Favorite. Charecter combo

[Dr.Hojo]

I need help decideing what to do with Vann. whats your fav. Charecter (I cant spell haha) combo? (theif, paladin, knight, ect.)

[Glitch]

Don't worry about your spelling, I can't spell worth a shit either. ;P


Anyways, at the beginning of the game, you won't have to worry what your character is going to be. Just bash stuff and go for one thing for now..

Right now I have 28 hours in the game, and I'm using 3 Characters. Vaan, Fran, and another person whom I will not say..

Vaan right now is my damage dealer.

Fran is my Archer and Mage.

The other guy is a slight damage dealer and partial tank. (Lots of HP.)


What I do, is I get Fran to cast Berserk on Vaan (Doubles Damage and Doubles attack speed..<3) And -sometimes- on the other guy.. and just constantly heal as they bash all around. I'm thinking of getting the other guy some more Healing spells though, because lately on some bosses I havn't been able to heal fast enough and have come to some..hard fights. (Havn't died ONCE in this game yet, thank you very much...Which suprises me since I went into 2 difficult boss battles ill-prepaired... One boss battle took me 31 Minutes, and I only had 4 Pheonix Downs on me at the start.. And the boss constantly was killing everyone. T_T)


Anyways, yeah..lol

[Cid!]

I find myself sticking primarily to both Vaan and Balthier. Ashe is the resident mage keeping the party up. I'll occasionally bring in Fran or Basch for Mist Quickenings in a Boss Battle, but normally that's it.

[Kouki]

I use Vaan and Balthier and Basch. All have swords equipped. I have Basch and Balthier set to heal if any HP falls below 70% or 60% depending on the battle. If I'm in a hard battle I set Basch to just fully heal.

I love the gambits system!

[Princess_Ashelia]

My fave comno is Balthier, Vaan, and Ashe they are all learning the same things so it is pretty well impossible for me to die at the moment. But yea....

[woodash]

We're just two lost souls swimmin in a fish bowl...

My favorite combo is Vaan, Ashe, and Basch. Vaan is mostly just brute force, but he is also the one i give blk magicks to. Ashe is my healer, and basch is completely brute force. he just owns everything in his path. I love it XD. As for the others, i kinda just stopped using Balthier after Ashe and Basch joined the party, so he's still lvl 8. Fran and Penelo both have quickenings, so I try to keep their lvls up to par with the others, although I only use them for their quickenings when I'm fighting a boss. UNLESS Ashe dies. then I just take out Penelo, because she's kinda like my backup Ashe :b

..Year after year..

[endy]

I tend to use all the characters and keep them around the same level, but I usually use Vaan, Fran and the last one is either Ashe or Basch, ocassionally Baltheir and almost never Penelo.

[TinyRedLeaf]

I keep all of them more-or-less equally levelled, and use every member in two regular squads.

(A)
Basch (heavy knight), Fran (archer/fencer/war-mage), Balthier (gunner)

(B)
Ashe (paladin), Vaan (thief), Penelo (white/green magick)

Squad A tends to do heavier damage (esp since it was with this squad that I first learnt how to chain Mist Quickenings), while squad B tends to fight faster and last longer because there are two healers in the team.

I'd agree that early in the game, it isn't strictly necessary to develop each character into specific roles. Just go with the flow, and design them to fit your preferred strategies. :)

[Punishment]

I use my characters so they are well-rounded. Though each character do have some specialization in some roles. I mainly use Ashe, Penelo and Basch.

[Bipolar bear]

I use Basch, Ashe and Balthier. Basch with an axe and shield, Ashe with a pole, and Balthier with a gun and magic. I also use a lot of quickenings. I have three mist charges for everybody at Mt. Bur-Omisace.

[SB]

I don't have one. I split my party into two groups, men and women. It's as simple as that because the licence board allows everyone to be the same.

[Shadow Of Madness]

I don't have one. I split my party into two groups, men and women. It's as simple as that because the licence board allows everyone to be the same.


Yeah I really dislike that whole thing. Everyone can be the same, no real variety to the party.


I use Vaan (Lvl 83), Basch (Lvl 81), and Fran (Lvl 81). The only reason I use those charachters is because I simply dispise the other three. Balthiers still Lvl 9 Penelo is Lvl 11. Ashe I lvled to 30 something so I could get the sky Pirates den Ave 50 peice.

[Lina]

I basically divide my party into short-range and long-range. Vaan, Basch, and Ashe are short-range, and Balthier, Penelo and Fran are long-range.

I equipped Vaan with a pole just to try it out and really liked it. He evades a lot of attacks and still deals good damage. Basch has a hammer with a high attack power and a shield. He basically is just there to hit as hard as possible. Ashe has a sword and a shield. She deals good damage, isn't bad at evading, and also has powerful curative magic.

Fran and Penelo have bows. Fran has a good stock of black and white magic and Penelo has predominantly white magic. Balthier has a bow-gun right now, and he deals the most damage out of the long-range characters.

Usually I have a combination of 2 short and 1 long range, or if there is a guest in the party, 1 short and 2 long range. Generally I control the short range character so that I can move them around the enemy and I let the long range characters attack from a distance and cure from a distance.

[Omega_Weapon_666]

Everyone can turn out the same as there isnt much a variety on the licence board but thats where it comes down to your own decisions really, it allows you to customize your party however you want them, at the moment im on deciding on how i want my party, im thinking about something a bit different but at the moment im using Vaan (Thief), Balthier(Gunner) and Basch (Some sorta Knight/Healer) as im not quite sure on how I want my party yet, its working so far, although now just gonna level up and make me some Gil

[Punishment]

Well by the time I hit the end of the game Ashe was a Paladin, Basch a Knight and Penelo a Healer with long range weapons such as a bow. I centered this party to be more of a tank in the game where they can take hits and survive. My second tema on the other hand is a bunch of melee fighters where Vaan is the Thief/Knight, Fran who is a heavy hitter/Healer and Balthier a loing range melee attacker.

[SgtToppin]

I am doing about the same as Lina. Also I accidentaly devided them up like Saberblade into men and women. I noticed after I did it. I have team 1 Vaan with a hammer and shield, Basche with a hammer and shield, and Balthier with a bow. Team 2 is Ashe with a hammer and shield, Fran with a bow, and Penelo with a bow. Vaan and Ashe are the characters I play as, and my long range characters are the healers. I also switch the characters as they level. If I am using team 1 and Basche levels I bring in Fran. I tend to use team 1 in boss battles but if someone is down on HP and MP I will switch them out for the team 2 counterpart. I want to keep everyone about the same level so I can count on any one of them in a boss battle. I am going to try out Vaan with a pole like Lina said.

[rudra]

My starting party is Vaan, Fran and Basch. Vaan and Basch hack away, Fran stays back and does her thing, shooting arrows and healing up the party whenever needed. Vaan's the second to do so if needbe. Since he's my party leader, I use him to do anything out of the ordinary; cast a blindna, stona, etc... or throw some black magic into the mix.

Vaan is my generic swordsman. Just give him the one-handers or else a pole.

Basch is my tank. I dress him in the best armors I can afford. He's had an axe for most of the game, but I recently got him a claymore, and he just mows through anything.

Fran's just with a bow. She hangs back.

Balthier's still a gunner. People hate on guns because of their ridiculously low attack power, but they're completely underrated. I find them more accurate than bows. I pump up his strength and he hits as hard as my Fran does.

Ashe is who I give exotic swords to. The Katanas, Ninja Swords, etc... She doubles as a healer for me too.

Penelo's my only true mage. Give her all the mystic armor and staves/rods. I find her really effective just because she can hit multiple enemies.


I use everyone pretty evenly though, I keep everyone within three or so levels of each other.

[Chronichalt]

So here's my set-up, I only post because I haven't seen any identical to mine and I have no problems in the game at all... My lvl isn't important, but the setup may help a few people at any lvl...

My main party firstly consists of 3 types of people, a Tank, Off DPS and a Healer...

Main Party
Vaan= Main Tank (Equip Sword, Shield and Heavy Armor)
Gambits: Protect(Self), Eye Drops(Self)

Balthier= Off DPS (Equip anything that helps deal massive dmg. ie. Hammers/lances/axes and Heavy Armor)
Gambits: Protect(Self), Expose(Party Leaders Target), Cure all allies <50%

Asche= Main Healer (Staves, Mystic Armor)
Gambits: Lure(Vaan), Regen(Vaan). Cure all allies <80%, Shell(Self)

That's my main party, but since I'm more of an involved player, I use EVERYONE! The gambits listed aren't the only gambits I use of course, but they are some of the most necessary to keep this group well out of danger, the following is how I use my other characters...

Balthier= Ranged DPS (Bows/crossbows and Light Armor)
Used when mob uses damaging or life threatening AOE, from a ranged distance, AOE wont effect this character and limit the amount of offtime healing and removing of annoying status effects (SUCH AS SAP, ugh I hate that crap...)

Fran (What a stupid name...)= DMG Magic/Off Healer (Staves and Mystic Armor)
When bosses or Mobs are weak to a certain magic, I pull out Fran to blow them to shit with magic... If Asche dies, Fran is also a very good off healer too...

Penelo= My favorite... Rogue/Offtank (Daggers, shields and light Armor)
Light Armor boosts HP, and rogues have allot of evasion, not to mention a higher ability to block with a shield. When Vaan seems to the point of exhaustion, drag her ass into battle and throw a lure on her, let her take the hits for a few seconds until Vaan has his rest (Heals and Debuffs) then cast lure back on Vaan and she helps do a bit of damage (Rogues are faster and do less damage on hit, but more damage over time. Class specifically casting poison/sap and a much higher % of doing chain attacks and Counters, she's also a great thief!)

That's how you play Final Fantasy XII... By effectively using all characters and abilities humely possible, the game is much more fun due to it's diversity, and still easy as cake and there is always that element the developers throw in to let you know that they know you are doing things right, such as unexpected status effects that make your main characters useless and storyline objects that take away all of your mana right before a boss... And don't use a strategy guide people, it's an adventure game, you want to know what's in that cave? GO INTO THE DAMN CAVE AND SEE FOR YOURSELF!

BTW FF12's system is completely awesome, and I would love to play more adventure games using this system, especially the fighting (Could use SOME blood and gore) and enviornment, though I wish the maps were progressive so I didn't have to load in-between sections. Hopefully an expansion to increase the number of liscenses, weapons and story, god I wish this game wasn't over...

I also want to see a more detailed item description before I buy it, Don't know how many times I bought something that was worse than what I already had, but wouldn't know until I already forked out the 6k for it. It's only element is to be a pain in the ass, and it makes me very angry, sometimes to the point of reloading from the last save just to save myself a buttload of money...

Gambits FTW!

[ezra]

i using vaan, balthier, and penelo.

Vaan and balthier are my attacker, both use the great sword("save the queen") and the nabudis heavy armor

penelo my healer and support caster, using faith rod and magick armor.

[Chaos Queen]

i pretty much use everyone for melee. fran occasionally will be used for ranged attacks using the Volcano hand bomb, but i like using everyone up at close range. i only use magic when i have to, and have gambits set for everyone to heal when health gets to a certain point. most people will say this is a retarded strategy, but it's easy to understand and works well. i keep all the characters around the same level and don't care who is all fighting at the same time, and right now i have beaten the game and am still doing side quests and hunts, all my people level 51-53, and i love my strategy.

but my all-time fave group is Balthier, Basch, and Ashe/Penelo. for me, Penelo and Ashe are pretty much the same.