Othin

Well, given that I don't recall seeing Eliwood or Sigurd in FE9...

You need a ton of healing, since your best characters die in 2-3 rounds. But for the Rescue staffs, it's because combat is so hard you need to make mobility not an issue. A main strategy I often use is having a character charge at an enemy group they couldn't hope to take on just to pick off one enemy, then grab them with a Rescue staff so they don't get obliterated on the enemy phase. But for every enemy you kill with that tactic, that's one Rescue use, so it can add up fast if you use it a lot. Because of this, it's really fortunate that you can buy them so easily past the halfway point in the game and that they're just an E rank staff, so characters like Leaf can use them. I also have Tiamo with E Staffs and often a Rescue staff on hand, but her range is pitiful due to her nearly nonexistent Mag stat, whereas Leaf has more Mag than Liz and Mariabel, my two dedicated healers. I was able to survive the first few turns by breaking away and fleeing after making a path to the right rather than staying to kill Cervantes and his knights, but because I didn't really address the enemies chasing my team, I ended up having to move too fast, causing Exceli's troops to turn around and go the back way right where I needed to go rather than go straight down the front and be out of my way. I'll probably kill Cervantes and a General or two to get some breathing room, and send Dion up the middle to lure Exceli's team away, then grab him with a Rescue staff and send him straight for Valhart again. With the enemy phase combined with help from Olivia to get two attacks on the player phase, he should be able to kill Valhart and end the map.

Huh, did not know this. That's really interesting; I was thinking "why didn't they address this" and then it turns out they did.

I guess most of us didn't think the male/female split all the way through. I recall someone did suggest Lyn on the basis of kings vs. princesses, but what really sealed it was the gender-specific classes, which I don't remember anyone pointing out in context with that.

Decided to give Ch20 another shot. I was able to get through the first few turns with a more aggressive strategy to kill some of Cervantes' troops while still holding off the Generals on the right to get some breathing room. Everything was looking good until enemy phase Turn 4, when almost 20 reinforcements showed up at the bottom. I was already starting to move up the right hallway, so my team didn't get completely destroyed, but they killed Tiamo. At the same time, Exceli's team started to move, but they moved down, leaving the hallway as a route around them. I wasn't going to save with a character dead, but I decided to see how much progress I could make anyway. Moving further up the hall, some of Exceli's troops turned around and got in the way; I bungled my attempt to fight them off while keeping my vulnerable characters out of the way and lost Olivia and Frederick. My plan was to have them support MU while he charged at Valhart, but I screwed up their positioning. Regardless, not many enemies were around Valhart, so I sent MU towards him, but the remaining ones kept healing him and making him impossible to kill fast enough with just one character. Also, I ran out of Rescue staffs. Seems spamming several uses per turn doesn't last long. The Rescue staffs are the smallest issue, since I have enough money to buy more before trying again. After that, I should be able to straighten out my positioning to keep everyone alive, then with working on MU's strategies and having Olivia for support, I should be able to kill Valhart before the rest of my team gets trapped. So victory is within reach, but there's still a ways to go. And another six chapters after this one.

RvB3 was obviously going to be an FE7 character, just as LvD3 is obviously going to be an FE9 character. The map selections make this clear, and there's no question of which FE9 character, as of the 20 main characters shown in ST and LvD, only one remains for FE9.

Excellent.

what Cellica all I see is Rule 63 Eliwood

Oswin is not a primary axe user. Looking at your post as a whole, I must ask: do you not understand how weapon access works?

Too psycho to pass up

I could do that, but I'd rather save myself the hassle and try to pair MU early to get Mark at some decent point to make things easier. Besides, when I eventually decide to keep a female MU unpaired until endgame, my first choice will be Gangrel. On the next couple of runs like that, Paris will have to compete with Basilio and Valhart. I'll have to wait until I see him to figure out where he'll rank on that list. Which, granted, will be before I start my Lunatic+ run, but I'm not seeing him beating out Gangrel in any case. And yeah, I'm planning on continuing with the Berwick Saga names. For my fifth run, I'll probably make a mute male MU named Derrick, but that's a ways off; I'm not even sure about my plans for that run. I'll probably eventually transfer them all to my first file for a full StreetPass team, keeping Othin as a Dark Knight but leaving the others in more logical classes.

Well, Othin is a Dark Knight, so not really. Faye is a Sorcerer right now, although I consider Dark Pegasus her "main" class. Which is similarly far removed from Swordmaster. Dion, like Othin, is a Dark Knight. So I guess you could say I got the "same class as Othin" part right even though it has nothing to do with his actual class.

Hm? Othin = Normal MU (male) - paired with Serge Faye = Hard MU (female) - paired with Krom Dion = Lunatic MU (male) - not yet paired (will be paired with Sariya or Inverse) Those are my three files as of now. I'm talking about my NM file. I'm not aiming for as much postgame-wise on my Lunatic file, so even though I still haven't yet completed the main story, I expect to finish it first and then replace it with my Lunatic+ file, where I'll make Sylvis as my MU. As with the others, I expect her to have no connection to the actual Sylvis. Not sure who I'll pair her with.

Best: Enide Worst: Percival

Oh, I paired myself with Serge on this file at least two months ago. I've already made the maximum number of possible S supports for this file; wouldn't be able to get all the A supports without having all the kids.

Well, monster DLC doesn't really have new content. And again, I feel like if they were going for more of them, we'd have seen them by now. Seems like they're just going for a trio, like with the other maps. Fits so nicely into the three-per-page layout of the shop.

Eleven dayyyyyyys I think I'm obsessing too much over this. Is there such a thing as obsessing too much over this?

You can get unlimited quantities of basically anything. Hammerne staffs are most prominently available as drops from bosses in skirmishes; they either drop their weapon, a stat-up item, or something else like that. On my main postgame file, I have 7 of them right now and never really bothered looking. And yeah, you'll need to grind quite a bit to face the final DLC maps (the LvD trio) and possibly the highest-level SpotPass teams and sidequests. Shouldn't be necessary otherwise, though.

Maxed out male MU's supports on my Normal file, with the obvious exception of Paris. That is, I haven't completed his supports 100%, but I've completed all the available ones up to A rank. Still a long way to go with the other characters, though.

No. After Ch3, you can battle and recruit any past-game units. After Ch25, you can also recruit the special FE13 units.

No. I said the opposite. After Ch3, there's a Wireless option on the world map menu where you can access SpotPass stuff. You can use this to download SpotPass content and to summon past-game SpotPass teams to the field, where you can battle them whenever you want. You can also use it to make the SpotPass sidequests appear, where you recruit characters like Gangrel and Valhart, but you can't reach those sidequests until after Ch25.

Ch17 has four parts, not three.

Hmm. The thing is, he's a bonus from a monster DLC, and yet he does fit as an FE4 Gen 1 character and as a missing Paladin.

There are multiple kinds of SpotPass. The kind where you download past-game characters as skirmishes are available anytime. The kind where you get entirely new chapters for important FE13 characters like Gangrel are only available at endgame.

Of course, thinking things over, it's also possible that Lyn might just have Wrath.