Part 39: Update Thirty Eight: It's A Moon Treasureathon

Update Thirty Eight: It's A Moon Treasureathon

Welcome back! Last time, on Final Fantasy IV, we got a quick sneak peek of the moon. Today, we're going to gather a ton of fucking treasure and barely make any actual progress, so let's mosey.





Starting back at the beginning, we head south this time. We'll actually make some semblance of progress today.



You can see a hint of a treasure chest. It's that taunting treasure chest.



You can't actually get it from over there, as I originally believed. I have trouble keeping all the various paths here straight. I've played this game a ton, but I'm far more familiar with things before the moon.





You can't just go straight to the chest, either. You've gotta wind around.



So, for those of you who haven't played this game before, did you remember that Kim could use whips? That's a serious question, by the way.



As you can see, there's a nice offensive boost and even a slight defensive one; this whip adds +5 Strength, Agility and Stamina, while it also takes away -5 Spirit and Intellect. Now, Kim can use this in the back row for full damage, as well as having a Fire elemental attack that has a chance to paralyze, but it slightly hurts her casting abilities. I'll be sticking with her old rod for now, as we're about to find an upgrade for that soon.



Continuing through this secret passage, we past an opened chest. We already hit that one.



Encounters are still going, by the way. It's just that nothing new has shown up, so I'm leaving those out.



Goddamn fucking secret passages. Moon people are a very secretive people, I guess.



But, just beyond that, we find the Dragon Shield. We don't have to fight a monster-trapped chest for it, either.



This goes to Bowser, and it halves the three main elements. Cecil or Cid could equip this, too, but Bowser, the dragon-dragoon-man, is getting this. I like to think it has a totally metal album cover painted on the front. It's also the second best shield for Bowser; there's only one shield better than it and that'll come later. Maybe. It's an enemy drop.





As soon as we enter the next room, we're assaulted.



Silver Dragons are nothing new, but they are around here. Gold Dragons are around, too, as well as the rest of the cast from Bahamut's Cave.



They still drop a shitload of gil upon death.





There's approximately jack and shit over here. It never hurts to check, though.





We talked about Bone Dragons, right? I'm certain we have.



This is as good a time as any, I s'pose, to show off Goemon's new ninja sword. I miss the purple one, but this one is still pretty swank.



Plus, Goemon hits even better now.





There seems to be squat over here, too.



Time to head down here.



*Gasp!* A secret passage! And a treasure chest!



Yeah, there's a lot of damn treasure down here.



It's all for Bowser, too. This is pretty well his room, finding pretty much his best gear.



I bet the generic Skyrim helmets look like shit compared to this one. Well, they look more like shit.





I'd like to call attention to all bitchin' artists reading this thread. I am going to beg someone to draw Bowser wearing all of this sweet-ass Dragon gear.





And just like that, Bowser is decked out in full Dragon gear, barring his spear. That'll be upgraded eventually, but for now, Fire, Ice and Lightning aren't as dangerous to Bowser.



Plus, he's also gotten quite the nice defensive boosts. He's pretty tough to begin with, but this is even better. He's got fairly good HP, too, good strength, and he's about as fast as Goemon is. Bowser is an excellent character when it comes to physical things, but his magic defense is pretty poor.

Edit: I should also take this time to mention that the elemental resistances of his various pieces of Dragon gear don't stack. He'll only get the elemental resistance from one piece of the armor, so it's always 50% resistance, instead of stacking to 200%. It's not a bad idea to give one bit to Cecil until he gets his own bit of gear that can do the same thing. As for why I haven't done that, well, just wait until next update.



We head through the door we skipped earlier. I don't know why I took that moment to do a small write-up on Bowser.





There's nothing over to the left, so we head right.



There's another treasure chest and some stairs.



Oh, joy, arrows I'll probably never use. Y'know, I should probably keep a bow for Rosa in the inventory, just in case.







I think I entirely forgot to go to the left. I hit it later, though, so everyone who's ready to correct me, calm your britches.





Y'know, the moon isn't too bad of a place, but there's just no atmosphere.

()







We finally encounter a new enemy in this room.



The Dinozombie has 12,000 HP to his name, with the ability to curse people.



However, being a member of the undead horde, he is weak to Holy and Fire, which we have an abundance of.







In case you forgot, Curse halves Attack and Defense, but in fights like this, it's nothing to worry about.





Y'know, that Firaga made me feel sad on the inside.



But, whatever, I have killed a dinosaur that was also a zombie.





More treasure. There's still an assload of it left, too. We're not even halfway through this dungeon, folks. I'd reckon we're nearly a quarter of the way through, if that.



Well, not the best treasure I could hope for, but it's still better than a fart with lumps.







Typically, in Final Fantasy games, the X-Potion will restore full HP to whoever it is used on, no fuss or muss. In this game, though, they just restore an assload of HP. The only item I can think of, off the top of my head, that will restore full HP 100% of the time is an Elixir.



Maybe it's just me, but I think this doorway is a little bit of a dick move. It doesn't really look like a door to me, more like a red herring for a secret passage.





Oh, God, a trapped chest! It's been a little while!



Jesus Christ, this chest isn't fucking around.



However, the Behemoth strategy has not changed a bit.



Get Blink up on everyone, then let the physical fighters take him down. Bowser is pretty good for Jumping on him here.



However, Behemoths don't really take any sort of shit from magic. Not even Bahamut was all that effective, only dealing a skosh over 4,000 damage.



But, after that fight, Kim leveled up and learned Quake.



And she also got a new weapon! Everything is just coming up aces for Kim right now.



This has a +15 Intellect boost, five points over her old Fairy Rod. This immediately goes on Kim and I doubt it'll ever be removed.



She's got a pretty good bit of Intellect right now, and it'll only get better. She's kind of low on MP right now, though.



But, MP isn't too big of a concern anymore. I can easily afford more Ethers and I could stock up on a good amount of Dry Ethers, too.



Oh, and the Stardust Rod does have an effect when used as an item in battle. It shoots little stars all over the enemies.





It is not very impressive, however.



Down those stairs, we spy a sword over there. Goemon already got a sword and that doesn't look like a ninja sword. I think we've spotted a new weapon upgrade for Cecil.



But, we've got some winding around to get over there.



Including this trapped chest.



These guys are fucking assholes. I'd rather fight two Behemoths than these guys. Or the Elemental Lords again.



This is on the lower end of their physical prowess. The Red Dragon there can also attack twice, either smashing one person for a ton of damage or spreading it around. The Blue Dragon can't do that, but he has something far worse.



This attack is based on his HP. The more HP he has, the stronger it'll be.

At his full 15,000 HP, this attack is going to drop some hurt on the entire party. He also absorbs Fire, Lighting, Ice, Throw, Holy and Darkness. I'm not sure what we have to deal Dark damage, but I'm not going to test it and find out.



Thankfully, being in the back row, the girls are fairly well protected from the physicals.



Bahamut is non-elemental, so he's an excellent choice for this fight.



Dear God, it's like if you gave Mike Tyson PCP.





Curaja is pretty awesome for healing a lot at once. As I've mentioned, the only downside is the 40 MP cost, but even that isn't too bad.





The God of Summons is pretty effective against his Dragon brethren.





The Red Dragon has 15,000 HP as well, and only absorbs Fire. He is weak to Ice, as well, but he also has a full party attack, which I didn't want to risk being hit by, so I went with the instant-casting Bio.







These rewards are very, very nice, but I do not like fighting Blue Dragons. Red Dragons aren't so bad, but the Ice Storm attack frightens me.



For that fight, we win Cecil's ultimate shield (barring the one that comes later, but we don't need to talk about that).



This shield also adds +3 Spirit, as well as resisting Undead attacks. Only Cecil can use it, as he doesn't like to share, but he's willing to jack Bowser's shield if he feels it would benefit him.



Cecil is kind of an asshole, I guess.





Up in this room, there's another secret passage and a chest.



This thing is pretty fucking awesome and it's great that you don't have to fight for it.



In addition to the great Defense boost, it also adds +15 Stamina, as well as halving the three main elements. Anyone can equip it, but Kim needs the extra protection.



There's more secret passages around here, but I'm starting to get a tad paranoid. There's a save point nearby, so I'm going to be heading toward that as quick as I can.



As I've found, whenever I start to get cocky on the Moon, something swings in and decides to shove a potato up my ass and then push me down the stairs.



We're not going down there today, as I'm in full-coward mode.







I'm skipping some treasure chests, yes, but I'll be back for them. I could just Teleport out and save up that way, but since I'm so close to a save point, I'd rather do it here.



If the chests are in my path, though, I'll snag 'em. I just won't be going out of my way for them.



This is a new robe for Rosa.



This adds +15 Spirit, which is a ten point boost over her old Light Robe. It also prevents Darkness, but I kind of forgot that existed as a status ailment.





To the left, there's some treasure. We'll get it later.



I'm sure some of you are just judging me so hard by doing it this way. If you are, fuck you. I'd rather not have to capture all of this footage again.





This room is an important one.



Not for the Red Fang. I'll show why it's important later, but keep it in mind for now.



Down these stairs now. There's nothing too interesting to the right.





The other chest holds a Fuma Shuriken, which I'm sure I'll use at some point.



Down the left set of stairs is this Cottage, which I'll be using shortly. I have over forty more in my inventory, too.



Over to the left there's this little walkway. It's entirely hidden, so I can see why you might skip over it, thinking it is just there to show off that area over there.





Heading down from here leads to the next room and one step closer to that save point.



Thinking about it now, though, I'm strong enough to take on whatever the game throws at me right now. However, I don't want to fuck with the Moon, as it might decide that I need a kick in the nads for my arrogance.



Golden Apples add a permanent +100 HP to someone's max HP. I hold onto this for now, but Kim would be a good candidate for it.





Moving north from there, we come to a dead end.



So we head south and begin going to the right.



In case you were curious about the kind of encounters you were missing. I'd encountered this exact group of enemies about five times in this room already and I was tired of their shit.





This teleporter takes us one step closer to a save point and my peace of mind.





These stairs lead just to this teleporter. I'm fairly certain this is a ploy on the developer's part to make me fight more.



I'll be back for you, treasure chest.



But first, we've gotta deal with this one.



I literally just yawned when I encountered this guy. I remember these guys used to scare the shit out of me and now I yawn when I fight them.



We get another Protect Ring out of this fight.



It goes to Rosa, as she's pretty instrumental in keeping our asses alive.



And just beyond this teleporter...



Is the save point.





I heal up and save my game. Sweet Christ, look at the amount of gil I have! I need to get to that Hummingway shop soon.



But first, what's beyond this door?



Oooh, the new sword for Cecil! Goemon's wasn't too hard to get, so how bad could this be?



I bet he's real tough because he uses curse words.



...I may have been too quick to sass this monster.



OH FUCK FAR TOO QUICK FAR TOO QUICK







Alright, I can recover from this. I'll get Bowser in the air to avoid his next attacks and get him to revive Rosa. Hopefully, then, she'll be able to pick up some other people.



Dark Bahamut will cast Reflect on himself and then start bouncing Flares off of himself. That's okay, though, because when Kim gets back up, I'll just use Bahamut on him.



Alright, that's a good start to whittling away his 60,000--



Aww, fiddlesticks.



He almost survived, too.



But, uh...With that crushing defeat, we'll end this update.

Next time, on Final Fantasy IV, we'll get some more moon treasure. Stay tuned!