Best Party member

[Evastio]

I'd definitely have to say it's Rosa, seeing how you get quite a lot of strong offensive team members, but Rosa (along with Porom) is the only character who has both strong healing capabilities and high MP. And with Rosa's higher strength and Aim command, she's better than Porom offensively.

[KainHighwind]

I never really was before, but after playing through the DS remake, I'm a big fan of Yang.

[Hot Shot]

I really liked Edge a lot. But I thought Kain was awesome and my brother really liked Cecil. So when we played the game two player, I controlled Kain and he had Cecil(it was especially awesome at the beginning of the game when it was just the two of them). Fun times

[Darkwolf090]

As for best char and not my favorite in FFIV depends on the version,
Edge in the PS1 FFIV was just horrid imo, while Rydia would end up keeping your ass alive via killing everything while Kain just jumps away.
However in the DS version Cecil is a powerhouse if you give him just like 2 augments mainly the one that draws all attacks to him since he lacks the ability to die in the DS one and give him Counter cuz he has good attack and can heal himself he is beastly. So for over all best Cecil in the DS and Rydia in the PS1 version. Kain is good in both but never best maybe 2nd best, Yang did some wicked damage too if you used his elemental claws right.
And for those who think Tellah is a good char... shame on you shame on you all.
Recall was the only thing he had going for him in the PS1 cuz it was free... then they made it cost mp in the DS and he just became more useless, even more so cuz the Twins are just so much better then him.... so much more...
FuSoYa I have issues with cuz he never gains stats and as a grinder... thats horrid!

[The Man]

<span style="font: 16px Candara, Skia, Corbel, 'Trebuchet MS', Georgia, Geneva, Helvetica, Lucida, 'Lucida Grande', Arial, sans-serif; color: #38bcee;">i think trotsky is a pretty cool guy. eh opposes stalin and doesnt afraid of anything.

...oh, wrong Party. FuSoYa was awesome for the brief amount of time you had him in your party, purely because having a character who could cast so much magic was awesome. Other than that I liked Lydia, Edge and Cain for varying reasons. Lydia was probably the best of the three, although Cain’s ability to jump was useful against certain bosses who dealt frequent damage.</span>

You know you typed Lydia right?

For me I only played the PS1 version and from that I found FuSoYa and Rydia to be the strongest. i had thought that Tellah had a low max MP because he was an old man so he would have less stamina, but apparently that doesn't apply to FuSoYa who is old too.

Sorry for bumping an old thrad, but I wasn't around and this deserves a response. Yes, I am aware. Lydia and Rydia are phonetically the same in Japanese and it seems extremely likely the people who actually named her meant to name her Lydia, as that is an actual name. However, the people who translated the game were not aware of this, because they did not actually know anything about English or any other language that wasn't Japanese (hence Barbariccia, Cagnazzo, Scarmiglione, etc. being rendered as Valvalis, Kainazzo, Milon, etc.). It is quite likely that the misspelling has simply stuck for exactly the same reason that the spelling Kain has stuck even though his name is clearly intended to be a Biblical reference: the misspelling is simply too well known to bother changing.

[Heath]

Baigan.

[Roogle]

<div style="font: 16px Candara, Skia, Corbel, 'Trebuchet MS', Georgia, Geneva, Helvetica, Lucida, 'Lucida Grande', Arial, sans-serif; color: #38bcee; text-align: justify;">Sorry for bumping an old thrad, but I wasn't around and this deserves a response. Yes, I am aware. Lydia and Rydia are phonetically the same in Japanese and it seems extremely likely the people who actually named her meant to name her Lydia, as that is an actual name. However, the people who translated the game were not aware of this, because they did not actually know anything about English or any other language that wasn't Japanese (hence Barbariccia, Cagnazzo, Scarmiglione, etc. being rendered as Valvalis, Kainazzo, Milon, etc.). It is quite likely that the misspelling has simply stuck for exactly the same reason that the spelling Kain has stuck even though his name is clearly intended to be a Biblical reference: the misspelling is simply too well known to bother changing.</div>

There seems to be a bit more to it than that. Aeris was changed to Aerith in consequent games after it was established that the name was meant to be Aerith all along. I think that the character designers tend to favor one transliteration of a name over another and adjust the character names in subsequent titles if they didn't like how it turned out. For example, contrast Aeris becoming Aerith to Rydia remaining Rydia in every single recent release of the game.

[The Man]

While that's a good point, I'd have an easier time believing it if Kain hadn't remained Kain in every subsequent English-language reissue of the game (that I'm aware of, anyway). The odds that he wasn't intended to be named after the Biblical character are so minuscule as to defy comment, especially since the Romanisation of his name is in fact spelled "Cain" in some Japanese materials. It seems more likely that FFVII and FFIV have simply been handled differently when it comes to character name translations.

[Del Murder]

I found that the characters provided a good balance in this game, with all of them being an important part of the team with the possible exceptions of child Rydia and, of course, Edward. However, in terms of overall value added to the team I am going to have to go with Rosa as number one. She is the main healer of the game and many of the later boss battles could quite simply not be won without her. I can't say the same of any of the other characters. Her heal spells and buff spells are unmatched in terms of keeping your party alive. In non boss battles she deals decent physical damage with bows and can also throw out the occasional Holy if you want to do a bit more damage. Her defense and HP are low but not as low as Rydia's and in the back row she can take a few hits.

Second place is probably a tie between Cecil and Rydia, with an honorable mention going to Yang. Rydia is obviously the best damage dealer with her final summons. Asura can also heal in a pinch if you get lucky, but she is physically weak with low HP and defense which makes it harder to keep her alive to tear stuff apart with Bahamut. But if you want to end a battle quickly, she's the one to use. Cecil has very high HP, defense, and strength making him a very strong character. He will likely be the last man standing in any battle if things go wrong. By far the best all around attacker. Yang for his part in the game is the best damage dealer on your team. His elemental claws make it easier to target enemy weaknesses before you get Rydia back. His defenese is low but he has high HP to make up for it. Kick sucks for the most part but it is nice to have a free attack all ability.

I found Edge to be the least useful of the 'final five'. His HP and defense are too low for a front line member, and though his other abilities are cool, they are more like novelties. Blitz does come in handy sometimes but otherwise if he dies in a battle I don't have too much extra trouble winning most of the time. Just one less person to heal, really.

[Hollycat]

Rydia kicks ass.

[Heath]

I found Edge to be the least useful of the 'final five'. His HP and defense are too low for a front line member, and though his other abilities are cool, they are more like novelties. Blitz does come in handy sometimes but otherwise if he dies in a battle I don't have too much extra trouble winning most of the time. Just one less person to heal, really.

Yeah, I've always felt a similar way about Edge. He can deal some decent damage, but he's general weakness defensively is a bit annoying.

In all seriousness (i.e. not Baigan), I've always liked Tellah and Cecil. Tellah is a crazy old man who's a very good party member in battle aside from his capped MP and he is tremendously useful when you have him. Cecil, I've always found to just be very dependable battle-wise and a great damage healer who can take a fair few punches. I very rarely use his white magic though, unless I really have to, which is part of the reason I like Rosa more than I ordinarily might do.

[Kaie]

Rosa ; without her I was toast, while I could still go on if any of the others died.

[Hollycat]

<div style="font: 16px Candara, Skia, Corbel, 'Trebuchet MS', Georgia, Geneva, Helvetica, Lucida, 'Lucida Grande', Arial, sans-serif; color: #38bcee; text-align: justify;">While that's a good point, I'd have an easier time believing it if Kain hadn't remained Kain in every subsequent English-language reissue of the game (that I'm aware of, anyway). The odds that he wasn't intended to be named after the Biblical character are so minuscule as to defy comment, especially since the Romanisation of his name is in fact spelled "Cain" in some Japanese materials. It seems more likely that FFVII and FFIV have simply been handled differently when it comes to character name translations.</div>

Wrong, he was named after Kain from final fantasy 2, the little boy whose father was the second to last of the dragoons.

[The Man]

The presence of another character bearing the same name earlier in the series doesn't mean the Biblical reference still wasn't intended. There are so many references to mythology throughout the game that the idea that a major character whose name is almost identical to that of a Biblical character wasn't intended to be a reference to that character, especially when he betrays someone who's like a brother to him, is pretty much nil. I mean, even stuff like the villain (Golubaeser, if it is properly translated, a reference to a poisonous fly of legend) and the Four Fiends (all of whom are taken from Dante's Inferno) come from mythology. So having a main character in such a game not named at least in part after a Biblical character is pretty unthinkable.

[Wolf Kanno]

Wrong, he was named after Kain from final fantasy 2, the little boy whose father was the second to last of the dragoons.

Except the boy didn't have a name until the Wonderswan remake which was years after FFIV. The boy was unnamed originally and when Square remade the game for the ill-fated Wonderswan, they named the boy after Kain from FFIV.

Kain is named after the Biblical character, made most obvious by the fact he tends to get a weapon in later installments like FFIV Advance and FFIV:TAY called Abel's Lance. If you look at any of the Japanese source material, his name is spelled Cain. It was changed to Kain cause Nintendo USA had strict policies about religious issues in games. How BoFII got under the radar will always be a mystery though...

Also Golbezza (Golbez's actual Japanese spelling) and his Four Fiends are all named after Biblical demons from the Apocrypha Books of the Old Testament and other Jewish writings.