Ruby Weapon

Ruby Weapon is one of the two superbosses of Final Fantasy VII, along with the Emerald Weapon. In Final Fantasy VII, it is one of the three Weapon enemies added in the North American, PAL, and International versions of the game. Ruby Weapon is one of seven Weapons the Planet has produced and dispatched to cleanse any threats to its continued existence, and one of the five awoken as a result of Sephiroth summoning Meteor.

Ruby Weapon is an optional boss that resides in the sand around the Gold Saucer on the world map. To get it to appear, the player must defeat Ultimate Weapon and then fight one random battle afterward to trigger Ruby Weapon's appearance, although some players have reported Ruby Weapon not appearing at all, or that it appears but is invisible and the player can only initiate the battle by running into it by chance.

The player can only approach Ruby Weapon by Highwind or chocobo. It can permanently eject party members from battle, has extremely high defense, inflicts targets with status effects by its tentacles, and uses some of the strongest attacks in the game.

Defeating Ruby Weapon in the PC version re-release of Final Fantasy VII unlocks the Ruby Weapon achievement. Doing so in the PlayStation 4 version earns the Ruby Render trophy.

The Desert Rose can be traded for a Gold Chocobo that can be used for accessing the four Materia Caves, but its stats are poor for racing.

Battle
Ruby Weapon's defenses nullify most damage that is not fixed or defense-ignoring. Its Whirlsand attack removes a party member from battle, but can only be used after Ruby Weapon's 25th and 32nd turns, or when its tentacles are not withdrawn. The PC version has no restrictions on the use of Whirlsand.

Ruby Weapon will not expose its tentacles unless only a single character is alive, but is immune to all damage until that point. Therefore, it is advisable to open the battle with a single character and cast Life2 linked to an All Materia, or the Phoenix summon. Ruby Weapon is not immune to the Paralyzed status, meaning Dazers or Hades can keep Ruby Weapon from attacking for a few turns.

When the tentacles are present, Ruby Weapon attacks using Gravity-based and/or MP-draining tentacle attacks, and casts Ruby Ray and Ruby Flame. Ruby Flame is Fire-elemental and deals roughly 2000 damage, while Ruby Ray deals roughly 3000 damage. Shadow Flare is used for over 5000 damage to a single character. Ruby Weapon uses Ultima, as both regular attacks and counterattacks to Knights of Round.

Ruby Weapon uses physical attacks and Comet2 if its tentacles are removed, but can no longer use Gravity attacks or damage MP. It can create two new tentacles when they are destroyed. The tentacles cannot kill a character because they deal Gravity-based damage, but they inflict the characters with status ailments.

Attacks

 * Unnamed attack and Big Swing: Claw attacks; only used when tentacles are retracted. This last attack may inflict paralyzed.
 * Comet2: A powerful magic spell that hits several times. Only used when tentacles are retracted.
 * Whirlsand: Permanently inflicts Eject to one character. Only used while tentacles are retracted.
 * Ruby Flame: Powerful fire-elemental attack.
 * Ultima: Powerful magic spell that hits the whole party. Sometimes also a counterattack to Knights of the Round.
 * Ruby Ray: Powerful attack that always inflicts confusion.
 * Shadow Flare: Extremely powerful magic; hits one character. Can be reflected.
 * Unnamed two right tentacle attacks: Gravity-elemental attacks; only used when right tentacle is present. Both attacks may inflicts frog and small. Can be counterattacks or normal.
 * Unnamed two left tentacle attacks: Same as their Right counterparts, but affect MP and used when left tentacle are present. Both attacks may inflict poison and slow-numb.

Strategies
Reflect can be helpful to deflect Ruby Weapon's Shadow Flare. As Ruby Weapon counters normal attacks and Knights of the Round with Ultima, it is important to only summon them if Ruby Weapon is paralyzed. A Fire Armlet can be equipped to all party members to drain Ruby Weapon's fire attacks. Another benefit of using Fire Armlet instead of a Fire Ring is that not being an accessory, the player can also equip all three party members with a Ribbon to prevent the status ailments that come from Ruby Weapon's tentacles. It is advisable not to destroy the tentacles, as it will accelerate the casting of Whirlsand.

One-man summon rush
This strategy requires Knights of the Round, Hades, W-Summon, Mime and HP-Absorb and can be done at a relatively low level (with HP bolstered by HP Plus Materia) and fresh Materia without any AP can be used. One should equip one character with all of these, linking Knights of the Round to HP-Absorb. The other party members should be KO when entering the battle.

The character should W-Summon Knights of the Round, then Hades. Knights of the Round will deal damage and Hades will inflict Paralysis. The HP-Absorb linked on Knights of the Round will fully restore the character's health. The player can use Mime to attack again indefinitely. After the second or third time, the player should wait for Ruby Weapon to begin to move again to properly re-inflict the Paralysis status.

If the player has two stars on the Knights of the Round Materia, they can do a new summon as the last move with Phoenix first and Knights of the Round second, with Phoenix reviving the party to let everyone get EXP and AP, while the Knights of the Round kills Ruby Weapon right after. However, the timing must be precise. The Materia used in the battle can gain massive AP growth if linked to the proper weapons and armor.

Dazers
This strategy requires the W-Item Materia and the item Dazers. Using the W-Item duplication bug on the Dazers and Megalixirs earns free copies of them; about 20 of each is enough. The character with the W-Item should use a Dazers on Ruby Weapon every turn, then use a Megalixir on the party.

The other two characters can kill Ruby Weapon using regular attacks. This strategy doesn't require a Knights of the Round summon, Mime Materia or level 99 characters, nor killing anyone off before the battle. It is possible to kill Ruby Weapon with all three characters using double or triple AP weapons and armor to get a good AP boost.

All Lucky 7s
This strategy uses the All Lucky 7s status to defeat Ruby Weapon. The player should start the battle with a character ready to use a Limit Break with 7677 HP, and having the two other party members knocked out. The player should start off the battle by targeting the tentacles with a powerful Limit, such as Omnislash, and Ruby Weapon will retreat its tentacles. Using a Potion to get the character's HP up to 7777 will activate All Lucky 7s, which will deliver 64 blows to Ruby Weapon, each blow dealing 7777 damage, totaling 497,728 damage (about 62% of Ruby Weapon's total HP).

Once the character has snapped out of their Lucky 7's, all one has to do is use Comet2 with W-Magic on Ruby Weapon and its tentacles; whenever it "sprouts" its tentacles, the player should use Comet2 twice on the tentacles, and whenever Ruby Weapon retreats them, one should use Comet2 twice directly on Ruby Weapon. The battle should take about ten minutes and the player should not receive any damage.

????
Ruby Weapon can be defeated with the use of Dazers and the ???? Enemy Skill. The player should equip the characters with Enemy Skill Materia, Ribbon accessories, and Mystile or Ziedrich armors. It is helpful to have high Luck and Dexterity.

The player should move Dazers, Phoenix Down, and Turbo Ether to the top of the item list and it doesn't hurt to equip Final Attack with Revive/Phoenix, but with any luck it won't be needed. One can also use W-Item or Mime, but neither are necessary. For Dazers, 25 is enough if one is efficient, but more can be stocked to be safe.

The player should begin the battle with two characters dead and one character with low HP. Ruby Weapon will plant its tentacles and the player should ignore the tentacles entirely. The tentacles cannot kill a character because they deal Gravity-based damage. Once the tentacles emerge, the player should throw Dazers at Ruby Weapon, then begin reviving the others. One does not want to bring anyone to full HP, but rather keep their HP low for the ???? Enemy Skill to be effective. The party should begin attacking Ruby Weapon with ????, but use Dazers when the Paralyzed status wears off. Once all characters are revived, the player can cast Big Guard or Haste to allow for twice as many attacks for each Dazers item thrown at Ruby Weapon.

The key to this strategy is timing: if one throws Dazers at Ruby Weapon while it is in the Paralyzed status, the Dazers will miss. Sometimes Dazers will miss and immediately thereafter Ruby Weapon will become active and attack. The trick is to know how many character turns one is allowed before Paralysis wears off, and to hit Ruby Weapon with Dazers as soon as it happens. Generally one can hit Ruby Weapon four-five times per Dazers throw if the characters have Haste and high Dexterity.

Much of the time the player can deny Ruby Weapon a chance to attack, but other times Ruby Weapon and the tentacles will get in a turn while the Dazers are queued. If someone dies from a main body attack they should be revived only after throwing Dazers. The only real concern with this method is that Ruby Weapon will wipe out the party with Ultima, but it tends to miss when Luck and Dexterity stats are high and Mystiles are equipped, as does Shadow Flare.

Limit Breaks
The player can kill Ruby Weapon using powerful Limit Breaks if they use Hero Drink items on the attacker. Good Limit Breaks to use are the attacks that hit multiple times, such as Cloud's Omnislash, Cid's Highwind and Barret's Angermax.

Gil attack
The player can use three mastered Throw Materia or three Master Command Materia to use gil to damage Ruby Weapon. Throwing gil ignores defense and will always inflict 9999 damage to Ruby Weapon if one throws at least 100,000 gil at Ruby Weapon. See here for good gil earning methods.

The player should enter the battle with two members of the party dead to stop Ruby Weapon from using Whirlsand, and before the battle use the W-Item duplication glitch to get a stock of Elixirs and Hero Drinks. The main character should use an Elixir and a Hero Drink every turn they get, and once their Limit Break activates use it. Because of Hero Drinks the character can deal good damage even with Ruby Weapon's enhanced defense. To fill the Limit Break gauge faster the player can use the Fury status. The character must equip the Ribbon to protect against status effects.

Glitch
There is a glitch that makes the battle not end even after Ruby Weapon is defeated. In this situation the only way to get out is to escape. To make the glitch happen the player must kill both of Ruby Weapon's tentacles once, so that Ruby Weapon will remove them. Once Ruby Weapon puts the tentacles back the player must kill only one of the tentacles.

Even if the second one is still alive, Ruby Weapon will remove both. After Ruby Weapon has pulled the tentacles away the player must kill Ruby Weapon itself, triggering the glitch. The battle isn't over because one tentacle is still alive, even if there is nobody for the party to fight. After escaping the battle Ruby Weapon has disappeared from the world map.

Merchandise
Ruby Weapon appears as a figurine in the Final Fantasy Creatures Vol 4 series that came out in 2004. The Final Fantasy Creatures collection figurines require minimal assembly and there are three types of every character: full-color, crystal, and chrome.

Related enemies

 * Ruby's Tentacle
 * Diamond Weapon
 * Emerald Weapon
 * Ultimate Weapon

Rubin Weapon