hey everyone,
so im playing ff9 and i'm at the end of the game...i can beat trance kuja no problem but i cant get through necron :@......my party is composed by zidane garnet (dagger) vivi and steiner....i'm beetween 55-62 levels and i cant really beat him :S. grand cross is a major pain in the ass but i cant survive neutron ring :S.....i know the method of equiping the anti status effects so dont bother with that......any suggestions??

thnx in advance :)

Wow, I was several levels lower than you my first time beating him and I had no troubles at all! :O Although Vivi and Steiner's cooperative Trance attacks are quite useful, I suggest you replace Vivi with Eiko and that way you'll have two healers AND two summoners; that's how I did it. And just keep doing your best to heal any and all status defects ASAP, that way they don't slow you down. I know it's tough when he hits you with Grand Cross, but just ensure you're focusing on healing as much (if not more) than attacking, and you should be alright.

i really cant get Eiko into the party since she's extremely low leveled (lv 24) and she can only summon fenrir....:S i use steiners trance but i cant last much since the neutron ring

Oh, yikes :-/ Well, in that case, I'd take Eiko out to the field and have her level up a bit first. Considering she's so low, I'd take her out to pretty much anywhere on the Mist continent and just make sure you've got a strong backup for her to help her out. For my playthrough I tried to keep pretty much everybody at least the same level, save for Quina; I strongly dislike her/him, just because he/she/it seems like he/she/it was just thrown in simply for the sake of having eight characters. Why couldn't they have had that Lani chick join the party instead?! She'd have made a much better addition!! Ahem . . . but at any rate, you can pretty much go either way; use Vivi and Steiner's Trances, or use Garnet and Eiko, but my best advice is to go with the latter; it just seems to give you more of the upper hand.

ok so do you know any good grinding spots? i'd also like to know if there is a good item shop with items and weapons with good abilities for the party in disc 4,

bump :(

Memoria itself is probably the best place to level grind in disc 4, especially as you can make up your party of anyone (even remove Zidane from the party and replace him with someone else) at any of the save 'spheres' in there.

I'd suggest Yans on Vile Island as an alternative to Memoria, but they're really too much trouble than they're worth, what with their nasty Meteor attacks, tendency to remove characters from the battle and afflicting characters who are left with viruses. So only go after them if you're sufficiently strong enough (and/or trying to find the 'Friendly Yan' for the Friendly Monsters subquest).

As for weapons and armour, check the Synthesist and shops in Lindblum, the Black Mage Village and Daugerreo, as they have new stock in disc 4. Speaking of Synthesists, by challenging and defeating the optional boss Hades in Memoria, it opens up his Synthesis shop which is the best one in the game (it's the only place you can synthesize the Tin Armour for starters).

Hades can be found in the area in Memoria which looks like the bottom of the ocean. There's a '?' spot where an ominous voice tells you to leave. Challenge the speaker to fight Hades. After defeating him at any time simply click on the '?' spot again to access his Synthesis shop.

thnx ekindoh :)

i never get tired of bumping :D xD

stop bumping or your thread could end up closed.

a useful place to level up is on any of the islands you can find in the bottom left of the world map, these island have Grand Dragons (You can also fight Grand Dragons on "popo's heights" which is above the grotto) on them which reward you about 35K exp, because their level is a mutiple of five, you can use Quina's level five death to OHKO the grand dragons, providing you with easy EXP, it's a much better way then wasting your time getting owned by those goddamn yans.

If your Quina doesn't know level five death then on the same island, walk on the beach, you'll find whale zombies who can teach you it.

thnx 4 the advice dude :)

desperate bump :(

You still can't beat him?

Necron was pretty easy for me and I had the same character setup you had and also around the same level(except my Vivi was at 52)

I had Auto-Haste/Auto-Regen on everyone and protection against status ailments, pretty much spammed Attack on Zidane, had Steiner cast Shock every turn(does 9999 damage) and Vivi doing Flares, and Garnet as main healer. Didn't really do anything extraordinary.

The TRICK to beating him is using Ribbons or whatever the fuck protects you from status ailments. Confuse/berserk can wipe the group if you're not protected. Good luck.

The Ribbon accessory doesn't protect against negative status in FFIX though - it's only equippable by Eiko and gives Eiko the Guardian Mog and Ability Up abilities, plus allows her to summon Madeen. In keeping with that strategy though, it would a wise move to learn and equip status-protecting abilities (like Jelly/Antibody/Clear-Headed/Locomotion etc) to protect your party against Necron's nasty status attacks.

Really, as long as you're above level 47 or so you should be okay though.

Wow i am mentally retarded hahahaha. Yeah, I just turned on anti Confuse/Petrify since those are the ones that really fuck me.

I had a bit of trouble at first.

The Ribbon accessory doesn't protect against negative status in FFIX though - it's only equippable by Eiko and gives Eiko the Guardian Mog and Ability Up abilities, plus allows her to summon Madeen. In keeping with that strategy though, it would a wise move to learn and equip status-protecting abilities (like Jelly/Antibody/Clear-Headed/Locomotion etc) to protect your party against Necron's nasty status attacks.

Really, as long as you're above level 47 or so you should be okay though.

although the ribbon in this game doesnt grant immunity to status effects, theres more than just eiko who can equip a ribbon. i played the game enough times to know this. necron was a pain, but he's nuthin compared to ozma.

hi all and thanks for the replies

the thing is that my party is equiped with the anti status skills but i dont have the spells you guys mentioned above....i guess bcs i didnt give too much priority to that :S.......and i have to say that the dude kills me with the neutron ring thing :S i can survive grand cross but not that

The strategy I used to beat him with a party of level fifty-something characters was pretty straight forward.

Zidane- Standby for using items when needed
Dagger and Eiko- Healers
Steiner- Spam his Shock attack! I don't remember Necron's total HP but 4 of those should put him in the red.

And as you already know, use all of your skill crystals to protect your status.

he has about 70,000 HP. not to mention, thats not a very good strategy.

I agree Aces, there are a billion superior methods but since I usually take the time to gather necessary equipment, abilities, skills, etc. it usually serves to ensure victory while still having a challenge provided. I will admit that I am not an endearing fan of over-kill strategies.