Dead character glitch

320px|right|thumb
The dead character glitch is a glitch in Final Fantasy XII, found by the user ff12nlbllgler. It involves dying during an Esper's Dismiss command animation, right when the character's action is about to begin, trapping them in a state of being flagged defeated, but remaining on the field, standing in place, not doing anything. Having a character like this on the field delays the enemies' cinematic or effect consuming attacks indefinitely. If the right amount of effects are in use with the "dead" character on the field, it can render the enemy harmless.
Any attack that prompts the "X is readying Y" message to appear to the top of the screen is delayed forever. This glitch only works against enemies that use effect consuming attacks (for more information about Effects, Effect Values, and Effect Capacity, check out the Effect Capacity page), meaning this trick works against Yiazmat but not against Omega Mark XII, as Omega only uses a basic attack which has an Effect Value of 0.
The glitch is somewhat difficult to perform as the timing is very precise. The easiest way to deliberately cause the glitch is by employing the Petrify status, because petrified characters are flagged as defeated and, essentially the same as the KO status.
The player must first inflict Petrify on a character who has access to an Esper and their gambits turned off. Petrify in Final Fantasy XII works like Gradual Petrify in the other Final Fantasy games, and sets a timer before that character turns into stone. The player can get the Petrify status simply by using a Gold Needle with the Nihopalaoa accessory equipped.
Once the counter is in place, the character must summon an Esper, and right before the petrifying counter reaches one, the player must activate the character's gambits, with a gambit where the character uses a mote of some kind onto themselves (any item that has a delay before being used works) as the first priority. Self: Holy Mote/Scathe Mote/Dark Matter will work. The player must then dismiss the Esper.
When the counter is almost at 0, the player must open and close the menu until the number 0 appears on the character, then enter the menu and change their equipment, such as by removing the character's weapon.
If the timing is right, the character reaches the action stage just before being petrified, and the glitch activates. While petrified characters are normally removed from battle as with KO'd characters, the glitch causes the petrified character to remain on the screen, albeit unable to do anything. In the event all other characters are incapacitated, the game will softlock rather than result in a Game Over.
This glitch works in all versions of the game. The dead character glitch is also able to block enemy combo attacks such as Ram and Poke in the PlayStation 2 versions, but is unable to do so in The Zodiac Age.
Category:Bugs in Final Fantasy XII