Just a simple question, please...

I've had FFXII for a while now, but between work, the rest of my life, and other games I haven't gotten very far. But there's a specific reason I haven't in FFXII as opposed to the other games I own.

See, when I played FFIX I was loathe to find out at the end of the game that I had missed a lot of mundane once-in-a-lifetime items that powered very key abilities my characters needed. That was incredibly annoying.

Obviously with the way FFIX's system works, that's not a worry, really, but I AM incredibly into the monster hunting side-quests, and that's what I'm hung up on; sometimes those guys are tough! I've been trying to beat them as I see them so I don't miss the opportunity or anything, and I don't want to look at a FAQ to find out whether or not I can go do some storyline things before coming back to beat those monsters later for fear of spoilers.

So please, can somebody tell me without spoilers if I can play through the main story of the game and not miss the opportunity to do the monster hunting sidequests or anything else that's equally important or interesting? Thank you.

With the exception of the Rogue Tomato and the Mandragoras (which don't count as a real hunt anyway), none of the hunts are in any way related to the storyline. Completing the storyline unlocks more hunts, but you can wait for the very end of the game to do all of the hunts. The only "one time" things to watch for are the few loot items you get from hunts which have a special purpose, the chests for the Zodiac Spear, and the rare items that are stolen from a certain Elite Mark...

Beating hunts gets you access to some powerful items and magic very early, but they compensate for this by making some of the hunts very difficult. Status magic and Quickenings are your friends. Most enemies can be greatly reduced by Blind, and once you get all your Quickenings down, how to use them, and cycling your characters to get the most out of them, you'll be able to take down a lot of high powered marks very early.

Thank you SO much.

Also make sure not to sell any rare loot until you're ready to synthesize a particular weapon/armor/rare loot. This is because any loot you sell beyond what is needed to make an item get wasted when the item gets made. This is the most frustrating aspect of the Bazaar, although you can save on materials if you synthesize several items at once that share ingredients.

Generally items and loot are reapeatable in the Bazaar while weapons and armor are not. By all means sell the common loot, like Pebbles.