Materia
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The magic system used in the role playing game Final Fantasy VII uses small balls of crystallized Mako, called materia, to let the user cast various magic.
Colours and usage
- Magic (green)
- For casting destructive spells like Fire and Bolt and protective spells such as Cure and Barrier.
- Summon (red)
- For summoning monsters to perform a single, powerful attack, such as Ifrit and Bahamut.
- Command (yellow)
- For adding new abilities such as steal and morph.
- Support (blue)
- Modifies the effects of other materia to provide an added effect. For example, the All materia allows a spell to target all units on a side at once.
- Independent (purple)
- A generally stat boosting type of materia, such as HpPlusses and LuckPlusses.
Materia works in conjunction with 'slots,' which are places on a weapon or armour to place materia (all materia crystals are the same size and shape, except the Black Materia, which is not available to the player, and the Huge Materia crystals, which can not be carried around). Slots come in individual or linked-pair varieties; the latter allowing the use of blue materia to augment the performance of the crystal sitting in the other slot. Blue materia is the only type that makes use of links.
Most materia lower one or more of the physical characteristics of the character they are equipped on (primarily HP, and also physical strength and resiliency). Therefore, a character loaded with lots of materia will have many abilities at his disposal but will suffer in other areas of performance and be weak and easy to take out, making the balanced application of materia an important ability to master.
Individual materia crystals 'mature' with extended use. Materia can have several levels of maturity, which are gained by obtaining AP at the end of battles. Some materia can have as many as 3 actions or spells: for example, Fire materia enables the character to cast Fire on its first level. Evolving the materia to the second level enables Fire2, a strong fire spell, and its third level wields Fire3, the strongest fire spell. When materia has gained a certain amount of levels, it will become 'mastered,' after which it will no longer evolve, and it will 'give birth' to a new, fresh piece of the same type of materia at level one.
History
The word "materia" is Latin, and means "matter". In the game, materia is created when Mako energy (really the so-called Lifestream of the Planet, i.e. the 'substance' of Gaea) crystallizes, forming materia orbs. Aeris discovered that Mako is really pure knowledge. Finding a natural source of materia is extremely rare; one such fountain exists in the Nibelheim mountains.