Game:

Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance (2005)

Duration: 1:47:40

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6

This is a two part stage, first a regular seize map, then a fight against the Black Knight.

The initial part of the stage isn't too bad. Mostly you just need to rush to deal with the thieves trying to break into the north part of the map and run off with the great items tucked away in those chests. I had Jill push forward with others on the right path to break through the two running off there, and Illyana just sniped the one on the left with the Double Bow with her siege tome.

Speaking of, there are 3 Siege Tomers...for now. But they're pretty far away from each other so it's not too hard to deal with them. Oscar was actually in the most danger, because his Biorhythm happened to be low for the last couple stages in the game, so he struggled to dodge as effectively as he normally does. Gotta love biorhythm's inconsistency. I split my team into three pushing up, but turned it into two teams before progressing past the doors and opening up the rest of the map.

This is because the rest of the map is just bullshit. Once it opens up, THEN you can see the 4 additional Siege Tomers and the Sleep/Silence Staffers just waiting for you. This was particularly annoying because if I had seen the Sleep staff guy I'd have brought a Restore staff along to fix it. But because I didn't have it, I had to deal with Gatrie and Ike getting slept and spending a big chunk of the stage knocked out. This is the stage I got the least BEXP from. In a lot of stages, you get BEXP for finishing the stages quickly enough and slightly less for every turn over a certain turn. But I had to spend a lot of time getting into position to break into this hellhole area and then got slowed down even more by two of my best units being taken out of commission for 5 turns.

Luckily Oscar had learned Savior, a skill that lets him Rescue units without penalty. And as it so happens, bond support bonuses stay active even when Rescued, so Oscar just got to keep that +30 Avoid all to himself while Ike let his sleep status wear off in safety.

Anyways, eventually my guys woke up and we started to make progress. Volke managed to even steal another siege tome since one of the Siege Tomers was set to not move and I could goad him into striking Gatrie at close range. The boss has a ranged weapon and a Brave Lance, so if you get him to attack with the ranged weapon, Volke can also steal a second Brave Lance, which is pretty good.

Once Volke gathers up all the chests and the boss is dealt with, then we move on to part 2 of the stage.

The Black Knight fight is nothing but a huge gamble. If Ike triggers Aether twice, you win, simple as that. If he doesn't trigger it once, you won't beat BK in time due to the 5 turn time limit. If BK triggers Luna twice in a row, Ike is dead without healing (even if he was at his HP cap of 60, Luna deals 34 damage). This means that playing normally, you have to play as safely as possible, making sure to heal anytime Ike is below 35 HP. Because if you lose this fight? You have to do that entire last stage aaaaaaaall over again.

Thankfully, this is on emulator, so I could just make a save state before the start of the fight and take it from there if I died. And I did on the first attempt, since BK proc'd Luna twice and Mist couldn't heal enough to counteract that much damage, and Ike proc'd Aether BEFORE he had taken any damage so he didn't get any HP back from it. Dice Rolls: The Battle! Second attempt, BK didn't proc Luna too much and Ike proc'd Aether later into the fight and brought BK down low enough a regular hit finished him off. By that time, the reinforcements had appeared however and I had to have Ike take out the bishop before he healed BK, so Mist took a spear to the face and went down. But I 100% expected her to die in this fight. There's a reason I only gave her a Mend with 5 uses and a Physic with 3. She has plot armor anyways, so she didn't actually die as far as the story goes, but she's the only combat unit I actually lost. And good riddance. Playing PoR and RD with her in my party has made me hate this character with how poorly she's designed in gameplay.

There's another tactic you can use against BK by having Ike with Nihil and Wrath, to prevent him from using Luna so Ike won't go down when he gets to low HP to proc Wrath. BK is normally immune to crits, but Wrath bypasses that. But that's still just another dice roll, though it is a safer option when you know for sure how much damage BK is dealing. But it's less likely to succeed since you'll have to heal, and wait to get knocked down to lower HP again if Wrath isn't proc'ing quick enough to end the fight. I also tried using a Sleep staff on BK before, but either it kept missing, or he's immune. I think he's immune and the game just doesn't show it.

I really dislike this fight. No matter what you do, it all comes down to RNG. You can prepare as much as you want, but if Ike doesn't proc Aether/Wrath crits throughout the fight, you aren't winning, period.

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