History AwesomeButImpractical / EasternRPG

* Both Shadow Hearts Covenenant and ''VideoGame/ShadowHeartsFromTheNewWorld'' have an accessory called "Extreme" which triples attack power, but can only be acquired late in the game if you have a Ring Perfect rate of 65% or better (in Covenant) or 95% successes and 75% perfects (in New World) - an exceptionally difficult task even among expert players. It also makes the Judgment Ring's hit zones AND indicator invisible, though to be fair, if you can pull off that consistent a perfect rate you can probably hit them in your sleep, let alone blind. Could be considered a case of DifficultButAwesome instead in that case.

* Both Shadow Hearts Covenenant and ''VideoGame/ShadowHeartsFromTheNewWorld its Sequel'' have an accessory called "Extreme" which triples attack power, but can only be acquired late in the game if you have a Ring Perfect rate of 65% or better (in Covenant) or 95% successes and 75% perfects (in New World) - an exceptionally difficult task even among expert players. It also makes the Judgment Ring's hit zones AND indicator invisible, though to be fair, if you can pull off that consistent a perfect rate you can probably hit them in your sleep, let alone blind. Could be considered a case of DifficultButAwesome instead in that case.

* Both Shadow Hearts Covenenant and ''VideoGame/ShadowHeartsFromTheNewWorld its Sequel'' have an accessory called "Extreme" which triples attack power, but can only be acquired late in the game if you have a Ring Perfect rate of 65% or better - an exceptionally difficult task even among expert players. It also makes the Judgment Ring's hit zones AND indicator invisible, though to be fair, if you can pull off a 65% perfect rate you can probably hit them in your sleep, let alone blind. Could be considered a case of DifficultButAwesome instead in that case.

* Both Shadow Hearts Covenenant and ''VideoGame/ShadowHeartsFromTheNewWorld its Sequel'' have an accessory called "Extreme" which triples attack power, but can only be acquired late in the game if you have a Ring Perfect rate of 65% or better - an exceptionally difficult task even among expert players. It also makes the judgment ring's hit zones AND indicator invisible, though to be fair, if you can pull off a 65% perfect rate you can probably do it in your sleep, let alone blind. Could be considered a case of DifficultButAwesome instead in that case.

* Yuri and Kurando's demon fusions in ''VideoGame/ShadowHeartsCovenant'' are reworked to consume a larger amount of Sanity Points each turn, rather than taking a flat sum up front. This, plus the fact that they both have mediocre magic stats that barely complement the spellcasting abilities of these fusions and the stat boosts they grant tend to be pretty marginal until the late game, make it much more practical to just stay in base form and use normal attacks until then. And maybe equip a Flare Brooch or two to make their SP costs more manageable.

* Yuri and Kurando's demon fusions in ''VideoGame/ShadowHeartsCovenant'' are reworked to consume a larger amount of Sanity Points each turn, rather than taking a flat sum up front. This, plus the fact that they both have mediocre magic stats that barely complement the spellcasting abilities of these fusions, make it much more practical to just stay in base form and use normal attacks until you get the top-tier fusions. And maybe a Flare Brooch or two to make their SP costs more manageable.

* Yuri and Kurando's demon fusions in ''VideoGame/ShadowHeartsCovenant'' are reworked to consume a larger amount of Sanity Points each turn, rather than taking a flat sum up front. This, plus the fact that they both have mediocre magic stats that barely complements the spellcasting abilities of these fusions (the main reason you'd want to use them; certainly isn't the marginal stat boosts), make it much more practical to just stay in his base form and punch stuff than to bother with them until you get the late-game variants. And maybe a Flare Brooch or two to lower their SP cost per turn.

** As a general rule, any of the strongest pieces of equipment in the game. Nearly all of them are very rare (1/128 chance) drops from very specific enemies, which means you can grind battles for hours and hours and never see them drop. Sure, they get amazing benefits (the Gutsy Bat in particular boosts Ness's Guts by a whopping 127, ensuring he'll get critical hits every other swing or so), but they come so late in the game, and by the time you luck out and find them you'll probably have gained so many levels that any extra gains they grant will be trivial at best. The Gutsy Bat is the worst offender in this regard; the enemy it drops from only appears in the very last leg of the final dungeon, and only the first two stages of the final battle are resolved by dealing damage -- the rest is a scripted event where a traditional offense does you no good whatsoever.

* A recurring spell is called "Bad Breath" spreads multiple status ailments all at once to the targets. The problem here is that most enemies this would be useful against resist most if not all of what Bad Breath has to offer. Even if you can cast it in a way that goes through, it probably won't stick around long enough to matter anyways.

** In ''VideoGame/Persona1'', [[EarlyInstallmentWeirdness rather than having a full team and swapping out members, you could only choose one additional person to join your initial party]]. Many consider Reiji Kido to be the best option, however recruiting him is not only a ''massive'' GuideDangIt but his nature as an SixthRanger also requires you to go through the opening portions of the game without a full party.

* ''VideoGame/Grandia1'' gives us Feena's Time Gate, which pauses combat for 2-5 turns for everyone but Feena herself. Which sounds great, until you realize that you need to max out your Wind and Water elements at 99 (which takes a solid twenty hours of grinding), it costs a whopping 99 Level 1 MP to cast, and that by the time you're likely to get it, you've already cleared most of the points where it would be useful. Feena gets a bunch of free turns, but has very few options to use them efficiently because of late game enemies' magical resistance and her poor attack power, and the sheer amount of grinding required to even unlock Time Gate means your party has gained enough levels that you probably won't ever need to anyway. This example gets subverted in the Nintendo Switch HD Remaster version of the game, as Time Gate's way too high requirements turned out to actually be a programming error, with the remaster fixing that bug and lowering the Water and Wind levels required to 35 and 33 respectively (the in-game menu shows that you learn them once you reach level 18 for each, but it's yet ''another'' bug), and the spell's cost to 25 instead of 99. In comparison, ''VideoGame/GrandiaIII'', released several years later, has a similar spell that doesn't cost MP to use, is given to you as part of the story and gives the entire team some free turns. The only downside is the ridiculously long period it takes to recharge.

* The Dual Link attacks and styles in ''VideoGame/KingdomHearts3DDreamDropDistance''. The former generally does significantly less damage then performing two solo Link Attacks separately, while the latter powers up your Keyblade combos even more than a solo Link Style, but at the expense of making your attack animations so lengthy it's extremely unlikely you'll be able to get off a full combo against any enemy or boss that's ImmuneToFlinching (of which there are a ''lot''), and when considering that the bulk of the damage comes from your combo finisher...

** While Hyper Beam and its variants (Giga Impact, Hydro Cannon, Blast Burn, Frenzy Plant, Rock Wrecker, Roar of Time and Meteor Assault) are very powerful moves with 150 base power and their animations look the part, the user cannot move on the next turn unless it misses. Leaving the Pokémon vulnerable to everything that the foe has to offer. Necrozma's Prismatic Laser and Eternatus's Eternabeam have 160 base power and suffer from the same problem.

** The hero gets access to Gigagash if you invest 100 points in both Swords and Courage, which hits all enemies for around 300 Lightning damage. However, it doesn't do appreciably more damage than Gigaslash (which only requires maxing one skill or the other) and still eats a whopping 20 MP each time you use it. Which you probably won't anyway seeing as the hero in VIII becomes your primary healer late in the game (only character who learns Omniheal). Spears and Boomerangs make better weapon choices for him overall, with the latter being very efficient at mopping up random encounters and the former having useful skills for Metal Slime farming (Lightning Thrust) and dealing damage to tougher bads (Multithrust).

** The hero gets access to Gigagash if you invest 100 points in both Swords and Courage, which hits all enemies for around 300 Lightning damage. However, it doesn't do appreciably more damage than Gigaslash (which only requires maxing one skill or the other) and still eats a whopping 20 MP each time you use it. Which you probably won't anyway seeing as the hero in VIII becomes your primary healer late in the game; he's the only character who learns Omniheal. Spears and Boomerangs make better weapon choices for him overall, with the latter being very efficient at mopping up random encounters and the former having useful skills for metal slime farming (Lightning Thrust) and dealing damage to bosses (Multithrust).

** The hero gets access to Gigagash if you invest 100 points in both Swords and Courage, which hits all enemies for around 300 Lightning damage. However, it doesn't do appreciably more damage than Gigaslash (which only requires maxing one skill or the other) and still eats a whopping 20 MP each time you use it. Which you probably won't anyway seeing as the hero in VIII becomes your primary healer late in the game (he's the only character who learns Omniheal).
* ''VideoGame/DragonQuestIX'' has a few, in the form of hidden weapon abilities. Once you've maxed out a weapon skill and finish the accopanied quest, you have access to some powerful, awe-inspiring techniques...that are all flash, with no real substance. One move in particular is Gigagash. It destroys foes, but only on a single group of enemies, cost INSANE amount of MP (more than any class that can reasonably use a sword would have), barely hurts boss enemies, and is generally more useful on {{Mooks}}, which aren't worth the MP spent. And that it's just an "upgraded" version of Gigaslash, which does the same for half the MP and reasonable power.

** Some Double Techs and nearly all Triple Techs suffer from this, especially late game when your gear breaks the game mechanics. Simply put, you're almost always better off having each individual character take their action than using all of your turns up at once.

*** Fatal Crest, which boasts the highest magic stat in the base game (second-best in ''Final Mix'') and boasts the Berserk Charge ability, which allows for endless combos during MP Charge at the cost of removing combo finishers. It's essential for some Mushroom XIII challenges but not so much against bosses, which ''must'' be finished off with a combo finisher. Luckily, the Upper Slash and Horizontal Slash combo modifiers, done by pressing the block/dodge button mid-combo, count as finishers too, but still.
*** The Gull Wing has the Experience Boost ability which doubles the experience the party gains while Sora is at low health. This makes battles quite risky and it won't really take that long to achieve level 99. Even most experienced players would rather level up at their own pace while they enjoy what the game has to offer.
*** The Hidden Dragon. Its ability is MP Rage. Sora's MP can be restored bit by bit each time Sora gets hit. Useful at the earlier stages but in the long run, Sora can just equip his MP Rage abilities (at level 41 when the Dream Shield is chosen and also from Wisdom Form) so it is better to just use other Keyblades. The Kingdom Key will usually see the most use until the good ones like the Rumbling Rose or Decisive Pumpkin come into play.
*** The Oathkeeper and Oblivion. They are good Keyblades, the Oathkeeper enhances magic and the Oblivion provides good strength but their abilities shine best when using Drive Forms. Oathkeeper is obtained after unlocking the Gateway at Twilight Town and Oblivion is obtained very late in the game when the party reunites with Riku in The World That Never Was.

* ''VideoGame/KingdomHeartsII'': The Drive Forms, a series of {{Super Mode}}s for Sora that either enhance his physical attacks, his magic, or both, and all but one (two with Final Mix) turn Sora into a [[DualWielding two-Keyblade-wielding badass]] that can take out dozens of the game's average mooks in seconds while restoring Sora's health and magic. 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 except the Final Mix-exclusive Limit are unusable, which includes the FinalBoss and almost every {{Superboss}}. 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 that same form is the only Drive that 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. Lastly, the forms remove every movement ability except the one it provides and several of standard Sora's abilities for as long as they are active. 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 and still allows you to block and dodge roll. However, conversely Limit Form is not really much more effective than Sora's standard form is while also locking out useful abilities like Glide and Reflect as every other Drive Form does at the same time. Lastly, when transforming into all Drive Forms but the Final Form, Sora will randomly transform into [[CursedWithAwesome Anti-Form]]. This form is a GlassCannon of the first order; Anti-Form Sora moves much faster, jumps higher, and can shred a single target with [[DeathOfAThousandCuts a swarm of individually weak-but-fast attacks]]. However, Anti-Form makes all other party members vanish while it's active, takes twice as much damage as normal, disables healing, prevents gaining experience, and can't be leveled up. The worst aspect of all, though, is that it can't be manually deactivated; Anti-Form automatically ends when the battle is over, the Drive gauge runs out, or you die. This 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[[note]]Well, technically, you ''can'' in ''Final Mix'' by equipping the Two Become One Keyblade, as its Light and Darkness ability essentially means that activating any Drive Form except Final Form in combat with two party members active will instantly revert to Anti-Form[[/note]], and the chance of changing into it goes up every time you use a Drive Form except Final Form, which reduces the chances. The rate also shoots up tremendously against an Organization XIII member, which is usually the time you'll want to use the Drive Forms.
** One of the Keyblades, only in the Final Mix version, called Winner's Proof. It is merely a Bragging Rights' reward since the player must clear the game once in order to meet last last Mushroom XIII member which is based on Roxas. Winner's Proof "has high strength and holds an excellent magic power" as described but its ability is "No Experience" which means Sora cannot gain any levels. And the only bosses left for this Keyblade's usage are Xemnas and also the Data Battles of Organization XIII. But wait. If players were to cheat in Winner's Proof for usage early in the game, it is no problem, right? Not really. There is an ability called "No Experience" which can be activated or deactivated at will so might as well use other Keyblades like the Fenrir, Ultima Weapon, Decisive Pumpkin and so which are much better anyway.
*** The another is Fatal Crest. Its ability is useful, essential for one of the Mushroom XIII challenges. It allows allows endless combo chaining but finishers cannot be performed until the magic bar is replenished. This can be solved by using items like Elixir but the item slots are limited so the bosses' HP must be knocked off as much as possible unless the player is good at dodging and blocking especially when going up against the Data Organization XIII.
*** The Gull Wing. Described as so. "Greatly increases the amount of experience gained when defeating an enemy at a critical moment". The problem to this is that Sora must be at critical health which makes battles quite risky and it won't really take that long to achieve level 99. Even most experienced players would rather level up at their own pace while they enjoy what the game has to offer.

* The highest difficulty of [[MiniGame Tile Puzzle]] in [[VideoGame/PokemonXAndY Gen VI's]] Pokémon-Amie earns better Poffins (used to increase your Pokémon's affection) than the lower difficulties. However, the difference is rather minor and while a puzzle on [[BoringButPractical hard difficulty takes less than a minute to solve]], a round of unlimited difficulty can easily last fifteen minutes.

** Selphie's 'The End' limit break. It will instantly win almost any fight [[note]]it doesn't have any effect on undead enemies, and in boss fights that have multiple phases (including the final boss) it will merely skip straight to the next phase unless used on the final phase[[/note]] in a beautiful and whimsical fashion, including major boss fights and even the superpowerful [[BonusBoss Omega Weapon]]. But you could go three entire playthroughs of the game, and never get the chance to use it or even know it's there because of how rare it is. To use it, you have to use Selphie's LimitBreak and cycle repeatedly through multiple spells, which are selected at random and can hit anywhere from one to three times. Naturally, "The End" is the hardest spell to land on.

* 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. Adding another nail into Ark's coffin is that enemies weak to Shadow Magic by the time you get him are painfully rare, if not non-existent, and there are more reliable max damage attacks at that point. One of them is [[BonusBoss Ozma]], but getting Ark before beating Ozma requires you to sacrifice the only two Pumice Pieces in the game for his equip's synthesis.[[note]]There is a third, but you have to steal it from Ozma, meaning you can't use the third one against it anyway.[[/note]] Individually, the Pumice Pieces absorb Shadow, which is practically necessary to survive Ozma's Doomsday, so getting Ark before Ozma actually makes the battle much harder, but if you get it from the Pumice Ozma drops, the only practical thing left to use it on are the notorious Yans.
** Similarly, Vivi's ultimate spell, Doomsday, is the strongest spell in the entire game and deals Shadow damage. Only problem is that the spell also hits your entire party, making it easy to cause a TotalPartyWipe if you're not careful. Even if you set up your party where they can nullify or absorb Shadow damage, you'll find much better armor that give better defense by the time you can learn Doomsday and the only times that the Shadow nullifying/absorbing gear does get some mileage is fighting Hades and Ozma, two bonus bosses that use Doomsday on you. It's also weaker than Flare, which is single target, but most bosses are against single enemies anyway.

** Meteor is highly dangerous when used against the player, as it has a chance to kill the whole party due to it's random damage nature. The problem is that the version the player gets has a chance to miss, and by the time Vivi learns it he has spells that are much more reliable and on average will do more damage over time even if Meteor doesn't miss. To make matters worse, the infamous [[BonusBoss Ozma]] version cost 2 MP less for him to use and will always hit.

** Special Dresspheres. Each comes with main part represented by dressphere's girl and two auxilliary parts that replace other party members. The Good: they all have powerful skills and auto-abilities (notably Cap-lifting breaks), many of which you won't get other way. The Bad: said breaks require you to obtain hidden key items, which are only available late into the game. Each dressphere can be activated only when the girl in question used each dressphere on currently equipped Garment Grid at least once. There is a grid with only two slots for this purpose, but it still means at least two spherechanges (between nodes, then to special dressphere), which slows you down. The special dresspheres themselves [[MightyGlacier are powerful but slow as molasses]], contributing with mentioned slow and sluggish start to difficulty with unlocking new abilities, because you can't be bothered to change to special dressphere each battle just to get some AP. In the end, this will be something that you'll use at most against some of storyline bosses, if ever, because BonusBoss will wipe it out before it can even get started.

* ''VideoGame/KingdomHeartsII'': The Drive Forms, a series of {{Super Mode}}s for Sora that either enhance his physical attacks, his magic, or both, and all but one (two with Final Mix) turn Sora into a [[DualWielding two-Keyblade-wielding badass]] that can take out dozens of the game's average mooks in seconds while restoring Sora's health and magic. 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 except the Final Mix-exclusive Limit 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 that same form is the only Drive that 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. Lastly, the forms remove every movement ability except the one it provides and several of standard Sora's abilities for as long as they are active. 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 and still allows you to block and dodge roll. However, conversely Limit Form is not really much more effective than Sora's standard form is while also locking out useful abilities like Glide and Reflect as every other Drive Form does at the same time. Lastly, when transforming into all Drive Forms but the Final Form, Sora will randomly transform into [[CursedWithAwesome Anti-Form]]. This form is a GlassCannon of the first order; Anti-Form Sora moves much faster, jumps higher, and can shred a single target with [[DeathOfAThousandCuts a swarm of individually weak-but-fast attacks]]. However, Anti-Form makes all other party members vanish while it's active, takes twice as much damage as normal, disables healing, prevents gaining experience, and can't be leveled up. The worst aspect of all, though, is that it can't be manually deactivated; Anti-Form automatically ends when the battle is over, the Drive gauge runs out, or you die. This 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[[note]]Well, technically, you ''can'' in ''Final Mix'' by equipping the Two Become One Keyblade, as its Light and Darkness ability essentially means that activating any Drive Form except Final Form in combat with two party members active will instantly revert to Anti-Form[[/note]], and the chance of changing into it goes up every time you use a Drive Form except Final Form, which reduces the chances. The rate also shoots up tremendously against an Organization XIII member, which is usually the time you'll want to use the Drive Forms.

* Many Formchanges in ''VideoGame/KingdomHeartsIII'' can be this due to their very slow combos. The combos of Hyper Hammer (and by extension, Boom Hammer), Nano Arms, and Mirage Staff in particular are so laggy that against single targets, they have a high chance of [[EpicFail whiffing the combo entirely]], and with the lack of cancel frames on their attacks they can easily leave you open to powerful enemy attacks. Mirage Staff also compromises your defense and while its Avatar Barrage, Aero Boost, and Aeroza abilities makes it quite useful in the base game, the low damage output of the Avatars and Aero spells make them fall flat against the {{Bonus Boss}}es, and its more damaging standard combos are hampered by their aforementioned slowness.

*** 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]].

** In both ''3'' and ''4'', it's possible to give Metatron immunity to every element via skill inheritance, making you immune to all damage except Almighty. It helps that Metatron inherently learns three immunity skills, so you just need to cover the rest of the elements through fusion. The problem is doing this in ''3'' uses up all his skill slots, so all you're capable of doing while he's equipped is regular attacks. (and if the enemy is immune to your weapon's element, you're screwed) It's also useless against 3's BonusBoss, who will instantly kill you if you use a Persona immune to one of her attacks. At least, in ''4'', you still have two free slots for usable skills.

* ''VideoGame/GoldenSun: The Lost Age'''s best Djinn Summon can only be acquired after confronting the strongest BonusBoss in the game, and that can only happen after you get halfway through the final dungeon. And using the summon costs a full complement of Mars Djinni and half of your Mercury Djinni -- a hefty cost that, depending on your class setup, can deprive you of your best healing for a few critical rounds. However, since it revives and fully heals everyone in the party, active or inactive, it's great to have your backup line able to pull it out and make the final boss substantially easier.

* ''VideoGame/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.

* ''VideoGame/SecretOfEvermore''[[note]]OK, so it's a Western game, but gameplay-wise it's based on Eastern [=RPGs=][[/note]] has the Reflect spell, which as its name implies, reflects alchemy spells back at the caster. This would have been a great spell, since no enemy absorbs alchemy spells and bosses frequently use very powerful alchemy (especially ThatOneBoss, Verminator). Unfortunately, you don't get this spell until the beginning of Omnitopia. At that point, the only enemy left that uses alchemy is the BonusBoss, the Faces (aka "Your Cleanliness")

** Actually, the ''entire magic system'' by the end of the game is damn-near useless with the advent of the items that replicate them. The two massive advantages are that they do not require Magic Points ''or'' Spirit Points, and the offensive items are generally far more powerful than the characters' magic, including Fina, who is a SquishyWizard. Also, Aika's Delta Shield -which the player has to spam against the [[BonusBoss Bonus Bosses]] to avoid [[TotalPartyKill Total Party Kills]] -- blocks ''all'' magic used against your characters, both friendly and hostile, but it doesn't block items. And like many other games, the instant death spells are completely useless.

* ''VideoGame/DragonQuestIX'' has a few, in the form of hidden weapon abilities. Once you've maxed out a weapon skill and finish the accopanied quest, you have access to some powerful, awe-inspiring techniques...that are all flash, with no real substance. One move in particular is Gigagash. It destroys foes, but only on a single group of enemies, cost INSANE amout of MP (more than any class that can reasonably use a sword would have), barely hurts boss enemies, and is generally more useful on {{Mooks}}, which aren't worth the MP spent. And that it's just an "upgraded" version of Gigaslash, which does the same for half the MP and reasonable power.

* ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyII'' introduced series staple Ultima. It scales in power with the number of spells known by the user and their levels, 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. However, in the BonusDungeon of the remake, you can use the spell in combination with Minwu, a CrutchCharacter who has pretty much every spell you could think of at a reasonable level, meaning [[ThisLooksLikeAJobForAquaman he can now steamroll the game.]]
* The Onion Knight in ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyIII'' is a fairly extreme case of MagikarpPower, being useless for most of the game and then seeing its stats explode at a certain level. What level is that? 92 and up, maxing at 99. [[AbsurdlyHighLevelCap Most guides consider 60 a good level for fighting the game's final boss]]. A team of 99th-level Onion Knights can turn just about anything in the game into a speedbump, but so can a team of 99th-level anythings.
* ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyIV'' includes the Meteo/Meteor spell, which is far and away the most powerful black magic spell in the game. It hits all enemies, ignores Reflect, is non-elemental, and is pretty much guaranteed to hit the damage cap of 9999 on every target. It even gets some GameplayAndStoryIntegration to further add to the idea that it's a wrecker of your enemies' day. But it's also the most expensive spell at 99 MP, and it takes four times longer to cast than the second-longest casting time. Only four party members can learn it; of those four, Tellah doesn't ever get enough MP to cast it [[spoiler:and only manages to cast it by performing a HeroicSacrifice]], [=FuSoYa=] joins you for [[GuestStarPartyMember only one dungeon]], Palom won't get the chance without some seriously unnecessary amounts of LevelGrinding, and Rydia can get summon magic that could do the same thing as Meteor for a smaller cost. Plus, in a game where magic points are hard to come by, wasting 99 MP on a random encounter isn't worth it, and the few battles where it might be useful in the final dungeon usually have other weaknesses or gimmicks to exploit instead. By the time you get a character that both knows the spell and has enough MP to cast it, chances are you'd be better off using something else.

* ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXIII2'' has the InfinityPlusOneSword, the Odinblade and Odinbolt. They get more powerful the more Fragments you have, but they don't have any useful passive abilities compared to some of the weaker weapons.

** Pretty much any monster with a recruitment chance less than 10%. Yes, that Metal Gigantuar might be an amazing Sentinel, and Miquitzli is one of the best Synergists in the game, but chances are, in the time it takes to get one, you could have gotten something a little more common ''and'' ground enough RareCandy to power it up significantly.

* ''VideoGame/KingdomHeartsII'''s Drive Forms, a series of {{Super Mode}}s for Sora that either enhance his physical attacks, his magic, or both, and all but one (two with Final Mix) turn Sora into a [[DualWielding two-Keyblade-wielding badass]] that can take out dozens of the game's average mooks in seconds while restoring Sora's health and magic. 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 except the Final Mix-exclusive Limit 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 that same form is the only Drive that 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. Lastly, the forms remove every movement ability except the one it provides and several of standard Sora's abilities for as long as they are active. 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 and still allows you to block and dodge roll. However, conversely Limit Form is not really much more effective than Sora's standard form is while also locking out useful abilities like Glide and Reflect as every other Drive Form does at the same time.
** Lastly, when transforming into all Drive Forms but the Final Form, Sora will randomly transform into [[CursedWithAwesome Anti-Form]]. This form is a GlassCannon of the first order; Anti-Form Sora moves much faster, jumps higher, and can shred a single target with [[DeathOfAThousandCuts a swarm of individually weak-but-fast attacks]]. However, Anti-Form makes all other party members vanish while it's active, takes twice as much damage as normal, disables healing, prevents gaining experience, and can't be leveled up. The worst aspect of all, though, is that it can't be manually deactivated; Anti-Form automatically ends when the battle is over, the Drive gauge runs out, or you die. This 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[[note]]Well, technically, you ''can'' in ''Final Mix'' by equipping the Two Become One Keyblade, as its Light and Darkness ability essentially means that activating any Drive Form except Final Form in combat with two party members active will instantly revert to Anti-Form[[/note]], and the chance of changing into it goes up every time you use a Drive Form except Final Form, which reduces the chances. The rate also shoots up tremendously against an Organization XIII member, which is usually the time you'll want to use the Drive Forms.

** The charge-up moves -- Sky Attack, Skull Bash, Bide, the aforementioned Solar Beam, etc, which require a turn or two of charging ''before'' they actually do damage and give the opponent plenty of time to play around the move with switching, Protect, etc. Many of them are also surprisingly underpowered when considering this drawback. For example, using ''Tackle'' twice will deal more damage in two turns than Razor Wind ever will, not to mentiom being more flexible. Later games introduce the held item Power Herb, which allows a Pokémon to bypass the charging turn and attack right away... [[ItOnlyWorksOnce once]]. Z-Crystals also give some use to the moves, powering them up and allowing them to be used in one turn...also once. However, the latter was enough for [[NotCompletelyUseless some of these moves to be found on competitive movesets]] in Gen VII.

* Lucario is a fan-favorite Pokemon, and for good reason. It's got a cool design, a pretty solid Steel/Fighting typing, is generally an offensive powerhouse that can run both Special and Physical move sets with more or less equal proficiency, and as the cherry on top it can control its own life energy and shoot it at things. However, as far as its usability in in-game playthroughs go it's more usable in just about every game it appears in EXCEPT [[VideoGame/PokemonDiamondAndPearl the ones it debut in]]. First, its otherwise solid Steel/Fighting typing is more BlessedWithSuck in Gen IV, because it shares at least one of those types with two of the starters, meaning unless you chose Turtwig it's actively competing with your starter from a typing standpoint. Second, it can only be obtained by evolving the Riolu that hatches from the egg you receive on Iron Island. Iron Island can only be reached from the town the 6th gym is in, right at the end of the mid-game. And on top of the headache of hatching the Riolu from an egg and getting it up to par with the rest of your team so late in the game, it also evolves through [[ScrappyMechanic friendship evolution]] but ONLY in the day.
* Slaking (final form of Slakoth) has some of the best stats in the game, even beating out some of the OlympusMons of the games, and can learn some very strong moves to boot. Problem is that due to its Truant Ability, it can only attack every other turn, preventing it from being usable at the tournament level (clearly, this handicap was added ''because'' of its incredible stats). 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 Pokémon, 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.

*** 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.

** PSI Rockin'. It's one of the strongest attacks in the game (rivaling even Starstorm), and attacks all enemies. However, stronger variations end up costing large amounts of PP, which is a problem considering how Ness is the primary healer. [[spoiler:Later, this is partially mitigated by the Magicant upgrade]]. Not to mention that Ness is the only PSI user who DOESN'T HAVE PSI Magnet so he can steal PP from enemies. Ness also has the strongest melee attack in the game, further reducing the effectiveness Rockin' has on single enemy fights. Lucas from [[VideoGame/Mother3 the sequel]] is essentially in the same boat as Ness, minus [[spoiler: Magicant buffs]].

* ''VideoGame/PhantasyStar'' prominently features the Laconian Axe, Odin's strongest -- and yet least used -- weapon. In the late stages of the game, enemies tend to attack in groups of 4-7 at a time, making single-target attacks all but worthless. Not to mention many of the late-game bosses dodge nearly all melee attacks anyways. You're honestly better off giving Odin a Laser Gun instead; it hits all enemies at once, does a respectable flat 20 damage and never misses.

** Actually, the ''entire magic system'' by the end of the game is damn-near useless with the advent of the items that replicate them. The two massive advantages are that they do not require Magic Points ''or'' Spirit Points, and the offensive items are generally far more powerful than the characters' magic, including Fina, who is a SquishyWizard. Also, Aika's Delta Shield -which the player pretty much has to spam against the [[BonusBoss Bonus Bosses]] to avoid [[TotalPartyKill Total Party Kills]] -- blocks ''all'' magic used against your characters, both friendly and hostile, but it doesn't block items. And like many other games, the instant death spells are completely useless.

*** Or, you could spend a lot of money to build up your characters' resistance to the virus that causes them to crystallize.

** Pretty much all the special moves you earn from completing sidequests in Xenosaga II fall under this; they might look nifty and do impressive damage, but so does landing a string combo against an enemy's weak point, which cost no EP and are easy to puzzle out with a couple turns of trial and error. They usually inflict more damage than specials, too.

* Grafaiai averts this trope. Like Smeargle, it has a signature move, Doodle, that lets it copy something belonging to the opponent. However, unlike Sketch which copies moves, Doodle copies abilities. While the downside is that it can't copy unique abilities like Komala's Comatose or Eiscue's Ice Face, it can also apply the effect to its ally Pokémon, meaning you could wind up giving your opponent's Azumarill's Huge Power to your Slaking. Helps that Grafaiai is more useable than Smeargle as well.