A handbag that puts a spring in its holder's step, but is produced in very limited quantities. The damage dealt varies greatly.
While equipped, raises speed.

Description in The Ivalice Chronicles

The hardscale bag, also known as hydrascale bag in The War of the Lions or P Bag on the PlayStation, is a bag in Final Fantasy Tactics. Though not particularly strong for attacking, it gives a slight speed boost to the wearer.

As all bags, the hardscale bag's damage varies greatly when used with the Attack command, though other action abilities may allow the player to bypass this penalty. In versions prior to The Ivalice Chronicles enhanced mode, bags can only be worn by female characters regardless of job, as well as onion knights in The War of the Lions. In the enhanced mode of The Ivalice Chronicles, bags are exclusive weapons for the dragonkin, bard, and dancer jobs.

Obtained[]

The player can buy the hardscale bag for 58,000 gil in the following outfitters from chapter 4, "In the Name of Love", onward, after completing the story events at Fort Besselat: Gariland, Dorter, Warjilis, Sal Ghidos, Zaland, Gollund, Yardrow, and Bervenia.

A hardscale bag can also be found as a rare item through the chemist's Treasure Hunter movement ability in Limberry Castle Undercroft (4,9 ).

The hardscale bag is also a rare (5% chance) poach from a dragon.

Mechanics[]

The hardscale bag deals damage based on the following formula when used with the Attack command:

The damage thus has high variance; their damage is randomized and could do much less than other weapons with similar attack stats.

Bags do not parry and cannot be thrown. The hardscale bag can be wielded with the samurai's Doublehand but is incompatible with the ninja's Dual Wield.

In The Ivalice Chronicles version, the preview damage for bags is now more accurate; instead of previewing the maximum possible damage, the average damage will be shown.

Use[]

The hardscale bag deals random damage like axes and flails. Bags are much more expensive weapons to buy than other weapons, and so the player could use axes or flails instead for the same random damage "perk" (though in practice it is more of a penalty). In the older versions of Final Fantasy Tactics, bags are notable for being able to be equipped to any female unit, and so could have situational usefulness, such as for Reis Duelar who cannot equip most weapons as a dragonkin without an equipment ability. In The Ivalice Chronicles enhanced mode, bags can be equipped to bards and dancers, who likely rarely use physical attacks, and are still available to Reis's dragonkin.

The bag's boon is its slight speed boost, but the constant Regen from the preceding proudhide bag may be more useful without sacrificing much attack power. Using Jump only uses the weapon's power to calculate damage without the random variable, and so this can be especially good for Reis who in The Ivalice Chronicles offers to join Ramza's company with dragoon skills already known.

Etymology[]

The bag is simply known as "H Bag" in Japanese, and translated literally for the original version on the PlayStation. In The War of the Lions, the bag is called hydrascale bag, re-localized as hardscale bag for The Ivalice Chronicles, likely because the bag is poached from a dragon rather than from a hydra.