Well then. Let's see what kind of shit I'm in.
My first act is to buy a vulnerary for Natasha so everybody has a vulnerary, because I feel like it might come in handy. There was a one use vulnerary in supply, but I wanted Natasha to have more, given that she can't exactly be healing herself with her staff. Also, I change some options, as usual with this LP now.
Next up, I declare myself the arbiter of stat boosts, and with that, I drop the Dragonshield on Lute, since she's got a bit of a defense problem...
...and then I drop the Secret Book on her as well because hey, why not. Let's help her become a god unit. Then I also buy her a new Fire tome just in case.
Now, let's give this mission a shot.
BORING.
Alright, now for the fun part. First, let's look at the map.
You'll notice that I'm not entirely sure on my memories of this map. There are still a few unclear things. I sure hope that won't come back to bite me in the ass!
Also, don't worry about the double Colm and such. I moved him around in battle preps to get more vision and haven't made my setup for the map yet.
Here's the crew I'm going with. You might say "Why are you not bringing Colm on a fog map?" and I'd say "I'm pretty sure if I do, some asshole is just going to run up and one-shot him.". Artur is also not great on the defensive side, and I'm not confident in my ability to defend him. I wanted Neimi for some range over Joshua, which might've been a bad decision, and finally, I figured I only needed one healer, so no Moulder.
And here we go. First basic idea is I take Gilliam and send him up in the direction of that forest spot where he can hopefully tank the one or two units that are up there, then go east with the rest of the group, weathering whatever's set up there.
And it is of course after I move most of my units that I decide to Torch to see what I'm getting into and then realize that just maybe I underestimated what was going on here. Well, we'll see how it goes.
The only guy that can reach Garcia in the first enemy phase goes down without much of a fight.
Gilliam, however, is not doing well at tanking. I did not expect an Iron Blade cav that can double Gilliam to come out of the fog. He is immediately in deep shit. There's also an Iron Sword cav that doesn't double. Fucking go figure.
Next player phase, Gilliam gets to the forest and tries not to die. I'm very torn on whether I need Seth here to help out, but eventually decide against it, figuring that the main group needed more help.
Garcia takes out the other soldier and hunkers down in the fort.
He also gets a mediocre level out of it.
Natasha gets a terrible level from Torching.
At least there's not too much extra here.
The final situation at turn end is this. I kinda set up a half-assed defensive formation behind Garcia to protect the vulnerable units, but ultimately I'm hoping Garcia takes most of the heat and tanks it. He has an Elixir, he'll be fine.
...that's not a good start. I mean, that's about 30% with True Hit, which I guess isn't too unlikely, but still, that's kinda rude.
This is also not good, but I had to expect that. I think I underestimated mercs at the time, which can be a fatal error, since I'm pretty sure they're very above average in regular enemy dangerousness.
...and then this guy shows up. OK, now I just need no other enemy to have a ranged weapon, and Garcia can pop an Elixir, and we're back on track.
Guess what my dipshit ass didn't notice because I didn't scroll the fucking map up after Torching?
...oh, go fuck yourself, Gilliam. That's like a ten percent chance! So now he's back at 8 HP - Iron Sword guy missed. That's not good.
Surprise! Another ranged asshole! Thankfully, he missed.
...but this guy didn't. So, uh, yeah. RIP Garcia. The first casualty, and hopefully not the last because otherwise that'd make me look bad.
So yeah, this is my situation now. Gilliam is hanging on by a thread and can't run away from the cavs fast enough, which means I should send in Seth, but the situation at the front is just as fucked, so I kinda need him there too. This kinda sucks.
Here's the first part of the phase. Looks good so far, killing a bunch of enemies, but there's still a lot left, so we're certainly going to have to weather some of it.
Ross gets a garbage level out of it.
Lute shows him how it's done.
And here's the second part of the phase. This did go a lot better than I expected.
And I immediately pay for thinking that, because I realized too late that I basically left Ross to the wolves - I should've probably rescued him with Vanessa and sent him off, but then Gilliam would have probably died to the Iron Blade guy.
Franz gets a level off killing some fighter that popped out of the fog.
This is about where I thought I'd shit myself. I did not check for weapons, and as a result, this fighter fuck could've just one-shotted Seth and I'd never have heard the end of it.
Iron Blade guy does what I hoped he would by attacking Vanessa instead of Gilliam.
Vanessa gets more defensive because of it. Good plan.
And then the archer claims his second victim. Fucking bravo, I say. MVP of this entire playthrough, I'm sure. RIP Ross, at least you didn't have a lot of time to grieve about your father dying.
Then there's this prick in the north, healing up the Iron Sword cav I did some damage to earlier. Brilliant.
Camera movement in the west after the Green Unit Phase. Reinforcements?
Next player phase. Seth blitzes up ASAP - the earlier he can kill this boss, the earlier I can get the fuck out of this nightmare of a map.
Eirika then starts working over the archer, though he's still alive, and I decide to have Natasha Torch the area where I saw movement earlier.
Oh you are
fucking shitting me. That's it, Gilliam's fucking dead. He's not getting out of there without getting swamped by cavs. I could try to rescue him, but that would just either lead Vanessa into a difficult situation or cause the cavs to quickly catch up to other slower units and murder them. So congratulations, Gilliam, you've been elected to fill up the fucking hat trick.
One problem I'm having with this merc is that he's really hard to hit and therefore hard to kill.
Lute gets to take out the Archer Of Death.
Neimi's not helping. I should've brought Joshua.
Finally, Natasha gets rescued by Vanessa because she's in the attack line of some cav, and this is the setup. Kinda fucked.
Lute helps with taking down the merc on enemy phase.
Gilliam gets hit by two 64s and misses a 74. Fuck you too. You are so dead.
Then he gets hit by a 40, misses an 88, and the last 40 actually misses, otherwise he would've been dead right then and there. I assume that means the next enemy will just be the one that kills him.
Meanwhile, Seth is doing Seth things.
Thankfully, the cavs positioned themselves in a bad way, leaving one cav unable to attack Gilliam, and the other one misses with the javelin, so he gets to live one more turn.
So, uh, yeah. I'm pretty sure I'm just accepting the death now unless I think of something. He's got 6 HP, and I'm pretty sure I can't get him out there without immediately greatly endangering someone else, and if somebody's got to go, it might as well be fucking Gilliam.
Though I'm giving him a bit more of a chance by trading him Franz's vulnerary, since he's getting the fuck out of Dodge.
Eirika uses her Torch to reveal a bit more map, and... uh, I don't like this at all. I need a better approach for this. The fact that Novala is an exact two-shot kill on Seth is
really not good. Also, why the fuck does he get to have so much HP again?
I mean, he's a level 10 Shaman! Do they really get that much health?
Guess I'll kill this cleric instead, he's going to be a pain in the ass if I don't get rid of him.
So, uh, yeah. Have fun, Gilliam!
OK, Lute, that's really not what I needed from you right now.
Seth does Seth things.
People start popping out of the fog again.
The
first cav that attack Gilliam instantly takes him down to 4 HP.
Then the Iron Sword guy takes him down to
2 HP.
Javelin guy misses.
Also, some shaman shows up too.
And that's it! Gilliam lives another turn thanks to forests making it hard for cavs to get to him! But now I really need to finish this
this turn. How do I do that?
I do heal him up and put him on a fort, but I don't expect that to hold. Now, I need something to solve this conundrum of killing Novala before the cavs murder Gilliam.
Well, whatever the solution is, this will help.
This looks good, but not good enough for a player phase kill. If I hit twice, that's an enemy phase kill, but does that save Gilliam... actually, it might! Don't bosses attack first on enemy phase? I think they do! So, if Seth hits two 81s - which honestly is a fucking feat at this point, given that I've seen several upper 80s miss this map - and bosses attack first, Gilliam is safe.
The first part works. Seth hits, Novala misses. I had things prepped to where I could rescuedrop Seth out with Franz and heal him, since two hits from Novala are a death, but this part works, so Seth should be safe at least. I can't believe I have to be happy about that. That should be a fucking given.
Still, we need to set up as well as possible in case Seth misses. Vanessa fails at getting that fucking merc out of my hair.
Franz gets the job done, finally. He's no Archer of Death, but he was a massive thorn in my side.
Neimi and Lute combine for a soldier kill.
MAG/SPD/DEF, let's go. Lute putting in work on her levels.
Well, this sucks. I'm pretty sure Neimi can get hit by a cav (though she has great speed, so she won't get doubled and should live), and Gilliam is probably wrecked if Seth misses or Novala doesn't attack first. The shaman will probably attack Natasha, but she should live. Unless there's some guys in the fog still. Let's see what happens!
Yes...
...yes!
Get fucking
wrecked. Ignore the fact that this mission fucking wrecked me. I wrecked it. That's all that matters.
Oh, yeah, I saved you. I totally was going fast because of that, not because I was fighting for the life of my units and needed to end the mission ASAP.
Somebody better promote Neimi with this.
Alright, there we go! Fucking done with this shit! I sure hope the next chapter isn't as extremely rude as this one.