- In the remake, Luso also gets it. Then again, Luso in FFT is a walking Final Fantasy Tactics A2 teaser trailer, and his being a Ramza clone as far as abilities go, might be a way to indicate that Luso would be more like Ramza than like Marche.
- It's because Alma is the "perfect host" for the angel Ultima. He's her brother, and some of the compatibility carries over; thus when subjected to Ultima's energies, he can control it a bit himself.
- Luso can do it because he's an inverse Summon Everyman Hero of the Grimoire; which was the force behind summonings in Vagrant Story (Ivalice). Thus this was also the power that bound the Summon Magic in Final Fantasy XII (Also Ivalice); including the Angel Ultima.
- It's because Alma is the "perfect host" for the angel Ultima. He's her brother, and some of the compatibility carries over; thus when subjected to Ultima's energies, he can control it a bit himself.
- 'Ramza' and 'Arazlam' are actually modern-day Ivalician Ren-Fair performers.
- Assassin's Creed crossover! GO!
- Conversely, the traits of the characters were magnified and/or distorted.
- Say, for example, Ramza wasn't a saint, though he may have helped save the world.
- And neither was Dycedarg a regicidal, patricidal, scheming manipulative bastard, though he was an opportunistic ambitious man.
- However, Cid was still a friggin' badass.
- Amen.
- In fact, Olan probably thought his adoptive father's true baddassery wouldn't be believable and so he toned it down.
- Toning down one's badassery wouldn't be unrealistic, there was a guy who in WW2 killed nazis with a machinegun with a grenade seconds of exploding on his hand and then threw it on a tank, it wouldn't feel out of place in a Rambo movie, but it was real life.
- Doesn't seem likely. If the Durai Report was the only source or it differed too much from other surviving documents, historians would have dismissed it outright. (And the Church probably wouldn't have suppressed it for several hundred years.) Besides, aside from the magical stuff, nothing that happens in Tactics is all that different from Europe's Late Medieval Era. So why would Olan have to make anything up?
- You must not leave out the possibility, though, that Balbanes knew his bloodline was unfit to rule. Knowing this, he would have gotten Delita into the academy because he saw Delita's indeed impressive ability to make a plan and come out on top.
- This would kind of undercut Delita's lack of noble blood being an important plot point. Also, why would Barbaneth acknowledge Ramza and Alma as his blood children but keep Delita a secret? The more likely scenario is that after their birth parents died of plague, Barbaneth 'adopted' Delita and Tietra after a fashion because of his kindness and their closeness with his blood children, as he made sure that Delita was sent to the same military school as Ramza, and implicitly also that Tietra and Alma were schooled together. It wasn't unheard of in medieval society for a well-off noble to take a child into their household to be a companion (and perhaps later servant/subordinate) to their own children. And given that by Ramza's teens, Dycedarg and Zalbaag were well into adulthood, Ramza and Alma might not have had any friends their own age otherwise.
- Germonique
- "Ajora lives again, mortal-oh hell, not again."
- Smack, Ajora hits the ground. "Ajora the mighty is getting sick of this shit. Stop getting reincarnated!"
- Very vaguely suggested that Ramza is at least of some kind of bloodline that Ajora recognizes.
- "Ajora lives again, mortal-oh hell, not again."
- Cid, because Cid's so badass he's been resurrected before his death.
- Or rather, {FFXII and Revenant Wings / FFTA adventures / FFTA2 adventures} > FFT adventures > Vagrant Story > FFTA framing device > FFTA2 framing device. There's also speculation that while FFTA2 is true time travel to the era of FFXII, the original FFTA took place in a fantasy version.
- Gametrailers had a Final Fantasy Retrospective that confirms this, showing the map layouts of FFXII and FFT, specifically that FFT is to the west of FFXII. Historically and stylistically, FFXII could take place in the equivalent of the Roman Empire, whilst FFT is the Middle Ages. As for the tech decline, it seems the Airships in particular were fueled by magicite, and if this was all used up, and nethicite manufacturing was forgotten or deemed illegal due to accidental disasters or terrorist uses, they would stop working.
- Gametrailers didn't really have their facts straight, but yes, this timeline is confirmed in the Ultimania. The patched together in-game maps from FFXII and FFT are wrong however; watch the prologue of FFXII again, and you can see there's a vast expanse of Ordalia in the way of that theory. The presence of Goug city in TA2, however, probably indicates that (following the Cataclysm that screws up technology) the Ordallian half of Jylland becomes the region from FFT. So FFT takes place on the other side of the continent from FFXII, but in the same region as FFTA2, though changed so much that it's mostly unrecognisable except insofar as it's a west-facing peninsula and has a city called Goug.
- Think about it. Ramza and company have just killed off Altima and they claw their way back up to the surface, alive and well. They've saved the world, but the world very decidedly wants to kill them. Everyone's at peace, pretty much. They could go ahead and continue the fight, or let everyone believe they've well and truly died. A little while after Ramza's funeral, Ramza drops off his accounting of the Zodiac Brave Story, which Olan adapts into the Durai Report, purposefully leaving out the portion where Ramza and everyone else survive.
"When I served as an inquisitor for the Church, many others in the Holy Office feared the existence of this work. And the same is no doubt true for the High Confessor. They were all fearful of these writings, for everything contained within them is fact."
However he never goes on to give any evidence that any of these claims made by Germonique, who was known to be a particularly sketchy and traitorous individual, have any semblance of truth in them. Germonique may just as well have had a vendetta against Ajora and wanted to wipe out his following, traitor that he apparently was. This would mean that the face-off with Ultima at the end of the game is largely the concoction of Orran's mushroom-addled imagination.
- Alternatively, the Scriptures are a lie in that the story they tell is absolutely meaningless. The Scriptures, after all, were actually meant to contain the code to activate the portal in Orbonne, and are nothing more than elaborate Spy Speak.
Hence why Delita says Teta saved him.
On the other hand, since crystal are known for empowering others with the deceased's knowledge, Delita may very well have been privy to Teta's last memories. I rather doubt they were peaceful. Imagine if her last thoughts were, "I don't want to die." Or the realization that she's been betrayed by her adoptive family.
No wonder Delita has such a chip on his shoulder.
The man rescues women left, right, and center and even has a potential Unlucky Childhood Friend or Victorious Childhood Friend in Teta/Tietra. Note that, without the war and everybody in the country going stab-happy, every woman he rescues are people he could have reasonably been expected to meet over the course of his life anyway. He would have met Agrias while she was guarding Ovelia, met Izlude and Meliadoul through Vormav and Dycedarg associating with one another, and probably would have foiled an assassination attempt by Barinten, leading Rafa to fall in love with him in the process.
Damn. Now I want to see this.
- I do too, the solution is fan fiction. Get crackin.
- No, it's because there's a difference between the Revive spells bringing people back from near death, and the Zodiac Stones bringing someone back from actual death.
- Revive spells are almost never mentioned in cutscenes, AFAIK. The closest I can think of is Ramza asking for a phoenix down, but that's not the same thing. Besides, revive spells work just fine for characters who just had their souls sucked out of them or were hit at point-blank with a fireball from the King of Dragons, so it's hard to believe they'd just stop working for "mere" bullet or crossbow wounds, just because it's a cutscene. Hence why it's slightly more believable to think that the spells are just there for gameplay reasons and don't exist in-story.
So, according to the ZBS, a power hungry king summoned demons to the world, and a hero gathered the 12 Zodiac stones and Braves to defeat the demon king. Now, what happens in The War of Lions? Any of a number of persons qualify for "Power Hungry King", but none better than Folmarv and the Glabados' leader. So they grab the Zodiac stones and, surprise! Summon demons into the world. Meanwhile, Ramza Beoulve and his companions gather the stones and ultimately pry them from the hands of demons to save the world.
Notably, Ramza and company exceed the 13 permissible, though it could be said that some of Ramza's followers aren't equal to others.
So say we count only the 12 most important aside from Ramza. Namely, Agrias, Cidolfas, Meliadoul, Rapha, Marach, Mustadio, Beowulf, Reis, Alicia, Lavian, and Ladd. You can dispute the canonicity of say, Cloud, Balthier, and Luso, so we discount them from the theory. Boco, Byblos, and Construct 8 are unlikely for being of the non-human variety. Now, for those keeping count, we've got 11 not counting Ramza, and we need 13. We can throw Alma in the mix of this if we want to, but that makes the numbers a bit sketchy for the following part. Likewise, for those dissatisfied with the inclusion of Alicia, Lavian, and Ladd among the 12, we can swap out at least one for Olan Durai, who makes a decent John or Peter to Ramza's Christ.
The idea here is to make a ridiculous comparison to Christ and Arthur, so we need our Judas/Lancelot. We could say Delita, or Gaffgarion (especially because of his presence at the execution grounds, which bear a name suspiciously similar to 'Golgotha'.) or even Argath.
Ramza also shares a number of other parallels with Christ. He faces persecution from the existing government, is of noble birth, is accused of heresy,and is harassed constantly by members of the existing clergy. Oh, and the possibly dying to save Ivalice from the great evils that ran amuck in it.
Ramza is also the only person to have seen The Gods perform miracles via the Zodiac Stones, instead of the unholy monstrosities the Lucavi bent them for.
In any case, Ramza most definitely fulfills the ZBA, if not all the requirements of a Christ-parallel. He had his 12 followers, gathered the Zodiac Stones, and defeated the demon, saving Ivalice. For a Christ-like set-up, he has his 12, as well as other followers. One is a traitor, one is trusted, and he dies for his people's salvation.
- CHALLENGE: I'm not saying you're wrong, I want to see if you can take the parallels further. Add examples as they apply. And yes, I know these are out of order.
- The revelation of divinity.
- The missing time from recorded adolescence to adulthood
- Chapter 1 -> Chapter 2. With the costume change, it marks a pretty big maturity shift, even though it's a short time (how long was that Time Lapse anyway?)
- Rebuking the moneylenders in the temple.
- The miracles. All of them.
- The temptations and the 40 days in the desert.
- The sermon on the mound.
- The baptism.
- The crucifixion and resurrection.
- The Chapter One campaign, "Cadets of Ivalice", where Ramza's player was Leeroy Jenkins and overall played everything like it was a buddy road movie, Delita's player was trying to roleplay a deep, serious, complicated character, and Algus' player was a total newbie who was just trying to learn the system. As the plot developed, Ramza and Delita grew to disagree about every facet of the game, and Algus, tired of being stuck in the middle, quits after the Sand Rat Cellar battle. The DM continues using Algus as a NPC, exaggerating Algus' previous character to the point of turning him into a Jerkass. The campaign ends with Fort Zeakden, except Rocks Fall, Everyone Dies.
- Ramza's and Delita's players have a falling out for some time, but since they're friends in "real life" things eventually work out. Delita's player offers to GM a game set in the Yvalice setting, allowing Ramza's player to reuse his character (handwaving how he survived) and bringing on new folks. Except Ramza realizes that Delita is not as over the previous campaign as he thought, since Delita also comes back as a plot-important NPC. While Ramza plays along better this time, having learned his lesson, the new players are not impressed with Delita-as-DM and pulls the plot so off the rails that Delita gets annoyed and throws a freaking demon at the (at this point rather low-level) party. Rocks Fall, Everyone Dies again.
- Some time later, Ramza takes a turn as a DM running a high-to-epic level party, handing off his character sheet to his girlfriend. Battle one of his campaign? A rematch against Queklain, of course. He also runs a B-campaign starring the Shrine Knights, but since they're all evil-aligned characters the ones who aren't killed by the A-campaign stab each other in the back. Eventually the players left in the B-campaign (including a certain Munchkin who was playing a Cool Old Guy) decide to join in the A-campaign. At this point the party hits epic level, so Ramza ditches the political intrigue portion of the plot and just has everyone go demon-slaying, since they were clearly having more fun doing that than anything else.
While this is possible, a number of people over the years have suggested that Matsuno is probably just a fan of Berserk and was inspired by it in the creation of Tactics, which makes a lot of sense when you consider the similarities between the two.
First, the setting, themes and general tone have a lot of similarities to the "Golden Age" part of the manga, with political intrigue, a Crapsack World Dung Ages setting, and themes of political ambition ESPECIALLY with Delita who is vaguely reminiscent of Griffith's character as a commoner with aspirations to the throne and who is willing to do whatever it takes to get to the top.
However there are two even MORE specific similarities that make the inspiration a strong possibility. The first is the whole reed flute thing, which in Tactics is a symbol of Ramza and Delita's camaraderie, is ALSO present in an iconic scene in Berserk where Griffith uses it to charm Charlotte by showing how earthly and down-to-earth he supposedly is.
But the HUGE one is the Lucavi themselves. In Berserk, there are items called "behelits" which are eggs with human features scattered about. They have a nasty habit of finding their way to people at just the moment where they are most emotionally disraught and/or about to die, at which moment the Behelit's features shift around to form a face, which screams and summons the Godhand, who are a group of godlike demonic entities. They propose a Deal with the Devil where the person will be free of their suffering, but they must in turn sacrifice whatever is most important to them (usually a loved one). When they take up the bargain, they are transformed into "Apostles", which are demons for all intents and purposes. This transformation usually (though not always) causes the person to lose most of their humanity and grow bloodthirsty and cruel. Their appearance changes, with many of them remaining humanoid but possessing warped, twisted features (unusual and menacing eyes are the most consistent feature), and they can also transform into another, much more monstrous and powerful form which is usually quite frightening and demonic.
Does any of that sound familiar? Because it's fundamentally the same way the Lucavi and the Zodiac Stones work, with a few minor to medium differences. They also serve a similar narrative purpose (in Berserk's golden age arc moreso) in that the setting is relatively grounded, and they serve as a looming, otherwordly, invasive and almost lovecraftian threat lurking in the shadows, an untold unspeakable terror that feels like it's too horrible to even exist.
The timeline for this also checks out; while the first Berserk anime had not aired yet (it was due to come out in a few months actually), the manga was being serialized and the story had already gone through all the aforementioned points and events even by the time Matsuno and his team would have started working on Tactics. This would mean that Matsuno was familiar with the manga, which is still plenty plausible still.
It's still possible that this is all a big coincidence (Berserk itself is subject to this, with a seemingly obvious inspiration for Guts' character actually being completely unknown to its creator before it was pointed out to him), but it's an interesting alternative to the oft-cited Executive Meddling that makes more sense on the whole.