Experience requirement vs. number of enemies

[Paper Jam]

To give an idea of how hard it might be to get 5-star Experience in any given chapter, I thought I'd compare each chapter's Experience requirements with the number of non-Boss enemies in that particular chapter. In the interest of not driving myself insane, I will not take enemy levels into account; I'm simply providing a general idea of how much Experience you must gain from each enemy on average to beat the 5-star Experience requirement (minus however much you get from the Boss, which will of course be more).

I'll use Lyn and Hector Hard Mode data, since that's my main interest.

I made extensive use of http://www.fireemblemwod.com/ENG_fe7.htmto count the initial enemies and add the reinforcements.

Prologue: 100/1

1: 200/4

2: 200/5

3: 300/8

4: 450/21 (11 initial, 10 reinforcements)

5: 250/6

6: 250/6

7: 350/10

7x: 450/14 (11 initial, 3 reinforcements)

8: 500/17 (13 initial, 4 reinforcements)

9: 650/18 (4 initial, 14 reinforcements)

10: 450/14 (9 initial, 5 reinforcements)

11: 0/9

12: 550/15

13: 750/27 (17 initial, 10 reinforcements)

13x: 700/32 (20 initial, 12 reinforcements)

14: 850/38 (29 initial, 9 reinforcements)

15: 0/34 (15 initial, 19 reinforcements)

16: 1100/33(+10) (22 initial, 11 reinforcements within 5-star Tactics par; 10 more beyond 5-turn Tactics par)

17: 1100/42 (27 initial, 15 reinforcements)

17x: 700/22 (19 initial, 3 reinforcements) (Arena chapter)

18: 1450/66 (23 initial, 43 reinforcements)

19: 2100/45 (32 initial, 13 reinforcements)

19x: 1000/44 (28 initial, 16 reinforcements)

19x2: 0/26

20: 2100/72 (+18) (36 initial, 36 reinforcements within 5-star Tactics par; 18 beyond)

21: 1200/48 (+6) (22 initial, 26 reinforcements within 5-star Tactics par, 6 outside) (Arena chapter)

22: 1700/70 (32 initial, 38 reinforcements)

23: 1200/46 (29 initial, 17 reinforcements) (Pent will inevitably kill some of them)

23x: 650/20 (initial; 4 possible reinforcements if you shoot Kishuna before turn 5)

24 Linus: 1900/81 (37 initial, 44 reinforcements) (Arena chapter)

25: 0/98 (24 initial, 74 reinforcements)

26: 1500/68 (30 initial, 38 reinforcements)

27 Kenneth: 1550/65 (35 initial, 30 reinforcements)

27 Jerme: 2250/91 (49 initial, 42 reinforcements)

28: 1800/77 (37 initial, 40 reinforcements) (Jaffar will inevitably kill some of them)

28x: 2250/115 (49 initial, 66 reinforcements)

29: 3650/116 (43 initial, 73 reinforcements)

30: 0/20

31: 2050/91 (35 initial, 56 reinforcements)

31x: 0/0 (Arena chapter)

32: 6150/180 (38 initial, 142 reinforcements within 5-star Tactics; more beyond)

32x: 0/? (16 initial, countless reinforcements)

Final: 2800/21 (16 initial, 5 reinforcements)

Final 2: 200/6

Strangely enough, chapter 32 doesn't have as high of an experience-required-to-enemies-available ratio as I thought; only about 35 experience per enemy. (Assuming a gain of 100 experience for defeating Limstella, it goes down to 34 experience per enemy.) Of course, a great many of those enemies are nonpromoted and thus give very little experience when promoted units kill them, but it's still interesting.

Another point of interest: The experience/enemies ratio in Kenneth's version of chapter 28 is about 24, while in Jerme's version it's about 25. Even if you make it a point to gain as much experience as possible in chapter 28 by killing all of the enemies anyway, it is actually a bit more efficient for your Experience ranking to take Kenneth's map rather than Jerme's.

[ruadath]

Interesting. This is something I've always been curious about, both to extrapolate what was required in zero-requirement chapters and to eventually (maybe) extend such an analysis to games like PoR and RD and play a "ranked run" there (where turns are determined by max clear BEXP, funds by sum of all treasure on map of which you have to get 80%, and EXP by this analysis).

Do you have data for 24 Lloyd?

[Paper Jam]

Sure.

24 Lloyd: 1650/84 (27 initial, 57 reinforcements) (Arena chapter)

I didn't think that anyone would care about 24 Lloyd, which is why I omitted it from my opening post.

I don't think it's possible to compare experience/enemies ratios of the Lloyd and Linus versions of chapter 24 the way I did with the Kenneth and Jerme versions of chapter 27, since the former two being arena chapters means that there is a potentially infinite number of arena opponents in addition to the listed enemies.

One could estimate that it would take about 5 turns longer to get to the arena in Linus' map than in Lloyd's, and clearly Linus' map allows 11 more turns for its 5-star Tactics par than Lloyd's; thus you could get about 6 more turns' worth of arena fights out of Linus' map than out of Lloyd's... but that depends on what you do during each turn: ignore the arena completely, send one unit to fight in the arena (or, with the help of an extra flying unit, two), or use Ninian and a flying unit to squeeze three or maybe even four arena fights out of every turn.

After making the calculations, I find that the first part of the Final chapter is clearly the most difficult (or perhaps outright impossible) to get 5 stars in every rank, as it requires an average of about 128 experience points from every enemy. The next-most difficult would be chapter 19, which requires about 45 experience per enemy. The other chapters mostly require an average of 20-33 experience per enemy.

With regard to the Final chapter in particular, the Combat requirements (as with all other chapters) are at least two wins for every five battles for 5 stars. And the experience requirements are about 256 experience for every two wins.

So assuming that your character is of low enough level to get 100 experience from defeating the enemies, you would need 200 experience from every two wins, plus 56 experience from every three battles that didn't result in a win; that's about 19 experience per battle.

(31+E-U)/3=19 --> (31+E-U)=57 --> E-U=26. Your unit would have to be at least 26 levels lower than the enemies (e.g. at most level 14 unpromoted against 20 promoted) to get that much experience from combat, unless your unit is a Thief.

If your unit IS a Thief (NOT an Assassin)... (31+E-U)/2=19 --> (31+E-U)=38... Actually, a Thief would get a ton of experience from these fights, regardless of level. I recommend deploying a level 14 or so Thief and using him to do a bit of damage to some of the enemies before using another unit to finish them off. (Incidentally, a level 14 Thief would get about 28 experience from each fight against a level 20 promoted character.)

Edited September 10, 2015 by Paper Jam

[ruadath]

Dang, I guess the strict requirements for the final Chapter do not bode well for my Max Tactician Star Run. I assume with some staff abuse and Nils dancing, that figure of 128 can be brought down considerably. But even if half of my EXP comes from that, I can't imagine racking up 64 EXP per enemy being an easy task...

[Paper Jam]

And don't forget the other requirements, either. Whatever staves or music you use to gain experience, you only have 8 turns to do it to remain within the 5-star Tactics par.

Then, too, there is the Combat requirement. With a total of 22 enemies (including the boss), you lose Combat stars if you fight more than 55 battles.

Your best bet, I think, would probably be to use Legault at base level (12 unpromoted) against the enemy Druid wielding Gespenst (17 promoted) for six turns (2-7). I believe that if Legault is first in your deployment roster, he can reach that Druid on turn 2, and I'm sure that somebody else (Athos, maybe) can help keep that Druid cornered; the Druid would probably rather target Legault than Athos, so Legault could get two battles every turn (or three if you use Nils on Legault; but then you'd want to rescue-take-drop Nils out of the druid's range).

Anyway, that's 12 battles for Legault, and he'll get (31+37-12)/2=28 experience for each battle until he levels up to 13; then 27 experience for each battle unless/until he levels up to 15.

So after 4 battles, if he started at level 12.00, he'll be at level 13.12; after another 4 battles, he'll be at level 14.20; after another 3 battles, 15.01; after another 4 battles, 16.05. That would be 405 experience after 15 battles. By using Nils on Legault each turn, rescue-take-dropping Nils out of the Druid's range, and using another unit to corner the Druid, this could be done in 5 turns.

Of course, I haven't calculated how much damage Legault does to the Druid every turn, or how much damage the Druid can take; I definitely would want somebody else to finish the Druid off.

Edited September 10, 2015 by Paper Jam

[ruadath]

If Serra/Priscilla are still unpromoted at that point and have A rank staves (they should), some fortify and warp spamming could go on for at least 5 turns, which would be 145*5=725 EXP. I also imagine that this will hurt my funds pretty badly, so if necessary, Hammerne can get used here too once (or twice) for another 40-80. I think perhaps Nils' dancing is used most efficiently on healers, since I imagine Legault will eventually finish off that druid even without any dancing. I don't know though, do you have a better idea?

EDIT: I suppose it might also be a reasonably good idea to Hammerne Warp/Fortify during the chapter so I can use it again... They are also pretty expensive, so it should be more effective than another weapon. This is great news, because it means I shouldn't bother training up Rebecca a ton for Brave Bow, and instead just wait until late game to use Hammerne on intense staves! I have no idea why I didn't make this realization sooner...

Edited September 10, 2015 by ruadath

[Paper Jam]

Funds is extremely easy to make in Final 1, since the S-rank weapons give you 100% of the chapter's Funds requirement, freeing you up to spend 20% of it (i.e. up to 30,000). Even two Fortify Staves and a Warp Staff aren't that valuable.

Funds in Final 2 are harder to achieve; unless you exclusively use 0-value weapons, I don't think it's possible to get 5-star Funds in Final 2 without using the Hammerne staff to repair a used, particularly valuable item (of which, to be fair, you should have plenty). For example, you might make one use of the Hammerne Staff (-600) to restore ten uses of the Regal Blade (+6,000). But to do this, you must have at least one Hammerne use left, as well as the Regal Blade with at most 15 uses left, as of the end of Final 1.

The moral of the story, I guess, is not to use up the Hammerne staff going into Final 2, and to have something valuable to repair in Final 2.

Incidentally, one of the highest cost-use ratios is 1,400 gold, for Gespenst. I would deploy Canas and have him use it 10-20 times in Final 1, then have somebody else use Hammerne on it in Final 2 for a net gain of 13,400 to 27,400 in that chapter; that should give you plenty of room to use whatever weapons or staves you need to, such as for fighting the mages on your rear.

Warp does have a higher cost-use ratio than Gespenst (1500), but only four uses at a time can be restored by Hammerne, so it's better for your Funds rank to restore ten uses of Gespenst. (Better still to restore 24 uses of Gespenst, but using it so much in Final 1 will cut into your Funds rank for that chapter.)

Edited September 10, 2015 by Paper Jam

[ruadath]

I guess we can repair a Warp/Fortify that got used in Light I? There is a reasonable chance I may want to use a Hammerne for VoD, so I guess I can see where my uses are allocated now...