Final Fantasy V's Job System

 With only a single game between them, Final Fantasy V brings back the Job system introduced in III, but with some refinements and changes. I'm about four hours into the fifth entry in this franchise, which was also the only SNES-era game not to be released in the US initially (hence why IV and VI were released as II and III here).

Interestingly, this is the first of these games that uses Jobs/Classes that a player actually picks to give the characters actual distinct personalities, and in a delightful change, even though each class has it iconic looks (like a headband for Monks and a unicorn horn for Summoners) the looks of these characters are nevertheless unique.

Bartz, the game's primary protagonist, hasn't quite had a story like Cecil's unfold just yet, but there are hints of some greater story of his late parents and his connection to the various elemental crystals (I think II is the only one so far that has not had elemental crystals as a central part of the plot, though I think that element will largely depart from the series from VI onward, unless you count the various Mother Crystals in XVI, though these aren't quite as specifically linked to the four elements).

There are some new jobs, and I suspect that we're getting access to most of them far earlier than in III, to give us time to fully level them up. The early options are, if memory serves, Knight, Monk, Thief, White Mage, Black Mage, and Blue Mage.

The Blue Mage is an interesting addition - it's the first instance of a character that can learn enemy skills, though weirdly, you have to level up that job at least once before you get the "Learn" feature, so you don't actually have any Blue Magic to cast at first (however, they get to wield most weapons and armor).

Rather than just getting a job level for every five actions you take in combat, there's instead a kind of alternative XP that you get in each encounter that allows you to level you jobs.

Each job comes with a core skill that you'll have when you are using that job, but you'll start learning other skills as the job levels up. You have a second slot for a second ability, but you can equip the skills you've learned from any job, regardless of your currently-equipped one. Some of these primary skills can't be learned, like the Monk's kick, but most can. This will allow you, for example, to learn the Guard feature of the Knight and then swap to a Monk.

For spellcasting, they divide spell abilities by level, so while you'll want to largely stick with a type of caster to get those better spells, if you already have a high enough spellcasting ability, you can swap and have access to all those spells.

One real convenience is that once you learn a spell, all of your characters can use it if they've got the ability to cast that level of that kind of magic - for example, I just fought and earned the allegiance of Ifrit, so if I were to make all of my characters Summoners, they ought to all be able to summon him.

One class I've found fun is the Mystic Knight (your man loves a battlemage) who have a special "Spellblade" ability, which then lets you cast any of your black magic spells on your weapon, infusing it with that element of damage or even that magical effect for the rest of the fight - this can include Silence and Sleep!

In fairly quick succession, you get more Jobs. The next set includes the Red Mage, the Time Mage (which gets all those "Slow," "Haste," "Stop," etc. spells) the Summoner (all your summon spells - you can pick up some less powerful ones from a store,) the Berserker (which acts as if it always has the Berserk condition - basically if you want to not worry about micromanaging one of your characters,) an the Mystic Knight (as described earlier).

Next, you get the Beastmaster (which I have not really figure out,) the Geomancer (which, like in III, has some powerful and MP-free abilities that you just sadly don't get to pick,) and the Ninja.

I think there are others you can get, but I don't know if I need to do side quests, explore, or just wait until later in the game.

Anyway, I think that the system probably makes a bit more sense than the one in III. Assuming there's an exponential growth in both the points gained and needed to level the jobs, I hope it'll be easier to catch up on a new job than it was in III.