Garcia solorun

[mangasdeouf]

Hi,

I don't know if it's right to call it solorun (I use thieves, Seth/Vanessa to carry weak forced units and to low turn maps like chap 7 but they don't fight except for ch5 where I had to use Vanessa and Natasha to draw the bandits from the skill tome house) but Garcia is doing all the damage and usually the only one to see combat screen.

Now, I plan on using him as a Warrior instead of hero. Why?

Lv 20 Garcia (in my file):

39 HP, 20 str, 17 skl, 9 spd, 7 lck, 9 def, 5 res.

Why not hero? Well, by the time he promotes, he'll have gotten the speedwings from Amelia, reaching 11 spd, by then he doesn't get doubled much at all, and after promotion he will be able to pump everything into strength (again) and soon OHKO everything in sight. So, why would he need 2 speed if it doesn't allow him to double much at all, while a 30 str cap would allow him to OHKO many ennemies he couldn't OHKO in hero with only passable speed?

For the record, hero gives +1 hp and +2 spd over warrior and looses 1 def and 2 res. 2 res is absolutely key in the later chapters where there are mages everywhere (especially great mogalls who fly to you) and 2 late game magic bosses who hit like trucks, have mediocre speed at best (still low chance to double as a hero against the old man in Rausten) and the 7+7 res he gets from his actual res + warrior + pure water mean he can tank much longer their hits (2 speed for him doesn't mean he will dodge more so...)

For swordies, he will get swordslayer in 13B , hoplon guard in 15, and he gets all the dragon shields and talismans (2 or 3 before endgame chapters) so he'll rock a solid 12+2+2(+2) def and 7+2+2(+2) res meaning 16/18 def and 11/13 res with his lv 1 warrior stats. What should I add? the only thing I have to worry about with 18/20 res (pure water) is stone, because I don't want him to be hit several turns in a row. It seems like swordreavers can be bought in the Narube river armory during chapter 17. Oh, and many of them loose speed to their own weapon weight so, there's that.

He also gets the swiftsoles, because it has to go somewhere useful. Then he'll become Mountcia.

With Garm, he also has virtually 14 speed, 16 with 1 speedwings, 18 with 2 and 20 with 3. That's not enough to double the demon king, but I guess 3 spd are quite easy to get from his 20% growth in 19 level ups (less than 1 with hero but still, 1 chapter of doubling 1 ennemy<11 chapters of better defensive stats and around 7-8 chapters of better strength when he beats hero strength). Plus instead of 14 or 15 con he has 16 so no penalty for wielding about any axe in the game including the weaviest ones (maybe there's 1 axe with 18 weight, that's all) and even then, with 1 body ring he can wield all axes without spd penalty (anyway he's too heavy when promoted to be pegasus'd so might as well use all his possibilities if you want to have fun fighting).

What are your thoughts? I hope that wasn't too long. I think I've made it clear why I think he's better as a warrior, but if you can convince me to go hero, I'm waiting for your own explanation, why hero is better and how this speed will help me more in beating the game with Garcia alone than the +5 damage from max strength and +2 res.

[eclipse]

If you're gonna solo, you might as well rig his speed a bit!  Though he joins at level 4, so you've got slightly less time to do it in.  Also, rigging three speed looks slightly less irritating than rigging one speed and two res (if you went Hero).

[mangasdeouf]

4 hours ago, eclipse said:

If you're gonna solo, you might as well rig his speed a bit!  Though he joins at level 4, so you've got slightly less time to do it in.  Also, rigging three speed looks slightly less irritating than rigging one speed and two res (if you went Hero).

I don't understand what you mean by rigging his speed. If you talk of save-scumming to try and get more speed on level ups, I found it very annoying in FE8 since the game is scripted to get fix level up at the start of the chapter and you have to use save slots and try 10 different combinations of pathing to get a different level up, only for it to be worse than the original one in some cases.

If I recall correctly, my Garcia has average def and speed (he had 7 def but I gave him the 1st dragonshield to get 9). He may have 1 or  more skill and about average strength (18+2 with the ch7 stolen energy ring). I don't want him to be better than his average, I want to show that Garcia is better than we usually talk of him.

With the ch8 seraph robe he has 46 HP, so I think 9 def will be enough while spamming elixirs in chapters with high speed pacing like 10B (which will be hard, I think I may take out the f***ing mercenary group at the beginning with Seth and a silver lance because Garcia needs to hit them to reach further and get to Duessel, or just use Ephraim a little since Garcia is lv capped for 2 more chapters anyway and I need to get to that house for the hero crest so Garcia can finally get exp again and not lag behind with his unimpressive unpromoted speed and def that will get him killed by axe wielders who hit him in the face and swordies before I get the swordslayer). Past that point (and only because it's impossible to do it otherwise without high luck since his hit vs mercenaries is that bad, around 60-65 with steel and in the 70-80s with iron but he doesn't kill them in one hit with iron) he will solo, but if he can't promote 'till 13 he can't solo for sure.

If only the 1st promo item gave you the choice of unit you can promote (I could still cheat for a master seal/hero crest since any cavalier/knight would already be promoted at that point, it's just plain bad design to get a magic unit seal ch5, a bow unit seal ch6, a knight crest ch7 and only a hero crest ch10B or 13A, so I guess to solo you need to even the odds by giving the same chance to everyone instead of bias towards one unit type (or in this case against one unit type). It's not like my Garcia reached level 20 3 chapters ago already...

[eclipse]

3 hours ago, mangasdeouf said:

I don't understand what you mean by rigging his speed. If you talk of save-scumming to try and get more speed on level ups, I found it very annoying in FE8 since the game is scripted to get fix level up at the start of the chapter and you have to use save slots and try 10 different combinations of pathing to get a different level up, only for it to be worse than the original one in some cases.

RNG manipulation.  If you're on emulator, save state abuse is the easiest.  If you're not, then get Garcia a hit away from leveling right before you end the chapter.  Then, have Garcia level as soon as the chapter starts.  If you don't get speed, restart the chapter, burn a RN, get the level again, etc.  If you're crazy/patient enough, you'll eventually hit that speed level.  Take note of how many numbers you burned (in case you need to do it again), and go on with the chapter.  If you have save states, create one right before Garcia levels.

3 hours ago, mangasdeouf said:

If only the 1st promo item gave you the choice of unit you can promote (I could still cheat for a master seal/hero crest since any cavalier/knight would already be promoted at that point, it's just plain bad design to get a magic unit seal ch5, a bow unit seal ch6, a knight crest ch7 and only a hero crest ch10B or 13A, so I guess to solo you need to even the odds by giving the same chance to everyone instead of bias towards one unit type (or in this case against one unit type). It's not like my Garcia reached level 20 3 chapters ago already...

Assuming you're talking about Garcia hitting level 20 Fighter, you still have time!

Still, good luck.  Gorgons suck.

[mangasdeouf]

10 hours ago, eclipse said:

RNG manipulation.  If you're on emulator, save state abuse is the easiest.  If you're not, then get Garcia a hit away from leveling right before you end the chapter.  Then, have Garcia level as soon as the chapter starts.  If you don't get speed, restart the chapter, burn a RN, get the level again, etc.  If you're crazy/patient enough, you'll eventually hit that speed level.  Take note of how many numbers you burned (in case you need to do it again), and go on with the chapter.  If you have save states, create one right before Garcia levels.

Assuming you're talking about Garcia hitting level 20 Fighter, you still have time!

Still, good luck.  Gorgons suck.

Thanks, I still suck at RNG manipulation (I only know for sure how to get the boots in Lagdou and was deceived when I understood by experience than you can't get them outside Creature Campaign).

Uh, Garcia was 20 fighter before the beginning of ch7.

I finally decided to change a knight crest into a hero proof, because there's no reason cavaliers should have 3 chapters more in their promoted class than weapon locked foot soldiers. I did it right before starting ch9. Now in chapter 14 with a lv 15 or 16 Garcia who got 5 speed lv ups (sitting at 16spd with only 1 speed wings), 29 str (1 energy ring before promo one from ch13), 24 skl (1 secret tome, couldn't reach the balista boat with the 2nd secret tome), 13 lck (1 goddess icon), 19 def (dragonshield from ch5, maybe there was another one after that, I don't remember where you get the second one) and 13 res (only 1 talisman! told you warrior was a good idea, he would have 11 in hero but here he has 13, he barely takes any magic damage and even before eating it he took 15 damage from Selena's bolting with 57-60 HP) and capped HP of course with only 1 seraph robe pre-promotion to stay relevant before promo.

So I have a rock with a beard and muscles walking his way in the park, with barely 1 full elixir used per chapter (only for safety because sometimes I use it when midlife, it helps with surviving the occasional crit, although only bosses deal 2 digits damage). His throwing axes reck havoc on the battlefield (I even saved 1 use of the hatchet in order to refill it with staves for dodgy ennemies). He runs with 4 axes (2 throwables, 1 iron 1 steel) and OHKOs most ennemies or doubles most of the ones he doesn't OHKO (mostly high HP ennemies like great knights, fighters and such).

That was my 2 cents on Garcia, even without the speedwing with 14 speed he would be very usable and if his strength followed its average instead of lagging behind he would have capped strength or nearly without any energy ring involved, and he would have around 55-56 HP, a little less res maybe (let's say 2 points) so 9 res before talisman.

Oh, I just realized I made a mistake on the promo gains, it's 2 def/res for hero against 3 for warrior, so there's only 1 point difference (doesn't change OHKOing later vs not OHKOing though, which was the main reason for warrior promotion). Also his D bows rock, even if I only got to use them in ch10B and 11B for the moment.

By the way, I had to use Duessel and a bit of Seth to be able to recruit Duessel (and Tana dodged 1 wyvern attack to draw it from Cormag so she would have an easier time to recruit him). Duessel died on the phantom ship because of stupid forced deployment of Ephraim (Duessel was the only one who could carry him in this oppressive chapter with many 20-25+ damage ennemies) and finally I shouldn't even have tried recruiting L'Arachel and Dozla, since Duessel died because of that and L'Arachel got suicide like the idiot she is while Dozla was killing the Mogalls she could have survived instead of the gargoyles who came at her. (Phantom ship is one of those poorly designed chapters where you must go fast but there are 50 ennemies blocking the path and 15 flyers trying to kill your <20 HP recruitable unit without any saving mechanics helping you, since pegasi are way too fragile to fight gargoyles while carrying people and Cormag didn't even get time to be trained before that chapter so he takes 8-10 damage per gargoyle attack, 12+ per mogall attack while having early-game-Garcia-tier accuracy, so he's perfect to use as a handicap to yourself, all that plus the damn fog...)