Final Fantasy IX - Abilities / Techniques / Basics

VII

VIII

X-2

XII

XIII

DOC

Spiras Destiny

Yunalesca

Final Fantasy World

Final Fantasy Synthesis

Enix Squared

Forgotten Memories

Final Fantasy Republic

FFVII Before Crisis FFVII Crisis Core FFVII Last Order Final Fantasy VII FFVII Advent Children FFVII Dirge Of Cerberus FFVII DOC Lost Episode On The Way to A Smile Final Fantasy VIII

Final Fantasy IX Final Fantasy X Final Fantasy X-2 Final Fantasy XII FFXII Revenant Wings Final Fantasy XIII FFXIII Agito FFXIII Versus FFXIII Haeresis

About Affiliation Disclaimer Site FAQ Staff Site Home Forums

Final Fantasy IX - Abilities / Techniques

Filed Under: Final Fantasy IX

Abilities are special skills that lie dormant within the people of Gaia, the world of Final Fantasy IX. Your characters can "rediscover" and activate their abilities during the course of their adventure. These skills are particularly useful in battle, enabling your party to defeat the mightiest monsters. Indeed, you'll often find that choosing the right set of abilities is the key to winning battles. There are two basic groups of abilities: Action Abilities and Support Abilities. Support Abilities do not need to be "used", but rather take effect automatically when certain conditions are met. Action Abilities, on the other hand, must be specifically selected as battle commands. This category includes, for example, offensive spells.

Ability Menu

The Ability Menu is accessible from the Main Menu, which you can open by pressing the triangle button in the field screen or on the world map. The menu allows you to final fantasy ix ability menu

choose between the Use and Equip options. The Use screen lists all Action Abilities, some of which can also be used outside battle - for example, Dagger's Cure and Life healing magic. When a character uses an Action Ability, s/he uses up MP. The Equip screen lists a character's Support Abilities, which can be activated by equipping magic stones. During your adventure, you will need to consider which set of Support Abilities you wish to have at your character's disposal: as the game progresses, you will rarely have enough magic stones to equip every ability learnt by a character.

The Info window in the Ability Menu displays information on the ability currently selected. The figure to the final fantasy ix ability menu

right of the "AP" entry displays how many AP your character has accumulated. The figure to the right of this one tells you how many AP are required to learn the ability in question. Your characters do not lose accumulated AP when they unequip an item, and you can continue the learning process by having them equip it at some later point. The symbol below, the word "Equip" indicates the item from which your character is learning the ability, and is no longer displayed once s/he has mastered the ability in question (i.e. accumulated enough AP).

Getting New Abilities

You can activate abilities by equipping items. Characters can activate different abilities from the same piece of equipment. Each character can only activate and learn the specific abilities corresponding to his or her nature. Until a character has completely mastered an ability, s/he can only use it when the item containing final fantasy ix ability menu

the ability in question is equipped. This means that you can choose your party's equipment according to the abilities you want your characters to learn - or have them equip specific items whenever you want them to use the associated abilities in particular circumstances. If a party member equips an item containing a new ability, s/he can make use of that ability white wearing the item in question, but can no longer use the ability after unequipping the relevant item. However, if your character has already accumulated sufficient AP, s/he has "learned" the ability and can use it even without equipping the item in question.

When the ability has red stars beside it, it means you have mastered it, and will not need a weapon equipped to use it.

When finishing a battle, all AP is distributed evenly to al characters abilities. #For example 5 AP awarded will mean 5 AP given to all the abilities Zidane is currently learning, 5 AP to all Vivi's abilities he's learning etc.

Learning Abilities

Your characters must accumulate AP to learn abilities. Each ability requires a specific amount of AP, obtained automatically whenever you have won a battle and your character has equipped an item containing new abilities. The AP are added to the "accounts" of the new ability or abilities of your party. Your party members can learn more than one ability at a time; the number depends on how many abilities final fantasy ix ability

their equipment contains. Note that only party members that are not disabled or afflicted by certain status effects when a battle ends obtain AP (see the section "Status effects" in this chapter for details). Press the X button to access the Main Menu and then view your accumulated AP in the Ability Menu or the Status screen. Each character needs different numbers of AP to learn an ability, so some party members take longer than others to master any given ability.

Tip: Even when you find more potent pieces of equipment for your party members, you should keep their "old" items equipped (if possible) until they have learned the relevant abilities (indicated by the AP gauge).

Tip: If you want a character to Learn an ability even faster, have him or her equip several items that contain this ability. This multiplies the distributed AP and fills the AP gauge faster.