screenshot Kirie Plays FE8 HALB: Strength Without Power [Complete! Closing Thoughts/Feedback Posted]

[Kirie]

A welcome message from ♥Klokinator♥:

Welcome to Fire Emblem 8: Hella Awesome Lightning Boots! ([H.A.L.B.] For short)

This is a randomized and edited version of FE8. It was edited by Klokinator and features a number of gimmicks, though the editing is not at the level of FE7CM, and this hack is unrelated to FE8CM. Don't get it twisted.

Here are the settings used for this hack: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/28014061/FE8%20HALB/LP%20%232.png

-Every character in every class, player and enemy, has 9 movement. The exception is the Demon King.

-Weapon effects wasn't checked in this image, but I did check it in reality. Every weapon has a very high chance to add any 1 extra effect, such as poison, unlimited uses, a stat boost, or even the Devil effect. Watch out!

-Character classes, their recruitment order, their growths are all totally randomized, and boss classes are also randomized. Character bases are also randomized, though to a smaller degree.

-Every enemy and every boss has had their growths increased up to 100%. Some enemies will be very difficult, though this is subjective as I've allowed the tower and ruins grinding as needed.

-Items are also randomized, though to a lesser degree. Initially I wanted to edit descriptions for the LPers but since FEditor is borked after randomizing, that won't happen.

The goal of this LP is to try out a new gimmick (All units with 9 movement) but also to show off the all new (not really) WIP FE8 Randomizer Fix Patch! If you guys want to randomize with Otaku's randomizer, apply my patch and randomize! (In that order, please) Important fixes include monster weapons displaying stats properly and Eirika always being able to wield the Rapier (Provided her class can wield swords). Also if you randomize her position around (As I did) then the new not-lord won't but that's beside the point.

The LPers can play Ephraim or Eirika route, though Eirika route is recommended since I have not playtested Ephraim's.

Each LPer has a list of three units. They MUST use all three. They cannot use any units assigned to other LPers. These units appear at random intervals throughout the game. The LPers are only required to use the units on non-Ruins/Tower chapters. (Ie: Main story) and can grind them up if needed. Any units not listed can be used by everyone without limits.

Here are the unit lists:

[1] The Trifecta of Terror: Neimi, Amelia, Gerik [TAKEN BY TEQUILA]

[2] Lords of Chaos: Moulder, Rennac, Duessel [TAKEN BY ECLIPSE]

[3] Where's Gerik?: Innes, Tethys, Marisa [AUTO ASSIGNED TO MR. NIGHT]

[4] Hardcore Heroes: Forde, Natasha, Saleh [TAKEN BY MONIKER]

[5] Strength Without Power: L'Arachel, Ephraim, Tana [TAKEN BY KIRIE]

Watch out for the demon king, and may the best LPer... win? I guess?

Hello everyone, and welcome to the first LP I've ever posted here. I had the opportunity to join this fun, random, likely very difficult, semi-draft thing and I just couldn't say no. Does that make me a masochist? Probably.

By virtue of being online at the right time, I had the second pick in the draft and went with the Strength Without Power team because it contains 3 of my favourite characters from FE8, especially the lovely lady L'Arachel. After choosing, Klok gave me the following cryptic message: "And your pick is fairly interesting. It actually has TWO really good units, so we'll see how you fare. Endgame might be a bit of a bitch though." Intriguing!

There's no good way to know what to expect until we see it, so let's dive on in. We'll be playing on Normal Mode, Eirika Route as this is what the hack was balanced for and I don't want to make things any more difficult on myself than they already are. Let's jump on in!

WARNING: I do show off stats and information about units, so if you're one of the other LPers playing this game, read through at your own risk if you don't want to get spoiled!

[spoiler=Prologue - Kicking off the journey of our Pretty, Pretty Princess]

We get a nice introduction to the Sacred Stones story. tl;dr: Grado is a dick and invades Renais so King Fado sends his loving daughter, Princess Joshua, to escape the castle with her vassal, Swordmaster Myrrh, and make for Frelia where they can hopefully survive and live in peace. Aren't random recruitment, randomized class runs fun? I must admit that Joshua makes for a very pretty princess.

In the opening scenes, we also get to see that Valter is one of those axe-wielding centaur guys, and Franz seems to have stayed a Cav if his map sprite is any indication (which it should be), though I didn't happen to catch anyone else yet. And now the map finally opens. Let's take a look at our star players, shall we?

Here's a guide for growth colours:

Grey = Fucking terrible

White/Light Red = Pretty bad

Orange = Average

Blue = Pretty great

Glowing green = 100%+

Yay for Princess Joshua Knight Lord! Str is green, so we'll be getting at least 1 point there every level up, which is handy. Blue Def makes sense for a Knight, and yellowy average Skl. Poor Spd kinda sucks, but we get a +5 Spd bonus from the equipped weapon (Slim Lance), so we'll have to keep that in mind. Shit Res, ohwell.jpg. Starting weapons are the aforementioned Slim Lance as well as the Rapier we got from Myrrh which we can't wield; I guess I'll save that for whichever character rolls the F!Lord class, assuming I can use them anyway. Since everyone has 9 Mov, the Knight class shouldn't be as shit as it is usually for anyone not named Oswin, so we'll see how it goes, but I'm optimistic.

Swordmaster Myrrh is our !Seth Jagen. She's actually very impressive with capped Str and green Res. Average Spd and poor Skl growths, but great bases in both (and for HP/Res, too), and Lck/Def... well, what else would you expect from a SM? She comes with a Steel Sword and a Killing Edge, though I haven't noticed what the "extra" boosts are to those yet. With those amazing bases, she's certainly a fitting replacement for one the most powerful Jagen archetypes in FE history, though I'm concerned about her fragility in the long term. Relying on dodgetanking will only get you so far, though she'll be safe against mages.

Now let's get onto the battle!

Opening scene, ought to look familiar. I check out the stats of the mooks and the boss, and although I apparently forgot to screencap the boss (has a Killer Lance, no obvious boosts), both of the fighters looked more or less like this:

The Iron Axe gives them a +5 Res bonus which is... completely fucking useless this chapter, but we'll keep it in mind. In the meantime, WTA isn't enough to stop Princess Joshua from being able to kick both their asses so I send her in to choke the point. She does miss 1 70-something% hit during EP, but otherwise does some nice damage and tanks admirably.

She sweeps up the fighters during the next EP and moves in towards the boss....

... yeah, I think we're going to need Myrrh for this one.

Much better! We hope for the crit, and...

*sigh*

Thankfully we make the dodge and score a regular hit on the rebound, but there's still EP to worry about...

Woohoo! \o/

And then she scores a pointless crit for the kill. Story of my life.

[spoiler=Chapter 1 - Fun with Weapon Spading]

This title has never made much sense to me. We're killing dudes, not running away. Whatever.

Ohshi- Grado's attacking Frelia too. I definitely didn't see this coming.

Starting formation. Let's take a look at our enemies.

The fighters are basically the same as before. The soldiers are very defensive and wield iron lances, no visible benefit. Cap'n Baguette also has an iron lance; he actually seems quite a bit less impressive than the previous boss with the killer lance, but he does get gate benefits.

Even Cap'n Baguette recognizes Joshua's sexy princess flair from afar.

Joshua moves forward to tank on the fort. While jabbing at oddly-defensive soldiers (she does 2-3 damage to each one with her slim lance), she eventually gets her first level up, a rather impressive one!

Meanwhile on a forest tile a bit more to the northeast, Myrrh wields her steel sword...

... and spades that it has a devil effect. Useful! Myrrh's Lck is shit, both growth and base, so that is... definitely unhandy.

Meanwhile, !Franz and !Gilliam move in from the north, while reinforcements from the sack of Renais move in from the south.

So, back to PP, let's take a look at our new units!

!Franz is actually Cavalier Gilliam... who looks like a lot like Franz, go figure. Got some very nice bases for a Lv. 1 Cav and godly Str growth... but those poor Skl/Spd/Def growths are worrisome. He's neither forced nor banned, so we'll use him for a while and see how he holds up. He comes with both an iron lance and an iron sword, no visible effects.

!Gilliam is Duessel, who's one of my non-draft units so I can't use him. Not that it seems like I'm missing out on too much anyway. He does, however, come with a Metis Tome, which has been buffed in this hack to give 25% to all growths. I'll have to find a good use for that.

We move Myrrh up to the fort and use a vuln to recover from that devil steel sword hit, then bring Gilliam down next to her. Testing out weapons, it appears as if the iron sword has a reaver effect. Handy! We score a few hits here.

During the next EP, everyone seems to want to go after Princess Joshua. She doesn't do much damage to the soldiers, but she holds her own admirably against them.

Testing the iron sword and it seems like the reaver effect is only against lances, giving it double WTA against both lances and swords. That's... really useful. Suspiciously useful. I wonder what the downside is...

Downside found! The iron sword also has a devil effect like it's older, steel brother. Potentially dangerous, especially since poor Gilliam has 0 Lck. I think he ought to stick to Lances.

And speaking of devil effects, I forgot to unequip Myrrh's KE when I moved her up to the fort, and she injures herself again badly in EP. Which apparently gives the AI the wonderful idea to rush at her in hopes of provoking her to suicide.

They succeed. RIP Myrrh, Death #1.

Let's try this again!

Opening strat is more or less the same, but Myrrh equips the KE instead of the steel sword. As much as I'd not like to waste the KE, I'd like her to kill herself much less.

Princess Joshua gets his first level all over again, and misses the Skl/Res points she got in her previous life, but beggers can't be choosers; still a pretty nice level.

Gilliam tanks a 4% crit from a soldier but manages to survive, even with devil sword.

Princess Joshua gets another level. Not too bad!

Gilliam's level reflects his mediocre growths, but he's not doing poorly.

Eventually we finish sweeping up guys and move in towards the boss. Neither Gilliam nor Princess Joshua can do even a single point in damage to him, so Myrrh swoops in for the kill.

Afterwards, we finally make it safely to Frelia where we meet up with !Tana and King Hayden. Princess Joshua hears stories about her wonderful brother, !Ephraim, performing guerrilla warfare inside Grado and she vows to follow after to help him. Hayden makes a token gesture of keeping her safe in Frelia, but is secretly happy to get her out of his hair. He lets both Gilliam and Duessel accompany us and also sends some additional retainers to help us out, Gerik and Tana!

Gerik's another non-drafted unit, so we won't be using him; he's mostly shown here for posterity. He does come with an unlimited use "Fiendcleaver", which is an E rank axe effective against monsters, as well as a Swordslayer. I guess we'll save those for someone else.

Myrmidon Tana is our first drafted pick that shows up. I guess she got demoted from bring the Princess of Frelia to one of its expendable retainers. As is befitting the team name "Strength Without Power", her Str growth is shit, but high Lck and "average" Skl/Spd/Def/Res. I don't really know exactly what number growths the colours refer to, but it makes me fear she'll be something of a coin flip unit. I'm definitely strongly considering using the Metis Tome on her to boost those average growths into something more reliable, especially since she's one of my 3 forced units. She comes with an unlimited use Armorslayer, which is potentially handy. High Lck growth means she'll be one of my better units for dealing with these pesky devil-effect weapons, anyway.

And thus, our first official chapter comes to an end.

Current Team:

Princess Joshua - Lv. 3 Knight

Squishy Jagen Myrrh - Lv. 10 Swordmaster

Tanky Cav Gilliam - Lv. 2 Cavalier

Demoted Tana - Lv. 3 Myrmidon

Known/Suspected Weapon Effects:

Iron Sword - devil effect, reaver against lances (?)

Steel Sword - devil effect

Armorslayer - unlimited use

Slim Lance - Spd +5

Iron Axe - Res +5

Fiendcleaver - unlimited use

Player Notes & Thoughts:

Well, the good news is that the opening wasn't as crushingly difficult as I feared. I guess that's one nice thing about high expectations. I would have beaten C1 on the first try, too, if I hadn't gotten rather unlucky with those devil effect rolls. Devil effect is going to be a bane to me this game, I can tell already. I almost never use the devil weapons in regular games because I'm afraid of them backfiring on me. Myrrh having such high Str and low Lck with those too is hilarious; I can't even give her the iron sword since it's the same thing.

Princess Joshua is doing rather well. It's really amazing how much more effective Knights can be when suddenly they can actually move around. I'm trying to save Myrrh for bosses until we can get her some weapons that won't kill her, or that I'd prefer to save for more important circumstances. Gilliam's been okay so far; we'll see how he lasts. And even with even move, Canto is still useful. Tana's intriguing but untested. Half of my usable units so far are Myrms; not sure what to make of that.

Big decision before next chapter is really if I want to use that Metis Tome on Tana on not. I'm leaning towards it though; she'd get some good use out of it, and she's forced, so the better stats she has, the more useful she'll be to me over all.

I'm honestly not sure how recruits are handled in this game, so I guess we'll see if !Ross may be one of those classes or he may just be something normal. I fully expect one of him or Garcia to be a non-draft unit from one of the other teams and the other to be a free unit, so we'll see if that ends up being true or not. Lack of flyer may be annoying for C2, but that's a problem for future Kirie.

All in all, I'm pleasantly pleased and surprised by this hack so far. I haven't really gotten very far in it, but the early part has had enough of a difficulty boost where it's not a cakewalk but neither is it frustratingly difficult. The random recruitment/classes adds a new layer of fun to a game I otherwise know rather well. Looking forward to continuing!

Edited May 17, 2016 by Kirie

[MrNight48]

from what I can tell, recruitment requirements are the same so no worries there.

dat insane +1 res stat in joshua though...

[Kirie]

[spoiler=Chapter 2 - ITC: Ross Saves Himself]



Not sure what this title is supposed to reference. Ross being protected by Garcia? Except he ends up getting hurt and has to have his ass saved by our dudes. It's awkward.

Oh, I suppose I should mention that I did actually give Tana the Metis Tome before starting the chapter. Shame it doesn't actually change her glowy stats, but I think it'll be useful.



!Vanessa is drunk and forgets that she's actually Gerik the Centaur.



As Gerik the Centaur, she sits and watches over the mountains... somehow... as a random village gets sacked, then runs back to Princess Joshua with a sob story about the poor Gargoyle kid that's getting his ass kicked. Battle time!

Let's take a look at our 2 recruitable NPCs:



!Ross is... actually Ross! Gargoyle Ross, anyway. Fast with average Skl/Lck growths and crap everything else. Bases are okay I guess. His biggest benefit is actually being a flyer, since I don't have one of those now. He comes with an iron lance.



!Garcia is M!Lord Rennac... who actually looks like a really nice unit. It's a shame we can't use him. :< He comes with Reginleif and also an unlimited use Toxic Lance.

Without a flyer of our own, we'll have to go the long way around to recruit Ross. Thankfully, Princess Joshua's Mov range just happens to end on the armory...



Where we scoop up a bunch of vulns since who knows how long it'll be before we get a healer. Also another iron lance.

Tana moves down below the armory to protect Princess Joshua from those naughty bandits and Myrrh and Gilliam begin to move out, but are hampered by terrain.

EP comes and Rennac...



... fails to accomplish much.



Ross gets his ass shot by the enemy archer and subsequently flies himself over the mountains to heal during NPC phase. Who needs to be rescued by a PK when you can fly yourself, amirite?



Then Rennac gets revenge for his son's injury with a crit in the archer's face. Useful!

I wanted to keep Princess Joshua up north to recruit Ross ASAP, so she and Myrrh visit the top villages while Gilliam amd Tana move south towards the remaining enemies and the southern village. The boss actually attacks Tana during EP, but she gets a nice hit on him.

And speaking of the boss, I forgot to cap him before:



Not too threatening, but he's a bandit, so, eh.

I move to see what kind of damage Gilliam can do, and...



Holy shit. I guess Iron Lances have an Axeslayer effect, which has the reaver effect plus bonus damage against axe units. Very useful! I wonder what the catch is.



Speaking of useful, Gillim scores a 2% crit to take down Bone. I wanted to give that kill to Tana, but I guess Gilliam wanted to prove his worth and hope I keep using him.



He could work on those levels a bit, though.



Tana saves the village for a pure water. Yay?



During last NPC phase, Ross had flown again to the far corner to keep healing himself, the cowardly bastard. He was juuuuust too far away for Princess Joshua to recruit. :<



Which meant he flied off to attack these guys on his own, but with that Slayer effect, it worked out pretty well for him, actually.



Rennac continues to prove his worth in the upper right.



Josh finally recruits Ross. Hurray! They both finish up the last couple units and we finish up the chapter.



Actually, no, he's the Great Rennac, master Ephraim impersonator!



lol

Though, honestly, I've already gotten more use of him in this run than I have in any other FE8 playthrough.

With the villages saved and everyone happy, we stop for a nice discussion with fat Villager #78.



Pretty sure this guy is actually a fortune teller or something. First he foreshadows really obviously, then he's all doom and gloom.



Later that night, our bracelet is accosted by a dastardly thief! Princess Joshua is willing to let it go, but Myrrh has no time for his shit and immediately orders the troops in the direction of a decrepit abandoned manor with a giant neon sign reading "thief hangout" hanging above the front doors.



Back on the world map between chapters, we visit the armory again to see that it actually has a bunch more shit now than it did before! We picked up a Slim Sword for Myrrh (crossing our fingers and hoping it doesn't have a devil effect) and a Slim Lance for Gilliam. I wonder why the Slim Sword has so few uses? Hopefully it's good.

Current Team:

Princess Joshua - Lv. 3 Knight

Squishy Jagen Myrrh - Lv. 10 Swordmaster

Tanky Cav Gilliam - Lv. 3 Cavalier

Demoted Tana - Lv. 3 Myrmidon

Ross w/ Wings - Lv. 1 Gargoyle

Known/Suspected Weapon Effects:

[spoiler=list]

Iron Sword - devil effect, reaver against lances (?)

Steel Sword - devil effect

Armorslayer - unlimited use

Slim Lance - Spd +5

Iron Lance - Axeslayer

Toxic Lance - unlimited use

Iron Axe - Res +5

Fiendcleaver - unlimited use

Player Notes & Thoughts:

Was simply having too much fun and decided to jump into C3 today, too. I was originally concerned about rescuing Ross without a flyer, but then he went and rescued himself, go figure. Tana's proving to be very useful so far; no regrets giving her the Metis Tome, even though she hasn't even gotten a level up. Between Rennac killing everything to the east and everyone else pretty handily wrapping up the west, this chapter ended up being really easy.

And speaking of Rennac, disappointment in not getting to play him, since he looks really damn good. I gave his toxic lance to Princess Joshua for now, but we might end up passing that around. Sure, it's got shit might, but it's unlimited and poisons. The reaver/slayer iron lance is interesting because it suddenly makes these bandit chapters much easier for our lance guys, of which there's a decent amount. I guess I didn't need to make Tana our star of the south after all.

I don't really foresee Ross sticking around all too long, though I did laugh out loud when I saw he replaced himself. For now, he's got flyer utility and he fills a spot that would otherwise be filled by someone I can't use at all, so it's better than nothing. We'll see how well he pans out compared to later recruits.

And speaking of recruits...

from what I can tell, recruitment requirements are the same so no worries there.

By "recruits" in that sense I meant the Ross/Ewan/Amelia characters; I wasn't sure if those classes got added to the randomization mix or not, and if so, if they'd end up in the same spaces for leveling balance or whatever. You're right in that regular recruiting does seem to be the same, which works out fine so long as you can tell which characters are which (which I've been able to do so far, thankfully). I might have to reference which are which in later levels, though hopefully it won't be an issue.

But, yeah, I would have loved to keep that +Res level up. :<

[Kirie]

[spoiler=Chapter 3 - Poisoning Walls and Unlucky Crits]


I guess simply calling the chapter "Bazba's Bandits" would be too obvious.



Myrrh's jumping to quite the conclusion here, especially since !Colm wasn't one of the bandits anyway, but it lets us kill some dudes, so I guess that's okay.



Everything in Renais is actually made out of sparkly rainbow puppies, right?



I guess !Neimi doesn't recognize the glorious royalty that is Princess Joshua.



Dude, we already know that, that's why we're here; pay attention. In fact, look, we're already here!



Actually, I can see by your map sprite that you're actually a Pupil, sooo...



Ohhey, this boss actually seems like quite a cultured gentleman... for, you know, a bandit leader anyway. Shame we have to kill him and mount his corpse on the wall as a warning.

The chapter finally starts in, so let's take a look at !Neimi:



Yay, it's Forde! Our sexy red cavalier (even though I like the green cavs better in every other FE game, shhh, don't tell him) comes as a Lv. 1 Pupil, so I guess we're getting recruit classes this map after all. His bases aren't terrible, but his growths could certainly be better. He comes with a C rank in Anima and an Elfire tome; that's what's giving him the +5 Res boost as far as I can tell. It's also been boosted to 11mt/100hit. Like Ross and Gilliam, he'll function nicely for chip damage until we find someone better. Automatic 1-2 range is certainly nice anyway.



Bazba himself is decently strong. Hand Axes are unlimited use as well, so we'll have to keep that in mind. It's not obvious what Steel Axes do yet, so there might be something fun waiting for us.

So let the battle begin!



Forde and Ross destroy the wall to let Tana ORKO the Fighter on the other side. She also happens to get her first level out of the deal.



Not bad!

Gilliam and Joshua make a chain to use the dropping Door Key to open the bottom door and we end turn, holding our breath to see what happens with !Colm.



Oooh, there he is. Wyvern Rider is certainly nice, if only...



Dammit, it's Natasha. :< As a non-drafted unit, she'll be benchwarming with the others. And those bases look so nice, too... Oh well. She brings us another Toxin Lance as well as a Door and Chest Key. I guess that makes sense, since she can't use lockpicks, but we'll still want to loot the chests this chapter. Thinking about that led me to checking out the Thief again...



No lockpicks or keys at all. No wonder he's just been sitting in that corner. I look over the other inventories again to realize that we'll only have 2 chest keys for 4 chests. I'm not sure if the chests will be randomized or not, but if they're not, but that's a problem for future Kirie.



The Pretty Princess scores a kill on one of the Fighters and gets a pretty nice level out of the deal. It's the Spd I was most excited for.



We trade the key to Gilliam and have him open the bottom chest. It's a Javelin like it should be, so chests aren't randomized. I decide to pass on the top chests (Iron Lance, Iron Sword, and Hand Axe, none of which are that great for us) to save the other chest key for a later chapter, just in case.



Next turn, Forde weakens the wall and I happen to notice that the Toxin Lance does the exact right amount of damage, so I use that (after all, it's unlimited). It poisoned the wall, which got a laugh out of me.



While Tana was attacking, I just happened to notice for the first time that Tana has the male Myrm sprite. Maybe that's why Hayden disowned her and made someone else the Princess of Frelia.

It's okay, Tana, we don't judge, you do what you want with your life and we'll support you.



Gilliam levels up... and gets the absolute bare minimum since both his HP and Str are green growths. Fuck you, Gilliam.



We're finally up to the boss, so I do a few dry runs to see what kind of damage non-Myrrh units can do. We also learn that the Javelin has the special effect of automagically doing half-HP damage like Eclipse. Intriguing! Shame it has like no chance of hitting here.

We can do enough chip damage that I decide to give Bazba to Joshua. I didn't have a screenshot of it, I guess, but Myrrh did 10x2 damage to him with the Slim Sword; still dunno what effect it has.

We then move Tana up for a bit more chip damage and...



Unintentional crit brings him down to 5hp. That wouldn't be a problem, except that I was planning on having Forde whittle his HP down a bit further, but Forde does 5 damage. So, instead we move Joshua in anyway. He gets a crit and spade the Steel Axe effect...



Poison, woo!

Bazba is surrounded. During EP, he decides to go after Tana, thinking that she won't be able to kill him since the throne regenerated him up for 4hp...



He wasn't planning on her critting him in the face. Neither was I, admittedly.



A nice level! But... she's never going to get Str, is she. Assuming the absolute worst case scenario where her natural Str growth is 0%, she should be up to 25% now so maybe, hopefully, someday.



Myrrh gets right down to business, taking Princess Joshua's bracelet back from that dirty, thieving Natasha.



Everyone keeps getting us confused for mercenaries...



Conveniently not mentioning that it had been stolen by someone that we've now recruited into our army.



I still wonder who's going to be playing the lovely Prince of Renais in this epic tale of adventure.



Because they aren't a hereditary monarchy otherwise? How progressive.



Actually, there aren't really all that many battles in this game compared to other FEs. You're getting off easy, Princess Joshua.

In any event, new recruits recruited, it's time to move on our rampage and continue on to Grado. We also get a sneak peak at the Empire's doings...



As as a result, we get a bit of a hint towards some of the other bosses with some fast screenshots taken between dialogue boxes. This is Glen, Selena, and Duessel... which is weird, because we know Duessel's a Gargoyle. I guess his enemy-version was coded different from his player version? 2 Great Knights and a Sniper between the three of them, though I'm not sure which is which.



Then Riev, Caellach, and Valter arrive. We know Valter is the Centaur which leaves Riev and Caellach for Manakete and 3-Headed Hell Dog. Again, not sure which, but that certainly sounds fun.

Back to the map, we don't really have much to do but swap around weapons a bit (Gilliam takes the 2nd Toxin Lance from Ross and gives him the Jav), buy a Fire time for Forde (for spading if nothing else), and move onto the next chapter...

[spoiler=Chapter 4 - Kiries makes up for her low death count]


I suppose this chapter would indeed be a bit more horrifying if we didn't already have a bunch of monster units on our team already. We pack up our stuff and move on, until...



Thank you, Myrrh, I'm sure we all needed that geography lesson. But before Myrrh can start prattling on about the local flora, Princess Joshua desperately seeks a distraction.



Looks like 4 zombies and a floating eyeball to me.



Meanwhile, in the village, !Artur suffers from a mental breakdown. !Lute, as usual, is fucking oblivious.



It would be really funny if actual Lute rolled a sword class.

!Artur runs out and reveals that he's a Recruit. Hurray~ He warns us to leave as soon as possible...



... while subtly hinting that we should totally stick around and help him fight these bastards. Given that he's a Recruit, he can probably use all the help he can get.



Princess Joshua reveals that she, too, had a learned upbringing... while also denying the existence of beings that are right in front of her, some of which are even fighting in her army. That's cold.



!Artur summons up all of the magic light powers of his boomstick lance and smites the evil being with a critical hit. And with that, let the chapter begin!

We finally get a prep screen starting this level so I'm able to remove the useless dead weight from our deployed units and also check out our new friend.



Not only is !Artur a Recruit, but he's also King Hayden. Hah, I guess Creature Campaign characters were randomized in, too! His growths could certainly be better, but for now, I'll take whatever I can get. I give him the spare Iron Lance we have in our convoy to supplement his Horseslayer and we go to work.



The boss is... a journeyman? I guess boss classes must be randomized too. I honestly hadn't noticed, since all of the previous bosses made sense in their rolled class. OH WELL. This guy looks like a pushover.



Forde can actually aaaaalmost OHKO these guys with his new Fire tome. We also learn that Fire has a poison effect. Between that and the unlimited use Toxin Lances, we're going to have a lot of poisoning going around, I think.

We move on, taking out the rest of the guys near the snag to get to !Lute ASAP, and the Princess picks up another level.



Yay Skl! \o/

Unfortunately, it's here when extra enemy movement bites us in the ass. Everyone gangs up on Gilliam...



... and he dies a warrior's death. Those magic eyes are fast!

Restart time! Death Count: 2



I actually forgot about that upper village previously, so I send Myrrh up there during take two and score an... iron axe. How useful.



Ross is the victim of a 2% crit...



... and Gilliam misses both of his hits against the same monster, failing to help at all. Good job.



Princess Joshua gets that same level again, but this time trading his +Skl for a +Lck. Booo... >:|

But it's okay because...



Ross was too badly injured from that random crit to survive EP anyway.

Restart time! Death Count: 3



... son of a bitch. I really need to actually plan a way to deal with those fucking magic eyes. They're way too fast and double everything.

Restart time! Death Count: 4



The next chapter starts off strong as Forde scores a random crit with his Fire. Everyone else kills the left-most guys and otherwise stays out of the magic eye range, except for Myrrh who moves forward to (dodge)tank them.



Which she's really good at, by the way. I began to suspect something was wrong when even they were still doubling Myrrh...



It's because Evil Eyes have a Brave effect. Huh. I didn't even know that was a thing. I guess you learn something new every day!

I had also forgotten that Tana has amazing Res too, so she was able to help out with the eyes quite handily....



Even going so far as to score a random pointless crit! But she did get a level out of the deal. A mediocre one given her growths, but I'll take it.



L'Arachel, Rennac, and Dozla appear! However, it seems their NPC versions are coded separately from their player versions, as Rennac did not appear as the M!Lord sprite, so we can't actually guess their classes based on this; sadface.



Myrrh backtracks to grab that axe again...



And the Princess scores another level, this time going back to his previous +Skl gain, woohoo! \o/



Nice to meet you too, !Lute. It's actually pretty funny since Ross actually IS a revenant.



Ohboy, now I really wonder what her class is going to be....



Ahahahahahahahahahaha :UU

Pupil Lute. Ohboy. Her growths are pretty meh, but at least she's likely to gain Mag, unlike poor Forde. And that Def base! Sadly the shit-tier Spd base and growth will likely relegate her to the bench, but I'll get some nice chip damage out of her in the meantime.



Meanwhile, Tana crits everything in the face...



... and earns herself an amazing level! \o/ <3 Tana~ her Spd is now capped, by the way.



We're finally almost done with this bloody level when the reinforcements arrive. >_< Tana and Lute stay south to take care of the boss while the others head north to get rid of them.

On a whim I decide to feed the boss to Lute...





On the other hand, I also manage to give Forde a level with the reinforcements to the north!



.... *sigh*



Myrrh, Captain of the Obvious.



lolololol



Dude, that's racist. You can't just call a whole group of beings terrible. You're going to hurt Ross, Duessel, and Gerik's feelings. :<



Princess Joshua will still ride forth! She refuses to give up! And the rest of you suckers are all going down with her.



Oh, L'Arachel, never change. <3



Awww... but I want to know what class she'll be... :<



And that's a wonderful place to wrap things up for today.

Back on the World Map, we backtrack a bit to buy another Slim Lance, ostensibly for Hayden, but when he inevitably gets benched, we'll have another one available for whoever. The low might sucks, but the +5 Spd is very nice.

Current Team:

Princess Joshua - Lv. 5 Knight
Squishy Jagen Myrrh - Lv. 10 Swordmaster
Tanky Cav Gilliam - Lv. 4 Cavalier
Demoted Tana - Lv. 8 Myrmidon
Ross w/ Wings - Lv. 1 Gargoyle
Sexy Magical Forde - Lv. 2 Pupil
Sailor Scout Hayden - Lv. 2 Recruit
"Superior" Mage Lute - Lv. 2 Recruit


Known/Suspected Weapon Effects:

[spoiler=list of weapons]
Iron Sword - Devil, Reaver against lances (?)
Steel Sword - Devil
Armorslayer - Unlimited
Slim Lance - Spd +5
Iron Lance - Axeslayer
Javelin - Deals 1/2 of Enemy's Current HP
Toxic Lance - Unlimited
Iron Axe - Res +5
Steel Axe - Poison
Hand Axe - Unlimited
Fiendcleaver - Unlimited
Fire - Poison
Elfire - Res +5
Evil Eye - Brave

Player Notes & Thoughts:

Man, I really caught up with my death count that last level. That was entirely my fault, though. I was playing very sloppily and wasn't paying a whole lot of attention. Knowing what I do now, I would have handled C4 level in a much different manner but OH WELL.

I'm glad that we're starting to pull in some more units, even if many of them are mediocre at best. Princess Joshua and Tana are definitely my stars, Myrrh is the most powerful (and most suicidal) Jagen, and I kind of feel like mostly everyone else is just kind of filler until I get something better. Nothing really awful, but as levels start getting more difficult, they'll start dropping back in usefulness a lot.

Next chapter should be fun. A potential for up to 2 new units, lots of villages with some useful shit in them, and an arena that I can dabble around in. I'm not really one much for arena abuse, and we're allowed to fight in skirmishes for extra exp if we want it anyway, but I might dive in for a bit just to see how it goes. And then in 5x we'll finally get to learn the identity of Princess Joshua's dashing brother and sneak a peak at a few more units, too.

Edited May 3, 2016 by Kirie

[MrNight48]

*cough* forde is a drafted unit too *cough*

moniker's to be exact *cough cough*

[Kirie]

Oh shit. I don't know how I missed that. >_< *sigh* I suppose I should restart to be fair. At least I didn't get very far yet, and it won't take me as long to redo what I missed since I won't have to spend time capping/writing.

I'll do a quick recap of P-4 with caps of levels for posterity (and anything else amusing) hopefully this evening and then start fresh with C5 tomorrow.

[MrNight48]

I'm not sure if you should go that far, it's not like forde did most of the work.

[eclipse]

Psst. . .the chapter numbers in the spoilers are off!

I've kept a running list of weapon effects in my opening post, so I don't have to scroll through 'em to find them. It's helpful, since there's no way I'm memorizing all of that.

[Kirie]

[spoiler=Prologue-C4 Redux - Bravely Fire Emblem: The courage to try again]

Prologue:

Plays basically the exact same as before. The only real amusing thing of note is that I could tell I was on a different RN string right away because Princess Joshua didn't miss a hit on one of the opening fighters, so I actually completed this chapter a whole turn faster than before.

Chapter 1:

Starts off more or less the same. Biggest change in playstyle is that I kept both Myrrh and Gilliam away from those dangerous devil iron/steel swords. Josh picks up a typical level:

... then Gilliam is the victim of a 4% crit from a soldier. :<

First restart of the redux! New Death Count: 1

Josh's new level up trades a Def point for a Skl point. Considering her Def growths and bases are better, I'll take it. Gilliam once again suffers from a random crit hit (this chapter seems to hate him), but he tanks it this time.

2 more levels. Then on with the show!

Chapter 2:

Once again, the level plays out very similarly, though I make a few small changes based on my foreknowledge, like keeping Princess Josh up top to prepare for Ross flying over. Rennac doesn't get nearly as many random crits this time, so he and some of the eastern enemies end up coming over south and getting involved with Tana/Gilliam as well.

Tana gets the only 2 levels this chapter, one from random kills accumulating, one from Bone suiciding on her.

Chapter 3:

Here's where the changes start. Forde's biggest contribution this level was attacking walls from range so they could be destroyed in one turn. Thankfully, I found a pretty easy solution.

Meet Myrrh, wall destroyer! She can OHKO the walls with her Steel Sword and I don't even have to worry about her stabbing herself. With that obstacle out of the way, I moved Tana in and noticed a weird thing...

I had traded her Gilliam's Iron Sword since her Lck is much better and I thought she'd be safer with it, but even though he didn't use it at all and just traded it over on the world map, it somehow has 0 uses now and is still in my inventory. I made a quick save state to test and I was able to use the sword once and then it broke. I know I didn't have any issues with Gilliam using the sword before I restarted. Anyone have any idea what's up with that?

NOTE: Since learned that this is basically a known weird-thing with some hacks that alter durability. So, I guess I'm out an Iron Sword. Ohwell.jpg I'll keep that in mind for any future ones I pick up, but I don't really care all that much since it's kind of a shitty weapon in this hack anyway.

Not that she needs it, really; that unlimited use Armorslayer is her best friend. I have never, ever appreciated Armorslayers as much as I do in this game.

Everything else proceeds more or less the same except that I end up having Ross open the chest with the Javeline (since he gets to keep it anyway), and I actually was able to successfully give the Bazba kill to Princess Joshua this time. Have some levels!

Chapter 4:

And now things really start to shake up. Forde definitely made his biggest contributions in this level, but I made up for that a bit by pre-purchasing a spare Slim Lance for Hayden and swapping around my plans a bit. Remembering Tana's awesome Res, I sent her immediately east to soak up the magic eye hits, since she gets much more exp from it than Myrrh does. Other things played more or less the same, even down to Tana and Lute killing the boss and the others sweeping up reinforcements.

We get some really nice levels, with special shoutouts to Tana's 2 almost-perfect levels (capped Spd really fast again), Lute's +Spd, and Ross's +Str.

And with that, we're all caught up againt!

Current Team:

Princess Joshua - Lv. 6 Knight
Squishy Jagen Myrrh - Lv. 10 Swordmaster
Tanky Cav Gilliam - Lv. 4 Cavalier
Demoted Tana - Lv. 9 Myrmidon
Ross w/ Wings - Lv. 2 Gargoyle
Sailor Scout Hayden - Lv. 3 Recruit
"Superior" Mage Lute - Lv. 2 Recruit


Known/Suspected Weapon Effects:

[spoiler=list of weapons]
Iron Sword - Devil, Reaver against lances (?)
Steel Sword - Devil
Armorslayer - Unlimited
Slim Lance - Spd +5
Iron Lance - Axeslayer
Javelin - Deals 1/2 of Enemy's Current HP
Toxic Lance - Unlimited
Iron Axe - Res +5
Steel Axe - Poison
Hand Axe - Unlimited
Fiendcleaver - Unlimited
Fire - Poison
Elfire - Res +5
Evil Eye - Brave

Player Notes & Thoughts:

Well... that was fun.

In all honestly, I tried to make the most of it and I think I did better the second time around. Our EXP is spread around better, Lute got that awesome +Spd, and honestly I just feel better playing the hack completely by the rules. Reminder to double/triple/super check all pool/draft units. >.<

With Forde out of the picture, I'm putting a lot more hope into Lute as a magic user, since who knows if/when I'll get another one. And, really, she's not too bad. That Def base is amazing; my endgame promoted Sages usually have less Def than that. Her other stats are all coin flips... except that Spd. Debating sending her Summoner and just having her stay in the back and summon shit and use staves, though that'd be slow going, especially with how cumbersome Dark tomes are. Mage/Sage would give her better promotion gains and Anima tomes are lighter, which would probably make her more useful midgame but her utility would likely fall off as we move on. Ah well; she's only a Lv. 2 Pupil for now, so that's a problem for future Kirie. I'll keep an eye on Tome effects, too, since there might be something useful there.

Tana and Joshua are still my stars for sure. The others aren't bad, they're just not keeping up quite as much. Let's see who's the next one to be able to consistently one-round! :D

With this behind me, I'm extra looking forward to starting on Chapter 5 tomorrow.

@MrNight - I know that intellectually, and I'm sure if I confessed my fuck-up to Klok and apologized he'd be fine with it. Had I been later in the game and/or past any particularly bitchy levels I probably would have. But I tried to treat this as a blessing in disguise, correct a few mistakes, and I think it worked out well. And it took me less than an hour for all 5 chapters, so not bad.

@eclipse - Thanks, I fixed them! Not that it matters now, I suppose. :p My running tally of weapon effects is mostly for the same purpose; keeping them at the end of a write-up lets me easily add and reference new ones. Spading weapon effects is fun, but I know I'm not going to remember even half of them on my own...

[Barrel]

Meet Myrrh, wall destroyer! She can OHKO the walls with her Steel Sword and I don't even have to worry about her stabbing herself.

Can't you still stab yourself to death on walls?

[RandomSwordmaster]

Can't you still stab yourself to death on walls?

Quite sure you can still proc devil reversal on walls (i'm astounded as to how that works though)

[eclipse]

Can't you still stab yourself to death on walls?

Yep!

That's how I found out about the Steel Sword devil effect.

[Kirie]

Oh, huh, I always figured that walls didn't go through regular battle calculations. That's rather interesting! I guess I'll have to keep that in mind in the future. Poor Myrrh. At least she was safe this time around.

[Kirie]

[spoiler=Chapter 5 - Yay, L'Arachel! \o/ Also, fun with Arenas]


Welp, looks like those guys spread around pretty fast.



Ohhey, chapter title time! This is another weird one. Considering that Serafew is a border town, that doesn't really imply that the Grado Empire's "reach" is actually very far at all. Who the hell came up with these names anyway?



!Joshua reminding us of the existence of the arena. I really do plan to let Princess Joshua spend at least a round in there, for posterity.



Ohhey, class preview. !Joshua's another Tarvos, and !Natasha is another Myrm. I'm betting both of them will end up being free characters since the other instances of these classes that we've seen so far have been pool-locked.



!Natasha doesn't have any time for !Joshua's shit.



Ohhey, more class previews! Looks like Glen is one of the Great Knights, !Cormag is a Thief (wooo), and this chapter's boss is an Archer.



Princess Joshua gets salty while reminiscing about the old days before all the blood and guts and violence started.



No one show !Saleh our beloved SM Jagen, please. >.> <.<



!Natasha doesn't even bother introducing herself, just starts spilling her guts to us. Thankfully, we're cool with it, so long as she'll fight with us. Chapter prep time! And !Natasha is...



L'Arachel, wooo, 1 of my remaining forced units. With high Skl/Res growths, average Lck, and shitty everything else... she'll be, uh, interesting to use. On the bright side, her bases are pretty good and she comes with that delicious unlimited Shamshir. Since crits are probably the only damage she's ever going to do in the long term, I'm definitely letting her keep that. Tana does fine with her Armorslayer anyway.



We can also take a look at Saar, this chapter's boss. His defenses stats are high, but he's just got an Iron Bow, so I don't foresee him being particularly difficult.



!Joshua joins the fray! I thought I screencapped him, but I guess I forgot. >.< He's actually Garcia, a Tarvos who joins with a 3-use Hammer. I'll add a screencap of him later.

We start off by making L'Arachel get into his range and then send Myrrh down to the lower village.



Woohoo, Dragonshield! \o/ Not sure who to give this to yet (our units are either pretty defensive already or are high bench possibilities), so I think we're just going to convoy it for now.

Tana takes the left-most path on her own, Joshua, Lute, and Ross line up next to the mid-left entrance, and Hayden and Gilliam hover near L'Arachel. I don't really remember how Garcia aggros, so I'm playing it safe.



Tana crits the soldier on that left path. Man, I love this girl.



L'Arachel's first action of the game is to score a crit of her own. Good start! Everyone else in range goes after Hayden. He would have been able to OR those guys if he had just been a bit faster, but oh well.



T2 and L'Arachel is just able to reach Garcia and recruit him. I want Garcia to get some additional weapons to fight with, so I move the Princess forward to take out a dude...



And she gets a decent level out of it.



Garcia plunders a bunch of axes from the convoy and discovers that the Swordslayer flashes against the soldier with the Iron Lance. I'm not sure if that's an effect on the Swordslayer or if its innate sword-slaying abilities are reacting to something in the Iron Lance. Regardless, I actually wanted to feed that guy to Lute, so we don't let Garcia kill him.



I kind of forgot exactly how things went down after that, but have some levels. I know that Tana moved a bit south to take out an Archer that punched Ross in the face, that's probably where that level came from. I think L'Arachel killed a bunch of guys in EP since she was so far north to recruit Garcia. Hayden stayed south to deal with the bandit reinforcements. Lute probably just shanked someone.



Garcia ends up grabbing the Secret Book village. Again, not sure who to give this to, so we'll probably hold onto it for now.



Serafew villager complains about Renais/Grado relations.... to the King of Frelia. Once again, I failed at screencapping properly, but he got another unlimited Armorslayer out of the deal. That'll go to L'Arachel.



And speaking of unlimited weapons, Tana ducks into the armory and learns that the Steel Bow is also unlimited. However, there's nothing there we feel like buying at the moment, so she went next door to steal one of !Amelia's torches instead. Myrrh does a bit of shopping at the Vendor for another Fire tome for Lute and I think another Vuln.



L'Arachel takes a shot at the Arena... I'd forgotten about Iron Swords and their devil effect, but she lucks out with an Axe-wielder enemy and comes out relatively unscathed, and even gets a mediocre level out of the deal.

Also, I learned while playing this chapter that the FE8 Arena music is a remix from Gaiden! I only started playing through Gaiden recently (a friend and I are playing it together while drinking and it's been pretty hilarious fun), so I wouldn't have noticed it before, but that's a pretty cool touch.



The next person to board the Arena Train is Princess Joshua who handily beats a Soldier while also spading (unfortunately for said Soldier) that the Steel Sword has a devil effect. So many devil effects this game...



Tana spades the boss and sees that he'll take a while to take down... but he's also an Archer with no throne/gate bonuses, so Tana, Garcia, Gilliam, and Lute all just surround him on all sides and slowly weaken his HP while a few others try out the arena for fun.



This was Myrrh's assigned arena enemy. Once again, I forgot about Arean's automatically assigning Iron Swords and they're stupid devil effect, but she manages to survive and even gets a level. Sadly, my finger slipped and I accidentally overwrote her level-up image with the next screen shot, but it was HP, Spd, and Res.



Princess Joshua goes back in, bravely spades that Silver Axes can poison you, and gets a +Spd level up, wooo.



Reinforcements rain down on the boss-killing party, so Hayden and Ross move in to help clear them out. Afterward, Hayden takes Gilliam's spot so that Gilliam can do a round in the Arena.



Yep, there's a nice, Gilliam-quality level up right there.



Hayden also gets a mediocre level while helping to weaken Saar...



But Lute gets the kill. And another crappy level. Chapter done!



After whining about her mentor for a while, L'Arachel finally drops a serious shit truth bomb. Hurray, now we conveniently know the villain's motivations! And of course we're going to take him down, because who would do a better job at destroying an empire run by a madman than a small team of scrappy youths?



We also get a sweet Guiding Ring as a present for saving all the other villages. Woohoo! \o/ Lute might get this, but we'll convoy it for now.

[spoiler=Chapter 5 - Help us, Orson Kenobi, you're our only hope... because we're all fucking useless, especially Seth]


No world map for us, instead we go straight to the !Ephraim "gaiden" chapter. I'm guessing the title is supposed to be some symbolic reference to !Ephraim's refusal to give up despite being stuck deep in enemy territory with only 2 vassals and a traitor for company.



So that's where !Ephraim's been hiding...



Another sneak peak at some future bosses. We kew the Tarvos is Valter already; the Warrior is Tirado.



You better hope you have some good news up your sleeve somewhere, Tirado. Valter's not exactly the most mentally stable and peaceful of generals.



Not-so-subtly foreshadowing Orson's upcoming betrayal.



More class previews! I can't tell who is who, but it looks like !Ephraim, !Kyle, and !Forde are a Thief, a Bow-using Bonewalker, and a Revenant.

For mostly meta-reasons, I'm guessing all 3 of these units will end up being "free".



If !Ephraim played FE, he would only play highest difficulty, ironman, challenge runs.



At least someone recognizes that !Ephraim is batshit crazy.



And !Ephraim agrees... but only to make a point. He still insists on going.



Forde gives in and accepts his fate.



Back in the castle, this scraggy-looking Myrm is apparently our boss. Battle begin! Let's take a look at our units.



Based off of levels, Bonewalker Kyle is !Ephraim. He's.... definitely not the best. A high growth in Spd is his best attribute (since Lck isn't that useful), though he starts off as slow as... a really, really slow thing. That shit Str/Skl isn't going to last him long either. His coin-flippy Def/Res are meh. Any small desire I might have had to play Ephraim's route has withered and died.



If you thought Kyle was bad, let's take a look at !Kyle - Revenant Seth. His stats make early-level base Soldiers look good. He's got really high HP, but his defenses are so shitty, and he's so fucking slow, that it basically just saves him from immediately rolling over and dying. At least his weapon gives him an extra +5 Str and poisons on contact.



!Forde is Thief Cormag, whom we spied earlier. His growths are awful and his bases barely workable, but at least he can pick locks, so he's got some utility. We'll stay away from using the devil sword, but the Shadowkiller will serve him just fine.



The traitor Orson is still Orson, and it's immediately apparent that we'll be relying on him heavily for this chapter. The unlimited use Silver Sword is a godsend, since I won't have to worry about him wasting uses of it before I steal it from him right before seizing the throne.



Zanta is our Myrm boss. High Def + Throne bonuses are ugh, but at least that Steel Blade will weigh him down. I expect Orson will be able to take him out just fine.

We start off the chapter with good intentions. Cormag gets a kill on the starting archer and Orson on one of the two starting soldiers.



I actually plan on using Kyle to just weaken the other soldiers, but he surprises me with a crit, which is a nice start to his career.

Kyle, Cormag, and Seth kind of fumblingly manage to kill the Knight and open the doors for Cormag to pick the chests. It's slow going, and the Fire mage poisons both Cormag and Seth; Seth actually goes down to 1 HP from poison damage at some point, but that's what Elixirs are for. The chests are a Killer Lance and an Elixir.

While that's going on, Seth begins the trip up north and starts baiting enemies to kill. Eventually the chests are opened, and the team regroups. Kyle and Cormag both end up getting their first levels in the fracas.



*sigh*

We move up north, with Orson baiting guys and killing them for the most part. I see an opportunity to maybe give Kyle some exp so I use him to lure the Druid up north, but after that kill, he ends up in range of an enemy cav from the east. Seth steps up to tank the hit...



And can't even hit him, but he did get the Cav to damage himself with the devil iron sword, so that has to count for something.



As we approach the throne room, Cormag manages to get another level in. High quality stat gains right there.



Seth, go home, you're useless.



Kyle gets another unimpressive level while cleaning up the throne room.



Finally, just the boss. \o/



Orson has shaky hit but manages to score a crit for a OHKO.



He even got a level for it! *cries softly*

We shuffled around our inventories to take everything from Orson that we could. Seth ended up going through an entire Elixir, so the only thing we left with Orson was a vuln with a single use left. Then Prince Kyle capped the throne (nice to have confirmation that he really is !Ephraim) and finally ended that chapter.



I suppose that, next to Seth, anyone is a brilliant, talented fighter.



And then Prince Kyle treats Renvall like a cheap one night stand and plans to get the hell out of dodge.



Oh?



Oh.



You think? FLAWLESS STRATEGY THERE, PRINCE KYLE.



That escape could have gone better. It was kind of funny to watch Valter galloping towards them, though, rather than swooping in like the Wyvern Riders.



Clearly this guy doesn't know Prince Kyle all that well. I'm not sure if it's overestimation or underestimation... but it's definitely some kind of estimation.



FLAWLESS STRATEGY THERE, PRINCE KYLE.



Once again, Forde gives in and accepts his fate.

Now that I know how shitty this team really is, especially without Orson, I'd be depressed if I were in his shoes, too.

Current Team:

Princess Joshua - Lv. 8 Knight
Squishy Jagen Myrrh - Lv. 11 Swordmaster
Tanky Cav Gilliam - Lv. 5 Cavalier
Demoted Tana - Lv. 10 Myrmidon
Ross w/ Wings - Lv. 2 Gargoyle
Sailor Scout Hayden - Lv. 5 Recruit
"Superior" Mage Lute - Lv. 4 Pupil
Lethal L'Arachel - Lv. 3 Myrm
Still-an-Axe-User Garcia - Lv. 5 Tarvos

Known/Suspected Weapon Effects:

[spoiler=list of weapons]
Iron Sword - Devil, Reaver against lances (?)
Steel Sword - Devil
Silver Sword - Unlimited
Armorslayer - Unlimited
Shamshir - Unlimited
Slim Lance - Spd +5
Iron Lance - Axeslayer
Steel Lance - Devil
Javelin - Deals 1/2 of Enemy's Current HP
Toxic Lance - Unlimited
Iron Axe - Res +5
Steel Axe - Poison
Hand Axe - Unlimited
Silver Axe - Poison
Fiendcleaver - Unlimited
Steel Bow - Unlimited
Fire - Poison
Elfire - Res +5
Evil Eye - Brave
Lethal Talon - Str +5

Player Notes & Thoughts:

Chapter 5 was quite fun to play through. With such high Mov, getting to the villages was pretty easy, and we were able to spread around exp to get a lot of kills to units. I had a much easier time recruit Garcia than I usually do with recruit Joshua, since L'Arachel is much better at being attacked than Natasha usually is.

L'Arachel is an interesting unit. If she weren't forced, I would probably just give her Shamshir to Tana and call it a day. Comparing the 2 directly, Tana has the better growths of the pair (not even counting the Metis Tome), and L'Arachel´s only real advantage is higher Skl, both base and growths. Since I will be using her... she definitely gets to keep the Shamshir. With them both being Myrms, too, I'm tempted to split their promotion options and have L'Arachel go SM for the Crit boost and just have her rely on crits for everything, and then Tana could go Assassin for fun, which would give her Lethality and I think she'd be able to use Lockpicks, though I'm not sure on that. In any event, that's a decision for future Kirie.

Chapter 5x was just spam Orson's unbreakable Silver Sword. It was the least interesting level I've played so far because of it. I did give some kills to Kyle and Cormag, but I'm not even sure why I bothered; unless there are no other thieves, they'll both likely be benched, and Seth will be super benched. Though, I don't remember if Ephraim is ever forced in future levels if you go Eirika's Route, so I guess I should look that up and maybe feed him some more levels when he comes back if so.

[Kirie]

[spoiler=Chapter 6 - Bonus Chapter because I had spare time this evening!]

With Prince Kyle and his hopeless contingent off to the side for now, we return to Princess Eirika's party, and the first thing we do is mess with weapons and stock up, obviously.

Oh dear, it appears that anything with >63 uses is fucked.

Weapon shop sells Javelins, hurray! \o/ Also... ridiculously cheap Hand Axes and Steel Bows. I'm guessing that's some kind of glitch not calculating value properly because they're unlimited. I get a few Javs to pass around, as well as a Hand Axe for Garcia and a Steel Bow to hold onto for Kyle.

They also sell monster weapons. Intriguing!

Forget Awakening, THIS is broken, OP Nosferatu. I hope I get a Shaman. Or maybe I'll just send Lute into T2 Pupil. I don't actually buy one, but I do by 1 Thunder tome for a bit over 1kG (not pictured). It's got a lot of uses and I figured I could give it to Lute and spade if it does anything fun.

Door and Chest Keys are easily available and cheap. That might be a good replacement for poor Cormag.

And now it's time for the battle to start! This chapter's title is good at foreshadowing the deaths coming your way.

*tsktsktsk* Some generic boss doesn't like his own boss very much...

Oh, yeah, right, it's that fog of war chapter. This will be fun.

Princess Joshua refuses to give up her MacGuffin bracelet and it's all Myrrh's fault since she refuses to communicate about it. 87% of problems in media all fall down to a failure to communicate.

Yeah, Josh should have known we wouldn't be getting away so easily.

And with that, we can finally start!

Tana is probably the unit I trust the most to hold her own, so I give her the torch and send her running forward to get a look at what's waiting for us. We want to rush east ASAP to save those villagers, since I have a feeling they'll be in a bit more danger than usual thanks to the increased mov and stats in this hack. L'Arachel and Joshua are also both near by; the others hang back a bit, afraid of death.

EP comes and Ross, Tana, and L'Arachel each pick up a level.

Aaaaand Joshua spades that Iron Blade have an Armorslayer effect. That's not good.

Soldier OHKOs one of the villagers T1. Ouch. I'm just about to restart and trying to think if there's any possible way I can get there in time. I can't think of one. Eventually, I give I peek at some of the other guides. Neither eclipse nor Tequila think it's possible to rescue, so I'm satisfied. No restart.

Oh, and did I mention Halberds have a Brave effect? Of course, thanks to him using it, he drops the Iron Axe instead. Stupid Enemies.

A Shaman takes advantage of the Princess's HP being low thanks to that Iron Blade and comes in for the kill. *sigh*

Death Count: 2

We start again, and this time now that I know I can't save the villagers, I spread out a bit. Tana goes south to the village, and Joshua heads to the Northeast. Tana continues to torch tank on the center-east fort. Everyone else spreads out in the trees.

Tana gets her Lv. 11 again, trading a +Def for a +Res. Oh well.

... son of a bitch, there's a Cav with an iron blade to the northeast too. >_<

Ross and L'Arachel also get their new levels. Ross trades his +Skl for +Str/+Lck which I will definitely take, given his Str growth. L'Arachel gets a +Def instead of +Lck/Res. That's fine, too.

Testing out damage and I discover that Thunder tomes have a Brave effect! Lute has a new favourite weapon. Definitely worth the 1k or whatever I paid for it. She gets a decent level out of the deal, too.

Myrrh goes up to take care of that stupid Iron Blade Cav and finally learns the secret of the Slim Sword - Horseslayer.

Meanwhile, Tana gets an amazing level. Since she's already capped Spd, that's effectively everything but Res, which she'll be capping soon anyway.

Unfortunately, I was too busy celebrating Tana's awesomeness to realize that I left a wounded Ross in range of a bow. Flyers really need to be careful in this game, especially squishy ones like Ross. I ended up rescuing him with Gilliam just to be safe.

Garcia scores an incredibly unlikely hit to gain himself a completely underwhelming level. Then again, with his growths... I'll take the +Spd.

Spider appears and the little girl rubs it in that I won't be able to save her or any of her family members. If there were ghosts in FE, I bet she'd haunt me.

Ohhey, I kinda forgot Hayden had that Horseslayer; useful!

Joshua and Tana both rake in some good levels. Tana has capped Res now, too.

At this point, we cast around aimlessly trying to find the boss because I can't remember where he is. Eventually Myrrh bumps into him. Literally. But that's okay because he's an unmoving Archer. I decide to feed him to Tana.

Though Hayden actually gets a level weakening him up, too. Not a good one or anything, but... yeah.

L'Arachel gets a level from the weakening and a level from the kill. She's capped Skl now... which means she's not looking at very good level-ups from here on out. Not that these were great or anything but yeah.

Finally with the enemies dead and the bracelet reclaimed, again, Myrrh spills the beans on the secret of the MacGuffin bracelet.

Weren't we doing that anyway?

Current Team:

Princess Joshua - Lv. 9 Knight
Squishy Jagen Myrrh - Lv. 11 Swordmaster
Tanky Cav Gilliam - Lv. 5 Cavalier
Demoted Tana - Lv. 13 Myrmidon
Ross w/ Wings - Lv. 3 Gargoyle
Sailor Scout Hayden - Lv. 6 Recruit
"Superior" Mage Lute - Lv. 5 Pupil
Lethal L'Arachel - Lv. 6 Myrm
Still-an-Axe-User Garcia - Lv. 6 Tarvos

Known/Suspected Weapon Effects:

[spoiler=list of weapons]

Slim Sword - Horseslayer
Iron Sword - Devil, Reaver against lances (?)
Steel Sword - Devil
Silver Sword - Unlimited

Iron Blade - Armorslayer
Armorslayer - Unlimited
Shamshir - Unlimited
Slim Lance - Spd +5
Iron Lance - Axeslayer
Steel Lance - Devil
Javelin - Deals 1/2 of Enemy's Current HP
Toxic Lance - Unlimited
Iron Axe - Res +5
Steel Axe - Poison
Hand Axe - Unlimited
Silver Axe - Poison

Halberd - Brave
Fiendcleaver - Unlimited
Steel Bow - Unlimited
Fire - Poison

Thunder - Brave
Elfire - Res +5
Evil Eye - Brave
Lethal Talon - Str +5

Player Notes & Thoughts:

Stupid FoW chapters. >.< Especially with the high mov on enemy units, that was really quite painful. I consider myself lucky that I only had to reset once, and I credit most of that to playing very carefully with all units not named Tana or Myrrh. Even Princess Joshua wasn't safe with those Iron Blades running amok.

I've noticed already that I'm playing this game quite a bit different than usual. I'm typically pretty obsessive about leveling my units evenly and not getting too far ahead with anyone. However, the viability of the units I'm fielding varies strongly, and maybe of the units that aren't forced, well, I'm not sure if I'm even going to bother using them, so I'm hesitant to give them lots of exp.

Ross and Garcia are very likely going to be benched. Ross is simply too squishy and it's hard to be a squishy flyer in this game. Garcia's my only axe-user, but I don't see him having any long term viability. Hayden and Gilliam are pretty similar; both mediocre lance wielders. They're almost kind of like Christmas Cavs. Hayden's the Green one since his Skl/Spd are better, and Gilliam's Red with better Str/Def. Plus, they can both promote into Paladins! :U If I had to pick one over the other right now, I'd lean towards Hayden since he's more consistent (I usually pick Green cavs anyway), but for now they're both doing okay.

Lute's not bad for a starting mage. That Brave Thunder tome really patches her Spd issues quite well. All of her other growths aren't bad, just coin flippy, so I guess we'll see how she does. I was originally debating putting her Shaman -> Summoner, but I learned from Klok that all the Trainees are T1 not T0 *sigh*. So, she can either go T2 Pupil for triple tome use (which would give her access to that OP Nos tome, ahahaha), or Sage for Staves.

Anyway, I'm kind of disappointed that we didn't get any new units this chapter, and we won't next chapter either, and even the chapter after that is just getting Prince Kyle, Seth, and Cormag back again, and all of them are awful. Finding out what new units are appearing and how terrible they are (or how good they are but I can't use them *sniff*) has definitely been my favourite part of this hack so far.

[Kirie]

[spoiler=Chapter 7 - Lots of archers, so Ross stays home and cries himself to sleep]

We could sneak in, we could study enemy movements and make an actual plan, we could swim and go in the back way, we could even, you know, do some information-gathering and figure out what actually is going on instead of just taking the boss's words at face value and assume the worst...

But, no, Princess Joshua learned all of her tactics from Prince Kyle and so it's just a frontal assault, no time to think.

They couldn't think of a deep and meaningful title that was symbolic of Princess Joshua's secret desires... so instead the title for this chapter is just a location.

For some reason, before the battle begins we get a little montage of battle quotes from all the characters, just like FE games usually do before the Endgame chapter. Why? Who the fuck knows.

We take a look at the enemies during the prep menu. This is our boss, another tile-trapped Archer who will be fed slowly to L'Arachel. The most interesting thing here is learning that Brave Bows are unlimited.

There's a really nice Energy Ring on this Mage... but we have no way to steal it. Sadface.jpg :<

This worries me. There's a few more archers, too. I don't really feel like babysitting Ross the whole game, so we just decide not to bring his punk ass and he spends the chapter hanging out with the non-draft units.

The chapter finally begins! This map isn't all particularly interesting, so we more or less just barrel forward.

Lute gets a decent level, hurray! +Spd means that her Spd growth isn't completely 0, so that's helpful.

What, you just noticed this now? We've been fighting a whole round already, and your ONLY PURPOSE is to watch this bridge. You deserve your coming slow death at L'Arachel's hands.

Most everyone keeps moving forward, though Gilliam stays back to guard the bridge from the couple reinforcements that are heading our way. Tana, L'Arachel, and Lute lead the pack while the others stay a bit and hide in the trees. Gilliam takes a pounding from the Thunder Mage, but Tana and Myrrh save his ass then backtrack back. Here, have some levels:

L'Arachel proves that her Str growth isn't 0 and Tana gets an effectively perfect level (since she's already capped Spd and Res). Gilliam's is also pretty nice. Overall, this was a really nice batch of levels.

Lute rushes up to take out that Ballista before it can get up to any shenanigans.

Princess Joshua lures the last couple archers forward and weakens them with his Jav so L'Arachel can finish them off.

And she gets another mediocre level out of the bargain.

Partially thanks to that +Str level up from earlier, L'Arachel isn't actually that bad against the boss, though I did laugh a bit when I saw that Murray was a female archer going against the male myrm L'Arachel. She gets a nice level for her troubles and Princess Joshua moves in to cap.

Ohhey, isn't that...

Yep. Looks like Myrrh trusts him about as much as I do. No world map since we're rushing in to save Kyle onii-chan. Onto the next chapter!

Current Team:

Princess Joshua - Lv. 9 Knight
Squishy Jagen Myrrh - Lv. 11 Swordmaster
Tanky Cav Gilliam - Lv. 6 Cavalier
Demoted Tana - Lv. 14 Myrmidon
Ross w/ Wings - Lv. 3 Gargoyle
Sailor Scout Hayden - Lv. 6 Recruit
"Superior" Mage Lute - Lv. 7 Pupil
Lethal L'Arachel - Lv. 9 Myrm
Still-an-Axe-User Garcia - Lv. 7 Tarvos

Known/Suspected Weapon Effects:

[spoiler=list of weapons]

Slim Sword - Horseslayer
Iron Sword - Devil, Reaver against lances (?)
Steel Sword - Devil
Silver Sword - Unlimited

Iron Blade - Armorslayer
Armorslayer - Unlimited
Shamshir - Unlimited
Slim Lance - Spd +5
Iron Lance - Axeslayer
Steel Lance - Devil
Javelin - Deals 1/2 of Enemy's Current HP
Toxic Lance - Unlimited
Iron Axe - Res +5
Steel Axe - Poison
Hand Axe - Unlimited
Silver Axe - Poison

Halberd - Brave
Fiendcleaver - Unlimited
Steel Bow - Unlimited

Brave Bow - Unlimited
Fire - Poison

Thunder - Brave
Elfire - Res +5
Evil Eye - Brave
Lethal Talon - Str +5

Player Notes & Thoughts:

A pretty straightforward chapter, all said and done, and much easier than 6. Thanks to the super high move (and benching Ross), the Ballista isn't really a threat at all; he makes one failed shot at Garcia before Lute takes him out. Enemies with Thunder tomes are kind of a pain thanks to that Brave effect, as Gilliam learned. Thankfully we've got a good few units with high Res to bait them out. Nothing else really caused us all too much trouble.

Lute with a Thunder tome, on the other hand, is very useful. She can still get doubled, obviously, but her high Def helps with that too. Overall, she's being more useful than I gave her credit for back when we recruited her.

L'Arachel is still struggling to pull her weight, but those 2 +Str level-ups will hopefully help with that.

Next time, we'll meet up with Onii-chan, score some useful loot (Killer Lance! Unlimited Silver Sword! Brave Sword!) and some less-useful units (Shitty Monster Lord with Bows! Useless Revenant! Slowest Thief in the history of thieving!). Looking forward to it~

[Kirie]

[spoiler=Chapter 8 - In which Kirie attempts to remember what she did in C8 yesterday based on the screenshots]

So, yeah, title. I played through C8 yesterday late morning/early afternoon but didn't have time to post up the LP and I lost my notes so basically I'm trying to reinact what happened based solely on the caps that I took.

FE invokes the spirit of Admiral Ackbar.

"And when I escaped I wanted to save him but when I went to his cell he was taking a nap and you know how cute Kyle-kun looks when he's sleeping so I thought I'd let him be and just escape on my own."

Myrrh does not trust this shit at all. To be fair, Orson does look kind of creepy.

Who would cross the Bridge of Death must answer me these questions three, ere the other side he see.

I bet Orson's wishing he would have asked for his favourite colour at the end instead.

And Orson turns red. The betrayal is real.

See, this is why we should have been a bit smarter about this whole "frontal assault" thing.

Anyway, the chapter finally starts up and we can take a look around.

Here's our boss. Stats are pretty meh, especially considering he's promoted. Those defenses in particular are practically nothing.

Pretty sure I took this just to show off the fact that enemies are starting to switch over to Steel Lances instead of Iron ones. This is both fortunate (because Steel Lances have that hilarious devil effect) and unfortunate (because they're not reaver weapons like the Iron one which means our Myrm collective will lose WTA).

And now it's time to start! I don't recall exactly what went on, so have some levels:

Joshua's was nice; Hayden's average. Ah well.

Not sure why I took that first shot, but L'Arachel gets an okay level out of the deal.

Why is this cap here? I have no idea. Based on damage, I'm guessing the Knight hurt himself. Maybe I just found it hilarious or something. Silly Past Kirie.

The gimpy reinforcements arrive! Thankfully, with our Mov being so great, it won't be long until we meet up with them, since I really shouldn't leave them on their own without Orson to protect them.

Cormag remains the beefiest thief.

Really Josh? You're going to miss that hit on me?

Fucking Longbow archer snipes Ross. Goddamn it.

Death Count: 3

Okay, with that death out of the way, I can finally start actually talking about what I actually did in this level since I do vaguely remember what my final plans were.

To start off with, Ross really isn't worth the trouble he causes me, so I leave him behind in the new version.

Josh, Tana, Lute, and Garcia head to the north while L'Arachel, Gilliam, Hayden, and Myrrh take to the west.

Thankfully, Hayden and Joshua both get better level-ups this time around, Hayden adding a +HP and Joshua just getting an amazing level of everything but Lck.

I had switched L'Arachel to her Armorslayer in hopes of her getting to kill that bottom Knight during EP, but instead the lack of crit meant that she wasn't able to take out the first Soldier, so it ends up being a detriment rather than a help. *sigh*

She trades her +Def for a +Lck. I'd rather have had the Def, but whatever.

Longbow Archer goes after Tana this time and I learn that Longbows have a Brave effect. Thankfully they also have shit hit and Tana tanks like a fucking truck so no harm done.

Cormag and Kyle team up to take out the bottom left archer, and Cormag repeats his level.

Lute gets a nice level taking out that Longbow archer up north. Tana had lured both it and the Shaman to the wall the previous EP. I didn't really have anyone good to take out the Shaman, though. The downside to making Javs Eclipse weapons is that they're shit for actually finishing anyone off, and the only other non-Lute ranged weapon we have available is Garcia's Hand Axe. He does damage the Shaman, but he can't kill it.

Next EP, I have Seth take a hit to protect the fragile Prince Kyle. He proves to us once again that he's utterly incompetent. Poor Seth.

Back in PP, Seth backs up and Prince Kyle gets... well, that's a level, I guess.

The northern group moves up to take out the rest of the Knights in the chest chamber (Josh was only able to kill a couple during EP). Tana caps her skill and Lute somehow goes even more defensive.

Ohhey, who knew Gilliam and Cormag were brothers?

Garcia opens the northeastern chest for an Angelic Robe. Useful!

Here, have some more levels and people continue to push together towards the throne room. None are particularly great, but oh well.

The Thief reinforcement arrives... and he's way too fast to have Cormag steal his Lockpicks. *sigh*

You keep doing your thing, Cormag.

Pretty sure I took this screenshot just because I happened to pause the game at this hilarious moment. L'Arachel is a tornado.

Thunder Mage vs. Thunder Mage. Round 1 - Fight!

Princess Joshua finally meets up with her Onii-chan~ <3

With the reaver Iron Lance, Joshua does pretty well against the boss. I decide to feed it to him.

And he gets another sweet level for the kill, woo! \o/

Yes, we were very worried. Because you're fucking awful and also bow-locked.

That's, uh, what she said?

Princess Joshua fondly reminisces about the day when she was an orange Knight instead of a pink one.

Should have prayed harder, Kyle, because you're still awful.

We make it back to Frelia and !Tana gives zero fucks about the awesome stories of our adventures.

And !Innes is as warm and cuddly as ever.

Because it's not a Fire Emblem game without dragons Manaketes.

It's okay, !Myrrh, you don't have to justify yourself. Everyone does stupid shit in this game.

Well... fuck.

Caellach confirmed for Helldog and Selena confirmed for Sniper.

And as if the fucking crazy emperor isn't enough, his minions are even more psychotic.

It really shouldn't have taken so long to decide this. !Innes, Joshua, and Kyle all outline their individual plans.

!Innes has the hots for Ismaire, confirmed.

FE Protagonists are never in any danger, nope, not a single one.

And Kyle is secretly suicidal.

!Hayden gives us a bunch of gold which we will totally not waste and we move on to the route split.

Not only did Klok confirm that the hack was balanced around Eirika's mode, but I also would not want to have to put up with Kyle's awful ass any longer than I have to.

Apparently Seth and Cormag are tired of his shit, too. At least we have a Thief now?

Back on the world map again, the Tower of Valni appears. Klok has said we're welcome to use it for grinding if we feel it's necessary, so I may take him up on that offer later, but for now we're going to ignore it.

Oh, yeah, I forgot this game also has skirmishes, too. We may need to fight those to access shops at some point, but we'll see. For now, I was still able to make it back to Ide and buy another Thunder tome for Lute. I also gave the Killer Lance to Hayden and one of the Silver Swords to Tana; she's not quite at A Swords yet, but close.

We also use the Angelic Robe on Tana to make her even more badass.

And that's the chapter!

Current Team:

Princess Joshua - Lv. 11 Knight
Squishy Jagen Myrrh - Lv. 11 Swordmaster
Tanky Cav Gilliam - Lv. 6 Cavalier
Demoted Tana - Lv. 15 Myrmidon
Sailor Scout Hayden - Lv. 8 Recruit
"Superior" Mage Lute - Lv. 10 Pupil
Lethal L'Arachel - Lv. 11 Myrm
Still-an-Axe-User Garcia - Lv. 7 Tarvos

Prince Kyle Onni-chan - Lv. 7 Bow Bonewalker

Slowest Thief Cormag - Lv. 10 Thief

Known/Suspected Weapon Effects:

[spoiler=list of weapons]

Slim Sword - Horseslayer
Iron Sword - Devil, Reaver against lances (?)
Steel Sword - Devil
Silver Sword - Unlimited

Iron Blade - Armorslayer
Armorslayer - Unlimited
Shamshir - Unlimited
Slim Lance - Spd +5
Iron Lance - Axeslayer
Steel Lance - Devil
Javelin - Deals 1/2 of Enemy's Current HP
Toxic Lance - Unlimited
Iron Axe - Res +5
Steel Axe - Poison
Hand Axe - Unlimited
Silver Axe - Poison

Halberd - Brave
Fiendcleaver - Unlimited
Steel Bow - Unlimited

Longbow - Brave

Brave Bow - Unlimited
Fire - Poison

Thunder - Brave
Elfire - Res +5
Evil Eye - Brave
Lethal Talon - Str +5

Player Notes & Thoughts:

I guess I'm just done with Ross now. He's way too weak to be worth the care I have to use in deploying him, so he's off the "Current Team" list and onto the bench. Seth is also perma-benched.

Cormag I see being occasionally useful, so I'll probably continue to drag him along for a while, at least until/unless we get another thief. I'm kind of concerned about how many Lockpick uses he'll have available, since he's much too slow to actually steal them from any other thieves, so I may actually rush level him to 20 via skirmishes/Tower as soon as we get an Ocean Seal so I can promote him to Rogue for Pick. The Spd boost should also help him actually steal effectively, too.

The chapter itself wasn't too bad. We've got enough decently strong units that my biggest concern right now is making sure to give exp to those ones that aren't super great, at least the ones that still stick around anyway. High enemy move is starting to be more dangerous now, but thankfully the enemies aren't strong enough (even with the growth boost) to be a serious threat, especially with our super defensive team.

Finally we get some more new units again next chapter, so I'm excited for that, though it might not be until Monday that I can actually continue. I'm actually kind of disappointed that this game is so short, because I've really been enjoying it.

[Kirie]

[spoiler=Chapter 9 - So many stat boosters]

I'm just going to stop trying to justify these stupid chapter title names.

A scene in Grado finally clearly reveals the various classes of the Grado generals. The new ones are Glen as a GK, Riev as a Manakete (somehow oddly fitting), and Duessel also has a GK.

Ohhey, there's a Blue fighter. It's our !Tana recruit!

We also bump into !L'Arachel and her friends again.

!L'Arachel clearly has her priorities in the right place.

Well, that's a problem. Guess we'll have to--

And that's an even more pressing problem. Combat time!

We take our time in the prep screen to check out a few things.

!Tana is secretly her brother Innes, and also a Fighter. As a non-drafted unit, we can't use him, but... honestly he doesn't look like much anyway. We give the Steel Axe to Garcia and convoy the Hammer.

Binks is an Elder Bael, and a pretty strong one, too. Looks like it'll finally be time to put those monster slaying weapons to work!

Some nice drops, though the Axereaver only has 2 uses, which feels... unsatisfying. Oh well; Iron Lances are reavers anyway.

Alright, let's get to work!

I know I said I was going to leave Ross behind, but I decide to pull his ass out for this chapter to take care of those water Pirates. I don't want them getting to that bottom village, and he's the only one that can fly. Thankfully, the reaver lances are very useful here.

He even gets a level, and not a terrible one by his standards.

I am the best tactician.

We get a bunch of levels, but don't pay much attention to them because...

This guy is a threat that I did not take seriously enough. Yikes!

Death Count: 4. I ought to start recording that in the title or something so I don't forget.

We restart and take to the bridge again. Ross and L'Arachel get some amazingly awful levels, but Josh and Lute make up for it and then some. Cormag's is... well, Cormag.

Garcia gets a complete overkill crit on this guy.

Ross refuses to be overmatched and gets a crit, too.

I lure the KE Myrm forward with Tana and then snipe him from afar with Lute during PP. KE get!

Garcia gets a level. Hurray?

Oh yeah, we get !Amelia this level, too.

Turns out she's Archer Franz. Comes with a Short Bow and not terrible growths, though his bases could certainly be better. Still, he looks better than Prince Kyle, and we're hurting for more ranged damage, so let's give him a whirl.

I'm actually terrified of messing up her recruit, so I kind of pull everyone back a bit to lure forward the other aggroing mercs and then wait to pull her forward.

Cormag gets another level. Since I have an Ocean Seal for him, I'm trying to feed him a lot, in case you haven't noticed.

That said, I have never seen him gain anything but HP, Lck, and Def. I think his other growths are practically nothing. *sigh*

One of the soldiers goes around into the sea to punch Innes. Good thing I unequipped him.

Hurray, Franz is recrutied! \o/

You just... keep doing your thing Cormag.

Oh, yeah, villages! And I... already have one of those floating in the convoy. The pain of indecision. I don't know what to do with Franz's Speedwings, either, though I'm leaning towards Lute. She's proved to be much mroe useful that I had originally thought she'd be.

We lure the final few soldiers across the bridge and score some more levels.

Joshua's is nice, but the rest... *shrugs*

Lute visits the last village for... a useless weapon. Maybe we'll get a F!Lord character one of these days.

It's boss time!

The monster weapons do a good amount of damage, but this guy is pretty tough.

Javs look like a nice bet to whittle down his HP a bit, but Gilliam's hit looks a bit shaky so I bring in Hayden...

Fuck you, Hayden.

Gilliam, however, does indeed make the hit. Woohoo! \o/

Tana can do a decent amount of damage with a KE, even without a crit.

I want to give the boss to Cormag but he's just not there yet, so...

Go Princess! \o/

Cormag finished up and gets a very Cormag level.

We've been betrayed again, really?

Ohshi-

Wait, a blue PK?

Oh, it's just a messenger, not a recruit. :<

*sigh* Fiiiine, we'll come save his punk ass.

More statboosters to rot in convoy! \o/

Seriously, look at all these.

Anyway, back to the World Map which means back to the shops to check them out...

An interesting assortment at the armory. I had already bought an Iron Blade and an Iron Bow in-chapter, but I also pick up a Heavy Spear here, too.

Less interesting, though I suppose an early source of Elixirs is nice.

Current Team:

Princess Joshua - Lv. 14 Knight
Squishy Jagen Myrrh - Lv. 11 Swordmaster
Tanky Cav Gilliam - Lv. 6 Cavalier
Demoted Tana - Lv. 15 Myrmidon
Sailor Scout Hayden - Lv. 9 Recruit
"Superior" Mage Lute - Lv. 11 Pupil
Lethal L'Arachel - Lv. 12 Myrm
Still-an-Axe-User Garcia - Lv. 8 Tarvos

Slowest Thief Cormag - Lv. 15 Thief

Girly Franz - Lv. 1 Archer

Known/Suspected Weapon Effects:

[spoiler=list of weapons]

Slim Sword - Horseslayer
Iron Sword - Devil, Reaver against lances (?)
Steel Sword - Devil
Silver Sword - Unlimited

Iron Blade - Armorslayer
Armorslayer - Unlimited
Shamshir - Unlimited
Slim Lance - Spd +5
Iron Lance - Axeslayer
Steel Lance - Devil
Javelin - Deals 1/2 of Enemy's Current HP
Toxic Lance - Unlimited
Iron Axe - Res +5
Steel Axe - Poison
Hand Axe - Unlimited
Silver Axe - Poison

Halberd - Brave
Fiendcleaver - Unlimited
Steel Bow - Unlimited

Longbow - Brave

Brave Bow - Unlimited

Short Bow - does Magic damage
Fire - Poison

Thunder - Brave
Elfire - Res +5
Evil Eye - Brave
Lethal Talon - Str +5

Player Notes & Thoughts:

Overall, not a bad level. The myrm and the boss were the two biggest threats, and it was easy enough to play decent smart and work around them.

The more I play, the more disenfranchised I feel about Hayden and Gilliam. I wish I could squish them into one being. Hayden does no damage and Gilliam can't hit the broad side of a barn. Each chapter it becomes more of a struggle for them to be useful. Even Garcia's been contributing more.

Franz is... intriguing. On one hand, GBA Archer. But, really, his growths don't look like complete shit, and we could use some reliable chip damage. I'll have to make an effort to feed him and see how he turns out.

We get 4 (!!!!) new units next chapter, so that's pretty exciting. I could really use another decent unit so I don't need to have Tana, Joshua, Lute, and L'Arachel carrying everything and the others struggling to contribute. Keeping my fingers crossed. >.>

[Kirie]

Alright, so, this was the first legitimately difficult level that I've played so far. I took 92 caps in total. I'm going to cut out some of the ones for my early attempts (especially things like levels that I end up restarting over, because who needs to see that) just to kind of make the whole thing not super long.

[spoiler=Chapter 10 - The difficulty gets turned up to 11]

Before we start in, I give Lute that Speedwing after all. I guess I'm committed to her now. It's certainly nice to have someone that can actually do some damage, and she's a pretty good tank for a mage. I'll take it.

I'm leaning towards T2 Pupil for her now for delicious dark tome access, but I'm also not sure if we'll ever get a staff user, so I guess we'll see how it goes.

I guess this chapter title actually kind of makes sense. Go figure.

Our first look at !Innes, !Gerik, and !Tethys: a Ranger, another Revenant (hopefully a better one), and a Knight.

!Tethys always brings life to the party.

Ohhey, I guess !Innes can actually be a nice guy sometimes.

.... I take it back.

Hopefully he'll be a better strategist than Prince Kyle, anyway.

Prep screen comes up and we can take a look at the units, yay!

!Innes is Ranger Marisa. Not bad, but she's a non-drafted unit so we can't use her. White Gem is nice, though.

!Gerik is Knight Neimi, another non-drafted unit. At least she comes with a Hero Crest for Tana.

!Tethys is Revenant Fado. The good news is that he's a free unit so we can use him, and he can actually fight unlike actual Tethys.

The bad news is that he's completely unusable anyway.

Over by the enemies, we find !Marisa, who is actually Ephraim, our last drafted unit!

Ephraim is a Lv. 5 Pirate. His bases aren't great, but his growths are decent... except for that grey Str growth, anyway. At least I expected it given the name of my group and the other units I've gotten so far. The Hatchet is nice, and he even comes with his own Metis Tome.

Now let's take a look at the rest of the enemies...

Ouch. It's going to be hard to take him down, especially with Gate bonuses. At least he's 1-range locked?

So many unlimited swords this game.

I would like this, but no way is Cormag fast enough for that.

Anyway, we finally start in. I'm concerned about those greenies to the south, so in the first attempt, I'm pretty aggressive in moving south quickly. Things are going okay and we get some decent levels even until...

Well, fuck. Death Count: 5

Second attempt is more defensive. We hold this line for the first wave. However...

I brought Ross for some reason and didn't notice that I happened to place him in range of a Mage. I'm not even sure why I bothered.

Death Count: 6

I remove Ross from the roster before starting again, more or less the same plan.

We survive EP! Barely, anyway. Franz was a bit too close to the front lines still and juuuust barely survived a round of poisoning with 1 hp.

We start moving again forward, but...

Goddamnit, greenies. I knew I was right to be concerned about you.

Death Count: 7

New attempt. I know I can trust Tana to survive well, so I decide to take on a mixed approach, being aggressive with Tana to move down ASAP and take care of the NPCs while the others hold a defensive line to take care of the opening wave of enemies. I trade L'Arachel's Shamshir over to her to give her better killings.

This is the attempt that, overall, survives. I'm going to start posting levels again now, since they're real.

(I'm also going to flat out admit that I did a bit of savestating in the next few rounds to make sure I didn't die and trash my computer at the thought of restarting the whole chapter again. Neimi died once again (Death Count: 8), so I reloaded and burned a couple RNs to make sure she survived. There was also another part where I burned some RNs to ensure a Shamshir crit. I don't remember exactly when these things happened, and I don't think I screenshot them for the sake of maintaining a narrative flow, so I'm just being open about it here.)

The first couple rounds go by very smoothly. Tana makes herself an EP target and performs admirably; the others also performed admirably cleaning up the rest of the first wave of enemies while Tana beelined south. Have some level screenshots:

Tana got herself some more Str, L'Arachel got a nice defensive level, Lute's was decent as usual, and Gilliam... well, he got something aside from HP/Str, so I'll take it.

I also move Myrrh forward, forgetting that she has the 0 use Iron Sword in the first slot of her inventory (it's been a while since I've used her since she's too good at killing), and she promptly stabs herself in the gut with it. *sigh* At least it's gone now.

Neimi stays next to Marisa instead of running further south to suicide. This was definitely handy to assist with her survival. The next round, she ran further north to heal.

Thus the recruitment train begins! I had brought Innes along for the purpose of recruiting Marisa, then Marisa recruited Neimi. As soon as they were recruited, I unequipped them.

Garcia gets another level, woo~ Though now that I know Ephraim's a Pirate, Garcia's probably not going to be seeing all too much action.

Ope, thus begins the trek of the Ephraim brigade.

Okay, this was actually the part where I loaded a save state, which I had saved as soon as I was done with the two recruitments. The first time, this soldier hit Neimi and then something else came along and chipped her to death. I reloaded, played the exact same until I was about to end turn, then burned a few RNs in hopes of rigging a miss here. Instead, I happened to rig a devil strike. I laughed.

I don't really have anything else for Marisa to do, so she recruits Fado.

... and he's fast enough that he could actually kill something! Go figure.

Garcia gets Sleep'd by the priest in Ephraim's group. *sigh*

This is where things look at the beginning of the post-reinforcement part of this level. Neimi and Innes are Fort healing. Fado had moved forward to kill a guy. Gilliam, Tana, L'Arachel, and Myrrh have all moved to this area to take care of the enemies plaguing the greenie group. Garcia had started heading down to help too before he was Sleep'd, and Cormag is also on the way. Princess Joshua, Lute, and Hayden are dealing with the western enemies. Franz was running around just trying to do his best to stay out of enemy range since he's... not very good at doing anything right now.

Lute gets a kind of shitty level. Come on, Lute, you're better than that.

Cormag dodgetanks Ephraim's attack. At least he's smart enough to attack from range with that Hatchet.

As soon as PP starts again, we clear out dudes so that Neimi can move in and recruit Ephraim.

And the very first thing Ephraim does is run up north and use the Metis Tome. Since L'Arachel has a strong level lead on him, it was the smartest choice. This will give him at least a 25% Str growth, and a 125%+ Def growth which is kind of hilarious.

Unfortunately for Ephraim, the enemy priest took his defection rather hard and Sleep'd him. So much for feeding him any exp this chapter.

Ohhey, just what we need, more enemies to fight. *sigh*

Another pretty shiny thing that Cormag isn't fast enough to steal.

Dealing with these guys is going to be a pain in the ass so I start moving my other units back west.

Lute takes the rearguard and ends up with a very nice level for her troubles.

We backtrack a little bit to kite the PKs until we get more strength in this corner, but we can't move all too far since we have 2 sleeping units to protect.

Thankfully Princess Joshua has absolutely no problem taking down these guys.

In fact, he gets a very nice level out of a suicidal PK in EP. \o/

Tana's capped so many things; gotta love that Metis Tome.

Start of the next PP. Garcia's finally awake now. It's time to clear up this mess and move on.

I finally found something Franz is good at! \o/

Thank you, Franz, you really earned that level.

Something aside from HP/Str, I'll take it. :U

Looks like KE is extra effective against either flyers or horses, not sure which. Will require more testing.

Lute gets an almost perfect level; I'm drooling.

Finally, all of the reinforcements are gone except for one lone Bandit that retreated to the northwest and the enemies behind the door.

While luring out the Ballista, I accidentally placed Ephraim in range of the brave Longbow. >_< He just manages to survive, though.

Looks like the Hatchet is also Brave. Handy!

Franz gets his second nice level. Definitely going to train this guy.

Okay, so, there's an arena. And I can't just not use an arena. The only guy I have free and in range is Gilliam. I don't actually expect him to survive, so I save state and send him in for the lols just to see what happens.

Oh, hey, at least he'll have WTA--

Except Iron Lance is a reaver weapon, fuck. The Merc gets off a his first hit and I almost just immediately go to load the save state then... except I remember that Iron Swords are devil weapons, so I decide to play it out.

And I'm so glad that I did, because he hit himself twice in a row and killed himself. I burst out laughing. Best arena ever.

Of course, Franz only got a single exp for surviving since he didn't hit him a single time, but whatever.

I was originally hoping to feed Pablo to Joshua, but... this would take a while.

Garcia gets the kill instead, and a decent level out of it, too.

You know, for being one of the leaders of a country founded by rich merchants, I always felt Klimt looks kind of hobo-like.

Thanks, I guess?

Considering how useful you guys were during the chapter, I think it's more going to be Princess Joshua keeping you alive.

Ohhey, that's right, we get !Ewan soon, don't we?

And he's somewhat useful even, too!

It was at this point that I collapsed into a puddle, thankful that the level was finally over.

Current Team:

Princess Joshua - Lv. 15 Knight
Squishy Jagen Myrrh - Lv. 11 Swordmaster
Tanky Cav Gilliam - Lv. 8 Cavalier
Demoted Tana - Lv. 17 Myrmidon
Sailor Scout Hayden - Lv. 10 Recruit
"Superior" Mage Lute - Lv. 15 Pupil
Lethal L'Arachel - Lv. 13 Myrm
Still-an-Axe-User Garcia - Lv. 10 Tarvos

Slowest Thief Cormag - Lv. 15 Thief

Girly Franz - Lv. 3 Archer

Benched Fado - Lv. 1 Revenant

Known/Suspected Weapon Effects:

[spoiler=list of weapons]

Slim Sword - Horseslayer
Iron Sword - Devil, Reaver against lances (?)
Steel Sword - Devil
Silver Sword - Unlimited

Iron Blade - Armorslayer

Killing Edge - Effective against flyers or horses?
Armorslayer - Unlimited
Shamshir - Unlimited

Lancereaver - Unlimited
Slim Lance - Spd +5
Iron Lance - Axeslayer
Steel Lance - Devil
Javelin - Deals 1/2 of Enemy's Current HP
Toxic Lance - Unlimited
Iron Axe - Res +5
Steel Axe - Poison
Hand Axe - Unlimited
Silver Axe - Poison

Halberd - Brave
Fiendcleaver - Unlimited

Hatchet - Brave
Steel Bow - Unlimited

Longbow - Brave

Brave Bow - Unlimited

Short Bow - does Magic damage
Fire - Poison

Thunder - Brave
Elfire - Res +5
Evil Eye - Brave
Lethal Talon - Str +5

Player Notes & Thoughts:

This level was definitely a huge difficulty spike, exasperated by suicidal greenies, high-mov reinforcements, and lots of useless baggage to protect. In hindsight, there were probably some better choices I could have made this chapter, but overall I'm pleased with how it went down.

On the bright side, we have our last drafted unit, Ephraim. With a Metis Tome in him, I'm hoping he'll be another Tana. I'm rather glad I didn't use the Ocean Seal on Cormag. >_> Already planning to send him to Berserker for that delicious Crit bonus. I haven't actually gotten to use him much yet thanks to him spending most of the chapter as an enemy or sleeping, but I'm looking forward to seeing how he does.

Next step is to take a bit of a break from the main plot and get some levels into Ephraim and Franz to make them usable.

[Jedi]

That was quite possibly the most amusing arena match I've ever seen, Devil Iron Weapons are silly haha.

[Kirie]

It was definitely the luckiest arena I've ever had, too. I burst out laughing when I saw what happened and I actually went back to reload the save state to take screenshots since it was too intense at the time for me to think about it.

Just goes to show, you should always give the arena a shot.

[Jedi]

Haha yeah, I don't think anything I've ever had happen in the Arena can really compare aside from in FE11 Radd dodging a number of lethal attacks and getting the kill. I actually used him that time through.

[Kirie]

[spoiler=Intermission - Training Montage]

Next step was to get Franz and Ephraim to a point where they could actually contribute. Time for some tower leveling!

First we sell this bullshit Steel Bow. Don't let the unlimited uses fool you; thing is worthless. I'd rather have the 12G.

Yay \o/

So, this is our boss. Holy shit. Unlimited Shadow Shot is awful and it has really good stats to boot.

Thankfully, most of the rest of the guys are like this. That +Def comes from the Rotten Claw effect.

Wow. Some good prizes here.

Here are our starting levels. I figured I'd compare beginnings and endings rather than cap each level as it comes. I'm including Joshua because he'll be my meatshield and he'll probably get a level out of the deal just from tanking hits.

Unlimited Fiendcleaver is Ephraim's best friend.

Boss doesn't move (at least not for siege eye anyway), but if you go within Shadowshot range... ouch.

I actually tried to see if I could rig a way to beat it with Joshua, but Crimson Eye also having a Brave effect ruined the strategy I had come up with, so, yeah.

We retreat and come back to fight more mooks.

This would be a really nice prize... if it wasn't randomized to only have 1 use.

Devil effect weapon.

Bonewalker actually uses that 1-use Runesword and drops the Steel Lance instead. I'll treat it as free gold.

We retreated again and also fought the random Sniper skirmish and retreated from that too (I just didn't find anything cap worthy there). For final comparison:

Franz got some really nice levels. +4 Str, +5 Spd, +7 Def, and +4 HP. He's incredibly defensive for an Archer, though he'd want an Angelic Robe to actually make the most of that, since his HP is still hella low.

Ephraim is AMAZING. 3 +2 Def level-ups, 100% HP/Spd gains, and strong gains everywhere else but Str. I'm guessing his original Str growth was somewhere around the minimum since he only managed 1/7 Str level-ups, though that could just be poor RNG, too. Regardless, he's amazing.

Only 1 level for Josh, despite all that tanking. Still, HP/Str/Skl is a good level for him. His hit is still a bit shaky, so I'll take all the +Skl gains I can get.

Current Team:

Princess Joshua - Lv. 16 Knight
Squishy Jagen Myrrh - Lv. 11 Swordmaster
Tanky Cav Gilliam - Lv. 8 Cavalier
Demoted Tana - Lv. 17 Myrmidon
Sailor Scout Hayden - Lv. 10 Recruit
"Superior" Mage Lute - Lv. 15 Pupil
Lethal L'Arachel - Lv. 13 Myrm
Still-an-Axe-User Garcia - Lv. 10 Tarvos

Slowest Thief Cormag - Lv. 15 Thief

Girly Franz - Lv. 11 Archer

Cap'n Ephraim - Lv. 12 Pirate

Known/Suspected Weapon Effects:

[spoiler=list of weapons]

Slim Sword - Horseslayer
Iron Sword - Devil, Reaver against lances (?)
Steel Sword - Devil
Silver Sword - Unlimited

Iron Blade - Armorslayer

Killing Edge - Effective against flyers or horses?
Armorslayer - Unlimited
Shamshir - Unlimited

Lancereaver - Unlimited
Slim Lance - Spd +5
Iron Lance - Axeslayer
Steel Lance - Devil
Javelin - Deals 1/2 of Enemy's Current HP
Toxic Lance - Unlimited
Iron Axe - Res +5
Steel Axe - Poison
Hand Axe - Unlimited
Silver Axe - Poison

Halberd - Brave
Fiendcleaver - Unlimited

Hatchet - Brave
Steel Bow - Unlimited

Longbow - Brave

Brave Bow - Unlimited

Short Bow - does Magic damage
Fire - Poison

Thunder - Brave
Elfire - Res +5
Evil Eye - Brave
Lethal Talon - Str +5

Rotten Claw - Def +5

Fetid Claw - Devil

Crimson Eye - Brave

Player Notes & Thoughts:

Yay for levels! \o/

Giving that Metis Tome to Ephraim was definitely a good choice. The guy's got some amazing stats and he's going to go far. Like my other two draft picks, he's hurting for Str, but he's solid basically everywhere else. Berserker for the crit boost seems like a clear choice here; the biggest things Warrior has over Berserker are a higher Def cap and Bow access.

I don't regret leveling Franz as he's turning out to be pretty decent. He's a GBA Archer, so I don't expect anything amazing, but he's doing rather well all things considered. His biggest downsides are his lack of Skl and the fact that we'd have to buy an Orion's Bolt for him to promote because we couldn't get the one from C6. As a result, I'm hesitant to put any stat boosters into him, since I'm not sure if he'll be worth that kind of investment in the long term. Though at least we're saving money from buying weapons with all these unlimited weapons we have flying around.

That said, he could really use both the Angelic Robe and the Secret Book I have sitting in the convoy. Maybe I'll give in. More likely, they'll just continue to sit there for a while. >_>

Anyway, would have like to play a real level today, too, just didn't have the tomorrow. Tomorrow I hope to continue onward.

[Enaluxeme]

I wonder if you'll ever get an eye or gorgon unit. I think you can use dark monster weapons with weaponless monsters and all magic attackers until you reach D in dark magic. If that's true you'll want Lute as sage.

Also about promotions, I would personally make L'Arachel an assassin because lethality and Ephraim a warrior because higher def cap and good with bows (he should be wonderful with the brave longbow, I think?), but it's your call anyway.

[Kirie]

I think I want to make one of Tana/L'Arachel an Assassin and the other a Swordmaster, but I haven't decided which is which. So far, Tana seems to have the better overall stats/growths, which may influence that decision. SM has the better caps and the crit boost, where Assassin mostly has Lethality and Lockpick access. It probably makes sense to put Tana in the overall stronger class and have L'Arachel for utility and gimmicks, but on the other hand, that crit boost would also help L'Arachel too. Decisions decision.

Higher Def cap for Ephraim is somewhat tempting. It's his best feature and it would be nice to make use of that. 3 points may not seem like a lot, but depending on how strong some of the enemies might be, that could come in handy. I'm less enthused about bow access. 2R lock seems like it would waste on a high Def unit who does better on the front lines. Brave Longbows are definitely nice in the right hands, but they only have 5 Mt, and Ephraim's Str is shit and will likely remain shit unless I do some serious RNG manipulation. I definitely foresee him sticking to the higher Mt Axes, no matter which direction I go.

I do think we're going to see more playable monsters, mostly based on an overworld map shops selling Claws and Fangs. I don't know if we'll see any playable Eyes/Gorgons, but they would be sweet as hell, and Eye weapons in particular are broken as shit it looks like so far.

Deciding between Pupil and Sage for Lute is an agonizing choice. On the Pupil side, Dark Magic looks incredibly great from what I've seen so far and Klok flat out said that it's the best weapon type in the game, hands down. On the Sage side, having a Staff user would be incredibly helpful, not even just for healing HP, but things like status restoration (it was awful being stuck asleep for so long in C10) and Warp/Rescue would be wonderful to have access to. It's very difficult.

I think I'm leaning towards Pupil just so that I can guarantee access to the broken, useful Dark Magic for my strength-lacking team. Klok flat out said I might have issue lategame with my team, especially with the changes he made to the Demon King, so I might need all the help I can get in that regard.

It would be useful to know if I'd have access to any other Staff/Dark Magic users before game end, but I'm not sure if I want to ask and spoil myself or not.