What actions cause your SeeD rank to go down?

[Tyrion]

That's my question

[Plectro]

There is a hidden counter in the game that determines your seed rank. You get these "seed points" where every 10 points, you get a seed rank.

You gain 1 point for every kill and you lose 10 points whenever you get paid. So if you don't get kills inbetween payments, your rank will go down.

Then there also are certain events that can change your seed rank:
- Any timer selection (e.g. in the Fire Cavern before Ifrit fight, you get to choose time, if you select too much time, you lose a rank, or in the Missile Silo you get to choose how much time you want to run away, again choosing too much will lower your rank)
- Before you get your rank on Disk 1 during the Seed Exam, there are certain events on the Dollet mission that deduct points, such as: Jumping off of the cliff after Selphie, Hiding in the pub when you're getting chased down by the robot spider, and not pressing X near the dog in the city (if you press X / Action near the dog, it will shoo it away and counts as protecting it from the spider)
- The Timber Mission on Disk 1, where you need to input codes to detach trains. If you do it on the first try, you gain a rank, if you fail, you might lose ranks.
- In a laguna dream where you need to fight a red dragon (minigame with a sword), I believe if you die, you lose a rank as well, but I could be wrong.
- In the Galbadia missile silo event where you infiltrate their base pretending to be galbadian soldiers, if you fight and give away your cover, you will lose ranks.
- In Disk 2 where Galbadia Garden attacks Balamb Garden there is a minigame with Squall where you fight a galbadian soldier on a flying thingie and you get to punch / kick / block, choosing the wrong options in the menu before the fight (i.e. being reckless and trying to run away or ask for help) and losing the fight may get you to lose ranks


There could be more, but these are the ones I am aware of

[SkirmishSlayer]

like YoMomIsANiceLady said. Several aspects play into this, one major one being your behaviour on the field and in battle. If you have the tendency to run from battles a lot, you will notice that your rank will drop. If you never run and fight a lot of enemies, your level will stay the way it is or you will even gain a rank! Furthermore, you should be nice to people and generally perform well in the minigames and missions (such as saving Rinoa quickly on Disc 3, or performing well during the Forest Owl's mission). It doesn't always affect your SeeD rank, but you never know.

[Maniac]

Seed tests increase your level of course.
but as other ppl already said you get points for killing enemys and loose points when getting paid.
But every level has 100 points so after 10 payments you loose 1 level.
But if you fight 10 enemys inbetween you dont loose points and cant loose a level.

thats a pretty good guide for it.
https://www.gamefaqs.com/ps/197343-final-fantasy-viii/faqs/19029

[Tyrion]

Does it have to be Squall? Or can it be any of your party that is a SeeD?