Final Fantasy XII International Zodiac Job System - Revisiting

[Nevex]

If you're not familiar with FFXII I'd say to get a black mage and a white mage in your first playthrough, both are awesome jobs.

Time Mage is good if you hate farming consumables and want "easy" access to Ribbons since it's the only job that can cast break (Required for Red Chocobo lv 99 trick, see on Youtube), but mediocre otherwise. Haste and Berserk are always good though and Time Mage is the only job that can use both without items.

Red Mage is surprisingly good, but lack of Curaja hurts it. It also needs a few Espers to get the good spells.

Hunter sucks till you get access to Main Gauge and Ninja Swords, then it becomes a solid attacker or a great tank depending on what you need.

Samurai, Dragoon and Breaker are more or less interchangeable since they focus on heavy physical damage more than else.

Knight and Monk are hybrid DD/healer classes but keep in mind that they require a heavy Esper investiment to be good on the healer side.

Archer is considered to be the worst job since bows are slow and inaccurate and its other specialty, item lores, is not that useful if you have a solid healer.

Machinist is almost a must have in weak mode and it's overall decent in normal plathroughs as well. It does get a few useful spells including Hastega but only late in the game.
Measures are highly situational but guns are good until very late in the game.

[samalis]

Thanks all for the tips. Need to figure out how to distribute espers and quickenings when the time comes. I'll most likely screw my characters up my first run through this game. lol

[Wakabo]

What makes them Time mages and machinests and such? I don't remember seeing job classes of a sort when I played XII but it's been quite a while..

[Sonomaa]

I cant not have fran as my archer, at least on this play through, in my next ones she was going to be my samurai.

right now I have:
Vaan - Hunter
Basch - Dragoon
Fran - Archer
Balthier - Machinist
Penelo - White Mage

Ashe is left but Im not sure what to make her yet tbh, I should probably get a knight but Im thinking either time or red mage

[Caiyuo]

What makes them Time mages and machinests and such? I don't remember seeing job classes of a sort when I played XII but it's been quite a while..

It's specific to the International version where your characters have to choose a job before they can ever do anything with the license board.

Thanks all for the tips. Need to figure out how to distribute espers and quickenings when the time comes. I'll most likely screw my characters up my first run through this game. lol

That was my thinking and so I went just for it knowing that this version of the game is kind of ideal for multiple playthroughs.

I cant not have fran as my archer, at least on this play through, in my next ones she was going to be my samurai.

right now I have:
Vaan - Hunter
Basch - Dragoon
Fran - Archer
Balthier - Machinist
Penelo - White Mage

Ashe is left but Im not sure what to make her yet tbh, I should probably get a knight but Im thinking either time or red mage

I was thinking the same for Fran, wanted to balance jobs that would work with something that at least somewhat fit the characters, though Basch as Archer and Balthier as WHM were just necessities in my case.

I eventually went with Fran as Machinist since she is apparently the weakest of everyone and ... does some cool gun flip for the victory pose.

[miokomioko]

I preferred Fran as my Black Mage, worked wonders for swarms of normal mobs... just not so great when it came to mana efficiency on bosses.

[Sonomaa]

any recommendations on ashe, Knight, Red, Time, or Ive heard she makes a bitchin Samurai

[samalis]

I'm so glad I checked this thread out, I'm having so much fun playing the international version. I never finished the original but it seems like they fixed most if not all the flaws of the original in this game. Is it safe to open every chest or did they add that zodiac spear chests in again?

[Sonomaa]

from what Im told there is no chest trick in int version

[Caiyuo]

I cant not have fran as my archer, at least on this play through, in my next ones she was going to be my samurai.

right now I have:
Vaan - Hunter
Basch - Dragoon
Fran - Archer
Balthier - Machinist
Penelo - White Mage

Ashe is left but Im not sure what to make her yet tbh, I should probably get a knight but Im thinking either time or red mage

any recommendations on ashe, Knight, Red, Time, or Ive heard she makes a bitchin Samurai

given that job spread, between Dragoon and Machinist and WHM I'd think you'd be good for DD/magic, which I think is a role SAM would fill as well. Knight would be another tank that becomes a strong healer as well, so it depends on whether you plan to use Vaan or Penelo much, as they both sort-of cover those areas, though I believe end-game finds Hunter-tanking to be a bit harder.

Your setup could use a Time or Red Mage, though Time with Machinist might overlap and RDM with WHM might overlap in healing while overlapping in nuking with Dragoon. Seems like overlap no matter what you choose, which is why this is usually such a bitch to figure out.

So in the end: idk. Maybe add Zodiac/International to the thread title to cull some more Zodiac players.

[samalis]

Question about quickenings, can every job learn 3 quickenings or do they disappear from other job classes after you get one?

[Tekki]

Time to go after my Tournesol items.

[Sonomaa]

I did a time mage but Im not quite sold on it and made a save before I chose. I think Ill be redoing it with her as a knight.

[Caiyuo]

Sounds like a good decision, having her on Knight should be fun.

[miokomioko]

I've always read that tank is hands-down the best for Ashe.

I really want to replay the game with the International edition and finally go 100% items since I've never seen the ultimate weapons of a few classes, but isn't Thief the only one with access to Steal in this version? :[ I don't know if I can hang with stealing from Entites at 1/3 the speed.

[Caiyuo]

I think I remember others getting it, definitely wasn't just Vaan by himself stealing for Gladius. I wanna say Balthier and Fran, but maybe not, I'll see if I can find an answer. I think it's something they get separate prior to license boards?

edit: HEYO: http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/Steal

In the International Zodiac Job System version, the Steal license costs 20 LP and can only be used by the job classes Machinist, Archer, Black Mage and Red Mage; the Black Mage must acquire the license for the Esper Zalera first, and the Red Mage must acquire the license for the Esper Hashmal. As an exception, Vaan, Balthier and Fran can learn this Technick no matter what job they choose, due to the fact they already have it when they first appear.

[Sonomaa]

CAIYUO DONT POST ANY MORE EVER YOU ARE 1337

my hunter (vaan) seems to be better at stealing than the others so idk
I like knight so far so all is well, once I get off the airship hopefully I can go beat a gladius or three out of the limbur wolf and maybe get a katana from the werewolves

[Caiyuo]

MY REIGN ENDED SO QUICKLY

I think I remember you saying you did a bit of grinding early on, but even without it, Vaan on Hunter rips through just about everything early on, and it just gets incredibly ugly and easy when he has a Gladius and auto-berserk on. During the rain season at Giza Plains I'd have him and Ashe on Samurai and most everything died before she could even get her first swing off, made fast-forward even more convenient. ENJOY.

[miokomioko]

Derp. Then that's not so bad... I will DO EET.

[samalis]

God damn I love this fast forward feature. My group is MNK/RDM/ARCH and they're already level 34. I just got to Ozmone Plains and feel so damn over powered. I went into this cave though and didn't know it had an esper in it, it killed my group pretty fast. Luckily I zoned with my other group. So far I'm having a blast though and I can't fucking wait for the harder hunts!