(Conquest) Lunatic Mode Playthrough

[Colonel M]

After Paperblade twisted my arm, I decided to forego my goal of beating the game on Hard and just jumping to Lunatic. I had some experience (up to Chapter 17).

EDIT: I will ask though, it was mentioned - try to keep the spoilers at least beyond 17 away from me. Prior to that chapter - feel free to feed me information.

Some information:

My Unit
Boon - Strong
Bane - Dull
Talent - Cavalier

The Talent is more experimental. The Boon seems okay - I noticed MU with some Strength could OHKO a lot of things in certain Chapters and it made some follow-ups with Offensive Stance easier too. The Bane is more or less a shoddy choice. In fairness I felt nervous going for other Banes like Clumsy because they have serious growth drops (-20%). Sadly Dull has a -5% Speed growth too. It blows.

In hindsight, Samurai might have been a little better than Cavalier with the Boon being Strong and going for Quick on Cavalier. Still, Pair Up can patch some of these issues. Felicia can easily patch up Speed as a Maid Pair Up or even Hero if warranted.

Base Stats - 19 HP | 9 Str | 3 Mag | 7 Skl | 6 Spd | 5 Lck | 6 Def | 2 Res
Growths - 45% HP | 60% Str | 15% Mag | 45% Skl | 40% Spd | 45% Lck | 40% Def | 20% Res

Goal is for LTC while obtaining somewhat optimal strategies. I may restart for some stat growths, though I have noticed it's difficult sometimes to do so due to how the RNG is set up for this game.

Prologue - 2/2 Turns

Nothing to note. Followed tutorial.

Chapter 1 - 5/7 Turns

I believe there is no way to do this in less than 5 Turns due to Xander's Chivalry (When Avatar's HP is max damage against Avatar is +2 and damage received from Avatar is -2). Xander does not counterattack; however, you will need to refill with the Dragon Vein's Healing tile.

Chapter 2 - 4/11 Turns

I believe this is the lowest that is possible without doing something extreme like fishing for criticals (which can be hard to do).

- Chapter 4 is cleared in 4 turns. On my Turn 3s I cannot seem to find an effective way to finish off Kaze because Felicia and Gunter are too weak to do it (16+2).

- 4 Turn ensures Avatar to grab EXP from both Kaze and Rinkah.

Turn 1:

- Gunter L2 U5

- Avatar L3 U2

- Felicia L4U2

To successfully 4 turn this the enemy Samurai on the RHS should be L1 of Kaze.

[X]

[K]

S - Samurai

K - Kaze

X - Blank

Turn 2:

- Gunter U4 Attack Samura

- Avatar U5 Attack Oni Savage

- Felicia U5

One Samurai should suicide into Gunter, then Rinkah should attack Felicia. Kaze will also do 2 damage to Gunter. His Defense will be cut by 3, but Gunter's HP and Def are so high at this point it's no big deal.

Turn 3:

[X][X][X]

[X][G][X][K]

[R][[A][C][C]

[X][F][X][X]

X - Blank Tile

F - Felicia

G - Gunter

A - Avatar

K - Kaze

R - Rinkah

S - Samurai

- Avatar should be able to KO Rinkah without interruption. Gunter and Avatar should combo to attack, though sometimes it goes to Felicia. It is kind of random. Sadly you need both of them to KO. Felicia misses out even though MU likely has +4 Str at base at this point.

- If not, move Felicia around.

- Have Gunter finish off the Samurai.

Turn 4:

- Combo to finish off Kaze. Avatar paired with Gunter should do it.

Chapter 3 - 6/17 Turns

- 6 Turns to complete chapter. The Sky Knights will show up but will never get the chance to move.

- The hardest part is the Hit rates. The Chance of Success for this map is still kind of high. Just there are shaky moments (boss especially).

- Every Unit can Seize in this map.

Turn 1:

- Pair Up Gunter to Avatar.

- Move Avatar R3 D1. This should put Avatar into range of the furthest Samurai.

- Move Felicia R5 1D.

Samurais should suicide and KO themselves onto Avatar.

Turn 2:

- Move Avatar 6D Separate Gunter 1D.

- Move Felicia 6D.

Hans should suicide into the enemies.

Turn 3:

- Move Avatar 4D 1L activate Dragon Vein.

- Move Felicia wherever so long as she is right next to Avatar.

- Move Gunter 2D 5R attack Archer.

Archers will likely gang up on Gunter. Samurai should potentially suicide into Avatar, which should be KOed by Avatar and Felicia.

Turn 4:

- Finish clearing Archers and heal Avatar if necessary (or Gunter).

Turn 5:

- Heal Avatar (if necessary) but keep Felicia close to where Avatar will stand near the boss (2 tile range from Avatar attacking at 1 Range as it gives +2 Def).

- Pair Up Gunter to Avatar. Attack boss with Avatar.

With Felicia's Demoiselle, Pair Up with Gunter, and the WTA against the Archers Avatar should be able to survive no matter what. You also get 3 chances of hitting the boss (Turn 5 PP, Turn 5 EP, Turn 6 PP).

Turn 6:

- Finish boss with Avatar.

- Move Felicia towards throne and Seize.

I do not think a 5 Turn is possible; however, I could be wrong. I also forgot to take the Iron Lance from Gunter - that is optional since Gunter will be leaving us for a while and will come back with his own equipment. It is possible for Avatar to get an extra round of combat in if he kills the boss.

Avatar (5.97) - 22 HP | 11 Str | 3 Mag | 11 Skl | 8 Spd | 8 Luck | 8 Def | 3 Res

Chapter 4 - 10/27 Turns

[spoiler=Chapter 4]

Well well, I thought I logged this. I guess not. I moved left then up. Pair Up Kaze with Rinkah will ORKO Level 3 Faceless provided they do not stand on Wood nor Mountain tiles. The chapter is kind of crap to train Avatar on without costing a lot of turns. People mentioned an 8 Turn is possible. I did one in about 9ish, but I guess XeKr will need to show me how 8 Turn works.

I forgot to record Avatar and Kaze's stats.

Chapter 5 - 8/35 Turns

[spoiler=Chapter 5]

Whew, this chapter is pretty interesting because Avatar becomes a Feral Dragon with goodish stats. I place Avatar so that he draws in the 2 Steel Sword Mercenaries. Meanwhile, I have Rinkah Pair Up to Kaze and have Azura Dance Kaze. Kaze goes and doubles the Mercenary from afar to reach the guaranteed Guard from Pair Up. There will eventually be a time where Kaze will have to draw in 2 Dark Mages, so keeping Sakura 2 tiles from Kaze is recommended. The Dark Mages and the Paired Up Wyrmslayer Mercenaries will eventually move towards your group. Have Avatar KO 2 Dark Mages while Kaze should go right into the choke point to prevent the Wyrmslayer Mercenaries from attacking Avatar. Kaze can finish this Dark Mage no problem. Afterwards I have Avatar + Azura Dance to KO both Wyrmslayer Mercenaries while choking the entrance a bit with Kaze. Sadly because of the reinforcements you have to clean up this map. I don't know if finishing the boss makes the chapter end faster - leaning towards doubtful.

Also sad fact - you can't transfer items like the Iron Shuriken nor Bloom Festal over to Nohr. Sad days. :(

Avatar (7.57) - 23 HP | 13 Str | 4 Mag | 13 Skl | 10+1 Spd | 9 Lck | 10-1 Def | 4-3 Res

I sadly did not get Kaze's stats, but something tells me he may be worth me using in the long run.

=====

It's possible that I don't need the Strength Boon and probably could've went for the Speed one in hindsight. The Strength one, IIRC, only made minor impact in Chapter 2 and didn't make a huge impact in 3 because Avatar was either Pair Up with Gunter or next to Gunter / Felicia (pending on phase). I do know, at the least, that Avatar would have failed to double enemies barring the Kodachi Samurai - which Avatar can't reach on Turn 2 (only Gunter can). The Oni Savage (x1) has 5 Speed, and 10 is needed to double. It may have been possible to double Rinkah, but she attacks from 2 range on the Enemy Phase anyway.

In Chapter 3 it would make little difference. Avatar would need 11 Speed to reliably double the Archers and they prioritize Gunter usually. Avatar can come in and KO them if Gunter is adjacent to Avatar. The boss can't be doubled by Avatar no matter what and the boss doubling Avatar only makes the Pair Up's guaranteed block build up faster. You would have to be Level 4 with +Speed on all 4 Level Ups or paired with Felicia (which means no +Str / Spd).

Edited March 2, 2016 by Colonel M

[Redwall]

Good stuff, looking forward to this.

I believe this [four turns] is the lowest that is possible [for C2] without doing something extreme like fishing for criticals (which can be hard to do).

If +Spd Corrin goes two-for-two on her first two level-ups (0.7^2 = 49% odds), she can double Rinkah for a three-turn clear. I didn't explore it very much, though, so I don't know how much it depends on enemy positioning. With a male Corrin, because Felicia is so weak, the only three-turn clear I found required the axe guy to move on turn 1 six squares away from where Gunter would end on turn 2, but there might be more reliable approaches.

I do not think a 5 Turn is possible [in C3]

Shephen and Gwimpage on reddit have both found five-turn clears using Felicia and Jakob respectively. I'm not sure how they did it, though; the only five-turn clear I could get on Lunatic (Jakob) required a crit on turn 5.

[Gwimpage]

If you rig a Gunter crit (60ish% hit and 3% crit) you can 4 turn Ch3. I think you might need Jakob over Felicia to keep the enemies from blocking your path though.

[XeKr]

Cool, this should be interesting.

Random comments:

In Lunatic, you can’t reset for stat growths unless the character joins in that chapter. It’s fixed then.

+Hp/Def can 4 turn C1. But it’s harder later.

FeCorrin/Jakob can very reliably 3 turn C2, but I’m not sure Felicia can.

I think Corrin with 8 Def (I think yours does, as it seems you split the bridge enemies) can 5 turn C3, but the boss hit rates still suck. edit: Oh yeah or 4 turn with crits. Also Jakob with +1 Str can 5 turn without crits.

Edited March 2, 2016 by XeKr

[joshcja]

Can confirm sub 5 turning ch3 is reset hell but it works.

Not sure if its worth it to lose the boss exp for such a hateful clear though.

Following this cause funtimes

Edited March 2, 2016 by joshcja

[Colonel M]

I think Felicia is a bit too frail to effectively help with some of those strategies. So something tells me you would need a Female Avatar to effectively crush through some of the runs. Especially later on.

I did notice some can be reset scummed a bit (Chapter 2, Chapter 3), but just the amount of times it takes to reset sometimes is really killer.

So far looks like Chapter 4 I got in about 10 Turns. This one I missed Concoction, though I'm also sure if you can rig the criticals a bit you can probably cut a couple turns in there. Best bet here is Kaze Pair Up with Rinkah to ORKO Level 3 Faceless. Sadly I want Avatar to finish the blows but Ryoma really likes to clean everything up in the process. Did at least get the boss kill on Avatar so that helps I guess.

I went Left then Up. Probably could do Up then Left but the Seal Strength / Defense Faceless are a pain in the ass.

I'm willing to restart and do Female Avatar if the turn counts so far appear sub-optimal. Or even search for what RNs yield a critical on the bosses or important targets.

As a final note - I can believe the 5 Turn on Chapter 3 now that I think more about it, but I feel you would have to connect almost every hit to do so (and that boss is a pain too).

Edited March 2, 2016 by Colonel M

[avengerfive]

Buy a capture card and record this. They are only ~$300.

[Colonel M]

Buy a capture card and record this. They are only ~$300.

Got to do tax return first, but it's on the order.

[XeKr]

I think it’s interesting to play efficiently with Male, but yeah it’s just suboptimal since Jakob has better durability pre-split, then can reclass to Paladin post-split.

Up to you of course. No one really judging your turncounts and figuring out the "puzzles" of Conquest in a first(-ish) run can be rewarding itself.

C4 isn't bad to 8 turn if triggering the center DV asap (bait boss with Rinkah), but (to the best of my ability/knowledge) lower requires some shenanigans.

[Colonel M]

I think it’s interesting to play efficiently with Male, but yeah it’s just suboptimal since Jakob has better durability pre-split, then can reclass to Paladin post-split.

Up to you of course. No one really judging your turncounts and figuring out the "puzzles" of Conquest in a first(-ish) run can be rewarding itself.

C4 isn't bad to 8 turn if triggering the center DV asap (bait boss with Rinkah), but (to the best of my ability/knowledge) lower requires some shenanigans.

Yeah, Felicia kind of seems a little stuck on Maid. She can go to a couple other classes, but the only one that might be (somewhat) worth my time is Strategist or Hero. There's Bow Knight too, but that's a bit frailer (at a cost of better Pair Up stats... especially +4 to Speed). On Hard Felicia got to be okay once the Flame Shuriken showed up since Felicia is a bit better in the Magic department too in comparison to Jakob. But yeah, having access to Paladin and doing it decently alone makes Jakob really superior I feel.

I'm okay with it either way. I mean, honestly this is my first time through Lunatic and, as you guys pointed out, I am missing a few potential things that I could do, to which I completely understand. I'll go with it for now and see what happens. Though I may re-do C4 if that can be reliably 8 turned by activating the middle mountain earlier. That I can actually believe.

If I plan another Lunatic playthrough (and when I get that capture card) I will definitely record and commentate on this.

Edited March 2, 2016 by Colonel M

[XeKr]

Yeah sorry if it seems like we’re/I’m backseating/micromanaging.

There are a number of insights wrt to efficiency that people better than me have figured out (though much of the earlygame I did figure out myself). I don’t think they’re very important to blind runs of Lunatic Conquest, but more just curiosities to point out, after the fact.

You can note if you prefer no gameplay spoilers or such.

Edited March 2, 2016 by XeKr

[Colonel M]

Yeah sorry if it seems like we’re/I’m backseating/micromanaging.

There are a number of insights wrt to efficiency that people better than me have figured out (though much of the earlygame I did figure out myself). I don’t think they’re very important to blind runs of Lunatic Conquest, but more just curiosities to point out, after the fact.

You can note if you prefer no gameplay spoilers or such.

Not at all. I enjoy hearing different methods on things like this. This is why I offered to restart lol. I'm never a person to really turn down different methods - though I do kind of get a little cringing with some insane resets (but I will, of course, acknowledge them as potential strategies). You guys are more than fine.

I will ask though, since you mentioned it - try to keep the spoilers at least beyond 17 away from me. Prior to that chapter - feel free to feed me information.

EDIT: Just finished Chapter 5. Took about 8 Turns. 7 seems likely. Not sure about anything less than that. HP Tonic probably could have been used on Kaze here to help protect him a little better. Will post information later.

EDIT 2: Well well.. looks like I cannot take items from either side with me. A pity.

Edited March 2, 2016 by Colonel M

[XeKr]

...

Well well, I thought I logged this. I guess not. I moved left then up. Pair Up Kaze with Rinkah will ORKO Level 3 Faceless provided they do not stand on Wood nor Mountain tiles. The chapter is kind of crap to train Avatar on without costing a lot of turns. People mentioned an 8 Turn is possible. I did one in about 9ish, but I guess XeKr will need to show me how 8 Turn works.

...

8 turns is a benchmark number because that’s how long it takes for Ryoma to kill the Faceless going for Sakura. Like turns 5-8 are just waiting for him to clean up.

All that’s necessary is surviving the middle dv turn 4 ep. Corrin+Kaze and Rinkah standing next to them should work, as the boss typically goes for Rinkah. iirc Corrin+Rinkah with Kaze adjacent can also work as Corrin gets more defense and so +Spd doesn’t double and kill some weaker Faceless (which can expose him to more attacks). This is supposed to facilitate even faster clears as Corrin avoids the Strength Seal, and you can push harder for the top left dv, but I find neither Corrin or Kaze have the durability to keep moving that direction (unless there’s some very clever positioning somewhere).

6-7 is possible with some dodges(/crits), however.

For C5 a ridiculous Kaze can shave more turns, otherwise I think around 7-8 is a reliable standard. Kaze with Sakura's aura exactly avoids the 2hko and both Sakura/Azura can take a single hit, so there's a few approaches to it. The limiting factor is your Dragon has no 2 range and Kaze can't one-round the mages on enemy phase (without being ridiculous).

I wouldn’t worry too much for Corrin’s exp. Yeah it helps early stat targets significantly and squeezing out any extra exp is clearly useful, but exp gain slows down so fast if overleveled so that he’ll quickly be around the same level, even if skipping many early kills (the bosses are nice though).

Edited March 3, 2016 by XeKr

[Redwall]

Good idea with the EP1 Dual Guard on C5. I previously thought that the most reliable six-turn clear of C5--namely, one without a WTD attack from Rinkah--required +1 of either HP, Def, or Res from Kaze's C4 level-up to tank C5's RHS enemies on EP1, but it looks like +1 Spd will also do. Corrin needs bulk that cannot be too far below average (I think yours is enough), but fewer than 1% of Kaze (Ninja) level-ups will leave all four of these stats unchanged.

edit: ack, thought about it a bit more carefully and realized that the EP1 DG alone won't do for an axe-less six-turn clear, and that reaching the stat benchmarks for an axe-less six-turn clear is probably less likely than connecting one or two axe hits from Rinkah. Regardless the aggro DG-meter build looks like it should be a useful tactic in general.

Edited March 6, 2016 by Redwall