This is a rough little hack I made. Maybe someone has already made something like this before, not sure. It is FE8 except you play as the bosses. Each boss and their equipment will join your party after the end of their chapter. This includes the crappy monster bosses.
I made this on the J version due to it’s generally higher difficulty, better shop inventories and obtainable status staves, so you will have to apply the patch to a J ROM. I don’t think this should be too much of an issue, as the menus are exactly the same as the U version, and the story is completely nonsensical now. I also broke half of the cutscenes so make sure you skip them lol. Only Eirika route is completed so far, and I’ve only really playtested it up to chapter 6 on Hard, but the game seems to work fine to the end, and early game is the hardest part anyway.
The base game is mostly the same as normal, with a few changes:
General Changes
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Due to class imbalance, all promotion items have been changed to Master Seals, and their value has been reduced to the same as the regular promotion items.
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Some interesting items that a player unit would give you are given to the boss upon joining (stat boosters, gems, rare weapons)
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As you get no thieves, items that are supposed to be stolen (except for healing items) are now dropped on defeat.
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Every unit is able to seize, so no need to drag Oneill through the whole game if you don’t want to.
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Every character gets small hard mode bonuses to compensate for their abysmal growths.
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Player units that join mid chapter are now NPC units.
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The monster bosses have 0 character stats in the Japanese version for some strange reason, so I have raised them to the same values as the English version.
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Some enemy inventories and chests have been rearranged to give better item access.
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Special monster weapons are locked to their monster (so no giving everyone dark magic).
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The U version added an extra deployment slot to some chapters, which I have also added in.
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Promoted bosses are given palettes close to their original, though some are rough (great knights especially, which half of the units promote into.)
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The Rapier is now a C rank sword, and has been reduced to it’s FE6 stats. (Haven’t decided if the Reginleif should be given as well.)
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The Lord’s special weapons are now S rank weapons.
Notable chapter changes
Prologue:
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Oneill starts as a playable character, and the boss has been changed to the unused bandit.
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Oneill comes with two vulneraries. (Trust me, you will need them)
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Objective has been changed from defeat boss to rout.
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The boss now moves
Chapter 2:
-All early game bosses will come with a vulnerary, as you can’t buy them until chapter 5.
-Bone comes with Ross’ hatchet (so Chapter 3 is not near impossible)
Chapter 5:
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Joshua now drops his Killing Edge upon defeat.
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Saar joins with an Elixir.
Chapter 5x:
- This is now a normal chapter with the same units you had before. Items are sent to the convoy and extra deployment slots are added for your larger roster.
Chapter 6:
- If promoted to Summoner, Novala can use Knoll’s Phantoms.
Chapter 8:
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Bizarrely, in all versions of the game the thief actually has normal enemy AI and will not aim for treasure, so I have changed it to regular thief ai
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The breakable wall has been removed so the thief doesn’t immediately escape upon spawning.
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The knight guarding the western chests has been moved one tile down to allow the thief to open the door, and has been given a door key.
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The shaman in the chest room has been given a chest key.
Chapter 9:
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Binks joins with Tana’s Heavy Spear
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Amelia drops her Speedwings upon defeat.
Chapter 10:
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Pablo joins with a Silver Bow, White Gem & Elixir.
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Marissa has been given an extra Shamshir to drop upon defeat.
Chapter 11:
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Added an extra deployment slot
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Some skeletons spawn with both a door and chest key. I have moved some of the keys to other monsters to allow all to be obtained.
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The boss joins with Dozla’s Battle Axe
Chapter 12:
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Added an extra deployment slot
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The boss joins with Ewan’s Energy Ring
Chapter 13:
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Amelia drops her Speedwings upon defeat.
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Removed the whip from Cormag’s inventory so he will drop his Killer Lance upon defeat.
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Reinforcement Pablo has been replaced with his conveniently unused 0x54 version to avoid problems.
Chapter 14:
- The chest contents have been rearranged so you don’t need to worry about losing the Member Card.
Chapter 15:
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Added an extra deployment slot
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Valter joins with Knoll’s Nosferatu
Chapter 17:
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Lyon no longer drops a weapon, he will join with both.
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Lyon can use his playable version’s summons.
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All cutscene Lyons have been changed from 0x40 version to the 0x6C version (from the final chapter) so he don’t disappear from your party.
Chapter 18:
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Added 2 extra deployment slots
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The boss Gorgon was given Stone like the U version. Both of it’s weapons are locked to it.
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Demon Surge now gives 1 WEXP per use like other weapons.
Chapter 20:
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Morva’s HP was reduced 60 to avoid breaking things when he becomes playable
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Wretched air is locked to Morva and Dracozombies.
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Riev was replaced with his playable version which has the same stats.
Chapter 21:
- Lyon drops Nagalfar upon defeat.
Final:
- The boss starts with Demon Light instead of Ravager like the U version, so you can’t cheese him from range.
Problems
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Cutscenes sometimes softlock the game if you let them play out, so make sure you skip them.
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I have added Eirika as an invisible unit like Merlinus to prevent some things from breaking, such as receiving gold and viewing the world map status screen. She will only appear on the unit screen for the world map and some early pre deployment chapters.
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Death quotes seem to break some boss flags, so having one of your units die in a defeat boss map can complete the map, They’re all in Japanese and I assume most can’t read them so I haven’t bothered with death quotes.
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Monster portraits cause graphical glitches.
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I haven’t removed the tutorials, so easy mode definitely won’t work.
Let me know if any problems occur, particularly with Lyon. I might polish it up a bit at some point. If you want to improve this patch yourself, feel free to do so, as this is my first hack so I was learning as I went along and I don’t really know what I’m doing lol.
great