Starting Berwick Saga

[99 2 99 2]

Hello not too long ago i decided to finally complete Berwick Saga and after starting chapter 2 I have some questions/concerns. Sorry if the formatting or my questions will be weird OR weirdly specified/explained but English is not my first language and I want to be as precise in my questions as I can.

1.Is it possible to recruit every mercenary(I have a habit of recruiting every playable character during my Fire Emblem runs) OR should i focus on specific group? And if possible then how hard and difficult will it make my run.

2.Hit rates makes me go crazy with how RNG dependent they are (nothing worse than you missing 80% with commander skill from Reese just to be hit by 19%). When do they improve OR how to improve them?

3.EXP management and distribution seems to be a problem and a headache considering that you only get it for killing enemies and certain mercenaries have lvl and happiness requirements to recruit them.So should i just go for kills and try to complete the chapters using OP units which don't get a lot of exp(I mean this game Jagens like Dean or Sylvia and Ward of course) OR should I try my best in softening enemies with strong units and feeding them to Main Lord(Reese) and weaker units(Leon, Chris, Sherlock, Chris,Ruby,Faye)?

4.Promotions, how do they happen. Do I have to promote via item OR hit certain lvl and when should I? Considering low growths I should as soon as possible.

Thanks for your answers.

[Saint Rubenio]

I hope you enjoy it! Berwick Saga is one of my favorite games ever, and it's always a pleasure to see more people giving it a shot.

1.

It is possible to permanently recruit everyone, yes, but I don't believe it's something you should gun for on a first run. It took me a number of runs before I could pull it off. It requires great knowledge of the game and a degree of planning. You should naturally end up recruiting most people that you care about. If you wish to know the exact requirements, however, the main Serenes site has some pretty good info pages for the game.

2.

The early weaponry is to blame in great part, it's pretty shoddy stuff. Hitrates will improve as you go and get better weapons. There are ways to improve them early on, though, such as the cav bros' Supporter skills, giving Ward a different spear, the aforementioned Commander skill...

Beyond that, you also have to keep in mind that this game uses 1 RN. If you've played a lot of FE before, you might know that it uses True Hit, a system that rolls numbers in such a way that the forecast isn't entirely accurate. No such thing here - if the game says 80%, then it's 80%. 80% means 1 in 5 hits on average will miss, so you have to be prepared for this scenario. Berwick Saga is all about minimizing risks, but being prepared for unpleasantness.

3.

People do like levels, for skills, promoting and in some cases, getting permanently recruited, so you should of course try to get kills to folks who can actually gain experience. That being said, don't obsess about it overly much - raw stats in Berwick Saga are not that important. Most units won't fall off simply due to a lack of stats. For an example: See Ward? He's endgame ready at base. Yeah. If you need to kill some mooks or some dangerous guy with the Jeigans, by all means, do so. The combat system being what it is, it's practically impossible to see a unit eating up kills passively, anyway.

As a side note, Sylvis is not a Jeigan. Her class may be sniper and she may be way more powerful than the rest when she joins, but she has unpromoted EXP gains and she needs to level up in order to be recruited. Do not hesitate to give her kills if you like her or if needed be. Dean also needs to get kills to be recruited and promoted. Of the three you mentioned, Ward is the only true Jeigan.

4.

To promote, you generally need to hit a level threshold and a weapon skill threshold, which varies from unit to unit. For example, Elbert needs to hit 20 sword, 20 spear and 20 shield skill, as well as level 10. Then he promotes. There are a couple of exceptions to this, though, units who promote by different means (usually they're easier, too).

Still, don't stress over promoting everyone. Like I said before, stats are a lot less important in this game than in FE, skills and equipment being far more impactful. I've taken unpromoted units to the lategame and even the endgame before, they can do their job okay. Some units don't even get much of value out of promoting, like Christine or the mages, and aren't worth the hassle unless you're going for high rank scores. Serenes also has a page on the promotion requirements.