Wolf Kanno
is a Level 99 Chocobo
Memento Mori
Site Contributor

Also, regarding III, I'm having doubts about weapons for my sages, since when I buy new ones all the shop shows is attack boosts. So are they better with swords, or do the staves actually enhance their magic?

Yeah, that makes a lot of sense, thanks. Looking forward to it!

Your main character starts as a Minstrel, a job that is pretty balanced. Your other characters choose their classes but several classes are only obtained through quests.

The Job system works like a mix of FFXI's and DQVIII. Your character doesn't level, only their job so switching your Lv. 50 Fighter to a Minstrel will make them Level 1 again, but levels are retained. Classes teach Magic and Abilities but only abilities can be transferred between classes, so Mages and Clerics stay useful because they have spells that other classes may never learn. Magic is gained through levels but abilities have to be unlocked.

Similar to DQVIII, each class has four weapon types they can use and a fifth style that represents the class. As you gain levels, you gain AP which can be used to level up a character's proficiency with one of the weapons or the class itself, which in turn purchases abilities and stat bonuses that will remain with your character regardless of class change. Though it should be noted that weapon abilities still require the character to be able to use the weapon, so switching to a class that can't use the weapon makes the ability useless. Luckily, several weapons overlap with the classes so you can plan your character's growth that way.

The system is designed to make all the classes useful for the whole game. Also, there are quests that can only be taken if the character has the proper levels in a class or weapon, fulfilling these quests gives you a special item you can place in your character's inventory to unlock a secret ability for the class though it can only be used by the class itself.

The system has a lot of replay value but the main quest isn't so difficult you can't power through the whole game with your starting party if you choose the right classes. In fact it's a chore to grind the levels to master everything so it's best to focus on leveling the class skills itself with some points thrown into a weapon type you plan on using for most of the game. This way you can gain all of the important class abilities and then slowly grind the weapon levels between classes that use the same type of weapon.

I hope that explained it enough for you.

So how exactly does the DQ IX job system work? Any description I find on the net is really vague

Oh, cool! So only those pieces of equipment modify looks, or does everything do that?

Well, it sure looks very nice. So tell me, can you create all your party members? Are all their looks customizable? Is there a big variety in looks?

... Yeah, I like to play around with that, you see

Huh. Well okay then, once I'm done with the Zenithian trilogy, we'll see if they have a release date for VII, how far away it is and if I'm patient enough to wait.

Also, I kinda wanna ration it, since even though I have IX, I wanna play them in succession, so I have to wait until VII and VIII come out on the 3DS. It's good that VII to IX are not a trilogy.

We'll see.

So DQ IV and V arrived today. I said they were Christmas gifts, but they were late, so dad had to send them over, and I'm still waiting for IX. Tried them out to see if everything is okay, and I'm really excited. They look beautiful!

But yeah, sending my DS for repairs tomorrow, so that should be a good pretext to take a short break between the trilogies. I mean, I could play on the 3DS, but for some reason I'd rather play DS games on the DS. Plus, like I said, I'm reducing the chance of burnout.

So I'll probably get in more progress with FFIII this weekend, and maybe play a little Devil Survivor too

Now I'm scared.

How high should I grind, do you think?