A Comprehensive Guide to Qu's Marsh

Basic Information
Location
Quina Quen
The Frog Catching Mini-Game
Frog Drop
Rewards
Master Quale

Basic Information

Qu’s Marsh is the name of several marshland areas located throughout Gaia. You may remember one of them as the setting for the several tutorials the moogles give early in the game. As the name indicates, these places are also sometimes used as homes by the strange Qu creatures.

Location

Qu’s Marshes are found on the Mist Continent, the Outer Continent, the Forgotten Continent, and Salvage Archipelago. The first marsh you have access to is the one on the Mist Continent and can be reached on foot from Lindblum’s Dragon’s Gate on the way to Gizamaluke’s Grotto. It is there you have the option of recruiting Quina.

Quina Quen

Quina Quen can be found trying (with little luck) to catch frogs in the central pond area of the Mist Continent’s Qu’s Marsh. You can recruit him/her by catching a frog by running up to one and pressing X and then talking to him/her. This will trigger a sequence of events that has Quina joining your party. With him/her as part of the team you can take part in the Frog Catching mini-game.

The Frog Catching Mini-Game

The Frog Catching mini-game is quite possibly one of the easiest mini-games in FFIX. To have the option to play you have to do is go to the central pond area of any Qu’s Marsh with Quina in your party.

Catching frogs is simple as all one has to do is run up to one that is out of the water and press X. There will be a limited number of frogs available at any one time at any of the Marshes, and you will have to wait for more to reproduce. The benefits of frog catching is increasing the power of Quina’s Frog Drop Blue Magic spell and the rewards presented by Quina’s Master Quale.

Take note that in some of the Marshes there will be golden frogs as well as green ones. While tempting, try to avoid catching the golden ones as they accelerate the rate at which frogs reproduce.

Frog Drop

Frog Drop is one of the first Blue Magic spells Quina can learn. This spell is conveniently learned from Gigan Toads who live in the Marshes. While the spell may seem weak at first, given enough time and effort it can become one of the most damaging and cost efficient attacks in the game. Being able to do 9999 damage (the maximum possible in this game) at the cost of a mere 10 MP can be very useful indeed.

The damage done by Frog Drop is determined by multiplying the number of frogs caught with Quina’s current level. For example, if Quina is level 25 and has caught 20 frogs then the damage of Frog Drop will be 25 x 20, or 500.

Rewards

The other benefit of catching frogs is that as you catch more, Master Quale will present you with progressively better prizes.

Frogs Caught Prize

2 Ore

5 Ether

9 Silk Robe

15 Elixir

23 Silver Fork

33 Bistro Fork

45 Battle Boots

99 Gastro Fork

The final prize, the Gastro Fork, also happens to be the strongest weapon available to Quina. And given enough patience and dedication you could get before any of the other ultimate weapons for the other characters are available. But just getting 99 frogs isn’t all that you have to do to earn the final prize…

Master Quale

Upon getting 98, or close to 98 frogs make sure you save. Once you catch 99 frogs Master Quale will challenge you to a fight before handing over Quina’s ultimate weapon.

Quale is a level 76 opponent and has a grand total of 65,535 HP, which is the highest HP of any enemy in the game, even more then Ozma (!). He also absorbs Water-based damage.

Fortunately, Quale doesn’t have nearly as much offensive power as Ozma and is a much easier fight. Much of Quale’s offense is in the form of a multitude of individually targeting, single status effect spells, so equip as many abilities that prevent status effects as possible. Quale’s other abilities include Aqua Breath (the same as Quina’s), Water-based Black Magic, and a strong Rolling Attack. Equip armor and add-ons that protect you from water damage and just keep your character’s HP high to deal with the Rolling Attack.

Another thing worth noting is that Quale has a number of rare items on him. Zidane can steal an Elixir, Ninja Gear, Glutton’s Robe, and a Robe of Lords from him. While the first three you may have found elsewhere, there are only a few Robe of Lords in the whole game and they are easily one of the best armors available (especially for mages).

Overall, this fight isn’t too difficult, the only thing you have to worry about is if you forget to save beforehand and/or are unprepared for it. It is likely that given the time it takes to get 99 frogs, your party will be near the end of the game anyway.