Part 33: Chapter 3, Part 9: Geyse's Fort

After a long delay and a couple false starts, Celica finally heads to Geyse's Fort. A lot of strong units in the forecast there.



The current load-out, though it'll change as the Angel Ring gets passed around.



It's another fortress invasion, with more desert tiles hampering our advance. Initial strategy will be for the fliers to take out isolated units while the main army meets the first wave at the fort entrances.



I, Lord Geyse, will show you my power. Get 'em boys! Kill them all!

Petty mid-chapter villains have more personality than most of our army.



The first obstacle is a feisty little myrmidon in a nearby watchtower.



There is a wizard and a sniper at three locations around the fort, ready for some siege tactics.



The front line of enemies is two mercs and three of these witches. We'll want to go after the witches with physical-attack units with a high Magic Defense.



In the 'boss chamber' are a skeleton-summoning shaman and a wizard with the powerful Slime spell and a map-wide all-unit heal in Fortify.



Geyse himself is a slayer, a promoted myrmidon (second promotion of the mercenary). His stats are rather intimidating - we'll have to gang up on him heavily while trying to minimize the amount of damage he can do.


Turn 1



Palla and Catria fly off to deal with the lead myrmidon, while everyone else moves up.



Did I mention that witches teleport? 'Cause they teleport. Anywhere on the map. And can still move and attack afterwards. Fortunately the AI doesn't abuse that ability as much as they could. Could you imagine the hard mode of some later FE games with magic users that can attack anywhere on the map at any time?


Turn 2



The witch is exposed and alone, so Leo and Celica immediately take her down.



Not a great level, but Celica picks up the Recover spell so we're no longer limited to just the one healer.



Meanwhile, Palla gets a timely crit to take out the myrmidon in the tower.



Two mercs on the way, plus the remaining witches further up. (Neither one teleports this turn.)


Turn 3



Saber can't double-attack, but his Defense is high enough that he only takes 2 damage anyway.



The merc is now weak enough that May and Boey can tag-team him and knock him out.



Boey you are seriously terrible.



Leo uses the increased range from the Steel Bow to take safe shots at the center wizard, though he only hits once. The damage will probably get healed away by the enemy Fortify wizard anyway, though.



Palla and Catria are headed up the right side of the fort, while Kamui and Jesse are going to meet the merc on the left.



The enemy shaman summons a few skeletons for the first time, but they aren't much more than fodder at this point for Celica's group.



Catria draws in the wizard on the right but misses both of her attacks.



The witches reach the front lines by conventional means this turn, landing minor attacks on Saber and Celica.


Turn 4



A critical makes up for Catria's earlier miss and wipes out the wizard.



Leo weakens one witch enough for Saber to get the kill.



Celica is able to get the witch down to 1 HP so that she can't attack next turn. Jenny tries for the kill herself but misses both shots of Nosferatu.



This image would be terrifying in any other Fire Emblem game, but here there's no effective bonus for the default bow so Catria only takes 5 damage.


Turn 5



Saber makes short work of the remaining witch.



Yet more Defense. Saber is already at the base Defense for the Slayer class.



May and Celica cast lightning upon the lead merc, with Celica getting a crit for the kill.



Palla also pulls out a crit to take out the sniper on the right, clearing that side of the fort.



Leo and Kamui weaken the merc on the left, but I leave Jesse where he is rather than have him attack and expose his 5 Defense to the center sniper.



Another merc reaches Saber and pulls off a 3-damage crit.



Catria draws in the two thieves and wrecks each of them for 24 damage.



The left merc goes after Jesse for 10 damage, barely surviving the counterattack.


Turn 6



Jesse starts the turn by finishing off the left merc.



The center wizard never actually got healed. Leo takes advantage, landing both hits for the kill.



The Angel spell is still awesome. Saber finishes off the weakened merc.



The fliers take out the thieves without any fuss.



Oops, forgot about that guy. Good thing he missed.



Because these two skeletons would've been enough to kill Catria otherwise. If one of them hadn't also missed. Still, would rather not rely on luck to survive.


Turn 7



Leo and Palla try to put the sniper into retreat mode, but Palla misses an attack. Meanwhile Catria falls back for some healing herself.



For some reason I thought it was a good idea to leave May exposed to two skeletons while everyone else trudges through the sand in front of the entrance. She can survive two attacks just fine, it's just a little sloppy.



She takes 4 damage from each skeleton but takes one out with a counter-crit and the other with a regular fireball.



Palla takes a hit from the sniper and also fights off one of the skeletons.



Another skeleton gets in on May after she made room for it, but this one's fresh so May can't pull off another counter-kill.


Turn 8



Saber starts off by taking out the last of May's attackers. Both entrances are now clear if we can get our army through the sand.



Palla lands both attacks this time to get rid of the sniper. She'll have to fight off two more skeletons on the enemy phase but she can handle those.



Catria's patched up so she flies in to bait the skeletons with her lower Defense, while a couple more people make it into the fort.



Only one skeleton lands an attack on Catria, and that for only 3 damage.


Turn 9



Two more skeletons down.



Slayers have 7 Movement, so we have to be careful in how we approach. Probably best to have the full army present to deal with Geyse, as well.


Turn 10



Valbo and Saber kill off the skeleton while positioning to draw out Slayer.



Well, I guess we're about ready for him. Let's see what he's got.



Geyse sees the writing on the wall.



The slayer jumps so high and fast that it looks like he phases out of reality entirely. Or maybe that's what he really does. Who knows? Either way, Saber takes both hits like a champ (thanks, extra Defense) but misses his own attack.



Another myrmidon was waiting up with Geyse, and throws himself futilely at Valbo.


Turn 11



Going to need to be careful here. Geyse is hard to damage and has a strong counterattack to any melee assaults.



A shot of Angel magic from Celica only does 5 damage here - the mercs were taking 19 damage earlier.



Boey and May can't do much but every little bit of counter-free damage helps I guess.



Well, if the spells actually hit, anyway.



Leo's one of the bigger sources of damage (5) but his hit rate is pretty low against the fast slayer.



Palla, freshly healed after a couple of turns on the healing tile, roughs up the myrmidon to ease up the pressure on the enemy phase. Catria also gets in an attack but although she's fast enough to not get double-attacked, she doesn't get a second attack of her own, either.



Geyse senses a softer target in Palla, ripping her for 14 damage, but Palla does 7 damage in return - a pretty good trade for us.


Turn 12



We can be a little more aggressive this turn, as long as we put Geyse into retreat mode. Still have to be careful with the Slime-wielding wizard, though.



So of course Valbo is now exposed to the wizard after hunting down the myrmidon with the Hand Lance.



More Angel magic from Celica gets Geyse down to 18/36 HP. A splash of fire from Boey puts Geyse under 50%, so he'll head straight for the healing tile on the enemy phase.



Leo gets in a shot this time as well.



And that's all for another turn.



As expected, Geyse heads straight for the healing tile.



And the shaman calls up seven skeletons to guard his back. Great.



OUCH. Fortunately the Slime spell is heavy so Valbo's only attacked once, and he even gets in two counterattacks for a total of 20 damage of his own.


Turn 13



Some quick math leads me to make this move. Celica starts off with a 5 damage attack, then the wizard gives up 2 HP for another Slime cast, which lets Celica take off the last 5 HP on the second attack. Even better, Celica dodged the Slime attack.



Leo and Boey miss, but Geyse is still below 50% HP so we're safe for another turn anyway. Just the skeletons to worry about....



Oh right, there's still a sniper and a wizard off to the left. Catria takes 5 damage right off the bat.



Skeletons go after Celica and Kamui without much affect.


Turn 14



Uh. There's a wall of skeletons between us and a rapidly-healing Geyse. Better take care of that.



Instead, Leo, Celica (not shown) and Catria team up to take out the sniper.



Catria is almost as fast as Geyse now.



May and Saber clear out a skeleton.



Kamui gets rid of another.



And Jesse and Boey take out a third.



There's no one left to attack Geyse, but our three mercs form up the front line so we should be fine for another turn.



Jesse takes one 10 damage attack but dodges another.



Two more skeletons move into the gap in the front line.


Turn 15



Geyse is off the recovery tile and the horde of skeletons is blocking any potential return to it. Now is the time to take him out. Celica starts off with a shot of Angel, then Leo follows up with a long-range shot to get Geyse down to just 8 HP.



That's low enough to start risking melee users, and Kamui rewards us with a crit-kill.



One last curse from Geyse on the way out.



Lots of XP for killing a third-tier unit, but not quite enough for a level for Kamui.



Some more skeletons died. Others would bash themselves against the merc wall on the enemy phase.



Eh, not great. In grand LP tradition, the levels gained during the lost recording were of course much better than in this run.


Turn 16



Palla flies over to investigate the last real threat on the map. Such as it is. Also the rest of the skeletons died.



First rule of summoning skeletons: Always summon more skeletons.


Turn 17



With that blow, the map devolves into skeletons all the way down.



I had thought a three-stat level was impossible at this point.



So I've got a lot of skeletons, a stable formation, and twenty turns left on the time limit. The details are rather boring since the skeletons aren't very threatening and the most interesting thing I did was juggle the Angel Ring all over the place. So instead of making this update into a full-length novel, here are some level up screens, in order of appearance:



Man that Skill/HP level sure is popular.



More Defense for an archer? Okay then.



Jesse's a bit of a paper tiger. Like the prototypical merc, really. He can now promote into a myrmidon, though.



Pretty much a perfect level for Jenny. She also gets the Physic spell, which for a cost of 3 HP (instead of 1 HP) effectively casts the Recover spell but with infinite range. So now Jenny can park herself on a healing tile and still heal up anyone on the map.



Kamui's just kind of...average.



May gets more powerful, and actually has a respectable amount of Defense, too.



Saber now has as much Defense as Valbo (with just 2 less HP and 6 more Magic Defense).



Celica wraps up the leveling by getting a little tougher.



On turn 40 of 40, Saber takes out the shaman to end the battle.



Out on the world map, a squad of Bow knights assemble to hunt down Alm (remember him?). Bow knights are promoted snipers. Thus archers end up getting the best promotion bonus in the game - a horse (+3 Movement).



Meanwhile Celica still has a ruined fort to explore.



Geyse held two prisoners but no treasures. Ah well. Let's talk to the one not currently in a cell first.



Well, that vile man had it coming. Mmm....I owe you guys one, eh? I gotcha. I'll lend you a hand.

With that, Sonia joins the group. Last update, Sonia (leading the enemies in the southern desert) retreated into the fort after we defeated Dean, lord of the northern desert. If we'd battled Sonia instead, it'd be Dean we found here (complete with the Hero Sword that in this timeline we already looted from his corpse).



Sonia is a mage and, like Ryuto in Alm's group, comes with the awesome Excalibur spell. Boey is now officially obsolete with two female mages completely outclassing him. Sonia's stats start off great - higher Power then either May or Boey, and much higher Speed - though her Defense is artificially high since she joins with a Steel Shield (+5). If we had fought Sonia instead, we would get the Steel Shield in that battle, so no matter which path is taken Celica's group gets the same items. Solid growth rates for Sonia, too - a flat 30% across the board.

Let's free the left prisoner next.



Remember how when Palla and Catria joined us, they said their sister was being held by Geyse? Yea, me either, but it happened, and here she is.



Est is the latest cameo from the original game. She joins up a bit earlier here, but still at a low level. Her stats are fine compared to her level but not compared to her sisters. Her growth rates are a bit higher - pretty great for this game, actually - with a minimum of 30% in everything and solid 40% Power and 50% Defense growths.

Just one person left to talk to, so let's free the prisoner in the center.



Wasn't Celica supposed to be headed for Mila's Temple before we got sidetracked by Geyse and the gang?



Hmm? What's the matter?

You just bear a striking resemblance to Lady Liprica.

Liprica!? That was my mother's name!

Then...then you truly are Princess Anteze! This is wonderful!

Anteze? I guess Mycen gave you a much better name when he 'adopted' you, Celica. Or maybe Anteze is the family name?

Also, red-haired girl turns out to be the princess, raise your hand if you're surprised by that.

You knew my mother? Please.... Tell me about her....

Yes.... Lady Liprica was originally a priestess at Mila's Temple. The king, charmed by her beauty, forcibly made her his queen. It was hard for her to bear, and she soon caught a grave disease. Soon after she gave birth to you, she perished.... She worried so about you.... Oh, Lady Anteze, don't cry.... I have something I must give you.

You know, the old king sounds like kind of a dick. Maybe Dozer did us all a favor by getting rid of him.



I wanted to show here that the conversation actually breaks off for a second and the girl turns around to fetch something that she was, for some reason, allowed to keep in the cell with her.

This diadem proves you are the princess of Sofia. Please use your power to save the kingdom.

Uh, how does that work, exactly? Didn't you just have the diadem yourself? Did that make you the princess at that time? Or does it just magically glow when in the hands of the princess or something?



Celica is promoted to a royal (completely meaningless class) and her portrait gets upgraded during the promotion message to add the tiara which, presumedly, holds the magic princess diadem. The class change doesn't give Celica any bonuses, since her stats are already higher than the base stats for the royal class. Anyway, we now have the magic plot key required to access Mila's Temple and complete (Celica's portion of) the third chapter.



Further conversation reveals that the mysterious girl isn't much of a fighter and is just going to follow along behind Celica on the way to the temple.


New Characters

Sonia is pretty awesome just by starting with the Excalibur spell. Throw in a great Power and Speed and all-around good growths, and she's already better than any current mage in Celica's group.
Est is a classic archetype in the Fire Emblem series (named after herself, naturally) - joining late at a low level with some of the best growths in the game. Since we're not grinding random battles, Est isn't as far behind as she might be, and with the Angel Ring combined with those growths could pretty quickly become a powerhouse.
Next time:



It's Alm's turn again, and he's up against Loso the Paladin backed up by a small group of Bow Knights.