As an owner of the Prima Final Fantasy Tactics Guide, I had very high expectations for the new guide. The Prima guide was excellent, and everything a guide should be; well put together, offering pages and pages of useful tables, great battle maps, and useful strategies ... all without giving plot away (well, as much so as possible). Luckily, hit & miss BradyGames has created an excellent guide for FFT: War of the Lions that is just as good as its predecessor.
Pros:
* Very pretty to look at
* Very well organized, clean, and easy to read
* Useful and easy to read tables
* Great looking battle maps, with treasure grids and deployment locations.
* Useful battle strategies - it will help you win if you're new to the game or struggling, and will make sure you don't miss anything if you're a veteran and are breezing through.
* Many great hints and strategies for getting the most out of your party, many great optimization strategies
* The Job Overview section is very well laid out, and has a recommended skill set section for each job. Very handy for new players, and might offer new and exciting combos for veterans.
Cons:
* Several minor typographical errors. My favorite is: "Female [X Zodiac Sign] has the best chance of stealing [Y's] equpiment and everything he has is really worth taking. Try not to deploy" ... what a great place to cut off. :p Luckily, the really important information was stated
* I have 1 quibble with the layout of the guide. They chose to do a walk-through section, followed by a section of secret stuff/sidequests, followed by a section of the multiplayer stuff. However, the earlier multiplayer rendezvous are in the walkthrough section; only the later ones get their own section. I feel that all of the multiplayer material should have been grouped in one section, or scattered through the walkthrough as it becomes available; not a combination. Also, the secret material should definitely have been put in the walkthrough section when it becomes available, so you don't miss it.
* The Prima guide has a very useful star system for ranking all of the job abilities. This guide just has a paragraph for each section telling you strategies and such about the jobs. While I like the strategy paragraphs, I wish the star system was there if you just want to quickly see which abilities are worth learning/using.
Overall:
This was a GREAT guide whos pros definitely overweighed the very minor cons. I highly recommend it for new players and veterans alike, as its jam-packed with useful information, full-color and easy to understand maps, and is very easy to flip through and find what you need. Sure you may be able to find all of this info online, but you can't really get the easy to read maps online; those alone (for the hidden treasure) make the guide worth it. 5 stars!
*update*
A few additional thoughts/problems:
1) Meliadoul's attacks now affect any unit, not just units wearing armor. The guide says the exact opposite, and discusses strategy based on that premise.
2) You can no longer steal from elmdore. The guide doesn't mention this, and seems to suggest the opposite.
3) Some of the errand rewards on the errand table are wrong. However the needed factor and suggested classes are correct, so its not a big deal.
None of these problems are enough to detract from my score, however.
