The Final Fantasy XII Thread!

[Rasix]

Don't break games? I'm levelling my characters unattended right now. I should take a pic of the 999 chain message. (It stops at 999)

Where at? Undead spawning place where you get the Medallion of Might?  I think they spawn endlessly there.

[Strazos]

how does that even work? Just set yourself near a spawn area, and 2 people with gambits take care of things?

[Lum]

Don't break games? I'm levelling my characters unattended right now. I should take a pic of the 999 chain message. (It stops at 999)

Where at? Undead spawning place where you get the Medallion of Might?  I think they spawn endlessly there.

Yeah, you can do that pretty much anywhere that has infinispawn. Just have gambits set up so you're always hasted, and your group leader will get resurrected before the prompt to select a new leader before they die. Pretty much impossible to lose that way.

[Miasma]

There's a good FAQ about it here.  I haven't tried it yet, maybe tonight.  Extra levels don't seem to affect stats at all so I'm not sure how much good it does.  I'm in the fifties and each level only gives about 75 extra HP too.

I just found out I can buy bubble belts from the clan broker so all of my characters now have their HP doubled.  There is another, even more expensive item for sale there which reverses the effect of potions, I'm trying to figure out what the advantage of that would be.  Unless it means you can use them as a weapon?  Near the end of the game some of the better spells and weapons are at the old vendors in east and westersands, I think I found telekinesis at the secret vendor in Nabudis.

[Kail]

The spear is like a .1% drop on steal though, from what I've read.

Odd; the strategy guide I read seems to indicate that it's in a treasure chest that has a 10% chance of spawning.  A tenth of a percent chance to steal seems a lot less tempting.

On a related note, according to the book, a lot of the big weapons are obtainable from treasure chests.  It looks to me like the treasure chests respawn when you leave an area (like the enemies); does this hold true even for the big fancy items?  That would be pretty crazy.

[Trippy]

The spear is like a .1% drop on steal though, from what I've read.

Odd; the strategy guide I read seems to indicate that it's in a treasure chest that has a 10% chance of spawning.  A tenth of a percent chance to steal seems a lot less tempting.

On a related note, according to the book, a lot of the big weapons are obtainable from treasure chests.  It looks to me like the treasure chests respawn when you leave an area (like the enemies); does this hold true even for the big fancy items?  That would be pretty crazy.

If it's in a "white" chest (as shown in the strat guide) it'll respawn. I spent hours early on "farming" Demonblades (the spawn rate seemed lower than what the strat guide implied or maybe the dice just weren't rolling in my favor) since that was far and away the best weapon I would be able to get for a long long time.

[Quinton]

Anyone still playing FFXII?  I'm just shy of 70 hours in, main party all level 49 and just had my first GAME OVER in the main mission (I've died a number of times while going after way over powered marks or just generally being dumb while exploring, but this is the first actual death during the storyling).  It remains a lot of fun.  Might be the first squeenix rpg in ages that I actually finish, instead of setting it aside at the 75% mark when I realize I need to go grind levels for a few hours to continue.

-Q

[Rasix]

Anyone still playing FFXII?  I'm just shy of 70 hours in, main party all level 49 and just had my first GAME OVER in the main mission (I've died a number of times while going after way over powered marks or just generally being dumb while exploring, but this is the first actual death during the storyling).  It remains a lot of fun.  Might be the first squeenix rpg in ages that I actually finish, instead of setting it aside at the 75% mark when I realize I need to go grind levels for a few hours to continue.

-Q

72 hours+ and still going.  Trying to finish off the clan hunts before I do the last battle.  I may succumb to temptation and just try to finish it though.

[Miasma]

I'm still playing, I'm taking my time with it since it might be the last game I play for a while.  I'm at about 70 hours, level 55 on all and am at the very last stage of the game before we take the flight to the final showdown.  Now I'm going through all the hunts I missed, tracking down some optional espers and completing the License board.  I've got all of the top boards done and about half of the bottom boards.

I find espers kind of suck, they aren't really much use in a battle.  The only time I've needed one was due to the plotline forcing it.  I don't care for the quickenings either, even chaining them I can almost always do more damage with my deathbringers and haste.

You know the guy you can steal the Genji armor from, if you run away will he reset so that you can take him down to his forms again to steal more of the same armor or is it impossible to have everyone wearing the Genji items?

Might be the first squeenix rpg in ages that I actually finish, instead of setting it aside at the 75% mark when I realize I need to go grind levels for a few hours to continue.

I find the area to the West of the save crystal in the Feywood to be a great place gain money and experience.  Equip the 2X exp items on the active party and the 2X LP items on the others and just do a circle attacking those mirror knights to get a nice chain going.  Zone twice and comeback in to keep the spawns fresh.  99 windslicer pinions later you have over a hundred thousand Gil and a few levels in 40 minutes.  Plus some mirror armor to boot.

[Quinton]

Might be the first squeenix rpg in ages that I actually finish, instead of setting it aside at the 75% mark when I realize I need to go grind levels for a few hours to continue.

I find the area to the West of the save crystal in the Feywood to be a great place gain money and experience.  Equip the 2X exp items on the active party and the 2X LP items on the others and just do a circle attacking those mirror knights to get a nice chain going.  Zone twice and comeback in to keep the spawns fresh.  99 windslicer pinions later you have over a hundred thousand Gil and a few levels in 40 minutes.  Plus some mirror armor to boot.

I'll have to give that a shot the next time I'm short on cash.  Earlier in, the cats just inside the jungle were fantastic for XP, LP, and cash.  The thing about FFXII is that 1. I don't think I'm going to *have* to grind a lot and 2. when I do grind a bit (usually because I obsessively want to buy *every* spell/gambit/technick available) it's actually pretty fun.

-Q

[Trippy]

I just crossed over the 110 hour mark at level 47 and I still haven't gotten to Arcades yet (just killed the bosses at the beginning of Sochen). As I said in my first post I progress slowly in these sorts of games. I agree with what Velorath said in the Wii thread that this game has incredibly weak characters with Balthier being the only interesting one and Vaan is now my most disliked FF main male character supplanting Squall on my list, though I haven't played all the FFs. But at least he has some personality as annoying as it might be. The others except for Balthier are just bland bland bland. And I don't particularly care for the story all that much -- I actually like the "save the world from total destruction" storylines, as trite and cliched as they might be.

Despite all that I may also actually finish this game, which would be my first FF that I've completed and one of the few JRPGs even though I've played so many of them. The combat gameplay is just so buttery smooth and polished to such perfection that I still haven't gotten tired of beating on monsters. Throw in the inspired gambit mechanic and you have the pinnacle of "auto-attack" style group combat. I'd pay SquareEnix $15 a month to play FF XI-2 (or FF XIV or whatever they might want to call it) that had the same combat mechanics and allowed you to control your own group (a la Grando Espanda) with gambits, though I would like them to at least add "and" logic to the gambit mechanic.

[tazelbain]

I am confused about loot.  I am supose to hoarde it or sell it?

[Trippy]

I am confused about loot.  I am supose to hoarde it or sell it?

Teleport Stones and Gyshal Greens you should keep (you don't need to keep all the Greens). Other stuff you should sell -- it's how you make money in the game since most monsters don't drop Gil in this one and it's also how the Bazaar items become available.

[Lum]

You guys who are level 60+ are going to find the ending somewhat anti-climactic, as it's balanced for level 40ish characters. My guys were level 65 and I think I had to cast a heal once.

[Trippy]

Can you keep playing after you finish the main story?

[Yegolev]

The series ended with FF6(3).  Can't we just all agree on that? 

Did you play FF4?

Still playing FFXII slowly.  Lots of fun.  It's interfering with all of my other games.

[CmdrSlack]

Also still playing slowly.  I just got done with the "fight the vastly wussy Tiamat" in the Hutu (Hursu?) mines bit that allows you to finally get through the damn jungle.  I am still looking for a good place to get some solid chains going....I found one on the first of the Sandseas, but it kind of peters out after about 110ish.

Either I'm still very very early in (somewhere around 30 hours right now), or I'm missing out on some key location that has the higher level spells.  I just now finally got the black magic 3 spells and I think haste (time magic 5?) from the Moogle guy in the jungle.

I didn't buy the strat guide, and I'm starting to wonder if that was a bad plan.  I really like kind of fumbling along and learning stuff, but dang, I'm finding myself farming LP to make up for my many "whoops, that was a bad license choice" moments.

[Lum]

Can you keep playing after you finish the main story?

No.

[Strazos]

I've always believed it was a bad idea to depend on guides to get through the game. If you're using the guide all the time, it's like you're hardly even playing the game; more like just following prescribed instructions.

[Miasma]

I didn't buy a guide and I don't use one for the main plot but I do look here to cut down on some of the standard JRPG tedious crap.  I'm not going to methodically visit every single vendor in every desert/zone/mine just to find out if they updated their inventory so that I can finally buy the full party heal spell.  Nor am I going to try and re-visit every zone when a hunt contact says "It's somewhere in the uplands" and also fails to mention that it has to be raining or else it won't even spawn.  Screw that.

[Strazos]

Ah ok.

[Signe]

I always buy guides and when they stop helping, I cheat.

[Velorath]

A word of warning for those who haven't finished the game yet:  Don't expect much out of the ending.  While the plot is obviously wrapped up, Basch is the only one that seems to get any sort of character development.  Everything else comes across as setup for the DS game Final Fantasy XII: Revenant Wings.

[ThursdayNext]

There's a good FAQ about it here.  I haven't tried it yet, maybe tonight.  Extra levels don't seem to affect stats at all so I'm not sure how much good it does.  I'm in the fifties and each level only gives about 75 extra HP too.

I just found out I can buy bubble belts from the clan broker so all of my characters now have their HP doubled.  There is another, even more expensive item for sale there which reverses the effect of potions, I'm trying to figure out what the advantage of that would be.  Unless it means you can use them as a weapon?  Near the end of the game some of the better spells and weapons are at the old vendors in east and westersands, I think I found telekinesis at the secret vendor in Nabudis.

you can use it to cast effect that might fail as a spell, for example to cast blind wear the item and use eye drops on the monster, that should blind 'em if the blind spell keeps failing

hope that helps

[Miasma]

Yeah, I forgot to test that out.  I wanted to see if I could use a megalixer and instakill enemies  .  I'm sure bosses would have been immune though.

I finally got tired of all the subquests and some of the more annoying hunts (not doing that black orb stuff at pharos again) and finished the game.  I added a gambit line of (self, remedy) on the leader for that auto-level set up and could leave it running for hours and hours without it breaking so I was level 91 when I finished.  Level 91 is a great number because none of those Level 2,3,4 disable spells work by the way.

I liked the ending, for a little while I was worried they were going to do something which would have made me really mad but they didn't (Obviously I can't get into too much detail).  It was an interesting game because the main character Vaan was basically just along for the ride, Penelo was only there because Vaan was while Baltheir and Fran were just helping out.  Only Ashe and possibly Basch had anything vested.  Most of the plot revolved around NPCs.

[Cheddar]

Since my computer blew up, and UPS misplaced my package with the part I needed, I went ahead and took a shot at this game.  I was worried; the last 2 FF's I bought were dreck; I wanted old school FF.  This game is the answer, and I am <temporarily> a console gamer once again!

Now I just need to find out what happened to my package.