Limit Breaks
How To Get New Limit Breaks
Getting new Limit Breaks may seem to happen completely at random, but it's actually anything but. There are only two ways to get limit breaks: Either using old ones or killing enemies.
For the first limit break of each level, you must kill a set number of enemies. When I say "you," I mean the character who you want to get the limit break... If the killing blow (previous damage doesn't matter) doesn't come from that character, it'll count as someone else's "kill." The magic number here is eighty, except for Vincent, who only needs to kill sixty to advance a level. So kill that many enemies to get your character his or her first level 2 limit break, and kill another eighty to get their first level 3 limit break.
It's even simpler to get the second limit break of each level. All you need to do is use the first limit break of that level eight times. For example, you'll get Cloud's Cross Slash when you use Braver eight times, and you'll get Climb Hazard when you kill eighty enemies. As you can see, this means that there's no set order for getting limit breaks, so make sure you come back for the ones you miss!
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Rigging The Limit Break Process
So now that you know where limit breaks come from, you can rig the process to get them as quickly as possible. Obviously, the best way to get the former type of limit break is to use that character a lot in battle. In order to ensure they'll hit the eighty total as fast as possible, make sure whatever character you're trying to raise has a couple of attack spells linked up to All materia, or a summon spell or two. The absolute best place to slaughter for enemies is early in the game, in the Mythril Mine. The enemies here are weak, and attack in large packs, ensuring plenty of kills for all.
To get the second limit breaks quickly, you'll need to ensure that the character gets hit enough to make them use their limit break eight times. One great way to do this is to give them the "Cover" materia, which will ensure that they take a disproportionately large amount of the hits. Or, you can put everyone else in the back row, where they'll be less likely to be targeted.
But the best way to do it is to use hypers on all of your characters, all of the time. As long as they're, uh, hyper, their limit gauge will charge up twice as fast. True, they'll miss their target a bit more often (that's a side effect of the anger condition), but that's a small price to pay to get the limit breaks early.
Oh, and since Cloud is the most powerful character in the game, and must always be in your party, he'll get limit breaks quicker than anyone else. Be aware of this, and make sure he gives up most of his easy kills to the weaker characters, and don't waste powerful, limit break-raising materia like Counter Attack and Cover on him unless you really need to.
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Level 4 Limit Breaks
Cait Sith has only two limit breaks, and Vincent has four (one for each level). Otherwise, every character in FFVII has seven limit breaks, with two in levels 1-3, and one in level 4.
The level 4 limit breaks must be found, either by fulfilling events, winning them as prizes, finding them in chests, or receiving them from defeated bosses. They're items that go in your inventory, and with weird names like "Cosmo Memory." You can use them at any time, but the character to whom they belong won't be able to master the technique unless that character has already mastered all six other limit breaks, so you won't be able to use them right away.
One other note about limit breaks: It gets harder and harder to charge each level, making level 3 & 4 limit breaks much harder to charge than level 1 limit breaks. So if you try equipping a level 1 limit break late in the game, it'll be charged in only a few hits. You might actually want to try this, as old limit breaks do get more powerful as your character goes up levels, and many will hit the 9999 barrier that is the maximum amount of damage a single hit can do!
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Raising Your Characters
Obviously, you'll get both types of limit breaks much faster if you use the same three characters throughout the game. So... should you? I like to rotate my characters just for variety, but if you're more concerned about winning, there are benefits to that strategy.
Just keep in mind that you will be required to play every character (except for Vincent) at various points in the game, so you may run into trouble if that character is ridiculously weak. Inactive characters do get 50% of the experience that active characters get, but they can't get limit breaks that way.
FFVII Basics
Icy Brian's Final Fantasy VII Page
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