Part 47: Chapter 19B: Last Hope

Chapter 19B: Last Hope



I'm kind of glad that invisible paralysis traps aren't in the game proper, but knowing IntSys, it's probably just because they didn't have the time to implement it.

Constant strife with dark creatures has made the group’s progress near impossible.

Princess L’Arachel of Rausten suggests they pay a visit to Rausten Court. It is here that the final Sacred Stone is sealed away.

L’Arachel rides cheerfully toward her homeland with the company in tow.



You remember everyone's favorite wacky uncle, Pontifex Mansel? Let's just skip right on past him, shall we?



: Come on, Ephraim, cheer up.

: What are you talking about, Tana? There's nothing wrong with me. I'm always like this.

: That's not true. I've never seen you look so sad as you do right now. If you're depressed, I'm sure my brother would worry... And I...well, I...

: ...... Tana. You're the princess of Frelia. Perhaps it's unwise of you to be so friendly to Eirika and me. After all, alliances aside, our two countries' needs may differ. Who knows what the future holds? Those ties could snap in an instant...

: No! Don't say that!

: And why not?



: We come from different countries, it's true, but...but... No matter what happens, the friendship I feel for you will never change!

: ...I'm sorry, Tana. I wasn't thinking straight. Please don't cry.

: Ephraim...

: You're right, though. No matter what happens, the bond between us will never disappear. And it's because Lyon is my friend that I have to put an end to this. Thank you, Tana.

Please don't ever make a drinking game out of "Lyon is my friend," either. I've made this joke before, but it bears repeating that the characters in this game repeat themselves a lot.



And then Riev showed his more playful, silly side, right before brutally murdering this guard.



: Brother...

: I'm sorry. I've been useless and worse lately. I'm over it now. I'm ready to fight. Let's go! Take out the enemy, and protect Pontifex Mansel!

Oh, come now, you've been slightly mopey for less than a chapter.



Though I'm glad that one of us is in good spirits, because this map...Remember how promoted enemies in normal mode were all patsies whose goal in life was to empower your units?



Not so harmless now, are they? After we clear out the opening foes, every enemy on this map is going to be coming at us with one of the highly dangerous Brave weapons or a Silver weapon of choice. Or Elfire, in the Mage Knights' case, but that's the magical equivalent of silver, anyway, which would make Thunder a steel weapon, I suppose.

Needless to say, it's not a good idea to let even one of these guys roam free around the knights of Rausten, since they'll heroically kill themselves without a second thought.



As always, killing wounding the smelly old man is an option if we need to end the chapter early. Might even be worth it this time around, since he's less dangerous than some of his minions.

: Lyon is my friend. No matter what has happened, that one fact will not change. I know this. I will not falter in my resolve. Lyon, because I’m your friend, I will strike you down.

That's the spirit.



Like the first time, sending someone down this way is a good idea. Marisa is better suited to the job than Colm though, because she isn't made out of porcelain.



Following the Ghost Ship chapter, I learned a special property of torches. Instead of merely setting people's vision range to a certain level, it actually adds to the character's vision range.



Needless to say, that gives Thieves and their promotions some pretty darn good vision. Using this vision range, Tethys, and at least two staff users, it's possible to warp your strongest unit right on top of Riev's head and kill him on Turn 1. Why do you need thief vision? Because you can't teleport into the fog of war.

(By the way, she's going east in order to open those chests. Guess what I forgot to give her.)



Speaking of the Warp staff, we're using it again in order to establish a defensive wall ASAP.



I should mention that Ephraim's spear was repaired not too long ago, because it's going to see a lot of use.



If it wasn't so fun deploying extra troops, I'd care about what Knoll's levels looked like.



In retrospect, I should have had Tana go on the shopping run, because she'd have been able to help out with the eastern section a lot better. Ah well.



Just as I did the first time, I have Cormag draw out the enemies up top. Thus far, my strategy has remained unchanged.



And Ephraim's reign of terror begins. Before starting this chapter, his number of kills was 75. Following this chapter: 101.



And he caps his skill on the first level of this chapter. With the crit bonus granted by the Reginleif and the supports given by proximity to Tana and Eirika, he is a little scary right now.



Meanwhile, Marisa puts her Killing Edges to use. Hope she appreciates those. They don't come cheap.



And the reinforcements arrive. Remember, that's two Swordmasters, one Great Knight, a Warrior, a Mage Knight, a Paladin, and a Ranger every single turn. For seven straight turns.

Somebody shoot me.



Just a quick inventory check to show you that Cormag's got the Fili Shield and Vidofnir, which grants +5 defense. He is ready for anything.



Quick note about assassinating people: it multiplies the experience gained from that fight by 1.8 of what you would normally get. That druid just gave Marisa 100 experience in one pop.



Which she squanders in her own special way.



And L'Arachel's ready to promote now.



At first, my thought was to have Garcia be Ephraim's wingman, using the Swordslayer to fight the Swordmasters, but I changed my mind when he kept taking hits.



I just want to emphasize that you don't want any fliers up here without a Fili Shield. We've got Snipers and Warriors with bows.



It's at this point that I realize that I sent Marisa off on a thieving mission without any Lockpicks. Given that this is my 12th take, one of which was ended when I realized this a different time, you'd think I'd have known better.



So Tana has to make a special delivery, assisted by the Rescue staff.



I'm beginning to wonder if I'd been better off just using Moulder again.



I'll bet those four hits really came in handy when Garcia whacked you with one.



That's the stuff I like to see, though I'd also take something in the defense or skill department.



As for L'Arachel, it's time to don a jaunty hat.





At first, I thought that her horse had also been given a beret or something, but all that happened was that his mane changed color for whatever reason.



Extraction of the Goddess Icon goes smoothly enough. I know a certain cavalier who could use some luck.



Lute's serving two roles here. If either of the two guys up front gets seriously injured, she'll heal them up, but otherwise, she and Innes are the artillery. If I didn't have to guard the top area and just had to worry about the bottom, they'd be more helpful down there.



Figuring that he can't beat Franz or Marisa, this fighter that Marisa refused to crit goes for an easy mark.



Bear in mind that the guards aren't powered up at all from normal mode, and even there, they were horribly outclassed. Fortunately, we only lose these two, so we still qualify for the cruddy treasure at the end.



Here's a fun little trick you can do with Phantoms and the enemy AI's established pecking order. Remember that, because of that whole "Going for the kill" thing, the AI will always prioritize the Phantom first. So if you can trick the AI into hitting the Phantom here from the side, you've effectively protected one member of your chokepoint from direct attack, because the enemy's blocking him or her.



Good thing too, because I discovered at this point just how dangerous having low speed can be. Duessel had to limp away from this turn and sub in Eirika instead.



I'm surprised that I had to lose Cormag twice before I finally hit on the idea of protecting him from arrows. In my original vision for this level, I'd placed it on Tana, because I was under the naive impression that I'd be able to push the enemy back.



I don't really know what to say about Eirika. She's actually...kinda good. Surprising, really.



Tana gets a not-as-spectacular level from tossing a javelin. In retrospect, this is what I should have been doing.



Instead of using my incredibly awesome weapons, I should have had two people with javelins, probably Seth and Ephraim. That way, I could deal with all the mage knights and rangers too.



Innes is a real help up here. As a guy with almost sole rights to all the best bows, he is just slaying with them.



And getting better.



Gerik is also slaying, but not improving. This saddens me.



Especially when compared to his partner in crime.



Meanwhile, the slaughter continues.



And that's speed capped. Ephraim's got a peculiar amount of resistance with that 25% growth, almost as much as the people who are supposed to be magical blockers.



And at this point, the thieves start coming in.



Perfect targets for Forde and Franz, who haven't gotten much chance to level in this chapter, given the horrendous number of face-smashing folks who would smash their faces.





Well done, bros.



Don't know why I wanted to show this off. Perhaps I thought it was endearing to see the little guy help in his own way.



There's a reason why I gave Cormag the defense-boosting spear. The time before this recording, a different enemy pulled the exact same stunt.



If Ephraim ends up capping resistance, I'm going to laugh. I hope he caps strength too, but that's a max of 27, so it's unlikely.



Eirika's doing well too. I was hoping that she and Ephraim would get another point of support this chapter, but no dice.



I almost feel like this isn't worth it, but let's promote Franz.





Compared to how Seth started out, Franz is better in a number of areas, but he's still not as good as his first few levels suggested. He really dropped the ball in the latter half of his career, which is just unfortunate.



Another thief popped up in the east, but Marisa stomped him down, getting mildly inconvenienced in the process.



Realizing that he was letting the physical half of his asskicking slip a little, Ephraim takes corrective measures.



Looking back on things like this, I have to wonder what I was thinking. Here I have Tethys, who could have restarted Rennac in order to speed up his looting, but she targeted Tana instead, who proceeded to do nothing. Just lovely.



I'd complain about the level, but to be honest, it doesn't matter.



What does matter is that Gerik is improving his defense, even if he could also use more bulk.



Same treasures up here. Got a Runesword, a Speedwing, and a Fenrir tome, though for reasons which I'll show off, I don't get the last one.



Look at that Reginleif. If I hadn't repaired it, Ephraim would have snapped it in half and used it as a large-headed dagger.



Up top, a rare break from keeping the three gents in tip-top shape gets Lute a level.



Not a bad one, at that. More defense on a caster is just fine in my book.



Ephraim can't not kill people. If they'll keep running at him, he'll keep wasting them.



At this point, the normal reinforcements from the top and bottom stop, only to be replaced by these Suckers. Fortunately, I've thought ahead and sent Garcia as support.



The Tomahawk sorts them out pretty well, though one of the generals did activate his shield technique and kill Garcia on the counter-attack in yet another alternate take.



Once again, for reasons I'll explain, I only nab the Bolting tome and Fortify staff, leaving the 5000G.



Forde does not hit Level 20 this map, nor does he hit this Swordmaster. Before you say that he's going against bad odds, I've been getting hit by things 50% and above for the entirety of this recording and quite a few past recordings as well, so Forde has no excuse.



Strength and HP, the two aspects of a Warrior. This is why we should have just used Ross.



It's like poetry. It rhymes.



And then these two yahoos arrive.



If I wanted to, I could potentially have waited out these dudes, assuming I didn't get unlucky with Garcia.



But here's the thing: most of the melee units are gone at this point, leaving units that are content to run away and plink Ephraim at a distance. We're on Take 12, with multiple other takes getting close to this turn before being cut short on some sort of BS. I'm tired, I'm irritable, I've got the treasures I need, and I just want this thing to end already.



So I decide that, rather than potentially losing yet another recording to random chance, I'm going to cheat the system a little.



Naturally, with the realization that there are no consequences for getting into fights, I have everyone get in whatever hits they can.



Someone wants to be on Phantom summoning duty forever.



Ephraim may have spilled a lot of blood today, but he's got room for a little more.

: Heh heh heh...



Shut up.



Had to happen sometime, I guess. After all, he's gotten everything else to beastly levels. Why not his luck too?



: Ephraim! I'd glad to see that your spirits are up.

: Ah, Tana. And I have you to thank for it.

: It was nothing. As long as you're back to your old self, that is thanks enough.

And then we get the other Sacred Stone, plus Ivaldi and Latona. With the exception of Saleh, I don't think we have someone who we can train up to S Light before the end of the game, but it's good to have it.



And we got the Light Brand too, I guess.

Next Time: We forge an endgame team, so everyone better bring their A game in Chapter 20: Darkling Woods.

Total Resets: 39+11=50. I guess that makes me a pretty bad player.