FFVI - NENMG Part VI: Ultima Weapon
22In virtually any restricted playthrough of Final Fantasy 6, Ultima Weapon is a challenging boss that poses a lot of trouble. It's not unlikely that if you record yourself beating this boss a video of epic proportions will be conceived. Hopefully, this one doesn't disappoint either.
We aren't playing a low level game of some sort so it's common sense to pick up Shadow on the way to the boss. Our party therefore consists of Mog, Gau, Strago and Shadow. Though you could come up with other effective strategies (for instance, bringing Edgar with Debilitator and concentrating on spamming actions and spells of the element the boss was made weak to), our tactic is quite simple. Gau and Mog go auto-pilot (in this case, Mog takes a couple of turns to successfully get into his Dance without stumbling) and perform Wind Rhapsody and Aspiran respectively. The former is a versatile dance that offers moves that deal a fair amount of damage to Ultima and a very effective healing technique that essentially returns all living members of the party to full HP (there's a 6/16 chance it'll be that move). However, since you cannot guess what exactly Gau and Mog will do during their turns, relying on them is not enough. Strago and Shadow are there to help them out with hurting the boss and keeping the party alive, and fortunately they can be controlled without having their potential limited.
The most reliable method of healing is Strago's White Wind. However, there are some nuances concerning it that make the battle a bit complicated. The first one is obvious: knowing that White Wind heals the party for the amount of Strago's HP at the time it is used, Strago using the move in critical or nigh critical health will be of no help to his allies at all. In those situations, Shadow (being the other controllable character) must aid him, sacrificing a precious X-Potion from out inventory to get the old fart back to full health. If Shadow is knocked out, Strago has to do that by himself. Being at full health takes priority over reviving the fallen since you never know when Ultima decides to use a multitarget Blaze.
Secondly, Mog may be faster than Strago and heal the party with his Dance. Strago following his action with his own will be not only unnecessary but allow Ultima to act quicker and this is not a boss we want to act a lot. This is why I open up the menu a lot. Since I'm not in the Active mode, suspending everyone's actions by doing that in the right moment is another tactical tool that can and should be exploited here.
The solution to this problem is to wait a bit for Mog to move and only then cast White Wind. As you can see, reliance on Mog's Dance leads to getting the moogle KO'd as Strago is late with his White Wind and that's the first time in the recording where I am not too far from facing the game over screen.
The third problem is that Blue Magic is not performed instantly and we are forced to wait a bit before White Wind is executed. Anything can happen during the gap between choosing the action and actually seeing it performed: Strago may be injured (and, with it, White Wind made ineffective) or killed, same for his allies. In fact, the moment you get Strago, the challenge gets really interesting as a lot depends on timing and the combination of attacks rather than just the choice of them.
The battle is quite interesting, again owing to the issues that arose from the aforementioned nuances related to timing, and the ending is epic too, with everyone surviving at critical health.
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