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MarsDragon's Final Fantasy Tactics (PS)
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| [February 9, 2007 02:06:47 PM]
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Gamelog for Friday, February 06, part 2.5
Because it was late last night when I was doing my second entry, I couldn't talk as much as I'd like. Please consider this part of the second entry, just time-delayed a bit.
Anyway. I told how I got to Dorter and beat the heck out of everyone, even if Dracula died to a knight in the process. And Delita wasted a Potion on Algus, of all people. I was kinda annoyed about that, so I'm thinking of taking Item off of him. A lot of my strategy to get my people up to speed is to kill my Guests so that the real characters can farm for EXP and JP without a Guest ending the battle by killing that last critical guy. Since I can't quite one-shot Delita yet, he has the tendency to use my potions to heal himself and Algus. On one hand, it's semi-decent AI, which is a rarity for FFT. On the other...die, damnit. (guests don't crystallize, so you can kill them with no consequences)
One thing I mentioned was farming for EXP and JP. One of the things I rather like about FFT is the EXP system. You get a set amount of EXP and JP per action, instead of per fight or kill like in the rest of the series. As long as the action works, you get points. Now, the Squire class has two very useful abilities to take advantage of this, namely Throw Stone and Accumulate. Throw Stone tosses a rock at an enemy up to four squares away, for minimal damage, usually 6-8 max and often 3-4. This is the first long range attack you get and while it's terrible for killing things, it's excellent for sitting around throwing rocks at enemies/your team for minimal damage (thus you need more actions, getting more points) while staying out of range of counters and the like. Accumulate just adds +1 to your physical attack, which means it can't miss, doesn't do any damage, thus not ending the battle faster, and by the time you stop spamming it it's pretty easy for even a mage class to do significant damage against an enemy. Combined with the Squire's gained JP up it's pretty easy to get 300 JP in one fight, assuming you have the patience. This is, of course, breaking a system that actually makes quite a bit more sense than the typical FF system, but hey. FFT was made to be broken.
Dorter is also where the story starts picking up. The first bits are mostly background (Fifty-Year War, brothers, et cetera), but with Dorter you get your first glimpse of the Death Corps (your random human encounters for the rest of the game, even though you make their leader run off to join the church before the first chapter ends) and your first hints that the guy you saved at Mandalia Plains, who in just about any other game would turn out to be a useful friend turns you to be a horrible, peasant-kicking jerk in just about every sense of the word. This is why I didn't want Delita wasting potions on him. (spoilers: you don't have to hang around him forever) Though the first chapter in general is rather slow and sets up the political drama that really doesn't matter to Ramza in the end, it does give a lot of useful character development. If, you know, you can understand it.
I keep talking about how the localization for this is terrible, but it really really is. Ls and Rs are mixed up in different places (so the enemy Zalera is also Zarela), dialogue is stilted and awkward, and let's just not talk about Daravon in the tutorial or the Brave Story. (The Brave Story is a good idea though, and one I wish more RPGs would use. You can see profiles on every character in the game, even ones that never appear on-screen, rewatch old cutscenes, and get information about artifacts you found on dispatch missions. It's a little like a proto-FFXII bestiary) FFT's story is confusing enough without adding sub-SNES localization to things. It's like they didn't even bother to edit it at all, and I really wouldn't be surprised if they didn't.
I'd like to have everyone where they're going by the end of chapter one (excepting Germain's equipment requirements), so I should do a few more random encounters before steamrolling over the last few battles. As I am right now I'd have a fairly easy time of it, by the end there shouldn't be any problem at all. The challenge should pick up around the middle/end of chapter 2, assuming a minimum of grinding after this.
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| [February 9, 2007 04:22:16 AM]
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Gamelog entry for Friday, Febuary 06, Part 2
I got up to Dorter this time, with most everyone well on their way to their chosen builds. Given that, it was a pretty easy fight. It's actually supposed to be rather hard. If you don't grind for a bit then all you'll have are Squires and Chemists, and you're up against Archers, Wizards, and a Knight. This is actually where I stopped playing the first time I played FFT, I just couldn't beat Dorter. I put the game down for three years until I finally figured out what to do.
This time, I sent Vincent and Charlotte up to kill an Archer in a high place, while leaving St Germain and Dracula to take out the knight and first Wizard. Unfortunately, I wasn't paying attention and got Dracula killed, but not before he Bolt2'ed the pair. The Archers and other Wizard fell pretty quick (especially when an enemy Wizard took out one of his own guys to kill Algus. Not that I blame him.), even before Charlotte could get down to Raise Dracula. Don't mess with a Monk's fists of fury, man.
FFT is one of the few RPGs to make battles actually fun, trying out new tactics and sometimes having the fail horribly. While it's not the most balanced game (some classes are definitely better than others), it fits together, and at least is more balanced than Disgaea.
It's late. I'll add another entry tomorrow.
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| [February 8, 2007 11:58:09 PM]
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Gamelog for Friday, February 09, entry 1.5.
This is just a quick thing where I can detail my plans for my characters. Given that so far they're mostly in chat logs spread across two operating systems, this seems like a good idea. And I like to talk about job classes and builds.
-Dracula (Ramza)-
Main Class: Summoner
Secondary: Wizard
Reaction: Dragon Spirit
Support: Equip Sword
Movement: Teleport
Since Ramza gets a male unit's physical growth and a female unit's magical, he makes a good choice for either path. Since Dracula's main power is to summon and control monsters, Summon Magic was an obvious choice. And since he's a magician, Black Magic is a good secondary. He gets Dragon Spirit (gives Reraise status) because he always comes back from the dead and Teleport because the first form of Dracula's attack pattern has ALWAYS been to teleport around shooting fireballs at you. Equip Sword is because according Lament of Innocence he used to be a knight, so hey, sword. It's not the best idea for a caster unit, but I'm going for theme over power here.
-St. Germain-
Main class: Ninja
Secondary: Geomancer/Time Mage
Reaction: Abandon
Support: Equip Shield
Movement: Teleport
The idea behind St. Germain is that he has incredible dodging abilities. With ninja as a primary class, Equip Shield for the Uber Shield, Abandon (raises Evade) and the best mantle, about the only things hitting him will be certain un-evadeable spells and very very lucky enemies. (before anyone says "Blade Grasp", I'm going for magic /and/ physical evade here) He teleports around through Curse of Darkness, so obviously he gets Teleport, and since one of his attacks as a boss fight is to raise vines from the ground, Geomancer is a good choice, since the most common attack is Hell Ivy. He also has control over time, so I'll substitute Time Magic in as I need it.
-Leon-
Main class: Knight
Secondary: Ninja
Reaction: Counter
Support: Abandon
Movement: Move+3
Leon being a knight ingame, he gets to be a knight, especially since Belmonts for a long time tended to be slow, clunky creatures. Since Leon's one of the modern ones, with the decent movement, he also gets Abandon and Move+3. Counter is a good, fighter ability to have, and Throw is there because he throws his subweapons. Not much to see here.
-Charlotte-
Main class: White Mage
Seconday: Wizard
Reaction: Counter Magic
Support: Magic AttackUP
Movement: Fly
Charlotte is pretty basic. Main and secondary classes can be switched around, depending on if I need speed or magic power; Magic AttackUP fits with her super mage image and is a good ability. Fly works since she can turn into an owl, but Reaction was harder. I eventually went with Counter Magic, if only because generally once you get hit with a spell in PoR, you'll be hitting back pretty quickly. I would've LIKED to give her MA Save, but that's a Bard-only ability, and Bards are male-only. But she works well enough.
-Vincent-
Main class: Thief
Secondary class: Mediator
Reaction: Gilgame Heart
Support: Secret Hunt
Movement: Move-Find Item
Hahaha. Vincent's the merchant in PoR, so it's hard to say what his battle abilities are like (hint: non-existent), but I wanted a thief and with his prices, he definitely qualifies. As of such, his reaction is Gilgame Heart, which gives you Gil in an amount to how much you've been damaged, times ten, and his movement is Move-Find item, which finds you find items hidden in the ground. (and is how Germain is getting his nifty shield later) Secret Hunt lets me get Poach items and get cheaper items from fur shops. (and how Charlotte will become virtually immortal later, assuming I want to put in the effort) Second class is Mediator because uh...he talks to Charlotte and Johnathan about things? Yeah, it's a hard sell, but there really wasn't anything else. I just like Mediators.
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| [February 8, 2007 11:21:10 PM]
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Gamelog for assignment Friday, February 09, entry 1.
Ah, FFT. Easily the best FF on the Playstation. (the SNES ports lose because of loading times) The sprites are high quality and still look gorgeous today, with an incredible range of expression. The music is mostly awesome, the story is deep, if poorly localized, and the gameplay is pure sweet (easily broken) SRPG goodness.
I've played the game before, ending with a hideously overpowered team consisting of a Wizard/Summoner with Short Charge, a Priest with Math Skill, two Ninja, one being Agrias, and Dragoon Ramza with the best spear and shield in the game. The game stopped being hard around the middle of the first chapter. I even took down Wiegraf in under two turns. This time, I decided to break the game /slightly/ less.
I tried to do this before with a Ninja Single Class Challenge (everyone's a ninja, and ONLY a ninja), but I got bored with trying to grind everyone up the job tree to ninja before Dorter, the third story battle in the game. (ninja is one of the last classes you can get, so that's a lot of grinding) I'll come back to that someday, but for right now I'm going with a Castlevania-themed game. By limiting my options to things that resemble Castlevania character's powers I can't steamroll over everything without trying, but I should have a varied enough team that it won't be as hard as a full SSC. And I can build characters up at my own pace.
The first few battles in the game are mostly tutorial battles with a pre-made team. The very first one even consists entirely of AI characters (besides Ramza), so you only have to worry about yourself. It's slightly annoying, because it's mostly watching the game play itself, but it does give you some idea of how the game works without letting you get yourself wiped out. They save that for the NEXT battle, where they give you a small team of cadets and tell you to kill some other low-level punks. It's actually not too hard, since you get AI character Delita on your side, who will happily absorb some hits and smack people around for you. I got lucky and had a good team, so it wasn't too hard to wipe them out. After that I stripped and ditched every single one of them.
Using the money gained from selling all their equipment, I bought myself three male and one female squire. Two of the males had good Brave, and the other two hirelings had good Faith, which fit my plans perfectly. I changed the girl into a Chemist and set off to the next battle, where you gt the best reward possible: Ten extra Brave for abandoning Algus. This translates into two permanent brave, so it's a little annoying I accidentally left one of my physical boys at home while accidentally taking along the guy destined for Move-Finding (which is based on 100 minus your Brave, so lower is better). I did manage to kill Algus, though, so good for me.
After that it was mostly just grinding enough to get my Chemist Charlotte to Priest and Dracula Beoluve to Wizard. Everyone has Gained JP Up to make things easier, and I should be moving along to knights and monks soon, possibly before Dorter. Money is tight, but I'm making it. My first knights will probably still be mostly naked, though.
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MarsDragon's Final Fantasy Tactics (PS)
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Current Status: Playing
GameLog started on: Thursday 8 February, 2007
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