FE4 Balance is fucked. My mission, circa four months ago, was to unfuck it. I succeeded, in most of the ways that mattered to me. Satisfied, I put down the game for a while, but recently, something brought me back... I couldn't put my finger on what it was- actually, I could- it was realizing that holy characters CAN drop items, and thus fixing my long-standing grievance with the Helswath drop. In that moment, it hit me just how much I still had left to learn. In retrospect, there were many aspects of the rebalancing that I was not satisfied with. 
For one, I completely neglected to alter the 2nd Generation's substitute characters. Seeing as those were some of the single weakest characters in the game, it's dumbfounding, how little I did with them. 
In the midst of figuring out how player inventories worked, during the development of this hack, I accidentally created a second instance of the duplicate item bug (if you would like to see the first, scroll down to the character changes section.). Arden and Holyn possessed the same Iron Blade, which would cause the item to disappear from the latter's inventory as soon as the game was reset. This has been fixed.
These two examples of simple oversight should give you an idea of how I went about tweaking things, this time around. 
Please read the original readme, for any changes not listed here (Tailtyu inheritence swap, previous character buffs, development issues, etc).
There is much to discuss, here. Let's begin.

\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\Patches////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
I acquired some patches from a JP website, that now come pre-applied to this hack.
- Crit is displayed during battle.
- Sword skills are usuable by anyone, and their activations can stack during a single combat.
- NPC battles play out with combat animations. If you wish to view events such as the Yied Massacre without them, turn off animations.


\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\WEAPONS////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
I doubt this irked anyone as much as it irked me, but some swords were disproportionately light, compared to others. The Slim Sword had 1 weight, and the Barrier Sword had 3. These have been changed to 2 and 5, respectively. The only swords left with less weight than an Iron are the Miracle Sword, Thief Sword, and the previously mentioned Slim Sword. Barrier Sword has 12 might now.
The Earth Sword's durability is set back to 10 every time the game is reset. To counter this, the repair cost has been reduced to 4000.
Armorslayers were shockingly terrible, even after a might buff. Now, they have 10, instead of 8. Wingclipper had it's weight reduced by 2.

I did not read the room when trying to fix the Gae Bolg. I gave a hit buff to a weapon that grants 10 skill when equipped. Outstanding. This time, it has 10 weight, down from 15, which was just gross. Gungnir still has 15 though, because like hell am I going to buff an enemy weapon.

Brave Axe has 80 hit.

Any weapons not mentioned here retain their changes from 1.0.

[Helswath][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][]
Holy weapons can be sold, at last! It's probably still best to land the killing blow with Johan/Johalvier, though.
[][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][]

The weight of the standard bows has been reduced to 7. Not sure why.

Aura and Nosferatu have had their weight swapped, making the latter heavier.

\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\CLASSES///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

base infantry have 7 Movement.
base cavalry have 8 movement.
promoted infantry have 8 movement.
promoted cavalry have 9 movement.
Thieves are a special case and get 8/9 like cavalry.
Second verse, same as the first, except that Bishops are now a playable class, and thus have 8 movement.

Almost every class in the game has had it's bases altered.
Horses in FE4, as well at the 1.0 version of this hack, possess virtually identical bases. This time around, each mounted class has a little something to differentiate them. 
Lance Knights have +1 skill, Bow Knights have +1 speed, Axe Knights have +2 def and -1 spe, and Free Knights have +1 skl and spe and -1 strength. 
These changes extend to their promoted counterparts, where each class should cap their main stat at 27.
Paladins have a bit more magic and resistence to compensate the otherwise lack of buffs. 25 stength cap. B axe rank. 
Female Paladins trade a bit of strength, defense, and C lances for magic, resistance, and B staves. 
Pegasus Knights have 3 magic, to make the boost to 7 on promotion less jarring. 
Snipers have the same stats as Swordmasters. There is no reason to stunt their maximum speed like that.
Heroes trade their 3 base magic for 1 defense and 2 resistance. I feel that the magic sword proficiency is kind of wasted on a class who's characters universally possess bad magic stats.
Generals got an extra +2 resistance.
Mage Fighters have +3 skill, allowing them to reach 30 skill at cap.
Mage Knights have received +2 skill and speed, due to an oversight in which Linda promoting to Mage Knight caused her to lose skill.
Dancers got +1 strength, +1 skill, +2 speed, and +1 defense.
Priests have 10 res instead of 7.
Bishops got some buffs to make them a bit more favorable as a promotion option (check Sharlow's page in this readme).
Thieves have 10 speed instead of 7. Them being so slow in this is quite odd. 
Rogues reach 30 speed cap instead of 30 skill cap.
Pegasus Knights have innate Adept and Bow Knights have innate Pursuit. It's no longer possible for pursuit-less Lester to exist.


changes not mentioned here are identical to the first edition.
...phew, that's class bases. How bout class growths?
You heard me right- classes in this game all have unique growths! ...well, they would, but for some reason, all of them are the same 100% HP, 30% everything else spreads. I added some diversity to growths by swapping these numbers around. 
For example, General growths have 25% skl and spd, but 40% def. Each class has these minor deviations in growths. Note, this only applies to enemies though.


\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\Characters////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
ALEC. NOISH.
In a sea of spiffy improvements for horseback characters, the two cavs you start with feel decidedly neglected. These two haven't been heavily altered, but their existing growths have been rearranged to better fit the "strong cav and fast cav" archetype... On closer inspection, all I did was swap Alec's speed growth with his skill growth, give the former 10% magic, and the latter 10% resistance. Sorry for hyping them up. 

ARDEN. 
Since the two cavs got +5%, so does he, and it goes to speed, of course. He also gets an additional 10% defense, just so that he hits the defense cap at level 30 on average.

HP 90% Strength 50% Magic 5% Skill 20% Speed 25% Luck 10% Defense 50% Resistance 5%

not so smug now, are you two? 

FINN. 
His survivability continues to flounder, in a world where axes don't suck ping pong balls. He got +20% luck growth.

AZEL. 
He has a strength base of 5 and a growth of 20%. Most sword/magic users will receive the same treatment.
Bolganone is now avaliable in the Chapter 4 armory. The wind tome it replaces is in Lewyn's starting inventory.

AIDEEN.
40% strength growth. Lester should suck less now. (But he'll always be my least favorite FE4 character, hahaha)

HOLYN.
10% HP growth. He now starts with one of the Iron Blades that appear in the later armories, instead of Arden's.

ERINYS. 
Her strength was reduced back to 20%. She got too strong a bit too fast with 30%.
HP 50% Strength 20% Magic 15% Skill 20% Speed 30% Luck 20% Defense 30% Resistance 15%
Erinyous.gif

TAILTYU. 
Base 5 strength for her, too. Remember that her inheritence is still swapped!

\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\GEN 2 CHARACTERS////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
ARTHUR.
Due to only having B thunder in 1.0, he was unable to inherit Thoron from Tailtyu. His base class has been changed to Thunder Mage, to fix this. His Wind tome has been swapped with Tinni's Elthunder.

DALVIN.
Focused on offense. 
|HP 80% |Strength 60% |Magic 5% |Skill 40% |Speed 40% |Luck 60% |Defense 20% |Resistance 5%
Received Sol.

RADNEY.
Exchanges Vantage for good magic stats. Focused on defense.
|HP 80% |Strength 30% |Magic 40% |Skill 20% |Speed 30% |Luck 10% |Defense 50% |Resistance 40%

MUIRNE.
+2 HP, +2 DEF, Received Miracle.

TRISTAN.
He is a colossal HP meatstick. Virtually no other redeeming qualities, but hey, that's a lot of HP...
|HP 155% |Strength 40% |Magic 5% |Skill 20% |Speed 30% |Luck 5% |Defense 30% |Resistance 5%
Received Accost. Regained Critical.

DEIMNE.
The nuke. Strength was admittedly overkill, so his stats have been shifted to give him some extra bulk.
|HP 90% |Strength 60% |Magic 10% |Skill 40% |Speed 20% |Luck 30% |Defense 50% |Resistance 10%

HERMINA.
A bit stronger than before.
|HP 60% |Strength 50% |Magic 10% |Skill 20% |Speed 50% |Luck 50% |Defense 20% |Resistance 5%
Received Nihil. Bow immunity on a pegasus is otherwise only accessible through the lousy Alec/Erinys pairing.

AMID.
The worst sub has received quite the overhaul.
|HP 90% |Strength 40% |Magic 40% |Skill 50% |Speed 40% |Luck 20% |Defense 20% |Resistance 20%
Received Critical, exchanged Adept for Pursuit.

JOHAN/JOHALVIER.
Their speed and skill deficiencies were swapped, meaning the former has personal 10 speed/4 skill, 25% speed growth/75% skill growth, and vice versa for the latter. 

SHANNAN.
+4 HP, Received Luna.

DAISY.
Her offense is beyond repair, so she is instead relegated to the role of dodging everything on earth.
|HP 50% |Strength 10% |Magic 10% |Skill 20% |Speed 50% |Luck 65% |Defense 10% |Resistance 50%
+9 Luck, Received Bargain and Miracle.

JEANNE.
Her level has been boosted to 7, with the statistical averages to match. More magic focused than before, but she also got a lick of Tristan's absurd HP...
|HP 100% |Strength 10% |Magic 50% |Skill 40% |Speed 20% |Luck 10% |Defense 30% |Resistance 20%
Received Charm.

LAYLEA.
+10% HP and Strength. Nothing to ride home about.

LINDA.
HP left something to be desired, even at 95%.
|HP 100% |STR 35% |MAG 45% |SKL 55% |SPD 45% |LUCK 25% |DEF 40% |RES 25%
Promotes to Mage Knight.

ASAELLO.
He's a level 9 prepromoted Sniper now. Base luck has been buffed to 10.

HAWKE.
Begrudgingly, I gave him minor Heim blood, which makes him the only Sage in the game with A rank light magic. 
Almuth gave me a better solution for getting the tome you didn't pick in chapter 6 (which was to put both tomes in Chapter 8's armory), so now Hawke is back to just having a single tome.

SHARLOW.
To add some diversity to the class lineup, he promotes to Bishop instead of High Priest. Bishops trade 5 resistance and light access for 2 defense and B rank fire, wind, and thunder. He has also been given Pursuit to further his offensive potential. You'll still mainly want him for Berserk, but it's a bonus.

HANNIBAL. 
Now that I've figured out how skill combinations are handled, Hannibal has Sol, in addition to Pavise, Renewal, Pursuit, and Vantage. He'll be practically invincible!

\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\ENEMIES///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

- Maios and Daccar are now a Sage and Mage Knight, respectively.
- Messing with Baron stats brings me no end of headaches. I gave them 15 magic and defense at base, forgetting that enemies ignore caps. It's too baked into the game's design to go back and fix.
- The General leading the army that recaptures Leonster is now Bharat.
- Fuck Chapter 7 in particular. I nerfed the shit out of said army that recaptures Leonster, again. Fuck them. Fuck them to the abyss of Loptous' slimy tailhole. I hate Chapter 7.

\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\MAPS////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
I really wanted to edit maps, but the output is always a few bytes too large, and winds up corrupting the map that follows it. 
I may edit maps in 3.0, if there's demand for it.

\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\CREDITS////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

Special Thanks To
Pobble Bobble, for suggesting strength bases for the Mage Knight and War Mage characters. 
Advent, for helping me craft a Japanese title for the hack.
Playtesters, whose experiences helped me further tweak this project.
Almuth, for providing me with the information on making Holy Weapons sellable, and fixing Brave/Adept.
dood, for strongarming me into buffing Paladins.











Maybe now, I can finally be done with FE4. I must return to the bowels of the earth... 