Lord Selection: March Of The Black Queen

[Jason]

It's no secret that I loves me some Ogre Battle, and that it's perhaps one of my favorite game series of all times ever. There's a great deal of freedom with what you can and can't do, the paths you travel, the units you build and recruit... there's just a lot there is what I'm saying.

Part of how March Of The Black Queen works is it gives you some questions at the beginning. A personality test if you will, that determines your leaders starting stats, attacks, and the units you'll eventually be granted. There's a few options here based on the answers to your questions and I, being super great, have got a little list here of what's available, why you might want it, and how to get it.

First, you'll see the ranking of the leader, and we'll refer to them by, and then the card and the option you pick. When you begin the game, Warren the Seer, draws a tarot card and asks a question. You pick the answer. Super hard stuff. The cards are, mostly based on RNG and you have one of three options. We'll call those 1, 2, and 3... cause numbers are fun.

Pick the Leader you want to go with, see where the card is in the chart, and pick that number of answer.

Make sense?


Anyway, from the top...

   

This is my go to setup. I really like starting the game with healers, and since white magic and white magic weapons are the only way to kill the undead, that makes it pretty handy. The leader, in the back row, has a pretty decent multi target ice attack, one of only a couple in the game and the rarest by far, plus a white magic attack in the front. Normally, you want to keep the Leader in the back all safe and secure, but this guy is pretty tanky compared to the rest of the options.

The army you get comes with some basic units... fighters, wizards, amazons... but they skew toward the side of good. A few clerics, a Valkyrie if you're lucky, and maybe even a samurai or two.

Remember, it's a lot easier to start good and go bad than the other way around, if you're into that kinda thing.

   

This one is, generally, considered to be the best Leader out there by people on the internet and generally only because he's got three attacks from the front row. This is up and down. Yeah he gets an extra attack, but he's also exposed to physical attacks from the enemy this way. Ianuki is powerful, but I've actually got a game over because of the splash back damage. He's also pretty crud in the beginning of the game. Poor HP and Agility means he's not gonna hit often, and will get hit often... unless you hide him in the back row where he'll hit himself for ya.

The units that come along are all pretty decent though. A good solid... kinda lawful but kinda beefy, attack force. This is, generally though, my last choice because of that ianuki attack.

   

This is my second favorite. If I wanna be a little less good and a little more "I'm just gonna melt your face." Your leader gets the same slash attacks from the front that the Ianuki lord gets, but from the back a unit targeting Thunder attack that, while not amazingly good, is very handy early-mid game. And... no splash damage to deal with. Sounds nice to me.

If you're into Beastman and the like, this is the one for you. If you're not so much into magic damage but brute strength this is it. It's not generally my play style, but it, I feel, is a better alterative than the previous mentioned Leader. I hate self damaging attacks, no matter how strong they may be.

   

The first time I ever played the game I got the Ice Lord. The second time I got this guy and he's all about getting the job done without caring what the peoples think. From the front you get 2 poison attacks (I know what the graphic says, I got the names backwards) and one unit hitting phantom from the back row. Health isn't a huge priority with this guy, but Intelligence mostly for that all important magic damage.

You're gonna start off with units that fit into the lower alignment tier here... wizards, wild men perhaps, maybe even a witch or a dollmage or two.

Generally it's fun for me if I just wanna wreck face and not... save face. Know what I'm sayin?

Anyway... hope someone found this helpful. Putting it together was not super fun, but I'm glad to have it.