Oh I eliminate the ambush the second it comes into play (hell last round in they all threw themselves at my mages the moment they spawned and killed themselves), but it fucks up the squad formation afterwards and the AI 'unleashes' and begins throwing itself at you at that point, so between trying to keep all my units alive while avoiding the foxy dark mage so Chrom can chat to her it's all a huge fucking headache
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Fire Emblem Awakening |OT2| PAL reinforcements
- Thread starter Shahadan
- Start date
Thank you for the responses. Blocking seems like a very good strategy, enchanced by having extra bodies. I can see that useful to prevent the hard counters like the hammer on knights. Except I don't use any knights really lol, 3/4 of my units have "no weaknesses" am I doing something wrong. I have a lot of theif like characters.
chaosblade
Unconfirmed Member
Oh, that chapter? Those never gave me any trouble. You should have most of your units around to the south side of the map by the time they start showing up (remember the tiles by the wall are a path so you can move further!). So you can just use a couple units that will be effective against wyverns back and let them handle it.
If you have a mage with decent defense or paired with Kellam (or both) that should work pretty well, especially if they have Elwind. Otherwise a reclassed Donnel should do, assuming you made him a Mercenary and not a Fighter.
Remember that the AI will always attack a unit in their range if possible, rather than skipping by them to get closer to another unit to attack on the next turn. So you can take advantage of that and keep them from your main party.
If you got the physic stave from the second paralogue that could also be useful to keep your wyvern killer healed without getting too close.
Edit: Well, I guess you're already sort of taking advantage of what I said. I've never had any trouble getting through that map quickly though so I'd have Tharja and be at the southern part of the map finishing off those units before the wyverns even start to show up.
dakkumauji
Member
Also, IIRC, along the wall, there should be some spots that are plains and not desert that you could use your non-magic users to walk along.
sorakirosaki
Member
just so im not mistaken this is the chapter where u recruit
tharja and the war cleric (i cant recall his name) right?
I kinda feel like diving into hard mode straight up wasn't the wisest idea, especially since in FE I'm super OCD about not losing units (unlike XCOM).
Units who have died before a timeline reset so far in this goddamn desert: Mirabelle (single axe blow to the face), Ricken (arrowed then axed), Sumia (axed, dodged three more axes and then got axed) and Lissa (random critical hit)
HawthorneKitty
Sgt. 2nd Class in the Creep Battalion, Waifu Wars
I like you, you have your name priorities in order.
And yes, that is the chapter mentioned.
It's the reason I recommend normal/classic or hard/casual; there are definitiley some sore spots that veterans just gloss over but new guys to the series might have some issues on these maps.
You should have a mage/a good sword melee trailing behind your main force here (Donnel/Lon'Qu) to clean up here. Even the warmonk that you recruit on this chapter can be used here.
There is another out as you can use the dlc/spotpasses to grind a mage/sword unit to help here.
Aveyn Knight
Member
I always start on the easiest setting, so I can study where the reinforcements come from. Then I get less headaches when facing the instantly moving reinforcements on harder settings.
This game's Normal mode is way too easy for anybody who's played a FE though...
Also, just got The Golden Gaffe and Harvest Scramble. Yay at more grinding options.
This game's Normal mode is way too easy for anybody who's played a FE though...
Also, just got The Golden Gaffe and Harvest Scramble. Yay at more grinding options.
The Awesomest
Member
Hey, don't use plural there. The second DS game is quite good, and introduced several new features that Awakening uses.
chaosblade
Unconfirmed Member
So reinforcements DO appear on those forts. I've never seen them because I always made sure to cover the forts.
Antiwhippy
the holder of the trombone
I have tharja x libra, sully x virion, sumia x frederick and FeMU x chrom.
I'm probably the most boring and straight forward shipper.
I'm probably the most boring and straight forward shipper.
sorakirosaki
Member
Honestly if thats the chapter i would equip your units with some vulnearies or elixers to get that quick fix if ure healer is too far away also i would move further into that map once you have cleared the first portion ie all the enemy units up to the first fortress.
if i recall libra moves towards chrom
tharja
I have issues with that tharja x libra pairing
tauroxd
Member
That's right. But if you are not in trouble and could handle reinforcements it's more fun to let them come, they are not infinite.
I'm not sure which fort he's talking about, there's about 4 of them on that stage 2 by Libra/2 above Tharja. They start coming out pretty earlier in that chapter above the ones by Tharja (around turn 3-4); and by that time I'm usually positining my army so I can't kill Tharja by mistake; and occupying the two western forts (the ones by Libra).
Neoriceisgood
Member
This is my first FE ever btw, any advice or tips so I don't make mistakes early on?
sorakirosaki
Member
What difficulty and are you playing casual or classic?
In any case try to use pair up strategically and dont forget to recruit the green knight in chapter 4 (cuz
kellam gets no love
1. Frederick is a scalpel, not a hammer. Use him sparingly otherwise you army falls behind pretty quickly.
2. Focus on a few units, the games throws a million of them at you. Your end game team will probably have about 8-14 units.
3. Chrom and the avatar are really really good; if you need to focus on two units early game, focus on them.
Check the enemies on the map of the chapter before you start the battle. Look at their levels, their skills, their weapons and make sure you can actually take them on.
Neoriceisgood
Member
What difficulty and are you playing casual or classic?
In any case try to use pair up strategically and dont forget to recruit the green knight in chapter 4 (cuzkellam gets no love
Hard difficulty, classic.
And I know I won't let people die. I'll keep my cutie-army safe!
chaosblade
Unconfirmed Member
Don't overuse Frederick, instead use him to pair up and strengthen other units or in case of emergencies. As a Great Knight he's in a promoted class so he's actually 20 levels higher than what his displayed level is. That means his experience gain will be tiny compared to your other units.
Don't use Master Seals on units that aren't level 20. Or, if you use second seals, wait until you start capping stats (stats will turn green) to use master seals. Using them early means you are skipping levels. And by skipping levels your stats end up low relative to your experience gain, and that means your units will end up weaker than they could/should be, making the game harder.
As soon as you can...
Pause.
Wireless.
Bonus Box.
Bonus Teams.
Scroll down to "Radiant Dawn".
Summon Edward.
Fight.
Easy, great way to get some levels and relationship.
I'll be honest, it might be a little rough on you in the beginning. Don't be afraid to grind up a bit using spotpass/dlc if you think you are falling behind. Anyway, just try not to get to frustrated (like Jintor was here).
sorakirosaki
Member
nothing you just lose a chance at getting an item
Nothing, you only recruit her from her side story, not in a random battle
I think she'll say that was a different Anna or something if you fail to save the Anna in the random battle
chaosblade
Unconfirmed Member
Nothing really. You won't be able to use her shop and get whatever items she had available.
If you save her you get a reward, plus access to whatever items she was selling.
Neoriceisgood
Member
I wish this game allowed gay marriage. I already wanna put Stahl and Teach together.
sorakirosaki
Member
Ah yeah hard classic
as others have been saying try to not use fredrick too much or use him as pair up bait (his +1 mov is really helpful getting around) or use him to bring the hp down of enemies so u can pick em off with your weaker units (give the bronze sword your Avatar has to make this possible) As for seals i personally think its a case by case basis ( since in the end of it all you can max out all your units in the long run) but it if you want skills early use master seals at lvl 10 but if you want really strong units for the main game and skills arent a factor then promote at 20
The english voices arent bad (if the voice actors didnt change from the american version) and they hold up preety well against the japanese ones ( i personally like sumia's english voice more then her japanese one for example while i enjoy Chrom's japanese voice more as well as lissa's ) but yeah just try em both out and see which ones you like more
edit: stupid words why can't I spell you properly!
chaosblade
Unconfirmed Member
Ah yeah hard classic
As for seals i personally think its a case by case basis ( since in the end of it all you can max out all your units in the long run) but it if you want skills early use master seals at lvl 10 but if you want really strong units for the main game and skills arent a factor then promote at 20
I really wouldn't recommend a new player use master seals at level 10, because your units are going to be a lot weaker in the long run without grinding.
And even though you can grind to make up for it, it still makes things slower since your earlier levels go faster due to a lower (or 0) internal level. So it's a shame to waste 10 of those faster levels.
sorakirosaki
Member
Ah thats true but i find even just second sealing helps make your units a bit stronger as well or ive been using seals wrong and ive just become acustomed to grinding lol
Starwolf_UK
Member
I totally noticed that when I was nearly done with the map. I was like "how come virion had no trouble while sully got stuck in the sand...".
dakkumauji
Member
Dunno, I would have just assumed it was cause Sully is mounted and Virion is not.
I believe most of the desert maps expect probably the paralouge one all have some plains lying around so your units don't get completely stuck in the sand.
chaosblade
Unconfirmed Member
Paralogue sand map has plains too, around the water.
Finished this on Hard-Classic yesterday with no deaths. Overall, I liked the game and consider it one of the better SRPGs out there, (as well as just one of the better games I've played recently in general) but there were quite a few things that bothered me.
Awakening Specific
Pair ups. At first, I loved the system. (and still do to some degree.) Ties in with the game's relationship system nicely, makes it possible to actually bring your squishy units into an engagement rather than having to Physic spam in the back, and allows you to overcome movement limitations by giving slower units high mobility partners. By the end, though, I felt that it was just too good. I entered most fights pairing up most, if not all, of my units and I would have liked there to be some more tradeoff to it where you actually need to consider leaving a unit outside of a pairing. When the ferrying and shielding aspects mentioned before also come with the S rank huge stat bonuses, high probability for second attacks, (especially abusive with high speed party members and/or dual attack weapons) and decent chances for straight up invulnerability, there's little to no reason not to utilize the system for everyone that you can. While you can obtain the same bonuses through careful positioning while leaving units outside a pair AND get to use those units separately at the same time, there often isn't room to leverage this and the approach entails too much risk for your weaker units that would be shielded in a pairing and murdered by the AI's one track spiteful mind if exposed. (Would be interesting to see how such a system would fare, balance wise, in a hex based FE, where using more units side by side would be more feasible)
Grinding. I was determined to complete the game playing nothing but the main story and paralogues. (No spotpass, dlc, random encounters, etc.) I was only playing Hard because I had to give up lunatic fairly quickly when I realized the difficulty assumed I would and started seeing major level discrepancies between my units and the enemies. Even in hard, I had to grind a little by lategame to proceed. I consider the ability to grind/need to grind pretty much inherently flawed game design with little exception and I'm disappointed that it's been integrated into FE. I thought that FE was one of the few series that did experience and leveling in an interesting way by making it a scarce resource to be managed among the team rather than the padding/crutch it is in other series. I don't want to have to second guess whether the current section of the game I'm playing is balanced for me, even having completed all of the main content preceding it. I could do a whole post and rant on this alone, but it's more of a general philosophy than a specific critique of FE, so I'll just end it here. I hope future installments reconsider this inclusion.
A few encounters. Most of the maps were great, but I felt that, in particular, the final encounter and any encounter where you simply ball up and wait for units to crash into yours (
, for example) really lacked anything interesting from a tactical perspective. The former just entails zerging the boss, for lack of a better term, and the latter simply involves the enemies zerging you. In both cases, strategy and positioning take a backseat to raw stats and just letting the fights play out, which is dull, ESPECIALLY for a final encounter.
Series
Reinforcements. Yes, the game warns you in advance a lot of the time, but there are times where you have no advance notice and, more importantly, times when advance notice is meaningless as the reinforcements are a) pegasi/cavalry and b) approach from random locations rather than designated spots like the forts. Preparing based on a warning for those sorts of engagements would amount to little more than hunkering down in the center of the map with your squishy units held in the center, which is not tactically rewarding, strategically demanding, or fun. The fact that the units get to act right after appearing adds even further to the "gotcha" feeling the difficulty brought on by those spawns inspire. Would it be too much to ask for highlighted squares indicating the spawn locations the turn before the reinforcements?
Enemy AI. The way the enemies play to make you lose rather than win gives the difficulty a cheap feeling where I don't feel that I'm ever being strategically bested, just game'd by an AI aware of the compulsive rules gamers play by with this series. Encounters become a matter of keeping the tankiest guys in range while the rest hover just out of it (or only in range of 1 unit/units that can't do much to it/etc.) or stay paired to a tanky unit and don't get used. I realize this is not a new nor unique criticism, but add another vote to the request to have more player like AI.
RNG. It's just too prevalent. I don't see why stats should be tied to RNG at all- some units end up weak, some end up overpowered, some end up in line for their class; why not just balance the game around a set growth rate for each class/char combination? Furthermore, given the dmg:health pool ratio, rng has a disproportionately high effect in combat, where a single crit/dodge/second attack/guard is often the difference between life and death, assuming units are of a similar power level. I don't find it rewarding when I win because a 15% crit chance proc'd on counterattack after I dodged an 85% hit chance lethal attack nor do I find it challenging to be beaten by the same scenario flipped- I just find it random and it lessens the feel that my strategy actually matters.
That ended up being a lot longer than I anticipated and I realize I sound pretty negative, but the game is good on the whole; I just feel like, in general, a decent portion of the challenge stems from aspects that don't really have anything to do with the player's decision making and skill. I hope the next installment will take into account criticisms like these. (if they're even prevalent enough to get noticed- given Awakening's series high reception, I'm not so sure more negative criticisms like these are even being discussed) Might do a min/max run on lunatic+ in the future at some point, but, for now, I think I've had my fill of the series and will take a break from it for a while.
Awakening Specific
Pair ups. At first, I loved the system. (and still do to some degree.) Ties in with the game's relationship system nicely, makes it possible to actually bring your squishy units into an engagement rather than having to Physic spam in the back, and allows you to overcome movement limitations by giving slower units high mobility partners. By the end, though, I felt that it was just too good. I entered most fights pairing up most, if not all, of my units and I would have liked there to be some more tradeoff to it where you actually need to consider leaving a unit outside of a pairing. When the ferrying and shielding aspects mentioned before also come with the S rank huge stat bonuses, high probability for second attacks, (especially abusive with high speed party members and/or dual attack weapons) and decent chances for straight up invulnerability, there's little to no reason not to utilize the system for everyone that you can. While you can obtain the same bonuses through careful positioning while leaving units outside a pair AND get to use those units separately at the same time, there often isn't room to leverage this and the approach entails too much risk for your weaker units that would be shielded in a pairing and murdered by the AI's one track spiteful mind if exposed. (Would be interesting to see how such a system would fare, balance wise, in a hex based FE, where using more units side by side would be more feasible)
Grinding. I was determined to complete the game playing nothing but the main story and paralogues. (No spotpass, dlc, random encounters, etc.) I was only playing Hard because I had to give up lunatic fairly quickly when I realized the difficulty assumed I would and started seeing major level discrepancies between my units and the enemies. Even in hard, I had to grind a little by lategame to proceed. I consider the ability to grind/need to grind pretty much inherently flawed game design with little exception and I'm disappointed that it's been integrated into FE. I thought that FE was one of the few series that did experience and leveling in an interesting way by making it a scarce resource to be managed among the team rather than the padding/crutch it is in other series. I don't want to have to second guess whether the current section of the game I'm playing is balanced for me, even having completed all of the main content preceding it. I could do a whole post and rant on this alone, but it's more of a general philosophy than a specific critique of FE, so I'll just end it here. I hope future installments reconsider this inclusion.
A few encounters. Most of the maps were great, but I felt that, in particular, the final encounter and any encounter where you simply ball up and wait for units to crash into yours (
Tiki's paralogue
Series
Reinforcements. Yes, the game warns you in advance a lot of the time, but there are times where you have no advance notice and, more importantly, times when advance notice is meaningless as the reinforcements are a) pegasi/cavalry and b) approach from random locations rather than designated spots like the forts. Preparing based on a warning for those sorts of engagements would amount to little more than hunkering down in the center of the map with your squishy units held in the center, which is not tactically rewarding, strategically demanding, or fun. The fact that the units get to act right after appearing adds even further to the "gotcha" feeling the difficulty brought on by those spawns inspire. Would it be too much to ask for highlighted squares indicating the spawn locations the turn before the reinforcements?
Enemy AI. The way the enemies play to make you lose rather than win gives the difficulty a cheap feeling where I don't feel that I'm ever being strategically bested, just game'd by an AI aware of the compulsive rules gamers play by with this series. Encounters become a matter of keeping the tankiest guys in range while the rest hover just out of it (or only in range of 1 unit/units that can't do much to it/etc.) or stay paired to a tanky unit and don't get used. I realize this is not a new nor unique criticism, but add another vote to the request to have more player like AI.
RNG. It's just too prevalent. I don't see why stats should be tied to RNG at all- some units end up weak, some end up overpowered, some end up in line for their class; why not just balance the game around a set growth rate for each class/char combination? Furthermore, given the dmg:health pool ratio, rng has a disproportionately high effect in combat, where a single crit/dodge/second attack/guard is often the difference between life and death, assuming units are of a similar power level. I don't find it rewarding when I win because a 15% crit chance proc'd on counterattack after I dodged an 85% hit chance lethal attack nor do I find it challenging to be beaten by the same scenario flipped- I just find it random and it lessens the feel that my strategy actually matters.
That ended up being a lot longer than I anticipated and I realize I sound pretty negative, but the game is good on the whole; I just feel like, in general, a decent portion of the challenge stems from aspects that don't really have anything to do with the player's decision making and skill. I hope the next installment will take into account criticisms like these. (if they're even prevalent enough to get noticed- given Awakening's series high reception, I'm not so sure more negative criticisms like these are even being discussed) Might do a min/max run on lunatic+ in the future at some point, but, for now, I think I've had my fill of the series and will take a break from it for a while.
Lon Qu is fantastic for a one-man lead or follow. His crit rate & avoid rates are ridiculous, as is his strength. He almost seems way OP at times.
I'm playing on hard with perma, and have lost Kellam and Gregory. Pour one out. Kellam died at the very end of a long battle being a wall for the main unit, and Gregory died shielding Nowi
in the very fist stage he appeared on, lol
Senator Soufflé
Member
I've really enjoyed this game so far but have hit a roadblock of sorts.
Morgan's side mission seems impossible on Hard, I have no units able to make it over to her by the 1st enemy turn in which she gets immediately killed by a myrmidon. Has this happened to anyone else or how can I get round this?
Morgan's side mission seems impossible on Hard, I have no units able to make it over to her by the 1st enemy turn in which she gets immediately killed by a myrmidon. Has this happened to anyone else or how can I get round this?
chaosblade
Unconfirmed Member
You really shouldn't have to grind, even on hard mode. Even in my screwed up hard mode run the only grinding I did was to raise some characters to match the rest of my party and I was still able to beat it, despite my units being significantly outmatched by the enemies in the last chapter.
I think this could be an okay casual mode change, but I don't think I'd want it to be mandatory. That probably makes me sound like a masochist though.
While I halfway agree, what should the enemy goal be? Specifically target Chrom/the lord character? The enemy has no victory condition other than to make you lose.
Path of Radiance (and Radiant Dawn?) had a fixed growth option, and while it wasn't as "fixed" as the name might make it sound, without abusing the system your units will generally end up as balanced as you would imagine they should be. Nothing ridiculous like your mage having 34 strength and 9 magic. I think that would be a good thing to keep for the series as a whole, but as an option like it was in that game.
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