Final Fantasy VII with Jobs Part IV
Oct. 19th, 2023 12:03 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
freshfeelingThese final two play sessions were on Feburary 3rd and February 5th 2022. We unfortunately missed the deadline of this timed event.
Having missed the deadline, my shame shall live on forever in the Wayback Machine.
May as well finish though, right? We're in Midgar just about to end Disc 2/Part 2. The jobs, of course, are the same as last time. We have unlocked just a few more things than we started with last time, and we have done much in the way of late-game sidequests so we are lacking certain heavy-hitters as Magic Counter, Slash-All, Quadra Magic, W-Summon, and Knights of Round. Beyond that kind of thing my characters are close to fully-realized in their jobs.
Fairly quickly, we ran into the Turks. This is normally one of those battles that I love because there are great items to steal, but we have no way to benefit from that this time. Yuffie set up Haste, Cloud set up buffs and healed, and Barret set poison on all three of these enemies. This set up a very controlled battle. Cloud ended it by using Climhazzard on Elena.
We went left to enter the Shinra Building. For some reason I decided I wanted to get the Behemoth Horn from the stairwell. There were a couple of other weapons here, including Cait Sith's ultimate weapon, but it was really nothing very exciting.
Onward to Proud Clod. I brought Barrett to ensure he'd be able to get his ultimate weapon too, even though he was fairly unlikely to use it. Too bad I didn't bring Vincent; I find some of the interactions of this enemy with summon animations pretty hilarious. Proud Clod was a silly fight where I was remarking on how little danger it posed throughout. Yuffie finished it off with her Conformer, and Cloud equipped the Ragnarok immediately afterward.
Hojo didn't end up being interesting. It's really strange to think that I had a game over so recently when the bosses were so easy. These bosses definitely do pay off in tons of levelled-up materia.
With that, we're done Disc 2/Part 2 and onto Disc 3/Part 3. I'm not just rushing the final area, though. The first thing I thought I should do was the remaining features in Wutai. I used the Leviathan Scales on the Da Chao statues and I also did the pagoda, which I normally do in Disc 1. The first four fights were won in a single action. Godo would've been two, but I thought I should use Yuffie's time mage skills to set up a speed differential. That was pretty pointless.
Next I decided to see about hunting down Ultimate Weapon. He takes a long time to settle down after a fight so after one round with him I chose to go to the Northern Cave for the first time. My team was Cloud, Blue Cid and Yuffie. We used a lot of Phoenix Downs in the first several screens, which is actually pretty normal given all of the Lv.4 Death and Lv.5 Death, but generally we managed well. I hadn't used any source items in the entire game, and at one point I was so frustrated with how often Cid was dying that I used a bunch of Guard Sources and Mind Sources on him.
When we got to the split path, I remembered to make Tifa go right to get an extra Mystile, and I reformed my team with Cloud, Yuffie and Cait Sith. I hadn't used Cait Sith the black mage for a very long time! He has some pretty good options now, including Ultima and Contain. This got even better a very short time later when we got Magic Counter.
I ran through picking up items, including really nice ones that I can't use like Mega All, and then backtracked to get the extras from the other party members. The swamp path is always a fun one; I had a handful of Elixirs that I effectively redeemed for thousands of AP here, and it feels like I encountered more Master Tonberries than any other enemy group in the Northern Cave.
We grabbed Shield, Counter, and W-Magic and met up with our friends just before the point-of-no-return and saved nearby.
The plan as I started was to just... do the rest of the Northern Cave and do the endgame rather than leaving for sidequests and whatnot. This meant going back to the right path where I had sent Tifa in the first place. I had a big plan to avoid fighting Dragon Zombies since I wanted an opportunity to learn their Pandora's Box ability on my Enemy Skill materia, which only Cid and Red XIII can use. Pandora's Box is only cast by enemies once per save file, so it can be tricky to learn. I got through and saved. I didn't even bother going back to get Pandora's Box; when I met up with the team I was too tempted to say, "Let's mosey."
Since we were now going beyond the point-of-no-return, I put on ultimate weapons and promptly died to the first Iron Giant I ran into with some miscalculations and input errors.
Well, I had wanted to get Pandora's Box anyway. I just needed to find means to change my team, which I thought probably meant exiting the entire dungeon. I guess that means more levels and AP anyway. And since I was leaving the Northern Cave anyway, I went back to some shops to restock my consumable items.
When I re-entered the Northern Cave, my team was Cloud, Blue Cid and Vincent. Vincent happens to have 14 summon materia equipped, which gives him ridiculously low HP.
On our trek back through, the goal was to get Angel Whisper and Pandora's Box. We got Angel Whisper from a Pollensalta (sp?) in our first battle on the right path. Very shortly after, we encountered a Dragon Zombie.
We also got Bad Breath that I had skipped earlier. It's not like these enemy skills were going to make some big difference, but some of the consumables might. Somehow I found myself feeling considerably more prepared for the endgame sequence.
For the trip down, I picked Cloud, Blue Cid and Cait Sith. The Iron Giants were much more manageable with this team. Cid managed to learn Big Brawl and thus Highwind in the second battle from the end, so that was timely. Jenova*Synthesis was really easy. I don't remember how any of the special conditions around the fight work, but I just had good buffs up and used all of my awesome damage options. Cait Sith was my primary offense with Ultima and Flare. Cait Sith managed to take our Jenova*Synthesis when its count was at 1.
The Bizarro Sephiroth fight goes differently depending on certain circumstances that I don't recall. Almost always in previous plays, I've been asked to make three teams (which means one group is just two characters). This probably has something to do with being over-prepared. This time, though, I was only making two teams.
Team 1 was Cloud, Blue Cid, and Cait Sith. Team 2 was Red XIII, Barret and Yuffie. Vincent is a bit too delicate and Tifa, as a knight, is a bit too useless. I set my teams and spent some time over-thinking their setups.
Bizarro Sephiroth is (suitably?) a strange boss fight. It's not particularly strong, and it's the only multi-party fight in the whole game so it feels very out-of-place. The way you get prompted to switch parties is awkward, too. I had both Cid and Red XIII using Pandora's Box for some offense which seems to cause something like... an after-image-like second copy of the enemy model to appear in battle. I only observed this in this fight and with Jenova*Synthesis. Very strange.
We had to switch teams a few times, lots of weird things happened, the animations were really slow, at one point Red XIII's Limit Break was completely skipped... but anyway, we won.
I had the foresight to keep a Ribbon equipped on Cloud, and even to use Vaccines during this fight to mitigate the role status effects play, because they're pretty nasty. My offense was mostly Cait Sith's Flare spells, what Cid could do with Enemy Skill, and Limit Breaks. The rest was a matter of staying alive. It's so fun when you're hit with a Super Nova and everyone gets their limits at once.
Cid finished off Sephiroth with a barrage of missiles. We were only hit with Super Nova once, and with a bit of care this fight was pretty easy. Not only do we have weird restricted materia due to jobs, but as a sidequest aficionado this is probably one of the lowest-leveled teams I've finished this game with.
This was fairly fun. I wish I met the deadline, but playing through a game of this scale in two weeks is actually pretty tough for me, at least when I'm not on vacation. If there was one thing I didn't like about it, it's the design of the mime job. I think the idea from the 2023 version of the event is a bit better, but it would still be no fun at all for like 80% of the game.
I decided I wasn't going to go for the triple crown of also beating Ruby Weapon and Emerald Weapon on this save file, since the timed event was already over. Maybe I'll consider doing that if I play this again with better time management. This event also definitely gave me ideas of how it could relate to my "Final Fantasy Classic Jobs" playthroughs.
<< Start | < Previous | Index
Having missed the deadline, my shame shall live on forever in the Wayback Machine.
May as well finish though, right? We're in Midgar just about to end Disc 2/Part 2. The jobs, of course, are the same as last time. We have unlocked just a few more things than we started with last time, and we have done much in the way of late-game sidequests so we are lacking certain heavy-hitters as Magic Counter, Slash-All, Quadra Magic, W-Summon, and Knights of Round. Beyond that kind of thing my characters are close to fully-realized in their jobs.
Fairly quickly, we ran into the Turks. This is normally one of those battles that I love because there are great items to steal, but we have no way to benefit from that this time. Yuffie set up Haste, Cloud set up buffs and healed, and Barret set poison on all three of these enemies. This set up a very controlled battle. Cloud ended it by using Climhazzard on Elena.
We went left to enter the Shinra Building. For some reason I decided I wanted to get the Behemoth Horn from the stairwell. There were a couple of other weapons here, including Cait Sith's ultimate weapon, but it was really nothing very exciting.
Onward to Proud Clod. I brought Barrett to ensure he'd be able to get his ultimate weapon too, even though he was fairly unlikely to use it. Too bad I didn't bring Vincent; I find some of the interactions of this enemy with summon animations pretty hilarious. Proud Clod was a silly fight where I was remarking on how little danger it posed throughout. Yuffie finished it off with her Conformer, and Cloud equipped the Ragnarok immediately afterward.
Hojo didn't end up being interesting. It's really strange to think that I had a game over so recently when the bosses were so easy. These bosses definitely do pay off in tons of levelled-up materia.
With that, we're done Disc 2/Part 2 and onto Disc 3/Part 3. I'm not just rushing the final area, though. The first thing I thought I should do was the remaining features in Wutai. I used the Leviathan Scales on the Da Chao statues and I also did the pagoda, which I normally do in Disc 1. The first four fights were won in a single action. Godo would've been two, but I thought I should use Yuffie's time mage skills to set up a speed differential. That was pretty pointless.
Next I decided to see about hunting down Ultimate Weapon. He takes a long time to settle down after a fight so after one round with him I chose to go to the Northern Cave for the first time. My team was Cloud, Blue Cid and Yuffie. We used a lot of Phoenix Downs in the first several screens, which is actually pretty normal given all of the Lv.4 Death and Lv.5 Death, but generally we managed well. I hadn't used any source items in the entire game, and at one point I was so frustrated with how often Cid was dying that I used a bunch of Guard Sources and Mind Sources on him.
When we got to the split path, I remembered to make Tifa go right to get an extra Mystile, and I reformed my team with Cloud, Yuffie and Cait Sith. I hadn't used Cait Sith the black mage for a very long time! He has some pretty good options now, including Ultima and Contain. This got even better a very short time later when we got Magic Counter.
I ran through picking up items, including really nice ones that I can't use like Mega All, and then backtracked to get the extras from the other party members. The swamp path is always a fun one; I had a handful of Elixirs that I effectively redeemed for thousands of AP here, and it feels like I encountered more Master Tonberries than any other enemy group in the Northern Cave.
We grabbed Shield, Counter, and W-Magic and met up with our friends just before the point-of-no-return and saved nearby.
The plan as I started was to just... do the rest of the Northern Cave and do the endgame rather than leaving for sidequests and whatnot. This meant going back to the right path where I had sent Tifa in the first place. I had a big plan to avoid fighting Dragon Zombies since I wanted an opportunity to learn their Pandora's Box ability on my Enemy Skill materia, which only Cid and Red XIII can use. Pandora's Box is only cast by enemies once per save file, so it can be tricky to learn. I got through and saved. I didn't even bother going back to get Pandora's Box; when I met up with the team I was too tempted to say, "Let's mosey."
Since we were now going beyond the point-of-no-return, I put on ultimate weapons and promptly died to the first Iron Giant I ran into with some miscalculations and input errors.
Well, I had wanted to get Pandora's Box anyway. I just needed to find means to change my team, which I thought probably meant exiting the entire dungeon. I guess that means more levels and AP anyway. And since I was leaving the Northern Cave anyway, I went back to some shops to restock my consumable items.
When I re-entered the Northern Cave, my team was Cloud, Blue Cid and Vincent. Vincent happens to have 14 summon materia equipped, which gives him ridiculously low HP.
On our trek back through, the goal was to get Angel Whisper and Pandora's Box. We got Angel Whisper from a Pollensalta (sp?) in our first battle on the right path. Very shortly after, we encountered a Dragon Zombie.
We also got Bad Breath that I had skipped earlier. It's not like these enemy skills were going to make some big difference, but some of the consumables might. Somehow I found myself feeling considerably more prepared for the endgame sequence.
For the trip down, I picked Cloud, Blue Cid and Cait Sith. The Iron Giants were much more manageable with this team. Cid managed to learn Big Brawl and thus Highwind in the second battle from the end, so that was timely. Jenova*Synthesis was really easy. I don't remember how any of the special conditions around the fight work, but I just had good buffs up and used all of my awesome damage options. Cait Sith was my primary offense with Ultima and Flare. Cait Sith managed to take our Jenova*Synthesis when its count was at 1.
The Bizarro Sephiroth fight goes differently depending on certain circumstances that I don't recall. Almost always in previous plays, I've been asked to make three teams (which means one group is just two characters). This probably has something to do with being over-prepared. This time, though, I was only making two teams.
Team 1 was Cloud, Blue Cid, and Cait Sith. Team 2 was Red XIII, Barret and Yuffie. Vincent is a bit too delicate and Tifa, as a knight, is a bit too useless. I set my teams and spent some time over-thinking their setups.
Bizarro Sephiroth is (suitably?) a strange boss fight. It's not particularly strong, and it's the only multi-party fight in the whole game so it feels very out-of-place. The way you get prompted to switch parties is awkward, too. I had both Cid and Red XIII using Pandora's Box for some offense which seems to cause something like... an after-image-like second copy of the enemy model to appear in battle. I only observed this in this fight and with Jenova*Synthesis. Very strange.
We had to switch teams a few times, lots of weird things happened, the animations were really slow, at one point Red XIII's Limit Break was completely skipped... but anyway, we won.
I had the foresight to keep a Ribbon equipped on Cloud, and even to use Vaccines during this fight to mitigate the role status effects play, because they're pretty nasty. My offense was mostly Cait Sith's Flare spells, what Cid could do with Enemy Skill, and Limit Breaks. The rest was a matter of staying alive. It's so fun when you're hit with a Super Nova and everyone gets their limits at once.
Cid finished off Sephiroth with a barrage of missiles. We were only hit with Super Nova once, and with a bit of care this fight was pretty easy. Not only do we have weird restricted materia due to jobs, but as a sidequest aficionado this is probably one of the lowest-leveled teams I've finished this game with.
This was fairly fun. I wish I met the deadline, but playing through a game of this scale in two weeks is actually pretty tough for me, at least when I'm not on vacation. If there was one thing I didn't like about it, it's the design of the mime job. I think the idea from the 2023 version of the event is a bit better, but it would still be no fun at all for like 80% of the game.
I decided I wasn't going to go for the triple crown of also beating Ruby Weapon and Emerald Weapon on this save file, since the timed event was already over. Maybe I'll consider doing that if I play this again with better time management. This event also definitely gave me ideas of how it could relate to my "Final Fantasy Classic Jobs" playthroughs.
<< Start | < Previous | Index
