Sephiroth FAQ Kingdom Hearts II by Jon Randall jrandall211@yahoo.com ---------------------- 4/4/06 Update: Added statistics and included ability names for US version. 1/31/06 Update: Added Proud Mode strategy for Sephiroth. Enter Sephiroth: Proud Mode into your Find command. =================== /////SEPHIROTH///// =================== Where is Sephiroth? ------------------- First and foremost, you will have to have sealed the Space Paranoids keyhole in order to find Sephiroth. He appears just beyond Crystal Fissure in the last section of Hollow Bastion, which is now called Radiant Garden, called the Dark Depths. Hit Triangle to converse with him to engage in combat. **Note** You will gain NO experience from this fight, and you can only fight Sephiroth once. After he is defeated you cannot fight him again because he will be off to bigger and better things afterward so make sure you keep a separate save file if you'd like to fight him again. You WILL gain an extra drive gauge bar and get the Fenrir keychain, plus the recognition of beating a REALLY tough boss, harder than most bosses I've fought in any video game so far. Preparing for battle -------------------- Before even attempting to fight Sephiroth, you'll want to have the following abilities and items: Items: -Ultima Weapon (MUST have) -supply of Elixirs (preferably), or Hi Potions Abilities: -Quick Run -Aerial Dodge -High Jump Level 2 -Guard (to use Square to block an attack) -Retaliating Slash -Combo Plus(es) and Air Combo Plus -Second Chance (to keep at 1 HP during the length of a combo so that you don't die) -Leaf Bracer *Level 70+ (preferably) with strength and defense 40+ each Note: Just a heads up of what you are going to be up against. Sephiroth is super strong and has 15 life bars. I beat him at level 63 after some hard working at a sound strategy. He has three different attack phases which will be discussed in granulated detail below in the strategy section. Also, Ultima Weapon is a must have (YES it is worth putting the time into getting it) because of the MP Hastega ability it possesses. You'll need speedy MP recovery to help heal yourself when needed. More about healing below. Strategy -------- Stats ----- HP: 3000 Str: 42 Def: 24 Exp: 0 Items: none Battle bonus: Drive Gauge +1 1st Phase --------- Press and hold Triangle at the start of the fight to block all of the hits from Sephiroth's starting move, the Dash and Cut move. You will block the attack and then Sephiroth will be momentarily open to a combo attack. From here on is where the battle starts. YOUR BEST OFFENSE IN THIS FIGHT IS A GOOD DEFENSE, so wait until Sephiroth is vulnerable to attack. Let him attack, then dodge and attack him, never the other way around. Remember this because this is key to the entire battle. Another key to remember is to do only a single combo attack on him and then wait for him to attack again. Never try and string more than one combo together as he will teleport out of the latter combo and you'll be open to attack. One last noteworthy thing, you MUST be on the ground to block the Dash and Cut attack. Even if you were in mid-air and have only landed a mere second before he launches the attack, you most likely will still get caught in the attack. Sephiroth will randomly do the Dash and Cut attack as well as Omnislash in this phase, along with the most annoying Teleport then Uppercut attack. If you have Reflect Guard equipped, you can block Omnislash and his Uppercut attack by pressing Square. If not, simply use Air Slide to avoid the attack. When he uses Omnislash, either block it or slide away and attack him once he is vulnerable. If Sephiroth teleports behind you, and you are quick enough you may be able to block his uppercut. If you don't have Reflect Guard equipped, dash away. But take note here as well that he may choose to teleport more than once to do a second or third uppercut. Either way, he will continue with Omnislash afterward so don't attack until he is done with this. In the most likely even that the Uppercut connects with Sora, you will be shot up into the air where he will perform a mid-air Omnislash combo. If this happens, wait about a full second while in mid-air and then press Square to do the Revenge Slash: You'll break out of your ascent upward and, if timed right, you'll have landed a hit on Sephiroth as soon as he teleports to the air landing him open for an aerial combo. Even if you miss him you'll still be in a better position to avoid his combo. Simply keep hitting Square until you land a hit and then combo. Continue on with this strategy until you have depleted 5 of his life bars, which will begin his second attack phase. 2nd Phase --------- All of the above attacks remain in this phase with a few additions or tweaks. Omnislash now has a much greater range of attack and will requiere 2 Air Slides to dodge it (if you can actually get away from it), or just block with Reflect Guard. Sephiroth will produce black orbs that form around Sora and pull toward his position. You can simply ignore them and dodge through them when few, but when there are a lot of orbs, knock them away and even bat them back at Sephiroth to do some minor damage. Don't get too caught up with the orbs, however, because Sephiroth makes his way over to you and will perform Omnislash at his earliest convenience so just worry about the orbs that are in your way to escape, then slide out of the way of danger. Note that you cannot attack after blocking Omnislash anymore because from here on Sephiroth will just teleport away when you try to attack, unlike the first phase. Sephiroth will also perform Descend Heartless Angel (DHA) in which he will mutter a few words while teleporting away from Sora in order to rise into the air for this nasty attack: It brings you down to 1 HP and 0 MP. Here, you have two options. First option is to try and hit him. This is where you'll need High Jump Level 2 because he is too high out of normal High Jump attacking range and you won't reach him. High Jump Level 2 enables you to get to his position, with my suggestion of having Air Dodge equipped, hit X and you'll gain some extra needed height to attack him. Once you land a hit he will stop the sequense of DHA and he will forfeit his attack. Your other option is what to do if he attack before you can reach him. If you know you'll be out of range then DON'T EVEN GO FOR IT. Reason is because he will connect and drain your HP to 1, then with you at close proximity he will perform Pillar of Fire, which now draws Sora in toward him making it much harder to dodge, in which case you die. (Note: either run or slide away from Pillar of Fire, don't jump. If you jump you'll be sucked in quicker in air and will get hit with the fire) When you know you can't reach Sephiroth in time to stop DHA, hold your position and heal with an Elixir or Hi Potion when the attack is over (if you are good enough you can actually use Curaga at the precise moment before DHA connects and you will fully heal HP, but still lose MP). Be prepared that since you are at a distance now he is going to go directly into his Dash and Cut attack. You'll notice this right away because the screen will turn it's usual darker shade. Heal, block the Dash and then attack when he is open. Continue all of this but be advised he may use Pillar of Fire at random. Once brought down to 5 health bars remaining he will begin his final attack phase. 3rd Phase --------- Sephiroth will stop dead and produce a pink aura that glows around the upper portion of his outfit. This denotes his last phase. He becomes even faster and will sometimes even glide across the ground to attack Sora. His Omnislash will now go the length of the battle field and he will conjure dozens of black orbs to hit you. He will still use Pillar of Fire, Dash and Cut and DHA still remain with the addition of Meteor. Still use the previous strategies for the other attack: Block Dash and Cut, then attack; hit Sephiroth to stop DHA; and try to block Omnislash (Air Slide is useless as he will connect always due to it's massive range). Once he summons Meteor, slide out of the way to avoid the attack as best you can, making your way over to Sephiroth. He is actually out of attacking range but stay as close as possible to get in an attack once he lands. **What I did was avoid Meteor, work my way over to Sephiroth while target locked on him, jump as if to attack when close and get hit by Meteor. Sounds dumb, but once you are hit once and you are near Sephiroth, hit Square to Revenge Slash and Sora will remain above most of the Meteors only to hit Square again once hit (sustaining minor damage) until the attack is over. You will have to wait and see what he'll do when you land because he will not be vulnerable for attack after meteor. He will teleport away to the ground and prepare his next attack so keep your eyes open. To be quite honest and accurate, the only times when Sephiroth is really vulnerable to attack in this phase is after Meteor and Dash and Cut. You'll simply have to be patient and have some luck as to find an opening. Quite difficult, but many failed attempts should yield you a good eye for his attack and a win! You gain no experience from the fight but you'll gain an extra gauge on your drive gauge. (Should be number 7 at this point.) ***UPDATE*** Sephiroth: Proud Mode --------------------- You'll need a bit of a tweek with your strategy if you plan to defeat Sephiroth on Proud Mode. As opposed to my strategy above, my stats for Proud Mode were as follows: Level 49, Strength 37, Defense 38. That's 14 levels lower than standard mode so it can be done, but it really is NOT easy. I'd recommend that you be level 65-70 and have all of the abilities as stated above. The only one I did not give myself time to acquire this time around was glide, but that really isn't completely necessary, although it might've helped out a little bit. One thing to note before the fight: Sephiroth is between 2 to 3 times as strong as before, so you'll be in for a battle that's twice as hard. I don't even need to say that Combo Live is a MUST have here. All I can say is to follow the strategy above with a few exceptions. If he teleports behind you during ANY phase, let him take the uppercut, don't bother to try and block it. Take ANY opportunity you can to get in some damage. I even reconfigured my abilities so that I could attack him, end it with the Explosion attack and wait for him to land, he'd be open again for another attack so I'd slide forward and attack him ending with a second Explosion for some really good damage before he'd do his teleport away. So attack whenever he's vulnerable, and don't block the uppercut. Another thing you'll have to do is be a little more dynamic in your strategy this time around. For instance, he changes up his attacks in Proud Mode, or so I've experienced, and for example in his 3rd phase when he would normally do Omnislash (usually after Meteor), he would do a sort of mini-uppercut attack that knocks Sora into mid-air, taking a nice big chunck of my life while at it, and THEN start Omnislash. The outcome is simple: in a logical sense, they are two ENTIRELY different attacks, so Combo Live is useless. The explanation is the small uppercut does really good damage, and then the first slash from Omnislash does well over half a lifebar in damage, so you'll end up dead. Some ways to get around this are to watch for what attack he is prompting after Meteor, and if he starts to fly swiftly over to you, try and jump/air dodge out of the vacinity or just glide away. ***This is the most important part of the Proud Mode strategy so pay attention here. Two things: 1. Customize Reflect(Reflega) to a button so that you'll have quick access to it (doing this with Elixirs and Hi-Potions wouldn't be a bad idea either); and 2. Conserve your MP. The reason to customize Reflect is because in Proud Mode Sephiroth produces TONS of black orbs during his 2nd and 3rd phases. No more simply batting them away or dodging them. When he produces them, use Reflect once (no more than once is needed, trust me, they will remain for a moment and then burst) and the orbs will disappear. The orbs become VERY cumbersome when trying to avoid Sephiroth's attacks while the orbs magnate toward you. The reason to conserve MP is that you'll need it for using Reflect. Yes, it's THAT important. That means that whenever you get hit with an attack, due to Sephiroth's incredible strength, you'll need to heal right away. No more using Curaga right away and waiting for your MP to come back. It won't come back quick enough, even with MP Hastega on your Ultima Weapon. So to heal, use a Hi-Potion that you've customized into your corresponding buttons, and keep your MP full for his next orb attack. You WILL have times when you'll be very close to death and you'll need to use Curaga, especially because you'll be momentarily invulnerable with Leaf Veil equipped. Do so sparingly and pay very close attention to his attacks, because he really is THAT much harder than last time. Some words of hope for this fight are these: With my abilities reconfigured this time around, I attacked with my normal attack string, followed by Explosion, then I'd get in another string of the same combo because I configured it right so that he'd teleport after the SECOND combo string. This helps out because with the two combos done at once, I'd take 3/4 of a lifebar off in one opportunity with only 37 strength! Also, this gives you valuable time to recover MP if you absolutely couldn't stay away from using Curaga and need to wait for your MP to recover. Watch for his newly changing attack patterns and follow this strategy to a win (GOOD LUCK!!) After the Battle ---------------- Once the battle is won, go back to the beginning of Radiant Garden to speak with Cloud. He will then set off to find Sephiroth, so head back to the Dark Depths. Here you will watch the Showdown of Fate 2 FMV and Tifa will reward you with the Fenrir keychain afterward. Fenrir has Attack +7, Magic Attack +1 and auto-ability of Combo Minus (decreasing your overall combo hits by one). Well done! Congratulate yourself for beating one of the hardest bosses I'd say I've ever faced. ------------------------------------------------- Copyright 2006 Jon Randall (jrandall211@yahoo.com) This document is not to be reproduced in whole or in part without prior consent of the author.
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