FFX - Dark Shiva at Low-ish level, Minimal Luck, No Aeons, Mix, Ribbon, or Clear Spheres

The Dark Aeons are regarded as requiring a ton of Sphere Grid work, specifically farming Luck and Fortune Spheres from Greater Sphere and Earth Eater respectively, which is a really annoying farm cycle. In this series I'm going to prove these guys are extremely over-hyped. With simple strategies and basic farms you can burn through them easily. Some of the fights will be longer, but I've saved at least as much time from traditional farms. I won't be using Mix or Aeons, but both of those make these fights easier. I'm still considering this a continuation of my "low-ish level" run, because none of my characters have completed the Sphere Grid, but I know some might not agree with that assessment.

Shiva represents what I consider the first difficulty spike among the Dark Aeons. My Ultima Buster stats are no longer sufficient here, as her insane speed makes it impossible to recover from Diamond Dust. Even worse, if she simply uses her physical attack repeatedly she can run circles around you and prevent any character from ever getting a turn.

If you understand how the game's speed system works you may be confused as to how Shiva can be faster than other enemies, like Nemesis, since speed essentially caps at 170. This is because her physical attack is Rank 1, effectively meaning she's using the JP/NA release pre-nerf Quick Hit against you. Heavenly Strike is only Rank 2, still as fast as the International Quick Hit. I think this is pretty clever design honestly, and it makes Shiva one of the neatest Dark Aeons to me.

Regardless, in order to defeat Dark Shiva you're going to need Nemesis-equivalent stats. This means once again I raised all of my characters to 170+ Agility using the region of the Expert Grid around Quick Pockets and Auto-Life. Having all three characters know those two moves is also nearly essential here, so if you're on the Original Grid you may need to use a couple of Warp Spheres bribed from Master Coeurl in the Omega Dungeon. You can watch my Nemesis video to see a guide for how to get Agility to 170 easily:    • Final Fantasy X - Nemesis at Low-ish ...  

The beginning of the battle before Shiva's first turn is your best opportunity to deal a big chunk of damage. I land 4 hits here, which is about ideal for my current Accuracy and Luck levels. After her first casting of Diamond Dust I switch Tidus to Auto-Life duty, as Shiva's too fast for Yuna to keep up on her own. You want to keep at least two characters with Auto-Life up at all times. This is because once you start to get close to Diamond Dust, if Shiva uses her normal attack repeatedly she can make it impossible to outpace her with Auto-Life castings. As long as you've got two up already, you should at least be able to maintain.

Even this is still easier said than done. Around 5:52 Shiva completely outpaces me, erasing all Auto-Life castings with a half-full Overdrive bar. She uses Heavenly Strike multiple times after, though, and gives me enough breathing room to recover.

It's difficult to focus on your offense when so much of this fight is about defense, but you might want to try to keep track of the damage you've done to her. Dark Shiva has 1.1 million HP exactly. This means you need to hit her for "11 and change", if you're doing 99,999 damage. In my fight here I land a couple of weak hits with Tidus on spare turns, so that doesn't come into play as much. If, however, you find yourself in a situation where you've hit her for 99,999 exactly 11 times, use any Overdrive to finish her off, since they can't miss.

Before closing, I want to talk about Aeons. Since Dark Shiva's HP is so low, as long as your Yuna is reasonably powerful for this point in the game you can blitz this fight by using your Aeons with full Overdrive bars (have Auron and Tidus spam Sentinel to keep Yuna safe):

Anima - 400,000 damage
Magus Sisters - 360,000 damage
Bahamut - 99,999
Valefor (Energy Blast) - 99,999
Ifrit - 99,999

This will deal around 1,050,000, putting Dark Shiva one good hit away from death. Grand Summon Yojimbo and pay him 8,200 gil. This should give him a decent chance of doing Wakizashi, adding another 99,999. Even if he does Daigoro, it will likely still deal more than the 50,000 damage you need (note that none of Yojimbo's attacks can miss). Alternately finish her off with a character Overdrive, like Tornado, Attack Reels, or Blitz Ace. Don't try to use Shiva or Ixion, as Dark Shiva is immune to Thor's Hammer and absorbs Diamond Dust.

0:00 Intro
2:30 Shiva
9:36 Stats check