Gears


 * This Djinni appears as an enemy that can be battled.

Gears (ドール Doll) is a Venus Djinni found in Golden Sun: Dark Dawn.

Gears is the seventh Venus Djinni in Dark Dawn.

Basic description
When Set, Gears increases its Adept's base HP by 8, base Psynergy Points by 3, and base Attack by 4.

When Gears is unleashed in battle, if at least 1 other foe aside from the target is present, that foe takes the hit, and the battle text reads "[Enemy] attacks an ally!". If two or more other enemies are present when Gears is used, the choice is made randomly. If the target is the only enemy in the battle, it takes the hit, and the battle text reads "[Enemy] is under self-attack!". Whatever target is hit with the attack, it is a Venus-aligned attack equal to the user's normal physical attack with 80 damage points added. This is identical to the Venus Djinni Mold in Golden Sun: The Lost Age, but with one difference: Gears actually uses the selected enemy's Venus Power rating, rather than the user's.

In Dark Dawn, Gear's unleash animation visually begins with the cluster of energy orbs that normally summons the 3D model of a Djinni to zero in and gather right into the enemy's position. If the enemy is alone, it is then hit by what appears to be an invisible attack, while at the same instant the 3D model of Gears will appear right above the enemy and float off the top of the screen in a glowing orange little "cloud" of sorts. If there is at least one other enemy on the field to be hit instead, then both the targeted enemy and the whole party disappear, and the enemy reappears where the party used to be. The enemy immediately performs its normal physical attack animation on the other enemy. Then the selected enemy will disappear and reappear at their original position on the enemy's side of the field just as the party reappears, and the 3D model of Gears makes its appearance at this point.



Location
Golden Sun: Dark Dawn: Gears is one of the Djinn that is only found by being randomly encountered in a specific area of the overworld map that otherwise appears to be featureless scenery. It is at the top tip of the Morgal region of Angara that is reached if you follow the narrow stretch of land north from Border Town quite a distance. Gears then must be battled and defeated to be acquired. Because this Djinni is located in the Morgal region which no longer becomes accessible at a later point in the game, Gears can be permanently missed if one enters the final gate in the Belinsk Ruins dungeon. (Late in the game, it is possible to return to Morgal through the Endless Wall glitch. It must be noted that there is a risk: entering a town while in Morgal results in getting trapped in the area with no way of returning other than to reset, but this is easily avoided.) See here for enemy statistics.

Analysis
General: In practical terms, all that is provided by Gears's unique trait of causing one of the other enemies on the field that is not the selected enemy to be the one that is hit is a small liability - that the move cannot be reliably targeted if it is used while three or more enemies are present. This does not do all that much to mar what is otherwise an attacking Djinni with a very high 80 added bonus damage, which is considerable as an offense if it is Set on a low-attack caster Adept. It can be reliably targeted so long as there are only one or two enemies on the field - if you want to attack Enemy A, simply target Enemy B. That the attack is based on the target's Venus Power basically amounts to a trivial detail because elemental power and resistance interactions do not affect damage results drastically, so even though enemies' Venus power ratings can differ drastically between different enemies, the damage will still be around 80 more damage points higher than a normal physical attack executed by the user. In The Lost Age, the Venus Djinni Mold is this Djinni's practically-identical equivalent (though Mold is slightly different in that it depends on the unleasher's Venus Power).

By game
Golden Sun: Dark Dawn: Gears can be found as soon as the Morgal region is entered. While having 80 set bonus damage makes it quite useful for an attacking Venus Djinni at that point, before then the Mars Djinni Fury and the Mercury Djinni Serac could have been found, which deal almost as much damage. Gears is generally not considered all that great an attacking Venus Djinni because it has a small liability in place of what would be a beneficial side effect on most other attacking Djinn - Serac is very useful in comparison because it has the powerful and useful side effect of instant death. This is not to mention the Mercury Djinni Spout, which can be found in the early part of Belinsk Ruins at the same time as Gears; it deals 80 bonus set damage and has the chance to Delude the target, a minor side effect that still makes Spout a superior package to a Djinni that deals 80 damage but cannot be reliably targeted when 3 or more enemies are present.

Nevertheless, there is still opportunity for Gears to be useful as a Venus Djinni to attack with, which is available throughout the segment of the game that takes place all the way through Morgal. The attacking Venus Djinni Pewter acquired later on in Kolima Forest will compete against it with its x1.5 damage multiplier and chance to ignore half of the enemy's Defense, but Gears (and most other attacking Venus Djinn, for that matter) can only be truly said to be obsoleted later in the Eastern Sea segment of the game, when the powerful Venus Djinni Chain can be found.

Name Origin
Gears are toothed wheels designed to transmit torque to other gears or toothed components. Dolls are toys manipulated by someone else. In both cases, the names refer to the manipulative ability this Djinni has over its target, causing it to attack its allies.