A Tale of Two Scripts: Let's play FF3 US & FF6 RPGOne!

How was I supposed to know that the clock thing is optional?

Explore a little?

But, most gamers will instinctively want to solve that puzzle.

Then again, Zozo has a lot of enemies that you can make a good profit off of, so even mindless wandering around there isn't the worst thing in the world.

It's certainly painful to do indoors, though. You will come to fear those Veiled Dancers and their Thundara attacks before long if you do.

I always thought that it was really weird that those dancers could cut your whole party to shreds if they showed up alone, but didn't do anything threatening when they were partnered with other enemies. Safety in Numbers, indeed.

When last we left off, the last of our wayward parties had finally made its way back to Narshe. Swooping ahead of them by the magic of “It’s a video game” we find Banon and Edgar trying to talk the Elder of Narshe into joining the Returners.


ARVIS: I never said... that!
ELDER: Something like it.
BANON: Ha! He’s right you know!
ARVIS: Banon!
BANON: Our blood will spill because of you. Emperor Gestahl’s racing to acquire Magitek power. He’s set his sights on the Esper that was found here! The increased use of magitek power’ll surely lead to global destruction...
ELDER: The War of the Magi... The mythical battle that set mankind back a thousand years... Can this really be happening? People will never learn...
Sabin [from off screen]: Brother!

Edgar: Who’s with you?
Cyan: I’m Cyan, retainer to the lord of Doma!
Gau: Gau... GAU!
Sabin: The people of Doma were wiped out by the Empire...
Cyan: Kefka poisoned... everyone...
ELDER: Barbaric!
BANON: Elder!
ELDER: But... that was only because Doma was collaborating with the Returners! If we make that mistake...
Locke [from off screen]: That’s nonsense!!

BANON: Locke. Where’d you hear that?
Locke: Celes, here, was one of the Empire’s generals...
Cyan: Grrr! I knew she seemed familiar. Sir Gau, out of my way! [CYAN knocks GAU past TERRA and into the far wall.] This’s General Celes! She torched Maranda! She’s an Imperial spy! Now, stand aside!

Cyan: But...!
Locke: I promised I’d protect her. I WILL NOT back out on my word.
Edgar: Locke... Are you still thinking about... that?
Terra: I was also an Imperial soldier.
Cyan: WHAT!!
Edgar: The Empire’s evil. But not ALL of its citizens are!
Sabin: Oh, this is...
[A NARSHE GUARD bursts into the room.]
GUARD: Emergency!! The Empire cometh!!

Yes, I’m also shocked that the Empire stuck by its battle plan when a traitorous general who knows all about it disappeared from her cell.


Oh, Kefka’s in charge of the plan. That explains it.
SOLDIER: Lord Kefka! There’re civilians here...!
KEFKA: Exterminate everyone!
SOLDIER: But Narshe is neutral...
KEFKA: Idiot!!

(Since the entire group is marching on Narshe as they’re talking, Kefka is jumping up and down while also moving the right. Dude’s nimble, I have to give him that.)


BANON: They’re after the Esper.
ELDER: We moved it into the hills.
Edgar: Then we’re going up after it!


Celes: I’m a soldier, not some love-starved twit!
Edgar: Cold as ice... ...
Interestingly, you might not catch it on your first playthrough but this is one of the biggest (or at least most blatant) early game hints that Locke isn’t rescuing these pretty girls because he cares about them but because he has his own issues. It’s easy to read this as Edgar simply trying to cockblock Locke and claim the blonde for himself.


Terra: You... can use magic, too?
Celes: When I was a baby I was artificially infused with magic, and raised as a Magitek Knight.
Terra: Have you... loved anyone?
Celes: ??? What’s that supposed to mean?!


And with that homey little bit of paranoia, we arrive at the place we’ll make our stand against the Empire.


While the game defaults you to Terra alone here, you can walk up to any party member and “talk” to them to switch. This allows you to set up equipment and, if you have any injured people (probably Locke and Celes, as theirs is the only scenario to end in a boss fight) you can throw the Tintinabar on them and do some pacing until they’re up to full health. When everyone’s topped off and has their best equipment, we tell Banon we’re ready and off we go.


The moogle here lets us know how things are going to go down. This is basically the same as protecting Terra in the mines way back when, only instead of three full teams of generic moogles (and Locke) we only have our handful of powerful party members (and Locke).


There’s plenty of ways to set up our characters for this scene – anything goes as long as you make three groups – but I tend to go with splitting them into the same groups they were in for the separate scenarios. On the right we have the Gau Power party, in the middle is the Mechanical Death party, and on the left is the Joke party.

Ok, look, I like Locke and Celes more than I did as a kid, and they certainly manage to hold their own here (even if just barely sometimes), but let’s face it: they’re weak compared to everyone else at this point in the game. Locke doesn’t have the good stats and great weapons he’ll have later and Celes has a tiny spell list, an attack spell that can’t kill a basic unit even with two Earrings feeding into it, and a middling MP pool. Each of the other groups has at least one power attack that this pair just can’t match. What this means is, obviously, that I really should have put more thought into my groupings. It’ll still work though.

BANON: They’re coming!

Yeah, we’re ready.

How delightful! This’ll be fun!


And now, as the soldiers wend their way up the snowfield towards us, we set up each of our parties at a choke point and wait for the enemy to come to us.


Locke and Celes go on the far right, which is actually probably a bad choice on my part – they’re alone out here, the weakest party, and if any enemies get through these two I’ll have to scramble to get another party in front of Banon for protection. Thinking about it now, outside the heat of the moment, I should have put them here:


Where I put Terra and Edgar instead. Edgar has a big advantage in this scene that he doesn’t get to show off often; not many enemies reach this point because the Sabin/Gau party goes...


not here. While this looks like a good chokepoint, if you go down further you’ll notice that the path on the left dead ends and there’s no way for soldiers to come up it. Instead, Sabin’s party should go one intersection down, where they’ll be facing a lot of enemies.

So what’s Edgar’s big advantage here?

The Bioblaster. Most of the enemies here are the humanoid Troopers and humanoids, you might recall, are generally weak to poison, letting the Bioblaster wipe out entire groups at once. It might leave some non-humanoids behind if there are any in the enemy group, but a quick shot of Fire or AutoCrossbow will finish them off.

Of course, even the Bioblaster doesn’t stand up against Gau’s big ace in the hole:

the Trilium Rage, which you might recall us getting in the last update. The Bio spell Gau can cast with it isn’t as reliable as the Bioblaster, but it’s almost twice as powerful and can do alright damage to the Heavy Armor and Bounty Man (a dog-type enemy, oddly enough) enemies that get mixed into the later groups.


Most level ups in this game aren’t all that interesting, but Cyan, Terra, Sabin, and Celes gain abilities at certain levels. You might have noticed Terra learning spells in previous updates; Celes does the same while Cyan masters new SwdTechs and Sabin devises new blitzes.


SwdTech #4 does four unblockable attacks of ok power against random targets. No enemies die until all four attacks are performed, but I believe that the later attacks won’t target an enemy that’s taken enough damage to die unless there’s no other targets. This still won’t replace Dispatch as our default action with Cyan, but I suggest you do it yourself at least once if only to see Cyan doing his best impression of Kefka’s laugh between each attack.

Anyway, the enemies have been greatly reduced in number while I was yakking away, so Sabin goes on the attack. After mopping up some last few mobile units, we head for the honcho.

One bodyguard runs back and forth in front of Kefka. If we’re careful, you can go ahead and get past her...

But she’ll probably still get you before you can initiate battle with Kefka.

Rider here is probably the toughest enemy in the scene, but she’s still all alone and that’s a huge weakness, especially against this party’s powerful but randomly-targeted attacks. She takes an AuraBolt, Dispatch, and Bio to the face without flinching, so there’s only one solution.


That finishes her off. (And yes, I will be showing off a Suplexing of every major enemy I can.)

With Rider, Saber, Archer, all of Kefka’s Servants disposed of, we confront the big cheese himself. Kefka’s sometimes considered frightening for two reasons. First:

He’s immune to Suplex. Brrr. Second:

He can use first tier elemental attack spells to do ~120 damage to one of your party members. Our illiterate thirteen-year-old is tossing around stronger magic than that, though, and Kefka is quickly beaten.
KEFKA: Don’t think you won. I’ll be back! [KEFKA uses Escape.]

Edgar: Where’s the Esper?
Locke: Is it okay?

Alright, time for a little post-mortem on this battle before I go on with the story. Like I said, my groupings, while adequate, could have been better. If I were doing this again anytime soon, I’d do one of three things.

First option: take Sabin out of his group and put him with Locke and Celes to give them some good offensive potential. This could make the Cyan/Gau group really weak if Gau doesn’t use his Rages’ specials very often. It would also make it hard to decide which group took on Rider and Kefka, since no group would have a high enough offense to take them out before taking major damage.

Second option: switch where I had Locke/Celes and Terra/Edgar. The latter pair would then do more fighting while Sabin’s group would stop most enemies from reaching the former. Probably the best route, I think.

Third option: go the high risk route of making a Sabin/Gau/Cyan/Celes group. Terra and Edgar would still take the right branch and Sabin’s group would have to run around smacking down all the enemies coming down two lanes while Locke sits on the sidelines. This has the advantage of giving your big hitters some magical healing, but if anyone gets past them Banon’s only protection will be Locke – not good.

But odds are I won’t be playing again soon enough to remember to do something smart like one of these. And, of course, there’s plenty of other workable groups you can make if you want, so feel free to experiment. Whatever groups you choose, though, I’d be sure to bring plenty of Tonic/Potion. Even with Terra and Celes Cure-ing I needed almost thirty Tonics and a handful of potions for out-of-battle healing.

(There’s a secret fourth option of just turtling (probably with one super powered group as described above) next to Banon until Kefka’s finite supply of soldiers is totally exhausted, but this is both boring and can be really frustrating when you think you’re safe, leave Banon to take care of Kefka, and a soldier you didn’t notice coming down a different lane hits Banon and you have to start all over. Why yes, this has happened to me, how’d you guess?)


Anyway, on with the story.
[The PARTY move north after dealing with KEFKA and gather around the frozen Esper.]
Edgar: That was a close call!
Cyan: Can it still be alive?
Sabin: Impossible... right?!
[The ESPER emits a light and TERRA steps back.]
Locke: Terra!! What is it!?

[LOCKE just barely catches the side of the outcropping as he is thrown away; CELES helps him up.]
Terra: Nooo!!

Sabin: Terra ‘n the Esper...
Edgar: There’s...some kinda reaction!

[The ESPER glows again.]
Terra: Huh? W... ...what’s going on... ...? Please... ...tell me! Who am I? WHO?!
Locke: Terra!
Celes: An Esper... ... I can actually feel its mind... ...
Edgar: Terra... ... Step away from the Esper... ...


Oh, we’ve seen this before. Last time it destroyed our awesome Magitek armor but also freed Terra from her mind control, so it was kind of a wash altogether. I’m sure it won’t do anything big this time eith-

what


With a banshee wail, the Terra-thing takes to the air and flies wildly across the world map before crashing into a mountain... somewhere.

Locke: ... Where’s Terra?!
Celes: She changed into a... something, and... took off. She looked like... She looked like... an Esper...
EDGAR [enters the room]: Locke! You okay? Something happened to Terra... There seems to be some connection between Espers and her... Anyway, we need to find her. Witnesses saw her screaming across the sky to the west.
Locke [runs to the main room]: Let’s go! I promised her I’d...
[The PARTY gathers around Locke.]
Celes: Locke...
Edgar: Think, people! The Empire still wants that Esper.
Sabin: Banon needs our help, too...
Cyan: A former Imperial soldier... But we’ve no choice. We must help her!
Edgar: Let’s split up. Those who aren’t searching for Terra will stay and guard Narshe. Figaro Castle can shuttle us to the western province. Then we’ll make for Kohlingen or Jidoor.


We form the most plot-heavy group we can, toss in Celes for that sweet, sweet leotard/cape/shoulder pads combo Cure magic, and head out. This actually marks the first time we can openly move around Narshe, so get ready for some NPC chatter!


ARVIS: Heard Terra turned into light and streaked away toward the west. Make your way to Figaro Castle. Maybe they can help you, there.
Cyan: We have to help her!
Gau: Gau... Gau do his best!

“So... magic really DOES exist!?”
“Magic?! Pshaw! What nonsense!”
“Curse the day we dug up that Esper! That’s what brought the Empire here!”
“Figaro Castle can burrow under the desert, and take you to Kohlingen!”
“I saw some Moogles walkin with a sasquatch.”
“We follow our Elder’s advice!”
“The house to the far right contains the treasures I’ve collected! Take them, before the Empire does! Only one of them is locked. Now what do ya suppose is inside...?!”

Total take:
5000 GP
Earrings
ThiefKnife (randomly steals when attacking)
Wall Ring (gives wearer Rflect status)
Sneak Ring (doubles success rate of Steal – Locke puts this on immediately)
Hyper Wrist (+50% to Vigor (A.K.A. Strength))

We also hit the weapon shop and pick up a Flail for Celes, which nearly doubles her attack power and does full damage from the back row. Finally Celes can hang out in the back row and deal decent damage without chewing through her limited MP supply. We buy Locke a Full Moon for the same reason, even though he’ll usually be using Steal to keep our item supplies up. With Sabin and Edgar both able to deal full damage with their special commands from the back row, we have a full party taking half damage from physicals while still dealing out their max damage.


Fully equipped, we head out. It’ll take us about a week to get to Figaro Castle from here, though. See you then!

Might I be so bold as to ask why you always referred to Rider with female pronouns?

Part X - The Battle of Narche Snowfield

I swear, Square-Enix is trying to keep me from working this LP. First Dragon Quest VI finally gets a US release, and now they've gone and put Xenogears up on PSN. But I have taken time out from my role-playing bliss on the go to bring you more Final Fantasy VI! Because I like you that much. Let'sa play!



♪♪ The Mines of Narche ♪♪

Jun "We didn't say that."
Elder "You implied it just the same, though."
Bannan "Hahaha! He's right, too!"
Jun "Bannan!"
Bannan "It's our blood that's being shed, though."

I'm genuinely embarrassed that both Woolsey and I made the same basic contextual mistake here. This conversation should go down more like this:

Elder "I understand what you're saying. But... You're asking us to shed our blood for you."
Jun "We didn't say that."
Elder "You implied it just the same, though."
Bannan "Hahaha! He's right, too."
Jun "Bannan!"
Bannan "We're asking you to shed your blood for us."

Way more blunt and to the point. And also familiar to players of FF6 Advance.



Bannan "The frozen Eidolon found in this city is his latest target...... At this rate, the Empire will manipulate everything using the power of magic, and it will begin again......"
*Elder's bummed*
Elder "The Great War of Magic..."
Random McGuard "The legends say that our world was destroyed during that terrible conflict..."
Random McGuard #2 "Is history going to repeat itself?"
Elder "Mankind never learns from the past..."
*Ker-open-sound!*
Matias "I'm here!"



And how the Hell did you beat Lock and Celes here!?

Edgar "Who's with you?"
*Cayene and Gau step up*
Cayene "I am a Samurai of the kingdom of Doma, sirs."
*Gau JUMP!*
Gau "Gau, gau!"
*Matias's bummed*
Matias "The Kingdom of Doma was slaughtered by the Empire..."
*Cayene's bummed, too*
Cayene "Because of Kefka, everyone... They were poisoned..."
Elder "Inhumane..."
Bannan "Elder!"
Elder "Um... But the kingdom of Doma was cooperating with the Returners. If we don't retain our neutrality with the Empire, then..."
*Ker-open-sound! Again!*
Lock "That's not true!!"

Damn right it's not true! Did they just forget that the Empire did a mechanical piledriver on their armed forces, broke into their mineshaft, and killed their giant snail monster? And for that matter, why are they not totally freaking out that Tina's standing right there!? As far as they know, she's still the same murderous monster that led the charge!

Ah well, I guess that's what Edgar and Bannan were explaining to the elder during the week and a half it took Matias to cross half the known world to get back to Narche...



Lock "No time, the Empire is coming this way!"
Edgar "What!?"
*The Returners are shocked, SHOCKED to hear this news*
Bannan "Lock. Where did you get this information?"
Lock "This is Celes. She was one of the Empire's Generals..."
*Cayene is angry-shocked!*
Cayene "Is that so! I knew I'd seen her face somewhere... Sir Gau, move aside!"
*Ker-SHOVE! So hard Gau hits the back wall and even Tina gets blown backwards into Bannan!*
*Cayene and Celes square off*
Cayene "This is the notorious General Celes, who destroyed Maranda! You spying dog of the Empire! Get out of my way!! I'm going to punish her!"
*ThieflyTreasure Hunterly intervention!*
Lock "Wait! Celes has forsworn the Empire, and agreed to cooperate with the Returners."
Cayene "I don't believe it!!"
Lock "I made a promise to protect her. I never go back on my word to defend a woman!!"
*Edgar steps up*
Edgar "Lock, you're thinking about back then, aren't you...?"

Wow, lotsa foreshadowing and drama here! Someone intervene again before this becomes a brawl!



No, Tina, that's... that's just gonna make him madder.

Cayene "What!?" {See what I mean?}
*Shocked, Cayene marches over to Tina*
*Tina and Edgar both get a little down*
Edgar "The Empire is evil. But not all the people who are or were a part of it are."

A wise sentiment from King Pervert. But will it convince our bloodthirsty spicy Samurai?



...Ow. I mean just ow. How the HELL did I not get the context on this one? Matias is supposed to be doing a gesture of compromise, and saying "I think we should defer to my big brother on this one...". Yeah, Woolsey didn't get it either, but man.



OH SNAP!



♪♪ Troops March On ♪♪

Soldier "Sir Kefka, the civilians..."
Kefka "Massacre the peasants!"
Soldier "But, Narche is a neutral country......"
Kefka "You idiot!"
*Kefka does the hop-step of RAGE!*
Kefka "Listen! Don't show mercy! Slaughter all who oppose us! Now MOVE OUT!!"

This does not look good for the Returners.



Well he changed HIS tune quick.

Bannan "The enemy is after the Eidolon."
Elder "We had the Eidolon moved up into the hills."
*Edgar takes point, everyone faces him*
Edgar "Alright, we'll have to defend it to the death there!"
*everyone nods*



Celes "I'm a General, I follow my orders. Emotions have no part in my life any more!"
Edgar "Such harsh words... You're really heartless!"

Everyone marches automatically in this sequence. It was hell getting the dialogue to not last too long here, but long enough that you could read it. If you let it last too long, the player gets to witness as everyone walks into each other on the last tile of the path. Ouch.



Tina "You can use magic, too? I thought I was somehow special in my ability..."
Celes "When I was a child, the Empire artificially infused my body with magic, and made me into a Majick Knight."
Tina "Can people like us ever be loved?"
Celes "??? Are you playing with me or something?"
*Tina's depressed, again*

Poor Tina. She just wants to be loved...



Celes "That's fine by me. You can see with your own eyes if I'm enemy or ally!"

Theirs is a rivalry that will last nearly one update!



Okay, time to give everyone their nifty new gear, save up, and form the assault teams!

Divide into three parties and fight back. Press the (Y) button to switch between parties. If the enemies manage to reach where Bannan is, you're defeated. Defeat Kefka before this can happen.

Thanks for the tip, Mogster!



I have a bit of a different tactic from Lucas. Unlike him, I feel that Celes is actually quite awesome for the coming fight, so she's going to be in the tactical strike team with Matias and Lock. Edgar and Cayene will take point, while Tina and Gau take up the rear.

(The rest of this update will be presented in Gunmetal Gray textboxes, because WAR!)

Alright, time to rock!

♪♪ Save Them! ♪♪



Kefka "Good. Now I can tidy up the Empire's loose ends in one fell swoop!!"
*Awesome laugh*
*Bring on the troops!*



That they will. Unless he's addressing my party. Also, hooray for my stealing lines from FFTactics!



Nothing is getting past my defenses. NOTHING.



Edgar and Cayene make an... interesting team. Cayene easily wipes up the leftovers of whatever Edgar's Bio Blast leaves alive. They have to use Potions and High Potions to stay alive, but they also have huge HP numbers, so they can stay alive easily.



Celes, Lock, and Matias have a bit more of a brawler approach, but that's alright since they're mostly in reserve and won't be fighting many battles outside of the last two.



Of course Gau is unstoppable in this battle with the Telarium rage, so he and Tina are pretty well protected.



We mock your attempts to murder us, Kefka! Okay, time to beat up that mysterious Rider...



HOLY BALLS! It's Hell's Harley! (Yes, that is what it's called.)



So, after stealing a Mithril Plate from the motorbike-made-mounted-rider and giving it to Lock, we take on the terror himself, Kefka.



And this is why Celes is awesome for this fight. Kefka relies almost exclusively on magic. Celes can absorb magic. Do the math.



Don't think you've won yet!
*Ker-ESCAPE!*

Well that was anticlimactic.



I hope so. It was such an embarrassing smackdown, after all.



Lock "Is it safe!?"

Well, unless the Empire employed ninjas to sneak past Bannan, I think so, yes.

Glad to have that cliffhanger resolved.

Cayene "But... Can it possibly still be alive...?"
Matias "It can't be, right...?"
*Tina steps back; Lock, Edgar, and Matias step closer to her*
Lock "Tina!! What is it!?!"
*Magic happens, and Lock goes flying, almost over the cliff; Celes helps him up*
*Everyone gets closer*
Tina "Everyone get back!"



Wow, a literal cliffhanger now!



Edgar "Are they reacting!?"

Well that IS why you brought her up here, right?



♪♪ Eidolons' World ♪♪

*The Eidolon glows*
Tina "Huh? Now what's happening...?"
*More glowing, Tina steps closer*
Tina "Please, tell me! What am I? What!?"
*Yet more glowing*
Lock "Tina!"
*Glowing, glowing, glowing...*
Celes "The Eidolon...... I can hear its reaction......!"
*Keep those Eidolons glowing...*
Edgar "Tina... Get away... from the Eidolon..."
*One last glow before...*



This does not look good for the Tina.



HOLY SHIT WHAT THE HELL JUST HAPPENED!? Tina stripped naked and turned all white! ...That's kinda hot.



Not screencapped (because you can't screencap sound): Tina screaming. She's gone, folks.



Gone, gone, flying all over the world, gone. (Amusingly, if you watch the world map, she's actually just sorta flying in circles and ends up right back where she started.)



♪♪ Awakening ♪♪

Celes "Are you awake?"
*Lock gets up and shakes out the cobwebs*
Lock "Tina's...!?"
*Celes looks down*
Celes "She changed to a different form...... Then, she just flew off. Nobody knows where she is......"
*Celes steps away, then nods to herself*
Celes "She looked...... Just like an Eidolon......"

Um, really? 'Cause she looked like a pale naked lady with bed head to me. Just sayin'.



Edgar "Something happened to Tina... Did something happen between her and the Eidolon? Hmm... We can't figure out where Tina went. People claim to have seen a blinding light flying off to the west of Figaro at an amazing speed......"

This bit makes it sound like Edgar somehow wasn't present, and of course was more of my context bungling. He should've been saying "What happened between her and that Eidolon, I wonder?" But I like to believe he was so stunned by seeing a pale naked lady that he forgot everything else.



*Everyone walks up to Lock*
Celes "Lock......"
Edgar "Wait. The Empire may decide to attack Narche to get the Eidolon again."
Matias "Somebody needs to protect Bannan, too..."
Cayene "She is an Imperial soldier... But, we cannot abandon her to her fate, sirs!"
*All agree*
Edgar "We'll divide into two groups, and one will go help Tina. The remaining group will stay here, and protect Narche. If we go to Figaro Castle, they can ferry us to the western half of the continent. We should then stop for supplies in Corlingen and Jidoor."

What a weird name, Corlingen. Sounds like mutilated French. Anyway, time to talk with allies.



Yeah, I went with the same party as Lucas. It's tradition.

♪♪ The Mines of Narche ♪♪

Jun "If you go to Figaro Castle, you should be able to reach that side of the continent."
Bannan "You must rescue Tina... That girl has taken with her the future of the world."
Cayene "Surely, we can help her, sirs!"
Gau "Gau do his best!"

And now, the people of Narche.



Old Man "I will give them all to you if you stop the Empire! But, there's one chest there that won't open... Surely, there must be something useful in it..."
Man "Since it's so cold here, we use steam engines all around this town to keep it warm."
Man "A ball of light flew off towards Figaro Castle... It almost looked like a human being..."
Old Man "We follow the will of the Elder."
Rogue "Did you know that Figaro Castle can submerge and get to the western side of the continent near Corlingen? It's true!"
Man "Narche is a neutral city. We have no interest in war. But that damned Empire..."
Old Man "So, the power of magic does exist."
Old Man "Magic? Nonsense, there's no such thing!"
Man "The Empire decided to invade Narche... It all started because we unearthed that frozen Phantom Beast!"
Old Man "I know I saw some Moglies wandering around with an abominable snowman recently! But nobody believes me..."
Elder "I'm rather worried about us getting involved in this. I want to avoid war... But..."



Some day we will know, I'm sure. Anyway, once we're all stocked and stoked up, it's time to leave Narche.



♪♪ Tina ♪♪

The newest leg of our adventure begins next time, same Bat time, same Bat channel!

It's a reference to the Fate anime/game/manga series, along with the mention of Saber and Archer. It just sort of came out without my noticing, really (it's the only other place I've seen a character simply named Rider, after all), but amused me enough I left it in upon proofreading.

If I was playing this and saw the monster listed as "Hell's Har," "Harley" is not the first thing I'd assume the second word is.

If I recall correctly, I usually make a Sabin-Edgar-Celes-Cyan super team and just charge. You can take out the Rider and Kefka before any soldiers get close to Bannon. Then all the extra soldiers vanish.

But I see now that that's less fun than setting up a protective blockade.

All I know is that no matter what parties I make I always realized I made a mistake after starting the war. Usually it's something stupid like leaving Gau and Lock together and them getting slaughtered when the Rage dice aren't kind.

Glad I'm not the only one who had that reaction

Yeah, that would be a potentially unpleasant combo. Actually, there's a lot of good combos. As long as your strike team has a healer and a high-damage character, you're pretty good to go (I always put Lock in my strike team just 'cause I like nabbing stuff from one-time enemies). Especially if you set up an assault team of a healer and Edgar to go and gas all the troops into submission before they get too far up the path.

I'm kinda embarassed to admit it, but I just stick with the ol' NP Guide setup of Edgar/Terra, Locke/Sabin/Gau, and Celes/Cyan.

Celes/Cyan might run into trouble with offense, but otherwise that's pretty solid.

It would've been better to do after you've gotten Espers, because then at least your characters would be learning abilities.

Just load up Terra/Celes/Edgar/Cyan and plow straight through to Kefka. It won't matter who's in the other two parties because the soldiers won't get anywhere near them.

Well sure, if you want to be predictable and boring. I prefer to mix it up and do all sorts of crazy crap.

Yeah, ever since I first played Final Fantasy III I've always made one party of badasses and stomped down the lines and ruined Kefka's day. Sabin, Edgar, Celes, and Cyan take point and wreck things, and at no point was I ever in danger of the soldiers coming close to Banon.

Also, 'Save Them!' is one of my favorite tracks in the game, and always seems pretty underrated; if only because the rest of the entire soundtrack is so damn good it's simply overshadowed.

I just used Edgar and Celes as a group to mop up most of the roaming enemies, and then had Terra / Sabin / Gau move in and finish off the bosses. Cyan and Locke were in the bullpen just in case.

I'm amazed that after playing this game for 14 years I'm still finding out things I didn't know about it. Also, while I'm fascinated by Skyrender's story explanations, I'm becoming increasingly unreasonably attached to and defensive about the changes to the character's names. It feels like blasphemy to call Sabin Matias. I don't know why this is bothering me so much.

So... why 'Majick Knight'?

That was a sort of compromise to deal with the Japanese wordplay. Magic is usually referred to by the common term (魔法/mahou), but engineered magic is called something else that's very similar (魔道/madou). The two terms mean basically the same thing to the casual reader, and would be seen as semantics without the context that the Empire's version of magic is derivative of "true" magic. The closest similarity to mahou vs. madou in English is Magic vs. Majick, for much the same reasons.

Or I suppose the difference between machine and machina in the FFX universe?