I remember getting Ramza the Ninja job simply because Ninja is the only job where you can be faster and deal more damage than Gaffgarion ever could. Samurai is way too slow to deal enough damage to take that old man out before he could heal himself with Shadow blade.
That, and bait him to be close to the gate so that my summoner unit can Ramuh his ass from the other side of the gate.
Me, being Really Super Clever: "Hadrian is way higher level than everyone else except Ramza so I should bench him for now so everyone can have an opportunity to catch up.
Yeah, Dragoon is definitely one of your better options for working around the limitations of this particular battle. It was a good bit of serendipity that you fell for the class and got Hadrian all nice and levelled.
I'll be honest, I'm a sucker for quiet and understated death scenes. A nice monologue before fading away can be fun, sure, but sometimes on the field of battle it's just. A couple words, and then you're at the end.
And I do like how Ramza respected old Gaff enough at the end to give him a little farewell. Something equally small, but I feel he'd be almost insulted by anything more showy.
And this concludes the final Gaffgarion battles. A truly heroic opponent, leveraging tactics deception and trickery along with terrifying battle power. In the end, I was never able to beat him one on one. The Gallows battle was a complex and challenging setpiece, though ultimately just an advanced 'normal' fight and I beat it on the first time - Lionel Castle Gate, in contrast, forced me to reconsider my entire approach to combat, to browse obsessively through my party roster weighing each potential party member and each ability I could combine, until I arrived at an answer.
It probably wasn't the 'right' answer. To an extent I was lucky Gaffgarion 'rolled' low HP, though there's a fairly wide range where I still would have won. There are likely much better approaches; I likely significantly overestimated the difficulty of using the Gate to regroup and move in force. I'm sure veteran players will have plenty to say about it. But it worked, and that's what matters.
In all honesty, if it works, it is right. When it comes to the Gate approach, the big thing is if you can get Gaffgarion close to it when it opens, there's a very short period of time between your squad ganging up on him and him dying, so there isn't much time until you can about face and deal with the bulk of the enemy forces.
If you can kill or otherwise disable the enemy summoner first, that can get rid of the main threat of being bunched up and let you rush down Gaffy and then wheel around pretty fast.
Of course, another answer is astrology - Gaffgarion's star sign is fixed, and so it's possible with foreknowledge to give Ramza an advantageous star sign for just this fight, though I admit I'm not too fond of that approach.
All things considered though, I think you took down this level pretty damn well! It wasn't a case of ramming your head at a wall until you broke through, you stopped and came up with a plan, and even though Gaff's random health (which I do not at all remember being a thing) rolled low, I think it just sped up the process.
In a sense, it's fitting that there is no further dialogue between Ramza and Gaffgarion. Everything they had to say to one another, they said at Golgollada. Ramza's idealism, Gaffgarion's pragmatism. Agrias's honor, Gaffgarion's will to see victory at all cost. But not just that - Gaffgarion spoke of fate and duty and a greater good. Maybe they were all lies to try and get Ramza to stop standing in his way, but… I don't think so?
I think that Gaffgarion is jaded and cynical and has had the pride and honor worn out of him, but he still believes. Part of him does, at least. Only, that belief has been subsumed into the ideal of Callous Necessity. There is a better fate for this land, a greater good to come - it's just that it's Dycedarg's ruthless machinations and Larg's endless scheming that will see it through, not any knight's pride or any saved princess, and Gaffgarion will shed rivers of blood to see that vision come through. He's not just a mercenary. He actually is a Dycedarg loyalist, and one who actually tried to get Ramza to stand down and do his part until it become clear that Ramza would stand by his principles.
You know, it's funny. If Gaffgarion was less of a Dycedarg loyalist, then maybe he could've actually joined us. If he cottoned on to how treacherous the Cardinal was, or maybe he just fucked off after finishing the princess delivery and figured that Ramza might lead to something interesting. We never really knew the depth of his character until he stood his ground to the last.
It's weird that it stings to hear these random Northern Sky Scouts mock and dismissed Gaffgarion as "naught but boasts and swagger." They didn't know. And they never will, now that he's gone. He was our worthiest adversary, the mightiest of our foes. In spite of his age, his battle prowess was greater than any opponent we'd faced before, but that was not all - his traps actually worked, he laid ambushes for us far more sophisticated than Ludovich Baert's or the Corpse Brigade. He won, time and again, until through the magic of video games I was able to reload and refine my strategy with foresight not available to him.
In another life, Gaffgarion might have remained Ramza's shady but helpful mentor, whose lessons in cold pragmatism conflicted with the boy's heroic instincts. In another life, he might have stayed on as Agrias's vitriolic ally, a slow friendship started with venomous quips. The Fell Knight and the Holy Knight, angel and devil on Ramza's shoulders, pulling him towards two incompatible and equally uncompromising ideals to find his own path.
That life was not to be. Ramza has found his own path already.
And like - it's kind of insane thinking on how much we can read into Gaffgarion with how little time we spent with him. He was with our party, what, two missions, not counting Orbonne? And after that, he only directly stands against us a couple of times before he meets his end at Ramza's Hadrian's blade.
And yet with just that time, we're given such a strong look into his character, his motivations, his beliefs. And all of it comes while he's putting on this affect of an old sellsword with no more fucks left to give, a curmodgeonly mercenary who can barely stand Agrias and is just humoring Ramza's newfound desire to find an old friend.
But at the gallows, when he tries to convince Ramza to stand down and go back to his brother - that almost feels like a mask slipping, of not just his loyalties, but the fact that he cares. Were Ramza just an obstacle I'm sure Gaffgarion would've been happy to just stab him and be done with it, and yet he promises that he can return home, that his brother will forgive him, and-
Gaffgarion: "It is not too late to change your mind, Ramza! Return with me to Eagrose! Your brother Dycedarg would fain forgive what's done. He said as much himself!"
And Gaffgarion almost sounds like Ramza did, back before Ziekden, doesn't he? Making promises of Dycedarg's moral character, that everything will work out. Looking back at the last time we saw him:
Dycedarg: "The fool. He soils our name, dogs my every move. I thought this a chance to let him learn the harsh truths of the world. But the boy is too stubborn." Gaffgarion: "Too much of his father's penchant for justice, that one."
[Dycedarg puts down the bottle and turns around again.] Dycedarg: "Father coddled the boy too much. If he stands aside, more the better. Should he interfere, there's naught can be done."
[He drinks his wine in one gulp, eyes closed, and turns back around.] Gaffgarion: "And you his brother. The blood curdles.
That doesn't sound like the words of a brother torn up over his wayward kin. It seems to me that he'd already made up his mind, and considered Ramza dead and buried if he showed up again - possibly conflicted or no, it seemed very final, and I doubt he talked to Gaffgarion later to ask him to bring Ramza home.
No, it seems old Gaffy was lying, or perhaps blinded by his own loyalties? His own feelings? I suppose we'll never know now, with only a crystal and a reminder to never neglect the fundamentals, but it's... interesting, to see these parallels between a young and idealistic noble and a jaded, cynical old mercenary.
All I know is I more and more wish we could've gotten him as the crotchety old mentor of the group, in another world he would've fit the team so well.
Gaff is definitely Ramza's foil, a peek at where Ramza Lugria the rudderless mercenary will end up if Ramza Beoulve doesn't nut up. While less metaphorical, this is Ramza's version of Mt Ordeal, facing a mirror of the path you were on in the form of a dark knight before embracing the true path forward.
Gaffgarion was never as evil as the blackened armor suggested, but his refusal to follow his convictions and instead drown himself in apathy and what was left of his pride doomed him.
Protect: "Precious light, be our armor to protect us! Protect!"
Immobilize/Don't Move: "Land of all lives, suppress all rebels! Dont' Move!"
Binding Darkness/Koutetsu: "Evil souls of the dark, gather here...Koutetsu!"
Gaffgarion takes out Hester. Ramza eliminates another Knight. Then one of the surviving Knights reveals he actually has a secondary Geomancer skillset, using the Sinkhole terrain ability to Immobilize Agrias. If you've been keeping track, Agrias is already immobilized from a Time Magic spell, so you know, this is a lot better than if this guy had gone and shut down another one of my party members. Current tally: 5v4, we've evened out the odds.
I mean these are presumably the same crew that captured Ovelia, right? They know damn well one immobilization on Agrias Fucking Oaks isn't safe enough.
Honestly though I'm fascinated by Fake Ovelia. It's a shame she doesn't get any line; do you think Gaffgarion went the Lionel garrison asking for a blonde female knight with a theatre background and that one Archer whose lifelong dream it had been to play on the big stage jumped at the chance? Do you think she asked to study Ovelia's body language and Gaffgarion was like "girl I literally just need you to stand in one place in a white dress for five minutes do not make this complicated"? Do you think she tried out her best ojou-sama laughter before being told Ovelia wasn't that kind of noble lady?
It's exceedingly common to make up little Head cannons of your generic borbos, get attached to them and imagine characterization arise from their actions.
. . .I don't know about doing it to enemy generics that don't even have any lines
Our opposition is made up of three Knights, two Archers, two Time Mages, and Gaffgarion.
It's interesting because there were already armed guards, guarding, but the 'surprise reveal' is basically a 5-person squad showing up on top of the foes who were already visible.
Agrias: "Ramza, you are a Beoulve?" Gaffgarion: "You didn't know? Aye, this little whelp is a son of the great House Beoulve." Ramza: "I am my father's son, but that does not make me the same as my brothers! I knew naught of the plot to kidnap the princess! I swear it!" Agrias: "Do you truly think I would doubt you now? You have more than proven yourself!"
I really appreciate that we waste absolutely zero time on a 'Agrias has a crisis of trust in Ramza because of his heritage' subplot, it would make zero sense for him to be a double agent now, any useful betrayal would have come earlier, so she just extends his trust immediately, at the start of her turn
This, however, also confirms that named NPCs do get unique story dialogue in main story battle, dialogue which I don't want to miss, which means that I will, in fact, have to take them into every battle going forward. RIP my blorbos.
I may be wrong, but as far as I recall in the original playstation versions, this is the last line Agrias gets in the game. Since she can perma-die or be kicked out, or even never recruited because you're party roster is too full of chocobos, it makes sense she's not plot-critical. The fact that even as a 'regular member' she has this bespoke interaction in a battle is interesting, I don't recall it happening anywhere else in the generic PS1 base game. (granted, I typically come down on the side of 'the blorbos I bought with 5800 gil total is all the support I need.' so if there is more stuff like this, I probably missed it.)
Of course, you're playing the almost-a-remake War of the Lions version, where SE came back after a decade to pander to the fans. So who knows what you'll see with her.
We return to the map, though our next move triggers another cutscene.
There's Wiegraf - I wondered how long it'd be till he came back. Here is on the Lenalian Plateau, where Milleuda fought her last stand. He has set her sword into a shrine or tombstone of sorts, and is making a solemn vow to her.
This scene is was created for WotL, once again in the PSX version this just flat out didn't exist.
I don't have anything else to say about it, just that FFT is really rather unique in showing these scenes where none of the relevant characters should have any awareness or relation to what's going on.
In FF7 we may not have always been playing as Cloud, but we always worked from Cloud's perspective. When he was out of it and didn't know who he was, it's not like Tifa and Cid were working with knowledge he didn't have. Meanwhile in FF8, Squall is very much the protagonist and viewpoint character, but we do sometimes get to play and control other characters, who act on information Squall doesn't have, and conspire to keep things from him. It's one of the first bits of showing information that the player-character doesn't have, but the player group does.
And now we get this, where the player is just shown and told things Ramza would have no knowledge of, and quite a lot of it! Even if you say Delita is half the story's protagonist, he still wasn't at this meeting, or the one with Gaffy and Dyceberg.
FF is really expanding the player's viewpoint into the world with the Playstation games.
Actually it does! Judgement blade and other sword skills (as far as I know) won't damage The Caster. And isn't that what's important? I can't think of any other relevant safety features you'd ever want.
This means she can cast it right in front of her, or even center it on herself and hit every square around her (good if she's getting surrounded).
This was a very effective first attempt in terms of setting up the terms of the problem.
I knew you were engaging with FFT, but this sort of sentence really shows how much you're getting sucked into it's tempo.
Of course, that's not the only problem, just the one that has to be fixed or victory is impossible. The other problem is: Squad #2 just got totally rinsed. So let's do some testing.
Since you're past it, I think it's relevant to mention that all the enemies have thunder-elemental weapons, and you can buy rubber shoes that negate thunder damage.
Doesn't do much against spellcasters, and often times enemies have bad secondary abilities, but it's one of the cheats for that side of the wall if you take the time to really give every enemy a full physical.
The Dragoon needs to be physically able to jump in order to Jump.
Which, I realize may seem obvious, but was absolutely not on my radar in any way, shape or form: having a roof obstructs Jump. In the screenshot above, "no units or tiles can be targeted from current position" because Hadrian is standing under the gate, with the wall over his head. This totally blindsides me - it's never been an issue for Jump actions in previous games, because they treated terrain as largely aesthetic.
There's a natural corollary to 'Dragoon's can't jump when there's a roof over their head' on the other side of the equation too, if you think about it.
Note the body-equip for both these characters. I don't know why Knights in particular have these equip options, but which set of gear gets rolled can have a pretty strong impact on how tough an enemy is.
I've seen people mention a tactic wherein they use Ramza's Speed-raising Tailwind move (and possibly Steel, which raises his Bravery?) to jack up Ramza's stats into an ubersquire capable of outspeed Gaffgarion so badly his damage and healing can't keep up. I don't really understand how to make it work. People have done it, so clearly it can done; I just don't intuitively see how that doesn't get me dead on the third Tailwind before Super Ramza is actually online. Maybe I'm supposed to alternate buffs and heals? This seems complicated and risky.
I know the strat, and honestly it's pretty crummy here. Since it's a small space you just can meaningfully run in circles the way you can on most maps.
It can still probably be done, although not with your character.
Remember that Ramza's compatibility is picked by the date you pick for his birthday. Even if you pick randomly, you have something like 1/4th odds that Gaffy does absolutely shit damage, which makes strategies that involve long plays a lot more workable.
One strategy would be put Ramza to Dragoon, and have him jump so Gaffy can't target him. This requires a pretty finicky management of CT, but requires no JP in Dragoon besides having it unlocked. Since you can free target the square next to you, it would lead to him just sitting around until the B-team can have fun storming the castle (gate).
and it tips Gillian over the 800 Orator JP line she needs to learn Equip Gun, so she can now be a White Mage with a Glock.
It's a truly bizarre way to handle difficulty. I don't really want to win because the game rolled bad stats for an enemy who's meant to be a specific threat level, you know?
I follow the Dark Souls creedo: If the game fucks with me, I can fuck with it back. RNG givith and RNG taketh away.
With that said, I've mentioned challenge runs before, and even without modding or gamesharks, playing self-imposed challenges in FFT was absurdly popular. Single-class-challenges are my favorite and the gold standard I feel, but there were other popular ones like 'Ramza only', low level challenges, no-random battles (so only story missions, or with very rationed random battles, something like one per chapter) and I believe 'monster only' runs.
People loved playing the game in ways that really challenged them.
Another scene, and fight even, that doesn't exist in the original playstation version.
Can't help but notice that this perfect hero of the Church, this Holy Knight aligned with a Cardinal, this peerless paragon with an astounding Bravery of 85, has 40 Faith. Possibly the lowest score I've encountered on any character.
I swear he had 55 faith just two weeks ago the last time he was here. (Probably a mechanical backstop, to ensure he doesn't accidently run best compatibility with the female-black mage and die to a strong magic spell? 40 faith really blunts magic damage but does nothing to his sword skill damage)
40 is the floor for brave/faith of generics at the soldier office by the way. 70 is the max. (Your starting noble generics can have their faith or brave as high as 80 I think, although this is all random rolls so you're most likely to get nothing over 70 in either stat. My first serious playthrough had my magical DPS anchored by a 74 faith generic I started wtih.)
It's weird that it stings to hear these random Northern Sky Scouts mock and dismissed Gaffgarion as "naught but boasts and swagger." They didn't know. And they never will, now that he's gone. He was our worthiest adversary, the mightiest of our foes. In spite of his age, his battle prowess was greater than any opponent we'd faced before, but that was not all - his traps actually worked, he laid ambushes for us far more sophisticated than Ludovich Baert's or the Corpse Brigade. He won, time and again, until through the magic of video games I was able to reload and refine my strategy with foresight not available to him.
I wonder if this nuanced, mournful view would have survived if you lost to him ten times like Wiegraf.
The only Abilities in that list, though, are for the Commands Ramza can actually learn. Potion, Reequip, in another iteration of this fight Aim+1.
Ramza cannot learn the Fell Sword Command, lacking access to a Job that would know it. And so he cannot learn Shadowblade, because he would lack any ability to use it. Though we vanquish Gaffgarion, and we acquire his soul crystal engraved with his knowledge, the only lessons he can pass on to us are simple fundamentals of lesser jobs.
You aren't the first. Probably not even the five hundred thousandth person, who double checked you couldn't get his sword drain skills from his crystal.
I've seen fanfics reference Ramza trying to learn his sword skills from this crystal (along with his 'critical-health teleport away trick') and how pissed their version of Ramza was that he couldn't learn it.
Also a lot of old school trolling, where people were basically smooth-sharking others that they totally learned Dark Knight (as it was called in the original translation) by eating his crystal, they must have done it wrong if it's not working. Places like GameFAQs and cheatcode sites were full of these completely made up lies, like the 'aerith revived' or 'Zack joins your party' ones spawned by unfullfilled narritive desire in FF7.
Auto potion from the chemist set is generally the simplest way of taking the bite out of Gafgarion's fell sword skills. At which point a Knights power break or two would almost neutralize him entirely.
If you really wanted an unorthodox way of fighting Gaf, you could use the mystics spell that turns someone undead on Ramza himself. Undead reverses hp drain skills. Fell Sword would actually HEAL Ramza in that scenario thus preventing Gafgarion from using it.
One strategy would be put Ramza to Dragoon, and have him jump so Gaffy can't target him. This requires a pretty finicky management of CT, but requires no JP in Dragoon besides having it unlocked. Since you can free target the square next to you, it would lead to him just sitting around until the B-team can have fun storming the castle (gate).
Tried this before, except Gaffgarion moves exactly after Ramza which means Jump never worked on him. I settled with Ninja Ramza and support magic attacks whenever Gaffgarion got close to the gate.
Pulling the lever to allow unit access past the gate unfortunately never worked for me because the turns to do that murks Ramza quicker than full on dealing damage to Gaffgarion from the first go.
Tried this before, except Gaffgarion moves exactly after Ramza which means Jump never worked on him. I settled with Ninja Ramza and support magic attacks whenever Gaffgarion got close to the gate.
Pulling the lever to allow unit access past the gate unfortunately never worked for me because the turns to do that murks Ramza quicker than full on dealing damage to Gaffgarion from the first go.
Gaffy moving while Ramza in the air is what I was suggesting. Not in a 'kill him' but in a 'lets just stall this fight until we can make it a nice fair 5v1.'
If speeds are close, Ramza can then move if Gaffy takes an action, or not move if Gaffy just moves, and keep that loop for the four or five turns for the other side to sort itself out.
Obviously the solution is what I would have done had I played this game when I was ten, and just grind that one map of random encounters you can access for hours and hours on end until Ramza can crush Gaffgarion.
Awfully nice of everybody to put their conspiracies on pause for a few months while Ramza punches birds
Ramza cannot learn the Fell Sword Command, lacking access to a Job that would know it. And so he cannot learn Shadowblade, because he would lack any ability to use it. Though we vanquish Gaffgarion, and we acquire his soul crystal engraved with his knowledge, the only lessons he can pass on to us are simple fundamentals of lesser jobs.
We cannot learn the old man's greatest technique from him. That secret he takes to his grave.
Huh. In the original Japanese script, Gaffgarion does a disbelieving "I actually lost...?" before expiring. Which is weird because he lost to Ramza a couple of times already but during those times just left before he could die.
Obviously the solution is what I would have done had I played this game when I was ten, and just grind that one map of random encounters you can access for hours and hours on end until Ramza can crush Gaffgarion.
Awfully nice of everybody to put their conspiracies on pause for a few months while Ramza punches birds
As for me, as mentioned, in my most recent playthrough I started because of this LP, I went with Monk Ramza and Lifefont. Walk around, get free healing, Chakra as needed, and punch Gaffgarion really hard. I think I managed to beat the old man in an attrition fight before I even went to open the gate, and I'm not doing any particular grinding (albeit I am using the WotL Tweaks mod).
Akihiko Yoshida tends to have a sameface problem (not helped by the fact that humans in Ivalice appear not to have noses), but I'm pretty sure that's literally just Folmarv in a hood. He's even wearing the same golden armor!
Huh. In the original Japanese script, Gaffgarion does a disbelieving "I actually lost...?" before expiring. Which is weird because he lost to Ramza a couple of times already but during those times just left before he could die.
Time for another episode of The Rakes of Final Fantasy Tactics! All the vets knew this one was coming, and were waiting to watch Omi suffer as they all had.
Rake #39: The Execution Site fight
Status: 8v5 can be hard if you're not careful with your positioning or have bad luck.
Big Rake #40: The infamous 1v1 vs Gaffgarion
Status: The game literally shows you how to open the gate. Hope you were paying attention.
Rake #40: Summon/Iaido training you to forget about friendly fire
Status: Probably got a little too excited about bringing swift death to your enemies there, Omi.
Rake #41: Ceilings block the Jump skill.
Status: Dragoons are not keen on giving themselves brain damage, who could have known?
And, of course, there's more to come. Omi if you don't drop the next one on Halloween I will be very disappointed.
I'll be honest, I'm a sucker for quiet and understated death scenes. A nice monologue before fading away can be fun, sure, but sometimes on the field of battle it's just. A couple words, and then you're at the end.
Honestly, I think that Gaffgarion would be physically unable to finish a tragic Shakespearan monologue because he'd die of embarassment first. He'd turn as red as a tomato and choke. It's the real reason why he keeps running away, because there some fates that are simply too awful to contemplate.
I think that Gaffgarion is jaded and cynical and has had the pride and honor worn out of him, but he still believes. Part of him does, at least. Only, that belief has been subsumed into the ideal of Callous Necessity. There is a better fate for this land, a greater good to come - it's just that it's Dycedarg's ruthless machinations and Larg's endless scheming that will see it through, not any knight's pride or any saved princess, and Gaffgarion will shed rivers of blood to see that vision come through. He's not just a mercenary. He actually is a Dycedarg loyalist, and one who actually tried to get Ramza to stand down and do his part until it become clear that Ramza would stand by his principles.
There was no way Ramza could have won, short of either extradiagetic levels of grinding or prepping the perfect build with knowledge of the game's systems. But Ramza didn't need to defeat Gaffgarion in single combat. Ramza is a Squire, the leader of his men, and not the strongest among them. Victory came from seeing through the lie of this duel, and tagging in someone else. Opening the Gate was the easiest way to do it - but the Dragon's Jump served just as well. Ramza won because he has people to rely on, and Gaffgarion lost because he tried to face his foe alone, with his backup being nameless Gryphon Knights borrowed from Cardinal Delacroix. Men who likely had orders to kill him too once the fight was done, before he could request Ovelia be given to him to take to Larg.
Omicron: Squire is a good class for Ramza. It is good he doesn't get sword skills. It's thematic.
Gaffgarion: Master of all swords, cut energy! Night Sword!
Agrias: Life is short...Bury! Steady Sword!
Omicron: I'm not coping at all.
Delita is lv 25, leagues beyond any member of our party. He wields an Ancient Sword, and combines 'Holy Sword' abilities with Arts of War, Counter, Safeguard (which prevents his equipment from being destroyed), and Move +1. He also has all the Sword Skills which Agrias can, potentially, in the future learn already unlocked. He's a beast, and his opposition of lv 08 enemies are basically there to be trod upon and show that there is, in fact, one man who is That Guy.
Ovelia: Yes, I understand now... The only way forward is through the guts of my enemies! I will break the cage that traps me like I broke their ribcage! I crave blood!
Delita: ...Ahh.
Such is the burden of all white mage-adjacent characters.
Note the body-equip for both these characters. I don't know why Knights in particular have these equip options, but which set of gear gets rolled can have a pretty strong impact on how tough an enemy is.
I'm pretty sure that the game provides the enemy team with a set amount of gil and a requirement that everyone gets equipment. I assume that they ran out of money before getting to the body slots, hence why the knight and Gaff are wearing clothing instead of armour.
And this concludes the final Gaffgarion battles. A truly heroic opponent, leveraging tactics deception and trickery along with terrifying battle power. In the end, I was never able to beat him one on one. The Gallows battle was a complex and challenging setpiece, though ultimately just an advanced 'normal' fight and I beat it on the first time - Lionel Castle Gate, in contrast, forced me to reconsider my entire approach to combat, to browse obsessively through my party roster weighing each potential party member and each ability I could combine, until I arrived at an answer.
I'll be honest, I was expecting the Execution Site battle to be the harder one for you - it's 8v5 and both Agrias and Mustadio don't really have any skillset to speak of, which can make it quite hard. So, congratulations on winning that first time through.
I did expect you to do well here thanks to Dragoon use, and said as much in the spoiler thread, yes. Other ranged attacks would have worked as well; summons cover large areas and Geomancy have significant range, both of which could have helped here.
It's a truly bizarre way to handle difficulty. I don't really want to win because the game rolled bad stats for an enemy who's meant to be a specific threat level, you know?
You mentioned you could get Items with Hi-Potion, didn't you? If you had that, then keeping Gafgarion inside Jump range was as simple as having Ramza stay still and use his turn for healing. Gafgarion would be forced to stay inside Hadrian's jumping range if you'd done that - just drink an Hi-Potion and wait, and repeated Jumps would eventually bring him down to Iaido killing range. That would have won you the fight regardless of how much HP he had, as long as you had sufficient Hi-Potions and were willing to stand still and wait while taking blow after blow.
The twist is that rescuing Princess Ovelia was always a fool's errand. Gaffgarion was misled - he probably never lied to us, he was just lied to in a way that gave us false information. While Ramza and his friends are rushing through Lionel Castle, Ovelia is already gone.
Yeah, as mentioned, this scene wasn't there in the original PSX version, so the tension here was significantly higher - you didn't know if Ovelia had accepted to become the Church's puppet or not, and indeed the scene was set for Ramza to save her just before she would give in; a great heroic moment that you can see coming... and then gets subverted when you get inside Lionel only to find out the Princess left for another castle.
In addition to completely murdering the tension, this added scene also entirely shatters the pacing - the Lionel sequence is clearly intended as a rush, a one-two punch of the Gafgarion fight followed by what happens inside the castle, so having this scene here slows things down.
The Wiegraf scene also is annoying to me, because without it, you were left wondering if you would ever see Wiegraf again; when you eventually did, it was a surprise - instead, now you know to expect it, which removes a lot of the punch from the suddenness of the next meeting with him. It's also damaging to the structure, in that it somewhat breaks the timeline of events - while obviously something similar happened in the PSX version as well, the fact that we weren't shown it strongly suggested, at the time, that Wiegraf was recruited during the one year while Ramza was being a mercenary. Having his recruitment take place at this point in the plot feels wrong, although I'll explain why that is later, after he shows up again in the game in a more proper fashion.
If Ramza was a Dragoon, couldn't he just ignore the lever altogether and jump back down to his friends, help them murder everybody up front, and then pop back over the wall to smack the lever, at which point Gaffy Garion gets Ceasar'd?
No, as others mentioned, those are impassable squares, you cannot move through them or stop on top of them. Not even the one that is lacking a parapet can be crossed.
I'm pretty sure that the game provides the enemy team with a set amount of gil and a requirement that everyone gets equipment. I assume that they ran out of money before getting to the body slots, hence why the knight and Gaff are wearing clothing instead of armour.
Not exactly. How it works is that, when the game sets up a battle, characters get assigned equipment randomly from those they can use, with their level acting as a limiter - the character must be a minimum level for the game to even consider assigning a specific item to them, which is why overleveling and then stealing equipment from random battles can lead to having equipment well in excess of what the story battles are sporting. In any case, the issue with knights, and Gafgarion in this fight, is that, while the head slot can only wear helmets but no hats, the body slot can wear both armors and robes; so, it's up to the random rolls which of those a character gets, and robes can really tank a unit's HP total.
Note that it's entirely possible to have fixed equipment; Gafgarion is always wearing the Cross Helm and always wielding specific swords for each fight - he has the Blood Sword at the Execution Site and the Ancient Blade at Lionel - but clearly the body slot was left to randomness. This is weird, as other bosses have their full equipment list fixed (as it should be), and clearly they did fix some of Gafgarion equipment, so I don't know why they left the body slot up to randomness here.
A man who is transparently Gaffgarion in an executioner's hood is standing dramatically at the gallows doing a bad poor accent.
Executioner: "Got any words t' leave behin', puppet? None, then? Just as well, I s'pose." Gryphon Knight of Lionel: "Is that-? The enemy!"
[Ramza and his team enter.] Ramza: "We are come for the princess! Stand down, or take her place on the gallows!" Executioner: "Ha ha ha! And the trap is sprung!" Ramza: "Trap?"
[Gaffgarion doffs his cloak, as does the 'princess,' revealing an enemy Archer.]
(…)
Honestly though I'm fascinated by Fake Ovelia. It's a shame she doesn't get any line; do you think Gaffgarion went the Lionel garrison asking for a blonde female knight with a theatre background and that one Archer whose lifelong dream it had been to play on the big stage jumped at the chance? Do you think she asked to study Ovelia's body language and Gaffgarion was like "girl I literally just need you to stand in one place in a white dress for five minutes do not make this complicated"? Do you think she tried out her best ojou-sama laughter before being told Ovelia wasn't that kind of noble lady?
Okay, I am desperate to know; what exactly were they going to do if Ramza & co hadn't shown up and yelled at them at that precise second? Seriously, this is so funny to me. Like, were they just going to wait for a few minutes and then recycle the hammy dialogue in the bad accent like an amusement park scene on loop? Would they have just awkwardly stood around in silence after going through the "any last works, puppet?" script? Would Theatre Kid Fake Ovelia Archer have ad-libbed something? Would they have actually gone through with "hanging" her on some kind of body harness? INQUIRING MINDS WANT TO KNOW, GAFFGARION! WHAT WAS THE STRATEGY HERE? HOW DID YOU TIME IT WELL ENOUGH TO GET THE HAMMY DIALOGUE OUT JUST AS RAMZA & CO GOT THERE? WHAT WAS YOUR PLAN IF THEY WERE LATE?
Gaffgarion: "A man does not eat an omelette without breaking eggs! Blood is the price of progress! It is the ink in which history's pages are writ! Look around you, boy! Ivalice rots from within! Your brother would carve out its decay, even if it means his hands must needs be soiled!"
An evocative phrasing to be sure, but one that rather delicately skirts the twin questions of a) what the metaphorical omelette we're making here is (because it sure doesn't seem to be a peaceful and happy nation), and b) who gets to eat it.
Okay, I am desperate to know; what exactly were they going to do if Ramza & co hadn't shown up and yelled at them at that precise second? Seriously, this is so funny to me. Like, were they just going to wait for a few minutes and then recycle the hammy dialogue in the bad accent like an amusement park scene on loop? Would they have just awkwardly stood around in silence after going through the "any last works, puppet?" script? Would Theatre Kid Fake Ovelia Archer have ad-libbed something? Would they have actually gone through with "hanging" her on some kind of body harness? INQUIRING MINDS WANT TO KNOW, GAFFGARION! WHAT WAS THE STRATEGY HERE? HOW DID YOU TIME IT WELL ENOUGH TO GET THE HAMMY DIALOGUE OUT JUST AS RAMZA & CO GOT THERE? WHAT WAS YOUR PLAN IF THEY WERE LATE?
