Let's start light, because I think this will be a very looooooong guide. This will include whatever I feel is appropriate as tips for making battles easier.

Obvious numbers like HP or MP aside(if you don't know what those are, uh, really? fine, HP is your health, you die if it hit 0, MP is your spellcasting resource, to cast something, you use MP), some numbers are a little more complex.

Brave is usually associated with Reaction Abilities. Reactions that require activation have their activation chance equal to your Brave %.

Some weapon also scales with your Brave, these add Brave% as damage multiplier.

• Barehanded
  
• Knight's Sword
  
• Katana

When Treasure Hunting, the chance to find rare treasure is the inverse of your Brave%; 30 Brave means 70% chance to find rare treasure.

For every 4 points of Brave modified mid-battle, 1 point of Brave will be changed permanently.

When your Brave is under 10, you become a Chicken and will only run away from the nearest enemy. You regain 1 Brave per turn in this state.

When your Brave is too low(5), the character deserts the army out of fear and leaves forever(though you already become a chicken at 9, and chickens restory 1 Brave per turn, so you really need to try to get them to leave that way). Ramza is the sole exception to this.

Faith is exclusively used for Magick Attack and Defense. When you are hit by a spell:

• The damage is multiplied by user Faith%
  
• The damage is multiplied by target Faith%

The same goes for status magic, in which you multiply the success rates instead.

This means that if either the user or target has low Faith, the magic will do considerably less damage. Not all magic damage scales with Faith, something like Iaido or Geomancy don't scale with Faith at all, though these attacks usually have lower base power to compensate for the fact that they ignore Faith.

• Faith(the status effect, not the stats) does not modify your Faith, but you are treated as if you have 100 Faith for the sake of spellcasting.
  
• Atheist does not modify your Faith, but you are treated as if you have 0 Faith for the sake of spellcasting. This means most spells will do 0 damage and status magic including Raise will have 0% success rate.

For every 4 points of Faith modified mid-battle, 1 point of Faith will be changed permanently.

When your Faith is too high(95), the character deserts the army to follow their faith and leaves forever. Ramza is the sole exception to this.

Is used for most Physical attacks. Your normal attack is usually (PA)*(WA), though there are exceptions.

• Barehanded Attacks use your PA as WA.
  
• Daggers use the average between your PA and Speed.
  
• Bows use the average between your PA and Speed.
  
• Ninja Blades use the average between your PA and Speed.
  
• Guns use WA as PA.
  
• Staves use MA instead of PA.
  
• Poles use MA instead of PA.
  
• Books use the average between your PA and MA.
  
• Instruments use the average between your PA and MA.
  
• Clothes use the average between your PA and MA.

The MA scaling weapons are still do physical damage, despite scaling off your magical attribute.

Some skills scale directly off PA, like Knight's status Rend, and does not take WA into consideration at all.

Is used for most Magick attacks. Your spell formula is (MA)*(magic multiplier), but magic multiplier is not a value you see, you simply need to look it up. For example, Black mage's basic/ra/ga/ja spells have 14/18/24/32 as their multipliers. Most Magick goes through Faith%.

Magic Guns follow the Magick Attack formula, with MA equal to the gun's WA, and randomly pick 14/18/24 as multipliers(you will know which the game picks from the animation, it's literally casting basic/ra/ga spells). Faith applies. You are literally casting a spell with your gun.

Geomancy uses (PA/2)+1 as magic multiplier and does not take Faith into consideration.

Status magic usually has a set success rate directly increased by your MA(as in, 10 MA means +10% raw) and goes through Faith%.

Speed increase how fast your character acts, and Daggers, Bows, and Ninja Blades scale off Speed.

The game operates in ticks, for every tick, everyone's CT increases equal to their Speed, once someone's CT reach 100, they get a turn. For example, if you have 9 speed, your CT increases as follows:

• 9
  
• 18
  
• 27
  
• 36
  
• 45
  
• 54
  
• 63
  
• 72
  
• 81
  
• 90
  
• 99
  
• 100

If multiple units hit 100 CT at the same time(like 15 and 16), the one with higher overflow takes the turn first. If two hit 100 at the same time with the exact value, I have no idea how the game decides priority, but if you're first in the order and does not get CT in any other way, you will get to go first again when you tie again. Once you take your turn, your CT resets to 0.

Waiting increases CT by 20 for each unspent action. Attacking without moving or moving without attacking will give you 20 CT, while completely passing the turn gives you 40 CT.

The spell "Quick" immediately set the target's CT to 100, and Orator's "Stall" set CT to 0.

Haste increases your CT gain by 50%, while slow halves it.

There are several evasions on your stats screen.

• Physical Evasion comes from your job. No job has Magical Evasion, so it is always 0.
  
• Weapon Parry comes from your weapon. This is only active if you have the Reaction Ability "Parry" equipped.
  
• Shield Parry comes from your shield.
  
• Cloak Evasion comes from your accessory, specifically your cloak.

These are multiplicative when working together, and each may or may not take effect when physically attacked from different directions.

• When attacked from the front, Physical Evasion, Weapon Parry, Shield Physical Parry, and Cloak Physical Evasion applies.
  
• When attacked from the side, Weapon Parry, Shield Physical Parry, and Cloak Physical Evasion applies.
  
• When attacked from the back, only Cloak Physical Evasion applies.

When attacked diagonally, the game favors the defender(diagonal front and side is considered front etc.).

• Shield Magick Parry and Cloak Magick Evasion applies. Facing does not matter for Magickal attacks.

Do note that some attacks like Rush or Holy simply cannot be evaded. As you can see from the difference between Rush and Holy, there are no tell, you need to memorize which attacks can't be evaded.

You can move horizontally up to your Move value as long as there isn't an obstacle or a height difference over your Jump value on your path.

For every 2 Jump your character has, you can jump across a 1 tile gap. This does not consume your Move more than to move across it as if it were flat surface.

Some tiles have traps on them. A unit with Treasure Hunter will instead find treasure on those tiles. When you discover a treasure, it could either be normal or rare. Your chance of finding rare treasure is the inverse of your Brave value, for example 30 Brave means 70% chance of getting a rare treasure. A Chemist with Treasure Hunter will have an increased chance of finding rare treasures, but I currently don't know by how much.

Your Jump value is the exact vertical height you can jump up. If you are pushed off a ledge higher than your Jump value, you take fall damage.

Water has depth, and characters in water 2 depth deep will submerge and not be able to act at all.

You completely ignore height differences and obstacles when you Teleport. Your Teleport is guaranteed to succeed if you Teleport within your Move range, with 10% chance of failing for each tile above your Move, for example, if a character with 3 Move Teleport 5 tiles away, they have 20% to fail the warp and Teleport in place.

Most melee weapon can attack 2h up, and 3h down. You can see the height on the top right of the screen. Knowing this might allow you to attack from a position where the enemy can't retaliate.

Polearm, Pole, and Cloth can attack from 2 tiles away and can attack 3h up because they're long. Their range will be limited to 1 when you attack a 3h target tough. Attacks from them do not go through obstacles and enemies and will only hit the first target in the way.

While obvious for melee weapon, ranged weapons have minimum range and might not be able to attack targets right next to the attacker.

Crossbows and Guns attack in a straight line and will get blocked by obstacles or another unit if they're in the way. You can use this to your advantage if you want to attack in melee range; simply aim past the target in such a way that the target will block the projectile, and you'll hit them.

Books and Instruments follows the same rule as Crossbows and Guns, but have less maximum range.

Bows has 3-5 range and attack in an arc, and can generally arc around obstacles, though some obstacle might be too high(mostly ceiling-height walls) and block the path anyway. When you have the high ground, maximum bow range will extend at the rate of 2h:1 tile, for example if you're at 4h and the target is at 2h, your bow can shoot them from 6 tiles away.

In both melee and ranged, your attack has a chance to crit, when an attack crits, a couple things could happen

• Half the time, you push the enemy 1 tile away.
  
• You do a random amount of extra damage up to twice your normal damage.

Most melee attack can crit, and "special sword skills" can all crit.

Some status effect simply overwrites each other.

• Regen and Poison
  
• Haste and Slow

Using one on the target successfully will immediately overwrite the other. This is extra useful on poison and regen, as you don't have to waste time removing them if you just have the other ready.

Reraise and Doom does not cancel each other out, but by their effect you will die then immediately get back up.

As is tradition with Final Fantasy games, most forms of healing will hurt undead instead, with Phoenix Down immediately killing them. Chakra, however, can heal undead units just fine. The Death spell will fully heal an undead if hit.

When you attempt to steal an undead's HP, the reverse will happen instead, you lose health, the undead heals.

Undead can't be revived when down, but they have a chance to rise back up instead of turning into crystal or chest when their life runs out.

Doom does nothing to an undead. The countdown simply disappears when it hit 0.

As this game operates in ticks, delayed abilities use them the way Speed does.

Casting operates just like your turn order. When you cast a spell with Casting Time, you begin charging with speed equal to the spell's Cast Speed. When your cast CT hit 100, the spell fires.

Time Mage's Swiftspell doubles your Cast Speed.

Status effects also use ticks for duration, for example, Poison lasts for 32 ticks. This means that the faster the entire battlefield is, the longer status effects will seemingly last.

When jumping, you disappear, completely immune to anything anyone does until you land. Your turn CT continues normally while airborne.

You start charging the same way you cast a spell, with Cast Speed equal to twice your Speed. Once you hit 100, you land, deal damage, reset to your original position.

Jumping power is always (Weapon Attack)*(Physical Attack)*(1.5 if weapon is Polearm) and is always non-elemental regardless of weapon, and is a funny way to bypass weird damage formula to abuse high Weapon Attack. For example:

• Axes deal random damage when normal attacking, but not when you use an Axe to Jump.
  
• Weapons that don't use PA at all like guns uses it when jumping.
  
• Knight's Sword uses Brave as % damage when attacking, not when jumping.
  
• Barehanded is the sole exception and uses the default Barehanded formula instead.
  
• Support abilities do not affect Jump. None of Attack Boost, Doublehand, or Brawler(while barehanded) work.

Now that we have the basic combat out of the way, time to Mimic Darlavon.

You gain JP by acting in that job. Acting as Knight, get Knight JP, acting as Archer, get Archer JP, etc.

You can also gain JP from spillover from others; for example, you have a Knight, and you have a Squire, when the Squire acts, the Squire get Squire JP, the Knight also receives Squire JP equal to 1/4 the pre-JP Boosted amount gained by the Squire.

This means you can either turbo JP grind a job by having multiple units be in the same job, or gain other job JP by leeching off allies.

You can get spillover for jobs you have yet to unlock.

Special jobs are considered Squire for the purpose of spillover.

With the above knowledge, you can turbo unlock advanced jobs very early on.

For example, to get Ninja very early, leave first battle > do first fight as all Squire, you should get JP, go all Archer after Eagrose until Archer 4> half party goes Thief, the other half goes Knight, by the time Thief hit 5, monk should unlock for all > everyone goes monk, and that's it, you get Ninja(you only need Geomancer 2, which is nothing, it's like, 200 JP and you possibly start 150+).

I planned my route differently(because my goal is different, I also want a Samurai), and I got Ninja around the start of chapter 2 at level 11. If you optimize like above, you'll probably get it before me.

The downside of optimizing pathing like this is that you don't get to explore the job system until you finish the route(in above example, you won't have a single Mage on your team). Don't recommend this for newer players, because exploring the job system is the main bulk of the fun. Although getting advanced jobs early could also enhance your fun, so do this at your own discretion.

Each job has different growth that will affect the character permanently when you level up in that job. Someone trained 1-99 Ninja will be a lot faster than 1-99 Samurai when both are Knights. The growth gained is not represented in your stats screen, you have to look it up to know them. I'll list some of the jobs with extraordinary growth:

• Ninja has the best Speed and very good PA while having tolerable MP.
  
• Knight and Dragoon(they have the exact same growth) have the best PA^(outside Mime) and very good HP, but bad MP.
  
• Monk has the best HP^(outside Mime) and very good PA while having tolerable MP.
  
• White Mage has very good MP while still retaining a very respectable amount of PA and HP.
  
• Summoner has the best MP, but bad everything else. Still useful for some builds.
  
• Mime has best HP, best PA, and is the only generic job with MA growth at all, but abysmal MP.

The growth goes into your base stats than are then multiplied by job multipliers to get your final stats.

Do note that Ramza, Orlandeau, Meliadoul, Beowulf, Reis, and Cloud have the best growth all round in their original jobs, but you'll still want to learn abilities for their builds.


Some jobs have very bad growth, but you'll still need to stay in them to, well, learn their abilities, and these have some of the best abilities in the game.

• Squire growth is fine, but leave after JP boost. You can gain Squire JP from spillover from Ramza anyway(Ramza Squire has some of the best growth in the game, it's only Squire in name and even changes name to Gallant Knight in chapter 4).
  
• Chemist is worse than Squire in every area and is generally worst outside Bard and Dancer.
  
• Orator will gut your MP, other stats are fine.
  
• Arithmetician still has a proper spellcasting-oriented growth, but it's the worst among peers.
  
• Bard has the worst growth in the game.
  
• Dancer has decent PA, but all other growths are the same as Bard.

Some of these jobs actually are optimal to finish a build as(pretty much everything above except Squire), they're just suboptimal to gain levels as.

Again, completely ignore you just learned if you're a new player, staying one job the entire game just to get good growth is simply not fun.

A unit has 5 ability slots, one of them is always fixed.

• Main Action Ability from their current job.
  
• An Action Ability Slot. You can equip any Action Ability from any Job you have unlocked. You have full access to every single Active Ability you learned from that job.
  
• A Reaction Ability Slot. These usually activates when someone does something to the unit. A lot of them has activation% equal to your Brave, while some are always active regardless. Reaction abilities do not trigger other Reaction abilities; you will not Counter each other to death.
  
• A Support Ability Slot. These usually are passive buffs to the unit, but can also allow the unit to do something they usually can't.
  
• A Movement Ability Slot. These usually affect the movement of the unit, but can also give you benefits from moving.

You can mix and match abilities freely from any job and doing so is highly encouraged by the game as the skillset of a single job is usually not that effective on its own.

Some jobs have innate abilities that are always equipped.

• Monk has innate Brawler.
  
• Orator has innate Beast Tongue.
  
• Ninja has innate Dual Wield.
  
• Chemist has innate Throw Item. The job does not have innate Treasure Hunter, but has the ability to obtain treasure without it. Treasure Hunter explicitly says it increases the chance to get rare treasures for Chemist instead of the usual effect. Potato potato, but though I'd mention it.
  
• Dragonkin has innate Dual Wield, Beast Tongue, Beastmaster, and Tame.
  
• All monsters have innate Counter, and could have more depending on the species, but this is about jobs, so look for them in-game.

-Ja spells can be learned Blue Mage style, you need to be in the correct job(the job learning the spell) and be hit by the spell. You have a chance to learn them if the spell does at least 1 HP or MP damage/healing or be inflicted by the buff/debuff if it's a buff/debuff.

Offensive Summons from Bahamut down on the spell list can also be learned Blue Mage style(and is the only way to learn Zodiark, as it is listed as ??? on the spell list), once again, you need to be in the correct job(Summoner), and you need to get hit by the spell. And it's also a chance, so you don't learn it every time.

I will now get into the specific jobs, any notable features, strength, and weakness, including recommended ability combinations that might enhance your play, and recommendations for finishing a build.

I will go by the order the game presents them on the job screen.

Special jobs will not be included, but may be mentioned.

The beginning of it all, and the job you should get out of asap. That is not to say Squire does not have any interesting elements to them, Fundaments is far from a bad Action Ability, with Focus boosting PA being so useful in so many jobs(Monk especially) and Throw Stone/Rush allowing you to reposition enemies. It's only a chance to do so, but no other ability does that!

• Leave Squire asap. Ramza is the only Squire you need, and others can get Squire JP from his spillover.
  
• Outside special jobs, Squire has the widest selection of weapon among all melee jobs(Dagger, Sword, Axe, Flail). Negligible, since you want to be in the better jobs for those weapons anyway, but I thought it'd be fun to mention.
  
• JP Boost is great, but not necessary. You can go through prerequisites faster to get your desired job sooner(and is recommended for that purpose), but permanently having JP Boost on means you basically have your Support slot locked out. The fun is not just in the final build, but the little things you discovered along the way as well.
  
• Equip Axe has several use cases, as there will be points in the game where Axe is the strongest weapon for that part. Jobs with weak weapon like Thief will greatly benefit from Equip Axe. When paired with Aim, it seems to somehow deal reliable damage despite the usually random nature of the weapon.
  
• Move+1 will get you far, especially if you're going the Mage route and would not have access to Thief's Move+2.

Fundaments may look simple, but it is far from useless.

• Focus allows you to stack PA indefinitely, during the early game, if you use Focus 3-4 times, you will find that your damage output literally doubles. This has places in some final builds.
  
• Throw Stone and Rush can both shove enemies off ledges.
  
• Throw Stone in particular can safely remove confused, charm, and sleep from allies
  
• Salve is not notable, but keep it on the back of your mind when you have Fundaments equipped. I have gotten rid of a game losing Poison once. Also, Silence is debilitating on Mages. Doesn't happen often, but having Salve to remove them is handy.

To summarize Squire in a single sentence, everyone has to start somewhere. It probably won't ever be optimal to use Squire as a foundation, but Fundaments can indeed be a part of one.

Chemist as a job is really good, it has all the makings of a great supporting job, being able to heal at range and remove pretty much all the debilitating status effects, while equip Gun makes up for their lack of offensive stats. I don't recommend staying in Chemist before your build is finalized though, as this is the beginning of a large tree, you are not progressing through the jobs if you stay in Chemist for too long.

• Item is a great Action to have throughout the game. Healing and curing status effects is never useless.
  
• Phoenix Down is a must. Reviving allies aside, you one shot undead with it.
  
• Auto-Potion is something anyone can use all the way through the game, as it activates on any attack. Your weakest Potion will be used first, so the moment you unlock High Potion, sell all your normal Potion, do the same for X-Potion. This Ability is key to beating ch3 Wiegraf without abusing decades old AI.
  
• Treasure Hunter is mandatory to get some of the best equipment in the game, though you only need one character to have it.
  
• Throw Item is useless if you're not using the Item action, but super useful with it. You can one shot undead enemies form 4 tiles away, and you could even apply the Undead status yourself if you have a Mystic.
  
• Safeguard prevents your precious ultra rare equipment from being removed from you. Useful once you have some of the best gear in the game and are up against Knights or Thieves.
  
• Reequip can be used to change setup mid-fight(ice sword against ice absorb enemy? change sword!), can also be used the same way as Safeguard for cheaper equipment; when something is broken/stolen, just equip a new one.

The job has really bad stats growth, but unless you spend your entire playthrough as a Chemist it won't affect your final build too much, so feel free to get all the abilities you need before moving on.

Chemist is a really good job to finish your build in for characters geared towards support. Guns allow you to ignore your stats and do damage while being able to instantly heal/revive from afar. Use Attack Boost for physical guns and Magick Boost for Magic Guns to boost damage. If you want to boost your damage even further, you can Aim your gun for a huge boost. The elemental boost from Japa Mala also boosts Magic Gun damage.

The Knight is a very simple job, you see something you wanna break, you break it. Be that the enemy's life, precious equipment, or even their stats. Armor also provides a hefty amount of health, so this will also be your premium front liner(despite how common this sounds, only 3 generic jobs can equip Armor). Knight's Sword is also among the most powerful weapon in the game bar none.

• All the Rend skills have the same range as your weapon, so if you have Equip Gun or Crossbow, your Rend are going to have those range. As Magic Guns have very high WA, they actually are pretty good at Rending equipment.
  
• Dual Wield allows you to Rend twice, effectively doubling your Rend. This is very powerful.
  
• Equip Sword is mandatory for special jobs, as those usually require a Sword to perform their skills. Also a good fallback option on other jobs, as a sword always have decent WA throughout the game.
  
• Parry is a Reaction Ability not reliant on Brave. Anyone can use it, and mages' weapon usually comes with very high Parry%.
  
• Equip Armor can be used to improve a mage's tankiness, useful in some stages where out of reach snipers harass your back line right from the start. Monk with Equip Armor will straight up be a meat shield.
  
• Equip Shield can be used to negate elemental damage via Flame and Ice Shields, and could be key to enabling some Black Mage or Arithmatick setups as it allows you to heal from allied fire or ice spells.
  
• There will come a point in the game where you can equip elemental weapon with element-boosting armor or accessories. This is when a Knight's offensive power skyrockets. The infamous Ice Brand/Black Robe veterans have used for years.

Art of War is premium against bosses. They're also useful for stalling out a fight, like Nelveska where you want to treasure hunt before the fight ends, but the boss hits too damn hard by default. For Rending Equipment, both PA and WA matters. For Rending stats, only PA matters.

• Rend Weapon can easily disable a physical attacker. This is very useful on tankier enemies you can't possible one shot, like the HP boosted enemies in Tactician mode. It even works on most bosses. As special jobs usually need a sword to use their skills, Rend Weapon can effectively leave those bosses harmless.
  
• Rend Speed robs the enemy of their turns. This will trivialize most boss fights if you manage to land a couple hits.
  
• Rend Power is super useful for similar reason to above. Early game, this basically reduce the enemies to 1 or 2 PA, rendering them effectively useless.
  
• Rend Magic is similar, but less useful as you are a Knight, a physical attacking monster, if you manage to close in on a mage, you can probably kill them. Still good in Lucavi fights though, they are mostly mages with very high HP.
  
• Rend Speed robs the enemy of their turns. This will trivialize most Lucavi fights if you manage to land a couple hits.*

This is also the non-mime generic job with the highest PA growth in the game, so it is an ideal job to spend some levels or even finish a build in. Get all those abilities on the fancy jobs, then come back to Knight and equip all the abilities you earned for one of the best generic melee fighters in the game. You can even go half-mage with the job since Knights have decent MP and can equip Robes, especially with support magic; cast all those Hastes or Protects, then go into melee!

Archer is also a very simple job; you hit the enemy from far away, and if not outright kill them, weaken them enough for your front liners to finish the job without retaliation. Archer is the only job in the game that can equip a Bow, as such you can finish your build in Archer to benefit from one.

• As Art of War has the same range as your weapon, Archers can easily cover the entire field while on high ground.
  
• Teleport and Ignore Height allows an archer to reposition more freely.
  
• Equip Crossbow is a very early unlock, and allows you to go ranged with any job.
  
• Concentration allows you to completely ignore the target's evasion. Useful for when Cloaks are starting to become a problem(Feather Cloak in particular, is a 40% evade even from the back).
  
• Archer's Bane is a trap. Due to an error in the original game, you get a much better reaction later on that basically do what Archer's Bane does and more.
  
• Speed Surge could be good in longer fights, as +1 or +2 Speed could affect your turn frequency in a significant way. You can easily trigger it with allied Throw Stones or Rush. Stoning one member to get extreme Speed is very funny.

Aim is also a very good Action Ability to use for the entirety of the game. You basically perform a basic attack with the + number added to your stats in the damage formula. This also somehow improves the reliability of Axes and Flails, allowing Geomancers(Axe) and Ninjas(Flail) to hit harder than already do.

• Lower Aim basically have no Charge Time, you can usually use them in place of a normal attack.
  
• Higher Aim straight up doubles your damage for most of the early-mid game. Boss killer if you time your aim properly.

Aim is also something they buffed in TIC, being faster than the original. This means it is now optimal on any job that relies on attacking, and is one of the few ways to increase the static damage of guns both physical and magical.

Archers, despite being a primarily ranged job, can equip Shields(native pairing with Crossbows). You can pull off some weird Equip X with them and have setups otherwise not attainable, for example, Equip Polearm Archer is the only generic combination that can equip Polearm and Shield with Hat and Clothing(meaning better PA/Speed boost) while having access to have both Aim and Art of War.

Monk is the typical go-to for heavy grinders, as barehand attacks use your PA as WA, this will massively outscale available weapons if you are overleveled. Of course the job is still giga strong even without overleveling, as PA boosting equipment starts to become available by midgame. Honestly worth to dip into for Brawler alone.

• Dual Wield allows Brawler to punch twice. This works in reverse, so a Ninja with Brawler can do the same.
  
• Aim your punches!
  
• Counter is the most basic form of reaction that is useful for all physical jobs. You can even counter ranged attacks with one of your own.
  
• First Strike sounds better than Counter on paper, but it only works on human attacks. You can't First Strike a monster at all.
  
• Critical: Recover HP is very funny in harder fights. Since you tend to get into critical range in a single hit, you immediately go back to full HP.
  
• Brawler allows you to bypass bad equipment selection at any point in the game. Early on when the weapon for a job isn't available yet, and later on as some jobs start to outscale store-bought weapon. Do note that you need to have both hands empty to get the Brawler boost. It also somehow improves your Steal chance if you are barehanded.

Martial Arts is a good mix of damage and utility. With Brawler, it is damage, and without, it is still utility.

• Chakra is free healing that also restores MP. Healing scales with PA.
  
• Revive is a free, albeit unreliable revival. Success rate scales with PA.
  
• Pummel is very strong early on due to its strange damage formula, but falls of by midgame.
  
• Aurablast and Shockwave are decent ranged options for melee attackers. Shockwave in particular is boosted by Gaia Gear.
  
• As with Salve, Purification won't be actively useful, but keep it in the back of your mind for when it comes up.

You can boost Martial Arts damage by equipping Brawler even if you have equipment in both hands.

As this is the generic job with the highest HP growth outside of Mime, you can gain some levels here if you're looking to build a tank. As a final build, Monk has the highest PA multiplier in the game, but since Monk as a very self-sufficient playstyle with very limited equipment option(literally just Clothing), your Monk will feel very samey regardless of build setups. They're only similar on the surface though, you have a wide selection of Abilities to make your unique Monk.

Your standard magical healer. White Mage abilities outside their Action aren't that notable, though Magick Defense Boost have a niche use case in some boss fights due to their magic-heavy nature. The White Magic itself, however, is plenty useful throughout the entire game.

• I don't need to explain Cure and Raise, you're a White Mage, those are literally your purpose.
  
• Shell and Protect are always good to cast on your downtime when your team is at full HP. They reduce the appropriate incoming damage by 1/3. **Wall** casts both at the same time, but only target one unit.
  
• Reraise can also be cast on your downtime if you are doing a purely supportive build. Otherwise, preventing death in the first place via either Protect/Shell or outright killing enemies with Holy so they can't harm your friends should take priority. Still a good counter to Doom.
  
• Holy is more powerful than Flare and can't be evaded. The Holy elemental means you can boost the damage further with boosting equipment.

As White Magick is mainly a supportive Active, you can easily stick it on something like Knight and expect it to work. You don't need sky high MA to successfully pull off a Protect or Raise.

White Mage provides very flexible building frame for your builds. Apart from the traditional healing and buffing, the White Mage job is:

• The spellcasting job with the highest PA multiplier in the game. You can reach melee level PA with some boosting equipment.
  
• The spellcasting job with the highest HP multiplier in the game.
  
• The only spellcasting job with positive Speed multiplier.
  
• To make up for all above, they have the lowest MA among mages.

This means they're the most customizable mage in the game just from the stats. You can have Equip X on and have a competent fighter that is still a functional healer. You can also be a fast Iaido user if you want to do what you already did plus murder without casting or spending MP. This is a versatile foundation for a hybrid or fast mage build.

Also the best job to level in if you intend to have a good mix of HP, MP, and PA growth. White Mage job growth is literally better than Agrias's Holy Knight's.

Despite being a standard damage dealing job, similar to White Mage, the Black Mage can also be very useful for your builds as it has the absolute highest MA multiplier in the game, special units included. Whatever strong MA scaling actives you learn will be more powerful on a Black Mage.

• Black Robe boosts all 3 main elemental spells and is a viable option even at endgame. You can use the elemental Rods early on.
  
• You can take advantage of fire and ice spells with Fire and Ice Shield, to allow your front liners to heal from your attacks.
  
• Iaido is at its peak power on a Black Mage.
  
• Magick Boost is a direct damage boost to magical attacks. The effect is as if your stats are 33% higher.
  
• Magick Counter can counter any spells, even ones not available to you, including enemy-only spells. You still need MP to cast them, though there's no casting time.

Black Magic is simple and useful for any job with high MA, though you might have a harder time past midgame to justify the Action on other jobs as Iaido and Summon becomes available, and especially after you have Arithmeticks.

• Basic/ra/ga spells are fast and do elemental damage. Unlike other FF games, lower tier spells find use even in late game as they have faster Cast Speed.
  
• Ja spells cover a very wide area and is the most powerful ice and lightning spells you have available to you(stronger than Ifrit/Shiva/Ramuh, but weaker than Salamander), but they're very slow and might need Swiftspell to even make use of later in the game.
  
• Toad is very useful in Tactician, as it has reasonably high hitrate and is basically an instakill. It lasts until healed, and there are only couple ways to heal them(either a Maiden's Kiss or a Toad spell of their own) which the enemy might not even have access to.
  
• Death is a trap. Lower accuracy than Toad, and Toad is basically a kill anyway. Can be used to fully heal undead, but they will still attempt to evade it despite being beneficial to them.
  
• Flare is objectively worse than Holy, having weaker power, slower Cast Speed, can be evaded, can't be elemental boosted, and even cost more MP. The non-elementalness of it might have use cases against certain enemies, though I cannot recall off the top of my head what absorbs holy(outside humans wearing Chameleon Robe).

Using Black Magic as an Action in other jobs is very useful early on, as you have no immediate better alternatives, and could still be useful later as you might not want to spend time in Summoner or Samurai in your build route. As mentioned earlier, Black Mage is not great for its Action Abilities, but a really good frame for final builds as it has the highest MA multiplier in the entire game.

Time Mage is a disruptive/supportive job, slowing time down for the enemy and hasten allies. Their actives are solid, but the gem lies in their other abilities.

• Mana Shield is very common in non-MP reliant builds, as it essentially prevents at least one instance of damage, and any excess damage will **NOT** go through to your HP. This makes it a natural pairing with **Manafont**, as even a single point of MP is a full instance of damage blocked. Can block pretty much anything, even Poison damage, but not damage from reactions.
  
• Swiftspell doubles your Cast Speed. This is crucial if you want to make use of any slower spells in the game, especially later on when your unit Speed starts to catch up to your Cast Speed.
  
• Teleport was so busted that they need to massively increase its JP cost in TIC.
  
• Levitate have some use cases in some maps with horrible terrain, like ones with 2 deep water or lava. You are also considered 1h higher for the purpose of targeting and is completely immune to Earth elemental attacks.

The Time Magic itself is also very useful throughout the game. Though it provides no healing or much damage, the utility provided by Haste is useful to any party composition and is a great Action to put on melee fighters so they can do the buff themselves while approaching the enemy.

• Haste is always useful, getting 1.5 times the turn means dealing 1.5 times the damage per tick.
  
• Slow halves the enemy turn, a good disruption with high accuracy.
  
• Stop basically removes the target from the fight.
  
• Float will not be actively useful, but can be used on maps that demands it. Ignoring map terrain will give you a massive advantage in mobility.
  
• Quick sets the target's CT to 100, basically immediately gives them a turn. If you tune your Speed in such a way that the Time Magic user is a bit slower than the target, you can effectively give the target a double turn on their first turn. Magick Counter will somehow counter Quick(and it's not fixed in TIC, meaning it's not a bug), resulting in a both units getting a turn immediately(repeatingly doing this will give both units a chain of turns, even more so if you have Swiftspell, provided neither miss their Quick of course).
  
• Gravity is not useful on mobs, but can deal massive damage to Lucavi as it deals HP% damage.
  
• Meteor has a massive area of effect(to my knowledge, it has the largest area of effect among non-map wide attacks) and is decently strong, but is horrendously slow. It was even slower in the original game, TIC buffed it. The spell is not cost effective at all, and you don't use Time Magic for the damage, but keep it on the back of your mind. Several near death enemies might group up, and there's your chance to Meteor their entire team.

Time Mage as a job is almost never optimal to finish a build in, but both Time Magic and the other Abilities are so useful that you definitely want to massively invest into the job, most abilities in the Time Mage tool kit is useful in all sorts of builds. Mana Shield and Teleport are very useful for melee fighters, while Teleport also allows Archers to easily reach key sniping position. Swiftness enables many styles of spellcasters otherwise obsolete without it.

Summoner as a job is actually really bad, it is one of the only two jobs in the game with negative Speed multiplier(although that in itself can be used for Speed tuning, as mentioned in Time Mage's Quick). Summoner only has 2 non active abilities, one of which is mostly useless. We'll only talk about the mildly useful one.

• Halve MP do have a use case, early on where you might not have MP to cast higher level spells. As you gain levels and MP equipment starts to become available, this fades away in its usefulness. Most spells that require large MP are very slow, and as your Speed starts to catch up, either going all in with Magick Boost or double the Cast Speed with Swiftspell will be infinitely more useful.

So what's the draw of the job? Are Summoners obsolete? Definitely not, Summon Magic is one of the best area of effect spells in the entire game, only second in raw power per area to Arithmeticks. Not only is the area of effect quite large, they can also distinguish between friends and foes, only harming enemies and supporting allies. Summons are also massively buffed in TIC, being much faster, allowing the higher tier ones to be used even without Swiftspell, and very fast with it. Do note, however, that they cost a ton of MP compared to spells of similar level, and Halve MP might be necessary to make frequent use of them early game.

• Ifrit/Shiva/Ramuh are almost as strong ga Black Magic, but comes out as fast as a basic Fire/Blizzard/Thunder.
  
• Moogle and Faerie are great healing options, especially when you don't have to clutter together to heal multiple units.
  
• Golem creates a Shield equal the caster's max HP. This creates a case where you can have a Knight cast Golem to basically make your entire team a tank.
  
• Bahamut/Odin/Salamander/Leviathan/Cyclops are all very powerful aoe wipes, and since they're much faster now, they're a lot less awkward to cast as you take extra damage and cannot evade while casting, you might end up killed if you take so much time that enemies can swarm you.
  
• Zodiark says "kill anything I hit", but is very slow.

Summoner has the highest MP growth in the game, so there are cases where you want to level as them, but it generally is not worth the HP and PA loss. As final builds, it is almost always better to use the other jobs as the main job, Summoner/Time Magic is better as Time Mage/Summon, Summoner/Black Magic is better as Black Mage/Summon, etc., and Golem relies on the caster's HP, which the summon has little. Although as I've mentioned, Speed tuning is very much a real thing you can do, so you can switch to Summoner if you want to intentionally decrease your Speed.

Builds aside, Thief is necessary to get some of the best equipment in the game. Some equipment can also be obtained much earlier by stealing from enemies. Aside from that, the job is also full of utilities.

• As the Thief has decent PA but bad weapon selection, they're fine candidates for Equip X.
  
• Attack Boost increases your chance to steal, as is Brawler if you are barehanded.
  
• Sticky Fingers is key to farming multiple best weapons in the game once you're at endgame.
  
• Poach is also key to farming some of the best equipment in the game, and you don't need to wait until endgame. Look up poaching guide to learn about domesticated Poaching. It feels very wrong the first time, but you do get used to it.
  
• Move+2 will get you very, very far at a very reasonable JP dip.

As you can see, Thief is less of a combat job and more of a provider of arms. That is not to say they're useless in a fight, they have plenty options. As Steal scales off Speed, equipping Speed boosting gear or put Steal on Ninja will give you a higher success chance.

• Steal Heart temporarily turns the enemy into an ally. This will also make Tactician AI go out for blood. They will use Jump to try to knock their friends out of the Charm, and knock their friends out entirely.
  
• Steal Weapon deserves special mention, as on top of getting you the weapon, you effectively it them from the enemy's hand, basically removing a physical threat from the fight.
  
• Steal the rest as necessary.

As a pure combat option, Art of War is strictly better than Steal, but you might still prefer Steal because you all are hoarders. Remember to always check enemy equipment pre-fight and put Steal on if you see anything interesting. As a building frame, Thief is strictly inferior to Ninja, so unless you have a reason to go Steal+another command not Throw, there's no reason to build on Thief.

Orator has some very good properties that makes it ideal to finish a build in. The stats are bad, and their job has no innate combat abilities outside normal attacking, but their equipment selection makes them ideal to use as a building frame. Equip Gun is also good useful in some builds.

Just like Chemists they use guns, everything I said there applies here:

• Guns allow you to ignore your bad offensive stats and do damage rivaling actual damage dealer, use Attack Boost for physical guns, and Magick Boost for Magic Guns to boost damage.
  
• If you want to boost your damage even further, you can Aim your gun for a huge boost.
  
• Unlike Chemist however, the Orator can get elemental boost from Black Robe for Magic Guns, meaning you have a free accessory slot(that you can use for, say, Septieme, for permanent Haste)
  
• You can still use Japa Mala for elemental boosts otherwise.

Some abilities are also quite useful.

• Tame is very good in a fight against monsters. When one is near death, it becomes your ally and and can tank at least one hit from other enemies.
  
• Equip Gun allows jobs with bad stats to contribute to damage. They won't be as powerful because the Support slot will be taken, but still better than anything that job can do otherwise. As Magic Guns have very high WA, when used by a Knight or Dragoon, if you Jump with them, you can use your high PA to smash enemies in the head with your gun. It's like a bayonet charge.
  
• Beast Tongue is mostly useless as the Orator already has it innate. When Speechcraft is used by other jobs, you can already speak human, and it's much easier to Tame a monster than talk to them. Still useful for adjusting a monster's Brave and Faith.

The Speechcraft itself is full of utilities, mainly for adjusting Brave and Faith of your army, but it also hides a great offensive power.

• Entice allows you to go +2 in terms of unit on the battlefield. You remove one enemy and add one ally. The success rate is not so reliable to use in this manner, its main use is to permanently add units to your army, but can still be useful in a pinch.
  
• Praise/Intimidate/Preach/Enlighten can be used to adjust your Brave and Faith to your liking.
  
• Intimidate is a broken ability YOU ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ INCINEROAR ahem--wrong game, Intimidate can be used offensively. It has 90% chance at base to reduce target Brave by 20, a couple uses will render Brave scaling jobs useless, and a few more outright turns the target into a chicken.
  
• The rest of the Actives have to low a success rate to actually be reliable in combat, but using Insult on a mage might save you from a wipe.
  
• Mimic Darlavon is what I am doing right now.

As this job provides high offensive power via guns, you can plan a non-stats reliant build around finishing in Orator. Orator/Dance or Bardsong is fun, while Orator/Time or White Magic is very useful. You can even go Oracle/Aim if you want a real gunslinger.

Is a very interesting job in that the Poles allow them to become some sort of battle mage. As a battlemage the Mystic job is strictly inferior to Beowulf(who has basically an upgraded Mystic Arts and has better melee power with swords and knight's swords), but they can still have useful niches they can fill; Beowulf won't be available until very late into the game and both Poles have better range than swords, and they can still cast their spells if their weapon got taken away.

• Poles have very high WA for the point you get them, and they scale with MA which is perfect for a mage. Can be Doublehanded for double damage.
  
• Defense Boost is very useful in Wiegraf fight if you could afford to take it(most Ramzas don't go the mage route). Also useful in Tactician in general as it cancels out the enemy buff from the difficulty.
  
• Manafont allows a mage to keep casting spells in prolonged battles.
  
• Manafont with Mana Shield allows any job that does not rely on their MP to refresh their Mana Shield every turn.

Mystic Arts inflict a variety of status effects and do include some buff in their spell list. They honestly are just inferior Spellblade, so if you're building around them, it is mechanically better to build around Beowulf. This is not to say not play Mystic at all, it's just that Mystic Arts won't be the optimal option for other jobs on their final builds.

• Invigoration does %Max HP damage, meaning it is extremely powerful on Lucavi bosses.
  
• Disbelief(Atheist) can be used to either render a mage useless or make your own unit immune to magic.
  
• Corruption(Zombie) can combo with Phoenix Down to instantly kill a unit.
  
• Quiescence(Silence) effectively kills a mage.
  
• Trepidation allows you to massively reduce the target's Brave, quickly turning the target into a chicken when used repeatedly. However, unlike Intimidate, this is a spell, so it has to go through Faith.
  
• Repose(Sleep) can be used to stop a slower spell mid-cast, and inflicting Sleep makes Tactician AI go out for blood on the target.

The main reason to finish a build in Mystic is to make use of the weapons unique to the job(Arithmetician can also use them, but they suck as a functional job, the user is literally just Mystic). As Books averages your PA and MA and Mystic has like, no PA(they're likely meant for Orran, who has both high PA and MA, which may or may not have been planned to join the party in the original game, but was cut in the end), Poles are now your only consideration. The niche here would be to build a proper mage that can do respectable physical damage from 2 tiles away. You can go full throttle on physical damage with Doublehand and Aim, or use something like Time Magic and attack after you're done Hasting your team.

Geomancer as a job is another one that is great to finish your build in. Their stats are very high across the board(there's a reason this is the optimal job to build Agrias in) with a good selection of equipment. The Abilities however, aren't that interesting, save for one. As Geomancer have both PA and MA, you can lean into either or sometimes even both.

• Attack Boost is the best Support Ability for physical units using Shields. Dual Wield have you use two weapon, Doublehand use two hands for one, and Brawler you have nothing in your hand at all. Attack Boost doesn't mess with your equipment while giving respectable damage increase. It can also be used to improve weapons that otherwise have static damage, like physical guns.
  
• Arithmeticks will allow you to have a spellcaster with a Shield(meaning they're completely immune to most of their own spells with Aegis Shield+Reflex)
  
• Aim with Axe one shots people.
  
• Jump turns one into a ranged attacker.
  
• Nature's Wrath doesn't do much damage, but the status effect can be game winning. You don't even have to learn any Geomancy spell.
  
• No idea why anyone would use Ignore Terrain or Lavawalking. They're useful for like, 1 map and there are other ways to deal with terrain(Winged Boots).

Geomancy uses (PA/2)+1 as magic multiplier(reminder, MA*magic multiplier is the formula for spell damage), so it's really weak, as you need 28 PA to even have the about the same multiplier as a basic Fire, but Geomancy does not have Cast Time, does not go through Faith, and has 1/4 chance to inflict rather debilitating status effects, it's still a very versatile Action. Japa Mala boosts all elements, so you can boost most Geomancy spells with it, but as you rarely use Geomancy for damage, this barely matters.

• Tanglevine/Torrent/Contortion are the only 3 you really need. Most maps are grass, stone, and water. Their status effects are also some of the most debilitating(Stop, Toad, and Stone, respectively).
  
• Will-o'-the-Wisp is useful for fights inside buildings.
  
• You can safely ignore the rest or level the ones you need in pre-battle as you get to see the terrain before the fight anyway.

Geomancer a great job to build on, as it is among the most versatile, having high base stats all around, you can go from the traditional Ice Brand+Black Robe with Aim or go Rune Blade+Aegis Shield for spellcasting builds. You can attach a lot of pieces to Geomancer, and they'll fit.

Another iconic FF job. Dragoon has stats similar to Knight, except they completely drop their magical aspects, so while Knights can make full use of supportive spells, Dragoon likely won't have MP to cast more than a couple spells before completely running out. Instead, they can attack from 2 tiles away with Polearms, allowing them to avoid getting countered by monsters.

• Art of War from 2 tiles away is neat, so is Aim.
  
• Dragonheart is funny, but not really worth it. You get Reraise when attacked, which after you die, you rise up next turn, you immediately have a chance to heal and trigger Dragonheart again.
  
• Equip Polearm is another Equip X for your builds.
  
• Ignore Elevation is a much cheaper variation of Teleport.

Despite the game encouraging the use of Polearms with Jump, as mentioned in the Jump section at the beginning, Jumping power is always (Weapon Attack)*(Physical Attack)*(1.5 if weapon is Polearm) and is always non-elemental regardless of weapon. It is a funny way to bypass high WA weapon with convoluted damage formula like Axes and Magic Guns. You can also Jump with, say, Glacial Gun, to do non elemental damage against ice absorb enemies.

• You can Jump even without learning anything, your Jump will have a range of 1 with 0 elevation.
  
• You don't need to learn the jumps one by one, you can skip tiers.
  
• You are completely immune to everything while airborne.

Dragoon has the exact same growth as Knight, so it is a fine job to level in if you prefer Polearms to Swords. They're not as versatile as final build material though, as their stats multiplier limits them to being a strictly physical build. You can have a Dragoon with Equip Gun/Aim for some interesting flavor, but Knights are generally better at the job for their native Art of War.

You can do something like raising someone as a Ninja their entire life to increase base Speed, then switch to Dragoon for fast Polearm Jump, but it is more likely that you'll use Jump and Equip Polearm as pieces for other builds.

Samurais are mechanically weird, to say the least. Iaido scales off of MA, but the job is PA heavy, in fact, their PA multiplier is only very slightly(so slight that it won't be noticeable 99% of the time) lower than Monk, so Samurai as a job is a PA monster, but Iaido is a mage Action.

• As is with other jobs with high PA and good WA weapon, Aim has one shot potential.
  
• Shirahadori is one of the best Reaction against non spellcasting humans. You have a Brave% chance to completely negate physical attacks. Originally, this is intended to only work on melee attacks(as described in the original game), but somehow or other it works on literally any physical attack. This is never fixed(and they in fact change the description to match the effect in the remasters), so it is safe to assume that it's intended. This leaves Archer's Bane completely useless and Shirahadori massively overpowered.
  
• Equip Katana is an alternative to Equip Sword. They're literally the same thing, just different flavors.
  
• Doublehand is the meat here. This allows a weapon that can be Doublehanded to be used with 2 hands if your offhand is free. You deal double damage with basic attacks.

All of those makes it seems like the Samurai is a physical attacking job. Iaido however, does not represent that at all. It scales purely off of MA the way spells do, does not go through Faith, and can even heal and buff in one ability slot. All of these can distinguish between friends and foes like Summons, and they won't accidently heal enemies or harm allies in the area. Their only downside is you are required to have a Katana with the same name in your inventory, with a chance(WA%) of permanently breaking said Katana every time you perform Iaido with it.

• Kotetsu is strong right the moment you unlock it. Will be phased away as you get better attacks, but I won't ignore the journey.
  
• Murasame is a very solid aoe healing.
  
• Kiyomori casts Protect and Shell on allies in range.
  
• Masamune does the same for Haste and Regen, but as you need the Araguay Ninjas to help get multiple Masamunes, you likely won't spam this all the time.
  
• Muramasa is the end of the store-bought upgrade to your damage dealing Iaido.
  
• Kiku-ichimonji deals slightly less damage than Muramasa, but it deals damage in a straight line.
  
• Chirijiraden is very strong, but as you need the Araguay Ninjas to help get multiple Chirijiradens, you likely won't spam this unless absolutely necessary.*

Stats wise the Samurai is very similar to Knight, except it has mage-level base HP. Armor will offset this, but you will need to rely on defensive Reactions to stay alive. As a finishing build, Samurai is not very popular, as their stats don't match the Active Ability. Doesn't mean you can't make a good Samurai build though, as the job already is a hybrid, you will most likely want to lean on one aspect to maximize their effectiveness while having the other side as alternative option(high MA Iaido, having, having Art of War as a fallback, or focus on Aim for damage, using Iaido as support).

Iaido as an Active Ability though, is very popular on spellcaster builds. Magic attack that does not have to go through Faith, have no cast time, and no MP cost? Yeah, I wonder why everyone uses it. It is also not uncommon to see Shirahadori on an entire team.

Ninjas are popular for their innate Dual Wield, extremely high Speed, and swift movement.

• Aim and Art of War will be performed twice while Dual Wielding.
  
• Jump Speed is based on Speed, so Ninjas are very fast jumpers.
  
• You fire two very powerful punches with Brawler.
  
• Dual Wield is very popular on all sorts of builds, two weapon, two attacks, double damage.
  
• Reflex has several different setups that enables some builds and provide solid defense for others. Reflex with Featherweave Cloak gives you 80% evasion from all side, while Aegis Shield bumps your Magic Parry to 100%, basically making you immune to magic attacks that can be evaded.

Throw allows you to perform a ranged attack with any throwable weapon with the formula (Speed)*(Weapon Attack). This means, as is with Jump, you can get around weird damage formula and make full use of high WA weapon, like Axes. Unlike Jump however, you keep the element of thrown weapon. To maximize Throw damage, gear for maximum Speed.

• Axes naturally have higher WA than weapon of the same tier, so it's prime for throwing.
  
• Bombs allow the Ninja to have cheap ranged elemental damage.
  
• You can throw lower tier weapon you no longer use instead of selling them. It'll be stronger than a Shuriken.

As this this the job with the best Speed growth and highest Speed multiplier in the game, Ninjas are great as both a finishing point and as pieces for other builds. You can go Brawler and bust bosses with Aim, or go Attack Boost with Steal for maximum success chance. Art of War with Flails will have very high success chance, and if you do the reverse, equip Dual Wield on Knight and perform Rending twice with Knight's Sword will have an even higher success rate.

Is absolute garbage as a job. No, seriously, the job has no redeeming factor, and none of the non-Active abilities are that good, except maybe Soulbind and Cup of Life which has a niche uses. The stats multipliers are complete garbage, and the growth is horrible. The only reason anyone would ever change into Arithmetician is for the Arithmeticks.

Learn all the Active Abilities. They allow you to designate an attritube for targeting, whether that be Height, Level, CT, or Exp, then designate a number for that attrubute(multiple of 3,4,5, or prime). You then cast any spell you know that can be mathed(check each spell list of the 4 prerequisite jobs for Arithmetician for "Castable with Arithmeticks") on every single target that fit into the algorithm you designate. For example, you pick "Level", then you pick "Multiple of 3", then pick "Holy", you will cast Holy on everyone with their level divisible by 3, for no MP cost, instantly without casting. You only need to know the spells, you don't need to have their Active Abilities equipped.

This is obviously very broken, and you can set your team up in a manner that the mathed spells will never hurt your party, for example, Chameleon Robe allows you to heal allies with Holy, or Reflex+Aegis Shield making you immune to any spell that can be evaded.

Obviously, you're not going to use Arithmeticks as an Arithmetician,

• If you want raw power, go Black Mage.
  
• If you want Speed, go White Mage.
  
• If you want Shield, go Geomancer.

Soulbind can be used on tank builds with high HP, as it essentially halves incoming damage, but you'd need to have high enough HP to not be down in a couple hits, as you need to be alive for it to activate.

As for Cup of Life, it allows you to share excess healing with your allies, which is a good way to heal allies on the opposite side of the map. That's it. That's the use case.

Bard is infamous for having the absolute worst growth in the game, and as such the prime candidate for deleveling***, and the multiplier is also pretty bad, so this is not a job you finish a build in, but the abilities themselves actually are quite powerful. Admittedly, Dance outshines Bardsong later in the game(stats increase matter less as you have more stats, and buffing your team is nowhere near as useful as debilitating your foes), but it is still crazy early on.

• Move+3. M o v e + 3. If Move+2 already is really good, Move+3.
  
• Fly is another cheaper alternative to Teleport.

Bardsong is really strong early on, as it is an ongoing, party wide buff that is fairly fast. The important song also requires no stats to use(they have a fixed 50% success rate, which is actually big since it'll be triggered repeatedly throughout the fight), so you can stick them on anyone.

• If you rush Bard early game, Seraph Song can actually fix any MP problem you might have.
  
• Rousing Melody/Battle Chant/Magickal Refrain are all useful early game depending on your team composition. Go Rousing Melody for Speed if uncertain, anything is good with Speed. They are extremely strong early game, as everyone is slow, and 1 point of increase to Speed matters more, and you keep stacking as you sing. You can expect to get +3 or +4 throughout the entire fight. Worse later on as you start to outrun your song and battles end sooner as you complete your builds.
  
• Nameless Song provides one of Shell/Protect/Haste/Reraise/Regen to your team. Casting Haste and Protect is straight up better later on, but earlier in the game when the song is still considered fast, you will stack multiple buffs per cycle and ends up with pretty good turn efficiency. Will be less useful once the battlefield surpass 10 Speed(earlier than you think with Speed boosting equipment).

You can have your support Sing in their downtime. Bard can be a fun finishing build because their weapon is unique(basically a reflavored book, but you do hurt the enemy with music), but just about anything else using Bardsong will perform better. A noble Knight singing as he approach the enemy!

Dancer, just like Bard, have horrible growth. Unlike Bard, however, the job multiplier looks fine outside the very obviously low HP, and the Dance ability is useful throughout the game. Dancer has Fly just like Bard, but no Move+3, and Jump+3 is a worse Fly most of the time(it's better against shoving off cliffs). Just like Bard, all the good Dance have a set 50% success rate.

• Slow Dance is stupid powerful. Unlike Rousing Melody where you get less song as you get faster because the game run on ticks, Slow Dance makes the enemy slow. Successfully stack this a few times will result in you starting to get double turns.
  
• Polka and Heathen Frolic are not that good. If you want to reduce stats, have someone with Art of War run in and do it to their face.
  
• Forbidden Dance, even more so. It has a chance to inflict one of Blind, Confuse, Silence, Toad, Poison, Slow, Stop, or Sleep to the enemy. Notice anything? Yes, half the ailment outright kills the enemy. This means that if even one enemy out of whatever gets inflicted by Toad or Stop(or Silence if it's a mage), you basically remove them from the fight, while Sleep and Confuse, as mentioned multiple times, cause Tactician AI to go haywire. Will be stupid busted if unlocked early, and will still be useful even in late game.

Dancer is also a weak build to finish in, but it has actual stats, you can make a fun Dancer build that can actually kill people. But as is with Bard, just about any other job Dancing will perform better. Orator Dancing until something is low on health, then fire your Gun!

Mime cannot equip any ability, and does not provide any for others, but there's one thing that min-maxer want from the job. The growth. Mime has the best HP and PA growth in general(Reis has better HP growth, but it's Reis), and is the only generic job with any MA growth. As this is meant for newer players, I don't recommend using Mime to grind growths, as you will miss out on exploring ability combinations.

The job itself, however, has a place in many endgame team. Mime will copy the generic action of any ally, executed from their position. For example, you cast a Fire 3 tiles ahead, Mime will cast Fire 3 tiles ahead from the direction they are facing. Notably, Mime can double your Bardsong, Dance, and Arithmeticks. By having a single Mime on the team, if you have, say, a Dance user and an Arithmetick mage, you effectively have 4 party members(2 Dancer 2 Arithmage) in 3 slots. This does not apply to most jobs, since it is impossible to position the Mime in such a way that they literally doubles the action of everyone.

Be careful when doing math with Mimes around, as they can't wear anything, they have no friendly fire protection.

22 Hours. It took me 22 hours total to finish this entire thing, plus a couple more to translate it to Steam guide(Reddit and Steam use two very different format). If this guide clear things up for even a single new player and/or get them to enjoy the game more, I'd consider this writeup a success. Hope you have fun with Tactics, and thank you for reading!

As this is done over days on notepad(over 70k characters) and at times when I was very drowsy, there are bound to be mistakes and things I miss. There will be lots of edits as I double check what I wrote. If any fellow veterans want to add or correct anything, just comment away.