Hello, fellow Pokemaniacs

[Yamaneko]

I never got around to beating this game back whenever and I'm in a particular mood that might attempt again. Now let's pretend I'm just completely clueless as to the gameplay mechanics and intricacies of what I recall to be a convoluted system I didn't particularly enjoy. Let us also pretend that I am interested in receiving advice as to preferred methods of play and strategy.

With the preliminaries out of the way, I am here to ask for help, tips, and whatever else you feel the need to tell me about the eighth installment in our beloved series. Just keep in mind I know very little. I read the tutorial at Squall's terminal, which pretty much confused me more than explained anything. I get the whole Junctioning thing is crucial to success, but beyond that, yeah. And the graphics are terrible, but I am a willing participant as long as I have you here to guide me. You talk, I listen.

This might be my first post in this forum.

[rubah]

Welcome to EoFF8, yamaneko!

1) make sure you always junction your GFs and check which abilities they are learning. Don't put a whole bunch on one person unless you want the ones on another person to level up faster.

2) try not to level up very much. If you remain at low levels and maintain excellent levels of spells for junctioning, the game gets so much easier! Here are some basic ways to do this:

Run away (no exp, no ap)
Cast Break (no exp, no ap)
Use the !Card command (no exp, yes ap)
Use GFs to kill monsters (no "finishing blow" extra exp, yes ap)


3) draw magic forever, but never cast it.

4) explore everywhere and talk to everyone and tell us every single cute little scene you discover and we can talk about our experiences with the same!

[Aerith's Knight]

sadly.. rubah is correct.. this game is very depressing in that aspect -_-

[Yamaneko]

What abilities are the ones I should focus on learning and how do I know which magic best junctions with a particular stat?

[Aerith's Knight]

from what i remember

cure/cura/curaga/life/full-life ---- HP
fire(etc)/thunder(etc)/blizzard(etc)/ultima/doom ---- Atk/magic
protect/shell --- def

death - atk-special
esuna - def-special

but i think you can find good combinations in guides.. and youll figure it out yourself along the way

[Bolivar]

I would just play straight through, don't get too caught up in drawing. You can draw a little as you go, your stats don't have to be overly exploited to continue.

As for which magic works best with which stat, its best for you to see for yourself and compare, since you can see how much it'll raise it whenever you highlight it with the cursor. That's better than memorizing or looking out for specific magics.

As far as abilities, pick whichever ones you want, it's made to customize your characters how you want them. I usually go for junctions for stats early on to get them out of the way, then maybe a command if it's useful, then stat bonuses and refining abilities, so you can make more magic from the loot you get in battle. But once you get Diablo, which you should try to get early on, focus on getting Mug, as stealing is a really valuable ability, you need it to get alot of tools to refine weapons.

But yeah, just play through the story, side-quests, too, just don't get too caught up drawing/magic refining because it can get pretty boring pretty quickly.

[rubah]

the gf HP abilities (not player hp) are probably the least worth while.

[Roto13]

The entire junction system:

Junction elemental spells to your attack and defense to boost your elemental attack and defense.

Junction status altering spells to your attack and defense to cause and resist status ailments.

Junction anything to your stats to increase them.

Junction support abilities to have support abilities.

The end.

[Comet]

And remember, there is an Occult Fan in one of the bookshelves in the library. :tongue:

[Yamaneko]

Now obviously drawing magic and using it does not take away from your own stock, correct?

I think I'm getting the hang of it. I'm definitely spending more time in menus than I have in a FF game before. Just beat Ifrit on the 10min time limit.

[Marshall Banana]

If you like Triple Triad, you should play it to collect cards and refine them into items with Quezacotl's Card Mod ability. Items that are refined from cards also refine into magic spells or can be used to upgrade weapons. One Cockatrice card refines into one Cockatrice Pinion, which refines into twenty Break spells, for example; Cockatrice Pinion is also one of the items required for the upgrade of Rinoa's weapon to Cardinal.

Once you have Ifrit's card and Diablos' card (which you get after you defeat them), Triple Triad is super easy. In Balamb, Zell's mother and a student at the dock have good cards; the students in Galbadia Garden also have good cards.

[Aerith's Knight]

I never really got how that worked.. i did however, kick ass in FFIX card game.. so i blame FFVIII

[rubah]

triple triad is super easy and you can play it anywhere! (if you print out the cards anyways)

[Yamaneko]

Yeah, I still don't get how to play it. The tutorial is terrible at explaining the rules. I there a good guide online that maps out the rules effectively?

[Marshall Banana]

These pages seem helpful:


Rules (http://www.rpgclassics.com/shrines/psx/ff8/cards/5.shtml)
Sample game (http://www.rpgclassics.com/shrines/psx/ff8/cards/samplegame.shtml)

[Roogle]

You will want to learn the Enc-Half and Enc-None abilities from the Guardian Force Diabolos when you some time, too.

Follow the guidelines to avoid receiving experience points while you learn those skills, or else Squall will have an inflated level compared to the rest of the party, and your boss battles will be slightly more difficult —

[Vivisteiner]

Now obviously drawing magic and using it does not take away from your own stock, correct?
Thats a given.

[Yamaneko]

Is the T-Rexaur a random encounter in the training facility? The dude just won't appear. Is it worth it to fight it?

[Roogle]

Yes. T-Rexaur is a random encounter in the Training Facility of Balamb Garden.

[rubah]

he's pretty hard if you don't have sleep magic, blizzard, or shiva.

[Breine]

I never really got how that worked.. i did however, kick ass in FFIX card game.. so i blame FFVIII

Really? For me it's always been the other way around. The card game in FFVIII was super easy, while the one in FFIX was more complicated.

Also, Junction-wise Water is a great magic spell to get, and you'll be able to get it early in the game. First, acquire the ability from Shiva where you'll be able to change items into ice/water spells (I think it's I Mag-RF), then go to any beach and fight the small orange fish that both float in the air and hide in the sand. They'll then drop Fish Fins that you can change into Water spells. Very easy, and very useful!

[Roogle]

he's pretty hard if you don't have sleep magic, blizzard, or shiva.

Blind is an effective method of halting the T-Rexaur, too.

[Tallulah]

Re T- Rexaur: You can also find them in the forests on Balamb Island, near the Garden and the Fire Cavern. Be careful if you go leveling in the forests there. Not that you will if you want a low-level game as suggested.

[Jessweeee♪]

I didn't read through everything so I might repeat some stuff :p


MAGIC!


Don't worry too much about using junctioned magic. A good way to stay balanced is to use Cast instead. I myself like to draw for every few spells I cast :p
You don't need to spend twenty minutes drawing every time you encounter a monster. I recommend drawing once with each character every time you have an encounter.
Have your GFs learn junction abilities and refining abilities first. Refining will give you lots and lots of magic!
Have Quetzacoatl learn Card, then Card refine as soon as you want to start on refining abilities. Cards refine into items that will refine into oodles of magic! GF cards especially.
Don't worry about overleveling, just go with the flow. You can easily fix your junctions to overcome any difficulty. If you get things just right, the only enemy that's even remotely challenging is Omega Weapon.



That's all for now n.n

[crono_logical]

Follow the guidelines to avoid receiving experience points while you learn those skills, or else Squall will have an inflated level compared to the rest of the party, and your boss battles will be slightly more difficult —Of course, you could always just keep Squall dead in the party :D

[BG-57]

Draw from every boss you encounter. You can get some nifty GFs and spells that way.

Junctioning 100 Ultima to Elem-Def will allow you to become immune to elemental magic.

Junctioning 100 Pain to Stat-Def will make you immune to three status ailments at once.

Junctioning Pain to Stat-Atk will allow you to inflict the same three status elements.

Some monsters can be instantly killed by junctioning 100 Deaths to Stat-Atk.

Triple Triad is worth playing just for items you can refine from them. But I found it fun. :D

[Yamaneko]

I'm at the beginning of disc 2 at the prison looking for Squall.

Apparently I started drawing every boss after the radio tower encounter because I forgot to get Siren. Is there any other way to get that GF?

I'm sticking to the basic rules of Triple Triad and not playing people with the weird random rules.

Squall is too high a level compared to everyone else. I might just KO him and level up the rest of my characters up to his level and then start running away from more battles.

Zombie works great on HP-J surprisingly.

But yeah, the Siren thing kinda sucks.

[rubah]

You can get siren at the very end of the game. She's not all that useful as a GF anyways, except she does have the Tool refine (I think) so you might want that.

Don't level up your characters to catch up to squall, that'll just hurt their levels later on!

Zombie works well because the magic in ff8 tends to take on a 'if it sounds good, it works really good, and if it sounds opposite, it still works pretty good!' You can junction Death magic to HP or was it vit? (especially luck) for great success.

[Jessweeee♪]

Levels don't mean anything. I wouldn't do any power leveling until you get a GF ability that boosts your stats for every level :p


That really sucks about Siren, though, Treatment is a really useful ability ;_;

...but I guess you can just get her later ._.


I think the next GF you can draw on disc two is Leviathan from NORG. (Best boss evar Fushufuru).


!

Did you get the magic lamp from Cid before going to Timber? I hope you got the magic lamp. It would be terrible if you didn't get the magic lamp.

[Marshall Banana]

I don't think it's possible to not get Diablos' lamp!

[Aerith's Knight]

lol yeah, its part of the ingame storyline xD

[Breine]

I actually missed it playing through the game for the first time :(

[rubah]

but you could sell it or throw it away!

[Yamaneko]

I have Diablos.

[Jessweeee♪]

Really? I thought if you didn't go back and talk to him you wouldn't get it. Maybe I'm remembering wrong xD

I just ask because his magic refining abilities are my favorite for junctioning magic <3