Shamshir

A Shamshir (グランシャムシール, Guran shamushīru^?, lit. Gran Shamshir) is a Long Sword-class Artifact weapon found throughout the Golden Sun series.

In Golden Sun and The Lost Age

Shamshir (GBA)
Visual effect of Acid Bath
In-Game Description
"Long Sword: Unleashes Acid Bath" (GS) (TLA)
Trade Info
Weapon class	Long Sword
Buy value	10000
Sell value	7500
Artifact?	Yes
Statistic Boosts
Attack Boost	99
Unleash effect
Effect name	Acid Bath
Extra damage	34
Side effect	May decrease the target's Attack rating by 25%
Acquisition
• Sold in Lunpa post-Lunpa Fortress (GS) • Sold in Izumo (TLA)

In Golden Sun, the Shamshir becomes available in the Artifacts menu of the weapon vendor in the village of Lunpa after defeating the boss Toadonpa at the end of the connected Lunpa Fortress. Prior to entering and playing through Lunpa Fortress, the weapon and armor shopkeepers do not sell their wares. When they do open, the artifacts added alongside the Shamshir – the Dragon Axe, Ninja Blade, Demonic Staff, Blessed Robe, and War Gloves – occupy roughly the "tier" of quality and expense in between the previous city of Tolbi and the final settlement of the game, Lalivero.

It is largely recommended to buy each of the three newly introduced weapon artifacts (except for the iffy Demonic Staff) and outfit your three male Adepts with them, since they will offer more Attack points than the weapons randomly acquired by tossing Lucky Medals into Tolbi Spring. However, since the Assassin Blade's Unleash effect is a Venus-aligned, 28-point damage bonus with a 20% chance to instantly down the target, you may prefer to keep that on at least one Adept and save yourself the money on one of the three Lunpa weapon artifacts.

The Shamshir's Unleash effect (with the standard 35% proc rate without equipment like Hyper Boots increasing it further) is Acid Bath (ストロングアシッド, Sutorongu ashiddo^?, lit. Strong Acid), which visually emits a purplish vapor-like cloud when the enemy is struck. The Unleash adds 34 points of damage to the equivalent to a physical attack and aligns it with Mars. It carries a 60% base chance to reduce the target's Attack stat by two 12.5% "stages" for several turns (out of a possible of four stages total); however much Attack is reported as deducted, you can expect the enemy's future physically aligned attack to deal less damage equal to half that value. This attack debuff is more reliable at shoring up your survivability than the Dragon Axe's chance to inflict Delusion.

Since the Shamshir and the Dragon Axe are both weapons with Mars-aligned unleashes and can only be equipped by the warrior-style Adepts Isaac and Garet, if you only need one weapon from Lunpa's Artifacts list for those two Adepts, the Shamshir is largely the better choice. In the first game, the Shamshir is the only weapon with statistics suitable for late-game play whose Unleash effect debuffs the Attack stat, and the only other weapon with an Attack-debuffing Unleash is the much-earlier Arctic Blade. Since Isaac does not have good Mars Power while in his Venus-aligned Squire class series, and Garet, who does have good Mars Power, is in the less hard-hitting Guard class series by default, swapping Djinn between them to become the high-Attack Brute class series will provide more of a damage bonus for Acid Bath in either Adept's case.

In Golden Sun: The Lost Age, the Shamshir becomes one of a good number of artifacts that become available for purchase among the four settlements that become accessible all at once when you first start sailing around in the Eastern Sea. In Izumo specifically, you can buy the Shamshir and fellow "Lunpa artifacts" Ninja Blade and War Gloves in the item shop. If you make a beeline for Izumo, these would amount to strong and solid upgrades to the weapons you would start off the Eastern Sea with (the 76-Attack Disk Axe would be your strongest weapon at that point). However, in addition to weapon artifacts you will find in dungeons for "free", such as the 110-Attack Mist Sabre, you will be spending a lot of money bringing Forgeable items and Rusty items to the Blacksmith in Yallam to acquire your weapon Artifacts, which will steadily reach higher Attack ratings than the Shamshir.

That said, the Shamshir continues to be the only weapon with its sort of Attack rating throughout much of The Lost Age that can produce an unleash that is likely to drop the target's Attack. The only other weapons capable of such are the Storm Brand (a weaker sword that is nearly identical to the first game's Arctic Blade) and the Salamander Rod (a late-game staff that can only be equipped by caster-style Adepts, and cannot even be wielded by warriors at all). This gives the Shamshir a niche in that it can be considered for its strikes' occasional Attack-dropping side effect throughout much of the Eastern Sea arc of the game. While the Shamshir can be wielded by Felix and Piers, since Piers does not have any decently high-Attack classes, only Felix can wield the Shamshir effectively – which becomes much more true if his class series is set to the Brute class series like in the previous game.

In Golden Sun: Dark Dawn

Shamshir (DD)
The DS model of the Shamshir
In-Game Description
"Weapon: Long Sword" (DD)
Trade Info
Weapon class	Long Sword
Buy value	10000
Sell value	7500
Artifact?	Yes
Statistic Boosts
Attack Boost	99
First Unleash effect
Effect name	Power Charge
Extra damage	x1.4
Side effect	May drop target's defense by 25%
Second Unleash effect
Effect name	Fearless Attack
Extra damage	x1.7
Side effect	May reduce target's HP to 1
Third Unleash effect
Effect name	Acid Bath
Extra damage	34
Side effect	May decrease the target's Attack rating by 25%
Acquisition
• Sold in Tonfon (DD)

In Golden Sun: Dark Dawn, the Shamshir is only sold as an artifact in Tonfon, which means that it will only become available as of the last third of the game set across the Eastern Sea, at a point when you already would have found free artifacts such as the 114-Attack Giant Axe and even the 100-Attack Sword of Dusk. Even if you were to somehow have missed those, you will have many opportunities to acquire stronger artifacts free of monetary cost while playing through the Eastern Sea, such as by bringing Forgeable items to the Blacksmith in Champa. In a later dungeon, you can find the 168-Attack Gaia Blade for Matthew, and Tyrell (a Mars Adept) will be the only other Adept out of the eight comprising your party who can equip long swords.

The randomized nature of the Unleash system in Dark Dawn makes it more difficult to capitalize on a specific Unleash because a given weapon will randomly choose between one of multiple Unleashes whenever it is procced. In the Shamshir's case, while it retains Acid Bath as its signature (and exclusive) unleash once mastered, two prior Unleashes can be chosen between: Power Charge (パワーチャージ, Power Charge^?), which deals a Mars-aligned attack with 40% more damage and a 70% chance to lower the target's Defense by two 12.5% "stages", and Fearless Attack (すてみのいちげき, Sutemi no Ichigeki^?, lit. Desperate Blow), which deals 70% more damage (without any elemental alignment) and has a 35% base chance to lower the target's HP to 1 if it survives.

The above results in the Shamshir starting out as already a fairly outclassed stopgap weapon for either Matthew or Tyrell with a vague niche in that two of its three Unleashes are capable of lowering a primary stat on an enemy (whereas many other weapons are even more randomized due to having four Unleashes in total to randomly pick between). Other sources of Attack-debuffing Unleashes include the Dragon Bow for Karis and Amiti and several Fist and Claw weapons for Sveta.

Gallery of Dark Dawn unleashes

• 

  Power Charge

• 

  Fearless Attack

• 

  Acid Bath

Etymology

A shamshir is a type of sword with a long curved blade originating from Persia that came into prominence between the 12th and 16th centuries.