Final Fantasy VI Tier List

[Life]

Equating "getting rages" with "grinding for rages" is basically sandbagging. I'd certainly grant that the post-Narshe trip is not justifiable and that hurts him, but you're basically saying "we're never getting Rages," which is quite different. There really aren't that many Rages he'd need, and he only really has to grab one or two of them. But I get the sense you don't care to know how Rages work or how easily manipulable they are. Hell, you give him just Stray Cat for the entire game and he's leagues better than Cyan, period. If you can't even give him that (he can get it in one Leap the very first time you're even on the Veldt), then we might as well be doing a three-man Kefka's Tower run because it would be equally tedious to walk to Tzen for Sabin (let alone get anybody else in the WoR). And that would be a bare minimum. There's absolutely no way he can be that low unless you simply do not care about using him. I'm not saying "put in the effort" because it takes almost no effort at all to get Stray Cat and Templar. You let him pick up one undead Rage at some point during the game and he can cheese several bosses or avoid ID moves with Rage-granted death protection, meaning he has 255 Defense and no need for a Safety Bit (which can go to somebody else).

I love the strawman you threw up. Problem is that you mentioned it to the wrong person. Unlike many people here, I actually have done a 3 person Kefka's Tower run. And I even have the pictures to prove it. But that's another matter.

The real problem here is that you don't understand that Gau "getting Rages" means that we're taking time out to actively look for them. Which IS "grinding for Rages". RNG abuse is not a suitable answer whatsoever for the fact that we're fighting more battles than normal. Hell, GJ's even against getting Dances for Mog for the same reason.

And trust me, I know how Rages work. I know how the Veldt works. And I love that you toss accusations here and there without anything to back them up. GJ can back me up on the fact that I look at guides (algorithms, monster AI scripts, Bestiary entries...) more often than I play the game.

Also how exactly is it easy to justify having Doom/Death but not Air Anchor? And given the choice between the two, it's obviously better to have Edgar use the latter since other characters have better things to do against enemies in the final battles (damage obviously, or Mute on Magic and Stop on Hit while Edgar puts Tools down). The fact that Edgar can do it for free is obviously better than anybody else in the same tier who would have Death at the end. I suppose Sabin doesn't really need his MP, but Sabin really shouldn't be spending any turn in the final battle not Bum Rushing.

I can justify Death very easily. Shoat teaches it at a 2x rate. If someone doesn't have Death by the Floating Continent, something's wrong.

And why can't we teach Death to Edgar? He gains Bio (stronger than the Bioblaster) and Petrify along the way. Then, he can kill Long Arm and Machine in 1 turn rather than 2 turns. Why do you want to possibly eat a Diffractive Laser?

[grandjackal]

First off, Renall, you're looking at character comparison all wrong. The better question rather than "who does something better" is "Does he deserve to be in this certain part of the game".

Edgar is great. Nobody is denying that. But Sabin may just be as good on the offensive side of things (completely forgot that his lategame defense sucks monkey balls) if not better. As for Air Anchor, that's a weak argument. I can replicate that with a Death spell and I don't even need to wait a turn for the enemy to die. Death's accuracy is pretty good when you're not sandbagging your character to hell (see my Fewest Steps run for example of that).

I'll see into learning Death in the WoR since there is an extreme lack of EXP in the WoR thanks to Mog. All I know is I don't really need to learn Death prior to it.

Couple of problems.

• This isn't a low level game.
  
• The Debilitator is not a very useful or reliable Tool. It's great in theory but its practicality sucks since you have to keep using it until you hit the weakness you want.
  

This is the truth. It's only helpful when you have Gogo to double down on it. Only time I really use the Debilitator is on Mog's team to make his Jumps stupid powerful. That's about as far as it goes though, I wouldn't use it outside of that point.

Three trips? On an efficiency run why are we ever fighting on the Veldt? I don't hear arguments for babying Meg on an efficiency run and I'm pretty sure that the same applies to Gau here. The only stuff Gau can do are his starting Rages (eh...) and the magic you teach him (as in... nothing).

Gau's pretty terrible here. God on a LLG but in that kind of run, grinding on the Veldt isn't exactly a bad thing.

I think an easier way to say it is that Gau kills more time than saves to get him doing (inconsistently) what everyone else will already be doing.

Cyan is usable up to... IMRF. It's a toss-up between him or Celes for Zozo simply because his damage output is better than hers and Locke's stealing takes care of healing (not to mention that GJ just realized how ridiculous Locke's earlygame offense can actually get with the Genji Glove). GJ's the Cyan expert though.

Zozo the fact he can OHKO Slam Dancers, cut Gigas in half for a 2-person kill and ignore Dadaluma's Safe. Celes is the only competition for the 4th slot, and I can tell you right now that even with double Earrings, it doesn't cut it. First off as a nuke, Flash makes it redundant. Secondly, it can't OHO Slam Dancers, or do any real damage, while Dispatch already hits hard thanks to Hyper Wrist, and will hit harder once Locke steals us a Gigas Armlet, something we'll have quite a few opportunities at here. Only thing she has is Runic for Slam Dancers, but one-shotting them is just as helpful. Then there's Gau...Cyan wins by default.

Then comes Vector and the IMRF. Celes and Locke are forced, and I'd be stupid to not bring Sabin because by now he'll have Fire Dance. You can get Bolt on at least 2 people before IMRF (one of them being Celes). Bolt+Fire Dance destroys Garm/Commando combinations, Fire Dance alone destroys Pipsqueaks, and finally a double Earring single-target Bolt can kill Proto-Armor along with Aura Cannon, so double Proto-Armor are also not a problem. This...Is all the encounters at IMRF. The fact that Locke is forced and that you have a 4th slot are completely redundant until a boss fight. This is something that Edgar sucks at. But then lets go over the bosses.

-Ifrit and Shiva. Due to the fact that Hyper Wrist and Atlas Armlet actually boost Sword Skill damage while not boosting Tool damage, they'd be doing the same damage if not Cyan straight winning with Dispatch compared to Drill.

-Wall Change guy. Quadra Slam does damage between Drill and Chainsaw at this point, of which makes up for the fact that Chainsaw fucks up 25% of the time. I'd say they're about even on this guy.

Then we get Bismark (Locke wants Fire 2, so he has Ifrit on). Down the Mag-Roader tunnel (of which Fire Dance alone nukes all things in 1 shot), Cyan can get at least 1 level depending on how close to a level he is by the time he gets it (not to mention if you're close to a level, Cyan and Locke can swap Ifrit to one another to get the +Str). So, he could have +2-3 Str, further adding onto the damage his skills do, something that does not help Edgar on the basis of Vigor not upping his Tool damage as proof that Hyper Wrist does not increase damage. This is important...

-Mag Roader boss. You can eliminate both limbs in 1 turn with 2 summons and a Fire Dance. In that next turn, you can sneak in a Quadra Slam before limbs regenerate, doing between 880-920 damage (it has lower Def than Mag Def, you gained 2-3 Str). That's BETTER than Chainsaw damage. Follow up with Aura Cannon and Locke bitchslapping him, and you kill this guy incredibly quick.

-Cranes. Edgar can focus one down easier, but damage is still damage since you have to kill both anyways. Cyan's Quadra Slam is still good here, doing 200-600, 400 even or straight 800 in terms of damage against both Cranes.

Past this, I wouldn't invest more time in Cyan for WoB. So he has no reason not to go to Zozo, and he's actually quite a good choice for IMRF. As you may notice, this is not Umaro kinds of useless. In fact, it's more than some punks like Setzer and Relm can say.

Equating "getting rages" with "grinding for rages" is basically sandbagging. I'd certainly grant that the post-Narshe trip is not justifiable and that hurts him, but you're basically saying "we're never getting Rages," which is quite different. There really aren't that many Rages he'd need, and he only really has to grab one or two of them. But I get the sense you don't care to know how Rages work or how easily manipulable they are. Hell, you give him just Stray Cat for the entire game and he's leagues better than Cyan, period. If you can't even give him that (he can get it in one Leap the very first time you're even on the Veldt), then we might as well be doing a three-man Kefka's Tower run because it would be equally tedious to walk to Tzen for Sabin (let alone get anybody else in the WoR). And that would be a bare minimum. There's absolutely no way he can be that low unless you simply do not care about using him. I'm not saying "put in the effort" because it takes almost no effort at all to get Stray Cat and Templar. You let him pick up one undead Rage at some point during the game and he can cheese several bosses or avoid ID moves with Rage-granted death protection, meaning he has 255 Defense and no need for a Safety Bit (which can go to somebody else).

This is again banking on the complete luck that we find a Stray Cat (and that's if you think the Veldt works the way you think it does. I' quite positive that the encounters you run into are based on level. If that's the case, I think you're out of luck because by the time you get there, you won't be running into any Stray Cat encounters. More like "Encounters Outside of Narshe" types of enemies. Ya know, winners).

Also, equating recruiting characters in WoR is not as tedious as Veldt grinding, especially if it works off levels. Which case, we'd have to do actual grinding first before Gau can even encounter the rages he wants.

Thirdly, you should know that in a Fewest Steps run, Kefka there had to grind a LOT before a "only 3 character run" of the Tower was even possible (and even then, he was slamming his head into the desk on Guardian, let alone one of the three warring triads). Recruiting characters still could prove to save time in comparison. So please, quit looking through multiple looking glasses when you only need 1 here.

Also how exactly is it easy to justify having Doom/Death but not Air Anchor? And given the choice between the two, it's obviously better to have Edgar use the latter since other characters have better things to do against enemies in the final battles (damage obviously, or Mute on Magic and Stop on Hit while Edgar puts Tools down). The fact that Edgar can do it for free is obviously better than anybody else in the same tier who would have Death at the end. I suppose Sabin doesn't really need his MP, but Sabin really shouldn't be spending any turn in the final battle not Bum Rushing.

I'll have to see on how quick one can still learn Death in WoR, but once the Deathable portions of the Spire are Death'd, what then does Edgar do? He doesn't do damage, I can tell you that much. So the argument that having Death works as well is the argument that I don't have to have Edgar on my team when he's arguably at his worst. He Air Anchors...Then what?

Also, Kefka, I should note that the reason I don't care to get Mog's dances is cause...Well...He doesn't really care to have them. He doesn't need them to be useful. Hell, Jump and his astoundingly high level are what made him useful in the Sealed Cave, not Dance.

Edited November 12, 2011 by grandjackal

[Renall]

The Veldt works off formations that you've actually seen in a cycle organized into semi-arbitrary "groups" of formations from which it picks one or skips the group if you haven't seen any formations in it (and some groups have no legal formations or no formations at all and are always skipped). Your level has nothing to do with it, except that when you first arrive in the Veldt you haven't seen much of anything yet (at minimum Narshe + Figaro + Koltz + Lete River + Sabin's Scenario (Overworld, Imperial Base, Phantom Train)). On the SNES you can manipulate the groups and eventually the formation as well. On the GBA you can't manipulate the groups but can manipulate the formations. I'm not really assuming you're doing this, but if you can it makes it trivial to get Gau any given Rage.

Stray Cats appear in almost all the forest formations in Sabin's scenario and also half of the grass formations between the Imperial Camp and Baren Falls. Just "going Point A to Point B" practically guarantees running into one or at least makes it more likely (even if you're running from everything, which the parameters set forth don't require, you flag the encounter(s)). It appears in three possible formations of one Veldt group, all of them on the first Veldt visit assuming two obscure formations aren't encountered and even then the chance is pretty high. And then it has a good chance of appearing in the immediate next pack. Likewise Aspik and Anguiform are Serpent Trench enemies so there's basically no way you could miss them. Primordite (which can set Stop on Kefka and Dadaluma) appears 1/3 of the time in one group and 2/3 of the time in another provided you've done Locke's scenario and not Terra/Banon/Edgar's yet (then the group fills up with encounters they run into). Plus Marshal/Guard Leader, though he's not a guarantee, but you're sure to have seen him. Granted, you might not see the formations, but that can work for you as much as against you since if you see one Stray Cat or Primordite formation and no other formations in their group, it will appear guaranteed. Templar/Templar/Soldier/Soldier is both a completely unavoidable encounter (and thus can't not be Veldt flagged the first time you arrive there) but also the only formation in its group for pretty much the entire WoB, meaning it really can't be missed. And HadesGigas/Whatever it is in FF6A is a pretty likely encounter in Zozo (and SlamDancer has Ice2).

So by IMRF Gau should already have at least Stray Cat (doing physical damage or better), Templar (inherent Safe and Fire2/Fira before anybody else has it), and a 10-15 minute diversion (which I grant is not necessarily worth the time, but if this is casual play one trip is not some leprous thing) could potentially also provide Giga Volt (stronger than Lit3/Thundaga), Aqua Rake (rapes Cranes), and Magnitude8 (rapes Number 128), and also have access to Fire2 and Ice2 before you even have Ifrit, Shiva, or Maduin. So this argument "he can do inconsistently what others can already do" strikes me as disingenuous when he can, in fact, do things nobody does, like Earth/Water/Wind damage. Well, okay, in fairness Cyan can do Wind damage (though if he's Vigor-centric it won't get boosted damage, but you could Earring him up for Cranes) and Edgar/Mog can do Water damage (with the Trident), but only roughly as consistently/effectively as Gau. And quick show of hands, who can put Stop status on Kefka and Dadaluma? Espers that teach Stop don't exist yet sooooooooooo nobody. Except Gau, 50% of the time, if you encounter an enemy you're very likely to encounter. Also by the way who can cast Quake in the WoB? Can you teach that with an Esper at that point? No? Go figure, because Gau can, and Quake is heavy damage + a full party heal if everyone's got Gaia Gear.

So he can "inconsistently" (it only has to hit once) do some things that, if you were being honest, nobody can do at the points in the game he can do them. Possibly. But again, at minimum he has the ability to give himself Safe (guaranteed) and Fire2 for free half the time or attack and/or face-rape-attack half the time. And if you were to give me just one Rage in the entire WoR, one Rage only, I can pick Nightshade and Gau (or Gogo admittedly) causes the last two parts of the final boss fight to commit suicide (as well as pretty much every other boss). This isn't even like manipulating Joker Doom or anything, it's an instant victory 50% of the time if you have the physical and mental facility to select a single Rage.

Somehow, this makes him almost as bad as Umaro. Somehow, Relm - a character whose primary advantages are a high base Magic Power, access to the Magus Rod and Cat Hood, and an unfathomably brief sequence where she's forced - who has to contend with not existing for essentially all the WoB, needing AP/MP to learn to do anything useful (so that's investment, just like Gau would need, only Gau can do it in 2 battles which is not enough time to learn any other good spell), having a pain in the ass re-recruitment segment in the WoR (Gau's re-recruitment: Go to the Veldt with 3 people), and having a completely useless special ability, and who merely gets about as good defensively as people like Terra with tons of WoR equipment (much like Gau, though he needs only one piece of equipment albeit one that Mog also wants), is better. Whaaaat?

But apparently we have no time to do anything, except when we arbitrarily do. Nevermind that the criteria established allows "limited" Veldt trips (up to one cycle), and I'm not even proposing going through an entire Veldt cycle, just cherry-picking from formations that are very likely or damn near certain to pop up. Or that on SNES, the Veldt is literally manipulable. Or that I'm not even discussing the potential for "limited Veldt trips" in the WoR and how well that could do. He's an extremely viable choice any time he's available and borders on broken with a dual Earring setup which, at times, exceeds even Sabin (mainly because of hitting weaknesses Sabin doesn't, though under practical terms Sabin clears randoms much better and is overall more consistent). And I'm trying my damndest to be as "limited" as possible on this; to limit him any more Stray Cat + Templar (which is already just fine) is being intentionally contrary.

Also on SNES he can use the Merit Award which I didn't even bring up (because it doesn't work in FF6A and it's unlikely you'd get it), but hey, it exists and he breaks the SNES version with it.

[Life]

So by IMRF Gau should already have at least Stray Cat (doing physical damage or better), Templar (inherent Safe and Fire2/Fira before anybody else has it), and a 10-15 minute diversion (which I grant is not necessarily worth the time, but if this is casual play one trip is not some leprous thing) could potentially also provide Giga Volt (stronger than Lit3/Thundaga), Aqua Rake (rapes Cranes), and Magnitude8 (rapes Number 128), and also have access to Fire2 and Ice2 before you even have Ifrit, Shiva, or Maduin.

This paragraph is your entire argument, cut down into a few sentences.

Now, the problem with it is that not only are we not going to get Rages at all (never mind spend time looking for specific ones), we're not even fighting for half the game. When you head to Zozo, the majority of that trip is done on the back of a Chocobo with a slight diversion to Jidoor (and yes, there's a stable there too). Half of the dungeons in the WoR are skipped thanks to the Molulu's Charm. We're not fighting if we can avoid it.

So... why are we looking for specific packs of monsters on the Veldt?

EDIT: I want to point something out. GJ has already said this before but Ramuh and Thunder/Phoenix Rush trivialize the IMRF completely. Especially Ramuh before either of those are available (you'll pick them both up within 5 battles of the IMRF so not to worry). Why are we wasting time looking for Anguiform and Aspiran (let's assume that we go back to the Veldt just for those Rages) when what we have destroys the dungeon anyways?

Edited November 14, 2011 by Kefka

[Renall]

Because many of those fights are required and skipping worthless filler packs actually makes the Veldt easier to use. You're helping me make my argument. Skipping everything between Figaro and Zozo is good, because none of those Rages are any good and never seeing them means they're never going to be on the Veldt, meaning the chance of finding a Rage you want is astronomically higher. The more you skip, the better this is for Gau; excessive Charm use late-game means only fighting select things you want to fight (Nightshade BTW is a single triggered battle in Owser's House). Again, this actually makes the Veldt easier to cycle through, as if you only ever tag good packs (or forced packs, since as I mentioned many of the good early packs are forced and can't be missed) then you're not "grinding the Veldt" as you seem to hate. Because there won't be any packs there that exist solely as filler.

But the criteria I'm seeing here isn't saying "avoid all fights if humanly possible." It's saying "don't grind." Getting in a few fights isn't grinding. Not using the Charm isn't grinding. As you yourself said, this is not a LLG. One of your Phoenix Cave groups will not have the Charm because there is only one Mog; if this group happens to run into a Chaos Dragon, well, Disaster is now available (not that useful outside Final Tier 2 but it does set every status the four parts are vulnerable to on them). Not really necessary, but I'm also not seeing what's so onerous about it. You've got to do some fighting anyway for spells, and the Veldt still gives out Magic Points/AP. Why not budget a handful of those fights there? Especially if you're Charm-skipping a bunch.

Also I'm not seeing any address of the fact that even with all your sandbagging he's better than Relm, who is godawful. Or that you completely ignored the part about Gau being able to do things nobody else is able to do early on like Stop before you have Stop (on bosses vulnerable to it) or do Earth/Water/Wind damage. Wind Slash or Fire2's competition in Narshe is what, Autocrossbow? Aurabolt ST vs. Fire2 ST? Genji Glove Locke? Sabin's the most obvious choice here and over time Aurabolt will beat Templar or Marshal, but I'm not saying Gau is better than Sabin. I'm just saying he's better than a number of people other than Umaro, and better than them in ways and at times that it's insultingly dismissive to say otherwise. But you seem to have a cost-benefit model where any cost cannot overcome its benefit, and the idea that the Veldt is worse than it really is (particularly if, as you say, we try to avoid unnecessary fights, as that actually is good for the Veldt).

EDIT: Ramuh costs mana and can only be summoned once? Also Gau can use Ramuh too, so... what's your point? Also Gau never has to hog an esper for anything but leveling up, and/or can be taught only restorative stuff if you're not going to bother getting General (I wouldn't, but it's there).

Edited November 14, 2011 by Renall

[grandjackal]

Because many of those fights are required and skipping worthless filler packs actually makes the Veldt easier to use. You're helping me make my argument. Skipping everything between Figaro and Zozo is good, because none of those Rages are any good and never seeing them means they're never going to be on the Veldt, meaning the chance of finding a Rage you want is astronomically higher. The more you skip, the better this is for Gau; excessive Charm use late-game means only fighting select things you want to fight (Nightshade BTW is a single triggered battle in Owser's House). Again, this actually makes the Veldt easier to cycle through, as if you only ever tag good packs (or forced packs, since as I mentioned many of the good early packs are forced and can't be missed) then you're not "grinding the Veldt" as you seem to hate. Because there won't be any packs there that exist solely as filler.

Congratulations, in your own words you basically just admitted that Gau won't be going to Zozo.

But the criteria I'm seeing here isn't saying "avoid all fights if humanly possible." It's saying "don't grind." Getting in a few fights isn't grinding. Not using the Charm isn't grinding. As you yourself said, this is not a LLG. One of your Phoenix Cave groups will not have the Charm because there is only one Mog; if this group happens to run into a Chaos Dragon, well, Disaster is now available (not that useful outside Final Tier 2 but it does set every status the four parts are vulnerable to on them). Not really necessary, but I'm also not seeing what's so onerous about it. You've got to do some fighting anyway for spells, and the Veldt still gives out Magic Points/AP. Why not budget a handful of those fights there? Especially if you're Charm-skipping a bunch.

Between getting Bum rush easily, getting Fixed Dice for free and getting the Master Scroll with almost zero thought (and still probably takes less time than getting Gau what he wants) and eventually Fire 3 on Terra doing straight 9999 damage, and Mog being forced, explain to me how Gau would ever fit into a team?

"But Kefka's Tower-"

You can fit characters in all 3 teams and you can have about 2 characters left out. Other characters are actually good, or have some form of automatic utility, and they all have something in common. They are not inconsistent and random.

Also I'm not seeing any address of the fact that even with all your sandbagging he's better than Relm, who is godawful. Or that you completely ignored the part about Gau being able to do things nobody else is able to do early on like Stop before you have Stop (on bosses vulnerable to it) or do Earth/Water/Wind damage. Wind Slash or Fire2's competition in Narshe is what, Autocrossbow? Aurabolt ST vs. Fire2 ST? Genji Glove Locke? Sabin's the most obvious choice here and over time Aurabolt will beat Templar or Marshal, but I'm not saying Gau is better than Sabin. I'm just saying he's better than a number of people other than Umaro, and better than them in ways and at times that it's insultingly dismissive to say otherwise. But you seem to have a cost-benefit model where any cost cannot overcome its benefit, and the idea that the Veldt is worse than it really is (particularly if, as you say, we try to avoid unnecessary fights, as that actually is good for the Veldt).

You have yet to point out how Gau can do any of this without wasting time, which he does. Example. Life Admiral has recently found out that Number024 can be 2 turned. He is also trying to see if Jump+Trident can OHKO a Crane due to it being water elemental. So, possibly a 1 turn depending on if Celes, Sabin and Locke can clutch it out on the other crane. Number124 can be 2 turned I believe (Depends on how much Jump does to it). Let's ignore the fact it takes time out of your day to just venture out to the Veldt in the first place. Let's assume Gau just straight 1 turns (if you're lucky) 2 of those 3 bosses (since you can possibly 1 turn the cranes anyways). You need a turn to find the encounter. You need another turn to get Gau back. Considering you're doing this multiple times, congratulations. Ignoring the fact we're going way out of the way and crossing our fingers for a random encounter (manipulable or not), we can see he actually costs more turns than saves just to do what characters already do normally. At least for IMRF. Sealed Cave you can 1 turn any random encounter, and the Floating Continent can be beaten by passing Shoat around like a Blunt. Atma weapon can again pretty much be 2 turned because you are not short on finding ways to do serious damage at this point, eliminating whatever made Gau special in the first place.

Look above and we see why Gau is not needed for WoR ever until Kefka's Tower. What OF Kefka's Tower then? It's her vs Realm. Would I go out of my way to get Gau's rages, or could I just slap Fake Mustache on Relm whom I get on my way to getting Gogo anyways for automatic utility (control Malboro, sneeze Great Behemoths and kill them 100% of the time for free, control Sky Base and nuke enemy team, etc etc) and have something be useful anyways? Better bet every time I'm not gonna pick the time waster.

EDIT: Ramuh costs mana and can only be summoned once? Also Gau can use Ramuh too, so... what's your point? Also Gau never has to hog an esper for anything but leveling up, and/or can be taught only restorative stuff if you're not going to bother getting General (I wouldn't, but it's there).

The point is nothing makes him stand out at all, ever, and you have yet to point out why we should ever take Gau seriously. You're basically oogling over "Look at Gau make big numbers" without thinking if they even mean anything.