What Games Are You Playing 2013?

[Grefter]

FF5 - Done 2 Fiestas this year.  First one was Blue Mage, Mystic Knight, Ninja and Chemist.  This was pretty broken and brutally fun.  Pick various ways to snap things in half (not necessarilly most efficient, but most fun).  Was the longer of two runs I think even though I played less of the game.  High point was Sleep Swording Atmos to death because iOS version fixed a bug (?) where hitting something with Sleep sword that was Asleep would wake it up anyway.  This is no longer the case and wreck follows.  I finished the Pyramid and did some basic stuff on the overworld (didn't bother with Lamp, did bother with Mighty Guard) then decided that meh I wanted to just go crush the final boss.  Crush is exactly what followed.  Chemist works like a more effort filled Bard in Ex Death in that you can just pour Level boosters down people's throats and wreck shit.  Overall based off my next run I would rate them better than Bard honestly.

Overall fun had and quality of that run was Laggy/10.

Next run I got Black Mage, hey off to a good start.  Berserker, oh well do I want to donate and change that?  What to?  I just watched CIATOS do a run with Time Mage, others are meh.  Lets try Berserker.  NOW I KNOW THE MEANING OF REGRET.  Fire class was Bard.  Bard is pretty good you guys, I don' know if anyone has told you.  Way too many of its tools are back loaded though.  Strength/Mag booster (one of) should have been dropped on you early World 2 or so really.  That said they completely tank in the final dungeon when shit randomly gets butt loads of Magic Evasion and some stuff Stop works on is barely phased by it, so applying it abusively is quite a bit more tricky than it used to be.  In the last chunk of the game their astounding frailty really shines through though.  Especially compared to Chemist who can just chug Goliath's Tonics and giggle.  Bard was pretty fun and worth it for Equip Harp Berserker beat down on Leviathan (couldn't get it to roll on Shinryuu).  Final class was Dragoon.  It wasn't Berserker at least.  I even used Jump unironically in one fight.

This run was quicker and technically harder, but none of that is particularly damning.  What it definitely was was infinitely less fun.  Berserker just shits on so many things you can try to do for fun.  Want to try and charm things in the flying ruins to get free healing?  Nah fuck you says Berserker.  Want to not get Counter killed to death?  Nah fuck you says Berserker.  Want to try and steal Coral Rings with Thief Knife?  Nah fuck you says Berserker.

The worst part is?  I didn't even want him dead on the one fight where you want to kill someone off because Berserker damage was still legit on Atomos.

Fuck this class.  It actively saps the fun out of FF5 which I have really come to love.

iOS continues to be easy mode though, Berserker now always seems to attack the first target in the list, so they won't randomly punch back row things.  On the other hand, this meant Necrophobe required applications of Jump to kill the back two Barriers (bard stuck singing, Black Mage getting one shot by barriers, MP sapped and Jump better turn efficiency than Ethers and you know, the untargetable part of Jump).  On the other hand iOS version has no delay when an ATB bar filled and I don't know if that would help, but I was unable to consistently Stop lock Omega even with 3 Bards.  Theoretically doable at the levels I was at (BRZRKR CRITZ CHEWING THROUGH 50K HEALTH YESSSSS), but I don't have the patience for it and after fishing for a 50% chance of correct targetting on Delta Attack on the opening turn (33% chance) and eating approximately 95 billion Atomic Rays in the face for 5k damage I ragequit and decided to punch the game in the goolies.

Then Exdeath kind of wrecked me a few times while I got the pattern of when to stop buffing and when to blitz Form 1 down (Berserker: Nah fuck you) and solidifying approach to form 2 so as to not eat Almagest for a spread of OHKO - strong 2HKO damage party wide.  I was kind of stunned that I actually finally used that Reflect your own spellz 4 more damage strat for once (since party had more live targets than Neo Exdeath at that point, so Firaga All was superior to Flare even unboosted).  Magic Lamp was key to a few too many strats IMO, but it is effective and got me wins so I won't complain too much.

None of this got me as mad as Exdeath Castle fight though where I was wiping to dudes just getting wrecked by double act physicals.  Nothing like getting stick up my arse about wiping to uncontrollable variables in the last phase (Yep legit locked in untenable position just because someone died to double physical, OHKO BM in back row).  I was mad.  Even when I won I was mad.  Fuck so much of that fight and fuck Berserker so much.  I ain't even mad at Bard, but losing control of ANOTHER PC doesn't help heaps either.  u didn't want to play this game anyway right? 

Fuck Berserker.  I am sorry Alex, but I would rather be playing with my Forest Friends.

[Ranmilia]

[Niu]

The end plot can be summed up as "God Arcs are People Too!"  God Arcs being the weapon that God Eaters use...yeah, this is weird stuff.  Ren is kind of annoying, what with the whole "I'm a young new recruit who happens to know EVERYTHING and is all mysterious *freaky glare* BUT I LIKE THIS DRINK EVERYONE HATES!"  The plot surrounding him/her (...seriously, I can't tell!) explains that, sure, but they could have at least made the character look and sound a little older!

When does projection that only some people can count as human being?

[Cotigo]

Walking Dead, Episode 3:

Well, for starters, it doesn't play around with any of the bullshit that made 2 kind of hokey (Oh hai mark). Shit also gets emotional pretty quick.  On the all but too expected downside, it turns out a lot of the choices aren't really choices at all. Investigating the little mystery in the start of the episode, and what you did with that, ultimately didn't matter, and for the purposes of the remaining narrative, neither does the big decision made on the side of the road that results from the drama. Also it is pretty obvious that Telltale realized that writing two whole separate characters based on what you do in Episode 1 was going to be too much of a headache for too little payoff, and Carlie/Doug dying isn't really shocking in the least.   Fortunately, this is completely invisible if you don't compulsively restart trying to get the outcome you wanted... which I guess is the point. I figured the storylines would diverge in much more grandiose ways and kept trying to get the storyline path that I wanted to see, but it turns out that the overall structure of the narrative remains the same regardless of the decisions. The only thing that changes are the details, so just going with it and not rewinding to make what you want happen happen is a much more satisfying experience. 

That said, it was a little strange storytelling-wise to have the climax of the episode happen, and then... oh hey let's go solve more puzzles this episode (so we can replenish our cast with more people since we killed off half of them!), but overall a much stronger episode than 2 was.

[Meeplelard]

The end plot can be summed up as "God Arcs are People Too!"  God Arcs being the weapon that God Eaters use...yeah, this is weird stuff.  Ren is kind of annoying, what with the whole "I'm a young new recruit who happens to know EVERYTHING and is all mysterious *freaky glare* BUT I LIKE THIS DRINK EVERYONE HATES!"  The plot surrounding him/her (...seriously, I can't tell!) explains that, sure, but they could have at least made the character look and sound a little older!

When does projection that only some people can count as human being?

When it is being used in a hyperbole for the sake of humor, albeit, no one else would really get it, but still.

[Anthony Edward Stark]

Walking Dead, Episode 3:

Well, for starters, it doesn't play around with any of the bullshit that made 2 kind of hokey (Oh hai mark). Shit also gets emotional pretty quick.  On the all but too expected downside, it turns out a lot of the choices aren't really choices at all. Investigating the little mystery in the start of the episode, and what you did with that, ultimately didn't matter, and for the purposes of the remaining narrative, neither does the big decision made on the side of the road that results from the drama. Also it is pretty obvious that Telltale realized that writing two whole separate characters based on what you do in Episode 1 was going to be too much of a headache for too little payoff, and Carlie/Doug dying isn't really shocking in the least.   Fortunately, this is completely invisible if you don't compulsively restart trying to get the outcome you wanted... which I guess is the point. I figured the storylines would diverge in much more grandiose ways and kept trying to get the storyline path that I wanted to see, but it turns out that the overall structure of the narrative remains the same regardless of the decisions. The only thing that changes are the details, so just going with it and not rewinding to make what you want happen happen is a much more satisfying experience. 

That said, it was a little strange storytelling-wise to have the climax of the episode happen, and then... oh hey let's go solve more puzzles this episode (so we can replenish our cast with more people since we killed off half of them!), but overall a much stronger episode than 2 was.

I think Telltale wanted to avoid rewinding as much as possible and just make a story that reacts to you through emphasis on character relationships, rather than events.  If you have wildly diverging events, then the push is there to replay it and try to get the different events, as much as it is to take in the story.  It's part of the same reason it's so hard to die in that game- players dying in video games isn't a consequence you have to deal with, it's a demand to replay part of the game.

When does projection that only some people can count as human being?

...How the fuck is this a sentence?

[Cotigo]

I think Telltale wanted to avoid rewinding as much as possible and just make a story that reacts to you through emphasis on character relationships, rather than events.  If you have wildly diverging events, then the push is there to replay it and try to get the different events, as much as it is to take in the story.  It's part of the same reason it's so hard to die in that game- players dying in video games isn't a consequence you have to deal with, it's a demand to replay part of the game.

I think that's pretty much on the money. After Episode 3 I stopped rewinding altogether and the experience was much more enjoyable.

No real further comments now that I've finished Episode 5. Great game, very well done. Plays to the strengths of the Adventure genre for sure. All of the episodes are consistently great, even if Episode 2 is a little hilariously bad about some things (oh hai mark).   Thinking about getting the DLC but now that the story is over I can probably wait for a while before rushing onto the DLC.

Also, of course the black man dies. of course.

[Anthony Edward Stark]

The DLC is a very different experience from the original game.  I think it's actually more interesting to replay, though.  The way that the narrative is non-linear w/r/t time makes it so you notice a lot of things that you maybe didn't realize were important the first time.

[Otter]

Summer means Steam!

Orcs Must Die 2: Fun stuff.  I spent almost a week predominately playing this (and Innovation) and enjoyed myself.  It's a simple tower defense game where you play an action game during the waves instead of just sitting there watching your traps do stuff for you; co-op makes all of the above better.  Eventually I'd done all the levels on Nightmare and I'd messed about with all the traps and weapons in the game and so the novelty wore off but I feel pretty well-served by what I paid for it.

Mark of the Ninja: not actually about a guy named Mark who is, himself, "of the Ninja," so that was disappointing but the stealth gameplay was fun all the way through.  I played through Normal as a pacifist and then ran it back for the hardmode NG+ as bloodthirstily as I could, which is pretty much my pattern with these things; did the same to Dishonored.  With both runs and some messing around for achievements and secrets I spent in excess of twelve hours here and in all that time rarely found myself frustrated with a game that's all about stealth, so that's something.  Like OMD2 this was a Summer Steam Sale item, so solid value, recommended, etc.

The Swapper: the art, the music, the puzzles, the atmosphere, it was all delicious to me and unlike the previous two games (which felt more like guilty pleasures or time-wasters) this one left me with a sense of personal satisfaction at having played it.  As a time-for-expense value it's vastly worse than the other two games I'm listing here, it's short and it has no replay value, but it's easily my favorite of the three anyway.

[Cmdr_King]

Project X Zone- Fin.  Not bad for a game that more or less stops meaningful character progression by mid-game and gave up on plot from the word go.

Gemini and Erica are probably the only cast members I wasn't familiar with that immediately got my attention.  Sadly I don't think their Sakura Wars game is even the one that was released over here.  That said, all the backflipping does make me wonder if I shouldn't put Resonance of Fate higher on the stack.

Otherwise it's basically Endless Frontier but less interesting.  Why it's so much more playable I don't know.  6/10.

[Meeplelard]

Actually, we did get Gemini's game.  In fact, I saw Sakura Wars for the Wii just yesterday at Gamestop, and she's right on the front cover (in different clothes so I did question if it was her at first.  Back of the box removed all doubts where she's dressed the same as PXZ) so yeah.

Alas, we did not get Erica's, but I suppose 1/2 aint bad considering we missed like 6 entries of the games.

[Dark Holy Elf]

Gemini's the cool one anyway, Texas cowgirl + samurai is just perfectly dissonant for a character design. I'm pretty much the same as CK as she's the only character I wasn't already aware of that I am managing to give a shit about. Okay, I also like Devilotte, but I had seen her before in uhhh... *wikis* Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo apparently, not sure that counts. The award for most annoying character I was unfamiliar with goes to Neneko, but that is a Japanese trope which doesn't work at all in English unless handled by a deft translation team, something I would certainly not say this game has. Also her music sucks and pushes aside better theme musics.

Anyway, PXZ is an okay game but it could have been much better. It's pretty fun when the game does a good job with mission objectives (defeat a well-defended boss, blow up the statues, etc.), but rout missions are boring because there are large numbers of enemies and bosses are dull sacks of HP of which there are typically 3-4 per map. I'm really sick of solo attack cut-ins (twice per battle scene, every time!) and I have no idea why there wasn't an option to turn those off (when there is an option to turn off the far shorter "KO" cut-in). I've already mentioned my at the decision to never give character choice, which helps bog down maps. So basically, the game ends up far slower than it should have been, a marked contrast to the fast-paced Endless Frontier. Response system is cool though, as mentioned, and I feel like mentioning it again because it is probably the game's coolest new feature (yeah SRW had something similar, EF's system is far more elegant and provokes more interesting decisions). Also this isn't a plus or minus but I have no idea how people can play this game with items, I have never used them and the game feels completely not balanced for them (unlike EF) since the enemy damage scale is so low (random damage is 8HKO or so, bosses get up to 3HKO with super moves! Sometimes GT!). It's not a terribly hard game without them but it's at least interesting; I know I would sleep through all battles if I allowed myself to use them.

I just got the Resident Evil team, which means I think I have all the pair units now unless I've miscounted? Still have a few scattered solos to pick up.

I do wish they'd done a bit more to differentiate the characters. The stat curve is pretty small overall (although not invisible), the biggest differences between the PCs seems to be the speed at which they pick up fourth attacks and MT attacks (so go Chun Li/Morrigan? Bonus points for them randomly having a 4-range MT which so far nobody else on my team has). A few PCs have notable passives like the RoF's +1 range above an XP threshold, and a few of the skills are quite notable (Estelle's MT healing is super-efficient, better than normal healing as soon as at least 3 people are injured! The MT Move+2 buff is also very potent) but I would like to have seen more.

[Meeplelard]

Mother 3: Beat Chapter 2.

On one hand, I approve of the game letting me use a character who can do things besides "multiple flavors of damage."  On the other-hand, I do not approve of the game forcing it to be mostly a solo sequence when you're forced to fight large number of enemies while having limited healing and no real way to deal with groups.  Chapter got significantly more interesting when Kumatora popped up, but that's only the last 4th of it or so.

Remember how I said Chap 1 was good at drama?  Yeah, Chap 2 seems to have dropped drama entirely and tried solely for humor and it's not really working.  Humor seems to be trying too hard at the "WEIRD IS FUNNY!!' angle that Earthbound had, except Earthbound actually had it work while Mother 3 is more just head-scratching.  A boss that is basically Boss Beethoven is amusing to be fair.

[Fenrir]

Far Cry 3: Pretty good, but offensively dumb. This is the ultimate white male privilege colonization story.
Also very similar to Just Cause 2 just worse in every way and with no grappling hook.

You're a Straight White Man on holidays on some island in the Pacific Ocean, who gets caught by bad guys but manages to escape before passing out.

You wake up in a Rebel Village where black people herald you as Very Badass because you managed to escape from Big Bad Guy's camp (how the hell did they even know about it?) From that point on you can stop any cars driven by rebels, steal it and throw it into the nearest ocean while the rebel walks back to the village to get another car. And you help the savages solve their problems because they give you resources. Also indigenous women tell you you're hot.

Apparently this game is actually supposed to SUBVERT the insulting colonialism trope? This is a fucking joke:
1) The game treats all this plot plainly with no sense of self awareness nor critiscism of the main protagonist up until where I played, which is already pretty far. (Well there's the insane main antagonist mocking the player? Hurray) I already know everything doesn't descend to hell at one point because the story of this game didn't get "Spec Ops the Line"-level attention, so if anything happens I sincerely doubt it will be enough. (and it will be too late)
2) The story is what it is because it sales more than "Non-white man/woman sees the effect of colonialism on his island". Stop being a hypocrite and pretend you made something progressive.


Dark Souls no level up challenge: Named the main character Sliman. Perhaps the greatest pun I've done (not that it says much)
2 slots of pyromancy makes this challenge a lot easier than it has any right to be, at least at the beginning.
You can spend all that exp on silly items (poison kunais!) and more importantly on the pyromancy flame. So the earlygame isn't even that harder than usual. You trade a lot of defense for slighty more offense.
Everything went pretty well up until O&S. Gwyn was impossible so I looked a way to cheese him on youtube: Force him to do his jump attack by running away, then roll left + 2 attacks, repeat. (still pretty hard damn to do)


Persona 4 Very Hard: In the sauna. I'm bored out of my mind. The Persona 3 only worked for one game for me. I like having to dedicate in game time and make choices, but Devil Survivor handled this way better. I don't really care about any of these characters and their Saturday Morning Cartoon antics.


Star Ocean Ratix Solo: Beat this.
This would be even easier than the incredibly easy main game if not for fatal status attack and incredibly awful status defense accessories. Best status protection in the game: 70% status protection against one status, 10% chance to break. Wow.
As it is the aftergame is impossible. I went up to level 15 or so.


Tales of Eternia Reid Solo: Tree village.
This would be a Yattaf solo but you know what? Farah isn't worthy of being called Yattaf.
The hair, the dress, the boots... Farah has such an incredibly bad taste, you just have to stay away.
Reid is a dude I already know too well, and it's not like he has a good fashion sense either, but he's not digusting and he looks goddamn mental in battle. So I chose him.

Since there's no exp focusing I'm staying on Normal mode instead of Hard.

Cooking stuff is pretty useful for once. It took a very long time but now Reid has truly learnt how to make a sandwich. What a badass.

Anyway I have pretty fond memories of this game and it has aged well enough. But looking back we can see that the series really started going in the wrong direction there, with a dangerously high cutscenes/battle ratio.
Mashing A during every cutscene leaves well enough time for battle here, unlike Tales of Symphonia onward.

[AndrewRogue]

Dragon's Crown: I'm playing through a DnD campaign as a dwarf who loves powerbombing troglodytes. Ashley joined me as an axe wielding Amazon.

[Lady Door]

Game is far less offensive than I anticipated, and it definitely comes across as an homage to the 80s.

Not that it invalidates the criticism, of course. But personally I don't find it off-putting enough to stop playing the game. Now, if I'd had to choose whether to buy it in the first place, I probably would have passed.

Worth noting that we got the art book when we picked up our pre-order. The art book is a fancy production! It's actually a book, albeit softcover, and it has really pretty arts. I like.

[Yoshiken]

I'm part of a charity marathon at the moment with a few friends - come join us and spam chat and stuff? We're taking donations for Macmillan Cancer Support, and there are prizes to be won and challenges to force us into for donations, so come and join the fun. <3
Tomorrow, specifically, I'll be doing an Ocarina of Time challenge run where I take a drink every time I take damage (meaning I get more drunk and get worse at the game and... vicious and beautiful circle) from about midnight (GMT) to 11:00 Friday, so join for that?
We're streaming over at http://www.twitch.tv/tolarian_tutor if you're interested - viewers, people in chat and especially donations are greatly appreciated. <3

[VySaika]

Dynasty Warriors 8: Beat all four kingdoms' storymodes, both normal path and what-if path. Zhang Chunhua is the most hilarious new character. Zhang Bao is the most useless new character. Guan Xing is an airplane. Shoe Shoe is the most plot important nobody ever. Huang Gai for most improved character from earlier versions of the game, no contest.

All in all, funtimes. Esp taking on the storymodes 2p. The fact that everyone has a unique EX weapon now is amazing. The balance between Dive/Shadowsprint weapons and Dash/Whirlwind weapons is unfortunate(like...8-9 each of the former two, like 30ish each of the latter two...), but still not too bad. It DOES mean that an amusing number of people are good with gigantic double axes or a combat boat, at least?

Also, SMT4. First section, up through Naraku's end feels alot harder then most SMT games. After that, feels easier then say Nocturne or the DDS games in general. Odd progression there, but it's easy to tell why, since it's about that time that you get a real skillset and some variety in your demons. Once you really get rolling and can fuse more resists/nulls onto your demons as you go, it gets harder for enemies to exploit weaknesses and the difficulty lets up more. Also, Tetrakarn is highly important to get, but if you have it you can lulz through some midgame bosses. Won't get into any real specifics since folks are still playing this and SPOILARS.

Plotwise...Jonathan is a moron, Walter is a moron, Isabeau is just kinda there and I reaaaaaaaally want to punch Abbot Smugface Hugo.

[Shale]

DQ6: Up to the "real" version of the Demon Lord Whatshisname. The first version wiped me once when I did some dumb things with Carver and got him killed immediately. Then I started the fight over, realized his AI can be cheesed out with Buff, and stomped him. Second fight, though. Ouch. I powerleveled enough to learn Zing after dying there; hopefully that'll help (although if Zing is as reliable as usual, I kinda doubt it).

FFV: Finally got off my proverbial ass to beat the pyramid. Mellusion is a pain without Scan/Libra, as always. Even more so because her barrier change can also make her immune to Zenigage. Luckily when it did hit her it was dealing 6000+ damage, so it didn't take many barrier cycles for me to get enough shots in. Picked up Masamune, Gaia Bell (holy crap that thing sucks) and Assassin's Knife from the sealed castle, which is all the legendary weapons I can actually use. Woo, endgame power!

[Nitori]

The Walking Dead ep 5: well that's depressing

Corpse Party: Book of Shadows: well that's depressing

[DjinnAndTonic]

Final Fantasy Dimensions: Having a lot of fun with this, but I'm already in the Dark Knight chapter and I realized I've missed every Eidolon so far... Time for backtracking!

Deciding which jobs to hand out in which combinations is the most fun. I think I've got a pretty solid setup I want to use now:

Dark Warriors:
Nacht (Thief/Warrior->Ninja when available)
Diana (WhiteMage/Summoner/Ranger->RedMage if I really need Dualcast)
Glaive (Monk/Warrior->DarkKnight when available)
Alba (BlackMage/RedMage for Dualcast -> Dancer when available/possibly Magus if I really need Ultima)

There are enough free JP in the game to max four Jobs with an extra point leftover, this makes building really organic and fluid as three jobs is generally more than enough. Alba's also spent some time as a summoner, so backtracking for summons has been worthwhile.

Light Warriors:
Sol (Warrior/Dragoon - no clue what I'll use for a third job, maybe Paladin or Thief?)
Sarah (Summoner/BlackMage -> Memorist, supposedly these guys can be twinked to make an awesome Mage or Melee build, but not both)
Aegis (RedMage/Warrior->Paladin when available)
Dusk (WhiteMage/RedMage/Bard->Seer when available even though Seer is useless. This is the ultimate support PC and the only one I'm sure will end up in my final party)

I'm guessing that my final party will include the twins, plus Nacht since Ninjas are apparently broken. A Memorist-Summoner also sounds like a lot of fun so I'll prolly use Sarah over Diana for my summoner. Then I just get to shuffle around Sol/Glaive/Aegis for my fifth-slot melee build. Since I'm not sure which job will end up best for endgame melee, I'll have to experiment with Paladin/Dragoon/Dark Knight builds. I suspect it'll be Paladin since I think they're the only class that can use the Break Damage Limit Ultima Weapon sword...

The game is very susceptible to breaking just by leveling a few times over the 'suggested' level, so this much planning is probably a waste, but it's fun to envision where my parties will end up. May have to try a challenge run on my second playthrough.

[AndrewRogue]

Dragon's Crown: Yup. This is more or less what was advertised. Fun brawler, super fucking chaotic with 4 people on the screen. Animation is great. It really does capture the feel of beer and pretzels style DnD well.

BlazBlue Continuum Shift: EXTEND: Been playing this too, but haven't mentioned it. Cleared Calamity Trigger Reconstruction and Ragna's story mode. Otherwise been grinding challenges (40-66% on all characters, I think?) and trying to figure out a main.

Had some weird difficulties in certain places (Relius challenge 5 was weirdly hard and took me like, an hour to clear. Which is a bit excessive for B, 6D, 2A, B, 6D, 2A, B, 6D).

Thinking about getting back to my BG: EE playthrough.

[Idun]

Xenoblade: just got Xord'd. Headed to Satorl Marsh; sort of low-key obsessed with Dickson. Cycling in Dunban to my main crew, but not quite sure who to cycle out. Reyn's p. dope at this pt: L26 each, Reyn @ 4k HP, auto-attack to the 716 range, str 341, Dunban at 620 range str 260, obv. excluding gems. When will these warriors get a break? Time to play on the waist of a bionis.

[DjinnAndTonic]

Final Fantasy Dimensions: Okay, so Job Micro-managing is incredibly effective for the actual dungeon-crawling aspect. In the previous Dark Warriors section, I pretty much had 2 fighters, 2 mages. However, I gave Diana, arguably the most useless of characters, a weird job combination with WhiteMage/Summoner and then Ranger. Now, the combination doesn't -sound- that strange, after all, Rosa's been doing the bow-healer thing since FF4. However, Ranger as a job is actually built as a melee class, as opposed to a Mage using a bow. Due to the extreme effect job changing and job levels have on stats, this effectively means I can play Diana as either job as if she were two different characters. The Jobs also complement eachother pretty well as Ranger has a few support options that White Magic and Summoner's MP+20% passive help to bolster. So I can run her as a major melee damage source for the winding dungeon sections, then switch her back to full Mage for boss fights. As I'm typing this, it all sounds pretty obvious and logical, but it broke a previous paradigm for me.

tl;dr: mixing melee and magic classes in FFD is more effective than progressing from one mage class to another mage class, or the same for melee. At least for the midgame where resource management is still difficult.

I suspect at endgame (based on all my stat topic work on this so far), that mage classes complement eachother very well and there's very little need for the skillsets or passives from the melee classes. But midgame, the resource management aspect means that switching back and forth is far more efficient if you're speedrunning or just in a hurry.

[Grefter]

Learning Fusion skills from overlapping skillsets also can be incredibly useful.  That say my final party did involve someone pinch hitting like that between Paladin/Memorist and Seer because it let them fill whatever role necessary.