Wild Arms 4:
Platapana Passage solder fight: Not too bad. Flame Thrower hurts but they don't get many chances to use it, and the fight is fairly controllable.
Neve D'Argento breakpoint fight: I have like half a dozen resets here, yeesh. First one of these that has truly worked me over. Anyway, the fight is against two Angels and two Fleuretys. All four go first and all four can 2HKO under the right circumstances, so I basically start every fight horribly on the defensive (and once get one-rounded before anyone gets a turn, joy). The Fleuretys are certainly more dangerous since they can also cast Hydro Pressure, while Angels occasionally use Heal but I only see it once, but it's great when they do. Jude can one-shot the Angels with Phantom Line, Arnaud pretty much needs an opposite leypoint, Raquel has trouble getting a turn though Dragon Edge is nice to off a Fleurety and heal her if she does. The time I win though is mostly blind dumb luck of Yulie starting on a non-water leypoint and surviving to get a turn.
Granted, I make things harder for myself because I don't save before the fight, so I'm pretty much stuck with the setup I have going in... and certainly having Magic Blocker (or Resist Water?) could have been a big help, for instance. But so it goes.
Kraken: I'm pretty surprised I beat him on the first try. He starts in the centre so can wreck Yulie, and his Widespread Slumber Fog is a huge pain. I'm able to Isolate him into the corner and poison him though, and poison = the win. It seems a near impossible slugfest otherwise and most of my PCs die as usual (not Arnaud!) since he has no exploitable weakness and a lot of HP but poison does its magic.
Hugo: Not too bad. He moves to the centre, Jude shoots him and he moves to the lower right. Arnaud moves, Jude on his next turn moves with Dash to box him in. Blah blah blah poison protect healing blast I win.
Spriggan: Jude and Arnaud need 3 turns to kill their mini-spriggans, Raquel gets hers does in one. In the real fight, Yulie starts alone so Protects herself, which means she mostly mocks Stone Bullet. Between that and the mini-spriggans needing some time to move into position she survives until everyone else shows up just fine. Unfortunately their physicals + Hyperion Blaster is a bitch, so she does fall, but Spriggan isn't too durable, Arnaud jumps to the opposite-element hex and blasts away after Raquel + Jude gut the mini-spriggans. Jude dies but it's okay.
Fiore and Asia (3 resets): Yeah these two are pretty badass! They open with Banned Spell which can one-shot Raquel and seriously hurts everyone else. On my first attempt I go for an opening Joint Struggle which does hurt but letting Jude take all that damage is too much, so I have him move away instead. Then, after the rest of the team takes one spell, Arnaud can jump them somewhere else (I usually go for the wind hex, so Fiore can't use her opposite-element Hi-Blast on me, but he still has strengthened spells of his own). I also learn the hard way not to let them get in the same hex (or if it happens, to Isolate 'em ASAP) as their second unite, Uncensored Spell, does big MT damage which I really can't handle at all if they start spamming it. Unfortunately they also do lots of damage with elemental Hi-Blasts, and those are hard to prevent. Arnaud's Magic Blocker is great, in fact, keeping Arnaud/Yulie in the same hex with Protect up does make them pretty magically tanky which helps, although Fragile can make a mess of things certainly (without the MDef boost, elemental Hi-Blasts still hurt like a bitch). Anyway, it's mostly a matter of treading water, trying to keep the sisters in non-deadly positions, and gunning whichever is more vulnerable down (Fiore is more dangerous due to her better speed, but on the winning run I actually end up killing Asia due to an opening poison on her). Sadly only Raquel gets Exp from this one, as it's a brutal fight to the finish after Yulie dies from elemental spells.
Also I never knew until hearing their victory quotes that Fiore is pronounced with a non-silent E ("Fioray"). Live and learn!
Guardian Chimera: I anticipate this fight being a bitch, but I get somewhat lucky. While the chimera moves to an elemental hex to start the fight as usual, it does not use its summon attack, and after a couple turns moves back to its starting place. I promptly corner it and lock down its pure physical skillset with Illusion. Poison overcomes its healing pretty easily. It has high defences and absorbs elements but Fragile to the rescue, that + Phantom Line spam gets the job done.
Next up: the hardest boss in the game!
