To Become an Elitist [Playlogs FE1-5] [currently playing: Thracia 776]

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FE4 Chapter 7: Beyond the Desert

Rivough --> Yied

Spoiler

Small whoopsie: Overwrote the turn 1 save and then noticed that my entire troop movement was balls. Why the heck would I send everybody towards Yied when there's literally nothing left to kill once they arrive?

On the plus side, the redone arena run includes a full clear for Julia, with a little bit of brute-forcing. When Wolfen one-shots anyway, it makes no difference if Julia goes in with 1 HP. I don't even think she wasted too many Nosferatu charges with this - a lot of fights in which Wolfen just kills her right away, but I think she managed to win the second or third time that Wolfen missed his initial attack.

There isn't a lot of smart strategies for Seliph's group on the first turn. A Cav can barely enter the closest Dark Mage's range, so Lester does so to counter on enemy phase, but that's about it.

No, wait, I tell a lie - one convo to strengthen Dermott a little:

: "Say, Dermott. You have a sister in Leonster, don't you?"
: "Yes, sir. We were separated when we were very young. From what I've heard, she grew up with Sir Finn, a knight of Leonster."
: "Sir Finn, you say... You're eager to have the chance to see her again, aren't you?"
: "Yes, sir. I can hardly wait!"
: "Heh. You'll have to give this battle your all first, then! How about a quick swordplay lesson?"
: "Yes, sir! I'd appreciate that!"

[+1 Str/Skl/Def --> Dermott]

Short and sweet. I like the little parallel to Finn receiving a similar lecture from Quan back in gen 1.

For Shanan, first priority is, of course, to get Balmung.

: "Kyaaaaaaa! Stop! Get your hands off of me!"
: "Ugh... Look, I don't want to hurt you. Could you just give me that sword back?"
: "Wait... give it back? Is it yours?"
: "Yes, it is! It's my family's ancestral blade, Balmung. I'm the only person capable of using it. You've nothing at all to gain from keeping it."

"For some reason, no pawnbroker in all of Jugdral will ever buy it from you.

: "Wait, so how'd this thing end up in Yied, anyway?"
: "It belonged to my father, who died in Grannvale's war with Isaach. Someone must've stolen it from him after he died. I only recently learned that it was being kept at Yied, so I came to retrieve it."
: "Hang on, hang on, hang on! Could it be... Are you Isaach's Prince Shanan?!"
: "I am..."
: "Really? It's really, really you?! Wow! Oh my gosh, this is incredible!"
: "Er..."
: "No, really, I've heard all the stories about you! All of them! I've been a huge fan of yourse for so long, but I never thought I'd actually meet you! But you're here! You're really here talking to me right now! It's like all my dreams've come true!"
: "...Yeah, I think I get the idea. My sword, please."
: "Oh, right! Sorry. Here ya go."
: "Balmung... My holy sword... It's finally mine... Hm? Ahh! What is this power...?!"
: "Wooow! This is incredible!"

__

Incredible indeed. Balmung is Forseti's physical equivalent - with even more speed because it's two points lighter, although of course Forseti's 1-2 range and res-targeting are a bigger deal than that. Still, with this, Shanan suddenly only faces hit rates of 16% from the nearby enemies instead of 56% - which gives him a decent chance to solo this whole area, but not without risk, because three Dark Mages (who two-shot him) will follow him and Patty.

Finally, Leif and company head out to face the Brigands. Finn goes west to go after the two Brigands there, while Leaf and Nanna face the trio closer to Leonster.

Paragon worth! A polite Thank You to Lester for not proccing any skill on enemy phase, since I believe this is Arthur's only fight outside the arena in this segment.

____

The Dark Mages are spaced very conveniently here, giving you the opportunity to pick them off in small groups. Bonus points for these two for not having identical ranges because of road tiles, so Lester can do the same thing he did on turn 1.

And while everybody else moves southwest and murders Dark Mages, Seliph and Fee go straight west to help out Shanan (Fee) or arrive when everybody has done their thing and seize the abandoned castle (Seliph). Lana also follows then around, unfortunately with all the desert slowdown that magic units will be free of in future entries, to Physic people if necessary. Julia can handle healing duties for the main group on her own without problem.

Here, Shanan takes a risk, since the Dark Mages two-shot him quite easily...

...but he will dodge every incoming attack. He didn't manage that in the abandoned attempt - he didn't die, either, but this is nice because it allows him to keep stabbing (and one-shotting) Dark Mages on player phase. And because he really dodges all incoming attacks, he can even face the boss without prior healing, since the guy is precisely one point of Mag short of one-shotting base level Shanan.

__

Leif and Nanna manage to get a bit ahead of schedule killing the Brigands, with Nanna getting an Accost proc and Leif getting a crit, resulting in two dead Brigands instead of one. Since Brigands will always go after villages first, it's no problem that Leif ends the turn at low HP, either.

In the middle of the enemy phases, we get a cutscene in neutral Darna Castle:

: "Milord, we've received word that the Isaachian rebels are on the move."
: "Isaachian rebels? Ah, the ones led by that brat... Celice, was it? Or Serlis? Something like that. Heh... Interesting. Very interesting, indeed!"

Love the "Celice" meta joke.

: "The Empire's put a hefty price on that boy's head. Let's make sure we're the ones to rake in that bounty, shall we? Keep our border locked down for the time being. The best option is to let them run themselves ragged, leaving them wide open to our strike! Instruct Commander Jabarro to put his squad on standby. His services will be needed in short order!"

Interesting twist on how the map will play out, too. I don't know how that'll be exactly, but pincer manoeuvres tend to be where Fire Emblem is at its most interesting.

: "Hey, what's with all this noise? You're not about to go to war, are you?"
: "No, we've not entered such a dire state yet. For the time being, we are merely preparing for the arrival of the Isaachian rebel army."
: "Oh, that's good. I guess I'm a bit worried about how you're gonna have to go and fight, too, Ares..."
: "What sorry excuse for a mercenary would I be if I refused to join a battle Leylia? Never mind one which, rumor has it, will oppose Sigurd's son... Never would I deny a chance to personally slay the spawn of my father's mortal foe..."
: "Hee hee! You're still going on about that, are you? Oh, you dolt. I mean, think about it. Both your father and that Sigurd man were knights, weren't they? And isn't killing part of a knight's job? It's like my job. Sometimes, I've got to dance for foul, leering, men! I hate it, but it's part of the work. I have to just deal with it. We've all gotta do what we gotta do to get by in life. I dunno... I just don't think it's right to hate someone for doing their job."
: "Leylia... I understand. I'll have to think it over for a time, but I do understand..."

Gotta give props to Leylia for just plain laugh at Ares for going, "Grr, my honour demands!". I feel like her argument that you shouldn't hate somebody for doing their job falls apart pretty badly in edge cases, but I appreciate the sentiment.

(Leylia and Ares won't hit the field before this update ends, so the frame colours are entirely by vibe. Honestly, I just should've gone with Eldigan's portrait for Ares and see if anybody would've noticed)

Next turn, Seliph does a thing! Which is just some chip damage so that Fee can retain her HP, but still. A thing!

(Honestly, it's refreshing that, for once, we don't have the lord as the vanguard, plowing through enemy lines. But it feels kinda bad to have Seliph see literally zero combat except for this.)

____

I think the main group is mostly covered already: Push forward, kill small groups of Dark Mages. So, to focus on Leif for a second - because Nanna and Leaf got lucky with their proc skills, they can finish their initial task before the Knight squad becomes a threat to them.

And with Canter, Finn can rendezvous with them (well, close enough to it) once the Knights do arrive.

____

They aren't terribly strong, only three-shotting both Nanna and Leaf, although with the random chance that they might kill an enemy to allow an additional one to hit them, they do have to be a bit careful about their positioning.

__

They're fairly successful in grabbing kills without relying on Finn to bail them out all the time, but unfortunately, Finn does get the boss kill, gaining him not a whole lot of XP. Could've fixed it by reloading, but I guess I was a bit lazy.

Afterwards, another small group of enemies comes out of Alster Castle. I'm not sure how these reinforcements worked, and if their numbers are fixed, but I appreciate the additional XP for Leif.

Final little whoops for that group: Forgot to swap Nanna away from the Earth Sword for enemy phase. 4000 gold she won't be seeing again.

Back to Patty and Shanan, with one of the few rounds of combat that Patty sees. Unfortunately, she gets one-shot by the three castle guards around Ctuzof - otherwise, she could've attacked one of those to steal money and make sure that Shanan can one-shot to avoid a counterattack. But with Shanan being perfectly evasive today, this didn't turn out to be relevant anyway.

__

Next turn, the cavalry arrives, and introduces itself with a crit. Turns out, the kill that Seliph set up for Fee earlier brought the Brave Lance to 50 kills! #TotallyPlannedISwear

__

Pictured: Me not checking the numbers and being a bit silly. "I should let Ctuzof attack on enemy phase", I thought, "in case Shanan doesn't kill him". Shanan, of course, has 100 hit on Ctuzof, since Jormungand isn't exactly a light tome, and overkills him by 15 points.

It wouldn't have mattered if Ctuzof had actually attacked on enemy phase, but he's apparently still busy looking for his Fenrir tome. The result is a bit more delay because the two enemies circling around from below the castle are approaching. Very convenient that the Dark Mage has lower movement...

__

...because it allows Patty to grab another 1000 gold. And save two Balmung uses, so that's another 2000...

__

Luckily, I've been fairly quick before this little mishap, so Shanan can still run through Ctuzof before he can kill Patty and/or Fee with Fenrir.

: "You rebel worms... How dare you defile the sanctity of the Yied Shrine! Come! Embrace the darkness, as it entombs you forevermore!"
: "G-glory to... The Loptyr... Empire..."

Perfect. No risk of death.

Overall, because Shanan has no way to heal himself until Lana slowly waddles close enough to use Physic on him, I found this part of the fight too "swingy" to be actually good. He's either lucky and keeps dodging the incoming 16%s, or he gets hit once and has to choose between running away or constant fear of death. My initial impression is that this would've worked better if Genealogy had Elixirs or some other strong, but expensive self-healing (with a nearby church maybe being too cheap). Gambling high-value items, or a decent chunk of money, in order to kill Ctuzof would've been fine, but I feel like this would've been a really annoying part of the map if Shanan hadn't been so lucky.

__

More money! And XP for Patty. Also quite nice.

Eventually, Seliph will get around to seizing, but before that, two more coversations:

Moving along.

At this point, I expect that these enemies will turn hostile after Yied is seized, so I positione everybody at the edge of their ranges - unnecessarily, as we'll see later.

: "Shanan! I'm so glad to see you've made it unscathed."
: "Yeah, sorry to worry you like that. You went and took back Isaach behind my back, did you, Seliph? I can't thank you enough!"
: "No, we'd still be in Tirnanog if not for you. You inspired ups. You gave us your courage. If not for you, we could never have taken to the field!"
: "Heh, you're starting to put on a bit of muscle there, aren't you? You're finally starting to..."
: "Shanan...?"
: "Hm? ...Oh, it's nothing. Pay me no mind, Seliph."
: "Anyway, we're finally starting to challenge the Empire! Not bad, wouldn't you say?"
: "Heh, not bad at all, Seliph! I've waited so long for this day... We all have, really."
: "Thank you, Shanan!"

[+1 Skl --> Seliph]

I don't know if I just can't see the elephant in the room, but I really don't get where Shanan's mind was going with that "bit of muscle" comment. It almost has a bit of a "oh myyy, you got jacked!" vibe, but this is a gay ship I certainly don't condone.

And with that, Seliph seizes, on turn 12. So while I didn't take not on what turn Shanan had killed the boss, it evidently still was with a bit of time to spare.

: "So this is Yied Shrine... It looks so sparse..."
: "The remnants of the Loptyr Empire have hidden within the depths of the shrine for generations. They had no choice. Trying to build new lives on the surface would have led to their mass persecution, or even being burned at the stake. I suspect that at first they weren't really bad or unusual people, but before long, their life here twisted them into what we know them as today."
: "I can hardly believe it... It's as if they were all being tortured for the sins of their long-dead imperial ancestors... All my life, these people have been branded as the 'dark cult', or the 'devil's kin'... I can barely imagine their pain... Hold a moment. This scribble on the wall... Is that a child's penmanship? It's a prayer... And it begs for the return of the dark god... ...Was Loptyr the only hope these people had?"
: "Yeah... Consider this a lesson, Seliph. Good and evil can't be easily reduced to such simple, black-and-white ideals. If you must hate, hate the evil which lurks in us all, not the individual. Never forget this."

Another lecture that, to be perfectly honest, becomes questionable if you consider the edge cases of particularly vile acts. Like, to take a random example, murdering children.

Here, Kaga decides to be merciful again, opening a path from Yied directly south towards Melgen. There's still some desert in the way between Yied and our main group, so these guys (especially the three without the Leg Ring) still are a bit behind the rest, but it's definitely nice that they don't have to do the entire loop-around that Seliph had to take.

: "We'll let them proceed through toward Fort Melgen, let them wear themselves out some more, then strike their wide-open backs! Kehehe... It's almost too easy to be any fun! Wouldn't you say, Jabarro?"
: "Heh, just another hard day's work for you, sir... But hey, so long as you're payin' the bills, my men've got nothin' to complain 'bout. 'Bout time we had a good fight, anyhow."

And with that, the border guards retreat back closer to Darna. Now, on to our next target, Melgen:

: "Hmm... The rebels have already taken Yied? Liza, what do you make of the situation?"
: "I suspect their most likely aim is to come to the aid of the Leonster rebels. As it stands, Ishtore, your father is still preoccupied besieging them at Leonster. Should they reach Alster and strike while he's occupied, the results would be disastrous... It is imperative that we intercept them here and now. Our force will be more than enough."
: "Indeed... My lord father could use the aid. Liza, may I place you in command of my army?"
: "Certainly. Leave everything to me, milord."
: "I confess I'd rather keep you away from the eye of the storm, but there's nobody whom I could ever trust more than you. My apologies, Liza."
: "I... Rest assured, milord. You've nothing to worry about. Just... Please, Ishtore, be careful... Now, excuse me... Men, move out! Assume your positions!"

So it seems that that portrait is used for female generals that their lieges are romantically involved with? Although I don't know if Aida's previous relationship with Arvis is actually established in Genealogy.

Liza hits pretty hard, two-shotting literally everybody on our team (except Julia, but only as long as she can Nos-heal inbetween), but she's also very frail despite the Shield Ring. Dermott can even avoid a counterattack if he kills her with the Brave Sword.

She notably has four Authority stars, one more than her boss, even.

In all other regards, Ishtore is the more powerful foe, though. A fair bit more bulky, with slightly higher Mag, a more powerful tome for hand-to-hand combat, and of course, Bolting. Oh, and as a War Mage, he has access to the Adept skill, which gives him a chance to randomly kill anybody who he doesn't one-shot to begin with (which, right now, would be Leif, Patty, Nanna, and Lester, although he'd need to use Thoron against the latter two).

The solution, I suspect, is called Forseti. Arthur even has weapon triangle advantage over Ishtore, which I believe will reduce Ishtore's hit to zero if Seliph is nearby to counter his Authority stars. Without Lewyn!Arthur, Ishtore just seems like a real arsehole of a boss.

The Team:

	  Lv.	  HP Str Mag Skl Spd Lck Def Res  Funds  XP    Arn
Seliph	  7.47	  39  12   2  12  12  15  10   3  23744  +7    [1]
Leif	  4.35	  31  12   3  11  11  11   9   3  3778   +335  [1]
Shanan	  14.02*  41  19   0  23  23  10  13   4  5000   +202  [1]
Ulster	  11.26	  44  16   2  19  14   7  15   0  29034  +488  [*]

Larcei	  10.26	  44  13   1  20  18  14  11   0  32034  +524  [*]
Patty	  1.71	  30   6   2   6  10  11   4   2  0      +71   [1]
Johalvier 14.44	  44  16   0   9  16   5  14   3  17500  +188  [*]
Oifey	  18.98*  43  17   9  18  17   8  18   8  21500  +106  [*]

Finn	  23.88*  46  22   0  16  20  17  17   4  18015  +8    [1]
Dermott	  9.82	  39  19   0  14  11  13  13   1  24752  +312  [*]
Nanna	  5.34	  33  10   3   9   8   8   7   3  3932   +234  [1]
Lester	  9.12	  37  14   2   9  13  13  12   0  15863  +316  [*]

Fee	  6.16	  31  11   2  10  17   5   8  13  15402  +101  [1]
Arthur	  11.48	  43   0  16  18  20  16   3   6  26893  +520  [*]
Julia	  6.96	  29   0  16   8  14   7   4  18  23300  +376  [*]
Lana	  7.75	  35   3  11  11  12  12   5   7  683    +175  --

• It's not like Finn didn't do his fair share of work, he's just that overleveled.
• Johalvier's Lv.Xp is really taunting me to restart the game.
• As you can see, Patty gave Seliph all of her hard-earned cash. Since he inherited the Renewal Band from Sigurd, he can now sell that to get the Paragon Band, once Arthur has an opportunity to sell it.

Answers!

Spoiler

On 3/30/2024 at 11:46 PM, Saint Rubenio said:

Hey, guess what, it's time for the same joke I make every time there's one of these screenshots.

...To be fair, Ishtore isn't particularly ugly. He could kiiiinda pass off as a playable. Except he's instead probably the most forgettable asshole that gen 2 pretends is kind of important. Wah wah.

Honestly, Blume is the only one that really looks non-recruitable here. Ishtore doesn't really look any more despicable than, say, Shinon actually is.

On 3/30/2024 at 11:46 PM, Saint Rubenio said:

This boss is complete garbage. I distinctly remember him. He's everything that sucks about FE4 bosses combined.

To be honest, Ishtore looks even more garbage, since it's more difficult to avoid getting screwed by Adept than it is to avoid getting counter-killed because of a Pavise proc.

On 3/30/2024 at 11:46 PM, Saint Rubenio said:

...Also, Rickard/Julian. Not sure if I'd call that excellent, but... They do get the same amount of interactions as Julian/Lena (exactly two), and heck, in FE12 they actually get more, due to sharing a support.

Well, Rickard/Julian doesn't seem particularly accidental, either.

On 3/31/2024 at 3:17 AM, BrightBow said:

Btw, did you notice that it plays the FE1 player phase theme if you wait in the arena lobby for like 30 seconds?
And the arena battle theme theme is also the version from FE1. It lacks the additional instruments that the FE3 version overlaid.

It's nice that they used the FE1 versions instead of the FE3 ones. In particular I find the FE1 version of the player phase theme to be much more pleasant.

I did not! To be honest, the speed-up button sees a lot of use when I'm arenaing, but I'll pay attention next time.

On 3/31/2024 at 3:46 AM, Interdimensional Observer said:

Which is why I was silently disappointed that he wasn't fed both of those odd stat-boosting villages in Gen 1. Finn technically gets the most mileage out of them, that's an argument. -Not sure if he needs them though, I can't even remember which two stats get the boosts.😅

Hey now, the +3 Str village is still with us, in the form of 0.6 Str on Lester and 0.3 Str on... Lana.

On 3/31/2024 at 5:28 AM, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

Ishtore only exists to

  Reveal hidden contents

Die, and for his death to motivate the women around him. ...Wait, did Kaga just invert a recurring sexist trope there?

 

Evil fridging be like:

On 3/31/2024 at 5:28 AM, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

There is a "chicken-and-egg" question here. Did Ethlyn fall in love with Quan via his close friendship with Sigurd? Or did Quan and Sigurd become close friends following his romantic relationship with Ethlyn?

Either way, yeah, it's weird that he doesn't refer to Sigurd as his "Uncle", or "Mother's Brother". Just "Dad's old war buddy". Like, you share a holy blood type with this man, Leif.

Since Quan and Sigurd (and Eldigan) are portrayed as going way back, I always assumed that Ethlyn and Quan met each other via Sigurd. Especially because Ethlyn's portrait looks younger than Sigurd's, too, although I'm not sure if the game explicitly established who was the older sibling.

On 3/31/2024 at 5:28 AM, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

Wait, so offscreen Edain only ecists at Tirnanog if her kids also exist? ...I mean I guess that makes sense.

Anyway, much as I'm no fan of "damn, I've been defeated! I must retreat", I feel like it would make sense for Edain's character. She's not a "fight to the death" sort of person, much more concerned with helping those around her. I could see her surrendering and getting picked back up later, as can happen to Deidre or Julia. And one way or another, I feel like the Tirnanog squad need some adult accompanying them. Especially when they're taking along an undisclosed quantity of babies.

Thus far, middle-aged Aideen only exists in Lana and Dermott's ch.6 conversation. So unless that will change, she indeed doesn't exist if those two don't, either.

I do agree that Aideen (alongside Deirdre) seems like the least fight-like character of the first generation. Does make sense, with her being the only staff-only character until she promotes.

On 3/31/2024 at 6:28 AM, Interdimensional Observer said:

I only just remembered I had this image.:

  Reveal hidden contents

Leif's actual army, don't believe this Genealogy nonsense.😝

Welp, I guess that T776's entire cast was wiped out in the failed mission Finn and Leif talk about at the start of the chapter.

 

[Saint Rubenio]

40 minutes ago, ping said:

Honestly, Blume is the only one that really looks non-recruitable here. Ishtore doesn't really look any more despicable than, say, Shinon actually is.

Yeah, I was more on about how Pigtails Mage overthere's design is so obviously more elaborate than the rest, but in this case it's not as bad. There's Liza being a recolor but at least she's only been used once before, unlike the one guy.

40 minutes ago, ping said:

To be honest, Ishtore looks even more garbage, since it's more difficult to avoid getting screwed by Adept than it is to avoid getting counter-killed because of a Pavise proc.

Yes, but Blume is a massively overleveled, legendary-wielding baron sitting on a castle all pavised up. Get ready for some RNG.

40 minutes ago, ping said:

Well, Rickard/Julian doesn't seem particularly accidental, either.

Hence why it doesn't count, see

40 minutes ago, ping said:

Hey now, the +3 Str village is still with us, in the form of 0.6 Str on Lester and 0.3 Str on... Lana.

Bad Ping. Go back and do it optimally. What if you need that +3 strength against the final boss?

40 minutes ago, ping said:

Evil fridging be like:

They should've fridged Seliph and let Oifey and Shannan be the main characters.

40 minutes ago, ping said:

Welp, I guess that T776's entire cast was wiped out in the failed mission Finn and Leif talk about at the start of the chapter.

There's theories that that's what happened, but... Eh, to be honest, T776 retcons enough things as it is. I suspect a FE4 remake will just establish Leif has an offscreen army doing things.

40 minutes ago, ping said:

: "Really? It's really, really you?! Wow! Oh my gosh, this is incredible!"
: "Er..."

Pffft. She's gonna wish she was Shannan's drinking water next?

...What a silly character that one was...

40 minutes ago, ping said:

__

Incredible indeed. Balmung is Forseti's physical equivalent - with even more speed because it's two points lighter, although of course Forseti's 1-2 range and res-targeting are a bigger deal than that. Still, with this, Shanan suddenly only faces hit rates of 16% from the nearby enemies instead of 56% - which gives him a decent chance to solo this whole area, but not without risk, because three Dark Mages (who two-shot him) will follow him and Patty.

See, even if you go for a subs only run, you basically have to extend the rule to "get Shannan killed immediatley" because otherwise it doesn't even matter. Shannan and the next fixed character can just solo the generation on their own with minimal help from the scrubs and Hawke.

40 minutes ago, ping said:

: "Milord, we've received word that the Isaachian rebels are on the move."
: "Isaachian rebels? Ah, the ones led by that brat... Celice, was it? Or Serlis? Something like that. Heh... Interesting. Very interesting, indeed!"

Love the "Celice" meta joke.

: "The Empire's put a hefty price on that boy's head. Let's make sure we're the ones to rake in that bounty, shall we? Keep our border locked down for the time being. The best option is to let them run themselves ragged, leaving them wide open to our strike! Instruct Commander Jabarro to put his squad on standby. His services will be needed in short order!"

Interesting twist on how the map will play out, too. I don't know how that'll be exactly, but pincer manoeuvres tend to be where Fire Emblem is at its most interesting.

Also interesting is how this guy is a recolor of Actually Interesting And Nuanced Bossman Clement. And he's, uh... let's just say, one of the least nuanced bossmen in the game. Funny how that works.

40 minutes ago, ping said:

Gotta give props to Leylia for just plain laugh at Ares for going, "Grr, my honour demands!". I feel like her argument that you shouldn't hate somebody for doing their job falls apart pretty badly in edge cases, but I appreciate the sentiment.

For the record, and in case you needed more proof that I have never, ever led you astray - As I recall (someone yell at me if I'm wrong), Lene's personality is exactly the same as Sylvia. Had you married the latter, you would've had to endure that again. Instead you get actually kind of badass dancer. No need to thank me.

40 minutes ago, ping said:

Perfect. No risk of death.

Overall, because Shanan has no way to heal himself until Lana slowly waddles close enough to use Physic on him, I found this part of the fight too "swingy" to be actually good. He's either lucky and keeps dodging the incoming 16%s, or he gets hit once and has to choose between running away or constant fear of death. My initial impression is that this would've worked better if Genealogy had Elixirs or some other strong, but expensive self-healing (with a nearby church maybe being too cheap). Gambling high-value items, or a decent chunk of money, in order to kill Ctuzof would've been fine, but I feel like this would've been a really annoying part of the map if Shanan hadn't been so lucky.

I guess Kaga figured 10%s across the board was reasonable enough.

Edited April 1 by Saint Rubenio

[ping]

35 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Bad Ping. Go back and do it optimally. What if you need that +3 strength against the final boss?

I have the feeling that Finn is going to do about as well against Julius with or without those three points, although my memories about the precise mechanics of that fight are vague.

Dangit now I must try and find a situation where one point of Str for Lester makes a difference ...

36 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Pffft. She's gonna wish she was Shannan's drinking water next?

...What a silly character that one was...

But you see, it doesn't count as avatar worship because Alear is humble about it.

38 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

For the record, and in case you needed more proof that I have never, ever led you astray - As I recall (someone yell at me if I'm wrong), Lene's personality is exactly the same as Sylvia. Had you married the latter, you would've had to endure that again. Instead you get actually kind of badass dancer. No need to thank me.

I hate to tell you that the only spot where a quick Ctrl+F through the chapter's script returns "Leylea" is the village where she can get the Barrier Blade. If the archives aren't incomplete, that means that she has precisely the same dialogue as Lene.

41 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

I guess Kaga figured 10%s across the board was reasonable enough.

We're talking about Shouzou "let's disallow 0%/100% hit rates" Kaga here, so that sounds realistic.

[Jotari]

1 hour ago, ping said:

FE4 Chapter 7: Beyond the Desert

Rivough --> Yied

  Reveal hidden contents

Small whoopsie: Overwrote the turn 1 save and then noticed that my entire troop movement was balls. Why the heck would I send everybody towards Yied when there's literally nothing left to kill once they arrive?

On the plus side, the redone arena run includes a full clear for Julia, with a little bit of brute-forcing. When Wolfen one-shots anyway, it makes no difference if Julia goes in with 1 HP. I don't even think she wasted too many Nosferatu charges with this - a lot of fights in which Wolfen just kills her right away, but I think she managed to win the second or third time that Wolfen missed his initial attack.

There isn't a lot of smart strategies for Seliph's group on the first turn. A Cav can barely enter the closest Dark Mage's range, so Lester does so to counter on enemy phase, but that's about it.

No, wait, I tell a lie - one convo to strengthen Dermott a little:

: "Say, Dermott. You have a sister in Leonster, don't you?"
: "Yes, sir. We were separated when we were very young. From what I've heard, she grew up with Sir Finn, a knight of Leonster."
: "Sir Finn, you say... You're eager to have the chance to see her again, aren't you?"
: "Yes, sir. I can hardly wait!"
: "Heh. You'll have to give this battle your all first, then! How about a quick swordplay lesson?"
: "Yes, sir! I'd appreciate that!"

[+1 Str/Skl/Def --> Dermott]

Short and sweet. I like the little parallel to Finn receiving a similar lecture from Quan back in gen 1.

For Shanan, first priority is, of course, to get Balmung.

: "Kyaaaaaaa! Stop! Get your hands off of me!"
: "Ugh... Look, I don't want to hurt you. Could you just give me that sword back?"
: "Wait... give it back? Is it yours?"
: "Yes, it is! It's my family's ancestral blade, Balmung. I'm the only person capable of using it. You've nothing at all to gain from keeping it."

"For some reason, no pawnbroker in all of Jugdral will ever buy it from you.

: "Wait, so how'd this thing end up in Yied, anyway?"
: "It belonged to my father, who died in Grannvale's war with Isaach. Someone must've stolen it from him after he died. I only recently learned that it was being kept at Yied, so I came to retrieve it."
: "Hang on, hang on, hang on! Could it be... Are you Isaach's Prince Shanan?!"
: "I am..."
: "Really? It's really, really you?! Wow! Oh my gosh, this is incredible!"
: "Er..."
: "No, really, I've heard all the stories about you! All of them! I've been a huge fan of yourse for so long, but I never thought I'd actually meet you! But you're here! You're really here talking to me right now! It's like all my dreams've come true!"
: "...Yeah, I think I get the idea. My sword, please."
: "Oh, right! Sorry. Here ya go."
: "Balmung... My holy sword... It's finally mine... Hm? Ahh! What is this power...?!"
: "Wooow! This is incredible!"

__

Incredible indeed. Balmung is Forseti's physical equivalent - with even more speed because it's two points lighter, although of course Forseti's 1-2 range and res-targeting are a bigger deal than that. Still, with this, Shanan suddenly only faces hit rates of 16% from the nearby enemies instead of 56% - which gives him a decent chance to solo this whole area, but not without risk, because three Dark Mages (who two-shot him) will follow him and Patty.

Finally, Leif and company head out to face the Brigands. Finn goes west to go after the two Brigands there, while Leaf and Nanna face the trio closer to Leonster.

Paragon worth! A polite Thank You to Lester for not proccing any skill on enemy phase, since I believe this is Arthur's only fight outside the arena in this segment.

____

The Dark Mages are spaced very conveniently here, giving you the opportunity to pick them off in small groups. Bonus points for these two for not having identical ranges because of road tiles, so Lester can do the same thing he did on turn 1.

And while everybody else moves southwest and murders Dark Mages, Seliph and Fee go straight west to help out Shanan (Fee) or arrive when everybody has done their thing and seize the abandoned castle (Seliph). Lana also follows then around, unfortunately with all the desert slowdown that magic units will be free of in future entries, to Physic people if necessary. Julia can handle healing duties for the main group on her own without problem.

Here, Shanan takes a risk, since the Dark Mages two-shot him quite easily...

...but he will dodge every incoming attack. He didn't manage that in the abandoned attempt - he didn't die, either, but this is nice because it allows him to keep stabbing (and one-shotting) Dark Mages on player phase. And because he really dodges all incoming attacks, he can even face the boss without prior healing, since the guy is precisely one point of Mag short of one-shotting base level Shanan.

__

Leif and Nanna manage to get a bit ahead of schedule killing the Brigands, with Nanna getting an Accost proc and Leif getting a crit, resulting in two dead Brigands instead of one. Since Brigands will always go after villages first, it's no problem that Leif ends the turn at low HP, either.

In the middle of the enemy phases, we get a cutscene in neutral Darna Castle:

: "Milord, we've received word that the Isaachian rebels are on the move."
: "Isaachian rebels? Ah, the ones led by that brat... Celice, was it? Or Serlis? Something like that. Heh... Interesting. Very interesting, indeed!"

Love the "Celice" meta joke.

: "The Empire's put a hefty price on that boy's head. Let's make sure we're the ones to rake in that bounty, shall we? Keep our border locked down for the time being. The best option is to let them run themselves ragged, leaving them wide open to our strike! Instruct Commander Jabarro to put his squad on standby. His services will be needed in short order!"

Interesting twist on how the map will play out, too. I don't know how that'll be exactly, but pincer manoeuvres tend to be where Fire Emblem is at its most interesting.

: "Hey, what's with all this noise? You're not about to go to war, are you?"
: "No, we've not entered such a dire state yet. For the time being, we are merely preparing for the arrival of the Isaachian rebel army."
: "Oh, that's good. I guess I'm a bit worried about how you're gonna have to go and fight, too, Ares..."
: "What sorry excuse for a mercenary would I be if I refused to join a battle Leylia? Never mind one which, rumor has it, will oppose Sigurd's son... Never would I deny a chance to personally slay the spawn of my father's mortal foe..."
: "Hee hee! You're still going on about that, are you? Oh, you dolt. I mean, think about it. Both your father and that Sigurd man were knights, weren't they? And isn't killing part of a knight's job? It's like my job. Sometimes, I've got to dance for foul, leering, men! I hate it, but it's part of the work. I have to just deal with it. We've all gotta do what we gotta do to get by in life. I dunno... I just don't think it's right to hate someone for doing their job."
: "Leylia... I understand. I'll have to think it over for a time, but I do understand..."

Gotta give props to Leylia for just plain laugh at Ares for going, "Grr, my honour demands!". I feel like her argument that you shouldn't hate somebody for doing their job falls apart pretty badly in edge cases, but I appreciate the sentiment.

(Leylia and Ares won't hit the field before this update ends, so the frame colours are entirely by vibe. Honestly, I just should've gone with Eldigan's portrait for Ares and see if anybody would've noticed)

Next turn, Seliph does a thing! Which is just some chip damage so that Fee can retain her HP, but still. A thing!

(Honestly, it's refreshing that, for once, we don't have the lord as the vanguard, plowing through enemy lines. But it feels kinda bad to have Seliph see literally zero combat except for this.)

____

I think the main group is mostly covered already: Push forward, kill small groups of Dark Mages. So, to focus on Leif for a second - because Nanna and Leaf got lucky with their proc skills, they can finish their initial task before the Knight squad becomes a threat to them.

And with Canter, Finn can rendezvous with them (well, close enough to it) once the Knights do arrive.

____

They aren't terribly strong, only three-shotting both Nanna and Leaf, although with the random chance that they might kill an enemy to allow an additional one to hit them, they do have to be a bit careful about their positioning.

__

They're fairly successful in grabbing kills without relying on Finn to bail them out all the time, but unfortunately, Finn does get the boss kill, gaining him not a whole lot of XP. Could've fixed it by reloading, but I guess I was a bit lazy.

Afterwards, another small group of enemies comes out of Alster Castle. I'm not sure how these reinforcements worked, and if their numbers are fixed, but I appreciate the additional XP for Leif.

Final little whoops for that group: Forgot to swap Nanna away from the Earth Sword for enemy phase. 4000 gold she won't be seeing again.

Back to Patty and Shanan, with one of the few rounds of combat that Patty sees. Unfortunately, she gets one-shot by the three castle guards around Ctuzof - otherwise, she could've attacked one of those to steal money and make sure that Shanan can one-shot to avoid a counterattack. But with Shanan being perfectly evasive today, this didn't turn out to be relevant anyway.

__

Next turn, the cavalry arrives, and introduces itself with a crit. Turns out, the kill that Seliph set up for Fee earlier brought the Brave Lance to 50 kills! #TotallyPlannedISwear

__

Pictured: Me not checking the numbers and being a bit silly. "I should let Ctuzof attack on enemy phase", I thought, "in case Shanan doesn't kill him". Shanan, of course, has 100 hit on Ctuzof, since Jormungand isn't exactly a light tome, and overkills him by 15 points.

It wouldn't have mattered if Ctuzof had actually attacked on enemy phase, but he's apparently still busy looking for his Fenrir tome. The result is a bit more delay because the two enemies circling around from below the castle are approaching. Very convenient that the Dark Mage has lower movement...

__

...because it allows Patty to grab another 1000 gold. And save two Balmung uses, so that's another 2000...

__

Luckily, I've been fairly quick before this little mishap, so Shanan can still run through Ctuzof before he can kill Patty and/or Fee with Fenrir.

: "You rebel worms... How dare you defile the sanctity of the Yied Shrine! Come! Embrace the darkness, as it entombs you forevermore!"
: "G-glory to... The Loptyr... Empire..."

Perfect. No risk of death.

Overall, because Shanan has no way to heal himself until Lana slowly waddles close enough to use Physic on him, I found this part of the fight too "swingy" to be actually good. He's either lucky and keeps dodging the incoming 16%s, or he gets hit once and has to choose between running away or constant fear of death. My initial impression is that this would've worked better if Genealogy had Elixirs or some other strong, but expensive self-healing (with a nearby church maybe being too cheap). Gambling high-value items, or a decent chunk of money, in order to kill Ctuzof would've been fine, but I feel like this would've been a really annoying part of the map if Shanan hadn't been so lucky.

__

More money! And XP for Patty. Also quite nice.

Eventually, Seliph will get around to seizing, but before that, two more coversations:

Moving along.

At this point, I expect that these enemies will turn hostile after Yied is seized, so I positione everybody at the edge of their ranges - unnecessarily, as we'll see later.

: "Shanan! I'm so glad to see you've made it unscathed."
: "Yeah, sorry to worry you like that. You went and took back Isaach behind my back, did you, Seliph? I can't thank you enough!"
: "No, we'd still be in Tirnanog if not for you. You inspired ups. You gave us your courage. If not for you, we could never have taken to the field!"
: "Heh, you're starting to put on a bit of muscle there, aren't you? You're finally starting to..."
: "Shanan...?"
: "Hm? ...Oh, it's nothing. Pay me no mind, Seliph."
: "Anyway, we're finally starting to challenge the Empire! Not bad, wouldn't you say?"
: "Heh, not bad at all, Seliph! I've waited so long for this day... We all have, really."
: "Thank you, Shanan!"

[+1 Skl --> Seliph]

I don't know if I just can't see the elephant in the room, but I really don't get where Shanan's mind was going with that "bit of muscle" comment. It almost has a bit of a "oh myyy, you got jacked!" vibe, but this is a gay ship I certainly don't condone.

And with that, Seliph seizes, on turn 12. So while I didn't take not on what turn Shanan had killed the boss, it evidently still was with a bit of time to spare.

: "So this is Yied Shrine... It looks so sparse..."
: "The remnants of the Loptyr Empire have hidden within the depths of the shrine for generations. They had no choice. Trying to build new lives on the surface would have led to their mass persecution, or even being burned at the stake. I suspect that at first they weren't really bad or unusual people, but before long, their life here twisted them into what we know them as today."
: "I can hardly believe it... It's as if they were all being tortured for the sins of their long-dead imperial ancestors... All my life, these people have been branded as the 'dark cult', or the 'devil's kin'... I can barely imagine their pain... Hold a moment. This scribble on the wall... Is that a child's penmanship? It's a prayer... And it begs for the return of the dark god... ...Was Loptyr the only hope these people had?"
: "Yeah... Consider this a lesson, Seliph. Good and evil can't be easily reduced to such simple, black-and-white ideals. If you must hate, hate the evil which lurks in us all, not the individual. Never forget this."

Another lecture that, to be perfectly honest, becomes questionable if you consider the edge cases of particularly vile acts. Like, to take a random example, murdering children.

Here, Kaga decides to be merciful again, opening a path from Yied directly south towards Melgen. There's still some desert in the way between Yied and our main group, so these guys (especially the three without the Leg Ring) still are a bit behind the rest, but it's definitely nice that they don't have to do the entire loop-around that Seliph had to take.

: "We'll let them proceed through toward Fort Melgen, let them wear themselves out some more, then strike their wide-open backs! Kehehe... It's almost too easy to be any fun! Wouldn't you say, Jabarro?"
: "Heh, just another hard day's work for you, sir... But hey, so long as you're payin' the bills, my men've got nothin' to complain 'bout. 'Bout time we had a good fight, anyhow."

And with that, the border guards retreat back closer to Darna. Now, on to our next target, Melgen:

: "Hmm... The rebels have already taken Yied? Liza, what do you make of the situation?"
: "I suspect their most likely aim is to come to the aid of the Leonster rebels. As it stands, Ishtore, your father is still preoccupied besieging them at Leonster. Should they reach Alster and strike while he's occupied, the results would be disastrous... It is imperative that we intercept them here and now. Our force will be more than enough."
: "Indeed... My lord father could use the aid. Liza, may I place you in command of my army?"
: "Certainly. Leave everything to me, milord."
: "I confess I'd rather keep you away from the eye of the storm, but there's nobody whom I could ever trust more than you. My apologies, Liza."
: "I... Rest assured, milord. You've nothing to worry about. Just... Please, Ishtore, be careful... Now, excuse me... Men, move out! Assume your positions!"

So it seems that that portrait is used for female generals that their lieges are romantically involved with? Although I don't know if Aida's previous relationship with Arvis is actually established in Genealogy.

Liza hits pretty hard, two-shotting literally everybody on our team (except Julia, but only as long as she can Nos-heal inbetween), but she's also very frail despite the Shield Ring. Dermott can even avoid a counterattack if he kills her with the Brave Sword.

She notably has four Authority stars, one more than her boss, even.

In all other regards, Ishtore is the more powerful foe, though. A fair bit more bulky, with slightly higher Mag, a more powerful tome for hand-to-hand combat, and of course, Bolting. Oh, and as a War Mage, he has access to the Adept skill, which gives him a chance to randomly kill anybody who he doesn't one-shot to begin with (which, right now, would be Leif, Patty, Nanna, and Lester, although he'd need to use Thoron against the latter two).

The solution, I suspect, is called Forseti. Arthur even has weapon triangle advantage over Ishtore, which I believe will reduce Ishtore's hit to zero if Seliph is nearby to counter his Authority stars. Without Lewyn!Arthur, Ishtore just seems like a real arsehole of a boss.

The Team:

	  Lv.	  HP Str Mag Skl Spd Lck Def Res  Funds  XP    Arn
Seliph	  7.47	  39  12   2  12  12  15  10   3  23744  +7    [1]
Leif	  4.35	  31  12   3  11  11  11   9   3  3778   +335  [1]
Shanan	  14.02*  41  19   0  23  23  10  13   4  5000   +202  [1]
Ulster	  11.26	  44  16   2  19  14   7  15   0  29034  +488  [*]

Larcei	  10.26	  44  13   1  20  18  14  11   0  32034  +524  [*]
Patty	  1.71	  30   6   2   6  10  11   4   2  0      +71   [1]
Johalvier 14.44	  44  16   0   9  16   5  14   3  17500  +188  [*]
Oifey	  18.98*  43  17   9  18  17   8  18   8  21500  +106  [*]

Finn	  23.88*  46  22   0  16  20  17  17   4  18015  +8    [1]
Dermott	  9.82	  39  19   0  14  11  13  13   1  24752  +312  [*]
Nanna	  5.34	  33  10   3   9   8   8   7   3  3932   +234  [1]
Lester	  9.12	  37  14   2   9  13  13  12   0  15863  +316  [*]

Fee	  6.16	  31  11   2  10  17   5   8  13  15402  +101  [1]
Arthur	  11.48	  43   0  16  18  20  16   3   6  26893  +520  [*]
Julia	  6.96	  29   0  16   8  14   7   4  18  23300  +376  [*]
Lana	  7.75	  35   3  11  11  12  12   5   7  683    +175  --

• It's not like Finn didn't do his fair share of work, he's just that overleveled.
• Johalvier's Lv.Xp is really taunting me to restart the game.
• As you can see, Patty gave Seliph all of her hard-earned cash. Since he inherited the Renewal Band from Sigurd, he can now sell that to get the Paragon Band, once Arthur has an opportunity to sell it.

Answers!

  Reveal hidden contents

 

 

Honestly, Blume is the only one that really looks non-recruitable here. Ishtore doesn't really look any more despicable than, say, Shinon actually is.

 

To be honest, Ishtore looks even more garbage, since it's more difficult to avoid getting screwed by Adept than it is to avoid getting counter-killed because of a Pavise proc.

Well, Rickard/Julian doesn't seem particularly accidental, either.

I did not! To be honest, the speed-up button sees a lot of use when I'm arenaing, but I'll pay attention next time.

Hey now, the +3 Str village is still with us, in the form of 0.6 Str on Lester and 0.3 Str on... Lana.

Evil fridging be like:

Since Quan and Sigurd (and Eldigan) are portrayed as going way back, I always assumed that Ethlyn and Quan met each other via Sigurd. Especially because Ethlyn's portrait looks younger than Sigurd's, too, although I'm not sure if the game explicitly established who was the older sibling.

Thus far, middle-aged Aideen only exists in Lana and Dermott's ch.6 conversation. So unless that will change, she indeed doesn't exist if those two don't, either.

I do agree that Aideen (alongside Deirdre) seems like the least fight-like character of the first generation. Does make sense, with her being the only staff-only character until she promotes.

Welp, I guess that T776's entire cast was wiped out in the failed mission Finn and Leif talk about at the start of the chapter.

 

Even without Forseti Arthur, Shannan makes pretty short work of Ishtore....and Bloom...and Ishtar... yeah, Shannan is OP for a reason, there are some really obnoxious bosses coming up that he is the designated counter for in case you ugenicsed wrong.

53 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

For the record, and in case you needed more proof that I have never, ever led you astray - As I recall (someone yell at me if I'm wrong), Lene's personality is exactly the same as Sylvia. Had you married the latter, you would've had to endure that again. Instead you get actually kind of badass dancer. No need to thank me.

Ha. Pretending like any of the Gen 2 cast have actual personalities.

[Saint Rubenio]

12 minutes ago, ping said:

But you see, it doesn't count as avatar worship because Alear is humble about it.

I mean, I do like how awkward and embarrassed Alear is about everyone worshipping the floor they walk on, but... Yeah, better to just not have the thing at all, honestly.

12 minutes ago, ping said:

I hate to tell you that the only spot where a quick Ctrl+F through the chapter's script returns "Leylea" is the village where she can get the Barrier Blade. If the archives aren't incomplete, that means that she has precisely the same dialogue as Lene.

Oh.

...Well, at least she has a less cringe design. So there's that.

In my own defense, this is the one pair of subs I didn't get, so I kind of just assumed, since she looks less childish...

12 minutes ago, ping said:

We're talking about Shouzou "let's disallow 0%/100% hit rates" Kaga here, so that sounds realistic.

lol

Just now, Jotari said:

Ha. Pretending like any of the Gen 2 cast have actual personalities.

HEY

Hannibal has a personality. It's called beard. How dare you imply otherwise.

Edited April 1 by Saint Rubenio

[BrightBow]

2 hours ago, ping said:

: "Really? It's really, really you?! Wow! Oh my gosh, this is incredible!"
: "Er..."
: "No, really, I've heard all the stories about you! All of them! I've been a huge fan of yourse for so long, but I never thought I'd actually meet you! But you're here! You're really here talking to me right now! It's like all my dreams've come true!"
: "...Yeah, I think I get the idea. My sword, please."

Somehow I get the feeling that I am not missing out by not playing Engage.

Frankly, even as a kid I found Lyn's obsession with the self-insert to be just painful to endure. And now that mr. Watanabe Generico is literally a deity, IS doesn't even need to pretend that everyone is worshipping him because of actual merit.
 

2 hours ago, ping said:

So it seems that that portrait is used for female generals that their lieges are romantically involved with? Although I don't know if Aida's previous relationship with Arvis is actually established in Genealogy.

It's not.
 

2 hours ago, ping said:

In all other regards, Ishtore is the more powerful foe, though. A fair bit more bulky, with slightly higher Mag, a more powerful tome for hand-to-hand combat, and of course, Bolting. Oh, and as a War Mage, he has access to the Adept skill, which gives him a chance to randomly kill anybody who he doesn't one-shot to begin with (which, right now, would be Leif, Patty, Nanna, and Lester, although he'd need to use Thoron against the latter two).

Huh, I suppose he could use Continue. Maybe they figured the chance of that happening is neglectable, given the tome's massive weight. Unless they actually did code something in to prevent Continue from triggering for those weapons.
 

1 hour ago, Saint Rubenio said:

For the record, and in case you needed more proof that I have never, ever led you astray - As I recall (someone yell at me if I'm wrong), Lene's personality is exactly the same as Sylvia. Had you married the latter, you would've had to endure that again. Instead you get actually kind of badass dancer. No need to thank me.

Uh, no it isn't. Lene's and Leylea share the same dialog, barring their exclusive scenes.

Edited April 1 by BrightBow

[Saint Rubenio]

12 minutes ago, BrightBow said:

Uh, no it isn't. Lene's and Leylea share the same dialog, barring their exclusive scenes.

Welp.

My bad for being charitable with gen 2, I guess.

[Interdimensional Observer]

2 hours ago, ping said:

I don't know if I just can't see the elephant in the room, but I really don't get where Shanan's mind was going with that "bit of muscle" comment. It almost has a bit of a "oh myyy, you got jacked!" vibe, but this is a gay ship I certainly don't condone.

Seliph does later refer to Shannan as being like a big brother. Presumably it's mutual- Shannan is just amused seeing his baby bro having grown up and now becoming a man (although Seliph is probably the least traditionally masculine of male lords visually and to think people mocked Brawl!Marth). And I'm sure that in their rearing of the six kids, that Shannan played up his big brotherliness when Dad Oifey couldn't convince the children to do something, a perfectly legitimate parenting tactic.

2 hours ago, ping said:

In all other regards, Ishtore is the more powerful foe, though. A fair bit more bulky, with slightly higher Mag, a more powerful tome for hand-to-hand combat, and of course, Bolting. Oh, and as a War Mage, he has access to the Adept skill, which gives him a chance to randomly kill anybody who he doesn't one-shot to begin with (which, right now, would be Leif, Patty, Nanna, and Lester, although he'd need to use Thoron against the latter two).

The solution, I suspect, is called Forseti. Arthur even has weapon triangle advantage over Ishtore, which I believe will reduce Ishtore's hit to zero if Seliph is nearby to counter his Authority stars. Without Lewyn!Arthur, Ishtore just seems like a real arsehole of a boss.

I think I had Seliph go alone into Ishtore's Bolting range, with the Wind Sword and other stuff. I recall getting stuck on an Adept RN for a few reloads.

[BrightBow]

1 minute ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Welp.

My bad for being charitable with gen 2, I guess.

Assuming Lene would be just as much of a tool as her mother is not being charitable with gen 2.

[Saint Rubenio]

14 minutes ago, BrightBow said:

Assuming Lene would be just as much of a tool as her mother is not being charitable with gen 2.

I mean, Lene's the one I saw. She's one of the only children I actually got. I was thinking Laylea wouldn't be the same, going by the far less... questionable design alone.

[ping]

3 hours ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Oh.

...Well, at least she has a less cringe design. So there's that.

In my own defense, this is the one pair of subs I didn't get, so I kind of just assumed, since she looks less childish...

I'll just remember this incident if I ever have to wonder if Ruben is going to lead me astray

Leylia's portrait does look, what, 6+ years older than Sylvia and Lene's (~20 years old instead of 14), which in itself is a significant point in her favour.

3 hours ago, BrightBow said:

Somehow I get the feeling that I am not missing out by not playing Engage.

Frankly, even as a kid I found Lyn's obsession with the self-insert to be just painful to endure. And now that mr. Watanabe Generico is literally a deity, IS doesn't even need to pretend that everyone is worshipping him because of actual merit.

To my memory, the two little kids would, in a vacuum, be a funny parody of the usual avatar worship in the newest games of the series (and BlaBla), because they're so over-the-top, but that rings hollow when other characters still do the same routine entirely straight-faced. As far as I watched Engage's story (I followed Mekkah's initial LP, but my interest fizzled out), I found that it had some good ideas and scenes, but was overall a lot of anime with not that much substance.

3 hours ago, BrightBow said:

Huh, I suppose he could use Continue. Maybe they figured the chance of that happening is neglectable, given the tome's massive weight. Unless they actually did code something in to prevent Continue from triggering for those weapons.

It's honestly bad enough with Thoron, which Ishtore has a ~1/3 chance of triggering Adept with. Although, thinking about it, you do have a few tools to deal with it - Shanan; (as long as Ayra got married) Nihil on the Sword Twins. Julia with Silence... if you don't leave it with Deirdre like an idiot, go through the arena with Julia and have Patty give her a bunch of cash so that she can buy it from Lana.

Still, I don't find that it's good game design to give Adept, Crit, or Accost to enemies that already two-shot basically (if not literally) every unit you have.

3 hours ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

Seliph does later refer to Shannan as being like a big brother. Presumably it's mutual- Shannan is just amused seeing his baby bro having grown up and now becoming a man (although Seliph is probably the least traditionally masculine of male lords visually and to think people mocked Brawl!Marth). And I'm sure that in their rearing of the six kids, that Shannan played up his big brotherliness when Dad Oifey couldn't convince the children to do something, a perfectly legitimate parenting tactic.

That's fair. I think Shanan's awkward follow-up is what makes that dialogue read a bit odd to me.

 

[Saint Rubenio]

50 minutes ago, ping said:

I'll just remember this incident if I ever have to wonder if Ruben is going to lead me astray

No that wasn't the point of this exercise, stop, stop, believe in meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

In all seriousness though. Come to think of it, I've been so focused on the Lene/Laylea thing that it didn't even register with me that this is how it is for all character/sub pairs, isn't it? I didn't even know that. I had always just foolishly assumed they'd write them different lines because, you know, different characters.

...Really being too charitable on gen 2 there, wasn't I...

5 hours ago, Jotari said:

Ha. Pretending like any of the Gen 2 cast have actual personalities.

Yeah, all in all, Jotari's probably got the right of it.

I stand by my point about Hannibal though

50 minutes ago, ping said:

Leylia's portrait does look, what, 6+ years older than Sylvia and Lene's (~20 years old instead of 14), which in itself is a significant point in her favour.

Yeah, exactly. Lene manages to look even more juvenile than Sylvia somehow. Blegh.

[ping]

23 minutes ago, Saint Rubenio said:

In all seriousness though. Come to think of it, I've been so focused on the Lene/Laylea thing that it didn't even register with me that this is how it is for all character/sub pairs, isn't it? I didn't even know that. I had always just foolishly assumed they'd write them different lines because, you know, different characters.

Not quite all dialogue. It's common enough that kids and subs have the same dialogue that the wiki.org has that as the default ("All second-generation characters and their substitutes have identical dialogue except where noted. Second-generation children are used, except where substitutes have unique dialogue."), but there's stuff like Fee mentioning to Seliph that her mother was on Team Sigurd, which Hermine obviously can't. And of course, some of the substitutes have some exclusive convos, like Roger-Roger stepping on Creidne's, but not Larcei's toes, or Tristan and Dalvin having a little crisis together (TL;DR: "Oh my god we both suck so much") in this chapter if both of them are below Lv.10.

[CelestialContrail]

7 hours ago, ping said:

I don't know if I just can't see the elephant in the room, but I really don't get where Shanan's mind was going with that "bit of muscle" comment. It almost has a bit of a "oh myyy, you got jacked!" vibe, but this is a gay ship I certainly don't condone.

My interpretation of that part of their exchange is that now that Seliph is getting older and a bit more built, he's starting to resemble Sigurd more and that's what Shannan started to comment on before thinking better of it.

[Saint Rubenio]

7 minutes ago, ping said:

It's common enough that kids and subs have the same dialogue that the wiki.org has that as the default ("All second-generation characters and their substitutes have identical dialogue except where noted. Second-generation children are used, except where substitutes have unique dialogue."), but there's stuff

Yeah, I forgot to clarify but I know there's some stuff. It's just... well, that there's enough for that note to be possible is just kind of lazy.

5 minutes ago, ping said:

or Tristan and Dalvin having a little crisis together (TL;DR: "Oh my god we both suck so much") in this chapter if both of them are below Lv.10.

Ahahaha! Oh yeah, I remember that one. They were right to be concerned, too, because the both of them were by far my worst units. Dalvin ended up dying in the final chapter to keep an absolute behemoth of a boss I didn't want to confront at all from capturing my first castle, and Tristan was so lame I made a disparging edit of his final stats. I don't know where that one went.

[ping]

27 minutes ago, CelestialContrail said:

My interpretation of that part of their exchange is that now that Seliph is getting older and a bit more built, he's starting to resemble Sigurd more and that's what Shannan started to comment on before thinking better of it.

Oh, that makes sense. Telling a 16yo that he's really grown over the last however long Shanan has been awol doesn't need to be "nevermind"ed away, but telling somebody that they're just like their parent is something I avoid with my younger relatives.

[BrightBow]

29 minutes ago, ping said:

Oh, that makes sense. Telling a 16yo that he's really grown over the last however long Shanan has been awol doesn't need to be "nevermind"ed away, but telling somebody that they're just like their parent is something I avoid with my younger relatives.

He would be at least 18, what with having been born by the time of chapter 3 and the 17 year time skip.

[Shanty Pete's 1st Mate]

12 hours ago, ping said:

Since Quan and Sigurd (and Eldigan) are portrayed as going way back, I always assumed that Ethlyn and Quan met each other via Sigurd. Especially because Ethlyn's portrait looks younger than Sigurd's, too, although I'm not sure if the game explicitly established who was the older sibling.

If I recall, Kaga (or someone else working on FE4) had envisioned that Sigurd, Eldigan, and Quan all attended an academy together. This would later provide inspiration for the central conceit of Three Houses. That said, I don't know if they were intended to have met there, or if they were friends beforehand. Perhaps Quan would've met Sigurd (and Ethlyn) if King Calf and Lord Byron ever had a summit or conference together.

And yeah, I do believe that Ethlyn is the younger of the two siblings, although I'm not sure if this is ever stated within the game itself. In any case, it makes her marriage to Quan feel... a little bit weird? Like, was she getting wedded off at age 16 or something? Not like that's unheard of for ersatz Medieval Europe, but still.

12 hours ago, ping said:

: "Sir Finn, you say... You're eager to have the chance to see her again, aren't you?"

...This reminded me that we really were due a Finn-Oifey conversation. They're barely apart in age, and probably are the closest to Sigurd, Quan, and Ethlyn, out of anyone still surviving.

12 hours ago, ping said:

And while everybody else moves southwest and murders Dark Mages, Seliph and Fee go straight west to help out Shanan (Fee) or arrive when everybody has done their thing and seize the abandoned castle (Seliph). Lana also follows then around, unfortunately with all the desert slowdown that magic units will be free of in future entries, to Physic people if necessary. Julia can handle healing duties for the main group on her own without problem.

It's a right shame. Infantry Mages and Clerics already tend to have lower movement than their physical counterparts, so letting them move readily over sand would make up for it a bit. And it's not like it'd be overpowered - it'd only make a difference in a portion of two chapters.

10 hours ago, Jotari said:

Even without Forseti Arthur, Shannan makes pretty short work of Ishtore....and Bloom...and Ishtar... yeah, Shannan is OP for a reason, there are some really obnoxious bosses coming up that he is the designated counter for in case you ugenicsed wrong.

Uh, what? Blume with Mjolnir one-shots Shannan. Same with Ishtar. Sure, you can send him against them, and hope he Adepts, Astras, or Dodges, but it's not exactly guaranteed. Especially in light of their high Hit rates (+20 skill and Authority). He's not the answer for them that, say, Demon-sword McCavalier is.

12 hours ago, ping said:

: "Leylia... I understand. I'll have to think it over for a time, but I do understand..."

Wait, THAT's how Project Naga spells the substitute Dancer's name? What a tragedeigh...

12 hours ago, ping said:

Next turn, the cavalry arrives, and introduces itself with a crit. Turns out, the kill that Seliph set up for Fee earlier brought the Brave Lance to 50 kills! #TotallyPlannedISwear

Ooh, that's gonna be one of the best weapons in the game. Anyone with B-Lances will have a near-instant "win" ticket at the Arena. ...With enough patience, at least.

12 hours ago, ping said:

Jormungand isn't exactly a light tome

Nope, it's a Dark tome.

12 hours ago, ping said:

Overall, because Shanan has no way to heal himself until Lana slowly waddles close enough to use Physic on him, I found this part of the fight too "swingy" to be actually good. He's either lucky and keeps dodging the incoming 16%s, or he gets hit once and has to choose between running away or constant fear of death. My initial impression is that this would've worked better if Genealogy had Elixirs or some other strong, but expensive self-healing (with a nearby church maybe being too cheap). Gambling high-value items, or a decent chunk of money, in order to kill Ctuzof would've been fine, but I feel like this would've been a really annoying part of the map if Shanan hadn't been so lucky.

Truthfully, I actually like the idea of a Church... in the middle of the desert... not far from the Yied Shrine. A shining endorsement of religious toleration and pluralism.

And thinking on it, the utter lack of healing items probably makes Genealogy one of the games where healing staves, in particular, are relatively more important. As easy as the Prologue is, I shudder to think of doing it without Ethlyn.

12 hours ago, ping said:

: "Heh, not bad at all, Seliph! I've waited so long for this day... We all have, really."
: "Thank you, Shanan!"

Totally unrelated to what you were saying, but I just noticed that these two have practically the same haircut. Maybe Shannan has been the one cutting Seliph's hair? Alternatively, Oifey's been on haircut duty, but he only knows one way of styling it.

12 hours ago, ping said:

She notably has four Authority stars, one more than her boss, even.

The "Authority" rating tends to confuse me, honestly. You'd imagine that the leader of a country would have higher "Authority" than any of their underlings. But then again, Eldigan had 5 stars, whereas Chagall had... fewer than that. In this case, I think that the previous translation - "Leadership" - might actually be a better one. An underling can actually have leadership skills superior to their Lord, even if that doesn't mean they have the same degree of authority.

12 hours ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Pffft. She's gonna wish she was Shannan's drinking water next?

Patty sets up a side hustle, selling "Sword Prince Bath Water" through the black market.

12 hours ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Also interesting is how this guy is a recolor of Actually Interesting And Nuanced Bossman Clement. And he's, uh... let's just say, one of the least nuanced bossmen in the game. Funny how that works.

I could forgive all that, if they didn't make him another boring general. He's not wearing armor, but a robe. Making him a Bishop, or maybe a High Priest, would be much more suitable, in my opinion. Especially if he's supposed to be in charge of the "holy city of Darna".

11 hours ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Hannibal has a personality. It's called beard. How dare you imply otherwise.

Speaking of "beard", something looks off... Hm...

...Oh, that's it! You've got a tan now! Had a nice vacation, I take it?

7 hours ago, ping said:

Still, I don't find that it's good game design to give Adept, Crit, or Accost to enemies that already two-shot basically (if not literally) every unit you have.

I think it'd be fine... IF there were a way to mitigate those skills. Something like "Adept always activates, but only on the first hit, and only if the attacker's AS is at least equal to that of the target." That way, your speedier units would be immune to Ishtore Adepting on Thoron, while only the slowest would be at risk of a Bolting Adept. Also, the obvious "let Luck function as Crit Avoid". At the very least, Nihil nullifies that one. Also also, as for Accost... maybe just get rid of it? It's one of those "hurts as often as it helps" skills, that even in the best case, reduces a unit's reliability. And it has no effect in the Arena, which is essentially "infinite Accost".

5 hours ago, ping said:

or Tristan and Dalvin having a little crisis together (TL;DR: "Oh my god we both suck so much") in this chapter if both of them are below Lv.10.

That's a pretty funny one, but in a weird way, it almost makes them worse. Like, I feel like I need to "hold back" on using them in the earlygame, rather than letting them fight when they may be at their most useful. Before the enemy power levels ramp up and they sorta-kinda fall behind.

11 hours ago, Jotari said:

Ha. Pretending like any of the Gen 2 cast have actual personalities.

Hey now, Demonsword McCavalier has a personality! "What if Navarre... had a horse?"

[Jotari]

1 hour ago, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

Uh, what? Blume with Mjolnir one-shots Shannan. Same with Ishtar. Sure, you can send him against them, and hope he Adepts, Astras, or Dodges, but it's not exactly guaranteed. Especially in light of their high Hit rates (+20 skill and Authority). He's not the answer for them that, say, Demon-sword McCavalier is.

 

I might be over selling Shannan a bit there, Mjolnir's crazy accuracy is a pretty good counter to Shannan as a hardboss hard counter, but he can still be one of your best tools against them and a secure, if not guaranteed, method of taking them out, especially if you can get another character to survive Ishtar's counter attack to deal chip damage to her (shame Asaello doesn't have that longbow you suggested) as, looking at the stats, Shannan is only 4 might short of one shotting Ishtar. I guess I should say that it's Ares and Shannan together that are your solution to the powerful enemies the game throws at you.

8 hours ago, Saint Rubenio said:

In all seriousness though. Come to think of it, I've been so focused on the Lene/Laylea thing that it didn't even register with me that this is how it is for all character/sub pairs, isn't it? I didn't even know that. I had always just foolishly assumed they'd write them different lines because, you know, different characters.

Hence why I made that one thread.

Edited April 2 by Jotari

[Shanty Pete's 1st Mate]

40 minutes ago, Jotari said:

might be over selling Shannan a bit there, Mjolnir's crazy accuracy is a pretty good counter to Shannan as a hardboss hard counter, but he can still be one of your best tools against them and a secure, if not guaranteed, method of taking them out, especially if you can get another character to survive Ishtar's counter attack to deal chip damage to her (shame Asaello doesn't have that longbow you suggested) as, looking at the stats, Shannan is only 4 might short of one shotting Ishtar. I guess I should say that it's Ares and Shannan together that are your solution to the powerful enemies the game throws at you.

Oh yeah, I would agree with the notion that Shannan is a great candidate for landing the finishing blow on these bosses. Moreso Ishtar, as in the case of Bloom, Pavise can just ruin your day. ...But Ishtar has Vantage, so-

Hm... if he's really just 4 Strength short of a one-shot, then maybe Power Ring Shannan is the answer? Alternatively, with 1 Strength level, he can beat her with the Brave Sword. But Balmung's effective 110 Hit rate is better than Brave Sword's 100 (which needs to land twice), especially against a dodgy enemy such as Ishtar.

[BrightBow]

Considering that FE3 didn't have the ability to skip dialog yet, I wonder if maybe the dialog in this game is so brief because the devs themselves were not sure if this was a feature that they would be able to implement. Not to mention what the exact limits of saving would be.

I mean, if this was like FE3 and you couldn't skip dialog and maybe couldn't even save between castles... novel-length dialog in the style of Tear Ring Saga might have been not exactly ideal if you end up having to reload once or twice.

Mid-chapter dialog was also pretty much a non-factor in FE3. But it's most certainly a thing here.

[Saint Rubenio]

10 hours ago, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

This would later provide inspiration for the central conceit of Three Houses.

The game where two of the characters are childhood friends, and the other is just some rando they barely know that has no story relevance whatsoever. Genius!

10 hours ago, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

Totally unrelated to what you were saying, but I just noticed that these two have practically the same haircut. Maybe Shannan has been the one cutting Seliph's hair? Alternatively, Oifey's been on haircut duty, but he only knows one way of styling it.

Them and half the cast besides. It's just a really popular style in Jugdral.

10 hours ago, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

I could forgive all that, if they didn't make him another boring general. He's not wearing armor, but a robe. Making him a Bishop, or maybe a High Priest, would be much more suitable, in my opinion. Especially if he's supposed to be in charge of the "holy city of Darna".

Oh, he was an armor? I forgot that.

10 hours ago, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

Speaking of "beard", something looks off... Hm...

...Oh, that's it! You've got a tan now! Had a nice vacation, I take it?

I don't know what you're talking about.

[ping]

FE4 Chapter 7: Beyond the Desert

Yied --> Melgen

Spoiler

Seizing Yied unlocks a second instance of fangirl Patty:

: "Kyaaaaa! You're Lord Seliph! Oh my gosh, oh my gosh, oh my gosh!"
: "...Oh? And who would you be, miss?"
: "I'm Patty, the one true love of Prince Shanan!"
: "You're Shanan's...? Er, somehow, I doubt that."
: "Whoops... Okay, you caught me! I'm actually a thief! Well, I used to be. I've had enough of all that now. Now, I want to pitch in with your army instead!"
: "Er... You aren't serious, are you? Military life is dangerous. There's no place for your ilk here."
: "Oh, you sound so sure! You barely have a coin to your name, but if you're gonna win this war, then nothing's more important than money. But with me around, you're not gonna have to worry about money ever again!"
: "I've no use for money tainted by theft."

Note to the reader: This conversation happens right after Patty dropped around 13000 gold on Seliph.

: "...You really have no idea, do you, sir? For every last coin carried by an Imperial soldier, there's a poor villager who they took it from. You can't look at all this and say that it's wrong for us to take that gold back! The people of this land've already lost so much... I... I just want to give something back..."
: "I see... Er, my sincerest apologies, Patty."
: "Sniff..."
: "Say, Patty... I'd like you to come with us."
: "Huh? Really? D'you really mean that?!"
: "But of course."
: "Th-thank you, sir! I promise I'll work as hard as I can for you! Oh, that reminds me! Here, take this sword. It's a little present, to commemorate us getting to know each other!"
: "Wow... This is a lovely blade!"
: "It's one of those rare brave swords. And it's aaaaall yours, sir!"

I probably don't need to reiterate that this isn't exactly my favourite character archetype. A few bonus points, I suppose, for cutting her losses and not insist that Shanan is totally into her.

Anyway - I wasn't aware that there's a second Brave Sword available, and this early, too. I don't think I'll keep it on Seliph, though. He has about 70 kills on his Silver Sword at this point, and while the Brave Sword is much more reliable in dishing out that extra damage, there's a few other characters that wouldn't mind grabbing it. Leaf, who is using the inaccurate Silver Blade as his hard-hitting option, or Nanna, who doesn't have any hard-hitting melee sword at all right now, or even Patty after she promotes (and this second Brave Sword honestly is a pretty good argument for Holyn!Patty).

One turn after seizing Yied, we get another cutscene in Darna:

: "Ohohohoho! Leylia, was it? That was quite the dance there! Come hither. I have a little reward for you..."
: "Eww, how rude! You get off your butt and come over here if you've got something to give me!"
: "Hohoho! As cute as that fiery heart is, mouthing off at me so violently? I can't say I care so much for that. Bring her to me!"
: "W-what d'you think you're doing?! Let go! Let! Me! Go! You ANIMALS!"

: "What? And who exactly are you? How dare you, a common sellsword, turn your blade on your employer!"
: "Nobody shall lay a hand on her, lest you face severe consequences. Are we clear?"
: "Gah... What is this sorry little pantomime? Seize him! End his little life!"
: "You all see my sword, correct? I trust I need not introduce the demon blade. Beware, for Mysteltainn craves the blood of men! Who dares to come forth and slake its thirst?"
: "M-Mystletainn?! That's the one and only demon blade? Th-then you... It can't be..."
: "Oh, but it can. It is indeed I: Ares, the Black Knight."
: "M-my deepest apologies, sir! I was merely jesting about! Look, I'll never lay hands on the little darling ever again! You forgive me, right? Right?"
: "..:Very well. Leylia, are you unharmed?"
: "Yeah... Thank you, Ares..."

Not everything about that scene is bad. It made me think of the music video for Everlong, so that's what I'm listening to right now.

Spoiler

 

Liza's squad is lazy, which makes this next part of the map an exercise in walking around. Bit annoying, but since it's only four characters (Seliph, Patty, Shanan, Lana) that have to cross the desert, it's not as bad as it could be.

Meanwhile, Fee takes a little detour to save the village to the west. She's not going to collect it, since I want somebody else to grab the Shield Ring from it with somebody else (actually, can you even stack multiple rings of the same type?), and unfortunately, when restarting the chapter last time, I forgot to have her grab the Thief Sword from her convoy - although that one is going to have an unintended benefit down the line. Probably. The pieces will be on the map at the end of the update, but they won't have interacted yet.

Eventually, I pull Liza's little army. Could've done a more impactful first contact, so to speak, if I had waited another turn...

__

...but nobody dies, and I just do a bit of a fighting retreat with Arthur getting a little bit of action.

Note how one Knight and one Mage decide to move up on the left side of the cliff - quite nice, since it reduces the number of enemies I actually need to fight.

With that, the enemies are out of Ishtore's Bolting range, so clean-up time it is:

____

...well, with a bit of RNG reshuffling to make sure that Seliph can crit-kill a Knight, and Julia hits two Nosferatus (at 80 hit).

: "So you're the rebel army... This is where your insurrection ends! So long as I, General Liza, draw breath, you shall never reach Melgen!"

: "Ahhh... Ish... tore..."

Well, as I said last update - Liza is not particularly tanky.

__

Enemy: cleared. Basically. On their own, the Ballistae don't really threaten to kill anybody, with Julia being out of range for the one further right.

__

Seliph and Dermott kill them, getting ready to kill two of Ishtore's guards. These guards become aggressive if Ishtore dies before they do (and note Arthur's position), so I'd rather remove at least two of them on the same turn Ishtore dies.

(small detail: Lester is still injured from killing the Mage that went west of the cliff, so he keeps behind a bit so that Ishtore can't target him)

: "You... You vermin! How dare you slaughter Liza like that! You'll have no mercy!"

It's a neat detail that Ishtore's battle (and death) quote change depending on whether or not you killed Liza before facing him. He's obviously not much of a character, given how little time he has spent on-screen, but he seems to work decently well for what he's supposed to do.

Next turn, Forseti. Adept. Dead Ishtore.

: "Liza... I..."

('nother small detail: Seliph cantered back a few tiles to provide Arthur with his valued Leadership. There's always something funny about a boss having zero hit against your dude)

And that's Melgen conquered.

I liked the first part of this chapter, with the caveat that Patty and Shanan's fight against Yied's troops is very RNG-variant. This second part is fairly boring in comparison - only this one fight you have to do (well, Leaf's group had some very minor clean-up left to do), and no real incentive to move fast. No, I don't count the one Brigand - he's an incentive to send A Guy (or Gal) over to kill him, but no obstacles between your army and him.

: "I still doubt that Prince Ishtore or his general were truly wicked people... Must we kill still more like them?"
: "That may be so, but don't forget they still actively served the will of a brutal tyrant. As far as our cause is concerned, there is no doubt. They were the enemy. This is war, Seliph. There's more to it than only fighting the thoroughly evil, or those whom we hate."
: "I suppose so..."
: "Heh! It's okay, Seliph. You're a good man, through and through. You could just stand to worry a bit less. Now then! We've got our goal to focus on: coming to the rescue over in Leonster."
: "Indeed. Let's move in on Leonster. Everything shall begin there!"

So I know that Ishtore is going to come up again, which could change my opinion on him to the better or worse, but I think that in this short segment, he... works. Lewyn's comment that, no matter how affable Ishtore may have come across, he's still fighting for an utterly despicable cause, is a nice change of pace from the usual Camüh sob story, that war is so cruel because it forces good people to kill each other.

After seizing, Shanan has finally caught up enough that Larcei can have a little talk:

: "Prince Shanan! Whew... Glad to see you're still in one piece!"
: "Oh, Larcei! Sorry I wasn't around to see all this begin. From what I've heard, you've all had quite the tough time so far."
: "Don't worry about it. The important part is that you're safe. I, er..."
: "How's your sword arm doing? Any stronger?"
: "Yeah, but still far below your prowess, sir."
: "How about a quick lesson to patch that up? See, raw power isn't quite enough here. Try putting a bit more spirit into it... and swing!"
: "Nnn-yah! Like this, sir?"

[+2 Str --> Larcei; 100 love points]

During all this, I have been moving Leif and company towards Melgen, too. Leif and Nanna continuously adjacent, because that seems like a fairly obvious pairing to shoot for.

After seizing, more cutscenes - and a new recruit:

: "What? Melgen's fallen already?! Blast! We were too slow! Oh, well. We can still ambush them while they regroup. Men, this is our chance! Jabarro, send in your brigade! Hit them hard while their backs are turned! Leave no survivors!"
: "At once, sir!"

: "D'you really have to go, Ares? Please don't leave... Please!"
: "I've little choice in the matter. It was Jabarro who found me as a lost infant, and raised me all these years. I owe him dearly..."
: "Don't you get it? He's just using your loyalty to treat you like a weapon! I...I hate him so much!"
: "Leylia... No, that isn't..."
: "Okay, fine! Whatever! Go with him, if you love him so much! It's your life to waste, after all! But you can just go forget we ever met!"
: "Leylia..."

__

*sigh*

Also *sigh*, but for the very different reason that I'm going to have to remember which witch is which.

: "I want you to show these rebel pigs just what it is that the Empire can do!"
: "Yes, milord. Leave it to us. We will never let you down, milord. The rebels shall be destroyed quickly, cleanly, efficiently and utterly. Excuse us, milord."
: "Hmm! Everything depends on you.

: "Hmph... One would think I could expect more gratitude from someone I raised out of the goodness of my heart after their mother died. Or have you forgotten my many kindnesses?"
: "No, uncle..."
: "Good. Now, get moving. Remember, these rebels are responsible for murdering my dear son, Ishtore, and his true love, Liza! Avenging them is your mission, Tinni!"

__

: "Fotla. Eriu. I trust you already understand. We must work in absolute, perfect unison. We will be the ones to claim Seliph's head as a trophy this day. We mustn't be beaten by Tinni's unit."
: "I don't understand... All the villagers talk of the rebels as if they're liberating heroes... But why... Why did they kill Ishtore? I... I don't know what to do anymore... Oh... Mother... What would you do..."

Taillte helped killing her father. ...honestly, not the worst thing Tinni could do in this particular timeline.

At the start of the player phase, one last cutscene, finally delivering that new recruit (it's not Tinni, yet):

: "There you are, girlie! How dare you embarrass me like that the other day. It's about time I thanked you properly."
: "Oh? And what exactly're you gonna do about it? I see right through you! The moment Ares is nowhere in sight, you think it's okay to act all tough again, you vile louse! Don't even think about coming any closer. I don't need Ares around to stop you!"
: "Of all the nerve... You little wench! Throw her in the dungeon! You'll have plenty of time to think about what you've done there!"
: "Ahh! No... Ares..."

♪♫Come down, and waste away with me♪♫
♪♫Down with me♪♫
♪♫Slow how you wanted it to be♪♫
♪♫I'm over my head, out of her head she sang♪♫

: "Y'know, I don't get you, Ares. Why the hell'd you go and get yourself all cosied up with a broad like that? Oh well, I guess. It's all in the past. You're gonna forget 'er sooner or later."
: "I beg your pardon? What exactly are you trying to say, Jabarro?"
: "Heh heh... Oh, nothing. Well, 'cept that I bet Bramsel's right about to..."
: "T-this can't be... Jabarro! How could you know his foul intent, yet let your tongue lie still before me?!"
: "You can't worry 'bout the fairer sex, Ares. Have your fun with 'em, but never stick around for when their sorry lives come crashin' down..."
: "How dare you! And to think you held my trust for so long... I must return to Darna! Leylia needs me!"
: "Nah, that ain't gonna happen, see. Nobody, and I mean nobody, blows off my orders and turns tail on my watch! Not even you, Ares."
: "Keh... I've come far in your company, Jabarro, but our association ends now. If anyone wishes to stop me, Mystletainn will eagerly welcome your necks!"
: "Grr... I'll show you your place, whelp!"

♪♫Breathe out, so I can breathe you in♪♫
♪♫Hold you in♪♫
♪♫And now I know you've always been♪♫
♪♫Out of your head, out of my head I sang♪♫

I'd like to imagine that Leylia will have an opportunity to whack Bramsel with a frying pan, but alas, I know that she only joins when Ares visits Darna, which is to say after Bramsel has been slain by a white knight. Or black knight. We'll see.

Anyway - as you can see, Fee is still nearby, after saving the village northwest of Darna. This is why there's some advantage in me forgetting the Thief Sword: It would've replaced the Horseslayer from her inventory, since there were zero mounted enemies on the map at the beginning, so she'll be able to kick some serious ass here in the next update.

Jabarro is somewhat dangerous, although mostly because of his high mobility and the swarm of cavs around him. He does have Adept, thanks to his class, but with 28 Atk, there's only a handful of characters on our team that he can two-shot.

Bramsel is dangerous if you don't pay attention, but he's also stationary and locked to 1-range.

[HP 130% | Str 90% | Mag 5% | Skl 20% | Spd 30% | Lck 50% | Def 40% | Res 30%]
Skills: Pursuit, Adept, Vantage
Weapon Level: Swords (*), Lances (C)
Major Hezul blood

And here is Ares, who goes right from red to blue without the intermediate green step. Very considerate of him.

I'm happy to announce that, at this moment, his cousin Dermott actually has better stats - specifically, 7 points more Str (and +8 Lck, lol) and roughly similar numbers otherwise. But of course, Mystletainn makes that announcement moot. Its stat bonuses don't look too exciting at first glance - but because it also grants Ares the Critical skill, the +20 Skl matters a whole lot more than just for the accuracy. In addition to the 32% crit chance, Ares also has a 28% chance to proc Adept, which means that with every swing, Ares basially flips a coin to see if he does any bonus damage.

And, of course, even without a proc, Ares just hits really damn hard. Holy weapons tend to do that, and with a 90% Str growth, he's only going to hit damn harder.

I also have to mention that, as somebody pointed out, Ares's mum must've been an incredible badass in her own right. Eldigan didn't have any skills whatsoever (outside of Mystletainn's Critical), so Ares inherited all three of his skills from her.

On the Alster's shore, the group led by another generic Commander seems primed to go and conquer Leonster. I think this is actually a good thing mechanically? If I understand correctly, letting Leonster fall means that Seliph can go paint it blue for another 1000 gold payment for everybody at the end of the chapter. ...who's paying that these days, anyway? Heck, who's been paying that after Sigurd was declared a traitor to Grannvale?

____

On the west side, the Mage Girl trio is strong enough to two-shot most people on our team. We'll see how to approach that, but this seems like it'll call for quick player phase action.

(and yes, I know about their triangle attack. With Genealogy remembering every death even after resetting, I'm afraid that this run won't include a triangle attack. At least not willingly.)

[HP 105% | Str 15% | Mag 35% | Skl 80% | Spd 85% | Lck 60% | Def 20% | Res 15%]
Skills: Adept, Critical, Wrath
Weapon Level: Fire (C), Thunder (B), Wind (B)
Minor Tordo blood, Minor Forseti blood

Tinni seems to be a very straightforward better version of her mum. Same base level, similar base stats (less Skl and Res, but a nice +5 HP) - but better growths in literally every stat and with two additional skills, although Taillte gained Adept by promotion.

That said Tinni doesn't seem amazing or anything. Her brother gains a little bit more from having Lewyn as his dad (turns out starting with Forseti is helpful), even though her high Spd and access to Elwind is quite nice. ...except that Tinni doesn't have Pursuit, of course. For her, Azel probably would've been the better dad. She'll be able to get through the arena with Wrath abuse, she'll deal good damage because she targets Res, but I don't know how much of an impact she's going to have.

The Team:

	  Lv.	  HP Str Mag Skl Spd Lck Def Res  Funds  XP    Arn
Seliph	  8.45	  41  12   2  14  12  15  10   3  23744  +105  [1]
Leaf	  4.67	  31  12   3  11  11  11   9   3  3778   +367  [1]
Shanan	  14.02*  41  19   0  23  23  10  13   4  5000   +202  [1]
Ulster	  12.00	  45  16   2  19  15   8  15   0  29034  +562  [*]

Larcei	  12.02	  46  17   1  21  20  15  13   0  32034  +700  [*]
Patty	  1.71	  30   6   2   6  10  11   4   2  0      +71   [1]
Johalvier 14.66	  44  16   0   9  16   5  14   3  17500  +206  [*]

Oifey	  19.25*  44  18   9  18  17   8  19   8  21500  +133  [*]
Finn	  23.88*  46  22   0  16  20  17  17   4  18015  +8    [1]
Dermott	  11.34	  41  20   0  15  12  14  13   1  24752  +464  [*]
Nanna	  5.74	  33  10   3   9   8   8   7   3  3932   +274  [1]

Ares	  7.00	  40  13   4  12  13   6  12   4  3000   --    [1]
Lester	  10.08	  38  15   2   9  13  14  12   0  15863  +412  [*]
Fee	  6.50	  31  11   2  10  17   5   8  13  15402  +135  [1]

Arthur	  13.80	  46   0  18  20  21  18   3   6  26893  +652  [*]
Julia	  8.20	  31   0  18   8  15   7   4  20  23300  +500  [*]
Lana	  8.00	  36   4  11  11  12  13   5   7  683    +200  --

 

 

13 hours ago, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

Like, was she getting wedded off at age 16 or something? Not like that's unheard of for ersatz Medieval Europe, but still.

(If a Genealogy remake includes an avatar that partakes in the eugenics program, that will be a very questionable game)

13 hours ago, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

Wait, THAT's how Project Naga spells the substitute Dancer's name? What a tragedeigh...

Probably to emphasize the diphthong that the name (レイリア - looks like four syllables to me) has. "Laylea" looks more like Lay-Lee than Lay-Lee-Uh to me.

Although, honestly, I find that the name just could've been Leyla to begin with.

13 hours ago, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

I think it'd be fine... IF there were a way to mitigate those skills. Something like "Adept always activates, but only on the first hit, and only if the attacker's AS is at least equal to that of the target." That way, your speedier units would be immune to Ishtore Adepting on Thoron, while only the slowest would be at risk of a Bolting Adept. Also, the obvious "let Luck function as Crit Avoid". At the very least, Nihil nullifies that one. Also also, as for Accost... maybe just get rid of it? It's one of those "hurts as often as it helps" skills, that even in the best case, reduces a unit's reliability. And it has no effect in the Arena, which is essentially "infinite Accost".

Hot Take: Throw out, or rather significantly rework, all of the "attack again" skills, including Pursuit. In every FE game, I think it's a design flaw that a single point of Spd can double a character's damage output (or losing -1 Spd having a character's survivability, although that's a rarer scenario). But the fanbase would probably be revolting even more if such a classic mechanic would be removed or at least nerfed significantly.

13 hours ago, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

That's a pretty funny one, but in a weird way, it almost makes them worse. Like, I feel like I need to "hold back" on using them in the earlygame, rather than letting them fight when they may be at their most useful. Before the enemy power levels ramp up and they sorta-kinda fall behind.

Looking at the stats of their non-subs in my run, not sending them through the arena seems like it would be enough to keep them below Lv.10. The real problem, I would guess, is a certain new sword-wielding recruit who will always outclass them so hard it's not even funny anymore, and who happens to join just as that conversation is unlocked.

6 hours ago, BrightBow said:

Considering that FE3 didn't have the ability to skip dialog yet, I wonder if maybe the dialog in this game is so brief because the devs themselves were not sure if this was a feature that they would be able to implement. Not to mention what the exact limits of saving would be.

I mean, if this was like FE3 and you couldn't skip dialog and maybe couldn't even save between castles... novel-length dialog in the style of Tear Ring Saga might have been not exactly ideal if you end up having to reload once or twice.

Mid-chapter dialog was also pretty much a non-factor in FE3. But it's most certainly a thing here.

I don't know if Genealogy's writers really held back with their dialogues' length. Some mid-fight convos (Fee and Arthur is a recent example) are still pretty darn long, so the short ones (or blatant omissions like Oifey/Shanan) might just be due to the writers not having enough time to create more (and, arguably, focussing on the wrong characters).

[RPGuy96]

7 hours ago, BrightBow said:

Considering that FE3 didn't have the ability to skip dialog yet, I wonder if maybe the dialog in this game is so brief because the devs themselves were not sure if this was a feature that they would be able to implement. Not to mention what the exact limits of saving would be.

I'm going through FE3 with "bad" units right now - my best guy is Radd, who is genuinely pretty good, followed by Roshea - and while you generally can't skip dialogue, there is an exception.  If you restart a chapter, you're allowed to skip the chapter opening dialogue (though units still move around the map if they did that while talking).  Since you can also skip the overworld intro text, it's not quite as limited as it might be.

20 minutes ago, ping said:

actually, can you even stack multiple rings of the same type?)

I'm reasonably confident that rings don't stack.

24 minutes ago, ping said:

It's a neat detail that Ishtore's battle (and death) quote change depending on whether or not you killed Liza before facing him. He's obviously not much of a character, given how little time he has spent on-screen, but he seems to work decently well for what he's supposed to do.

Given the upcoming focus on Ishtar as a secondary villain, and all of House Freege in Thracia, it's kind of weird that Ishtore never gets to do anything of note.  He's...fine.

26 minutes ago, ping said:

And here is Ares, who goes right from red to blue without the intermediate green step. Very considerate of him.

Ares is very hotheaded, like his father - fortunately his ordering of grudges seems a bit off, as you will discover when he talks to Seliph.

13 minutes ago, ping said:

Hot Take: Throw out, or rather significantly rework, all of the "attack again" skills, including Pursuit. In every FE game, I think it's a design flaw that a single point of Spd can double a character's damage output (or losing -1 Spd having a character's survivability, although that's a rarer scenario). But the fanbase would probably be revolting even more if such a classic mechanic would be removed or at least nerfed significantly.

Let me interest you in a game called Berwick Saga, made by one Shouzou Kaga...

[Jotari]

 

44 minutes ago, ping said:

I probably don't need to reiterate that this isn't exactly my favourite character archetype. A few bonus points, I suppose, for cutting her losses and not insist that Shanan is totally into her.

Oh, boy. Don't look at her Forging Bonds to see what they did with her this century. At least most of the rest of her conversations in this game are about saving orphans.

44 minutes ago, ping said:

Pictured, tactical genius four star leadership Liza promptly moving her army outside of her long range support.

44 minutes ago, ping said:

 

Not pictured, or mentioned, here is Cohen, Aida's father, who fights Seliph's forces at this point and manages to survive.

44 minutes ago, ping said:

On the Alster's shore, the group led by another generic Commander seems primed to go and conquer Leonster. I think this is actually a good thing mechanically? If I understand correctly, letting Leonster fall means that Seliph can go paint it blue for another 1000 gold payment for everybody at the end of the chapter. ...who's paying that these days, anyway? Heck, who's been paying that after Sigurd was declared a traitor to Grannvale?

Taxes. What else do you think the peasantry are for? That's what Seliph is fighting for, the ability to steal from the poor as he is rightfully entitled to do so by blood.

16 minutes ago, RPGuy96 said:

Given the upcoming focus on Ishtar as a secondary villain, and all of House Freege in Thracia, it's kind of weird that Ishtore never gets to do anything of note.  He's...fine.
 

What really gets my goat is that he barely even gets a mention in Thracia (though it's a good bare mention), but I'll rant about Thracia ignoring and retconning Genealogy stuff when that time comes.

Edited April 2 by Jotari