Part 3: Chapter 1, Part 2: Thief Woods

Last time, Alm and the other villagers were recruited by Loka to join the rebellion against General Dozer, who had betrayed the king and captured Sofia castle. We had to fight off some thieves on our way out of the village, but now we're really on our way.

Music: World Map 1



Welcome to the world map. Our eventual goal is first the liberation camp (blue) and then Sofia castle itself (red). As you can see, there are a number of enemies standing in the way.



The first group in our way is another set of thieves. There will be seven enemy units this time, with a 'Powr' of 87. This stat is the sum of the units' Quality - itself the sum of Power, Skill, Speed, Luck and Defense combined.



Contrast with our own army, which has far more total Quality in fewer units. Plus one of those units is Cliff. Safe to say this battle won't be much of a challenge, either.

The menu options are pretty much the same as they were in the village. There's an additional option to move Alm's army along the map, or 'Rest' and allow the mobile enemy groups a free turn to move.



The Units menu still shows our army, which now has a few more units to view. We can also change the order of units on this page, which affects where they show up in the battle map, and eventually even which ones get left behind (the bottom of the list). Alm always has to stay in the first slot, however.



Scrolling to the right gives a convenient way to view the power of our army all at once.



Nobody has any items yet, but we could also look at those here.



I re-arrange the army randomly just to show I can.



We can go back to Ram Village if we want.



There's nothing there, though. Even Mycen is mysteriously gone....



Without further ado, we enter the Thief Woods.



We start at the bottom this time, with six thieves arrayed against us. There's also a new unit in the center....



Meet the Archer, a class that uses a bow to attack from more than one tile away. In the first game, Archers could attack only from exactly two tiles away, which allowed them to attack regular units without getting counter-attacked, but left them defenseless against melee units in return and ultimately limited their utility - why use a unit that can only attack one per turn instead of one that can counter-attack most everything to get in several attacks per turn?

IntSys has attempted to address the issue, with mixed results. This time around, the basic bow for an Archer can fire at units 1-3 tiles away. Not only do they have increased range, but they can counter-attack melee units as well. However, there's a trade-off - the basic bow has only a 70% accuracy, and with the large dodge boosts granted by terrain in this game, bow-users are actually less reliable overall.



The rest of the thieves are the same lackluster enemies from the last battle. Let's get started.


Turn 1



The thieves are all out of range, and while we could take some shots at the archer, it's going to be more effective to have everyone wait in the forest for the 40% evasion boost. The exception is Gray, who waits off to the east out of bow range.



One of the thieves attacks Alm, who dodges and then counters for 16 damage.



Robin also dodges this Thief, countering for 10 damage. Hiding in the woods is paying off already.



The archer also goes for Robin....



Another dodge. Notice that Robin can't counter-attack, due to the archer firing from three tiles away.


Turn 2



One turn down, and we've avoided taking any damage. That'll soon change.



Gray starts off by attacking the archer.



The archer is itself hiding in the forest, so Gray only lands one attack, but still manages to dodge the return arrow.



Luka brings the archer down to critical condition, which opens the door for....



Level Up Fanfare

Cliff to overcome a terrible hit rate to get the kill on his one chance, and gain the first level of the game.



Power and Defense, but still no Speed.



Robin attacks this thief from the forest. He only lands one of his attacks, but also dodges the counter-attack.



Alm for some reason moves out of the forest to kill this thief. He takes just one damage anyway, but breaks up the dodge streak.



More thieves advance, with one attacking Gray and again missing him. Gray counters for another 14 damage.



Cliff takes damage for the first time, and misses his own attack.


Turn 3



Five thieves remain. Alm can't reach anyone so just moves forward.



Gray chips away at one thief for 7 damage, again dodging the counter. Luka gets in two hits for another 16 damage, leaving the thief with just 3 HP.



That opens the door for Cliff to once again steal the killing blow.



Robin lands one attack, misses the other.



The full-health thief in our midst trades blows with Cliff, while the other two retreat.


Turn 4



Alm starts things off with 16 damage.



We'll finish that one off later, but first Robin takes another bite out of the runaway.



Cliff finishes off Alm's target for his third kill.



This time Gray and Luka are both left behind.



Both of the thieves retreat. The top-most one hasn't moved yet, and is actually sitting on and blocking the healing tile - the pink four-square tile - with heals the unit sitting on it for several HP at the start of each turn. We have one of our own at the bottom of the map, which would essentially be our only source of HP recovery if we weren't dodging nearly every attack anyway.


Turn 5



Robin brings the first thief down to 1 HP, and the drip of XP finally pushes him over the top to Level 3.



That's not a great start for Robin.



However, upon reaching Level 3, Villagers can be promoted into a new class. However, we don't have the means to achieve that quite yet....



Cliff looks to steal another kill...



but misses.



No one else can reach the front lines, so another turn ends.



The last full-health thief finally emerges from the fortress, only to miss Alm entirely and then take two swords to the face.


Turn 6



One of the damaged thieves retreated onto the healing tile, so that'll extend this battle a little more.



Cliff makes another attempt, with more success, also reaching Level 3.



Still better than Robin. Really need some Speed, though - that's supposed to be a 50% growth! (And yes I forgot to look at his stats page until after the battle ended.)



Alm tries to kill the thief on the recovery tile before it takes effect. However the recovery tile also grants a large 40% boost to evasion, so Alm ends up missing both attacks.



Robin comes through this time.

The last thief just sits on the recovery tile, lest Alm counter-kill him.


Turn 7



The thief gained 5 HP back, but that's not enough to save him.



And another band of thieves (plus one archer) falls before Alm's army-in-training. The battle once again ends as soon as the last enemy is killed (rout condition). Coming off the previous game where every chapter required seizing an objective, having every battle won by rout is a little simplistic, but most battles in FE1 are routed anyway - can't let any enemies leave alive and waste precious XP, after all.



With that, we're returned to the world map, with one less enemy to worry about. This battle was a bit messy with all the accuracy issues on both sides, but that should clean up as our army grows in strength and number.

Next time:



We take a little side trip into the Thief Shrine.