A mysterious object found underground? That glows with a blue flame? And it makes people sick? That's not magical St Elmo's Fire, that's fucking Cobalt-60.
Let's Play Every Final Fantasy Game In Order Of Release [Now Finished: Final Fantasy Tactics]
- Thread starter Omicron
- Start date
- Let's Play
- Location
- Sweden
Incidentally, if you do that he will almost certainly die very fast, which means losing out on every single mid-battle conversation during this battle.
Thozmp
Gets my kicks above the waistline, Sunshine.
If you know it's coming (on replays or such) it is somewhat funny to make Gaffgarion into a priest/white mage with almost no equipment. Though, just imagine how that conversation would go in-game:
"Hey, Boss, we've come to the decision that you should be on healing duty for the time being."
"Ramza, what the fuck are you talking about?"
"Yeah, me and all the others agreed, you need to be on white mage duties."
"... And how are you going to make me?"
*Some time later*
Gaffgarion wearing robes: "How the bloody hell did this happen?"
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Dragoon is something I've seen considered good even if I never really used one in my own playthrough back in the day, so they're probably a decent option to train someone in. As for Jump, yeah that's pretty much how it works, probably best to grab like... Horizontal/Vertical 3 or 4 early on, then just save the rest of your JP for the big skills.
Mystic, the status effect class! It's hard for me to say how useful status effects are in a game like this, honestly? When they aren't useful, they aren't useful because you can mulch the enemies before they need it... but also games like this tend to be very sparse with enemy immunities, unlike mainline Final Fantasy where bosses roll up and go "haha immune to everything except Moldy Cheese status", so you can totally shut down dangerous enemies with them if they hit.
I'm just saying, if I was in his situation fuck the church and their heretic talk, we surrendering now and telling Gaffy and pals exactly who called for their heads before skedaddling.Okay, the thief going 'JESUS CHRIST, THAT'S JASON GAFFGARION" is a very good comedy beat. Dude is regretting his entire life choices right now, I'd bet.
8 Range, baby! Might honestly be some of the farthest possible range for smacking people around other than something like an Archer with the high ground.
Dark Knight and Holy Knight do be nuts, especially this early on in the game.
...Does. Does Agrias have Black Magic equipped for some reason? Why??? Just... give her Item, or Fundaments, or something useful.
Such is the downside of the job and JP system. Though, the Expeditions system seems like a great mechanic for pumping a bit of early JP into new classes.
Ah yes, classic JRPG syndrome. Nobody tell Omi about the time-gated events in the game and how it causes a story split. This is a lie~
Harkening back to the early FFV metagame of "what if I spent 10 AP in Monk so all my mages were buffed up and punched all their enemies to death?"
You know, never considered it but yeah slapping in exactly three new party members in the chapter that unlocks three man expeditions does make sense.
Spears! Spears are pretty good, two range is always nice in a tactical game!
As for Jump, it has the traditional damage buff of "Spears do more Jump damage", just to get that out of the way. As for actually landing a Jump, unlike the Archer's Aim skill (where Aim has a set charge time), Jump is apparently based on the Dragoon's Speed stat. So, buffing up your speed is a good way to make the Jump land sooner, thus lower risk of the enemy moving away. Could also always body-block someone into a corner so they can't escape, or do something that gives them the Stop/Immobilize status. I've seen Jump mentioned often as a boring, but practical and high damage option for physical classes, so presumably it's more usable than Aim.
Starting to wonder how long Delita and Ovelia were waiting at that waterfall later
Considering each Errand is like 15-odd days, that means this was what, a several month detour?
It's the Talk Good Class!
Not too bad of a niche class, honestly? It's basically Mystic-lite where there's less focus on direct status attacks, and more on messing with bravery/faith stats or even recruiting enemies (including monsters!) Feel free to abuse this to recruit enemies mid-battle and make them kill all their friends.
...I wonder if enemy Orators can do that to your party, or even exist in game. Maybe in mods, I can 100% see modders giving the enemy lineups an Orator or two to steal your party members.
Lol, lmao even
One of those things the spoiler thread was really hoping you noticed, and it looks like you did
According to the wiki, Invigoration is a percentage damage based attack, as in it always does 25% enemy's max HP drain, so I guess that would explain the inaccuracy. Wouldn't want something that can instantly murk a quarter of a boss healthbar to be too directly good.
You find it later in the update, but yes you can (usually) always update guest party member abilities and equipment and classes like you can your own, same way you could swap around Argath and Delita's setups in Chapter 1.
Yeah, in my experience Chocobos (and monster units as a whole) were often not that worth it, too limited in skillset compared to an actual human party member who can jump across a dozen classes to create some super monstrosity. Might be some species are good though.
GOLLYEveryone's caught up? Clear sight of the politics at play?
Okay, then the following should come as no surprise.
The Northern Sky Knight orders Gaffgarion to kill everyone, and Gaffgarion shrugs, and turns around to draw on us all.
Top 10 anime betrayals, all year, every year.
WHO COULD HAVE SEEN THIS COMING WHY WOULD THE SEASONED MILITARY VETERAN WITH A HISTORY OF WAR CRIMES BETRAY YOU FOR MONEY?
The real surprise is that Ladd sticks around after Gaffgarion leaves, since he's presumably another merc who works under Gaffy (rather than the rest of your squad either being Ramza's old akademy buddies and two knights working with Agrias). Guess Ramza's rizz is just that strong... or he made a lot at Mount Gulag and wants to stick around for more expeditions.
Seems like an accurate read to me, or at least that's how I parsed it after a moment or two of confusion.
Damn, Delita moving up in the world.…
The fuck do you mean, Northwain's Strike. Why does he have Northwain's Strike. Why is it dealing 70 damage on hit.
What. Is. Delita's. Character class.
HOLY KNIGHT!? Not even 'Divine Knight,' not even 'White Knight,' Holy Knight!?
Okay Omi but to be fair Ramza's unique version of the Squire is actually pretty cracked? Starting in Chapter 2 he has way more equipment selections, he has better stat growths than the default Squire, and his unique skills added in like Tailwind and Chant give him some added versitility (Tailwind, in particular, is the kind of ability you give him the entire Mettle skillset at all times for just because it means all of Ramza's off turns can be spent buffing someone's speed stat).
Fair take from Delita, I suppose, and also one that feeds right back into that missed line from the Chapter 1 finale about how "Ramza's Next". It does look like he gets over it by the end of the fight, though - presumably because Ramza actually was clearly willing to protect the princess.
...Oh right lmao it took me until this part to remember the secret trick for this fight - I'm pretty sure Gaffgarion, since he starts the battle as a "party member", will fight with exactly what he had equipped before the battle.
Meaning, you know, if you realize this betrayal is coming on this specific map, you just take all his equipment and reclass him to Black Mage or something so he goes down like a loser.
Gaffy really stabbing Ramza exactly where it hurts the most with his words, huh? Does he know a decent amount about Ramza's past for those laser-guided words, or is he just getting lucky, I wonder?
There's always the "bop your allies over the head for free JP", or even using things outside of the class skillset since you still get JP that way, but yeah Mystic seems... potentially disappointing. Also potentially quite good if those abilities land, because status effects tend to be especially crippling in a tactical game like this, but they do have to land first.
Ah yes, the power of Named Characters outclassing your unoptimized Blorbos, truly a shame.
Delita really ain't doing much to make himself sound trustworthy, that's for sure. Hell, if it weren't for Ramza being here, he would have probably gone for an attempt at killing the entire party on top of all the knights (likely failed mind you with that many opponents, including Gaffy, but still).
Funny enough, while not getting into spoilers? At this point you've unlocked a good chunk of the jobs available, including almost every single mage-line class. Future unlocks might be slightly more complicated, so up to you if you want it to come naturally, or want someone to give some hints/straight up spoil "you unlock the Time-o-Mancer by getting Geomancer, Time Mage, and Chemist all to Level 5".
Just Monster Things ™️Oh, and Boco just produced a kid by spontaneous generation.
We'll find out more about this when it hatches, I'm sure.
Chocobo egg.
Really, one of the biggest downsides of having a monster in your party, especially in the PSX version where you only have 16 character slots: Monsters will just asexually reproduce at random, dumping eggs and eventually more monsters in your party that you have to eventually get rid of somehow if you intend to recruit more characters/unique monster species (considering there's waaaaay more monsters than I remember). It's like Dwarf Fortress Cats all over again.
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There's two basic types of churches in JRPGS:
1) Universal Healthcare Center
And
2) Evil conspiracy.
Anything else is niche.
Parabola
Divided Loyalties Librarian
- Location
- The Destination of Fate
- Pronouns
- She/Her
...Given that they fall under 1), do Pokemon Centers in Pokemon count as a type of church, and Nurse Joys count as a type of priestess?
somewhatLazy
Serial Procrastinator
- Location
- lurking
As someone who only knows Tactics from vague osmosis… god, I did not know Delita is this badass. He fucking soloed half the map. I'm really looking forward to seeing what nonsense he's up to the next time we meet him.
Thozmp
Gets my kicks above the waistline, Sunshine.
You say that like the two types are exclusive.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Final Fantasy Tactics early game does a good job of putting you off balance, both story wise and mechanically. Your hero's introduction explicitly says that what he does will be forgotten to history, his entrance to the stage is as a lackey of the Black Knight, the prologue introduces a typical Knights vs Bandit plot (THE tactics game starter plot all the way back to Fire Emblem and Shining Force) only for it to show that you were working for the villains the whole time. Your closest ally swears vengeance on you, and then when he reappears he's wearing gold armor and using unique Knight skills while seemingly doing the type of hero stuff you would expect the protagonist to do. Your mentor betrays you right as he seems to be falling into the "gruff but fair" archetype.
Final Fantasy Tactics zigs when genre convention tells you it should zag. Square was just at the start of it's subversive era, questioning the genre cliches it had spent the SNES era crafting. FF7 & FF8 used their choice of protagonist and setting to help shock player expectations, now Final Fantasy Tactics is playing the setting straighter then even II or IV and questioning your place in it.
Welcome to the Final Fantasy game where you are playing Leon or Kain.
The comparisons to ASoIaF aren't just because both borrow heavily from the War of the Roses or because the WotL version used Martin's prose as inspiration, we are now probing what makes a JRPG protagonist in the same way that those first few books probed the Western Fantasy protagonist.
Final Fantasy Tactics zigs when genre convention tells you it should zag. Square was just at the start of it's subversive era, questioning the genre cliches it had spent the SNES era crafting. FF7 & FF8 used their choice of protagonist and setting to help shock player expectations, now Final Fantasy Tactics is playing the setting straighter then even II or IV and questioning your place in it.
Welcome to the Final Fantasy game where you are playing Leon or Kain.
The comparisons to ASoIaF aren't just because both borrow heavily from the War of the Roses or because the WotL version used Martin's prose as inspiration, we are now probing what makes a JRPG protagonist in the same way that those first few books probed the Western Fantasy protagonist.
Kuja
I'M A SQUIIIID
- Location
- AZ
- Pronouns
- He/Him
[>] Chronicle
"A TRUMPETER, being taken prisoner in a battle, begged hard for quarter, declaring his innocence, and protesting, that he neither had, nor could kill any man, bearing no arms but only his trumpet, which he was obliged to sound at the word of command. For that reason, replied his enemies, we are determined not to spare you; for though you yourself never fight, yet, with that wicked instrument of yours, you blow up animosity between other people, and so become the occasion of much bloodshed."
[>] Rumors
"You spoony bard."
(paragraph text is Aesop's Fable of the Trumpeter)
GilliamYaeger
M'crazy.
Chant damages yourself to heal an ally for twice that amount. You're thinking of Tailwind - called Yell in the original PSX release - which increases speed by +1 and, more importantly, stacks infinitely. Ramza's Squire has also gained a new ability now that you're in Chapter 2 in the form of Steel, which permanently increases a target's Brave by
Ramza may not be able to summon giant swords from the ground like Agrias or Delita...but he can start a fight yelling like a DBZ character for several turns.
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It's a good starter.
Turns out rock hard abs and magic Kung Fu is improved by actual armor.
- Location
- Malaysia
I got murked by Gaffgarion at Zierchele multiple times (he also killed Ovelia very quickly). So in pettiness and ease of gameplay, I stole his items. His items are also pretty up there in strength during this part of the plot, so more for me.
Delita being in Church's employ now is likely because it's either he became a sellsword like Ramza or siding with the only other neutral Power in Ivalice, which is the Church.
This is a retelling of the story of Delita the Hero, so Arazlam probably embellished the part that Delita is now a Holy Knight on par with the likes of Wiegraf and Agrias in a year.
I call Bullshit on that.
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Muramasa
Best Girl
About Brave/Faith changes. For every 4 points of brave or faith gained or lost, 1 point is permanent.
Brave and Faith Hard Cap at 100 so it isnt possible to permanently boost brave and faith to more than 97 each for Ramza (as boosting it at 97 only allows a gain of 3 and thus doesn't qualify for a permanent boost)
Other units have an annoying mechanic that pretty much gives them a soft cap of 84 Faith and you're not going to want to boost it more then that.
That said you can implement the Faith status effect which allows that character to cast magic assuming a temporary faith score of 100 (and makes no permanent adjustments on your scores) so it's a very significant boost.
Brave and Faith Hard Cap at 100 so it isnt possible to permanently boost brave and faith to more than 97 each for Ramza (as boosting it at 97 only allows a gain of 3 and thus doesn't qualify for a permanent boost)
Other units have an annoying mechanic that pretty much gives them a soft cap of 84 Faith and you're not going to want to boost it more then that.
That said you can implement the Faith status effect which allows that character to cast magic assuming a temporary faith score of 100 (and makes no permanent adjustments on your scores) so it's a very significant boost.
I've mulched entire maps with that modified squire class.
- Pronouns
- Him/He
Yep, that's how it works. You can just wait to get the 8 high/8 far skills, and then ignore all the others. Saves you a lot of JP, and then you can go do other things. You may choose to be less efficient in the long term to get a mid-range jump. Notably, if you jump on someone next to you and they have counter, they will have a chance to counter attack you. So it may be worth getting Horizontal Jump 2 and then saving for the max jump skills.
The other Dragoon skills are worth checking out of course.
It is plot based. So yes, if you start using Dragoons in chapter 1, they're weaponless wonders.
I've done most of a Dragoon single-class challenge. That means for dorter and everything after until chapter 2, all your characters can only punch, or jump. It's a interesting challenge once you fully understand the systems the enemies (and you) operate under, but it can be a real struggle since punching everything to death when you're not a monk can be very slow going.
Honestly, it feels like an oversight you can't use the prediction function for Jump, because jump is a command and not a menu-opener.
As others have said, the jumper will be in the air for as long as it takes them to hit 50 CT (so very close to half the time it takes them to go from one turn to the next. It also doesn't get boosted with Haste, before you try that).
Now since your play-by-plays usually have the format of 'all the enemies go. And then my guests. And then me' I suspect you're a bit underleveled, and thus your speed is slightly under the story enemies. So you're going to keep that in mind, that you'll want to jump on people at 40-ish CT and below.
I could also post a grid chart where you check your speed, the enemies speed, and see exactly what CT level will let you jump them. I used it for about 10-ish hours on my aforementioned SCC before I internalized it like multiplication tables.
Wild that after a year Ramza just happens to run into that same Chocobo. While chasing someone who was last seen fleeing on chocobo. Who when you catch up to them, no longer has a chocobo.
You see now why the WotL remake added in that option. 'How to get Ramza as X-Knight' class was a constant internet rumor in FFT online, spread with the same 'nah, I totally did it' stories as saving Aeris was to FF7. People wanted it so bad.
This happened to me in my current playthrough. Notable, she's not casting protect, she's casting a princess spell that gives her protect, shell, regen, haste, and maybe some other stuff. It makes her extremely tough to kill.
The RNG fucked you (and me) on this. From her starting position, she can jump into the waterfall, and none of the knights or Gaff can easily reach/attack her for several turns. She does this on her first turn most of the time.
The level designs and unit placement are usually quite thoughtful like this, but the fact that even story missions have some amount of randomization means that every fourth time the NPC's or guests will just do some completely other thing then what they normally do.
In fact, they did find a way to do that in the original PSX version of the scene! It has Agrias and the Princess on solid ground, standing, and Agrias does edge in front of the princess during the talks protectively. It's all on the same map as the battle, so it's perhaps less dynamic and fairy-tale composition, but honestly I'm always fond of good in-engine cutscenes, it makes it feel all the same story.
I know it's frustrating to tinker with guests (Oh, the things I could tell you about how to use equipment to corral guests into acting more sensibly!), you may want to take a quick look at Ovelia. If it's like the PSX version, you might be able to see what (doesn't) happen when you master a class!
- Location
- Spain
Yeah talking about that, Omi should probably redistribute the princess wealth.
(By which i mean stealing her awesome clothes)
This is the true events so I'm assuming the faked ones were something like this.
Narrator: "Delita The Hero was 7 feet and killed men by the hundreds with fireballs from his eyes and bolts of lightning from his ar... Summons."
ZerbanDaGreat
Daemon Noble of D E M O G R A P H I C S
- Pronouns
- They/them
And it looks like Gillian has unlocked a new job.
What the fuck is an Orator.
Okay so apparently there is a whole class centered around 'talk good,' and it can do stuff like convert enemies into allies? It can also modify values like Faith and Bravery, convince opponents to stop, convince opponents to give you money…
…
I'm not going to even touch Orator for the time being, but I just want to highlight something.
I've talked before about how tedious the Tutorials are, and how they're framed as in-character lessons by this one old guy (not Arazlam the narrator, another one) called Master Darlavon. Despite not yet appearing in the story, Master Darlavon actually has an entry in the Dramatis Personae; Darlavon teaches at the Akademy, so he likely taught Ramza, and he is well-liked by students but considered long-winded, and as his entry reveals, served only one tour of duty in the Fifty Years War, giving him very little experience.
The Orator has an ability called "Mimic Darlavon."
It inflicts the Sleep status.
Hilarious.
I want this to be one of the jobs added in the next FF14 expac. You can abbreviate the job name to YAP and everything.
FunkyEntropy
Occasionally insightful, possibly grumpy
- Location
- Los Angeles
Bruh you'll be fine. Good class/skill combos can hold their own just fine, you're just in the process of learning what's good and don't know what abilities to shoot for immediately.
You already have Arcane Up, I suggest just trying it out and seeing if you think the JP loss might be worth it in some situations.
Think about what kind of lofty Knight titles Zalbaag and Dycedarg have, then consider what you know about their personal character.
Goddammit Fluffles, I was counting on Omi doing a couple Errands, check his party/get into a battle, and realize he had a Tribble problem.
- Pronouns
- Him/He
I mean, think about what we've seen so far in just chapter 1, who talks, and who stabs? Who fails to talk people onto their side?
Politicians are fucking dangerous, it makes sense they're a late-unlock job, while all the people fighting and dying are Archers, knights, and Black/White mages, which unlock right from chemist or squire.
Politicians are fucking dangerous, it makes sense they're a late-unlock job, while all the people fighting and dying are Archers, knights, and Black/White mages, which unlock right from chemist or squire.
Not even the Delita/Ramza backstory? I figured that kind of stuff was fair game after the missable ''you're next'' line from Delita.
In all fairness it's more like you betrayed Gaffgarion, here.
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FunkyEntropy
Occasionally insightful, possibly grumpy
- Location
- Los Angeles
Time for some more rakes!
Rake #24: Spears (and some other weapon types) aren't available at the start of the game.
Status: You could try fisting people, but that usually requires consent. Or a Monk.
Rake #25: Optimize Gear is decidedly suboptimal.
Status: It's bad now, it gets worse later.
Rake #26: Sexism is a thing even in fantasy video games
Status: Women smart, men unga bunga.
Rake #27: The Dragoon's Jump ability purchase list
Status: I have no idea what the devs were thinking with this one.
Rake #28: Using chocobos as mounts
Status: Would be awesome except for the fact they take up a party slot and riding them destroys your action economy.
Rake #29: Monsters are like Tribbles, apparently.
Status: Goddammit Fluffles.
And as always, there's more on the way.
Rake #24: Spears (and some other weapon types) aren't available at the start of the game.
Status: You could try fisting people, but that usually requires consent. Or a Monk.
Rake #25: Optimize Gear is decidedly suboptimal.
Status: It's bad now, it gets worse later.
Rake #26: Sexism is a thing even in fantasy video games
Status: Women smart, men unga bunga.
Rake #27: The Dragoon's Jump ability purchase list
Status: I have no idea what the devs were thinking with this one.
Rake #28: Using chocobos as mounts
Status: Would be awesome except for the fact they take up a party slot and riding them destroys your action economy.
Rake #29: Monsters are like Tribbles, apparently.
Status: Goddammit Fluffles.
And as always, there's more on the way.
