How are you developing your characters?

Gave everyone white magic spells.
Vaan- Greatsword Berserker
Ashe- Basically a Paladin
Basch- Equipped with a spear and light armor.

Balthier-Gun with Green magic
Fran-Bow, with Arcane magic
Penelo-Crossbow-Black magic and Green Magic

Breezed right through the game with this.

Party 1:
Basch - Tank/ leader (Sword/Greatsword, Heavy Armor)
Ashe - Quick, Combo user/Healer (Katana/Spear, Light Armor)
Penelo - All-Purpose Mage (Mace/Staffs, Mystic Armor)

Party 2:
Vaan - Tank2/ 2nd leader (Sword/Greatsword, Heavy Armor)
Balthier - Quick, Healer, Fighter (Guns/Bombs, Light Armor)
Fran - Mage, Fighter (Bows/Measures, Mystic Armor)

3 Tanks.

Right now (and since they are twenty leves higher, from now on), I'm using Vaan, Ashe, and Basch. They all know every spell available, and every technik I can use.

They are in the process of mastering every augment, and wielding Katana/Poles.

Vaan - Everything
Ashe - Everything
Penelo - Everything
Balthier - Everything
Fran - Everything
Basch - Everything

So yeah, basically I plan to fill every single character's liscense board so they can do anything they want to do.

Yes, I know it will take a great amount of time to do this.
No, I don't care.

I started out like..

Vaan - Spear, heavy armour
Penelo - Sword, shield, heavy armour
Ashe - Staff, mystic armour
Fran - Bow, mystic armour
Basch - Dagger, shield, light armour
Balthier - Gun, light armour

But now my license board is full anyway, so yeah, i can give anybody any weapon or armour i want

I give all my characters the charge technique and Fran and Penelo are the mages, they both use bows, staves and poles. I usually give Penelo the last weapon that Fran used. Basch and Ashe are both hard hitters, but I make Ashe all around just like I do with Vaan. It's hard to make someone on the game a pure Mage, as the game doesn't give you enough MP for that.

I had Vaan with daggers, Ashe with swords, and Balthier with guns. Balthier and Vaan used light armor and Ashe used heavy armor.

At first, they had some separate skills and magic, but eventually I had no reason to punish myself by making spells exclusive to certain people...Eventually, they all knew pretty much everything on the top board. Except most of the techs, because almost all of those are rubbish.

I am going old school FF, men with the big swords up front, girls with their spells in the back.

Yes, I hate myself.

Vaan - Daggers, although when I got the Icebrand, the best dagger available was the Gladius so I had to switch to the sword. Vaan is a thiefy sky pirate wannabe, although he's got all the spells and techs...just because

Balthier - guns n crossbows, just depends on which has the best status enhancement ammo. Right now I'm liking the xbow w/ longbolts(added effect slow) Balthier is also my techy guy.

Fran - Bow of course, mild magic user mainly green time and white

Basch - I try to stick with one-handed heavy hitting weapons so he can use a shield b/c he's my backup 'tank'. basically no magic, some techs though.

Ashe - Bow, because she reminds me of the bow-wielding lass from an antique FF(see if you can guess) obviously a major magic user. She comes in to heal-spam when necessary.

Penelo - staves mainly, main magic user, and specializes in item use too, has the remedy/potion/phoenixdown upgrades. Main esper user too

Also I'm trying to give each person the right set of quickenings. Haven't gotten them all yet but:

Vaan: [Color - Moving Shape] Red Spiral, White Whorl

Baltheir: [Weather/Element "of" Something] Fires of War, Tides of Fate

Fran: [Descriptive - Contact of Some Kind] Feral Strike, Whip Kick

Basch: [dunno] Fulminating Darkness, don't know what next Q goes with this. Viscerating Terror maybe?

Ashe & Penelo: Ashe has Northwain's Glow and Penelo has Intercession, and I'm debating on which gets Heaven's Wrath, I think it should go to Ashe, but it could conceptually fit in with Penelo's Intercession although not with the phrase/word structure.

Well i'm still early in the game (Raithwall's Tomb), but right now it's:
Vaan: axe, spells
Balthier: gunner/daggers, spells
Ashe: small swords, spells
Fran: bows, spells

I keep all those people pretty much on an equal level with spells, and then just outfit them all with the strongest weapons, so most know a few different weapon styles on the licence board. Only Ashe and Penelo know quickenings right now. I like quickenings, but they're bad too since i rely on magic frequently and those stupid quickenings wipe out my MP >_<

I'm pretty much ignoring everyone else...i whip out Basch on occasion though, i use him for longswords and spells

My main party is

VAAN
FRAN
BALTHIER

THe upper grid is all maxed out on all of them
I have Fran use bow when fighting bosses and a Katana otherwise (Since katana is Magic based). The Katana looks sexy on fran and does better dmg then the bow.
Vaan is my tank he has heavy armor and an sword/axe + shield.
Bathier is the armor piercer with his badass gun. I got his best gun in the game.

I pretty much don't use the rest of the party. My main party is lvl 51 and the other three are barely 20.

well, for me its the boys... vaan with sword.... basch with GUN and balthier with sword...1st all of them should have all thier quickenings for triple MP..i found out that vaan's magic is still strong even with a sword on...and basch is good with a gun for his default evasion is higher than balthier's...and balthier with sword and shield and heavy armor coz he gets hurt easily but still has high atk power...all of them should have haste, protect, cure, cura, shell, bubble and esuna...and have at least 1 character with curaga, protectaga, shellga, esunaga and hastega...and all black magics should belong to vaan..

but for me i like going solo with no gambits on....thats just me...a party is also good but really burns MP and items

Suckage, just figured out that each character's quickenings are set in stone; I thought that each quickening square was a specific quickening that anyone could get.

I leave gambits on. However, since they're mostly useless so far, I override the gambits during boss/mark fights. Farming/Grinding I don't need to worry about it b/c Vaan pretty much one-shots everything.

Vaan-Light armor, swords and shields, and some white magic and technicks.
Balthier-Light and heavy armor, poles, spears, guns, all the technicks and maybe ninja swords.
Fran-Light armor, measures, the bow and arrow, and some white and black magic.
Basch-Heavy armor, swords, axes, hammers and some technicks.
Ashe-Heavy armor, swords, shields, katanas, white magic, and green magic.
Penelo-Magic armor, staves, rods, daggars, cross bows, black, time and arcane magic.

I just got all my characters and this is how I'm making them so far:

Vaan - sword & shield, heavy armor, some white magic & technicks
Fran - bow & arrow, mystic armor, all magic
Balthier - guns/poles, light armor, support technicks
Basch - spear/axe, heavy armor, attack technicks
Ashe - sword & shield/staff, light armor, heal/support magic
Penelo - rod/dagger, mystic armor, offensive magic

Yay!

I like assigning set weapons to people just because it's fun that way. So when I get to katanas and stuff I'm not sure what to do.