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FFR: RDM/THF/GEO/EVO playthrough Part I
Oct. 30th, 2023 01:43 amI first learned of the Final Fantasy Renaissance project through a friend, who found it through Celdia's streams. I wasted no time in introducing it to Sullla, who has as of writing done one variant on the legacy version as well as having another in process. I decided when I had a distraction lull and after seeing his first publication that it was finally time to do a run of my own on it. I would be using the new mode of it with added jobs and content. Despite the fact that the 2.0 version of the game was on the horizon and I was originally waiting for that to start anything.
In addition to changes and tweaks for the original six jobs, Renaissances adds an additional ten (!) jobs to the game as of writing. Jobs now come with up to three kinds of abilities. Combat skills can be used during battle and act like commands in later Final Fantasy games. World abilities are used in the overworld and have a variety of features. Finally, passive traits come up in a variety of situations and are labeled as anything from the Black Belt's unarmed abilities, Geomancer's ability to prevent tile damage, or just stating what a mage can do.
I felt it would be a good idea to get a sense of the new jobs before trying anything funny variant wise. Of course, I was also interested in seeing how the changes to the old jobs would work out. With sixteen jobs, I came up with a list of four parties making use of each of these classes at least once. Hopefully, they would turn out to make for interesting and not-too-painful experiences!
This would be my first playthrough. The two base game classes whose changes I was most looking forward to were the Thief and the Red Mage. The former was notoriously bad, partially due to bugs. There was very little reason to consider taking one; the No Items/Potions challenge run I did was one of the few examples of where doing so isn't completely suboptimal. By comparison, Red Mages rule the roost when it comes to magic in Final Fantasy 1, also partially due to bugs. So long as you were not under variant restrictions, particularly no class changing, they were almost completely superior to Black Mages and did most of the important things White Mages could do. While the HEAL spells were off-limits, they could still get LIFE and EXIT. And by the time you hit bosses where elemental spells are ineffective, FAST on attackers is better - including the Red itself in lieu of anything else.
It remains to be seen how they play out in practice. But on paper, Renaissance has given Thief a new tool in MUG, a command that attacks and steals gold from an enemy - no item theft, for better or worse. They have a world ability called SEARCH that allows you to find "hidden valuables" on field maps. Finally, they increase movement speed on the overworld. Yay? This seemed to be more like later releases of Final Fantasy V where running is enabled by default, but they could make it go faster. Red Mages meanwhile have the SABOTEUR passive, which is said to give them an accuracy boost when casting enfeebling magic. Given I like to abuse those when possible, it seemed like a perfect fit for me anyway! Now, it was mentioned in a post shortly after typing this up that they were getting Level 8 spells of some sort, but this hopefully won't be too drastic. Or maybe it'll update midrun and there will be compatibility!
As for the two new classes, Evoker is a class based around summoning monsters. Like in many later Final Fantasy games, it is necessary to defeat them in battle before acquiring them. I picked up this class, even restarting my playthrough to use it with the final class: Geomancer. Its combat ability is TERRAIN, which seems to work similar to Final Fantasy III and V. As I mentioned, their LIGHT STEP trait means no taking damage from the lava in Gurgu Volcano, the spikes in the Ice Cave, etc. as long as they're the displayed character. I heard good things about this class from talk in the FFR Discord, so I was looking forward to see just how effective this would be. It's hard to do worse than FF5's Geomancer at least.
To use an overworld ability, the character must be the displayed one. This can be switched at will in FFR instead of it being locked to the first character slot. Thief's SEARCH worked like a dowsing rod: it displayed messages as I got closer to a hidden item. You need to face the correct location to obtain it. There was most notably 100G hidden in the well, which helped fund some of my purchases: Chain for Redall, Wooden Armor for Thea, and clothes for the mages. The first two got Rapiers, the last two got Wooden Staves.
There was a portal to the Astral Plane in Coneria as shown there, but I ignored it for the time being. This meant that Evoker was going to be highly useless until I got spells. As I went out into the overworld and initiated my first battle, I was able to start getting accustomed to Geomancer. They had four spell levels, each presently with a single use. They could also use their special ability TERRAIN to cast one of these spells at random, with a chance to restore spell points. I also saw several ones not on the list pop up from time to time.
There were three terrains directly available on the overworld. On the plains, the first of the four spells available for direct casting on plains was WIND GUST, which dealt Wind-elemental damage to a single enemy. Wind isn't an element in the original FF1, so this was a new thing for Renassiance. SHINING FLARE and TANGLEVINE did low level AoE damage, the former in Fire element and the latter non-elemental with a chance to inflict paralysis. I wasn't too impressed by the damage, but thankfully, I found later on that it scaled. Finally, Sunbath was like a HEAL spell! Two of the other spells I saw here were TWISTER, which had no indication as to what it did, and THUNDERBOLT, which did massive ST Lit damage.
There were additional spells in the forests and swamps. Using a spell charge from one location didn't use the same spot in the others. Conversely however, a TERRAIN use could not restore a spell charge from another terrain. For brevity, I'll cover these in a magic section in my articles page.
Once I hit level 2, I went into that portal to the Astral Plane. I encountered a lot of IMPs in this negative world that had music that seemed like it came straight out of an Earthbound game. I had to chase and speak with a sparkle thrice in order to fight it. There were more TERRAIN spells here. The biggest standout was DREAM SHROUD: a 30% boost to magic damage for all allies. Whoa, that is certainly good.
The boss somehow ambushed me and attacked with its special, GOBLIN PUNCH, that did around 30 damage to Georg. I had to spend Evelyn's turn on DRINK - not like she was doing much else. Thea used MUG but couldn't steal any gold, so I had her attack normally. I'm not sure if MUG does less damage or if it can indeed just replace FIGHT. Redall cast FIRE a few times. I gave ASTRAL SHIFT a whirl - an ability that inflicts random status ailments - but it only hit Poison. Boo.
After this and getting the goods in the castle, I went to the Temple of Fiends. Naturally, there were more Geomancy spells to be had in the temple. CARVE MODEL did non-elemental to one target. No petrification nonsense like in FFT, alas. CLOSE-IN hit all foes and could inflict Darkness. The last two looked interesting: MARBLE ARMOR increased absorb by 20%, and FORGED IN IRON boosted attack and accuracy by 10%. Given I was dealing with GARLAND the notorious fraud, I mostly buffed and sandbagged while robbing him with the Thief.
There was a second boss for summoner in the Temple of Fiends. There was no indication as to what I would be fighting here, as the enemy set was the same as in the temple. After a lot of meandering from the center-right to the bottom left to right in front of Garland's chamber that took my party to level 3, I found Kirin. This was accompanied by three WOLFs and used an ability that restored health and gave Regen to the enemies. I took advantage of DREAM SHROUD here. Kirin fell quickly and the WOLFs were no threat.
That apparently filled out the Evoker's Lv1 spells. KIRIN did what it did in the battle: a HEAL spell (restoring 12-24HP) and Regen, restoring 5% of max HP at the end of every turn for 5 turns. Decent, especially for a level 1 casting. But the real winner seemed to be GOBLIN. This did "semi-random" base non-elemental damage with a base damage of 40 (20-80 damage), capping damage at the user's max HP. Despite this, I was seeing it hit for slightly more than Evelyn's max HP, and heard it gets even stronger later.
This was also the first time in forever I felt compelled to head to Matoya's Cave immediately, thanks to the Thief's ability. It paid off when I found a pair of Gloves in the old witch's abode, the first worthwhile thing. Sure, they weren't much, but they were something. Moreover, there was another summon to find.
I was attacked by BROOMs when I entered! They were hopelessly weak, but it was funny I guess. The boss was CAIT SITH, which could inflict mass confusion. I reset the first time because Evelyn hit a critical on Georg at ridiculously low odds. I just removed the characters' weapons to deal with it. The spell could do the same thing to enemies and it made the PIRATEs even more of a joke. To rub it in more, the available spells there included two AoE Water spells. It was over in one round because of it. Now I could move on to Elfland with around 3000G in stock.
There were only consumables and no summon to find in Pravoka - speaking of which, there wasn't anything hidden for the Thief to find in the summon-only areas so far. I sat on the funds at Elfland and this time didn't buy the Scimitar for the Thief. I trained outside Elfland until the party was level 6, where Redall reached 2 hits with the Silver Sword. I took advantage of MUG against OGREs whenever they showed, allowing me to gain gold faster. CAIT SITH also proved a useful asset, shutting down any encounter I decided to cast it on. I bought FIR2 and HOLD for Red before heading into an portal I saw in the Elvish Castle - there was also a Copper Bracelet for the Thief to find in the Prince's Chamber, but none of my jobs could equip it.
After some wandering with enemy sets partially from the Marsh Cave, I encountered the boss, UNICORN. I was immediately ambushed and had two of my warriors paralyzed by the undead on the spot before I could move, leaving only Thea and Georg mobile. UNICORN itself used HEALING HORN, which...damaged the undead enemies that were attacking in addition to healing itself for around 20HP. I tried throwing out an Astral Shift, and about half were hit (including UNICORN with something called burning), but the HEALING HORN removed those statuses even as it damaged the undead. Eventually, they died and the horse went berserk, hitting everyone one by one for over their max HP. What the hell?! I was ejected from the Astral Plane with no ill effects other than losing all progress I made.
I figured it was the ambush that did me in, so I reset and tried to get it without - I ran from each fight in there because I intuited correctly that this was going to take several tries. Unfortunately, it happened every time! It had to be fixed or I was getting insanely unlucky. I tried to swing the odds in my favor by taking off my warriors' armor to increase their evasion, but it didn't help much. I reset several battles in the first turn, but the sixth try (the fifth I forgot to change the message speed), I rearranged the party as well: Thea and Georg in the first and second slot respectively. Redall was STILL hit regardless, but with Blind, and though Thea got stunned, everyone else remained in motion. A few rounds of slashing (thankfully they hit!) and Gobling Punching later, the boss had fallen. But I was left with several undead still standing and only Evelyn able to move. The only play was CAIT SITH. Georg got unstuck as Redall fell, allowing him to use AoE to end the fight. Final cost: some HEALs, a trip back to Coneria, and my OCD being triggered by uneven levels earlier than I wanted. Well, it was inevitable anyway. UNICORN seemed to restore the same amount of health as KIRIN did, with the added advantage of restoring status ailments. It was a L3 spell. Did I miss one?
I next checked out the North Castle, finding a Copper Bracelet in Astos' chamber and another summon portal. This one held RAMUH. The fight lasted all of three rounds: on the first, he cast LIT2 and killed Georg before I could buff magic. Message Speed 8 made me not see what he did on the second, I assume it was charging for his third: JUDGMENT BOLT, which finished the job. Uh.
I went back to Pravoka and mused whether or not I wanted to spend one of Redall's spell slots picking up ALIT. Well, I was definitely taking MUTE and SLOW at Lv2: fit the Red's gimmick and I like them anyway. SLO2 is single target and its only advantage is not being status elemental - and the big disadvantage is being on Lv5, posterchild for a crowded spell level. INVS is niche, even more so with the bugfixes to evasion. LAMP is still questionably useful. I wasn't sure how much mileage I was going to get out of DARK: there were better ways of crippling enemies and it didn't do much to Redall. But ICE and TMPR both had merit, and I felt whichever of the other three Black Spells I went with, they had far more than ALIT which had a definitive shelf life.
While I was up here, I decided to pay a visit to the Peninsula of Power. I already had a mage to tear things up with FIR2, but CAIT SITH proved equally destructive. It completely crippled everything that was up here with confusion, even TYROs which most abusers of the peninsula have to avoid! Georg could also join in the offense and status fun, and Thea could earn me even more money. I spent just enough time so I could afford magic bills in the near future, getting the team to level 8 before I moved on.
I remembered to check the Dwarves' Cave at this point. I found my first item of any real worth on the smith's table: a Long Sword! Would've been useful to know earlier! There was also a Cap in a nearby wall. So far, every area has had three hidden items. The third here was a Heal.
There was also another summon to get: GOLEM. It came accompanied by a SCUM, a MUCK, and a JELLY. The last was a new enemy, but it died in a single FIR2, so it probably isn't much to write home about. The turn order lined up with Georg going first and I nuked the enemies before GOLEM could use its special EARTHEN WALL, which applied Stoneskin: essentially extra HP that absorbed "a fixed amount of damage". Not sure how much, and it cast a similar effect when used in battle. It turned out to be the L2 spell I missed for the Evoker. It fell quickly.
With the extra spells and levels, I gave RAMUH another go. None of the status spells I tried landed. Jeez. FF1 was actually pretty nice about those on certain bosses if you knew what to cast on them, but I wonder if any of these summon bosses let you? Pretty lame, especially since it cripples Red Mage's special ability. But when I cast GOLEM, its Stoneskin prevented most of the damage dealt, except to Evelyn herself. Hm. I started attacking and had Evelyn drop KIRIN then GOLEM again before the JUDGMENT BOLT happened. She and Georg died horribly, but the physical attackers survived. The only thing to do was FIGHT, Redall was out of L3 charges. RAMUH next used a weak LIT, another LIT2 which they both survived, then charged for a second JUDGMENT BOLT. However, they went before RAMUH did on the turn it was set to happen and pulled out just enough damage to win!
With all that out of the way, I finally went into the Marsh Cave. The Geomancy spells here were identical to the Temple of Fiends. I first swept the upper portion, picking up a second Copper Bracelet in the process. Here I was definitely noticing how awful running was supposed to be in FF1. I was trying to avoid obnoxious or tedious encounters, but it all depended on where Thea fell in the turn order: everyone else was never guaranteed.
After going out to refresh, I made my way to the WIZARDs, mostly running along the way while ignoring the Thief treasures for now. I had a draw of three. LIT2 rolled horribly and only got one of them. I used GOLEM but it proved unreliable - sometimes it worked well like here, other times it got broken near instantly. Redall actually got knocked down to 1HP, but nobody died.
But Thea died to a MUCK ambush and turn order on the way out. Then when I was within sight of the stairs, I was ambushed by GHOULs, the whole team got paralyzed, and the party never got to move again.
After some refreshing with other games and finding out how to speed the game up, I got back into it. I cleaned out the floors more prudently this time, finding the Bone Mail hidden on the second basement??? I'm uncertain if it has additional properties like the FF5 version. It had the same weight as Chain and nobody could equip it. There was also a Great Axe on the bottom floor and...something that seemed to be in one of the KEY-locked treasure rooms.
This runthrough, the WIZARDs were thoroughly fried by the LIT2 and the only problem with getting out was running low on PUREs. I had to run the rest of the way out of caution.
I reset against ASTOS the first time. The second time, I landed the MUTE and neutralized him on the spot. Thea robbed him blind. I had Evelyn bring out RAMUH here. This locks down the Evoker for one turn while it charges. If they die, the summon isn't used, but the spell charge is only used when the spell activates. His spell, JUDGMENT BOLT, did a base 120 Lit damage to all enemies. It was effectively two LIT2s focused into one turn. I'm really not sure about this, to be honest. Against weaker enemies that I'd want to throw the big AoE against, it'd be better just to drop them right there. I would get some use out of it against bulkier groups later.
I hit Level 10 on the way back which was a big breakpoint for everyone but Evoker. It's when Red Mage gets 4th level spells, it's when Thief can start doing 2 hits with +10% weapons, and Geomancer's other three spell slots went up to 2 manual uses each.
I did a bunch of Mystic KEY looting, and was surprised to find something new in the Northwest Castle. The Rune Harp had pathetically low attack but dealt bonus damage to spellcasters. I would find another harp hidden in the Marsh Cave's locked rooms: the Ash Harp. Similar story. I prowled around beyond, finding a second Silver Bracelet in particular. I also found a free Buckler, aka the shield that exists only to be used by Red Mages and Thieves. And uh, Geomancers too? I bought an extra one at Crescent Lake because of it. There was no sign of any new summons however...except in the Titan's Tunnel. There, I spotted a portal behind the Titan himself, who is probably going to end up being TITAN if I know my Final Fantasy. He even responded to the Evoker when I talked to him, neat touch.
I had the sinking suspicion that something was going to be hidden in the Hall of Giants. Sure enough, some poking around with the Thief revealed the presence of a hidden item. I was concerned to say the least. Those concerns evaporated in the very first battle when I had when I had Georg use TERRAIN.
This was one of the four new spells available for casting in the Earth Cave, an AoE heal. Like I mentioned, Geomancy spells scale and they scale hard. I saw it reach the low 70s. That is uh, more than HEL2 would normally restore and closer to HEL3 in scaling. The other interesting roll here was Mineral Shell, which gave "Earthspikes" to an ally. This caused half of the physical damage suffered to be returned on the attacker. It had some niche uses, particularly against the EARTHs. The other two spells were Earth-elemental: STALACTITE and EARTH EMBRACE were ST and AoE respectively, and the latter could slow action order.
My prize for getting to this spot was the Giant Sword. This could be equipped by Redall and was two points of damage weaker than the Silver Sword, but 5% more accurate and dealt bonus damage to giants. With this property being fixed in FFR, it felt worth it to switch due to the OGREs and such running around this place.
Earth Cave had some surprises as I went further down. The first was finding a HEAL2 potion with the Thief. Like how HEALs are actually CURE spells in a can, this appeared to be a bottled CURE2. The third floor got more interesting: new weapons! The Magemsh, despite being a knife, could not be equipped by any of my classes. It seemed inferior anyway: 15 damage, +10 hit, and a crit value of 3. Crimson Sword sounded exciting, but it was not a Red Mage weapon and carried a massive hit penalty. Dark Knight, maybe? Arcane Spear was obviously Lancer exclusive. But then there was the Earth Bell.
The statistics are as such, and at level 13, actually boosted Georg to 2 hits for what it's worth. Not that he'd be attacking, not with TERRAIN basically outclassing it. More interesting was the description about enhancing Geomancy. What exactly did it mean?
Aside, to my twisted delight, CAIT SITH worked on the WIZARDs! I was low on spell charges so I couldn't exactly spam it, but it was funny nonetheless. The VAMPIRE was roadkill. He actually missed his first attack, ha! I took the RUBY to the Titan's Tunnel for my next summon.
It was NOT Titan. This guy spammed RUBY LIGHT throughout the battle, which reflected magic including Geomancy. So I guess Georg got to hit stuff with the bell after all. The two RubyGOLs accompanying the boss would bounce LIT2 off their walls. This only hit one target so it felt more like a gimmick. Like in other FF games, summons pierced reflect. CAIT SITH actually confused one of them, ha! Unfortunately, hitting them with RAMUH healed them??? It damaged CARBUNCLE just fine. I actually popped the HEAL2 potion here when Redall was reduced to low HP: he spent his first three turns on FAST before I started attacking. It was pretty anticlimactic in the end.
The Thief also located the Thief Gauntlet in the lower section of this map. This said it maximized MUG's effect, which seemed to be a guarantee of stealing the maximum amount each time. More defense too in any case. Sarda's Cave had an extra Power Staff to find. Uh, shoutouts to money? I found another new piece of equipment called an Earth Gauntlet in the lower floors of the Earth Cave. These could be equipped by anyone and gave resistance to Earth. Neat if limited.
But then I saw this on the bottom floor. I wavered. Why in the world was this here of all places? I decided to give it a try anyway.
The fight started off easily enough. TITAN was accompanied by two GrANKYLOs who could use the same spikes spell that Geomancers could. Hilariously, this worked in my favor: I threw out a bunch of status at first. None hit TITAN, but they ended up confused. One of them attacked the other, killed it, then got killed by the Earthspikes! Ha! Then TITAN he used his special, GAIA'S WRATH. This overkilled Thea for over 200 damage, though the rest got off easy. Not wanting to take on LICH with a person down, I allowed him to kill me and got out. Enough of that then.
There was another Earth Gauntlet hidden before LICH. I figured there was no better time to use CARBUNCLE than now. RUBY LIGHT grants the same Reflect status to your party. It also seems like it'd be hilariously bad in a team with a White Mage or otherwise self-cast heavy. However, not only did this go after the ICE2, but LICH skipped the SLP2 that was supposed to be next and went directly to his FAST? Was this a bug or just a means of making Reflect useless except for dissuasion? It didn't end up mattering because I killed him on the second turn, finishing with a GOBLIN and having dealt great damage with Thief and Geomancer in the meantime. But still, that was worrying to see if it's not a bug.
I considered my next move. This time, there were four doors for the midgame. Besides the usual three, there was also the option of going back in to try and see if I could get TITAN. I didn't doubt I could win, it's just the hassle of making a second run at the Earth Cave. Ordeals would get me spellcasting items and who-knows-what extra goodies in FFR with a Thief. It as usual felt like the logical first choice. It would also get me to class change faster, and I knew from some reading that there was a lot more to be seen with class change here.
The Geomancy set matched ToF and Marsh Cave. I was absolutely correct that there would be more goodies in Ordeals besides the usual. The first of these was the Assassn Dagger, found in back of the first winding part of the maze. The Thief could use this: 16 damage, +20% hit, and a 30% crit chance! Keep in mind that this was actual chance and not halved. One thing I haven't mentioned is that MUG cannot deal a critical hit, so it felt time to stop using it for now. The Spirit Helmet was in an alcove only accessible in the corridor to the left of the first split choice, and prevented parlaysis. Didn't save me from a SORCERER wipe, but the thought counts. There was a second Gold Bracelet near the Zeus Gauntlet location on the final floor. Also it seemed there was an out-of-bounds hidden item near the Heal Staff? Turned out to be nothing important once I finally found it on going back. One was behind the throne, which I could only get by turning around after completing the dungeon: the Gilbart Harp. Couldn't equip it, naturally.
The rivers had new spells: Splash was ST Water, Rapids was AoE Water with a chance to confuse, Drown was Water/Death instant death, and Cleanse was a party-wide status heal. No problem. I found that Zeus absolutely was welcome on Evelyn. Instead of wasting time futzing with RAMUH's wait to charge, she could blast the enemies twice for no charge and the same amount of damage effectively.
I found an upgrade to Georg's bells with Thief in the rocks south of the first set of stairs in the Ice Cave. Or so I thought: it had identical stats! Maybe they only boost the element they're attuned to? There was a second in the FLOATER room. The spells here were Ice Pillar (ST ice), Whiteout (AoE Ice, silences), Icewall (party AICE and heal), and Forged in Ice (party AICE and 20% attack buff). Not bad. Another Ice Sword was in the rocks in the square room - all the treasures were there, conveniently. Would be nice in a bit. In the basement, I could also take advantage of Geomancer's ability to not take damage from damage tiles. A small bonus.
SHIVA was a summon boss waiting in the basement. She was accompanied by six COCTRICEs and had a simple pattern: ICE, ICE2, ICE3, charge, then special. I again thought this was a perfect opportunity for CARBUNCLE, only to find the reflected spells healed her! Yes! Instead of protecting my party doing piddly damage, it was actively detrimental! Ugh! This summon sucks! I lost twice then decided forget it. For now, at least.
I threw all the status I could at the EYE, but it unfortunately was able to XXXX Georg before the MUTE landed. It was neutered and easy to beat from there at least. Then the undead spike in the pit ambushed me!!! Mercifully, they all went for Redall, allowing me to escape even with terrible turn order. I ran like crazy on the way out, but had to tangle with a FrGIANT/FrWOLF group and WIZARDs, which were simple enough. But ultimately, I survived and made it out of the Ice Cave on the very first try!
I wasted no time in heading to Bahamut to claim my class change. I'll go over this on the next page.
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In addition to changes and tweaks for the original six jobs, Renaissances adds an additional ten (!) jobs to the game as of writing. Jobs now come with up to three kinds of abilities. Combat skills can be used during battle and act like commands in later Final Fantasy games. World abilities are used in the overworld and have a variety of features. Finally, passive traits come up in a variety of situations and are labeled as anything from the Black Belt's unarmed abilities, Geomancer's ability to prevent tile damage, or just stating what a mage can do.
I felt it would be a good idea to get a sense of the new jobs before trying anything funny variant wise. Of course, I was also interested in seeing how the changes to the old jobs would work out. With sixteen jobs, I came up with a list of four parties making use of each of these classes at least once. Hopefully, they would turn out to make for interesting and not-too-painful experiences!
This would be my first playthrough. The two base game classes whose changes I was most looking forward to were the Thief and the Red Mage. The former was notoriously bad, partially due to bugs. There was very little reason to consider taking one; the No Items/Potions challenge run I did was one of the few examples of where doing so isn't completely suboptimal. By comparison, Red Mages rule the roost when it comes to magic in Final Fantasy 1, also partially due to bugs. So long as you were not under variant restrictions, particularly no class changing, they were almost completely superior to Black Mages and did most of the important things White Mages could do. While the HEAL spells were off-limits, they could still get LIFE and EXIT. And by the time you hit bosses where elemental spells are ineffective, FAST on attackers is better - including the Red itself in lieu of anything else.
It remains to be seen how they play out in practice. But on paper, Renaissance has given Thief a new tool in MUG, a command that attacks and steals gold from an enemy - no item theft, for better or worse. They have a world ability called SEARCH that allows you to find "hidden valuables" on field maps. Finally, they increase movement speed on the overworld. Yay? This seemed to be more like later releases of Final Fantasy V where running is enabled by default, but they could make it go faster. Red Mages meanwhile have the SABOTEUR passive, which is said to give them an accuracy boost when casting enfeebling magic. Given I like to abuse those when possible, it seemed like a perfect fit for me anyway! Now, it was mentioned in a post shortly after typing this up that they were getting Level 8 spells of some sort, but this hopefully won't be too drastic. Or maybe it'll update midrun and there will be compatibility!
As for the two new classes, Evoker is a class based around summoning monsters. Like in many later Final Fantasy games, it is necessary to defeat them in battle before acquiring them. I picked up this class, even restarting my playthrough to use it with the final class: Geomancer. Its combat ability is TERRAIN, which seems to work similar to Final Fantasy III and V. As I mentioned, their LIGHT STEP trait means no taking damage from the lava in Gurgu Volcano, the spikes in the Ice Cave, etc. as long as they're the displayed character. I heard good things about this class from talk in the FFR Discord, so I was looking forward to see just how effective this would be. It's hard to do worse than FF5's Geomancer at least.
To use an overworld ability, the character must be the displayed one. This can be switched at will in FFR instead of it being locked to the first character slot. Thief's SEARCH worked like a dowsing rod: it displayed messages as I got closer to a hidden item. You need to face the correct location to obtain it. There was most notably 100G hidden in the well, which helped fund some of my purchases: Chain for Redall, Wooden Armor for Thea, and clothes for the mages. The first two got Rapiers, the last two got Wooden Staves.
There was a portal to the Astral Plane in Coneria as shown there, but I ignored it for the time being. This meant that Evoker was going to be highly useless until I got spells. As I went out into the overworld and initiated my first battle, I was able to start getting accustomed to Geomancer. They had four spell levels, each presently with a single use. They could also use their special ability TERRAIN to cast one of these spells at random, with a chance to restore spell points. I also saw several ones not on the list pop up from time to time.
There were three terrains directly available on the overworld. On the plains, the first of the four spells available for direct casting on plains was WIND GUST, which dealt Wind-elemental damage to a single enemy. Wind isn't an element in the original FF1, so this was a new thing for Renassiance. SHINING FLARE and TANGLEVINE did low level AoE damage, the former in Fire element and the latter non-elemental with a chance to inflict paralysis. I wasn't too impressed by the damage, but thankfully, I found later on that it scaled. Finally, Sunbath was like a HEAL spell! Two of the other spells I saw here were TWISTER, which had no indication as to what it did, and THUNDERBOLT, which did massive ST Lit damage.
There were additional spells in the forests and swamps. Using a spell charge from one location didn't use the same spot in the others. Conversely however, a TERRAIN use could not restore a spell charge from another terrain. For brevity, I'll cover these in a magic section in my articles page.
Once I hit level 2, I went into that portal to the Astral Plane. I encountered a lot of IMPs in this negative world that had music that seemed like it came straight out of an Earthbound game. I had to chase and speak with a sparkle thrice in order to fight it. There were more TERRAIN spells here. The biggest standout was DREAM SHROUD: a 30% boost to magic damage for all allies. Whoa, that is certainly good.
The boss somehow ambushed me and attacked with its special, GOBLIN PUNCH, that did around 30 damage to Georg. I had to spend Evelyn's turn on DRINK - not like she was doing much else. Thea used MUG but couldn't steal any gold, so I had her attack normally. I'm not sure if MUG does less damage or if it can indeed just replace FIGHT. Redall cast FIRE a few times. I gave ASTRAL SHIFT a whirl - an ability that inflicts random status ailments - but it only hit Poison. Boo.
After this and getting the goods in the castle, I went to the Temple of Fiends. Naturally, there were more Geomancy spells to be had in the temple. CARVE MODEL did non-elemental to one target. No petrification nonsense like in FFT, alas. CLOSE-IN hit all foes and could inflict Darkness. The last two looked interesting: MARBLE ARMOR increased absorb by 20%, and FORGED IN IRON boosted attack and accuracy by 10%. Given I was dealing with GARLAND the notorious fraud, I mostly buffed and sandbagged while robbing him with the Thief.
There was a second boss for summoner in the Temple of Fiends. There was no indication as to what I would be fighting here, as the enemy set was the same as in the temple. After a lot of meandering from the center-right to the bottom left to right in front of Garland's chamber that took my party to level 3, I found Kirin. This was accompanied by three WOLFs and used an ability that restored health and gave Regen to the enemies. I took advantage of DREAM SHROUD here. Kirin fell quickly and the WOLFs were no threat.
That apparently filled out the Evoker's Lv1 spells. KIRIN did what it did in the battle: a HEAL spell (restoring 12-24HP) and Regen, restoring 5% of max HP at the end of every turn for 5 turns. Decent, especially for a level 1 casting. But the real winner seemed to be GOBLIN. This did "semi-random" base non-elemental damage with a base damage of 40 (20-80 damage), capping damage at the user's max HP. Despite this, I was seeing it hit for slightly more than Evelyn's max HP, and heard it gets even stronger later.
This was also the first time in forever I felt compelled to head to Matoya's Cave immediately, thanks to the Thief's ability. It paid off when I found a pair of Gloves in the old witch's abode, the first worthwhile thing. Sure, they weren't much, but they were something. Moreover, there was another summon to find.
I was attacked by BROOMs when I entered! They were hopelessly weak, but it was funny I guess. The boss was CAIT SITH, which could inflict mass confusion. I reset the first time because Evelyn hit a critical on Georg at ridiculously low odds. I just removed the characters' weapons to deal with it. The spell could do the same thing to enemies and it made the PIRATEs even more of a joke. To rub it in more, the available spells there included two AoE Water spells. It was over in one round because of it. Now I could move on to Elfland with around 3000G in stock.
There were only consumables and no summon to find in Pravoka - speaking of which, there wasn't anything hidden for the Thief to find in the summon-only areas so far. I sat on the funds at Elfland and this time didn't buy the Scimitar for the Thief. I trained outside Elfland until the party was level 6, where Redall reached 2 hits with the Silver Sword. I took advantage of MUG against OGREs whenever they showed, allowing me to gain gold faster. CAIT SITH also proved a useful asset, shutting down any encounter I decided to cast it on. I bought FIR2 and HOLD for Red before heading into an portal I saw in the Elvish Castle - there was also a Copper Bracelet for the Thief to find in the Prince's Chamber, but none of my jobs could equip it.
After some wandering with enemy sets partially from the Marsh Cave, I encountered the boss, UNICORN. I was immediately ambushed and had two of my warriors paralyzed by the undead on the spot before I could move, leaving only Thea and Georg mobile. UNICORN itself used HEALING HORN, which...damaged the undead enemies that were attacking in addition to healing itself for around 20HP. I tried throwing out an Astral Shift, and about half were hit (including UNICORN with something called burning), but the HEALING HORN removed those statuses even as it damaged the undead. Eventually, they died and the horse went berserk, hitting everyone one by one for over their max HP. What the hell?! I was ejected from the Astral Plane with no ill effects other than losing all progress I made.
I figured it was the ambush that did me in, so I reset and tried to get it without - I ran from each fight in there because I intuited correctly that this was going to take several tries. Unfortunately, it happened every time! It had to be fixed or I was getting insanely unlucky. I tried to swing the odds in my favor by taking off my warriors' armor to increase their evasion, but it didn't help much. I reset several battles in the first turn, but the sixth try (the fifth I forgot to change the message speed), I rearranged the party as well: Thea and Georg in the first and second slot respectively. Redall was STILL hit regardless, but with Blind, and though Thea got stunned, everyone else remained in motion. A few rounds of slashing (thankfully they hit!) and Gobling Punching later, the boss had fallen. But I was left with several undead still standing and only Evelyn able to move. The only play was CAIT SITH. Georg got unstuck as Redall fell, allowing him to use AoE to end the fight. Final cost: some HEALs, a trip back to Coneria, and my OCD being triggered by uneven levels earlier than I wanted. Well, it was inevitable anyway. UNICORN seemed to restore the same amount of health as KIRIN did, with the added advantage of restoring status ailments. It was a L3 spell. Did I miss one?
I next checked out the North Castle, finding a Copper Bracelet in Astos' chamber and another summon portal. This one held RAMUH. The fight lasted all of three rounds: on the first, he cast LIT2 and killed Georg before I could buff magic. Message Speed 8 made me not see what he did on the second, I assume it was charging for his third: JUDGMENT BOLT, which finished the job. Uh.
I went back to Pravoka and mused whether or not I wanted to spend one of Redall's spell slots picking up ALIT. Well, I was definitely taking MUTE and SLOW at Lv2: fit the Red's gimmick and I like them anyway. SLO2 is single target and its only advantage is not being status elemental - and the big disadvantage is being on Lv5, posterchild for a crowded spell level. INVS is niche, even more so with the bugfixes to evasion. LAMP is still questionably useful. I wasn't sure how much mileage I was going to get out of DARK: there were better ways of crippling enemies and it didn't do much to Redall. But ICE and TMPR both had merit, and I felt whichever of the other three Black Spells I went with, they had far more than ALIT which had a definitive shelf life.
While I was up here, I decided to pay a visit to the Peninsula of Power. I already had a mage to tear things up with FIR2, but CAIT SITH proved equally destructive. It completely crippled everything that was up here with confusion, even TYROs which most abusers of the peninsula have to avoid! Georg could also join in the offense and status fun, and Thea could earn me even more money. I spent just enough time so I could afford magic bills in the near future, getting the team to level 8 before I moved on.
I remembered to check the Dwarves' Cave at this point. I found my first item of any real worth on the smith's table: a Long Sword! Would've been useful to know earlier! There was also a Cap in a nearby wall. So far, every area has had three hidden items. The third here was a Heal.
There was also another summon to get: GOLEM. It came accompanied by a SCUM, a MUCK, and a JELLY. The last was a new enemy, but it died in a single FIR2, so it probably isn't much to write home about. The turn order lined up with Georg going first and I nuked the enemies before GOLEM could use its special EARTHEN WALL, which applied Stoneskin: essentially extra HP that absorbed "a fixed amount of damage". Not sure how much, and it cast a similar effect when used in battle. It turned out to be the L2 spell I missed for the Evoker. It fell quickly.
With the extra spells and levels, I gave RAMUH another go. None of the status spells I tried landed. Jeez. FF1 was actually pretty nice about those on certain bosses if you knew what to cast on them, but I wonder if any of these summon bosses let you? Pretty lame, especially since it cripples Red Mage's special ability. But when I cast GOLEM, its Stoneskin prevented most of the damage dealt, except to Evelyn herself. Hm. I started attacking and had Evelyn drop KIRIN then GOLEM again before the JUDGMENT BOLT happened. She and Georg died horribly, but the physical attackers survived. The only thing to do was FIGHT, Redall was out of L3 charges. RAMUH next used a weak LIT, another LIT2 which they both survived, then charged for a second JUDGMENT BOLT. However, they went before RAMUH did on the turn it was set to happen and pulled out just enough damage to win!
With all that out of the way, I finally went into the Marsh Cave. The Geomancy spells here were identical to the Temple of Fiends. I first swept the upper portion, picking up a second Copper Bracelet in the process. Here I was definitely noticing how awful running was supposed to be in FF1. I was trying to avoid obnoxious or tedious encounters, but it all depended on where Thea fell in the turn order: everyone else was never guaranteed.
After going out to refresh, I made my way to the WIZARDs, mostly running along the way while ignoring the Thief treasures for now. I had a draw of three. LIT2 rolled horribly and only got one of them. I used GOLEM but it proved unreliable - sometimes it worked well like here, other times it got broken near instantly. Redall actually got knocked down to 1HP, but nobody died.
But Thea died to a MUCK ambush and turn order on the way out. Then when I was within sight of the stairs, I was ambushed by GHOULs, the whole team got paralyzed, and the party never got to move again.
After some refreshing with other games and finding out how to speed the game up, I got back into it. I cleaned out the floors more prudently this time, finding the Bone Mail hidden on the second basement??? I'm uncertain if it has additional properties like the FF5 version. It had the same weight as Chain and nobody could equip it. There was also a Great Axe on the bottom floor and...something that seemed to be in one of the KEY-locked treasure rooms.
This runthrough, the WIZARDs were thoroughly fried by the LIT2 and the only problem with getting out was running low on PUREs. I had to run the rest of the way out of caution.
I reset against ASTOS the first time. The second time, I landed the MUTE and neutralized him on the spot. Thea robbed him blind. I had Evelyn bring out RAMUH here. This locks down the Evoker for one turn while it charges. If they die, the summon isn't used, but the spell charge is only used when the spell activates. His spell, JUDGMENT BOLT, did a base 120 Lit damage to all enemies. It was effectively two LIT2s focused into one turn. I'm really not sure about this, to be honest. Against weaker enemies that I'd want to throw the big AoE against, it'd be better just to drop them right there. I would get some use out of it against bulkier groups later.
I hit Level 10 on the way back which was a big breakpoint for everyone but Evoker. It's when Red Mage gets 4th level spells, it's when Thief can start doing 2 hits with +10% weapons, and Geomancer's other three spell slots went up to 2 manual uses each.
I did a bunch of Mystic KEY looting, and was surprised to find something new in the Northwest Castle. The Rune Harp had pathetically low attack but dealt bonus damage to spellcasters. I would find another harp hidden in the Marsh Cave's locked rooms: the Ash Harp. Similar story. I prowled around beyond, finding a second Silver Bracelet in particular. I also found a free Buckler, aka the shield that exists only to be used by Red Mages and Thieves. And uh, Geomancers too? I bought an extra one at Crescent Lake because of it. There was no sign of any new summons however...except in the Titan's Tunnel. There, I spotted a portal behind the Titan himself, who is probably going to end up being TITAN if I know my Final Fantasy. He even responded to the Evoker when I talked to him, neat touch.
I had the sinking suspicion that something was going to be hidden in the Hall of Giants. Sure enough, some poking around with the Thief revealed the presence of a hidden item. I was concerned to say the least. Those concerns evaporated in the very first battle when I had when I had Georg use TERRAIN.
This was one of the four new spells available for casting in the Earth Cave, an AoE heal. Like I mentioned, Geomancy spells scale and they scale hard. I saw it reach the low 70s. That is uh, more than HEL2 would normally restore and closer to HEL3 in scaling. The other interesting roll here was Mineral Shell, which gave "Earthspikes" to an ally. This caused half of the physical damage suffered to be returned on the attacker. It had some niche uses, particularly against the EARTHs. The other two spells were Earth-elemental: STALACTITE and EARTH EMBRACE were ST and AoE respectively, and the latter could slow action order.
My prize for getting to this spot was the Giant Sword. This could be equipped by Redall and was two points of damage weaker than the Silver Sword, but 5% more accurate and dealt bonus damage to giants. With this property being fixed in FFR, it felt worth it to switch due to the OGREs and such running around this place.
Earth Cave had some surprises as I went further down. The first was finding a HEAL2 potion with the Thief. Like how HEALs are actually CURE spells in a can, this appeared to be a bottled CURE2. The third floor got more interesting: new weapons! The Magemsh, despite being a knife, could not be equipped by any of my classes. It seemed inferior anyway: 15 damage, +10 hit, and a crit value of 3. Crimson Sword sounded exciting, but it was not a Red Mage weapon and carried a massive hit penalty. Dark Knight, maybe? Arcane Spear was obviously Lancer exclusive. But then there was the Earth Bell.
The statistics are as such, and at level 13, actually boosted Georg to 2 hits for what it's worth. Not that he'd be attacking, not with TERRAIN basically outclassing it. More interesting was the description about enhancing Geomancy. What exactly did it mean?
Aside, to my twisted delight, CAIT SITH worked on the WIZARDs! I was low on spell charges so I couldn't exactly spam it, but it was funny nonetheless. The VAMPIRE was roadkill. He actually missed his first attack, ha! I took the RUBY to the Titan's Tunnel for my next summon.
It was NOT Titan. This guy spammed RUBY LIGHT throughout the battle, which reflected magic including Geomancy. So I guess Georg got to hit stuff with the bell after all. The two RubyGOLs accompanying the boss would bounce LIT2 off their walls. This only hit one target so it felt more like a gimmick. Like in other FF games, summons pierced reflect. CAIT SITH actually confused one of them, ha! Unfortunately, hitting them with RAMUH healed them??? It damaged CARBUNCLE just fine. I actually popped the HEAL2 potion here when Redall was reduced to low HP: he spent his first three turns on FAST before I started attacking. It was pretty anticlimactic in the end.
The Thief also located the Thief Gauntlet in the lower section of this map. This said it maximized MUG's effect, which seemed to be a guarantee of stealing the maximum amount each time. More defense too in any case. Sarda's Cave had an extra Power Staff to find. Uh, shoutouts to money? I found another new piece of equipment called an Earth Gauntlet in the lower floors of the Earth Cave. These could be equipped by anyone and gave resistance to Earth. Neat if limited.
But then I saw this on the bottom floor. I wavered. Why in the world was this here of all places? I decided to give it a try anyway.
The fight started off easily enough. TITAN was accompanied by two GrANKYLOs who could use the same spikes spell that Geomancers could. Hilariously, this worked in my favor: I threw out a bunch of status at first. None hit TITAN, but they ended up confused. One of them attacked the other, killed it, then got killed by the Earthspikes! Ha! Then TITAN he used his special, GAIA'S WRATH. This overkilled Thea for over 200 damage, though the rest got off easy. Not wanting to take on LICH with a person down, I allowed him to kill me and got out. Enough of that then.
There was another Earth Gauntlet hidden before LICH. I figured there was no better time to use CARBUNCLE than now. RUBY LIGHT grants the same Reflect status to your party. It also seems like it'd be hilariously bad in a team with a White Mage or otherwise self-cast heavy. However, not only did this go after the ICE2, but LICH skipped the SLP2 that was supposed to be next and went directly to his FAST? Was this a bug or just a means of making Reflect useless except for dissuasion? It didn't end up mattering because I killed him on the second turn, finishing with a GOBLIN and having dealt great damage with Thief and Geomancer in the meantime. But still, that was worrying to see if it's not a bug.
I considered my next move. This time, there were four doors for the midgame. Besides the usual three, there was also the option of going back in to try and see if I could get TITAN. I didn't doubt I could win, it's just the hassle of making a second run at the Earth Cave. Ordeals would get me spellcasting items and who-knows-what extra goodies in FFR with a Thief. It as usual felt like the logical first choice. It would also get me to class change faster, and I knew from some reading that there was a lot more to be seen with class change here.
The Geomancy set matched ToF and Marsh Cave. I was absolutely correct that there would be more goodies in Ordeals besides the usual. The first of these was the Assassn Dagger, found in back of the first winding part of the maze. The Thief could use this: 16 damage, +20% hit, and a 30% crit chance! Keep in mind that this was actual chance and not halved. One thing I haven't mentioned is that MUG cannot deal a critical hit, so it felt time to stop using it for now. The Spirit Helmet was in an alcove only accessible in the corridor to the left of the first split choice, and prevented parlaysis. Didn't save me from a SORCERER wipe, but the thought counts. There was a second Gold Bracelet near the Zeus Gauntlet location on the final floor. Also it seemed there was an out-of-bounds hidden item near the Heal Staff? Turned out to be nothing important once I finally found it on going back. One was behind the throne, which I could only get by turning around after completing the dungeon: the Gilbart Harp. Couldn't equip it, naturally.
The rivers had new spells: Splash was ST Water, Rapids was AoE Water with a chance to confuse, Drown was Water/Death instant death, and Cleanse was a party-wide status heal. No problem. I found that Zeus absolutely was welcome on Evelyn. Instead of wasting time futzing with RAMUH's wait to charge, she could blast the enemies twice for no charge and the same amount of damage effectively.
I found an upgrade to Georg's bells with Thief in the rocks south of the first set of stairs in the Ice Cave. Or so I thought: it had identical stats! Maybe they only boost the element they're attuned to? There was a second in the FLOATER room. The spells here were Ice Pillar (ST ice), Whiteout (AoE Ice, silences), Icewall (party AICE and heal), and Forged in Ice (party AICE and 20% attack buff). Not bad. Another Ice Sword was in the rocks in the square room - all the treasures were there, conveniently. Would be nice in a bit. In the basement, I could also take advantage of Geomancer's ability to not take damage from damage tiles. A small bonus.
SHIVA was a summon boss waiting in the basement. She was accompanied by six COCTRICEs and had a simple pattern: ICE, ICE2, ICE3, charge, then special. I again thought this was a perfect opportunity for CARBUNCLE, only to find the reflected spells healed her! Yes! Instead of protecting my party doing piddly damage, it was actively detrimental! Ugh! This summon sucks! I lost twice then decided forget it. For now, at least.
I threw all the status I could at the EYE, but it unfortunately was able to XXXX Georg before the MUTE landed. It was neutered and easy to beat from there at least. Then the undead spike in the pit ambushed me!!! Mercifully, they all went for Redall, allowing me to escape even with terrible turn order. I ran like crazy on the way out, but had to tangle with a FrGIANT/FrWOLF group and WIZARDs, which were simple enough. But ultimately, I survived and made it out of the Ice Cave on the very first try!
I wasted no time in heading to Bahamut to claim my class change. I'll go over this on the next page.
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