Final Fantasy V Four Job Fiesta, Run 2-03

North Mountain, though another short dungeon, proved to be quite the annoyance for my thiefy team.

Between high damage and enemies having evasion, I was using Potions after every fight, and having to use actual strategy with my row placement!  I eventually settled on the people with higher damage in the front row, and 2 people in the back row to steal/throw Potions around.  It worked, and I was able to mostly break even on Potions, sometimes through fleeing scary fights like the ones with Blocks.  At least everything died in 3 hits, sometimes 2 if I rolled high damage twice.  I also grabbed 5 Softs from Cockatrices, which I fully intended to sell at the next town for pure profit.

Whoa, that's a nice steal!  The Glasses accessory boosts defense, magic defense and makes the wearer immune to the Blind status.  Swoop made the Cockatrice fights a lot more dangerous since it does full damage irregardless of row (or would deal 100+ if the RockGarter wasn't there, I'm not sure which but neither outcome is desirable).  I reached the save point at level 8, so I fought a few battles to reach level 9 before taking on Magisa...

...and Forza.  I was dealing about 60 damage with Reina and Galuf and 80 with Bartz and Faris, so Magissa summoned Forza after just 2 spells and died before she could cast a third.  Since her 2nd spell was a missed Drain, this was a good opening to the fight!  Shame I had to waste a turn on an Antidote on Reina due to story stuff-though I do like the events that occur outside the battles will sometimes change a status.  So that left me with the powerful brawler Forza.  His higher defense meant I was dealing ~45 or ~60 damage per hit, and he was dealing a lot of damage to me every time he struck!  Ummm...that's a oneshot from full HP....yeah.  Thankfully I have Phoenix Downs, and managed to win on the first attempt with 8 Potions left in my inventory, without dipping into my pile of Elixirs.

After defeating this duo, plot happens involving Reina poisoning herself for a dragon, the dragon healing her somehow, Bartz being afraid of heights and everyone laughing at him (not funny guys) and we get a dragon to fly around.  Normally, you'd head to Walse first to open up the Walse Tower, but I have a different plan in mind-Tycoon.  There's an optional event revealing that Reina and Faris are sisters, but also quite the treasure hoard.  Being the typical RPG hero, Bartz loots it all-he has every right to it, having 2 princesses, one of whom is a pirate and a king in the party alongside him.  The treasure retrieved tallied up to 1 Hi-Potion, 2 Ethers, a Cabin (Cottage), 2 Phoenix Downs, 1 Maiden's Kiss and 2 Elixirs from the castle, and the armory yielded a Katana, Shuriken, Giyaman's Bell and the Heal Staff.

After looting Tycoon for all it was worth, I proceeded with the plot to Walse.  Stocked up on Potions (up to 40), swapped out my Copper Plates for Training...somethings, probably Uniform but it doesn't say.  The point is they give me 1 additional point of strength-a big deal for weak melee classes like this one!  I also found a 2nd pair of Glasses in the town while hunting for Shiva-since I didn't know what my second class would be, I was trying to prepare for anything.  That, and an optional boss could be fun :3.  Then I went to the castle and looted it too, obtaining 490 gil, a Tent and a Phoenix Down from the upper floors, and abusing the Flee command to escape from the Garkimasra/Harpy encounters in the basement with no damage.  Definitely glad I got Thief for that, since the 2000 gil and Elf Cape became no more difficult to obtain than any other common treasure.

I messed up once though, and Reina paid the price.

Then I spoke with the king, he didn't listen, a meteor crashed into the earth this plot is stupid the king runs off to go die at the tower and we follow, knowing no one else can stand up to the unknown threat.  But first, I found the mini-dungeon with Shiva!

Believe it or not, I'd never actually been in here before, since it is hidden behind a waterfall.  Shiva alternates between attacking the front row and the back row with Ice2 for around 80 damage, unless a row is empty in which case she attacks only the full row, or only one person is in the row making it deal 160 damage.  The Commanders hit hard too, being unsurvivable if hit from the front row after an Ice2.  So how could I win this fight now, without wasting valuable items?

I couldn't.  Oh well, I can always come back later when I'm better equipped and a higher level, and hopefully with a more useful class too.  I headed off to Walse Tower, where there were many amazing steals to be had-RikaldMages had Rods which I can turn around and sell for profit later, and Wyverns (Y Burn, in the Anthology translation) had Mythril Daggers.  These Mythril Daggers gave a hefty increase to attack power, from the 14 of the Dagger up to 23.  There was also a Silver Ring lying around, a better version of the Glasses without the status protection.  I reached level 10 on the last fight before Galura, which was enough to make Bartz and Galuf deal extra damage compared to Reina and Faris due to the way the strength modifier works.

It's hard to see here, but Bartz is slowed and Faris is
asleep.  I only had 2 Mythril Daggers at this point

That brought me to Galura.  Galura is another entirely physical boss-if I had gotten Knight this fight would be a joke, but since I have low defense and no way to mitigate damage, I have to fight this fight in the front row.

Once Galura loses 400 HP, the fight becomes quite a bit trickier since Galura counters everything with a regular attack, and sometimes a higher damage attack that inflicts HP Leak in addition to that!  My strategy was simple-have everyone attack once, and switch the slightly weaker girls to the back row to take less damage.  Their turns would be throwing Potions unless none needed throwing, in which case I would defend.  Bartz and Galuf would throw Potions if anyone needed healing, and one of them would attack every round.  The strategy worked perfectly on the first attempt, using only Potions and again ending with 8 in stock, with no Phoenix Downs used.  Galura dropped a Hi-Potion which will be nice-one less to steal later.

Between the Water Crystal job classes of Berserker, Mystic Knight, Time Mage, Red Mage and Summoner, I wanted Time Mage most, because Hasted Thieves are something to fear.  Let's see what I got...

Aww crap, now I have to go beat up Shiva.  At least this won't be boring, but MP is going to be an issue...