Gameplay

GAMEPLAY

PRESENTATION WORLD MAP(S)

AREA MAPS SELECT MENU CHARACTERS' STATS Stats Skills Support Level EQUIPMENT STATS Types Status Change Attributes Weight

BATTLE ENCOUNTERS VICTORY! PARTY & FORMATIONS BATTLE MECHANICS Action Choice Phase Buffs & Debuffs Status COMMANDER MODE: FTechs - Spell Fusion Multi-magics

ADVANCED MONEY MANAGEMENT HEALING PARTY RECOMMENDATIONS SOLO PLAYTHROUGHS Tips - Invisible JP Playthroughs No-Magic Katarina Solo SPECIAL PLAYTHROUGHS All-Mage - Charmers FULL CM TIPS RTA & VARIA TIPS

PRESENTATION

- There are 31 playable characters in all, tons of techs, magics, places and quests, several character-related mini-games and maps, numerous endings...
- With the exception of the very beginning and the very end, the game is non-linear: you are completely free to explore the world in any fashion or order you like, and some events are exclusive (you have to make choices).
- Due to the enemy encounter system & alternate routes, you can rarely see all the 300+ enemies & monsters of the game in a single playthrough. Some fixed enemies scale with your party level, but usually the more you fight one specific type of enemies, the more powerful they become (and inversely if you don't, they stay weak).
- There is no EXP in this game! Instead you may become more proficient at the weapons or magics you use in battle. And your characters can learn new techs while fighting strong enemies.
- Enemy item drops are rare in general, and there are many items that can only be obtained that way (some of the best items are extremely rare drops from near-unique encounters).
- Gold (G) is a rare resource, scarcely dropped by monsters (why and how on earth would a Ghost even drop anything, eh?), that is mainly gained in quantity at specific points of the game (chests or rewards): grinding for money is completely superfluous (not recommended at all, even). Besides, you may not want to be overly greedy (there is an invisible Greed Counter). You can make extra money by selling unused or duplicate equipment. Gold is used to buy items in town shops. MaxG is 10,000 and the excess from rewards or sales goes in a bank for which you even have a card. See the Money Management section for more details.

All of this makes each playthrough a very unique experience and RS3 a dense and complex game with an immense replay value.

More interestingly maybe, it is probable that the development team wanted to make the game mechanics closer to 'real life': there are affinities that determine who is good at what (fixed stats, class, weapon of choice: genetics, education, personality), but combat experience and effective use in battle determine which skills might improve (used weapon proficiency random lvl up, random tech learning, more chances against strong enemies: challenge, resourcefulness and chance are important); neither items nor money lie around in the open for you to grab (evident!), even scavenging is difficult (rare gold & item drops); you can't steal things in regular people's houses (at last!); you have a global goal – save the world, haha, yeah – but are free do to as you please until the final battle, and that includes doing nothing; etc. etc.!


Let's have a closer look at the game architecture:

There are 3 modes in RS3:
- World Map(s), where you may select a place to go to among the:
- Action-Movement Area Maps, where you move your main character's icon, that stands for your whole party;
those maps may be friendly (towns) or hostile, with enemies that attack you and trigger:
- Battles, turn-based.


WORLD MAP(S)

The World Map spans over several screens. You move a pointer to choose a location (Action-Movement Map) you want to go to.
Most locations must be opened before you can access them from this map.

By pressing the Y button you enter the World Overview Mode, where you are able to quickly go to the World Map screen you want.
The only time you must use this mode is to open the Ice Galaxy.


AREA MAPS


SELECT MENU

During the action-movement phase, you can access the Select Menu.
There you see the characters in your party, the name of your location, how much Gold you have, and can do the usual:

Equip / Tech / Magic - see stats, equip items, techs, magic spells
Items - see your item inventory, use some items
Event - check if you have any ongoing quest
Form - change your party's battle formation & your characters' place in it
Conf - change audio & text speed settings
Save - save your game (3 slots)

Let us have a look at the stats visible in the Select Menu.


CHARACTERS' STATS

For information on Character Creation and the influence of Favorite Weapon & Rank/Class on stats, see the Characters section.

The character stats are the main variables of the game (enemies have such stats too).
They can be accessed on Area Maps in the Select Menu in Equip, Tech or Magic.

Gender - Male, Female, Unknown, (Neuter). Some techs (pretty nasty ones at that) are gender-dependent, so it's a full-fledged stat!
Phys Def & Mag Def - some of the defenses granted by your equipment. See Equipment Stats section below.

HP Health Points - When HP reaches 0 you are down and lose 1 LP. Affects some techs.
LP Life Points - The number of times the character can be down until they leave the party (with their equipped items; they can be re-recruited after closing one Abyss Gate). Except Leonid (Undead, 0 LP). If the main character's LP reaches 0: Game Over.

TP Tech Points (or SP Skill Points in 2019 Remaster, or WP Waza 技 Points) - Used for techs. Affects some techs.
MP Magic Points (or JP Jutsu 術 Points) - Used for spells.

Max HP, TP, MP can grow after each battle (Max HP = 999, Max TP/MP = 250).
Concerning the factors that determine stat growth chance, see the Victory section below.
Max LP is static.
HP is the only stat restored to full after each battle.
During battle, HP can be restored by using spells (Earth Heal, Life Water/Water of Life, Revival Light/Ray of Hope, Moon Shine/Lunar Light), techs (Kungfu's Focus, Nightingale Epee's Nurse Heal/Medicate, Life Cane/Staff of Vivacity's Power Heal, Life Cane/Staff of Vivacity & Rune Staff/Runic Staff's Shatter Staff/Staff Strike, which is the only in-battle Heal-All of the game), or battle-usable items. See the Healing section for details.
Formation- or equipment-related HP regen and item-related TP regen can also occur at the end of each turn.
To restore TP, MP & LP, you can use various items outside battle or sleep at an Inn (for the cheap rate of 1G per person, or for free).

When Max TP ≥ 45 + (Max MP) x10, you gain a Weapon Mastery Crown (-1 TP for all techs). You can also lose it if you gain 5 MP in a row.
When Max MP ≥ 45 + (Max TP) x10, you gain a Magic Mastery Crown (-1 MP for all spells). You can also lose it if you gain 5 TP in a row.

Concretely, if you have 0 of one, you need 45 of the other to gain a Crown, and it goes up by increments of 10 for each point gained (e.g. if you have 5 MP you need 45+10x5=95 TP to have a TP Crown; if you have 11 TP you need 45+10x11=155 MP for a MP Crown).

A 'TP' Crown also allows you to learn techs more easily.

STR Strength (JP: 腕力) - affects Swords, Axe, Spear, Staff, Kungfu, Axe accuracy.
DEX Dexterity (JP: 器用さ) - affects Bow, Epee, Accuracy.
SPD Speed (JP: 素早さ) - affects battle turn order, some Kungfu.
CON / STA Constitution (JP: 体力 Stamina) - affects resistance, HP growth, HP regen.
INT / MAG Intelligence (JP: 魔力 Magical Power) - affects magic, some techs.
WILL / WIL Will (JP: 意志力 Willpower) - affects status attack success & resistance, some techs.
CHAR / CHA Charisma or Charm (JP: 魅力) - affects charm attack success & resistance.

These base stats are fixed (raw max = 25). Your main character's stats are affected by Favorite Weapon & Class (chosen when you start a new game). The recruitable characters have default stats. Nevertheless, it is possible to affect them with equipment.
In the example below (left), Fat Robin's CON is raised by Titan Suit ('+2' in blue) and his CHAR is halved by Silk Shirt ('9' in red).

Next to the base static stats are the icons and levels of your character's weapon/magic proficiency:

Sword LV - affects Sword & Greatsword damage & accuracy.
Mace/Axe LV - affects Mace/Staff/Club & Axe damage & accuracy.
Epee/Spear LV - affects Epee/Short Sword & Spear damage & accuracy.
Bow LV - affects Bow damage & accuracy.
Kungfu/Martial LV - affects Kungfu/Martial Arts damage & accuracy; also affects some buffs & Leonid's magic.
[Magic 1 / Jijutsu LV (Earthly/Terrestrial Magic) - affects Wind, Fire, Earth or Water damage & accuracy.]
[Magic 2 / Tenjutsu LV (Heavenly/Celestial Magic) - affects Sun or Moon damage & accuracy.]

All of these LVs have a max value of 50 and can increase after each battle if you use (or intend to use) the corresponding weapons or spells. Magic is optional.

 

Last but not least, there is another, little-known, hidden stat: the characters' Support LVL.
It is quite important: it is the stat-enhancing skill of your 6th (reserve) member and it affects all the other members.
Its max value is 50 and it grows like the other skill stats. At max level it enhances damage by +39%.
Note: The only way to get an estimate and see the effect of this stat is when HP regeneration due to the formation happens (in Genbu formation, or during Commander Mode). HP regen goes up to 99 per turn and the formula is: (Support LVL+10)*Formation Mod + Max HP/16.


EQUIPMENT STATS

Wpn Pwr (Atk), Phys Def & Mag Def are the only visible numeric values.
They are the base values upon which seem to be based damage & resistances.


But there are in fact several Types of attacks and defenses (as suggest the characters' various skill levels, physical and magical),
and as many Atk & Def values (and not one main stat):

Category	Type
Physical	Slash
	Hit
	Pierce
	Shot
Magic	Heat
	Cold
	Bolt
	Status
None	None

Defense Items have various strengths or weaknesses to these Types (in the item description, noted in blue or red next to the def value: see the Armor Section for details).

Very importantly, the techs that do not belong to any category or type ('None' above) simply ignore all def stats! It may be a bug... Among those are all counter techs, Meteor Kick, Tiger Break.


Another set of parameters deals with Status Change.
There is no corresponding def value either, but a possible immunity thanks to equipment (for example noted as: 'Stat Def: Dark' in blue).
Here are the various status ailments:

Death - Target is instantly knocked out, LP -1.
Petrify - Unable to take action for the rest of the battle.
Paralysis - Unable to take action, block or evade for some turns.
Sleep - Unable to take action, block or evade until character is hit.
Stun - Unable to take action, block or evade for the rest of the turn.
Dark - Blind: reduce Accuracy of Physical attacks.
Mind (Confusion) - Variants with different behavior patters and durations: Confused (may forget to act < attacks indiscriminately), Charmed (becomes an enemy), Silence (unable to use techs or spells), Mixed.
Poison - Damage at the end of every turn. Dmg = (Max HP/8)+40 - 2*CON

See the Battle: Status section below for more details.


Finally, attacks & defenses may also have Attributes: Water, Throw, Sonic, Stare, Ground.
There is no def value corresponding to those attributes, but the character is either susceptible or immune (thanks to equipment) to attacks of a specific attribute. Most of these are not visible in the Select Menu. See the Armor section to see the immunities equipment grants.

You might also wonder what those three color bars below your character's name on the Equip page are.
- The red one represents your average attack power,
- the green one represents your average overall defense,
- and the blue one represents your Weight: a hidden stat for all equipment, that decreases speed (although probably less than formation bonuses or penalties) and affects the accuracy of most skills and the damage of some skills.


BATTLE

During the turn-based battles, first you choose, for each character, which weapon, tech or magic spell you want to use (you can target any reachable enemy; if the targeted monster dies during the turn, attacks are randomly re-targeted; for friendly actions, like healing, targeted at a party member whose LP reach 0 during the turn: action cancelled). When all characters' actions have been decided, the turn plays out (enemies and allies act in turn, in an order mainly depending on their speed and a RGN). This phase repeats until whichever side's HP is brought down to 0 (or you can retreat).

When you win a battle, each character's Max HP, TP & MP and proficiency in the Weapon or Magic they used in battle may randomly increase.
See the Victory! section below for details.

Before battle, in area maps, in the Formation menu (Select Menu), you can put your main character in Commander Mode, which is an alternate way to do battles (you give only general orders to the party; there are techs specific to this mode).

Bosses and fixed enemies usually have a fixed level (+𝛂 HP), but your regular hostile encounters depend on a counter relative to each enemy type (which take into account several factors). Each map also has an enemy level mod parameter (some high-end enemies can only be encountered in specific places). See the Enemy Section for more details.


ENCOUNTERS

Touching an enemy sprite triggers a Battle
but there are three ways to do so and it may affect the first turn and your formation:
- If you run (Y button) into an enemy, you will be Ambushed! and penalized: you are forced into the Free Fight formation and for the first turn the enemies play first.
- If you walk into a walking enemy from behind, you perform a Back Attack: your characters get a free turn.
- If you walk into a walking enemy from the front, left or right, or into a running enemy from any side, you get a normal battle.

Note: This is a design flaw IMHO, but you can Run! away from a battle even if you were Ambushed!, and start anew in regular conditions. Also, if you are not 'satisfied' with the enemies you got, you can Run! and get new ones.. It is possible not to battle at all: when you Run! from a battle, the enemy icon is sometimes pushed away from you and you can avoid it altogether. Nevertheless, note that running away from a battle resets your characters' individual battle counter (that increases your chances to LV-up skills, see next section or here more in detail).

Note [Remaster only]: In the Phantom Maze, encounters are always normal (no surprise attack, no back attack).


VICTORY!: LEVEL-UP, ITEM DROP, TECH MASTERING

When you defeat the enemies you had encountered, the battle ends.
There are possibly four phases at this point:

・Phase 1 - Stat Level-Up Attribution

If your characters are alive at the end of a battle (= not down, not petrified), their stats may level up.
Which stats may go up depends on your characters' actions during the battle.
All may gain HP. Weapons: Sword/GSword, Axe/Mace, Epee/Spear, Bow & Kungfu, depending on the weapon(s) you used. If you used a weapon, you may gain TP. Magic: depending on the specific magics you used. If you cast a spell, you may gain MP.
Note that your character does not need to have performed the action effectively: you can gain levels simply if the action has been validated during the action selection phase. (In other words, the fact that the enemy has been defeated before a character's turn, or if a character was Stunned before acting, does not prevent that character to possibly gain levels in the corresponding stat that the action which did not occur would have marked as eligible.)

The main factors for stat level-up chance are as follows. Some work in favor of leveling-up, some against it:

Stats ∖ Effect	Positive	Negative
HP	Enemies' Up LVL Characters' Growth Rate	MaxHP
TP/MP	Best Skill level Sum of all Skill levels	MaxTP/MP
Skills	Enemies' Up LVL Characters' Growth Rate Battle Counter	Current Skill levels
Support LVL (invisible)	Enemies' Up LVL Characters' Growth Rate	Current Support LVL

Notes:
- There is a 'pity system': if no Skill level-up occurs, one character still gets 1 HP (which is why in solo playthroughs your main character's HP grows faster). This is the only way for Leonid to gain HP.
- For the detailed mechanics, see the Skill Level-Up & HP Gain section.

・Phase 2 - Item Drop
You may find one (1) item after a battle. There are 3 degrees of rarity (8, 4 & 2% drop chance).
Which means that most of the time you won't find anything, haha.
See the Monsters section to see which enemy may drop which item, and the Items section for items descriptions.

・Phase 3 - Gold Drop
Gold Drop mainly depends on each enemy's GIndex & GCoeff. See the end of this Note in the Monsters section.
Many enemies do not drop any money. (Why would they indeed? haha.)

・Phase 4 - Tech Mastering
Finally, you may have mastered techs during the battle: this is validated only at the end of the battle via a confirmation message (4 max).
More details in the Techs section.

MonsterLV and CompanionLV, a couple hidden parameters, may also go up upon battle victory. See the dedicated section.
But your party may have been defeated instead (all characters are down or unable to fight): you are brought back to the title screen and can resume from a Save. Exception: Devil Lords (you go back to the beginning of the dungeon).


PARTY & FORMATIONS

Your party can hold up to 6 characters: your main character and 5 recruited characters.
You can recruit characters in various places and ways, but you can make most party members leave by talking to the bartender in any Pub.
Nevertheless, some characters will join forcefully or won't leave your party until some event is triggered.
See the Characters section for recruitment specifics.

Important note: You can only have a party of 5 in the Abyss (the final dungeon) because you must take Shonen (Young Boy) with you. So you might not want to bother raising a 6th character who will not be with you for the final battles. Instead, leave the reserve spot open for trigger characters (Herman mainly).

In prevision of battles, you can arrange your party in various Formations (in the Select Menu) with various bonuses or penalties for your characters.
Be mindful of the fact that each time a character joins or leaves the party, the formation goes back to default (Free Fight).
At the start you only have a few formations at your disposal.
1∼4P formations are generic and can be used by anyone.
On the other hand, 5P formations are provided by specific characters and you learn new formations when recruiting them.

Speculation (Wedge) - Shonen (Young Boy), Fairy (Peony) Whirlwind - Julian, Ellen, Thomas, Katarina Phoenix Dance (Rising Phoenix) - Tiberius, Fullbright, Zo (Rukh) Genbu (Genbu Stance) - Yan Fan, Boston Power Raise (Seer's Focus) - Sharl, Undine, Bai Meiling (Bai Meiniang)

Dragon Form (The Dragon) - Herman, Black Tri Anchor (Tri-anchor) - Robin, Fat Robin Tiger's Den (Tiger's Ferocity) - Mikhail, Nora Hunter Shift (Hunter's Gambit) - Sara, Paul, Zhi Lin Desert Lance - Harid (Khalid)

Your current formation can be changed in the Select Menu > Form.

On that screen you can see the available formations.

A brief description of the highlighted formation appears if you press X,
and if you press Y, your characters HP, LP & Def show up.

There is one reserve slot at the back, so if you have only 5 members, for example, you can also use 4P formations by pressing Left or Right (directional) buttons (one character will be placed in the reserve slot) to switch between 4P and 5P formations.
The character in the reserve slot only gains HP (visible) and Support LV (invisible).

If you select a formation (A button), by pressing the X button you can see the Formation Techs available if you were to use the Commander Mode (the greyed-out FTechs are unavailable in your current formation configuration). You can also bring out characters' data with Y (although on this screen, magic & equipped weapons would have been much better).

And by pressing A, you can switch characters around.
If you place your main character in the reserve slot, you activate Commander Mode (see below).

Go back to the previous screen at any moment with the B button.

When your main character is placed in the reserve slot, your battles will play in a special Commander Mode.

In CM you cannot control each character like in regular battles, but give general orders to your crew, and use special FTechs (default or learnable, just like regular techs), Spell Fusion & Multi-Magics.

See the Commander Mode section below for a detailed description of CM, FTechs, Spell Fusion & Multi-Magics.

Note: If your party size changes (recruit or leave characters) the formation is reset to the default Free Fight (Free for All).
If you are Ambushed, the battle will play in Free Fight (can be changed during the battle if in CM).
Note: For the correspondances with the Remaster Edition, see the 1995/2019 Glossary > Gameplay section.


5P FORMATIONS

FREE FIGHT All	Target Chance	Bonuses & Penalties	F Techs
	1 = 21.6% 2∼5 = 19.6%	All = SPD +25%	Spell Fusion YES

SPECULATION Shonen - Fairy	Target Chance	Bonuses & Penalties	F Techs
	1 = 38.8% 2 3 = 19.6% 4 5 = 11%	1 2 3 = Close-Range Atk Dmg +25% 1 = SPD +50% 2 3 = SPD +25% 4 5 = SPD -25%	4 5 = Twin Rush 1 2 3 = High Speed (30) 1 2 3 = Shiva Triangle (37) 2 3 = Cross Driver (15) 1 2 3 = Axel Driver (25) Spell Fusion NO

WHIRLWIND Julian - Ellen - Thomas - Katharina	Target Chance	Bonuses & Penalties	F Techs
	2 3 = 25.5% 1 = 21.6% 4 5 = 11%	All SPD +25%	2 3 = Time Gap Atk 4 5 = Twin Rush (6) 1 2 3 = High Speed (27) 1 2 3 = Shiva Triangle (33) 2 3 = Cross Driver (22) 1 2 3 = Jack Knife (17) Spell Fusion YES

PHOENIX DANCE Tiberius - Fullbright - Zo	Target Chance	Bonuses & Penalties	F Techs
	1 = 78% 2 3 = 8% 4 5 = 3%	1 = Def before & after action 1 = SPD -25% 2 3 = SPD +25%	2 3 = X Attack 2 3 = Time Gap Atk (3) 2 3 4 5 = Double X (20) 2 3 4 5 = Nature Moon (16) 4 5 = Crossbow (23) Spell Fusion YES

GENBU Yan Fan - Boston	Target Chance	Bonuses & Penalties	F Techs
	1 = 21.6% 2∼5 = 19.6%	All SPD -75% All HP REGEN at the end of every turn	External Bind (15) (Wormhole) Galaxy Spell Fusion YES

POWER RAISE Sharl - Undine - Bai Meiling	Target Chance	Bonuses & Penalties	F Techs
	1 = 21.6% 2∼5 = 19.6%	1 = Mag dmg +25% 1 = SPD -25% 4 5 = SPD +25%	2 3 = Time Gap Atk 2 3 = X Attack Crimson Flare Tempest Spell Fusion YES

DRAGON FORM Herman - Black	Target Chance	Bonuses & Penalties	F Techs
	1 = 21.6% 2∼5 = 19.6%	1 = Atk & Mag dmg +25% 1 = SPD +50% 2 = SPD +25% 4 = SPD -25% 5 = SPD -50%	1 2 3 4 5 = Kibaryu Dance 1 2 3 4 5 = Shinryu Dance (20) 1 2 3 4 5 = 1000-Hand God (34) 1 2 = Dbl Impact (16) Spell Fusion NO

TRI ANCHOR Robin - Fat Robin	Target Chance	Bonuses & Penalties	F Techs
	1 = 21.6% 2∼5 = 19.6%	1∼3 = Def before action 4 5 = SPD -25%	1 2 3 = Dinofang 1 2 3 = Shiva Triangle (35) 1 2 3 = Triplet (12) 1 4 5 = Water Stream (19) 1 4 5 = Marvelous Cannon (26) Zodiac Fall Light Wall Spell Fusion NO

TIGER'S CAVE Mikhail - Nora	Target Chance	Bonuses & Penalties	F Techs
	1 = 21.6% 2∼5 = 19.6%	All = Def before action All = SPD -75%	Deflect 4 5 = Twin Rush (13) Spell Deflect (13; does not spark, unusable: Info Info) Multi Counter (24) Spell Fusion YES

HUNTER SHIFT Sara - Paul - Zhi Lin	Target Chance	Bonuses & Penalties	F Techs
	1 = 21.6% 2∼5 = 19.6%	1 = Long-Range Atk Dmg +25% 1 = SPD -25%	Arrow Storm 2 3 = Time Gap Atk (6) 2 3 = X Attack (11) 4 5 = Crossbow (12) 4 5 = Shadow Arrow (18) 1 4 5 = Dragon Shock (32) Spell Fusion NO

DESERT LANCE Harid	Target Chance	Bonuses & Penalties	F Techs
	1 = 68.6% 2∼5 = 7.85%	1 = Def after action 1 = SPD +25% 2∼5 = SPD -25%	4 5 = Twin Rush 4 5 = Crossbow (12) 4 5 = Shadow Arrow (18) Spell Fusion YES

4P FORMATIONS

FREE FIGHT	Target Chance	Bonuses & Penalties	F Techs
	1∼4 = 25%	All = SPD +25%	Spell Fusion YES

BATTLE SHIELD	Target Chance	Bonuses & Penalties	F Techs
	1 2 = 31% 3 4 = 19%	3 4 = SPD -25%	1 2 = Cross Driver 3 4 = Crossbow 3 4 = Shadow Arrow Spell Fusion YES

SPELL PYRAMID	Target Chance	Bonuses & Penalties	F Techs
	1 2 = 39% 3 = 14% 4 = 8%	1 = Mag dmg +25% All = SPD -25%	3 4 = Time Gap Atk 2 3 4 = High Speed 1 3 4 = Jack Knife 2 3 4 = Nature Moon Spell Fusion YES

DESERT LANCE	Target Chance	Bonuses & Penalties	F Techs
	1 = 57% 3 4 = 15.5% 2 = 12%	1 = Def after action 1 = SPD +25% 2∼4 = SPD -25%	3 4 = Twin Rush 3 4 = Crossbow 3 4 = Shadow Arrow Spell Fusion YES

3P FORMATIONS

FREE FIGHT	Target Chance	Bonuses & Penalties	F Techs
	1∼3 = 33%	All = SPD +25%	2 3 = Time Gap Atk Spell Fusion YES

CLOSE DELTA	Target Chance	Bonuses & Penalties	F Techs
	1 = 50% 2 3 = 25%	x	2 3 = Crossbow 2 3 = Cross Driver Spell Fusion YES

OPEN DELTA	Target Chance	Bonuses & Penalties	F Techs
	1 3 = 39% 2 = 22%	x	2 3 = Time Gap Atk 1 2 3 = High Speed 1 2 3 = Jack Knife Spell Fusion NO

2P FORMATIONS

FREE FIGHT	Target Chance	Bonuses & Penalties	F Techs
	1 = 50% 2 = 50%	1 2 = SPD +25%	Spell Fusion YES

LIFE SHIELD	Target Chance	Bonuses & Penalties	F Techs
	1 = 78% 2 = 22%	2 = SPD -25%	Spell Fusion NO

1P FORMATION

FREE FIGHT	Target Chance	Bonuses & Penalties	F Techs
	1 = 100%	x	x

Notes
The best formations are probably Speculation (offensive, but dmg bonus for Slash Hit Pierce only), Phoenix Dance (center character in permanent defense, add a magic shield, suitable for Snowman, immune to Heat & Cold, or Zo, who can use a Shield with any weapon or magic), Genbu (auto-regen is big, but it stops when 1P is down: use Commander Mode; couple with Troll Stones or duplicated Royal Ring), Tiger's Den (same comment, chance to auto-parry instead of auto-regen in CM; most likely the best defensive formation).


BATTLE MECHANICS

At the beginning of each turn, you choose the actions your characters will perform.
You may act or attack in various ways, Defend (L button, 1 character, 50% dmg reduction) or Run! (R button, all party flees from the battle).

Action Choice Phase

You may use regular attacks, techs (waza) or magic (jutsu).

You can only attack with the weapons you have previously equipped (Select Menu) and can flip through the menu using left and right arrows.
There are Swords, Big Swords, Axes, Maces/Staves, Epees, Spears and Bows.
Quite logically, Kungfu (barehand, Punch) doesn't need to be equipped.
You can also attack with one specific Shield (Spike shield).

The regular attack is the first line for each of your weapons (usually the weapon's name).
You can see all the available weapons in the Items section.

Techs (Waza) are special techniques that must be learned and equipped too (Select Menu). They use TP (WP).
See the Tech section.
Some weapons have built-in techs that needn't be equipped and don't take a slot in the Tech Equip Menu. Some must be learned.
See the Tech section and the Weapon section.

Magic spells (Jutsu) must be learned (bought) and equipped too. They use MP (JP).
Each character can have up to 2 types of magic (1 among Wind, Fire, Earth & Water; 1 among Sun & Moon) and 10 spells at most.
See the Magic section.

Lastly, you can also use a few specific items during a battle.
Like weapons and armor, usable items must be equipped in the Equip Menu before battle (unless you are in Commander Mode).
One item can only be used once, and it disappears once used.
Most are healing or status curing items, but a few usable items allow you to attack: Spirit Stone, Sand of Mars, Eternal Ice.
See the Usable Items section.

Buffs & debuffs

Some techs or spells increase a character's or your party's stats (buff) or decrease the enemy or enemies' stats (debuff).
The enemy also uses such techs.

Buffs and debuffs behave differently:
- Buffs are cumulative (they stack) and lose 25% of their efficiency at the end of each round.
- Debuffs do not stack (latest effect applies), only disappear at the end of the battle or if erased by a spell, but can miss.

In a nutshell, debuffs are more effective. Unless buffs also come with a power tech (like Tiger Break).
Unfortunately, most of the time, the only way to know if a debuffing attack tech was successful is to observe the enemy's behavior (some debuff-only attacks may display a 'Miss' if it misses). Also, vs. enemies that change forms or behaviors (Byunei, Dragon Ruler, Destroyer), the effects are reset at every change.
Mace/Staff and Kungfu/Barehand have the most and best debuff techs.

For a detailed account of the buff-debuff mechanisms and the list of all related techs, see the Tech section.


Status

As we have seen in the Equipment Stats section, Status can be altered.
This happens during battle only (unlike in some other RPGs, a character cannot be poisoned in battle and die outside battle due to that poisoning). If a character's status is affected, his/her icon changes also. (Enemies' status can be affected too.)
Here are all the status changes and the ways to revert to normal if possible:
Death Stone Paralysis Sleep Dark Mind Poison Stun.

Status Change	Effect	Cure
Death	Insta-death: target is instantly knocked out, LP -1.	Restore HP (except if LP=0, irreversible in battle)
Petrify	Unable to take action for the rest of the battle.	Soft/Depetrifier
Paralysis	Unable to take action, block or evade for some turns.	Mystic Water/Libation, Revival Light/Ray of Hope, Earth Heal (EarthLV30+), Remedy/Panacea, Nurse Heal/Medicate
Sleep	Unable to take action, block or evade until character is hit or wakes up.	Mystic Water/Libation, Revival Light/Ray of Hope, Remedy/Panacea, Nurse Heal/Medicate
Dark	Blind: reduce Accuracy of Physical attacks.	Mystic Water/Libation, Revival Light/Ray of Hope, Moon Shine/Lunar Light (MoonLV20+), Remedy/Panacea, Nurse Heal/Medicate
Mind / Confusion	Variants with different behavior patterns and durations: Confusion (may forget to act < randomly attacks: see note 3 below) - Charmed (becomes an enemy) - Silenced (unable to use techs or magic)	Mystic Water/Libation, Revival Light/Ray of Hope, Remedy/Panacea, Nurse Heal/Medicate
Poison	Damage at the end of every turn. Dmg = (Max HP/8)+40 - 2*CON	Mystic Water/Libation, Revival Light/Ray of Hope, Remedy/Panacea, Nurse Heal/Medicate, Salve/Balm
Stun	Unable to take action, block or evade for the rest of the turn.	None

Note 1: When a character is Stunned, the Japanese スタン appears and the character assumes the position of one who has played its turn.
(In the same way that, when an attack misses, the Japanese ミス flashes.)

Note 2: Near-death (kneeling) doesn't seem to be doing anything. A visual reminder of the urgency of the situation (HP ≤ MaxHP/4)! Nevertheless, a character in near-death status will not obey your orders in Commander Mode (nor participate in Ftechs) any more, but attack.

Note 3: Mind statuses. There are several degrees of Confusion (red stars) : 1) character actionable but may forget to act - 2) Character actionable but will randomly target friend or foe - 3) Character non-actionable and will randomly attack friend or foe. It means that the condition of a Confused character can get worse if hit several times with a Confuse Status attack. There are also several natures (variants) to Mind attacks: when Charmed (red heart), the character turns into an enemy and will attack the party ; Silenced (blue stars) is also a Confusion variant that prevents you from using techs or spells. Note that Silence is also sometimes called Magic Stun or Berserk (from the Japanese 狂戦士); but it does not belong to the Stun category, and there is also a spell called Berserk, hence 'Silence' for disambiguation.

Note 4: Mixed status include those induced by the following attacks:
- Nightmare = Sleep + Confuse, Charm or Silence.
- Death Widow = Poison + Silence.
- Insanity = Confuse, Silence or Charm.

Note 5: Forewarned is forearmed. It is possible to immunize yourself against most status ailments beforehand, thanks to Items & Evade Skills.

Note 6: On enemies, the Dark status appears as ダーク flashing below the monster. Silence does not seem to be visible.

Note 7: Invisible Status
The favorable Invisible status, that results from Golden Bat Escape Out (Stealthy Swing) tech or Fire (Shucho) magic Feather Seal spell, has several effects: it prevents the enemy (or your other characters) from specifically targeting your invisible character (who can still be hit by hit-all attacks, who can still target him/herself, and who can still be healed by others in the same turn your character becomes invisible); it allows your character to evade most physical attacks (Trample is one exception); it will be cancelled by any action against an enemy (exceptions on SFC only: Nurse Heal, Revival Light & Moon Shine on self or by another in the same turn, that will dispel the invisible status: careful). Works with the Devil King Armor. This can be used advantageously in several ways, including in solo runs: see this detailed Note.

COMMANDER MODE:
FTECHS, SPELL FUSION, MULTI-MAGICS

When your main character is placed in the reserve slot, your battles will play in Commander Mode.

・In CM you cannot control each character but give general orders (Mode) to your crew (X button).
・You can use special FTechs (default or learnable, just like regular techs) and, possibly, Spell Fusion & Secret Multi-Magics. CM FTechs & Spells consume special WP (Waza Points). You start battles with 1 WP and gain 1 WP per turn.
・You can access your Backpack and use unequipped battle-usable items (Left or Right directional buttons).
・At the end of every turn, HP regen occurs and all status ailments except Petrified and Poison are cured.
・You can change your Formation during battles (press B).

Notes:
- You can enter CM even with only 2 characters in your party (although in Free Fight only, quite evidently, since you would have only 1 character fighting), but then at the end of each turn there is no HP regen nor revival with 1HP.
- The only times you cannot fight in CM are the battles against Maximus, the Dragon Machine (which are not compulsory) and airborne Byunei (who can be defeated in her lair instead). This excepted, a full CM playthough is possible (recommended even, if your main character is Sara: tips here).
- The Silver Hand does not work in CM Ftechs except for Dragon Fang.
- In CM, with Ftechs, even if Muse is in the party the Dream Devil does not go down in one hit from Muse (with the exception of Dragon Fang, and when one character of the Ftech becomes unable to fight).
- Sara as a main character has a Special Commander Mode for the last boss.
- This is one of the earliest RPG auto-fight modes in the video game history! Would require a competent game historian to confirm how early.

In battle, the Mode page (X button) allows you to set general orders. It changes the behavior of your party:
・Focus (Concentrated Offense) - The characters will focus their attack on the designated enemy.
・Defense - The characters not using a FTech will Defend. Does not apply to characters in Near-Death status.
・Fast (Preemptive Attack) - You have a (50+SupportLVL)% chance to play first. If failure: the enemy plays first.
・Counter (Counter Strike) - You let the enemy play first.
・Multi Tech (Formation Skill) - Use FTechs first, other characters play after.
・Stun (Diversion Tactic) - A chance to stun the enemy.
・Power Tech (Power Offense) - Use equipped Techs & Magic Spells that damage the enemy (hence it won't use attacks with delayed damage like Grand Slam or Firewall).

The behavior of all characters in Commander Mode is preset. Will use:
・either Weapons or Magic: Thomas, Mikhail, Sara, Monica, Sharl, Fullbright, Boston, Snowman.
・Weapons only: Julian, Harid, Ellen, Katharian, Shonen, Wood, Paul, Robin (both), Poet, Tatiana, Yan Fan, Zhi Lin, Herman, Black, Nora, Fairy, Zo.
・Wind Magic only: Bai Meiling.
・Water Magic only: Undine.
・Sun Magic only: Tiberius.
・Moon Magic only: Muse.
・Weapons & Special Magic: Leonid.

Notes:
- Characters will attack with their first handslot weapon only (when there is no weapon in slot 1, they use Kungfu), except in Tiger's Den / Ferocity formation.
- Characters who use Magic only will Defend if MP=0. Of course, you can still have them perform Ftechs.

In CM, special Formation Techs & Spells can be used:

F TECHS Delayed Attack (Time Gap Atk) X-Attack (X Attack) Bee Rush (Twin Rush) Reverse Delta (High Speed) Shivan Triangle (Shiva Triangle) Cross Drive (Cross Driver) Light Drive (Axel Driver) Jack Knife Double X Flying Crescent (Nature Moon) Outer Bind (External Bind) Dragon's Fang (Kibaryu Dance) Shenlong Dance (Shinryu Dance) Guanyin (Thousand Hand God) Triplet Axe Stream (Water Stream) Marvelous Cannon (Deflect) (Spell Deflect) Frenzied Counter (Multi Counter) Arrow Storm Crossbolt (Crossbow) Shade Arrows (Shadow Arrow) Dracoshiver (Dragon Shock) Dino Fang (Dinofang) Dual Impact (Dbl Impact)

F SPELLS SPELL FUSION Sunshine Shadowbolt (Shadow Bolt) Morning Moon Star Virus Rabbit Stream (Rabbit Storm) Black Dragon Strike (Black Dragon Hit) Rising Flame Dopple Roar (Doppler Roar) Tsunami (Tidal Wave) MULTIMAGICS Zodiac Fall [Wormhole] Galactic Rift (Galaxy) Crimson Flare Light Wall Tempest

FTechs are techs that can only be used in Commander Mode.

For each formation there is one default FTech; the others FTechs must be learned / sparked.
FTechs can only be sparked in a 5P formation.
They spark just like regular Techs and also have a difficulty level (varies depending on your formation, see the Formations section too).

Which FTechs are sparkable/usable in your current formation disposition, depends on 3 factors:
- your formation (see the Formations section above for a detailed account of usable FTechs for each formation)
- the position of your characters in your formation
- your characters' equipped Weapons

F TECHS / FORMATION SKILLS

Notes

The Name in ManaSword's translation is followed by the Japanese and the official Remaster translation.
WP is the cost in WP.
Form # = required positions in the formation.
Weapons = required weapons. CRW = Close Range Weapons (any weapon except Bow & Kungfu).
W = Weapons = any weapon except Kungfu.
Target column: '1E' = 1 Enemy, 'CR' = Close Range.
Pwr / Type column: Pwr is a base dmg indicator; Type states the Types & Attributes of the attack: SL (Slash), HI (Hit), PI (Pierce), SH (Shot), HE (Heat), CO (Cold), BO (Bolt), STS (Status), and WTR (Water), TH (Throw), SO (Sonic), STR (Stare), GR (Ground), and FL means critical vs. Float/Flying status. But most of this mined data is unreliable (Types & Attributes depend on the Weapons used in battle, which vary in Ftechs).
Crit = Critical Hit Chance (%), rounded to the nearest integer. (S) = Critical Hit guaranteed if performers are of the same gender.
Formations column: here are listed the Formations that can use/spark that Ftech and between brackets the Tech Spark Rank of the Tech in that Formation (the higher the TSR the more difficult it is to spark). The basic Ftechs ('default') are readily available. For Formations of 4P and fewer, Ftechs are usable once available/sparked in 5P Formations.
Tiger's Cave FTech Spell Deflect (スペルディフレクト) can't be sparked (bug, Info Info).

About the translation, if you ever wondered: High Speed 高速ナブラ is in fact a High Speed Nabla / Kibaryu (Garyu) = Dragon Fang / Shinryu = Dragon God / Water Stream アクスストリーム is in fact Axe Stream / 1000-Hand God = Kannon / 花鳥乱月 ('Nature Moon') is a play-on-words with 花鳥風月 (the traditional depiction of the beauties of nature, with flowers 花, birds 鳥, wind 風 and moon 月), in which the character 風 (wind) was replaced with 乱 (riot, war). Other translation notes below and in the Remaster section.

Time Gap Atk 時間差攻撃 Delayed Attack	WP	Form #	Weapon	Target	Pwr / Type	Crit	Formations
	1	3-5P: 2 3 2P: 1 2	CRW	1E CR	80 SL HI	17% (S)	Whirlwind (default), Phoenix Dance (3), Power Raise (default), Hunter Shift (6), Spell Pyramid, 3P Free Fight, Open Delta.

X Attack エックス攻撃 X-Attack	WP	Form #	Weapon	Target	Pwr / Type	Crit	Formations
	1	3/5P: 2 3 4P: 3 4	CRW	1E CR	80 SL HI	3% (S)	Phoenix Dance (default), Power Raise, Hunter Shift (11)

Twin Rush ツインビーラッシュ Bee Rush	WP	Form #	Weapon	Target	Pwr / Type	Crit	Formations
	1	5P: 4 5 4P: 3 4	CRW	1E CR	80 SL HI	3%	Speculation (default), Whirlwind (6), Tiger's Cave (13), 4/5P Desert Lance (default)

High Speed 高速ナブラ Reverse Delta	WP	Form #	Weapon	Target	Pwr / Type	Crit	Formations
	2	3/5P: 1 2 3 4P: 2 3 4	CRW	1E CR	400 SL HI	3%	Speculation (30), Whirlwind (27), Spell Pyramid, Open Delta

Shiva Triangle シヴァトライアングル Shivan Triangle	WP	Form #	Weapon	Target	Pwr / Type	Crit	Formations
	3	1 2 3	CRW	1E CR	800 SL HI	3%	Speculation (37), Whirlwind (33), Tri Anchor (35)

Cross Driver クロスドライバー Cross Drive	WP	Form #	Weapon	Target	Pwr / Type	Crit	Formations
	2	3/5P: 2 3 3P: 1 2	Spear	1E CR	300 PI	8%	Speculation (15), Whirlwind (22), Battle Shield, Close Delta

Axel Driver エクセルドライバー Light Drive	WP	Form #	Weapon	Target	Pwr / Type	Crit	Formations
	3	1 2 3	Spear	1E CR	600 PI	3%	Speculation (25)

Jack Knife ジャックナイフ	WP	Form #	Weapon	Target	Pwr / Type	Crit	Formations
	1	3/5P: 1 2 3 4P: 1 3 4	CRW	1E CR	40 HI PI	13%	Whirlwind (17), Spell Pyramid, Open Delta

Double X ダブルエックス	WP	Form #	Weapon	Target	Pwr / Type	Crit	Formations
	1	2 3 4 5	CRW	1E	80 SL HI	3%	Phoenix Dance (20)

Nature Moon 花鳥乱月 Flying Crescent	WP	Form #	Weapon	Target	Pwr / Type	Crit	Formations
	1	5P: 1 2 3 4 5? 4P: 2 3 4?	Curved Sword	All	40 SL, FL	0	Phoenix Dance (16), Spell Pyramid. Some characters do not need a Curved Sword to participate in Nature Moon. At times, thrown swords are not Curved Swords. Characters not adequately equipped act according to selected Mode.

External Bind 外縛陣 Outer Bind	WP	Form #	Weapon	Target	Pwr / Type	Crit	Formations
	1	1 2 3 4 5	CRW	Counter	Counter	0	Genbu (15)

Kibaryu Dance 牙龍舞 Dragon's Fang	WP	Form #	Weapon	Target	Pwr / Type	Crit	Formations
	1	1 2 3 4 5	W	1E CR	0 SL HI	0	Dragon Form (default)

Shinryu Dance 神龍舞 Shenlong Dance	WP	Form #	Weapon	Target	Pwr / Type	Crit	Formations
	2	1 2 3 4 5	Any	1E CR	200 SL HI	0	Dragon Form (20)

Thousand Hand God 千手観音 Guanyin	WP	Form #	Weapon	Target	Pwr / Type	Crit	Formations
	3	1 2 3 4 5	Any	1E CR	600 SL HI	0	Dragon Form (34)

Triplet トリプレット	WP	Form #	Weapon	Target	Pwr / Type	Crit	Formations
	1	1 2 3	Epee	1E CR	40 PI	3%	Tri Anchor (12)

Water Stream アクスストリーム Axe Stream	WP	Form #	Weapon	Target	Pwr / Type	Crit	Formations
	1	1 4 5	Axe	1E	200 SL HI	8%	Tri Anchor (19)

Marvelous Cannon マーベラスカノン	WP	Form #	Weapon	Target	Pwr / Type	Crit (%?)	Formations
	3	1 4 5	CRW	1E CR	0 SL HI	3% (S)	Tri-Anchor (26)

(Deflect) ディフレクト	WP	Form #	Weapon	Target	Pwr / Type	Crit	Formations
	0	1 2 3 4 5	CRW	(Parry)	(Parry)	0	Tiger's Cave (default)

Multi Counter マルチカウンター Frenzied Counter	WP	Form #	Weapon	Target	Pwr / Type	Crit	Formations
	1	1 2 3 4 5	CRW	Counter	Counter SL HI	0	Tiger's Cave (24)

Arrow Storm アローストーム	WP	Form #	Weapon	Target	Pwr / Type	Crit	Formations
	0	Bow-equipped characters	Bow	All	40 / SH	0	Hunter Shift (default). The characters not equipped with a bow act according to the selected Mode.

Crossbow クロスボウボルト Crossbolt	WP	Form #	Weapon	Target	Pwr / Type	Crit	Formations
	1	5P: 4 5 4P: 3 4 3P: 2 3	Bow	1E	80 None	8%	Phoenix Dance (23), Hunter Shift (12), 4/5P Desert Lance (12), Battle Shield, Close Delta. Plays last.

Shadow Arrow 影矢 Shade Arrows	WP	Form #	Weapon	Target	Pwr / Type	Crit	Formations
	2	5P: 4 5 4P: 3 4	Bow	1E	0 SH	8%	Hunter Shift (18), 4/5P Desert Lance (18), Battle Shield. Insta-Death.

Dragon Shock 龍震 Dracoshiver	WP	Form #	Weapon	Target	Pwr / Type	Crit	Formations
	3	1 4 5	Bow	1E	0 HI, GR	0	Hunter Shift (32)

Dinofang ディノファング Dino Fang	WP	Form #	Weapon	Target	Pwr / Type	Crit	Formations
	0	1 2 3	CRW	1E	0 SL HI	0	Tri Anchor (default)

Dbl Impact ダブルインパクト Dual Impact	WP	Form #	Weapon	Target	Pwr / Type	Crit	Formations
	2	1 2	Any	1E	400 HI, TH	0	Dragon Form (16)

SPELL FUSION

Notes
Spell Fusion = spell cast by 2 characters together.
Formations that can use Spell Fusion = Free Fight (2/3/4/5P), Whirlwind, Phoenix Dance, Genbu, Power Raise, Tiger's Cave, Battle Shield, Spell Pyramid, Desert Lance (4/5P), Close Delta.
The 2 characters are always those in positions 4 & 5 in 5P formations, 3 & 4 in 4P formations, 2 & 3 in 3P formations, 1 & 2 in the 2P formation.
Limited to 2 spells per formation. Which spell(s) can be used depend on your 2 characters' highest Magic LVLs.
EM = Earthly Magic (地術) = Wind, Fire, Earth or Water (as opposed to 天術 Heavenly Magic = Sun, Moon).
There is one enemy-only Fusion Spell: Cat & Dog.

Sunshine サンシャイン	WP	Form #	Magic	Target	Pwr / Type	Special
	1	4 5	Sun	All	0 HE STS	x

Shadow Bolt シャドウボルト Shadowbolt	WP	Form #	Magic	Target	Pwr / Type	Special
	1	4 5	Moon	1E	0 STS	+ Silence (Magic Stun)

Morning Moon モーニングムーン	WP	Form #	Magic	Target	Pwr / Type	Special
	1	4 5	Sun + Moon	Self	Boost STS	Raises the casters' STR INT CON SPD by 2+(LVL/5)

Star Virus スターウィルス	WP	Form #	Magic	Target	Pwr / Type	Special
	1	4 5	Sun + EM	All	0 CO BO	+ Dark

Rabbit Storm ラビットストーム Rabbit Stream	WP	Form #	Magic	Target	Pwr / Type	Special
	1	4 5	Moon + EM	All	Stun STS	Plays first.

Black Dragon Hit 黒龍撃 Black Dragon Strike	WP	Form #	Magic	Target	Pwr / Type	Special
	1	4 5	Wind + EM	1E	Insta-Death STS	x

Rising Flame ライジングフレーム	WP	Form #	Magic	Target	Pwr / Type	Special
	1	4 5	Fire + EM	1E	0 / HE	x

Doppler Roar ドップラーロア Dopple Roar	WP	Form #	Magic	Target	Pwr / Type	Special
	1	4 5	Earth + EM	All	40 STS, SO	+ Silence (Magic Stun)

Tidal Wave 大津波 Tsunami	WP	Form #	Magic	Target	Pwr / Type	Special
	1	4 5	Water + EM	All	Insta-Death Water	x

COMBINED SPELL & SECRET MULTI-MAGIC SPELLS

Notes
The following are spells cast by 3 characters together.
There are 4 Secret Spells and one extra Combined Spell (2 in the Remaster Edition).
Secret Spells = you need to find the Secret Books of Multi Magic in order to use them (1 in each of the dungeons leading to the Abyss Gates), and place your mages as shown (interchangeable in fact) in a specific formation.
Anna in Lance can remind you of the Secret Books you have already found if you ask her about Multitech ; )

The extra Combined Spell, Zodiac Fall, is only usable in Tri Anchor formation.
(The last spell, Genbu-restricted Wormhole, appears in the menu, but it is bugged and does not activate.)
Note: Wormhole works correctly in the Remaster Edition.

Zodiac Fall ゾディアックフォール	WP	Form # & Magic	Target	Pwr / Type	Notes
	2	1 4 5 - Any	All	0 HI HE	Tri Anchor only.

Wormhole ワームホール [Remaster only]	WP	Form # & Magic	Target	Pwr / Type	Notes
	2	4 Any   1 Any 5 Any	All	Counter	Genbu only. Counter to Hot Cold Bolt Status attacks: prevents damage to party and deals damage to all.

Galaxy ギャラクシィ Galactic Rift	WP	Form # & Magic	Target	Pwr / Type	Notes
	3	4 Moon   1 Sun 5 Wind	All	800 HE CO BO STS	Genbu only. Found in Byunei's Den

Crimson Flare クリムゾンフレア	WP	Form # & Magic	Target	Pwr / Type	Notes
	3	4 Moon   1 Sun 5 Fire	1E	800 HE CO BO	Power Raise only. Found in Fire Palace

Light Wall 光の壁	WP	Form # & Magic	Target	Pwr / Type	Notes
	2	1 Sun 4 Moon 5 Earth	Party Front Row	0 STS	Tri Anchor only. Found in Devil King Palace Effect: Halves dmg to Party + dmg to enemy front row at the end of the turn. Cancels Dark Wing.

Tempest テムペスト	WP	Form # & Magic	Target	Pwr / Type	Notes
	2	4 Moon   1 Sun 5 Water	All	Insta-Death Water	Power Raise only. Found in Undersea Palace

ADVANCED SECTION


MONEY MANAGEMENT

In RS3, money mainly comes to you in large quantities at specific points of the game.
The table below shows the hard cash (G) you get from rewards & chests, which is your main source of income.
Your other sources of income are the reselling of superfluous items (from chests & drops, but also stolen)
and G drops from enemies (the regular Green, Black, Blue & Red Dragons having the highest G drop).

Where	Amount (G)
Intro	2,000∼4,000
Transport Goods	3,000
Thieves' Cave	2,000∼4,000
Strange Pets	0∼5,625
Algernon	[0∼10,000]
Stanley vs. Farce	1,000∼3,000
Ice Lake	0∼(800 by selling the Fur Pelt you can get from Wood)
Treasure Caves	450 / 80 / 90 / -200
Herman's Treasure Cave	2,250-2,350
Zelnam's Den	2,800
Crystal Ruins	4,000
Fire Palace	4,000
Vanguard Murder Case	600∼5,600
Troubled Moses	4,300∼8,000
Sea Palace	5,500
Zweig Tournament	10,000
Maximus' Hideout	2,800
Divine Tower	1,000 (or -9,000 if Harid in party)
Mt. Loob	0∼10,000
Rotten Sea Ruins	3,000
Kings Capital (Harid only)	4,000
Leonid's Castle	1,200
Devil Palace	1,000
Business Minigame	30,000∼40,000

Notes:
- Excess money (over 10kG) goes into your bank account, including the money from chests (strangely), but excluding enemy drops (lost), Zweig Tournament reward (lost), and if you main character is Mikhail (into Loanne Treasury).
- Penny-pinchers can rest for free in Ake, in Snow Town and in Leonid's Castle (but it is less accessible). You are also fully restored when you lose in Zweig Tournament.
- Favor alternative economical ways to open locations. Are necessarily reachable by ship: Librof, Wilmington, Vanguard, Great Arc (open them after the Introduction while you still have money!).
- The Greatsword tech Stealing Hands can net you nice items that you can sell. You can also strip the recruitable characters of their default items, which you can keep or sell.
- Even if you do not have enough funds, the locals in Great Arc will guide you to their respective locations...
- By the end of the game (unless you do speed runs) you won't know what to do with your gold. But if you want the easy & fast way out: unlimited money.
- 'Algernon' in the table above: 10kG is an option in the Remaster edition only.



HEALING: HP RECOVERY & HP REGEN

Healing (HP restoration) can be achieved through several means (Techs, Magic, Items, Elemental Equipment, Formation) which are either active (manual healing) or passive (HP regen at the end of each turn).

Notes:
- Leonid cannot be actively healed nor Revived and has special magi-techs to regain HP.
- A few items (Death bow/Mortuus, Death Ring/Ring of Demise, true Dusk/Twilight Robe) cause an 'Undead Status': it means that the character cannot recover HP, nor be revived through active HP recovery from spells or techs (but HP regen and Reviver work).
- There is no MP regen in RS3 and only one item allows TP regen: the Holy Grail (equips in a weapon slot, like Poet's Fiddle).
- For status-related actions/effects and (de)buffs, see the respective Status section and Buffs & Debuffs section.

・Active Healing via Techs

One tech allows HP recovery: Focus (Martial, 0 TP, Mod=3).
It is by far the easiest way to regain HP: it is easy to spark, all characters can use it without the need to equip a weapon (Martial tech), it does not cost anything to use. It just takes one slot in your characters’ tech inventory.

Some weapons have built-in techs that allow HP restoration.
The weapon needs to be equipped for the character to use the said tech.

- Power Heal (Life Cane/Staff of Vivacity only, 0 TP, Mod=2) heals 1 ally. Convenient lesser HP recovery for free (at the cost of 1 weapon slot).
- Shatter Staff/Staff Strike (Life Cane/Staff of Vivacity & Rune/Runic Staff only, Mod=8) is the only Heal All in the whole game. The weapon breaks when the tech is used.
- Nurse Heal/Medicate (Nightingale only, 2 TP, Mod=1) needs to be sparked first (use the basic attack). Recover HP, cure all status ailments and resets all stats (i.e. cancels buffs and debuffs) except Petrify. Clears the Invisible status (SFC only).

Note that there are healing restrictions for characters who are Invisible: see the Status section, scroll down a little to Note 7: Invisible Status.

General HP Recovery Formula:
Restored HP = (Target MaxHP / 8) + Mod x (EffectValue + [INT + (RGN mod INT) + 1] + [(RGN mod (LV x 3)) + 1]

Max HP restoration = 999 HP.
Total +50% if caster equipped with magic-enhancing items, a full list of which is readily available in the Spell Dmg Enhancement section.
Total -50% if caster equipped with Abyss-elemental items (except in Abyss environment). See this Note in the Items section for details.
No influence from Support LV, Formation, etc. (which buff DMG or SPD only).

Nurse Heal: same formula but Previous Skill instead INT/MAG.

・Active Healing via Spells

There are several spells to regain HP: healing spells per se, and HP drain spells.

Healing spells always hit their mark! They are:

- Moon Shine/Lunar Light (Moon/Lunar, 5 MP, Mod=6): Recover HP. MoonLVL20+: cure Dark.
- Revival Light/Ray of Hope (Sun/Solar, 7 MP, Mod=5): Recover HP, cure all status ailments except Petrify, and reset all stats (including Stone value). Same formula but Previous Skill instead of INT.
- Earth Heal (Earth/Byakko, 4 MP, Mod=4): Recover HP. Earth LVL15+: cure Sleep. EarthLVL30+: cure Paralysis.
- Life Water/Water of Life (Water/Genbu, 1 MP, Mod=2): Recover HP. WaterLVL15+: cure Sleep. WaterLVL30+: cure Paralysis.

- Reviver/Revive (Fire/Shucho, 16 MP) is in fact a delayed healing spell that fully restores the HP of the character it has previously been cast upon when that character’s HP reaches 0. It is very expensive but arguably the best healing spell there is. Note that this acts a magic shield (additional HP regen when in Fire environment, and spell failure if cast on a character equipped with the Devil King/Archfiend Shield).

HP drain spells may fail. They are:

・Suction (Wind/Soryu, 5 MP): Status dmg to enemy + HP recovery to self.
・Blood Suck/Suck Blood (Abyss, Leonid only, 0 TP): attacks an ally to regain HP.
・Gentle Touch/Caress (Abyss, Leonid only, 12 TP): drains 100 LP dmg & 999 HP drain.


・Active Healing via Battle Items

These items must be equipped in a weapon slot for the character to be able to use them during their turn.
Here is the complete (and short) list of the battle-usable items.
Note that in Commander Mode, you have full access to all the battle-usable items present in your inventory (via the Backpack tab) once per round (Commander privilege).

・Item/Environment-related HP Regen

There are two useful items that allow HP regen at any time: Royal Ring & Troll Stone.

In the adequate battle environment (which you can alter by casting spells or using specific techs), elemental items have the same function. Here is the full list (see the Items section for complete details on these items):

Allows HP regen when in the following environment:
- Fire: Flame Beast/Ignus Leather (armor), Firebird/Shucho Armor (armor)
- Wind: B. Dragon/Soryu Armor (armor), Scarf/Floral Scarf (accessory)
- Earth: White Tiger/Byakko Armor (armor)
- Water: Lake/Lagoon Robe (armor), Sea Tortoise/Genbu Armor (armor), Eternal Ice/Everfrost Crystal (accessory)
- Moon: Magic Beast/Morax Leather (armor), Beast Leather/Bestial Leather (armor), Moon Bone/Lunar Bone (accessory)
- Sun environment: x
- Abyss: Dusk/Twilight Robe (Armor, true and fake), Dead Heart (accessory), Bone Ring/Bone Bangles (accessory), Bone Cross (accessory). These items also prevent damage in Super-Abyss environment (Last Boss Dark Wing form). There is a 50% penalty for active healing (to self or to others) when a character is equipped with Abyss-elemental items. See this Note for further details.

Under this category also falls a variant: HP regen will also occur thanks to magic shields when in the corresponding environment (Water Ball/Column in Water/Genbu environment, Dancing Leaves and Dragon God/Descent in Wind/Soryu environment, Reviver in Fire/Shucho environment..). This HP recovery method requires at least one step (cast the magic shield) and at most numerous steps (depending on how easy it is or how often you have to change the battle environment to get the desired element). See this Note on Magic Battle Environment.

The HP regen bonuses thanks to items/environement do not stack.
E.g.: Royal Ring + Troll Stone + Dancing Leaves in Wind environment will only give you one HP regen.

Note that there is a Priority Order among items (only one of your items will allow HP regen in the fitting environment):
Accessory > Body Armor > Shirt > Forearm
See this Note for more details.

The formula for item-related HP regen is: (CON + CON Mod)/4 x MaxHP/32
Max regen = 99 HP / turn.

Cumulates with Formation-related HP regen.


・Formation-related HP Regen

Auto HP regen occurs if you are in Genbu formation, or if you are in Commander Mode (any formation, but the HP gain differs depending on the formation due to a corrective multiplier, which is 0 for Free Fight, 2 for Genbu & Spell Pyramid, and 1 for the rest).

The formula for formation-related HP regen is: (Support LVL + 10) x Formation Mod + MaxHP/16
Max regen = 99 HP / turn.

In regular battle mode, Genbu provides automatic HP regeneration as long as HP>0 (i.e. characters who are down do not revive). In Commander Mode, characters who are down are revived with 1 HP at the end of each turn, as long as LP does not reach 0.

Cumulates with Item-related HP regen.



PARTY RECOMMENDATIONS

In a nutshell, it is possible to beat the game with any party and at a low level too. It mostly depends how familiar you are with the game.

I strongly suggest that your first run should be played mostly without any guide (have a look at this brief non-spoiler page for a few pointers if you will) except when on the verge of rage-quitting, haha. Then and only then, in-depth reading while doing subsequent runs will most likely make them a lot more enjoyable, given the specificity of game mechanisms and the variety of sub-quests branchings.

For first timers, Harid/Khalid is always a strong starting MC or addition.
Natural magic users usually come with powerful spells from the get-go (Bai Meiling/Meinyang).
Rather than characters, what you make of them may even be more important. Magic will be an extremely useful support (healing, Magic Shields), and it should probably be cultivated as early as possible (to give MP the time to go up decently).
Swords, Martial Arts, Spear and Mace to a slightly lesser extent, are all quite powerful. Bow only get powerful at the very endgame. Short Sword can inflict various status ailments and is best coupled with support magic.
If you train in several weapons (simply use them in battle at least once), your SP/TP will go up faster.
One-handed weapons allow the use of shields and guards, which will most likely save your life many times over.
Lastly, mindless grinding is superfluous but can be done without penalty.
And all in all, all character builds are viable!

In a nutshell, a party mostly composed of all-rounders (1-3 weapons + 2 magics, attackers with Moon Shadow Servant if you play aggressively) will be very solid.

It's not all about characters and party members. Remember that adequate equipment and a good use of formations are capital. You should change equipment depending on the enemy. An excellent general choice for formations is Tiger Den / Ferocity (which halves incoming damage but make your party slow).

Have fun!



SOLO PLAYTHROUGHS

Tips by Destruction Angel
https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/588634-romancing-sa-ga-3/68710650:

"In normal fights mostly you want to kill most enemies as quickly as possible with little regard to TP cost, because your single character can't take the damage for very long. Just save between battles in case something goes wrong, which quite often will. Speed is extremely useful in doing that, so Katrina is great solo. The only thing that gets much better solo is hiding with Escape Swing (Golden Bat built-in tech) or the Feather Seal Fire spell. Enemies mostly won't target you and you can heal up with focus. Also your HP stat will rise quite fast, because if nobody gets a powerup after battle someone automatically gets +1 HP. My magic was Fire and Sun, for Reviver (which works and is really important), the aforementioned Feather Seal, and Illusion Sun. Magic is not that important for most of the game though. Also you want a bunch of evade techs. Tech learning is pretty annoying when you get only one person to do it and will drive you crazy without savestates.

Excellent techs include Tiger Break, Powerup Fist and Million Dollars. Spears are awesome midgame, and Round Slicer on the Dragon Spear is also very nice and always stays useful. The Seven Star Sword is also nice for longer battles. However, equipment and tech slots are limited, and any tech slot you can use for evades is valuable.

In the save I found my equipment is
weapons: Holy Grail, Dragon Spear, Enhanced Bow, Water Mirror Shield
armor: Hid. Leather, Royal Ring, E. Martial, Holy King Helmet

I mostly use Tiger Break and Powerup Fist, because martial arts lets you block, and blocking keeps you alive. Million Dollars and Round Slicer are also sometimes useful. Million Dollars does more damage than powerup fist against many enemies, and Round Slicer can be nice because it's cheap and strong and doesn't take a tech slot. Tiger Break is extremely good because it's really strong, always hits, ignores defense and even boosts your strength. Amazing attack, but expensive and learned very late. Powerup Fist is cheaper than Million Dollars and lets you block, also it's very good against Skeletons.

Of course you will have to use some other techs and weapons over the course of the game. Techs like Great Wheel, Double Dragon (spear) and Shadow Kill (bow) can be very useful, and swords are a good single target attacks until you get Tiger Break.

The armor set provides decent defenses, regeneration (from the royal ring) but most importantly lots of useful immunities. Being immune to poison, instant death, confusion and blindness is pretty sweet (Hidora Leather protects against poison, Holy King Helmet against blindness and confusion, and the Royal Ring against instant death). You should get these items ASAP. I also used this armor set against the destroyer.

Charm, sleep and paralyzation can still screw you badly, try to cover these with evades like Stare and Shadow Sew, and Pheromones and Hypnotize where they apply. Other good evades are dangerous single target attacks that are common in the enemies you are fighting, such as Trample, Body Hit, Aiming, Bone Crush, Feint, etc. Most evades can block a whole bunch of different attacks.

Speed is actually mostly important for the regular fights, not for bosses, and Reviver is really useful in difficult fights.

Before you get very strong a bunch of bosses are quite hard. Especially ones that regenerate are hard to kill due to the much lower damage output. Once you start doing a few thousand damage with Tiger Break it's fine, but if you're doing just 2000 damage with some midgame tech and the enemy heals by 1000 every round fights get really difficult.

As for beating the Destroyer with savestates, you just keep Reviver up, attack, and reload every round if you get hit badly. Maybe use the seven star sword and split body for TP efficiency, I don't quite remember. Tiger Break is really good against the light form though due to its high defense. If you use the Holy Grail you can get away with wasting some TP for the higher damage." [end of quote]

The Invisible status can be used advantageously in solo playthroughs.

Reminder: it prevents the enemy (or your other characters) from specifically targeting your character; it allows your character to evade most physical attacks; it gets cancelled if you take action against an enemy (see the Status section, Note 7, for details). SFC only: Note that Nurse Heal, Moon Shine & Revival Light cancel the target's invisibility.

There are two main strategies:
- Escape Out & Repeat. Just use Escape Out (which will damage the enemy then make you invisible) over and over again.
- First Strike Escape Out. This requires a character fast enough to play before the enemy does: use Escape Out (becomes invisible, most attacks will miss), then attack with a powerful tech (the enemy's action was determined according to your invisible status, which means that it will defend most of the time), use Escape Out again, etc. In this case, since you do not rely on the damage dealt by Escape Out, you can use Feather Seal instead.

This is not foolproof: you can still be hit by hit-all techs and a few other attacks, some enemies recover too many HP per turn, etc.

The other problem is that you need TP or MP (Escape Out = 5TP, Feather Seal = 3MP): to remedy this you can either level up until you have enough T/MP, equip the Holy Grail (but the battle may drag on and you may lose), or cast Dragon God (18MP needed; but you may run out of LP instead). Every battle must be thought out accordingly. Concretely, First Strike Escape Out + Dragon God + Shadow Servant is a good combination, providing extra damage and protection.

Korotan's 'Perfect Escape Out' requires Golden Bat's Escape Out, the Holy Grail, Shadow Servant, Focus or Power Heal. Become invisible, cast Shadow Servant (not vs. Byune) and keep using Escape Out. When out of TP, heal or counter until you can use Escape Out again. Does not work against enemies with high HP regen or if you cannot heal in time.

Of course, the Invisible status can be profitably used in a full party also, e.g. either to direct all attacks to one countering character (the others being invisible), or simply to protect your healer.

Escape Out can also be used in Commander Mode, e.g. make everyone invisible and use attack items (Sand of Mars, 99 stockable in Backpack). You can also couple Invisibility with powerful Ftechs like High Speed; this can be especially efficient against the Dark Wing Destroyer: if all characters except one kept invisible (in a spot not used by High Speed) are down, the Destroyer's next action will be restricted (to Nightmare, Abyss Wind or Defense for the regular Destroyer, or to Abyss Wind, Earthlizer, Firewall or Defense for the Full Destroyer) but your characters are revived with 1HP and can cast the Ftech next turn; at the end of the turn they go down again because of Abyss damage, then up again, and repeat as many times as your characters' LP allow it.



Korotan's solo playthrough with Katarina (Merchant/Epee) at lowest levels possible [jp]:
https://web.archive.org/web/20090414133837fw_/http://korotan.xrea.jp/lowlv.htm
Reached levels were: 570 HP, 20-25 Weapon LV, 27-28 Magic LV. Mainly for Forneus (only 350-400HP are needed for the last boss).

A hardcore No Save No Damage Solo playthrough [jp]:
http://reversedelta.web.fc2.com/html/yarikomi/solo/solo_nono.html

https://www.nicovideo.jp/mylist/26564116
A solo playthrough (in video, [jp]) with Katarina and only 25 completed battles.
Uses a number of incomplete battles to spark techs & evades and profit from bugs, to set up favorable conditions for the battles actually played through. Capital points are: item-related immunities, Escape Out, Evade Skills, Dragon God, Perfect Magic Shields, Split Body bug. (Below, the battle listing, and the setting for the final battle.)

There are some crazy playthroughs here and there, all in Japanese, with insane or weird self-imposed conditions (like No Select Menu, haha).




No-Magic Katarina Solo Playthrough

Here are the specific notes of a recent Katarina solo playthrough (no magic) done on the Remaster edition (iOS).
It does not really stray from solo basics so I'll use it to add details to the sections above.
For this playthrough: first-timer Katarina Ares/Martial, NG+ for readily access to sparked techs & most items.

1) Set-up

Useful items:
- Golden Bat (Stealthy Swing for the incredibly helpful Invisible status)
- Everfrost Blade (cancels all Cold dmg but Freeze Wall Counter may cancel your turn if your character is not fast enough or if you ran into the enemy: use it for the adequate bosses only)
- Holy Grail (on & off)
- Willguard or Dragonscale Shield (or Water Mirror ofc, but I don't have it)
- Hydraskin Vest as all-rounder armor (strong vs Hit & Status, immune to Poison)(otherwise Dragonscale Armor can do)
- Matriarch’s Helm (immunity vs Confusion & Dark)
- Padded Gi or Witch’s Eye or Rubber Soles
- Royal Ring (immunity vs Insta-death)
- Expert Ring makes SP management quite superfluous.

The worst status ailment is Paralysis; there is nothing you can do about it (no item with immunity) but equip Evade skills against Paralysis-inducing attacks (like Gaze).

Worked simultaneously on 4 skills: Martial, Hit (Golden Bat), Slash (Dragonscale Sword or Triones Sword) and Pierce (superflous, Nightingale or Blitz Lance / Matriarch’s Spear).
Solo, HP grows faster (pity system).

Main techs:
- Hit-all: Punishing Fist
- Single enemy: Tiger Break
- To change battle environment: Dual Dragons, Seismic Strike, Vortex Drive or Firecracker (Dual Dragons is the strongest tech but it does not allow shield activation; Firecracker is the most expensive and may Silence; Seismic Strike does not hit Flying enemies; Vortex Drive is the cheapest tech but most bosses are immune to Sonic).
The rest of the slots for Ward Skills, either vs common or specific attacks (Bonecrusher, Tackle, Trample, Gaze..).

2) Walk-through

Follow a few notable steps (in chronological order) of this enjoyable no-magic solo ride!
Note: Whenever 'usual setup' is mentioned (or when an enemy is not mentioned at all), see with profit the Boss page.

In the Fire Fortress:
* Cerberus * - Counter.
* Pyro Hydra * - Counter, Dual Dragons to prevent regen.
* Aunas * - Optionally Evil Crush for debuff, Dual Dragons, Focus when Kat below 150 HP (at the time 330HP), Counter when out of SP (at this point 70SP with skill lvls of about 20)

* Red Dragon * - Poison with Snake Blaster, Stealthy Swing and wait.
* Maximus * - Rubber Soles, Mdef (magic attacks can hit you even if invisible), possibly equip a Depetrifier.
First get rid of the guards one by one: Poison with Snake Blaster, Stealthy Swing & wait out (def) until dead, repeat.

* Buné * - The usual through Mt Louv with Gwain, easy as pie.

* Matriarch Trials * - Equip the Matriach’s Helm you get from the Trial of Royalty (it grants immunity to Confusion and thus to Charm).

* Yami *
Equipment: Earth Guard, Everfrost Blade, Hydraskin Vest, Matriarch's Helm, Rubber Soles, Royal Ring.
Techs: Tiger Break, Focus, Net, Tackle, Bonecrusher, Trample.
Tiger Break only. A very tight fight bc no SP to spare (at this point had 113SP & Martial 22), some luck needed (a fully successful Multishot means Game Over). With 136SP & Martial 24 in a parallel playthrough for this video of the full battle!

* Careful with Alloces Demons (and Minotaur / Juggernaut-Colossus teams): Invisible status cannot protect you from Ftechs.

* Alloces * - The usual setup, Holy Grail, Tiger Breaks then Perfect Swing.

* Galatea * - The usual setup. Biggest threat: Stoneskin. Dual Dragon to prevent regen, Tiger Break, no time to waste, it is a race against the Petrification clock!

* Water Dragon * (Careful, it is fast!) - Dual Dragons / Stealthy Swing and/or Tiger Break.

* Forneus * - Stealthy Swing & Holy Grail: boring but 100% win if Forneus does not change the battle environment to Water during the first turn; very tough & luck-based any other way.

* White Dragon Ruler * - Firecracker to cancel regen, Tiger Break & Counter (only 14kHP).

* Green Dragon Ruler * - Tiger Break, Stealthy Swing to take a break & regain HP (655HP & 155SP at this endgame point).

* Genryu * - Stealthy Swing & Vortex Drive to stop regen & deal massive damage (but misses a lot). Windup may Paralyze you, in which case most likely Game Over.

* Yama *
A tough enemy for a no-magic solo (impossible to stop the 999HP/turn Abyss regen).
Equipment: Earth Guard (25% vs. Lightning Pierce), Everfrost Blade (vs. Mega Suction), Holy Grail (SP+1/turn), Matriarch's Helm (vs. Confusion/Silence), Expert Ring (STR+5, SP/2), Royal Ring (HP regen).
Body armor: Flame Mantle (readily available from Aunus, vs Fire attacks) or Hydraskin Vest (Workshop with rare item, vs Corpse Moss, possibly better, since an early Poison significantly cripples your HP regen, and good vs Fire).
Main tech: Tiger Break. The usual Ward skills (Net, Bonecrusher, Tackle, Trample). If body armor = Flame Mantle, thanks to Tiger Break buff, HP regen will increase and overcome the Poison from Corpse Moss. Remaining Lightning Pierce & Multishot (especially) are possible Game Over, as is indirectly a successful Nightmare. If you need to heal, just Focus, do not bother losing a turn to hide, it is a race against time (even though the Expert Ring makes any sort of SP management superfluous). Some HP & luck needed.
Here is the video of the full battle with Yama.

* Red Dragon Ruler * - The usual setup, Counter. Sm'augg dropped unexpectedly: nice! (That is the reason why you should never grind for items or anything in RS3: you make yourself sick with the game and miss on the joy of surprise!)

* Medusa + 2x Basilisk * - Equip Gaze Ward. Combination of Windup (Paralyze) + Gaze can kill you every time: a bit annoying!: Tiger-Break the lizards first.

* Colossus + Juggernaut * - Kill J at turn 1 (or die from an unavoidable Ftech, haha)

* True Buné *
Equipment: Golden Bat, Holy Grail, Willguard, Hydraskin Vest (Silver Armor), Matriarch’s Helm, Padded Gi, Royal Ring.
Techs: Firecracker (until battle atmosphere changes), Tiger Break, Stealthy Swing & Focus, Gaze Ward.
Successful Lullaby most likely means Game Over. Vanish & heal when around 5-600 HP.

* True Aunus *
In the Remaster, Aunus' Birdsong seems to be a Wind attack, what a goof... Aunus will change the battle environment by himself...
Switch body armor to Flame Mantle and the only mildly dangerous attack is Air Slash.
Techs: Tiger Break, Focus.
A successful Lullaby is annoying but may not mean Game Over.
A very easy battle.

* True Forneus *
Several viable setups possible, the easiest being possibly: Archfiend’s Shield & Armor (immunity vs Throw & Water), Rubber Soles, Royal & Expert Rings, Tiger Break, Focus, the usual Rolling Slash Ward. Heal when Double-Thrusted. Rather easy too.

Note:
Guard shields react strangely to some techs like Double Thrust or 360 Delta: most of the time when they activate, you still get the full dmg, but sometimes half, and rarely they do as advertised and nullify the attack. Happened too on SFC.

* True Alloces *
Ward Skills, whichever you have: Rolling Slash, Shivers, Screwdriver, Aim, Dancing Plover, Eliminate.
Equipment: Hydraskin Vest, Matriarch’s Helm, Padded Gi, a good shield, Tiger Break.
Or you can Stealthy-Swing your way through after changing the battle environment with a Fireworks for example. By far the easiest solution.

* Lesser Oblivion *
Equipment: Everfrost Blade, Golden Bat, Holy Grail, Will Guard, Hydraskin Vest, Matriarch’s Helm, Padded Gi or Rubber Soles or Expert Ring (if you don’t use the ring you will have to spend some time defending while invisible to regain SP), Royal Ring.
Techs & Wards: Tiger Break, Focus, Net, Bonecrusher, Gaze.
Rather easy (well, it depends on how many times you get Nightmared and survive, haha), because no Rising Earth (see True Oblivion below) can hit you before you can hide. Tiger-Break the Light form (to speed things up), Stealthy Swing / Tiger Break the Void form, Tiger Break the last Void form. The End!
Video of the full battle (with Expert Ring) here.

* True Oblivion *
Unexpectedly the real challenge. Tried at three different times: at around 700 HP, 900+ and 999. In the end, a matter of luck, since you cannot Stealthy Swing & Repeat the last Void form, which keep 'getting stronger' (seemingly ever-increasing atk & HP, see Note 2 below).

Items: Everfrost Blade, Golden Bat, Holy Grail, Will Guard / Hydraskin Vest, Matriarch’s Helm, Padded Gi (or Expert Ring), Royal Ring.
Techs: Tiger Break, Focus, the usual Ward Skills (Net, Bonecrusher, Gaze). Martial 30+ when I reached it.

Keep yourself in top condition (Stealthy Swing & Focus) to anticipate on any Void Wings, quite unforgiving if you have delayed in healing yourself.

Demonic Wings:
Stealthy Swing & Repeat for Byakko & Soryu.
Tiger Break only for Shucho to kill as fast as possible.
Stealthy Swing & Repeat, or Tiger Break (or Kick / Reaper to regain SP) & Stealthy Swing (Focus if needed), for Genbu.

Void Wings:
Stealthy Swing & Repeat (very safe but very long and tedious), or alternate Tiger Break (or Kick / Reaper to regain SP) & Stealthy Swing (+ Focus when needed), faster but riskier.

Last Void Wing
For some reason, repeated Stealthy Swing does not seem to work (see Note 2 below), so Tiger Break (& Focus when needed).
One of the worst combinations is Rising Earth + Mighty Cyclone or Vibrato Blade, bc the tech following Rising Earth will also always play before your character, often leading to a Game Over.

And The End. Now that's a Good Job!
Here is a video of the full battle (no Expert Ring) with ending!

Note 1: on Body Armor.
- Archfiend Armor & Shield: protects vs Sonic, Water, Throw (and cancels out an attack about 20% of the time) but techs are more expensive and you still get heavy dmg from Rising Earth (Game Over if another atk hits).
- Flame Mantle has poor def but immunizes vs all Fire atks (including Acid & Acid Spray).
- Hydraskin Vest may be the best compromise (good phys, Fire & Status def).
Even if you keep yourself healed, it’s still quite all down to luck, whatever your choice is.

Note 2: 'The Abyss is getting stronger'
Bug or new feature? After over 2 hours and over 210k dmg on the boss (with Stealthy Swings over 800 turns), got bored and Katarina got killed by the Flame of a Chaos Disaster, that dealt over 5k dmg... (= ever-increasing atk & HP are most probably new mechanics that translate the fact that 'The Abyss is getting stronger'). The full 2h14min video of the battle is available if anyone is interested or needs 'proof'.

Note 3
During Demonic Wings: Wings of Light (heal only) can happen after a Focus and possibly the two subsequent turns. Glitch?
Note that after these Wings of Light even if an attack dispels the Invisible status your sprite (only) is still invisible: glitch! Video here.

SPECIAL PLAYTHROUGHS

ALL-MAGE PARTY

A party composed of mages only! pretty popular.

The possible mages are:

Main character:
- Thomas: raw INT22 (27max with SPD14).
- Sara: raw INT21 (26max with SPD17), but cannot take part in the final battle unless solo.
- Mikhail & Ellen: raw INT17 (22max with SPD17/18 respectively).

When creating your character, Scholar(Athena) + None = boosts INT(MAG) by +5. The consequences of Scholar+None are actually: STR-4, DEX+3 SPD-2 CON-5 INT+5 WIL+2 CHA+3, so there are pros and cons (SPD-2 ouch, and CON-5 hurts HP regen), but as stated in the Magic section, 1 point difference in INT/MAG means a lot in term of damage, so maxing out INT(MAG) is probably the best choice. SPD is also important (but formation & equipment weight also impact battle turn order, and it depends on your playstyle).
In a nutshell, Thomas and Sara come out as the strongest mages (but Thomas has low SPD), followed by Ellen (but abysmal CON) & Mikhail.
Note that, alternatively, Thomas with Hunter(Artemis)/Epee(Shortsword) gives him a possibly better-balanced INT24 / SPD20.

Among the recruitable characters:
- Undine (INT24 SPD16). Affinity: great with Water, good with Moon. Default Water magic, but -1 MP discount with Earth magic: Earth (Hypergravity) & Moon (Shadow Servant) can make a powerful combo. MP Crown possible.
- Yan Fan (INT23 SPD21). Affinity: good with Earth & Wind. No MP Crown. Only really recruitable after closing all 4 Abyss Gates.
- Bai Meiniang (INT23 SPD14). Unremovable Wind magic. MP Crown possible.
- Tiberius (INT23 SPD14). Affinity: good with Sun, reasonable with all Earthly magics (Water goes up out of party). MP Crown possible with early recruit only.
- Boston (INT21 SPD20). Unremovable Water magic. His default armor Lobster gives +25% Water magic dmg. No MP Crown.
- Fullbright (INT19 SPD16). Reasonable affinity with Earth (but also with the other Terrestrial magics) & Sun. Possible MP Crown.
- Sharl (INT19 SPD16). Unremovable Fire magic. No MP Crown.
- Muse (INT19 SPD15). Affinity: great with Moon, good with Wind & Earth, reasonable with Fire & Water. MP Crown possible.
- And then there is Leonid (INT25 SPD21) but his Abyss-Martial magitechs are unremovable. He's a real charmer, though (CHA 27).


Your mages' INT(MAG) can be increased by items:

Item	Def/Mdef +/-	Special
Body Armor
Star (Celestial Armor)	27/16 Bolt-	INT +2
Moon (Moonlight Robe)	14/27 Cold+	INT +2, Moon magic dmg + 25%
Devil King (Archfiend's Armor)	20/40	All Stats+1, Immune: Water, Throw, Sonic & Stare, TP/MP Cost x2
Gold Dragon (Koryu Armor)	25/25	All Stats+1, Immune: Insta Death
Stardust (Stardust Robe)	18/21 Bolt+	CON & INT+1
Star Trail (Star Mail)	32/24 Pierce- Shot- Bolt-	INT+1
Lake (Lagoon Robe)	14/18	INT+1, Immune: Water, Water env.: HP regen
Magician (Caster's Robe)	8/12	INT+1
Helmet
Psycho (Psychic Hat)	8/1 Hit+	INT+1, Immune: Dark
Headband	1/6	INT +1
Gauntlet
Bone Ring (Bone Bangles)	8/8 Shot-- Hot--	INT+1, Abyss env.: HP regen, Healing Pwr/2
Accessories
Mage Ring	3/3	MAG+5, Raw MP cost/2 [Remaster only]
Candy Ring	0/6 Hot+ Cold+ Bolt+ Status+	INT+1
Fairy Ring	0/7 Stat+	INT+1

Hence with a max bonus of INT +5 (or MAG +20 for Remaster NG+).
Possibly, these can be completed by SPD-enhancing items (all shoes):

Item	Def/Mdef +/-	Special
Hurricane (Cyclone Shoes)	1/6	SPD+2 [Harid MC only or Remaster NG+]
Feather (Feathered Boots)	5/12	SPD+2, Flying status, Immune: Ground
Plastic (Rubber Soles)	3/10 Bolt++	SPD+1

In battle, techs & spells can help:
- INT UP with the built-in techs Spell Enhance (Acuity, INT up by 8+MaceLVL/10) & Victory Song (Paean of Victory, STR INT CON SPD up by 1+SpearLVL/5) and the Spell Fusion Morning Moon (casters' STR INT CON SPD up by 2+LVL/5).
- SPD UP with the spells Hard Fire (Flashfire, SPD up by 5+FireLVL/4) & Moon Glow (SPD & MDef up by 4+MoonLVL/4).


Spell power can also be enhanced by Formations, Items & your reserve character's Support LV, up to a whooping +171% in all.


Notes:
- The most important problem with spells is that they prevent shield activation. With the notable exception of the Devil King / Archfiend's Shield, at the cost of double TP/MP cost and the inability to have any other Magic Shield on the equipped character. IMHO, not being able to shield-block/evade is never adequately compensated for in terms of attack power (the only attack spell that does as well as reasonably good endgame techs is Hypergravity).
- Note that a party composed mostly of mages is great for runs with the lowest possible number of battles, because most mages come with great spells and good levels from the start, like Bai Meiniang (non-mages must resort to the Repeater Bug).
- Strategically, it may be beneficial to have one character with a strong defense (possibly at the detriment of INT) who will act as a target for enemy attacks (spot 1 in Phoenix Dance or Desert Lance).
- The Invisible status can be very useful for supporting/healing characters (Golden Bat's Escape Out/Stealthy Swing needs 5 TP, but self-only, unlike Feather Seal). SFC only: Remember that Medicate, Revival Light & Moon Shine dispel Invisibility.
- Healing: learning Focus and equipping it on unCrowned characters can be useful (it allows shield activation and does not disturb the Invisible status). If you would rather use a weapon slot, the Life Cane (Staff of Vivacity) can fulfil the same role and can act as a last-resort Heal All (Shatter Staff). Be mindful of Abyss-elemental items if you have any equipped (see this Note).
- Equip the most common Evade/Ward skills at all times.
- Insta-death spell Daybreak can be invaluable (the Golden Bat built-in Midas Hand or the spell Touch Gold / Gilded Touch can be used too), especially if it can be coupled with spells that have a chance to induce Paralysis or Sleep (Soul Freeze, Star Fixer, Nap). You can check the monsters' suceptibility or immunity to Sleep, Paralysis or Insta-death on the Monsters page.
- Note that the damage of attack items (Spirit Stone, Sand of Mars, Eternal Ice) depends on INT & MaxHP, and that some techs also rely on INT for dmg (Blade Net, Scare Voice, Flash Arrow, Star Stream?, Misty Ice, Were Buster, Inner Eye, Final Strike).
- Reminder: For a MP Crown, MP ≥ 45 + 10xTP. E.g. if you have 5 TP you need at least 45+10x5= 95 MP for a Crown.
- Mages suitable for the reserve spot (good Support LV growth): Mikhail, Thomas, Sharl.
- Item Counters can be used with benefits.
- On SFC, Perfect Magic Shields can be set up, and on the Remaster, something close enough using the same set-up.
- A mage party can be used in Commander Mode too! with Spell Fusion and Multi-Magics.
- The underlying question about the factors that make a mage a good mage. Growth rates are arguably less important than fixed stats (INT, SPD for mages), especially for INT21+ (see the magic dmg formula in the Magic Section). This is heavily supported by the fact that, by endgame, if you have used specific weapon(s) or spell(s) in every battle, you will notice that everyone pretty much ends up with the same (corresponding) weapon/magic levels numbers, whatever their initial growth rates (differences appear at the start, which are then leveled out when the probability for skills to level up is considerably reduced). Note that stats and magic levels do not matter if a mage is dedicated to casting magic shields (including Shadow Servant). On the other hand, magic levels are a factor in MP growth calculation. Nevertheless, MP pool can be by-passed with the Dragon God Descent spell.

CHARMERS

There are a few Charm attacks, that attempt to Charm the enemies of the opposite gender, making them allies for some turns.
A Charm specialist can be an interesting and refreshing addition to a party (not only does Charm prevent enemies from hurting your party but the Charmed enemies also damage the other enemies or themselves). Nevertheless (plainly said) it is useless against all tougher bosses (immune to Mind attacks).

First you preferably need characters with high CHA (Charm, Charism).
A high CHA raises the chances to Charm and the chances not to be Charmed.
Note that it can be useful to have a high SPD too, to act first, but SPD can be sensibly raised by the adequate formation bonus while CHA cannot.

Characters with highest CHA are:
- MC: Ellen (raw 22), Monica (raw 21).
When creating your character, Royalty (Zeus) + Epee gives CHA +4 and unchanged SPD, so: Ellen (max 26) and Monica (max 25).
Hunter (Artemis) + Epee, with CHA +3 and SPD +2, may even be better.
- Others: Leonid (27), Muse (25), Poet (22), Fairy / Tatyana (20).

The Items that increase CHA:

Item	Def/Mdef +/-	Special
Princess Necklace [Remaster only]	3/3	WIL +5 (CHA+5 for Khalid only)
Heartache	0/9	CHA +2
Devil King Armor Archfiend Armor	20/40	All Stats +1 Immune: Water, Throw, Sonic, Stare TP/MP Cost x2
Gold Dragon Koryu Armor	25/25	All Stats +1 Immune: Insta Death
Clown Jester’s Shoes	4/4	CHA +1
Hair Orna Phoenix Hairpiece	1/7 Stat+	CHA +1

So max CHA bonus is +5 on SFC and +8 (+20 for Khalid) in Remaster NG+.
See the section above for SPD-enhancing equipment.

Note about 'Gender Unknown' characters: Fairy, Boston, Snowman.
Fairy is both Male & Female and can thus charm both females & males!
Boston & Snowman have no Gender and thus can Charm neither...

Charming techs & spells are:
- Resona Weep / Resonance Weep (Canary / Canaria Bow, AOE)
- Charm Stare / Enchanting Gaze (Evil Eye)
- Stare / Gaze (Leonid, AOE)
- Charm Light / Glamor Glow (Moon / Lunar, AOE)
Tech accuracy depends on CHA, except for Charm Stare (which depends on LVL & WIL).

Gender determines the possible targets: you can charm the opposite sex only. Unfortunately, a lot of monsters are gender-less.
Here is the list of the Charmable monsters:
- Males:
Imp, Nuts, Minotaur, Nixie, Goblin, Brother, Krypton, Weretiger, Hobgoblin, Ogre, Crypt Elder, Ogre Batt, Werewolf, Ikaros, Ogre Lord, Jester, Kryptomagi, Barbarian, Pegpowler, Bronze Magi, Silver Magi, Gold Magi, Volcano, Lizardman, Winnah, Mad Bull, Nothing, Straycat, Happilang, Dandelion, Neft, Arakes Demon, Thief, Great Thief, Maximus' Guard.
- Females:
Nixer, Undine, Draconian, Snake Girl, Medusa, Arachne, Fey, Dancer, Belladonna, Fawn, Vanadise, Echidna, Minity, Lilith, Enabler, Alve, Invoker, Byuni Spirit.

Note that you can visually tell which enemies you can Charm: after activating the tech or spell, the enemies you can Charm either become Charmed (red heart) or the attack Misses ('Miss' under the target); the enemies you cannot Charm are unaffected and the 'Miss' message does not appear.

All in all, the best charmer is most probably Fairy, who is fast, has a high CHA and can charm both genders.

Note: Leonid's special AOE magic tech Control Undead is, result-wise, a Charming attack (enemies can become allies) and it can affects not only Undead, but also enemies with no Race specified, which is quite a lot all in all (even the last boss):
- Undead enemies (= all Undead, all Skeleton and a couple more):
Skeleton, Ill Head, Frisberg, Barisyldra, Elm Bird, Scare Head, Bone Drake, Mortal Ghost, Sword God, Nosferan, Skull Titan, Abyss Drake, (Yama?), Yami, Death Shark, Mushroom, Undead, Dead Spirit, Corpseman, Afkar, Rotten Gion, Dragon Zomb (red, purple, green), Ghoul Gulper, Circle Kill, Carpenter, Pois Gion (Poison Gigant).
- Race-less enemies:
Cheshire, Soulsucker, Wind Flower, Barbarian, Mushroom, Whirlwind, Rain, Thunder Fire, Splash, Aerial, Fen, Plasma, Shadow, Bronze mag, Silver Magi, Gold Magi, Volcano, Undine, Devil Armor, Meldworm, Crawler, Winnah, Mad Bull, Gnashing, Stray Cat, Happilang, Dandelion, Dancer (Special), Clown, Ghost Fire, Strange Eye, Zelnams, Red Shoes, Ghost, Taomaster, Corpse Eye, Ren Wang, Kuan Yin, Ming Wang, Death Master, Triomagen, Fey, Dancer (Fairy), Belladonna, Fawn, Vanadise, Minity, Enabler, Alve, Invoker, (Sphinx?), Rat Cluster, Aunas Mage, Arake Demon, N. Zweiger, H. Cannon, N. Cannon, Thief, Great Thief, Maximus, Max's Guard, Byunei, Arakes, Aunas, Forneus (Abyss), Destroyer.

It could be appealing to turn the Destroyer Last Dark Wing Form into an ally for one turn (it will not hit you for one thing, and hit itself for another), but Control Undead may very well Miss, and instead Leonid would most probably do more damage attacking.

FULL CM TIPS

A few tips & trivia about a full Commander-Mode playthrough.

For CM, SupportLV is the important stat (enhances party members' stats & boosts formation-related HP regen, up to x1.39).
The characters with the highest SupportLV growths are: Mikhail (8), Harid (5), Thomas (4), Monica (1).

Nevertheless, Sara is the only character that plays her final battle in a Special Commander Mode (rather similar to a mixed beneficial regular mode), in the preparation for which you should have her in CM as much as you can to raise her SupportLV (but it is not compulsory at all).

It is possible to play the whole game in CM (CM starts with a party of 2) with the exception of the battles against Maximus, the Dragon Machine (which are not compulsory) and airborne Byunei (who can be defeated in her lair instead). You do not need to prepare Sara for this because HP goes up quite normally in the reserve spot (she won't be one-shot) and because Repeater techs (Split Body..) can make up for possible low skill levels.

Given that party members have preset behaviors in CM, you just have to equip them with the weapon they are good at, and manage their techs. One-handed weapons are recommended (they allow shields to activate). Kungfu (Tiger Break) is very useful for the very endgame: use formations like Dragon Form to cultivate both your characters' favorite weapon (use the regular f attack pattern) and Kungfu (use ftechs like Shinryu Dance).

Individual Techs spark normally in CM. When fighting regular enemies, only equip the techs you have not mastered yet. Mastering can be slow but you will master all sparked techs in time.

Eventually, double HP regen is a must (you cannot use healing techs or spells)(but the Backpack is useful): equip your characters with Royal Rings or Troll Stones. Note that Sara CM-only HP regen does not work for the last battle (but Genbu's does), so it is still worth it to have Life Canes, Nightingale (needs sparking) and/or healing & the Reviver spells handy.

A crazy Sara Playthrough exploiting bugs & all [jp, video]:
https://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm12396112

A Katharina Commander Mode playthrough with only 25 complete battles [jp]:
http://reversedelta.web.fc2.com/html/yarikomi/status/25commander.html
Details here also: http://www8.plala.or.jp/ultianima/game/rs3_25sen.html


RTA & VARIA TIPS

3 RTA (Real Time Attack) playthroughs with various self-imposed starting conditions (respectively 1:43, 2:26 & 3:43) [jp]:
http://www8.plala.or.jp/ultianima/game/rs3_ta/index.html (with savestate abuse)
http://reversedelta.web.fc2.com/html/yarikomi/rta/rta1.html
http://reversedelta.web.fc2.com/html/yarikomi/rta/rta2.html


Here is the list of the compulsory battles, regrouped by quest / location:

(Shortest intro: Katarina: stay in prison) 1) Forne Soldier x3 2) Cold Spirit x4 3) 3 Cramp 4) Bronze Magi 5) Crypt Magi 6) Volcano 7) Forneus 8) Triomagen 9) Pyro Hydra (Hidona) 10) Aunas 11) Arakes

12) Byunei (with Gwayne) 13) Sundine x3 14) Zelnams 15) Zelnams 16) Devil King Armor 17) Dragon Ruler (red) 18) Night Flower 19) Medusa + Basilisk x2 20) Sword God x5 21) Mantis God 22) Dragon Zombie (green) x3 23) Cerberus x2 24) Abyss Naga 25) Destroyer

Non-compulsory but useful:
Snake Girl x5 in the DKP to open the portal.

Note 1: If you do not know what or where those enemies are, you probably should not be doing what you are doing and should go back to the Walkthrough.
Note 2: In the Remaster's NG+, stats, techs, ans most spells and items carry over: it's like a cheat mode: no need to plan the run: just speed through the whole thing with your OP party!


Playthrough with 31 completed battles with Korotan:
https://web.archive.org/web/20100419070646fw_/http://korotan.xrea.jp/fewbattle.htm
Allows LVL UP manipulation (reset & replay if unsatisfactory) to reach the Skill LV 16+ to be able to fight Byune with Gwain, and to reach the minimums of 350HP, 15WP, 20 Blunt LV for the last boss.
Necessary techs: Escape Out, Midas Hand, Focus, Stealing Hands, Windmill.
Main character: Mikhail (Fighter, Mace).


Defeat Yami during the Introduction!
Strategy: Against Fire/Bolt & Mega Suction: high MDef. Against Blade Net, Ectoplasm: Net Evade (spark vs Yami, master vs ghosts). Bone Crush: the corresponding Evade Skill (spark & master vs. Afkar's Skull Crush). Against Multishot: unless aimed at 1 character, bearable. Against Death Widow: x (reset if hit). Against Nightmare: x (low probability). Against Trample & Face Hit: x (over if hit).
Equipment: Moon Bone (from War Bat), Dead Heart x2 (from Red Dragon Zombie / Mortal Ghost), Candy Ring (from Smart Gelatin).
Techs: Southern Cross (the best tech but at this point you have at most 2 Epees: Monica + Epee main character), Dynamic Hit (buy an axe in Podol, but may miss), Brook Rush (get a Bsword from Belladonna), Stone Cut, Niagara Buster (but high miss rate).
Party: Epee (Sara, Monica), Axe (Julian, Ellen, Thomas). Life Cane to Thomas. Shields. Free Fight formation.
Requirements: HP 200, Weapon LV 10+, TP 21+ for Epee/ 24+ for Axe.
Est. dmg per turn = 5k -> 3 turns to defeat Yami (13333+HPregen).
Tips: Take items from Harid. Give Spears to Sara & Monica. Sell unwanted items in Podol, buy Tpotions & weapons. Spirit Stone x3 vs. War Bat. LV UP & Tech Sparking vs. Zombies in the next room (best vs. 1, Feint it & attack). Red Dragon Zombies: Leg Sweep & attack with Blade Roll & Great Wheel, Feint when 1 left. Spark Southern Cross & Dynamic Hit vs. Mortal Ghost. Then gather the necessary def items, rest upstairs when TP-dry, sell unwanted items, buy Tpotions. Spark & master Evades. Defeat Yami.
Note: This is an ideal set-up. Sub-par is acceptable (weaker techs, fewer Evades) with additional battling. You can also get Moon magic from Podol to stop Yami's HP regen, for example. See also the page Bosses > Yami for other details. Note also that there is no point in doing this, haha. There won't be anything at the bottom of Leonid's castle, but you can still have a good look at his cool coffin ; )

Defeat the Black Dragon Ruler right after Harid's Introduction (with about 10 completed battles).
Strategy: Against Acid Spray: Self-Burning. Against Earthquake: the corresponding Evade Skill (learn from Ogre in the Devil King Palace: become invisible and wait). Against Trample: the corresponding Evade Skill (learn form Red Dragon in the Devil or Holy King Palace: cast Self-Burning at turn 1, become invisible, show yourself, repeat). Against all physical attacks (mostly used): become invisible.
Attacks: Possible use of counters (Windmill with Fairy and/or Robin, SPD-enhanced with Hard Fire to raise activation rate).
Party: Speculation: Undine, Robin, Fairy, Harid, Nora.
Equipment, Techs, Spells:
Golden Bat for everyone except Undine. Earthquake Evade for everyone except Fairy. Self-Burning for everyone.
Harid (Self-Burning), Nora (Life Cane), Robin (Rubber Soles / Plastic, Hard Fire), Fairy (Amen Tomb, an Epee, Shell Blazer, Plastic, Wing Charm, Axel Sniper, Windmill, possibly Trample Evade), Undine (Plastic, Hard Fire, Feather Seal).

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