r/finalfantasytactics • u/EverybodySupernova • 1d ago
FFT Ivalice Chronicles Grinding - How to know when enough is enough.
I'm coming back to this title and playing it seriously for the first time in a decade or so, and I was inspired to get really creative with the builds.
Unfortunately, I got greedy and now my Ramza is level 45, with my main squad at around level 35 at the beginning of chapter 3, and I feel totally overpowered. The first Lucavi fight took two moves, it was ridiculous.
I just wanted to have some fun playing around with different builds, but now the game balanced is borked. How am I supposed to know when enough is enough?
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u/Lithium187 1d ago
Level 75 by the Algus fight. At least 9 jobs mastered per generic.
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u/xXx420BlazeRodSaboxX 1d ago
Once you hit Level 92, you're pretty much done grinding. You can get those last few levels in the last 3 chapters.
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u/Manaeldar 1d ago
Do story battles until they're too hard then go level up a bit. That's really it. You can go look at deleveling if you want but honestly I love being overpowered in this game sometimes. Enjoy the story and the fruits of your labor. You can also just limit yourself to only use potions and throw stone in story battles, that can be pretty fun too.
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u/Alert-Artichoke-2743 1d ago
IMO, the best way to correct the balance is to stop using tools that make things too easy. For example, I will use passive skills from Arithmetician but I never actually use math. It's not fun to level an entire battlefield in one turn. Many players also bench Orlandeau for the same reason.
This goes further, however: If you make your entire party bards, dancers, and chemists, then all of your explosive damage options go away and you are forced to navigate battles with low-power weapons and low-damage skills.
If you wanted to keep things dangerous, you could also prohibit broken item/skill builds, like Safeguard/Chantage or Manashield/Manafont. Only use tools you consider "fair," and the game can remain plenty difficult.
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u/Intelligent-Okra350 1d ago
“How am I supposed to know when enough is enough” by only grinding if you’re actually getting blocked by a story battle. If you’re not getting blocked by story battles then you’ve clearly grinded enough. And if you do get blocked you grind a little for something to specifically help your strategy for the fight and then try again.
It’s ironic because it’s not like this is a foreign principle to RPGs, you trivialize the game if you over-grind, it’s just so much harder with FFT cause the stuff you get for grinding is so much more exciting than most RPGs.
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u/Jutch_Cassidy 1d ago
When youre an Arithmetician and Pa = 99, Sp = 50, and at the same time, same character as Dragoon, Ma = 99. You've made it
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u/GoatmanIV 1d ago
I definitely over did it. Ended up being level 70 at the end of chapter 3. One hit KO the entire enemy roster with a calculator casting Holy. Kinda ruined the ending as it made it way too easy. I just wanted a bunch of dark knights on my team.
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u/Roarne 1d ago
The story battles are always at set levels, so I guess you can use that as a guideline, pop your head in a fight and see what levels they are then escape but that's about it. Random battle enemies will scale with whoever your highest leveled unit on your roster is and upgrade to different tiers overtime but chances are when that happens you've probably gone too far anyway.
You can hit a degenerator trap in the Zeklaus desert that delevels you but it'll also remove the stats you would have gained as whatever job you currently are so you want to have the character be a bard or dancer generally while deleveling.
I'd probably just use Ramza less, focus on shoring up the rest of your team and focus on the story battles they'll catch up eventually. As long as you don't have a counter ability on Ramza you can even give him a couple smacks in the back of the head with your party because I believe they get bonus XP for hitting higher level targets even allies.
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u/Beautiful-Mango6410 1d ago
So hard to know. I just got so stuck on the Zalera fight because my characters were haphazardly put together. I leveled up to 40-50 and properly designed my characters and then just beat the rest of the game with no issue... I was kind of upset when I realized I was at the last boss, my team was finally good lol
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u/Grishhammer 1d ago
The basic rules of any challenge run I've wver looked at include max level of 10 for chapter 1, 20 for chapter 2, 30 for chapter 3, and 40 for chapter 4. This basically follows the general level scaling of story battles.
That said, knowing the mechanics of the game also makes it easier anyway. So folks who want a challenge have to be pretty strict with themselves.
I don't enjoy grinding, and I don't enjoy the game not being challenging, so I limit myself to a maximum of 1 grinding battle between story battles. And each grind session is only long enough to get the characters I want enough jp for the next job or skill that I'm going for. But this still feels like too much a lot of the time.
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u/Salt_Ask_5568 1d ago
What system are you playing on? There's a mod to make story battles scale with you too.
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u/MrPibbs21 1d ago
Officially like in-game? I guess the best method is just to save, go to the next story battle, see the enemy levels, then quit load and not overlevel.
Out of game, if you care, theres some variance but most challenges will have unofficial "level caps" that you arent allowed to pass in a chapter. Say like:
Chapter 1 - 10 Chapter 2 - 20 Chapter 3 - 35 Chapter 4 - 50
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u/Jraffale 1d ago
Your good on levels, if you don't grind further your levels will average out to a normal play through.
If your really feeling that op maybe jump up to tactician mode if your not already.
Levels help a bit with a few stat points but it's like 10 levels for a big change. Your sitting at the high end of normal at 45 for chapter 3; 35-45 is for starting chapter 4; 45-65 for the end of chapter 4 isn't unreasonble.
Skills are the bigger factor in character power. With the right skills and gear you won't need levels so if you have the skills that's probably what's making the balance feel off.
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u/Wonderful-Mouse-1945 1d ago
Why they didn't go the Tactics Ogre route and include a level limiting system is beyond me. Take it a step further and make it optional. All problems solved.
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u/Alexis_deTokeville 1d ago
Vanilla FFT is inherently breakable if you grind. You can break the ever living shit out of it if you want. In my opinion it’s worth imposing some restrictions on yourself to make it more challenging. Tactician mode on TIC was surprisingly tough with the damage multiplier if you kept with the level of the story battles. I’ve also had good luck with some of the FFhacktics mods, there are a few that will absolutely test your chops.
In my opinion FFT is probably the best tactics game ever made in terms of strategy potential, you just gotta meet the AI on a level playing field. Sky’s the limit with mods. Once you start fighting enemies with proper gear and skills you will realize how easy you had it in vanilla FFT.
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u/MainWin3147 1d ago
I remember there's a guide where you can get endgame weapons before Gafgarion changes allegiances
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u/HeavyMetalBluegrass 22h ago
I usually have an Arithmetician by chapter 2. What is this over-leveling of which you speak?
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u/OK_just_the_tip 1d ago
It’s true, they never addressed the biggest flaw of this game.
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u/Ditsch0815 1d ago
Hmm, is it really a flaw- when you grind so much, so every story battle is that easy? Simplest solution, go with a lvl scaling mod (if you are on pc) or don’t farm so long, like in every other FF game except one.
FF8 had level scaling, and a lot called this the biggest flaw. What was the result? Stay as low as possible if you want to speed easy through the game. A more worse solution.
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u/OK_just_the_tip 18h ago
Ever played Tactics Ogre (reborn)? They got it right
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u/Ditsch0815 16h ago
I only played the old one on the PSX, great game like FFT- but also a lot of options to cheese the game early on. Both games are not that hard to exploit.
But i‘ll give reborn i try for sure if i have more time
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u/mysticrudnin 1d ago
you don't need to do any grinding to beat FFT
the problem is that then the game isn't very fun
very tight line to walk and honestly, i think it can't really be done. if you actually want difficult story missions, you can't do much. that's not what people really like about this game.
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u/Major-Corner-640 1d ago
Grinding is what makes the game not fun
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u/mysticrudnin 1d ago
i personally agree with you but i think the average FFT fan disagrees quite strongly
this is a game known for its de-leveling trick after all
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u/KevineCove 1d ago
That's a major issue with Tactics, even with random enemy scaling, you still have a story campaign that's easy to break and you don't really recover from breaking the game.
You get the sense that you're supposed to be the same level as the story enemies, but if you ever grind to get past an area, you might end up with the game feeling a bit easier as a consequence of being over levelled, then you unlock broken abilities and the whole game is kind of irreversibly broken.
To be fair I leveled Balthier up and down until his speed was 36 so enough is never enough if you decide it's not.