The Rage Guide Version 1.1 Djibriel, January 2005 Contents No number: Foreword (01/21/2005, by assassin) 1.1 Version History 1.2 Introduction 1.3 Glossary 2.1 What will Rage do to those who use it? 2.2 What Rages will give me what properties? 3.1 How do I get new Rages, and how does the Veldt work? 3.2 Clearing the monster formations...elusive monsters 4.0 Misplaced in the data space...Rages which fit and Rages which don't 5.0 What was changed in Anthology concerning Rages? 6.0 Legendary Tactics...cheaper than a Brazilian prostitute ;) 7.0 Not just Gau...Gogo the Rager 8.1 Good Rages in random encounter battles. In other words: the elusive answer to the question "What are the best Rages?" 8.2 Boss strategies 9.0 The Merit Award....or to go where no game designer wanted you to go 10.1 Items Gau, you and I love...but where to get them? 10.2 Rage and Relics...True love or an abusive marriage? 11.0 Status ailments and Gau...what'll happen if? 12.0 Bugs concerning Rage, Leap and the Veldt 13.0 Conclusion 14.0 Credits No number: Disclaimer ********************************** Foreword (01/21/2005, by assassin) ********************************** Gau is one of Final Fantasy 6's most versatile characters, and is the most powerful for much of the World of Balance. Having grown up amongst monsters rather than humans, wrapped in hides while most kids are still swaddled in diapers, competing for beef jerky when his contemporaries were back at their mothers' teats, he's hardly a conventional hero. Gau never mentions the Empire, nor makes any vow to save the world. Nay, some of his first acts as a Returner are to shout gibberish, misname Sabin, and to laugh after scaring hard-earned party funds into a pit. But what Gau lacks in fashion, vocabulary and financial savvy, he makes up for in a huge repertoire of attacks and accompanying protections. Some players do not bother to tap into these vast resources, citing how "Gau is uncontrollable." Ah, but some of life's most beautiful processes unfold beyond our control: heartbeats, breath, sneezes, passing the bar exam with flying colors, completing a violent but steady ascent through a drug cartel to emerge as the world's most feared and wealthy kingpin. It is folly to claim that everything involuntary is worthless! Besides, the Rage ability *does* provide sufficient control for most battles. It differs from other abilities in that it requires some foresight; you can't react from round to round. Instead, players must give thought upfront in selecting the Rage. Choose a right one for the situation, and you can coast on through. Like with Ron Popeil's award-winning rotisserie ovens, interaction is rarely NEEDED; just set it and forget it! With at least one great Rage to answer nearly every battle, you can cook anything. Unfortunately, the ability's vastness -- the size of the metaphorical kitchen -- is one of its main downsides. Over 250 total Rages can be learned, Squaresoft didn't bother to alphabetize the menu used in their selection (why, if some benevolent soul did that, he or she would be the toast of the town! And be swarmed by nubile women. .. Swarm, damnit!!), and there's often no connection between what you see from the monster in a normal battle and the Rage attacks it provides Gau. That last point was especially a hindrance before this game's data became documented so thoroughly. The trial and error needed to master Rage was often frustrating to the point of amusement: "A passive raccoon/squirrel hybrid can command the earth to swallow its foes? Right." "Somebody's lost housecat is the most physically dominating presence? Okay." "The ever resilient and Meteo-flinging Intangir has a penchant for suicide? Figures." "Woolly uses Ice 3? That might infuriate me, had I not abandoned Rage fifteen hours ago." Despite this madness, many players would harness impressive early Rages like Hazer, Templar, and Stray Cat when the Rage list was still modest in size. But as it grew later in the game (along with the pool of Veldt enemies), they'd either stick with those initial staples, or simply give up on the command. Others yet were drooling peons who neglected the command from the outset. Rage has experienced a bit of a renaissance due to hacking and subsequent documentation of this game's internals. Even with all this information, there's still a lot for the player to digest. You might know the general strongest attacks or which monsters are particularly sturdy. However, what if you want to pick the Rage which not only puts great hurt on a boss, but -- when combined with readily available equipment -- also absorbs or nullifies every element the fiend can throw at you, and wards off any status ailments it can inflict? That's no casual task. And this is no ordinary guide, my friends. Enter stage left, Djibriel! ********************************** 1.1 Version History ********************************** Version History: - Version 1.1 (01/25/2005) Features close to no content additions, 'Januari' was corrected.\ For GameFAQs purposes, mainly. - Version 1.0 (01/25/2005) Initial Release ********************************** 1.2 Introduction ********************************** Main Entry: rage Pronunciation: 'rAj Function: noun Etymology: Middle English, from Old French, from Late Latin *rabia*, from Latin *rabies* rage, madness, from *rabere* to be mad; akin to Sanskrit *rabhas* violence 1 a : violent and uncontrolled anger b : a fit of violent wrath c archaic : INSANITY 2 : violent action (as of wind or sea) 3 : an intense feeling : PASSION 4 : a fad pursued with intense enthusiasm synonym see ANGER, FASHION How many FAQs have started with a Copy/Paste from the dictionary? While I'm not earning points for originality, I have just explained how the words 'Rage' and 'Rabies' actually come from the same word, and that has to count for something, right? Gau. To like him is to love him, to dislike him is to loathe him. Whatever the opinion on this fellow is, it's a strong feeling. He's paired with Relm in terms of uselessness, and he is paired with Terra and Sabin in terms of kick- ass. So is Gau a blessing to every party but misunderstood by some? Or is he a character only driving on charisma, fiercely neglecting the moral responsibility to aid you in your struggles against evil? I wrote the Guide, trust me, it's the former. Now we have established that Rage is a useful skill, I assume you want to know how to use the Rage command properly? Here's how: Are you in the WoR? Use NightShade Are you in the WoB Imperial MagiTek Research Facility? Use Anguiform Are you in the WoB? Use Stray Cat Now you know how to use Rage. But there's a difference between the Skill of Rage and the Art of Rage. The latter involves picking exactly that Rage out of the eventually 252 Rages that will aid you most. And that, my friends, is what this Guide is all about. There is so much to do, so much to see, so much to enjoy, so much strategy hidden in that single command. Is it all necessary? Not really, no. Gau is a great character even with just those three Rages and a vague grasp of when to use them. But for a Low Level Gamer or a Single Character Challenger, for somebody who wants to have fun, or for people who just really wants to humiliate every boss in the game until it weeps on their boots, this is the Rage Guide, and I hope you will learn from it. There are 255 Rages, of which three are unavailable in a normal game. That's still 252 choices as opposed to 8 Tools, a single special command such as Morph or 24 Lores. There are even several options within a single Rage...the options are endless. Then where to begin? Where to start with a Rage Guide, without a doubt a massive undertaking? I think I'll just start slowly by explaining what a Rage is, what it'll do to you and how to get them. I'll see what I want to tell you then :) ********************************** 1.3 Glossary ********************************** I'll throw in some words here and there that you may not have heard of: LLG: Low Level Game. The challenge of this self-induced torture lies in running from every battle and defeating the game at the lowest level possible. Most end up around level 10, although it's said an average of level 8 should be obtainable. While this is not an LLG Guide I'll give some useful tips on them concerning Rage from you. SCC: Single Character Challenge. The objective of this game is to defeat it using only one character and traveling with otherwise dead people where possible. While this is not an SCC Guide I'll give some tips on a possible Gau SCC you might be playing. Those tactics are important anyway as the entire party safe for Gau might be killed, leaving it necessary for a specific Rage to be self-sustaining. WoB: World of Balance. The green, clean dreamlands you start in. WoR: At some point in the game the previously described World of Balance is destroyed by a plot device, giving way to new dungeons, monsters, side-quests but foremost new Rages and new items. Logic tells us you cannot reach the WoR when you're in the WoB, unless some kind of overly dramatic cutscene would do that for you. Gau: While it's possible to name Gau something along the lines of 'Beaver', there is a strange custom to refer to characters using their official names. I'm going to stick to it. Blackjack: Its name never mentioned in the game, the Blackjack is the WoB counterpart of the Falcon. The Blackjack is, as far as you know, the only airship in existence, and it's owned by a pirate known as 'the Wandering Gambler'. Ctrl + F: Rumored to be the fourth invention of the world (only fire, the wheel and women were invented earlier), Ctrl + F is a fabled button combination with which you can instantly transport your mind to a certain location, or even swoop over all the times a certain word is mentioned in a document. While reading this entire Rage Guide certainly would make your life better, I cannot exclude the possibility that you just popped in to look up whether 'This Or That' causes 'Such Or So', and you can instantly find the answer to yon riddle with this combo. ********************************** 2.1 What will Rage do to those who use it? ********************************** When selecting Rage by using the arrow keys (yes, they're used in this game) and actually using the action button, a menu screen will appear where you can pick between every Rage you have. Select one, and watch how Gau and/or Gogo gets into a killing frenzy, randomly switching between a normal Battle command and a special attack every turn, automatically, until the Rage user is either killed or victorious. At first glance. There is a Rage for pretty much every random encounter monster in the game, and even a few odd bosses here and there. Every Rage is named after its corresponding monster. There is the Brawler monster at Mt. Koltz, and there is the Brawler Rage. When Gau or Gogo selects the Brawler Rage, he will become the Brawler in several aspects. Not only will he randomly perform a specific attack 50 % of the time, he will adopt elemental attributes, inherent statuses and special properties of this monster. Confused yet? Let's take a look at Brawler. This monster absorbs Poison-elemental attacks. As soon as Gau takes his first turn in this Rage, he will start absorbing Poison. Elemental properties are always handled in such a way that the most positive outcome for the target is determined, not counting ForceField (which rules all) and having no special treatment, which is always overruled. So if Gau's equipment says he should absorb Ice-elemental attacks, yet his Rage says he should be weak against it, the absorbing will prevail. In other words: ForceField --> Absorbing --> nullify --> 50 % damage --> weakness Let's take a look at another monster. Let's take a look at Apokryphos, a creature from the Floating Continent. This monster is immune to certain status ailments. For Apokryphos, these status ailments are: Zombie, Poison, Imp, Condemned, Near Fatal, Berserk and Muddle. Upon entering the Apokryphos Rage, Gau and/or Gogo will become immune to these status ailments as well, effectively protecting him from every single one of these life-threatening ailments without having to sacrifice a Relic slot. The status ailments Rage can protect against are: Dark, Zombie, Poison, Clear, Imp, Petrify, Condemned, Near Fatal, Image, Mute, Berserk, Muddle, Seizure, Sleep, Slow, Stop and finally Death. Note that Death protection doesn't really include being immortal. Death protection will grant Gau the same effects Relm and Shadow can receive from the Memento Ring (and every character from the Safety Bit): he will be immune to death-based attacks such as Demi, Missile and Dischord. Also note that some of these sudden status protections will appear more positive than negative (Clear, Image, Berserk). You'll have to live with it :) I told you about special properties, right? The properties I was talking about are these three: Die if MP = 0, Human, and Undead. Die if MP = 0 is a pesky property that you don't really want but isn't really harmful either. When the MP of the Rage user reaches 0 by means of an MP attack (Rasp, Osmose), the Death status will automatically be set. There are a grand total of two enemies I can come up with which use Rasp, so you should have no fear. Human is a very slight property that only comes into play when the Rage user is somehow targeted by somebody with the Man Eater, as he'll take double damage. That's all there is to it. In all my playthroughs I have never had his happen, so let's pretend this feature isn't there, okay? Undead is the most annoying one. Becoming Undead will give the Rage user some advantages, and in some rare situations it's a good thing. The undead Rage user will not die from Doom, enemy Roulette, the Reaper that comes with Condemned and any strike with the Assassin/Striker/Wing Edge/Trump but instead will be fully healed by it. The downside, however, is that curative spells will now harm the undead Rage user. Those spells that will heal regardless of being undead or not are: Pep Up Lagomorph The Dried Meat Item Fight command with the Heal Rod Tapir (only when the target has the 'Sleep' status) All others, such as Cure/Cure2/Cure3, Pearl Wind and Mantra will damage Gau, and given the nature of healing spells they will kill him very quickly. Be aware. Let's take a look at Brawler yet again. The monster is always under the influence of the Berserk status. As soon as Gau or Gogo selects this Rage, the Berserk status is applied to the Rage user. A Rage-inflicted status (ailment) is not removable/curable. A status protection Relic will prevent Rage- inflicted status ailments coming into play, though. Should Gau or Gogo have been wearing a Ribbon or Peace Ring, the auto-Berserk would not have been applied. Both positive and negative statuses are applied in some cases. Templar benefits from auto-Safe, and Enuo suffers from auto-Seizure. Status ailments are often hardly more than a small annoyance, beneficial statuses is what it's all about in some battles. There is yet another thing that the Rage user receives, and it's the Special attack. Some Rages will have no spell for the second attack, but instead have the monster's Special. This Special can vary from status- infliction (Primordite's Numblade causes 'Stop', Mind Candy's SleepSting causes 'Sleep') to a physical attack stronger than Battle (Hornet's IronNeedle is 1.5 times stronger than Battle, Stray Cat's Catscratch is 4 times stronger than Battle). Obviously, Gau will be doing this monster’s Special attack should his Rage force him to do so. Finally, there's only little snippet that is related to Rage. Every monster has a 'weapon' of which the graphic is shown. This weapon is also placed on a Rager. Note that this does not, in any way, have an influence of the power of the physical attack itself. Some monsters use a Trident, other use a Partisan; the latter is not stronger then the first when you see it on a Rager. So this is what the Rage user receives. To be clear, the Rage user does *not* take over: - Any kind of statistic, including Evade and Magic Block - Stolen items - Control and Sketch attacks - Morph items - AI Script The Rage user stays in the monster-induced frenzy until the battle is over or the Rage user is Petrified or killed. Also, Rippler can take away the 'Rage' status which causes the Rage user to stop with the frenzy thing. Take a look at the bugs section for more info about that. So, to be perfectly clear, let me sum it all up: - Two attacks, of which one is always Battle - Elemental properties, which are placed alongside of the existing ones - Status protection, which are placed alongside of the existing ones, with Death Protection being the exception. - Inherent statuses/status ailments, which can be prevented by means of status protection - Special properties, which include Die if MP = 0, Human, and Undead, which replace the current special properties. - Special attack - Weapon graphic, which replaces the current weapon graphic, unless the held weapon is Dice or Fixed Dice. The effect and strength of the weapon are not affected in any way. ********************************** 2.2 What Rages will give me what properties? ********************************** There are two lists to make sure that it all fits nicely and looks nice. Please note that this is not really meant for reading or something, this is for those of you who have mastered to use of Ctrl + F and wish to know what the hell Necromancr does. This is the first list. It lists the monsters in the order they appear in the data and the location of them in the Rage menu. This list includes from left to right the name of the monster, the attack they will use half of the time, the inherent statuses, the possession of Death Protection (if so, they have 'Dth. Prot.' listed) and the possession of the Undead trait (mentioned if so). Guard Special Soldier Fire Templar Fire2 Safe Ninja Water Skean Float Samurai Lullaby Dth. Prot. Orog Pearl Undead Mag Roader Bio Safe Dth. Prot. Retainer Shock Dth. Prot. Hazer Bolt2 Dahling Cure2 Dth. Prot. Rain Man Bolt3 Float Brawler Stone Berserk Apokryphos L. 3 Muddle Dark Force CleanSweep Whisper Demi Float Undead Seizure Over-Mind Elf Fire Undead Osteosaur X-Zone Undead Commander Break Rhodox Snare Were-Rat Poison Ursus Net Rhinotaur Mega Volt Steroidite Blizzard Dth. Prot. Leafer Special Stray Cat Special Lobo Special Doberman Special Vomammoth Blizzard Fidor Special Baskervor Cyclonic Dth. Prot. Suriander Aqua Rake Dth. Prot. Chimera Aqua Rake Dth. Prot. Behemoth Meteor Mesosaur Step Mine Pterodon Fire Ball Float FossilFang Sand Storm Undead White Drgn Pearl Dth. Prot. Doom Drgn N. Cross Float Dth. Prot. Brachosaur Disaster Dth. Prot. Tyranosaur Meteo Dth. Prot. Dark Wind Break Float Beakor Special Vulture Shimsham Float Harpy Cyclonic Float Dth. Prot. HermitCrab Net Safe Trapper L.3 Muddle Float Hornet Special Float Crasshoppr Bserk Float Delta Bug Mega Volt Gilomantis Shrapnel Dth. Prot. Trilium Bio NightShade Charm Dth. Prot. Tumbleweed Lifeshaver Bloompire Bio Undead Trilobiter Special Safe *Siegfried Flare Safe Dth. Prot. Nautiloid Special Safe Exocite Special Anguiform Aqua Rake Dark Reach Frog Slimer Lizard Break ChickenLip Quake Dth. Prot. Hoover Sand Storm Rider Virite *Chupon W Wind Dth. Prot. Pipsqueak Imp M-TekArmor Tek Laser Safe Dth. Prot. Sky Armor Tek Laser Float Telstar Sonic Boom Float Dth. Prot. Lethal Wpn Grav Bomb Reflect Vaporite Blaze Float Undead Flan Slimer Ing Lifeshaver Float Undead Humpty Poison Undead Brainpan Blow Fish Float Undead Cruller Slimer Undead Cactrot Blow Fish Repo Man Exploder Harvester Haste Float Haste Bomb Blaze Float StillLife Lullaby Dth. Prot. Boxed Set Meteor Float Reflect SlamDancer Ice2 HadesGigas Magnitude8 Pug Break Dth. Prot. Magic Urn Cure3 Dth. Prot. Mover Merton Figaliz Dischord Reflect Buffalax Slow2 Seizure Aspik Giga Volt Float Ghost Bolt2 Float Undead Crawler Step Mine Sand Ray Special Areneid Special Actaneon Special Dark Sand Horse Sand Storm Dth. Prot. Dark Side Ice2 Float Undead Seizure Mad Oscar Sour Mouth Crawly Special Bleary Doom Marshal Wind Slash Trooper Special General Cure2 Safe Covert Wind Slash Dth. Prot. Ogor Storm Dth. Prot. Warlock Pearl Dth. Prot. Madam Pearl Dth. Prot. Joker Bolt2 Float Iron Fist Stone Goblin Bolt3 Reflect Apparite Imp Float Undead Seizure PowerDemon Flare Undead Displayer Doom Undead Vector Pup Special Haste Peepers Pearl Wind Seizure Sewer Rat Special Slatter Cave In Dth. Prot. Rhinox Life3 Safe Dth. Prot. Rhobite Life Wild Cat Blaster Red Fang Drain Bounty Man Special Tusker Blizzard Ralph Special Chitonid Stop Safe Dth. Prot. Wart Puck Rasp Dth. Prot. Rhyos Surge Dth. Prot. SrBehemoth Fire3 Undead Vectaur Pearl Wind Dth. Prot. Wyvern Cyclonic Zombone Condemned Undead Dragon Revenge Dth. Prot. Brontaur Fire3 Dth. Prot. Allosaurus Doom Cirpius Haste2 Float Sprinter Aero Gobbler Shimsham Float Harpiai Aero Float Dth. Prot. GloomShell Net Drop Muddle Seizure Dth. Prot. MindCandy Special Float WeedFeeder Bserk Float Luridan Land Slide Float ToeCutter Shrapnel Dth. Prot. Over Grunk Special Exoray Virite Shell Undead Crusher Lifeshaver Dth. Prot. Uroburos Quake Primordite Special Sky Cap Megazerk Float Cephaler Special Safe Dth. Prot. Maliga Remedy GiganToad Slimer Dth. Prot. Geckorex Break Cluck Quake Land Worm Magnitude8 Test Rider Flash Rain Dth. Prot. PlutoArmor Tek Laser Tomb Thumb Step Mine HeavyArmor Tek Laser Safe Chaser Plasma Float Scullion Dischord Dth. Prot. Poplium Special Float Undead Intangir Pep Up Clear Dth. Prot. Float Haste Safe Shell Misfit Lifeshaver Float Undead Eland Bio Enuo CleanSweep Seizure Reflect Deep Eye Dread GreaseMonk Shell Haste NeckHunter Imp Haste Grenade Blaze Float Critic Condemned Pan Dora Revenge Float Undead SoulDancer Osmose Dth. Prot. Gigantos Magnitude8 Safe Mag Roader Mute Haste Dth. Prot. Spek Tor Blaster Dth. Prot. Parasite Giga Volt Float EarthGuard Big Guard Seizure Coelecite Magnitude8 Anemone Giga Volt Hipocampus Flash Rain Float Undead Spectre Fire Undead Evil Oscar Bio Slurm Slimer Latimeria Magnitude8 Dth. Prot. StillGoing Osmose Undead *Allo Ver Quake Undead Phase Blow Fish Float Dth. Prot. Outsider Pearl Haste Barb-e Love Token Dth. Prot. ParaSoul Flash Rain Float Pm Stalker Drain Float Undead Seizure Hemophyte Shock Wave Dth. Prot. Sp Forces Safe Dth. Prot. Nohrabbit Cure2 Wizard Demi Dth. Prot. Scrapper Elf Fire Haste Dth. Prot. Ceritops Giga Volt Safe Dth. Prot. Commando Rflect Opinicus Slide Undead Poppers Stone Lunaris Special Dth. Prot. Garm Demi Vindr Acid Rain Float Kiwok Imp Nastidon Blizzard Safe Dth. Prot. Rinn Fire Float Undead Insecare Special Float Vermin Scan Mantodea Wind Slash Dth. Prot. Bogy Specail Safe Prussian Land Slide Black Drgn Storm Seizure Undead Adamanchyt Acid Rain Safe Dth. Prot. Dante L.3 Muddle Undead Wirey Drgn Cyclonic Float Safe Dueller Mega Volt Psychot Lifeshaver Float Dth. Prot. Muus Pep Up Shell Dth. Prot. Karkass Bolt3 Float Dth. Prot. Undead Punisher Bolt3 Haste Balloon Exploder Float Gabbldegak Vanish GtBehemoth Meteor Dth. Prot. Scorpion Poison ChaosDrgn Disaster Dth. Prot. Spit Fire Tek Laser Vectagoyle Aqua Rake Dth. Prot. Lich Fire2 Float Undead Osprey Shimsham Float Mag Roader Haste Bug Stop Float Sea Flower Sleep Fortis Fire Ball Abolisher Poison Aquila Cyclonic Float Dth. Prot. Junk Pep Up Float Mandrake Raid Dth. Prot. 1st Class Stone Tap Dancer Slow 2 Necromancr Doom Float Undead Borras Revenge Dth. Prot. Mag Roader L.4 Flare Haste Wild Rat Special Gold Bear Special Innoc Virite Float Trixter Fire2 Float Dth. Prot. Red Wolf Special Dth. Prot. Didalos Merton Undead Woolly Ice3 Float Veteran Condemned Float Dth. Prot. Sky Base Doom IronHitman Dischord Io Flare Star This is the second list and uses the same order of monsters. All this list provides is elemental reactions of the Rage in questions. Note that these can be overruled by equipment, as you should know from reading this Guide. Guard weak against Poison Soldier weak against Poison Templar weak against Poison Ninja absorbs Poison, weak against Lightning, Pearl Samurai weak against Poison Orog absorbs Poison, weak against Fire, Pearl Mag Roader absorbs Ice, weak against Fire Retainer weak against Poison Hazer weak against Pearl Dahling weak against Poison Rain Man weak against Ice, Pearl, Water Brawler absorbs Poison, weak against Fire Apokryphos weak against Lightning, Pearl, Water Dark Force weak against Pearl Whisper absorbs Poison, weak against Fire, Pearl Over-Mind absorbs Poison, weak against Fire, Pearl Osteosaur absorbs Poison, weak against Fire, Pearl Commander weak against Poison Rhodox Were-Rat absorbs Poison, weak against Fire Ursus weak against Fire Rhinotaur absorbs Lightning Steroidite weak against Ice Leafer absorbs Ice, weak against Fire, Water Stray Cat Lobo weak against Fire Doberman weak against Fire Vomammoth weak against Fire Fidor weak against Fire Baskervor Suriander weak against Pearl Chimera Behemoth weak against Ice Mesosaur weak against Ice Pterodon weak against Fire FossilFang weak against Fire, Ice, Pearl, Water White Drgn absorbs Pearl Doom Drgn Brachosaur weak against Ice Tyranosaur weak against Ice Dark Wind weak against Fire Beakor weak against Fire Vulture weak against Wind Harpy HermitCrab weak against Water Trapper weak against Lightning, Water Hornet weak against Fire Crasshoppr weak against Fire, Wind Delta Bug weak against Fire Gilomantis weak against Fire Trilium absorbs Water, weak against Fire NightShade absorbs Water, weak against Fire Tumbleweed absorbs Water, weak against Fire Bloompire absorbs Water, weak against Fire Trilobiter *Siegfried weak against Fire, Ice, Lightning, Poison, Wind, Pearl Earth, Water Nautiloid absorbs Water, weak against Fire, Lightning Exocite absorbs Water, weak against Fire, Lightning Anguiform absorbs Water, weak against Lightning Reach Frog weak against Ice Lizard absorbs Poison, weak against Ice ChickenLip weak against Ice Hoover weak against Ice, Water Rider weak against Fire, Poison *Chupon absorbs Fire, weak against Ice, Water Pipsqueak weak against Lightning, Water M-TekArmor weak against Lightning Sky Armor weak against Lightning, Wind Telstar weak against Lightning, Water Lethal Wpn weak against Lightning, Water Vaporite absorbs Lightning, weak against Fire, Pearl Flan nullifies Poison, Wind, Pearl, Earth Water, weak against Fire Ing absorbs Fire, Poison, weak against Pearl, Water Humpty absorbs Poison, weak against Fire, Pearl Brainpan absorbs Poison, weak against Fire, Lightning, Pearl Cruller absorbs Poison, weak against Fire, Pearl Cactrot weak against Ice, Water Repo Man weak against Poison Harvester weak against Poison Bomb absorbs Fire, weak against Ice, Water StillLife weak against Fire Boxed Set weak against Pearl SlamDancer weak against Poison HadesGigas absorbs Earth, weak against Poison Pug absorbs Water, weak against Fire, Lightning Magic Urn absorbs Fire, Ice, Lightning, Poison, Wind, Pearl, Earth, Water Mover absorbs Poison Figaliz weak against Ice Buffalax weak against Fire, Water Aspik absorbs Water, weak against Fire Ghost absorbs Poison, weak against Fire, Pearl Crawler weak against Ice Sand Ray weak against Ice, Water Areneid weak against Ice, Water Actaneon absorbs Water, weak against Fire, Lightning Sand Horse weak against Ice, Water Dark Side absorbs Poison, weak against Fire, Pearl Mad Oscar absorbs Poison, Water, weak against Fire Crawly weak against Fire Bleary weak against Fire Marshal weak against Poison Trooper weak against Poison General weak against Poison Covert absorbs Poison, weak against Pearl Ogor weak against Lightning, Poison Warlock weak against Lightning, Poison Madam weak against Poison Joker weak against Lightning, Poison Iron Fist absorbs Poison Goblin weak against Pearl Apparite absorbs Fire, Poison, weak against Ice, Pearl PowerDemon absorbs Poison, weak against Fire, Pearl Displayer absorbs Poison, weak against Fire, Pearl Vector Pup weak against Fire Peepers weak against Ice, Water Sewer Rat absorbs Poison, weak against Fire Slatter weak against Pearl Rhinox absorbs Lightning Rhobite weak against Water Wild Cat weak against Fire, Water Red Fang Bounty Man weak against Fire Tusker weak against Fire Ralph Chitonid weak against Lightning Wart Puck weak against Fire Rhyos SrBehemoth absorbs Poison, weak against Fire, Pearl Vectaur weak against Ice, Water Wyvern weak against Ice Zombone absorbs Poison, weak against Fire, Pearl Dragon weak against Lightning Brontaur weak against Ice Allosaurus weak against Fire, Pearl Cirpius Sprinter weak against Lightning Gobbler Shimsham Float Harpiai weak against Wind GloomShell weak against Ice Drop weak against Lightning, Water MindCandy weak against Fire, Wind WeedFeeder weak against Fire, Wind Luridan weak against Fire, Wind ToeCutter absorbs Ice, weak against Fire, Wind Over Grunk weak against Fire Exoray absorbs Poison, weak against Fire, Pearl Crusher weak against Fire Uroburos absorbs Fire, weak against Ice Primordite weak against Lightning Sky Cap weak against Lightning, Wind, Water Cephaler weak against Lightning Maliga weak against Ice, Lightning, Water GiganToad weak against Ice Geckorex weak against Ice Cluck absorbs Poison, weak against Ice Land Worm absorbs Earth, weak against Ice Test Rider weak against Poison PlutoArmor weak against Lightning, Water Tomb Thumb weak against Lightning, Water HeavyArmor weak against Lightning, Water Chaser weak against Lightning, Water Scullion weak against Lightning, Water Poplium absorbs Poison, weak against Fire, Pearl Intangir absorbs Fire, Ice, Lightning, Poison, Wind, Pearl, Earth, Water Misfit absorbs Poison, weak against Fire, Pearl Eland weak against Lightning Enuo weak against Pearl Deep Eye weak against Fire GreaseMonk weak against Poison NeckHunter weak against Poison Grenade absorbs Fire, weak against Ice, Water Critic Pan Dora absorbs Poison, weak against Fire, Pearl SoulDancer weak against Poison Gigantos weak against Poison Mag Roader weak against Ice Spek Tor weak against Water Parasite weak against Fire EarthGuard weak against Water Coelecite absorbs Fire, weak against Ice Anemone absorbs Lightning, Water, weak against Fire, Lightning Hipocampus absorbs Poison, weak against Fire, Pearl Spectre absorbs Poison, weak against Fire, Pearl Evil Oscar absorbs Ice, Lightning, Poison, Wind, Pearl, Earth, Water weak against Fire Slurm weak against Fire Latimeria weak against Lightning StillGoing absorbs Poison, weak against Fire, Pearl *Allo Ver absorbs Poison, weak against Fire, Pearl Phase absorbs Fire, weak against Ice Outsider absorbs Poison, weak against Pearl Barb-e weak against Poison ParaSoul absorbs Fire, weak against Ice Pm Stalker absorbs Poison, weak against Fire, Pearl Hemophyte Sp Forces weak against Poison Nohrabbit weak against Water Wizard weak against Lightning, Poison Scrapper absorbs Poison Ceritops absorbs Lightning, weak against Fire Commando weak against Lightning, Water Opinicus absorbs Poison, weak against Fire, Pearl Poppers weak against Fire Lunaris Garm weak against Lightning, Water Vindr weak against Fire Kiwok weak against Ice Nastidon weak against Fire Rinn absorbs Poison, weak against Fire, Pearl Insecare weak against Fire, Wind Vermin absorbs Poison, weak against Ice Mantodea weak against Fire Bogy Prussian Black Drgn absorbs Poison, weak against Fire, Pearl Adamanchyt Dante weak against Poison Wirey Drgn Dueller weak against Lightning, Water Psychot absorbs Fire, weak against Ice Muus nullifies Poison, Wind, Pearl, Earth, Water Karkass absorbs Poison, weak against Fire, Pearl Punisher weak against Poison Balloon absorbs Fire, weak against Ice, Water Gabbldegak weak against Poison GtBehemoth Scorpion ChaosDrgn absorbs Fire, weak against Ice Spit Fire weak against Lightning, Wind Vectagoyle Lich absorbs Fire, Poison, weak against Pearl Osprey weak against Ice Mag Roader Bug weak against Ice, Water Sea Flower absorbs Fire, Water, weak against Ice, Lightning Fortis weak against Lightning, Water Abolisher Aquila absorbs Fire, weak against Ice Junk weak against Lightning, Water Mandrake absorbs Water, weak against Fire 1st Class weak against Poison Tap Dancer weak against Poison Necromancr absorbs Poison, weak against Fire, Pearl Borras weak against Poison Mag Roader Wild Rat absorbs Poison, weak against Fire Gold Bear Innoc weak against Lightning, Water Trixter weak against Pearl Red Wolf Didalos absorbs Poison, weak against Fire, Pearl Woolly absorbs Ice, Lightning, Poison, Wind, Earth, Water weak against Fire Veteran Sky Base weak against Lightning, Water IronHitman weak against Lightning, Water Io nullifies Poison, Wind, Earth, weak against Lightning, Pearl, Water ********************************** 3.1 How do I get new Rages, and how does the Veldt work? ********************************** Gau starts with a few Rages the first time you recruit him. These Rages are Brawler, Exocite, Hornet, Lobo, M-TekArmor, Rhinotaur, Trilobiter, Were-Rat and Whisper. While even with these Rages and these Rages alone he's superior to Relm in an SCC, none of these Rages are overly impressive, and none of them are named in any boss battles. So how do you get new Rages? It's all very simple. Let's say you're in bad need of the Areneid Rage. First off, you must have met an Areneid in a battle formation (group of monsters) which is capable of appearing on the Veldt. Don't worry, pretty much all monster formations short of boss battles appear on the Veldt. You must have successfully 'completed' the fight with this battle formation in order for it to appear on the Veldt. Options which allow this include: 1) Winning the battle 2) Escaping the battle by any means 3) Having Locke die when he's still alone in his South Figaro scenario And do not include: 1) Having the battle end with a scene fade-out 2) Not saving and resetting the game 3) Not saving and receiving a Game Over So you've cleared a massive amount of Rages. That means it's time to pay a visit to: The Veldt. During the WoB, it's a massive piece of land where Mobliz is located. It's accessible by jumping down Barren Falls, and you can leave it by jumping down the Serpent Trench. That's only smart when you don't have any kind of airborne transportation yet: I guess I should note that riding an airship is arguably the easiest way of doing it. Now that you are on the Veldt, there are two states you can be in: A) You don't have Gau, and you want him in your party. B) You have Gau, and want to have him Leap. The latter is easy. Just walk around until you meet a monster you want to Leap. Use Leap. You're now in status A again. If this is your first time on the Veldt, and Gau hasn't been properly introduced, make sure that both Cyan and Sabin are alive. If this is not the case, Gau will not pay you a visit. In any other case, there are certain things that need to be checked in order for Gau to return. *Gau will never return in a Back Attack, Side Attack or a Pincer Attack. In other words, your party must always be facing the left side of the battlefield. A Preemptive battle will allow Gau. *You must have three party members or less. If not, Gau would not be able to fit back into your team. Given the nature of the Veldt you should just stick to three members unless you have a specifically good reason not to listen to me here. *Code-wise, Gau semi-holds the sixth Slot in a monster formation to return to your capable hands. There are quite a few monster formations which have monsters in this slot, effectively screwing you out of a well-deserved possibility of Gau returning. These monsters formations include: Hornet, Bleary, Bleary, Bleary, Hornet Leafer, Leafer, Dark Wind, Dark Wind Rhodox, Rhodox, Rhodox, Rhodox Rhobite, Rhobite, Rhobite, Rhobite, Rhobite Telstar, Soldier, Soldier, Soldier, Soldier Actaneon, Actaneon, Actaneon, Aspik, Aspik Ghost, Ghost, Poplium, Poplium, Poplium Bomb, Bomb, Hazer, Hazer StillGoing, StillGoing, StillGoing Trooper, Trooper, Trooper, Trooper Mind Candy, Mind Candy, Mind Candy, Mind Candy Gabbldegak, Gabbldegak, Gabbldegak, Gabbldegak Sewer Rat, Vermin, Sewer Rat, Sewer Rat, Vermin Crawler, Crawler, Crawler, Crawler Pipsqueak, Pipsqueak, Pipsqueak, Pipsqueak Bomb, Bomb, Bomb, Bomb, Bomb, Bomb Bug, Bug, Bug, Bug, Bug, Bug ChickenLip, ChickenLip, ChickenLip, ChickenLip, ChickenLip Lich, Lich, Lich Balloon, Balloon, Balloon, Balloon, Balloon, Balloon Mesosaur, Mesosaur, Mesosaur, Mesosaur Delta Bug, Delta Bug, Delta Bug, Delta Bug Humpty, Humpty, Humpty, Humpty Deep Eye, Deep Eye, Deep Eye, Deep Eye, Deep Eye, Deep Eye Deep Eye, Muus, Muus, Deep Eye Anemone, Anemone, Anemone, Anemone Luridan, Luridan, Luridan, Luridan, Luridan, Luridan Vectaur, Vectaur, Vectaur, Vectaur Wizard, Wizard, Psychot, Psychot, Psychot Red Wolf, Red Wolf, Psychot, Psychot Psychot, Psychot, Psychot, Psychot, Psychot, Psychot Vindr, Vindr, Wild Cat, Crusher, Crusher SoulDancer, Wild Cat, Wild Cat, Wild Cat, Wild Cat Warlock, Cluck, Cluck, Eland, Eland Boxed Set, Boxed Set, Figaliz, Figaliz Boxed Set, Boxed Set, Boxed Set, Boxed Set Suriander, Pan Dora, Parasite, Parasite Reach Frog, Reach Frog, Reach Frog, Reach Frog TumbleWeed, TumbleWeed, TumbleWeed, TumbleWeed Sea Flower, Sea Flower, Sea Flower, Sea Flower, Sea Flower Flan, Flan, Flan, Flan, Flan, Flan Flan, Flan, Flan, Flan Wild Rat, 1st Class, 1st Class, Wild Rat, Wild Rat Pipsqueak, Pipsqueak, Pipsqueak, Pipsqueak, Pipsqueak Mag Roader, Mad Roader, Mag Roader, Mag Roader (all red) Balloon, Balloon, Balloon, Balloon (forced Pincer anyway) Sky Baser, IronHitman, IronHitman, IronHitman, IronHitman Commando, Commando, Commando, Commando If these conditions are met, Gau has a 5/8 chance of popping up when you have defeated the enemy monsters. To clarify, that's: 62.75 % of the time. But having Gau return does not automatically mean he'll join your party. The first time you see him in battle, you need to feed him a Dried Meat, an item you can conveniently buy in Mobliz for the first time in the game. Any other time, you'll simply have to wait for Gau to say he'll join you. If you either damage him or kill him in a single hit using Doom or a related spell, Gau will make a run for it, just as you should when your friends start directing their violence against you. Returning Gau is an odd little thing: - Returning Gau is considered equipped with the items you sent him into the monster formations with. - Returning Gau will not load inherent statuses such as Wall Ring's Rflect and Thornlet's Seizure. He will load their immunities, though. - When you cast Stop on Gau, and you hurt him, he'll still run away if you wait for Stop to wear off. If you put him to sleep, however, and hurt him with a magical attack and wait until Sleep wears off, he can still join your party. So what Rages will you get when doing what? When Gau Leaps, he will obtain ALL Rages he didn't know yet from that particular monster formation. If you killed one already, Gau will learn that Rage. If the monster is still hidden (for instance, the Chaser hasn't died and called the Pipsqueak brigade yet), Gau will learn the Rages. While you're fighting and Gau stays away, Gau WILL NOT learn the Rages of the monster formations you defeat in the meantime. Some people may claim otherwise and even suggest hurting Gau whenever he returns to learn as much as possible in one go. This is false info. When Gau returns he learns all the Rages of the monsters you defeated in that battle (excluding Pugs and ProtoArmor obviously). The same applies as when he Leaps. Obviously you killed all the monsters to even have Gau return, but monster that never showed (Telstar died too quickly to summon the Soldiers), Gau will learn those Rages. If you scare him, however, by trying to torch/ impale/petrify/electrocute/whatever him, he will not learn the Rages of the monster formation he popped up in. Also, the very first time you recruit him, Gau will not have learned the Rages of the monster formation he appeared in. That's all there is to it. There is neither an improved chance of him showing up when you don't know the Rages of the monster formation yet, and there's no decreased chance of him showing up in a monster formation he knows everything about either. Gau isn't smart enough to notice the difference between the monsters, it seems. Those 'eyes shining of intelligence' never were more than hateful leers directed at party members anyway :P Monster formations which appear on the Veldt do not appear random. There is a fixed pattern which you can use to your advantage if you know about it. Every time you fight a battle out of a certain Monster Formation Pack, you'll fight a random Monster Formations out of the next Monster Formation Pack. You continue down the list until you've reached the end, at which point you jump to Pack # 1 again. You'll never fight monster formations you haven't cleared yet. If you run into a monster formation pack which holds no monster formations you've fought so far, the game will skip to the next monster formation pack. Note: I know this list greatly resembles that found in Terii Senshi's Algorhitm FAQ. While it was by no means my intention to borrow his info and pretend it's my own, after getting a thumbs-up from Terii on me using the info, I discovered this was extremely little I could do with it which would improve quality. Pack 1: 0 Lobo 1 Lobo, Lobo 2 Guard, Guard 3 Bleary, Bleary, Crawly 4 Lobo, Lobo, Marshal 5 Hornet, Bleary, Bleary, Bleary, Hornet 6 Leafer 7 Leafer, Leafer, Dark Wind pack 2: 0 Leafer, Leafer, Dark Wind, Dark Wind 1 Sand Ray, Areneid, Areneid, Areneid 2 Sand Ray, Sand Ray 3 Areneid, Areneid, Areneid 4 Sand Ray, Areneid, Areneid 5 Hornet, Hornet 6 Were-Rat, Were-Rat, Were-Rat 7 Hornet, Crawly, Crawly pack 3: 0 Tusker, Tusker 1 Vomammoth, Lobo 2 Crawly, Crawly, Crawly 3 Rhinotaur 4 Rhinotaur, Rhodox, Rhodox 5 Rhodox, Rhodox, GreaseMonk 6 Rhinotaur, GreaseMonk, Rhodox, Rhodox 7 GreaseMonk, GreaseMonk pack 4: 0 Rhodox, Rhodox, Rhodox, Rhodox 1 Soldier, Soldier, M-TekArmor 2 Repo Man, Vaporite 3 M-TekArmor 4 Trilium, Tusker, Cirpius, Cirpius 5 Cirpius, Cirpius, Cirpius 6 Trilium, Trilium 7 Tusker, Cirpius, Cirpius, Cirpius pack 5: 0 Brawler, Brawler 1 Brawler, Trilium, Vaporite, Vaporite 2 M-TekArmor, M-TekArmor 3 Pterodon, Pterodon 4 Zombone, Zombone 5 Nautiloid, Exocite, Pterodon 6 Nautiloid, Exocite 7 Pterodon, Exocite, Exocite pack 6: 0 Empty 1 Lobo, Guard, Guard 2 Empty 3 Empty 4 Were-Rat, Repo Man 5 Were-Rat, Were-Rat 6 Doberman, Doberman 7 Actaneon, Actaneon, Actaneon pack 7: 0 Empty 1 Stray Cat, Stray Cat, Stray Cat 2 CrassHoppr, CrassHoppr, Stray Cat, Stray Cat 3 CrassHoppr, CrassHoppr, CrassHoppr 4 Rhobite, Rhobite, Rhobite, Rhobite, Rhobite 5 Beakor 6 Beakor, Beakor, Stray Cat 7 Beakor, Rhobite, Rhobite pack 8: 0 Rhobite, Rhobite, Rhobite 1 Beakor, Stray Cat, CrassHoppr, CrassHoppr 2 Empty 3 Empty 4 Empty 5 Telstar, Soldier, Soldier, Soldier, Soldier 6 Doberman, Doberman, Doberman 7 Empty pack 9: 0 HeavyArmor 1 Ghost 2 Ghost, Ghost, Ghost 3 Actaneon, Actaneon, Actaneon, Aspik, Aspik 4 Ghost, Poplium, Poplium 5 Ghost, Ghost, Poplium, Poplium, Poplium 6 Whisper, Whisper, Hazer 7 Vaporite, Vaporite pack 10: 0 Bomb, Bomb, Hazer, Hazer 1 Apparite, Apparite, Lich, Lich 2 Whisper, Whisper, Whisper, Whisper 3 Over-Mind, Over-Mind 4 Bomb, Bomb, Bomb 5 Bomb 6 Over-Mind, StillGoing, StillGoing 7 Empty pack 11: 0 Whisper, StillGoing, Hazer, Hazer 1 Whisper, Hazer, Hazer, Hazer 2 Anguiform 3 Anguiform, Anguiform 4 Vomammoth, Vomammoth, Guard, Guard 5 StillGoing, StillGoing, StillGoing 6 Anguiform, Actaneon, Aspik 7 Rider pack 12: 0 HeavyArmor, Trooper, Trooper 1 Fidor, Trooper 2 Whisper 3 Trooper, Trooper, Trooper, Trooper 4 Bounty Man, Trooper, Trooper 5 FossilFang 6 Red Fang, Red Fang 7 Over Grunk, Vulture, Iron Fist pack 13: 0 Iron Fist, Iron Fist, Mind Candy, Mind Candy 1 Red Fang, Vulture, Red Fang 2 Over Grunk, Over Grunk, Mind Candy, Mind Candy, Mind Candy 3 Vulture, Vulture 4 Vulture, Iron Fist 5 Mind Candy, Mind Candy, Mind Candy, Mind Candy 6 HadesGigas 7 Crawler pack 14: 0 Gabbldegak, Gabbldegak, Gabbldegak, Gabbldegak 1 SlamDancer 2 SlamDancer, Gabbldegak, Gabbldegak, Gabbldegak 3 Harvester 4 SlamDancer, Harvester, Harvester 5 Harvester, Gabbldegak, Gabbldegak 6 HadesGigas, Harvester 7 Mag Roader (purple) pack 15: 0 Vermin, Sewer Rat, Sewer Rat 1 Sewer Rat, Vermin, Sewer Rat, Sewer Rat, Vermin 2 Crawler, Crawler, Crawler, Crawler 3 Garm, Garm, Commando, Commando 4 Garm, Garm, Commando 5 Mag Roader (purple), Mag Roader (red) 6 Trapper, Trapper, Trapper 7 General, General pack 16: 0 General, Pipsqueak, Pipsqueak 1 Pipsqueak, Pipsqueak, Pipsqueak, Pipsqueak 2 Chaser, Trapper, Trapper, Trapper 3 Chaser, Pipsqueak, Pipsqueak, Pipsqueak 4 Gobbler 5 Commander, Commander, Commander 6 Empty (Allo Ver would go here) 7 Empty pack 17: 0 Nastidon, Nastidon 1 Empty 2 Empty 3 Empty 4 Empty 5 Empty 6 Nohrabbit, Nohrabbit, Nohrabbit 7 Bomb pack 18: 0 Bomb, Bomb, Bomb, Bomb, Bomb, Bomb 1 Io 2 Maliga, Maliga, Maliga 3 FossilFang, FossilFang 4 FossilFang, Bug, Bug, Bug 5 Bug, Bug, Bug 6 Bug, Bug, Bug, Bug, Bug, Bug 7 Ralph, Ralph pack 19: 0 Ralph, Wyvern, Wyvern 1 Ralph, Wyvern, ChickenLip, ChickenLip 2 WeedFeeder, WeedFeeder, WeedFeeder 3 Ralph, Joker 4 Joker, Joker, Joker 5 ChickenLip, ChickenLip, ChickenLip, ChickenLip, ChickenLip 6 Zombone 7 Zombone, Ing, Ing pack 20: 0 Ing, Ing, Ing 1 Apparite, Apparite 2 Coelecite, Coelecite, Coelecite 3 Lich, Apparite, Coelecite 4 Lich, Lich, Lich 5 Sp Forces, Sp Forces, Sp Forces 6 Balloon, Balloon, Balloon 7 Balloon, Balloon, Balloon, Balloon, Balloon, Balloon pack 21: 0 Baskervor 1 Chimera 2 Cephaler, Baskervor 3 Cephaler, Cephaler, Cephaler 4 Adamanchyt, Slurm, Slurm 5 Adamanchyt, Adamanchyt 6 Slurm, Slurm, Slurm, Slurm, Slurm 7 Mandrake, Mandrake, Mandrake pack 22: 0 Mandrake, Insecare, Insecare 1 Abolisher, Abolisher 2 Gigantos 3 Empty 4 Empty 5 Empty 6 Empty 7 Sky Armor, Sky Armor, Spit Fire pack 23: 0 Sky Armor, Spit Fire 1 Behemoth 2 Apokryphos, Misfit, Misfit 3 Apokryphos 4 Ninja, Ninja 5 Wirey Drgn, Wirey Drgn, Wirey Drgn 6 Apokryphos, Apokryphos, Apokryphos 7 Brainpan, Misfit, Apokryphos, Brainpan pack 24: 0 Brainpan, Brainpan, Brainpan 1 Dragon 2 Behemoth, Misfit, Misfit 3 Behemoth, Behemoth 4 Ninja, Ninja, Wirey Drgn 5 Grenade 6 Chimera, Cephaler, Cephaler 7 Baskervor, Baskervor pack 25: 0 Peepers, Peepers 1 Peepers, Peepers, Peepers 2 EarthGuard, Peepers, Peepers 3 Black Drgn 4 Didalos, Veteran 5 Mesosaur, Mesosaur 6 Mesosaur, Mesosaur, Mesosaur, Mesosaur 7 Gilomantis, Mesosaur pack 26: 0 Gilomantis, Gilomantis, Mesosaur 1 Chitonid, Gigan Toad, Gigan Toad 2 Lunaris, Osprey 3 Lunaris, Lunaris 4 Osprey, Chitonid, Gigan Toad 5 Madam, Veteran, Veteran 6 Veteran, Veteran, Veteran 7 HermitCrab, HermitCrab, Pm Stalker pack 27: 0 Empty 1 Scorpion, Scorpion, Scorpion 2 Intangir 3 Pm Stalker, Pm Stalker, Pm Stalker, Pm Stalker 4 Vectagoyle, Vectagoyle 5 Buffalax 6 Buffalax, Delta Bug, Delta Bug 7 Bloompire, Bloompire, Lizard pack 28: 0 Bloompire, Bloompire 1 Delta Bug, Delta Bug, Delta Bug, Delta Bug 2 Bloompire, Bloompire, Delta Bug 3 Buffalax, Lizard 4 Maliga, Maliga, Nohrabbit, Nohrabbit 5 Cactrot 6 Sand Horse, Sand Horse 7 Sand Horse, Maliga, Maliga pack 29: 0 Latimeria 1 Latimeria, Nohrabbit, Nohrabbit, Nohrabbit 2 Doom Drgn, Doom Drgn 3 Land Worm 4 Humpty, Humpty, Humpty 5 Cruller, Humpty, Humpty 6 Humpty, Humpty, Humpty, Humpty 7 NeckHunter, NeckHunter pack 30: 0 NeckHunter, Cruller, Humpty, Humpty 1 Dante 2 Drop, Drop, Drop 3 Pugs, Pugs, Pugs 4 Harpiai 5 Hoover 6 Harpiai, Deep Eye, Deep Eye 7 Bogy, Bogy pack 31: 0 Deep Eye, Deep Eye, Deep Eye, Deep Eye, Deep Eye, Deep Eye 1 Deep Eye, Muus, Muus, Deep Eye 2 Muus, Muus, Muus 3 Muus 4 Orog, Orog 5 Orog, PowerDemon, PowerDemon 6 Osteosaur 7 PowerDemon pack 32: 0 PowerDemon, Exoray, Exoray 1 Exoray, Exoray, Exoray 2 Mad Oscar, Exoray 3 Mad Oscar 4 Empty 5 Pug 6 Poppers, Poppers, Poppers, Poppers 7 Kiwok, Ceritops pack 33: 0 Kiwok, Poppers, Poppers, Poppers 1 Ceritops, Ceritops, Ceritops 2 Anemone, Anemone, Tomb Thumb 3 Anemone, Anemone, Anemone, Anemone 4 Ceritops, Tomb Thumb, Tomb Thumb 5 Luridan, Luridan, Luridan 6 Punisher, Scrapper, Punisher 7 Borras pack 34: 0 Borras, Ursus, Scrapper 1 Ursus 2 Luridan, Luridan, Luridan, Luridan, Luridan, Luridan 3 Ursus, Punisher 4 Toe Cutter 5 Toe Cutter, Toe Cutter 6 Rhyos 7 Vectaur, Vectaur, Vectaur, Vectaur pack 35: 0 Brontaur, Evil Oscar 1 Red Wolf, Red Wolf, Red Wolf 2 Test Rider 3 Nastidon, Red Wolf, Red Wolf 4 Wizard, Wizard, Wizard 5 Wizard, Wizard, Psychot, Psychot, Psychot 6 Red Wolf, Red Wolf, Psychot, Psychot 7 Psychot, Psychot, Psychot, Psychot, Psychot, Psychot pack 36: 0 Mag Roader (yellow), Mag Roader (yellow), Mag Roader (brown) 1 Mag Roader (yellow), Mag Roader (brown), Mag Roader (brown) 2 Brontaur, Brontaur 3 Empty 4 SoulDancer, SoulDancer, Crusher, Crusher 5 Vindr, Vindr, Wild Cat, Crusher, Crusher 6 Vindr, Vindr 7 SoulDancer, Wild Cat, Wild Cat, Wild Cat, Wild Cat pack 37: 0 Dahling, Dahling 1 Nightshade, Nightshade, Nightshade 2 Still Life 3 Opinicus, Opinicus 4 Displayer 5 Opinicus, Hipocampus, Eland 6 Hipocampus, Hipocampus, Hipocampus 7 Hipocampus, Cluck, Cluck, Cluck pack 38: 0 Slatter, Warlock, Eland 1 Slatter, Slatter 2 Warlock, Cluck, Cluck, Eland, Eland 3 GtBehemoth, Vectaur, Vectaur 4 Doom Drgn 5 Goblin, Goblin 6 Goblin, Figaliz, Figaliz 7 Boxed Set, Boxed Set, Figaliz, Figaliz pack 39: 0 Boxed Set 1 Lethal Wpn 2 Enuo, Enuo 3 Enuo, Goblin, Figaliz 4 Boxed Set, Boxed Set, Boxed Set, Boxed Set 5 Rain Man, Rain Man 6 Samurai, Rain Man, Rain Man 7 PlutoArmor, PlutoArmor pack 40: 0 Barb-e, Critic 1 PlutoArmor, Sky Cap 2 Allosaurus, Parasite, Parasite, Parasite 3 Critic, Pan Dora, Pan Dora, Pan Dora 4 Allosaurus 5 Barb-e, Samurai, Suriander 6 Suriander, Pan Dora, Parasite, Parasite 7 Crawler, Crawler, Crawler pack 41: 0 Tyranosaur, Tyranosaur 1 Tyranosaur 2 Brachosaur 3 Mantodea, Sprinter, Spek Tor, Spek Tor 4 Reach Frog, Reach Frog, Reach Frog, Reach Frog 5 Mantodea, Mantodea 6 Geckorex, Geckorex, Reach Frog 7 TumbleWeed, TumbleWeed, TumbleWeed, TumbleWeed pack 42: 0 Sprinter, Sprinter, Spek Tor, Spek Tor 1 GtBehemoth, Evil Oscar, Vectaur 2 Evil Oscar, Evil Oscar, Evil Oscar 3 Harpy 4 Harpy, Prussian 5 Prussian, GloomShell 6 GloomShell, GloomShell, GloomShell 7 Empty pack 43: 0 Phase, Phase 1 Trixter, Trixter, Trixter 2 Phase, Parasoul, Necromancr, Necromancr 3 Trixter, Trixter, Necromancr 4 Sea Flower, Sea Flower, Sea Flower, Sea Flower, Sea Flower 5 Uroburos, Sea Flower, Sea Flower 6 Chaos Drgn, Uroburos, Sea Flower, Sea Flower 7 Aquila, Chaos Drgn, Chaos Drgn pack 44: 0 Empty 1 Empty 2 Ogor, Ogor 3 Covert, Ogor 4 Wart Puck, Wart Puck 5 Karkass, Karkass 6 Tap Dancer, Covert, Covert 7 Tap Dancer, Woolly pack 45: 0 Woolly, Woolly, Karkass, Karkass 1 Wart Puck, Ogor 2 Empty 3 Magic Urn, Magic Urn 4 Flan, Flan, Flan, Flan, Flan, Flan 5 Flan, Flan, Flan, Flan 6 Empty 7 Empty pack 46: 0 Rhinox, Rhinox 1 Gobbler, Rhinox, Gobbler 2 Empty 3 Empty 4 Empty 5 Empty 6 Empty 7 Empty pack 47: 0 Empty 1 Empty 2 Empty 3 Empty 4 Empty 5 Vector Pup, Vector Pup, Commander 6 Vector Pup, Vector Pup 7 Trilobiter, Primordite, Primordite pack 48: 0 Gold Bear, Primordite 1 Trilobiter, Trilobiter, Trilobiter 2 Primordite, Primordite 3 Dark Side, Dark Side 4 Dark Side, Spectre, Rinn, Rinn, Rinn 5 1st Class, Wild Rat 6 1st Class, 1st Class, 1st Class 7 Wild Rat, 1st Class, 1st Class, Wild Rat, Wild Rat pack 49: Empty pack 50: 0 Empty 1 Empty 2 Empty 3 Innoc, Fortis 4 Fortis, Fortis 5 Empty 6 Dueller, Dueller, Sky Base 7 Scullion pack 51: 0 Innoc, Innoc, Innoc 1 Junk, Junk, Junk 2 Empty 3 Empty 4 ProtoArmor, Pipsqueak, Pipsqueak 5 Pipsqueak, Pipsqueak, Pipsqueak, Pipsqueak, Pipsqueak 6 Mag Roader, Mag Roader (both purple) 7 Mag Roader, Mag Roader, Mag Roader, Mag Roader (all red) pack 52: 0 Empty 1 Empty 2 Templar, Templar, Soldier, Soldier 3 Balloon, Balloon, Balloon, Balloon 4 Soldier, Soldier 5 Sky Base, IronHitman, IronHitman, IronHitman, IronHitman 6 IronHitman, IronHitman, IronHitman 7 Dueller, Fortis pack 53: 0 Commando, Commando, Commando, Commando 1 Empty 2 Commando 3 Empty 4 Empty 5 Empty 6 Empty 7 Empty pack 54: 0 SrBehemoth (The undead Behemoth only) 1 Dark Force, Dark Force 2 Retainer, Retainer, Dark Force 3 Hemophyte, Retainer 4 Outsider, Outsider, Madam 5 Mover, Mover, Mover 6 Steroidite 7 Didalos, Didalos pack 55: Empty pack 56: Empty pack 57: 0 Empty 1 Empty 2 Empty 3 Empty 4 SrBehemoth (The undead Behemoth only, the living formation is swapped out at battle start. Meeting it on the Veldt opens the possibility of encountering the SrBehemoth monster formation in Pack 53) 5 Empty 6 Empty 7 Empty pack 58: Empty pack 59: Empty pack 60: Empty pack 61: 0 Empty 1 White Drgn 2 Empty 3 Empty 4 Empty 5 Empty 6 Empty 7 Empty pack 62: Empty pack 63: Empty pack 64: Empty If you Save and Reset and either Load with the in-game option or using an emulator Save State, a number of 13 will be added to the monster formation you're going to fight. If you're fighting in Pack # 4, you should normally fight a battle out of Pack # 5 next. If you Save and Load/emulator Load from the Title Screen, you'll fight a battle from Pack # 17. This can be used to your advantage if you know what the Packs look like, as you can make large jumps towards the monster you really want to Leap. Now for some high-quality Veldt hunting! Let's say you want a rare Rage in a crowded Pack. Let's say you want to get Test Rider (Flash Rain looks so gosh-darn cool!). Now, just there using the above described trick and fight until you've fought a battle from Pack 34. Now, the next battle *could* be Test Rider. You try, yet see that it's Red Wolf x 3. Load again. Now every time you fight, it *will* be that same Red Wolf x 3 monster formation. There's only one way known so far to change the upcoming fight, and that's fighting a battle off the Veldt. That's right, either take the Blackjack/Falcon to some non-Veldt lands until you fight a normal random encounter, or (provided you're in the WoR), dive into the Cave of the Veldt to kill some Toe Cutters or, if you're lucky, Rhyos. Save, return to the Veldt and try another time. Missed again? Repeat. Using this strategy, you'll be able to actually pick Rages from the Veldt rather then having Gau Leap anything which happens to cross its path. Note that this is an emulator-trick only, as cartridge Save and Load screws with your location in the list. Finally a few tips: Make sure your entire party does not consist of people whose levels are divisible by 5! I cannot stress this enough. When you know that you could get into a battle with a Trapper or the like anytime soon you’re aware of the danger that Level 5 Doom will kill the entire party in one devastating hit, but that move can also kill you all in a single hit on the Veldt while your mind is elsewhere. Don’t let that happen. Equip a Back Guard. The use of it is obvious. It will disable any kind of coincidental back attack or pincer attack thus increasing your chance of having a battle suitable for Gau to come back in. Some battles are forced into a certain formation; (Guard x 2, Lobo and Tyranosaur x 2 are two examples which are both forced pincer attacks) and cannot be prevented by the Back Guard. Too bad. Gogo, Mog and Umaro. Gogo can use Rage and Dance, Mog's power is Dance, and Umaro will hit stuff until the battle ends. A Dancing or Raging character won't notice the difference between Returning Gau and a monster and won't hesitate to use violence against him. Gau will cry and run and you won't have gained your Rages. Refrain from selecting Rage and Dance on the Veldt when Gau can return, and simply don't let Umaro's huge Yeti feet touch the Holy Lands of the Veldt. Especially in the WoR you'll be simply plowing through massive amounts of weak monsters that aren't worthy of your time anymore. You'll want a quick answer to all of them. There's only one attack which will take care of all of them, regardless of elemental properties, being Undead or doing the samba: It's the AutoCrossbow. It's quick, painless (to you), painful (to the monsters), it doesn't use any MP, has no element, isn't random in any way and the cursor will gladly stay on AutoCrossbow when you select Options, Cursor --> Memory in the Menu. ********************************** 3.2 Clearing the Monster Formations....elusive monsters ********************************** During what can best be described as the prologue of the game, you'll automatically clear Guard, Lobo and Vommamoth. Repo Man and Were-Rat can be found in the mines, and Vaporite can be found in the hall where the Esper is located. Lonely Terra escapes the Guards and doesn't meet any new material doing so, although you can meet Vaporite if you didn't before. Locke rushes in to save Terra after she fell down and rescues her from the Marshal. The walking monster formations all include a Lobo and a Vommamoth and have already been cleared; Marshal hasn't and the boss fight will do it for you. With Locke and Terra on the Overworld Map, you can clear Leafer and Dark Wind on the plains/in the forests, and Areneid and Sand Ray in the desert. You meet up with Edgar, and the very next day you're chased out of the castle by two M-Tek Armor. You fight and clear them. In the Cave of South Figaro, you can clear three bug monsters, being Bleary, Crawly and Hornet. Be sure to do so, as these monsters will later disappear from this area. You climb Mt. Koltz with the three-headed party. You can clear Brawler and Vommamoth in the caverns and Cirpius and Trilium on the slopes. You meet with Banon and ride the Lete River with him. You can and should clear Exocite, Nautiloid and Pterodon. A boss fight with Ultros (no Rage) ensues and Sabin will be gone. You can now choose between three scenarios. For Rage purposes it's most beneficial to do Sabin his scenario last. This way, you can collect more Rages in the first Veldt section. It hardly matters which of the other two you do first, so we'll start with Locke. As soon as you can move, pick a fight with a HeavyArmor. You'll lose if you fight him, so try to run. Note that even when you lose, you'll start the scenario over again rather then getting a Game Over; this means that even when the HeavyArmor kills you, you'll have cleared his Rage. Play through the tedious scenario until you have freed Celes. Clear Commander and Vector Pup during you escape and get out of South Figaro. The Cave of Figaro houses some new monsters, including Primordite, Trilobiter and Gold Bear. Clear them before you attempt to leave. When you have defeated the TunnelArmor, you're free to go and the scenario is over. Edgar's scenario doesn't bring you anything new for a good while. More Lete River, more Overworld Map, more mines of Narshe with Repo Man and Were-Rat. When you pass the dungeon where you initially saved Terra from the Narshe Guard Marshal, you come in a dungeon where there are two new monsters: 1st Class and Wild Rat. Clear them both and continue to the next room. There's a sparkle here. Follow the path of the light and you won’t be bothered by a battle. Obviously you'll want to get a battle, as Dark Side is the monster you fight, a monster you can only clear here and which is pretty formidable with Ice2 and inherent Float. Although there's a 75 % shot at fighting two Dark Side monsters, there's a 25 % at fighting another monster formation. This one holds, next to a Dark Side, three Rinn monsters and a Spectre, two monsters you can only clear here. It may take a good while if you're unlucky, but don't leave until you have fought this monster formation. Sabin's scenario: Sabin wakes up next to a hut. Recruit Shadow if you wish and clear Beaker and Rhobite on the plains and Stray Cat and Crasshoppr in the forest. Continue down south and enter the Imperial Camp. After a scene you switch to Cyan. Fight one soldier to engage in a monster formation with oh horror, TWO Soldier enemies. You clear the Rage in doing so and only have to kill the leader, who is surprisingly called 'Leader'. Back to Sabin. Loot the camp as much as you can. One chest is locked. Opt to Kick it!, and there's a 50 % chance on fighting two Doberman monsters. The other 50 % contains three Doberman monsters. You have cleared yet another Rage, and you may proceed. Cutscene, Cutscene, Cyan, Cutscene. Before you chase Kefka all the way, make sure you open the new chests available. One of them contains Telstar, which not only clears his Rage (the best status ailment-protector at that point), it gives you another reason to roam the Veldt. Green Beret’s are kickin’. If you’re done, chase Kefka some more. You will clear Templar (and Soldier if you hadn’t before) and can make your escape to the Phantom Forest. Ghost monsters a' plenty here, but don't leave until you've met some Poplium as well. Now board the Phantom Train. There are quite a few new enemies here to be fought. Outside and on the roofs there's Whisper and Bomb, and inside there's Hazer and StillGoing. After you jump over a train car you can meet Over-Mind; the best odds lie in fighting battles in the first train car you walk through after the leap. Play through the scenario. When you exit you can still head back into the Forest if you missed Poplium, and you have another shot at CrassHoppr and Stray Cat on the plains if you haven't cleared those yet. Jump down the Falls and try to not die. This is vital! The Veldt. You can't clear any Rages here, but you *can* obtain them and I suggest you do just that. Feed Gau a Dried Meat you bought in Mobliz and he'll join your party so you can master the Leap command. A Kappa tries to do a man's job (explaining Rage) and fails miserably. When it's all over, get Rages until you're tired and/or satisfied. *Veldt moment one* Jump down the Serpent Trench and you should clear Anguiform, Actaneon and Aspik. Everybody's in Narshe again and everybody's happy. But then Kefka cometh! You retreat to the hills of Narshe where some people have already moved Tritoch, not taking into account there really wasn't any real reason to do so and it's still a ten-foot high massive block of ice. A Save-Terra-from-the-Guards-esque game ensues where you fight monsters and make sure they don't reach Banon. The monsters to be cleared are Bounty Man, Trooper and Fidor. HeavyArmor also appears, should you have missed it in Locke's scenario. Just fight all groups to be certain. Heading to Kefka you see a single soldier racing around in front of him. This is Rider. Kill him to clear the Rage. Defeat Kefka and watch how Terra loses all her clothing. When the hentai ends you'll wake up in a new and improved Narshe which allows you in its walls. Just pick whatever team (you'd better take Gau) and make a trip with Figaro Castle to Kohlingen. New Overworld Map monsters! There's Vulture and Red Fang on the plains, and Over-Grunk in the forests. FossilFang lives in the desert, but he's quite the opponent so you might not want to mess with him right now. Further down south there's Iron Fist and Mind Candy to be obtained. Travel to Zozo. Inside Zozo, there are a lot of strong monsters (that is, compared to previous challenges). Clear HadesGigas and Gabbldegak outside, and clear SlamDancer and Harvester inside of the towering houses. Defeat Dadaluma and get a new mission from Ramuh. Although you might be too lazy to follow my advice, I suggest you head back to the Veldt to take horrible advantage of the new Rage options. There's a trip in the near future which will block you from Veldt entrance for a while, so this is the time. Here's how to get to the Veldt and back: Take Figaro Castle back to its former location. Through the Cave of Figaro, passed Mt. Koltz, there's the Returner Hideout. In the room where you first met Banon, there's an entrance to the raft. Jump on it. Ride the rapids, but this time it will make you take Sabin's route. From here on, you can just go to Barren Falls. You won't have to bother with the Imperial Camp or Phantom Train, thankfully. Jump down the Falls (no Piranhas) and you're on the Veldt. You can exit the Veldt by jumping down the Serpent Trench and taking the Nikeah ferry to South Figaro. You'll be smuggled out of South Figaro in a chest, which has brought a smile to the lips of many a mentally ill person around the world. Head back through the Cave of Figaro and you're at the castle again. Congrats, you just completed: *Veldt moment two* In the Opera House, Celes will sing and Ultros will annoy. As soon as the comical squid is, comically, about to drop the comical anvil on Celes' head (the comedy!), open the door to the left with a lever to the right and enter the rafters of the Opera. There are rat formations here, and they all contain Vermin and Sewer Rat. Although it's said you can get by without fighting a single battle, this is pretty darn hard, and you want to battle and clear one group anyway. You foil Ultros' plan, proceed to beat him up and get the Blackjack for your troubles. A new Overworld location! Next to FossilFang (go clear the Rage if you haven't already), you can encounter Bug in the desert, ChickenLip in the forest, and WeedFeeder, Ralph, Joker and Wyvern on the plains. Go around collecting treasure and enter Vector. Sneak into the MagiTek Research Facility. In the first few rooms there's nothing but Garm, Commando and Pipsqueak to be found. ProtoArmor as well, but as you are reading this guide I assume you know how this thing has no Rage. When you drop into the pit where Ifrit and Shiva were thrown in, you can fight Flan. Get the new Espers and continue up the stairs. On these stairs you can clear Trapper and General. In the room on the top of the stairs, there's Gobbler and Rhinox. Clear them and continue to watch some cutscenes. When you've ridden the elevator, go use the Save Point. Talk to Cid and he'll push you into a mine cart. Several battles will pop up. If they're all big, purple Mag Roader go reset the game and change the leader of your party. Try until you also find a small red Mag Roader. Do the boss battle and you're outside again. Fight Chaser before Setzer picks you up, and you get another shot at Trapper as well. You flee and Kefka tries to stop you using Cranes, which turns out to be a complete waste of everybody's time. Tragic daddy issues rule the day when you have a chat with Terra, but you're rewarded with control over the Blackjack. Go to the triangle-shaped island, but only if you have the Rhodox Rage. If so, execute it as soon as you encounter an Intangir. If you do anything else, Intangir will kill you using death, so try to avoid that. In a forest west of the Veldt, only two monsters appear: Bomb (en masse) and Grenade. The latter is basically a black Bomb which Rage you'll want to clear for purposes which include the word 'complete'. Travel to the last continent you haven't been on. On this piece of the Overworld Map, clear Baskervor on the plains and Cephaler and Chimera in the forests. And just like that, it's time for yet another... *Veldt moment three* Dive head-first into the Cave of the Sealed Gate. It's near the Sealed Gate. In the first two rooms you can fight Apparite, Coelecite and Lich monsters. Be sure to equip Wall Rings in this stage of the game as Lich will burn you badly otherwise. In the other rooms there's just Zombone and Ing. You can push a button to fight a Ninja, but this won't clear the Rage as it's not a valid monster formation for the Veldt. Esper Rampage and Imperial Apologies: The diplomacy-related part of the game now. Be sure to answer like a polite young man would, and be sure to pick a fight with the Imperial Officers like a complete idiot would. They're Sp Force enemies, and you clear their Rage. Not much else going on after that, so get Terra and Locke on their boat-ride. You do some stuff that's pretty obvious until you sleep at the Inn and a house presumably sets itself on fire using fire. Seeing as how you are intelligent, sane people, you get into the collapsing house to fight the fire using weapons. You're bound to run into at least one wandering flame which will trigger a battle with Balloons. Even if you somehow manage to elude them all, you'll still open a door which turns out to be filled with four of them, so no worries. Boss Battle! While the FlameEater can summon both Balloon monsters and a solitary Grenade, this is not a valid monster formation, and it won't make either monster appear on the Veldt. With Strago, and later with Relm, you explore the spontaneously appeared new cave dungeon. There's Slurm and Adamanchyt in the caves, and Abolisher, Mandrake and Insecare on the slopes. Another Ultros fight, you meet the Espers, everything goes exactly how it wasn't planned and a continent is sent flying. Obviously, you go into hot pursuit. On the way there you are stalked by men in flying armor, and you clear the Rages of Sky Armor and Spit Fire. Another Ultros battle, and an Air Force battle, and finally you're where you wanted to be. The Floating Continent houses a massive array of new monsters, all with their own Rage. The monsters here include Dragon, Ninja, Apokryphos, Brainpan, Misfit, Wirey Drgn, Behemoth and the monster-in-a-chest Gigantos (chests on the Floating Continent are blue orbs in the wall). When you are asked if you want to exit the Continent and jump down on the Blackjack, please do. The reward is a *Veldt moment four* Now travel back again. Like most storyline events, you are completely unable to do anything even remotely useful and the world is destroyed. Celes wakes up on a solitary island. You control the life of Cid for a while, but what's more: you can clear your first WoR Rages! Peepers on the main land, and EarthGuard and Black Drgn in the desert. The last requires an Amulet or Ribbon from Celes' side to prevent a Game Over. Take the raft to the main land and you've done the WoR prologue. On the main land, there are Lunaris and Osprey on the green patches, and Gigan Toad and Chitonid on the grey ones. Mesosaur lives in the forests (although you might see some outside of it) and Gilomantis lives more to the north-east of this continent. Enter Tzen. Sabin is holding up a house and can barely last for much longer, so you go in. Inside there are Scorpion and HermitCrab to be fought, and very rarely a Pm Stalker. It's better to open chests until you fight a formation of four Pm Stalker, though. To be sure, and all. Get the kid, get out, get Sabin, and get Jiggy with it. Crossing the bridge to the east of Tzen, you're now walking on the Serpent Trench. On it there are new monsters. There's Delta Bug, Lizard and Buffalax, and in the forests you have a good shot at finding Bloompire monsters. Take a look in Mobliz, do your stuff, and leave again. On to Nikeah, the city of your hopes and dreams. You get a ferry to a new continent (yet again). On it there are Nohrabbit on the fields, Sand Horse and Maliga in the desert, and Latimeria in the forests. Clear them all, talk to Gerad in South Figaro and enter the Cave of Figaro which has had its final makeover in this game. Inside you can clear Humpty, NeckHunter, Cruller and Dante. Proceed to and through the castle until you reach the engine room. Linger before you talk to Gerad, there are Drop monsters here which are rare and elusive and all. After you've found those, do battle and ship Figaro Castle to the Kohlingen Continent. Get Setzer from the Kohlingen Pub and explore the new continent with a new four-headed team. There are Muus on the plains, Bogy to the north (this is also where the Colloseum is), Harpiai and Deep Eye in the forests and Black Drgn in the desert. You already could fight the last one, but you were just plain single Celes then who might've been afraid. Now's your chance if you didn't fight him earlier. Enter the Tomb! In the first room there's Orog and Osteosaur, and in this room only. When you've fought them, proceed. From here onwards you'll meet nothing but Exoray, Mad Oscar and PowerDemon. Finish the Tomb quest and you're airborne now. You automatically fly to Maranda. Land here and go fight. In the desert there are two monsters: Cactrot and Hoover. Kill the Cactrot using Dice and run away from the Hoover for now (you just cleared the Rage). On the plains, there are Crawler for a while until you reach Jidoor. There's Reach Frog, Geckorex and Mantodea now. Back to the airship! Fly to the continent in the south-east part of the map. Land to fight Harpy, GloomShell and Prussian. Back up in the airship. To the last unvisited continent with new Rage monsters: the one north of the Veldt (you'll recognize the Veldt). Fight TumbleWeed, Sprinter and Spek Tor. Do NOT enter the forest now, the forest will kill you. Off to recruit Gau! But you're with four characters, right? How can you lose a character? Normally you'd just talk to another character, but that's not an option. On the first continent you arrived on, there's a massive mountain formation on the north part. There's a little hole in it. Fly the Falcon over it and have your characters divide. Use either the Crane or a Warp spell/Warp Stone to get out again and you'll be just Setzer now, piloting the Falcon. Go below deck to get yourself a party of three and go to the Veldt. Find Gau, but before you have another Veldt moment, let's take a look in the cave. To the Veldt now, but hold off getting Gau for now: enter the Cave on the Veldt. You'll fight more Toe Cutter monsters then you'll ever want to, but be sure to stick around until you've found yourself a Rhyos. Seeing as how Allo Ver won't clear anything for you, do whatever and find Shadow/Relm. Fight the boss battle (which will clear a Rage for you!) and you'll find yourself in Thamasa. Anyway, now you've cleared what just may be the most important Veldt monster formation in the game, I guess I can allow... *Veldt moment five* Having found Gau, there are multiple side-quests open to you. Each side-quest will give you some good Rages I may suggest in other side-quest boss battles. Now that you have a BehemothSuit, I suggest the first thing you do is obtaining a Snow Muffler and other items you may pull from the Colloseum. If it was Shadow you found in the Cave of the Veldt you should recruit him here by betting a Striker. Complete the Mt. Zozo quest. Doing so should clear Borras, Punisher, Ursus (inside) and Scrapper and Luridan (outside). Go to Owzer's Mansion in Jidoor. Note that the NightShade battle is completely optional and can (and should!) be triggered by examining a picture or some flowers (which almost look alive...). You cannot fight this battle when you've completed this dungeon, so make sure to do this. Other cleared Rages include: Dahling, SoulDancer, Wild Cat, Crusher, Vindr and StillLife. Go to Narshe and clear Red Wolf, Nastidon and Test Rider in the town. Take the hidden path you took in the Edgar scenario and you'll find Wizard and Psychot in the mines. Find Mog and pull the Moogle Charm from the place he was standing on. Get out and now enter the mines north of Narshe. You'll meet and clear two new kinds of Mag Roader here, a big yellow one and a small brown one. Proceed to the Ice Dragon and Tritoch. Beat them both and jump down into the new Umaro dungeon. You can open a chest for monster-in-a-box fight with three Pugs. While you clear their Rage you can never actually get it from the Veldt. Other Rages include Ceritops, Poppers, Kiwok and Pug. The last one is extremely rare, but keep trying until you meet him. In the room where you fight Umaro, Tomb Thumb can be found. Fly to the tower surrounded by mountains you couldn't reach earlier. Bring Mog and Relm. Relm will unlock Strago, and Mog with the Moogle Charm should make your life a little easier while climbing this tower. Loot it, but do *not* take the Gem Box from the chest on the very top. To be more precise, don't stand in front of the chest, as even that will trigger a MagiMaster battle which you probably don't want right now. Find the White Drgn and defeat it. You just cleared its Rage. Take the Moogle Charm off for a while. The only monsters you'll find here are L. 50 Magic and Magic Urn. The former poses no threat with Wall Rings and Revivify items, the second is a monster you'll want to clear the Rage from. When you're done, leave. Now it's time to head to the Triangle Island. The Intangir are gone, but Zone Eater will be more then willing to annoy you. While they have no Rage (which is a sad fact given their respectable elemental properties), they will suck you into a new dungeon. Monsters you fight here are Karkass, Tap Dancer, Covert and the highly rare yet extremely useful Woolly. Get Gogo for his Steal and Rage abilities and get out. It's been a while, so might as well make some room for *Veldt moment six* Take Cyan to Doma and spend the night there with a four-headed party. Cyan won't wake up and you'll leap into his soul. And an LSD-induced experience it turns out to be. In the first dungeon, fight Critic, Pan Dora, Allosaur and Parasite. Fight the brothers and proceed. On the train you'll find Rain Man, Barb-E, Suriander and Samurai. Proceed and you'll find yourself in MagiTek armor! Fight PlutoArmor, Sky Cap and the elusive yet nifty Io here, all to clear those Rages. Fight through the rest of the scenario without any new Rage-monsters. Take Figaro Castle to the other side, and you'll get stuck! Exit and explore. In the underwater dungeon, there's Enuo, Goblin and Figaliz to fight. Proceed to the Ancient Castle. In here Lethal Wpn and Boxed Set will fight you. Do your stuff and leave. Take Strago and Relm to Thamasa and you'll get to see a cutscene which will open a new dungeon. It seems Strago has a tendency to change the Overworld Map, not unlike Kekfa. In here, fight until you have cleared Eland, Cluck, Warlock, Slatter, Displayer, Hipocampus and Opinicus. Slatter and Cluck will appear more often in the first room of this dungeon, so fight some battles there if you're having trouble finding them. Having obtained all characters but Locke, dive into the Phoenix Cave. You can fight a large array of monsters here, and most of them absorb fire. The to-be-cleared Rages are Aquila, Chaos Dragon, Trixter, Necromancer, Phase, Parasoul, Sea Flower and Uroburos. You find Locke and you're all set to go. At the end, the Final Dungeon. A lot of strong monsters with generally impressive Rages. Among the rubble, you'll find Vectaur, GtBehemoth, Evil Oscar, Brontaur, Land Worm, Doom Drgn, and Vectagoyle. The Imperial, metal-like parts of the dungeon contain Outsider, Didalos, Mover, Madam, Hemophyte, Retainer, Steroidite, IronHitman, Veteran, Dark Force, Dueller, Fortis, Sky Base, Scullion, Innoc and Junk. Just fight a few battles in every room you come and you'll see them all. When you're almost at Kefka's, warp out and take your final Veldt moment: *Veldt moment seven* You now have cleared all Rages excluding Siegfried, Chupon and Allo Ver, and can meet all of them on the Veldt. Complete your Rage list and smash the game. Note that there are a few Rages which cannot be obtained when playing a 'perfect' Low Level Game. Those that are either impossible to obtain or very difficult to obtain are: Fidor, Rider, Sewer Rat, Bounty Man, Gigantos, Mag Roader (red), Sp Forces and Vermin. Ninja: You could encounter it together with two Wirey Drgn monsters, kill the Ninja, then run. Phase: Encounter the Phase, Parasoul, Necromancr, Necromancr monster formation, kill the Phase, run. Covert: Will always be ecountered with another monster (Orog or SoulDancer, so kill the Covert and run). GtBehemoth: Kill and run, as it can only be encountered with Vectaur and Evil Oscar. For the lowest amount of exp, you'll want to meet purple Mag Roaders only, so in a perfect LLG, no red Mag Roaders for you. HeavyArmor: your best bet is talking to one of the MagiTek Armored soldiers during Locke's scenario. You can even die; instead of a Game Over you'll have to restart the scenario. If you didn't do this, you could always cross your fingers during the Narshe Raid, hope you'll have to fight HeavyArmor, Trooper x2, kill the Troopers and run like a crazy man. Trooper: Attempt the Narshe strategy described above, and you'll have cleared Trooper as well. Rhyos: Set Poison on him. Seizure also works, but Poison is the easiest. Now, make sure it has very little HP and dies on the next turn (from the ailment). Have someone cast Palidor and muddle the caster so he makes Rhyos jump. If it dies in mid-air, you won't get any experience and you'll have cleared the Rage. Land Worm: Utilize the same bug as used by Rhyos. Condemned also works in this case. ********************************** 4.0 Misplaced in the data space...Rages which fit and Rages which don't ********************************** White Drgn White Drgn is Rage # 37. Its existence in that specific place in the list has been debated quite a lot. That's because unlike his seven partners in crime, the White Drgn can appear on the Veldt and has a Rage. There is no logical explanation for this whatsoever. You cannot partly break the Dragon Seal without killing the unique White Drgn, so there is no narrative excuse for this baby to appear on the Veldt. Yes, measures have been taken to minimize the damage here. White Drgn doesn't just drop his special item like the other dragons, but it's given to you after the battle in the Fanatics Tower. But quite a few people, including me, are convinced this dragon has no business on the Veldt. Regardless, you can get this Rage, and since it's a rather good one - Death protection, Pearl, Pearl-element absorption - nobody's complaining all too loudly. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Marshal Together with White Drgn and SrBehemoth, this is the only boss which appears on the Veldt. The Marshal is the leader of the Narshe Guards, and you kill him in the very start of the game. Unlike White Drgn nobody goes around claiming this guy shouldn't be on the Veldt period, but it doesn't make sense from a story-line point of view, and it's still one of the three bosses in the game which appears on the Veldt, so I list it here. And Wind Slash is still the best multi-target spell Gau can produce in a WoB Rage, so no whining has been detected so far. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Allo Ver All that's wrong here is a formation mix-up; formation 515 was used instead of 126. So what's the problem here? Well, 515 is not a formation that can appear on the Veldt, and you can only encounter Allo Ver once, which means Allo Ver is never an available Rage. Also, 515 doesn't give Magic Points, as it is incapable of doing so, so the bug also keeps you from your much lusted-after Magic Point. Allo Ver, being undead, would have given you the usual Undead attribute, weakness against Fire and Pearl and absorbing of Poison-elemental attacks. The listed second move was Quake. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Siegfried First off, there are two Siegfried monsters. The one in formation # 479 is the one you fight in the Phantom Train. This battle formation doesn't show up on the Veldt, as it only contains the weak Siegfried which does not have a Rage. However, there is also another Siegfried. The strong version which appears on the Coliseum and one of the only true challenges there. You never fight this monster outside of the Coliseum, so even though this Siegfried has a Rage you can never get it as Coliseum battles don't count as far as the Veldt concerns. There's evidence the game designers definitely wanted you to fight him at some point in the game (battle text was programmed already), but it was never completed and this Rage isn't accessible. Death protection and a Flare spell aside, this monster has eight elemental weaknesses and wouldn't have been that good anyway, unless paired with a Paladin Shld. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Chupon Almost the same story as with Siegfried. There is a weaker Chupon out there which you fight in a normal battle (he's together with Ultros, as you should know). There's a stronger version in the Colloseum which you fight there and there alone. There's isn't anything in the game which indicates that this Chupon would have ever appeared in a normal battle (his job is at the Coliseum, preventing you from betting cheap items), so if anything this would probably be a mix-up not unlike what happened to White Drgn. The Rage would have included W Wind. People often wonder if it's perhaps Sneeze, but that would simply have been too cheap (it wouldn't have worked in boss battles, by the way, as you can not set 'Hide' on a monster in a monster formation which doesn't allow you to run yourself). ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Pugs Ah, Pugs. Monster # 255, thus the 256th monster (00 counts as one, you work it out). While this monster in fact has a Rage, the menu needs an 'Empty' slot for the game to work properly and this 256th slot remains empty. You can meet the Pugs monster formation on the Veldt, and you actually *do* get their Rage once you have Leapt them, but as it is unselectable under any circumstance (including Muddle/Charm or Berserk) these guys have no reason to be on the Veldt but to provide you with a potentially unlimited amount of Minerva armors, even though you'll never need more than two. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ ProtoArmor ProtoArmor, like Pugs, appears on the Veldt. The monster formation with two ProtoArmors doesn't, but there is a monster formation where it is paired up with two Pipsqueak monsters. ProtoArmor does not have a Rage, and no matter how many times you try to Leap on it and learn its Rage, Gau will always come back without a ProtoAmor Rage. It simply doesn't belong on the Veldt. Take comfort in the fact that seeing as how all other machine-related Rages suck, it probably wouldn't have given you anything but Schiller or Tek Laser had it made the final cut :) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Remaining enemies Not all enemies which appear randomly in dungeons or on the World Map appear on the Veldt. Those enemies which *surprisingly* miss from the list are: All L. ## Magic enemies from 10 to 90 Mega Armor Naughty Prometheus Zone Eater Although there are some small pieces of the monster listing where it makes a bit of sense (several humans or several plants in a row), the order of monsters seems random. FF V had a monster listing which was, in most ways, a chronological listing starting with the weakest monsters from the first part of the game to the strongest monsters at the end of the game, ending with the boss monsters. The only explanation for this random listing is the Veldt, which makes it all the more bizarre these mistakes - should you want to label them that way - are here. If anything, it's back-up for the theory it was all meant like this, but there's really no way to being sure. ********************************** 5.0 What are the changes in several releases concerning Rages? ********************************** Three versions have been released so far. One in Japan for the Super Famicom called Final Fantasy 6 (often called Final Fantasy 6j to indicate it's the original thing), an American release called Final Fantasy 3 (often referred to as just Final Fantasy 6) and a recent release on the Anthology disc for America (the Europe version featured IV and V). There are two differences between the releases that concern Rage. In FF6j and Anthology: The Atma Weapon is now compatible with the Merit Award. I don't know what the hell they were thinking; as it was wise they left it out in the original game: as you can see in the Bugs section, a damaging Special with the Atma Weapon in either hand will produce graphic glitches because it can't decide what length to choose, so it'll just take garbage from some foreign location. This can potentially crash the emulator if you play on one, so I'm guessing it could abort a PS game. Nothing as evil as Save State destruction has been reported, though. While the Atma Weapon wouldn't have been half bad on a Rager, the graphic glitches aren't worth it. Should you be playing the Anthology version, DON'T EQUIP IT ON GOGO. I say Gogo because Gau can no longer equip the Merit Award in the Anthology release. Bye bye Wind God Gau, we'll have to go with Wind God Gogo now. While Gogo can do in Anthology what he also could in the SNES releases, his Vigor is significantly worse than Gau's Vigor, not to mention his Battle Power wasn't meant to be a stand-alone weapon like Gau’s Fists. Gau’s massive potential with the Merit Award is but a dream, a vague memory of better times in Anthology. ********************************** 6.0 Legendary Tactics...cheaper than a Brazilian prostitute ;) ********************************** ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Wind Gods Wind God Gau is the demon child of a simple overlook from Square. I can honestly call this an overlook because, while it isn't a bug by itself, it was partly removed by Square Enix in the Anthology release (take a look at the previous section for more info). I'm talking about the Merit Award on Gau, allowing him to equip weapons. Obviously it means only *more* weapons for Gogo as well. Equipping weapons on Gau has effects that are quite nice and will be discussed later in this document. For now, there is only one combination which is important when talking about the Wind God as it is what created the Wind God itself. The Tempest Knife. As you all should know, this knife has a 50% chance of nullifying the effects of the physical attack and replacing it with a Wind Slash attack. This can happen even when the strike itself misses. Under a normal Battle command this will simply produce a 48 Base Power Wind Slash, but when used in combination with a Special, the power is increased. The strongest Special Gau can use under normal circumstances is Catscratch, which quadruples the power of the attack, making Wind Slash a 192 Base Power attack. The second-strongest attack in the game when talking pure power. When teamed up with the Offering, this will produce four attacks of that 192 Base Power Wind Slash. That's pretty close to four times Crusader at the enemy party only at NO cost whatsoever. Hailed as the ultimate deployment of Gau by many, although these are often morons who are in bad need of a FAQ not unlike this one ;) The only downside of the Wind God is that it is, in fact, a Wind God. Monsters who are immune to Wind are Flan, Ifrit, Io, Muus, Naughty, Nerapa, Shiva, Tritoch and Zone Eater; monsters who absorbs this element include Atma, Evil Oscar, Girl (The angel head from Tier 3), Hidonite (Bottom left), Intangir, L.90 Magic, Larry, Magic Urn, Poltrgeist, Storm Drgn and Woolly. Final note: During a Wind God Wind Slash with the Offering, don't be surprised if the all-targets hitting Wind Slash suddenly skips some targets. After the physical strike has been rendered ineffective, the Wind Slash will only target those monsters that haven't been defeated yet. The monsters won't go until you completed all four hits, so should you use the Wind Slash against a group of four monsters, and the first hit kills one already, the next Wind Slash will only target the other three. When all monsters are dead the Wind Slash animation won't show up at all, only the ineffective physical strike. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Rage & Run Rage & Run is a technique which might not be the most fun way of dealing with some bosses, but rather essential when playing self-imposed rule games such as a Single Character Challenge or a Low Level Game. Rage & Run means exactly that what it says: you pick a Rage and start running. Why will this help you? Some bosses will cast spells you can protect against when they are at maximum HP, but start using Meteor or something along those lines when they reach certain low amounts of HP. In a game where Gau is only level 10, this is both unavoidable and deadly. After picking a Rage, for instance Magic Pot, you gain status protection and elemental attributes of that Rage...but you don't actually damage the opponent as you are running as opposed to attacking. After the boss has drained its own MP so he cannot cast the feared spells, you can stop running and start hurting. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ NightShade The NightShade Rage is so blindingly cheap, easily accessible and downside- free you can seriously wonder if there never was supposed to be some kind of defense against it...which the game obviously lacks now. Charm has been discussed before in other FAQs - Assassin’s Lore FAQ, to name one - but for purposes of completeness I will explain it here yet again. Charm sets a specific kind of 'status' in which the affected targets acts like it's been confused by something like Muddle or Stray's Cat Rain. This effect does *not* go away when the target is struck by a physical attack, but while terribly convenient in its own right, this isn't why Charm is such a game-destroyer. Since it’s not an actual status, there can be no defense: Charm works *always*. On every boss, from the undead Hidon to the invincible Guardian, from the final Kefka to whatever part of the last battle. This could have been fun had it been extremely rare, such as Joker Doom. However, the NightShade Rage has a 50 % chance of using Charm, and with a Hit Rate of 80 (which indeed means a 4/5 chance of hitting the target) you'll be able to eliminate every challenge this game has with ease. Charm, to elaborate a little more, creates a 'bond' between the target and the caster. If either one dies the effects of the spell are over. If Gau or Gogo has Charmed one target he cannot Charm another one until the first target dies. If Gau has Charmed a monster which is then Charmed by Gogo, Gogo will successfully 'steal' this target from Gau, creating a new bond between them. Gau would then have a new capability of successfully Charming another target. Or steal that thing right back :) Finally, Charm can co-exist with Muddle, allowing both monsters and characters to use random moves out of their list against the proper party, as the spells are re-directed twice. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Doom Drgn Not quite as cheap as NightShade, Doom Drgn nevertheless gives us a move that will be of great help in every battle, having the power to stop every enemy in its tracks by giving it the Freeze status using N. Cross. Unlike Charm, Freeze wears off after a period of time (34 intervals using the same intervals as Condemned), and it's instantly dispelled when the target is struck by a fire- elemental move (If the Final Fantasy series have thought us anything, it's that Fire melts Ice). N. Cross has a Hit Rate of 90, which sounds a bit better that the Hit Rate of Charm. However, there is one major thing keeping us from adoring N. Cross, which is it's special effect. With 0% Mblock, there's a 10 % chance it will miss, which will give you that perky 'miss' message. But after the game has decided in your favor that the move *did* land, there's still a 50 % chance that it will not do anything. Even when the move doesn't do anything due to that there will be no such notification as a 'miss' message, and as Freeze has no visual effects on monster you can never be for sure it worked until you sit around and watch the target do nothing for a good while. Which you shouldn't be doing in a tough battle as there's still a 50 % chance he's about to pummel your asses all the way back to Switzerland :) NightShade can be encountered fairly quickly, Doom Drgn appears only in Kekfa's fortress. NightShade has, all in all, a 80 % of working, Doom Drgn only a 45 % one. And the results of Charm are better than that of N. Cross. I'll admit NightShade is the cheaper trick out of the two, but let me tell you something: had it not been for NightShade, this baby would have gotten all the glory. The glory it so rightfully deserves. Despite killing the challenge of the game, that is! ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Intangir Intangir was a massive disappointment for many, I suppose. A monster who is inherently invisible, has Float, Haste, Safe, Shell and Death protection, immune to all status ailments and absorbing all elements. The ultimate defense Rage in the game, topping even Magic Pot due to the inherent positive statuses. Too bad it casts Pep Up half the time, not only killing but also removing Gau or Gogo from the battlefield. Then why the hell is this a Legendary Strategy? Mute the guy. While Intangir is immune to Mute, the trick is to Mute him before you select the Rage, and you have a Muted Intangir which cannot use Pep Up. Note that due to a bug, the positive statuses won't be set if the first turn is the muted Pep Up attack. If the attack is the normal physical one, you'll have a defensive tank in the WoB well beyond Magic Urn. Kick-ass! Have a look at the Bugs section (section 1.9) for info on why exactly it works this way. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Stray Cat No Death protection. No elemental absorbing. No status protection worthy of mention. No positive statuses whatsoever. What the hell is a normal Battle and Special WoB critter doing in the Legendary Tactics section? Stray Cat has a Special for a Rage, you see. The Special is called Catscratch, and it's the strongest Special you'll see in the game performed by Gau. Many an inexperienced player clings to this Rage as he can remember at least a single Rage and what it does, and it seems to work brilliantly. You'll even find it here fairly often, as combined with the Merit Award and the right choice for weapon; it can exceed any magical attack. It's also a vital part of the Wind God, as it will make the Wind Slash attack reach 192 as opposed to the second-best from Gold Bear, which would make for a 120 one. That's an Alexander as opposed to a focused Crusader. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Deep Eye This is hardly legendary, but there's something special about this Rage I wanted to point out, and it can be neat enough to defend its ranking among the Rage Gods. Deep Eye is a normal bug: Fire weakness, not a lot of status protection. The move it uses is Dread, which is simply a petrification- inducing move with a Hit Rate inferior to Break and a spiffy animation involving eyes. With one big exception. Break and Shoat's Demon Eye check for Death protection. That means that any monster with Death protection but without Petrify protection still can't be killed with it. Dread doesn't check for it, meaning that Dread can oen-hit KO certain monsters which you can't one-hit KO in any other way. The monsters in question: Hazer, Baskervor, Suriander, Gilomantis, Pug, Wart Puck, Vectaur, Brontaur, Cephaler, Gigan Toad, Spek Tor, Latimeria, Lunaris, Nastidon, Karkass, Borras Trixter, Dadaluma, Tentacle x3, Hidonite, Naughty Brontaur, Borras and Karkass are nice, but especially Pug is a great moment to pick a Deep Eye Rage. Pug is arguably the strongest monster in the game (he can obtain a 9999-damage inducing counter to everything you do with Step Mine), and a one-hit KO against it, completely legal, is very nice indeed. ********************************** 7.0 Not just Gau...Gogo the Rager. ********************************** It's tempting to think about Gau only when doing a Rage Guide. After all, he's the embodiment of Rage, he's the only one who can Leap, has no other skills besides that, etc. But there's another character who can use Rage, and if you didn't know that is Gogo then you need to be smacked over the head with a rolled up New York Times. Differences between Gau and Gogo are statistic-wise or equipment wise: Statistic: Gau Gogo Gau, n.u.e.* Gogo, n.u.e.** Vigor 44 25 48 32 Speed 38 30 41 37 Stamina 36 20 38 27 Magic Power 34 26 34 45 Battle Power 99 13 99 181 Defense 44 39 250 202 Magic Defense 34 25 191 172 MBlock 18 6 36 86 * Normally Ultimate Equipment: Genji Shld, Red Cap, Snow Muffler ** Normally Ultimate Equipment: Magus Rod, Paladin Shld, Genji Hlmt, Tao Robe As you can see , I put the Paladin Shld on Gogo to make up for the lack of any kind of worthwhile stats. The reason of this is to see where Gogo could possibly outshine Gau when it comes to Rage. Vigor is still severely lacking, and with Gau easily reaching 255 in Battle Power with the Merit Award, it's obvious that Gogo will never quite use the Catscratch like Gau will. Speed is comparable yet slightly less with Gogo. Stamina, for all what that's worth, is much less. But then we reach the statistic Magic Power. Magic Power is naturally higher on Gau, but he develops himself physically with his equipment, where Gogo is compatible with all sorts of magic-boosting armor. Even without the Paladin Shld he'll outshine Gau here, and I chose the Genji Hlmt over the Magus Hat here (the latter could've added 5 more to the Magic Power stat, bringing it to a very respectable 50, which is higher than equipment-less Relm). Battle Power is much higher here, because Gogo can equip weapons where Gau cannot. However, this is easily remedied with a Merit Award. In the Anthology version, Gogo beats Gau when it comes to physical hits (see the Anthology section). Defenses, both physical and magical are lacking compared to Gau. Gogo is the defensive WORST in this game, where Gau is the best because of the Snow Muffler. You see that Gau wants a Merit Award for offensive; Gogo needs one for defense. But Mblock...even with as many non-Merit Award Mblock-boosting equipment as possible, Gau will never equal Gogo in that aspect; Gau has the tank-ability going for him. He has 255 Defense, and physical hits are one of those things a Rage can't really protect you against. A strategy that relies on that 255 Defense will be wasted on Gogo as he'll take massive poundings from Honed Tusk, Crush and Havoc Wing. On the other hand, Gogo beats Gau with evasive maneuvers. Gau stands fairly powerless against a Charm spell; Gogo can simply avoid it in most cases. Also, strong spells such as Land Slide, Meteo and Shock will hurt a lot more coming from Gogo in this set-up. As far as physical attacks go, it depends on the version you're playing. A SNES game favors Gau over Gogo because of the Merit Award, an Anthology version will favor Gogo over Gau. Remember, Gogo can attach six elements (Fire, Ice, Bolt, Poison, Pearl, Earth) with corresponding random spell casting to his Battle attack, and do twice the amount of damage to human targets with the Man Eater, all without the Merit Award. Granted, the Air Lancer has the Wind element, but even doubled it won't reach the power of a non-super effective Pearl Rod. ********************************** 8.1 Good Rages in random encounter battles. In other words: the elusive answer to the question "What are the best Rages?" ********************************** For the quick answer, the Rages that you'll want are: WoB: Anguiform, Aspik, Baskervor, Behemoth, Brawler, ChickenLip, Chimera, General, Gigantos, HadesGigas, Hazer, Ing, Mag Roader (purple), Mandrake, Marshal, Ninja, Primordite, Rhinox, Rhodox, SlamDancer, Stray Cat, Telstar, Templar, Trilium, Vector Pup. WoR: Brontaur, Doom Drgn, Evil Oscar, Harpiai, Magic Urn, Mesosaur, Mover, Nightshade, Outsider, Prussian, Punisher, Retainer, Rhyos, Toe Cutter, Tyranosaur, Vectaur, Veteran, White Drgn, Woolly. Now for the long answer. WoB: Where other characters will surpass Gau when it comes to Mblock% and spells such as Quick, Gau stands equally strong on those aspects as his fellow party members in the WoB. The best WoB Rages in alphabetical order: ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Anguiform Aqua Rake absorbs Water, weak against Lightning Anguiform is the slightly inferior version of Chimera (which I'll discuss in a bit), but you can obtain Anguiform well before you can obtain Chimera, and this period of time includes the MagiTek Facility, pretty much *the* best time to have an MP-less Aqua Rake up your sleeve. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Aspik Giga Volt Float absorbs Water, weak against Fire Aspik is one of the first enemies you see after you leave the Veldt for the first time, which makes it necessary to make a special Veldt Trip for this Rage. It's all worth it, though. Giga Volt is the strongest single-target magical ability usable through a WoB Rage, and it's pretty massive. Giga Volt can target both all targets and a single one. Has inherent Dark status but due to Dark immunity you'll never notice. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Baskervor Cyclonic Death protection Cyclonic may not be the most accurate of spells, but it dispatches 93.50 % of your opponents current HP. ALL the targets. As long as you make sure the enemies aren't immune to instant-death attacks and you have a good follow- up move you'll be more then fine. The attack will actually miss now and again. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Behemoth Meteor weak against Ice Behemoth always was a physical tank in the Final Fantasy series, so why this Rage doesn't include the Take Down Special we'll never know. Meteor is multi- target, non-elemental, barrier-piercing and you won't see it beyond the Rage ability for well into the WoR. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Brawler Stone Berserk Auto-Berserk is a good thing, but Stone is equally awesome. Not only is it the only non-elemental magical attack Gau will perform until after the Floating Continent, it muddles everything it hits (unless protected against said status) and will do 7.5 times the damage (!) when the caster's level and target's level are identical. Note that due to the damage formule of Stone, Gau will make a better Stoner then Strago'll ever be. For game purposes that is because Gau's Vigor is superior, and for real-life purposes that's because old people swallow medicine which makes them immune to drugs. ;) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ ChickenLip Quake weak against Ice Quake is an extremely powerful spell with two special attributes about it which prevents it from completely making any other multi-target spell seem like a waste of time. First off, it doesn't hit Floating targets. Most of them are recognizable, so that shouldn't be a major concern. Also, the spell will hit monsters and character alike. In the WoB, Gaia Gear is readily available as soon as you can talk to Strago without him giving you the finger, so equip it to absorb or cast Float/wear Cherub Down to avoid Death from your side. Unfortunately the only WoB boss you'll face with Gau after you could've gotten this Rage is AtmaWeapon, who is Floating. Oh well, plenty of random encounters to be killed with it. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Chimera Aqua Rake Death protection Anguiform is the first you'll get with Aqua Rake, and you'll be using it a lot where Chimera isn't available until you get an airship. But Chimera has no weaknesses (Anguiform doesn't like Lightning) and Chimera has Death protection, and with the Sealed Gate and Floating Continent still heavily tempting to use this move Chimera is just a little better. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ General Cure2 Safe weak against Poison If all is well you might as well ignore this Rage, but it can be vital when you're in a tight spot. Should your favorite, controlable spellcaster be down for a moment, Gau can either heal someone to the maximum or go for a nice full-party white magic blessing. And with Safe you'll know that Gau will be around for quite a bit. Combine with a Black Belt for tough fights and you have yourself a destructive yet slow tank here. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Gigantos Magnitude8 Safe absorbs Earth, weak against Poison It's the pallete-swap of HadesGigas, a monster that'll appear more in a normal game as it can be obtained after Zozo where this baby appears on the Floating Continent as a monster-in-a-box. Gigantos has a Safe where HadesGigas hasn't, though, so no complaining. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ HadesGigas Magnitude8 absorbs Earth, weak against Poison The two debating over the proper Magnitude8 Rage are fortunately very close to each other in an alphabetized list. HadesGigas is a very nice Rage with an extremely powerful attack, but is to Gigantos what Anguiform is to Chimera: much more famous due to chronological advantage yet inferior in the long run. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Hazer Bolt2 weak against Pearl Hazer is not Undead, contrary to popular belief. It doesn't make sense, I know. It just makes this Rage a little better. Bolt2 hits hard throughout the WoB, and it hits significantly hard before everybody else can touch it. Gets bonus points for being extremely useful in a LLG. Hazer becomes mostly obsolete by the time you obtain Aspik, but it’s a nice Rage to utilize in the meantime, especially against a Veldt-roaming Telstar. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Ing Lifeshaver Float Undead absorbs Fire, Poison, weak against Pearl, Water Lifeshaver is extremely strong. It's too bad it's a draining move and acts like it, effecitvely stopping to hurt stuff when the caster's maximum HP is fully restored. It doesn't reduce any tank capabilities it grants though, and with Fire being the foremost popular element to cast stuff with, Ing absorbing it is a good thing. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Mag Roader Bio Safe absorbs Ice, weak against Fire The big, purple Mag Roader. You wouldn't say that Mag Roader had Safe, horrid physical defense and all, but on Gau the Safe status shines all the clearer. Bio is the poison-elemental spell you want for the entire game, and with basically everything walking on two legs being weak to it, Bio can hurt a lot. Just keep in mind: Two legs good Four legs good enough ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Mandrake Raid Death protection absorbs Water, weak against Fire Mandrake is an alternate Ing. Raid is non-elemental, so that's a little better; Mandrake absorbs Water and is weak against Fire and that's generally not quite as good as the opposite set Ing has. It kinda evens out with Ing having Float and Mandrake having Death protection. If you're up against that crazy Launcher/Water Edge combo-using WaterMagiTekHaxx0rmonster out there, keep this Rage in mind. :) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Marshal Wind Slash weak against Poison Wind Slash is a strong multi-target attack throughout the WoB, is the strongest multi-target attack you can get Gau right away and is simply illegaly effective against the Imperial Air Force. And it's only a dim shadow of what the Wind God will be doing later on. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Ninja Water Edge Float absorbs Poison, weak against Lightning, Pearl The strongest multi-target Water-elemental attack in the game, inherent Float, and just being a kick-ass monster; it all comes together in the Ninja Rage. It's not specifically useful for anything in particular, mainly because there's a shortage of powerful opponents weak against Water, but it's still the only Item used in a Rage and I like that. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Primordite Numblade weak against Lightning Carbunkl teaches Stop when you get him, as does Golem. However, when you note that any boss monster Gau faces before the MagiTek Facility is vulnerable to Stop, you'll soon grow to love this Rage. There's not a whole bunch more to say. It stops. Arguably the best status-inflicting Special for a nasty-ass status-inflicting Wind God Wind Slash. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Rhinox Life3 Safe Death protection absorbs Lightning Even if you know NOTHING about the entire game but what is written in this doc, you still won't be in such trouble you'll actually be needing Life3 on large scale in the WoB. Still, it's a grossly overpowered White spell which is available early on, and with Death protection and that Safe, a Rhinox Rager can be almost impossible to take down. Especially when you have to do it over and over again due to that Life3 spell. Combine with a Cure Ring and watch how the tanking displays itself. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Rhodox Snare While Bleary uses Doom and Commander uses Break, there's no instant-death spell quite like Snare. It looks pretty nifty (especially when used on a large creature), it's more accurate then Doom , checks less immunities then Break and it stalls final spells for one turn. Generally hailed as the ultimate Intangir-Slayer, and not without cause. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ SlamDancer Ice2 weak against Poison It's an alternate Hazer, but without the Lightning going on and with more frigid goodness. If you are too much of a macho to make one of your male characters pretend he's a woman, you can always go for Undead Seizure Dark Side which incidentally comes at the very start. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Stray Cat Catscratch Legendary Tactics, look for both plain Stray Cat AND Wind God. Heck, it's too much. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Telstar Sonic Boom Float Death protection weak against Lightning, Water It's a semi-fearsome monster-in-a-box and is treated like a boss in some aspects, including that Death protection and full-scale status protection list. Sonic Boom isn't all that, especially when you have Rhodox, but there's really no better auto-Ribbon Rage then Telstar in the WoB. If you fear Mind Blast, Rage Telstar and you'll be out of trouble. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Templar Fire2 Safe weak against Poison Alternate Hazer/SlamDancer here, with a Fire-element this time. Is much more manly then that wussy sorcerer of cheap exotic dancer could ever be, and has inherent Safe to boot! In general, one of the best Rages to use when facing random encounters as they mainly use physical attacks and are often weak against Fire. Only question which remains: Are you bad enough of a dude to use it? ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Trilium Bio weak against Fire, absorbs Water Trilium is in the same catagory as HadesGigas can Anguiform: they rock in those area's where the next move-specific Rage hasn't been encountered yet. Mag Roader is superior due to Safe and Ice is a more important element to absorb than Water is. Trilium appears well before Zozo, however, while Mag Roader makes a rather late entrance. While it's cool to be fashionably late, Trilium usually has the upper hand when thinking of a Bio Rage. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Vector Pup Bite Haste weak against Fire When your level is decent Catscratch may be overkill, and while Bite won't hit nearly as hard, there's still an auto-Haste to consider. So if you're sick of that Catscratch graphic you can...do something entirely non-Vector Pup as Bite shares the graphic :( ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- WoR: In the WoR, Gau's focus will shift. WoB Gau was a monster who could pull off multi-target spells of seemingly every element but Pearl, and could annihilate complete parties when stuck in an appropriate Rage. WoR Gau starts to lean more towards defensive capabilities. More and more monsters, and thus Rages, will feature Death Protection and elemental absorption of some kind. While Gau will fall behind on the offensive in especially the last parts of the WoR, there are still pretty powerful spells locked up in his Rages. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Brontaur Fire3 Death protection weak against Ice Death Protection and Fire3. If you need a Fire-element this Rage is your best bet unless you are prepared to deal with the consequences of a Merton spell. Just plain a very solid contender without any gross downsides and a very respectable attack. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Doom Drgn N. Cross Float Death protection Check the Legendary Tactics section on Doom Drgn. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Evil Oscar Bio absorbs Ice, Lightning, Poison, Wind, Pearl, Earth, Water, weak against Fire While Bio has lost most of its charm in the WoR, it's the elemental reactions of Evil Oscar which has earned this Malboro ancestor a place 'mongst these regions. Bio is still a very respectable attack in an LLG on everything that's not protected against the Poison status, and with this kind of elemental attributes Gau will most likely live to see the end of the battle. Tragically lacking Death Protection continues to cause sorrow, however. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Harpiai Aero Aero is the second-strongest guaranteed multi-target attack Gau'll get in this game, not counting the Merton spell which needs some items to make it work. Unfortunately no special attributes which make this Rage more interesting, but if you're still feeling sympathetic towards the old-school WoB Gau who sparkled because of heavy-hitting multi-target attacks, then you'll want to go with Harpiai. Retainer’s Shock is slightly stronger, but that Rage won’t be obtained until the latest parts of the game while Harpiai can be obtained half- way through. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Magic Urn Cure3 Death protection absorbs Fire, Ice, Lightning, Poison, Wind, Pearl, Earth, Water Called 'Invincible Pottery' these days. Have a look at the Legendary Tactics section on why and how. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Mesosaur Step Mine weak against Ice It you take a look at the MP cost and want to determine the value that Square intended for a move to have, Step Mine is the best attack in the game. That's because the MP actually increases throughout the game. Step Mine is fixed damage, like Blow Fish; it's unblockable, non-elemental, doesn't vary a single digit in damage, it's the simple outcome of it's damage formula. Since it doesn't depend on level and can actually be made stronger for a battle (unlike Flare Star), Step Mine is Gau's high damage inflicter in an LLG. Mesosaur combines the least elemental weaknesses with the most status protections, but Crawler and Tomb Thumb will make suitable replacements. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Mover Merton Float absorbs Poison I've mentioned the Merton spell twice now, and Mover is the best Rage to employ it with. Merton is a barrier-piercing Fire/Wind-elemental spell. It's only inferior to Ultima in sheer damage and it's unblockable. The big-ass downside is the fact it hits every target on the screen, including your own party members. If this is something you prepared for using Flame Shlds and the like this will be a Ultima/full-party Cure3 all rolled into one wonderful move. If you haven't prepared, you die. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- NightS