Final Fantasy Tactics has some tough-as-nails fights, especially if you’re coming to the strategy RPG formula for the first time. The Ivalice Chronicles remaster ups the ante with a new Tactician difficulty mode that stacks the odds even more against your burgeoning squad of heretical recruits. As someone who’s played the game a dozen times before, I love the new layer of challenge even if some of the encounters kicked my ass.
Importantly, The Ivalice Chronicles adds some helpful features for navigating the game’s underlying difficulty. Unlike in the original, it’s generous with auto-saves and lets you flee any battle at any time. No more getting trapped in multi-encounter missions with no other save files to escape to. You can also dial the difficulty up or down throughout the campaign and, like in the original, every story mission lets you over-level if you’re diligent enough.
Even so, some of these fights get tricky! Here’s my ranking of the toughest battles in Final Fantasy Tactics and some tips for how to beat them.
10. Dorter Slums
Why it’s hard: It’s early in the game, your characters are probably under-developed, and the map layout heavily advantages the enemy, which includes an Archer high up and two Black Mages. Most kick-ass battle music in the whole game, though.
What to do about it: The easiest strategy is to have Ramza hang back and use Focus a couple of times until he’s able to move in and take out one of the Black Mages in a single hit. Make sure he has battle boots and Move +1 equipped. A fully outfitted Knight to tank damage is useful but you can really get away with just Chemists and Squires as long as you focus on staying healed until Ramza can go on a rampage.
9. Fovoham Windflats
Why it’s hard: Any fight against a character with Holy Knight abilities is bullshit, and the game throws this one at you super early. Wiegraf can immediately take your party down to critical HP if they stay bunched up, and his backup will start killing you from there.
What to do about it: This is the one battle I’ve never tried to beat without cheese. Just make sure you have at least a couple of ranged attackers and Ramza (preferably as a Monk) is able to get one hit on Wiegraf before dying. Focus exclusively on him until you get him to flee.
8. Finnath Creek
Why it’s hard: This is the first time you see a Red Chocobo. Cute, right? Not when they start one-shotting your party with ranged Meteor attacks. It doesn’t help that they already have incredible movement range and the river is hard to navigate. Give them even a moment to breathe and the Yellow Chocobos will have them all healed up.
What to do about it: Put your party back as far as possible to try and prevent any of them from being hit in the first round. Then prioritize sniping them from afar with Holy, Flare, or actual guns. Have tanky characters move just far enough in front to act as decoys while using X-Potion to keep themselves alive.
7. Ziekden Fortress
Why it’s hard: This fight is great because you finally get to kill Argath. What sucks is he now has Auto-Potion at a point in the game where few of your attacks will be hitting for more than the 30 HP he gets healed. In addition, there are three tanky Knights and two Black Mages. Plus he will pick at you from afar with a crossbow.
What to do about it: The battle has you start with characters split between the two sides of the fort but you should just immediately bring the group that doesn’t include Ramza over to the bottom corner of the map where he is. Have Ramza use Focus and hang back. Get an Archer with Jump+1 to climb the tower and use an Aim+3 on Argath and try to lure him in close so you can hit him with a magic attack. Ideally, you can get one of his own Black Mages to target one of your characters and then move them right next to him before it goes off. Once Argath is dead, the battle is over.
6. Walled City of Yardrow
Why it’s hard: You meet Rapha during this fight and if she dies you automatically lose. What makes that extra challenging is that it’s very easy for her to die before you even get a turn. Plus there are multiple Ninjas and Summoners to contend with, and a city wall that’s a pain to traverse.
What to do about it: Assuming Rapha survives (there’s a chance the Ninja Throw attacks can miss her, so keep resetting if that doesn’t happen), have a Chemist or White Mage heal her up and then hope she runs to the corner and stays out of trouble. A Lancer is good for this fight to scale the walls and block the Ninjas’ attacks. A Summoner can also hit lots of targets as they bunch up near the entrance. Agrias is also clutch in this fight. Just plop her down in front of the entrance to keep the enemies inside and buy yourself some extra time.
5. Golgollada Gallows
Why it’s hard: It’s a trap! Not only do you have to fight Gaffgarion and his goddamn self-healing Night Sword attack, you also have to deal with being surrounded by a bunch of enemies including Knights and Archers. But mostly that Night Sword thing.
What to do about it: As with any Sword Magic-based enemy, you can try to burst them down as quickly as possible or just use the Knight’s Sword Break ability to try and destroy his weapon. If it doesn’t work, reset and try again. Eventually you’ll be able to neutralize him within the first few turns. If you don’t want to be a coward you can use Mustadio’s Arm Shot ability to disable him, or the Mystic’s Hesitation equivalent.
4. Lionel Castle Gate
Why it’s hard: Gaffgarion’s back and this time he’s got Ramza trapped on the other side of the gate. Final Fantasy Tactics loves these little duels but they completely subvert the normal strategies the game usually incentivizes. In addition to being stuck in a one-on-one, the rest of your team is thrust into a Summoner meat grinder with basically no cover.
What to do about it: If you’re a try-hard you can teach Ramza Teleport and have him simply leave Gaffgarion behind to be dealt with last. You can also use that Weapon Break trick again. Personally, I like to have Ramza as a Monk keep himself healed with Chakra while a Time Mage on the other side of the gate casts Haste on him. Eventually you can either have him get down to open the gate and let everyone else through, or stack enough extra speed with Tailwind to just overpower him. A Summoner with Bahamut or Cyclops can make quick work of the rest of the enemies.
3. Riovanes Castle Roof
Why it’s hard: It’s time to keep Rapha from dying again, only this time she’s in the middle of a brawl with the most busted enemies in the whole game: Celia and Lettie. Before you even get a chance to move, she’ll be near death.
What to do about it: Hopefully you’ve had someone learn Teleport by now. The key is being able to act before she gets killed. Try to get as many of your characters in range to draw the enemy’s attention or use a skill that has a chance of casting Confuse on Celia, Lettie, or Elmdore. Characters with higher speeds get to act first, so having Ninja unlocked on someone helps, as does having a pair of Sprint Boots equipped.
2. Lost Halidom
Why it’s hard: Dragons. So many dragons. Plus they can fly and cast magic. Also two guys with magic guns. And a giant chasm through the middle of the map. RIP.
What to do about it: I don’t have much good advice for this one. You can try to rely on Mustadio to keep Barich and his Chemist from being able to act. Dealing with the dragons is still a pain. You can roll a couple of Mediators to try and tame them which will not only absorb a lot of aggro but also dish it back out. One big plus is having a movement skill equipped on Orlandeau so that he can quickly get across the ravine and keep up the attack. Just make sure your characters stay on spots with adjacent squares of the same elevation. This will stop the dragon’s magic attacks from only targeting a single square and increase the chance they miss entirely. Otherwise you’ll be getting one-shot all across the map.
1. Wiegraf and Belias
Why it’s hard: Another one-on-one fight with Ramza, except this time you can’t escape. Wiegraf will kill most players in two turns, giving you little room to heal and attack him. Plus the fight goes directly into the Belias showdown and Ramza doesn’t get healed in between. Nasty!
What to do about it: Not to sound like a broken record but you can try to break Wiegraf’s sword. The Full Restore reactive ability also comes in handy here since he’ll almost always get you down to critical. This will effectively keep you at full health and free you up to just attack him. Ramza Monk is still the best option for this fight. Or if you want to play a game of Chicken, you can go the Thief or Ninja route and keep using the Tailwind Mettle ability plus Haste to slowly raise your speed and start stacking extra turns.
Okay, but what about Belias? On Tactician, this is actually the harder part of this two-pronged encounter. It’s the one that gave me the most trouble in my recent playthrough, and I only finally beat it on my ninth try with a bit of luck. Mostly, it came down to a Summoner with Short Charge using Bahamut and wiping out all of Belias’ accompanying Demons in one turn. From there you’ll want to keep whaling on him but keep your party spread out. Once he’s out of magic he’ll start using Petrify so watch out. A Lancer with Jump comes in handy here, as long as the timing syncs up right.
