some details of my current playthrough

[Progenitus]

So since this board seems to think that Aran isn't helping us beat DB chapters, or rather, make them go faster, I decided to play through the game again. First, I wouldn't use Aran, and then see how many turns it takes to beat it (I would generally play multiple times to see if I could go any faster). Then I would use Aran and record my turn count and/or other interesting notes.

If anyone wants to play and try to see if they get "better" results than me, feel free, since apparently I'm a terrible strategist. Well, I say apparently, since whenever I "debate" with other ppl on this board, half their counterarguments are "you're terrible at this game". If you're going to sit here and insult my playthrough and not even try the game out on your own, I'm just going to ignore you.

BTW, before I forget, if you're going to talk about how something like "but no one ever said Aran never had positive utility!" or "even garbage like leo have positive utility!", there's a difference between making a potshot once in awhile (like what a crappy unit like Edward or Leo would do) and being used as an active member of the party (like what you'd do with someone like Nolan, or Aran in this case). The former is where anyone can have positive utility, as long as the crappy units are stuck with the minor utility jobs (like Meg opening chests) and the latter is where a unit's stats actually matter, i.e. that unit is actually good.

In case you were wondering, when I did 1-3 and 1-4 (and 1-5) "without Aran", I still used him to throw javelins and such, but I didn't use him to wall. Basically, I treated Aran like Edward/Leo (e.g. can't expose Aran to attacks).

Here are my results so far. inb4pemn

1-3

Without Aran: The best I got after four tries... I beat it in 10 turns, but I had only 3 PCs escape (including Micaiah) and no NPCs.

With Aran: I beat it in 10 turns, but I had every single PC and NPC escape. I actually could've beaten it in 9 turns, but I wanted more people to escape. BTW, this was my first try with Aran.

BTW, I tried to go down the right side. Whoever the fuck made that strategy up is out of their mind, because that's just a nightmare. Sothe can't do anything because there are too many enemies with 2 range beyond the door and he has no access to 1-2 range weapons, which means I take out a whooping 1 enemy per turn. I can't even bumrush those enemies because there are thickets right behind that door, which means only, like, 2 guys can get through. I didn't even bother to finish it, since by turn 5 I still only had Sothe beyond the door, STILL wasting time killing off enemies so I could get everyone else through, so I just restarted.

BTW, I also managed to get Aran a level in this chapter. Nolan was level 11, with some odd exp.

1-4

Without Aran tanking: I had Edward/Ilyana/Micaiah go north, and Meg stuck around since one of the enemies in the north had a chest key, so I would trade it over to Meg and she would go all the way around the bottom to get the robe in the top-right corner. Everyone else went south. Then Nolan/Leo/Laura/Aran branched off to the right while Sothe went to the left (I didn't have Sothe get the master seal, and I would also skip the bottom left chest that had the pure water).

The problem I had here was that Edward was using a bronze sword since I didn't want him to accidentally crit something on the counter and then open up a space for another laguz to attack him, which means he did absolutely nothing in offense, and I had to pray that Ilyana or wrath Micaiah crit'd (which has liek a 60% chance of happening, before factoring in Ilyana's awful hit). So often, I'd have to spend extra turns to kill off a laguz at the north chokepoint. It took me four tries before I finally managed to beat the chapter in 10 turns and get all the items I wanted (I skipped the master seal, only getting it if I got lucky and someone that wasn't Sothe managed to get it).

With Aran: I had Nolan/Leo/Micaiah go north, while Ilyana went South with Aran. Otherwise, it was a similar setup. I beat it in 9 turns on my first try, although I skipped the pure water and beastfoe. I actually could've gotten the beastfoe too, but I didn't count Sothe's squares correctly and had him skip the beastfoe so he could go for the top right chest with the robe, but it turned out that Meg would've made it to that chest on turn 9 anyway. I also got lucky and Meg managed to pick up the master seal as she was walking around that southeast corner.

I redid the chapter since I didn't want to skip the beastfoe. This time, I actually could've beaten it in 8 turns, but I wanted to get the robe so I took 9 turns again, and while I was waiting for Meg to make the trip to the top right corner I also had Sothe backtrack and get the pure water (which I skipped when he was first going up the left side). Meg got lucky again adn picked up the master seal.

Later, I redid the chapter *again* (for reasons I'll say later). This time, Meg refused to pick up the master seal (I had her trade the chest key to Aran so he could open the chest while Meg was in the bottom right corner), so after Sothe opened the top left chest, I had him go all the way back down to get the master seal (I had Nolan unequipped so the laguz wouldn't suicide into him while I was waiting). Took 11 turns.

Before this one, though, I didn't like the runthrough and restarted, because Leo critted two laguz and killed both of them, and I didn't want him to take all that exp (I wanted to funnel it into Nolan). So when there was only one laguz left, I said to myself, "w/e, I'll just replay the chapter".

So I played the chapter four times (although this is ignoring all the first-turn screwups I had, like forgetting to trade with Sothe so his beast killer goes to the top of his inventory rather than countering with his bronze dagger, or moving Sothe before having Micaiah attack the wall so that Micaiah would get the +2 att from supports and her + Leo could break the wall which means Edward could go and attack the laguz on the right behind the wall with the wind edge, rather than also have him attack the wall too).

The number of times Aran got critted: 0.

Just something I wanted to point out.

Also, since some people here don't know how to funnel kills into the units you want, without losing any efficiency, the first turn of 1-4 is a perfect example of this.

There's a laguz at the south chokepoint by that healing pot thing (the one you kill on turn 1). See this video for the placement of that laguz.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xcwzKyvWgO8

You have a 2-range person like Leo or Ilyana attack it, then move Sothe to the right of that laguz and attack it with a bronze dagger. Then Laura moves in and trades with him so his beast killer goes to the top of his inventory (and if he took damage, heal him afterwards). Then have the person you want to funnel kills to deal the finishing blow, and in the process this unit will also fill in the other space in the chokepoint (thus having both your 2-range attacker and Laura protected).

This produces the same immediate result as just having Sothe run in from the start and kill it with his beast killer (i.e. dead enemy), but in the process the exp actually goes to a good cause, since Sothe's growths are terrible.

I'll post more later. I'm actually at 1-E right now.

Edited August 27, 2009 by smash fanatic

[Narga_Rocks]

Since I doubt you'll read this I won't bother saying anything about the rest of your post, except that Aran isn't useless. I know that. I've never tried to argue him into lower mid or anything. Occasionaly, I may have said he could drop to mid tier. Even still, that isn't to say he's bad, just that he's not as good as you seem to think he is. And the crit thing isn't something that will happen to everyone. Or even very many people. We're talking like 1 in 12 people playing through the chapter, or something similar. The point is not that it happens all the time, but that it happens to him more than anyone else in that chapter. Or to put it in other words: Other units will cause resets less frequently than Aran will. The fact that Aran doesn't cause them very often does not change the fact that he causes resets more frequently than other units. There is strategy that can make certain other units don't end up dead, the only strategy that does this 100% for Aran is to not let him be attacked.

The question I have is what level is your Edward? Also, was he facing fresh Laguz? Because it takes 20 mt for him to critblick a cat, and given how it takes level 16 for him to have the str for a 6 mt iron sword to kill a cat on a crit, why were you afraid he'd get himself killed? Also, it takes 17 mt for a double crit to kill a tiger. Level 10 or 11. Otherwise, an iron sword again isn't going to kill one. And since he'll have 11 crit and the tigers have 1 cev, the probability of him double critting a tiger is the same as the chance of Aran getting blicked. 1%. Since the chance of it happening is the same as what you say doesn't happen often enough to care with Aran, it's not an issue anyway. I'm not quite sure why Edward needed a bronze weapon.

[Interceptor]

So, before I even get started, this thread has an invalid premise. You say that "this board seems to think that Aran isn't helping us beat DB chapters", which is another one of your gross mischaracterizations. Not only does "this board" not have a universal opinion to begin with, since it's composed of many people with different ideas, but even those people who disagree with your ranking of Aran are not going so far as to say that he's not helping beat the DB chapters. For christ's sake, smash, even Eddie and Leonardo are helping you beat the DB chapters, and most people agree that they are bad units in Hard Mode.

The real issue that people have is that you rate Aran above his station. AKA, you put him on the same level as someone like Mia. It boggles my mind why you repeatedly ignore the actual criticisms that people have, in order to refute fantasy arguments that don't even exist.

Now, as for your runthrough, already the spectre of sub-optimal strategy has reared its ugly head. It's fine to half-ass your way through the game when you are just playing for the sake of it, but if we're talking about unit potential under efficient playthrough conditions, it's no longer acceptable to goof off. If there is some manfiestly superior strategy, you should be using it if possible/feasible, otherwise you aren't proving anything WRT efficient play.

For example, take 1-3. I've shown you in the past how you can use Kurth to soak hits and distract enemies for the purposes of a clear, even going as far as telling you the exact square to have Micaiah Direct to. I've also told you how to get Eddie over to the right side immediately along with Sothe, in order to kill the guy with the door key, smash the door down, and get the drop on the enemies before they can clog up the works. The advantage of the right side is not speed (although it is still fast), it is safety. Tons of people not named Sothe or Micaiah have accuracy problems, meaning that misses can be quite deadly. Fighting down the right side gives you insurance: no reinforcements will spawn in the quadrant that you have blocked off, you can protect it with a mere two units, and there are trees to fire over and thickets to stand in for your indirects, for protection.

The special bonus of the right-side strategy is that you can completely bypass the armors to the left. They are fixed in place if you approach them from the top, but if you go through the door on the right hand side you can backdoor them and force a battle on your terms (they move if you get behind them). It is hilariously effective to quickly dispatch the enemies immediately behind the door on the right hand side, and them swarm down to the Arrive aquare, because now you have herded these units into a narrow corridor and can kill them at your leisure. Kurth helps greatly with this, as does Sothe. At any time you can pull the ripcord and have everyone simply escape, because you are fighting within spitting distance of the Arrive square.

Going down the right side does not preclude you from getting Aran, since he will eventually come to you. Just make sure that he doesn't accidentally suicide himself on Ilyana or something.

As for 1-4, again, your playstyle is confusingly inefficient. You send Eddie/Micaiah/Ilyana north, as you should, but you aren't saying whether or not you're abusing the laguz AI to get free hits without having Eddie get attacked. I know that you know how to do it, since I've told you how several times already. Also, you're complaining about Ilyana's HIT, but not giving her a forge even though you have plenty of money for it. On top of that, you're having Eddie use a totally inappropriate weapon for the job, when a different one would serve better, as Narga already pointed out. Why are you sandbagging your own performance, here?

Sending Sothe/Nolan/Laura south, with Sothe going west and the other going east is probably the most sensible thing you did in this chapter. If you fought in the north correctly, you probably could have either gotten more items or shaved turns off your total.

Regarding Aran not getting crit-blicked, PEMN. You played Russian Roulette, and managed to not blow your brains out. This means that you got lucky, not that the gun wasn't loaded.

There is a reason that people accuse you of being a mediocre strategist, smash, and it's because you do a lot of silly things when you play. Agian, that's not to say that the average person doesn't do that or more, it's to point out that you can't speak to efficient play by giving examples where someone is playing inefficiently. You can't prove anything like that.

EDIT: by the way, like I said, this thread has an invalid premise. In many cases you can speed things up by using Aran. In the early chapters, even a bad unit like Leo or Ilyana is necessary for an efficient clear, because your choices are limited. Hell, even MEg is good for finding random items. Nobody is claiming, or has ever claimed, that dropping Aran somehow makes things faster. So, for you to compare Aran vs. No Aran is to misrepresent the argument.

Edited August 27, 2009 by Interceptor

[Interceptor]

Just for the sake of pointing out weasely behavior, smash editted-in this portion of the original post after Narga and I already commented:

[...]If you're going to sit here and insult my playthrough and not even try the game out on your own, I'm just going to ignore you.

BTW, before I forget, if you're going to talk about how something like "but no one ever said Aran never had positive utility!" or "even garbage like leo have positive utility!", there's a difference between making a potshot once in awhile (like what a crappy unit like Edward or Leo would do) and being used as an active member of the party (like what you'd do with someone like Nolan, or Aran in this case). The former is where anyone can have positive utility, as long as the crappy units are stuck with the minor utility jobs (like Meg opening chests) and the latter is where a unit's stats actually matter, i.e. that unit is actually good.

In case you were wondering, when I did 1-3 and 1-4 (and 1-5) "without Aran", I still used him to throw javelins and such, but I didn't use him to wall. Basically, I treated Aran like Edward/Leo (e.g. can't expose Aran to attacks).

So his "before anyone says" is more like "oh shit, I'm supposing to be ignoring Int and Narga, let me edit this in and hope that nobody notices".

On the subject of trying the game on my own, I have basically given up on giving smash detailed examples of how to clear chapters efficiently. Examples that are based on my own experience playing the game, naturally. The right-hand side clear in 1-3 is the best example, but the turn 2 boss kill in 1-4 is another one, or the fast clear in 1-6-2 by air-dropping Tauroneo, or getting max/near-max BEXP in 2-3, or clearing 3-6 with nothing but Sothe/Micaiah/Savior, or a pacifist clear of 3-13, or any number of other actual real-life strategies that he flat-out ignores because they are devastating to whatever point he was trying to make.

[-Cynthia-]

I think that the best way to have "No Aran" would be to actually not have Aran period, IE never recruiting him.

I don't think most people are arguing that Aran is useless for his DB chapters, just that he isn't so useful as to be so highly rated by you specifically. I'm not seeing how your personal anecdote is really going to show much.

I doubt that half the arguments against you are that you're a terrible player anyway, it's mentioned sometimes, but you're exaggerating.

Edited August 27, 2009 by -Cynthia-

[Narga_Rocks]

BTW, before I forget, if you're going to talk about how something like "but no one ever said Aran never had positive utility!" or "even garbage like leo have positive utility!", there's a difference between making a potshot once in awhile (like what a crappy unit like Edward or Leo would do) and being used as an active member of the party (like what you'd do with someone like Nolan, or Aran in this case). The former is where anyone can have positive utility, as long as the crappy units are stuck with the minor utility jobs (like Meg opening chests) and the latter is where a unit's stats actually matter, i.e. that unit is actually good.

What's Edward doing in 1-P and 1-1? Or Leo in 1-1? Also 1-2?

In 1-P, Edward is either attacking on enemy phase and self healing on player phase to boost Micaiah's levels (she kills on player phase), or Micaiah attacks first then him. Either way, Micaiah is not soloing this in 10 turns. Not with 8 enemies and needing to KO them all. In fact, an Edward double and Micaiah single doesn't even kill some of these guys, so then Leo is helpful.

In 1-1, sure, Nolan is doing most of the tanking. But when he's self healing, just who is killing the things? Micaiah, Edward, and Leo. Nolan + Micaiah might kill some things, but 7 turns to the boss with just Nolan's enemy phase and Micaiah's weak attacks on player phase? Not likely.

In 1-2, there's again enough enemies that if you want to finish by turn 10 you likely can't just sit around until Sothe appears and just have Nolan and Laura move. Edward and Leo are again doing more than potshotting. Which is still an important part of the team since without them around you generally don't have the unit numbers to kill everything in the right number of turns. It's why even Meg can get a kill on turn 1 in 1-5 and why my Aran doesn't stay at base level, or Leo and Edward don't remain at whatever level they ended 1-2. They cut turns. Make life easier.

And when there are other tanks that don't run the risk of being critblicked, I don't see the point in using a unit that can be. Even if it's like 2%, it's still ~13% after just 7 tries. More than 1 in 8 people using your strategy will have to reset because of it. The fact that you are apparently lucky enough to be among the 7 does not make it good strategy.

Even if it's just 1%, that's still ~6.8% after 7 tries. 1 in ~15. Sure, you are among the 14, apparently, but when I have the option of 0% or 6.8%, I choose 0%. You don't. That's why we say you don't have good strategy. We think no chance of death is better than a chance of death. Especially when we can pull off the same turn count regardless.

Also, getting stuck at the door like that is another one of the reasons we say it. And using Aran with a javelin seems silly when a forged thunder or forged bow has more accuracy. Honestly it'll just make things more difficult if you let him attack from 2 range rather than Ilyana or Leo. Nolan should also have more hit with a hand axe. Micaiah with light/thani. Sothe with a knife. So many superior 2 range options. And I'll bet you tried to recruit Aran in your "No Aran" try.

[Progenitus]

I think that the best way to have "No Aran" would be to actually not have Aran period, IE never recruiting him

I was comtemplating about this, not using Aran at all, but then it would make me go even slower.

I don't think most people are arguing that Aran is useless for his DB chapters, just that he isn't so useful as to be so highly rated by you specifically. I'm not seeing how your personal anecdote is really going to show much.

Most of the arguments made for any character are based on "personal anecdotes". For example, determining how much a laguz' transformation gauge slows you down. Based on your personal strategy, this drawback could vary from "doesn't matter" to "completely detrimental".

I doubt that half the arguments against you are that you're a terrible player anyway, it's mentioned sometimes, but you're exaggerating.

Of course it's an exaggeration, but to even bring up "you're bad at this game" or "your strategy is horrible" and not actually refute the point just screams logical fallacy.

[Narga_Rocks]

I doubt that half the arguments against you are that you're a terrible player anyway, it's mentioned sometimes, but you're exaggerating.

Of course it's an exaggeration, but to even bring up "you're bad at this game" or "your strategy is horrible" and not actually refute the point just screams logical fallacy.

You mean when the point you are making is that a certain character or action won't work out well so the character is bad, but the rest of us can make better use out of them than you and so we know they are better than some other unit? Why doesn't that refute the point? Do you want a turn by turn, grid space by grid space walkthrough that shows how to do it properly before you'll accept that you are doing it wrong? Like in 2-3 or 1-3 or 1-4?

[Interceptor]

Of course it's an exaggeration, but to even bring up "you're bad at this game" or "your strategy is horrible" and not actually refute the point just screams logical fallacy.

The problem with this statement is that people do actually refute the point by giving examples, you just choose to ignore them. I guess when your Modus operandi is to disregard the arguments devastating to your point, that when you think back to the people who have called you a mediocre strategist, you won't actually be able to recall anything of subtance.

For instance, recall my assertion a million years ago that Nephenee is one of the best units in Normal Mode, because of the Part 2 BEXP dump potential. After failing to counter my argument in terms of opportunity cost WRT to BEXP use, and failing to counter it in terms of who was best suited for the BEXP in the first place, failing to counter it by refuting the idea that she's hit tier 3 by the end of 2-E (she rapes the GMs even as high tier 2), and even failing to argue that Haar would be diminished by the strategy, you resorted to arguing that getting enough BEXP via Geoffrey's Charge in 2-3 was prohibitively difficult. To that end, you demanded that I not only give you a strategy to get all 14,000+ points of BEXP, but to get the Arms Scroll and the Speedwing, too. Never mind that Nephenee does not even need a full clear of 2-3's BEXP in order to rock and roll.

So this soldier obliged. As a matter of fact, I still have the 2-3 save that I used (I got 14,294 BEXP in that run). It's difficult to do a turn-by-turn given the randomness of hit rates, enemy and NPC movement, but I gave so many specifics that anyone could pull it off. Or, so I thought. Despite many people having no difficulty getting high enemy counts (40+ out of 50), success eluded you, and all you produced were complaints about problems that you had that betrayed your lack of understanding of how to either 1) think critically or 2) follow basic instructions.

I could only come to one conclusion.

[Jaybee]

Damn, wtf's the square? I might have it but for some reason my Kurth dies by ~ turn 7. When he's on a thicket.

Also, 1-1's moar like 8 turns. Edward and Leo are practically useless anyway. Other than maybe potshotting the boss.

[Interceptor]

Also, 1-1's moar like 8 turns. Edward and Leo are practically useless anyway. Other than maybe potshotting the boss.

They are not useless. Eddie is particularly vital as a blocker, because Nolan can't be in two places at once. Leonardo and Micaiah serve the same function of weakening things to hopefully cut down on a counter, etc. Sure, Leo des not hit hard, but his damage at this point can still be decisive.

Damn, wtf's the square? I might have it but for some reason my Kurth dies by ~ turn 7. When he's on a thicket.

I'll give you the square, but while I'm at it I think that I will kill two birds with one stone and give an example of how you set up a good right-side clear of 1-3. Fortunately since everyone always starts in the same spot, the first turn placement is very easy. These all all cardinal directions, north/south/east/west.

Turn 1 Player Phase:

Micaiah -- 3E/1S. Direct, Target the square 2S of where she ends.

Leonardo -- 1N/2E/1S. Shove Micaiah 1E.

Sothe -- 4E, 3S. Attack and kill the the fighter (chance is 100% in all circumnstances).

Edward -- 3E/2S. Trade with Sothe and take the Door key from him.

Nolan -- 1E or 1E/1S (he will counter a Myrmidon on Enemy Phase).

There are several good branches from this point. A more aggressive clear involves sending Ilyana 3S so that she counters the Armor on Enemy Phase, and opens up the possibility of actually clearing the field on Turn 2. A more conservative approach is to have Laura move 1S/3E and shove Leonardo 1S, so that Ilyana can move 1S/2E/1S into Leo's old spot. This gives you a configuration where you can react pretty easily to misses.

Turn 1 Enemy Phase:

Regardless of which way you went, Kurth is going to get attacked by an Archer on the other side of the wall, and by a Fighter. Nolan will get attacked by a Myrmidon. Aran and co. show up.

Turn 2 Player Phase:

If Nolan landed a hit, Leonardo can kill the Myrmidon. If not, you can focus fire to kill him anyway, or cut your losses and fall back. Ilyana + Micaiah can double-team the Fighter on Kurth easily, and sometimes Ilyana can ORKO him because he's weighed down to 9AS by his Steel Axe.

Regardless of what you do, Eddie runs to the door and opens it with the key. Sothe goes 1S of Eddie and ORKOs the Archer standing there. This might require Kard if you used Micaiah to fight something, otherwise it's an easy kill with Bronze.

Turn 2 Enemy Phase:

What happens on the left depends on what you did, but generally you'll want Nolan to face one or two more enemies on Enemy Phase if possible. On the right, Sothe gets attacked by the Archer that attacked Kurth on Turn 1, and he counter-kills a Myrmidon.

Turn 3 Player Phase:

Diverges too much from this point based on accuracy and strategy used for the left, but suffice it to say that Sothe can now ORKO the Archer that attacked him on Enemy Phase. At this point, there's only one guy who has a 2-range attack that's anywhere near Sothe, a Fighter with a Hand Axe, and he won't even move until you're in range (aka ready for him). Now, remember that smash was still trying to get through this door on turn 5. This is the difference between executing a well-planned strategy, and half-assing it.

Basically your Kurth setup can last almost forever, you never have to move him if you don't want to, he's like 10HKO'ed and you can heal him with Laura in an emergency. Some alternatives, though, are using him as a mobile shield to cover your withdrawl down to the sanctuary square. A useful thing to do in this chapter is to have Micaiah lolOHKO the armor right above the square, move Sothe there and ORKO the longbow archer, and now you've effectively cut off the entire level, because thw square that Sothe is on is the only way to get through (the other spot has a tree). You can fight at your leisure, here. and take as long as you want. Kurth can bring up the rear and block reinforcements (hell, even Eddie can sometimes do that).

Edited August 28, 2009 by Interceptor

[Jaybee]

I'd do it nao if it wasn't 11.15 p.m. here.

Nolan can stnd at the square where the 2 fighters can take him on at once. Since they have no ranged attacks other than the Javelin guy who doesn't move, Micaiah is safe to potshot.

Maybe they can take out the Javelin, but other than that there's no reeal reason to do so.

[Interceptor]

That's also a valid way to do it. I just posted that particular one since it uses Kurth as a meatshield right away. You don't need to use Kurth at all if he doesn't mesh with the specific strategy. You don't even need to protect Aimee, honestly, she's only worth 50BEXP and she's good for soaking two hits, easy.

[Interceptor]

So, I just did 1-4 five times in a row, without deploying Aran (literally, I removed him from the map so that I wasn't tempted to even use him to shove or break a wall). I never clocked in over 9 turns. Two of the runs were 8 turns, and two of the 9 could have been finished in 8, except I did something retarded towards the end in both cases and couldn't kill the last guy on Player Phase.

I don't know WTF you were doing, smash, but I just used my normal strategy of:

Turn 1 PP:

Break wall, send Eddie 1E of the elbow.

Kill pot-laguz, with Nolan positioned 1S of him so that he has two facings.

Turn 1 EP:

Laguz runs up to Eddie, does nothing.

Two cats lose >50% of their health to counters from Nolan.

Turn 2 PP:

Kill guy next to Eddie with Ilyana and Eddie. Micaiah Sacrifices to heal Eddie and put herself in Wrath range. If Ilyana + Eddie is not enough, Ilyana + Micaiah will do. Eddie equips wepaon that will not clear space w/crit.

Nolan kills east cat from the east, he is now blocking a choke. Heal w/Laura.

Leo shoots west cat for free EXP. Cats untransforms. Intercepter lols. Sothe finishes the cat off.

Turn 2 EP:

Laguz attacks Eddie, who may or may not crit but won't kill him on counter.

Nolan gets attacked, survives easily, does tons of damage in reply.

Etc. It's simply a matter of having Sothe run up the west side, killing everything he sees, with Nolan/Laura/Leo handling the east portion. Meg can be on chest key duty, especially if you have some left over from 1-2. Ilyana + Micaiah + Eddie can kill any laguz on the map without taking damage, and they won't miss.

You can actually have them standing in the sand on Turn 4 and Turn 6 when the laguz reinforcements come in, because you can just kill the Tiger reinforcement on Player Phase and the cats are unable to ORKO Ilyana. AKA, you protect Micaiah with a 2-man wall made of Eddie and Ilyana. Ilyana never gets attacked anyway because she does such crazy damage, and they all go after Eddie.

After Turn 6 there are no more reinforcements, and both Sothe and Chuck Nolan are closing in on their objectives. The only X factor is what the second boss does. Sometimes you get lucky and Ilyana gets a shot on him untransformed, firing right over the scenery and ruining his day.

The only way to get seriously boned is on the %chance to find items, but Aran has nothing at all to do with that other than being another warm body for the Master Seal. His presence does not speed this up much at all, other than shoving/javving duty.

EDIT: oh, and my first couple of runs I didn't even have forges for people other than Nolan and Ilyana. In fact, Leo still does not have a forge, I only added one to Eddie because he got STR-screwed and has 7 STR at level 8.

Edited August 28, 2009 by Interceptor

[Ardan]

Aran for god tier =0

[Progenitus]

I remember running some calculations about Aran's chances of getting critted and dying in 1-4, as well as his chances of surviving 2 rounds. Lemme pull them out...

For quick reference, including reinforcements but ignoring the two bosses, there are 5 cats (18 att/14 AS), 4 tigers with 24 att/10 AS, and 6 tigers with 26 att/12 AS. 2 cats and 2 26 att/12 AS tigers are the reinforcements, btw. All 5 cats have 8 crit, all tigers have 7 crit except for 1 of the 24 att/10 AS tigers, who has 6; sorta significant when there are only 15 non-boss enemies around, and we're *****ing about Aran facing 1-2 crit rates, but for simplicities sake I'll pretend that 6 crit tiger actually has 7.

Aran has a 35% chance of getting +spd. With it, cats no longer double, and they 4HKO, meaning even IF they get a crit, he doesn't get one rounded (granted, that's at full HP, but if he's not at full HP that implies that he/Meg already got attacked, in which case it won't matter).

He also has a 35% chance of getting both HP and def (50% HP x 70% def = 35% chance). With it, cats 5HKO, meaning they need double crits to kill him off, and the chances of that happening are extremely negligible (lol, 0.04% chance. It may as well be 0).

(It's worth noting that with HP + def, the 24 att tigers no longer 2HKO as well).

And then a 35% chance of getting +lck, which reduces a cat's crit to 1, meaning they have like a 2% chance to crit and kill; however, because they 4HKO, Aran can possibly kill them on the counter since he doesn't get instablicked (e.g. the cat was already attacked several times, or Aran procs a crit), and kill the cat before it does the second attack, so it's actually lower than 2% (this also applies even if he doesn't get +lck, btw). And also, +lck means tigers have 0 crit on him now, so he has a 0% chance of getting one rounded by them.

This gives him ~58% chance of not getting one rounded if a cat lands a crit, and then the 35% chance to get lck and reduce his crit chances against everything in the map.

So 42% of the time Aran will not have the required stats to not get one rounded if a cat crits (assuming that he won't kill a cat on the counter, and the cat will be able to get the second hit in and kill him off).

Of this 42% of the time, 35% of the time he'll get +lck and drop his crit to 1, meaning cats have ~2% chance to crit on a double (so 14.7% of the time, overall). The other 27.3% of the time is for "he didn't get spd, or HP + def, or +lck". And out of this 27.3% chance, he has ~4% chance of a cat critting him.

.147 x .02 + .273 x .04 = ~1.39% chance that an 8/0 Aran will get one rounded by a cat critting him.

A tiger is more straightforward, as they have 1 crit, and he has a 35% chance of getting +lck and reducing that to 0. Of the 65% chance that he doesn't get +lck... .65 x .01 = 0.65% overall chance that a tiger will crit and kill him.

However, he has a good chance of surviving at least 2 rounds.

With just +spd, cats 4HKO, meaning a cat has ~4% chance of 2 rounding him. 96% of the time he'll be safe.

with HP + def, cats 5HKO and double, meaning a cat has ~7.76% chance of 2 rounding him. The other 92.2% of the time he's safe. With +HP and def, the 24 att tigers also don't 2HKO, meaning they'll need a crit to finish him off (it'll happen like 2% of the time in 2 attacks).

If my calculations are correct, he has a 65.9% chance of not getting 2 rounded by cats (35% spd * 96% chance to avoid a crit + 35% HP and def * 92.2% chance to avoid a crit = ~65.9 //he only needs one of the two to happen).

And a 34.3% chance that 24 att tigers don't 2HKO.

Then he can level up. Laguz give 30+ exp a kill, and like 15 for hitting them (on NM, on a youtube video, level 7 Aran got 19 exp just for hitting a laguz. On HM this drops to 14, but technically on HM the laguz are a higher level, so it should be more), meaning he levels up after 2 kills + 3 hits or something like that.

Considering I'd prefer to give the units I'm using in the future precedence on kills (e.g. Aran/Nolan get the kills, or Meg if we were masochistic; Leo, Micaiah, and Ilyana are just softeners), this easily happens in a few turns.

At 9/0, Aran now has ~58% chance to get +1 spd, 58% chance to get +1 HP and def, 58% chance to get +1 lck (and 12.3% chance to get double lck). I can't be bothered to do all the calculations again, but this is ~66% improvement on his chances when he was just 8/0, and his chances of surviving at 8/0 were already pretty good, just to give you a general idea.

I'm pretty sure Edward's chances of having <= 26 combined HP and def (aka 26 att tigers OHKO) are higher than Aran's chances of getting critted. I can do the math later.

Edited August 29, 2009 by smash fanatic

[Narga_Rocks]

I'm pretty sure Edward's chances of having <= 26 combined HP and def (aka 26 att tigers OHKO) are higher than Aran's chances of getting critted. I can do the math later.

You are missing the point. Well, ignoring or not comprehending, I'm never certain with you.

At the beginning of the map, we can see if Edward has the requisite hp/def to survive. If not, well, you need a new strategy. Or a modification. Whatever. Point is, I can see that if I do option A, Edward will probably die. You can't do that with Aran. Unless he gets luck + spd or luck + hp + def, there is no possible way to be certain that whatever strategy I'm about to employ will end with Aran alive. You'd have to be an idiot to send Edward into battle with insufficient hp + def and expect him to survive those tigers. If he doesn't have it, hey, new strategy. Do something else, and try to minimize chance of death. Guess how we minimize chance of death in Aran's case. Go on, guess. That's right (not that you'd say it), don't let him get attacked.

At least Ed's chances are higher (depending on level) of having enough hp and def to survive than Aran's are of getting both a level and luck and (hp + def) or spd on that level. Then the plan is to send in an Aran we know faces a chance of death (if he didn't get what he needs) into the path of enemies?

How do you think these two things are even remotely comparable? Or that stating that Edward may not have hp + def > 26 has any bearing on Aran being bad in this chapter. Even if Edward doesn't pull off the requisite hp + def combination, that doesn't excuse Aran from his issues. Plus this isn't the only time he's got them.

[Interceptor]

Never mind Eddie's 85% HP growth, or the fact that a C support with absolutely anyone gives him +1 DEF.

[grandjackal]

Another problem I notice you don't really go turn by turn of how you went about your strategy of using Aran for these chapters. For all we know, you could be purposefully fucking up to make Aran look better. Secondary note is, it's not lke you're showing us any strategy that Aran can do that someone like Eddie can't. I don't even see the point of this topic existing. I'm an Aran fan, but simmer down dude.

Another thing is that with Aran, he HAS to deal with his luck problem, while nobody else even HAS such a problem. Aran has chances of being insta-blicked, while everyone else does not. In fact, Eddie's problem is fixable, as a C support and dracoshield, even base Eddie can survive teh laagooz. I think, I could be off by a single HP, but the point stands. He could in a way pull 3 def out his ass. Aran has no way out of his luck problem unless he gets lucky and gets a luck level up, which is A. Very unlikely, and B. Means you are basically feeding kills to Aran in 1-3 out of hope he will land that small chance, meaning you are taking plenty of gambles with Aran, while Eddie is at least fixable.

Face it, Aran's none too hot until later in part 1.

Edited August 29, 2009 by Robo Ky

[Rewjeo]

Would it be possible to get Aran into the safety zone by tossing some BEXP his way? He's got a decent shot at getting HP, and a great one at defense. And he's getting strength as a well, which is always nice for the laguz. I've done this in NM, but with HM having way less BEXP on top of him needing more, I'm not sure if it's possible.

[Interceptor]

You don't really have a lot of BEXP up to this point, and his STR/SKL/DEF growths completely dominate. You'd be resetting pretty frequently to get what you wanted from a level-up.

[Narga_Rocks]

Considering I'd prefer to give the units I'm using in the future precedence on kills (e.g. Aran/Nolan get the kills, or Meg if we were masochistic; Leo, Micaiah, and Ilyana are just softeners), this easily happens in a few turns.

So let me get this straight, you completely prevent Ilyana from ever killing anything and don't give her a forge, then complain that she can't go to 1-E since she's useless when you are the one that made her useless? Also, you complained about her hit issues but did it ever occur to you to give her a forge? I mean, I know int already mentioned the forge thing, but come on, are you kidding me?

And as for your whole feeding all the exp (or most of it, anyway) to units you are using in the future:

When Reikken first started his "jeigans like Titania leeching exp is a load of crap" arguments, didn't everyone disagree with him until we realized he was right?

So while Ilyana isn't exactly a jeigan, if she makes things easier and safer and go by quicker, why prevent her from doing that job? That is, after all, what a Jeigan does and why letting them get exp is worth doing, despite the loss in levels the other characters could have had and the lost experience if the jeigan, or Ilyana, gets dropped later on. The difference is that a Jeigan is usually super durable for the first part of the game and destroys everything. But really, in the end it comes down to the fact they make things more efficient overall. Just like Ilyana.

Also, "the units I'm using". Explain to me how you hacked the game and removed Micaiah from the later stages of the game. There's a reason you think she isn't any good for anything but healbotting in endgame, and it's the same as why you think Ilyana is useless in 1-E.

[Progenitus]

1-5

I didn't redo this chapter too many times, since it has a 6 turn limit anyway. I just want to say taht using Aran gave me an easier time for Sothe to stick around in the south long enough to steal the master seal from one of the soldiers. Without Aran, I needed more forces in the northeast to wall off the enemies so they won't kill off Jill. Partly because the northeast has a ton of 2-range enemies towards the end of the chapter, which means Volug can't counter them (though he still makes a hell of a wall). I threw Nolan in the chokepoint, but that gave him less time abusing the ledges in the middle (and gaining more exp) and didn't get the boss kill =/

However, I managed to clear out more or less every enemy by the end of turn 6 (including the boss), with or without Aran.

For this chapter, I had Aran x Laura at a C, but after this, I switched it over to Aran x Nolan. I wanted to try out Zihark x Volug (since apparently Z x V is faster than Z x N).

Nolan was 14 and Aran was 11, with both around 50ish exp. Nolan is getting annoyingly spd screwed (he had 11 right now), so I have to feed him extra levels to get it up. Nolan getting doubled by myrms is not pretty =/

1-6-1

Finished it in 7 turns with and without Aran. Nothing to say, really. Tauroneo solo'd the northeast corner and then took out the peg reinforcements that came from the right side. Everyone else (Volug/Zihark/Sothe/Nolan/Aran, with a little bit of Jill/Ilyana/Micaiah/Laura) just pushed forward.

1-6-2

Without Aran, I beat it in 4 turns.

With Aran, I took 6.

It's worth noting, however, that it's almost impossible to get the master seal if Tauroneo just solos everything on the left. The master seal is on the left in front of that ballista, around where the boss can reach and attack, which means Sothe will have serious issues surviving if only Tauroneo is there (the chokepoint is 2 tiles wide). Nolan might die and can't function as a wall, and I had Zihark and Volug going to the top right corner to save Fiona so they couldn't wall either.

After this, I accidentally saved over the file, but I wanted to see how long it would take to get Volug x Zihark to a C (they didn't manage it). So I had to restart from 1-4 (which is why I redid that quickly and took 11 turns because I was sloppy). I took 8 turns in 1-6-2 (and 7 still in 1-6-1), and got both Volug x Zihark to C, and Aran x Nolan to B. Along with more exp for ppl and strike rank for Volug and whatnot since I wiped out almost every single enemy, rather than leaving over half of them alive while Tauroneo solo'd the boss.

Nolan was level 16 with some odd exp and Aran level 14. Zihark got about 50 exp.

1-7

I hated this chapter, so I didn't do this too many times. However, my best run without Aran was 11 turns, and my best run with Aran was 10. Since the NPCs in the southeast cell take like 6 turns to escape, and I had more or less cleared out the map by turn 7 or so, I just started shoving and support abusing while I was waiting for the NPCs to escape. I got Volug x Zihark to B and Aran x Nolan to A. You might call it "support abuse", I call it "making good use of downtime while I waited for free BEXP".

Also, a lot of the enemies in this chapter don't move. The archers in front of the boss don't move, as well as the enemies in front of the cell doors. The two mages by the right cell don't move either.

Nolan was level 18 and Aran level 15. I had paragon on Zihark, so he was level 4 with a bit of exp.

1-8

Without Aran, I didn't even bother to finish the chapter, since by turn 6 I still had the boss + several lackeys to kill when I did this twice.

With Aran, I beat it in 6 turns on my first try.

Also, I never threw BEXP on Volug until now, but it was awesome. Getting spd means he jumps to 21, and now doubles basically everything aside from myrms for 1-8 and 1-E, and also now recovers 5 HP with renewal for what that's worth (he's too manly for any of the good skills, so I gave him something crappy). He got S-strike about halfway through the chapter.

Nolan was level 19 and Aran level 16. I kept paragon on Zihark so he was level 5.

1-9

who caers

1-E

Without Aran I had Jarod dead by turn 9, and opened the chests by turn 13. Although, one of the chests was a stupid coin, so technically it should've been 12 since if I knew it was a coin I would've skipped it. With Aran, I had Jarod dead by turn 10 (it would've been turn 9, but Zihark refused to proc a crit or adept, and he was using the frickin brave sword), and had the chests opened by turn 11.

I'm waiting to see if Zihark x Volug hit an A. I'm pretty confident it did, since I started shoving and stuff while I waited for Sothe and Nailah w/ chest key to open the chests. Again, you may call it support abuse, but if I immediately finished the chapter after killing Jarod, I would've missed out on stuff like the speedwing.

Nolan was level 20/1 (seal'd him halfway through the chapter) and Aran level 18. Zihark was level 7 (still had paragon).

I also threw a robe on Aran and dracoshield on Nolan. I don't know why I didn't do it earlier.

I'm actually going to go through more or less every chapter and give my results. So on to part 2 for now.

Edited September 1, 2009 by snakes utilt

[Florete]

Hey, can someone remind me what the point of this topic is? Is smash trying to prove something?

[Jaybee]

He thinks that we think that Aran doesn't contribute and wants to prove Aran helps. Even though we have been playing down his overhyping.