After a crazy weekend of Opus VI gaming, it’s nice to resume doing a write-up! Monday is upon us, so I have answered the call to link more FFTCG cards back to their roots!

Zalera, The Death Seraph – 3-037H

Ah, Zalera, quite the interesting boss from Final Fantasy XII. This boss frustrated many gamers (as it does many players in the TCG) with it’s debuffs and instant death capabilities. The ability here is directly referenced from the XII encounter, Prime Lv. Death, which affects characters whose levels are a prime number.

Behemoth – 4-111H

Behemoth, quite possibly one of the most iconic monsters from Final Fantasy, is represented quite accurately in the TCG, especially from Final Fantasy IV. In Final Fantasy IV, combat with a Behemoth can be just as frustrating as it is in the TCG, because going toe to toe with one means you get counter attacked every time you inflict damage to one. While this only applies to physical melee damage in FFIV, (use Rydia summon to get around that), it is faithfully represented here by “dealing that forward damage equal to half of the received damage). This monster also has above average health, reflected in both the game and the TCG.

Illua – 5-099H

Illua, one of the best “Hero” cards to be printed yet, hails from FFTA2, and comes loaded with multiple abilities that are straight from her video game character. Her most notable ability, allows her to cancel the effects of a Summon or ability the first time she is targeted in a turn. This is linked to her job ability “Impervious”, which grants the user immunity to debuffs. In the TCG, her S ability “Sheol” activates all your forwards and gives them haste, while lowering the power of all opponents by 2,000 until the end of the turn. In FFTA2, it inflicts Slow and Immobilize on foes and Haste and Regen for her allies, which is just as annoying as it sounds in both games.

Red Mage – 1-003C

The iconic Red Mage, which has been a must have in Fire decks since Opus 1, has a very strong ability that can prevent a target Forward from blocking this turn. This represents the spell “Paralyze” that Red Mages can use to disable enemies, most noticeably represented in Final Fantasy XI. Paralyze prevents targets from taking action for a set time, which would prevent a target in the TCG from blocking.

And that’s it for this Monday! Hope you are continuing to enjoy the Monday segments!

(Did you know? Final Fantasy’s battle system was inspired by American football. Hiroyuki Ito, the designer of Final Fantasy’s battle system, had never played a tabletop or video game RPG in his life before working on Final Fantasy. Instead his inspiration was American football, with it’s back and forth action, two teams taking turns on offense and heavy emphasis on strategy. The side-view battles also represent how most people spectate football, from a sideline view.)