Pandemonium Warden

Pandemonium Warden is one of two High Notorious Monsters in Final Fantasy XI (along with Absolute Virtue) to garner special maintenance to weaken its powers. Upon its introduction into Final Fantasy XI, more than 36 players marathon fighting Pandemonium Warden for 18 hours were unable to defeat it. They were forced to retire after members of the party started to become physically ill; after such a prolonged period of gaming, they began to faint and vomit, creating news reports to be filed in argument of the game's User Message present at every login, which states that Square Enix "...does not wish to see [their players'] lives..." suffer as a result of extensive play. Following the 18 hour attempt, the monster (along with Absolute Virtue) was patched to only have a spawn time of two hours, and its overall difficulty was significantly decreased — if not beaten within that time, it despawns and vanishes; also, its satellites no longer have 25,000 HP each, but closer to only 2,400.

Though rewards for felling the Warden are essentially negligible, they are unique to its loot pool, making the ornate weapon and armor models more trophy items than applicable gear choices. Until the update to augment additional damage to Relic Weapons, the Shenlong's Baghnakhs, for example, were a particularly strong hand-to-hand weapon for Monks and Puppetmasters, but no longer hold a fight against a fully-upgraded pair of Spharai. However, with the addition of Mythic Weapons, the Mulcibar's Scoria item that the Warden drops is an essential part of the upgrade process for Mythic Weapons; specifically using 3 to fulfill the Trial of the Magians quests to upgrade the weapons from level 95 to level 99. Garnering an additional 150 scoria for a further Trial will grant the Afterglow effect to the weapon as well.