Even I play "Hunting by Daybreak", this is the worst map in the game.

[wissenschaft]

1 hour ago, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

Where did you find the time to do acquire Defense +2? You only have chapter 12 with him, so unless you're doing a lot of auxilliary grinding (wait, do you even get aux battles that month?), he won't have any class mastery skills in his toolkit on NG.

Its still a good idea to let Byleth pull out a Silver Shield to give to Seteth. Additional tankyness will help him survive.

[5PointGordin]

On 3/15/2022 at 5:43 PM, Jotari said:

I find Anna's paralogue less desirable to play. Bow Knight spam on a huge map just doesn't do it for me.

I completed the map earlier today on Blue Lions Maddening. It was definitely challenging and I had to restart a couple of times + use up almost all my divine pulses, but it was pretty dang satisfying to complete. Granted,  I did have some ridiculously powerful tools at my disposal, like double Lancefaire Dimitri, double Black tomefaire Constance / Lysitha, and double Bowfaire Felix. However, on the flipside, my Anna wasn't leveled at all and may as well have been a dead unit slot.

The bow knights can be kind of annoying, but I had more issues with the grapplers since they had good hit, avoid, AS, and bulk. Even with double Bowfaire, Felix was barely reaching the threshold to kill them with Brave Bow. Constance couldn't reliably nuke them with Bolting either due to their high avoid. Still, if you stay near the center of the map, the reinforcements shouldn't be too big of an issue I feel.

On 3/16/2022 at 2:01 PM, Dark Holy Elf said:

Also it makes no sense to me that a fight against bandits is more challenging than the dramatic events of the previous fight. So there are multiple reasons the devs should have erred on the side of making Chapter 13 easier than it is

 

I thought it made sense from a story / thematic perspective. Its been 5 years since your last battle and the world around you has changed for the worse as the war. rages on. The enemies from your past have evolved to a point that you are unfamiliar with, but so too have your comrades. The map being so difficult makes the moment your allies come back pretty powerful.

Its kinda similar to Ocarina of time, where after the time skip in that game, the world gets messed up and Link is basically starting at square 1 since he can't use any of his toys as a kid. Initially he has a tougher time as an adult, but once he starts making progress, getting new items, etc he has an easier time dealing with the obstacles ahead.

[Barren]

6 hours ago, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

Where did you find the time to do acquire Defense +2? You only have chapter 12 with him, so unless you're doing a lot of auxilliary grinding (wait, do you even get aux battles that month?), he won't have any class mastery skills in his toolkit on NG.

You do get one extra week before the chapter 12 mission. Shamir mentions that the empire will invade within 2 weeks (though technically in the game it's 2 weeks and I think 1 or 2 days). So week 1 you have a chance to do whatever you need to do around the monastery. In the case of Silver Snow, it's your only shot at recruiting Hilda. Or recruit whichever student you have yet to nab. Then week 2 assuming your professor level is maxed out, you have 3 activity points to do battle if you so desire.

For me, on week 1 (the moment you get Seteth) I get him to pass the soldier exam, then the next week the brigand exam. So I would spend 1 activity point getting him to master soldier which isn't too hard, then the next point on mastering brigand. Finally at that point even when you spend the third point on Hilda/Cyril Paralogue Seteth will be a Wyvern Rider with Defense +2, Death Blow and Reposition so now he comes with better bulk, damage and utility. 

[Shanty Pete's 1st Mate]

2 hours ago, Barren said:

For me, on week 1 (the moment you get Seteth) I get him to pass the soldier exam, then the next week the brigand exam. So I would spend 1 activity point getting him to master soldier which isn't too hard, then the next point on mastering brigand. Finally at that point even when you spend the third point on Hilda/Cyril Paralogue Seteth will be a Wyvern Rider with Defense +2, Death Blow and Reposition so now he comes with better bulk, damage and utility. 

Bruh that's an insane amount of investment. What are you doing, sending Seteth in with a Knowledge Gem to solo those maps? Achieving class mastery in a single battle isn't realistic outside of very constrained (and turn-intensive) playstyles.

7 hours ago, wissenschaft said:

Its still a good idea to let Byleth pull out a Silver Shield to give to Seteth. Additional tankyness will help him survive.

I like that approach, especially if you didn't get the Aegis Shield.

[Dark Holy Elf]

The array of playstyles with respect to grinding/skill acquisition is funny, isn't it? I've seen it claimed that it's unreasonable to get Hunter's Volley by Chapter 13 even with a Knowledge Gem, but here someone turns around and proposes getting even more class exp than that (with a class change in the middle, to boot!) in a single week. My reaction here is much closer to @Shanty Pete's 1st Mate's myself.

Having said that, and I feel like I'm repeating myself from another thread: there are far less grindy ways to get the results you desire. When I did SS Hunting by Daybreak, I admit Seteth wasn't very useful, but he didn't need to be. Petra and Byleth were Wyverns, Dorothea was an Assassin who could one-shot every enemy on the map, and Caspar was a dancer dodgetank who could survive any reasonable amount of punishment. (Seteth was actually a Brigand because I felt good about the rest of my team.) None of this took significant investment and the combination made the map quite simple; it'd be even easier if you left Seteth in Wyvern and gave him a shield as mentioned.

[5PointGordin]

I beat this chapter today for the first time on Maddening.

It definitely is a stupid chapter, esp on the first few turns where it is a crapshoot whether you will survive or not. I gave byleth every single one of my speed boosting items and he was still getting doubled by the unpromoted theives despite having 30 speed....

Once the first few turns pass though, the chapter isn't too bad. Truthfully, I struggled more with the previous chapter due to my poor positioning and strategy for that map. I chose not to make Byleth a Flying class & was able to get through it just fine.

[Bylift]

On 4/7/2022 at 9:33 PM, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

Where did you find the time to do acquire Defense +2? You only have chapter 12 with him, so unless you're doing a lot of auxilliary grinding (wait, do you even get aux battles that month?), he won't have any class mastery skills in his toolkit on NG.

You get 2 weekends and one training session before the first monestary defense followed immediately by Reunion at Dawn. Easily enough to grind Seteth a few beginner or even intermediate classes, and even get him up to A lance for swift strikes. But yeah unless you're grinding with broken/rusted weapons on an AVO tile and essentially cheesing (which is 100 my jam), it's difficult to do much for him other than give him decent weapons and make sure his setup is as good as it can get.

I just played this map last night on a SS NG ladies-only run, and even with aux grinding and and an OP Byleth (Falcon Knight, AS+, Swordbreaker, etc.) I had to pulse a few times because I got rattled by a 30%-to-hit gambit or accidentally pulled enemies too close to my students and they got bumrushed.

Even with my elite cheese tactics this map isn't a pushover 🙂

[Barren]

3 hours ago, Bylift said:

You get 2 weekends and one training session before the first monestary defense followed immediately by Reunion at Dawn. Easily enough to grind Seteth a few beginner or even intermediate classes, and even get him up to A lance for swift strikes. But yeah unless you're grinding with broken/rusted weapons on an AVO tile and essentially cheesing (which is 100 my jam), it's difficult to do much for him other than give him decent weapons and make sure his setup is as good as it can get.

I just played this map last night on a SS NG ladies-only run, and even with aux grinding and and an OP Byleth (Falcon Knight, AS+, Swordbreaker, etc.) I had to pulse a few times because I got rattled by a 30%-to-hit gambit or accidentally pulled enemies too close to my students and they got bumrushed.

Even with my elite cheese tactics this map isn't a pushover 🙂

That’s the thing about Hunting by Daybreak. You can never be 100% sure unless you put your strategy to practice. The route that kind of gave me the most trouble was Azure Moon if only because I had to use up at least 4 divine pulses some of which was because Dimitri got killed because of un lucky hit he had to endure and then it snowballed. But even then it wasn’t too bad.

[Bylift]

3 minutes ago, Barren said:

That’s the thing about Hunting by Daybreak. You can never be 100% sure unless you put your strategy to practice.

Truth. Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face by that map lol.

[DaveCozy]

On 3/15/2022 at 8:43 PM, Jotari said:

I find Anna's paralogue less desirable to play. Bow Knight spam on a huge map just doesn't do it for me.

I know these replies are several months old but yeah, I agree that map really sucks on Maddening.

In the context of Hunting by Daybreak, the one similarity both that and Anna's Paralogue have for me is that I try my best to finish them by avoiding as much combat as possible. Enemies are just really strong in both, in general.

For HBD I try to make Byleth at least be a flier, specially if Dimitri is the lord cuz his on-foot class isn't getting far. Most of my other units are either flying or at least have range. I try my best to just hit and run as much as possible and kill the Assassins with Pass ASAP.

Claude and Seteth flying helps a lot, I gotta say. Even if Seteth admittedly isn't as good as the lords, he's still pretty good to have if only because he's easier to manouver with.

On 3/16/2022 at 5:01 PM, Dark Holy Elf said:

I tend not to bother with it on non-CF routes; it does give you a lot of money, but eh, there are other ways to get it.

For Anna's paralogue, I think the best thing is the flying battalion with stride tbh.

For that one I make Anna and Byleth fliers, and just hide in the bottom left corner of the map for all 10 turns. It's on a cliff and even the Bow Knights don't have enough range to reach you.

I've done it normally without cheesing it even in non-CF routes but it is pretty hard. Strategy in loose terms is take the center of the map as fast possible and hold most units there, moving only the ones who can reliably kill or dodge or tank to dispatch the groups of enemies that don't move. Typically a very late part 1 paralogue clear if it's on a non-CF route.

Edited May 11, 2022 by DaveCozy