Diamond Dust

Diamond Dust, also known as Gem Dust, is a recurring ice-elemental attack in the Final Fantasy series. It is commonly used by Shiva.

Diamond Dust is also known in PAL versions as "Polvo de diamante" (Spanish), "Polvere di Diamante/Diamanpolvere" (Italian), "Diamantenstaub" (German) and "Poussière de Diamant" or "Transcendantale" in (French).

Final Fantasy III
Diamond Dust is one of Shiva's abilities in Final Fantasy III. It is similar to her Icy Stare but deals ice-elemental damage to the entire enemy party.

Final Fantasy IV
Diamond Dust is Shiva's summon attack in Final Fantasy IV. It inflicts ice-elemental damage to all enemies. Though she can be fought in the Advance release in her normal form as well as the Lunar Shiva, she will not use Diamond Dust against the player, but, instead, she uses the strong ice attack, Ice Storm, which has a similar effect and affects a random amount of party members.

Final Fantasy IV -Interlude-
Diamond Dust is Shiva's attack when summoned and functions identically to its Final Fantasy IV appearance.

Final Fantasy IV: The After Years
In the Final Fantasy IV sequel, Diamond Dust is still Shiva's signature attack. It is also an attack used by Nova Dragon.

Final Fantasy V
Diamond Dust is Shiva's summon attack. It inflicts ice-elemental damage to all enemy targets for the cost of 10 MP. During the battle against Shiva she will only use Blizzara, and not her signature attack.

Final Fantasy VI
Diamond Dust, originally titled Gem Dust, is Shiva's attack. It inflicts ice-elemental damage to all enemy targets for the cost of 27 MP.

Final Fantasy VII
Diamond Dust is Shiva's summon attack which hits all enemies with ice-elemental damage for 1.5 times magic damage for the cost of 32 MP.

Final Fantasy VIII
Diamond Dust is Shiva's ice-elemental attack which strikes all enemies. Shiva's summon time is 12.9s, which, according to the Final Fantasy VIII Ultimania, allows the player to boost its damage to around 180% of normal damage using a regular PlayStation controller.

Its damage is calculated as follows:
 * $$Damage = 62 * Level / 10 + 43 $$
 * $$Damage = Damage * (265 - TargetSpr) / 8 $$
 * $$Damage = Damage * 43 / 256 $$
 * $$Damage = Damage * Boost / 100 $$
 * $$Damage = Damage * (100 + SummonMagBonus) / 100 $$
 * $$Damage = Damage * (900 - ElemDef) / 100:$$

Elemental Defense starts at 800 (0%), 900 nullifies damage and 1000 absorbs it. If an enemy is shown to be weak against an element, its Elemental Defense is below 800. If damage becomes negative (due to high Elemental Defense), the target is healed by that amount.

Final Fantasy IX
Diamond Dust is Shiva's ice-elemental summon attack which targets all members of the enemy party for the cost of 24 MP, originally 96 MP. The spell power for Diamond Dust can be boosted by accumulating Opals in the inventory.

Final Fantasy X
Shiva uses Diamond Dust as her Overdrive in Final Fantasy X. Inflicting ice-elemental damage to all enemies, Diamond Dust is also used in the battles against Shiva and Dark Shiva, where the attack is non-elemental.

Final Fantasy X-2
While summons cannot be used in Final Fantasy X-2, the enemy Shiva can use Diamond Dust on the party.

Final Fantasy XI
Diamond Dust is Shiva's Astral Flow Blood Pact. It costs twice the user's level in MP to active the command, and using it reduces MP to 0. Diamond Dust deals massive ice-elemental damage to all enemies within its area of effect.

Final Fantasy XII: Revenant Wings
In Revenant Wings, Shiva can use the ice-elemental attack, Diamond Dust, which inflicts Stop and deal heavy water damage to all foes in range. She will also use Diamond Dust when fought during the game.

The Judge of Wings also summons Shiva who uses Diamond Dust to knock Balthier out during the game's storyline.

Final Fantasy XIII
Diamond Dust is Shiva's finishing move in Gestalt Mode. It greatly increases all enemies' chain gauges and inflicts heavy non-elemental damage. How much the chain gauges increase is dependent on the ability's level. Diamond Dust can reach a maximum level of three by initiating Gestalt Mode with a full Gestalt gauge.

Diamond Dust raises the chain gauge by an amount based on the attack's level prior:
 * Level 1: 6.0 * 3 + 17.00 * 5 = 103.00
 * Level 2: 6.0 * 7 + 17.00 * 6 = 144.00
 * Level 3: 6.0 * 9 + 17.00 * 8 = 200.00

Final Fantasy: The 4 Heroes of Light
Diamond Dust appears as an enemy ability used by Mammon. The attack inflicts moderate Water-elemental damage to all enemies.

Dissidia Final Fantasy
When summoned, Shiva uses Diamond Dust to prevent the opponent's Bravery from increasing during a certain period of time.

Dissidia 012 Final Fantasy
Yuna can summon Shiva to perform Diamond Dust as an HP attack. It requires 30 CP to equip and 150 AP for mastery. Yuna also summons Shiva to perform a chase and assist HP Attack.

Shiva also returns as a summon, purchasable from certain Moogle Shops.

Theatrhythm Final Fantasy
Diamond Dust returns as Shiva's signature attack and is used when she is summoned in battle stages.

Kingdom Hearts
Diamond Dust is a Keyblade in Kingdom Hearts Final Mix and in Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories. In Kingdom Hearts Final Mix it is obtained after defeating the Ice Titan in the Gold Match.

In Kingdom Hearts Chain of Memories and Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days, Diamond Dust reappears as one of Vexen's Sleights (only against Riku) and his Limit Break, respectively. For the Sleight, Vexen creates a swirling blizzard around the area, damaging Riku. For his Limit Break, Vexen summons ice from the ground to strike enemies from beneath, dealing Ice-elemental damage and inflicting the Frozen status.

In Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep, Diamond Dust appears as one of the Command Styles usable by all three playable characters. As the name tends to imply, it has an ice-based style that seems to specialize in crowd-control and dealing with multiple enemies.

Etymology
refers to a meteorological phenomenon which occurs at below 0 °C temperatures. When ground temperature is colder than air temperature, the result is a ground-level cloud composed of ice crystals, somewhat similar to fog.