The next Mission involves hunting down an Adamantortoise, which you are likely ready to take on at this point, but it is worth noting that farming these creatures becomes slightly less efficient after you have completed Mission 63. Many players choose to complete their farming after the Mission has been completed with no issue but it’s worth noting that if you plan to pursue the Treasure Hunter Trophy / Achievement that you may want to start your Adamantoise farming now in order to be even more efficient (you’re going to have to do a lot of farming!)
In short, there will be fewer Adamantortoise enemies wandering about in the Archylte Steppe because they will be replaced by Long Gui enemies, which are more difficult to defeat and harder to farm. Only one Adamantortoise will be found wandering the plains after this Mission is complete (still farmable but a little slower).
The Cie’th Stone for this Mission is located in the Subterranean Lake area of the Sulyya Springs.
The mark for this Mission can be found in the Eastern Tors area of the Archylte Steppe. It will look like the pathway is blocked by other giant Oretoises but you can sneak past them relatively easily.
Class: A
HP: 3,699,000
The Adamantortoise is a tough enemy to face but its attack pattern is very straight forward and, assuming your party members are leveled well enough, and assuming you utilize the right strategy, it should be relatively easy to bring them down. So what are their attacks?
“Roar” is by far the most challenging attack that you will have to deal with when fighting against an Adamantortoise. Because it has a chance to Daze your party members, there is a chance that multiple party members or, worst case scenario, all of your party members, will be unable to act until they are hit again, which likely means you are headed for a “Game Over” screen.
Preparation
For this fight, consider switching your party members to Fang, Lightning and Vanille. Hope and Vanille are pretty close in terms of their stats and usefulness, but Vanille has a step up with her ability to apply status debuffs more efficiently, making her more useful for this fight. There are a number of approaches to going about this fight, including this one, so don’t hesitate to experiment with other setups. But here is one that should work well; set up the following paradigms:
Some guides and walkthroughs suggest a more uniform paradigm setup (all characters as Medics, all characters as Saboteurs) to quickly jump between each stage of the battle setup, and this can work as well, though through experimentation, the above paradigm approach works well for quickly getting through the setup and preparation phases.
Lastly, make sure that your characters are equipped appropriately. This is the best time for you to upgrade your main party member’s weapons. Check out the Upgrading Weapons page for tips. You should also make sure that Vanille has her Belladonna Wand equipped (or its upgraded forms, the Malboro Wand or Nirvana) to ensure that she has the “Improved Debuffing” passive ability.
Make sure that all of your characters have a Gaian Ring equipped and consider equipping them with a Royal Armlet or an Imperial Armlet if you managed to get one upgraded. You should also equip Fang and Lightning with a Genji Glove. Equip Vanille with one only if she has the extra spot. Lastly, these enemies have great potential drops, so make sure you have a Collector Catalog and Connoisseur Catalog equipped.
The Fight
The fight is fairly straightforward because Adamantortoise follows a standard and predictable attack pattern. It will continuously stomp throughout the fight and it has a chance to use “Quake” or “Roar” after a certain amount of time has passed. Unfortunately, if it uses “Roar” and enough of your characters are Dazed (at which point they will likely die from the next stomp) you may just need to restart the battle and try again.
The goal is to defeat both the Left Leg and Right Leg to knock Adamantortoise down, trigger a Stagger, and defeat it in a single Stagger before it stands back up. It takes increased damage while it's laying down so preparing for the all out attack once it drops down is critical and timing is everything.
Then switch to Tri-disaster which will trigger a Stagger on Adamantortoise but stay in Tri-disaster until the Chain Gauge gets up to at least 900%. Lastly, switch to Cerberus paradigm and rotate between the two Cerberus paradigms to take advantage of the ATB Refresh trick. Note that you can use Relentless Assault if Vanille doesn’t have a strong Commandos Crystarium yet.
The goal here is to get Adamantortoise’s HP all the way down before it stands up. Once it begins standing up, even if it is still Staggered, it will take far less damage and be much more difficult to defeat.
Good luck!
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