Times: Even with all of your characters fully developed, Target Time is around
20 minutes. With a little luck, you can Poison him to death in around 12 - 14
minutes.
Paradigms:
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* Van * Fang * Snow *
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* #1 * Sab * Sab * Sab *
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* #2 * Sab * Med * Med *
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* #3 * Sen * Sen * Sen *
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* #4 * Med * Syn * Med *
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* #5 * Med * Com * Med *
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The Battle (If you can call it that) -- Make Vanille the Leader and replace
Lightning with Snow, since you are going to be in Sentinel Mode almost
exclusively. Equip everyone with his/her weakest Tier 1 weapon. We're playing
defense here, so let's dig out those Witch's Bracelets from Mission 62 and
those Black Belts/General's Belts that we first used in Mission 55 and get some
more use out of them. Equip each team member with 3 Bracelets, and one Belt.
(I tried this battle with 2 Bracelets and 2 Belts, but it didn't seem to make
much difference, so we might as well use the Accessories that we have already
Upgraded.) You won't have Haste for the first round, but that is an acceptable
tradeoff for the extra protection. Remember -- we're not trying to out-muscle
this guy; we're just trying to outlast him.
Begin with #1 and have Vanille cast Poison 5 times. If it doesn't stick,
switch to #2 and have her try 5 more times. As soon as it sticks, change to #3.
The enemy's attacks will do minimal damage, and your Mediguard ability will
restore some of your HP while you wait for Poison to sap away his HP. When the
Mark goes into his trance, switch to #4 to have Vanille and Snow restore HP
while Fang restores Haste. Before he comes out of his trance, change back to
#1 and be prepared to spam Poison again (because his trance removed it). Fang
will Dispel his buffs, and Snow will try to Slow him. Continue this pattern of
Poisoning and Dispelling him, defending while he attacks, and healing and re-
Hasting when he is in a trance. Eventually Poison will sap away every one of
his 15,840,000 HP and you will earn a 5-star rating without ever drawing a
weapon!
There is a chance that he will go into Wicked Whirl before you get Poison to
stick. If so, you must immediately return to the safety of #3 or you will die.
Once the danger is past, you can try to use #2 to stick Poison again or just
wait until he comes out of his next trance. As long as you are defending when
he uses Wicked Whirl, you should survive and be victorious.
I have tried this strategy maybe a dozen times. I never came very close to
dying, but once or twice I did get 4 stars instead of 5. This was mostly
because of bad timing of his Impenetrable Aura. It seemed that as soon as I
got Poison to stick, he immediately went into his trance, so I didn't get much
damage out of several battle cycles. Otherwise, this seems to be a relatively
foolproof method of winning an otherwise extremely difficult battle.
If you are having trouble 5-starring this Mission, there are at least two
possible solutions. One is to let Vanille keep her Tier 2 Malboro Wand. This
will reduce the Target Time by a couple of minutes, but Poison will stick in
the first round virtually every time. You can also use Paradigm #5 to let Fang
whittle away some HP between when Vanille sticks Poison and when the Mark goes
into Impenetrable Aura. With a crummy weapon and no stat-boosting accessories,
Fang can't do much damage, but at the very least she seems to be able to offset
the HP that the Mark recovers when in a trance. However, once the Mark starts
using Wicked Whirl (when its HP get down to about 9,000,000), I would advise
against letting your guard down for these weak physical attacks and just let
Poison do its work.
Overall, remember two things: First, Poison is your offensive priority and you
need to get it to stick before doing anything else. As long as the Mark is
Poisoned, you will gain ground. Secondly, when you see Wicked Whirl begin, you
MUST go to a 3-Sentinel formation or things will get rather ugly very fast.
If you think that the above method constitutes "cheating" and you want to fight
him straight up, be my guest. I have won this battle with 5 stars without
using Poison, but it is frustrating because of the relative impossibility of
Staggering him. You can definitely 5-star this Mission with a "fair" fight,
but it will definitely take some trial and error. Have fun!
