Part 18: Chapter 16, Part 2: Arena
We've all but finished the map, just some wrapping up to do. Then some fun with the Arena.Let's visit the rest of the houses:
Ooh, a Devil Sword. Sounds exciting. I wonder if we have any high-Luck units that could take advantage of the extra weapon Might....
That house was more useless than normal.
Oh...poor princess...I hope you are unharmed...Goddammit Garnef. Guess we won't be rescuing Marth's sister here.
Hmm, Oguma is facing the same bet. I wonder if it's the same enemy?
Yup. Same result, too!
Chainy gets his heal on.
Sheeda eventually finishes off that last Social Knight.
And gets...this level.
Meanwhile, Oguma is cheesing the Arena even more than normal. The Resist boost from the MShield Wand carries over into the Arena, so if he faces another Magician he won't even need to heal up afterwards.
The bet is lower this time. That usually means an easier enemy. Although it doesn't get much easier than a Magician facing an MShield.
Ooh, a mirror fight. Good thing we have a Kill Sword, that and his Speed should give Oguma the edge here. This fight definitely isn't 'easier', though.
It takes into the second round, but Oguma wins without his opponent even landing a blow.
Wow, you are not really making your case here Oguma.
I forgot about this house up here, so Sheeda makes her way over to it:
In the western lives Alan, a Paladin. In the eastern lives a Hero: Samson. But the villages aren't friendly with each other. Because of that, you can only visit one of them.Oh right, the villages. I need to get Marth over there. I had him parked by the castle, waiting to seize it, so this'll take some time.
Oguma heads in for Round 5 in the Arena. The bet is about the same here. Every level that he gains, the bet goes up by 4 gold for the same opponent, so we should see here....
Yup, same enemy, same weapon, but the level has increased to match.
Oguma still wins in three attacks, but takes a hit this time.
Marth reaches the western village. If he visits that one, here's what happens:
I will gladly lend my strength, but there's an age-old conflict between this and the other village. After seeing you enter this village, they've surely closed their gates.
Alan's stats aren't very impressive (compare him to Hardin, for example) but he does come with a Silver Sword and a Knight Killer.
Instead, Marth goes to the eastern village.
I will gladly lend you my strength, but there's an age-old conflict between this village and the other one. After seeing you enter this village, they've surely closed their gates.Yea almost identical lines there. Samson's portrait is cooler, though. Alan's got kind of a sneaky look about him.
Samson's got better stats, but he's no Navarre. He also comes with a Silver Sword, but brings us a Vulnerary instead of a Knight Killer. Honestly I would toss either one at this point, anyway.
A bit higher bet for Oguma this time, but we can still predict who's gonna show up.
Aha, another Magician! Oguma's still got 3 Resist from the MShield Wand so this fight's a breeze.
Round 7 for Oguma has a bet in between the last two, so we can pretty easily guess that it's back to the Iron Lance-equipped Social Knight. Oguma's lack of useful stat gains are catching up to him, though - he now only does 6 damage per attack, and takes 8 damage in exchange. He is just barely able to kill off the Social Knight in three attacks, though, so he still comes out victorious.
Seriously, Oguma. Although....
He can now use a Silver Sword. Less crits, but 4 more guaranteed damage per attack.
The lowest bet we've seen so far. Will it be a new enemy?
Yup - an Iron Axe Fighter.
It hits hard, but doesn't have much Speed or Defense. Oguma wins in a single round this time with the Silver Sword.
At this point, we've now seen all four possible enemies for a Mercenary to fight. With Oguma using a 100% accurate weapon, none of them are really all that threatening barring a lucky critical, so, a summary....
Round 9 - Oguma again wins in one round against another Mercenary.
Round 10 - Oguma takes out another Social Knight and gains a level:
Oguma hasn't hit his 40% Power growth yet in his four levels.
Round 11 - Another Fighter, another kill for Oguma. He broke a Silver Sword but he's made enough money for 10 more so it's all good.
Round 12 - See Round 11, but without the weapon breakage.
Round 13 - A Social Knight that Oguma kills in one hit with a crit.
All of Oguma's levels so far have been Weapon Level, HP, and maybe Speed or Luck.
Rounds 14-16 - A change of pace with a couple of Magicians, plus another Social Knight for good measure. Oguma murders them for money.
He certainly isn't doing it for the levels. The more levels he goes without Power or Defense, the less damage he does in the Arena, and the more he takes.
I set this one up on purpose on the side. If your weapon breaks mid-fight in the Arena, you're pretty much screwed. You can't attack, but your opponent can keep wailing away on you. If you can survive five rounds, though, the bout ends in a tie and you get your money back. That's to keep a high-Defense unit from just stone-walling the competition, I guess - prevents an infinite loop if your weapon breaks and the enemy can't deal any damage, too.
Rounds 17-19 - Two Fighters, a Magician, and a level:
That level alone will drag out this exercise significantly.
Rounds 20-21 - A Mercenary and a Fighter, neither one threatening.
Another good level, for whatever that's worth. Still, without any crit evade in this game, eventually Oguma is going to get hit with one, and the only way to survive that is with more Defense (and a bucket of HP).
Rounds 22-24 - A Social Knight and two more Fighters. Oguma got a critical hit of his own in, though.
Annnndd we're back to shitty levels. Good thing he's hit that 70% Weapon Level growth every single time, though.
Rounds 25-27 - Two more Fighters, and a Social Knight. The Social Knight this time took four attacks for Oguma to kill, so he took two attacks (and dodged one). Oguma's running out of time, now....
No Defense, so no more extensions for Oguma. The bit of Power will help a bit, though.
Rounds 28-29 - A Mercenary and a Social Knight this time, but nothing of note happened.
I feel like the RNG is a bit 'sticky' sometimes, don't you?
It's hard to make out, but you can see at the bottom that Oguma's doppleganger opponent here has significantly more Defense - 4 extra points, in fact. Only the Silver Sword and superior Speed is keeping Oguma alive now.
Rounds 30-32 - A Mercenary, a Social Knight, and a Magician. The mages are easy fights at this point, since their damage doesn't scale up at all and their Defense doesn't increase very much, either.
On the whole, this is a good level. However without more Defense, Oguma is starting to fall behind in the damage war. If his Speed doesn't hold out, he's doomed.
Rounds 33-34 - A Social Knight and a Fighter. The Power the last couple levels has barely kept Oguma from taking more than one hit per fight, but a critical hit will still one-shot him.
At least he still doesn't have to worry about getting doubled anytime soon.
Rounds 35-36 - Two more Social Knights, Oguma's toughest matchup now.
An example here - Oguma is still doing just 9 damage against a Social Knight who's up to 30 HP, and taking 13 damage in return against his own 32 HP.
Defense! Still can't survive a critical hit, but his 'nominal' combat viability has once again been extended. Rena's now using Recover Wand charges to patch up Oguma most turns, but there are plenty more available at the Shop here.
Rounds 37-38 - A pair of Magicians this time, easy pickings.
The winnings are getting more and more lucrative, too. We've almost doubled our treasury so far. Nothing like riding a hot streak!
More Power, mooorrreee!!! Oguma's turning into a pretty good unit after all, really. If I really wanted to power-level Oguma risk-free here, I could just enter and leave the Arena indefinitely until I got a bet that indicated a Magician opponent, but that's no fun so let's keep rolling.
Rounds 39-41 - Two Fighters, and then a Mercenary. Let's see how Oguma is matching up to his mirror these days...
The enemy merc is still cheating with extra Defense, but Oguma's extra Speed still makes the difference here.
Random extra critical hits help, too.
Although I swear every time I gain a level off a critical hit, the level gains suck. But hey, Oguma's still kicking.
Rounds 42-43 - A Mercenary and a Magician, and Oguma steamrolls them.
Okay, Oguma is just asking for it now.
It's been four levels since Oguma faced a Social Knight, and they haven't exactly been good ones.
Oguma is doing 9 damage against 34 HP, so it's four attacks again. That Social Knight has 16 Defense!
He's also taking 14 damage from his own 35 HP, so can still survive two attacks. And Oguma is still double-attacking (and occasionally dodging, too, as he did in the first round here). So the margin is getting slimmer, but he's still surviving.
Oguma dispatches another Fighter in what is now Round 45 and gets his last level as a Mercenary:
Oguma actually has as much Defense as Navarre now. Much less of everything else, though.
Small interlude - the Thief's Arena table includes both another Thief and a Magician, both easy foes. So I pump a few levels into Julian while I'm here.
Julian has almost rounded into fighting form, though he's a bit soft-skinned.
Back to Oguma...
Oh, why not. He doesn't get any bonuses, though.
Oguma's a different class, so he has a different table of enemies to draw from, mainly promoted units. Of course, these promoted units are also still Level 1 and have stats comparable to the pre-promoted allies we've recruited thus far. If anything, promoting actually puts Oguma at less risk, at least for the first few levels.
He even survives his first critical hit.
And a couple more battles later, caps...Weapon Level. Seriously, Oguma.
It's weird when the Level 15 Social Knight is much more threatening than the Level 2 Paladin. The Paladin also crits, but Oguma can weather it just fine (just 24 damage). The Arena really is a lot easier for promoted units. At this point I'm starting to wonder if Oguma will ever lose. I guess I could always just stop healing him, but that doesn't seem sporting.
For some reason there's an Armor Knight on the Hero's enemy table. They are extremely non-threatening.
And a Priest replaces the Magician. Despite the spell upgrade, he's still not a threat - Elfire only does 9 damage, so it'd have to hit Oguma 5 times at this point.
So, Oguma gains a few more terrible levels. He's now the same level as Navarre. Let's compare, shall we?
Oguma's turned out decently, but he's no Navarre. 4 ahead in HP, but 6 behind in Power and Skill. (Luck is actually even - Navarre had a Goddess Statue, remember.)
How far can we take this?
Well at this point Oguma has been getting a bunch of HP-only levels ever since he capped both Weapon Level and Speed. But he can still survive a critical from this guy and kill him in three attacks before he ever gets a second chance.
Still going strong here with terrible levels, though Oguma now needs four attacks to win and has to survive two counters. A single critical and a regular hit could've killed him here, but he dodged twice anyway. Even the Armor Knight becomes threatening, with 14 Power and 20 Defense. Basically even without a lot of Defense, Oguma's giant HP bucket is keeping him alive.
So, here Oguma is high enough level that the bet amounts wrapped around (259 -> 255 + 1 [to wrap] + 3). I guess it's a good thing it didn't go negative!
Well, here we are. Oguma has made it to the vaunted 20/20 mark. Too bad he wasted everyone's time in doing so. On average, he should cap Power as a Level 18 Hero, but he's two short of that here. He also managed to gain precisely zero Defense over all 19 levels gained as a Hero (20% growth rate). And not that it really matters, but he's 3 behind in Skill on top of everything else. But hey, at least he capped HP.
Well, no point stopping now. For reference, Oguma's mirror opponent over there has just 42 HP, but 17 Power and 16 Defense. (That's 7 more than Oguma.) Fortunately (for Oguma, anyway), Oguma still gets to double-attack, since the Silver Sword is lighter than the Steel Sword.
Oh come on now, that's just mean.
Oguma takes a critical from a Paladin. One more hit and he's a goner this time.
He has one last attack before the Paladin gets to strike again, but he'll only do 12 damage and the Paladin has more HP than that.
So Oguma pulls out a critical of his own to save his ass.
Eventually, after 100 successful Arena battles, Oguma permanently retires as Champion.
It took 135 turns, but I don't think we'll need to worry about money ever again.
Come to think of it, Navarre would probably do pretty well in the Arena, too....nah.
With that, Marth can finally seize the castle and give a victory speech to his troops.
Hurrah!
New Characters
Alan - PaladinAlan is more notable for the weapons he comes with than his utility as a contributing member of the team. He has the low stats of a pre-promote - barely above the class's base stats, so almost every Paladin grown out of a Social Knight will be better off. His growth rates are worse than our top three Social Knights, so he doesn't even have that going for him. He can't be recruited if Samson is recruited first, and vice-versa.
Growth Rates:
- HP: 50%
- Power: 50%
- Skill: 30%
- Weapon Level: 50%
- Speed: 40%
- Luck: 40%
- Defense: 10%
- Total: 270%
Samson - HeroSamson is the counterpart to Alan, but his higher base stats make him a more viable unit when he first joins. He has the same total growth rates as Alan, but they're distributed so that his higher base stats have lower growth rates, evening everything out overall. Basically, he's another replacement unit if you find yourself short, but your originals will still usually turn out better. He can't be recruited if Alan is recruited first, and vice-versa.
Growth Rates:
- HP: 70%
- Power: 30%
- Skill: 10%
- Weapon Level: 70%
- Speed: 20%
- Luck: 50%
- Defense: 20%
- Total: 270%
Chainy - CommandoChainy is the original Fire Emblem gimmick character. Most of the later games have a unit that can 'refresh' other units and let them take an extra turn. Chainy serves a similar purpose - he transforms into a copy of another unit, so that you can effectively attack with that unit twice each turn. The down side is that, technically, he's an Exp-eater, since any gain in his own stats don't really matter.
Growth Rates:
- HP: 50%
- Power: 30%
- Skill: 10%
- Weapon Level: 0%
- Speed: 20%
- Luck: 20%
- Defense: 20%
- Total: 150%
Our current roster, with the active units in bold. (Full stats in this post.) If you want to make a change, propose a recall motion and, if seconded, we'll have a recall vote and vote on a replacement. (Only applies if there is a replacement, of course.)
Lord: Marth
Pegasus Knight: Sheeda, Minerva [Dragon Knight], Paola, Katua
Social Knight: Hardin [Paladin],
Armor Knight: Roger, Doga, Tomth,
Archer: Gordon [Sniper], Thomas, George [Sniper]
Cleric: Rena,
Mercenary: Navarre [Hero],
Fighter: Barts, Maji,
Hunter: Kashim
Pirate: Daros
Thief: Julian, Ricardo
Magician: Linda, Marich,
Bow Knight: Wolf,
Mamkute: Banutu
Shooter: Jake, Beck
Commando: Chainy
* Non-violently retired
I need just two votes this time around: 1) Another chapter, another new sacrifice is required. Even if it didn't quite work out the normal way this time. Speaking of which, we get to bring 16 units to next chapter. We now have 16 classes with Chainy on board, and need to reserve a space for the sacrifice. So one class needs to be benched, but I'm going to pre-emptively bench Banutu since he's useless and has been voted out of every chapter almost since he joined. And any other fun ideas, don't hesitate to speak up.
2) We finally got a Dragon Shield (+3 Defense). It's another item that almost anyone can use, since Defense is kind of at a premium in this game. Roger could use it to become even more of a wall. Navarre could become even more godly. Linda could turn into a counter-kill machine. My only veto is Sheeda, who's going to get a big Defense bump on promotion anyway, but otherwise vote for the unit to receive the Dragon Shield.
Next time:
We storm Aritia castle.