Need help with Death Riders (DoS)

Okay, I can get through Jade Passage like nothing. The only time I'm in trouble there is when I get ambushed by a group of five Abyss Worms. But as soon as I step into Pandaemonium, I get slaughtered by the Death Riders. The rest of the monsters I can handle easily enough (on the first floor, at least). Are there any tricks to killing these guys? Here's my setup (roughly):

Frionel - HP: 3000, Weapons: Excalibur and Ripper, only good magic is Teleport but it's only level 7
Maria - HP: 4500, Weapon: Yoichi's Bow, Decent magic: Cure 15, Osmose 6, Esuna 5, Life 5
Guy - HP: 4500, Weapons: a strong sword (forget which), a strong lance (forget which), Magic: Fire 9, Blizzard 6, Thunder 6, Flare 4, Ultima 1
Leon - HP: 2500, Weapons: a sword and a spear, can't remember which, no magic

My basic strategy is to have Maria heal and use Osmose when she's running low on MP, attacking only when neither of those needs to be done. Frionel, Guy and Leon pretty much stick to physical attacks. It works fine for everything else, but I just can't take on these Death Riders.

My strategy involved swearing and resetting. There's nothing you can do about them raping you for 2000 damage a swing to my knowledge except for constantly healing.

So there's no real strategy involved eh? Well, I saved and restored when necessary (twice, I think) until I got up to 3F. From then on it was alright, I wasn't running into groups of Death Riders every single fight anymore. I had a chance to recover and Osmose my MP back between run-ins. Now I'm on 4F getting the Genji equipment in the back rooms. Much easier now!

Yep, as expected, the rest of the game was simple. A group of three Death Riders was far more difficult than the final boss. Now on to Soul of Rebirth!

Actually there is a strategy. It's called "raise your evasion". But since you've beaten it already, it doesn't matter.

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Originally Posted by DarkLadyNyara

Actually there is a strategy. It's called...

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Originally Posted by Jowy

swearing and resetting. There's nothing you can do about them raping you for 3900 damage a swing.

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EVER!

Aaaand, beat it. Soul of Rebirth wasn't really hard, it was just a few hours of levelling and then taking on the dungeon, fighting the bonus boss somewhere in the middle.

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Originally Posted by Martyr

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Originally Posted by DarkLadyNyara

Actually there is a strategy. It's called...

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Originally Posted by Jowy

swearing and resetting. There's nothing you can do about them raping you for 3900 damage a swing.

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EVER!

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Evasion leveling is quite easy on DoS. Really, just use a sheild for much of the game, and stick to light armor. I've had certain characters not take a single hit from the bastards. Also, really high HP= bad. :D

Yes, but keep in mind that most people don't know how to use FFII's unorthodox growth system to their advantage. I didn't even know how important Evasion could be until I already played the game four times.

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Originally Posted by DarkLadyNyara

Evasion leveling is quite easy on DoS. Really, just use a sheild for much of the game, and stick to light armor. I've had certain characters not take a single hit from the bastards. Also, really high HP= bad. :D

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HP raises on its own in the DoS version.

To defeat Death Riders, I'd suggest casting something like Blink, Berserk, Haste and Protect on your party, and things like Curse, Toad and Death on the enemies. Then whack away with physical attacks and spells like Holy and Flare. In DoS, you can save between every battle if you want to, so you can even avoid the Death Riders if you want to. I never found them really hard, but I thought Souls of Rebirth was extremely tough.

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HP raises on its own in the DoS version.

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True, there are automatic HP gains, but in general they don't compare to the damage induced ones. So you can still go through the game with your HP quite low.

High HP is useless if your Defense and Evasion sucks.
Basically, try getting your Defense and Evasion up first-hand, then you can start worrying about the HP. :)

More evasion than defense. In fact, at this point in the game, defense is all but useless.