Part 201: Coyote and the Bomb
Welcome back to Coyote's Tales! This is a Mime run, with a few catches:
Coyote must always be alone. (This is a solo Mime run.)
Coyote is of the land, and needs nothing besides what he can get for himself. (This is a "living off the land" run.)
Coyote is restless, and a bit of a coward. (This is a low-level run.)
Coyote is his own worst enemy. (I will eliminate one ability that I use in reach boss battle, after each boss battle. I'll be able to use those abilities between bosses, but not in boss battles. Abilities unusable against bosses or in solo runs will not be party of my list in the first place, so I won't have things like !Revive to lose.)So far, Coyote has lost the following abilities:
!Calm (Lost at Wing Raptor)
!Attack (Lost at Karlabos)
!Chakra (Lost at Siren)
Undead (Lost at Magissa and Forza)
!Check (Lost at Garula)
HP +10% (Lost at Liquid Flame)
Magic Shell (Lost at Ifrit)
MP +10% (Lost at Byblos)
!Flirt (Lost at Shiva)
First Strike (Lost at Ramuh)
Equip Rods (Lost at Sandworm)
Berserk (Lost at Cray Claw)
!Gaia (Lost at Adamandoise)
Equip Shields (Lost at Soul Cannon)
!Lance (Lost at Archeoavis)
Solo Mime, Episode Five:
Coyote and the Bomb
We're almost at world 2, which means the meteor boss gauntlet. I know Titan is up first, so Coyote needs to do some prep work first:
"See you later, suckers! (God, I hate cats.)"
I failed to steal Gaia Gear form the sorcerers in Karnak Castle, and I have no other way to cast float on Coyote at this point in the game. I pretty much need to proof Coyote against earth damage, because Titan's Earth Shaker will probably one-shot Coyote's flimsy HP. Having neutralized that, though, the rest of Titan's repertoire is physical attacks, so here's the plan:
Titan isn't that much of a problem as long as Earth Shaker is kept in check. I was tempted to go with Barehanded or Dual Wield, but I want the security of a shield to go with the Main Gauche, Elf Mantle, and Shirahadori. All of that should give Coyote a ridiculous evasion chance. Offense, as usual, is Coyote's biggest problem. You also may be wondering why I'm using Long Reach when I don't have an attack ability set. Yeah, we'll get to that.
Titan opens with a swing and a miss. Coyote returns fire:
Flash doesn't work, but it was worth a try. Titan misses again (2), and Coyote goes to the ol' direct damage:
Not too shabby. Aera ends up doing 300-335 damage. My plan is to use it (for free, after the first casting, due to !Mimic) until Titan hits Coyote once or twice. I end up using it five times and Titan still hasn't hit Coyote. He tries Earth Shaker, to no avail. I was planning on topping-off Coyote's HP with Vampire at this point, but there's no need. Welp, no time like the present:
Moon Flute is seemingly stupid for a solo run, but it lets me flip a switch (and then break said switch off...) to go into physical attack mode. This lets Coyote use physical attacks without setting an attack ability. I'm showing it off here, but it might be necessary later. And, due to Long Reach, he's staying in the back and still able to hit reasonably hard. Ok, sure, it's not as much as Aera was doing, but this was just a test run for this tactic. After just a few attacks like that, Titan goes down swinging (and missing):
Titan
Coyote's Level: 15
Abilities Used: !Blue, Long Reach, Shirahadori
Deaths: 0
Total Boss Deaths: 12
Coyote-esque Mistakes: 0
Total Coyote-esque Mistakes: 9
I'm going to choose to lose Long Reach, because it's never going to be a necessity:
!Calm (Lost at Wing Raptor)
!Attack (Lost at Karlabos)
!Chakra (Lost at Siren)
Undead (Lost at Magissa and Forza)
!Check (Lost at Garula)
HP +10% (Lost at Liquid Flame)
Magic Shell (Lost at Ifrit)
MP +10% (Lost at Byblos)
!Flirt (Lost at Shiva)
First Strike (Lost at Ramuh)
Equip Rods (Lost at Sandworm)
Berserk (Lost at Cray Claw)
!Gaia (Lost at Adamandoise)
Equip Shields (Lost at Soul Cannon)
!Lance (Lost at Archeoavis)
Long Reach (Lost at Titan)
(I'm going to switch to listing just what I've lost because god damn is that whole list long.)
Next up is Purobolos.
The less I say about this strategy, the better.
"Ah! It's a bunch of 
"Better get out of here!"
"Hey, isn't there something you guys are just itching to do?"
So this didn't work. At all. My last ditch effort is for Coyote is peek back into play, hoping to provoke Self-Destruct targets, and hide again before they act. But when he hides again, they go back to idling with their turns. I have no way to win like this, so it's time for Coyote to face the music:
We'll file that one firmly into "Coyote-esque Mistakes" and never talk about it again. (But not really. Feel free to discuss it.)
I do learn a bit more form this: they have 1,500 HP, and I have about three turns to take them all down.
Here's my new plan:
My plan is to Aqua Rake the shit out of them. It's pricey at 38 MP, so MP +30% will give Coyote enough MP to use it three times. !Bladeblitz is expendable, and a backup plan that can hit all targets.
But this plan is also a Coyote-esque Mistake, albeit a much smaller one. Can you figure out what it is? I didn't until I got back into combat:
Figured it out yet? There's two things I'm doing wrong here, that could be solved by swapping one ability for a very expendable one.
After three Aqua Rakes, they're all still alive, and have between 20 and 150 HP. I might get lucky enough to live through all the self-destructs.
I don't. (But so close!)
But I have a solution. That plan will work, with a tweak that fixes the Coyote-esque Mistake.
I'm going to switch MP +30% for !Red, which will boost Coyote's Magic power a bit, hopefully enough to kill them all with three Aqua Rakes. Even if the MP isn't enough for three castings, I don't need it. I only need 38 MP: I'll Mimic for the other two, getting them for free. As extra insurance, I've switched the Main Gauche for the Healing Staff, to get extra magic power and to be able to heal myself without killing one of the bombs. I'll use !Aim instead of !Bladeblitz in order to attack myself with the staff.
In short, it works:
Purobolos
Coyote's Level: 15
Abilities Used: !Blue, !Red, !Aim
Deaths: 2
Total Boss Deaths: 14
Coyote-esque Mistakes: 2
Total Coyote-esque Mistakes: 11
Time to lose an ability:
!Calm (Lost at Wing Raptor)
!Attack (Lost at Karlabos)
!Chakra (Lost at Siren)
Undead (Lost at Magissa and Forza)
!Check (Lost at Garula)
HP +10% (Lost at Liquid Flame)
Magic Shell (Lost at Ifrit)
MP +10% (Lost at Byblos)
!Flirt (Lost at Shiva)
First Strike (Lost at Ramuh)
Equip Rods (Lost at Sandworm)
Berserk (Lost at Cray Claw)
!Gaia (Lost at Adamandoise)
Equip Shields (Lost at Soul Cannon)
!Lance (Lost at Archeoavis)
Long Reach (Lost at Titan)
!Red (Lost at Purobolos)
Next up is Manticore. Here's the plan:
Yeah. It's vulnerable to instant death, and Coyote is flimsy enough that it can almost kill him in one attack. I'm not going to screw around here. I'll use up one of my last freebies, Equip Armor. !Mug is in the off-chance it opens with a missed physical attack and I get a chance to take its rare steal.
No time to heal. THE WAY OUT IS THROUGH.
~One !Iainuki later, which I failed to capture for some reason~
Manticore
Coyote's Level: 15
Abilities Used: !Iainuki, !Mug, Equip Armor
Deaths: 0
Total Boss Deaths: 14
Coyote-esque Mistakes: 0
Total Coyote-esque Mistakes: 11
Losing Equip Armor:
!Calm (Lost at Wing Raptor)
!Attack (Lost at Karlabos)
!Chakra (Lost at Siren)
Undead (Lost at Magissa and Forza)
!Check (Lost at Garula)
HP +10% (Lost at Liquid Flame)
Magic Shell (Lost at Ifrit)
MP +10% (Lost at Byblos)
!Flirt (Lost at Shiva)
First Strike (Lost at Ramuh)
Equip Rods (Lost at Sandworm)
Berserk (Lost at Cray Claw)
!Gaia (Lost at Adamandoise)
Equip Shields (Lost at Soul Cannon)
!Lance (Lost at Archeoavis)
Long Reach (Lost at Titan)
!Red (Lost at Purobolos)
Equip Armor (Lost at Manticore)
Onto world 2! I'll keep this update brief because I have work to do and so that Gilgamesh can have his own update next time.
Next time: Coyote Meets His Match!