Bethany Plays: SS Chapter 4: The Light to fight the Dark

The tiny blue dots have a specific meaning in the world map. We won't get into that meaning yet, though, but these are actually the majority of destinations.

She will get where she's going before Seth sends them off for those nice earrings.

Serafew is a town on the Renais/Grado border. I think, technically, it's a Grado town?

Wait what

Oh no.

Well, this map looks nice and pleasant.

Hopefully Ephraim's still there. I can't imagine he'd be in much luck, but at least if he's still in Renvall, we know where he is.

At this point? I wouldn't be surprised if an Imperial General has a full guard deployed waiting just for us.

Unfortunately for us, our luck is actually a little bit worse than that.

Those... things were not there when we saw the map a few scenes ago.

The revenants and the bonewalkers, I'll give you. But who is confusing a mogall with a human?

Whatever they are, they're clearly not friendly.

Meanwhile, over in the village.

This monk (no, seriously, that's his job) despairs about the monster attack, as is reasonable for people who are being attacked by monsters.

His friend just stares at him. She likes doing that.

Reasonable advice, but honestly, Lute is way better equipped to deal with monsters than you.

Lute, of course, knows all about monsters and their ilk.

They were apparently described in vivid detail in books. I'd quite like to know who these authors are.

Lute, of course, has her textbooks memorised. Could come in handy, that.

At other times, she just comes off as a bit of a blunt child who has no standards on what is or isn't appropriate conversation.

Artur is going to charge blindly into the thick of the monster horde to help out random passersby.

And insists that Lute not follow his example. Restoration Queen edits this so Artur is making the reasonable suggestion of defending the village instead, but he makes such a poor case for leaving that I don't mind Lute not getting invited.

Apparently, neither does Lute. She's smart, so she actually understands Artur's kind of acting dumb.

The latter is true, but the former is not. Magic is only as powerful as the wielder. It just seems more overwhelming because most characters don't have resistance to it.

Plus, you're tinier than Eirika.

Sadly, this isn't the case, because she's got some defence issues. For now.

To reach us, Artur had to cross two bridges and make a giant loop around to here.

...

The fiends are south of us.

If someone ran up to me screaming that, I think I'd question their sanity and qualifications too.

It's a dirty job, but someone's got to do it. No one ask why it's Artur, though.

Artur: "I don't think I can do this myself."
Artur: "Please go away and leave me to my work."

Apparently Eirika recognises the concept of "fiends".

Although only as fairy tales. This is kind of strange, considering the Demon King is definitely real, and they have the records to prove it. Why wouldn't his minions be real?

What they're doing wandering about now, though, that's a different question.

Depends on why they've come. I'm sure it's not that important a question, though.

Seth interrupts Eirika's important question. Fortunately, this is a legitimate warning.

One of the mogalls has moved up to Artur.

And Artur gets into a fight to show off his magic powers. This doesn't count as a fight on his records- strangely, cutscene fights in FE7 did- and so this isn't technically breaking the All Girls rule.

If it did, there'd be nothing I could do anyway.

Artur pulls off an 8% crit to look extra good fighting this guy. He only has WTA right now, he is no better disposed to handle a mogall than any other unit.

...

YES?

Hooray, new screen! Battle Preparations means we can now reoganise our party composition, builds, and positioning before battles. Not having this screen is second to not having the convoy in being annoying.

Pick Units, Items, and Save are all pretty obvious in what they let you do, while "Check Map" sends you to the other screen you have.

The "Support" tab opens up this listing. This is a place where you can rewatch the conversations and keep track of which ones you've seen. I have half a mind to fill this up on a save file one day, but I also know that will be long, tedious, and mostly pointless. Although Serenes isn't the most precise of resources sometimes.

As for why I have 1% rating already, I'm doing the run that will ultimately become the Ephraim route run simultaneously, and I got Ross/Garcia C in Chapter 3. Not sure why Ross and Garcia aren't lit up, though- perhaps you can only review Supports you have in that file while in the file? You can see this library in the game's Extras menu, and that lets you see all your Supports, obviously.

You can also use this screen to check which characters you can Support with, even if you don't know who those characters are. I thought I'd make a habit of checking this, but I ultimately didn't bother. At this point in the game, you don't even know who most of these characters are. Although Eirika's top spot is Ephraim, obviously, and I think the fourth position could be filled after this mission.

Neimi's list is actually almost full now. Amazing. The third spot is a unique sprite showing she'll support our female trainee, once we recruit her.

So, here's how the party arrangement started out. Artur, sadly, has locked himself into our party, but we can figure things out.

Here's who I'll be bringing. Even if there was a good reason to bring a unit I explicitly don't want doing anything, it's hard to hide such units on this map.

This is the "Check Map" menu. "View Map" lets you scroll around the map, which is redundant since Formation lets you do that too. You can also fiddle with your Options... I guess it's better than not? You can go back to the other menu from here anytime.

This is the formation I picked. Units that are force deployed must be positioned in the places they start in, while your free positions can be shuffled amongst all the blue squares- so while Neimi could start above Eirika if she wanted, she could not start adjacent to Artur.

Here's a rough guide to what we're facing down on the south side of the river. So let's check out our boss, then.

...

"Entombed" are promoted Revenants, and they're glorified punching bags. Dropping one is worth a lot of EXP, and dropping this one usually gives Seth a full 100 EXP. We'll be giving that EXP to someone else, of course, but since it caps at 100, it's just the one level.

...Now I kinda wish FE let you overflow.

Here's Artur. He's a pretty decent user of Light Magic, and a solid contender for your team- Ephraim route will actually pick him up, slight spoilers. For us, though, we won't get any Light magic until we promote one of our other magic users. In this game, Light magic is kinda just "Anima but worse". WTA on monster spells, though- those are uniformly Dark magic. (Magic schools have an Anima > Light > Dark > Anima triangle, which is somehow even less helpful than the sword > axe > lance > sword one.)

I finally found the "look at the whole map" button. This style of map, while amazing in Advance Wars, is honestly kinda terrible for Fire Emblem. Still, how else do I show off the map in one screenshot?

No thanks. I'd rather get her to start killing things.

Right, time to get things going.

Vanessa's position allows her to fly right to Lute's village. Told you I wanted her killing things in a hurry.

Not so much of a hurry that I can't stop and irritate this guy, though.

I needed the level up. And some Strength, finally.

Revenants are kind of the most pathetic enemies the game can throw at you (at least soldiers have WTA on Eirika!), but still, here's Neimi doing most of the work to take one out.

And, you know, dodging just because she can.

EIrika also gets to fight a few revenants who had no other choice. They get destroyed for their trouble.

Because if there's one thing Eirika didn't have, it was dodginess.

Well, time to finish this guy off.

One thing about bonewalkers I should mention, since apparently a few of them spawned in the east while I wasn't looking, is that they can wield both Swords and Lances, despite the bonewalker sprite always looking like it's holding a sword. If having WTA is make-or-break for your plans, be sure to check whether you've got the sword-using type or the lance-using type. They never have Axes, though.

The sooner I get rid of these, the better. Mogalls can not only cast magic, but they can fly. With monsters, it's always smart to check.

I have no idea why I took this screenshot, but I'm glad I did. I love this Eirika sprite.

All monsters seem to have this description, annoyingly. I think the interesting stuff would be in the class description.

This is a legitimate gameplay tip. There are these piles of wood and brush called "Snags" on some maps, and if you hit them until they break, like a wall, they turn into a bridge over the body of water they're next to. There's one on this map, actually.

This villager even gives us just the tool to do the job!

Yes, an Axe is incredibly fitting, but we won't be using it.

If you're curious, the snag is two tiles east of Vanessa, and falls south. I don't think I knock it down, because Vanessa can fly and I'd rather Neimi and Eirika went east.

Vanessa's here to visit Lute, after all.

Lute, because she's got some kind of mental condition (presumably ASD, 2004 was a little before most other kinds got mainstream attention), opens her conversation by staring intently at the visitor. I think this exchange is non-specific to the character (unless it's Artur, of course), but Vanessa and Lute do Support.

Putrefaction is the process of decomposition, so I don't think Eirika's makeup would fool her.

Lute, of course, not giving a damn what Artur told her to do.

Not actually backed up by anything major, although there aren't exactly a great list of anima mages running around- just her, a reclusive sage, and his kid apprentice, I think. With that in mind, perhaps magic itself is just innately rare in Magvel.

That, on the other hand, is true.

Artur: Lute, help has arrived.
Lute: ……
Artur: Lute?
Lute: Your flesh shows no sign of putrefaction. It seems you’re not a revenant.
Artur: Well, I should hope not! I wanted you to know help has arrived. Please be patient a bit longer…
Lute: No, no. I insist on joining you in combat. I’ve been reading up on these revenants. They are, quite simply, no match for me. I am superior after all.

Unlike Neimi/Colm, I think Artur/Lute does have a more solid foundation (in their Supports, Artur is characterised as understanding of Lute's various ASD quirks), but he's really not making a solid case for himself on arrival. At least he's trying to keep his friend safe.

Vanessa, with her remaining movement, takes position here, to block Lute from that bonewalker up ahead. These two Support and I want them building points as fast as possible.

Hey, no need for weasel words here. Lute absolutely roasts Neimi from base stats, and that's ignoring the fact her magic makes her hit harder than Neimi could dream of. Being able to attack at 1-2 range does that. Like Neimi, Lute is more than a little afraid of being whacked with a solid weapon (although perhaps this is more the case with Lute than Neimi), but with time, her dodge chance will shoot up and that won't be a problem.

Lute's working on getting enough Speed to start doubling things first, though.

Annoying, but livable. More annoying is the fact I can't make much forward progress without breaking the Support setup.

Eirika, incidentally, does not care what kind of weapon bonewalkers are using on her.

Lute might, but hopefully this is the only one she does.

Ow. I suppose it's my own fault for baiting them. I didn't want them standing there menacingly. Although I hate this guy's position.

See, how am I supposed to deal with that? I don't even know where to put Neimi!

...Also, those guys on the cliff are new. I wonder what happens if you put Vanessa up there.

Say hello to best girl. I'm not going to beat around the bush on this one: L'Arachel is my favourite character, although Eirika and Tana give good competition.

This is her loyal servant, Dozla. I don't think he has a personality beyond this line.

Excellent idea! We could use a staffbot and a chance to get some-

...Actually, yes, good point. This man is named Rennac, and he would rather be anywhere else right about now. L'Arachel just pays well. Sometimes. Maybe.

L'Arachel has a bone to pick, literally, with monsterkind, and she will not countenance any fight with monsters she is not personally a part of.

They won't find their way down the cliff to help us until after the battle is over, no matter how long you spend Support grinding.

And now we've got like four revenants spawning right behind us. This is going to make it hard for Artur to find a place to stand.

Let's start by heading over this way and making this side free of enemies.

Vanessa decides to go forward and kill this guy.

Now Lute can take this guy. And another hit on the way, but such is progress.

The Mogalls have to die, that's just how things work.

Artur is really running out of places to stand. I'm not even sure this place is safe.

73% hit odds? Sounds like a 1 in 4 chance to dodge!

All right, this situation has only deteriorated.

That Mogall is still there. As is the inability to get Vanessa to help out the north without leaving Lute in trouble.

Let's start with killing that guy.

Magic, Speed, yes, Lute desperately needs the ability to keep pace.

All right, so this is where the Mogall can move... I think I can work with this.

...I guess I can't.

Well, fine, we'll do it this way. Neimi standing in this position is too important- it lets her swing back at the mogall when it gets here.

Also, Strength/Speed, and some Res, too, for that Mogall.

Artur is out of places to stand unmolested. That bonewalker I could've killed if Neimi could ORKO the other one was the clincher.

Maybe I should've considered having Vanessa lug him over to the south-west.

At least this went according to plan.

So long, revenant.

Vanessa decides it's time we had some more melee in the north.

And Artur gets the hell out of dodge.

Time to prepare for those revenants from a few turns ago who finally caught up to a lownman army.

Fortunately, the loss of Neimi's string of good luck won't hurt too badly.

Eirika, on the other hand, doesn't need luck.

She needs swords.

Yay, more Strength! Turns out we need it again, after all those almost-kills.

Vanessa blocks this route, to help get things moving around here.

Eventually, someone is going to have to backtrack and kill that revenant in the west who doesn't seem to want to move of his own accord.

And Neimi is helping make her surroundings safe.

Lute's edging around the south, attracting her own attention.

This is a very defensive Vanessa.

That is exceptionally annoying.

At least these two won't be worried about getting too close.

Still going for Speed, hm? May as well.

Vanessa drew the short straw and dealt with this guy.

Lute handled this one just fine, even if she didn't dodge.

After all, more Magic and Speed is always a plus.

Now then, time to deal with the Entombed.

Lute backs up so she can get more Support points.

Eirika handles the Entombed with aplomb: Doing most of the work and leaving the EXP for someone else.

Ultimately, I picked Neimi to get the kill. The thing about "guaranteed EXP" is that it's a genuinely tough choice between your low level characters and your high level characters- low level characters need EXP, obviously, but high level characters do too and EXP is harder to come by for them- Lute could get 100 EXP in less kills than Neimi would. This is why a lot of people like the idea of giving this EXP to Seth- it would take him dozens of kills to scrounge up 100 EXP from other enemies.

And Neimi's still working on becoming an artillery battery.

...Can monsters do that? I suppose there's no reason they can't.

History, Eirika. Still the contents of our nightmares, though. Especially those Mogalls.

...

Seth, I don't like how arrogant you are. No, revenants are nowhere near the power level of even soldiers, what are you comparing them against? Even Ross can go toe to toe with them!

Honestly, monsters are kinda a breather mission between human missions. For the most part. There are some annoying kinds of monsters later.

Mauthe doogs are the scariest monster on this list, and I'd certainly call them the third-scariest monster class, but the gargoyles and baels are no slouches.

Not listed by Lute: tarvos, cyclopes, gorgons and dracozombies. I'd rank them, but I'd also need to divert to talk about what each of those monsters can do. All of them are scarier than mogalls except maybe the baels. Revenants and bonewalkers are at the very bottom of the list.

Don't worry, it's not enough now, but we can figure something out.

Probably.

...In universe, I can... kinda see where Seth is coming from?

Out of universe, though... this mission was started under the premise that we were facing long odds. This doesn't make the odds that much longer.

And while Ephraim does know about the Grado enemies (presumably), he has no reason to know about the monsters.

We've got to save Ephraim, for no other reason than he's a good guy to have around and dealing with him being dead is not a situation we want to be in.

Seth doesn't argue very hard for his ideas.

Told you they'd get here once everything was done!

L'Arachel immediately leaps into action, preparing to smite her enemies with her staff. I feel it is relevant to mention that L'Arachel currently believes that Eirika does not know her name.

Yeah, this is on-brand.

Not that L'Arachel is too broken up over the loss of some monsters to kill.

She did want to show off her patented "hit them until they go away" technique, but you know, there'll be more monsters.

Dozla and Rennac are up to their usual antics. Again, note the use of L'Arachel's name.

Eirika doesn't recognise the name L'Arachel. And in my opinon, this is kind of a weird element to the plot of Magvel. By all means, Eirika should at least know the name "L'Arachel", even if she's never met the woman or even seen a picture of her. Perhaps she has heard the name but mispronounced- in FEH, L'Arachel pronounces it "Lara-SHELL", but I have heard people pronounce it so as to rhyme with "Rachel". Perhaps Fado used that pronounciation and it doesn't occur to Eirika that the two names are connected?

L'Arachel is highly interested in introducing herself, and opens up with a long prelude about her homeland of Rausten. Knowing L'Arachel is a resident of Rausten and bears the "Lady" honorific should clue you in as to who she is and why Eirika ought to know her.

Remember what I said about it being a detail that Eirika doesn't know L'Arachel's name? That is the third time her name has come up in this conversation.

Quite frankly, this is probably the most careful she ever gets on-screen.

L'Arachel is very clearly intending this turn of phrase using the "adventurous, imaginative, daring" definition rather than the usual definition of "relating to eros-type love", but I think L'Arachel is intended, on some level, to be Eirika's love interest. They don't have a paired ending together, but they have nearly everything else. ~~And, to be frank, the alternative is Seth.~~