Medallions

Medallions are Y-items that cast a magic spell effect that impacts the entire screen. There are three of them in the game:

• Ether medallion
• Quake medallion
• Bombos medallion

Locations

Ether location

The ether medallion is located at an ancient tablet on Death Mountain, just west of Tower of Hera. Obtaining ether requires the book to translate the tablet as well as a sword that's level 2 or higher.

Unlike many Light World sprites, ether cannot be obtained from its tablet in the rain state Dark World. Instead, the rain state ether tablet will drop an uncollectable bombos medallion.

With major glitches, ether can also be obtained by triggering a dungeon prize drop when your dungeon is Hyrule Castle (including the Sewers) or Castle Tower. For example, this could be done by entering Hyrule Castle and then using EG to go to Lanmolas in Desert. Upon defeating the Lanmolas, the game will drop the ether medallion instead of the blue pendant.

Quake location

The quake medallion is gotten from the catfish in the northeast section of the Dark World overworld. The player needs to throw something into the ring of stones in the water. The catfish will emerge and throw out the medallion.

Without using major glitches, this requires getting to the Dark World portion of the game via defeating Agahnim1, and the player will naturally meet the requirement of a lift upgrade.

With major glitches, players can basically reach catfish whenever they want, except in the rain. Quake is one of the few items that is completely inaccessible in the rain state. Because the rainy Dark World holds Light World sprites, there's no way to speak to the catfish.

Bombos location

The bombos medallions is found at an ancient tablet on a mesa on the east side of the Desert. Ordinarily, this area is inaccessible in the Light World, and the player will need to head west from the Swamp Palace area in Dark World, pass the hammer pegs, and use the mirror to warp onto the bombos tablet mesa.

Using clips, the bombos tablet can be accessed without warping from the Dark World. It can be reached from the Desert, the Desert pass, and the grove entrance screens.

In order to read the tablet and receive the medallion, Link will need a level 2 sword or greater (Master, Tempered, or Gold) and the Book of Mudora.

Description and mechanics

All medallions will cast a spell that effects the entire screen. There will be a pause in the gameplay while the medallion animation happens. Casting a medallion spell costs 32 MP (16 with half magic). Casting any of the medallions requires a sword.

Ether mechanics

Ether casts a freezing spell over the screen. Some enemies will be immediately killed by it, while others will be frozen.

Ether is required for accessing Misery Mire without the use of major glitches. Even with major glitches, skipping ether in a run that requires beating Mire (i.e. runs with All Dungeons as a goal) tends to be very inconvenient as it requires convoluted shelf shift routing. The big exception to this is Swordless, which cannot use ether due to lack of sword.

Quake mechanics

Quake casts an earthquake spell over the screen. Enemies on the screen will either be directly damaged, transformed into a blob, stunned, or unaffected. Most enemies who are "airborne" (like green and blue zirros, for example) can't be damaged by quake.

Quake is required for accessing Turtle Rock without the use of major glitches. With major glitches, this requirement is trivially bypassed in a number of ways. This is because TR has 3 other entrances that don't depend on quake, all of which can be accessed through various glitched means.

Bombos mechanics

Using bombos casts a fire/explosion spell over the screen. This will kill most normal enemies on screen, making it more powerful than the other two medallions.

Unlike the other medallions though, bombos isn't required for opening a dungeon and is an optional item even when the player isn't using major glitches. Because of this, it's almost always skipped in runs unless the goal is 100% or some kind of Max%.

Against Kholdstare, bombos can be used to melt the first phase ice shield. Bombos has no use against bosses other than this.

Medallion tech and glitches

Arming superspeed

Main article: Superspeed

All of the medallions will arm superspeed if they're used with an item dash.

Medallion cancel

A medallion cancel is a minor glitch that causes the magic drain of a medallion to occur but not the spell or its animation. It can be executed by:

• Pressing Y while moving parallel to a pit at its edge, or into the pit
• Pressing Y 1 frame after releasing B for a spin attack
• Pressing Y on the same frame Link jumps into water
• Pressing Y on the same frame Link jumps a ledge (quickhopping works)