Tips for no Online, no DLC, no New Game+ Maddening Classic run?

[Hanes]

I can't buy the DLC, I don't want to feel like I am cheating by "inconsistencies" from Online and New Game+ so I'm not using them. 

What tips do you have? Should I be overly concerned for how good or bad my level ups have been?

EDIT: I am playing Golden Deer, progressing from BE -> BL -> GD -> BE(SS) in ascending difficulty, so I guess BE tips is also cool.

Edited September 28, 2019 by This boi uses Nino

[eclipse]

As someone whose Switch currently does not have that difficulty. . .

- Blue Lions has the easiest start.  You've got a tank in Dedue, two nukes named Dimitri and Felix, an early relic in Sylvain (22 MT is not something to sneeze at), and Mercedes as the best healer.  Annette can function as an early rallybot (and a dancer later on), Ingrid can fly relatively quickly, and Ashe can get items from chests/open doors for free and poke with Deadeye (IMO he's the weakest of the bunch, since he's a growth character).  Sylvain can also tank fairly well, if given the correct class path.
- Recruit the faculty ASAP!  That means shoving a bunch of levels into Byleth.
- Get your mages Heal ASAP.  That's free experience.  You want free experience.
- Plan your class routes early on.  You have less experience for instruction, so make them count!
- Also, make sure you don't waste lectures (as in, you have two free slots, and no one has motivation).
- The greenhouse and the fishing spot are your new hangouts.  They give free professor levels.  Well worth it IMO.
- Sniping Lorenz may not be the worst idea, even if it'll take a bit longer.  Thyrus gives your mages enough range to poke at archers safely.
- Birthdays mean tea time, full stop.  Because you get Charm.

Edited September 28, 2019 by eclipse

[Boomhauer007]

Anybody that tells you need to reset because of level ups is wrong.

As for actual tips, without knowing what route...

- The faculty are great RNG fail safe fall backs, Catherine in particular has ridiculous stats if recruited early. Don't be afraid to switch out units with bad levels.

- There are very few maps that penalize you for playing slowly. Don't be afraid to take a bunch of turns early game if you think you need to because unless you have Dedue there are very few characters that can take multiple hits on enemy phase.

- Go west in the mock battle. Your divine pulse recharges between part 1 and 2 of chapter 5 so go nuts using it on those pass reinforcements. Also, if you aggro the archers of the top of that map the entire map will rush you down.

- Gambits are your friend, use them a bunch. Enemies have sky-high charm,  not everybody will be able to land attack gambits all the time. Support gambits are as busted as they've always been.

 I can come up with more but I can come up with more but that's a basic start.

 

[redlight]

53 minutes ago, eclipse said:

- Recruit the faculty ASAP!  That means shoving a bunch of levels into Byleth.

You can actually spam gifts and get an immediate support with them if you do 1 fast travel which will make the requirements easier. However there are specific chapters that recruiting them becomes available that'll you'll have to check from the recruit requirements page here.

[Modirufa6317]

Unless you're going the Crimson Flower route, DO NOT neglect any students from your main house : it is crucial for chapter 13.

Use gambit boost (putting up to 3 other units in position where they can attack the target enemy with their equiped weapon) to make the most out of offensive gambit. You may want give the best damage gambits to units with the highest charm (including the MC and lords of course) and save supports gambits for those with the lowest one.

[Hanes]

Spoiler

2 hours ago, eclipse said:

As someone whose Switch currently does not have that difficulty. . .

- Blue Lions has the easiest start.  You've got a tank in Dedue, two nukes named Dimitri and Felix, an early relic in Sylvain (22 MT is not something to sneeze at), and Mercedes as the best healer.  Annette can function as an early rallybot (and a dancer later on), Ingrid can fly relatively quickly, and Ashe can get items from chests/open doors for free and poke with Deadeye (IMO he's the weakest of the bunch, since he's a growth character).  Sylvain can also tank fairly well, if given the correct class path.
- Recruit the faculty ASAP!  That means shoving a bunch of levels into Byleth.
- Get your mages Heal ASAP.  That's free experience.  You want free experience.
- Plan your class routes early on.  You have less experience for instruction, so make them count!
- Also, make sure you don't waste lectures (as in, you have two free slots, and no one has motivation).
- The greenhouse and the fishing spot are your new hangouts.  They give free professor levels.  Well worth it IMO.
- Sniping Lorenz may not be the worst idea, even if it'll take a bit longer.  Thyrus gives your mages enough range to poke at archers safely.
- Birthdays mean tea time, full stop.  Because you get Charm.

Why should I recruit Faculty that quickly? Like I understand Shamir, but the rest?

2 hours ago, Boomhauer007 said:

Anybody that tells you need to reset because of level ups is wrong.

As for actual tips, without knowing what route...

- The faculty are great RNG fail safe fall backs, Catherine in particular has ridiculous stats if recruited early. Don't be afraid to switch out units with bad levels.

- There are very few maps that penalize you for playing slowly. Don't be afraid to take a bunch of turns early game if you think you need to because unless you have Dedue there are very few characters that can take multiple hits on enemy phase.

- Go west in the mock battle. Your divine pulse recharges between part 1 and 2 of chapter 5 so go nuts using it on those pass reinforcements. Also, if you aggro the archers of the top of that map the entire map will rush you down.

- Gambits are your friend, use them a bunch. Enemies have sky-high charm,  not everybody will be able to land attack gambits all the time. Support gambits are as busted as they've always been.

 I can come up with more but I can come up with more but that's a basic start.

Oh yeah forgot to mention it was GD. Still thank you though.

10 minutes ago, Modirufa6317 said:

Unless you're going the Crimson Flower route, DO NOT neglect any students from your main house : it is crucial for chapter 13.

Use gambit boost (putting up to 3 other units in position where they can attack the target enemy with their equiped weapon) to make the most out of offensive gambit. You may want give the best damage gambits to units with the highest charm (including the MC and lords of course) and save supports gambits for those with the lowest one.

Alright this is very useful but why not do it for Crimson Flower? It's still the house units isn't it? Unless you mean SS?

 

[Boomhauer007]

Every ch13 except Crimson Flower is fighting bandits to reclaim the monastery where your allies slowly trickle in, sometimes in bad spots against high level enemies. CF ch13 is just a normal map.

GD specific stuff: Rush Lysithea to dark spikes if you want to easily take out ch4 death knight (Luna works well too, just less cheese). After that, pump everything into faith for warp.

Doing Lorenz paralogue as soon as it's available can turn Lysithea into the delete button she always is. Incidentally, this map can be warp skipped if you choose to since Acheron has lower stats than random enemies in the map.

Hilda's personal is incredible early game, especially for bows doing chip damage.

Lorenz and Ignatz are susceptible to being stat screwed, everyone else should be fine.

[Shadow Mir]

43 minutes ago, Boomhauer007 said:

GD specific stuff: Rush Lysithea to dark spikes if you want to easily take out ch4 death knight (Luna works well too, just less cheese). After that, pump everything into faith for warp.

Isn't the Death Knight going to be too durable at that point? Especially since iirc, he has more resistance than defense.

Speaking of which, he moves in chapter 4 in Maddening, so STAY AWAY.

[SatsumaFSoysoy]

55 minutes ago, Shadow Mir said:

Isn't the Death Knight going to be too durable at that point? Especially since iirc, he has more resistance than defense.

Speaking of which, he moves in chapter 4 in Maddening, so STAY AWAY.

Nope, kills him in one hit.

 

If you can hit 14 AS on someone (usually Byleth with Rally Spd from Ignatz, there are probably other ways to adjust), you can bait Death Knight without getting doubled, though he does have like 30% crit rate.

[Shadow Mir]

7 minutes ago, SatsumaFSoysoy said:

Nope, kills him in one hit.

 

If you can hit 14 AS on someone (usually Byleth with Rally Spd from Ignatz, there are probably other ways to adjust), you can bait Death Knight without getting doubled, though he does have like 30% crit rate.

Aren't his stats boosted too? Because I'm not seeing Lysithea getting strong enough to do it with the experience cut.

[SatsumaFSoysoy]

Just now, Shadow Mir said:

Aren't his stats boosted too? Because I'm not seeing Lysithea getting strong enough to do it with the experience cut.

Well you probably need to chip him a little bit with Gambits, but Lysithea can easily hit lv 5 or so before Ch 4, and will do around 40 damage with Dark Spikes.

[Shadow Mir]

24 minutes ago, SatsumaFSoysoy said:

Well you probably need to chip him a little bit with Gambits, but Lysithea can easily hit lv 5 or so before Ch 4, and will do around 40 damage with Dark Spikes.

That doesn't answer my question. Besides, aren't gambits likely going to whiff because your charm is much lower than his at that point?

[SatsumaFSoysoy]

1 minute ago, Shadow Mir said:

That doesn't answer my question. Besides, aren't gambits likely going to whiff because your charm is much lower than his at that point?

Your question being, does he have boosted stats? Yes.

You can hit high hit rate with Gambits by abusing supports, which is easy since you're baiting him into your circle of friends. I literally just did this last night.

[Wuzzy]

In addition to everything else that has been said...

• Black Eagles has a more difficult time in Maddening, specifically Crimson Flower route due to the limited access to resources. Less available units (no Catherine, Hilda, Seteth or Flayn), less paralogues (paralogues give Chapter exp, as opposed to aux battle exp), and an incredibly steep level curve in Part 2 due to CF route having less chapters overall. Black Eagles also don't have a reliable dedicated tank besides Edelgard and Byleth (Ferdinand needs time, Petra relies on dodging usually and can't take more than 1-2 hits, Caspar needs a lot more time than Ferdie due to low base Speed and mediocre bulk growths). 
• Female Byleth > Male Byleth because she can go Pegasus Knight for early flying utility, and can transition easily to Wyvern Lord/FalconKnight
• Don't underestimate Rallies, rallies are incredibly useful in this game, especially early on. Characters with access to good Rallies early on include Annette (Str/Spd), Ignatz (Spd), Raphael (Str), Hubert (Magic), and Ingrid (Magic) are good. Situational Rallies like Dorothea's Rally Charm are also pretty useful later in the game as well.
• Debuffing arts/spells are also good. Spells like Mire and Swarm are very useful early, while arts like Break/Waning Shot are also useful but come a bit later. Seal stat abilities from units like Hilda, Ferdie, and Ignatz are also handy.
• Take advantage of late recruiting students so you can focus on just a handful of units early on, and then recruit students late since they'll join with pretty solid stats. Students that benefit from late recruitment include Leonie, Petra, and Ingrid.
• Training weapons are better than Iron weapons in most cases early on. The extra AS training weapons give > extra might iron weapons give, especially with jacked up enemy speed stats in the early chapters. 
• Give every physical unit a bow, even those with Bow banes like Sylvain. Every unit really needs to have access to some sort of range chip to make the early chapters a lot more manageable.
• Tea time is beneficial because of more Charm, if you have leftover Activity Points, use them on Tea Times for your main units
• Maddening mode is a lot more manageable past Chapter 4/5 and gets "easier". The only chapters you need to watch out for is Chapter 12/13 (Thieves chapter) and the final chapter of each route.
• Hanneman is honestly better in Maddening than most people give him credit for, considering he's regarded as a "worse" Dorothea by a lot of people. He joins with pretty good bases for his level despite his late join time and has access to a very solid Reason pool. Lacks utility and speed obviously but, he makes up for it by having more fire power. Also since he has a crest, he can wield Thyrsus without the negative effects of it which is nice.

Edited September 29, 2019 by Lunarly

[kremelover]

Sylvain can be recruited for free with female Byleth.  Getting him early could make the run easier.  You can soft reset the game, after the first turn, if the level ups were a waste.  Lastly, using combat arts effectively will keep durability up! More durability = more $. 

[Palasid]

Currently going through Maddening GD now, and lemme tell you: Ignatz gets Rally speed and that helps.

[MisterIceTeaPeach]

In general Byleth and Lys are your best friends in combat. 

Byleth is the best enemy phase unit when she has some breakers and usually will not get doubled by Death Knight. Lys will oneshot 90% of the enemies and magic also ignores terrain boosts. That also means enemies with 50 speed are no threat. Furthermore Catherine is great because she can double and ORKO a lot of enemies early on. Hilda should also be able to hit hard. 

Rallies have much more value because they are required to double / ORKO or not getting doubled. Annette has STR / SPD rally which is fantastic. 

Since enemies have breaker skills magic is also much needed in maddening. 

 

These are units I would recommend to recruit (free ones excluded):

• Petra (similar offensive unit as Hilda and affinity for flying) 
• Annette (strength speed rally) 
• Linhardt (warp) 
• Ingrid (flyer and magic rally) 

Iirc Bernadetta also has access to rescue, but I doubt it would work well with her low magic. 

 

[eclipse]

7 hours ago, This boi uses Nino said:

(snip)

Cyril joins as a Commoner, which means crappy class growths, so you want him out of that class ASAP.  Catherine can go either way, but having an auto-BRV weapon can help your students out.  The rest require some time to join.

[Elephantus]

5 hours ago, kremelover said:

Lastly, using combat arts effectively will keep durability up! More durability = more $. 

Explain this one to me please. o:

[DefyingFates]

6 hours ago, Elephantus said:

Explain this one to me please. o:

Conserving durability = less money spent repairing/ replacing your weapons 🙂

[Elephantus]

1 hour ago, DefyingFates said:

Conserving durability = less money spent repairing/ replacing your weapons 🙂

That I get, but how does using combat arts conserve durability? If anything it's the opposite.

Hang on, your point is that using them effectively rather than just spamming them is what saves durability, right?

(I tend to be an idiot, don't mind me)

Edited September 29, 2019 by Elephantus

[DefyingFates]

3 hours ago, Elephantus said:

Hang on, your point is that using them effectively rather than just spamming them is what saves durability, right?

(I tend to be an idiot, don't mind me)

That's it!

And no harm done, we all have our moments 😛

Edited September 29, 2019 by DefyingFates

[Shadow Mir]

19 hours ago, SatsumaFSoysoy said:

Your question being, does he have boosted stats? Yes.

You can hit high hit rate with Gambits by abusing supports, which is easy since you're baiting him into your circle of friends. I literally just did this last night.

You do realize you just contradicted yourself about Lysithea being able to one shot him, do you not? Not that I'm shocked that someone tries to hype her up and fails - she's honestly the single most overrated character in the game.

Edited September 29, 2019 by Shadow Mir

[Anathaco]

On 9/29/2019 at 10:26 AM, Shadow Mir said:

Besides, aren't gambits likely going to whiff because your charm is much lower than his at that point?

IIRC, his charm stat on maddening was actually lower than some of the enemies on that map. Byleth had higher charm than him, and the rest of my units only had 1 or 2 points lower than his. I think my hitrates on him (with gambits) were around 75-80%. Could be better, but not bad by any means. 

And yes, Lysithea is strong enough to finish him off with Dark Spikes, even with nerfed experience + his slightly boosted stats. Granted, she needs Dark Spikes to do so, but a B in Reason isn't so hard to achieve by that time, even with reduced study XP on Maddening.

 

[Silly]

If you want to kill the DK in chapter 4 you sort of need a unit that doesn't get doubled by him (or defense blessed Dedue), which isn't the easiest requirement. You might need to plan out some speed cooking ahead of time. (If you start with BL/GD you can probably get Annette or Ignatz to Rally Speed by then if you focus Authority, which trivializes the requirement).

The Death Knight moves on Maddening, and being a mounted unit his threat range is way higher than your unit's attack range. You probably need to bait him with a unit first before you take him out. There's no way Lysithea gets into range to attack the DK without somebody baiting him to move first (or alternatively some convoluted shove chain).

Also, Knightkneeler + Steel Lance has 28 might versus the Death Knight, which goes a fairly long way towards killing him, so you don't really have to use Lysithea. You'll need some other damage as well, but given that you are already baiting him with a unit that doesn't get ORKOed by him, you probably have the ability to put some extra damage onto the DK.

In later chapters you have Knightkneeler + Lance of Ruin, which has a ridiculous amount of might versus the DK, so you can probably just one-shot him with anybody that has C lances. Spear of Assal also works post-timeskip on anybody that has A lances.

Edited September 30, 2019 by Silly