The Lunatic Club

[Czar_Yoshi]

Whether or not it counts to you is entirely up to you. If you get a sense of accomplishment from doing it, good for you. I don't advise basing your accomplishments off what other people have done. Because...

Too many people have completed Lunatic+ (especially with Logbook/DLC/what have you) to count. It's difficult, but not so much that each and every completion gets burned into the general public's memory. Even Lunatic+/Cla runs using no Spotpass/DLC, limited Renown and no random events (Skirmishes, Merchants, Barracks, Event Tiles) are a dime a dozen. Unless you were to do something like all that without saving, of course... Or if you were the one to write the book on dealing with the Lunatic+ skills... Then you can be legendary.

You're still in the club, though, so congrats on completion!

The site support tables are being inconsistent with my ingame results again.

Have any inconsistencies been documented outside Lunatic(+)? I want to find a way to isolate a control variable and figure out exactly what causes this (and adjust the formulas accordingly) but want to make sure I do so on the right mode.

Edited April 21, 2015 by Czar_Yoshi

[ultmatelifeform]

Yeah I guess a LOT of people would have had to do it by now. Its still cool though I guess. Well time to finish up the Double duals.

Maby over the summer Il try the no saves thing. I can't imagine doing it in less than 5 hours and may need to do it over a few breaks by il take a challenge.

Edited April 22, 2015 by ultmatelifeform

[Irysa]

Have any inconsistencies been documented outside Lunatic(+)? I want to find a way to isolate a control variable and figure out exactly what causes this (and adjust the formulas accordingly) but want to make sure I do so on the right mode.

I seem to be the only person who runs into these things, and I've only ever played the game on Lunatic(+)*. I think Kaoz tried to test some stuff on Hard Mode and couldn't replicate it, so it's quite possible that like Lunatic EXP Decay, there's Support Point decay. Or something like that.

Although that still doesn't explain the Severa x Cynthia thing I encountered.

*Okay actually I did start a Hard Mode file once but I laughed at the fact the Myrms and Barbs in Prologue couldn't even do any damage to Chrom or Robin with Fred in the back, then went back to Lunatic. <_<

Edited April 22, 2015 by Irysa

[Kuroi Tsubasa Tenshi]

I seem to be the only person who runs into these things, and I've only ever played the game on Lunatic(+)*. I think Kaoz tried to test some stuff on Hard Mode and couldn't replicate it, so it's quite possible that like Lunatic EXP Decay, there's Support Point decay. Or something like that.

I've run into it a little bit myself, but only on Lunatic+, since that's what I play most. It's happened a couple times when cutting the BP precisely with Robin/Chrom, Fred/Virion and Robin/Sully C supports. I've likewise never heard of it happening on Normal or Hard.

[Knusperkeks]

You guys might be on to something important. Keep researching please.

[eclipse]

The best place to find the answers would be to ask the guys hacking Awakening. I posted Irsya's quote here. Worst they'll tell me is "no, and why did you even bother".

[Czar_Yoshi]

*Okay actually I did start a Hard Mode file once but I laughed at the fact the Myrms and Barbs in Prologue couldn't even do any damage to Chrom or Robin with Fred in the back, then went back to Lunatic. <_<

That's because unlike Lunatic(+), Hard actually has a difficulty curve and gets harder as you go along. The earlygame is supposed to lay down and die, but it picks up- especially if you try to do the harder child Paralogues early and train a full team- quite significantly later on.

[Irysa]

Lunatic has a difficulty curve too though, in exactly the same way. It's just more prone to being broken since it's difficult to keep more than a few units ahead/on par with the enemy stat curve.

Even ignoring that, the Hard Modes from basically any other game in the series don't start you out against enemies who can't even tickle your non Jeigan player units, usually they're capable of 3HKOing at worst.

Edited April 22, 2015 by Irysa

[Kobazco]

I. I DID IT. I BEAT LUNAITC PLUS CLASSIC WITHOUT LOSING ONE UNIT. 43 HOURS TOTAL WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO.

[eclipse]

Congratulations! How'd you do it?

[Czar_Yoshi]

43 HOURS TOTAL

The game time listed on your file doesn't count resets- I'd hazard a guess your real time is quite a bit more than that.

Congrats though!

[Irysa]

Think I finally mapped out what I'm gonna do for this male avatar nogrind run of Lunatic, where I try to experience some different units!

[spoiler=Wall of Text]

MAvatar (+speed -luck) x Olivia - Given Olivia only shows up later, during the earlygame Avatar will primarily support with whoever gives him required stats for any respective map. Avatar will not take an early second seal and will instead promote at 20 with the first Master Seal. He will transition into a rallybot/pairupbot role via Rally Spectrum. Olivia will remain a dancer. I will save early Paralogues in order to get them hitched ASAP, and dancegrind Olivia so she doesn't pass crap bases to Morgan. Morgan gets passed Ignis and Luck+4, Inigo probably comes too late to do anything but pairup bot so it doesn't really matter.

Chrom x Sully - Chrom takes the renown seal to Cavalier, using the Chapter 5 and 7 EXP dumps to rocket ahead, then promotes to Paladin later. He'll be used the whole game, and will support with his daughters to kill Grima. Sully takes some early EXP, but I've got no plans on using her longterm. My primary goal is just to get her to pass down Luna to her daughters via an early promotion to Great Knight with the second Master Seal and 5 levels. Shouldn't be too hard. I don't reckon her daugher's bases will suffer that much since Chrom's increased stats should balance it out.

Panne x Stahl - Panne takes the Chapter 8 Seal to Wyvern, then later promotes to Griffon Rider, passing Deliverer to Yarne. Will be used the whole game. Stahl is pretty much just pair up fodder. He'll be lucky to make it to a promotion. Since I want him to pass down discipline to Yarne (so he can actually build weapon rank at a reasonable rate), he doesn't really need to do anything but provide pair up bonuses to Panne. Panne can support Yarne instead once recruited and Stahl can hit the bench.

Gregor x Nowi - Not planning on actually using either of them or Nah for actual important things, I just want Nowi to get married so Nah's paralogue opens up. I'll Mire it with instantpromoted Henry so I can buy Second Seals before finishing Chapter 16. This is Nowi's fastest support so it's the easiest for this purpose. Just grab a few kills here and there, and can also used the saved Paralogues to get hitched if neccessary.

Frederick x Maribelle - I want Brady ASAP, don't care about his stats, and this is Maribelle's fastest support. The support goes up fast enough that I can probably get away with just having Maribelle healing Frederick a lot. Might try to do Chapter 5 before Paralogue 1 in order to get a lot of EXP into Maribelle via archers wailing on enemies through walls allowing for safe heal spam. Passing DSp+ to Brady would be cool, but getting that much EXP might be a pain without lots of rescue staff abuse. Ideally Maribelle becomes a Falco after rescuespamming to 15 Valk. Fred passes Discipline because lol Brady's weapon ranks, but it doesn't really matter.

FMorgan x Brady - Morgan starts as a Tactician, so Avatar can pass Ignis instead of Veteran. She reclasses to Peg immediately, promotes to Dark Flier and does Morgan things. Brady instant promotes to Sage and just stays in her pocket for the rest of the game, with DSp+ hopefully. Maybe he learns Rally Magic, who cares. Morgan probably also tries to build some support with her dad too. May have to reclass to some non flying tome class in lategame when Bow users get really accurate.

Lucina / Kjelle - Both inherit Aether/Luna proc combo, both get Sealed to Cavalier, both promote to Paladin. The two of them will probably just support their parents and each other most of the time, I might try to marry them to Yarne and Inigo. Paladin is a pretty solid class, not much to talk about here.

Yarne - Sealed to Barbarian, promote to Warrior. Discipline from Stahl should let him build weapon rank at an acceptable pace. Deliverer from Panne, in addition to the +1 mov her Griffon pair up gives should let him keep up with the Paladin squads. Going to be my Bow User. Might get reclassed to Bow Knight later on if I really want 11 mov lol. Might try to marry Kjelle or Lucina.

Inigo - His Paralogue is too hard to do early on so he will probably join rather late. In the event he isn't too late, as previously outlined, may marry one of Lucina and Kjelle. Likely just instant promoted to either Bow Knight or Hero for the pair up bonuses. If he joins too late I may just pass Rally Spectrum instead of Veteran so that Avatar can provide significantly better pair up bonuses and Dual Strikes to anyone I choose whilst Inigo Rallies instead. Solidarity wouldn't be a bad choice either if he's trying to marry one of Chrom's daughters. Hmm.

Staffbot Entourage - The usual suspects. Libra, Anna, Lissa. Just add on/swap Maribelle in this time as the probable Falco rescuebot/rally speed user since she'll get early EXP priority. Lissa might try to get married to Libra again just for the sake of getting Owain's Paralogue EXP and loot, and may also still make it to Falco herself. Libra can probably make it to Rally Magic. Owain would only be used for whatever Rallies he inherits if FSR I need someone else to do them, because fuck Owain. I've been thinking about trying to get Miriel to level 10 as well and marrying her off to Libra instead of Lissa via staffspam just to get Laurent's Paralogue instead of Owain's, seeing as I haven't done Laurent's before. Laurent wouldn't be actually used for anything but a clutch Rally, same as Owain. I don't think there are enough deployment slots for all these staffbots though.

Tiki x Sayri (?) - I shouldn't be as reliant on Tiki to cut a swathe through the lategame maps with strong 1-2 because I'll actually have a tome wielding Morgan, but it's a pretty sensible pairing if all else fails. I doubt she'll need to be used though. 2 Turning her Paralogue shouldn't be an issue since Galeforce Morgan can get 6 enemies with Olivia and a Rescue Staffer's help, then the remaining 5 should be easily coverable by Lucina, Kjelle, Chrom, Yarne and Panne.

I checked the wiki for paralogue unlocks and I believe I should be able to reach Brady's Paralogue right after Chapter 13 as long as Avatar is married to Olivia, since that will get both Inigo's and Morgan's paralogue on the map to link all three up. I shouldn't have to clear Inigo's to reach Brady since I was able to reach Cynthia's via Severa's just being unlocked on my first run. And although I said it in the spoiler, in case you only read this part, I'm aware that an S support with Olivia will take more than the 3 maps available post chapter 11. I'll save the early Paralogues to make sure Avatar and Olivia get hitched before advancing the story, and to train the kids a little, and along with Kjelle and Nah's Paralogues, there shouldn't be any problem having them tie the knot.

Edited April 23, 2015 by Irysa

[Czar_Yoshi]

If you've been hanging onto your Seed of Trust, have a little luck with Event Tile support boosts and maybe do a little Barracks manipulation (easier than it sounds, but still semi-random), you can actually get that S support in 4 maps. Assuming you don't get bitten by this jealousy/support decay system. It should take 1 seed/support boosting event + 1 map of full combat to get the C/B supports and 2 seeds/support boosting events + 1 map to get the A/S supports, so if you're on the ball with those they're very in reach.

[Irysa]

How exactly does Barracks manip work? I've heard it mentioned but never seen it actually outlined anywhere.

[Octag]

All of the actions in the barracks occur based on a unit's position in the Roster. The game doesn't think 'oh, Vaike's going to get +Mag and +Lck today', it thinks 'unit #4 is getting Mag/Lck'. If you go through the barracks, see who gets what, and reload, you can wiggle the roster around and give those barracks events to any units you want.

For instance, if I want to build Maribelle and Gregor's support, I could enter the barracks and see which units get support-building events. Say that Lissa and Sumia are talking to each other- reset the game and enter a chapter, see which positions in the prep screen are occupied by Lissa and Sumia, and fiddle about with deploying/undeploying units until Maribelle and Gregor are in the positions that Sumia and Lissa were at. If I save the game, exit the map, and enter the barracks, when the support-building event drops down it will involve Maribelle and Gregor.

[Irysa]

Ahhhh, I see. That's very helpful, thanks!

[Ownagepuffs]

All of the actions in the barracks occur based on a unit's position in the Roster. The game doesn't think 'oh, Vaike's going to get +Mag and +Lck today', it thinks 'unit #4 is getting Mag/Lck'. If you go through the barracks, see who gets what, and reload, you can wiggle the roster around and give those barracks events to any units you want.

For instance, if I want to build Maribelle and Gregor's support, I could enter the barracks and see which units get support-building events. Say that Lissa and Sumia are talking to each other- reset the game and enter a chapter, see which positions in the prep screen are occupied by Lissa and Sumia, and fiddle about with deploying/undeploying units until Maribelle and Gregor are in the positions that Sumia and Lissa were at. If I save the game, exit the map, and enter the barracks, when the support-building event drops down it will involve Maribelle and Gregor.

What the fuck is this wizardry. Hear I thought it was random. I feel like a kid who has been told that Santa isn't real.

[Kuroi Tsubasa Tenshi]

Technically, it still is random. Just the not-particularly-secure, abusable kind of random.

I find it really strange that they don't lock in the targets when the event is generated. Like, I totally get randomizing slots 3 and 14 as a way of generating the event, but why not lock it to the characters in those slots once the slots are determined?

[Czar_Yoshi]

What the fuck is this wizardry. Hear I thought it was random. I feel like a kid who has been told that Santa isn't real.

Funny, when I first found out I felt like an adult who discovered that Santa is in fact real.

Credit goes to Tables for figuring this out, by the way.

I find it really strange that they don't lock in the targets when the event is generated. Like, I totally get randomizing slots 3 and 14 as a way of generating the event, but why not lock it to the characters in those slots once the slots are determined?

It has to do with how the game stores unit information- it can't actually say "find Vaike" and just be given Vaike's stuff (without asking every unit "are you Vaike?"), but it can look at a certain position in the team roster and say, "this is Vaike, here's his stuff". So it's easy to keep track of two positions and just call the units there to an event, it's more complex to keep track of two different units and find their positions later in order to call them to the event. Why didn't they program it differently? I'm not on the staff and don't really know, but it was probably set in stone long before the Barracks was a thing and nobody wanted to completely scrap the system (which would render pretty much all their existing code useless) to re-implement it in a new way that would be more friendly to this.

So as-is what they'd have to do to fix this is actually make a separate array of pointers to the units that stay in the same place and never move around, and assign the events to those (actually storing the event data in the unit data is a huge mess). That, however, takes extra work, both because you'd have to create the thing and then you'd have to implement ways to deal with units who are dead or not recruited yet (the Roster is a list and handles all of this automatically, so it's not an issue there). Basically more work for no payoff, considering as they probably thought their current system works fine.

All that's just an educated guess, though. I'm no an authority on this.

[Vascela]

It's probably coded in a an array/list since it's much easier to access information that way. Pulling from those is probably the easiest way to apply barracks interaction. Plus, using an RNG or even a randomized seed to pick from said array/list is also very simple.

Picking out variables such as "unit slot 1" also makes randomness easier to deal with than actually selecting a unit from the pile as well.

[Knusperkeks]

I wasn't too surprised about barracks manipulation. One day, Yoshi told me that it's possible, and that I should ask Tables for more advice, but just knowing the possibility exists quickly lead me to the realization that it works as outlined in #3843.

I find it really strange that they don't lock in the targets when the event is generated. Like, I totally get randomizing slots 3 and 14 as a way of generating the event, but why not lock it to the characters in those slots once the slots are determined?

Because the barracks bonus' attribute changes with time. One time it's +strength/+skill. Another time it might be +resistance/+luck. It's also easier to implement into the game, as outlined by Vascela in the post prior to this one.

I've intentionally 'reset' the bonus in order to achieve +Speed/+Luck to boost a certain units' avoidance.

1. Save the game. Check whether the events include as many barracks stat boosts as you wish. If there are enough boosts, proceed to point 2.
   If there are insufficient barracks stat boosts, reset the game, complete a random map (I just hit skip turn a few times in exp growth), save, and check again whether the number of bonuses is sufficient. If yes, continue to step 2. If not, repeat this step until the prior condition is met.
2. Confirm the slots which will receive the bonus(es), let's say slot α (and β)
3. Reset the game and put the unit(s) which are meant to receive the bonus(es) into slot α (and β) in the unit preparation screen. After that is done, leave the unit preparation screen and save the game.
4. The units at α (and β) should receive barracks bonus events. Confirm the attribute of the barracks bonus. 4.1 If you like it, end the operation.
   4.2 If you do not like it, reset the game, open a screen which - after closing it, prompts the game to update world map events to renew the barracks stat boost time based random seed (I use the DLC gate screen for this. Just opening it up and having Anna say "Welcome to the Outrealm Gate..." is enough.).
   Repeat this until condition 4.1 is satisfied.

Completing a map will reset the entirety all barracks events. They'll be completely shuffled anew. I usually do this a few times until two of the five events include stat boosters. This is part of point 1 above.

Prompting the game to re-calibrate via opening a window such as the DLC gate will change the stat boosters attribute.

Generally speaking, it's easy to get a single specific boost for a single unit.

Getting a single unit with two boosts is more difficult.

Getting two units a single boost is equally difficult as getting a single unit two desirable boosts.

Getting two units two specific boosts is a pain already. By now you probably see that the difficulty to achieve multiple desirable bonuses scales exponentially with the number of bonuses. That's the gist of it.

Edited April 24, 2015 by Knusperkeks

[eclipse]

What happens if there's a barracks event at points X and Y, with Y being close to the end of the roster, and enough characters die such that the map ends with Y-1 units?

[Czar_Yoshi]

I'd hazard a guess that it would wrap around back to unit 0. It's probably already generating huge numbers and just having them wrap around hundreds of times until it settles on some unit (that's how RNGs typically work, at least).

...Actually that would mean that just one unit dying would completely scramble the whole list, so it's easy to check.

Edited April 24, 2015 by Czar_Yoshi

[Kuroi Tsubasa Tenshi]

Well, I don't think it would've been too much trouble to set the names in stone and then do an iterative search on the name roster after. I mean, sure, string comparisons kinda suck for efficiency, but it's only up to 2n where n is the max roster size (which isn't all that big, IIRC). Thinking more on it, I suppose this is probably a hindsight thing, though, where they didn't anticipate us finding a way to manipulate the method.

[Kobazco]

Sorry that I just posted i beat it and left. I saw someone ask me how i beat lunatic +. Well here is my personal strat. Dark Mages. Mire tomes. That is all.