- Location
- Alberta
Cecil right before arriving here: "Well, at least this day can't get any worse."
Let's Play Every Final Fantasy Game In Order Of Release [Now Finished: Final Fantasy Tactics]
- Thread starter Omicron
- Start date
- Let's Play
Guile
Having a really great time right now
It's probably a good thing this is the order of cause and effect, but I really want a version of the game where these two events are reversed.
Baron isn't in the right with its war crimes, but you could see the reasoning after the ceaseless and brutal magic nerd bullying its jocks have endured.
Or else imagine the opening scene on the Red Wings' ship, all the serious soul searching and 'Are we the baddies?' dialogue would have been better coming from a bunch of toads and pigs, plus that one guy who got poisoned from pillaging the beer.
Baron isn't in the right with its war crimes, but you could see the reasoning after the ceaseless and brutal magic nerd bullying its jocks have endured.
Or else imagine the opening scene on the Red Wings' ship, all the serious soul searching and 'Are we the baddies?' dialogue would have been better coming from a bunch of toads and pigs, plus that one guy who got poisoned from pillaging the beer.
Rushanaq's revengeance.
Zap Rowsdower
Ex-cultist vagrant
- Location
- Bright lights, big city
- Pronouns
- He/Him
The item is diet rations, but the only source of them is random drops for another couple towns.
Kuja
I'M A SQUIIIID
- Location
- AZ
- Pronouns
- He/Him
30-50 Feral Hogs Tear Through Mysidia, Steal Water Crystal
Local Wizard Who Spammed Pig Spell a 'fucking idiot' Says Elder
Another change in the 3d version. They won't do that to you. They will just taunt you about the spell/poison they inflicted on you.
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Vocalist
Verdant Maiden in Violet
- Location
- By a Cedar Tree
Aww, I can't decide if that's worse or better.
Kadmus
Dragon's teeth are surprisingly hard to sow
- Location
- Devon
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Prompted by this thread I've been doing my run through FFI and man, there are some real D&D 1st Edition-ass encounter designs in this fucking game. It's all fine until you run into a thousand birds that can both petrify and instakill you.
Final Fantasy IV, Part 6
- Location
- Brittany, France
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Appropriate to its aesthetic as a non-militarized society and their defeat at the hands of Baron, Mysidia doesn't have a castle, but rather a kind of fortified central townhouse:
I just want to highlight that it's a really neat piece of design. The townhouse has a wall and a fortified gate around a large mansion, so it's not like the Mysidians are completely oblivious to the dangers of the world, but this place is friendlier, less overwhelming than Damcyan or Fabul's towering gothic fortresses.
And inside this townhouse, we meet a sadly familiar face.
Yeah, remember that guy? It's the same elder from the intro cutscene - the one Cecil shoved aside, but did not kill, before seizing the Wind Crystal.
Understandably, he's none too pleased with Cecil's reappearance - but, as the elder, he is more willing to actually listen to him make his case than the rest of the townsfolk.
"My name is Cecil," he says. "I am the former commander of the Red Wings. At that time, I did not have the courage to go against my king's orders…"
Quite fairly, the Elder tells him "Words will not bring back our dead." Then, after a moment of somber resignation from Cecil, "However… I can see that you have changed. Perhaps it would not be a waste of time to hear what you have to say."
Cecil explains about Golbez, Baron's quest for the crystals, the Leviathan attack, his being separated from his friends. The Elder declares that this must be a test, and Cecil must prove himself worthy…
Cecil protests that he doesn't have time, his friends are in danger, but the Elder is adamant that he cannot go on as he is and must fight "with purity" and pursue the great fate to which he is destined - and become a paladin.
I knew this particular twist was coming, but it's definitely interesting in context. We've never seen the paladin named as such in FF before, but we've definitely seen its vibe before - in the Knight of FF1 and FF3; a powerful warrior, wielding swords and heavy armors, in one case wielding white magic alongside its combat prowess, in the other protecting others with its own body. But this framing, making it the antithesis of the Dark Knight, a warrior of light to its warrior of darkness, purified from the corrupting influence of the dark sword, is new. And again we come back to the darkness as corruptive, leading to a "darkening of one's heart," and I really wish we had more insight into Cecil's backstory and the training process that goes into becoming a dark knight.
Cecil resigns himself to this duty, and the Elder declares that the journey will be too dangerous for a lone dark knight, and summons…
That's right. FFIV is not yet down with magical child prodigies with an attitude!
Palom and Porom are twins, still apprentices - although Palom claims himself 'the greatest mage in all Mysidia' - and tasked with accompanying Cecil to Mt Ordeals, where he can redeem his dark blade. Palom and Porom have a clear sibling dynamic; Palom is overconfident and casually familiar, Porom is polite and respectful except when she's smacking her brother on the head for being a twat. Palom is a black mage, Porom is a white mage.
In many ways they presage FFXIV's Alphinaud and Alisaie, only with personalities and skillsets swapped between the brother and sister.
These two, for the uninitiated.
The Elder command the twins do everything in their power to assist Cecil, and the mages around him declare that, should Cecil succeed in becoming a paladin, he will have earned their trust. Talking to other characters in the town causes them to scoff at Cecil and declare there's no way a monster like him could ever become a paladin - as well as one black mage revealing that dark swords are ineffective against the undead, and that Mt Ordeals is infested with undead, which…
Yeah, this probably isn't a deliberate assassination plot, but if Cecil whiffs massively at Mt Ordeals and dies to a bunch of dark-immune zombies I doubt the Elder will shed a tear.
I've rarely seen a portrait convey "full of [thoughts of crime]" that strongly before.
Palom and Porom's Command list is… interesting. Palom has Black Magic, "Bluff," and "Twincast." Porom has White Magic, "Cry," and "Twincast." Bluff is a self-buff that increases Palom's Magic stat, ensuring his next spells hurt more. I have no idea what Cry does. Twincast, meanwhile, is a shared ability; if you select it from one of the twins, both of them have it as their next action. They essentially synchronize to cast a single spell - either Pyro, which explodes at every opponent on the screen, or Comet, which rains starfall on every opponent but... appears to do less damage, despite having a smaller chance to proc? Not sure what's up with that.
"Comet" being a powerful finisher spell is something else that will come up again later in the series.
The damage on Pyro and Comet is fearsome, and Palom and Porom's spell lists are pretty well-stocked, especially as soon as they start gaining levels. The main problem is the twins run out of MP quickly. And that they are made of tissue paper - look at these HP counts.
The result is that failing to approach basic random encounters as life-or-death situations to be solved with maximal efficiency results in things like this:
A barely-avoided wipe, long after both Palom and Porom went down, to a single monster.
As a result, the long, winding peninsula that takes us to Mt Ordeals requires a few tries to get through. Quite simply there's no alternative to grinding levels for Porom and Palom until they have enough HP to survive being sneezed at.
Thankfully, we find a Chocobo Forest, alongside the series' first alternate-color chocobo; the white chocobo restores all your MP, allowing for infinite grinding thanks to Porom's healing.
Mt Ordeals is…
…you know what, I'm starting to wonder what is up with the dungeon environments in this game? Dungeons in past games were often very samey, but they often introduced slight tweak or gimmick. Worst-case scenario, it was a shade of grey instead of the shade of brown of the previous dungeon, but more often we had "water-strewn corridors" or "foliage hanging from the ceiling" to add a bit of pep, you know? But Mt Ordeals looks exactly identical to every mountain/cave in the game so far:
If that's because the game simply couldn't afford the resources after it spent so much elsewhere, well, that's fair, I know I would rather have more character diversity than slightly color-shifted dungeons, but it's still disappointing.
That big flame to the left, by the way, is blocking the entrance and is why we needed Palom with us.
Palom casts Blizzard, smothering the flames, and gloats about it - "Ha! Too easy!" only to be quickly smacked on the head by his sister, "who reminds him that "The elder taught us not to submit to arrogance!"
These two are fun. They're a simple yet effective comedic duo.
But then, the game decides to do a dramatic cut-away!
Is this the first cutaway to a villainous scene happening while the heroes are busy elsewhere? I feel like it's the first. Like, I pretty sure I've thought in the past, "what this game needs is some cutaway scenes to the villains doing villainous things." It was direly missing from FF2 to give us some internal texture to Palamecia, and FF3's Xande might have benefited from some to give him some actual character. Between introducing Golbez in person early and giving him that kind of scene, FFIV is really doing leaps and bounds to properly build up its antagonist.
Can't say I'm a huge fan of Rosa being literally tied up to some kind of pole, though.
Golbez commands "Come forth, Scarmiglione!" and an ominous figure in yellow (although not too ominous - it's using the same generic "robe with spooky eyes in a dark hood" sprite previous games have been using to show monsters in dungeon that would trigger a fight if interacted with), which introduces itself as "Scarmiglione of Earth, at your command." So we're starting our new quartet of elemental fiends, looks like.
I wonder how Golbez knows such things. Does he have powers of far-sight? He's really giving off a Sith Lord vibe here. And his way of putting things - "Cecil aspires too much," "clip his wings," really comes across as someone who would have been content with Cecil living on as a miserable wretch whose dark power could not harm him, but who sees his aspiration to paladinhood as an annoyance to be stamped out. He orders Scarmiglione to dispose of Cecil, as "his dark sword will be all but useless against your undead," and Scarmi promises to come back with Cecil's head.
Scarmiglione disappears, and Golbez engages in some good old-fashioned Evil Lord In His Lair banter with his highest-ranking minion, Kain.
Kain warns him not to underestimate Cecil, and Golbez asks if he is questioning his judgement; after all, Scarmiglione is one of the "four Elemental Lords," and will not fail.
Oh, hey. So that's our translation for Shitenno here. Not "Four Fiends," but "Elemental Lords," which immediately gives them a loftier vibe. Golbez also announces that "Rosa and I will delight in watching Cecil's demise," which, hm.
I'm not sure what definition of "demise" you're using, here. Especially as Rosa is still tied up to that weird technological contraption which, by the way, not sure why this place is looking like the interior of the Dreadnought! And where is the King of Baron in all this? Yeah, it's been obvious Golbez was the one calling the shots since he showed up in Fabul, but… I have the feeling when we get to Baron things will be even more fucked than we expect.
Kain begs to be allowed to be the one to slay Cecil, but Golbez tells him to just be glad he's alive after his failure. Rosa whispers Cecil's name, and we end the cutaway.
Pretty basic as far as these scenes go, one of a thousand similar cutaways to an evil lord ordering his minions to go kill the hero and having some spooky exchange with his general. But as far as new introductions to the series, it's great, it adds something that was very much needed, expands the audience POV beyond the hero's own two eyes, gives the villains a little life and internal strife…
It Just Works.
End cutaway, back to Mt Ordeals.
I'm going to cut away most of the gameplay, but I have more general thoughts.
On Mt Ordeals and Dark Knights
I think it's really interesting that Cecil's final journey as a Dark Knight has to be done with Palom and Porom.
Cecil has to face Mysidia, and his journey to become a Paladin, without moral support. When he's talking to the Mysidians and suffering their spells and mischief, there can't be anyone around who tells him "hey man, I've been with you for a while, I know you're a standup dude." And similarly, his ascent of Mt Ordeals and confrontation with his inner darkness is a personal task, not one where his companions supporting him would feel appropriate.
But that creates a double obstacle for the game. One is narrative; the game's greatest strength is in its character writing. Having Cecil go it alone would mean giving up that strength. I would do that - but I wouldn't do it there. A whole game's worth of character writing and cool dynamics suddenly cut off by a journey of somber solitude is something that works when you're at least ¾ of the way in and it really hits the heartstrings, not when you're before the halfway point. And the other is mechanical; Cecil isn't self-sufficient for any kind of challenging content. The game is, like all FF games, reliant on the balance of multiple character classes supporting each other. Cecil is powerful, but he has zero utility and zero self-sustain ability. The whole thing would come down to how many hi-potions you remembered to buy, and even then, it would have to be way toned down in difficulty to make sure Cecil can hack it.
Which is why Palom and Porom are such a clever addition, in my opinion. They're fun, they have a great character dynamic, but they don't care about Cecil. They're here to help him on the elder's orders (and definitely to observe him and see if he's actually worthy), but they have no established relationship and very little stakes in whether his trial succeeds - as residents of Mysidia, they're more likely to watch him in judgement than in hope. Which is perfect here. It means they don't distract from the weight of Cecil's personal journey and hope for change, but also there are still character shenanigans happening. And mechanically, they provide the mechanical support Cecil needs to operate optimally. They're a great compromise, IMO, and if I learn that actually there is some kind of fandom-wide consensus that they suck and should not be there I will look at you all, shake my head silently, and do a 'tsk tsk' sound..
Which actually is a great opportunity to segue into: Dark Knight. We're about to have Cecil swap this class out from another. So, how did it perform, overall?
It's good. Dark knight is a simple, but elegant design, that especially shines because once Kain leaves the stage, Cecil is always the only physically-focused character in a party of bards and mages. He hits hard, he has tons of HP, he has high defense. Even as just an attackbot, he's effective at taking out one enemy per turn or dealing significant boss damage, all he needs is some support to let him sustain without taking turns using healing items. And his Darkness Command is well-designed for the gameplay range it covers. It is effective at dealing with large numbers of enemies, and while its HP cost means it isn't costless, Cecil's huge HP pool means it's never a stupid move; you have to assess the situation and trust your judgement, but using Darkness is often a sound tactical move. It has only one big issue… It can't perform as a tank. It has no ability to control aggro, that is to say to draw enemy attacks to itself or protect comrades in danger. The Dark Knight is fundamentally selfish and can only ensure its own survival and the death of the enemy.
But it's also running out of gas. It's lasted pretty much as long as it could. Cecil doesn't gain new abilities as he levels, and there isn't much depth to his current setup. The main character of the game can't just keep that simple a setup in a post-FF3 world, because he is effectively running an FF3 class without the ability to swap jobs as needed to vary the group's skillset or evolve his own. He's getting a class change and, as much as it saddens me because Dark Knight is conceptually fucking sweet, gameplay-wise it's the right move.
But, for its last stretch, Dark Knight is getting one hell of a workout. "The dark blade cannot hurt the undead" was something of an overstatement; effectively it depends on the specific flavor of enemy. The "zombie" chain take only 1 damage from any direct attack from Cecil (unless he crits), but Darkness seems to work well enough; the "skeleton" chain and "spirit" chain seem to take, if not normal damage, then at least enough to hurt. The 'spirit' chain are the same as the 'red soul' from FF2 - they're floating ghosts that absorb almost any magic sent their way but have low HP, and a single Darkness can wipe a whole screen of them. These undead usually appear in mixed formations, requiring some tricky planning, especially given that the game nerfed the "healing spells used against undead" compared to the previous ones and so Porom isn't that much use offensively.
Climb high enough, though, and we find a familiar face…
Cecil, of course, has no idea what a 'Meteor' is, but we recognize it from FF3 as the ultimate spell that more or less took the place of FF2's Ultima (and which endgame enemies loved to spam), and Porom and Palom recognize it as a secret magic and identify the sage as Tellah, who hails from Mysidia and is known to them.
Tellah, it turns out, did a small detour on his way to kill Golbez to claim the ultimate destructive magic for himself (Porom and Palom do their routine where Palom is excited to have found out who this "old man" is and Porom smacks him again and tells him to be respectful to his elders, then Palom nearly immediately blurts out that they're here to spy on Cecil and gets smacked again for his trouble. I love them.) Porom protests that Meteor is too strong for a man his age to wield, but Tellah says he has little concern for his own life it can bring down Golbez. He's similarly resolute and stubborn as he was back in Damcyan, but he has thankfully tamped down the burning anger and hostility.
Cecil explains the situation with Rosa, his disappeared companions, and his paladin quest.
This is notably the first time Cecil himself acknowledges the dark sword as something sinister whose influence he would like to be rid of.
Tellah concludes that if this mountain holds the key to something has important as the power of a paladin, then he must have been right about his hunch that it also contained the secret of Meteor, and joins forces with the party.
Now with the great sage Tellah in our party, the rest of Mt Ordeals is a piece of cake!
It's a nearly total slaughter.
Okay, so, like, even having leveled up the Twins some, they're still babies. Tellah, despite his status as sage, actually has the weakest spell list of all three, because he basically only know bottom-tier attack spells like Fire and his Recall command is largely useless. Throw in the way Cecil's attacks whiff against zombies while spells only make the Souls stronger, and a screen like that is just a nightmare.
Making it the rest of the way requires some wrangling, but eventually we manage. Porom starts hearing sounds and yelling at Palom to cut the crap, and Palom protests that he's not doing anything, until Tellah declares he senses an evil presence…
I wonder why both Lich and Scarmiglione have been associated with undeath. If I had to hazard a guess, it would be because of burial - the Fiend/Elemental Lord of Earth lays claims to all that is within the ground, and that includes the dead answering his command. It's a really compelling association, but one I've rarely seen in other media; usually death/undeath is treated as its own domain separated from the earth.
These Skullnants have the power to cast Drain, inflicting low damage to heal themselves, and Scarmiglione can order them to "Tear them apart!" to give all his minions a second attack in a turn. On top of that, they're from the zombie family, so they're immune to Cecil's basic attack.
Not immune to a Twincast Pyro, though, which wipes out the zombies in short order while inflicting heavy damage on Scarmi, who is now exposed to Cecil's attack, and is very much not an undead himself.
"What's happening to me?" Scarmiglione shouts, uncomprehending, then succombs. The group advances across the bridge.
I absolutely do not trust that this small sprite of a faceless figure clad in a shroud was all that we had to expect from the Elemental Lord of Earth, though, so I save and top up my characters before taking one step forward, and wouldn't you know it…
Granted, the back attack is a nasty surprise. If you forgot, it means rows are reversed. Palom and Porom are now in the front row taking full damage, and Cecil is in the back row dealing half damage. A nasty situation to be in, and to top it off, his attacks inflict status effects like Poison.
Unfortunately for Scarmiglione, I've realized at this point that since Tellah is useless on the offense but good on the defense (he has Cura) and that Twincast's MP cost is not so high that I can't spam it for one entire battle, he is eating Pyros to the face every turn while Cecil keeps doing way more damage than I expected from the back row, and the fiend is dealt with in short order.
Falling from the bridge is a convenient means of disposing of the fiend without having to answer the question of what "my true strength lies in death" means and whether he might have been able to come back from that defeat. Dead or not, he's at the bottom of the mountain now.
This is it. The summit of Mt Ordeals. The Elemental Lord of Earth is defeated, and nothing stands in the way. Cecil approaches this standing stone…
"Long have I awaited you," says the voice, "and much sorrow have I endured. I shall now entrust you with my strength. In doing so, my pain will only grow, but there is no other way..."
This whole sequence here is so intriguing and also really cool. The voice talking here is not the impersonal voice of the crystals from FF1 and FF3; it is directly calling out to Cecil, calling him its son, and saying that helping him, while necessary, will cause it great pain. There's something going on here and it's just as unclear what it is to Cecil as it is to me - and none of the mages are chiming in to explain.
And Cecil's dark sword and armor are exchanged - magically - for the gold-white hue of a Paladin, taking what I'm pretty sure are direct cues from Amano's design for the WW1 Warrior of Light - long blue-white hair, cape, the style of armor… A warrior of light stands before us renewed, but before he can truly complete his transformation, he must face one final challenge.
The party steps forward, ready to face this new foe, but Cecil tells them to stand back, for this is his battle, and one he must fight alone to atone for his wrongs.
Ooooh yeah that's the good stuff. What's there to say? Seeking atonement, Paladin!Cecil must face the shadow of his former crimes in the form of his past self as a Dark Knight. And that Dark Knight isn't shy about drawing on their terrible power, casting Darkness every turn. Cecil's attacks deal about the same damage as the Dark Knight's Darkness, and while he can cast Cure on himself, it doesn't outpace the DRK's damage. It seems a battle that could go down to the wire… Until…
Oh my god. Of course. The mark of a true Paladin isn't that it can kill stuff even harder than a Dark Knight could. That would be literally the opposite of the intended lesson. A paladin protects. That is the whole point. And you can't kil your past. You can't stab your sins in the face and make them go away. Cecil can atone for his crimes, but ultimately it's up to others to forgive him or not. He can't make the Dark Knight vanish. He can't kill it. He must sheathe his sword and allow that shadow to exist.
Which, mechanically, means taking the Defense action as the Dark Knight whacks you in the face with Darkness once, twice…
…and stops.
"One day," it says, "you will see."
We've passed the test.
The mirror shows him his reflection as a Dark Knight this is so good. Cecil begs the spirit not to go, but it changes into Cecil's true reflection, and only then does the game chime in to say "Cecil has become a paladin."
Fuckin' A.
Cecil says the feeling and the voice are familiar to him, but he doesn't recognize them. Palom almost spills the beans on some secret by saying "You must be…" and Porom shuts him up before he can go any further, but Cecil is thankfully (for them, not me, who would like to know what the hell is up) oblivious to their bickering in his trance-like state.
Meanwhile, Tellah is going through a revelation of his own.
And not only this, but the light, he says, "has broken the seal upon Meteor" - whether he means some artifact or inscription in this temple, or in his own memories, is unclear; but Tellah now knows the spell. The twins are, understandably, kind of overwhelmed by all this. They look at each other, and then decide it's time to confess something to Cecil, only to be interrupted-
I love Tellah. He's such a great spin on the old sage. Dude has never wanted anything more in his life than wreck 217 of his own bones casting the ultimate spell in his archenemy's face.
We walk out of the temple, and let's take a look at our character sheets…
So, Cecil is a twink now.
I think that's important to note. My dude is now rocking lustrous long blue-white anime hair, and it's clear that he was gorgeous under his helmet the entire time. No wonder Rosa wanted to get him out of that armor, if you know what I mean.
Also, he's lv 1. His entire class progression has reset. But this class starts with an astounding 600 HP, much higher than he had as a lv 20+ Dark Knight. Darkness is gone, of course - Cecil's Commands are now Attack, White Magic and "Cover" - he is basically as if the FF1 Knight and FF3 Knight did the fusion dance. His only spell right now is Cure, but as he goes down the mountain and fights random mob and rapidly gains levels, he learns Sight and Scan, and will hopefully learn more. Cover, though, is perhaps even more important - now Cecil actually has the ability to shield other party members from blows. As a paladin, he has now gained the ability to protect, and not just kill - and he must learn again how to fight with these new skills.
No notes.
Meanwhile, Tellah's spell list is so huge it's nearly dizzying. Look at the girth of these lists. Dude's got every tier of spell, white and black. He's got Full-Life, he's got Haste, he's got Firaga… He's got Meteor, although he actually can't cast it; his MP tops at 90, and Meteor costs 99 MP, so he can't actually use it in combat for the time being, lmao.
I think that's a good stopping point for today.
Man, what a game.
I just want to highlight that it's a really neat piece of design. The townhouse has a wall and a fortified gate around a large mansion, so it's not like the Mysidians are completely oblivious to the dangers of the world, but this place is friendlier, less overwhelming than Damcyan or Fabul's towering gothic fortresses.
And inside this townhouse, we meet a sadly familiar face.
Yeah, remember that guy? It's the same elder from the intro cutscene - the one Cecil shoved aside, but did not kill, before seizing the Wind Crystal.
Understandably, he's none too pleased with Cecil's reappearance - but, as the elder, he is more willing to actually listen to him make his case than the rest of the townsfolk.
"My name is Cecil," he says. "I am the former commander of the Red Wings. At that time, I did not have the courage to go against my king's orders…"
Quite fairly, the Elder tells him "Words will not bring back our dead." Then, after a moment of somber resignation from Cecil, "However… I can see that you have changed. Perhaps it would not be a waste of time to hear what you have to say."
Cecil explains about Golbez, Baron's quest for the crystals, the Leviathan attack, his being separated from his friends. The Elder declares that this must be a test, and Cecil must prove himself worthy…
Cecil protests that he doesn't have time, his friends are in danger, but the Elder is adamant that he cannot go on as he is and must fight "with purity" and pursue the great fate to which he is destined - and become a paladin.
I knew this particular twist was coming, but it's definitely interesting in context. We've never seen the paladin named as such in FF before, but we've definitely seen its vibe before - in the Knight of FF1 and FF3; a powerful warrior, wielding swords and heavy armors, in one case wielding white magic alongside its combat prowess, in the other protecting others with its own body. But this framing, making it the antithesis of the Dark Knight, a warrior of light to its warrior of darkness, purified from the corrupting influence of the dark sword, is new. And again we come back to the darkness as corruptive, leading to a "darkening of one's heart," and I really wish we had more insight into Cecil's backstory and the training process that goes into becoming a dark knight.
Cecil resigns himself to this duty, and the Elder declares that the journey will be too dangerous for a lone dark knight, and summons…
That's right. FFIV is not yet down with magical child prodigies with an attitude!
Palom and Porom are twins, still apprentices - although Palom claims himself 'the greatest mage in all Mysidia' - and tasked with accompanying Cecil to Mt Ordeals, where he can redeem his dark blade. Palom and Porom have a clear sibling dynamic; Palom is overconfident and casually familiar, Porom is polite and respectful except when she's smacking her brother on the head for being a twat. Palom is a black mage, Porom is a white mage.
In many ways they presage FFXIV's Alphinaud and Alisaie, only with personalities and skillsets swapped between the brother and sister.
These two, for the uninitiated.
The Elder command the twins do everything in their power to assist Cecil, and the mages around him declare that, should Cecil succeed in becoming a paladin, he will have earned their trust. Talking to other characters in the town causes them to scoff at Cecil and declare there's no way a monster like him could ever become a paladin - as well as one black mage revealing that dark swords are ineffective against the undead, and that Mt Ordeals is infested with undead, which…
Yeah, this probably isn't a deliberate assassination plot, but if Cecil whiffs massively at Mt Ordeals and dies to a bunch of dark-immune zombies I doubt the Elder will shed a tear.
I've rarely seen a portrait convey "full of [thoughts of crime]" that strongly before.
Palom and Porom's Command list is… interesting. Palom has Black Magic, "Bluff," and "Twincast." Porom has White Magic, "Cry," and "Twincast." Bluff is a self-buff that increases Palom's Magic stat, ensuring his next spells hurt more. I have no idea what Cry does. Twincast, meanwhile, is a shared ability; if you select it from one of the twins, both of them have it as their next action. They essentially synchronize to cast a single spell - either Pyro, which explodes at every opponent on the screen, or Comet, which rains starfall on every opponent but... appears to do less damage, despite having a smaller chance to proc? Not sure what's up with that.
"Comet" being a powerful finisher spell is something else that will come up again later in the series.
The damage on Pyro and Comet is fearsome, and Palom and Porom's spell lists are pretty well-stocked, especially as soon as they start gaining levels. The main problem is the twins run out of MP quickly. And that they are made of tissue paper - look at these HP counts.
The result is that failing to approach basic random encounters as life-or-death situations to be solved with maximal efficiency results in things like this:
A barely-avoided wipe, long after both Palom and Porom went down, to a single monster.
As a result, the long, winding peninsula that takes us to Mt Ordeals requires a few tries to get through. Quite simply there's no alternative to grinding levels for Porom and Palom until they have enough HP to survive being sneezed at.
Thankfully, we find a Chocobo Forest, alongside the series' first alternate-color chocobo; the white chocobo restores all your MP, allowing for infinite grinding thanks to Porom's healing.
Mt Ordeals is…
…you know what, I'm starting to wonder what is up with the dungeon environments in this game? Dungeons in past games were often very samey, but they often introduced slight tweak or gimmick. Worst-case scenario, it was a shade of grey instead of the shade of brown of the previous dungeon, but more often we had "water-strewn corridors" or "foliage hanging from the ceiling" to add a bit of pep, you know? But Mt Ordeals looks exactly identical to every mountain/cave in the game so far:
If that's because the game simply couldn't afford the resources after it spent so much elsewhere, well, that's fair, I know I would rather have more character diversity than slightly color-shifted dungeons, but it's still disappointing.
That big flame to the left, by the way, is blocking the entrance and is why we needed Palom with us.
These two are fun. They're a simple yet effective comedic duo.
But then, the game decides to do a dramatic cut-away!
Is this the first cutaway to a villainous scene happening while the heroes are busy elsewhere? I feel like it's the first. Like, I pretty sure I've thought in the past, "what this game needs is some cutaway scenes to the villains doing villainous things." It was direly missing from FF2 to give us some internal texture to Palamecia, and FF3's Xande might have benefited from some to give him some actual character. Between introducing Golbez in person early and giving him that kind of scene, FFIV is really doing leaps and bounds to properly build up its antagonist.
Can't say I'm a huge fan of Rosa being literally tied up to some kind of pole, though.
Golbez commands "Come forth, Scarmiglione!" and an ominous figure in yellow (although not too ominous - it's using the same generic "robe with spooky eyes in a dark hood" sprite previous games have been using to show monsters in dungeon that would trigger a fight if interacted with), which introduces itself as "Scarmiglione of Earth, at your command." So we're starting our new quartet of elemental fiends, looks like.
I wonder how Golbez knows such things. Does he have powers of far-sight? He's really giving off a Sith Lord vibe here. And his way of putting things - "Cecil aspires too much," "clip his wings," really comes across as someone who would have been content with Cecil living on as a miserable wretch whose dark power could not harm him, but who sees his aspiration to paladinhood as an annoyance to be stamped out. He orders Scarmiglione to dispose of Cecil, as "his dark sword will be all but useless against your undead," and Scarmi promises to come back with Cecil's head.
Scarmiglione disappears, and Golbez engages in some good old-fashioned Evil Lord In His Lair banter with his highest-ranking minion, Kain.
Kain warns him not to underestimate Cecil, and Golbez asks if he is questioning his judgement; after all, Scarmiglione is one of the "four Elemental Lords," and will not fail.
Oh, hey. So that's our translation for Shitenno here. Not "Four Fiends," but "Elemental Lords," which immediately gives them a loftier vibe. Golbez also announces that "Rosa and I will delight in watching Cecil's demise," which, hm.
I'm not sure what definition of "demise" you're using, here. Especially as Rosa is still tied up to that weird technological contraption which, by the way, not sure why this place is looking like the interior of the Dreadnought! And where is the King of Baron in all this? Yeah, it's been obvious Golbez was the one calling the shots since he showed up in Fabul, but… I have the feeling when we get to Baron things will be even more fucked than we expect.
Kain begs to be allowed to be the one to slay Cecil, but Golbez tells him to just be glad he's alive after his failure. Rosa whispers Cecil's name, and we end the cutaway.
Pretty basic as far as these scenes go, one of a thousand similar cutaways to an evil lord ordering his minions to go kill the hero and having some spooky exchange with his general. But as far as new introductions to the series, it's great, it adds something that was very much needed, expands the audience POV beyond the hero's own two eyes, gives the villains a little life and internal strife…
It Just Works.
End cutaway, back to Mt Ordeals.
I'm going to cut away most of the gameplay, but I have more general thoughts.
On Mt Ordeals and Dark Knights
I think it's really interesting that Cecil's final journey as a Dark Knight has to be done with Palom and Porom.
Cecil has to face Mysidia, and his journey to become a Paladin, without moral support. When he's talking to the Mysidians and suffering their spells and mischief, there can't be anyone around who tells him "hey man, I've been with you for a while, I know you're a standup dude." And similarly, his ascent of Mt Ordeals and confrontation with his inner darkness is a personal task, not one where his companions supporting him would feel appropriate.
But that creates a double obstacle for the game. One is narrative; the game's greatest strength is in its character writing. Having Cecil go it alone would mean giving up that strength. I would do that - but I wouldn't do it there. A whole game's worth of character writing and cool dynamics suddenly cut off by a journey of somber solitude is something that works when you're at least ¾ of the way in and it really hits the heartstrings, not when you're before the halfway point. And the other is mechanical; Cecil isn't self-sufficient for any kind of challenging content. The game is, like all FF games, reliant on the balance of multiple character classes supporting each other. Cecil is powerful, but he has zero utility and zero self-sustain ability. The whole thing would come down to how many hi-potions you remembered to buy, and even then, it would have to be way toned down in difficulty to make sure Cecil can hack it.
Which is why Palom and Porom are such a clever addition, in my opinion. They're fun, they have a great character dynamic, but they don't care about Cecil. They're here to help him on the elder's orders (and definitely to observe him and see if he's actually worthy), but they have no established relationship and very little stakes in whether his trial succeeds - as residents of Mysidia, they're more likely to watch him in judgement than in hope. Which is perfect here. It means they don't distract from the weight of Cecil's personal journey and hope for change, but also there are still character shenanigans happening. And mechanically, they provide the mechanical support Cecil needs to operate optimally. They're a great compromise, IMO, and if I learn that actually there is some kind of fandom-wide consensus that they suck and should not be there I will look at you all, shake my head silently, and do a 'tsk tsk' sound..
Which actually is a great opportunity to segue into: Dark Knight. We're about to have Cecil swap this class out from another. So, how did it perform, overall?
It's good. Dark knight is a simple, but elegant design, that especially shines because once Kain leaves the stage, Cecil is always the only physically-focused character in a party of bards and mages. He hits hard, he has tons of HP, he has high defense. Even as just an attackbot, he's effective at taking out one enemy per turn or dealing significant boss damage, all he needs is some support to let him sustain without taking turns using healing items. And his Darkness Command is well-designed for the gameplay range it covers. It is effective at dealing with large numbers of enemies, and while its HP cost means it isn't costless, Cecil's huge HP pool means it's never a stupid move; you have to assess the situation and trust your judgement, but using Darkness is often a sound tactical move. It has only one big issue… It can't perform as a tank. It has no ability to control aggro, that is to say to draw enemy attacks to itself or protect comrades in danger. The Dark Knight is fundamentally selfish and can only ensure its own survival and the death of the enemy.
But it's a weakness that's baked into Cecil's character arc. All in all, it works. It's a well-designed class.But it's also running out of gas. It's lasted pretty much as long as it could. Cecil doesn't gain new abilities as he levels, and there isn't much depth to his current setup. The main character of the game can't just keep that simple a setup in a post-FF3 world, because he is effectively running an FF3 class without the ability to swap jobs as needed to vary the group's skillset or evolve his own. He's getting a class change and, as much as it saddens me because Dark Knight is conceptually fucking sweet, gameplay-wise it's the right move.
But, for its last stretch, Dark Knight is getting one hell of a workout. "The dark blade cannot hurt the undead" was something of an overstatement; effectively it depends on the specific flavor of enemy. The "zombie" chain take only 1 damage from any direct attack from Cecil (unless he crits), but Darkness seems to work well enough; the "skeleton" chain and "spirit" chain seem to take, if not normal damage, then at least enough to hurt. The 'spirit' chain are the same as the 'red soul' from FF2 - they're floating ghosts that absorb almost any magic sent their way but have low HP, and a single Darkness can wipe a whole screen of them. These undead usually appear in mixed formations, requiring some tricky planning, especially given that the game nerfed the "healing spells used against undead" compared to the previous ones and so Porom isn't that much use offensively.
Climb high enough, though, and we find a familiar face…
Cecil, of course, has no idea what a 'Meteor' is, but we recognize it from FF3 as the ultimate spell that more or less took the place of FF2's Ultima (and which endgame enemies loved to spam), and Porom and Palom recognize it as a secret magic and identify the sage as Tellah, who hails from Mysidia and is known to them.
Tellah, it turns out, did a small detour on his way to kill Golbez to claim the ultimate destructive magic for himself (Porom and Palom do their routine where Palom is excited to have found out who this "old man" is and Porom smacks him again and tells him to be respectful to his elders, then Palom nearly immediately blurts out that they're here to spy on Cecil and gets smacked again for his trouble. I love them.) Porom protests that Meteor is too strong for a man his age to wield, but Tellah says he has little concern for his own life it can bring down Golbez. He's similarly resolute and stubborn as he was back in Damcyan, but he has thankfully tamped down the burning anger and hostility.
Cecil explains the situation with Rosa, his disappeared companions, and his paladin quest.
This is notably the first time Cecil himself acknowledges the dark sword as something sinister whose influence he would like to be rid of.
Tellah concludes that if this mountain holds the key to something has important as the power of a paladin, then he must have been right about his hunch that it also contained the secret of Meteor, and joins forces with the party.
Now with the great sage Tellah in our party, the rest of Mt Ordeals is a piece of cake!
It's a nearly total slaughter.
Okay, so, like, even having leveled up the Twins some, they're still babies. Tellah, despite his status as sage, actually has the weakest spell list of all three, because he basically only know bottom-tier attack spells like Fire and his Recall command is largely useless. Throw in the way Cecil's attacks whiff against zombies while spells only make the Souls stronger, and a screen like that is just a nightmare.
Making it the rest of the way requires some wrangling, but eventually we manage. Porom starts hearing sounds and yelling at Palom to cut the crap, and Palom protests that he's not doing anything, until Tellah declares he senses an evil presence…
I wonder why both Lich and Scarmiglione have been associated with undeath. If I had to hazard a guess, it would be because of burial - the Fiend/Elemental Lord of Earth lays claims to all that is within the ground, and that includes the dead answering his command. It's a really compelling association, but one I've rarely seen in other media; usually death/undeath is treated as its own domain separated from the earth.
These Skullnants have the power to cast Drain, inflicting low damage to heal themselves, and Scarmiglione can order them to "Tear them apart!" to give all his minions a second attack in a turn. On top of that, they're from the zombie family, so they're immune to Cecil's basic attack.
Not immune to a Twincast Pyro, though, which wipes out the zombies in short order while inflicting heavy damage on Scarmi, who is now exposed to Cecil's attack, and is very much not an undead himself.
"What's happening to me?" Scarmiglione shouts, uncomprehending, then succombs. The group advances across the bridge.
I absolutely do not trust that this small sprite of a faceless figure clad in a shroud was all that we had to expect from the Elemental Lord of Earth, though, so I save and top up my characters before taking one step forward, and wouldn't you know it…
Granted, the back attack is a nasty surprise. If you forgot, it means rows are reversed. Palom and Porom are now in the front row taking full damage, and Cecil is in the back row dealing half damage. A nasty situation to be in, and to top it off, his attacks inflict status effects like Poison.
Unfortunately for Scarmiglione, I've realized at this point that since Tellah is useless on the offense but good on the defense (he has Cura) and that Twincast's MP cost is not so high that I can't spam it for one entire battle, he is eating Pyros to the face every turn while Cecil keeps doing way more damage than I expected from the back row, and the fiend is dealt with in short order.
Falling from the bridge is a convenient means of disposing of the fiend without having to answer the question of what "my true strength lies in death" means and whether he might have been able to come back from that defeat. Dead or not, he's at the bottom of the mountain now.
This is it. The summit of Mt Ordeals. The Elemental Lord of Earth is defeated, and nothing stands in the way. Cecil approaches this standing stone…
"Long have I awaited you," says the voice, "and much sorrow have I endured. I shall now entrust you with my strength. In doing so, my pain will only grow, but there is no other way..."
This whole sequence here is so intriguing and also really cool. The voice talking here is not the impersonal voice of the crystals from FF1 and FF3; it is directly calling out to Cecil, calling him its son, and saying that helping him, while necessary, will cause it great pain. There's something going on here and it's just as unclear what it is to Cecil as it is to me - and none of the mages are chiming in to explain.
And Cecil's dark sword and armor are exchanged - magically - for the gold-white hue of a Paladin, taking what I'm pretty sure are direct cues from Amano's design for the WW1 Warrior of Light - long blue-white hair, cape, the style of armor… A warrior of light stands before us renewed, but before he can truly complete his transformation, he must face one final challenge.
The party steps forward, ready to face this new foe, but Cecil tells them to stand back, for this is his battle, and one he must fight alone to atone for his wrongs.
Ooooh yeah that's the good stuff. What's there to say? Seeking atonement, Paladin!Cecil must face the shadow of his former crimes in the form of his past self as a Dark Knight. And that Dark Knight isn't shy about drawing on their terrible power, casting Darkness every turn. Cecil's attacks deal about the same damage as the Dark Knight's Darkness, and while he can cast Cure on himself, it doesn't outpace the DRK's damage. It seems a battle that could go down to the wire… Until…
Oh my god. Of course. The mark of a true Paladin isn't that it can kill stuff even harder than a Dark Knight could. That would be literally the opposite of the intended lesson. A paladin protects. That is the whole point. And you can't kil your past. You can't stab your sins in the face and make them go away. Cecil can atone for his crimes, but ultimately it's up to others to forgive him or not. He can't make the Dark Knight vanish. He can't kill it. He must sheathe his sword and allow that shadow to exist.
Which, mechanically, means taking the Defense action as the Dark Knight whacks you in the face with Darkness once, twice…
"One day," it says, "you will see."
We've passed the test.
The mirror shows him his reflection as a Dark Knight this is so good. Cecil begs the spirit not to go, but it changes into Cecil's true reflection, and only then does the game chime in to say "Cecil has become a paladin."
Fuckin' A.
Cecil says the feeling and the voice are familiar to him, but he doesn't recognize them. Palom almost spills the beans on some secret by saying "You must be…" and Porom shuts him up before he can go any further, but Cecil is thankfully (for them, not me, who would like to know what the hell is up) oblivious to their bickering in his trance-like state.
Meanwhile, Tellah is going through a revelation of his own.
And not only this, but the light, he says, "has broken the seal upon Meteor" - whether he means some artifact or inscription in this temple, or in his own memories, is unclear; but Tellah now knows the spell. The twins are, understandably, kind of overwhelmed by all this. They look at each other, and then decide it's time to confess something to Cecil, only to be interrupted-
I love Tellah. He's such a great spin on the old sage. Dude has never wanted anything more in his life than wreck 217 of his own bones casting the ultimate spell in his archenemy's face.
We walk out of the temple, and let's take a look at our character sheets…
So, Cecil is a twink now.
I think that's important to note. My dude is now rocking lustrous long blue-white anime hair, and it's clear that he was gorgeous under his helmet the entire time. No wonder Rosa wanted to get him out of that armor, if you know what I mean.
Also, he's lv 1. His entire class progression has reset. But this class starts with an astounding 600 HP, much higher than he had as a lv 20+ Dark Knight. Darkness is gone, of course - Cecil's Commands are now Attack, White Magic and "Cover" - he is basically as if the FF1 Knight and FF3 Knight did the fusion dance. His only spell right now is Cure, but as he goes down the mountain and fights random mob and rapidly gains levels, he learns Sight and Scan, and will hopefully learn more. Cover, though, is perhaps even more important - now Cecil actually has the ability to shield other party members from blows. As a paladin, he has now gained the ability to protect, and not just kill - and he must learn again how to fight with these new skills.
No notes.
Meanwhile, Tellah's spell list is so huge it's nearly dizzying. Look at the girth of these lists. Dude's got every tier of spell, white and black. He's got Full-Life, he's got Haste, he's got Firaga… He's got Meteor, although he actually can't cast it; his MP tops at 90, and Meteor costs 99 MP, so he can't actually use it in combat for the time being, lmao.
I think that's a good stopping point for today.
Man, what a game.
Khona Moshr
Pink Flamingo Cabal Healer(they/them)
- Location
- Alabama
- Pronouns
- They/Them
Well they did say the spell was too strong for him to use.
Which is another nice bitof story/gameplay matching up instead of them contradicting each other.
Alectai
Speaks Words of Wisdom... On occasion
I'm going to tell you a secret that'll save you some aggravation in the future Omicron.
See that Order command? Did you know you can reverse which spots in the party order are back row and which are front row? You even saw it in the second match with Earthboi being imposed on you.
When you have a pile of casters, it's convenient to switch it to having only two front row fighters while the others stay in the back.
See that Order command? Did you know you can reverse which spots in the party order are back row and which are front row? You even saw it in the second match with Earthboi being imposed on you.
When you have a pile of casters, it's convenient to switch it to having only two front row fighters while the others stay in the back.
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- Location
- Not your place of residence
Comet usually functions as Diet Meteor in the games that they both appear in. How diet this is ranges from "not worth it in the slightest" to "why the hell is this random encounter kicking my ass so hard?"
Also does this make Tellah automatically more badass than Minwu for not dying in the process of obtaining the ultimate magic?
Also does this make Tellah automatically more badass than Minwu for not dying in the process of obtaining the ultimate magic?
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Khona Moshr
Pink Flamingo Cabal Healer(they/them)
- Location
- Alabama
- Pronouns
- They/Them
Also in FFIV Cry increases the chance to steal items from enemies and Comet ignores the effects of reflect.
In the 3d remakes they do change Cry to make enemies defenses be cut in half.
- Pronouns
- He
That is Twincast with an a. If you want to use another vowel, there's other sites you can go to.
Zap Rowsdower
Ex-cultist vagrant
- Location
- Bright lights, big city
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Worth noting is that the spirit was definitely helping speed the process along artificially. The sequel (the one that's not worth playing outside of looking at pictures and bios of the characters because the only weapons, dungeons/maps, and enemies not ripped straight from the original with minimal changes are in the final dungeon), set 17 years later, has a character reveal that they spent the entirety of the 17-year timegap meditating at the top of Mt Ordeals, and only after 17 years of meditation did they unlock the class change (also, that defeating your inner darkness is a whole lot harder when your inner darkness isn't trained to use HP-depleting spells - Darkness consuming HP to use was part of the foreshadowing to the player of how to win that fight).
Relatedly, the sequel also reveals that Palom and Porom aren't actually (or at least don't always want to present themselves as) opposite gender identical twins; its just a phase they eventually grow out of.
Palom keeps the same look as a twenty-something (not realizing that the bowl cut and vertical green stripes look does NOT work when you aren't actually a cute kid anymore)
Whereas Porom decided to change her image entirely and dive facefirst into the deep end of Distinguishing Myself From My Brother By Looking More Girly and embraced the PINK
Relatedly, the sequel also reveals that Palom and Porom aren't actually (or at least don't always want to present themselves as) opposite gender identical twins; its just a phase they eventually grow out of.
Palom keeps the same look as a twenty-something (not realizing that the bowl cut and vertical green stripes look does NOT work when you aren't actually a cute kid anymore)
Whereas Porom decided to change her image entirely and dive facefirst into the deep end of Distinguishing Myself From My Brother By Looking More Girly and embraced the PINK
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- Location
- Brittany, France
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Or I could be using these turns for more DPS o__o
Alectai
Speaks Words of Wisdom... On occasion
No, I mean, you can change your default setting in the menu before battle.
- Location
- The Great Beyond
- Pronouns
- He/She/They
Not knowing what Cry does is understandable, as Cry is, according to the wiki, functionally useless in the original. I'm unclear if the pixel remaster is being faithful to this, but apparently it makes it easier to steal items from enemies...
but of course you don't have a thief in the party. So it does nothing.
(apparently some of the remakes gave it greater functionality? but the wiki is unspecific if it was changed in the pixel remaster)
- Location
- Brittany, France
- Pronouns
- He/Him
People keep saying that, but I have tried to exactly this for the past three hours since Rosa showed up in the game and I've had to deal with a one-warrior three-mage party, and it doesn't work. I've shuffled the row order every which way but no matter what, it insists on having 2 characters in the front row and 2 characters in the back row no matter what. If there's a way to do what you are suggesting, it's incredibly non obvious.
...
Wait, gimme a minute.
...
This is stupid. The game is stupid for doing it that way. And none of you have explained how it worked properly >:C
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Alectai
Speaks Words of Wisdom... On occasion
This is one of the few problems with the Pixel Remaster. The menus all use the same UI, so weird one-off things like FFIV's five character groups can get some jank in them. In this case, it makes switching the Row incredibly obscure. It's more obvious in the original version.
It is, however, an association found in Roman mythology- he picked up a lot of Hades, but Pluto was also conflated with the Greek god of wealth, because he was lord of the underworld and all that was to be found there… which included the gold and silver you mined from under the earth.
thePUNisher
Unbothered. Moisturized. Happy. In My Lane
- Location
- Brazil
Palom really is rocking that "coconut tied to a rope," look, huh.Palom keeps the same look as a twenty-something (not realizing that the bowl cut and vertical green stripes look does NOT work when you aren't actually a cute kid anymore)
I must have slept through the day covering this in world history class.
Connelly
As useless as a penguin with mittens
- Location
- Salamanca, Spain
And I also said that was fair, later in that comment. :_DNot to dismiss your argument entirely, but I would like to point out that, as someone with a lifelong love of turn-by-turn RPGs and a FromSoft veteran, I do in fact like both live action and turn by turn and it's the middle-ground approach that is bothering me
I think the intention here was that given that Cecil is a perfectly strong and still growing warrior, it's less about being a dark knight in the setting of IV is not a valid martial choice and perfectly capable of facing danger in general, and more that in this particular situation, and with Cecil's recent experiences and guilt tripping, it's like fighting fire with more a progressively more pitiful by self doubt fire. A paladin would be the water of the current metaphorical fire, and becoming one would both prove Cecil's sincerity and help him focus his efforts in a constructive way.
Or maybe his formation as a DKN proper sucks massive balls, basic martial training notwithstanding, and that's why he never gets any upgrades to his skills, only new gear. This is also long before XIV came and said that DKNs are supposed to be protectors because of
But also
Yeah. Theme.
Pretty sure they went with the idea of "if the layout is good, the rest is good too". Later dungeons do get more original visually.
Must be a PR thing. At least in GBA (can't remember SNES or 3D) the zombies always ignore Darkness.
It's called mount "Ordeal". As if the devs were laughing to themselves.
Last I remember, what I did to make things easier for myself was use healing staffs with Poromand Tellah to top up the party (using those staffs while equipped throws a party wide Cure), while Cecil was on ghost or potion/ether duty and I indulged Palom's potential pyromaniac tendencies. Tellah also threw spells if healing wasn't needed. Twincast can be a waste of turns, even with Cecil and Tellah alone you can manage to kill all enemies before the twins finish the cast.
Yeah I don't remember this from older versions.
Objection! During battle you can change rows for the entire party at once by pressing left and selecting "Row". For example when you get ambushed. So that your melee DPS is proper and rules abiding DPS and your mages don't get kicked in the nuts.
This entire sequence of events does so much with so damn little. It's great.
"You should take off your armor, let the servants polish it."
"But I cleaned it myself last night. And it's a dark knight's armor, it's not supposed to shine or anything."
"If you say so." *Rosa turns around and cri*
"If he's not gonna change a single thing, I will change EVERYTHING."
- Location
- Spain