I'm going to have to partly side with WK and partly with Vivi.

I agree with WK about XII's battle system. The game gave you free reign to design the battle system how you see fit. And unless you're fighting only week creatures, for you to not have to do anything would involve a lot of planning and development of the gambits. If you want that, great; if you don't want that... then don't do it. Really, that simple. It's not about what's better or worse, but about your own preferred play style. It boggles my mind that people can complain about how they chose to play the game, or perhaps I am overestimating people.

But I do mostly side with Vivi about XIII's battle system, which I also thought was engaging, though admittedly more simplistic than XII's (in that you only had command of a certain type of action for non-leaders). It did start to get a bit old later on, but the whole game was getting old at that point due to the linearity and dismal writing of the latter half of the game. Overall, I thought XIII's battle system was a rare plus for the game.

But this thread is about XII, so WK is right, and people need to stop bitching about things when they are perfectly capable of playing a different way. What XII did is allow you to choose your own play style for the battle system, but that does entail actually making a choice and utilizing the gambits and leveling system to do so. If you never bother to think about it, it is less surprising when you don't have as much fun as someone who does.