Woo, I beat Normal Mode today, and now I want to attempt Maniac (Yeah yeah, I know it's called "Hard", but w/e). I don't know who else has tried, or even if anyone has beaten it yet (though I bet a few people have, at least) so I'm making this topic to organize my thoughts, and ask for help. It might also come in handy for anyone else attempting Maniac Mode.

My plan for Part 1:

Team: (based on number of slots in the Endgame)
Micaiah
Sothe
Volug
Black Knight (for the Lehran event <____________<)
Nolan
Laura
Aran
Jill
Edward -> Zihark
Rafiel
Ilyana -> Tormod
Nailah (Not sure; don't want all the EXP to get sucked up between her, Sothe, Volug, and the BK, and I HAVE to bring the other 3...)

Supports:
Micaiah x Sothe
Zihark x Volug (Earth x Earth FTW)
Nolan x Laura
Nailah x Rafiel (Don't think they have enough time to form supports with anyone but each other)
Jill x Aran
Edward x Ilyana (If time permits; I'm replacing them both anyway...)
Tormod - No one
BK - No one

I'm debating whether to first go back to PoR and make a good transfer file to send bonuses to units that would benefit from it, (Sothe, Jill, etc.) but I don't know if it's worth the time investment.

Anyways, anything I should change before starting?

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Don't use so many people. Exp is too scarce.

I'm on Part 3 Chapter 4 at the moment, and don't waste your bexp. use it for stats ONLY. You'll get a crapload of it in part 2, don't use any of it. Especially don't waste it on Haar, not yet at least (wait until he caps str, skl, def... then load up his speed, lck, and res).

Pay attention to how much each terrain slows down an enemy, you'll need it due to lack of movement ranges.

Utilize the lack of weapon triangle. Nolan can now attack Myrmidons without worry.

Part 1 is really the only hard part, everything past that is only moderately difficult.

Is there actually a Maniac Mode after 'HM'? <<;

HM = MM

<_<

First impresions, after Part 1 Prologue:

Having to calculate enemy ranges myself is *^#@ing annoying.

Lack of Weapon Triangle doesn't seem to affect combat as much as I thought. Edward still had 100% hit against all of the bandits except the boss, but none of them had less than 65% hit against him.

I'm not sure about whether or not there were extra enemies, or if they were stronger. Then again, it's only the prologue.

Having to Suspend instead of using Battle Saves makes me sad.

I got 30 BEXP for finishing the chapter. That's it. <__________<

I think Solide beat it. I'm not sure, though.

Movement ranges: Looking >>> Calculating.

There are more enemies.

Just do as GB said and try to use the lack of WT to your advantage. It shouldn't be too hard after the first few chapters as long as you don't rush in backwards.

Further impressions:

Nolan is GOD due to being able to take 3 or so hits and survive while the rest of the Dawn Brigade dies in 2 or less, including Edward. I had to rely on dodging to beat Chapter 1. ._.

Even Sothe takes a good amount of damage from the enemies; he can't just flat out rape everything any more. Thanks to boosted enemy stats, he's great for setting up kills since he'll get the enemy soldiers to around 1-3 HP.

BEXP is still scarce; I didn't get any extra BEXP for having all of my allies escape in Chapter 1. <<

Leonardo is half-decent for weakening the enemies, since it takes 3 or 4 attacks to take down one enemy in this mode. Though if he gets left out in the open for one turn, he's dead. Same with Micaiah, except I can't bench her.

Laura is a godsend after 2 chapters of relying on Herbs and Sacrifice, although her MOV leaves something to be desired.

From what I've seen so far, compared to Normal Mode, I'd have to say:
Nolan, Sothe, and Laura are all better. Sothe actually does WORSE in the battles, but this can work to my advantage for setting up kills for Micaiah or Edward, so his Jeigan utility is >>>, although his own abilities are worse.

Edward plays about the same. He just dodges more often against Soldiers and less often against Fighters. He still doubles everything, which is awesome.

Leonardo and Micaiah are both worse, due to not being able to take 2 hits, and not being able to dodge fairly reliably like Edward. I need more frontliners...

yay4nin

This game sounds hard as hell. Can't wait to get it. :DD

I personally thought Laura was a lot worse in hard Mode, because she is yet ANOTHER unit who is brutally murdered in ONE hit.

I think what he's saying is that since most units are one-rounded in part one, she's about the same durability-wise, but gives unbelievably needed extra durability to the rest of your army.

Durability isn't at a surplus in Part 1 HM, from what I've heard, so you might as well use a unit that can help augment the overall durability of your army.

*coughARANcough*

I just gave up on Edward during Chapter 3. He's absolutely useless, he can't even consistantly double.

Laura wasn't as big a help in HM, as she had to be 100% shielded always. After a few level-ups, even Micaiah could take at least ONE hit. Not Laura, though. Doubled AND OHKO'd.

Yeah, Edward not being able to double consistantly after chapter 2 = massive phail. Although watching him get hit once and then landing 2 criticals in a row thanks to Wrath was pretty funny.

I'm in the middle of Chapter 3 right now. Aran is decent; he can do good damage and his durability is >>> than everyone except Nolan and Sothe.

Micaiah can still one-shot the boss with her knight-nuker tome. %::%

Haven't gotten a chance to use Ilyana yet.

I have to play a lot more defensively than I did in NM, since anyone carelessly left out in the open that isn't named Sothe is guarenteed to die on the enemy phase. Chapter 2 took me 17 turns. <________<

EDIT: Played a bit more, don't want to DP.

Ilyana barely ever doubles, and can't hit reliably at all. Also needs to be shielded from multiple attacks; she can survive no more than a single hit.

Eddie is starting to have trouble with doubling reliably and dealing excess damage.

Nolan and Sothe are even godlier than they were a few chapters ago. Nolan is gaining lots of stats and can take 3 or 4 hits before dying, plus he deals ~16 damage per round. Sothe is still great for setting up kills, and for being one of the few units that doesn't die instantly. Plus, I bought him a Beast Killer so he could tank in the Laguz chapter.

Micaiah is improving, although she still dies in 2 seconds if you leave her in the open. But nuking Knights and cavalry is awesome.

I'm halfway trough Part 1. Meg's in my team. I have to say, she's doing pretty decent. I let her take on most of the Tigers including the bosses and she got like 5 levels easy. Laura benefited a lot from all the healing XD
She doesn't double sadly, she doesn't GET doubled, STR got blessed slightly, she barely takes two hits at a time though, has a C Support with Ilyana. Both are benefiting from the extra HIT. She needs some looking after, but used right she comes in handy.

As for HM in general, it took me multiple tries to complete chapter 1. Once I got my head into it, it almost goes smoothly. I overestimated Hard Mode a little...
Leo's also doing fine. I had him clear the Archers and that lone Fighter on the other side of the wall. Damage he took was horrendous, but with the other enemies being out of reach of him, Laura/Micaiah could safely heal him. His itchy sleeve is helping.
As long as Aran doesn't get doubled by most enemies, I'm happy. Defence is on schedule and he seldom missed thanks to good skill. I'm hoping he'll slowly but surely take out all those cavalry that come to the west bridge like he does in Normal Mode.

It tends to take a while with me since I'm not the rushing type. But no one has died since chapter 3. Attack range miscalculation. Leo got totaled. And there was also chapter 6 because he missed at a most critical moment! But that was plain bad luck u_u HIT 87. Considering the True Hit thing I learned from Serenes Forest, that was quite unlucky. He supports no one at the moment.

As of the middle of chapter 5:

I've got mixed feelings about Volug; he can one-round pretty much everything, but eats EXP. He's no good for setting up kills. Good in a tight spot, though.

Nolan 4 top of God Tier. He's surpassed even Sothe in terms of usefulness for the team. He gains more EXP and grows faster, and will probably even surpass Sothe stat-wise by the end of Part 1.

Micaiah is getting better; she's great at picking off enemies from behind the frontlines, and can do like 15 damage with a Light tome.

Meg is half-decent, but the enemies are going to get stronger faster than she is, so I'm not going to put in the effort of raising her.

Aran is great at frontlining; he takes hits reliably and makes a decent fighter. Never doubles and has trouble hitting reliably though, although his defense is sexy.

Ilyana is just terrible, mainly because Thunder magic sucks so badly in this game. Even Leonardo has better offense than she does.

My tier list for the first 5 chapters would be like this:

Nolan
Sothe
Laura
Aran
Edward
Micaiah
Volug
Leonardo
Ilyana
Meg

Gaining experience faster stopped mattering after FE7. As there's no requirement of how much experience you have to get. The only person that is affected by low exp growth is the person with the low exp growth. For example, the BK is level 20, which means he gains no experience at all. But that doesn't matter in any way because he will still remain superior.

And keep in mind. Sothe getting a kill Vs. Nolan getting a kill is still taking away the exact same amount of experience from the team.

And you said yourself that Nolan has yet to surpass Sothe stat-wise. Which can only make me believe that the entire reason for placing him higher is because of the experience argument. It's definitely not because Nolan's better at stealing.

Experience is so ridiculously scarce in this mode (srsly, I've got like... less than 500 BEXP after 5 completed chapters), so it matters who gains more. Sothe gets 3 EXP per kill at a maximum, while Nolan gains the normal amount. Therefore, Nolan is making the most of the limited EXP, while Sothe is just vacuuming it. Nolan is growing way faster, and WILL surpass Sothe by the end of the Part.

Plus Nolan completely rapes Myrmidons thanks to the absence of the Weapon Triangle. %::%

But Nolan is gaining more EXP for the team than Sothe is, kill for kill.

I see you didn't learn anything from my last post, so quoting it would be unnecessary.

So just tell me, how does gaining more experience cause Nolan to be superior to Sothe statistically or in usefulness WHILE knowing that he isn't?

DH 4 God. :o

I never got that until you just explained it. :)

Alright, Nin, I'll try and explain it.

Nolan - 30 EXP per kill
Sothe - 5 EXP per kill
Micaiah - 30 exp per kill

Okay, so Sothe does get alot less exp per kill. But for that enemy he killed, Michaiah could have gotten 30 exp from it. However, Nolan took the same ammout of exp from here by killing the same enemy, so Sothe is only hurting himself, which doesn't matter because that's all the experience he would normally get.

It's one thing if he will surpass Sothe, but he's not better now. Sothe's usefulness Earlier >>>> Nolan's usefulness later.

And how can Aran not hit reliably when he starts with 12 skill at level 7 and has a 70% growth?

Before I gave him a forged Iron Lance, his Hit was around 75 on most enemies.

Maybe mine is just getting RNG raped...

Also...

Zihark - With a Killing Edge he either criticals or activates Adept roughly 50% of the time, and since he always doubles, he 1-rounds pratically everything. He's got great AVO too, which will skyrocket once I start his support with Volud.

Jill - She's decent, and doubles semi-reliably, but her Strength isn't that great. Still, she'll grow and get better.

Tauroneo - He's like Volug offensively, but doesn't ever die. Too bad I only get him for one chapter.

Nolan is nearly promoted, lol. Aran and Micaiah are getting there too...

Also, Edward gained some more SPD, so he's doubling reliably again... (weird) He also deals decent damage. I'm reconsidering my original plan to bench him.

Hard Mode/Maniac Mode didn't turn out to be all that hard as I had thought. I was expecting Enemies >> Allies in Strength, but I didn't really notice too much of a difference.

Part 1 team
Micaiah
Sothe
Volug
Aran
Laura
Meg
Ilyana
Leonardo

Okay, lay it on me. My team sucks. Anyway, Meg got 19 STR by 20/-- and hits reliably with Ilyana (even with Meg's skill being reaped continually from RNG). Though they won't be together again for some time... Oh well, I guess Iron Sword will have to do, and now I'm thankful for the blessing. But it wasn't that hard still. Don't get me wrong, Nolan and Edward still fought up untill the prison chapter, after Aran promoted.

After taking a break for a week, I'm back with further impressions.

It's Chapter 1-F. This is my team:

Micaiah - She hit level 20 fighting Jarod in chapter 9, after whoring Paragon for 3 whole chapters, but w/e.
Sothe - I gave him Paragon for this last chapter, but it's probably going back to Micaiah after she promotes. He'll be essential for getting the chests before thieves do.
Volug - He isn't as godly as he used to be, and in fact, never one-rounds anything, and takes lots of damage. His support with Zihark only got up to C... oh well.
Black Knight - Eh, I had to bring him. He rapes everything that as much as breathes on him.
Nolan - He's level 17, and will almost definitely promote by the end of the chapter.
Jill - Being unavailable for so many chapters makes her a sad panda, but she's still a decent fighter, although only level 15.
Aran - Eh, he turned out worse than expected, and a good chunk of enemies actually double him. <_______<
Zihark - Still doubles everything, which makes him godly. <3
Edward - Decided to use him instead of Nailah, since he turned out better than expected.
Laura - Obligatory healer. Plus she makes Nolan godly with their A support.
Rafiel - Gave him celerity to improve his utility. Woo.
Tormod - Filler, because everyone else left sucks massively or is named Nailah. See you in 4-4. <___________<

It's going to be a tough chapter, probably.

In other news, I managed to save all 6 prisoners in 1-8. %::% That was tough. Zihark is MVP of that chapter for OHKOing Wyverns with the Wyrmslayer while not getting doubled like everyone else that was holding a prisoner. *coughAranandNolancough*

1-9 was surprisingly easy. I guess it helped that my Micaiah was level 18, though, and was slightly blessed with SPD and DEF.

For the chests, just take your time, and pin a thief to the wall with somepeople, and have sothe steal everything back from the thief. It's far easier than rushing for chests.

@Nin: What's so bad about Nailah?

She steals experience from the Daien Army, which will need every point of experience for the part 3 chapters that they are in.

Explain. I don't see how she "steals" _any_ more experience than other units.

She will gain less experience than anyone else in your party(exept the BK, but W/E), and she doesn't even need that experience. She is s level 33 Laguz Royal for God's Sake! She will kill anything that she attacks, or attacks her, so she uses that kill EXP that becomes like 1-2 EXP, which could have done someone else like Nolan, or Edward, a great deal more good.

She "gains" less experience.

I don't see how she "steals" _any_ more experience than other units.

If Tormod kills something, the rest of your team has one less kill.

If Nailah kills something, the rest of your team has one less kill.

No difference.

The unpromoted units need the EXP, or I'll be screwed in Part 3. Why invest in a unit I won't even have for those chapters?

I've already got the BK; I don't need TWO gods.

And yeah yeah about the no EXP stealing... with Nailah on the map, my team gains LESS EXP.

If Nailah gets a kill, you take away 30 Exp from Eddo.

If Eddo gets a kill, you take away 2 Exp from Nailah.

If Nailah actually benefited from getting kills, then there wouldn't be a difference.

Not that I agree with Exxo, because I don't. Nailah should definitely be brought- she doesn't hurt the team that much. I'm just pointing this out.

Tormod won't be there either, and regardless of who takes the kill, it's still gone. Tormod gaining more Exp from it doesn't help any of the other units.

You can never have too many gods.

This isn't FE7, total Exp gained means nothing. All that matters is the unpromoted units, right? It doesn't matter what the one who does take the kill gets out of it, just that it isn't there for the other units.

@Beta: That doesn't say anything about Nailah vs. Tormod, though.

Oh, this was about Tormod? =P

By all means, then, go Nailah. She's better than Tormod any way you slice it, and it's not like you'll be using Tormod later anyway.

Okay, you're bringing the BK, but not Nailah? Because Nialah takes experience?

:no:

There's so much wrong with that. First off, the Black Knight is at max exp. Nailah actually gains some exp, albeit little. Nialah actually has more future use at this point. BK only helps in that one laguz chappy, whereas Nialah is in alot more chapters than that. Nialah can also build a support with anyone for more future bonuses.

He is probably using the BK to get Lehran at the end. Ashera staff >>>

EDIT: If Volug is so bad, why not replace him with Nailah? Or you could replace Tormod. Nailah is much more useful either way.

Guys, Volug AND the BK are both mandatory.

I'll take Nailah instead of Tormod, w/e.

After taking a long break due to getting a lot of new video games for Christmas, I finally started playing again and finished Part 1.

-Nolan hit level 20 in the Final, but didn't promote. I'll just give him the Master Seal before 3-6.
-Managed to kill the thieves with the BK before they stole anything.
-Zihark and Nolan were the chapter's MVPs, and Sothe was helpful too.
-Jill, Aran, and Eddie are all kinda underleveled at this point. Owellz.

Aaaaaaaaaand... starting Part 2. Can't really plan a team for this part, so... yeah.

Just avoid the bad units. Nephenee and Brom should be used in every chapter here.

After 2-1:

-Marcia <3's lack of Weapon Triangle
-Elincia sucks in the Prologue; lol @ doing 4 damage to 1st tier Dracoknights as a 3rd tier
-Haar is still awesome
-Brom has h4x defense but sucktastic offense
-Nephenee has decent offense but sub-par defense (hey, they make a great team)
-Heather is... still useless.

If you actually go for BEXP she's the best unit among them <_<