Part 26: Bonus: What Might Have Been (Part One)

Bonus: What Might Have Been (Part One)

One of Persona 2's selling points is the wide variety of Personas that are available to the characters; I've been trying to show off as many as I can, but there's only five characters at most at any given time to distribute them amongst. Thus, there's a lot of Personas that won't be used in this playthrough.

In order to rectify this, we'll take a moment now and before the end of the game and take a look at the Personas that didn't quite make the cut. Personas are arranged by Arcanum, in case you've forgotten or haven't been keeping track; each character is more or less compatible with Personas from each Arcanum. Additionaly, each character's strongest Arcanum relates to that character in a way, so I'll provide who's best with each as we go through the list.

Enjoy!

Magician
Used by Persona 1's Alana

Tengu is actually surprisingly varied for a Persona at his level; Maha Garu is nice for Fusion Spells, and Recarm is always handy for resurrection. However, he ends up becoming a jack of all trades, master of none, since he lacks a decent "power" spell.

Agrippa doesn't really have anything to reccomend him. Being strong against magic is great, sure, but his spells are garbage for his level, not to mention he looks really fucking creepy with that doll he's carrying around.

Abeno Seimei is a fairly standard Persona except for two specific nice qualities. First off, he reflects all magic, which rocks very, very hard. Secondly, he's got Summon Spirit, which is eventually used to create summon spells via Fusion. The spell and fusions themselves aren't that great, but the spell is rare so it's worth mentioning.

Priestess
Used by Persona 1's Mary

Tensen Nyan Nyan is probably not the character mentioned in that Wikipedia article, but it's the closest I can get, so. She absolutely fucking loves her status attacks, with Fata Morgana, Dream Needle, and Marin Karin all throwing various flavors of ailment at the enemies. Sadly, status attacks are largely useless, and Medirama isn't enough to save her since Maia Custom is available earlier and can heal more effectively.

Parvati looks mysteriously similar to Iris. She's honestly not all that bad, as Refresh Ring and Recarm are both great to have and Bufudyne isn't awful for a power spell. She loses out largely because there's better options at the level she's available.

Heirophant
Used by Nate

Genjo is basically all over the place; he's got healing, Almighty and Holy damage, and a status attack. Sadly he's not really good at anything he tries to do, so we took a pass on him.

Umayado no Ouji is worthwhile for one thing and one thing only - that'd be the Estoma spell he gains at his final rank. Unfortunately for him, we've got Hotei, who has Estoma and other decent spells besides.

Yama is actually pretty cool; not only does he look like a superhero, he focuses on both Dark and Holy attacks, which is pretty unusual amongst Personas. Sadly, his specialties don't lend themselves very well to Fusions, so he got benched.

Mithra is pretty lame for the level he's available at. Photon Cannon is cool, but it doesn't fuse well, and Fear Torrent is easily replaced by Water Fusion Spells.

Empress
Used by Yuki

Nemesis is another Persona that's not bad for the level she's available, but just wouldn't fit into the party setup we're using. Triple Down in particular does a pretty good chunk of Gun damage, so if you absolutely must have physical damage of some sort, Nemesis is a good choice to deliver it.

Seioubo (Listed as "The goddess who lives in the Gozan") can't really decide what she wants to do. Taru Kaja is a handy buff, though there's better, and she's got Holy, Almighty, and Throwing damage as well. None of this helps much, however, so she gets flushed.

Rinok is a Filipino Earth goddess, and boy does she love Earth. She's a little too concentrated for my taste. That's a shame, too, because she looks badass.

Emperor
Used by Persona 1's main character

Airgetlam is one of those gods in the list, I'm pretty sure. He's basically useless, as his spells suck, so he's benched.

Marduk is also basically useless due to not having any decent spells. Bersac and Posumudi are embarassments and his attack spells aren't much better.

Baal is actually pretty awesome, despite being concentrated a bit too hard on water. The guys are pretty strongly compatable with him, and he can heal, which is unusual and makes him handy at times.

Hurakan is all about physical damage, and he does it well if you're into that sort of thing; he's even got Taru Kaja to buff himself for even more physical damage. Sadly, I don't care much for physical, so he goes in the trash.

Lovers
Used by  Lisa 

Pixie would be garbage if she didn't have one specific use - it's possible to stick a powerful healing spell on her via a Spell Card and use her for cheap healing between battles.

Robin Goodfellow is like Callisto, but worse. Pass.

Jack Frost is really cute and we all love him! Sadly he's just too concentrated to be very helpful in combat - that Atomic Bufula spell is used in summon Fusions, though.

Jack o' Lantern is better than Jack Frost, but still not that great. You'll never need this much fire.

Vivian would be pretty solid if she was about five levels lower. As it is, there's Personas that can do better water and ice damage, heal more effectively, and cast status better than she can. Alas.

Chariot
Used by Persona 1's Mark

Minotaur has Wall of Earth, which is...well, it's useless. So are the rest of Minotaur's shitty spells.

Taranis looks pretty cool, and if you're into physical attacks he's not too bad to have since he's got a fair mix of them. I, however, am not. Poor Taranis.

Seiten Taisei doesn't do anything new. Yay, he shoots fire! Yay, he stabs things! Yay, everybody else can do that and better!

Susano-o is another physical Persona. He's damn good at it, too, so hand him over to one of the guys and have him bash away if that's your bag.

Strength
Used by nobody

Ryume is some sort of dragon horse from some sort of Chinese myth thingy. It's another one of those Personas that falls prey to the "really good, but there's better options" trap.

Otohime is totally gay for Water. Useful if you need a shitload of Water in the level 21 range; we did not.

Kerepres is a Spanish flying dragon, and a really, really shitty Persona.

Taksaka is a king of the Naga in Hindu mythology, and is another shitty Persona. Strength doesn't really bring much to the table, huh?

Hermit
Used by nobody

Nekomata is a fucking furry and God knows we don't want any of that shit in our party. She's actually not too bad a Persona, but she's outgrown not long after you're able to use her.

Tenhou Gensui has a pretty strong variety of spells; sadly, they're a variety of spells we don't need, including Earth damage, physicals, and a physical Defense buff.

Grinbulsti is a physical/magical hybrid Persona, and not a very good one at that, unless your party's strapped for Earth damage.

Byakko is just nuts about Water, but it's really only useful for a special Fusion with Suzaku, Genbu, and Seiryu.

Genbu is like Byakko but with more Earth. It's actually pretty good if you're looking for Earth, though it's got both Magdyne and Maha Magdyne which is a bit redundant.

Kinich Ahau is great at frying things and that's about it. Freidyne is actually pretty damn cool, and it makes for a good Nuclear Blast fusion if you've got other Nuclear Personas.

Fortune
Used by  Jun 

Cerberus has some great defenses, and that's the biggest draw to it; it's also got healing and resurrection, but it's sorely lacking for damage.

Hanged Man
Used by Baofu

Shax is a huge fucking bird in a trenchcoat. That's . However his spells are garbage, especially given his level, so that's all he's got going for him.

Kabanda has fuckloads of Water and some shitty physical attacks we'd never use ever. Starting to see a pattern here?

Barbatos is fucking . Just look at him. Sadly none of his spells are worthwhile for his level, but holy shit he's cool.

Justice
Used by Katsuya and Persona 1's Brad

Mars has fire, healing, physical attacks, and absolutely no use at all.

Gundari Myouou is one of the five great kings of Buddhism. Despite looking awesome, he doesn't really have much to offer, from his annoying weakness to his shitty spells.

Death
Used by nobody

Ankou is just awesome-looking, and not too bad for physical attacks as well. Not too hot otherwise.

Temperance
Used by nobody

Fearal is a bird! Birds use wind! Birds are useless! Bye Fearal!

Stuparideth is also known as Stymphalides, and is also known as crap.

Phoenix has fire and resurrection, ha ha, because it dies in fire and is reborn get it? Not enough punch behind any of its attacks, and if you need this much resurrection you're doing something wrong.

Devil
Used by nobody

Poltergeist is basically useless, save for one thing; when attempting to mutate a Persona, it can fail and be converted into a Poltergeist Persona instead. Keeping a Poltergeist around prevents this from happening, as you can only have one of any given Persona summoned at once.

Surt is physical, I don't like physical, blah blah blah.

Tower
Used by  Guido Kandori 

Kanaloa is just too for me. I'm terrified of it.

Aeshma is just too watery for me. I'm terrified of it.

Judgment
Used by Ellen

Phaleg is just way too weak for the level he's available at. There's better Water options.

Moon
Used by Maya

Pariker are nymphs that conspire with Azi Dahaka in Zoroastrian myth to steal rainclouds; this particular Pariker is only handy for her ability to void all physical attacks except Sword, which comes in handy if you're having trouble with Shimazu.

Succubus is just too status-heavy. Most of this crap won't work until the tenth time or so you try it.

Star
Used by Ulala

Kimnara has Trafuri, which lets you escape from battles and isn't really that great. It's also got nothing else of value. Pass.

Gandharva is Kimnara, but eleven levels higher and without Trafuri. Bah.

Kenren Taishou has Tetraja, which blocks physical attacks and is kinda nice. Otherwise he's not worth bothering with.

Heinir is physical-heavy and I don't like physical stuff!

Likewise with Valkyrie!

Sun
Used by Tatsuya

Kinich Kakmo looks pretty awesome, but his only decent spell is Tetraja and even that doesn't help much.

World
Used by nobody

Demeter can learn one of the spells required for a summon Fusion, but she's too status-heavy otherwise to be of much use.