Fang/anyone/anyone works cause she's so busted broken. she is easily the best commando in the game; to anyone that uses Lightning primarily as a com, stop doing that. Lightning is far, far, far better as a ravager (in fact, she's arguably the best ravager in the game next to Hope), since she can't possibly compete with Fang in damage output. she should be spending most of her time as that, switching to com when you really need to blitz the stagger gauge. As far as other characters are concerned, i find they all have uses (i regret not using Snow or Vanille more cause they are both awesome)...except Sazh. other than his awesome gun-fu, he's really quite useless imo. Hope learns the same offensive buffs he does, and has much higher mag to be an effective ravager and is the best medic in the game. the only difference is that Sazh has a weapon that boosts duration of buffs...but Sazh's stats are so weak that you're better off going for the most powerful gun if you want him to contribute more than just buffs.
it's been a week since i beat this game and i think it's fair enough to judge it now. overall, i found the experience very...unsatisfying. the game was not that great; unlike other jrpgs, this game makes it no secret that you're going to be following one path the whole time. even the so called "open-field" of ch11 is just a really wide corridor. only in a game like this can that be called "freedom." the only sidequest in the game, missions, are a complete rip from mark-hunting in ffxii and are basically what you'd expect in a game like this: go to point a, kill monster b, find point c for new mission. it gets boring.
as for the gameplay, i am still unsure where i stand on it. on the one hand, combat is hella fun and this game is actually genuinely difficult (the ch11 boss, for example, actually required that i change my party and use proper tactics. although later in the game, the difficulty comes moreso from monsters having millions of HP and taking forever to kill rather than me being killed), as apposed to virtually every other modern ff. on the other, i feel like its trying too hard to be an action game; hp refilling after battles, no running, lead character dying, etc. it just doesn't feel like a proper rpg. definitely worth the time, considering i spent more time playing this game than sleeping in the week that i beat it...but now i feel unsatisfied. when it was announced in november for release, i was expecting something...so much more. instead, i got a cut down, pseudo-action game that handles the player's intelligence with kids gloves. no choices to make, no towns to explore, no objectives to be found. ultimately disappointing.
the game gets a 5 or a 6 out of 10 from me.