Fire Emblem Awakening: 0% growths LTC - Chapter 12: The Seacomers

Chapter 12 is cleared in 5 turns (47 total). Challenge playlist:    • Fire Emblem Awakening HM - 0% growths in 7...   Tonic use: Cordelia - str, def Anna - spd, def Libra - def Tharja - spd (a spd tonic is traded to Cherche midchapter) I am back from a month-long absence that's a bit unusual for my generally consistently prolific YouTube stay of nearly 11 years. It's real life as you'd guess, leaving with me with little time and even less energy for working on projects like this. Though I did get the odd moment to play something every now and then, I couldn't commit to a challenge / LTC runthrough as I'd like to, instead doing goofy things like replaying Bugs & Taz: Time Busters on my PSP while falling asleep. Got way more free time now, so naturally I can work on runs I was in the middle of, and I've also been thinking which really old runs could be brought back from the dead as there are quite many to choose from. Another reason for the hiatus was my Awakening file refusing to let me shop for Strength/Defence tonics, with the enemy archer on the map persistently claiming the spot for what seems like a month - as soon as he got away, I started working on the clear. Now there's a monster on the Speed Tonic shop not letting me clear chapter 13, but this time I'm better prepared with three identical saves (other than the save time) giving me better odds to finally get the monster off the map, so new progress should come soon. Anyway, this map is really nasty. The enemies are all over the place, and there's no easy way to rout it this time. Anna has the best combat in the army by far, capable of doubling and 2HKOing most enemy types, be it knights or cavaliers, doubling the Paladins too and also putting a dent into nomads and the boss. She is however frail, and while her defence can't be easily fixed, her support with Robin makes her harder to kill, but we're still looking at 50-60 displayed hit on her from enemies that often 2-3HKO her (the knights are less accurate but also more threatening). As my clears kept failing, I went ahead and fed Anna my only Dracoshield. The permanent +2 defence boost from it allows Anna to take more hits or more combinations of hits (like on turn 1, she can take a knight and a cav, but not two knights). Meanwhile, Chrom's automatic marriage happens before this map, and I made sure he marries Robin and not anybody else (all options are pretty poor tbqh). Pairing up with Robin now, Chrom actually great chances of one-rounding a knight with a Levin Sword between the offensive stat gains from pair-up, crits and 70-ish dual attack proc rates, though Robin is using the Elthunder tome to assist (Anna could use any tome). Chrom gets a lot of work done in this map and is very close to his eventual promotion (there's no rush if you ask me) that will be necessary should we ever progress far enough in the game to face Validar, something that's far from guaranteed considering the brutal challenges awaiting us in the mid to lategame. Cordelia gets traded the Beastslayer Chrom obtains on turn 1 and takes on a large group of cavs, usually necessitating a single dodge to withstand their assault. I redid chapter 11 again, returning to my original recorded clear that can be seen on its individual video page, the one that uses Kellam instead of Ricken and has Cordelia pair up with the former - getting a support of C with the knight gives Cordelia the much-needed avoid, strength and defence bonuses which help a lot with survival. Ricken can get his last round of chip damage some other time (if nothing changes, next map); we don't need a 2nd/3rd Rescue user right now anyway. Cherche is the new unit in this map and one that should remain relevant for the rest of the map due to great stats (she's almost as fast as Cordelia but with better raw stats outside of res) and flight. She is instapromoted to Griffon Rider which may offer inferior bulk compared to Wyvern Lord but gets us more attack speed and a great skill for mobility eventually at lv. 5, where I do intend to get. On turn 3 of the map, if everything goes according to plan, Anna should be ready to promote. Originally demoting her to Mage to go Sage, I did actually stop and think if I don't want her to go Dark Knight instead. Staves can't be used anymore if I go this path, and a Second Seal reclass somewhere down the line isn't possible unless I can get her to lv. 10 to unlock advanced reclasses, which shouldn't be possible seeing how infrequent rout maps are from this map onwards. You also lose some magic and speed, but you get 9 movement in turn, and +5 hp AND def makes a huge difference against enemies that don't hit too hard. (out of space; see comments for the end)