What JRPG character types do you love...and what do you bench?

I'm not talking class here, more the full package - personality, playstyle, the works. What JRPG archetypical characters do you like, and which ones do you never seem to use? And to make things a bit creative, if you don't want to just invoke the trope feel free to give them a title, like "Goofball", or "Brick House".

For me, I always keep the hero's Designated Love Interest in the party, if she survives to the end. Also, if there is an "old guy" (you know, anyone older than 20) in the party, he stays too.

I bench any Small, Annoying Creature immediately. And yes, I know full well that there will be that one boss fight where they would be useful, but I don't care - they are going to sit on that bench and keep it warm, so help me.

Honestly, I don't like any of the JRPG character types; it's one reason I don't care for the genre at all.

Keep on my team:

Charming and oddly sexy Goofball. See Zelos or Raven. I suppose it helps that they both (serious Tales spoilers here) end up betraying the party. Makes them into slightly more complex characters. And then they have redemption stuff to do! Yaaaaaay!

The Idiot Hero, ala Lloyd. It's hard not to like the naive fool who will do anything for his companions.

Neutral:

The smartypants spock type. Since I'm going with Tales examples...Raine.

Tsundere. Rita, Sheena, etc. Not my favorite character type.

Bench:

Moe! Colette is the perfect example!

Of course, these being Tales games, they have a tendency to make all characters pretty deep and worthwhile. Still hate moe characters, though! ^_^

One of my few regrets about being born female is the inability to grow a handlebar mustache. -Landstander

It is hard to get away from some characters, who seem to crop up in every single JRPG ever made. And it is kind of frustrating to boot, because it can't be all that hard to be a bit more original, companies just don't attempt it for fear losing their customers. For instance, I can't think of a single JRPG that I've played that had a girl as the party's leader, outside of maybe Fire Emblem Radiant Dawn (which isn't even a "pure" rpg, but a turn based strategy with rpg elements). Yet why not? We see plenty of girls who kick some major butt in JRPG titles, but they can't be the leader because the target audience might not connect properly with the character? Nonsense.

So really, I don't blame you if you don't like JRP Gs - its just something you enjoy or you don't, no hard feelings.

I just got into the Tales series (finally own a sony playstation 3), and I'm loving Tales Of Graces so far, but I don't know about those other examples, so I'm wondering: would Cheria be considered the moe character type? You know, ribbons in her hair, wears her goth skirt a little bit too short, high stockings...

edited 17th Mar '12 11:25:54 PM by MyGodItsFullofStars

Phantasy Star 1, which came out in the late 80s mind you and was the first game of its series had a female as its leader. Of course back then JRP Gs had little characterization but she still definitely counts. Most are male since more males play these games than females and due to the main characters often acting like gah what's the trope I'm looking, it's where the main character is sort of supposed to be the player.

edited 17th Mar '12 11:31:21 PM by VertigoHigh

Looking at the character sheet...possibly. I don't know.

I'd have to see her in action, really.

One of my few regrets about being born female is the inability to grow a handlebar mustache. -Landstander

Never got to play Phantasy Star 1 either. Would pokemon count as a "female lead", seeing as how in some of the games you can choose a female trainer? I'd love to know if you can think of any other exceptions

I'd like to add to my list of bench warmers characters that use ridiculous weapons, like umbrellas, or wooden spoons, or magic tennis rackets, though there is one exception to that rule - Quina.

edited 17th Mar '12 11:41:56 PM by MyGodItsFullofStars

Oh dude, I love using people with ridiculous weapons.

Seriously. If a guy can beat you up with a fucking spoon, then that dude's pretty hardcore.

One of my few regrets about being born female is the inability to grow a handlebar mustache. -Landstander

Hmmm Valkyrie Profile is another one.

I just don't like the unacceptable break from reality. I get that its a game, but if a weapon is so ridiculous that it comes across as ridiculous even in a fantasy world, that kills my immersion, especially when there are other options available. I don't necessarily hate the joke character, but they better not hijack the setting in their ridiculousness, either.

Want to know how to do a good joke character? Pascal has been great so far in Tales Of Graces. Sure, she's a Cloud Cuccoolander, and a bit of a lech (towards the girls in your party, no less), but at least her weapon is somewhat believable (ok, so its a staff that fires bullets, but at least its not something spoony like a harp, or a spoon, which wouldn't even possibly make for a good weapon, no matter what planet you are from).

Cool. I'll have to see if I can find some of these titles.

edited 17th Mar '12 11:51:30 PM by MyGodItsFullofStars

So by JRPG character types, you mean common character tropes in JRP Gs?

Also Cheria is more Tsundere.

edited 17th Mar '12 11:57:50 PM by JotunofBoredom

Umbran Climax◊

I generally tend to stick with the characters that deal the most damage and a healer. Maybe a buffer/debuffer if I really need one or I have a large active party. Tanks are pretty much guaranteed to stay on the bench

I really only base things on personality if I find a character particularly loathsome or if the characters are largely interchangeable in gameplay

Yes, basically character archetypes. You often see similarities across JRP Gs when it comes to the roles and personalities of specific characters.

For instance, consider Vincent from Final Fantasy VII. A guy who forces himself into your party, that you don't trust, but whose skills are strong enough that you tolerate him anyway. You see similar characters in many JRPG titles - for instance, Volke from Path of Radiance, or Magus from Chrono Trigger.

If there's a character who holds a special amount of plot relevance I generally try to keep him/her in the active party for the duration of that dungeon/battle/stretch of story. Otherwise I just keep the characters who work best together.

My Megaman and MegaTen liveblogs

Oh, Maya's a leader in the second game (Eternal Punishment) of Persona 2.

I can't really decide which I like and hate!

Alt account of Angeldog 2437.

I actually make an effort to use everyone. You can imagine how long it takes me to play something like Suikoden.

But, hrmmm... I don't really have a clear-cut preferred set of archetypes. It depends heavily on the game. But I do have preferences for the party as a whole: never have two or more characters that use the same weapon or have the same elemental affinity or have the same type of attacks or... you get the idea.

tl;dr The only thing I really want is variety.

I always keep the Nuker around.

You can tell why Magus was my favorite PC in Chrono Trigger.

edited 18th Mar '12 12:51:17 AM by Nizbel

My priorities, in order:

• Endgame power. I will put in the time and effort to level up that lousy Magikarp.

• In games with a battlefield map, ability to attack something that starts the turn a long distance away, either through ranged attacks, or through a high move rate per turn.

• Single-target DPT, single-target DPS, or whatever manner of single-target DP applies to the game's turn system.

• Ability to reliably deal damage, never running out of a resource like arrows or mana.

• Ability to neutralize or counteract enemies' damage-dealing capabilities. In general, I only need one of these per party (most frequently a healer.)

In general, I only use characters for their combat skills—I'll keep them around even if I hate their guts.

edited 18th Mar '12 4:00:13 AM by feotakahari

That's Feo . . . He's a disgusting, mysoginistic, paedophilic asshat who moonlights as a shitty writer—Something Awful

I always use all the characters, levelling them up so that they are on equal levels.

Join us in our quest to play all RPG video games! Moving on to disc 2 of Grandia!

Fire Emblem has conditioned me to take the Rookie over the Veteran.

So. Let's all pause for a moment to smell what the Rock was, is, and forever will be... cooking.—Cave Johnson

With smaller parties, I tend to try to everyone, other than that, just what clicks. When it comes to FE, I do have a preference for earlygame people.

Also, from what I understand about Moe and what little I understand about Cheria, her personality isn't that Moe. Moe characters are supposed to give off a "aww, how cute, I have to keep her safe" little sister response. From what little I've seen of Cheria she could pass as being the Big Sister of the the group (correct me if wrong) so most Moe fans wouldn't find her Moe.

Characters that have an interesting background story get a higher pass in my book in who I use and who I bench. But overall I don't choose characters based on their archetypes, at least not their personality archetypes.

I will say that Etrian Odyssey, where you can chose how a character looks from a list of portraits, I try to have a wide range of males and females, older and younger. It's cool that you can make a loli team but I'd never do that. So I guess party balance is best for me.

Taking a break from FE1, for the FE8 draft instead

I do tend to love the older badass types. Auron, Balthier, Kratos and Jade, for example. I was rather pleased when Tales Of Vesperia's protagonist turned out to be (a somewhat younger) type of this character.

Token Little Kids tend to annoy me. So Presea*

, Anise and Karol are usuallly on my bench. I'm okay with Genis and Rita because they are powerful and in Rita's case because she's a badass. I'm actually somewhat neutral on the subject of Hope. I actually didn't find him that whiny, but I don't particularly like him either

I also don't like the whole girl-who-has-mysterious-powers-and-or-destiny archetype. So I don't like Aeris/th, Rinoa, Garnet, Yuna, Shirley or Estelle*

. I'm actually okay with Collette because she's something of a deconstruction.

edited 18th Mar '12 7:01:24 AM by lrrose

I always keep the designated healer. Yukari and Yukiko were in my party from start to finish.

I usually bench characters that annoy me (Ken, Vaan).

Estimated shipping time: 2-4 weeks.

Magically inclined characters usually get the shaft in my playthroughs because the likelihood is that they require MP to be of much use and you don't need to summon the aether to stick something with a sword.

Unless, of course, you're playing a Megami Tensei title and not only is the game founded on magic, but MP is candy to everyone and their dog.

I make video games. They're not the most interesting video games, but they're video games nonetheless.

I don't play enough JRPG with characterization apparently. Since I am too busy thinking about Pokemon, I can't really think of any...

WAIT! If I could, I would bench Marche, because I am at least partially in agreement with his Alternate Character Interpretation.

To be honest, in games like FFTA, I prefer a party of generics to the plot characters, because they are blank slates. I can make them into whatever I damn well please. The Dragoon/Gladiator? An old retired Bangaa who picked up the spear again to try and stop the evil in the world. The Paladin/White Mage? A former soldier who gave up a life of violence to try and help as many people as he can. The Scholar/Sage? A researcher who wishes to learn of the exact reasons for how the Grimoires work and to surpass even the most legendary of mages in knowledge.

edited 18th Mar '12 7:25:53 AM by EviIPaladin

"Evii is right though" -Saturn "I didn't know you were a bitch Evii." -Lior Val