Ghoul enemy line

The Ghoul, Fiendish Ghoul, and Cannibal Ghoul are enemies that are battled in Golden Sun and Golden Sun: The Lost Age. These monsters, resembling goblin-like humanoids with broken shackles around their wrists, are palette swaps of each other that have differing levels of power and defense and are fought in different locations in the games.

Ghoul
A Ghoul is a light-green-skinned variant with brown pants and purple boots that is level 9 in Golden Sun and level 12 in The Lost Age. In Golden Sun it is battled throughout Bilibin Cave and Mercury Lighthouse. In The Lost Age it is battled throughout Air's Rock and in Alhafran Cave.

In the first game, the ghoul has the highest Attack rating among the monsters in Bilibin Cave by quite a large margin, though it has the second lowest Agility rating. Because this earlier portion of the game can be traversed somewhat nonlinearly and Bilibin Cave and the subsequent areas can be gone through before the much easier Kolima Forest (which ideally you would do first before going through Bilibin Cave), this can prove quite a damaging and sturdy monster to an underleveled party. In the second game, the Ghoul has as much strength and durability as the other monsters it is fought alongside, but its speed is much lower, making it technically the weakest monster in Air's Rock and Alhafran Cave.

A Ghoul's statistics are as follows:

A Ghoul uses these battle commands:

Fiendish Ghoul
A Fiendish Ghoul is a dark-purple-skinned level 17 variant with violet pants and green boots. In Golden Sun only two are fought throughout the entire game, together with the Lich as one scripted boss encounter that occurs on the third "dungeon floor" of the optional Crossbone Isle as soon as you try to enter the door to that floor's puzzle room.

As part of a team of three monsters that is one special encounter, the Fiendish Ghouls are the monsters with more physically offensive brawn, but are quite less durable than the Lich, which acts as general support. Most would not find this battle to be overly difficult, however, even if Crossbone Isle is visited and this battle is fought earlier in the game through the hidden method at Tolbi-bound Ship. This is definitely a battle that can be won in one turn by having everyone use full-powered summonings at the start, but if you decide to battle these the typical way, you should hold off on felling the Fiendish Ghouls until you have either felled the Lich or are reasonably certain that it has used up enough of its PP meter that it wouldn't be able to cast Revive to bring back a Fiendish Ghoul. (Indeed, it is possible, though unlikely, that a Fiendish Ghoul can be brought back to life at full power in this battle.)

A Fiendish Ghoul's statistics are as follows:

A Fiendish Ghoul uses these battle commands:

Cannibal Ghoul
A Cannibal Ghoul is a red-skinned variant with purple pants and green boots that is level 23 in Golden Sun and level 31 in The Lost Age. In Golden Sun it is battled only in Suhalla Gate. In The Lost Age it is battled in the earlier, easier portion of the optional Treasure Isle.

In the first game, the Cannibal Ghoul is only average among the enemies it is fought alongside. It has the ability to summon other Cannibal Ghouls into the battle, but it uses this rarely and often doesn't occur before you defeat it. In the second game it is about the same in these aspects.

A Cannibal Ghoul's statistics are as follows:

A Cannibal Ghoul uses these battle commands: