Master Tonberry is an enemy in Final Fantasy VII in the Northern Cave. Unlike the normal Tonberry, a star floats over its head and its skin is blue instead of green.
Its 44,444 HP alludes to the pronunciation of the number four in Japanese and Chinese, which spells and sounds the same as "death" (漢字 Chinese: 死 sǐ death；四 sì four；Japanese pronunciation: し shi).
Master Tonberry has the highest HP of any normal enemy in the game.
Stats
Formations
| # | Formation |
|---|---|
| 872 | Master Tonberry |
| 891 | Master Tonberry |
| 896 | Master Tonberry |
Locations
| Northern Cave | |
|---|---|
| Red Passage | 872 |
| Horizontal Fork | 872 |
| Vertical Fork | 896 |
| Water Crossing | 891 |
| Water Path | 891 |
| Light Cavity | 896 |
| Rocky Descent | 896 |
| Above Mako Stream | 896 |
| Mako Stream | 896 |
Battle
Each time a Master Tonberry gets a turn, it walks two steps towards the party. It may randomly change its direction. Once a party member is within its Knife's reach, it inflicts instant death. The Death Force E.Skill and the Safety Bit accessory can render party members immune to this attack for the duration of the battle. The Resist spell also grants temporary immunity: the knife's attack dispels Resist instead of causing instant death.
Between Master Tonberry's turns, the party (taken as a whole) may attack it once undeterred. Any additional attacks between Master Tonberry's turns is retaliated with an unstoppable counterattack called Everyone's Grudge, which deals damage equal to the number of kills the _target character has amassed, multiplied by 10. This attack inflicts fixed damage and cannot be blocked, but can be avoided by inflicting Stop or Paralysis status ailments on Master Tonberry.
Master Tonberry can be morphed into a Ribbon, one of the best and rarest accessories in the game. The player cannot use Sense on it.
Strategy
One of the easiest strategies involves opening the battle by casting Death Force on each party member, and then only attacking the Master Tonberry once between its turns to avoid the Everyone's Grudge counterattack. This strategy renders Master Tonberry harmless, but is time-consuming. To speed the battle up, one can:
- Attack Master Tonberry with Double Cut, since it counts as one attack but inflicts the damage of two.
- Cast Bio spells (or even better, Bad Breath) at the start of the battle to inflict Poison. Once the poison has damaged Master Tonberry 32 times, it will have 28 HP left. This will enable the player to morph it into the highly valued Ribbon. However, as players cannot see Master Tonberry's HP, they have to manually count the number of times poison has damaged it.
- Another way of obtaining a Ribbon is to use Yuffie's Conformer, which ignores the damage penalty incurred by using Morph. The player can give Yuffie a Double Cut to speed up the process.
- The party can disable Master Tonberry and attack it as many times as possible while the effect lasts.
- Dazers cause Paralysis.
- The Stop spell from Time Materia can inflict the Stop status ailment. In addition, Freeze has a chance of causing Stop.
- Linking the Choco/Mog, Time Materia, or the Hades Materia to the Added Effect Materia on a weapon allows for both damage and possible status effects.
AI script
AI: Setup {
- TempVar:LRPos = 1
} AI: Main {
- TempVar:DontMove = 0
- TempVar:HitCounter = 0
- TempVar:Right_target = 1st Opponent
- TempVar:Middle_target = 2nd Opponent
- TempVar:Left_target:= 3rd Opponent
- If (TempVar:LRPos == 0) Then
- {
- If (TempVar:Distance == 0) Then
- {
- Nothing
- } Else If (TempVar:Distance == 1 or 2) Then {
- Choose Self
- If (3/8 Chance) Then
- {
- Use <Move Left> on _target
- TempVar:LRPos = TempVar:LRPos + 1
- }
- } Else {
- If ((TempVar:Right_target doesn't have Death Status)
- & (1/2 Chance)) Then
- {
- Choose TempVar:Right_target
- Use Knife on _target
- TempVar:Distance = 0
- TempVar:LRPos = 1
- } Else {
- Choose Self
- Use <Move Left> on _target
- TempVar:LRPos = TempVar:LRPos + 1
- }
- TempVar:DontMove = 1
- If ((TempVar:Right_target doesn't have Death Status)
- }
- } Else If (TempVar:LRPos == 1) Then {
- If (TempVar:Distance == 0) Then
- {
- Nothing
- } Else If (TempVar:Distance == 1) Then {
- Choose Self
- 1/4 Chance:
- {
- Use <Move Right> on _target
- TempVar:LRPos = TempVar:LRPos - 1
- TempVar:DontMove = 1
- }
- 1/4 Chance:
- {
- Use <Move Left> on _target
- TempVar:LRPos = TempVar:LRPos + 1
- TempVar:DontMove = 1
- }
- 1/2 Chance: Nothing
- } Else If (TempVar:Distance == 2) Then {
- Choose Self
- 3/8 Chance:
- {
- Use <Move Right> on _target
- TempVar:LRPos = TempVar:LRPos - 1
- TempVar:DontMove = 1
- }
- 3/8 Chance:
- {
- Use <Move Left> on _target
- TempVar:LRPos = TempVar:LRPos + 1
- TempVar:DontMove = 1
- }
- 1/4 Chance: Nothing
- } Else {
- If (TempVar:Middle_target doesn't have Death Status)
- & (1/2 Chance) Then
- {
- Choose TempVar:Middle_target
- Use Knife on _target
- TempVar:Distance = 0
- TempVar:LRPos = 1
- } Else {
- Choose Self
- If (1/2 Chance) Then
- {
- Use <Move Right> on _target
- TempVar:LRPos = TempVar:LRPos - 1
- } Else {
- Use <Move Left> on _target
- TempVar:LRPos = TempVar:LRPos + 1
- }
- }
- TempVar:DontMove = 1
- If (TempVar:Middle_target doesn't have Death Status)
- }
- } Else {
- If (TempVar:Distance == 0) Then
- {
- Nothing
- } Else If (TempVar:Distance == 1 or 2) Then {
- Choose Self
- If (3/8 Chance) Then
- {
- Use <Move Right> on _target
- TempVar:LRPos = TempVar:LRPos - 1
- TempVar:DontMove = 1
- }
- } Else {
- If ((TempVar:Left_target doesn't have Death Status)
- & (1/2 Chance)) Then
- {
- Choose TempVar:Left_target
- Use Knife on _target
- TempVar:Distance = 0
- TempVar:LRPos = 1
- } Else {
- Choose Self
- Use <Move Right> on _target
- TempVar:LRPos = TempVar:LRPos - 1
- }
- TempVar:DontMove = 1
- If ((TempVar:Left_target doesn't have Death Status)
- }
- }
- If (TempVar:DontMove == 0) Then
- {
- Use <Move> on _target
- TempVar:Distance = TempVar:Distance + 1
- }
} AI: Counter - General {
- TempVar:HitCounter = TempVar:HitCounter + 1
- If (TempVar:HitCounter == 2) Then
- {
- TempVar:HitCounter = 0
- Choose Tonberry's Last Attacker (General)
- Use Everyone's Grudge on _target
- }
}
Other appearances
Pictlogica Final Fantasy
Master Tonberry from from Final Fantasy VII appears as an enemy in Pictlogica Final Fantasy.
Gallery
