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Maniac Prologue is kicking my ass. Please help.


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  1. 1. Should I use it on Marth?

    • Use on Marth.
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    • Don't use.
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I started this game on Hard, but once I got into maingame, it was a little too easy--most of the difficulty was from not knowing reinforcement times. I started over on Maniac, but now I can't clear Prologue 8. Since it's only the third highest difficulty, I am inclined to believe this is more of an "I suck at FE" problem than a "this game is too hard" problem.

Starting over is no problem at all, if it's necessary or even if it would just make things better. I'm using DraStic, so I don't have access to DLC (if anyone has an AR code or DraStic-compatible save that would give me the DLC I'd be grateful). I'll try to put all the relevant information to my playthrough here. If you have any advice regarding planning ahead fod maingame that's appreciated too, but please keep in mind that reclass limits are intact.

MU can surcice and ORKO two thieves. Unfortunately she doesn't level from it. 99 exp ._.

Recruitment. I have Athena, Ogma, and Cain.

Stats. I made a Myrm MU (farmer, diverse, humane) who is currently level 8.19 (27 HP, 11 Str, 1 Mag, 15 Skill, 17 Speed, 7 Luck, 9 Def, 0 Res). I thought I would try training just one 7th Platoon member (Luke) to focus exp, and he is now 6.32 (25 HP, 10 Str, 0 Mag, 8 Skill, 10 Speed, 5 Luck, 10 Def, 0 Res). Caeda is 5.80 (20 HP, 6 Str, 2 Mag, 7 Skill, 16 Speed, 14 Luck, 8 Def, 6 Res). Wrys is 4.87 (16 HP, 3 Mag, 7 Speed, 4 Luck, 3 Def, 8 Res). Athena has 31 exp. Ogma has 47 exp. Merric has 83 exp.

Weapon ranks. MU is at C Swords and not close to B. Luke is sort of close to C Swords, and nowhere near D Lances. Wrys has 22 WEXP No one else has gained any significant WEXP.

Thanks!

Edited by isetrh
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Even if he's more-or-less at base, I'd deploy Merric, for chip. You can either attempt to LTC it and hope for dodges (while killing off units like Merric/Cain), or turtle the beginning enemies. The bad guys move in waves - see if you can figure out the pattern, and lure them accordingly.

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Deploying Merric. I plan to use him long-term for story reasons (looking up gameplay info has given me some vague spoilers, and I'm guessing based on their role in Final that he, Sirius, Julius, and Minerva are important to the plot), even though Linde or Etzel might be a better unit. Haven't gotten him a whole lot of exp due to his high level though.

Out of those two, turtling appeals more to me. I'm not going to worry about turns on my first playthrough. I'd also like to complete the game with no deaths ideally. I've been just making a five-unit line, but I probably need to be more creative.

Figuring out enemy patterns is something I've been avoiding because it seems tedious. I guess Maniac on a first playthrough will require some trial and error though.

Thanks!

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If you kill off a unit in Prologue, they'll come back in the main story - their text will indicate that they retreated, as opposed to dying outright. MU/Marth are the only exceptions, for obvious reasons.

As for turtling. . .pull the first couple of enemies towards your team by staying JUST within their range on the first turn. Figure it out from there.

There's Lunatic videos that'll show off exactly what I mean. Their stats might not be identical, but the gist of the video should help you.

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Even though units who die in the Prologue come back, it would still make the run feel less perfect.

I cleared the Prologue with your advice. Who would have thought that strategy would be so useful in a strategy game? Anyway, I'm over that hump, and I think I might have learned something in the process. Thanks for the help!

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I just got to Chapter 4 and my stats are quickly outpacing the enemy. I've been playing in the same way I would FE13 Lunatic (minus the lowmanning of course), making sure units grow well and taking as many turns as I need to maximize/allocate exp safely. This might be overkill for Maniac, judging by the fact that MU, Luke, Palla, and effective damge Marth can all ORKO, Luke and MU often do so with Iron, and Catria only needs about 10 damage chip.

I'm thinking of starting over again and playing Lunatic, but I don't know if that's a good idea. How much of a jump up is Lunatic? Alternatively for a smller difficulty jump I could use a weaker MU, like Archer. Wouldn't make Luke and co any less OP, but maybe I wouldn't snowball as hard?

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On Lunatic the prologue is far more difficult. Enemies get steel in prologue 5 or 6 instead of chapter 1. They get silvers in ch 1 with A ranks. Forged weapons appear earlier. Dragons have 1-2 range instead of the 1 range of Maniac. It's harder to feed kills to Luke in the prologue. In other words, it's much tougher, but you can handle it. Just curious, what MU are you using? For Lunatic I recommend Cavalier if you haven't completed the game on hard (Draco!MU is really good). Otherwise, I recommend Knight or Fighter. One other thing about Lunatic, you're likely to early promote your units and make forges more often.

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Knight!MU is OP, I recommend against using it unless you like to steamroll on a first H3 playthrough, Cavalier can lead to similar results. Otherwise I agree with momogeek, H3 is significantly harder than H2 but it's very doable with any MU type. Don't hesitate to forge things, a +8 iron bow or +5 steel bow can prove to be valuable for example, you get a good chunk of early cash anyway.

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Usually my MU is level 10 at the end of the prologue, and I promote him by chapter 5 for Dracoknight access because he tends to have the highest defense for me and can one round the dracos over the mountains. You should promote whenever you need the instant movement and/or stat boosts. If you like female MUs, then myrm, PK, or Cavalier is the best. Generally people agree that male MUs are better because of the extra defense. On some chapters, I recommend against turtling because Lunatic reinforcements are actually scary.

For forges, usually I start out by forging a +4 iron bow on chapter 1 for archer!Rody or hunter!Draug to use, although if you have removed reclass limits hunter!Rody or luke would be better. It's also useful on chapter 2, because those dracoknights are tough. I also forge a sword for myrm!Luke so that he can kill stuff more easily. Wing spear of course, and maybe a ridersbane. I'm still playing through Lunatic, but I would assume that you forge a wyrmslayer and dragonpike for endgame.

Just a note, on some chapters turtling may not be a good idea (unless you're like me and spam savestates.) Lunatic reinforcements are actually scary because your entire army is 2-3 shotted besides maybe MU.

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+4 iron bow helps you save money, but +7~+8 helps more on C2 and C3 because most units can actually OHKO DKs with it. also +7 allows for chumps like warren to miss out on the KO so anyone can finish off and get the EXP. +8 can kill some specific lategame enemies, but they typically are non-issues on casual runs.

>Wing Spear of course

I wouldn't forge a Wing spear beyond +2 (should allow Caeda to kill the C19 boss and all other generals), earlygame it's a waste because you have the armorslayer that Sirius, Ogma, MU and Sword!Luke can use so Caeda usually does well enough with a vanilla Wing Spear.

Ridersbane forge is pretty good, +5 mt OHKOes all relevant Paladins with a str-capped or close to it General / Dracoknight / Pally, str-capped swordmasters can ORKO all mage dragons and doubleable fire dragons in endgame; you're likely to cap str and get A swords but if you miss out on it (or don't want to bother with A swords horseman), a +1 mt wyrmslayer can do the job and is pretty cheap. A +9~+10 Dragonpike can OHKO endgame dragons. +2~+5 Mt Javelins or Hand Axes can situationally be nice, depending on what you want to kill from range. +2~+4 Dragonpike allows for Wyrm OHKOes, and allows Caeda to kill Ice Dragons. You may want to forge a levin sword if you use linde and she misses ORKOes as a swordmaster (typically handy from C16 to 21, and on some midgame maps).

agreed on promotion, it's very flexible.

I recommend using a horseman, since it's very useful overall with high Spd + no counters + high mov.

Edited by Gradivus.
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Huh, I thought male MU was better because of combined class sets.

Thanks for the advice on forges and promotions. I'll probably go with the +7 Bow.

Would Ogma make a good Horseman?

Would it be a decent idea to not train a Prologue scrub, leaving more exp for MU and Caeda? Prologue seems to be harder than early maingame if Hard and Maniac are any indication, and having one more deployment slot for the awesome units like Athena, Cain, Ogma, and Merric seems potentially useful.

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But Male MU is better...

You only get combined class sets after beating Hard and harder.

Ogma would make a decent one, but his speed growth is iffy (for Lunatic at least.) I would go with Draug.

I highly recommend you get at least 2 prologue levels into either Luke/Rody (or both), and then use one or both of them longterm because they're great units. Just FYI, they get oneshotted on the chapter 1 at base. You have 4 prologues to get them levels, so after that I wouldn't deploy either of them because 6-8 are the tougher prologues. Just deploy your better units. Also, get Ogma for prologue 6, Draug is pretty bad.

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it's actually very beneficial to deploy luke / rody etc on P6 to 8 because the enemies give lots of EXP. Deploying both on P8 might be a bit difficult but there are throne healing and such so it should work. an overleveled Caeda doesn't help as much as a third prologue unit either - her job is essentially double things with effective weaponry, and she has zero issues meeting speed benchmarks, so it's better to spread your exp towards 1-2 7th platooners. she'll likely cap cavalier spd before she promotes even if you don't overlevel her.

Edited by Gradivus.
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I see. I guess Luke is sticking around then. Not sure about Rody though. His options seem kind of limited with reclass limits. Thanks for the advice. I'll look back at it as I go through the game to see what forges are good.

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If you have not unlocked male class sets then your only two solid options for a Horseman are Ogma and Draug. Draug is significantly easier to train, although he may require an Angelic Robe in order to avoid being OHKO'd, and he will also need arms scrolls in order to use Wyrmslayers/Swordslayers. Ogma on the other hand misses some great early training chapters, but he has base C Swords meaning he only has to work on Bow Rank. He will require speedwings and a lot of speed rigging in order to have enough speed however. Castor might be an option but I have never tried to use him and he has quite mediocre growths and bases.

Also, use female MU if you want. Female MU has better class sets than Male without class sets unlocked, having access to the good Class A types along with General is actually pretty awesome for a first playthrough. I actually think Pegasus Knight female MU is the best female option, because with an Orphan > Beautiful > Enlightened build she ORKO's the first Soldier in Prologue 1 and if you rig her stats a little she will consistently double just about everything in the Prologue with a stronger weapon type than Myrm. She will then come out of Prologue with a good Lance rank, and can switch to Cavalier and use the Lady Sword (since it's E) freely to train some Sword Rank if she wishes. Female Cavalier is similar without the doubling, but beacuse she has base D Swords she comes out with slightly less useful weaponranks. Regardless, this MU will be able to transition very well between Peg/Draco, Sniper, Swordmaster, Paladin and General due to a good Lance Rank and Lady Sword access.

Finally, whilst it is beneficial to train a 7th Platooner over other prologue units such as Caeda, Cain, Athena, Ogma, etc, units like Caeda make many of the Prologue Maps significantly easier. I honestly don't think you should be training more than one of the 7th Platoon anyway, so if you restart on Lunatic then slot Luke in and feed him kills and ignore the rest. Rody's Lance Rank is not particularly helpful because between MU, Palla and Catria and Sirius you will have enough competant Draco/Paladins with C Lances or better, wheras Luke's Sword Rank is helpful for Armorslayer use in Chapter 5, 6 and 8. Rody's growths are also not put to good use in Class A types as you've outlined, and Luke has an easier time becoming durable enough to take hits. Both of them can't rely on Hunter without mixed class sets to get EXP so they're stuck with the crappy Archer class, which is not something you want to put units into unless you have to.

Edited by Irysa
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I just got to Chapter 4 and my stats are quickly outpacing the enemy. I've been playing in the same way I would FE13 Lunatic (minus the lowmanning of course), making sure units grow well and taking as many turns as I need to maximize/allocate exp safely. This might be overkill for Maniac, judging by the fact that MU, Luke, Palla, and effective damge Marth can all ORKO, Luke and MU often do so with Iron, and Catria only needs about 10 damage chip.

I'm thinking of starting over again and playing Lunatic, but I don't know if that's a good idea. How much of a jump up is Lunatic? Alternatively for a smller difficulty jump I could use a weaker MU, like Archer. Wouldn't make Luke and co any less OP, but maybe I wouldn't snowball as hard?

Get to Chapter 12, and tell me how easy it is. Don't judge a game based on the first four chapters.

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Get to Chapter 12, and tell me how easy it is. Don't judge a game based on the first four chapters.

It gets harder? I assumed early game would be the hardest part. Oh well.

Edit: To clarify, I didn't mean to accuse Maniac of being too easy. What I was trying to say was that the cheap way I was playing didn't fit the difficulty. The game seems pretty well balanced.

Edited by isetrh
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C4 is one of the hardest maps in lunatic, the enemies near sirius mass aggro on turn 3 and have 29-31 atk, though they are stupid enough to have a fixed attacking order

also, since you asked for a file with DLC, use this: http://www.mediafire.com/?jd573iihvcczjhv

idk if this is compatible with DraStic but should it not be compatible, it works for desmume. I don't really recommend RP for a first playthrough but your choice I guess.

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It gets harder? I assumed early game would be the hardest part. Oh well.

Edit: To clarify, I didn't mean to accuse Maniac of being too easy. What I was trying to say was that the cheap way I was playing didn't fit the difficulty. The game seems pretty well balanced.

Not every chapter can be cleared that way - the best benchmark for this IMO would be the end of Chapter 14, but I despise Chapter 12. Either way, keep playing. Four chapters does not a good judge of difficulty make.

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C4 is one of the hardest maps in lunatic, the enemies near sirius mass aggro on turn 3 and have 29-31 atk, though they are stupid enough to have a fixed attacking order

also, since you asked for a file with DLC, use this: http://www.mediafire.com/?jd573iihvcczjhv

idk if this is compatible with DraStic but should it not be compatible, it works for desmume. I don't really recommend RP for a first playthrough but your choice I guess.

I actually only played up to Chapter 4. I guess.I should.have said through 3x instead to be clearer. So I can't speak for what Ch 4 on Lunatic is like.

Thanks for the file. I am computer-semi-illiterate, and it took me a while to realize that desmume and drastic use the same save file type. I won't use the RP or Bond Drop on this playthrough, but I want to have them in the future without starting over from scratch. Not sure whether or not I'll use the Growth Drop.

Not every chapter can be cleared that way - the best benchmark for this IMO would be the end of Chapter 14, but I despise Chapter 12. Either way, keep playing. Four chapters does not a good judge of difficulty make.

I actually already started over... I wasn't very far anyway though, and Lunatic is... frustrating (MU gets critted? She dies. MU crits in P4? She dies. MU procs Luck on first level? Luke kills Ryan.). I wasn't very far anyway, so it's not a big loss. I get to redo past/present/future too, so that's nice. Edited by isetrh
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I believe with fort healing in between, Ryan can tank 2 hits from Luke and fire off an iron bow shot, tanks the 2nd hit, then fires off another iron bow and MU finishes. Crits on chokepoints from a squishy are a pain but outside of giving the enemies lck it can't really be changed.

Edited by Gradivus.
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I believe with fort healing in between, Ryan can tank 2 hits from Luke and fire off an iron bow shot, tanks the 2nd hit, then fires off another iron bow and MU finishes. Crits on chokepoints from a squishy are a pain but outside of giving the enemies lck it can't really be changed.

Yes, but at least when I tried it, Luke would continue to always attack Ryan every turn unless he could kill MU. MU couldn't hit him on PP without dying EP, so I had to use all my Vulneraries keeping Ryan alive while he slowly chipped Luke until Ryan could kill him. This could be avoided with a tanky MU, but Knight isn't a good option until I unlock class limits. Thus, back to Maniac, to unlock them.

Since class limits are intact, I'm thinking of using Cecille. She has the best class set of the four right now, and her durability will be more of a problem once I move up to Lunatic. It seems like unless I play H2 again, this is her best chance to be useful.

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