How to Master Weapon Abilities in Final Fantasy VII Rebirth

In Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, you can permanently unlock Weapon Abilities for your teammates if you follow the right steps in combat. This guide will explain how to master Weapon Abilities in Final Fantasy VII Rebirth.

How to get Weapon Abilities in FF7 Rebirth

At first, Mastering Weapon Abilities seems pretty straightforward in FF7 Rebirth, as the game explains the feature early on in a Chapter 1 tutorial. Use Cloud’s weapon enough times in combat, and you will eventually get proficient enough to unlock its ability permanently for him. However, what happens if you want to master Weapon Abilities for your teammates?

Many players will encounter this problem the first time they discover a new weapon for Tifa, Aerith, Barret, or Red XIII and realize they haven’t mastered their previous weapon’s abilities. After spending 100 hours in Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, we’ve only found two ways to do this. However, we are going to split up both methods for early-game and mid-to-late-game.

Master Weapon Abilities in FF7 Rebirth – Early Game Method

Here is how to master Weapon Abilities in Final Fantasy VII Rebirth:

• Equip the Weapon you want to master from the “Materia & Equipment” menu.
• Jump into battle with any enemy, and press “left” or “right” on the D-Pad to switch characters.
• Swap from Cloud to the teammate with the weapon you want to become proficient with.
• While controlling your teammate, press “X” on your controller to access the “Command Menu” and then click “Abilities.”
• In the Abilities menu, select your character’s Weapon Ability and use it in combat against the enemy.
• Repeat the steps above, and keep using your teammate’s Weapon Ability until you get proficient enough to unlock it permanently.

The first step you need to take to master weapon abilities is to select the character you want to focus on. Pause your game and navigate to the “Materia & Equipment” menu. From here, swap the weapon you want to master on the character you will progress. In this example, I used Aerith.

You can tell whether a weapon’s ability has been mastered by the yellow check mark next to it. You are good to go if your teammate’s weapon already has the check mark. If it doesn’t have it, you will need to get proficient with it.

Explore any section of the game with enemies in the overworld and dive into battle. Once the fight has started, pause combat, and then switch from Cloud to your teammate using “left” or “right” on your controller’s D-Pad.

Now that you are controlling your teammate, spam their basic attack to earn ATB. Once you have enough points to use their ability, you want to pause combat again with the “X” button and then click the “Abilities” menu. I switched to Aerith for this guide example and used her Weapon Ability, “Chrono Aegis.”

Once you’ve used your Weapon Ability enough time in combat, you should see a message on the screen saying that “character has become proficient with X weapon.” If unsure, you can also go back to the “Materia & Equipment” menu and look for the yellow check mark next to the weapon.” One trick to speed this process up is to use the “Weapon Proficiency Bonus.”

Completing set tasks in battle will give you extra points that help you master abilities more quickly. In the Weapon menu, the bonus is listed under the item’s description. So, for Aerith’s Chrono Aegis ability, for example, the Profieicney Bonus can be triggered by “Striking an enemy and inflicting Stop” on them.

Master Weapon Abilities in FF7 Rebirth – Late Game Method

The more efficient way to master Weapon Abilities in Final Fantasy VII Rebirth is to use the Auto-Weapon Ability Materia, which is unlocked once you reach the Corel Region. More specifically, you will need to progress the campaign past the Costa Del Sol section and hike through Mt. Corel.

Once you make your way to Barret’s hometown in North Corel, Chadley will sell you the Auto-Weapon Ability Materia for 30 Corel Region Data Points. However, buying the special materia is only half the battle, as there is a specific method you will need to use, which we will explain below:

• Pause your game and click the “Materia & Equipment” menu.
• Once here, select the character whose ability you want to master and equip the “Auto-Weapon Ability” materia on their weapon or accessory slot.
• Next, go to the “Combat Settings” menu and navigate to the character’s “Set Shortcuts” menu.
• Set the Weapon Ability you want to master to the L1 + Square, L1 + Triangle, L1 + Circle, and L1 + X slots. Duplicate the move across all 4 shortcuts.
• Go into any battle with enemies, and your character will now automatically use their Weapon Ability due to the new materia slotted and Shortcuts set.

The first step may take players hours to reach, as you can’t unlock the Auto-Weapon Ability Materia until Chapter 6: Fool’s Paradise. After you hike through Mt. Corel and make your way through Yuffie’s mine section, you will eventually arrive at Barret’s hometown in North Corel. Speak to Chadley in this makeshift village, where he will now start selling you the ability material we need.

You can find the location where Chadley sells Auto-Weapon Ability Materia on the map below:

If you have already been doing World Intel outside of Costa del Sol, you should already have 30 Corel Region Data Points. However, if you don’t have enough, then go around the map and complete Remnawave Tower, Lifespring, or Fiend Battle intel. Once you have the 30 Data Points, purchase the Auto-Weapon Ability Materia from Chadley in North Corel town.

Now that you have the materia, it’s time to equip it! Pause your game and click the “Materia & Equipment” menu. For this example, I am using Aerith’s Ceremonial Staff to get her ATB Ward Weapon Ability. In the weapon menu, click the “Triangle” button and then equip your Auto-Weapon Ability Materia in an empty slot.

This next step is really important. With the Auto-Weapon Ability Materia now slotted in, navigate to the “Combat Settings” menu. Here, you are going to want to change all four Shortcut slots to the Weapon Ability you are trying to master. The reason for this, is your Auto-Weapon Ability Materia uses the abilities set to your shortcuts.

Having all shortcuts have the same ability will force your character to use only that ability and nothing else. So, for this example, I have set all of Aerith’s shortcuts to “ATB Ward.” Now, when I enter battle, she will use ATB Ward automatically anytime she has enough points to use the spell.

Finally, it’s time to drop into the open-world regions and start battling random enemies. If you’ve done everything correctly, you will notice your teammates using their Weapon Ability automatically without having to switch to them manually. This is the most efficient method if you don’t want to manage your team.

However, it’s still technically faster to manually switch to other characters. This is the quickest way to do it because you can spam the weapon ability more when you play the character. Still, the Auto-Weapon Ability Materia is an incredibly useful option in the game’s late-game sections when you might not want to swap off Cloud while in difficult encounters.

Final Fantasy VII Rebirth is now available exclusively for PlayStation 5.