...yeah, it just keeps going like that. All the way up to:

Only very few people possesses the patience, perserverence, and free time needed to get fulfill all the requirements needed to enter the 'assassin' class. Fewer still possess the power, dedication, stealth, and cruelty needed to master the dreaded assassin techniques...so you can imagine how mad the people who fulfull all the requirements and then can't master the skills get. Hopefully they don't get too made though, attacking that assassin's guild hall is suicide, let me tell you...

Assassins are trained to use every concieveable kind of weapon (plus the ones that they just make out of household objects whenever they're in a pickle). Their ninja background trains them to use two weapons at once ('dual wield'), and to hurl objects with deadly accuracy, not to mention training them to move quickly and blend in with their surroundings. Their background as theives grants thems the stealth skills they need to sneak into even the most heavily-guarded of places.

Assassins know a great deal about the body. Their background as snipers gives them detailed knowledge of where the best places on a person's body to aim at are, and their background as monks gives them intimate knowledge of how to best use their own bodies (not to mention ensuring that they have trememdous experience with hand-to-hand combat). Their background as lancers teaches them how to jump to incredible heights, even if weighed down by heavy plate armor...which they don't wear, but the point remains.

Their background as samurai ensures that they will know how to draw out the hidden potential in their weapons ('draw out' skill), and be able to use them well. And finally, their background as dark knights give them access to a wide variety of swordskills, as well as a few wizard skills.

In a nutshell, not the kind of poeple you want to be messing with.

Basic Skills (Use Arm):

Berserkers are hard core melee types. Their 'berserk' abilities help raises stats, but they can only use it on themselves. The standard berserker strategy is to madly boost one's own stats, and then charge into the enemy horde like a man insane! ...Or a man gone berserk, anyway.

Well if you're looking for a caster then this isn't your class. Berserkers are traditionally bad at casting and defending against magic. As such, a healer should be close at hand to help out a berserker who finds himself on the wrong end of an elemental spell. But there's no arguing with a berserker's huge attack power and physical defense after he's cast a few 'berserk' abilities.

A berserker with the 'charge' skill equipped is also quite formidible. Granted his moves will be much slower, as they require time to charge, but a berserker's high physical defense and hp will often let him get away with this, provided no one casts anything on him..

Also, if a berserker has the 'distribtion' (calculator) ability on him, then any 'berserk' spell he casts on himself will also effect all of his allies, but the damage he takes will also be divided up amongst his allies.

Basic Skills (Berserk):

Blue mages are an interesting bunch. They have no spells, except that they can instantly learn any spell that is cast on them. Once you hit a blue mage with a spell he instantly learns it, and will, in all likelyhood, then proceed to...you know, cast it back at you.

Natrually, to pull this off blue mages must have relentlessly high magical defense. And that they do. They also have exceptionally high magic attack power, but are genenerally lacking in attack power and physical defense. To fully take advantage of a blue mage's abilities, it is best to equip him or her with the 'white magic' or 'black magic' skill so that he is not just completely helpless while he's taking hits to learn new spells.

Basic Skills (Blue Magic):

Except for the monk class, brawlers are the strongest barehand fighters around. Their 'blitz' skills are excellent for inflicting melee damage.

Barwlers have high attack power, high defense, high speed, but low magic power and magic defense. Needless to say giving them magic abilities is not going to be too useful. Also, they must be fighting barehanded in order to use thier 'blitz' techniques. This somewhat limits the number skills sets that work well with them, but there are a few. 'Charge,' 'punch art,' 'jump,' 'throw,' 'snipe,' 'battle skill,' and 'berserk' are some good choices.

Basic Skills (Blitz):

The basic class of warriors amongst the Brood tribe (consisting entirely of humans who can change into dragons). Members of the Brood tribe have dragon genes withing them, which they can splice together at will to transform into several different types of dragons. Brook knights are able to use basic dragon powers while in human form, and channel them into their sword techniques.

Basic Skills (Splice):

Ok, keep this in mind because it's important: calculator skills are useless unless you combine them with another skill.

Math skills are all well and good, but they don't help much if you can't attack with them. So why get a claculator? Why, to combine his math skills with other skills of course!

Consider this: you give a calculator the 'black magic' skill (or give a wizard the 'math skill' ability), and you want to cast 'fire.' Normally 'fire' has a small range and a small area of effect. However, if you have the 'CT' 'math skill' and the '3' 'math skill,' then you can use it to make the 'fire' spell hit every enemy on the field who's current CT is divisible by 3, regardless of the spell's usual range or area of effect. This can be done with 'ct,' 'exp,' 'levels,' and 'height' that are in divisible by 3, 4, 5, or a prime number (provided you learn all of the 'math skills'). This makes a spell caster very powerful, and gives him almost unlimited range and unlimited area of effect for his spells.

This massive increase in range can be done with all 'black magic,' 'white magic,' 'holy magic,' 'red magic,' 'time magic,' 'yin/yang magic,' 'phantasm,' 'truth' (although they strike randomly, so you're never quite sure which enemeis are going to get hit), and some 'blue magic' abilities. Needless to say, a caster with 'math skills' is a very powerful ally.

Calculators also have some lovely equip abilities which makes spellcasting and evading much easier. 'Damage split' is also an excellent counter ability, as it is unblockable.

Calculators also have the 'distribution' ability, which allows all allies to share in stat bonuses that are cast on him. Doing this, however, decreases how long the spells last. ...Unless, of course, a calculator had the 'berserk' ability, and he were to share the stat-boosting abilities (and remember that he can only use 'berserker' spells on himself) which last for the entire battle, and creates an army of super stat-boosted allies to effortlessly crush enemy opposition...he...hehe...hehehe...MUAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Basic Skills (Math Skill):

Warriors that specialize in items. Standard stuff. The chemist job's main use is that it acts as a gateway to a great deal of other useful classes, including 'wizard,' 'priest,' 'summoner,' 'necromancer,' 'mesmer,' and 'engineer.'

Basic Skills (Item):

Clerics possess some of the finest shield and support spells around. Spells like 'barrier,' 'm'barrier,' and 'wall' do are excellent for defending allies against enemy firepower and melee attacks. Spells like 'regen' help keep allies on their feet, even when the going gets tough and they're having trouble finding someone to heal them.

But by far the most impressive cleric spell is 'auto life.' This spell causes incredibly powerful healing magic to seep into an ally. When an ally suffers a shoud-be-fatal wound, this impotent healing magic will become potent, and burst forth, healing whatever would was supposed to have killed him. If an ally's neck is cut, the healing magic will zoom through him, and heal his neck, all before his head has time to fall off, or his blood has time to burst forth from the wound.

This is useful because a) it keeps an ally from dying, and b) it totally freaks out whatever enemy cut the head off. I mean, he sees the head not fall of off, and he's like "waaahhh...?" And then the guy who was supposed to die jumps up and hits him. Haha, good times...

Oh! But it only works once per casting, so be careful not go die twice in a row.

Basic Skills (Holy Magic):

There are countless secret rituals and spells that can be invoked through the art of dance. A dancer who knows how to invoke these rituals can be a powerful ally on the battlefield. Rituals invoked by dancers generally have a very wide area of effect, and some even have unlimited range. A dancer could be a mile away from the battle field, do a 'witch hunt' dance to drain mp from the enemy wizards, and then her melee allies could charge in before their chemist and/or alchemist have time to create 'ethers' to recover the wizards' lost mp. Being a mile away from the battle, said dancer probably won't even get hurt.

Dancers generally have low physical attack power (they use cloth as weapons, what did you expect?) and their physical defense is often lacking (although you can tip this balance a bit by giving a dancer the 'equip armor' ability), but they do tend to have high magic attack, and magic defense. Equipping a dancer with the 'white magic,' 'black magic,' or 'summon' ability is often useful.

Also, if you give a dancer the 'battle skill' ability, she can use her cloth to break enemy armor...I'm not sure how that works exactly, but it is funny.

Basic Skills (Dance):

Dark knights are well-armored melee characters who incorporate the dangerous art of shadow magic into their swordskills. Their 'dark sword' skills are powerful, but you have to be careful which ones you cast on undead enemies...

Dark knights have high attack power and defense, and fair magic power and magic defense. Since not all of their skills are useful against the undead, it is often useful to equip them with something that is, such as the 'white magic' (priest) or 'light sword' (paladin) skills.

Whatever you give them, however, bear in mind that dark knights must have a non-ranged bladed weapon equipped in order to use their 'dark sword' skills, so avoid unarmed skills like 'punch art.'

Basic Skills (Dark Sword):

No, divine knights are not actually divine, it's just an expression. I.e. "you dance divinely darling!" or "that sword technique was simply divine!" or "that man did a divine - albeit, somewhat barbaric - job of defeating those enemies with his 'mighty sword' technique(s)!" Just wanted to make sure everyone understands that.
Anyway, divine knight take the swordskills that they learn as knights and mercenaries, and then, as monks, learn how to use their inner chakra and energy to project them over a distance. Their 'mighty sword' abilities inflict damge over a distance, and are infused with the intention of breaking the target's equipped items. A divine knight can inflict massive damage on enemies, and break their armor at the same time.

But there is one small problem...

If an enemy is not actually wearing any armor, then the technique will miss. 'Shelbust stab,' for example, will not effect a target that is not wearing armor over his chest (so monks are off the hook). To put it simply, 'mighty sword' techniques generally work on humans.

Thusly, it is generally prudent to equip a divine knight with a second set of skills that work on non-humans. Divine knights have very high attack power, high defense, and fair magic power and magic defense. A good way to take advantage of this is to equip a divine knight with skills like 'dark sword,' 'light sword,' 'jump' (lancer), or 'draw out.'

Whatever you give them, however, keep in mind that divine knights need to have a non-ranged bladed weapon equipped in order to use their 'mighty sword' abilities, so avoid unarmed skills like 'punch art.'

Basic Skills (Mighty Sword):

Ok, first off, dragonairs have a lot of hp. I mean...wow! They also have very high attack power, high defense (complemented by their ability to equip heavy armor), very high magic power, and high magic defense.

While dragonairs can not actually transform into dragons like the Brook can, they have discovered how to use the energy in their bodies to immitate dragon abilities. As such, dragonairs generally have deep kinships with dragons, and know a great deal about how to tame and care for them (more so, even, than most beast masters). Dragonairs and dargons always fight very well together in battle.

Basic Skills (Dragon Magic):

A more powerful version of the brood knight. Dragonmances can preform the 'accession' ability with three genes at once, while the brood knight can only do two at a time. These give him access to a much wider variety of dragon transformations. Furthermore, dragonmancers have more powerful special abilities than the average Brood member.

Basic Skills (Advaned Splice):

Engineers aren't particularly skilled fighters, but they have a lot going for them. They are the earliest class type that can equip guns, and their 'gadgetry' skills can inflict lots of damage, are usually long-ranged, and cost no mp (thought some of them do take time and require items). Also, keep in mind that gadgets that an engineer leaves lying around can be used by ally humans...but also by enemy humans.

One thing to keep in mind about engineers, however, is that every time they fire their gun they use up some of the gunpowder in their inventory. It is very helpful to keep a hefty stash of gunpower in your inventory, or else equip the engineer with the 'transmute' skill set, and keep the 'make gunpowder' skill handy...of course if you do that you'll have to then keep of hefty stash of stuff to make gunpowder out of and/or constantly look for places where you can 'withdraw' stuff to make gunpowder out of. Hmm...

Basic Skills (Siege):

Fencers are swordsmen that are more known for their high speed and evasion stats than their attack power. They have high physical attack power and defense, fair magic power and magic defense, very high evasion, very high speed, high movement range, and very high accuracy.

Being as quick as they are, fencers have a few skills that allow them to attack more than once per turn. They also have the 'flash cut' ability that allows them to move and attack at the same time.

Since fencers are famous for their accuracy, it is often prudent to give them skills that have a high miss-rate, such as 'steal,' 'battle skill' (particularly 'break weapon'), or 'yin/yang magic' (their magical abilities are about average, but 'yin/yang' magic involves status effects such as blind, poison, and petrify, so as long as it hits you're in good shape).

Basic Skills (Sword Dance):

Basic starting class. Fighters don't have particularly impressive stats, but they have a few useful tricks, and they act as a gateway to a lot of other useful classes.

Basic Skills (Basic Abilities):

Gamblers are fighters that deal damage based upon luck. All of their skills involve a certain element of luck, but if can potentially deal very high damage against which there is no defense. If use 'roll big damage' and get all 6's, then you will do 4200 damage. There is nothing an enemy can do to decrease this number, it's set in stone. On the other hand, if you roll all 1's, then you will do a much less impressive 700 damage.

So yes, there is a great deal of luck involved in what gamblers do (which is why it is fitting that they have the massivly useful 'luck +50%' equip ability), but if you do happen to be lucky, then you will have yourself a neigh-unstoppable, dice rolling, big-damage-dealing machine!

Basic Skills (Roll the Bones):

Geomancers extremely versatile characters. They are one of the few types of casters that can, by default, equip armor and use swords. Not only that, but geomancers naturally have very high attack power, which makes the sword-equipping useful.

Geomaners can cast various types of spells, depending upon what kind of terrain they are around. Because they use the power of the nature around them, and not their own energy, to cast spells, geomancer abilities cost very little mp, and some actually cost none.

To fully utalize a geomancer's high attack power, one may wish to give them the 'dual wield' (ninja, assassin skill) that allows them to use two swords at once. Also, since a geomancer's abilities vary depending upon where he is standing, it is often useful to give him a movement skill like 'shadowalk' (dark knight) or 'teleport' (time mage) so that he can more easily get about the battlefield, and move onto different terrains.

As for additional skill sets, there are a lot of good combinations. Giving a geomancer another brand of magic offensive magic - 'black magic' or 'summon' - will allow him to attack even if he is not on the right terrain. Or you can equip something to try to make use of the high attack power: 'battle skill,' 'dark sword,' 'mighty sword,' 'sword dance,' etc. The sky's the limit really, there are countless skills that would suit a geomancer.

Basic Skills (Topography):

Gun mages are very powerful spellcasters who bring together the mechanical abilities of an engineer, the mathematical abilities of a calculator, the magic powers of a wizard, the alchemic abilities of an aclchemist, and the exceptional gun-using abilities of a sniper.

Unlike other classes, gun mages do not use gunpowder when the use their guns. Instead, their normal 'attack' option is replaced with the 'gun magic' option. Their guns fire magic (you can pick whiche element) over long distances, and run on mp. When you attack with a gun mage, you select a type of shot (e.i. 'blaze shot' (fire), 'blast shot' (lightning), or 'glacier shot' (ice)), and then fire away. There is no charge time for this, since it counts as a normal attack.

Additionally, gun mages can use their mastery of metal and magic to create mechanical mounts for themselves. Each of these mounts have their own unique uses and abilities, and are very durable. However, the gun mage must sacrifice steady mp every turn to continue riding one.

It should be fairly obvious at this point that gun mage's need to have a lot of mp at hand. Therefore, it is generally prudent to have them equip robes, even though they can wear more durable light armor. Also, it is best if they equip a secondary skill that requires very little or no mp useage. 'Topography,' 'battle skill,' and 'snipe' are good options for this. Or, you can equip abilities that allow you to drain mp from enemies. 'Yin/yang magic,' and 'dance' have some nice spells in this department.

'Magic attack up' (red mage) is also a good skill for a gun mage, as it increases the damage done by magic, and gun mages use pretty much nothing but magic.

Also, if you equip 'battle skill,' you can break opponent's armor from a distance with your gun, that's always nice.

Oh, and you can use gun magic with a weapon other than a gun. But if you use a close-ranged one, chances are you're going to be close enough to the enemy to hit yourself with resulting spell...

Basic Skills (Gun Magic):

Basic Skills (Metallurgy):

A harmonixer's 'fuse' ability is a combination of a monk's ability to utalize their body's inner energy, a geomancer's ability to utalize external energy in nature, and a blue mage's ability to learn new skills by combining nature energy with internal energy.

When a harmonixer defeats a monster (an elemental non-human enemy), he draws its spirit and mind into himself, and assimiliates its energies. Unlike a blue mage, a harmonixer does not instantly learn spells when he assimiliates monster energy, but instead draws the monster's entire spirit into his mind.

When a harmonixer has assimiliated enough spirits of one type (fire, water, wind, etc.), the spirits will form together to form the body of a new creature. Next, using his own internal energy, a harmonixer draws his mind to the spirit's graveyard - a place dangerously close to the world of the dead - and must fight this new creature. If he defeats it, he may thereafter use a 'fusion' technique to change into it during combat.

Basic Skills (Fusion):

Heaven knights, despite what their name suggests, are more prone to magic usage then melee abilities. They have high magic power, high speed, high evasion, high jump/movement ranges, but are lacking in defense and have only average attack power. They are also one of the few knight classes that cannont naturally use swords or equip armor.

The 'truth' skill set consists of powerful magic abilities, but it they strike at random, and are therefore innacurate. For example, let's say you want to use the 'heaven's thunder' ability. You select an enemy, and the area of effect includes your enemy, and the four space adjacent to him. When you cast the spell, it will strike four times in that area. If you're really lucky, all four of them will hit the enemy, and cause heavy damage. If you're kind of luck, two of them will hit in the empty space around the enemy, and two will hit the enemy. If you're unlucky, all four of them will strike in the empty space around the enemy, doing no damage.

Thus, it is best to save the 'truth' spells until there are multiple enemies in the area of effect. The more enemies in range, the better your chances of hitting them are. If there are five enemies in the five space area, then your chances of hitting at least one of them are 100%.

First off, you'll probably want to give your heaven knight the 'equip armor' (knight) ability. This will vastly increase their physical defense, and raise their max hp. Next, you should probably give them a counter ability that helps them protect themselves (especially if you're not going to give them the 'equip armor' ability). 'Sunken state' (ninja) or 'speed save' (archer) are good choices for this. As for a second skill set, it should probably be something that takes advantage of their high magic abilities, but also doesn't require them to be too close to enemies while casting (low defense you know). 'Dance,' 'summon,' 'topography,' and 'magic sword' are some useful options.

Another thing you can do is give a heaven knight 'math skills' (calculator). 'Truth' skills can be guided by the 'math skill' abilities to target enemies without regard to range or area of effect. If you do this, the 'truth' skill will hit an enemy each time it strikes (but heck if you'll know which ones...), and it will allow the heaven knight to keep a safe distance from most enemy attacks.

Basic Skills (Truth):

Hunters, as their names more ore less imply, are good at hunting stuff. They are experts at setting traps, making use of their surroundings, and using poison. They are very quick, and have very high movement ranges. The only thing is, hunters have to be especially careful not to place traps where their allies might step on them...

Hunters are bow users, so it is generally prudent to give them something that is useful with long-ranged weapons. Equipping 'battle skill' is useful, as it will allow the hunter to break armor at a safe distance with his bow. Other useful skills include 'snipe,' or 'gun magic.' Since they are good at moving around, equipping 'topography' is also a good option.

Basic Skills (Hunt):

Illusionists can not actually damage their enemies, but they can trick them into being inflicted with status effects. These status effects have a muc higher success rate than those brought about by 'yin/yang magic,' and are about on par with the accuracy of the 'magic sword' techniques.

Illusionists have fair attack power and defense, but high magic power and magic defense. Thus, it is usually best to equip them with a additional set of magic skills. 'White magic,' 'black magic,' 'summon,' 'time magic,' or 'topography.'

Also, 'phantasm' can be used in conjunction with 'math skills.' A mastered set of 'math skills' will allow an illusionist to target several enemies (somtimes even all enemies) at the same time, regardless of range, and get the most out of his skills.

Basic Skills (Phantasm):

Knights are another kind of tough, hardcore melee characters. They have high attack and defense (complemented by theri ability to equip shields and armor), but also have low speed, low movement range, and low magic power/defense. Thus, they should be used for melee combat, and should be given a secondary skill set that focuses on their physical power, but doesn't require magic usage. 'Berserk,' 'sword dance,' 'throw' (ninja), 'snipe,' 'mighty sword,' and 'hunt' are some good options.

Basic Skills (Battle Skill):

Lancers are a powerful, and surprisingly quick, melee class. They have very high attack power, very high defense, fair speed, high movement range, impossibly good jump range, low magic power, and fair magic defense. Their spears can also reach accross two spaces in any direction, which helps them avoid impending counter attacks.

Also, lancers have the 'jump' ability (the range for which is dependant upon what kind of 'jump' skills they have mastered). When a lancer jumps he a) cannot be attacked until he lands, and b) inflicts heavy damage if/when he lands on an enemy. The 'ignore height' ability also allows a lancer to jump to any height, even if he later changes his class to something other than a lancer.

Lancer's are better built for melee than magic abilities, so their second set of skills should focus on attack power instead of magic power. 'Battle skills,' 'berserk,' 'sword dance,' 'throw,' 'snipe,' 'mighty sword,' and 'hunt' are some good options.

Basic Skills (Jump):

Mediators are very useful under the right conditions. They can increase your party by convincing enemies to join you. They can inflict status effects on enemies (average success rate), and they have abilities that raise and lower faith (average success rate). They are also able to equip guns, although it should be remembered that this uses up gunpowerder (unless, of course, you equip them with 'gun magic,' which isn't too bad of an idea).

Mediators have pretty average stats. Giving them 'battle skill' allows them to attempt to break armor over a large distance. Giving them 'gun magic' also gives them access to some spells, and eliminates the need for them to use gunpowerder while attacking.

It should also be noted that 'invitation,' and 'threaten' are the only 'talk skills' that work on non-humans, unless you have the 'beast tounge' skill equipped.

Basic Skills (Talk Skill):

Mercenaries are exceptional swordsmen that do not belong to any particular organization. In other words, the bulk of their skills are self-taught. Their 'desperado' skills inflict are supurb for inflicting melee damage on multiple targets, and don't require much charge time.

Mercenaries have high attack power, high defense, high speed, fair magic power, and fair magic defense, so they're pretty well-rounded. Because of this, they are good candidates to have advanced skill sets equipped. A mercenary with the 'dark sword,' 'light sword,' or 'might sword' ability equipped can be quite the formidible opponent. Granted, getting a character to have a mercenary class along with the dark knight and/or paladin and/or divine knight calss would take a pretty long time...

Basic Skills (Desperado):

Mesmers can create different effects, depending on their state, the state of their allies, and the state of their enemies. A skilled mesmer can select an ally that is about to die, and cast 'shared pain' so that he has three turns to heal himself, while the mesmer who cast the spell takes damage in his place.

Mesmer spells have a huge (not unlimited, but still huge) range, but they can only effect one ally or enemy at a time. Thus, it should not be too dissapointing that 'chaos magic' and 'math skills' cannot be used in conjunction with one another.

All mesmer stats are fair, except for their max hp which is unusually high. Since all of their stats are more ore less equal, they can use almost any secondary skill set equally well as the next (kind of like red mages). Both melee and magic skill sets are ueful to mesmers.

If you're looking for a quick power boost, you can always equip 'dual wield,' 'two hands,' or 'magic power up.'

Basic Skills (Chaos Magic):

Monks have the best barehanded fighting abilities of all the classes. They are trained not only to be strong, but also on how to heal and damage the body using pressure points, blood vessels, and their own internal energy. The fact that they wear no chest armor makes them very quick and agile, but also decreases their defense.

Monks have very attack power, low defense (they wear less armor than most), high magic power, fair magic defense, high speed, high evasion, high accuracy, and high movement/jump range.

Well, if you're looking for a quick fix regarding the low defense situation, then you could always give a monk the 'equip armor' knight ability. But this will a) take a bite out of the monk's trademark speed and evasion stats, and b) confront you with the fact that putting on armor kind of defeats the whole purpose of being a monk.

As for secondary skill sets, there are plenty out there that can take advantage of a monk's high attack power and high magic power. Now, a monk has to be barehanded to use 'punch art,' so skill sets that require weapons - 'dark sword,' 'mighty sword,' 'magic sword,' 'light sword,' 'sword dance,' etc. - are definately out. But other melee skills like 'blitz,' 'snipe,' 'battle skill,' 'steal,' and 'charge' will work out just fine.

Monks also have high magic power (which is somewhat unusual for melee classes), so you can also equip a skill set that takes advantage of that. 'Black magic,' 'time magic,' 'summon,' 'yin/yang magic,' 'topography,' and even 'sing' are very useful to a monk.

Basic Skills (Punch Art):

Necromancers have no offensive, defensive, or healing spells. Instead, they use their powers over bones and spiritual energy to create minions and mounts to do their bidding. Given enough corpses, a skilled necromancer can mount a bone dragon, create an army of vampires, skeletons, and mana spirits, and wreak use them to overwhelm his enemies. Necromancer minions are impressive, but they generally don't last long. Except for the mana spirit they all lose hp at the beginning of each round, and once it hits 0 they're gone for good, and they can't be healed (healing magic actually damages them, so watch out for that). The mana spirit can be healed, but it disappears if it runs out of mp.

A necromancer can also use bones to create mounts for himself, but he needs to sacrifice a certain amount of mp every round to keep them animated. It's best to have a necromancer equip robes, as they will increase his max mp and allow him to keep his mounts longer.

Necromancers have high magic and magic defense, low attack and physical defense, and fair everything else. Thus, it is generally good to equip them with a set of magic skills, but it should be one that doesn't use up too much mp (so 'gun magic,' and 'summon' are probably out). Skills like 'topography,' 'sing,' and 'blue magic.' are some good options.

Basic Skills (Animate):

Ninja's are renowned for their attack power, speed, and evasivness. In fact, they are the quickest class in the game. Their 'throw' abilities allow them to hurl weapons from their inventories at enemies (but they can't throw items, only chemists get to do that), with very high accuracy (unless the target has the theif's 'catch' ability equipped...that thing is like ninja kryptonite), to inflict a great deal of damage. Just make sure you don't accidentally throw a weapon that you intended to sell or equip later.

Ninja's have very high attack power (complemented by their ability to use two weapons at the same time), very high speed, very high evade, very good jump/movement range, low defense, fair magic, and low magic defense. Thus, it is mostly their evasion stat that keeps them alive in combat. You can add to this ability by equipping the 'sunken state' or 'abandon' counter attacks, but the 'hamedo' and 'counter' abilities (both monk skills) would be better for inflicting damage.

As for secondary skill sets, ninja's are best suited for melee abilities, but an ability that allows them to heal themselves would also be handy. Skills like 'item,' 'snipe,' 'dark sword' (dark knights some lovely skills that sap hp from enemies), 'steal,' 'berserk' (berserkers have some nice defense-increasing abilities), 'jump,' 'battle skill' (won't need a whole lot of defense if you break the enemy's weapon), and 'mighty sword' (same deal as 'battle skill') are some excellent options.

Basic Skills (Throw):

Orales are casters that attempt to inflict their enemies with status ailments instead of causing actual damage (except for 'life drain,' that'll cause some damage). Many of their ailment-inflicting spells ('yin/yang magic'), however, have a high miss rate. The temple knight's 'magic sword' is a much more accurate counterpart. Also, the 'magic sword' spells have no charge time requirement.

So why raise an oracle instead of just going straight for the temple knight? Simple, 'magic sword' can not be used with calculator skills, but 'yin/yang magic' can. An oracle will a mastered set of 'math skills' can target many (sometimes even all) enemies present on the battlefield at the same time, regardless of range. An oracle with a mastered set of 'math skills' is a marvelously useful and powerful ally.

But, if you don't want to do that, it is generally a good idea to take advantage of an oracle's high magic power and high magic defense (balanced by low attack power and low defense) by equipping a second set of magic skills. Ideally, a set of skills that cause direct damage ('black magic,' 'summon,' etc.) in case you encounter enemies that are immune to most status ailments.

Basic Skills (Yin/Yang Magic):

Paladins are very well-balanced characters. Their 'light sword' abilities can inflict heavy damage on enemies (and deal monster damage to enemies like the undead that are weak against holy), but they can also cast powerful healing and protective spells on allies (although these abilities don't work in conjunction with 'math skills' like the preist's 'white magic' or the cleric's 'holy magic' does). Their heavy armor gives them extremely high defense (they are the only class that can equip true silver armor), but lowers their speed and movement/jump range a bit. The speed/move/jump lowering isn't much of an issue, however, once they are able to summon their mounts.

Paladin's need a lot of mp for their skills and they can't equip robes, so it may be helpful to equip the 'move mp up' (oracle) ability. Also, you can cause some outstanding melee damage by give a paladin the 'dual wield' (ninja, assassin) ability.

As for additional skill sets, paladins have very high attack power and fair magic power. They do alright with magic skill sets, but seem to be better suited for melee skill sets. Also, magic skills tend to use up a lot of mp, which lessens the maximum amount of time they can be atop a summoned mount.

Now, paladins have a lot of skills that heal and protect allies, but not a whole lot that protect and heal themselves. If you want to give a paladin the ability to raise his or her own stats, then the 'berserk' ability might make a lovely choice. If you're looking for an ability that will allow a paladin to heal himself or herself, then the 'dark sword' is a nice choice. The 'dark sword' has a lot of abilities that both damage enemies and restore hp and mp (the 'night sword' is particularly useful for keeping mp up).

Speaking of which, having the 'dark sword' ability equipped kind of eliminates the need to equip 'move mp up,' so you may want to swap that for something else (I would suggest 'teleport' but that seems unnecessary once you can summon the pegasus *shrug*).

Other useful skill sets for a paladin include 'draw out,' 'mighty sword,' 'jump,' 'desperado,' 'sword dance,' 'topography' (it's magic, but it doesn't have a high mp cost), and 'dance.' But whatever you do, avoid equipping really mp-costly abilities like 'gun magic,' 'summon,' 'animate,' and 'metallurgy.'

Also, keep in mind that you must have a non-ranged bladed weapon equipped to use the 'light sword' skill.

Basic Skills (Light Sword):

Priests have excellent healing abilities, which are excellent for keep allies alive, and for keeping the undead dead (funny how that works...). Their 'holy' ability is also a powerful spell that is about on par with a wizard's 'flare' spell.

Priests have low physical attack, low defense, high magic power, very high magic defense, and fair everything else. Thus, it is generally prudent to equip them with an extra set of magic skills. Equipping them with offensive magic skills ('black magic,' 'summon,' and 'blue magic' to a lesser extent) will result in a well-balanced character that can heal and attack with magic. Equipping 'holy magic' will result in a character that can cast excellent healing magic, and excellent protective magic. Equipping 'time magic,' 'phantasm,' or 'yin/yang magic' will result in a character that can heal allies and hinder enemies. All of those are good choices.

However, I must remind you that 'white magic' is compatible with the 'math skill' ability. Equipping a priest with a mastered set of 'math skills' will allow him or her to heal countless allies (in some cases even all allies) at the same time, regardless of range.

Basic Skills (White Magic):

Red mages are very versatile characters (and by that I mean they have 'fair' everything). They can cast both 'white magic' and 'black magic,' but only up to level 2. The real gain here is learning the 'magic power up' ability that increases the damge done by magic attacks.

Red mages have all fair stats, so they can equip pretty much anything. If you're going for versatility, it's a good idea to equip a melee skill like 'sword dance,' 'snipe,' or 'desperado' along with 'red magic.'

However, it should be remembered that 'red magic' can be used in conjunction with 'math skills.' Equipping a red mage with a mastered set of 'math skills' will allow him or her to target a large number of enemies or allies (in some cases all enemies or allies) regardless of range. This will allow him or her to heal many allies at once, and attack many enemies at once, which is particularly impressive when the 'magic power up' ability is equipped.

Basic Skills (Red Magic):

Runic knights are highly specialized knights who have learned how to absorb spells cast on them, and turn them against their enemies. When a rune knight uses a 'runic shield,' the shield will absorb any offensive/elemental spell from the following catagories: 'white magic,' 'black magic,' 'red magic,' 'gun magic,' 'topography,' 'use arm' ('ultima only'), and any elemental monser skills. Non-elemental spells (except for 'aura shot' and 'ultima') wil not be absorbed.

Runic knights have high attack power, high defense, high magic power, high magic defense, fair speed, and low movement/jump range. Thus, it is a good idea to equip them with the 'teleport' (time mage) ability so they can more easily move around the battlefiled, or equip them with a mount-summoning skill set ('light sword,' 'animate,' or 'metallurgy'). They are also good candidates for the 'dual wield' (ninja, assassin) skill.

Also, 'runic' skills don't have a very high mp cost, so you don't really have to worry about that when equipping secondary skill sets. 'Light sword,' 'dark sword,' 'mighty sword,' 'magic sword,' 'desperado,' 'animate,' 'summon,' 'metallurgy,' 'sword dance,' 'jump,' and 'dragon magic' are some of the many excellent choices for a rune knight's secondary skill set.

Also, keep in mind that you must have a non-ranged, bladed weapon equipped to use the 'runic' abilities (except for 'runic shield').

Basic Skills (Runic):

Samurai have the ability to 'draw out' the spirit of a katana, and use its powers to either attack enemies, or assist allies. All 'draw out' effects take place in a circular range around the caster, and do not effect the caster. This main drawback to this technique is that it requires you to keep extra katanas in your inventory (and there's a chance of one breaking when you use a 'draw out' technique), which can get expensive.

Furthermore, samurai have high attack power (particularly if you use the 'two hands' ability), high defense (if you want it higher you may wish to equip the knight's 'equip armor' ability), high speed, low magic power, fair magic defense, and fair jump/movement range. Therefore, they are best suited for melee skill sets as opposed to magic skill sets.

Now, katanas are two-handed weapons, so equipping 'dual wield' is out. I would just go with the 'two hands' skill. Katanas are compatible with the 'dark sword,' 'light sword,' and 'mighty sword' skills, so you can equip any of those. Some other useful sets for samurai are 'berserk,' 'jump,' 'sword dance,' and 'snipe.'

Basic Skills (Draw Out):

Snipers have high attack power, fair defense, fair magic power, fair magic defense, very high speed (not as high as a ninja's though), very high movement/jump range, and very high accuracy. The idea for a strategy for a sniper is to climb onto the highest point in the battlefield (put that high jump range to some good use), and then attack and 'snipe' enemies on the battlefield from that spotting position.

For a sniper, a second skill set that best takes advantage of their long range weaponry and high accuracy like 'charge' or 'gun magic' (although they aren't the best casters) is a good call. The best skill, however, would probably be 'steal' or 'battle skill.' 'Battle skill' allows a sniper to break an enemy's equipment from far away, and with a high degree of accuracy. You have to be close to an enemy to use 'steal,' but a sniper's high accuracy makes stealing much easier, and you can prevent counterattacks by using 'arm aim' before moving in closer.

Basic Skills (Snipe):

Soldiers have high attack power, low defense (it doesn't help that they have only basic armors), high magic power, fair magic defense, fair speed, high movement/jump range, and awesomly powerful special attacks!

Alright, the first thing to do is equip a soldier with the 'short charge' and 'counter quick' abilities. The reason for this is that his limits, although amazingly powerful, have an insanely high CT requirement. Without 'short charge,' for example, 'cherry blossom' can take as many as 74 turns to charge. Plenty of time for your enemy to wander out of range...or wander over to you and kill you while you're casting.

Now, it seems like a good idea to equip 'equip armor' to up a soldier's defense, but doing that would prevent you from equipping the 'short charge' ability, as you can only have one support ability equipped per unit. What you can do, however, is master all of the limit skills, change your class to something that does wear armor, and then equip 'short charge' and 'counter quick' with that class.

If you plan to do that, make sure it's a class that can use a sword, as a sword is required to preform the 'limit' skills. Dark knight, paladin (oh yeah, that'll fix your defense problem), divine knight, dragonair, temple knight, mercenary, and knight are some fine armor-wearing, sword-bearing examples.

Another good idea might be to give the 'limit' skill to a ninja. Now, ninja's aren't really that much better off defensivly than soldiers, but they are much faster, and can equip two swords without needed to use 'dual wield' as their support ability. It could work.

Basic Skills (Limit):

Summoners can call forth any spirit that they have made a summoner's pact with. Summoners are very powerful casters once they have a spirit to summon but are, needless to say, not too handy before then. Until they make their first 'summoner's pact' they will be relying on their secondary skill set, so choose it wisely.

Summoner's have high magic power, high magic defense, low attack power, low defense, and fair everything else. 'Summon' spells require a lot of mp (although you can drastically mitigate that problem with the 'half of mp' ability), so it is usually a good idea to equip robes. Also, 'summon' spells can take a long time to cast, so it is an even better idea to equip the 'short charge' (time mage) ability to decrease the heavy CT requirements. Other than that, pretty much any secondary skill set that involves magic should do alright. Just avoid skills like 'animate,' 'gun magic,' and 'metallurgy' that use up huge amounts of mp, and then don't have any left over for the actual 'summon' spell...

Basic Skills (Summon):

'Magic sword' abilities are similiar to 'yin/yang magic' abilities. 'Magic sword' skills are much more accurate than 'yin/yang magic' skills, and require no charge time to be cast. However, they are also incompatible with 'math skills,' and can only effect one enemy at a time.

Temple knights have high attack power, high defense, very high magic power, very high magic defense, fair speed, and a high movement/jump range. The 'magic sword' skill can be a bit costly with regard to mp, but the 'aspel' spell can drain mp from a target and transfer it to the caster. But, if you're still worried about running out, you can always equip the 'dark sword' ability (and use 'night sword' to drain larger amounts of mp), or equip the oracle's 'move mp up' ability.

Temple knight's have high attack power, and are good candidates for the 'dual wield' ability. Skills sets that work well with them include 'light sword,' 'dark sword,' 'mighty sword,' 'runic,' 'truth,' 'topography,' 'chaos magic,' 'phantasm,' 'black magic,' 'white magic,' and 'time magic' (but not 'yin/yang magic,' that would be kind of repeitive).

Also, keep in mind that you must have a non-ranged bladed weapon equipped to use the 'magic sword' techniques.

Basic Skills (Magic Sword):

Thieves have low attack power, low defense, low magic defense, very high speed (not on par with a ninja, but still good), very high movement/jump range, and some very useful (and potentially profitible) 'steal' abilities. A high level thief can strip his opponent down, taking his weapon, his helmet, his armor, his accessory, his underware, you name it, in a matter of seconds. Or, if the enemy happens to be a member of the opposite sex, he may even use 'steal heart' to get her to join his allies.

Sadly there are only a two skills sets that really work well with the theif class. 'Item' is nice, as this will allow a thief to heal himself with items, and to rush over to other allies (via his excellent speed and movement range) who may need of healing thems. And other other is 'berserk,' which allows a thief to raise his stats, and mitigate some of his physical weaknesses.

Basic Skills (Steal):

Time mages are spellcasters who have learned how to alter the flow of time with magic. They can increase the speed of allies and decrease the speed of enemies to help turn the tide of battle. They also have a few spells that do direct damage. The 'short charge' ability is very useful for casting spells quickly.

The time mage's msot valuable ability is actually 'short charge.' It allows casters to act quickly in battle, and decreases the charge time requirement for spells. This is especially useful for 'summon' spells, 'limit' skills, and the 'meteor' spell which take a very long time to charge.

A time mage will do well with any sort of magic skill set equipped, but the ideal one would be a mastered set of 'math skills.' This will allow a time mage to cast spells on many allies or enemies (sometimes all allies or enemies) at the same time, regardless of range. This is massivly useful when you can cast 'quick' on almost all of your allies at once, while your enemies are still waiting for their CT guages to fill up so they can take their next turn. Good times...

Basic Skills (Time Magic):

Ok, first order of buisness: 'black magic' is not evil - well, ok, sometimes it is, but it's usually not. See, what happened was 'white magic' was invented first, and then wizards came later. And everyone said "oh look! It's a new form of magic that hurts people - which is the opposite of healing people, which is what 'white magic' does. And since it's the opposite of 'white magic' and black is the opposite of white, we should call this new stuff 'black magic!" Unfortunately, not everybody knows that, and now they think all types of 'black magic' are evil because its name is kinda similiar to 'dark magic' which is evil. You've gotta be careful when you name these things...

Wizards don't have much going for them with regard to attack power and defense, but if you like offensive magic, forget about it! Wizard's have high magic power, high magic defense, and fair everything else.

It's a good idea to equip a wizard with 'short charge,' so that he can cast spells quickly. 'Teleport' would also be useful, so that he can teleport away from melee enemies if he need to (and he probably will, with his low defense and all).

A wizard can make use of any kind of magic skill set. 'Time magic,' is useful for keeping allies going, 'white magic' will allow the wizard to both attack and heal, 'yin/yang magic' will allow him to both attack and cast status ailments on his enemies, and so on. However, the idea set would be a mastered set of 'math skills.' These will allow a wizard to attack many enemies (sometimes even all enemies) at the same time, regardless of range, while on the battlefield. This will allow a wizard to make full use of his offensive magic, and not cast from a safe distance away, and not risk getting killed by enemy melee units.

Basic Skills (Black Magic):