Music: Act 1 - Where the Wind Rustles | 
YT 
KHin 
NES
Welcome back everyone! You may notice slightly more artifacting in the images today, and that's because I've tested out taking screenshots from a video instead. Even despite being .avi and eating up 16 GB on my hard drive, it doesn't seem to avoid artifacts entirely for some reason, but it does streamline the process a lot for me compared to my original method. Do let me know if it's too bothersome, though.
It's time to end this Act of the game, which also means it's time to kick Desaix's ass.
Before we do that though, we must make time for
SWEET GAINS
Calculated from reader votes, Clair gets 2 ATK and Lukas gets 1 ATK.
On our way out, Gray gets this disappointing level.
Oh man, look at these muscles! Who wants to touch 'em?
Tobin at least gets ATK in his.
More interestingly, we've got some supports to do here as well, which I guess is more appropriate than doing them during the final battle of the chapter.
I would like to make a proposal. If you don’t like gossip, why don’t we talk about Sir Alm?
Oh no. Sorry Silque, but I think if anything, that's the last thing she'd talk about to anyone.
Talking about Alm isn’t fun unless Alm himself is there.
*She walks off*
Faye? ... Faye?
Poor Silque, she just wants someone to talk girl talk with. Unfortunately, she's really in the wrong army for that, I think.
Still, I mean, there's Clair?
Speaking of Clair, she's also got her support with Alm ready. That means some more Crit for her.
I really do like this game's font, I just wish the comma was more distinct.
And just what are you guffawing at? Such behavior is unspeakably boorish!
Sorry! Sorry. Very sorry.
(I mean, if we're gonna split hairs, why are you having a casual conversation on the battlefield in the first place?)
Wh— Bu— I say it! Oh, very well. How would our fearless leader have me greet him instead?
Ha ha! I’m not criticizing the way you speak, Clair.
I'd be willing to say that this exchange alone generated the majority Alm/Clair shippers out there. I don't blame them, these two dorks are just great together, but you should already be able to tell where this is going thanks to the prologue.
Anyways, that was about the last interesting thing to happen in this battle, so let's get to the real meat of the update.
We must wrest the castle from the chancellor’s grasp. Lead us well, Alm.
I’ll do my best.
You may note one familiar figure there on the map. It's been a long while since we've seen him, but rest assured he's still around.
And we also get to kick his ass.
Y'know, I could've sworn the Steel Lance was heavier than this, but I guess not. Either way, I swap Clair and Clive's weapons. She needs the damage more, and he's struggling with speed as is.
Python gets the Iron Bow given his speed is so low. I didn't mention it, but though Python's growths are usable, he comes a low enough level to make it hard to get use out of him.
With our preparation done, it's time to bring the fight to these jerks.
Music: Treason | YT KHin
I wonder who built this throne? It is marvelously comfortable! Why did I let it be wasted on that incompetent fool Lima for so long?
Meet Desaix. If you hadn't inferred it thus far, his voice acting and that lightly twirled mustache tells you every single thing you need to know about him.
And then I will rule from this throne as king of Zofia! But first, I must crush those worms in the rebel army. And worms they are…
And now they dare march on the castle? They will pay for this insult in blood! I must know what—or who—gave them this second wind…
We’ve captured a rebel in the forest. It’s Lor… It’s Fernand, sir.
Great, thanks. Good work there Fernand.
What?! But Fernand is Clive’s right-hand man. Why would he be wandering the woods without a detachment?
March, prisoner!
What’s this? Am I to believe you have left your precious “Deliverance”?
Deliverance… Pah!
Indeed. Clive has thrown all of our ideals at the feet of the unworthy.
Well, I say damn them all! There. You have my story. Now kill me and be done with it.
Ah… Now I see this for what it is. Rudolf, you villainous dastard…
Huh?
Silence! When I address you, you’ll know it.
Killing you would be…wasteful. Come with me. I will introduce you to your new master. A master more…befitting of your ideals.
New master? Wait—explain yourself!
Lots of foreshadowing going on here. Looks like Fernand is going to be betraying us, but really, who's surprised?
This game also has some good animated scenes. I'll do some gifs and some screenshots, but the FPS will be a bit lower than it is in game. These scenes do look really good all things considered.
I unfortunately don't have the music for this scene, so just imagine whatever you want.
He approaches the doors...
...and is surprised by the view, I suppose.
(Here's two more new characters. One is unimportant to the plot, and the other will be around a lot more, even if they don't accomplish much. I'll let you guess which is which.)
He's just dumbfounded by this dancing apparently.
(Well, anyways, here's them up close.)
The game especially wants you to see Dark Justin Bieber here.
Music: Tense Silence
You should hold your head high as you command us on this great day.
It will be a great day, won’t it? Fellow soldiers! Fight with me!
... Fellow soldiers! Fight with me!
*Loud, raucous cheers*
Music: Prince of Darkness | YT KHin
What a disheveled herd of clodhoppers!
Oh boy, this guy. He and the girl from earlier are two new additions and while I can see what they were going for with them, I don't particularly like the execution of the idea.
I couldn’t agree more.
The Empire’s finest general need not trouble himself with such rabble. You may watch from on high as my finest troops cut them down like wheat.
This is a bit of an exaggeration.
War is horrible, and I will make no spectacle of it.
Heh heh. I jest, my dear.
He probably wasn't, and that should already tell you a good bit about this guy.
Yes, of course.
(I'll go ahead and say now though, this is not an exaggeration.)
It is a fine gift, my lord. You honor me.
You said the name of the Deliverance’s new leader is “Alm,” correct? And that he is of common birth? There is no mistake in this?
None, my lord.
Hmph. What nonsense.
Has a sheep any hope of leading wolves? No!
*gasp*
Truer words were never spoken, Lord Berkut!
(Yep, no question about it now, he's betrayed us now that he's found somebody with the same fucked up ideals as him.)
Still, I am surprised at Sir Clive. Tales of his exploits have spread as far as Rigel…
I just wonder how he became so celebrated in the first place.
The Deliverance has no future now. All of Zofia will soon belong to the Empire… Rinea!
I have a promise to make you, my dear. I will succeed His Majesty Rudolf and become the next emperor. I shall rule over the Valentian continent as I was meant to.
To be fair, I don't think most people would.
…It has begun.
Hey, if I'm not doing that, what's the point in me doing this LP? :V
Music: Battle Preparations - Deliverance | YT KHin
Hey, finally, preparation time. At least I've got a real reason to put this music up given that I've got some stuff to talk about here.
This map has two paths you can take, and also introduces doors. There's no lockpickers in this game, so you actually just unlock doors by getting behind them and turning the handle from there.
No, seriously.
This also means Clair is our lockpicking expert given that walls mean nothing to her.
Both paths lead to the same place, it's just that one is guarded by archers and the other isn't. In order to save time, we'll send one half our army up the other side and just send whoever can handle being shot at over here.
Their stats are the same as we've seen before.
This pile of angry red guys is where
both of our bosses are.
The knight I've highlighted has mostly the class minimums, so our Lukas is still ahead of him. He won't be much of an issue though.
The line of cavaliers is underwhelming aside from their moverange.
Oh look who it is! Slayde's stats are actually pretty meh all things considered, mostly being at the Paladin's promotion minimums.
Here's the main event though.
Yes, you're reading those stats right. 22 ATK, 31 DEF, 20 RES, and a health regen of 5 per turn (not including the orange supply he's standing on).
He's also a Baron, the third and final level promotion for soldiers (Soldier -> Knight -> Baron)
(There is DLC for a fourth tier, but I'm not made of money, okay?)
Anyways, after some rearranging of units on my side, I think it's high time we put the boot to the Empire, don't you?
---
Music: Treason | YT KHin
...but you have no hope of defeating me!
…Now, Slayde! Take the cavalry and run down every last one of those wretches!
Player Turn Music: March to Deliverance (Act 3) | YT KHin NES
Enemy Turn Music: Air of Brutality (Act 3) | 
YT 
KHin 
NES
As a neat detail, they run this fight with the battle music for Act 3 which is decidedly more tense. This also means that last update was our last time hearing the Act 1 music.
Anyways, there's a lot of movement going on here that I'll cut out for the sake of brevity. We're already in nearly 80 screenshots and we've just reached the battle.
Clair, Lukas, Kliff, Silque, and Clive have all gone to the left, mostly because I won't be needing them as much to handle those archers.
She also opens the door to expedite this process.
Meanwhile, everyone else has been moving in on the right. Tobin, the presently better of our two archers stands just in range to lure out the enemy archers.
While the others catch up on the other side, Clair goes ahead and starts luring out cavs to punch on. She's a bit behind in levels, and the Peg Knight promotion is at 12. We won't be needing it soon, but we want her to keep up in strength with the rest of the team.
Time to see some real fighting.
Tobin gets hit, but he's tough.
He then returns one arrow, completely knocking the guy's helmet off somehow, and misses the other.
On the other side of the map, a cavalier takes the bait.
For the sake of it and in celebration of my new .gif tools, have a slightly lagged gif of them duking it out.
(The lag is from me streaming the video, and is pretty much unavoidable most of the time. Consequences of LPing a swan song game, I suppose.)
This gets Clair to top off with chip EXP, getting her a level that is only 50% useful.
I suppose in a way I'm being a bit harsh on SKL and LCK, because more Clair crits is nice, and given that fliers don't get terrain evasion bonuses, every point of dodge counts.
You bore me! Begone!
On our turn, she puts a stylish end to the cav.
If you think this is too much flapping, just wait until she promotes.
Tobin moves up to clear some room all while targeting some more archers. I make sure to bring Alm and Gray up first to make sure he gets those support bonuses.
It got one shot to land at least. I'm not going to complain about a 50% chance acting like a 50% chance.
Python uses superior range to try and put more hurt on one of these jerks, but he just misses.
Faye can take the hit, but I opt not to move her up for now.
On their turn, Python and the archer continue their duel, trading blows.
A new archer approaches Tobin and he returns the pain in double.
Alm sidehops an arrow because he's cool like that.
Back on our turn, Python does make the shot this time. His final blow taunt has him shrugging, though it's a bit hard to see here.
Ah, thanks.
Faye heals Python for some EXP.
Tobin continues his air raid, not getting the finisher, but at least reducing this guy to fleeing HP levels.
After that, everyone who's capable of doing so piles up in the center.
That's how it's done!
Tobin does manage to catch one of the archers with his absurd range.
Nice save!
Faye does more healing and gets a level. HP and ATK is acceptable.
This is why I've been actively showing Faye healing. This Physic is precisely the same as the one you're thinking of, yes.
If you don't know, Physic is the usual mid to late game healing spell in FE that sometimes heals a little less than the basic Recover/Heal, but trades that for having insane range.
In some games, Physic range is one to half the character's Magic stat in tiles. Here, we've got one to
our ATK in tiles. This means that Faye's Physic range is already 10 tiles of distance. Lategame, this will usually be the entire map.
Even now, this means I can pretty much guarantee one heal per turn on nearly any unit.
Allow me.
I move Lukas to this specific spot right here. That red outline I'm trying to avoid is Slayde's aggro range. This spot right here (and the one symmetrically across from it) is guaranteed to let us around the corner and not end up in Slayde's aggro range.
Why am I tiptoeing around him like this? Well, I'll explain, but not right now. I've got a feeling you'll see why soon enough.
Before I end my turn, I go ahead and have Clair go punch on those soldiers that were up with the archers. The enemy archers only have basic bows and they're all retreating, so she's completely in the clear here.
Man, early Gaiden was like the best time to be a Peg.
After a little bit of movement fnagling on my part, it's the enemy's turn again.
Too late!
A glorious victory.
RIP you, Soldier.
Back on our turn, Lukas stealths around, I guess?
I mostly just want his help clearing out some cavs so the others can move in safely.
Thought you were clever, didn't you?
I'm not sure if there's anything funnier in FE than watching a Knight dodge somebody.
Well?
Another cavalier steps up and bites it as well.
All the promotions have new animations, and depending on the character sometimes even new victory poses.
Like, even if the story's got problems sometimes, they went all out on this game. Compared to Awakening's hoof feet and recycled animation sets, the visual polish and budget here is pretty astounding,(although, there was 5 years of experience between then and now, as well as the impending close of the studio, so er, maybe that's not the most even comparison).
Anyways, Kliff starts to move in on the other side while Gray takes the spot Lukas was just in.
I'm still omitting a lot of movement stuff, by the by. This update's going to be overlong even with me making that effort, but I've got no choice.
Lukas continues to make these guys look like fools.
You may notice that Lukas is getting a hell of a lot more EXP from these nerds than our other units. Why?
Well, that's a conversation that will take me to one of my biggest talking points hidden in this game. Put short, the EXP curve is really goddamn strange compared to other FE games.
And believe me, when I say it's unusual, I'm not kidding there either. I both kind of like it, but also kind of hate it.
Kliff, despite being decently fast, is still having trouble catching up to his true potential. Pictured here is him being doubled just barely by these cavs because his magic is weighing him down. All things considered though, I haven't given him too many levels compared to other folks.
I know this seems like two perfect segues to talk about this odd level curve present in the game, but I've actually got other things to talk about that are more immediate.
Observe.
Yeah, so that robed guy that I so sneakily avoided showing at the beginning is an early introduction to something we'll be seeing more of in the game soon enough.
Before I do that though, look at Faye's healing range!
Also, the maps actually modeling distance is so cool.
There!
I'm a Forsyth to be reckoned with!
Also just gotta fit in this bit of Forsyth getting a win.
Er, so yeah, this guy. His defenses are rather good and his health is quite beefy, but being a mage type enemy, that's typical the decent defenses aside. Arcanists are the enemy's version of our male Mages, and if that isn't foreshadowing enough as is with that portrait, I don't know what to tell you.
Miasma is their basic attack, and it hits pretty hard as is, and it's only their weakest spell they'll end up having. They also have a copy of our healing spell, and they will use it all the time.
But enough alluding and sort of spoiling later content, let's fast forward a bit. Just keep in mind this jerk is also healing those units I weakened earlier.
After some battling and moving people up the side outside of Slayde's range, I've been luring out archers and the last living Cavalier.
I know I've already given Lukas enough attention today, but honestly he and Clair have been doing most of the work here today.
I wanted to show this off because not only is it a separate
second finishing animation, it also shows off the really smooth dodging counterattacks.
This level is incredibly disappointing though. It's really not very palpable.
This is what is important, though. I'm presently luring in Slayde so I can weaken him to below half health and put him on retreat.
That sounds silly, but I'll get to why I'm doing that in a moment.
Music: The Fallen Knight | YT KHin
Also this track is the perfect level of dreadfully tense.
You’re those bumpkin brats from the village in Ram Woods.
Huh? …This is the knight who tried to kidnap Celica!
You whelps deprived me of a prize I most desperately needed. Hear me well, runts!
...and today, I in turn shall deprive you of your lives!
Lukas didn't even need the shield for this.
Unfortunately, here is where everything goes wrong in this timeline.
Lukas would have dropped Slayde to precisely 10 HP had he hit both strikes, and it would've been perfect for my needs. Pavement makes for bad aiming, evidently.
So, now here is me weighing my options. The plan was to be cool and have Gray kill that archer, Clair kill the Arcanist, and then Lukas use Swap to switch places with her and block up the pathway. Then Faye would move in the way southwards and it would keep Slayde heavily delayed on his retreat to the oranges.
"But hey, Lukas can just get him to 1 HP which will be even better because he'll be stuck in recovery for longer!" I thought to myself.
But I was forgetting something.
This is farewell!
I forgot that this was the crittiest playthrough of any Fire Emblem game I've ever had.
This is neither the time nor place for me to die…
Well, that's a lot of EXP.
But why is this such a problem, you ask? I suppose it's about time I finally explain.
Damned rebels will rue this day.
Right, so remember how I said early on in the LP thread that I'd beat the bonus boss?
There he went, the coward.
Well, time to reset-
Stop right there!
Huh? Who are you?
I'm you from an alternate timeline! You can do that, remember?
Oh, right. I keep forgetting that thing exists.
Jokes aside, this at least gives me the perfect chance to show off Mila's Turnwheel in perhaps the most atypical way you could be expected to use it: sparing an enemy's life temporarily.
The Turnwheel, activated by that little gear button in the bottom right you may have seen a few times, starts with three uses and allows us to go back to any point in the battle. You might know it as a Divine thingamajiggit if you've played the most recent game, but this is where it originates.
This thing has been hailed as the greatest thing to happen to the series and also the worst thing to happen to the series depending on how much a diehard fan of the classic games you are.
I've got a bit mixed of an opinion on this thing. Really, my only problem with it is that it makes my decisions feel a little less important in my strategy, and it combined with Physic makes me be incredibly lazy when it comes to playing this game. Alternatively, it's also really goddamn nice to have when you're 20 turns deep in a very tense map and one of your units eats a crit or a wayward arrow.
By the end of the game, we'll have
nine uses for this thing. Yes, nine. By that point I end up blowing half of them on nitpicking unit movements. I personally think nine is a bit much, and I lean towards preferring it having less uses. That way you've got chances to recover from random crits or a bad move deep into a map that's taken an hour, but you have to make each of them count.
Had I not just come off of Awakening Lunatic, no deaths, no grinding, no DLC when I picked up this game, I might've been a little less receptive to it, but at the end of the day, let's face it- people usually don't like losing, and this helps prevent that.
(As an aside, IntSys, get rid of enemy random crits please. At least for lower difficulties or something. You can still give them crits with Killer/ing weapons to create strategic tension, but single digit percentage crits are just rude.)
(As a second aside, I've mentioned this game doesn't use True Hit right? It's crits are also unmodified. 1% crits are a thing, albeit rare.)
Aaaanyways, long overdue ramble over, have fun discussing the Turnwheel now. Back to my master plan in which I send Clair to to weaken Slayde.
...WHAT
THE
ABSOLUTE
front door
Ugh, time to rewind aga-
Oh, hey, that's a good level. We're keeping this, screw it. I'll do the Desaix early kill in a separate update.
...But in retrospect, this happening probably isn't unusual.
So, one aspect of the Turnwheel is that it unclearly has zero to little effect on RNG. It says it has little effect at least.
The way RNG works in a game like Fire Emblem, though we don't know for sure with this one, is that it makes lists of randomly generated numbers and pulls one off the list every time it needs a roll (hit, crit, stat growths, etc). These numbers are calculated roll under versus the percentages you see, so for a 75% growth to trigger, the grabbed number must be equal to under that.
What likely happened here is that the second number on the list (the first would be for the hit roll) from the beginning of the turn is equal to or less than 4 (Lukas's crit chance). Clair's is 14, so it's going to be a guaranteed crit for everyone on our team but Gray whose crit is 0 presently thanks to the Lightning Sword.
I'd have some numerical evidence I could've given you had Lukas also leveled from this (comparing their growth rates would give me a good estimate of the numbers needed), but at the end of the day, nobody's done the calculations for this and I have no idea how or how much the Turnwheel changes the RNG tables.
For all I know, this was probably just amazingly bittersweet luck. Either way, I did actually say fuck it to messing around with trying to kill Desaix early because I realized I kinda don't have the damage right now to pull it off.
What does this mean?
It means have a cool gif of Gray dunking a guy with a sword that shoots out lightning.
Well, Tobin missed both shots, but I personally swear these jerks have a higher than advertised dodge chance. They always do this to me on my playthroughs.
This is the more important part though.
Weapon arts that aren't minor things like Swap tend to be things like this. They have an HP cost like spells, sometimes have better range, but primarily come with boosted damage or extra effects.
Tobin's been pretty good at doubling things all considered his effective 4 SPD, but that'll quickly fall behind and this will make up for it in the long run.
So, (I already mentioned this in the last update, but whatever,) weapon arts don't double unless they say they do. If Tobin meets an enemy he can't double, he can just hit 'em with this instead.
Oh, and here's the stats on Miasma, just in case you wanted to know.
Lukas is just the tiniest bit short on damage here, but I go ahead and do it. The little prediction bars do calculate spell HP costs into the matter, but can get a little funky when the HP costs are a lot larger than 1.
This is more damage in one hit than Lukas has taken the last update and this one combined. Probably. I'm not doing the math on that.
Regardless, this is a nice reminder that the DEF/RES system is important to watch out for.
On the enemy turn, Alm gets into the first battle he's seen all day.
It's suitably awesome.
Because we're over 150 screenshots in, I'm just gonna skip to the good parts now that the boss is dead.
Forsyth delivers one of the most meh levels ever. It's fine though, really, his promotion boosts will carry him enough.
Lukas bodyslams the caster to both get payback and to block the way for his allies.
Gray tears the enemy knight a new one.
Oh, and this is what the normal shield looks like. Lukas would be using one, but evidently they're made of cardboard as the little leather buckler has more defense.
Jeez, Clair, didn't you have enough crits to your name already? You don't have to try and catch up with the rest of the squad!
Reprehensible!
Then Silque beats up on the knight to get a level that has a high chance to mean absolutely nothing in the long run.
And that's Update 9, folks. See you next time.
...No, seriously, I've gotta cut it off here. 170 screenshots and multiple gifs is enough. There's at least 60 more screenshots of story and text after this part.
Next update, I'll go to a different
savefile timeline, grind a bit, and beat Desaix for real this time.
As to whether we keep this one or that timeline is up to you, though. Until then.
Next Time: Master Plans Come To Light (Yes, Multiple!)
Crit Emblem is eternal. (Then watch as we go on the other route and never get a crit again.)
Forget who got away! There’s still plenty of reason to celebrate.
Thanks to you, the castle is finally rid of those imperial dastards. Oh, what a joy to watch them run… We’re finally free! You have my heartfelt thanks. Truly.
He’ll be beggin’ Rigel for help now, so he will! What a piece of filth, leavin’ his men behind to die in his stead…
The Rigelian imperial household gave us that sword as a sign of friendship. I don’t know what use Desaix has for it. Oh, it’s a powerful sword, and no lie… but only in the hands of the right wielder. And that wielder isn’t him!
Of course, he never liked much of anything besides his wine and women. I wager Desaix looked upon the general as an obstacle of sorts, too, because after he murdered the king’s children, he pinned it on Sir Mycen. You’d have been daft to believe such a thing, of course… which is precisely what the king did. Or perhaps he just saw it as an excuse.
After that fire at the villa, however, neither body was found. I often dream that at least the princess managed to escape somehow…
Well, yes, but…how very odd.
Please proceed up these steps. A visitor is waiting for you up on the balcony.
Heh. I have my reasons. Look how far you’ve come, Alm. You’re a man grown now. You’ve been through quite a bit since leaving the village, haven’t you?
And what of Berkut?
A Rigelian Knight, the emperor’s sworn defender, scurrying away like a rat? My arcanists would never have painted so sorry a picture…
Hold your tongue, Master Jedah.
It’s been years since crops last grew on Zofian soil. Our barren fields have fallen victim to Terrors, the Rigelians have invaded…
Hmm… Perhaps it is, at that. I’ll not deny that the kingdom of Zofia faces her darkest hour in some time. More sick and hungry come to the priory’s door each day seeking aid…
But surely their own lands must be suffering the same fate. What could have driven them to invade Zofia at such a price? I would dearly love to know what’s going through Emperor Rudolf’s mind…
But alas for them, this island’s no better off than anywhere else. We’re even poorer than most, what with pirates seizing inbound supply ships… We’ll soon have naught to eat but what fish the waves see fit to provide.
If so, then I’m going too. You can’t say no!
I do! And I can! I’ll be more help than you, at least.
What? No? Awww… I was really hoping I could help you out…
-> 
-> 
-> 
-> 
If you ever find yourself in need of steel, you could do far worse than him. Though if that steel needs a history fit for retelling in polite company, well… 
You lost, little lass? This ain’t a place for children.
-> 
These waters belong to Barth the Pirate King, as yer surely aware! 
)
