SHADOWTEXT'S PROFILE

author=Clest link=topic=2607.msg48945#msg48945 date=1228356921
I still find all pixel better looking than static drawings, specially when those draweings are more realistic portraits.

Yeah, but would you rather it be the same pixels over and over with little more difference than the colors?

Monsters being huge and detailed while characters are small and simplified comes as a time saving measure with an attempt at still looking good. If monsters are the same size as the player characters, it's only fair to expect they be animated the same way those characters are, and if they're animated the same way the characters are, it's going to take a lot longer to make each monster. Which, realistically, means a lot more palette swaps than we already have to deal with.

Big, detailed but motionless monsters mean we can have a variety of monsters, and when it's large they can be drawn instead of having to be done pixel-by-pixel. Which also saves time, and often looks a lot better.

It's inconsistent, but it's preferable to fighting the same monster over and over because making more would take too long. I'd be much more annoyed by that.

D&D 4th simplified the roles of characters in battle even further, you know. Pretty similar to the ones Craze listed, but anyway:

Striker: Dishes out lots of damage and avoids getting hit. Generally fairly squishy, relying on avoiding being attacked rather than soaking damage--your classic Glass Cannons and Nukes.
Defender: Soaks damage and keeps allies from being killed. Tanks.
Leader: Heals and provides support to allies. Healers / Buffers.
Controllers: Deal with multiple enemies at once and control the battlefield in a tactical sense, by setting up traps or dealing out Debuffs.

It really makes it a lot easier to think of what role a character's going to play in a party, because that basically covers everything you're going to see in battle, and meets the classic D&D party lineup of Rogue, Fighter, Cleric and Wizard besides.

Beyond that, it's all just filling in the details about how they fill their role, and figuring out whether they dabble in any of the other roles. And there's always your out-of-battle stuff, like Item Creation, navigation, survival, what have you to provide even more details. Even though they both fill the same role, there's a lot of difference between a Ranger and a Thief, or a Cleric and a Bard.

Yeah, Augments make a huge difference. The New Game+ carries over little more than Augments (there are also some weapons and things that carry over, but they're ultra rare drops and I didn't get any), but it's so much easier. It goes by about three times faster just having Cecil with Draw Attacks, Counter, and Kick throughout the whole game.

...first playthrough, though? Move to a new area and get ANNIHILATED was basically the rule.

author=GreatRedSpirit link=topic=2227.msg37870#msg37870 date=1224005194
Bad example. The Black Mage learns nothing from AP that it already doesn't have. To be a good Black Mage all you need to do is switch classes to the Black Mage. If you want to have a selection of black magic spells you need to work at it. This was pretty much true for any of the spell casting classes, and the skills you learn are only really effective when you're another spell casting class since a character's stats are solely based on what class they are (with exception to Bare and Mimic which revolve around mastering 5-6 classes).

I really gotta disagree here. The whole point of mastering spell casting classes is to use the spell caster as a sub-job, and there are some fine examples where you sub something like a mastered Gladiator/MagiKnight (depending on the version you're playing) into something like a Knight or a Wanderer with Two Swords and get an EVERYTHING DIES.

Also: A mastered Red Mage is about two hundred and twelve times better than a Red Mage of any other level because of Doublecast.