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It's far from the first, and probably not the most purely effective Final Fantasy Tactics party setup ever. But my crew of Blade Grasping atheists is pretty close to invincible.So I've been replaying Final Fantasy Tactics. Again. What, it's not like I have a problem. I can stop any time I want. Anyway, I'm at the point with this game that I'm running out of gimmick parties to see how they work. My latest experiment is the best one yet.Everything about this strategy comes down to FFT characters' Bravery and Faith scores. You see, with a little bit of grinding, you can set your party's Bravery and Faith to whatever you like courtesy of Ramza and Orator skills. The Samurai's Blade Grasp reaction ability (Shirahadori in the PSP remake, but I prefer the goofy original ability name translations) sets your physical evasion for both ranged and melee attacks at your Bravery score. Hello, permanent 97 percent evasion!
Faith, on the other hand, affects how effective your spellcasting is as well as how susceptible you are to enemy magic and status effects. The bad news: low-Faith heroes are utterly worthless spellcasters. The good news is that Faith does not have any impact on how effective you are at a) punching dudes in the face, b) stealing and/or breaking all of their equipment, or c) distributing potions and other recovery items to your allies. Crank that Faith score down to its permanent minimum of two (out of 100), and the nastiest Firaga is a light tickle that immediately precedes your dual-wielding death machine gutting everything.So, you're 97 percent immune to physical attacks and roughly 98 percent immune to magical attacks. Most encounters are complete walkovers at this point; large portions of the enemy's army will be incapable of doing anything to you. The world is largely your plaything at this point...but you're not bulletproof.** Actually you are, because Blade Grasp blocks bullets, but bear with me here.
The few things that can hurt you are mostly monster abilities – typically magic-type attacks that don't check the target's Faith in their damage calculation. Skeleton "Soul" attacks, for example, can still hit you and do reasonable damage. Red and black chocobos can get their specials past your defenses. Malboros can wreck you with their Bad Breath. Many Zodiac boss abilities still connect.Fortunately, there are only a handful of fights in the game that have a threatening number of enemies who use that small subcategory of attacks. And that's what giving a few of your party members Item and Throw Item is for anyway.Go now, and laugh your way to the conclusion of the War of the Lions. Zodiac, schmodiac – no army in Ivalice will be able to come close to standing up to your forces.Have any of your own silly FF Tactics party configurations (besides Calculators, we all know about those already)? I'd love to hear about them in the comments.
Email the author Adam Biessener, or follow on Twitter, and Game Informer.
One of the best games on PSP. Tactics Ogre is even better though. Square Enix + SRPG = Heaven
I don't really remember doing any crazy configurations. I did love getting that shield that blocks pretty much anything and that really powerful spear. They were worth working through that really terrible battle with the robot and the three hyrdra-dragon things.
The first time I learned about the calculator thing and got it, it blew my mind. The calculators also blew up anyone else that looked at my team funny.
this sounds extremely close to HCBailly's party setup in his lets play of the game
That's great, I'm in the middle of another Tactics playthrough myself. Props to your battle tactics, man... But all I need is Orlandu duel-wielding Chaos and Excalibur. Thunder God Cid FTW! Great blog.
I loved the blade grasp. I would mainly have a Ramza with high faith and magic. Sounds bad, until I couple it with the ultima ability that can completely wreck everyone. And Mustadio, and T.G. Cid, and Agrias, and basically all of the other story characters that seem to serve as a portal to totally destroying the enemy. Once Ramza hit lvl 99, I rarely lost. Ya, I played that game way to much on my beloved PS1...
I think I'll try this, FF Tactics is one of my favorite games ever and I have tried many set ups, but not all!
I give my whole party 97 Bravery with the Shirahadori ability and equip them with Aegis shields so that they can block half of magic attacks too.
I can honestly say that there's no game that I'd like to see a new version of more than Final Fantasy Tactics. No, I'm not talking about a Gameboy or DS or even 3DS version, but a fully realized next gen console game.
This was one of my top 5 favorite games of the PSone and PS2 eras, and I've honestly played all the way through it more than any other video game before. If only Square would listen to the small but vocal minority that feels next gen doesn't have to mean action RPG's like Dragon Age, Elder Scrolls and Mass Effect (though those are also great games, of course).
As for my party, I can't resist going with Dark Knights. Their HP is always huge and they do so much damage. I always equip a few with Time Mage and Priest abilities so I can cast Don't Act and Don't Move on the last opponent so I can just level up and gain JP by hitting my own players and healing them nonstop. But the completionist in me likes to get every ability for every job, so I still mix and match.
Well, if you're willing to put in way too much time, you can boost a character's stats by deleveling (using the delevel traps over and over), then releveling back up as a dark night. The job you have affects your overall stat growth. Leveling as a dark knight boosts your attack, if I recall, so going up 99 levels as a DK boosts your attack unnaturally high. Throw in some evasion moves or auto potion and your Ramza becomes an unstoppable one-hitting death machine.
I called 'em The Troupe. 2 Dancers, 1 Bard, 2 Mimes. Hilarity ensues. Another fun one was 5 Monks with Geomancer subs. Good times there too.
I love Final Fantasy Tactics, and I am greatly appreciative of this strategy.
I just started replaying FFT and I can't wait to try this strategy. Thanks for the tip.