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Hello widows, widowers, and widowmakers! Welcome to the New Year!



But first...reflect on what happened last update. Imagine you're a 12 year old playing this game for the first time. You're a Japanese school-boy, and you just watched your favorite hero get demolished. You had a whole Generation to stop Manfloy and his goons, and you failed. You throw your controller down, you cry to your parents, you go to school, get home from school...and then you ignore your Super Famicom for a day or two. You take as much time as you need to process all that happened...



And then you grimace. You gird up your loins, pick the game back up, and bring those save files up. And upon hitting that START button...you get...this:





The intense battle over control of the capitol sent most of the powerful lords to their grave.



Only Lord Alvis’ plan went without a hitch as he successfully gained full control of the kingdom.





After overthrowing the two opposing kingdoms, Silesia and Lenster, Lord Alvis unified the continent. And with the overwhelming support of the people, he became the first emperor of the Grandbell Empire.

DARN THAT DASTAAARD!!





The people who once enthusiastically welcomed Emperor Alvis were now experiencing extreme hardship under his oppresive rule.

Oh there's our typical Fire Emblem plot! Except this time, we actually got to SEE what it was like before the "big, huge military power" started getting out of control.



The extreme conditions had taken its toll on the people.

We, as the 10-12 year old child, feel a very palpable sense of guilt for not stopping all this. We established all the way in Chapter 1 that Isaac didn't deserve any of what happened to it; it was all a frame job by Manfloy and his Sect, and we could never do a blasted thing to stop it.



Never...until now. Alvis and co. did wrong...and there WILL be a reckoning!!



King Dannan of Isaac was a merciless ruler, taking much after his father, Duke Langobalt. He dropped the social standing of the Isaacian people to that of slaves, while he himself indulged in the pleasures of the royal palace at Rivough.





Dannan’s second oldest son, Johan, presided over Isaac Castle while his youngest, Johalva, presided over Sophara. Dannan’s confidant General Harold administered the remote Ganeishire Castle. He as well relied heavily on oppressive governing tactics to control the citizens.

"Relied heavily on oppressive governing tactics" + Already angry about Chapter 5 = Dead Man Walking



Prince Shanan had organised a liberation army based in the northern isolated village of Tilnanogue.

Shanan...wait! You couldn't mean...





It is! It IS him!



Bwahahaha! AWESOME! Now we get to PLAY as him!



Among the army of young soldiers was one who the Isaacian citizens referred to as ‘the Bringer of Light’. He was also revered as the Imperial Prince of Grandbell.

Oh? And is that who I think it is ?



Yes it is~! Prince Celice, IN the flesh! Oh yeah!





BOOM!! Now THAT'S how you do a time skip! THAT'S how you ride the waves of excitement and anger that every li'l kid in the world is feeling!





Dannan: Don’t tell me you haven’t done anything yet. Prince Shanan’s rebel army gets larger each year and they’re meddling with my affairs! Don’t you know they’re harbouring Sigurd the Traitor’s son? With them on the loose my position as King of Isaac is completely being undermined! You tell me how to explain this to His Majesty the Emperor!

Harold: I thoroughly understand your concerns, but I have matters under control. We’ve located the rebel army’s hideout, and I have already dispatched forces to subdue them. They have nowhere to run now, so you can sit back and relax as we eliminate the threat.

Dannan: Well, we’ll see. But listen closely, Harold. Do not underestimate them! The problem isn’t with the younger rebels, it’s with Oifey and Shanan. You overlook those two and the complications will be far reaching!

Like, "whoa, Oifaye and Shanan! Those two guys grew up on the team that we controlled in Gen 1! Better watch out for THOSE two!"

Harold: Yes, I understand, but I have information that both Oifey and Shanan are presently away from the rebel hideout in Tilnanogue.

Dannan: What? Then what are you waiting for!? Order your men to attack! The Isaacian citizens have made the rebel army out to be some kind of liberation army. They’re treating them like heroes! But I think it’s time to teach them a little lesson. Harold, kill every last one of them! I’ll be back in Rivough awaiting your good news.

Pah. Like that's gonna happen on the intro chapter .







Skasaha: Subjugation forces have left Ganeishire and are heading this way!!



Lakche: Let ’em come! At least we don’t have to waste our time going to them. We can confront the enemy and make an advance on Ganeishire all in one shot.

Skasaha: Lakche, you’re crazy! Prince Shanan is still at Yied Shrine, and Oifey hasn’t made it back either. It’s just us! How do you expect us to take them on!?

Same way Sigurd always did I guess.

Lakche: Skasaha! You’re not scared, are you? This is our chance to see a little action. Shanan still thinks of us as kids. That’s why we almost never get to fight, but we’ve had enough training!

Skasaha: But Lakche…

Lakche: I’m… I’m so sick of running! Those animals out there have killed too many of my friends! The imperial troops chased us girls… taking us out one after another. If it weren’t for Prince Shanan rescuing me, I wouldn’t be here now! I will never, ever forget what those girls had to go through!

Skasaha: Lakche, I know it was horrible, but we…



Celice: I’m sure Shanan gave him strict orders to keep me out of danger. Because if Shanan hadn’t, he would’ve been the first one out there. He is just itching to get into battle.

Lakche: Oh, that’s right. I completely forgot about you, sir.

Celice: Lakche, I’m not a kid anymore! I can fight just as well as any of you! Anyway, we can’t just turn our backs on Tilnanogue. The people here have done far too much for us already.





Lana: Sir, I’m not staying behind!

Celice: I’m not going let you get yourself killed out there. Nuns and warfare DO NOT mix!



Lana: Nuns can fight too, you know. I feel just as strongly about this as Lakche does. The imperial troops are becoming crueler with each passing day. It’s dangerous just to be a girl anymore! But I don’t plan to go down without a fight. I have my own means of warfare!

Celice: I’m sorry, Lana. You’re right. This is everyone’s battle. Alright. We should get going. It’s hard to say how this is going to turn out… But let’s give it everything we’ve got!

Lana: Sorry if I got a little outta hand, sir.

Celice: Haha! No problem… Okay. Skasaher, Lakche, Lana… Let’s move!





And there we are! The start of Chapter 6! Now let's see what enemies we got:







Mr. Harold here has what I like to call our first "recoverable item". He's the guy you can get the 2nd Return Ring from if you never bought the Return Ring in Gen 1, or didn't manage to pass it down. We DID pass it down though, so his Return Ring dies with him.

Anyways, we got ourselves an all new party, and rating them all at once is going to drag this update to a halt. So I put an overview of all five of them in Testposter instead of the main update. Here they are!

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Lana Overview

Lakche Overview

Skasaha Overview

Celice Overview

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



Anyway, this is the first instance of what I like to call "Sub Exclusive Moments". I might have covered this before, but, your mothers are not guaranteed to have kids. If they get killed before marrying, their children are replaced by what we call "Substitute Characters". They're mostly carbon copies, except they miss out on Inherited Items, and also tend to have inferior base stats, growths, and skills. Also, their conversations DO differ from their respective child characters at certain points, and this here is our first example of that...

SKASAHA AND LAKCHE (+1 Luck for Lakche)



Skasaha: Well, take it easy, alright? We don’t need you pulling any of your stunts out here.

Lakche: I’m not a child! You don’t have to speak to me like that.

And this is where the differences start...

Skasaha: Prince Shanan tells me you’ve got an iron will just like our mother did.

Lakche: Aira… Yeah, I have no memories of her whatsoever. How about you, Skasaha?

Skasaha: Of course I don’t remember anything! You forget we’re twins or something? We weren’t even two years old yet at the time. We fled to Isaac with Oifaye. But she never showed up. Maybe she didn’t survive the Battle of Barhara after all…

Lakche: Skasaha! You promised you’d never say that! She is alive!! Don’t you ever let me catch you saying that again!

Skasaha: …I’m sorry, Lakche. Yeah, I shouldn’t have said that.

Aaand then we have the Roddlevan and Radney conversation...

RODDLEVAN AND RADNEY (+1 Luck for Radney)



Roddlevan: Radney, are you alright?

Radney: Yeah, I’m managing.

Roddlevan: Well, take it easy, alright? We don’t need you pulling any of your stunts out here.

Radney: I’m not a child! You don’t have to speak to me like that.

Roddlevan: Sorry. Hey, you know Johan and Johalva, right? Man, I can’t figure them out.

Radney: They’re driving me nuts. Geez, I can’t stand men. They make me want to puke!

Roddlevan: You just hate men because of the imperial troops. Not all men are like that.

Radney: Yeah, I know. But I still get freaked out when I’m around a guy.

...Huh. Does the man-hate also apply to Lakche, or does that not count? Since she and Skasaha talked about their mom instead ?

Roddlevan: Any guy?

Radney: Well, I can handle being around you and Sir Celice.

Roddlevan: Hmph… So how about Shanan?

Radney: Roddlevan!!

*laugh track*





Also, yes; I will give an overview on all the Substitute characters as well. They're just going to be at the end of the update rather than the middle of it.



Whoo, first fight of Gen 2! And uh...





Yyyeah...remember what I said about Celice before? About how he's a guy that starts slow, but then evolves into the most awesome fighter ever?



Yeah, we're just skipping past the "slow" part. This is back in the days where "Seize" was the only objective FE games ever had; so the faster Celice goes, the more turns we save!





Speaking of slow, nothing much happened that Enemy Phase; but that won't be the case for us!



For example, Lakche. She's Level 1, she's got Elite, and the Silver Blade is just strong enough to ORKO almost every non-Armour unit in the Chapter.





Might as well have some fun with that!





Strike 1!





Strike 2!



And strrrike 3! You're out!



Granted, Celice is fragile enough to die here if you're careless; but then, that's why I put him on a Mountain. Do that, and Celice will be guaranteed to survive this next wave of axe fighters. He'll slurp up 4 Levels from the likes of them, get awesome stat ups, recover his HP with the Live Ring and Libro Staff, and then...well, that's basically the whole strategy right there. Heck, you won't even need the Libro Staff after a certain point; this Chapter was designed to accomodate even the most miserable of planners. Everyone can beat this chapter, even if they ended up with all Sub characters, and didn't give Celice anything good. So needless to say, these enemes have about as much of a chance of beating us as a one-legged man does of winning a butt kicking contest.

Speaking of which...





HAI OIFAYE !



Delmud: Lana might be out here fighting for all you know.



Ha! More characters!

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

Delmud Overview

Lester Overview

Oifaye Overview

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

Moving right along...





The Live Ring heals what little HP Celice lost...



Lana uses the Libro Staff to get 35 EXP per pop...



And everyone but Oifaye moves in Celice's direction! Because again, he's already at a high enough level to easily cap. How do I know that? Well, let's talk about that.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

The War Room Part 8: (Hitting 30 in Gen 2)

This one will probably be very short, but it's still worth making just for how valuable this knowledge is. Now, like I said, pure melee units tend to have the hardest time capping their level; combat is their only way of getting EXP, and this game already moves slowly enough as it is. So because of that, there are four very dangerous pitfalls that you want to avoid...

quote:

1) Obsessing over ALWAYS having the Elite Ring on someone before EVERY fight in the Arena, even when they're already high leveled.

2) Feeding too many enemies to one unit.

3) Feeding too many civilians to one unit

4) Feeding civilians to any unit that can get EXP outside of combat (staff bots, thieves, and dancers)


Now, we can avoid No. 4 easily enough; but the only way to calculate No.'s 1-3 is to figure out exactly how much EXP you get from each and every fight in the Arena WITH THE ELITE RING EQUIPPED...and then factor that in to how much EXP you already have. That's around 35 fights that I had to calculate using the following formula...

code:
30 + [(enemy’s Level – Level) x 2]


As well as keeping track of how high leveled your Arena foes are...

code:
http://serenesforest.net/genealogy-of-the-holy-war/miscellaneous/arena-data/


If that all seems long and tedious...that's because it is. Worse yet, I kept making small mistakes in my calculations, making the whole thing take even LONGER than it already was. But that's alright; I had saves from Chapters 8-Final, so I was able to work it out just by taking a Staff bot, and manipulating her EXP till I had hit the EXACT sweet spot for each Chapter! So here's EXACTLY how much EXP. you need by the time you hit the Arena in each Chapter!

quote:

Chapter 7: Level 11 (24 EXP)

Chapter 8: Level 14 (88 EXP)

Chapter 9: Level 18 (64 EXP)

Chapter 10: Level 22 (48 EXP)

Chapter Final: Level 26 (28 EXP)


So if you're in Chapter 7, you need to buy the Elite Ring and have Level 11 w/24 EXP; that's what you need before you can Level 30 off of JUST Arena fights. And if you're on Chapter 8, see six Civilians, and wondering which combat unit to give them to? Do NOT feed ANY of them to ANYONE who's cleared the Arena, and is Level 18(64) or higher. You're only wasting EXP if you do so. Now then...

------------------------------------------------------------------------



Come at me, bros!





I was hoping that this Bow Armour would target Lakche; Celice isn't killing him anyway, so that would have made him easier to leech Gold and EXP off of . But oh well.











And there we go. See that "blue ring of light" around Celice? That's the Live Ring healing animation, and I put it there in GIMP. That's howI put that there in GIMP, and that's how you know that the Live Ring healed Celice that turn. Otherwise, I'd have to post two screenshots at the start of every turn.



Anyway, I do wish the west Bow Armour had gone for Lakche instead. Celice will still seize Ganesheire in the same amount of turns, but the rest are going to be slowed down a turn.



Oh well; this just means that I'll have Lester bait him with his Silver Bow while having the others wait outside it's Range. Lester will probably land either 1 or 2 hits; Delmud will then rush in, steal with the Thief Sword, and Aira will finish the job in order to get buffer. It's not the ideal situation, but it's fine.





Plus, this helps demonstrate what I was saying about “Normal A.I.” compared to “Hard A.I.”. This never would have happened had I switched to Hard A.I. If I had, the Bow Armour would ALWAYS have gone for the “7 Defense & 22 Evade” unit instead of the “12 Defense & 48 Evade” unit. I am, therefore, making things harder on myself by adding in more randomness; and that's precisely what I wanted.



Besides, it feels more like an actual strategy game that way! I've never played FE14, so I don't know if it's guilty of this or not, but... I don't like the direction that FE11-13 went in in terms of “difficulty”. When I start having to base all my moves on “ok, what will make the A.I. do such and such” and “ok, which turn are those reinforcements going to spawn” and “ok, which completely OP enemies are going to move, and which ones are going to stay still till I get in range”...

Can I really call it a strategy game? Or is it more like a glorified puzzle game? One where I don't even get to see all the relevant pieces till it's too late?





I didn't mind the enemy stat boosts, I loved the fact that they would alter enemy formations based on difficulty level, I appreciated them changing their weapons based on said difficulty levels...all of that was fine.





But man...some of the stuff that Lunatic!FE12 pullled...

I'm not the kind of guy who generally throws his controller across the room or anything, but...I remember how it's reinforcements would never come at a consistent time. Uber powerful Wyverns would spawn from all four corners of the map, Vyland would ambush my rearguard...and I couldn't figure on which turn they would show up! Sometimes Vyland would show up at Turn 4, sometimes Turn 3, sometimes Turn 6...and I couldn't figure out when the dracoknights would show up either!





Lakche finished off the Bow Armour, in case you're curious.

But yeah, I got my rear stomped over and over again just trying to figure out the logic behind their appearance. I though maybe there was some kind of invisible line that I had to not cross; so I tried having my own dracoknights go everywhere I could. I crossed into every part of the map I could think of, just trying to see what might trigger those reinforcements. But that didn't work either! I got so frustrated one day, that I look online, found a guide that told me exactly which reinforcements there were, and what caused them to appear...

http://www.fireemblemwod.com/fe12/guia/ENG_capitulo-19.htm

And just about snapped my DS in half when I saw the “Enemy Reinforcements” section.



Like...what the heck? Reinforcements come when I attacked one of the thieves?! Those generic, no-name thieves with NO unique portraits or line of dialogue? The SAME thieves that I know are going to destroy a village (they could do that in FE12) WITH a recruitable character in it?!





That's the kind of difficulty I don't like; the kind you could never predict on your first try without a guide. Reinforcements that trigger when you attack a certain kind of generic unit...just when has THAT ever been a part of the series? Has there been any other Fire Emblem that did that?



Either way, that's an example of the game designers breaking their own rules. Every other game up to that point had set a standard; that reinforcements would only appear once a certain amount of Turns had passed. They MIGHT be triggered once you passed a certain point in the map too, but the games would usually make said triggers relatively obvious. FE6 had one or two moments that didn't mark those triggers well, but that's FE6. That entry was known for being rough around the edges.





What I just posted though? That had NEVER happened before in the series; or at least, not in any non-FE5 game. If some of FE5's maps did that, then those get the same seal of disapproval that FE12's Chapter 19 got. I didn't feel like I was struggling because I played badly; it was like I was getting my butt kicked because the designers tried too hard to make things “difficult”.



They knew that a reasonable FE player would take out the Thieves first (so they can't destroy the village) and rescue said village as quickly as possible; so they specifically designed the map to punish players for doing something that any FE veteran would naturally try to do.





And why do they do that? Well, I think at least part of it is precisely because of how fixed the A.I is in the later games. FE4's “Hard A.I.” makes it so that the game's enemies follow a fixed set of behaviors, and the later games all seem to model their A.I in a similarly predictable fashion. It never takes long to figure out exactly what makes it tick. So suppose you're a game designer, and you're trying to make your enemies hard, despite them being predictable in everything they do. How else are you supposed to do that...



Except by bumping up the enemies stats to unholy proportions and pulling cheap stunts like that upon the player?





I hate that kind of Kaizo nonsense...but at the same time, I can't imagine many other ways of working with an A.I that's completely fixed. One can always say “clever map design” and “creative situations that challenge you in new, unexpected ways”, but...that's not always easy to do when you've done 12 games, and have to design something like 25 Chapters for each one. That's why I rather like the randomness that FE4's “Normal A.I.” brings; I'd much prefer to be challenged by an A.I.'s unpredictability than by it's unfair advantages.



That's why I'm wondering if perhaps some more randomness in the A.I. would help the designers not have to rely on as much of that Kaizo nonsense. The challenge that said designers are trying to create would come partially from just having to adapt to the A.I. doing different things every time you attempted a chapter. No more nonsensical reinforcement triggers, no more enemies appearing that you couldn't see on the "Map Preparations" screen, no more having to manipulate the A.I. in all kinds of goofy ways...just a good clean fight.



Like, maybe each generic enemy would have a 35% chance of targetting the PC with the lowest amount of Defense, a 35% of targetting the PC with the 2nd lowest amount of defense, a 20% chance of targetting the PC with the 3rd lowest amount of defense, and then a 10% chance of targetting the PC with the 4th lowest amount of defense. They'd still be biased toward attacking your more vulnerable units; you just can't build your entire strategy around that assumption.





It's not that I'd want the A.I. to be as dumb as the Normal A.I. in this game; I'd just want it to be random enough to where some of the challenge comes from having to adapt to it acting slightly different each time, rather than from the cheap tricks I mentioned.





Anyway, I could've had Lester move further, but Delmud is lagging behind. I need to lure the guy far enough west that Delmud can actually reach him next turn. In addition, I need to make sure NOT to heal Lester if he gets hit by the Armour. Why's that?





Well, do you see that MBandit to the right there? He's going to start moving next turn, and he's going to start moving next turn. He's got 5000G to steal for Delmud, but I also need to weaken him to the point where Delmud can kill him with the Thief Sword; that way I can have Delmud steal his Gold AND visit the village on the same turn.



But there's a problem; Lester has Charge. If you guys recall, it has a chance of activating 2-20 extra rounds of combat if the user happens to have 25+ HP. This means that I won't usually know how many times Lester will actually attack someone.





Fortunately, the MBandit doesn't have any 2 Range potential; and I've never seen them attack my units.





So, just have Delmud steal from this guy...





Finish off the Armour with Lester...



And then we can move on to bigger and better things. Lester moves on to rescue the northeast village, and Lakche's going south so she can grind off these guys later...



This is Johalva and his platoon of men...



And this is Johan and HIS platoon of men. Remember? They're Lord Dannan's two sons that were mentioned in the map narration. They're neutral now, but they're going to turn red the instant we conquer Ganesheire. And, here's something odd about their soldiers...



Both platoons have a special Talk conversation with Delmud and Lester; but ONLY those two. I have no idea why the game's so picky about who can and can't talk to them, but...here you go.



If it were me, I'd go for someone a little more... Er!? Why am I telling you this!

Lester/Delmud: ......





Hehe... Anyway, Celice is gonna take care of Johan when the time comes, and Lakche's gonna pacify Johalva.





And I'm also skipping a turn here; nothing really happened on that one.



Let's just skip to the MAIN EVENT!!





Boo...thank you so much for this line .



And Celice? Thank you so much for being awesome. You may start slow, but that doesn't matter when raising you saves turn. Even the Efficiency guys at Serenes Forest like you!





Now let's finish this!







Oh HAI Levin! You're looking very, uh...alive, today...

...



Levin: Hey, drop the ‘king’ bit, okay? Once the Battle of Barhara was over and the empire took control of Silesia, I just kinda… Well, let’s just say my shrink has had steady work for a while. My mother may have perished with Silesia, but she at least kept her dignity to the very end. While I’m just wasting away as a bard again… Celice, I don’t care what Oifaye may have told you. Don’t EVER address me as ‘King Levin’ again. Got it?

Ok, so we have a...vague idea of what he was doing. Still curious about the "survived flaming meteors" part...

Celice: Geez… Sorry, Levin.

Levin: Haha! I’m just giving you a hard time. So it looks like you guys have finally made your move. There’s no better place than Isaac to raise an army to take on the empire.

Celice: Yes, the Isaacian people are very strong. And their hatred for the empire is unparalleled. Of course, things would all be that much easier if Prince Shanan was with us.

Levin: Did Shanan take off and go to that shrine in Yied?

Celice: Yes. He got word that his royal family’s heirloom, the Divine Balmung, was there. But people say a dark bishop governs that region, so we’re all a little worried.

The "Balmung" is another Holy Weapon, just like the Mistoltein and Tyrfing. One can see how it'd be cool to have THAT on our side.

Levin: Sheesh… Right. He’ll be just fine. That reminds me, Celice. I’ve got a favour to ask.

Celice: Sure, anything! What’s up?

And now...my favorite track in the entire game...





Levin: So I took her to a remote area of Silesia and have been taking care of her all this time. But things there got a little too hairy for my taste, so we made our way here. But now I have to go to Lenster and… well, she’s slowing me down a bit. Celice...



Levin: I think she’s been through quite a bit. She hasn’t a single memory of what happened to her before I picked her up.

Well, nice to know that he got to do something good while things were going to hell. People sometimes complain about his character development in Gen 1 being undone by Gen 2, but it sounds like he at least stuck it out till Silesia was overthrown. It wasn't till after that that he started "wasting away as a bard".

Celice: That poor girl! You go on ahead and leave her with me, Levin. But please, try to hurry back. She probably won’t feel right with you being gone.

Levin: Yeah, I suppose. Look, I’ll be back once you get this country under control. Good luck to you, Celice.

Celice: Levin, you too!



I am kind of iffy on him not helping us out with this though. Just what's he planning to do that's more important than THIS?!



Celice: Julia, I’m sure you’ll be sad with Levin gone, but don’t you worry. I’ll keep you safe till he gets back. Actually, I’m not all that strong yet… But you’ll see! I’ll be strong enough to protect everybody here someday! And then I can save all the people from the empire! I’ll be strong someday… just like my father was.

Julia: Celice…

Honestly though; I've seen a lot of games do the whole "innocent, fragile maiden with a heart of gold" theme, but I've never heard one knock it out of the park as thoroughly as FE4 did. I love whatever chimes Yuka Tsujiyoko used as the main instrument; and I think xylophones were what provided the percussion? Whatever those instruments were, it set the song apart from every other one in the soundtrack.

Plus, it also gets bonus points for reminding me of Gotoh's theme...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XlOXcPCyNKA

Yes, the original Gotoh theme; NOT the pitched up version from every one of the remakes. I don't understand why they increased the pitch so much in all the remakes...but it didn't sound nearly as good to me as it did on the NES.





Anyways, Julia gets a new item from Lana, so I'm sending her west to Talk to her. But hey, wait a tic...what's Julia like as a unit?



Umm...I really don't know. Pursuit, Continue, and Awareness are all nice to have, but there's no point in really rating her till we can actually use her...huh. I wonder if she's got any Holy Blo-



...Oh...Ohhhhhhh....

...



A, anyways, here's what Lakche and Lana are doing. And hey, we got Talk conversations! I never got these in the actual playthrough, so uh...wanna see me?!

LESTER TALKS TO LANA (+1 Luck for Lana)





Lester: I bet you were. But you be careful out here. Mother would be a wreck if anything happened you.

Lana: Yes, but do you know what she told me? She said that we are greatly indebted to the people of Isaac and we should do whatever we can to help them.

Lester: Yeah, we wouldn’t be here now if it weren’t for them. …So where is mother now?

Lana: She’s working at the convent in Tilnanogue.

Lester: I see. Lana, we need to do our best out here for mother and our missing father. Someday we’ll be able to return with mother to her hometown of Jungby.

Lana: I hope so, Lester.

Alright, so we just outright confirmed that Aideen's alive in the Child conversation. And then we get a nice bit of character development in the Sub conversation.

DIMNA TALKS TO MANA (+1 Luck for Mana)



Dimna: Mana? You’re fighting too!?

Mana: Yeah, I was so worried about Sir Celice.

Dimna: Hmm… I thought so.

Mana: Thought what?

Dimna: Ah, nothin’. Just don’t get your hopes up. He’s of royal blood, you know. He’s actually a member of the Grandbell Royal Family. In all reality, we shouldn’t even be near him. Just don’t get yourself hurt. Okay, Mana?

Mana: Dimna, you have it all wrong! I’m merely trying to keep him out of danger!

Dimna: Really? Er… Sorry. I’m just trying to watch out for you.

Mana: I know, Dimna, and I appreciate it.

I never knew about these little differences between the Sub and Child character Talks until now; I just assumed they were copied and pasted for both versions. When I see them now though? The Sub conversations are actually turning out to be more interesting than the Child conversations; I'm kind of wishing the writers had just included the Sub parts into the Child parts as well, and just axed the whole "finding our mothers" bit from the Sub conversations. It's like I'm being punished for playing well!

Still, I do think I have a better idea of whether or not the Child characters have the same traits as their Subs. We'll find out later that Lana also has a thing for Celice, and I just thought of how large portions of the Sub dialogue is copy and pasted from the Child dialogue. So maybe Lakche DOES dislike men like Radney does. Who knows?

OIFAYE TALKS TO CELICE





Oifaye: Things are getting worse. People all over the continent are being oppressed. As a result, there are uprisings popping up all over the place.

Celice: So it’s not just Isaac, is it… Oifaye, there’s no way we can help them, is there?

Oifaye: Well, we just don’t have the manpower to take on the empire.

Celice: But Isaac’s war of liberation is already under way. There’s no turning back now.

Oifaye: And we can’t keep you in hiding now that your whereabouts have been leaked. I just wish we were more prepared… But we have no choice now.

Celice: Sorry that I sort of got things rolling before it was time. I’m just tired of seeing the people of Isaac still suffering under Dannan’s rule. Please understand my reasoning, Oifaye.

Oifaye: I do. Anyway, we need to move now and lay in an attack on Rivough. We must move before the empire has a chance to send reinforcements!

That is one thing I'm kind of curious about, now that I look at this Chapter again; what were these guys doing before? It doesn't sound like they would have liked to do this whole all-out assault thing until later; yet it obviously works out in the end. So what were they doing BEFORE this fight started? Doing an occasional guerilla strike when the Imperial Soldiers were off-guard? Swooping to the rescue whenever Dannan tried to put down a peaceful protest? And then maybe they'd seize Ganesheire sometime later, and turn it into their military stronghold?

And, for that matter, why did Shanan and Oifaye leave the hideout unprotected? They sound like the two most capable military leaders, so you'd think they'd have left one or the other there in case of this exact scenario, but...I'm not military expert. I'm curious as to how liberation armies of their sort operate, so if we have any military historians here, feel free to talk about that.





Speaking of Rivough, here it is!



Dannan: Where the hell were my sons!? Tell ’em to strike the rebel army at once!



Dannan, baby! You're gonna need more than that!



Ergh, that's Celice's army, thank you very much.



Johan: I could never fight Lakche. Argh… What am I gonna do.

Well Johan, we'll just have to find the answer to that, NEXT TIME, on let's Max Rank FE4! For now, we'll take a brief look at the Sub Characters, update the AAAA Run Stats, and then I'll see you sometime later! But can Celice and his army possibly succeed in liberating Isaac? Will Levin and Shanan return in time to aid us in our conquest? Can we defeat the combined might of Johan and Johalva's forces-



PFAHAHAHAHAHA!! Yeah, I'm sure the next update's gonna be real tough. Stalwart resistance on all sides; gonna take a miracle to make it through this one. Hehehe... God bless you everyone!

SUB CHARACTER OVERVIEWS

Mana Overview

Radney Overview

Roddlevan Overview

Tristan Overview

Dimna Overview

And here's our final Gen 1 wrap-up post; look forward to Chapter 6 Part 1 tomorrow! On New Years!

CURRENT AAAA RANKED RUN STATS (END OF GEN 1):

Time Taken This Update: ~16 minutes and 28 seconds

Total Time Elapsed Over the Run: 14 hours, 36 minutes, 17 seconds~

Turns Taken This Update: 10 Turns

Total Turns Elapsed Over The Run: 218 Turns

Levels Gained This Update: 14 Levels

Total Levels Gained: 550 Levels

Things I Regret: In the Prologue, I regret the fact that Noish had to hang back as I rigged levels for Sigurd in the Prologue.

In Chapter 1, I should've brought Midir to guarantee that Kinbois's men would be taken down without issue.

On Chapter 2, I regret the fact that Ardan built up so many love points with Aira even though that pairing's been written out of the route, I regret making that positioning mistake with Fin, and I wish I hadn't made that careless mistake with Sigurd attacking that guard near Boldo (even if it did end up working out). I regret deciding to not just get Deirdre to Level 30 by the end of Chapter 2. I regret wasting something like 12 minutes rigging Aideen a win against Keimos, when it ultimately didn't end up doing much for Jamka anyway. And I could have manipulated Dew's Gold a bit better so that Aira got just 18,000G instead of 22,470G.

On Chapter 3, I regret selling Deirdre's Aura tome! I'll bet she TOTALLY could've kicked Manfloy's butt, if ONLY I hadn't taken that away !!

On Chapter 4, I regret spending so much time disabeling the Arena bug for Fury's Arena fights; her combat stats didn't even matter once I promoted her! I also regret not having Claude turn around sooner. I also regret not repairing the Return Staff before giving it to Aideen.

On Chapter 5, I regret not having Dew sit tight after slaying that General; I didn't really accomplish much by moving him around outside, so I probably wasted about a minute or so.

Level 1-11: 32 > 45 HP, 8(13) > 12(17) Str, 1 > 6 Mag, 8 > 14 Skl, 8 > 12 Spd, 6 > 8 Lck, 7(12) > 12(17) Def, 1 > 4 Res!

Level 1-4: 30 > 33 HP, 10 > 11 Str, 0 Mag, 13 > 16 Skl, 13 > 15 Spd, 7 > 8 Lck, 7 > 8 Def, 0 Res!

Level 1-2: 29 > 30 HP, 2 > 3 Str, 9 Mag, 8 > 9 Skl, 8 Spd, 16 > 17 Lck, 2 Def, 7 Res!