If you think the pacing is bad here, try their first attempt at it with Vagrant Story. Two hours of fighting and pushing boxes, ten minutes of dialogue, rinse and repeat. -_-
I considered the story sequences as “rewards” for all the sidequesty stuff I had to do to get that far. 
And btw, Vaan and Penelo are fleshed out quite a bit more in FF12:RW for those who think of them as fifth wheels here.
It’s in your best interest to leave the Earth Tyrant alone, since it’s an easy way to trigger sandstorms in Westersand which you need to do for a couple of farming rounds and rare hunting. You can still get sandstorms if you kill it when it’s the Rains in Giza, but it’s nowhere near as fast. There’s no reward for killing it anyway.
What do you mean by farming? Making rare beasts appear? And isn’t the ET a subquest? How can it have no rewards?
I’d better make sure of that before I fight it. Btw, another problem I have with the guide, is that the ENTIRE Hunting Marks section is printed in really tiny lettering, and on top of that, on orange backgrounds, making it nearly impossible to for me to read. >_<
A couple of the Rare Game only appear during sandstorms in Westersand, as well as the Gnoma Entite that has one of the required pieces for the Ultima Weapon (Which isn’t that hot anyway, but still). Entering the Earth Tyrant’s area will automatically trigger a sandstorm in the entire place. Once you kill it, you will need to wait until the Rains in Giza since entering from there at those times is the only other way to cause sandstorms.
Yeah, I think it does have one reward, but it’s utterly worthless. It’s an overal very pointless quest with no real benefits.
I don’t understand how you need to farm before progressing. I just killed everything in my way and I didn’t need to do more.
I can’t think of a single non optional boss that gave me problems.
I generally did all the hunts I could before going further. I did find some non-optional bosses challenging even with that, though I don’t think I ever got a Game Over screen from a non-optional boss.
Same. It also didn’t take me 45 hours to get to level 27.
Yeah, you’ve already explained how you came up with killer strategies and just blasted your way through the game, without bothering to pick up loose stuff or see hidden scenes the way I am. And I already explained I’d rather not play the game that way at all, as I find it boring, so much so I even started the game over. Can we turn the snark off now? Thank you.
I’m certain I’m still doing something wrong (though not sure what- buying the wrong licenses or equipment, maybe?) but I AM having fun. I like the gameplay better than the story here anyway. I just need advice with a few things… most of my problems have been with running into rare beasts unexpectedly, or with things the book doesn’t cover (I had to go to Gamefaqs to figure important details about several spells, for example.)
OK, I looked at a FAQ and it seems the only Mark that needs a sandstorm present is the Ring Wyrm. Is that correct? (I don’t care about the rare beasts; I’m not going to chase around rare monsters on the odd chance they appear in some remote corner of the world, at least not on this playthrough.) It level 32, however… should I try it now? My party is level 27 but I just killed the Feral Retriever and several Saurians, so maybe with the right strategy I can take it.)
The sandstorm is most useful for tracking down the Earth elemental which gives you a nice rare drop. You might not need it, though…
You don’t. As seraphim said, the gnoma halcyon is used to get the ultima blade, which isn’t to great. The only other useful item they have are feystones, which you can get from any entite. ( I don’t think you can take one of those on at level 27 anyway:)).
That settles it, then- I decided from the start that I would NOT go after random things in this playtrough. I want to complete the game, get all the Espers and hunt all the marks, but things like rare Bazaar items will have to wait for the next time I play the game. So, I’ll go get the Ring Wyrm, then the Earth Tyrant.
Um, if you want to kill all the Espers and Marks, you’ll find it hard going without the best equipment, which you can only get via bazaar items. Having said that, I’d just go for a single Masamune and the Tournesol; you shouldn’t really need any other weapons (you get another Masamune for beating one of the later Marks).
Supposedly you can get super high early in the game by buying Phoenix downs before Penelo even joins your party the first time and repeatedly killing some undead monster over and over.
So essentially you realized the game had no story, then you realized you didn’t like how to make the game work so you made it harder for yourself, then you realized that you made it too hard and tedious for yourself so you’re removing the grind by not doing the extra side stuff to stick to the story you already acknowledged didn’t really exist?
Originally Posted by ME
[i]You know all of this talk about is making me want to go back and finish up the sidequests that I haven’t done yet which includes…Fighting Zodiark and Ultima,
Fighting Ixion, Piscodaemon, The Seer/Shadowseer, Fafnir, and Behemoth King,
Fighting Yiazmat and Omega MKXII,
and other Miscellaneous objectives like getting the WyrmHero Sword and the Tournesol.[/i]
As an update as to my own activities at the moment.
I’ve smote Ixion, Piscodeamon, Shadowseer, Fafnir, Behemoth King and Hell Wyrm.
I’ve also acquired Ultima and a few improved pieces of equipment like Excalibur and a few other miscellaneous pieces of crap.
Started the Fishing minigame making it to midstream.
And gained several more levels going from 62-40 to 73-49.
The only things I have left to do is to bring down the big three. Zodiark, Omega Mk XII, and Yiazmat.
So far I’ve made two attempts to bring down Zodiark, and one attempt against both Omega and Yiazmat (the later of the three not counting since I reset as soon as I was sure that it was there). And barring any more stupidity on either my part (as in going into battle against Zodiark with two of my three reserve characters beserked >.< ), or Squeenix’s part (why do I have to accept the hunt for Yiazmat before I can challenge Omega even though I’m standing right next to him tapping confirm and everything? >_< ) I should be able to trash them within a week.
What? You don’t have to accept the yiazmat hunt to fight Omega, you just need to find the bastard. I beat Omega long before fighting Yiazmat.
As I said I was in the room I circled Omega a couple of times I ran right up to it and performed every action I could think of. And NOTHING happened. Admittedly I had not yet defeated Hell Wyrm and Behemoth King prior to my first attempt.
Did you?
Sin: You’re only half right. There is a story here, but the grinding needed to get thru the game takes away from it. And I realized I was playing the wrong way so I started over and liked it much better the second time. And from the very first time I decided I wasn’t going after random stuff like rare drops or rare beasts; I was doing, and still am, everything else, including all the sidequests.
I’ll admit this game is frustrating, in that it is not as user-friendly as most RPGs. Too much too do, not enough of it very clear. Things like not getting Quickenings early enough can screw you up.
And please, no more snark. I don’t need it.
I did beat hell wyrm but not behemoth king. I don’t remember having to do anything to trigger the fight, but I fought him ages ago. The guide book doesn’t say ANYTHING required for the fight to be available or how to trigger it.