PvP Patch v5 Focused: Campaign

Today, we go over how the fifth and final version of the PvP Patch will finally support the Campaign so you can embark on a single-player adventure with one of the greatest stories in video game history and suit up afterward to take on some of Tactics League’s best players in competitive PvP. Let’s go over these changes below.

Party Roster Expansion

Though this was first mentioned in the v5 Focused series, the roster expansion is a very important detail for those looking to progress the story once more or for the first time. The expansion unlocks the four reserved Guest slots to be fully usable, expanding the party limit from 24 to 28. Leveraging this also allows for more unique characters to join your party permanently in the story and for Tactics League PvP, but there are a few important notes to share:

• Guest characters are fully deployable (for the first time) in both story and random encounters. Note that because of this, you can have duplicate Guest characters in a mission, such as two Delitas in the Chapter 1 fight in Garland. If you want to keep things true to form, avoid deploying these Guests where they normally would already spawn.
• Guest characters are also fully dismissable now so keep cautious of this and always remember to save in between battles.
• NPC-controlled mission-based Guest characters do update their stats, gear, and abilities if they already exist in your party.

Progress Faster with Always-On EXP and JP Boost

Everyone loves being able to build their party and further explore the creative offerings of Final Fantasy Tactics, and version 5 is supporting that by ensuring that the EXP and JP Boost support abilities are always enabled – you won’t need to slot these abilities to quickly start watching your units grow in levels and unlock abilities faster.

Additionally, the Bard and Dancer jobs both now support spillover JP whereas they originally did not and Onion Knight Base and Master versions can now accrue EXP and JP as well; all a part of making sure you can progress in the way you choose to.

Warriors’ Guild Changes and Zodiac Signs

A few changes also went into the Warriors’ Guild unit recruitment. Such as:

• New hires are always 60 Bravery and 60 Faith to conform to the Tactics League Standard format.
• Female-generated Squires will start with an Oak Staff instead of a Dagger since their Magick scales better with this starting weapon.
• New hires always have the Serpentarius Zodiac Sign.
• The hiring cost is now a flat 1,500 gil instead of being 1,000 gil + equipment price.

There may be additional changes to follow with the Warriors’ Guild in a later update during beta.

Additionally, the Zodiac Compatibility system is fully disabled. This change is to follow suit with the Serpentarius-neutral sign that is already used in Tactics League game formats to set expectations early that this system no longer plays a role in this mod. Units with different signs that you come across in the Campaign did not have their signs changed.

Errands Unit Customization

Ever deployed a unit on an Errand and maybe forgotten to remove gear from them beforehand? Or do you want to deck them out in the latest fashions while they are away? Or even change their job or abilities while unavailable? Now you can with this quality of life change! The picture below is a screenshot of being able to use the Outfitters on “unavailable” units deployed on an Errand.

Encounter Updates and Monster Improvements

One of the main goals of the Campaign is to set some expectations heading into Melee. Additionally, one area that I felt needed improvement was monsters and monster abilities. The following changes have been made to story and random encounters in general:

• All non-unique units are set to 60 Bravery and 60 Faith, including monsters.
• Monsters in story-based encounters and Midlight’s Deep now use Party Level +2 level scaling unless they were already assigned a higher value by default; this is to improve their combativeness while not hopefully making them overbearing for most players.
• Many monster abilities have been improved, notably in their PWR (which dictates its base damage/healing or chance); you should see more non-attack-like monster abilities happen due to this change and monsters are a bit more challenging, especially in mid-to-end game encounters!

One of the bigger goals was to avoid changing encounters from their original design; besides the NPCs now having access to stronger gear and abilities due to the PvP Patch, the majority of fights are familiar as intended. However, with access to new stuff, some battles may require a bit more strategy and careful planning as some can be quite surprising to handle if you are not prepared, such as Argath’s battle at Fort Ziekden.

With Aerith joining the Tactics League roster in Standard, a change was made to Cloud’s Sal Ghidos event that now has her staying instead of fleeing and fighting alongside Cloud and friends. Aerith will now also join your party roster alongside Cloud after a successful finish now scaled with your party level instead of the original Level 1 join-in!

Tactics League-Exclusive Abilities and Equipment Balancing

Efforts were made to all Tactics League-exclusive abilities to now have a JP cost associated with them to ensure they are a part of the campaign progression and some equipment balancing was made to reduce getting your hands on powerful gear early game, such as moving the updated Knives, such as Blind Knife or Tiptaptwo later into Chapter 1 instead of being a part of the starting Chapter 1 inventory. Keep in mind, that with some changes, the “balancing act” isn’t perfect, but suitable for those wanting to go from start to finish with the PvP Patch in Campaign.

Conclusion

Though the PvP Patch was originally multiplayer-focused only, community feedback and requests stoked a change in heart with version 5 to ensure that those who wanted to enjoy this mod in a single-player setting could now from start to finish, with bigger hopes that you can become better accustomed to changes and more ready to enter the true endgame: PvP.