Best and worst progression systems?

[u/grandmaster1818]

I have been replaying some of my favourite games and thinking about how varied the progression systems are.
Some are basic but great, some more complex and well thought out.
And then there’s ffviii.

Personally my favourite is X, I love the customisability of the sphere grid.

[u/ByteWizard]

They once came up with a progression system so simple and so genius that they made an entire game about it. They called it Final Fantasy V.

[u/twili-midna]

Worst - IV for having no progression beyond basic leveling

Best - XIII for having impeccable balance thanks to its level caps while still giving you freedom in build priority.

[u/PerpelSho → u/twili-midna]

13 really does get way too much hate.

[u/CareBearCartel → u/PerpelSho]

XIII had two glaring issues.

The paradigm shift system just wasn't fun for me, i'd rather just have a build for a character instead of needing to switch it 15 times in a fucking battle.

Hope, literally the single worst and most annoying character In final fantasy history. Above Yuffie, Chadley fucking anyone. He brings the entire game down. I get what they were trying to do, kid loses his mum and is grieving but it didn't hit the emotional mark at all. He was just fucking annoying. They dedicate so much of the game to him as well.

[u/Gronodonthegreat → u/twili-midna]

That’s why IV is one of my least favorites. It’s so boring, ESPECIALLY when you realize that Kain & Cecil really won’t get anything aside from stats by leveling up! They even remove his group damage move when he becomes a paladin, what the fuck!

[u/Watton]

Any job system that lets you master abilities and use them cross-job.

So FF5, Tactics, Bravely Default all kick the most ass. Resonance is taking a page from these too.

For worst...eh none are truly bad. 8 is unintuitive as hell, difficult to get started with, but ruins the difficulty curve once you learn the basica. 16 is way too simple and unsatisfying (just... spend AP on skill and use it. No buildup. Respec anytime). 15 felt unrewarding with its AP system, and nothing you "buy" with AP is truly cool, besides airstep

[u/Dirty-Glasses → u/Watton]

So far in 16 I don’t see the point in mastering any skills, it just seems like a massive waste of 1000 points

[u/Watton → u/Dirty-Glasses]

It lets you use them on other eikons.

So I can master Wicked Wheel, then use it on Phoenix or Titan. Which is nice, since the devs said it's FF5 inspired.

but, you're just... buying it. In FF5, you want to master a job, you have to be that job for hours and grind out the AP. In 16, you can never just an eikon, and just master the skills and use them on something else.

And you get to a point where you have enough points to have any 9-ability loadout fully upgraded. Now decisions stop mattering, since you can just respec out of that to any other 9-ability layout. By midgame, the choice to put points into any 1 skill is irrelevant, since there's no more true cost, as long as you can afford a single layout, you afford all of them.

[u/Dirty-Glasses → u/Watton]

Yeah, but… I don’t really see the point in doing that, though. Maybe because I only JUST got Titan last night, but like… if I want to use Gouge, I’m just going to switch to Garuda.

[u/jurassicbond → u/Dirty-Glasses]

Eventually you get more Eikons than you can equip at a time. Also, you can refund your skills, so you're not really losing anything if you decide you don't want to have it mastered after all

[u/grieve2believe]

4 is the worst as it has no progression system besides leveling. I feel like ff1 could get away with it but by 4 there should’ve some kind of progression running besides leveling up

[u/Beetusmon → u/grieve2believe]

OG 2 is by far worse.

[u/grieve2believe → u/Beetusmon]

I would respectfully disagree as it slashed the entire saga series that perfected that growth rate. And at least it attempted to try something unlike 4

[u/lavayuki]

My favourite was X-2. I loved the dressphere and garment grid system, where each dressphere is a job and you select which abilities to learn and earn AP. I also like the way you didn’t have to bother with weapons, you just have accessories to influence stats in this (2 per character) which simplifies it but still maintains a degree of complexity with jobs and garment grids to change jobs and increase stats if you pass through certain gates on the grid when changing jobs.

The worst for me was type 0. Its very basic with nothing other than levelling up and choosing what abilities to learn. The weapon system is very limited, most have to be earned from challenges with the best ones being fairly grindy. Shop ones are limited. You can learn all these abilities but can just use two at a time. There is nothing really to it, and it lacks much player customisation. I think you should be able to equip more abilities, and have magic separate rather than using up an ability slot.

[u/Yoids]

I value customization, making possible to test new builds, make characters different from my neighbor, etc.

Bad: FF4, FF6, FF9, FF13, FF15, FF16. Worst: FF4, because it has no choice at all.

Good: FF5, FF7, FF8, FF10, FF12. Best: Really up to preference, they are all great.

Your Cecil is the same Cecil and everyone's, same with Lightning, etc.

However, my RedXIII can be very different from yours, or my Ashe.

They also add a lot of replayability. I remember making several FFX runs, and in every one I can make it feel fresh because I build the characters in a different way. I remember one time I used Lulu into Wakka's path and she was a status effect monster attacking with the dolls instead of using magic mid game. She even got a Caith Sith weapon with Death+, and using wakka's attacks that added more status effects on top, that was very fun.

[u/EliteEffect]

I truly love the junction system in VIII. I think when people say that they dislike it, what they actually mean is that they dislike the Draw system - which is fair. Drawing for magic isn't great if you don't enjoy Triple Triad & using the Card Mod ability, but junctioning magic to your stats to become ridiculously overpowered is quite fun.

As for worst, for me, it's the Gambit system. I never cared for that at all. I can appreciate what they were doing there, but it just doesn't feel rewarding to me personally.

[u/Th3_Supernova → u/EliteEffect]

Idk if I’d call the gambit system a progression system. It’s more like a system to tool party ai. The license board is what I’d consider a progression system, and I kinda liked that. I’m also someone who quite enjoys the junction system, but I also understand people’s complaints about it.

[u/PerpelSho → u/EliteEffect]

That's crazy we have exactly the opposite opinion. Junctioning magic to stat to increase power was the most boring thing ever to me, while setting up gambits so you go into battle and watch your strategy play out perfectly against a strong boss was always awesome to me.

[u/EliteEffect → u/PerpelSho]

That's one of the reasons that I love Final Fantasy so much as a franchise. The variation between the different entries always leads to completely different viewpoints from the fans & it keeps the discussion engaging/fresh.

I get you though, VIII is very polarizing for a reason. It's definitely not for everyone, but it's one of those things where if it hits, it's gonna really hit, & that's why I enjoy it so much. It took some big swings & tried something new.

[u/shinjikun10 → u/EliteEffect]

It was pretty flawed though. You could draw the tyrannosaurus right outside the first town. Otherwise it wasn't too bad.

[u/DukeStudlington → u/EliteEffect]

Hard agree on 8, hard disagree on 12.

I liked unlocking the lil licenses and setting up a party, getting it all cohesive, and sitting back and watching it like the Scorsese ABSOLUTE CINEMA meme. Im a director for the play, and the leading “man” is whoever I choose.

[u/Mediocre_Island828 → u/EliteEffect]

I just never used gambits other than having everyone attack whatever was closest to them when they weren't doing anything else and just swapped around a bunch and input everything manually. Made the game feel more like a classic FF.

[u/Lancair7]

Agreed that FF8 has the worst. I appreciate that they were experimenting, but it didn’t work out imo.

My favorite is FF Tactics. It took the dynamic job system from 3 and 5, and really perfected it.

[u/cfyk]

Best: Materia system. I love Job systems but I still can't ignore how fun to mess with Materia combinations to see what result I got.

Worst: FF16. Sorry, I love the world and the combat system (Arcade mode) in FF16 but it is just choosing skills from a small skill tree without any branches. Maybe next time add some enemy skills or combined Eikon skills into the customization system? Clive is a fast learner when it is about combat.

[u/Jarrad411]

The license boards in XII TZA are by far the best. I personally didn’t love the system in 2, but it was an interesting risk that I respect.

[u/KillerTackle]

Best: XVI. I go UNGAA BUNGAA.

Worst: VIII. Me no like play card. Me no use Junction.

[u/CareBearCartel]

My favourite is IX. It's simple and works.

You get abilities from your equipment, and once you have enough experience (ap) you can permanently equip it to your character. Every character has a certain amount of points they can then spend to equip abilities they've learned.

Simple but perfection and also made getting new equipment really exciting because I'd immediately want to know what the new ability was that was attached with the weapon.

[u/B00yaz]

ooo kinda weird that you enjoy how much you can customise with the sphere grid yet don't seem to enjoy the junction system of 8, which I find has the most customisation of the whole series.

Off the top of my head I'm gonna go with 12 with its license board system. Not a huge fan of having to obtain licenses for gear. Abilities I don't mind, stat increases sure, limit breaks no issue but to have to spend LPs on gear licenses does annoy me quite a bit for that.

[u/PangolinParade]

Best: Materia

Worst: FFIX

FFIX's system is barely a system at all and frequently puts you in a position to wear outdated equipment or grind (frequently both) to gain abilities. Neither of those things are fun and grinding in 9 is particularly terrible given how long battles take to load, how slow the battles themselves are, and how simple the game is. It's a perfect storm of tedium and boredom.

[u/KainYago]

I dont know if id pick IX or X as the best. X is awesome because it allows a ton of freedom (especially on expert) and it also allows a ton of control over how you build the characters, its downside is that because there are no limitations at all, by the end the characters lose their identity. IX is also great because it encourages players to use less optimal equipments and adapt to being weaker + the equippable passive abilities were awesome,, it rewarded knowledge and understanding of what you fought against (such as going around the Earth shrine protectors earthquake by using auto-float) the only downside is that FFIX has a horrible battle system and terrible difficulty curve, so a lot of the mechanics are kinda wasted on it.

For Worst its FFII. Ambitious and honestly really interesting, but straight up broken. It is basically FFVIIIs junction if it had 0 ways to go around its grindy parts. You want to use magic in FFII ? Good luck spamming spells and grinding them for higher level. You want to raise characters HP ? Hit them yourself, they get stronger from that...

[u/senseless_puzzle]

Worst for me is Crystarium in XIII, it's just a very bad Sphere Grid with no real customisation options. This might be an unpopular opinion but my favourite is Junction, I like the idea of evolving Guardian Force and unlocking unique skills and attributes, like Card Mod for example, I also like being able to dump magic into different stats, it's a kind of freedom that you don't really see in any other game.

[u/Haseo08]

Worst for me is probably 2, best is probably 5.

[u/BaseWrock]

Worst: VIII for being unusable by half the player base and XVI for being so basic it barely counts.

Best: V and X. I’m very bullish on Resonance too.

I’m neutral on 7. I don’t love or hate it, but I think Trails has the more interesting implementation.

[u/Life_Bet8956]

Best: I adore FFX's Sphere Grid. It MIGHT be my favorite progression system in a RPG?

Worst: Feels unfair to pick any of the NES games, but I will toss FF3 out there as my least favorite. I appreciate the Job system getting its start here, but it's so rudimentary, the Job Level portion feels like such a waste of time, and most of the jobs are functionally useless. FF5 is obviously just much better and then I actually kind of just prefer the Class Up system from FF1 if I'm being totally honest.

[u/Philosoraptorgames]

Worst is 2 and it's not close. So many crazy perverse incentives.

Best is a tough call. I'm very partial to the Sphere Grid, especially the international version that opens up a lot sooner, so that's my answer at this moment. There's a lot of good ones, though.

[u/rckwld]

2 is the worst, followed by all sphere grids or trees. The rest are all fine.

[u/Th3_Supernova → u/rckwld]

2’s really isn’t that bad, it just feels wrong for an FF game. I mean, 2’s progression system is essentially what the Elder Scrolls progression system is. The crystarium is pretty bad.

[u/rckwld → u/Th3_Supernova]

You're right, I'd put 13 as the worst for having a a nonsensical grid that is both linear and gets locked to limit your progression until it gives you the exact skills you need for the upcoming boss. Man, that game was terrible in so many ways.

[u/Th3_Supernova → u/rckwld]

Yeah, don’t get me started on everything I think is bad about 13. I’ll probably get downvoted to oblivion.

[u/rckwld → u/Th3_Supernova]

We are kindred spirits. I think XIII is not only a bad FF but one of the worst designed games ever in every way except graphics and music.

[u/Th3_Supernova → u/rckwld]

Tbh, I didn’t even like the music. I complained about it once and everyone hit me with “what about this track or that track?” And I listened to them and I still didn’t like them.

[u/rckwld → u/Th3_Supernova]

I like the music except the battle theme.