Alastor plays and ranks the whole series! Mission Complete! ...For now.

[Benice]

Chapters following the First arc (about Eliwood's papa) are very limiting until Vaida's chapter,  If I recall correctly. This only really hurts on the desert maps, though.

[Shadow Mir]

On 3/12/2020 at 6:47 PM, Alastor15243 said:

Balance: My first thought upon double-checking the current list, incidentally, was “Wow, did I really put Gaiden in second? And then my second thought was “Oh. That's why.” And honestly, I'm torn here. In terms of classes, in terms of taking the best representatives of every class and comparing how they stack up with each other, the results are shockingly even. You have the usual high-rollers like the paladins and wyvern riders and magic users... but like I said, there is a myrmidon who's like top three on the current tier list. Granted, again, that's due to a glitch...

...But as I just said, I'm judging the results, not how close to their intentions they got.

Aside from knights and maybe archers (Klein isn't nearly as good as Shin), I struggle to think of a single class that doesn't have a good unit in it.

But on the other hand, in terms of characters, the balance is decidedly more mixed. A disappointingly small percentage of the main cast is viable in this game, given how utterly cutthroat the competition can be on hard mode. That said... I checked the current tier lists, and the lowest-ranked character I managed to make a serious mainstay of my army was Raigh, who's lower-mid. And more than half of the cast is above him. So maybe it's not as bad as my initial impressions.

Another thing to consider is how often having a handful of ridiculously powerful units enemy-phase everything was the solution to my problems. And the answer to that is... almost never. Milady came the closest, but she's just one unit, and nobody else could really take nearly the amount of punishment she could. She fulfilled an important role of holding off wyvern hordes and keeping them from overwhelming me, but there was still always the entire rest of the map to deal with. I felt a tangible difference between how I used each of my units, and a tangible difference in how they fought, similar to Genealogy and Gaiden, but without the... frankly ludicrous other issues those games had (to varying degrees).

Honestly, I can't expect perfection. Certainly not this early in the list. It's got its issues, but really... I've gotta give it to the game. I think we have a new winner here.

1: Binding Blade

2: Mystery of the Emblem Book 1

3: Gaiden

4: Mystery of the Emblem Book 2

5: Thracia 776

6: Genealogy of the Holy War

7: Dark Dragon

I must say, this is surprisingly generous, considering that Binding Blade is often considered one of the most unbalanced titles in the series. When it comes to balance, I'd personally consider a game where the top tiers could solo it, but everyone else is still usable better balanced than a game like Binding Blade, where I'd have to ignore a legion of garbage units (though in this case, "a legion" means at least half the cast). Which would lead me to think it really deserves to be right down there with Holy War; coincidentally, both games favour mounted units up the wazoo..

Edited March 22, 2020 by Shadow Mir

[Boomhauer007]

I would think it's more circumstantial than anything. Fe6 is absolutely one of the more unbalanced games, but it's still more balanced than 4 or 5. And I think the list of people that have played through 1/2/3 proper is pretty small (I know I haven't), so that comparison isn't usually made to those. 

[Shadow Mir]

1 hour ago, Boomhauer007 said:

I would think it's more circumstantial than anything. Fe6 is absolutely one of the more unbalanced games, but it's still more balanced than 4 or 5. And I think the list of people that have played through 1/2/3 proper is pretty small (I know I haven't), so that comparison isn't usually made to those. 

Even so, it being above Mystery of the Emblem or Gaiden is a big double u tee eff. A huge chunk of the Binding Blade cast is terrible (and this is even setting aside that it's the game with Sophia and Wendy), whereas I could get away with using just about anyone in Mystery.

Edited March 22, 2020 by Shadow Mir

[Alastor15243]

Just now, Shadow Mir said:

Even so, it being above Mystery of the Emblem is a big double u tee eff. A huge chunk of the Binding Blade cast is terrible, whereas I could get away with using just about anyone in Mystery.

Counterpoint: When you can easily get basically anyone to cap every stat, and only mages can get reliable 1-2 range damage, how are mages not far and away the objectively best classes in the game?

[Shadow Mir]

2 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

Counterpoint: When you can easily get basically anyone to cap every stat, and only mages can get reliable 1-2 range damage, how are mages not far and away the objectively best classes in the game?

Bold: And that's why I think it's better balanced than Binding Blade. There's no units that stand out as obviously being more trouble than they're worth, whereas Binding Blade's cast is littered with such units, even ignoring Sophia and Wendy. Not to mention it being one of the most blatantly mount dominated games. And the fact that axes are virtually unusable (granted, they were literally unusable in book 2, but that's because the player got no axe users. The sad, sad accuracy of FE6 axes is no better, and in fact makes them something to avoid unless you're willing to tolerate their having 65 hit at most [bar Armads, which is the only axe that has a hit rate in the 70s, while most of them, by which I mean the number that DON'T is one I can count on one hand, have 55 hit or less. Shame that working your way up to S axes is a complete chore that isn't worth it]). I take far, FAR greater issue with those than I do with any balance issues Mystery has.

Edited March 23, 2020 by Shadow Mir

[Alastor15243]

1 hour ago, Shadow Mir said:

Bold: And that's why I think it's better balanced than Binding Blade. There's no units that stand out as obviously being more trouble than they're worth, whereas Binding Blade's cast is littered with such units, even ignoring Sophia and Wendy. Not to mention it being one of the most blatantly mount dominated games. And the fact that axes are virtually unusable (granted, they were literally unusable in book 2, but that's because the player got no axe users. The sad, sad accuracy of FE6 axes is no better, and in fact makes them something to avoid unless you're willing to tolerate their having 65 hit at most [bar Armads, which is literally the only axe to have a hit rate that isn't complete trash. Shame that working your way up to S axes is a complete chore that isn't worth it). I take far, FAR greater issue with those than I do with any balance issues Mystery has.

While I'm not saying that Binding Blade is well-balanced, I do maintain that it accomplishes balancing feats that are almost unheard of in the series that make it edge out in the pile of balancing garbage and mediocrity that the early series has been so far in this marathon. For one thing, FE6 makes swordlocked foot units that are actually good, and it does it by making their points of strength (accuracy, speed and critting power) actually relevant and necessary to defeat a lot of foes, rather than this being yet another game where anyone can kill anyone with anything and thus it turns into a question of who can do it with the highest move and range coverage. For this reason, I have to disagree with the idea that FE6 is one of the most mount-dominated games. There are tons of functions in the army that basically no mounted unit can accomplish nearly as well as some of the footsoldier options. No mounted unit can kill bosses like Rutger can, and no mounted unit is nearly as good at using staves as basically any mage with a good staff rank, given that the magic stat of every playable troubadour is absolutely terrible. Plus, this game even gives you access to buyable boots, giving foot units even more of a chance to stay relevant.

Edited March 23, 2020 by Alastor15243

[Alastor15243]

Blazing Blade Day 6: Chapter 11

Okay, having not played Eliwood mode in a very long time, it suddenly occurs to me watching this intro that the opening narration is almost pathetically inadequate on its own. It assumes the player has already seen the intro to Eliwood mode, and, well, naturally the player has, given it's a prerequisite for getting Hector mode, but on its own, seeing the transition from Lyn Mode to Hector Mode as part of a continuous single narrative, this opening narration just does not remotely work at all without the additional information and exposition I'm positive I remember Eliwood Mode providing.

Oh wow. That utterly badass “enter the thief” map visual effect, where they spontaneously appear with that badass gusting visual flourish. I always pictured that as the thief/assassin just fucking dropping from the ceiling and making a three point landing on the floor.

“You called, Milord?”

I'm not sure if I should chalk this up to bad writing, or well-written short-sighted stupidity, but Hector doesn't trust Matthew, his brother's spy, to tag along with him on his adventure, but does trust him to arrange his escape in the first place?

Also, once the fight starts:

Hector: I thought you were one of them.

Matthew: Well I'm not! I'm one of me! And I'd like to remain in one piece!

Honestly, I would have probably used that opportunity to tie those two parts of Matthew's line together.

“Well I'm not! I'm one of me! And I'd like to stay only one of me!” or something like that.

So, this is a much more interesting map than basically every map in Lyn Hard Mode, and there seems to be a real threat, even with Hector's bulk, that getting too aggressive on this map will end in disaster.

One thing I've immediately noticed is that lockpicks are half as durable in FE7 as they were in FE6, which means it's gonna be even more important to steal the lockpicks from every thief I can. Including this one, who I'm going to have to lure over to this treasure chest somehow.

Hector's first level up is HP, strength, speed and defense, which is... outrageously encouraging. Until he caps, he's going to be an absurdly useful combat unit, and then hopefully once he finally promotes I can get him to catch up again. Hector's one of my favorite lords gameplaywise, and probably my least favorite thing about Hector Mode is the fact that it pushes his promotion even further back.

Looks like the thief decided to ignore the chest after I blocked it with Hector, and instead he's decided to just obsessively unlock every door he can find. This thankfully brought him exactly in range for Matthew, hiding behind a chokepoint Hector was guarding, to steal his lockpick without even having to kill all of the enemies Hector's busy holding off. Thankfully Matthew leveled up speed with his recent level up and thus could steal it.

The AI is surprisingly stupid, with archers running right up into Hector's face when all the other avenues of attack are blocked, thereby keeping the soldiers from being able to attack as well. I don't remember anything that dumb happening in FE6.

Hector's second level up is just HP. Fuck. Watching units level up can be terrifying sometimes. I understand and appreciate the benefits of making sure you never have quite the same stats on each replay, but I also wish more games had a safety net to get rid of that uncomfortable, always-physically-possible chance that your unit you've put so much work into will wind up worthless.

Alright, so, Hector's conversation with Wire reminded me: this is the Black Fang. I mean, that'd be cool and mysterious and all if you were somehow playing Hector mode as your first playthrough, but... you can't do that. So you have to know what they and their motivations are, and so you have to ask:

The fuck are they doing here?

Were they really after Hector? Why? And how the fuck did they even know he was leaving? I mean, given that the Black Fang conclusively employs extremely skilled assassins, sure, maybe they have spies and soldiers stationed in every capital on the continent, ready to act at a moment's notice, and sure, maybe they wanted anyone who planned on sniffing too closely around Elbert's disappearance promptly silenced, but if their spy network is that vast, surely sending him and Eliwood on a wild goose chase with a trail of false information would be a far more practical and effective use of their manpower than attacking Hector in the middle of his own castle!?

Because I can see two reasons, just off the top of my head, why this is a terrible idea:

1: There's no way they'd really be able to sweep his death completely under the rug and make it look like a mysterious disappearance. Not when the crime scene is inside the castle itself, in the immediate aftermath of a noisy battle. And if they can't cover it up, killing Hector like this something something sleeping giant something something terrible resolve.

2: This is a strategy that, as Matthew points out, would fail instantly if Hector simply swallowed his pride and alerted the nearby castle guards!

Honestly, unless I'm missing something, which as I've said before plenty of times I'm entirely open to accepting, this feels like a terribly thought out excuse to give Hector a fight in Castle Ostia before he meets up with Eliwood. And in fairness, I can only fault their execution, not their motivations. Their head was definitely in the right place thinking that spending time in Castle Ostia was important. Lord Uther just did not have that many opportunities for characterization in this game, and it would be damn near unacceptable storytelling to reveal his tragic death later without using this opportunity to explore Uther and Hector's relationship at least a litle bit more. I just wish they came up with a less clumsy excuse to put a fight here.

...Oh thank goodness, Hector got basically every stat but defense this level up. That more than makes up for the last one.

I find it kind of annoying that Hector simply tells Matthew his own words will be good enough for an oath of loyalty, despite clearly mistrusting him earlier. They've got this really weird variation of the “vitriolic best buds” relationship that I can't quite pin down or make sense of at the moment.

But at any rate, that's it for today. The chapter's over, and I don't want to make a habit of rushing these shorter chapters now that the ironman challenge is gonna start to have serious, dangerous potential consequences.

Take care, everyone!

[Eltosian Kadath]

1 hour ago, Alastor15243 said:

Thankfully Matthew leveled up speed with his recent level up and thus could steal it.

Its honestly kinda funnier when Matthew doesn't level speed, so they have a speed tie and you can have Matthew, and the other thief repeatedly steal the lockpicks back and forth until Matthew gets his first speed level.

 

1 hour ago, Alastor15243 said:

Were they really after Hector? Why? And how the fuck did they even know he was leaving? I mean, given that the Black Fang conclusively employs extremely skilled assassins, sure, maybe they have spies and soldiers stationed in every capital on the continent, ready to act at a moment's notice, and sure, maybe they wanted anyone who planned on sniffing too closely around Elbert's disappearance promptly silenced, but if their spy network is that vast, surely sending him and Eliwood on a wild goose chase with a trail of false information would be a far more practical and effective use of their manpower than attacking Hector in the middle of his own castle!?

I think its far more likely this is part of the Lord Darin plot that the Black Fang are still "helping" with. All Nergal wanted from Darin was to have him start a war in Lycia to farm for Quintessence, so killing off Hector, or failing to kill off Hector with the more incompetent Laos assassin to take the blame would both help push Lycia towards that war they wanted.

[Alastor15243]

22 hours ago, Eltosian Kadath said:

Its honestly kinda funnier when Matthew doesn't level speed, so they have a speed tie and you can have Matthew, and the other thief repeatedly steal the lockpicks back and forth until Matthew gets his first speed level.

Oh shit, you can steal even if you tie? Duly noted.

22 hours ago, Eltosian Kadath said:

I think its far more likely this is part of the Lord Darin plot that the Black Fang are still "helping" with. All Nergal wanted from Darin was to have him start a war in Lycia to farm for Quintessence, so killing off Hector, or failing to kill off Hector with the more incompetent Laos assassin to take the blame would both help push Lycia towards that war they wanted.

Oh, I am going to probably have some stuff to say about Darin and the Black Fang's "alliance" when that comes into greater focus. But that is an interesting possibility.

 

Blazing Blade Day 7: Chapter 12

Alright, I decided to read up on the script of Eliwood Mode for these first two chapters, and yeah, for a story mode that has lots of hidden, extra, canon story content, it's kind of unacceptable how much Hector Mode just does not include of the beginning plot. And honestly, this whole thing of focusing on Hector, while I'm still reserving judgment until I see the whole thing... feels kind of weird. This isn't his story. He's very much a supporting protagonist in this tale. As I remember it, this is mostly just us seeing Eliwood's story with some added touches of Hector's perspective, with the story focus only changing when it absolutely has to due to gameplay impact, like with getting the legendary weapons from their resting places. The narration may treat Hector like the main character, but Eliwood is still the guy who does everything, and the guy everything happens to. So it feels weird that Hector Mode is the “complete” experience with the extra chapters, especially since, as I said, it's very much not a “complete” experience when it comes to being a stand-alone narrative. Hell, there's barely any reason for this mode to even exist. Most of the extra chapters, to my knowledge, could be told without the added emphasis on Hector at all. I'll have to see what Hector does with the “main character” role, and see if he does anything to justify this storywise.

Also, and I remember Mekkah pointing this out from what little of that massive series I've watched, when Eliwood hears of Laus preparing to go to war with an unknown enemy, Eliwood decides that's the best lead he has and decides to head there to check it out. But the way he says it implies he had literally no leads and didn't actually have a planned destination in the first place when he was “setting out”.

...But the next chapter's narration seems to suggest something much more reasonable, even if slightly indirectly. The narrator says that Eliwood knew that Lord Elbert visited Ostia before his disappearance, and that Eliwood suspects he went through Santaruz on the way there. Given that has literally nothing to do with the new information about Laus, I guess we can chalk this up to Eliwood's dialogue in Chapter 11 being a really clumsy way of saying “after we visit Santaruz, which we were going to do anyway, Laus will be a good next step in our investigation.”

But if it weren't for the narration, the actual dialogue of chapter 12 Eliwood Mode would suggest that going to Santaruz before going to Laus was entirely the tactician's idea, purely to request support, given how dangerous Laus seems to be of late. Which would make this terrible. But thanks to the narration, I can assume that this is just something that the tactician told Eliwood would be a good idea while they're in the area, and that Eliwood did in fact have an idea for where he would actually be going when he left the castle.

But this whole deal with the beginning of Eliwood mode seems to suggest that not only are Pherae's spies not as good as Ostia's, but that it might not even have spies at all. Ostia, and by extension Hector, knows full well about how suspicious Laus is being at the moment, while the first Eliwood is hearing about that whole affair is from some random village elder's brother.

...Alright, on to the battle proper. And holy shit is this a major gear shift from the rest of the game. Yeah, honestly this is another reason why I wish Lyn Hard Mode were harder: to make a more consistent difficulty curve between that... and this.

And also, unless there are some strategies I'm not seeing here, this seems to be another extremely-strict opening level where victory is very RNG-reliant. The main offenders here are the pegasus knights, who need to be dealt with promptly or else they'll swarm and kill your only healer. I really don't care for this sort of thing at all, as 1: it can make ironmanning an unpleasant crapshoot, and 2: demanding the player simply get lucky or die when they haven't had any chance to customize their army isn't really a test of their skill, is it? It's not really much of a test of anything, really, once they figure out the “correct” outcome they have to try their luck on. I'm not saying every attack should be guaranteed to hit, but the player should have some breathing room to retreat and fall back if things go horribly wrong, and these pegasus knights really interfere with that.

Not to mention, these pegasus knights, with stats intentionally designed with the base stats of muliple starting units in mind, have a 1% crit chance on several units they can instantly one-shot with a crit. Which is... why? Why do you feel the need to do that, game? Doing that later, sure, shit like that can happen with low-luck units, but when these units are literally all you have to work with, and you've had no time to train your army to come up with workarounds?

Also, I hate it when games give characters a personal weapon and nothing else. Usually it's tolerable because it's a sword, and there are plenty of swords in your army, but when it's an axe, and when you then put this guy on the opposite side of the map in chapter two, and put enough enemies between the two of them that the axe will be half used up before it's over because the hand axe isn't quite reliable enough to deal with these must-be-killed enemies... seriously?

Also, I just found a way to put into words why I find GBA fighters so lame:

They look like damned gym teachers! They look like if the physical amalgamation of every goofy-looking public school gym teacher in all of western media, albeit with less of a gut, was made to go grumpily chop firewood by the back of the school while wearing basketball shorts! Everything about this class just looks so undignified and goofy, and it's honestly kinda sad, because characters like Dorcas have really nice character designs.

Curious how the bandit leader is apparently from Caelin. Wasn't he hired by Ephidel and/or Helman? What's he doing all the way over here? Was he driven out of Caelin by the bandit purge Lyn inevitably set into motion the instant she got the political clout to do so?

At any rate, I just barely managed to feed the boss kill to Eliwood with a combined assault from him, Bartre, Rebecca and Lowen, with Marcus on standby in case anything went wrong.

Holy shit is Marcus's power overwhelming at this point in the game. He's nothing like FE6 Marcus, who needed his silver lance to kill. Here he's like 4 ish points away from killing some of these enemies in one hit, let alone two! And yes, he's going to fall off big time by the endgame, but going by his averages, that's mostly because of his terrible speed and defense growths. His strength and skill are still going to wind up in the 20s. Hell, if the lategame enemies are as terrible as everyone says, I may still be able to use him the whole game through!

Actually, speaking of his high skill, I think it's cool that the Jagen of this game has skill as his best stat. Honestly, it would be cool to do that with one of the old Jagens. Give them terrible old man bases and terrible old man growths, but put their skill base and growth super high to reflect the immense experience behind that broken body of theirs. Not only would that be great from a story perspective, but it's a really useful trait for an early-game panic button to have: reliability.

Anyway, Eliwood gets HP, speed, skill, luck and resistance for his first level up. The speed is very much appreciated. The sooner he can get out of this non-doubling mediocrity state he's in, the sooner he might actually be able to do shit.

And this ending conversation confirms that Hector's knowledge of Eliwood's mission came from Ostia's vast intelligence network, because Eliwood never told him.

Curious how the dialogue regarding Serra and Matthew, both before and after the fight, seems identical here to what it was in Eliwood mode when you couldn't use them until chapter 13.

Curious how Matthew doesn't seem willing to tell Eliwood that he's a spy, and would rather still pretend that he's a criminal.

“Experienced bounty hunters and mercenaries are vanishing...”

Is the implication of that that these are exceptional people who have been harvested for their quintessence? Or is that either Darin or Nergal making a lot of new hires?

Also, now Dakota's back with us, and... yeah, this feels... outrageously odd, to go a full chapter and a half of story and two whole chapters of gameplay without the supposed POV character. I mean, we've seen stuff outside of the tactician's POV before, but to have two entire maps take place without the chick supposedly giving all the orders in-universe even talking to Hector's group?

Honestly, having the tactician be in Ostia instead of Pherae when the story starts for Hector Mode would have probably been better. Picture this: either when Matthew is handing Hector his food and weapons (either that or when Matthew shows up again when the chapter 11 battle is about to start), he brings in the tactician and says he thought to enlist the help of an old friend who happened to be in the area, thinking a tactician would be extremely valuable for Hector and Eliwood's coming adventure. This would be even better than what happens in Eliwood Mode, because Matthew, unlike Eliwood, can actually vouch for the tactician's skill firsthand, not just by reputation.

But at any rate, the chapter is over now. And by the way, even though this is an ironman, I've been cycling through save slots in case I royally fuck up the ironman and have to start over non-ironman style from an earlier chapter. So this way I always have the last two previous chapters saved.

But with that, I'm out. Stay safe, everyone!

[Interdimensional Observer]

I actually mistook the ear visible on GBA Fighters for being a really off-centered and grumpy face. 

Agreed on Jeigans specializing in Skl, nobody can break the game with a super Skl stat, yet it still has some usefulness. HP/Str/Skl I think is a good spread for a Jagen overall, if you keep their Def and Spd in check, they can't do supreme ORKO enemy phasing and thats good. One strong, guaranteed hit is nice niche. Though, I do think Reina is fairly balanced, if perfectly usable to the very end of BR and Rev, with her Spd emphasis and average Str.

As for Birds of a Feather, my strat for Eliwood's group is to rush Marcus to the southern hill at the very end of the map. Once Marcus secures it, Eliwood is placed atop it, and the bandits and boss are now forced behind a chokepoint to fight a red-haired wimp whose WTA and +30 Avoid terrain lets him safely reap a bunch of early EXP.

 

8 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

Also, now Dakota's back with us, and... yeah, this feels... outrageously odd, to go a full chapter and a half of story and two whole chapters of gameplay without the supposed POV character. I mean, we've seen stuff outside of the tactician's POV before, but to have two entire maps take place without the chick supposedly giving all the orders in-universe even talking to Hector's group?

If you skip Lyn Mode, the Tactician doesn't exist in Eliwood/Hector Mode, at all. I hear it was possible to skip Lyn Mode even on a first playthrough in Japan if you used a GBA link cable to connect FE6 to FE7. So, the main story of FE7 had to be written without the Tactician in mind.

You needed to use a link cable too, if you wanted to see the extended epilogue scenes with Roy & Lilina and Zephiel & Jahn without completing FE7 8-11 times.

[Alastor15243]

28 minutes ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

I actually mistook the ear visible on GBA Fighters for being a really off-centered and grumpy face.

I am immensely intrigued now. Any way you can show me what you mean?

28 minutes ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

If you skip Lyn Mode, the Tactician doesn't exist in Eliwood/Hector Mode, at all. I hear it was possible to skip Lyn Mode even on a first playthrough in Japan if you used a GBA link cable to connect FE6 to FE7. So, the main story of FE7 had to be written without the Tactician in mind.

Ah yes, I am aware of this. Still though, when he does exist, it's weird for there to be this strange period where he isn't the player character he's supposed to be.

28 minutes ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

You needed to use a link cable too, if you wanted to see the extended epilogue scenes with Roy & Lilina and Zephiel & Jahn without completing FE7 8-11 times.

That I did not know! I never realized they made that automatic in the western versions! Damn, that's... I mean that would have been crazy for me as a kid, suddenly seeing Roy in a game I thought I'd seen everything in after playing it a ton of times. Given how in love with the game I was, I've no doubt I beat the game enough times to meet those requirements. But that's still one hell of a ridiculous wall to hide that behind.

Edited March 25, 2020 by Alastor15243

[Jotari]

What I really hate about the extra Hector chapters is that they're not Gaidens. They don't anything of value to the actual plot, yet they take up numbered chapters! This means all the chapters are out of sync between Hector and Eliwood after the first one. You can't just say chapter 21 to refer to anything, because you need to specify which Chapter 21. Which is wholly unnecessary.

1 hour ago, Alastor15243 said:

I am immensely intrigued now. Any way you can show me what you mean?

Ah yes, I am aware of this. Still though, when he does exist, it's weird for there to be this strange period where he isn't the player character he's supposed to be.

That I did not know! I never realized they made that automatic in the western versions! Damn, that's... I mean that would have been crazy for me as a kid, suddenly seeing Roy in a game I thought I'd seen everything in after playing it a ton of times. Given how in love with the game I was, I've no doubt I beat the game enough times to meet those requirements. But that's still one hell of a ridiculous wall to hide that behind.

A number of completions above one is usually a silly barrier to hide content around, but I can see the sense in making it only available with a link cable. You yourself have expressed some confusions about those scenes as a child before being able to play Binding Blade. They kind of aren't part of this story and just serve as a bridge to something that's already published. It's not really vital content, just fan service. So only making it available to people who know are looking for that fanservice and have the context for it makes some sense.

2 hours ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

I actually mistook the ear visible on GBA Fighters for being a really off-centered and grumpy face. 

Agreed on Jeigans specializing in Skl, nobody can break the game with a super Skl stat, yet it still has some usefulness. HP/Str/Skl I think is a good spread for a Jagen overall, if you keep their Def and Spd in check, they can't do supreme ORKO enemy phasing and thats good. One strong, guaranteed hit is nice niche. Though, I do think Reina is fairly balanced, if perfectly usable to the very end of BR and Rev, with her Spd emphasis and average Str.

As for Birds of a Feather, my strat for Eliwood's group is to rush Marcus to the southern hill at the very end of the map. Once Marcus secures it, Eliwood is placed atop it, and the bandits and boss are now forced behind a chokepoint to fight a red-haired wimp whose WTA and +30 Avoid terrain lets him safely reap a bunch of early EXP.

 

If you skip Lyn Mode, the Tactician doesn't exist in Eliwood/Hector Mode, at all. I hear it was possible to skip Lyn Mode even on a first playthrough in Japan if you used a GBA link cable to connect FE6 to FE7. So, the main story of FE7 had to be written without the Tactician in mind.

You needed to use a link cable too, if you wanted to see the extended epilogue scenes with Roy & Lilina and Zephiel & Jahn without completing FE7 8-11 times.

Wait, are you saying Reina's a jagen? Or just that she's useful while focusing on those stats?

Edited March 25, 2020 by Jotari

[Interdimensional Observer]

4 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

That I did not know! I never realized they made that automatic in the western versions! Damn, that's... I mean that would have been crazy for me as a kid, suddenly seeing Roy in a game I thought I'd seen everything in after playing it a ton of times. Given how in love with the game I was, I've no doubt I beat the game enough times to meet those requirements. But that's still one hell of a ridiculous wall to hide that behind.

Only in North America. I don't know why, maybe Nintendo of Europe thought "there is no chance this older game will come our way, so why have these teasers towards it?", but for whatever reason, the Roy & Zephiel scenes were outright removed in the European version, so I've read.

 

4 hours ago, Alastor15243 said:

I am immensely intrigued now. Any way you can show me what you mean?

You see that old SF emoji thing, and how the grin exists only on half of its face? Look the Fighter combat sprite, and pretend its ear is the half-grin seen here, except not happy, or nice-looking. Because the character of Fighters is burly and not so nice. The Hand Axe posture for some reason is particularly associated with "Fighter grumpiness" to me.

I have a hard time re-seeing this after I realized the mouth was an ear, but it I swear I saw it, and didn't stop seeing it until... I forget when, but it could've been after Awakening or even Fates. So a decade of this mistaken notion.

In a slight defense, I was young and impressionable to fantasy. And in a second defense, how many other GBA sprites have ears? Pirate and Bandit and thats it.

 

2 hours ago, Jotari said:

What I really hate about the extra Hector chapters is that they're not Gaidens. They don't anything of value to the actual plot, yet they take up numbered chapters! This means all the chapters are out of sync between Hector and Eliwood after the first one. You can't just say chapter 21 to refer to anything, because you need to specify which Chapter 21. Which is wholly unnecessary.

Agreeing on this annoyance. Talons Alight would be fine as a forced Gaiden of False Friends. And as distinct (and not in a bad way) as Crazed Beast is in gameplay, it is very filler, if very apparent why it's Hector Mode only too. At least Talons Alight has connection to Kinship's Bond's enemies, if not the most compelling or in the slightest an important connection.

 

And @Jotari I consider Reina to be Jagen-ish. Not exactly, but she is old among the playables, early, prepromoted, and her total growths are unusually low when you look at everyones' total growths in Fates.

But Reina can cling on as useful from beginning to end through high Spd and just enough Str (with a good weapon, maybe a Str Tonic, and a OS or DS boost)  to score medium durability ORKOs throughout the game.

She's balanced, because her though she combines these things with flight, Reina is hopelessly fragile, and her Skl combined with the inaccuracy of Yumi (her preferred weapon) leaves her hit chances somewhat shaky. Reina has Darting Blow for that otherwise unassisted guaranteed PP doubling throughout the game, but no Archer access barring Morrin's love means no Certain Blow or Quick Draw, which would make her PP offense so good, Takumi, Setsuna, and Mozu would be practically obsoleted.

I might be wanting to make Reina a Jagen because I want to have a very balanced one in a post-FE6 game, where the idea permanently became being realistically able to use anyone from prologue to the epilogue. Yet I think I have a feasible Jagen case for her.

Edited March 25, 2020 by Interdimensional Observer

[Alastor15243]

Blazing Blade Day 8: Chapter 13

Jesus Christ. Looks like this mode is really gonna make a habit of throwing in extra pegasus knights.

Given that my starting formation is less than ideal and I have no idea how these enemies are gonna move and how overwhelmed I'm gonna get, I decided to play it safe, toss Marcus Bartre's hand axe, get him into range of one of the two archers and one of the two pegasus knights to the southeast, and just nuke them from orbit.

This proved slightly unnecessary with the power of hindsight, but I still think it was a good call with the information I had. Meanwhile, Oswin, Bartre and Dorcas went to secure Merlinus's village, because we definitely want Merlinus sooner rather than later.

Curious. I'm pretty sure this sprite for the village witch is the same as the one for the fortune teller I get in chapter 14. Are they the same person? I seem to remember this person being in a Lyn Mode village too though...

And yes, I'm well aware of the hilarious glitch that happens if you use this mine in the right way. I know, firsthand, that if you reset right as an enemy walks on a mine and then resume the chapter, you'll be in control of the rest of the enemy's turn, letting you do shit like have Vaida transfer her ridiculous enchanted spear straight into Merlinus's tent. You can do even crazier stuff in FE8 using a similar glitch, namely giving every single character in the game a dark magic weapon rank by stealing enemy-only rankless monster magic. That sounded really time-consuming though, so I never even bothered trying that one as a kid. But yes, I definitely had fun with the “uber spear”.

Bartre's first level up gives a full left column of HP, strength, skill and speed. Definitely encouraging, because I need this guy if I wanna finally see Karla.

At first I was scared that it was gonna be a really time-consuming slog to make it safe enough to charge Guy with Matthew, but thankfully, a turn after the reinforcements started showing up, he started charging, and wound up going right into Matthew's range.

Oh wow, I kinda forgot what a hilarious jackass Matthew is here. He says “I believe you told me you owed me your life,” and then Guy immediately reveals that Matthew made him say that, as a condition for being fed. Does Matthew make a habit out of shit like that, hoping for the moments like these where he gets to call one of these cards in? That's... I love it. That's brilliant.

Also, it's weird that Guy's static, not-talking face in this scene is smiling, while his expression immediately goes to the proper serious/angry face whenever he actually says his lines.

Alright, the major danger has passed. I've secured both villages (and it looks like they have at least slightly personalized lines for whoever visits commenting on Merlinus's dropped torch), and the reinforcements are being dealt with. Now it's just a matter of feeding kills now that the enemy numbers have thinned.

Suddenly a lot more forces came out, requiring some player phase tactics, but I didn't really have any reliable options, largely because I couldn't put Guy close enough without getting him in range of a hand axe bandit. Choosing to keep him and all others out of the range of said bandit so Hector could hand-axe him... turned out to be something of a mistake. But what I wound up doing was doing the least-likely-to-succeed but also least-dangerous-if-failed action first, to see if it worked: having Hector attack a sword cavalier with Wolf Beil while standing on a fortress. It worked, meaning I can now probably kill everyone but the archer. If I hadn't succeeded, I would have had everyone retreat to deal with them next turn, rather than risking one of my numerous squishies getting hit twice and killed.

Man, early-game cavalry are really tough in the GBA games so far. They're not as tough as they were in Binding Blade, that's for sure, but in the pecking order of how powerful enemy generics are, with soldiers on the bottom, cavalry are pretty damned near the top.

Shit! I completely forgot to check if these guys are the Black Fang or just corrupt guards turned against Helman-

...Nope, looks like the boss's description confirms, they're part of the Black Fang.

How progressive of a guild of assassins to hire so many knights.

...Oh! Looks like only the boss is part of the Black Fang. His generic boss dialogue says everyone else was just a pack of hired mercenaries.

My efforts to feed the boss kill to Hector (even he struggles to do damage to the bastard without his Wolf Beil) were thwarted by Marcus getting a crit on him when I was trying to soften him up. Ah well. Such is life. I did manage to buy a ton of hand axes, which are going to be super useful in this game, way more useful than they were in Binding Blade.

Oh hey, it's King Batou, except it's way, way more believable that he's still alive!

Alright, so, Helman “told Elbert about Darin's plans”. I'm gonna have to remember that, because from what I've heard, the game is unclear how much Lord Elbert was really in on this whole Lycian conspiracy, and I wanna see if I can piece together enough clues to at least make a plausible headcanon.

...Look Helman, I know you're dying and probably can't think too straight, but simply telling Eliwood to “go to Laus” and that “Darin knows all”... I'm pretty sure that almost allows Erik to set a trap for Eliwood due to the ambiguity of how willing to talk Darin'll be and how dangerous he is.

Kind of amusing that the “steward” of Santaruz uses the same sprite as the equivalent guy in Caelin in Lyn Mode.

But more importantly, I like how they actually address the political consequences of a dead ruler, and Hector and Eliwood give pretty reasonable-sounding instructions for the people to follow. Honestly, so far, the story's holding together pretty well, and again, the actual narrative aspect, as in the actual act of telling the story wholly apart from what the story is, is definitely the best in the marathon so far, and that's to be greatly commended. Still bracing myself for when things apparently get supremely dumb though.

Take care, everyone! Stay strong, stay safe!

[Alastor15243]

Blazing Blade Day 9: Chapter 13x

Oh god. Fog of war, ironman, with no preparation screen and no ability to control who starts where.

As usual, the beginning part is always the scariest, but with fog of war and (apparently) ambush spawns, I need to stay as far away from the darkness and forts as I can. But I still want whatever's in that damned village. Initially I sent Marcus up north to clear the way, which worked, but he took way more damage than I expected. I healed him up and everything, but wow.

Anyway, he's guarding the east now. I have Oswin holding on to Merlinus since he's the only one who can still take pretty much just as much of a beating even with halved speed.

HOLY SHIT WHAT!? THIS HAS NOMADS!? NOMADS ARE COMING FROM THE FORTS!?

JESUS FUCKING CHRIST, GAME! YOU PUT THE UNITS WITH THE HIGHEST ATTACK RANGE OF ANY UNPROMOTED UNIT IN THE ENTIRE GAME... ON MAPS WHERE THE PLAYER STRUGGLES TO SEE PAST THE END OF THEIR ARMY'S NOSE!?

Thankfully I got the torch transferred from Serra (who used it once at the beginning) to Matthew, so now I can see exactly what's going on and what places I need to defend.

WHAT THE FUCK IS WITH THE SHEER NUMBER OF REINFORCEMENTS HERE!? HOW THE FUCK WAS I SUPPOSED TO GET TO THAT VILLAGE IN TIME WITHOUT KNOWING WHERE THE-

...Deep breaths...

...In hindsight, I should have given Matthew the torch before the end of chapter 13. I knew a fog of war map was coming, and I didn't do that, and that cost me valuable information I could have very easily obtained.

Still, holy shit does this make me question the viability of a changes-blind ironman run of this mode. There was practically no window to visit that village at all, especially not once the sheer numbers of enemy reinforcements clogged up the path there. I basically would've had to send Marcus over immediately. Which I was going to do, until something demanded his attention, unknowingly costing me my one window to get what may be my only money for a while. And even if I hadn't chickened out, he might very well have died when he got trapped away from my army unless I gave him basically all of my vulneraries.

Looks like I'll be selling Erk's goddess icon for cash.

...Still, mere survival has been reasonable enough. Enough of my army is tanky enough at base to guard enough of these bottlenecks, and if you're proactive at getting rid of enemies, then not every area will be swarmed at once.

I've learned my lesson here: Don't take chances with villages. Visit them immediately, and send the goddamned Winged Hussars.

Hopefully, if this mode is reasonable, that will be enough.

Alright, so I succeeded. Not exactly with gusto, but nobody died, and I got Merlinus.

...Curious that, unless Merlinus is just kissing ass here, Pherae is apparently right after Ostia in terms of how much authority and respect the houses of Lycia command. I always got the impression that it was just another one of the non-Ostian houses of roughly equal standing. Before Eliwood and Roy, what did Pherae do to get this reputation?

“It's nice to be appreciated for a change. Lately, people just seem to want us dead.”

Ah, blunt, understated humor. How I love it.

And then, of course, there's the line. That incredible line that I'm frankly shocked never became as memetic as “Ike, father of Sothe's children”:

“Lord Eliwood! Lord Hector! Take me into your bosoms and keep me safe forever!”

I love how even Eliwood is a little phased by that absurd, borderline homoerotic line, and actually pauses a second before he can give a polite response.

Hector doesn't seem to give a single shit, however. He just gets straight to business, letting him be as weird as he likes without comment, as long as he does his job. That... wasn't what I was expecting, but now suddenly that strangely sounds very much like him. He's never been one for manners, after all. Makes sense he wouldn't be too phased by people being weird.

Well, this chapter was short but stressful. And a very big eye-opener of how proactive I'm gonna have to be if I don't want to get slowly eaten alive by my lack of resources. Also, I have no money, so I'll have to find a way to make my current supplies of stuff last.

Take care, everyone! Next map is gonna be a fun one!

...I hope.

[Interdimensional Observer]

Not sure why the Peg Knights were added to Hector Mode, maybe to make Hector even easier to train? Or to spice up the early chapter a little?

 

Money shouldn't be a problem later, but I do tend to spend most of mine right before Dread Isle, even if I buy too much for a mere 2-4 chapters. Using Dart may hinder that b/c 25k in funds when sold, from the Ocean Seal but if Rath doesn't work out, you'll have every Orion's Bolt to sell. And, Silver Card, which is Hard Mode exclusive and I don't get that. -Though now I remember exists, and best Peg sis must be recruited.

 

37 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

And then, of course, there's the line. That incredible line that I'm frankly shocked never became as memetic as “Ike, father of Sothe's children”:

“Lord Eliwood! Lord Hector! Take me into your bosoms and keep me safe forever!”

Sothe and Ike making love and standing besides their two daughters is an image most can bear. Merlinus resting his head on Hector's pecs as Eliwood strokes his hair, is to our ageist minds with a narrow conception of beauty an abomination that must be destroyed!

[Eltosian Kadath]

1 hour ago, Alastor15243 said:

HOLY SHIT WHAT!? THIS HAS NOMADS!? NOMADS ARE COMING FROM THE FORTS!?

JESUS FUCKING CHRIST, GAME! YOU PUT THE UNITS WITH THE HIGHEST ATTACK RANGE OF ANY UNPROMOTED UNIT IN THE ENTIRE GAME... ON MAPS WHERE THE PLAYER STRUGGLES TO SEE PAST THE END OF THEIR ARMY'S NOSE!?

Side note its the ambush spawn nomads, particularly the ones that can come from the fort in the right hand corner, that I rather despise the most.

 

1 hour ago, Alastor15243 said:

But I still want whatever's in that damned village. Initially I sent Marcus up north to clear the way, which worked, but he took way more damage than I expected. I healed him up and everything, but wow.

Yeah those guys can take down Marcus if you aren't careful. The fog of war can make it rather difficult to determine how much damage might be heading your way.

 

1 hour ago, Alastor15243 said:

 

I've learned my lesson here: Don't take chances with villages. Visit them immediately, and send the goddamned Winged Hussars.

Hopefully, if this mode is reasonable, that will be enough.

A better way to get that village is to send Guy (and possibly an axe bro is you can spare one) to take the south eastern forts and distract anything that can sack it from that direction, and keep your defense on the two northern bridges of the main island long enough that the brigands in the north attack you instead of the village, then send either the fort takers or Marcus after the village once things have settled down a bit on one of those fronts.

 

1 hour ago, Alastor15243 said:

Also, I have no money, so I'll have to find a way to make my current supplies of stuff last.

Ouch, that is going to be harsh. Money ceases to be a problem later, even as early as Lyn's return, but before that I find you have just about enough money to sustain yourself, so being down about 5K will hurt a lot.

I am guessing you didn't see Puzon the boss of this chapter, as you kinda have to go out of your way for no benefit other than the XP, but figured I would ask.

[Alastor15243]

5 minutes ago, Eltosian Kadath said:

I am guessing you didn't see Puzon the boss of this chapter, as you kinda have to go out of your way for no benefit other than the XP, but figured I would ask.

I'm aware he's fightable, but no, he never really came up.

[Boomhauer007]

Incidentally I believe this is the last chapter without the prep screen. I think it's also the last chapter with ambush spawns but I may be off on that. 

The beginning is the hardest part of fe7 ironman, once you get to noble lady of caelin the game just starts handing you great units (and Lyn) in almost every map.

[Jotari]

7 hours ago, Boomhauer007 said:

Incidentally I believe this is the last chapter without the prep screen. I think it's also the last chapter with ambush spawns but I may be off on that. 

The beginning is the hardest part of fe7 ironman, once you get to noble lady of caelin the game just starts handing you great units (and Lyn) in almost every map.

I can only speak for myself, but Genesis is the chapter that kicked my rear end the hardest in Hector Hard Mode. I think the limited deployment slots really hurt there as you have so few units to deal with so many mages. Night of Farewells is also infamously bullshit.

[Eltosian Kadath]

7 hours ago, Boomhauer007 said:

 

The beginning is the hardest part of fe7 ironman, once you get to noble lady of caelin the game just starts handing you great units (and Lyn) in almost every map.

If you skip Lyn mode Noble Lady of Caelin is one of highest run enders of ironmen due to how terrible the starting stats and equipment of Lyn's crew are, with a few misses it can be almost impossible to save Lyn from her own incompetence. 

40 minutes ago, Jotari said:

I can only speak for myself, but Genesis is the chapter that kicked my rear end the hardest in Hector Hard Mode.

Genesis is particularly odd in that it is the only maps in FE7 that is made easier if you trained an Archer.

[Alastor15243]

Blazing Blade Day 10: Chapter 14

So, the narration describes Merlinus as a “droll merchant”, and honestly, the word “droll” doesn't sound like what it means. I hear that word and I assume it means the opposite of “amusing in a weird way”.

Wow. I'm assuming this is a Hector-Mode-only thing, but the narration outright spoils that Leila is a good guy by using her portrait as one of Ostia's spies. That's supposed to be a surprise in Eliwood mode, I know.

Darin: How are they coming here!?

Ephidel: Perhaps when they went to Santaruz, Lord Helman was still clinging to life...

Okay, Ephidel, I get that you're not technically an assassin, but you're a shadowy cloaked figure working with a bunch of assassins, and created by an evil magical genius for the express purpose of being a shady backstabbing agent of conspiracy. How can you be that bad at killing people? If you were in a hurry or got distracted by something more important, I can understand not being absolutely thorough with the job, but...

...Okay, in fairness, they weren't expecting Eliwood to make it, and had planned for him to die. But that's another thing: why did you send a bunch of mediocre lackeys after him when the last batch of mercenaries proved insufficient!?

...Right, well... ugh... that's actually a problem with a lot of games that don't make it clear how much of the power level scaling in gameplay is actually canon, and if they really got that much more powerful over the course of the game...

...Fuck it, let's just get back to the game.

...Huh. Hector says he's gonna “go for a ride” to survey their surroundings. So he can ride a horse? Well gee, that would be helpful to do in combat, wouldn't it?

I like how Hector, the presumably brash and reckless one, is the one who suspects a trap. Oswin helps, but Hector clearly had his own suspicions.

Oh shit. I forgot. Apparently hard mode doesn't have the fortune teller. Well, I mean... I get that, kinda, but it would still be nice to have a reminder for people who haven't played the game in a while but wanna do a harder mode anyway.

Incidentally, I checked the rest of the “Fortune” menu, and apparently I've got five stars in everything but tactics (speed), which I have to assume is due to all the faffing about in Lyn mode to get Nils to level 7.

Oh shit. Glad I checked this. I'm so used to Erik using a silver lance that I may have just assumed that without looking. But on this mode it's a horseslayer, which means whoever I send after the guy, it can't be Marcus or Lowen.

I'm also dangerously short on vulneraries, especially when I know I'm gonna have to leave someone behind to defend Merlinus, and I only have one healer at the moment (though that will hopefully swiftly change). Thankfully (I swear to god I initially accidentally mis-typed that as “Tankfully”), Oswin should be good as long as he has a few vulnerary uses, and Matthew can steal us a batch with some rescue-dropping tactics on turn one by stealing from that knight.

I'll take the secret book from storage, because given my financial situation that shit's definitely getting sold. Marcus will take care of that, while he's going off to save Priscilla. If I have time before more reinforcements show up from behind (I really want to get out of here before Merlinus gets overwhelmed), I'll sell the goddess icon too.

Alright, I've been skating around this, waiting for it to actually come up, and now that I'm okaying my preparations, it has. Part of this never occurred to me until just today, but I kinda hate part of how Merlinus was implemented in this game. Most of it I like. I like how he can actually realistically level up now, and I like how he creates these optional “defend your base” missions for a bonus reward. However...

I don't like the “Deploy Merlinus?” prompt. First off, because it happens after you've prepared, and if the positioning of Merlinus ever becomes a problem for first-turn tactics, I'm gonna be docking some usability points for that. Not much though, since this is still going above Binding Blade in a landslide.

Second off, because as far as I can tell, there's literally no benefit to saying “no”. If you deploy him and he survives, you level up. If you deploy him and he doesn't survive, he doesn't level up. If you don't deploy him at all... he still doesn't level up, and you don't get to use your merchant at all.

It's one of those things where it's hard to believe people came up with it and didn't realize the problem. Frankly, I'd have made it so that if you don't deploy him, he still levels up, or that if you deploy him and he dies, he loses a level. Something to create a situation where you'd actually want to not deploy him if you don't feel you can protect him. As it stands, there's literally no reason not to, even if you're certain he's going to die. And that makes the question utterly meaningless.

I was about to kill the soldier by the northern village, but then I realized that if I do that, there's no guarantee that Erk isn't gonna be an idiot and go chase after the entire army and get himself killed despite his great stats. So I let the soldier live and simply bait him in with Rebecca, hoping that the soldier will attack her instead of Erk (who would slaughter him in a single round and thus be in the same position of having no convenient soldier to attack when his turn arrives). This way, I'm hoping Serra can talk to him immediately. He'll be great to have on the team if I can make this work.

I really hope I can make this work.

...It didn't work as hoped. The soldier attacked Rebecca from a space out of Erk's range, causing Erk to take a potshot at a soldier from across the cliff. Not the worst outcome, but now I have no guarantee he won't run uncontrollably away from Serra before she can recruit him.

OH THANK GOD.

That was terrifying for a little while, but thankfully, with no one to attack, Erk went towards Serra, with enough time to spare to recruit and heal him before anything went horribly wrong. I also managed to take care of the initial enemies fast enough to send Marcus to kill the pirates before they could sack the southern village. Funny how it seems the pirates have also developed a mountain branch, judging by how bandits come from the mountains at the same time as the pirate calls for the normal pirates to appear. How enterprising of them!

But yeah, holy shit. I totally get Marcus's psychotically high position on the tier list now. The idea of not using this fucker on Hector Hard Mode frankly strikes me as psychotically insane. These maps are clearly designed for you to use the shit out of him in certain spots if you want to get the job done. Even with his overwhelming power and mobility, you still have barely any room for error. Marcus is the absolute last unit I would want barred from my team in any run of this mode. And while I get that now...

...I kind of also don't like it. If I had a unit of this overwhelming power in a game I made, ideally I'd make it something of a situation where you have multiple jobs to do, and you have this one badass you can send to singlehandedly do any one of these jobs with ease, but only one. Basically a sort of panic button where it's up to the player's discretion what challenge they feel they need him for, or if they're willing to risk not using him to try to get the job done with people who have more to gain from it. Contrast that with here, where it's painfully obvious the exact thing they want you to use your paladin for. This feels very “figure out the one single solution” puzzle-y here, which is a complaint I have a lot about the beginnings of some hard modes. There's really no need for it, especially since none of them can keep up that kind of difficulty forever. I much prefer the modes that start out easy, but gradually get nightmarishly hard.

Oh man, Erk and Serra's dialogue here... I can't tell whether Serra's really so egotistical that she interpreted “You're the last person I wanted to see” as “I wanted to see you again”, or if this is some kind of counter-snark, like the one from Pirates of the Caribbean:

Norrington: You are, without a doubt, the worst pirate I've ever heard of.

Jack Sparrow: But you have heard of me.

Forgot to mention this earlier, but it's curious that this isn't a seize map. Which means I don't have to have Hector go towards the castle. Maybe I should leave Hector behind to guard the tent? ...Nah, he's my best shot at killing Erik.

Man, making Serra be the one who has to recruit Erk is surprisingly dickish on Hard Mode. Your only healer has to go off doing an extremely time-strict job that lets her spend very little of her time healing. Especially if you then want the village. Now half of my army is gravely injured, and I still haven't managed a single turn to use a heal staff because I needed Eliwood and Erk to team up to kill the mercenary that was blocking me from blocking the village from the bandit, and thus Serra had to literally block the entrance with her body.

Oh yeah. This scene. This scene where Erik calls for reinforcements. I remember this scene vividly. I love it from a writing perspective, though from a plot perspective... I have some grave issues. Or at least I think I do. Let's watch.

Holy shit. Watching Ephidel talk Darin into abandoning his own son in order to escape... I mean I get that he was in deep shit and had to evacuate or die, but leaving his own son behind... and being talked into doing it that easily... honestly, this made me feel really bad for Erik as a kid. And itt still is really sad, even now that I know that it doesn't make him grow up in any way by the events of Binding Blade.

That said though, why the fuck are they even taking Darin? They're using him to start a war in Lycia. Near as I can tell, that plan's fallen through, and he has very, very little to offer them at the moment. What exactly is he doing for Nergal on the Dread Isle in chapter 19, exactly? Is he funding them? Or was it an elaborate ruse so they could eventually harvest his quintessence? I mean, when Nergal makes those mega-morphs in the final battle, Darin's one of them, so that suggests, for all of his foolishness and cowardice, he has some kind of quality that makes him ideal for that sort of thing. Did he have a shitton of quintessence due to his raw ambition or something?

...Wait, maybe the plan hasn't completely fallen through yet. I seem to remember Darin and Ephidel having a conversation about Darin abandoning even his own best men and relying entirely on the Black Fang for protection, and it didn't happen here. But I kno that at that point, Darin should have basically nothing left to offer if he isn't just being tricked for Quintessence farming. But then Ephidel should have been able to do that himself, right? What's going on here?

...But at any rate, back to gameplay, where the remaining cavalry charges and then it starts raining. I really, really hope that if/when the rain stops, it happens at the beginning of my turn.

Christ. This means it'll be a few more turns before I can get Priscilla.

Interestingly, it looks like houses are clearer terrain in rain than plains are. Cavalry seem to be able to cross it with just one move. Well, I mean, I guess they have roofs, but I don't think that really helps horses move around them better...

Alright, the rain's stopped. Good news: It happened at the beginning of my turn, so the game doesn't pseudo-ambush you by suddenly changing how far the enemies can move on the enemy phase without warning.

But I mean really, what kind of a low bar is that? Why even bring it up? Do I really expect any game in the series to screw up like that?

What travesty of a game would think that was an okay thing to do?

HAHA. I KNOW, RIGHT?

Let's move on.

The bad news is that Erik and most of his cavalry are chasing the more fragile units I sent on that mission to get Erk: Eliwood, Rebecca, Serra, and Erk himself, obviously, followed by the wounded units I sent off that way to get healed: Dorcas (who's unarmed so that Marcus can have an iron axe), Bartre, Matthew and Guy. They've all been healed up, which is good, but now basically the whole Lausian cavalry troop is charging between that cliff and that village at them.

Which means my best bet is probably to bottleneck with Eliwood from the space directly east of the southeast corner of the village. That way, I can fit a healer and a ranged attacker adjacent to him, and have him tank as much of this as he can, gaining some sorely-needed exp in the process.

Honestly, I wish it were remotely realistic on Hector Hard mode to see what happens when Erk visits Priscilla's village. Guess I'll have to read that from the website.

Oh, that's nice! They have basically the same conversation in a talk event if you don't use Erk to recruit her.

SWEEET. Secret Books sell for 4000 gold. That is way better than I was hoping! I thought it was just gonna be 2k! Looks like we've got money after all!

FUCK. I forgot about Merlinus. One of the pegasus knights made a beeline for him. Looks like that's one more chapter I'll have to wait before getting his wagon form. Now I also have to finish my shopping immediately too, if I wanna buy much of anything.

Erk continues to get stupidly good glass cannon level ups, hitting both 10 magic and 12 speed at level nine. Best part? This apparently isn't even that far off from his averages! He's only blessed by 1 in speed and 2 in magic!

Erik's gone down, and in the process Eliwood's reached 10 speed, which means it should probably get easier to train him now that he can double things. But I'll be feeding some more kills to him now, because why not? My tactics rank is already burned into the ground, and even if it weren't, this isn't even a ranked run!

I'm gonna be pairing Priscilla and Erk together since I've never seen their supports, but I also hear that he's the only exception to her infamously tragic romantic options.

Hmm... So Darin “always” felt Laus deserved to rule over Lycia. I wonder if there was anything beyond “because that would make me king and I want to be” that made him say that. It'd be interesting if a remake could expand upon the lore of the territories of the Lycian Alliance.

Okay, so, we have Erik saying that Elbert approved of the idea of rebelling against Ostia. And we know everything else he's saying is the truth. So despite the source, there's some credence there. But we don't know the context or the full picture here either.

But we also have him mention Darin and Elbert argued a ton about Elbert not trusting Ephidel and the Black Fang, which suggests that either Elbert change his mind quickly, or this entire thing was a ruse to learn more about the Black Fang.

Oswin seems to feel these “rumors”, as he puts them, are enough to justify basically severing ties with Eliwood and Pherae entirely, while Hector doesn't believe that Elbert is a traitor at all. I honestly get the feeling that we're not supposed to believe Erik, but I also weirdly don't remember this plot getting... any closure at all.

Honestly, this talk between Oswin and Hector feels... weird. The only way I can justify Oswin spontaneously kneeling and swearing his service to Hector is that he's either trying to avoid being sent away in case Hector does wind up betrayed by Elbert somehow, or the entire thing was a ruse to test Hector's judgment and whether or not he'd throw Eliwood under the bus over these rumors. Beyond that, this conversation feels... whiplash-y.

...But, at any rate, we've got that done, and come Monday, it'll be time for the first Hector-Mode-exclusive chapter of the game! Stay tuned! But more importantly, stay safe everyone!

[Interdimensional Observer]

2 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

Incidentally, I checked the rest of the “Fortune” menu, and apparently I've got five stars in everything but tactics (speed), which I have to assume is due to all the faffing about in Lyn mode to get Nils to level 7.

Lyn Mode does not affect rankings in E/H Mode.

 

5 minutes ago, Alastor15243 said:

Oh man, Erk and Serra's dialogue here... I can't tell whether Serra's really so egotistical that she interpreted “You're the last person I wanted to see” as “I wanted to see you again”, or if this is some kind of counter-snark, like the one from Pirates of the Caribbean:

Just yesterday, I saw the Japanese of this was slightly different. Erk grumbled to himself "you're the one person I didn't want to meet". And Serra heard him say that, minus two consecutive syllables that by her not hearing them, changed the meaning to "you're the one person I want to meet".

So, the English isn't snark, just her either ignoring or misunderstanding the "last" in "last person I wanted to meet".

[Alastor15243]

1 minute ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

Lyn Mode does not affect rankings in E/H Mode.

Jesus Christ. How did my speed ranking tank that quickly!?