Final Fantasy XII

[prophetik music]

i did like the complete customization of the game. i tend to prefer characters that can just do whatever i feel like letting them do rather than having them focus on something specifically. i only wish that the characters could 'focus' on certain abilities - like, i wish that as you used a certain style more over time you'd become more proficient at the inherent abilities of that type...aka, as Basch hammers the crap out of enemies, his physical attributes go up. however, if i want basch to be a time mage, as i use more time magic his magic and mp skills go up in that way.

[The Pezman]

Because with the liscense system, the idea of having classes is completely eliminated. You can make a Black and Green Mage, a White Mage with Barehanded who can beat the crap out of opponents and then heal themselves, a Time Mage who is proficient with guns... whatever. There's no limit on who can learn or wear what at all, just all-out awesomeness.

That is completely possible without you being unable to equip an awesome weapon or armor that happened to find lying around but wait... you spent your license points on abilities instead of equipment. Now you're out of luck.

No other RPG has made us choose between equipment or skills.

[Avatar of Justice]

After getting Yiazmat down to his last 10 bars, then getting my ass kicked once he doubled his level, during Christmas vacation, I've decided to pop FF12 back in and give it another shot. Just 3 1/2 bars left. Now, I'm not even bother to heal anyone, just constant casting of Arising. Pretty slow going. The last five bars suck since he stops using his breath weapons and just spams you to death with Rake. I went from around 74 to 80 using the Henne mines trick, and that enabled me to at least get past the first five bars of the last ten.

[Thin Crust]

I'm about halfway through his bars. (lvl 95) After I got about 5 bars in 1.5 hours, I finally said screw it and went all heavy weapons. the most powerful weapon I have is the ragnorack, and the save the queen, and the excalabur is useless in this fight. This thing is taking way too long. A good tactic is to bezerk one of your tanks. But not two because if your healer or magic caster dies, then you have to switch out if you want your third position filled.

[Avatar of Justice]

I must say, after Yiazmat, Omega Mark 12 was a huge disappointment in terms of the length of the battle and difficulty. I had assumed it was to be the "Omega Weapon" of the game, but I guess I forgot that Omega Weapons in Final Fantasy have almost always been really easy to defeat. And the Wyrmhero Blade that you get out of killing them both and completing the fishing mini-game is just way too slow to be worth using. Not that there's anything left in the game to kill it with.

[The Orichalcon]

That is completely possible without you being unable to equip an awesome weapon or armor that happened to find lying around but wait... you spent your license points on abilities instead of equipment. Now you're out of luck.

No other RPG has made us choose between equipment or skills.

I went through most of the game without using any licence points except for when I needed to learn a certain spell or equip a particular item. So once I realised that you could boost your skills on the licence board, I was well towards the end of the game. Never ran out of points and never had a problem with the game while I wasn't using them. So the complaint against the licence board doesn't really sit with me.

[Bahamut]

I went through most of the game without using any licence points except for when I needed to learn a certain spell or equip a particular item. So once I realised that you could boost your skills on the licence board, I was well towards the end of the game. Never ran out of points and never had a problem with the game while I wasn't using them. So the complaint against the licence board doesn't really sit with me.

Leveling was tedious as fuck though...that's probably one of my two major complaints that sits with me with the game.

[Malaki-LEGEND.sys]

You know, I didn't find leveling that tedious at all in the game, save for the near-end when all I wanna do is beat the damned thing. But then again that always happens to me in every RPG I play so I don't really pay it any mind.

The gambit system was a little tricky to really get a hang of, but for the most part, I loved looking around for stuff to kill. This game really does make turn-based combat look archaic to me. I honestly don't know how I'm gonna be able to play another JRPG again after this. Also, if you really wanted to breeze through leveling(well, I wouldn't say "breeze through" so much as "level a bit faster"), you could just steal Embroidered Tipets from Coerls at the Tchita Uplands.

I love this game so much, I'm already about to start my second(as close to 100% completed as I can get)run. This time I'm going to actually try mapping out specific classes instead of giving everyone licenses all willy-nilly like.

And to end this post, I'll just say that this game needed more John DiMaggio. Hell, every game/anme/cartoon needs more John DiMaggio. Fuck it, they should just put Bender in everything.

[prophetik music]

the part i loved was farming for LP in the desert. i used to just groove around there for hours slamming those yensa into the dirt. i think i got a chain of about seven hundred or so before i mistakenly attacked one of the pumpkinheads.

[Warmech]

Ok, so how do you complete the Hunt Club sidequest at the Phon Coast? I've killed all the trophy monsters, but the Huntmaster says I've only given 29 of them away because he took the first one that I got from the turtle. How do I "get" that trophy back?

[Thin Crust]

I DID IT!!! I finally beat Yaizmat. I had to go and save 14 times, but I did it. I was at level 95 and all I did was attack, and have 2 curers. I spent a lot of time casting breavery and beserk as well. But when he did growing threat (level doubles) he just killed my guys too quickly. So, I set my gambits for every character to arise, chronos tear, attack. Don't worry about curing, it isn't worth it. I think someone already said that here somewhere.

Also, I was wondering about the hunt quest at the phion coast too. I have about 20 trophies, but haven't given it to anyone. Which banga should I give it to? They put different things into the bazzar.

[Trash Man]

Yiazmat is a joke compared to other bosses like Omega Mark XII or Zodiark. Sure, he has a butt-load of HP, but that's all he really has going for him. I was at like level 70 or so when I beat him the first time (Maybe not even that high). Reserves, as usual, were never touched, so they were all really low levels.

Zodiark was harder IMO. I think I died like twice before I learned my lesson on him (Level 70ish for him as well on my first time). I never got a game over on Yiazmat. I only left because it got boring over time, and I wanted to play it safe just in-case the power went out or something.

I remember the old days of FF optional bosses, where you can get entirely raped in just one turn. Didn't matter if you were max level, max stats, or so on. It was still able to happen. Nowadays, it's just big show bosses that have no real bite in them anymore.

OH and uh, the hunt club prizes are worthless, you can easily get all those things elsewhere. And those are all you get.

there are 31 rare game hunt club enemies. 1 to start the thing (The turtle), then 30 more to get trophies that you give to Atak Blok or Stok. You get nothing special otherwise. Yeah, what a fun waste of time huh? The worst part is that nothing you get from them is even worth the effort it takes to find those enemies (assuming you are the honorable player who does not use a guide to get answers).

[The Orichalcon]

Zodiark... hard? I beat that thing in like 40 seconds.

[Trash Man]

I said he's harder than Yiazmat. I didn't say he was HARD to beat. I only died the first two times because I didn't equip the proper things to protect against Darkja. After two failures, I learned from my mistake.

Also, I didn't use cheap tactics like quickenings pulled off right before he puts up the pailing.. Or the old I'm the suck so I'll use Decoy, Reverse, Stop trick.

Yeah, if you use those, then it's a quick battle.

Also, the only way I see you beating that guy in 40 secs is if you are one of those really lamer people who use the dark matter when it was charged all the way up.

[Warmech]

31 rare monsters? But...no...I can't find any more. What the crap.

[prophetik music]

I said he's harder than Yiazmat. I didn't say he was HARD to beat. I only died the first two times because I didn't equip the proper things to protect against Darkja. After two failures, I learned from my mistake.

Also, I didn't use cheap tactics like quickenings pulled off right before he puts up the pailing.. Or the old I'm the suck so I'll use Decoy, Reverse, Stop trick.

Yeah, if you use those, then it's a quick battle.

Also, the only way I see you beating that guy in 40 secs is if you are one of those really lamer people who use the dark matter when it was charged all the way up.

its not cheap if you can do it every time. they recommend using the nicopawhatsit and remedies on every boss, for goodness sake.

[The Orichalcon]

I can't remember how I beat him. I just remember mashing him down really fast with my three strong male leads.

[Trash Man]

By any chance remember your level and weapons and armor? The later two make a huge difference. All I had on my first time against him was 3 Save the queens, Maximillion, Some hat that protects against Darkja (didn't know to use it until 3rd try), Bubble Belts (which were later switched to Opal Rings so I could just attack him with Flare). Level was only 70 or so. So yeah, it took me longer than just a few seconds. I can see how if my level was higher, and if I had the best weapons in the game, that it would make him die faster.

I also just don't see how a person could walk in there and just know he's gonna throw Darkja at you and know to protect against it (unless they use guides to do everything in a game, which to me, is not what a good gamer does). Even with protection, there's still a 50/50 chance it will kill a party member, if not all 3. So even if you had protection, chances are slim that he did not entirely wipe out your entire party with one of his Darkja attacks, which he spams to hell and back. And later on he puts up a pailing, so having 3 strong guys will mean nothing, since the pailing never goes away, and you are forced to use magic. And if you dare use Dispel on him, he also puts up a magic pailing, rendering himself near impossible to beat. The only way to have beaten him really fast, is to know what was coming, and rape him before he got his pailing up. Otherwise, it would have been at least a few mins battle, even it it went well, seeing as the first 20 secs are just you watching Darkja happen right off the bat as soon as you enter the room.

I never liked using quickenings because to me, they just seem to make the game too easy. I know about other tricks too, but it also just feels cheap, and I'm the kinda person that likes to make a game harder. Sorta like how in FF6, how you can just beat almost any boss/enemy in the game in a single turn with the old vanish/doom or vanish/X-zone trick. I know about it, but I never use it.

[The Orichalcon]

Like I said, I can't remember how I beat him. I do know I was expecting him to be super difficult, but his HP just went down so damn fast, it was an easy battle.

I didn't read any guides, I can't even remember if he used darkja. Maybe I got lucky and he didn't hit me with anything like that? I remember him putting up the paling, but I switched my attack gambits to the strongest magic I had immediately and he went down fast.

I did have most of the strongest weapons by that point, and I was level 99 all around. But keep in mind that a good gambit set-up can overcome pretty much anything an enemy throws at you. Arise, Faith and Curaja going consistantly, especially in a short battle, keeps everyone going.

[irriadin]

maybe I'm a bad player. maybe the time I fought him, I got really unlucky. But when I first fought him (knowing nothing other than that he was supposedly hard as hell) he wiped out my entire party with darkja. I died soon afterwards.

Next time I went in, I brought some dark resist stuff, and proceeded to have an epic 20 minute fight. He used darkja at least once every minute or so.

[Warmech]

He just spammed Darkja way too much for me to beat him. Plus towards the end he had Faith in effect that I couldn't Dispel because he would put up a Reflect so it hit everyone for 9,999 damage. Even with a Black Mask equipped you still have a 50/50 chance of dying instantly. I couldn't overcome it.

[Thin Crust]

Yiazmat is a joke compared to other bosses like Omega Mark XII

This is a joke right? It took me all of an hour to beat Omega. It is the most predictable boss ever. Its laser did a little over half of my max HP with bubble belts so they die in 2 hits. He attacks too fast for cure to be used effectively. What do you do? Set gambits to arise, attack. Then switch your party leader when he/she dies. I had all three characters put on the strongest weapon (ragnorack, Excalibur, save the queen) and attack until dead. I hated that boss because it only had one attack.

Anyway, I'm done completely now. Last time I played through the game, I did it fast, and it still took 60 hours. Ok, fine, I didn't do it that fast. But the second time, it took over 130 hours. I did all espers, hunts, levels, and everything I can think of except for the rare game side quest. FF12 is my favorite game.

For the record, in ff6, I have my 12 characters gathered, and now I'm leveling up the weakest ones. The game got much more fun once I got past the tower of the cult of Kefka. I used the moogle charm to get to the top. Every time I tried to ascend to the top, something always stopped me just before I reached the top. The first time, I got hit with some massive damage spells. Like earthquake and died just a few steps before the top. The second time, I had float cast so the earthquake did no damage, but then tornado with meteor right afterward took me out. The next time, I was a few steps from the top when my battery died. Now I'm done, and I'm about to assault the final dungeon.

[Malaki-LEGEND.sys]

If it wasn't because FFIV was the first FF I played and thus my all-time favorite(it has more than enough merits other than just that), then FFXII would be my all-time fav. Amazingly enough, it beat out VI and VIII.

[Alexis]

So I just got a hamster. Why is this in the FFXII thread you ask? Because I named her Penelo.

[prophetik music]

i thought penelo was kind of annoying.