General Horace

every use of warp is 1500g too, there's a wolf beil and I think a couple of stealable statboosters that really help funds (which is probably the toughest rank) EDIT: and if you're going for turns it's almost better to have someone like Boots!Heath or someone just take Hector to the boss and kill him for/with Hector.

yeah it's beneficial to make them hit 20, and with the lax turncounts, it's pretty easy to do so. Serra's level lead is a mixed blessing too, depending on what level she leaves Lyn mode at too. edit: dammit baldrick

I honestly haven't used the mine glitch, but I believe you can't get Nergal's (or anybody's) weapons in the final chapter because there's no Merlinus to deposit them in.

i removed my fe11 run because I lost my savefile and didn't want to have an incomplete run just sitting around. I guess I could have saved it, but tbh I found doing the run pretty boring (outside of a few select chapters) and very easy past the first few chapters. fe5 ltc 100% movegrowth go Another thing about stats in general, sometimes it's better to have lower defence on some of your offensive juggernauts (i'd imagine even more so in FE6 since weapon hit is lower) so enemies get sucked into attacking them instead of some units that might not be as strong offensively. I think the reality of playthroughs with growths though is skipping enemies is sometimes detrimental since you oftentimes really need the exp. That being said, my playthroughs aren't full recruitment, so i'd have quite a few more turns to do stuff (like get Saleh levels without him having to kill a bunch of enemies at 10 HP to just barely make A Staves and 26 magic) too. I'd actually say FE8's the hardest GBA game to LTC, since the enemies (especially the endgame bosses like Lyon) are just as tanky (or tankier) than FE6's and FE7's endgame bosses, with significantly less chapters to gain levels in (and lower bases on characters in general). FE6 without full recuitment would do stuff like skip Rutger too, and instead you get quite a few turns to sit around and feed Roy and Thany exp, and same goes for stuff like recruiting Sue and Cath, FE6 gives you a lot of turns to catch up, so maybe maximizing exp early on isn't as important. It's almost like having a bunch of FE7 defence chapters i expect i'll be exponentially more useless once like, chapter 9 hits or something because I've honestly only beaten FE6 once on hardmode, and not at a fast pace at all.

The only reason i've had suggestions for stuff in the first few chapters because i've been helping Raven with a few chapters here and there. I don't have the patience to actually do an fe6 run, lol.

that priscilla doesn't even have good luck, that's awful I was gonna rage at the update being awful because nothing happened but the bartre poetry is always enough to tide me over for a few months

i present the best strategy evertm

the odds of thany doding like 2 of 3 60's is way more likely than a perfect level on anybody excpet karel like the odds of an Alan perfect level is roughly 0.06%, and his growths are all pretty high honestly (except res). You can get Thany to kill the solider Dieck critted on turn 2, and she'll counter another Javelin solider on the enemy phase. Dieck can chip the archer he killed on turn 3, and Thany can kill with the slim lance, and someone can weaken the merc to be in KO range on the enemy phase for her to kill, and at worst, she'll have to dodge 2 fighters and a merc (at like, ~49, and ~59 hit, it's not even that bad) and can probably even get hit by one depending on her hp. Then she can kill the archer by the throne with the help of one of the fighters, and she'll be close to or above level 3 without much risk of death. EDIT: Also I hope you don't take my comments in a negative light, I just know from personal experience it sucks when you get to a later chapter and realize "dammit I really wish I had one more point of strength or an extra weapon level" or something.

man, if you're gonna use thany you have to get her more than 38 exp this chapter it's remarkeable how much easier it is to get her exp in the next few chapters if she has even +2str/spd.

Did you skip the power ring? I might have just missed it or something, but I imagine having a second power ring would definately help. And for some reason I thought Ishtar moved as an NPC. I guess it was always my paranoia when she spawned so I always killed her as an NPC as well.

okay i'll expand on my thoughts a bit the chapter 17's are pretty much a wash 18 Sacae is at least two turns faster than 18 Ilia 19 Sacae is at least as fast if not a turn faster than 19 Ilia chapter 20's are a wash you can 1 turn 20x, I don't know why you think it takes forever when do you need Niime to have 3 extra warp range? can you just give her an energy ring at some point? Regardless, if her having 3 less warp range causes you to lose 4 turns, i'd be surprised. I actually think Tate will be almost totally worthless too.

Sacae's probably the faster route with growths, imo.

Yeah, it's better if that solider bounces off Roy for 10 exp than being eaten by Marcus anyway. Bors can replace one of the cavs in the fortdrop too. What cavalier are you gonna pour levels into? I imagine it'll be kind of detrimental if you train both evenly.

there have been quite a few of auction drafts in the past, if you Ctrl+F auction in DTE you should find a bunch for templates (most of them probably have different setups) if you're into that.

Yeah, Roy gets pretty much nothing, and he probably needs it for later in the game. Although I think you could just have Marcus pick Roy up on turn 2 and go with him, and Roy can get a kill on the bandit Marcus weakens on turn 1 or something. I think you could honestly probably optimize chapter 1 a little better so that dudes like Wolt that will do nothing ever don't get any kills though.

roy doesn't actually have to traverse the ruin, he just sits on the edge of it you can lure the fighters that block marcus with alan/lance i just did the chapter yesterday, it works.

you don't need any crits in chapter 1 other than the one on the boss if you had fullmoved Marcus on turn 2 and dropped roy on the destroyed village south of the throne

I can confirm the blank levels can happen in the arena, but I don't know why. Otherwise this Cuan should have at least 43 HP:

Oh, you were suggesting that so he could use Garm, I missed that. Honestly pretty much anybody that uses axes can use garm, you can Devil axe the Gorgon eggs for massive exp, and Steel weapons give twice the WExp of Irons and are E rank. (why IS, steel swords and lances are D rank), so Franz or Gerik or General Amelia can reach Garm by endgame if you put your mind to it.

It's pretty unreasonable for Gilliam to only gain 6 levels in 10 maps, he can actually get exp reletively easily. In a draft here http://serenesforest.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=33007&page=3where I essentially gave Vanessa as much exp as possible Gilliam managed to reach 15/2 by Duessel's join chapter, which essentially just makes him a slower Duessel. This is probably playing faster than most people play with a full team with Seth too, so i'd assume a 102 turn clear without Seth is remotely efficient, especially since my Vanessa was pretty terrible. Drafts are a different environment than normal playthroughs, but my point still stands. 15/2 Gilliam loses by 4 HP, 1 strength, 1 skill, 4 speed (which does suck), ties defence, and probably loses luck and res, I forget Duessel's bases there (they're pretty irrelevant anyway) They're pretty much the exact same unit, except Gilliam doesn't double Fighters and weighed down archers, and Gilliam gains exp almost twice as fast as Duessel, so he'll likely surpass him in strength in a couple chapters. A Axes isn't honestly any better than D axes in almost any way, does Duessel actually need to use any axe that's higher than D rank before later in the game (where Gilliam can easily have matched the rank) anyway? Gilliam has a high lance rank too, he'd probably have A lances, but that's irrelevant. And does anybody actually ever give Duessel (or any great knight really) swords? Gilliam can use Garm just as well as Duessel can too, although Gerik's a far better candidate than both of them if he's in play. I'm not saying Gilliam's fantastic or anything, but the gap between him and Duessel isn't big at all. Gilliam technically does stuff for the first half of the game too (albeit he's not all that useful in the first few maps) @Irysa you meant Gilliam and not Garcia right? Garcia's not actually that terrible either I'd say Paladin is still better overall since Franz's skill kinda sucks so handaxes -5 hit kinda makes a difference when you have like 70-75 hit on archers (javelins would gain another 5 hit pretty quickly too with the S rank bonus), There's lots of sword enemies in FE8 too, so Javelins are just universally better unlike in FE7 imo. EDIT: All this being said Gilliam nor Duessel are actually Cavaliers let alone Paladins, my bad EDIT2: ok Duessel's a Cavalier in Reverse recruitment he totally counts

I definately still think he's a solid unit, I just don't think he's the god that some people make him out to be on Ephraim route. If you promote Gilliam the chapter after getting Duessel to Great Knight, you have a very similar unit (albeit at the cost of using a knight crest on Gilliam), which puts things into perspective a bit too. But like you said, it depends on playstyles.

He's fantastic on the phantom ship, but other than that, he's really reliant on actually proc'ing speed to stay relevant (even with a speedwing). Sure, he'll probably never die, and can use Garm, but 6 move is below average for promoted units. It's more of the same reasons I don't like Kyle and Forde. Eph!Duessel is a bit better, but you get a powerhouse in Cormag in the same chapter and he just crushes Duessel statwise after like, a few levels and a promotion, and he's very good in the next few maps (desert, Selena's chapter etc) while Duessel really isn't (or is just another dude that 2HKO's enemies, although he's good against the knights in chapter 14). His base level is also really high, so he gains exp way too slowly to be effective lategame. People hype up being able to S rank axes and use Garm easily, but he doesn't even use it that well. He doesn't have a prayer to double the final boss, and his hit is pretty awful anyway since his base skill and luck are very low (like, he only has one more skill than Dozla and is 7 levels higher). I guess he can help kill Lyon in chapter 17 (but if you're using Duessel you've probably gone Eph route, and he's the best bosskiller lategame in that case), and you still have other guys like Cormag that do the job better. And I don't think anybody thinks he's that good on Eirika route. He's ok filler I guess, nothing more.

when I say they're "pretty bad", look at it this way you have the obviously good units, like Seth and co, and the obviously bad units like Ewan and Marisa. Forde and Kyle are somewhere in the middle, bunched with middling units like Duessel, Joshua, and uhhh, Dozla or something. In my opinion, their is a much bigger gap between someone like Seth and Forde, than someone like Marisa and Forde, just because the best units in the game are so much better than the rest of the cast. Seriously, Marisa's offence in chapter 11 is only slightly worse than Forde, and I think everyone can agree that Marisa is an awful unit. Theoretically, Seth is a 10, Marisa is a 2, and Forde/Kyle are like a 5, average at best. so tl;dr being above average (they're not even that, one could name ~10-15 units that are better) doesn't equate to being a good unit. One can score above the average on a test, but if the average is 30%, it's still not a good score. I'd honestly argue that Joshua is about as good as Kyle or Forde. He's much better in Chapter 9 and 10, and can solo Caellach's area and Caellach himself with very little investment. Unless we're talking pure LTC in which case kyle/forde win because they save a turn in 5x. I will admit that I gave Noah a bit too much credit but you're criticizing Noah for being bad at the exact same things that Kyle and Forde are bad at: at least Noah can double enemies in the Western Isles since 70% of them have steel axes (he doesn't kill, yes) but I guess his offence is only slightly better than someone like Astohl or something.

There are a few enemies weighed down in the early chapters of their join times (like say, pirates in the water that they're never dealing with) but a good majority of the enemies in chapter 9 are merceneries and archers, Kyle won't double the archers (even with their lame 6 AS) and Forde won't ORKO them. Most of the axe using enemies start in the little group beneath your starting spawn, and its easy to leave someone like Joshua or Eirika back to kill them. Chapter 10 is mostly mercs and fighters, most of the weighed down fighters have hand axes, so Forde and Kyle can't counter. There's literally one steel axe fighter in the chapter. Nobody has a prayer other than maybe Joshua, Vanessa or Seth when it comes to the myrms and mercs though. Chapter 11 has a bunch of chumpy monsters, so I guess movement wins here. The Gargoyles all have iron weapons though, so their 10 speed stands. 12 has less chumpy monsters (including Mauthe doogs that likely double Kyle and maybe even Forde) and more gargoyle that aren't ORKO'd even if they do double. 13 is a bunch of 9AS cavaliers and knights, more enemies they struggle with, although that's largely inconsequential because the chapter is probably over pretty fast anyway. 14 they're pretty good though, it might be better to early promote them (which neuters their lategame effectiveness) so they can move to the throne quicker. There really aren't very many enemies here though. 15's obviously bad for them because of the desert, and the rest of the game can be warpskipped, but if it isn't, they're pretty bad since the prepremoted units are actually surprisingly fast and tanky until you get back into the monsters anyway. They just have no real time where they're an above average unit I guess. At least other mediocre units like Noah (with his sword rank) and Lowen (with his good bases early on) can shine, they never really have any good moments. Ephraim Route is much the same, but with more Cavaliers and Mercs they can't deal with. i think it's actually pretty accurate, people have misconceptions about a lot of units in FE8 (in my opinion anyway) like Duessel and Moulder. But you're right, after units like Seth, Franz, Vanessa, Artur, Eir!Saleh, Eph!Cormag, and Gerik, a good majority lf the FE8 cast is pretty underwhelming though, I agree.

I've always found they start too underlevelled. Even with levels their stats are really weak. Like compare Forde's bases to Franz's. They have the same base Strength, and Forde has one more speed, and is five levels higher. FE8 enemies are actually pretty fast as a whole though (the ones that aren't zombies anyway). Most of the Mercs have 10-14 AS and the slower enemies like fighters have a ton of HP (and still around 9AS) so Kyle and Forde can't really handle them. The rest of the enemies are either tanky monsters or Cavaliers, who are too tanky for Kyle/Forde to ORKO. But seriously, Forde is 5 levels high than Franz and has the same base strength and +1 base speed, and Franz's bases are pretty standard for a level 1 cavalier. A general benchmark needed to double most unpromoted units is like, 13AS which Forde doesn't reach until level 18 and Kyle doesn't reach until level 20 at which point most of the enemies are promoted and they can't double them anyway. Comparing them to Ephraim is a pretty big joke too, the dude is a level 4 unit with 11 base speed and lances, and like you said a totally broken prf. Ephraim also beats them or ties them in every non-HP growth, too. tl;dr they never have good combat against anything other than soldiers (and forde still need steel lances to kill them) and zombies. They also never double in their join chapter because they come with steel weapons as well. also paladins have 8 move in fe8