AP and Learning Abilities: Overview

Learn how to earn AP and teach Guardian Forces abilities in final fantasy viii, including how to use the Card ability to avoid XP.

When you defeat enemies, you'll earn both XP and AP. XP is used to level up your main characters (Squall, Quistis, Zell, Selphie, Rinoa, and Irvine). This XP is split between any GFs they have equipped, potentially leveling them up as well. The more GFs a character has equipped, the less XP each individual GF receives. As a GF levels up, it generally gains more HP and deals more damage, and may unlock new abilities.

Each GF also has abilities they can learn, with each ability requiring a specific amount of AP to be accumulated before it's learned. You can tag skills you want a GF to learn in the GF menu. As you defeat foes and accumulate AP, this AP will count towards the tagged abilities. Unlike XP, AP is not split between GFs; all equipped GFs acquire the full amount of AP gained. Each GF can learn a total of 22 abilities, and learning some abilities is a prerequisite for unlocking others. For example, learning HP+20% might unlock HP+40%. If a GF has 22 abilities, any new abilities that would normally be unlocked won't be, so be sure not to fill up your GFs with extraneous abilities while still learning and unlocking new ones.

GFs can be taught new abilities using certain items, with rare abilities typically requiring rare items. You can also force a GF to forget unnecessary skills using Amnesia Greens, which can be purchased from the Timber Pet Shop. Be careful, as some abilities, while easy to unlearn, can be difficult or impossible to teach again.

Generally, you'll want to get rid of common, redundant, or lackluster abilities like Magic, GF, Draw, and Item, as you likely only need one of these on a character. Other candidates include Elem-Atk-J (again, only one is needed), Elem-Def-J and Elem-Def-Jx2 (both are obsolete when you get a GF with Elem-Def-Jx4), and similarly with ST-Atk-J, ST-Def-J, and ST-Def-Jx2. GFHP+10% and SumMag+10% are also fairly disposable. Raising your compatibility allows you to summon your GFs faster, making them less vulnerable, and you likely won't be summoning most GFs often, making their GFHP and SumMag abilities expendable.

It's possible to increase a GF’s AP without leveling up your characters, which is useful for a low-level run. To do this, use Quezacotl’s Card ability. This weakens enemies and then turns them into Triple Triad cards. This defeats the enemy, voids any XP you'd normally earn, but retains the AP, allowing GFs to learn potent new abilities without leveling up your characters. Monster levels are based on your character levels, so keeping character levels low means enemy levels will also be low. The Card ability allows your GFs to gain power and learn abilities, which in turn opens up more options, like refining higher-tier spells before you'd otherwise be able to get them. This effectively makes your characters relatively more powerful than enemies and is an ideal way to make gains in final fantasy viii, at least until disc 3 when you can acquire a GF that makes power-leveling more lucrative.