[Sever]

Defensively, i find a party of one to be the optimum. This does get a little lonely though, and by the time you reach chapter six, you're "wasting" xp by the truckload. Twice i've gone with a three person party (including my most recent) and it has worked well. Not too much inventory management going on and there's enough premium items going around to have them all decked out as semi-specialised all-rounders. There's never usually an obsolete member in a three person crew. With a six person party however, i find myself constantly resurrecting/reloading due to Aerie or whoever getting themselves killed/chunked. I don't like the little pre-battle buffing sessions that are required to make most battles headache free for the whole party. Six is great for conversation, but not as good as it sounds for everything else.