Part 34: Chapter 24 (part 2)
Playing Through:
Heath and Fiora wall out the northern myrmidon. Heath’s position was carefully selected so that the wyvern riders would aggro to him and get badly injured but NOT killed, leaving them in range for my weak units to kill instead.
Dart moves into position to fight the mercenaries from his forest. For units locked to only a single weapon type, reavers can be a godsend. But they’re expensive so don’t overuse them.
Florina goes shopping.
Ah, sweet, sweet soul-devouring dark magic. How I’ve missed you. You’ll note that Canas has a Mend staff, but can’t use it yet. He’ll be able to in just a couple more heals, though obviously the Heal staff is still a better deal for most purposes.
There isn’t much for Ninian to do this turn, so having Sain start way back and her dance to get him in proper position was a fine idea.
Now I can get Lucius and Raven and Erk all close to the soon-to-be front.
This spot right here is the ideal one for healing. She’ll be able to exactly reach Dart and is also perfectly positioned to reach nearly any other character in the unlikely event that they need help more.
Pretty meh level since Dart’s speed growth is a nearly matchless 60%, but it’s what he needs right now I suppose. Level count: Dart 1
Heath owns the enemy wyverns.
And another cutscene. The one Nino was supposed to deliver a message to was Jaffar! And he pulls his usual trick of poofing out of nowhere.
And his usual trick of being covered in- oh wait, that’s HIS blood this time.
And he’s dying. Well that mission apparently didn’t go well at all. By the sound of it, he DID kill his target but he was terribly wounded himself. I wonder who it was he was after. At a guess, it was just someone with a ton of quintessence who Nergal just wanted to harvest- which of course made him a dangerous opponent.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZKYi81giDrQ
Have I mentioned how much I love this map theme? And pretty much every map it plays on is awesome too.
Well this situation is AWESOME. All those nearby units you see? All at like 8 HP or less. And they’re all high level. So my Lucius, Erk, Rath, and Dart are about to get a mountain of XP.
Ding! Another very Lucius level. Level count: Dart 1, Lucius 1
No one else quite levels, and I get set up for next turn. Fiora cuts off the giant army of mercenaries at the chokepoint, just as planned. Notably she DOESN’T attack. See, 1 wyvern off screen can hit her and so can 1 more mercenary off screen to the left. Those 3 hits she can take. But if she took an additional counterattack, she’d die.
Heath of course is in position to repeat his last trick. And Hector and Marcus are walling for Priscilla so the remaining mercenary in the area doesn’t get her.
The main danger at this point is the shown bolting range. I need to stay out of that area for the forseeable future. Which means I can’t move up to kill air units approaching.
And as you can see, this really is a chokepoint she’s at. Those stores are a lot wider than they look.
Ugh. Level count: Dart 2, Lucius 1
As you can see, I have a few more turns yet to get to that right village. Still, I don’t want to dally since I need to get Geitz first.
He’d kill Dart with about 100% accuracy, but Sain can take it and then Dart can talk to him. Sain of course has an iron sword so that Geitz won’t be tempted to use his killer axe over his bow.
So this situation looks a little rough, but it’s really fine. Only 2 of those mercenaries can actually attack ANYONE and I can kill all but 1 wyvern rider easily.
So Florina gives Hector her silver card and takes a vulnerary she might need. Time for him to go shopping.
So how to do this. She needs healing, but the wyvern rider on the other side of her also needs killing. I’ll probably have to use Ninian, but I also need to be wary of the uber hero over there on the left.
Rath gets a solid level killing one of the wyverns that has to die.
Level count: Dart 2, Lucius 1, Rath 1.
I used Heath to kill the top wyvern rider and hopefully attract some fire too, letting Canas heal Fiora. In this position, he also acts as bait for the enemy hero. I need to take that guy out fast to move freely and I want him getting hit by Canas immediately.
Solid. My Erk has had lousy speed.
Level count: Dart 2, Lucius 1, Rath 1, Erk 1.
Oh and notice the cool background. I believe that one is unique to this level. They could have gone with a town background or something like they’ve used before, but they really put a fair amount of work into making more art than necessary for this game.
Well Geitz shoots Sain. You know, if he can be that close to effective against Sain, he can’t be THAT bad.
Dang, that guy does hit hard. Well so does Canas, they’re pretty much evenly matched (unless Canas uses Luna of course, but I don’t want Canas getting the kill).
And this time a whole flock of wyvern riders moves into position north of me. THIS turn will be a little tricky since I can’t thin the herd due to bolting. Plus I need to kill that hero and keep Fiora healed.
And bam, 7 reinforcements all at once out there. Also note those 3 wyvern riders in the middle of the lake. They don’t move apparently.
First things first, time to recruit Geitz.
Second things second, time to re-equip Geitz. Sain was ready to do so of course.
Easy stuff done, I need to figure out how to handle this. The key is going to be making sure no one but Heath can be hit by more than 1 wyvern. That’s a matter of a tight ball kind of formation.
I’ll need to take the hero down and I want to feed him to someone weaker than Canas. Fila’s Might will give Canas just enough power to reduce the hero to tiny HP without killing him. It’s great for all kinds of tricks like that.
Ooh, she gets a level out of it. Pretty great. Level count: Dart 2, Lucius 1, Rath 1, Erk 1, Ninian 1.
Hm. I was starting to get used to Mag + Speed + Res every single level. Level count: Dart 2, Lucius 2, Rath 1, Erk 1, Ninian 1.
So Heath took down the hero for like 90 XP, now Florina and Rath get Lucius back out of possible wyvern attack range- remember, they can instant kill him- before getting into position to help complete the wall.
Canas was busy and Priscilla couldn’t get in range, so Priscilla heals Fiora with Physic. When you need it you need it.
Here’s the resulting formation. They can hit Heath all they like, but he can take it. At most 2 people can attack either Florina or Fiora- either can take it. At most 1 person can attack Erk or Hector or Canas- they can take it. They will break upon us like water upon rock!
Unexpectedly, one actually DOES try to hit Canas. Thanks to Fila’s Might, he can actually instant kill it. Pretty cool.
Egad! So many pirates. They basically can’t move, so they really pile up and have nowhere to go.
And 4 more mercs per turn are coming for a little while now. Just as the initial crowd was thinning.
Sain visits the bottom right village and meets a man who was apparently one of Prince Zephiel’s teachers until King Desmond decided he hated Zephiel and sent his teachers away.
He gives us an Earth Seal, believing somehow that we’ll help Zephiel.
Hector goes shopping and I buy nearly everything on my massive list.
It’s becoming apparent that I can indeed get Florina to level 20 this chapter, so I need to send her back to get an Elysian Whip from Merlinus. A minor waste of time, but worth it.
Priscilla levels up- using Mend because I have no heals remember.
Hm. I was starting to get used to Mag + Speed + Res every single level. Level count: Dart 2, Lucius 2, Rath 1, Erk 1, Ninian 1, Priscilla 1.
Dart on a forest actually has pretty good odds against a wyvern. The trouble is he doesn’t double and if they DO hit him, he’s in trouble. Oh well, there’s not much to do but go for it.
Sweet! The hero put Heath just one hit away from a level up, so he finished off an injured mercenary and got this.
Level up count: Dart 2, Lucius 2, Rath 1, Erk 1, Ninian 1, Priscilla 1, Heath 1.
Rath keeps killing the wyverns and mercenaries and gets a decent level for his trouble.
Level up count: Dart 2, Lucius 2, Rath 2, Erk 1, Ninian 1, Priscilla 1, Heath 1.
The first pirate to reach shore (he started neaby) gets weakened by Fiora and she nets a bad level.
Level up count: Dart 2, Lucius 2, Rath 2, Erk 1, Ninian 1, Priscilla 1, Heath 1, Fiora 1.
What is it with weak enemies trying to kill my promoted units when I have weak characters nearby they should go for? I just can’t predict that really. It’s like they’re trying to deny me XP.
Oh well, a great level. Sain has now capped his Speed. He’s not EVER supposed to do that.
Dart 2, Lucius 2, Rath 2, Erk 1, Ninian 1, Priscilla 1, Heath 1, Fiora 1, Sain 1
Well if the enemy is going to suicidally attack if they’re there, I’d better just have them leave. Dart can’t really handle all the wyverns alone, but if Sain and Geitz lurk just out of range until he’s in trouble, it should work out.
Just lining up neatly to be killed one by one . But that will take too long.
Nice! There’s the Lucius I know and love.
Level up count: Dart 2, Lucius 3, Rath 2, Erk 1, Ninian 1, Priscilla 1, Heath 1, Fiora 1, Sain 1
I need to open up a second front to speed things up and prepare to kill the sage. And I finally can now that the wyvern and hero threat is gone. Hector is great here in that he DEFINITELY won’t kill any mercenaries but will heavily injure them and they love attacking him.
Next turn I killed every mercenary and now I need to plot the best way to kill the bolting sage. I want to be just on the edge of his range so he moves maximally close to me. And I need Ninian fairly close to the front and at least one flyer (or Sain but he’s elsewhere) in position to then charge 11 spaces with Ninian’s help and kill him.
The trap is set. Florina is pretty great bait for this.
Nice, dart gets a good level off a wyvern. What’s key here is that with just a point or two more speed (and with his 60% growth, that’s coming soon, he’ll begin doubling them. THEN he’ll really start to rake in the XP.
Level up count: Dart 3, Lucius 3, Rath 2, Erk 1, Ninian 1, Priscilla 1, Heath 1, Fiora 1, Sain 1
A meh level for Lucius killing off a mercenary.
Level up count: Dart 3, Lucius 4, Rath 2, Erk 1, Ninian 1, Priscilla 1, Heath 1, Fiora 1, Sain 1
So as you can see, Florina can’t quite reach the sage- as expected. But with Ninian’s range, any of my 3 flyers can do it- as planned.
First, Erk clears some of the annoying enemies out of the way and gets a great level.
Level up count: Dart 3, Lucius 4, Rath 2, Erk 2, Ninian 1, Priscilla 1, Heath 1, Fiora 1, Sain 1
So I’d better be darned sure I can kill the sage when I get to him or I’m in deep trouble. Heath can do 24 – def per hit with his iron lance.
Not good enough, the sage will live at 1 HP (he has 0 speed due to Bolting so anyone can double him).
But with this steel lance, it’s easy.
This should net Heath another level or close to it.
Nice. This is about the fastest Heath I ever saw. He’s an amazing unit regardless, but this has just made him my best on the field other than Sain and Canas.
Level up count: Dart 3, Lucius 4, Rath 2, Erk 2, Ninian 1, Priscilla 1, Heath 2, Fiora 1, Sain 1
Rather visits a village and an old woman talks about how much she loved this one time that the Black Fang murdered her former local lord, who does sound like kind of a jerk. You’ll note the “It mattered not what others said” there, strongly implying that the Black Fang wasn’t even popular among the commoners of Bern outside a few areas like this where they killed a real tyrant. Their reputation as heroes of the common people is largely a myth they like to promulgate.
Score! That’s enough speed that he can double many of them with an iron axe now.
Level up count: Dart 4, Lucius 4, Rath 2, Erk 2, Ninian 1, Priscilla 1, Heath 2, Fiora 1, Sain 1
YES! I had no idea this place had restore staves, I just assumed it was a regular vendor. Gimme, gimme, gimme! I buy two of them so that I can now have 2 people curing status ailments whenever I need to. That lets me do things like de-silence or sleep my main restorer among other things. Very important. DEFINITELY buy one or more of these.
And then I buy a truckload of heals and vulneraries, though it turns out there’s no door keys.
Land shopping is done, so Florina takes the silver and member cards to go visit the secret shop.
Nice, another good level on Rath.
Level up count: Dart 4, Lucius 4, Rath 3, Erk 2, Ninian 1, Priscilla 1, Heath 2, Fiora 1, Sain 1
Time to move in! The air force heads out to sea while everyone else starts running in by land. I could have started this a turn earlier probably, but this works.
Classic Dart, though I’m beginning to worry about his defenses. (It’s also really annoying that even doubling wyverns with an axe and massive strength, he still can’t kill the darned things in one round. They’re tougher than knights.
Level up count: Dart 5, Lucius 4, Rath 3, Erk 2, Ninian 1, Priscilla 1, Heath 2, Fiora 1, Sain 1
Heath had to tank 3 wyverns so he got pretty badly injured, as expected. Canas has him back in shape for more fighting though.
And Sain moves into range of one hero with his ineffective iron axe equipped. This will cause him to leave that hero at 3 or so HP for someone else to finish.
Ok, my Dart is now officially a whole point ahead in speed (his first 3 speedless levels set him behind for a while. He’s fairly average overall. This guy is a fantastic unit, one of the best in the game. He’s just too expensive to promote.
Level up count: Dart 6, Lucius 4, Rath 3, Erk 2, Ninian 1, Priscilla 1, Heath 2, Fiora 1, Sain 1
At long last, she gains some Skill! It’s really been hurting my strategy that her accuracy sucked up till now, but that’s finally about to change!
Level up count: Dart 6, Lucius 4, Rath 3, Erk 2, Ninian 2, Priscilla 1, Heath 2, Fiora 1, Sain 1
Yeah, Heath can now take on pirates and completely wreck them. Florina can’t do that. Wyvern riders all the way!
Florina is in position to visit the secret shop next turn depending on how the pirates behave. But some wyverns are going to spawn on the bottom right area of the screen, so I probably won’t do that yet.
And she reached level 20 with this AWESOME level up. She even gained defense! Amazing!
Level up count: Dart 6, Lucius 4, Rath 3, Erk 2, Ninian 2, Priscilla 1, Heath 2, Fiora 1, Florina 1, Sain 1
Dart did finally get worn down by all those 20-30% chances to hit, so he vulneraries up and continues the fight. He’s killed like 15 wyverns singlehandedly and is only now hitting his stride.
Hector visits the top left village. A lot of people assume this mysterious person is Harken, but imo there’s actualy not much evidence for that. The way he or she talks is rather different from Harken for one thing and you’d think Harken would, say, recognize and join Eliwood if Eliwood visited. And there’s no mention or hint of his suicidalness or anything. And he knows more about the organization- emphasizing above all that we must kill Sonia.
It strikes me as much more likely that this is a spy infiltrating the organization- we know that Ostia alone had several doing that, Leila being one. Since this person knows what we’re doing to some extent, they’re probably a spy- Harken had no clue.
Well whoever it is, I got a Silence Staff from him/her/it.
Meh. He’s decent overall and is turning around.
Level up count: Dart 6, Lucius 4, Rath 3, Erk 3, Ninian 2, Priscilla 1, Heath 2, Fiora 1, Florina 1, Sain 1
Florina promotes. Some nice gains there.
Sain rushes over to this side of Linus and equips his Javelin. He’ll probably weaken Linus without killing him, which is what I want. He’s also in position to jump on the wyverns about to spawn over there.
Rath is still much too weak to kill a wyvern in one round, but he CAN double them. And that means Filla’s Might will let him kill it easily.
And Priscilla and Canas haul Ninian up closer to the front. I need her in position to dance for pretty much whoever next turn.
Well that made them both look lame, misses all around.
Fortunately the new boss theme made them sound pretty cool: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0zAEsa42sM0
It really seems timed well with the animations to me.
Nice! I could use more defense and speed.
Level up count: Dart 7, Lucius 4, Rath 3, Erk 3, Ninian 2, Priscilla 1, Heath 2, Fiora 1, Florina 1, Sain 1
A lot of those wyverns had javelins and he took 4 hits to kill most, so he needs a new handaxe. Geitz was left in trade range for just this reason.
Amazing Heath// how sweet the sound// of ding, +1 to speed
Level up count: Dart 7, Lucius 4, Rath 3, Erk 3, Ninian 2, Priscilla 1, Heath 3, Fiora 1, Florina 1, Sain 1
Since Sain missed Linus, Canas weakens him instead.
Meh.
Level up count: Dart 7, Lucius 4, Rath 3, Erk 3, Ninian 2, Priscilla 2, Heath 3, Fiora 1, Florina 1, Sain 1
I wanted to win this turn, but Sain double-missing kind of spoiled that. That’s fine. Next turn I can have killed EVERYTHING on the map. More reins would still come of course, but at least I won’t be wasting everything that had spawned already.
Linus will be reduced to tiny HP fighting Canas if Canas hits both times. Meanwhile almost everyone else is piling past him to slaughter the 2 wyverns about to pop up.
Well Canas missed one, but he got a great level so I don’t care. Yeah, beat Sain in Defense!
Level up count: Dart 7, Lucius 4, Rath 3, Erk 3, Ninian 2, Priscilla 2, Heath 3, Fiora 1, Florina 1, Canas 1, Sain 1
Turn 15, I’m about to win. Just a few more easy kills left.
And Florina visits the secret shop. You may recall that my greatest mistake so far was missing out on the armorslayer in a stupid fashion on chapter 22. I make up for that now by purchasing 2 as well as a Halberd (I don’t think I had one. It could be pretty great for Dart or for Raven when he promotes, or just for someone like Dorcas if I use him next chapter).
Man, unpromoted Heath can actually probably beat the level 13 or something much better armed hero.
Had to break out the killer bow on this one, Rath didn’t have the damage without it. One nice thing about the weakness of archers is that it means you have all these great, unused bows sitting around with no competition for them when you do get a bow user.
More free XP healing before Fiora strikes the final blow.
Great level!
Level up count: Dart 7, Lucius 4, Rath 3, Erk 3, Ninian 2, Priscilla 2, Heath 3, Fiora 2, Florina 1, Canas 1, Sain 1
And that’s a wrap. Tons and tons of levels, many of them on people who were unusable on previous chapters. I got approximately 2900 XP this chapter. The requirement is only 1900. If I had done something like use Raven, Lowen, and my other well-trained guys or given lots of kills to Heath and Fiora or something I’d probably have gained something more like 1200. All the XP is gained by using weak people basically.
And we’ve spared this twerp.
Yep. Fortunately we were also really nice and are now trying to help you even though you attacked us for no reason in the middle of a town and probably blew our cover.
What a jerk!
I mentioned previously that Eliwood pretty much just told Uhai to go ahead and kill his hostage Lyn before and mentioned that he shows later that he wasn’t asking anything of her that he wouldn’t do himself if need be.
Linus is confused by his courage and gives Eliwood a chance to ask a rather pertinent question that Linus should have considered 50 men ago.
He’s finally beginning to question the party line on this one…
And he, being an idiot, believed her when EVERYONE is talking about how she’s manipulating the whole organization for Nergal’s benefit.
And we just let him go even though he’s still probably planning on attacking us again later. Hector said correctly that Eliwood is too nice for his own good.
Yeah, but perhaps they’re all murderous assholes to begin with. Linus kind of demonstrated that with how he decided to just attack our group without question in the middle of the town and paid no attention to the pirates trying to pillage it.
That’s the right answer! What does our contestant win?
A creepy red fog of death!
Limstella murdered him by stealing his quintessence now that he’s injured. She seems to basically be following us around and just finishing off everyone we fight. Or presumably our own fallen. The game over screen does show that same red fog of quintessence draining afterall…
Meanwhile, Jaffar wakes up.
The black fang really is insane. It’s apparently official policy that even though he was safe with her and he was within her power to save and even though he’s the greatest asset the fang has, she was supposed to just kill him.
And he’s re-opened his wounds and collapses.
Linus finds Lloyd’s corpse, where Limstella just left it where it fell.
And he jumps to the conclusion that Eliwood and his group killed Linus, though he does realize that it was probably Linus who attacked rather than the other way around.
He decides that life isn’t really worth living without his brother, but first he’ll kill all of Eliwood’s party to get revenge. What a swell guy.
Meanwhile, in a semi-enemy cutscene.
The fake pleasantries these guys bandy back and forth are pretty great. They hate each other and they both know it, but you can’t just say that.
And she unwisely taunts him about how Zephiel is going to be named heir and Demond’s illegitimate daughter will never inherit the throne. Hellene really does a fair amount to stoke up this feud.
She really thinks he came here on his own just to hear her gloat doesn’t she?
And he completely owns her here, revealing that the Fire Emblem- a jewel which is integral to the ceremony- has been ‘stolen’. He came here just to gloat himself. I really love these two and their war of intrigue and jerkery.
Oh no! How terrible!
There’s a great old saying: “He lied; I knew he lied and he knew I knew he lied. THAT’S diplomacy.”
She knows his story about the gem being stolen was a lie and he must have arranged for it to be taken himself to cancel the ceremony and he knew she’s know that and just wanted to rub it in her face that she can’t prove anything so she can’t stop him.
And he reveals his motive- sort of, he later does admit to himself that he’s certain Zephiel is his real son. But he hates to think that because Zephiel is better than him at everything and he’s jealous of his son’s success,
The king leaves, having totally won that conversation, and Hellene is left wringing her hands when Louise and Pent finally arrive.
They’re relatives, as mentioned before, though just how is unclear.
Louise immediately realizes Hellene is having some kind of trouble and volunteers her husband’s help.
And Hellene explains what happened.
So Hellene tasks us with retrieving the Fire Emblem from wherever it’s hidden in exchange for her help.
Or Athos didn’t really care what you did exactly as long as you struggled and learned. That’s kind of like destiny. Eliwood is just assuming for now that Athos sent us here to find the Shrine of Seals in good faith.
Total Restarts: 14 (Easy chapter, no restarts)
Turn Surplus: 25 (Sweet. 0 Chapter coming up of course, but this is still great).
Things I Regret Missing: The lockpick on chapter 11, that darned archer on chapter 11, this one brigand who attacked Marcus on chapter 12, 2 more brigands who ignored everyone else to attack Marcus on chapter 13x, and 2 archers who ignored Hector and Dorcas (DORCAS!) to attack Marcus on chapter 14, like 10 more enemies I could have killed if Hector could have survived one more turn on chapter18, and Uhai who decided to take a 100% chance of death to Sain over a free hit on Hector, the chance to finish shopping properly with my silver card on chapter 21, the armorslayer that I have acquired if not for a stupid minor mistake on chapter 22, and these 3 wyvern riders who decided they preferred a 0% chance to hit Isadaora and then 100% chance of death against her to fighting a low level Heath.