Let's All Play Fire Emblem: Draft Edition!

Dorcas is probably not a bad target for the Speedwing given his low growth. As for the Dragonshield, it is often better used on Marcus, surprisingly. Dorcas has good HP, but Marcus has higher move so will inevitably see more combat in this sort of play - allows him to operate more autonomously instead of being stuck near a healer.

Also, I've uploaded Chapter 11 with commentary. Find it here, I think I'll post more of these in addition to the screenshots to get a slightly better idea of the strategy, and maybe there'll be some commentary that doesn't get filtered through to the thread and new tidbits of information can be discovered. That's the idea, at least.

Units Available: Eliwood (Lord Lv 5), Marcus (Paladin Lv 3), Dorcas (Fighter Lv 6), Oswin (Knight Lv 11), Matthew (Thief Lv 3), Guy (Myrmidon Lv 4)
Turn Count: 6 (Total turns: 33)

Defeat-all-enemies maps are the bane of low-turn FE playthrough, mainly because we have to track down every lazy-ass enemies who won't move until our units reach their range, and be careful not to left enemies hanging by a thread so that they won't scurry away for a Vulnerary/fortress and potentially cost us some turns chasing them. Plus, this map has rain.



The strategy: Marcus (and Lowen carrying Serra) charge to the top of the map, Eliwood, Oswin, Guy, and Matthew beeline toward the main force of enemies, while Dorcas stay behind to deal with a couple of Cavaliers near our starting position. Guy and Dorcas got less-than-satisfying level-ups during the first few turns; it's quite surprising to see Guy not gaining Speed twice in a row, while Dorcas still needs to gain some freakin' Defense already.



Eliwood, on the other hand, is shaping up to be real good. He destroyed most enemies here with Rapier, and covered up for Hector's absence really well. Both he and Oswin easily steamrolled their way toward Erik's group, while Guy and Matthew reach the southern shoreline to ambush the Pirates coming their way.



Up there, things were going pretty swell. Erk was converted with Serra (it's a good thing that he stay put, instead of suicidally rushing enemies like he'd be in Hector's Mode), while Marcus fetched Iron Blade from the village and move into Erik's range. Meanwhile, Oswin got a pretty good level-up, compensating for the crappy one he got last chapter.



Erik was crippled by Marcus, who also vanquished all those who came after him. Instead of finishing Erik, I moved Marcus into the range of three stationary enemies below the castle, so that he could finish them all before the rain falls. Oswin moved into Erik's range, while Eliwood moved south to aid Guy fighting a Knight near the vendor. On his turn, Erik has the option to attack either Marcus or Oswin--both can finish him. In the end, he was defeated by Marcus...who apparently can't gain anything else other than Skill.

Annoyingly, rain then fell, and I had to spend a couple of turns moving Marcus to the range of a Brigand coming from the top left mountain. Guy and Eliwood cleaned up things on their part of the map, meanwhile.



On turn 6, only 2 enemies are left: a Pirate and a Brigand. I decided to hand Matthew the experience for killing the weakened Pirate, while Marcus wrapped things up by counter-attacking the Brigand to death on the enemy's phase. I didn't visit the village for Priscilla, but it doesn't matter since she would join by the end of the map anyway. And thus, we gain a new drafted unit for the next chapter!

Speaking about next chapter....dammit, Toothache's really set the bar high. I'll see what I can do.

Chapter 13: Go West, Young Eliwood!

Inspired by the chapter title, here's "Frontier Psychiatrist" by The Avalanches.

(character bios will go here when I have the time!)



On turn one, I start my strategy. Marcus and Eliwood go west to dash for seizing the castle. Meanwhile, my two drafted units, Serra and Lowen, go south to combat enemies and get as much experience as possible. Marcus knocks down the tree to make a bridge, while Lowen absolutely slashes a bandit to pieces. Serra stays out of range, along with the rest of my units.


Lowen gets pot-shotted by one of the enemy archers, so he takes out one and Serra heals him up, hiding in a forest to make sure that she can dodge the arrows of another archer. Eliwood, Marcus, and Matthew (for recruiting Guy for his Killing Edge) head westward.


Story of the chapter!


Marcus takes the time to talk to a certain cowardly merchant. Lowen, not pictured here, presumably takes out an archer with his lance.


Marcus takes down the tree, Eliwood forges ahead and gets in a spot where the mercenary can't attack and hide in a tree, and Matthew stays right behind so he can't be attacked and get me a penalty. Lowen gets the mine, because he can, and moves with his remaining move so that he attracts the attention of another bandit. Little does he know he's wearing his lance at this point in time!

Lowen is targeted, but I believe he avoids the hand axe.


Eliwood takes out an archer in his way and gets a pretty "meh" level up. You can't win 'em all. Marcus takes out the mercenary that Eliwood weakened during the enemy's last turn.


Lowen severely wounds the hand-axing Bandit with his sword and nets a sweet level up! Serra stays out of the range of any potentially harmful attacks.


There were moments of carnage (all for me!)...


There were moments of healing (also all for me)...


And of course Serra dodging even more attacks for Lowen's sake.


Marcus decides to take on the boss so that we can cut this chapter short. This'll take two turns-


Oh.


Marcus gets a typical Marcus level up. Hurray?

Lowen maims, Serra actually gets hit (!), and all is good in the world as Serra dodges more attacks again.


Matthew recruits Guy so that he can assassinate him and never hear from him again. Oh, and handy that he left us his killing edge, eh Eliwood?


Lowen kills yet ANOTHER bandit, and despite a bad showing this level up, is an extremely formidable unit at this point. It's been extremely useful to my low-turn count run to have this guy so early. Serra still hasn't gotten a level up yet, so I'm a little concerned for her sake, but perhaps 13x will be better for her.


Eliwood seizes and I take this one down in eight turns. Not so bad!
Chapter 13: 8 Turns/20 Turns

I'm not really sure what I just watched.

But I think I like it.

This is very cool. I'd never heard of FE drafts before.

I wonder if anyone's done an FF5 draft...

TA, any chance of putting a scoreboard in the OP, so we can see how folks are doing comparatively without flipping around between posts?

I also think it'd be fun to see stat comparisons every now and then, like between everybody's Eliwoods and other universally available characters. But that'd be more impressive further in, when it can be obvious who's severely unlucky.

Keep up the good work, guys (and maybe gals, I don't know)! The one thing that I think would be great to see would be a scoreboard every now and then, since some of you are a few missions ahead of others.

Not sure if you're being serious, but we had a massive FF5 LAP just a few months ago.

I should really get around to finishing off Exdeath on my remaining two files, but school work is crazy and Touhou is a black hole.

Yeah, that's what made me think of it. Since the FF5 LAP was done with random assignments for the most part. Would be kind of cool to have a group of five players who each select four jobs via draft, and otherwise follow the normal rules of the four-job challenge. Hey, maybe you should start another run! :P

Ok, maybe next year.

Chapter 16: 8/45 turns

If I had a slightly better plan for this map, I could have knocked a turn off and still got all the items. Nevertheless, here we go.



Initial set up. Marcus is prepped to move along, but with the amount of enemies he won't get to move his full distance all the time. Florina has much to fear from those archers.



Eliwood softens up one of the archers, giving Erk a kill with a perfect level up. This was awesome and unexpected :-)



Matthew isn't attacking, but he is doing a vital strategic role here by pinning the archer in to prevent him attacking. I lacked the manpower to kill him outright, but Erk can finish that job next turn. Speaking of Erk getting kills, he manages to get the archer from behind the wall on enemy phase.



Finishing off the other archer nearby gives him more awesomeness.



Eliwood feeds Florina a great level up too.



Sain is just outside the armour's range, but within the archer's, so he can spoonfeed Florina another kill here. Marcus takes the armour out to assist in this.



On the enemy phase, the archer in the chest room attacks Marcus. The Chest Key he had was a better gain than the level up here.



Hammer get! This will make dealing with the boss easy. Hawkeye will enjoy it for a much later chapter too, but I'm getting ahead of myself.



Sain borrows a vulnernary to heal up. Turns out this didn't help as the archers all went for Marcus, even though I put Sain in range of two of them. I guess the AI's unit detection can't see around corners.

Erk can clear the way for Matt to get the southern chests. The vulnerary used was a waste, he could survive without the healing.



No more combat for the rear guard, but Sain and Florina still have a use here. One is ferrying Eliwood while Marcus clears the way, opening the door to the northern chests as he goes.



Here is my mistake that cost me a turn. Marcus had 1 space to move after opening the door. What I should have done was leave him in that square instead of moving to the right. Dropping Eliwood on the next turn would have just put him in seize range on turn 7.



As such, Marcus had to move one space back, in order to trade Sain the Chest Key, and take Eliwood off his hands.



Sain collects the Knight Crest, and stops here so Florina can get the Silver Sword in the same turn. I guess one benefit of the extra turn taken was that Matthew could collect both the Hero Crest and Unlock, even though the crest is no use for me other than selling for cash.



Killing the boss gives another typical level up for Marcus. He was injured so badly the armours went for him instead of Eliwood.



Final turn count confirmed.

I should be able to fit in one or two chapters for tomorrow. And I am also too jealous of your Erk, Toothache.

Bah, I think I might have to restart or something something. And not because I'm doing bad, but we'll get to why later. Anyways, since Chapter 14 is all about Erik, a former "friend" (or at least ally) betraying the main characters, what better theme to play out the level than this (the correct answer is NONE)?

♫Theme Of Black Knight♫

(for some reason I have an incredibly small amount of images for this chapter; it's easier for me, but maybe I shouldn't have cut so much stuff out)



So here's my formation. I have all of my guys bundled up next to the top bridge (while in retrospect, perhaps I should've had Eliwood/Hector at the bottom bridge).



After the first turn of killing and more killing, the enemies foolishly attack Eliwood, and...well, you can see how well that plan went. Obviously somewhere in the mayhem, Hector killed an enemy and gained a...OK level up.



Which turns out to be amazing in comparison to Rebecca's level up. Jeez, Rebecca, I thought you were the MVP of the team (well, not counting Marcus, but he's a cheating prepromote)!



Speaking of cheating prepromotes, Marcus has been killing bitches and taking names (or at least the first part, unfortunately Nintendo didn't see fit to give these generic mooks names). Eliwood gets another merely decent level up, which is annoying. This chapter is not going well so far, and it's going to get much worse.



Erk kills a cavalier after taking one for the...nuetral team? OK, that would've made much more sense if I actually recruited him.



But I didn't and instead left Erk to die.



Jeigan gets another crappy level up, reassuring me that he's not actually good and would never get much use in any standard method of playing the game.



#@*% rain.



But it does "kind of" (but not really in the long run) prove to my advantage, as I leave Hector close enough to be attacked by Erik but not any of his cavaliers. I was betting on Erik missing and Hector landing both of his shots and he suprisingly did not dissapoint.

But of course I jest, despite killing the big boss, he manages to get another mediocre level up...Woot.



He almost gets killed by generic mook before getting very lucky with the 68% hit rate.



Oh, and Eliwood kills a pirate and ends the bad level up streak I've been having. Too bad there is another pirate on the island and it literally takes him three turns to get his fat arse over to where I am. I probably should've restarted the chapter and got Marcus to kill him.



Anyone notice my mistake? Anyone? Well, it's not that I took 10 turns to complete the mission, although that sucked too. I continued playing and taking footage up till Chapter 16, because the low turncount playthrough was suprisingly addicting, and then WHAM! I could not recruit Lucius. Why? Because I didn't recruit Priscilla early on, and therefore could not recruit Raven who I needed to recruit Lucius. Well, damn, because I saved over my old file, there's no way I can redo Chapter 14. So I have 3 options;

1) Restart the entire playthrough- This is kind of unfair, because I'd be able to redo my actions and get a lower turncount, so I probably won't do it unless everyone else is OK with that.
2) Use someone else in place of Lucius- Self explanatory, although it'll be wierd having more duplicate characters and I'll be able to pick anyone, so that's probably more unfair.
3) Skip Lucius- I probably deserve gimping myself for being so stupid in the first place.

I think since you are so early on in the playthrough, restarting now would be a good thing - might be able to improve the earlier chapters a bit too. As long as you keep Erk alive in Ch14, Priscilla will automatically join in Ch15, so you don't need to visit her village. Killing Erik ASAP is the key to low turning that chapter, since it stops the pirate and bandit reinforcements sooner.

If I'm going to restart, might as well figure out how to add video segments.

Even though I wasn't doing so great, I'm still kind of sad. Rebecca and Eliwood were turning out pretty awesome. Hector, not so much, and Jeigan Marcus is well, Marcus Jeigan. At least he's better than he was in the last game. Still, after trying the same challenge in Sacred Stones, I'll say that Seth is WAY better for these kind of challenges (or maybe it's because Sacred Stones is really damn easy, not only is the game easier as a whole, but the characters growth rates are fucking ridiculous).

Oh wow, that's too bad-I presume you don't keep a savestate from any previous chapters?

Anyway, no problem if you want to restart, we're still early anyway. It's probably the best option. Alternatively, if you're going to do 2), you should substitute Lucius with Canas; another spellcaster, and comes just after Ch 16.

(I'm also trying out this challenge in FE6. Let's just say I'm not having any fun)

Seth is usually banned in FE8 drafts because he just breaks the game. For that matter, some drafts even ban Marcus in FE7 after a certain number of chapters (after Dragon's Gate). Also, you can't just choose another unit because you missed Lucius. If you fail to recruit one of the draftees, you can restart, or continue and move on with one less unit to use. Why bother drafting at all then, if you can just ignore the units you don't want and pick up the ones you do?

No wonder things were so easy. I beat the 12th chapter in 3 turns. Any drafts you can point me to in regards to FE8?

BTW, I would assume a low turn playthrough draft would be pretty damn hard to make in Fire Emblem 4, just because of how that game works and the huge maps.

FE4 drafts work a bit different. The method I've seen for drafting means that Gen 1 mothers are picked first, this determines some of the children for Gen 2. After that, the other units get picked - fathers, Gen 2 fixed characters and substitutes. It is a much tougher game than the GBA ones, but still doable in a draft situation.

Serenes Forest FE8 forum is the place to find FE8 draft logs. It is worth looking around the forums for the relevant games' drafts, might give you some tips and strategies for your own playthroughs.

Units Available: Eliwood (Lord Lv 6), Marcus (Paladin Lv 4), Dorcas (Fighter Lv 7), Oswin (Knight Lv 12), Matthew (Thief Lv 3), Guy (Myrmidon Lv 5), Priscilla (Troubadour Lv 3), Sain (Cavalier Lv 4)
Turn Count: 7 (Total turns: 40)

The previous chapters had been mostly a breeze, mainly because I got so many of my draftees early and we excel in smaller more confined maps. This chapter though, expose our biggest weakness. It has a mountainous shortcut, and lots of forest; while I only have two mounted units, one of them a healer.

We get to use Priscilla now, and it would be tricky to get her up to speed as soon as possible. I only got her to heal three times in this chapter, mainly because none of the units near her are damaged until late. Plus, I had to keep her away from the enemies--who can kill her in just two hits.



Okay, see that mountain pass? Normally, that kind of thing doesn't matter much, but it really comes to play in low-turn playthrough. Mounted units (as well as Oswin) can't cross them, so I only send Dorcas and Eliwood there. The strategy is simple: rush ahead with Marcus, and have him pick Eliwood on the way to the castle. Everyone else would distract the enemies and just harvest as much experiences as possible.



Of the Caelin units available for this chapter, I opted to use Sain while the other units were sent for some shopping (mostly Steel weapons). It turned out that Sain wasn't fast or accurate enough to deal with the Mercenaries and Myrmidon efficiently--maybe should've picked Kent instead. However, enemies weakened by him did turn away toward my draft units, so they got the bulk of experiences. Great. Sain got (irrelevant) level-up during the process, and I also sent him to fetch the Heavy Spear. Thanks for your contribution, Green Lance! You can now retire and woo some ladies.



These are Turn 4 to 6. By Turn 4, Marcus had rescued Eliwood and reached the vicinity of the castle, while my other draft units were also near behind. This was the key moment of the chapter: there were lots of enemies around, but my guys were positioned around them in such a way that they can't just focus-fire on a single target. Vulneraries and taking advantage of terrains are also important. Finally, Marcus released Eliwood on Turn 5 and engage Bauker on the next turn. The boss was slain on the enemy's phase, Turn 6.



Turn 7! I used it to wipe out all the red units in sight and gain a bunch of level-ups (that single enemy left is a Brigand who had crept his way along the mountainside toward Merlinus). Eliwood seized.

A gallery of level-ups in this chapter:



Usually, Matthew's growth pattern mirrors Marcus' (only with Speed instead of Skill), so this is a pleasant surprise. Sure, he would never be a great combat unit, but he can pretty much hold his ground while torch-lighting or treasure-raiding later. I'm happy.



Like Matthew, Guy also got two level-ups this time, but I somehow missed the first level-up screen (a quick check reveals that he gained HP, Speed, Luck, and Resistance in Lv 6). Fits my expectation so far, and a couple more Speed would enable him to double enemies with a Steel Sword.



Yup, for a Knight, Oswin's got a surprisingly nice Speed growth. Until magic units start appearing, I also don't have to worry about him being damaged at all.



Maybe if I stop complaining about Dorcas' Defense, he will start gaining some. Maybe. On a bright side though, his offensive performance is quite stellar (that decision to use Secret Book on him paid off really well), and he's now officially the glass cannon of the team. Can't wait for him to start wielding bows; that stats are pretty much made for destructive indirect combat.



.......no comment.

Try it with FE8 instead. Much easier. Since it's not a competition, maybe give yourself Seth for a stress free playthrough.

EDIT I hate to keep harping on it, but it's kind of neat to see Dorcas to something besides being a bench warmer. I think I used him the first time I played in Lyn Mode, but I wizened up when I got to Eliwood Mode.

Units Available: Eliwood (Lord Lv 1), Marcus (Paladin Lv 1), Rebecca (Archer Lv 1)

So my last attempt at completing this mad, mad challenge didn't go so well. But as the fine folk at Square always say, "Try, try, try again!" So here I am playing Chapter 11 today. I'm sure it'll go so much better than last time. Since this is the start of a grand adventure, I've decided to go with the bombastic stylings (or whatever word you like to use to describe music) of Yuzo Koshiro. Specifically, an orchestration from the Act Raiser Symphonic Suite.

♫Opening~Sky Palace~Bloodpool~Casandora♫



Perhaps making a tactician is the key to success. His +1% avoid to units with the same elemental affinity will undoubtedly prove invaluable in the coming chapters, and I was a fool not to realize it sooner. I name him Nergal, because I am an expert at coming up with highly original names. He's not the nicest Guy around, so I picked the sinister month of August as his birth date.



And here is our villain of the day. He goes by the name of Groznyi. How do you go about pronouncing such an aberration of a name? And what kind of parents would name their child that? These are the kind of questions that keep me up at night.



I am the epitome of wit. Can someone say plot holes?



Even the game seems determined to tell me that this time will be much better by letting/making/forcing Marcus whiff his first spear throw. Obviously I will be feeding this kill to Rebecca, as she's an archer and has a harder time getting levels because she can't counter direct attacks. Also, Eliwood is much too pompous to do it himself.

Speaking of Eliwood, Rebecca, and Marcus (hereby referred to as "Jeigan" because I said so), let's take a look at their stats! If this seems redundant to you, that's because it totally is! I'll try saying something a little different and possibly profound this time.



HP 80%, Str 45%, Ski 50%, Spd 40%, Luk 45%, Def 30%, MDef 35%

(click on the link to see the beautiful artwork, same goes for the other characters)

This person is the Roy of Fire Emblem 7, actually Roy's dad, but whatever, Eliwood! Obviously, I have to use him, so hopefully he turns out to be good! Last time I said that his growth rates were iffy and that he wasn't so great and he had to go and prove me wrong, so I'm hoping for the same effect here sans the complaining. As far as weapon skill goes, he starts out with a C rank in Swords, which is fantastic, because he'll be able to use a Killing Edge from the get go (Chapter 11, in case you forgot); in the end, isn't that all that matters? He also comes equipped with a Rapier, which has the uses (give or take 6), weight, and accuracy (with a little extra) of an Iron Sword, (almost) the power of a Steel Sword, the armor reducing capabilities of an Armorslayer, and the Cavalry rending powers of the Long Sword. In short, it's pretty fucking awesome, and since only Eliwood can use it, it's a nice bonus for being forced to use him. Oh, and he comes with a vulnerary (and the Iron Sword I stole from Lowen), nothing too special there.

Personally, I think Eliwood's stats are geared toward using lances and he would've been so much better for it (not to mention somewhat differentiated from the other Lords), but Hiro Protagoneist has got to use a sword, dammit!



(HP: 65%, Str: 30%, Skl: 50%, Spd: 25%, Lck: 30%, Def: 15%, Res: 35%)

Fire Emblem, with its unparalleled array of characters, understandably uses a few archetypes every now and again. Jeigan (AKA Marcus) is part of the Jeigan archetype (AKA the Jeigan archetype). He's not much better than past Jeigans and certainly not better than the likes of Seth or Titania, but he's still pretty good if you know how to use him right. In normal gameplay, Jeigan can be use to weaken enemies for your other units to finish off (well, not now, but later on). In this playthrough, as you can see, he's essential in finishing the chapter in a pace that's faster than "slow as fuck" (interpret that as you will).

He doesn't even have the decency to come with a good weapon, as members of the archetype are wont to do (generally a Silver Lance). At least his starting stats are good enough to carry him through the first half of the game, and they better be. If your Jeigan gains even a single point into Strength, Speed, or Defense (you know, the stats that matter the most to him), YOU WERE LUCKY.



HP 60%, Str 45%, Ski 50%, Spd 60%, Luk 50%, Def 15%, MDef 30%

Oh, and Rebecca, of course. I think my last playthrough said all there needs to be said about her. That is to say, even though her starting stats are modest (not necessarily bad, but nothing to write to Intelligent Systems about), her growth rates more than make up for it.



Now you might be wondering what's so important about this guy. He doesn't even have a name! Well, this guy here determines how easy of a time you're going to have with this first chapter. See, his speed can either be 3/4, but Eliwood's speed starts out at 7 regardless, and it's much easier to whoop his ass when your main character can double attack him to oblivion.



As depicted here for posterity.



The way Marcus is demolishing these guys, it's no wonder that Groznyi is terrified of the Pheraen knights. I mean, this guy is old and out of his prime (but still the epitome of greatness), imagine what the main body of the Pheraen army is like.

I've learned from my mistakes and hand Rebecca the Energy Ring, and have Marcus "rescue" Eliwood.



Rebecca takes one for the team, while Marcus absolutely demolishes the other bandits. I mean, he's got Eliwood weighing him down, he's damn old, and he's still OHKO them. Come on guys, at least put up a semblance of a fight!



Oh, and one Groznyi down. Marcus also killed the archer on the next turn because he was a jerk.



And thus, Chapter 11 is down! That sure was tough, but the good news is after that, it's all smooth sailing from here on out*.



*May not be true.

So are any of you harboring hopes of getting any supports going during this competition? I suppose there are enough "guard stationary position" and "glue healer to fighter's butt" situations that a low level support isn't impossible.

I could probably get a low level support between Eliwood and Hector, but it'll be pretty damn hard for the others.

Oh, almost forget about this.



(HP: 45% Magic: 40% Skill: 50% Speed: 40% Luck: 65% Defense: 15% Resistance: 50%)

The flame-haired beauty, Priscilla, is a direct gameplay successor to FE6 Clarine: valuable mounted healer, an exceptionally good dodger, and an okay-ish offensive unit once promoted. Her strongest growths are in Luck, Skill and Resistance, making her an evasive magic tank after some level-ups. She's a good enough anima-user, although usually I prefer Erk, Pent, or Nino for that capacity. Lastly, Priscilla has an excellent Support list, with every single one of her options being great characters.

In this draft playthrough, it's beyond obvious that Priscilla is extremely valuable: she's the only stave unit and healer for a long while, plus one of the two mounted units I have. The trick is how to get her experiences fast enough, which is already hard in normal playthrough but is even more daunting here; I guess abusing utility staves like Unlock and Torch would help, as well as promoting her as soon as possible.

Chapter 16: Whereabouts Unknown

Units Available: Eliwood (Lord Lv 6), Marcus (Paladin Lv 5), Dorcas (Fighter Lv 8), Oswin (Knight Lv 13), Matthew (Thief Lv 5), Guy (Myrmidon Lv 7), Priscilla (Troubadour Lv 3)
Turn Count: 8 (Total turns: 48)

Another hard chapter for the team, with narrow hallways that restrict movement efficiency. There are also treasure chests, plus Raven Raymond and Lucius to recruit (yeah, I realized belatedly that I don't really have to recruit them, but it just feels kind of wrong to play FE without recruiting everyone. So, I'm going to do it as long as it doesn't cost me valuable turns).



I wish I can say that I used more sophisticated strategy than just "send Marcus to rush ahead of everyone else, kill most people, and take Eliwood at some point", but yeah: this chapter is pretty much The Marcus Show. I rush ahead with Javelin equipped on him (weapons with versatile range are essential in low-turn playthrough, since every enemy's attack that you can't counter may result in a wasted turn or two), while the other guys just try their best to keep up and whack some enemies nearby. Oswin is kind of a liability in this fast-moving approach, and I think the entire chapter passed without him getting into any battle. Meanwhile, I also send Matthew to the western treasure chamber to get the Unlock staff and Hero Crest.



Of course, while Marcus taking care of stuffs, I must make sure the other guys also got decent amount of experience. Eliwood and Guy got meh level-ups, BUT DORCAS COMPLETELY FLOORED ME WITH THAT ONE. Am I dreaming?



Marcus obtain the Hammer, which he would use to crush the boss' skull. Whereas Matthew was evasive enough to defeat an enemy Shaman near the treasure chamber's entrance. He got a great level-up, too. This chapter has turned out pretty sweet in terms of level-ups, and you haven't even seen the best thing yet. Also, that Unlock staff we acquired should be useful later: Priscilla now has something else to do besides waiting for someone to be wounded, and it would ease some of Matthew's lock-picking burden.



Rescue-and-give/take maneuvers are important in order to increase movement efficiency. In this case, I had Priscilla rescued Eliwood and transferred him to Marcus, who was already way ahead. From there, Marcus-Eliwood rushed ahead to the throne, while Priscilla went east to recruit Raymond and prevent him from killing those NPC Soldier units (which isn't really necessary and I shouldn't have bothered in hindsight, but it doesn't really matter much either way). Marcus released Eliwood just when they entered the throne chamber; he needs two turns from there in order to reach the throne. Fortunately, he is robust (and lucky) enough to withstand the Knights' assault.



Marcus and his Hammer were too much for Bernard. We seized on Turn 8, missing Lucius and the two treasure chests in northwest chamber during the process (the chests contain Silver Sword and Knight Crest...so I guess we won't be promoting Oswin anytime soon).

And finally, for the ultimate best thing in this chapter:



OH GOD I'M NOT WORTHY FOR THIS