If you pick Magus, you are a loser

[RedPouch]

If the game didn't give you Tabs to alter stats though, Magus would be one of the strongest characters naturally since Crono's magic only reaches 46 at max level, they would be on equal terms, though Lucca's standing in the game would go up.

Yeah I understand, and that's basically what VeloZer0 said, but again, that's like saying "well if the game was coded so that Luminaire's multiplier was merely slightly higher, then Magus wouldn't be able to catch up to it no matter what". The point is that the game does make a lot of Tabs available.

In regards to the significance of Magus' super versions of everyone's spells. It is important cause it allows him to be versatile and efficient. It wouldn't mean much if you are simply Flare/Luminaire/Dark Matter spamming but if you actually care not to blow through ethers (despite them being numerous) Magus allows you to blast your way through dungeons with little effort and little MP cost.

Yeah, but only at later, like on your third or fourth New Game+ though once he's attained that level to have enough Magic for that. I don't really find much problem with using Ethers since as you said, you get astounding heaps of them. Plus there are save points conveniently placed relatively close to eachother, so Shelters help make up for that. And I'm not being rude, but for the reasons I mentioned in one of my earlier posts, I really don't think this gives Magus any versatility at all. If anything, it only shows that if you want to save Ethers/etc. on your third or fourth play through the game, then Magus becomes useful for the purposes of frugality, which at that stage I feel is kinda pointless [though at this point you've likely pumped many other people with tabs as well, so he might not even have the chance to outshine others with tier 2 magic either]. The only question I really have is if he would be much higher than Lucca or not, because while his magic stat is higher than hers, she still has a pretty beast Magic development to begin with. Hers is the second highest in the game.

Until you get some of the final spells in the game Dark Mist is probably one of the nastiest spells in the game.

Could probably be true but I've never experienced this due to how many tech points they decided to shove in your face on the Mountain of Woe. Some people I know actually stay there and max out all their techs for everyone, kinda like the dinosaur forest from FF VI or the castle basement with the Statues in FF V [except in this case, you don't have to stay at the Mountain of Woe for very long]. But even if all this wasn't an issue, I still have the huge complain of Magus' lack of a single target physical tech or something. Pretty much everything has is AoE, which can cause a lot of nuisance problems that can make a battle really irritating like in the examples I gave a few posts back.

In terms of storytelling and character development, I kinda wonder what the point is. We see everything in regards to Magus' past so its not like he would give us any real insight to who he was. He was a bratty little kid to begin with so its not like his personality is really a stretch from his childhood. In regards to his speech with Zeal, once again we have to remember that Janus never got along with his mother and since he was taken at a young age any attempts to foster feelings of love or hate for her are gone. His dialect of disgust is fitting cause his last real contact with her was as the Prophet where he got to see first hand her greed and how much of a tool she is. In that state of mind, would it matter if he made some great proclamation? It would be like talking to a wall.

I'm afraid I have to disagree. He gets sent flying from his time period in a place where he's separated from his beloved sister and the Gurus who actually cared for him for umpteen years because of his mother's foolish mistakes, and he doesn't have anything to say to her? I don't buy it at all, it just seems so unrealistic to me. It also seems really unrealistic that as a kid, he would find hatred towards Lavos [whom he knew very little about], as opposed to his mother which is someone that he's constantly exposed to and gets made aware of her drastic change when it occurs [he even mentions it to Schala]. Even if he didn't get along with her to begin with, it is his mother, whom he was probably around a lot. And given that he was warped out at a really young age, he hadn't had much time to grow attached or familiarity with anyone else besides close friends and family. Even if he hated her as a kid, she was still an important part of his life in that regard, aside from the obvious.

I'm expecting to hear a "well as a kid, he was so smart that he reasoned that Lavos was the one truly responsible for it all, and that's where he should focus all of his anger on, and not his mom who was actually the victim and probably made his childhood miserable due to her corruption" type argument from someone, and I would roll my eyes and say "Wow a genius child prodigy that has the mindset and reasoning capabilities of an adult despite the fact that he's 7 or something, gee I have NEVER seen that one in JRPG's/anime before" [sarcasm].

For the rest of his dialogue, if they had written more it would most like be nothing but snarky comments and "cool" boasting

Says who? If they chose to go that route, then sure you're correct. They have the option to give his character actual depth and true soul, even if it's a cold one. They decided not to go in this direction. All of the characters at various points of the game have interesting interaction and character depth develop as you progress through the game, except Magus. There are ways to give a character much depth to make them interesting, without contradicting their personality slate.

Like I said, it would be nice for me to see a Magus-like character [and they're everywhere, at least one in almost every anime/video game], prejudge them based on their looks and initial attitude/dialogue, and actually be wrong about it. And yes some people somewhere will hate something no matter what, but I really feel that this direction would be for the better. I'm sick of seeing character archetype recipes being reused over and over. And small variations like "well this one's different, because he's actually evil!" or "well this one's different, because there's no time travel in this game" or "he wants revenge on his brother instead of a big monster" aren't really enough to make the distinction between all of them for me. That's sorta like some newcomer fic writer making one Mary Sue character after another, then giving the newest one a scar on his cheek and stating that he's bad at playing the Piano, then saying "See?? Unlike the others, this one has flaws!".

I think I've pretty much said everything I have to say about my Magus rant. My latest rage-rant is about Arumat from Star Ocean 4. I'm ready to pounce the second I see a topic about him made.

For the record, again I'm sorry if I seem too feisty or rude, I really don't mean to be. I'm just really opinionated by nature and I get carried away with voicing it a lot.