Final Fantasy I (Dawn of Souls) Party Lineup

[ThinkMinty]

I'm about to play me some Final Fantasy I for the first time, and I'm wondering how I should line my party up, classes-wise.

[GloatingSwine]

Classes are somewhat better balanced against each other in the Dawn of Souls version than they were in the NES version due to things like intelligence having an effect on spells now, so you can probably get places with just about any party without requiring super special attention.

That said, White Mage is probably the most replacable character, because Red Mages are perfectly competent healers who can actually contribute damage.

Fighter is a solid beatstick with good tanking potential (I can't remember whether DoS does the same enemy targeting mechanics as NES, if it does then the person in the top slot gets hit the most and a fighter there will soak a lot).

Thief is underwhelming until he turns into a Ninja when he can buff with Haste which is really good (that's his most important spell).

Black Belt is the single target damage monster, doesn't have as much damage soak as Fighter though.

Black Mage is captain crowd control, with lots of AoE spells

White Mage is a healer with poor damage output.

Red Mage loses access to the best spells of either magic type but can still use the second best so is a capable replacement for either mage.

I think when I played it I used Fighter/Thief/Red Mage/Red Mage, though Fighter/Thief/Red Mage/Black Mage is a decent choice as well.

[Talion]

While it's not my favorite of the series, I can offer some advice:

1. Warriors: They hit pretty hard and they have great defense and health. Downside: they don't have any ability to hit multiple targets at once, it's difficult for them to get around damage immunity types or exploit weaknesses. Additionally, keeping them geared up in the latest, often vital, equipment is very expensive if you have more than one.

2. White Mage: They don't hit the hardest, but they'll save you a lot of grief in terms of having enough potions and status effect removals on hand (because despite it being the earliest entry in the series, status effects are absolutely savage in this game). Though I myself haven't tried it, rumor has it that a team of 4 White Mages will steam roll over the final boss. However they're limited by their spell point pool.

3. Monk: They start out a bit slow, but they have the highest damage in the game, and they hit pretty hard as well. They don't take any actual hits as well as a Warrior, and like the Warrior are lacking in the specials department. However, they require very little in terms of equipment, making them cheap to use. In the original version of the game Monks could quickly dominate the group in effectiveness, but my understanding is that they got a bit of a nerf in later versions.

4. Black Mage: Very good damage out put, especially with situation bonuses (Ice vs Fire enemies for example). They can also hit multiple enemies at once with many of their spells. Downside: like the white mage they've got a limited mana pool and can't do much of anything once that's depleted. Their evasion, physical accuracy, and defense are also poor.

5. Red Mage: A jack of all trades class that starts with the ability to use most of the same equipment as Warriors and many spells from both White and Black mage lists. However, they don't have access to the highest tiers of spells (and miss out on a few others in the lower tiers). They also have less usable spell points than either of the other mages, and don't have access to as much of the high end armor as the Warrior.

6: Thief: Like the monk, the Thief has high accuracy, agility, and respectable damage. This gives them a lot of initiative bonuses so they'll likely have the first strike in battle. Unlike monks and mages, they have a lot of equipment options, second only to the Warrior. However, like monks and mages, they don't take hits well.

So, that all being said, for a first run through I would recommend:

A Fighter to take hits and dish out some damage.
A White Mage to do damage to the undead and heal/buff the party.
A Thief to try and whittle down the enemy before they can move.
A Red Mage to act as a jack for anything you need at the moment.

However, there are many other viable combinations and, with enough persistence, virtually any group can succeed.

[GloatingSwine]

3. Monk: They start out a bit slow, but they have the highest damage in the game, and they hit pretty hard as well. They don't take any actual hits as well as a Warrior, and like the Warrior are lacking in the specials department. However, they require very little in terms of equipment, making them cheap to use. In the original version of the game Monks could quickly dominate the group in effectiveness, but my understanding is that they got a bit of a nerf in later versions.


It's not that the monk got particularly nerfed, but that several other things got buffed whilst he stood mostly still. For instance the last boss has ten times the HP in Dawn of Souls (because a high level Master could one shot him when Hasted on the NES version)

He did get his magic resist fixed though (in the NES version the class upgrade kills his magic resist progression)

[Talion]

It's not that the monk got particularly nerfed, but that several other things got buffed whilst he stood mostly still. For instance the last boss has ten times the HP in Dawn of Souls (because a high level Master could one shot him when Hasted on the NES version)

He did get his magic resist fixed though (in the NES version the class upgrade kills his magic resist progression)

That's fair. Similarly, the Black Mage might not necessarily take a lethal wound from a light breeze in the updated versions.

Though going back to the topic at hand, probably the best piece of advice I can give is to avoid pigeon holing yourself into one strategy by not having a diverse enough party. For example, a full team of Warriors might march over a lot of the game like a steam roller, but it'll be a real chore to keep 4 warriors equipped in all the latest gear, which they will absolutely need. Similarly, until late game they won't have means to regularly heal the various status effects that can cause a TPK without touching your Health (such as through paralyze). Alternatively, a group of 4 Black Mages or Monks might lay waste to most anything in terms of sheer damage output, but they won't be able to last more than 2-3 hits each if the opponent gets a chance to strike back, which means that if the situation is bad enough you could lose sizable portions of your total effectiveness very quickly. You will also be nursing a nasty Health Potion addiction to compensate between battles.

Oh, and as an added warning: Magic is very random; you could do 150 damage on one shot, but the same spell on the next round might only do...say...40.

[GloatingSwine]

Oh, and as an added warning: Magic is very random; you could do 150 damage on one shot, but the same spell on the next round might only do...say...40.

IIRC they normalised magic a lot in Dawn of Souls so it now does a relatively predictable amount, and they also made intelligence count for something (FF1 NES never actually used it in any calculations, which made the Black Mage even more pointless as all he could really do was cast NUKE and ICE3 wasn't that far behind).

[tyckspoon]

You'll want at least one physical beatstick (Warrior, Black Belt, Thief can do it after classchange but is lacking before) and somebody who can cast Haste. Other forms of black magic are useful, but generally not required; you can kill most anything by buffing up your beatstick with Haste/Saber/Temper and pummeling enemies into the ground. A White Mage is also handy, because healing without access to the higher level Cure/Heal spells is pretty obnoxious, but you can do without if you want. A 'standard' team would probably be something like Warrior (heavy armor, absorbs physical attacks well), Black Belt (does good damage, you mostly don't have to worry about gear for him) Black Mage (Haste! And also nuke spells/crowdsweeping, I guess), Red Mage or White Mage (depending on how strongly you value White Mage's better MP and spell choices against Red Mage's secondary fighter talent. Also, there's a few weapons that basically only a Red Mage can use.)

[ThinkMinty]

I ended up going with Thief, White Mage, Warrior, and Black Mage for my first run; their names are Fence, Hammer, Dune, and Turnip, respectively. So far, Fence is a swift beatstick and my MVP, Turnip's versatility in damage, buff, and debuff has been invaluable, Dune's been tanking hits and dishing out more than he takes reliably, and Hammer's been useful, but is dragging his feet a bit so far, although casting Blink on him in the first round every round has him contributing properly now.

[Wookieetank]

If you're up for Dwarf Fortress kinds of Fun, 4 white mages makes for quite the experience.

[Red Fel]

My formation was pretty standard. Warrior, Black Mage and White Mage were my staples, and then the last slot simply depended on the playthrough.

I found Monk to be pretty solid, and he really helps save budget. I liked Thief's upgrade to Ninja, which is a great upgrade, but that's really only good in endgame. I found, however, that I tended to put Red Mage in my last slot, for redundancy. He gives the combat readiness of a beatstick, plus the spell slots of a caster. And putting my weaker spells on him allowed me to save my strongest stuff for my BM and WM.

[Wookieetank]

My formation was pretty standard. Warrior, Black Mage and White Mage were my staples, and then the last slot simply depended on the playthrough.

I found Monk to be pretty solid, and he really helps save budget. I liked Thief's upgrade to Ninja, which is a great upgrade, but that's really only good in endgame. I found, however, that I tended to put Red Mage in my last slot, for redundancy. He gives the combat readiness of a beatstick, plus the spell slots of a caster. And putting my weaker spells on him allowed me to save my strongest stuff for my BM and WM.

You can get the class upgrades right after clearing the earth dungeon. I think I managed to pull it off at level 15 once even. Non-linear open world ftw! :smallbiggrin:

[GloatingSwine]

Also you get faster stat gains on the upgraded classes.

So absolutely do the class change as soon as possible.

[Deadline]

Is the One Fighter Challenge still viable in Dawn of Souls? If so, and you've already played through the game at least once, I recommend that. It can be very tricky to pull off.

[GloatingSwine]

Solo thief no class change?


That was probably the hardest, since Thief got almost none of the good toys other than having a guaranteed run away.


Solo WM was popular for a while too because you could stack Blink and spam item use the Bane sword at things and eventually it would stick.

[Shpadoinkle]

[QUOTE=ThinkMinty;20051236]I ended up going with Thief, White Mage, Warrior, and Black Mage for my first run; their names are Fence, Hammer, Dune, and Turnip, respectively./QUOTE]

I hope you don't have them in that order, because party order matters. When enemies attack, they randomly choose a number from 1 to 8. From 1, 2, 3, and 4 means they target the lead (top) character, 5 or 6 means they target the second, 7 targets the third, and 8 targets the fourth (bottom) character in your lineup. Therefore, you warrior and thief should be in the top two slots, since they should have the best defense and evasion, respectively, while your mages are in the bottom two because they tend to be rather squishy.

[ThinkMinty]

I hope you don't have them in that order, because party order matters. When enemies attack, they randomly choose a number from 1 to 8. From 1, 2, 3, and 4 means they target the lead (top) character, 5 or 6 means they target the second, 7 targets the third, and 8 targets the fourth (bottom) character in your lineup. Therefore, you warrior and thief should be in the top two slots, since they should have the best defense and evasion, respectively, while your mages are in the bottom two because they tend to be rather squishy.

Oh that's why people do that. Noted, and I'll fix it goin' forward. I did take (admittedly I shaved some actual-world time with selective speed-ups, because emulation) time to grind for gil whenever I couldn't afford stuff, which led to a lot of time killing Ogres near Elfheim, and doing the Hall of Giants when I got class up'd at...around 35, because I wanted my new spellcasters to have enough MP to use their spells. So now I'm in the Sunken Shrine at ~53, which I think is probably higher than I need to be, but at this point I keep stumbling into gil by just trodding along without grinds, so I'm more inclined to do a little more plot and swoop back for a spell or a weapon at this point because I don't need to frontload myself that much.

There is some nice idiosyncratic stuff this game makes me do, like never letting anyone pass out (most RPGs aren't as mean about that without being Fire Emblem) ever because there's little you can do about it in a fight that lets someone come back in without needing to be pampered to keep their head above water...until whenever the **** I get Full-Life. I also like that it wants me to explore, but doesn't really force me to outside of a dungeon. I also dig the talking dragons.

I also am wondering how to use the items that say they cast spells when used. Dunno how that works.

[Talion]

Oh that's why people do that. Noted, and I'll fix it goin' forward. I did take (admittedly I shaved some actual-world time with selective speed-ups, because emulation) time to grind for gil whenever I couldn't afford stuff, which led to a lot of time killing Ogres near Elfheim, and doing the Hall of Giants when I got class up'd at...around 35, because I wanted my new spellcasters to have enough MP to use their spells. So now I'm in the Sunken Shrine at ~53, which I think is probably higher than I need to be, but at this point I keep stumbling into gil by just trodding along without grinds, so I'm more inclined to do a little more plot and swoop back for a spell or a weapon at this point because I don't need to frontload myself that much.

There is some nice idiosyncratic stuff this game makes me do, like never letting anyone pass out (most RPGs aren't as mean about that without being Fire Emblem) ever because there's little you can do about it in a fight that lets someone come back in without needing to be pampered to keep their head above water...until whenever the **** I get Full-Life. I also like that it wants me to explore, but doesn't really force me to outside of a dungeon. I also dig the talking dragons.

I also am wondering how to use the items that say they cast spells when used. Dunno how that works.

I can't remember having tried this myself, but my online sources are saying that to activate the spell on an item you have to have it unequipped in your inventory and, on your turn, you select the 'item' option, select the item, and then it should let you use it's spell for that turn. I'm also given to understand that while it doesn't expend the item, it can only be used by one character per turn unless you have multiple copies of it.

[Wookieetank]

I can't remember having tried this myself, but my online sources are saying that to activate the spell on an item you have to have it unequipped in your inventory and, on your turn, you select the 'item' option, select the item, and then it should let you use it's spell for that turn. I'm also given to understand that while it doesn't expend the item, it can only be used by one character per turn unless you have multiple copies of it.

You do use them like this. As for the number of times you can use them, I always assumed once per battle, but if its more than once, I might have to try a solo character run for kicks.

[ryuplaneswalker]

Warrior/Black Belt/White Mage/Red Mage was always my standard FF1 Party, Black belt could go without buying weapons so you had to grind less gold, and he scaled insanely with just his fists, and Red mage is my less magical, more stabby black magic user, because most things in the game really didn't require magic outside of Astos, and heck most of the thing black mages got for buffs you find an on use item for eventually.

[tyckspoon]

You do use them like this. As for the number of times you can use them, I always assumed once per battle, but if its more than once, I might have to try a solo character run for kicks.

Oh, no, they're permanent and reusable- they're a big part of solo character runs because you can do things like stack up Blink and Saber until even the lowest Black Mage can rod a boss's face off. The items that cast Fira/Thundara also make sure you don't have to worry about watching your mages MP to have them contribute to random fights. Also the Heal whatever items for topping off your HP; have your Black Mage and Ninja item-cast a nuke, white Mage and Knight item-cast Heal, cruise through everything until boss.

(Oh, btw, most of the buff spells stack with themselves. I don't think you can have Haste more than once, but the ones that increase attack power, evasion, and defense can be layered without any practical limit. If your White Mage doesn't have an immediate need to heal, just drop another Protect or Invis on the party.)

[danzibr]

How's Dawn of Souls compare to the version on iOS? If they're the same, I have suggestions which may be slightly contrary to what others said.

If you plan on doing just the main game, literally any party will do. However, if you plan on doing the additional content, a WM is absolutely essential. I made the mistake of having a party consisting of, I believe, a Fighter, Black Belt, Thief, and Red Mage. They steamrolled through the main game, but couldn't keep up with the damage from some of the bosses in the additional content.

Beyond that, I would say it's key to have a Black Belt, and I would suggest against a BM (sadly). Black Belt gets some nice custom gear in the additional content, and does utterly absurd damage. BM is decent, but other classes are better.

[tyckspoon]

If you plan on doing just the main game, literally any party will do. However, if you plan on doing the additional content, a WM is absolutely essential. I made the mistake of having a party consisting of, I believe, a Fighter, Black Belt, Thief, and Red Mage. They steamrolled through the main game, but couldn't keep up with the damage from some of the bosses in the additional content.


I've done the game and the extended optional dungeons several times. I disagree. You don't *need* a White Mage, especially if you're willing to leave the extra dungeons until you're most of the way through the base game and have access to a decent pile of spell-casting items and consumables for casting the anti-element spells. It's just harder and requires a lot more over-leveling.. but then, when you're doing the 20 and 40-floor long dungeons for the Water and Air bonus dungeons you kind of naturally over-level anyway unless you just run away from everything.

[danzibr]

I've done the game and the extended optional dungeons several times. I disagree. You don't *need* a White Mage, especially if you're willing to leave the extra dungeons until you're most of the way through the base game and have access to a decent pile of spell-casting items and consumables for casting the anti-element spells. It's just harder and requires a lot more over-leveling.. but then, when you're doing the 20 and 40-floor long dungeons for the Water and Air bonus dungeons you kind of naturally over-level anyway unless you just run away from everything.
Touche.

Me, I tried 'em early, and I prefer to never use consumables.

Still, man, 'dat White Mage sure comes in handy when the boss keeps blasting everyone's face for 300 damage.

[ThinkMinty]

Touche.

Me, I tried 'em early, and I prefer to never use consumables.

Still, man, 'dat White Mage sure comes in handy when the boss keeps blasting everyone's face for 300 damage.

Yeah. I get enough damage out of stacking buffs on the Knight and Ninja that the lack of offensive oomf from the White Wizard against undead hasn't bothered me at all. In the fights where it matters, they're busy stacking buffs and patching up wounds anyways.