Beating Shinra on the 3rd chapter:

For people who want to beat Shinra in chapter 3, you need to master 1 thing before you battle him
- Learn to use Coin Count Echo

At the tournament you are given the following coins:

1
2
3
5

** One of them comes with "Coin Count Echo", can't remember which

Starting: 1st turn
Do not go overboard and use 10 coins to do a break. This will cause Shinra's sphere to give you very few coins for the next 3 turns, i.e. very few options and low quota. You will go a lot further by liminting your coin counts to lower than 5.

From the first turn you need to start trying to get a Coin Count echo chain going

At any break try to use the same number of coins to keep getting echoes. Aim for a low coin count: 3 coins or 2 coins. Aiming for a chain of 4 coins is a bit risky. It is almost impossible to keep a good echo chain going with higher number of coins on most opponents, Shinra in particular.

If you keep on a steady 3 coins chain you will be close to 100 way before your last turn. Shinra's sphere throws a couple of "1" that will break your chain. Just start again, avoiding the "10 coins on a break syndrome" (unless you are at 90 coins and you can fill the quota in this turn, then go for it!)

Exception: Sphere throws a "2"
If you have just started a new chain and the sphere throws a 2 is party time: Pick 3 or 5 (or any odd number) from your center coins and then pick all the even coins on the border. Finish with an odd coin on the border that gives you goodies or use the other odd center coin. (5 if you started with 3's or vice versa). But this will cause the sphere to thorw very few coins for the next 3-4 turns so you may want to stop after the 5th coin...

http://www.ffx2.com/forum/showthread...1&page=3&pp=10