The Lunatic Club

[Czar_Yoshi]

It depends on how lucky you get with Second Seals from Anna. Using Cht.8's Second Seal on Avatar can be a good idea, but it also limits your ability to train extra units. What chapter you're in is also an important factor- I definitely wouldn't stay in Hero past Cht.11, because once promoted units start appearing OHKOes will be a thing of the past.

Also, having a Bow makes recruiting Tharja much easier in Cht.9, for what it's worth. Though if you only care about maingame, she's not a big loss (and you still get her Elthunder Tome for killing her).

If you can make it to Axebreaker though, it's practically worth it for Walhart alone.

[isetrh]

Last night I messed up and deleted my completionist/optimization file. Now I'm not sure whether to start over on Lunatic or Lunatic+. How hard is it to optimize on Lunatic+?

[Thor Odinson]

I pretty much just plan on soloing with mu with an extra side of training chrom until morgan and lucina show up so I think I'll go with the chapter 8 seal for her. Chrom's mostly there for Lucina's bases and support fodder, anyway. Not sure if i can pull off getting to bows and axebreaker by tharja, but i'll try.

[Interceptor]

Assassin sounds tempting as well thanks to Pass, though I'm not sure about the defense...

I've never been able to make an Assassin last long-term; Pass is great, but the lack of DEF really does hurt. I feel like you need to have a final class with better defenses in order to make it still work. Gregor has the best class set for it (he can end as a Warrior), but it's hard to get through the gauntlet in time.

[Thor Odinson]

I do plan on going Sniper for final just for longbow usage, but it's just come down to which intermediate bow class prior to sniper i want. I think I have enough exp since I'm basically MUsoloing until Lucina (I'm pretty bad at training other people ngl) but if Assassin def is going to be that big of a problem I think I'll go BK->Sniper after I get out of hero.

[Interceptor]

If you're just cramming Robin through it, you can get away with Assassin because of Veteran. The low DEF cap doesn't really become a problem until promoted enemies start showing up in force, at which point your ~31 starts feeling like a real liability (combination of both increased enemy mt, and also less ability to avoid-tank).

[Thor Odinson]

Would you say that pass is worth it more than bowbreaker then?

[Interceptor]

Bowbreaker is better for lategame stuff; Pass is fun, but it's not giving you huge passive advantages versus enemy archers, it's more of a finesse thing.

[Thor Odinson]

Alright, I'll probably end up doing BK->Sniper anyway then just to be safe. I like having movement anyway.

[isetrh]

Seems like my post got missed, so I'm going to post it again.

Last night I messed up and deleted my completionist/optimization file. Now I'm not sure whether to start over on Lunatic or Lunatic+. How hard is it to optimize on Lunatic+?

[Kuroi Tsubasa Tenshi]

Early game might be a bit tough if you have an Asset/Flaw combo that doesn't allow Avatar to snowball as easily, but if you have DLC available, once you get to the Outrealms, there are easy, static ways to train for postgame.

[isetrh]

Thanks! Some of the enemies have Counter though, right? How do I deal with that if I'm training a unit that doesn't have Bows or Galeforce?

[Czar_Yoshi]

If you can make it to the Outrealm Gate, you'll be fine (it'll just be a little slower due to higher IL caps than Normal/Hard). Making it there is another story, especially if you're going -Def.

To deal with Counter, either kill the enemies at range, weaken them at range and then oneshot them up close (Counter doesn't work on the killing blow), or just fight them at 1-range with a unit who can take both their attack and the Counter damage.

[isetrh]

Okay, sounds like it should work out. I've managed in the past to get there in L+ with -Def so I should be fine. Thanks!

[Dual Dragons]

Finally got to Chapter 4 in a no grind! So now I have access to Renown items (which I'm considering not using the weapons in there). I'm not sure who to use the stat boosters on between Chrom and Avatar (the only couple I'm doing).

Their stats so far:

              Lv        HP      Str      Mag      Skl      Spd      Lck      Def      Res      Weapon Ranks

Chrom        5.77       24       8        2        9        12       6        8        2         Sword C
Avatar      14.33    (+)37      14       11     (-)9        10      15       10       10     Sword D, Tome B

(First time playing with code option, so please excuse if it looks horrendous)

Spirit Dust will definitely go to Avatar, but the rest I'm unsure. From how I remember, Chrom kept getting weird stats in level ups, barring Spd (his first level up even gave him Mag of all things). He's starting to get better thanks to C in swords, B support with Avatar, and C with Lissa and Fred and I feel safer having them together during Enemy Phase, but he is still a squishy Lord. I would think Energy Drop and Dracoshield to Chrom so he can give +1 Str and Def to any pair-up but Avatar might get the best mileage out of any stat booster maybe?

The Renown Second Seal I could of think using on Chrom if I have Avatar go Grandmaster for Rally Spectrum--but I am still debating about buying an Avatar/SpotPass/DLC character for Rally/Staffbot. I wanted to have Lunatic(+) earn its namesake after I unfortunately broke Lunatic with DLC grinding and extra items.

[Czar_Yoshi]

Your Avatar looks slightly screwed in everything compared to where you should be by Cht.4. If anyone is getting the Naga's Tear and other statboosters, it should be her. Chrom can catch up easily in Cht.7.

[Dual Dragons]

True. Up until Chapter 3, she was having trouble doubling even with Chrom at C Support, and even getting in good position in Chapter 2 required her to get a lucky crit to the Mountain Barbarian. Oi.

I don't remember the enemies in Chapter 7 but I have no qualms pouring all resources into Avatar. Thanks!

[Czar_Yoshi]

Cht.7 is tons of Axes and a massive almost-player-exclusive terrain advantage with almost no Lances to mess swordguys up.

Edited September 10, 2014 by Czar_Yoshi

[Dual Dragons]

Ah. That's good then. Thanks a bunch!

[Kreekakon]

Well I've finally beaten normal Lunatic Casual for the very first time! Sped through the rest of it yesterday in a few hours. Little chronicle of what happened in the final couple of chapters:

Recruiting Gerome

I was on chapter 18 at this point so I figured I should not wait much longer to get my children. This an extremely difficult chapter to get through since all the enemies were promoted , and had higher than average stats than the enemies in the main chapters at this point. It took many retires, but in the end I was successfully able to have Chrom, and Avatar tank everything without dying, and I successfully recruited Gerome. passed down skills were Quick burn, and Astra (From Lon Qu). I eventually married him with Lucina.

Recruiting Owain and Morgan

Their parents were Lissa, and Avatar. Given that Avatar had several of his stats getting close to his caps at this point they both started off with great bases. I passed down Lifetaker, and Tomefaire to both of them, and reclassed them to Tactician right after talking to them. They were so powerful already that I was able to snowball them in their own recruitment chapters, and by the end of Morgran's chapter (I got Owain first) they had both capped out most of their stats so I promoted them to Grandmaster. Owain, and Morgan were mostly paired with each other for the rest of the game.

Chapter 18 - 23

These chapters usually equal Avatar/Owain/Morgan Owning House: The Game. Owain, and Morgan also both hit level 20 by the end of chapter 23, and I reclassed them both to Dark Knights (For no reason really since the game was almost over anyways) Avatar also hit his own lvl 20 again, and I reclassed him to Sorcerer.

After I had recruited Owain, and Morgan I had decided that Vaike, Cordelia, Nowi, and Henry were all more trouble than they were worth, and decided to axe them. I also didn't bother to recruit anymore children since I thought my team was pretty much adequate as is. This left my main team looking like this for the rest of the game:

Chrom x Sumia

Avatar x Lissa

Cherche x Lon Qu

Gerome x Lucina

Morgan x Owain

Chapter 24 - 25

These chapters were very humourous since I noticed that since now my Avatar was a Sorcerer + All his stats were nearly capped I would have a little bit of fun. For these two chapters I just packed my Avatar with 4 Nosferatu tomes, threw him into the middle of the enemy army, skipped the turn, and woke up to see almost the entire enemy army gone. So yes it was cheese.

The rest of the army cleaned up any stragglers who were not in the range of Avatar, and had decided to creep up on the other units instead.

Endgame Grima

This chapter was definitely an insane chapter mostly because of Grima. True to its nature, Lunatic Grima had absolutely insane stats, and at first I had no idea how to take him down since my attacks did so little damage. Even the idea of getting to him was a bit difficult at first since Grima's attack range was so massive, and he had a wall of units protecting him.

My first several tries were devoted to seeing if I could clear the map of enough units to lessen the pressure enough so that I could focus on Grima easier. This turned out in the end to be deemed a complete failure since the enemies were replenishing too fast, and too far away to clean up properly. Plus I also had no way to clean up the goons protecting Grima.

The second strategy I used was the one that worked (But could very easily fail): I decided to zerg rush Grima, and just go for it. Prior to battle I spent all of my money as well as selling several of my items to upgrade a Waste tome's accuracy to maximum for Avatar to use, and a Celica's Gate to maximum damage for Owain to use. Morgan, who was acting as Owain's support in this battle, used the Valflame I had gotten from a Deadlord in Chapter 22.

In the chapter I also added Oliva, and Anna to the party for dancing, and Rescue properties respectively. I also added a couple of other random people to act as random cannon fodder, and to transport Oliva+Anna.

This still took several attempts to refine, and get right, but here's mainly how it played out in the end when it was successful. On turn one it was mainly getting everyone into position into the area closest to Grima but still unable to be attacked by enemy units on the next turn. I also used a mixture of dance, and Rescue on this turn to take out one Beserker who was a piece of Grima's wall.

Turn 2 was when the fun would begin. Chrom x Sumia would go in first, followed by Owain x Morgan, then Avatar x Lissa, THEN finally Oliva's dances for Avatar so that he can attack again. I got some pretty bad RNG on Ignis, and Ather procs so Grima was left with 9 HP when all of this was finished. However I got very lucky, and the attacking Grimleal didn't kill me, and Grima killed himself due to counterattack from Avatar when he attacked him.

It was an absolutely glorious moment when Grima finally fell after so many tries, and I felt just like this video (I (The player) was Goku, Avatar was Gohan, and Oliva was Vegeta):

So at the end of all that here is the final stats for the party that won me the game! (Although strictly speaking only three pairs actually really helped)

Unit      Level   Class        HP   ST   MG   SK   SP   LC   DF   RS
Chrom     12.89   Paladin      73   37   05   41   41   46   29   20
(MU)      12.05   Sorcerer     80   30   41   40   43   44   41   24
Morgan    02.03   Dark Knight  79   36   39   38   37   38   34   27
Owain     03.36   Dark Knight  80   37   36   36   41   44   36   22   
Lissa     05.26   Valkyrie     45   12   31   24   34   31   10   24
Sumia     19.20   Dark Flier   49   22   15   35   43   31   17   29
Lon Qu    15.15   Swordmaster  46   25   08   35   38   23   18   19
Cherche   11.83   Wyvern Lord  56   34   06   26   23   21   29   08
Gerome    10.91   Wyvern Lord  63   38   08   29   30   22   30   13
Lucina    11.33   Great Lord   57   29   07   37   37   35   22   16

So now Lunatic+ mode is unlocked! Though I think I'll hold off on that mode for now, because I'm not sure if my heart can take the horrors of that just yet.

Edited September 10, 2014 by Kreekakon

[Thor Odinson]

Been documenting/liveblogging my run over on my tumblr ever since chapter 9, though no interesting strategies happened so far. MU's so powerful it's ridiculous and it may not even be all a good thing because I could get complacent, and Chrom needs to hit 20 defense sometimes so i get a point more on pairup.

Please, Chrom, don't disappoint me.

[GrySun]

Every chapter went fine, without much problems, even the evil chapter 2 fell within 2 tries.

The chapter I got stuck on was the Mila tree. I could have rushed the boss, but I wanted to kill all the reinforcements without losing one of my units. Apparently that is impossible.

[Kreekakon]

Every chapter went fine, without much problems, even the evil chapter 2 fell within 2 tries.

The chapter I got stuck on was the Mila tree. I could have rushed the boss, but I wanted to kill all the reinforcements without losing one of my units. Apparently that is impossible.

Depending on how strong your units are, and how many "super" units you have by this point it is very easy to get overwhelmed simply by the sheer amount of them, especially if you are in range when the bottom group of reinforcements show up. Also weaker units which you are attempting to train may easily also be doomed by flying units from the left, and right which cannot be ran away from in certain positionings.

I don't remember what I did too clearly, but I think I took a half measure in which I killed as much as I could, and ran for the boss when I realized that it was becoming too much to handle/tank anymore with my super units.

[Interceptor]

Every chapter went fine, without much problems, even the evil chapter 2 fell within 2 tries.

The chapter I got stuck on was the Mila tree. I could have rushed the boss, but I wanted to kill all the reinforcements without losing one of my units. Apparently that is impossible.

It might difficult depending on your army, but most likely you just need to be creative. Fliers and Rescue staves can get you to the thin strip of land in the east side of the map, where none of the land units can reach you. Just deal with the Pegs, and then you can dice with the land units at your leisure (only the Longbow archers will be able to reach you there, and even then only if you are all the way to the water's edge).

[Thor Odinson]

FUCK

I derped hard and accidentally did not pass Lucina veteran and I saved

fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck

Oh well at least high enemy density means she'll get exp pretty fast anyway hopefully

Edit: found a save at the end of chapter 11

c12 wasn't bad anyway

Edited September 10, 2014 by Thor Odinson