Gamer Corner Guides

Guardian

You may have fought the Guardian in the World of Balance, but this time you need to actually destroy it. Fortunately, it is no longer invincible. The Guardian cycles through four "battle programs," each with different attacks. They don't affect Guardian's defensive capabilities or its ability to counter 1/3 of attacks with a basic attack of its own. Guardian will proceed with battle programs in this order: Basic → Ultros → Basic → Dadaluma → Basic → Air Force → Basic → AtmaWeapon → repeat from start. Here's a breakdown of each program.

• Basic Battle Program
  1. Attack, Tek Laser, or Missile
  2. Atomic Ray, Tek Laser, or Missile
• Ultros's Battle Program
  1. Tentacle or attack
  2. Entwine, Ink (1.5× damage), or attack
  3. Stone, Ink, or attack
  4. Entwine
• Dadaluma's Battle Program
  1. Shock Wave or attack
  2. Shock Wave or attack
  3. Throw MithrilKnife or Ashura, use 3× Tonic or Potion
  4. TekBarrier
• Air Force's Battle Program
  1. Diffuser or Tek Laser
  2. Diffuser or Tek Laser
  3. Launcher or Tek Laser
  4. WaveCannon
• AtmaWeapon's Battle Program
  1. Meteo or Flare
  2. Flare or attack
  3. Attack or Meteo
  4. Flare Star

Each successive program has more dangerous attacks to worry about, so the sooner you can end the fight, the better. Fortunately, the Guardian is vulnerable to Thunder and Water like most machines. Bolt 3 is very effective, and can help end this fight before it gets started. It's not meant to be an incredibly difficult fight, and it won't be if you take it seriously.

Once the Guardian is defeated, the middle party will have an open path to Poltrgeist. A save point is spawned each time one of the Statues is defeated, so you don't need to worry about coordinating saving between parties.

Doom (Left Party)

Doom is the Ice-themed Statue, though his physical attacks are his most brutal offense. He'll start battle using Ice 3 and Absolute 0 to deal Ice damage or N. Cross to Freeze Characters. It will counter most attacks with a powerful basic attack. After eight such attacks, Doom will use R.Polarity to reverse your party's row positions.

Once you've reduced Doom to about half HP (32,640 of his starting 63,000), you will see a message that his aura is shaking. This gives him the Image, Reflect, and Haste Statuses, and triggers a number of changes to his battle strategy. Doom will use ForceField at this point and again approximately every 20 seconds. This unique Lore makes Doom completely immune to a randomly chosen Element, which will be announced. ForceField chooses a new Element each time, and Doom will stop using it after he has immunity to all eight Elements.

Doom shifts to an entirely physical onslaught at this point as well. In addition to counterattacks, he will now make normal attacks and use Targetting to set up a quadruple-damage special called Demon Rage on the next turn. This attack cannot be avoided, and even if you remove the original target (e.g., with Jump) Doom will hit someone else. Doom will continue this strategy until the battle is complete.

Doom has a weakness to Pearl, and absorbs both Ice and Poison. When any of these Elements is selected by ForceField, damage from them will instead be reduced to 0 (even if they'd otherwise be absorbed). The Pearl Spell and Pearl-Elemental Weapons are useful early in the battle, but may become ineffective later if you're unlucky. Non-Elemental Spells and physical attacks will remain effective regardless of how many times ForceField is used.

Doom drops Cyan's ultimate Weapon, the Sky Render. Defeating him also creates a new save point. The pipe beyond Doom leads to the Staging Area, which consists of three small rooms with a floor switch in each. When all three parties are standing on these switches, they will be transported to the final battle.

Goddess (Right Party)

Goddess's affinity is for Thunder, though she also prefers to use her foes against one another with Status attacks. This battle is a side attack, so you'll flank Goddess with two characters to either side. To start with, she'll use a combination of basic attacks, Bolt 2 and Bolt 3, Lullaby, and Charm. Her Thunder Spells are quite powerful. Charm, which you may remember from Owzer's House works like Muddled but cannot be healed. Goddess will sometimes counter Fight with Love Token, which makes the target take other basic attack hits in her stead. You will therefore want to favor Magic and special Commands in this fight. Non-Fight attacks can be countered with Bolt 2.

After dealing a mere 11,540 damage to Goddess, she'll shift gears and focus on only three magic damage attacks. The most common is Bolt 3. She'll often use the weaker Flash Rain, which is notable because it is Ice/Water-Elemental and not Thunder-Elemental like her Spells. Quasar is a non-Elemental Lore that ignores Mag.Def and MBlock%. It is like a lesser version of GrandTrain, and Goddess's version deals around 1,300 damage to each Character. It is one of only two attacks Goddess uses that affect both sides of the party at once.

After you've attacked her 8 times, Goddess will use Overcast to give the party the Condemned Status. This is a special version of Condemned where the target will be turned into a Zombie rather than Wounded when the countdown reaches 0 or when they die for any other reason. This too will affect party members on both sides of the battle, but won't affect Characters protected against Wound (Zombie protection does not work).

Goddess has no Elemental weaknesses, but only 44,000 HP. She absorbs Thunder and Pearl damage, but other Elements are fair game. She has high Mag.Def and a permanent Shell effect (along with Haste), so physical attacks are generally more effective than Magic. You can attack her from behind (the golden wing faces her front) for a 50% damage boost to your physical attacks. Just be careful with Fight, since it opens you up to Love Token counters.

Goddess drops Excalibur, a powerful Pearl-elemental Weapon. She also leaves behind a save point. As with Doom, the party is free to leave Goddess's room when she is defeated and stand on one of the three switches in the Staging Area required to reach Kefka.

Poltrgeist (Middle Party)

There is a well-hidden Ribbon on the path to Poltrgeist. Once you step outside, search the obscured area to the south. The chest is found two steps right of the entrance, or one step left from the bridge to Poltrgeist. Walk as far south as you can go and press A to find it.

Poltrgeist is the Fire-aspected Statue, but will use many non-Elemental attacks as well. At the start of battle, he will use normal attacks, Psychrip for double damage, and both Shrapnel and Stop. Shrapnel is the biggest threat in this phase, dealing very high damage if it hits. If Stop connects, Poltrgeist will follow up with Blaster. This will always hit due to the effects of Stop, so the only way to prevent Wound is to use a Relic that grants immunity to it.

After Poltrgeist takes 25,360 damage, it will abandon physical attacks entirely. S. Cross and Flare Star deal heavy Fire damage to the party, while Aero deals less damage and is Wind-Elemental. Meteo will deal well over 2,000 damage to any Character it hits. Flare Star is Poltrgeist's only attack that is guaranteed to hit, so MBlock% is highly recommended for this battle. It can also block Fire 3, which he counters one third of all attacks with.

Like the other Statues, Poltrgeist uses a special Ability after being attacked eight times. In his case, he will use the Thunder-Elemental WaveCannon. Poltrgeist has no other counters, but absorbs Fire and Wind. He has permanent Haste and combines a high Defense with the Safe status. He does have a weakness to Poison, but by this point your main Magic offense should consist of Spells that will deal more damage than Bio will even when targeting a weakness.

There are a variety of possible strategies to use against Poltrgeist. Fire protection will blunt some of his attacks, including his Fire 3 counter, though as previously mentioned MBlock% is your best overall defense against his magic. Physical attacks will deal far less damage than useful unless they ignore Defense, as many of your most powerful attacks may. Your most powerful Spells are all good choices as long as they are not Fire-Elemental.

Poltrgeist drops the most powerful lance in the game, the Aura Lance. He won't spawn a save point upon defeat, but you can find one in the Save Point Drop through the northern door. There is a hole here that you can jump into to reach the middle switch in the Staging Area. This is one of the three switches that lead to Kefka.