- Location
- Malaysia
It's frustrating when you just start using the job, but Geomancer is a pretty good job with transferable skills overall.
Just don't equip them with an axe as their main melee weapon. Give them swords instead. Axes fucking sucks.
Let's Play Every Final Fantasy Game In Order Of Release [Now Playing: Final Fantasy IX]
- Thread starter Omicron
- Start date
- Let's Play
Just don't equip them with an axe as their main melee weapon. Give them swords instead. Axes fucking sucks.
OkayishGatsby
This Titan is Fine
Samurai is poorly optimized, but don't let that stop you. Just about any class can pull its weight in this game, if applied in a certain way. Samurai as a container is mid, but Iaido is a stellar skillset. Don't forget that it can equip armor(but not shields) and doesn't need the MP from caster gear. It's way safer as a Samurai to wade into the enemy frontline than as a mage. They're still decent beatsticks if you want to ignore Iaido all together and just swing katanas around. Some of its later sword skills don't even do damage and instead provide support, like healing and haste. That said, folks generally learn the skills and equip Iaido on another job like Black Mage.
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FunkyEntropy
Occasionally insightful, possibly grumpy
- Location
- Los Angeles
Samurai Ramza is still go.
It isn't optimized, but why let that get in the way of having fun? Just try to avoid too many more levels up as a Monk if you plan on using Martial Arts as your secondary, they have terrible MA growth.
Fie! Fie upon whoever preemptively warned you of this rake!
It's bad design but by god it's bad design that some of us have learned about the hard way!
OK, but then I wouldn't have been able to rib you about having your units KO'd. Clearly it was meant to be this way.
MiskWisk
Hoot
- Location
- Somewhere devoid of wit
- Pronouns
- He
It'd be worth an experiment to find out!
Unfortunately, I'm pretty sure Marlboro are obligate carnivores, so you'd need to find things that make good smelling corpses.
Maybe a trip to the perfume store would help?
- Pronouns
- He/Him
I mean, we already have White Wind...
- Pronouns
- Him/He
Samurai toolkit is very good, and is based around doing Samurai things. Of course in a job-system mixing-and-matching is usually peak power, but the job is very much an advanced 'here's a bunch of cool stuff that works together'
And it's one of the few jobs where Ramza isn't just good at, but objectively best at. Since it's a job that uses PA and MA, and Ramza has best of both worlds.
It's just that people aren't happy leaving good classes as they are, when they could instead optimize it over the past 25 years.
But when you line it up against the other two heavy armor jobs, you have Knight, who's based around their equipment and stats more then their skills, Lancer, who does one thing but does it very very well, and Samurai which has heavy armor, but can do a lot.
And it's one of the few jobs where Ramza isn't just good at, but objectively best at. Since it's a job that uses PA and MA, and Ramza has best of both worlds.
It's just that people aren't happy leaving good classes as they are, when they could instead optimize it over the past 25 years.
But when you line it up against the other two heavy armor jobs, you have Knight, who's based around their equipment and stats more then their skills, Lancer, who does one thing but does it very very well, and Samurai which has heavy armor, but can do a lot.
- Location
- USA
I think that'd depend on the malboro in question? Like how long the individual will last before it starts demanding meat. Including its owner's--like real-life carnivores (or omnivores), it might not be picky as to whose when it really wants to eat that.
Once again, it's time for incest chocobo eugenics. If they can spit out a meteor, they can smell like roses when they die.
Final Fantasy monster breeders when they run into any problem whatsoever
Egleris
Vagrant Dragon
- Location
- Italy
Alright, so, going back to the PSX translation comparison:
- As I mentioned last time, Delacroix is obviously the correct translation, but the PSX translation is interesting, in that they chose to translate the name to "Draclau", which is obviously an anagram for "Dracula". Talk about foreshadowing that the Cardinal wasn't somebody to trust, uh?
- Anyway, in Zaland, the discussion with Mustadio proceed in a more logical manner, in that they start with "we know you have it!", he says "I've no idea what you're talking about!" and then they say "the Holy Stone!", making the discussion more of a progression than the WotL "you have the stone! - What stone? - The Auracite", which is needlessly repetitive to me. Also, of course, "Auracite" is a backported term from future Final Fantasy entries; the PSX version consistently refers to either "holy stones" or, eventually, "Zodiac Stones".
- In the after battle discussion, the explanation of Baert's Trading Company is clearer in the PSX version, as when Mustadio says their name, instead of simply repeating it, Agrias says "the importer?", and Mustadio then straight out states "they're not just traders, they're a criminal syndicate involved in anything, from smuggling to slavery". Notably, no reference to opium here, and also the PSX explanation makes them feel like a somewhat smaller deal - something which is more reasonable to expect the Cardinal could wipe out if informed of the group's activities.
- When Agrias describes the times of Saint Ajora, in the PSX version she very clearly says "robots walking the streets", not metal men, which suggest a bit more informed knowledge remains of that time, at least enough to know what robots are. That's interesting from a cultural standpoint, I think, since it raises the question of how much, exactly, was forgotten about those ancient times.
- Agrias' line about the Cardinal while looking on Lionel from afar is a bit different in the PSX version in a way that, once again, clears up some confusion - specifically, she says "the Cardinal is very loyal to the Royal Family", which is a bit more precise than "the crown" and, so long as we assume Agrias doesn't consider Louveria to be "Royal Family", given she married in, can easily be taken as her assuming that the Cardinal will protect Ovelia over bowing to Louveria's demands. It makes her plan more logical from her point of view when she words things that way.
- Of note, the PSX translation also has the confusing line about Alma telling Ovelia that she'd lived in the monastery her whole life. So, that's one point of confusion where the PSX and the WotL are equally weird; it's a very confusing sentence that doesn't seem to make much sense with what we know of Alma as a character.
- Interestingly, during the discussion between him and Dycedarg, PSX Gafgarion frames the comment about Barbaneth as a question, saying "did his strong sense of justice came from his father?", instead of the WotL version stating "too much like his father, that one", which instead suggest Gafgarion knew Balbaneth personally. Everything else in the conversation is the same, including Dycedarg's line that "as long as the Princess is with the Lady Agrias, getting her back won't be that difficult", which, considering Agrias now joined the team, it now seems clear in hindsight just means that Dycedarg has no respect for Agrias' bodyguard skills. That might be why Gafgarion was confident letting her be bait?
- Upon arriving at Lionel, we're presented with the PSX translation for the Lionguard's name, that being "St. Konoe Knight", which is along the same line of "Hokuten" which the game has been using for the Northern Sky Order; also, the question and answer about Saint Ajora to be let inside the castle is entirely nonsensical in the PSX version, to the point that it seems like a password more than a genuine request.
- During the discussion with Delacroix, Alma's retelling of the story doesn't have the line about "mountains settling down into the earth", or any reference to flying islands, she just say "when the land was different". Not sure if that means that the Flying Island line is another backported thing like Auracite that the WotL version added to the text, or if the original Japanese translation included a line to that effect that the PSX version failed to translate.
- I must apologize, because I completely forgot that, in the Chronicles section of the Menu, when checking what he party knows about the Zodiac Stones, there's an entire hidden cutscene about Mustadio escaping from Goug; this ought to have been mentioned at some point before the last update, even if technically only becomes available during it. @Omicron, you'll probably want to check it over, even if it doesn't have any new information. Still, it's an extra mark of hidden lore, which does seems like something worth taking note of.
- Before the confrontation in Goug slums, PSX Ramza opens the scene with another of his somewhat iconic/famous lines: "He's late... too late". It's nothing particularly exciting, but I do think it has a bit more personality than his WotL line, even if it's simpler in choice of prose.
- After the battle, we have another instance where the PSX translation clarifies the issues around "the crown", with Mustadio saying "he wouldn't dare to hurt a member of the Royal Family", which makes more sense than the "go against the Crown" issue - since harming a member of the royal family is not something Louveria could openly forgive. Then Ramza's exposition is a lot clearer than the WotL version; Ramza says "the Cardinal wants to use the "Zodiac Brave Story" - by collecting the stones, he can create "Zodiac Braves" to control the land", which here clearly means "the populace". The idea is clearly that having a soft coup by the church supported by the twelve Zodiac Braves, as identified by their possession of the Zodiac Stone, would have enough legitimacy in people's eyes for the kingdom to accept it.
- As usual, the PSX version has no FMV, instead having a in-engine cutscene to present the meeting between Ramza and Delita. Delita's warning to Ramza in the PSX version is particularly different, as he said "you would save the Princess by only one danger; only I can save her from all of them". His next line is almost as stark as "blame yourself or God", with him saying to Ramza "the best way won't always lead to the best results", which I like more than the WotL "Noble endeavors do not always reach the end that we desire"; the PSX line is making a point about effectiveness requiring compromise, rather than making a statement of good intentions not leading to good results - the way PSX Delita frames it, you can get the result you want from acting goodly, but that will have other costs elsewhere.
- The battle in Bariaus Valley, or rather Balias Swale if we go by the WotL name, doesn't features the knights addressing Agrias as "gosling", but does instead features another of Ramza iconic PSX lines, as well as probably the silliest and most inexplicable in the whole script, as he starts the battle by following the "Protect Agrias!" sentence, which is in both version, with "Geronimo!" rather than "Be quick!". So, that's that; it seems like an appropriate note to end this stretch of translation on. Overall, I want to say that the PSX version was a lot clearer then the WotL version of the script here, "Draclau" and "Geronimo" notwithstanding - and it was so primarily by having the space to clarify things when needed due to keeping most of the dialogue shorter and snappier most of the time.
As others have said, Iaido as a Skill Set being based on MA does means that it works better as a secondary on other classes, with Black Mage and Geomancer being the two best choices, than it does on Samurai itself, just like Agrias' Swordskills work better on a class with higher PA, such as Knight or Geomancer, than they do in her native Holy Knight class.
This in no way means that using the skillset in their native classes (which you will need to do at least when you're learning the abilities) makes them somehow bad skillsets; it just means that you're losing on somewhere between 2 and 5 (depending on level and equipment - the gap grows larger as the game progresses) points in PA/MA, but since the other part of the formula is a fixed number (for Swordskill, is Weapon Power + a value between 2 and 5 which is dependent on the specific swordskill ability, for Iaido is a number that is dependent on the specific Iaido ability and varies between 8 and 18 for the damaging ones), this isn't as damaging as losing a point in PA was for the Monk's punching power.
The difference only truly becomes huge after level 30 or so; until then, yes, Samurai Ramza will inflict slightly less damage than Geomancer Ramza or Black Mage Ramza, but as others noticed, he'll have heavy armor, and also better attack when comparing with the Black Mage specifically, so there's actually valid reason to stay in the class. Well, aside from needing to learn the skillset in the first place, anyway - Samurai is the fourth class by JP total costs, learning all that it offers isn't a fast process.
- As I mentioned last time, Delacroix is obviously the correct translation, but the PSX translation is interesting, in that they chose to translate the name to "Draclau", which is obviously an anagram for "Dracula". Talk about foreshadowing that the Cardinal wasn't somebody to trust, uh?
- Anyway, in Zaland, the discussion with Mustadio proceed in a more logical manner, in that they start with "we know you have it!", he says "I've no idea what you're talking about!" and then they say "the Holy Stone!", making the discussion more of a progression than the WotL "you have the stone! - What stone? - The Auracite", which is needlessly repetitive to me. Also, of course, "Auracite" is a backported term from future Final Fantasy entries; the PSX version consistently refers to either "holy stones" or, eventually, "Zodiac Stones".
- In the after battle discussion, the explanation of Baert's Trading Company is clearer in the PSX version, as when Mustadio says their name, instead of simply repeating it, Agrias says "the importer?", and Mustadio then straight out states "they're not just traders, they're a criminal syndicate involved in anything, from smuggling to slavery". Notably, no reference to opium here, and also the PSX explanation makes them feel like a somewhat smaller deal - something which is more reasonable to expect the Cardinal could wipe out if informed of the group's activities.
- When Agrias describes the times of Saint Ajora, in the PSX version she very clearly says "robots walking the streets", not metal men, which suggest a bit more informed knowledge remains of that time, at least enough to know what robots are. That's interesting from a cultural standpoint, I think, since it raises the question of how much, exactly, was forgotten about those ancient times.
- Agrias' line about the Cardinal while looking on Lionel from afar is a bit different in the PSX version in a way that, once again, clears up some confusion - specifically, she says "the Cardinal is very loyal to the Royal Family", which is a bit more precise than "the crown" and, so long as we assume Agrias doesn't consider Louveria to be "Royal Family", given she married in, can easily be taken as her assuming that the Cardinal will protect Ovelia over bowing to Louveria's demands. It makes her plan more logical from her point of view when she words things that way.
- Of note, the PSX translation also has the confusing line about Alma telling Ovelia that she'd lived in the monastery her whole life. So, that's one point of confusion where the PSX and the WotL are equally weird; it's a very confusing sentence that doesn't seem to make much sense with what we know of Alma as a character.
- Interestingly, during the discussion between him and Dycedarg, PSX Gafgarion frames the comment about Barbaneth as a question, saying "did his strong sense of justice came from his father?", instead of the WotL version stating "too much like his father, that one", which instead suggest Gafgarion knew Balbaneth personally. Everything else in the conversation is the same, including Dycedarg's line that "as long as the Princess is with the Lady Agrias, getting her back won't be that difficult", which, considering Agrias now joined the team, it now seems clear in hindsight just means that Dycedarg has no respect for Agrias' bodyguard skills. That might be why Gafgarion was confident letting her be bait?
- Upon arriving at Lionel, we're presented with the PSX translation for the Lionguard's name, that being "St. Konoe Knight", which is along the same line of "Hokuten" which the game has been using for the Northern Sky Order; also, the question and answer about Saint Ajora to be let inside the castle is entirely nonsensical in the PSX version, to the point that it seems like a password more than a genuine request.
- During the discussion with Delacroix, Alma's retelling of the story doesn't have the line about "mountains settling down into the earth", or any reference to flying islands, she just say "when the land was different". Not sure if that means that the Flying Island line is another backported thing like Auracite that the WotL version added to the text, or if the original Japanese translation included a line to that effect that the PSX version failed to translate.
- I must apologize, because I completely forgot that, in the Chronicles section of the Menu, when checking what he party knows about the Zodiac Stones, there's an entire hidden cutscene about Mustadio escaping from Goug; this ought to have been mentioned at some point before the last update, even if technically only becomes available during it. @Omicron, you'll probably want to check it over, even if it doesn't have any new information. Still, it's an extra mark of hidden lore, which does seems like something worth taking note of.
- Before the confrontation in Goug slums, PSX Ramza opens the scene with another of his somewhat iconic/famous lines: "He's late... too late". It's nothing particularly exciting, but I do think it has a bit more personality than his WotL line, even if it's simpler in choice of prose.
- After the battle, we have another instance where the PSX translation clarifies the issues around "the crown", with Mustadio saying "he wouldn't dare to hurt a member of the Royal Family", which makes more sense than the "go against the Crown" issue - since harming a member of the royal family is not something Louveria could openly forgive. Then Ramza's exposition is a lot clearer than the WotL version; Ramza says "the Cardinal wants to use the "Zodiac Brave Story" - by collecting the stones, he can create "Zodiac Braves" to control the land", which here clearly means "the populace". The idea is clearly that having a soft coup by the church supported by the twelve Zodiac Braves, as identified by their possession of the Zodiac Stone, would have enough legitimacy in people's eyes for the kingdom to accept it.
- As usual, the PSX version has no FMV, instead having a in-engine cutscene to present the meeting between Ramza and Delita. Delita's warning to Ramza in the PSX version is particularly different, as he said "you would save the Princess by only one danger; only I can save her from all of them". His next line is almost as stark as "blame yourself or God", with him saying to Ramza "the best way won't always lead to the best results", which I like more than the WotL "Noble endeavors do not always reach the end that we desire"; the PSX line is making a point about effectiveness requiring compromise, rather than making a statement of good intentions not leading to good results - the way PSX Delita frames it, you can get the result you want from acting goodly, but that will have other costs elsewhere.
- The battle in Bariaus Valley, or rather Balias Swale if we go by the WotL name, doesn't features the knights addressing Agrias as "gosling", but does instead features another of Ramza iconic PSX lines, as well as probably the silliest and most inexplicable in the whole script, as he starts the battle by following the "Protect Agrias!" sentence, which is in both version, with "Geronimo!" rather than "Be quick!". So, that's that; it seems like an appropriate note to end this stretch of translation on. Overall, I want to say that the PSX version was a lot clearer then the WotL version of the script here, "Draclau" and "Geronimo" notwithstanding - and it was so primarily by having the space to clarify things when needed due to keeping most of the dialogue shorter and snappier most of the time.
Ramza is the best Samurai because he has higher MA than any male Samurai (to use Iaido/Draw Out with) and more PA than any female Samurai (to use the attack command with). The latter is overall less important, since Katana, like Fists, need maxed Brave for their damage, but depending on the enemy having the option of a good physical can be useful.
As others have said, Iaido as a Skill Set being based on MA does means that it works better as a secondary on other classes, with Black Mage and Geomancer being the two best choices, than it does on Samurai itself, just like Agrias' Swordskills work better on a class with higher PA, such as Knight or Geomancer, than they do in her native Holy Knight class.
This in no way means that using the skillset in their native classes (which you will need to do at least when you're learning the abilities) makes them somehow bad skillsets; it just means that you're losing on somewhere between 2 and 5 (depending on level and equipment - the gap grows larger as the game progresses) points in PA/MA, but since the other part of the formula is a fixed number (for Swordskill, is Weapon Power + a value between 2 and 5 which is dependent on the specific swordskill ability, for Iaido is a number that is dependent on the specific Iaido ability and varies between 8 and 18 for the damaging ones), this isn't as damaging as losing a point in PA was for the Monk's punching power.
The difference only truly becomes huge after level 30 or so; until then, yes, Samurai Ramza will inflict slightly less damage than Geomancer Ramza or Black Mage Ramza, but as others noticed, he'll have heavy armor, and also better attack when comparing with the Black Mage specifically, so there's actually valid reason to stay in the class. Well, aside from needing to learn the skillset in the first place, anyway - Samurai is the fourth class by JP total costs, learning all that it offers isn't a fast process.
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Zap Rowsdower
Ex-cultist vagrant
- Location
- Bright lights, big city
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Not actually backporting on the Auracite thing. The first game to use the term was a spinoff/sequel of XII for the DS which came out literally a month before WotL (April 2007 vs May 2007).
If it wasn't coined specifically for this translation, it was coined by a guy the next cubicle over while this translation was being written and shared at the water cooler shortly thereafter.
If it wasn't coined specifically for this translation, it was coined by a guy the next cubicle over while this translation was being written and shared at the water cooler shortly thereafter.
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FunkyEntropy
Occasionally insightful, possibly grumpy
- Location
- Los Angeles
OTOH unlike any other class its skill usage is completely gated by story progression. What skills you can use is based upon the katanas you can buy, and what you can buy is restricted by how far along you are in the story.
Which is part of the reason why I like the class, there's no pressure to have JP Up equipped until you master the class because you won't be able to use half the things you unlock until much later. This gives you the freedom to experiment with other abilities, which is neat.
Egleris
Vagrant Dragon
- Location
- Italy
I mostly agree with that, and will point out that the R/S/M (Reaction/Support/Movement) ability set of the Samurai is also quite good itself - nearly all of the abilities can be put to use in a number of interesting ways. It's a great class in terms of abilities, it just has below-average stats which hold it back from being competitive with others once all the abilities have been learned.
- Pronouns
- They/Them/She/Her
Egleris said:
Sorry about whatever the confusion was(/is)?
Wiadi said:
Ahh. Thanks!
Hm. Also, as a further thought, if Ramza is correct about the cardinal's plan, that does seem to imply that either the cardinal genuinely believes he's in the right, whatever dirty deeds he may have to do along the way, that the Braves were/are secretly as corrupt as he is, and/or that he'll be able to control them somehow. If he knew he was corrupt, and he thought the Braves would object to that, and he didn't think he could control them, actively summoning them seems like it'd be a clear bad move for him.
- Location
- Spain
Nothing inexplicable about this, is just more proof than Ivalice used to be Texas.
Egleris
Vagrant Dragon
- Location
- Italy
If you go with the PSX translation, the idea is to give twelve knights that the Cardinal/Church trusts the twelve Zodiac Stones, then reveal them to the people and say "these Holy Knights have been recognized by the Zodiac Stones and become the new Zodiac Braves!", and then use the political pull of having the local equivalent of the Knights of the Round Table on their side to take power. The Braves would follow the Church's plan because they're Holy Knight the church instated, therefore part of the Church themselves.
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- Location
- Singapore
- Pronouns
- Singular They
NGL when I first read this I immediately thought Final Fantasy Tactics had suddenly made positionals a great deal more damaging/important (beyond just character facing), because thus far FFT has been gameplay rakes all the way down.
In Japanese, Agrias gives a fuller description of her position and allegiance: "Knight Agrias Oaks of the holy/divine guard knight order of Lesalia".
"By the grace of Saint Ajora" is also expanded a bit: "to seek the aid of the child of god, Saint Ajora". The term is 神の御子, which does translate literally to "the revered child of god". Occasionally this gets translated as "the child of the emperor", because of the whole "the Japanese emperor is deified" tradition, but in any case it's clearly naming Ajora as the direct child of a god.
It's difficult to tell whether this is a boilerplate declaration, because while it does have the feel of an old ritual formality, Agrias also just Talks Like That in general. The translation here is approximately the proper amount of formality, but if I had to change it I would make it even more extra, with Agrias going on and on with full names and titles like it's the highest ceremony.
One point in favour of the "formalized ceremonial exchange" interpretation is the Guard also talks in high style, except for the lines "Who goes there" at the very beginning of this exchange, and "Raise the gate" at the very end. So the whole thing could be a shibboleth that acts as an indication of the rank of the supplicant: if they can recite all of this formality, the authorities know roughly how well to treat them in welcome.
A couple of points. First, Delacroix talks like a Dignified Old Man, using older grammatical forms, but not so much as to overdo it. Standard high politeness, but without any pompous flourishes. When referring to himself, he goes "このドラコロワ" or "この私", which is directly "this Delacroix" or "this I", which is a speech pattern I would estimate at 70% to 80% humility. He's presenting himself as "your humble servant". This carries on through his description of Lionel Castle as "wanting", while is another polite-humble self-debasement: in Japanese he says 古く汚らしい, which is "old and filthy".
Yes, it does sound rather over-the-top in English. Japanese is just like that.
Second, I had to double-check "High Confessor Marcel". "High Confessor" is probably the sensitivity-friendly version of "Pope" in the faux-Catholic fictional religion here, so not really significant; the term is 教皇. (Fpr FFXIV players, this is the same term used for "Archbishop".) "Marcel" is trickier, since Delacroix doesn't name the High Confessor in his line, but Agrias does in the line immediately after. However, she uses the High Confessor's surname, while "Marcel" is his given name.
The High Confessor's full name is マリッジ・フューネラル (V世, ie "the Fifth", if it matters). This is transliterated as "Marijji Funeral", and what the heck can you do with that. So I can imagine "Marijji" being altered into "Marcel", and WotL uses the given name in keeping with RL traditions of the Pope being known by his given (or at least pontifical given) name.
A general point about "Zodiac Brave": it's written in katakana, so both "Zodiac" and "Brave" are intended to be read as Fancy Words.
"Brave" is one of the enduring attempts to translate into English the many possible words for "hero" in Japanese, between 勇者 ("courageous person"), 英雄 ("outstanding man"), ヒーロー ("hero" in katakana, these days often meaning cape superheroes), and so on. I say "translate into English" rather than "English translation" because "Brave" as a noun is from the Japanese side attempting this. It's an old and obsolete definition in English, so it's not incorrect, but seeing stuff like "the Zodiac Braves" or "the Crystal Braves" in any relatively modern work is a good sign it's a Japanese original.
As a tangential note, the character bios in Japanese is called "Brave Story characters", because the subtitle for FFT is "The Zodiac Brave Story".
"Before the mountains had ceased their wandering" is indeed just a fanciful way of saying "before the world has taken its current shape". "World" here is 大地, which refers to the physical ground, albeit encompassing the entire planet. Having said that, the story Ovelia recites also uses 大地 to refer to the world the Lucavi ruled over, so it could be a very unusual and oblique way of talking about the political landscape. It's definitely not standard use of the term, but this is both an ancient poetic story in-universe, and Final Fantasy Tactics which just phrases things like that by default.
As mentioned by others, "Lucavi" is in katakana, with 悪魔の意 in parenthesis after that. I'm thinking this is the Japanese script's version of furigana (or "furikanji"), since it has also been used in other, less implication-worthy contexts. For example, Cardinal Delacroix (and the High Confessor) have been addressed as 猊下, which in the translation is "Your Eminence". In the Japanese script, the first time this happens in sequence (when the Guard opens the gate for the party to enter the city), there's the parenthesis with the hiragana reading, げいか. When does the game decide to use furigana? Is it for the benefit of teenagers playing the game and encountering these words for the first time? Who knows.
悪魔の意 translates to "the thoughts/feelings of evil demons". So that's an interesting way to describe the as-yet undefined term "Lucavi", which without any other context would probably be assumed to be standard demons.
"Spirit world" is straightforwardly 魔界, which is more often translated as "demon world". I'm a little curious if the translation is trying not to use the word "demon" or "devil" in story-relevant dialogue. The translation here appears to be missing a bit of context: the term used for "driving the Lucavi to the spirit world" is 追い返す, which implies "chasing back", in the sense of turning back or repulsing an invasion. So the Lucavi came from "the spirit world", and they were driven back there.
"The Twelve each bore an auracite crystal emblazoned with a house of the night sky" is fascinating in a few ways. "Auracite" is not used in the Japanese text, whether in katakana or the current "original" kanji of 聖石 "holy stones". "Crystal", meanwhile, is in katakana クリスタル, which is an example of what I mentioned in a previous post about Japanese using English loanwords in katakana in place of existing kanji due to being cooler.
"House of the night sky" is probably the translation's attempt to differentiate between the Japanese script using the word "Zodiac" in katakana, and the actual kanji for "zodiac": 黄道十二宮. Splitting it up, 黄道 (literally "yellow path") means the ecliptic plane, 十二 means "twelve", and 宮 means "palace" (or things related to palaces, like princesses or big proper shrines). Thus, "the twelve palaces of the ecliptic plane", which is the standard way of saying the Latinized Greek "zodiac".
Thus, Ovelia's recital of the story differentiates between "zodiac" as a concept of a set of constellations, and "Zodiac" as a proper name. (Also, "the heroes of the zodiac" and "the Zodiac Braves".) This is very obvious and blatant in the Japanese text, so I'm not sure simply capitalizing "Zodiac" would carry that meaning in English. This translation fits as well as any, especially since it's clear Ovelia is reciting the story, since she's not using the "noble lady" formality she had been using previously, instead just using poetic yet clear sentences like someone telling a fairy tale. "The twelve constellations" might also be a good translation.
It's always amusing and instructive to follow the progression of the Ascians from their beginning of "mysterious villains" in ARR, when the writers were scrambling to figure out any sort of backstory and motivation for them after the even more lacking depiction in 1.0, to what they ended up being through Shadowbringers and Endwalker. I strongly suspect a great deal of it is due to YoshiP and his team taking over in 1.x and bringing their immense desire to reference Ivalice as much as they could.
Which does lead to cases where the Greek constellations are apparently mystically significant, despite the setting having nothing to do with Earth, or even any deeply-explored culture where the Greek zodiac happened to evolve. The ARR relic weapons are the obvious example, being literally called "Zodiac Weapons".
Or the cases where the number twelve when it comes to members of a group is significant, but in entirely unrelated ways to each other. Apart from the Convocation (of Fourteen, because theme number; twelve constellation signs, plus Our Buddy El-Deebs, plus one more to make for fourteen), there are also the Twelve Archons of Eorzean history, who famously helped Eorzea during the Sixth Umbral Calamity (of Water), and which Louisoix deliberately modelled his Circle Of Knowing after to evoke exactly the "king under the mountain come to save us" reaction from the general public.
Technically also the Twelve members of the Eorzean pantheon, before they were eventually linked to the whole Ancient society story. The Twelve don't have associated Greek zodiac constellations, but they do have associated Eorzean constellations (the Spire, the Ewer, the Bole, etc).
Trivia: the Japanese name for the skillset in FFT is 引き出す, "pull out" (as in pulling out a sword). I assume the translation went with "Iaido" partly because it's much more well-known among English-speakers, and partly to avoid lowbrow "pulling out" jokes.
Every ability name has the actual name of the technique, followed by a dramatic description of the technique. So Asura would be "Asura: Martial Arts Illusory Sword" (阿修羅 "武術幻刀"), which is just as chuuni as one might imagine. This also leads to weird and amusing cases like the Kiku-Ichimonji ability, which is literally "Kiku-Ichimonji: Kiku-Ichimonji".
If anyone was wondering, the Japanese name for this place is ツィゴリス湿原, where the kanji means "wetlands"/"marshlands", and the katakana is another case of "WTF DO YOU MEAN BY THIS". It's "Tsigorisu", so "Tchigolith" is as good as anyone can do.
I posted this in the spoiler thread (as part of a summary for FFXIV RTI), so here's FFXIV's Red Chocobos.
(No spoilers, other than "Red Chocobos are in FFXIV".)
Trivial note: the Japanese text does not name Lionel's troops. They're just called "Lionel Knight Order". I think this might be another "Lionsguard" situation, where the prosaic names for organizations are spiced up in translation.
Technically the line is "the chimney under Ramza's feet", but going by the pictures it's the same idea anyway, and "the chimney under Ramza's feet" is a little weird to think about for placement.
"Summon the Zodiac Braves" in Japanese is a more vague "create Zodiac Braves". Which could mean summoning them, or bringing them into existence ex nihilo through whatever means, or turning something existing into Zodiac Braves, or any number of other interpretations.
The rest of the translation is fairly accurate, including the odd implication of "how does Ramza know what the Cardinal wants?"
Translation insertion. In Japanese, Gaffgarion doesn't use any titles for anyone present. (The only title-adjacent term he uses is "princess" to refer to Ovelia.) I'm not sure why the translation makes him say "Your Holiness".
Also tangentially the term used for "Your Eminence", 猊下 as mentioned earlier, I have also seen translated as "Your Grace". I don't know the detailed nuances between the two, so I'm assuming it's just a general term of address for a non-specific section of noble rank.
It's one of the confusing parts of the text: a character's game mechanical Job might or might not be the same as the title they are given in the game UI. Agrias has been a Holy Knight since she joined Ramza's party at the beginning of Chapter 2, based on the screenshot of her ability screen you posted, back in part 6.A, so I was assuming "Divine Knight" was just what the game called her in the UI, while her Job has always been Holy Knight (written in katakana).
Wiegraf, meanwhile, was "White Knight" in katakana as his game mechanical Job. I have no idea what the differences between any of these are.
For more "wtf is this supposed to be", the katakana is ゴルゴラルダ, "Goru gora ruda". So if transliterated closely, it would have been "Golgollalda", with the extra "L" near the end.
If it matters, the more common transliteration for "Golgotha" is ゴルゴタ, "Goru gota". It looks like FFT decided to disguise the name by throwing in more "go" and "la" sounds.
Asura: "With the power of life and death, hold aloft the unparalleled sword. Release the sword's energy!" It's very chuuni. "Unparalleled" is what the original translation wrote as "Legendary", and means much the same: 古今無双, "without equal from history to now". "Sword's energy" would likely be left untranslated in today's Square Enix as 刀気, "kenki", which FFXIV players might recognize as one of the SAM gauges.
Thundara: "Light lost in the dark clouds, gather to me. Release that power!" I like my translation better.
Opium, or at least 阿片, is mentioned in the Japanese text. As in it's the actual word for "opium", but I wouldn't know if it was intended to mean "drugs" in general.
The Japanese text also has Agrias not just repeat the Baert Company's name, it has her repeat it several times: "Baert Company? That famous Baert Company that trades (in foreign goods)?" Hence my initial comment about how it's redundant in English, and the translation going "Baert Trading Company" neatly encapsulates this.
The term is 機械仕掛けの人間. The last two kanji mean "human", or more generally "people". The first two kanji, 機械, is "machine", and the next kanji, 仕掛け, is "device" (as in mechanism or gadget, like a stage curtain pulley). So together it can be translated as "mechanical people". Notably, this does not translate to "robot" other than through definition; "robot" in Japanese is either the direct katakana ロボット, or 人造人間, which works out to "artificial human".
The PSX translation appears to directly assume "robots", while the WotL translation is more poetically "men of iron". I'm not happy with either, and would prefer a translation that emphasized the mechanical nature, as viewed by someone who doesn't know how those mechanisms work. Something like "constructs shaped like men that move through mechanical means", or even just "mechanical puppets".
For Delita's line about saving the princess from all dangers, it's not exactly in the Japanese text, but can be extrapolated from implication. What Delita directly says is "You may think you are saving the Princess, but you are only saving her from the immediate problem. Only I can save the Princess in truth."
Which I think the WotL translation ("You think to save a princess from a burning tower. In truth, you would but set her on a higher floor.") makes perfect sense and expresses this both clearly and poetically, but I admit I'm also very used to dialogue like this via FFXIV (and now FFXVI), and I love that sort of dialogue, while I've seen complaints about FFXIV's writing being "too many complicated words". I don't understand that complaint, but I've seen them.
About the "best ways" line, it's talking about 最良の方法 ("best methods") and 最善の結果 ("best results"). 最良 does translate to "best", but it's more like "most good", with the various interpretations and implications: "best" as in "most effective", and "best" as in "most noble"/"doing the most good". The latter "best", 最善, literally means "most virtuous", but often means a sort of "golden ending" type of "best".
So it's another case of the original text being intentionally vague for poetic licence, and the translators have to interpret it their own way.
Egleris
Vagrant Dragon
- Location
- Italy
What's your take on what I posted about the PSX translation of the phrase, and the implication thereof that this is politically-minded plan, not an actual "summoning"?
That's why Ramza, the noble, can see it whereas Mustadio and Besrodio (as commoners) didn't figure it out, was my understanding - because it's a political ploy.
I've always found it odd because I never find FFXIV's writing to be all that complex or wordy, but then again, I'm also one of those who thinks Urianger talks like a normal person.
- Location
- Singapore
- Pronouns
- Singular They
It's completely vague in the Japanese text, despite Ramza delivering the explanation with inexplicable confidence.
The parts about "Cardinal Delacroix wants to use the legend of the Zodiac Braves" (specifically the legend itself) is pretty much accurately translated (at least from what I see in Omicron's post of the WotL translation). The only piece of pedantry is Ramza essentially only says that for that one line, which is after he talks about the people being tired of the long war. So the implication is Delacroix wants to use the "legend of the Zodiac Braves" to do something about this, because otherwise the statements would be non-sequiturs.
Ramza then says "Upon collecting the auracite (holy stones), (Delacroix) will try to create Zodiac Braves he can control at will".
"Can control at will" is おのれの意のままに操る, fairly straightforwardly. "Create" is 誕生, which is also often used to mean "birth" (of a person). Hence "birthday" being 誕生日. Other translations are "form" (as in forming) and "assembly" (as in "parts being put together into a whole").
That's all Ramza says, in the text I'm assuming we're all concerned with (Ramza explaining Delacroix's plan after rescuing Besrudio). Everything else is just grammar ("upon", "will try to" etc).
What does "create" mean? How would Delacroix create the Zodiac Braves? How does that tie into using the legend of the Zodiac Braves? How will the auracites help with that? How does Ramza know any of this? None of this is explained.
So based on a strict reading of the Japanese text (at least in this one dialogue; I don't know if there are other pieces of information in the game codex or something), the interpretation of all this being a purely political plan is extrapolation beyond the source. However, given the source gives no explanation or elaboration, I also cannot say it's wrong, at least until we potentially learn more later.
... Hasn't Ramza's running flaw been how he's pretty much completely blind to political maneuverings despite being raised as a noble, though?
As in, isn't that literally how we got here, with him not noticing any of the scheming going on in the background during Act I or realizing Gaffgarion was working for the people trying to kill Ovelia?
Egleris
Vagrant Dragon
- Location
- Italy
He might be learning? ...that's not very persuasive to me, either, but you gotta admit that the plan itself makes sense, and it's the only translation of the sentence that makes sense coming from Ramza, who doesn't know Delacroix' plan and is therefore speculating on it from available info.
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Thozmp
Gets my kicks above the waistline, Sunshine.
The PSX translation of the skillset is "Draw Out," which works on the level of "draw your weapon" as well as "draw out the spirit of the sword."
- Location
- Brittany, France
- Pronouns
- He/Him
"Cardinal Delacroix plans to grab his twelve most loyal knights, give each one a piece of auracite and shout 'BEHOLD! THE ZODIAC BRAVES RETURNED!' to win the people to his side" is defnitely a plan that would better fit the vibe of Final Fantasy Tactics so far, with its emphasis on deceit, the falsity of noble ideals, and magic being a prosaic 'some combat units can throw grenades with their mind' tactical concern rather than grand miracles, than "summon King Arthur". I can't quite say it makes more sense as a thing for Ramza to guess, though, it still comes kind of out of nowhere.
Also I suspect it will end up being "summon King Arthur" anyway because this is still, at the end of the day, a Final Fantasy game.
Also I suspect it will end up being "summon King Arthur" anyway because this is still, at the end of the day, a Final Fantasy game.