Attempting to do a no-paid DLC skill/class Apotheosis Run… but already had made pairings… also, only using story characters

[astrophys]

So, I'm trying to tackle this…. the thing is, I had originally planned to do a DLC run, but then got it in my mind to try it with a no-DLC (other than Apotheosis itself) run instead….

However, I had already made all of my pairings BEFORE realizing that I might want to try a DLC-less run. And as such, as I made then when assuming DLC (and knowing that Limit Breaker, Aggressor, all Rallies including Rally Heart, All Stats+2, etc. ) make Apotheosis trivially easy I had allowed myself to make a bunch of sub-optimal pairings because I liked them as couples and [EDIT] aesthetic choices (such as my asset/flaw, etc.).

However, as its a file in which I've already sunk a good deal of hours into, I'd like to try this challenge anyways rather than starting a new file that would take ages to get it ready…

I actually HAVE done a few exploratory runs…. currently I've demonstrated that I'm pretty easily able to clear waves 1 and 2 of the Secret Route of Apotheosis under the no-DLC conditions…. I was even doing pretty well in wave 3 and would have won most likely…. until I got my distracted and got careless [forgetting to rescue Severa out of danger… oops… reset]. But before losing because of that silly and totally preventable mistake I had managed to take down the three Sorcerers [including the 99 luck Miracle on] and the Ragnell Paladin. Severa had managed to tank his Aether and survive with 2 HP [thanks to having 85 HP due to the HP tonic] and then kill him with Vengeance'd Waste.

So I know in principle that my units are at least minimally good enough to handle up to and including wave 3 [if I hadn't made that stupid and 100% preventable mistake]…. but the Berserkers in wave 4 and Anna, as well as the time limits for taking them down are on my mind… I've been finishing waves 1, 2, and almost 3 in less time than the time limits that wave 5 would have, but thins will be more complicated needing to take down the wave 4/5 bosses….

So any suggestions of builds, classes, skills, etc. to handle the last two waves in particular would be helpful. I'm willing to reshuffle my classes/skills [so I won't list them, except in cases of gender specific inheritances that have already been made, some of which weren't optimal choices as I wasn't originally planning to do it this way]. But because I want to try to do this with the file I have now, all the pairings [even the bad ones] are set in stone. Of course, as there is a 20 slot limit and staff and Rally users are needed, not everyone is getting deployed either.

Oh, and one more rule I had set for myself:

I want to do it with only story/paralogue characters… this does pose the constraining limitation in turn that one of Avatar, Morgan, or Severa must take up Rally duties to provide Rally Spectrum to the army… I know that I could use a bonus team unit, but I just want to do it with this extra stipulation…. story/paralogue characters only. This makes things more difficult for me, as I can't leverage one of them as a powerful combat units, but I had been managing well so far.

So these are the pairings that I have to work with; also, I have everyone [all 49 characters] recruited and plan to use 20 of them; unmarried units can still be used as Staffbot fodder.

1. Chrom x Sumia
2. +Mag/-Str Avatar x Cordelia [didn't give male-only skills; I wasn't interested in them at the time, etc.]
3. Frederick x Lissa [gave Galeforce]
4. Donnel x Sully [gave Aptitude to Kjelle]
5. Kellam x Miriel [gave Rally Resistance to Laurent]
6. Lon'qu x Maribelle [gave Galeforce]
7. Virion x Panne
8. Vaike x Nowi ADDENDUM: [gave Axefaire]
9. Gaius x Tharja [gave Sol]
10. Stahl x Olivia [gave Galeforce]
11. Gregor x Cherche ADDENDUM: [gave Dual Support +]

Alone: Ricken/Henry/Libra [yeah, I know that I'm missing out on Vengeance children this way and that Ricken is a good dad, so this is an obvious weakness of my configuration and is what happens when you let aesthetic preferences sneak in]

12. Sumia!Lucina x Lon'qu!Brady
13. Donnel!Kjelle x Stahl!Inigo
14. Chrom!Cynthia x Virion!Yarne
15. Cordelia!Morgan(+Mag/-Str) x Kellam!Laurent
16. (+Mag/-Str)Avatar!Severa x Gregor!Gerome
17. Gaius!Noire x Frederick!Owain

Alone: Vaike!Nah

Currently I've thought of Sorc Severa w/Forseti x Hero Gerome as one solution that gets the speed to avoid being doubled yet has the defenses to survive an Aether, in terms of 1-2 range options [and then chipping her down with dual strikes]…. but of course, using a Longbow Sniper is probably the better solution here…. although Sorc Severa with Waste and Hero Gerome partner is what survived the Ragnell Rightful God Aether Paladin and was tearing up waves 1-2, so clearly its functioning there…

Currently I've been running 5 combat pairs [the most recent one had 2 double gale and 3 single gale as my third double gale couple still needs to be leveled up more before they'll be useful], Olivia, 2 Rally units [collectively with all Rallies except for Rally Heart, which is a DLC exclusive skill and thus banned under the rules of my self-imposed challenge], and 7 exclusive staff bots. Although some of my combat units also had staff access, so it was really more like having 8 staves if I needed them.

So, in conclusion, any advice for builds, ways to take down the wave 4/5 bosses without running out of time, etc., under these conditions would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks for reading this!

Edited April 26, 2015 by astrophys

[Czar_Yoshi]

GM and DK both have similar defensive stats to Sorc but with some other advantages too. Did you consider them for Severa?

Also try Spd tonic Hero Ragnell Severa paired with Assassin Gerome for Anna survival. It should still hit 66 Spd and the same Def for her, but will have higher Atk than the Sorc/Hero due to getting a bonus from Gerome and can hit Thronie outside Aegis.

[astrophys]

That is a very good point…

I have to admit that since I had been going into the run treating it more like a test run, there was a certain degree of laziness in may setup… Severa and Gerome already happened to be in those classes from their earlier training and I did a quick check of the numbers and saw that they met certain speed thresholds (and I realized that they'd have good defense, although I didn't confirm Ragnell Paladin survival in advance).

But Hero Ragnell Severa…. that's a good idea… I had forgotten about my own Ragnell…. yes, you're right, that has +5 defense.

And Dark Knight… you're right, they have even more defense that Sorcerers (1 point, although at the cost of worse resistance)… and they get +2 move…. granted, they also lose 3 magic and access to Waste [which I was regularly getting to 100% anyways thanks to forges/skills/dual support], but Celica's Gale also does fine and doesn't need as much work to ensure its accuracy. But Dark Knight would also get options for attack Pavise and Aegis, whereas Sorcerer only attacks Aegis….. and they both have the same speed…. that's a good idea.

Back to Ragnell Severa….

So that would give 40 defense (Severa Hero) + 2 (tonic) + 3 (Gerome's pair-up) + 5 (Ragnell) + 8 (Rally Spectrum and Rally Defense) = 58 defense, which will be enough to survive the Ragnell Paladin and Anna…..

But if I'm using Ragnell to get that defense necessary for survival it means that I'm also sacrificing the ability to double with Waste/Celica's Gale…. not that what I already came up with was doing that against Anna, but it was capable of doing that against the Paladin…. so that would be one notable target in which the build would possibly be worse….

And I was also using Sorc so that I could 1-2 range brave attack the counter using enemies at 2 range, as well as picking off the enemies with 1 range weapons with impunity.

And yes, Ragnell lets you attack from range, but its not a Brave attack….

But I'll have to think hard about this, as using Severa as a Hero in that capacity is indeed interesting……

Edited April 27, 2015 by astrophys

[Knusperkeks]

I agree that this specific Paladin is a true badass, but what's the harm in using two pairs to take him down? Have Severa kill one of the lesser Paladins (there is one who has a Lance, abuse weapon triangle to kill him with a Brave Axe) and then engage the Boss, possibly with healing in between if necessary.

After Severa and Gerome pounded him a bit, he shouldn't feel as reluctant anymore to fall to the engagement afterwards.

[astrophys]

Some of the other combat pairs I was using… I know that some of the classes and setups are questionable [do to laziness for what was only intended as a test run], but I'm planning to do some class changing to correct some of the more egregious issues. Also may swap out one of the combat pairs for another….. maybe swap out two so that I can use three double-gale pairings.

1. Chrom (force deployed) x Sumia [bow Knight for Speed/Skill + Dark Flier]

2. Avatar x Cordelia [ Grandmaster for Speed pair-up + Dark Flier]; This is an issue of pure laziness… I most likely should use HIM as the rallier [for Rally Spectrum] so that it doesn't fall upon Morgan or Severa, who have better stats… as its was, I already happened to have the rallies on Morgan from earlier in the game, so despite it being obviously stupidly wasteful, I was using Morgan as the Rally bot, with her husband Laurent being the 2nd rally bot [spectrum/Speed/Move/Skill and Strength/Magic/Defense/Resistance/Luck between the two of them]… Avatar really should take over from Morgan [after learning the skills himself], get a female unit with all the female rallies to be the other rallier, and free up Morgan and Laurent….. although both Avatar x Cordelia have Armsthrift, which is very convenient [only need to forge one weapon and not worry about weapon management… but given that I'm already handicapping myself, dropping Armsthrift for a stronger combat skill might be wise…. although I had been doing fine with it]

3. Lucina [bow Knight (laziness) x Brady (Dark Knight)] - took down fliers well, but I should class them to something that has their mods work better together.

4. Warrior Inigo x Falcon Knight Kjelle

5. The aforementioned Sorcerer Severa x Hero Gerome

ADDENDUM (to avoid double-posting):

Well, while I've decided that I want to retool certain class/skill choices before doing Secret Route under the specified conditions, I decided to just go ahead and beat Normal Route while I was there and had everyone tonic'ed up and setup.

Normal Route (unsurprisingly) turned out to be trivially easy even with the no DLC conditions I had imposed on myself [as well as the fact that only 4 of my characters were using forged weapons, also attributable to laziness, although something I'll correct when doing my actual final Secret Route run]. The combination of pair-up, Braves/Dual Strikes, Luna or Vengeance, and Rallies (all except Heart) are just too much in your favor for it to pose much of a challenge at all when combined with a bunch of staff users and a player phase orientated attacking strategy.

While doing the normal route I experienced greater issues with Severa's limited movement range than I had during my earlier test runs of Secret Route. This suggests that I should possibly move her to an 8 movement class to have more flexibility during Secret Route. Considering that I was trying to use her to tank the most powerful enemy units, this suggests that I might want to look into the Dark Knight class for its 42 base defense and 8 movement range. Combined with a tonic (+2), a defensive pair-up (+7 from Hero) or a generic pair-up plus Ragnell (which a Dark Knight can indeed us, also for a combined +(3+5) =+8 defense), this can bring her up to 49 or 50 defense after pair-up or pair-up plus Ragnell; this becomes 59 defense or 60 defense respectively, more than enough to survive the Aether Paladin's 85 attack [threshold required: 58 defense, max HP, and an HP tonic for 5 more]; there is no weapon triangle disadvantage to worry about here. It also meets the threshold of defense needed to survive Anna's Aether [ 48 defense if with a weapon triangle neutrality, 50 defense if at weapon triangle disadvantage, if my calculations are correct].

Dark Knights have 40 speed, 45 speed in the case of Severa's particular mods, which becomes 47 with a Speed Tonic and 55 when Rally Speed+Rally Spectrum are applied. With an Assassin pair-up that hits 64 speed… and then as Severa is Cordelia's daughter she can learn Speed +2 from Pegasus Knight.. this brings her up to 66 speed, which is enough to avoid being doubled by Anna.

And I even have room to run it…. during my prior test run I was using Armsthrift [as convenience], Hit +20, Tomefaire, Vengeance, and Galeforce. I just need to discard the convenience of Armsthrift and slot in Speed +2.

Moreover, as the Anna survival threshold is 48 or 50 defense for neutral or disadvantage, the 42 defense from Dark Knight + the 8 defense from rallies is sufficient on their own, even before the tonic and generic defense bonus give an additional +5 to bring it up to 55… i.e. a Ragnell isn't needed to survive Anna, so I can use Dark Knight Severa + Assassin Gerome to tank it while Severa wields a tome [to attack at range]…. I'll need to see what I can do to help Gerome's accuracy (Hexathema, etc.), as he doesn't have Hit+20 himself and while he gets Swordfaire from Gregor that also puts him at Triangle disadvantage against Anna…. he lacks Bowfaire as well, but at least he can use a Brave Bow without an accuracy penalty on that front.

If Aether triggers I can expect Severa to take something like 74 damage, which will result in a boost of 18 damage per hit after the 1/2 of the damage effect of Vengeance (37) and Dragonskin (18) are taken into account. This should be combed with Celica's Gale.

Looking at things, I could also get Cordelia to be able to survive it if I equipped her with Forseti and switched the Avatar to a Paladin for the pair-up bonuses (even though this is probably a bad idea because it would hurt his dual strike dame even more).

32 def + 2 from tonic + 7 from Paladin + 8 from rallies is 49 defense… Cordelia takes 83 damage from Aether [2 HP left]. Speed is 44 + 2 from tonic + 7 from Paladin + 8 from Rallies + 5 from Forseti (optionally +2 from Speed+2 to get 68, or 63 w/o Forseti).

But I think going with Severa to do it would be better.

2nd Addendum:

Just found yet another Anna survival candidate….

Warrior or Sniper Stahl!Inigo has 42 speed and defense… he's married to Kjelle, who is currently a Falcon Knight [and is also capable of being an assassin, both of which give +9 speed].

42 + 9 pair up + 2 tonic + 8 rallies + 5 Yewfelle = 66 speed

42 defense is easily rallied to 50 before anything else is considered….

Any thoughts about the Berserkers, by the way?

3rd Addendum….

Running some calculations, if I switched Severa over to an assassin (despite the -1 strength flaw and her magical asset carried over from her Avatar parentage) and made Gerome a Berserker, she'd get to 69 speed [46 assassin base + 5 speed mod + 8 Berserker pair-up + 2 tonic + 8 rallies = 51 +8 +2 + 8 = 59 +2 + 8 = 69], and thus be able to double the throne Berserkers at range…. I've calculated that she meets the survival threshold…. Luna+ Helswath isn't nearly as scary as Ragnell Aether…..

Gerome as a Berserker has 56 strength…. if my calculations are correct, I could easily be doing 118-126 damage to the Berserkers, mainly from Gerome's dual strikes… although he only has a 54.7% chance of landing all of them…. although if could allow another pair to finish the Berskerk off even if that did not work, most likely…. .Dual guards could also reduce the margin of error, as Severa should be taking 77 damage and getting 9x2 = 18 extra damage from Vengeance vs. Dragonskin/Aegis+ for her second two hits…

Of course, this necessitates shifting around tasks to get another tank, and this setup still cannot survive Anna without a Ragnell… and special dance OR defense+2 because of Anna's triangle advantage…. and defense _2 would make Severa take only 76 damage from the Berserker…. but thankfully due to rounding it works out the same way….

Yeah, because Anna would get 78+1 = 79 attack from triangle advantage… 31 defense Assasin +3 generic defense pair-up + 2 defense tonic + 8 defense rally + 5 defense Ragnell + Def+2 = 51 defense

First hit: 79 - 51 = 28 damage

Second hit 79 - 25 = 54 damage

Total sustained = 82 damage

If Aether is not dual guarded, Severa Vengances for 7+20 = 27 damage.

Thanks to his WTA, Gerome with Axefaire and Strength +2 gets 90 attack…. 58 defense on Anna (55+3 on throne) and Dragonskin reduces this to 16 damage per dual strike if they occur…. up to 32 damage from the round… Dual strike has 86% chance of occurring….

27 + 32 = 59 damage (best case scenario)

if no Aether/its dual guarded: 7 + 32 = 34 damage

if no dual strike: 27 damage

if no Aether/its dual guarded and no dual strike: 7 damage...

Aether has a 65% chance of occurring

In the best case scenario, if I recover them and Dance for them…. Anna would deal 26 damage in the sol (thanks to Special dance) and heal 13 HP….. Severa would still do the same damage….

59-13+59 = 105…. best case scenario, I can 1 round Anna…. it just is unlikely as it requires two 65% chance Aethers and two 86% dual strike chances…. and no dual guard, which I haven't accounted for yet…

i.e. less than a 31% chance of a 1 round KO…..

But it definitely suggests that over 7 rounds I'd most likely be able to fell her, perhaps even early on if I got luck…

Edited April 28, 2015 by astrophys