NobodyInWonderland

I like the DLCs for a couple of reasons that may not apply to everyone, but likely apply to at least a few people. 1) Some of them make the game easier and/or remove specific issues that some people may not wish to deal with in-game. For example, if you are running short on funds or want to grind those characters who die in one hit, there are DLCs to help with that. On one hand, some may consider those problems part of the gaming experience, but if you just want to focus on the story or building a really good team for Streetpass, they remove some of the time and effort spent on stuff that you might not necessarily care to bother with. 2) Some of the skills and classes make otherwise weak characters who you think are cool but never can use viable on more difficult maps. Thanks to Limit Breaker I can use Dancer Olivia near the enemy without a staffbot dedicated to rescuing her weak little self, and she actually hits things hard enough to activate Galeforce most of the time if I need her to. 3) They actually make the late-game characters somewhat worth using. Not that those characters will be any better than the ones you've used the whole game - because they're not - but if you want to use, say, Aversa, you have a place to use her besides one end-of-the-game battle and a handful of paralogues. The points about additional story are also true, but those are some of the reasons I actually bought the DLCs I did.

Yeesh, that's a lot of training logbook characters! Not that I couldn't imagine myself doing that if I had a couple of months with nothing to do. But otherwise my attention span wouldn't survive that long. Regarding Emmeryn's death - I have found the most peace of mind by believing that Paralogue Emmeryn came from an alternate timeline, like Paralogue Yen'fay. I don't know if that's a discredited theory, but I think it would explain a lot, and there'd be precedence. It's never explicitly stated that she was our Emmeryn, and a head injury doesn't necessarily have to be from a fall. Heck, she could have arrived in our timeline perfectly fine only to get knocked in the head by a Risen at some point. And don't worry, I won't avoid joking entirely! Not with Gangrel giving me such excellent material.

@Roflolxp54, oh, yep, the double Morgan thing is always cool. Also, Manakete Morgan is really fun; I got her during my last MaMU playthrough, and of course that's MaMU only. I decided to get Seliph maxed-out after seeing him about a million times while grinding for Paragons; I might end up going and training the other Galeforce guys too at some point. I've already got so many Logbook characters cluttering up my roster though... @TheSilentChloey, yep, guys with Galeforce! There are some pretty cool skills you can find on Spotpass characters if you look hard enough. Oh, and as Ebony said, you can only exchange avatars locally... I don't really think the friend codes do anything for Awakening, that I can tell. @MewMewExorcist, yeah... I really like dragons, but I usually never use Nowi as part of the main team and only deal with her long enough to get Nah. A pity, really; I'd feel more comfortable if they put her in... well, even stuff like what Nah or Tiki wear would work. @EvilElectro, even Chrom Morgan using magic gets pretty OP. Morgan is always going to be awesome. If I didn't get tired of MaMU trailing behind his own kid(s) I'd have Manakete Morgan almost every time, because dragons. @Ebony, it would be really awesome if remotely trading avatars was a thing - I'd love to do a chapter with avatars of people on this forum. You'd think that Nintendo would have made something to use those friend codes with this game. ----- Alright, so, I have a few really busy days ahead of me so I'm probably not going to get a new chapter up till later this week. Also, I'm not really sure how I'm going to handle the next chapter yet. There's only so much I can joke about before it gets tacky and insensitive with a chapter this serious. But I also don't want to make things boring. I'm sure I'll think of something, but it might take a few days.

Hmm, that does make a lot of sense. Wyvern Severa is under consideration, then. Eh, I guess I probably came off as a little too excited about the whole deal, and I tend to overexplain things. I was worried that I was missing how Virion helped Severa since so many people recommended him. And I was, actually - thanks to the above explanation, though, I think I get it. I'm happier taking a non-optimized pairing with full understanding of what I'm giving up, rather than realizing later that I missed something. I'd rather feel like an idiot for not seeing some obvious advantage in this thread than once I've gone through with the actual S-support, even if it doesn't make that much of a difference. And I tend to ramble when I'm running on little sleep, so I suppose I was getting a bit off-topic with making stuff so specific to my own playthrough. Sorry about cluttering up the thread, will stop now.

So, if I choose Virion for Severa, exactly what sort of skillset/class would she use? I mean, I suppose she gets Tomefaire for Dark Flier or Sorcerer, and I do kind of like Deliverer as a utility skill, but I don't usually need the breakers or better hit skills for this sort of playthrough (Normal, a ton of grinding, and Limit Breaker on everyone), and Sol means Lifetaker isn't helpful. I don't use archers at all, so that class wouldn't be utilized. As far as stats, she doesn't get an especially great amount of either magic or strength; she gets some pretty good skill, but she barely has the procs to really abuse it - Vengeance is risky without Vantage and tends to conflict with Sol, and both are only good when she's taking damage, which tends to be pretty rare once she has Limit Breaker. I do like the wyverns/griffons as ending classes for physically-oriented characters with good movement, but with the Pegasus classes it's not really necessary for Severa in particular. So basically, the only thing I see Virion offering Severa is a really good speed stat. I feel like I'm missing something here as to what else she can really get out of him that she can't get out of Kellam, but better, besides the speed, which isn't a dealbreaker since I'm not optimizing for Apotheosis and have Limit Breaker. She still gets Tomefaire, along with Lethality and Luna. Lucky Seven is better than Hit +20 in most battles, since it also helps with avoid. She gets a bit more strength and defense, and only one point less skill which means she'll still have pretty great skill activation - with stuff to actually activate. I'd use Assassin over archer classes any day, if I'm going to use bows. What am I missing?

I hadn't thought of Frederick Yarne, but looking at some of the stuff that Frederick gives him... he actually looks decent. He's got some good options if I decide to stay with the taguel class, and also good options if I decide to permanently reclass the kid (which is not out of the question; I really like the killer bunny thing but... yeah). And his speed isn't nearly as hurt by the pairing as some kids I could name. Okay, Frederick Yarne it is. So that means it's up to Virion, Kellam, or Stahl for Gerome and Severa. And, looking at what Kellam and Virion do for Gerome... I don't think I'd like either one. I like Kellam's classes but he gives the worst speed possible; and I never really worry about weakness to bows or being hit with things during Normal mode with capped stats, so I probably wouldn't use any of Virion's hit/avoid skills which are his only offerings in this case (mage tree is useless here). Stahl Gerome is actually pretty fantastic from the looks of it, mainly because Stahl is a great father for physical stuff. I guess it really has to be Stahl Gerome with the choices I have, because I can't throw the resident Batman under the bus. So, how's Kellam Severa? I mean, obviously she's not the best Severa, but I like Kellam's class sets better than Virion's. I've got enough wyverns and I'd much rather have Thief tree than Archer tree. Also Luna. I just don't want to unintentionally ruin her by missing some major problem with Kellam as her father, because she already has Galeforce and Armsthrift and I'd feel pretty awful if I managed to mess that up.

I'd like to get some opinions on pairings for the following kids, since I'm having a hard time deciding what to do with them. The kids I'm unsure about: Severa, Gerome, Yarne The available fathers: Stahl, Kellam, Frederick, Virion What I'm looking for: Good offensive skills to compliment each of the kids, and somewhat decent stats though I can compensate for a few bad ones with Limit Breaker. I'm playing in Normal Mode and optimizing for game-breaking during the main storyline, so defensive skills are less of a concern. Gerome is going to have Wyvern Lord as an ending class, and Yarne will likely end as a Taguel. Severa can do whatever her father gives her the right stats for, really; suggestions are good. Getting hair colors that look nice is not the biggest priority, but given that the reason I'm not automatically going with Stahl Severa is the hair color... well, it's taken into consideration. @TheSilentChloey, I tend to run characters through all the classes that I can get useful skills from. If that doesn't cap their stats, then they're usually pretty close, and a few runs through Lost Bloodlines 3 while I conveniently farm Paragons tends to do the trick.

Just alongside Male Robin? Those are my favorite skills to abuse on anyone who can get them in almost every situation. Actually, the reason I don't play Male Robin that often is because he can't get Galeforce and ends up being outshined by just about everyone who can. That's also the reason why the Logbook League has been all-female so far, though I do have DLC Seliph who I might use at some point. But yeah, those are awesome skills and I plan to abuse them thoroughly in this playthrough.

@TheSilentChloey, I consider "shiny" to be a good reason for many things and this will probably influence this playthrough a bit. As for Chromia... well, when I'm playing MaMU, Sumia sometimes ends up married to Chrom because there's not a lot of options. I like other dads for Inigo (though, as I've said, I do think he's impossible to mess up as long as Olivia passes on Galeforce), and Sumia's the third best choice for Lucina's mom. On the other hand, I don't play MaMU that much. I've only played as FeMU without marrying Chrom once. I kinda restarted the game halfway through after I decided that it was just weird having Morgan as an only child. @MewMewExorcist, "glass cannon" is definitely the right term for them. At the moment Miriel and Ricken are some of the hardest hitters on the team, not counting Riza who's gotten a lot more levels than anybody else. They don't even have the worst defense; Lonqu is a good example of really abysmal defensive stats, and Gaius had better not get hit with anything any time soon. The difference is that Lonqu and Gaius are good at dodging, and Miriel and Ricken are... less good at dodging. If I were trying to do a non-lazy playthrough where I didn't let the Avatar and Chrom bulldoze through everything in the early game, I'd probably make more use of Miriel's fantastic attack since it would be a bit more necessary. As it is, I'm still going to use 'em, but it'll be after I can get them a few more levels. Alright, next chapter! There's not enough stuff that's changed since last chapter to make a special spoiler for it, so here's the summary: Riza has been reclassed and got another 20 levels, Cordelia has Galeforce, and a Streetpass team with a very nice shop showed up with both kinds of Seals for sale, so I've got another Second Seal. I also went ahead and reclassed Gaius to Hero so I can have him get Sol at my leisure, and I have plans for one more of those seals, so that means I have 3 Second Seals to play around with - 4 after this chapter. I'll have to think about what to use them for. [spoiler=A Moving Story: Chapter 8] The chapter opens on sand. Yep, that's it. Sand. Chrom is expecting a trap, but it looks like Gangrel isn't exactly worried about the angry guy with the sword who's headed for him. However, that doesn't mean that Chrom's able to stay out of trouble, because this is Chrom and things that need to be hit with swords must follow him wherever he goes. The battle preparation screen shows up pretty quickly. And as usual, it's time to introduce our cast today. But before I do that, let's reveal what I reclassed Riza as! If you didn't guess "Dark Flier" already, then you have underestimated my unholy love of Galeforce. I probably make it out to be a bigger deal than it really is, but it's useful in so many ways that it's impossible to properly break the game without as much of it as possible. Since I'm trying to make everyone useful in this playthrough I'll probably rely on it less than I usually do. I know, this is very sad and I should feel bad. Anyway, on with the introductions. Chrom hasn't changed since the last chapter, but let's include him anyway along with Riza's new stats. She actually capped her magic stat in the process of getting her to Dark Flier Level 20, so I gave her Limit Breaker. Cordelia just joined, might as well use her for a battle. She can hang out with Sumia. They can start a Dark Flier club or something. I also managed to recruit DLC Palla. At least this wasn't nearly as difficult as recruiting Katarina. I think I found Roster Rescue more annoying than Apotheosis, though. Not nearly as difficult as Apotheosis; just a lot more annoying. At least in Apotheosis if you hit the things enough times and then head for the hills before enemy phase, you'll probably win eventually. There's no surprises. Roster Rescue is for people who thought that Nah's paralogue was far too straightforward, and those walls needed to be forming and disappearing while you're in a maze. And getting your best characters stuck in rooms in that maze. With a limited number of turns to kill certain enemies that are very far away from the rooms your best characters are stuck in. With reinforcements appearing from the second turn onward. And the things you need to kill appear to be the result of when a Revenant and the Hulk love each other very much, except uglier. I apologize for the rant. Anyway, I have Palla, and for the moment I've got her as a Falcon Knight. She's joined by Falcon Knight Riza, who gets a Rescue staff for this mission. I've managed to pick up a few more Rescues from Streetpass and Anna, so I can spare a use or two. Katarina returns, because since I went through that much trouble to get her, I'm going to use her. I even gave her the tome with her name on it, since I keep picking them up in the barracks. She is joined by another Avatar I got via Streetpass. I've upgraded this one a bit. She was originally a sniper. She also originally had much lower stats and none of the skills that she's currently sporting. When did I do Tiki's paralogue? It's not even unlocked yet. (Just kidding; this one's from the Bonus Box.) And, since I've been remiss in my favorite strategy of using Celica's Gale as much as possible, Celica herself is joining us today. You know how these sand chapters are annoying because none of your good tanks can really move much? You know how I'm a petty person who likes to go overboard in this playthrough with destroying any difficulties whatsoever that have annoyed me in the past? Well, if you didn't know about the last one, it's not that important. What is important is that today's theme is just how fast I can get the Logbook characters to run around this fairly large map. Besides the Logbook Boots trick (and thanks to the very helpful person who reminded me about it), we have three skills today that are going to help these characters run around the map with the speed of a hyperactive squirrel. Four, if you count Acrobat for Tiki. These skills are: 1) Galeforce 2) Movement +1 3) Deliverer (a.k.a. movement +2 in a pair up) If I really wanted to go crazy with the maximum movement possible, I'd use Rally Heart and Rally Movement and I'd have made everyone Dark Fliers for the pair-up bonus; but at this point I think that the Logbook League isn't going to have a problem with getting pretty much wherever they want to go in a hurry. And I think I'm ready to start. Before the battle, some elf kid shows up. Definitely an elf; she's got the pointed ears and everything. Hey, the game has pegasi; elves aren't that far-fetched. A text box covers most of her besides the head, but since she's an elf I bet she's wearing a pretty dress and... ... that's definitely not a dress. I'm not sure what it is, but I don't think "dress" is the right word for it. Y'know, I think I need to start a clothes drive for some of the characters in this game. Because obviously, some people are desperately in need of shirts. I'll even give one to Aversa if she promises not to try to murder me in my sleep as a thank you. It's going to be a long road till the poor shirtless denizens of this game are no longer shirtless, folks, but with your efforts the entire Sorcerer class will one day be able to put down their tomes without revealing too much of themselves to the world. Anyway, clothes aside, Gregor has arrived! Nowi is not as happy as I am. I don't understand why. I mean, look at this face, isn't it the most innocent face you've ever seen? Chrom doesn't seem very convinced, Nowi doesn't seem very convinced, and Lissa is calling him a creep. Good thing he's a forgiving fellow, since I'm planning on pairing her with him for this playthrough. While they are doing this another face shows up, apparently belonging to a guy called Chalard. This guy immediately starts making Gregor's face actually look like an innocent-baby face by comparison. It's pretty easy for Chrom to decide that Chalard is the bigger problem than the poor maligned Gregor, as threatening Grima's wrath upon everyone tends to be a pretty clear sign of who needs whacking with a sword the most. And so the battle properly begins. I go ahead and pair Gregor up with Nowi for the moment, to move the two of them around more efficiently. And, since I'm using Deliverer today, I'll be pairing up everyone, including the Logbook units. Chrom supports Riza, Sumia gets to be A-support buddies with Cordelia, Palla is joining Falcon Knight Riza, and Katarina is backing Drale. Celica and Tiki are the final pair-up for today's battle. First things first: I want to clear all the enemies out of the range of the nearest sparkly tile so Nowi can see what's over there. Because sending a manakete to help out a manakete amuses me, Tiki is the first one I move. She goes after the cavalier at the bottom of the screenshot there. He's taken out by 68 damage-worth of dragon breath. Tiki and Celica are within range of the lower left-hand village; might as well go visit it because I'm easily distracted. I have Celica take out another cavalier on the way over with 75 damage and a flurry of pretty pink wind. Then I let Tiki be the one to actually visit the village. Oh, in case you didn't know - if you have two characters with Galeforce paired up, you can actually get three moves out of them by switching them for the second enemy. Theoretically, you'd get more kills by letting everybody with Galeforce fight by themselves. In practice, by the time your army of Galeforce users wipes out everything in the vicinity, all the enemies are probably on the other side of the map and you're wasting turns trying to get your army to them. By using the Galeforce pair up strategy, you can get a lot of mileage by moving a pair as far as possible, killing an enemy, moving again, switching who's in the lead and killing another enemy, moving again, and by that time they have a group of enemies all to themselves or they're bidding a less-than-fond farewell to the commander. Anyway, the village. Y'know, I might be able to get Master Seals in Harvest Scramble, but it's a bit tedious to farm enough for everyone, so this Master Seal will definitely come in handy. I'll probably give it to Gregor. Back to rescuing the little girl. I still want her to go see what's on that sparkly tile, after all. Let's have Riza and Chrom go kill the dark mage near the upper right-hand village, since he's the current problem with this plan. Ignis activates for 64 damage, and is completely awesome, and when I attempt to take a screenshot I realize that the whole screen-goes-blurry effect is not the nicest thing to get a picture of. Next time I'll try to get a screenshot when it first activates. At least the flurry of flower petals at the end is pretty. This means that the sparkly tile is now safe for Nowi. She has a nice civil chat with Gregor - I guess she decided he was a good person - and their relationship improves. There's a ridge that runs along the right side of this map, and at the very end of it is a myrmidon who is probably up to no good. I end my turn by having Riza - that's Our Riza, by the way - take him out. 51 damage deals with him just fine. Before we send out the actual fliers with ridiculous range, let's see how Cordelia does against this axe guy. He's the fighter in the upper right-hand corner. Correction: He was the fighter in the upper right hand corner. He is no longer fighting, nor is he in the upper right hand corner any longer. Sumia crits for 90 damage against the myrmidon near the same village. I then let her visit said village. I get another Rescue staff; told ya it was fine if I used those a bit. Not that I have yet. I decide to use Falcon Knight Riza next. Remember the village that Tiki visited? A little bit to the south and right of that, there is a Dark Mage. Falcon Knight Riza has 13 movement. I think I'll just drop her on the other side of the map now. She hits the guy for 55 damage. Nice. There's three villages on this map, and I think it will be amusing if I manage to visit all of them on the first turn. I send Falcon Knight Riza toward the lower right-hand village. She's one square away from being able to visit it, but that's fine, since I can get an extra turn out of Palla. I have her attack the Dark Mage in front of the the last village. Then I let Palla visit the village. I get a Second Seal, which is awesome and I am happy. I have one pair that hasn't moved yet; that's Drale and Katarina. There are three enemies over on the left-hand side, above the village Tiki visited. These are the only three enemies within range of Drale, so I have her fly over and attack the Dark Mage that's the farthest south. She hits him with an axe for a good 59 damage. I decide that I want to have someone near Nowi to make sure that nothing nasty gets by me while I'm busy looking at all the things to look at, so I have her finish off the fighter near Our Riza and Chrom. She crits for 177 damage, and needless to say, the fighter is very much dead. The enemy phase begins, and the first enemy to move is the fighter near Tiki. Since I don't want to have Nowi fighting this time around, we won't be seeing her as a shiny awesome dragon for now; so here's a shiny awesome dragon to tide you over until Nowi is a shiny awesome dragon with better stats. SHINY. YES. A dark mage attacks Drale and gets smacked with an axe to the face for 60 damage. The myrmidon near Drale experiences a similar fate. A cavalier goes for Palla afterward, and it doesn't go very well for him; she neatly crits for 171 damage. The Dark Mage and the Fighter in the upper left-hand section of the map move toward the right side, and a cavalier near Chalard decides to go sit right in front of the guy for some reason. Then it's the player phase. I don't very much appreciate those two rascals in the right-hand corner heading for poor sweet defenseless Nowi, so I send Tiki and Celica to take care of them. Not at all because I want to see Shiny Awesome Dragon again. That used to be a Dark Mage, by the way. Celica takes out the fighter . Now, there's one sparkly tile left at the bottom of the map; I think I'll have Tiki wait on it. She gains 26 XP that she doesn't exactly need. Now I have a little problem. I'd like Chrom and Riza to actually participate in the killing of the boss. There isn't any special dialogue from doing that, but after seeing so much of those two in the beginning I feel like I'm abandoning the main characters or something. Problem is, they're not close enough. Well... in the meantime, might as well have Palla and Falcon Knight Riza deal with the other nasty things around him. There's a fighter, a cavalier and a myrmidon left, all in a row in front of the boss. Palla takes out the fighter with 56 damage, Falcon Knight Riza gets the cavalier with 54, and guess what? I've got one more turn from her, and she has a rescue staff. Excuse me for a minute while I chuckle at Riza rescuing herself. Our Riza can go ahead and deal with the last two enemies now - the myrmidon and the ugly. Er, I mean Chalard. Our Riza is hitting almost as hard as the Logbook Rizas now; 51 damage and that's one myrmidon down. Chalard asks if we dare defy the Grima, the god of annihilation, and given that I personally am not interested in being annihilated, I do think I'll go ahead and defy him if it means I'll avoid that. Oh wait - wasn't Grima the weird pantless person from before, with Creepy Gray Guy? Let me put this Grima fellow on the list of beneficiaries for that clothes drive, I forgot about that. And anybody who has pants to spare, won't you please help out your poor local Grima, god of annihilation, who seems to have annihilated his pants? Riza lands a critical strike for 129 damage on Chalard, which probably destroyed Chalard's pants along with the rest of him. If he was wearing any; I didn't really look too closely at his Dark Mage outfit, but I'm pretty sure it doesn't include pants. Chalard says that his life force is Grima's, though I don't really think that's what Grima needs right now. I guess it's not like Chalard has much to offer in the way of clothes, but maybe one of his myrmidon buddies could have loaned Grima one of those long coats or something in the meantime? Anyway, with that the stage is complete. It was inevitable that Riza and Chrom would end up being the heroes again. With all the enemies gone, Nowi and Gregor are of course safe. Nowi doesn't seem to be very happy at first, until Gregor reminds her that the enemies being gone is a good thing. I'm not sure what those two were up to while hanging out in the center of the map and watching the Logbook League race around the battlefield in the most haphazard patterns possible, but at least they're friends now. Gregor recommends that Chrom hire him, because beneath the innocent-baby face lies a very capable mercenary. I probably chuckle more than I should at his comment that he is perfectly reliable even though he just finished killing his former employers. It's more accurate to say that he stood by and watched the massacre unfold on his former employers; it's not like he could have stopped it even if he wanted to. I suppose it's the thought that counts. I honestly think that Gregor is the funniest first-gen character in this game, at least according to my sense of humor. I continue laughing at his attempts to convince Chrom that he's definitely the guy for the job of smacking things with a sword. Chrom finally gets tired of listening to him get more ridiculous by the sentence, and Gregor's hilarious and fumbling impromptu resume comes to an end when Chrom hires him with the reasoning, "Why not." Nowi was apparently being sold as a slave, since somebody thought it was a good idea to enslave a freakin' dragon, because mistreating something that can eat your face and call it a light snack is always an excellent plan. Her age comes up in an attempt to make the people playing this game a little more comfortable with her outfit. The Grimleal - in other words, the guys we just finished clearing off the battlefield - are explained as followers of Grima. It is not explained why they want to follow Grima, and Riza looks just as puzzled as I feel. Nobody bothers to ease her confusion or mine. And so ends the chapter, not with a bang, but with an awkward suggestion from Flavia that everybody go to sleep.

Out of curiosity, what pairing would you recommend instead of Fred? I've used Vaike Gerome a few times and he was pretty good - hit like a truck - but I'm using Vaike Kjelle in my current playthrough and I'm still unsure about who Gerome's father will be. (Ending class would be Wyvern Lord.)

Dread Fighter - Lost Bloodlines 2 DLC. Limit Breaker - it comes from the Rogues and Redeemers 3 DLC. Very difficult map the first time around, required pretty much mostly maxed-out kid units to deal with it. There's about a gazillion enemies and your only saving grace is that they don't all start moving toward you at once, and the fact that it's straightforward hit-the-enemy-with-the-thing without any weird terrain or having to protect any allies. Out of this, you get what's arguably the best possible skill - since it raises your stat caps by 10, then as long as you bother to max out your characters with the new skill equipped, it will help with anything. Grima included. Plus, it gives any advanced class 100% Armsthrift activation if they've got Armsthrift. Once you get the first Limit Breaker, use it on your Avatar and then get maxed-out stats, then as long as you have a reliable method of self-healing that works on the enemy phase (in other words, Sol, Nosferatu or Aversa's Night) it gets a lot easier. If you've got a magic-using Avatar I'd recommend combining Sol with Celica's Gale and Armsthrift so you don't run out of your weapon in the middle of enemy phase and so you have range, because there's a guy with Counter and another guy with Lethality and it's probably for the best that you handle them from a distance. You always have to bring Chrom along, but with the appropriate set of skills I've found I don't necessarily need any support levels. These days, when I don't want to train a team specifically to get that first Limit Breaker for my Avatar in a new playthrough, I hire one of my old maxed-out Avatars with Limit Breaker out of the logbook, sit them down in the middle of the map and end my turn repeatedly (just keeping an eye on the two with the scary skills).

For the record, in my last playthrough Libra!Inigo made a pretty great sorcerer and had pretty much anything I could ever want on a character. On the other hand, I don't go for a lot of physical classes for my most-used characters, so there's that. I pretty much put him on par with the Avatar kids in that particular playthrough, and he's the only character I trusted to solo Rogues and Redeemers 3 with Chrom (and obviously no support levels) before he had mostly capped stats with Vantage/Vengeance (and occasionally a bit of Aversa's Night, yay Armsthrift). As a disclaimer, I did use him in Normal Mode with Limit Breaker, and I was weird enough to put him in a magical class, and Libra mostly just gives a well-rounded Magical Kid Starter Kit to whichever kid gets him as a father. So if you're looking for min/maxing of stats or a lot of useful skills for a physical Inigo to add to the ones he's already got, I'm not sure if Libra's the one to go for; if you don't want Inigo in a magical class you're probably not going to get a ton out of the pairing (though it won't hurt him either). Not that Inigo really needs much in my personal opinion; but I've got my own ideas of what I like as far as available skills and class sets, and Inigo - especially Libra!Inigo - just happens to fit the bill.

@EvilElectro, it's pretty much what Roflolxp54 said. I think I've gotten a Second Seal out of a DLC village about once in fifty times playing a map with two of 'em? Honestly it would probably take less time to just wait on Anna to show up on your map bringing gifts. I tend to get things like logs and ladles for the most part. However, if you want to try your luck, I'd recommend Champions of Yore. It's probably going to still be pretty tough if your units are underleveled, but if you do what I've been doing for the DLCs I want stuff from in the early game and bring along some overpowered logbook units, it should be pretty easy. I do not recommend Roster Rescue, as it's got those same disappearing/reappearing walls as Nah's paralogue, only worse, along with a bunch of tough enemies. And now, on with the playthrough! Sorry for the delay, folks! [spoiler=Some Pre-Chapter Miscellany] A lot has changed since I last posted a chapter here. First off, everyone besides Lissa, Maribelle and Panne has achieved Level 20 Advanced Class status. Lissa and Maribelle because I'm not going to bother with them until I get a shop with rescue staffs to grind them easily, and Panne because I need more Beaststones or a Second Seal in order to use her, and she's not exactly Second Seal priority. I guess I could turn her into a Bride class without wasting Second Seals, but I'd really rather not. It would just seem really, really weird to see Panne in that floaty sparkly dress. I know that's a silly reason, but hey, this is a silly playthrough. Second, we've got some marriages! Vaike and Sully are successfully married, as well as Miriel and Ricken. Chrom and Riza have had the ability to S Support for a while, but I'm going to wait until Chapter 11 and let Chrom do his nice little post-battle proposal. If anybody wants me to comment on any supports between characters, I'll do that by request; but there's a lot of 'em and I don't feel like spending more time on pre-chapter rambling than on the actual chapter. A decent number of A supports have been achieved between various characters as well. Anna has dropped by a few times with Second Seals, bringing the total in my inventory to 5. It'll be 4 after this chapter. I decided that it was completely necessary to use Riza as a Level 20 Grandmaster in a chapter before she switched classes for the sand chapters, because shiny coat is shiny. Most of the other changes will be seen in this chapter, in which I probably use the word "squishy" way too many times... [spoiler=The Charge of the Knight Brigade: Chapter 7] We open the chapter with Lissa and Riza both commenting on the pain of walking long distances, and Chrom being apparently immune to exhaustion now. He's entirely unsympathetic to Lissa, but jokingly offers to carry Riza, despite the fact that Lissa looks like a much shorter, lighter person to carry. Sometimes I think that the game developers had a contest to see who could slip the most subtle hints about Chrom's romantic inclinations into the main storyline, and neglected to make sure that all the hints were about the same woman. They also neglected to make sure that all the hints were subtle. A very nervous fellow whose name is apparently the same as his title (Hierarch) is along for the journey as well. Something about the fact that he doesn't have a name besides Hierarch tells me that he's not long for this world, and something about his nervousness tells me that he's only got himself to blame. Some guys with axes show up - as though they think that sending Axe Guys after Chrom will work any better this time - and I think this is the quickest we've actually gone from the chapter opening to the battle preparation screen. And now to introduce our characters. Actually, it's less introducing and more reintroducing; but since you haven't seen their shiny new stats and classes yet, let's do a quick run-through. Relatively quick, anyway, given that I'm bringing enough people along to actually fill all the allowed slots. This way you can also see all those fancy weapons I bought from Spotpass shops. So, as always, the Duo of Destruction... The newlyweds, Vaike and Sully... Kellam and Stahl, who even share a class now... Frederick and Sumia (finally an end to the Great Knights)... And a couple of sword wielders, Lon'qu and Gaius. I guess I'll let Virion come along too, why not. He's a Bow Knight, maybe the Great Knight club will award him honorary status despite him being not that Great. (I'd apologize for the awful pun, but if I actually felt bad about it I'd remove it.) I think I'll have to change his nickname from Squishy to Less Squishy. I didn't have the EXPonential Growth DLC the last time I tried to get him leveled up, and I also did not have Paragon, and these two things together made getting him through 40 levels a LOT less painful. He's still probably not going to use that bow much, but I figured I'd give him one just in case. As you can see, I left Miriel and Ricken out. They're inheriting the title of Squishy from Virion. They're Sages now, but without decent defense or avoid they're still pretty fragile. So they get benched until further notice, further notice being "when I can reclass them multiple times and hope to heaven that they actually grow some defense in the process." I do some shuffling around of map positions and I'm ready to go. Do I have enough Great Knights on the field here? I'm not sure I've got enough. Honestly, it's not my favorite ending class for most characters because it doesn't fit my playing style, but the pair-up stat boosts are pretty good, and LUNA. Luna is awesome and I love it. I picked most of the classes I did either for better stat growth, or for skills that would let them kill things easier, and Luna will hopefully let everybody kill things easier; though with enemy defense being so low it probably won't make much of a difference right now. Before the battle begins, we've got to listen to some guy named Vasto laugh like a maniac and mock the Hierarch. Given that said Hierarch is a cowardly traitor foolish enough to run out onto a battlefield looking for protection, I don't entirely blame Vasto for either the mockery or his quick disposal of the fellow. Mean, yes; weird, coming from an enemy, yes; but also understandable. Less understandable is that the Hierarch thought that running out onto the battlefield and announcing his guilt in front of the people he just betrayed was a good idea. I mean, I'm not a cold-blooded traitor who would betray the leader I've spent years serving, but if I were, I'd wait till the battle had started and then slip away quietly. And maybe make sure that the people I wanted protecting me were the winners before announcing my guilt. Vasto is slightly more polite to Chrom - and by "polite" I mean doesn't call Chrom a pig, so it probably doesn't fit most people's definition of the word - and asks for the Ylisseans to hand over Emmeryn. Chrom declines, and finally it's time to fight. Guess what? Riza is not being paired with Chrom today. Shocking, I know. I decided that today I'd have a rule for pair-ups: Characters must pair with characters who they have supports with, but cannot pair with any character who they are capable of S-supporting with. In other words, everybody's going to be paired up with somebody of the same gender who they have an A-support with. The exception is Riza, since 1) there were an odd number of slots and 2) she can support with anybody so I felt kinda like I was cheating by matching her up with somebody. Therefore, today we've got Sully supporting Sumia, Virion supporting Frederick, and Lon'qu and Vaike getting along surprisingly well. Chrom has Gaius's back, and Stahl and Kellam are still buddies. Riza is going to hang out by herself, but she's a strong independent woman and has a fantastic coat. She'll be fine. The first thing I do is send Sumia to attack the nearest wyvern rider, because GALEFORCE. Also I think it's funny that she can apparently carry around a Great Knight, horse and all, without a problem. Another thing she doesn't have a problem with is this wyvern rider. She hit him for 31 damage. I forgot just how fragile these early-game guys are. Of course she gets another turn now. I have her go attack another wyvern. I have her use the Brave Lance, since all the wyvern riders are carrying iron axes and I don't need to worry about her ability to counterattack at range. I meant to use the Brave Lance on the first wyvern rider, but forgot to equip it. She takes Wyvern Two out with another 31 damage, and that's the end of her turn. Next, I realize that Kellam and Stahl were both stuck in the back of the troupe, and the only guy in attacking range is the closest barbarian. I have Kellam go deal with him. He's far enough away that Kellam has to use a spear to reach him, even with the movement boost from Stahl. This isn't exactly a problem; he hits for 43 damage, and the barbarian doesn't have nearly that much HP. One barbarian down. I then have to decide between letting Gaius and Chrom or Vaike and Lon'qu deal with the closest archer, since neither of them are close enough to the battlefield to reach anything else. Since Chrom has had enough screen time, and I genuinely like Lon'qu, I send the latter. (I also like Gaius, but eh. I feel like sending Lon'qu.) Y'know, I might find the Vaike a bit annoying - though he does have his good moments in a few supports - but the pair-up strength boost from his Warrior class is nothing to laugh at. He's giving Lon'qu 10 extra points of damage there. Gaius can't reach anything from where he's standing, so I send Frederick and Less Squishy to take out the next barbarian. Frederick activates Luna, and informs the barbarian that he should pick a god and pray. This is all very awesome, except that Frederick started in an advanced class and hasn't had as many levels as everyone else, and therefore hits for only 33 damage, which is a bit less impressive after Lon'qu's 48 and Kellam's 43. Next, the only character within range of anything is Riza. She can attack a thief. Coincidentally, the spot she has to stand in order to attack is directly next to Frederick and Lon'qu. This means she at least gets a few support bonuses. Not that she really needs them with Celica's Gale, 40 levels and a Magic asset. Even though Riza has had enough screentime already, I haven't used Celica's Gale enough. I really should have. Now it's kind of unnecessary, since these guys she's fighting are pretty flimsy and literally fall over with a gust of Wind, but SHINY. Also very pink. I have Gaius park himself behind Lon'qu, and that means it's enemy phase. Lon'qu gets attacked by a barbarian, because obviously Axe Guys don't get the memo that they should maybe try not going after the swordsmen for once. Lon'qu activates Astra. The guy goes down in one 25-damage hit. I forgot to park Frederick out of range of an archer (or make him use his spear), so the nearby archer decides to go after him. Archer misses, Frederick does nothing because having a spear doesn't mean he can use it unless the brilliant tactician tells him to, and that's the end of that. A wyvern rider heads for Kellam. Stahl Dual Guards, and then 40 damage is quite enough to deal with the problem. The next wyvern rider heads for Frederick and misses his swing by about a mile, and Frederick gets a nice 27-damage strike in. (Again, that contrast... Frederick is going to need some serious work once I get those Second Seals.) After this, the battle switches to Sumia. Every wyvern rider in the vicinity heads for her. (That means three, in case you were wondering.) Every wyvern misses, and Sumia dispatches the first two with 31 damage and the third with 30. And that's the end of the enemy phase. I would say that the first order of business is to deal with the annoying archer, but I'd rather deal with every annoying enemy with ranged weapons. That means one barbarian with a hand axe and another archer must go as well. And how nice, Sumia's in range of both, and can even reach a sparkly tile while attacking the barbarian. This is why I love fliers, especially with Galeforce: they can reach the problems that nobody else can. And also the other side of the battlefield on the second turn. (The archer who went after Frederick is highlighted, because I had ranged enemies highlighted. I unmarked the barbarian and the archer Sumia is after because it makes a better screenshot.) Barbarian goes down in one hit, Sumia's weapon proficiency improves thanks to the tile, and she deals with the nearby archer just as easily with 37 damage. There's another sparkly tile; I have Riza sit on it before I forget about it. She gains 24 XP that could be better used after I give her a Second Seal. Gaius hasn't had a turn to kill anything yet, so I let him have the archer who threatened Frederick. He lands a critical hit. It's hard to get a good picture with the light show going on, but suffice to say that the critical hit is fantastic and it makes me happy. The only enemy in range of someone who hasn't already finished their turn is the thief near Sumia. My choices for his removal are Frederick and Virion, or Kellam and Stahl. While Stahl hasn't been in the lead attacker at any point, he's had more screentime than Virion. I feel like letting Less Squishy do something, just this once, because I've ranted enough about him that I feel obligated to demonstrate his less-squishyness. Or at least show that he can take out this guy in one hit as well as anyone. Meh. Gaius's critical hit was shinier. Nobody else is within range to attack anything, and only three enemies are left: a barbarian, a wyvern rider, and Vasto. This battle is going to end after this enemy phase, since Vasto will head for Sumia and the other two have Virion or Sumia to choose from. It's a good thing Cordelia auto-recruits, since she's not going to get a chance to show up. I end my turn. The barbarian decides to attack Virion - I probably would, too - and Frederick dual guards. The barbarian goes down with 35 damage. Then Vasto goes to attack Sumia. The battle has apparently not helped with his etiquette. Hey, Vasto? I know she looks delicate, but... sorry to break it to you, Sumia's not being splattered anywhere today. If I'd brought Miriel along, you might have managed some splattering. Not Sumia, though. This is the first time anybody today has actually needed to double the enemy. Sumia probably didn't need the Brave Lance for that; but two strikes later Vasto finds himself laying beside his wyvern, which is belly-side up and does not look like it intends to change that position. Vasto says, "You doves think... killing me will change anything? Heh..." Actually, I do think that killing him changes something. And that something is his manners, since it's hard to be rude when you're dead. I've met far more polite Risen than this guy, amusing as he is. He also mentions that his 'brothers' are storming the border. Because telling the people who just swept your battlefield clean that there's more enemies to mop up is an excellent plan. I mean, since the storyline isn't affected by having ridiculously overpowered characters, the plan is going to work, but if I were him I'd avoid mentioning my army's plans to the enemy with my dying breath, especially since he killed somebody not that long ago for telling plans to the enemy because it's a despicable thing to do. Doesn't seem like an appropriate way to use his final words, somehow. More appropriate as his final words, there are of course the insults. You see how there isn't any blood on the ground near him? While you could say that this is because the game doesn't include stuff like that, I'd argue that it's because this guy bleeds sarcasm. The final wyvern goes after Virion, who dodges and then gets a pretty respectable critical strike in. I'm starting to warm up to him a bit now that I don't have to baby him. Don't get me wrong, his personality is still pompous and I'd cheerfully join Sully in a boot to his face if he tried any of his lines on me, but in some of his supports he shows glimmers of actual intelligence. Besides, I like Inigo just fine - well, more than just fine, I like Inigo a lot - so it's not fair of me to judge his womanizing ways too harshly. I know this is not a really good screenshot position-wise, but I couldn't let a screenshot of Virion Being This Useful pass. It's an unfamiliar feeling. That's the end of the stage, and we FINALLY have heroes who are not Chrom and Riza. I'm not sure that Sully did much of anything. I should probably have switched her out with Sumia for that archer so she could actually land a few hits. Hopefully I remember stuff like that next time. Now Cordelia shows up, with the same dialogue that she usually has when she shows up in the middle of the battle. Except it's now conducted at the opposite end of the battlefield, with no enemies in sight. She then continues on to report to Phila about the attack on the border that Vasto already mentioned, except with more traumatic detail. I think she has PTSD, but somehow I doubt that she's going to get any counseling any time soon. Emmeryn decides to return to the capital and hands off the Fire Emblem to Chrom. Chrom is understandably more concerned about his sister than the mystical MacGuffin, but his attempts to inform her that he will not leave her are unsuccessful. Lissa is even more insistent on going with Emmeryn and is denied as well. Phila attempts the same thing, and... actually succeeds, without a single argument. Okay then. We get a bit of a break from the arguing while Phila tells Cordelia to stay with Chrom - a job she accepts willingly, of course - and then it's back to arguing. While I could continue to explain my opinion on heading straight back to the castle that was already broken into and leaving her strongest troops elsewhere, with only the protection of the same security who somehow let horsemen get past them, I think that Chrom does a pretty good job already. Since we didn't have a lot of story before this battle, that means double the dialogue after it. It's back to Regna Ferox, where Sumia has apparently been taking ideas from the local warrior culture, since she smacks Chrom in the face for spacing out.* Her punches seem a little bit scarier to me this time around; most of the time she's still a fragile weakling at this point in my playthrough, but after seeing her take down all those wyverns I expect she has a pretty decent amount of strength behind that blow. Flavia ships the two of them, because of course she does. Here go the 'subtle' hints again. She calls Basilio her "insignificant other"; it's at this point in my first playthrough that I assumed the two were married already. The insignificant other shows up at this point to inform Chrom that Ylisstol has fallen and Emmeryn has been captured. He then says the most sensible thing I've heard so far. The sad part is that this needed to be pointed out. I'm not joking here. I seriously think that maybe they should have figured how to not walk into traps sooner. Chrom also needs to be reminded that sometimes brains are necessary, because smacking things with a sword doesn't solve all problems automatically. This is news to him; but after Riza agrees that having plans might actually be helpful, he finally decides to not go marching straight into Plegia and destroy everything like the one-man army he is. And so ends the chapter, with actual sense being made. Tune in next time for a break from Riza's shiny coat and my irrational love of said coat. *Yeah, I know that it's made clear that Sumia got the idea from Phila. I'm joking.

@EvilElectro, keeping him out of the way once he gets that level isn't the problem. The problem is getting that level in the safest way possible. The challenge I'm setting for myself is getting that level without him taking damage. So I'm not dead, in case anybody's wondering. I'm busy, but I've also been trying to level the main cast up since I can get Master Seals from Harvest Scramble, and I'm not going to use much besides logbook characters in the sand chapters because of that lovely movement penalty. And I decided that waiting till Second Seals were available to see any of the normal cast besides the Chrom-Riza duo holding their own would end up kinda boring and a bit unnecessary.

@TheSilentChloey, if you want any tips on anything specific, feel free to PM me! I might not be the best at the game myself, but I DO know a few things and don't mind rambling about them. @EvilElectro and ChloeC01, I was wondering if anybody would notice. @Roflolxp54... I'm just gonna go ahead and put this in spoilers. [spoiler=Donnel's Paralogue Strategy (This is NOT a playlog)] I wasn't going to use quite the same strategy as yours there, but I was going to use a similar one. And you've mentioned some things I haven't thought of, too. I'm probably going to integrate the forged bronze lance and Tiki's Tears ideas into my strategy. My other ideas are as follows: 1. Bring along Paragon and All Stats +2 scrolls. As I've tested, they DO equip the moment you use them as long as skill slots are free, even in a battle. I could probably substitute Tiki's Tears for All Stats +2 or stack them, good idea. 2. Use a high-level sword-wielder (see #3 for who) to lure archers and kill the guys with axes. Theoretically, I can get Donnel to take no damage whatsoever this way, since the archers can't attack back; but the Axe Guys have a leg up via the weapons triangle. 3. Along with my Rallybot(s) (hello Katarina and Palla (who I finally went and got)), bring a sufficiently high-level (preferably maxed-out) Dancer Olivia (who doubles as that sword-wielder) and a Rescue Staffbot. Olivia lets Donnel get two strikes in - preferably against a defenseless archer - and Staffbot means he gets Rescued if the archer isn't sufficiently dead or Donnel is left in the range of something nasty. Plus, with Special Dance, that extra strike can pack a little more power. 4. Let's add Dual Strike+ to that list of skills on Donnel's supporting pair-up. And since Donnel's not going to be taking damage if he just goes after archers, speed for doubling is better than defense, which means that a Grandmaster Lucina works nicely. I tend to leave her as a Grandmaster anyway, because magic > lances for range in my opinion, despite the fact that I love her Lord outfit. If I changed my mind about defense and/or nice outfits I could reclass Catria or Spotpass Prince Marth, though. After the archers are dead, with Paragon equipped Donnel's usually gained a level, and I can switch him with whoever his pair-up buddy is and go kill everything as normal. @Radiant head, it fits with the rules I'm playing by, though. By using that strategy or a similar one, I can have Donnel "hit the enemy with the thing, heal as necessary, rinse and repeat" quite easily.