Helm made of platinum.
Description
The Platinum Helm is a late game helmet in Final Fantasy IX for Steiner and Freya. It teaches Restore HP, which allows the character to replenish their health automatically when they survive being attacked in Near Death status, and Stone Killer, which improves damage against stone type enemies. It halves Ice damage to the wearer.
The Platinum Helm in Final Fantasy IX is based on the Platinum Helm from Final Fantasy Tactics where this helm type debuted for the Final Fantasy series.
Obtain[]
The Platinum Helm is bought for 4,600 gil from Bran Bal and from Daguerreo after visiting Bran Bal.
Mechanics[]
The Platinum Helm provides 23 Magic Defense, mitigating damage from magic attacks. It halves Ice damage to the wearer. If the character also wears a Reflect Ring weakening them to Ice, they take ~75% damage from Ice attacks.
Use[]
The Platinum Helm is already eclipsed by the superior Genji Helmet from a Choco treasure by the time it can be bought. If the player is not doing the chocobo quest, then the Platinum Helm is the best helmet for Pandemonium until the superior Kaiser Helm can be bought in Daguerreo.
The abilities from the helm are not particularly good, as Restore HP activates rarely due to a character needing to be in Near Death already when surviving an attack, and is made obsolete by Auto-Regen. There are also no more stone type enemies in the places the player needs to visit (and stone enemies can be defeated with Softs anyway). As the Platinum Helm also gives no level up bonuses, the only boon left is the Ice-halving effect. The player can make use of this trait for Ash in the final dungeon, and the final boss.
As the benefits are so minor the player could skip getting the Platinum Helm as it is not needed for synthesis.
Beatrix can also equip the Platinum Helm though the player cannot see this in a normal playthrough.