The fact that I needed two posts just to cover the first leg of this chapter should probably be making you realize this is one of my favourite chapters in the game.
Chapter 3 continued
Before anything else happens, Ethlin Returned Cuan and then herself (yay Return Ring) home so she could promote, plus they each got a bit more arena work done.
To deal with the Cross Knights, I set up Lex (with his Hand Axe) and Cuan (with his Javelin) ahead of the pack (but just outside of Eltshan's range, because you don't fight that guy and live) to soften up as many as possible, while a few other 2 range users hang farther back to hopefully draw in one of them. Lachesis gets as close as she safely can so that with Sylvia's help, she can talk to her brother (that's Eltshan for those keeping track at home) to get the Earth Sword and more importantly to make him leave and go get executed by Shagaal. His troops stay around, but they're a lot more manageable than a guy with 52 attack and a 38% crit rate.
Despite screwing up my placement for Sylvia's dance (I ended up forgetting to put Lachesis in the square, so I had to scramble a bit and sub-optimal people got danced instead of the ones I wanted), I still reduce the enemy to two Cross Knights, one at full HP, the other down to just 10. Not a bad result for one turn's work. Then we get our brief introduction to Trabant, king of southern Thracia. His dragon knights are here to serve as mercenaries and come to attack me, led by a butterfly. Seriously, the guy's name is Papillion. He's also a Harold. Anyway, we'll be seeing more of Trabant later on. Between this game and FE5, you should expect to hear a lot about him, because like Alvis, he's a very interesting character and one I think the writers did an excellent job on.
Ethlin triggers the guards around Silvail to start approaching, then we begin to slaughter them leisurely. I say leisurely because I could kill Shagaal and seize before Papilion and his crew reach me, and I want to kill them for EXP and for the Life Ring butterfly Harold drops. No idea who will get it yet, but I'd rather figure it out later than just skip out on a very handy item. Anyway, while that business happens Ayra nabs the village that gives +1 defense and Fury grabs the +3 strength one. Told you I favour her and her daughter. Expect to see Fee inherit the Hero Lance (duh, she's the only one who can besides *spoilers*) as well as Power and Shield rings, if not even more than that <_<
In the end, Sigurd gets the Life Ring because he was the last person available who could kill Papilion. He probably would have ended up with it eventually anyway, so it's no big deal. Then comes the agony; I'm trying to have Lex kill Shagaal so he can grab the Silver Blade and hold onto it so he can pass it down to Delmud. Shaky hit rates, but it will be worth it to have Delmud actually have a real weapon in gen 2. The ability to use the arena to burn some RNs is kind of helpful here. I hate to play RNG manipulation but it's not like "land one hit at 44% accuracy" is that big a stretch to ask for, and the alternative is to just waste time chipping at him forever to keep his health low enough (because being on a castle heals you every turn). In the end I get what I wanted, and then it's time to fight some pirates and protect the Brigid/Claude/Tiltyu group. But that will happen next update.
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Mistake you're making - overlooking the fact that we might not want to be saved.