Getting ready for Necron Necron

[nothgual]

This is my first post here, so if I say something dumb, go easy please.
I know Necron's supposed to be incredibly easy, but I'm not finding him to be that way. I want to level up before I go to him, but for some reason every random encounter I get into in the crystal place is not giving me any exp. Where can I level up? Can I leave this place and go back to gaia to do side-quests to get better? Also, any general hints on how to beat this guy?
Thanks for any answers I get.

[Mindu]

You can leave the crystal place to go back to Memoria and the rest of Gaia whenever you want. Memoria is also a great place to gain levels. I'd be best to leave the strategy to someone else seeing as it has been many years since I've played, although be sure to set your abilities to guard against his Grand Cross attack. That one I remember.

[Xanatos]

Head back to Memoria, to parts where you fought four fiends. With "level up" ability on you should gain levels fairly easy, I suggest you grind up to level 65 or above. Same as Mindu I don't recall any specific tactic as how to beat Necron easily, though I highly suggest you have Quina in your party. It's Blue Magic comes in handy here, Mighty Guard, Angel's Snack, White Wind and Auto-Life should do the trick.

[Firefly]

Head back to Memoria, to parts where you fought four fiends. With "level up" ability on you should gain levels fairly easy, I suggest you grind up to level 65 or above.

^ This. In my party I had Garnet,Vivi,Steiner,and Zidane and I am pretty sure they were in the 60 to 70 levels. Like Mindu and Xanatos,I haven't played this game in forever so I don't remember exactly how I beat it. I suggest looking at a Boss Guide or such for more advice

[loaf]

Necron can be easy with the right abilities equipped. He's a pain otherwise. I liked to level up with Grand Dragons for awhile but Memories was better for me personally.

[Mindu]

What I can remember is that I still had trouble with Necron despite having a beefed up party. Eiko knew Holy and Full-life, Zidane had his Ultima Weapon, and Steiner was equipped with Ragnarok and knew Shock (or whichever his strongest Sword Tech was). Yet despite this, after several turns I had one character remaining and was praying Necron would use the attack that reduces your HP to 1 until I revived Eiko. He's probably the hardest final boss in the series after Zeromus.

[Zargabaath]

Personally I would trade out Steiner for Freya. Steiner's Shock costs a lot of MP and he doesn't have that much. While Freya's Dragon Crest costs 16 MP and she has way more total MP. If you killed enough dragons, Dragon Crest will be doing max damage. The reason why I choose Freya over Steiner is I won't have to worry about restoring his MP, saves a turn.

A good strategy involves equipping Shadow-absorption armor or Null-shadow armor (preferably the absorption). Put Vivi in your party and have him cast Doomsday. Max damage to Necron. Full heal to party members w/ Shadow-absorption armor.

Auto-regen is good to. Plus auto-haste. And having as many status immunity skills equipped works as well.

[loaf]

Steiner + Freya + Vivi (Doomsday) + Eiko for final Battle and it's over in like 6 turns lol.

[Nidogod]

Auto-haste
Auto-regen
Auto-potion (don't know if it goes without saying, but make sure there are no regular potions in your inventory, just hi-potions)
Body temp
Clear-headed

On everyone. If you're using a mage they could use loudmouth, and antibody is pretty useful as well. I believe he can also cast level 5 death, so make sure no one in your party is a multiple of 5. Definitely give him a shot before making any changes -he's really not that difficult. If you have good equipment he can be taken down at level 50 no problem. Just make sure you're prepared for the statuses he throws up and use the auto abilities I listed and he should go down fast.

[loaf]

The Potions suck in FFIX, Auto-Potion is a waste of Skill Points.

[nothgual]

I just beat him a few minutes ago, using a lot of the tactics that you guys suggested. Thanks to you guys I now understand why people complain about him being too easy! I want to thank all of you for making my first experience with this forum a happy one.

[loaf]

He's one of the hardest and easiest at the same time.

[Nidogod]

The Potions suck in FFIX, Auto-Potion is a waste of Skill Points.

Not a chance. At the cost of 3 ability points it's practically free, 450 hp healed whenever you get attacked is a large amount of recovery, especially considering that Kuja and Necron won't be doing any more than 1,500-2,000 a pop, and even better, auto-regen continues to work while characters are using their potions. The only way auto-potion could be considered a waste is if your characters are already strong enough that auto-regen or your white mage heals you enough on it's own.

[loaf]

Auto-Regen is enough healing in this game to cover any Auo-Potion and healer, with character animations, the Regen is enough.

[Nidogod]

I know the game is on the easy side, but I wouldn't go so far as to say that all players can do without a healer and auto-potion. Also, the items that grant auto-potion can be obtained very early in the game as opposed to auto-regen, and matched with the cheaper point cost is ideal over auto-regen until disc 3 or so.

[loaf]

I know the game is on the easy side, but I wouldn't go so far as to say that all players can do without a healer and auto-potion. Also, the items that grant auto-potion can be obtained very early in the game as opposed to auto-regen, and matched with the cheaper point cost is ideal over auto-regen until disc 3 or so.

If you know how to cast animations with longer time to execute you can avoid using a healer all together in this game with Auto-Regen.

[Nidogod]

Yes, I know, but I'd wager someone who needs to ask for tips on how to beat the final boss doesn't know. In that case, once again, I don't think they'd be inconveniencing themselves by spending 3 ability points to have another means to heal their characters.

[Diamond Dust]

Not earning EXP in Memoria? That doesn't sound right. Make sure your characters are not stuck with the 'Virus' status effect (which prevents them from acquiring EXP). If they are, use a 'vaccine' to remedy the situation.

[loaf]

Not earning EXP in Memoria? That doesn't sound right. Make sure your characters are not stuck with the 'Virus' status effect (which prevents them from acquiring EXP). If they are, use a 'vaccine' to remedy the situation.

They said The Crystal, not Memoria. The Crystal gives no XP.

[markandrewkinzett]

Necron can be a bitch but what REALLY gets me about Necron is after defaeting Kuja he comes out of nowhere what is up with that?