Flame Shield

A Flame Shield is a Shield-class hand armor found in Golden Sun: The Lost Age.

Basic Description
The Flame Shield increases the wearer's base defense by 44 points, and it increases Mars resistance by 60 points. It can be bought for 8600 coins and sold for 6450 coins.

The Flame Shield is obtained by bringing a Salamander Tail forgeable material to Sunshine the blacksmith in Yallam, where he will randomly forge it into either this or several other items. As a Shield, it can be equipped by Felix, Piers, Isaac, and Garet.

Analysis
If forged when Salamander Tails become first available, this is quite a desirable piece of equipment, as some of the remaining bosses (such as the Flame Dragon pair) focus heavily on Mars-based attacks. Thus, the enormous resistance boost is undeniably useful (and the 44 defense is not insignificant either). Overall, it may be considered inferior to items such as the Cosmos Shield or items forged from Dragon Skin, as these boost resistance to multiple elements, or to other offence-based equipment like the Big Bang Gloves or Riot Gloves. However, as none of these give anywhere near as much resistance to a single element, the Flame Shield is still a desirable piece of endgame equipment.