Training in Terra

Wow! I can't believe what incredible luck I just had! I never expected to finish this part so soon. Anyway, now is the time for the detour that defines this path. The reason for the detour is that both Quina and Dagger require a Holy Miter for their leveling, but only one is available at this point. That means one of them has to level up enough so that character will not gain any levels in Pandemonium. This requires a minimum level of 45. Unfortunately, Quina can't afford to gain that many levels without access to Dark Gear, so I have to level Dagger. Furthermore, Dagger needs Minerva's Plate for all her leveling, and the first place that becomes available is in Terra just before reaching Bran Bal. Thus, I have to train her in Terra without the benefit of saving between battles because I can't train anymore once I enter Bran Bal.

I'm already set up the way I need to be for this training, so I got in the airship and flew to Shimmering Island. I kept my party the same when I reached Terra. I had a total of four random encounters before reaching Minerva's Plate. The first one was against two Ring Leaders. Before I could do anything, one of them used Virus Powder on Amarant, inflicting him with Virus status. This was a huge lucky break for me because it made the rest of this whole process much simpler. I revived him and cast Night to put the Ring Leaders to sleep. I then had Zidane and Dagger knock themselves out while Amarant killed the Ring Leaders with one hit each. Quina went up to level 28 as a result of this battle. Leveling Quina at this point is optional, but it helps a lot in the upcoming fight with Abadon. I revived everyone and removed Quina's gear after the battle, giving him a Yellow Scarf and activating Millionaire and Loudmouth with the increased number of magic stones Quina now has available. I fled from the other encounters I had before reaching Minerva's Plate because Quina can't afford to gain any more levels before Pandemonium.

When I got Minerva's Plate, I equipped Dagger with her leveling gear, which is the Magic Racket, Holy Miter, Magic Armlet, Minerva's Plate, and Ribbon. I also activated her Level Up ability, deactivating Loudmouth because she doesn't have enough magic stones yet. I put it back on as well as Ability Up once she had space for it. I then ran around in circles on that screen, getting into battles and leveling Dagger all the while. In another stroke of luck, I never encountered a Mover during the leveling process. Mover is by far the most difficult enemy to deal with here. Hecteyes was easily dealt with by casting Life after Zidane and Quina had knocked themselves out. I took out Ring Leaders using the same strategy detailed above. Between battles, I used Dagger's Life spell to revive everyone, thus saving Phoenix Downs. I also used an Elixir on anyone who got low on MP. I avoided selling my Eye Drops and Echo Screens in Daguerreo so I could use them in case the Ring Leaders inflicted those statuses, but I turned out to not need them. It's still a good idea to keep them, though, because they did it several times in my practice runs.

In case you don't get lucky like I did getting Amarant in Virus status, here is a link to the original strategies as given by camdad04. They work very well, although the Mover strategy relies on a fair amount of luck.

http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/197338-final-fantasy-ix/68411051
The strategies are in post #40.

I gave Dagger the Dark Matter once she reached level 43 because she can only gain 42 levels with the Ribbon. It's ok to do this at level 42 if you're worried that she might go straight to level 44 with the next fight. When she reached level 46, I noticed she was about 16,000 experience away from the next level, so I deactivated Level Up hoping that the next battle would be just enough so put her to the next level while keeping her at least 26,377 experience away from level 48, and it was. This is so she won't gain any levels from Shell Dragon. If Dagger gets too close to level 48 then you'll have to reset because she can't afford to reach that level without a Pearl Rouge. In the process of leveling, Dagger learned Berserk, Mini, Body Temp, Insomniac, and High Tide.

NOTE: Even if you're letting Steiner take Abadon's experience and thus don't need to train Dagger, it would still be a good idea to level her up a bit before entering Bran Bal. This will make the Shell Dragon fight easier.

When the training was complete, I changed Dagger's equipment to give her a Magus Hat, Gaia Gear, and Pumice Piece, activating Chemist, Auto-Potion, and Boost. Make sure you deactivate Level Up at this point if you haven't already! If you're not going to use Shiva, I would recommend giving her the Mythril Racket, Green Beret, Bone Wrist, Power Vest, and Black Belt (taking it from Amarant), and activating Auto-Float. This is to maximize her physical attack damage.

Once she was ready to go, I entered Bran Bal and headed straight to the hut with the moogle. I picked up the Wing Edge, freed the moogle, and picked up the letter. I then sold the spoils from Earth Guardian (Avenger, Rubber Suit, and Phoenix Pinion), and bought 9 Zorlin Shapes, 1 Defender, 1 Bistro Fork, and 1 Adaman Hat. I also bought a few Phoenix Downs, making sure to reserve 2,222 gil for Stiltzkin. If you need more cash, you can sell the items you picked up in Terra except for the Coronet. Also, the Bistro Fork and Adaman Hat are optional. If you can only afford one of the two, I would recommend the Adaman Hat. Don't forget that you can buy the Defender after the forced battles if necessary. The three battles give you a total of 6996 gil. When my shopping was done, I saved with a time of 10:13:46.

EDIT: After looking into it further, I've concluded that Movers will never appear in the screen with Minerva's Plate. Thus, I highly recommend that you not backtrack to any previous screens during Dagger's training. Also, it seems that single Ring Leaders rarely appear here. With this in mind, I looked at all the possible ways to get into one of the experience windows Dagger needs to be in and determined that these two options are the best:

Option 1:
5 battles against 2 Ring Leaders with Level Up
3 battles against Hecteyes with Level Up
1 battle against Hecteyes or 1 Ring Leader without Level Up

Option 2:
4 battles against 2 Ring Leaders with Level Up
6 battles against Hecteyes with Level Up

Both these options give Dagger just enough experience to be at level 47 without gaining a level from Shell Dragon. Option 1 is a bit faster if you can pull it off without having to run away because you got the wrong encounter, but either of these should be doable in a decent amount of time.