Part 4: Update Four: Cephalopods Ain't Shit

Update Four: Cephalopods Ain't Shit

Welcome back! Last time, on Final Fantasy IV, we find out Rosa was dying of desert fever and needed a Sand Ruby to cure it. Gustav was in the Waterway they needed to cross and requires Cecil's mastery of the Dark Sword to slay the beast. Today, said beast is going to be slain, so let's mosey.



Last time, we had left off after changing Tellah's name to Gustav and buying him some equipment.



The first room is pretty much the same, but the second half is open to us.



It's barely more interesting than the first half.



It has a treasure chest, though, so we can't pass that up.





It might look like we won't be able to get there from where we are, but I assure you, we can.



You just gotta climb through these little waterfalls.



Well, I didn't need to buy Gustav one of those rings, but hey, at least I can sell this for a touch of profit.





Let's get to exploring the rest of the Waterway. It's bigger than you think it would be.









Huh, four images without a caption.



Hey, I said this place was bigger than you'd think, not more interesting.





There is some treasure around here, though.



Granted, it's not super-exciting, but we'll get to the exciting treasure around here later.



And it's real treasure, too, none of that "friendship" conceptual treasure bullshit.



I wonder how uncomfortable it is to have water in your armor's boots. I hate it enough when it gets in my shoes, I can't imagine if it was in thick metal boots.



To the left of Cecil, there is another treasure chest.



I only realize this in a bit.



As right now, there's a new enemy!



The Killer Fish is nothing too exciting.



Being fish, they are weak to lightning. They also only have 65 HP to their name, so Gustav and Kim can one-shot them with their Thunder spell, and Cecil does around 60 damage to them.



Like, it fucks them up good. I meant to multi-target this one, but it seems a little wonky; you can't push "L" or "R" to do it, you have to push the cursor all the way to the back row, then hit it again to multi-target and it seems a little sticky. I fuck this up more than I'll admit.





In the video I took of this area, you can realize when I see that chest; I actually stop moving entirely and Cecil just stares at it for a second.



Ethers restore some MP to our magic users, so this is nice. Gustav has quite a bit of it, though, along with Osmose, so he can just drain what he needs. Kim's MP isn't very high right now, so it's not worth burning an Ether on her when it gets low, as Rod is a free attack, plus Cecil's physicals can usually mop up whatever Tellah Gustav doesn't.



Who the hell built this door?



Oh. Same people who built the save point, I guess.



Sounds good to me, chief.





I included the picture before this one just so you didn't have to wonder where Gustav disappeared to.



The best part of this is that it counts as a full heal to the party.



So, half-way through the dungeon, it gives you a full heal and a chance to save. Granted, this place isn't terribly difficult, so it's not essential, but it's still pretty cool.



...There's something off about this, but I can't figure it out.



One of the few five year olds who I don't think deserve to be pelted with sewage.





: spells. Look at her. What a cute face. She reminds me of Anna at that age.

Yeah, she is rather adorable, huh?



Didn't you listen to the people in Kaipo, Cecil?



...A bard? Does he have a tale?



I tried to think of a Confederacy joke here, but kept comin' up short.



It's okay, Gustav. You couldn't have guessed she would run off.



Smooth change of subject there.



"Friend"? Cecil, you full of shit. She's more than a friend.



She's one of those kind of friends.





Tentacles, Japan, gross, rape, etc.





I'm sure there's a joke I could make here about doujin artists and deadlines, but fuck it.





We begin to fade away as Gustav turns away from Cecil again.



And now we are ready to go! Originally, I was going to end the update here, but Christ, that'd feel like I was just giving you guys the finger after the first three updates.



Like, I took around 260 shots for the first update. That was long as hell.



This one isn't that long. I try not to do updates that long, because I'm afraid you guys will get bored.



But, hey, you guys seem on board for this, so maybe I was worried about nothing.



The Ice Rod is pretty cool.



It's an Ice elemental weapon, as you'd imagine, but it's also better than the Rod Kim initially had equipped.



Heading south from that treasure chest provides me the perfect opportunity to show it off.



Sure, Kim wouldn't be half bad physically striking these guys, but the Ice Rod has a better use. It's another weapon that can be used as an item in battle.



As you'd imagine, it casts Blizzard on the opponent. It's also completely free.



And just as effective as the spell itself.



Granted, most enemies in here are weak to Thunder, so the Ice Rod isn't supremely useful, but hey, I won't turn down a free casting of Blizzard.





Y'know, Cecil, when you got that chest to your right, couldn't you have just hopped down here?







There's more treasure down here, and it's just as cool as the Ice Rod.





Well, the gil isn't the good part here. It's still good to have, though.



Bomb Fragments are in-battle items. They cast a strong Fire-element spell on the enemy, as the name would imply.





Short room, huh?



This room is interesting.



Dead end, right?



HELL NO BITCH WALL HAX





Actually, it's just an entirely useless secret passage. I don't know why it's there.



Maybe it's just so you know that there are, indeed, secret passages in this game.





You don't even need it to get that Potion.





Also, this group of enemies can be dicks if you don't know what the gimmick is.



Well, actually, it's just those Tiny Mage motherfuckers. They have 69 HP a piece.



And if you cast a spell on them that doesn't kill them, they counter with Osmose. For Gustav, whose White Magic list is displayed here, it's not that big of a deal, but Kim doesn't have his easy MP recovery.



So, either have Cecil whack them to death or Kim use her Chocobo summon. Though, if Cecil doesn't kill it in one hit with a physical, they'll counter with Hold.



Sahagins are weak to Thunder and that's about it. The only reason they're ever a pain in the ass is because they show up with Tiny Mages.



No reason to cast Fire on them, no, I just wanted to show Fire off.



Let's move on.



We're almost out of here, by the way.



The best treasure in here lies just over there.



But first, we have to hit these two chests.





The Antartic Wind is the ice version of a Bomb Fragment. I, uh...Don't have anything else to say about it beyond that.



But, hey, right here we meet a new enemy.



This is the first of the Pudding type of enemies.



Don't bother physically attacking these guys. It'll barely deal any damage (if it's more than 1, you are incredibly overlevelled), so magic is the way to go.



Their color is also indicative of what magic you need to use on them to exploit their weakness.



These guys only have 35 HP, by the way, so this is totally overkill and I love the fuck out of it.



There are some enemies in here that I never encountered, which is weird. I'll probably come back to find them, though.





However, this next group is, I think, the biggest pain in the ass encounter you can find here.



Zombies have 52 HP a piece. Now, you might be thinking that Cecil can easily one-shot these guys.



Incredibly, our Dark Knight is useless against ghoulies of the night.



But, being Undead type, they are weak to Fire and Cure magic. Using the Ice Rod there was just to have Kim be helping in this fight for free.



Just burn them back to death and move on. Beyond that, Zombies aren't worth mentioning.



This entire dungeon, the second chest here was the treasure I was looking forward to getting.



The Hourglass ain't bad, though. It'll cast Stop on an enemy when used in battle.



This thing here is what I was looking forward to.



Now, for those of you who know me, you know how much I like being able to hit bad guys as hard as I fucking can. This is far from the hardest Cecil will ever hit something, but it's a nice boost.



Let's mosey on out of here.



I should have mentioned that there was two parts to the Waterway.



In another act of kindness, before entering the second part, you can save and Tent up if you need to.



Just a calm little outside area. There are still random encounters out here, though, as I found out when I was attacked after taking a step outside of the cave. It's just the same enemies from Kaipo, if you were curious.



Keep in mind how the Tent's description is worded. It'll come in handy later.



In Final Fantasy VI, each character had a custom tent sprite. In this game, everyone just has a boring brown tent.



But, Cecil still gives us the "All set!" pose, but he doesn't say it.



The second area of the Waterway is short and sweet, so we're tackling this part of it, too.



Down where?



Cecilstopmovin



CECIL I DIDN'T TELL YOU TO DO THAT



DAMN YOU OLD MAN





Well, we're down here now. Incredibly, falling down a waterfall has no negative repercussions for an octogenarian and a five year old. Cecil, I can kind of see, but if he hit a rock or something, would he be splattered inside of his armor? Quickly, someone, science this up and tell me!



South from where we landed, there is nothing interesting.





So we've just gotta scoot along this way.



It looks like there'd be something over there, though, right?





Down these stairs, though, there is something very worthwhile.







Two new pieces of armor for Cecil.





By the by, since I haven't mentioned this yet, that number on the right, next to the white sphere is that character's magic defense. At least, that's the conclusion Mega64 and I have reached.



And are you guys sensing a theme in Cecil's new armor?





This is the last room of the Waterway.



It's shorter than the last one, so we're nearly done here.







Hermes' Sandles cast Haste on a character, which increases their speed for a while.



It's not a huge boost, no, but every point of Defense is worthwhile.





...Is that the monster? I only see two tentacles.







Oh, look, there's more of him!



And there's some over there!



I THINK IT'S A TOUCH TOO LATE FOR THAT



Here's the monster that Gustav needed Cecil's help slaying.



It's weak to the Dark element of Cecil's sword.



And good Goddamn, does it show.



The other two should just use their Thunder spell to put some hurt on him, as he's also weak to that.



He has 2,350 HP to tear through, so this is a small part of that, but it helps.



Y'know, Gustav, for being a Sage, you seem to be coming close to being outclassed by a little girl.



After dealing some damage, tentacles will start to disappear. I'd have a gif of it, but just look at the last image of Octomammoth with all of his tentacles, then back to this one really fast. You'll get the idea.



Cecil is the MVP of this fight, as he could easily solo it.



See, Octomammoth isn't actually all that dangerous. Sure, he's got a lot of HP, but he does nothing but physically attack throughout the battle, and his physical prowess isn't very impressive.



And it's not like the amount of tentacles he has influences that damage, either. As far as I know, Octomammoth is just a pussy, with out without eight tentacles. Though, supposedly, the lower amount of tentacles he has means that he's going to hit harder, but I didn't see much of that in this fight. I saw it a little bit, but at the same time, that could have just been damage varying. It seems more like that if it does work that way, it's not really enough of a boost to matter.

If you're curious, here is the video of the fight, so you can decide for yourself and prove me a moron in the thread!



Though, uh, Gustav's defense leaves a lot to be desired. He's in the back row, too, so remember, he's taking half damage.



This is Gustav's Recall failing. When used, Recall gives Gustav a chance to remember a spell and use it on the enemy, assuming he has enough MP to cast it. He can cast some high-level shit with it, but the chances of him doing so are very, very low.



Since this fight is pretty much a joke, I spent a lot of it dicking around with Recall.





I don't think it counts as a Recall, Gustav, if you already knew the Goddamned spell you old fuck!



I'm including this shot just because Octomammoth terrifies me. Look at that fucking face.



But, uh, Fire isn't very effective.



You can tell how close Octomammoth is to death by looking at his sprite; he's pretty close to dying right now.



Dammit, Gustav! You fucking suck at recalling shit!



No it's not, Goddamn you!



No shit, Gustav! Maybe it's easier being a Sage than I thought it would be.





He's just a few hits away from death right now.



Speak of the devil...



Too bad Octomammoth is immune to that, as well as Death in general being a terrible spell in the Final Fantasy games.



But, a blast of lightning from Kim finishes it off and this fight has been won.



Is this the most efficient way to get there? Because, seriously, if everyone has to go through this, I'll understand if Damcyan just fucking blows.





The castle is just ahead. Let's see if we can rest up there before going to the Sand Ruby. Oh, and I guess we can see about Anna, too.



FUCK!