Part 5

Understand that disabling a spell in the Symbology menu does not prevent the AI from using it if set as a battle skill.

Note that Adray can set five spells as battle skills (four basic elemental spells and Southern Cross), while Sophia can set all spells except Crush.

Be aware that unlike physical skills, spells remain active when cancelled.

Casting time can be reduced by a maximum of 75% with a Star Necklace and Quick Symbol, but spells with short casting times may not see significant speed increases due to animation processes.

If you attempt to cast a spell without enough Fury (the resource used for special abilities), it will fail. Enemies will not initiate casting without sufficient Fury, but you can still cause their spells to fail by dealing Fury damage.

Fighters have six AI settings in the Tactics menu: Attack enemy with all your might (AWAYM), Act in a well-balanced manner, Conserve Fury, Focus your attacks (FYA), Don't use coups de grace (battle skills), and Off (manual control).

Do not expect perfect AI performance; while Attack and Defense skills can improve behavior, their effectiveness is limited.

Increasing the Attack skill gradually makes chaining more likely for the AI, but consistency requires very high levels (820 SP for Lv10). Prioritize maxing HP and MP before investing heavily in Attack to avoid fragility.

Increasing Defense above Lv1 enables self-preservation (except on AWAYM). It is recommended to keep Defense at Lv1, as higher levels often result in ineffective self-preservation attempts, especially when characters are near walls or low on Fury. The MP threshold for self-preservation can be excessively high.

At the start of battle, the AI selects a main target and sticks with it until it's defeated, unless an 'override' variable triggers a temporary new target. The detection range for these variables is slightly larger than the area of effect for the Explosion spell.

Override variables include: an enemy flinches, an enemy attacks with a blockable attack, an enemy attacks with an unblockable attack (requires Def Lv3 & Atk Lv3+), an enemy is stunned, or an enemy is casting a spell.

Variables a, b, and c will not activate if the incoming attack cannot deal damage.

The AI's attempt to avoid unblockable attacks (variable c) is often ineffective, potentially resulting in only one sidestep or interrupting the attack without successfully avoiding it. This variable is not triggered frequently.

Flags for healing and support spells will also override main targeting.

When backing away to cast attack magic, a fighter might switch to a physical attack instead of casting.

A fighter's avoidant behavior when casting magic is temporary but can be briefly re-triggered by changing AI settings. This occurs on any AI setting.

Fighters will not back away from enemies when casting spells with a limited effective range, such as Ice Needles, Lightning Blast, or Earth Glaive.

When searching for a new main target, the AI ignores moving or status-ailment-immobilized enemies, except when using FYA.

When using FYA, the AI selects a new main target from enemies your controlled character has recently attacked, allowing some control over AI targeting. However, the AI can sometimes enter a state where it fails to acknowledge painted targets but may still respond to override variables a and b.