Gameplay

Miscellaneous

Full recovery: All party members are revived and fully recovered after winning a boss fight.
- Reviving characters: Most towns have a revive wellspring, usually in a house with a blue roof.
- MP recovery can only be achieved by resting at an inn, from a wellspring or by using an Elixir.
Phoenix Downs and Elixirs are the only recovery items that cannot be bought, only found in chests or randomly acquired from enemies.
Saving the game can only be properly done on the world map. Quicksaves are meant for when you have to exit the game — the command closes the game after saving and erases the quicksave when you continue.
Formation: Characters can be swapped around and put in front/back row by using the "Formation" menu item (row can also be temporarily swapped in the battle with "Front" and "Rear" commands). Characters in the back row take and deal 50% less physical damage, with the exception of Jump (Dragoon), throwable weapons (Ninja) or bows (Ranger). Onion Knights can also equip (but not throw) throwable weapons and bows.
Shields protect against magic as well as physical damage.
Throwing: The Ninja can throw any weapon in your inventory as an attack at an enemy. The damage formula is complicated, but a very rough approximation to give you some idea would be 1000 + (60 * WeaponAttack). This is a very rough average, the real amount will differ a lot (up to a thousand or two either way) depending on your job level and pure randomness.
Damage cap: It is possible to do more than 9999 damage, but it won't be shown in battle. The maximum damage you have done in a single combat turn can be seen along with other game stats in Gysahl or on the Invincible.

Stats and leveling

Leveling

Characters level up by gaining EXP, while jobs are leveled up by performing actions in combat (except running away or changing formation). It takes between 5 and 10 actions (depending on the job and job level) to gain one job level (Onion Knights need 13 actions after reaching job level 14).

Stats

All stats except HP (see below) are determined by your character level and job (but not job level). Each job has predetermined stat values for each character level, so switching jobs will change the character's stats according to their level and what the new job is.

HP

HP is the only permanent stat that doesn't change when switching jobs. It's determined by the character's Vitality (+ some randomness) at the moment of leveling up. So, if a character is starting to lag behind others in HP, assigning them a high-Vitality job will let catch up with further level-ups (see the relevant reference section for details on job Vitality).