Mighty Guard (Final Fantasy VIII)

Mighty Guard is a protective Limit Break for Quistis in Final Fantasy VIII. It is one of her two supportive Blue Magic spells, alongside the healing skill White Wind.
Mighty Guard bestows beneficial statuses to the player's party depending on the current Crisis Level. It is most likely a late game Blue Magic spell, though can be procured early, learned from a Barrier. Limit Breaks are randomly available when Quistis is on low health or under Aura.
Behemoths use Mighty Guard to protect themselves and their allies; when used by enemies, Mighty Guard only bestows Protect and Shell, whereas Quistis can get many more status benefits if her Crisis Level is high.
==Obtained==
Quistis learns Mighty Guard when a Barrier is used in the inventory. Barriers are obtained from Behemoths and their cards. Behemoths are fought as random encounters on the Esthar region after the events on the Lunar Gate late into the game, and on Deep Sea Research Center, a bonus dungeon also accessible at this time.
A Barrier is made with Quezacotl's Card Mod from 10 Behemoth cards. This is available since the beginning of the game, but it would be a grind to collect 10 Behemoth cards. As Mighty Guard is a useful Blue Magic spell to have, the player may still want to try. Any AI Triple Triad player who uses Level 5 cards has a chance of using Behemoth in a play. Examples of players who use Level 5 cards are the man operating the Balamb Garden entrance barriers, Trepies, Ma Dincht, CC King, and the familiar face by the lift and Martine in Fishermans Horizon.
==Mechanics==
Mighty Guard bestows the party with beneficial status effects depending on the current Crisis Level. 
:Crisis Lv 1: Protect, Shell
:Crisis Lv 2: Protect, Shell, Regen, Float, Haste
:Crisis Lv 3 & 4: Protect, Shell, Regen, Float, Haste, Aura
The party can get nearly every beneficial status with Mighty Guard besides Reflect (which can be bestowed with Carbuncle) and Double and Triple (which can be bestowed with Cerberus), and Invincible.
==Use==
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Mighty Guard is a good way to protect the party in a tough encounter. It is better than Selphie's Wall beyond Crisis Level 1. It is much faster than giving statuses one by one with Magic.
Mighty Guard remains a good situational protective ability throughout the game. If the player is partaking in the card game, it may be worth always taking a Behemoth card from an opponent that uses one to eventually mass 10 of them to make into a Barrier. Without the card game, the player can easily still get one when they come across a Behemoth.
A good time to use Mighty Guard is in boss battles, such as against the late game bosses Mobile Type 8, Adel, bosses in the final dungeon, and the optional boss Bahamut. It can also be a good protection against tough enemies the player does not want to outright degenerate for carding, mugging, or devouring purposes.
Though the player can eventually get Auto-Protect, Auto-Shell, and Auto-Haste, Mighty Guard's biggest boon is that it gives Aura, a status otherwise tough to bestow as Aura Stones are rare, Aura spells have limited draw opportunities, and Selphie rarely rolls Aura in her Slot. The one downside of Mighty Guard is that the player may not want the Regen status it gives if they wanted to stay on low health for Limit Break purposes; if Mighty Guard gives Aura, then this does not matter.
The best set-up would be to have Quistis first use Mighty Guard to bestow Aura, and then using Rinoa's Invincible Moon or a Holy War to make the party invulnerable while locking the Aura status in. Using Mighty Guard as Quistis's first Limit Break in a battle is a good idea, as if she gets Aura from it, she can then follow up with other, damaging Blue Magic spells.
Category:Blue Magic in Final Fantasy VIII