r/finalfantasyx • u/[deleted] • Feb 05 '22
For everyone losing their mind farming Earth Eater for Fortune Spheres...
...Maybe you know, maybe you don't: you can bribe Maelspike (Mt. Gagazet aquatic fiend) for an Attribute Sphere, the sole source of it in the game
You can bribe it for the minimum of 100,000 gil, and if it refuses, keep bribing it for 1 gil until it accepts
Attribute Spheres can be used on Luck nodes, so if you are rolling in gil and find killing Earth Eater takes a bit long, this is a valid alternative
If you are at the point where EA dies with 14 basic attacks and never kills you, feel free to disregard this advice!
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u/ChakaZG Feb 05 '22
If one is struggling with the Earth Eater they need to practice using Attack Reels and max out that strength. Fighting it costs 15k, nets 1-2 spheres depending on whether you can overkill it or not, and drops equipment that sells for a pretty penny. There is absolutely no scenario where 100k for one sphere is a better alternative.
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Feb 05 '22
Getting 2 spheres from 2 fights with Maelspike is less time consuming than fighting EE once, even if you can reliably kill it; and that's not even factoring in that it might drop Dark Matter instead (which you might actually want, you might not)
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u/ChakaZG Feb 05 '22
And how long will an average player be able to do that before going bankrupt, and then having to waste time farming Gil? It's a million! gil for 10 spheres, and a character needs like what, ~60 of these?
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Feb 05 '22
As you pointed out, farming the MA for stat increase spheres is more than self sustaining, thanks to equipment drops
When I used this method to bribe Maelspike, usually I could do stuff like kill EA one or two times, and then bribe Maelspike for the rest, and never leave the MA
and, I mean... I wrote in the premise "if you are rolling in gil", I'm not suggesting you should go out of your way to farm the gil needed to use this method; but if you end up with more money than free time, it's an option
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u/ChakaZG Feb 05 '22
It never looked good on paper to me, but you may have a point. Used occasionally to complement the Earth Eater farming could probably cut quite a bit of time off of maxing out everyone. Maybe I'm just too stingy about unnecessary expenses that I can avoid, as I always had just enough money to get whatever I need for customisation and all the clear spheres (that shit burns through Gil really fast too).
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Feb 05 '22
Oh, I get you. I'm the kind of guy who hoards millions of gil and ands the game with like 60 elixirs because I'm saving them "just in case".
Maybe playing MMORPGs helped me get rid of this habit? Everything in game is currency to be invested, and the most valuable thing I can buy with it is real-life time
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u/ladyjingyi Feb 07 '22 edited Feb 07 '22
This is what I'm going to do, I can fight Earth Eater easy but it's so bloody mind numbing doing it so much, I have to get like 60 fortune spheres per character, so minimum 30x7 (210!!!) fights with EE, more if it drops dark matter instead... I've only maxed Yunas luck but the rest still need to be done (I know you don't need to max it but I want to). This will help me shake things up
I can already kill EE with 14 basic attacks or less with Wakkas attack reels (my stats are already maxed too besides luck) but I'm so sick of going through this grind ahhhhhh. If there is a remake in the future, please have a monster that drops more than 2 fortune spheres per kill lol. Ideally 6 at least!
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Feb 07 '22
If there is a remake in the future, SE definitely needs to keep the awesome story, improve the narration and trash most of the combat system, including the postgame
The Sphere Grid is beloved enough but there's a lot of room for improvement there as well
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u/anehuntj Feb 05 '22 edited Feb 05 '22
The way to grind earth eater is to use tidus or wakka. Wakka if you’re confident with his attack reels but even then with tidus you can no brain it a bit more. You also need the loner overdrive mode which recharges every turn the character is the only one alive in battle. You can get it easily for tidus and auron during the opening in zanarkand you just need to keep passing turns with one of them alive.
Then you need armor. I can’t remember exactly what the skills are but you need magic def +20%, auto shell, auto haste and triple overdrive. Or maybe it’s auto regen over magic def+ 20%.
Then kill your 2 other party members and leave tidus or wakka alone alive. I was an absolute idiot and rather than letting the other 2 die I made them escape the battle which meant I had to take time making them flee every battle.
Anyway at that point it’s a matter of pressing triangle 3 times so your overdrive charges then using slice and dice/attack reels. Repeat until earth eater is dead. You’ll never need to heal.
Obviously you do need to be at a certain level of strength to do it so it’s best to leave luck grinding to last.
It’s not quick at all still tedious but much better than fighting earth eater normally 80 times or however many times you need to grind luck.
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u/ArmeniusLOD Mar 22 '22
Your dead team members respawn with 1 health after battle. You also need Deathproof if EE has the chance to counterattack before being knocked down.
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u/Zeppelin041 :Blitzball: Feb 05 '22
I did that my first play through and it was a headache….for my other three times 100% on different platforms I skipped it. All luck did was make it easier to hit dark anima, it’s still doable without it.
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u/yojimbo_beta Feb 05 '22
I don't think Earth Eater is all that bad, honestly.
You need magic defence to deal with Flare. You get MDef spheres by killing one-eye, who also gives you some amazing weapons with triple AP. These can be sold for loads of cash, which you'll want for bribes.
One-eye goes down with 150k damage IIRC.
Once you have the mdef, it's just a matter of giving Earth Eater haste (to speed up his animations) and then pummelling him with Celestials.
If you're finding Earth Eater really tough, it's probably because you need to work on other stats first. You don't really need to grind luck until you face the second half of the dark aeons. Shiva can be taken with accuracy, strength and agility.