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On FFVIII dont you think magic is pretty pointless in battle?
Only good for junctioning!

You're pretty right. It's only useful against an elemental enemy, really. GFs are handy throughout, but their animations are so long. If you're in a timed battle, you'll be screwed if you use them, unless the chunks they take out are huge.

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Why don't you go hang out with the village idiot so you have someone to look up to?

If your characters were junctioned properly, you really didn't have to use magic at all from the second disc onwards.  I always junctioned powerful magics to my physical attack first and HP second, so it didn't end up mattering if an enemy was elemental or not -- you'd have the offense to take them down regardless and the HP to take any hits.  That was one reason why I didn't like FF8 -- the magic was unnecessary and the magic system made the game much too easy.  Of course, other games also turned into this... FFX, for example, became incredibly easy once you started to get the characters' ultimate weapons and unlocked all the abilities.  The only difference between this and FF8 was that in early FFX you _had_ to use magic -- there simply was no way to beat some of the enemies without it.



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Hey, put the cellphone down for a while
In the night there is something wild
Can you hear it breathing?
And hey, put the laptop down for a while
In the night there is something wild
I feel it, it's leaving me

Aura and Haste were excellent magic, and of course, in the strange event that you actually wanted to cure the members of your party, magic was helpful. But attacking magic was pretty pointless, only Ultima did a halfway decent amount of damage, and it was much more effective to keep 100 of them junctioned to your attack.

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Downtown Philly where it's realer than a heart attack
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Magic becomes pretty useless once you've gotten past the early stages of the game.  As a matter of fact, almost every battle could be easily won by a proper use of Junctions and Guardian Forces.  So in this sense, you're absolutely right.

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I disagree, FF8 had powerful and unusual magics to use.
Meltdown- 0-vit
Pain- nuff said when it works
Curaga- Aside form the obvious, they have powerful effects of the undead.
Demi- I like it...
Triple- Triple Ultima? I dunno forget it...

Just go throgh your spells and check out which ones you really like.

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At times one remains faithful to a cause only because its opponents do not cease to be insipid.
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844 - 1900)

I junction, 255 strength attacks do much more damage than magic attacks, and either way, I'm too lazy to sit around and watch ultima 88 million times. Some things were good, such as aura and meltdown, so I kept one person with magic, especially at the end of the game when you didn't need to draw new magic as much.

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Lou: There's a couple of guys fighting down at the aquarium, Chief.
Wiggum: Do they still sell those frozen bananas?
Lou: I think so.
Wiggum: Let's roll.

i think Aura is pretty useful, i saw my friend cast aura on his
guys and pressed triangle a bunch of times so that you get
instant limit breaks, or something.. maybe i was seeing things..



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Why do kamakazi pilots wear helmets?

I'd say Aura and Meltdown were the best.  The rest were for junctioning.  Aura just helped me get instant Limit Breaks without being weak though.

Hell, you don't need Magic as long as you can stay weak enough to call forth Limit Breaks anytime you want them.  That's when I'd say Magic was most helpful, since Selphie was my mage.

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I didn't think they were that useless. At first, in the game, any spell was good. Then later on, they were great for junctioning, and the stronger spells were more useful. I particularly like Demi, Flare, Aero, Aura, Haste, Regen, and Curaga myself.

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I had an old signature. Now I've changed it.

I have to agree with Anrachist.  8 did have some pretty unique.  I personally like, Aura, Triple, Meltdown, etc.

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"The Master of Past, Present, and Future has returned."

honestly, i never used aura, only time i actually used magic is when i first played FFVIII. For attack, I just deal with physical damage, and don't care about stats magic in FFVIII because enemies die too fast. I still rarely use magic to attack. Why use magic when there are summons? because it takes forever to summon in FFVIII

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I will be there...

The GF's make magic useless in the late game, because with the exception of aura, everything can be cast with a GF. Most statuses are done by DoomTrain, that devil guy can do demi, and others.

I kind of go into a non-comprehensive state whenever I summon GF's, so I never get sick of them in theory.



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And one by one I watched every constellation die
And there I was frozen, standing in my backyard
Face to face, eye to eye, staring at the last star
I should've known, walked all the way home
To find that she wasn't here, I'm still all alone

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Quote (monkey-wrench @ 11 Nov. 2002, 19:24)

i think Aura is pretty useful, i saw my friend cast aura on his guys and pressed triangle a bunch of times so that you get instant limit breaks, or something.. maybe i was seeing things..

You weren't seeing things. If you don't get a limit break right away, press triangle to switch member. Keep changing till it comes back to you, and you might get a limit break. Keep trying and you'll eventually get it. Cheap as it is, it's good!

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Lou: There's a couple of guys fighting down at the aquarium, Chief.
Wiggum: Do they still sell those frozen bananas?
Lou: I think so.
Wiggum: Let's roll.

Quote (Jlombardi13 @ 13 Nov. 2002, 17:45)

Quote (monkey-wrench @ 11 Nov. 2002, 19:24) i think Aura is pretty useful, i saw my friend cast aura on his guys and pressed triangle a bunch of times so that you get instant limit breaks, or something.. maybe i was seeing things.. You weren't seeing things. If you don't get a limit break right away, press triangle to switch member. Keep changing till it comes back to you, and you might get a limit break. Keep trying and you'll eventually get it. Cheap as it is, it's good!

that's what you can do if u don't have limit when you are on low life, but even so... LIMIT > MAGIC

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I will be there...

Its totally useless, Just as the game....

unlike EVERYONE, i think this is a great game, and i think it has the best ending from any game ive ever seen. anyways, i think that the magic was ok, but keep in mind, you deplete your stats when using it if it is junctioned. for that reason, i actually LIKED junctioning. it was unusual, but when you got used to it, it was ok.

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Your time will come...

Hey Melfice, eat a can of botulism , FF8 owns your sorry hide.

As for hoads here, I condone the guy, there's finally somone here who likes the system like I do. Here's some advice. Junction Ultima to your elemental defense and take a trip around the islands of heaven and hell looking for junction points. You'll get a ton of Ultima, triple, Tornado, Aura, ect.ect.ect.

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At times one remains faithful to a cause only because its opponents do not cease to be insipid.
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844 - 1900)

Personally I liked the game too. Just something to think about, though...A lot of the GF's had elemental properties and could be considered magical.

~Just my humble, accurate insight~

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"You see Timmy, you can't take every thing as a life and death situation, 'cause you'll die a lot of times" -Van Wilder

Well as for offinsive magic past disc 2 is pretty much useless.  Unless you use triple and even then limits are still better.  The best magics I think are Ultama well just because you can junction it, Triple, Haste, Demi, Meltdown, Aura, Flare, and Holy.  And as for Summons they are really useless most limit breaks do much better damage and take less time.  

Also I loved FF8 I actully think that so far FF8 is the 2nd best FF game Square has made.  Allthough I havn't played FFX.  I think Square really took a step in the right direction.  They made a trade off between magic and better stats which I thought was brillant.  I only wish that Square hadn't made stockpileing magic so annoying.  I mean make drawing low lvl spells a bit easier being able to draw 20 or 30 fires or useless spells would have been nice.  Also get rid of Aura it make your chars too godly.  FF8 would have had one of the better systems if they had just balanced the game out a bit more...

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