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This is it. The final update. Why am I combining Chapter 20 and the endgame? Well... you'll see.



Let's see what wonders the final armory has in store.



Nothing turned out hilariously bad like the Silver Axe from the last run, and these are pretty good! The Silver Blade has 22 might and about 90% hit but I, um, the highest sword rank in my army is Amelia and she only has a B. I do pick up a bunch of Silver Lances, as I have plenty of people at Lances-A or better, as well as a Silver Bow for when the lower hit rate on Joshua's three Nidhoggs isn't cutting it. I get extra tomes for all my mages, and I also grab a few more ranged weapons for those who need it. That's not the end of my shopping spree, but the rest of it will have to wait until the prep screen.



Speaking of which, let's get to that.



Oh, if only.



I'd do the slow pan around the map to show what the enemies are like, but frankly most of them have trash stats and not really any interesting skills, so it's not worth showing off. That said, this wight has a Brave Bow and it kind of sucks compared to the bows I have, but it's still something to get.



The remaining 40k gold goes to a Skill Scroll for Kyle (who got screwed out of a skill at level 5), and the rest will go towards stat boosters. I say "will" for a reason.



Kyle immediately takes the Skill Scroll, and oh baby did he hit the jackpot. Provoke+Pass means he can slip past enemies who will then gladly turn around and suicide on him. He's not likely to get hurt by much of anything physical (magic can still kind of mess him up), and Garm means he'll be less likely to get doubled doing so.

And... You know what? Since we're here and so close to the end of the game, let's have some fun with this. Kyle gets all but one (The last one is a Dragonshield, and he's only 1 away from capping Defense) of the stat boosters I have currently - one each of a Secret Book, Speedwings, Body Ring, Talisman, and yes, the Swiftsole.



Eighteen party slots? Fuck that, we only need one. Ephraim can come along for moral support.



Kyle is loaded for bear with four unbreakable axes and an Elixir for when he inevitably takes a beating. Let's rock.



The carnage begins with an Entombed suiciding on Kyle to let him cap Defense.



Every single light user on the map has Aura and it helps precisely none of them. I still don't understand why Aura is the only A-rank weapon that enemies in the self-randomizer seem to have...



Ephraim does his part too.



That's Strength capped, on top of HP, Skill and Resistance!



Yet another Entombed dying gives Kyle some good stuff.



My quip about Ephraim coming for moral support wasn't entirely a joke - their B support does help them both be just a little more unstoppable. Anyway, this guy had the Brave Bow and now it's mine!



This is really all Ephraim needs at this point.



I wasn't kidding about Aura, by the way. Not pictured: At least 3 other Bishops going for Kyle despite having a hit rate of 15% at best.



One of his buddies gives him this.



These reinforcements are already spawning, and I am infinitely grateful that these ones don't have Wary Fighter. This highlighted one...



...has an axe that can easily replace one of the four in Kyle's inventory.



Another random one had a Tomahawk, and while I'd like a better ranged axe, it's a little bit too late for that.



Unfortunately, one other problem brought on by Kyle's low speed is that he's forced to switch to Garm if he wants to double some enemies, including this big boy.



And this one, who coughs up the Brave Axe.



Cyclops Reinforcement #2170 inexplicably has an Energy Ring for the taking, which I'm genuinely surprised by. In both runs, this is the first time I've seen a droppable stat booster.



Kyle gets yet more strength for killing him, and... the Energy Ring doesn't drop! This has happened a few times over the course of this LP, but it's much more infuriating to get screwed out of a stat booster over this instead of a weapon.



One more level on the enemy phase gives Kyle a skill I haven't seen since Franz had it in Run 1, that for some reason I thought was Aether at first glance.



And we're already this close to the bosses. What's to stop me from just having Kyle run up and kick their a-



-ah.



Riev is absolutely not fucking around this time. He has maxed Skill and Speed on top of the Vantage/Hawkeye/Bane combination that the Chapter 12 boss had, plus Full Metal Body as the cherry on top (not that anyone in the party ended up with actually useful Seal skills). The only saving grace is that he's locked to the rather weak Thunder tome, but I would still really rather not have Kyle rush headlong into this because Riev could destroy him on the next turn.



Meanwhile, Ephraim breaks a Javelin against some dude for more speed.



This mage started at the bottom-center of the map and followed Ephraim and Kyle all the way around the map, which is some incredible dedication.



I intended to have Kyle bait out Riev with the Hand Axe equipped... and switched to Garm instead. Probably for the best, as otherwise he might accidentally trip Vantage. That said, Riev kind of needs to die immediately now, as Kyle can't go another full round with him.



And Ephraim is too busy grinding on reinforcements... hmm.



Let's just actually switch to the Hand Axe and pray for the best. He ends up missing, and that was my last Elixir...



It's at this point where I just said "fuck it" and decided to roll the dice.



Really, what more does he need at this point?



Amazing that Ephraim still has a decent amount of growth room left in him despite promoting twice and having four capped stats.



Pass is a fun skill and I wish I got it sooner than one chapter before the end. Who needs strategy when you can just charge right through the enemy lines?



The rest of the chapter is just wading through the reinforcements that the Black Temple shits out while the duo make their way to Morva, with Kyle getting even stronger.



It's really kind of amazing just how awful all these Aura valkyries are.



This is... far less amazing.



Morva manages to be even more pathetic than he was in Run 1. Sure, he has a little more HP and way more Skill (plus Wretched Air has more accuracy this time around), but his defenses are even lower.



Since Kyle can't have all the glory, Ephraim gets the honor(?) of killing him.



I decide to hang out for just a little longer to get Ephraim to level 15, and the fact that this is the most danger he's been in for a little while now goes to show just how powerful the double promotion glitch is.



I'd say this was worth it.



It also lets me show off a feature of the skill system - units are capped at 6 skills. I decide to delete Shadowgift in favor of Armor March (If unit starts next to an armored unit, both of them get Move +2 for the turn) even though I doubt I'll actually use it.



Let's get out of here, and...



...dive right in to the finale.



No fucking around this time, I'm bringing a full party... but not before blowing the last of my money on stat boosters. The last stat booster distribution ended up going like this:
1 Dragonshield for Eirika
2 Energy Rings for Joshua
1 Dragonshield for Knoll
1 Dragonshield for Neimi
1 Speedwing for Moulder








And here's how the party is looking going into the endgame. Pretty solid, even if most of the team is underleveled as a result of last chapter's shenanigans.



Same strategy as the previous run's endgame went - two groups, meet in the middle, etc. Rennac and Cormag start by heading for one of the chests.



Eirika gets first blood, gaining a decent level and Voice of Peace (takes -2 damage from enemies within 2 spaces). Good stuff!



Cormag is helping, too.



In hindsight, Neimi isn't quite a glass cannon, but she's still pretty darn strong.



Joshua deletes a Cyclops using Nidhogg, and makes me wish all of his levels could have been this good.



Oh! This is a really nice treasure, actually. This is going to Joshua, who gets...



...Rally Strength. A second Rally Strength. And no, it doesn't stack with the first.



Less okay with this.



I'm... alright with this. A random enemy with Black Magic managed to silence Syrene, hence why her sprite is lighter.



Strength capped for Moulder!



Since she's already capped strength and speed, this might as well be a perfect level for Tana.



Same with this and Eirika's magic cap.



More gratuitous overkill happens...



...as we close in on Lyon.



Syrene got one of the Fili Shields, hence why this Ranger isn't a threat to her outside of the poison.



No, stop that, you were doing so good



Rennac continues being a really strong assassin. Why can't you be this good in vanilla Sacred Stones?



Lyon is still a shitty boss and I'm sticking with my headcanon that the reason Syrene is so buff is because she stole all of his stats.



Honestly, it'd have been more surprising if he didn't get one-rounded. And we speed right along into the final boss fight...



...where we find that it was actually Fomortiis stealing Lyon's stats. He has 109 HP, his defense and resistance are even higher than they were in the first run, which pretty much disqualifies anyone without a sacred weapon from being able to damage him. Also he got Duelist's Blow as if 32 Skill and 30 Speed wasn't enough, but to compensate for this...



...his weapons have been severely gimped.



Kyle being in the third party slot has put him just inside Fomortiis' range, so let's start this off with a bang.



More power! More!



I won't be able to one-round Fomortiis, so everyone else with legendary weapons gets in front and everyone else falls in for moral support. He'll probably be going down next turn anyway.



He doesn't bother to counterattack Kyle, instead spawning a bunch of mages, including this Druid smack-dab in the middle of the army.



Unfortunately, even with Ephraim's A support, Tana is only able to deal 6 damage to Fomortiis.



Knoll takes out that Druid and then really makes me regret not fielding him more. Too little too late, sadly.



Meanwhile, Eirika can't even scratch Fomortiis. A shame, really - I wanted to see if the busted animations would affect anything if she got the killing blow.



Instead, another Garm to the face...



...and Ephraim brings it on home.







It's over, for real this time.



6 turns for the prologue, 9 turns for the endgame, for 379 turns total - 31 less than Run 1. I decline to comment on the length of Chapter 5x.



Once again, Gilliam ended up being overlooked for Kyle. Axefaith was just too good to pass up, even if Gilliam could have been just as good of a tank as Kyle if not better.



Moulder, on the other hand, was amazing from the word go, even if he fell off for a bit during the middle of the game. Hawkeye will never not be an amazing skill.



Vanessa was also really good - having two -Faire skills you can actually use will do that for you.



Somehow, it feels like Neimi had way more than 19 battles, but she still ended up putting in a lot of work even if she wasn't at the same level of godhood she was in Run 1.



Artur had so much promise, but being locked to Light magic screwed him over.



The skeleton king and his mage wife were both... not as mind-blowingly good as I was thinking they would have been, but they still turned out pretty good. Maybe if I had made Natasha a Sage, I would have been able to actually use one of my S-rank tomes?



Speaking of battle counts...



Syrene's turnaround between runs from "horrible magic user" to "shoved L'Arachel out of the final party" is still kind of amazing to me. Gargoyles are just that good!



Cormag, you were the weirdest bard.



Yes, Eirika died 7 times. The first few chapters were... rough.



And of course, there's Ephraim and Tana. Tana was basically a lock for the endgame party as soon as I got her, and Ephraim went from "completely unusable" to "one of the best party members" even before his second promotion. Together, they made quite the pair.



That will do it for this run, and for the LP as a whole. Thank you once again for reading.