 So, what's all this then? This is Fire Emblem: Sacred War, a ROMhack for Fire Emblem 8: Sacred Stones. The original release post describes this hack as follows: quote:This is a Remake of the original Sacred Stones game in an effort to make the game more fun to play with new features, a new freshness as well as new challenges and obstacles to conquer. So basically, you can kinda consider this to be a remix of Sacred Stones. The story is the same, as are the characters, but the maps, while generally getting the same idea across, are different, there's changes to weapons and classes that mix things up... so while you're generally still playing Sacred Stones, you're definitely getting a new and fresh experience. So what's so special about this hack? Well, there's something extra about this hack that you won't see in that description. This hack doubles as a sort of challenge hack. While you won't notice it in the early game, the lategame ramps up in difficulty quite a bit compared to Sacred Stones, and then there's the postgame... ...let's not beat around the bush. The postgame gets loving nuts. It starts difficult, then gets a lot harder, then kicks it into maximum overdrive and never looks back. Despite all of it, I found the experience of playing through this hack... enthralling, somehow. Despite feeling like bashing my head against a wall at times, I wanted to keep going. I mean, I did eventually break down and cheat, but still. It was interesting enough that it kept me going for a long time, where smarter men might have cut their losses. I feel that's worth something. All in all, I hope this will make for an interesting and entertaining LP. Haven't I seen this hack before? Depends. If you're reading this on the LP Beach, you might remember that there was an earlier attempt at LPing this hack by Moonside that ended up abandoned. In fact, it was this LP that set me upon playing the hack, and which eventually led us here. If you're reading this on SA, you might remember me going over my recollections of playing through this hack in vilkacis's bows-only Sacred Stones LP in something that looked like an LP update, but instead of game screenshots it was Discord screenshots. So what LP will this be? Standard fare SSLP. I might get a bit more creative with it for the postgame, but that's a while off, so we'll cross that bridge when we get to it. Anything else we need to know? I will be assuming two things going into this: - You are familiar with Fire Emblem, and specifically Fire Emblem 8: Sacred Stones. I will not explain basic gameplay or anything like that. I will only go into things that the hack does differently from regular Sacred Stones - though there are a lot of those things. - You either know or don't care about the story of Sacred Stones. The story is untouched in this hack, there is only an addition in the postgame. I will be skipping basically all of the story apart from that addition. If you want the regular story, read Blastinus's LP on the Archive. What about a spoiler policy? I'll just keep it simple and ask that you don't bring up stuff that hasn't come up in the LP yet. Particularly the postgame stuff. There's some crazy poo poo in this hack, and I want people to be able to see it for the first time. Now, let's get to it. - MAIN CAMPAIGN (SSLP) - Update I - This Is Probably A Bad Idea... Eh, Whatever. Update II - Not Quite Untouchable Update III - Don't Fire Emblem While Tired Update IV - Eirika Lacks The Strength To Carry On Update V - Monster Mash Update VI - The Boss Box Begins Update VII - Breaking News: Ephraim Still Good Update VIII - Here Actually Not Be Any Dragons Update IX - Ballistaless Update X - The Good Lord Is Back Update XI - Insert Training Montage Music Here Update XII - Sometimes, You Just Say "gently caress It" Mini-Update I - A Bunch Of Basic Weapons Update XIII - Ancient Mariners Not Included Update XIV - Copious Grinding Action Update XV - The gently caress Zone Update XVI - Purge Panic Update XVII - Death In The Dunes Update XVIII - Things Go Bad Mini-Update II - Oh No! More Weapons! Update XIX - Reinforcements Everywhere Update XX - Scrambled, Fried Or Poached Update XXI - gently caress This Map Update XXII - loving Hell This Map Is Big Update XXIII - The End Of The Beginning Update XXIV - Tier Lists Are Popular These Days, Right? - POSTGAME (VLP) -                              - BONUS LP - FIRE EMBLEM 7 RANDOMIZED (VLP) -  What's all this, then? This is Yune, a universal Fire Emblem randomizer that as of writing can randomize the three GBA Fire Emblem games, Genealogy and Path of Radiance, with some pretty fun results. And what's this doing in the Sacred War thread? Well, I've always had some sort of FE randomizer thing on my LP shortlist, and I just figured there's no time like the present, since I probably won't be doing FE related stuff for a while after this thread is done. So what in particular will this be? The three of us - Kinu, Icon and I - will all randomize Fire Emblem 7 using the same settings but with different seed phrases. We will then all play our randomized versions at the same time. Hijinx ensue. Anything particular to know? Most things I'll go over in the beginning of the first video, but generally speaking, I'm not looking to make some sort of hardcore challenge out of it or anything. So emulator speedup is encouraged, as is using savestates to bypass bullshit. Because, well, we're starting with Lyn mode, and Lyn mode can have some situations that are for all intents and purposes impossible. So while we will let ourselves get hit with the bullshit, I'm not going to require us to suffer through it several times over. What settings are you using?  Our separate seed phrases are as follows (without quotes). TheMcD: "I don't know why you believe this killing is your destiny, but I pray that you will someday know peace." Kinu: "Oh yeah, baby, funk it!" Icon: "Iconoclast" And with that, let's get going.             With the way things were going, we decided to call the LP quits after Dragon's Gate. So that's all there is. TheMcD fucked around with this message at 15:58 on Jan 22, 2022 |
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Nov 4, 2020 00:12
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Update I - This Is Probably A Bad Idea... Eh, Whatever. Let's get to it.  This hack does not give us a choice in difficulty. It's got one, take it or leave it.  BORING.  We rejoin Eirika and Seth, having run away from Renais, and there's a few things we can already tell have changed.  This has changed as well...  ...as has this guy. But we'll go over that in a bit. For now, let's check this map.   The difficulty is not exactly high from the get-go. So this prologue map won't pose too much of a challenge. However, we can talk about a lot of stuff. First, let's go over one of our protagonists.    A few things to unpack here. First, our heroine herself. Eirika - Lord: STATS: LV: 1 HP: 16 STR: 5 (+1) SKL: 8 SPD: 9 LCK: 6 (+1) DEF: 3 RES: 1 MOV: 5 CON: 5 GROWTHS: HP: 65% (-5%) STR: 45% (+5%) SKL: 50% (-10%) SPD: 55% (-5%) LCK: 55% (-5%) DEF: 25% (-5%) RES: 35% (+5%) Changes noted in brackets are compared to vanilla Sacred Stones, based on what I read on Serenes Forest. So while a +1 in strength right off the bat is nice, Eirika did kind of get a bit of a nerf with her growths, which I didn't really think was necessary, but oh well. Next, the items she has. Slim Sword: Rank E. Range 1. Weight 2. Might 3. Hit 100. Crit 15 (+10). 50 uses (+20). Noble Rapier: Rank Prf (Eirika only). Range 1. Weight 5. Might 8 (+1). Hit 100 (+5). Crit 20 (+10). 50 uses (+10). Effective against cavalry and armor. Vulnerary: Five uses (+2), heals 20 HP (+10). Star Seal: New item. Adds +1 to all stats (well, STR/SKL/SPD/LCK/DEF/RES, anyway). Can be given to any unit. I'm noticing this hack likes crit. That might be a problem down the line. Still, the stat booster is nice, and better vulneraries are also going to help quite a bit. Finally, a note about weapon ranks. You cannot gain weapon ranks in Sacred War. Your weapon ranks are fixed with your class. Generally, the hack will try to balance it out - so if you promote a unit and have a choice between a class that has three weapon types vs. a class that has only one, the class with only one weapon will probably have S rank in it, whereas the one with three weapons will probably only have B in all of them. I like this idea. I feel like I usually like to go for more weapons over less weapons most of the time, so this might give me something to think about. Now, let's look at our partner in crime.     Seth - Grand Knight (formerly Paladin): STATS: LV: 10 (+9) HP: 30 STR: 10 (-4) SKL: 12 (-1) SPD: 14 (+2) LCK: 12 (-1) DEF: 10 (-1) RES: 12 (+4) MOV: 9 (+1) CON: 14 (+3) GROWTHS: HP: 200% (+110%) STR: 100% (+50%) SKL: 100% (+55%) SPD: 100% (+55%) LCK: 100% (+75%) DEF: 100% (+60%) RES: 100% (+70%) CAPS: HP: 60 STR: 27 (+2) SKL: 26 SPD: 28 (+4) LCK: 30 DEF: 26 (+1) RES: 28 (+3) Anyway, Seth got a big ol' rework. New class, new growths, new everything. You'll note that Seth now starts at level 10 promoted instead of level 1, which means he gets gently caress all EXP at this point. In fact, kills right now give him 1 EXP. So if you thought Seth was an EXP hog before, well, this just makes it worse. His growths have been redone to give him guaranteed levels, so he will gain every regular stat on level up, and 2 HP as well. Also, peep that 9 MOV. Seth goes vroom. But this brings us to the next big change in Sacred War: Abilities. Basically, every promoted class has an ability. Seth's is special in that it gets two. I like this quite a bit - it introduces more things to think about upon promotion and makes encounters with promoted enemies potentially more dangerous. However, there is something about these abilities that I kinda don't like but also kinda do? In essence, they might be a bit overdone, kinda? Here, look at Seth's abilities. Crusade: - Equipped weapon's Might x2 against Mages, Magic Beasts, Zombies, Skeletons and Dragon Zombies - Terrain magic RES bonus x2 - +5 crit Sentinel: - Reduce all types of incoming damage by 1 - Use of the "Rescue" command to rescue allies without the SKL or SPD penalty - Modifies the AID stat to be CON - 1 instead of the usual formula - Equipped weapon's Might x2 against Archers, Snipers and Skeleton/Legion Archers That's a lot of stuff. Three or four different effects per ability. Thankfully, all these abilities are listed in the guide menu, so you can always look them up, but you probably will look them up quite a few times before you have most of them memorized. And these abilities can be game changers, so it's always good to keep them in mind. However, for Seth, we won't be using him unless necessary, so we won't be dealing with abilities for a while. Next, let's check his weapons real quick. Steel Sword: Rank D. Range 1. Weight 9 (-1). Might 7 (-1). Hit 85 (+10). Crit 0. 50 uses (+20). Silver Lance: Rank C (formerly A). Range 1. Weight 10. Might 12 (-2). Hit 70 (-5). Crit 0. 50 uses (+30). It seems this hack has a thing for high-use weapons, but some weapons got a bit of a nerf accordingly. Works for me.  We make our first moves. I'm not going to go into great detail how I'm playing this. I mean, I think you can gather that I'm leaving Seth behind and slowly marching Eirika ahead, taking advantage of cover to fight advancing enemies.  Like this fighter. Check that crit - almost a 1 in 5 chance of a crit. However, there is a caveat - crits only do double damage in Sacred War, not triple. So crits are more common, but also more potentially survivable.  Interesting addition we get to see on our next turn - a threat zone. If you push SELECT, you get a threat zone showing you where the enemy units as a whole could currently attack. Of course, this doesn't account for units that don't move, but oh well. Still handy.  Eirika slowly makes her way across the map, stabbing enemies and not getting touched. A note on my playstyle here: I will play these maps fairly slow unless there's a reason for me not to. As I've told you, this hack stops playing around at some point, and generally just being cautious and slow helps cut down on resets. And that's a good thing.  And with that, the boss moves. One thing you might notice is that O'Neill has been demoted from being allowed to have a name. Now he's just "Commander". Poor guy. He's not exactly good, either, being completely overmatched by Eirika in a forest.  Eirika gets her first level fighting with him, and it's a patented At Least She Got Speed Level.  A quick look at this guy shows that he actually is quite a bit beefier than his vanilla hard mode counterpart. +1 HP, +1 STR, +3 SKL, +2 SPD, +5 LCK, +1 DEF and +5 RES for some reason, plus +2 CON.  A look at his items shows off another interesting thing about Sacred War: A lot of enemies carry gold. Now, common guys just carry like 5 gold right now, practically worthless, but this guy here has 400 gold, that's maybe a weapon, so that's actually worth mentioning. Also, let's check out the axe real quick. Iron Axe: Rank E. Range 1. Weight 8 (-2). Might 7 (-1). Hit 75. Crit 0. 50 uses (+5). Notable that axes, or at least this one, are quite a bit lighter. Might make them more viable if more units can use them without being weighed down as heavily.  Alas, it doesn't help him here, as he gets shanked without further incident, leaving Eirika entirely untouched the entire map.  And that's it for the prologue, and for this update. I've decided to keep this one short. I'll make the next one Wednesday/Thursday and post it Thursday, then do weekly updates on each Thursday. Forcing myself onto a schedule should allow me to keep a more relaxed pace in making this LP, which is probably a good idea because I'm doing a VLP of Hearts of Iron 4 at the same time. Anyway, see you next time! TheMcD fucked around with this message at 12:43 on Nov 4, 2020 |
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Nov 4, 2020 00:12
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Well, I can't say I'm a fan of the overblown skill system, but the rest looks like it could be good. I'm looking forward to seeing when it gets punishingly hard.
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Nov 4, 2020 02:09
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I'm pretty sure I found the documentation somewhere when I played this, so if you want I could probably find caps and stuff.
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Nov 4, 2020 02:45
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So they nerf Erica even harder but give Seth All The Stat Growths? okay
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Nov 4, 2020 05:37
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vcvcvc12 posted:I'm pretty sure I found the documentation somewhere when I played this, so if you want I could probably find caps and stuff. If you could PM me the docs in some way, that'd be great. Having more information is never a bad thing. Seraphic Neoman posted:So they nerf Erica even harder but give Seth All The Stat Growths? I think the idea with Seth is to have one unit that can never be RNG screwed. Seth is completely fixed. He will gain 2 HP and 1 in every other stat every level up, guaranteed. Should everything completely go to poo poo, you will always have Seth as an option. He will always end up with these stats at level 20: HP: 50 STR: 20 SKL: 22 SPD: 24 LCK: 22 DEF: 20 RES: 22 Not world-beating, but hey, it's guaranteed.
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Nov 4, 2020 12:46
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In all honesty, even though he wont rip through stuff, 20 def and 22 res with solid speed mean he looks like he'll be pretty beefy for tanking and 9 move let's him get to those key hold out points in time.
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Nov 4, 2020 15:53
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My first impression from this hack is that it's in many ways different for the sake of being different rather than because of particularly creative design choices and that it's overcomplicated, but maybe I'll change my mind as we get deeper in. Also units being locked at lower ranks but stuff like silver weapons being only C is an interesting choice, though I kinda feel like it defeats its own purpose there. I'm guessing all the specialized weapons will be bumped up to B or A.
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Nov 4, 2020 23:00
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theshim posted:Also units being locked at lower ranks but stuff like silver weapons being only C is an interesting choice, though I kinda feel like it defeats its own purpose there. I'm guessing all the specialized weapons will be bumped up to B or A. Seconding your guess. It'd let everyone play with the generic toys (iron/steel/silver) while keeping specialized weaponry on the specialists. If javelins are B, or even A, suddenly your cavalry has to choose between full triangle coverage or invalidating archers. Bump the killing edge at A and hero vs swordmaster is now an actual choice (lol no it still won't be unless swordmaster's skill is Astra + lethality + galeforce but let's pretend). Does this hack make steel somewhat usable? It looks like it's lost some weight.
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Nov 4, 2020 23:43
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This is way too dense for me to even process, much less keep up with, but godspeed.
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Nov 4, 2020 23:55
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TheMcD posted:If you could PM me the docs in some way, that'd be great. Having more information is never a bad thing. https://www.dropbox.com/sh/b0xc7s22k3wgzu2/AAC1F63eWX3kgvpX6DXFSsC7a?dl=0 Here's a link to the documentation, found under "Specific Patch Notes" on the FEU page for it. The max stats page doesn't have any other spoilers or anything that I could see, if that's a concern. EDIT: One nice thing I noticed is it looks like gender differences for caps are gone (except for Great Lord, but that's legit two different classes). vcvcvc12 fucked around with this message at 04:07 on Nov 5, 2020 |
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Nov 5, 2020 04:01
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TheMcD posted:This Is Probably A Bad Idea... Yes. Good luck. ...Eirika did need a str boost, but she did not need less def, what the gently caress game. Also  those "actually 48 skills in one" skills.I do kind of like weapon rank being a class feature though. theshim posted:My first impression from this hack is that it's in many ways different for the sake of being different rather than because of particularly creative design choices and that it's overcomplicated, but maybe I'll change my mind as we get deeper in. I came here expecting to have to make an effort, but, hell, i'm fine just posting 
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Nov 5, 2020 08:45
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vcvcvc12 posted:https://www.dropbox.com/sh/b0xc7s22k3wgzu2/AAC1F63eWX3kgvpX6DXFSsC7a?dl=0 Cheers. I feel like I should've been able to find that myself, but I guess I'm just blind. This'll help a lot.
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Nov 5, 2020 09:53
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Update II - Not Quite Untouchable Alright, let's see what the next chapter has in store for us.   There's a lot more enemies around here than you might be used to from vanilla. Thankfully, since only the fighters will move towards us, we're still fairly good with just "park Eirika in a forest and Seth far away and let the slaughtering begin".  Eirika picks up another level during the stabbing, and gets even more myrmidon.  Still, it looks like she has this well in hand.  Reinforcements! Let's see what has changed with these two.    Gilliam - Knight: STATS: LV: 4 HP: 25 STR: 9 SKL: 6 SPD: 5 (+2) LCK: 3 DEF: 10 (+1) RES: 3 MOV: 5 (+1) CON: 12 (-2) GROWTHS: HP: 80% (-10%) STR: 55% (+10%) SKL: 45% (+10%) SPD: 25% (-5%) LCK: 30% DEF: 50% (-5%) RES: 25% (+5%) Well hot loving drat, look who got an upgrade. Yes, 5 move knights are a thing now! And not only that, but they can use axes now! Not to mention, Gilliam got some more speed to start with, which is always helpful (even if the growth loss hurts a bit). The added skill growth will help with hitting with axes, too. All in all, pretty nice boosts for Gilliam. Now, let's check one of his weapons, since we already looked at the axe. Iron Lance: Rank E. Range 1. Weight 7 (-1). Might 6 (-2). Hit 80. Crit 0. 50 uses (+5). Slightly weaker and slightly lighter. Not exactly a major change. Next, the other one.    Franz - Cavalier: STATS: LV: 1 HP: 20 STR: 7 SKL: 5 SPD: 7 LCK: 4 (+2) DEF: 6 RES: 1 MOV: 7 CON: 9 GROWTHS: HP: 60% (-20%) STR: 55% (+15%) SKL: 40% SPD: 55% (+5%) LCK: 50% (+10%) DEF: 30% (+5%) RES: 35% (+15%) Wow. I did not think Franz needed a buff, but I guess he got one. Who needs HP when you get basically all your other growths buffed? Back when I first played through this hack, the 4 Cav Crew featured heavily into my plans. I think there might be a repeat of that here in this playthrough. Franz is just really good. Also, you'll note that there's a "talk" slot in the stats menu. This will show you who this particular unit can talk to. If there are multiple targets, it'll cycle after some time. And Franz's got a new weapon for us too. Iron Sword: Rank E. Range 1. Weight 5. Might 4 (-1). Hit 90. Crit 0. 50 uses (+4). Meh.  Here you can see a little speech bubble above Franz showing that Seth can talk with him. Very handy feature.  We set up defensively and let them come. Everybody gangs up on Franz this time, I suppose because of better hit odds (in the 30s instead of around 20). Nobody really does anything.  Gilliam takes his axe for a spin and immediately misses and gets hit in return like a dipshit. The rest of the gang does fine.   Seth even gets in on the action and shows me both of his animations in the same battle! Good job, Seth.  And Franz gets a good level killing the last fighter on enemy phase. Good job, Franz.  We then move Gilliam forward to start fighting the soldiers, and let him take his axe for a spin. He's doing pretty good with it. On the other hand, these are soldiers. So, eh.  Surprise! Six new enemies! These guys will come for you, so you might be caught a bit off guard. But still, there's plenty of good defensive terrain nearby that you can use to your advantage.  So we just set up accordingly. We have forts, we'll use them, god damnit. Free healing!  And after two rounds of just letting the enemy approach, this is where we're at. Things are looking pretty good.  Eirika picks up a defensive level killing her fighter.  And after a bit more mopping up, here's where we're at.  Gilliam levels while trying to get rid of the last soldier...  ...while Franz tries to hit the myrmidon on a fort. I'm pretty sure this is the first time anyone's been hit so far. But Gilliam and Franz working together eventually manage to take that one out as well, leaving us with just the boss.  Breguet's gotten a bit beefier as well. +9 HP, +1 STR, +3 SKL, +5 LCK, +6 RES, but -1 CON. I don't get why these early bosses are getting RES boosts. It's literally impossible for us to have magic here! Oh well. Breguet's still slow as gently caress, though.  Alright, Eirika. Take care of him!  ...no, Eirika. That's not how that works. That is in fact the absolute opposite of how it's supposed to work! Also, check the neat new battle window for when you have animations off.  And then you crit on enemy phase for a one-shot. I'll take it. Both Eirika and Franz are now at 98 and 99 EXP respectively, so we'll see some levels next chapter.  I also went and checked the houses, but they seem to be the same as vanilla.  So let's just finish this chapter.  Free money!  And that'll be it for this time. Again, not too long an update, but I just wanted to get on the weekly rhythm I wanted. I'll probably end up condensing two chapters into one update next time if they end up short as well, but we'll see how that goes. See you next Thursday!
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Nov 5, 2020 19:56
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Those Franz buffs are ludicrous.
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Nov 5, 2020 20:19
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This isn't going to be one of those 'all the female characters get nerfed, all the men get buffed' mods, is it?
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Nov 5, 2020 20:27
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Cythereal posted:This isn't going to be one of those 'all the female characters get nerfed, all the men get buffed' mods, is it? Oh no. Not at all. This is an "everyone's gotten buffed but they're going to need it to deal with what's coming" kind of situation.
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Nov 5, 2020 20:42
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Yeah Franz was always good, buffing him that much (and leaving Eirika with such minor touch-ups) seems weird. 5-move knights are good but... Gil didn't need his speed growth nerfed even with a slightly buffed base. And i don't like Seth's new animation much. GBAFE animations need to respect the platform! Don't just have the characters stand on empty air!  His crit is really boring, too.
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Nov 6, 2020 06:29
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vilkacis posted:And i don't like Seth's new animation much. GBAFE animations need to respect the platform! Don't just have the characters stand on empty air! I'll second the crit comment, it's impressive just how lame that crit is.
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Nov 6, 2020 13:56
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Seth's new animations are weird, and I agree the sword ones are pretty lacklustre, but it's worth noting that he also has completely different animations when using axes and lances, and I thought those looked a bit better.
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Nov 6, 2020 14:05
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I think Seth's sword animations are bad mostly bc they took cues from Great Knight's sword animation without considering why those animations work in practice. If you compare the two you'll notice what I mean immediately. There's just no sense of momentum and that makes for a real weak animation.
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Nov 6, 2020 15:46
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It also seems to have relatively few smears, which makes it feel much more stilted compared to most other sprites.
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Nov 6, 2020 21:02
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Wow... definitely excited to see how insane this gets later.
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Nov 8, 2020 21:02
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Update III - Don't Fire Emblem While Tired Alright, we're on the world map. Nothing has changed here. However, we have two new units to look at!    Vanessa - Pegasus Knight: STATS: LV: 2 (+1) HP: 20 (+3) STR: 5 SKL: 8 (+1) SPD: 11 LCK: 6 (+2) DEF: 6 RES: 5 MOV: 7 CON: 5 GROWTHS: HP: 50% STR: 35% SKL: 55% SPD: 65% (+5%) LCK: 55% (+5%) DEF: 20% RES: 40% (+10%) Slim Lance: Rank E. Range 1. Weight 4. Might 4. Hit 90 (+5). Crit 15 (+10). 50 uses (+20). Javelin: Rank D (formerly E). Range 1-2. Weight 10 (-1). Might 5 (-1). Hit 65. Crit 0. 50 uses (+30). So, the first thing you'll notice is that Vanessa got herself a new haircut. Why? I don't know, and stop asking, because if you'll ask that for every change, we'll be here all day. Otherwise, Vanessa didn't see too much of a change, which I would have expected, given that she's already top tier. Then again, Franz is top tier too, and he got a buff, so again, don't ask, we'll be here all day. Vanessa mainly seems to have gotten a free level with a bit of extra HP, which will help her survive just a bit more. Nothing major on the growths either. The slim lance got the crit boost we've already seen with the slim sword, and the javelin got possibly nerfed? It got lighter, which helps, but it lost a point of damage, which doesn't. However, the global 50 use thing seems to push it back into buff, at least as far as the "throw four javelins on one unit and just have them counter everything forever" strategy goes.    Moulder - Priest: STATS: LV: 3 HP: 20 MAG: 5 (+1) SKL: 4 (-2) SPD: 9 LCK: 1 DEF: 3 (+1) RES: 5 MOV: 5 CON: 9 GROWTHS: HP: 65% (-5%) MAG: 50% (+10%) SKL: 45% (-5%) SPD: 35% (-5%) LCK: 30% (+10%) DEF: 35% (+10%) RES: 50% (+25%) Heal: Rank E. Range 1. Weight 2. 50 uses (+20). Heals 10 HP + MAG / 2. Use gives 15 EXP (+4). Seems like Moulder is getting a bit more tanky and a bit more powerful, but less accurate and fast. Which I guess is appropriate for a manly man like Moulder. Otherwise, not a lot interesting here. The light boost to EXP for healing is welcomed, should help in getting healing units up to promotion levels without spamming Barrier or Torch or whatever.  Now, on to the actual chapter.   This map is by and large unchanged, which is fairly uncommon. However, it does have a few tricks up its sleeve. Now, let's start by looking at our recruits-to-be.    Garcia - Fighter: STATS: LV: 4 HP: 28 STR: 9 (+1) SKL: 8 (+1) SPD: 7 LCK: 4 DEF: 6 RES: 1 MOV: 5 CON: 12 (-2) GROWTHS: HP: 75% (-10%) STR: 60% (-5%) SKL: 40% SPD: 30% (+10%) LCK: 40% DEF: 40% (+15%) RES: 20% (+5%) Hand Axe: Rank D (formerly E). Range 1-2. Weight 11 (-1). Might 7. Hit 60. Crit 0. 50 uses (+30). Garcia seems to have been made a lot more well-rounded, gaining growths in his weak points and losing them in his strong points. A 50% increase in speed growth in particular (in that his rate went from 20% to 30%, increased by 10 percent points) is very welcome. He has however lost some weight and will be weighed down by some high tier axes, which seems to point towards Hero for his promotion choice.    Ross - Journeyman: STATS: LV: 1 HP: 15 STR: 5 SKL: 4 (+2) SPD: 5 (+2) LCK: 8 DEF: 3 RES: 0 MOV: 4 CON: 8 GROWTHS: HP: 65% (-5%) STR: 45% (-5%) SKL: 50% (+15%) SPD: 45% (+15%) LCK: 50% (+10%) DEF: 30% (+5%) RES: 25% (+5%) Slim Axe: Rank E. Range 1. Weight 5. Might 5. Hit 85. Crit 15. 50 uses. Ross is in a lot better position than he is in vanilla. Boosts to skill and speed right off the bat help him hit and not get doubled / possibly double himself, which will help him gain EXP and get over that early difficulty curve of surviving to his first promotion. His growths overall have gotten a good boost, and much like with his father, the big speed boost is very welcome. And as you might have noticed, Ross has a completely new weapon: A slim axe. This essentially replaces his hatchet, and while he doesn't get a light 1-2 range option, as with the other slim weapons, the crit boost will be very helpful.  So, we start with the usual moves for this chapter. Pick up Garcia...  ...get some stuff from the villages...  ...Eirika proves herself to be a Master Of Disguise (and gets a red gem)...  ...and the rest of the gang moves forward.  ...uh, hang on.  ...right. I was supposed to rescue *Ross*, not Garcia. I, uh, kinda fell asleep at the wheel there. Let's try that again, this time with, uh, less derp. Resets: 1 Yeah, we're keeping track. This number is going up eventually.  There. Turn 1 done, and this time I actually went and rescued Ross.  Nothing much going on turn 2 either. Recruited Ross and kept moving forward.  Turn 3, Seth starts moving towards the village, Vanessa rescues Garcia for eventual recruiting, and the rest gets ready to fight, with Franz taking point on the fort with a sword.  Eirika keeps getting myrmidonier.  Franz, meanwhile, just gets better.   Surprise! Of course this map has a few more extra reinforcements, and they additionally mix up the weapon triangle situation on this map, going from very axe-focused to still axe-focused, but with everything else mixed in just to make things a bit more complicated. The myrmidon makes it more difficult to get the village, since he spawns right in front of it, but I don't think Seth will have any trouble.  So we split up. Garcia and Ross head for the soldiers, Eirika takes the reinforcement brigand, Seth keeps going for the village, and Franz takes the rest of the brigands. Vanessa and Gilliam just kinda hang around.  Surprise! The reinforcements were so nice, we do them twice! Things are actually getting a bit crowded. Thankfully, weapon triangle advantage will help us deal with basically everything.  One turn later, and things are a lot more cleaned up.  Ross gets a kinda crappy level cleaning up a soldier.  Seth picks up some stuff I'll probably sell, and we're now down to just the boss. And I hope he won't go for Seth, but for Franz, because I kinda want him to get that EXP.  Speaking of the boss, he gets +2 STR, -1 SKL, +3 SPD, +6 LCK and +4 RES compared to his vanilla hard mode counterpart. Not too shabby.  Thankfully, he does go for Franz.  Then Eirika and Franz soften him up some more. Vanessa misses a 27 hit javelin chance for a kill, so I just end turn and let the guy pick his death.  He picks Eirika.  Eirika, you have a 45% strength growth. loving HIT IT.  And that'll be it for this chapter. I guess I'll stick with one chapter per update for now. If I build up too much of a backlog, I can always post faster. Anyway, see you next time, when we get a new map again!
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Nov 12, 2020 12:28
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Vanessa's changes are... interesting. I'll admit I'm VERY curious as to why her level increased. It's just by one, sure, but... I guess it brings her more in-line with the other people around this point? I think if Moulder didn't just point-blank get buffs to his base (oh no, someone who won't be attacking for at least six levels has two less skill, which is already a not-very-important stat. whatever shall we do.) it'd be less weird to me. Or if they buffed anything actually meaningful. I am fully aware I care entirely too much about this, by the way. :V
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Nov 12, 2020 17:40
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Almost everyone gets level increases starting from this point (barring the trainees), I think the creator said they basically wanted every non-trainee character to be usable immediately when you get them without needing to be babied. I'm not sure why Vanessa needed one specifically, but I'm not going to complain either. (Don't ask me about the hairstyle thing either, I think ChinaFE started it and then other hacks started doing it too? although this isn't the same one ChinaFE used.) Incidentally, I honestly think Vanessa is the worst flying unit in the game now (at least in terms of raw stats), thanks to buffs other characters have gotten. This isn't a bad thing, though - she's still great, and she's also the only one you have for the first 9 chapters so you're probably using her no matter what. I had four flyers on my team and didn't ever regret it. Moulder's pretty good although he ended up having some speed problems for me; all that con is great (and there are some heavy tomes in this) but reducing the penalty doesn't do much if he can't double anyway. With how big the maps get in this, having multiple healers helps out a lot, he's another character I kind of felt was forced regardless of whether I wanted to use him (that said, I like Moulder).
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Nov 12, 2020 18:00
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quote:Moulder - Priest: Unacceptable. Don't even start editing Moulder if you're not going to make him huge, coward! 
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Nov 12, 2020 19:06
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okay but why did they edit Vanessa's sprite
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Nov 12, 2020 19:20
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vilkacis posted:Unacceptable. Don't even start editing Moulder if you're not going to make him huge, coward! 
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Nov 12, 2020 20:05
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theshim posted:okay but why did they edit Vanessa's sprite 
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Nov 12, 2020 21:21
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Explopyro posted:Almost everyone gets level increases starting from this point (barring the trainees), I think the creator said they basically wanted every non-trainee character to be usable immediately when you get them without needing to be babied. Vanessa definitely needed a HP/Luk(/Skill??) level to be usable immediately, sure. 
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Nov 12, 2020 22:03
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vilkacis posted:Unacceptable. Don't even start editing Moulder if you're not going to make him huge, coward! Incidentally, vilkacis, I'm pretty sure this hack is using the version of Innes you made for Restoration Queen. I recognised some of the other battle sprites that have been inserted, too (but not all of them), I wonder if they were drawing on some common repository or something.
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Nov 12, 2020 22:55
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Vanessa's boost is a bit weird, but +3 HP is actually pretty nice considering her base was so bad before.
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Nov 13, 2020 02:01
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Explopyro posted:Incidentally, vilkacis, I'm pretty sure this hack is using the version of Innes you made for Restoration Queen. I recognised some of the other battle sprites that have been inserted, too (but not all of them), I wonder if they were drawing on some common repository or something. Yea, there's a big repository of free to use animations maintained at feuniverse. Quite a lot of them.
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Nov 13, 2020 13:04
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Update IV - Eirika Lacks The Strength To Carry On Welcome back! So, Eirika got some stuff yoinked and we're getting it back now.  This chapter's map has seen quite the overhaul again.   This map has been drastically expanded from the original. Lots more enemies. This hack has a lot more EXP to go around. Now, we have a new party member!    Neimi - Archer: STATS: LV: 1 HP: 20 (+3) STR: 5 (+1) SKL: 5 SPD: 6 LCK: 5 (+1) DEF: 3 RES: 2 MOV: 6 CON: 6 GROWTHS: HP: 50% (-5%) STR: 45% SKL: 50% SPD: 60% LCK: 55% (+5%) DEF: 20% (+5%) RES: 40% (+5%) Not a lot has changed here. Neimi got ever so slightly more survivable in the early on by getting a few points of HP but losing it in the long term because of growths. She also has a very slight boost to defensive stats. Meh. As for the weapons... Iron Bow: Rank E. Range 2. Weight 5. Might 5 (-1). Hit 90 (+5). Crit 0. 50 uses. Slim Bow: Rank E (formerly D). Range 2. Weight 3. Might 3 (-2). Hit 100 (+15). Crit 15 (+5). 50 uses. The slim bow stats are relative to the short bow, in case you're wondering. It seems low level bows are being made more accurate here. Not sure the slim bow fills a real niche here since nobody needs a super low weight bow to not be weighed down, but I guess the 15 crit makes it interesting as a smaller brother to the killer bow.  The welcoming committee is dispatched relatively easily, though the mage gets to attack one more time. However, his magic stat is pretty low (2), so he's not a real threat either.  Some brigands show up next and are dispatched by their arch nemesis: People With Swords.  Franz apparently poo poo his pants at seeing that mage and decided he needs to prepare for magic above all.  Colm shows up after the next enemy phase, but with the camera at his previous spawn point.  However, he starts in the completely opposite corner.  Next, some soldiers try their luck and don't fare much better than the brigands.  While moving up, we pick up Colm. And with that, let's take a look at him.    Colm - Thief: STATS: LV: 2 HP: 20 (+2) STR: 4 SKL: 4 SPD: 10 LCK: 8 DEF: 3 RES: 1 MOV: 6 CON: 6 GROWTHS: HP: 60% (-15%) STR: 40% SKL: 40% SPD: 60% (-5%) LCK: 55% (+10%) DEF: 25% RES: 20% ...well. Those sure are some stats, I guess. I mean, that's really not a lot changed. At least Neimi had it spread around a bit more. Iron Sword: Rank E. Range 1. Weight 5. Might 4 (-1). Hit 90. Crit 0. 50 uses. Iron sword nerf! Alrighty then. That's not going to help Colm get levels. I guess he doesn't really need them?  Ross gets some more speed whacking around those stationary soldiers since he needs the training.  We spend two turns getting everybody caught up to move into the next room with these stationary enemies. Sword guys are more fearsome than axe guys or lance guys right now, though a coordinated assault is probably still more than they can handle.  Neimi gets some strength taking out the myrmidon.  A myrmidon comes and joins the fun, and while the archer does move, the mercenary stays put.  Franz misses a 94 because he can.  Still, the barrels do give us a lot of opportunity to keep vulnerable units safe - not that the mercenary would have moved if he had the opportunity to smack Neimi around, but whatever.  Gilliam gets to hit even harder after the myrmidon suicided on him by way of doing no damage.  We start moving forward again, with Vanessa taking some snipes at a myrmidon because she can. Again, not a lot of movement on these guys. This will change fairly soon.  Vanessa gets some strength, and really, that's all she needs this early.  We steal the gold the archer would've dropped anyway. I now know that stealing gives 20 EXP.  A bit of splitting up ensues to go and grab all the chests.  Eirika lures out a brigand, and... STRENGTH! STREEEEEEEEENGTH! loving GET IT! Anyway, Franz kills the brigand with Bazba, so let's see how Franz does against Bazba himself.  ...could be a lot better, honestly. Let's take a look.   Steel Axe: Rank D (formerly E). Range 1. Weight 11 (-4). Might 10 (-1). Hit 70 (+5). Crit 0. 50 uses (+20). Dang. Bazba gets +7 HP, +1 STR, +2 SKL, +3 LCK and +5 RES compared to his vanilla hard mode counterpart, and more importantly, the steel axe doesn't weigh him down any more, so that makes him a bit harder to double, as Franz has just realized. And that addition to his HP will make him harder to whittle down too. Let's just let Franz wait and see what happens.  ...I don't think this is sustainable.  Franz gets another attempt after getting healed up while Ross and Eirika clear the way for Colm to rob those chests, and, uh, not going well.  At least he'll hit harder.  Ross gets faster.  While Franz gets healed, I check how Garcia does, and, uh, no. Eirika might be our best bet here.  Meanwhile, Colm pilfers chests.  And he finds this! Dragon Tear: Adds +10% to every stat growth rate. Oh yes. Double Metis's Tome. This is very handy. Also, this won't be the only one of these we find in the early game. This will let us choose a few units to turn into real poo poo wreckers.  As such, Vanessa is the one that gets the first of these.  Thing of beauty.  Also, meanwhile, Franz is like one for four on dodging these steel axes.  So because Franz is incompetent, Eirika picks up the slack. Even without getting strength.  And being incredibly gracious, she even sets up the kill for Franz.  Double digit strength and speed, that's pretty good.  Colm nabs an angelic robe as well. Angelic Robe: Raises maximum HP by 5 (-2). Huh. Angelic robe nerf. Not sure why that's a thing, but OK, whatever.  I stick it on Ross, since he's got the lowest HP in the crew right now, and so he can use an early boost.  And that'll be it for this map!  See you next time, when we get to fight some monsters and see to it that we do not become monsters.
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Nov 19, 2020 17:49
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Strength was always an issue for Erica he devs just exacerbated the issue with other nerfs
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Nov 19, 2020 18:11
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Neimi also lost a point of base speed, because ??? Colm is just...worse, for some reason??? A growth booster this early is kinda nutso, especially given that it's a 10% boost. Really lets anyone become a wrecking ball (on average  ).
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Nov 19, 2020 18:58
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The more updates come, the less I understand the logic in these stat changes.
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Nov 19, 2020 19:32
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We're definitely starting to see the core map design philosophy of this hack, which is "make everything take longer". That's not always bad, but some of these become real slogs. Irrespective of nerfs, Colm is basically a mandatory character in this hack, IMO. There are so many good items to steal in the coming chapters (including a bunch of stat boosters and accessories), and most of them show up before Rennac.
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Nov 19, 2020 22:21
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Seraphic Neoman posted:Strength was always an issue for Erica he devs just exacerbated the issue with other nerfs I mean, Eirika has a 45% strength growth here. That's on par with Neimi (OK, possibly not so impressive) and Ross (maybe a bit more impressive as a comparison - albeit not with what we've seen out of Ross so far). It *shouldn't* be an issue. Blaze Dragon posted:The more updates come, the less I understand the logic in these stat changes. I'm not sure if there's a logic to be understood in some of them. I just take them as they go now.
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Nov 24, 2020 00:33
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