Importance of Class Mastery?

[Sines]

I'm wondering what people think of how important it is to master classes. Do you just master your main and sub class, grab your passives and call it good? Do you maybe master some other classes along the way you were close to mastering anyway? Or do you just start mastering everything you can get your greedy mitts on?

I'm mostly curious about what people think from a more 'minimal grinding' point of view. Obviously, if you're trying to create the most OP party possible, then you want to grab everything. But right now, my Kyrie has maxed out Fellblade and Marked (well, once Holy Burst unlocks) as well as Mercenary, and I'm mostly happy with her skillset right now. I could happily leave her in Marked for the equipment variety and stat growth from here on out. I could, of course, move her around a variety of classes for the mastery, but most mastery rewards are relatively small.

I might still grab Plague Doctor and Warmage for her, since PD trades some of her offensive (and speed) growth for some defensive growth, and +5 to HP, Mind and Defense isn't so shabby, and Warmage is just kind of a variation on Marked's growth, ending with +5 to HP/Attack/Mind. Both give her a skillset that expands on what Fellblade and Marked offer, with PD offering some healing and Warmage offering raw damage and elemental exploitation. I'm not sure how often I'll actually alter her class to suit the mission, but as a forced deploy (and being unable to get an injury) adaptability is hard to argue with.

Of course, depending on what stat growth you want, you might even lose relevant stats by leveling up in the wrong job running around for Mastery. So there is that to consider.

Lastly, there is the Crit, Evade and Resistance masteries to consider, stats which can't be gained through level ups. Resistances are generally not part of a build, so that's not something to worry about on it's own. But Crit and Evade can be, and every little bit stacked helps. I suspect any character that wishes to focus on these stats are much more inclined to rack up masteries.

Overall, I think class mastery is nice, and it's a good idea to grab a few extras if you can do so without hindering the characters ability to participate (most likely by altering their passive combos or equipment choices), especially if the obtained skillsets, passives and counters might be switched to depending on the specifics of the fight.

[Conan The Librarian]

Sines-

The answer is -- it 100% depends on your playstyle.

Originally posted by Conan The Librarian:

If you find yourself at a point where you've "learned all you want" on a given hero, you can certainly feel free to "stagnate" their AP gains by just staying as whichever main class you desire (likely a main class whose growth you like, for example). Given how late you are in the game, perhaps it's fine to "stop learning" more things (should you deem that what you want to do).

Basically, some people like constantly switching up their heroes' classes, others will decide to "stagnate" them sooner than others. I'm generally a big fan of "always be learning", but that' just me.

Originally posted by Sines:

Overall, I think class mastery is nice, and it's a good idea to grab a few extras if you can do so

That right there sounds about right, and how I tend to look at it. If you've invested heavily into a given class, ya might as well spend the few AP it would take to finish mastering it for a small bonus.

Originally posted by Sines:

Lastly, there is the Crit, Evade and Resistance masteries to consider, stats which can't be gained through level ups. But Crit and Evade can be, and every little bit stacked helps. I suspect any character that wishes to focus on these stats are much more inclined to rack up masteries.

Indeed, your instincts are correct, since Crit / Evasion / Elemental Resists are static in nature throughout the game, so they are a bit more valuable.

[Sines]

Originally posted by Conan The Librarian:

The answer is -- it 100% depends on your playstyle.

Well, naturally! I'm just wanting to hear what everyone else does. I suspect most people will play like me, and then you'll have a smaller number of people who will sit on a completed build ASAP, and a slightly larger number who grind out everything they can because some people like to do that.

Mostly, I'm curious to know about that flourishing middle. What do people in between the two extremes consider 'enough'. The extremes are easier to understand, but there's no real clear line to cut off grabbing masteries when your goal is somewhere between "Only what I need" and "All the things". Are they like me grabbing classes 'good enough' and in the way? Or do they go out of their way to grab a few select classes with particularly notable bonuses (like Evasion, Crit and Resistance). Not that I don't want to hear from the 'no grind' and 'all grind' people too, as I'm still curious how many people go those ways.

[⭕TheSodaman]

Hi Sines,

I had a longer post. It ultimately boiled down to:

• At first, I didn't care about masteries while just trying to unlock classes to see what possibilities I had (I wasn't using a wiki / guide / build recommendations - trying to blind as blind as possible at first.)
  
• I was trying to unlock and story progress at the same time, but sometimes didn't plan well and led to inefficient teams with lots of injuries or game overs (e.g. no healer, no caster, and sometimes not enough gear all for duplicate classes all on the same map).
  
• Decided to focus on unlocking just enough to fulfill my core desires instead of the constant class hopping everyone was doing and progressed near the end of the game with people just sitting on their main class. Used a roster of about 9 units, 2 story and 7 recruits. I ended up mastering about a few classes through vicarious learning. The ones benched more often started mastering other classes that synergized with their role, but didn't deploy them until the last three content hours of the game.
  
• And then at the end, I partially gave in to the over-grinder and woke up with a roster of 23+ people mastered in nearly every class and badge class. I only played four battles with this amount of grinding with a level range of 54 through 77.
  
• When deciding what to carry over into the New Game+ to try out the team even more, I gave into the power of Resetti and pushed it all aside to start a New Game without any of that progress on the same difficulty as last time. Just playing again with the intent not to use specific tactics I used on my previous run.

[Morphic]

Originally posted by Conan The Librarian:

Originally posted by Sines:

Overall, I think class mastery is nice, and it's a good idea to grab a few extras if you can do so

That right there sounds about right, and how I tend to look at it. If you've invested heavily into a given class, ya might as well spend the few AP it would take to finish mastering it for a small bonus.

Originally posted by Sines:

Lastly, there is the Crit, Evade and Resistance masteries to consider, stats which can't be gained through level ups. But Crit and Evade can be, and every little bit stacked helps. I suspect any character that wishes to focus on these stats are much more inclined to rack up masteries.

Indeed, your instincts are correct, since Crit / Evasion / Elemental Resists are static in nature throughout the game, so they are a bit more valuable.

This is basically what I have been doing so far. If a Class is 1-3 skills away from being Mastered, I just master it. However some Classes that offer Crit/Evasion I definitely try to go for and Master if it will overall supplement my character.

Overall though I don't see myself trying to Master every Class since there doesn't seem to be anything directly tied to that. Unlike in FFT where you get the Mime Class after you Master a few Classes.