Chasm

Chasm is a Venus Djinni found in Golden Sun: Dark Dawn.

Chasm is the eleventh Venus Djinni in Dark Dawn.

Basic description
When Set, Chasm increases its Adept's base HP by 10 and base Agility by 3.

When Chasm is unleashed in battle, the user produces an effect that reduces all damage the entire party would take for the rest of the current turn by 90%. This effect has the "strikes first" property, meaning it will be the first performed action in a given turn regardless of the agility rating of the user and any other combatant in battle.

In Dark Dawn, Chasm's unleash animation visually resembles the user summoning the 3D model of Chasm above the party, and the following effects occur at each party member's position in order: first, a black sphere coursing with purple electricity forms at each Adept's upper body area, and this sphere turns pitch black surrounded by a glowing white aura. As that disappears, a small yellow field forms underneath the Adept and swirls up the Adept's legs.

Location
Golden Sun: Dark Dawn: Chasm is located in the giant room with intertwining maze-like paths early in the appropriate dungeon of Belinsk Ruins. When the path brings you to the northwest corner of the screen below where Chasm is, it will be on a pillar puzzle similar to one seen earlier in the room. Cast the Crush Psynergy on the pillar to the left of the Djinni to drive the pillar to the ground and make the pillar under the Djinni rise up. Chasm will hop right off its pillar onto the ledge. Now cast Crush on this other pillar to lower it and raise the original one back up. That way, when you approach Chasm from the right, it won't hop out of reach. Fight it to obtain it. This Djinni can be permanently missed once the final gate in this dungeon is passed through.

Analysis
General: Chasm is one of the Djinn that cuts total damage the party takes this turn, but while other Djinn of this type cut it down by lower values such as 50%, Chasm reduces all damage the party takes by 90%, practically nullifying all damage the party takes this turn, and with increased priority as well. This is far and away the best defensive effect in the games this specific effect appears, even though once Chasm is used it would have to be on Standby and therefore effort would have to be used to bring it back to Set mode so that it can be used in the next turn. This effect, most relevant in boss battles, highly justifies the turn it takes for one of your four Adepts to use it in a given turn, and is considered one of the best Djinn in the series. This is Dark Dawn 's equivalent to the legendary Mars Djinni Flash that featured in the GBA games.

By game
Golden Sun: Dark Dawn: During a turn where all damage dealt against you is divided by 10, the party may safely heal itself without the risk of any low-health party members to be downed by a strong attack before your healer, such as Rief and his Wish Psynergy series, gets around to their action. It obsoletes the Venus Djinni Bark found earlier in the game, which merely halves all damage, as well as the Mercury Djinni Shell, unusually found some time after Chasm, which merely reduces all damage down to 40%. Random enemy encounters and boss encounters in Dark Dawn aren't as threatening to the party as in the GBA games, making defense-oriented battle options in general, even one powerful such as this, to be not as useful as offense-oriented battle approaches and group healing. Unless the player is playing some sort of self-imposed challenge that enhances the practicality of protecting the party, Chasm's usefulness is undermined in most situations. Even so, Chasm can still be very useful against the final boss and optional endgame bosses, where hits against the party can be very hard.