Thanks! Also I meant chappter 21 not 22 lol, silly mistakle.
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The Essential Character Challenge Run:
The Dark Amulet and The Shadow of Dawn were both incredible, both in their game play and epic storytelling! One of the things that makes both of these games unique is the many number of characters that are essential to the plot, and will trigger a game over when killed. As you play through the game the number of essential characters become smaller and smaller.
So I asked myself, can I defeat the game on hard mode using only essential characters? It turns out you can, but it was a wild ride!
I wasn’t able to find a list of the essential characters outside of the game, so I was not able to plan out which characters I would have till the end exactly, but I had played through the game and had a general idea of who would be with me for the long haul. Turns out there were a lot of characters I thought might be with me for longer who I had to leave behind. There were also some characters that were essential to me in my first play through that I wasn’t able to touch at all… cough, cough, (Hilda). Fortunately, the game makes it very clear who is essential at varying points of the game. It also got tricky when a character is recruited automatically who is not essential, moving them around the map so that they wouldn’t engage with enemies, especially reinforcements from the back.
There are two ways you could play the run when characters that were essential become no longer essential. When you start a chapter after the preparation a map will tell you if a list of characters are no longer essential. You can either restart the chapter and deselect those characters (which is how I did it), or you can count that chapter as the last time you can used those characters.
I could go on and on about how much fun I had, but I mainly wanted to share the fun with you all. It is a really fun way to play back through such an excellent game, especially if you go into it blind!
Thank you Vorgus for such an amazing game. I can’t wait for the third in the trilogy!
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Hello! I recently downloaded this and I been enjoying it really like that this game as Romance option, I di have a question, how exactly does increasing support work? Do I glue to them or just be in the same map?
It’s Tellius Style supports, meaning they just have to be deployed to the same maps X number of times until the Support is ready.
The best way to do support tbh, wish all romhacks would do it like this!
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@Vorgus I downloaded your patch after reading some of the comments here I became interested. Just fired up the first chapter and Golden Sun music was playing…
Just wanted to say that alone has me hyped and I am really looking forward to playing your creation. I made an account just to make this comment.
Thank you!
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Hi, just finished this hack. I think you did a great job of making each unit really fun to use and giving them each a specific power fantasy. The story was stellar throughout and I was impressed at the ending twist. Hilda for sure the gameplay MVP and Tancred the narrative GOAT. Thanks for making this.
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Hi Mr Vorgus, this is a small review / opinion in this hack
I really like the plot, it really feels like a medieval story, with all the betrails, lies and similar things, I have the feeling that you capture that element of a medieval story in a exceptional way
Now, with the gameplay, is when the issues starts…
I’m pretty sure you have readed a lot of times the differents opinions about the reinforcements, and the huge number of them, so I’m not going to focus on that. Instead, I wanna leave a small opinion about the units, and more importantly, the units leaving the party.
My biggest issue with the hack wasn’t the units leaving the party, that’s okay, and in the story, hwas sense… untill you lost the equipment in that units for who knows how many time… I’m not going to say who leaves the party (Is my first comment here, so I don’t know how to hide that info, haha) but, I have the feeling that us, as player, could know for before who would leave (Like the dialogue of the Thief in chapter 4. Is very clear that that dialogue is a hint for the player, not only for the Lord in the story) I have the feeling that dialogues like that would be helped a lot gameplay - wise
Besides, I really enjoyed this hack, is easy a 8.5 or 9/10. You had good ideas, maybe with the time can be refined. I know that The Dark Amulet has a sequel that I’m going to start right now, and I would leave a opinion there too!
PD: English is not my native language, so, if some ideas aren’t clear, you can say it!
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Thanks for your feedback, Mazapan. I’m happy to report that I tried to reduce the number of reinforcements (slightly, at least) in the sequel compared to The Dark Amulet. As for units leaving the party… uh… that still happens. It’s just dramatic and fun! 
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PEAK. Fantastic stuff, great units, interesting writing, good map design with integrated story, this game does a wonderful job in all the places that matter for me. Can’t recommend it enough.
Spoiler
The sequel setup definitely hooks you in, but I can’t lie, it does detract from the experience of the base game a little. I can definitely excuse it, though, as it sets up the next game at least a little.
Overall, this is a standout hack for me, and I’d put it at a full-on 5/5.
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I just beat Dark Amulet! I would say the best parts about the game was the leniency with units (everyone is usable and generally good), map difficulty (felt fair on normal mode with a lot of tools to handle situations) and a great story (I like games where playable units actually have personalities). I wish I got more supports with characters and that every pair had a paired ending, but oh well. The ending really goes hard towards the implication of a sequel, which is fine, but let us celebrate for a minute longer please?
Edric was a good protagonist, although a bit too perfect I feel. Fairly standard good natured lord with some edge. I like the conflict around Fenix and the lore of the world. I am interested to see it expanded upon and how the sequels improve upon the base. I wish some characters had more meaningful skills or if there were skills scrolls to really hone in on each character having a very specific niche, but ah well.
Units
Edric: Very powerful lord with excellent stats and skills. Hard to go wrong with him.
Julia & Catrine: Underwhelming, but they are healers so they always serve a purpose.
Shorn & Miley: Shorn getting galeforce and his busted swords is insane. Miley is less impressive, honestly she prolly should’ve gotten Galeforce, but she’s usable. In fact, she was my only bow user.
Leandra, Nadya & Tancred: All very powerful magic users. Leandra’s Smite is insane, Nadya has amazing mobility and Tancred is just unkillable. I love tanky druids.
Galen & Gareth: Comically busted. I got him S rank dark magic because of how much I relied on him. Gareth is fairly average, but his support with Shorn makes them both better.
Rikvah & Freya: I was going to bench Rikvah eventually, but she surpassed Dwalt in essentially everything and quickly maxed her stats. Freya was my love interest for Edric (which didn’t change much dialogue) and she was a strong pegagus knight.
Ruslan & Eleanora: Ruslan is a very strong, low maintenance flier. Eleanora might be the strongest dancer unit I have ever used. Proof rapier, staves, power staff, she can do so much.
Hilda & Morgana: Hilda gets good quickly, but even with all those extra levels, she’s not the best. Morgana also not as good as I thought, but not terrible.
Harlan, Rowan & Othello: Harlan’s proof weapon is insane, Rowan is a good extra axe user and Othello is an excellent ending unit.
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Just finished the hack a few hours ago and after reading all the supports and letting it sit I am here to offer my thoughts, show my units and praise you for the incredible Act 1 of a larger narrative you have created
Overall I found the gameplay difficult but fun. It kept me thinking and punished me for mistakes I would make. I did not mind the amount of essentials as with most hacks I play I usually reset for everyone since I play through them once. The array of personal weapons was amazing and really gave every unit a niche which combined with the skills and lack of class overlap made it incredibly tough for me to choose who to use come mid game. Specifically chapter 17 was agonizing since there is one less slot than available characters which made me want to edit the rom myself but I decided against it. The power nerf to 1-2 range I think was wise and the only complaint was that by endgame every single one of my units was 1 or 2 points away from 1 shotting/one rounding which annoyed me but I can chalk that up to bad luck.
Story wise I found your writing excellent and the overall plot was fantastic. I called it earlier an act I of a larger story since I know both of the sequel and in development third game and looking at the story through this lens I think it was very adept. It reminds me a lot of how Trails in the Sky FC was structured with a relatively smaller plot devoted to creating a world and cast more so than resolving the over arching conflict. Like Trails FC the ending certainly made me want to instantly start playing more and I am thankful it is already written. Chapter 15x was a magnum opus in gameplay-story intergration and the pain in the ass that chapter mustve been to code was extremely well worth it.
Here is a link to an album with all my units I used for the endgame, I had to add to imugur since I hit the character limit writing about them all in the dropdown. In addition to them I will write my spoilery thoughts on a few NPCs/those missing from the album.
NPC and Spoilery Thoughts
Of the characters not in my album I would like to talk about Jarnathan, Fenix, Ormer and Madelina.
Jartharn entirely to the ending making me believe he is the king of dusk. He reminds me again of trails villains being hidden in plain sight which makes me suspicious. OR he could be a cheeky self insert of yourself. I have no way of knowing until I have more information.
Fenix and Ormer go together as they both exemplify the stories themes of lusting for power. Both men wanted a title that was not theirs to take and belonged to the man they were sworn to and through the circumstances are able to claim it. Both men were consumed by that new title with Fenix giving it up to survive with his daughter and Ormer dying for it as was his duty. Fenix was probably my third favorite character behind Madelina and Sophia and I think what made him work was how real his story was. He was a guy who worked his ass off, who was undoubtley sucessful but wanted acknowledgement and appreciation from one person and when he didnt get that he succumbed to anger. It reminds me of my IRL dad in his wish for his brothers to appreciate him despite him eclipsing them in success. Ormer meanwhile was a very well done NPC. His arc was complete and his cold nature befitted his homeland.
Finally Madelina was perhaps my favorite character in the hack. It always stuck in my mind her little prods and suggestions here and there. Her insistence that Edric should be king, that he should marry Julia, that they should do this or that. It was always subtle but noticable that it stuck with me. Then her betrayal at the end of the game was fantastic. Her laying it all out to Edric that its too late, she won and her scheme of two decades was successful. I await to see what evil plot she has in the sequel and what the Redenze under her control will do.
Overall 10/10, great hack. I hope you enjoyed this write up
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I read the write-up. I read the Imgur link. Loved all of it. Glad you enjoyed the game! I think you’ll really enjoy The Shadow of Dawn. Let me know how it goes! 
Also I went back into The Dark Amulet and read over the Battle Quote between Sophia and Zeddard, and then the Battle Quote between Fenix and Miley. You’re right, they’re pretty devastating in the best way possible 
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The Zeddard-Sophia one in particular felt like the culmination of the entire games narrative journey. It was amazing and hope theres more from that well of writing. Glad you enjoyed the write up I sure enjoyed the game. I will be starting SoD right after I send this message so I hope to write you in another month or so
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I found a funny bug that probably makes Rivkah much more op, I’m on her join chapter, I recruited her, I move to attack an enemy while also having her be next to Edric, I open Supply then close the supply and check the battle forecast and she now has 100 crit regardless of weapon. I then see if I can cause it through other methods, and yep, if she opens the trade menu, then close it, I get 100 crit.
Edit: Just realized its also causing her to take 0 Damage on top of the 100 crit. The bug is likely causing her Outrider skill to treat her as if she moved an absurd amount of spaces.
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I promote mostly at 20 but do it when the game is getting tougher and your characters already hit any stat cap
Just finished the game . First time posting here and infact anywhere like that , and a non native English speaker , 20 years old kid here, so don’t mind anything guys. Bro i absolutely loved the game , almost player 6-10 hours a day to complete it and that when I’ve not been that much of a gamer at all for years (I’m actually an aspiring data scientist+ Athlete so barely play games anymore , just a few during vacation periods, but you got me addicted lol) . I’ve a very hyper aggressive kinda play style , like i love it the most when i somehow send a character in between different enemies , they attack him and miss him while he’s just one shitting them all the time that’s why assassins + swordmasters have been my fav in the earlier games (then they introduced busted skills like aether , etc which are basically a cheat code when activated by the lords like how Ike in radiant dawn became). So the game absolutely felt like it’s made for people like me. I did a lot of fun things and strategies, my fav one was how i defeated that tower map against Velaina mage map in just 3 turns lol, miley’s kiss of death worked well and did it in 2 turns although i had to rescue her from there in the first turn. And yeah I’m a very biig nerd , so basically i even researched, looked up online , discussed with gemini about different players and their capabilities, endgame players i can focus and kept changing them based on my preferences and how the story is unfolding like miley + galen were my first units which i locked in for endgame because their very explicit romance in the story and i love narrative the most. Also i basically abused save states that’s why i got excellent character growths ( i used to just redo my whole turn until that character whose leveling up get close to optimised stats, especially when that’s struggling in some field in the game). I must have strategised and researched for almost 10+ hours since i started this game.
Oh btw my endgame team, as i said i looked a lot of things online so i locked in the 10-12 units quite early, also path of radiance and especially radiant dawn experience worked here as well, i knew the og team of phoenix blades are going to be one of the strongest so i chose all of them for both narrative and gameplay reasons. So i barely wasted a lot of exp on other team members and i leveled up most characters at 17-20.
Summary
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Oh btw, random things
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Welll…i have a very soft spot for zeddard tbh, i don’t think he was evil, first how badly he was treated by infact both his father and brother and then the tragedy with helena.
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Sophia portrait was my fav, she looked like a really elegant and beautiful lady.
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It took me around 218 turns total to finish the game ,felt like an achievement for me after abusing so many save states lol
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I have paired every one of the characters i used with their canon romantic support ( i learnt the calculations and mechanics of fire emblem, so yeah i tried to finsih them adjacent to each other as much as possible)
So here was my team in the endgame
First time using this, for some reasons “hide details“ was applied twice here so please click on it again
The lord himself, his broadsword was quite handy initially and he was showing great growths, but once he got promoted ( quite late tbh, he hit is cap a chapter ago so i had to basically hide him so that the exp wouldn’t be wated) , he gained aether and he got so busted after that , like when he got promoted his skill was at some 18 and he used to activate aether quite decently, after the rightful king he basically became a one man army, i basically abused him and elyse , like i sent him and elyse together through warp staff and rescue by flyers at the top in the tower map against monster velaina and they both finished more than quarter the enemies of the entire map singlehandedly in one turn. 9.5-10/10 unit especially after getting lionheart sword and 10/10 when he got that extra 10% skill activation, aether is overpowered in every game
Tbh i did found out she’s gonna be an absolute nuke of a staff user after chapter 22× so i kept using her as a healer and she was doing a good job with all the warp and hammerne stuffs letting her gain levels almost instantly , and her late promotion let me level her at lv 20. She was quite good as rescue support with her 14 aid as well. 6.5/10 unit for most game cause she doesn’t do anything except healing even after promotion and that happens pretty late as well, 9/10 after promotion if you leveled her well cause’ her staff utility increases exponentially after that. I liked her story as well so i grinded her well, also i liked harlan too so an indirect reason for choosing her.
Great healer (had to grind a lot with her to reach her staff level to C so that she’d be able to physic which let her cover most parts of the map and heal anyone) , great magic unit as well with her high magic and speed and i used 2 const items on her because her prf had a 10 wt so she turned out great after that. Promoted at 16. 8/10 unit
Last minute recruit tbh, i leveled her up until i found ruslan, then i got to know ruslan has a level cap until chapter 22 so had to bring her back, promoted her at 16 lvl although i managed to get an A support between ruslan and hadima before benching him . I had shortage of lance users and she was quite decent especially when she got silver and killer lances because steel lance and other heavy lances was making her lag. Promoted at 16 . 7.5/10 unit especially when she and nadya both were quite handy in rescue.
Tbh i didn’t want to use hadima much, but gemini said she’s going to get really important in narrative of the sequel so i picked her as well, well i wasn’t disappointed . Promoted at 20 . 9/10 especially when her aid was at 8 
He was absolutely a great unit with his high const. and his canto+ with the skill of ignoring the field obstacles really helped me in my strategies. Promoted him at 16 and used some stat boosters on him too , especially the luck. 9.5/10 for utility and trying various strategies especially with eleanora.
I don’t know how but i almost overused her and she got 4 levels in 2 chapters after unlocking that extra move skill and somehow i managed to push her staff level c just when she reached that point , i fed her some kills of the mages too to level her fast. 8.5/10 unit because of how much she helped in my strategies.
As i said before too , swordmasters are my fav , so i almost instantly locked him in for endgame after i got him in the early chapter because i knew he’s gonna be great, and he was brilliant for most of the maps where i used go put him in between axe usera and just one space away from lancers and he used to annihilate the ax users, his performance got a bit dipped in the endgame because the monsters were mostly easily killable through legendary weapons and his main power was constant criticals so that reduced in the legendary weapons as compared to his prf. Promoted him at 18. 9/10 and infact 10/10 if i remove the endgame especially after he activated galeforce , that made him a one man army fr .
Galen and miley , Power couple lol. Galen was a decently fast tank especially with his nosferatu , so apparently his 14 const didn’t let the heavy dark magic drop his speed one bit that’s why he worked perfectly, i used him and miley a lot for a spikey wall kinda thing those few times when i took defensive positions and baiting the enemies to come near my team . And apparently his growth was quite well balanced while miley acted perfectly as an offensive archer , her low defence and resistance hurt ( that’s why i used to seraph rope and some more things on her otherwise her hp was quite bad too). Both together turned out well , i kept using miley btw even when galen was gone for the story . I promoted galen at 20 and miley at lv 15 . 9/10 to both. Oh btw i still didn’t get against whom chivalry is effective with, i basically used to make a check against any unit who uses lance .
Don’t have much to say about them tbh , they’re great though, i really abused dwalt’s resolve skill although save states helped me a lot otherwise he would’ve died a lot of times. I used to let his hp go just below the 50% mark then never anymore. 8.5/10 to both . I used them together mostly and they’re brilliant against lance units like knights and paladins. And similar to chivalry, i really had it tough to get against whom dwalt’s weapon is effective. Promoted them at 16 (rivkah) -18 (dwalt ) probably.
For some reason my hilda didn’t turn out to be that exceptional compared to my other units as much people were saying, i leveled her up to 10 as pupil and then all the way 20 as the cavalier. She still was quite great once she got silver and killer lances , and when she joined forces with alexias her utility increased a lot . 8.5/10 probably especially after how much i invested in her.
Wtf was this guy !!!? No seriously, i used that perfume on him, had to shield him a lot and mainly got him exp of few opponents with low res like knights , once he caught up like around lv 15 mage when he started doubling opponents with high magic , his potential exploded , like I was sure if I’d have warped him somehow in between various enemies and somehow keep hilda 3 spaces around him at a place where she’s safe , he’d be devastating and might clear half a map singlehandedly in one turn . His last 2 levels were just basic hp growths because there was no stat to growth to begin with , his luck is literally exceeding the bar itself. And his romance with hilda was lovely lol. 10/10 unit , maybe even 11/10 , was worth every investment and even more.
The lord’s partner in my gameplay, her palette ,her narrative, her prf weapons , her paragon skill, everything was brilliant, she was just insane and i loved her the most in every way . 1000/10.
Well my fav characters are assasins tbh, in all fire emblem games , especially their high crit ratio with lethality is so fun to use , i remember in binding blade my assasin had literally 1 damage showing on the window against one of the last chapter bossses, the attack happens and lethality kicks in , boom, 60 hp in one shot , that’s one of my fav memory of fire emblem. Always fun when it got activated . Guess we didn’t have lethality here in this game, but harlan was still great with his shadow bane especially and how he supported julia , his high exp gains helped, 9/10 unit sure.
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I’m currently up to chapter 18. This is a great romhack and I’ve been enjoying the journey so far. I appreciate the inclusion of normal mode, because that still has a fair challenge.
Some pluses:
- The story is well done, as are the supports.
- Units feel different and all the skills feel significant. There’s no skill bloat, or so insignificant that you stop playing around them. In particular, I really like the cavaliers with skills that do more when you use more of their movement.
- Good portrait and sprite work. For sprites, I really liked Edric and Rivkah. For portraits, I found Catrine, Griss, and Freya to be standouts.
The bad:
- Too many reinforcements. The number of enemies they bring, and the randomness of their spawn points can be frustrating. Chapter 10 in particular was not fun and I considered if this was going to be indicative of the rest of the experience and considered dropping it. I had set up blockades of units enemies would spawn in and behind them. That’d be fine if it had a visual cue like a staircase.
- Too many units are “essential.” That is only a problem because this is a Fire Emblem game. If it was a different tactics game that didn’t lean into permadeath, then I think the implementation of that facet of the game was really good.
Possible Bug:
In 16x, the first time Royce killed an enemy, Galeforce didn’t trigger. It did every other time on the map however.