Zeteginea

Size: 4x4 (Large) Overall Terrain: Arctic tributaries Daylight Hours: Short Stage Music: Santa’s Coming Overall Difficulty: 5 Stage Boss: Empress Endora

City & Roshian Temple Information Cities (14) Hidden Cities (4) Roshian Temples (3) Buried Treasure (2) Xanadu Arhomes RT #1: N of Xanadu & W of 1) E of Dalna; above the Rebel Base W of Almalge; on the W Almalge mountain along the Zeteginea side of the small island RT #2: SE of Zeteginea; shore Boss Castle Azuzau / Azuza in the grass area right 2) E of Shibulg; in the Ajudahya W of Arhomes; at the nearby Zeteginea clearing where the three NE of Xanadu; at the fork edge of the peninsula RT #3 (H): NE corner of mountains meet road across the water near the edge of the map the map; clearing in the   Albeyta El’ Kedah / El’ Keda mountains   N of Ajudahya NE of Dalna; on the other     Albunba side of the river above the     N of Shahat closest mountain     Almalge Mislata     NW of Ajudahya & E of W of El’ Kedah; in the     R.T. #1 snow right along the     Bregga snow/grass border     E of Ajudahya         Dalna         N of Almalge; in the         clearing along the shore         Haljaya (Shop)         NW of Shibulg         Jijibrani         N of Haljaya         Mattle         W of Zeteginea; in the         grassland in the NW         Rashid         N of Jijibrani         Shahat         NW of Albeyta         Shibulg         N of Albeyta

Stage Shop Wares

Haljaya “HEAL” (Cure Stone) 700 Goth “ALL HEAL” (Cure Ankh) 2,000 Goth “REVIVE” (Ethereal Flute) 2,000 Goth “JOKER” (Joker Tarot) 2,000 Goth “SUNSHINE” (Ray of Sunshine) 4,000 Goth

Pretty standard, really. Just pick up stuff you are running low on. This is a good time to also, because you won’t want to take time during the final stage to refill your inventory!

Neutral Encounters

LV: 24 Cerberus LV: 24 Raven Man LV: 24 Tiamat Mountains Ocean Plains

At this point, you should not need at more characters to fill up your units. that could probably have been said like 10 stages ago, but I may as well say it now!  Tiamats are nice finds, the other two are only so-so.  You could possibly gain some small amount of Charisma & Alignment if you choose to kill any Raven Men that you come across. Do what you wish with them...

Enemy Units

Different Types of Units: 9 Total Enemy Unit Deployed: 26 Enemy Level Threshold: 22 - 26 Unit# 24-1

This will be the toughest batch of enemy unit you will ever have to face!  And it’s only because of one unit that is as tough as a boss fight! Mainly because the leader is a boss from previous stages; an old friend...  A big help would be to have many many Sylph & Seraphim.  The bad guys that will show up on this tage are very weak to Black attacks.  The rest are simply annoying and similar to the ones you saw last stage.  Get your fighting units primed and ready, because you’ll need them!! 

Beat The Stage!

Prologue:  At last, you have reached the Empire’s capital: Zeteginea.  Although the Empire is now destined to crumble, its ruler, the enchanting & bewitching Empress Endora will fight until her last breath.  She is not without help however, as Prince Gares is here as well.  He gave up being human when he accepted the dark powers bestowed by Rashidi.  He is now a spirit of darkness. His worn-out black armor shows not only how far the Empire has fallen, but also what they are doing to their generals...

This stage is arguably the toughest stage in the whole game! Why? Well, several reasons. First, it’s another gigantic stage comprised of mixing & matching terrain types, especially mountains and rivers.  The map is about 95% covered in snow, so having a unit or two with the Snow terrain type will help. However, if you have too many land based units, you will be severely restricted on how fast you can react to the enemy unit deployments. So, try and get as many High Sky & Low Sky terrain type units as you can. That is half of the battle on this stage.

The other half, is of course the battle, er, battles!  And you’re in for quite a shock this go around. No more weak & easy units to push around this time! Remember that boss fight way back on Island Avalon or Shangrila, where the boss of those stages was a guy called Gares?  Well, get ready for a reprise, because now you’ll be facing a much more mobile version as a regular unit encounter!  And not just one of them, oh no! Several iterations will come spewing forth!  Gares has been cloning himself with magic, and will send countless copies of himself from the boss castle of Zeteginea to stop you! There are other normal enemy units too, intermixed in with the barrage of Gares units.

Deployment Time!
Your ultimate goal, besides the boss castle of course, is to liberate R.T. #3, which is hidden waaaay up in the NE corner of the map.  That is because this is the location where the real Gares is hiding, and once you confront him here, all of the clone units of him that you have been fighting will stop coming!  So, get your fastest city liberator ready (which is probably Canopus) and send him directly up there.  Have other escort units around him so that he doesn’t get beaten to a pulp by the Gares units that do manage to come out from Zeteginea.  This time the enemy isn’t fooling around with the units that they send out!  Canopus can stop and snag a town or two along the way of you want, but don’t deviate too far from your Roshian goal.

As for the rest of your units, send your remaining fighting flying units straight north, to the region around the town of Almalge & R.T. #1.  Bring a liberator, like maybe even your Opinion Leader, to liberate these two locations.  Send some liberating units west to the region where all of the hidden cities are located.  Any other sky liberators that you have will serve this purpose well, as the terrain is rough. As for all of the towns in the eastern region of this land, they are not as urgent, and can be liberated at your leisure. All of your non-flying land units will half to go the long way around to get to this area however, by first going east first, and then north near the town of Ajudahya.  It’s a much longer trip this way...

Step 1:  Upon liberating, R.T. #1, you will get a big warning that something is not right about Gares.  “Why are there so many Gares?” they exclaim! They will warn you about the oncoming onslaught of multiple Gares if you didn’t catch on to that fact by now! Almalge tells you that Gares killed the paladins of Shangrila, and that he lost his caring side when he chose the dark path.  Continuing on your march to the sea, as soon as you liberate Almalge, use some “BOOTS” (7 League Boots) to bring the rest of your slower land units up to the front lines.  They should now be able to liberate the eastern towns a lot quicker. Most of these towns will tell you about how Gares executed the paladins of the highlands after they confronted the Empress about her war effort, asking her to stop.

Step 2:  From the middle point of the stage, make your next pit stop at the town of Dalna, which is just on the edge of the large body of water that supplies all of the rivers on this map.  You can see the boss
castle of Zeteginea in the distance...  But it’s still a long ways off, so don’t get too excited just yet.  Station your units along the edge of the water to form a wall, as almost every enemy unit will funnel right into your trap.  This can be a good distraction to let Canopus get over to R.T. #3 in the NE corner. Just be careful, because every now and then the Gares unit will appear and hit one of your units along the wall!  All of this fighting should grant you the time you need to liberate the mess of towns to the east, and let your low sky liberators get over to the western island that is populated with the 4 hidden cities.

Step 3:  The ring of hidden towns on the western island will provide you with much needed information about all that has gone wrong with the brain trust of the Empire.  The hidden town of Arhomes starts it all off.  A wise sage will appear, and he will provide you with some necessary back story.  North of of the Zeteginean Continent is the nation of Lodis, a religious nation with a mighty military. They have designs on invading the continent of Zeteginea, and Empress Endora warned the other four kingdoms of this, including King Gran.  She suggested that they all band together to ward off the impending invasion, but none of them listened to her. Instead of banding together with her, the other 4 kingdoms attacked the highlands. Even the highlands could not defend against four different nations, and that is  when Rashidi approached the Empress, and thus the Zeteginean Empire was formed...  For all of you Ogre Battle buffs out there, this Lodis that is mentioned is one and the same as the backdrop for other game in the Ogre Battle series, hence the name of the GBA game “Knights of Lodis.”

Step 4:  Staying on this western island, the hidden town of Mislata tells you to go check out the fort city of Mattle for more information regarding the paladin executions.  When you get to this remote town in the NW corner of the map, they in turn tell you that they managed to free some of the paladins before they were executed, and they are hiding in the hidden town of Azuzau.  At the hidden town of Azuzau, the paladin Gawain will appear.  Here he tells you that Rashidi's purpose for joining the empire was not to help Empress Endora defend against the other four nations, but to use the newly formed Zeteginean Empire for more sinister purposes.  He not only sought to use the Empire to dominate & rule the entire continent, but by using them, he could get his hands on the power of the gods by using the 12 Zodiac Stones.  Gawain says that the paladins tried to tell the empress about it, but she was already consumed & corrupted by Rashidi, and Gares executed many of them.

Step 4:  Along the eastern rim of the mountains, along the top of the map, the town of Rashid will give you a hint about the location of the hidden Roshian Temple and where the real Gares is hiding out.  When you finally do make it to R.T. #3, you will find Gares himself is here!  Don’t get all hot & bothered though, as he won’t fight you. At least not in person!  As you can see, he is a broken hulk of what he used to be.  He admits that the Empire is indeed finished, but he says that he & Rashidi will still conquer the continent. He then taunts you a second time that he will crush you himself later on, if you  manage to survive his wave of clones.  Now, one thing that is probably another misconception is that the clones of Gares stop coming once you liberate this temple. In actuality, they do not! There are temples & towns that hints that they will cease, but you will still see a Gares unit or two trickle out of the boss castle long after you’ve liberated this temple. I think what happens is that the time between appearances of Gares units is what really gets effected, because they don’t come flying out of the boss castle back to back as bad as they did before you find this temple. No matter.  You should be able to take them!

Step 5:  The best place to stage your assault on the boss castle of Zeteginea is from the Roshian Temple that is right next to it. However, there are NO towns anywhere close to this.  The closest is possibly the town of Dalna, but it's on the other side of the wide river.  Another possible staging point can come from the town of Albunba, but it is quite a ways down the road from Zeteginea.  Once you liberate this temple, a wise man will tell you that in order to defeat the real Gares, you have to beat him in the flesh. The Gares that you have been fighting all along was just a clone, or a “black armor” as he says.  Find him, and you will stop the clones. You should have already gotten to that far off temple, as this one is probably the last inhabitant on the whole map that you will liberate because it is so close to the boss castle.  So, this news is not so enlightening, especially since I told you at the beginning what to do!

Step 6:  Once you’ve corralled the boss castle as you probably have done for most of the game, you have several options.  Since Empress Endora is such a go-getter, there are two different character vying for her affections!  One of them is your Opinion Leader.  He/she did start this whole rebellion after all, so it is only fitting that he/she be the one to end it!  The other character is none of other than Debonair.  He was scoffed at imprisoned, and discarded by her, and so he should get the chance to have the last laugh! The choice is yours, really. One interesting thing of note is that if you use any other unit, that unit will get sweet talked by the Empress, and she will ask if they wish to join her side to help in the oncoming invasion from Lodis.  I don’t think I need to tell you not to, because if you are impaired enough to say yes, you will LOSE THIS UNIT PERMANENTLY!  Besides, you didn’t come this far just to get supplemented into an oppressive regime!

Fight It Out!!

Boss Time!

LV: 24 Evil One   Empress Endora Black Queen HP 287 LV 28     LV: 21 Black Queen       LV: 24 Evil One   4 Targeted, & 5 Hit-All !!!!

Time for a challenge!  Endora has five, count 'em, 5 total Hit-All attacks!  She is like a Lich, only with 2 extra attacks and dealing scores more damage!  If you don’t use a “World” Tarot Card, you’ll be dead after her second volley. It’s just that simple. Even your seemingly invincible units will fall victim to this game’s subtitle. She not only can wield spells with the best of ‘em, but is also very resilient to all types of attacks.  All that you really have to do is use an endless supply of damage cards.  If you feel that route is cheap, you can use a combination of “Star” & “Emperor” Tarot Cards instead.  Sadly, it’s not really that difficult after that.  Well, once a “World” card is up! Kinda anticlimactic, if you ask me.  But don't worry your pretty little head, because there’s still one stage left!

Available Items

There are two items to collect on this stage.  One’s a sellable, the other’s a class promotion item! well, they both are in a way...

SNES Name: DEMON Selling Price: 230 Goth PSX / Full Name: Sentoul Demon Buying Price: - - Description: “A statue of the demon Sentoul.”

SNES Name: FOLIO Selling Price: 50,000 Goth PSX / Full Name: Tome of Myths Buying Price: 100,000 Goth Description: “A record of the gods. The book of the heavens.”

Aftermath

The batch of hidden towns have some nice trinkets that you can pick up.  They will help you promote those last few characters that you’ve been holding out on just in time...

1) Visit the hidden town of Mislata, and the resident Roshian Monk will give you a “FOLIO” (Tome of Myths).  This item could be used to get a Tiger Man on Fort Shulamana, if you trade it for a “FULLMOON” (Full Moon Stone) at the town of Ochiwalong.  Otherwise, just sell the thing for 50,000 Goth. With how sucky Tiger Men are, that is probably a better option!

2) Visit the hidden town of El’ Kedah, and the resident Roshian Monk will give you a “DEMON” (Sentoul Demon).  This item should net you either a Dragoner, Sorcerer.  A big no-brainer decision there!

3) This is possibly even more important than grabbing the above two items.  If you are running low on any item, I highly suggest you go and fill up your inventory right now!  And when I mean low, I mean less than 40!  Can’t hurt to be prepared, eh?  What items should you look to have tons of? Well, “BOOTS” (7 League Boots) for starters, and then some “ALL HEALS” (Cure Ankhs), “REVIVES” (Ethereal Flutes), “JOKERS” (Joker Tarots), and maybe even some “SUMMONS” (Mass Summons), “SUNSHINES” (Ray of Sunshines), &“MOONBEAMS” (Moonbeams).  Another item that you may want to use are any “MERCHANTS” (Trade Tickets) that you still have lying around. Before you use any, sell any and all items that you have no plan on using.  This would include unequipped weapons, and any sellable items that you have hung onto as status symbols. Sorry. Then, buy as many stat boosting items as you can. Still leave yourself enough Goth to support your deployed troops!  Maybe a few day’s worth, anyway.  Then, pump your characters full of all the stat boosting items that you have bought.  You’ll want all the help you can get for your final stand...  Temple Shalina...