Sour


 * "Reduce a foe's resistance."



Location
Sour is a Djinni that is randomly encountered in a specific area of the overworld that otherwise appears to be pointless scenery. Thus, it is very often missed by players playing the game the first time without any outside information. The battle with Sour may ensue in place of a random battle in the pictured area northeast of the town of Mikasalla and just below the cavern containing the Megaera summon tablet. It must be defeated to be acquired.

As an opponent
Statistically, Sour has 291 HP, 26 PP, 75 Attack, 19 Defense, 57 Agility, and 9 Luck. Like all other Mercury Djinn that are fought, in terms of resistance, it has a Mercury Resistance rating of 193, Venus and Jupiter Resistance ratings of 100 each, and a Mars Resistance rating of 25, and in regards to its abilities it uses its available Mercury-based attacks with a Mercury power rating of 125.

Sour can use the following battle commands:
 * Cool: Used 53 out of 256 times, this is a Psynergy spell that summons a small group of icy spikes out from the ground at the opposition, dealing a Mercury-based attack with a power rating of 35 and a range of 3. This ability consumes 6 of its user's PP.
 * Ice: Used 47 out of 256 times, this is a Psynergy spell that shoots a mass of ice spikes down onto a target Adept, dealing a Mercury-based attack with a power rating of 35. This ability consumes 5 of its user's PP.
 * Froth: used 41 out of 256 times, this is a Psynergy spell that projects a small array of watery spheres that arc into the party, dealing a Mercury-based attack with a power rating of 28 and a range of 3. This ability consumes 5 of its user's PP.
 * Douse: Used 35 out of 256 times, this is a Psynergy spell that causes a small array of watery spheres to drop onto the targeted Adepts, dealing a Mercury-based attack with a power rating of 25 and a range of 3. This ability consumes 5 of its user's PP.
 * Frost: Used 29 out of 256 times, this is a Psynergy spell that drops shards of ice onto the party, dealing a Mercury-based attack with a power rating of 20 and a range of 3. This ability consumes 5 of its user's PP.
 * Attack: Used 28 out of 256 times, this is this monster's standard physical attack, but for this monster it is counted as a Mercury-based attack rather than a non-elemental attack.
 * Flee: Used 23 out of 256 times, this enemy has the ability to attempt to Flee the battle, thereby ending the battle if successful without rewarding you with the associated EXP, Coins, and the Djinni itself. Since this is a randomly battled overworld Djinni, however, it can be very quickly fought again just by running around in the same area you first fought it in.

When defeated, Sour yields 130 EXP and 152 coins and the Sour Djinni is added to your party's Djinn collection. If you fell it with an offensive Mars Djinni like Cannon, its rewards increase to 169 EXP and 197 Coins.

The Fume Psynergy is still the most useful Psynergy to use against Sour in the interest of knocking it out quickly, and if you collected Iron near Madra you have the two Djinn needed to summon Ramses as a moderately powerful offense as well. You should also be at a high enough level for Sheba to be able to use Plasma.

Description
When Set, it increases base HP by 8, base PP by 4, and base Attack by 3.

When Sour's battle effect is used, the user deals a Mercury-based attack equal in power to the user's normal physical attack increased by 50%. There is then a chance that all of the target's resistances may be be lowered by 40 each. Note that resist-dropping effects may be stacked to a maximum of -80.

Ability Analysis
Sour is the one Djinni in either game that deals an attack and has a chance to drop the target's Resistances by a hefty amount (equal to the Weaken Psynergy). This is good flavoring to what is already one of the best attacking Mercury Djinn in the game; a 1.5x damage multiplier is matched only by the later Mercury Djinni Gel (and to compare secondary effects, Gel has a chance to drop the target's Attack rating by 25%; many prefer the sharp drop to resistance towards all forms of element-related assault). Of course, its damage being boosted by a multiplier means that it only gets better as an attacking option over the course of the game, making it valuable at the endgame. It could be attested that the only other Mercury-element attacking Djinni that matches the other two in overall value is Serac, which while doing added damage has a chance to instantly kill the target.

Name Orgin
At first glance, Sour seems like an unlikely name for a Mercury Djinni. However, sourness is the taste that detects acidity. Acids are typically considered liquids or are associated with them, hence the reason Sour is a Mercury Djinni. Acids also corrode, which fits the side effect of the Djinni.