Tino

Hi to you, too ^_^

Personally I don't care whether we're allowed to restart or not. Not being able to will simply require some more planning beforehand, I guess. If Life says we can't redo chapters, then so be it. That's perfectly fine with me.

Can be, but now I still have no clue as to what the reasoning behind those placements is...

Hey Crash, why is everything on your list placed where it is? Because I have only seen opinions thus far, or are false facts. What, so this isn't even supposed to be an objective list? Then this is frankly one of the most useless topics up to date : o

You don't have to. You can also decide to skip on Canas if you really want to go for fast turn completion. I mean, maybe Canas won't make that much of a difference, and maybe he might even cost you some turns due to being underlevelled at first : o

Sain joins only a little later than Erk. Erk is pretty good in the two chapters he's in that Sain's not, but let's not dabble about the significance of a little less than two chapters (after all, Erk doesn't join right at the start of ch 14). So what levels do they come out of Lyn Mode? I generally have something like a lv 9 Kent/Sain and a lv 7 Erk, so I'll just say they're both lv 9 in ch 16. Stupid RPGDL is down, though (they really need to work with they're MySQL connections better), so simple averages will have to suffice. lv 9 Sain iron lance: 19.8 atk, 9.2 spd, 97.0 hit, 3.4 crt -- 25.4 hp, 25.2 avo, 7.6 def, 1.6 res iron sword: 17.8 atk, 107.0 hit javelin: 18.8 atk, 7.2 spd, 82.0 hit -- 21.2 avo lv 9 Erk thunder: 16.2 atk, 10.0 spd, 99.1 hit, 9.6 crt -- 22.2 hp, 25.4 avo, 3.6 def, 7.2 res This is really quite a difficult situation. Sain is considerably more durable, but doesn't have as great 1-2 range as Erk does. Plus Erk's offense is probably a bit better. I guess this requires me to take a look at some enemy stats, then. Actually, I'll just average them out a bit to make it shorter. Physical enemies average 14.3 atk against Sain (with WT taken into account. Against Erk this is 14.6 atk. 14.3 atk 4HKOes Sain. 14.6 atk nearly 2HKOes Erk. If there is, what, one slightly stronger enemy on the field, this average rises to 14.7 atk already, which is a 2HKO. If Erk got somewhat unlucky with either hp or def, he gets 2HKOed. If Sain has 1 def or hp less, there's no problem. 6.7 dmg per round still 4HKOes 24.4 hp, and 7.7 damage per round still 4HKOes 25.4 hp. So we can say Sain's concrete durability is twice as good as Erk's. And while that's no big surprise for physical vs magical, it does give Sain a little more flexibility. Oh, and Sain will also be able to dodge more attacks due to WTA against a fair amount of enemies, so his durability is more than twice as large as Erk's. Or make that just 2, because Erk does have 1-2 range. I really can't be bothered to say anything about magical enemies here. There's a grand total of 2 in a group of 45 enemies. Not really worth much, in my view. Erk wins against them, but it's worth next to nothing in the face of a huge-ass durability lead against ~96% of the enemies. On the offense, Sain is slightly worse than Erk. Sain 2.2RKOes the enemies on this map, Erk is 1.9RKOing. So we see more mobility and far better durability vs a slight offense lead. And even then, 2.2RKOing really isn't that bad, anyway. If Sain got a lucky spd level up, he'll be outperforming Erk on offense. If he got a lucky +1 str he'll be outperforming Erk on offense, if Erk got an unlucky -1 spd Sain will be outperforming Erk, and the list goes on. If Sain misses out on 1 hp or def, or if Erk has 1 more hp or def, Sain will still be superior defensively. So the win here goes to Sain hands down. And after this, when Sain has gotten like one or two more points of spd, Sain will be doubling about as much as Erk, so Sain will win by an even larger margin. Then later on they're both awesome killing machines, where Sain is far more durable and mobile and has full WT control, but Erk has staves and innate 1-2 range. I think what's going to play quite a bit factor here is promotion time, and this is where Erk has to hand it to Sain. Sain has to contend with Oswin, Kent and Lowen for a knight crest. All three of them are awesome. Erk has to contend with Serra, Priscilla, Lucius and Canas for a guiding ring, and most of them are pretty damn sweet, too. So how does Sain win this? Quite easy, actually. Kent and Sain will be leveling about equally, and it would be nonsense to discuss which of the two is going to promote first, so it's safe to assume Sain gets the second hero crest since Oswin is likely to get the first one. Assuming both Kent and Sain are in play, which isn't too unlikely, the earth seal comes only two chapters after the ch 22 knight crest, so that's not too big a deal. Lowen is going to promote quite a bit later than all three of them, so he won't be that big a problem in this whole mess. The point? Sain doesn't really have any problems promoting. Erk? He definitely does. First there is Serra, who will be levelling pretty quickly due to her healing capabilities (as will Priscilla, by the way). By the time you have the first two guiding rings in your posession, Serra will want to promote, Erk will want to promote, Priscilla will probably want to get an early promotion to get the benefit of attacking early, and a few chapters later, when the next guiding ring is available, Lucius/Canas will probably be nearing promotion time, too. All in all, Erk has far more competition than Sain when it comes to promoting, so Sain can fairly easily nab an advantage there. If he promotes first, he gets the benefits of that promotion for a longer time, so even if Erk's healing and 1-2 range would somehow be better than Sain's mobility, durability and full WT control, Sain being promoted longer would easily cancel that out, and then his earlygame superiority still gives him the win. But I'd say Sain's advantages upon promotion > Erk's advantages upon promotion, so Sain's win is even larger. Sain > Karla Oh, and Sain > Erk, too.

So long as they do not only encourage gambling, but also proper the application of proper bankroll management while doing so, then yes, governments can encourage gambling. After all, applying proper bankroll management is the key to being a succesfull gambler (at least, I believe that to be the key to it). If they - to put it bluntly - don't care about how much money the people can/will eventually lose, then they should definitely refrain from encouraging gambling.

Urgh, and no my computer is having issues again (and has been having them for the past few days)... I would have uploaded videos already if it weren't for my computer. Maybe I should consider buying a new one : o More videos asap, guys, but I don't know when that will be.

Thanks. I compared the pros and cons of not getting the secret book to eachother, and decided I didn't need the +2 skl anyway, and the funds... Sure, they're nice, but 5500 or so gold will probably suffice for the time being. And there are always dropped items, stolen items, chest items, unnecessary items, and whatever else you can think of to get the money I need. It's worth quite a lot, but I believe I can do without it (plus in ch 14 I can try to recruit Erk and sell his ashera icon and still have enough (selling two stat boosters for money seems fairly redundant to me this early in the game)).

@RP and mike: I'm working on my counter and opener. I'm just a little bit slow is all. I'll have it up soon enough, though ; ) Just a heads-up.

Much appreciated, Death.

Apparently my computer is doing a bit better lately (dunno why), so I'm uploading another video right now, in which I clear chapter 12 in 5 turns. EDIT: chapter 12

Dutch and German are even uglier than English, believe me.

Um... Rolf has 6 str, 3 skl, 4 spd, 3 luc, 4 def and 2 res on Shinon. Shinon has nothing on Rolf. Don't you tell me Shinon isn't doing that much worse. He's terrible in comparison. That's all I really wanted to say.

It could be just me, but isn't discussing which weapon combinations (things that are nearly character-exclusive) kind of pointless?

Oscar: axes. Makalov: axes. Astrid: axes. Kieran: axes. Or lances, depends on the mood I'm in Mages: staves. Except I once gave Soren knives just for kicks, and he actually got 10 str that playthrough. Hell yeah for dealing 2 damage tops to whatever somewhat decent enemy.

Yeah. I definitely remember you. Boy have there been huge conflicts with you on GF >_> Welcome, though. Do stick around ; )

I just like the idea of making videos, though, because that way I can ensure you guys that I'm not cheating my way through this. It's just a bit of a nuisance that my computer doesn't really want to cooperate. I was thinking about trying to get the extra lockpick as well, but decided I couldn't really be bothered. I guess it could be useful for either selling or using, I guess, though.

Chapter 11 7 turns was all I needed (and a little bit of luck critting the archer). I honestly don't know if I'll produce any more videos, because it took quite some work to get this video done...

Yeah, sure. Expect it to be up in two or three days, maybe sooner. Edit: Sain vs Erk, by the way. I like Sain just that little bit more ; )

I think I may be able to do it in 7 turns while still getting the red gem. Not entirely sure, though, but I'll give it a shot.

Since apparently there's room for improvement for everybody, I have reason to believe there's room for improvement on my side, too. So maybe I'll start over again.

Erk vs Kent or Sain? Or have those been done a thousand times already?

Chapter 13 On turn 1, everybody but Marcus went west. Hector also sort of took a middle path, as I had him cross the river (or at least, he would cross the river on a later turn). Marcus went south to act as a distraction for the southern enemies, since they would otherwise start attacking my non-drafted units, and I didn't really want that to happen... Eventually I sent Matthew down south, too, so that he might recruit Guy. Not that I would really mind if I wouldn't recruit Guy, but whatever. His killing edge (and vulnerary) might just come in useful sometime. After some more fighting, Hector bought some vulneraries (they really help) on turn 5. Marcus was doing very well down south. He was getting attacked from all sides, pretty much, but sitting on a fort made him immortal or something, I don't know. Too bad the enemies mostly used hand axes and bows, though, since that definitely makes it more difficult to recruit Guy. And the next turn Guy started moving, too, so I decided not to bother with Guy's weaponry, and just have Marcus sit there for a bit longer, so that those southern enemies wouldn't suddenly move up to my western group. I moved Matthew out of the way again, too. I also bought Lowen a javelin or two, and an additional hand axe for Marcus. On turn 9 Boies had already taken some severe damage. It's a pity I didn't have access to a hammer yet Anyway, taking care of the last few enemies near the castle was easy with some proper use of vulneraries. On the ninth enemy phase Boies commited suicide against Hector's wolf beil. So this was done by turn 10. I think I did pretty well here. I also just noticed I actually beat chapter 12 and 13 within the HHM turn requirement for 5 stars : o Turns: 10 Total turns: 25 Name lv hp str skl spd luc def res Hector 7.33 25 9 5 8 5 10 2 Marcus 2.29 32 15 16 11 8 11 8 Lowen 4.41 25 7 7 7 4 7 1 Dorcas 4.21 33 10 9 6 4 3 1 I actually would like to record my playthrough, too, but for some reason my computer starts spacing like mad if I try to, no matter if I use VBA's built in screen recorder or some other sort of screen recording software. My computer stinks like that...