Part 25: End of the World of Ruin

Chapter 24 - End of the World of Ruin



Just two dungeons left! We'll start today with Hidon, since it's short and sweet.









Cutscene stuff out of the way, of course.







Same deal as the original, you've got to feed the chest at least 22 pieces of Coral/Booty at once to pass by. This chest also really loves pirate speak and puns. Eh, more flavor than the original.



Warlocks cast Flare. Dumpties probably do stuff too.



Whichever one is the seahorse does a lot of rain attacks.



Black Bears are beefy and use Avalanche.





There's really nothing else to speak about here, as there's no treasures, so let's get to Hidon.





Hidonites each have a gimmick attack.





I believe the order, from right to left, is Kappa Claw (inflicts Imp), Crazy Claw (inflicts Muddle), Stone Claw (inflicts Stone), and Mega Claw (deals more damage). The status ones are pesky, while my party has no trouble taking/evading Mega Claw.



Meteor's good at damaging them all. Generally, you want to leave all but one alive, as if all are dead Hidon will revive them and start spamming his ultimate attack. Of course, you actually want him to use his ultimate attack so Strago can learn it.



Hidon himself has other nasty moves like Quasar, Virite (damage/poison everybody), and Spellbind (physical attack that inflicts Mute).



He'll also use Shield, which casts Safe on all allies. I think he castss it off before the Hidonites respawn, so they aren't affected by it. Strago can learn this Lore as well, which is nice.





This is Black Omen, Hidon's ultimate attack (and one of Strago's best Lores). Not as strong as Strago's other lores, but it ignores defense, which is really nice. It hurts our party pretty hard.





Takes a couple tries, but Hidon eventually goes down, and Strago gets a couple new Lores, including probably his best multi-target spell (and Shield isn't bad to have either).













Nice and short.



Now for the Fanatics Tower, our last dungeon before Kefka's Tower. My initial party is this one, hoping that Gogo's versatility would work well here. Also, I decided to make Locke Berserk to see if being offensive would work well here.







This guy gives information on the secret to the Ancient Castle if you pay him 100k GP. Does anyone do this and then not reload the game?



This is also one of two hints about the old Air Anchor location. The Air Anchor itself is gone, but what's there now?





The boss of this tower has a rather fun gimmick that we'll get to soon enough.



The enemies still fill the pattern of Lv. X Mage, up to 90. They cast all sorts of variable spells, as you'd expect.



The big change is that all commands are available here, rather than just Magic. This is huge for characters like Strago who have better commands. Of course, physicals suck in this area still, so your physical guys like Cyan and Sabin are better off not coming here.



Originally, I reloaded after the first team sucked, then sent in a team with Umaro, who wasn't as useful here as he was in the original.

My third team was Terra/Celes/Strago/Relm, which I used to beat the tower, but then I lost all that footage, though not the gameplay. Knowing the next couple bosses, I brought Mog to do this run since he has access to a couple useful spells. I also got Strago Aero before this run for extra wind damage.

I also ran from every encounter since I didn't feel like fighting a bunch of battles when I was going to continue from my original run's progress anyway, so I didn't bother capturing the rest of the regular encounters. They use magic, there's your description.



Magic Pots are interesting, though. They'll throw Elixirs at the party and run away.



Also, balls.



First chest is the Death Ward. Stamina +7, blocks Zombie/Instant Death, and gives auto Safe/Shell. Solid defensive relic.



If you remember, there's a switch that unlocks another chest the level below.



This time, instead of the Air Anchor, we get Crusader.

Name: Crusader
Characters: Celes
Stat Boosts: Magic +2
Spells: Merton (2)

A nice +2 Magic option for Celes, plus a fire attack to balance out learning Ice3 and Bolt3 naturally. I let her learn it during the tower in the original run, of course, while also boosting her magic a bit.



The rest of the treasures are good, but not as exciting (Relic Ring, Genji Helm, Force Armor). Otherwise, there's the White Dragon.



He'll start off with Mute, which can be annoying.



White Dragon is weak to Poison, so a dual-casting Mog, a Raze-casting Strago, and a Morphed Poison-casting Terra do quite a bit of damage to him.



Of course, since it's the White Dragon, he'll counter with Holy, though it helps that Relm and Strago have Reflect Rings on.



And hey, RegenX goes right through Reflect!





White's peskiest move is to cure itself with Holy Wind. Just gotta burn through its HP.





Other than a nasty Quasar attack, it's pretty simple, though long since it can heal itself. Our prize is the holy-elemental spear, Longinus, which boosts HP by 25%.



And again, another hint about the switch to Crusader being next to the Death Ward relic.



Skipping ahead, the Pendant we need to enter Kefka's Tower is here.







But not without a fight, of course!



He still has the Wallchange gimmick, though without the nasty Ultima death spell fortunately.



So you may think, so what? Just skip the gimmick and rip through him with non-elemental attacks like Flare.





He'll counter those with a powerful move and fully healing himself. Nope, you have to play by his rules (unless you cast Dispel on him, I hear, but I didn't try it this run).



He'll randomly be weak to an element, at which point you lay into him with that element. Unfortunately, spells with two elements don't work since he'll be immune to the other seven he's not weak to. But for Wind, Mog and Terra have Break and Strago has Aero.



Poison's similarly easy. In fact, Terra alone has five elements covered (Fire/Ice/Bolt/Wind/Poison), with Mog holding Poison/Earth and Strago having Ice/Wind/Water. Even Relm has Fire to use when she's not healing.



Also, Terra's brushing against the damage cap here unmorphed. That's pretty wonderful.



Overall, I had fun with this battle. Not too difficult, just knowing what spells do what, and giving you an excuse to use spells like Break and Poison.



Our reward is the Gem Box, which now is a Terra-exclusive relic that boosts Vigor and Magic by 7 and halves all MP costs. Pretty damn awesome. If you prefer Celes to cast magic, simply bet the thing in the Coliseum to get the Soul Box, which does the same exact thing except it's Celes-exclusive.





That's all the dungeons! After this, I grinded some more Rages and Lores for Strago off-screen, the latter now having every Lore besides Tsunami.

Now for a few loose ends, like Brachosaur.



All sorts of nasty multi-target attacks like Starlight and Meteor. It's weak to ice, though.



Look at that beautiful damage!



No reward, though it's still nice to kill it.



There's still these guys, though obviously after killing the Brachosaur they're not as threatening.



Next up, restocking on items.



I'm even finally investing in scrolls for Shadow!





I also do a bit of bidding at the Auction House, getting another Zephyr Cape and a Hero Ring, which boosts HP/MP by 25%, Vigor/Magic by 7, and protects near-death allies.



Also bought this but I don't know what this is and couldn't find it in my invetory, so who knows.









Also got the rest of Shadow's dreams because why not.



Finally, I got around to getting some stuff from the Coliseum.



Took a few tries, but eventually Edgar spent more time jumping than getting hit and won the Omega Weapon.



Also traded to the Apocolypse.



I figured Avenger would be more useful than the Stunner, losing 10 attack, 10MBlock, and 2 speed for 7 Vigor, holy-elemental, and being accessible by Setzer, Locke, and Gogo.



Traded Frostgore for Stormfang since the latter is stronger.



Finally, you can trade all the unbuyable starting items for high-end consumables like X-Ethers and Phoenix Tears.



Magic Pots just use Evil Toot in the Coliseum, and Umaro's tackle gets by their high evasion, so I get some X-Ethers.



And this is just a direct upgrade, so why not?





Now let's get into Kefka's Tower. These are most likely going to be my final parties, though I may still switch some around. I like using the original twelve for Kefka's Tower simply due to each of them getting a line before fighting Kefka.







I'll probably give Terra the Omega Weapon since no one else is grabbing it and it gives her more stat boosts. I may also give Sabin the Nirvana Band over Cyan since Sabin has more Stamina attacks he may actually use. Setzer gets a lower-end knife simply for the stat boosts since I never attack with him (though that may change once I get the Fixed Dice).

And now for character summaries.



Terra is pretty damn awesome at magic, having the most spells in the game and being able to rip enemies apart with the L3 spells, plus being rather effective with Wind/Posion weaknesses as well. She's also a great healer, and the Gem Box makes her magic even more useful. She doesn't even have her ultimate spell yet! And of course, her equipment options are great, and Morph is great for killing enemies even harder. Just as awesome here as in the original.



Honestly, Sabin's physical prowess, though impressive in the beginning, kinda pales now compared to Cyan and Edgar. Still, he's got lots of variety in his Blitzes and Golem. His recovery skills suck, but inflicting Seizure's still great, and Bum Rush is still awesome as ever. Plus, he can still Suplex anything, which is always awesome.



Locke hasn't had as much a chance to catch up, but he's decent at offense, healing, and even a bit of magic with Fire 3. I'll need to boost his MP up a bit, but his speed helps make him even more versatile. I have a feeling he'll shine a bit better once he gets time to catch up a bit.



Mog's very versatile, but for my game I'm opting mostly toward his Dances, which give some nice alternate healing and attacks. Bio and Quake are nice spells to have as well, and he's kinda tankish. He's alright, not one of my favorites this run but still decent.



This is how Cyan was fucking meant to be. Probably my hardest hitter, with Bushido being much more useful. He has no trouble cutting through everything in his path. He can even do a small bit of healing if needed. He's definitely one of my favorites in this hack.



Another one of my favorites. Sketch still sucks, and Relm quite frankly sucks in the WoB, but once she gets Starlet and Bahamut, holy crap. Cure3, RegenX, Flare, Meteor, she's freaking amazing at both healing and attacking, plus her brushes are nice free heals. Definitely a solid character to have.



Shadow's physical attacks aren't anything to write home about, but man, his speed makes him great at chucking items. And now that I'm going to actually bother giving him Scrolls to throw, he'll be even more useful. Can't wait to see how awesome he is at chucking items at enemies.



Strago's crazy slow, getting lapped by others even with Haste. His regular magic is kinda underwhelming even with X-Magic, but his Lores are pretty awesome and versatile. Raze and Black Omen are just fantastic to have, and many others like Raid and Holy Wind are nice to have as well. He's pretty damn powerful once you get him going.



Edgar's tools aren't that great in WoR besides to inflict Seizure, but to make up for it, Dragoon Edgar is freaking strong, especially with a double jump. He's one of my best damage-dealers, and when he is on the ground he can tank magic attacks quite easily. He's definitely more fun to use to rain death from the sky.



Setzer is probably my tankiest character, especially when he constantly spams Lagomorph for free. His slots are also useful, and in general he's a solid healer when Lagomorph isn't enough. He'll survive most anything thrown at him, and you can't really beat that in a healer.



I made Celes more of a physical fighter this run, which works fine since she's got great offensive options available. Of course, she also has tons of awesome magic to attack/heal with, and Runic's slightly more versatile now. Another solid all-around character.



Finally, there's Gau, who's just as god-damn broken as the original. His physicals are crazy strong, his magic attacks are effective, and he's so damn fast that he'll clobber enemies to death before most characters even have a chance to do anything. Fuck yeah, Gau.

Next time, Kefka's Tower.