-
Combination: O, X

Just 3 repeated punches, nothing too special. This is also his
weakest attack but it's kinda easy to tap and links before and after
most moves.

Combination: Right, Left

This looks like a headbutt but it's actually a knee! (Is it?) I found
this is the easiest move to tap and does about the same damage as
Punch Rush (ie, lower than the rest of his attacks.) Links too and
from Punch Rush, thus making an easy loop that's preferred over his
more spectacular moves by experts.

-Heel Drop-
Combination: Up, Down

This looks weird as Zell lifts one of his leg up as if he's doing a
vertical split then bring it down at the enemy. I guess you can sorta
call it an Axe Kick. Slightly more damaging than the previous and the
motion is just as simple to do. The disadvantage is that few moves
links to this.

-Mach Kick-
Combination: Left, Left, O

Zell kicks the enemy with a high roundhouse. I like this move. It
does about 1.5 times as much damage than Punch Rush/Booya and isn't
all that hard to tap. It links to and from Dolphin Blow, which is the
loop that I use often.

-Dolphie Blow-
Combination: L1, R1, L1, R1
Combat King issue: 001

Like Tifa's attack from FFVII except there are 2 dolphins instead of
one, and you can see the ocean behind the enemy. Does the most damage
out of all the normal moves but requires 4 buttons to activate, but
isn't all that hard to do if you practice. (I can sometimes do this
in less time than Punch Rush, since I don't like the latter very

-Meteor Strike-
Combination: Up, O, Down, O
Combat King issue: 002

This looks just like Tifa's from FFVII, but it works differently.
Zell lifts the enemy up with one arm (gosh he's strong, but what's
even more impressive is that Tifa is as strong as Zell is!), leaps
into the air and yank them back to the ground. As hinted from the
magazine article ("...the bigger they are, the harder they fall.."),
this move is of gravity elemental. (Ok, gravity attacks ain't defined
as an element like in FFVII, but since they're used so much and are
so wonderfully useful, I might as well give them credit and their own
respective element that they deserve.) I think this does damage equal
to 75% of the target's maximum HP, but it cannot do more than 9999
damage per hit. Also, it does not work on most bosses (but I think
Mobile Type 8 is one which this attack DID work.) Against enemies
with HUGE defence and HP (Ruby Dragons, Iron Giants etc.) you'd want
to use this as often as possible, since it will do 9999 damage per
hit, very worthwhile against those enemies.

NOTE! The only enemy where this did not work on was a Behemoth

The motion is quite easy to do (despite how the magazine says this is
tricky) but won't link after many moves. Note if this attack does 0
damage, it means that the enemy is dead.

The below moves are finishers, meaning that no matter how much time
is left on the timer, Duel will end upon executing these moves. They
will show up on the screen with their names flashing and they're all
very tricky moves to do. Also, you can't just pull them right off the
air, as they require a certain combination of moves to be done in a
series before the option for a finishing blow becomes available.
Remember, the pre-requisite moves are only the simplest chains that a
finisher can be invoked! Meaning you can chain anything before the
pre-requisite moves and still trigger the finishing blow.

Note I don't know who started this whole thing about Zell must be at
a certain level to use a certain finishing blow. I was able to use
ALL of them at LEVEL 12!!! Go figure.

-Burning Rave-
Combination: Down, Down, Down, Down, O
Prerequisite moves: Booya, Heel Drop, Meteor Strike, Booya
                or: Punch Rush, Mach Kick, Punch Rush, Heel Drop

Zell steps back and punches the ground with his fist as it cracks and
the chasm travels to the enemy then explodes, sending the enemy high
up into the air. This is really disappointing for a finishing blow.
Does about 2 times the damage of his weak attacks and that's it! It's
not worth the effort!

-Meteor Barret-
Combination: Up, X, Down, Triangle, O
Combat King issue: 003
Prerequisite moves: Punch Rush, Dolphin Blow
                or: Booya, Meteor Strike, Dolphin Blow, Mack Kick
                or: Booya, Heel Drop, Mach Kick, Heel Drop, Booya,
                    Punch Rush, Mach Kick

Zell leaps into the air and gathers a green energy bolt in his hands.
Then he glides down followed by a trial of energy like a comet and
punches the enemy as they collide, and (supposedly) passes through
the enemy as it explodes. This looks cheap when Zell is supposed to
pierce right through the enemy, but I suppose the PlayStation's
polygon power ain't as advanced to handle such animations. (Or maybe
it's too violent but I'm hoping for the former.)

The damage isn't all that great either but I sometimes use this as a
"stylie" finisher after my combos, and I time them just right to fit
in this! (See below.)

-Different Beat-
Combination: Triangle, Square, X, O, Up
Combat King issue: 004
Prerequisite moves: Booya, Meteor Strike, Booya

Zell kicks the enemy into the air, jumps up and air-combo them with
kicks then stomps them as his legs get surrounded by pink energy.
This is probably my favourite finishing blow as it looks cool and is
very damaging.

-My Final Heaven-
Combination: Up, Right, Down, Back, Triangle
Combat King issue: 005
Prerequisite moves: Booya, Heel Drop, Meteor Strike
                or: Booya, Heel Drop, Mach Kick, Punch Rush

Zell holds his fist and sprints forward past the enemy and runs
around the globe like Superman (as if his Meteor Barret ain't
enough!) He gets back to the battle field and comes to a stop just
behind the enemy, and his momentum are released as a fiery explosion
that sends the enemy head over toes up into the air.

Looks kinda cool but does abut the same damage as Different Beat.
Alright, EdwChang@aol.com  has convinced me that this is better than
Different Beat since it targets _ALL_ enemies while Different Beat
hits just one. Uh.. not much else to say about this but you might
wanna see this at least once but I don't find this move exceptionally

  - Learn a few links to some of your favourite moves. There's
nothing wrong with referring to the screen listing all the attacks
that can be executed after the current attack, especially when you're
trying it out the first few times. You should be used to a few links
and should be able to remember the button combinations to all the
normal moves if you practice a few times. Here are some combinations
that I found useful, feel free to submit more if you like:

* - Armageddon Fist - (started by Kaze Yagami<yagami@pacific.net.sg>)
  Booya, Punch Rush, Booya, Punch Rush, repeat.

The 2 basic attacks are simple to tap and does decent damage. The
damage is around 4000 per attack later in the game, and try junction
spells to Zell's Luck attribute as a critical can do 9999 damage! You
should be able to execute ~20 moves for the 4 seconds interval!!!
What's even better about this is that it can be accommodated easily
if Zell's starting attack changes.

* - Grand-Calamity Symphony - (by James Wennberg)
  Booya, Heel Drop, Booya, Heel Drop, repeat.

The Armageddon Fist killer. Heel Drop does more damage than Punch
Rush and is just as easy to do, can significantly increase damage
when does with a 12 second Duel. Give it a try.

Another cool thing about GCS is that you can easily refine it into a
stylish My Final Heaven easily, just add Mach Kick and Punch Rush
after Heel Drop when your clock is running low.

* Booya, Punch Rush, Mach Kick, repeat.
or: Punch Rush, Mach Kick, Booya, repeat.

These 2 are identical the only difference is the starting move
(remember how the starting move differs depending on the time
interval you get.) This is also identical to Armageddon Fist except
Mach Kick is added. I used this to take out the X-ATM092 boss in
Dollet and it's really a killer. I like Mach Kick since it does more
damage than the basic attacks and isn't really all that hard to use.

* Punch Rush, Mach Kick, Dolphin Blow, Meteor Strike, Dolphin Blow,
           Mach Kick, Meteor Barret

I hope I got this in the correct order. Anyway, practice this and
it's PERFECT for the 4 second interval. Of course, this don't work
very well on bosses because of Meteor Strike, but this is what I used
on the enemies on the Island Closest to Hell when training Zell, and
it's a killer to the enemies there because of Meteor Strike. Also,
the Meteor Barret makes a stylie finish.

* [Starter moves], Meteor Strike, Heel Drop, Meteor Strike, Dolphin
           Blow, Meteor Strike, Heel Drop, repeat
(Thanks to Qualera for this chain combo)

This is another great combo for high HP enemies since you can use
Meteor Strike _every other turn_! Geez, imagine how long you can
toast a Ruby Dragon with this. Anyway, the [starter moves] will be
different depending whether you've gotten Booya or Punch Rush as your
first attack.
For Booya: Booya itself will lead to Meteor Strike
For Punch Rush: Try Punch Rush, Mach Kick, Dolphin Blow

  - Later in the game, you'll wanna avoid using finishing blow as
much as possible, since they take ages to do and their maximum damage
limit is still only 9999. Each normal blow can do 4000-5000 if you
have 255 Strength and a critical hit nets you an instant easy 9999.

  - Against normal enemies with high defence and HP, release Meteor
Strike as often as possible. Meteor Strike is essentially one of
Zell's best attacks as it's independent of his Strength and target's
Vitality. So even if you have very low Strength and fighting a level
100 Ruby Dragon, you can do 9999 with every blow of Meteor Strike
while your other moves takes out less than 1000.

  - There are some people who think that if you want to use a Duel
finisher, you can only execute the pre-requisite move and nothing
else. Well you are WRONG!!!!! You can execute any move as long as the
pre-requisites are done in order after those moves. There are people
who thinks that to use My Final Heaven and Different Beat, Zell must
start with Booya (and therefore, only useable in the 8 or 12 second
intervals.) That is NOT correct. You can chain a Punch Rush in front
of it or even a Booya, Punch Rush, Mach Kick in front of the pre-
requisite Booya if you want to (and if you're quick enough!)

  - Thanks to Ian Wee <brenanne@cyberway.com.sg> who said that Zell's
Combat King are exactly like the weapon magazines. You CAN use his
Duel moves WITHOUT actually reading the magazines. The magazines will
make the move available in the menu though, and that scroll that
tells you what moves can link after your move in battle. Of course,
you HAVE to use a move that can link into the move you want to do
though, just like a normal Duel.

---Rinoa Heartilly---
HP         4181      6851
Str         180       186         Spd       36
Vit         115       120         Luck      22
Mag         148       162         Eva        3%
Spr         123       126         Hit      107%

Comments on stats: Whoa! Gosh, she's the girl with god-like stats!
Too bad that her Limits are trashy. I think she is supposed to have
good stats to offset her attacks. (If you can remember, she also has
really good starting stats when she first joins!) Her Str and Mag are
among some of the highest I've seen. She needs only 100 Meteors to
bring up Strength up to 255.

Limit Break: Combine
Rinoa is the only character in the game who has 2 completely
different sets of attacks, Angelo skills and her unique Angel Wing

Angelo is Rinoa's dog who is actually really smart and can learn
various tricks to aid Rinoa in battle. I think Angelo skills were
originated from Red XIII's Limit Breaks in FFVII and a bit from
Shadow's dog, Interceptor in FFVI. Angelo skill comes in 2 types,
automatic and manual. The automatical skills can take place randomly
in battle, given that certain conditions are met, while a random
manual skill will be executed when Rinoa uses her Limit Break from
the command window in battle.

Unfortunately, most of her Angelo skills are mostly crap, and since
it's random, it can also be very weak compared to the others later in
the game. She has a couple fairly decent ones though, so you might as
well make the use of them. The damage dealing Angelo attacks are
dependent on Rinoa's Strength.

To learn new Angelo skills, you must buy or find Pet Pals magazines
from around the world. You must read them too (use it in the item
menu) then the skill's name will appear in Rinoa's status menu along
with Angelo's other skills. A full bar represents that skill has been
mastered. Select a skill that you wish to learn and walk with Rinoa
in your team and you'll eventually learn the skill. (Note some skills
like Wishing Star can take a very long time to learn.)

The below 4 skills are manual skills:

-Angelo Cannon-
Pet Pals issue: None, initial attack.

Rinoa whistles for Angelo who runs onto the screen and jumps onto
Rinoa's extended arm, then Rinoa launches him like a rocket that
hurts all enemies with a fiery explosion. Then Angelo gets a bone for
his hard work.

An ok attack I guess, since it targets all enemies but gets less
useful as the game progresses. It can do 9999 damage to all enemies
later in the game though, but that's nothing compared to what the
boys can do.

-Angelo Strike-
Pet Pals issue: 1

Angelo runs onto the screen to the enemy, grabs them somehow and
takes them into the air with him. Angelo rotates about 1080 degrees
and slams the enemy back onto the ground for big damage.

This is a lot stronger than Angelo Cannon but targets only one enemy.
The damage is quite strong though, about maybe 2000+ earlier in the
game. However, since the damage maxes out at 9999, this will actually
be WEAKER than Angelo Cannon later in the game, which can also do
9999 damage but targets all the enemies. You may want to abandon this
move so the chance that Rinoa executes one of her better ones

-Invincible Moon-
Pet Pals issue: 3

Looks a lot like Red XIII's Howling Moon if you ask me. Angelo runs
into battle, gets surrounded by silver energy waves (like a certain
Red XIII Limit Break) and jumps into the air with a silvery moon in
the sky. A curtain of translucent lights envelops all allies and they
turn transparent.

This well may possibly be Rinoa's best Angelo skill, as an invincible
character is immune to all damage and status (even positive ones) and
the effect is identical/better than a Holy War (Drink) since it's
free. This skill has a fair chance of being executed and I think the
effect lasts longer as Rinoa's level increases.

-Wishing Star-
Pet Pals issue: 6

Rinoa and Angelo runs towards the enemy and disappears while the
background turns into a colored star field. Multiple shooting stars
zooms across the screen and hurts all enemies for quite a number of
hits. If you look closer, the stars are actually Rinoa and Angelo!

I was really disappointed at this move when I first saw it. First,
the rate which this attack appears is EXTREMELY low (about 5% max)
and second, it wasn't as strong as I heard it was. Each hit did
around 2000 points of damage for about 10+ hits. I've heard this
attack can do 9000+ damage per hit though, but I'm not in the mood to
spend about half an hour trying to see this move again!

I saw this again and it's actually really impressive since she
actually did 8000+ damage her hit!!! Although the chance that Rinoa
will use this is really low making it rather unreliable when you
REALLY want high damaging attacks. I know that not learning Angelo
Strike and/or Invincible Moon is one way to raise the chances of
Wishing Stars appearing but that Angelo Cannon can really get on my

One thing that I forgot is that the weaker Rinoa is, the more likely
that she uses Wishing Star. Lower her HP a lot (2 digits) and even
give her bad status (not Poison though, as it's deadly when her HP is

so low) like Silence and Darkness. If you cast Aura when Rinoa's in
critical, she'll almost always execute this move.

The 4 skills below are automatically but randomly executed when the
conditions are met. Rinoa's Luck parameter plays a major role here,
higher it is, the more likely you'll see Angelo execute one of these

-Angelo Rush-
Pet Pals issue: None, initial attack
Condition: Rinoa gets damaged (both physical and magical, either
singular or multiple targeted)

Angelo rushes across the screen at high velocity and charges into the

This works on the same basis as Shadow's dog Interceptor's Take Down,
which is basically a counter attack. This attack sucks in many ways.
One is that it's terrible when you want to keep the enemy alive to
draw spells from or card them. This usually ruins it for you. The
damage Angelo does is no where near as much as Interceptor. So this
means one thing: Rinoa is a terrible character if you want to card

-Angelo Recover-
Pet Pals issue: 2
Condition: Any ally in critical condition

Angelo comes onto the screen and uses an item on the ally in critical
condition and restores their HP.

I don't like this skill either. Sometimes I purposely lower an ally's
HP so they can use Limit Breaks easily but no.. Angelo comes along
and heals them. The amount healed varies, but usually a lot, I've
seen as low as 1500+ to about 6000+! Not bad if you really need
healing in a boss fight or something. Note a character who is not
Rinoa CAN receive the benefit of his skill too.

-Angelo Reverse-
Pet Pals: 4
Condition: Ally KO'd

Angelo comes into battle and uses a Phoenix Down on a fallen ally

Now this is a useful one, but it would help if it happens a little
more often. I've seen this only ONCE during my 80 hour game. What's
neat about this is when an ally is revived, their HP would be
critical and you can execute Limit Breaks easily.

-Angelo Search-
Pet Pals: 5
Condition: Don't know (Having the Item command? Or Random?)

Angelo runs into the battle field, sniff the ground and begins to
dig. He then finds an item and gives it to Rinoa, then he receives a
treat for his hard work.

I have seen this a few times, most of the time you'll get really
crappy stuff like Potions mainly, Phoenix Downs etc. But it can also
net you some really good stuff at times though, I've heard of Force
Armlets and Elixirs.

Thanks to Viki, Qualera and Allan Mills for all the info on this

NOTE! Qualera has e-mailed me saying that it's possible that the
chance of seeing Angelo perform this move will increase if you use
the Item command more often. You know what? I think he's right! I was
trying to lower my team's HP to do the Omega trick (see below) but
the enemies kept killing Selphie and Irvine that I had to use items
all the time to revive them. As a result, Angelo appeared TWICE and
picked up 2 awesome items.

Oh yeah, you'll probably get better items if Rinoa's condition is not
very good when Angelo appears. In the above example, Rinoa had 198HP
and blinded, and Angelo found a Curse Spike and a Mega Phoenix!!!

Angel Wing
After the scene in space (and a terrible micro-game!), Rinoa gains a
new Limit Break. You can use this while inside Ragnarock the first
time. With this, a pair of wings appears on Rinoa's back and she gets
lifted into the air, then she comes back onto the ground like if
nothing had happened. You'll notice the effect soon though, as you'll
realise that you cannot control her any more, as she's gone berserk
in a way.

Whenever Rinoa's turn comes up, she will cast a _random_ spell on a
random enemy. The quality of the spell is really quite a mixed bag.
Rinoa will either cast a really powerful spell like Ultima or a
really sloppy status spell like Sleep, and Scan/Dispel occasionally.
What's sorta worthwhile about this is that the power of a damage-
dealing spell is increased by 5 times, WOW! (Watch out for Meteor,
it's a real killer on a single enemy. Can do upwards of 40000
damage!) However, she rarely uses one of them (about 5 crap spells
per 1 good spell) which makes Angel Wing no better than her terrible
Angelo skills.

Note that this is actually a status, which means that it will have no
effect while Rinoa is in the Invincible status (Invincible Moon.)
Rinoa is immune to Berserk, Silence and Confuse status while in Angel
Wing. Also, her spells ain't THAT random as there are certain spells
that she will never use, such as any aiding/healing/reviving spells.
The power of her spells is also dependent on Rinoa's Magic attribute.

Note! EdwChang@aol.com told me that what spell Rinoa casts is based
on the spells in her stock even though it doesn't use up a charge but
he doesn't know if having a high number of a certain spell being
stocked is going to raise the chance of that spell being cast.

Happy Matt was able to confirm this query. He told me that he used
Varly (aka Angel Wing) with Rinoa when she had absolutely no spells
stocked. The result: Rinoa can only execute regular _physical_
attacks like Berserk without the damage bonus!

There's still much to discuss about Rinoa's Angel Wing, -Skrybe-
<skrybe@hotmail.com> have sent me the complete list on what Rinoa
will and will not cast through Angel Wing.

These spells CAN be used in Angel Wing: Aero, Berserk, Bio, Blind,
Blizzaga, Blizzara, Blizzard, Break, Confuse, Death, Demi, Dispel,
Drain, Fira, Firaga, Fire, Flare, Holy, Meltdown, Meteor, Pain,
Quake, Scan, Sleep, Slow, Stop, Thundaga, Thundara, Thunder, Tornado,
Ultima, Water, and Zombie.

These spells CANNOT be used in Angel Wing: Aura, Cura, Curaga, Cure,
Double, Esuna, Float, Full-Life, Haste, Life, Protect, Reflect,
Regen, Shell, and Triple.

I'm sure you guys have also heard of the secret spell Apocalypse, a
spell that can only be drawn from Ultimecia. Anyway, you _can_ get
them via a GameShark, so it is possible that Rinoa will cast
Apocalypse through Angel Wing, since it's just another version of
Ultima. Selphie's Slot spells can also be cast through Angel Wing (if
you got them stocked via a GameShark) these includes: The End,
Rapture and the dummied out Catastrophe and Percent. Full Cure and
Wall cannot be cast, obviously.

*NEW* I have played around with Angel Wing and it seemed that getting
rid of SOME of the status spells don't help very much, it seems what
spells she'll cast in a given round is affected by spell types:
status or damage dealing. If you have at least ONE status spell,
she'll use that spell whenever the "Angel Wing spell indicator" says

For example, if you have Thundaga, Ultima, Meteor, Demi, Holy, Flare,
Water and Confuse stocked, the chance of casting Confuse will not be
1/8, but more like 1/2 (I'm not too sure about the Status/damage
spell ratio though.) So having more status spells stocked will not
mean casting status spells more frequently but more like casting a
larger variety of them. It's kinda confusing to explain, did someone
cast Confuse on me or something?

So the moral of the story is, get rid of ALL your status spells if
possible, because if you have at least one useless status magic, she
will still cast it frequently. However, 2 spells counts as both
status and damage dealing, they're Meltdown and Drain, but I'd say
you keep those 2. Scan and Dispel fits into neither category, but
they're still useless. So if you wanna use Angel Wing effectively,
stick to the below strategies.

Here's a tip from EdwChang@aol.com:
Simply get rid of all of Rinoa's lesser use spells that ain't being
junctioned such as all status spells and Dispel. Keep as many Holies,
Flares, Ultimas, Meteors or just whatever you feel is powerful to
raise her chance of casting a better spell in Angel Wing. Oh yeah,
don't forget to boost her Magic and Speed attributes, as it can get
pretty powerful when you get a good spell, especially Meteor, and
with a high Speed, Rinoa can cast more spells before the enemy's turn
comes up, which kinda makes up for the fact that she cannot be

Here's what Another Gamer's "Meteor of Doom" strategy:
Get rid of all offensive spells except for Meteor, it'll do more
damage than Ultima. This is like a refined version of the above
strategy except the ONLY spell Rinoa will ever use is Meteor. With a
good Magic attribute and the Angel Wing status, I've seen a comet
doing up to 4000+ damage each! (And there's 10 of them!) It's much
more reliable than hoping for Wishing Star with her Angelo skills.
The bad point of this is that you'll miss out a lot of junction
potentials of Ultima. Try this out and see what you think.

---Selphie Tilmitt---
HP         3680      6440
Str         157       162         Spd       37
Vit         115       120         Luck      26
Mag         136       141         Eva        3%
Spr         123       130         Hit      255%

Comments on stats: No too bad. She's kinda weaker physically but has
very good Magic stats. Her Speed is decent though and she's the
luckiest character in the game. Her best improvement is probably how
her best weapon has a 255% hit rate, meaning she can no longer miss
the target with her regular attacks.

Limit Break: Slots
Selphie's Slots is completely different to Setzer and Cait Sith's.
Selphie can cast any spell up to 3 times in a row. Her Slots window
will show a random spell with a random number of times that spell
will be cast. If that's not the spell you want, you may select "Do
over" which will bring up another spell. When the desired spell comes
up, you may select "cast" to cast it. These spells will not consume
Selphie's stocked spells so use them as often as you wish.

Note time does not stop as you select your spells, even with the
"Wait" option. (The Wait option sucks in this game anyway.) So
spending too long on her Slots trying to get better spells can be

Selphie has 4 unique spells on her Slots too, and they're all good
ones. At the beginning of the game, you may only get crap magic like
Fire but she'll likely to get better spells as her level does up.
(ie, Ultima may have about a 1% chance or less of showing up while
she's at level 10, but at level 100, Ultima comes up quite often.)

Note if a certain spell is cast multiple times, the targeting is
random and it's not very effective if you ask me! When you come up
with say a positive status spell (like Haste) cast 3 times, it never
works so that each member on your team gets a dose, which wastes the
spell. (The spell will always be cast on the same member twice.)

Below are the 4 unique spells Selphie that can be cast only with her
Slots. Note none of these can be cast multiple times, since they
don't need to be. When you cast one of these spells once, it will
show up in her status screen and the chance of getting that spell on
her Slots in the future will increase.

-Full Cure-
This heals all allies to full HP AND it will cure negative status
too, effectively the best healing spell in the game. Also, I'm sure
this spell will work on Invincible allies! The chance of getting this
on her Slots is very high, so you don't need to struggle when you
want healing, although Full Cure shows up less times when she's at
higher levels.

A stone barrier raises through the ground to guard all allies. Not a
bad defence spell but if Quistis is in your party, have her use
Mighty Guard instead. Wall will only give you Shell and Protect, but
it's pretty decent if you don't have access to Mighty Guard yet.

A useful spell with a terrible translated name, which puts a pair of
wings on each enemy's back and they get lifted into the air and is
never seen again. Works well on normal enemies but certain enemies
are resistant to it (like Tonberries.)

-The End-
EVERYBODY fears this spell! Flowers will blossom before the enemies
and the background turns into a flower filled meadow and the words
"The End" pops up like if the game has ended. Then the enemies die
for no reason. What's so powerful about this is that it will even
work on really tough bosses like Omega! Very rare on her Slots, but
has a decent chance of showing up at high levels. Undead enemies are
resistant to it though.

Yes, thanks to -Skrybe- for the descriptions of Selphie's secret Slot
spells. Ever wonder why there are 2 empty spaces in Selphie's Limit
Break window? Well, Square planned to implement 6 unique spells for
Selphie only but only got around to make 4 of them playable. So
unless you have a GameShark or its equivalent, you'll never be able
to use these 2 powerful spells.


It really shows that Square don't really care about their gamers
since they haven't even got around to make the animation for Percent
and Catastrophe. This looks like the basic "Fire" spell that Seifer
uses at the beginning of his Limit Breaks, or so I've been told.

However, the descriptions of this spell says "Put enemies near death"
which probably does damage based on the target's HP (gravity
elemental) which would have been really useful in Carding and
Devouring enemies.

Again, the animation is the same as that of the Fire spell.

Catastrophe follows the trend of Ultima and Apocalypse that does
heavy non-elemental damage to all enemies, its description says
"Major damage to all enemies". Unfortunately Catastrophe is not quite
Shockwave Pulsar standards and damage STILL caps at 9999. Still, I
asked -Skrybe- to test Catastrophe against both Apocalypse and Ultima
to compare its power, here are his results: Ultima 1300, Apocalypse
2600 and Catastrophe 4000. So Apocalypse is twice and Catastrophe is
thrice as strong as Ultima.

Note that all 6 Slot spells can be gotten as stocked regular spells
for all characters using a GameShark, except that none of them can be
junctioned. -Skrybe- also went further saying that certain GF summons
can be gotten as regular spells, although they tend to lock the game
up when cast, and gave some strange junction stats.

Since time is not paused when Selphie uses her Slots, try to use it
when another character/enemy is executing a lengthy action (casting a
spell etc.) The best way to select your spell is to do it during a GF
summoning animation, if you wanna give up Boost for it that is.
Diablos is the best since his attack is lengthy and don't use Boost.

The spell to look for depends on your situation. Early on in the
game, basic elementary spells can satisfy most purposes and may
actually top Squall or Zell's Limit Breaks! Later in the game
however, her usefulness pans out since everyone else has at least one
really powerful attack or defensive skills. So Selphie is best used
as a healer with her Full Cure. Her Wall is also good if you don't
have Quistis. If you manage to get Aura then you might as well use
it. Haste is also fairly decent.

As for offence, the best Selphie can do is probably multiple Meteors
for single targets or multiple Ultimas for multiple targets. (Meteor
will actually do respectable damage when her Magic attribute is 255.)
If you manage to get The End, you can end the fight in one shot! (You
might not want to do it though, as it kinda spoils the fun in a boss

|Thanks to Matt <The200sx@aol.com> for this trick.                  |
|                                                                   |
|Have you tried to strike it lucky with Selphie's Slots but don't   |
|get any good magic? Try this trick.                                |
|                                                                   |
|Make sure that Selphie is in critical condition, or under Aura. Now|
|have another team member cast a spell (any will do, preferably a   |
|cheap one) but before the spell is executed, press the "Open"      |
|button on your PlayStation to open the lid. The game will try to   |
|load the spell off the CD but it cannot, so the game will kinda    |
|"soft" freeze. Take advantage of this time to cycle through        |
|Selphie's Slots for desirable spells, then close the lid and       |
|resume play.                                                       |
|                                                                   |
|Since the time is paused, you virtually have an eternity to cycle  |
|for your favourite spells, but this trick is not without flaws. One|
|big drawback is that the spells offered with this is quite limited.|
|If you keep cycling for ages and ages, it'll eventually "recycle"  |
|the old spells, meaning if you do not get say The End for the first|
|50 times, you will never get it. (To get around this problem, exit |
|the Slot sub-screen and tap the O button until the triangle appears|
|again, and this time you'll get a completely different list of     |
|spells.) This is still a really neat trick IMO, enough to keep     |
|Selphie fans happy. :)                                             |

---Irvine Kinneas---
HP         4120      6730
Str         156       157        Spd       39
Vit         108       118        Luck      21
Mag         128       129        Eva        3%
Spr         105       115        Hit      115%

Comments on stats: For some reason, Irvine seems to have really low
stats. His Str is the lowest... and all his other stats are the
lowest out of all characters. You think it's because he starts off at
the highest level? He's the fastest permanent member though.

Limit Break: Shot
Hehe, his Limit is fun. I think Irvine's Limit is based loosely on
some of Aya Brea's (Parasite Eve) and Billy's (Xenogears) attacks.
Choose a type of ammo that you've stocked in your inventory and tap
the trigger button (R1) rapidly to shoot as many bullets as you can
under a time limit. The time limit is a depleting bar to the lower
right of the screen and the amount of time he has available can vary.
Unlike Zell though, Irvine's bar does not lengthen as his timer is
expanded, instead it moves slower, so it's not easy to identify the
amount of time he has available or the amount of it's left. It's also
hard to tell how many different time intervals Irvine has. When a
shot deals zero damage, it means that the target is dead so don't
waste any more bullets. (But it sucks since you'll always waste at
least one bullet for this purpose.)

By obtaining new bullets, Irvine can expand his variety of shots.
Most of them can be bought in stores, some of them can be won or
refined from cards, and all of them can be refined from Ifrit's Ammo-
RF Menu Ability (some of the rarer bullets can only be gotten this
way.) Make sure that you browse through that ability menu often as
you can find some really good deals that you just CANNOT resist!
(Like 1 Chef's Knife into 10 AP Ammo or 1 Poison Powder into 10 Dark
Ammo!) The power of Irvine's Shot is dependent on his Str.

Since his Limit Break is not free like all the others, I don't use
his as much.

Note: One very interesting thing I've noted is that Irvine's Shot is
sorta like magic is that, it will NOT wake a target suffering from
the Sleep status. Strange indeed!

The list of different types of gun shots are listed below, sorry for
the delay, as I finally got to play with them thoroughly last night.
Also, I give the various ammunition ranks in various categories,
Power, Speed, Acquirability and the Overall Usefulness. An S is the
best while an F is the worst.

Note: A C (average) in Power is comaparable to normal attacks, while
a C in Speed indicates it can be fired about 4 times for the shortest
Shot Limit Break interval.

-Normal Shot- (Normal Ammo)
Power: C     Speed: B      Acquirability: A   Overall Usefulness: B

This resembles Irvine's normal attack, only shot multiple times in

The cheapest ammo is actually quite efficient, it can be bought in
most stores. The speed is good and the damage is equivalent to his
normal attacks. Needless to say, if Irvine has very high Str, this
attack can be quite strong and is cheap. I use this attack the most.

-Scatter Shot- (Shotgun Ammo)
Power: D     Speed: B      Acquirability: A   Overall Usefulness: D

Looks similar to Normal Shot but hits all enemies.

This has the same speed as Normal Shot, but it's only about half as
strong. There are not very many situations in the game where you need
to target multiple enemies at the same time so this shot is a waste.

-Dark Shot- (Dark Ammo)
Power: D-    Speed: B      Acquirability: B   Overall Usefulness: C+

Irvine shoots a grenade that explodes into a green cloud.

I like this. It's the weakest ammunition there is but it has decent
speed and has a chance of giving the enemy a random negative status
per shot. I've seen Poison, Darkness, Silence and Sleep. Can also be
gotten fairly easily.

-Flame Shot- (Fire Ammo)
Power: B     Speed: C      Acquirability: B-  Overall Usefulness: C

Not quite a flamethrower but Irvine launches a burst of flame similar
to that of Opera's long ranged version of Flame Launcher in SO2.

The only elemental shot there is, so it can either be extremely
useful or completely useless. The fire elemental nature of this
attack is good against certain enemies like Malboro, as it will do
double damage. The damage done with Flame Shot unde neutral elemental
resistance is about twice that of Normal Shot.

-Canister Shot- (Demolition Ammo)
Power: B+    Speed: F      Acquirability: C   Overall Usefulness: E

Irvine blasts many rockets from his gun which homes in on the enemy.

I hate this attack. It's very strong but it's so slow that I can
bearly manage to shoot 3 times during the shortest time interval, so
Normal Ammo can hit for more damage than this most of the time (via
critical hits.) It's quite expensive but you can still find a few
bargins for Demolition Ammo if you look for Running Fires.

-Quick Shot- (Fast Ammo)
Power: E     Speed: S      Acquirability: B   Overall Usefulness: A-

Irvine fires rapid shots at an enemy, but not quite machinegun

Does about the same damage as Dark Shot but it can shoot 2-3 bullets
per 1 Normal Ammo! Since it is fired so many times, the rate of a
critical attack pops up is also the highest among all shots. The only
drawback is that the ammunition runs out faster than the rate at
which Lara Croft's boobs grows, so keep plenty of them in stock.

-Armor Shot- (AP Ammo)
Power: A+    Speed: E      Acquirability: C-  Overall Usefulness: B+

Irvine blasts a thin beam of laser which penetrates the enemy's

Probably the one of the best ammunition in the game. It's did 9999
damage when I didn't junction anything in Irvine's Str (his normal
attack was doing only 1100+ damage!) It's not too hard to get, Chef's
Knives can nets you loads of this, and they're reasonably easy to
acquire. It's slow though, and you won't even notice a critical hit,
so IMO, Fast Ammo is more useful.

-Hyper Shot- (Pulse Ammo)
Power: S+    Speed: E      Acquirability: E   Overall Usefulness: D

Irvine fires a huge beam of intense light at the enemy.

It's exceptionally hard to get your hands on (but it wont be much of
a problem if you use the infinite Elnoyle encounter to your
advantage.) Slow like Armor Shot, but it almost always do 9999
damage, meaning all critical hits will be wasted. You can shoot 3
times during the shortest time interval, meaning doing 29997 points
of damage, but with 255 Str, Quick Shot can hit 10+ times, for ~2500
each hit, plus critical hits, meaning there's a much greater chance
of doing more damage if you just stick to Quick Shot.

---Seifer Almasy---
Thanks to Colin Pentney <salivator@hotmail.com> who took the time to
level Seifer to level 100 and sent in the stats. The value to the
left is Seifer's at level 100 WITHOUT any bonuses, the one on the
right is the estimated maximum acquirable with the bonuses. It is
served mainly to compare with the max stats of the other characters.

                    Est. MAX
HP         5823       8553
Str          60        151       Spd       45
Vit          39        130       Luck      19
Mag          45        136       Eva        4%
Spr          38        129       Hit      255%

Comments on stats: Geez, Seifer's stats rivals even that of Rinoa's!
His Str is the lowest though, but that's because he cannot upgrade
his weapon and is stuck with a crap gunblade. (If he did, add 13
points to his Str, and he'll have standard Str.) He has the highest
Vit and Spr. Don't go away yet, look at this HP and Spd. WOW! His max
HP is about 2000 higher than most and he's even faster than Irvine!
(Not sure about Kiros though, as he does seem to be the fastest
character in the whole game.) All that plus the ability to hit with
perfect precision and easy-as-hell Limit Breaks, making him the most
powerful character in the game. Oh dear, if only you can get him in
your team permanently.

Limit Break: Fire Cross
I'm a little puzzled by the name of his Limit Breaks, I know it's
supposed to be confusing since you only get to use him for a little
while. Fire Cross seems to be the "style" of his Limits (like Rinoa's
Combine) while each attack (like No Mercy) is a separate skill in the
order of Fire Cross.

Seifer, like Squall, also uses a gunblade, but his style of attack is
completely different. Seifer seems to be able to "fuse" magic with
his "sword" attacks, forming a style of his own.

Seifer is also the strangest since he seems to have the ability to
use his Limit Breaks at will, meaning he has no problem to get the
triangle to show up indicating a Limit Break is available.

-No Mercy-
Seifer blast all enemies with a Fire spell then he spins his gunblade
and starts charging for an energy sphere. He then swings the blade,
sending a high speed spinning projectile at each enemy.

Well, at least it hits all enemies. It's only a single hit so it's
not very powerful. IMO, this acts in a very similar way to Rinoa's
Angelo Cannon, or perhaps slightly weaker. And no, this is not fire

-Demon Slice-
Seifer again torces one opponent with a Fire spell then he spins,
forming a tornado, sucks one target into the air and slices them
repeatedly in mid air.

Well, not a playable Limit Break, but it's his special attack when
you fight him at the end of disc 2. His gunblade has the same
greenish glow as his No Mercy skill so I guess it's his new Limit
Break at that time.

-Zantetsuken Reverse-
It's sorta like Odin's attack except that there are 2 more characters
after the 3 Kanji, spelling "Reverse".

Not a playable Limit Break either, but it looks pretty cool.

Seifer burns all targets with a Fire spell then leaps into the air
and slashes with his gunblade in the shape of a cross. A flaming
cross appears on the ground below his targets and it begins to sink,
until it finally colapses. Something like that.

Another non-playable Limit Break, Seifer uses this during the third
time you encounter him inside the Lunatic Pandora. According to
-Skrybe-, Gilgamesh will take down Seifer before he can take enough
damage to use Bloodfest, so that's why Seifer could only use regular
attacks during that fight. To see this attack, you've really have to
beat up on Seifer and make it fast, which isn't a good idea since
you'll be missing the opportunity on drawing Aura.

(Thanks to -Skrybe- for the information.)

---Edea Kramer---
Thanks to Qualera for Edea's level 100 stats.

                    Est. MAX
HP         3777       5997
Str          61        135       Spd       31
Vit          20         94       Luck      15
Mag          55        129       Eva        2%
Spr          45        121       Hit       97%

Comments on stats: Nothin' to see here. Edea is no where near as good
as Seifer and is even weaker than all normal party members, but who
can blame her? She starts at such a high level of 26. Low HP, very
low Vit and Spd but has ok Mag and Spr. The only interesting thing
about Edea is her Str. It is the highest even though she's a magic
user and uses no weapons.

Limit Break: Sorcery
Well, sorcery is everything to a sorceress, but Edea seems to be
quite limited in her sorcery skills, at least in battle. I've only
seen one sorcery skill.

-Ice Strike-
Edea gets angry and icicles start to materialize in thin air, then
she directs them at the enemy. She used this on Squall in the final
FMV of disc 1.

No this does not do ice elemental damage. It's not a bad attack
though, but don't expect too much since it still does 1 hit and only
targets one enemy.

> Any others??

---Laguna Loire---
Thanks to Ed Asano for the info.

                    Est. MAX
HP         4148       6938
Str          62        154       Spd       37
Vit          41        133       Luck      21
Mag          46        138       Eva        3%
Spr          36        128       Hit      103%

Comments on stats: Um... Laguna does have fairly good stats in all
areas, he's no Rinoa though. Very good HP and defensive attributes.
His Str is excuseable, if it weren't handicapped like all the
temporary members it'll be one of the highest. Nearly there.

Limit Break: Limit
"Limit" is probably what all the Galbadian soldiers uses back in
those days, 'cuz it's of the same discipline as Ward and Kiros'

Throws a geneade at the enemy. He then leaps into the air, swinging
from an industrial strength cable. After hitting his foe(s) with a
hail of gunfire, leaps down just as the geneade explodes.

Just another version of No Mercy and Angelo Cannon I suppose, not
great, not too crappy.

---Kiros Seagul---
Thanks again to Ed Asano.

                    Est. MAX
HP         3728       6458
Str          56        147       Spd       48
Vit          31        122       Luck      23
Mag          50        141       Eva        4%
Spr          41        132       Hit      102%

Comments on stats: Kiros obviously ain't the fighting-heavy type
character, as a matter of fact, his stats resemble Selphie's a LOT!
Very good Mag and Spr, except that Kiros is the FASTEST in the game!
His Spd is even higher than Seifer's, and he can practically act
twice per every action another member excutes! An exellent character

Limit Break: Limit

-Blood Pain-
Rushing his enemy, Kiros attacks with a red blur of fury. He strikes
his enemy with 6 hits (this number is exact, and doesn't vary). The
last hit being a forward flip with a slash from both his knives.

Probably the best Limit out of all the temporary members, as it hits
multiple times. So the maximum damage this can do would be 9999 x 6,
although it might be hard to get that far since each hit tend to be
rather weak. A scrubbier version of Renzokuken with less damage per
hit, constant number of strikes and no random finisher.

---Ward Zaback---
Thanks to Ed Asano (aka Qualera) yet again!

                    Est. MAX
HP         4768       7498
Str          72        163       Spd       27
Vit          44        135       Luck      14
Mag          36        127       Eva        2%
Spr          30        121       Hit       98%

Comments on stats: Exactly opposite of what Kiros was. Ward is the
physical character, with EXTREMELY high HP, Str and Vit. If not
because of his Str handicap, Ward may come out stronger than Rinoa!
On the other hand, Ward's Spd, Luck, Eva and Hit sucks!

Limit Break: Limit

-Massive Anchor-
Launches his anchor high into the air. Ward soon leaps up after it.
He then rides the anchor by standing on it, landing on top of his

A traditional FF Dragoon's jump attack, similar to one of Cid's from
FFVII. It's ok, but since Ward's Str tend to be high, it'll often
deal the most damage out of Laguna's team.

Final Fantasy VIII is the first game I've ever written a walkthrough for, and I
have learned a lot from the experience. Please keep in mind that this isn't your
ordinary walkthrough, it's a very specific walkthrough designed for those
perfectionists who wants to get the best out of their characters. In other
if you found my above instructions a bit vague or you couldn't possibly imagine
how on earth I can get through a length of the game gaining minimum levels. So
here's how I did it. We're also going to abuse the system and take advantage of
every trick in the book, including GF abuse, AP abuse, Limit Break abuse, card
mod abuse, cash abuse... and since most of the characters are under 18, child
abuse as well. ;) Have fun.

I strongly advice that players who wish to use this walkthrough to play through
the game "normally" first beofre attempting these procedures. Not only will you
be able to achieve better results because you know what to do and what's going
to happen next, you also won't have to bear with the pressure of the powering-up
on your shoulders, thus preventing you from enjoying the game fully.

Another word on the walkthrough. Originally I went through this game with no
levels and bare minimal junctions. That means no magic refining abuse, no card
abuse and the only spells came from whatever that I drawn from the enemies that
I had run into. I based the original walkthrough on that, which was definitely
doable. Then came the AP abuse, abusing Seifer in Dollet, playing cards to get
great spells early, etc. Some the moral of the story is, at some stages through
this walkthrough you may see me recommend some really junky spells, or primitive
strategies. That is because I choose to keep the "bare bones" strategies in the
walkthrough for anyone who's not going to devote as much time. If you are more
powerful then obviously use your common sense, since most battles are a cake
walk when you have good spells.

The walkthrough contains some spoilers. Discretion is adviced. :D

Some of the terms:
> Junction Check! - All about what GFs, spells and commands to junction.
> GF Check! - New GFs, or GF ability acquisition recommendations or just
anything to do with GFs. Remember: Love your GFs!
> Magic Check! - Any info on spells, whether it'd be drawn, refined, upgraded or
> Card Check! - Anything that's got to do with cards, such as rare cards or
refining cards.
> NOTE! - Just some interesting or important stuff.
DP - Draw Point
SP - Save Point
BOSS - A boss fight
GF PROFILE - A summary of the GF and its abilities, an * next to a GF's name
indicates that GF cannot be junctioned.

================================== Disc 1 ======================================
Like all multiple disc RPGs, the first disc is always the longest and the most
exciting, IMO. FFVIII's first disc will introduce all major characters and set
the atmosphere for the rest of the game. It's also loaded with GFs, about half
of all GFs can be goten in disc 1. In terms of cards, it has it's own share but
it's only taste of what you can get later. Enjoy.

---It begins---
When you wake up, you can enter a new name for Squall (although I see nothing
wrong with "Squall") and Dr. Kadowaki will call your teacher Miss Trepe. After a
short scene you'll be in the hallway with Instructor Trepe. You know what to do
so just walk and see how the pre-rendered background turns into an FMV!

> GF Check! Quezacotl and Shiva are obtainable from your study panel.

> NOTE! Viki told me that if you didn't get the GFs yourself, Quistis will give
them to you later during the tutorials. It's probably an addition to the US
version of the game.

Apparently Quezacotl has replaced Ramuh as the Thunder specialist in
FFVIII, nevertheless he is still an excellent GF, especially for the
fact that he is your first one! His attack Thunder Storm is one of
the more useful ones since many enemies during the course of this
game is weak against Thunder. Abilities like Card, Card Mod and Mid
Mag-RF makes Quezacotl an ideal GF for the first half of the game and
his rich Junction, Character Abilities and the summon itself makes
him a perfect all-round GF.
>> Best abilities: Card, Card Mod, Mid Mag-RF, T Mag-RF

Everyone's favourite FF chick is back but ain't better than ever. :-(
Apparently the director wanted her to show a bit more flesh and
stripped away her bikini in FFVII. Anyhow, her attack, Diamond Dust
is stronger than ever and for once, she is not the second weakest
summons in the game! Though not as many enemies are weak against Ice
as against Quezacotl's Thunder, her summon attack is still her best
asset. Ability-wise, Shiva is probably one of the boring ones as even
her unique skill - Doom ain't all that great. This ice maiden's
saving grace comes from those useful and plentiful Junction and
Character Abilities which are valued greatly.
Best abilities: None really, but Vit+40% and Spr+40% are quite good.

Every other GF has the same summoning animation but like in FFVII,
Shiva has 2! It's not that big deal really, it's just whether she
faces one way or the other. She usually faces left but occasionally,
she will face the other direction. I've seen this twice and it's nice
since you can get a closer look at her. :)

Thanks to EXCALIBUR <tomo_ciel@hotmail.com> who informed me that you
can only see Shiva's alternate summon animation when you're back

Before you meet Quistis you'll want to wonder around Balamb Garden a bit. You'll
bump into a girl (who is later known as Selphie) in the hallway. If this is your
first time through then definitely show her around, otherwise do what you wish.

> Card Check! Remember to speak to the guy in the 2F hallway, he'll give you 7
el cheapo cards. (Don't challenge anyone yet though, you won't stand a chance
with those.. "cards".)

> Magic Check! Draw Esuna from the DP in the library and the entrance for Cure.
Now go to the Training Area (don't forget to Junction both GFs first) and draw
(preferably) 100 Sleeps from a Grat, perhaps some Silence as well. (I'd get 100
of each.) Run away when you're done. (Don't worry, this part does not count in
the test so you won't get points deducted.) While you're in the neighborhood you
might as well grab the DP for Blizzard.

If you're hurt you may want to rest in the dorms. Meet Quistis at the entrance
and she'll teach you something about GFs.

---Lava bath anyone?---
> Junction Check! Junction Quezacotl to Squall (Magic-J, junction your 100 Sleep
to it) and Shiva on Quistis (Spr-J, junction Cure to it.)

> GF Check! As for what abilities they should learn, Quezacotl should definitely
choose "Card" while it doesn't matter all that much for Shiva, but "Boost" may
come in handy sometime. If you wanna be more AP-efficient, have Shiva learn a
more expensive ability first, such as Str-J.

> Magic Check! You need spells before challenging the Fire Cave. Encounter some
Fastitocalons at the beach and draw lots of Blizzards and more Sleep if you
also get some Scans as they're really useful when carding enemies. Run for it
when you're done (you'll probably get points deducted but..)

> Caterchipillers holds Cures (draw lots of them) and Thunders.

> Draw some Fires as well if you want. Bite Bugs have them. Run from all of the
above encounters since you don't want to gain any EXP.

> Junction Check! Give Squall lots of Blizzards and junction 100 Cures into
Quistis' Spirit. Put Magic, Draw and GF commands on Squall and Item, Draw and GF
on Quistis. Save your game outside the Fire Cavern.

When you're ready, and have stocked up on enough spells, approach the Fire
Cavern. Choose the 10 minutes option to give your points some boost. Ready? Run
all the way to the centre of the cave, it should be really straightforward. Run
away from the encounters as well. When you get to a lava pit, you'll encounter
the boss. There should be plenty of time left on your clock so no worries.

The test score is not determined by how much time you have left on your clock or
the time interval you chose, it's dependant on how much time is left when you
defeat Ifrit! (You score points in the category of "Judgement", the skill to
Judge the correct time limit.) So yes, you can get full marks if you choose 40
minutes, but who'd want to?

Ifrit - Level 6     HP 1068
        Draw: Fire, Cure, Scan
        Weak vs: Ice
        Absorb: Fire

He's really not that hard. Have Quistis summon Shiva repeatedly while Squall
(with Sleep junctioned to his Magic) should cast Blizzard on Ifrit. You
shouldn't have any problems. If either one of you guys needs curing have Squall
draw Cure from the boss and cast on the character. If Squall's HP becomes low,
let him execute Renzokuken.

If Squall is unluckily enough to get killed, let Quistis revive him with a
Phoenix Down, but you probably won't need to use it.

If you want the highest exam score possible, you need to finish Ifrit with
minimum time left on your clock, meaning you've gotta execute the killing blow
pretty late into the fight. Since Ifrit will talk after you beat him, you do
need to time the last blow carefully, else it'll be Game Over. Use Blizzard and
Shiva to lower Ifrit's HP to about 80 or less. (Use Scan often.) Then let Squall
cast Blizzard when the timer reaches exactly 30 seconds. Congrats, you've just
scored full marks!!!

Win: 4x G-Returner, Ifrit's Card
AP: 20

This will be a quick fight. When you win, you'll gained Ifrit as your GF and
you'll also get his card (your first rare card and a VERY good one, one of my
personal favourites!) The timer has stopped so junction Ifrit to Squall and get
the hell out of the place, and don't forget to run away from all encounters.

Despite the absence of Ramuh, the third member of the FF-Summon-Gang-
Trio is here! Half man, half beast and ready to barbecue the enemies.
Ifrit's summon attack, Hell Fire, packs a mean punch but just doesn't
appeal to me as much as Shiva's, Quezacotl's or Doomtrain's since
enemies weak against fire are rare. (I wonder why.) Ifrit's other
abilities however, are a different story. Favouring strength, Ifrit
can turn a character into a physical powerhouse with those Str and HP
abilities and when combined with the right character (Zell is a good
one) can absolutely ruin a boss' day! He's also the first GF that
nets you the Elem-Atk ability which can mean extra damage against
many enemies if you're careful. Also comes with him but somewhat
hidden is the Ammo-RF ability crucial to Irvine's Limit Break.
Without it, he'll be powerless!
>> Best abilities: Ammo-RF, Str+40%, F mag-RF and Str Bonus

Back in Balamb Garden, Quistis will leave you. However, you might want to head
to Balamb town to purchase some spare Phoenix Downs.

>>> PREPARATION! The next quest is the infamous Dollet mission. There are
several power up tricks that are optional. I recommend that you read the Dollet
section first to check out which quests, if any, you would like to do. You can
also start playing cards now and if you gather many of them, you can learn the
required abilities during the Dollet mission to mod them, including powerful
spells like Tornado.

When you're done, get back to your room at the dorms and get changed. Check out
the sorry excuse of a pillow Squall is using. ;)

---Dollet Me--- (As in "Doh ray me".. nevermind..)
After a few scenes with Zell, Quistis and Seifer, drive the car to Balamb. Pay
attention to Xu's briefing and view another pretty damn good FMV.

> Junction Check! Put a GF on each guy. I junctioned Ifrit to Zell, Shiva to
Squall and Quezacotl to Seifer.

> GF Check!
  - Shiva: She should have learnt Boost if you assigned it earlier so the next
most important skill of hers is Str-J. Otherwise let her learn Boost now.
  - Quezacotl: You should be halfway of acquiring the Card command.
  - Ifrit: Boost is perhaps the best option now.

> Magic Check! Exchange Quistis' magic to Seifer. You may want to give him 100
Sleep to junction to his Magic.

Save at the SP. There are about 5 fixed encounters here that you cannot run
but you've got an Ace up your sleeve. Seifer! When you encounter the first bunch
of soldiers, let Squall and Zell kill themselves off by drawing and casting
spells on themselves. (You might want to draw some spells before you do so.) Let
Seifer finish off the enemies (they're easy) when you're satisfied.

> NOTE! Seifer is certainly a strange kid for 2 reasons. 1) He has really good
starting stats and gains stats very fast as he levels up and 2) His Limit Break
"No Mercy" can be executed EXTREMELY easily!! He has no trouble getting the
triangle to show up even at FULL HEALTH! Too bad you can't get him as a
permanent member.

Anyway, what you wanna do here is to leave Squall and Zell alone and fight the
battles with just Seifer. Since Seifer is the only active member in the team,
you'd want to keep a close eye on his HP and since he can use his Limit so damn
easily, you don't really have an excuse not to try to keep his HP as high as

After the 4 fixed battles with soldiers, random battles will start to show up.
Fight these as OFTEN as you wish and as many as you want! As a matter of fact,
it's a really good idea to fight many random battles here with Seifer since your
GFs will grow with the AP/EXP (and more abilities will show up when their level
rises.) Fighting here will also earn you points in the "Attack" category in your
SeeD test scores, which translates into a high SeeD rank and more money.

You might be tempted to remove all the GFs from Zell and Squall and junction
them all to Seifer. I recommend you keep them where they are since they gain EXP
quicker this way.

> GF Check! Your GFs will gain tons of AP here if you continue to fight, which
means that they can master many abilities here. Here are some abilities that I
think are quite important and should be learnt before everything else.
  - Quezacotl: His Card command should be ready, so let him learn the Card Mod
ability, which complements the former nicely. T Mag-RF is not bad either (and
cheap) and will unlock the useful Mid Mag-RF.
  - Shiva: Pick up her Str-J and Vit-J first from her list of trashy abilities.
Then either I Mag-RF or Vit+20%.
  - Ifrit: Um.. if you're after his Str Bonus ability just in case you leveled
up then start from his Str+20% and +40% first (but they're good skills
nevertheless.) Otherwise his HP-J and F Mag-RF are the way to go.

> You need to get Shiva and Ifrit up to LV10 at least. This is to unlock Doom,
Mad Rush and Ammo-RF, the last ability is especially important!

> You may want to adjust these to be more AP-efficient. There's a boss worth
18AP coming up and an optional boss with a whopping 50AP!

At the top of the stairs you'll have to fight an Anacondour. It has about 1400HP
but isn't really all that hard. It has a strong attack though, can cause ~70
points of damage per hit. Keep Seifer's HP high and summon Shiva if you
junctioned her to Seifer, or just use Blizzard. His Limit Break is easily usable
but it still won't cause as much damage as Blizzard. You may want to turn it
into a card (since Quezacotl's Card ability should be completed right about now)
but it will give your GFs quite a bit of EXP when you kill it.

If you want to build up your GFs, wander around this area. You can encounter a
double Anacondour here. They're tough but the 8AP and ~600EXP you gain for
winning is worth it. Keep Seifer's HP high is mandatory since they are both
quite fast and powerful.

The idea of this "side-quest" is to level up Seifer, which in term raises the
average level of enemies to improve their draw list, netting you some very nice
free spells early on. Apart from getting some good spells, doing this will also
max out the levels of the first 3 GFs - Quezacotl, Shiva and Ifrit, as well as
complete all of their best abilities. This will give you a huge advantage
against the things to come.

DISCLAIMER: Be warned that this process takes around 7 hours to complete, so you
won't be goin' anywhere in a hurry so to speak. It's completely optional. If
you're after the bare minimum, skip it. The game is very beatable anyway. As a
matter of fact, several readers have noted that the benefits that you receive
aren't quite worth the amount of effort, and it is quite true. You can receive
free -ga spells, but you can get much better spells with less effort back in
Balamb by playing cards. The usefulness of having high level GFs is debatable,
though and earning abilities is counter productive as you don't get the best GF
for the first half of the game, Diablos, until after this mission. Diablos also
comes with very useful, VERY expensive abilities, so even if you max out the
first 4 GFs, you'll still have to put effort into raising Diablos. Personally, I
wouldn't pass up the opportunity to level up the trio to LV100, but it's hardly
essential to completing the game, though it certainly makes it easier. If you
have the time, give it a go to see what the fuss is about, but I will leave your
fate in your own hands. ;)

Within that time, Quezacotl should have completed Card, and started working on
Card Mod. It's advised you complete Card Mod during this mission.

So what you do is just fight as many random battles as possible. Remember,
Seifer is a tank and his Limit Break is executable even at nearly full health!
His stats also go up considerably as he levels up. Even with minimal junctions,
his attacks are good enough to defeat G-Soldiers with 1 or 2 hits, and his Limit
Break will mop the floor against multiple G-Soldiers. Don't forget that Seifer's
normal attack has a trigger, just like Squall, for doing extra damage. Also by
setting the cursor to "Memory" will help speed things up. If you are going to
level up for a while, make sure you don't go past the screen that is right after
the place where you fought the forced Anacondour fight. It's basically a narrow
pass over-looking the cliff. If you do, then an automatic scene ensues and
Seifer leaves. Also go back to the entrance of Dollet and save every so often,
just in case. You don't want to lose your hours of progress, do you? ;)

The best place to level up, I've found, is on the bridge, right before the
screen with the stairs. Here you will either run into a lone G-Soldier, or a
trio of them, and you will be guaranteed to meet the trio at LEAST every other
fight, sometimes more. A battle with 3 of them gives you around 250EXP, so 4
fights will raise you a level. Alternately, you may want to fight on the screen
with the stairs and hope for double Anacondours, which will give you around
600EXP. They are, however, very rare and you'll probably meet them only 5-10% of
them time. And your other foes in the mean time will be either a lone Geezard, a
lone G-Soldier or a pair of them. So you actually earn EXP faster fighting on
the bridge. Consistency = win.

Enemies will have their second level (-ra) spells available at LV20, which third
level (-ga) spells are available once they hit LV30. Because enemy levels are
calculated at an average of party member's levels, you won't be seeing -ra
spells and -ga spells consistently until Seifer has reached around LV36 and
respectively. As enemy levels can fluctuate, you may not away be able to see
these spells on every enemy, but they're definitely there, just get into another
fight until you find one.

By doing this, you've just added Firaga, Blizzaga, Thundaga, Curaga, Bio and
Dispel to the smorgasbord of spells available. The 3 elemental spells and Curaga
can be found on the common G-Soldiers. Dispel can be gotten from Elite Soldier
(wearing red) on screens before the bridge, and Bios are available from
Anacondours. Getting 400 Curagas will go a long way, as they're some of the best
defensive junctions for a while and they're the best healing spell, will last
you through the entire game. Getting about 200 of each of the 3 -ga spells will
be good for your junctions. I'll leave Bio and Dispel to your discretion. They
aren't bad, so you can get a few to play with if you like. You might also want
to -ra spells, Curas especially, as they're good for healing, but really if
you've got -ga spells, you don't really need -ras. When you start drawing, it is
a good idea to change your junctions and put Quezacotl on Seifer, so that you're
able to junction magic to your Mag stat, and equipping the Mag+??% abilities
will help too. They will make sure you get 9 castings of a spell per draw. Don't
forget once you've stocked up 100 of a said spell, exchange it all to another
character, otherwise you're unable to draw anymore.

While you're at it, store around 20-30 Thundaras and give them to Squall. You'll
see why in a second.

You might say it's a lot easier to get these spells through refining items, and
you'd be right. But remember, your GFs will also get buffed up to insane levels.
As a matter of fact, it seemed that the developers had this in mind when they
made the game, as 60 is the magic number. At level 60, if you've junctioned 1 GF
to each party member, including the very dead Squall and Zell, all your GFs will
pretty much hit LV100 exactly. They are also able to max out most of their
abilities, so make sure you keep a close eye on which abilities they are

Quezacotl - Complete the Card command, then acquire all of his Menu abilities,
followed by HP-J and Vit-J, then the Mag+??% abilities. What you learn after
that is up to you, as you've already gotten all the key abilities.

Shiva - Complete Boost and I Mag-RF, then her Junection abilities, then her
Character Abilities. Whatever you want after that.

Ifrit - Boost, then his Menu Abilities, Ammo-RF will also be unlocked once he
hit LV10. After that HP-J and Character Abilities. You're also able to acquire
Strength Bonus as well. Whatever you want after that.

Also be prepared to max out the number of Potions you receive as loot. You'll
also get a few Phoenix Downs, lots of Normal Ammo for Irvine and other
miscellaneous stuff. High level Anacondours will drop Star Fragments, as well as
Venom Fangs and Dragon Skin. No Dragon Fangs though, as I've stated in previous
versions. My bad. Geezards will also drop Screws, which will be helpful for
weapon modding.

This is an alternative if you want good junctions during Dollet mission that is
less time consuming. What you need to do is start playing cards before coming to
Dollet, and collect many Blitz (Thundaga), Snow Lion (Blizzaga), Vysaga/Imp
(Firaga/Thundaga/Blizzaga) and Abyss Worms (Tornado). Once you're in Dollet, you
need to learn Card, Card Mod and T Mag-RF from Quezacotl, I Mag-RF from Shiva
and F Mag-RF from Ifrit. These spells (especially Tornado) make wonderful
junctions that will make the X-ATM092 fight easier.

> GF Check! Before you go on to the next area, your GFs should be at least level
10 as they won't be able to gain any more EXP for quite a while. Shiva's Doom
commands becomes available at level 10, and the same goes to Ifrit's Ammo-RF
(crucial ability!) and Mad Rush (not so). Of course, if you did take the time to
level them up your GFs would all be beasts, literally.

Follow along the path to the Communication Tower. After the scene where Seifer
runs away, you'll be introduced to Selphie by a cute FMV. Note that Squall and
Zell are both revived with 1HP if you killed them earlier. Use a Cure on both of

Don't take the shortcut (like Selphie did) or you'll get points deducted.
Instead, walk along the paved road. Talk to Selphie and she'll join you. Don't
forget to run from encounters, now that "the man" (Seifer) has left the
Awwwwww... :(

> Junction Check! Junction Quezacotl on Selphie, Shiva on Squall and Ifrit on
Zell. Shiva should have gotten Str-J if you trained her. Junction whatever magic
is best fit for the team. If you've done Seifer's quest, you'll have PLENTIFUL
skills and spells to use. Since the enemies are of a low level, you can REALLY
crush them like peas. As for commands, here's what I had:
   Squall:  Attack, Draw, Magic, Item
   Zell:    Attack, Draw, Magic, GF
   Selphie: Attack, Draw, GF, Item
> The Item command is crucial at this point of the game since Phoenix Downs are
the only way to revive a KO'd member right now.

> GF Check! The up coming boss holds 18AP, so adjust your abilities for it.

> Magic Check! Selphie inherits all the spells Seifer had stocked so you don't
have to worry about her being magic-less. There's also a DP for Blind inside the
tower, make sure you get it as it will be useful in an up coming fight.

Save at the SP and take the elevator up and meet Biggs. After an FMV that I'm
sure you're all familiar with since it's detailed in the demo, you'll have to
fight some bosses.

Biggs - Level 6     HP 582
        Draw: Fire, Blizzard, Thunder, Esuna

Wedge - Level 6     HP 524
        Draw: Fire, Blizzard, Thunder, Cure
        Immune to: Poison

You'll be facing Biggs first. He's not very powerful. Take some time to draw his
Esuna. Since only one character in your party has Mag-J, the other 2 will fail
quite often. But since this boss is quite harmless, I usually try to stock up on
as much Esunas as I can hold.

After a bit, Wedge comes to help Biggs. He's even less of a threat as most of
the time he will just stand there. You can call a GF to wipe out both of them in
one shot when you've drawn enough spells since your GFs are of a high level.

After you beat on them for a bit, they'll get swept away by a whirlwind and
you'll be up against...

Elvoret - Level 8     HP 2872
          Draw: Thunder, Cure, Double, GF Siren
          Immune to: Poison
          Weak vs: Wind

This is a continuation from the last battle. Elvoret is no joke. Every 3 rounds
he'll use his Storm Breath attack, a wind elemental attack that does about 150
to all 3 members of your team, so keep your HP above 200.

> GF Check! Do NOT forget to draw GF Siren from this boss!

Elvoret has a nice spell to draw - Double! Again, I'd have all my characters
draw Double from it and 200 of them would be my goal. Double is _slightly_
easier to draw compared to Esuna, or so it seemed. Your characters without Mag-J
will still have some problems coping with it but Doubles are really useful in
junctions so I think it's worth it.

When one of your characters need healing, have a character without Mag-J draw
Cure from Elvoret and cast. If all your characters need healing (ie, after Storm
Breath) then let Selphie use her Full-Cure. If you're unfortunate enough to get
KO'd, use a Phoenix Down.

After a while, Selphie should have 100 Doubles stocked, so let her summon
Quezacotl to raise their Compatibility. Keep an eye out on Quezacotl's HP
If it gets too low, only summon it after Elvoret does his Storm Breath. The
other 2 should keep on drawing Doubles from the boss. If you have done Seifer's
power-up side-quest and gotten some -ga spells, you don't need Doubles, so it's
up to you if you want a few. Honestly, Doubles aren't useful for casting and but
it does make a good junction at this point, but is it outclassed by the -ga
spells, and later on gets replaced by Triple.

You may also wanna play around with Selphie's Slots and try to learn her unique
magicks. Try casting Aura from her Slots on herself then use it again, you'll
notice that the selection of spells has been significantly improved. Combining
that and the Slot trick, I learned all her Slot magic in this fight. :)

You'll be able to beat it after summoning Quezacotl about 5 times, but if you
have leveled it up to LV100 like I did, 2 summons will take care of this
monstrosity. However, Elvoret has extremely high Spirit, but low Vitality, so if
you wanted to, unleash some physical attacks and/or Limit Breaks and it will go
down easily.

Win: 2x Elixir, 2x Cottage, 3x G-Returner, 1x Weapons Mon Mar
AP: 18 (accumulated for both fights)

Alright after this fight, the timer starts ticking. Tick tock tick tock. No Gwen
Stefani in the house today, but do check out the trick for AP abuse a little bit
down the page. What are you waiting for? ;) To prepare for it:

> Junction Check! Junction Siren to Squall and junction 100 Doubles (or better)
into his Magic (steal Doubles from Zell if you haven't got enough) Junction 100
Doubles to Selphie's Magic as well. Don't change your commands. You might also
want to read the next section on X-ATM092, if you want to do the AP abuse trick,
for how to set up your characters that way.

> GF Check!
Quezacotl: He should've gotten Card Mod already. Any Menu Abilities should do
now. If you've been training hard and have gotten all his Menu Abilities, get
his Junction Abilities.
Shiva: Get Vit+20% then Spr+20%.
Ifrit: Get his Str+??% abilities.
Siren: Definitely Move-Find first.

Drooling all over Shiva yet? Well, that girl's got some tough
competition comin' up 'cuz here comes Siren! Although looking
somewhat indecent (have you seen those Siren action figures?) but
she's kinda unique in that she has these cute wings on her head.
(Hey, looks like Morrigan!) Playing the part of a maiden by the sea
who takes the lives of unsuspecting sailors (sounds like Baywatch),
Siren's attack Silent Voice can instantly mute all enemies while
inflicting a fair amount of damage at the same time. Although the
damage done is nothing to praise about, it is non-elemental meaning
it's a safe one to use against enemies who are strong against
everything. The Silence effect is also neat against enemies who likes
to cast spells, mainly human troops, although many of the more
powerful enemies are immune to it. Ability-wise, Siren is a rich
goldmine. The Treatment command may seem a bit dull at first but it
can save your butt many times when fighting against Malboros, since
it's not hindered by the Silence status. (It's also the only way I
know of curing Doom.) Siren's the first GF who gives you the
advantage of blocking a status too, as well as returning one with ST-
Atk and ST-Def. Those Magic abilities are perfect for magic users
like Selphie and she has THREE distinct Menu Abilities, making her a
versatile one. Finally, her Move-Find skill will review all those
hidden Draw Points and Save Points! (In the field maps only though.)
Phew, what a mouth full!
>>Best abilities: Treatment, Mag Bonus, L Mag-RF, ST Med-RF, Tool-RF
and Move-Find

Make sure you save at the SP down the bottom. You now have just over 29 minutes
to get to the shore so run like hell!!!

X-ATM092 - Level 6     HP 5410
           Draw: Fire, Blizzard, Thunder, Protect
           Weak vs: Lightning

This is an optional boss where you can choose whether to fight it or not.
Killing it will result in 100 bonus points towards your SeeD score and loads of
AP. There are 3 ways you can go about doing this. I'm going to list them all.

METHOD ONE - The better part of valor
This is what most people will do and it's also the suggested strategy for most
FAQs. This is by... not fighting it and run away like a coward. What you do is
reduce its HP by physical attacks, or casting Thunder, til it drops. It takes
around 1000 points of damage to drop it. Don't summon Quezacotl if you don't
want to fight it, because it might be too strong and you will force it to repair
itself. Once it drops Zell will tell you to run away, so hold L2 and R2. Once
you've run away from the first fight, just keep running towards the beach, where
you started this mission. Don't forget on the screen where there's a narrow path
over-looking the cliff, WALK DON'T RUN, else you'll be forced to fight it again.
If that's the case, just repeat what you did the first time. Once you get to the
beach, Quistis will gun it down in an awesome FMV.

METHOD TWO - AP whoring
This is the way to go if you want to abuse the system and completely master your
GFs in half an hour. I recommend that you build up your GFs through Seifer from
the previous trick if you want to take apart in this. How are we going to do
this? Make sure you have junctioned your characters properly before this fight.

Squall: Give him Shiva and Siren, place your best -ga spell in his Mag. He
should have some Thundaras in stock from Seifer, too, if not, Quezacotl should
have learned Mid Mag-RF Menu Ability, so just refine around 20 for him.
Otherwise, if you're willing to part with your Thundagas, they will work as
Make sure he has the Magic command.

Zell: Give him Ifrit, place your best -ga spell in his Str. Give him 100
Thundagas and place them in his Elem Atk-J for added lightning damage. You
should also have gotten Str+20% and 40%. Put them both on for some seriously
strong stats! Give him the Item command for emergencies.

Selphie: Give her Quezacotl, junction the best -ga spell to her Mag also helps,
as well as having some Thunder spells. Quezacotl should also have learned
Mag+20% and +40%, put them both on. Also make certain that she has the GF and
Magic command equipped.

And before you start, go into your GF's menu and choose Move-Find for Siren, as
it's her best ability. Note you can only access the menu at selective spots once
the chase starts. The first time is right after meeting and escaping from the
'bot for the first time, so be sure to get into the menu and select a different
ability for Siren. The next 2 screens your menu is completely locked, so if you
fight X-ATM092 here you may not be able to choose which ability to learn. When
you get to the screen where the cliff is however, you can access the menu, but
only before the spider catches up to you. After that, everytime you want to
access the menu, you need to run to a new screen. After you've completed Move-
Find, grab all 3 menu abilities for Siren, as they're all very useful. All this
may take a minute or 2 to setup, but believe me, this is going to be so
streamlined it will save you tons of time later on.

Ready? Here we go. Go outside and meet the robot. The idea here is to cause
enough damage to wipe out all of its HP, which is just a little over 5000,
forcing it to repair itself. Then knocking it down again and run away. Because I
have already knocked out all of its HP, the game will reward you 50AP! And you
can do it again and again til the time limit runs out for some good ol'
fashioned mayhem!

What you do is wait til Selphie's turn comes up, immediately charge up for
Quezacotl and have both Squall and Zell on stand by. You may get hit a couple of
times but it's ok. As soon as the summon start, hold the Select button to bring
up Boost. Now you need to boost it to 100 or above. The idea is to make it
strong enough to KO the boss in one hit. An un-boosted summon will cause a
little over 4000 damage, not good enough. However, by boosting it up to 100 it
will cause around 6000 damage, KO-ing it in one hit, forcing it to regenerate.
If not, or you were unlucky, have Zell attack it, that will definitely force it
to regen. While it's restoring itself, have Zell execute his physical attack.
Watch whether he scores a critical, as a critical hit will score around 1400
damage which will make it collapse and giving you the opportunity to run away,
otherwise it will do around 700 damage. If that's the case, follow it up with
Squall's Thundara (or Thundaga if you wish), which will definitely make knock it
down. Thunder won't cut it unless it's cast by Selphie, which is an alternative
option, but using Squall will make it faster.

If you didn't do Seifer's power up quest you can still take advantage of this,
but it will take longer obviously, and you can do it fewer times. Have Selphie
summon Quezacotl, you should get around 1300 each time with a good boost, while
Zell and Squall should execute their Limit Breaks. They won't do much damage,
but hopefully, their combined damage will eventually force it to repair itself.

When you run away, run to the next screen and you'll see it start to follow you.
You can now fight it as many times as possible, until the time limit runs out of
course. If you ever need to heal, have Squall or Zell use Cure when Selphie is
charging up for the summon. Zell also has the Item command should you need to
revive. Note Quezacotl will be faster and faster each time you summon it, which
makes it easier and easier. You can kill the robot about once every couple of
minutes on average, which translates to many mastered abilities.

The last place you're able to fight the robot is right after seeing a FMV with
the car getting crushed. It's the screen where you can see a bridge hanging
above your head, and where the pub is. I was able to take it down 10 times with
7 minutes to spare! Your mileage way vary, but 15 times is definitely an option.

METHOD THREE - Take no prisoners
This method we will kill the robot. Note you can't do this on the first time you
meet it, outside of the tower. On any rematch, you have the option of completely
destroying it.

What we want to do it take off its full HP 4 times. So have Selphie charge up
Quezacotl and blast it 4 times, each time forcing it to repair itself. And then
on the fourth time, it will explode instead. The only difference if you kill the
robot is that you will receive an item loot on top of the 50AP.

You might say Quezacotl takes too long, and you'd be right, it does use up a lot
of your time. However, consider your alternatives. A Duel or Renzokuken combo
will do less damage and take just as long, since Quezacotl is the shortest
summon sequence. What about using Thundagas? They don't do enough damage, and
you need multiple castings to take it down. You even have to recharge your ATB,
and within that time, the boss can act and if it uses Ray Bomb, it eats up a lot
of your time and causes damage to all, forcing you to heal more, which uses up
even more time.

Anyway, if you want to destroy the robot, make it chase you all the way past the
screen with the "Nautilus" sign, where you see a short FMV of a car being
crushed. The last time you can fight it is right after team C runs out from the
pub (so while you're busting your ass saving the world, they're enjoying Happy
Hour with Karaoke!) X-ATM092 will fall on top of you. This is the last place
where you can bust it up, if not, the automatic scene will unfold leading to the
FMV where Quistis takes it out. Reason you shouldn't take it out early is
because after you've defeated X-ATM092, random battles will start plaguing you,
and if you encounter human enemies, you cannot escape! By fighting it at the
last place possible, you eliminate much of the chance of a random battle. It
does take a long time to complete though, and you'd want a MINIMUM of 6 minutes
ticking on the clock to make it by a hair! I'd recommend 7 just to be safe.

If you didn't power up your GFs and get the -ga spells, you'll be in for a
tougher fight, but still doable. Again, have Selphie summon Quezacotl every
round, and pound on it with Zell and Squall's Limit Breaks. It will eventually
blow up, but you'll be looking at between 15 and 20 minutes, so make abso-
freakin'-lutely sure you have the time to spare.

Yes, you can milk it for all it's worth by fighting the robot again and again,
grabbing 50AP each time you do, and then destroy it at the end. However, with
that extra 6 minutes you could be looking at defeating it an extra 5 times and
earning an extra 250AP, so decide for yourself whether the loot is worth 200AP.
On the other hand, if you've powered up Seifer, your first 3 GFs would be very
close to maxing out, and you'd only be doing Siren a favor with the extra AP. Oh
another thing, if you do destroy the robot, you won't see the FMV with Quistis.
If you haven't seen it before, I recommend that you keep it alive so you can
sneak a peek at it, it's pretty cool.

Win: (Random) Giant Ring, Power Wrist, Orihalcon, Hypno Crown, Force Armlet
AP: 50

Once you arrive back in Balamb, just head back to the Garden. We will take the
time to explore Balamb and play cards in a little while. I might not be yellow,
nor make outta brick, but following the road will take you back to Garden
without having to worry about fighting.

View a scene in the Garden lobby, then exit right and view another scene. Now
get a message to head to the second floor. Run around the area and the faculty
will come around and call out names and watch the next scene. Make sure you
speak to Cid again to get Battle Report. You should get around rank 6 or 7 by
following this walkthrough, more if you had defeated X-ATM092. Don't worry, it
only affects how much money that you get, which isn't important.

EXPERT TIP - How to gain SeeD LV10 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Obtaining SeeD LV10 is normally not a problem, except you are restricted from
taking certain actions if you are following this power-up guide. For example,
can't fight random battles. I'll go through and show you how it can be done.

Judgement: This category is easy. You need to defeat Ifrit with 7 seconds or
below on your clock. If you stall him by having ATB set to "Wait" and your magic
menu is open, his ATB bar will not fill. Simply reduce his HP to 80 or under and
cast Blizzard when timer reaches 30 seconds exactly. 100 points.

Attack: You need to defeat around 80 enemies in Dollet. To do that, kill off
Zell and Squall, have Seifer absorb the EXP.

Atiitude: This is easy if you know what you're doing. Basically, when you arrive
in Balamb for the mission, DON'T talk to anyone. Don't talk on the boat, follow
Seifer's orders, don't advance til Seifer says so, don't take the shortcut like
Selphie, save the dog and don't hide in the pub.

Spirit: This is difficult. You are allowed to escape once and still receive full
points, but you are required to escape for the first X-ATM092 fight. It is easy
until Seifer leaves your team. After he leaves, you'll have to go around another
screen before you reach Selphie and you may run into random battles. You may
find yourself having to fight once or twice, but both Squall and Zell have a
small buffer on their EXP, should be able to absorb it without problems. If you
encounter an enemy after you got Selphie, but before you take the elevator, you
can cast Break from Selphie's Slots to avoid any EXP penalties. You must also
not left X-ATM092 ambush you during the chase.

Conduct: This is measured by how much time you have left when you get to the
beach. You need to make it there in 5 minutes, or having 25 minutes or more on
the clock. To make it more difficult, you must not let X-ATM092 ambush you after
the first fight. What you need to do is after the first fight, exit right. The
run down and exit the screen. While the next screen is loading, hold left on the
left stick and stick to the bottom to make a sharper turn. It should narrowly
miss you. The next screen is the cliff, what you need to do is WALK all the way
instead of running. Next screen, just run all the way down. Then you get to the
bridge, which is tricky. Run right, when you see it jump, immediately run to the
left. When it jumps again, turn right and it will miss you. Make sure you save
the dog on the screen with the fountain, and keep going down until the cut scene
takes over.

Bonus: Another way you can make up any points you've lost is by defeating X-
ATM092 which gives you 100 bonus points. These points can be used to buy you
another escape. When you get to the screen with the bridge and the pub, run down
to the bottom and you'll see team C coming out of the pub. Stay here and let it
run into you. What you will need to do here is kill it, as killing will earn you
100 bonus points towards the exam. It would be better if you had leveled up
Seifer to get the -ga spells, or alternatively, collect lots of cards before
coming to Dollet. Namely, Blitz (for Thundaga), Snow Lion (for Blizzaga) and
Abyss Worms (for Tornados.) After you learn Card Mod, I Mag-RF and T Mag-RF, you
can refine these spells for junctions instead of having to spend time leveling
Seifer up to Lv60. Junction them to Squall and Zell's Str and execute their
Limit Breaks for good damage. If you can make it back by the timer reaches
you'll still get LV10 with 2 escapes.

---Voulez-vous coucher avec moi ce soir?---
Congrats congrats, now you're a SeeD members. Get changed (noticed how he got
changed with the doors OPEN while Selphie is just standing outside?!) and talk
to Selphie when you're done.

You'll be treated to a couple of bootieful dance FMVs with an unknown girl.
Quistis then comes along and wants you meet her in the secret area in the
Training Area. Get changed again (I don't see the point) before you go you
should junction both Squall and Quistis properly.

> Junction Check! Junction 2 GFs on each character, I had Squall with Ifrit and
Siren while Quistis got Quezacotl and Shiva. Junction the 200 Doubles that
you've worked so hard for in each character's Magic. Junction Blizzard to Ele-
Atk if you wish and Junction Sleep to
Squall's ST-Atk. Finally, the commands should look something like:
   Squall:  Attack, Draw, GF, Magic
   Quistis: Attack, Draw, GF, Card

> Substitute in Item instead of GF for Squall if you wanna play safe just in
case Quistis dies.

> If you have taken on the option quests in Dollet, you should be a lot more
powerful. Just junction your best spells.

> Magic Check! Trade someone's magic to Quistis, trade those Blinds to Squall.

> GF Check! Your GFs should have learnt some abilities in Dollet. If you didn't
bother with powering up before:
  - Quezacotl: Card Mod should be complete now. Learn T Mag-RF then Mid Mag-RF
if you haven't done so.
  - Shiva: Vit+20% and Spr+20% followed by the +40%s.
  - Ifrit: Str+20% and +40%.
  - Siren: She should have gotten Move-Find already. Learn Boost then either all
her Menu Abilities (L Mag-RF is great!) or her Mag+20%.

> Card Check! So you have gotten Card Mod, it's time to get some new Blue Magic
for Quistis. You can get 3 decent skills just by modding some of the crap cards
you were given at the start of the game.
    Caterchipiller -> Spider Web    -> Ultra Wave
    Gesper         -> Black Hole    -> Degenerator
    Gayla          -> Mystery Fluid -> Acid
If you've played some card games already and manage to win, you might have more
cards that can be turned into Quistis' new skills.

Save your game in Squall's room. Head to the Training Area and Quistis will be
waiting for you. She'll teach you something about Status Attack.

Enter the Training Area and prepare for a fight. If you encounter Grats, have
Squall weaken them and have Quistis turn them into a card. If you encounter a T-
Rexaur, try putting it to sleep by attacking it with Sleep Junctioned to ST-Atk.
If it doesn't work, have Squall cast Blind on it. You can Scan it if you want,
it should have about 13000HP. Summon Shiva with Quistis and another GF or cast
Blizzard using Squall. When you've done about 8000+ damage, you can card it with
Quistis. You'll get a nice 10AP for your effort, which is worth it IMO. If it
floats your boat, come back after you've gotten Diablos.

Granaldo - LV6     HP 1409
           Draw: Sleep, Blind, Shell
           Weak vs: Wind

Raldo    - LV6     HP 185
           Draw: Fire, Thunder, Protect

Head back to the entrance after the scene and you'll have to fight 3 Raldos and
a Granaldo to save a girl. This is an easy battle since they can't really do
much damage, maybe about 30 points max.

Draw Protects from the Raldos as they act as decent spells for Vitality, and
cast them on your team if you want. When your Limit Break comes up (will be
quite a while since their attacks are weak!) eliminate them in one hit with
Squall's Renzokuken and Quistis' Laser Eye or Ultra Waves. I usually get 100
Protects for either member.

When you finished with Protects, Granaldo holds Shells which is nice for your
Spirit. I usually get another 100 each, but if you don't want to then don't
worry too much as it's not the best spell in the game and it can be refine
really easily later. Draw some Blinds too, they're not good for junctions at all
but are useful against many enemies who uses physical attacks, like T-Rexaurs.

Of course if you've powered up, you won't need these spells. Still would like
nice to draw a couple of them for personal use.

Finish them off with your Limits once you're satisfied, or if you're no where
near critical HP, summon your high level GFs to kill them in one hit (Ifrit
works well.)

Win: 16x Wizard Stone
AP: 14

Now return to the dorms.

---Whoohoo, our first mission!---
The next day you'll be awaken by Selphie. Before you leave make sure you grab
missable item the Weapon Mon Apr item that's lying on your desk, and save. Now
that you're a SeeD you will get paid periodically based on your rank. You can
also increase your rank by taking the test in the tutorial menu. You're allowed
to take as many tests as Squall's level, and because he starts at LV7, you can
give your SeeD level a boost by 7 levels! Also if you've fought a lot in Dollet
with Seifer, the first time you get paid your rank will go up depends on how
many enemies you took down. I went from LV6 to LV12! Here are the answers for
the test for your convenience.

         Questions:  1  2  3  4  5  6  7  8  9  10
         Level 1:    Y  N  Y  Y  Y  N  N  Y  N  N
         Level 2:    Y  N  Y  Y  Y  N  Y  Y  N  N
         Level 3:    N  N  Y  N  Y  Y  Y  N  Y  N
         Level 4:    N  Y  Y  Y  N  N  Y  Y  N  N
         Level 5:    N  N  N  Y  Y  N  N  Y  Y  Y
         Level 6:    Y  N  Y  Y  N  N  Y  Y  N  Y
         Level 7:    Y  Y  Y  Y  Y  Y  N  Y  Y  N
         Level 8:    N  Y  N  N  Y  Y  N  N  Y  N
         Level 9:    N  Y  N  N  N  N  N  N  Y  Y
         Level 10:   Y  N  N  N  N  N  N  N  Y  N
         Level 11:   Y  Y  N  Y  Y  N  Y  N  N  Y
         Level 12:   N  Y  N  N  Y  N  Y  N  Y  N
         Level 13:   Y  N  N  N  Y  N  N  N  N  N
         Level 14:   Y  Y  Y  Y  N  Y  Y  N  Y  N
         Level 15:   Y  Y  N  N  N  N  N  Y  N  Y
         Level 16:   Y  N  N  Y  N  Y  N  N  Y  N
         Level 17:   Y  N  N  N  Y  N  N  Y  N  N
         Level 18:   Y  N  N  N  Y  N  N  N  N  N
         Level 19:   Y  N  N  Y  N  N  N  N  N  Y
         Level 20:   Y  Y  N  Y  N  Y  Y  Y  N  N
         Level 21:   Y  Y  Y  Y  N  N  Y  Y  Y  N
         Level 22:   N  N  N  Y  N  N  N  Y  Y  N
         Level 23:   Y  N  N  N  N  Y  Y  Y  Y  Y
         Level 24:   Y  Y  N  N  Y  Y  N  N  N  Y
         Level 25:   Y  N  Y  Y  Y  N  N  Y  N  N
         Level 26:   Y  Y  N  Y  N  Y  N  Y  N  N
         Level 27:   N  Y  N  N  N  N  Y  N  Y  N
         Level 28:   Y  N  N  Y  Y  Y  N  Y  N  N
         Level 29:   N  N  N  Y  Y  N  N  N  Y  N
         Level 30:   N  Y  N  N  N  N  Y  N  N  N

Head to the entrance and receive the instructions for you first mission from
aid the Forest Owls in Timber.

> NOTE! Before you go, talk to Cid and he'll give you a Magical Lamp. Do not
forget this as it's vital for another GF.

> GF Check! Cid's Magical Lamp can summon the demon Diablos. You can acquire
this GF from now on by using the Lamp. I'd recommend you do it straight away but
do junction yourselves properly first.

> Junction Check! Junction Quezacotl to Selphie, Ifrit to Zell, and the ladies
(Shiva and Siren) to Squall. Junction your best spells to Mag. If you have
acquired Vit/Spr-J, junction Protect and Shell, respectively, to those
attributes. As for commands, put Draw on all members and Item on at least two
members as it's still the only way of reviving an ally. You'll want the Magic
command too.

> GF Check! You should continue with my recommendations given above, since
they're quite expensive (ie, Str+40% takes 120AP!)

> Magic Check! Give Blind to the character who has the Magic command.

Diablos - LV7     HP 6400
          Draw: Cure, Demi
          Weak vs: Wind

Everyone fears this boss, I wonder why. He loves to cast Demi which takes off a
quarter of one member's HP, but he also has Gravija, the upgraded version where
it takes off 75% of all member's current HP! Then he has a rush attack which is
deadly after Gravija.

Since gravity elemental spells can never kill you, try casting Blind on Diablos
so his rush attack will miss most of the time. You should do it until it works,
which can take a few tried at times (junction spells to your Mag will increase
the likelihood of the success rates.) Blind can also be cast multiple times for
free from Selphie's Slots. Now he's almost harmless. His gravity spells can
reduce your HP to 1 but afterwards, all attempts will do 0 damage!

Draw Demi from him. It's a very advanced spell at this point of the game so
you'll expect to fail most of the time. However, it's worth the effort to stock
up on 200 of them as they're the best spells you can junction to Magic for quite
a while. Squall and Selphie can expect to draw about 1-5 Demi with Double
junctioned while Zell will be next to useless. It doesn't take THAT long to
stock 200 Demi BTW.

If you don't draw Demis from him it's no biggie because if you're a keen card
player, you can get loads of awesome spells early with some effort. Even Demis,
can be refined easily. I still like a few though, as they're nice to have around
and it's nice to get them for free with little effort.

If you've done the Seifer quest earlier and/or the X-ATM092 AP snatch quest, you
should be able to get a very good Mag level right about now, and equip Mag+??%
from Quezacotl and Siren. You should now be able to draw 9 Demis every round!

Once you start attacking, make sure you go full on aggressive. That's because
when Diablos' HP gets low, it will use nothing but physical attacks. Even
blinded it can get lucky and hit you. Summons your GFs to block his hits, or
execute your Limit Breaks ruthlessly. Or alternately, try to get Selphie's The
End, which will end it right there and then. Also, getting all of Selphie's Slot
magic now means hey will appear a lot more often later.

Win: 8x G-Returner, Diablos' Card
AP: 20

A demon living in another dimension, Diablos is full of mysterious powers.
Controlling the powerful elements of time and space, Diablos uses the forgotten
potential of gravity as its weapon, and the tool that aids his attacks is no
other than the enemies' natural bodies. Diablos' summoning attack, Dark
Messenger is of a gravity type attack BUT, like FFT, it does damage according to
the target's MAXIMUM HP (not current) so it's possible to kill an enemy with it.
Also, the proportion of HP Diablos can remove is also dependant on his level, so
when you first get him, he'd be very weak but he can later remove a much higher
portion of an enemy's HP. I think this summon is not that worth it though, as it
takes ages to animate (strange huh?) but has no Boost function. Use Demi or
Quistis' Micro Missile instead. It's still one of the best looking summons in
the game though. He also has some of the most useful (although extremely
expensive) skills so gaining him as early as possible is recommended. Diablos is
the first GF to give you the advantage of equipping up to 3 Character/Party
Abilities with Abilityx3. His Mug skill, although extremely expensive, will
allow you to steal a foe's private possessions for rare items that aids weapon
customizing or spell refinery. Enc-Half and Enc-None eliminates the annoyance of
random encounters which is very important to this guide and of course, who can
forget his Menu Abilities that lets you refine really good spells like Demi,
Meltdown and Triple.

> NOTE!!! Brian Lennon <bowie_knife@hotmail.com> said that Diablos' attack is
exactly proportional to his level, he will remove the exact percentage of the
enemy's max HP as his level, so at LV12, Diablos will remove 12%. Fairly weak at
low levels, and his attack still caps at 9999. However, at LV100, Diablos will
instantly KILL all enemies with less than 9999HP.

>>Best abilities: Abilityx3, HP+80%, Mug, Enc-Half/None, ST Mag-RF, Time Mag-RF

Now return to Garden and heal up, or use Selphie's Full Cure.

> Junction Check! Junction Diablos to Zell. Junction your Demis that you just
drew from Diablos to Magic, it should increase it by about 40! Otherwise, use
100 Doubles.

> GF Check!
  - Quezacotl: His Mid Mag-RF should be (or close to) completed. Move onto HP-J.
  - Shiva: Vit+40% and Spr+40%
  - Ifrit: Either Str Bonus or F Mag-RF (Str Bonus is not so crucial right now
but make sure you learn it as it's useful later)
  - Siren: Mag+20%/40%
  - Diablos: I'd recommend that you start with Enc-Half, moving onto Enc-None.
Mug is really good as well, but the encounter skills are more important at this
stage, especially if you're not going to card too many enemies along the way. If
you are eyeing on spells that can be refined, ST Mag-RF and Time Mage-RF.

---Triple Triad Bonanza---
This is a new section that I've composed because there are many card-related
activities that are available at the start of disk 1 and now is the best time to
do it. I have also completely rewritten all card info up to this point from
previous updates. This section will include coverage on all rare cards, as well
as card related magic/item refine that will be beneficial to your quest. Much of
this section is optional, especially cards refine, which have received minimal
coverage in my guide previously. I will list several options, use it as you see
fit. If you don't want to play too many matches of Triple Triads, I recommend
that you just grab the rare cards that are available as you won't be back in
Balamb for many hours, and skip the refinery, as they're always available later.

You can also play cards and grab the rare cards before the Dollet mission, but I
recommend that you do it now instead. Reasons being it's easier now that you've
received another rare card, and you would not have had access to the Card
command, nor Card Mod menu ability earlier on. So it's just easier to do them
all at once.

Getting started
You would have received 2 very good rare cards at this point, Diablos and Ifrit.
Combine that with the starter deck that you've received, are all you really need
to win the first few card matches and you'll have a full hand of rare cards in
just a few minutes. If you're not confident having to use 3 LV1 cards as
what you can do is wander around the Training Center and card any Grats and T-
Rexaurs that you come across. T-Rexaur cards are decent enough for this point
and will be a better filler than any of the starter cards. You'll also rarely
receive a Shumi card, which are pretty decent as well. Bomb cards from the Fire
Cavern are good as well.

Note the Balamb region has the Open rule, which lets you see your opponent's
hand. This is a very good rule as it allows you to place cards in spaces where
the opponent can't turn.

MiniMog should be your first target because of its accessibility and ease of
taking. Go to the lobby of Balamb Garden and wait. There's a little boy in blue
that keeps running around the garden tirelessly. He will enter from the left so
catch him with the [] button. He has MiniMog and uses really crappy cards
otherwise. You'll be up for an easy win.

Quistis can be gotten from any of the 3 Trepe Groupie members, either the chicks
on 2F classroom, on the guy on the right table at the cafeteria. I have had good
luck with Groupie #1 at the cafe. Save your game and challenge him.

Save at the lobby. Ride the elevator up to the third floor and challenge Cid to
a game. Cid has got some pretty good LV5 cards and seem to have better AI than
most. He still lose just the same. If you find Cid a bit hard, play a few more
hands with other players and get some LV5 cards. Or, go to Balamb and grab Zell,
another excellent card, first. It is important that you grab Seifer now, as your
next opportunity is not til disk 3... and you're stuck with the awful Centra

You have now got all the rare cards in the Garden itself. Traverse to Balamb
town and go to the next screen. One of the houses on the right is where Zell's
parents live. Challenger his ma and snag Zell's card off her.

Get some trade ;)
Go to Balamb train station and you will see a woman dressed in white robes
standing on the stairs. She is the Queen of Card and you'll be seeing her face
many times throughout this game. In disk 1, 2 and 3, there are 2 things that she
is good for, manipulating card rules and obtaining new rare cards. What we're
here for is to get her to change the trade rule. Default trade rule is always
One. There are a total of 4 trade rules in the game.

One: Winner picks 1 card used in match from loser
Diff: Winner picks the number of cards from the loser based on the difference in
the final scores of the game
Direct: Both players receive whatever cards they've turned over during the
regardless of who the winner was
All: Winner receives all cards used in match from loser

By playing with the QoC, she will first introduce the Diff rule. When you play
with her using that trade rule, there's a chance that everyone in you region
will start following suit. By spreading the Diff rule in Balamb, you'll be able
to earn 2-5 cards for every win, which would propel your card collection through
the roof and it rewards you for card you turn over, which in turn develops you
into a better card player. How do we know whether the trade rule stuck? Just
find the nearest card player (which is, unfortunately, Ma Dincht) and she will
using that trade rule if it has taken over.

You might think that the All rule would be a better choice, as it guarantees you
5 cards when you win. It will definitely help you gather your cards much
however all good things must come to an end. After a number of matches, whatever
trade rule will degrade in the order

                        All > Direct > Diff > One

Though it may skip 1, for example, Direct > One. Once All degrades, you'll be
end up with everyone's least favourite trade rule Direct! To get rid of Direct,
challenge players to a match, but then on the screen where the rules gets
displayed select "no". If you do it enough times it will eventually revert back
to One, or Diff, if you're lucky. So if you're willing to bare with having to
deal with Direct eventually, go for all, but if you think it's too much of a
hassle Diff would be good enough. Besides with a decent strategy it's easy to
get 4 cards consistently, and it's rare that you see a match with 5 desirable
card anyway.

So if you're planning to play cards for a bit, and maybe refine them into great
items or spells, you'll definitely want to fix up the trade rule to gather your
cards quicker. All or Diff, I leave it up to you.

Card rules erasing
You can find a man squatting by the water near the docks in Balamb. If you play
a hand with him, it will wipe out all rules (excepting trading rules)in the
Balamb region! The only use for this is if you had screwed,  up the rules in
Balamb. Maybe you accidentally spread Random, or anything like that, this will
give you a second chance per se. You can then pay QoC 30000 Gil to re-establish
the Open rule. Also what's interesting, I've played a match before with him
before Fire Cavern and he used the "Null" trade rule. Yes, a mock game with no
cards exchanging hands!

Complete your gathering
You can play as much cards as you like now and can fill up everything from LV1-
LV5, except for 1 unique level 5 card called Pupu, so don't worry if there's an
empty space on your list. LV5 cards will probably be the ones that you want a
lot. There are several players in Balamb Garden that will use LV5 cards, though
my favourite has always been Trepe Groupie #2, who is one of the gossiping
lasses at the second floor classroom. Your experience may vary though.

Learn new Blue Magic skills
Playing cards are a GREAT way of obtaining the items needed for Quistis to
acquire new Limit Breaks. You should already have 3 extra skills by modding 3 of
the starter cards (Acid, Ultra Waves and Degenerator), plus her default Laser
Eye. The following cards are what you want to keep an eye out for. The Card Mod
menu ability is used in this case to obtain the items.

      Fastitocalon   -> Water Crystal     -> Aqua Breath
      Creeps         -> Coral Fragment    -> Electrocute
      Tri-Face       -> Curse Spike       -> LV? Death
      SAM08G         -> Running Fire      -> Gatling Gun
    4 Malboro        -> Malboro Tentacle  -> Bad Breath
    5 Fastitocalon-F -> Water Crystal     -> Aqua Breath
   10 Behemoth       -> Barrier           -> Mighty Guard
   10 Ruby Dragon    -> Inferno Fang      -> Fire Breath

Obtain powerful junction magic
By playing cards you can also refine them into items, which will in term refine
into spells. Some are very powerful, some are completely useless. I'm going to
go through a few cards which will refine into very good junction spells at this
point of the game, so keep your eyes out for these.

   10 Ruby Dragon    -> Inferno Fang      -> 20 Flares (F Mag-RF, Ifrit)
      Abyss Worm     -> Windmill          -> 20 Tornados (I Mag-RF, Shiva)
      Tri-Face       -> Curse Spike       -> 10 Pains (ST Mag-RF, Diablos)
      Armadodo       -> Dino Bone         -> 20 Quakes (Time Mag-RF, Diablos)
    2 T-Rexaur       -> Dino Bone         -> 20 Quakes (Time Mag-RF, Diablos)
      Gayla          -> Mystery Fluid     -> 10 Meltdowns (ST Mag-RF, Diablos)
   10 Chimera        -> Regen Ring        -> 20 Full-Lifes (L Mag-RF, Siren)

These are all VERY good spells, and some of them like Flare and Pain, are useful
even at the end of the game. Flares and Full-Lifes however, takes 50 cards to
refine into a full set of 100, which is probably not worth doing. Everything
else don't take nearly as long, and 2-3 hours invested at this point will easily
give you 3 sets of 100 of various spells. Note you also get free Dino Bones if
you fight T-Rexaurs in the Training Center. I recommend that you still keep your
weaker spells now that you've got these, as we need the weak junctions to do
weak hits against random enemies for carding, otherwise you'll simply end up
killing everything you encounter. I'm also going to list some spells that may
not be quite good for stats junction at this point, but will come in handy
mostly in status defense junctions.

      Cockatrice     -> Cockatrice Pinion -> 20 Breaks (ST Mag-RF, Diablos)
      Belhelmel      -> Saw Blade         -> 10 Deaths (L Mag-RF, Siren)
      Tonberry/King  -> Chef's Knife      -> 30 Deaths (L Mag-RF, Siren)
      Forbidden      -> Betrayal Sword    -> 20 Confuses (ST Mag-RF, Diablos)
      Elastioid      -> Steel Pipe        -> 20 Berserks (ST Mag-RF, Diablos)

You can also use the Steel Pipe, along with some Screws (Geezard card), modify
Squall's weapon to a Shear Trigger, which teachs Fated Circle, a finisher move.
Apart from these, you can also get some spells that are good for casting.

      Tent           -> 10 Curagas (L Mag-RF, Siren)
      Cottage        -> 20 Curagas (L Mag-RF, Siren)
    5 Turtapod       -> Healing Mail      -> 20 Curagas (L Mag-RF, Siren)
    5 Torama         -> Life Ring         -> 20 Lifes (L Mag-RF, Siren)

And finally, if you don't mind a little work you can get these.

    1 Krysta         -> 10 Holy Stones    -> 10 Holies (L Mag-RF, Siren)

Krysta is a boss card. You might not be able to win them right now, but if you
want you can go back to the Fire Cavern and card Buel enemies. You'll have about
10% chance of getting Krysta card instead. If you want to put in the effort and
get 100 Holys, they make awesome junctions til the end of game.

If you would like to see a full list of what spells/items can be created by each
ability, go to the main menu and select Tutorial. Then Information, Abilities,
Manu Abilities and then select the ability that you would like to check. If your
GF has learned that ability, a FULL list will be available. However, Siren won't
be able to refine Dark Matters via Tool-RF til she is LV100, so it wouldn't
appear before that.

Rare card modding
Rare cards such as Quistis or Zell can usually be modded into some very useful
and/or rare items. This has never been something that I have actively recommened
due to the fact that the way of getting them back wasn't thoroughly tested.
However, as most FF8 players know these days, any rare cards modded can be won
back from QoC or the CC gang in disk 4, an infinite amount of times. Yes,
infinite. That means you can get an unlimited number of all those nasty items
like Heroes or Holy Wars. At this stage in the game however, the rare cards
don't mod into anything that great but do keep an eye out on any rare cards that
gives off interesting items in the future. An exception would be the cards
required for the QoC quest. Make sure you don't mod them until you have used it
in the QoC quest and have gotten the card back from her son.

One card worth mentioning though is Quistis. Quistis' card mods into 3 Samantha
Soul, which teaches any GF Sum Mag+40%. This is not the real reason to mod the
card though. One Samantha Soul can be turned into 60 (!!) Triple spells through
Diablos' Time Mage-RF, which is one of the best spells in the game, THIS early!
If you are not going to get Odin until disk 3 or 4, then this is a way of
getting some Triple spells early.

Honorable mentions

   10 Elnoyle        -> Energy Crystal    -> 10 Pulse Ammo (Ammo-RF, Ifrit)

Elnoyle card seem to be the hottest cards around, everyone on the Gfaqs board
wants them. Why? You can obtain Lion Heart in disk 1, but 12 Pulse Ammo is
required also. By obtaining 20 Elnoyle cards, you can mod them into Pulse Ammo.
I personally see very little benefits to obtaining Lion Heart in disk 1, because
there's little you can use it on and you will eventually get it anyway. I
recommend challenging Trepe Groupie #2 for Elnoyles, or any LV5 cards.

    5 Shumi Tribe    -> Gambler Spirit

Credits to Sister from gfaqs boards who suggested that this deserves a mention.
You have a small chance of obtaining Shumi Tribe cards by carding Grats and T-
Rexaurs in the Training Center of Balamb Garden. A Gambler Spirit allows a GF to
learn the Card command! If you are going to do some heavy carding to get AP,
having 2 characters with the Card command can make things go a lot quicker.
However, it can take a long time to obtain 5 of them. They have around 10%
chance of appearing instead of Grat/T-Rexaur cards, so you'll be looking at
defeating 50 enemies. If you are planning to stay at the Training Center and
card many enemies to gain AP for Diablos, then there shouldn't be much problems.
You can obtain a generous about of AP from these enemies.

AP Gaining
If you would like to grab some AP and learn a few abilities, now would be a very
good time for it. You can either fight in the Training Center, or Balamb beach.
The Training Center hosts Grats and T-Rexaurs, the former comes in packs or 1, 2
or 3, for 2AP each, and the latter gives you a whopping 10AP! You also have a
chance of earning Shumi Tribe cards in the Training Center, so do it there if
you want to earn the Gambler Spirit. You can encounter Fastitocalons at the
beach, which gives you 3AP each, and comes in packs of 2 or 3. I'm going to tell
you how to junction to card them.

Grats: Junction 100 level 1 elemental spells, or 100 -ga spells to Squall's
Strength (give him Shiva). For the former use 1 attack WITH trigger, the latter
1 attack WITHOUT trigger. Card after that.

T-Rexaur: Summon Shiva, should do around 8000-9999 damage. Card.

Fastitocalon: Junction 100 -ga spells to Squall's Str, 1 attack WITH trigger.

>>> NOTE! When you are ready to proceed, I recommend that you make a spare save
in your memory card at this point in time, so that if you want to play a new
game of FF8 in the future, you can load this save instead of starting all the
way back at the beginning. This is especially important if you have completed
the Seifer power up quest, or AP abused X-ATM092 and played a lot of cards. All
of these can be very tedious and time consuming. Making a save now could mean
you can reap all these benefits in future games and since it's still early on,
you will still be able to go through the rest of the game (ie, the fun bits)
again. If you want a more "authentic" experience, you could start a new game and
play normally (eg, don't waste time doing the optional stuff) so you can enjoy
the story/FMVs, and after graduation load up the spare save. Would have saved
you hours of boredom. ;)

Queen of Cards Quest
I recommend that you start the QoC quest now because it's convenient. There are
5 rare cards that are not obtainable normally, and the only way to get them is
if you LOSE a specific card to her. (Don't worry we'll get it back.) Her artisan
father will use it as a muse and paint another rare card. If you don't do it,
you'll have to wait til disk 4 to get them through a lot of tedious work.

Before we start, remember we are going to Timber next, which is Galbadian
territory. If you've played many games with Diff/All rule in Balamb, you can
spread it across the world. Talk to her and pick the second option, she will say
"whatever trade rule" will spread across the world.

When you're ready, save upstairs at the inn. While you're at it you might want
to check out the copy of Timber Maniacs on the table. You don't actually get to
see the contents, but later on you can get a short summary for each one you
"read". Apart from 1 (which I'll get to when we get there), they're completely
useless. Challenge the queen to a game. You want to deliberately LOSE the
MiniMog card to her, so pick that, plus 4 very weak LV1 cards (like Funguar) and
expose all the weak sides to lose the game. She will pick MiniMog always. Now
whenever you lose a rare card to her, she will get bored of the region that she
is in. In this case, she had 60% chance of going to Galbadia and 40% chance of
going to Dollet. YOU WANT HER TO GO TO DOLLET! You can ONLY get her to tell you
of the new card created in Dollet and if she leaves Balamb and doesn't go to
Dollet, you'll have to chase her all the way to the moon (literally!) and then
some. So, if she chooses Galbadia, RESET! L1 + L2 + R1 + R2 + Start + Select
will take you back to the title screen, where you can load your previously saved

>>> NOTE! You CAN'T start the CC quest now. Wait til disk 2.

When you're ready to move on, take a train from Balamb Station, it'll cost 3000
Gil. (Don't you think the Garden should have provided you with the ticket
instead letting you buy your own? If so, I want a pay rise!)

Inside the train, you'll see some sequence with Selphie and Zell, he also steals
the magazine, Pet Pals Vol. 1. Then all of your guys falls over and enters the
dream world. Spooky!

---I know where it's at---
You'll take the role of Laguna's team in this sequence. Squall is Laguna, Zell
is Kiros and Selphie is Ward. Just follow the path.

You can encounter Funguars and Geezards here but it's not worth the effort to
card them, as the former keeps putting you to sleep while the latter gets killed
in one hit. They don't give you enough AP either. So just run from them if you
want. If you do want to card them, leave the Geezards alone, they're just way
too weak. Attack the Funguars once with Ward (Selphie, who has no Str-J), then

> Magic Check! There are 2 DPs here, Cure and Water. The latter is a pretty
decent spell that you can cast all you want without having to worry about stock,
since they can be refined easily.

As you approach a car, the gang hops in and drives to Deling City in Galbadia.
Keep going right and enter the hotel and watch some lengthy story and somewhat
cheesy sequence. Oh look, 2 single beds. At least you know there won't be any
sorta hanky panky goin' on if ya know what I'm sayin'. ;)

---Owls + Trains = Timber Resistance Group---
Once in Timber, choose the right password (something about the Owls.) Though if
you choose the wrong oneyou get to see a funny scene.

When you're inside the train, go up one screen and you'll be able to see a SP.
You can go get Rinoa at the end of the hall when you're ready, but before you do
you might want to play cards.

> Card Check! Challenge Watts here if you want Angelo's card. You can
get it later though, but much later so I'd recommend you do it now. If you've
been playing Diff or All trade rules in Balamb, there's a chance that it won't
carry over. Either way it doesn't matter too much, as we are not going to play
too many matches here. Also, select to mix rules, and then cancel out of it.
There's a chance that Open might spread, or Same getting abolished. Sister's
card walkthrough goes into it for much detail, so if you want granny to hold
your hand and tell you what to do, go take a look.

After meeting Rinoa, go back one screen and then head back into her room. The
bed that she was lying on has now been folded away back into a couch, and on it
is a copy of Pet Pals Vol 2. After the meet and greet scene, it's briefings
again. Pay attention. It sounds really complicated if it's the first time you're
playing, I remember I was completely stunned the first time, but it's actually
rather simple. Remember to save your game before starting the mission.

The first test is the sounds/temperature censor guards, you're suppose to remain
still for the former and keep moving for the latter. However, I was the other
side of the screen before I even noticed those guards so just run and you won't
have any problems. Then you have to enter 3 pass codes, get back up after 2 of
them. Then you have to enter 5 codes without the help of Selphie and Zell. This
is still easy as you can still enter 2 codes at a time without having to worry
too much about the guards. Do keep an eye on them though (R1.)

If you complete the mission without making mistakes, your SeeD level will be
raised by 1. It will also drop if you fail too many times. You'll have to
confront the President now, so junction properly.

> Junction Check! Junction Diablos and Ifrit to Zell, Shiva and Siren to Squall
and Quezacotl to Selphie. Basically, just Junction whatever you had previously.
For some reason, the GFs from both Zell and Selphie are removed. As for ST-Def,
Silence would be idea. You should have gotten some Character Abilities like
Mag+20% or Str+20% so equip those. As for commands, here's what I had:
         Squall:  Attack, Draw, Magic, GF
         Zell:    Attack, Draw, GF, Item
         Selphie: Attack, Draw, Magic, Item

Talk to Rinoa when you're ready.

Fake President - LV 8     HP 458
                 Draw: Cure

Not much of a boss here and not much to draw from. If you don't have
enough Cure spells draw some from him. It only takes a few hits to
take him down.. then he melts (ala Parasite Eve) an turns into...

Gerogero - LV 8     HP 2450
           Draw: Esuna, Double, Berserk, Zombie
           Weak vs: Fire, Earth, Holy (Undead)
           Immune: Poison

If you have minimal junctions, he can cause quite a bit of damage. He has a
powerful claw swipe that does about 200 damage to a member, and breath attack
that does 150 damage plus status and the rest of the time, he casts annoying
status spells like Berserk, Silence etc..

He does have some decent spells to draw from, but nothing to die for. Pick up on
some Esunas if you don't feel that you have enough (although they're really
common later on) and more Doubles if you wish. He also holds 2 new spells -
Berserk and Zombie. I'd say you get some Berserks even though they're useless on
their own and crappy for junctions, but they can be very useful VERY late in the
game (although you might as well refine them later if you're lazy.) Zombie on
the other hand, is completely useless.

Anyway, if your HP gets too low, cast Cure. If you get inflicted by Slow,
Silence or Berserk, have another member draw Esuna from the boss and cast it.
Darkness don't matter and Curse is harmless when you're only drawing your

If you've powered up your spells earlier, he shouldn't be much more of a
nuisance with his status magic. Zell and Selphie should be in critical when you
re-junectioned them, so just let out some Limit Breaks when you're ready to take
him down. I used Slots for some Ultima fun. ;)

You can also kill him with a Phoenix Down, but why waste it?

Win: 8x Zombie Powder
AP: 20

After the fight, Rinoa and her team will have a strategy meeting and
after some discussion, Rinoa will official join you. She is mandatory in Timber,
so you need to remove either Selphie or Zell. I recommend that you make a party
of Squall/Rinoa/Selphie. Also note, Rinoa can start learning new Angelo skills,
but I don't recommend you learn either of the 2 that's available for you now,
since they'll be useless later on, and you can't unlearn it.

Watts will lead you out of the train if you talk to him.

When you have the freedom to explore the town, keep in mind that there are
random encounters around town at this point of the game, so run if you encounter
them. If you have trained a lot back in Balamb, you could have gotten Enc-Half
or Enc-None from Diablos already. (I did.) So equip it in that case.

> Junction Check! You need to junction Rinoa. If you use the "switch" option in
the menu, you can switch all junction and magic from another member! So switch
Zell's junctions over to Rinoa. If Selphie is at full HP, remove and put her
junction back on to get her to critical. We will be abusing her Slots here.

> GF Check!
  - Quezacotl: HP-J and Vit-J.
  - Shiva: Vit+40%, Spr+40% and the rest don't really matter
  - Ifrit: Str Bonus
  - Siren: Mag+40%
  - Diablos: What you chose earlier

> Magic Check! Since you've probably have gotten Mid Mag-RF, turn all your low
level Fires, Blizzards, Thunders and Cures into -ra level spells. It will take
some time to accumulate 100 of each though, since they're upgraded with the
ratio 5:1. If you want, you can refine more spells of those types with I Mag-RF
or the other Menu Abilities, or draw some more from the enemy soldiers around
here. If you do get 100 of the -ra spells, junction them to Str. > There are a
few DPs around here too. The room to the left in the Timber Maniacs building
hides a Blizzaga DP, the DP in front of the pub is Cure and the one in the back
ally is Scan.
> If you have learned ST Mag-RF from Diablos, you can refine several (about 10
is enough) Break spells from Soft, or Cockatrice Pinions (gotten by modding
Cockatrice cards). If you don't have it, don't sweat it, we're gonna cast it
from Selphie's Slots for FREE. Cheapskates RULE! :P

> NOTE! Ed Asano came up with this really nice idea, modifying M Stone-Pieces
into simple spells and upgrading them to -ra levels. This helps a lot as it
solves the problem of having to draw from the soldiers and free up your
inventory. (2 birds with 1 M Stone-Piece he said, :) I'm sure you all have many
M Stone-Pieces tucked away in your item list and you can get more by refining
useless cards like Bite Bug and Funguar.

Head north and you'll see the pet shop on the left. They sell mostly useless
junk, but you should purchase Pet Pals Vol 3 and 4, which teachs Rinoa
Invincible Moon and Angelo Reverse, respectively. Start learning them now, as
they're both pretty good. Now head down and see the hotel.  You cannot stay at
the hotel yet, since it's crammed by Galbadia soldiers and you cannot leave
There's a SP at the hotel though and the weapon shop is right next to it. If you
keep going down, you'll come to the gates to see some guards fighting. If you
continue to approach it, you will be forced into an unescapable fight. You can
cast Break from Selphie's Slot magic to get rid of them, but you don't get
anything by fighting them, so just avoid them.

After that head back the way you came. On the platform overlooking the train
tracks you may randomly run into a green shirted guy who's in love with Rinoa.
Talk to him and you'll get a Potion. You can do this everytime you find him
including if you return to Timber later on. Head back to where you begun your
adventure in Timber and exit right this time, that's righ, the Timber Maniacs

> Card Check! This may not be a card now but be sure NOT to missed the kinky
Girl Next Door porno mag, it's behind the pile of magazines in the hallway of
the Timber maniacs building. It can be traded for a rare card (Shiva) way into
the game!

> Magic Check! The door to the left leads to a Blizzaga DP.

Enter the other door and you can find a copy of Timber Maniacs on the floor to
the right. Talk to the guy up the top for some verbal diarrhoea goodness. ;) The
building to the right of Timber Maniacs doesn't get important until later, but
you can have some fun with the dialogue.

Exit the screen to the right and you'll see 2 paths, exit to the right first to
explore the rest of the town. Exit the screen to the right and you'll see 2
paths, exit to the right first to explore the rest of the town. You're on the
train track. Head up the steps and enter the door here. You can use the faucet
to the left to recover yourself, works like the inn. Check the cupboard at the
center repeatedly til it coughs up 500 Gil. If you do this, you won't be able to
drink from the faucet anymore though. Note the SP across the brige.

To carry on with the story, simple go down the steps that leads to the pub.
You'll meet up with 2 G-Soldiers. You cannot run from this battle and they
cannot be turned into a card. The easiest way to avoid EXP is to cast Breaks,
but if you haven't got the abilities for it, you can cast them for free from
Selphie's Slots. They're a bit rare, but since they can't really hurt you, you
can take your time. Another way is to kill off 2 of your characters, let the
third summon a GF to take them out. You'll minimize EXP this way. You'll get a
Buel card for winning.

> Magic Check! A DP for Cure is right in front of the pub.

Enter the pub and talk to the drunk. Show him the card and he lets you keep it
as well as giving you another (Tonberry). Then he lets you out of the back door.

You'll see a SP. Run up the stairs to the giant TV and another interesting story
scene will take place. Rinoa runs away after the response (or the lack of it)
from Squall and whoever you left in the train will join you. Don't bother
exchanging junctions here since you don't have to fight for a while.

Run across the bridge to the TV Station after Quistis appears on screen. After a
bit of story sequence, Rinoa comes back but goes off again, followed by Quistis
and your team. Just run down the stairs where you came from. Squall decides to
take Rinoa with him.

> Magic Check! A DP for Scan just magically appeared!

When you get to the bar, the pub owner's wife tells you to hide at her house.
Talk around a bit and when you can finally leave, Quistis says to go to the
nearest garden for help - Galbadia Garden! When you leave, the woman that
invited you to her house will give you some free items: Potion, Phoenix Down,
Soft, Antidote and Remedy.

Talk to the soldier outside. Then a couple of scenes will automatically unfold.
Zone will get you tickets for the last train to East Academy. Get on the train.

---Things to do #1---
Instead of getting off at East Academy, ride the train all the way to Dollet cuz
there's a couple of fun things you can do at this point. Go up the steps on the
first screen and you're in familiar territory, it's fountain square! You can
save at the Dollet hotel.

> Card Check! You are going to be playing many matches in Dollet, so it's
important that you abolish the annoying Random rule here. I recommend that you
save at the hotel, then challenge the attendant to the right for a game. If you
don't you're the results you wanted, just reset. Also making repeated trips
between Dollet and Timber, you can adjust multiple rules. Idealy, you'd want to
introduce Open and abolish Random. Elemental is more of a nuisance than a
hiderance. Sister's walkthrough has a step by step guide for it.

> Go to the pub and head up the stairs. Make sure you equip Siren's Move-Find
ability, which reveals a hidden SP at the corner. There's also an issue of
Timber Maniacs on the Black Jack table to the left. Challenge the guy on the
left. The fact that he holds Siren's card is reason enough. If you win a match,
he'll show you to his private room and also gives you a bunch of cards (5
Geezard, 4 Red Bats, 3 Buels, 2 Anacondour and a Cactuar). Also, be sure to
examine the pile of magazines near the entrance. Most of the time you'll find
nothing of interest or expired coupons, but occasionally you can find free items
here! You can get Potions, Phoenix Down, Softs, Antidotes, Geezard Cards and a
copy of Occult Fan II here! However, when you get it 3 times, you need to get
out of the room and come back in to get more items.

> If you lost the MiniMog card to the Queen of Cards in Balamb, she should be
here. Talk to her about her father and she'll tell you that Kiros' card has been
made. You can win the MiniMog card back from her son in the old painter's home,
which is one screen down from the pub.

> By establishing a good trading rule we can make collecting cards an easy task
in Galbadia. Challenge the queen and the trade rule of your choice to be
Then play around 10 games, talk to the queen and pick the second choice. She
should say the trade rules are based from rules in Dollet (this is the dominant
region, you set it by playing about a dozen games in that region) and then you
may be able to spread that rule around the world.

I always take a lot of time out here to build up my GFs by carding the enemies.
In the forest west of Dollet, you can find encounters with an Anacondour, a
Funguar and a Wendigo with a total of 7AP. In the forests near lake Obel you can
fight double Anacondours (8AP) and Ochus (7AP). If you meet up with 3 Funguars
then it's not really worth fighting them. Thrustaevis are the plains are good
(3AP) and you can also encounter AP-queens, the Fastitocalon, near the beaches.
The come in 3s, so 9AP fights are common.

> NOTE! Ed Asano said if you have Mug, you can steal Whispers from Adamantoises.
Whispers are great as they let Quistis learn her useful White Wind.

You can take whoever you want, but I like to use Selphie and have no magic
junctioned to her Str. I'll give some strategies for weakening enemies.

Geezard: Selphie with no Str-J, attack once. Card.
Thrustaevis: Squall with 100 -ga junctioned to Str. 1 attack WITH trigger.
Funguar: Squall with 100 -ga in Str-J, 1 attack WITHOUT trigger.
Wendigo: They have around 1100HP. Just attack them a couple of times.
Cockatrice: They have around 1000HP, same as above.
Ochu: They have around 990HP, same as above.
Anacondour: They have around 1300HP. Attack a couple of times.
Adamantoise: They have around 1200HP, extremely high defense and healing spells!
             Thunder type spells work well at weakening them.

> Magic Check! The Thrustaevis holds Floats. Get a bit of them (not necessarily
100) as they're useful later.
> Also, you can refine lots of Aeros from the Shear Feathers you won with the T
Mag-RF from the Thrustaevis. They make nice disposable spells.
> Make sure that you've stocked up on some (refined) Breaks if you want to make
the next section a bit easier.

> GF Check! If you haven't maxed your skills before this is what you should have
ideally, otherwise you should train around here for a bit.
  - Quezacotl: Complete the -J abilities and onto Mag+20% and +40%
  - Shiva: Complete both Vit+40% and Spr+40%, the rest of her abilities don't
    matter too much in which way you learn them, since they're not too good. I
    usually get Elem-Def and Elem-Defx2 first
  - Ifrit: Complete Str Bonus and HP-J. Then Ammo-RF would be good.
  - Siren: Complete Mag Bonus and then get all her Menu Abilities.
  - Diablos: I recommend that you complete, or at least be very close to
completing Enc-None. You'll definitely want it by disk 2. Move onto ST and Time
Mag-RF if you like, or move onto the more expensive Mug. Some players like to
complete it now, as the AP around here is very good.

When you're ready to move on, go to the forest near Galbadia Garden. BTW, don't
forget to trade the junctions of whoever you were using to Selphie and Quistis.

> More Magic Check! Souma told me about ways to get some cool new spells at this
point of the game. If you head west from Timber, go near the mountains and
there's a small canyon (Shenand Hill). You can encounter Vysages here with
several spells like Protect, Shell, Haste, etc. The only spell that's worth it
is Haste, but even that's easily refined using Magic Stones. If you want to
spend some time drawing spells here, just remember they can't be carded! So if
you inflict any damage, use Cure to heal them back to max health before running.

---I know where it's at part 2---
Deja vu! You guys stumbled while inside the forest and woke up in their
alternate lives, well, kind of. After Laguna gets lost again, follow the path
down to some metal walkways. Before you progress any further, check your
junctions as SPs are kinda hard to find in here.

Meet your identity crisis. Squall is Laguna and will always be in these "dream
scenarios", Quistis is Ward and Selphie is Kiros in this scene.

> Junction Check! Keeping your existing junctions' fine. If you didn't junction
Selphie/Quistis before this, you need to put them on now.

> Magic Check! You should definitely have gotten Diablos' ST Mag-RF before
coming here. If you don't have any Break spells stocked, refine them NOW. One
Cockatrice Pinion will give you 20 which is plenty. There's a Sleep DP here too.

Try to cross the metal walkway bridge and you'll be attacked by 2 groups of
soldiers. Even though Selphie is apart of this event in "spirit", she's in
Kiros' body, so you can't access her Slot magic in this scenario. What you need
to do, instead, is to cast the Break spells you've just refined. If you don't
have them, kill off 2 of your other members (Laguna/Ward) and let Kiros summon a
GF to kill these soldiers.

After 2 battles you'll once again take control of Laguna's team. There should be
2 paths forming a Y-shaped junction in the walkway. I suggest that you take the
left one as it's more convenient in doing the mini-quests here. And yes they are
optional, however, Zell and team will come back here later in disc 3 (this place
is actually the Lunatic Pandora before it was excavated!) and will be able to
access certain parts of the structure if you've triggered certain "traps" while
playing as Laguna. It is rather important that you do not miss this opportunity
the areas it later unlocks contains some of the coolest goodies in the game,
such as a rare Ultima DP and Quistis' Ray-Bomb.

There is also another reason to trigger the traps, as the more traps you set,
the lesser streams of enemies you'll have to face at the end of the scenario,
which is important here and you don't want to gain any experience.

> Magic Check! Don't miss the Confuse DP to the right side

Climb the ladder down and press the X button when you walked over to the space
on the ground where you hear a "clink" noise, it's an old key. You'll see some
funny scenes and also affects future treasures. Thanks to Efrem Orizzonte for
bringing that to my attention.

You can run into random encounters in the following locations. If you have
acquired Enc-None, equip it for a better time navigating the area, if not,
you'll just have to run most of the time as most enemies you encounter here are
soldiers that cannot be turned into a card.

In the next section, walk across the middle metal plank thing and you should
hear another "clink". Examine it and choose to "tamper with it" and exit the
screen to the right. But before you do anything, re-enter that screen and try to
tamper with the right hatch, it doesn't do anything now though.

Crpss the featureless screen, the next one has another key that Laguna can pick
up (and loose it again). Take the exit to the right though, you'll end up at a
walkway that looks kinda like a sewer system. Climb the ladder and you'll end up
at the right path in the Y-junction (the one you didn't take.) Go all the way
back to the 3 hatches and examine the left one, then retrace your steps to the
other end where you found the second key. Each one of these hatches opens up a
room later, and each room holds something cool. Miss it here and you'll be
kicking yourselves 20 hours later.

Take the upper path this time and you can see a large boulder to the left. There
are another 2 paths in this screen but the one to the right don't seem to be
very useful so you don't have to be bothered with it. Head left to the next
screen where you see another boulder and a detonator.

Activate the detonator but you MUST clear the boulder in the previous screen
first (red fuse) then the one nearest to the detonator (blue fuse), because if
you do it the other way, the boulder in the previous screen will block the path
of the nearest boulder and it will not only seal off that exit, you'll also
unable to clear the path to the "hidden" areas later in disc 3. So activate both
switches in the correct order, and enjoy the trio spewing nonsense.

When you're done, head up and enter a new screen, it should be the one with
steps in a pink background. As a side note, you can encounter Elastoids here
very easily. They're not that hard to beat (use about 2~3 Thunders should do the
job for carding purposes) but you can draw Dispels from them and their cards can
also be refined into Steel Pipes. (So if you cannot seem to get Steel Pipes from
Wendigos, get lotsa of Elastoid cards here.) They also give you 3AP. You can
steal Dynamo Stones from them (can be refined into Thundagas) if you have
acquired Mug, but it's a shame really since Laser Cannons can be stolen from
them but only when they're at a high level. (And they only appear in this and a
future Laguna scenario.) If you managed to get one somehow, it's really good as
it will let Quistis learn her potent Homing Laser skill.

You can also encounter Gespers throughout the cave and they drop Black Holes
that can be refined into Demis. They're really annoying though as they love to
cast status changing spells like Silence and Blind. Try about 2-3 Fires on them,
it should weaken them enough to turn them into cards.

Anyway, continue heading right will bring you into another one of those greenish
cavern paths. There's also another boulder in this area to the left, examine it
and Laguna will push it, crushing more soldiers in its path.

> Magic Check! There's a Cure DP behind the boulder. Also, Gespers have Protects
and Shells, if you feel like stocking them up.

Continue heading north will bring you to a SP (FINALLY!) Save of course. The
path to the right will lead to the right side of the screen with the "far
boulder", the one that I said it doesn't matter.

Finally, when you're ready, head north again for the final battle(s) of this
scenario. You might want to collect more Elastoid cards here though. Also,
you'll have to face 5 battles at the end of this scenario, but 4 of the traps
that Laguna can trigger will eliminate one fight each, those 4 traps are:
* The middle hatch where the soldier steps on and falls
* The 2 boulders that you needed to use the detonator for, remember to use them
in the right order. It will also open 2 other hatches if you've tempered them.
* The boulder that hides the Cure DP

So if you did everything right, you'll only have to fight one easy battle, and
what's even better as it won't give you any EXP! Anyway, it's very easy as one
summon will get rid of both soldiers. But right before the last soldier dies, he
will lower Kiros and Ward's HP down to 1. This concludes this scenario.

---Gardening Galbadian style---
After you team wakes up in the forest, Quistis and Selphie have 1HP. Use a Cure
on them if you wish and continue on with the journey to Galbadia Garden. If you
want to build up some more, do it now as power up opportunities are pretty slim
over here in the Galbadia side of the continent.

You can find Belhelmels and Blood Souls in the area surrounding Galbadia Garden,
but they're pretty bad for carding, as they put you to sleep or berserk/blind
you all the time. I've heard that the Belhelmels may drop Laser Cannons
occasionally but I've never gotten one. You can get Saw Blades from them though,
and can be refined into Death via Siren's L Mag-RF. I recommend the forest if
you do want to gain some AP since you can find enemies that gives you more AP
and are easier.

Also of interest, in the forest where you woke up, you can encounter Grendels.
They are infamous because even low level Grendels drop Dragon Fangs, one of the
required items for Squall's best weapon, Lion Heart. However, you may need a
little patience, as they drop them one at a time, and you need 4. Sometimes
they'll also drop Dragons Fins and Skins, so it could take a while. They have
around 2800HP and VERY good Spirit. Can't find them? Run along while HUGGING the
side of the cliff to the left. I encounter one every fight! They also give you
6AP, so might as well grab them while you're hunting for them.

When you're happy, enter Galbadia garden, don't worry, you don't have to fights
here.. yet. Quistis leaves to have a word with the head-master and you can
freely explore the garden, however, the second you enter the lobby, you are
called to the second Reception Room. I suggest you go to the Reception Room and
progress through some story scenes first then do what you want.

Proceed forward til you get to the main lobby with walkways designed in the
shape of a cross. There's a SP here. Take the north exit, then take the stairs
on the right. You'll see it immediately, the Reception Room is right in front of
you. There are 2 cut scenes here, one with your team in the Reception Room
about Seifer. Then Squall foolishly runs out of the room because of some stupid
thoughts of his. Get back down stairs back the way you came in and you'll get
another scene with Fujin and Raijin. Then you can explore all you want.

> Magic Check! The centre of the lobby hides a DP for Haste. There's also a DP
for Shell at the tennis court, which is reached by keep going north.

You should be back at the lobby. If you take a left, you'll find an empty
lecture theater. If you take the right, there are a couple of more areas. The
door to the left leads to an ice hockey field.

> Magic Check! There's a DP on the field itself for Protect, but you can't reach
it yet. The door on the left is the locker room with a Life DP.

> Card Check! The guy in the locker room is a transfer student from Trabia
Garden and uses Trabia rules (Random and Plus). While you won't be in Trabia til
middle of disk 2, fixing up the rules now makes it much easier in the future, as
you won't have to travel around too much. Get rid of Random and Plus would be
idea. Also if you are going to abuse rare card modding in disk 4 it is mandatory
that you fix up Trabia rules, as that's what you'll be playing most of the time.
> Across the hall, you'll meet 3 students talking about cards. They use
Galbadian rules so you can go from them to the transfer student to change rules.
I like to play the girl here as you can win all LV6 cards from her.

There are more areas if you go back upstairs again. The door to the left is
locked, so take the right and you'll be on the second floor overlooking the

>Magic Check! Make all the way around and enter the door, there's a one-time
hidden DP for Double here. It's not worth much at this stage though.

When you're ready to go on with the game, get back to the entrance to meet
Martine, the headmaster of Galbadia Garden. He issues you a mission and
introduces an new member for your teams. It's... Michael Jackson! Unfortunately,
Michael asked Square for too much money, so they had to settle for his
impersonator, Irvine Kinneas instead. ;)

You'll leave the Garden now. Divides the team up however you like but you might
want to leave it as Irvine wishes, to see a hilarious scene with Rinoa, Selphie
and Quistis. Or, put Irvine and Zell in your second squad to see another funny
scene with Irvine and Zell.

---I choo choo choose Deling City---
Move to the train station. You HAVE to catch a train here for 3000 Gil, since
the road to Deling City is blocked and you can't get there any other way.

Deling City is probably the most atmospheric city in FFVIII but it's
so big that its geography is still puzzling me. Exit the station and you'll see
how big the city is. You can either explore on foot on via buses.

Check out my pathetic excuse of an ASCII diagram of Deling City. Note how Deling
City streets go in loops, so if you follow one direction you'll eventually be
right back at where you started. A couple of things to note, there's an "Arc de
Triumph" ripoff at the center of Deling city. Also note the sidewalk that's like
a shortcut to the Arc, it's right opposite Caraway's mansion, and there's a DP
there for Thundara. They will be important later, but now the only place of
interest are the hotel and shopping districts. Also if you stay at the hotel
here, you can read an issue of Timber Maniacs.

         EXIT---Rental car----------------Station----------Hotel
                             |               |               |
                             |               |               |
          Caraway Mansion----+------DP-------|               |
                             |              Arc          Shopping
                             |               |               |
                             |               |               |
                             -------Presidential Residence----

> Card Check! The woman in green cross the street from the hotel is from FH, and
that means she uses FH rules. You can play a few hands here with her if you
to abolish FH rules. They're Elemental and Sudden Death, both mild rules.
> At the shopping district, there's man in black on the left side of the street
near the guy in green. If you have completed the first step with the QoC quest
and lost MiniMog to her previous, he will has Kiros' card.
> Kiros' card mods into 3 Accelerators, which teachs a GF Auto-Haste. You can
use them now to double the speed of your entire team! This is up to you, I would
rather wait til I get more GFs before modding their skills.

Talk to the guard outside Caraway's Mansion and he won't let you in unless you
prove yourselves in the Tomb of the Unknown King to the north and get the
password. He hands you a map as well. Buy a location displayer from him if you
want and have him escort you out of town.

---The known Tomb of the Unknown King---
The Tomb of the Unknown King is not shown on the map but you can find it to the
north-east. Look for a long and slim peninsula on the map, and finally, the
ground around it should be grasslands, not rough land like the rest of Galbadia.

> Magic Check! Before you enter the Tomb of Unknown King, make sure you have an
adequate supply of Float spells. Draw from Thrustaevis if you haven't.

Enter the tomb and save at the SP, check you junctions. BTW, you should choose
your characters carefully too. I ALWAYS have Selphie in my party in the first
half of the game because you can get some really cool spells that you can't get
at that point of the game with her Slots.

> Junction Check! All your characters should have Mag-J and 2 have Vit-J.
Junction to HP too, if you have it. Just junction your best spells, as
everyone's going to have vastly different spells available, depending on what
optional things you've done at this point. Use auto junction is fine, except
always check you have nothing junctioned to Elem Atk. It's next to useless.

Souma written in with what she had at this point. If you're a keen card player,
these spells are not out of reach. If you're really patient, you could've even
gotten stuff like Full-Life, Flare and Holy by the bucket.

"I think my junction list looked a little more like:
HP: Quake (Dino Bone from Armadodo/T-Rexaur card+Time Mag-RF=20 each)
Str: Tornado (Windmill from Abyss Worm card+T Mag-RF=20 each)
Vit: Meltdown (Mystery Fluid from Gayla card+ST Mag-RF=10 each)
Mag: Pain (Cursed Spikes from Tri-Face card+ST Mag-RF=10 each)
Spr: Regen (Mesmerize Blade from Mezmerize cards+L Mag-RF=20 each)

The cool thing is, you can win all these cards in games at Balamb (especially
with Diff or All rules in effect) so as soon as you get the appropriate Mag-RFs
you could be really mowing the opposition down :)"

Or you might have something like this... either way, doesn't matter whether
you're strong like Souma, or just using spells drawable til this point, it's
good enough.

         HP:  Zombie/Dispel/Aero
         Str: Zombie/Aero/Demi
         Vit: Protect/Dispel
         Mag: Demi/Break
         Spr: Shell

> Magic Check! Draw from the DP here, it's Protect.

> GF Check! Uh.. is this section getting boring or what? That's 'cuz you haven't
gotten any new GFs in a while, but that's about to change. Anyway:
  - Siren: ST-Defx2 is very useful
  - Diablos: Menu Abilities, HP-J, Hit-J

Enter the tomb and you should find something to the right side on the ground in
the second screen also, examine it and you'll get the pass code. It is random in
every game and it's a 3 digit number, HOWEVER, if you only get a 1 or 2 digit,
it means that the digit for hundreds and tens are zero.

You can get out now and carry on with the story, but who'd want to since there's
a pair of GF in here. You can get lots here easily so the best solution is to
turn either left or right at EVERY junction, that way, you can cycle around the
tomb and never get lost.

There are random encounters here BUT, they will never appear at the junctions.
Enemies here includes mostly Blobra and Buel, but they're just not worth the
effort to card since the former is exceptionally resistant towards regular
attacks, while the latter is especially weak against it. The amount of AP you
gain is also not worth the trouble. I don't know about the other enemies here
though, I usually just stick Enc-None on someone and run away.

Take a right turn 3 times and you'll arrive in a chamber to the east. Sacred is
in this room, and you'll have to fight it.

Sacred - LV8     HP1340
         Draw: Shell, Protect, Berserk, Life
         Weak vs: Poison, Wind
         Immune: Earth

Sacred is an earth based creature, and he is so powerful in that, simply being
in contact with the ground will give him regenerative properties every round.
(Heals about 100HP each time!) Its attacks are not very strong though.

Hopefully, you've given the Draw command to everyone since Sacred holds Life
spells, and they're exceptionally useful. Get as many of them as you want as
this is the first time Life has been available for drawing.

One "fun" thing to do here is to cast Shell on Sacred and it reduces the healing
by a half, of course, I was just toying around with him. To get rid of his
regeneration, simple cast Float on himYou don't have to worry about casting
Float on yourselves here though, since Sacred has no earth based attacks yet.

It is weak against wind so you can do extra damage if you junctioned Aero to
your Elem-Atk. Otherwise, he's pretty easy. Simply summon a high level GF like
Shiva will get rid of him easily. Else you can try your hands at Selphie's Slots
and see if you can get some nifty spells (not necessarily offensive spells, ones
like Aura and Haste are great!)

This fight is exceptionally easy and Sacred usually dies before you
can even say "what?" Even if you weren't powered up.

Win: 8x G-Hi-Potions
AP: 20

> Junction Check! If you have gotten 100+ Life spells, trade them in HP-J or
Vit-J, they're really good spells for now. Also, make sure that (since you only
have access to 2 HP-J abilities) the character who hasn't got HP-J gets the Vit-
J ability, or else they just won't survive the next fight!

Take 3 more right turns and you'll end up in the northern chamber. Examine the
right side of the wall where there should be a chain, Squall will release the
floor gate, bring water into the man made canal.

> Magic Check! There's another DP here and I think it's hidden, it holds Float.

Take another 3 right turns and you'll end up in the room to the west. Examine
the wheel thingy on the left side of the wall to turn it, I think it lowers the
drawbridge leading to the centre of the tomb.

> Magic Check! DP here is Cura. A hidden SP further away.

Make your way to the centre of the structure. If you're don't have a very good
sense of direction, try take 3 right turns to go back to the entrance and take 3
straight paths to the centre. A bridge leads to the coffin and you'll see Sacred
again but this time, he's angry and calls his big brother Minotaur, who is
actually a miniature version of Sacred. They'll both attack you!

Sacred - LV6     HP1085
         Draw: Shell, Protect, Berserk, Life
         Weak vs: Poison, Wind
         Immune: Earth

Minotaur - LV6     HP1530
           Draw: Shell, Protect, Berserk, Double
           Weak vs: Poison, Wind
           Immune: Earth

Minotaur proves that size does not matter since he's actually stronger than
Sacred. His attacks HURTS! He also has an attack that deals damage to all your
members and both brothers have a combination attack (Mad Cow Special) where they
strike the ground, sending shockwaves that can do a lot of damage! Oh yeah,
don't forget that they can both regenerate every round.

The first thing I do is to draw Double from Minotaur and cast it on Selphie,
then let her cast Float on everyone (which eliminates the threat of Mad Cow
Special.) If you are weak you can draw Protect and cast on your party members,
or use Wall from Selphie.

I recommend that you take down Minotaur first since his attacks do so much
damage so cast Float on Minotaur first. You can damage him with either high
level GF summons or your Limit Breaks (Zell's Duel is excellent at that.) If
anyone gets KO'd, Sacred offers Life spells that you can use at your pleasure.

When Minotaur's gone, it's basically a sure victory. Draw some more Life from
him if you want some more and beat him again like how you beat them before. Note
neither of them have anything to steal.

Win: 8x G-Returner, 8x G-Hi-Potion, Sacred's Card
AP: 40AP

> Card Check! You'll win Sacred's card after beating them and then the ghost of
the unknown king shows up (spooky!) and gives you Minotaur's card also. They're
both excellent corner cards y' know.

Get outta the tomb when you're done and get back to Deling City.

Strong like stones, the brothers Sacred and Minotaur have replaced
Titan in the series. Their summon attack, Brotherly Love, really puts
on a good show and crushes enemies in their paths with falling rocks
and stones. Although it's strong in their own element, Brothers'
summon is probably the least useful out of all GFs in the game since
earth elemental attacks are not all that useful in the first place.
It can get most jobs done if you're good at Boost though. Ability
wise, Brothers resembles mostly Shiva in that not very many of their
skills stand out, but it's still a useful GF that offers a good deal
of Junction Abilities. The part that makes Brothers really shine is
its ability to raise one's HP to the extreme, easily turning a
weakling into a giant pincushion.
Best abilities: HP+40%/80%, HP Bonus

> GF Check! Set a new ability for your new GF Brothers. Boost should come first
especially if you decide to do a tiny bit of powering up for the 10AP needed.
Then Spr-J would be as good as anything (since you'll only have 1GF that offers
the same ability that this point.) HP+40% is also very good but remember, it's
also very expensive.

---Things to do #2---
Ok this is quite a minor thing but if you're the kind of person like me who got
really excited after getting a previously unobtainable Kiros' card and wants
more, you can continue with the Queen of Cards quest now.

> Card Check! Return to Dollet to visit your old friend the Queen of Cards. Save
at the hidden SP located upstairs at the pub and challenge her to a card game.
Deliberately try to lose the Sacred card and get her back to Balamb.

> To loose a specific card, choose to use that card plus 4 really cheap cards
like Funguar that I bet you guys all have many. Just loose the game and they're
sure to choose the card you want to loose. If you're playing Direct (arrgghh!!),
you can probably trade your cheap cards for something better by leaning the
strong(er) side of your weak cards against a weak(er) side of your opponent's
card but make sure that she cannot take it back afterwards.

> You don't have to get her to go back to Balamb really, but the problem is that
the probability for her to return to Dollet is exceptionally low in ALL cities
in the world, and you can ONLY get access to the information about the new cards
in Dollet, meaning you'll have to do lots of resetting. Anyhow, it seems that
the probability for her to return to Dollet is at its highest in Balamb, making
it the best choice when you don't have many choices.

> You can't really get the new card until FH in disc 2 though. :( But you can
win back the Sacred card from her son.

EX TIP - Getting Lion Heart in Disc 1! ========================================
Thanks to XP39C@aol.com for this trick.

Although it is time consuming, you can get Squall's Lion Heart weapon now, as
all the necessary ingredients are available right now. The required items are:
           1x Adamantine
           4x Dragon Fangs
          12x Pulse Ammo

The only way to get Adamantines at this stage is from modding the Minotaur card
that you've just received. Dragon Fangs can be gotten from carding Grendels and
there's a chance that it may drop one for you. The most tedious ingredients are
the Pulse Ammo. You had to be a keen card player in Balamb and accumulated 20
Elnoyle cards. They can be refined into 20 Pulse Ammo from Ifrit's Ammo-RF. You
can also win back Minotaur's card from the CC gang in disk 4, so it's not like
it's gone forever. However...

I reckon this isn't worth the amount of time it takes. You've only got about an
hour worth of game left for disk 1, and Squall's not available for SEVERAL
missions in disk 2. I reckon if you want to get Lion Heart early, do it on disk
2. You can grab a piece of Adamantine from the robot boss in FH and doing
Irvine's quest in FH nets you 5 FREE Pulse Ammo, reducing the number of Elnoyle
cards required down to just 10.

Or if you've decided not to mod the Lion Heart, you can always obtain Squall's
Blasting Zone finisher by modifying his Shear Trigger to either a Cutting
Trigger, Twin Lance, Flame Saber or Punishment (if you haven't already done so.)
Blasting Zone is not a very good move if you ask me, although it seems to be the
one that's triggered the most out of all his finishers.

A Cutting Trigger is easy, modding Mesmerize's card for the blade. You can get
Betrayal Blades and Turtle Shells needed for the Flame Saber from modding
Forbidden's and Adamantoise's cards respectively. The ingredients needed for the
other 2 models are rarer since you won't have fought the enemies that drop them
and they require many higher level cards. I got Flame Saber at this point.

Make your way back to Deling City and talk to the guy in front of Caraway's
Mansion, but before you do that, don't forget to buy some Normal and/or Shotgun
Ammo for Irvine if you don't have any, without them he'll be shooting blanks.
Alternately, you can refine them from Ifrit's Ammo-RF and you may even be able
to afford more advanced deals like Dark Ammo etc. Screws gotten from Geezard are
an inexpensive source of Normal Ammo. Also note Normal and Fast Ammo are
interchangeable using Ammo-RF as well.

Give your code to the guy in front of the mansion, remember, you have to input
the ones, then tens and then the hundreds digits in that order.

Get inside the mansion and after Rinoa runs away, Caraway will appear and give
out detailed explanations about this mission. You'll have to follow him around
town for it but do pay attention to his briefings. When you're ready, talk to
him again in his mansion of begin the mission. You'll divide into 2 teams:
         Gateway team: Quistis, Zell, Selphie
         Sniper team:  Squall, Irvine
Notice that Rinoa is in neither team, but it doesn't mean that she does not come
into play here.

When General Caraway and the Sniper team leaves, you'll control Quistis. Try to
leave and she'll bump into Rinoa who said that she has a plan. Quistis then does
her Judge Judy impersonation and leaves.

You'll then take control of Squall and Irvine, just follow the rest of the gang
as the general takes you guys to your stands. The scene then switches back to
Quistis who wants to apologize to Rinoa, so move back to the mansion. You don't
need to alter your junctions just yet.

Inside the mansion, Rinoa escapes but Quistis arrives and gets locked in!

You'll now play as Rinoa alone. Save at the SP and descend into the manhole if
you wish. You can remove the GFs from the other characters and junction then on
her if you want, but it's just way too much of a fuss since this scene is short.

Inside the sewers, just keep heading left to get Weapon Mon May at the dead end.
If you encounter any fights just run. If you want to card, ignore the Red Bats
since they're so weak! The Creeps are okay but Angelo Rush can come at the
unexpected moment so I suggest you just run.

Climb the crates once outside to get to the sorceress' chamber then sneak up to
her. Watch the awesome FMV and Edea's speech.

Gateway team
Quistis' team is being locked inside the mansion. Selphie and Zell will search
for clues. The lady in the painting and the maiden statute will hint a way outta
here, cups! Grab a glass off the shelve and examine the status to open a doorway
to the sewers.

There's another SP down the stairs. You don't really have to re-junction your
character for this scene as it's exceptionally short and not worth the effort.
Just climb the ladder and you can climb the first water wheel to get to an upper
path. The scene will end after a little walk, then the parade starts.

Sniper team
Watch another exceptionally cool FMV and sneak into the palace after Irvine.
Climb the crates like Rinoa did but do junction yourselves properly this time,
as a fight is coming up.

> Junction Check! Junction all your GFs on Squall and Irvine, try to spread them
out a little so each character gets the Junction Ability for all 5 main
attributes. As for commands, Attack, GF, Magic and Draw would be ideal.

> Magic Check! Not much here yet but if you want a lot of Break spells, give any
Breaks your guys already have to a non-active member.

> GF Check!
  - Siren: You should have gotten ST-Defx2 already, so the rest don't matter so
much. Treatment is good but it's likely that Siren's level is a bit too low to
acquire that skill. Remember to get it once she's level 12 later ok?
  - Diablos: If you really have been training hard, his HP-J, Hit-J
and maybe even Darkside ain't bad either.
  - Brothers: Spr-J is quite important in the up and coming battles. I don't
think Str-J is that crucial since a couple of other GFs should have it too, so
move on to their HP+40%.

Move all the way to the sorceress' chamber and you'll see Rinoa being attacked.

Iguions - LV12     HP944
          Draw: Cure, Esuna, Break, GF Carbuncle
          Weak vs: Earth, Holy
          Immune: Fire, Poison

Not much of a threat really. Their Magma Breath will set a Petrifying countdown
on a character but it's easily remedied by drawing Esunas from them. They have a
combination attack called Resonance, a pretty strong attack to both characters,
just draw Cure from them. If you don't have HP-J, Resonance is gonna hit you
pretty hard.

> GF Check! Do NOT forget to draw the GF Carbuncle!

They have Break, a fairly good spell to draw. If you're planning to draw from
them, get rid of one of them first so to stop Resonance. Simply use either guy's
Limit Break when you're in critical condition to dispose of one. (Use Normal
Ammo for Irvine.)

If you just wanna move on, summon Brothers coupled with Boost to get rid of both
of them in one hit! (I sure did!)

Mug: 6x G-Returners (each)
Win: 8x G-Returners (both)
AP: 20

Rinoa will join you here, but you don't have to alter your junctions just yet.
Return to the previous screen and examine the TINY hatch to the right side of
the hall (you'd have to be skinny like Nicole Ritchie to fit in there!) In the
next room, just examine the rifle and Squall'll pass it to Irvine. After a bit
of dialogue, Irvine will freak out and refuse to shoot.

I wonder how the mother of all useless summoned beasts made it into
FFVIII while some of the more useful ones in the series like Golem
didn't. Carbuncle is a cute cuddly toy, and it's unique for its large
ruby embedded on its forehead, capable of emitting a ray of light
that envelops its masters in an anti-magic barrier. Its trademark
skill Ruby Light does exactly that, but it's probably the least
useful action in the whole game as the Reflect status is really a
double edged sword, both positive and negative magic will be
reflected. On toppa that, Reflect has no effect towards some of the
more damaging spells like Meteor, Tornado and Quake, making it as
pointless as it gets. Carbuncle is a defensive GF, giving many
abilities involving the user's Vit and HP. Its Abilityx3 skill will
give a second character the chance to try out 3 Character/Party
Abilities at once. Its only Menu Ability, Recover Med-RF may not be
very useful in itself but it proves to be a big potential moneymaker.
Best abilities: Abilityx3, ST-Atk, ST-Defx2, Vit Bonus, Recover Med-RF

Gateway team
This scene picks up at where it was left off last time.

> Junction Check! Remove the GFs from Squall and Irvine and share it around
between 3 people. Put the Card command on someone as some enemies here are kinda
worth carding. Don't forget to junction your newly acquired GF Carbuncle to

This place sucks. It looks complicated but it's really linear.

1) Some gates leading left or right can be opened, just try examining them
2) Certain ladders will fall flat across the sewer, allowing you to cross to the
other side
3) When you're stuck, try examining water wheels, as some of them can be
"ridden" and takes you to the platform above/below.

You may find a couple of side tracks but they only lead to Draw Points for
mediocre spells. There are no other treasures in the sewer. Also, remember the
waterwheels are one-way, once you get on, you can't drop back down! I won't give
the exactly details as no matter where you go, you can't go wrong here. Since
you can't backtrack, you will get to the end eventually. You'll know when you
see a hidden SP with a ladder going up near it.

> Magic Check! You can draw Waters from the Grand Mantis and Life from Creeps.
There are also 3 DPs in the sewers: Esuna, Zombie and Bio (in that order.)

> GF Check! Brothers should move onto HP+40% and Carbuncle should start by
learning Recover Med-RF. I also recommend that you grab just 10AP here. You'll
thank me later.

If you encounter Red Bats, ignore or run from them since they're quite
impossible to weaken as they're too weak in the first place already. Against
Creeps, use a basic elemental spell or two like Fire. I usually just stick Enc-
None on someone and run through it.

At one point in the sewer, you'll come across a falling ladder that lets you
cross to the side where you first started, where you can take the ladder and
return to the stairs leading to Caraway's Mansion. You can encounter Grand
Mantis here. They also drop Sharp Spikes but are very strong.

Get to the end and climb the ladder. Watch another set of awesome FMVs, throw
the switch when Zell says so.

Gateway team
Seeing how the Gateway team fulfilled their task on time, it is now up to Irvine
to shoot down their target. Watch how Squall talks Irvine into it, did that look
like a "Lone wolf" to you? (Official character overviews can be so deceiving at
times.) Anyway, Irvine finally picks up the rifle and blasts at the sorceress,
but it got bounced right off a "Protect-like" barrier thing. It's now time for
plan B, frontal assault.

> Junction Check! Remove the GF from the other members and junction them to
Squall, Irvine and Rinoa. Don't just use the Switch Junction but you should re-
junction everyone from scratch. Give Spr-J to whoever didn't receive HP-J (you
should have 2 of each) and junction good spells to them. Each character should
have the commands: Attack, Magic, GF, Draw/Item. Equip any Spr+??% skills if you
have them. You need to put Diablos on Squall and equip the Mug command, the
other GFs you can do as you like.

> GF Check!
  - Diablos: Any of his Junction Abilities would be fine
  - Carbuncle: Recover Med-RF, remember you'll gain 20AP in the next fight, so
if you've gotten 10AP in the sewer you will be able to master it in this fight.

Seifer - LV6     HP345
         Draw: Fire, Cure, Life
         Weak vs: Poison

Squall will have to fight Seifer alone, but he's a piece of cake. You shouldn't
have any problems here. Even Squall's regular attacks can take him down easily
if you junctioned good spells to his Str.

Make sure you Mug him, as he holds the rare Hero item although it is very rare.
Don't use trigger, cuz he has sissy HP and if you don't succeed, heal him before
you do it again.

Mug: Hero
Win: Nothing

Edea - LV8     HP3400
       Draw: Cura, Dispel, Life, Double

This can be an easy fight if you summon Carbuncle with someone to put up Reflect
on all your guys (this is also the only fight Carbuncle comes in useful.) Edea's
AI will then be screwed up as she'll continuously cast Dispel on all your
characters until all Reflects are destroyed. She'll sometimes use her "physical"
attack Astral Punch though, but that's extremely weak.

For offence, just use your regular attacks (my Squall was doing ~1000 damage to
her at this point) or summon high level GFs like Ifrit. Don't bother with Siren,
as Edea is powerful enough that she cannot be Silenced at all. If you like
spells, Water is a good and cheap spell to cast, just draw Double from her and
use it on yourself.

Her draw list is pretty disappointing for the "most powerful sorceress in the
world". You can Mug her for an Elixir.

Mug: Elixir
Win: Nothing
AP: 20

The fight ends with a pissed off Edea, as she unleashes her Limit Break and
nails Squall. Is this the end?

========================= End of Disc 1 =============================

============================ Disc 2 =================================
Disc 2's in most long RPGs are mostly drag-ons, making a game longer with boring
events, it's more so in FFVIII. The first half of this disc is exceptionally
linear, but you can have a good long break from the story halfway through it,
with a good number of side quests and secrets.

---Win a hill---
My first reaction was "What the? Did I put in the wrong game?" at the start of
this disc, since you're given a scene that has absolutely no relation to the one
you've just seen. Anyway, you're Laguna and a little girl runs up to your room
and tell you someone's here to see you.

> Magic Check! A hidden DP to the left of the door has Curaga.

Go down the stairs and make your way to the next door down. Yay, Kiros is here!
You'll then get to have a conversation to see what Laguna had been up to for all
this time. After some more of Laguna's trademark pointless conversations with
Ellone, Kiros joins you to go monster hunting outdoors.

> NOTE! Kiros is Irvine this time, so you won't have to worry about him being
magic-less after the fight with Edea on the previous disc, although it makes
absolutely no sense if you think about an event later in the disc.

> Junction Check! Junction all your GF to both guys. Make sure one of them
doesn't have any spells in Str-J or junction weak spells to it as you need to
make weak hits, and give the other the Card command.

> GF Check!
  - Diablos: He should have gotten all of his major abilities so just go with
his -J abilities for the moment if you haven't done so.
  - Carbuncle: Recover Med-RF should be ready to put to the test as a
big-bucks maker. If you haven't learned it yet, do it now. After that starting
working on the -J abilities.
  -Brothers: HP+40%

Outside you'll encounter Caterchipillars and Bite Bugs. They're really weak so
that's why you need to have no Str-J to deal with them. Attack them with Kiros
twice and card them with Laguna. If you don't need the AP, stick on Enc-None.

The objective here is to make it to the town's entrance, so do it anyway you
like, just don't miss the DPs on the way.

> Magic Check! The town square has a DP for Dispel, there's one near the flower
shop for Drain and if you take the right path, you'll end up near a cliff with a
non-recoverable and hidden DP for Reflect.

After you reach the town entrance, Laguna will have a chat with Kiros and they
decide to head back. Before you do so, you might wanna try the trick below.

> NOTE! Ripping off Laguna
Have you noticed that Squall and Laguna will share the same inventory BUT not
the same cash account? So, Laguna has 3000 Gil to spend, if you purchase
something in his scenario, Squall'll receive them as if they were free! This is
the only Laguna scenario where you have the access to a shop so buy anything you
like until Laguna's broke, though Tents are really the only thing useful.

Return the way you came and Laguna will chat some more with Kiros. Go back to
Raine's bar and head up stairs. After another cut scene, Laguna will report how
many monsters they've killed or carded. If you didn't fight you'll get a big fat
zero, but it doesn't seem to matter. Now return to Laguna's room in the house
next door and choose to rest. His scenario will end.

---Is cheapness contagious?---
Zell wakes up inside a cell with Rinoa, Selphie and Quistis, he had been in the
dream world too as Ward. After a fairly long sequence, Rinoa will get taken
I suggest that you save the Moomba as it's cute having it following you for a
long time. You'll also see scenes with Seifer torturing Squall. Make sure you
select "Let me die!" here for Squall.

The team plans for a jailbreak but their weapons have been snatched away. Zell
came up with a good idea to go reclaim all of the weapons since he fights with
his fists.

> Junction Check! Take off the GFs and put them on Zell. Make sure you equip
Enc-None. Also make sure Zell has several Break spells in his inventory.

You'll be on the 7th floor of the prison. Before you start I suggest you move
DOWN one floor to 6th, as there's a convenient SP right there. Then take the
stairs up to 8th floor and you'll see 2 guards toying around with the team's
weapons. Approach them and you'll have to fight. Cast Break on them for no EXP,
otherwise you can summon a GF to kill them if you have enough of a buffer.

Now that you've claimed your weapons, it's time to give the guards a run for
their money. Watch the awesome sequence where your team shows off their skills!
(Especially how Selphie handles her nunchakus.)

> Junction Check! Remove the GFs from Squall and Irvine and replace them on the
trio, make sure your Magic attributes are good. Everything else ain't as
important but give the GF command to whoever that gets Siren. Give Mug to
someone too. I had:
         Zell: Ifrit, Siren, Carbuncle
         Quistis: Shiva, Diablos
         Selphie: Quezacotl, Brothers

You'll then get a visit from your old friends, Bigg and Wedge, who are not very
happy after the Dollet incident. They attack your team.

Biggs - LV9     HP1671
        Draw: Cure, Haste, Slow, Regen

Wedge - LV9     HP1608
        Draw: Fire, Shell, Protect, Reflect

This battle is again pretty easy, and again, they have good spells worthy to
spend time to draw. The most valuable spell is probably Wedge's Reflect, as
they're excellent for Spr-J even though they're lousy by themselves. Biggs'
Regen is also fairly decent for junctions at this point of the game (HP/Vit)
unless you've got loads of better spells. Biggs also holds Haste and Slow. You
can get some of them if you want but keep in mind that both of them (especially
the latter) can be refined extremely conveniently from Diablos' Time Mag-RF. So
just get some if you like.

Their attacks are fairly weak, but they do occasionally cast spells. The first
thing to do in this fight is to summon Siren to Silence both of them, or they'll
cast annoying spells all the time.

Oh yeah, mug them if you have the command. You can get a rare Regen Ring from
one of them, compared to the crappy Potion or something for defeating them.

When you're satisfied with your stock load of drawn spells, just summon a high
level GF to kill them off. Or use your Limit Breaks or whatever.

Mug: Regen Ring (Biggs), Strength Love (Wedge)
Win: ?
AP: 10

Now you'll have the freedom of exploring the complex, however, when you step out
of your cell the alarm sounds as monsters are released. The random encounters
here aren't really worth it, as a lot of the time you can run into soldiers or
enemies that can't be carded. I usually just stick Enc-None on someone to get
through this part.

We wanna save our game first though. There's a SP on floor 1, 6 and 10, the
nearest of course is floor 6. Every floor follows the same pattern, and there
are 2 doors on each floor (left and right), some are locked, some contain very
good items. I'll list what's contained on each floor. Also, on some floors
there's a barrier separating the stairs up from the stairs down, so you'll have
to take the long way around.

Floor 1: Hidden Save Point (left), Combat King 001 (right, it's on the floor)
Floor 2: Pet NameTag (left), Str Up (right)
Floor 3: Pet House (right)
Floor 4: Tent (left)
Floor 5: Card player 1/500 Gil (right)
Floor 6: Save Point (near stairs up)
Floor 7: You start in left room
Floor 8: CC Joker (left)
Floor 9: Berserk DP (right)
Floor 10: SP (left), Card player 2/300 Gil (right)
Floor 11: Card player 3/200 Gil (left), Thundaga DP (right)
Floor 12: Nothing of interest

> NOTE! There's a man from garden on floor 8 and he sells you items. Remember
him, because he's actually Joker of the CC gang from Balamb Garden! You can also
sell stuff that you don't need at his store too.

There are prisoners on certain floors that will play cards with you FOR MONEY!
Player 1 charges 500 Gil, player 2 300 Gil and player 3 charges 200 Gill per
game. It is unlikely that you will run out of Gil but if you do, and you've
learned Carbuncle's Recovery Med-RF you can start manking infinite money. Just
check below for it. Card players 1 and 3 will also give you items when you win
and player 2 will upgrade your tutorial and give you Character Report. They both
give you Potion, Eye Drop and Remedy. Lets see their rare stuff:

Card player 1 (500 Gil)
Gysahl Greens, Mega Phoenix, Phoenix Pinion, LUCK UP!
-> He also uses all LV6 boss cards.

Card player 3 (200 Gil)
Hi-Potion+, Holy Stone, Mega Potion, HP Up and ROSETTA STONE!!!
-> He uses LV5 cards and has really really screwed up AI!

As you can see that you can score some very rare and very good stuff. However,
your chances are random... and crappy at that. If you are patient or lucky, you
could farm them here. You might as well bang your head against the wall, cuz
they're pretty rare. I do recommend that if you are going to play here for a
little while grab yourself just ONE Rosetta Stone. Studies have shown that
people who spend too much time here tend to go crazy, so knock yourselves out.

Having said that, if you do manage to grab a Rosetta Stone you can start
powering up your characters as soon as you get GF Leviathan and that's not too
long away! Some players like to have a couple of their characters built up and
although there's a slim chance you may get a Rosetta Stone during the Balamb
mission, this is still your best bet at securing one early.

When you get to the top, free Squall in the room and you'll get Squall back. If
you said "Let me die!" before, the 3 Moombas where will offer to break down the
barriers separating from the stairs up to the stairs down for 3 floor, just
choose which ones you like. The team decides to get to the bottom via the crane
while Zell operated the machinery in the control room. When you get to the
bottom you find that it's all covered in sand and have to get back up again.

Then Zell's in trouble. When you control Zell, hold the left stick down to make
him run clockwise to the next screen, if you do it correctly, the guard will
barely miss Zell, else you'll have to fight the guard. If you do it's no biggie,
just cast Break.

After some more cut scenes, Irvine shows up with Rinoa and the team gets
reunited yay! You'll now have to divide into 2 teams again, Squall's team will
look for an exit to the top level, Irvine's team will hold the enemies back.

Choose whoever you wish but remember, Rinoa is a mandatory member in Squall's
team and Irvine's team don't have to fight the boss, so choose someone with good
abilities as the third team member in Squall's team. I recommend Quistis if
she's learned most of her abilities now (like Mighty Guard), else Selphie.

Squall's team
> Junction Check! Hopefully, you've exchanged the junctions from the other
characters, and keep that Enc-None equipped at all times. Keep the Mug command.

Movin' on up. This is also your last chance to play some last minute cards.

Irvine's team
Not much here really. You don't have to exchange all the junctions since they're
not going to fight anyway. Just exchange whoever has Diablos with the Enc-None
ability to one of the guys in Irvine's team and climb the stairs down.

Squall's team
You should see 2 Moombas, talk to them to get a Cottage and a Rename Card. Take
back Diablos and keep movin' until you reach a round platform with a computer
terminal. The computer is there just for decoration but what you really wanna do
is to equip Siren's Move-Find to review the hidden SP to the right. Save there
and move up a bit more to trigger a boss fight.

Elite Soldier - LV8     HP229
                Draw: Fire, Blizzard, Thunder, Scan
                Weak vs: Poison

GIM52A - LV8     HP1736
         Weak vs: Lightning, Earth, Water
         Immune: Poison

The guys are hardly worth mentioning. Only reasons they count as boss is because
they give no EXP. The Elite Soldier is most annoying as he keep casting support
spells like Aura/Shell on the robots and negative ailment spells like Meltdown
on you! The robots are big damage makers with Micro Missile.

Attack and kill the soldier first with Squall, it should do the job in one hit
if you junctioned his Str properly. Otherwise you can disable him with Silence.

With him out of the way it should be easy. Cast Wall with Selphie's Slots after
Micro Missile if you can. If you need healing, use Selphie's Full Cure or
Quistis' White Wind.

Remember that I told you to keep Mug? Well, if you steal from the robots you can
get a Missile which lets Quistis learn their special attack Micro Missile for
your own use. Of course, you can just win them and you'll get more Missile if
you do it that way, but you might get screwed with... Screws instead.

Kill them however you like (Limit, GF, regular attacks etc..)

Mug: Missile (each GIM52A), Tent (Elite Soldier)
Win: 4x Screws (each GIM52A), small chance of Missiles
AP: 8

After the battle, have Quistis learn Micro Missile. Save again if you like.
Irvine's team sends a message and Squall will aid them with the computer
terminal. Now just head out to the bridge.

After an awesome and death threatening FMV, the bridge give away and Squall is
stuck hanging onto the platform. Careful here, you can get a Game Over if you
don't do it right. Just keep moving to the right until you can't move any more,
then the scene will end.

Hopefully you didn't see the Game Over screen earlier. The team will drive away
in 2 cars, but Irvine didn't get to sit with the ladies.

---Haha, missed me by a mile... NOT!---
The team arrives in the desert, Irvine tells you that Edea's planning to bomb
both Trabia and Balamb Garden with missiles.

> Magic Check! A DP for Aero is here.

Keep talking to Selphie to get on with this scene. Then you see missiles being
launched at Trabia. The group suggest that you divide into two teams again,
Squall'll lead the team back to Balamb Garden to warn people of the missiles
while Selphie will lead a lead to infiltrate the Missile Base and try to
stop/delay the launch.

Here's my recommendation:
         Missile Base team           Balamb Garden team
             Selphie                       Squall
             Irvine                        Rinoa
             Zell                          Quistis

The lovebirds (Selphie and Irvine) will be happy, but Irvine is a great member
to support Selphie's team. Also, her team needs heavy offenses so Zell makes
another excellent member. As for Squall's team, Rinoa is basically there for the
FMV (yup, that's all she's good for) but Quistis is absolutely marvellously
useful with her newly acquired Micro Missile at carding the enemies.

---We're the train-stealers---
The group separates again and you'll control Squall's team. This is an extremely
short scene so just head left to the engine of the train and the scene will
automatically take place. The member on the bottom slot of your team gets to
mock the soldier.

---Is that a rocket in your pants or are you just happy to see me?---
The scene switches to Selphie's team and you get to control her even on the
world map, yay! Oh yeah, you have a car too, but it can still run out of fuel,
so don't get "carried away" . (Ok, bad joke, but I ran out of fuel in my first
game when I took the car for a cruise.) You also seem to have been given 1 unit
of Fuel in your inventory, just in case.

> Card Check! The card maniacs will be happy to know that another rare card is
available for grabs after a long, card-less journey. Head back to Deling City
with Selphie and enter Caraway's Mansion. General Caraway has Rinoa's card but
he refuses to use it if you don't loose your Ifrit's card to him first. So do it
and after a couple of rounds, he'll use Rinoa's card. Talk to him about cards
after you won Rinoa, he said he's lost it to Martine, no wonder, since he uses
such crappy card. Don't worry, we'll be getting Ifrit back in a teeny weeny

> Note you don't have to make this side trip now, you can always come back later
after you've obtained more mobile means of transport. However since you're in
the neighborhood you might as well do it now than having to make a separate trip
later. Convenience is everything.

Get back to the Missile Base by heading west. You're suppose to drive into the
place but if you walk instead, you'll see the funniest scene in the game!

The gang parks the car in the parking lot and comes out dressed in Galbadia
uniforms. It's funny here if you took Irvine along. Just enter the room and save
at the SP.

> Junction Check! Not much to say here but just the usual, I usually use the
auto-junction command to set my characters automatically (favoring magic) but do
check your Elem and ST Def and Atks, since the game usually junction attributes
you don't want. (It's a good idea to keep your Elem-Atks free of spells.) You
don't have to fight for a while so you can readjust later if you want.

> GF Check!
  - Diablos: Hit-J, Character Abilities after that
  - Brothers: HP+40%
  - Carbuncle: Vit+20% and Vit+40%

Examine the left ID card slot and Irvine'll give you a card he found in the car,
which is accepted. Since this is a reconnaissance mission so it's a good idea to
AVOID ALL FIGHTING. You will get penalties on your SeeD rank everytime you get
discovered. If you do everything perfectly you can raise TWO ranks at the end of
this mission.

You'll meet many soldiers within the complex and they'll ask you questions. The
answers you give back are usually divided into 3 types: Talk your way out of it,
run away and fight. Choose to talk your way out of as many situations as you can
because not only you get to hear some of the craziest excuses Selphie makes up
(and how the idiots actually believes her!), you'll also avoid fights. If you
choose to run away, the soldiers will realize that you're a fake and sends some
monsters at you.

To get pass the first guard, just act casual or whatever, although you do get to
see a funny scene if you choose the second option. Two more screens after that
you'll reach an intersection-like platform with a computer to the right.

> Magic Check! If you take the exit to the left, you'll reach a hidden DP with
Blind on the same platform as 2 guards who looks like they're urinating at the
edge of the platform. The central room has a DP for Full-Life!! (And it's
recoverable too!)

What to do here is to talk to the soldiers near the Blind DP then go into the
central room and talk to one of the guards, then go back again. They'll want you
to do a favor of checking the control room or something like that.

So head back to the place where you saw the first guard and tell him you're
there to take over.

> Magic Check! Another DP in here has Blizzara, if you even bother that is.

Have Selphie screw around with the key panels, do what you like here. All of a
sudden the lights went out as the power had been cut off. Exit the room and
you'll bump into 2 guards. Choose to talk your way out of it (funny) and you'll
dispose of them anyway.

Head back into the intersection platform and try to get pass through the central
door, a commander steps out but just play along and help him. You know what they
say - "No pain, no gain" so you won't get anywhere without putting in some
labour, so help the guard to push the large don't-know-what to the right. You'll
then get to operate the computer.

> Magic Check! The Full-Life DP should be active again so get yourselves another
pump before sayin' goodbye to it. :(

Operate the computer and all your gotta do here is just change the type of
missile and set the  Error Ratio to the maximum and hope that the missiles will
miss Balamb Garden. Then upload the data and you're all set. Save your game.

Try get up the stairs to the right. You'll meet up with another commander but
talking your way out of it doesn't work this time, since he's the only smart one
around here and knows that your salute is wrong. So you do have to fight.

They're waaaaay too easy, one hit and they're gone. But you might want to draw
some Confuses. Like Berserk, they're useless by themselves but are excellent in
ST-Def later. The soldiers also have Reflect if you want some. You WILL gain EXP
for this fight cuz Break doesn't work. But killing your guys off is sometimes a
bit more hassle than its worth so if you have enough of a buffer, just summon a
GF to wipe them out and hopefully the EXP you gain for this fight won't do much
harm. Otherwise you'll have to kill your guys off and let the one with the
highest "EXP 'til level up" guy handle it.

> Junction Check! Junction Quezacotl to Selphie because she should still have a
high Compatibility with it after the Dollet event. Junction good spells to both
Zell and Irvine's Str (ie, Quake if you have it, or Demi or something like
Equip Enc-None now, but you don't have to bother with Mug.

After the fight, make sure you check your junctions now so you won't have to do
it with the timer on. Just examine the computer terminal to the left. Enter the
next room and set the self-destruct sequence. If you're feeling confident with
the game and wants a pay raise, choose 10 minutes to rise your SeeD level by 2.

> NOTE! For the up coming battle, you might want to put Zell and Irvine at
critical by swapping junctions with another member and change back.

Choose your time and if it's 20 minutes or below, you can use the shortcut to
the right, which leads to the first room with the card-locked doors. If I
remember correctly, all the SPs disappears for no reason, which is a pain. Exit
the door and you'll see a long sequence with the timer ON (which is frustrating
but shouldn't be a problem.) A large robot comes in and you'll have to fight
another boss.

BGHZ51F2 - LV8     HP: 5600
           Draw: Shell, Protect, Stop
           Weak vs: Lightning, Earth, Water
           Immune: Poison

A large robot but its attacks are quite weak, it has a high defense though,
which can be a problem. It has Stop in its draw list, but the last thing you
want to think about is drawing with a timer on right?

What you do here is to let Selphie repeatedly summon Quezacotl like in the X-
ATM092 fight and aid it with Boost. If you've acquired the SumMag+??% then it'll
be great too. Otherwise, just repeatedly cast Waters, a cheap and fairly decent
spell or Thundagas. I used a fully maxed out Quezacotl with good boost and it
did JUST enough damage to kill it in one hit.

Irvine and Zell should be in critical if you did the swap junction trick so just
unleash their Limit Breaks to make this fight a breeze. It should only take like
2 minutes.

With the robot out of the way, you'll have to fight the soldiers. One cool thing
is to let Selphie charge up for Quezacotl when the robot is almost dead, then
have Zell unleash a long and powerful chain combo with his Duel and kill it.
When the guards arrive, Quezacotl should kill them before they can even act!

Mug: Nothing
Win: Weapon Mon Jun, 4x Potions (soldiers)
AP: 24

The gate shuts locking Selphie's team in.. Oh no! Oh well, I'm sure they'll
survive since even Squall survived after Edea's chilling spikes!

---Hanging Garden of Balamb---
The scene will switch back to Squall's team, who has just made it back to Balamb
Garden. It's total chaos back here, SeeDs and cadets running around like
headless chickens.

> Junction Check! Swap all the junctions from Selphie's team but do equip the
Card command on either Squall or Rinoa. Swapping the junctions will make your
characters critical. It's also a good idea to heal Rinoa so that her Angelo Rush
doesn't come and ruin and party.

You'll be mistaken for Cid's followers and those guys dressed in cult-ish
clothing will send monsters at you. They're easy so simply use Quistis' Micro
Missile (since she's in critical status) and card them.

You have to search every area in the garden, and each time you'll have to fight.
I'd clear the dorms first because there's a SAVE POINT there! (Imagine having to
do Missile Base again. Yuck!) Here's the list of enemies and what you are given
for each area that you free.

Garden gates: Grat, Caterchipiller
Dormitory: Caterchipiller
Cafeteria: Bomb (Gysahl Greens, also a hidden Demi DP)
Quad: Bomb, Glacial Eye (X-Potion)
Parking: Grendel (Tent)
Training Center: T-Rexaur (Remedy)
Infirmary: Granaldo# (Elixir)
Library: Grat (Remedy... maybe more?)

#Note the enemy at the Infirmary is a Granaldo, an ex-boss. It's counted as a
boss so you cannot card it but you will gain around 185EXP for defeating it. So
the best thing to do here is to be ignorant and let the SeeD members take care
of their own business. If you do that then you won't receive the Elixir.

Thanks to Niek for this trick! Also thanks to Sir_Elan from gfaqs boards for
confirming this.

In prevous versions of this guide I said that if you go to the library last you
will receive a Rosetta Stone. I have received numerous emails that this doesn't
work. However, Sir_Elan has brought to my attention that he DID receive a
Rosetta Stone here. So how is it that no one else is getting one? That is the
big mystery. I myself have only gotten a Remedy everytime. Unless the way to get
it is by having a specific combination of party members? Or by fulfilling some
other pre-requisit? Either way, if you get one then it's great, if you don't
then just move on. It's like winning the lottery really.

In previous versions, I said you have to clear all sections before you can move
on. However it seems that is untrue. All you have to do is clear ONE section
(dorms don't count) and the students will tell you about Xu. Then you can
trigger the next event. I would personally still clear out each area just for
the sake of it. If you head back to the lobby and you'll see Xu sneaking up the
elevator. Follow her to the second floor at the end of the hall. After a bit of
conversation she'll take you to see Cid. After a long scene in Cid's room, he
gives Squall a key that takes them to the MD level in search of a way to save
the Garden.

Take the elevator and suddenly the power goes off, you'll have to climb down
from the evacuation hatch. All of a sudden the elevator's power comes back and
it descends after you at full speed. Watch as your team make the grand escape.
Open another hatch and descend into the sewer like piping and Quistis will tell
you some tips on Elem-Atk.

> Junction Check! This place is full of sissy enemies like Blood Souls and
Blobras that give you crap and are very resistant to attacks, so I'd avoid
carding here and stick on Enc-None. Although you do occasionally encounter Tri-
Faces that give you good stuff. Pack Mug with you too.

> GF Check!
  - Diablos: Should have gotten his -J abilities by now, or about to. Get his
Darkside next but it doesn't matter too much.
  - Brothers: HP+40% should be done, so I'd suggest moving on to the horribly
expensive HP+80%.
  - Carbuncle: Vit+40%

Follow the path and enter a room with a large wheel handle thingy. Open it (only
seems to open when all 3 characters are turning it) and go back to previous
A ladder has been created so make your way down the ladder into a large circular
room with a pillar in the middle.

> Magic Check! There's a DP (hidden) here with Full-Life

Have Squall climb the ladder and he'll fall into a room, activate the switch and
take the ladder back. Examine the blinking green light and take then ladder in
the foreground down to a platform with a SP. Examine the terminal near the SP to
open up the gate, then save because when you try to approach the gate, 2
monsters jump out of the water and attacks.

Oilboyle - LV7     HP2786
           Draw: Esuna, Blind, Cure, Confuse
           Weak vs: Fire
           Immune: Water

These 2 white squid-like thingies likes to spit oil on you, which does quite a
bit of damage for oil.

They have Confuse so draw some if you like, and if you haven't had the chance in
Missile Base. If one of your character gets inflicted by a status change, draw

You can steal 4 Fuels for your car by stealing from each Oilboyle,
which ain't the best items around but it sure beats the Magic Stones
or whatever you get for beating them.

Defeating them is easy, simply summon Ifrit will cause major damage. Try out
some of Quistis' Blue Magic for this fight, although Aqua Breath won't do much
good since they're immune to water. If you have gotten Fire Breath by exchanging
cards, use it to maximum effect. This is an easy boss.

Mug: 4x Fuel (each)
Win: 10x Wizard Stones
AP: 20

When it's over, make your way deeper into the structure and you'll eventually
get to some kinda power generator. Fiddle around with it and you'll eventually
see an awesome FMV where the Garden takes flight, barely escaping the missiles.

After some event, you're called to the balcony. Go there (on second floor) and
you'll get more FMVs and a special one if you bought Rinoa along. You are then
called back to Cid's office again, and you'll see how Squall pilots the Garden
to avoid Balamb town.

The next day, Squall'll be lying on his bed as Rinoa comes in and wants him to
show her around. Take her around the place if you wish. When you get to the
lobby, a Garden worker guy comes and tells you that Master NORG wants to see you
and tells to you go to the basement.

When you get down there, you'll see a very angry Cid loosing his temper, he
leaves and Quistis comes in.

> Junction Check! Make sure you have a good Spirit level, and Str for both Rinoa
an Squall. Take Mug for this fight. Junction Silence to ST-Def and give Item
command to someone. Try to exchange junctions to lower your characters' HP to
critical so you can abuse their Limit Breaks.

Then you'll be called to see NORG. YIKES! What is that THING? Squall reports to
NORG and it eventually gets angry and angrier and attacks.

Left Orb - LV9     HP597
           Draw: Thunder, Life
           Immune: All elements

Right Orb - LV9     HP597
            Draw: Dispel, Confuse, Slow
            Immune: All elements

NORG Pod - LV7     HP2000
           Draw: Cure
           Strong vs: Lightning
           Immune: Poison

NORG - LV9     HP6800
       Draw: Shell, Protect, Esuna, GF Leviathan
       Weak vs: Wind
       Immune: Poison

NORG fights in a tank thingy. The Left and Right Orbs have an insane Spr/Vit
level, high HP, immune to all elements and regenerates every round so it's
impossible to beat them. All you gotta do here is to beat NORG's Port.

Steal from the Left and Right Orbs will get you Mag Up and Spr Ups respectively,
don't miss them! My most recent game netted me TWO Mag Ups. NORG himself will
also give you a Cirlet item.

NORG loves to cast spells on you, including various elemental type spells.
Summon Carbuncle to bounce spells like Fira back to him but he can still cast
Tornado to hit you. If you need healing use items or Quistis' White Wind. As
long as you have HP-J, the spells won't hurt you bad.

If Squall is in critical, have him execute Renzokuken on NORG Port, otherwise
just summon some GFs like Shiva and Quezacotl, or just use a well junctioned
regular attack. It may take a while. When you defeat NORG Port, NORG himself
becomes available for targeting.

> GF Check! Don't for get to draw GF Leviathan from him.

NORG is weak against wind but casting Aero on him will still do less damage than
a well junctioned regular attack + trigger. Just use your regular attacks,
summon GF or Limit Break to take it down. Also, try to use Rinoa's Limit Break
to get Invincible Moon. Quistis' Gatling Gun and Aqua Breath also works well.

Mug: Mag Up (sometimes 2, Left Orb), Spr Up (Right Orb), Circlet (NORG)
Win: 8x Wizard Stone
AP: 20

> Magic Check! If you check the pod you'll find a hidden DP for Bio.

The giant serpent of the deep sea that swallows sailors is probably
the least exciting GF to many people since I'm sure you all have seen
movies/screenshots of this many many times since the FFVIII demo.
Anyway, we all know what the summon looks like but it's actually not
too bad, even though Quistis' Aqua Breath will often do more damage
in less time. Tsunami works well against a wide bunch of enemies
simply because they're rarely resistant towards it. One cool thing
about Tsunami is that if it kills an enemy, they'll get swept away
along with the water. Some of Leviathan's abilities are really cool
although it doesn't have that many of them, so Leviathan will get
boring quickly. Its Recover command is quite unique as it will heal a
single character to their full HP for free, but I'd say the Magic
command is more versatile. Leviathan also comes with 2 separate Menu
Abilities so it's still quite a handy GF to have around when you want
spells like Aura. The rest of its skills are a bit unbalanced, but
Leviathan's Spirit skills are nice to have around when fighting the
Best abilities: Recover, Spr Bonus, Supt Mag-RF, GF Med-RF

What to do now is to ask Cid in the Infirmary some questions and return to the
lobby where Xu catches up with you. Go back to the 2F balcony. Follow this event
to find the chick in green in the library and you'll see more of the plot,
wouldn't want to spoil it.

---Do you like fish?---     <'>>>><
The next day Rinoa goes to bother Squall again and when you're just about to
leave, the Garden goes boom and crashes into Fisherman's Horizon. Go to see Cid
and he wants you to go apologize to the people in FH. (Oh, letting other people
do his dirty work.) Head to the balcany in 2F and you can explore FH after a bit
of talk, god how I looooooove the music in this town! So what you do is just
keep following the platform, however...

> NOTE! On the platform where the elevator leads down, there's a VERY hard to
see ladder leading down. After you come off of the crane-line platform you are
on a platform that's attached to a white brick building in the background. A few
steps from the left edge of this building you should see some sorta black
ladder-like thing that runs all the way to the botoom. Take it. When you get to
the bottom platform, head all the way to the left, climb a few ladders in the
process and you should reach Master Fisherman, the guy you saw in the FMV. Talk
to him and apologize, he will give you Occult Fan III magazine. Speak to him
again and he mentions his pupil at the docks, we'll visit him in a bit. Remember
this place though, he hides a very good DP that you cannot get yet.

Get back to where you started and head all the way right this time. You'll be
able to take an industrial-sized elevator down to the bottom. You'll see some
steps leading down to what looks like a giant satellite dish with thousands of
channels, that's the mayor's house, or head right for some train tracks.

> Magic Check! Heading right you'll find a DP for Rege, next to a SP.

When you're down with it, follow the tracks down and you'll get to the
residential area. There's an amalgamated inn/shop to your left. If you head
upstairs you can grab a copy of Timber Maniacs. Take the right wooden planks to
get to the docks. There's a junk shop here as well as a Shell DP. Talk to the
kid on the boat, he's the Master Fisherman's student. You can talk to him 3
times for some comedy act.

Go back one screen. You can't enter the tower-thingy to the right, but you can
follow the tracks north. Grease Monkey lives to the house on the right, you'll
be getting some freebies here later, though you can pick up a copy of Timber
Maniacs on the floor here. Get back out. The train tracks have been closed up
the top so you'll have to exit to the left to the abandoned station entrance.

> Magic Check! You can find a Haste DP by going through the gates, but that's
the only thing still active here.

Go back all the way ad head down into the satellite dish-thingie. Go to the
mayor's house and they'll order you to leave as soon as possible in a sissy
kinda way because they say that they hate violence. After the scene is over,
there are still MORE goodies to be found.

> Magic Check! In the mayor's house is a hidden DP for Ultima! Of course,
something this good must be non-recoverable.

> Card Check! Mayor Dobe has Quezacotl's card. Try not to loose any rare cards
to him as it's very hard to get them back again.
> The mayor's wife has Irvine's card if you lost the Sacred's card to the Queen
of Cards like I've told you to above.
> Martine who sits outside the mayor's house uses many LV7 bosses cards that he
confiscated from students in Galbadia Garden so you might want to play a few
hands with him. (He's slow though.) Also, if you lost Ifrit's card to General
Caraway, you can win it back now.

When you're on your way out, calls for help indicates that Galbadia soldiers are
invading. The stupid mayor tries to talk his way out of it and his wife blames
it all on you! Gosh what a bunch of sissies!

> Junction Check! Give your characters appropriate junctions and spread your GFs
around, Vitality is very important here.  Give someone Mug and Enc-None.

> GF Check!
  - Diablos: Think you've gotten all his important abilities already? Not yet,
he's such an exceptional GF as if you learn HP+20%, you'll unlock his +40% and
+80%!!! Wow, you'll almost never get bored with him.
  - Brothers: HP+80% takes ages!
  - Carbuncle: Vit+40%
  - Leviathan: Don't get Boost first a lot of AP is gonna be a wasted, instead
get its Supt Mag-RF first. After that get Boost, Spr+20% and 40%.

Now head towards the way to the train station, save at the SP. If you didn't
pack Enc-None you can fight SAM08Gs. They drop Running Fires which are good to
turn into Demolition Ammos. When you do reach the mayor, you'll have to help.

The first fight is against some soldiers. They'll net you EXP so it's a no-no to
fight this properly. You need to cast Break and petrify then all. After that the
real boss shows up.

BGH251F2 - LV7     HP5700
           Draw: Shell, Protect, Stop
           Weak vs: Lightning, Earth, Water
           Immune: Poison

Yup, that one again, except it's already been trashed. It can only do some gun
shot attacks but they can be quite damaging if you didn't junction spells to
your defensive attributes. Draw Protect from the boss and cast them on the weak

Did you bring Mug? Good, now steal an Adamantine from it.

This fight is as easy as back when Selphie's team had fought it. Have Quistis
use her Aqua Breath (which can do 3000+ damage!) and let Squall have his
Renzokuken. Rinoa do whatever, preferably summoning Leviathan or casting spells
like Water or any Thunder spells.

Mug: Adamantine
Win: 8x Missiles
AP: 20

When you kill it for good, it'll fall into the sea and.. Selphie's team climbs
out! They're safe, YAY!!! After the grand reunion and a talk with Rinoa, you can
explore the town again. You can take a mini-quest involving the Master Fisherman
to get some items, but what you really wanna do is...

Speak to the fishing kid. He'll finally "get it". You can go back to Master
Fisherman and you'll pick up Irvine along the way. Master Fisherman invites you
over to his room at the inn for some good times. Ooooooh. Sounds suspicious, but
I'll do it if there's something in it for me. Head upstairs at the inn, then
choose to keep him company. At the end, no matter which dialogue options you've
chosen, you'll get a Megalixir. Go back to Grease Monkey's house. Talk to the
soldier, go back outside and back in again, you'll score a Mega Phoenix. Now you
can return to the Garden.

> Magic Check! On the way back, check out the spot that Master Fisherman stood
when you first met him. It's a DP for Full-Life, too bad it's once only.

Go to the quad and cheer Selphie up. After that you'll see an important scene at
the bridge.

---Top of the Pops---
Now you'll see an interesting scene where Selphie and Irvine got everyone
together to perform a number. To the musically inclined it should be a piece of
cake in determining which tunes goes with which. Choose which ever instruments
you want but I'm telling ya, if you piece together the Electric Guitar, Bass,
Piano, and Saxophone, you get to hear a nice instrumental version of Eyes On Me.

Irvine's side quests
You control Irvine in this scene and you can actually leave this screen and
explore the rest of FH! As a matter of fact, there are loads of Irvine exclusive
events that nets you some freebies, or just good for a laugh.

Get back to the train tracks and down the residential area, you'll notice that
no one is around. Head back to Grease Monkey's house, you'll see the soldier
again. Step outside and back. Talk to Grease Monkey and get a Phoenix Down. Now
search the soldier and you just hit the jackpot! Fast, AP and Pulse Ammo 5 each!

You can also explore Balamb Garden as Irvine to get different conversation.

Now when Squall wakes up, Rinoa takes him out to the concert. Hey, this is like
the Golden Saucer date scene in FFVII!!! Just follow this scene and hear some
seedy stuff Irvine has to say. When the concert begins, exit that screen to the
place with a porno mag which Squall has no interest in cuz he's got Girl Next
Door and it's better. ;) But it looked like Rinoa was interested in taking a
peek. ;) A loooooooong story scene will take place, and it's different depending
on what instruments you chose.

After this scene Squall will be back in his bed. Make your way back up to the
bridge and you'll see that Quistis, Nida and Xu have taken over the controls of
the Graden. And you can also control the Garden as a vehicle, just talk to Nida
when you want to go.

---Things to do #3---
Having the ability to control Garden will open up a HUGE number of new places to
explore, tons of mini-quests, new GFs and cards! You'll spend at least 2 hours
with these mini-quests, so I'll divide this into more sections but you can do
these in any order.

-> New GFs <-
Take the Garden south (you need to bypass the bridge first, or head north all
the way) to the southern continent. It's the Centra continent which is a mostly
a huge amount of nothing. The place you're looking for is Centra Ruins which is
pretty much dead center of the region and it looks like an oil rig.

I recommend that you take Squall, Quistis and Irvine for this quest because it's
brute force that will win you over. This place holds 2 GFs, Odin and Tonberry.
In previous versions I recommened that you grab Odin (as well as his load of
goodies that includes drawing 300 Triples, Odin's card and a Luck-J Scroll) and
then Tonberry. However, because Odin shows up unexpectedly he may ruin your
party by giving you unwanted experience which is a big nuisance. So it is way
better just to grab Tonberry, ignore Odin and get him at the last place
If you get him before Lunatic Pandora in disk 3 you will get Gilgamesh as well,
if you get him in disk 4 you'll miss Gilgamesh. I'm going to detail both here.
If you rather get Odin here be my guest, if not we're on the same boat.

Follow the path to a screen with a round statute. Take off Enc-None if you have
it equipped and prepare to fight. They have around 16000HP and immune to all
instant death attacks except Selphie's The End, making them very hard to kill.
The best way to go about it is of course, Limit Break abuse! Quistis' Micro
Missiles will do 9999 damage to them almost all the time, severely weakening
them, then have Squall/Zell line up theirs. Another excellent way, as suggested
by members at the gfaqs message boards, is with Irvine and his Shot Limit.
Refine AP Ammo using Chef's Knives (Tonberry/Tonberry King's card) and junction
the best spell you have to his Strength. A 4-shot Limit Break will kill them if
you have good junctions, which saves you a lot of time and frustration. Even if
you did have mediocre junctions like I did, a Micro Missile/Armor Shot combo
will take care of them in about 30 seconds.

Luckily, Tonberries will earn you zero experience points and gives you a measly
1AP per kill. You will have to kill between 18-22 Tonberries before the King
shows up. Also beware that if you card them, they won't count towards the total
amount of kills. Because of the 20 minute time limit you probably won't have
enough time to kill them all, but that's ok, just exit and re-enter. Odin will
call you a dishonorable wretch but it doesn't change anything. When you come
back, the Tonberry kill count does not reset. When you have killed enough...

Tonberry King - LV9     HP22500
                Draw: Death, Cure, Life

...A giant king of the Tonberries will appear to avenge for all the Tonberries.
It does have some killer attacks and likes to cast death sometimes, but it'll
just sit there most of the time. If it kills you, draw Life from it.

Release your well-trained Limit Breaks and it should be gone easily. Irvine's
Armor Shot works great. The Tonberry King has lower Spr than Vit, so magic and
especially summons work very well.

Mug: Nothing
Win: Royal Crown
AP: 20

Perhaps the most annoying enemies in the series is now one of the
good guys. Tonberries are creatures that resembles the Shumi Tribe
who wears coarse tunics, the knife and lantern they hold on their
hands are their trade marks. This GF's attack, Chef's Knife will stab
a random enemy in battle. It's non elemental, but it's still not very
strong and only targets one enemy, making the summon attack rather
useless, although it's cute. (Doink!) The Tonberry has a hand full of
good merchant-like abilities. The part where this GF really shines
comes from Tonberry's Menu Abilities, being able to alter the price
and stock of every shop you've visited and make them come to you! It
also has 2 unique commands, LV Up and LV Down which are helpful for
countless future battles. A few other skills are also pretty cool,
but the disappointing fact comes from the lack of Junction Abilities.
Best abilities: LV Up, LV Down, Initiative, Call Shop, Sell High,
Haggle, Familiar

> GF Check! Tonberry should start with Boost then Haggle.

I'll say it again. I recommend that you come back for Odin later in disk 3, but
if you insist, this is what you do.

> Junction Check: Very important here, you all should have HP-J and most, if not
all, of the important Junction Abilities. Also, make sure that all your members
are in critical before entering. Pack your best spell in MAGIC attribute as
it'll be very important, and for Squall and Zell, junction your second best
spells in their Strength. Equip Mug, Enc-None, any Mag+??% or Str+??% for

> Magic Check! If you've somehow gotten some Triples, exchange them
to a non-active members.

You have 20 minutes, but it'll be more than enough if you followed my advice of
equipping Enc-None and made your characters critical.

What you do here is to climb the stairs. There are many DPs in this area but I'd
advice you to ignore them for now, as the timer is rather merciless if you
decide to make those side trips.

Climb the stairs again in the place with a round statute in the centre keep
heading forward and into a room with some steps. Walk up the steps and an
elevator will take you up into a round shaped platform with 2 ladders. Take the
left one, which will lead to a room with some devices. Press the button on the
wall and get back down to the ground, press the blue thing between the ladders
and steps will magically appear to the right side of the screen, wow!

The stairs spiral around the central pillar thing. When you get to the top, you
should see a gateway thing and a demon statute atop it. Climb the ladders to
reach the statute and take out the eye. Now make your way down and climb more
steps to the right. Clime another ladder leading to the top of the dome and
you'll see the identical statute. Place the eye you found into the statute and
it'll give you a 5 digit pass code, jot it down if you can. Then remove both
eyes from the statute.

Return back to the first statute and place both eyes into the socket. The flame
to the right will start to emit rings, it's actually the place you enter the
pass code, so do it and press the cancel button. If the pass code is correct,
the gate should open, leading you to a big guy sitting in his throne - Odin!
Check your timer, you should have about 10 minutes left.

Odin does not attack at all, but if you check his draw list, he has Triple!
That's why I wanted you to have a good Magic attribute. Anyway, draw 300
and no, it's NOT optional this time! You must draw them... actually I couldn't
care less if you don't but this is THE best opportunity to stock up on one of
the top 3 spells in the game, if you don't, you're gonna be REAL sorry later

It shouldn't take long, maybe 3 minutes or so. When you're done you should still
have plenty of time, and the critical status helps you to do Limit Breaks
So let Squall and Zell unleash their Renzokuken and Duel respectively, while
Quistis uses her best Blue Magic, Aqua Breath should do it.

You should also Mug him, which in term gives you a Luck-J Scroll, much better
than the G-Potions or whatever you get normally.

This fight is fun, but not long. Odin's really weak for some reason and goes
down in 30 seconds flat! Congrats, now you have a new GF (well kinda), 300 of
one of the best spells and a new rare card!

> Magic Check! Now that the timers has stopped, you can feel free to wonder
around for the DPs, some of them are hidden. There's one for Pain near the dome
with the top statute, the right ladder at the double ladder tower thing has Aero
and the DP in the round shaped room with a statute in the centre has Drain.

Odin is unlike all other GFs, you cannot junction him and you cannot
summon him either, instead, he will come randomly at the beginning of
a battle. This fact makes Odin potentially the most annoying thing in
this game, especially when you're trying to not gain a level, as he
will slay everything in his path and let you handle the EXP. (So for
the rest of the game, it's a very good idea to just stick on Enc-none
and sprint through it.) He has only one attack, Zantetsuken, a blade
skill that EVERYONE fears and it will tear everything into shreds! (I
wonder why they didn't even translate it.) Yeah yeah, Odin is a dumb
GF but getting him will clear the way to 2 other cooler GFs a bit

> NOTE! TunzVic@aol.com informed me that if you hold L2 and R2 when
the battle is loading (ie, trying to run away), the chance that Odin
appears will be increased. Now I am really not sure about this
because Odin appears way too often in the first place anyway. "Call
upon me in times of need" was what Odin said when you defeat him,
could this have been a clue?

-> Shumi Village <-
Check your map. It should say there's a Shumi Village to the northern most
island on the map. Take your Garden there, you will be able to fly up the shore
on the eastern side. Immediately to the west is the village. Enter the large
dome when you get there to proceed to the village.

> Magic Check! I think the biggest charm of this village is the fact that it has
the only recoverable Ultima DP in the world, and it's unusually drawer-friendly
too, meaning that you'll always get a decent number of spells. However, you'll
need to pay 5000 Gil for a pump, but I'd say it's worth it. Remember to return
regularly to stock up on the best spell in the game.

Stone searching quest
Take the elevator and you'll arrive underground. The first house you'll see is
the inn with not a lot happenin', and the next house can't be entered. Leave the
left screen (with a Moomba) to the left. The right path leads to Artisan's house
where you can find a copy of Timber Maniacs.

> NOTE! It is important that you do NOT examine this copy of Timber Maniacs,
because ir affects a later Laguna scenario. If you do get it only Kiros and
Laguna will be in the next scenario, where as if you don't you'll get to play as
the trio. An extra set of hands will definitely help there. However if you've
already examined it then it's no biggie, the scene will just be different.

Now take the left path, pass the frog, into the next house. Go to the end and
you'll see a scene involving Sculptor and Laguna's statute. After that, go back
to the previous scene and the Moomba would've moved its ass outta the way.
Listen to the Elder's spiel and as you leave, they want your help with
Go back to the workshop and talk to Sculpter. He will send you on a mission to
find 5 elemental stones.

Blue Stone: Just examine the stone to the top left corner from the statue
Wind Stone: Between the inn and the locked house, examine the rocks
Life Stone: Outside Elder's house, examine the roots of giant tree
Shadow Stone: Opposite Ultima DP, examine the shadows at top right
Water Stone: Artisan's house, examine the kitchen sink to his left

> Magic Check! There are 2 more DPs around this area, the one in near the
statute is Firaga and the one outside the elder's house has Blizzaga.

When you're done, check back on the elder and after some pointless conversations
(they've obviously picked it up from Laguna) you'll be rewarded with a Phoenix
Pinion which summons the Phoenix GF during battle, and no, this item is not
unique. You can get them via several other ways. You will see a couple more
scenes outside his house, which leads to the next quest...

This Bird of Immortality has been a favourite among the series, and
no, I don't think this is the Cosmic Entity that saved Jean Grey. :P
By using a Phoenix Pinion during battle, the Phoenix will appear (in
a VERY cool graphical sequence) to aid your characters. Its flame
will burn the enemies for a good deal of damage and will revive all
fallen allies as if Life has been cast on them. The fire elemental
damage is pretty good IMO, I've seen this doing 8000+ damage. The
item is rare and expensive so it's not like you'll see Phoenix very
often, but you should see it at least once as it looks really

NOTE!!! Stephanus Rudiyanto Natari <s_rudiyanton@mailcity.com> said
that if you have summoned Phoenix at least once in the whole game,
there'll be a chance that Phoenix will appear when ALL of your party
members are defeated in battle, therefore savin' your butt. It's
random whether or not that Phoenix will appear though, and it'll
still use up a Phoenix Pinion, so keep some of them in stock. (I
don't know if the number of Phoenix Pinions in your inventory will
affect the chance of the GF sppearing though.)

NOTE2!!! Katman told me that you do NOT use up a Phoenix Pinion when
it appears when you die. I don't know about this because I've never
seen it appear randomly.

Statute quest
You can start this right after completing the previous quest, but you need to go
back to the world map and come back again to trigger it. Go back to the workshop
and you'll see that Attendant has joined the gang though he's not very
enthusiastic. Go back to the Elder and he'll say get the Moomba to help, so talk
to the Moomba outside. Go back to the workshop and you'll see Attendant has
decided to work. Go back to the Elder's house and he will fill you in on some
story. Head back to the workshop and the Shumis say they need more help. Go ask
Artisan next door and he will refuse.

If you've been piecing minor clues together you'll know Artisan has a friend in
the outside world. It's Grease monkey from FH! When you're in the neighborhood
pop in and see Grease Monkey. He will give you his mechanical Moomba. Take it
back to Artisan at Shumi Village, leave and see a scene outside as he finally
agrees to it. Now talk to the Elder and you'll receive a rare Status Guard!

-> Chocobo Forests <-
While you're here on the world map, right beside the village you should see a
dome-like forest. This is a Chocobo Forest and there are 6 of these all over the
world. You can catch Chocobos here by solving a puzzle. Unfortunately, they're
all boring and tedious but you do get compensated by being given a prize each
time, and if you do them all, more prizes are up for grabs. Might as well get
them over and done with now.

Talk to the evil greedy Chocoboy and he will give you a couple of whistles and
charge you 1000 Gil to teach you now to use them. The idea is to select the
Sonar first. Walk around holding O and if a Chicobo is in that area (ie, the bar
reacts), press [] and select the Ziner. If a Chicobo is in the area, one or a
group of them will fall, otherwise you'll get your stuff stolen and you'll have
to pay for another set. You have to single them out til there's only 1 Chicobo
left, then talk to it, the mother Chocobo will come out and you can ride it.
After that's done if you look around for another spot that reacts to the Sonar,
the Chocobo will dig up an item for you.

Complete it for the first time and you'll be able to access Chocobo World on the
Pocketstation. I am one of the five players around the world that has one, so I
will put up a section near the end of the walkthrough to cover it.

Chocobo Forest (Beginner) - Winter Island near Shumi Village
This is easy. Sonar north of the Chocoboy til it reacts, Ziner should make just
1 fall. Once you have the mother Chocobo, move to the top right and Sonar for
another spot that reacts, Ziner will get you Aura Stone.

Chocobo Forest (Basic) - Sorbald Snowfield north western Trabia continent
This one sucks cuz all the spots are within 1 step of each other. Go to the left
of Chocoboy and find a spot where all 3 Chicobos drop down. Now go down about 1
step from the bottom right Chicobo and here's another spot that the Sonar react
to. Use the Ziner here and it should make 2 of the go away, leaving you just 1.
A Flare Stone is all the way to the left of the mother Chocobo.

Chocobo Forest (Roaming) - Bika Snowfield north east of Trabia Garden
You'll start this forest with 2 Chicobos already on screen. Walk to the spot
between the 2 of them, the Sonar should react. Use the Ziner, 1 will fall, then
all 3 will go away. Now run all the way down the path and the Sonar will react
down the bottom for a lone Chicobo. Now go all the way up and Sonar will react
again. Get the mother Chocobo to dig here for a Shell Stone and a Holy Stone.

Chocobo Forest (Solitude) - Nectar Peninsula north of Centra Ruins
This place is annoying. There's only 1 spot that responds but you need to be
VERY specific with it. It's located about 3 steps behind and 1 step to the left
of the Chocoboy. Make sure the Sonar responds while you're standing still,
that's now precise you need to be. As for treasure the Chocoboy is standing
right on it, that evil little twit! Use the [] button to talk to him but don't
play cards, select the third option "just move" and he'll get away. Now Ziner
the spot he was on. You'll get a Protect Stone and Meteor Stone.

Chocobo Forest (Fun) - Lenown Plains near Lighthouse/Orphanage
Go to the top right for a Sonar spot, 2 will fall. Now walk 2 steps down from
that Chicobo and the Sonar will respond again, another 2 will fall. Now go to
the spot to the right of Chocoboy, on the lower platform should be another Sonar
spot that triggers another Chicobo. Last step go to the left most Chicobo (near
Chocoboy) and use the Ziner. It will run towards all the others knocking them
out leaving just the one. Treasure spot is to the very top and right. Gets you
Meteor, Flare and Ultima Stone, one of each.

Chocobo Forest (Enclosed) - Talle Mountains south east Centra
This is a pain to get to. From the last forest (near Lighthouse), go south all
the way til your path is blocked by the mountains. There's a narrow path between
the peaks and you can only squeeze in there either on Chocobo or on foot. Then
go all the way south east you will be able to spot another forest behind some

Don't move, use the Ziner where Squall initially starts will drop 2. Behind the
left Chicobo is another spot, makes one drop and the right one goes away. Go to
where the right one way before, use Ziner and It'll drop again. Run far back
behind the right Chicobo and you'll find another spot to make the 4th one drop.
Now go to the middle and another spot will go off, use the Ziner here and all 4
will rise and the final one will drop. The treasure spot here is to the right of
the Chocobo, gives you a Meteor Stone, Holy Stone and Ultima Stone.

Chocobo Holy Ground
This part is a nightmare! Go to Trabia and take the Chocobo that you right next
to Trabia Garden. Now head south a little til you see the giant crater, then
north east and you'll see the shore. Now follow the shallow water south east til
you see a continent with nothing but never ending forest. Provided you haven't
gone crazy yet listening to the horrible excuse of a remix of the Chocobo theme,
get in there and keep heading north and eventually you'll see the dome forest
again. Go in there and you'll see 7 Chocobos doing a mating dance and a baby
pops out (gee that was quick!) Examine the baby and you'll get the Chicobo card,
though the game will call it "Chocobo Card" the first time though. Tsk tsk,
Square, you've got almost as many typos as I do! And I ain't charging $50. ;) If
you examine the baby again it will steal 600 Gil from you and give you some
Gysahl Greens. Now take the chocobo back and lets never speak of this pathetic
abomination of a side quest ever again. ;) My lips are sealed.

-> CC Quest <-
If you've been a keen card player, I'm sure you've all heard about the CC gang.
A group of card players who just loves cards and are in search of worthy players
day and night. So why not start challenging them now? You can actually start the
quest and beat 4 of CC gang right after challenging NORG, but I like to do them
now so I can complete it all in one go.

First you need to build yourself a reputation by winning the card game about 15-
20 times inside Balamb Garden. However if you've played card in Balamb Garden in
disk 1 at all, they will count towards it. I didn't play cards at all in Balamb
Garden disk 2 and Jack immediately revealed himself to me. Jack is the guy who's
walking around the lobby, he will reveal himself when the conditions have been
fulfilled. Winning the battle and you're ready to move on, there are 6 more
members of the CC gang left. If you're really havin' trouble with this guy then
you need to practice your card skills.

He's a guy walking around in the northern passageway, between and cafe, dorm and
parking. Just talk to some guy around that area and you'll probably hit the
jackpot. After him, it's time for Diamond.

The 2 girls standing nears the map of Garden in the lobby will play against you
next. (Hey not fair, 2 against 1!) Afterwards it's Spade's turn, although I will
make a side trip and challenge the Joker first.

The Joker is the guy who was selling you items inside the prison. He appears
randomly inside the Training Centre. Joker appears on a tiny island connected by
planks to the screen to the _right_. He has Leviathan's card so you'll want to
play him and win that card from him. Ironically, it's the only other Water
elemental card in the game! He also upgrades your Battle Metre as well.

He appears on the platform outside the elevator on the second floor and
apparently he is the same person who handed you those 7 cheap cards at the
He's also a liar cuz he told you he didn't play.

Head for the bridge because... Heart is actually Xu!! Play her (she seems to be
quite slow) and win from her. She also carries Carbuncle's card so it's another
nifty win. After the battle Nida will comment how he didn't know that Xu was
actually Heart. Xu said it was a secret and Quistis said she already knew. One
more member to go, the King!

What you need to do now is talk to Dr. Kadowaki in the Infirmary. She will say
that she was the former King of the CC group, but she handed the title down to
another girl sometime ago.

What you need to do now is get back to your room and choose to be alone, then
rest. It's a random event so if you don't get to meet the King, try again.
During the middle of the night, Squall will be wakened by the King who is...
Elvis!! *Gasp* Kidding, it's Quistis. Actually it was rather obvious if you
piece together the clues. Anyway, she challenges you. The King carries
Gilgamesh's card so it'll be another great find. If you didn't get it this time,
go back to the bridge the next day and challenge her there.

> NOTE! All of the CC members carriy LV7 boss cards so you know where to go if
you wanna complete your collection. IMO, the LV7 boss cards are the WORST! They
are quite hard to get (as it's not a sure thing that they'll use them, unlike
the rare cards), harder to beat (since they're powerful and hey, even rare cards
have weaker sides!) and gives you really crap items with Card Mod. The higher
the CC rank, the more likely that they'll use a LV7 card, so if you want LV7
cards, I found Xu is the best person to go to.

-> Winhill <-
Remember this place? Yes it's still around and it has appeared on your map as
well. It's south of Missile Base and you can get there via Balamb Garden. It has
changed some, and most of the DPs from Laguna's scenario are still here. Go up 2
screen and you'll be at the road with a caution sign. There's also a baby
Chocobo running around. What you wanna do is catch it 3 times. First time you
get a Vase Piece, then some Gysahl Green and the last time is a Phoenix Pinion,
even though it says "Phoenix Down". If you keep doing it the mother Chocobo will
come and run you over. :D

Now go to the center of town and enter the mansion. The man here is shattered
because his vase... well, shattered. If you find all 4 pieces you can claim a
prize. Now examine the armor to the left and you'll see an amusing scene, and
get piece number 2. Now go to Raine's bar and examine the bottom right table and
you'll see a ghost. Go and examine it for piece 3. Go to the flower store and
examine the bottom right corner again and you've just found the last piece. Go
back to the mansion and the man will give you a Holy Stone.

-> Lotsa AP <-
Ok, everybody knows that Cactuars are good for AP right? Well, you don't
necessarily have to step onto Cactuar Island (which is only approachable with
the Ragnarock) to meet them. In the Kashkabald Desert in the Centra region,
which is near the 6th Chocobo Forest, you can encounter them as well. Fight
there for lotsa AP and single digit EXP, whoohoo! You might wanna come back here
every so often when you get a new GF to learn its skills. The easiest way to
kill them is with Irvine's Scatter Shot (Shotgun Ammo) as they never miss and
hits all of them at once.

-> Collecting spells <-
Now that you have Tonberry and Balamb Garden, you can have some fun at
encountering different enemies, leveling them up and you'll have access to
spells or items that you've never had the opportunities to collect. In any case,
make sure you take Quistis (for Micro Missiles) and the Card command.

You can encounter Ruby Dragons in the forests near Edea's house in the Centra
region, although they're really rare. Leveling them up will give you access to
Flare and Meteor. Make sure you have good junctions or else you can't even draw
properly. Also kill off one of your characters will "tame" the Ruby Dragon,
disabling their Meteor/Breath attack, making it safe!

Around the Trabia area, Gaylas are a very common, very weak enemey. Leveling up
gives you access to Meltdown, arguably the best junction for Vit.

-> Others <-
That's pretty much most of it. There are a couple of other bits and pieces but
nothing major. You can talk to the girl with pig tails who has a crush on Zell
with Zell in the party. Then leave the garden and come back, talk to the girl at
counter for another scene. You'll be able to set yourself up for more scenes

Also there are events in both Timber and Dollet where you can get free stuff,
but if you wait til disk 3 these will be upgraded so I'll cover it later.

---Silence of the (Ba)lamb---
Ho ho ho, when got the weight of the tons of mini-quests off your shoulders,
it's time to carry on with the story. Head over to Balamb and you'll see that
Galbadia Garden (also taken flight) has occupied the town of Balamb.

Zell rushes in and demands that you take him with you, as for the other
character, notice that Selphie is healed after the Missile Base mission? Take
her along if you want. Quistis ain't too bad either.

Talk to the guard next to the car and Squall'll make an excuse to get in. Try
going to the hotel to talk to the commander but it's blocked off by guards. They
want you to find the captain.

Go back to Zell's house and since the hotel is occupied, Zell has no choice but
to let you use his room. If you brought Selphie, you'll see a scene where she
jumps onto Zell's bed, if you chose Quistis she'll tell you something about
Zell's adventure on a T-Board and if you brought Irvine, he'll fiddle around
with Zell's gun collection. All of them are hilarious, but if you brought Rinoa
instead, you'll see a lame scene with her talking about Zell's grandfather
(she's rarely funny.)

If you wanna get outta town, talk to Big Bad Rascal and follow him around,
distract the guard when he goes to find the girl's parents and then he can help
you escape.

> Card Check! According to David Seo, if you did helped Big Bad Rascal, talk to
the hotel owner's daughter in the house next to Zell's. The girl will tell you
that she has her father's card (Pandemona) and you can get it now instead of
later. Whoohoo!

Whacha have to do here is to find the captain. He likes to play hard to get and
you have to keep asking people around town for details. If you can't be
just talk to a guy near the docks and he'll tell you that the captain caught
some fish. Return to Zell's house and you'll see smoke coming out of it. After
speak to Ma Dincht, go back to the docks and talk to the dog. The dog will sniff
him out and runs towards the train station. Or alternatively go to the train
station and the guards should be down on the floor after eating the fish. To
make them move outta the way, keep talking to the one blocking the stairs and
everytime you do so, he'll move a little bit.

Enter the train and you'll find that the captain is no other than Raijin! He
runs away. Go back to Zell's house to save and check your junctions.

> Junction Check! Junction good spells to Vit. GF and Magic commands are useful
for this fight. Pack Mug if you wanna goodie.

> GF Check! Your GFs should have learnt a few new skills after the mini-quest
events right?
  - Diablos: HP+??%s
  - Brothers: HP+80%
  - Carbuncle: Vit Bonus
  - Leviathan: Should have gotten Spr+20% and Boost, move onto Spr+40% and Spr
Bonus when you're done
  - Tonberry: Should have gotten Boost and maybe even Haggle, if so move onto
Sell High.

Head to the hotel when you're done, and you'll have to fight Raijin.

Raijin - LV7     HP2800
         Draw: Thunder, Thundara, Shell, Protect
         Weak vs: Poison
         Absorb: Lightning

G-Soldier - LV7     HP87
            Draw: Fire, Thunder, Blizzard, Cure
            Weak vs: Poison

Nothing much of a threat. The soliders will go down in one hit. Raijin is
stronger and his attacks can hit for decent damage, about 200 each hit. He has
Thunder-type spells too, and can hit pretty hard but he's likely to go down
sooner than expected.

Mug 2 Str-Ups from him too. You can get them if you win the fight instead, but
you'll only get 1, so my advice is that you steal them.

Use regular attacks to take out the soldiers. Don't cast Thunder on him as he'll
absorb it. (It's actually pretty obvious when you look at his name. I think
Raijin means "Thunder" in Japanese.)

Leviathan works amazingly well on Raijin, about 1000 damage. Otherwise, use your
regular attacks or spells like Water (economical and decent power.) Tonberry
might work too (since he starts off at about level 30.)

Mug: 2x Str Up (Raijin), Potion/Phoenix Down (G-Soldier)
Win: Str Up (Raijin), Potion (G-Soldier)
AP: 12

After he's been beaten, you'll enter the hotel and yes, the commander is
actually Fujin! You'll now have to fight against 2 of them.

Fujin - LV8     HP2400
        Draw: Aero, Cura, Life, GF Pandemona
        Weak vs: Poison
        Absorb: Wind

Raijin - LV7     HP2800
         Draw: Thunder, Thundara, Shell, Protect
         Weak vs: Poison
         Absorb: Lightning

Yeap, Raijin still absorbs Thunder and Fujin will absorb Wind attacks, so don't
use them. Raijin still uses same old same old stuff but do look out for his
Raijin Special attack, as it can hurt you pretty bad. Fujin's Zan don't pose
much of a threat but her Tornado can hurt.

> GF Check! Do NOT forget to draw GF Pandemona from Fujin!

Mug Raijin again for more Str-Ups, Fujin has a Megalixir but winning gives you
the same thing so it doesn't matter.

For offence, Leviathan again works well, but it won't do as much damage to Fujin
as Raijin. Tonberry + Boost too. Regular attacks works exceptionally well if you
have good spells. Try getting your character to critical to unleash their Limit
Breaks if you want, but it won't matter too much. Magic isn't bad either, but
Fujin seems to be quite magically resistant so it's better to deal with her with
physical attacks.

Mug: 2x Str Up (Raijin), Megalixir (Fujin)
Win: Str Up (Raijin), Megalixir (Fujin), Combat King 002
AP: 20

Originally named Pandemonium in the Japanese version, this GF had its
dignity taken away by the translation team by changing its name to
suit the 9 letter limits. Pandemona resembles a squid-mage creature
from FFT only purple colored with a large squirrel-like tail.
Fortunately, its summon attack is of straight wind-elemental, not
completely screwed up like FFVII (Typhoon was actually earth!) or
non-existent like the previous Fantasies. Tornado Zone sucks all
enemies into Pandemona's guts and then thrown out in a gust of wind,
hurting all enemies badly amidst the fiery tempest. It's great for
just about any enemy, especially ones taking flight. Not only that,
Pandemona is also the first GF that grants you Spd-J and Spd+20%/40%
which are essential to winning most fights later on. The only bad
part is that you need to learn Spd-J yourself by accumulation a large
bundle of AP. Pandemona also has decent Strength abilities and the
Initiative ability that allows you to act first.
Best skills: Spd-J, Spd+20%, Spd+40%, Initiative

---My heart will go on---
You're in the bridge of Balamb Garden and the blissful Selphie comes along and
wants your team to take a look at the remains of Trabia Garden.

> Card Check! Before you go anywhere, go back to Balamb and challenge the guy
standing outside the hotel. He has Pandemona's card and it's a really good card
with THREE strong sides!!! If you've won the card off her daughter earlier, just
ignore this bit.

> Uh uh, don't leave yet. Remember how I told you to try to get the Queen of
Cards to Balamb after loosing Sacred's card? Well she should be here right now
and that Chicobo card can open up another opportunity to get a new rare card.
Save at the hotel and challenge the queen and deliberately try to loose the
Chicobo card, try to get her back to Dollet.

> If you've done so, head back to Dollet and she tells you her father has
painted another card and it's somewhere in Balamb Garden. Before you leave, win
back Chicobo's card from her little brat.

> As for the new card, you might want to try the guy who's sitting next to a
fountain opposite the library at Balamb Garden. You can win the Chubby Chocobo
card off him.

Once you're ready to move on, move the Garden north-eastwards to get to Trabia
Garden, or at least what's left of it. You don't actually have to take Selphie
on your team, as everyone comes here anyway, so take whoever you want. You don't
have to fight here so anyone will do.

Climb the fence and your other team members arrive. Just follow the path and
you'll arrive at a ruined fountain. Walk all the way down but not enough to exit
back to the previous screen. There's a VERY hard to see yellow thing to the very
bottom of the screen. This is Weapon Mon Aug. Take the right exit for the
cemetery. There's an issue of Timber Maniacs around the top left area. Run round
tapping X and you can find it. Head back and take the keft exit from the
fountain. To the right leads to the computer room and a SP. Apart from fiddling
with the computers there's nothing of interest. Go back and take the left exit
to get to the stage.

> Magic Check! There's a DP for Thundaga next to the fountain, the screen with
the gravestones hides a useless DP for Zombie and a non-recoverable DP for Aura
can be found on the ruins of the stage.

Move further left to the basketball court for a long story scene, I won't spoil
it here. You also get one of those infamous FF7 interactive flashbacks, yuck!
Just take the north exit and then north again to get to the beach. In the next
scene, talk to tall the kids and exit the door. Interestingly enough, you CAN
get paid during this flashback sequence. Just keep talking to everyone to move
it along. At least end where everyone leaves you'll have to talk with Rinoa.

> Card Check! Go back to Trabia Garden and play a game with Selphie's best
friend when as she uses Selphie's card. The Random/Plus rules makes this really
tricky but if you've fixed up Trabia's rules it'll be a lot easier.

---Boom boom boom boom, the Garden goes boom---
Somebody suggests a visit to Matron's orphanage, but make sure you complete all
the mini-quests and do anything you need to do first, because you won't see the
world map until disc 3.

Take the Garden south to the Centra region and you'll see Galbadia Garden
hangin' near Matron's orphanage. It's kinda hard to see since it's most likely
to be in the screen's blind spot and takes most people by surprise. Upon getting
reasonably close to the enemy Garden, a cut scene will follow where the Garden
prepares for combat.

You'll be given a list of options but I have absolutely no idea what they're
good for, and neither do I have any idea how it works. So just choose whatever
(or bang on the buttons like Selphie does) since I don't think it matters too
much in the game. Squall will give a speech and gives commands to all pupils
within the Garden, then Irvine, Quistis and Selphie arrives. Make a new team but
it doesn't matter since it's going to be a short scene.

Make your ways to the Quad and you'll see Zell and Rinoa. Then Nida
calls you back to the bridge (drag ons.) The scene switches to Zell's
team, but you need to junction yourselves this time, since you will
encounter enemies but it doesn't matter too much what you
junction. I usually just stick Diablos and Enc-None on Zell since
this scene is extremely short and don't deserve a careful junction.

Continue as Zell to the left and after the scene where the ground gives away,
you need to make a retreat back to the lobby to meet with Squall's team.

You will now have to choose 2 members between Quistis, Selphie and Irvine to
stop the enemies in the classroom. Zell will help Rinoa and the member who is
not chosen by Squall will help Xu defend the front gate. Choose whoever you
but make sure you have some Break spells stocked. Save the game though.

> GF Check!
  - Diablos: HP+??%
  - Brothers: HP+80% then HP Bonus if you wish
  - Carbuncle: Vit Bonus then ST Def
  - Leviathan: Spr+40% then Spr Bonus
  - Pandemona: Boost if you haven't gotten it yet, then definitely Spd-J
  - Tonberry: Any "shop" abilities will do

Make your way to 2F Classroom and the enemies will come through the window.
You'll be against 4 Paratroopers who are a real pain to beat since they love to
cast annoying spells like Silence. In previous versions I recommened using
Tonberry's LV Down command to reduce them to LV1 before killing them. This
strategy is still an option, however it is just much faster casting Break on
them. Also Selphie's Slots would be useful here as well if you can get Break, as
you can cast them multiple times and Slots cuts through the annoying Silence
status. You may also be able to disable them through Quistis' Bad Breath (Sleep)
but it's a little risky as if they take damage, you will receive some EXP for
your efforts, and both Confuse and Poison status can do that.

You'll be called back to the bridge afterwards where your characters will argue
about what you should be doing. Squall finally decided that it's about time that
they take an offensive turn and crashes into Galbadia Garden to get on board.

Now you take control of Squall alone. On the second floor you have to help the
girl to look for the little boy down the end of the hallway. When you do
a Galbadia soldier with a jetpack comes through the entrance and pins Squall
against the emergency door. It's time for a terrible micro-minigame but you are
treated to an unfair disadvantage since the enemy will be able to hit you twice
before you can even retiliate!

After you get hit twice you'll be against the emergency exit. Don't move, press
the X button and options will appear. Choose to look for another option. Now
don't move or else you'll get hit. Press X again and this time choose to use the
emergency exit. Escape is NOT an option since you cannot, you'll simply give the
enemy the opportunity for a free hit.

The enemy tackles Squall just as he releases the lock and they both falls
outside, hanging onto a rope and the only thing that keeps them from falling is
the opponent's jetpack. You'll have to fight your way out though. This is a
terrible game as it simply just suck. Just alternate between punches and kickes.
You'll probably die a few times simply because this game sucks so much. But
eventually you'll luck out and win it.

When you win Squall saves Rinoa and they'll end up on Galbadia Garden. The
couple will have more conversation before entering the Garden.

> Magic Check! Don't enter the Garden yet. Junction Siren and Move-Find, you'll
see a DP at the back. This is Aura.

Your other members already made it there, you'll now have to seek out Seifer and
the sorceress. Now make a party of any combination of characters. There's also a
SP here. There are many locked doors here that leads to previously unexplored
areas and what you need to do is to find the 3 key cards that are required. It's
easier to just put on Enc-None and run through this area. If you want to card,
just remember there will be a lot of human enemies that you have to run from.

> Magic Check! Yup, the same old DPs are still here if you feel like it but the
one in the ice hockey field is now reachable, which contains Protect.

Take the right exit and then head upstairs to the right. All other doors are
either locked or empty. On the second floor you'll meet your old friends Raijin
and Fujin again. Take a left then the right door. The guy here will give you
Card Key [1] which will open all locked doors marked [1].

Head back to the stairs and back down. Head back to the hall with the SP and
take the left exit and you'll unlock the left door. This leads to the other end
of the ice hockey field. From here on it should be familiar territory. Exit to
the right and take the right door, the student in the lecture theater will give
you Card Key [2]. If you go back to the previous screen and run south, you'll be
able to unlock a door which leads you back to one of the hallways from the

Keep running south and you'll come back to the hall with a SP again. Take the
right and go back to where you saw Raijin and Fujin, but keep going up the
stairs to the third floor. You can unlock the door here as well, which leads you
outside. Following this road and your guys will jump into the tennis court,
again, familiar territory.

> GF Check! When you get to the main lobby of Galbadia Garden, you'll see a
giant monster with a tail occupying the stage in the centre of it. It is the GF
Cerberus and I'd advice you challenge it but do save at the SP first.

> Junction Check! Alright, finally some serious preperations. Junction Quake
(use Float if you don't have it) to Elem-Def and if you have a spare slot,
junction Thungaga to it as well. As for ST- Def, try Berserk. Pack the Mug
command along with the usual (Magic, GF, Draw etc..) Spr is very important here,
and give a good Str boosts to both Squall and Irvine. If you brought Rinoa, make
sure her condition is critical. Also you can draw free Quakes from Cerberus, so
if you haven't done any refining, make sure you boost your Mag as much as
possible to take advantage of drawing it.

> Magic Check! Make sure you have an adaquate supply of Dispels. It's about the
only time that spell is useful.

Cerberus - LV6     HP7600
           Draw: Quake, Double
           Immune: Wind
           Absorb: Lightning

This boss can really hurt you bad, I mean, REALLY bad if you didn't take the
precautions. It has 3 heads and each one like to cast different spells. Quake is
the most common but sometimes Thunder-type or Tornado too. It also likes using
Berserk on your members. Finally and the biggest threat of all, it LOVES casting
Triple on itself!

Obviously, Siren and Silence will not work so that's why you need to protect
yourselves from the elements. Cast Dispel on it IMMEDIATELY after its Triple and
use Esuna on whoever got affected by Berserk.

Mug a Spd-J scroll from it too.

You can draw Quake from Cerberus, as well as Double. If you've leveled up one of
your characters you can deploy him/her to make Cerberus higher level, and in
that case Triple becomes available for drawing.

When the time is to take care of it, just whatever your strongest attacks are.
Limits work well, as do high level GF with Boost, or a well junctioned normal
attack. This is a no brainer battle.

Mug: Spd-J Scroll
Win: 8x G-Returner, Cerberus' Card
AP: 30

You'll get Cerberus' card for winning, as well as a new GF.

The 3 headed dog who guards the gate to Hades' realm is probably the
most valuable GF in the whole game. Despite being cute, the summon
Counter Rockets is also most useful. Even though the name makes no
sense whatsoever, it gives all members in your party the Double AND
Triple status in battle. A definate "must-have" for all the people
who likes using magic as their main source of offence or defence.
Just make sure you have a good compatibility. :) Cerberus also has
the largest collection of the MOST useful abilities and MANY Junction
Abilities for a variety of stats. Abilityx3 is great like you've all
seen before but Cerberus' Spd+??% and ST-Defx4/ST-Atk has the guts to
take on BOTH Siren and Pandemona! It's unique skill, Auto-Haste is
also one of the most useful abilities in the whole game and is
especially important for maxing out the Spd attribute. Make sure you
so not miss this GF!
Best skills: Spd-J, Spd+20%, Spd+40%, ST-Atk, ST-Defx4, Auto Haste,
Expendx2-1, Abilityx3

> GF Check! Cerberus should start with Spd-J like Pandemona.

Now take the left path and go left again. The girl here will give you Card Key
[3] which allows you access to the elevator. To get there take the north exit
from the lobby, go up to the second floor and take the left path. You'll see a
SP on the right, save before confronting the evil people. ;)

Seifer - LV8     HP3400
         Draw: Fire, Thunder, Dispel, Haste
         Weak vs: Poison

*Yawn* Same old same old Seifer but this time her has a new Limit Break, Demon
Slice. Not all that damaging, just laugh at how weak he is compared to you. ;)

Not much strategy here, normal attacks can take him out in a few hits and you
can mug 8 Mega Phoenixes from him. Funny, cuz I could've sworn that I used to
get a Hero from him, which is much rarer.

Mug: 8x Mega Phoenix or Hero (?)
Win: 8x Mega Potion
AP: 20

Edea calls Seifer useless and disappears. Take the elevator down to 2F and head
for the Auditorium. There's a hidden SP outside so save there and check your

> Junction Check! Make sure you have good spirit. Junction Death to Squall's ST-
Def and also Aura if you have an adaquate amount of it, if not, use Esuna/Life.

Seifer - LV6     HP2200
         Draw: Fire, Thunder, Dispel, Haste
         Weak vs: Poison

Edea - LV6     HP3000
       Draw: Blizzard, Demi, Esuna, GF Alexander

Seifer rushes into battle again saying that he's not weak and he's
going to protect Edea. He's just the same as last time, a couple of
regular attacks and he'll go down in no time. If you brought Rinoa,
try again for Invincible Moon, which will lasts through the encounter
with Edea.

When he's defeated, Edea gets angry and will start the battle with
Maelstorm, a gravity attack that takes out a lot of HP and gives you
the Curse status. If you have Selphie, have someone draw Esuna and
use it on her and cast Full Cure from her Slots. Otherwise, cure the
status with Esuna and cast Cura/ga on yourselves.

> GF Check! Do NOT forget to draw GF Alexander from Edea!

Carbuncle still sorta works here, try it if you want. I've heard that
if you do so, Edea will cast Reflect on herself and bounce spells off
it to hurt you. She DOES cast Reflect on herself BUT she doesn't cast
spells on herself to bounce it off both times when I fought her. I
guess it's probably because her levels are low and therefore, she has
low AI.

Anyway, if you do summon Carbuncle, she'll again try Dispel on you.
However, at times she will ignore 2 members and goes out on Squall at
full force and occasionally she will cast Death on Squall, that's why
you need to junction Death to his ST-Def.

Try out your Limit Breaks on her, which IMO is the best form of
offense as Edea has very high Spirit and resists most summons.
Rinoa's Invincible Moon is great in this battle. Also if you can, try
out the various bullets for Irvine. It was fun as I put Edea to sleep
with his Dark Ammo! :) Edea isn't all that hard if you've taken
precautions and heal yourselves regularly.

This is pretty cool. You need to junction 100 Sleep into someone's
ST-Atk and fight Seifer normally. When he gets crippled, you need to
command the character with Sleep ST-Atk to attack before Edea arrives
on the scene (ie, when Seifer starts talking.) This way, that
character will get to hit Edea before she can act, and thus you can
avoid her Maelstorm attack. Fill her up with magic to beat her easily
(as it won't wake her up.)

Mug: Hero (Seifer), Royal Crown (Edea)
Win: Hero (Seifer), Force Armlet (Edea)
AP: 50

This powerful GF have always raised a common question throughout the
series: Why is Alexander a robot? Strange huh? Hmm, well Alexander
had always been a popular summon since it's one of the very few ways
of causing Holy-elemental damage. Holy Judgement is more spectacular
than ever in FFVIII, and is strengthened even more by offering a long
graphical sequence aided by Boost. Its skills however, will only hold
your attention for a very short time. Like Leviathan, Alexander has
only a few very good skills. High Mag-RF will refine medium -ra
spells into better -ga spells, and frees up more slots! Med Data
isn't very useful in battles but it'll uncover the Med LV-Up skill, a
MUST acquiring another GF later on in disc 3. The Revive command will
bring back a fallen ally for free. Elem-Defx4 is one of the best
defensive skills and Abilityx3 is the last worthy member in
Alexander's skill list that you can call good skills.
Best skills: High Mag-RF, Abilityx3, Elem-efx4, Revive, Med LV-Up

Just when you thought that Edea gets pissed off with you again and
about to throw another buncha icicles at you, Matron regains her
consciousness and sanity. Rinoa walks her way to Seifer, kissed him
(at least it looks like it, gee she must be desperate) and feints. Oh
========================= End of Disc 2 =============================

============================= Disc 3 ================================
Disc 3 will probably be the climax of the story and plot development,
most questions will be answered and yup, it's a now or never
situation with most of the subquests. You can get the remaining GFs
and cards about mid way through where the game gives you a good long
break away from the game. Just hold on for a bit more, because your
training is about to start.

---Taxicab Confessions V: A witch's secret--- (Ah, not really...)
After a scene with Squall and the unconscious Rinoa, Quistis calls
saying the sorceress Edea is back in her orphange and wants to see
Squall and gang.

The Garden should be relatively close to the lighthouse and Edea's
house. Go there and check out Edea and Cid. Listen to her when she
explains the situation and a new threat. Squall drifts off to his own
little world again, this time without Rinoa. What Squall really want
is just to see Rinoa back on her feet so he left.

> Magic Check! A DP in the basement has Curaga

> Card Check! Edea's card is now obtainable from the sorceress
herself. Make sure you save first because the pain in the a$$ Centra
rules are used in this region, along with Random. Do what you did in
Trabia and see what happens. You can make trips to abolish these
rules but considering the only good card in the Centra region is
Edea's, it's not worth the effort. Hopefully luck will be on your
> If you didn't get to challenge Cid for Seifer's card in the
previous discs, he's here.

---To be scorched, or not to be scorched---
> Magic Check! If you want good spells early, give all Meteors and
Flares that Squall and the member whom's about to enter Laguna's
scenario to someone else.

Squall will return to the Infirmary to see Rinoa, and boom, there he
goes. It's the dream world again and this time, you get to choose who
you want to tag along with. I personally chose Irvine since he
started off at a higher level than my other characters so he'll have
a _few_ more HP. The other thing to note is, Kiros will inherit all
the spells from the character whom will enter the dream scenario.

> NOTE!!! This is a very strange scenario because sometimes Ward does
appear and sometimes he does not! I do not know what is the exact
requirement to get Ward to appear in this scenario but if you do, be
sure to down me a line and I'll fill your name in this guide. (I
didn't have Ward in both of my games.)

> NOTE2!!! Thanks to Colin Pentney, who told me that, to get Ward,
simply skip the issue of Timber Maniacs in Shumi Village (the one
where it features Laguna and Kiros in the film and Selphie commented
that "I wonder why Ward is not in the picture.")

Zap zap, Laguna ran out of money and is posing as an actor like it
detailed in a copy of Timber Maniacs. When the camera starts rolling,
you'll see Laguna taking the role of a sorceress slayer. Then came
the dragon that was supposed to be played by Kiros except it smells
like barbecue. Uh oh, another horrible micro-minigame's comin' your

This time it's a fair fight, except Laguna's gunblade does way too
little damage compared to the dragon. Remember to block when the
dragon's about to attack, or else you won't last long. When you see
an opening, jam on the attack button and continous slices will sorta
work. It's not fool proof though, as sometimes his claws will break
through your attack, but it works most of the time.

When you "kill" it, Kiros joins you. Don't fight it yet since you'll
be junction-less. Choose to get ready and head back to the save point
in the previous screen.

> Junction Check! Spread out your GFs between 2 characters. Junction
Aero/Tornado and any Fire spells (preferably Firaga) to your Elem-Def
to block its magic attacks. Junction good spells to Vitality and
Strength. ST-Atk don't matter too much since it rarely works against
powerful enemies that a Ruby Dragon when your levels are so low. As
for commands, pack Card if you wanna card it, else pack LV Down. Also
equip Mug if Quistis hasn't learnt her Fire Breath yet.
> ALTERNATE! If you wanna try out my alternate strategy for getting
good spells, it's much more important. The Elem-Def junctions won't
protect you enough, so you need a good Sprit too. These are some
         HP:  Tornado     =+3000
         Str: Quake       =+40
         Vit: Meltdown    =+80
         Mag: Pain        =+60
         Spr: Reflect     =+72
         Spd: Triple      =+70
You should have at least 100 Ultimas if you've returned to the Shumi
Village regularly, so put it in place of HP/Spr if you like. Str
isn't all that important here. Equip Character skills like Vit+40%,
Spr+40% and something else (Mug/HP+80%) and you should be powerful
You also need both LV Up and LV Down, because of this, one character
will have to sacrifice the Magic command for the Draw command. An
Item command can be useful here too. Finally, switch the battle speed
to the slowest.

> Magic Check! For the alternate method, you need an adaquate supply
of Shell, Haste, Protect, Life, Regen and Curaga.

> GF Check!
  - Brothers: HP Bonus then their other -J abilities.
  - Carbuncle: ST-Def and x2
  - Leviathan: Recover/Mag-J
  - Pandemona: Having already learnt Spd-J will be a great asset,
start on Spd+20% if so
  - Cerberus: Ditto, but he maybe a bit slow at that
  - Alexander: You should get his Boost first if you haven't, then
the useful High Mag-RF is worth looking at

You might wanna take your GFs to the desert regions and fight some
Cactuars to learn some abilities, especially for Alexander. Try to
complete High Mag-RF, Med Data and Med LV-Up if you can.

> NOTE! On the screen with the Ruby Dragon, you can encounter Ochus.
They're pretty decent to fight against since they give you 7AP each!
Fight here for a while to learn some expensive abilities if you wish.

When you're done, heal, save and go for the dragon.

Ok, this isn't REALLY a boss since you will receive EXP for it but
making this section for this fight is gonna make my guide look tidy
right? Don't shake your head like that...

Anyway, if you've juctioned yourselfves properly, it shouldn't be
able to hurt you with its spells. Just use LV Down on it a few times
and kill it off. Mug it for a Inferno Fang (but sometimes you'll get
a crap fang if its levels are too low.)

ALTERNATE STRATEGY! - The quest for the better spells early.
Alright. We all know that Ruby Dragons has some great spells
available for drawing right? The problem is this one is too weak. So
you need to level it up to steal its spells and level it down again
to kill it. This is VERY dangerous though, since the most powerful
monster in the whole game can crush you like peas when there's a big
level difference.

Before you level it up, cast your support spells while the dragon is
still weak. The first priority is to summon Cerberus or cast Double.
This makes casting spells quicker, so add Haste, Protect, Shell and

Now you should determine what level you should raise for the dragon.
Your aim should be above 30, but if you raise it too much, it'll be
way too powerful. Level 30-50 would be my recommendation. (If you
cannot get it right, rise it to level 100 and use LV Down to make it
go back to 50.)

The character WITH the magic command is VERY crucial here, so do
anything to keep him alive.

The dragon's spells are going to hurt you bad, but the Spirit and
Shell will deduce the damage by quite a lot. Its most damaging attack
is Breath, which by my calculations with the HP/Vit boosts and
Protect, you'll probably survive.

Now draw both Flare and Meteor at your leasure, but if a status wears
off, renew it quickly. Don't hesitate if you need healing, it's
better off safe than sorry.

Finally, when you've done all the hard work accumulating 200 Flares
and Meteors, use LV Down and crush it. Oh and don't forget to steal
Inferno Fangs if you want to.

Thanks to Colin Pentney <salivator@hotmail.com> for this trick.

"Well, I have a strategy that could theoretically let you LV Up the
Ruby Dragon as high as you want, without (much) fear of it turning
your party into crispy, bite-size snacks. I say "theoretically"
because although I've seen it work many times before, I'm still not
EXACTLY sure how or why it works. But here's what I know:

"Ok, this happened to me in my first game of FF8, while I was
(foolishly) wandering around in the forest near Edea's house,
completely unaware that Ruby Dragons sometimes make their residence
there... I was also lv. 100 at the time. So I ran into a lv. 100 R.
Dragon, and began what would turn out to be an hour and a half long
battle. It wasn't going so well for the first hour or so... he would
basically do either Meteor or Breath every single turn, so I was
forced to sit back and do nothing but heal, rarely getting the chance
to attack.

"After a while, it eventually killed of Zell, and I had no real way
of reviving him, because I couldn't afford to take that extra turn to
use a Phoenix Down or cast Life. That's when a funny thing
happened... the dragon completely stopped doing Breath and Meteor! In
fact, the only things it was attacking me with were Aero and Fira
(not even Firaga!). So I was able to draw all the spells to my
heart's content, only taking several hundred damage on one person per
turn, instead of several thousand per turn on everyone! Actually, it
would still rarely do it's claw attack, but that only did about ~1000
to one person, anyway. So after drawing 100 Meteors and Flares for
Squall and Rinoa, I went and resurrected Zell... big mistake.
Instantly, the dragon started it's old attack pattern of using Meteor
or Breath every turn! So I cleverly deduced that it was Zell's death
that caused it to cease attacking so fiercely. So I put my theory to
test... I let Zell die again. And sure enough... it would throw
nothing but Aero, Fira, and the occasional claw attack at me.
So if you haven't caught on by now, my strategy is to kill one person
in your party while facing Ruby Dragons, and it'll apparently become
'tame', leaving you free to draw all those juicy spells at your
leisure. I've tested this again and again, and it seems to work every
time on the Ruby Dragons in the forest!

"Now... there SHOULD be no difference between those dragons and the
one you fight in Laguna's scenario. So just kill off Kiros or Ward
(preferably Ward) at the start of the battle, then Lv Up the dragon
as high as you want. It should then be tame, and only hit you with
weak spells. Draw all you want, then kill off Kiros and revive Ward,
letting him get a turn at drawing. Lv Down the dragon when you're
done, and then kill it off or Card it! It's that simple!"

Gee, it just keeps on going. Oh, this strategy has been tested by
Qualera and a few other readers, so it does work.

When you're done, the scenario ends after a little walking.

---Seedy... I mean SeeD Ship---
Squall will share some conversation with Ellone via telepathy and
that's when he get the idea of trying to get Ellone to bring back
Rinoa... doesn't make too much sense to me I know.

Go back to Edea's place ("Look who came crawlin' back!"... is what
I'd say.) She tells you that the white SeeD ship is of nomad blood
and never stays at the same place for long, but seems to be adapt to
the Centra region.

Take the Garden for a spin around that region. The ship is located in
one of the "ditches" around the land that looks a bit like a hand.
It's quite hard to find even in your second game, but following the
above guidelines will narrow down the possibilities.

Once you're on board, you need to convince the white SeeDs that
you've been sent by Edea, and you'll also find 2 familiar faces:
Watts and Zone.

> Card Check! If you held onto the kinky wet T-shirt edition of Girl
Next Door all the way back in Timber, you can exchange it for Shiva's
card if you give it to him for free. (Gee, it almost makes you wonder
what he's been doing with a card of a naked lady...)

> Magic Check! There's a Holy DP in one of the rooms. It's quite a
rare spell in this game for some reason.

Talk to the guy who appears to be the "captain" and he'll tell you
some stuff about Ellone. She decided to play hard to get and was
taken by Esthar soldiers.

Well, no luck here so head back to the Garden and Squall'll foolishly
try to carry Rinoa to Esthar and you'll see a long scene with the 2
of them. When you get to a train station, Zell and Quistis will be
waiting and guess who's tagging along? Edea of course, she'll be a
great asset, even though she may not be as powerful as Seifer.

---Salt Lake City? Yup, I've been there---
With the mighty Edea in your team (BTW, her status picture looks
really cool!) will allow your second power up session, and some of
your GFs, like the poor Siren, REALLY needs some EXP. So do what you
did with Seifer earlier, kill of 2 members and let Edea take all the

> Junction Check! Well, if you want to quickly level up a few GFs,
junction only 1 or 2 GFs you want to level up (Siren) to a dead
member so the EXP gained isn't spread over a large majority. Junction
all the important ones to Edea though, and make sure she has all the
-J abilities. Equip LV Up on Edea if you want. Also, don't junction
any GFs who has mastered both their level and skills (ie, your first
3 GFs if you did the Seifer power-up trick in Dollet.)

> Magic Check! Make sure that Edea has a large supply of good spells
for junctions.

Now you can fight either on the world map or in the Great Salt Lake
area. You can only encounter Vysages in the latter, they're pretty
good for AP though, and if you level them up, you can get some pretty
decent spells for drawing, but watch out for Meteor, it can be lethal
when you have only a single member.

> Note! Junction good spells to Edea's HP and equip HP+80% for a huge
HP boost. Edea can execute her Limit Break, Ice Strike, more easily
than the other members but not as much as Seifer. (I'd say about 50%
health remaining or less.) So use it to your advantage.

Try out Edea's Ice Strike on the Vysages, or you may wana try to
Silence them with Siren. If you decide to power up on the over world,
expect to see a lot of Mesmerizes but you can encounter a Hexadragon
or something occassionally that're great for EXP.

> GF Check! I think I'm gonna stop listing this section since it's
towards the end of th game where things can get a bit loose, so I'll
just list what skills you should learn in what order.
  - Brothers: All of their HP skills first, then the -J skills.
  - Carbuncle: All Vit skills, then ST-Def and ST-Atk skills and
finally complete the -J skills.
  - Leviathan: All Spr skills then Recover and -J skills
  - Pandemona: All Spd skills then Initiative and -J skills
  - Cerberus: VERY tricky here, since many of its great skills has
prerequisites. I'd get its Spd skills first, then Spr-J will unlock
ST-Def and learn everything until ST-Defx4 is complete. Then Mag-J
will unlock ST-Atk and finally all his other Character Skills.
  - Alexander: You'll want to complete High Mag-RF ASAP, then
immediately move onto Med Data, which unlocks Med LV-Up. (These
skills are required to acquire the GF Doomtrain but are as expensive
as hell!) Afterwards, complete Elem-Defx2 and x4, then Revive.
  - Tonberry: All of his shop skills are exceptionally useful, not
crucial but convinient, especially if you wanna use the money trick.
Completing all 3 of its shop skills will trigger Call Shop. It also
has 3 interesting Character Skills.

I stayed in this area until Alexander learns High Mag-RF, which comes
just in time since I was running out of magic slots and it helped to
turn -ras into -gas. If you've done Seifer's power-up trick in
Dollet, you shouldn't need the -ra spells.

> Magic Check! There are 2 DPs here. There's a hidden DP for Meteor
before a bone bridge hanging over a cliff, it's also non-recoverable.
The other DP is Thundaga and it's over the other side of the bridge.
When you're satisfied, find the SP and revive your members with a

> Junction Check! Spread out your GFs again and pack Leviathan's
Recover if you want an easy fight, also Enc-None too. Junction
Confuse and other status spells to your ST-Def.

Whenever you're ready, save and head all the way to the left, you
should be on top of a cliff over looking a large canyon, where you'll
find your next boss.

This boss is an undead, but it has very powerful claw swipes and it
can cause the Curse status. After a while, it'll take a defensive
stance by standing up, where it'll start to cast negative status
spells on you. Its defence is also rised during that period.

Since it's undead, cure-type spells can deal damage to it. If you've
equipped Leviathan's Recover command, use it on the boss and it will
deal 9999 damage, killing it in one hit. Else, draw Cura and cast it
on the boss. If you've became critical, use your Limit Break, also
take advantage of Edea's Limit Break.

If you brought Mug, you can steal a Power Wrist, else you'll win 10
Flare Stones.

When you're done, exit the screen and you'll have a sequence with a
hidden portal. Work your way into it and after taking the elevator a
couple of times, your team will arrive in a giant modern looking city
complex... Esthar?!

> Magic Check! Oh yeah, before proceeding with the story, trade
Edea's spells to another member... you'll see why in a sec.

---And then a hero comes along..---
Just when things are heating up, someone has to ruin it by sending
your team back in time to Laguna's world. Ward is back in this final
Laguna scenario after a long absence as a janitor and you can assign
who is going to play the parts of Kiros and Ward yourself. I don't
think sorceress Edea is selectable so that's why you need to trade
her magic to someone else. Basically, just choose whoever has the
majority of the spells stocked.

You'll see Laguna's team being held as prisoners and are used as
slaves for manual labour. Ward and Kiros gets taken away, but before
you do anything, check your junctions.

> Junction Check! Juction all GFs on Laguna first, and give him the
command LV Down.

Talk to everyone on the screen and eventually it'll yield a fight
with a guard, one on one. You need to use LV Down on him, it should
be an easy fight.

Actually, I've forgot what really happens here, but eventually Ward
and Kiros will be back in your team and you'll get surrounded by
soldiers. Don't fight yet as you need to prepare.

> Junction Check! Spread out your GFs and keep the LV Down command,
maybe the Card command too if you want.

I think you'll have to fight 2 streams of soldiers, with a Gespar in
the second fight. Just the usual LV Down strategy, but you may want
to card the Gespar, doesn't matter anyway.

Head all the way up to the surface where you'll meet up with the lab
assistant guy. They'll mention something about Ellone being held

> Magic Check! A DP for Death is near the entrace.

> NOTE! If you haven't gotten a Laser Cannon to learn Quistis'
powerful Homing Laser already, you can get one now, but it also
requires a bit of work. Make sure you equip both LV Up and LV Down
commands and the Mug skill.

Save at the SP and return to where you started. You'll encounter
another fight when you approach Dr. Odine. It's 2 soldiers and an
Elastoid. You can normally steal Laser Cannons from the Elastoid
easily, but not when your level is so low. (This is also the last
time you will ever fight an Elastoid so don't miss this chance.)

Alright, now use LV Down on the soldiers and eliminate them. Use LV
Up on the Elastoid until its level is above 30, then use Mug. You
should get a Laser Cannon.

> Magic Check! The high level Elastoid has Meltdown, a great spell,
for drawing. So stock up on it if you want. (It's also a good idea to
trade all your Meltdowns to a member who's not going to participate
in this scenario earlier. Oops, I should've mentioned this earlier
shouldn't I?) Anyway, get as many Meltdowns as you want. It also has
Stop, but you don't need to stock it. Just draw it and cast it on the
Elastoid, it should freeze it for 2-3 rounds.

Use LV Down on it and either card it or squash it. Done.

After you beat the enemies, you'll see a scene where you take the car
to the research centre to rescue Ellone. You'll fight another battle
when you get inside the structure, just use the usual LV Down

> Magic Check! 2 more DPs are in this section, equip Move-Find to see
them all. The first one to the top right corner has Double and the
one upstairs has Flare.

You can take the yellow disc thing in the centre of the room (it
looks like a throne) up. Enter the door and you'll fight another
boring encounter, just use the usual. Examine the computer terminal
and take the elevator thing back down to find Ellone. This scenario
will end with a happy ending. (And they lived happily forever
after... or did they?)

---Scarred for life---
Squall and team will wake up where they fell unconscious. A car
arrives to pick them up. You'll get a quick tour (well, not really a
tour) of Esthar and you'll arrive at the Presidential Palace. Edea
will explain her situation and Dr. Odine wants to examine the
unconscious Rinoa. Nope, Ellone is not here either, but they arranged
to have Squall and Rinoa launched into space. Lunar Gates is your
next destination, but you'll want to check out Esthar before you do

> Card Check! Before you go, challenge Dr. Odine to a card game since
he has Ward's card, my personal favourite card, as it's basically a
more powerful version of Ifrit's.

> Magic Check! Esthar is HUGE, so you'll have to run around to find
all the DPs, but some of them are not worth the effort. The one
outside the Presidential Palace has Blizzard (?!) A DP for Tornado is
outside Dr. Odine's lab and one for Quake is in the shopping mall.
(Or was it the other way around?) The other DP (Curaga) is on one of
the highways somewhere to the east.

Before you go though, check out the shopping malls, you can buy a lot
of cool stuff here, especially if you have gotten Tonberry's Familiar
ability. Don't forget to repeatedly visit Cheryl's shop for a free
Rosetta Stone. Johnny's shop may appear to be closed, but just
repeatedly visit his shop and it'll eventually be open for business.
It's worth it though, as he sells some great and rare stuff like
Elixirs, saving you time of having to make them. Once you visited his
shop, you'll be able to shop "online" at anything through Tonberry's
Call Shop ability.

Leave the city when you're satisfied, but Lunar Gates is pretty far
away so you might wanna hire a car. But then again, there's a few
things you can do right about now so maybe not.

---Things to do #4---
You'll want to check your map for the location of Tears Point, which
is to the south east of Esthar. Head over there since you can pick up
a vital item.

> Magic Check! There are 2 DPs in this area, one for Reflect next for
the statutes and one for Life (hidden) on the path leading to the

Walk towards the statutes in the centre of the area and you can
vaguely see a shiny thing on the ground. Examine it to receive the
Soloman's Ring.

This ring is indeed the one detailed in the third issue of Occult Fan
magazine (no, not Squall's ring!) The other issues of Occult Fan
hints the key 666 items to unleash the cursed GF. So these items are:
* 6x Malboro Tentacle
* 6x Steel Pipe
* 6x Remedy+

Once you have the required key items in your inventory, you can use
the Soloman's Ring to summon the GF Doomtrain to be your ally.

You should have accumulated quite a number of Steel Pipes from
fighting with Wendigos, or you can mod Elastoid's card. Six of them
is not hard to get. As for Remedy+, it can only be obtained from
refining 10 Remedies into 1 Remedy+ through Alexander's Med LV-Up
skill, which is quite a pain since it's so expensive and requires the
prerequisite of Med Data. As for Malboro Tentacles, you can obtain
them now or later, by defeating or stealing from Malboros.

Malboros can be found in the Esthar region but only before the Lunar
Gate event, they also seem to favour the western border. Also, it's
also going to be quite a mission to get its tentacles since you don't
want to level up, but here's how I did it.

Ok, junction Tonberry, Siren, Shiva, Quezacotl and Cerberus to Edea,
and make sure she has good spells in every category to junction. (Put
100 Triples in her Speed.) Kill off the other 2 members like always
so they won't gain any EXP.

ST-Def is vital for this mission. ST-Defx4 can be learned from
Cerberus, but it's very long way and requires MANY prerequisite
skills. If you've gotten the Status Guard from Shumi Village, use it
on one of your GFs. Else, just stick to Siren's ST-Defx2. (I only had
an ST-Defx2 when I did this.) Junction 100 Berserk and Confuse to it.
And if you have ST-Defx4, junction 100 Sleep and Silence as well.

Make sure Edea has an adequate supply of Regen, Shell, Protect,
Haste, Demi, Curaga and at least one Double/Triple. Give her the
commands, Attack, Magic, LV Up and Treatment. As for character
abilities, I'd choose any Spd+??% and HP+80%.

Run around the western border until you encounter a Malboro. You're
gonna need some luck on your side. The first thing it will do is Bad
Breath, which is gonna put Edea to Sleep if you only have ST-Defx2,
but it's quite mild if you have x4. If you have only x2, just wait
until it hits you with its Dissolving Acid attack, which will wake
you up.

In either case, use Treatment on yourself, since the Malboro won't
use Bad Breath for a while. Now cast all the positive status spells
on Edea, in this order: Haste, Regen, Protect (wards off Dissolving
Acid), Shell (wards off Eerie Sound Wave) then Double or Triple.

Now use LV Up on the Malboro ONCE, it should bring its level over the
30 barrier. This is needed because low level Malboros gives you
Poison Powder instead.

Now keep casting Double/Triple Demis when your turn comes up. If you
get affected by Bad Breath again, use Treatment like before. If you
really need healing fast, just use Curaga on yourself (one should be
enough.) If one or more positive status wears off, renew them.

Soon, the Demi you cast will start taking off less than 9999 damage,
it's an indication that you're getting close. You may switch to other
spells if you want, but just take note that they won't do all that
much damage for some reason. Firaga is decent since the Malboro is
weak against fire. Else just execute Ice Strike for a lot of damage
(about 8000.) You should be able to nail the Malboro without much
problems with this strategy. The only threat is not having ST-Defx4
and the Malboro keeps using Eerie Sound Wave, I remember getting KO'd
once because of it.

You should win 8 Malboro's Tentacles (or rarely 10 Cursed Spikes) and
tons of EXP! (My Edea went up TWELVE levels!!!!!)

If you do not wish to obtain the tentacles now, you'll have to wait
until after acquiring Ragnarock. As for the Remedies+, buy 60
Remedies and refine them from Alexander's Med LV-Up into 6 Remedies+.
Now you should have the basic requirements to summon GF Doomtrain, a
VERY cool GF!

When I first downloaded the Grasharaboras (Doomtrain) video off the
net, I immediately knew that Doomtrain would become my favourite GF
in the game. I wasn't disappointed. Never in videogame history had
you given the choice of summoning a _train_ to your aid, which makes
Doomtrain extremely unique and, well, hip. In someway related to the
Phantom Train boss in FF6, a vehicle that carries all "past aways" to
the "other side", Doomtrain's graphical sequence is no less than
breathtaking (IMO.) Its attack Runaway Train is of Poison elemental,
and can get very strong because Doomtrain is capable of learning
SumMag+40%. As an added bonus, Doomtrain's attack will also cause
every single negative status on the targets that you can think of,
except the ones where the target is immune against. Doomtrain is a
good choice against bosses because of Vitality Zero. It doesn't have
that many to-die-for skills, but enough to keep you going. ST-Defx4
and Elem-Defx4 are both invaluable defensive skills. Forbid Med-RF is
essential to get your characters stronger if you have the cash and
Junk Shop is the only "shop" skill that Tonberry does not have,
Best skills: ST-Atk, ST-Defx4, Elem-Defx4, Auto-Shell, Forbid Med-RF,
Junk Shop

> GF Check! Start with Doomtrain's Boost, then Forbid Med-RF for its
ability of creating goodies. Then Elem-Defx4 and ST-Defx4 will be
great assets to your party. Auto-Shell is nice if you put it to use.
IMO, Doomtrain benefits greatly from the SumMag+??%s, since it's
rather weak at first when you get it (and since it's a GF that you
will want to use a lot.)

---Gateway to the moon---
When you're ready to move on, head to Lunar Gates where you'll see a
scene. They're preparing to launch Rinoa, Squall and another team
member into space. Choose whoever here since they don't have to
fight, but if one member is really in trouble of almost gaining a
level, take them.

Zell will accompany Edea for her stuff and you're prompt to take
someone else. You'll hear a loud thump and it's time to head back to
Esthar to check out what happened.

---The box in the sky---
You need to go to Dr. Odine's lab (the one where you can't get into
earlier) and he'll explain the situation. The Lunatic Pandora will
cross Esthar and you have 20 minutes. There are 3 points where the
Lunatic Pandora will pass over a certain point in the city, and
you're given the approximate time which the Lunatic Pandora passes
by. What you need to do it to be at a certain point in the city
during a certain time frame. Just pay attention to Dr. Odine and you
shouldn't have much of a problem finding your destination.

> Junction Check! Give the LV Down command to the person who has the
best speed, and pack Enc-None as well.

Exit the lab and head for the destination. You can press the Square
button to bring up a very helpful time bar showing the time left, the
time and where the Lunatic Pandora passes through the city. I'm not
too sure if you will meet random encounters here though, can't

The first destination is the "city centre"... You can play "spot the
difference" with the picture you're shown and they real destination,
it's somewhere to the central western part of the city. It's kinda
hard to find but you have 5 minutes so no worries. If you get there
in time, just wait a little while.

>NOTE!!! The below walkthrough of the Lunatic Pandora is intended if
you succeeded in getting into the ship at the first time interval
(15:00). If you've failed the first time and got in either the second
or third time, you'll end up at a different place within the
structure. Thanks to Efrem Orizzonte <efroriz@hotmail.com> for this,
and here's the directions he gave to ensure you readers can find the
first meeting point without problems.

   "From the road outside Odine's lab, you must go right twice, then
    climb down the stairs behind the lift plate, then go up the steps
    and left. The Pandora will show up there."

> He also said that according to the official guides, the shops that are
usually closes in Esthar will be open during this time, although no one
has yet been able to varify that.

When the time comes, some soldiers will jump out and attack. Just
lower their level and kill them, they're easy. Note that the timer is
still on during the fight but there should be enough time for it.

After the fight, Zell's team will enter the Lunatic Pandora. There
are a LOT of goodies in here, and even MORE if you've triggered all
the traps in Laguna's second scenario. Make sure you catch 'em all.

Anyway, I've gonna be detailed here to get you all the cool stuff in
there. From the entrance, there's a Meteor DP and a Curaga DP is in
the room with 3 elevators. They recover very fast so stay here for a
while to pick some of them up.

The right #3 elevator up to the basement (??) and climb the ladder in
that area down. There is a DP for Confuse here, and the circular red
gate would be open if you triggered a certain trap, leading to a
LuvLuvG (kinda hidden.) Now take the path south and you'll regconize
this area. It's the infamous three hatches! So if you fiddled around
with all 3 of them, they should all be open. The left one has a
Phoenix Pinion, the middle one has a Silence DP and the right one
(and the best one of all!) has a Power Generator! Now Quistis can
finally learn Ray-Bomb!

Further along with path, you can pick up a copy of Combat King 005
(very obvious) and to the end of the passage has an Ultima DP. (Maybe
something else in there too, forgot.)

Make your way back to the elevator hall. You don't have to worry
about #2 as it will lead you to some empty hallways with NOTHING in
them. Don't even try to find stuff in there. I remember spending like
half in hour jamming on the X button trying to find items in there...
Ugh... Bad memories, don't wanna talk about it.

Take elevator #1 down and there's a Holy DP ready to be drawn.
There's also a Spd-J Scroll near by. That's about all folks, not too
bad huh? If you didn't get everything now, you'll still have a chance
later with Squall. So just follow the path past a SP and take the top
exit. Your team will be kicked out of the Lunatic Pandora.

---Vixen or tramp?---
You'll get to see a pretty cool scene on how they catch those
capsules in space. Afterwards, Squall and gang are quickly thawed.
You'll be asked to carry Rinoa to the medical room.

> Card Check! Save at the SP and challenge Piet to a card game, as
you wanna rob his Alexander card. The space region is the most
annoying as it uses ALL rules, so you really need a lot of strategy
and luck. (But a lot of strong cards isn't the answer, since he can
combo you badly.) It might take a few tries, but eventually you'll
get it. It's the _only_ holy elemental card in the whole game, making
it absolutely perfect for elemental battles, since Holy elemental
spots appear more often than others. Note you _can_ delete rules even
if this region has every single one, but it's rarely of much help.

Leave Rinoa and follow them to the control room. After a bit of
speech, you'll be told that Ellone is in the room upstairs. Save your
game again though, because...

> Card Check! Ellone has Laguna's card. It's not as easy as it sounds
though, as Ellone is a real b**ch when it comes to card games, even
more so than Edea/Quistis/Xu/Selphie's friend/Queen of Cards and her
little brat put together. First, she rarely uses Laguna, then she'll
usually combo you _really_ badly. (Talk about a 5 hit combo outside
of a fighting game. :) Curse that girl! It'll take some reloading for
this game. (Prepare some Asprin too.)

Make sure you play the card game with Ellone _before_ you speak with
her normally. Squall will take Ellone with him to see Rinoa, then the
alarm sounds as Rinoa wakens and is possessed. Follow her around and
she'll eventually switch off Adel's seal, and flies out of space to
free her.

The Lunar Cry has started, what shall I do? Anyway, go upstairs to
the locker room and put on one of those astronaut suits and try to
get outta there. You'll see another pointless scene where you try to
race them outta the air lock but it shuts and you'll have to go back
again. Geez, if that's how they're planning to lengthen FFIX by 2
minutes then I'm gonna go complain.

You'll have to get onto an escape pod right now. You'll have to talk
to Ellone and then descend an elevator. Don't go into the pod yet

> Magic Check! If you examine a hatch to the left-hand side, it'll
open reviewing a DP for Meltdown.

Then hop onto the escape pod and ready for lift off. The space
station is completely destroyed after that. Ellone will try to send
Squall into Rinoa's past, just watch some nifty cut scenes to see
what Rinoa had gotten up to during her absense. You'll see quite a
long scene with Rinoa in space and her past, I won't spoil it here
(and there is something to spoil this time :)

Anyway, the scene ends with Squall's voice reaching Rinoa's heart,
this part's kinda touching. He just rushed out of the escape pod to
chase after her in space.

You'll be forced to play the _worst_ micro-minigame in all videogame
history. Not only is it boring and pointless, you're not even
informed about the controls until you fail! Geez, what you do here it
to keep your finger on the accelerate button (it's the Triangle
button) for 30 seconds and aim for Rinoa's figure with the stick.
Playing this game almost makes me vomit...

Squall rushes up to Rinoa and embrace her in his arms, holding onto
dear life. The end is nigh...

---Eyes on me--- (No, not her, ME!!!)
An airship just happens to be near by, watch the awesome FMV
sequence. The couple will climb in. Go release the air lock and save
at the SP.

In the next room, Squall and Rinoa will take off their bulky
astronaut suits. Rinoa wants a hug but Squall isn't very keen. Keep
going, but check your junctions first.

> Junction Check! Junction all GFs on these 2 characters, and just
use whatever you see fit. If you don't have enough spells, steal them
off another team member. Not all that much here really but be sure to
give Rinoa a good magic level. Junction any Thunder-type spells to
Elem-Def (or use Flare) and junction any Silence to ST-Def.

> NOTE! Rinoa will loose the ability of her Angelo skills inside the
Ragnarock, since Angelo did not accompany her into space. To make up
for it, Rinoa will gain the access to her Angel Wing Limit skills.

> Magic Check! Make sure Rinoa has a variety of good offensive spells
and trade any status spells not being junctioned or Scan/Dispel to
another member to make her Angel Wing more effective.

Y..yikes! A..aliens! You've gotta fight them because the air ship
will refuse the access to the pilot's chamber when it detects a
biological contamination. They are counted as bosses too...

They are not all that hard. They love casting Thundaga but you should
be protected. Use Squall's Renzokuken for a quick fight, and you
might want to try out Rinoa's Angel Wing too.

There are 8 of them on the ship, but if you kill them in an incorrect
order, they will keep regenerating. The trick it to kill them off in
pairs. If you kill 2 Propagators of the same color one after the
other, they both will remain dead forever. It's kinda cruel to the
color blinded people though.

You might need to do a bit of sneaking as once one of them sees you,
they'll chase after you. They give you 5AP each and isn't all that
hard so if you want some AP, here is not a bad place.

Qualera told me a long time ago (I think) that you can also get pass
this point by defeating the Propagator enough times, 36 I think.

> Magic Check! I'm not sure when these DPs will become available but
it's probably after you've eliminated all the aliens. There's one for
Life (hidden) near the door on a bridge-like platform above another
platform. The other is a non-recoverable DP for Full-Life in the room
with a SP.

When you've killed them all, the elevator will be active and you can
use it to get to the bridge. A loooooong cut scene will follow,
followed by a musical sensation sung by the brilliant Faye Wong -
Eyes On Me!!! Enjoy. (Although it does kinda distract you from
reading the text conversations between Squall and Rinoa.) I won't
spoil anything here.

After you land, Rinoa gets taken away. Then whoever you took with you
to space will come back safe and sound. (Watch what Quistis says
here, if you took her. Don't worry Quisty, I'll always love you.
Hehe...) Then Zell's team will also arrive, saying that Matron is not
a sorceress anymore. You will now loose Edea as a playable character
:( but she's still an ally. After hearing how Rinoa got taken away,
everyone got angry at Squall, and Quistis calls him a coward. (Or was
it idiot, or looser, can't remember.)

Then a hilarious scene involving Selphie piloting the Ragnarock will
follow. The Sorceress Memorial is your next destination. You might be
tempted to start powering up now, but it doesn't hurt to start it
after taking back Rinoa.

Land the Ragnarock near the Sorceress Memorial and head inside.
There's no fights here so don't worry about junctions.

> Magic Check! There's a DP for Stop right outside the structure.

Squall will take Rinoa by force (don't you think sound effects or
music would help during that FMV?) while your other members will hold
the protesters back (watch out for Selphie's nunchacku!) Then your
team returns safely back to the Ragnarock.

Rinoa suggests to go to Edea's orpahnage but tell her "shove it"
because it's powering up time!

                          Power Up Extra
Hehe, this is a new section with any comments that I have to help you
power up. I will re-type the above Cactuar/Bahamut sections plus the
strategies. Also, I will also detail any fun mini-quests you can do
while powering up, you can do them in any order though, so you might
want to read through all of them to see which ones you want to do.
Basically, this section is here to help you get powerful and prepare
for the last showdown in disc 4.

---Acquiring Cactuar---
Take the Ragnarock south past the desert and land of the tiny island,
the Cactuar Island. Check your junctions. As for party members, I'd
take Quistis, Squall and Rinoa (for her Invincible Moon.)

> Junction Check! Speed is very important here, junction 100 Triples
to all character's Spd, equip Spd+40% and Auto-Haste if you have it.
Junction Water to your Elem-Atk. Try lower your HP to critical if you
can (or just for Rinoa.) As for commands, try:
     Squall:  Attack, Magic, GF, Item
     Rinoa:   Attack, Magic, Revive, GF
     Quistis: Attack, Draw, Magic, GF
If you wanna draw spells from Jumbo Cactuar, pack Draw instead of GF.

Hey, the Jumbo Cactuar is Italian!!! Jumbo Cactuar is pretty bad,
since it has the 10,000 Needles attack that does 10000 damage to one
target regardless of your Vit/Spr, which is instant death.

Try letting Rinoa use her Angelo Limit Break and hope for Invincible
Moon. That way, it'll render the boss' 10000 Needle attack useless.
If you wanna draw spells, Meltdown and Tornado are never a bad
choice, although you can get them from other enemies. Draw your
spells during the time where your characters are invincible.

If you don't want to draw spells, Invincible Moon is still great,
especially if all your characters are in critical condition. If
someone gets knocked out by 10000 Needles, use Life or the Revive
command on them.

For offence, nothing can beat your Limit Breaks. Use Quistis' Aqua
Breath for big damage since the Jumbo Cactuar is weak against water.
A regular attack with Water junctioned to Elem-Atk is also very
strong. You should have no problem beating it.

Oh yeah, don't steal, because you'll get some crap Cactuar Thorns
instead of a Gaea's Ring (a free HP-Up!)

Like the Tonberry, Cactuars are another enemy in the series. These
cactus-like creatures have been through numerous identity-crisises,
from "Cactrots" in the old days, "Cactuar" nowadays and "Sabotender"
in the Japanese versions. This Italian needle thrower may look
stupid, but that fact hides the potential of a deadly attack. 10,000
Needles is different to any other GF attack in that it does damage
purely based on GF Cactuar's level. The amount of damage dealt is
equal to the "tens" digit of Cactuar's level x 1000. For example, if
GF Cactuar's level is 30-39, the damage dealt is 3000, simple and
effective. This also means that at maximum level of 100, Cactuar will
do 10000 damage to all targets everytime, just like its name. Not
that there's much difference from the 9999 from other GFs, but the
extra digit sure does appeal to the eye. :) Cactuar is also the
master of Character Abilities, since it comes with all Bonuses learnt
and many other potentially useful ones to be learnt. It is also few
GFs that offer the Luck-J and Eva-J ability that's more useful than
it sounds.
Best skills: HP Bonus, Str Bonus, Vit Bonus, Mag Bonus, Spr Bonus,
Eva-J, Luck-J, Expendx2-1, Initiative

> GF Check! GF Cactuar should start by learning Luck-J and Eva-J
abilities, then any Character Abilities will do. Its extra Command
Abilities ain't all that great.

---Acquiring Bahamut---
Save the game somewhere. Take the Ragnarock to the south-eastern
corner of the map and try to find a place that resembles an oil rig
(Deep Sea Research Centre.) Land there and select your team. It
doesn't matter who you take for this mission though, but I'd suggest
you bring along Mr. Know-it-all Zell.

> Junction Check! Make sure your party members has good HP and Spr
levels. LV Down is required, and the Recover command is nice. Also,
remove any spells you have junctioned to Luck since if it's too high,
Odin may appear and ruin it for you.

> Magic Check! Try giving away any Full-Life your active team members
have, since it's about time to get them by the truck loads.

Enter the structure and you'll see a glowing tube. Don't retreat when
it asks you to and inch your way towards the tube but only when the
lights spinning around the tube goes away, else you'll be attacked by
some monster.

Examine the glowing tube and it'll ask you a question. You don't have
any choice on what to answer so just select "It's not our will to
fight." You'll have to fight a Ruby Dragon. It's not that hard, given
that your levels are so low. So just use LV Down on it until it drops
to level 1 and kill it off.

Then the tube asks "Begging me for mercy?" Just choose the Bottom
option, "Never!" You'll fight another Ruby Dragon, same old same old.

Then it asks you a third question, a trick question in fact. Choose
neither answer but instead, move the curser down to the bottom where
it lies a third hidden option. Choose that, and you'll fight the
mystery existance behind the light - Bahamut!

You'll now enter the light tube to fight Bahamut. It'll spend most of
its time hangin' around in the air doin' nothing. It occasionally
swoops down and slashes one member with a claw swipe, that's kinda
powerful but you should have a decent Vit so it won't matter too
much. If needed to, use Leviathan's Recover command.

Another great spell is finally available for mass-drawing: Full-Life!
Try getting 300 of them. If you don't damage Bahamut, it won't attack
very frequently, just an occasional claw swipe or so. Your Mag
attribute should be good enough to get 9 charges every turn. Bahamut
also has Flare, so get some if you want it, although it's quite
common a bit later and ain't as powerful as it should have been.

When you feel it's done, finish off Bahamut in anyway you want.
Doomtrain won't work very well since Bahamut is strong against
Poison, but the Vit Zero status is useful (or you can try Meltdown.)
Another strategy is to draw Flare and cast it back at Bahamut. It's
not that powerful, but since Bahamut is at quite a low level, it may
surprise you at the number of Flares needed to take the legendary GF
down. Regular attacks will work well too and if you're feelin'
generous, try out Aura and unleash someone's Limit Break.

Bahamut has an ultimate attack - Mega Flare! It'll only use it when
its HP gets low though, or after a loong loooooong time. If you get
hit by it, immediately use the Recover command, draw Curaga from
Bahamut or use Selphie's Full Cure/Quistis' White Wind. Mega Flare is
no joke, as it can do 3000 damage to all your guys, that's why you
need high HP, because it would be a "Super Douper Mega Bummer" if
you've spent the time to draw Full-Life and gets wiped out by it. If
you're fast enough in finishing Bahamut, you may not even see Mega
Flare! (I didn't!)

As any FF fanatics will know, it's just not a FF without Bahamut.
(Yup, FF2 was more of a SaGa than a FF.) Of course, Bahamut is not as
good as he was in the _really_ old days, since he hasn't been the
most powerful summon for a very long time. His trademark Mega Flare
is powerful and non-elemental, but still caps at 9999, making it an
iffy summon if you ask me. It cannot, however, be blocked by Shell
like the other summons though, so it still has some value. Bahamut
has more value in its skills than the summon, since it's the only GF
that gives Abilityx4, Mag+60% and Str+60% naturally. Rare Item comes
in handy when you want the good items from enemies, as the chances
for the enemies to drop a better item is increased. Forbid Mag-RF is
also the most handy way of get your hands on Ultima spells, although
the ingredients may be hard to find.
Best skills: Abilityx4, Mag+60%, Str+60%, Mug, Auto Protect, Forbid
Mag-RF, Rare Item, Expendx2-1

> GF Check! Get Boost first for Bahamut, then just get all his best
skills that I've listed above first.

Now it's your time to power up, but there are a few things you might
be interested.

---Complete your collection... nearly!---
Did you mug Alexander's card off Piet? Good. (If not, I think you can
find him somewhere in the over world, the crash landing zone of the
escape pod somewhere south of Esthar.) Take it to the Queen of cards,
who should be back at Dollet after the Chicobo card event above.

Anyway, loose the Alexander card to her and try to get her back to
Balamb. I know it's a pain having to rest but if you let her go
anywhere else, it'll take even more time to get her back to Dollet.
Before you leave Dollet, win back Alexander from her son.

The newly created card is Doomtrain, which can be gotten from the guy
who's sitting in a booth in the "Aphrora pub" in Timber. If he
challenges you to a card game when you talk to him regularly (ie,
with the X button instead of Square) then you know it's him, can't
miss it. It might take some time to get him to use the card though, I
think it was after about 30 matches before I saw him use it and won
it from him. Have some patience.

Guess which card is acquired for the last "special" rare card? Why
it's no other than Doomtrain's card that you just won. So take it
back to the Queen of Cards (in Balamb) and loose it to her, and you
must try to get her back to Dollet one last time.

Afterwards, chase her back to Dollet and she'll tell you another card
has been created. Whew, what a woman, but the good news is that you
don't even have to be bothered by her again... for this disc anyway.
:( Before you go, pick up Doomtrain from her son. Oh yeah, if you
haven't done the bone searching quest, do it now while you're in

The new Phoenix card is in possession of Presidential Aide in Esthar
city. So take the Ragnarock back Esthar and find him in the
Presidential Palace. It might also take some time until he uses
Phoenix, but not as long as the guy in the pub. When you've finally
won Phoenix, you should only have 3 more empty slots in your card
menu, Pupu, Squall and Eden. Don't worry, they're all easy.

If you're missing any LV7 boss cards, go to either Xu, Quistis or
Martine for them. It's pretty hard to complete a full set of LV7
cards IMO.

For Pupu's card, a rare LV5 card that's even rarer than the LV10 card
(!!) you'll need to prepare 5 Elixirs. They can be refined or bought
in Johnny's shop in Esthar, and you should have a few in your

Now you need to see 4 UFO encounters, they're in these locations:
  - Mandy Beach near Timber
  - Near Winhill
  - Kashkabald Desert
  - Health Peninsular east from Trabia Garden (island)

The first 3 encounters can be seen during earlier stages of the game,
while you'll need the Ragnarock for the last I think. Anyhow, these
encounters will occur even if you have equipped the Enc-None skill,
so equip it and walk around that region and you'll encounter the UFO

When you've seen all 4, take the Ragnarock toward the direction of
the Chocobo Holy Ground and land on the rocks. Walk around and you'll
encounter a flying saucer. Kill it (!!) and it'll explode and you'll
earn a VERY useful Aegis Armlet, which teaches a GF the useful Eva-J.

Now take the Ragnarock back to where Balamb Garden used to be, and
walk around the giant crevice and you'll eventually encounter an
alien, a cute green thing. It'll say "Elixir please" (what? This is
the replacement for the Magic Pots?) so use all your Elixirs on him.
Don't forget to equip the Item command. :) After 5 of them, the fight
will stop and you'll earn Pupu's card, which is the rarest card in
the game and can be refined into a Hungery Cookpot, which teached the
Devour command to a GF.

---Mmmmmmm, Rosetta Stones... *Drool*---
You may be tempted to go fight Ultima Weapon and acquire Eden right
away, but I'd advice you wait a little, and there's a very good
reason for it: To gather Dark Matters/Rosetta Stones.

I usually do this after powering up 2 members, Quistis and Selphie.
Now replace Selphie with Zell and revive Squall and maybe do just a
little more powering up. Now take the Ragnarock back to the oilrig
thing, the same place where you got Bahamut. Climb down the hole
where you fought Bahamut. (Note: I've received some mail from a few
people who claimed that they CANNOT reach beneath it. All you gotta
do is climb aboard the Ragnarock and talk to everyone on deck.)

> Junction Check! Make sure that Squall and Zell are junctioned with
the right GFs for power-level-upping and all the bonuses you want.
Give Diablos and Tonberry to Quistis and give her the commands: Mug,
Magic, LV Up and something else. She should be really powerful now,
doing godful amounts of damage with each blow. The other characters
are weak though, so you might want to junction 100 Deaths into their
ST-Atk to beef them up. Junction 100 Confuse to ST-Def, Bio helps too
if you have it. Doesn't matter if you don't.

> Magic Check! There's a DP for Dispel at the bottom of the pillar
thing you just climbed down, but who cares?

Approach the generator and use 4 blocks of energy to operate it. Now
there are multiple ways of getting down that thing. I used 4, 2, 1, 1
and 1, so that works. Note that you can encounter Grendels and Bombs
on those levels. They're crap so just do whatever. At the bottom is
the main generator. Let Zell handle it and he punches the piece of
junk, and guess what? The gate opens!

The next screen is your target, it should be look like an ancient
ruin underwater. Strange indeed. Anyway, you must make sure you have
more than 10 blocks of steam pressure left since it's required to
acquire Eden a bit later, but lets not worry about it now.

Save at the SP. The deal with the encounters in this floor and every
floor below it is that they're NOT random. Everytime you step across
a certain point on the ground, you'll be attacked. The type of enemy
varies from floor to floor. This floor is full of Tri-Faces, who you
can steal Curse Spikes from. Why, they're the ingredients for Dark
Matters you say? That's right, you sure do catch on quickly. So
repeatedly fighting them on this floor will result in building up
your collecting rapidly.

However, Siren MUST be at level 100 to do the conversion, which is a
hard job since it's not a good idea to junction her alone to a dead
member when doing level upping so she don't have to share the other
GF would not work. Siren hold the Mag Bonus skill required for the
second member. However, if you're following my "Customized character"
method above, then you might want to junction Siren to a dead Squall
when you're levelling up Quistis earlier. (In that case, trade
Selphie's place for Irvine.) Otherwise, you'll have to do a lot of
EXP gathering to get Siren to level 100.

The 3 encounter points on this floor are located:
  - Right before the SP
  - The steps to the centre of the screen
  - In front of the steps leading down

> NOTE! I don't know if random encounters occur on this floor in
addition to the fixed encounters, but I know that the floors below
has random encounters, so it might be a good idea to give Quistis

Now keep fighting the Tri-Faces. Let Quistis use LV Up on it to get
it to level 100, while the other 2 characters can draw some good
spells like Pain and Flare. When it gets level 100, have Quistis
steal from it, you should get 6 Curse Spikes (or rarely 8) which is
good. Then have the low level characters kill it in one blow with
Death in their ST-Atk. In addition to the Cursed Spike, it gives you
decent EXP so that's 2 birds with one stone, whoohoo! Tri-Faces do
occasionally drop 8 Curse Spikes upon its defeat, but it's rare and
most of the time you'll get crap like Poison Powder. Odin will
occasionally come and ruin it for you though, but there's not much
you can do about that, maybe remove any spells in Luck-J.

When you fought all 3 of them, just exit the screen and come back,
they'll be back, so carry on.

Once you've accumulated 100 of them, use Siren's Tool-RF to turn it
into a Dark Matter. Then carry on until you're worn out.

***************** The wonders of a Dark Matter **********************
* First and foremost, you should always give your first one to      *
* Quistis to let her learn her best Blue Magic, Shockwave Pulsar.   *
* You have a choice with the rest of them, there're waaaaaaayyy too *
* many options and believe me, they're all so awesome!              *
*                                                                   *
* 1x Dark Matter -> 100 Ultima (Bahamut: Forbid mag-RF)             *
* I believe that this is the one of the best way of gathering       *
* Ultimas. However, you can draw up to 300 Ultimas from Ultima      *
* Weapon later, plus any Ultimas you've drawn from the DP and count *
* the 100 Ultima Stones (and the ones you have already) you get for *
* beating Ultima Weapon, you should have 600 Ultimas easily without *
* having to spend a Dark Matter, but it's good idea if you don't    *
* feel like drawing from Ultima Weapon.                             *
*                                                                   *
* 1x Dark Matter -> Shaman Stone (Siren: Tool-RF)                   *
* Shaman Stones improves the Compatibility with Bahamut slightly,   *
* but it's just a waste. However, you can refine Shaman Stones into *
* a lot of things. Also note that you can refine 10 Shaman Stone    *
* into a Hero-trail. If you wanna make Heroes manually, then this   *
* is probably the best place for it, but it's much easier to do the *
* card trick in disc 4.                                             *
*                                                                   *
* 1x Shaman Stone -> LuvLuvG (Siren: Tool-RF)                       *
* This is much better if you want Compatibility, but it's still a   *
* waste IMO.                                                        *
*                                                                   *
* 1x Shaman Stone -> Rosetta Stone (Eden: GFAbl Med-RF)             *
* Now this is what you really wanna do. You should have a few GFs   *
* with the Abilityx4 skill (Bahamut and Rosetta Stones you've found *
* earlier) and you can get another later in Ultimecia's Castle. You *
* will probably won't need to refine these if you've been lucky     *
* enough to collect enough of these. The reverse also holds with    *
* Siren's Tool-RF. Note you have not gotten GF Eden yet, so this is *
* not possible yet. However, don't rush to get Eden yet, since all  *
* fixed encounters will be gone after beating Ultima Weapon. So     *
* store everything as Dark Matters for now since it's the most      *
* versatile form.                                                   *
*                                                                   *
* 1x Dark Matter -> Luck-J Scroll (Eden: GF Abl Med-RF)             *
* Another great deal, since only ONE GF in the entire game starts   *
* with Luck-J normally (Cactuar.) You can find 2 scrolls in the     *
* game though, but that's barely enough. Luck is good for Selphie's *
* Slots, and determines the frequency of Rinoa's Angelo Search      *
* (I've seen it twice now, yay!) It also determines how often       *
* Odin/Gilgamesh appears. Also, it affects critical hits, so that   *
* makes Zell and Irvine's Limit Breaks extra effective with the     *
* extra damage. Finally, Luck might have something to do with the   *
* effects of Quistis' Blue Magic (such as the effects of Mighty     *
* Guard.) So you'll need 2 of these for you perfectionists, but     *
* it's still good to get everyone Luck-J. Also, note that you can   *
* refine 1 Luck-J Scroll into a Luck Source if you have any         *
* spares, but it's again, quite a waste, but it's decent if you've  *
* gotten everything above and have spent a VERY long time gathering *
* Dark Matters.                                                     *

When you are satisfied with your load of Dark Matters (I usually get
about 6 or so of them) and is hungry for the last GF, head down. The
second floor has 3 more encounters with a Grendel and an Imp, 2 crap

NOTE: Before you carry on, you might want to read the section after
this for an alternate way of acquiring GF Eden.

On the third floor however, Behemoths resides. You can mug/win
Barriers from them. Use one on Quistis immediately to get her to
learn Mighty Guard, possibly her most useful Blue Magic. If you
collect lots of them, you can turn 50 of them into an Aegis Armlet
with Eden's GFAbl Med-RF, which is another cool item, but since you
don't have Eden yet, you can only store them in their "raw" form. Be
careful though, Behemoths uses some very nasty spells like Flare and
Meteor, so make sure you beef up your Spr levels. They also tend to
cast Flare before they die, but they _can_ be killed with Death in

Ruby Dragons craws on the fourth floor. They're good for that it's a
nice place to collect 600 Meteor, Flares and Reflects for all your
characters. With Behemoths and Ruby Dragons, it strikes me instantly
as a good Devour place. However, you don't have Eden yet, and all
enemies will disappear once you do. The only option is to mod Pupu's
card into a Hunger Cookpot and teach a GF the Devour command.
However, consider that Pupu's card is the rarest and cannot be won
back with the card trick in disc 4, it's going to be a painful thing
to us perfectionists. It's still an idea though, if you wanna try it,
this place makes it an EXCELLENT place to beef up your HP and
especially Magic. Beware of their Breath attacks though, I remember
getting a Game Over here. If needed, use Colin Pentney's trick by
killing one of your characters.

On the fifth floor lies the Iron Giants. They have insane Vit so it's
a good idea to summon Doomtrain. They don't serve much of a special
purpose except for being there. They do have Reflects though. Oh
yeah, they give you Star Fragments and Running Fires, the latter is
good for refining into Demolition Ammo.

> Magic Check! There are various DPs spread among this place. On the
third floor there's a DP for Triple, and just before exiting the
fifth floor, there's a hidden DP for Ultima. They're both non-
recoverable. :(

At the bottom, there's a large electronic terminal thing. There's a
hidden SP to the left, save there, and prepare to fight Ultima
Weapon. As for party members, try out Quistis/Squall/Zell if they're
all at level 100. However, if Squall and Zell are of lower level,
trade Zell's place for Selphie. Now yes, Selphie is much less
powerful than Zell, _but_ Ultima Weapon seems to have an aversion to
attacking her, very strange indeed. So having her in the party as the
main healer is a great idea. (However, that's what happened in my
game, but things could be different in yours.)

> Junction Check! I'm gonna go into a lot of details here. Junction
your GFs to your characters carefully, make sure they're spread out
and everyone has Spd-J and -J abilities to all their major stats.
Don't worry about the Bonus abilities, since you won't get any EXP.
Here's the commands I used:
   Quistis: Attack, Draw, Magic, GF
   Squall:  Attack, Draw, Magic, Item
   Selphie: Attack, Draw, Magic, Revive

The Draw command is there to take advantage of the unlimited supply
of Ultimas. Everyone needs Magic or Items to Revive each other.
Selphie will be the main healer, so give her Revive since she gets
KO'd the least. Junction 100 Triples to everyone's Speed, this is one
fight where Speed is the most important attribute, then equip Spd+40%
and Auto-Haste/Spd+20%. If you already have Auto-Haste, 100 Triples
and Spd+40% are enough to raise the stats so high that doubling it
with Auto-Haste will automatically hit 255 (the max) so equipping
Spd+20% won't make any difference. As for other skills, equip any HP
skills to get it to 9999 if you want, or Auto-Protect if you have it.
Then _either_ Mug or Rare Item (but not both.) You'll get different
stuff: Mug will get you a Three Stars (Expendx3-1 skill or refined
into 100 Triples) but defeating it will get you 100 Ultima Stones, so
it's up to you. I'd take the Ultima Stones, since you can get a Three
Stars by doing the Obel Lake quest. Rare Item is there because
sometimes Ultima Weapon won't drop anything! (It didn't in my first
game.) Because of this, turn any Ultima Stones you already have into
spells. The one who has the GF command should have Doomtrain
junctioned, or even Cerberus. Junction Quake to your Elem-Def. Oh
yeah, make sure that you adjust the battle speed to the slowest

Now examine the terminal. It'll take 10 blocks of steam pressures.

Erh... I guess everyone's familiar with this boss. It does look a bit
like the AtmaWeapon in FF6 and it has Cloud's Ultima Weapon from FF7.

It has some deadly attacks. Light Pillar is the worst, as it'll do
9999 damage to one character no matter what, killing them in one hit,
and he repeatedly used them quite often, that's why you need to keep
up with high Speed. Make sure you immediately revive anyone who gets
KO'd with Light Pillar. It also uses Ultima and Quake occasionally,
but that won't hurt you much. Then it has a regular sword attack,
it'll do about 1000 damage to one character, so that's pretty mild.

> GF Check! Do NOT forget to draw GF Eden!

You might want to cast Haste on you characters, but seeing how often
you get killed, it might not be a good idea. Summon GF Cerberus as
the first thing is a good idea, since at times Ultima Weapon can
knock 2 characters out before you can act, so having Double is quite
useful. (It saved my butt in my game.) Then draw GF Eden.

If you're lucky, Ultima Weapon will waste many of its turns doing
regular attacks. I found that if you don't attack him, he won't use
Light Pillar as much and takes longer to act, which is good. So if
you want to draw Ultima from it, do it now, until you get enough of
them. Revive anyone who's been KO'd.

You might be tempted to use Quistis' Mighty Guard, but I found that
it will provoke Ultima Weapon to use Light Pillar more often if you
do. Whenever you're ready, summon GF Doomtrain to give Ultima Weapon
the Vit Zero status. If Doomtrain gets KO'd, switch to a Meltdown
spell. Then if Squall's in critical, have him use his Renzokuken. If
he has acquired Lion Heart, it can kill Ultima Weapon in one hit. If
not, cast Aura on him, and Quistis too, if she's not in critical
either, then just use her newly acquired Shockwave Pulsar for 20000+
damage! As for Selphie, I do not recommend that you spin away on her
Slots, instead have her do all the reviving and casting Auras. If
she's free, draw Ultima from the Weapon and cast it back on it for
decent damage. If you bought along anyone else, have them do their
best Limit Breaks too. Rinoa would be cool if you managed to get an
Invincible Moon. With your speed, Ultima Weapon shouldn't be a

Mug him if you want the Three Stars. You'll win Eden's card after
this fight. Yay, one more card to go!!!

Eden is the final GF in the game, as well as having the most powerful
single hit attack in the whole game. "What is that thing?" is the
words in everyone's lips when we see it for the first time. Someone
mentioned that it's the "Garden of Eden", a futuristic Garden like
Balamb Garden. I guess it does make some sense. Other guesses
includes Zodiac of FFT and another one of Bahamut's friends (like Neo
Bahamut etc.) as its portrait does look kinda like a dragon. Anyway,
its summon sequence takes over a minute, which would be a killer in
the old days but in FFVIII, enjoy an easy 250 tapping with Boost. :)
It has really low Compatibility with all characters though, and
summoning it doesn't increase it by very much. So the best way to
increase Compatibility with it is through lotsa LuvLuvGs. Its attack
Eternal Breath is very powerful though, as it can easily do over
35000 damage! Of course, it also has great value in its skills, such
as the Devour command, another decent way of gaining stats. GFAbl
Med-RF is about the only way to get some of the best skills for your
GFs, don't overlook it. Expendx3-1 is great support skill for magic
and Triple, and Eden is the only GF that uses the true potential of
all the SumMag+??% skill.
Best skills: Devour, GFAbl Med-RF, Expendx3-1, Spd-J, Eva-J

NEW!!! <yang1@altavista.net> has e-mailed me about what Eden might
be. It sounds pretty logical, here's what he has to say.

"While reading through the FFVIII script, I noticed the story one guy
in Balamb was telling to a girl about Hyne and how she split up her
body, gave half to humans, and ran away with the other half, never to
be seen again. Then an idea struck me: could Eden be the part of
Hyne's body hidden from the world? It would explain why Eden was
buried deep, Hyne most likely wanted to keep away from humans, and
would make Eden's power and partial control over time (read below);
such powers belonging to the first sorceress and creator of humans
would not be surprising. Hyne might have created Ultima Weapon to
guard her body from people seeking its power. It also gives an
explanation for why Eden's compatibility is so low with everyone;
having lost a war to humans, Hyne most certainly would not like
having her powers controlled by one and have contempt for its master.

"Of course, this is just my interpretation. Its not by any means
right, and was a product of some boredom on the mind. Hyne theory in
mind, this is my interpretation of Eden's (massive) attack sequence:

"Summoned by humans, Eden traverses the space-time continuum,
reaching the site of the battlefield. It then takes the enemies into
the continuum again, gathering its power up and its foes with it.
Eden uses its power to collect Earth's energy throughout time, from
the creation of the world to the distant futher. Collecting the
power, it shapes it into a beam and uses it to send its unlucky foes
into a distant galaxy, which causes it to explode in a massive
supernovae of many stars in its core, which destroys the galaxy
itself. The power generated from the explosion hurls the enemies back
to its own time, causing it to crash and take spectacular damage."

Pretty convincing huh?

> GF Check! Eden should start with Boost, then GFAbl Med-RF and
Expendx3-1. After that, not many of its skills has great appeal so
start with Eden's SumMag+??% skills for a real killer, getting all 4
of them means an extra 100% of damage, wow!

The good news is that you've gotten the last GF, gotten lotsa Dark
Matters and lotsa other bonuses. But the bad news is that all the
fixed encounter have disappeared, meaning no more goodies. :(

Bonus tip - You don't know what you've got 'til it's gone ===========
|This is the trick on getting Dark Matters/Rosetta Stones after the |
|Eden event. Thanks to Duncan Day-Myron <wombat_84@hotmail.com> for |
|this trick.                                                        |
|                                                                   |
|1) Acquire GF Siren. (easiest step)                                |
|2) Learn Tool-RF (Ok, this is pretty easy too)                     |
|3) Acquire GF Eden (not hard, not easy)                            |
|4) Learn GFAbl Med-RF (kinda easy)                                 |
|5) Let Rinoa get the Esthar region possesed by devils (from the    |
|   landing of Adel)                                                |
|6) Run around until you fight the enemy "Imp"                      |
|7) DO NOT MUG THEM but kill them brutally or card them or whatever |
|   so that they are no longer there but you receive items after the|
|   battle                                                          |
|8) You will usually receive "Curse Spikes" (about 6)               |
|9) Collect 100xCursed Spikes (*gasp*)                              |
|10) Get GF Siren up to Level 100!!                                 |
|11) Use GF Siren's ability Tool-RF to turn 100xCursed Spikes into  |
|   1xDark Matter (only works if GF Siren is at Lvl 100)            |
|                                                                   |
|Not bad huh? Of course, it's not as good as the one in Deep Sea    |
|Research Centre but hey, we've got no choice.                      |
|                                                                   |
|This method works, but not that well. However, another sorta okay  |
|way of collecting Curse Spikes is to equip Rare Item and Mug, then |
|go to the Island Closest to HEAVEN (not Hell)! You can encounter   |
|Tri-Faces there, but the encounter rate is so low that it alone    |
|will make this trick collapse under its own weight. Although       |
|Malboros are quite common on that island, they will also give you  |
|Curse Spikes. Do NOT mug it when you encounter one, instead defeat |
|it (use Quistis' Degenerator for the best effect) and you'll       |
|occasionally receiver 10 Curse Spikes, with about a 10% chance.    |
|Most of then time you'll just get crap like Malboro Tenticles but  |
|with Rare Item equipped, the chance of receiving Curse Spikes jumps|
|to about 50% or 60%, so you can try gathering Curse Spikes there.  |
|If you do encounter Tri-Faces, mug it then card it for an extra    |
|one. (We're Curse Spike-pinching here!)                            |

---Acquiring Eden - Alternative!---
Thanks to <yang1@altavista.net> and Ankhorial.

Eden is the most powerful GF in the game with massive number of
awesome abilities. However, it's a double edged knife when acquiring
it. Because you'll loose the fixed encounters in the Deep Sea
Research Centre, where you can all sorts of rare and cool bonuses.
Now there's a solution! *GASP*

Forget about drawing Eden from Ultima Weapon. Wait 'til disc 4 and
get Eden from Tiamat in Ultimecia's Castle. You'll acquire the GF a
bit later, but there are 3 HUGE advantages you get to keep:
1) The fixed Tri-Face encounters can be used with the trick above to
refine Darkmatters, Rosetta Stones and other rare stuff easily.
2) The fixed Ruby Dragon and Behemoth encounters makes a fine "all
you can eat" buffet, perfect for boosting Magic and HP with Devour.
This is VERY valuable, because Behemoths are probably the rarest
enemy in FFVIII.
3) While you're devouring Behemoths, you can mug Barriers from them
which are the ingredients for Aegis Amulets (learns Eva-J.) These are
also very rare!!! Although it's a pain having to collect 50 of those
for one Aegis Amulet, there's no other way.

You'll also be given a few minor disadvantages.
1) Acquiring Eden late in the game, where all towns are sealed. Make
sure you get everything you need and complete all mini-quests before
you do that.
2) Not fighting Ultima Weapon will reduce your Ultima supply by 300.
Although this can be remedied. Darkmatter itself will refine into 100
Ultimas. Else you may want to draw them from ICTH..... or, from Omega
Weapon. (YIKES!!! I know, don't do it...)
3) Miss out on a Three Stars or 100 Ultima Stones. The latter can be
remedied and the former isn't very useful anyway.

Final word: Perfectionists - go for it!!! The advantages are well
worth it!!! Try if you can max your stats this way. :)

---Yikes... I have a Chocobo in my pocket!---------------------------
> NOTE! This section will only apply to gamers who own a Pocket-
station and the PC gamers.

I have recently gotten my hands on a useless Pocketstation accessory
and tried out this game. Here's what I have to say... This game is
AWESOME! Of coruse, I didn't mean it that way. It's a boring game
(what did you expect from a 32x32 pixles screen anyway?) but it
allows you to gain TONS of items with your eyes closed! Perfect for
my Power-Up strategies...

Anyway, here's a break down of the game. Basically, you are Boco, the
Chicobo. You can walk in 4 directions on the world. Pressing the
Start button will bring up the menu. You can view the world map
there. The blinking dot is Boco while other black dots are the event
points. When Boco comes in contact with one of these points, an event
will occur:
         a) A battle (most likely)
         b) Moomba appears to give you a new weapon (10% chance)
         c) Cactuar appears to give you a treasure item (10% chance)
         d) Special set events

Boring as. You don't get to control the Chicobo at all. What you can
do is to tap the left and right buttons quickly to increase Boco's
ATB, so he can attack before the opponent. When one attacks, both
party's ATB will reset. So if you're good, you can kill the enemy
before it can even attack you! If your HP drops to zero, Boco falls
asleep and his HP will fill up slowly. If you win, a O-&-X-like grid
will appear and a blinking dot will travel through all the points
really quickly. Press the start button to make it stop. When you
managed to get 3 stones in a row to light up, Boco goes up a level.

Boco's weapon is a 4 digit number, each digit will be randomly chosen
as the damage done to an opponent when Boco attacks. (Eg, if it's
4546, 50% of the time Boco will do 4 points of damage, 25% 5 etc..)
Moomba will offer Boco a new weapon, but it usually sucks. Choosen
the better of the 2. (If you set it on auto, the computer will choose
for you.)

This is really cute. :) The cactuar says "Hello!" and gives you a
treasure items. Items in this game are catagorized into grades A, B,
C and D. A is the best while D is the worst. These items can be
transfered over to the main FFVIII game!

Special Events
These only happens at set periods within the game. The only random
Special Event is finding Mog. Upon reaching LV25 or so, Boco will be
able to find Mog randomly. You can set Mog to standby and he will
make a final attack for Boco if Boco ever falls in battle. If the
final attack kills the enemy, Boco goes back to 1HP. If it does not
kill the enemy, Mog will get take away and you'll have to find him
again. Note you MUST have Mog with Boco when you port him back to
FFVIII game to be able to use the MiniMog summon, else the game will
say that Mog is not there.

Other special events
  - LV20
    Boco will meet Kiko, a female Chicobo, for the first time
  - LV50
    This depends whether you have Event Wait on or off. For the best
    results, put it on just before you tune LV50 so you can save Kiko
    and get a kiss from her. This will give Boco his first power up.
    If you have Event Wait off, you'll get something bad and you'll
    miss the power up forever.
  - LV75
    Cannot remember, but it's not important
  - LV100
    Kiko will be taken away by the Master Mage or something and
    you'll have to save her. Put Boco's movement on 1 (straight line)
    and run into a event dot to fight the boss. (You can cheat this
    really. Put movement on 1 but control Boco's directions manually.
    This way, it won't take as long.) The boss has 99HP, so good

Power ups
Each power up Boco gets shifts his attack up one level. The power of
these attacks also depends on Boco's level (just like other GFs.)

 a) ChocoFire   - Weak fire damage, not even worth the trouble!
 b) ChocoFlare  - Strong Fire damage, can be quite good!
                  (At high levels, can do 4x the damage of Ultima!)
 c) ChocoMeteor - Dunno
 d) ChocoBuckle - Dunno

I have yet to find power ups #2 and #3, simply because I don't have
the patience to play this little game. If anyone knows anyway of
getting them quickly, please let me know.

This is really unfair. Boco will be given an ID when you first create
the file, which is dependant on your Pocketstation ID. Your ID
determines your grade, and your grade determines EVERYTHING about the
game, from Boco's HP, max weapon to treasure frequency. Basically,
the better grades gives you better stuff but is rarer. The lower
grades are more common and gives you really shitty stuff. :( My ID is
550, lowest grade possible.

The ONLY reason to play (or leave it on auto, hehehe...) is for the
treasures. Cactuar gives these to Boco, and when transfered from the
Pocketstation to FFVIII, each item turns into something real. The
treasures' grade determines what items it can turn into.

Grade A: Rare stuff and really good stuff. Unfortunately, if your
         Chicobo Grade is 7 (lowest) like mine, you will NEVER get a
         grade A treasure! Luckily, I don't think there's anything in
         Grade A that's not obtainable in other treasure grades.
Grade B: Mostly the same as Grade A, pretty rare. You get a LOT of
         good stuff here though, like all the Chocobo World exclusive
         items, stats-boosts (!!), rare GF items (Rosetta Stones) and
         other rare items. You can get unique items here too, like
         the Magic Lamp!!!
Grade C: Mostly medicines and healing items. You can get the +grade
         variants too (eg, Potion+). Some pretty good junk too, and
         bullets (even Pulse Ammo!)
Grade D: Most common treasures found and mostly junk. You get a LOT
         of those crappy Magic Stones here. Some fairly decent
         refinement items can be found too.

Well... if you have access to a Pocketstation, use it immediately
when you have access to it in disc 2. You'll get a LOT of nice items
early, many refining items to turn into good spells, rare stuff for
Quistis (Power Generator anyone?) and sell the rest for loads of

Also, if you're up for it, you can acquire GF Doomtrain in disc 2!!!
That's right. The Soloman Ring can be gotten as a Grade B item
(rare), but once you've gotten it, you're basically home free! The
Malboro Tentacles are common Grade D items, while the Remedy+ can be
gotten as Grade C items, they're pretty common too. As for Steel
Pipes, they are really common in disc 1 and 2. What are you waiting
for? The Pocketstation is there to be abused. :)

What else? Well, if you are having trouble getting some Pulse Ammo
for Squall's Lionheart, look no further, because you'll be getting a
lot of them with the Pocketstation. Many of the junk can also be used
for weapon upgrades. Some cool stats-boosts too, helping you power up
faster. Also, extremely rare material can be gotten, like Hungry
Cookpot (!!), Darkmatters, Rosetta Stones, Power Generators etc..

Finally, there's the Pocketstation-only items, Mog's Armlet (learns
MiniMog Command/Summon), Friendship (Summons Moomba) and Ribbons.
You'll also be able to see a few new summons.

Chicobo is a cute little baby Chocobo, you can play his own little
minigame with the Pocketstation peripheral. Although he likes
slacking off with his friends, Moomba, Cactuar and Mog, his summon
can be quite damaging. Gaining power ups from the Pocketstation will
translate into a more damaging attack for Boco when you summon him
with a Gysahl Green. To those gamers without a Pocketstation, bad
luck as his default ChocoFire is very weak, but it's rather cute
don't you think?

Mog's status picture is really really cute, but his summon, Mog
Dance, is really REALLY scary. It looks almost exactly like the baby
dance from Ally McBeal... I know, very disturbing. Other than that,
it can be useful as it is the only means of healing GFs inside
battle, although it does cost you a lot of Gil. Note you can only
summon Mog when he is with Boco.

A new mascot for this game, a Moomba looks like a little panther and
is as cute as Moogles and Chu-Chus. :) You can summon him with the
item Friendship. Moomba jumps at the enemy, delivering a series of
kicks, will knock their HP down to 1 (damage caps that 9999 though.)
It can be very useful, especially when you're Devouring/Carding
enemies, but considering that Friendship is so rare, you may want to
spare them. It's another cute summon though.

---Whoa, careful with that... what do you call that thing anyway?---
A few people have requested that I should cover sections on every
character's best weapons and the locations of their ingredients. I
personally have thought about covering these in some detail since
some of the are pretty hard to find. Anyway, the best time to gather
these items is IMO, while you're powering up! Many of these
ingredients are carried by the enemies on the Island Closest to Hell,
so here we go!

BTW, remember how I've said that you DON'T need to have read the
magazine to remodel your weapons, all you need is all the ingredients
then then option to remodel you weapon into that will become

Squall - Lion Heart
Requirements: 1x  Adamantine
              4x  Dragon Fang
              12x Pulse Ammo

The Adamantine is easy. You can steal one from fighting BGH251F2 boss
the second time. The you can win them from Adamantoise near Dollet.
Dragon Fangs are also pretty easy. Just beat the Blue Dragons or
steal from them. Pulse Ammo is probably the hardest to get. If you
did that quest with Irvine in disc 2, you'll have 5 of them. You can
refine them from an Energy Crystal dropped rarely by Ruby Dragons,
they refine into 10 each. Elnoyles drops them at a steady rate, but
they're hard to find until after the Lunar Gate event. You can get as
many as you want from the Elnoyle trick in Esthar, but they MUST be
at a high level (else you'll get Wizard Stones) which makes it a pain
when you're at a low level, since LV Up doesn't work on it. So power
up a bit before going to Esthar. Else you can try collecting Elnoyle
cards, if you can modify the trade rule to All or Diff.

Zell - Ehrgeiz
Requirements: 1x  Adamantine
              4x  Dragon Skins
              1x  Fury Fragment

The Dragon Skins caused me the most problems. They're occasionally
dropped/can be stolen from Blue Dragons, or Anacondours. You should
get some of them if you fight on Island Closets to Hell for a while,
if not, you'll have to max out someone's level and equip Rare Item,
and mug an Anacondour in the forests near Timber. Fury Fragments are
not all that hard to get, Blue Dragons and Ruby Dragons will drop
them occasionally. If not, refine Blue Dragon's cards.

Quistis - Save The Queen
Requirements: 2x  Malboro Tenticles
              4x  Sharp Spikes
              4x  Energy Crystals

Malboro Tenticles are pretty easy, you should have some left-overs
after acquiring GF Doomtrain, if not, just defeat Malboros. Sharp
Spikes can be refined with Grand Mantis cards, or can be stolen from
them. Energy Crystals however, are the hardest, especially when she
need FOUR of them! Sorta not worth it since this weapon don't
increase Str/Hit by a lot like Squall/Selphie's, but considering how
useful Quistis is...

Rinoa - Shooting Star
Requirements: 2x  Windmill
              1x  Regen Ring
              1x  Force Armlet
              2x  Energy Crystal

Windmills can be stolen from Abyss Worms in the desert, or refined
from its card. Regen Rings can be stolen from Toramas around Esthar,
and you should have one by mugging Biggs in disc 2. Force Armlets can
be bought in Esthar, and some monsters drop them but I forgot which
one, you probably have one already.

Selphie - Strange Vision
Requirements: 1x  Adamantine
              2x  Curse Spikes
              3x  Star Fragments

Curse Spikes are easy, you should know where to get them by now
right? ;) Tri-Face cards can also be refined. Star Fragments ain't
all that hard either, you can mug Iron Giants for them. Few other
enemies also drop them, like Ruby Dragons and Blue Dragons. It's the
easiest out of all these weapons.

Irvine - Exeter
Requirements: 2x  Dino Bone
              1x  Moon Stone
              2x  Star Fragment
              18x Screw

Dino Bones are easy, defeating T-Rexaurs. Moon Stones can be gotten
by stealing from Elnoyles, and maybe defeating Imps occasionally too.
Screw are by far the most common weapon upgrade ingredients. Geezards
drop them, and you can refine their cards too.

---Abra Kadabra---
This is the section on magic and what you should keep and what goes
in the trash. Each characters has 8x4=32 slots to keep up to 100 of
each spell. Better keep an eye on what goes in and what goes out the
window, because the last thing you want is to try to draw truck loads
of a good spell from the boss but realizing that the slot is occupied
with Fira or some junk like that.

So, these spells are what you should keep for everyone in your team.
Make sure everyone in your team has 100 of them, as they're mostly
for junctioning to your vital stats. Of course, getting 300 of each
of the best spells ain't that hard, but try to get 600 as you'll need
everyone in your party active at the end of the game. Of course, it
can be a pain gathering them all but there shouldn't be much of a
problem for us experts right?

Spells that definitely should be kept. Note I've sort them in a
certain order but it's not necessarily the "official" order.
| Ultima       | Quake        | Life         | Reflect       |
| Meteor       | Tornado      | Full-Life    | Double        |
| Flare        | Curaga       | Protect      | Triple        |
| Holy         | Esuna        | Shell        | Aura          |
| Sleep        | Death        |
| Silence      | Pain         |
| Confuse      | Drain        |
| Berserk      | Meltdown     |

* Note: If you like Rinoa's Angel Wing, then you might consider
taking away the status spells (except for Meltdown.) Then the only
spells she'll use are the powerful ones. Give her some elemental
magic in place of the status spells if so.

That leaves each characters with 8 slots for other spells. Anyway,
Ultima and Meteor are both great junction spells, Flare is good for
Elem-Def, Holy is just another one of those fixer-upper spells in the
series that no one has the guts to dump. :) Quake is there as a back-
up junction spell but Tornado is great in Eva-J. Curaga is simply
there for your use and the same goes with Esuna, although it has some
ok effects with ST-Def. Life are there for your own use too but Full-
Life is a good junctioner. Protect and Shell are both just "there"
but you never know when you'll need it (and has some decent effects
with Elem-Def.) Reflect is super lousy regularly but it's excellent
for Spr. Double is just "there" but Triple is great for Speed. Aura
is good for your own use as well as Hit-J. Panel #5 are mainly for
ST-Def (or Atk), can't live without them. Death too, but it's also
good with ST-Atk. Pain is good for a lot of juctions and the same
goes to Meltdown while Drain is an okay spell in ST-Atk.

Here's the list of spells that at least one or two team member should
have, but keep everyone's collection varied to some degree.
| Blind        | Demi         | Haste             |
| Break        | Dispel       | <elemental magic> |
| Stop         | Scan         | Float             |
| Slow         | Regen        |                   |

The first panel are status spells that are not all that great for
junctions, but keep some of them around. Demi is very good though, so
keep more of those. Dispel is basically uselss, but do keep just a
bit of them just in case, and make sure you keep them away from
Rinoa! Scan is also a good spell, so having some of them around is
handy, the "Rinoa exception" still applies. Regen is good for casting
occasionally, the same goes to Haste, but they're not worth giving
everyone. As for a <elemental spell>, I give everyone a different
one, like Firaga, Thundaga, Blizzaga, Bio and Water. They're quite
weak so that's why I'm only keeping 100 of them. Float can be useful,
but rarely.

The weaker spells like Fira or Aero ain't worth keepin', and the
useless ones like Zombie ain't either. If you have spare slots, play
around with them and see what's useful.

Now lets find a way to get all the best spells, I'll include them in
this section. Note only the rare and best spells are listed here, as
some spells like Sleep are simple to get. These should be enough to
get you 600 of them.

  - Ultima: Draw from Ultima Weapon to get 300
            Draw from the DP in Shumi Village for about 100+
            Win 100 Ultima Stones by defeating Ultima Weapon
            Draw from various other DPs for about 50
            Refine Dark Matters/Energy Crystals to fill the rest

  - Meteor: Draw from Ruby Dragons for an easy 300 each time
            Draw from various DPs

  - Flare: Draw from Ruby Dragons/Tri-Faces/Bahamut etc.

  - Holy: Draw from high level Elnoyles, easy.
          Refine Krysla cards into Holy Stones with Tool-RF

  - Quake: Draw from high level T-Rexaurs/Cerberus etc.
           Refine from Dino Bones

  - Tornado: Draw from Abyss Worms/Jumbo Cactuar
             Refine from Windmills
             Upgrade Aeros with HighLV Mag-RF

  - Full-Life: Drawn from Bahamut for 300
               Drawn from Fujin later (save room if you want.)
               Refine from Regen Rings, stolen from Toramas
               Drawn from various DPs for about 50

  - Triple: Drawn from Odin to get 300
            Refine from Three Stars (bad choice!)
            Drawn/refine Double and refine from HighLV Mag-RF

  - Aura: Draw 300 from Seifer at end of this disc (save some room!)
          Drawn from overworld DPs (not very effective)
          Refine Hypno Crowns (bought) into Aura Stones with Tool-RF

  - Pain: Drawn from high level Tri-Faces
          Refined from Curse Spikes

  - Meltdown: Drawn from high level Gaylas/Bombs/Jumbo Cactuar
              Refined from Mystery Fluids

Basic Junctions
This section below is all about what and how spells should be
junctioned to maximize their effects. This one below is the basic
structure on how your junctions should look like.

HP   Full-Life
Str  Ultima/Meteor/Holy         Spd  Triple/Haste
Vit  Meltdown                   Eva  Tornado
Mag  Ultima/Meteor/Holy         Hit  Aura
Spr  Reflect                    Luck Pain/Death

Anyway, let me explain. Ultima should go in the slot that's best
suited for the character, whether they're fighing or magic based. For
example, Zell should have Ultima in his Str and Selphie should have
it in Mag. Meteor is a good alternative. Ultima, however, is great
for EVERYTHING, so if you do want to remove it somehow, Holy and
Meteor makes a fine replacement. Also, there are times when your
stats are so high that a lesser spell will be enough to make it hit
the maximum point, so don't waste a good spell when your stats are
high enough. (For example, simply by power-levelling-up Rinoa, her
Str will hit 255 with only 100 Meteors, so if you junction 100
Ultimas instead, it'll still be at 255 so they're wasted.)

Some people likes to place Triple in Mag though, but I think it's
MUCH more useful is it's in Spd. If you do take Triple off Spd some
how, Haste is a decent replacement.

Pain is a very good spell for Luck, but it also has nifty effects in
Mag and works wonders in ST-Def/Atk (since it's basically a 3 in 1
spell) which makes Death a good replacement. If you need to remove
either, Float may become an option.

Another note is that, if you did not use the "Customized character"
powering up method, 100 Full-Life will NOT bring your max HP up to
9999 without a support Character Ability. (Unless you've refined a
lot of HP-Ups or Devoured Ruby Dragons.) At least an HP+20% is
needed. If you do not have enough slots, most character's HP can be
maxed if you take Ultima off Str/Mag and place it in HP.

Elemental Junctions
Of course, there are no fixed best spells in this category as it's
based a lot on the situation, so expect to alter these junctions when
the situation changes. However, this is the all-round Elem-J I use.

Elem-Atk  <None>
Elem-Def  Flare
Elem-Def  Shell
Elem-Def  Life
Elem-Def  Protect

Elem-Atk is basically useless and making it non-elemental is actually
the best option, however, you can toy around with it if you want to
do extra damage but be careful, the wrong spell can mean disaster.
You might also want to try Holy in Elem-Atk, since there are no
normal enemies who are strong against Holy attacks and it's usually a
good element to deal extra damage. However, remove it when you're
fighting Omega Weapon or you'll regret it.

The 4 Elem-Def spells listed above will provide 100% absorption for
Fire/Ice/Thunder based attacks and half damage for all other
elements. The best thing about this is that those 4 spells don't
really collide with your regular and status junctions.

Happy Matt recommends junctioning Ultima (!!) to Elem-Def, which
coupled with Flare/Life/Shell will absorb everything. This is not a
bad junction but I think Ultima is much better when used in other
attributes. However, when your stats are so high that Ultima is no
longer needed, you might feel free to do so. :)

Whenever you're facing a boss that uses a particular elemental
attack, remove Protect and junction any elemental spells you wish to
me protected against. The best are the -ga spells, Bio if you want
protection against Poison, Tornado for Wind, Quake for Earth, Holy
for Holy etc. The fancy ones like Meteor ain't worth the trouble.

Status Junctions
Like elemental junctions, this will also depend on the situation, at
least in the beginning of the game where only 1 member is protected
against 1 or 2 status. However, later in the game it becomes more or
less irrelavent if all 3 members has ST-Defx4 and junction all the
worst status spells there, so the only status you'll be affected are
the mild one. This is what I use for all-round ST-J though.

ST-Atk  Sleep/Death
ST-Def  Confuse
ST-Def  Berserk
ST-Def  Silence/Pain
ST-Def  <any>

Anyway, junction your favourite form of status in ST-Atk, I've listed
the decent ones in the tips section. Sleep, Death and Drain are all
good ones.

Confuse and Berserk should ALWAYS stay in your ST-Def slots IMO,
since they are among the worst status there are.

For the other 2 slots, junction any statuses that you don't like. I
usually use Silence since many bosses use that spell on you and it's
usually a very restrictive status. However, if you're not using Pain
in any other junctions, choose that one instead since it protects
against 3 statuses (Poison, Silence and Blind.)

Oh yeah, ALWAYS have at least one member with 100 Death junctioned to
their ST-Def. Death is a VERY nasty spell, and unlike in the previous
FFs, it will ALWAYS work on a character without protection. This is
especially important when fighting Omega because of its LV5 Death
attack, and the maximum level is 100, making impossible for your
characters to escape without it. (I remember getting Game Overs when
the Toramas decided to use LV5 Death...)

---The limiting factor---
With weapons and spells outta the way, it's time to obtain all the
Limit Breaks for your characters. You might have already gotten them,
if so just ignore this.

Did you get a Lion Heart? That weapon says it all as it contains his
best finisher and his other not-as-good finishers. There's not much
you can do when the lesser finishers appears since you cannot unlearn
it without sacrifising Lion Heart. So if you wanna see Lion Heart
more often, make Squall critical and cast Aura on him. (I wish there
was an "Auto-Aura" skill in the game... *sign*)

All 6 magazines should be available in Esthar bookshop right now if
you haven't gotten them yet. Remember, you must "read" them (ie, use
them in the Item menu.) Since you don't necessarily have to use a
certain learnt Duel move, it doesn't matter if you learn them all.
(Unlike Squall and Rinoa, who have no control on what attacks they'll

Gathering all 16 Blue Magic isn't an easy job, but a page with all
the blank spaces being filled looks a lot nicer. Remember, MANY of
the items used for the earlier Blue Magic can be refined from Cards.
The hardest one to learn is Ray-Bomb so make sure you get the free
Power Generator. (If you missed it as Zell, you still have another
chance as Squall, but only if you triggered the traps in Laguna's
sceanrio.) Shockwave Pulsar shouldn't be a problem with the Dark
Matter trick. The only thing I might have left out is White Wind,
which is learnt with a Whisper, stolen from Adamantoise. If Quistis
hasn't got Homing Laser yet, you can get another one soon. Make sure
you've gotten White Wind, Mighty Guard and Shockwave Pulsar, her top
3 Blue spells.

Like Zell, if you've missed the first 2 edition of the magazines, you
can buy them from Esthar bookshop. Issues 3-6 can be bought too.
However, like Squall's finishers, you might want to skip a couple of
the moves. One definate crap is Angelo Strike, which is when weaker
than Angelo Cannon right now. Not learning it would increase the
chances for both Wishing Star and Invincible Moon appearing.

Note Wishing Star takes a VERY long time to learn, and I ran out of
patience so if you can't seem to make her learn it, try this trick.
Equip the Enc-None skill and put Rinoa in your team (select Wishing
Star in her status) then take the Ragnarock to the deserts in the
Galbadia region. Make sure you're away from Deling City (somewhere
around the Missile Base should be fine.) Now grab a rubber band and
wrap it around the left stick and the left edge of the controller,
this will make Squall run in anti-clockwise circles. Leave it on for
10-20 minutes and go make yourself some coffee or bacon and eggs.
When you get back, voila! She should have learnt it. Note however,
this will lower your SeeD rank by 1 or 2, but it didn't matter too
much to me since you can get as much gil as you want with the
infinite credit trick.

NOTE!!!!! To get Rinoa to learn Wishing Star and Invincible Moon
REALLY quickly, jump onto a Chocobo and take it for a spin. Since
Chocobos are much faster than humans, you virtually double your
learning speed! This is also a good way of gaining Gil. Thanks to
Mega Moth for this tip.

As for her non-command Angelo moves, Angelo Recover was the one I
didn't wish to learn because it kept ruining my attempt of easy Limit
Break trick with critical characters, however now Aura has become
available, you might want to learn that move.

If you're keen with her Angel Wing, make sure she has 255 Mag and
(preferably) a high Spd with Auto-Haste. Then trade as many status
spells to someone else so she won't use them as much, and if you
want, remove any damage dealing spells that you don't want her to
cast. Definitely get rid of all her Dispel and Scan magic. This will
make her spells extremely powerful, and she won't have to waste her
time on status spells. The reason with the high Speed is to make up
her damage dealing potentials. Since Rinoa is "Berserk", her command
will be set the instant her ATB is full. Since it's set by the
computer, you won't waste any time having to tap for your Limit
Breaks and even if you don't tap, inputting command manually will
waste minute amounts of time. At this rate, she may even be able to
take on Squall!

Well, not much to say as her Slots ain't as pratical as all other
member's Limits in the heat of battle, however, it does not mean it's
useless. You must _cast_ her unique Slots spells to make them appear
in her status screen, simply getting them to appear but not casting
them won't do a thing. To make them useful, get all of them to appear
in her status screen, that way, the chance of her unique spells
appearing will be increased by a LOT! Oh yeah, make sure Selphie gets
a high Luck rating, this way, getting the best spells will ba a LOT
easier!!! The saddest thing about Selphie's Slots is that 2 of the
spells didn't make it into the final game. Those 2 empty slots at the
bottom of her list are really annoying.

If you have problem getting The End, try this. Properly junction
everyone and make sure you give the best spell (preferably Ultima) to
Selphie's Luck attribute and equip the Luck+50% skill. Lower her HP
by a LOT (to 3 digits or less), use Demi if you can't seem to hit
her. Go to the Trabia region and encounter a Gayla. Try your hands at
her Slots. The Gayla can't even hurt you!!! Be careful though, as I
missed The End THREE times when it came on her Slots, so the less
responsive players are at a disadvantage. Slow down if you're having
trouble, since you have all the time in the world. You can try make
her Blind, maybe even Zombie, Vit Zero and Silence. Casting Aura
should make it easier, but it just don't last as long to be useful.
The "soft-freeze" trick can also be used for this.

Most of his ammunition can be gotten easily. Refining ammo from items
or cards will give you the best deals, but if you want, you can also
buy all the ammo except for Pulse and AP from Esthar's shop (with the
Familiar skill.) As for the last 2, you should have some ingredients
for AP. I'm sure you still have a lot of Chef's Knives after
acquiring Tonberry, so turn them into AP Ammo. As for Pulse Ammo, the
items needed are very rare, that's why you should take advantage of
the fixed Elnoyle encounter in Esthar, getting 100 Pulse Ammo is
pretty easy that way. Talking about Energy Crystals, you may want to
keep a lot of them in your inventory as spares, since you will not be
able to enter Esthar (or any towns for that matter) in disc 4.

                     The end of Power Up Extra
Well, that's probably all of them. At the end of your powering up,
you should have all cards (except for Squall's, since it's not
available yet) and GFs, the best stats, magic and weapons and all
your character's Limit Breaks. If I missed anything or anyone wants
to cover more about a certain aspects of the game, just drop me a
line. Enjoy the final bits of the game!

---Say you'll be there---
Make it back to Edea's orphanage and go out to the garden. A scene
will occur where the third member will say something and leaves the
love birds alone. (It's completely different depending on whoever is
your third character, I like Selphie's.) Then another scene will take
place between the 2, kinda uninspiring for a moment of intimacy. Then
Zell comes along saying that Kiros (!!) from Esthar has a mission for
Squall and team. Leave the place and Edea will make her speech.

---Mission impossible---
Take the Ragnarock back to Esthar and make your way back to the
Presidentical Palace. Now the guards to the left screen will let you
in. Inside you'll see even MORE familiar faces, Kiros, Ward and
Laguna. Gee, since when did he become the president. You might want
to catch on with what he's been doin' over the past 17 years. And
when you choose to hear you mission, Dr. Odine will come over and
explain the current situation and the mission briefing. To rescue
Ellone, let Ultimecia possess Rinoa and let Ellone send Rinoa back in
time to complete her Time Compression.

> Card Check! Before you go anyway, play a game with Laguna and scab
Squall's card off him. Ironically, it's exactly the same as Seifer's
except the placement of the values are all inverted. It's also the
last card you need to complete your collection, Check your menu now,
you should see a * next to the Card option.

When you decide to take accept the mission, Laguna and team will
"move in" with you to the Ragnarock.

Whenever you're ready (remember, do ALL the mini-quests before this,
as you won't get a chance to complete most of them later), take the
Ragnarock and fly towards the Lunatic Pandora, Selphie will make the
ship crash into the box to get inside it. It's a very cool FMV, enjoy
the Dual Shocks! :)

> Jucntion Check! Junction whatever. Everyone of you should be a
walking demi-god right now so it doesn't matter what you do. Equip
Enc-None though, as you don't wanna be bothered with the lousy random
encounters. Don't equip Mug.

> Magic Check! Well, I did say you can draw Full-Life from Fujin
didn't I? So if you don't have 600 Full-Lifes yet, don't panic. (You
should already have 300+ after Bahamut right?) Just trade as much
Full-Lifes as you can to the non-active member.

Whoever you choose doesn't really matter right now. If you want to
leave, just talk to whoever is at the pilot seat and choose to take
off. Walk forward and you'll meet up with your friends, Fujin and

Damn, don't you love these guys? They look so damn awesome and gives
you free goodies each time. I wished they're playable characters.

Anyway, Fujin is MUCH stronger this time, but Raijin is still so so.
Fujin can cast some very nasty spells, including Pain on you and
Regen on themselves. She don't act all that often though. If you drag
this battle on for a while, she will say something then release
Meteor. Fujin also has a VERY dangerous attack, Sai, that will lower
one member's HP to 1!!! Raijin on the other hand will just stand
around most of the time, occassionally striking you with a physical
attack. Sometimes he casts Aura on himself and attacks with his
"Limit Break" Raijin Special. Strangly enough, neither of them will
cast their native elemental spells.

Remember how you can steal Str-Ups from Raijin? Don't do it this
time, as you'll get a Hyper Wrist instead. :( Instead, winning will
score you 3 of them. Fujin will give you a Megalixir as usual.

If you were prepared to draw Full-Life, get them off Fujin. Fujin has
Curaga if you want healing. They won't do much damage unless you piss
off Fujin and gets hit by her Sai.

When you're satisfied with your load of Full-Life, also any attacks
will do. The easiest way is probably summoning Doomtrain which will
deal 9999 damage to them both, summon it twice should knock them out.
If not, just use normal attacks.

NOTE! Katman told me that if you summon Carbuncle, it'll scare the
**** outta Fujin and she'll only use her weak Zan projectile. Never
tries it myself though.

Walk along and you'll meet up with another pair of your old friends,
Biigs and Wedge! No fight this time though. You know this place
right? Just make it all the way to the place where Zell's team got
kicked out, but do save at the SP before it. All the old DPs are
still here if you wanna be bothered with it.

> Junction Check! Pack Mug this time, and remove any spells
junctioned to Str for the character who has Mug.

In the next screen, you'll see Fujin and Raijin who sends a robot to
get you.

I'm still a bit puzzled with the this boss' attacks. Anyway, it
attacks in whole when you first meet it. Just hit it a few times and
it will split into the body and 2 probes. During the period where
it's a whole, it'll counter attack with Twin Homing Laser, which is
REALLY weak compared to Quistis' version, about 300 damage.

When it splits, mug 2 Str-Ups from the Left Probe and 2 Vit-Ups from
the right one. They have low HP so that's why you need to remove your
Str, as you might accidentally end up killing it. You can mug a Laser
Cannon from the main body though, useful if you haven't gotten
Quistis' Homing Laser yet.

It'll still counter with laser though, but it doesn't matter. At
sometime during the fight, the boss will unleash Corona, making your
HP down to 1. I think it only uses it upon its defeat. It's an easy
boss anyway, normal attacks will do.

Now your characters will have their HP dropped to 1, so get back to
the SP and use a Tent. Save.

> Magic Check! Remember how I told you to save some room for Aura? If
you have, trade all your member's Aura to the non-active members.
Make sure your character has an empty slot in their magic list.

Now enter the room beyond the place where you fought Mobile Type 8.
You'll see Seifer, he orders Fujin and Raijin to take care of you.
They refused and... well, I guess they're just not happy with the way
that Seifer had become. (Note not Fujin is actually speaking normally
in this scene? So she's been fakin' it all along. I wonder if that
eye patch is fake.) They released Ellone and walked away. It's time
to fight Seifer yet once more.

The first thing that will happen is Odin will enter the screen,
trying to Zantetsuken Seifer. But no, Seifer learnt to not only avoid
Odin's sword, but countering him and slicing him in half. (*Gasp*
Deja vu!!!) A strange scene then takes place where Odin's sword flies
into the air and gets caught by someone.

Seifer is REALLY weak. All he does is normal attacks. Just draw 300
Auras from him and then switch to normal attacks. Summon Doomtrain if
you want, it should do 9999 damage to Seifer.

You can Mug a Hero from Seifer, but you can also get it by defeating
him. He'll occasionally drop a Holy War instead though.

This is a really easy fight. When you've done enough damage, the one
who caught Odin's sword will descend from the heavens and uses the
sword to "kill" Seifer. He is indeed Gilgamesh! (DarkHoly17@aol.com
commented that Gilgamesh looked a LOT like Gogo from FF6, and you
know what? He has a point there. :)

When the fight ends. Another scene will take place where Seifer
rushes to Rinoa and kidnapped her. (Hope he didn't molest her in the
precess. :) All of a sudden, the screen goes blank and... Yup, end of
disc 3.

Gilgamesh returns from FFV to take Odin's place, except he's MUCH
more versatile than Odin. Like Odin, he cannot be junctioned nor
summoned, but comes randomly. However unlike Odin, he may appear
_anytime_ in combat, like Angelo Search. His "summoning" sequence is
really cool. Four swords will drop from the sky and Gilgamesh will
rise from the ground, chooses a sword and swings it at the enemy. The
4 attack includes Excalibur, Excalipoor (Excalipur), Masamune and
Zantetsuken. This also means that he will attempt to instantly kill
boss characters will Zantetsuken, which will have no effect at all.
(Don't expect it to be like Selphie's The End. :) The other attacks
will be damage based, Excalipoor (worst translation since "Blow Fish"
in FF3US) will do 1 point of damage to all enemies though, just an
inside joke and reference from FFV; Excalibur will deal decent damage
to all foes (around about 5000) and Masamune will deal heavier damage
(maybe 7000 or 8000). One thing distinguishes between Gilgamesh and
Odin is that Gilgamesh appear a LOT less often than Odin.

========================== End of Disc 3 ============================

============================= Disc 4 ================================
The final disc of this game concludes the plot, not a very good one
if you ask me, but that's another matter. It's short, it's not all
that exciting and it's restrictive since you cannot enter any towns.
Hopefully, you won't be disappointed with the ending.

---Which is the witchiest?---
You'll have to select another member to accomedate the loss of Rinoa,
I'd choose Squall, Zell and Quistis has my team.

> Junction Check! While Rinoa is taken hostage, exchange her
junctions with another member. Just junction whatever, but equip Mug.

Head back to the screen where you fought Mobile Type 8, you'll see
that there's a ledge leading to the "thing" to the right (what is it
anyway?) Climb that and climb the first set of stairs.

> Magic Check! If you climb another set of stairs you can reach a
Slow DP. Claimb back down afterwards.

Follow another platform to the left, you can reach the outer ledge,
then just make it all the way to the right. It'll lead to a shrine-
like structure. Inside, you'll see Seifer holding Rinoa in front of
Adel, as if she was to be sacrificed. He releases Adel who somehow
grabs a hold onto Rinoa. (Gee, look at the details in the FMV, you
can see the texture of Rinoa's clothing! And they call that seamless?
Ok bad joke...)

This is strange. Rinoa is hanging from Adel's chest (who is twice as
tall and... hey, you sure she's a woman?) Rinoa is actually being
junctioned by Adel! (Try Scanning her.)

You don't want to hurt Rinoa in this fight, because if her HP goes to
zero, the game is over.

Whenever Adel's turn comes up, she'll cast a powerful spell (Meteor,
Flare) and uses Drain on Rinoa for about 700HP. You can actually draw
from Rinoa (!!) so drawn Regen and cast it on her to counter Adel's

This fight is pretty easy if you get it under control. Because Rinoa
is on the other side of the battlefield, you shouldn't use any all
target attacks. Try out a Meltdown on Adel to lower her defense. Then
you may want to cast Aura on your characters and use their Limit
Breaks. Zell's Duel works the best, but stay away from the multi-
target finishers. If you have Quistis, try out her Homing Laser.
Squall shouldn't use his Renzokuken because of Fated Circle and
Blasting Zone. However, I found that regular attack works just as

Mug from Adel for a Samantha Soul, a pretty classy item. Try out
Rinoa will net you 8 Megalixirs, no kidding! (You may wanna use teh
"steal and not mug" trick so you won't accidentally kill her.)

When you defeat Adel, Rinoa will inherit her powers and Ultimecia
will possess Rinoa. Ellone steps in and shows that she's on top of
the "food chain" and sends them all back in time.

Time Compression has begun. You'll see a very cool sequence where
your members fall through everything. Wow. After that, you'll end up
in Edea's room in Deling City (you know, in disc 1.) Save at the SP.

When you approach "Edea", she turns into a witch and attacks.

BOSS - Sorceress x5, x6, x1 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
You'll have to fight a buncha witches. The first type of sorceress
are "thin" and they're really weak. Try mugging them though, they'll
die in one hit but you may end up nabbing yourself an Ultima Stone or
something. There are 5 of them, and the background will morph with
each Sorceress killed.

The second type are "fat" and comes in 2's (I think.) They're equaly
as easy but you can still steal goodies from them.

When you've beaten all 6 of the second kind, the boss witch will
appear to avenge the death of the other sorceressed, and she is the

Anyway, there's not much to it. Just use your regular attacks, don't
even have to waste your time summoning Doomtrain for this.
Eventually, it'll start a countdown from 5, then it'll cast Ultima,
which should only hit for about 400 or so to each member. Just kick
her butt.

Eventually, you'll reach Edea's orphanage... in the past! Enter the
door to the right and get outside to the beach. It'll shift to the
present but keep moving and it'll morph into the future! You'll see
corpse of white SeeDs lying on the ground.

Get behind the the rock and you'll enter the next screen with even
more dead bodies!

> Magic Check! There's a DP for Triple near the entrance.

Keep going and you'll walk along huge chains connecting Edea's house
to Ultimecia's Castle.

> Magic Check! There's a DP for Flare to the right of the castle's
entrance, it's hidden.

Your other members will come to aid you when you decide to enter the
castle. Save at the SP though.

<I don't think I will write the walkthrough for Ultimecia's Castle,
because for one, I really HATE that place. It's got some of the most
annoying puzzles and it's just so damn boring! I absolutely hate it!
However, I'll carry on with some other tricks to do in disc 4>

I will give you some tips though. I recommend that you find and fight
all 8 of the optional bosses. Not only will they unseal your powers,
they'll also give you really awesome GF ability items like Status
Guard and Rocket Engine.

Final trick - Mad about the Rosetta Stones ==========================
|This is what? The fifth tip on Rosetta Stones? Anyway, thanks to   |
|Zachary Lim <bio_freak90@hotmail.com> for this awesome trick.      |
|                                                                   |
|"In disc 4 at ultimecia castle, get the flood gate key in the      |
|library room. After that, go to the flood gate room and examine the|
|red lever... use the Floodgate Key on it and pull the lever, all   |
|the water should stop flowing. Now go to the chapel and play the   |
|piano by holding all the buttons. After that, go to the passageway |
|to the right of the fountain. The fence should be gone now, if not |
|then play the piano again. Go inside and you should find the       |
|Rosetta Stone. Go through the other way to find your way back to   |
|the prison room."                                                  |
|                                                                   |
|Mmmmmmm, Rosetta Stones, can't get enough of them. If you have     |
|enough of them already, you can always change it into a Shaman     |
|Stone and a whole lotta other stuff. Have fun! :)                  |

---Other optional stuff---
First you'll need to get outta Ultimecia's Castle. It took me a long
time to figure out how to get out. You need to walk along the chains
and you'll see 3 portals to the left. Approach it and your characters
will hop over and you can enter it. All 3 portals will lead to a
different place on the world map.

Take the middle portal, which will lead you somewhere in the Centra
region. Find a Chocobo forest in that region and try to find your way
to the Ragnarock, which ended up in the desert somehow. Sorry, I
can't offer you much of a guidance on which direction to go since I'm
pretty much confused about the topography in the Centra region
myself, so just wander around with a Chocobo and listen to the WORST
remix of the Chocobo theme ever!

When you do finally get back to the Ragnarock, hop onboard and you'll
see Xu! (BTW, this will only happen if you've completed the CC quest
in disc 2 or 3.) She said that the CC members are all here (!!) and
they want to play cards with Squall! Excellente!

The CC members will use any rare cards that you don't have, meaning
it's sorta a "last resort" on getting the cards since you cannot
enter the towns anymore. However, this will also lead to a nifty card

You can mod most rare cards into nifty items then play a hand with
any CC member, they'll use it and you can mod them again and again!!!
This is the best when done with the CC Spade, since he uses friendly
rules (Esthar rules) and there's a SP in the same room!

However, this does not work with some cards, and those are the Queen
of Cards quest cards (wow, what a tongue twister!) Irvine, Kiros,
Chubby Chocobo, Doomtrain and Phoenix simply didn't even exist
originally, and was painted by the father of the Queen of Cards,
which is why you cannot win them back. Which is sad, since those
cards are the ones that gives you the best items. :( The other card
you cannot win back is Pupu, because Pupu does not technically count
as a rare card, since it's only a LV5 card.

The Queen of Cards will still available to challenge though. She's
somewhere on the world map, south of the Esthar region and Tear's
Point. (It's _near_ the southern coast and to the east.) She seems to
ONLY use the Queen of Cards quest cards though, so you can get them
back from her if not the CC members. However, she only seems to use
them once, and just play with crap cards afterwards. Also, make sure
you're prepared for Same/Same Wall/Plus/Random and Sudden Death
WITHOUT Open!!! You know, sometimes I doubt the fairness of a card
game without the Open rule, as it seems the CPU gets to peek at your
cards even though they're denying it. Can't trust computers! >:(

Oh yeah, if you wanna play cards, DON'T screw around with all the
members since each one of them uses the rules of a specific region.
So to keep the rules from spreading, keep answering "No" when they
offer to combine rules. It is because of this that makes certain CC
members extremely annoying to play with, namely Joker and Diamond.
You can also abolish the rules just like the normal game.

NOTE!!! You CAN win back QoC cards back, it goes something like this:
(Sorry, I cannot remember who submitted this trick...)
1)	Mod the 5 cards all at the same time or seperately, you choose
2)	Challenge the QoC and win them back
3) Mod them again
4) You can now win them back from Diamond (or maybe other CC
Make sure you abolish the crappy rules from Diamond or else, ready
lots of Asprin and prepare for a cheap fight.

---GF customization---
Whoohoo, I bet you have a LOT of GF ability items in your inventory
after the trip through Ultimecia's Castle and card mod trick. Now
it's time to customise the GFs for your characters. Also, I recommend
that you split your 16 GFs 6 ways, so each character will get 3 or 2
GFs. You should keep them in their possession for the rest of the
game (not that there's much left anyway) but it's nice to let your
characters get used to them. Also, tailor the GFs to suit your
character's style. For example, don't give any GF that has the Hit-J
ability to Squall or Selphie since they can hit with 255% accuracy

Also, try to minimize and maximize the GF's abilities, forget the
extra and repeated abilities to create room to learn new ones. For
example, don't give a character 2 GFs that both has the Spr-J
ability, try to mending the weaknesses of one GF with another. For
example, GFs Shiva and Diablos is a good combination to give to your
characters, since Shiva offers Str-J, Vit-J and Spr-J while Diablos
has HP-J, Mag-J and Hit-J, voila! All your basic attributes are
covered! No repeats meaning no skills getting wasted. Spend sometime
trying to find the perfect GF combination for all your characters,
and take into account what stats benefit which character the most.

It is because of this, it is a very good idea to save all your -J
Scroll items in your inventory to allow maximum "min-maxing". (The
scrolls for rarer stats like Speed are VERY hard to find.)

Then buy truckloads of Amnesia Greens from the shop and start
brainwashing your GFs. Forget the basic commands on the 1 or 2 GFs
since only 1 GF is needed to use those skills.

You may also want to upgrade certain abilities, just as fogetting
Siren's ST-Def and ST-Defx2 but use a Status Guard on her to learn
ST-Defx4. Also, try to get Abilityx4 on everyone, then forget the
Abilityx3 skills. That way, you should have more than enough slots
for all your favourite skills.

Elem-Atks are aplenty, so delete any repeats. You may also want to
teach some of your GFs certain commands, like if you found
Leviathan's Recover command useful, get a Doc's Code (easily gotten)
and teach it to another GF.

It may take hours, but you'll eventually come out with a _perfect_
set of GF and skill combinations that'll make you a winner. Also,
decide who you want to use against Omega Weapon and try to give those
characters the best GFs (ie, Doomtrain) and skills (ie, Auto Haste.)

I have spent hours and hours devising the perfect combination of GFs
for the characters and came up with this:
   Squall:  Quezacotl, Pandemona, Bahamut
   Quistis: Shiva, Diablos, Doomtrain
   Zell:    Ifrit, Leviathan, Eden
   Rinoa:   Cactuar, Cerberus
   Irvine:  Carbuncle, Tonberry, Alexander
   Selphie: Siren, Brothers

Note that my best team was Squall, Zell and Quistis, so all the best
GFs goes with them (ie, Eden, Doomtrain, Bahamut etc.) Rinoa however,
has 2 really useful GFs too, so she's another really good character
to put in your team. If you like other members, you can exchange
Zell's/Quistis' with Irvine or Rinoa. Selphie is more of a pain,
since she has that 255% hit thing, so the best thing is probably
exchange her junctions with Irvine.

Of course, I was at a disadvantage since I've used many of the rare
GF items (like Aegis Amulet etc) on the GFs at an early stage, which
made it hard to find the perfect combination. However, if you didn't
use a Rosetta Stone on Shiva, here's a waaaaaaay better solution:
   Squall:  Quezacotl, Pandemona, Doomtrain
   Quistis: Shiva, Diablos, Bahamut

This is because Quezacotl already has Mag+40% and Pandemona already
has Str+40%, so junctioning Bahamut to Squall (with Str/Mag+60%)
would simply put them to waste, so the latter combination is better,
although my first strategy still works, as there weren't any repeated
key abilities and no pointless abilities given to the wrong character
(such as Hit-J with Squall.) Selphie needs to really beef up both
Brothers and Siren though, as they don't come with all that many

You should have 6 characters with -J abilities to all their basic
attributes. Spd-J Scrolls are hard to come by, the same goes to Eva-J
Scrolls, so use them wisely. Luck-J Scrolls shouldn't be a problem if
you've gotten lotsa Drak Matters. If certain characters don't have
the necessary xxx+??% skills, buy the items required to learn them
from the pet shops.

Hope all goes well, and good luck with Omega. And I hope you all had
as much fun reading this as I've had typing it, and yes, my guide is
"officially" complete. There will be updates if the situation calls
for it and if more readers send in helpful tips. Have a fresh start
with the new millennium, I've personally made my resolution. :)

****** Combo cheap trick - Beat Omega Weapon in under 5 rounds ******
* This is a cheap trick that combines most of the tips I've taught  *
* you in my guide and take on Omega to show him who's boss. I have  *
* tested this trick and it really works, although it does backfire  *
* occasionally due to the random nature of many of the gameplay     *
* aspects. So whatta you waiting for? Lets get ready to kick some   *
* butts, and for the players who have failed to beat Omega in FFV,  *
* it's time to get our sweet revenge. :)                            *
*                                                                   *
* First of all, you need to choose the team members to use for this *
* mission, and it's quite flexible on who you can use this time     *
* around. Quistis is a mandatory member for this trick and she will *
* act as the support member who's going to be the backbone of this  *
* trick. Other than that, you can choose 2 characters out of Zell,  *
* Squall, Rinoa or Irvine who will be the main offensive units. (We *
* can leave Selphie outta this but look below for a mission built   *
* especially for her.) Anyway, it is indeed possible to dump Squall *
* in favour of another character, thanks to the Dual Team Division  *
* system used in Ultimecia's Castle (although you might not want    *
* to, since Lion Heart is especially powerful.)                     *
*                                                                   *
* Of course, how well this trick works will be dependant on who you *
* chose as the offensive units. This is the basic requirement for   *
* each character, ranked in order of decreasing strength:           *
*                                                                   *
* Zell - None, but mastering Armageddon Fist or Grand-Calamity      *
*        Symphony will be helpful                                   *
*   Yes Zell is actually more powerful than Squall because he will  *
*   be able to execute more hits than Squall's Lion Heart with a 12 *
*   second Duel and that he can make full use of critical hits.     *
*                                                                   *
* Squall - Lion Heart learned, need Lion Heart gunblade model       *
*   Another very powerful character, the only weakness is that the  *
*   Aura + critical status trick don't work as well for Squall as   *
*   it does for other characters.                                   *
*                                                                   *
* Irvine - 100 Fast Ammo stocked                                    *
*          100 Normal Ammo OR ~50 AP/Pulse Ammo                     *
*   Irvine is actually not a bad character in terms of power, and   *
*   like Zell, he can make full use of critical hits. The only      *
*   really disappointing thing about Irvine is that he can only     *
*   hold up to 100 of each type of ammunition in your inventory,    *
*   seriously hindering Irvine's usefulness, since many of his      *
*   bullets are next to worthless.                                  *
*                                                                   *
* Rinoa - Wishing Stars learned                                     *
*         Do NOT learn Angelo Strike (recommended)                  *
*         Do NOT learn Angelo Recover (recommneded)                 *
*   Rinoa's Wishing Stars really packs a punch, although it doesn't *
*   inflicts nearly as much damage as the other boys. It does hit   *
*   all enemies on screen though, but she cannot take the advantage *
*   of that in this fight.                                          *
*                                                                   *
* Quistis - Mighty Guard learned                                    *
*           Shockwave Pulsar learned                                *
*   Not much to say about her damage potential, as it stinks. On    *
*   the other hand, Mighty Guard will come in really handy. Like    *
*   Squall, the Aura + critical trick don't work as well either.    *
*   See below for precautions.                                      *
*                                                                   *
* After you choose your team, you need to prepare. Take your team   *
* to fight some weak enemies (the random ones inside Ultimecia's    *
* Castle are ok.) And you need to low all of your HP to at least    *
* the 3 digit mark, although it will be ideal if you can lower them *
* to somewhere around 100HP. I know it's hard work, you can try     *
* Demi if their HP is high, or poison them with Bio. The latter is  *
* easier, as it removes abour 800HP everytime they take an action.  *
* Then use your regular attacks to do small amounts of damage,      *
* remove the Poison if needed. Then finally cast Blind on all 3     *
* characters and Silence on Quistis.                                *
*                                                                   *
* The you need to junction your characters, here's the requirements *
* for the 2 attackers:                                              *
* - 9999 HP maximum                                                 *
* - 255 Strength, 200+ Vitality and Spirit                          *
* - 100x Triple junctioned to Speed                                 *
* - 100x Tornado (or better) junctioned to Evade                    *
* - 100x Pain (or better) to Luck (for Zell and Irvine)             *
* - 100x Death junctioned to ST-Def                                 *
* - Abilityx4                                                       *
* - Commands Attack, Magic, Item and something else would be ideal  *
* - Equip Spd+40% Character Ability                                 *
* - Abilities to fulfill above requirements if needed (eg, Vit+40%) *
* - Luck+50% for Zell and Irvine                                    *
* - Evade+30% recommended                                           *
* - One character has Initiative                                    *
*                                                                   *
* For Quistis, her requirements are slightly different:             *
* - 9999 HP maximum                                                 *
* - 255 Strength and 255 Magic recommended                          *
* - 200+ Vitality and Spirit                                        *
* - 100x Triples junctioned to Speed                                *
* - 100x Tornado (or better) junctioned to Evade                    *
* - 100x Death junctioned to ST-Def                                 *
* - Commands Attack, Item and 2 other (note that she's Silenced)    *
* - Equip Spd+40% Character Ability                                 *
* - Evade+30% recommended                                           *
*                                                                   *
* When you're ready, save outside Ultimecia's Castle. Switch the    *
* batle speed to its slowest and use Wait. You'll have to divide    *
* into 2 teams, the one who fights Omega will be Team A while the   *
* other one will be Team B. Junction Diablos to Team A and place    *
* one of your abilities with Enc-None temporarily. You need to get  *
* to the screen with a fountain (outside the Chapel) and remove     *
* Diablos and replace Enc-None. Switch to Team B with the Switch    *
* Point.                                                            *
*                                                                   *
* As Team B, junction Diablos and the Enc-None ability. Take the    *
* door to the right and you'll see a large bell hanging from the    *
* ceiling. Now you need to pull the rope (to take the steps down    *
* and it's located to the left corner. When you do a message will   *
* pop up saying you can hear a monster roaring from afar. You have  *
* a minute to get to Omega. Now switch back to Team A with the      *
* Switch Point in the room. You don't really have to re-junction    *
* Team A if the absence of Diablos don't make much difference. (It  *
* shouldn't.)                                                       *
*                                                                   *
* As Team A, head for the Chapel gates and Omega will be there.     *
* Note it is possible that you may run into a random encounter on   *
* the way to Omega, although it might not be probable since random  *
* encounter rates in Ultimecia's Castle are quite low.              *
*                                                                   *
* Omega Weapon will always use a certain attack pattern, it's       *
* important to learn the first few:                                 *
* (0) - Physical attack                                             *
*  1  - LV5 Death                                                   *
*  2  - Meteor                                                      *
*  3  - Megido Flame (the rest don't matter)                        *
* There are 2 things to note here, Omega only seems to use action   *
* zero (physical attack) sometimes. Megido Flame will inflict 9998  *
* points of damage to all 3 members, so if you haven't beaten Omega *
* by then, you'll probably gonna be all wiped out, so be speedy.    *
*                                                                   *
* If it execute its physical attack, chances are, he'll miss due to *
* your Eva-J. This is the most obvious hole in my strategy as Omega *
* will hit once in a while, but I've never seen how much damage it  *
* does, but since your HP are so low, you'll probably get KO'd. If  *
* you've powered up your character a lot and that Ultima is no      *
* longer needed in other stats, junction it to Eva and equip        *
* Eva+30% to prevent this. Otherwise, let's pretend that he misses. *
* :) I'll divide the rest into simple steps.                        *
*                                                                   *
* 1 - Character 1 (with Initiative) cast Aura on Quistis            *
* 2 - Quistis use Mighty Guard                                      *
*     Note: Tricky here. If the > has already appeared before       *
*     Quistis was affected by Aura, it don't seem to register. So   *
*     if that happens, you need to re-tap the O button to get the > *
*     to show up again. With low HP + Darkness + Silence, it        *
*     _should_ give all your characters Aura on topa all the other  *
*     positive statuses. You may also want to execute action #3     *
*     first instead.                                                *
* 3 - Character 2 cast Meltdown on Omega (Doomtrain takes too long) *
* 4 - OPTIONAL Someone use a Holy War                               *
*     Note: It's tricky to say if you should or shouldn't execute   *
*     this action. This is recommended if Omega did not try to hit  *
*     you with a physical attack (action zero) or if you're using   *
*     Rinoa and/or Irvine. Basically, use this if you don't think   *
*     you can kill Omega before he uses Megido Flame. (It takes     *
*     longer than 5 rounds if you're using Rinoa/Irvine.) Also note *
*     that the Holy War will negate all the negative statuses       *
*     aiding the better Limit Breaks.                               *
* 5 - Beat on him with your best Limit Breaks. It should achieve    *
*     the best effects (except for Squall, but his 7 or 8 initial   *
*     Renzokuken hits should make up for it.)                       *
*                                                                   *
* Notes:                                                            *
* - Omega's action #1 (LV5 Death) will not harm your characters,    *
*   therefore, it buys you sometime for the preparations.           *
* - The reason why you need to lower your HP so much is because     *
*   Mighty Guard also gives you Regen. With Zell and Squall, you    *
*   can finish Omega in just under 5 rounds, HP at about 2000. With *
*   Irvine and Rinoa however, it takes about 7 rounds, HP at about  *
*   3100. Note your condition is still considered to be critical if *
*   your HP is less than 32% of maximum, so the Aura trick still    *
*   works.                                                          *
* - Omega's action #2 will not harm you because of your high Spr,   *
*   Shell (Mighty Guard) and Regen. Buying your even more time.     *
* - Omega's behavior pattern changes from game to game. Sometimes   *
*   it's really slow, just sit there and let your whip his a$$, but *
*   sometimes it goes all berserk. If it does the latter, it maybe  *
*   wise to use a Holy War.                                         *
* - Oh, don't save your game after beating it, because if you do,   *
*   you have to complete another game just to fight it again. You   *
*   might want to use a different team or whatever. I always keep   *
*   an "Omega file" on my memory card just for this purpose. With   *
*   all the preparations (low HP) and junctions done so I can have  *
*   some fun with Omega once in a while.                            *
* - The reason not to learn Angelo Recover is that dog may come and *
*   heals you, ruins the Aura + critical combo.                     *
* - Here's a Jap/NA difference for ya. Happy Matt told me that Hero *
*   and Holy War will NEVER work on Rinoa. (Best guess is that      *
*   they're SeeD items.) However, it works fine in the NA version.  *
* - He also said that Aura + critical doesn't work as well in the   *
*   Japanese version of the game, meaning our version has been      *
*   toned down AGAIN!!                                              *
*                                                                   *
* Now comes the fun part, calculations!                             *
* Zell - 12 second Duel + Armageddon Fist/Grand-Calamity Symphony   *
*   An expert will probably be able to execute about 4 (or more)    *
*   moves per second, both Punch Rush and Booya will do about 4500  *
*   damage, and with high Luck, half of them will be criticals!     *
* => (4 x 12)/2 x 4500 + (4 x 12)/2 x 9000 = ~324,000 (or more!!)   *
* => Add a few thousand for Grand-Calamity Symphony                 *
*                                                                   *
* Squall - 7 or 8 hit Renzokuken + finisher                         *
*   I don't know why, Squall executes mostly 7 hit combos. Also,    *
*   Aura + critical will not always work (mumble mumble Blasting    *
*   Zone mumble.) I only got to see Lion Heart just over 50% of the *
*   time.                                                           *
* => (7 x 9000) + (9999 x 17) = ~233,000                            *
*                                                                   *
* Irvine - Shot with Fast Ammo and others                           *
*   Fast Ammo works really well, but only lasts 2 rounds. :( Try to *
*   shoot 50 of them per round (a turbo controller might work.)     *
*   They'll do 2000 damage per hit and half of them are criticals.  *
*   Afterwards, you may think of resort to Pulse or AP Ammo, but    *
*   Normal Ammo actually works a bit better, since it has decent    *
*   speed and can take advantage of critical hits. The damage of    *
*   Normal Ammo is identical to Zell's Duel moves, and can be shot  *
*   17 times. You can only shoot 8 AP or Pulse bullets. Ironic huh? *
* => Fast Ammo: (50/2 x 2000) + (50/2 x 4000) = ~150,000            *
*    Normal Ammo: (8 x 4500) + (9 x 9000) = ~117,000                *
*    AP/Pulse: 8 x 9999 = 79,992 :(                                 *
*                                                                   *
* Rinoa - Wishing Stars                                             *
*   Not all that powerful, as it only does 8 hits, but it sometimes *
*   deals more damage than Squall should his Lion Heart fail.       *
* => 8 x 9999 = 79,992                                              *
*                                                                   *
* Quistis - Shockwave Pulsar                                        *
*   Better than nothing I guess...                                  *
* => 31,000~35,000                                                  *
*                                                                   *
* Other notes and extras:                                           *
* If you really want Squall to do Lion Heart, try Silencing him as  *
* well, it doesn't guarantee a Lion Heart but it may help. (Note    *
* the Holy War will cancel it, but you probably won't need it if    *
* you see Lion Heart.) You also need to adjust his strategies a     *
* bit since he's Silenced. Instead of casting Aura on Quistis, use  *
* an Aura Stone with the Item command instead. Note Darkness and    *
* Silence are the only ones that you can use, since you don't want  *
* to spend time Petrifying and Doom your characters while in battle *
* (actually, you can't.)                                            *
*                                                                   *
******* Super Douper Mega Cheap Trick - As Cheap As It Gets *********
*            "Selphie is the most powerful after all!"              *
*                                                                   *
* Simple, just do the same to Selphie as for the other characters   *
* above (low HP + status) and junction 100x Ultima to her Luck.     *
*                                                                   *
* Get into battle, cast Aura on Selphie and open the lid of the     *
* PlayStation. The game will "freeze" when Omega tries to cast LV5  *
* Death. Do the tap tap easy Slot trick until The End comes up      *
* (should be quite common, I once got 3 The Ends in 10 "Do overs"!) *
* Boom, bang, whoohoo, over! Easy but cheap as hell...              *

This section just includes all the weird and interesting stuff on
this game.

* Is Doomtrain REALLY the train boss from FF6? Well, I asked Happy
Matt and he checked the monster compendium in the Japanese version of
FF6 and he said that the boss' name could be directly translated into
"Magic Train" or "Phantom Train" or something along the lines of it.
The Japanese name of Doomtrain is "Grasharaboras" so there is NO
evidence that Doomtrain is exactly the Phantom Train in FF6. However,
it's possible that they're related.

* Like FFT, FFVIII contains lotsa references from the previous
fantasies (and I don't just mean the FF motifs like Chocobos,
Moogles, Shiva, Behemoth etc), these are the ones I've found:

None yet.

-> Gilgamesh, who was Ex-Death's servant in FFV, a comical villain.
Likewise, 2 of his sword attacks are also from FFV.
  => Excalibur: The sword he wanted so much but..
  => Excalipur (Excalipoor is just a poor translation) was the one he
got. A joke item in FFV as it could only ever do 1 point of damage.

-> Boco (again, Boko is another bad translation): Butz's Chocobo is
now the default Chicobo name.

-> Omega: I hated this bonus boss as it's next to impossible to beat!

-> Brothers: Flanker358@aol.com said that Sacred and Minotaur were
bosses in FFV. I think I remember seeing something like it so I
assume that he's right.

-> Siren: Siren was a boss in FFV too, although she didn't act
anything like her 8th self. She's the boss in the Ships Graveyard.

-> Doomtrain (see above)

-> Odin's fate: Remember what happened to Odin in FFVI? That's right,
he got slaughtered by an inverted version of his sword attack, which
is used by Seifer in FFVIII.

-> AtmaWeapon (Ultima Weapon): see below

-> Vicks and Wedge: Vicks is originally named Biggs in the Japanese
version. These 2 are the imperial soldiers that accompanied Terra at
the beginning of the game. (Note that they fixed Vicks back to Biggs
in the Playstation Anthology version of FF6.)

-> Merton: Merton was renamed Meltdown in the NA version of FFVIII.
However, the original Merton in FFIII (Snes version) has been changed
to Melton in the FFA (FFV and FFVI) rerelease. Why? Probably trying
to accomedate the changes in FFVIII and "Meltdown" won't fit.

-> Cloud: He owns a shop in Esthar where he sells some useless stuff.

-> Ultima Weapon: Another bonus boss that appeared in FFVI, VII and

-> Ultima Weapon: And the Ultima Weapon is holding Cloud's Ultima
Weapon. It's not as strong as it was in FFVII though.

-> Biggs and Wedge: Two Avalanche members make a triumphant return in
FFVIII with another identity. (Thanks to Ed Asano for reminding me.)
Oh yeah, he also mentioned that Biggs and Wedge are from the original
Star Wars, so is it possible that the crew at Square are huge Star
Wars fans?

-> Olan/Orlan (I'm not sure which is the bad translation) is the
person who invented Triple Triad. And he IS Olan from FFT since
there's a picture of him in the card tutorial. You can also see a
Black Mage in the background drawn in FFT style.

-> Diablos: Have you ever wondered how much Diablos resembles that of
the Lich (the summon) in FFT? They look identical and works the same
way, so I guess they're the same thing.

-> Eden: Is Eden Zodiac? They look kinda similar and share few
features, that they're both the most powerful summons and that it's
next to impossible to tell what they're supposed to be. (IMO, Zodiac
looks like a fairy and Eden looks like a giant mushroom.)

-> Save the Queen: Quistis' best weapon is of the same name is
Meliadoul's (and other Divine Knight's) sword.

-> Blind: Ok, this is a bit off the topic but the Blind spell in
FFVIII looks suspiciously similar to the one in FFT.

-> Ehrgeiz: The fighting game, but the timer runs out way too fast
for my liking!

-> Vicks and Wedge: Can't believe I forgot this. Viki reminded me
that Vicks (Biggs) and Wedge also appeared as puppets in Chrono
Trigger. Also, she said that the other puppet Piette (or something)
bears a resemblance towards Piet, the guy in the space station.

* In Laguna's scenario where he asked the receptionist about Julia's
room, the receptionist called her "Ms Julia". Actually, it does not
mean that she's married like in my last version. Qualera e-mailed me
saying that "Ms" is like "Mr" in that it does not contain any
information on a person's martial status. But then again, why could
they have just used "Miss Julia". (The difference is 10 years..)

* Did you notice who was playing the role of the sorceress in
Laguna's fourth scenario? That's right, the Queen of Cards!

* What's the third FFVIII theme song? Selphie's one of course! Here
are the lyrics.. Anyone wanna write the music to it?

        Train, Train, Take Us Away
        Take Us Away, Far Away
        To The Future, We Will Go
        Where It Leads No One Knows :)

* Is it just me or does anyone else think that Irvine looks like
Michael Jackson? (I mean, he even has THE hat!!)

* Does anyone thinks that Zell's opening stance when he bends over
and stretches looks a lot like Fei's in Xenogears? Likewise, Zell's
in battle standby animation is also very similar to Fei's.

* Sorry to have to say this but being a male myself, I can't help but
noticing that none of the females in the game has exceptionally large
chests. Anyway, my point was not to be rude but FFVIII is a good
proof that silicone polygons are not the only thing that sells games
these days.

* Have you noticed that ALL GFs always starts off with the highest
compatibility with Rinoa and Selphie? Likewise, Leviathan's
compatibility with Rinoa is the highest. Hmm, I wonder if this has
any connection with the demo.

* Who thinks Quistis looks like Aya Brea? Actually, it's almost
impossible to have not noticed that. :)

* Ok so this is not FFVIII related but I discovered this last week
and I just want everybody to know. It's about Xenogears and FF6, but
since I won't write an FAQ for either game, this guide is the closest
thing that I can put this tidbit on.

Anyway, do you recall the middle names of the Figaro brothers? (It
was never mentioned in the game but it's in the manual, I think.)
Edgar's middle name was "Roni" while Sabin's "Rene". Now head all the
way back in time to the first generation of the Fatima family in
Xenogears, Bart's great ancestor was named "Roni Fatima" and in one
of the cut scenes, a guy called Rene was present (along with Roni,
Lacan and Krelian.) Who was "Rene" anyway? Could he have been Roni's
brother? In that case, would the Fatima and Figaro family be somehow
related? Oooh, the plot thinkens.

* Something bothers me about the way that Laguna speaks. Is it
because he's a big Seinfeld fan? :) Actually, Laguna's stardards are
so bad it's probably on par with Spin City.

* I don't know if this will happen to you but when I fought the
enemies in Dollet with Seifer to max out my GF's level, the first
time I got paid, I went up *FIVE* SeeD ranks!!!!! How is this
possible?! (I wonder if you can get a straight LVA when you fight
enough enemies.)

* Ok this tidbit is not about FFVIII but you can get Zantetsuken in
Kartia! Go to create a weapon and choose Swords, then choose the
Kanji "Cut", "Steel" and "Sword" which are the exact Kanji for Odin's
sword attack, but it's been translated into something very different.
(And a lot weaker. :) Good only for Odin fanatics.

There's more but my head's only so big so I cannot remember it now.

This FAQ is intended to be used for non commercial purposes and there
shouldn't be any money involved. It is free to everyone who is
interested and you can print it if you like (although with my type of
format, it's not very print friendly.) Please do not rip me off by
claiming that it's your own work or rip any others off by selling
them a free FAQ. As I've learnt from my "debut" walkthrough, that
writing a walkthrough is really not an easy task at all but I've
really worked hard on it. So enjoy this "free" guide!

Copyright 1999 by me. E-mail me at i_love_aya@hotmail.com

Final Fantasy VIII (c) 1999 Squaresoft