History AwesomeButImpractical / EasternRPG

** [[spoiler:Kratos]]'s Judgment spell. He only knows it if he rejoins your party late in the game ([[GuideDangIt which is near impossible if you don't know how to do it)]], and while it's more powerful than Colette's and has an ''[[BadassCreed awesome incantation]]'', [[spoiler:Kratos]] takes significantly longer to cast Judgment than Colette (''fifteen seconds!''), his version's accuracy is just as piss-poor as hers, and his magic stat is low enough that even though his version is more powerful, he would still deal less damage if they are anywhere near the same level.

* The second-level mystic artes in ''VideoGame/TalesOfTheAbyss'' are nearly impossible to figure out how to use, but are absolutely brutal.

** Presea and Lloyd both have flashy, awesome-looking powers that have long lists of absurd requirements that are never even vaguely hinted at in-game. Consider Preseas ultimate attack, Crimson Devsstation. Presea is able to rip off half of the ultimate boss's health, or downright kill the third Sword Dancer in one use. Problem? Everyone else in her team needs to be dead, she needs to be at 18% of her max health or lower, she needs to have access to the Mighty Charge EX skill (which activates at random), and have used Beast 100+ times. Then, activate Mighty Charge (it'll probably fail), run up to whatever needs to meet death, and use Beast. If you don't die from being below 15% HP.

* Maxwell in ''VideoGame/TalesOfSymphonia'' -- he's the most powerful SummonMagic bar none and casts a higher-power meteor storm that blankets most of the battle, but he can only be cast while Sheena is in [[SuperMode Over Limit]] mode, which happens more or less randomly, and he appears only once you've unlocked the last stage of TheVeryDefinitelyFinalDungeon. Odds are you'll never get to summon him at all; never mind summon him in a battle where he'd actually be useful. The worst part? This applies to all summons.
** Presea and Lloyd both have flashy, awesome-looking powers that have long lists of absurd requirements that are never even vaguely hinted at in-game. Consider Hien Messhoujin (spelling?). Presea is able to rip off half of the ultimate boss's health, or downright kill the third sword dancer in one use. Problem? Everyone else in her team needs to be dead, she needs to be next to dead herself, she needs to have access to the Mighty Charge EX skill, and have it work, and have used Beast 100+ times. Then, activate Mighty Charge (it'll probably fail), run up to whatever needs to meet death, and use Beast. If you don't die from being below 15% HP.
** Colette's "Sacrifice". If its absurd [[{{Mana}} TP]] Cost isn't enough of a deterrent, casting the spell ''causes Colette to die.'' While its effects are nothing to scoff at, you will rarely want to use this. It's only useful in [[GodzillaThreshold desperate situations when your healer has died and you've run out of life bottles.]]
** [[spoiler:Kratos]]'s Judgment. He only knows it if he rejoins your party late in the game ([[GuideDangIt which is near impossible if you don't know how to do it)]], and while it's more powerful than Colette's and has an ''[[BadassCreed awesome incantation]]'', [[spoiler:Kratos]] takes significantly longer to cast Judgment than Colette (''fifteen seconds!''), his version's accuracy is just as piss-poor as hers, and his magic stat is low enough that even though his version is more powerful, he would still deal less damage if they are anywhere near the same level.

* KingdomHearts2's Drive Forms. These are four superforms for Sora that either enhance his physical attacks, his magic, or both, and all but one turn Sora into a [[DualWielding two-Keyblade-wielding badass]] that can take out dozens of the game's average mooks in seconds. The impractical parts? [[LongList *Deep Breath*]] All the Drive Forms require the removal of one or both party members when activated, depriving the player of their help (while the party never does that much damage compared to Sora, they're extremely useful for healing). When the party members are absent for story reasons, all Drive Forms are unusable, which includes the FinalBoss and almost every BonusBoss. Most tournament battles lock the Drive Meter. The Drive Forms CAN be leveled up to increase in power, but they all have very specific conditions in order to be able to gain experience, making them ''very'' tedious to level up, especially the Final Form. All but one form lacks a dodge ability, and none of the Drives can block. In a game series that emphasizes blocking and dodging attacks, and waiting for the right moment to attack over [[AttackAttackAttack blindly charging forward]], this is a bad thing. The addition of Limit Form in the UpdatedRerelease mitigates all of this somewhat, as it gives you a powerful option that doesn't need party members to use.

* ''KingdomHeartsBirthBySleep'':

*** But....If you happen to be playing the SNES/Famicon version of Earthbound/Mother 2, you can abuse the [[GameBreaker Rock Candy]] and gain more IQ points, to have Ness end up with insane amounts of PP as high as in the 1000's, making PSI Rockin' really useful and not a problem to use. This was fixed in ''Mother 1+2'' though.

*** Worse yet, the [[BoringButPractical]] move Protect will shield its user from almost all damage, has higher priority than just about any move, is available to all but a handful of Pokemon, and works nearly all the time if used every other turn. Unless nobody on the other team knows Protect, Protect will render Slaking literally useless.

* The Almighty spells in the ''Franchise/ShinMegamiTensei'' games. On the surface it sounds like a dream come true: A type that ''no demon'' is resistant to in a game where elemental resistances are your main obstacle to victory. However, the inflated MP cost and lackluster damage compared to your normal elemental spells means that they just aren't worth it. Making things worse, no demon is weak against the Almighty type and by the time you gain access to the Almighty spells you'll already have figured out that it's far more profitable to aim for a demon's weakness to earn more actions.
** It gains practicality in ''VideoGame/DevilSurvivor'', especially against bosses, in the form of Drain and Holy Dance. Since many late-game bosses are at least strong to every element, if not outright draining or repulsing at least one, the two-to-five hit Holy Dance has a chance to deal tremendous damage by itself without risking an Extra Turn for the enemy. Follow it up with a Drain to restore MP and take some away from the boss, and it's a very practical nuke.
** This trope is rather subjective because Almighty varies in effectiveness depending on the game. For example ''VideoGame/ShinMegamiTenseiStrangeJourney'' makes them almost required in the endgame setting because the bosses there have shifting weaknesses. Others like Digital Devil Saga REALLY make them reliable with Ragnarok and Lost Word being strong contenders for a reliable attack despite their high cost.
*** Not to mention [[VideoGame/ShinMegamiTenseiIIINocturne Freikugel, Fire of Sinai]] and [[RaidouKuzunohaVsTheSoullessArmy Astral Burst]].
** Fourth-tier elemental spells (described as inflicting "severe" damage instead of "heavy") tend to be this. They're not much more powerful than the third-tier "-dyne" spells, and they're inefficient--for instance, the fire-elemental single-target Ragnarok spell in ''{{Persona 3}}'' costs 30 SP, which is even more than Maragidyne (third-tier, hits all enemies, and costs 24 SP)...and ''only does about 30-40% more damage than Agidyne ''(third-tier, one enemy, 12 SP)''!''
** Even worse are the series of spells in ''Strange Journey'' that hit every enemy and inflict some sort of status ailment. They cost a whopping 65 MP to use (vs. the 20-30 MP for Ma-dyne spells), don't always cause the corresponding ailment, and worst of all, the damage ranges from on par with -dyne spells at best (Cold World) to ''as much as first-tier spells'' at worst (Charming Bolt).
*** Speaking of ''Strange Journey'', its take on the repelling "-karn" spells. A spell that repels attacks aimed at you and your demons! Cool! Except the effect only lasts on the current turn so there's no point in a demon casting it if they aren't fast enough to move first. Not to mention, each casting costs 45 MP. You're better off using Attack and Magic Mirrors, especially since using an item grants you maximum turn priority.
** Averted in ''VideoGame/ShinMegamiTenseiIMAGINE'', where, although still rather expensive and with a huge cooldown (Megidoraon costs 80 MP plus 200 Magnetite, and has 6 minutes cooldown, for example), they can be very useful. Also, most mages have at least 25% MP reduction, at least 60% cooldown reduction, and at least +300% MP regeneration. Not to mention there are ways to be able to shoot it ''four times'' before the cooldown takes place.
*** Although in that game building a character around counter/guard/dodge is a very bad move if you plan on doing combat. It's great for crafters who simply need to level and don't want to be TheLoad when a monster spots them, but the damage from them is dependent at best, and TacticalRockPaperScissors means you may not do all that much if the enemy doesn't comply. Depending on defensive skills is a wonderful way to stay alive, but the damage is very poor so it's better to take only a few levels (that way any cooling guard has a backup, but even then it might be redundant) and spend the rest of the time focusing on more offensive branches.
** ''VideoGame/ShinMegamiTenseiIV'' has two demons that fit this:
*** Mother Harlot, the strongest member of the infamous Fiend clan of {{Bonus Boss}}es, is exactly as powerful as that descriptor implies, and comes with the her unique move, Babylon Goblet, that deals a stupid amount of damage and inflicts [[HatePlague Panic]] besides. Thing is, her fusion chain requires each of the lesser Fiends at some point or other, and getting ''them'' requires an [[ThatOneSidequest absurdly aggravating and tedious sidequest]], plus a quest to unlock the Mother herself. By the time you get all the lesser Fiends, fuse them, do the Mother's quest, and fuse ''her'', you'll probably have several demons of similar power to her but significantly easier to get (such as Mara, Shiva, Lucifuge, or Yamato-Takeru), meaning the Mother basically exists to be [[HundredPercentCompletion Compendium-filler]].
*** Then there's Masakado's Shadow, the single most overpowered demon in the game. He ''begins'' with an attack that always hits as a weakness, no matter what the opponent's weakness is, and with leveling up can learn to NoSell all the elements and finally he can learn '''Dragon Eye'''--yes, that same skill that bosses in ''Shin Megami Tensei III Nocturne'' [[TheComputerIsACheatingBastard use and abuse without giving you or your demons a chance to learn it]]. Only, to unlock Masakado's Shadow, you have to beat the single cheapest boss in the game, which is... Masakado's Shadow. What use is a demon that powerful if you can already beat the hardest boss in the game without it? And with regards to Dragon Eye, it costs 255 freaking MP to cast, ensuring that even if you pass it on to a demon with an acceptable MP capacity, they won't be able to cast it more than three times without needing an MP refill, and refilling MP is not cheap in ''Megami Tensei''.
* ''VideoGame/{{Xenosaga}}'' has a few examples:
** First, the last special attacks that can be earned for certain characters. They are awesome to watch and rack up the damage, but unless you have the right accessories and/or items, you'll never have enough boosts in your gauge to pull them off.
** Second, Erde Kaiser Sigma. Leaving out the fact that the crucial item needed to get this ether skill is only obtained through a near impossible side-boss battle, the ether cost is absurdly restrictive. The Erde Kaiser line is like this in all three games. Insane damage, but insane ether cost too.
** An item in Episode III called Seven Moons brings the character back with full HP and EP. Unfortunately it can sometimes crystalize the character you use it on, meaning if you don't have the item that cures crystallization, they're out in three anyway. And to upgrade this to its better form (no crystallization), you have to go through a GuideDangIt sidequest in a limited-time area.
*** Or, you could spend a lot of money to build up your characters' resistance to the virus that causes them to crystallize.
** MOMO's Episode I transformations, due to their time limits (2 turns normally, with one or two added if MOMO has lost a lot of HP) and once-per-battle usage restrictions.
* In ''BatenKaitos Origins'', you can get a lot of artifacts designed to screw with your enemies; showing their health, decreasing their turnover speed, etc. However, most of them are ridiculously limited, take a whole turn just to use, or both. In general, the deck space is better allotted to simpler cards; equipment magnus, healing or revival artifacts, or specials.
* In SummonNight Swordcraft Story, the elemental attack spells, especialy the screen wide spell of your Guardian Beast is this, but mostly in the second game. In the first game, the damage and area combination is really neat and useful during some hard to manage random ecounters, and save it from being completely useless, even the ultimate spells that charges slowly. Against boss since using weapon is simply faster and more efficient, you will want to use the enchancement spells most of the time. However, by the second game, the random ecounters are simply easier to handle, especialy considering the new buffed Drill, making them completely useless.
** The second game is really, filled with this. The high end technique that consumes tons of weapon durability, some of them even outright destroyed your weapon. It deals 999 damage easilly. But it wont even OneHitKill a boss, and combo moves that hits less multiple time and deals higher damage for far less cost, and [[GameBreaker Drill Special]] that is simply absurd and has ridiculously small cost. The EleventhHourSuperpower version and Standard version of the transformation move counts as well. It increases your stats at the cost of taking away your special move slot into an exclusive special move that simply shots a red wave of power for massive damage. Except, it only hit once. Part of the reason why the FinalBoss is harder in its OneWingedAngel mode is because you are forced to use this form against said boss, since despite the battle allows you to use spells and items, you cant use your locked weapon special move since otherwise you can just spam Combo and Drill Special and win in seconds. As for the normal version, you will prefer to use your offensive spells and basic move against random ecounters. Against boss, Basic multiple hit Special moves deals massive damage for low cost. This translates to it being useless except for the revival effect. And this before we count the fact that your weapon durability is degenerated and you cant use spells and items when transformed coupled with the fact that you need to recharge the Daemon gem before using it again.
* Many weapons and items in ''VideoGame/DarkSouls'' are like this. One of the biggest examples is the Dragon Great Sword, a huge person sized weapon that appears to be made of flesh. Not only that but it has a special attack which causes a huge RazorWind to tear along the ground, wrecking enemies. Unfortunately the stat requirements for it are insane, and by the time you have the stats to use it, there are other better weapons available because it also doesn't scale with stats.
* The Quadruple Giga in ''MonMusuQuest 2''. Not only does it take four turns without spirits to charge up (that's more than enough to be defeated in, by the way) but you need to do it ''without getting hit''. It's only truly useful in a few, very specific situations.
* In ''VideoGame/LiveALive'', Masaru's final skill does high damage against enemies in a large area and has a pretty cool rock-splitting animation. Too bad its charge time is so agonizingly long that you're better off using his skills that activate immediately.
* ''{{Gungnir}}'' gives us War Gods, powerful summons that would be incredibly useful if they discriminated friend from foe, which they don't.
** War Gods actually do target only enemies, but only if you meet certain requirements, making them useful for a pre-empitive attack or a desperation attack. Naturally, the game doesn't tell you this, nor do they tell you the requirements each god has.
** Gungnir itself arguably qualifies, as it takes up ''3/4 of the user's inventory'', thus restricting them to little armour or items. While it certainly has some advantages to make up for this, some may argue that it's inferior to a normal weapon. Averted later on, as Giulio becomes strong enough to make up for the spear's weight.
* In ''BreathOfFireIII'', Garr can obtain a weapon called the Beast Spear. At 150 attack points, it's far and away his strongest weapon (the second strongest weapon, the Dragon Spear, only has 110 Attack Power), and is even obtained about halfway through the game (provided [[GuideDangIt you know where to look]], and [[LostForever don't miss it]]), instead of at the end like most of the other strongest weapons. However, the Beast Spear also weighs a whopping 15 points (making it heavier than any other item in the game and practically ensuring that Garr will have a Speed of 0) and will drain 10% of Garr's max HP every single round. These drawbacks will naturally turn most players away from it (though if you're willing to work with them, Garr can become a damage dealer, thanks to his already high Attack power).
* ''LostOdyssey's'' "ultimate" magic spells require the player to visit a side area and defeat a boss to obtain them. The rewards? "Sacrifice Self" kills the caster to revive any dead party members and "Divide" damages the entire enemy party for an amount equal to the caster's current health divided by the number of enemies. Averted with "Leveler", which has an ingame description that makes it sound like a single-target version of Divide, but it's actually based entirely on the caster's Magic Attack stat and is the only spell in the game that can reliably do 5-digit damage. Divide also tends to veer towards NotCompletelyUseless when it comes to the final [[MonsterArena Backyard]] opponent and the DLC BonusBoss, since they're both basically immune to all other physical and magical attacks.
** That's not even touching the cannons that shoot ''swords'' instead of arrows.
* In ''VideoGame/{{Robopon}}'', the * (Star) software sort of falls into this. On one hand, the attacks they create can do obscene amounts of damage. On the other, they require a team of Robopon that mutually like each other, eat anywhere from a third to a half of a Robopon's Energy Points, and do pathetic damage if the enemy has appropriate stats.
* In ''VideoGame/MetalWalker'', Marine Cores have good attack and defense, but can only move well underwater. Coupling that with the fact that their weakness, Sky Cores, can move well on any field, you'll likely switch to something else as soon as you hit land.
* The spell Thordain/Kazapple from a few ''Franchise/DragonQuest'' games. It's an extremely powerful single-target lightning spell, and in this series lightning is a very difficult element to resist. The catch is that it uses your entire team's power to do this. Not only does it force you to skip your own allies' turns, but it draws 10-20 MP (depending on the game and version) from all allies. If any one of them doesn't have enough MP (or they're under a status ailment that prevents them from casting), you can't cast the spell. This is especially bad in ''VideoGame/DragonQuestIV'', where some of your best allies don't have ANY MP at all. It's certainly possible to get around this by giving them Seeds of Magic (which permanently increase one character's max MP), but that's a heck of a waste when you could just feed those seeds to actual spellcasters and just let everyone take their turns as normal, which will probably generate more overall damage than Thordain anyway.

** Pokémon with perfect [=IVs=] (31) in every stat. Considered the holy grail of breeders and RNG abusers, the potential such Pokémon have are ultimately limited by what species they are and movepools they have. Very few Pokémon have the base stats that can take advantage of every stat (Mew and Arceus) and even they are limited because a Pokémon can only know four moves at a time. The effort value caps at 510 effort points and you can only max out 2 of the stats to the fullest. Its pointless to have a 31 [=IVs=] in attack when your mon is a special attacker (and vice versa) and having a 31 [=IVs=] in speed is detrimental to Pokémon that need to move slower then the opponent. No single Pokémon can really do it all.

*** Then there's Masakado's Shadow, the single most overpowered demon in the game. He ''begins'' with an attack that always hits as a weakness, no matter what the opponent's weakness is, and with leveling up can learn to NoSell all the elements and finally he can learn '''Dragon Eye'''--yes, that same skill that bosses in ''Shin Megami Tensei III Nocturne'' [[TheComputerIsACheatingBastard use and abuse without giving you or your demons a chance to learn it]]. Only, to unlock Masakado's Shadow, you have to beat the single cheapest boss in the game, which is... Masakado's Shadow. What use is a demon that powerful if you can already beat the hardest boss in the game without it? And with regards to Dragon Eye, it costs 255 freaking MP to cast, ensuring that even if you pass it on to a demon with an acceptable MP quantity, they won't be able to cast it more than three times without needing an MP refill, and refilling MP is not cheap in ''Megami Tensei''.

*** Then there's Masakado's Shadow, the single most overpowered demon in the game. He ''begins'' with an attack that always hits as a weakness, no matter what the opponent's weakness is, and with leveling up can learn to NoSell all the elements and finally a move that gives him three free turns. Only, to unlock Masakado's Shadow, you have to beat the single cheapest boss in the game, which is... Masakado's Shadow. What use is a demon that powerful if you can already beat the hardest boss in the game without it?

* In ''VideoGame/MetalWalker'', Marine Cores have good attack and defense, but can only move well underwater. Coupling that with the fact that their weakness, Sky Cores, can move well on any field, you'll likely switch to something else as soon as you hit land.

** Focus Blast is a move that deals a lot of damage (120 base power), but it has paltry accuracy and very few power points. Its poor accuracy can be shored up with an accuracy raising held item, the accuracy-boosting move Hones Claws(Coil also boosts accuracy, but nothing that learns that can also learn Focus Blast) or X Accuracy.

** Stone Edge is a Rock-type version of Focus Blast with the same power and unreliable accuracy but only ''when the player is using it.'' To rub salt to the wound it is distributed like candy to NPC trainers from Generation 4 games onward while their TMs are difficult to obtain for you to use. Also whenever [=NPC=]s use said move(which is common), [[TheComputerIsACheatingBastard Stone Edge always hits]] despite their Pokemon did not use any accuracy-boosting moves before or having the [[AlwaysAccurateAttack No Guard]] ability.

* In the ''{{Telefang}}'' series, each Denjuu is capable of learning powerful Denma Attacks, which can do massive damage. However, in the first game, to be able to use them, the user has to charge up a Denma meter, which takes many turns, and by the time that it's fully charged, the attacker would have been better off using regular attacking moves over and over. The attacker could easily faint from all the turns that it wastes, due to it being vulnerable from repeated attacks from any opponent. In addition, Denma attacks in general have a slight chance of ''missing'' (or the defending Denjuu can use a move to evade the attack), so using them can be even more of a waste since the Denjuu wasted many turns charging all for nothing. Some bad. Denma Attacks run off the user's and opponent's Denma stats rather than their physical stats, so the only time when it's a good idea to use them is when the attacker has a terrible Attack stat but an excellent Denma Attack stat (this is the case for a lot of mod-evolved Denjuu), '''and''' if the defender has an excellent Defense stat but a terrible Denma Defense stat, in which case Denma attacks will out-damage regular attacks.

** Quina is this as well even when you know it's special magics. A lot of Quina's magics rely heavily on his/her piss poor spirit stat to really be of much help unless you equip the right armor to boost his/her spirit stat up upon leveling up. Even at that, you have to hope they're not immune to the magic to begin with. Disregard the status magics; you have Twister which deals random damage anyway, 1000 needles which phases out of use by disc 3, and Earth Shake which is the only way aside from Eiko to do Earth Damage; but Eiko's Fenrir is easier to power up and she has better white magic than Quina. It also has frog drop, but compared to Dragon's Crest and Thievery, is painfully slow to power up to any reasonable damage. Upon examining her use with everyone else; Quina really only has one purpose: the Millionaire ability (Double Gil); which is outclassed itself if you're dedicated to using Zidane's stealing abilities.

** Cyan's more powerful Sword Techs tend to be rather impractical. They have useful effects like multiple-hits and {{One Hit KO}}s; however, they require long periods of charging-up, during which time you can't give commands to your other characters, leaving your party completely defenseless against enemy attacks. (Using a Quick spell on Cyan beforehand will remove this drawback.)

* Instant death spells in most ''FinalFantasy'' games are absolutely pointless. Any enemy worth using them on is immune or else evades an absurd amount of the time. In fact, a lot of Final Fantasy games have ''other'' spells that immediately incapacitate enemies but aren't technically instant death. They're usually cheaper and more reliable.

** Odin, a recurring SummonMagic who shows up in the late game, has an instant-kill attack, the Zantetsuken. Even though he's, you know, Odin, and appropriately often hard to get, the Zantetsuken is as much of a UselessUsefulSpell as you'd expect. Oftentimes, he adds further layers to it. In ''FinalFantasyVI'', he taught the spell Meteor, at a point in the game where Ultima is the only option worth using, and boosted your Speed stat, which was unique in the original but something that Giant Cactuar could do even better in the remake. In ''FinalFantasyVIII'', he would randomly appear at the start of battles and murder everything, which wasn't a good thing when you were taking part in the signature ''FFVIII'' tactic of "draw magic, then [[LowLevelAdvantage run away before you end up gaining any XP.]]"

* ''FinalFantasyTactics'': Cloud. He was a total badass in VideoGame/FinalFantasyVII, so he should be the same here, right? Wrong. You get him in Chapter IV, after undertaking a sidequest that grants you three (technically four) other characters. He comes with the best non-heavy armor in the game. The catch? He's level 1. No joke. Most of your characters by this point are somewhere in their 30's or 40's, and now you have a level 1 guy. If he levels up quick, so no harm, no foul, right? Wrong again. In order to use his unique skill set (named Limit, appropriately enough) you need to find his weapon, the Materia Blade. To find it, you need to have someone with low Brave with the Move-Find Item ability equipped (named Treasure Hunt in the PSP remake), and get them to the top of Bervenia Volcano. Still, easy enough, so what's the problem? The problem is, even when he's decent level and has the sword, he's next to useless. The Materia Blade is pathetic compared to the best sword in stores (the Rune Blade), and his Limit skills are not much better. His most powerful skill, Cherry Blossom (a case of AdaptationExpansion, perhaps, as he didn't have it in VII), has a charge of 2. For those who haven't played the game, there is an invisible counter keeping track of everyone's turns. The counter will have someone's turn come around when the counter reaches 100. This means that Cherry Blossom requires 50 ticks of the counter before it will trigger. Compare this to Holy (the most powerful White Magic) which has a charge of 10. That takes 10 ticks of the counter. Oh, and the kicker? Cloud's skills ONLY target tiles. Meaning, your target can just walk out of the area of effect, and Cloud will have wasted all that time. The ONLY way to prevent this is to have someone capable of keeping the target in place. Holy can target a unit, and remain locked on even when said unit moves.

* In ''FinalFantasyCrystalChronicles'', the difference between -ara and -aga fusion spells is about an extra second delay between the two casters. If all four players want to create one huge -aga spell, they have to coordinate their timing such that it'll take several seconds to actually cast the spell, during which the enemy might just attack them, interrupting the whole thing. Similarly, the single player mode -aga spells also have a much longer charge-up time than the lower levels. Best used for an opening move.

* ''FinalFantasy CrisisCore'' had the Ultima materia. While one of the rarest materia you would obtain or fuse, casting the spell takes a ridiculously long time. Unless you have endure status, the smallest of enemies can walk up, attack and interrupt whole process. Plus it doesn't work with Dual Cast.

* Ark in ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyIX'' is an example. He does a lot of damage, but in the time that his 2 minute summoning animation takes to finish you could have defeated every enemy on screen with lesser spells and taken a short nap. Although if your party is outfitted with auto HP regen, it's actually useful as a way to stop the enemies from attacking without actually pausing the game. Typically you'll regenerate to full HP with just one summon sequence.

** The fourth-level elemental attacks (such as Ragnarok and Niflheim) from ''VideoGame/{{Persona 4}}'' also qualify. While they're the strongest elemental attacks available, they only deal slightly more damage than the "Dyne" level attacks while costing about four times the MP. Plus, they can only be found on certain Personae, and cannot be transferred through fusion. The exception is in ''{{Persona 3}}'', however, since in that game these attacks are both more powerful and transferable, making them good investments.

* The charge-up moves in ''{{Pokemon}}'' -- Sky Attack, Skull Bash, Bide, etc, which require a turn or two of charging ''before'' they actually do damage. Later games introduce the held item Power Herb, which allows a Pokemon to bypass the charging turn and attack right away... [[ItOnlyWorksOnce once.]]

** Cloud's real value is his "Finishing Touch" move that will KO, Stone, or Stop anything it hits. That alone makes him powerful crowd control. He can also wear ribbons.

** [[spoiler:Meliadoul Tengille]]. She possesses excellent offensive stats and a skillset that deals great damage and breaks equipment in one fell swoop. She also comes with the rare Save the Queen knight sword. However, her skills can't hurt things that don't have equipment, including all monsters, though this issue is fixed in the PSP version. She also joins the team only a few battles after you obtain [[GameBreaker Cid]], who has better stats, better equipment options, a better weapon (Excalibur), and every single one of her skills plus more.

* ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyII'' introduced series staple [[DangerousForbiddenTechnique Ultima]]. It scales in power with the number of spells known by the user and their levels, rather than Spirit or Intelligence, and does significantly more damage than the next strongest magic, Flare and Holy, when used by a character with many high-level spells. However, since Flare, Holy or [[BoringButPractical elemental attacks]] did more than enough damage if leveled properly, the LevelGrinding needed to deal adequate, let alone better, damage with Ultima became pointless. Many of the spells in that game were terrible, forcing characters to learn & level up spells they'd never use again to make Ultima useful.

** Lastly, when transforming into all Drive Forms but the Final Form, Sora will randomly transform into [[CursedWithAwesome Anti-Form]]. This form is fast and can shred a single target, but it takes twice as much damage as normal, disables healing, prevents gaining experience, and can't be leveled. The worst aspect of all, though, is that it can't be manually deactived; Anti-Form automatically ends when the battle is over or the Drive gauge runs out, which means a lot of running away if you're at low health. Never mind the fact that you can't use Anti-Form on purpose, even if you wanted to, and the chance of changing into it goes up every time you use a Drive Form.

** Stone Edge is a Rock-type version of Focus Blast with the same power and unreliable accuracy but only ''when the player is using it.'' To rub salt to the wound it is distributed like candy to NPC trainers from Generation 4 games onward while their TMs are difficult to obtain for you to use. Also whenever NPCs use said move(which is common), [[TheComputerIsACheatingBastard Stone Edge always hits]] despite their Pokemon did not use any accuracy-boosting moves before or having the [[AlwaysAccurateAttack No Guard]] ability.

** The Wyrmhero Blade. To get it, you have to kill [[MarathonBoss Yiazmat]] and [[ThatOneSidequest Omega Mk XII]], and [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking complete a fishing mini-game]]. To be fair, it is a pretty good sword. Now if only there was something worth ''using'' it on. To put this into perspective for those who haven't played the game. Yiazmat boasts '''''50,112,254 HP'''''. This is the highest total in the entire series, and you can only do up to 9999 damage per hit unlike in VideoGame/FinalFantasyX and VideoGame/FinalFantasyXIII which are the only other games in the series with 8-digit enemy HP counts.