Final Fantasy V Four Job Fiesta 2026 Part I

Again, because of my Pokemon burnout, I had been wanting to play more old Final Fantasy games. I had a whole plan to play more of the Pixel Remaster series and I was going to do the Ban Something challenge for a few of them, and I had already started with Final Fantasy VI. Unfortunately, on July 30, I got all set up to play and then my computer made a terrible loud noise and the game wouldn't load. I decided I'd just sneak in a Final Fantasy V Four Job Fiesta run to fill the gap and investigate fixes for that computer.

I started playing on GBA instead of Pixel Remaster. I started on that day, July 30th, and with completely default settings. I took the job spoiling route though, so I knew up front that my jobs were Monk, Berserker, Ninja, and Chemist.
Naming screen, where Bartz will be named Bartz and not something stupider like "Barts".

Naming screen, where Bartz will be named Bartz and not something stupider like "Barts".

Monk and berserker are both quite bad, but ninja and chemist are both quite good. With Chemist in particular, I really got a taste of how busted they can be in last year's run. With no jobs with a respectable magic stat, there are some good options for berserker and ninja that will be fully out-of-play.

I was wary of some early bosses - Byblos in particular, so I thought I would wander around the map room in the Ship Graveyard hoarding Flame Scrolls. This was really annoying; I got 3 Elixirs off Calcruthls because I got my first Flame Scroll, at which point I was level 12 and just gave up. I mean, how hard could Byblos be if I was level 12 this early?
Four level 12 monks in the Shipwreck.

I failed to take a screenshot against Siren because it ended so quickly and surprisingly. Everybody used Focus once, and it died.
Bartz says, "Galuf! You saved us... I owe you my life."

Bartz says, "Galuf! You saved us... I owe you my life."

Basically the same thing happened against Magissa on the North Mountain. I queued up Focus on everybody and didn't think I'd have good odds of taking her out before she called her husband, Forza Motorsports, but that's exactly what happened.
Here is a picture of Magissa. She is a whip.

Here is a picture of Magissa. She is a whip.

Monks using Focus is actually a classic strategy on a counter-heavy boss like Garula. This one was also a piece of cake.
Lenna punches Garula for 184 damage.

I picked Lenna to be the berserker for now, mainly because I think her sprite is the cutest.
Monk, monk, monk, kitty.

Random battles for a while were kind of funny. Monks fall off bigtime in the second half of this game, but they're real powerhouses in the early going. In nearly every battle, the monks would fight or kick and Lenna would almost never get a turn. I did a lot of randoms around here because it's nice to get money from Wild Nakks (especially if you can abuse the behaviour of shops in Karnak, which I cannot) and to accumulate some Turtle Shells while the experience points still carry some benefit. I got nearly 40 Turtle Shells before proceeding.
We fought these Wild Nakks and many Grass Tortoises.

We fought these Wild Nakks and many Grass Tortoises.

Random person says, "There's with the monsters! We saw you all crawl from the meteorite-don't try to deny it!"

The fire ship was uneventful. Liquid Flame is sometimes a hard boss, but with the "everybody focus" strat we beat it fairly quickly and without issue. I actually did throw my only two Hi-Potions in this fight. I reasoned that was okay since I would have ninja soon and that presents better offensive options for a lot of early bosses.
Galuf punches Liquid Flame for 516 damage.

Galuf punches Liquid Flame for 516 damage.

We got most of the Karnak items, including Main Gauche, and got access to ninja.
Ninja. Ninja. Rap.

We are level 19 with a monk, a berserker, and two ninjas.

I guess we aren't particularly overlevelled after all? Usually I'm wary of level 20 in the Ancient Library because of enemies who use L5 Death. We didn't have that problem. In fact we didn't have much problem at all. Ifrit went down to traditional violence.
We defeated Ifrit!

Against Byblos, the two ninjas threw Fire Scrolls. I had exactly one from the Ship Graveyard, one from Liquid Flame, and one from Ifrit. I threw two right away, and when the fight dragged on and felt annoying I threw the third. I knew it wasn't long before these were buyable.
We threw Fire Scrolls at Byblos.

Byblos takes 1280 damage from a Fire Scroll.

Next, it was sailing time. I went up to Istory but there wasn't much to do there. I fought around Crescent to get exactly one Death Sickle very quickly, then proceeded to the next part with the black chocobo.
We caught the black chocobo.

This gives us access to cheaper items and scrolls in Lix. The next boss is Crayclaw, and it was amazingly easy.
We defeated Crayclaw in about 6 seconds.