Final Fantasy VI Walkthrough

Short Arm is incapable of doing anything magical, and it will normally just use Battle. It has a 66% chance of countering any damage it takes with Battle too. When it hits 10112 HP, Short Arm may start to use !Razor Gale, which is a tad stronger. Did you know '112' is the Dutch alarm number? Did you care? Long Arm is only slightly more inventive than its shorter twin; it switches between Battle and Shockwave. When it hits 10240 HP, Long Arm takes a break from the Shockwave attacks and uses either Battle or does nothing whatsoever. Bold strategy, Cotton. If Long Arm is the last target to be taken out in this first battle, it'll use up to three Shockwave attacks before going palm-up.

Visage is one that only a mother could love, I suppose, and since there is no mother to speak of, it only makes sense that this creature is trapped in a state of continuous furious torment. It doesn't really do a lot normally, very rarely using either Reverse Polarity or !Sapping Strike. Every fifth turn it'll use either Protect or Haste on one of its Arms. Of course, the trouble begins once you pound it enough and it hits 10240 HP. From this moment on, it'll never rest and use either !Sapping Strike or the Petrify-inducing Dread Gaze attack. In this damaged state, every fifth turn may feature Dread Gaze, Magnitude 8, or Reverse Polarity. If Visage is the last target to be killed, it'll go with a Quake spell.

The first tier of the final battle is beyond any doubt the easiest tier, and, since every succeeding tier will be more difficult to handle than the previous one, it makes sense to use the relative harmlessness of this titan to your advantage. Start the battle off by reducing the damage you're taking. Take out Long Arm easily by employing an instant death attack: either use the Air Anchor on it or cast Break spells until one hits. Now, cast Slow on Short Arm and you're good to go. Make sure that you do not summon Golem or Fenrir right now: Their effects won't carry to the next tier and you'll need them much more up there.

Now that you're just taking !Sapping Strikes and occasional physical hits from the fiend, it's time for your barriers. Cast Hastega, Mighty Guard, Regen, Reraise, you've got all the time in the world and there's nothing stopping you from applying all the positive status ailments you see fit. Know that if you brought Terra to this battlefield, you can have her Morph and let her Morph timer run out while she's Sleeping to make her Morph status permanent. If you're done, it's time to finish this titan off.

You'll want to take out Visage before Short Arm, so focus your attacks on it. Since Visage is weak to Fire-elemental attacks, an single-target Firaga spell leaves a huge dent, as do Thrown Flametongues. There's nothing particularly interesting to say about the do's and don't's of this battle: focus your powers mainly on Visage, as you want to take it out first, and simply inflict damage as efficiently as possible. You've had much more experience with your characters than I have, so go with what has proven itself in your particular situation. Expand Full Strategy

Tiger will act very rarely, but, when it does, the effects tend to be less than desirable for your part of this ordeal. Characters that absorb Fire are relatively safe from Tiger's attacks, but it'll be rough for the others. Tiger's normal AI script reads Nothing - strong attack - Nothing - 1/3 Battle - loop, but once you pound it below 11520 it'll get mad and start using the strong attacks every turn, with a 1/3 chance of using !Zombie Fang in the same turn immediately afterwards. This frenzied Tiger is far and away the most troublesome opponent of this tier and is priority number one as a result. Since his elemental weakness is the popular and easily exploitable Ice-elemental variant, Blizzaga spells and Thrown Icebrand blades are extremely strong attacks versus the ferocious feline. Did you know: Tiger's image is the exact same one as Sabin uses when he executes his Desperation Attack 'Tiger Break'?

If you'd thought that you had seen the last of those repetitive machine moves when you destroyed the Empire's most powerful weapon, you had better think again. Machine is less than picky with its AI script and will randomly use any of its attacks in any situation with only one quirk: Once Machine hits 11520 HP, it'll stop using Atomic Rays and start using the ever-so-slightly stronger Absolute Zero attack.

Magic uses spells. A lot of them. It has all kinds of conditions too, so allow me to present them to you: Normally, it's Poison, Drain, Bio, Firaga, Confuse, Haste, Imp, Hastega. When its HP drops below 30720, it's: Blizzaga, Thundaga, Holy, Flare, Sleep, Stop, Reflect, Slowga, Reraise. Below 20096, another change: Blizzara, Firaga, Thundaga, Holy, Flare, Rasp, Silence. Below 10240, same story: Starts using 33% Graviga spell as an omni-counter. Finally, below 5120: Starts using 33% Graviga and up to two Dispel spells as an omni-counter. Note that when Magic dies, its Mute status will be removed and its final counter will definitely produce results.

Power hits you. Every turn it uses Battle. It never rests or does something remotely interesting; it just sits there and pounds every character it can get its hands on. When it dies, it uses !10-Hit Combo once and follows up with nine Battle attacks before croaking for good. Obviously you were supposed to expect a tenth hit here, but luckily you have me to suck the fun out of every single one of those little tricks.

You should still be buffed up from the previous battle, so there's no need to redo it now. Don't touch Golem/Fenrir yet. Start by killing Machine ASAP; once again, the Air Anchor really helps. Death spells are a suitable replacement. Cast the Silence spell on Magic, or use the Bad Breath Lore. If Magic managed to set Haste on Power, cast Slow to counter the effects. By this point, you should have killed Machine, crippled Magic into uselessness, and Slowed the inherently inferior Power. What's left is Tiger.

Focus all your attacks on Tiger. Like I said, Blizzaga spells and Thrown Icebrand blades really hurt it. When Northern Cross hits home, use a Fire spell to recover. Don't let Zombies roam either; cure immediately and make destroying Tiger a priority over healing as Tiger is the only dangerous opponent on the field (not to mention the fact that, if you're in trouble, he can't be more than 10000 HP away from defeat based on his AI). Once Tiger is down, recover from any wounds you might've obtained and go for Magic instead.

After you've killed Magic (there's no special tricks), you'll probably have one or more characters who have lost their positive statuses due to !Zombie Fang, dying in some other manner, or Dispel. Re-set them (since Power won't be KO-ing anybody anytime soon) before finally going for the kill on the final part. Power's !10-Hit Combo shouldn't hurt too bad; even in such large numbers, its weak and inaccurate physicals fail to impress. Expand Full Strategy

Lady just isn't that interesting. White Wind can show up at any turn, and !Repose may make a cameo appearance too. If you dare to kill off Rest before Lady, Lady will respond by casting Arise on Rest, reviving it. Note that Rest won't revive back to its max HP, but to 9999 HP instead, which is good news for us.

Lady is just there to keep Rest around, which is bad enough for you, as Rest is a particularly nasty enemy to have around. Every odd turn, Rest may cast either Tornado or Meltdown, and, on every even turn, Rest will either use Battle or Doom. Since this tends to be a long battle, Doom quickly becomes a burden. Rest really goes for the kill once it dips below 10240 HP, though. Once you've brought this disaster on yourself, Rest will use Meteor. Always. Not only this, but it will also gain access to an omni-counter: 33% Meteor, 33% nothing, and 33% Trine, a new attack. Trine is unblockable and sets Dark and Mute, which is pretty bad as unless your characters are White Cape-, Ribbon-, or Rage-protected. Once Rest is killed, it'll use at least one and possibly two !Repose attacks to set Death on a character, which is, again, pretty bad, since characters killed this way cannot be revived right after and disappear from your team.

The first priority of this battle is Golem or Fenrir. As soon as this is in place, Lady needs to go down. It is vital you have non-elemental and targetable attacks to use for this purpose. Edgar's Drill Tool, Shadow's Fuma Shurikens, Falchions, Pinwheels or Impartisans, Fixed Dice, Flare spells, and Ragnarok or Lightbringer swings are all grand. Obviously, nothing is stopping you from hurting Rest in the meantime, so Grand Delta and Ultima aren't out of the question either. Taking down Lady can be quite tedious, as she is constantly healed by both her own White Wind attacks and Rest's Meltdown spells. If you brought Locke or Gogo with a Steal command, you might try to Steal Lady's Ragnarok sword; if one of your characters is wielding an Enhancer, replace it.

Once Lady has been killed, you just need to rough it out with Rest. Keep yourselves healed and always recover from Trine right away. You just need to bridge the dangerous gap between Rest having 10240 HP and Rest having 0 HP, as in this window Rest is simply strong enough to kill you whenever his AI script gives him the chance. The best route in the end is to go all-out on the offensive and give Rest as little time as possible to use Meteor. When Rest dies, it'll use either one or two !Repose attacks. This is why we kept Golem and/or Fenrir around for all this time: Avoiding the gruesome fate of a successful !Repose attack. Having circumvented this dirty last trick, it's time to rise even further up in the Heavens and face the Fallen One himself. Expand Full Strategy

So how does the final boss of Final Fantasy VI do battle? He'll start the battle with that demented little speech of his. Characters that were in the air when you defeated the third tier could land from their attacks before he starts it: That's kinda humorous. His first attack is Heartless Angel, which will reduce all of your characters' HP to 1. After that, it's all about physicals, !Havoc Wing, level 3 spells, and that most annoying of attacks, Trine. !Havoc Wing is his most popular and, in most instances, most powerful attack Kefka will perform.

As soon as Kefka hits 32640 HP, he will become quite a bit meaner. Calling a head into existence, he'll say "The end draws near..." and the screen will start to shake. The next turn, he'll execute the Forsaken attack. Forsaken is a multi-target magical non-elemental attack that, in terms of pure power, is the strongest attack in the game. It lacks the barrier-piercing ability, however, so sufficient Magic Defense should ensure that your characters all survive a single Forsaken slaughter. After this is completed, Kefka will use two attacks in two turns: !Havoc Wing, Trine, or Revenger. Revenger is also a new attack: it's like a multi-target Dispel that only removes positive status ailments. It removes Clear, Image, Regen, Haste, Shell, Safe, Reflect, Life 3, and Float. After those two turns, Kefka will once again start to charge up for Forsaken.

2560 HP later (at 30080 HP), Kefka will start employing a horrible omni-counter: For every attack directed at him, he may counter with either Battle or Hyperdrive. Hyperdrive is an extremely strong attack that's both unblockable and barrier-piercing, so any character struck by it is likely to die unless he or she was really power-leveled. At 10240 HP, this Hyperdrive counter even changes into an Ultima spell, which is obviously even worse, as it's fairly stronger than Hyperdrive, though the power is cut since it targets every character. Keep in mind that Ultima may be absorbed by a Runic blade. The Hyperdrive and Ultima counters are not employed when Kefka is charging for Forsaken. This is vital information, as, quite frankly, Kefka's counters are what make him a mean opponent. The last 'stage' of Kefka's battle tactic is when he hits 7680 HP, which is when he just charges up for Forsaken, uses it, cast a Meteor spell, and charges up for Forsaken again. Meteor is especially troublesome since it cannot be absorbed by a Runic blade. Kefka has a lot of strong spells that will fly past all your fancy elemental protection. The trick here is to keep reviving characters that die (I find this is mostly due to !Havoc Wing attacks) and try to avoid being hit by Hyperdrive and Ultima as much as possible. If you can employ the Runic skill, both attacks are vulnerable to its powers, so take advantage of that. If not, I suggest you only attack when Kefka is charging for Forsaken.

Locke should definitely try to Steal the Megalixir Kefka possesses; it's a great way to heal up after a Heartless Angel attack. Mog should Jump as usual; he's a real asset in this battle since, in addition to doing a lot of damage, his 255 Defense means that he will be practically immune to !Havoc Wing. The same goes for Gau. The best Rages for him are the pure offensive ones. Stray Cat, possibly paired with a Sniper or Man-Eater, will really hurt Kefka. Edgar should do nothing but Jump. If you've taken Cyan up there, try to reach Tempest. Quick is a real asset to Cyan in this battle, as it is in all. For Setzer, it's Fixed Dice, which should be obvious. Shadow should first empty your stash of Impartisans. Other weapons that are more powerful than Pinwheels/Fuma Shurikens that you are unlikely to have equipped include Gladius, Kagenui, Excalibur, Holy Lance, Mutsunokami, Murakumo, Healing Rod, and Wing Edge. Strago should use Grand Delta. Sabin and Gogo should use Phantom Rush. If Terra is Morphed, she should definitely stick to level 3 spells, but if she's not, Flare is the superior option. Relm should just use Flare or level 3 spells too. If Celes is around, I suggest keeping her on Runic stand-by, as it's really awesome in this battle. If Runic conflicts too much with your other characters' offensive plans, it should be avoided, obviously, so take a look at your options and decide what's best.

Kefka isn't extremely tough; he can just catch you off-guard with some of his more powerful attacks. So long as you make sure that doesn't happen, he's an entirely beatable final boss. If your characters are all decked out with Quick spells, a Soul of Thamasa here, a Master's Scroll there, and Ultima everywhere, the final battle with Kefka will feel like a walk in the park. Expand Full Strategy