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Upholding a long tradition in its optional first paralogue map,Fire Emblem Engagere-introduces the long franchise staple of the “Aptitude-Villager” in its character Jean. Available after completing the story’s fifth chapter, you’ll be able to challenge this map and potentially gain an additional unit - arguably one of the best units in Engage - in the process.
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Although Jean begins at level one, he’s an incredible early unit to add to your team, and the many rewards you’re able to earn in this map - as well as the experience - make this early challenge worth your time. It’s easy, it’s simple, and it comes with a unit you shouldn’t pass up. What is there to lose?
Setup Phase
This particular map is extraordinarily well-balanced for any early-game team you bring to the table. With a healthy mix of weapons leaning more toward axes (and your lack of available sword users outside Alear at the point this chapter becomes available), you’ll want tobring your best and rely more on smart chipping and baiting rather than the weapons triangle.
There aretwo houses that will require your visitationin order to get their items, but therightmost house has the exceptionally valuable Energy Drop, giving a permanent +2 increase to Strength to any unit that consumes it. This house gets destroyed quickly, so marching forward toward as fast as possible while also saving Jean and the other civillians will require highly mobile units.
There are several archer units on this map, so bringing a flying unit (like Chloe) would be a high-risk move. It can pay off due to their typical high resistance and speed - making them perfect mage killers, but you’re probablybetter off with cavalry units or beefy physical attackers paired with Sigurd.Thereshould be at least two of these highly mobile unitsso that one can go to the right house and the other can reach Jean quickly.
Additionally, there are a number of cavalry units here, soyou’ll want units equipped with cavalry-effective weapons- like the Marth’s Rapier or Sigurd’s Ridersbane - either as an equipped item or through their Emblem pairing. Additionally,all enemy units will be Corrupted units, so Celica’s Seraphim tome will be incredibly useful and potent here.
In gist, you’ll want to bring:
Jean’s Stronghold
On the north side of this map, Jean will be positioned close to his father, Sean, to spam-heal the civilians acting as human meat shields against the Corrupted units. Corrupted enemies will begin attacking them on their first turn, but Jean’s (and Sean’s) healing will be able to keep up with this for a few turns.
The higher the difficulty, the fewer turns you’ll have to work with.
Eventually, theLance Flier on the far east side of the map will swoop in and cause the greatest threat to this stronghold.Once the Lance Flier makes it to the Stronghold, you’ve essentially run out of time - especially since the boss archer will be very close behind as well. On Maddening difficulty, the Lance Flier will typically remove either Sean or Jean in either one or two turns (depending on your luck), so you should keep a close eye on its movement to determine how well the map is progressing.
If the Lance Flier makes it to Jean’s home before even one of your units reach it and the two attacking units are still alive,you should come to the conclusion that you’ve prematurely lostthe battle and use the Time Crystal to set yourself back and make a stronger push for the house.
Budding Talent Overview
Enemies
3x Mage, 2x Barbarian, 3x Axe Fighter, 2x Sword Cavalier, 1x Lance Flier, 3x Archer
Defeat all enemies
Treasures
Defense Tonic, Energy Drop, Surge (map completion reward from saved villagers), Pure Water (map completion reward from saved villagers)
Difficulty
★★★☆☆☆☆☆☆☆ (3/10)
As your first action, you’ll want tomove Alear to the house beside your army’s spawning location and visit it. Afterward,move your Qi-Adept - who, at this point, is probably Framme - to Alear’s side and out of enemy range to use Chain Guard. You can leave these two here to deal with the enemies on the west side of the map, as they’ll likely do fine without assistance so long as Framme has been invested in during the preceding maps. Their movements after this will be Alear wiping up the axe fighter and Framme using Alear’s Divinely Inspiring ability to deal some damage against the supporting mage for Alear to sweep up on the next turn.
Yourtankiest mobile unit should immediately start moving east and be placed in the woods tile,baiting all enemies that aren’t the mage forward to deal with. One unit might be able to slip between the buildings northward to face the enemy there around the corner. Otherwise,the rest of your army should focus their first and second rounds on dealing with the units immediately to the east.
Theunit moving east should ideally have Sigurd equipped as an Emblem pairing. It is recommended, however, to not Engage with Sigurd until you have visited the eastern house. Once done, you may use the Engage for the additional movement in order to close the distance between your unit and the enemy Corrupted further to the north, catching them in an admittedly very attractive pincher maneuver.
Rushing Home
Once the immediate threat to the east is dealt with, you canbegin splitting up your group and make for Jean’s house.Keep your cavalry unit heading for the eastern house with the Energy Drop, but your other units need to start heading north in earnest.Using Warp Ragnarok with Celica to take out one of the enemies in front of the civilians is highly recommended here.
Keep in mind that they likely won’t retaliate against your mage in their next turn as the civilians will be weaker, easier targets and draw most aggression, so this is a fairly safe play.
Alear and Framme should start running here, but given the large size of the map and the small number of enemies, they’ll likely be left behind by the rest of your army. Framme is really the only one with a use if your mobile units can spare moving back a square or two to grab a heal from her staff and then race forward again. From this point forward,keep moving Alear and Framme but keep in mind that they likely won’t see any action for the rest of the battle(unless you’re playing Maddening; in such a case, they should be able to provide back support when you’re defending the house).
Defending The Stronghold
By the time your units are able to reach the home and begin seriously defending it, the majority of the remaining enemies should have moved within range at your doorstep. From this point forward, it’s a game of ensuring youkeep the Corrupted out of the range of the civilians while using the garden’s cover to your advantage.
Place your units within the shrubbery but in between them and the civilians and begin systematically defeating enemies where possible.If you’re on Maddening, you’ll certainly want your units placed at the chokeholds points on both garden exits near Jean’s home, but difficulties below it find this strategy unnecessary. Given the map’s incredible ease on Normal and Hard modes, the clean-up should be rather straightforward and doesn’t require much strategizing outside using the foliage to your advantage.
If you find yourself struggling to hit the boss archer or the mage within the garden because they’re using the strategy of hiding in the foliage against you, you’ll certainly want torely on Celica’s Seraphimhere - if she’s paired with a mage unit that has the Mystical class. If you have exhausted her Engage meter, there are energy wells at Jean’s house you may use.
Once all the Corrupted are defeated, the map will end.So long as Jean did not die (in Classic mode), he will be added to your roster.For each civilian you save, you’ll receive a reward. Sean being defeated during this map does not appear to change anything - on Classic or Casual modes.
Post-Battle Exploration
When you appear in the post-battle exploration segment, there will be multiple items directly behind you:
Going east, you’ll findtwo more orangesin a bush just before reaching the garden, andwheat flour and a potatocan be found inside the garden. Within this garden is also the much coveted good boy, aWhite Elyosian Dog.A sheep(north near Jean’s home) anda chicken(on the south side of the map near Alfred and Vander) can also be found here, and you can adopt them for Achievements rewards or to fill out your paddock until you can adopt more dogs.
With your dogs, ingots, and Jean in tow, you can head back to the Somniel to start working out at the newly opened Arena (which comes with the fifth chapter) to beef up Jean and get him up to par with your current team.
