Final Fantasy VI

Combat Advice

• Make good use of the characters' personal abilities. Edgar's Tools and Sabin's Blitz are powerful and cost nothing, Locke's Steal can net you a bunch of free and sometimes rare items and Celes' Runic can be a lifesaver against spellcasting bosses.

• Party members in the back row take half damage from most physical attacks but also deal half damage with their own basic attacks. It can be worthwhile to stick characters like Edgar who primarily rely on their abilities or spells to deal damage to the back row. Certain weapons also deal full damage from either row.

• Undead enemies, including bosses, take damage from heals and are often outright killed by revives. Most are also weak to fire and are revived to full health if hit with a Death effect.

• If the diagonals in Sabin's blitzes are giving you trouble in the non-mobile versions of the game, you can simply use either of the two adjacent directions and the blitz will still work. For example down-down-left will execute AuraBolt/Aura Cannon.

• Sabin's Suplex/Meteor Strike deals 50% less damage if there's more than one enemy on the field, but can deal tremendous damage against isolated targets.

• Gau is a hit or miss character in combat, depending on which Rage he uses. The Stray Cat rage (4x normal damage) is one of the best and available early, but don't be afraid to experiment. Many opt to ignore Gau more or less entirely.

General Advice

• The Evade stat is glitched in the SNES and PS1 versions, causing it to do nothing, with Magic Evade governing all evasion instead. Amongst other things this means that blindness has no real effect and certain pieces of gear are either way worse or way better than they're supposed to be. This was fixed in FF6 Advance and the phone/PC versions of the game.

• The stat listed for each esper (+10% HP, +1 STR, etc.) indicates a small bonus that you'll get when you level up with that esper equipped. This can be worth keeping in mind with characters like Sabin whose strongest blitzes are all based on Magic, making Magic-increasing espers particularly useful for him.

• While level grinding shouldn't be necessary to beat the game, it's definitely not worth it until you get access to Espers due to the aforementioned stat bonuses they provide upon level up.

• Early in the game you get control of several parties of moogles. You can strip one of them of all his items and keep them. These items are better than what you currently have.

• When a man named Banon asks you to join the Returners fairly early in the game, you have the opportunity to get one of two rare Relics. Saying "Yes" nets you a Gauntlet (Hold a weapon with both hands) but saying "No" once and subsequently talking to a man in a nearby storage room nets you a Genji Glove (Dual-wield two weapons). You also get the Genji Glove by refusing three times, but this method skips a small plot-relevant scene.

• Certain treasure chests will contain more powerful items if left unopened until later in the game. Primarily this affects treasure in the early game areas of Narshe mines and South Figaro Cave, which amongst other things will net a couple of powerful relics if left untouched until the second half of the game.

• While they won't be lost for good, consider not giving Shadow any rare or powerful equipment in the first half of the game as he can leave on a whim. Also, there'll be a point later in the game where you are given a choice to jump or wait for him. Wait for him.