The Lunatic Club

[Czar_Yoshi]

Your Avatar will want to drop Slow Burn for Lifetaker instead of Patience, it's much less useful.

[Kirie]

It can sometimes be a big deal because Seals are incredibly rare early on. You get one guaranteed Second from Renown, and that's it until Cht.8 unless Anna likes you.

You can also Streetpass yourself if you have a second 3ds to sell yourself more seals, but that's obviously not the standard strategy. Or, if you're willing to use DLC, the boss of Harvest Scramble has a Master.

My copy of FE:A is digital since I got the FE branded 3DSXL, so no StreetPass hacks, but I don't think I would do that anyway. I didn't realize how slim SS were; I must have gotten really lucky last playthrough, but you can't plan for luck. I was leaning more towards promoting first anyway to grab a more useful skill, so I guess that solidifies that choice. Renown SS will probably go to Avatar and the others will have to be more patient unless I get lucky.

[Kuroi Tsubasa Tenshi]

My copy of FE:A is digital since I got the FE branded 3DSXL, so no StreetPass hacks, but I don't think I would do that anyway. I didn't realize how slim SS were; I must have gotten really lucky last playthrough, but you can't plan for luck. I was leaning more towards promoting first anyway to grab a more useful skill, so I guess that solidifies that choice. Renown SS will probably go to Avatar and the others will have to be more patient unless I get lucky.

SSs pretty much aren't readily accessible until roughly mid-game, possibly slightly sooner if you access certain child paralogues. And yeah, luck is what it comes down to otherwise. I mean, Anna's decently likely to spawn and pretty likely to show up enough times to randomize one or two seals for sale (increasing odds if you let more time pass), so it's almost possible to plan around getting a single seal, but you'd better have a contingency plan. I've had multiple runs where the first 5-7 map spawns were all Risen (or I get a single Anna and she's all "buy my Iron stuff!"). Because I'm somewhat lazy and am not interested in competing with other people for times, when I do speed runs and this happens, I usually pretend Anna showed up and I bought the Renown SS by chucking out 2500 gold and claiming it.

[Czar_Yoshi]

Yeah, the odds of Anna having one are actually pretty good (3 in 10 for at least a Master, 3 in 10 for at least a Second, 8/15 for at least one of either, 1/15 for both), and if you're getting an average of one Anna per chapter, your odds of getting one are actually very good.

[Kirie]

My first Lunatic run I got 2 Annas and 1 Risen my first map spawn; 1 Anna had a Master and a Second; the other Anna had a Second. Of course, I didn't get anything good after that for a while, but it was a nice surprise and I had a bit of a field day with reclassing.

[Blaze The Great]

Alright, it's time for me to face the dreaded chapter 21. Tips, anyone?

[Thor Odinson]

If you got galeforce and rescue and don't care about exp, now it's time to really bust that out.

If you don't, try to kill everything fast and definitely keep moving as much as possible, use full movement whenever possible. Don't bother with the chests, I don't remember what's in them but it's probably not that important at that point (unless one of them has money and you don't have AT; I don't remember what's in them though) The less time stuck around on that chapter, the better.

Edited November 9, 2014 by Thor Odinson

[Kuroi Tsubasa Tenshi]

There's a Secret Book in the top-left chest that I usually snag on speed runs both because it's easy to reach and Chrom can often use the extra hit. Otherwise, there's a Large Bullion (meh), Noble Rapier (depending on if Chrom or Lucina are still Great Lords, may be helpful for chapter 24, but eh), Fortify (I don't think I've ever fielded enough units in Awakening for this to be much better than Physics). It's worth noting that getting the chests aren't too hard for a decently leveled Thief line class because there's usually only 1-2 guards and the Mire goons that appear later will have crap accuracy due to Mire having really poor base hit. Rescue can be used to bounce this unit around to get it into position for opening chests in an efficient manner. Alternatively, if the leading units are really strong, separate units can break off per chest (Master Keys makes this easy for the last two).

Note that a cavalry unit with Boots + Galeforce can finish this chapter in 2 turns if its only goal is to book it over to and assassinate the boss.

[isetrh]

I'm starting over my L+ run and using a team meant purely for in-game this time. I'll try an optimization run again after this (I don't like the hair color I chose anyway), but right now I've hit a wall. My asset/flaw combination was actually pretty manageable. The thing that hurt me was my poor team building.

To clarify, I'm not abandoning the run you guys helped me so much with. I'm just postponing it to when I'm a little better at L+.

For this time around I was thinking of using

Avatar x Chrom: I hardly need a reason for this one, but if my previous attempt is anything to go by Lucina wants the Merc line and Morgan wants to exist.

Miriel x Gregor: I found in my last attempt that there's a big chunk of exp in Chapters 10-13 just begging for an unpromoted scrub to feed. I couldn't understand just how perfect Gregor is for L+ until actually trying L+. As for the Miriel part, I'm sort of just going with Interceptor's ideas, but she does also seem to me like the best of the Chapter 1-3 scrubs.

Asset/Flaw: I'm thinking +Def/-Skill. +Speed/-Skill would make the early chapters easier, but based on my last attempt more Defense helps a lot with facetanking to train Miriel, and Lucina would appreciate a few more points of Def base.

Maribelle x Libra: Both good Staffbots, and I'm hoping to have them eventually S-rank so I can get Brady for a third and some extra exp.

I probably don't need to ask if this team is good considering it's mostly a copy of Interceptor's, but I'm somewhat in the dark when it comes to good class paths. Could you guys take a look at them?

Avatar: Tactician->Merc->BK->Grandmaster

I'm hoping that Lucina and Morgan will be strong enough to carry the team after some training so that their mom can grab Rally Spectrum by Grima. Veteranless Lucina was starting to get close on my last run. Alternatively to the Bows route I could send her to DF for Galeforce.

Chrom: Whatever I can spare seals for. I want to plan for not getting any Anna Seals, so if I'm lucky then Chrom can have the little boost, but otherwise he will stay as a (Great) Lord until after Chapter 16.

Miriel: I really don't know. Reclassing to DM would give her more room to level up before promotion, but then Sorc doesn't have Staves unlike Sage, and it also requires me to count on at leadt one early Anna Seal. She doesn't seem like she really wants to be in a differwnt class that badly, but leaving her as a Mage->Sage wouldn't give her many levels.

Gregor: Merc->Myrm->Assassin

I thought about Barbarian->Warrior, but E-rank Axes, and he would pass even more wasted Strength to Laurent.

Lucina: Lord->Merc->BK->?

I don't really know where to go after that. If I were to go the Galeforce route then she would need to squeeze in Tactician before Merc. BK also seems like a pretty good final class, so I don't know if I should put her through it so early.

Morgan: Tactician->Archer->Sniper->Warrior if Avatar goes Bow route, Tactician->Merc->BK->Warrior if GF route

If he inherits GF, then he needs to get AT himself.

Laurent: Mage->DM->Sorc->Sage

Taking a wild guess at what might be decent after getting through DM->Sorc.

Thanks!

Edited November 10, 2014 by isetrh

[Czar_Yoshi]

With Miriel, keep in mind that early Masters are even rarer than early Seconds. You're going to want Anna's help either way.

BK's Def is a little low for a final class.

In general, remember that it's not a bad thing to SS back into your current class to keep gaining levels.

[Thor Odinson]

I just rotated BK again for my Lucina. On runs with far less counter, I tend to favor Paladin, but unless she has galeforce I wouldn't recommend that straight up for L+. If you do go the DF route with Avatar and pass her galeforce, I like Paladin's support bonuses better than BK's (notably, gives more defense which synergises well with bowtanks like Morgan) , but BK fronts better in L+ for obvious reasons so it depends on what you want to do with her I guess. I was actually gonna do that if she hit 15 BK by endgame (which she did, twice) but really BK's good enough by itself anyway and I'd imagine she'd be tankier with her mother being +def instead of what I had. Lucina's free Aether gives her a lot more survivability than a BK without that to play with if you put Warrior Morgan with her, which is nice.

Edited November 10, 2014 by Thor Odinson

[Kuroi Tsubasa Tenshi]

35 is a level of Def that's pretty good on a main tank (especially one that's dodgy) until about mid-game. Even with its flying weakness, I've found a +Def Dark Flier can hold its own with that 36 cap (although it's recommended to get it and through it earlier because there's a brief early period where bow users are relatively uncommon and, well, getting Galeforce early results in snowballing out of control more easily). A +Def Bow Knight would have a respectable 39, which is almost good enough for end game. I've taken a +Spd Dark Knight, which has 42 Def, through L+ with little issue (at least at the point when the caps started mattering), so a +Def Bow Knight would probably just have to be a little more careful.

[Thor Odinson]

In my experiences (with 37def cap as a +Str) Lucina does well enough if you make sure the only people that get to hit her from 1 range are the ones that don't have Luna+ and especially not in conjunction with Hawkeye. I was able to solo 23 with her supported by warrior Morgan's defensive bonuses (my team setup was inconducive to an aggressive clear of 23 due to not enough units and I was aiming for 100% survival so I just delayed killing validar to leave the shields up)

Edited November 10, 2014 by Thor Odinson

[Vanilluxe]

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Edited July 15, 2015 by Vanilluxe

[Czar_Yoshi]

1. Probably not, she's still got a long ways to go and Morgan can get it very quickly thanks to Veteran. But you should wait for it for Severa.

2. This is why Chrom x Olivia usually isn't recommended. You'll be able to win on Inigo's paralogue once you have at least three Galepairs who can reliably ORKO stuff. Severa's Paralogue should be doable with a similar amount of stuff, though you may only need two Galepairs + a lot of Rescue for Severa.

3. Avatar wants either Warrior or Sniper next, Chrom wants BK, Lissa wants Valkyrie or Falco, Olivia wants Falco, Lucina wants Cav (and maybe an Arms Scroll for Javelins).

[Blaze The Great]

I've finally beaten Lunatic. It took me over two months, but I've done it.

Lunatic mode Grima is absolutely RIDICULOUS. Seriously, his/her skill set and stats are so over the top it made me want to cry. My strategy for the chapter was simply to have my Dark Knight Annilese (rocking Sol, Lifetaker, Armsthrift, Patience and Veteran) paired with Chrom (having Dual Strike+, Charm, Aether, Rightful King, and Defender). I parked Annilese in one location to take on the swarm of mooks and healed her with Elixir as necessary. When all the healers were finally dead, I charged Grima with her Brave Sword and Chrom's Exalted Falchion and hoped for the best. I still barely won.

[Kuroi Tsubasa Tenshi]

2. This is why Chrom x Olivia usually isn't recommended. You'll be able to win on Inigo's paralogue once you have at least three Galepairs who can reliably ORKO stuff. Severa's Paralogue should be doable with a similar amount of stuff, though you may only need two Galepairs + a lot of Rescue for Severa.

Given the level design, I don't think Galeforce is strictly necessary to have an easy time. Granted, a decent amount of Rescue and a couple staffbots may be necessary to safely deal with clusters of Counter melee (depending on the team's overall raw killing power, since trying to face tank may be painful against these glass cannon type enemies). There's a lot of one-tile-thick walls here and enemy ranged don't have a lot of overlapping attack zones. Said ranged will be all too happy to divide and conquer themselves by picking fights over said walls, leaving the melee to fend for themselves once they get themselves all killed.

I've finally beaten Lunatic. It took me over two months, but I've done it.

Lunatic mode Grima is absolutely RIDICULOUS. Seriously, his/her skill set and stats are so over the top it made me want to cry. My strategy for the chapter was simply to have my Dark Knight Annilese (rocking Sol, Lifetaker, Armsthrift, Patience and Veteran) paired with Chrom (having Dual Strike+, Charm, Aether, Rightful King, and Defender). I parked Annilese in one location to take on the swarm of mooks and healed her with Elixir as necessary. When all the healers were finally dead, I charged Grima with her Brave Sword and Chrom's Exalted Falchion and hoped for the best. I still barely won.

Depending on stats, a setup like that can be played aggressively and blow up Grima in one turn (combat against Grima may need to happen on both phases). It's a bit RNG-dependant if there aren't any skills in place to boost Chrom's hit, though (Hex and Anathema in tandem usually do the trick).

[Vorena]

Now that I think about it. What is the most reliable strategy for taking out Grima within Lunatic that is pretty easy to get no matter what? Despite how over the top it seems, I feel there is always some RNG related way to win on turn 1.

As far as I know, Exalted Falchion is the most powerful weapon against Grima due to the effective damage.

My initial thought is to stack up on Chrom with any character with whom he can S rank for support. With Exalted Falchion along with +3MT from A rank in Sword Chrom already has 48 damage of the needed 50 to do any damage. Then, the rest is based purely upon his strength stat from how much you used him. Which to be honest I do not find very hard to do in Lunatic given he is forced unit and has some niche uses earlier on with Rapier and Falchion (Knight/Horse/Wyvern) effective damage is quite nice. Later on, it feels very easy to drop in say favor of Lucina (if she turned out well).

Anyway, with 70% dual strike rate a minimum reaching 100% or close to it seems pretty easy to do. Then, give appropriate S rank partner a Brave Weapon that can double. Then, you get your 4 attacks from Chrom along with whatever from your partner. Its been awhile since I played FE13, but I think dual strike activation can activate that person's skills.

At the very least, I think this is probably the best strategy maybe even if it does not have too be with Chrom. But, one unit to do most of the damage with some weapon and getting it to attack 4 times with dual strikes through brave weapon usage. Then, stack any defense nullifying attacks you can to get extra damage through. Aether, Ignis, Luna, Vengence.

[Kuroi Tsubasa Tenshi]

I posted a setup I use for my speed runs a bit back, but I'll give a quick overview:

Dark Knight +Def/-Luk Avatar w/ Boots; Brave Sword (+5 mt, +15 hit), Bolganone; Hex, Anathema, Galeforce, Vengeance, Whatever (I usually have Axebreaker, but it doesn't matter that much)

Great Lord Chrom; Exalted Falchion; Dual Strike +, Charm

Buffs: full range of Tonics, Basilio's Rally Str

-There's a spot in the middle of the back that's safe for Basilio and Olivia to stand during enemy phase. Basically gonna want to head there with Avatar, have Basilio, then have Olivia give that extra turn to Avatar (Olivia will more than likely have to pair onto a cavalry unit for enough Move).

-Avatar runs up and melts a Berserker (use Balganone if there is risk of damage), Galeforces up beside Grima and attacks.

-On enemy phase, because of AI behaviour, if Grima cannot kill Avatar without Ignis, then he will take the first turn and engage Avatar again. This gives Avatar and Chrom both eight attacks before Grima gets a chance to heal. Up to six of Avatar's attacks can have Vengeance damage and Chrom is typically looking at 18 damage with 85% true hit if his Str, Skl and Luk are around 35 (not hard to get by far). This is a lot of incoming damage. Five hits from Chrom alone puts Grima at 9 HP left. Avatar can easily do a ton of damage once Vengeance ramps up too. In fact, there's a pretty decent chance of this strat killing Grima before the enemy ever gets a phase. And this chance only goes up if Chrom has better stats or other characters bring other Rallies to the table.

[Vanilluxe]

Edited July 15, 2015 by Vanilluxe

[Czar_Yoshi]

Anyway, with 70% dual strike rate a minimum reaching 100% or close to it seems pretty easy to do. Then, give appropriate S rank partner a Brave Weapon that can double. Then, you get your 4 attacks from Chrom along with whatever from your partner. Its been awhile since I played FE13, but I think dual strike activation can activate that person's skills.

At the very least, I think this is probably the best strategy maybe even if it does not have too be with Chrom. But, one unit to do most of the damage with some weapon and getting it to attack 4 times with dual strikes through brave weapon usage. Then, stack any defense nullifying attacks you can to get extra damage through. Aether, Ignis, Luna, Vengence.

No, procs don't activate on Dual Strikes.

1) Should I make Morgan a pegasus --> pegasus --> dark flier then? Or should I do pegasus --> mercenary --> hero --> dark flier (or something) so she can get Armsthrist?

2) I might be able to do Severa's soon then, because Cordelia almost has Galeforce and Lucina will be trained soon!!

3) What should Lucina promote to after cav?

Morgan will either want to go Peg -> DF -> Merc -> Hero, or Peg -> Merc -> Hero -> DF. It depends whether you'd rather have AT or GF early.

Alternately, if your Avatar has AT and passes it, you could go Peg -> Tact -> Peg -> DF. This may cost you some stats missed thanks to base caps (probably at least 15 levels' worth, if you promote at Peg 10), and is more Seal intensive (you can buy them soon, but they're still expensive) but will be the fastest way to get everything on Morgan and won't trash her exp gain quite yet.

Paladin is the stronger option if you want Lucina to lead, GK works better if she wants to spend her EPs in the back. If you ever plan on putting her through GK, though, do it now.

[Vanilluxe]

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Edited July 15, 2015 by Vanilluxe

[Kuroi Tsubasa Tenshi]

WIth that much Galeforce, 23 should be more than enough. With sufficient Mag, one Rescue use should set Severa back 3-4 turns.

[Czar_Yoshi]

Both Inigo's and Severa's Paralogues sell Second Seals. If you can clear one of them next, you'll be good to go.

[Blaze The Great]

Overview/reflections on my Lunatic run:

Chapters

The Prologue was really hard, thanks to the Elthunder/wind Mages. Chapter 1 was easy. 2 was a nightmare, 3 wasn't quite as bad. 4 was difficult. 5 was moderately challenging, 6 was moreso. After that everything until about Chapter 17 was easy (besides training my newer characters). Chapter 20 was pretty easy, and 22 felt like a break as well. I 2-turned 25, probably could have 1-turned but oh well. Endgame was fairly difficult.

In terms of the children paralogues I did...

Morgan's was semi-difficult.

Lauren'ts was hard.

Severa's had some ridiculous stats but it's not that hard if you can keep her safe (which I did by spamming Rescue on her)

Characters

Annilese-Annilese was amazing. She totally carried the team. She was a Hero by about Chapter 9, and she got Dark Knight later on. She murdered everything, especially with the ridiculous combination of Sol, Patience, Lifetaker and Armsthrift she had later on. She was far and away my most reliable character, though I probably could have made some others better.

Chrom-Chrom was surprisingly alright. I got him to Great Lord without a problem. He was actually very good around Chapter 12 or 13. He really fell off when the difficulty spiked, but thanks to his solid stats and good skills, he was really helpful against Grima.

Miriel-Miriel was pretty good. As a Valkyrie, her tomes and staves were a very good thing (especially since staves are not weapons like they were in Radiant Dawn). She was pretty powerful overall, but I don't think that I brought her full potential out.

Cordelia-Cordelia was probably my 2nd best 1st gen character. She was strong, had solid defenses, and was extremely powerful once she learned how to gain speed and got Sol. She is definitely worth it, and I think that, at least in Lunatic, she is better than Sumia, all things considered.

Frederick and Kellam-Pair Up units who served their purpose just fine (i.e. Pair Up bonuses, occasional Dual Strike/Guard, producing offspring)

Lucina-Extremely powerful. Her stats and skills were ridiculous (she capped everything except for Magic and Resistance). Unfortunately, since I went Lord->Great Lord->Dark Flier with her, she wasn't powerful enough to help much at all against Grima.

Morgan-Probably 2nd best character overall. Morgan crushed everything as a Tactician and Grandmaster, and was a ridiculous physical unit as a Great Knight. Unfortunately, this left him open to magic, which due to his not great speed and low resistance made him a vulnerable target. He was very powerful, but I probably could have made a better choice with him.

Laurent-Note to self:when making a Sorcerer, make sure the father passes down Armsthrift! Wow that was dumb. Laurent was a Mire-bomber without Armsthrift. He was still powerful. His main downfall was lack of overall experience (besides Mage 10 to Dark Mage 1, he never reclassed) and no-self healing skills. Otherwise he would have been up with Lucina and Morgan.

Severa-I probably could have made her powerful, seeing as I passed her both Sol and Luna, but I didn't put in the effort needed. She only reached about Level 8 Bow Knight by the end of the game. However, her stat gains that she did get seemed to be really good, and she proved to be a solid wife for Morgan.

Overall: It was a difficult but overall rewarding experience. If you can make it past those first few chapters, you are set. Just make sure to avoid stupid mistakes (which at times, I failed to do) and you will be good to go.