Part 192

Learn about the Elementalist class in Final Fantasy Tactics, its abilities like Boulder Crush, and its requirements of 2 White Mage Abilities.

Requirements: 2 White Mage Abilities

Abilities:

• Lightning Strike - 300 AP (Perseus Bow) - Active: A blindingly fast attack that does not trigger reaction abilities. Excellent against those who can attack back and use Archer's Bane, this makes sure that they take the damage.
• Arm Shot - 350 AP (Nail Bow) - Active: Takes aim at the target's arm to DISABLE it. If you don't want your enemy, who is already in your sights, and prevent them from doing any damage they could possibly be dealt.
• Cupid - 450 AP (Artemis Bow) - Active: Pierce the target's heart with a magicked arrow. CHARMS the target. A very useful way to get an enemy unit to turn on their allies. Support units will heal you, fighters will fight for you, both will continue to do so until they are dealt damage.
• Archer's Bane - 200 AP (Green Beret) - Reaction: Avoid all bow-based basic attacks. The best way to avoid enemy arrows, this will always give misses to normal bow attacks. Later on, you'd want to get abilities that hit back, instead of just avoiding.
• Concentration - 250 AP (Target Bow) - Passive: Focuses the user's thoughts. Increases chance to hit. A useful one for ranged units, you always want your shots to hit the target. You have the Take Aim for nevermiss damage, but this will effect all your moves, especially when you change jobs.
• Boulder Crush - 200 AP (Estoc) - Active: Drop an enormous boulder on the target. Deals earth damage and IMMOBILIZES the target. A nice ability, and dealing Earth damage is quite a nice touch. What I am interested in is the Immobilise ability, because it basically means that the enemy unit cannot move, and if that unit is a melee unit, they can't really fight.
• Earth Heal - 200 AP (Fleuret) - Active: Harness the energies of leaf and loam to heal the target. Restores HP. Don't think that this is a Holy attack, it will be an earth heal, as the name implies. So don't use this on the undead. Well, you could, but don't bother. This will only heal one unit, the one below doesn't.
• White Flame - 200 AP (Flamberge) - Active: Summon a divine flame to heal units in a small area. This is a fire based move, but it heals instead of hurts. This will heal 5 units, but the problem is that this cannot heal with less than 10 MP. Like Cura, this requires 12 MP to use, and heals 5 units. This is why the Elementalist is a versitile class, they can hurt and heal.
• Shining Air - 200 AP (Djinn Flyssa) - Active: Buffet the target with a shining gale. Deals wind damage and BLINDS the target. Wind damage is quite useful, and Blind is a nice touch as well. Use this if the enemy is weak to Wind, such as the Adamantitan, or else use Boulder Crush, because Immobilise is a much better as a debuff on the enemy than Blind is.
• Thunderous Roar - 200 AP (Mage Masher) - Active: Strike the target with a bolt of lightning. Deals lightning damage and SILENCES the target. Another debuff based move, in fact, all the Elementalist skills that are offensive in nature contain debuffs. Silence is a useful debuff, but only on mages, which is the target of this attack, and the name indicated on the weapon.
• Fire Whip - 250 AP (Scarlet Rapier) - Active: Hurl a ball of flame at the target. Deals fire damage and DISABLES the target. This is the best ability that the elementalist has in my opinion. Disable is the strongest buff that you'd normally come by, because it means that the target cannot use their arms, and that means that they cannot use any sort of action, no normal attack, no magick, no abilities and no items.
• Sliprain - 250 AP (Silver Rapier) - Active: Drench the target with driving rain. Deals water damage and SLOWS the target. Not a bad move. Water damage is rarer, and not to be confused by Ice. And Slow means that their speed drops, and that means that the targeted enemy unit will get their turn later than they would. I prefer Fire Whip to this all the time.
• Evil Gaze - 300 AP (Joyeuse) - Active: Summon the evil that lurks in the shadows. Deals dark damage and CONFUSES the target. Dark damage done by controllable units is rarer that you would think. They are normally provided by the weapons, not by units. Still, Confuse is more of a 50/50 skill. It might help you, it might not, but given that the enemy is fighting against you, any chance that they might turncoat on your enemies is one that you want.