A Challenge Run Clearing FF6 with EXP, Gil, and Magic AP All Set to 0x

The game begins with Terra and two imperial soldiers in Magitek Armor marching on Narshe. In the first boss fight, against Whelk, Terra, who can fire the powerful Tek Missile, serves as the main damage source, while the two soldiers fire beams more or less at random. When Whelk retreats into its shell, they stop attacking and wait. The player adds that in this shell state, even accidentally hitting it with Bolt Beam doesn't trigger a counterattack, which is a bit of a relief.

In the following fight against the Guard Leader, the goal was to use Locke's Steal to grab a slightly better weapon before the battle ended. According to the player, the success rate is 37.5%, and while they joke about being "a total failure as a thief" as the steals keep missing, they persist and finally succeed.

In the Magitek Armor fight while escaping Figaro Castle, Edgar's Noiseblaster confuses the enemies, and in the meantime the party steals and attacks with magic. Discussing the Vargas fight, the player compares the two games: in FF5 they mainly fought at level 1, but FF6 starts at level 6, so there's MP to spare, which makes things comfortable. In this fight, they first defeat the two bears Vargas brings along, and endure Gale Cut with Terra's Cure. They also explain that aiming to trigger the phase transition right after Gale Cut makes the battle in the next phase easier. Once it becomes a one-on-one with Sabin, they defeat Vargas with Aura Cannon and Raging Fist (left, right, left + confirm), Blitzes performed via command input. From the second time onward, they say, Blitzes are performed automatically even in auto-battle.

In the Ultros fight during the escape from the Returners' hideout, the player introduces the action elements of FF6's combat. Because the enemy's attacks are strong in this battle, they keep the command cursor open during their own turns to hold back the enemy's gauge, letting their allies act more often in the meantime. After the first attack, Banon's Pray restores Sabin and Terra to max HP. Terra, who is being targeted, is placed in the back row and set to Defend. By carefully managing the turn order, they defeat Ultros without letting any attacks be directed at Banon.

The effects of having encounters OFF also show up around this point. With no encounters, the trip to Narshe was over "in an instant," they say.

In Locke's scenario, he rescues Celes, who was being held captive by the Empire, escapes the town, and fights an armor-type boss that emerges from the wall of a cave. Locke the thief steals items, while Celes, with her high magic power, attacks using rods. Celes can raise her sword to absorb magic on the field. The player explains that this lets her neutralize the enemy's magic.

In Sabin's scenario, the shuriken of Shadow, whom Sabin meets at Doma, are introduced as "powerful." For the Phantom Train fight, the player says that since the enemy is undead, they beat it using the cheapest healing item. In the battle inside the waterfall, defeating the enemies after a certain amount of time has passed makes the boss appear. So the player stalls for time by defending until then, and defeats the boss that appears with Blitzes.

The Veldt alone became an exception to this challenge. Here the story can't progress without encountering enemies, so they reluctantly turned encounters ON just once (the same note appears in the video description). Joking that "maybe the developers didn't anticipate this kind of playthrough," the player gives Gau some dried meat and recruits him.

In the battle against the imperial army targeting the frozen esper, they ignore the mass of soldiers and go only after their leader, Kefka. The player describes Kefka as an opponent who isn't much of a threat apart from his magic, and explains that absorbing his magic with Celes's Runic means it isn't a tough fight. Dealing 3,000 damage makes him flee and ends the battle.

The boss in Zozo, which the party reaches while pursuing Terra after she flies off, is Dadaluma. Saying it has no particular strengths, the player beats it in auto-battle with everyone attacking at random. Edgar's Flash is effective against the small fry it calls in partway through, they say. Afterward, the esper Ramuh turns himself into magicite to lend the party his power.

In the opera house event, undertaken to get an airship, the video shows Celes's aria scene in full. In the following Ultros fight, the power of newly usable magicite keeps the whole party's HP constantly regenerating. In this battle, the enemy's counterattack patterns change depending on its actions. The player first lures the enemy to the lower left, waits by defending until it has acted a certain number of times, and starts attacking once it is safe. Attacking at the right timing sends the enemy back to the lower left again, so after that they just ganged up on it in auto-battle, they say.

Afterward, Celes beats Setzer in a gamble using the Figaro brothers' coin, and he agrees to lend them his airship.

The Ifrit and Shiva fight in Vector centers on Cyan's Bushido "Sky," with the player introducing him as "the man who shines this time." In battles in the town of Vector, they get party members into a near-death state, let Cyan, equipped with the True Knight, take hits, and deal damage by countering with "Sky." The setup is: Bushido for physical attacks, Celes's Runic for magic attacks, and "Good Karma" for full-party attacks; the player explains that this completely shuts down Ifrit's attacks. Ifrit has 3,300 HP, and after landing "Sky" five times, they finish it off with the Drill, the Icebrand, and Blizzard.

The fight against Number 024 used the same division of roles. When it triggers a barrier change partway through, it switches to an action pattern that doesn't use physical attacks. At that point they switch to the Bushido "Fang" to attack, and otherwise just pray that no full-party attacks come, they say.

For the Number 128 fight after escaping by minecart, they use the Phantom magicite in a prior small-fry battle to put everyone in Vanish status before taking it on. Blind is effective, so Edgar fires Flash first. The player calls it "a simple slugfest with nothing especially worth watching," but expects that although Vanish will eventually be stripped away, its HP is just over 3,000, so if things go well they should be able to whittle it down before being wiped out.

In the fight against the cranes on the airship, they turn invisible with Phantom to nullify attacks to some extent and hurry to whittle down the left crane. They take out the left one first because they want to hit the right one with the Ramuh magicite, they say. After a certain amount of time, a powerful full-party attack comes, so they need to finish them off before then. Setzer's Slot is what shone here. If the symbols line up, it deals considerable damage to all enemies. The player praised the game for having Setzer join right at this point, where the party gets attacked from both sides, saying it "really feels like they knew what they were doing, which is nice." This time the slots kept hitting by luck, and they were able to destroy the cranes.

In Zozo, Terra's memories return, and her origins as the child of a human and an esper are revealed. After that, a rampage by the espers leads the Empire to propose a ceasefire.

In the Flame Eater fight in the burning village, Strago summons Carbuncle to cast Reflect on everyone, nullifying the boss's attacks. They brought four Ice Rods, and once the two with Magitek power throw them, it's over, they say. In the fight against Ultros, who reappears in the cave, there's an event where Relm joins in and redraws Ultros's face. The enemy attacks normally in the meantime, so they turn invisible with Phantom and repeat until the Sketch succeeds.

On the way to the risen Floating Continent, Ultros and his large partner appear again. After successfully neutralizing them, the player switched weapons for later battles and was watching in auto-battle when the enemies got blown away and the battle ended.

The Air Force fight is one the player calls "a pretty fun battle." First, the fast Locke takes the initiative, and they use magicite to cast Shell on everyone so they can survive one Magitek Laser. Next, they destroy the Laser Gun with two Ice Rods and aim to steal from the Missile Bay. The missiles deal percentage-based damage, so they aren't a problem, they say. While continuously healing so the thief doesn't fall to the slip damage from the Speck that appears partway through, they persist with steals that rarely succeed. A countdown is displayed on screen, and when it hits 0, the Wave Cannon wipes out the party. Since they had to finish stealing and also defeat the main body, the player finally landed the steal at a count of 2, and at the end, deciding it would be a waste to use a Thunder Rod, switched to the Thunder Blade to finish it off.

In the Ultima Weapon fight, they cast Shell on everyone so a full-party attack won't wipe them out, wait until the Debilitator gives it a lightning weakness, and then attack with Thunder Rods. It has 24,000 HP. If Meteor came, it would be over, so they fought while praying, but thanks to bringing along two members with high magic power and the enemy itself cooperating with Flare and Bio, they whittled it down surprisingly smoothly, they say.

During the escape from the Floating Continent, a boss appears that acts under the time limit. The player describes it as a monster that eats up time with long lines of dialogue, uses Doom four times, and acts for as long as 20 seconds. However, it has no resistance to instant death, so the Chainsaw can take it down. At the airship exit, waiting until 5 seconds remain lets Shadow arrive, and everyone escapes together.

After the world's collapse, the game starts with Celes nursing Cid on a solitary island. Cid dies, and Celes throws herself off a cliff in despair, but she survives and washes up on a sandy beach. There she finds Locke's bandana, regains her hope to live, and leaves the island on the raft Cid left behind. From here, the player declares, they'll "breeze through" gathering the party.

In the fight against the tentacles wrapped around Figaro Castle's engine room, they poison them with Bio Blaster and then just watch while healing with Cure. One tentacle is immune to poison, so only that one is attacked and defeated normally.

For the Dullahan fight at Daryl's Tomb, the player explains that it has no dangerous attacks, so equipping Reflect Rings and giving it an ice weakness with the Debilitator is enough to win. It also has no resistance to Blind, so they first blind it with Flash and then leave it alone, and the enemy falls on its own to its reflected Blizzards.

Locke rejoins the party in the Phoenix Cave, and Cyan also returns. The King Behemoth, fought in front of Shadow (or rather, a trap in his form), is defeated by turning invisible with Phantom. After it revives as undead, healing it will defeat it, they say. Terra, reunited with the party in Mobliz, had lost her will to fight. In the Humbaba fight, they repelled it by attacking at random while still invisible from the previous battle.

In the Shadow fight at the Colosseum, commands can't be entered. So the player used Locke, who doesn't waste actions, equipped with the Thief's Bracer. Locke has a high evasion rate to begin with, and supplementing it with equipment lets him dodge almost every attack, they say.

In the Chadarnook fight to recruit Relm, they used magicite to put everyone in Image status and also used Golem to block physical attacks. This enemy periodically switches between a goddess form and an evil spirit form. In the goddess form, its counterattacks are a hassle, so they attack only while it's in the evil spirit form. Using the Debilitator, they made the enemy's Thundaga get reflected, narrowing its means of attack down to one, and attacked with Setzer's Fixed Dice and Sabin's Phantom Rush.

After Strago joins, the party moves on to the Magic Master fight in the Fanatics' Tower. Enemies in the tower only use magic attacks, so equipping everyone with Reflect Rings means they basically can't be killed. However, it has 50,000 HP and casts unreflectable magic as it dies. Prefacing it with "there are lots of ways to solve this," the player chose a method of fighting with three members and using a certain tactic immediately upon seeing the seventh spell being cast. The finishing blow was Setzer's Fixed Dice, and Relm and Strago survived the Ultima it cast at the end.

From the Master Tonberry they fought on a side trip, they learned the Lore "Step Mine," which it uses as a counterattack. This ability becomes the mainstay of the strategy from here on.

At this point, the player jokingly introduces Strago's "morning routine." He puts on Sprint Shoes, walks in front of his house for about six hours to rack up 320,000 steps, and then heads off for "a night at the opera." Going straight down onto the stage to fight the Earth Dragon, one of the Eight Dragons, Step Mine deals 9,999 damage and defeats it in three hits. The Earth Dragon's earth-elemental attacks are absorbed with Gaia Gear.

In Cyan's dream, they first instantly kill one of the Dream Stooges with the Air Anchor obtained in the Fanatics' Tower, and handle another, which has 15,000 HP, with Step Mine. Before the final blow, they turn everyone invisible with Phantom in preparation for the next battle. In the following Wrexsoul fight, the way Vanish wears off reveals that the one the enemy has possessed is Celes. They remove the other members' Vanish with Cure so the Reflect Rings work, and defeat it with Step Mine. Here the player says, "Standing before you is a mage who has walked 320,000 steps." Through this battle, Cyan masters all of his Bushido techniques, becoming able to use all of them even at his starting level.

In the final dungeon, Kefka's Tower, Cyan takes center stage in the Inferno fight. Among his mastered Bushido is a technique that casts Stop on all enemies and seals the movement of both arms, and in that opening Strago attacks with Step Mine. There are many attacks that can't be fully blocked, so Celes devotes herself to defense with Runic, and Golem is also summoned to shore up the defense. When Delta Attack hits Edgar, the player brushes it off with "Well, if it's Edgar, that's fine."

Among the Warring Triad, the Demon is considered the weakest. If you exploit its weakness with the Debilitator, you can beat it just by equipping Reflect Rings and waiting. The Guardian mimics the actions of past bosses, so they block physical attacks with Fenrir and Golem and magic attacks with Runic, and defeat it with Step Mine. The Fiend has no resistance to Stop, so they reflect Stop back onto it to halt its movement and keep it sealed with Cyan's Bushido, completely shutting it down.

In the Goddess fight, the danger grows the longer it drags on, so they chose four members who can deal damage, aiming for a quick battle. Sabin handles Phantom Rush, Edgar uses the Debilitator with the aim of making the enemy's Thundaga reflect back, and Strago handles Step Mine. With a certain probability, Setzer's Slot is answered with "Love Token," and when that happens, Setzer's actions are over. The Goddess has 44,000 HP, and the player described this battle as "a life-or-death gamble."

The party for the final boss fight is Celes, Edgar, Shadow, and Strago.

In the first phase, Edgar defeats the right arm with the Air Anchor, and the face, with 30,000 HP, is defeated with three Step Mines plus one more move. Since they enter while still invisible from the previous battle, they take almost no damage. Shadow was knocked out once, but they recovered with Ninjutsu and turned invisible again.

In the second phase, Celes prepares for magic with Runic, Edgar seals the center with the Air Anchor, and Shadow seals the left side with magic. The Air Anchor–afflicted center self-destructs by attacking, and the rest are defeated one by one with Step Mine. The final part's 10-hit final attack was reliably absorbed by the invisible Shadow, as a last line of defense in case dodging failed.

In the third phase, the top part is defeated with a single Step Mine. The right side starts using Meteor after a certain amount of damage, so they used Step Mine and Hi-Potions to adjust it to just short of its frenzy threshold. The plan for the end was to give it a fire weakness with the Debilitator and use the enemy's magic as a counter. But the player, saying "I had a feeling I could pull it off today," gambled on the counterattack roll, drew the lucky Trine, and defeated it.

The final form begins with "Heartless Angel," which reduces HP to 1. While it had no troublesome attacks, the player used the Debilitator to give it fire, ice, and lightning weaknesses, and whittled down about 20,000 of Kefka's 62,000 HP with Step Mine, right up to the edge of its frenzy. The goal was to trigger the frenzy with their own gauges charged up by reflecting the enemy's magic. Partway through, they were hit with Mute from Trine, but Edgar and Shadow immediately cured Celes and Strago, the magic users.

When the frenzy triggered as planned, Strago used Step Mine, Edgar and Shadow attacked using shields, and Celes summoned magicite to avoid the "end draws near" attack. After that, they whittled it down in one go with elemental attacks, and, helped along by Interceptor and Cid's evasion, defeated it with one final Step Mine.

After the victory comes the escape from Kefka's Tower. According to the player, FF6's ending runs over 20 minutes, but it's well worth watching, so they played all of it without cuts.

Finally, the player reports that they were able to save the world even with EXP and the rest set to 0x, and reflects that, even compared with previous entries, FF6 offers an extremely wide range of room for creativity, and that there was real enjoyment in choosing among the many possible solutions.