The efficient and fun approach to beating FF7

Blockinlick

ShinRa Guard
Joined
Jan 2, 2012
Messages
47
Age
35
Gil
0
This is my plan for a less-time-consuming team built only to kill Sephiroth as efficiently as possible while still playing legit [No item dupe] and not using KotR or Mime. Sure, you can build a far better team if you put a lot more time in it, but I'm not going to do time consuming things such as raise a gold chocobo, level my characters past level 75, or master 2 Double Cuts to have 3 Etc. To my own knowledge, this is the best team I could put together in the restricted time span I feel comfortable with. The only relatively time consuming things I am doing are over-leveling [25+ outside Corel, 35+ in Cave of the Gi, 45+ in Temple of the Ancients, 65+ outside Mideel], raising & racing a Chocobo to acquire 2 more Counter Attack materias, and simply grinding Double Cut to level 2. Other than that, I'm keeping things concise.

Mastery Levels
-Every All, Restore, Lightning, and HP Plus mastered.
-Double Cut is level 2 for 4x Cut.
-Comet is lvl 2 for Comet 2
-Ultima is at level 2 for Ultima
-Every Counter Attack is at least level 3 as well as one mastered
-Bahamut ZERO is level 2
-Destruct is level 1
-All MP Plus Materias are all level 1 [Are just filler tbh]

Cloud
Weapon: Ultima Weapon
Restore+All, Double Cut, Comet, HP Plus x2
Armor: Mystile
MP Plus x6
Accessory: Ribbon

Barret
Weapon: Missing Score
Restore+All, Ultima, Destruct, MP Plus x4
Armor: Mystile
MP Plus x6
Accessory: Ribbon

Red XIII
Weapon: Limited Moon
Restore+All, HP Plus x2, Counter Attack x4
Armor: Dragon Armlet
Cover, Bahamut ZERO, Lightning, MP Plus x2
Accessory: Ribbon

Key Notes on my strategy
-Ribbon ensures that Supernova doesn't cause any status changes
-Each character has at least 1 kind of magical attack [Comet, Ultima, BZERO/Lightning] that can hit Sephiroth while he's flying. If Reds Bahamut ZERO is used up, I'll use Bolt 3 if there is no need to heal.
-Destruct is for Debarrier to remove Sephiroths MBarrier
-Red is basically the designated healer. He will chain-counter-attack every time Sephiroth attacks [Cover 100%] and his constant healing will ensure that not only he stays alive, but the rest of the party as well. This way, he doesn't really need to go offensive until Sephiroth starts flying. I chose him as the healer because he is simply the weakest on offense. However, I have thought that using Cloud might be better, as he would do more damage with his Counter Attacks as well as the huge bonus of getting to use Omnislash much sooner, which can essentially single-handedly defeat Sephiroth by the time it's used. I'll try both and see what is more effective.
-Every character is equipped with a mastered Restore paired with a mastered All, as healing is a constant measure that must be taken while battling Sephiroth. Even with a mastered Cover, other characters can still take plenty of damage.

Q&A
Q: Why not use Knight of the Round?
A: I've beat sephiroth and the weapons time and time again and I find that, at this point, it's boring and un-challenging to use it. It's like playing your favorite baseball console game and unlocking a bat that hits a homerun at every swing... it takes all of the fun out of the game after you a abuse it for awhile. Then there is the fact that it's very time consuming to acquire it in the first place.

Q: Why not use Quadra Magic on Ultima or Comet?
A: It's too time consuming to raise a Gold Chocobo. I've done it so many times that I'm just too lazy to do it now and without the option of KotR on the table, QM isn't much of an incentive to do it.

Q: Why not master all of your materia by using Item Dupe + Elixer/Magic Pot grinding?
A: I am playing this legit, so the item dupe is out of the question. That being said, grinding Magic pots and Movers really isn't an option anymore. I'll be sure to Yuffie-Morph a decent sum of Vladorakos to get elixers and do it a little bit, but I'm not going to grind them for hours the way I used to.

Q: Why not use Mime?
A: The same basic reason I'm not using KotR and not using the item dupe... it's cheap and chaining it with a summon the way you can is, in my eyes, more of an exploit than a strategy. Therefor it's borderline cheating and I'm not into that anymore.

Q: Why use the characters you chose?
A: Barret has to be the most underrated character in my opinion. His final limit, Catastrophe, is the second most powerful limit [Dmg wise] to Omnislash that I am aware of. Since, by the end of the game, all characters are doing at or close to 9999 damage a poke, limit breaks are what make the most difference. I don't like slot attacks like Tifa and Caith Sith have, I'd rather have something 100% reliable. As for Red, I've narrowed it down to him and Cid. Red and Sids final limits are basically the same and max out at 9999 damage, however, I don't use Cosmo Memory on Red, I use Stardust Ray... it has the potential to deal out a bit more than 9999 but I'm not sure how it will do at only level 75. I've heard that Cait Siths limit can be very powerful, but I've never really tried him simply because I don't like his character and I don't like slot attacks. Then you have the worst limit of all, Vincent. His transformations are quite powerful, but it's not strategically ideal against Sephiroth to use a limit that gives up your control over a character, which in turns hurts your ability to heal himself and the others, not to mention him having the hardest Ultimate Weapon to acquire. As for Yuffie, I've never really tried her. I've never been fond of her character, so I never really tried the option of using her. I think I'll try her the next time around. At the same time, you find her so late in the game that any effort you've put into whoever she's replacing is seemingly wasted. It's the same reason I don't ever try to work with Aeris before she's gone, because any effort I put into leveling her is largely wasted.

Q: How did you acquire X piece of equipment/materia?
A: I didn't grab any of the Ribbons you could pick up through the first disc. I didn't really need them, the game is far too easy as it is when I grind to level 35 in the caves at cosmo canyon and to 45 at the Temple of the Ancients. So what I did was waited until disc 3 to grab to Yuffies Conformer and morph the Master Tonberry [In Northern Cave] 3 times for 3 Ribbons. It took about 20 minutes. Barrets ultimate weapon is before you face Hojo at the mako cannon. Reds ultimate weapon is the easiest to acquire, as you simply need to visit Buganhagan in disc 3, and Clouds is easy, as you simply need to kill Ultimate Weapon [The flying dragon... and ironically, he's the easiest of them all] to get it. The Dragon Armlet is a reward for killing the Red Dragon in the Temple of the Ancients. As for the Mystiles, one is found when you go back to Midgar in the second CD and the other is found in the Northern Cave.

As for Materia, I bought 8 HP Plus's [At Cosmo Canyon] while I over-leveled to 35 in the Cave of the Gi. Pretty much, by the time I ran out of MP while grinding and went back to Cosmo, I had at least 10,000 Gil, so every trip back I bought one until I had 8. The MP Plus materia I wont buy until it's actually time to face Sephiroth, they're simply filler for all of the left-over materia slots I couldn't make much use of. Double Cut and Conformer [Yuffie for Morphing] are in the Sunkin Gelnika plane under water. Bahamut ZERO is gotten by collecting the Huge Materia and "Looking closer" at the Blue one while it's in Buganhagans Observatory in disc one [Or if you miss out on it, you can dig it up on disc 3 in the bone village]. Ultima is gotten if you save Corel from the runaway train during the Huge Materia saga [If you failed to save it from the train, but at least got on it, you can buy it from the kid, but I've heard you cannot get his final limit in that case, idk as I've never failed it]. Comet is gotten in the City of the Ancients in the "Shell House" that leads to the Forgotten City by walking to the top of it. As soon as I reach the hideout in Sector 7 at the very beginning of the game, I buy two more Restores to go with the one I found in the reactor. I grab the first three or four All materias that I can, which are one in the Beginners Hall in sector 7, one on the Shinra boat, one at the Great Glacier, and an extra one at Mt. Nibel, and just work with those. By the time I reach the 3rd CD, I've mastered all three of them and never really have much use for the fourth except to have one Restore+All while I use Lightning/Fire+All to over-level [If I wasn't doing that, I was using Odin]. Cover is gotten in the flower area by Aeris house, Sephiroth throws you a Destruct when you get to the Shinra Mansion [Irony eh?], and Morph can only be found in the Temple of the Ancients.

As for the three final limit breaks, Clouds has to be bought in the Battle Arena at Golden Saucer, Barrets is gotten by talking to the lady in the shack after you've saved Corel from the runaway train, and Reds is gotten early in the Shinra Mansion by opening the safe [Right 36, Left 10, Right 59, Right 97] and defeating the boss that it releases. You also get Odin that way, which is vital to over leveling, as it will, more often than not [It has what seems like a 15% chance to miss each monster], instant-kill every non-boss enemy in one swipe.

Some people do not truly understand how to use these limits and think there is glitch that disallows them, but this is a myth and misconception. Most people acquire the 3rd limits and claim they've got them all and that it should work, but what they don't know is that you've actually got to use them a bit too. For the longest time [My first 3 playthroughs], I couldn't figure out why Cloud wouldn't learn Omnislash, and it was because, although I had Finishing Touch and Meteor Rain, I had never once used Finishing Touch.
 
Nice strategy. If I ever play FF7 again I might use this. Last time i played i just leveled all my guys to 90 haha.
 
I've always found Yuffie worth using, Il stick her in my party as soon as I get her, mostly because if I don't I have a hard time beating the Pagoda bosses :hmph:

Her limits are pretty good too, doom of the living and all creation are both worth using
 
Yuffie's a decent choice anyway as the Conformer deals damage based on the enemy level and Yuffie's own level. So she can deal higher damage than the others if used right even through Safer's Wall and stuff.

This being said, you put an awful lot of thought in this for it to just be a fun and casual run, I figure the best way to have fun with it is go with the flow and not plan your whole game out from the off. =P
 
Yuffie's a decent choice anyway as the Conformer deals damage based on the enemy level and Yuffie's own level. So she can deal higher damage than the others if used right even through Safer's Wall and stuff.

This being said, you put an awful lot of thought in this for it to just be a fun and casual run, I figure the best way to have fun with it is go with the flow and not plan your whole game out from the off. =P

Very true. I wish I could replay the game again for the very first time so I didn't know about all the materia, summons, weapons etc. It was a lot more fun when I wasn't stressing about every last little item! Having said this, I'm a bit OCD over that type of stuff and I doubt I'll change anytime soon so I may try this method out. I've just re started FF VII on my PSP so I might just go for a story completion rather than a "must find everything" playthrough.
 
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