One of these things isn't like the other...
There actually isn't any contradiction. I'm saying com/rav/rav should be the default and then you go from there. Medic should never be out unless you're healing. You should only be healing for a sec, because thats all it takes. A medic should never be in you're default starting paradigm. It's Com/rav/rav because there you start off the battle running.
What is the point of switching when "killing quickly" WANTS you to continue to use RAV/COM/RAV? At the very least you only need TWO: COM/RAV and then a MED to beat the game.
But it dosen't. You have to stagger enemies most of the time. To do that the best is start off with a com or Sab and then quickly switch to rav/rav/rav. You can switch to something with sab so you can put some effects, but the AI is bad with sab because they stop after everything has been put on. It should only be com when something is staggerd honestly. The rest of the battle system is balancing healing, keeping the stagger bar up, and putting up buffs and debuffs. But if you have a com/rav/rav as you're main way to stagger people then you're wasting time. Thats why my party is Light/Vannile/Hope because they can do tri-disaster.
If thats all you need to beat the game then fine, but thats not fun to me and it sure is'nt playing the battle system to it's strengths.
But if you use that logic then allow me to say FFXII is terrible because you don't need to do anything, but set gambits to auto attack and then let the game play itself.
You can go "OH BUT TO BEAT THE HUNTS YOU NEED BLAH BLAH BLAH OR DOOM" and while yes those side-quests may need the system, the main game itself only wants those two. SAB/whatever the buff class is on the converse aren't really needed. Neither is Sentinel unless you need the damage buff.
I did'nt say anything about hunts. The main game is fun enough. You say sab is useless, it isn't. It's a useful tool to keep stagger but actually impact something more effective. It also is what makes that Vannile and Szah part great because you don't have com and so stagger is harder, but ounce you start using sab it makes most enemies in that part go down really fast, like those shelled monsters. You can now easily stagger them. Sab is quite useful when you've switched the party to defending and buffing. It's great for Vannile because she has no com skill.
And since FFXIII did that stupid "PARADIGM SHIFT! PARADIGM SHIFT! PARADIGM SHIFT!" *animations* to where you couldn't get that buff instantly (thank god FFXIII-2 fixed that), what is the point of going Sentinel?
Sentinel has no point other then taking damage for specific enemies that have charge attacks. But then again, this is FF. Whats the point of whatever Wakka was in X? Whats the point of the LP when I get everything easily in XII and characters have no affinities? These games always have flaws in thier systems. XIII is hardly the only one guilty.
No, it really isn't. And Paradigms are awful because there's no point to switching to them when you can get 5 stars easily just using COM/RAV/RAV RAV/COM/MED. Here's how I got five-stars in 13: Dive-bombing my HP to dangerously low levels (700HP or so) and then using Medic to raise those quickly if needed then switching back to RAV/COM/RAV while smashing X/Auto-battle.
Sounds like a boring way to play the game when theres a much faster way to play it. You chose to do that, thats you're fault. I belive when I said XII sucked because characters are awful I was told to just limit how I spent the LP. I'm not sure why i can't say that.
But other then that I'm not sure how you beat XIII. I've played the game many times and I do not see how that paradigm set-up would work especially when the game is cheap with the doom spells. But I guess it did for you. I'm not interested in playing that way.
"BUT THEN YOU'RE PLAYING IT WRONG!"
As far as I'm concerned you are.
Then, why am I getting five-stars if I'm playing it so wrong? The game WANTED that. If it didn't, it wouldn't reward me for going dive-bombing as quickly as possible to beat the battles.
The ranking system in XIII makes no sense and is pointless.
So, Paradigm System: Pointless. You only need TWO Paradigms at most.
Not in my experience. I rather play the game in a fun way.
Having two characters in XIII is very fun. The game is completely fun the entire way through.
If the FF dark period is where you have games that are extremely fun to play at the expense of crappy story execution then fine. Sounds better then other periods.
Lol ffxiii is not fun until pulse and even that is just merely okay and pales to xii's mark quests.
Going through tunnels and five starring battles by hitting auto is not fun.
Well I'm just going to disagree. The game is fun from Breasha lake onward. More fun then any other FF to play. Can't help that it's linear, not like I care if a jrpg is linear.