Walkthrough:Final Fantasy VI/CSM's Walkthrough/Part 40

This is part 40 of the Walkthrough for the Super NES version of Final Fantasy VI.

A confrontation with the root of all evil[]

Once all three groups step on their tiles, and make sure you're absolutely ready to move on, you'll warp to the area where Kefka is. He's got a nice little throne, don't you think? Anyway, your party members will plead with him to stop (since when does diplomacy work with a God of Vengeance and Horror?) and fail miserably. You'll then hear each party member give a speech as to why they want to live, and Kefka delivers another famous line. At this point, you'll get to put the party in the order you want to fight Kefka in. So do that, and the battle will begin.

Enough of me holding you back: Time to jump right in!

The First Tier[]

This is an easy Tier. It consists of Face, Long Arm, and Short Arm. The Nintendo player's guide is stupid here and says that these Tiers are reincarnations of the goddesses. It says that this is a reincarnation of Poltregeist. Don't summon any Espers here, you want to save them for the later Tiers.

Cast Haste 2 at the start of the fight. Face needs to go down first. If it's the last one to die, it'll use Quake, which is dangerous. Other than that, well, it doesn't do much. It rarely uses R. Polarity to change the row of each party member, and Slip Hit which inflicts Seizure. Once it gets weak, it can start using Magnitude8 and Dread. Beware of Dread. This is unblockable and you don't want to go to your fifth character this early. It can also cast Safe and Haste on the arms. It's weak to Fire, so cast Fire 3 spells, throw Flame Sabres, or use any Fire Elemental attacks to churn it into submission.

Next is Long Arm (the arm that's longer, duh!). This guy is weak as hell. All it uses is its physical and the weak Shock Wave. If this is the last thing to die, it'll use up to three Shock Waves on you. But this is weak as hell. Just cast Doom on it or use any other Instant Death attacks (Edgar's Air Anchor comes to mind) for an easy win. The Short Arm sucks; all it does is its physical and, when it gets low on HP, uses VacuumWave, a slightly stronger physical. It's weak to Water, but you should be able to just pound it into submission.

The Second Tier[]

Things start to get harder immediately here. This Tier features Magic (far left), Tools (center), Tiger (bottom right), and Hit (far right). The Nintendo Player's Guide says this is the reincarnation of Goddess.

Recast Haste 2 immediately. Tools is a strong opponent which uses a lot of machine-related spells on you. These include Delta Hit, Atomic Ray, Tek Laser, Diffuser, Absolute 0, Missile, and Grav Bomb. He won't use Absolute 0 (his strongest attack) until he's low on HP, but you can take him out with Instant Death attacks, so get rid of him first.

Magic is next. This guy uses a lot of spells, and some particularly crippling ones (particularly the status inducing ones). The spells he uses depends on how much HP he has left. Normally, he'll use Poison, Drain, Bio, Fire 3, Muddle, Haste, Imp, and Haste 2. Once it gets down to 3/4 of its HP, it'll start using Ice 3, Bolt 3, Pearl, Flare, Sleep, Stop, Reflect, Slow 2, and Life 3. Once its HP is cut in half it starts using Ice 2, Fire 3, Bolt 3, Pearl, Flare, Rasp, and Mute. If you brought Gau here, DO NOT RAGE MAGIC URN. Magic Urn dies when out of MP, and the Rasp spell does just that. Once it has 1/4 of its HP left, it'll start countering with Quarter spells. Once it gets down to 1/8 of its HP, it adds up to two Dispel spells to its counter. Thankfully, its biggest strength is its own biggest weakness. Cast Mute on it, and it'll be disabled. We'll come back to actually killing this guy later.

Tiger is the main threat now. Tiger rarely attacks, but when it does it uses dangerous things. Those who are immune to or absorb Fire are safe from most of these. They include N. Cross, S. Cross, and Flare Star. It can also follow up with a dangerous Doom Tusk, which sets Zombie. This is the most dangerous attack in this entire Tier. Cast Ice 3 and Throw your Ice elemental stuff at the enemy here, as Tiger is weak to that stuff. After Tiger dies, finish off Magic.

This leaves you with Hit, who does nothing but physical attack. Summon Phantom here and you win this Tier. When it dies, it uses 10 Hits! which just does ten physical attacks in a row, all of them weak. Note: This "10 Hits!" will also interrupt Quick's spellcasting.

The Third Tier[]

The Third Tier consists of only two enemies: Sleep and Girl. The Nintendo player's guide says this is the reincarnation of Doom.

Girl MUST be defeated first. If you kill Sleep first, Girl will revive him with Life 2. She loves to use Pearl Wind a lot to recover everyone's HP. Thankfully she only has 9999 HP, but with Pearl Wind it may take awhile, so be careful. She also absorbs all eight Elements, so you'll have to use Flare or Ultima or throw Falchions or Tack Stars to do decent damage. Dragoons should equip Aura Lances in this Tier. If you brought Locke, you can have him Steal a Ragnarok from the girl and Atma Weapon from Sleep, but too bad it's too late for the Ragnarok or Atma Weapon to be of any use. From what I understand GBA users can take it into the Dragon's Den with them, so if you're using a GBA, go for it. You can abuse this and get as many Ragnaroks and Atma Weapons as you want yet, but I consider abusing the Evade bug to not be cheating, so I guess I'll let GBA users abuse this. Also, from what I understand the GBA doesn't let you use Wind God Gau, so I guess this is compensation for that loss. The Genji Glove plus two Atma Weapons plus offering strategy could be considered cheating if you cast quick with it.

Sleep attacks in a pattern. Every even turn he uses the unfocusable W Wind or Merton, and every even turn he uses his physical or Condemned, which actually hurts you in this fight. When he gets below 10000 HP, he'll use a new spell: Train, which inflicts Blind and Mute on the entire party. Obviously a party that's entirely Muted is bad, so you'll have to use an Echo Screen to recover from this. Hopefully someone has a Ribbon or White Cape on. It can also counter with both this and the dangerous Meteo, so be careful.

Sleep isn't weak to anything, so just use normal strategies against him, being aware of what he can do. When he changes his attack pattern, immediately summon Fenrir or cast Life 3 on your party unless you have someone in the fifth slot you really want to use. This is because of his trump card. When he dies, he'll use Calmness which instantly kills a character and ignores death protection. It may even use it twice! Stuff like Image and Life 3 help prevent this, as does high MBlock. Just pray Calmness doesn't get around anything.

The Final Battle[]

Now, we're finally ready to face Kefka himself! Kefka's form has changed to look like an Angel of Death. Starting in this game, every final boss has in some form or another looked like or been referred to as an Angel of Death. Kefka opens with a speech saying that life is useless or something. I don't care, it's just not a Kefka-esque speech.

Kefka always opens with Fallen One, which always reduces everyone's HP to 1. Immediately heal up after this. Kefka's attacks are moderate at this point. He uses Fire 3, Ice 3, and Bolt 3 mostly, but he'll often use his most dangerous ability throughout the fight as well: Havok Wing. This isn't his strongest attack, nor is it his ultimate attack. It's just his most dangerous because it has a VERY high Hit Rate (so relying on MBlock isn't wise) and its animation is VERY fast that he'll often double turn you with this. And it does deal a lot of damage. He'll also use Train, which is crippling as it can Mute the whole party. He'll also use Fallen One again occasionally, so be aware of this and heal up after a Fallen One. These attacks are unblockable anyway.

Once Kefka's HP is halved, he'll stop using Fallen One, but he'll change his attack pattern to something really bad. He'll say "The end comes beyond chaos," and the screen will start to shake. At this point, he'll immediately use his ultimate attack: Goner. It has a VERY high Spell Power, but it doesn't ignore defense (if it did, you'd all die), but you should still heal up afterwards because your entire party will have taken a lot of damage. It then spends two turns using either Havok Wing, Train, or a new attack: Revenger. Revenger is basically Dispel on the entire party, so you may have to recast your barriers.

Once Kefka's HP drops below 30080, beware. Any attack you make can, and probably will, be countered with his most damaging attack: HyperDrive. This is unblockable and ignores defense, and if this doesn't kill you, a follow up Havok Wing will. Once Kefka dips below 10240 HP, the counter changes from HyperDrive to the even more dangerous Ultima, which affects the entire party. There is one way around this though: when Kefka is charging for Goner, he won't use any counterattacks, so attack him when the screen is shaking.

Once Kefka gets below 7680 HP, he'll alternate his turns with Goner and Meteor. He will still counterattack when not charging up for Goner, though the "counter-able" period is significantly shorter, and you should be able to finish him off easily.

Mog is great in this fight since 255 defense means he's immune to Havok Wing, and he'll spend a lot of time airborne so he'll avoid a lot of dangerous stuff. Gau will similarly be immune to Havok Wing, but his uncontrollable nature means he'll eat the occasional HyperDrive, so watch out for this. Because of this, Gau should use pure offensive stuff like the Stray Cat or Io (Sharpshooter setups work great in this fight). Terra should Morph here and start casting her strongest spells, and Celes, Strago, and Relm should all use their strongest spells, too. Locke should be on a ValiantKnife Rampage. Edgar should be Jumping as usual, as his Tools are useless at this point. If you brought Sabin, be prepared to see the true power of Havok Wing because Sabin doesn't stand a chance here. Bum Rush is still powerful though, for the rare occasion that Sabin actually survives a turn. Same with Gogo. Shadow has the advantage of Shadow Edges to avoid Havok Wing. He should begin by Throwing any Imp Halberds you may have. After that, just Throw everything but the kitchen sink.

When you beat Kefka, congrats, you beat the game! Now relax and enjoy one of the most teary endings I've ever seen in a video game! Watch as Square shows you that ALL its characters were important back then, rather than just a few (read: Final Fantasy VIII). And give yourself a pat on the back! You just finished what is most likely the best game in the series.

The Ending[]