Final Fantasy V Job Classes

Chemist

Vital Statistics

"Apothecaries who can mix powerful brews, and gain twice the benefit when drinking potions and ethers."

Job Description

The Chemist is probably the best self-buff unit in the game. Any worthwhile battle can be started with setting Haste and doubling HP, even increasing level if you want to. This comes at the cost of poor equipment options, though. The Job's restriction to merely Knives and Staves means the Chemist can only really boost Syldra and Holy at the end of the game. Massive HP is useful for powerful Holy Breath and Dragon !Mix attacks and certain Blue spells such as White Wind, ???? and Self-Destruct as well. The Chemist is best used as a support character; the healing/reviving backbone of a party that just never seems to die.

Job Ability Summary

Pharmacology is trivial mostly, though 1000 HP healing is great in the second third of the game. !Drink is a great self-buff ability that gives extra oomph to Blue Mages and Mixers (Since White Wind, ????, Self-Destruct and Breaths all look at the caster's HP, and Goliath Tonic is awesome). !Recover and !Revive are two commands you shouldn't need to use; though MT, you can the same thing ST in a skillset so much more versatile.

The kicker, obviously, is !Mix. !Mix is the best ability in the game, really. It can revive and heal better than !White, has better buff possibilities then anything ever and can deal a lot of damage as well. There are downsides, though. Mixing things is a bother since you need to scroll through your menu all the time. In addition, it consumes items, and the more potent !Mix outcomes require the three items you'll only find as monster drops, namely the Turtle Shell, the Dragon Fang and the Dark Matter. Particularly potent damage-dealing Mixes will always use these rare items. !Mix doesn't care about elemental boosting, and has but a few attacks which run off Magic Power, so the difference between Jobs you put it on is small. Chemists themselves are great since, after a Goliath Tonic, moves such as Dark Breath, Dragon Breath and Holy Breath are twice as powerful. !Mix also features what is easily the best way of draining MP from enemies, so it has this advantage over Robe Jobs as well.

Transfer to Freelancer

The Chemist's stats are not very good. Pharmacology isn't very hot end-game, but if you for some reason mastered Chemist early, then switched to a Freelancer, 1000 HP Hi-Potions are nice.