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

[Jotari]

We have six more chapters now before we confront Hardin. Five of them are repeats from the first game. It's cute for the bridge, the wrong direction for Khadein, and just excessive for Altea, Gra and Archanea. I have one simple fix suggestion however, one that provides a different experience for two chapters, is completely possible to do within the technical limitations, makes Archanea less of a push over, makes Gotoh less of an unhelpful dick and should be cooler and more memorable. My suggestion is to swap the next two chapters. Instead of vaguely teleporting Marth to Altea's border so he can conventionally reconquer his homeland in the same way he did in the first game, Gotoh teleports Marth's army directly into the throne room of Altea castle. Archanea is caught with its pants down and is scrambling to defend themselves from an unseen attack as Marth's army attacks them out of nowhere. Same two maps only with a different deployment location, which should change the pacing of them entirely. Or at least vary it up compared to Shadow Dragon.

Gra could be a whole different map or the same, but the Knorda Market map shouldn't have Knora Market at all. It makes way more sense if that chapter had my Khadein suggestion of reorientation things Shrine of Seals style. Marth specifically is coming through a risky mountain pass, so put the capital in the south east and have him come from the north west which is said mountany area, conveniently also with enough plains tiles for there to be a route there.

[Saint Rubenio]

13 hours ago, BrightBow said:

New headcanon is that this entire plotline is the result of Gotoh losing his keys and accidentally locking himself into that tower.

But... he can teleport...

13 hours ago, BrightBow said:

That's a convenient power for it to have. Not to mention it also raises the question if it's power could have been used to shield other dragons from degeneration as well.

The other dragons aren't a "cute dragon loli" like her. So, no. Nobody cares about them.

10 hours ago, Jotari said:

Instead of vaguely teleporting Marth to Altea's border so he can conventionally reconquer his homeland in the same way he did in the first game, Gotoh teleports Marth's army directly into the throne room of Altea castle. Archanea is caught with its pants down and is scrambling to defend themselves from an unseen attack as Marth's army attacks them out of nowhere. Same two maps only with a different deployment location, which should change the pacing of them entirely. Or at least vary it up compared to Shadow Dragon.

That's... actually a really good idea. Dang.

Edited February 3 by Saint Rubenio

[BrightBow]

3 hours ago, Saint Rubenio said:

But... he can teleport...

It's probably warded against teleportation. Chances are a high level wizard doesn't like the idea of scry-and-die tactics being used against them.

[Interdimensional Observer]

15 hours ago, Jotari said:

Instead of vaguely teleporting Marth to Altea's border so he can conventionally reconquer his homeland in the same way he did in the first game, Gotoh teleports Marth's army directly into the throne room of Altea castle.

Gotoh's large-group-long-range teleportation magic isn't actually that good. Precision is lacking. Where you end up isn't a twenty-decimal places spatial coordinate, you'll likely end up somewhere within a defined radius, but the exact spot is dependent on things you'd need a quantum computer to calculate in the moment of transfer. 

This being headcanonically true, Gotoh couldn't warp Marth inside a castle. Odds are somebody would get warped inside a wall or table, that'd be more than a little horrific. A big open field only risks someone ending up five meters/yards off the ground and taking a blow to their bum as the probable worst case scenario.

-Before you say "But Manfroy...!", single-person teleportation greatly increases the accuracy/precision rapidly declines with increases in transferred mass. Furthermore, Gotoh is only a Good Wise Old Man, Cult-kun is unbeatable when it comes to warp magic, every practitioner of magic knows that.

[Jotari]

8 hours ago, Interdimensional Observer said:

Gotoh's large-group-long-range teleportation magic isn't actually that good. Precision is lacking. Where you end up isn't a twenty-decimal places spatial coordinate, you'll likely end up somewhere within a defined radius, but the exact spot is dependent on things you'd need a quantum computer to calculate in the moment of transfer. 

This being headcanonically true, Gotoh couldn't warp Marth inside a castle. Odds are somebody would get warped inside a wall or table, that'd be more than a little horrific. A big open field only risks someone ending up five meters/yards off the ground and taking a blow to their bum as the probable worst case scenario.

-Before you say "But Manfroy...!", single-person teleportation greatly increases the accuracy/precision rapidly declines with increases in transferred mass. Furthermore, Gotoh is only a Good Wise Old Man, Cult-kun is unbeatable when it comes to warp magic, every practitioner of magic knows that.

He seems to warp them directly into Thabes no problem in Shadow Dragon. Course my comment was less a criticism of Gotoh not using his army teleport more and was a suggestion for better maps that could conveniently make the story better too. Because, isn't it a bit weird that Marth does manage to win in the following maps? In the early game Archanea is overwhelming Marth and forcing him to flee, then, after a few months of hiking through the Alps Marth defeats Archanea seemingly with ease. What happened? One person doing some Rocky training in the mountains makes sense, but managing an entire army up there is going to make his forces weaker, not stronger. He should be no more capable of taking down Astram and his cohorts than he was at Khadein. Some warp shenanigans being responsible for winning a major battle against Archanea and putting them in disarray would help make that seem like it makes more sense. Of course we can still imagine that's what happened since appearing right outside Altea presumably was pretty unexpected, but right insid nthe castle so we can play the maps in reverse would be cooler.

If we're talking full rationale actors, then regardless of the power of his teleports, Gotoh should have sent them right to Hardin. Be it those fields around the capital or into the castle itself. Hardin is, after all, the only one they really need to defeat for Archanea to be liberated. None of the other guys are real characters pushing for it now that Lang is dead. Warpy warpy right up to Hardin, kill him then and there and the Archanean system will collapse, Willow and Eibel would be a cinch to conquer with their suppose and reinforcements cut off and the Archaneans in Sheema's army would be deserting right away. It's understandable Marth wants to secure his homeland first, but you're better off cutting off the snake's head right away. Though that would leave random thief making off with the Geo Sphere and dooming the world from Medeus, but while they knew the Geo Sphere was there, I don't think anyone knew someone was stealing it five minutes before the castle fell (unless it was because the castle fell and then in a Hardin first timeline things are really messy).

If it was instead Gotoh who had the Geo Sphere and Altea that had the Light Sphere, then conquering Altea first would be vital, though in gameplay you couldn't risk losing the light Sphere from random thief and result in an unbeatable Hardin.

[ping]

FE3 Book 2 Chapter 15: Prince's Return

Spoiler

Swoosh!

They were ready to begin the battle to reclaim their homeland. The commander of Archanea's army, General Eibel, had ordered the Gra Knights to charge, to buy time. At the same time he prepared many dishonourable tactics, and waited for the chance to defeat Altea's army in one swift blow. Before his fond homeland, Marth's battles were about to begin once again. "We will reclaim our capital of Anri!! We will reclaim our homeland!!" Prince Marth's voice resounded through Altea's skies. They had travelled a difficult journey, but their destination was finally reached.

: "General, the missing Altean remnants have finally returned."
: "Really? Haha...! What good timing. We will follow our original plan. Have Gra's soldiers move out to lure them and then defeat them in one go."
: "Understood, but, what about 'him'?"
: "The paladin, Abel? It doesn't matter if he betrays me! If he does, you will kill the female hostage!! He has already retired from the army. He won't swear loyalty to the prince again. Ha ha...! How will they avoid fighting Abel...? This will be very interesting to watch..."

I see that Kaga had to add another kidnapping (if one without brainwashing) to the four princesses to maintain his excitement.

The map is very Akaneian, and not just because it's a repeat from Book 1: A lot of enemies at the start of the map, then boredom until Marth arrives at the goal. There's not really anything to back up the talk in the opening about special, "dishonourable" tactics. At most, two ballistae covering the area where you're likely to clash with the Paladin/Horseman group? The enemies technically flank Marth, but it's the world's least threatening flanking manoevre, with two chokepoints between you and the enemies to the west, who don't even seem to chase after you if you keep out of their range.

[HP 50% | Str 70% | Skl 70% | Spd 70% | Lck 60% | WLv 70% | Def 20%]

(add +3 Skl/Spd for mounting)

The "female hostage!!" is, of course, Est, who joins with precisely the same stats as she did in Book 1. As a result, she seems about as underwhelming as she was in Book 1, too. Maybe she's a bit more "worth it", since she joins one map earlier and with the final chapter being a four-parter, but... joining late as a high-growth unit doesn't seem like a great deal when everybody else had been able to massage their growths with shards until the previous chapter.

[HP 70% | Str 40% | Skl 50% | Spd 50% | Lck 40% | WLv 70% | Def 20%]

By contrast, Abel seems quite good. His bases are similar to those of our other units (that aren't Catria or Yubello) and he kept his good growths from Book 1. Heck, with 10 level-ups, he will (on average) cap Spd and sit at 17 Str, so he absolutely seems like a good endgame unit, dismounting notwithstanding.

It's also worth noting that his physical bulk is better than that of the other three Paladins (spoiler warning: Matthis will be one by the end of the chapter), who all sit at 12 Def and between 23 and 28 HP. Heck, if Matthis hadn't consumed a Goddess Icon, Abel even would've had the highest luck between them.

__

Step one for this fight: eliminate the two Ballistae. Palla and Catria one-shot with Javelins, which allows them to stay out of Abel's range, and with Iote's Shield, Catria can battle against the nearby Sniper without any issue.

__

Tiki goes Mage Dragon for full tankiness...

__

...which allows her to just run into Gra's forces with reckless abandon. She has notably shaky hit rates with this form's FireBreath, but since several enemies here carry Silvers, the added Def matters more.

I have to say, I was surprised to see that MageDragon turns out to be supremely tanky on the physical side of the spectrum, too.

Bantu chokes a point. He's too tanky for the job, since the Knights only carry Javelins and won't suicide into him, cowards that they are, but that's a first-world-problem if I've ever seen one.

Finally, Est moves up to the top of the cell. The Bishop below carries a Swarm tome, so she wants to keep her distance. Luckily, the General doesn't attack her, so you don't need to spend a Rescue use on her.

Some risky manoevring to kill the Sniper on turn 2 without fighting Abel, since Catria barely misses the two-shot with a Javelin.

__

And then the map is more or less beaten.

__

Interestingly, Abel started moving on turn 2, which is very considerate of him - this way, Palla and Catria can just one-round the Bishops with some lighter weapons.

Other than that... I mean, Marth visits the village, then turns around and moves towards the boss through Est's jail cell. Mistake in retrospect, since the thieves were just lingering around on the western edge of the map, and because they all carry some goodies, I had to send Sheeda over to stab them. Would've been more convenient to have Marth do that while swinging around that way.

: "Oh, your highness, you've finally come. I have been waiting, to give this to you. However this village and the neighboring village..."
: "Mmm, I understand. But, for the sake of everyone, you should start to make up with them..."

PowerRn obtained!

If I had to guess, I'd say that Kaga received the same compaint that I made during FE1 and/or Book 1, that it's silly how these villages value their rivalry higher than Prince Marthipan saving the day, and this is his polite way of saying, "shove it, nerds".

Later, recruitment - Abel went back and forth a bit, thanks to Palla and Catria killing the Bishops in melee range, i.e. from where they can be reached from the boss's island, so he didn't get to move far overall.

: "Abel... I'm sorry, you must have suffered."
: "Est!! You're safe."
: "Yes, Lord Marth rescued me. I'm alright now."
: "Really...? Damn, Archanea... But how should I apologise to Lord Marth...?"
: "I'm sorry... It was all because of me."
: "No, Est! It has nothing to do with you!! Those fools... I won't forgive them... I'll show them how deep my anger is!!"

And then they lived happily ever after.

__

Some promotions happened during the map: Matthis (at Lv.17), Warren (dito), and Yumina (Lv.16). Catria (Lv.19) is the most hilariously overpowered one, though.

We're also back to maps with actual bosses, portrait and all. Eibel is very tanky, but being locked to 1-range, he's not exactly a threat.

: "What! Being able to defeat my great army. Are you even human?"

Warren chipped him for some XP because why not...

____

: "My Archanea army could be defeated...?"

...and Catria does the obligatory Triangle Attack for the kill.

This was on turn 9, but because there were still a few thieves waiting, it took another couple turns until Marth could seize. So yeah, easy map, despite what Marth is about to claim.

: "That was a fierce battle. Is everybody alright?"
: "Don't worry, they have been awaiting this day for a long time."
: "Archanea's actions were too cold-hearted. They even had innocent citizens killed. How can I apologise to the citizens...? I only bring trouble to everybody... Perhaps I'm not fit to protect this country."
: "No, your highness, you're wrong! Your highness, you have a gentle heart, so that is why no matter what hardships, we can endure them. We believe in your highness, so that is why we follow you. Your highness, please raise your spirit!! We still haven't reclaimed Altea castle. There are probably many enemies awaiting us, but this is our castle. We already know how to fight this battle. Well, Lord Marth! Let's go!!"

We have indeed been here before.

Not Jeigan's greatest speech, either, to be honest. Doesn't actually address the source of Marth's self-doubt, that he wasn't able to prevent any of this to happen, and goes for some "No, you're good because you're nice!" consoling as if he's talking to Corrin.

The Team:

	Lv. 	   HP Str Skl Spd Lck WLv Def Res  +XP
Marth	14.23	   33  14  13  13  16  10  12   0  +32
Matthis	17/1.47	   27  16  17  15   9  16  12   8  +157* (+5 Lck +5 Skl)
Arran	*/11.08	   23  11  12  13   4  11  12   6  +95
Sirius	*/8.95	   28  13  12  16   2  14  12   6  +45

Abel	*/1.00	   28  13  14  15   5  11  14   6  --	(base)
Catria	19/2.39	   36  19  20  20  11  18  20   0  +254*
Palla	15.31	   29  12  16  17   9  13  11   7  +117
Est	5.00	   20   6   7  13  11  11   8   6  --	(base)

Caeda	17.96	   25  12  17  21* 19  20  13   8  +270
Julian	12.48	   23  13  12  19  12  10   9   0  +10
Bantu	12.25	   25   7  14   9   1   2   7   1  +106	(+7 HP, +10 Skl)
Tiki	6.82	   18   6   6   6  13  10   5  10  +82	(base)

Warren	17/1.71	   33  13  15  16   3  11  11   2  +49* (+5 Spd)
Wendell	*/13.30	   29   9   9  13   7  16   5   7  +85	(+5 Str)
Jubelo	20/6.91	   26  20  11  20  16  20   9   9  +87
Yuliya	16/1.30	   20  12  11  16  16  15   4   8  +30*

Phina	8.90	   18   4   8  16  14   7   4   0  +80

• Another point of Def for Bantu! Shards are dead, long live the Orb.
• Marth now officially survives one attack by Medeus, I think.

Answers!

Spoiler

  

On 2/1/2024 at 11:59 PM, Jotari said:

Is he just going to be a villain because he's an incel then? Or would he still randomly trip and find the Dark Sphere without Gharnef? Because no magical coercion would lead to a very radical alteration from Shadow Dragon. Granted he has no character in Shadow Dragon so there'd be no contradiction, but still it'd be weird to go back and play knowing early cavalier guy is such a huge douche. Also like 65% of Japan is in a sexless marriage who probably wouldn't be sold on the idea.

I think my mind was going into Lyon's direction, although I didn't really think this through But what pushes Lyon into villainy is a combination of low self-esteem, lady problems, and the death of his father, which the Demon King latches on. Hardin shares the lady problems and also some self-loathing in the form of comparing himself to Marth. Something like the death of the Wolfguard (minus Roshe, since Kaga seems to like him), maybe even due to a mistake on Hardin's part, could maybe put him in a similarly vulnerable state as Lyon.

As for the Dark Sphere - I know that Thabes is presented as rather unreachable, but it wouldn't be unreasonable for Akaneia to try and send investigators to Gharnef's former HQ. One of those could've found the Darksphere and brought it to Pales.

Bottom line, SacSto has a better story than Mystery.

On 2/2/2024 at 11:00 PM, BrightBow said:

I just don't see a way to handle this elegantly.

Any attempt of approaching this without pulling back and laming it out inevitably involves someone getting exposed to at least 3 ice dragons. They deal 20 damage each and ignore defense. HP cap is 52, so it's impossible for anyone to survive that. Not even Bantu can handle this due to his ice weakness.

The Ice Dragons that can attack through the walls are the problem. Without those, it might be possible to bait put two low-HP character right behind your frontliners, so that the first two Ice Dragons will attack these and spread their fire because a character in the 2nd row can only be attacked once. But with the potential attacks coming from the left and the right, that doesn't really work.

--

RE: Teleport: It's just a very difficult ability to write around, once you gave one of your heroes (or villains, really - the Warp Powder in Tellius is a bit unsatisfactory, too) access to it. This game's Camüh blocked the only path to the enemy capital? *pop* Enemy that is way too strong to fight? Just avoid him. *pop*

A bit like time travel, in that the implications of it existing go out of hand very easily.

(I'm also reminded of the old DnD-clone I used to play as a teenager. That one had a spell that forces the target to truthfully answer a yes/no question... which means that any kind of murder-mystery campaign needs some justification why a mage can't just go around asking anybody even remotely suspicious if they (a) did the thing or (b) know who did the thing. Simple spell, big implications)

 

[BrightBow]

Maybe you already noticed it during Book 1, but a really nice detail is that any orbs you have collected on your current savefile will be shown embedded in the Shield of Seals during the intro.
Though maybe it's not entirely appropriate that this already happens during Book 1, considering back then it wasn't revealed that the shield and the orbs are connected.
 

8 minutes ago, ping said:

I see that Kaga had to add another kidnapping (if one without brainwashing) to the four princesses to maintain his excitement.

Not to mention getting her kidnapped in Book 1 when no such thing happened in FE1.
 

9 minutes ago, ping said:

The "female hostage!!" is, of course, Est, who joins with precisely the same stats as she did in Book 1. As a result, she seems about as underwhelming as she was in Book 1, too. Maybe she's a bit more "worth it", since she joins one map earlier and with the final chapter being a four-parter, but... joining late as a high-growth unit doesn't seem like a great deal when everybody else had been able to massage their growths with shards until the previous chapter.

Same stats while her sisters got much stronger and join near the beginning of the game. It sucks to be Est.

HP is also something of a weak growth for her. So she isn't exactly dominating the endgame where everything either uses magic or bypasses defense. Not that her defense stat is anything to write home about in the first place.

One perk she has is that she gets two support partners in Minerva and Adel. But while that is cool, it's also a trait shared with both her sisters. Just replace Adel with Marth in Catria's case.
 

16 minutes ago, ping said:

Finally, Est moves up to the top of the cell. The Bishop below carries a Swarm tome, so she wants to keep her distance. Luckily, the General doesn't attack her, so you don't need to spend a Rescue use on her.

Though I would imagine that he will start attacking Est if Marth is the one to recruit Adel.
 

20 minutes ago, ping said:

Bottom line, SacSto has a better story than Mystery.

Oh so very much.

[Jotari]

2 hours ago, ping said:

FE3 Book 2 Chapter 15: Prince's Return

  Hide contents

Swoosh!

They were ready to begin the battle to reclaim their homeland. The commander of Archanea's army, General Eibel, had ordered the Gra Knights to charge, to buy time. At the same time he prepared many dishonourable tactics, and waited for the chance to defeat Altea's army in one swift blow. Before his fond homeland, Marth's battles were about to begin once again. "We will reclaim our capital of Anri!! We will reclaim our homeland!!" Prince Marth's voice resounded through Altea's skies. They had travelled a difficult journey, but their destination was finally reached.

: "General, the missing Altean remnants have finally returned."
: "Really? Haha...! What good timing. We will follow our original plan. Have Gra's soldiers move out to lure them and then defeat them in one go."
: "Understood, but, what about 'him'?"
: "The paladin, Abel? It doesn't matter if he betrays me! If he does, you will kill the female hostage!! He has already retired from the army. He won't swear loyalty to the prince again. Ha ha...! How will they avoid fighting Abel...? This will be very interesting to watch..."

I see that Kaga had to add another kidnapping (if one without brainwashing) to the four princesses to maintain his excitement.

The map is very Akaneian, and not just because it's a repeat from Book 1: A lot of enemies at the start of the map, then boredom until Marth arrives at the goal. There's not really anything to back up the talk in the opening about special, "dishonourable" tactics. At most, two ballistae covering the area where you're likely to clash with the Paladin/Horseman group? The enemies technically flank Marth, but it's the world's least threatening flanking manoevre, with two chokepoints between you and the enemies to the west, who don't even seem to chase after you if you keep out of their range.

[HP 50% | Str 70% | Skl 70% | Spd 70% | Lck 60% | WLv 70% | Def 20%]

(add +3 Skl/Spd for mounting)

The "female hostage!!" is, of course, Est, who joins with precisely the same stats as she did in Book 1. As a result, she seems about as underwhelming as she was in Book 1, too. Maybe she's a bit more "worth it", since she joins one map earlier and with the final chapter being a four-parter, but... joining late as a high-growth unit doesn't seem like a great deal when everybody else had been able to massage their growths with shards until the previous chapter.

[HP 70% | Str 40% | Skl 50% | Spd 50% | Lck 40% | WLv 70% | Def 20%]

By contrast, Abel seems quite good. His bases are similar to those of our other units (that aren't Catria or Yubello) and he kept his good growths from Book 1. Heck, with 10 level-ups, he will (on average) cap Spd and sit at 17 Str, so he absolutely seems like a good endgame unit, dismounting notwithstanding.

It's also worth noting that his physical bulk is better than that of the other three Paladins (spoiler warning: Matthis will be one by the end of the chapter), who all sit at 12 Def and between 23 and 28 HP. Heck, if Matthis hadn't consumed a Goddess Icon, Abel even would've had the highest luck between them.

__

Step one for this fight: eliminate the two Ballistae. Palla and Catria one-shot with Javelins, which allows them to stay out of Abel's range, and with Iote's Shield, Catria can battle against the nearby Sniper without any issue.

__

Tiki goes Mage Dragon for full tankiness...

__

...which allows her to just run into Gra's forces with reckless abandon. She has notably shaky hit rates with this form's FireBreath, but since several enemies here carry Silvers, the added Def matters more.

I have to say, I was surprised to see that MageDragon turns out to be supremely tanky on the physical side of the spectrum, too.

Bantu chokes a point. He's too tanky for the job, since the Knights only carry Javelins and won't suicide into him, cowards that they are, but that's a first-world-problem if I've ever seen one.

Finally, Est moves up to the top of the cell. The Bishop below carries a Swarm tome, so she wants to keep her distance. Luckily, the General doesn't attack her, so you don't need to spend a Rescue use on her.

Some risky manoevring to kill the Sniper on turn 2 without fighting Abel, since Catria barely misses the two-shot with a Javelin.

__

And then the map is more or less beaten.

__

Interestingly, Abel started moving on turn 2, which is very considerate of him - this way, Palla and Catria can just one-round the Bishops with some lighter weapons.

Other than that... I mean, Marth visits the village, then turns around and moves towards the boss through Est's jail cell. Mistake in retrospect, since the thieves were just lingering around on the western edge of the map, and because they all carry some goodies, I had to send Sheeda over to stab them. Would've been more convenient to have Marth do that while swinging around that way.

: "Oh, your highness, you've finally come. I have been waiting, to give this to you. However this village and the neighboring village..."
: "Mmm, I understand. But, for the sake of everyone, you should start to make up with them..."

PowerRn obtained!

If I had to guess, I'd say that Kaga received the same compaint that I made during FE1 and/or Book 1, that it's silly how these villages value their rivalry higher than Prince Marthipan saving the day, and this is his polite way of saying, "shove it, nerds".

Later, recruitment - Abel went back and forth a bit, thanks to Palla and Catria killing the Bishops in melee range, i.e. from where they can be reached from the boss's island, so he didn't get to move far overall.

: "Abel... I'm sorry, you must have suffered."
: "Est!! You're safe."
: "Yes, Lord Marth rescued me. I'm alright now."
: "Really...? Damn, Archanea... But how should I apologise to Lord Marth...?"
: "I'm sorry... It was all because of me."
: "No, Est! It has nothing to do with you!! Those fools... I won't forgive them... I'll show them how deep my anger is!!"

And then they lived happily ever after.

__

Some promotions happened during the map: Matthis (at Lv.17), Warren (dito), and Yumina (Lv.16). Catria (Lv.19) is the most hilariously overpowered one, though.

We're also back to maps with actual bosses, portrait and all. Eibel is very tanky, but being locked to 1-range, he's not exactly a threat.

: "What! Being able to defeat my great army. Are you even human?"

Warren chipped him for some XP because why not...

____

: "My Archanea army could be defeated...?"

...and Catria does the obligatory Triangle Attack for the kill.

This was on turn 9, but because there were still a few thieves waiting, it took another couple turns until Marth could seize. So yeah, easy map, despite what Marth is about to claim.

: "That was a fierce battle. Is everybody alright?"
: "Don't worry, they have been awaiting this day for a long time."
: "Archanea's actions were too cold-hearted. They even had innocent citizens killed. How can I apologise to the citizens...? I only bring trouble to everybody... Perhaps I'm not fit to protect this country."
: "No, your highness, you're wrong! Your highness, you have a gentle heart, so that is why no matter what hardships, we can endure them. We believe in your highness, so that is why we follow you. Your highness, please raise your spirit!! We still haven't reclaimed Altea castle. There are probably many enemies awaiting us, but this is our castle. We already know how to fight this battle. Well, Lord Marth! Let's go!!"

We have indeed been here before.

Not Jeigan's greatest speech, either, to be honest. Doesn't actually address the source of Marth's self-doubt, that he wasn't able to prevent any of this to happen, and goes for some "No, you're good because you're nice!" consoling as if he's talking to Corrin.

The Team:

	Lv. 	   HP Str Skl Spd Lck WLv Def Res  +XP
Marth	14.23	   33  14  13  13  16  10  12   0  +32
Matthis	17/1.47	   27  16  17  15   9  16  12   8  +157* (+5 Lck +5 Skl)
Arran	*/11.08	   23  11  12  13   4  11  12   6  +95
Sirius	*/8.95	   28  13  12  16   2  14  12   6  +45

Abel	*/1.00	   28  13  14  15   5  11  14   6  --	(base)
Catria	19/2.39	   36  19  20  20  11  18  20   0  +254*
Palla	15.31	   29  12  16  17   9  13  11   7  +117
Est	5.00	   20   6   7  13  11  11   8   6  --	(base)

Caeda	17.96	   25  12  17  21* 19  20  13   8  +270
Julian	12.48	   23  13  12  19  12  10   9   0  +10
Bantu	12.25	   25   7  14   9   1   2   7   1  +106	(+7 HP, +10 Skl)
Tiki	6.82	   18   6   6   6  13  10   5  10  +82	(base)

Warren	17/1.71	   33  13  15  16   3  11  11   2  +49* (+5 Spd)
Wendell	*/13.30	   29   9   9  13   7  16   5   7  +85	(+5 Str)
Jubelo	20/6.91	   26  20  11  20  16  20   9   9  +87
Yuliya	16/1.30	   20  12  11  16  16  15   4   8  +30*

Phina	8.90	   18   4   8  16  14   7   4   0  +80

• Another point of Def for Bantu! Shards are dead, long live the Orb.
• Marth now officially survives one attack by Medeus, I think.

Answers!

  Hide contents

  

I think my mind was going into Lyon's direction, although I didn't really think this through But what pushes Lyon into villainy is a combination of low self-esteem, lady problems, and the death of his father, which the Demon King latches on. Hardin shares the lady problems and also some self-loathing in the form of comparing himself to Marth. Something like the death of the Wolfguard (minus Roshe, since Kaga seems to like him), maybe even due to a mistake on Hardin's part, could maybe put him in a similarly vulnerable state as Lyon.

As for the Dark Sphere - I know that Thabes is presented as rather unreachable, but it wouldn't be unreasonable for Akaneia to try and send investigators to Gharnef's former HQ. One of those could've found the Darksphere and brought it to Pales.

Bottom line, SacSto has a better story than Mystery.

The Ice Dragons that can attack through the walls are the problem. Without those, it might be possible to bait put two low-HP character right behind your frontliners, so that the first two Ice Dragons will attack these and spread their fire because a character in the 2nd row can only be attacked once. But with the potential attacks coming from the left and the right, that doesn't really work.

--

RE: Teleport: It's just a very difficult ability to write around, once you gave one of your heroes (or villains, really - the Warp Powder in Tellius is a bit unsatisfactory, too) access to it. This game's Camüh blocked the only path to the enemy capital? *pop* Enemy that is way too strong to fight? Just avoid him. *pop*

A bit like time travel, in that the implications of it existing go out of hand very easily.

(I'm also reminded of the old DnD-clone I used to play as a teenager. That one had a spell that forces the target to truthfully answer a yes/no question... which means that any kind of murder-mystery campaign needs some justification why a mage can't just go around asking anybody even remotely suspicious if they (a) did the thing or (b) know who did the thing. Simple spell, big implications)

 

One thing that might not be noticable here at first is that, despite the series impressive variety in character names, they seriously give us a chapter with a boss called Abel and Eibel, who interact with each other and are part of the same command stricture without any apparent confusion. That would be because their Japanese names are アベル-Aberu (playable)   エイベル-Eiberu (boss) so not identical in Japanese, but given traditional English pronunciation of the guy killed by Biblical Cain is Abel sounding the same as Able (not Abble like Babble), in English, Eibel and Abel are to be proununced the exact same way. Ah language, what a weird beast thou art.

Edited February 4 by Jotari

[Saint Rubenio]

17 hours ago, ping said:

[HP 70% | Str 40% | Skl 50% | Spd 50% | Lck 40% | WLv 70% | Def 20%]

By contrast, Abel seems quite good.

Such a weird thing to read, coming from all those FE12 runs. But well, it's certainly true.

17 hours ago, ping said:

: "No, Est! It has nothing to do with you!! Those fools... I won't forgive them... I'll show them how deep my anger is!!"

"I will show them the true meaning of pain" goes much harder, I'll say.

17 hours ago, ping said:

And then they lived happily ever after

Hah!

17 hours ago, ping said:

: "What! Being able to defeat my great army. Are you even human?"

: "My Archanea army could be defeated...?"

This guy's dialogue is particularly Engrishy lol

17 hours ago, ping said:

Not Jeigan's greatest speech, either, to be honest. Doesn't actually address the source of Marth's self-doubt, that he wasn't able to prevent any of this to happen, and goes for some "No, you're good because you're nice!" consoling as if he's talking to Corrin.

Well... He tried. Alternative was to say "yes, my liege, you are indeed terrible. Please hurry up and have a child with Princess Caeda that you can abdicate the throne to."

[ping]

FE3 Book 2 Chapter 16: Reclaim the Capital

Spoiler

All that remains is the castle... If I could regain Altea castle, where I was born... Everybody, thank you... I really must thank you all for placing your trust in me... Before Marth's face flowed shimmering tears... Even the girl, who gently wiped his tears away, couldn't prevent her own tears...

I do wonder if this intro changes if Sheeda is dead. If not, "the girl" is most likely Catria trying to make a move on Marth while he's emotionally vulnerable.

: "What's going on...? Even thieves have managed to find their way in. Could the Geosphere have been taken by them!?"
: "Your highness, a suspicious thief is escaping towards the north."

"As opposed to the very trustworthy thieves currently raiding the treasure chamber."

: "We should send somebody in pursuit before it's too late."
: "Mmm, but we can't use horses or Pegasi inside, so what should we do..."

The Thief with the Geosphere is, of course, the one in the bottom left.

He's also Lv.20 and uses a Devil Sword, which can be a nasty surprise if you don't check his stats, as the other thieves are just low-Lv. chumps.

Pursuit isn't the greatest option, since we also can't use horses or Pegasi outside. The easiest solution would be to warp somebody, but since the path north can be reached from inside by 2-range weapons, that isn't really necessary.

The initial unit split - mostly sending everybody west, including Marth so that he can gain some XP from the enemy Heroes. Tiki can easily handle everything that the throne room throws at her. I had one attempt ruined by a crit against Warren, so I know that her MageDragon form is too tanky here - there's a lot of enemies in the throne room, but they're generally pretty weak, so she'd have virtually no enemy phase with 19 Def.

And Sheeda makes a little detour to kill the nearby thief, since she's close to a level-up and can make use of the Orb easily because of that. Note that she has capped her Spd while unmounted - the game did remember that she got to 18 Spd while unmounted at an earlier time, and the Orb allowed her +2 Spd with this level.

__

And some trading allows both Marth and Bantu to grab some extra stats from the Orb on the following player phase, too.

__

Astram is a nice guy here and only starts moving on turn 2, which makes it relatively easy for Jeorge to recruit him, especially because there's a fair number of characters ready to cleave him a path.

Like in FE12 (but without warning in the intro), a thief opening a chest will cause the door to the throne room to open, which will happen on EP2 if you don't warp anybody over.

____

But yeah, the enemies coming out aren't too strong. Tiki takes very little damage (except from the Snipers, who deal 2x4 damage with high crit chance) and one-shots everything (except the Snipers).

__

______

The main danger comes from the boss and the two of the four Bishops that use long-range tomes. I have to admit that I forgot to give Jubelo the Barrier staff, so these did hit pretty hard, but I never had to dodge a lethal attack. Not quite sure if I would've been in trouble had the Swarmy boys been very lucky.

: "So it's the traitor, Jeorge. What do you want with me?"
: "Wait, Astram. General Eibel has already fallen. You won't be able to win even if you continue fighting."
: "You want me to surrender...? Never! Even if I am the last one standing. I am a warrior of Archanea to the end!!"
: "Why are you... Who are you fighting for? Are you fighting for Emperor Hardin?"
: "No! It's not because of that man, but because of Nyna... And for Archanea!!"
: "But, did Nyna tell you to fight here? Do you really think that Nyna would hope for this kind of battle?"
: "Well... I hadn't seen Nyna for a while. I was told that she fell ill, and that I couldn't see her. But... Since Hardin is Emperor of Archanea, I have no choice. If I don't follow his orders I will become a traitor, and I will be betraying Nyna."
: "Astram, Nyna already entrusted the Emblem to Prince Marth. Do you understand... the meaning of her actions?"
: "Wh-what!! When did this happen, Jeorge? Nyna requested Prince Marth for help?"
: "I believe that is the only explanation. Astram, if you want to find out the truth then come with us... If you die here, what will Midia do? You must live on, for her. You must live on, so you can confirm with your eyes what is happening."
: "Hmm... I guess I have to choice. But, Jeorge. If this war is as Hardin said, and was caused by Prince Marth's Ambitions. I will never forgive you! Remember that!!"

What, no threat of rolling heads? Still congratulations to Astram for his entry into the list of people who are smarter than Camus. *clapclapclapclap*

[HP 90% | Str 50% | Skl 40% | Spd 20% | Lck 50% | WLv 40% | Def 10%]

Astram loses the comparison to Abel, who trades -2 Spd for +2 Str and +3 Def/Res in comparison, but he still seems like a perfectly fine unit that should be able to hold up right to the endgame. His growths are pretty alright, in particular his HP and Str, and he of course has an advantage on indoor maps. He's a bit more frail than most of our other physical characters, but even that isn't by a huge amount.

__

The GeoSphere grab: Not very reliable, even with Bantu's +10 Skl from SecretBooks. Not sure what the escape tile would've been and if I would've had another shot next turn, but luckily, I don't have to find out.

__

The boss kill: Yubello one-rounding through the boss's high Res stat. Not that he needs the XP, but this seems disrespectful, so I had to do it.

And after Julian and Rickard have plundered Marth's life savings, the map's done. Last enemy dead on turn 6, seized on turn 9. Short and... sweeter than the last maps, although this fight gets its arse kicked by Tiki and Bantu really hard. The GeoSphere thief adds some urgency, which does help.

: "Prince Marth. The enemies in the castle have been vanquished. Altea is finally in our hands again."
: "Really? That's great. But, I still don't see my sister..."
: "Your highness, Princess Elice was taken by Gharnef."
: "Huh? Gotoh, is that true!?"
: "he ordered the dark priests to search for the clerics of noble birth. Lena, Maria... and even your sister Elice. They have all been taken by Gharnef."
: "Is that so... But what is he planning on doing by capturing them?"
: "That I don't know, but I bet it's not anything good. The chain of events so far was all the doing of Gharnef."
: "Gotoh! Where is he now?"
: "I don't know, but I bet Gharnef's next target will be Princess Nyna. So he is probably at Pales..."
: "I see. We will go to Pales. I will rescue Hardin from the Darksphere's influence. I will defeat Gharnef and the dark priests... And I will rescue the captured clerics!!"

The Team:

	Lv. 	   HP Str Skl Spd Lck WLv Def Res  +XP
Marth	16.18	   35  16  14  15  18  12  13   1  +195
Matthis	17/3.97	   28  17  18  16   9  18  13   8  +250	(+5 Skl, +5 Spd)
Caeda	18.36	   26  12  18  23* 20  20  14   8  +40
Astram	*/5.00	   28  11  16  17   5  16  11   3  --	(base)

Julian	13.38	   24  14  12  20  13  11   9   1  +90
Rickard	3.09	   18   6   3   9   1   6   3   0  --	(base)
Bantu	14.80	   25   8  15  10   2   3   7   1  +255	(+7 HP, +10 Skl)
Tiki	11.05	   20   8   7   9  15  10   5  11  +423

Warren	17/2.43	   33  13  16  16   3  11  11   2  +72	(+5 Spd)
Jeorge	*/5.10	   27  10  11  13   4  15  10   3  +10	(base)
Jubelo	20/8.06	   28  20  11  20  16  20   9   9  +115
Yumina	16/1.58	   20  12  11  16  16  15   4   8  +28

Phina	9.50	   18   5   8  17  14   8   4   0  +60

• Bantu is now faster than Rickard.

Answers!

Spoiler

  

On 2/4/2024 at 9:01 PM, BrightBow said:

Maybe you already noticed it during Book 1, but a really nice detail is that any orbs you have collected on your current savefile will be shown embedded in the Shield of Seals during the intro.
Though maybe it's not entirely appropriate that this already happens during Book 1, considering back then it wasn't revealed that the shield and the orbs are connected.

I hadn't noticed, since I generally use save states to skip the title screen. Very nice, though.

On 2/4/2024 at 9:01 PM, BrightBow said:

Same stats while her sisters got much stronger and join near the beginning of the game. It sucks to be Est.

It's a shame, since I found her pretty alright in FE1 and Gaiden. I don't know how good she is in Echoes, but otherwise, she really fell off hard after a good start. The Est archetype is the Jeigan of the Fire Emblem franchise

23 hours ago, Jotari said:

One thing that might not be noticable here at first is that, despite the series impressive variety in character names, they seriously give us a chapter with a boss called Abel and Eibel, who interact with each other and are part of the same command stricture without any apparent confusion. That would be because their Japanese names are アベル-Aberu (playable)   エイベル-Eiberu (boss) so not identical in Japanese, but given traditional English pronunciation of the guy killed by Biblical Cain is Abel sounding the same as Able (not Abble like Babble), in English, Eibel and Abel are to be proununced the exact same way. Ah language, what a weird beast thou art.

I wouldn't have noticed because I parsed the names as in German, where Abel starts with a long Ah (like the vowel in 'laugh') and Eibel is pronounced Eye-bell (although the first syllable would be pronounced more quickly than 'Eye', I guess?).

8 hours ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Such a weird thing to read, coming from all those FE12 runs. But well, it's certainly true.

Yeah, I was thinking of that contast, too. Stat inflation is one helluva drug.

8 hours ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Well... He tried. Alternative was to say "yes, my liege, you are indeed terrible. Please hurry up and have a child with Princess Caeda that you can abdicate the throne to."

I mean... It's understandable that Marth blames himself for falling for Hardin's trap, but realistically, that wasn't really predictable until the second Marth ran into General Lang. By taking the "hey, people like you because you're so nice" angle, Jeigan is just letting Marth's self-doubts stand.

 

[Jotari]

9 minutes ago, ping said:

FE3 Book 2 Chapter 16: Reclaim the Capital

  Hide contents

All that remains is the castle... If I could regain Altea castle, where I was born... Everybody, thank you... I really must thank you all for placing your trust in me... Before Marth's face flowed shimmering tears... Even the girl, who gently wiped his tears away, couldn't prevent her own tears...

I do wonder if this intro changes if Sheeda is dead. If not, "the girl" is most likely Catria trying to make a move on Marth while he's emotionally vulnerable.

: "What's going on...? Even thieves have managed to find their way in. Could the Geosphere have been taken by them!?"
: "Your highness, a suspicious thief is escaping towards the north."

"As opposed to the very trustworthy thieves currently raiding the treasure chamber."

: "We should send somebody in pursuit before it's too late."
: "Mmm, but we can't use horses or Pegasi inside, so what should we do..."

The Thief with the Geosphere is, of course, the one in the bottom left.

He's also Lv.20 and uses a Devil Sword, which can be a nasty surprise if you don't check his stats, as the other thieves are just low-Lv. chumps.

Pursuit isn't the greatest option, since we also can't use horses or Pegasi outside. The easiest solution would be to warp somebody, but since the path north can be reached from inside by 2-range weapons, that isn't really necessary.

The initial unit split - mostly sending everybody west, including Marth so that he can gain some XP from the enemy Heroes. Tiki can easily handle everything that the throne room throws at her. I had one attempt ruined by a crit against Warren, so I know that her MageDragon form is too tanky here - there's a lot of enemies in the throne room, but they're generally pretty weak, so she'd have virtually no enemy phase with 19 Def.

And Sheeda makes a little detour to kill the nearby thief, since she's close to a level-up and can make use of the Orb easily because of that. Note that she has capped her Spd while unmounted - the game did remember that she got to 18 Spd while unmounted at an earlier time, and the Orb allowed her +2 Spd with this level.

__

And some trading allows both Marth and Bantu to grab some extra stats from the Orb on the following player phase, too.

__

Astram is a nice guy here and only starts moving on turn 2, which makes it relatively easy for Jeorge to recruit him, especially because there's a fair number of characters ready to cleave him a path.

Like in FE12 (but without warning in the intro), a thief opening a chest will cause the door to the throne room to open, which will happen on EP2 if you don't warp anybody over.

____

But yeah, the enemies coming out aren't too strong. Tiki takes very little damage (except from the Snipers, who deal 2x4 damage with high crit chance) and one-shots everything (except the Snipers).

__

______

The main danger comes from the boss and the two of the four Bishops that use long-range tomes. I have to admit that I forgot to give Jubelo the Barrier staff, so these did hit pretty hard, but I never had to dodge a lethal attack. Not quite sure if I would've been in trouble had the Swarmy boys been very lucky.

: "So it's the traitor, Jeorge. What do you want with me?"
: "Wait, Astram. General Eibel has already fallen. You won't be able to win even if you continue fighting."
: "You want me to surrender...? Never! Even if I am the last one standing. I am a warrior of Archanea to the end!!"
: "Why are you... Who are you fighting for? Are you fighting for Emperor Hardin?"
: "No! It's not because of that man, but because of Nyna... And for Archanea!!"
: "But, did Nyna tell you to fight here? Do you really think that Nyna would hope for this kind of battle?"
: "Well... I hadn't seen Nyna for a while. I was told that she fell ill, and that I couldn't see her. But... Since Hardin is Emperor of Archanea, I have no choice. If I don't follow his orders I will become a traitor, and I will be betraying Nyna."
: "Astram, Nyna already entrusted the Emblem to Prince Marth. Do you understand... the meaning of her actions?"
: "Wh-what!! When did this happen, Jeorge? Nyna requested Prince Marth for help?"
: "I believe that is the only explanation. Astram, if you want to find out the truth then come with us... If you die here, what will Midia do? You must live on, for her. You must live on, so you can confirm with your eyes what is happening."

 

 

I like the really obvious gameplay tip off Willow gives in New Mystery. It's like "Muhahaha, we'll attack when the thieves open the chests, I'm such strategic genius!"...uh...how exactly does that help your strategy in any way?

9 minutes ago, ping said:

: "Hmm... I guess I have to choice."

 

Astram has to choice

9 minutes ago, ping said:

Answers!

  Hide contents

 

help.

: "Prince Marth. The enemies in the castle have been vanquished. Altea is finally in our hands again."
: "Really? That's great. But, I still don't see my sister..."
: "Your highness, Princess Elice was taken by Gharnef."
: "Huh? Gotoh, is that true!?"
: "he ordered the dark priests to search for the clerics of noble birth. Lena, Maria... and even your sister Elice. They have all been taken by Gharnef."
: "Is that so... But what is he planning on doing by capturing them?"
: "That I don't know, but I bet it's not anything good. The chain of events so far was all the doing of Gharnef."
: "Gotoh! Where is he now?"
: "I don't know, but I bet Gharnef's next target will be Princess Nyna. So he is probably at Pales..."
: "I see. We will go to Pales. I will rescue Hardin from the Darksphere's influence. I will defeat Gharnef and the dark priests... And I will rescue the captured clerics!!"

Dialogue feels a bit repetitive here.

Marth: Gotoh, is that true?

Marth: Is that so?

Gotoh: That I don't know.

Gotoh: I don't know.

9 minutes ago, ping said:

What, no threat of rolling heads? Still congratulations to Astram for his entry into the list of people who are smarter than Camus. *clapclapclapclap*

[HP 90% | Str 50% | Skl 40% | Spd 20% | Lck 50% | WLv 40% | Def 10%]

Astram loses the comparison to Abel, who trades -2 Spd for +2 Str and +3 Def/Res in comparison, but he still seems like a perfectly fine unit that should be able to hold up right to the endgame. His growths are pretty alright, in particular his HP and Str, and he of course has an advantage on indoor maps. He's a bit more frail than most of our other physical characters, but even that isn't by a huge amount.

__

The GeoSphere grab: Not very reliable, even with Bantu's +10 Skl from SecretBooks. Not sure what the escape tile would've been and if I would've had another shot next turn, but luckily, I don't have to find out.

__

The boss kill: Yubello one-rounding through the boss's high Res stat. Not that he needs the XP, but this seems disrespectful, so I had to do it.

And after Julian and Rickard have plundered Marth's life savings, the map's done. Last enemy dead on turn 6, seized on turn 9. Short and... sweeter than the last maps, although this fight gets its arse kicked by Tiki and Bantu really hard. The GeoSphere thief adds some urgency, which does

The Team:

	Lv. 	   HP Str Skl Spd Lck WLv Def Res  +XP
Marth	16.18	   35  16  14  15  18  12  13   1  +195
Matthis	17/3.97	   28  17  18  16   9  18  13   8  +250	(+5 Skl, +5 Spd)
Caeda	18.36	   26  12  18  23* 20  20  14   8  +40
Astram	*/5.00	   28  11  16  17   5  16  11   3  --	(base)

Julian	13.38	   24  14  12  20  13  11   9   1  +90
Rickard	3.09	   18   6   3   9   1   6   3   0  --	(base)
Bantu	14.80	   25   8  15  10   2   3   7   1  +255	(+7 HP, +10 Skl)
Tiki	11.05	   20   8   7   9  15  10   5  11  +423

Warren	17/2.43	   33  13  16  16   3  11  11   2  +72	(+5 Spd)
Jeorge	*/5.10	   27  10  11  13   4  15  10   3  +10	(base)
Jubelo	20/8.06	   28  20  11  20  16  20   9   9  +115
Yumina	16/1.58	   20  12  11  16  16  15   4   8  +28

Phina	9.50	   18   5   8  17  14   8   4   0  +60

• Bantu is now faster than Rickard.

This is all the left over quote stuff I can't get rid of on mobile.

[BrightBow]

19 minutes ago, ping said:

: "Mmm, but we can't use horses or Pegasi inside, so what should we do..."

Wyvern Riders?

Hey, Tiki can transform into a wyvern indoors, so Wyvern Riders should work too.
 

19 minutes ago, ping said:

I suppose I do always sell the Master Sword for some extra dragonstone cash. I mean, the thing has the same might as Silver Swords but 5 times the value.
 

19 minutes ago, ping said:

: "I don't know, but I bet Gharnef's next target will be Princess Nyna. So he is probably at Pales..."
: "I see. We will go to Pales. I will rescue Hardin from the Darksphere's influence. I will defeat Gharnef and the dark priests... And I will rescue the captured clerics!!"

Anyone wanna bring up Starlight? Maybe make a new one. What happened to the previous tome anyway?

Although come to think of it, I never tested if it is possible to kill Gharnef by disabling Imhullu with the Silence Staff. Silence just turns off ALL magic for a turn, so there shouldn't be a defense against it.

Edited February 5 by BrightBow

[Jotari]

Serenes won't let me edit back in a little dialogue hypothetical for willow so enjoy it here in isolation.

I like the really obvious gameplay tip off Willow gives in New Mystery. It's like "Muhahaha, we'll attack when the thieves open the chests, I'm such strategic genius!"...uh...how exactly does that help your strategy in any way? It's still a decently challenging map, but there seems to be a missing step in how that actually helps Willow more than charging right away or after a set amount of time. Presumably this exchange happens if you warp into the Treasury.

 

"Sir, they've killed all the thieves themselves."

"Excellent! Wait for them to open the chests!"

"Uh, they're not doing that sir."

"Really? What are they doing?"

"Seems they're lining up outside this very room getting ready to charge. Should we pre-empt them?"

"Cruse the intelligence of that handsome knight called Kris. No we can't preempt them, they haven't opened any chests. We'll just have to wait for them to get into position."

"Are you sure sir? We could open the doors now and rush them."

"No,no,no they haven't opened any chests. Didn't you hear me?"

"Sir they've just opened the doors. Please say we can rush them."

"Oh alright, but someone better open those chests later."

"Huh, despite the enemy lining up the position themselves, they're now retreating because our stats are just that high. Maybe we could have done this from the start."

4 minutes ago, BrightBow said:

Wyvern Riders?

Hey, Tiki can transform into a wyvern indoors, so Wyvern Riders should work too.
 

I guess it's the riders head and not the wyvern itself that just makes the cut off point for indoors.

4 minutes ago, BrightBow said:

Anyone wanna bring up Starlight? Maybe make a new one. What happened to the previous tome anyway?

Well Michalis ends up taking it from Gharnef himself, which is actually really smart of Gharnef. Presumably Gharnef got his hands on it because it was kept in Archanea after the first war (Boah for canonical Starlight user!).

[Saint Rubenio]

1 hour ago, ping said:

I do wonder if this intro changes if Sheeda is dead. If not, "the girl" is most likely Catria trying to make a move on Marth while he's emotionally vulnerable.

Or Xane.

"Mmm, dry your tears, Princey. I can be the best princess you could ever ask for~"

"Jagen can you please take the trash out of my room?"

"On my honor! Even though I, Jagen, am old and senile, I won't--"

"Okay okay, I'm going, sheesh..."

1 hour ago, ping said:

[HP 90% | Str 50% | Skl 40% | Spd 20% | Lck 50% | WLv 40% | Def 10%]

Astram loses the comparison to Abel, who trades -2 Spd for +2 Str and +3 Def/Res in comparison, but he still seems like a perfectly fine unit that should be able to hold up right to the endgame. His growths are pretty alright, in particular his HP and Str, and he of course has an advantage on indoor maps. He's a bit more frail than most of our other physical characters, but even that isn't by a huge amount.

Forget Abel, this is the real deal when it comes to looking worse in 12. How did he manage to lose a fucking speed point in the transition? Sure, they gave him 3 strength and defense. For all the good it does him when he gets doubled by his fellow heroes. Thanks for the early mercury, jackass.

1 hour ago, ping said:

Last enemy dead on turn 6, seized on turn 9.

That's certainly faster than the remake version.

1 hour ago, ping said:

Bantu is now faster than Rickard

lol

lmao even

1 hour ago, ping said:

I mean... It's understandable that Marth blames himself for falling for Hardin's trap, but realistically, that wasn't really predictable until the second Marth ran into General Lang. By taking the "hey, people like you because you're so nice" angle, Jeigan is just letting Marth's self-doubts stand.

Yeah, all jokes aside, Jagen had a couple of things to bring up that wasn't just "hey you may be a moron but at least you're nice!"

56 minutes ago, Jotari said:

I like the really obvious gameplay tip off Willow gives in New Mystery. It's like "Muhahaha, we'll attack when the thieves open the chests, I'm such strategic genius!"...uh...how exactly does that help your strategy in any way? It's still a decently challenging map, but there seems to be a missing step in how that actually helps Willow more than charging right away or after a set amount of time. Presumably this exchange happens if you warp into the Treasury.

"Sir, they've killed all the thieves themselves."

"Excellent! Wait for them to open the chests!"

"Uh, they're not doing that sir."

"Really? What are they doing?"

"Seems they're lining up outside this very room getting ready to charge. Should we pre-empt them?"

"Cruse the intelligence of that handsome knight called Kris. No we can't preempt them, they haven't opened any chests. We'll just have to wait for them to get into position."

"Are you sure sir? We could open the doors now and rush them."

"No,no,no they haven't opened any chests. Didn't you hear me?"

"Sir they've just opened the doors. Please say we can rush them."

"Oh alright, but someone better open those chests later."

"Huh, despite the enemy lining up the position themselves, they're now retreating because our stats are just that high. Maybe we could have done this from the start."

It really is pretty damn goofy when you think about it. Heck, if things get really bad a good last resort is to use the treasure room itself as a chokepoint. The machinations of Willow's mind are too complex for mere mortals to comprehend, clearly...

[ping]

FE3 Book 2 Chapter 17: Gra's Setting Sun

Spoiler

But, along their way, they passed through the Kingdom of Gra, a land allied to Archanea. In the previous war Gra sided with the Dolhr Empire, which resulted in their king, Jiol, dying in battle and the destruction of the kingdom. The country was once a part of Altea, but they sided with Archanea listening to Hardin's orders. Hardin found King Jiol's daughter, Princess Sheema, and allowed her to ascend the throne, and he then ordered reinforcements from Gra. Sheema received wild support from the citizens of Gra. To them, Sheema was their only hope. The youths all volunteered to become soldiers. They were happy to move out and have a chance to defeat their bitter enemy, Altea. But, their dreams were shattered in an instant... Before the fast approaching Altean elites, Gra's soldiers lost all morale, and fled for their lives.

Kinda rough for Gra. Previous war, they sided against Akaneia, and ended up invaded by Marth. This time, they side *with* Akaneia, and also end up invaded by Marth.

The "bitter enemy" part feels a bit artificial, to be honest - Altea and Gra are said to have been allies for their entire existance as independent nations, until Jiol switched sides during the War of Shadows. Well, I suppose if Jiol was still highly popular when he was killed... Eh, the whole thing isn't really described in any detail, so I'm sure one could fill these in in a way that makes sense. In both Book 1 and Book 2, Gra is basically just a quick stop on the road between more important destinations, which seems like a bit of a waste considering their highly dramatic backstab in the backstory.

: "Princess Sheema, it seems the Altean army has arrived."
: "Really...? It's already the end. Samson, I have brought you much trouble. I need to watch the final days of my Kingdom of Gra. You may leave now."
: "Princess, isn't it already enough? Shouldn't you despise King Jiol for forcefully taking your mother? Isn't that why you hid at Pales and stayed away from this country? Right now you are just being tricked by Hardin, and being used by him."
: "Perhaps. I heard that the people of Gra wished for the restoration of the country, and that's why I agreed to help him. However Hardin is only interested in using us. He would just throw us away like rubbish the moment we became useless to him. Still, I will not leave! How can I just abandon those fighting for my sake!?"
: "Impossible... How can our fresh recruits resist Altea's elites...? Fine, if you're staying, I will also stay to the end. This could be interesting."
: "Samson... Why are you doing this? Aren't you mercenaries only interested in being paid with gold? I no longer have money to give you..."
: "I don't know why either. It's just... Sometimes men feel like there are things that they must do. Also, I want to see how that kid fights this battle. If he truly is a hero, perhaps your mind may be changed..."

This part I like, though, minus the "just to be sure that you don't forget that Jiol isn't sympathetic, bee tee dubs he's a rapist" part. Almost always I find that this is a cheap way to give a story a more ""mature"" veneer. "Oh, look, we're not shying away from the dark, taboo realities of the world" - like, dude, you threw in half a sentence and called it a day.

ANYWAY, I do like how the intro hints at Sheema and Samson being recruitable. A nod towards Gra's soldiers being green and no match for your own units, saying that Marth should fight the battle "like a hero"... That's well done, I find.

__

And it's easy enough to recognise the dangerous enemies between the greenhorns. This also doubles up as a good gameplay representation of how Akaneia just spent Gra's finest soldiers' lives on the previous fight, and how only the last reserves are available for its last stand. Good job, Kaga. In that regard.

The map! We've been here before, of course. We still have the village in the top left corner, which means that Marth has to move in the wrong direction a bit at first, and a separate treasure room, so Julian and some bodyguard have to go their separate way. You can technically shove everybody through the eastern part of the map and use the backdoor to the throne room, but that's a really long one-tile path that you'd have to move through.

The two groups of three Wyvernlords each haven't quite synced up their attack timings, which is a bit more restraint by the map designer than really was necessary. It's not ch.2 anymore; three Wyverns at once isn't that big of a deal for our team at this stage.

The main problem of this map is that there's no real pressure on the player to go fast, with exactly one exception - a thief with a Nosferatu tome that will escape the map pretty quickly if you don't intercept him. But other than that, it's once again a fight with some (but not a lot) of initial pressure by the Wyverns, followed by a very easy clean-up that still takes more time than defending against these flying buggers.

And as far as the Thief goes: Catria boosted by Phina can catch him on turn... 3, I believe it was, which is barely in time before he escapes at the southern edge of the map. Her stats are kinda OK, so she can do this solo, as long as she brings Iote's Shield against the Archer.

__

The Wyverns coming from the east get taken out on PP2...

...and Tiki, boosted by Phina, then murders the other three on EP3, also answering the pending question (for me) if her DivineDragon form's "Dragon" effectiveness applies against these, too. You never know with these old FE titles.

Meanwhile, Minerva makes a quick trip to the Armoury, sells some Silver Axes that I forgot about, plus some promo items, and buys a bunch of Silvers.

Oh, and Minerva also buys a bunch of Door Keys, since Marth uses the last one in the convoy. I forgot to give it to somebody before the start of the map, but luckily, Boots are very good in this game, so the main group didn't have to wait overly long.

__

Promotion of the day: Caeda, which happens to confirm that when a dismounted character promotes, they stay dismounted even if they're doing so while outdoors.

Oh, I almost forgot - at some point, the Gra soldiers start running towards the southern edge of the map, although I don't think they actually escape from it. I'm not sure what triggered this - maybe it's just turn-based, or maybe they started running when there were no Akaneian soldiers on the map anymore (visibly on the map, that is, since they started running before I opened either room).

__

: "You are Princess Sheema? It's great to see you safe. I don't view Gra as an enemy. Gra and my country were originally one country. The country may have divided after Anri's death, but we always got on well as allies. But, in the previous war, I felt deeply regretful about things turning out the way they did. Princess Sheema, please allow us to be friends once again. I don't want to fight Gra."
: "Prince Marth... Once I heard that you didn't attack my fleeing soldiers, I was really surprised. You truly are the second coming of King Anri. I trust you. Please... Treat the citizens of Gra... as if they were you citizens. I will hand my whole country to your care... Prince Marth."

Can't allow a woman to be king, eh, Kaga?

I liked how Sheema was introduced at the beginning of the chapter (minus the... but don't let me get started on that again). Reminiscent of FE11!Marth, in a way (#KagaDidItFirst), in that she didn't ask to be put into her position, but still accepts the responsibility she has in it. Also, as little as we actually see of Gra, the opening makes it seem that her people put a lot of importance in being a politically distinct nation - at least that's how I would rationalise why they're so devoted to their royals. So it's really disappointing that Sheema immediately tells Marth to absorb Gra into Altea again, and that she, once Marth becomes the King of Kings, also refuses to become queen of a Gra sub-kingdom again. But hey, we can't risk having a girl infect any throne with cooties.

[HP 60% | Str 60% | Skl 70% | Spd 50% | Lck 60% | WLv 60% | Def 20%]

Kaga also did Barth from The Binding Blade first. Her offensive stats are funny bad considering her joining time (even though she has the WLv to use Gradivüh at base), but she has average HP and is only 3 points below the Def cap. She isn't uniquely bulky or anything (Sheeda has 26 HP | 18 Def when mounted, not to mention Catria or the dragons), but it's a lot more impressive than her New Mystery self, which has a personal Def base of two.

Her growths are very good, of course, almost on Est's level - but like with Est, it's not the greatest look for a late-joining growth unit when the early-joining growth units already started hitting stat caps before you arrived with 8 Str and 0 AS.

[HP 70% | Str 30% | Skl 10% | Spd 20% | Lck 50% | WLv 70% | Def 20%]

Meanwhile, Samson joins as Better Astram. It's not by a lot - same HP/Def, +1 Str, +2 Spd - but it's notable that the only stat that Astram beats Samson in is WLv... and Samson already has a high enough WLv to use Mercurius at base. He seems just like very straightforward endgame-ready character.

Of course Sheema has to recruit him first...

: "That's great, Sheema. Now I can finally leave without worry."
: "Samson... Can you not leave...?"
: "You don't need me anymore. From now on Prince Marth will protect you."
: "Don't leave! I don't want you to leave..."
: "Huh, what? Why do keep me? It doesn't seem like you. ...Fine. If you say you need me, I won't go anywhere else. I will protect you wherever you may go. Is that fine with you?"
: "Yes..."

Romance for the ages.

(Well, I mean, at least neither of them randomly vanishes without a trace after the war)

And that's the map. I didn't really say all that much about the fight itself, but that's because there isn't all that much to say. No reinforcements, only that one thief as an incentive to go fast. Easy map as a result.

: "Lord Marth, if this battle continues it will become meaningless, and will only give more time for Hardin."
: "Mmm, I was thinking the same. If we keep heading east, more needless blood will be spilt. So I have decided a different route for us to go. How about we go directly south from Menedi, and enter Pales from Adria Peak?"
: "You want the troops to cross that dangerous mountain path? It's too dangerous..."
: "I am already prepared for danger. Besides, we were able to conquer the dangerous Anri's Way, so this should be easy in comparison..."
: "...That's a fair point. If we can cross it, we can attack the enemy from the rear. Understood, we'll try that."

Is this the first time that Marth came up with a strategy? Good for him, if that's the case. It really would be a shame if, in a potential remake, this plan would be attributed to somebody else.

The Team:

	Lv. 	   HP Str Skl Spd Lck WLv Def Res  +XP
Marth	17.59	   36  17  15  16  19  12  14   1  +141
Arran	*/11.08	   23  11  12  13   4  11  12   6  --
Sirius	*/9.37	   30  14  13  16   3  15  12   6  +42
Matthis	17/4.29	   29  17  19  17   9  19  14   8  +32

Caeda	19/1.00	   26  16  19  23* 20  20  18   3  +64*
Catria	19/3.43	   37  19  20  20  11  18  20   0  +104
Minerva	*/8.20	   25  13   9  15   7  14  16   0  +10
Sheema	*/1.00	   26   8   3   5   4  12  17   3  --	(base)

Samson	*/5.00	   28  12  16  19   7  12  11   3  --	(base)
Julian	13.70	   24  14  12  20  13  11   9   1  +42
Warren	17/3.30	   34  13  17  16   4  12  11   3  +87
Bantu	15.42	   25   8  16  10   3   3   7   1  +62

Tiki	12.95	   20   8   8  10  16  10   5  11  +190
Jubelo	20/8.36	   28  20  11  20  16  20   9   9  +30
Wendell	*/13.82	   29   9   9  13   7  16   5   7  +52
Yumina	16/1.88	   20  12  11  16  16  15   4   8  +30

Phina	10.30	   18   6   8  18  15   9   4   0  +80

 

Answers!

Spoiler

  

On 2/5/2024 at 11:25 PM, Jotari said:

I like the really obvious gameplay tip off Willow gives in New Mystery. It's like "Muhahaha, we'll attack when the thieves open the chests, I'm such strategic genius!"...uh...how exactly does that help your strategy in any way?

If it only was Marth's team opening a chest that triggered it, you could rationalise it as "they are distracted by plundering their own shit, strike now", even though the map layout with the very choke-y treasure room doesn't really support that strategy at all. With the "neutral" thieves on them map... yeah, doesn't make much sense at all.

On 2/5/2024 at 11:25 PM, Jotari said:

Astram has to choice

Whoops.

Generally speaking, that kind of typo is almost always my fault, while I can blame the translation for most oddly placed commas or if the syntax is a bit off at times. I've been collecting some mistakes where I'm quite certain that they are mistakes and not just a clunky phrasing, but honestly, FE3 is probably the non-localised game that can use a new translation effort the most, with Jugdral having relatively new ones.

On 2/5/2024 at 11:25 PM, Jotari said:

Dialogue feels a bit repetitive here.

Marth: Gotoh, is that true?

Marth: Is that so?

Gotoh: That I don't know.

Gotoh: I don't know.

Case in point. Gotoh is a bit of a betting man in that dialogue, too.

On 2/5/2024 at 11:28 PM, BrightBow said:

Wyvern Riders?

Hey, Tiki can transform into a wyvern indoors, so Wyvern Riders should work too.

On 2/5/2024 at 11:35 PM, Jotari said:

I guess it's the riders head and not the wyvern itself that just makes the cut off point for indoors.

And horses are just really tall in Akaneia.

On 2/5/2024 at 11:28 PM, BrightBow said:

Although come to think of it, I never tested if it is possible to kill Gharnef by disabling Imhullu with the Silence Staff. Silence just turns off ALL magic for a turn, so there shouldn't be a defense against it.

Interesting, hopefully I'll remember to test that when I get there.

On 2/6/2024 at 12:35 AM, Saint Rubenio said:

Or Xane.

"Mmm, dry your tears, Princey. I can be the best princess you could ever ask for~"

"Jagen can you please take the trash out of my room?"

"On my honor! Even though I, Jagen, am old and senile, I won't--"

"Okay okay, I'm going, sheesh..."

Careful - you're showing first signs of writing slashfic, a clear symptom of overexpostion to anime stuff.

On 2/6/2024 at 12:35 AM, Saint Rubenio said:

Forget Abel, this is the real deal when it comes to looking worse in 12. How did he manage to lose a fucking speed point in the transition? Sure, they gave him 3 strength and defense. For all the good it does him when he gets doubled by his fellow heroes. Thanks for the early mercury, jackass.

Well, at this point of the story in New Mystery, he and Samson can get drunk together and reminisce on their glory days.

 

[RPGuy96]

3 hours ago, ping said:

This also doubles up as a good gameplay representation of how Akaneia just spent Gra's finest soldiers' lives on the previous fight, and how only the last reserves are available for its last stand. Good job, Kaga. In that regard.

It doesn't always work, but I think Book 2 is where Kaga, having laid the foundations of the genre in FE1 and Book 1, can explore new ideas that would be foundational to his later games.  The gameplay / story integration with these Gra soldiers is a good example that does work.  We've still got a ways to go on map / enemy formation design, unfortunately.

Admittedly, I don't actually remember FE1 or Gaiden that well (even after reading your playthroughs so recently!) so I might be slandering them.

[Saint Rubenio]

5 hours ago, ping said:

Kinda rough for Gra. Previous war, they sided against Akaneia, and ended up invaded by Marth. This time, they side *with* Akaneia, and also end up invaded by Marth.

Being Gra is suffering.

5 hours ago, ping said:

: "Perhaps. I heard that the people of Gra wished for the restoration of the country, and that's why I agreed to help him. However Hardin is only interested in using us. He would just throw us away like rubbish the moment we became useless to him. Still, I will not leave! How can I just abandon those fighting for my sake!?"

Fortunately, Sheema is a massive badass and can take the suffering.

Until Kaga decides she's too competent and shafts her, but let's not dwell on that.

5 hours ago, ping said:

Oh, I almost forgot - at some point, the Gra soldiers start running towards the southern edge of the map, although I don't think they actually escape from it. I'm not sure what triggered this - maybe it's just turn-based, or maybe they started running when there were no Akaneian soldiers on the map anymore (visibly on the map, that is, since they started running before I opened either room).

Hey that's actually pretty cool. Likely the game doesn't have an escape functionality programmed in, but they tried to simulate it this way. Cool.

5 hours ago, ping said:

Wow she's even worse than in 12. Of course, this game has 20 caps - if she had her 12 stats she'd be legit amazing.

...Funny how her defense works too. In 12 17 defense means she dies in one round. Here she's 3 points away from cap. Not bad.

5 hours ago, ping said:

Meanwhile, Samson joins as Better Astram. It's not by a lot - same HP/Def, +1 Str, +2 Spd - but it's notable that the only stat that Astram beats Samson in is WLv... and Samson already has a high enough WLv to use Mercurius at base. He seems just like very straightforward endgame-ready character.

That moment when Asstram isn't as bad in this version but it doesn't matter because Samson is just a better unit one chapter later. So it's still optimal to just grab early Mercurius lolololol

5 hours ago, ping said:

Is this the first time that Marth came up with a strategy? Good for him, if that's the case. It really would be a shame if, in a potential remake, this plan would be attributed to somebody else.

The one moment where I'll agree Kris did make things worse by existing. Why give this to Kris, anyway? The entire game they've been the one that doesn't know anything about anything, and all of a sudden they're a geographical erudite. Let Marth have his win.

5 hours ago, ping said:

Careful - you're showing first signs of writing slashfic, a clear symptom of overexpostion to anime stuff.

Ahahah, haha... Yeah, see.

About that.

5 hours ago, ping said:

Well, at this point of the story in New Mystery, he and Samson can get drunk together and reminisce on their glory days.

Assuming they can lift an ale mug.

[ping]

Double update today!

FE3 Book 2 Chapter 18: Battle of the Pass

Spoiler

__

Once they passed Adria Peak, they would be directly at Pales. Hurry, we can't let the enemy spot us! We must charge straight through!! Marth and the others were anxious, but they carried on advancing across the narrow mountain road. But they didn't expect, in the middle of the cliff, to be ambushed by an unfathomable enemy. They were the northern Kingdom of Aurelis's elite squad, the "Wolfsquad", who had headed south to aid Archanea.

: "Wolf, Sedgar, Vyland. Is this really okay...? Can we really fight this battle?"
: "Roshea! What are you trying to say? Look, the Altean army is marching along the narrow mountain road. Now's our only chance to defeat them."
: "Yes, Roshea. We swore that we could sacrifice our lives for Lord Hardin. Lord Hardin was the one who freed us plains people from slavery. If we don't fight Altea now, Pales will fall. Do you want Lord Hardin to be defeated by them?"
: "That's right! Prince Marth wants to destroy Archanea, and conquer the world. And that's why he joined forces with Macedon to crush Grust. Now he even has Gra under his rule. If we don't do something, the whole world will fall under his control."
: "I still don't believe it. I cannot believe Prince Marth would have such ambitions."
: "What? Are you saying that Emperor hardin lied? Do you think that he would stoop to such a low!? Enough, Roshea!! You disappoint me, if you want to betray us then go ahead. Sedgar, Vyland, let's go. If we're too slow, they will pass us."
: "Hey, wait! I won't betray you. I understand... I'll go."

Honestly, these three should've remained unrecruitable in New Mystery. Not only for the drama, but also to spare them the humiliation that are their stats in the remake.

The map! It's pretty good at capturing a solid cavalry charge at your flank, I find, with your troops being far more spread out than usual, facing a big clump of horse units. I like it even though it is really easy because you can just neutralise all these horsies (not just the named ones) by visiting the village. FEWoD recommends warping Marth over...

...but that's really not necessary because Marth with Boots can just walk over in a single turn with a dance. Because I misremembered a bit and thought that the horsies leave immediately via cutscene, I did the murder-for-XP routine before this...

...including a face-off between our Paladins of choice in Book 1 and Book 2. Who is stronger?

Matthis, of course, who can double and one-round with a Silver Lance.

: "Lord Hardin..."

Naturally, the other non-Roshea dudes also face Marth's wrath:

: "The leader of Aurelis's knights, Wolf, is here for your head!"

: "You... Why are you invading other countries? Have you been blinded by ambition?"

The most dangerous part of the map is a bunch of Wyvern reinforcements after you visit the village. I got 6 immediately (that is, at the start of EP1) and one on the second turn, although there might be some randomness involved.

The play here was to make sure that they all fly into non-flyer range, enemy phase kill optional, to make sure that the squishies are safe.

But I need to go back to Marth getting the village real quick...

: "Oh, Prince Marth. It is good to see you."
: "Huh, aren't you King Aurelis?! What are you doing here?"
: "I came here to stop my country's army. Also I must apologise to your highness. I believed Hardin's words and followed Archanea, but I now realise my wrongs. Archanea's Empress Nyna secretly sent me a letter, saying that Hardin isn't normal and is ill... My country will remain neutral, and its knights will return to Aurelis. I hope you won't attack my men anymore."

:whistle:

: "I understand, your highness. I don't want to fight with you. Please forgive me for taking so many of your kngihts' lives."
: "Oh! You really are like what the rumours say. My body is frail and I have no children, and even Hardin, my younger brother, has completely changed. Prince Marth, please protect Aurelis in my place. I will hand my whole country to you. I give this jewel to you as a gift. This is a magical jewel containing the divine power of life. I spent a lot of gold to buy it from a travelling merchant. I believe it will be useful to you. Don't worry about Hardin. Since he is a knight, it is natural for him to die in battle. That is his fate. Well, Prince Marth, I will go on ahead. I hope you will all be safe..."

Y'know, it would've been a really funny twist if that magical jewel bought from a travelling merchant would've turned out to be the Darksphere. Hardin's already corrupted, so Gharnef made sure to pass it on to the next monarch, but King Orleans passed it on to Marth before he himself could be affected too much.

Anyway, I have to reiterate that Marth really is rather corrinesque. The "You're so nice, lemme give you my kingdom" routine that Sheema and now King Orleans do wouldn't have felt out-of-place in Fateslandia at all.

__

Pff... I'm sorry, but hot pink armour is just inherently funny to me.

Sheema didn't do a lot of combat this map, just two kills, but that's because she was busy ingesting some stat boosters (+7 HP, +4 Str, +5 Spd).

After the Wyverns are dealt with, the rest of the map is pretty much a formality. All those three Bishops use Fortify staves, which slows things down a bit, but it's not too bad. What's nice about this narrow formation is that it's possible to pass around the Starsphere pretty consistently.

(as a note, you can see Catria flying over the mountain after crit-killing the final Wyvern. Had she not gotten a crit, I believe Phina would've been able to boost Sheeda far enough to get the kill.)

The biggest beneficiary of the orb-sharing is Marth himself, who made use of the Mercurius's boosted XP gain (and the Orb's second effect to prevent weapons from wearing down) to hit Lv.20. He didn't gain any Str in his last three levels, but +5 HP and +3 Def is a pretty good outcome nevertheless.

Oh, and from the cave spawns 1 Thief per turn, which was some nice and easy XP for Julian, although without boosted growth rates, of course.

And that's that. Only five turns, really without any downtime. Good map, just a bit easy.

: "Jagen, it seems we've finally crossed the peak. Pales isn't far from here."
: "Yes, if we go down from here, we will reach the capital of Pales in an instant. Also, your highness, I just received news of an attempted coup in Pales. The knights and civilians who opposed Hardin's actions rebelled against him. It seems their leader was Lady Midia."
: "What! Midia...? What happened?"
: "Unfortunately Lady Midia was defeated, and was captured... Each day many people are executed. It is only a matter of time before Lady Midia shares the same fate."
: "Damn, Hardin... I can't believe that he would do that. Alright, let's go and rescue Midia! We must hurry to Pales and end this once and for all. Jagen, let's go!!"

The Team:

	Lv. 	   HP Str Skl Spd Lck WLv Def Res  +XP
Marth	20.--	   41  17  18  17  20  12  17   1  +241
Matthis	17/5.29	   30  17  20  18   9  20  15   8  +100	(+5 Skl, +5 Lck)
Sirius	*/10.22	   31  15  13  17   4  16  12   7  +85
Arran	*/11.18	   23  11  12  13   4  11  12   6  +10

Catria	19/4.98	   39  20  20  20  11  19  20   0  +155
Caeda	19/2.25	   27  17  20  23* 20  20  19   3  +115
Sheema	*/1.85	   33  12   3  10   4  12  17   3  +85	(+7 HP, +4 Str, +5 Spd)
Julian	15.30	   26  14  13  20  15  11  10   1  +160

Warren	17/3.62	   34  13  17  16   4  12  11   3  +32	(+5 Spd)
Bantu	17.72	   25   8  16  10   3   3   7   2  +230	(+7 HP, +10 Skl)
Tiki	13.87	   20   8   9  11  17  10   5  11  +92
Jubelo	20/9.26	   28  20  11  20  17  20   9   9  +90

Wendell	*/14.37	   29   9  10  13   8  17   5   7  +55	(+5 Str)
Yuliya	16/2.68	   21  12  12  16  17  16   4   8  +80
Phina	10.70	   18   6   8  18  15   9   4   0  +40

 

 

3 hours ago, RPGuy96 said:

It doesn't always work, but I think Book 2 is where Kaga, having laid the foundations of the genre in FE1 and Book 1, can explore new ideas that would be foundational to his later games.  The gameplay / story integration with these Gra soldiers is a good example that does work.  We've still got a ways to go on map / enemy formation design, unfortunately.

Admittedly, I don't actually remember FE1 or Gaiden that well (even after reading your playthroughs so recently!) so I might be slandering them.

I'd say there's the occasional flash of that in the NES games, too, although to be honest, the only concrete example I can think of right now is Gaiden's endgame - first the neat detail that Celica "overworld-walks" across the final map before talking to Judah, and later her group taking damage from fighting offscreen while Alm is desperately trying to get to her.

1 hour ago, Saint Rubenio said:

The one moment where I'll agree Kris did make things worse by existing. Why give this to Kris, anyway? The entire game they've been the one that doesn't know anything about anything, and all of a sudden they're a geographical erudite. Let Marth have his win.

Checkmate, Kris apologists

Yeah, I'm never going to be Kris fan (I still find them to be a really boring protagonist), but actually playing Book 2 really dispels the myth that they ursurp anybody's role. Except here, of course.

1 hour ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Ahahah, haha... Yeah, see.

About that.

I think this is the part where Wraith would start his sermon? I'm afraid I can only offer cookies.

1 hour ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Assuming they can lift an ale mug.

The ale mug probably doubles and one-rounds them.

[Saint Rubenio]

1 hour ago, ping said:

the "Wolfsquad"

Yeah I do believe I prefer Wolfguard lol. Has more oomph to it.

1 hour ago, ping said:

Honestly, these three should've remained unrecruitable in New Mystery. Not only for the drama, but also to spare them the humiliation that are their stats in the remake.

I like the logistics of the recruitment chain but... Yeesh they didn't even have the "didn't bother changing the stats" excuse there. They just let these three be pathetic because they felt like it.

...Of course, the fact that in this one they just unceremoniously leave on turn 2 and you never see them again is still pretty asinine.

1 hour ago, ping said:

...including a face-off between our Paladins of choice in Book 1 and Book 2. Who is stronger?

Matthis, of course, who can double and one-round with a Silver Lance.

: "Lord Hardin..."

Unless, of course, you kill them for experience.

Attaboy, Matthis. Attaboy.

1 hour ago, ping said:

The most dangerous part of the map is a bunch of Wyvern reinforcements after you visit the village. I got 6 immediately (that is, at the start of EP1) and one on the second turn, although there might be some randomness involved.

...Wait, is this in New Mystery? I don't remember any wyverns in this map in New Mystery. In fact, I distinctly recall it being the "calm before the storm" map that's just pretty easy so you can train Frost or something.

Oh okay, just checked. In NMotE there's a set of four wyverns, but only in lunatic and they are at the castle instead of up there. Huh.

1 hour ago, ping said:

The "You're so nice, lemme give you my kingdom" routine that Sheema and now King Orleans do wouldn't have felt out-of-place in Fateslandia at all.

Heck, if anything Corrin meets with more opposition lol. Sure, everyone's like "oh boohoo I'm so sad I have to fight you" but at least they do still fight them. Multiple times, even. Marth just walks somewhere and gets countries handed over to him.

...Sheesh, can't wait to get to FE5 for a story that's actually great... Say, completely unrelated, but might I ask what translation patch you've got for Thracia? Everyone knows the old meme patch, but even when it comes to the more modern translations the situation's a mite... interesting, for lack of a better word.

1 hour ago, ping said:

__

Pff... I'm sorry, but hot pink armour is just inherently funny to me.

Funny because in her portrait all you can see is a black collar. Honestly would've preferred black armor and a red cape for her.

Her old TCG artwork does make it work better. Mostly by turning it from bright pink into a more burgundy red. She does get a bright pink, uh... drape? Come to think of it, this artwork basically just reversed her ingame sprite palette.

Eh, I mean, could be worse. Could be this guy from Berwick Saga who just wears a dress skirt into combat for some reason.

Years ago I defended that it was some kind of cloak or robe. Now I am older and wiser and I can plainly see, no that's just a dress skirt lol

1 hour ago, ping said:

Sheema didn't do a lot of combat this map, just two kills, but that's because she was busy ingesting some stat boosters (+7 HP, +4 Str, +5 Spd).

Ahh, what better substitute for real training, talent and effort than drugs

1 hour ago, ping said:

Yeah, I'm never going to be Kris fan (I still find them to be a really boring protagonist), but actually playing Book 2 really dispels the myth that they ursurp anybody's role. Except here, of course.

Turns out it's difficult to steal any roles when the original text doesn't have a personality lol

1 hour ago, ping said:

I think this is the part where Wraith would start his sermon? I'm afraid I can only offer cookies.

And that's not all. I wrote 17 Izana soups. 17.

...They're not all being implemented yet, of course, but they did implement like 7 of my soups in this update, which is pretty good considering their stated priority is supports written for abandoned older versions of the mod. Feels good to feel appreciated, I won't lie.

And yes, I did write Gunter and Fuga a romance.

1 hour ago, ping said:

The ale mug probably doubles and one-rounds them.

I would not even be fucking surprised. New Mystery is such a silly game.

[Jotari]

9 hours ago, ping said:

FE3 Book 2 Chapter 17: Gra's Setting Sun

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But, along their way, they passed through the Kingdom of Gra, a land allied to Archanea. In the previous war Gra sided with the Dolhr Empire, which resulted in their king, Jiol, dying in battle and the destruction of the kingdom. The country was once a part of Altea, but they sided with Archanea listening to Hardin's orders. Hardin found King Jiol's daughter, Princess Sheema, and allowed her to ascend the throne, and he then ordered reinforcements from Gra. Sheema received wild support from the citizens of Gra. To them, Sheema was their only hope. The youths all volunteered to become soldiers. They were happy to move out and have a chance to defeat their bitter enemy, Altea. But, their dreams were shattered in an instant... Before the fast approaching Altean elites, Gra's soldiers lost all morale, and fled for their lives.

Kinda rough for Gra. Previous war, they sided against Akaneia, and ended up invaded by Marth. This time, they side *with* Akaneia, and also end up invaded by Marth.

The "bitter enemy" part feels a bit artificial, to be honest - Altea and Gra are said to have been allies for their entire existance as independent nations, until Jiol switched sides during the War of Shadows. Well, I suppose if Jiol was still highly popular when he was killed... Eh, the whole thing isn't really described in any detail, so I'm sure one could fill these in in a way that makes sense. In both Book 1 and Book 2, Gra is basically just a quick stop on the road between more important destinations, which seems like a bit of a waste considering their highly dramatic backstab in the backstory.

: "Princess Sheema, it seems the Altean army has arrived."
: "Really...? It's already the end. Samson, I have brought you much trouble. I need to watch the final days of my Kingdom of Gra. You may leave now."
: "Princess, isn't it already enough? Shouldn't you despise King Jiol for forcefully taking your mother? Isn't that why you hid at Pales and stayed away from this country? Right now you are just being tricked by Hardin, and being used by him."
: "Perhaps. I heard that the people of Gra wished for the restoration of the country, and that's why I agreed to help him. However Hardin is only interested in using us. He would just throw us away like rubbish the moment we became useless to him. Still, I will not leave! How can I just abandon those fighting for my sake!?"
: "Impossible... How can our fresh recruits resist Altea's elites...? Fine, if you're staying, I will also stay to the end. This could be interesting."
: "Samson... Why are you doing this? Aren't you mercenaries only interested in being paid with gold? I no longer have money to give you..."
: "I don't know why either. It's just... Sometimes men feel like there are things that they must do. Also, I want to see how that kid fights this battle. If he truly is a hero, perhaps your mind may be changed..."

This part I like, though, minus the "just to be sure that you don't forget that Jiol isn't sympathetic, bee tee dubs he's a rapist" part. Almost always I find that this is a cheap way to give a story a more ""mature"" veneer. "Oh, look, we're not shying away from the dark, taboo realities of the world" - like, dude, you threw in half a sentence and called it a day.

ANYWAY, I do like how the intro hints at Sheema and Samson being recruitable. A nod towards Gra's soldiers being green and no match for your own units, saying that Marth should fight the battle "like a hero"... That's well done, I find.

__

And it's easy enough to recognise the dangerous enemies between the greenhorns. This also doubles up as a good gameplay representation of how Akaneia just spent Gra's finest soldiers' lives on the previous fight, and how only the last reserves are available for its last stand. Good job, Kaga. In that regard.

The map! We've been here before, of course. We still have the village in the top left corner, which means that Marth has to move in the wrong direction a bit at first, and a separate treasure room, so Julian and some bodyguard have to go their separate way. You can technically shove everybody through the eastern part of the map and use the backdoor to the throne room, but that's a really long one-tile path that you'd have to move through.

The two groups of three Wyvernlords each haven't quite synced up their attack timings, which is a bit more restraint by the map designer than really was necessary. It's not ch.2 anymore; three Wyverns at once isn't that big of a deal for our team at this stage.

The main problem of this map is that there's no real pressure on the player to go fast, with exactly one exception - a thief with a Nosferatu tome that will escape the map pretty quickly if you don't intercept him. But other than that, it's once again a fight with some (but not a lot) of initial pressure by the Wyverns, followed by a very easy clean-up that still takes more time than defending against these flying buggers.

And as far as the Thief goes: Catria boosted by Phina can catch him on turn... 3, I believe it was, which is barely in time before he escapes at the southern edge of the map. Her stats are kinda OK, so she can do this solo, as long as she brings Iote's Shield against the Archer.

__

The Wyverns coming from the east get taken out on PP2...

...and Tiki, boosted by Phina, then murders the other three on EP3, also answering the pending question (for me) if her DivineDragon form's "Dragon" effectiveness applies against these, too. You never know with these old FE titles.

Meanwhile, Minerva makes a quick trip to the Armoury, sells some Silver Axes that I forgot about, plus some promo items, and buys a bunch of Silvers.

Oh, and Minerva also buys a bunch of Door Keys, since Marth uses the last one in the convoy. I forgot to give it to somebody before the start of the map, but luckily, Boots are very good in this game, so the main group didn't have to wait overly long.

__

Promotion of the day: Caeda, which happens to confirm that when a dismounted character promotes, they stay dismounted even if they're doing so while outdoors.

Oh, I almost forgot - at some point, the Gra soldiers start running towards the southern edge of the map, although I don't think they actually escape from it. I'm not sure what triggered this - maybe it's just turn-based, or maybe they started running when there were no Akaneian soldiers on the map anymore (visibly on the map, that is, since they started running before I opened either room).

__

: "You are Princess Sheema? It's great to see you safe. I don't view Gra as an enemy. Gra and my country were originally one country. The country may have divided after Anri's death, but we always got on well as allies. But, in the previous war, I felt deeply regretful about things turning out the way they did. Princess Sheema, please allow us to be friends once again. I don't want to fight Gra."
: "Prince Marth... Once I heard that you didn't attack my fleeing soldiers, I was really surprised. You truly are the second coming of King Anri. I trust you. Please... Treat the citizens of Gra... as if they were you citizens. I will hand my whole country to your care... Prince Marth."

Can't allow a woman to be king, eh, Kaga?

I liked how Sheema was introduced at the beginning of the chapter (minus the... but don't let me get started on that again). Reminiscent of FE11!Marth, in a way (#KagaDidItFirst), in that she didn't ask to be put into her position, but still accepts the responsibility she has in it. Also, as little as we actually see of Gra, the opening makes it seem that her people put a lot of importance in being a politically distinct nation - at least that's how I would rationalise why they're so devoted to their royals. So it's really disappointing that Sheema immediately tells Marth to absorb Gra into Altea again, and that she, once Marth becomes the King of Kings, also refuses to become queen of a Gra sub-kingdom again. But hey, we can't risk having a girl infect any throne with cooties.

[HP 60% | Str 60% | Skl 70% | Spd 50% | Lck 60% | WLv 60% | Def 20%]

Kaga also did Barth from The Binding Blade first. Her offensive stats are funny bad considering her joining time (even though she has the WLv to use Gradivüh at base), but she has average HP and is only 3 points below the Def cap. She isn't uniquely bulky or anything (Sheeda has 26 HP | 18 Def when mounted, not to mention Catria or the dragons), but it's a lot more impressive than her New Mystery self, which has a personal Def base of two.

Her growths are very good, of course, almost on Est's level - but like with Est, it's not the greatest look for a late-joining growth unit when the early-joining growth units already started hitting stat caps before you arrived with 8 Str and 0 AS.

[HP 70% | Str 30% | Skl 10% | Spd 20% | Lck 50% | WLv 70% | Def 20%]

Meanwhile, Samson joins as Better Astram. It's not by a lot - same HP/Def, +1 Str, +2 Spd - but it's notable that the only stat that Astram beats Samson in is WLv... and Samson already has a high enough WLv to use Mercurius at base. He seems just like very straightforward endgame-ready character.

Of course Sheema has to recruit him first...

: "That's great, Sheema. Now I can finally leave without worry."
: "Samson... Can you not leave...?"
: "You don't need me anymore. From now on Prince Marth will protect you."
: "Don't leave! I don't want you to leave..."
: "Huh, what? Why do keep me? It doesn't seem like you. ...Fine. If you say you need me, I won't go anywhere else. I will protect you wherever you may go. Is that fine with you?"
: "Yes..."

Romance for the ages.

(Well, I mean, at least neither of them randomly vanishes without a trace after the war)

And that's the map. I didn't really say all that much about the fight itself, but that's because there isn't all that much to say. No reinforcements, only that one thief as an incentive to go fast. Easy map as a result.

: "Lord Marth, if this battle continues it will become meaningless, and will only give more time for Hardin."
: "Mmm, I was thinking the same. If we keep heading east, more needless blood will be spilt. So I have decided a different route for us to go. How about we go directly south from Menedi, and enter Pales from Adria Peak?"
: "You want the troops to cross that dangerous mountain path? It's too dangerous..."
: "I am already prepared for danger. Besides, we were able to conquer the dangerous Anri's Way, so this should be easy in comparison..."
: "...That's a fair point. If we can cross it, we can attack the enemy from the rear. Understood, we'll try that."

Is this the first time that Marth came up with a strategy? Good for him, if that's the case. It really would be a shame if, in a potential remake, this plan would be attributed to somebody else.

The Team:

	Lv. 	   HP Str Skl Spd Lck WLv Def Res  +XP
Marth	17.59	   36  17  15  16  19  12  14   1  +141
Arran	*/11.08	   23  11  12  13   4  11  12   6  --
Sirius	*/9.37	   30  14  13  16   3  15  12   6  +42
Matthis	17/4.29	   29  17  19  17   9  19  14   8  +32

Caeda	19/1.00	   26  16  19  23* 20  20  18   3  +64*
Catria	19/3.43	   37  19  20  20  11  18  20   0  +104
Minerva	*/8.20	   25  13   9  15   7  14  16   0  +10
Sheema	*/1.00	   26   8   3   5   4  12  17   3  --	(base)

Samson	*/5.00	   28  12  16  19   7  12  11   3  --	(base)
Julian	13.70	   24  14  12  20  13  11   9   1  +42
Warren	17/3.30	   34  13  17  16   4  12  11   3  +87
Bantu	15.42	   25   8  16  10   3   3   7   1  +62

Tiki	12.95	   20   8   8  10  16  10   5  11  +190
Jubelo	20/8.36	   28  20  11  20  16  20   9   9  +30
Wendell	*/13.82	   29   9   9  13   7  16   5   7  +52
Yumina	16/1.88	   20  12  11  16  16  15   4   8  +30

Phina	10.30	   18   6   8  18  15   9   4   0  +80

 

Answers!

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If it only was Marth's team opening a chest that triggered it, you could rationalise it as "they are distracted by plundering their own shit, strike now", even though the map layout with the very choke-y treasure room doesn't really support that strategy at all. With the "neutral" thieves on them map... yeah, doesn't make much sense at all.

Whoops.

Generally speaking, that kind of typo is almost always my fault, while I can blame the translation for most oddly placed commas or if the syntax is a bit off at times. I've been collecting some mistakes where I'm quite certain that they are mistakes and not just a clunky phrasing, but honestly, FE3 is probably the non-localised game that can use a new translation effort the most, with Jugdral having relatively new ones.

Case in point. Gotoh is a bit of a betting man in that dialogue, too.

And horses are just really tall in Akaneia.

Interesting, hopefully I'll remember to test that when I get there.

Careful - you're showing first signs of writing slashfic, a clear symptom of overexpostion to anime stuff.

Well, at this point of the story in New Mystery, he and Samson can get drunk together and reminisce on their glory days.

 

 Bullet point responses, because, while I can break quotes on mobile, I can't get rid of quotes on mobile or copy and paste them elsewhere. Meanwhile on desk top, the ability to break quotes just stopped working for me like a year and a half ago.

*I think bitter enemy at this point is pretty apt. Sure, allies for ever before that, but betraying someone mid battle and resulting in their king getting killed and their country conquered, that's one hell of a bitter pill to swallow. And because it's just so fucking scummy, you know the people of Gra have absolutely no other choice than to use mental gymnastics to justify it and make it somehow Altea's fault.

*Somehting I'm only picking up on here for the first time. Sheema hid at Pales? Wot? Okay, makes sense if she has the autonomy to get away from Jiol, but...Marth conquered Archanea before Gra in Shadow Dragon. So where was Sheema? Did Marth meet her in Archanea and have the moral fortitutde to not use her as a hostage when conquering Gra, even though he only has the character development to stop hating his enemies during Menedy? Or was Sheema undercover hiding as a maid or something and managed to survive the entire war in relative safety by hanging out with castle staff or something? Gee, what wasted potential. Shadow Dragon's refusal to ever incorporate it's Mystery canon continues to baffle and irk me.

*I do like that they use Samson for this. Sure it violates the player's agency by making a canon choice for the village visit, but man did Gra need an extra character to its name and Samson was right there doing nothing. In Shadow Dragon NES literally the only Gra character is Jiol himself. The Shadow Dragon remake would give us our first and only minor Gra boss, but they refused to give him a name and just called him the Lieutenant. Unless you go with my headcanon that Lieutenant is his actual name as his parents were moderately (but not overly) ambitious about his prospects in life and he's desperate to prove them wrong by getting a promotion.

*I'm still certain I had a Hunter Promote to a Bow Knight and keep the horse in the Fire Dragon Graveyard chapter before

*I have no highground to stand on when it comes to typos. FEBuilder GBA's lack of spell check is the bane of my existence.

2 hours ago, ping said:

Double update today!

FE3 Book 2 Chapter 18: Battle of the Pass

  Reveal hidden contents

__

Once they passed Adria Peak, they would be directly at Pales. Hurry, we can't let the enemy spot us! We must charge straight through!! Marth and the others were anxious, but they carried on advancing across the narrow mountain road. But they didn't expect, in the middle of the cliff, to be ambushed by an unfathomable enemy. They were the northern Kingdom of Aurelis's elite squad, the "Wolfsquad", who had headed south to aid Archanea.

: "Wolf, Sedgar, Vyland. Is this really okay...? Can we really fight this battle?"
: "Roshea! What are you trying to say? Look, the Altean army is marching along the narrow mountain road. Now's our only chance to defeat them."
: "Yes, Roshea. We swore that we could sacrifice our lives for Lord Hardin. Lord Hardin was the one who freed us plains people from slavery. If we don't fight Altea now, Pales will fall. Do you want Lord Hardin to be defeated by them?"
: "That's right! Prince Marth wants to destroy Archanea, and conquer the world. And that's why he joined forces with Macedon to crush Grust. Now he even has Gra under his rule. If we don't do something, the whole world will fall under his control."
: "I still don't believe it. I cannot believe Prince Marth would have such ambitions."
: "What? Are you saying that Emperor hardin lied? Do you think that he would stoop to such a low!? Enough, Roshea!! You disappoint me, if you want to betray us then go ahead. Sedgar, Vyland, let's go. If we're too slow, they will pass us."
: "Hey, wait! I won't betray you. I understand... I'll go."

Honestly, these three should've remained unrecruitable in New Mystery. Not only for the drama, but also to spare them the humiliation that are their stats in the remake.

The map! It's pretty good at capturing a solid cavalry charge at your flank, I find, with your troops being far more spread out than usual, facing a big clump of horse units. I like it even though it is really easy because you can just neutralise all these horsies (not just the named ones) by visiting the village. FEWoD recommends warping Marth over...

...but that's really not necessary because Marth with Boots can just walk over in a single turn with a dance. Because I misremembered a bit and thought that the horsies leave immediately via cutscene, I did the murder-for-XP routine before this...

...including a face-off between our Paladins of choice in Book 1 and Book 2. Who is stronger?

Matthis, of course, who can double and one-round with a Silver Lance.

: "Lord Hardin..."

Naturally, the other non-Roshea dudes also face Marth's wrath:

: "The leader of Aurelis's knights, Wolf, is here for your head!"

: "You... Why are you invading other countries? Have you been blinded by ambition?"

The most dangerous part of the map is a bunch of Wyvern reinforcements after you visit the village. I got 6 immediately (that is, at the start of EP1) and one on the second turn, although there might be some randomness involved.

The play here was to make sure that they all fly into non-flyer range, enemy phase kill optional, to make sure that the squishies are safe.

But I need to go back to Marth getting the village real quick...

: "Oh, Prince Marth. It is good to see you."
: "Huh, aren't you King Aurelis?! What are you doing here?"
: "I came here to stop my country's army. Also I must apologise to your highness. I believed Hardin's words and followed Archanea, but I now realise my wrongs. Archanea's Empress Nyna secretly sent me a letter, saying that Hardin isn't normal and is ill... My country will remain neutral, and its knights will return to Aurelis. I hope you won't attack my men anymore."

:whistle:

: "I understand, your highness. I don't want to fight with you. Please forgive me for taking so many of your kngihts' lives."
: "Oh! You really are like what the rumours say. My body is frail and I have no children, and even Hardin, my younger brother, has completely changed. Prince Marth, please protect Aurelis in my place. I will hand my whole country to you. I give this jewel to you as a gift. This is a magical jewel containing the divine power of life. I spent a lot of gold to buy it from a travelling merchant. I believe it will be useful to you. Don't worry about Hardin. Since he is a knight, it is natural for him to die in battle. That is his fate. Well, Prince Marth, I will go on ahead. I hope you will all be safe..."

Y'know, it would've been a really funny twist if that magical jewel bought from a travelling merchant would've turned out to be the Darksphere. Hardin's already corrupted, so Gharnef made sure to pass it on to the next monarch, but King Orleans passed it on to Marth before he himself could be affected too much.

Anyway, I have to reiterate that Marth really is rather corrinesque. The "You're so nice, lemme give you my kingdom" routine that Sheema and now King Orleans do wouldn't have felt out-of-place in Fateslandia at all.

__

Pff... I'm sorry, but hot pink armour is just inherently funny to me.

Sheema didn't do a lot of combat this map, just two kills, but that's because she was busy ingesting some stat boosters (+7 HP, +4 Str, +5 Spd).

After the Wyverns are dealt with, the rest of the map is pretty much a formality. All those three Bishops use Fortify staves, which slows things down a bit, but it's not too bad. What's nice about this narrow formation is that it's possible to pass around the Starsphere pretty consistently.

(as a note, you can see Catria flying over the mountain after crit-killing the final Wyvern. Had she not gotten a crit, I believe Phina would've been able to boost Sheeda far enough to get the kill.)

The biggest beneficiary of the orb-sharing is Marth himself, who made use of the Mercurius's boosted XP gain (and the Orb's second effect to prevent weapons from wearing down) to hit Lv.20. He didn't gain any Str in his last three levels, but +5 HP and +3 Def is a pretty good outcome nevertheless.

Oh, and from the cave spawns 1 Thief per turn, which was some nice and easy XP for Julian, although without boosted growth rates, of course.

And that's that. Only five turns, really without any downtime. Good map, just a bit easy.

: "Jagen, it seems we've finally crossed the peak. Pales isn't far from here."
: "Yes, if we go down from here, we will reach the capital of Pales in an instant. Also, your highness, I just received news of an attempted coup in Pales. The knights and civilians who opposed Hardin's actions rebelled against him. It seems their leader was Lady Midia."
: "What! Midia...? What happened?"
: "Unfortunately Lady Midia was defeated, and was captured... Each day many people are executed. It is only a matter of time before Lady Midia shares the same fate."
: "Damn, Hardin... I can't believe that he would do that. Alright, let's go and rescue Midia! We must hurry to Pales and end this once and for all. Jagen, let's go!!"

The Team:

	Lv. 	   HP Str Skl Spd Lck WLv Def Res  +XP
Marth	20.--	   41  17  18  17  20  12  17   1  +241
Matthis	17/5.29	   30  17  20  18   9  20  15   8  +100	(+5 Skl, +5 Lck)
Sirius	*/10.22	   31  15  13  17   4  16  12   7  +85
Arran	*/11.18	   23  11  12  13   4  11  12   6  +10

Catria	19/4.98	   39  20  20  20  11  19  20   0  +155
Caeda	19/2.25	   27  17  20  23* 20  20  19   3  +115
Sheema	*/1.85	   33  12   3  10   4  12  17   3  +85	(+7 HP, +4 Str, +5 Spd)
Julian	15.30	   26  14  13  20  15  11  10   1  +160

Warren	17/3.62	   34  13  17  16   4  12  11   3  +32	(+5 Spd)
Bantu	17.72	   25   8  16  10   3   3   7   2  +230	(+7 HP, +10 Skl)
Tiki	13.87	   20   8   9  11  17  10   5  11  +92
Jubelo	20/9.26	   28  20  11  20  17  20   9   9  +90

Wendell	*/14.37	   29   9  10  13   8  17   5   7  +55	(+5 Str)
Yuliya	16/2.68	   21  12  12  16  17  16   4   8  +80
Phina	10.70	   18   6   8  18  15   9   4   0  +40

 

 

I'd say there's the occasional flash of that in the NES games, too, although to be honest, the only concrete example I can think of right now is Gaiden's endgame - first the neat detail that Celica "overworld-walks" across the final map before talking to Judah, and later her group taking damage from fighting offscreen while Alm is desperately trying to get to her.

Checkmate, Kris apologists

Yeah, I'm never going to be Kris fan (I still find them to be a really boring protagonist), but actually playing Book 2 really dispels the myth that they ursurp anybody's role. Except here, of course.

I think this is the part where Wraith would start his sermon? I'm afraid I can only offer cookies.

The ale mug probably doubles and one-rounds them.

*A double update!...this is going to be because the next chapter is basically only a cutscene, right? Which is coincidentally our only chapter in this section of the game not lifted from Book 1. Which really helps to test my patience with Book 1. But hey, at least Hardin's nameless brother shows up, and we all love minor nameless characters who are actually important in universes.

*Oi, Wolfguard stats in New Mystery. They really did do them dirty. They are the supposed leaders of the squads yet they are so hugely inferior to their capped stat unerlings, it's not even funny. It's genuinely difficult to recruit them and stop them getting murdered by their own men while not killing them yourself and still having enough units to actually take out said underlings. If the DS games weren't so dedicated to NES and SNES fidelity, then those underlings would have become green units after recruiting Vyland and co.

*I'm questioning the timeline here of King Aurelis' redemption. He was with Hardin initally, but he changed his tune when a letter from Nyna convinced him that Hardin was mad with power. When did Nyna have an oppertunity to write that letter? When did King Aurelis receive it? I kind of get the impression Nyna was nabbed pretty early on in the war when the other maidens were being rounded up. So, I can only conclude that letter had an epic journey of its own traveling across Archanea with people trying to stop it and near encountes until its bearer finally managed to get a one on one audience with the King of Aurelis, just in time for King Aurelis to rush to Marth's aid.

 

Edited February 8 by Jotari

[ping]

8 hours ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Yeah I do believe I prefer Wolfguard lol. Has more oomph to it.

It's in my list for corrections, too. Wolfguard is the official localisation (apparently, Heroes uses "Coyote's Men", but fuck Heroes), so it probably should be used in the translation patch, too.

8 hours ago, Saint Rubenio said:

...Sheesh, can't wait to get to FE5 for a story that's actually great... Say, completely unrelated, but might I ask what translation patch you've got for Thracia? Everyone knows the old meme patch, but even when it comes to the more modern translations the situation's a mite... interesting, for lack of a better word.

Hmm, I thought I hadn't applied any translation patch yet...

...and now I'm a bit confused. The opening has these English subtitles, but everything else (dialogue, UI) is still Japanese.

I'm also curious what "a mite... interesting" contains. Without context, that could mean anything from "They took some liberties in the translation. In America." to "The creators drink blood and sacrifice virgins to Cthulhu".

8 hours ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Funny because in her portrait all you can see is a black collar. Honestly would've preferred black armor and a red cape for her.

A reverse Wendy, if you will. (although I think her ingame portrait is the only instance where her armour is pink, it being orange in both the official art and her battle sprite)

8 hours ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Eh, I mean, could be worse. Could be this guy from Berwick Saga who just wears a dress skirt into combat for some reason.

He might be a Scot that didn't want to spend money on dyes for his kilt.

8 hours ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Ahh, what better substitute for real training, talent and effort than drugs

They say that hard work beats talent any day. What few people add is that a hard worker with lots of talent is still going to come out ahead of a regularly talented diligent worker. But what truly nobody can beat is a hard worker with lots of talent and a well-stocked drug cabinet.

8 hours ago, Saint Rubenio said:

And that's not all. I wrote 17 Izana soups. 17.

Average Boy's Love enjoying FE fan: "Gosh, I just can't decide if Soren or Ranulf is the better match for Ike.
Ruben:

8 hours ago, Jotari said:

*Somehting I'm only picking up on here for the first time. Sheema hid at Pales? Wot? Okay, makes sense if she has the autonomy to get away from Jiol, but...Marth conquered Archanea before Gra in Shadow Dragon. So where was Sheema? Did Marth meet her in Archanea and have the moral fortitutde to not use her as a hostage when conquering Gra, even though he only has the character development to stop hating his enemies during Menedy? Or was Sheema undercover hiding as a maid or something and managed to survive the entire war in relative safety by hanging out with castle staff or something? Gee, what wasted potential. Shadow Dragon's refusal to ever incorporate it's Mystery canon continues to baffle and irk me.

I would assume that she's a non-legitimised bastard, and that her existance wasn't even all that well-known while Jiol was alive. But there's a lot of blank space in the story between that and her ascension. Did Jiol have a legitimate heir and that's why her existance had never been publicised, and said heir died in the war? Did he just not bother to set up his inheritance? There's room for an interesting backstory, but it's entirely speculative.

It's interesting to note that Jiol's last thoughts were of Sheema. It's a bit odd (Book 1 gives him some last-second humanisation, then Book 2 declares that he was a rapist), but it also suggests that she's his only child. Well, that or this was just a quick bit of foreshadowing without much thought put into the implications.

8 hours ago, Jotari said:

*I do like that they use Samson for this. Sure it violates the player's agency by making a canon choice for the village visit, but man did Gra need an extra character to its name and Samson was right there doing nothing. In Shadow Dragon NES literally the only Gra character is Jiol himself. The Shadow Dragon remake would give us our first and only minor Gra boss, but they refused to give him a name and just called him the Lieutenant. Unless you go with my headcanon that Lieutenant is his actual name as his parents were moderately (but not overly) ambitious about his prospects in life and he's desperate to prove them wrong by getting a promotion.

Yeah, Gra is seriously underdeveloped. My main issue with Sheema and Samson is that they only appear for a single chapter, with literally no reference to them before or after except for Jiol's death quote, but at least they add something to the country's charactarisation.

8 hours ago, Jotari said:

*I'm questioning the timeline here of King Aurelis' redemption. He was with Hardin initally, but he changed his tune when a letter from Nyna convinced him that Hardin was mad with power. When did Nyna have an oppertunity to write that letter? When did King Aurelis receive it? I kind of get the impression Nyna was nabbed pretty early on in the war when the other maidens were being rounded up. So, I can only conclude that letter had an epic journey of its own traveling across Archanea with people trying to stop it and near encountes until its bearer finally managed to get a one on one audience with the King of Aurelis, just in time for King Aurelis to rush to Marth's aid.

Nyna's actually the last one to be kidnapped, if Gotoh is to be believed (big if, of course). At the end of Ch.16, he assumes that Gharnef is in, or on his way to, Pales in order to collect her, so it's quite feasible that she wrote that letter very recently. That said, it's still a bit odd that she didn't send a letter earlier, considering that she sent Marth the Fire Emblem months before informing Hardin's brother.

[Jotari]

47 minutes ago, ping said:

and now I'm a bit confused. The opening has these English subtitles, but everything else (dialogue, UI) is still Japanese.

I'm also curious what "a mite... interesting" contains. Without context, that could mean anything from "They took some liberties in the translation. In America." to "The creators drink blood and sacrifice virgins to Cthulhu".

Well considering that viewing the garbled name of a certain enemy class on the last three chapters of your game freezes the emulator, I'd say the latter. For some reason I just endured that. Despite being absolutely bullshit, it did feel quintessentially Thracian.

47 minutes ago, ping said:

I would assume that she's a non-legitimised bastard, and that her existance wasn't even all that well-known while Jiol was alive. But there's a lot of blank space in the story between that and her ascension. Did Jiol have a legitimate heir and that's why her existance had never been publicised, and said heir died in the war? Did he just not bother to set up his inheritance? There's room for an interesting backstory, but it's entirely speculative.

It's interesting to note that Jiol's last thoughts were of Sheema. It's a bit odd (Book 1 gives him some last-second humanisation, then Book 2 declares that he was a rapist), but it also suggests that she's his only child. Well, that or this was just a quick bit of foreshadowing without much thought put into the implications.

She is specifically not a bastard as one villager notes that she is the daughter of King Jiol's second wife (maybe the first wife was infertile). So the "taking" Samson refers to would be more forcing her to marry him than raping her on a bar table or something (course forcing someone to marry you almost certainly would have some inevitable raping going on by our standards).

And, for what it's worth, New Mystery tells us Sheena's mother gave Sheena a doll at some point which she still hides in her armour as a keepsake...which is nice even though it doesn't clarify things a whole lot.

47 minutes ago, ping said:

Nyna's actually the last one to be kidnapped, if Gotoh is to be believed (big if, of course). At the end of Ch.16, he assumes that Gharnef is in, or on his way to, Pales in order to collect her, so it's quite feasible that she wrote that letter very recently. That said, it's still a bit odd that she didn't send a letter earlier, considering that she sent Marth the Fire Emblem months before informing Hardin's brother.

Maybe the last one actively brought to the Dragon's Table, but I think we can easily speculate that she was under house arrest and not given much agency not long into the opening chapters.

[BrightBow]

1 hour ago, ping said:

Hmm, I thought I hadn't applied any translation patch yet...

...and now I'm a bit confused. The opening has these English subtitles, but everything else (dialogue, UI) is still Japanese.

Yes, that's the unpatched game. It has an English narration with Japanese subtitles. Surprisingly solid English too.

 

[Saint Rubenio]

3 hours ago, ping said:

It's in my list for corrections, too. Wolfguard is the official localisation (apparently, Heroes uses "Coyote's Men", but fuck Heroes), so it probably should be used in the translation patch, too.

Heroes as per usual coming in with the worst of the translations. Quick, everyone, rush to update your translation patches!

3 hours ago, ping said:

I'm also curious what "a mite... interesting" contains. Without context, that could mean anything from "They took some liberties in the translation. In America." to "The creators drink blood and sacrifice virgins to Cthulhu"

The original patch, dubbed Shaya Patch, needs no introduction. Pearls like "in America" and "stupid bitch," garbled menus, specific statsheets that crash the game, a chapter famously named Murder Hollace, a critical mistranslation leading people to believe that any units left behind when Leif escapes will also escape... Stray clear. This patch is best left forgotten outside of memes.

A patch called Project Exile was then released a few years ago. It was initially received with great clamor, as not only a patch that was actually polished, but also read really well! The writing was excellent, Thracia had never looked so good.

Then it turned out it took... liberties. Now you know how I feel about this issue, but I mean big liberties, like recontextualizing an entire spiel about the nature of weapons as tools to be about free will, adding four paragraphs of words to explain the new (invented) name for Murder Hollace, making up a catchy nickname for the main villain and adding a ton of new text throughout the game to explain it, misinterpretations and mistranslations galore like Leif being from Munster instead of Leonster... That, and the head of that patch was the kind of guy to threaten "legal action" of some kind against people, excised folks from the credits based on petty grievances and eventually took down the patch and ran away from the internet. So uh. Yeah.

 

Now for the relevant part: The patch you want is Lil' Manster. You can find it here in Serenes. It's basically an updated version of Project Exile, with a lot of the more egregious liberties restored and/or tweaked, while still maintaining the really pleasant-on-the-eyes prose and the more banal/fun liberties (there's an ongoing script revision that might change this, but don't wait on it, the release date is currently still Soon™). Also, tons of optional QoL additions if you want to make the Thracia experience more user-friendly, such as weapon rank growth and unit growth displays, hidden info displays, removed menu lag, etc. Nothing that affects the gameplay (except for the option to tweak the starting formation), but it would save you a lot of time looking for info online. If you don't want it, it's all optional, of course.

So uh, yeah, tl;dr: Get Lil' Manster. That's about it.

Funnily enough, Lil' Manster still refuses to just translate the chapter as "Murder Holes" as it was blatantly intended (Kaga misspelled it lol). Instead it's Desperate Ground, which I mean, works, but what's with everyone being so opposed to Murder Holes lol

3 hours ago, ping said:

A reverse Wendy, if you will. (although I think her ingame portrait is the only instance where her armour is pink, it being orange in both the official art and her battle sprite)

The OA always threw me for a loop, but her sprite isn't orange. It's not bright pink either, it's a sort of... Salmon color.

3 hours ago, ping said:

He might be a Scot that didn't want to spend money on dyes for his kilt.

Hah! I like this theory.

3 hours ago, ping said:

Average Boy's Love enjoying FE fan: "Gosh, I just can't decide if Soren or Ranulf is the better match for Ike.
Ruben:

It's fun writing the guy, what can I say.

Edited February 9 by Saint Rubenio

[Jotari]

1 hour ago, Saint Rubenio said:

Heroes as per usual coming in with the worst of the translations. Quick, everyone, rush to update your translation patches!

The original patch, dubbed Shaya Patch, needs no introduction. Pearls like "in America" and "stupid bitch," garbled menus, specific statsheets that crash the game, a chapter famously named Murder Hollace, a critical mistranslation leading people to believe that any units left behind when Leif escapes will also escape... Stray clear. This patch is best left forgotten outside of memes.

A patch called Project Exile was then released a few years ago. It was initially received with great clamor, as not only a patch that was actually polished, but also read really well! The writing was excellent, Thracia had never looked so good.

Then it turned out it took... liberties. Now you know how I feel about this issue, but I mean big liberties, like recontextualizing an entire spiel about the nature of weapons as tools to be about free will, adding four paragraphs of words to explain the new (invented) name for Murder Hollace, making up a catchy nickname for the main villain and adding a ton of new text throughout the game to explain it, misinterpretations and mistranslations galore like Leif being from Munster instead of Leonster... That, and the head of that patch was the kind of guy to threaten "legal action" of some kind against people, excised folks from the credits based on petty grievances and eventually took down the patch and ran away from the internet. So uh. Yeah.

 

Now for the relevant part: The patch you want is Lil' Manster. You can find it here in Serenes. It's basically an updated version of Project Exile, with a lot of the more egregious liberties restored and/or tweaked, while still maintaining the really pleasant-on-the-eyes prose and the more banal/fun liberties (there's an ongoing script revision that might change this, but don't wait on it, the release date is currently still Soon™). Also, tons of optional QoL additions if you want to make the Thracia experience more user-friendly, such as weapon rank growth and unit growth displays, hidden info displays, removed menu lag, etc. Nothing that affects the gameplay (except for the option to tweak the starting formation), but it would save you a lot of time looking for info online. If you don't want it, it's all optional, of course.

I would absolutely watch one of those hour+ YouTube video essays that goes into painful depth about all the changes made and unmade in the various Thracia translations.