A list of characters from Final Fantasy Tactics A2. Some spoilers are unmarked.
The Jobs page has been combined with the jobs from Final Fantasy Tactics Advance and can be found here.
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Playable Characters
Luso Clemens
Luso Clemens
- BFS: In the artwork. It's basically identical to Marche's, although unlike his Luso never actually gets his hands on it.
- Book Dumb: Averted; It's stated at the beginning of the game he isn't a particularly bad student, just a troublemaker. His Naïve Newcomer status has more to do with him coming from another world than him actually being stupid.
- Character Development: If you pay attention to the things he says during sidequests, he gets much more sure of himself as time goes on.
- The Hero: He starts off as naive but eager, becomes the clan leader, and helps numerous people in Ivalice—both his good friends and quest-givers.
- Heroes Prefer Swords: According to his official art and basic equipment.
- In-Series Nickname: Red Cap by Vaan.
- Instant Costume Change: When he swears to Clan Gully. Then he stays in it for the whole game.
- Kid Hero: The youngest of the main cast aside from Hurdy.
- Ordinary High-School Student: Although we don't know exactly how old he is.
- Naughty Is Good: Well, he wouldn't have gotten to Ivalice in the first place if he hadn't been put in detention.
- Rummage Sale Reject: Just look at the kid. Heck, he's the page image!
- Spell Book: His magic journal. Which turns out to be the eponymous Grimoire of the Rift.
- The Chosen One: The Grimoire of the Rift chooses its owner.
- Took a Level in Badass: Starts out as a level 1 soldier, but can be upgraded into pretty much anything you want.
- Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: Ghosts. Even in random encounters, his standard dialogue is replaced with "H-hey, that wasn't a ghost, was it?"
- Would Hit a Girl: He smacks Adelle back when she smacks him.
- Year Inside, Hour Outside: Luso literally can spend years—without aging—in Ivalice, but he wakes up in the library as though he'd just nodded off at the desk.
Cid
Cid
- Berserk Button: Played for Laughs. Don't steal an alraune drill from him when he was going to buy behemoth steak from the money it would fetch on the market.
- Big Brother Mentor: Towards Luso and Clan Gully in general.
- Crutch Character: Appears as such in a few early missions. By the time he joins for real, he's just a Bangaa (job wise) with no unique abilities that can't gain easy JP or EXP via dispatch, and unlike Luso/Adelle, is not forced for any missions.
- Death Is Not Permanent: In-story version. He swore himself to a Judge right after getting shot for leaving Khamja.
- Dark and Troubled Past: Used to be a member of Khamja. It comes back to
hauntshoot him, literally. - Defector from Decadence: Perhaps not that decadent per se, but he decided that the power that came with Khamja wasn't worth their methods.
- The Lancer: He's much more mature and savvy than Luso.
- Quickly-Demoted Leader: Hands over the reins to Luso after getting shot, and is more-or-less an adviser after he recovers.
- Resignations Not Accepted: Finds this out about Khamja the hard way.
- The Worf Effect: Combined with the aforementioned demotion to show how dangerous Khamja is.
Adelle
Adelle the Cat / Adelaide
- Action Girl: Starts as a Thief, a Fragile Speedster class that is good at combat. She's also been surviving by her wits for some years in a place that's full of monsters and ruffians.
- A Fool and His New Money Are Soon Parted: Deliberately. She spends whatever she gets right away, as Cid and Luso discover when they try to get their rightful pay for the alraune drill—she'd rather enjoy herself now than save for later.
- The Ageless: She isn't old yet, but being a Gifted, she has biological immortality.
- All Take and No Give: Her dealings with Clan Gully at first.
- Anti-Hero: She starts out as an Nominal Hero who joins Clan Gully only for her personal gain. After her Character Development, she is more of a Pragmatic Hero.
- Blessed with Suck: How she views being a Gifted. As time goes on, she confronts this issue.
- Brainwashed and Crazy: During one battle, thanks to Illua. Leading to...
- Broken Bird: She doesn't look like it, but for all her snarks and tease, the girl has issues.
- Cast from Hit Points: Her Heritor ability Elpe has Adelle sacrifice herself to fully heal all allies.
- Character Development: At the end of the game, she makes a remark about what "the old her" would have thought of the situation.
- Charm Person: Ljda, a Heritor ability, can Charm the target.
- Classy Cat-Burglar: Downplayed — she has a feline theme to her outfit, but no Spy Catsuit. Note the ribbon cat-ear-like ribbon, the tail, and the paw-print symbol on her knees. Her nickname is also "Adelle the Cat".
- Deadpan Snarker: She spends a lot of time in Snark-to-Snark Combat with Luso, but Cid is sometimes the target as well.
- Defeat Means Friendship: A very strange variant. The first time she meets with Clan Gully, she offers them her services, only to double-cross them at the last minute. Later, she attempts to do it again, only to end up double-crossed by them. After this, she decided it was more profitable to just stick with them for a while, and basically forced them to include her in their clan.
- Defrosting Ice Queen: Initially joined Clan Gully only for profit, but eventually genuinely befriends them.
- Don't Think, Feel: This is part of how she unlocks and uses her Heritor abilities. The command abilities are even called "Instinct."
- Doomed Hometown: They all died of a plague. Adelle, as a Gifted, survived.
- Duel Boss: With Lennart, the first Gifted she encounters.
- Exact Words: When they learn the history of Frimelda and Luc Sardac, and that Luc is the one who put out the bounty on Frimelda, Adelle suggests they fulfill his request to "never look on this creature again" by killing him.
- The Fashionista: If she doesn't spend her takings on dessert, it's on fancy clothes.
- Fragile Speedster: Starts out as a Thief with an above average speed growth unique to her, but as her default class would imply she's not taking too many hits. On the same token, she won't have to.
- Freudian Excuse: Her hometown was ravaged by a plague, and she was the only survivor due to her Gift. Fearing she would end up outliving and as such losing any people she would come to befriend, she chose to be concerned only with her own affairs.
- The Gift: She has special powers, though it's never stated what the source is.
- Heroic BSoD: Suffers this when she realizes she is forming real bonds with Clan Gully.
- "I Know You Are in There Somewhere" Fight: Luso has to talk her down when she's brainwashed by Illua.
- I Just Want to Be Normal: Initially, she rejects her Gifted potential. She gets better.
- Ineffectual Loner: She tries to avoid forming ties with others to avoid the pain of outliving friends.
- Light 'em Up: Lennart, a Heritor ability.
- Lovable Rogue: Admittedly, Luso and Cid disagree with the "lovable" part at first, but she grows on them.
- Master of All: As a Heritor, her unique Gifted job, she can wield nearly all weapons and have abilities with a wide variety of effects.
- Mystical White Hair: Her white hair may be a subtle clue of her nature as one of the Gifted.
- Sticky Fingers: Starts with the Thief class and nabs some loot from Clan Gully.
- Super-Empowering: On the receiving end; once she embraces her Gift, her questline consists in meeting other Gifted who grant her their own Gifted abilities, typically by giving her their own weapons.
- Supernatural Gold Eyes: She has gold eyes, fairly unique in the setting. This hints at her status as one of the Gifted.
- 10-Minute Retirement: She leaves your clan out of the blue towards the end of the main storyline (right after the mission at Goug), partly because of the fight against Neukhia's hand, and partly because of her nature as a Gifted, but not without robbing Cid of his gils beforehand. Thankfully, she comes back after you defeat her brainwashed self in the following storyline mission.
- The Trickster: She spends a lot of time early in the game playing pranks on the party, particularly Luso.
- Vitriolic Best Buds: With Luso and Cid. Especially Luso.
- Walking Spoiler: There's certainly more to her than being a ordinary hunter.
- Who Wants to Live Forever?: One of the reasons she's not happy about being a Gifted.
Hurdy
Hurdy
- Ascended Extra: Hurdy was just an unimportant Moogle Sibling in Final Fantasy XII. Here, he becomes an important playable character complete with a sweet-looking appearance makeover.
- The Baby of the Bunch: Youngest party member and youngest of his five siblings, and treated as such.
- Gameplay and Story Integration: Hurdy and Montblanc can normally change to any job the player wishes, with the sole exception of Chocobo Knight. This is because they don't have a chocobo riding animation, but the in game reason is that Hurdy doesn't like riding them.
- The Heart: He's not initially geared for physical combat and is much more concerned with the emotional state of the clan than loot and things.
- Magic Music: Mostly healing and status buffs.
- Nice Guy: Notably, he is the only main character who never bickers with anyone else in the party.
- Odd Friendship: With Adelle; the two hit it off right from the start, contrasting her relationships with Luso and Cid.
- Plucky Guy: Hurdy apparently had little musical talent at first, and even had his audience throwing food at him, but he kept working at it until he got better.
- Quirky Bard: His unique class. Final Fantasy Tactics A2 being job-based, it is possible to make him more badass, though Song abilities are actually fairly useful. It is the job's stat growths that aren't very impressive.
- Tagalong Chronicler: One of the reasons he is so enamored with joining the clan is so he can compose music about their exploits.
- Tag Along Kid: Doesn't have much to do with the main plot or Khamja.
- Turn Undead: His Requiem song.
- Verbal Tic: Like every moogle, he will end his sentences with the word "kupo".
Frimelda Lotice
Frimelda Lotice
- Action Girl: A powerful female Paladin, famous as one of the most skilled fighters in Jylland.
- And Then John Was a Zombie: Initially this is a literal question; she really doesn't know that she's a zombie when the party first meets her.
- Back from the Dead: She kind of died, but she just turned into a zombie.
- Battle Couple: Used to be partner and lover with Luc Sardac. That is, until he poisoned her out of jealousy.
- Because You Were Nice to Me: Twice. First, she joins Clan Gully out of gratitude for them supporting her and helping her return to her human self. Second, Ghi Yelghi gives his life to help cure her from undeath out of gratitude for her saving him years ago.
- The Big Guy: A very powerful physical attacker and defender.
- Determinator: Subconsciously. She refused to die and remained in the world as a zombie.
- Driven by Envy: Not herself, obviously, but it turns out Luc Sardac poisoned her because he could not surpass her skill with the blade.
- Dual Wielding: With swords, her default weapons being Lohengrin and Save the Queen. Yes, she does in fact start out with this skill, hence the Badass classification.
- Duel Boss: Against Ghi Yelghi.
- Guest-Star Party Member: In one of the early missions where you meet her, you are hired to help a man who turns out to be Luc Sardac, her murderer and ex-lover hunt down a monster that has been stalking him. This "monster" turns out to be Frimelda, and when you find out he is responsible, you turn to face him in battle with zombie Frimelda's aid.
- Knight Errant: This used to be her job.
- Incorruptible Pure Pureness: Even as a zombie, she manages to retain both her intelligence and her morality.
- Lady of War: Noted as the most skilled blademaster in all of Jylland with a native Dual Wield ability despite not being a Ninja.
- Master Swordsman: Famous for her skills with swords. This was both Luc Sardac's motivations for killing her and Ghi Yelghi's motivation for curing her.
- Named Weapons: Her original sword was called Fallen Angel, appropriate for a powerful Paladin who one day was murdered and became a zombie.
- The Paladin: Her default job, and a very powerful one right off the bat.
- Optional Party Member: Her quest line isn't part of the main story.
- Revive Kills Zombie: Her first quest is asking for a few potions from the party, being still unaware just what she's become and thinking she just needs those to recover from her illness. Needless to say, this trope disagrees and leads to her figuring out what happened to her.
- Sword over Head: She has the chance to kill Luc Sardac out of revenge for what he did to her after she joins the party as a guest to defeat him in battle. She doesn't. Good thing, too, because he later has a change of heart and protects her from ghouls in order to help find a cure.
- Unexplained Recovery: Averted. She does recover, but it takes a whole quest line for it to happen.
Vaan
Vaan
- Bag of Spilling: In story Vaan and Penelo are implied to be far more powerful than the other characters from their previous adventures.
- Chronic Hero Syndrome: Despite his sticky fingers, Vaan is still going out of his way to help those in need. Namely the Baron of Jylland who was being targeted by Khamja .
- Cool Airship: Though we don't get to see the Galbana in action this time around, Vaan has a model of it on his belt.
- The Dreaded: To the point people disguise as him to take advantage of his notoriety.
- Heroes Prefer Swords: His exclusive Sky Pirate class specializes in bladed weapons, in particular swords, sabers, and blades.
- Kleptomaniac Hero: His moveset is centered around his status as one.
- Lethal Joke Character: His trap-disabling ability can come in handy on specific missions, and if you've successfully stolen a lot of items, his Life of Crime ability can be devastating.
- Magikarp Power: His Life of Crime ability does damage that scales based on the amount of times he's successfully stolen in his lifetime, which has no cap, which means eventually you can have Vaan steal enough times that this move will hit the 999 damage cap.
- The Rival: To Luso, until he joins the clan.
- Sinister Scimitar: His starting weapon and in the artwork to the right.
- Sky Pirate: His exclusive job class.
- Sharp-Dressed Man: He's wearing a shirt this time. Many players consider this an improvement from his Final Fantasy XII attire.
- Walking Shirtless Scene: Actually, in a subversion of his usual attire, he now has a simple white shirt under his armored vest.
Penelo
Penelo
- Bag of Spilling: In story Vaan and Penelo are implied to be far more powerful then the other characters from their previous adventures.
- Combat Medic: Starts out with quite a few White Magic spells already learned.
- Dance Battler: Has the exclusive job class "Dancer".
- Magic Dance: Penelo is a Dancer in this game, just as she was in Revenant Wings. She has dances that provide lots of supportive effects, but she does have the offensively powerful Sword Dance as well.
- Girlish Pigtails: They've grown out quite a bit.
- Lethal Joke Character: She can easily become this if you teach her Assassin skills, crippling units left and right with her dances before finishing them off with Last Breath. To say nothing of the sheer damage she can do by using Sword Dance with a Katana.
- Only Sane Woman: As she was to Vaan in previous games.
- Stripperiffic: Though not as much as in Final Fantasy XII: Revenant Wings.
Al-Cid Margrace
Al-Cid Margrace
- The Casanova: Not only does he flirt with every single attractive girl he meets in-game (including Adelle and Penelo), but his entire skillset is based around this.
- The Computer Is a Cheating Bastard: When you fight him in one mission, he has the computer-only "Impervious" Support ability that makes him immune to all status. When he joins you, he doesn't have this ability any more. Indeed, he can't learn any Support abilities, thanks to his inability to class change.
- Cool Shades: As usual, Al-Cid has his sunglasses and wears them all the time.
- The Gunslinger: Al-Cid is an Agent, the only Hume class that can equip guns.
- Overrated and Underleveled: You can't get him until after you beat the game, and even when you do, most of his abilities are useless or not very useful unless you have a lot of female units on the field. He can't even change jobs. As the only unit with this restriction, this shoots his usefulness in the clan straight to the bottom. A pity; a Hume who wields guns could've been so useful.
- Promoted to Playable: He was a minor character in the original Final Fantasy XII, but he is a playable character here (albeit still not particularly important to the story).
- Taking the Bullet: Has a skill that does this. But only for women.
- Tuxedo and Martini: His Agent job is based on the gentleman spy archtype.
- Useless Useful Skill: His custom Agent job.
Montblanc
Montblanc
- Adventurer Archaeologist: Subverted when Montblanc says "Please, kupo, let's be realistic here. My life is more than bauble-hunting!"
- Berserk Button: Invoking Always Someone Better on him gets Montblanc pretty riled up.
- Black Mage: Montblanc starts as a Black Mage, just as he does in Final Fantasy Tactics Advance. However, you can choose to make him into any other job.
- Early-Bird Cameo: It's hard to spot, but Montblanc shows up in the background in the scene where you name your clan, and a few other times at the pub, which makes this an Easter Egg.
- Gameplay and Story Integration: Hurdy and Montblanc can normally change to any job the player wishes, with the sole exception of Chocobo Knight. This is because they don't have a chocobo riding animation, but the in game reason is that Montblanc just isn't good at riding.
- Good Samaritan: He prevents Luso from accidentally making a racist remark towards a Bangaa, similar to his meeting with Marche.
- Mythology Gag: He asks Luso to help him find the Gigas Pendant, the Earrings of the Dead and the Pin of Order. All items worn by the main trio of the previous game.
- Previous Player-Character Cameo: Though it's possible to recruit him.
- Verbal Tic: Like every moogle, he will end his sentences with the word "kupo".
Non-Playable Characters
Lezaford
Lezaford
- Ancient Keeper: Lezaford explains most of Ivalice's lore during the missions and also tells Luso how to go back to his world.
- The Archmage: He is referred to as an extremely powerful mage with lots of ancient knowledge. He even has a unique job, the Runemaster, but we never actually see him in battle.
- Figure It Out Yourself: He tells Adelle she has to deal with her Gifted abilities on her own, but he does point her in the direction of Lennart.
- Hermit Guru: A renowned archmage that lives in a library, isolated from the towns.
- Mr. Exposition: He gives a lot of background lore about the world and he is kept in the loop about Luso being from another world, so he helps Luso figure out how to go back home.
- Mysterious Past: He has a set of Judge armor in his home, perhaps indicating that he may have once been a Judge himself along with establishing their order. He makes a comment about apologizing for "a pact he misused," perhaps indicating a Dark and Troubled Past and the reason why he left the order.
- Older Than They Look: He already looks pretty old, but he is responsible for introducing the concept of Judges and Laws to Ivalice hundreds of years ago.
- The Professor: Lives in a library, pretty much.
Ezel Berbier
Ezel Berbier
- Bunny-Ears Lawyer: He has the general reputation of an eccentric loony but he is a brilliant mage and scientist who developed the Anti-Laws.
- But Now I Must Go: At the end of one of Ezel's missions, "A Small Favor," Ezel decides to leave Jylland altogether, thanking Luso via a letter.
- Demoted to Extra: Ezel had a larger presence and role in the first game (along with even being playable in that one), but he is still useful here with his law cards.
- Funetik Aksent: Unlike the original game.
- Honest John's Dealership: Subverted. He charges outrageous prices and the stuff may appear to be junk at first blush, but the card he sells Luso keeps Illua from disabling the clan's Judge.
- Irony: Spent the first game inventing cards to undermine Judges and the Law. Here, he sells Luso the aforementioned Judge-saving card.
Mr. Randell
Mr. Randell
- Canon Character All Along: Turns out the librarian with a magic book went on some adventures of his own.
- Cassandra Truth: Averted in the ending. He believes Luso's story about being transported to Ivalice, telling him how he too had gone there years ago.
- Herald: It is thanks to Mr. Randell that Luso comes across the grimoire that whisks him away to Ivalice.
Luc Sardac
Luc Sardac
A famous blademaster and former lover and partner of the Paladin Frimelda Lotice, who roamed the world with her until her untimely death.- Battle Couple: With Frimelda before her death.
- Get It Over With: After the party defeats him with zombie Frimelda's aid, he tells Frimelda to kill him to achieve her vengeance. What he didn't count on was the sheer depths of her capability for forgiveness. He tries this again after she is recovered, but this time he is fully aware of how much of a monster he really was and thinks he deserves it. She still lets him live, and he wanders off into the desert and the two never see each other again.
- Go and Sin No More: His final encounter with Frimelda ends with her sparing his life and him going out into the desert, seemingly in repentance for what he did.
- Green-Eyed Monster: He was jealous of Frimelda's superior sword skill and ended up murdering her. He just didn't count on her coming back as a zombie.
- Heel–Face Turn: After being spared by Frimelda, he later ends up protecting her from ghouls and seeks a way to restore her to life.
- The Paladin: Like Frimelda, he is one of these.
Ghi Yelghi
Ghi Yelghi
Another blademaster, one who travels the land fighting ever more powerful foes in order to find one stronger than him.- Climax Boss: Of the Frimelda side quest.
- Duel Boss: With Frimelda, before he reveals he was the one to provide the potion to revive her. He wanted the chance to fight her one-on-one after learning of her skill.
- Heroic Sacrifice: He gives up his life force to the Witch of the Fens so she can create a remedy to cure Frimelda's zombification.
- Katanas Are Just Better: Unlike the other two Paladin blademasters, Ghi is a Parivir.
- Rōnin: He wanders the land searching for the greatest swordmaster he can find.
The Gifted
The Gifted
A group of people that possess supernatural abilities. They are not a formal organization; very few of them actually work together, and the exact number of them is unknown. Several are encountered during the Heritor quest line.- The Ageless: Gifted people don't age and are immune to disease.
- Charm Person: Ldja's power is to do this to both people and monsters. She uses it on a group of monsters that were about to attack her to test Adelle's worthiness of wielding her weapon.
- Combat Clairvoyance: Hilo uses it to tell the party how to fight the Magick Weapon.
- Duel Boss: Lennart, with Adelle.
- Friend to All Living Things: Ldja is able to communicate with monsters.
- Gameplay and Story Integration: Each of the Heritor abilities have something to do with their life story, for example Ljda's ability to sway monsters to her side manifests as a Charm-inflicting ability, while Nessiaam, driven mad by his powers, gives Adelle an ability that damages and Addles the target.
- Green-Eyed Monster: Gade sought ever greater power in hopes of surpassing a companion of his named Viola. His search continues on in undeath until Adelle comes along to put him out of his misery.
- Heroic Sacrifice: Elpe sacrificed herself, turning her body into magical stones in order to keep monster attacks at bay. Her skill invokes this, sacrificing the user's life to revive and fully heal all other allies.
- Infinity +1 Sword: Many of them possess (or possessed) the strongest weapon in several types (specifically, the strongest knife, sword, blade, knightsword, katana, and pole). One is given after each Heritor mission, and they all teach an ability for that class.
- Non-Elemental: All of the skills named after them. Even Wermut, which has the animation of a water-element spell, is non-elemental.
- Posthumous Character: Viola and Elpe. According to Shoofa, Viola was even killed by her own powers and Adelle risks the same fate. Subverted with Gade, whose quest for greater power lasted beyond his death.
- Powers as Programs: Gifted and learn the abilities of other Gifted by wielding their weapons.
- Seers: Hilo has the ability to see likely futures and hires Adelle to prevent his vision of Goug's destruction by a giant robot.
- Scatterbrained Senior: Wermut tries to pass himself off as this.
- Superpowerful Genetics: Downplayed. Lezaford states that the Gifted are born into their powers and agelessness, but the places where they grew up are also a factor.
- Telepathy: They're all capable of it with others of their kind.
- Who Wants to Live Forever?: Lennart refuses to make friends or join clans for this reason.
- With Great Power Comes Great Insanity:
- Nesiaam Was Once a Man, but became corrupted by his powers and turned into a monster.
- Gade, one of Viola's friends, seemed to have this happen to him by proxy. Viola died because of her powers, and Gade became obsessed with seeking out the source of them. His obsession was so strong that it continued into the afterlife, and he became a vengeful spirit who continues to look for it.
Villains
Illua
Illua
- Artifact of Doom: Her Grimoire, a mirror image of Luso's, which she uses to summon the Neukhia when she completes it.
- Black Magic: She wields various forms of dark magic in her battles against Clan Gully.
- The Chosen One: As she wields tremendous power which came to her (through, presumably, her grimoire), she views herself as a chosen one.
- Curtains Match the Window: Has blue hair and matching blue eyes.
- Dimension Lord: This is her goal.
- Don't You Dare Pity Me!: Averted. Before dying, Illua asked Cid to pity her because "Power is all I am".
- Evil Counterpart: To Luso. Likewise, her Grimoire can be considered the Evil Counterpart to Luso's.
- Faux Affably Evil: She even invites Clan Gully to witness her final attempt to open the Rift and summon a horrible demon out of it.
- Femme Fatalons: Has long blue fingernails.
- Iron Lady: She never suffers a breakdown even once. Probably due to the fact the endgame outright states that even if she is defeated, Khamja is so vast and ingrained in the Ivalice underworld it will never be stopped and she knows it.
- Katanas Are Just Better: Her weapon of choice is a massive ornate katana.
- Knight of Cerebus: The game's lighthearted tone completely vanishes every time she appears. Justified, as she is the leader of a crime syndicate who employs assassins to do her bidding. She tries to have Cid killed several times, is fond of using poisons against people who oppose her, and doesn't bat an eye when one of her best underling, Ewen, is killed before her eyes, merely considering that she lost a "pawn".
- Lightning Bruiser: You better be prepared, as Illua won't pull any punches in your fights against her. Her unique class, Nightshade, grants her formidable stats and access to devastating abilities: Saber is a self-buff raising her Attack and Accuracy (which will make it difficult to avoid her other abilities), Time Blade deals massive damage and can inflict Stop to your unit, and Dimensional Rift is similar to Gravity, except it will make you lose 75% of your current health points, and it has an area of effect as big as summons. She is also immune to debuffs and to normal attacks, thanks to the Reflex skill.
- Magic Knight: Has the exclusive job "Nightshade" combines fast and powerful attacks, akin to a Parivir, with devastating black and time magics.
- Makeup Is Evil: Wears blue make-up and is depicted as evil and vain, thinking of herself as The Hero of a story.
- Might Makes Right: She subscribes to this philosophy, claiming that the world needs powerful beings. As she considers herself to be powerful, she deems herself worthy of ruling over others.
- "Not So Different" Remark: After her first defeat, she claims that Cid and herself are no different, with both of them seeking power. Cid calmly rebuffs her, saying that power through destruction doesn't interest him.
- Not So Stoic: She acts collected, high and mighty, but she is genuinely surprised to see Luso in possession of a grimoire similar to her own. She immediately attempts to destroy it, but the grimoire easily repels her sword strike and throws her against the wall.
- Red Eyes, Take Warning: In her final confrontation with Clan Gully Illua channels the power of the Neukhia, gaining red eyes in the process.
- We Used to Be Friends: If Cid comes along to the final battle, he and Illua will briefly allude to having fought side-by-side in numerous adventures. When Cid left Khamja, he asked Illua to come with him - an offer she declined in pursuit of power.
- Wrong Genre Savvy: She has a Grimoire and thinks she is the hero of the story. And calls Clan Gully the chorus, except one usually doesn't try to kill the chorus even in Greek Tragedy....
Ewen
Ewen
- The Dragon: Falls between this and Elite Mook.
- Establishing Character Moment: To Khamja as a whole; his first two appearances respectively involve him shooting Cid to establish the group has a past history with him, and then trying to force Luso into selling him his judge, establishing Khamja as a criminal organization and the main antagonistic force.
- Hoist by His Own Petard: During the second battle with Khamja, Illua disables the Judges to ensure Clan Gully won't benefit protection; turns out it works for Khamja as well, meaning Ewen will die for real if you defeat him this time. Not that Illua cares.
- Killed Off for Real: There are plenty of battles where he can appear in, but if he's killed in any of your battles with him, he'll never appear again; presumably, he wasn't under a Judge's protection.
- Ninja: His class is officially "Nightfall," but it's basically the same.
- Slouch of Villainy: Right in the artwork.
- Underestimating Badassery: During his first battle with Clan Gully, he assumes Luso won't be a threat once his Judge disabled. Luso wastes no time in proving him wrong.
- We Have Reserves: If you kill him in battle, Illua is slightly miffed over losing a "pawn."
Neukhia
Neukhia
Some kind of semi-solid purple... entity... from another dimension. Nobody who knows about it wants it in Ivalice for very, very good reason.- Blob Monster: It's made mostly of some kind of purple slime. It's also big enough to walk around on.
- Eldritch Abomination: Neukhia is a viscous, purple thing from another dimension. At first, only its hand is fought, but later you fight its entire body while on top of it.
- Eldritch Location: It normally lives in another dimension.
- Final Boss: Neukhia is the final boss of the game.
- Final Boss Preview: You face one of its hands alone early in the story.
- Puzzle Boss: The first battle allows you to activate switches on the map to damage it, but this is pointless, as any party that can clear the previous fight is more than able to just kick its ass the old fashioned way, and it's even quicker that way too.
- Oh, Crap!: A resounding this from Clan Gully when they meet it.
Rival Clans
Khamja
Khamja
Khamja is a crime syndicate that operates out of Graszton, and the main antagonistic force of the game. Officially, they build and sell ships. This is a from for a great many illegal activities committed across Jylland. Illua is their leader, Ewen is a high-ranking member and Cid is a former member.
- Awakening the Sleeping Giant: In the Duelhorn questline. The Duelhorn's invasion of Jylland was going all smoothly, until the point where Duke Snakeheart decided to threaten Khamja. Then they started treating them seriously, and the Duelhorn ended up slowly but surely crushed.
- Dark Is Evil: They have access to two unique job, respectively named Nightfall and Nightshade. They also happen to be the main antagonist Clan of the game.
- Evil Poacher: Poaching is one of their operations. They use Carm Mercantile to identify rare monsters, though most of the latter's members are unaware of this.
- Kick the Dog: Their actions on-screen include trying to force Clans into selling them their Judges, killing members who try to leave and making profit from poaching endangered species.
- Mob War: Between them and Duelhorn. Khamja wins.
- Power Nullifier: Their leaders know a spell to temporarly disable a Judge, forcing you to fight them without your privilieges or the ability to raise defeated party members.
- Replacement Goldfish: Horeme the Dragoon is this for Ewen after he dies.
- Resignations Not Accepted: Cid found this out the hard way.
- The Unfought: It's possible to go the whole game without ever seeing Horeme, and even if he is seen, he only ever appears to bail out other Khamja members and never fights Clan Gully.
- Villain with Good Publicity: They are using Carm Mercantile, an organisation devoted to the protection of endangered species, as a cover.
- We Are Everywhere: According to Maquis, they control all of Jylland.
Duelhorn
Duelhorn
Duelhorn is a crime syndicate from an unspecified distant land that seeks to extend its grip over Jylland. Technically, they are not a clan at first, calling themselves a "war-band," but acclimate to Jylland's culture pretty rapidly. Over the course of the game, rivalry with the much more villainous Khamja for control over Jylland leads them into an Enemy Mine situation with Clan Gully.
- Anti-Villain: All except for Duke Snakeheart. Alys does not like harming innocents, and Maquis is motivated by a desire to one day end war. Even The Night Dancer gives candy to a crying kid who witnessed him fight another clan to force them to work for Duelhorn. The Night Dancer also seems to be looking for a challenge more than anything, and otherwise can be as kind and helpful as Alys to innocents.
- Blood Knight: Duke Snakeheart deliberately reveals Duelhorn's plans to Clan Gully right after he and the other Four Bosses get off the boat just to provoke them into a battle for the fun of it. He also provokes Khamja so he can fight them, which costs Duelhorn their turf war with them.
- Camp Gay: The Night Dancer. Note that it's more than him cross-dressing and acting flamboyantly: he can be affected by Al-Cid's special abilities that only work on women normally.
- Confusion Fu: Duelhorn mooks tend to rely heavily on secondary abilities that don't match the class they look like, tripping up inattentive players. This is probably meant to show that their homeland has different methods of fighting that don't quite match what Jylland is used to.
- Enemy Mine: They will side with and occasionally call for Clan Gully's aid against Khamja, but they are still enemies in the end.
- Equal-Opportunity Evil: Each member of Duelhorn is from a different race: Marquis is a hume, Alys is a viera, the Night Dancer is a bangaa and Duke Snakeheart is a nu mou.
- Expy: Duke Snakeheart seems very similar to Kefka in personality and also has similar eye markings.
- Gameplay and Story Segregation: Alys the Ensorceled claims that battling with several status ailments strengthens her magical power. This is false, and none of her abilities actually benefit from this. The first time you fight alongside her, the enemies think she's lost it.
- I Fight for the Strongest Side!: Subverted, villainous version. After the Four Bosses arrive, they split up and run around beating up smaller, weaker clans to force them to work for Duelhorn. Oddly enough, they seem to treat their forced converts pretty well afterwards, and none seems to grumble too much, so this trope is in play for their recruits.
- Me's a Crowd: Maquis can create copies of himself during battles. He does so when you try to stop him from going on a suidical charge against Khamja. In fact, this capability is why he is know as the Phantasm.
- Names to Run Away from Really Fast: "Snakeheart".
- Smug Snake: Duke Snakeheart. Out of all the leaders in the Duelhorn clan, Snakeheart fits the mold of this trope. He acts like everything goes according to plan and how he will never be beaten. Once he drops his facade and reveals that he was working to dismantle his clan against his fellow leaders so he can take over, he gets even more arrogant until you actually kill him, to which he uses his dying breath wondering why he is getting so cold.
- The Starscream: Duke Snakeheart, to the rest of Duelhorn.
- The Syndicate: Unlike Khamja, though, they are willing to operate in the open using legitimate means to conquer Jylland as well, like the auction house system.
- Token Evil Teammate: Duke Snakeheart.
- Token Good Teammate: All of the bosses seen in-game, except Snakeheart, are this to the wider Duelhorn organization. Eventually the get fed up with the bosses and overthrow them.
- Utopia Justifies the Means: Maquis the Phantasm. Alys has similar views.
- Villainous Crossdresser: The Night Dancer. The "Laws" for missions involving him seem to be in place only to trip people up on it. Appropriately, his class is "Trickster". This may be slightly subverted, as the clan "The Night Dancer" is in pulls a Heel–Face Turn, turning him into a Wholesome Crossdresser instead.
- Would Not Shoot a Civilian: Except for Duke Snakeheart.
House Bowen
House Bowen
A small, elite clan of four pursuing Klesta, the monster you encounter in your first battle, led by a Fighter named Bowen. You help them pursue their vengeance against the beast and also introduce them to Veis, an assassin who wishes to join them, teaching you her class in the process.
- The Atoner: The clan warns Clan Gully not to pursue Klestia once wounded because a cornered beast is dangerous. They know this, because that's how Bowen lost his wife.
- BFS: Loa, being a Ravager, uses them.
- Blow You Away: Tweigel has the Wild Tornado spell.
- Bounty Hunters: Most of the missions you encounter them in outside of their subplot have them hunting down various fugitives from justice.
- Cast from Hit Points: Tweigel has the Blood Price ability despite it not being available to Nu Mou.
- The Computer Is a Cheating Bastard: Veis is ALWAYS scripted to have the first turn in any battle.
- Death Seeker: Bowen. He gets better.
- Foe-Tossing Charge: Subverted. Bowen's Rush ability knocks the target back if there's space available, but the game mechanics don't allow for an actual charge.
- Invisibility: Veis can use Vanish.
- The Lost Lenore: Bowen's wife, Friese.
- Playing with Fire: Bowen's Backdraft ability.
- Squishy Wizard: Tweigel.
- This Is Something He's Got to Do Himself: Bowen tries to take on Klestia alone at the end of his story arc. Fortunately, you show up in time to prevent this from going terribly wrong.
- Time Master: Tweigel has the Slow spell.
Prima Donna
Prima Donna
A clan/band of four Idol Singers — two Viera and two Gria. They have a large, popular following and even have two perpetual Fanboys following them around. They also happen to be pretty skilled warriors.
- Action Girl: Every single one. During the Bonga Bugle mission where you try to interview them, thugs show up to try to kidnap the band. The editor promises that his assistants will protect them, but they counter that he's the one who most needs protection and attack the thugs first.
- Beast Man: Aluette and Valentyne are Viera.
- Emotionless Girl: Lili, if her flat expression is any indication.
- Hot-Blooded: Mayhew.
- Little Bit Beastly: Mayhew and Lili are Gria.
- Luck-Based Mission: The "Kidnapped!?" mission revolves around trying to keep them out of water that their two fliers can close on in two turns, one of which you'll need just to get in range of them. You better hope your lock-down powers don't miss.
- Meaningful Name: Subverted. They're pretty personable and nice. Only Lili lacks a friendly smile in her portrait.
- Musical Assassin: Averted. There is a Spoony Bard class in the game, but none of them have its powers.
- Not What It Looks Like: Clan Gully gets this from Prima Donna in one mission. The four have skipped off to go take a bath, but forgot to tell their manager, who hired Clan Gully to find and rescue them from kidnappers. When the two groups meet, they mistake Clan Gully's motives.
- The Prima Donna: All four of them are idol singers and celebrities in Jylland and a few of them even expect to be treated as such. The name of their clan says it all.
Veluga Pirates
Veluga Pirates
A minor, all-Seeq clan based around Grazston who are Exactly What It Says on the Tin. You butt heads with them a few times over the game, and their leader, Lord Grayrl, will teach you the Viking class after one encounter.
- Bandit Mook: Most of their units that aren't Vikings are Thieves.
- Blatant Lies: Lord Grayrl will promise to stop his pirating ways if you spare his life. He doesn't.
- Dirty Coward: Lord Grayrl, once beaten.
- Dumb Muscle: Lord Grayrl, who can't remember just how much money he's trying to extort out of you and keeps upping the numbers, even after you've beaten him.
- Greed: Lord Grayrl's sole motivation, though he sucks a making demands.
- Horny Vikings: The clan that can teach your Seeqs the Viking class if you beat them.
- Pirate: They are a clan of pirates, though "Pirate" isn't a proper class in the game; Viking is.
- Shock and Awe: The Vikings in the clan can use Thunder spells of varying levels.
Zedlei Consortium
Zedlei Consortium
A minor, all-Seeq clan based out of Zedlei forest who raise malboros and flans for the "produce" they can gather from them.
- The Beastmaster: Battles with them always include "Zedlei Produce" monsters.
- Blob Monster: They always have at least one flan in their battle team.
- Breath Weapon: When they have malboros on their battle.
- The Brute: They are generally rude, greedy, and not all that bright.
- Elemental Powers: Their Flan have Black Magic spells of the appropriate element.
- Invisibility: The Rangers can have this as a reaction ability at low health.
- Sore Loser: Most of the times you fight them, it's because they're peeved about losing the Auction to you.
- Totally Not a Criminal Front: For a supposed "agricultural collective," they sure do love to cause trouble.
- Trap Master: Their Rangers have access the abilitys that allow them to set traps and walk over said traps unharmed.
Bangaa Brotherhood & Nu Mou Nobles
Bangaa Brotherhood & Nu Mou Nobles
Two rival clans from neighboring villages in the Rupee Mountains that have had a violent feud for years and years. Both sides will post bills requesting aid in settling the score once and for all, and both sides pride their strengths (physical and mental, respectively) while denigrating their opponents' corresponding weakness. The leaders of both factions will teach their jobs to you (Arcanist and Cannoneer) when you answer a bill requesting supplies.
- Blow You Away: The Bangaa Brotherhood's Bishop has Aero.
- Brains Versus Brawn: The nature of their conflict, with the Nu Mou Nobles being the brains and the Bangaa Brotherhood being the brawn.
- Casting a Shadow: As an Arcanist, Madreth has Dark spells.
- Dumb Muscle: What Madreth of the NMN accuses Mocedad of being. When you speak to him, he doesn't seem all that bad, though, especially compared to some of the dumber Seeq thugs in this game.
- Escort Mission: Their last quest has you protecting their leaders against House Bowen.
- Enemy Mine: They band together when someone hires House Bowen to drive them out of the Rupie Mountains. They decide they'd rather end the feud after the battle.
- Feuding Families: Apparently, they've fought over 100 battles so far.
- Fire, Ice, Lightning: The Nu Mou Nobles have a Black Mage. The Bangaa Brotherhood has a Gladiator.
- Making a Splash: The Bangaa Brotherhood's Bishop knows the Water spell.
- Ki Manipulation: The Brotherhood has a White Monk when you fight against them.
- Know-Nothing Know-It-All: Mocedad of the Bangaa Brotherhood accuses the Nu Mou Nobles of being these.
- Meaningful Name: Mocedad is Spanish for adolescence and youth, which reflects his brash attitude. Madreth resembles madurez (and would be written the same way in Japanese), which reflects his more calm and wise attitude. Incidentally, their names were changed in the Spanish version of the game.
- The Medic: The Brotherhood has a Bishop and the Nobles have a White Mage.
- Shoulder Cannon: Mocedad uses hand-cannons, which have a pretty good range.
- Time Master: The Nobles have a Time Mage.
Yellow Wings
Yellow Wings
A clan that acts more like bandits than anything else.
- Bandit Mook: One of their members is a thief.
- Enemy Mine: You get hired by them at one point to defend them from pursuers. It turns out that the pursuers are your friends from House Bowen, and they are fleeing because they stole something.
- The Highwayman: They will block a road in Camoa and demand a toll to pass until you beat them. Many other clans will do this too, but this is more or less explicitly this clan's "hat," and you have to fight them early in the main storyline.
- Small Name, Big Ego: They're offended to find out that Clan Gully has never heard of them.
- Starter Villain: They are one of the first clans you face at the beginning of the game, and while they do come back, they are definitely not the strongest of your opponents.
Kthili Surveyors
Kthili Surveyors
A clan of profiteering tomb-raiders posing as legitimate archaeologists in the Kthili Sands area. You run into them a few times either in the act of stealing or in the act of fleeing from justice a few times.
- Adventure Archaeologist: Subverted. They pose as researchers but make secret, illegal digs for goods to sell when no one is looking. In other words, they play this trope in a world that takes a much dimmer view on this sort of behavior than the trope's heyday.
- Bandit Mook: They are pretty much all members of the Thief job or monsters.
- Fake Charity: Like other rival clans, you can encounter them in their home turf and face the choice of paying 5,000 gil or fighting them. However, unlike most other clans that act outright as The Highwayman, the Surveyors instead ask for a charitable donation for research. If you pay up, they seem pleasantly surprised that you were such a sucker; if you don't, then they jump you.
- Killed Off for Real: One of the rumors you can pick up in the game reveals that the entire clan was annihilated.
- Multi-Mook Melee: There is a mission where you have to pick up some spilled gems before they can steal them all. They make no real effort to get the gems first, but you face an unlimited steam of replacement mooks, so there's not much point in fighting them.
Chita's Weaponers
Chita's Weaponers
An all-Bangaa clan of blacksmiths. They are just as good at using their weapons as they are at crafting them.
- BFS: Two of their Warriors use these.
- Berserk Button: Chita HATES it when his weapons are stolen, as a group of unfortunate Baknamy find out in one mission.
- The Blacksmith: Their primary line of work.
- Combat Medic: And varios offensive spells.
- Lizard Folk: All of them are Bangaa.
- The Medic: Their Bishop knows Cura.
- One-Handed Zweihänder: Inverted. Chita has a passive ability that allows him to wield a one-handed sword with both hands, increasing his attack power.
- Status-Buff Dispel: Another of their Bishop's abilities.
- Taken for Granite: The Bishop can also do this.
Graszton Seaways
Graszton Seaways
A clan of sailors operating out of Graszton.
- An Ice Person: Their Beastmaster knows Blizzard and Blizzara.
- BFS: Their Warrior wields one.
- Bandit Mook: One of their members is a Thief.
- The Beastmaster: They have one, but since they never fight alongside monsters, he acts as a spellcaster instead.
- The Berserker: One of their members is one.
- Blow You Away: The White Monk knows Aero.
- Charm Person: The Archer knows Cupid.
- Dishing Out Dirt: The White Monk also knows Earth Render.
- Instrument of Murder: Their Beastmaster has one.
- Making a Splash: The White Monk also has the Water spell.
- Shock and Awe: The Thief knows Thunder and Thundara.
- Squishy Wizard: Averted. Their spellcasters have moderate to high defense stats.
- Sore Loser: They demand that you apologize for being too noisy if you beat them in an auction. If you don't, they fight you. Unlike other clans, however, they're pretty content to just let you be in peace after you do so.
Jytras Pirata
Jytras Pirata
A group of bandits that operates in eastern Jylland as associates of the Jytras Group.
- Bandit Mook: Their leader is a Thief who can steal your gil.
- Blow You Away: Their Raptor knows Cyclone and Whirlwind, which both deal wind damage.
- Cast from Hit Points: Their Seer knows Blood Price, which converts MP costs to HP costs.
- The Computer Is a Cheating Bastard: Their Seer knows Blood Price, which Seers and human characters in general shouldn't be able to learn.
- Death Dealer: They have a Trickster who fights by throwing cards.
- The Red Mage: Their Seer knows powerful attack and healing spells.
- Your Mind Makes It Real: Their Trickster induces status ailments through psychological manipulation.
Moogle Porters
Moogle Porters
A group of Moogles that operate in the eastern region of Ordalia.
- Blinded by the Light: Their Tinker knows Silver Disc, which uses a reflected flash from a giant disc to inflict Blind on either party.
- Damage Over Time: Their Tinker knows Green Gear, which can inflict poison on all units of either side.
- Dodge the Bullet: Their Flintlock knows Blur, which allows them to dodge basic attacks with guns and hand-cannons. Their Tinker knows Archer's Bane, which does the same for arrows.
- Forced Sleep: Their Tinker's Chroma Gem has a chance of inflicting this on each unit of either side.
- Gradual Regeneration: Their Animist knows Regenerate, which grants them a buff that grants them proportional healing on their turn.
- Instrument of Murder: Their Animist wields an instrument, though they can have the weapon's ability mastered already.
- Power Up Mount: Two of their number are Moogle Knights, riding a Red Chocobo and a Green Chocobo respectively.
- Sore Loser: If they confront you, it's for winning an item or control of an area at the Auction.
- Status Buff: Their Flintlock and green Chocobo Knight can both bestow Protect and Shell, which increase physical and magic defense.
- Throwing Your Sword Always Works: Their Juggler knows Weapon Toss, which throws a weapon to deal damage, and Dagger Toss, which throws a dagger to disable a target. They also have Sticky Fingers, which prevents the former from working on them.
