Let's Play: Fire Emblem: Sacred Stones!

[QuoteMyFoot]

Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones is the 8th title in the Japanese turn based strategy series Fire Emblem, commonly known as ‘FE8’ or simply ‘Sacred Stones’. I have a lot of love for the FE, since it was my first fandom, and introduced me to the wide world of the internet. It’s also to this day my only major non-Pokemon game interest. Make of that what you will.

FE8 is considered by the fandom to be the worst title in the series, because it’s shorter and significantly easier than the others. But in a series that tends to practise the Nintendo Hard trope religiously (as far as I know, every release except Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn for the Wii was made easier for Western audiences by adding ‘Easy’ mode, and these games are still pretty hard), I think it’s a good introduction. It also has a host of colourful characters, some good graphics considering the format, and hey, this game used to kill me on loleasy mode. This was also my introduction to the series, so it has a special place in my heart.

I used to be heavily involved in the Fire Emblem meta game. My knowledge and mental tier list is probably outdated, but I do know a lot about the characters and how the mechanics work. I’ll try not to overwhelm you with this knowledge. (I'm assuming for now that most of you are unfamiliar with these games.)

Okay... I think that’s more than you need for an introduction. Without further ado, let’s play Fire Emblem: Sacred Stones!

Spoiler: show

New Game!
I didn’t screencap it, but I chose Difficult mode. This is my first LP so I’m still getting used to it. You’ll probably notice that this first chapter is really sparse on screencaps of stuff we actually want to see. That will pick up next chapter, I hope. Bear with me on this.


Bets on these Sacred Stones being important? Anyone?


Heh. If you’re thinking this sounds like the backstory to 95% of all RPGs, you’d be right. There is a reason this game is liked less than the others.


Woohoo!


Aww man.




There can be a lot of exposition between chapters. This is good, because the characters in these games are generally really interesting. However, sometimes we get world lessons like this.


Seriously, this is like the beginning of a bad fantasy novel. Or a really simple textbook. I’m a history student and even I find this boring!


Lolbias? What’s that?


So much for ‘peerless Warrior King’, huh?

Missed some caps here, but I’ll be doing that a lot for these sections. Basically, Renais offered about zero resistance, and Grado has taken most of the country.


Goddamit Ephraim! Can’t you stay put for three seconds?!


This is actually a pretty depressing start for a Fire Emblem game.


Wait, what’s this?! ACTION!


...Nope, more talky talky. :( Oh well, at least it’s not as bad as Persona 4.


SERIOUSLY FADO, IS NOW THE TIME TO BE WORRYING ABOUT HER FASHION SENSE.
This girl here is Eirika, by the way. She’ll be our major protagonist for the first part of the game.


Well, when you put it like that...


Oh no you don’t! If you die, we get a game over!


Seth here (forgot to cap his introduction, derp) is of the Oifaye archetype. Fire Emblem has a bunch of terms like this which come from the early games that like three people have played. Basically, it means he starts off much stronger than your other characters, but will continue to be useful throughout the game.


He’s not kidding, by the way. Losing either of these two means game over and you have to play the chapter over again. With any other character, you have the option of continuing without them, and they stay dead unless they’re needed for plot scenes. Even then, you can’t fight with them again. No Phoenix Downs in this game!


Nooo...


Now that’s just rude. :-|


And you are just a corpse who does not know he is dead!”


Hell yes, a fight screen! ...That is pre-programmed in, doh. Basically, Seth misses and ends up with 13 HP. Well done dude.


Time to flee! There was a bit here about Seth sticking to his duty, but I missed it. It’s boring anyway. Also, I like how he just watches the guy on a horse leave even though he is riding a huge flying lizard. (These are called wyverns, btw.)


These games are well known for their moral ambiguity and lack of Card Carrying Villains.


Priorities: this guy has them.


I mean, it’s only a huge gaping wound in my arm. That’s not going to make swinging a sword harder or anything.
Due to Gameplay and Story Segregation, of course, it actually doesn’t.

{Eirika worries about her Dad.}

This is grand and all, but I’m more concerned with, you know, how good they are at fighting.


Eirika’s stats are pretty pathetic at this stage, so he has a point.

“You’re right, Seth.


{The journey will be dangerous blah blah blah.}


Presents!


Bets this guy’s not on our side? Anyone? Also, this guy is officially the least developed boss of the games. He doesn’t even have eyes.

{Princess, you must flee.}


I will stand with you.”

FIGHTAN TIME!


These are Eirika’s stats. There’s a third screen that I ignored for some reason? Ah well, you’ll see it later. For some reason, I forgot Seth’s. I WILL GET BETTER NEXT CHAPTER I PROMISE.
Anyway, Eirika’s your typical Fragile Speedster: accurate and fast, but horrible, horrible defences. In the later stages of the game she’ll be fast enough that she’ll dodge most things, but for now we’ll have to be careful with her. Two hits from the guys in this chapter and she’s dead.
Rapier is her Prf, or Preference weapon. She’s the only person in the game who can use it. It’s pretty fantastic, giving her a critical boost [chance of x3 damage] and does double damage to armoured and horse units.


Since she’s so fragile, we don’t want her to be able to face more than one guy at once. Move her here...


Takes out one guy, but gets hit by the other [didn’t get any of it, sorry]. Vulneraries heal 10HP, which is a fair amount at this point in the game. Later they become a bit useless, but these things are always good for emergencies.


Thank you, Captain Obvious.


See that little icon in the bottom left of the first shot? Different terrains give different boosts in this game, but are harder to cross. Forests give pretty decent boosts, so they’re useful when you’re on the defensive. The default terrain is ‘Plains’, which gives nothing. Moving Eirika here is a good idea, since she’ll get +20 to her avoid. She already gets +15 from the weapon triangle [more on that later], so it’s highly unlikely the boss will be able to hit her now.


Like I thought, he misses. Eirika then criticals and wipes him out in one blow. Not bad at all.
Your units (characters) will level up every time they gain 100 EXP. Bosses and units higher level than your own will give much more experience than average units. Seth, for example, would get very little exp from killing these guys (4, max) -- Eirika gets about 30, I think.
This level up is pretty decent for her. Her strength growth is a solid 40%, but because of her low starting stat, she can be a little weak. We have to use her anyway though, so let’s just hope we get lucky.

{War is bad.}

Strength is all that matters for you, darlin’. Don’t worry, you’ll recruit magic users later who cast spells... from books! Considering your Resistance (Magic defence), the pen is indeed mightier than the sword.

And that anti-climax concludes the Prologue. Less talky-talky and more stabby-stabby next time, I promise. Later when we recruit more units you can start picking out a team, but for now we're fairly limited.


Also, at the risk of referencing a meme no one will get: No, Marth and Roy are not in this game.

[QuoteMyFoot]

Prologue: The Fall of Renais -- [above you]
In which we are off to a depressing start, and the basics of the game are outlined.
Characters introduced: Eirika, Seth

Chapter 1: Escape! -- Here
In which we pull off a rescue, and the basics of the game are outlined further.
Characters introduced: Gilliam, Franz

Chapter 2: The Protected -- Here
In which we do good at the beginning of an insane journey, and gain some loot.
Characters introduced: Moulder, Vanessa, Ross, Garcia

Chapter 3: The Bandits of Borgo -- Here
In which we have a canonical sidequest, more looting, and our first opportunity to plan ahead.
Characters introduced: Neimi, Colm

Chapter 4: Ancient Horrors -- Here
In which zombies are fought, Quote's bias against light magic is revealed, and our first support is achieved!
Characters introduced: Artur, Lute

Chapter 5: The Empire's Reach -- Here
In which Seth makes use of an arena, the plot thickens, and Amelia cameos!
Characters introduced: Natasha, Joshua aka Nice Hat Guy

[Tempest Kitsune]

Interesting so far (and I'm liking the narrator commentary too).

[MEKristian]

Well, we'll have to see how this goes; what I know of FE's metagaming fandom is... less than positive. But if it doesn't go down that road, no harm no foul 'n' stuff.

And, as somebody who has done screen-shotting of a text-heavy, top-down turn-based strategy game, you have my sympathies.

[Greybane]

Ah, FE8, how I remember that tower. Fun game, I look forward to this.

[QuoteMyFoot]

Well, we'll have to see how this goes; what I know of FE's metagaming fandom is... less than positive. But if it doesn't go down that road, no harm no foul 'n' stuff.

And, as somebody who has done screen-shotting of a text-heavy, top-down turn-based strategy game, you have my sympathies.

I had a good time debating the metagame, but it's very Serious Business. I was new to the internet in those days, and it didn't bother me so much, but I'm definitely going to do my best to stay away from that here.

...I probably know far too much about these games now. It's a little sad that I still get enjoyment from them...

ATTENTION!
MEK raises a good point here. Even though I’m probably gonna say things like, “this guy’s pretty bad” or “this character is kinda hard to use”, please feel free to ignore me. No really, if you like the look of a character, say so and they’ll get added to the team! (As long as enough people agree to it.)

Spoiler: show

The way that the game works is that every character has a set of ‘growths’ for each of their stats. For example, Eirika’s Strength growth is 40%. Every time a unit levels up, the computer rolls a series of numbers from 0-99 to see if you get +1. In this case, Eirika will gain a point of strength every time this number is 39 or less, and miss it every time it’s 40 or higher. What this means is that everything is random. Characters with better growths will probably turn out better than those with bad growths, but it’s far from certain. So when I describe a character as ‘bad’ or ‘good’, I’m talking about on average. So ‘bad’ characters can turn out awesome, and ‘good’ characters can suck.

A lot of the ‘bad’ characters in this game are also really entertaining, which is why I like it so much. In fact, this will probably be more entertaining if you pick the bad characters, because then you’ll get to see me failing at keeping them alive.

tl;dr don’t let me be a “Stop Having Fun” Guy. Anything I say is just advice and probability.


Onwards!


Escape? Wait, what were we doing last chapter then? The Macarena?

Spoiler: show

Oh hey, someone with eyes! She must be recruitable!

{Go get reinforcements!}

...Bets we have to bail these guys out? Anyone?



OSHI-- That’s a critical, guys. Be very afraid of these.

(Green units are neutral characters, by the way. You can’t control them unless you recruit them, but sometimes you’re just supposed to protect them. Yes, there are escort missions in our future. Not for a while yet, though.)


Oh, Tana. Your heart’s in the right place dearie, but...


Her brother, by the way, is my favourite character in this game. We’ll meet him later.


Standard Female Grab Area strikes again.


I love this game. There’s always at least one character who points out the smart thing to do...

{We must help them!}

...so you can sigh when the other suggests Honor Before Reason and it works. To be fair, Seth is a knight*, and that’s a pretty good guilt trip.
*Not a Knight, the in-game class. The capital is important here. Yeah, this is confusing sometimes.


How do you plan to retake a castle with two people, Princess?! It’s a good job this is a Fire Emblem game. Don’t try this at home kids!

CHAPTER START!


Here’s a look at Seth, as promised. Notice how he’s kinda godly compared to Eirika? That’s because Seth is a “prepromote”. There are two levels of “classes” in this game -- ‘Lord’ and every other unit we’ll get for a good while or so will be of a lower-level class. When a unit reaches Level 20 of a lower “class”, they can “promote” into a higher one using special items.
A prepromote is, well, already promoted. They’ll gain exp a lot slower, but they’re guaranteed to turn out at least decent. Seth can match most other characters for the rest of the game because of this headstart, and he’ll a big help if we get stuck in the early chapters. (He does tend to turn out worse than the other cavaliers available though, so eh.) However, relying on him steals exp from other units, so it’s best to avoid that whenever possible for a while.
Notice also the weapons he has. Silver is the best kind of weapon in the game (yes, I know how much sense that makes), but you can’t buy them until later. This one here is strictly for emergencies. Also, you need to be rank ‘A’ in Lances, so Seth is the only guy who can use this now anyway.
That’s what the third screen is, btw: weapon levels. Seth starts off with an A in lances and swords. Other characters who use two or more weapons aren’t likely to get high in both until near the very end of the game, if then, making Seth pretty versatile here.
The highest weapon rank is S. There are only a few S-rank weapons, but getting an S rank gives a +5 bonus to critical and hit, so it’s worth paying attention to. You can’t S-rank your weapons until after promotion, though.

Anyway!

You can see I’ve moved Eirika here, as she’s helpfully greyed out. If you have the cursor over an enemy and press the A button, you see their attack range, like this (they can get anything in the blue or red squares). Normally I would be worried that Eirika is in range of this guy, but he doesn’t move, so she’s safe. Under other circumstances you can assume I’m checking these religiously. If someone dies, it’s probably because I didn’t check them enough.


The “visit” option allows us to enter houses and villages. If you’re new to the game, you can get helpful information from these guys, like this one here. Villages tend to give out items and gold instead. I know all this stuff already, so I’ll only visit places with loot from now on. This is just an example.
Also shown here: blue movement squares! Mounted units (wyverns, horses or pegasi) can move after some actions. Attacking isn’t one of them, unfortunately. Still, it can be helpful under some circumstances.


The enemy’s turn starts automatically when you move all your units, but all that happened was that Eirika killed this axe dude (a Fighter).


Before it’s our turn again, these guys show up! Now we can take on a castle with four people!


...Or we could just have the guy on the right glare them into submission...

Now our party’s going to start getting bigger!


Gilliam here is a Knight, and also a knight. He doesn’t say Ni. Knight are armoured units, and as you can probably tell, they have incredible defence -- seriously, nothing physical will bother this guy. Their strength is pretty good too, but they don’t tend to do well in offence because their speed is awful. They also have lower Move than other characters, so they can fall behind quickly. I tend not to use them because my strategy’s nearly always offensive.
That said, Gilliam is a lot better than most knights in terms of speed, and he has the option to promote into a class with good movement later in the game. (Or you can tell me to stop rushing so much.) He also looks pretty badass, which is always a plus point. If you guys want to use him, don’t let me stop you. He can also be pretty funny in some of his Supports. [Extra conversations that boost stats: more when it comes up.]
There are some weapons designed to do extra damage to these guys, but they’re rare enough that it’s not an issue.


Franz here is the first Cavalier we’ll get. Like Seth, he’s mounted and can use both swords and lances, so he’s pretty versatile. His strength and speed tends to come out pretty good, so he’s a good offensive unit. His luck and resistance, however, are horrible. Luck contributes to avoid, so he won’t be as good at dodging as other characters. That said, his defence and HP are normally pretty decent, so he can soak up damage.
Franz is the newcomer knight in-story, but even though that’s a pretty worn out trope, I think his supports are fun. He also gets some really heartwarming Supports with a certain other character. :3
Like Gilliam, there are some weapons designed to do extra damage to horse-units. Also like Gilliam, they’re rare enough not to be a problem.


Now that that’s out of the way... see first cap, bottom right? More terrain bonuses. Forts give the best terrain boost and they restore some HP at the beginning of a turn, so they’re pretty awesome.
The last cap is also a sort of “attack preview”. You can see how much damage you do here and how likely you are to hit without committing to an attack. The “x2” here means that Eirika double attacks and she literally can’t miss this guy, so he’s definitely dead. In general, 80+ is reliable in terms of hit. 70s you’re likely to see a few misses, 60s and especially 50s you better cross your fingers. You will ALWAYS miss at the worst possible time.


Nothing unexpected here...


Not as good as the last level up, but still got some strength. I’ll take that.


Aha! Weapon level up! This means she can use stronger swords now. Not very well, mind you, but still. I probably won’t screencap these all that often; it’s not that exciting and for most of the game, the highest ranked weapons we’ll be using are Cs.


For the record, Soldiers like this guy are pure mook-troops. They tend to have Attack Speed of 2 or less, sometimes 0. (I’ll get into Attack Speed [AS] in more detail later, but for now if your AS is 4 or more higher than your opponent’s, you’ll double.) So that Gilliam can’t double this guy is pretty pathetic. He’ll get better later though.
Gilliam’s Level 4 right now, so weakening this guy for Franz works to our benefit anyways.


Time to explain the weapon triangle! Axes beat lances beat swords beat axes. Don’t worry about remembering that, though, because the little arrows are a pretty big hint. Lances beat swords, so by using a sword here, Franz gives the soldier +1 Attack and +15 hit. Franz also loses -1 Attack and -15 hit. This means the soldier is fifteen percent more likely to hit him. That’s a pretty big number at this point in the game.
[The second screencap here, by the way, is Franz’s raw stats with the Iron Lance equipped compared to the Iron Sword - he gains attack and loses hit, hence the arrows. We’re focussing on the first and third here though.]
Franz CAN gets axes when he promotes, but he doesn’t have them now. Weapon triangle neutral is the best we can go for.


Of course it doesn’t matter very much here, because Franz was going to kill him anyway -- since he initiates he gets the first attack and it’s kinda hard to counter when you’re dead.

However, this marks the end of our turn, so...


I missed screencapping it, but you can see that Franz lost a couple of HP here. Doesn’t matter so much on a level with such a low ratio of enemies:allies, but later in the game giving him the weapon that’ll do best against the most enemies might be important. This is also why characters like Eirika, who are stuck with one weapon type, are at a disadvantage. Gilliam... not so much, since his defence is so high, and he can get other stuff when he promotes.
That was Franz doubling, by the way. That axe guy moving up is a bit of a problem for lance!Franz, but we’ll be fine.


Our turn again! Eirika heals that 1 HP she got from the level-up by glowing, as you do. You can see those enemy reinforcements down in the corner there. Forgot to screencap them when they arrived, but they won’t be much trouble. Sometimes these guys can appear in the worst places, though, and on defensive levels you can get a lot of strong reinforcements constantly coming at you.


Check the Soldier and Fighter attack ranges...


Move Franz so he’s only in the Fighter’s range, equip sword FOR SCIENCE! And I’ll end the turn there. Slow and steady wins the race and all that.

[NOTE: Sorry if I come across as a bit patronising with things like this. I’m trying to get you guys used to the sort of tactics/mechanics of the game, so you can suggest strategies later when there’s more opportunity to plan for this stuff. I’m also shamelessly advertising the Fire Emblem series here, hence me explaining about things you don’t need to know about. Er, apologies if it’s a little boring.]


On the enemy turn, the Fighter hits Franz anyway.


Move Gilliam so those reinforcements can’t get at Franzy-boy, and have Franz finish off that Fighter.


Well... okay... could have been better, but since he doesn’t get Res all that much, it could’ve been a lot worse too.


And on the enemy turn, Eirika kills all of the reinforcements. :-| Missed capping Soldier, but she did get that guy too.

THIS MEANS


...a pretty meh level up, apparently. We won’t be seeing magic units for a while and Eirika tends to do okay at Res, so this is comparatively worse than Franz’s despite being the same stats. :/


Our turn again! Franz here can’t reach the forest. Since the enemy AI tends to target units with low HP, I don’t want to give that soldier opportunity to attack him from the forest, so he’s two spaces away instead.


Demonstrating the Talk command! Seth has somehow ended up as Mr. Exposition here, but that’s the way the cookie crumbles. [There was more to this conversation, but it’s not important.] Here it’s just to add a bit more to the characters, but later you can use this to recruit people.
(By the way, Franz? You had this guy and Mister Peerless-Warrior-King on your side. You still lost the war.)


Checking the Soldier’s range because I don’t want Eirika to killsteal...


Back to our turn again -- Franz is low on HP so we’ll move him out the way and have Gilliam weaken the boss. Eirika’s Rapier is super-effective on this guy, but she doesn’t receive the “it’s not very effective...” in return. I also want to conserve uses of that Rapier, because it’ll be a long time before we get another and it’s already looking quite low. (Every time you hit an enemy, your weapon loses 1 use. Magic tomes lose uses just by missing.)



Two turns’ worth here. (‘End’ can be used to end a chapter without telling every. Single. Unit. To just ‘Wait’. Not so helpful here, stops you dying of boredom in later chapters.) Gilliam can’t take any more damage without dying and I don’t want to use a vulnerary at the very end of the chapter. Boss should be weakened enough now anywa--


...Oh, for Pete’s sake. 1 point off? Really?


Franz, my man!


I forgot the boss would recover HP from the castle. Normally this wouldn’t make much difference, but since Franz MISSED with his second strike (told you 50s aren’t ones to rely on), we’re right back where we started, and this whole turn was pointless. That’s my fault for trying to be a miser with the Rapier, I guess.


With a 60ish chance of hitting, and having to hit twice, I’m not risking attacking on my turn. Wait.


Eirika missed her first attack, proving me right. But then she criticalled, making all my manoeuvring of the last turn very, very pointless whilst achieving precisely what I wanted.

So yes, Boss Guy. Those were my exact thoughts.

The Random Number God points and laughs at me sometimes, I swear.


All that’s left is to seize the castle, the goal of the chapter. Even though you have two Lords later in the game, only your main one can do this. This makes no sense, but. Mechanics.

Now for more talky-talky! ...Am I going to hit the image limit soon? >_>;


That’s the problem with these knights, they never say: “Well Excuse Me, Princess!”

Sometimes it just needs to be said.


Tana, if you can’t even recognise your best friend, maybe you shouldn’t be out at the border when your country is being invaded. Just sayin’.

Thanks for worrying about Eirika, though. It’s good to know I’m not the only one.


Oh no wait, she just wants to know how Ephraim is.
S-Sometimes I think you don’t care about me at all, Tana! :sad:


Random path appeared!


...I just think it’s cute how the sprites walk! :D


Oh boy, I sense story time!


Wait, so you’re using our survival to get yourself out of trouble with Daddy?

...I don’t know whether to admire that or not.


“Does me more good than the digitalis!” 8D


I’m starting to wonder what qualifies a guy for ‘peerless’ around here.


Let’s hope he doesn’t put Tana in charge of this.


What the--? :-| Okay, how come this guy knows more about Ephraim’s movements than his own country?


At least there’s one guy around here who doesn’t confuse ‘valiant’ with ‘invincible’.


I’m with the old guy. Your Defence? Remember that? It’s three.


Then why don’t you have his stats?!


Stop it with the guilt tripping! ;-;



Give in?
Sounds like a plan!


Wait, who?


Moulder the Boulder!


Vanessa the Pegasus... girl... rider... thing.


And Gilliam, who you’ve met. H-He keeps glaring at me...


Presents? :eek:


PRESENTS!!


Well I don’t know Tana, why don’t you tell her?


Not anymore. His Dad kinda killed my Dad, you know, it’s just awkward now. :-|


Let’s face it Tana, you don’t want Ephraim to die either, right? (Any bets on what kind of unit she’ll be?)


...

What do you mean, “you can’t recruit Tana yet”?!

...But we just saved her from Grado soldiers!
B-But she has a crush on my brother!
BUT she’s not suicidal! Anyway, Daddy’s mad at me, remember? Laters~

Well played, Tana. Well played.

Our team currently!
Eirika - Lord, level 4 [we have to use her]
Seth - Paladin, level 20/1 (20 here representing his ‘previous’ class)
Franz - Cavalier, level 2
Gilliam - Knight, level 4
Vanessa - Pegasus Knight, level 1
Moulder - Priest, level 3

I’ll go into more detail on Vanessa and Moulder next chapter. For now I’ll probably be using everyone anyway, with some bias towards Eirika (three defence!) and whoever else you want to stick around, although you can change your mind on that at any time you want. Seth, as I said, will be for emergencies only, but if you guys like him I might use him a bit more than I would normally.

Just so you know, the maximum number for a team is about 12. Minus spots for the two lords, that’s 10 more characters to pick.

[MEKristian]

I had a good time debating the metagame, but it's very Serious Business. I was new to the internet in those days, and it didn't bother me so much, but I'm definitely going to do my best to stay away from that here.

...I probably know far too much about these games now. It's a little sad that I still get enjoyment from them...

ATTENTION!
MEK raises a good point here. Even though I’m probably gonna say things like, “this guy’s pretty bad” or “this character is kinda hard to use”, please feel free to ignore me. No really, if you like the look of a character, say so and they’ll get added to the team! (As long as enough people agree to it.)

Unlike some, I do my best to point out potential problems before they develop into problems.

And your ramble can be best summed up by the fandom's proclamation that "personal experience [with a character] doesn't matter."

When a unit reaches Level 20 of a lower “class”, they can “promote” into a higher one using special items.

Not technically true, but as far as the metagame is concerned, it is. SO, I shall quickly explain the actual mechanics, as I don't remember is Sacred Stones has the tutorial for it like Blazing Sword does:

The actual requirement for a character being able to promote is being level 10+. Now, note that it's only half of the amount Quote says; this is because the highest level a unit can reach is level 20. They will continue to gain experience until this cap, as well as stat boosts on level up. So, the best option it to wait until they hit this cap and you've wrung ever stat gain out of the previous class before promoting a character. Otherwise you'll be missing out.

THE MORE YOU KNOW!

[QuoteMyFoot]

And your ramble can be best summed up by the fandom's proclamation that "personal experience [with a character] doesn't matter."

Well, I like to think I was being a bit more open to the idea of using a character just because you can. :D I have favourites that I use all the time, but I default to the meta when explaining anything to anyone, heh. Thanks for bringing this up.

Also, thanks for pointing out the thing with the experience. I had genuinely forgotten you could promote sooner, because I'm clever like that. 20 is my default unless someone says otherwise, though.

[Greybane]

I say focus on the Pegasus Knight and Priest until we get some better versions of both (if ever). That should give us some good mobility, and healing is always, always useful in games like this.

Also, I love flying units. I tend to have a couple Pegasus or Wyrven quite a few levels beyond what they should be at. Very useful for the escort and Protect missions. Plus grabbing some objective that you can only get in (x) turns or something. Worth having at least one primary flyer be as high level as our lord in my experience.

[serbii]

Ahh Fire Emblem, for your permanent deaths and breaking weapons I shall remember you, the series which launched a thousand save states.

Ahh Sacred Stones... I played you... and that's all I remember. Hmm, I had a hax pegasus knight I think.

Damn the standard female grab area!

*More reading* That blonde guy... oh... I don't think I picked him but I have the niggling feeling we have to pick someone for a meat shield heroic sacrifice soon.

Speaking of permadeaths how easily are you going to give up your dead to the reaper?

Oh god early level pegasi suck, they're made of glass and fragile bird bones, when people start upgrading to nigh on unhitable pesasus knights then we'll be ok but for now. Ugh, the only thing they're good for is getting to villages quick and killing archers, IF, and only if, they can move inside their range in one turn as arrows are pegasus kryptonite. Keep Vanessa from the front line. They can be really good later game, but from memory having them as primary attackers early is suicide.

[DIT_grue]

My only exposure to Fire Emblem was reading an RP over on SpaceBattles. It looked pretty fun, but moved fast enough that every time I got distracted by something else I'd fall further behind. I'm pretty sure I still have a 'where I'm up to' pointer buried somewhere in my files, but I don't know whether I'll ever get around to finish reading it. Anyway, I'm interested in this, but I'm afraid I'm not very talkative, so this may well be all you ever see of me in the thread.

[QuoteMyFoot]

*More reading* That blonde guy... oh... I don't think I picked him but I have the niggling feeling we have to pick someone for a meat shield heroic sacrifice soon.

Speaking of permadeaths how easily are you going to give up your dead to the reaper?

The heroic sacrifice is the the FE1 remake for the DS (which I never completed).

Also, on deaths: if anyone dies, I'll end the update there. If you guys want me to carry on despite the death, I will do, if not I'll replay the chapter. Obviously if it's a Lord character I'll have to restart anyway. Mostly I suspect this will be an opportunity for you to laugh at me.

My only exposure to Fire Emblem was reading an RP over on SpaceBattles. It looked pretty fun, but moved fast enough that every time I got distracted by something else I'd fall further behind. I'm pretty sure I still have a 'where I'm up to' pointer buried somewhere in my files, but I don't know whether I'll ever get around to finish reading it. Anyway, I'm interested in this, but I'm afraid I'm not very talkative, so this may well be all you ever see of me in the thread.

Don't feel like just because you're not familiar with the game you can't post, btw. If there's a character you think is cool, especially early on, post something and I'll try to keep them around for a while. I would appreciate it if you let me know you're still enjoying/following every now and then. Thanks for reading anyway!

---

Oh boy, and I thought last chapter was image heavy... almost 260 shots here. Hrrgh. There was some culling involved. That said, the next chapter is probably going to be even worse, because I’m going to play through to the beginning of Chapter 4 as well, to give you a sneak preview at the map. After that it should balance out.

Not looking forward to some of the longer chapters. Not. At. All.

But for now -- ONWARDS! TO GLORY!


...This is where we get to be do-gooders, isn’t it.

Spoiler: show

But before that! Just showing off the new world map we have access to. Most of the time you can access this between chapters, meaning you’ll be able to manage supplies, buy weapons and healing stuff, etc. We can’t buy anything right now, though I did do a little reorganisation. I’ll do this offscreen because it takes up too many snapshots.
All there is to move on to our destination -- Ide!

{Summary of all the chapters we’ve just played}

Yep... do-gooder chapter.


You are all insane.


Well, at least we aren’t being totally reckless...


Asdkhaksla;shjsksld; Eirika is not kidding about those bowmen. Franz (and Seth) and Gilliam have a few weapons designed to be super-effective against them, fliers have a whole weapon class. There’s an item later which will protect them from this, but until then... we’ll have to keep a VERY close eye on Vanessa.


I just love the little overworld sprites. Hee! Wings!


Ah, bandits. A Fire Emblem staple. Is there any FE game that doesn’t feature these?

That guy on the left isn’t in this chapter, by the way. We’ll get our chance to kill him too.


Characters with eyes who aren’t evil! I bet we can recruit them!


Oh no you don’t! That’s our loot!


Any time a bandit enters a village, it gets destroyed (with a helpful caption telling you so that I didn’t get here). Sometimes it’s a real pain trying to get there before they do. Here’s also the first appearance of neutral characters onscreen!


It turns out he’s lost 10 of his 15 HP. So yeah. A scratch. (Hey, a vulnerary can heal it!)


Vanessa, of course has been spying on this conversation. Presumably these two guys missed the big hulking winged horse in the sky.


More flying! :D


When even the priest recognises that this is a bad idea...


GUILT TRIP SUCCESS!

--CHAPTER START!--


This is Moulder. Healers can’t attack, but they are invaluable. Every team needs one of these. They can’t fight, so they level up pretty slowly. Raising two at once is possible but... not a good idea. For now, though, we don’t have any other choices for this position.
The meta game loves Moulder because he gets good Support bonuses, but I don’t like relying on those, since the bonuses are only active in a certain range, and I tend to hurry all over the place with my healers. ON TOPIC NOW. Moulder gets decent magic and good speed, with above average defence for a magic unit. However, his luck is pretty awful for a guy who’s going to be called on to dodge a lot. His Res is way below average for a magic unit but perfectly adequate overall.
Character wise he’s the wise old priest and a sort of Team Mom. He has some nice friendship supports with Gilliam, and is supportive of Vanessa, etc. He has some funny ones with Colm, who we’ll get next chapter, but he’s mostly a serious character.


Vanessa, as I said, is veeerry weak to bows. Her defence is generally okay, but her HP can be really iffy. Her strength is also decent. She’ll get excellent luck and speed, so she’s good at dodging. Her Res is also solid and she’ll make a great mage killer.
What I really want to talk about is her Con, or Constitution. This is what decides how often you double attack. All weapons have a weight, generally higher rank = higher weight. If your weapon weighs more than your Con, the difference is subtracted from your speed. Basically with heavy weapons Vanessa will lose some ability to dodge and double.
That said, I generally like Vanessa as a unit. She needs careful looking after early on but becomes powerful later. However, personality wise, she’s pretty dull imo. Dutiful knight, very serious, has a low opinion of herself. Oh, but she does have a crush on Frelia’s prince, which is kinda cute.


First port of call is to get Ross to safety...


Take him from Vanessa and Drop him there... (Constitution, or rather Aid, also effects being able to rescue a unit. Mounted units have higher Aid. This’ll rarely come up. I don’t use Rescue very often.)


Move everyone around a little, have Eirika collect us some loot...


Wait, a non-generic character portrait?

{Eirika comes to warn about the bandits, Blondie notices something off about her.}

Lying always works!


Wait... what? Moral ambiguity, in my Fire Emblem? It’s more likely than you think!


Why do they get all the cute blondes?


Wait, you mean we’re getting paid for being do-gooders? SWEET.

(Gems are only useful to sell for funds. Red Gem is worth the least of the lot. Blue is next on the list, then White.)


On the enemy phase, Garcia gets attacked!


On the “Other” turn (that’s literally what it’s called), he killsteals! Seriously dude, couldn’t you have waited like two turns?

(What he’s using here is a Hand Axe, one of the weapons that can attack from a range. You’ll see me use this later. The lance equivalent is a Javelin. Swords don’t really have an equivalent, which sucks, because these things are pretty useful.)


First thing on our turn, Eirika recruits Ross.


Ross is one of three exceptions to the classes I was talking about earlier. Journeyman is a “trainee” class. Basically, he gets ten levels more than other characters. So even though he looks pretty weak now, he’s worth the looking after to train up. He also levels up really quickly -- he won’t be like this for long. If you want this guy to stick around, pick a class route for him - Pirate or Fighter? I’ll talk about this more in the summary.
Like most axe units, Ross gets excellent HP and Str. His Res is normally... passable, I guess. He can soak up the damage because of his HP. Speedwise, he’s normally decent at least, so he’s an offensive powerhouse. His luck is also excellent. His accuracy can be a little iffy sometimes though.
Ross is your typical Hot Blooded Boisterous Bruiser. His supports range from amusing to hilarious, with some heartwarming thrown in for good measure.


Rescue Garcia with Vanessa, drop him off there with Seth... CHARACTER GET!


In this context, “together” apparently means, “with these complete strangers whom I’ve not so much as spoken with”. We could be real mercenaries for all you know! ...Oh wait, there are no real mercenaries in Fire Emblem.


Here’s Garcia! Like Ross, he has good HP and Strength. Unlike Ross, he tends to be slow. Really slow. Checking, his Speed growth is only 20%, which... ouch. His luck is decent, but his Def and Res could be a lot better. Basically, he’s a slower Ross, with less opportunity to grow.
That said... Garcia is one of my favourite characters in the game. He has the most hilarious supports I’ve ever seen with another axe guy, and he arm wrestles with Gilliam! (They have a nice friendship moment too.) But he also has some fairly heartwaming supports with Ross and Neimi. His support with Seth is interesting, too. Basically, I really like his character.


Time to heal Garcia! (Stay away from the light...)


Just showing off the Hand Axe here. It’s useful because of the ranged attack, but it’s pretty inaccurate and a little weaker than an Iron Axe, so there are downsides.


Brought an Iron Sword for Eirika (so I can stop using the bloody Rapier already) and an Iron Lance for Vanessa. It’ll slow her down, but she needs the attack boost sometimes.


Finish moving everyone around and-- don’t... screencap that guy attacking Franz on the enemy turn for some reason...

Also, reinforcements.


Showing off a quick trick with the “Trade” mechanic: you can swap a character’s weapons around to equip something else. Comes in handy sometimes.


Demonstrating the supply convoy. You can only access this through your main Lord, which is a little odd, but a lot less irritating than some of the previous games, let me tell you. I’m just offloading a few things here, but you can retrieve stuff as well. Helpful if you’ve ran out of weapon uses unexpectedly.


One point off killing him... sigh. Should I have Garcia attack him anyway? Ross could finish him off and he has enough HP to soak it up...


Except CRITICAL! Killstealing from your own son now? Garcia, you bastard.

(The vulnerary he got here was dropped by this guy. Sometimes enemies will drop some really good weapons and other items, but this is fairly average as pickings go. This stuff flashes green if you check the enemy’s inventory.)


I did check this before I moved Vanessa too, btw. Archers are awkward precisely because they have long ranges like this - but they can only attack from two spaces away, so they’re easy to take care of later, just have someone attack up close.


I’ll probably skip the enemy turn unless something really important happens from now on, actually.


I feel a bit guilty for sending Gilliam up here because he’s not going to get used, but at this stage he takes a fair bit of damage from these axe guys and he won’t be hitting back very accurately. He’ll get more use next chapter [even though it’s yet more axe guys].

Elixirs are nice items, but I normally save them until later in the game. Unlike a vulnerary, they heal you back to max health. They’re expensive to buy, though.


...Somehow I’m not surprised. What, if it’s not killstealing it’s not good enough for you? Is that it? >[


Over the course of the enemy turn...

AND THEN

...Another point of Res? Really? (Also, I’m going to be worried if his speed doesn’t pick up soon. I need you to double dammit!)


This is why Vanessa is hard to level up. X.x (I moved her to stop this guy getting at Ross.)


Eirika, on the other hand, is looking pretty darn awesome right now. More strength! I’d really like to see her get some defence soon though, that’s worrying me...


Oh, and this archer misses Moulder. He gets 1 exp out of the deal.


60+ exp from one kill? I’ll take that!

If Daddy loved you more you’d be level 2 right now.


Moulder heals Vanessa because, hey, exp.

At this point Quote realises that the bandit boss is going to be able to get to that village before she can get Vanessa there and resorts to drastic measures.


EEZ-ERR! Uh. I mean. Nice work Seth. He also gets a decent amount of exp out of it because of boss bonuses, wahoo!


Eirika does what she does best.

Aaaand then Quote realises that this is why she sucks at defensive strategies: planning ahead, she doesn’t do enough of it.


Luckily this guy can’t get anyone I don’t want him to, although the archer...


...Can’t kill Ross! We’re cool! *end turn*


Misses Moulder again.


Vanessa warns the other village about the bandits, gets some Buxton spring water for her trouble.

Pure Water temporarily boosts Res. It’s rarely very helpful, but there is a situation later where I like to make use of it, so I wanted to pick it up. Of course my strategy might be a lot different this time around because of you guys. :D It gives +7 Res initially, and the bonus decreases by one every turn thereafter.


Eirika sets up a kill for Ross. If he missed, it would have been a bit awkward (luckily Moulder was on hand), but he didn’t, so...


Res, huh? I guess I’ll take that.


Franz weakens the last guy left.

Huh, it’s a bit of a long shot, but I wonder if Garcia could--


Yes... yes he can.


Too right you do.


Eirika, shut up. Just because we got paid doesn’t mean we weren’t doing good, they SHOULD thank us!


That’s what he just said.


“I would have levelled up, too, if it weren’t for that killstealing Garcia! And his dumb axe!”
Ah, those were good times. ^^


Wait, you mean Retirony didn’t get him?


I left no time for my family.”


Sad story time?


...Sad story time. Garcia actually has one of the most developed backstories in this game.


I can understand that.
I’m sorry I brought it up.
MAN UP, DAD!



Oh, wait. By being a WUSS!


Er, yeah Ross, about that... your defences are worse than Eirika’s at this point!
I didn’t even know that was possible!


Except for you of c-- wait, really?


OH.


I’ll even try to hold back on the killstealing from now on!
Wow, that is generous.

{Villager tells them to rest the night, Eirika says they have to keep going.}

Seriously, you just lost a war! Is the bracelet really that important?!
But I love this bracelet. :(


Their chief weapon is surprise; surprise, and fear! ...Their two weapons are surprise, fear, and an almost fanatical devotion to the Pope wrongdoing-- their three weapons... Can I try this again?


AMONGST THEIR WEAPONS are surprise, fear, and an almost fanatical devotion to wrongdoing!


The... comfy chair?!


Wow, isn’t this guy just a barrel of laughs...


Is this a--? GODDAMMIT! WHO LET KISHIMOTO DESIGN THIS GAME?


...Didn’t we cover this back in the Prologue?


And thank god you did, or the prologue would have been a lot more difficult.
I-I stab them with the sharp end, right?


IS THIS FORESHADOWING. IS IT.


So what did we learn from this?
--Eirika and Ephraim are siblings. (Heard this in the Prologue)
--Ephraim taught Eirika how to fight. (Prologue)
--Eirika wants to protect/help her brother. (end of Chapter 1)

...Wow, this really is a Kishi flashback.


Heh. The character portraits blink on screen, so sometimes I’ll capture stuff like this.


You didn’t notice someone stealing your bracelet? From your wrist?
I-I haven’t been eating well recently! It’s a little loose!

{That man must have taken it!
I’ll find him!}

Okay look, even I think this is getting ridiculous now! I know it goes with my outfit, but really!
B-But you look so ugly without it...
R-Really? :( I guess we have no choice then...


I meant to say less beautiful... Why did I say that?!

Okay, wacky bracelet and flashback scene hijinks aside, our team just grew by four, and we’re going to recruit two more characters in the next chapter, and two more after that. What do you think of the new additions?

Currently: (Starred* units are ones to focus on.)
Eirika - Lord, level 5*
Seth - Paladin, level 20/1
Franz - Cavalier, level 3
Gilliam - Knight, level 4
Vanessa - Pegasus Knight, level 1*
Moulder - Priest, level 3*
Ross - Journeyman, level 2
Garcia - Fighter, level 4

Sorry Vanessa didn’t see much use, I couldn’t resist playing this chapter before I got feedback I’m sorry there were axe users everywhere! She’ll get a level or two next chapter.

Also next chapter, we get: a thief (swords, can steal stuff) and an archer.

On Ross: (I need some input on this guy in particular.)

Spoiler: show

He’ll automatically promote at the end of a chapter (or beginning? I don’t remember) once he reaches level 10 as a Journeyman. From there, he has two choices in promoting:
--Pirate
--Fighter
The Pirate’s ‘unique’ class is Berserker. Berserkers use only axes, but get a 15% boost to critical, and have really high caps in all of Ross’ good stats.
The Fighter’s ‘unique’ class is Hero. They have generally lower/more balanced caps but Ross’ll also pick up swords.
(He can promote into the ‘Warrior’ class (axes + bows) from Fighter or Pirate, but don’t worry about that too much.)

I only ask because if you guys want me to use Ross, I can have him promoted out of his trainee class by the end of Chapter 4-ish.

[MEKristian]

Have to wonder what Ross' mother was like, with her Husband being a kill-stealing soldier and her son questions people's masculinity.

And Ross and the other "Trainees" are the reason I brought up the whole "Units can be promoted at level 10" thing, in addition to Blazing Sword's forced tutorial involving such; they can't be leveled up beyond level 10 until they reach their first "normal" class.

And I am completely torn because I love the Pirate units (and they seem to be one of the rarer units), but Heroes are awesome and have awesome critical animations...

[gman391]

Heretical as it is...pirate

[Tempest Kitsune]

I also vote for Pirate.

[Random_fan]

I'm going to agree with everyone and say pirate.

[serbii]

War! Kingdoms falling! Brother in peril!
DETOUR TO RECLAIM BRACELET FROM PICK POCKET!
Next chapter:
Eirika: The Responsible Princess!

No preference for Ross, I'm fine with pirate.

[QuoteMyFoot]

Pirate it is, it seems. I was actually sorta hoping you guys would pick that one, Pirates are cool and I haven’t used Ross in a while. :D

368 screencaps initially for this chapter... yeah. I cut as many as I could, but still, sorry if this is both more lengthy and glosses over a bunch of stuff. Like I said, it should balance out in later chapters... on the plus side, you guys will get to do some planning for next time!

But for now, we’ll have to tackle--

They’re about as challenging as they sound.

Spoiler: show

Remember this guy from last chapter?


*sigh* Of course she can’t. Guess we’re off to slay us some bandits.


Well, that’s awfully handy. I’m not sure why this village is still there, though. Considering some of the other stuff these guys have done...


A fair guess, but a wrong one. He has eyes and he’s not some form of ugly. Seems like a recruitable character to me!


There needs to be a trope for Knights Who Actually Do Something For Commoners.


As much as I like making fun of this game, it does have moments like this which I like. The characters point out things like this which foreshadow that there’s more going on here than meets the eye. Because obviously JUST restoring a Princess to the throne of her lost country would make an awful game... wait.


Offscreen person?


Wow, what a pretty name for a village! :)


Don’t I feel like a jerk now.


Practical and insensitive, that’s our Seth!


Colm is a cool guy who doesn’t afraid of anything.


Are you going to do this every time we hear a sob story?
Only for Renais sob stories, I promise.
Why do I suspect I won’t be able to hold you to that.


Ugh... freeloaders.
Renais freeloaders!


Why is she leading the way? I thought we knew where the stronghold was?
I’d rather be able to keep an eye on her.
But her hair’s pink! She can’t be a bad person!
Pink? Really? I’d call it purple myself...

{I can be helpful!}

Y-You don’t believe me? *sniff*
I believe you, I was just being sarcastic. The bow and quiver sort of gives it away.

{Looks like we’ve got guests!}

Because strangers are only dangerous if they’re male!

--CHAPTER START!--


Well, this is Neimi folks. She doesn’t look very special now, but she actually get’s pretty good later -- her Def is just about passable, but she dodges so much it doesn’t really matter, and her Res is great for a physical attacker. Her Str can be iffy sometimes, but normally she pulls through. Oh, and if you’re worried about the bows thing, she can gain swords and a pony upon promotion.
Character-wise, Neimi is a bit of a crybaby, but she’s also kind-hearted. This could be pretty generic and boring, but with the characters she supports with (including a Deadpan Snarker and Gilliam) it can end up pretty funny, or at least sweet.


You know how I promised to use Gilliam in this chapter? Err... yeah. He basically gets used to take down walls. >_>;

Actually I should probably mention that. Where walls are cracked, you can break through using weapons. You’ll also occasionally find “snags” (big trees, pretty much) to knock down to form bridges. The “HP” of these things can vary a lot. Sometimes you need them, sometimes you don’t.


Vanessa gets some good use this chapter though. Hopefully her defences will pick up soon though. I didn’t have her attack here, by the way, that would just be asking for trouble.

Everyone else just got moved around.

On the enemy turn--

Vanessa in action here. She criticalled on her first strike! One of the pluses of the “slim” weapons -- weaker, but more accurate and with a slight critical boost. Normally not worth using though, I’ll probably just stick to Iron Lances once Vanessa’s speed grows a bit higher.


Recognise this guy? Yep, our thief. Turns out he’s just a jerk with a heart of gold. He helpfully opens that door for us.

We have his childhood friend on the team. GUESS WHAT THIS MEANS.


(This is a much abbreviated conversation. In the extended version, Colm calls Neimi a clumsy oaf. And yet I think these two are adorable together.)


Colm is the only thief we’ll have for much of the game. They’re not completely necessary, but you miss out on a lot of good items that you might not get otherwise. I mean, there are Chest Keys, but... anyway, if you train him up he can prove to be a decent fighter too -- he’ll dodge pretty much everything despite poor Def and Res, and he makes a good team with Neimi. I don’t like to rely on supports, but these two work well together so it’s normally pretty easy for them to stay in range for the Attack bonus. That said it’s also perfectly acceptable to just drag Colm along on missions where you need him.
By the way, Lockpick -- what a thief needs to be a thief. Hard to come by, but you also don’t need that many of them throughout the game.
Personality: Colm is there for comedy. He has some sweet moments with Neimi, but even those are funny. His other supports are humorous, and he also shows a surprising depth of character -- his Moulder support is my favourite for this.

SPEAKING OF SUPPORTS

EXPOSITION TIME!

Yes, Colm and Neimi can support as soon as you get them. I used a savestate so we’d have a clean slate, so if you want these guys to support, let me know and I can do that next chapter.




...I probably could have cut more of this conversation, but... it amuses me too much.


Anyway, apart from amusing conversations, these conversations give bonuses. The bonuses received depend on each character’s “Affinity” (for example, Colm is ‘Light’ affinity and Neimi is ‘Fire’), but that’s not really important, they all give nice boosts. Supports are only active when characters are three spaces away from each other though.

You build supports every turn the characters are stood next to each other. This page gives a list of who each character can support with. Some pairs will build supports quicker than others (Neimi/Colm is the quickest in the game), but that doesn’t really matter because I can wait around all day if that’s what it takes.


When you have supports, you can see them on this screen! C is the lowest support level, A is the highest. The bonuses stack, so an A support will give 3x the bonuses a C support does. Characters can have a maximum five support “levels” -- that would be 5 Cs, 1 B and 3 Cs, 1 A and 2 Cs, etc. The best case scenario is 1 A, 1 B, obviously.

Serenes Forest [the site I linked to above] is a good source of info if you want to learn more about any of this.

BACK TO OUR TURN QUOTE STOP TALKING SO MUCH NOW

Vanessa kills a guy!


People get moved around!


On the enemy turn, Franz fails at dodging!


Our turn again, Neimi weakens this guy for Franz to finish off... if I’d been thinking properly it probably would’ve been the other way around, doh.


Colm opens a chest for us. Why can I never remember what’s in these things? I always end up buying Vanessa an Iron Lance when I don’t need to.


Enemy phase again.


Ross heals with a vulnerary on our turn because Moulder can only do so much at once and he likes Vanessa better.


Colm grabs us some more loot.


Enemy turn! Vanessa’s almost killed this guy.


And Ross levels up.


Our turn: more looting (priorities, people).


Nice! Would’ve liked some Def, but I won’t complain about more Str.


And he dropped a convenient chest key!

By the way, Neimi up in the top corner there? She’s there to take a shot at the archer.


On our next turn, open that one for another Javelin. For some reason I tend to use these less? Ah well, still helpful and free stuff!


Colm opens a door. You have to wonder how hard that is if only thieves can do it. I mean, this is a game where you can summon fireballs and stuff. What are these doors made out of?


Quote wants to have Franz finish off the archer but forgets that he hasn’t been getting speed recently. Argh.


Eirika does the job instead.


Now normally I would be worried about leaving someone in range of the thief, since this guy’s AI tells him to steal stuff and, well... I don’t like having stuff stolen from me.

However.

His speed is only 10. (Only, she says.) Since your AS needs to be higher than your target’s to steal...


He ends up attacking instead, which does very little damage even to Eirika.


It also nicely sets up a kill for Neimi.


I move people around and leave Ross in this guy’s range for the enemy phase and seriously there is a reason why you should pay attention to enemy stats Quote.

I was pleasantly surprised when the guy missed.

Ross didn’t miss with his reply either, awesome.

BUT THEN


HOLY FLYING FUCK HE JUST DOUBLED ROSS THAT COULD HAVE BEEN AWFUL

Attack Speed: it’s not just us who has it.

On the plus side:


Ross had a pretty darn good level up and now he doesn’t get doubled anymore!


And the enemy misses again because Ross is too bro to hit or something.


He misses Vanessa too! Seriously, how big is this room if the great winged pony can dodge stuff like that?

She kills him on her next hit, I move people about a bit and the turn ends there.


Except I forgot that Franz was still equipped with that lance from trying to kill the archer... ugh. No [permanent] harm no foul I guess.


More exp for Neimi!


Check the guy’s stats and... hello, stealable item.

THIS SOUNDS LIKE A JOB FOR--

...He still has all that loot from the chests clogging up his inventory, doesn’t he.

Take 2.

THIS SOUNDS LIKE A JOB FOR

COLM!

[You have no idea how many times I almost selected that Support option in this chapter.]


He also gets a bit of experience out of the deal. Pure Water’s not worth it normally, but this was just to demonstrate. ^^


Ross takes a potshot at the guy and Vanessa finishes him off.


AND NOW FOR SOMETHING COMPLETELY DIFFERENT -- Moulder gets what will probably be the worst level up of the game... touch wood.


Who can bait this guy...


Capped this because it’s one of the few times you’ll see Gilliam dodging anything. Unfortunately he also missed with his reply. This was probably going to be his only proper use of the chapter, too. >_>; I really just don’t work well with Knights, I guess.

On the plus side!


Yet more exp for Neimi!


Vanessa levels up again! (And gets strength!)


Neimi takes another shot and levels up! This is a good one for her.


All that’s left is their--
Uh Seth, we can see that already...
Right. Sorry. Purple hair.
I keep telling you, it’s pink!

(I like to think they’ve been arguing about that all chapter whilst I’ve been focussing on other characters.)


This is what damage Franz does to him... unimpressive but he was close to a level up. However, knowing my luck with Franz, I wasn’t about to risk him getting hit.


Good job, too!

Move Franz out of the way now and...


Eh, why not?


The thief dodge is awesome. I’ll have to see if I can get that at some point.


Moved him out of the way afterwards. Don’t want another guy with a hand axe to double him, no sir. (Also: more speed, whoo!)


I like how bandits jump around all over the place.


Franz was literally 1 exp from levelling so I thought I might as well. Still no speed, this has me slightly worried.

Now this is the point where I throw all my other characters at him to finish it this turn because I’m too lazy to let him restore HP from the chair and get Ross a few more levels.


Lol, no.

Colm, my man!

Ow... got revenge though, so it works out.

AND YOU KNOW WHAT KILLING A BOSS MEANS [probably]


Hell yes strength, I will take that.


Mission success!


By the way, can I have that stuff back?



(I still think they’re cute.)


Didn’t Lark like... burn down and you both had to flee for your lives? It’s not an unreasonable assumption.


It’s so funny when people do this. “Oh god! There’s a girl crying! I didn’t do anything I swear DON’T HURT ME!”


And then Colm fails an Intimidation Roll just to add a little more amusement in there. I like to imagine him squaring up to a six-inches-taller Seth and then the others are just off facepalming in a corner somewhere.


Half of Seth’s lines seem to be Visible Silence. We love this trope in my house, it makes us giggle without fail. Even better: “...!” or “...?”


Because Seth, as we all know, is the go-to guy for romantic advice.


Pardon, a word which here means: “Just watch me.”


Mercenaries... with a Princess among them. Pfft, as if that would ever sell!

... Wait.


I already am.


For all that he was a bit sharp back there, he doesn’t actually tell Eirika that the guy who just joined them was the thief they were chasing.

{Daddy gave me this!}

Wait! So you mean there’s some incredible secret to these bracelets?!
I... yes?
Then you called me ugly for nothing, you jerk! I’ve been worrying about that for hours! Maybe I don’t look as lovely as normal, but -- my father just died, my brother’s missing, my country is in ruins, and I’ve been sleeping rough for the past two weeks! Cut me some slack!
Your Highness... you look as lovely as ever.
Really? This isn’t a backhand compliment?
No.
Well... that’s alright then! I feel better for having yelled at you anyway.

*awkward topic change*


Eh, there are longer roads. You should try FE10 sometime.


Now we get to spend some time with the plot, because why would the game want to make it easy for me to shorten this?


From left to right: Generals Duessel, Glen and Selena. Grado really does get all the cute blondes, it seems.

{Glen thinks His Majesty is acting a little strange.}

You can come and join our side if you want. We’re not picky.


Whippersnappers! No whining in front of your elders!



I suspect that one of these guys is less enthusiastic than the others.


Wait, what?

{Certain soldiers performed well in Renais, they’re our new generals.}

No really, what? Are we sure this is the Emperor everyone else has been going on about? Because he sounds a little like any generic fantasy evil would-be overlord ever.


Creepy.


...Has taste at least.


Does not make sense!

He introduced himself as a General back in the Prologue. Yet we find out later that he was previously dismissed from that position, and has just been reinstated. So how was he a General in the Prologue?

Sorry. It bothers me.


However, I think we have ourselves a stylish villain!


I sense backstory!


*sigh* Backstory later I guess.


Bring the siblings to me.”


I once more sense differing levels of enthusiasm here.


THE PLOT THICKENS!

Okay, phew. That’s that chapter done.

NEXT TIME ON FIRE EMBLEM: THE SACRED STONES

Sigh.

Spoiler: show

Wait, what’s that?
Princess Eirika, that hasn’t made me look the last three times you said it, and I doubt it will work on the Grado troops either.
No, I mean it this time!


I’d be less worried about what they are and more worried about whether they’re going to eat me or not.


These are the two guys we’ll recruit this chapter. Our first magic users! Well, not counting Moulder.

(Technically you can only recruit Lute by visiting the southern village, otherwise she joins you next chapter, but it’s a good idea to get her some experience on this level -- she starts at 1.)


I love Lute. She is amazing. I mean, she’s a prodigy. Duh!

She even quotes a book by title, page, and paragraph here, but I culled that.

“According to the book, revenants

She knows how to cheer people up, too!


Who are you?
Does it matter? Take the excuse and go!



{At some point he actually says ‘fiends’.}


I have to admit that I am no longer a sceptic.


We could slip away whilst he does that... you know... just in case anyone cares...
Did you say something Colm?


Programmed critical! Look at all the shiny lights! (It’s worth noting that he can’t kill these guys in one round without a critical.)

These eyeballs, by the way, are actually quite dangerous. They use magic, and since almost none of our characters have good resistance at this point they do a good bit of damage despite low Attack.


You said that just to spite me, didn’t you.


NOW WE CAN ACTUALLY DO SOME PLANNING AND SELECTING AND STUFF.


Most important right now: unit selection. The max for this chapter is 9, glowy green means they have to be taken, I’ll look at Artur’s stats and stuff next chapter.

So, who are we taking?


Supports allows you to see who’s able to support with who -- the table I linked you to above is a more complete version.

Who do you want to support with who? I can make a start in this chapter.


Check map! Arguably the most useful option!


Allows you to swap units round, so now people don’t start in fantastically awkward places. Note that units who have to be taken along have their places fixed.


Village in the north gives an Iron Axe. Village in the south is where you recruit Lute. That snag in the third one is one of those ‘bridge’ things I mentioned earlier; it can only be hit from one side though.

Recinforcements (four of the shuffling zombie things) will appear about where you start off at a later point. There’s something that triggers it, but I can’t remember what exactly. Skeletons arrive about where those eyeballs are just north of the river on the right on... turn 2, I think? Maybe 3? I can’t quite remember, but expect them.

Oh my god that took far too long to type. It’ll make things better later, it’ll make things better later...

Current team: (Starred* indicates guys to focus on.)
Eirika - Lord, level 5*
Seth - Paladin, level 20/1
Franz - Cavalier, level 4
Gilliam - Knight, level 4
Vanessa - Pegasus Knight, level 3*
Moulder - Priest, level 4*
Ross - Journeyman, level 5*
Garcia - Fighter, level 4
Neimi - Archer, level 2
Colm - Thief, level 3
Artur - Monk, level 2
Lute - Mage, level 1 [RECRUITABLE]

Also, some support suggestions might be good. They’re nice boosts, but not that important, so don’t worry if somebody supports with someone we end up dropping later.

I’m assuming all our starred units are going in, and I’d recommend taking Seth as well because sometimes there’s just no one else to kill those magic eyeballs. (Now there’s a sentence the English language won’t see all that often.)

I’d also like some suggestions on tactics. I normally leave someone up north and stick them in the trees to deal with the reinforcements when they show up, but who’s stuck with that job, and who are we sending to get Lute, and who’s going towards the bridge by the river?

Remember that whoever goes to fetch Lute will have to be able to cut that snag down... unless it’s Vanessa I guess.

[MEKristian]

One of the chapter 3 pictures isn't working correctly, just so you know.

The one bandit couldn't hit Ross because Ross kept calling him a wuss over and over again.

And I have no problem with love blooming on the battlefield Nemi and Colm's support.

As for chapter four, I dunno. I mean, it'd be nice to see Gilliam DO something outside of being a battering ram for once, and zombies are in his speed-class...

[gman391]

Nemi and Cole are adorable to bring along.
I'd like to bring along our priest and knight (Moulder and Gilliam)
Vanessa and we should probably bring Seth...if only to keep Erica from getting us into more problems.
And Ross...just to let him enjoy not having his dad kill stealing a little longer.

[Flux_Blade]

I like the Gilliam suggestion, and on supports, Amelia/Franz and Kyle/Lute. One I find sweet the other a bit funny.

Also agree with the pirate for Ross. You could have Seth go recruit Lute...

[serbii]

Happy with the above plan/s.

[QuoteMyFoot]

Hmm... since you wanted me to take Gilliam along, I had to leave Franz behind. Don’t worry if you still want to use him though, there’s quite a lot of exp available in the next chapter. He’ll catch up.

Also yes, I really did have so little to do on my birthday that I spent part of it on an update for this.

For now, it’s time to deal with--

I don’t know about ancient, but there were certainly horrors in this chapter... mostly because of my careless mistakes.

Spoiler: show

Unit selection and position.


Don’t worry Artur, she’s more valuable than you!


So, here’s Artur. He’s okay. Mainly, his problem is that he uses light magic, and it’s a) more expensive for less uses and b) weaker than anima. It has a crit bonus, but not enough to really make up for it. His magic isn’t spectacular either (though it’s certainly not bad). He’s quite fast, but his luck’s not great... which is a shame because his Def is terrible and he’s going to be relying on that to not die. His Res is awesome, but that’s not so important.
He’s not a bad unit by any means, heck he’s probably above average, but he’s not spectacular. In supports he can be quite amusing though - he suffers quite a bit at Lute’s hands and the dancer tries to make him her apprentice.


Now the plan was to weaken this guy so Vanessa could finish him off, but Artur criticalled so... there you go. It worked out though, I had her equip the javelin so she could counter those magic eyeballs later.


Gilliam had a go at this guy and suffered a devastating 1 HP of damage.


Ross missed this guy, so Seth took him down instead -- he had a sword and would’ve attacked Ross from the trees, otherwise I probably wouldn’t have used Seth for this. He only got 4 exp out of it. :(


Moved everyone else around, had Colm get that C support with Neimi that we saw last chapter.


Enemy turn! Here’s that thief dodge I wanted to show you.


2 magic eyeballs attack Vanessa; she kills both of them. [I’ve genuinely forgotten what the name is for these monsters. Magic eyeballs seems fairly accurate, though.]


Screencapped a bit early, but here are those three skeletons -- also on turn 2, so good guess, Quote!


Checking their attack ranges...


Receiving loot...


Restoring some HP...


Gaining some exp! A fairly average level up here for Ross, but eh, can’t have a good one all the time.


Seth takes care of the snag.


Enemy turn! And here’s where you can start giving Quote the :-| face.


BECAUSE THIS WAS PRETTY DARN TERRIFYING LET ME TELL YOU-- there is a reason to check these things, goddamnit, that was CLOSE.

But just wait, it gets better!

Not just yet though.

Ross hits this guy, which was a fair accomplishment, to be honest.

AND THEN

THE COMIC RELIEF ARRIVES!


I love all of these guys. So. Much.


Unfortunately you can’t recruit them for a while, and for her level, this girl (L’Arachel) is quite a late joiner.


NOW BACK TO OUR REGULAR SCHEDULE! Neimi finishes off a guy, Colm gets healed.


Vanessa does some killing of her own.


Ross hits this guy again, which I was honestly surprised by, and Seth finishes him off.


Moulder doesn’t heal Colm quite enough so I have to use a vulnerary on him. [This turned out to be quite pointless anyway, as you will soon see.]


Enemy turn begin!


Nice! This is basically everything Vanessa needs. I would’ve liked some more HP, but can’t complain.

BUT THEN

Remember what I said about checking enemy stats?

GUESS WHO DIDN’T DO ENOUGH OF THAT?


However, Colm pulls through via sheer bloody luck, and possibly the skeleton being distracted by Ross practising his manly battle cries.

He gets a rather underwhelming level up out of it, but frankly after the enemy missing at 70%, I have no right to complain.


Ross does some healin’ on our turn, as does Moulder.


Vanessa kills another guy!


Enemy phase again, ever get the feeling I’m being a little too reckless with Colm? I sure did.


Artur does his job as bait for the magic eye.


REINFORCEMENTS ARRIVE! Gilliam will take care of those guys, have no fear.


Neimi gets a very impressive level up. Everything but luck? I’LL TAKE THAT.


Vanessa does her stuff.


SETH FINALLY VISITS THE GODDAMN VILLAGE.


Oh Lute, I do love you so. I tried to capture her using the arson fire tome here because we love things like that, but I wasn’t quick enough.

Ohwait, stats.

She doesn’t look very impressive now, but she will be. Her Con is awful and she loses speed even from the basic fire tome... but frankly, she doesn’t really need anything better than that. Her speed isn’t great, average-ish in fact, but her Mag stat is so high that pretty much anything she can’t kill in 2 hits with Fire goes down in 1 hit with one of the stronger tomes. As long as you keep her on the light weapons, her dodge is normally okay too.
Personality wise, oh my god. You’ve probably guessed by now, but I love Lute. She’s egotistical and has no social awareness to speak of. What’s not to love? We already have Kyle/Lute as a suggested support, but she also has a good (read: hilarious) one with Ross, Vanessa, Artur, and another character called Knoll.

ELSEWHERE ON THE MAP


Gilliam’s being Gilliam.


Yelling ‘WUSS!’ apparently doesn’t work on zombies... err, I mean revenants.

...No, you know what, I mean god damn zombies. It’s better than the monster names they have here.


Skeleton misses Lute, Lute uses more pretty fire.


...Isn’t this the same level up as last time? Still, can’t really complain.


Lute kills this guy, Gilliam kills the other guy.


Moulder gets a pretty darn good level up here.


Gilliam levels up again. This is actually... a pretty good level up for him.

IT ALSO MEANS

Yes, now he can double the zombies. They are that bad.


For the last two I’m going to be focussing on Ross and Lute, they need the exp the most.


Nice, but it doesn’t look like I’m going to be able to get Ross to 10 on this level after all. :/ Oh well, definitely next time.


And Moulder gets some more exp from healing Ross.

Here’s a look at the boss.

What’s special about him? Well, he’s a green zombie, and apart from having higher attack than a common zombie, he’s pretty much the same.

Except, this guy gives 100 exp guaranteed upon death. You can find these guys in the Tower of Valni [later] and I think this even applies to promoted units.


... *shrug*

Killing the boss gives a level, but since Ross gets about 60 from killing normal units and is level 8 already, it seems a bit of a waste to have him finish him off when level 1 Lute is right there. This also means that he’ll be able to attack more than, like, twice on the next chapter before he hits level 10 and can’t get any more exp.

With this in mind:


...Well, if you have to have a +1 level up, at least you have the decency to make it the best +1 level up possible. (I’m looking at you here, Moulder.)


Obviously Eirika is pretty naive here. Everyone on the internet knows it’s not a matter of if... but when.


W-Worse? Sniff...
Yeah, mage lady, you are really not helping.


Frankly, if this is a sign, I would’ve preferred more warning.


I was afraid you were going to say that.
You and me both.


I can’t just let Ephraim get eaten by monsters! We’re over half-way there now anyway, we might as well continue.
I like that kind of logic! Never surrender!
You aren’t allowed to have an opinion on this sort of thing anymore.


An incredulous silence all round, here.


I am a... tad disappointed however.”


Never change, you three.


B... But I didn’t--
Note: Eirika does actually ask in the game. But this is more amusing.


Are you for real.



...Well, she seemed nice! =D
More like insane.


A-Are you saying I can’t be friends with her? ;-;
DO ANYTHING YOU WANT JUST PLEASE DON’T CRY

I hope I have learned my lesson from that.

Anyway, a preview of next chapter!

NEXT TIME ON FIRE EMBLEM: THE SACRED STONES

No walking abominations, awesome!

Spoiler: show

So of course...

{Serafew used to be used as a meeting point for people from Renais and Grado.}

...We head straight for this place!


Nice hat!


Well, she seems a little on edge.

“No, pardon me! I never meant

Eh, it’s probably nothing.


Good job too, we wouldn’t want Nice Hat Guy in the middle of the next cutscene.


I’d really like to know who’s spreading all these rumours.


Well, surely you’d want to put her on trial fir--


Oh wait, I forgot these are generic medieval fantasty RPG antagonists.


...Another cute blonde from Grado? And this one has a cool scar? Really?


He’s just thinking about committing treason, it’s nothing to worry about.


I wonder if that nice scarf merchant is still here?
Princess, now is really not the time.


...I guess that means no scarf merchant.
That it does.


I bet this doesn’t foreshadow anything.


THIS WAY FOR PLOT!


Looks like this is our newest recruit.


This isn’t working out as well as I’d hoped. Time for plan B!


Oh, we’ll have to deal with these soldiers first.
It’ll really only take a sec--
This is exactly what I hoped to avoid.
If you could just wait one--
But it was your idea to come over here!
You’re not paying attention to me anymore, are you?
No it wasn-- ...There’s no time to argue. We have to prepare for battle.


...Bother.


Nine units max again for this one (the unit you can’t see there is Lute).

I’d recommend benching Moulder at least for this chapter, there’s no point in taking two healers along and we’re force to use Natasha anyway, so...


Units on the team Natasha can currently support with (we recruit the guy at the top of the list in this chapter).




Where we start off, and enemy unit positions. One of the lower Fighters on the left hand side will move towards our company automatically, the soldiers and some archers will move towards us too.

At the end of turn 1 (I think), two bandits will appear above the lowest set of houses on the right. Two more pairs will appear further up the map later. If we visit all the houses in this chapter, we’ll receive an item that can promote magic units, so I’ll probably have to rush a little more than I’d like on this level.


Boss data. This guy doesn’t move, by the way, so we can leave him until everything else is taken care of.

There’s also an arena in this chapter. This enables units to fight higher-level enemies for exp and gold, but people are also really prone to dying in there. I could use savestates to make this not matter, but I feel like this is cheating. However, Gilliam’s Def is probably high enough to be okay in here, and it’s an opportunity to level up Seth decently if you guys want. Let me know on this.

We have our other option for healer, guys!

Spoiler: show

Natasha! I’m including her stats here, because if you guys want to pick her over Moulder, I’ll heal like mad in this chapter to get her some exp and probably abuse the boss a bit to get her up to level 3 at least.
Statswise, Natasha is generally faster and MUCH luckier than Moulder. Once she levels up some, her dodge becomes pretty reliable. Her Def is terrible compared to his, although her Res is a lot better (but that doesn’t matter so much). I think her Mag is about the same... 60% growth compared to his 40%, huh, that’s more than I thought.
She’s the gentle cleric, so pretty Yamato Nadeshiko. She can romance Seth and Nice Hat Guy, though, which is nice. Her supports are pretty WAFF. I mean, her support with Cormag involves a kitten. A kitten.

For comparison, here’s Moulder’s current stats:

Also, I think you guys probably need to make a decision on Franz vs. Gilliam:

Spoiler: show

Bear in mind that Gilliam is two levels higher.

Since our numbers are fairly limited at this point, and constantly switching these two isn’t really viable in the long run, I’ll want a decision on which one to stick with. I stand by my initial assessments, so it’s really up to you guys. For what it’s worth we’ll recruit two more Cavaliers in the next... 3 or 4 chapters or so.

Franz can promote into a Paladin, like Seth, or into a Great Knight. Great Knights get +Axes and 6 Move, which is a step down for Franzy-boy but a step up for Gilliam. Gilliam’s other option is General, which has higher caps but only 5 Move.

Of course, you can take a third option, say “BOTH!” and drop someone else. Heck, you could even take a fourth option and drop both.

Nice Hat Guy who we recruit this chapter is also a very good unit, by the way. So many choices!

Our units currently: (Starred = focus)
Eirika - Lord, level 5*
Seth - Paladin, level 20/1
Franz - Cavalier, level 4
Gilliam - Knight, level 6*
Vanessa - Pegasus Knight, level 4*
Moulder - Priest, level 5*
Ross - Journeyman, level 8*
Garcia - Fighter, level 4
Neimi - Archer, level 3*
Colm - Thief, level 4*
Artur - Monk, level 2
Lute - Mage, level 2
Nice Hat Guy - Myrmidon, level 5 [RECRUITABLE]

Supports (And you can find the options HERE.)
Colm/Neimi -- +MEK and gman
Franz/Amelia -- suggested by Flux
Kyle/Lute -- also suggested by Flux

[MEKristian]

You only dislike Artur because he's not Lucius, don't you? :T

Also, Nemi didn't get Con on her level up. So not just luck.

Even though he's The Moulder, I'm fine with benching him for this round. And I want to stick with Gilliam because Gilliam is a name destined for Greatness. Also, unlike most games, generals can use swords.

And quote doesn't recognize that in this universe, being pragmatic is more liable to get you into trouble than being the helpiest.

Also:

Spoiler: show

It may not be a gif, but it'll do.

[QuoteMyFoot]

I would like to state for the record that I don't like Lucius either. I generally barely tolerate light-magic users, though, so I'm probably biased.

EDIT: In fact, here's a list of growth rates so you can judge for yourself.