Arbitrary Headcount Limit: Difference between revisions

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*** Averted during the final [[Boss Battle]]. Normally, the player controls one group of 3 characters during a battle, but when fighting the [[Big Bad]] the player is allowed to equip ALL 8 characters and may cycle between them at any point in the battle, if it seems like one group is struggling to make progress alone. Not unique, but certainly unusual among RPGs to allow the entire cast to take part in a fight.

*** Then, you have the Fort Condor proto-RTS sequences. The gist of these, according to the inhabitants of the fort, is that they have to hire mercenaries in order to repel attacks by the Shinra. Naturally, they ask you for your monetary contribution. Eventually, you are forced to take an active role as commander, and this involves buying the services of various units and placing them around the battlefield. [[Arbitrary Headcount Limit]] rears its ugly head here, because you are limited to placing a maximum of twenty. By the time you reach this sequence, it is entirely possible that you have enough money to fill every square foot of the battlefield with units.

** ''[[Final Fantasy IX (Video Game)|Final Fantasy IX]]'' deals with this trope in several different ways. At the very beginning, you only have three or four characters in the party at a time, with the [[Guest Star Party Member|guest character]] getting a [[Dropped a Bridge On Him|bridge dropped on him]] to make room for the fourth. Later on, when the fifth main character appears, the party [[Let's Split Up Gang|splits up into two groups]], each of which can accommodate the Abritrary Headcount Limit. When the two parties reunite, some of the characters are [[Put On a Bus]] for the rest of the disk to make room for the final party members. When the entire party unites at the start of Disk 3, they are frequently seen gathering in various dungeons, sometimes offering explanations as to why they split up again, but by the final few dungeons it's assumed that the entire party is travelling together, and the fact that whichever four characters the player isn't using don't seem to be doing anything is pretty much [[Hand Wave|Hand Waved]].

** ''[[Final Fantasy IX (Video Game)|Final Fantasy IX]]'' deals with this trope in several different ways. At the very beginning, you only have three or four characters in the party at a time, with the [[Guest Star Party Member|guest character]] getting a [[Dropped a Bridge On Him|bridge dropped on him]] to make room for the fourth. Later on, when the fifth main character appears, the party [[Let's Split Up, Gang!|splits up into two groups]], each of which can accommodate the Abritrary Headcount Limit. When the two parties reunite, some of the characters are [[Put On a Bus]] for the rest of the disk to make room for the final party members. When the entire party unites at the start of Disk 3, they are frequently seen gathering in various dungeons, sometimes offering explanations as to why they split up again, but by the final few dungeons it's assumed that the entire party is travelling together, and the fact that whichever four characters the player isn't using don't seem to be doing anything is pretty much [[Hand Wave|Hand Waved]].

** ''[[Final Fantasy X (Video Game)|Final Fantasy X]]'' and ''[[Final Fantasy XII (Video Game)|Final Fantasy XII]]'' limit you to three characters at a time. X uses a [[Lazy Backup]] tag system so if all three characters get KO'd, you're screwed, but XII allows the "sideline" characters to rotate in at any time.

*** [[Final Fantasy XII (Video Game)|Final Fantasy XII]] Revenant Wings however makes the arbitrary headcount 5 but that is because it is a real time strategy game. One does wonder however why the other 4 characters are not allowed in battle when your army size can be maximized to theoretically 45 members.

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* The entirety of the ''[[Tales Series]]'' has four as this number, with the actual party size ranging from <s>five</s> six (''[[Tales of Phantasia (Video Game)|Phantasia]]'') to nine (''[[Tales of Destiny (Video Game)|Destiny]]''). What, if anything, the extra members are doing while the others are fighting is never explained, barring a fight in ''[[Tales of the Abyss (Video Game)|Abyss]]'' where the two extra members have to secure an escape route.

** ''Tempest'', ''[[Tales of Innocence (Video Game)|Innocence]]'' and ''[[Tales of Hearts (Video Game)|Hearts]]'' have a limit of three. The GBA ''Narikiri Dungeon'' games also had four parties of three each, but since the actual party size was [[Massive Multiplayer Crossover|every character in the first five games]]...

** ''Hearts'' also averts it, like ''Mugen no Frontier'' above, by introducing the "Link Attack" system, by which characters in the back party can be summoned in to use attacks or spells. Since characters Linked in can't be damaged or interrupted, it's useful for calling out a Raise Dead or [[Last Disc Magic]] with a charge time of "eternity".

** ''Hearts'' also averts it, like ''Mugen no Frontier'' above, by introducing the "Link Attack" system, by which characters in the back party can be summoned in to use attacks or spells. Since characters Linked in can't be damaged or interrupted, it's useful for calling out a Raise Dead or [[Last-Disc Magic]] with a charge time of "eternity".

** [[Lampshade Hanging|Lampshaded]] in ''[[Tales of Symphonia (Video Game)|Tales of Symphonia]]'':

{{quote| '''[[Dishing Out Dirt|Gnome]]''': You guys [[Just for Pun|play dirty]]. [[Arbitrary Headcount Limit|Four against one?]] Well, {{spoiler|Mithos}} did it by [[Duel Boss|himself!]]<br />

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* Justified in ''[[The Reconstruction (Video Game)|The Reconstruction]]'' by Wadassian law restricting your guild to six armed combatants at a time.

** And then {{spoiler|Wadassia is reduced to ruins, and you're still using six characters to fight the final boss and save the world}}.

* ''[[Infinite Undiscovery]]'' allows 4 characters, or 3 if one of them is [[Everything Is Worse With Bears|Gustav]]. [[Loads and Loads of Characters|Out of 18]]. And some of them are arbitrarily forbidden from being in the same group as the [[Player Character]], restricting their use to [[Let's Split Up Gang]]-situations -- without the slightest explanation.

* ''[[Infinite Undiscovery]]'' allows 4 characters, or 3 if one of them is [[Everything Is Worse With Bears|Gustav]]. [[Loads and Loads of Characters|Out of 18]]. And some of them are arbitrarily forbidden from being in the same group as the [[Player Character]], restricting their use to [[Let's Split Up, Gang!]]-situations -- without the slightest explanation.

* ''[[Lost Odyssey]]'' has a limit of 5. Even though the formation interface has 10 positions, you're only allowed to fill half of them.

* Played agonizingly straight in ''[[Suikoden]]''. You have an entire army, but you can only take six at a time. ''[[Suikoden III]]'' added a seventh slot for 'support' characters.

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[[Category:Strategy Game Tropes]]

[[Category:Arbitrary Headcount Limit]]

[[Category:Trope]]