FFXII - Picking the Three

So, been trying to get in some time lately but it's been hard. Didn't get a whole lot done in the last two days. I headed out to the Stilshrine in Miriam and ran through that dungeon. There was a bit of puzzle solving involved which was cool and at the end I had to fight Mateus. Once he was defeated I had my second Esper who I gave to Ashe.

I knew things were a little off when the esper fight proved so difficult. The dungeon in general was a bit tough at times. My entire party of six was about level 25 at the end when I finally gained possession of the Sword. Upon receiving it, the party said that Ashe should see if it works, try to break the Dawn Shard with it since the shard no longer held any power. But as she places the shard to break it with the sword, Rasler appears once more and shakes his head. She swings and misses on purpose. The shard glows then fades away, fearing the sword but knowing the danger has passed. This time though, when she asks Vaan, he didn't see Rasler, only she did. We head on outside. And when we look up we see an entire fleet of airships on their way to Mt Bur Omisace. Wow, Vayne has balls.

We arrive to a burned out refugee camp with many people dead or beaten. The Judge (can't remember his name) came for Larsa. Larsa went willingly to avoid any blood shed but once Larsa was in hand the Judge ransacked the place anyway. We arrive and they tell us to leave at once, the Judge is still there in the temple. Of course we're not going anywhere. We continue up the road and into the temple. There we find the Judge and his victim, the dreamsage, who he's just murdered.

The Judge is crazy with power and we can see a faint shadow of a demon in him. His very body emanates with the power of the Mist from manufacted nethicite. He sees us and deems it's our time to die. I then get into a battle and he destroys me. Reset. Die again. Ok...

So when I played FFXII before, I played with my room mate. He played three characters and I played three characters. So I had no issues keeping everyone on the same level and using them during boss fights. But it's just too much now on a time table. It was time to pick my three and leave the others behind for the time being. I went back to the Stilshrine, setup and grind route and killed undead through a chain of 198 or so. This net me five levels and about 100k in gil which I needed badly for gear anyway. With my chosen three of Basch as tank, Vaan and DPS and support, and Ashe as healer and DPS I went back in and killed the Judge, not easily but he died.

I'd forgotten how merciless this game was with boss fights. With the sword in hand now, we decided that we need to kill Vayne and destroy the nethicite. We head off to Archadia. However I just want to mention some annoying shopping first. I bought a bunch of gear to fight the Judge with my 100k. After the fight, of course, new gear popped up. I bought that. Then I went back to Rabanastre, two minutes later, new gear. Gah! Bought that. Moved down to Nalbina twenty minutes later on the way to Archadia, new gear. Fuck. Now I'm broke with barely up to date gear. Annoying.

Anyway, I ventured forth and the mobs are easy but the tough mobs are hard. I think I have to grind up another five levels or so tonight. I fought a boss in the woods near the end of the night and it took me about twenty minutes to kill him. I went through elixirs and several phoenix downs and handkerchiefs. In my experience, it's never a good thing when you have to use an Elixir before the final boss fight in a FF game. Got some work to do and not much time to do it. I think I'm going to have to lock my door to get my room mate to leave me alone.