MegaGax

I would rather the Crimson Flower route got a chapter extension to at least be on par length-wise with the other three. Echoing the sentiments of others, dealing with TWSITD really should have been incorporated into her route.

I messed up my order slightly, but if I were to do it all over again (I saved the GD/Church routes for last), I would've done: Crimson Flower -> Verdant Wind -> Azure Moon -> Silver Snow Doing Crimson Flower first gives you a broader perspective of who Edelgard is that she doesn't really receive on the Verdant Wind route, and comes wayyyy late on Azure Moon. Plus while it's shorter than the other routes (stupidly so, I may add), it gives you time to bond with one of the primary antagonists, which could make those later encounters more emotional. Verdant Wind is a nice change of pace when finished with Crimson Moon because it dives more into the overarching lore of the game, which Edel's route didn't do, the pace should be changed enough to prevent burn out. Azure Moon is just a really good character driven story, consider it the other side of the coin to Crimson Flower, except way more in-depth with Dimitri's struggle and his overall development. Just a really great story imo. Silver Snow, I haven't actually completed this one yet, but I always see people mentioning it as the worst route, or just an inferior version of Verdant Wind, so take that as you will.

I voted for Paladin, so this makes me feel justified in doing so! Although, in my actual play-through he was a DK, and was still effective kinda felt like something was a bit off. But he did have some nice Avo with that budding skill talent.

I always had Edelgard pegged as a "ends justify the means" vibe whenever the E3 trailer showcased her in the TS trailer. Her actions and route seemed to confirm that to me, in her mind she believes that causing this war while causing bloodshed on a large scale, would ultimately save lives that would otherwise be lost over decades due to the cruelty of the crest machinations breeding individuals such as Miklan, and experiments. There is a point I will agree with her on: nobility, stature of birth, neither of these things should matter when it comes time to dole out rewards based on reputable acts. Gains made through strong character and accolades achieved via hard-work should always be rewarded appropriately. However, I do largely understand Dimitri's point of view, she has some good points, but I do believe she ultimately went about it the wrong way. There were certainly people within the nobility, and future rulers themselves that felt as she does, together they could have made more ground via a more peaceful solution, kinda a shame that she didn't really seem to try to give it a fair shake. On-topic: I went with Crimson Flower first, followed by Azure Moon. I felt this was a pretty okay order since I didn't know much about things ahead of time, and it didn't feel samey because the perspectives were plenty different. In retrospect, maybe going: Crimson Flower, Verdant Wind, Azure Moon, Silver Snow would have been the best order?

I'd say Crimson Flower was the hardest for me (Granted I haven't finished Verdant Wind/Silver Snow yet), Azure Moon was pretty easy since I just avoided Myson and went around the left vicinity of the map. Crimson Flower was the most difficult for the simple fact that I was under-leveled by virtue of it being my first play through (and I didn't grind Prof Level like I should have, so my units were under-leveled for the last two maps. Plus... ignorance, Chapter 17's mission battle took me by surprise the first time, but I adapted well on the second attempt.)

I actually have gotten a crest proc with Bernie while using a brave bow, she attacked thrice instead of just twice. I was using it on an armor knight to test this theory out so it was able to tank the damage from the first two hits, she crit on the third one though. Edit: On second thought I can't remember if it was actually the brave bow, or she was just naturally doubling with a silver bow, but I do remember her attacking three times.

I kept Ferdinand as a Paladin, mostly out of laziness for not wanting to go for GK reqs (although I did get his budding skill and Weight -3.) WL is always gonna be the answer for a physical unit with a prof in axes, and not a detriment in flying, but that's a boring answer, and he did well enough as a Paladin for me. Dorothea I used as a Gremory, and while I did vote for that.. after reading some of the posts I kinda wanna give Warlock an extended try. There's some very compelling evidence on that front. I did certify her as my dancer, but I never used her in the dancer class (I might need to try that in the future). Felix... I've used him as both a Swordmaster and a Mortal Savant, he did admirably in both classes, but I might just keep him in SM due to the novelty of it all. I think I'm too lazy to try getting the reqs high enough for Bow Knight, although I do think he could excel as one (obviously, because they're so good). War Master is just a great physical class, especially if you like some diversity in the line-up, although since I used Dedue as my WM, I never used Felix as one.

So, I'm curious to know how everyone handled tutoring Authority while also keeping their other weapon/mobility skills up to task, especially for the ones with a weakness in it (Caspar/Felix/Hilda, interesting that every house had at least one.) On my first play-through I kinda just ignored it, stuck a battalion on everyone and just played through, by end-game the highest level was like a C. So on my Blue Lions play-through I'm making a conscious effort to increase it, although the balance makes me fudge up at times. What has been your strategy so far?

Quite the informative post. Lots of helpful advice to be found here. Admittedly I hadn't even really delved into the killer weapons at all, but I may give them more of a shot. I was a bit disappointed about Javelins and Hand axes being so horrid, but their higher-level counterparts are at least somewhat respectable.

This seems like a pretty good strategy to me. Forged iron for the fodder, and carrying around some extra power for when you need it. Do you ever find yourself using Steel weapons at all?

So now that the game has been out for a spell and people have gotten to have a couple of play-throughs, I'd like to see some opinions on something: weapons. In general, what has been your mainstay weapons for your units in each weapon category, do you forge at all, if so, which weapons are worth forging? Did you make conservative usage of hero relics (due to the pain required to repair them), or did you spam them out of the gate? For my own play-throughs so far, I've mostly used forged iron weapons as my units main attacking weapon simply due to the low weight, decent durability, and decent might. I've also sprinkled in some of the brave weapons too. Notably, I haven't really used the hero's relics at all (minus the sword of the creator, and accessories that you can equip, like the Aegis Shield.)

While I certainly knew about Authority and its benefits, I didn't really know how high the tiers of battalions could get. By the end of the game only Byleth and Edelgard were able to equip A-ranked battalions. Everyone else was at C or lower since I neglected to instruct Authority (didn't really seem important at the time).

Wow, I didn't know this so I ended up killing them both.

Agreed! I thought it was a powerful scene, I'm a bit disappointed I missed it since I killed Dedue while he was still human. I guess it matters since when Dedue transforms and subsequently dies, he's no longer capable of having that conversation? Both are pretty nice in their own ways.

Oh, well yes that was what I meant. I didn't finish Dimitri off with Amyr either (I used the sword of the creator) But, I did attack Dimitri with Edelgard. I can post the video of where I saw the scene, I think it's still in my history. Honestly I think it depends on if Dedue transformed or not.

Nah it's the dialogue after the battle is over. In the video I saw Edelgard and Dimitri had a conversation before she axes him, however in my playthrough, Dedue and Dimitri spoke before the latter kicked the bucket. There was a Graphic involved with the former, of Edelgard holding Aymr above a kneeling Dimitri.

Happy to report that I successfully completed this mission. Odd though, when I saw a let's player complete this they had some other dialogue than what I got. Wonder if that means if certain events are done in it, that it changes things?

Sylvain and Mercedes are enemies if you didn't recruit them. Without defeating Mercedes Peg knights will infinitely spawn in the top left corner. I cleared it up a lot better after getting the initial blind side run of it done, only one Managed to transform, and I made sure to kill Dedue w/ Dorothea using Meteor, wasn't dealing with that nonsense.

Well, that's a bit of a solace, for now at least..

Speaking of those mages.. they kept healing the damage I had done to the beasts already, it was quite the irritating set up.

I had just played that paralogue before the mission battle, so I was already frustrated by that particular occurrence, I somehow managed to get through that with no casualties at all, despite having my more squishy characters right in the line of fire. But this? This was just sooo much more to overcome. I'm a bit terrified of the curveballs that may come in chapter 18 when I finally get past this.

I'll agree, this map was a huge pain. I was not at all prepared for the sudden uptick in difficulty, going in blind made it even worse. I usually like to turtle which was how I dealt with the bolting mage the first time around, I set Hubert in range and just tanked the hits until the mage ran out. That was a HUGE mistake, because I didn't know the soldiers were gonna turn into beasts, and by the time the mage ran outta uses, all of them had turned. The funny part is Dedue wouldn't have been an issue at all if it weren't for his transformation, he would be a sitting duck for any decent mage. But he ends up being the worst out of all of them, if you can bring down his 2 HP bars, he has 151 HP in the last skirmish, insane. Sadly I didn't get to recruit Ingrid on this file (Petra is mostly my flier), but I do have Felix. But I didn't train him in authority so I dunno if it's worth even sticking a battalion on him at this point.

Does anyone have any advice for this particular mission battle? I had been having an easy enough time on Hard Classic thus far, and this map shows up and completely slaps me in the face. The soldiers turning one by one into beasts was bad enough, because I couldn't get to them in enough time to prevent the change, but Dedue turning, and getting flanked by Rhea completely destroyed me, I had to use all my pulses and it still wasn't enough to overcome. Anyone have a solid strat for dealing with this? I really don't want to turn the difficulty down if I can help it.

Ah, thanks for clearing that up. I was getting confused looking back and forth between the abilities page, and the classes page.

Is it Heartseeker or Hex? I thought Hex was the localization o.o. Referring to Class Abilities & Arts.