Bravely Default: Started a replay, Hard Mode because there are no other modes, etc. This is a challenge run of sorts, which is forcing characters to only use Jobs that fall under a specific guideline. First off, just beat Khamer/Khint, to give a frame of reference of where I am so you can understand my decisions; the actual playthrough stuff later in post!
First off, the rules! Naturally, can only use jobs that fall under their role. Each job falls under one role and one role only, so no sharing jobs. Likewise, abilities can only be used based on that role. This is notable because getting the Job means you have access to the most basic of skills, meaning Knight = Stomp, White Mage = L1 White Magic, etc. No cheap nonsense of "Oh, they technically have it!" Prior getting it, everyone uses Freelancer until their first job, and Miscellany until their 2nd job. Here's the split up I've done!
Also trying to keep the split up relatively equal; won't be perfect and there are some obvious ambiguous jobs (like Freelancer or Conjurer), and I'll have to figure those out eventually. Additionally, everyone needs to show some level of even job usage, so I can't just neglect a job entirely. This aspect may be pulled once characters hit Job Level 9 given the JP Req spikes, so I might just change it to "everyone needs to get their Job to level 9 at very least."
Tiz: Light Fighters. Tiz is a country boy so naturally he's built strong, but he's got no formal training. Yes, I'm using Plot Logic behind this...also his stats fit but quiet! Anyway, Light Fighters are determined by being a clearly Physical Job that doesn't use Heavy Armor, defined by "gets an A/S in Shields, Helmets and Armor." Has to be All 3 mind you.
Agnes: Staff Mages. Because she's a Vestal which is a religious figure meaning White Mage meaning shut up this logic is flawless. I specify "Staff Mage" because "Support/Healer" Mage has more arguments behind it, leading to less objectivity.
Ringabell: Rod Mage. Mostly "by default" reasons because the other 3 feel more fitting in their primary roles. Anyway, see Agnes, make appropriate adjustments, obviously the primary offensive spell caster.
Edea: Heavy Fighter. She's got formal training and actually uses swords, so damn it, she gets the swords! Basically "everything Tiz doesn't get" is best way to sum it up. And yes, I suspect she will be my best character outside of possibly Agnes who gets White Mage.
Fighters are pretty straight forward, really, given the guidelines I made, and nicely enough, they both have exactly 6 of each, so that feels pretty much set. The others are a little harder to decide.
This first came up is Merchant vs. Time Mage. Both are Staves > Rods, so I decided why not look at INt vs. Mind...and both are Int > Mind Jobs. So there's an argument for both. Ultimately, Ringabel is the "default" Merchant character, so I went with that as a tiebreak. Time Mage...has Tiz of all characters being the default, which is completely random, but whatever, so this logic works as a tiebreak. Also, and more importantly, Merchant is a 100% Awesome Swag Job, Time Mage is the Anti-Swag Job that looks completely dumb. Ringabel, as we all know, has an S Rank in Swag, while Agnes has Not!Ringabel rank in Swag, so of course that Job goes to Ringabel!
As is stands, there's 4 jobs left, and each Ringabel and Agnes have 4 jobs each, so 2 per each. Performer and Red Mage are both meaningful, Freelancer...less so, but at least it exists and Conjurer is BWAHAHAHAHAHAHH! I'm thinking Ringabel gets Conjurer simply because it's stats are closer to what he'd be using (S in Int, B in Mind), plus Conjurer is clearly meant to compliment Summoner in the same way Arcanist compliments Black Mage and Spirit Master for White Mage. Given this, that would put Freelancer on Agnes, which would sort of address an issue I am bringing up next. If you've forgotten, Conjurer has an A in every Weapon Rank, E in All Armor Ranks, S in Int/MP, B in Mnd, C in everything else, so it does actually fit Ringabel's in the sense of "uses Rods, Int > Mind" job albeit in a technical sense in the former aspect! Freelancer is a B in all weapon/armors, C in all stats, so it can pretty much go everywhere. Also worth noting? Agnes will be stuck with Miscellany longer than Ringabel due to the Merchant thing I mentioned, so it fits there.
Additionally, giving Agnes Freelancer also makes me feel less guilty about the few times I used Treat to maintain resources while she was a White Mage (Ringabel did use Examine once or twice but if he's using Examine on a turn, then that suggests he'd have been using Default on the turn otherwise, so I don't think that's really meaningful), so it's more legit or something!
Logically Performer should go to Agnes which would put Red Mage on Ringabel. The one thing I don't like about this is how it means Ringabel gets 2 jobs from the Water Crystal Arc, and Agnes gets nothing until the Fire Crystal arc (where she will get two.) I do want to keep things even, but wondering if I should just treat that as "dems the breaks" for a challenge, and really, whoever gets Conjurer is going to have to wait a damn long time for it anyway. Considering the rant above, Agnes' lack of a Florem Job won't be as big a deal given she'll have access to Freelancer anyway, lessening the gap.
"But Meeple! Red Mage is a Swag Job! That totally kills the discussion there and then!"
You're right...except that Performer is ALSO a Swag Job, so the Swag Tie-break unfortunately doesn't work here. As a reminder, Red Mage has a B in all weapon ranks save Swords (A), Bows (C), and Knuckles (D), B in Armor rankings, B in all stats save Str, Dex, and Vit which are C, so yes, it's legitimately tough to figure out where it goes based on gameplay.
So considering all of the above, I have concluded the job sets will look something like this:
Tiz: Monk, Thief, Hunter, Pirate, Ninja, Vampire
Agnes: Freelancer, White Mage, Time Mage, Performer, Salvemaker, Spirit Master
Ringabel: Black Mage, Merchant, Summoner, Red Mage, Arcanist, Conjurer
Edea: Knight, Spell Fencer, Valkyrie, Sword Master, Templar, Dark Knight
And now...WITH THE ACTUAL PLAYTHROUGH STUFF!
The prologue is mostly unchanged. Yeah, some technicalities like no one else can use White Magic, Ringabel and Edea stuck as Freelancers when they otherwise wouldn't be, but there's not much to talk about so ONTO ANCHEIM!
First off, Jackal's Dungeon. Tiz equips an Oak Staff because it's barely weaker than the Iron Knuckle, but one handed, which in BD is always a good thing, as unlike FF5/T/Etc., Shields are universal, just some are way better with it than others, so Tiz appreciates the defense boost. Tiz is unfortunately kind of shitty at this point. Edea has Two Handed Stomp w/ Issun No Kami, much higher defense, and has Cover. Tiz has an unreliable boost move, way lesser damage, higher HP at the cost of much lower defense, and his big damage attack misses 50% of the time. Oh joy. Ringabel is a cannon with limited resources, and Agnes is my lifeline. I get a little overzealous with Ringabel, and end up fighting Jackal/Khint with him being useless.
Jackal/Khint (2 resets): I enter the fight the way I showed above. things are going fine! Then Jackal uses 500 HP Healing Potions because he cheats, which ends up being a big deal because I can't reliably break that. Edea's Stompx4 can break that, but that only happens once in a while, where as he can throw Potions whenever after stealing. Tiz, unfortunately, isn't very good here; he does 40 damage per physical, and Strong Strike does like 120, but misses half the time. I reset, take off the Oak Staff, see Tiz's attack raise notably thanks to Barefisted (making the Iron Knuckles useless now), attempt again, no dice. I leave dungeon entirely, heal Ringabel of all MP, rush back in there now with a real MP score, and win. Note to self: Always go into boss fights with Ringabel having actual MP!
Tiz now gets Thief. This makes him so much better I cannot stress it enough. The big thing from this is Thief's A in Bows, giving Tiz access to the Iron Bow. Bows, unlike Fists, are actually strong enough to be almost as good as a 2 Handed Sword from Edea. He's still clearly worse than Edea, but at least now he reliably goes first, and does damage that registers. Also Life Thief can be handy to easy up Agnes' role a bit.
Profiteur/Khint: Pretty straight forward. I do go in without someone having the magical 601+ HP (which I could have easily gotten by making Tiz a Monk) but ultimately didn't matter since he never focused on the same character.
Ringabel now gets Merchant! He can now Swag like he's suppose to at the cost of effectiveness.
Wind Temple is uneventful; a lot of Tiz shoots things with Bows, Edea stomping on enemies, Agnes either defending or healing because she can't do anything else, and Ringabel sometimes hurling big damage, other times poking things with the Oak Staff to do damage equal to about 1/3rd of what the fighters are capable of. Hey, it's a major improvement over what a Black Mage does with the Mace ok!?
The Thread Cave gets a scare moment where my ENTIRE TEAM gets confused. Lucky for me, Ringabel uses Run and we get out of it. Tiz is actually my best character here because there are so many flying enemies, so the Iron Bow seems a lot of use. Also, thanks to DLCon, Norende is developing really fast, which while for shops isn't a big deal (the good stuff is way too expensive at this point.) Due to money reasons, didn't buy much from Yulyanna's Pet, which makes this dungeon a bit more annoying than it needed to be but ultimately, that one scare moment aside, everything was straight forward.
Dragon: Hey look, a Boss I don't remember at all! Goes down pretty easy, though one thing worth noting is due to how the boss works, after his initial onslaught to use the Bow special, Tiz actually equips a Dagger + Shield combo since his damage isn't big anyway and his speed makes him a prime Item Boy user. On top of that, Daggers activate Specials based on items used, so if Tiz is attacking, he might as well make it a big hit that boosts Edea's damage. The other thing to note? Bully is a pain in the ass. No, not hard to deal with other than I was low on Phoenix Downs (though not TOO low), but rather, the lowest HP character kept being Agnes so she kept dying, and was dead at the end of the fight so missed all EXP and JP from the fight. BAH I say to you!
Buy some Mithril Stuff, a few Norende equips (Lambent Hat for the mages, Rainbow Dress for Agnes). Mithril Sword vs. Axe was a tough choice; on one hand, Mithril Axe is cleanly better on damage and Stomp makes it's accuracy meaningless. On the otherhand, the Sword has a Special that can activate far easier (Use Brave vs. Kill Enemies), especially vs. Bosses, so I opt for that. Think it was the wise decision because I can equip Beast Slaying properties on the specials which will be handy for Othros. Also turned Tiz back into Monk because he gets a Beast Slaying weapon, which will be handy for the boss.
Othros: For a fight I remember giving me a lot of trouble, was able to beat him in one attempt. First time I fought him, kept resetting and then finally went in with *2* Staff Specials Ready. This time, having Agnes simply alternate between Default and Cure x2 seemed to work, while Tiz, Edea and Ringabel focus on killing one of the heads. Also got lucky in that he only used Blazzard twice in the fight. Once the Ice Head died, the fight was pretty simply and easy. Things that may have helped include giving Edea a Shield and using Shield Bash on turns instead of Ironclad, knowing that the breath damage is physical now.
The Clock Tower of Ancheim was uneventful other than enemies randomly would OHKO characters with Eye Gouge and such and because of low Phoenix Downs, I do leave the dungeon to restock. Turns out it wasn't necessary but better safe than sorry. I actually pay attention to some damage value related stuff for Tiz. First off, Mithril Bow on Thief is 86 attack vs. Edea w/ 2H Mithril Sword at 106 attack. Tiz is doing about 350-420 damage, depending on how many hits he gets, RNG, etc. Edea does about 450-520 damage w/ Stomp. So while Tiz's damage is clearly worse than Edea, he's still keeping up to some degree, which is a hell of a lot better than what he was doing as a Monk, where he downright needed Strong Strike to compete. I also look at equip differences too:
Mithril Sword is 18 power, so 36 w/ Two Handed. Mithril Bow is 34 power (albeit used by an A in the weapon vs. an S, so slightly weaker in practice). The Basest Claw is 23 Power, best weapon Monk can use (w/out Two Handed). Why am I posting this? Mostly to demonstrate why Thief is a huge upgrade vs. Monk. It's still cleanly worse than Knight, make no mistake, but worth noting that without Stomp, Tiz actually outdamages Edea thanks to increased hits, as well as further demonstrates that Bows do feel properly scaled against weapons w/ Two Handed while Claws do not, as we can see the Mithril Bow is only marginally weaker than a 2H Sword at the same time, while Claws are significantly weaker. In conclusion? Thief Tiz is competent, albeit nothing special. Monk Tiz is just kind of blech unless his claws can squeeze out damage. Oh yeah, Mithril Dagger is better than Oaken Staff too, so Thief Tiz even does better with a 1H Weapon should he require a shield.
BUT ENOUGH OF THAT! ONTO THE LAST BOSS I FACED!
Khamer/Khint: ...is really easy. The only thing worth noting is that Khamer loved to cast Stop on Tiz, which pisses me off because Tiz was trying to steal from him. Go figure, the successful steal was Ringabel using a Thief Knife item cast after many failed attempts by Tiz, despite Tiz being a Thief thus getting the Steal Up Bonus. Not much else to say, other than I open with the Level 2 Sword Special (again, thank you DLCon!) and Poison both since I shoved Poison on the special as a "why not" kind of thing. No, I don't think that was meaningful, because the two really aren't threatening.
Now Agnes has a stupid outfit, and Edea is now dressed in a 100% Approved By Ringabel Manner. She's immediately regretting this Heavy Armor decision.
This playthrough will probably be on hold until I finish FF3 Dual Playthrough. Mostly started it because of DLCon purposes, and the game I was playing was FF3DS and kind of want to keep the DS and NES version on equal footing. One last thing I'll note is I have MP Recovery Lv2 ready for Rejuvenation, which means Ringabel is probably a lot better because Agnes can every once in a while cast a bit healing spell that restores 30-40~ MP. Might actually equip her with 2 Staves just to allow more castings.
