Escape ( command ) Escape , also known as Run , Flee and Runaway , Run Away , is a command in the " Final Fantasy " series . When employed , it lets the party members try and escape a random encounter . The most common way to escape a random encounter is by pressing down two buttons on the game controller or the console . For the titles on the PlayStation , this is done by simultaneously pressing both the and buttons . The Game Boy Advance titles require pressing both and buttons . In " Final Fantasy XII " the command is issued by holding down the button while running from the enemy , and in the " Final Fantasy IV " Nintendo DS remake , it is issued by holding down the button . In " Final Fantasy Tactics Advance " , there is a special option for escape at the battle menu . After escaping , the mission will fail or the battle will be lost . As with Flee , Escape can only be employed in random encounter with normal enemies . The player cannot escape from storyline enemies and bosses , but there are a few exceptions . Escaping varies from game to game . In some games , when one member flees , the others will . In other games the members flee individually and the battle will not end until any remaining party member flees or gets knocked out . Appearances . " Final Fantasy " . Individual characters may choose to flee while others can still fight . If the shoulder buttons are pressed , the entire team chooses to flee . If one character is successful in fleeing , the entire party flees with them . Running is always successful in a preemptive attack , and never possible in inescapable battles . Running is successful if : Running is bugged on the NES and it loads something else instead of the runner ' s level : So , someone in Slot 1 or 2 will usually be able to run if their Luck is 15 or higher and the character in slot 3 or 4 has normal status . Enemies can always run in any battle . They will if : " Final Fantasy II " . The process for escaping from battle and using the Flee command functions the same way as in the original " Final Fantasy " . " Final Fantasy III " . The command Run Away is present on the majority of the jobs , selecting it will make the user attempt to run from battle . This command can fail and the user will lose a turn . In NES version ( unconfirmed in 3D ) if a character ' s attempt at escaping fails their Defense will go down to 0 until next turn . " Final Fantasy IV " . When escaping from battles there is a chance of the party dropping gil equal to 1 / 4 of the amount they would have received if all of the initial enemies in the battle would have been defeated . The party won ' t drop gil if they escape by the spell Teleport or the Ninjutsu ability Smoke . Using the ability Cry in the 2D versions reduces the amount of time it takes for the party to escape from a battle . " Final Fantasy IV - Interlude - " . Escape functions similarly to its predecessor . Gil may be dropped by the party after successfully escaping from battle , although there are alternatives methods of escaping without losing gil , like casting the White Magic spell Teleport or the Ninjutsu spell Smoke . Escape still functions similarly to its predecessor . Gil may be dropped by the party after escaping although this can be avoided through alternatives like casting the White Magic Teleport or the Ninjutsu spell Smoke . Edward has the ability Escape , which allows him to hide to avoid being targeted . " Final Fantasy V " . The player can escape by holding the and buttons together , or by using the Thief ability Flee , the Time Magic spell Teleport , or the Ninja ability Smoke to escape instantly . If all party members use the Hide command , the party will instantly flee unless it is an inescapable battle . The weapon Chicken Knife has a 25 % chance of forcing the party to flee whenever the user attacks with it . If all of the party members are Berserkers , the player is unable to escape . Every time the player escapes , the power of the Brave Blade goes down , and the power of the Chicken Knife goes up . " Final Fantasy VI " . Holding the shoulder buttons causes all characters to proceed with running animation . Unlike the other games , each character escapes individually until there is no one left . This is determined by a hidden " Escape Success " value for each character ( this value is 0 in side attacks ; otherwise , the value is equal to double the number of enemies present , though some enemies add 6 instead of 2 to the equation ) . Each character ' s " running modifier " is as follows : Once every 2 seconds the game will check if the the party is trying to run . If they are , each character ' s " run success " value increases , depending on the character and a random number between 1 to a value listed above . If a character ' s " run success " value is greater than or equal to the " Escape Success " value , and if the character ' s ATB gauge is full , the character will escape . If not , they will keep trying to escape and their " run success " value will increase 2 seconds later . The game prevents characters that are afflicted by Zombie , Petrify , KO , Sleep , Stop , and Trance from getting a run animation . It oddly counts the Trance status as among those ineligible for running , but not those afflicted by Freeze . " Final Fantasy VII " . To escape from a battle , the player has to simultaneously hold the and buttons . The animation has the players facing the opposite way of the enemies and running on the spot . If the player succeeds in escaping they will flee off the screen and the character models will fade . Characters in certain statuses will not flee : Death , Paralyzed , Petrify , and Stop . Players in the Confuse status will be running while spinning . Players cannot flee from bosses ( see also : Inescapable battles glitch ) . A player cannot escape an ambush until all enemies on one side are defeated . " Final Fantasy VII " uses the Global Timer to decide when the party can escape . The Global Timer is the timer for the entire battle , and its speed is based on the the battle speed in the config . The default battle speed is 128 , and at max it is 255 . A Global Timer Unit is earned for every mark of 8192 the Global Timer reaches . On the fastest battle speed setting , it would take just over 30 ticks for a single Global Time Unit , but on the slowest it would be about 152 . At the end of each Global Time Unit the game checks if the party has been running for at least half the unit ' s time . If they have not , there is no chance of escaping until the next Global Time Unit has finished . If they have , then further mathematics have to be checked . The battle will end once the Run Difficulty reaches zero . Depending on the encounter , the Run Difficulty will vary . Usually it is one , but for back attacks , it is usually two , and if encounters include certain enemies it is also higher . Every Global Time Unit the party has been running for at least half the time of , there is a 25 % chance of reducing the Run Difficulty by one . If the battle was a preemptive strike , or the party enclose the enemy via a side attack , the Run Difficulty will always reduce by one . Some enemies use attacks to eject party members from battle . Some of these attacks flag the ejected units as defeated , but some of them flag them as having escaped the battle instead . " Crisis Core - Final Fantasy VII - " . Zack can escape from most normal battles by running towards the edge of the battlefield . After several seconds of persistently running against the invisible wall around the battlefield , the battle will end , or a " Can ' t escape ! " message will be displayed if the battle is inescapable . " Final Fantasy VIII " . The player can escape random battles by holding the and buttons . Unlike in the other games , in " Final Fantasy VIII " the player receives EXP from battles even if they escape . The amount of EXP gained from fled battles depends on how much the player reduced the enemies ' HP by ; if the player does damage equivalent to 50 % of an enemy ' s HP , they will get 50 % of the EXP the enemy would normally give when defeated . Earning EXP from petrified enemies works the same . However , the player will not get AP or items for the battle . The number of escapes affects the SeeD exam score in the Dollet mission , and the player must escape from the first encounter with X - ATM092 . Holding the and buttons makes all party members run . Every second or so , the game will check if a random number between 0 and 255 is less than the battle ' s " running difficulty " and if that is the case , the party will successfully flee . The running difficulty depends on each encounter , usually being 255 or 128 . Bosses always have a running difficulty of 0 , meaning escaping is impossible . " Final Fantasy IX " . The player can use the and buttons to escape , or use Zidane ' s Flee Skill to escape instantly . Using the Flee ability causes the party to drop a small amount of gil ( equal to 10 % of the Gil held by the opponents ) ; this does not occur when the party runs away manually , although it may take longer than Flee , which allows the party to escape as soon as the move is completed . The chance to escape from battle by holding and simultaneously is decided by the level average of members in the party ( KO included ) and the level average of the opponents ( dead monsters not included ) : This check is performed once per second for as long as the player holds and . Escape is possible only during the idle time when enemy ATBs are filling . A level 1 party has no chance of escape against any monster or group of monsters whose level average is 51 or higher . The flee animation is not performed if there is another battle animation going on at the same time , but if the flee was successful the character will flee as soon as the animation is finished even if the player has already stopped pressing the flee buttons . The support ability Flee - Gil allows the party to earn gil even from escaped battles . " Final Fantasy X " . Characters run away individually , and are not replaced by another character when they do ; once all three characters participating in battle are either KO ' d , eject ed from battle or have escaped , the battle ends . Escape command can either succeed or fail . If a party member escapes and the remaining party is KO ' d it will not result in a Game Over . Flee ability allows the entire party to escape from any non - boss ( except Lord Ochu , Dark Ixion and Penance ) or all Mimic battles . Unlike the Escape command , Flee never fails . " Final Fantasy X - 2 " . The escape command is an accessible command given by any dressphere , using the button to change battle menus and select Escape , unless hindered by a status ailment such as Petrify , Stop or the character is KO ' d . The character will escape from the battle and not be able to be replaced . The entire party can escape simultaneously using the Flee command in the Thief dressphere . Like in " Final Fantasy X " , if one or two of the party members have escaped from the battle and the remaining characters are KO ' d , the battle will end , but not result in a Game Over . The player will simply return to the game , with no experience points earned . " Final Fantasy XII " . By pressing the the party will put their weapons away and gambits are disabled allowing the player to flee . Pressing the cancels all actions and the party is unable to evade enemy attacks . Escaping is made easier by changing the battle speed to slow in the config ; the enemies take longer to execute commands , but the party will still be running away at the same pace . If the player does not want to engage in battle , but is being chased by the enemy , the player may also opt to hold the . This will prevent the characters from drawing their weapons , allowing them to easily run away . The game ' s escape function can sometimes stop enemies from fleeing ; some enemies , while in low health , tend to run away . However , if the player presses when this happens the enemy ' s AI might be reset and it ' ll launch after the party again . This is useful to avoid chasing fleeing enemies across battlefields . " Final Fantasy XIII " . In " Final Fantasy XIII " the player may not escape from battles . The " Retry " function brings the party back to the previous screen before they engaged the enemy , effectively acting as a replacement to the escape system . Unlike Escape , Retry will also work on boss battles . A known exploit to avoid enemy encounters is to use a Deceptisol to run past an enemy undetected , engage the enemy from the other side anyway before the effect runs out , and then Retry out of the battle , regaining the Deceptisol . " Final Fantasy XIII - 2 " . Enemy encounters are now random , and monsters materialize out of thin air to challenge the party . When monsters appear in the player ' s vicinity the Mog Clock activates . If the player doesn ' t want to fight , they can run away from the enemies on the field . If they get far enough away from the monsters in time the monsters disappear and the player has escaped the encounter , but if they run out of time in the Mog Clock the battle will begin anyway . In some areas the player is unable to avoid monsters by running from them , such as in Academia 400 AF , where monsters will keep chasing the player until a battle initiates . The Retry option returns , but if the player is caught by monsters because they run out of time when they are trying to escape , the Retry option will be sealed for that battle . Winning 50 consecutive battles without using the Retry option earns the player the " No Retreat " achievement / trophy . Escape is an EP Ability that costs no Energy Points to use . It is used if Lightning loses a battle , and returns her to the field before the battle occurred , with all the items and EP used in the battle regained . Escape is also used when the player loses a Slaughterhouse battle . Using Escape penalizes the player by taking an hour off the world ' s time , unless the player is playing in or on the final . " Final Fantasy XV " . Enemies are engaged on the field . A red gauge appears when a battle is about to start when the player comes to the vicinity of an enemy . Running away from the enemies at this point can avoid a battle . The player can also run away from an active battle by running from the enemies that eventually give up the chase . In closed areas escaping from enemies is not always possible . " Final Fantasy Mystic Quest " . Selecting Run causes the party to try and escape the battle . There is a chance this will fail , wasting the turn . " The Final Fantasy Legend " . Run is one of two basic commands that is available . If the player tries to run , only one party member will attempt to run , yet if this character succeeds or fails , the entire party will do the same . If they fail , all the enemies will get a round to attack the party . " Final Fantasy Legend II " . Run is one of two basic command available during battle . A successful escape is related to the Agl of the characters , the higher the Agl is the better chance they have at running away from monsters . " Final Fantasy Legend III " . Run is one of the basic battle commands and gives the player a chance to try and run from the current battle . There is a chance they ' ll fail prompting to lose a turn . It doesn ' t work during boss battles . The ability to run away is base on the average agility of the party versus the average agility of the monsters . The player can escape from random encounters with Wayfarer ' s abilities Runaway and Escape . Runaway lets the player escape most of the time but it can fail , and using it takes one AP . Escape never fails and costs two AP . Runaway is the default ability on the job , and the player must upgrade the job with Gems to learn Escape . " Final Fantasy Record Keeper " . When in a dungeon , the player has the option to Retreat from the dungeon . Retreating from the dungeon does not cost the player any items obtained thus far in the dungeon , but they will have to redo all of the stages if the player enters the dungeon again . While in battle , the Flee option appears in the pause menu . Fleeing a battle forfeits any items gained during the battle , however Stamina used is not regained , characters do not regain HP or ability uses that were lost during the battle , and any status effects inflicted during the battle that remain after battle will not be removed upon fleeing . It is possible to exploit fleeing from battle to accumulate Soul Break points by having characters attack and fleeing before the enemy can inflict any harm to the party , though as this requires expending the stamina cost of the battle each time , it is impractical for battles with high Stamina costs .