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[R^2]

I'm sure a lot of people, given the ability to scry in secret, would mostly use it to peep on members of the opposite sex.


But since we have an Ahriman Eye too, we can track this guy down and take his place stop him.






Three floating eyes and a Beastmaster. Not a tough battle.




These are available in shops but they're kind of expensive, so.










Yes, your territories are in trouble constantly throughout the game, and you have to go fight to defend them every time. The battle to defend them never changes, so it's again with three bugs and a Moogle animist. The only advantage here




is that the moogle in question has some of the later Animist abilities to take, and a harp not found in stores yet.






Two different kinds of goblins and some more bugs. But goblins I can control!




Try as I might, Blue Magic cannot be stolen.


But with a monster under my control...


















With two Thief abilities under his belt, Johanes can promote into a Juggler.

Juggler is an advanced job for Moogles. It can be unlocked with training as a Thief. Juggler stat growth is kind of crummy. Their HP growth isn't terrible and their Speed is second only to Thieves, but their Weapon Attack is lackluster and their magical stats are abysmal.
Jugglers equip knives.
For all the poor stat growth Jugglers get, Stunt abilities are great. Ring and Smile are the king of them all, duplicating expensive Time Magic effects (Stop and Quick) for no MP cost whatsoever. Two Jugglers tossing Smiles at one another can go anywhere on the battlefield they like in an infinite turn loop! Gil Toss (throw 30 gil for 30 damage) isn't great, but is okay for certain situations like finishing off Flans or removing Charm from a buddy without doing too much damage.




In fact, the random clan out of Eluut is simply called "Antlions". Guess what it's mostly made of.






Hastebreak is a spell I don't think has appeared in the series before or since. It causes Slow status, unless the target has Haste already. If they have Haste, it Stops them instead.






Until he gets his turn with the Cinquedea, Ramses will have to keep learning skills the old-fashioned way. Air Render is a much-needed ranged attack on the Fighter skill list, so I bought him an Atmos blade to learn it.


Somewhere along the line we got our Combat rating up.

[R^2]

A thunder flan, a goblin, and a couple panthers. No sweat.


This flan only knows black magic spells, so I can't learn any blue magic from him.


That'll work, though. Poison Claw slashes for damage and poison status.
















"I think I knew a girl in grade school named Crystal Theory."




"We're in a Final Fantasy game, remember? There's gotta be crystals somewhere."

[R^2]

Oh, right. Free Sprohm isn't a mission that takes one battle, it is a battle.






"Seriously, a thief, a white mage, and a warrior? You're hardly a speedbump."


"I told you, we roll over fights like this and barely notice or post screencaps on the Internet."


Keep on dancin'.














It must've been a big rock.




Demands a white mage bearing white thread, so I swap Undine over.


Yes, again.






Some mission encounters wander, too. Clan Baham here starts at the Ulei River and walks wherever they feel like going.


You can accept their offer, which changes your clan's name to Baham and fails the mission. Fuck that noise.












It's not as well-developed in English, but in the original Japanese it was pretty clear that the clan warfare was hurting a lot of innocent people, and the palace didn't care enough to stop or regulate it.








Finally. Time to switch Montblanc to a thief so he can rev up his learning rate.






Again, you can accept, which in this case costs you some money and fails the mission.


Your GP or your HP!














I didn't even KO the Bangaa. I knocked him down to critical HP, at which point he hit R2 with Backdraft. Backdraft deals damage to the target and the user takes a little bit in return. That knocked him out. Totally worth it!
















Seriously dude I have a juggler with a stop effect and a skilled thief. You're lucky you can walk away with that stupid turban still on your head.






I had no diamond armor before this fight, but got one as a reward and stole one from Raven. So yeah.


I forget what clan ability advancement nets you Madu, but fuck yes.


Rescuing Giza again.


Doublecast lets you choose from any spells currently equipped. With White, Elemental, or Summon magic as a secondary -- or Red as a secondary to those classes -- you can doublecast those spells too. Red Magic itself isn't very useful, but Doublecast makes a Viera caster very good at her job.

Doublecast also turns whatever spells cast through it into Red Magic. You can get around laws forbidding Summons and Elementals that way, if that's important.




Now having said all that, I have to turn Undine into a Fencer for her next dispatch. Oh well.




Our clan turf and reputation is starting to have an effect on the locals.

[Stush]

The lines they say at the end of a battle are sort of weirdly written,

"[White flowers] Went well!" Why not just say "The job went well!" or "The mission was over too fast!"?

[Bongo Bill]

To indicate which mission you cleared.

Can you use Steal Ability on your teammates?

Apparently, once upon a time, FFXII was supposed to come out before FFTA. Talk about development hell.

[R^2]

It's possible to have several dispatch missions going at once -- as many as you have clanners to dispatch, really -- so I'm with Bill on this one. It's just a way to keep track of what your clanner just did. Although when a mission (or a bunch of missions with the same clear requirement, like a number of battles) is done, you get to pick what it was from a menu, so . Maybe they just have a good feeling about what they accomplished?

You cannot steal anything from allies or guest units. Equipment, skills, gil, experience, JP, nothin'. It's kind of annoying in some later missions when you have guests that appear with nice gear that you can't keep for yourself.

And on the subject, for whatever reason, boots do not fall into any of the categories of items you can steal. They're equipped as accessories, but Steal:Accessory can't take them. I mean yes it's hard to take an item a giant reptilian gladiator is standing on, but is that really any less practical than undoing all of the buckles and straps on his platemail and stealing that?

[R^2]

Two Lamias and a Lilith are present here, but none of them know the blue magic associated with their species. I could have sword I usually pick up Night here.




The fairy is more obliging.








If R2 isn't present for a battle, someone else will check in after it's over. And if you run away from a battle you don't feel like fighting, it's not good news.

[R^2]

If you look closely, you can see a faint inscription on the front that looks like two jagged lines atop one another -- the Aquarius zodiac symbol.


























Who in later games became the Aquarius-associated zodiac beast/Esper/whateveryouwannacallem. In FF12 he's decidedly water-elemental, an association he lacks here.

Also, he doesn't speak in iambic pentameter like the Lucavi did.


"I am the gatekeeper. Are you the keymaster?"


Half of the dialog for the protagonist in any JRPG is repeating what someone just said to you with a question mark at the end.






















The Lucavi didn't appear on the unit list for the battles that included them in the first game, but they're a little more open now. Breath of God is an area attack, Lightspeed ignores counter abilities.


They look imposing I guess but there are far more threatening monsters he could have summoned than a couple floating eyes.


This one knows a blue magic spell.




Roulette spins around the battlefield to friend and foe alike, then chooses one at random...






...and kills it. Since we don't have the capability to survive the attack and learn the magic, we won't be trying to pick this up here.


So, on to battling Famfrit and his minions.




For an attack that's supposed to strike so quickly you can't react, the animation on this one is kind of long.


It works, though.


Doublecast White Flame missed twice, but it did put Undine at close enough range that the Ahriman just hit her instead of using Roulette again.




Technically Montblanc beat him.

[R^2]

"...racist."












An image of a boy appears, with a ridiculous haircut and ostentatious clothes. I thought he got a line of dialog, but he vanished instead, and I didn't screencap it.

[R^2]

I told you it was a ridiculous haircut.














So Mewt is deeper into this escape-fantasy than R2 or Ritz are. He's completely forgotten what it was like in St. Ivalice, and breaking the crystal made him remember a little.


His father, no longer constantly drunk apologizing to his coworkers, doesn't remember at all.






Well, if you're constantly shat on in the real world, there are worse places to put yourself when you construct an elaborate fantasy to live in instead.




Also Mewt's mom is still alive here.


Babus is the only Nu Mou with a nose.










So the once-bullied kid is a prince, his totally-not-alcoholic father is now the highest judge, and his mom is the queen instead of dead. Hell of a setup there, Mewt.

[R^2]

Giving rise to the protagonist's tiresome alternate character interpretation: he just decided, without looking into it for more information, talking about it to anyone, or taking anyone but Famfrit's word for it, to destroy the world.


Sure enough, Montblanc and Johanes (and any other moogles who may join later) can now summon Famfrit. It takes 10 JP to do, and attacks all enemies on the battlefield. It's based on Magic Attack power, so Montblanc, having gained his stat boosts leveling as a black mage or time mage, is going to be better at it than Johanes, who's been a thief or animist for most of his career.

Famfrit is supposedly based on the Cloud of Darkness from Final Fantasy 3.  When the game was new I wasn't really sure how they got from this
Final Fantasy III DS - Cloud of Darkness

or this I guess
Dissidia Final Fantasy: Vs. Cloud of Darkness Intros

to this
FFTA - Totema Famfrit

But Final Fantasy 12 makes it a little clearer: Famfrit's armor is hollow, holding only a swirling dark miasma. So it's a Cloud of Darkness imprisoned in metal with a canon (or ewer in later games) instead of a shapely lady with bizarre tattoos and snakes. I guess that makes as much sense as anything.




We place a new town, Cadoan, on the map. It's the home to Nu Mou, so it offers a small discount on magical gear like staves, rods, and maces.


Placing Cadoan put a treasure at Lutia Pass for me to pick up, too. Rubber Suit is a good piece of armor for Viera only. It nulls Lightning-elemental attacks.


Not only are individual laws somewhat harsher, but two are now in effect at once. Whereas before only one law covered any given battle, now I have to observe two restrictions at once. But given how we're still in the early game, it's not a problem to not use -- in today's case -- broadswords (used by heavy fighter classes like Bangaa) or Charm effects (the Archer's Cupid, or Animist's Tail Wag).

[Ted Belmont]

I could have sword I usually pick up Night here.

 

[R^2]

While getting Gaffgarion's Fell Knight technique "Night Sword" would be infinitely better I could have sworn I meant the blue magic spell Night, learned from Lilith monsters, that tries to put every unit on the battlefield to sleep.

[Ted Belmont]

I just figured it was an attempted pun!

[R^2]

Nah, just a typo. I talk about swords a lot in these things, and muscle memory's a bitch.

[R^2]

In which nothing even remotely important happens.




I tend to send Undine on short missions so she's back in time to take place in any battles I might need. Doublecast costs 999 AP to learn, and that takes a long time to accumulate.





Oh huh I didn't screencap the setup for "Diary Dilemma". In the pub. I went back and got one from my Clan screen mission archive instead.








Incidentally, while defending Giza Plains from attack again

The antlions are now strong enough to use their blue magic attacks, Sandstorm and Lv3 Def-Less.

[R^2]

Right, off to Cadoan.












Not really, Mister Random Passerby.


























"And you appear to be one of them, Mr. Passerby, which I do not find suspicious in the slightest."








It's probably never going to happen. He's a busy man with many admirers. You know this.

[R^2]

We're taken back to the map screen, where we're free to visit the pub and shop as usual for a town. We can leave, but if we come back...








































It's not even "Save Ezel".


A few jobs we haven't seen as enemies yet. There's a bangaa warrior and a human fighter, but there's also (clockwise from left) a bangaa gladiator, a human illusionist, a human hunter, and a human ninja.


Remember when I said you can't steal from Guest units? Sadly that is the case here, as all three pieces of Ezel's equipment outclass anything we have.

My thoughts exactly.

So hey you might be wondering what Illusionists do.






Illusionists use Phantasm Skill to cast spells on all enemy units for elemental damage. Freezeblink is, of course, the ice-elemental one. As you can see, it takes several applications of any phantasm to have much effect on the battle overall -- compounded with the Illusionists' terrible speed growth, that's not likely.


Ezel counters with one of his own special skills. Azoth targets all enemy units and causes sleep status.


With some advanced human jobs available this place is pretty good for stealing abilities. R2 picks up three Illusionist spells, and Ramses takes the enemy hunter's Aim:Vitals (cause a random status ailment) and Sonic Boom (ranged area attack). Sadly, the only skill the ninja has memorized is Double Sword, which as a support ability cannot be stolen.


Johanes, unable to steal abilities, settles for taking equipment instead. Ninja gear teaches Last Haste (adds haste status when dropped to critical HP) to Beastmasters and Ninja and Bonecrusher (counter with a 50% damage bonus) to Fighters. Wygar here teaches Strikeback (automatically dodge, then counterattack) to Fighters and Gladiators. We steal some swords and hats too, but nothing particularly noteworthy.

And after stalling to steal everything even remotely valuable before KOing all enemies:

[R^2]

Judgemaster Cid then holds up a rather large card, which vanishes in a flash of light.










You can practically see the sarcasm dripping from his text box.

[R^2]

A card shop? It's full of sweaty nerds talking about the newest expansion set, isn't it?


Not even a Black Lotus is worth what you're charging.




In addition to the money, gil, and equipment we get for winning, we get an R2 Antilaw. R2 in this case isn't me or my ingame avatar, it's "Rank 2" -- namely, the card can be consumed to remove all laws that are rank two or less from a given battle. Laws go up to rank 6, and the higher the rank the more strict the law is. A rank 1 law might forbid one elemental attack type (fire, lightning), but a rank 3 will forbid an entire ability set (Steal, Chivalry), and a rank 5 will forbid several ability sets (all Techniques, all Skills, all Color magic).


We place the next location, Aisenfield, on the map.