[Classic] Manhogan Fantasy V: Because CHz really, really hates himself

All right assholes, check it. Skills and I are going to play Final Fantasy V in an incredibly idiotic way, and you're invited to join in.




If you haven't heard of it before, the Four Job Fiesta is a hilarious for-charity mass challenge play of FFV that anyone can sign up for. The gimmick is that a Twitter bot assigns you a random job at four points through the game, and you can only use the jobs it's given you. So if the first job it gives you is White Mage, you have to use four of them until you get another job. Crying is a free action.

Skills and I were going to enter, but we found a critical flaw with the process: it's possible that the random jobs might accidentally be useful. If the point is hilarity, then we might as well just choose the worst jobs ahead of time and ensure failure. So here's what we're going to run:

1. Thief
2. Skills and I weren't sure which was worse for job #2, so we're going to try both: I'm going to take Berserker, and Skills is going to take Red Mage. The winner of the debate is whoever wipes more, and the prize is a rage aneurysm.
3. Geomancer
4. Dragoon

I'm going to be playing the GBA port, because I've never played that version before, and it sounds like Skills is going to too. This meshes well with the enormous degree to which we hate ourselves, because the GBA version has a bonus dungeon with balls-stompingly difficult bosses. Grinding to level 99 or engine exploits may be necessary. This is the price we pay for glory.

~~~~~

Now, how are you involved in this, dear reader? There are two routes available to you.

Paco Mode: In this mode, your participation is limited to laughing at our plight as we post updates on how we're doing and what killed us this time. We exist for your amusement.

I'm Not a Worthless Shitgolem Mode: In this mode, you play along with us because you're awesome like that. I've uploaded the GBA ROM I'll be using, already patched, so just click this enormous hyperlink to get it for yourself.

Either way, have fun! =D

~~~~~

RUN LIST:

• Acer - Thief/Summoner/??/?? - Walse Tower
• CHz - Thief/Berserker/Geomancer/Dragoon - complete + Shinryu w/o Omega, Sealed Temple (Gil Turtle, Grand Aevis)
• Diss - Thief/Mystic Knight/Ranger/Chemist - Krile
• Garr - Black Mage/Berserker/White Mage/Bard - Twintania
• Hyde - Thief/Berserker/Ranger/Dancer - complete
• Pang #1 - White Mage/Berserker/Ninja/Dragoon - complete
• Pang #2 - Blue Mage/Red Mage/Thief/Bard - complete (next: superbosses?)
• Shin - Knight/Berserker/Ninja/Samurai - complete
• Skills - Thief/Red Mage/Geomancer/Dragoon - North Mountain
• Sousuke - ??/??/??/?? - ??
• TheKnightOfNee - Knight/Red Mage/Bard/Dragoon - ??

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Oh, I just realized that I forgot to explain what I meant by the ROM being "already patched." The ROM I uploaded is the European version of the game with the musicfix patch applied, so the instrument quality is better and the music-related slowdown is almost entirely gone. It's nothing major and doesn't affect the challenge, so feel free to play whatever version of the game you want. It's just there for convenience.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

AWWW YEAH LET'S ROCK AND ROLL





Now, I'm not a Japanese language originalist at all, and I'll happily use the localized names 99% of the time. But for this game, the original Japanese name of the main character is so, so superior that I can't not use it.









And we're off!

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Originally Posted by SO FAST.. YET SO USELESS

Check out my journal to help me name my characters for my run.
AWWW YIS

The only character in FFV you're allowed to rename is Bartz.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

This guy is a total joke. Gotta enjoy the Freelancers while I still have them, because after this battle finishes in thirty seconds this game is going to get much, much worse.









I THINK THESE CRYSTALS ARE DEFECTIVE, CAN I GET A REFUND PLEASE





The Tule weapon shop is the first sign that I've made a terrible, terrible decision. The weapon classes they stock are sword, rod, and staff. Thieves can only equip knives. This means that the only two knife-class weapons I have available are the ones two of my characters started off with, and two of my dudes have to go unarmed.

My shit is so fucked, you guys.

By the way Skills, as a friendly piece of advice, make sure you buy like 30 potions before you leave Tule. THIS IS NOT A JOKE





Karlabos is not terribly difficult. Would've been easier with magic, but the physical damage of the two weapons I have were enough to beat it.





My first encounter in the Ship Graveyard gave me two daggers. This is one of the luckiest breaks I've ever had in the history of gaming.





SIREN WAS SO HARD JESUS. Without magic you basically can't damage the undead form, so you have to spend the normal form recklessly attacking at every opportunity and the undead form spamming potions to recover from her nasty physical attacks. Did it without anyone dying, but I used literally 20 potions during this battle.

My shit is so, so fucked, you guys.

I was speaking idiomatically.

The Carwen weapon shop sells daggers. Thanks a lot, assholes, I really need these now.







I left Carwen with 30 potions, and I had 14 left before trying this fight for the first time. Turns out that 14 is not enough! I was doing okay until Magissa drained Lenna for 184 HP. Lenna only has 147 HP max, so she somehow drained HP out of her even after she was dead. I had some phoenix downs and could've kept going, but I decided to just take the game over and go back for leveling and more potions. Especially since those 184 HP Magissa recovered were like four turns' worth of damage. D:

I went back to Carwen to get a million more potions, and in the process I leveled up twice (8 -> 10). That made a bigger difference than the potions, because it tripled my damage output per turn. Took them down the second time without much trouble.





The first benefit from Thieves, and probably the only one I'll ever get, comes in Walse. The Flee command makes it really easy to escape from the Jackanapes in the basement, so with three or four phoenix downs you can grab the amazing Elven Mantle.







See Diss's post directly above.





OH MAN OBSESSIVELY CHECKING THE BESTIARY AFTER EVERY NEW ENCOUNTER PAID OFF, I NEED NEW WEAPONS LIKE YOU WOULDN'T BELIEVE





SON OF A BITCH

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

I will destroy both of you.

Additional Spam:


FUCK

FELIPE NO

Heads up to folks who are running this on their own with dice or ChocoDecide: the fire crystal jobs are unlocked in two groups, so if you roll when they're first available, you'll be limited to 3/5 of the possible jobs. When you roll, this is the full list you should use: Beastmaster, Geomancer, Ninja, Ranger, Bard. If the job you roll isn't immediately available, just wait and it will be.

I really recommend using the full list, because the Ranger has one of the most broken abilities in the entire game.

Originally Posted by Fluffykitten McGrundlepuss

I take it when you get to change jobs you change everyone to the new job, right? Last night I got as far as finishing the ship graveyard and being about to go and bag me a dragon with no discernible issues from having all knights.

Your party has to include at least one of every job you've unlocked, in addition to only being made up of jobs you've unlocked. So when you unlock the second job, your choices are 3 of one and 1 of the other or 2 of both.

You're also allowed to switch your mens's jobs, if you want to mix abilities. Characters don't have to be in the same job permanently as long as you meet the job constraints on the party at all times. (Skills and I are pretty much going to have to do this with our runs. D:)

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?

With four Mythril Knives, this fight was pretty uneventful. His sap counter got pretty annoying, but attack + potions + an Elven Mantle got the job done.





Gonna try 2 Berserkers and 2 Thieves and see how that goes. I may switch it up situationally, but it sounds good for now.

Thief's final job ability, Artful Dodger (agility up), is pretty much the only ability I have available that's useful for other classes. Unfortunately, it requires a million ability points, so there may be hella grinding in the future.

I want to slap it on my final Berserker at the very least, because Berserkers are dreadfully slow. Butz is probably going to be my Berserker because he has the highest strength stat, so I'm leaving him in Thief until he gets that skill.

We now return you to your usually-scheduled programming of me losing to bosses.





FUCK





Karnak is the first town in the game with useful equipment. Gotta get those axes for my Be—





Oh god damn it. What do we look like, a bunch of thieves?

Waaaaaaiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit





HAHAHA EAT A DICK

It took a level 13 party and gear from Karnak but I finally completed this almost completely pointless exercise. I get a summon, which I can't use, and a Frost Rod, which I can't use. However, I can sell the Frost Rod for 9 3/8 potions, so in a technical sense it's not worthless.







So this boss you would normally spam ice magic, ice rods, or Shiva on. You know, if you were playing sanely. Two characters using potions wasn't enough to keep up with the amount of magic damage this guy deals, especially since he counters all attacks, so I wiped pretty hard.

It turns out that hi-potions are stealable from the Poltergeist enemies in the dungeon, and they spawn with 100% certainty in the room before the save point. So I grabbed about 25 of those, leveling up once in the process, and tried again. It was still challenging even being able to recover 500 HP, and Lenna died once, but I hung in there until it tried to counter and this happened:



HAHAHA EAT A DICK

Victory came pretty quickly after that.





I tried the castle escape sequence twice, because I wanted to prove you could get every single chest with a Thief + Berserker party. 2 Berserkers couldn't deal damage quickly enough to make it through all the encounters, so I died with two treasure chests and the final battle left. 3 Berserkers worked brilliantly though, and the Thief with the Thief Gloves let me loot elixirs off the Gigases and Mage Mashers off the Sorcerers. I have 18 elixirs now, this is pretty incredible.





FUCKING GEOMANCER GO AWAY

I DON'T WANT YOU

NO ONE WANTS YOU

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Hi-potions aren't available in shops until [GAMECHANGING PLOT EVENT] which is still quite a few bosses away, so you're pretty much hosed on the healing front. There's a single enemy that drops hi-potions, so if you need them I'd start getting really chummy with the bestiary, or checking FAQs if you're that kind of person. I don't think you've reached the place where it spawns yet.

Thief continues to pay off in unexpected ways!

(... while doing the opposite of paying off in completely expected ways. )

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Ifrit's Blaze attack is pretty nasty, but luckily my Berserkers were capable of dealing enough damage that I wasted him before HP because a serious issue.





22:23 <@CHz> Okay this Protect counter is getting pretty old
22:24 <@CHz> Geomancer is SURPRISINGLY USEFUL in this fight because Gaia has a magic fire attack
22:26 <@CHz> No don't cast Dischord on my Berserkers ;_;
22:27 <@CHz> lawl magic hammer mp halved
22:27 <@CHz> JOKE'S ON YOU
22:28 <@CHz> OH GOD HE'S COUNTERING EVERY ATTACK WITH DRAIN
22:29 <@CHz> Wow I think I really lucked out on getting that done on my first try.

So that could've gone a lot worse.





Ramuh was actually totally easy with all these hi-potions I've got. Beating up old men in forests is my party's specialty.



When you beat Shiva and Ifrit, you get them as summons immediately. However, Ramuh drops an item, which you then use to get the summon. Since I can't use summons:



DISREGARD RAMUH, ACQUIRE POTIONS

(if only this worked )





THIS IS GONNA SUCK WITH TWO BERSERKERS



I WAS RI—NO WAIT WHAT

So the reason this fight is awful is that Sandworm switches between the holes randomly, and if you attack a hole, he counters with the nasty attack Gravity. I went into this fight with two Berserkers, who pick targets randomly and therefore have a 2/3 chance of missing and triggering Gravity. This is pretty much a recipe for disaster.

I went in with the two Berserker party mostly for hilarity purposes; I fully expected to wipe immediately, get a game over picture to post, and then come back with a real strategy. The strategy was probably going to involve moving to 2 Thieves + 1 Geomancer + 1 Berserker, KILLING the Berserker before the battle so its random attacks didn't fuck me over, and having one of the Thieves attack from the back row with the Moonring Blade while everyone else kept the party HP up.

Buuuuuuuuut, it turns out I had enough hi-potions and phoenix downs on hand to beat this fight with two Berserkers. Between this and that Byblos fight, I've clearly drained all the luck from the world and used it for this FFV session. Wish I didn't have to stop here, 'cuz I'm pretty sure I could take down Exdeath right fucking now.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

22:38 <+Dullenplain> so apparently people can trade items in the new FFV?
22:39 <@CHz> Nope.
22:39 <+Garr> That was just Shin bein a weiner
22:39 <+Garr> being*
22:39 <+Garr> I NEED ETHERS
22:39 <+Garr> or I guess just a shitload of tents and/or cottages
22:40 <@CHz> That would be some hilarious social shit.
22:40 <@CHz> FFV on Facebook
22:40 <@CHz> "Garr has sent you five ethers!"
22:41 <@CHz> You can only get in 25 random battles a day, unless you buy tokens.
22:41 <+Garr> fffffffffffFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF
22:41 <+Tritoch> And every job costs $10
22:41 <+Tritoch> Berserker is free
22:41 <+Garr> AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHh
22:42 <@CHz> $10 to give someone an additional ability slot.
22:42 <+Garr> That would be amazing if four berserkers was a viable party.
22:42 <+Tritoch> Starting inventory space of 15 items
22:42 <+Tritoch> $5 per additional 2 items
22:43 <+Garr> Well, they made a game where you pay to rub your tablet so I could actually legit see this happening
22:43 <@CHz> All the legendary weapon dungeons are DLC.
22:44 <+Tritoch> For $12 you can get FFTA costume versions of the jobs
22:44 <+Tritoch> Because fuck it, FFTA sprites must be in all Square games now

Most amazing jew boots

OH MAN IT'S MY FAVORITE PLACE IN THE ENTIRE WORLD I TOTALLY FORGOT I GOT ANOTHER CHANCE TO COME BACK HERE





BRING IT ON ASSHOLES





EATING HI-POTIONS LIKE CANDY THIS GUY AIN'T GOT SHIT ON ME





GET A LOAD OF THIS GUY, DOES HE HAVE 99 HI-POTIONS I DON'T THINK SO

Even on a normal FFV run, Cray Claw and Adamantoise are clownshoes after Byblos and Sandworm. I didn't even need to grind all those hi-potions; I had 4 after the Sandworm fight, and I used 4 across BOTH of them.

I'll tell you what I needed those hi-potions for, though.







This motherfucker right here. I've been dreading the Soul Cannon fight since I started this run, since without white magic or lightning magic this guy is a tremendous maelstrom of fuck.

The main problem with this heap of crap is that the two Launcher enemies inflict the Old status, which slowly lowers the inflicted character's level to 1 and reduces their damage output accordingly. The only ways to cure Old are to use the spell Esuna, or to kill and revive them. However, curing Old only prevents further level reduction; the accrued level drop remains until the end of the battle.

As an example of how Old works in this fight, my Berserkers were only doing 174 COMBINED damage by the end of this wipe. Soul Cannon has somewhere around 12,500 HP. So when all your damage dealers get Olded, the battle turns into a mathematical equation: do you have enough healing items to survive the 70 rounds of whittling? 82 hi-potions and 40 elixirs weren't enough.

I could've tried the dumb luck method of restarting if I didn't manage to kill the Launchers before both of my Berserkers got Olded, but I don't have time for that. PLAN B





STEP 1: SELL EVERYTHING. (Sorry Garr, I'd give them to you if I could!)



STEP 2: BE THE FIRST PERSON ON EARTH EVER TO BUY AN ANGEL RING FROM ISTORY.



STEP 3: BEAT THE SHIT OUT OF SOUL CANNON WITH AN OLD-PROOF BERSERKER.

Fucking Soul Cannon, I hate that fucking guy. Almost as much as I hate Geomancers. Their only Gaia attack completely bounces off both Soul Cannon and the Launchers.

Useless pieces of shit.

I was speaking idiomatically.

Archeoaevis's shifting elemental weaknesses aren't a problem when you only deal physical damage. 8)





Okay let's move on, but first, for completely innocent reasons, let's switch Lenna's and Galuf's jobs and make Galuf the Geomancer.



Peeeeeeeeerfect. Cutscene time.











HAHAHAHAHAHA GOODBYE FOREVER GEOMANCER





Manticore hits hard, but also dies really quickly. I wasn't able to keep Butz alive, but Lenna was able to maintain her and Faris's HP.





Purobolos is normally one of the trollingest battles in FFV, because when you kill one, they cast a spell to revive all the dead ones. The normal strat is to use a spell or summon to murder them all at the same time. For obvious reasons, that's not really feasible here.

The dumbest alternative strategy, which I used because I'm dumb, is to take advantage of how they don't have very much MP. If you last long enough, they'll run out of MP and won't be able to revive any more. The fact that they won't revive the others if they kill themselves with Self Destruct also helps. Good thing I had plenty of hi-potions and phoenix downs!





Titan has the most powerful attack at this point in the game, Earth Shaker. It deals 500+ damage to every single member of my level 21 party. Titan uses it as a normal attack, and once more when you kill him as a final "fuck you."

There are several ways to deal with Earth Shaker: steal some Gaia Gear, find a way to get Float on your party, or have White magic on everyone so you can rapidly heal. Unfortunately, all of those strategies I've either missed the opportunity for or were never possible. Soooo, my only options really are to grind up to a million HP or get super fucking lucky.



If you haven't noticed by now, I'm always trying the get super fucking lucky strategy first. It's worked more often than not so far. =DDD







ENJOY YOUR DYING WORLD MOTHERFUCKERS, WE'RE BAILING OUTTA HERE

How ya doing, buddy?

Zeninage is a super cheap ability. Enjoy your get out of jail free card, man. (Until you forget to check your GP before a boss battle.)

Everyone one of the earth crystal jobs is gamebreaking except Dragoon.

FELIPE NO

I guess this is technically a boss. Rare steal of Gaia Gear is possible off this guy, because I really need one now.









Oh god.





I didn't want this.





I DIDN'T WANT THIS AT ALL





Fled every random encounter like a pro. Gilgamesh battle #1 is also technically a boss battle I guess, but since it's beatable with solo Geomancer, I think it's an insult to actual boss battles to call it that.





Okay we're back.





Gilgamesh #2 is the first legitimate fight in this place, and even then it's a cakewalk until he buffs himself near the end, and EVEN THEN it's easily manageable with hi-potions.





Hey look, it's the undead boss in every Final Fantasy game that you can kill instantly with a phoenix down. I couldn't possibly be stupid enough to



HAHAHA I AM EXACTLY THAT STUPID

FOR THE GLORY OF WHATEVER THE NAME OF THE PLANET THAT WE JUST LEFT WAS



WHAT THE FUCK



Okay phew.

How ya doing, buddy?

Gee, uh, thanks guy.





Next year, just put cash in a card. It'll be easier for both of us.





Let's see if this guy is any harder the second time around HAHA NOPE





Spent 15 minutes abusing save states and force-feeding Golem hi-potions for literally no reason.



Cool, this can sit right next to my Ramuh magicite. Too bad I can't transfer this shit to FFVI and get a jump-start on things.





Geomancer has a couple of shockingly useful multi-target Gaia attacks in Drakenvale, so clearing the Dragon Flowers wasn't a problem. Sucked how my dancing Berserker wasted Sword Dance after Sword Dance on the flowers instead of the actual boss though.





Well, it took just one boss battle before Geomancer went back to being a total waste of a party slot again. Despite this, Gilgamesh #3: still a joke.







Abused save states again to get four Reflect Rings off these guys for... reasons.







Fuck, this optional, non-boss fight was harder than I remember. My streak of not wiping broken for an item I can't even equip.





Atomos: kind of a dick. Murders your guys and then devours their corpses. Also infli—

Hold on, I've got an idea.







HAHAHAHAHAHA GOODBYE FOREVER GEOMANCER











Okay, let's start over.



Atomos: kind of a dick. Murders your guys and then devours their corpses. Also inflicts some status conditions to limit your damage output.



Well, TRIES to inflict some status conditions to limit your damage output. Since I don't have to worry about using magic to heal my party members at any point during the game, I'm free to leverage the strategic possibilities of four Reflect Rings.

With that shit taken care of, this is an astoundingly easy fight with a Sword Dancing Berserker.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Originally Posted by Fluffykitten McGrundlepuss

I have to say by the way this is the most fun I've had playing a Final Fantasy game for ages and this thread is legendary already. We've totally got to play something else retarded after this.

As long as the game doesn't have Geomancers in it.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

ACQUIRE ALL SUMMONS







AHAHAHAHAHA HYPERSPEED DANCING BERSERKER ACTIVATE



New party config. I decided just now that I'm going to switch the Dragoon around so I can get Lance on everyone. Gonna experiment and see if it'll work as a supplement to hi-potions. I'm not holding my breath, but we'll see how it goes.







WELL IT DIDN'T HELP HERE

Hardest fight of this run by far. 4 wipes, plus a couple of non-wipe restarts. Brace for words.

Each of these assholes uses a powerful, multi-target elemental attack when they have about 2/5 of their HP left. Two of them are reflectable, hence the Reflect Rings again, but two of them aren't. The non-reflectable attacks do more than 500 HP of damage, and the Crystals are FAST, so it's impossible to heal quickly enough with hi-potions.

The Crystals don't have a whole lot of HP compared to other bosses, so the way to beat this one is to pile on the damage on one at a time, killing them before they have a chance to do the elemental attack more than once. With a Dragoon that takes two turns to Jump and a Berserker with four possible targets, this is nearly impossible to coordinate. I ended up having to heal the BOSS with hi-potions frequently, just to make sure only one was ever using an elemental attack.

I targeted the ones with reflectable attacks first. The reflected spells would inevitably heal the Crystal I was targeting, so it became pure luck: survive long enough for the Berserker to Sword Dance the right Crystal AND have my Dragoon land a Jump to kill it, without the Crystal healing in between.

With just the non-reflectable attacking Crystals left, I didn't have to worry about them healing themselves, so it became a little simpler. I got them near the damage threshold and waited for the Berserker to Sword Dance one. Then, I could send my Dragoon up to land the finisher while keeping my party HP up with the other two controllable characters. Jumping also meant the Crystal wouldn't hit the Dragoon, so when she came back I'd have someone who could revive people if necessary.



Fuck this fucking boss. Probably should've just grinded instead of trying it at level 26.

Guess I'll spoiler this too, although pretty much all screenshots from the rest of the game will spoil this part as well so:

Blah blah scripted battle blah blah blah



lawl Reflect Ring



lawl Reflect Ring



lawl Reflect Ring



lawl Reflect Ring



lawl Reflect Ring





Dang.







I HAVE A PRETTY GOOD IDEA OF WHY THEIR ATTEMPTS AT WHITE MAGIC AREN'T WORKING





HAHAHAHAHAHA GOODBYE FOREVER GEOMANCER







Oh for the love of fuck, why is forever never forever.

How ya doing, buddy?

Oh man, check out this lava here. Normally it would hit all your characters for 50 HP a step, but it's Geomancer's time to shine!



This is one of the two or three places in the game where this Geomancer ability is useful! Finally Geomancer, you are earning your keep.



WAIT I CAN'T EVEN EQUIP THIS

GEOMANCER YOU USELESS PIECE OF SHIT





LEAVE NO SUMMONABLE MONSTER UNMURDERED





Time for another Gilgamesh beatdown. This guy is just having the worst week.





Simply the worst.





Mastered Lance on Lenna too, so I switched jobs again. I would make Krile the Dragoon next because she still needs the skill, but the next fight could be even worse than Crystals, so every point of Strength helps, maybe.





Reflect Rings on everyone again. This is arguably not a great move initially because in his first phase he uses mostly physical and non-reflectable attacks, so keeping the Elven Mantles on everyone might help mitigate more damage on average. However, in the second and third phases he'll start casting spells and basically kill himself for me, so I definitely want those on. The hard part is surviving that long.

There's no real strategy here besides having everyone heal and revive constantly and moving everyone back into the back row when he pulls them out.



Neat, I survived that long! I honestly was not expecting that at all.





Now that that battle's over, I'm free to move Krile to Dragoon. This is actually really convenient for some stuff that's going to happen in a minute.





These dancing assholes prevent me from talking to Thief Faris and Geomancer Lenna, so Butz gets to escort around a teenage girl dressed up in a dragon corpse while they sit on thrones and be all lordly. What a raw deal.





And here's why Krile's a Dragoon. Although this fight is super easy and would probably be doable even with Thief & Geomancer.







All right, what's her face is back, cool. We missing anyone? Did we have a fourth class?









Naw, I'm probably just imagining things.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

These guys are like Purobolos except even worse because they won't run out of MP. Pretty much the only thing I can do in this fight is count their HP and get really lucky with my Dragoon/Berserker timing. Took about 15 minutes.







All right, so now we're going into an ancient pyramid untouched by man for hundreds of years with someone who indiscriminately attacks everything he sets eyes on, someone who jumps five hundred feet in the air on a regular basis, and someone whose job title is literally thief.

This is the best team of archaeologists ever.





Oh, she made it after all.

See, this is why I didn't say "GOODBYE FOREVER GEOMANCER" the last time, because every time I do the Geomancer always comes back.



Please let the demon keep her body please please please

Guys play it cool just walk away









Another boss with magic means it's Reflect Ring time again. She only uses spells that she'll absorb, but marginally healing her is way better than having to heal myself all the time. I've got a Berserker with the Dancing Dagger and a Dragoon jumping with the maxed out Chicken Knife so I'm good w.r.t. stabbing her in the face until she dies.





The team somehow managed to loot a tablet from the pyramid without Butz breaking it in half with his face or eating it, so that means we get three of these legendary weapon deals. Of course, I can't actually equip most of them, but I can sell the extras for delicious, delicious potions.









So this marks the end of Adventure of the Dancing Berserker. While the 4000 HP or so of damage that Sword Dance unleashes is totally hilarious, it only happens 1/8 of every attack, and 3/8 of the time he'll do one of the useless dances and waste his turn. The Rune Axe has a much higher attack than the Dancing Dagger, so on average he'll do more damage with it, even taking Sword Dance into account.

Besides, when I really need the extra oomph in battle, I already have a weapon that 3/4 of the time will attack with more power than Sword Dance: the Chicken Knife. The problem with the Chicken Knife is that 1/4 of the time it'll cause the party to flee, and I'd like to earn experience from battles once in a while. But during boss battles when you can't flee: look the fuck out.



I also grabbed the Holy Lance for my Dragoon. The lance is less powerful than the Chicken Knife, but when a Dragoon uses Jump, attacks with lances get a 2x damage bonus. That bonus pushes its attack slightly over the Chicken Knife's.

The last weapon I picked up was the Assassin's Dagger, which has a 25% chance of causing instant death, but I'm probably never going to use it except when it's exploitable. I'm leaving Main Gauches on my Thief and Geomancer for the 25% chance of blocking physical attacks, because I've gotta keep these bumblefucks alive.





Oh thank god, the next update will have more monsters and less essays about equipment.

Most amazing jew boots

If you can wait until you unlock the first set of sealed weapons, grab Sasuke's Katana for your Ninja for sure. It's like the Main Gauche but with triple the attack power.

If you can't make it that far, the Main Gauche will do in a pinch, but its attack is pretty low for this point in the game and there are some other blocking options that won't hamstring your melee damage: Samurai's level 3 ability definitely, Elven Mantles, and also Ninja's level 2 ability will eat two physical attacks. Main Gauches work for me because those characters would do no damage even with the best weapons, so I'm basically trading their weapon slot for another armor slot.

Since the Ninja has the lowest Stamina of your jobs by far, you might consider moving it to the back row and using it as a support character. This isn't a bad idea if you use Throw a lot, since throwing does full damage from the back row.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

So this is where the game opens up. If I felt like it, I could jump into the rift and take on Exdeath now. But no. I intend to give this game the biggest of middle fingers by beating up everything I fucking can with this godforsaken party. As long as there's a boss I haven't socked in the face, my job here is incomplete.

Since Shin's using my posts as a walkthrough, I figure now would be a pretty good time to go grab a bunch of items and summons and do absolutely nothing to advance any part of the story.





First up is the Magic Lamp from Istory Falls. This thing is going to save my ass repeatedly in boss fights to come. But what does it do?



When you use it in battle, it summons a monster. Nearly every single summon in the game, in order. Finally, I have a use for Geomancer's absurdly high Magic stat.







Next up, there's this asshole in the Phantom Village. What the fuck do you even get out of this exchange?



And how the fuck can you even know that? I have an airship, maybe I took the biggest damn shortcut.





Anyway, so this Mirage Vest. When you equip it, you get a one-copy Blink effect when you start a battle. This means that the first physical attack that would do damage to that character will miss, and then that copy of the Dragoon you see there will go away.



Handy, although limited in utility because the effect only happens once. Well, until I do this.





Give her equipment a swap from the inventory menu like so...



... and armor effects reset.

Suddenly, my Dragoon is now invincible to physical attacks.





Went back to the Phantom Village to do some shopping. There's all kinds of useful stuff here for nearly every party build, so make sure to take time when you get here to explore the hell out of it.





DID SOMEONE SAY MORE SUMMONS



lawl Magic Lamp letting me use Bahamut on Bahamut



Real talk: this is the easiest time I've ever had beating Bahamut. It took like three turns with my Geomancer spamming the Magic Lamp, my Berserker hitting for 4500 HP per turn, and Mega Flare bouncing off a wall of Reflect Rings.

Skills, maybe you were right about Red Mage after all.





Aw yiss, the ABP Pleasuredrome.





Faris seems significantly more excited about this windfall than everyone else.



Oh and then there's also this thing, which I disappointingly didn't have to murder anything to get.





Man, second summon in a row I got without murdering. What's a guy gotta do to get his hands on some murder?





Now that's what I'm talking about. Had to give my Dragoon a weaker lance because Odin is one of a few annoying bosses that absorb Holy. Odin's Zantetsuken hits every character for like a billion HP, so the strategy here is pretty much to keep the Dragoon in the air and the Berserker at max HP for more than 45 seconds. Three or so Berserker hits, a couple of jumps, and a couple of Magic Lamp summons get it done.



Incidentally I think this is the first time I've ever beaten Odin legitimately without using the Break instant death trick. Breaking the game sure is neato.

FELIPE NO

Okay, I can't think of any other ways to stall this LP, so let's get back into things with the Island Shrine. Another tablet dungeon means another set of these annoying jerks to beat up.

Since the last time I fought these guys, though, I picked up a new toy.



HAHA EAT A DICK





Oh look, it's the boss with copies of itself where only the real one takes damage and every time you hit it it switches places. If you try to take the easy way out and attack all of them at once, they each counter with Frost.



Well, unless you use the Magic Lamp.

The lamp is actually not very useful in this fight beyond one use, because after Bahamut is Leviathan, which Wendigo absorbs, and then no other summons after that really do any damage. All I can really do is keep sending my Dragoon up and hope she hits the right target while Butz charges at holograms.







Oh look, it's the part where the party splits up and you have to go down two paths in the same dungeon. The left path monsters all require you to use magic against them, while the right path monsters you have to beat up physically.



So the right path is obviously not a problem for my troupe, as random outbursts of physical violence are all they're really good at. Well, that and healing Minotaur because he absorbs Holy and I left the Holy Lance on my Dragoon haha whoops

Anyway this battle was over in 13 seconds. Chicken Knife, you complete me.





But how am I supposed to beat the magic side without magic? If you try a physical attack on him, he casts Return, which resets the battle. For the purposes of this fight, using the Magic Lamp counts as a physical attack. As does Gaia. And he cures himself constantly, so bouncing his spells back with Reflect Rings won't do it.

He's vulnerable to Stop and Silence, which he occasionally casts on himself when they bounce off my shields. These provide an opening for one or two attacks, but even with the Dragoon in this battle I can't deal enough damage during these windows to keep up with his healing. Other classes could pull it off, but nothing I have access to.

Guess I'll just have to speed up my emulator and let him bounce spells off me until he empties his 30,000 MP.



ONE HOUR LATER



TWO YEARS LATER



Started reading a book.



Oh thank god.

Return only costs 1 MP, so he needs to be COMPLETELY out of MP before you start attacking him. Just because he doesn't have enough MP to cast a specific spell doesn't mean he's out of MP entirely. Luckily, one of his attacks is the 1 MP spell Libra, so you're looking for that to fail. When it does, go nuts.



Being shanked to death by a Geomancer has got to be embarrassing.

Let's see how long that took on the in-game clock.



I REGRET EVERYTHING

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?

Whattup, time for something new. Instead of unlocking a summon that I'll never get to use, this time I'll unlock a job that I'll never get to use.

Another puzzle boss fight here. As a mime, Gogo dishes out whatever you hit him with several times over, so the trick is not to attack, and eventu—





Wait Berserker what are you doing





Oh god damn it RELOAD SAVE STATE





Whattup, time for something new. Instead of unlocking a summon that I'll never get to use, this time I'll—

What, something seems different this time? Preposterous.





Mime is one of the best endgame jobs and is usually totally worth getting when you play the game normally.





Tablet dungeon #3 means you get another chance to destroy some Gargoyles. Take that, ancient stonecraft.

I'm not even taking a picture of them this time because fuck 'em.





These guys are yet another boss who revive if you don't kill them simultaneously, but unlike Gargoyles, you can't cheese this one with attack timing. If you don't kill them all at the same time, they instantly revive and then use a counterattack on you.

Even in a normal run of FFV, the easiest way to deal with them is to summon Odin, because they're not immune to instant death so Zantetsuken murders them immediately. Magic Lamp all day every day.





Last one of these means the last two Gargoyles. Goodbye, old friends. I'll miss you in a way that doesn't entail any longing whatsoever.





Tablet dungeon #4 boss is optional on account of it being a summon. Due to this guy's propensity to spam Tidal Wave at you, the only way to beat him without magic (besides getting really lucky with his RNG) is to flush 200,000 gil down the toilet in the Phantom Village for four Coral Rings. So if you don't have a Summoner, it's probably best to skip this one unless you have a major urge to waste your cash.

However, my policy of murdering everything demands that I show this guy what for. Plus, I'm going to need those rings anyway for a superboss fight I'm going to attempt (and wipe forever on).





Tee hee.





With everything else I can do now complete, it's back to Kuza to pick up the other nine legendary weapons that I'm never going to use. This doesn't do anything storywise, so since I don't need these weapons, I could've skipped this step and gone directly into the Rift. However, returning the tablets does something important for me later:



This guy comes up and hints you that the absurdly difficult GBA bonus dungeon has been unlocked. I'm going to give it a shot along with Shinryu and Omega after I beat the final boss. STAY TUNED FOR HILARITY

Jam it back in, in the dark.