Quote Originally Posted by Lord Golbez View Post

By the way, I'm pretty sure the Sylph are not mandatory and that I've even beaten the game without collecting them before.
Yeah, I think I was mixing it up with something else from another game of the era. Fixed in the opening post.

The rare drop summons are the worst, especially Mindflayer because they're uncommon enemy encounters to begin with, so getting that drop on the first attempt in the Dark Elf Cave is a nightmare. I think in the DS version, I actually got most of the team to lv. 70 in the time it took me to get that item to drop.