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Let's Play Every Final Fantasy Game In Order Of Release [Now Finished: Final Fantasy Tactics]

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Reese said:
Regarding the question of the Alma timeline confusion, if occurs to me: what if the claim of Alma having also spent her whole life in monasteries just outright wasn't true, instead a cover story?
...Actually, though. Thinking on it more... it would be a bit of an odd cover story, but a good for specifically for getting close to the princess. Hm. Then, of course, the question would be, though: on whose behalf, and for what purpose?


Also, some more thoughts on the coming changes to warfare:
First, it can probably be assumed that any enemy that can be dealt with by gun-Chemists will be, so combat units can roughly be divided into gun-Chemists (though potentially in various forms -- leg infantry, mounted, in carts, emplaced, militia...) and various sorts of super-units.

If the super-units don't have access to some sort of rapid redeployment (teleportation, flight, etc.), as soon as one's committed at one point on the front lines, the enemy will know (though there might be some communication lag) that it isn't anywhere else and can adjust accordingly; deploying a super unit to an area gives an initial advantage, but with the expectation a countering super unit will be on the way and the potential cost of enemy advancement elsewhere (though that could also be used to set traps...).

If they do have access to rapid movement, then they're probably going to spend most of their time garrisoning strategic points (forts, cities, river crossings, etc.) with only brief jumps out for surprise attacks -- because leaving those strategic points undefended for too long risks enemy super units jumping to them, right past the front lines, and potentially making the front line advantage moot.

The above, though, assumes symmetric warfare, where both sides have roughly equal resources and capabilities -- and there's an important reason why, at least initially, that might not be the case, that being that how uneasy this kind of war makes the relationship between the peasants and the nobility. If the nobility don't train and arm large numbers of peasants as gun-Chemists, and the other side does the same thing, no problem, war continues more or less as normal. If the other side does have a gun-Chemist army in addition to noble super units, though, then the nobility is in big trouble. The complication, of course, is that if the nobility does raise an army of gun-Chemists, and that army then decides it doesn't like the nobility very much, the nobility is in, if anything, potentially worse trouble.

Importantly, though, in the latter situation, the monarchy potentially isn't. Those peasants might decide they want a republic (or at least to raise their own emperor), but they might also retain more conservative support, and the support of the monarchy itself, by declaring themselves for the monarch and against the corrupt nobility. The peasants win by getting a lower tax burden, since there's no longer a hierarchy of nobles all wanting significant cuts, the monarch wins by having more centralized power, potentially even slightly more tax revenue, and a large and loyal army of gun-Chemist peasants.

So if the nobles prevent their peasants from being armed, they basically just have to desperately hope that all of their enemies do the same thing. If they do arm their peasants, they have to convince those peasants not to overthrow them, which potentially involves having to make concessions to both the peasants and the monarch. Their main potential lever in this setting is probably that the army will still also need super units, for which the nobility is the best source... but still not the only potential source. And it's not necessarily all the noble families that would be needed...

In other words, just all around not a great time to be the average noble.
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Given that the main source of super units so far is Holy Knights (and Fell Knight), I feel that the church should factor into the analysis.
 
Something I've kind of been wondering; are the Order of the Northern/Southern Sky not to the north and south, respectively?

Larg's lands stretch from Eagrose in the west to Dorter in the east, and from Gariland in the south to Ziekden in the north
Where's the Black Lion forted up, here? South of Gariland is pretty much just... water.
Zaland, where Omi is now, is southeast of Dorter, but south of that is (spoiler) our new pal Cardinal Delacroix, no Goltannas to be found.
 
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Guile said:
Something I've kind of been wondering; are the Order of the Northern/Southern Sky not to the north and south, respectively?
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Up on the map might be East instead. Modern maps almost always have North-South as up-down because that was convenient for the Mercator world maps that were hugely useful for navigators (who typically were not attempting to cross the poles) but up = East because of sunrise was a historically used choice in some places. As was South, etc, it varied. I'm not an expert though.
 
Guile said:
Something I've kind of been wondering; are the Order of the Northern/Southern Sky not to the north and south, respectively?

Larg's lands stretch from Eagrose in the west to Dorter in the east, and from Gariland in the south to Ziekden in the north
Where's the Black Lion forted up, here? South of Gariland is pretty much just... water.
Zaland, where Omi is now, is southeast of Dorter, but south of that is (spoiler) our new pal Cardinal Delacroix, no Goltannas to be found.
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Never seen a good, official explanation of that to be honest.

I have seen a good, unofficial explanation, though. War of the Roses was 1455-1487 (so I guess Omi has at least 32 years to finish the game?), but maps did not start tending to have North on the top of the map until about 1569. East or South were more common to be on the 'top' of the map (since it is where the Sun comes from, not where the Sun disappears, and North is darker than South, direction of Jerusalem/Mecca, things like that). So the Northern/Southern Sky works if the East is the top of the map.

Link that has a short explanation, as well as containing a link to a longer explanation.

The Origins of North at the Top of Maps – The Map Room

www.maproomblog.com www.maproomblog.com

EDIT: Been Ninja'd.
 
Yeah, it's almost certain that the map of Ivalice is oriented with East at the top, seeing as the Northern's Sky Gallione province covers the left arm of the T-shaped structure of Ivalice.
 
Melchiorgk said:
Never seen a good, official explanation of that to be honest.

I have seen a good, unofficial explanation, though. War of the Roses was 1455-1487 (so I guess Omi has at least 32 years to finish the game?), but maps did not start tending to have North on the top of the map until about 1569. East or South were more common to be on the 'top' of the map (since it is where the Sun comes from, not where the Sun disappears, and North is darker than South, direction of Jerusalem/Mecca, things like that). So the Northern/Southern Sky works if the East is the top of the map.
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And, in fact, was/is fairly prevalent in Japan until Western influence made "North = Up" popular, i.e.:



And as I understand it, even today your typical Japanese person thinks of the country as running on an East/West axis even if one would normally think of it as north/south when looking at a globe, because the overall shape of the islands are sort of on a diagonal and the main portions do mostly go east/west.

Combine that with the factoids about old Western maps and the way some real Europe-aboos were involved in FFT, and it's not hard to come to that conclusion!
 
Unsung said:
So, funny story here. when I first played tactics, I did not find how to unlock jobs. I ran with squires and chemists until I stopped playing out of frustration at one point. I'll point out where I recall I got when it comes up.
I only picked tactics back up when it became available on the PS3 and finished it then. I'm excited to read your pinions on this Omicron.
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I realize I completely forgot about this. It was back at the desert. I was doing all kinds of tricks to get through, and probably could have beaten it, but I just bured out after getting to the desert
 
Omicron: Waxes about how unfair it is for enemies to be able to use the same playfield as them, with the summons.

Omcron: Spends other half talking about how great guns are

I feel like this is only going to end in one direction. An entire order of Gunslingers falling upon Ramza's head.

Also huh, coming from ffxiv auracite is an extremely interesting word choice, to throw into this story. Wonder what that will lead too.
 
A thought occurred to me: People ragged on Delita's 'It is your birth and faith that wrong you, not I' as hypocritical, but I'm starting to think it was the exact and literal truth. Delita seems to be out to save the princess, who, by virtue of who her parents were and the church she follows, is an intentionally made helpless pawn in the power politics of Ivalice.
 
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Omicron said:
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Mustadio's job is Machinist, and his special ability is Pulling Out A Glock. I don't know if you can see it in the picture above, but he is literally using a handgun to shoot at this enemy archer.

This is not as surprising as it would be if we hadn't just completed that errant and landed the ancient magical AR-15. But it is pretty surprising. I think this is the first appearance of the Machinist class in FF history, which would go on to become one of FFXIV's many jobs. Did Mustadio pull that gun from an ancient ruin, or did he build it him himself? The War of the Roses which provides some inspiration for FFT's story did feature early gunpowder weapons, but nothing like the convenient pistol Mustadio is using here.
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To quote a very weird movie, "The gun is good". And all Tactics games see to make that true.
In FFTA Moogles, owing their mechanical aptitude, are the only race that employs guns, with the Gunner Job harnessing the mighty power of "just shoot 'em in the face". Blessed with the ability to use guns and little else (they have surprisingly good defenses, both physcial and magical, and bad everything else), the Gunner can imbue bullets with a variety of elements and status effects in their pursuit of bodily harm. Thanks to the fact that guns have all the range (range 8 for most of them) and the Concentrate ability, Gunners can also use effectively quite a lot of abilities that are otherwise limited by accuracy and/or weapon range, though low stats will hurt a bit. Not to say that their own abilities are bad, attacking and applying status at the same time is very good, and when you can Charm or Stop enemies while also hurting them you cna see why Guners are good despite their stats.

FFTA2 then strives to improve guns. How? Explosives. Enter hand cannons, with a smidgen less range (7 instead of 8) but much stronger. And of course we have not one but two Jobs that can learn the ancient art of blowing stuff up.
Our first new entry is the Flintlock Job, half Moogle, half hat (seriously, look it up) and wielder of hand cannons. A direct evolution of the Fusilier Job (our old friend Gunner, renamed and returning. Shame for the Concentrate nerf though), the Flintlock is more focused on support through its use of Prime (needed to use other abilities) and a suit of buffs like Protect Cannon, Shell Cannon, Cure Cannon, Ether Cannon and the ever so funny Teleport Cannon; they also get direct attack abilities in the from of Ether Boost and Blowback. Stats-wise we're sadly not far from the Fusilier, so most other Jobs will outperform them. Still a useful Job, range is good and can work in many situations.
The second new entry is a Bangaa Job, as they decided to not be outshone at range anymore (going from 0 ranged Jobs in FFTA to 2 in FFTA2): the Cannoneer. A more offensive mirrror of the Flintlock, they share the use of hand cannons and possess very similar stat growth. Where Flintlocks are built more for support, the Cannoneer can effectively buff their attacks (with Prime for Attack Up, Scope for more precision, Foresight for more attacks next run and Buckshot for AoE on attacks) and has strong, though restrictive attacks (Mortar Immobilizes next turn, Target takes up one turn before the attack). They still have Potion Shell and Ether Shell for support too, and don't have to Prime before using any of their abilities, so in practice they end up easier to use than Flintlocks.
The final Job to use Guns is the Agent. This is is a special Job, available only to a certain postgame character returning from FFXII (and in fact the only Job available to him, the only case in the game). The Job focuses on supporting female units and has otherwise limited utility (just some self-healing and a speed-reducing debuff). It's more of a cameo than anything serius, TBH.

I should note that FFTA2 would have had another gunner Job, had circumstances permitted: the first ranged No Mou Job, the Transmuter. This was a Job that used hand bombs as weapon and had the ability of mixing items to get new effects, much like the original Chemist in FFV. It was cut close to launch because with 19 items in the game the combinations were over 300, and QA simply didn't have enough time to test everything. The game still has the Job sprites and portraits, and those are used for NPCs, while weapon data is still in but dummied out. Being dummied out doesn't prevent some NPCs to access a rather strong S-Ability that the Transmuter would have had, Blood Price (abilities cost HP instead of MP, costs are doubled); this makes some postgame missions rather dicey, to say the least.

In the end this is the story of guns in Tactics, from a rather unexpected introduction to many Jobs dedicated to them.
 
Might depend on if Delita bought his fancy new powerset (and outfit) or not

If they're just handing those out for box tops, then long live the Church
 
Bangaa Cannoneer also deserves a look if you've never seen it.


Edit: this just wouldn't leave my head

Bangaa: You see em?"
Bangaa Cannoneer: "Yup."
Bangaa: "Teach their next of kin why that's a bad idea."
 
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CeBrudras said:
The FFTAs both had such a great, ridiculously cute vibe. I hope they reuse the designs for some 3d game sometime.
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FFXIV should have been set in FFTA/FFXII era Ivalice. I say this as a powerful, intelligent, virile, & objectively correct Femroe player who would be devestated to lose my longtime character, but all of the FFXIV races are hot dogwater compared to the ones in FFTA/2, and I would swap them out in a heartbeat.
 
RubberBandMan said:
I'm very glad Omi is doing these propositions. Walking back and forth in circles waiting for them to conclude was never anything I had patience for,but the few I did do have some pretty fucking wild rewards lore wise, as Omi has seen.
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Now that I have seen how much cool extra lore you get from the Errands and how cool (if at times baffling) the Artifacts are, I'm pretty much committed to doing all of them. Every single one.

This proved a little tricky so far given that I need to somehow spend two weeks running between nodes while avoiding random encounters because half my good team is away, but this problem solved itself very recently.

somewhatLazy said:
You know, with Gaffgarion apparently being a long-term underling of Dycedarg's, I wonder if Ramza Beoulvre coming into his employ is truly as accidental as Ramza thought at first. Or if, perhaps, whatever spy network a schemer like Dycedarg undoubtedly has caught word of his brother's survival and he quickly worked to put his brother under the watchful eye of his best underling. Sure, maybe a self-interested man like Gaffgarion might try to use Ramza as leverage against him one day…

But we all know how Zalbaag dealt with Gustav holding Tietra hostage.

Poor Ramza. He tried to escape the lies of nobility, but he could never do so for as long as he remained within Ivalice. And soon, these plots will embroil the whole of the kingdom in chaos and likely war…
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Yeah, I'm convinced that is the case. Ramza thought he was joining up with a neutral, unaffiliated mercenary, but Gaffgarion was hired to approach him and keep an eye on him the entire time. This is far too big to be a coincidence.

Guile said:
Something I've kind of been wondering; are the Order of the Northern/Southern Sky not to the north and south, respectively?

Larg's lands stretch from Eagrose in the west to Dorter in the east, and from Gariland in the south to Ziekden in the north
Where's the Black Lion forted up, here? South of Gariland is pretty much just... water.
Zaland, where Omi is now, is southeast of Dorter, but south of that is (spoiler) our new pal Cardinal Delacroix, no Goltannas to be found.
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Duke Goltanna rules over the Duchy of Zeltennia. We haven't been to Zeltennia yet, but from contextual cues, it's the province 'above' Gallionne (Duke Larg's province) on the map; I believe one character makes reference to Zieklaus Desert marking the boundary between Gallionne and Zeltennia. In ancient times, Ivalice was made up of seven kingdoms which were then unified, another oddly specific trait it shares with A Song of Ice and Fire.

Yes, this does mean that if the map is oriented North-Top/South-Bottom, Duke Larg commands the Order of the Northern Sky which operates in the South, and Duke Goltanna commands the Order of the Southern Sky which operates in the North. For this reason I think everyone who's suggested the map was instead oriented with East up to is right, it's the only way this makes sense.

foamy said:
A thought occurred to me: People ragged on Delita's 'It is your birth and faith that wrong you, not I' as hypocritical, but I'm starting to think it was the exact and literal truth. Delita seems to be out to save the princess, who, by virtue of who her parents were and the church she follows, is an intentionally made helpless pawn in the power politics of Ivalice.
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Mmhm. I've been thinking similarly myself.

It's a little odd because it also ties into the difference between the delivery of Delita's line at Orbonne between the PSX version and WotL. When Delita says "Don't blame me, blame yourself or God," he's saying this to Agrias; he turns to look at her and Ovelia is already unconscious at that point. The line and the context of its delivery make him come across as an indifferent asshole.

Meanwhile, the CGI cutscene does have Delita being kind of a dick (he's pretty callous when saying "You've got quite a mouth on you, princess" and then, again, punches her unconscious), but the line "Forgive me. 'Tis your birth and faith that wrong you, not I," is delivered to the unconscious princess in a fairly neutral tone of voice which could be read as genuinely apologetic. It parsed as "Delita being a moral coward" to me, but with the benefit of hindsight, his characterization there is entirely compatible with him being here to actually save Ovelia but being business-minded about it and ready to use force rather than 'waste time' explaining himself to her, then telling her something to the equivalent of, "I don't mean to hurt you, but merely by being a princess you invite tragedy from which I have to save you."

So it's possible the PSX characterization is a red herring meant to make the player assume the worst of Delita only to reveal he's a good guy, or it's possible that it's meant to be a hint that Delita is actually a lot more sinister than he has been letting Ramza and Ovelia believe after their first encounter. Similarly, the WotL version of the scene could be intended to make Delita's characterization as a good guy more consistent across the board, with his intro making him look bad but in a way that's actually congruent with his true personality when you look back at it with further context, or it could be a red herring meant to make us believe that Delita is a good guy out to save the Princess to better hide his ultimate betrayal.

It's impossible to say until we know more about him. "Who can you trust?" appears to be one of the defining themes of the game; if Delita is truly just the hero of another story whose intentions are pure, I suspect we won't know for sure until the credits roll without him having betrayed us.
 
Omicron said:
Mmhm. I've been thinking similarly myself.

It's a little odd because it also ties into the difference between the delivery of Delita's line at Orbonne between the PSX version and WotL. When Delita says "Don't blame me, blame yourself or God," he's saying this to Agrias; he turns to look at her and Ovelia is already unconscious at that point. The line and the context of its delivery make him come across as an indifferent asshole.

Meanwhile, the CGI cutscene does have Delita being kind of a dick (he's pretty callous when saying "You've got quite a mouth on you, princess" and then, again, punches her unconscious), but the line "Forgive me. 'Tis your birth and faith that wrong you, not I," is delivered to the unconscious princess in a fairly neutral tone of voice which could be read as genuinely apologetic. It parsed as "Delita being a moral coward" to me, but with the benefit of hindsight, his characterization there is entirely compatible with him being here to actually save Ovelia but being business-minded about it and ready to use force rather than 'waste time' explaining himself to her, then telling her something to the equivalent of, "I don't mean to hurt you, but merely by being a princess you invite tragedy from which I have to save you."

So it's possible the PSX characterization is a red herring meant to make the player assume the worst of Delita only to reveal he's a good guy, or it's possible that it's meant to be a hint that Delita is actually a lot more sinister than he has been letting Ramza and Ovelia believe after their first encounter. Similarly, the WotL version of the scene could be intended to make Delita's characterization as a good guy more consistent across the board, with his intro making him look bad but in a way that's actually congruent with his true personality when you look back at it with further context, or it could be a red herring meant to make us believe that Delita is a good guy out to save the Princess to better hide his ultimate betrayal.

It's impossible to say until we know more about him. "Who can you trust?" appears to be one of the defining themes of the game; if Delita is truly just the hero of another story whose intentions are pure, I suspect we won't know for sure until the credits roll without him having betrayed us.
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Part of the interesting question at that point is; when we're being introduced to the idea that Delita was not the 'true hero' of the events by our narrator dude, is that merely to say that Delita was given undue credit for actions actually undertaken by Ramza, or is it meant to imply that Delita is not in truth heroic at all?

Certainly, that framing of the opening while following the LP had me inclined to expect Delita to be Actually An Evil Bad Guy, but setting (falsely) that expectation could well be the point.
 
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