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[R^2]

Sadly no, it just means you've learned all the skills there are to learn.

[R^2]

Neato. Now white mages, summoners, and bishops can learn a combo too.


Good job, Muscles Eldena!























































First round:











He's not wrong. Any attempt to deal damage to Llednar has a 0% chance of doing 0 damage. Which isn't as good as the double-sort-of-negative makes it sound, it's more doubly-hopeless.

I did accidentally discover he can be put to sleep with Night, though.

See that pit in front of my starting position? For whatever reason, it's impossible to jump over, even for agile classes like the assassin. Everyone has to painstakingly move around, while the templars and titania close in.


Llednar, too. As you'd expect from this sort of thing, he's got powerful unique attacks.


Fun fact: Llednar was asleep when R2 said this.





And as my thieves close in, ready to pillage his unique-so-far helmet...

[R^2]

"Come to think of it, I could have just let Llednar do whatever it was he was going to do to you. We've already established you wouldn't die from it, and it'd shatter the crystal for you without having to do this -- oh hey, spoilers -- Totema boss fight."




"Spoiled."





































































































Since we can't steal, capture, or learn anything from the vampires, all we gotta do is pound on Mateus until the fight's over.


Mateus is already at half HP and half of my clan hasn't even moved yet. It warms up a Thundaga for Gallahan and Ramses, which misses Ramses and does negligible damage to Gallahan...


Before Gallahan's reaction ability, Return Magic, fires a Thundaga right back. Man Mateus at this rate you'll destroy yourself and all we have to do is wait for you.


Nah, sounds boring.


























































What a fantastic idea!













The human Totema is Mateus, based loosely on Emperor Mateus Palamecia, from Final Fantasy 2. While English games just refer to Mateus as "the Corrupt", in Japanese he's "The Corrupt Emperor" or, if you like, "The Emperor of Corruption". Palamecia was defeated halfway through the game in FF2, counquered hell, and came back to try to take over the world again as a lich-like abomination. In Final Fantasy 12, the esper Mateus is described as joining the rebellion against the gods, failing, and being cast into hell. So there's that kind-of-similarity.

Mateus is associated with Pisces, and is ice-elemental in FF12 (water-elemental having been claimed by the Aquarius esper, Famfrit). In this game it's an armored creature of some sort with a bondage-queen goddess blindfolded and stuck to it as a human shield.
Final Fantasy XII Mateus Deathblow

But in this game he just does HP damage based on magic attack to all enemies, and is actually a female form wearing armor.
FFTA - Totema Mateus

Anyway.



Upon reaching a town...

[R^2]

Yep, laws are getting pretty tough to work around now. In this case, causing any status ailment gets you cited. This shuts down a few enemies, but not enough.




I'm assuming this is some Japanese cultural reference that doesn't translate well, because to my knowledge nobody ever said that.






Allmighty cards either remove any law, or remove all the laws affecting a battle. I forget which.


White magic, blue magic, red magic, black magic, stealing, and any attack with bows, greatbows, or guns, including things like Hunt and Fighter Tech that are weapon-based. Sheesh.






The stated reason these monsters have swords stuck in their shells is that people have tried to stab them before, and their weapons got stuck in the monsters' tough hides and they couldn't pull their weapons free again. So they just walk around with sword hilts and stuff sticking out of their backs.

In this case that spear is my mission reward, aptly named the "Beastspear". Since it's a spear, and thus Bangaa-only, I give no fucks about its actual statistics.


OH COME ON. Clan Ritz is an all-viera group (it's somebody's fetish), and there's not a single assassin among them?


Hell, I'm sorry I had to come out all this way just for that.















































Usually I match up the mission-ending quote with the mission setup from the pub, but in this case, I took all those missions at once. If it weren't



...for Words of Love finishing quickly, my next couple of fights would have been R2 alone.






So of course I turn around and deploy again.






"Us being someone else entirely."

Anyway, this was a three-person battle on account of everyone else being deployed. (Montblanc, 10 levels behind everyone else, doesn't count.)


WOULD PEOPLE STOP SAYING THAT










put your skypole in the wormhole to end your dry spell eh hur hur hur




Why's it called "Armor and Turtle"? The mission poster is a guy named Gilgame, a pun on the Japanese "Zenigame", or money-turtle. Zenigame is so named because its shell is about the size and shape of a coin. Gilgame is usually a giant turtle-monster that's worth a lot of money if you beat it. It's usually translated as "Gil Snapper" in English games.





Our clan skills net us Zanmato, a katana with high attack power and...

The viera Ultima skill, Ultima Masher. Because if someone's immune to KO, petrify, sleep, doom, and stop, sometimes you just gotta punch 'em til they run out of HP instead.


FUCKITY CHRIST RAMSES THE JOB WAS TO

GO TO A PLACE

ACCEPT A HAT

PUT HAT ON HEAD

COME BACK HERE

HOW DID YOU FUCK THAT UP YOU ARE THE WORST MAGICIAN EVER

[Esperath]

FUCKITY CHRIST RAMSES THE JOB WAS TO

GO TO A PLACE

ACCEPT A HAT

PUT HAT ON HEAD

COME BACK HERE

HOW DID YOU FUCK THAT UP YOU ARE THE WORST MAGICIAN EVER

SOUNDS LIKE IVALICE TO ME

[Brentai]

[Classic]

So is there any difference between the various combo abilities? Really?

[R^2]

There are! I will explain them later in the LP.

[R^2]

WE NEED MATERITE, AND WE NEED IT MATERITE NOW



















This battle has a ton of good stuff to steal.











So we do. Also looted: Nike Bow, Brint Set, Cheer Staff... I actually stole so much I figured the point was made and stopped screencapping.


It actually took so long Undine ran out of MP for killing people.


We do it the old-fashioned way instead.




Doned runs up and donkeypunches R2.


















The line in English comes off as more derisive on Doned's part, since he's being an obnoxious little shit right now. In the original Japanese he asks if you're going to make a magic machine gun (a throwback to one of the collectible treasures in Final Fantasy Tactics) or a Calcobrena.




Instead, Doned throws it on the ground and shatters it.






It's ore, you . It's broken up and melted down anyway. Just pick up the pieces.





































And since we took the Wyrmstone with us as an optional mission item...



We get the hidden character Pallanza to join our clan! Pallanza is the only bangaa I ever bother with, which is to say I send him on dispatches and rarely take him into actual combat, because bangaa are still awful. Nu mou and viera can KO enemies in a single turn with Death and Last Breath, and moogles can Smile or Quicken the nu mou and viera to make them do it more often. Having to actually hit something for HP damage pales in comparison.

Anyway, Pallanza joins as a Gladiator, one of the many "hit things with a big, heavy weapon" bangaa jobs. He has Blitz, the high-accuracy-low-damage Gladiator Tech, and the bangaa Ultima ability, Ultima Sword. Not like he's gonna use his MP for anything else. (In this shot I'd already equipped him with a Wygar, so he's learning Strikeback.)


We don't get to place Bervenia Palace, it just appears here.

[R^2]

You guys immune to sleep?

No?


Then why did you bother?


This guy reequipped his Life Crosier five times before giving me what I want.

[R^2]

This scene really shows why the "playing the antagonist" character interpretation doesn't really work. At this point Mewt is fully aware of what's going on, and that he's living in a fantasy where everything exists just to serve him. How many missions have I been on to solve bandit activity or bring a criminal to justice, while Mewt plays the poster-boy of a corrupt aristocrat? When he's threatened he completely shuts down, throws a tantrum, and cries for his mother.

He is, as noted earlier, completely bonkers.

Speaking of crying for his mother, look who teleports in.





































Guess who teleports in to take their place.























We engage. No laws are in effect for this battle (as there's no judge around to enforce them), but Llednar is still immune to nearly everything I can throw at him. The mission objective isn't "Defeat the Boss" this time, it's just "Survive" -- there's no judge here to make sure R2 doesn't die for real, either.









Llednar is immune to almost everything.

Almost everything.


It's probably a bug that this still works.




If I had planned ahead better, I could have equipped R2 with the Steal ability set and swiped Llednar's armor and helmet. But I have few units who wear heavy armor, and while the helmet is better than what I have now... eh.




Bullshit, you were asleep when Cid showed up.

Llednar teleports out.
























































...as well as could be expected, at least.

[R^2]

I also sent Pallanza out on a repeat of "Jerky Days", which he finished quickly for a few AP. He took the Snake Shield with him, and came back with...

Arr, it's Cheney the Hunter! Which is even more hilarious in hindsight.


Anyway, Cheney starts with the human Ultima skill, Ultima Shot.






An Ahriman saves me the trouble of killing him by casting Roulette and targeting... himself.




Small HP restore and add Reraise. I'll take it.


As you might have guessed from the pub description, this mission requires me to bust up some more statues.






Missing Prof is not a repeatable mission, so it's kind of annoying that you have a random chance of...


...the sage Quin joining you afterward. I had to savescum a bit to get him to show up, and I'd never recruited him in any game I played on an actual GBA.


 

[R^2]

The secret characters don't have any bonuses to their stat growth, aside from having all of their experience levels come from one class. Hunters and gladiators get some great HP and attack growth at each level up compared to other jobs their races can take, and sages likewise have excellent growth in their magical stats.

So let's compare a bit. I unequipped everyone before taking these screencaps, so there's no changes to their base stats from equipment. Not everyone is the same level, but that should only make single-digit differences anyway.







Humans and Pallanza (since Pallanza is trained in a martial job and thus comparable to Ramses and Cheney).
R2 has spent most of his career as a fighter, a ninja, or a blue mage. His stats are strictly middle-of-the-road, although all that mage training has given him an edge on magic attack and magic resistance. His defense is oddly high for some reason.
Ramses is... kind of terrible all-around, really. His attack and defense aren't as high as they really should be, and his magic stats don't matter (which works to his favor, as they're terrible). His speed is okay, thanks to all the levels he gained as a thief. He has the lowest HP total, too.
Cheney is the best of the bunch, as far as raw statistics are concerned. Hunters have good attack and resistance (for some reason), and Cheney exemplifies that. He's also the fastest of the four.
Pallanza, surprising no one, has good attack and defense, terrible magic stats, and is the slowest of all. His HP are good, but eh.




The moogles. Montblanc, trained as a mage and not competing here, is only level 14. Both have mastered Animist and have all thief skills, as well as similar training each in juggler and mog knight. So their stats are pretty much the same.
Lini, since he started as a mog knight and worked his way to more agile classes from there, has slightly higher attack and defense. Johanes, who's spent more time overall as animist and thief, has better magic and speed.




The viera. Eldena got most of her levels in red mage, while Undine took assassin as quickly as she could and stayed as long as she could. There's a three-level difference, but Undine has significantly better stats than Eldena in all areas. Even magic -- Undine spent some time as a red mage and elementalist herself, but I still thought Eldena, trained exclusively in red mage, white mage, elementalist, and summoner, would beat her there.




Gallahan spent too much time as a Beastmaster to really compete toe-to-toe in magic against Quin. Quin grew up exclusively as a sage, and they have some of the best all-around stat growth of any nu mou job.

Except speed.

Quin is the slowest unit in my entire clan.

[Classic]

I think some jobs have mediocre stat rates in order to "compensate" for baller menu commands.
Gamefaqs has a full listing of growth rates. Dunno if it actually merits looking up, as everyone's got pretty similar stats.

[R^2]

You're right. Juggler and Gadgeteer are a fine example. Juggler has a fuckawesome command set in Stunt -- it can cause Stop, Quicken, Confuse, and Disable at range at no MP cost. Their stat growth is terrible. Gadgeteers have a terrible skill set in Pandora -- it causes status ailments or buffs to the entire party, but you don't know which party you're casting sleep or regen or whatever on. Gadgeteers have fantastic stat growth.

I boiled down how most jobs grow in their rundowns. Generally, fighter jobs have good HP and attack/defense growth, mage jobs have good magic/resistance growth, and archers, snipers, thieves, ninja, and assassins have good speed growth. Viera have better speed growth overall, bangaa have better attack and defense growth overall, nu mou have better magic/resistance growth overall, moogles have better defense/resistance overall, and humans grow depending on what job they're in -- although humans aren't quite as fast as viera, as tough as bangaa, as magical as nu mou, or as hardy as moogles, they're definitely faster than bangaa and nu mou, stronger than moogles and nu mou, better wizards than bangaa and moogles, and less fragile than viera.

[R^2]

:romosavatar:



punch punch punch punch punch




What's great about this mission is that it's repeatable. This guy breaks out of prison every year, and every year they're taken by surprise.



That Helje Key unlocks this mission:







Dude, spoilers.


T_RAMSES THIS IS HOW IT IS DONE












Neat. Presumably there's a mission that gives you Zodiac Ore somewhere in the world, but it hasn't come up yet. Meanwhile, "Crusite Alloy" -- the mission that requires two Zodiac Ore to complete -- has been coming up for ages.




The Feather Badge is a nice optional item to take. The AP from a mission you take it on is increased by 50%, rounded down to the nearest ten.










Purchasing the stuff legitimately doesn't fail the mission, so why fight?


Let's see if we can make up for Ramses' previous failure. Um, again.


Arr, that's how it's done.






If I'd sent Ramses, he'd fail the mission complaining of minstrel cramps.

Anyway, the Dark Fiddle is an instrument with surprisingly high attack power, putting it on par with some daggers and... you know... actual weapons.










If law cards are illegal, and you could do that all along, why haven't you been doing that all along?


We have no laws holding us back, so.


Notice how none of the enemies have moved.


That'd actually be a boring-ass fight to watch.


Sequence is an odd knightsword. It gives bonuses to a bunch of different stats, but has low attack power. However, "Battle Tourney" is a recurring mission, and each time you complete it, the attack power goes up by 1.




We already have an Ahriman Eye. Get another wing and we can build our own ahriman.


The good-luck charm he wants is a bloodstained demon cloak we got from a previous mission. Search me, man, I dunno.














FINALLY

There are two missions that have been on the board for about half the game now, and both of them call for Runba's Tale. I get to clear one of them.


A lot of these missions consume mission items in order to give you equippable items in return. I'm finally shaving down my list of mission items, as it overflows at 64, and filled up with chocobo eggs and adamantite long ago.


SO KAWAII


Hey, another Mythril wea-- oh.


cocksucking motherfucking




Anything but white, black, red, and blue magic gets you cited.


I can still Night all the enemies to sleep, but can't finish them off with Last Breath or Death, since those aren't color magic. I have to wake them up one at a time by blasting them with Firaga/Thundaga/Blizzaga, Twister or Bad Breath, or smaller doublecast spells.




Sapere Aude is like Sequence. It gives a general bonus to a lot of stats, and each time you re-complete Mage Tourney, the boost it gives to your Magic attack goes up by 1.


yay.jpg


That Sage Robe I picked up isn't for sages, it's for black mages. Geomancy is a support skill that decreases elemental resistance by one step, by which I mean an enemy who would normally absorb an element takes half damage instead, one that would normally half damage takes full damage, and one that would normally take damage is treated as being weak to that element.


HERE'S YOUR GODDAMN NOVEL I HOPE YOU CHOKE ON IT NOW LEAVE ME ALONE




It calls for a soldier.


Please try not to fuck this up.


Oh, no wonder he's so terrible at dispatch missions. Ramses is in the wrong game! He's actually the Hero of Time!






Oh, man up.








Since the battlefield is flooded, mobility is an issue, and most of the places you can go disallow you from doing anything once you get there. To keep you from spamming Illusionist spells from across the battlefield while your enemies close the distance, they forbid target:all abilities here.


It doesn't slow us down too much.




The Acacia Hat is like the Sequence and Sepere Aude. In addition to its stat boosts, its defense bonus increases by 1 whenever you do Swimming Meet again.

[R^2]

Well, shit. Hey guys remember how I said my emulator would overwrite screencaps without any warning?

Yeah, it did that. For the last two story battles, and a lot of side gameplay. In fact it overwrote so much I actually do not have a fallback recovery save going back far enough to recover it all.

LP is on hiatus until I organize whatever it is I've got and figure out how to keep going.

This pretty much precludes me from doing another screenshot LP of Game Boy Advance games.

[Ted Belmont]

 

[Brentai]

Clearly you need to switch to video LPs.

They are fun.

[R^2]

I probably should. I've been dinking around with it a little but haven't gotten the quality up where I want it to be. Besides, would you really want to watch a video LP of a Final Fantasy game? :boredtodeath:

Anyway, previously on Final Fantasy Tactics Advance:
Mewt is a whiny little bitch.
Llednar is Mewt's non-whiny-little-bitch side.
Mewt and Queen Remedi buggered off somewhere and no one has seen them since Present Day.

Our next story mission is Hidden Vein, in Tubola Cave:
"Most say the Tubola Cave mines were depleted during the 1st Mythril Rush, but my grandfather's will says otherwise.  Please check!"
-Cruu, Mine Foreman

Of course, the story mission has nothing at all to do with the setup. It rarely does. There's a cutscene in the pub after we accept the job:

Montblanc:  Kupo!  So, what's our next job, R2?
Marche:  We need to find some mythril ore.
Montblanc:  Kupokupo... Mythril hunting?  Why do you always have to pick the tough jobs, kupo?
R2:  Just trying to make a name for us, you know.
Montblanc:  That's true.  If we find some, our clan will be famous!
R2:  Actually, I lied.  I'm just trying to get Doned's attention.
Montblanc:  Kupo...?
R2:  I didn't think he'd come if I just asked him normally.
Montblanc:  So you're going to lure him in, kupo?
R2:  When he hears I'm out looking for mythril... There's no way he'll be able to resist interfering!
Montblanc:  That's right!  He was the one that wrecked your materite! Kupopo... Now I get it.  You know, you've changed, R2.  You seem much... older than when we first met, kupo.
R2:  Older?
Montblanc:  Kupo!  I mean that as a compliment, kupo.
R2:  I really had no idea what was going on at first... All I could do was worry about getting back home.  To tell the truth, I still don't know what's going on.  But I do know that as long as I truly want to go home... I'll be able to.  No matter how long it takes.
Montblanc:  But you should try to make up with your brother, kupo!
R2:  You're right, of course.  Let's get going!

So we get going. There's a fight at Tubola Cave, but I'd have skipped those screens anyway.

R2:  Come on out, Doned!  I know you're there!
(He does.)
Doned:  So, this was just a trick to get me to come, eh?
(nod)
Doned:  I already know what you're going to say, Marche!  "Come back with me, Doned!"  "Come back home!"  No way!  I'm different than you.  You have everything, but what do I have?
R2:  Doned, that isn't true!
Doned:  How isn't it true?  You can run!  You're not sick!  You have friends, and you can have snowball fights...  Well, I can have all those things, too.  In this world!  I have lots of friends in my clan.  And someday soon, I'll be strong enough to engage!  I can have fun here, fun!  And you want to take it all away!
R2:  I don't think going back home means losing everything.
Doned:  That's because you are you!  You have everything there!
R2:  Not everything, Doned.
Doned:  What then?  What don't you have!?  Don't tell me you want more!
R2:  I never said I "wanted" anything!  I gave all the "I wants" and the "I don't wants" to you!  You were always saying "I want this" and "I want that."  And I always had to put up with everything!
Doned:  ....
R2:  Yes, you were always sick, and I wasn't.  And Mom was so busy looking after you... I couldn't ask for anything for me, could I?  I was jealous that Mom gave you all the attention... Especially after we moved away from Dad, into the country.  It was like I was living alone.
Doned:  R2...
R2:  I don't have everything.  I know, you were happy when you found yourself here.  I was, too.  I like this world -- you can do anything.
Doned:  I know this isn't the real world.  ...I know.  But... But still... It's so much fun.  I can run!  I don't have to go back to my wheelchair...
R2:  It's like I said.  Even if the world turns back... I don't think you have to lose what you've found here. I'm sure you'll be able to run when we go back!  I'll do everything I can to help, too!
(Doned hugs R2)
Doned:  *sniff* R2... I'm sorry!


All right! [Hidden Vein] cleared!