Lex and Azel join at the start of our 2nd turn.
I'm going to go over them before moving on. It'll give me a chance to explain a few more things.
Start with Lex.
Good Strength and Defense growths but all his other stat growths are low. Base Skill, Luck, and Speed are quite high considering his difficulty in naturally developing them.
Lex is an AxeKnight, which means he's stuck using Axes. That's right, stuck.
This is the perfect time to explain the different weapon types in Genealogy. They are balanced in quite a peculiar fashion. That is, they are not balanced at all.
Basically, it all comes down to Weight. Every weapon is given a Weight value, along with it's other stats, like Might (which affects damage) and Accuracy. The "problem" (I don't think it's a problem) is that most weapon types have extremely high Weight in comparison to certain other weapon types- specifically, Swords and Wind magic. Weight negatively affects Evade, as well as AttackSpeed- which has a place in many different combat formulas - so using it places the wielder of the heavier weapon at a constant and severe disadvantage. That's the argument anyway.
To illustrate this point, an Iron Axe has a Weight of 18, an Iron Lance has a Weight of 12, while an Iron Sword has a Weight of... 3!? The sword wielder would have 15 points higher AttackSpeed as well as up to 30 points higher Evade than the axe wielder! WOAH! Can you say problematic!?
There have been all kinds of mods (I say mods but they're really hacks) that attempt to re-balance the different weapons, but they're all missing the point so hard it's pathetic. The extreme lack of balance gives a distinct character to each weapon type, as well as their wielders. More than anything, this is why I like the design, why I said before that the balance of types fascinated me. The gameplay systems themselves seem to tell a story about the characters. Story and gameplay is woven so tight here you can't really tell where one ends and the other begins.
And why do Axes need to excel in the same situations a Sword would? They're different weapons designed for different things. The game is balanced around this perfectly. A sword wielder fighting on the open plains against a legion of Lance Knights would wish he knew how to handle an axe. Anyway...
Lex has two skills. One is Ambush, which we've gone over already. He makes much better use of it than Ardan as he is actually going to be on the frontlines quite often, and as an axe wielder can expect to take a lot of hits.
The other skill is Elite. Elite doubles all experience received, meaning Lex will level up incredibly fast. If we allow him to, he could hit the level cap before we even come near reaching the end of the game. While his stat growths are weak in a few areas, he will still outmatch nearly all his opponents through sheer experience.
Lex is a descendant of Neir, the Crusader who once wielded the divine axe Swanchika. Lex is not a direct descendant of Neir, however, so he'll never be able to unlock it's power. The blood of Neir does give Lex some benefit though, boosting his Axe rank to A when the typical Axe Knight would be stuck with B.
Holy Blood always gives a boost in Weapon Level to the type of weapon that Crusader used, as long as the unit with Holy Blood would be able to use that weapon though his class.
So, Lex, in summary, is a unit that overcomes the weaknesses of his class, and by extension his blood, through an excellent skill set.
He also gains a special weapon just a bit later on that pushes him further to greatness.
On to Azel.
Azel has excellent Magic and Speed growth rates while the rest of his growths are poor. Good base stats for a Level 1 unit.
A Mage, Azel is able to use all three types of magic, while specializing in Fire. He's got the Pursuit skill.
As far as the different types of magic go, Fire is the Axe: Excessively heavy. Unlike axes, however, fire magic doesn't have extra Might to compensate for the increased Weight. I've already given my views on the balance between types, but just to repeat myself: it makes sense, it gives character, the game was balanced around it.
A descendant of Fala, wielder of the Flame. This is where Azel gets his affinity for Fire magic.
Early on Azel struggles to make himself useful. An unmounted 5 move unit, he'll rarely get a chance to face the enemy. Once you manage to promote him this changes. He gains a mount, and by that time his stats will have developed to the point where he is quite deadly. A late bloomer, Azel will come into his own when he's needed the most.
Yeah.
Having a lot of trouble figuring this LP stuff out, you know.
It's difficult to balance all words and images. Can't have too many
can't have too few.
It's tough.
Units can enter villages.
Here’s a small sum of money we all pooled together. Use it how you see fit. Please help out the other villages if you can. They’re sure to appreciate it.
They'll have a conversation with a villager, then be given some gold. The amount of gold received depends on the state of the village. Badly damaged ones give less gold then safe, unharmed ones. Some villages give out special items as well as gold.
I mentioned this before, but gold is not shared between all members of the army. Deciding on who to allow to enter villages is important as gold is limited. I let Noish take this one.
Remember what I said before about the Mountain Thieves? We'll be taking advantage of their AI here with Azel.
Swords are stronger than axes, axes are stronger than lances, and lances are stronger than swords. Keep that in mind when you’re in combat.
The old man is talking about the Weapon Triangle.
When using one of the weapon types that is 'stronger' than the opponents weapon type, a unit gains a +20 bonus to Hit, and the opponent gains a -20 penalty to Hit. I've been going on as if you already knew this, but it's important enough that I need to say it explicitly.
And if you find yourself hurting, the church is your one stop to full recovery. But it ain’t free, mind you. The going rate is 5 gold for each hitpoint.
There's a church a few tiles West of Azel. We'll be using it soon.
I move Lex over to this tile, trying to pinch off the nearest barbarians movement. Notice that we're completely ignoring the Mountain Thief.
That's because it isn't yet a threat to us. There are other villages on the map not yet pillaged, so the Mountain Thief will ignore our units and try and reach them. This one here is also conveniently blocking the only tile this barbarian can attack Azel from. Because Mountain Thieves are always last to move, the barbarian will be forced to strike Lex, who has significantly higher Defense.
It's a pretty smart move. It allows Azel to get the gold from the village without slowing down, and he needs it far more than Lex.
Sigurd sets his sights on this Bow wielding Hunter.
Bow wielding units cannot retaliate when directly attacked. Their strength is in their ability to strike from range, and the fact that they exist outside the Weapon Triangle.
Sigurd ends his turn one tile over to the West on a Meadow tile. He could move to the Road tiles 2 tiles to the west, or 2 west and 1 south, as they are closer to Jungby, but Road tiles give a 10 point penalty to Evade.
And I think moving any further West would put him out of range of that barbarian to the East.
Remember: we want Sigurd to get as many kills as possible.
After killing the second barbarian, Sigurd Levels up.
+1HP, +1STR, +1LUK.
I won't list each level up, but the first one deserves it's own screen, I think.
One more barbarian attacks Sigurd, and he kills him without taking any damage.
To the North, things go just as I said they would.
Lex dodges the attack, delivers a heavy counter.
A few more barbarians move in, and that Mountain Thief begins to run away to an unoccupied village to the West.
Before we can take control of our units...
I’m sure I can put my Live Staff to some use around here. I’m sorry to pull you into this, Cuan. I know I’m no longer a Chalphy, but I can’t just sit back and do nothing. On my brother’s behalf, thank you so much for coming.
You don’t need to thank me, Ethlin. You know Sigurd and I go way back. Not to mention that he’s my brother-in-law now. Besides, I can’t have you fighting alone.
I sure appreciate it, dear.
Forgive me for interrupting, but we should hurry. The battle is just up ahead.
Cuan, Ethlin, and Fin join the battle. I'll be sending them along the road to Jungby, where they'll be used to assist in seizing the castle and destroying the surrounding troops.
Before that, have to take a look at our new men and woman.
Cuan joins already promoted, like Sigurd. Excellent base Strength and Defense, other stats decent. His growths are high in all areas but Skill and Luck.
Cuan's only skill is Continue. If Continue activates Cuan will make a 2nd attack, directly after his first. It's activation depends on AttackSpeed.
Cuan joins with Ethlin as his Lover. Lovers gain a 10 point bonus to Hit and Evade when fighting within 3 tiles of each other, and when fighting side by side have a 20% chance of dealing a Critical. They can also share gold with each other. There are no downsides to having a lover.
The blood of Noba flows strongly in Cuan.
A powerful unit, he is able to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with Sigurd and not be found lacking. Wielding Lances with devastating effectiveness, he'll lead the charge alongside him, if not in front him. I can't say a negative word about Cuan.
Fin is a rookie knight under Cuan's command. Not even introduced upon recruitment, we are not supposed to see this guy as important.
Base stats are good, his growth rates are identical to Alec nearly all across the board, so very average. The exception is his Luck growth, which is abnormally high.
A Lance Knight, Fin's only available weapons will be lances C and B rank.
He has the Pursuit and Prayer skills.
Prayer dramatically increases Evade when a unit is critically injured. For every point under 10HP, Fin will gain 10 Evade, the effect lasting for one turn. A very interesting skill. It will allow us to pull off some neat maneuvers later on, but shouldn't be counted on to save Fin's life when you screw up tactically. Enemies are more likely to outright kill Fin then critically injure him.
I'm having a hard time going over Fin. He's an interesting unit for a few reasons, but they are hard to explain. Prayer and Luck go well on him, you could say.
Ethlin. Our first female unit. Her base stats, besides Strength, are excellent, but her growth rates are low across the board. Her Magic growth is nearly non-existent, which is bad.
She joins with a Slim Sword. Slim Swords are weapons even lighter in weight than regular swords (Weight of 1 rather than 3). They also have a decent Might of 8, and an exceptional Accuracy stat of 90.
Ethlin is a Troubadour, able to wield both Swords and Staves. She has the Critical skill.
Like her brother, Ethlin is a descendant of Baldo. This pushes her Sword rank from the Troubadour base of B, to A.
As our only healer early on in the game, Ethlin is an invaluable unit. She won't be able to fully heal larger wounds due to her low Magic, but this won't hinder us too much. Later on she retains her usefulness, as being able to heal and move- while keeping up with the faster units- is, again, invaluable. Her low Strength keeps her from taking much action on the front lines.
We'll move Cuan here, toward Jungby
and have him equip his Javelin.
Javelin are a 1-2 range weapon, allowing units wielding one to attack directly or from range.
Ethlin and Fin head for Jungby using another road.
It would be faster to travel alongside Cuan, but we want them out of range of this enemy barbarian.
It's equipped with a Hand Axe, which functions the same way Javelins do.
We send Sigurd's Knights west, ignoring the barbarian.
I don't know exactly how the AI chooses it's targets, usually it attacks the enemy that cannot counterattack, but not always. The barbarian will attack Cuan on the enemy phase, the only unit that it cannot take free shots at.
I think the enemy prioritizes certain characters over other, but this is only a theory. Sometimes the AI's target selection just doesn't make any sense.
Sigurd takes out another barbarian.
I move him one tile West afterwards. I'm not sure why I didn't just end his turn where he was. I think it's because I expected him to be surrounded on the enemy phase, and he wouldn't be able to take full advantage of the road tiles, but I'm not sure.
I mentioned before that road tiles give a penalty to Evade, but they also give a small bonus to Movement. This is a rough calculation, usually true but not always, but the bonus is 1 extra move for every 3 road tiles traveled.
Road tiles are interesting, and I like them, but sometimes the bonus is hard to factor in, road tiles don't look like road tiles...
Azel kills a barbarian here. He's the only unit besides Sigurd able to take an enemy out in a single round.
Lex finishes off the barbarian that attacked him on the enemy phase.
He ends his turn on the nearby church.
The barbarian two tiles over from him will attack Lex, rather than low Defense Azel, and the Church will heal Lex back up to full at the start of our next turn.
I mentioned before the AI is not very sensible, so I won't repeat myself.
This is the end of our third turn. I won't always throw in the enemy phase screen, or mention when I've ended the turn.
I think you can tell.
The barbarian attacks Cuan.
Cuan retaliates. Notice the barbarian has more HP, Defense, and is a much higher level than other barbarians. There are a few more enemies with the same stats, equipped with Hand Axes, scattered around.
Sigurd kills off a few more enemies and gains another level.
Lex heals back up to full at the start of our turn.
The Knights continue West.
Fin finishes off the Hand Axe wielder that attack Cuan
and they continue down the Road toward Jungby.
Lex damages the high-level Brigand
and ends his turn just south of this Mountain Thief.
Azel finishes the barbarian off from the Church. I expected him to take damage here, but he avoided it.
Sigurd kills him
And ends his turn outside Jungby.
Those three barbarians grouped up around the castle entrance use a different AI than regular enemies. They remain stationary, only attacking units that are within range of their fixed positions.
We'll see this guard AI behavior a few more times.
This Hunter lands the first enemy hit of the game.
Cuan is targeted by a barbarian Hand Axe wielder that Sigurd left alive.
The guard units have just a bit more HP than regular barbarians.
The Mountain Thief attacked Lex, as there was no more unoccupied villages on the map.
The countryside around Jungby is mostly clear now.
These two barbarians always tailor their movement to Sigurd's position on the map, so they're heading for Jungby. Alec and Noish will draw them away, as they can easily slow down the capture of the castle.
Lex finishes off the Mountain Thief
and moves to join the Knights.
Sigurd liberates this village.
It’s called the Speed Ring. Slip her on for a little boost in speed. Go ahead… put her on! Your enemy’ll have a tough time hitting you now!
Sigurd gains a Speed Ring, which boosts Speed by 5.
There are a few more rings in the game, usually they're dropped by boss characters, but a couple are given out through villages like this one.
I usually have the unit that receives the Ring sell it off for money, as most aren't really useful, but Sigurd will keep this one for the rest of the playthrough. Speed is his weakest stat, with only an average growth rate. The ring ensures that even with poor level-ups Sigurd will remain dominant.
Ethlin heals Cuan
and ends her town just out of range of an enemy Hunter.
Cuan misses his Javelin throw against this guard.
I'm going to go over them before moving on. It'll give me a chance to explain a few more things.
Start with Lex.
Good Strength and Defense growths but all his other stat growths are low. Base Skill, Luck, and Speed are quite high considering his difficulty in naturally developing them.
Lex is an AxeKnight, which means he's stuck using Axes. That's right, stuck.
This is the perfect time to explain the different weapon types in Genealogy. They are balanced in quite a peculiar fashion. That is, they are not balanced at all.
Basically, it all comes down to Weight. Every weapon is given a Weight value, along with it's other stats, like Might (which affects damage) and Accuracy. The "problem" (I don't think it's a problem) is that most weapon types have extremely high Weight in comparison to certain other weapon types- specifically, Swords and Wind magic. Weight negatively affects Evade, as well as AttackSpeed- which has a place in many different combat formulas - so using it places the wielder of the heavier weapon at a constant and severe disadvantage. That's the argument anyway.
To illustrate this point, an Iron Axe has a Weight of 18, an Iron Lance has a Weight of 12, while an Iron Sword has a Weight of... 3!? The sword wielder would have 15 points higher AttackSpeed as well as up to 30 points higher Evade than the axe wielder! WOAH! Can you say problematic!?
There have been all kinds of mods (I say mods but they're really hacks) that attempt to re-balance the different weapons, but they're all missing the point so hard it's pathetic. The extreme lack of balance gives a distinct character to each weapon type, as well as their wielders. More than anything, this is why I like the design, why I said before that the balance of types fascinated me. The gameplay systems themselves seem to tell a story about the characters. Story and gameplay is woven so tight here you can't really tell where one ends and the other begins.
And why do Axes need to excel in the same situations a Sword would? They're different weapons designed for different things. The game is balanced around this perfectly. A sword wielder fighting on the open plains against a legion of Lance Knights would wish he knew how to handle an axe. Anyway...
Lex has two skills. One is Ambush, which we've gone over already. He makes much better use of it than Ardan as he is actually going to be on the frontlines quite often, and as an axe wielder can expect to take a lot of hits.
The other skill is Elite. Elite doubles all experience received, meaning Lex will level up incredibly fast. If we allow him to, he could hit the level cap before we even come near reaching the end of the game. While his stat growths are weak in a few areas, he will still outmatch nearly all his opponents through sheer experience.
Lex is a descendant of Neir, the Crusader who once wielded the divine axe Swanchika. Lex is not a direct descendant of Neir, however, so he'll never be able to unlock it's power. The blood of Neir does give Lex some benefit though, boosting his Axe rank to A when the typical Axe Knight would be stuck with B.
Holy Blood always gives a boost in Weapon Level to the type of weapon that Crusader used, as long as the unit with Holy Blood would be able to use that weapon though his class.
So, Lex, in summary, is a unit that overcomes the weaknesses of his class, and by extension his blood, through an excellent skill set.
He also gains a special weapon just a bit later on that pushes him further to greatness.
On to Azel.
Azel has excellent Magic and Speed growth rates while the rest of his growths are poor. Good base stats for a Level 1 unit.
A Mage, Azel is able to use all three types of magic, while specializing in Fire. He's got the Pursuit skill.
As far as the different types of magic go, Fire is the Axe: Excessively heavy. Unlike axes, however, fire magic doesn't have extra Might to compensate for the increased Weight. I've already given my views on the balance between types, but just to repeat myself: it makes sense, it gives character, the game was balanced around it.
A descendant of Fala, wielder of the Flame. This is where Azel gets his affinity for Fire magic.
Early on Azel struggles to make himself useful. An unmounted 5 move unit, he'll rarely get a chance to face the enemy. Once you manage to promote him this changes. He gains a mount, and by that time his stats will have developed to the point where he is quite deadly. A late bloomer, Azel will come into his own when he's needed the most.
Yeah.
Having a lot of trouble figuring this LP stuff out, you know.
It's difficult to balance all words and images. Can't have too many
can't have too few.
It's tough.
Units can enter villages.
They'll have a conversation with a villager, then be given some gold. The amount of gold received depends on the state of the village. Badly damaged ones give less gold then safe, unharmed ones. Some villages give out special items as well as gold.
I mentioned this before, but gold is not shared between all members of the army. Deciding on who to allow to enter villages is important as gold is limited. I let Noish take this one.
Remember what I said before about the Mountain Thieves? We'll be taking advantage of their AI here with Azel.
The old man is talking about the Weapon Triangle.
When using one of the weapon types that is 'stronger' than the opponents weapon type, a unit gains a +20 bonus to Hit, and the opponent gains a -20 penalty to Hit. I've been going on as if you already knew this, but it's important enough that I need to say it explicitly.
There's a church a few tiles West of Azel. We'll be using it soon.
I move Lex over to this tile, trying to pinch off the nearest barbarians movement. Notice that we're completely ignoring the Mountain Thief.
That's because it isn't yet a threat to us. There are other villages on the map not yet pillaged, so the Mountain Thief will ignore our units and try and reach them. This one here is also conveniently blocking the only tile this barbarian can attack Azel from. Because Mountain Thieves are always last to move, the barbarian will be forced to strike Lex, who has significantly higher Defense.
It's a pretty smart move. It allows Azel to get the gold from the village without slowing down, and he needs it far more than Lex.
Sigurd sets his sights on this Bow wielding Hunter.
Bow wielding units cannot retaliate when directly attacked. Their strength is in their ability to strike from range, and the fact that they exist outside the Weapon Triangle.
Sigurd ends his turn one tile over to the West on a Meadow tile. He could move to the Road tiles 2 tiles to the west, or 2 west and 1 south, as they are closer to Jungby, but Road tiles give a 10 point penalty to Evade.
And I think moving any further West would put him out of range of that barbarian to the East.
Remember: we want Sigurd to get as many kills as possible.
After killing the second barbarian, Sigurd Levels up.
+1HP, +1STR, +1LUK.
I won't list each level up, but the first one deserves it's own screen, I think.
One more barbarian attacks Sigurd, and he kills him without taking any damage.
To the North, things go just as I said they would.
Lex dodges the attack, delivers a heavy counter.
A few more barbarians move in, and that Mountain Thief begins to run away to an unoccupied village to the West.
Before we can take control of our units...
Cuan, Ethlin, and Fin join the battle. I'll be sending them along the road to Jungby, where they'll be used to assist in seizing the castle and destroying the surrounding troops.
Before that, have to take a look at our new men and woman.
Cuan joins already promoted, like Sigurd. Excellent base Strength and Defense, other stats decent. His growths are high in all areas but Skill and Luck.
Cuan's only skill is Continue. If Continue activates Cuan will make a 2nd attack, directly after his first. It's activation depends on AttackSpeed.
Cuan joins with Ethlin as his Lover. Lovers gain a 10 point bonus to Hit and Evade when fighting within 3 tiles of each other, and when fighting side by side have a 20% chance of dealing a Critical. They can also share gold with each other. There are no downsides to having a lover.
The blood of Noba flows strongly in Cuan.
A powerful unit, he is able to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with Sigurd and not be found lacking. Wielding Lances with devastating effectiveness, he'll lead the charge alongside him, if not in front him. I can't say a negative word about Cuan.
Fin is a rookie knight under Cuan's command. Not even introduced upon recruitment, we are not supposed to see this guy as important.
Base stats are good, his growth rates are identical to Alec nearly all across the board, so very average. The exception is his Luck growth, which is abnormally high.
A Lance Knight, Fin's only available weapons will be lances C and B rank.
He has the Pursuit and Prayer skills.
Prayer dramatically increases Evade when a unit is critically injured. For every point under 10HP, Fin will gain 10 Evade, the effect lasting for one turn. A very interesting skill. It will allow us to pull off some neat maneuvers later on, but shouldn't be counted on to save Fin's life when you screw up tactically. Enemies are more likely to outright kill Fin then critically injure him.
I'm having a hard time going over Fin. He's an interesting unit for a few reasons, but they are hard to explain. Prayer and Luck go well on him, you could say.
Ethlin. Our first female unit. Her base stats, besides Strength, are excellent, but her growth rates are low across the board. Her Magic growth is nearly non-existent, which is bad.
She joins with a Slim Sword. Slim Swords are weapons even lighter in weight than regular swords (Weight of 1 rather than 3). They also have a decent Might of 8, and an exceptional Accuracy stat of 90.
Ethlin is a Troubadour, able to wield both Swords and Staves. She has the Critical skill.
Like her brother, Ethlin is a descendant of Baldo. This pushes her Sword rank from the Troubadour base of B, to A.
As our only healer early on in the game, Ethlin is an invaluable unit. She won't be able to fully heal larger wounds due to her low Magic, but this won't hinder us too much. Later on she retains her usefulness, as being able to heal and move- while keeping up with the faster units- is, again, invaluable. Her low Strength keeps her from taking much action on the front lines.
We'll move Cuan here, toward Jungby
and have him equip his Javelin.
Javelin are a 1-2 range weapon, allowing units wielding one to attack directly or from range.
Ethlin and Fin head for Jungby using another road.
It would be faster to travel alongside Cuan, but we want them out of range of this enemy barbarian.
It's equipped with a Hand Axe, which functions the same way Javelins do.
We send Sigurd's Knights west, ignoring the barbarian.
I don't know exactly how the AI chooses it's targets, usually it attacks the enemy that cannot counterattack, but not always. The barbarian will attack Cuan on the enemy phase, the only unit that it cannot take free shots at.
I think the enemy prioritizes certain characters over other, but this is only a theory. Sometimes the AI's target selection just doesn't make any sense.
Sigurd takes out another barbarian.
I move him one tile West afterwards. I'm not sure why I didn't just end his turn where he was. I think it's because I expected him to be surrounded on the enemy phase, and he wouldn't be able to take full advantage of the road tiles, but I'm not sure.
I mentioned before that road tiles give a penalty to Evade, but they also give a small bonus to Movement. This is a rough calculation, usually true but not always, but the bonus is 1 extra move for every 3 road tiles traveled.
Road tiles are interesting, and I like them, but sometimes the bonus is hard to factor in, road tiles don't look like road tiles...
Azel kills a barbarian here. He's the only unit besides Sigurd able to take an enemy out in a single round.
Lex finishes off the barbarian that attacked him on the enemy phase.
He ends his turn on the nearby church.
The barbarian two tiles over from him will attack Lex, rather than low Defense Azel, and the Church will heal Lex back up to full at the start of our next turn.
I mentioned before the AI is not very sensible, so I won't repeat myself.
This is the end of our third turn. I won't always throw in the enemy phase screen, or mention when I've ended the turn.
I think you can tell.
The barbarian attacks Cuan.
Cuan retaliates. Notice the barbarian has more HP, Defense, and is a much higher level than other barbarians. There are a few more enemies with the same stats, equipped with Hand Axes, scattered around.
Sigurd kills off a few more enemies and gains another level.
Lex heals back up to full at the start of our turn.
The Knights continue West.
Fin finishes off the Hand Axe wielder that attack Cuan
and they continue down the Road toward Jungby.
Lex damages the high-level Brigand
and ends his turn just south of this Mountain Thief.
Azel finishes the barbarian off from the Church. I expected him to take damage here, but he avoided it.
Sigurd kills him
And ends his turn outside Jungby.
Those three barbarians grouped up around the castle entrance use a different AI than regular enemies. They remain stationary, only attacking units that are within range of their fixed positions.
We'll see this guard AI behavior a few more times.
This Hunter lands the first enemy hit of the game.
Cuan is targeted by a barbarian Hand Axe wielder that Sigurd left alive.
The guard units have just a bit more HP than regular barbarians.
The Mountain Thief attacked Lex, as there was no more unoccupied villages on the map.
The countryside around Jungby is mostly clear now.
These two barbarians always tailor their movement to Sigurd's position on the map, so they're heading for Jungby. Alec and Noish will draw them away, as they can easily slow down the capture of the castle.
Lex finishes off the Mountain Thief
and moves to join the Knights.
Sigurd liberates this village.
Sigurd gains a Speed Ring, which boosts Speed by 5.
There are a few more rings in the game, usually they're dropped by boss characters, but a couple are given out through villages like this one.
I usually have the unit that receives the Ring sell it off for money, as most aren't really useful, but Sigurd will keep this one for the rest of the playthrough. Speed is his weakest stat, with only an average growth rate. The ring ensures that even with poor level-ups Sigurd will remain dominant.
Ethlin heals Cuan
and ends her town just out of range of an enemy Hunter.
Cuan misses his Javelin throw against this guard.
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