Penelo - Transient Extraordinaire

[Captain Maxx Power]

Seriously, can someone tell me what the hell she was around for exactly? She just seemed to kind of get roped in with Vaan (who also feels like a third-leg at the best of times, and as an unwanted interloper at the worst), and then proceeds to be completely inconsequential to anything but battles if you decide to use her. Really, where's the motivation besides just tagging along? She always feel like either a severely underdeveloped character or a sixth party placeholder to even out the battles without any thought given to exactly why she's there.

[The black mage]

what she has more MP that most of the party, and therefore becomes my main healer.

[Renmiri]

She is there to make you buy the sequel

[Necronopticous]

Adult doujinshi.

[Disco Potato]

Plot-wise I think (SPOILER)it was her capturing that eventually led the party at that point to first learn about nethicite (but I haven't played the game in a while so that might be wrong), but after (SPOILER)Bhujerba I really don't know.

[rubah]

She's there to be the clever astute one to counter vaan's insipid dullness.

Seriously, she makes the connections between a lot of things.

I know i love her, and would use her in my party all the time if I wasn't trying to level everyone up equally xD

[Cap'n Basch]

She didn't want to be seperated from Vaan like she was when he taken off to Nalbina, since he's one of few people important to her that she has left, and due to his nature she can't trust him not to get pulled off to a dungeon again. She's trying to watch out for him. And her general purpose over the course of the story is to interact with Larsa and help show the human side of the Empire. Vaan is in the party for potentially any number of reasons. He wants to find out what kind of man Basch truly is and why Reks admired him; he wants to see Dalmasca restored and the best way to do that is to aid the resistance; he wants to be a sky pirate and one of the best ways to learn would be to learn from a master (Balthier).

I guess people would be happier if there was some empty and ultimately meaningless motivation for them all to be there. "A Princess needs her bodyguards" in the manner of "A Summoner needs her Guardians" or something. But it's not because the characters are somehow bereft of motive that people have this problem - it's that they expect the spoonfed "we're all here for X", whereas the game places a greater onus on the player to pay attention to the characters and work this stuff out themselves.

[Savannah]

I don't really understand why people keep asking this question. Clearly, she has been with Vaan since they were children-- they're pratically brother and sister. She went along because she wanted to keep Vaan safe.

I guess people would be happier if there was some empty and ultimately meaningless motivation for them all to be there. "A Princess needs her bodyguards" in the manner of "A Summoner needs her Guardians" or something. But it's not because the characters are somehow bereft of motive that people have this problem - it's that they expect the spoonfed "we're all here for X", whereas the game places a greater onus on the player to pay attention to the characters and work this stuff out themselves.

Exactly. What I like about this game is that all the characters have different reasons for being on the quest-- Basch wants to protect Ashe, Ashe wants to restore her homeland, Vaan wants to avenge his brother, Penelo wants to make sure Vaan doesn't get himself killed, and Fran and Balthier want to stop Cid and scoop up some loot along the way.

[Renmiri]

Vaan forgets his brother right after Jahara. Penelo forgets herself after Bhujerba.

Face it. XII is oodles of fun to play, but it is not much in the way of story telling. The fact you have to make it up as you go is not a virtue, it's plainly bad script writing.

[Shattered Dreamer]

Face it. XII is oodles of fun to play, but it is not much in the way of story telling. The fact you have to make it up as you go is not a virtue, it's plainly bad script writing.

Anyone who has seen the ending has to agree with that

[Ashley Schovitz]

The ending was really the only good part.

It doesn't make sense that the party practically ran around the whole world with each other, but they hardly spoke to each other, in every toher FF practically every town or dungeon you stop in the party communicates with each other and not just for a second.

[Renmiri]

Yeah and Ashe (SPOILER)just dumps the people who saved her life and her kingdom. that was so lame!!!

[Shattered Dreamer]

That really annoyed me it also doesn't make alot sense since the people she saved the world with are all she has left in the end.

[Renmiri]

That really annoyed me it also doesn't make alot sense since the people she saved the world with are all she has left in the end.

QFT

Yes, after all that talk about friendship from Vaan and all her angst ridden face at Balthier's fate she tuns out to be a cold blooded bitch ?

[Shattered Dreamer]

What good is peace if you have no one to enjoy it with serves her right