My GBA gameplaying on the trip down was a bit frustrating due to an issue I've seen in RPGs before. I was playing Mario & Luigi Superstar Saga when I stumbled across a boss battle. Now, as far as I'm concerned a console RPG boss battle should have 1 of 3 outcomes:
1) You're not leveled up enough so you simply can't defeat the boss until you've leveled up some more.
2) Due to mistakes or bad judgment the boss kills you, but you'll be able to win if you replay the boss with a better strategy.
3) You beat the boss.
The 4th undesirable outcome is a stalemate between you and the boss. Your attacks aren’t strong enough to overtake the boss healing himself. Theoretically this should eventually result in outcome 1, but due to magic or items (or in the case of M&L, pattern recognition to avoid attacks) your characters don't die. So you can keep fighting this boss 'til the end of time, but you just won't get anywhere. You have to give up, turn off the game and start back at your last save point. Sounds fun, eh?
As a self healing boss I would like to say that your statements are one sided and unfair. Self healing is necessary to counter act the flurry of attacks you deliver in a moment, compared to our single slow attack we are able to deliver every three seconds. It is true the programmers sometimes push too far in our direction. But it might mean that you are not skilled enough to defeat us. Besides we don't get all the super cool powerups and weapons you collect during your journey. We have one maybe two cool strikes we are able to perform.....whooptie flippin' doo.
I'd say give it the 'ol college try, and if you still fail...well then I have nothing left to say.
I played Final Fantasy II on an NES emulator and encountered the same situation at the end. Since I was using an emulator, I had the game saved right before the battle started so I spent perhaps 5 hours fighting the boss. I got so frustrated (and my eyes hurt) so I relented and started over on the previous level and upped my HP/MP, etc. Then, when I went back to fight the last boss, he died in about 3 minutes. So it's really a matter of my impatience costing me time. Kind of ironic, eh?
I do moderately agree with your "no holds barred" attitude toward boss encounters, but I do tend to disagree. Now I don't know the dymanics of Mario and Luigi yet since I have yet to play it, but for the most part bosses follow the same rules you do. Therefore their healing follows the same guidelines: Either Item healing which ends when the items do or Special Ability healing which is dependent on the same medium that regulates your special abilities. Most often this is some form of magic point that will sooner or later wear down
My advice to you would to suck it up and be a man! Try again, play smarter, not harder. And if its true the only way for "you" to win is thru a marathon boss fight, than so be it.
So... so nerdy