Briggs

Briggs is a major NPC central to a lengthy subplot in Golden Sun: The Lost Age. While not necessarily an antagonist, he is involved in two separate boss encounters in the game.

Biography

 * Note that several elements depicted in The Lost Age relevant to this subject seem to contradict each other; parts of the following information and some of the ordering of the sequence of events are therefore assumed.

History
Briggs was presumably born and raised in Champa. In his early life he is described as formerly being a real brat, but in the present age he has become a swarthy middle-aged man who was eventually recognized as the greatest of Champa's sailors, so he was subsequently named the captain of the sailors of Champa. He is also described as having "never been sick a day of his life." While he is recognized as tough and boasts of it, Briggs is also very insecure around those even more powerful than himself, instinctively running away from someone who defeats him in battle.

Champa's survival relies entirely on the sea to run its fish market, but in recent years, apparently even before the eruption of Mt. Aleph (perhaps this was caused by the first disturbance at Mt.Aleph in the prologue to Golden Sun), the oceans have warmed up and the fish have gradually depleted in number, so Champa's sailors eventually had to resort to committing piracy far abroad to survive. This made Champa feared as a pirate town, and Briggs was the most effective and fearsome of its pirates, so he thus developed the reputation of a dread pirate across the Great Eastern Sea. Briggs kept his craft a secret from his grandmother, the town matriarch Obaba, because she obviously disliked the notion that Champa had to take from other towns in order to preserve itself, so she could never forgive Briggs if it turned out he was among the populace that facilitated piracy.

Eventually, shortly before the end of Golden Sun, Champa's predicament became so unbearable that the Champa elders decided that it was up to Briggs to lead the best of Champa's sailors, henceforth referred to as Sea Fighters, out into the Great Eastern Sea to look for food and jewels to save the village from poverty and starvation, without resorting to piracy like the rest of the town had. Briggs took up the responsibility and brought his wife Chaucha and toddler son Eoleo along for the effort. He left the town in a moderately-sized oar-powered boat.

Madra
Briggs first raided towns such as Daila for riches, knowing full well that Obaba would never forgive him for resorting to piracy if she knew about it, but Briggs operated under the maxims that desperate times call for desperate measures, and that the ends justify the means. He and his crew acted as brutal pirates, but only for a time, because sometime later they happened upon Treasure Isle to the northeast, and in the chests near the entrance they found some very valuable jewels and some strong weapons as well. While the switch on the ground that causes the pillars to rise up (the pillars that can only be removed with the Grind Psynergy) prevented them from getting the rest of the treasures in the cave, the ancient pirate treasures they found made them rich enough that they didn't have to perform any more raids on the other towns they encountered. But when the crew headed south towards Madra, the great Tidal Wave caused by the return of Poseidon occurred all throughout the Great Eastern Sea, and the continent of Indra was shifted downward and was sandwiched between the continents of Gondowan and Osenia. Briggs' boat was driven and crashed into the newly formed Osenia Cliffs, wrecking it. While this was a major setback for Briggs and his family and group of four Sea Fighters, Briggs was still set on the objective of getting food for Champa, and of course they would just have to find another ship somehow in the future.

Shortly after crashing into Indra, Briggs was suddenly found out by the nearby town of Madra and was arrested and thrown into Madra's jail. Even as news of Briggs' capture spread across the Great Eastern Sea (and it was much welcomed news indeed, which attests to Briggs' reputation), Chaucha and the Sea Fighters remained out of Madra's reach and were trying to come up with a plan to free Briggs. They were soon chanced upon by a group of warriors from the Kibombo tribe, hailing from lower Gondowan, and they were under orders by the Kibombo witch doctor Akafubu to acquire any gemstone that would look suitable for a coronation ritual that would take place back at the Kibombo hometown. Since the two groups shared the objective of breaking into and raiding Madra, they decided to assist each other; the Kibombo shared their weapons with the Sea Fighters while the Sea Fighters provided information about the town's layout, including how one section of wall at the town's southwest edge was weak enough to be broken down and allow for an easy way in. They plotted and soon carried out an elaborate and daring plan of attack.

It was obviously not feasible for the two raiding parties to charge through the front gate, so they came up with something far less likely; the Sea Fighters proceeded to dig a hole right outside the town with the intention of digging their way underneath Madra's walls and creating an exit in the interior. It would have taken them a long time to do this, but the Champa pirates dug their way into an amazing discovery: they found the Madra Catacombs, a complex of tunnels underneath the town, and using these tunnels allowed for this phase of the operation to be completed much faster. Per the plan, creating this passage was actually a decoy as the rest of the raiding party busted through the weak wall near the prison and the Sea Fighters busted Briggs out of jail, and as they made their escape, they wounded several townsfolk, including the item shopkeeper, and did battle against the other merchants who took up their swords. The pirates also raided Madra's households for gold and riches. They escaped from Madra amid the chaos and fled eastward to Osenia, while the Kibombo failed to find the gemstone they were looking for and had to retreat back to their cave hideout at Gondowan Cliffs.

Alhafra
With Briggs back in the crew, the group traveled east to the town of Alhafra, a wealthy and powerful port town they made sure not to raid or antagonize, and they figured that place was their best bet at acquiring a ship to use to bring their food and jewel stockpile back home to Champa. So after destroying the bridge west of Alhafra so that any possible pursuers from Madra couldn't reach them easily, Briggs and the crew entered Alhafra and saw that the town had built and possessed a ship unlike any conventional ship seen before in Weyard: a large, wooden sea vessel that is powered not by the rowing of oars, but by catching wind in the sail hoisted on its mast. It was damaged by the tidal wave, however, so they couldn't use it to sail back to Champa when Briggs bought it with the gold pilfered from Madra. Briggs also used some of the jewels he found to buy a huge stockpile of food for Champa from Alhafra fair and square, and stored it within the ship's storage area. Briggs and his family convened in the interior of the ship while the Sea Fighters tried to figure out how they could get the ship's broken mast back onto the ship - it could be done, if there weren't a giant rock pinning down the mast into the water, preventing the movement of the mast at all. For the moment the group was stuck in this position.

Fate throws Briggs' party another curveball shortly afterward; arriving at Alhafra are a group of Madrans led by the Elder of Alhafra and the Mayor of Alhafra themselves, and they are accompanied by the Adepts Felix, Jenna, and Sheba, and the scholar Kraden as well. While one reason they all came to Alhafra was to stop Briggs and get him to answer for his crimes of piracy, the real important reason was this: Shortly after Briggs and his crew fled Madra, the townsfolk were in an uproar, and a survivor of the tidal wave, a man named Piers, who was in the area at the time, was falsely detained and imprisoned by the townsfolk because they suspected he was one the Champa, which was obviously untrue to the Elder and the Mayor. Not content with having someone in their jail just because the town needed a scapegoat, the Elder and Mayor came over to Alhafra to get the testimony from Briggs that Piers is not one of his men. Felix's group is accompanying them because they are personally interested in freeing Piers so they can join up with him and be able to use his own ship afterwards for their own quest across Weyard.

While the Elder and Mayor of Madra meet with the Mayor of Alhafra in the latter's mansion, when Felix's party confronts Briggs inside the ship about Piers, Briggs brushes them off and shows indifference towards whatever Madra might have done with some uninvolved party, and a brawl ensues between Felix's group and Briggs and his Sea Fighters. Felix wins the tough battle, and Briggs concedes, saying even pirates have a code of honor. When the Mayors of Madra and Alhafra arrive, they secure Briggs' vow that Piers is not one of his men. A method to win points with these mayors occurs to Briggs when he clarifies that since the ship was bought with Madran gold, it belongs to the Madrans, and the Mayors of Madra are quite pleased with the concept that they will have a ship which they can use for trade between Madra and other towns, so the Mayors decide that Briggs should now be jailed in Alhafra's prison while they await the repair of their new ship to commence. The Mayors stay in Alhafra Manor while the other Madrans return to Madra to give the news concerning Piers. Briggs in the meantime requests that Chaucha and Eoleo can stay inside the ship while it is repaired, which the Mayors grant.

Felix's party decides to try and fix the ship themselves with their Psynergy powers, so that they could conveniently sail back to Madra on it afterward with the Elder and Mayor of Madra to return to Piers, but the boulder pinning down the mast proves too much for their Psynergy powers, so they decide they must travel back on foot. Before leaving, they see Chaucha and Eoleo visiting Briggs in the jail, where they remark about how the gruel Briggs and his men must eat is disgusting. Eoleo fiddles around with a nearby key with Psynergy power, to Felix's considerable surprise, but Briggs scolds him because he has come up with another plan for escape in the future, a plan involving Eoleo using his Psynergy to get the key to unlock the cell doors when the ship is repaired and allow him to escape both the jail and Madra itself with the ship; letting anyone be aware of Eoleo's power to do this would ruin Briggs' chance to escape. This escape plot will only occur in the future, however, because, as it turns out, the greedy Mayor of Alhafra resents the Madrans owning the ship Alhafra built, so he holds off on repairing the ship by focusing on repairing the town that was damaged by the tidal wave, much to the chagrin of not just Briggs and Chaucha but the Mayor of Madra as well, especially considering that the Alhafran Mayor is using the Madran Gold Briggs paid him to repair his own town instead.

Much later on, having journeyed across Weyard on the Lemurian Ship of Piers who they've now joined up with, Felix's band returns to Alhafra to remove the boulder pinning down the mast for good, using the Burst Psynergy, because Felix has a hunch that doing so would be helping these towns out immensely. The town takes immediate notice and raises the mast, fixing the ship. This is Briggs' cue to bust out of jail; Chaucha subdues and blindfolds the guard standing watch while Eoleo uses his Psynergy to get the key and unlock the cell doors. Briggs, his family, and the Sea Fighters all then escape together, but they do so secretly by tunneling into the wall behind them that leads into the Alhafran Cave underneath the Mayor's mansion. They then stealthily make their way to the ship behind the buildings along the beach, then assault the Mayor of Alhafra as he comes to inspect the ship himself. They hijack the ship for themselves and flee Alhafra, and Briggs taunts Felix for the time he defeated him in the battle with a "neener-neener-bleah" routine he perfected in prison. Briggs and Chaucha also declare that it's the Mayor of Alhafra who is guilty of trying to steal the ship that they paid for. While this is true, Briggs' taking the ship for himself may be considered morally wrong in this case because Briggs was saying previously how the ship they bought with gold stolen from Madra belongs to the Madrans. But to Briggs, returning to Champa with the food and jewels his group has collected over their expedition to save the town from starvation is what is most important, after all, and after saving Champa Briggs was planning to return to and repay all the towns he stole from and make amends anyway.

Champa
Briggs triumphantly returns to Champa with the food and jewels, on a bigger ship than what he left Champa with, no less, and the town is completely revitalized, so much so that the once-starving citizens become self-indulgent and lazy gorging themselves on food and riches. Briggs is viewed as a hero for his deed of saving the town, and the townspeople heavily appreciate that they do not have to resort to piracy across the seas anymore to survive, so the elders consider appointing Briggs the first-ever chief of Champa. Of course, none of the Champa, particularly Obaba, are aware that Briggs had heavily employed piracy himself to acquire the food and jewels, and Briggs and Chaucha keep it a secret from Obaba and the townspeople that that is what they did. Briggs does tell the townspeople, however, that it was "some amazingly tough thug named Felix" that captured him at Alhafra, and makes Felix sound like a really bad guy interested in stealing the jewels he acquired.

But Felix and his band of Adepts most certainly are aware that Briggs has committed large-scale piracy, and they arrive at the town to confront Briggs and set him straight. When Briggs sees him in town, he flees inside the cliffs of Champa in terror while Felix pursues. Within the mountain at the Forge of Ankohl, Felix stands opposite of Briggs and Obaba, and Obaba is not impressed by how Felix does not look the part of what Briggs described to her about him. Briggs pipes up and exclaims that Felix will take him far away if Obaba doesn't destroy Felix now, but when Obaba thinks Felix doesn't look like the kind of boy that would do that, Briggs wins her over by saying how "poor Eoleo will be so sad" when he does, and Obaba takes out a pet lizard and throws it into the forge, imbuing it with great power and transforming it into the Avimander. Felix's party engages in a battle where the overgrown salamander is slain.

At a loss of words over the power of Felix's group, Obaba tells Briggs he must now fight them himself because she has done everything she can, and Briggs protests he can't, saying that they are bad guys too strong for him, and Briggs even tries to use the Eoleo gambit again. But Sheba pipes up and says she doesn't like hearing a pirate call them the bad guys in this scenario, and Jenna accuses Briggs of stealing the ship from Alhafra - the ship they fixed for the town - and escaping from their jail. Thunderstruck, the extent of Briggs' crimes and how it plays into the status of Briggs' return to Champa becomes completely clear to Obaba, and she lashes out at her grandson in a rage, calling him a scoundrel. But Chaucha butts in and says he only did it for Champa, and clarifies that they had stopped the piracy once they found the jewels, and Briggs always had the full intention of repaying every town they "borrowed from". Obaba forgives Briggs for that, citing that she's "too old for grudges". Briggs agrees with Chaucha that they ought to make amends with all the towns they caused trouble for. Briggs then pretends to catch a cold, and goes into bed to rest, claiming that he'll set out on the voyage to make amends with Daila and Madra as well as look for more jewels in Treasure Isle once he's over his cold, though it's clear to Chaucha that he doesn't have any illness at all and is merely trying to stall having to go out for the task.

Felix, in the meantime, consults with Obaba about forging the Trident of Ankohl, which is necessary for his party to battle Poseidon and gain entrance to Lemuria. After the finale of The Lost Age sees the return of Alchemy to Weyard, it is assumed that Briggs is now traveling to each of the towns he stole from to repair and repay them and patch things up, and his popularity with the Champa has most likely prompted the elders to appoint him the town's first-ever chief. Briggs becomes one of many NPCs whose status at the end of the game allows for a potentially large role in a hypothetical Golden Sun 3 storyline.

As a boss
Briggs is fought as a boss early in the game when the party is on the continent of Osenia. Since it would take place after the boss fight against the King Scorpion in the nearby Yampi Desert, Briggs can be considered the "big boss/final boss" of the continent. The boss fight with him and his Sea Fighter minions is much tougher than anything else thus far in the game. Due to the non-linear layout of the game at this point, Briggs can be fought much earlier in your exploration of Osenia or at the end of it, or any time in between. It is hugely recommended that you complete all other activities in Osenia first before fighting the battle - completing the immense Air's Rock dungeon, buying the powerful equipment available at Mikasalla, completing the Garoh segment of the game, getting all of the Djinn available on the western portion of the continent (One Mars, two Jupiter, one Mercury) as well as the Megaera and Flora Summon Tablets - because all that can be done anytime before or after the boss battle, and doing all that before it will make the battle much easier. To initiate the battle, enter Eastern Alhafra, enter the ship, and trigger a cutscene with Briggs.

The battle starts with Briggs and one Sea Fighter underling as the opponents. Briggs carries 984 Hit Points, 129 Attack, 29 Defense, 76 Agility, 42 Luck, and completely balanced and standard resistances. He can attack with a physical attack, Defend, and use a powerful technique called Echo Cut to damage one Adept with a tackle-sword-slash. He also carries and can use an Herb, a Nut, an Oil Drop, and up to three of a unique item called a Signal Whistle, which when used summons an additional Sea Fighter unit to his side to join the battle. When Briggs is felled, the party gains 333 EXP, 891 Coins, and a guaranteed Vial.

Each Sea Fighter features 197 Hit Points, 119 Attack, 28 Defense, 61 Agility, 26 Luck, and completely balanced and standard resistances. A Sea Fighter can physically attack and use the Echo Cut technique that Briggs uses for a lot of punch, and each Sea Fighter carries and can use a Smoke Bomb, an Herb, and an Oil Drop. When a Sea Fighter is downed, the party gains 89 EXP and 130 coins.

This is a great battle to unleash the Flora summon on, because she will deal massive damage and possibly inflict Sleep on the opponents as well, and the boss fight will seem much less fierce if the party is both relatively leveled-up and carries the strong equipment found elsewhere in Osenia such as the Storm Brand in Air's Rock and the Hypnos' Sword in Garoh. Completing the fight will cause the town of Madra to update, with Piers leaving the town, and you will be able to continue the quest into lower Gondowan.

Quotations

 * At Alhafra:
 * Sea Fighter Zack: "You don't stand a chance! We're hardened criminal types! We eat punks like you for breakfast!"
 * Briggs: "Watch yourselves, you self-righteous little brats! You're the ones with a lesson to learn!"


 * Briggs: "We lost... Even pirates have honor... I'll go quietly. I won't make a scene just because I lost... Go on... Hand us over to Madra or Alhafra or whoever..."


 * Kraden: "No crops? So you have no grains? And no meat? It sounds like life in Champa is hard..."
 * Briggs: "It's not hard! It's unbearable! Our children can't eat! Our village is dying!"


 * Jenna: "[Champa]'s so far away..."
 * Briggs: "Well, yeah! You think we could be successful pirates so close to home?"


 * Briggs: "I won't run, and I won't hide. ...Actually, I don't feel up for much of anything right now."


 * Briggs: "I don't know any Piers! Sounds to me like you've made a pretty big mistake!"


 * Briggs: "Oh, stopped by for a visit, did you? (If Felix says yes) I wish that I'd met you under different circumstances... If we had met out on the open seas, you would have seen a different man."


 * Briggs: "Did you call me a thief? I paid for this boat, fair and square. I'm no thief."
 * Chaucha: "You're the thieves! You tried to take our boat away, after we paid you so much for it!"


 * Briggs: "Hey, Felix! You guys take care! And keep Alhafra safe from thieves and pirates! And politicians, too!"
 * Kraden: "What!?!"
 * Briggs: "I doubt we'll ever meet again, but if we do, remember this! Neener neener neener! Neener neener neener! Neener neener bleah!"
 * Chaucha: "That may have been a bit much. If you make him mad, he might chase us right back to Champa."


 * At Champa:
 * Briggs: "Grandma, what's going on? I thought you were going to protect me!"
 * Obaba: "What do you mean? I've done everything I can!"
 * Briggs: "Grandma!!! [Felix]'s going to take me away! He's a bad guy! You have to do something!"


 * Briggs: "Grandma, we found those jewels ourselves, and we paid Alhafra well for that ship, didn't we?"
 * Obaba: (If Felix says no) "So he's lying again?"
 * Briggs: "Dang it, Felix, I'm not lying!"