Final Battle Impossible?

[Quickpawmaud]

I have not played in a while but last couple days just tried to rush through the end of my church playthrough. It was really easy to just solo with Byleth but now the final battle is impossible. I can’t get to Rhea without everyone other than Byleth dying and he can’t tank so many monsters. I tried killing the monsters one at a time but there are way too many and all my units die in one hit sometime two. Do I have to just start completely over wtf why is the last mission so hard. I am only playing on hard casual mode.

[Darkmoon6789]

While I haven't played the church path. I actually found Rhea in the Crimson flower a path to be rather easy on hard. Still, the final bosses are usually pretty difficult, especially on maddening. The verdant wind and azure moon final bosses were really tough. 

Are you attempting a solo run?

[Quickpawmaud]

No I was just trying to finish the game quickly so I can start new game plus. I guess I will try lowering the difficulty to normal and just remember to not rush through the months skipping training.

Edited May 20, 2020 by Quickpawmaud

[Dark Holy Elf]

If you're just trying to finish, you might as well lower the difficulty to Normal. The SS final battle is quite a step up from the previous maps.

[Zapp Branniglenn]

It's the hardest finale in the game by far. I remember getting bored too since none of the post-time skip chapters compare to this nonsense. Most of the monsters (maybe all? Don't remember) in that map deal magic damage instead of physical, so holy water might be worth chugging. You've also got some ballistae to work with near the start, but it won't be long before you find yourself retreating straight south around where you first cut off reinforcements. Unfortunately you can't stop reinforcements until after one spawns, so don't just head there at turn 1 or the first beast will just eat somebody squishy.

Once you've taken out all the enemies aggroed to your position, you can head back to the start and snipe some of the immobile beasts with ballistae. Let your snipers or war masters do it, since their crit rates are naturally very high, and you just need to break one piece of armor to start critting. Finally, for the boss, you may want to split up the army to hit her from all six sides, since her AoE is every turn and hurts a bunch. Better to have two people that need healing instead of your whole army. I would see if getting the armor break is possible with large gambits, but don't spend too many pulses trying to rig it since you only have one turn to work with before they all regenerate. It's often better to just repeatedly break the same pieces of armor and have your attackers all focus on that spot for damage.

Edited May 20, 2020 by Glennstavos

[Darkmoon6789]

8 minutes ago, Glennstavos said:

It's the hardest finale in the game by far. I remember getting bored too since none of the post-time skip chapters compare to this nonsense. Most of the monsters (maybe all? Don't remember) in that map deal magic damage instead of physical, so holy water might be worth chugging. You've also got some ballistae to work with near the start, but it won't be long before you find yourself retreating straight south around where you first cut off reinforcements. Unfortunately you can't stop reinforcements until after one spawns, so don't just head there at turn 1 or the first beast will just eat somebody squishy.

Once you've taken out all the enemies aggroed to your position, you can head back to the start and snipe some of the immobile beasts with ballistae. Let your snipers or war masters do it, since their crit rates are naturally very high, and you just need to break one piece of armor to start critting. Finally, for the boss, you may want to split up the army to hit her from all six sides, since her AoE is every turn and hurts a bunch. Better to have two people that need healing instead of your whole army. I would see if getting the armor break is possible with large gambits, but don't spend too many pulses trying to rig it since you only have one turn to work with before they all regenerate. It's often better to just repeatedly break the same pieces of armor and have your attackers all focus on that spot for damage.

What exactly is it that makes it so much harder than its Crimson flower counterpart? Is it the level around it? Presumably it is the same boss

[Moltz23]

...that sounds like Silver Snow's endgame, allright.

First things first, you want to clear the lower half of the map as soon as possible and put someone sturdy enough in marked tile at the bottom of the map so the White Beasts can stop spawning. If you don't do that, Rhea will heal herself as soon one of those things get near her.

After that, clear the left & right side of the map and slowly make your way to Rhea while accounting for the stupid high range of her AoE attack. Once you get near her, start focusing on breaking her barrier so your units can make actual damage and take her down eventually (breaking the whole thing is very difficult to do so however, as she has an unique skill which repairs it as soon she gets to attack during enemy phase, so if you wanna go for it then save as many of your gambits as possible).

Other tips:

* As @Gleenstavos said, most monsters deal magic damage rather than physical (the only exception being Rhea herself), so you might wanna account for that. Also, while the White Beasts get Miracle when they're weakened, they also have a ton of weaknesses so anything effective to monsters/dragons/flying units should take care of them quickly.

*Watch out for every enemy called something like Crazy Church Boss/Cardinal; those guys are really tough and will most likely have brave weapons, powerful spells, and Miracle so if you have any unit that could conceivably lure them while avoiding damage can help a ton with taking them down later.

Edit:

23 minutes ago, Darkmoon6789 said:

What exactly is it that makes it so much harder than its Crimson flower counterpart? Is it the level around it? Presumably it is the same boss

Long story short: you lack a lord character and their broken battalions, there are a ton of enemies with miracle, many minibosses are disguised as normal enemies at first glance, the White Beasts can overwhelm you quickly if you don't block the tile which makes them spawn and the map has so many enemies it legit makes the console lag in hanheld mode.

As far the final boss goes, Rhea pulls a bait-and-switch and appears to be far weaker than she actually is at the beggining of the battle, she has stupid high stats and a charm stat which is gonna make most of your charm-weak units miss their battalions, she has an exclusive skill which not only allows her to pull her AoE attack in her turn without having to charge it, it also heals her barrier as soon she attacks in enemy phase, she has another skill that heals her health whenever a White Beast gets near, AND lastly, she also happens to have Miracle (because of course she does).

When the devs said the Silver Snow route was made with being the most difficult route in mind, they weren't bluffing.

Edited May 20, 2020 by Moltz23

[SSbardock84]

If you've been solely relying on Byleth, I can see why you'd be struggling. I definitely had a hard time too and I probably couldn't have done it without Divine Pulse.

[Timlugia]

6 hours ago, Darkmoon6789 said:

While I haven't played the church path. I actually found Rhea in the Crimson flower a path to be rather easy on hard. Still, the final bosses are usually pretty difficult, especially on maddening. The verdant wind and azure moon final bosses were really tough. 

Are you attempting a solo run?

Rhea in Silver Snow isn't really the same as in Crimson Flower, she's in the even stronger form.

In fact, she has the most HP as an unit in whole FE series I believe.

[Quickpawmaud]

On 5/20/2020 at 6:38 PM, Moltz23 said:

...that sounds like Silver Snow's endgame, allright.

First things first, you want to clear the lower half of the map as soon as possible and put someone sturdy enough in marked tile at the bottom of the map so the White Beasts can stop spawning. If you don't do that, Rhea will heal herself as soon one of those things get near her.

After that, clear the left & right side of the map and slowly make your way to Rhea while accounting for the stupid high range of her AoE attack. Once you get near her, start focusing on breaking her barrier so your units can make actual damage and take her down eventually (breaking the whole thing is very difficult to do so however, as she has an unique skill which repairs it as soon she gets to attack during enemy phase, so if you wanna go for it then save as many of your gambits as possible).

Other tips:

* As @Gleenstavos said, most monsters deal magic damage rather than physical (the only exception being Rhea herself), so you might wanna account for that. Also, while the White Beasts get Miracle when they're weakened, they also have a ton of weaknesses so anything effective to monsters/dragons/flying units should take care of them quickly.

*Watch out for every enemy called something like Crazy Church Boss/Cardinal; those guys are really tough and will most likely have brave weapons, powerful spells, and Miracle so if you have any unit that could conceivably lure them while avoiding damage can help a ton with taking them down later.

Edit:

Long story short: you lack a lord character and their broken battalions, there are a ton of enemies with miracle, many minibosses are disguised as normal enemies at first glance, the White Beasts can overwhelm you quickly if you don't block the tile which makes them spawn and the map has so many enemies it legit makes the console lag in hanheld mode.

As far the final boss goes, Rhea pulls a bait-and-switch and appears to be far weaker than she actually is at the beggining of the battle, she has stupid high stats and a charm stat which is gonna make most of your charm-weak units miss their battalions, she has an exclusive skill which not only allows her to pull her AoE attack in her turn without having to charge it, it also heals her barrier as soon she attacks in enemy phase, she has another skill that heals her health whenever a White Beast gets near, AND lastly, she also happens to have Miracle (because of course she does).

When the devs said the Silver Snow route was made with being the most difficult route in mind, they weren't bluffing.

Just amazing info dude top notch. I just tuned down the difficulty and solo’d with Byleth, Wyvern Petra and Falcon Catherine helped, Caspar sat on the spot you mentioned. If I had spent a few more hours and seen this post earlier I probably could have beat it on hard. I will try to do better next time. All my other units just died I had Lysithea she killed a monster then got surrounded and 1 shotted along with my healers Mercedes and Linhardt. My archers Anna and Bernadetta killed a few flyers but then got killed along the way and didn’t make it to Rhea. Ferdinand didn’t do anything he just got destroyed. I tried to protect Cyril gave him some expensive bows made him a Wyvern Rider but in the end he died as well. I think that is everyone might be missing a few. In the end I had Byleth solo all the enemies on the left side of the map while everyone else tried to clear the enemies on the bottom of the map. I left Caspar there to guard and the survivors Catherine and Petra regrouped with Byleth after his massacre and then the three of them killed Rhea pretty easily.

Edited May 22, 2020 by Quickpawmaud

[paladin21]

45 minutes ago, Quickpawmaud said:

Just amazing info dude top notch. I just tuned down the difficulty and solo’d with Byleth, Wyvern Petra and Falcon Catherine helped, Caspar sat on the spot you mentioned. If I had spent a few more hours and seen this post earlier I probably could have beat it on hard. I will try to do better next time. All my other units just died I had Lysithea she killed a monster then got surrounded and 1 shotted along with my healers Mercedes and Linhardt. My archers Anna and Bernadetta killed a few flyers but then got killed along the way and didn’t make it to Rhea. Ferdinand didn’t do anything he just got destroyed. I tried to protect Cyril gave him some expensive bows made him a Wyvern Rider but in the end he died as well. I think that is everyone might be missing a few. In the end I had Byleth solo all the enemies on the left side of the map while everyone else tried to clear the enemies on the bottom of the map. I left Caspar there to guard and the survivors Catherine and Petra regrouped with Byleth after his massacre and then the three of them killed Rhea pretty easily.

Wow, the way you explain the battle is anime-epic. Congrats on your victory.

My SS run was my first (so it was a blind noon-NG+), directly in HM, but I managed to train everyone. I had no casualties due a pavise/aegis activation on Lysithea on Rhea's retaliation because of the Thyrsus staff. I managed to break all her shields and beat her within two turns from that moment. My team was strong, with the original black eagles (paladin Ferdinand, war master Caspar, bishop Linhardt, dancer Dorothea, wyvern lord Petra and bow knight Bernadetta), aided by gremory Lysithea, gremory/bishop Flayn (I don't remember her class), bow knight Ashe, falcoknight Ingrid and dark knight Sylvain. Quite an expected team, but far from optimal when you saw their skills.

[Quickpawmaud]

14 hours ago, paladin21 said:

Wow, the way you explain the battle is anime-epic. Congrats on your victory.

My SS run was my first (so it was a blind noon-NG+), directly in HM, but I managed to train everyone. I had no casualties due a pavise/aegis activation on Lysithea on Rhea's retaliation because of the Thyrsus staff. I managed to break all her shields and beat her within two turns from that moment. My team was strong, with the original black eagles (paladin Ferdinand, war master Caspar, bishop Linhardt, dancer Dorothea, wyvern lord Petra and bow knight Bernadetta), aided by gremory Lysithea, gremory/bishop Flayn (I don't remember her class), bow knight Ashe, falcoknight Ingrid and dark knight Sylvain. Quite an expected team, but far from optimal when you saw their skills.

That was also my first finished run am playing Blue Lions now. Only going to recruit Dorothea and make sure she becomes a dancer this time. I missed the event before I kind of forgot about it and fought battles instead of exploring. I am getting all my characters to try to become fortress knights warriors and bishops for defense strength and resistance. Probably won’t bother getting mages into anything past armored knight though. I realized I suck too much at this game to have glass cannons like Lysithea so I am making Sylvain a dark knight and Felix a mortal savant. I know it is not optimal but they can always target weaknesses with this setup like using weapons against mages and magic against armor knights. I will make sure they don’t get screwed by putting them through the mage line and fortress knight and warrior. Going to make Dedue the ultimate tank with pavise aegis renewal and quick repost (going to take a lot of grinding) probably will end in great knight or something.

[paladin21]

17 hours ago, Quickpawmaud said:

Going to make Dedue the ultimate tank with pavise aegis renewal and quick repost (going to take a lot of grinding) probably will end in great knight or something.

If you plan on having Dedue learn Quick Ripost, you'd better leave him as a War Master. Crit +20 is way better than 1 movement. The higher Def won't make that big of a difference if you load him with Pavise+Aegis. Renewal is too big of a detour since you have Mercedes that can cast Physic and Fortify from miles away, Flayn with Fortify as well, and Sylvain (as a DK) and Dorothea with Physic. Just saving one of this characters to move the last to heal, would be enough to keep his health up. However, you're pointing to get very high proficiencies with Dedue, like B/B+ in Lances, Axes, Brawling and Armour (he has a boon, so it's doable to even score A's), but also in Riding and Faith, in which he has a bane. This means too much dedication for a character that won't have much availability. Don't get me wrong, it's doable, but it might make you neglect other characters.

17 hours ago, Quickpawmaud said:

I am getting all my characters to try to become fortress knights warriors and bishops for defense strength and resistance. Probably won’t bother getting mages into anything past armored knight though.

Getting everyone to an advanced class for stats is unneeded. If you're going for the stat boosts, armour knight is more than enough to fix some characters defense, since it may be easy to grind Axe and Armour for them to get to the class soon (this is specially true with Annette, since she already has a boon in axes), but going any further might mess with you endgame characters, as having many B proficiencies won't help you much when trying to get advanced classes. And I know this just because, just like you, I did a grind-heavy AM run as my second one (to collect class masteries in my case), and it wasn't an easy task. If you stormed through SS to finish it already, grinding will probably mean hell to you, as it meant to me. If anything, use NG+ to do that through several playthroughs, as it'll be less repetitive.

17 hours ago, Quickpawmaud said:

I realized I suck too much at this game to have glass cannons like Lysithea so I am making Sylvain a dark knight and Felix a mortal savant. I know it is not optimal but they can always target weaknesses with this setup like using weapons against mages and magic against armor knights.

If you think you're gonna have a hard time in hard mode, there's nothing wrong to go normal instead and enjoy the ride. I'm not maddening material myself. I know it's a game I'm suppossed to enjoy, and getting frustrated because enemies are overpowered is no fun for me (like in Shadow Dragon H5).

[Shadow Mir]

On 5/20/2020 at 5:38 PM, Moltz23 said:

Long story short: you lack a lord character and their broken battalions, there are a ton of enemies with miracle, many minibosses are disguised as normal enemies at first glance, the White Beasts can overwhelm you quickly if you don't block the tile which makes them spawn and the map has so many enemies it legit makes the console lag in hanheld mode.

I've had the game lag in zoom view in handheld mode, but are you saying that this map will have it lag even without being in zoom view??

[Moltz23]

42 minutes ago, Shadow Mir said:

I've had the game lag in zoom view in handheld mode, but are you saying that this map will have it lag even without being in zoom view??

Yep. The sheer amount of White Beasts in the map eat the game's framerate like breakfast.

[Quickpawmaud]

On 5/23/2020 at 10:19 AM, paladin21 said:

If you plan on having Dedue learn Quick Ripost, you'd better leave him as a War Master. Crit +20 is way better than 1 movement. The higher Def won't make that big of a difference if you load him with Pavise+Aegis. Renewal is too big of a detour since you have Mercedes that can cast Physic and Fortify from miles away, Flayn with Fortify as well, and Sylvain (as a DK) and Dorothea with Physic. Just saving one of this characters to move the last to heal, would be enough to keep his health up. However, you're pointing to get very high proficiencies with Dedue, like B/B+ in Lances, Axes, Brawling and Armour (he has a boon, so it's doable to even score A's), but also in Riding and Faith, in which he has a bane. This means too much dedication for a character that won't have much availability. Don't get me wrong, it's doable, but it might make you neglect other characters.

Getting everyone to an advanced class for stats is unneeded. If you're going for the stat boosts, armour knight is more than enough to fix some characters defense, since it may be easy to grind Axe and Armour for them to get to the class soon (this is specially true with Annette, since she already has a boon in axes), but going any further might mess with you endgame characters, as having many B proficiencies won't help you much when trying to get advanced classes. And I know this just because, just like you, I did a grind-heavy AM run as my second one (to collect class masteries in my case), and it wasn't an easy task. If you stormed through SS to finish it already, grinding will probably mean hell to you, as it meant to me. If anything, use NG+ to do that through several playthroughs, as it'll be less repetitive.

If you think you're gonna have a hard time in hard mode, there's nothing wrong to go normal instead and enjoy the ride. I'm not maddening material myself. I know it's a game I'm suppossed to enjoy, and getting frustrated because enemies are overpowered is no fun for me (like in Shadow Dragon H5).

I am only on chapter like 7 (on the one where you investigate the village with Jeralt) and Dedue already has B Faith, C Lances, S Axe, A+ Armor, D+ Riding, and no idea with gauntlets have not started with those yet. I think Bishop is worth it purely for the 15 resistance. Dude has not gotten a single resistance level up so far only the bases from Priest. I stormed through my other playthrough because I stopped playing for a few months and wanted to start over but I forced myself to finish the playthrough for new game+. I have not neglected anyone so far. I am using really efficient grinding in extra battles since I have max professor level. Sylvain is lagging a bit with his Faith at C but I will get it up (he has A+ Reason, A Lance, and A Riding) The hardest is actually Byleth since I am going female Byleth this time I thought Falcon Knight was a good way to go but it is so hard to get flying high enough for Pegasus Knight. It took me months talking with Seteth and Manuela and of course right when I need just one more talk the month where they are busy with the Death Knight starts. I have Annette as a Dark Flier which is pretty cool. Not going to use Flayn just using the 10 I have since you can always field at least 10 for the most part. Also I wanted to make Dedue a Great Knight because I have not ever used the class and I am already grinding a ton anyway what is the harm in giving him a weekly riding event nobody else needs it really except Ashe if I want him to be a Bow Knight so I just have both of them doing it. What do you mean by availability though? Dedue is there starting at chapter 1 that is super available? Luckily Felix and Dimitri were blessed so did not need Warrior or Fortress Knight for them but Byleth and Ingred badly needed it and Ashe needed Warrior since he got mega strength screwed. Dimitri is super speed screwed though but can’t really fix that with classes had to use my speed wings on him. It takes me 1 battle to level up a skill from E to like C and I can do ~6 characters at once and I get 3 battles per week. I just put my three units leveling weapons into either Armored Knight or Fortress Knight with broken or rusted weapons and put magic leveling units as adjutants then bunch everyone on the corner of the map with Mercedes. I just watch YouTube while pressing end turn with skip actions on and heal if someone is about to die. Only thing that I can’t really grind this way is flying since they get one shotted by archers and it is hard to kill them first without dying with only so few units. I think there is an item that fixes this weakness but I am sure by the time I get it it’s too late anyway. Also Ingrid and Byleth don’t have enough tank without the armor knight bonuses so they can’t really grind in Peggy Knight anyway. Also I have beaten Awakening, Fates, and Echoes on Hard/Classic although I let quite a few people die in Awakening and Fates since there are so many characters. I am going to try a grindmaster lunatic playthrough in Awakening sometime but will probably have to look up a guide for the first few chapters Frederick has to carry.

Edited May 25, 2020 by Quickpawmaud

[Shadow Mir]

On 5/23/2020 at 3:14 PM, Moltz23 said:

Yep. The sheer amount of White Beasts in the map eat the game's framerate like breakfast.

Wait, will this happen even in console mode? Because this sounds crazy.

EDIT:

Quote

What do you mean by availability though? Dedue is there starting at chapter 1 that is super available?

Spoilers:

Spoiler

Dedue will die if you don't complete his paralogue before the first part ends. Even if you do, he'll still be unavailable until chapter 16.

 

Edited May 25, 2020 by Shadow Mir