"It's too dangerous to stay together!"

...Yeah right!

Final Fantasy games only allow a certain amount of members of your team to be used at once. It is usually four, but in games like VII, VIII, and X it was three, and in IV it was FIVE for some reason. Because of this the game has to come up with excuses as to why only so many of you are on the main mission (while others are... I dunno, maybe down the pub somewhere?)

The most common seams to be that it is "too dangerous for a group". What? I thought there was "safetey in numbers" or something?

Any particular excuses you liked in the subject?

Yeah, and even when the whole party is together you can only use 3-4 of them in battle. So the rest are just standing around watching you get your ass beat? Wtf guys help me out.

It doesn't really make sense, but as there is a good functional reason why they do it I don't mind. You really only have 3 choices:
1) Only have the max number of in battle characters in the party at a time (FF4 style)
2) Have all available characters in battle at the same time. (Attempted to be approximated by FF10 & FF12)
3) Have some excuse as to why you can only have a select number of your characters in battle at a time.

I think complaining over something like this is kind of splitting hairs. It goes into the same bin as 'why do they wait for each other to attack'. Because it is a game and designed to be fun and not to be realistic.

I know it's split hairs, it's just fun to think about these little things.

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Any particular excuses you liked in the subject?

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Oops, I missed this line in the OP. I thought this was a thread to bitch about it. Carry on. :eep:

If the choice is to have someone like Relm, Cait Sith or Kimahri, help me out, I'd rather attempt destruction myself. ~

What about the fact that up to XII, if your main party members die, it's game over DESPITE having 3-5 other characters ready to fight?

Scene: Final Fantasy VII. Cloud, Tifa and Cid vs. Emerald Weapon; Tifa and Cid are dead.

EW: (Hits Cloud fatally.)
Remaining party members: :eek:
Red XIII: Do you guys really wanna fight that thing?
Yuffie: Aw SMURF no.
Cait Sith: Let's just play dead.
Vincent: (has already pulled his coffin out of hammerspace and climbed inside.) Nuthin' ter see here...
Barret: Is ther room in there for me, man?

Game code: Screw you, you cowards. *throws up Game Over*

Oh, shoot, we've got too many party members, let's kidnap the love interest again.

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Originally Posted by Skyblade

Oh, shoot, we've got too many party members, let's kidnap the love interest again.

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And again. And again. ...And aGAIN.

Is there a more overused trope in FF? Even Penelo gets kidnapped at one point.