Final Fantasy Tactics Efficiency Tier List

[Anouleth]

Firstly, FFT works with the CT system, which to my knowledge is unique and is very different from other ways of doing it (TO, FFTA, etc.)

Actually, that sounds pretty much identical to FFTA, just with smaller numbers. And spells don't take additional cost in FFTA. Although I thought you made it unnecessarily confusing by using the same acronyms for Clock Tick and Charge Time. I'm not sure how FFX does it, but I don't imagine it's entirely different.

[Rodykitty]

Actually, that sounds pretty much identical to FFTA, just with smaller numbers. And spells don't take additional cost in FFTA. Although I thought you made it unnecessarily confusing by using the same acronyms for Clock Tick and Charge Time. I'm not sure how FFX does it, but I don't imagine it's entirely different.

The ability delays in FFT make it play out much differently than FFTA, despite both games having a CT system.

[Aquilae]

Yeah, FFTA has a similar system but it works a bit differently. In addition to the CT bar, they have something called a reserve bar (which you can read here). I'm not really familiar with FFTA, but to my understanding, the extra bar makes it such that waiting or not moving doesn't have the same impact as in FFT. It also makes slow units even slower compared to FFT's.

[Espinosa]

I started an efficient run of the game a few days ago after reading this thread, and it's been going very well so far after a rather rough beginning. I fully agree with AquiIae (listen to this man when it comes to FFT) that there's no such thing as a "turn" in FFT, and the only way to measure a concept like efficiency is through the speed with which you complete battles and perhaps also the convenience (the latter would imply certain amounts of JP grinding would be acceptable or even desirable to make some frustrating missions easier). For example, wouldn't you beat the game faster if you used some missions to grind JP to unlock Calculator and all the abilities that make Math Skill so good?

I wanted to ask, is the list of classes ordered by the stats you have in those classes or the skillsets? For example, some people might want to use Monk's skillset under a different primary class, or, vice versa, get Two Swords as a Ninja and go back to Monk class to punch twice for some heavy damage. The builds you end up making for your character throughout the game rely on using many different classes at one point or another.

One thing I'd like to argue about right off the bat is Summoner being below Upper Mid. Teach it one of the 200 JP elemental spells, equip the right elemental rod, and start kicking ass. It's easy to unlock, it's very good as soon you start using it and it just keeps being better (at both offence and support - Golem is such a great spell for missions with many physical hitters), and when you've learnt all the skills you want, you could reclass to Wizard for better MA. I'd say the range of Summoner's spells alone makes it better than Wizard (who is somehow in God Tier), plus you needn't fear your Summons will hit allies as well (like they do in FFTA). I'd say Summoners should be at least as high up as Wizard.

[eclipse]

Math skills take forever to unlock, and you need THREE of them before you do anything of note.

Wizards have ridiculous MA, range, and hit hard. What else do you want?

Dunno about the dual-wielding Monk. While it sounds cool, the dual attack requires you to be up close and personal - something that a lot of enemies hate, IIRC.

[Espinosa]

Just found some skill tier list on GameFAQs' FFT board:

1. Math Skill

2. Summon Magic

3. All-Swordskill

4. Draw Out

5. Use Hand

6. Swordskill

7. Holy Sword

8. Magic Sword

9. Dance

10. Starry Heaven

11. Yin-Yang Magic

12. Time Magic

13. Jump

14. Guts

15. Destroy Sword

16. White Magic

17. Black Magic

18. Limit

19. Holy Magic

20. White Aid

21. Punch Art

21. Dark Sword

23. Throw

24. Talk Skill

25. Mighty Sword

26. Sing

27. Elemental

28. Item

29. Truth

30. Battle Skill

31. Dragon

32. Untruth

33. Steal

34. Basic Skill

35. Snipe

36. Charge

Math Skill is on top, so it's based on maximum potential rather than efficiency, I guess.

[Radiant Dragon]

Basic Skill made it above Snipe (Mustadio's skillset?) and why is Item so low?

[Dark Sage]

I started an efficient run of the game a few days ago after reading this thread, and it's been going very well so far after a rather rough beginning. I fully agree with AquiIae (listen to this man when it comes to FFT) that there's no such thing as a "turn" in FFT, and the only way to measure a concept like efficiency is through the speed with which you complete battles and perhaps also the convenience (the latter would imply certain amounts of JP grinding would be acceptable or even desirable to make some frustrating missions easier). For example, wouldn't you beat the game faster if you used some missions to grind JP to unlock Calculator and all the abilities that make Math Skill so good?

I wanted to ask, is the list of classes ordered by the stats you have in those classes or the skillsets? For example, some people might want to use Monk's skillset under a different primary class, or, vice versa, get Two Swords as a Ninja and go back to Monk class to punch twice for some heavy damage. The builds you end up making for your character throughout the game rely on using many different classes at one point or another.

One thing I'd like to argue about right off the bat is Summoner being below Upper Mid. Teach it one of the 200 JP elemental spells, equip the right elemental rod, and start kicking ass. It's easy to unlock, it's very good as soon you start using it and it just keeps being better (at both offence and support - Golem is such a great spell for missions with many physical hitters), and when you've learnt all the skills you want, you could reclass to Wizard for better MA. I'd say the range of Summoner's spells alone makes it better than Wizard (who is somehow in God Tier), plus you needn't fear your Summons will hit allies as well (like they do in FFTA). I'd say Summoners should be at least as high up as Wizard.

Keep in mind that this is a minimal grinding tier list, so getting Two Swords or any Math Skill abilities is a giant pain. This is also why the Calculator is in bottom tier. It takes forever just to get any JP to get three skills to do make use of Math Skills.

Also classes are judged with other abilities in mind. That's another reason why the Wizard is so good. It's class abilities are already very good on them but they can also be great healers or they can use Summon Magic even better than Summoners. Summoners have a slew of problems. For one thing, their higher end abilities cost a lot of JP and all their magic costs a lot of MP, so they're not that great early on. For another thing, while their MA is high, it's not the best and they have among the worst durability in the game. They're still good, don't get me wrong, but the Wizard's advantages far outweigh any of the Summoner's advantages.

By the way, if you're wondering about the Holy Knight's placement (this is a preemptive), they're low for some PA problems and the fact that they have bad movement combined with skills with either limited range or have higher JP costs. The skills are worth the investment, but they do have a large amount of problems.

For character builds, you'll probably be finished building them by Chapter 4, but Chapter 4 is not the whole game.

[Espinosa]

I agree that applicability at any given point of the game is important as applicability at any other point, but I think efficiency is not only limited to the amount of time it takes to complete a certain build, but should represent the correlation between the effort necessary and the effectiveness of the final product. For example, we tend to agree that using Nino and Ewan is inefficient because said characters contribute little for the effort needed to train them up to their maximum potential. Does Math Skill follow the same pattern? It's difficult for me to give a definite answer because the Calculator skillset does things the other classes don't do, and can greatly simplify the rest of the game once acquired. I believe the current best speed run of the game employs Math Skill to its fullest, but it should be taken into account that it involves the JP overflow glitch to master the skills quickly.

On my last 'efficient' run (which I finished just yesterday) I had no trouble learning Two Swords just by using Ramza and a generic male as ninjas and throwing balls at everything (sometimes attacking something from behind) with JP Up equipped, and I was able to switch into different jobs and give them double attack earlier than you might expect, around the beginning of Chapter 3 or so, maybe earlier. Ninjas' naturally high speed and the ability to continuously attack without moving might have something to do with it. When I switched them to Monks, I double punched stuff 90% of the time and used the ranged attacks only when I was out of range to attack something directly. I wouldn't say it was forced in any way, as Ninjas have enough usefulness to warrant their use until Two Swords is learnt, so it was efficient to a point.

I agree that Summoners are hard to use long-term until you have the MP necessary to at least cast Shiva/Ifrit/Ramuh twice per battle, but there are always Chemists who could toss an Ether to make it possible, and I think it's quite worth it. It's true that Wizard with Summon as secondary skill will succeed more than a pure Summoner, but you do need to learn all the necessary summons for Wizard to really shine.

I disagree about summons requiring more JP though. Compare Shiva, which demands 200 JP, to Ice 3, which demands 480. Both share the same power, but Shiva is learnt more quickly, is 100% accurate, covers more space horizontally and vertically, never targets allies... Really, the only loss is the MP, plus the inability to combine learning the best skills with having the best stats to use those skills at any given point. I really think Wizard and Summoner shouldn't be separated by such a big gap, and I'd rather put Summoner on top and Wizard lower because Wizards aren't self-sufficient at all and demand reclassing to function well in battle.

Holy Knight is fine in that tier with the likes of Summoner and Chemist, but I think it should be above Engineer, Priest and Knight at least. I do know from first-hand experience how long it takes for Agrias to get that Lightning Stab, but the first move in that skillset is just about all you need until Orlandu joins, outclassing Agrias entirely.

I don't understand such high respect for Geomancers, by the way. Why top tier? They're great offensive units for straightforward attacking, but their skills are weak, situational to a high extent, and their chance to inflict a negative status effect is too low to be relied upon (which is efficiency-related, I think).

[Radiant Dragon]

Wizards are so high because they trivialize Chapter 1, where Summoners aren't doing you any good. Even after you unlock Summoner, Wizards are still really good at what they do.

I don't think they belong in their own tier above everyone else though, since they aren't great at everything (they lack mobility and durability, and rely on MP, which is limited early on, when they're at their best) unlike Marcus/Seth/Titania. Top of Top sounds good enough for them.

I agree Holy Knight should be above Knight. The Knight's only advantages are a little PA and availability, but they get outclassed quickly. Not sure about Engineer, due to the status effects and above average speed, but Guns are pretty underwhelming.

Geomancer does look a little high, but they do have good stats if I remember correctly, so I'll wait to hear your reasoning on that one.

Mediator looks a little high also, since their skills aren't extremely useful and tend to have low accuracy. Not sure where I would put them, though.

Calculator > Dragoner and Soldier. Also, I think the Heaven and Hell Knights are probably more useful than Bards, Dancers and Mimes, due to the difficulties unlocking and limited usefulness of them.

Edited July 3, 2011 by Radiant Kitty

[grandjackal]

Does Math Skill follow the same pattern?

Yes, it does. It's skillset function and expense is only half the equation. To get it, you need to be lvl 3 as an Oracle and a Time Mage. Both might have decent skillsets, but they are awful classes to actually be. Wizard is just such an absurdly powerful class with it's Magic UP, high Magic stat, and the ability to equip Elemental Rods. Like, I'm talking OHKOing Knights sort of ridiculous. Just being another class to not have Rods is a severe damage cut to the point that it's noticeably worse. These two classes are supportive only, and really, you don't need much to be supportive (Anyone who has Time Mage open has the JP automatically for Haste, and Oracle spells are redundant when you can just blow things away with great haste). Then you become a calc who's even worse than those two classes, with no abilities of which it won't have for eons.

CT Math skill to calculate CT. -- 250 4

Level Math skill to calculate level. -- 350 5

Exp Math skill to calculate Exp. -- 200 5

Height Math skill to calculate height. -- 250 4

Prime Number Math skill that guides selected item in prime -- 300 4

number. (A Prime Number is any number that is

only divisible by 1 or itself.) Below is a list

of prime numbers under 100:

2 3 5 7 11 13 17

19 23 29 31 37 41 43

47 53 59 61 67 71 73

79 83 89 97

5 Math skill that guides items in multiples of 5. -- 200 4

4 Math skill that guides items in multiples of 4. -- 400 4

3 Math skill that guides items in multiples of 3. -- 600 5

You need 450 JP just to be able to do the cheapest thing, and with CT and 5, not only is this a very minimal margin of which it would work since 5 is a wide number to work with, it can also backfire on you most often due to CT being constantly changing. So even with the minimum abilities, Calcs will still just sit there and do nothing, since at the time the spell might only do more harm than good. One number alone is 600. You don't just get 600 JP. 600 JP is a commitment.

By the time you finally get this shit class up and running fully to it's max potential, the game might damn well be over, and the calc class will not be able to make up for all the harm it's done. Did I mention the Calc class is among hte slowest classes in the game, meaning it will take about he least actions one could possibly take? That alone pretty much breaks the calc into a useless class.

It's difficult for me to give a definite answer because the Calculator skillset does things the other classes don't do, and can greatly simplify the rest of the game once acquired. I believe the current best speed run of the game employs Math Skill to its fullest, but it should be taken into account that it involves the JP overflow glitch to master the skills quickly.

Simplifies sure, but does it make up for every awful thing we had to go through just to get it that way? I would easily assume no. Also, the JP glitch shouldn't be assumed, because the JP Glitch makes the game generally unfun and broke as fuck.

On my last 'efficient' run (which I finished just yesterday) I had no trouble learning Two Swords just by using Ramza and a generic male as ninjas and throwing balls at everything (sometimes attacking something from behind) with JP Up equipped, and I was able to switch into different jobs and give them double attack earlier than you might expect, around the beginning of Chapter 3 or so, maybe earlier. Ninjas' naturally high speed and the ability to continuously attack without moving might have something to do with it. When I switched them to Monks, I double punched stuff 90% of the time and used the ranged attacks only when I was out of range to attack something directly. I wouldn't say it was forced in any way, as Ninjas have enough usefulness to warrant their use until Two Swords is learnt, so it was efficient to a point.

While I feel that chapter 3 is a bit early to learn it (I'm going through this game grindless, I'm almost done with chapter 2 and I'm barely just gonna be able to get to Ninja class by chapter 3's start), I agree with the sentiment.

I agree that Summoners are hard to use long-term until you have the MP necessary to at least cast Shiva/Ifrit/Ramuh twice per battle, but there are always Chemists who could toss an Ether to make it possible, and I think it's quite worth it. It's true that Wizard with Summon as secondary skill will succeed more than a pure Summoner, but you do need to learn all the necessary summons for Wizard to really shine.

While Wizards are indeed absurdly more powerful with summons under their belt, the Wizard hardly needs them to be amazing with how huge their damage output is. The Summoner class however has a fair tradeoff, cause what it makes up for in damage (since Wizards can wtf power boost their spells to ridiculous power, and due to how early the start, can have lvl 2 stuff before summoners even become a possibility, or an improvement) with it's wide AoE. n tight cramped areas, the huge AoE might outdo the high damage overall.

I disagree about summons requiring more JP though. Compare Shiva, which demands 200 JP, to Ice 3, which demands 480. Both share the same power, but Shiva is learnt more quickly, is 100% accurate, covers more space horizontally and vertically, never targets allies... Really, the only loss is the MP, plus the inability to combine learning the best skills with having the best stats to use those skills at any given point. I really think Wizard and Summoner shouldn't be separated by such a big gap, and I'd rather put Summoner on top and Wizard lower because Wizards aren't self-sufficient at all and demand reclassing to function well in battle.

The earliness and superpowering the Wizard can do for their own spells is what would largely seperate the two, since you can't just go straight into summoner. Even once you unlock it, you still gotta build the JP up to give it 1 spell while the wizard could have several of which to abuse weather with.

Holy Knight is fine in that tier with the likes of Summoner and Chemist, but I think it should be above Engineer, Priest and Knight at least. I do know from first-hand experience how long it takes for Agrias to get that Lightning Stab, but the first move in that skillset is just about all you need until Orlandu joins, outclassing Agrias entirely.

Agreed.

I don't understand such high respect for Geomancers, by the way. Why top tier? They're great offensive units for straightforward attacking, but their skills are weak, situational to a high extent, and their chance to inflict a negative status effect is too low to be relied upon (which is efficiency-related, I think).

Generally it's because it's the only skillset the physical job tree has that can be deemed spammable without costing us money in buying equipment, and their disabling effects. Sure it's not strong, and the situation is dependent on the terrain, but what else s a combat unit gonna do?

[Aquilae]

While Wizards are indeed absurdly more powerful with summons under their belt, the Wizard hardly needs them to be amazing with how huge their damage output is. The Summoner class however has a fair tradeoff, cause what it makes up for in damage (since Wizards can wtf power boost their spells to ridiculous power, and due to how early the start, can have lvl 2 stuff before summoners even become a possibility, or an improvement) with it's wide AoE. n tight cramped areas, the huge AoE might outdo the high damage overall.

I'd like to point out that Summons do more damage than a level 2 spell, have higher AoE, and only cost at most 200 JP (counting job reqs. and starting JP) to unlock. In fact, you might not want to get the level 2 spells at all. You can save the JP for MA Up and blow things away with Summons.

Also, Summons are 100% accurate, and later summons (Leviathan, Odin, Bahamut) have 3 AoE and crazy high damage, which blows every enemy apart.

The earliness and superpowering the Wizard can do for their own spells is what would largely seperate the two, since you can't just go straight into summoner. Even once you unlock it, you still gotta build the JP up to give it 1 spell while the wizard could have several of which to abuse weather with.

With the JP you used to buy 2 level 2 spells, you could have gone into Summoner and bought 1 Summon, which outdamages and outAoE's the level 2 spells even without a weather boost.

We also shouldn't discount Golem. Due to a programming oversight (...I hope...), AI units prioritise breaking Golem instead of using abilities that go through it. This is a great boon to your units, because you will be protected for a few turns while the enemy tries to break through it. Combine it with Abandon, Blade Grasp, Hamedo and other reactions, and the enemy can't do much during that period.

If you're skeptical about this, here's a vid of Golem in action. Just fast-forward to after the 3-minute mark, and you'll see how well it works.

So, in summary Summoners are basically Wizard++, and they only require 2 Chemist / 2 Wizard / 2 Time Mage to unlock, which is really cheap in terms of JP. I'd move it to Top, below Monk. I'd also throw Wizard down into Top of Top, since it's earlygame advantage isn't very significant at all, considering the relatively cheap JP costs to go into summoner vs. the JP costs to unlock higher level Black Magic, which is inferior to Summons.

Generally it's because it's the only skillset the physical job tree has that can be deemed spammable without costing us money in buying equipment, and their disabling effects. Sure it's not strong, and the situation is dependent on the terrain, but what else s a combat unit gonna do?

I'd like to push for Geomancers down as well. It takes a crapload of JP to have Elemental function properly, and even then it's an attack that does piddly damage and is reliant on it's unreliable status proc. The basic Geomancy (Hell Ivy + Demon Fire + Kamitatchi + Carve Model) already costs 600 JP, and that's not counting the numerous Local Quake and Pitfall tiles. Geomancers simply can't compare to Lancers, Oracles, Chemists and Priests in damage output and support, and is also an inferior carrier class due to it's mediocre stats.

A unit that has mediocre stats, mediocre damage output, costs a lot of JP and is reliant on ~20% status procs is not worthy of Top tier in the least. I'd kick it into Upper Mid, below Chemists.

[Espinosa]

I do agree that the Calculator is a burden to the party if taken along to battle prior to learning its cheapest skills, but what I'm not saying is that this shouldn't be done at all. If you plan to use a Calculator in an efficient (=fast in this case) run, you will dispose of all enemies but one, cripple that one enemy and grind your JP to the necessary level. Once the right skills have been learnt, you reclass to Wizard, set Math Skill as secondary and obliterate stuff. If you do this early, you can make the rest of the missions significantly quicker. It'd be really cheap, but I think it pays off well, though I wouldn't diminish the significant amount of grinding needed to settle in it. If you compare it to other lowest tier classes, those will not be beneficial to the party no matter how much time you spend grinding them up. Calculators, on the contrary, will be the team's absurdly cheap units.

I did no grinding whatsoever, too, and still got two Ninjas fairly early. It just depends on how you set your priorities, and I set mine to get to Ninja as soon as possible, beginning with the Archer and Thief jobs when these jobs could still do non-laughable damage and there were other units to take care of most enemies, then going the more efficient Knight > Monk > Geomancer path (any of these jobs is more than good at melee combat). Actually, I remember having a Ninja fighting in the fake Ovelia battle, that's how early I was able to get it (skipping all the random encounters). It took Ramza quite a bit longer to get to Ninja than the generic, but that's because I had him master different skills (mainly the unique Squire ones at first).

I agree that the JP Glitch shouldn't be taken into account when talking about these matters.

Going into Summoner is easy enough - I think having a Time Mage out just for one single battle is enough to open it for that character. And if you train more than one mage (not a bad idea at all, I would argue), the other one will have access to Summoner shortly without even having to reclass to Time Mage.

Oh, and if a combat unit is too far from action, he could just, you know, wait. Your next turn will come sooner, too.

[Rodykitty]

Just found some skill tier list on GameFAQs' FFT board:

I just want to point out that GameFAQs isn't exactly open to judging things based on efficiency. Edited July 4, 2011 by Rodykitty

[Espinosa]

They mainly judge things based on maximum potential, like most gamers do. Efficiency can be viewed as immediate usefulness or how long-term grinding justifies the final product of the effort invested into having something reach its full potential. Certainly though, that list doesn't reflect things like availability, situational usefulness in particular missions (e.g. Weapon Break helps disable particularly nasty storyline enemies) and various other factors, only the top of strength when everything is mastered.

A bit off-topic, but reliance on single-target blitzing in FF6 is terribly luck-reliant and not efficient at all. If you get unlucky, Sabin will waste your time blitzing the wrong enemies that are already near critical health (when if you could manually target something, you'd aim your strongest attack at something at max health and have a mandatory, weaker unit like Locke finish off the weakened monster). AuraBolt and Bum Rush both suffer from this, so that's a major shortcoming Sabin has to face from start to finish. Imagine facing Tier 3 of Kefka, and Bum Rushing Sleep instead of Girl - she will just keep using White Wind, and the battle will go nowhere. Finally, Sabin has poor equipment choices and is easily taken out by a powerful elemental attack. Other characters have ridiculous perfect MEvade setups that are easily available w/o Paly Shield being necessary, can equip stuff like Minerva and Force Armor, which Sabin can't... The man is a glass cannon, and his single target blitzes are too random to be relied upon. A very fine person in boss battles, though.

[Dark Sage]

I'd like to point out that Summons do more damage than a level 2 spell, have higher AoE, and only cost at most 200 JP (counting job reqs. and starting JP) to unlock. In fact, you might not want to get the level 2 spells at all. You can save the JP for MA Up and blow things away with Summons.

Also, Summons are 100% accurate, and later summons (Leviathan, Odin, Bahamut) have 3 AoE and crazy high damage, which blows every enemy apart.

Summons are better than I gave them credit for, but you're ignoring the MP cost for the summons. Early on, you can pretty much only cast one summon before needing an Ether. Also keep in mind that Golem costs 600 JP and even with Gained JP Up, it takes awhile to learn it and even then, it's cost is steep (it's worth the cost though).

You're also underestimating just how good Wizards are. You can immediately get and use Wizards as early as Mandalia Plains and the amount of turns they save is phenomenal. The thing is, Wizards deal the most damage early on and they can cast their spells fairly often before running out of MP. They also have ridiculous MA, so they can use any MA skillset with the best effect. Also keep in mind that they're the most reliable way of killing groups early on and even killing single enemies. Simply put, the amount of turns they save throughout Part 1, combined with their strengths (cheap magic in MP, relatively cheap in JP, Best MA, saves the most turns early on), really does put them in their own tier.

I will move Summoners up though and I will move Geomancers down to High tier. Geomancers just have really good stats and some good equipment options.

Also moving Mediators down. Their ability to use guns doesn't make them a full tier above Squires now that I think about it. I think I also put them their for allowing you to get monsters for poaching but it's not likely we're doing so.

[Espinosa]

I noticed that sometimes a single summoning of Shiva (or two) is just enough to end a battle. If you keep using the Summoner class, Half MP Cost is a useful ability, especially if you decide to run support with Golem.

[Dark Sage]

It takes a long time to get Half MP though, so he might not get it until late in the game.

I dunno. Early on, the Wizard spells really are enough to kill things in one hit, or are very close to it. And unlike a Summoner, they can do it multiple times before requiring an Ether. I think the Wizard's MP efficiency and higher MA, combined with their better earlygame, really does have more of an impact than the summoner's magic.

[Aquilae]

You get Silk Robes after Lenalia. Combine that with a Red Hood, and there's a +24 MP boost already. A level 4, female Wizard turned Summoner has 25 MP on average, with the MP boost from Red Hood and Silk Robe, there's just enough MP for 2 Summons. Assuming that Wizard gets unlocked after Sweegy Woods, that's about 4 battles that the Wizard can cast more than 1 spell, when the Summoner cannot. Hell, the Summoner might not even be unlocked until that point. However, 4 storyline battles don't make up to much of a lead in the grand scheme of things. After Lenalia Plateau, there are 45 storyline battles to go, 45 storyline battles where the Summoner clearly trumps the Wizard.

However, the Wizard does not have as noticeable an offensive lead as you would expect. They have 8 MA at level 8. Assuming the Wizard has 65 Fa and the target has 55 Fa (the median Fa number), they do 64 damage. Summoners have 7 MA at level 8, giving them 68 damage assuming the same situation. Both of them one-shot the same targets (Spellcasters, Archers and Thieves), while two-shotting the more tanky ones (Knights and Monks).

Except, Summon does it with 100% accuracy and better AoE, and can grab the KO on lower Fa lower HP / higher Fa higher HP targets. The JP they gain can be used for better spells, such as Golem and the 3 AoE Summons, while the JP going to Wizard is wasted on positively inferior options that barely match Summons in terms of Utility and JP cost.

Also, I've been meaning to ask, does this tier list rank classes or skillsets?

Edited July 4, 2011 by Aquilae

[grandjackal]

1. You can't just jump straight to Summoner, you have to be a Time Mage first, and being a Time Mage is a noticeable drop in offense due to the lack of not being able to equip Rods. One must also consider that we might not get Magic UP before unlocking Time Mage class, thus meaning we might spend more time still in Wizard first, as to power up Summon spells.

2. Can Summoners equip rods? Like I said, I'm kinda clueless with this game, and I've yet to actually uh...Need a summoner.

[Espinosa]

Getting your Time Mage to job level 2 requires one mission. One, no more. After which you'll be free to use Summoner for the rest of the game (which is the great majority of missions). If you haven't learnt Magic Attack UP yet, you can switch back to Wizard as soon as you learn your first Summoner spell, and then switch back to Summoner to make use of her superior abilities.

Yes, Summoners can equip Rods too, but that's not so important because eventually you'll be relying on Black Robe/108 Gems to power up your elemental damage, anyway.

[Dark Sage]

Summoners do indeed equip rods.

And this tier list ranks classes, but here's the thing. Classes are ranked based on their availability, their abilities, and what they do with various abilities in their class. Note that if a class requires more JP to get their abilities, that is a negative. With the summoner, that is a negative, though not nearly as much as other classes.

I got the Summoner unlocked by the Fovoham battle I believe and I definitely had the Wizard unlocked right after the Gariland battle, so that's around a 6 battle lead. The wizard saved me so many turns during those six battles, so I believe it is indeed an important advantage.

Still, they are definitely closer together than I thought, so I think I'll put the Summoner into Top Tier.

EDIT: Damn. Ninja'd.

Also moved Wizard out of God tier and the Summoner is now below Monk, only two spaces below the Wizard.

Edited July 4, 2011 by Sagekitty

[eclipse]

I'm playing the PSP Japanese version. Here's how to unlock Summoner:

Chemist 2/Wizard 3/Time Mage 3

Not sure if it's just the Japanese version, the PSP version, or what.

[Dark Sage]

It's Chemist 2/Wizard 2/Time Mage 2 to get the Summoner in the PSX version. The PSP version must've changed it.

[grandjackal]

I'm playing the PSP Japanese version. Here's how to unlock Summoner:

Chemist 2/Wizard 3/Time Mage 3

Not sure if it's just the Japanese version, the PSP version, or what.

Indeed it's different. Looking at gfaqs job map, it's only 2 levels Wizard and Time Mage, so the time it takes is significantly shorter.

I also doubt you can just get a full job level in 1 fight. 2, however, is not that big a difference, so I suppose you have a point.