Gain ultimate power with this Persona 4 Golden Fusion guide

How does Persona 4 Golden Fusion work? While getting through Atlus' excellent JRPG, you can’t rely on just your original Persona to get by. You’ll need to collect and fuse Personas in order to survive the TV World’s daunting challenges, but some of the aspects of fusion can be a bit… mysterious. 

So that's why I've put together this Persona 4 Fusion guide to demystify the process. Here I'll be breaking down what Fusion is for Persona beginners, how it works, with some tips on how to get the most from this arcane mechanic, create powerful Personas, and take out the monstrous Shadows.

What is Fusion?

In Persona 4 Golden, your main character (MC) is able to hold and equip different Personas. While you start with six Persona slots, as your MC levels up, you’ll be able to hold up to 12. Other party members can't equip any Personas that aren't theirs, although maxing out their Social Ranks has those Personas evolve into a more powerful form.

Due to your MC’s ability to hold multiple Personas, you can ensure you have a versatile selection available to take on different situations. However, Personas quickly outlive their usefulness, so you need to replace them constantly so you're not under-powered. The Persona equipped has an effect on the MC’s stats, and having a low-level Persona in a high-level area will lead to issues.

But if you want more powerful Personas, you'll need to fuse them. Combining two (or more) Personas allows you to make a stronger new one, with some of the skills of its 'parent' Personas. While you can get them through other methods, Fusion is the way to make the most powerful Personas in the game.

How Fusion in Personal 4 Golden works

Fusion is a mechanic you’ll unlock early on. Igor, in the Velvet Room, will combine two or more Personas for you to create a new one, generally of a higher level. This new Persona will get the stats and base skills it normally would, in addition to skills inherited from the Personas that were used.

While you can get new Personas from Shuffle Time after battles, fusing Personas will be the main way to fill out your team. The most powerful Personas of each Arcana are only available via fusion, too, so it's best to commit to collecting and fusing.

Another important aspect of Fusion is Margaret’s Persona Compendium. For a fee, you’ll be able to summon a Persona of the level at which you recorded it. So, if you want to use a Persona for fusing, but still really want said Persona, you can re-summon it again anytime if you have the money.

There are multiple types of Fusions available. At the start, you’ll have access to Normal (2 Personas) and Triangle (3) Fusions. As you process in the game, though, you’ll eventually unlock Cross (4), Pentagonal (5), and Hexagonal (6) Fusions. They get progressively more complicated, but they're the best way to get the most powerful Personas.

Persona 4 Golden Fusion tips

There's quite a bit to get your head around over your hundreds of hours of dungeon crawling, so here are a few more quick Fusion tips to help get you started:

• Register your Persona in the Compendium before doing anything else: This is free, and if you leveled a Persona and it learned new skills, this increases your pool of available skills for Fusion. It’s a good idea to get into the habit of updating the Compendium after every visit to the Velvet Room.
• You can’t create Personas higher in level than the MC: If you’re level 15 and the Persona you want is level 17, you’ll have to beat up some more Shadows before you can fuse it. That said…
• Fusing Personas with the same Arcana as a leveled-up Social Link will give you experience bonuses: The higher the Social Link rank, the better experience boost, and the boost won’t be affected by the MC’s level. So if you’re level 15 and fuse a level 15 Magician Persona with that Social Link at a high rank, you can level the fused Persona up multiple times. It’s also a handy way to buff your MC.
• You don’t need to min-max: You can find Persona Fusions calculators online to get the most from your Fusions, but you won't need it to beat the game on most difficulties.
• Use more advanced Fusions to create the most powerful Personas in the game: For example, Yoshitsune, a Persona well-known in Golden for absolutely wrecking enemies, requires a Pentagonal Fusion with some high-level Personas. But, the reward for using these difficult Fusions are some extremely powerful Personas.