How often does Fire Emblem features an optional, overleveled boss with an mediocre reward?

[Jotari]

32 minutes ago, Imuabicus said:

According to the wiki:

Garon has 58HP/33STR/19SPD/29DEF/26RES and Dragonskin. Bölverk has 21 might, 90 accuracy, apparently offers 20 dodge when equipped.

Xander has 43HP/28STR/15/SPD/29+4DEF/15RES. Siegfried has 11 might and 80 accuracy +3 from Elbow Room for ~42dmg WT not accounted for.

No way in hell does a unit take around 54 damage in chapter 12, +4dmg35hit/-4dmg35hit depending on WTA/WTD. 

And Dragonskin halves all damage, lowers crit dmg and negates Poison Strike.

 

You have neither a Hunters Knife nor a Beastkiller in chapter 12 (lest we assume MyCastle shenanigans) so good luck with that. Kaden does have his inferior innate effect but good luck surviving the counter. Tanking with Guard Naginata, defensive PU and Sakura Skill, exploiting Guard Gauge and hoping to go in with magic when he´s low enough is the only way I´m aware.

That depends on what mode you're playing. Those are Lunatic stats. I can't say I've personally taken Garon out in Chapter 12, but I've heard people say it's not too challenging.

[Armchair General]

10 hours ago, Parrhesia said:

If you're in a position to kill a difficult bonus boss, you don't need a big reward. That's just snowball-design.

Depends on how the game is set up, but this is mostly true.

 

10 hours ago, Imuabicus said:

Why kill an optional boss then and, to think that further, why even put it on the map to begin with, other than for fleeting story reasons and maybe a little bit of map design

Because it's fun to kill shit that you aren't supposed to. Sometimes you get some bonus dialogue, ideally an alternate level; but all we usually get is a ring that I keep forgetting that existed.

 

 

 

 

[AnonymousSpeed]

13 hours ago, Parrhesia said:

If you're in a position to kill a difficult bonus boss, you don't need a big reward. That's just snowball-design.

Kind of agree, but here's an idea. Beating the boss gets you the Mercy Ring or whatever. Whoever has this in their inventory cannot kill enemies, but leaves them at 1 HP. Assuming you beat the superboss with a 'roided out unit, you can use the Mercy Ring to help other units catch up.

[Cysx]

5 hours ago, Jotari said:

He's about as hard to take down as Xander. For some strange reason Garon doesn't use his end game stats. Xander has more defense, but less HP. You can use effective weaponry on him though. But the trouble is he's charging you while Garon is stationary. Garon has Draconic Hex though, which is a pain even when you fight him at the end of the game.

Yeah, as Imuabicus said, you don't get beast effective weaponry yet. Ryoma, Scarlet, the beast killer, all are in ch 14.

4 hours ago, Imuabicus said:

Garon has 58HP/33STR/19SPD/29DEF/26RES and Dragonskin. Bölverk has 21 might, 90 accuracy, apparently offers 20 dodge when equipped.

Xander has 43HP/28STR/15/SPD/29+4DEF/15RES. Siegfried has 11 might and 80 accuracy +3 from Elbow Room for ~42dmg WT not accounted for.

No way in hell does a unit take around 54 damage in chapter 12, +4dmg35hit/-4dmg35hit depending on WTA/WTD. 

From my experience, Garon is about dealing chip damage until death, which isn't particularly interesting. With Sakura around and HP+def tonics, a few early-promoted units can barely tank him on a regular playthrough; from there you can exploit attack stance to apply damage, fall back, heal, etc.

There are more ways around Xander but he's definitely a big challenge still on luna.

6 hours ago, Imuabicus said:

I can see that argument for a game like Dark Souls or Darkest Dungeon but not really for a SRPG.

If you are prepping for a challenge 8 chapters ahead, is it then still a challenge, a nuisance (for reasons of opportunity cost) or just another side gig?

Usually these are side goals, which you're not preparing for the entire time. Even if you were, idk, the preparation becomes the challenge? There's not really anything wrong with that either.

Edited December 18, 2021 by Cysx

[Shadow Mir]

14 hours ago, Imuabicus said:

e.g.: Garon in chapter... 13 BR I think, where you get Kaden and fight Xander. He amounts to nothing sitting there.

That's chapter 12. Chapter 13 involves fighting in Cheve. That being said, I'd consider Xander a more apropos example here.

5 hours ago, Jotari said:

That depends on what mode you're playing. Those are Lunatic stats. I can't say I've personally taken Garon out in Chapter 12, but I've heard people say it's not too challenging.

How? Even on the easiest difficulty, he's still got stats that are far above what you can hope to take in a fair fight at that point (48 HP/28 Str/24 Def/21 Res). I don't see anyone taking a 50-ish Might hit and surviving at that point, and there's still the fact you struggle to so much as dent him.

1 hour ago, Cysx said:

From my experience, Garon is about dealing chip damage until death, which isn't particularly interesting. With Sakura around and HP+def tonics, a few early-promoted units can barely tank him on a regular playthrough; from there you can exploit attack stance to apply damage, fall back, heal, etc.

Unfortunately, Bolverk has 3 range, meaning Sakura isn't safe. Also, he's all but guaranteed to have crit chances on you.

Edited December 18, 2021 by Shadow Mir

[Cysx]

4 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

That's chapter 12. Chapter 13 involves fighting in Cheve. That being said, I'd consider Xander a more apropos example here.

How? Even on the easiest difficulty, he's still got stats that are far above what you can hope to take in a fair fight at that point (48 HP/28 Str/24 Def/21 Res). I don't see anyone taking a 50-ish Might hit and surviving at that point, and there's still the fact you struggle to so much as dent him.

Unfortunately, Bolverk has 3 range, meaning Sakura isn't safe. Also, he's all but guaranteed to have crit chances on you.

I know, but Sakura's personal skill also has two range, so if you attack from range yourself... technically both Basara Oboro and Oni Chieftain Rinkah can use rat spirit for crit mitigation(and WTA). But, that's still some crit unaccounted for and you'd have to evacuate both the tank and the attack stance partner, which doesn't add up.

A Corrin backpack + a bronze forge might have been what it was then? At B support every -Luck Corrin gives +3 Def. Garon has 29 Def and 26 Res though, so idk about that... Either way, surviving is absolutely possible. Then it's only a matter of dealing at least one damage.

Edit: Forgot that Attack stance can grant Crt avo as well, notably Corrin's at C rank with most boon/flaw combinations. So Rat spirit + 10/2 Lck plus the aforementioned 5 Crt avo cancels out Garon's crit completely. You shove/swap Corrin at 3 range, attack with the tank at 2 triggering Corrin's dual strike, move Corrin out of the way since their turn wasn't spent, rescue the tank with Silas, dance Silas with Azura from out of range, move Silas out of the way, and voilà.
... Corrin's damage will be divided by 4 though, so, you know.

Edited December 19, 2021 by Cysx

[Shadow Mir]

13 hours ago, Cysx said:

I know, but Sakura's personal skill also has two range, so if you attack from range yourself... technically both Basara Oboro and Oni Chieftain Rinkah can use rat spirit for crit mitigation(and WTA). But, that's still some crit unaccounted for and you'd have to evacuate both the tank and the attack stance partner, which doesn't add up.

A Corrin backpack + a bronze forge might have been what it was then? At B support every -Luck Corrin gives +3 Def. Garon has 29 Def and 26 Res though, so idk about that... Either way, surviving is absolutely possible. Then it's only a matter of dealing at least one damage.

Edit: Forgot that Attack stance can grant Crt avo as well, notably Corrin's at C rank with most boon/flaw combinations. So Rat spirit + 10/2 Lck plus the aforementioned 5 Crt avo cancels out Garon's crit completely. You shove/swap Corrin at 3 range, attack with the tank at 2 triggering Corrin's dual strike, move Corrin out of the way since their turn wasn't spent, rescue the tank with Silas, dance Silas with Azura from out of range, move Silas out of the way, and voilà.
... Corrin's damage will be divided by 4 though, so, you know.

Good luck with that. A +2 Rat Spirit (the highest you can forge at that point in the game) only has 7 might, so you're still gonna need to pull a crapload of magic out of your ass for this to work (Basara and Oni Chieftain both have all of 5 base magic). Also, FYI, even a 20/1 Oboro, which you can't have at this point, would still be doing jackshit to Garon. I also highly doubt Corrin would be able to do much of anything at this point either, so hoping Corrin does the damage is pretty much off the table unless you got insanely lucky with their level ups. And this is on Normal mode (let's be honest here, if the chance of this working on normal mode is slim to none, I'm not holding my breath for this to be possible on Lunatic, where Garon has improved attack and defense). Long story short, this is a long way to go just to fail to do anything to Garon.

Edited December 19, 2021 by Shadow Mir

[Cysx]

3 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

Good luck with that. A +2 Rat Spirit (the highest you can forge at that point in the game) only has 7 might, so you're still gonna need to pull a crapload of magic out of your ass for this to work (Basara and Oni Chieftain both have all of 5 base magic). Also, FYI, even a 20/1 Oboro, which you can't have at this point, would still be doing jackshit to Garon. I also highly doubt Corrin would be able to do much of anything at this point either, so hoping Corrin does the damage is pretty much off the table unless you got insanely lucky with their level ups. And this is on Normal mode (let's be honest here, if the chance of this working on normal mode is slim to none, I'm not holding my breath for this to be possible on Lunatic, where Garon has improved attack and defense). Long story short, this is a long way to go just to fail to do anything to Garon.

Just in case I wasn't clear, I've done this. It's definitely not impossible.

Corrin can easily reach 29+ physical damage at that point. There's Hinoka's passive and the attack stance partner can be paired up, plus tonics, plus a steel forge, plus WTA plus at least C rank sword. That's 2 + let's say 2 from the pairup(archer or something) + 2 + 11 + 1 + 1 = 19.  Having a 11 Str Corrin by that point is pretty easy, and I'm being conservative with the numbers here.
And yes, the tank will deal 0 damage, that's expected, their role is to trigger the dual strike and survive. And I was looking at Lunatic stats I'm pretty sure.

To be honest, just using pairup is much more straightforward and boring, but that's kind of Fates in a nutshell.

Edited December 19, 2021 by Cysx

[Shadow Mir]

23 hours ago, Cysx said:

Just in case I wasn't clear, I've done this. It's definitely not impossible.

Corrin can easily reach 29+ physical damage at that point. There's Hinoka's passive and the attack stance partner can be paired up, plus tonics, plus a steel forge, plus WTA plus at least C rank sword. That's 2 + let's say 2 from the pairup(archer or something) + 2 + 11 + 1 + 1 = 19.  Having a 11 Str Corrin by that point is pretty easy, and I'm being conservative with the numbers here.
And yes, the tank will deal 0 damage, that's expected, their role is to trigger the dual strike and survive. And I was looking at Lunatic stats I'm pretty sure.

To be honest, just using pairup is much more straightforward and boring, but that's kind of Fates in a nutshell.

So let me get this straight; you're assuming that Corrin has a steel forge when the odds are very high (5/6) you don't have the ore needed, that Oboro is early promoted to Badsara when she wants nothing to do with it, and that the tank can survive a hit from Garon (and not be critted, because otherwise, this falls apart like the house of cards this is). That's a lot to ask.

[IonicAmalgam]

It's been a while, but I remember it being possible in Fates to stack damage reduction over 10 with the right allies in range from unit's unique skills, it was how I fed Mozu all of the kills in her recruitment mission when she starts level 1 on Lunatic while enemies were level 11+

Sakura: -2 Damage Taken
Avatar/Ryoma: -2 Damage Taken
Def Tonic: -2 Damage Taken
Jakob: -3 Damage Taken
Rally Defense/Strength/Res: + 4
Base +2 Def/Res Skill
Inspiration: -2 Damage Taken
Gentilhomme/Demoiselle: -2 Damage Taken
Pair Up (incompatible with Jakob): +2 Def/Res possible
Health Tonic: +5 Health
Excluding Pavise/Aegis/Izana, that's +19 Def/Res you can get on top of your base Def/Res, about 29 damage reduction minimum for a unit with 10 base Def/Res.

NG+/cards:
Pavise/Aegis (NG+/cards): Halve damage taken
Izana (NG+/cards): -2 Damage Taken
Rose's Thorn: -1 Damage Taken
Fortunate Son (+15 Crit Evade)
Wary Fighter
Draconic Hex: All Enemy Stats -4
Solidarity (+10 Crit Evade)

On the offensive there's so many options, Luna, Sol, Camilla (NG+), Jakob, and many others also provide damage increase (eg Charm)

Edited December 20, 2021 by IonicAmalgam

[Cysx]

1 hour ago, Shadow Mir said:

So let me get this straight; you're assuming that Corrin has a steel forge when the odds are very high (5/6) you don't have the ore needed, that Oboro is early promoted to Badsara when she wants nothing to do with it, and that the tank can survive a hit from Garon (and not be critted, because otherwise, this falls apart like the house of cards this is). That's a lot to ask.

Right, the ore is a good point, though fortunately it's not strictly necessary as a regular Steel has 9 mt and Corrin should be closer to 20 Str than 11, plus other aspects can be higher, like weapon rank(+1 damage per rank over D for swords), or the pairup. And you're misunderstanding, I'm not assuming anything except like, Oboro or Rinkah being over level 13, and Corrin, idk, over 15 depending on boon? Obviously this thing implies preparation, it's a challenge.

I've addressed the crit, Garon has 20, it's tight but you can negate it. He has 56 Atk but WTD from Rat spirit lowers that to 53. With +5 HP and +2 Def from tonics, plus Sakura's passive, plus Corrin's passive(because that also applies as an attack stance partner), and 15 AS or more(again, tonics can boost that if needed), you need 43 natural defenses to survive a round against him. That's not crazy at all, Oboro and Rinkah are just good candidates because they can tank with WTA from range which helps a lot with the positioning. There are definitely other ways.

Edited December 20, 2021 by Cysx

[LoneRecon400]

Great Knight Jakob would be a good budget way of taking down Garon in chapter 12 without going out of your way too much.

At base he'd have 29 HP and 14 Def with both tonics applied. Add on Armored Blow with a Corrin Pair up and he'd be able to survive hit the 54 attack from Ganon with a Katana at base stats.

Speed would also be a trivial issue. He'd have 7 at base, but with a generic Samurai pair up, Katana Boost, and Tonic, that'd already be 14 Speed. He'd only need 4 procs of Speed in ~15 levels to avoid being doubled even with Draconic Hex.

Add in Luna to the mix to occasionally lower Garon's Defense by 8, he'd also be beating Garon at a much faster rate than most other units.

Overall, Garon is pretty easy to beat as long as you make use of certain niches and shelter dancing.

Edited December 20, 2021 by LoneRecon400

[Cysx]

2 hours ago, LoneRecon400 said:

Great Knight Jakob would be a good budget way of taking down Garon in chapter 12 without going out of your way too much.

At base he'd have 29 HP and 14 Def with both tonics applied. Add on Armored Blow with a Corrin Pair up and he'd be able to survive hit the 54 attack from Ganon with a Katana at base stats.

Speed would also be a trivial issue. He'd have 7 at base, but with a generic Samurai pair up, Katana Boost, and Tonic, that'd already be 14 Speed. He'd only need 4 procs of Speed in ~15 levels to avoid being doubled even with Draconic Hex.

Add in Luna to the mix to occasionally lower Garon's Defense by 8, he'd also be beating Garon at a much faster rate than most other units.

Overall, Garon is pretty easy to beat as long as you make use of certain niches and shelter dancing.

Right, you can bring Azura out with just one shelter, I forgot.

[Shadow Mir]

5 hours ago, LoneRecon400 said:

Great Knight Jakob would be a good budget way of taking down Garon in chapter 12 without going out of your way too much.

At base he'd have 29 HP and 14 Def with both tonics applied. Add on Armored Blow with a Corrin Pair up and he'd be able to survive hit the 54 attack from Ganon with a Katana at base stats.

Speed would also be a trivial issue. He'd have 7 at base, but with a generic Samurai pair up, Katana Boost, and Tonic, that'd already be 14 Speed. He'd only need 4 procs of Speed in ~15 levels to avoid being doubled even with Draconic Hex.

Add in Luna to the mix to occasionally lower Garon's Defense by 8, he'd also be beating Garon at a much faster rate than most other units.

Overall, Garon is pretty easy to beat as long as you make use of certain niches and shelter dancing.

...That not everyone will have access to, because not everyone will have a girl Corrin. Aside from that little tidbit, fair enough.