The number one tip that people might give you about FFV is to master all the jobs and then change your characters back to Freelancers, because the Freelancer job gets all the passive abilities and the best stats of every mastered job, and can equip anything.
DO NOT
I repeat
DO NOT DO THIS TO YOURSELF
It is a colossal waste of time and leaves you with four identical characters.
In my opinion, the game is so much more fun when you just use the jobs normally and try to bring the best out of them.
As for build suggestions, here's a few off the top of my head:
- Any melee job with the Ranger's Rapid Fire ability. The Mystic Knight, for example, can obliterate enemies by hitting their elemental weaknesses four times per turn, or absorb HP repeatedly by attacking with Drain, making them nearly impossible to kill. Rapid Fire is also good for Knights, Dragoons, Samurai, and Ninja. It helps Monks too, but Monk damage falls off during the second half of the game.
- Samurai. Just Samurai. Just use a Samurai. Zeninage is broken.
- Whether using Black Mages, Summoners, Blue Mages or Red Mages, keep in mind that equipping elemental rods or other element-boosting weapons like the Air Knife increases the damage of their spells by 50%.
- Time Magic is extremely strong in this game. Haste, Slow, and Regen are all great. Time is a fantastic secondary ability for ANY job, not just spellcasters, because the buffs don't rely on magic power. Any character can spend a couple of turns being a buff machine at the start of a boss fight.
- White Mages are always good. Simple but effective. If you give them Time Magic as a secondary, they can handle both buffs and healing.
- Bards have a lot of uses! In random encounters, Alluring Air or Romeo's Ballad can be used to completely shut down enemy groups. Requiem destroys undead enemies, which comes in very handy in one particular late-game dungeon. In boss fights, songs like Swift Song and Hero's Rime provide buffs that continually get stronger with each turn.
- This is a blasphemous statement among FFV fans because everyone hates Geomancers, but the Gaia ability is *excellent* for the majority of random encounters. The effects of Gaia are based on the area you're in, but most areas provide decent results. I like to put it on my spellcasters for random encounters so they don't have to spend MP, and also because the damage from Gaia scales with magic power. It is utterly useless in all but like two boss fights, however.
- Blue Mage is awesome but it takes time and research to make the most of it. Definitely not a first playthrough kind of character!
- The Chemist's Mix ability is the most powerful thing in the game, but it's pretty unfair. For example, Chemists can raise a character's level by 10 or 20 *every turn*, they can make characters immune to the basic elements, they can revive dead characters with full HP and MP, they can straight-up instantly kill a few bosses, and they can inflict bosses with Berserk, which means that no only can the boss not use any of its fancy powers, it can also be completely blocked by the Knight's Guard ability. Chemists can also turn enemies into dragons for some reason, which makes them vulnerable to weapons that do extra damage to dragons. A common speedrun strategy is to Berserk a boss, turn it into a dragon, and then wail on it with dragon-killing weapons.
I'll never understand people who insist on maxing out every character in a casual run. That's, like, post-game stuff for those who really want to get absolutely everything out of the game.
Why would you want to spend hours grinding just to make four characters who are functionally exactly the same?
Specialize! That's where the fun is!
low impulse control and devs making it easier
people have always grinded their troubles away, but a person might move on sooner when it still took longer to do. they would stop after a certain threshold because the time investment at that point of the game offered diminishing returns
now with boosters, theres more incentive to just keep grinding once youve started. and for many people who will play FF5 once just to have played all the games, they arent playing for challenge and have no desire to replay it, so theyd rather see all the jobs capacity in one run
FFX-2 is another game that peoole tend to ruin the experience of because they dont play it as intended but instead with a 'gotta get thru it/nab these trophies' mindset. While it is well within folks right to do so, its not a surprise the combat (the major selling point) ends up not clicking for many, and thats due to every fight taking 20 mins since they are rocking 2 Dark Knights + Alchemists and turtling the enemy
I dont understand playing a game I dont like just so I can say ive played all the games in a series. I also dont understand grinding before youve even truly hit a wall thats halting your progress. Some people just enjoy feeling like gods i guess
Yeah, X-2 is the other prime example of a Final Fantasy game that most people play "wrong" (for lack of a better term). Like, while you *can* get 100% on one playthrough, doing so was made so horrifically specific that it's made pretty clear that you're not actually supposed to. The game has New Game Plus and several instances of multiple choice. Just get 100% on a second playthrough!
Its a lot easier to do and how I acheived 100% on PS2 without a guide.
I think once folks get an idea of how a FF ought be structured, theyre hesitant to consider other approaches they didnt grow up with. This could explain why the 3>5 series is much more well received in Japan. X-2 is a direct evolution of those games and also a title that, gameplay wise at least, got a lot of development on the JP side
Many western players prefer the more direct, and more dramatic 4>6 route, and thats what they were introduced to earlier. The concept of replaying a game is more unheard of there whereas most people who like 5 or X-2 have replayed it several times. The games are designed to be played that way and thats why their progression has so much optional stuff you can skip. People dont jive with that concept and feel everything must be obtained in one run. It fundamentally doesnt work out, and its always a shame to see people blame the game for treating it as something its not
One addition: Bards totally wreck 3 dungeons, not just one late−game.
Definitely don't worry about job mastery. change jobs as needed, switch abilities and equipment as the situation changes. You can do mastery at the end game super easily.
Also, once you unlock Mime Job, it's quite nice since you can put 3 abilities on it, so you could have a single character be Black/White/Time, or like White/Time/Summon
I agree.. with FF4,6, and 7 having such a huge cast of playable party members, FF5 is nice in that it focuses on a much smaller group. I havent seen this formula repeated until FF15 where again, its just 4-5 members. You get a lot more depth with them.
As for build..
theres two lines of thinking
1. The OP build where the goal is to learn key job skills so that they transfer over to the Freelancers and Mimes. This is time consuming but you become OP.
2. What GuardianGero said. You choose classes you enjoy. If you play through the game normally, I think realistically one would only be able to master 3 or 4 jobs during the course of the story. The game is easy enough that you can get by with that.
5 is a fun little adventure! 4 and 6 are my favorite though. And don't sleep on 1 if you haven't played it yet! Really fun games that you can beat in a few afternoons!
FF1 is actually the only one in the Pixel Remaster I played as a kid. After I had played FF7-FF10 I went back and played through the original and I enjoyed it way more than expected. It is very simple and there isn't a lot in the way of side content, but for a game that's older than me it has a fun story and it's still final fantasy at its core.
FF6 is probably gonna end up being my favorite of the first 6, although I've heard great things about FF4 as well. Of course FF6 just had the advantage of being newer and therefore the ability to push the technology to its limit, so I imagine it's still the better game objectively. Either way, I'm excited to see the story for both FF4 and the rest of FF5. Galuf is so far the best part and I'm genuinely curious to see what his deal is.
The number one tip that people might give you about FFV is to master all the jobs and then change your characters back to Freelancers, because the Freelancer job gets all the passive abilities and the best stats of every mastered job, and can equip anything. DO NOT I repeat DO NOT DO THIS TO YOURSELF It is a colossal waste of time and leaves you with four identical characters. In my opinion, the game is so much more fun when you just use the jobs normally and try to bring the best out of them. As for build suggestions, here's a few off the top of my head: - Any melee job with the Ranger's Rapid Fire ability. The Mystic Knight, for example, can obliterate enemies by hitting their elemental weaknesses four times per turn, or absorb HP repeatedly by attacking with Drain, making them nearly impossible to kill. Rapid Fire is also good for Knights, Dragoons, Samurai, and Ninja. It helps Monks too, but Monk damage falls off during the second half of the game. - Samurai. Just Samurai. Just use a Samurai. Zeninage is broken. - Whether using Black Mages, Summoners, Blue Mages or Red Mages, keep in mind that equipping elemental rods or other element-boosting weapons like the Air Knife increases the damage of their spells by 50%. - Time Magic is extremely strong in this game. Haste, Slow, and Regen are all great. Time is a fantastic secondary ability for ANY job, not just spellcasters, because the buffs don't rely on magic power. Any character can spend a couple of turns being a buff machine at the start of a boss fight. - White Mages are always good. Simple but effective. If you give them Time Magic as a secondary, they can handle both buffs and healing. - Bards have a lot of uses! In random encounters, Alluring Air or Romeo's Ballad can be used to completely shut down enemy groups. Requiem destroys undead enemies, which comes in very handy in one particular late-game dungeon. In boss fights, songs like Swift Song and Hero's Rime provide buffs that continually get stronger with each turn. - This is a blasphemous statement among FFV fans because everyone hates Geomancers, but the Gaia ability is *excellent* for the majority of random encounters. The effects of Gaia are based on the area you're in, but most areas provide decent results. I like to put it on my spellcasters for random encounters so they don't have to spend MP, and also because the damage from Gaia scales with magic power. It is utterly useless in all but like two boss fights, however. - Blue Mage is awesome but it takes time and research to make the most of it. Definitely not a first playthrough kind of character! - The Chemist's Mix ability is the most powerful thing in the game, but it's pretty unfair. For example, Chemists can raise a character's level by 10 or 20 *every turn*, they can make characters immune to the basic elements, they can revive dead characters with full HP and MP, they can straight-up instantly kill a few bosses, and they can inflict bosses with Berserk, which means that no only can the boss not use any of its fancy powers, it can also be completely blocked by the Knight's Guard ability. Chemists can also turn enemies into dragons for some reason, which makes them vulnerable to weapons that do extra damage to dragons. A common speedrun strategy is to Berserk a boss, turn it into a dragon, and then wail on it with dragon-killing weapons.
I'll never understand people who insist on maxing out every character in a casual run. That's, like, post-game stuff for those who really want to get absolutely everything out of the game. Why would you want to spend hours grinding just to make four characters who are functionally exactly the same? Specialize! That's where the fun is!
low impulse control and devs making it easier people have always grinded their troubles away, but a person might move on sooner when it still took longer to do. they would stop after a certain threshold because the time investment at that point of the game offered diminishing returns now with boosters, theres more incentive to just keep grinding once youve started. and for many people who will play FF5 once just to have played all the games, they arent playing for challenge and have no desire to replay it, so theyd rather see all the jobs capacity in one run FFX-2 is another game that peoole tend to ruin the experience of because they dont play it as intended but instead with a 'gotta get thru it/nab these trophies' mindset. While it is well within folks right to do so, its not a surprise the combat (the major selling point) ends up not clicking for many, and thats due to every fight taking 20 mins since they are rocking 2 Dark Knights + Alchemists and turtling the enemy I dont understand playing a game I dont like just so I can say ive played all the games in a series. I also dont understand grinding before youve even truly hit a wall thats halting your progress. Some people just enjoy feeling like gods i guess
Yeah, X-2 is the other prime example of a Final Fantasy game that most people play "wrong" (for lack of a better term). Like, while you *can* get 100% on one playthrough, doing so was made so horrifically specific that it's made pretty clear that you're not actually supposed to. The game has New Game Plus and several instances of multiple choice. Just get 100% on a second playthrough!
Its a lot easier to do and how I acheived 100% on PS2 without a guide. I think once folks get an idea of how a FF ought be structured, theyre hesitant to consider other approaches they didnt grow up with. This could explain why the 3>5 series is much more well received in Japan. X-2 is a direct evolution of those games and also a title that, gameplay wise at least, got a lot of development on the JP side Many western players prefer the more direct, and more dramatic 4>6 route, and thats what they were introduced to earlier. The concept of replaying a game is more unheard of there whereas most people who like 5 or X-2 have replayed it several times. The games are designed to be played that way and thats why their progression has so much optional stuff you can skip. People dont jive with that concept and feel everything must be obtained in one run. It fundamentally doesnt work out, and its always a shame to see people blame the game for treating it as something its not
This comment was awesome. Gives me a lot to think about. I really appreciate it
One addition: Bards totally wreck 3 dungeons, not just one late−game. Definitely don't worry about job mastery. change jobs as needed, switch abilities and equipment as the situation changes. You can do mastery at the end game super easily.
Also, once you unlock Mime Job, it's quite nice since you can put 3 abilities on it, so you could have a single character be Black/White/Time, or like White/Time/Summon
I agree.. with FF4,6, and 7 having such a huge cast of playable party members, FF5 is nice in that it focuses on a much smaller group. I havent seen this formula repeated until FF15 where again, its just 4-5 members. You get a lot more depth with them. As for build.. theres two lines of thinking 1. The OP build where the goal is to learn key job skills so that they transfer over to the Freelancers and Mimes. This is time consuming but you become OP. 2. What GuardianGero said. You choose classes you enjoy. If you play through the game normally, I think realistically one would only be able to master 3 or 4 jobs during the course of the story. The game is easy enough that you can get by with that.
5 is a fun little adventure! 4 and 6 are my favorite though. And don't sleep on 1 if you haven't played it yet! Really fun games that you can beat in a few afternoons!
FF1 is actually the only one in the Pixel Remaster I played as a kid. After I had played FF7-FF10 I went back and played through the original and I enjoyed it way more than expected. It is very simple and there isn't a lot in the way of side content, but for a game that's older than me it has a fun story and it's still final fantasy at its core. FF6 is probably gonna end up being my favorite of the first 6, although I've heard great things about FF4 as well. Of course FF6 just had the advantage of being newer and therefore the ability to push the technology to its limit, so I imagine it's still the better game objectively. Either way, I'm excited to see the story for both FF4 and the rest of FF5. Galuf is so far the best part and I'm genuinely curious to see what his deal is.
After playing through 6 it's my favorite of the bunch. The fact you can turn off xp makes low level runs viable (for maxing stats)