Part 16: Update XV - The Fuck Zone
Update XV - The Fuck Zone
Alright, before we get to this next map, there's some organizing to be done. Mainly in the promotion department.
First, Vanessa promotes to Falcoknight.
CAPS:
HP: 60
STR: 24 (+1)
SKL: 30 (+5)
SPD: 27
LCK: 30
DEF: 20 (-4)
RES: 30 (+4)
Coup De Grace:
- +20 CRT, +5 AVD.
So Falcoknights seem pretty tailored towards accurate strikes with good crit potential, and tanking magic. Fine by me.
Then, Cormag gets promoted to Wyvern Lord.
CAPS:
HP: 60
STR: 28 (+1)
SKL: 27 (+2)
SPD: 23
LCK: 30
DEF: 28
RES: 22
Wyvern lords lose one point in MOV, going down to 7, but gain full access to the weapon triangle, gaining both swords and axes.
Nest Master:
- No weakness towards arrows and wind spells.
- Get terrain bonuses despite being a flying unit.
Cormag is basically a flying general now. Full weapon triangle, ability to take advantage of terrain bonuses for more tanking, huge strength and defense, turd resistance. Just keep him away from magic users and he'll be great.
And since I have two hero crests laying around, might as well promote Garcia to Hero.
CAPS:
HP: 60
STR: 26 (+1)
SKL: 28 (-2)
SPD: 26
LCK: 30
DEF: 25
RES: 25 (+3)
Lionheart:
- Outdoors: +2 DEF, Indoors: +2 RES.
- Equipped weapon might +150% vs. dragon type enemies.
- Equipped weapon might +50% vs. monster type enemies.
The way I'm looking at this, Garcia might be just a total nuke vs. dragons and monsters if we give him a legendary weapon. Sounds like a good thing to have in reserve.
Now, on to the chapter.
But first we need to promote Ewan.
I'm going with Mage, because I'm either going Sage or Mage Knight with him. Sage is just a super useful allrounder, and Mage Knight has some quirks I'm interested in maybe trying out. Now, on to the map.
Big changes here. You'll see what I mean by The Fuck Zone pretty soon. Let's get going.
So first of all, we get Gerik and Tethys.
Gerik - Mercenary:
STATS:
LV: 14 (+4)
HP: 38 (+6)
STR: 16 (+2)
SKL: 15 (+2)
SPD: 14 (+1)
LCK: 9 (+1)
DEF: 13 (+3)
RES: 5 (+1)
MOV: 5
CON: 10 (-3)
GROWTHS:
HP: 70% (-20%)
STR: 45%
SKL: 50% (+10%)
SPD: 35% (+5%)
LCK: 30%
DEF: 35%
RES: 25%
Nothing much changed with Gerik, just a few additional levels, in staying with what has been happening with all the other characters to keep them from having to be babied up. Not really that Gerik had that problem to start with, but I guess since we've already got many promoted units going around and the enemies are also beefier than in vanilla, he could use the boost.
And I'm not fucking around with Gerik at all. He's getting promoted right away, since he still comes with a promotion item. And since we already have a hero in Garcia, let's give the ranger a shot.
CAPS:
HP: 60
STR: 23 (-2)
SKL: 26 (-2)
SPD: 30
LCK: 30
DEF: 22 (-2)
RES: 26 (+3)
Ambush:
- Always attack first, even in enemy phase.
- +2 DMG when using bows.
Rangers also gain 1 move, from 7 to 8. Should be pretty fun to use. I can see some goofy stuff happening with always attacking first.
Now, Tethys. She's been through some changes.
Tethys - Oracle (formerly Dancer):
STATS:
LV: 1
HP: 30 (+12)
MAG: 14 (+13)
SKL: 17 (+15)
SPD: 16 (+4)
LCK: 10
DEF: 7 (+2)
RES: 12 (+8)
MOV: 6 (+1)
CON: 7 (+2)
GROWTHS:
HP: 60% (-25%)
MAG: 40% (+35%)
SKL: 55% (+45%)
SPD: 45% (-25%)
LCK: 60% (-20%)
DEF: 30%
RES: 40% (-35%)
CAPS:
HP: 60
MAG: 22 (+12)
SKL: 30 (+20)
SPD: 27 (-3)
LCK: 30
DEF: 20 (-4)
RES: 24 (-2)
Divinity:
- Access to buff abilities.
Tethys also gained 1 move, from 5 to 6.
So, Tethys. She joins Seth in the "complete rework, including a new class" bucket. As you might have guessed from the massive stat boosts, Oracle is a promoted class, and Tethys now has access to anima magic as well as staves. She however has lost her dancing ability - for now. More on that in the postgame. Instead, she picks up the ability to use buffing staves, which are basically Ninian's different dances from FE7, just in staff form. For instance...
Mirage: Rank A. Range 1. Weight 1. 25 uses. Increases avoid by 10%, lasts 2 turns. Use gives 25 EXP.
Something that could really come in handy for boss fighting. We'll run into the other staffs eventually.
Tethys picks up another dragon tear from the village. Not sure where I want this one to go, we'll see.
We set up a sort of defensive line to take on the early wvyerns, since those can really be a big problem.
Tethys gets attacked on enemy phase and easily dispatches with the enemy. Also, you'll note the 66 EXP she got from killing an unpromoted enemy. It seems that Oracles (and Valkyries) level like they're unpromoted or something. This is probably a bug. I don't care. I'll take advantage of that shit.
And after killing a wyvern, she already levels.
Some of these wyverns are carrying poison weapons. Not really fun. All that defense doesn't help against poison.
Gilliam carefully steps into The Fuck Zone.
And in the next enemy phase, we get a ton of reinforcements, including some cavs from the north. All the reinforcements in The Fuck Zone have poison weapons, and had I actually moved in with most of my units, that poison could be spreading pretty quickly and being a big pain in the ass.
But I'm not going to be dealing with that.
Meanwhile, Dozla knocks down a snag and makes a bridge so Gerik and Tethys can join up with the main crew.
Cormag gets to set up and deal with all the poison weapons. I've got time.
And of course we get a second wave of the same reinforcements. This is why I called this The Fuck Zone. It gets very crowded, very fast.
Duessel gets a pretty solid level throwing a javelin at a fighter.
Also, there's a physic guy here, being annoying.
Ewan levels fighting the cav reinforcements.
As does Tana.
And L'Arachel levels by healing in the aftermath.
And Ephraim levels up chucking javelins into The Fuck Zone.
Also, while you'd be struggling in The Fuck Zone, the hack handily spawns a wyvern right in range of probably half your army. Thankfully Dozla can deal with the problem and then Vanessa can block the fort next turn.
Next enemy turn, reinforcements from the factory start slowly making their way up. A merc, a knight and a fighter will be coming for a few turns, then the reinforcements will be two mages and a shaman for a few turns.
Natasha gets a level healing everybody up.
Cormag gets a level after cleaving through half of the reinforcements in The Fuck Zone.
And just as we start cleaning up all the stuff in The Fuck Zone and the reinforcements from the factory get closer, we get some wyverns spawning in to add to the fun.
But at least this mess is by and large cleaned up now, so soon we'll be chokepointing a little bit further. Yay!
Gerik gets some bows from storage, and looks like he's going to be pretty good at sniping unpromoted guys at least.
We're now at wave four of these guys.
Franz levels up while throwing a javelin at the physic guy while sadly not killing him.
Also, on enemy phase that guy shows he has a sleep staff too.
The wyverns come in and show me that, uh, they're pretty strong. Looks like Cormag will deal with these mostly.
I misremembered: The magic reinforcements of two mages and a shaman don't come from the three forts. But still, they're going to be coming for a while. And of course there's another set of two wyverns spawning in.
Yeah, these odds aren't great, and I'm saving up for something special, so I'm kinda low on good weapons. So yeah, Cormag will be our main force against those wyverns.
He matches up a bit better, don't you think?
And now it's time for Duessel to choke the fuck out of this point.
Ewan gets to stand behind him and snipe - all these guys only have steel weapons, so he's safe for sure.
Shoutouts to Cormag getting terrain bonuses.
Ewan really appreciates that Duessel doesn't double the mercs and leaves them in killing range.
Of course, we'll also take some help from other friends in getting this big blob of units thinned out.
I set up Cormag in range of the blob after sniping a wyvern that could've caused some trouble, so he's probably going to kill half of them on enemy phase now.
In the end, he just gets two enemies, which gives him a level.
Ewan gets another kill. He's developing quite well.
Also, a wyvern decides to have a stab at Gerik, which turns out to be his last mistake.
The magic horde starts arriving just as we start having cleared out the physical one. At least they only had three waves instead of four.
Another Ewan snipe level.
Duessel is basically the real Seth of this hack. Can deal with pretty much everything you throw at him and stays good. Meanwhile, I've basically stopped bringing the actual Seth along because he's just stopped being useful. Seriously, look back at Seth's stats. He'd be trash now, those wyverns would shred him. And he's level 10 promoted. He'd have to kill so many guys to get a level. The level would be great thanks to his ridiculous growths, sure, but he'd need like five to get back up to par for this point of the game. It's just not worth it. Pretty sure I did the exact same thing in my first playthrough - didn't use Seth in the early game, he fell off hard and just lounged on the bench forever.
The fliers move out to maybe get some stuff done early before the rest of the crew can move out.
Cormag grabs a guiding ring from the village. That is going to L'Arachel for sure.
Also, visiting that village opens the flood gates. Literally. I think that Selena starts out on a fort, but doing this takes away that terrain and replaces it with neutral terrain. So that's very helpful. So this is also a thing this hack does at times - fairly drastic changes to terrain in the middle of the map.
Oh. Wait. He's in bolting range now.
Yikes. That was some spicy chance of death.
Another Ewan level.
I've also been spamming mend uses to give L'Arachel another level before promotion.
For the last few magic enemies, I let Ewan take point, since he's got great stats and two star seals, so he pretty much outclasses them entirely.
Also, L'Arachel gets her promotion.
CAPS:
HP: 60
STR: 22 (-3)
SKL: 26 (+2)
SPD: 30 (+5)
LCK: 30
DEF: 20 (-4)
RES: 28
Providence:
- +15 HP healing with staves.
- +5 AVD.
L'Arachel is going to be a force to be reckoned with when it comes to healing - a flat +15 HP healing boost means a basic heal staff is going to heal a ton. And that 30 speed cap is going to mean she can dodge tank just fine. Also, remember that she, much like Tethys, gets a ton more EXP from kills, so she's a candidate to hit level 20 promoted before any of our units that started unpromoted hit level 10 promoted.
Actually, speaking of promoted units, since we're getting kind of close and she's got that bolting, let's look at Selena.
Arcthunder: Rank B. Range 3-10. Weight 12 (-8). Might 10 (-2). Hit 65 (+5). Crit 10 (+10). 5 uses. Uncounterable.
+21 HP, +3 MAG, +1 SKL, -2 SPD, +5 LCK, +5 DEF, +3 CON compared to her hard mode vanilla counterpart. Get ready for every boss from here on out to have nutso HP boosts. Boss fights are not going to be quick and easy affairs. That'll be interesting to deal with. And that little crit boost to bolting could be very annoying in parts.
L'Arachel gets 72 EXP from killing a mage.
Franz levels as we start moving out.
L'Arachel gets her second kill and first level.
Duessel sets up in range to eat the bolting charges.
And he's more than capable of doing so.
Once bolting runs out, it's time to start mopping up the remaining forces.
Gerik gets a fantastic level.
I'm not sure how long Forde will hold on with Amelia ready to rise up the ranks.
And as I start moving in the fliers, shoutouts to this ranger.
This fucking guy is just straight up boss tier.
I check and see if he moves. He does. He's going to be a big pain in the ass.
Lute levels as we start cleaning up the units surrounding Selena.
What really doesn't help with taking out the ranger is that I also need to snipe this troubadour with a physic that will just heal him back up.
And then I fuck up and let the ranger hit Lute. Thank god he doesn't double, or we would have a real problem.
And honestly, if Cormag doesn't hit this 51, we probably still would've had a real problem, though Franz might've been able to save it?
Cormag becomes more tank.
And now Lute can snipe the troubadour.
Interesting change: The convo between Selena and Duessel plays when Duessel gets close, not in combat.
Combat begins with L'Arachel, who can freely chip at Selena with no chance of dying.
Duessel can also fight without having a chance of dying, so let's get him involved as well.
Franz also survives a crit, but I can't let him attack on player phase. Good thing I didn't, since Selena crits him on enemy phase.
She also gets a crit on Duessel. Man, good thing I'm playing this safe.
Good thing I'm playing this safe, I say.
Thankfully it pays off and I don't have to reset right at the end of the fucking chapter.
You can level more than one stat, Gerik.
And that's it! Over 100 images this time. Hope that won't become a general thing now. Next time, we get to deal with Vigarde and get some nice stuff.