Shiki

Just saying but movement-reducing terrain doesn't negate a +2 Mov advantage. The maps where terrain is delibitating for them are far in-between. In contrast most maps in 3H are pretty open and vast where a Cavalier is absolutely going to be ahead. That WEXP gain is not that low. By the time you have Intermediate classes you can very much expect your units to be in multiple battles and these points adds up, especially with classes giving additional skill Exp. Compared to LTC you will get a lot more out of combat which in turn enables faster weapon ranks. I'm not sure how this is conflicting. I assume that all these resources are readily available for every unit. So I rate every magical unit's (not only Lysithea's) performance with Thyrsus in mind. I just don't let the acquirement of these items flow into a unit's placement because it doesn't tell you how good a unit is. This is something that is generally assumed on tier lists. e.g. in FE6 Sophia getting a Guiding Ring for free doesn't flow into her unit assessment. Considering Maddening mode changes very little to the Monastery routine this doesn't mattter? Like it has nothing to do with the efficiency criteria. Recruiting everyone doesn't require you to take extra turns or negatively impacts you in a significant way. To legimately recruit them you need to have certain skill ranks on Byleth but until the deadline you have so much AP to spend (if you optimized Professor rank which is a given) that you will have more than enough to cover Byleth's needs for Wyvern Rider access while having plenty to spare to level other skills. B rank support only requires Gold which is abundant in 3H. If only Paralogue access is relevant then you don't even have to recruit every student. Annette doesn't get hers on the other routes while some of the pre-war ones only require 1 student to unlock it (e.g. Ingrid-Dorothea). PEMN but out of 5 Maddening runs (1 for each of BL, GD and SS, 1 GD "LTC", 1 CF in progress) I managed full recruitment while getting Byleth to Wyvern Rider (F!Byleth on SS went from PK to WR) with no difficulty at all. No tier list worth its salt takes it for granted to skip optional chapters. It is generally assumed that you actually play them and, more importantly, clear them with the same efficienty/LTC criteria in mind. I find it baffling that so many basic criteria are questioned. I would have assumed that SF had experience to make tier lists like these and aside from the unique criteria of 3H recruitment all of this is pretty standard stuff, almost carbon copies from tier lists of older games. BE will also miss Ch.5 Warp so I was already taking it into account for this list. Only GD gets that delicious turn shave on Maddening. DotG is first available post-timeskip though and that's about the time the other Warp users get access (a bit earlier I guess). Lysithea will have it Ch.6 onwards and is the sole user of it for the entire pre-war period and assorted paralogues. Plus while Flying+Stride can substitute Warp it doesn't necessarily make it worse. Correct me if I'm wrong but I thought the final BL map required Warp for the fastest clear. I don't think this changed with Maddening. Though reviewing your comment I should differentiate some units, especially for the SS path. Hilda's placement imo doesn't change that much on SS because she still scales very well and has no trouble becoming a Wyvern Rider. The only thing you lose is her availability for Part 1. Catherine though takes a lot longer to even access an inferior flying class and as a PK her performance is middling until she can reclass into a Falcon Knight. Her stat lead is also lost so that makes SS Catherine a lot worse than on othe rroutes. Cyril is pretty much unsalvageable. He auto-levels as a Commoner which completely neuters his stats. Auto-leveling Axe and Bow are still nice and he reaches C rank Flying quickly enough but his stats are so bad that I don't think he is worth it. Is there anything else I would have to account for as significant route differences? EDIT: I also changed the tier list a bit.

Musashi being handled better is part of the improved writing quality but it doesn't change the fact that this entire chapter revolves around her. If someone doesn't care about or even dislike her then they will get bored quickly. Speaking of which, I have finished Shimosa. Overall, it's a great EoR chapter. I put it on an equal or above level to Shinjuku but it's still 2nd place to CCC.

So, uh, this happened: Still doing Shimosa though I will have to say; despite being of much higher writing quality this is basically Nero's Septem for Musashi. Good for people like me who enjoy her, not so good if you don't.

If you do enjoy Waver as a character or are just interested in his development after Fate/Zero it's very much worth a look. Though the main plot line is a bit of a mess. I still find it odd they skipped the first book entirely despite it being Luvia's introduction. Well at least there is now a retweet/like campaign (don't bother reading the comments though). NA getting less SQ has been a thing since time immemorial. This year we miss some retweet campaigns (like the one with the 7M download campaign) and other small stuff like stage play or stream events. Can't exactly give out stuff without reason though I wish NA would put more effort in to somehow hand out those rewards. I can't possibly pull for King Hassan anymore because we lost way too much free SQ this year. That being said some people expect we should get the same amount of maintenance SQ. ------- For some more positive news (read: how I make people salty😞 I got Musashi with 5 10-rolls. Hell yeah. Now to cry bitter tears when I don't get NP2 Tomoe with my 300 SQ tomorrow. Also the game doesn't approve of me getting her. She only passed 1st Ascension. Why? I have enough EXP and mats to make her fully ascended with 10/10/10 skills. Gated. By. Saber Pieces. Not Monuments but Pieces. Btw. relevant:

Earliest Silver Bow is Ch.7 I think which you get from a side quest involving her. I don't think by Ch.6 you can unlock the option to forge Silvers from Steel. But I would argue both her and Felix occupy the same bow niche but the latter requires more work and needs to be recruited asap. Question does Felix's potential 2 chapter lead weigh more than Shamir's advantages? I would say no and his few stat leads from his growths are already diminished by his lack of Authority (Shamir even brings along a Fusillade battalion). iirc it is generally agreed that people grow Speed carrots for gardening so her Spd issue shouldn't be hard solve. No, she joins with A rank. Yes, her and Catherine are filthy cheaters

2-3 chapters late is a rather big flaw considering either Marianne and Mercedes can have it much earlier with some investment or just come with it at default with. Dorothea absolutely requires you to recruit her early for Physic access otherwise she simply comes too late to be a good healer. Combat mages ... are just not good. Death Blow seems a bit of a stretch considering we want to clear the maps fast and Brigand is definitely an inferior choice to the Cavalier. Plus they get more Lance WEXP which helps to get Swift Strikes faster. Here's something you should consider: Recruiting students in your free time is basically a given anyway as you want the extra items and EXP from paralogues. Past Ch.5 you have full access to all the support-building mechanics that don't require AP and considering the paralogues pay themselves 90% of the time there is very little reason not to do so. This list mostly serves to highlight which units should be recruited asap while pointing out some who can still perform good enough if recruited later. Take Lorenz for example. You really don't get anything from recruiting him early and you would have gotten more mileage out of someone else like Sylvain or Catherine. You have plenty of time to get recruit him before Ch.7 anyway so why would someone want to waste the very limited support resources in the earlygame on him? LoR access is trivial, too, considering Sylvain is thirsty enough to bring it to you for free. The only real question is whether I should penalize Ferdinand and Caspar for wasting Byleth's skill EXP which does matter and I didn't consider that before. It's basically the same thing as FE7 Geitz and most lists tend to penalize him for that. I should sleep more. I really should sleep more. Guess the first change will be to move Sylvain and Ferdinand up while dropping Felix. I guess Shamir, too, considering she comes rather late though I would argue that Shamir > Felix for her earlier access to +2 range bows and having actually good weapon ranks to work with. EDIT: The wands are fairly inconsequential, Levin Sword is buyable later and more of a gimmick. It's possible to warp someone to the March Ring chest and move towards to the DK with Stride. But tbh the March Ring costs probably too many turns as it is worth. ... where are you getting the Dancer from? Warp is absolutely relevant to reach Solon. There are beasts on the NW and NE corner which are not in range of strided fliers. You can reach one with a Dancer but for the other Warp is your best bet. It's kill boss and warping a strided flier towards the boss cuts at least a turn. On the other hand Warp enables the same thing as flying + stride so how does that speak against it? Warping Ingrid towards the escape point save turns regardless though. Actually no. Killing the bosses on the exits makes it easy to manipulate the central thieves to move towards a specific one which will save turns. Bonus points for clumping up and making them susceptible to a gambit wipe. I mean either you clear it ASAP (where a Dancer is out of the question) or you might as well wait until Alois is recruited for the extra battalion. Every paralogue except Ashe+Catherine and Seteth+Flayn is unlocked by month 8 so you actually don't have a Dancer at this point. Never mind you get your Dancer at Week 3 (pretty almost at end of the month) so technically even those two have not a Dancer for their earliest clears. On the flip side why should one not take account of it? Lysithea for Warp use doesn't lock her out of Thyrsus nor does she monopolize its use over others. This doesn't make any sense. It astounds me that you are not realizing what kind of logic fallacy you're commiting here. So Marianne is supposedly bad because you have a healer on the other routes. Even though she is capable of doing the same thing as your current healer. Never mind that she will be on a higher level than your current one as the exp gain of healers is low and auto-leveling utterly eclipses it. Guess I have to demote Mercedes, too, considering she has the same issue. 6 range. Cool. All the mounted units have already moved 11-13 spaces away from her though. What move have healers again? 4 (5 as a gremory). Physic is better because of its range. You can actually reach your wounded units which is something mages in this game struggle to do. Fortify is not that great and you are grossly overestimating its uses. It's perfectly reflected. Using a gambit wastes a unit's turn and there are certaintly better things to do then to apply a weak safety net so you can enable someone to kill. It is also bold to assume that Vengeance is the strongest art when Swift Strikes with Relic weapons, Atrocity and Raging Storm exists which also require no setup.

Ch.5 is generous considering as a recruit she doesn't get much time to focus on her Faith rank. That being said Manuela's Warp is not available for a long time either. She has B rank Faith when she is recruited and reaching A rank isn't trivial at all (especially on Maddening). Considering that Lysithea has warp monopoly at minimum for 4 chapters that puts her far above her. The fastest skips require Stride and Warp so that doesn't say much. Not to mention early on you only get a single Stride battalion which makes earlier Warp access even more important for efficent clears. Considering recruiting past Ch.5 is a trivial matter I don't see why are you assuming Lysithea has not Thyrsus. Until Ch.7 (when the first paralogues unlock) you have a lot of time to recruit other students. That's a nice pitfall you have here. So because you already have a unit that covers a niche makes a similar good unit worthless. Wat. Guess Franz is trash because Seth exists. That's obviously not true. Not to mention Physic is the only important healing magic, everything else is "nice to have" at best. Restore is mostly niche and Fortify has low range which doesn't bode well with mages having gimped move. Marianne trumps the other two Physic users in regards of utility because she gets Thoron for 3 range chip, Silence against siege tomes and has an easy time to get a mount thanks to her strength in Riding and eventually Lances. Mercedes only offers healing spells while her offensive spells are very basic. She just gets different 1-2 range spells which doesn't do much. Dorothea suffers a lot from the recruitment mechanic because her preferred skills are Swords and Reason. Aka she stars with E Faith. Despite having a budding Talent that weakness in Faith makes it a lot harder to get Physics access early on which is why she is an entire tier below the other two. Rallying is very good on Maddening but actual units are simply better. Annette doesn't do anything beyond that as her stats are bad and her spell list offers nothing. Ignatz is similar. He has only Rally Spd but Deadeye + his talent can be fairly useful to trigger the boss in Ch.5 or aggro the AI. Other units can kill without relying on elaborate setups. Vengeance is very overrated and without Blessing her lack of durability will get her killed. Bernadetta is more carried by her good skill affinities in Lance, Bow and Riding. There might be some niche setup where Vengeance Bernadetta can kill bosses in conjunction pass but Flying + Stride + Warp is a lot easier to pull off. He is a student who has a recruitment lock till Ch.5 and his stats aren't even that great either. That's pretty bad. PBV is good and so are his many skill preferences but compared to everyone above him there is very little he brings to the table in exchange for his downsides. At the very least Raphael has some uses with Rally Str and being rather bulky (though much worse than Dedue or Catherine).

This is the first time I ever heard of that and I'm very skeptical of what you consider "low". I skipped Ch.20 in 3 (might have been 2 but probably 3) turns so I know that you can abuse the wind in your favor. But that's like saying 14x in Binding Blade is good design because you can warp-skip it (which is absolutely not the case). I mean I enjoy the first half of Conquest (which I stated how many times now in this single thread?) but the later maps with their gimmicks are awful. 21 doesn't require DV if you have fliers. Are you perhaps confusing it with something else? Endgame being Rescue-skip is something that is probably well-known by now, too. To DV's credit Ch. 15(?) is an interesting gimmick I can get behind. Also just saying I wouldn't make distaste of Conquests lategame so clear if I didn't properly play it (which is the reason why I don't comment on anything that Judgral or old-school FE did).

@Tables Pretty sure you and I are on the same page except I screwed up the terminology (this game has so many labels for EXP it's ridicilous). My bad. I will have to update it properly. Also skill EXP reduced to 4 is still a massive difference because early on you don't get EXP for your mobility skills which are always major requirements for your classes. Not to mention for some units you have to train them in different weapons, meaning you don't always get EXP for that weapon type you need. Some units like Sylvain who prefer a flying class as their advanced class doesn't get EXP for flying during battle either. It makes strengths a lot more relevant than before (which is why I highly prefer Maddening for a critical evaluation). I took it for granted that units are not rated by the items they bring. Maybe I should clarify that (and no New Game+ of course). @Silly tbh Authority weakness is a lot more stomachable than other flaws. The best battalions are usually at B rank and fliers don't have the greatest selection to begin with (best is Cichol or the BE exclusive Pegasus). It is also one of the few skills where Byleth is guaranteed to have proficiency at, meaning it's a lot easier to raise than say specific weapon skills. In general I would say the females tend to be a lot better because a better earlygame matters more. Flying on some of those early paralogues makes it much easier to get the full rewards and the males can't do any of it until they reach the threshold for Advanced classes (which is significantly later). Darting Blow is a good boost to their offensive and allows them to carry heavier weapons. Lategame performance is not that big of a deal considering at that point you have so many options to kill enemies despite them still being pretty scary. Of course Sylvain and Ferdinand with Swift Strikes can eliminate some of the more egregious enemies on Maddening but such enemies also usually get stomped by Brave weapons (unless it's War Masters which ... are a different beast all together). Only Petra is the exception because as you said no Lance strength is already bad but she auto-levels Sword and Axe which is a lot worse. Not to mention she promotes to Thief which utterly destroys her durability in the long run. That is the reason why I put her below the two Cavaliers. I would say aside from Lysithea either of the Physic users can be recruited at any point of time (which is why I put them higher than usual). They peak at C anyway and it is reached very quickly either way. Same could be said for Linhardt though if you want another Warp user it's definetly more advisable to get him early. That being said he is one of the few students who ages like fine wine and can be recruited basically at any point during Part 1. EDIT: Also why are my Tiers suddenly smileys?

Tables of Content: Motivation Criteria Za Listo In-depth explanation (WIP) 1. Motivation I once said this in a different topic but I don't think the current Tier List thread works well because a unit's viability is influenced by many factors that need to be properly segregated. One of these aspects is the recruitment itself. In 3H non-recruited units will auto-level to the recommended level of the current chapter. This means they automatically gain skill EXP in their set preferences (e.g. Sylvain raises his Lance and Axe rank) but also their base level increases. It's important to note that instead of the player's class growths these units will benefit from the enemy growth rates which offer higher values. Therefore a unit recruited from other houses might perform better or worse compared to when they start as a student from your own house. I think this is a good criteria to build a 3H tier list on which motivates this. 2. The tier list criteria Assume Maddening difficulty Assume efficiency, fast-play or whatever you want to call it (just not hardcore LTC that simplify the list to "use, not use") No New Game+ Monastery activities will be factored in but no amiibo, online or paid DLC interactions Automatic recruits or house-specific units will not be evaluated So no Byleth, Lords, Dedue, Hubert, Flayn, Seteth and Gilbert. While it's better to recruit units early on I will look at them based on their entire lifespan, meaning I will factor in how well their usefulness age the longer you put off their recruitment. Being still good despite a late recruitment is a pretty good quality to have, especially since early resources are very limited. A unit will be rated on their performance only. Paralogues or Items they unlock will not flow in their evaluation. Technically you would have to divide the list for each house's perspective (especially with the Black Eagle routes) but considering how similar the units are I don't think it's necessary. 3. Tier List 4. Below you will find a detailled review of each unit. (WIP)

Recruiting Catherine as early as Ch.5 will make your life a lot easier. You can achieve this with a B-Support (easily achieveable if you start working on it in Ch.3) as this will lower the Lv requirement to recruit her. Catherine (and Shamir) are the only two units that you can get early on that can deal with Maddening enemies on their own. Especially Catherine is a wicked good boss killer with Thunderbrand. Early recruiting her is also beneficial for her long-term use. The earlier you work on her Lance and Flying rank the better she can serve you post-timeskip.

It's still a map gimmick though and especialy the ones that tinker with positioning/mobility tend to be never good in Fire Emblem, considering they usually drag maps out. imo, this one is not an exception to this rule. If you are masochistic enough to like it more power to you but count me out. I generally dislike any of the DV gimmicks in this game. Though I guess it helps to LTC this chapter. That's more I can say about Revelations. This comparision doesn't make much sense because you are comparing an endgame chapter with an earlygame one (Ch.9 to be exact). If Revelations introduced the very same gimmick this early on it would have been a disaster with the butchered unit roster at that point. If anything this shows Fates' map design has no choice but to rely on those map gimmicks to compensate its lacklustre maps. This is especially mind-boggling when Conquest has probably some of the strongest earlygame maps. Last time I checked people haven't shown nearly as much contempt to 3H compared to Fates' "offerings". You are entitled to like what you want of course but Fates is just not good in my books.

@Alastor15243 You just critized Revelation's map design but somehow name Conquest's Chapter 20 as one of your favorites. Guess die-hard Fates fans are like that game's plot I guess. Actually I don't mind the Steel Lances here. Iron weapons would have been arguably worse. Aside from the Soldiers and some Shamans Forde or Kyle don't double the enemies anyway and they wouldn't one-round with them either. With the Steel Lances they can 2HKO most enemies sans Fighters and maybe some Cavaliers if not scoring ORKO against some slower Soldiers. Sure, they aren't accurate and Mercs will double the cavaliers but as long as it's not FE6 levels of unreliable I rather take that than extending my time on this chapter killing enemies. The bigger problem imo is you only get 1 Javelin and no healer in a map where mages are abundant the closer you get to the throne.

Ch.5 Fire Emblem (FE6): A massive patch of forests with those wonky weapons stats just don't make a good combination. Doesn't help that a good amount of enemies are Mercenaries with their ridicilously high Spd making it even harder to get reliable hit rates. I'm also not fond of the boss having a Killer weapon this early on and likely screwing you over with a crit. Ch.26x/28x Night of Farewells (FE7): Unlike 14x in FE6 you don't have Warp for this awful map gimmick, meaning you are forced to play through it. Even worse there are tons of reinforcements on this map to drag it out even longer, never mind Sonia on her throne is annoying to take down. Ch.5x Unbroken Heart (FE8): Compared to most long-winded maps people tend to whine about this one is imo the worst because you have to traverse it with only 4 units and limited inventory. Combine that with narrow passageways and this map is very annoying to low-turn. Ch.26 Clash! (FE9): As much as I love PoR, play this map at Maniac mode and then tell me of your experience. Spoilers; you will absolutely agree with me that this is not fun. Part 4, as in all of it (FE10): Even though I really dislike the unit management in this game at the very least the maps were challenging and interesting (especially the varied objectives). Reach Part 4 and everything good I just said about the gameplay flies straight out of the window. Ch.19 The Conqueror (FE13): This ain't map design, Awakening. Kitsune Lair, Winds of Change (Fates): Conquest maps so good and free of shitty gimmicks, am I right? Mmmm, I'm dripping with sarcasm today, I wonder why. Postgame (Shadows of Valentia): While technically not "maps" traversing through this dungeon is not fun at all. It's very tedious and unforgiving for a rather unnecessary piece of lore.

Let me one up you and say that Silver Snow Ch.13 manages to be even worse. Seteth is a decent unit but he is not able to take that many hits and unlike Claude you can't really reverse roles with him and Byleth (who you can pump up to be able to stall the enemies). BE is also the one route where cross recruitment is required because on Maddening the base roster is god awful. Your first reinforcements are Dorothea and Caspar from the north-west corner, Petra south-west. Needless to say that doesn't cut it (GD has the opposite problem of giving you Hilda and Leonie from SW but Ignatz and lolenz NW) and if Petra isn't a Wyvern Rider she is super dead since she won't be able to handle all the enemies by herself.

Just going to add here something that somehow many people seem to miss. Use. Gambits. (and Battalions) Everytime you face multiple enemies and are at the verge of being overwhelming Gambits can save your hide just being rooting every enemy to the ground and opens up breathing space to nuke down the most dangerous enemy (for Ch.13 specifically the Assassins). It also blocks other enemies from attacking you since the panicked ones block the tiles for them to move on, even preventing Archers from getting their shots in. Dimitri comes with his own special battalion which covers a lot of tiles. Byleth really should have the Duscur Heavy Soldiers with the +10 Prt bonus and 2x3-tile Gambit for tanking out damage. Fussilade is however your best bet for this chapter (Archers and Snipers, I think) because it is not only ranged but the whole map structure on your starting position makes it very effective. Otherwise standard gambits like Assault Troop for its multiple uses or Poison Tactic are also pretty decent. Especially the latter is something you can give to anyone since the Merchant battalions is ranked E and can help the two from the south to starve of enemies (though if they can hit is another matter entirely). Your fliers hopefully have D rank Authority so they can use at least the Pegasus battalions for the Assembly gambit. Though I will say that Chapter 13 is still bad design as it requires very specific things from the player. You have to go through Ch.12 first and considering your unit inventory is very unlikely going to be optimal after it you are kinda stuck with what you get (unless you waste turns to reshuffle equipment). Add to the fact that you are forced to use your original house members (with each house having at least 1-2 dud units) and you get a lot of unwarranted difficulty with this chapter.

Meanwhile I'm waiting for them to announce the KoRT Interludes. Shimosa is probably going to on the 3rd of October or the week after if they are using the Interlude campaign as a buffer after Halloween.

Maddening is fun. Finally the training wheels are off. Finished the 1st run on BL, now I am on BE (probably Silver Snow because I suspect CF has insane difficulty spikes). Some notes:

Someone needs to get punished I see. Also everybody is lying about being Dust addicts anyway. Worse than coke I say. tbf there are plenty of opportunities to farm for QP. Lottos and 1/2 Dailies are pretty common events by now. Not to mention usually Lores are the bottleneck that keep you from maxing out stuff. In comparision if you want an easy way to farm mats you are either lucky with the shop or you have found your past-time during dead weeks. Any Bronze Mats are the worst offender, 20-30 is not enough.

Don't worry I'll be dead in 3 weeks anyway. You wanna hear something cursed? On the other hand you won't have the FBI on your doorstep. I could have sworn that you have either Artoria or Void Shiki. Was that on your JP account? Oh, I'm definetly picking Edison now. Why? Just checked my inventory after max. ascending Arthur. I can't believe I'm saying this but I'm out of Saber Pieces and Monuments. Can't even get past the 1st Ascension. Guess that was bound to happen after I managed to finish my backlog. At the very least I have now everyone max. ascended, max. leveled and at 4/4/4 minimum. Now only I need to farm for my targets.

inb4 JP now gives away a SSR ... or nothing at all. Bad rep sticks harder on you than chewing gum. Or you know people just dislike him in general? Every time he shows up he is a douche. Emiya could be a choice if you care about bonus drop for future events. CCC rerun and all GudaGuda events list him as a bonus Servant and Christmas Rerun is also coming up. Otherwise pick Wu I would say. Saber Alter depends on if you are actually using her all that much. Not that S!Alter is your waifu anymore, you betrayed her after all. Also where is the Lancer Alter pick? I knew you tasted like a liar. ------ Might just have to roll the dice for my pick. It's between: Nero Edison Gorgon Most of my go-to SRs are already at NP2+ and while NP2 Tristan was tempting with his upcoming Interlude I would prefer something new. Li will be benched in favor of Kagetora so that's another off from the list. So that leaves me with Story-locked stuff. I don't have any EoR SR but none of them are priority either. Tried to get Nero now 2 times and failed both times (CCC and Nero Fest). Gameplay-wise not that great since she is severely lacking in damage (IP doesn't really count) but aside from Void Shiki and Jason (pfffffff) we don't have another AoE Arts Saber yet. On the other hand she technically has a rate-up with Skadi next year. Edison is a funky option. Exceedingly rare too. I don't think he is great but he certainly looks like to be fun to mess around with. Gorgon is probably a pass. JP screwed up her Strengthening really bad and considering I will gun for NP5 Salieri not really appealing.

You see some outcomes which you wouldn't get on the other route due to its circumstances.

It's a bit funky how Three Houses has a small roster but they decided to not include some more route-specific, non-student units. Somehow only BL gets this privilege in form of Gilbert who is technically not even affiliated with the Kingdom anymore (as he is a Knight of Seiros). They could have done more with that. GD has 2 obvious choices in Judith and Nader. It's very weird how Judith is not playable considering she joins your army and only hangs around the monastery. Nader is a bit of underbaked character considering his title as "the Undefeated" as you don't see much of him beyond the Alliance part on the True BE route and one chapter in GD. Also he is jacked-up Wyvern Rider, I need to break this game even more. Another unsung hero of the Alliance is Holst. He is apparently one of the best generals in the Alliance and everyone strokes his shaft, only for him to get his butt handed to him by Nemesis and poisoned mushrooms. BE really should have made Randolph and Ladislava playable. You don't get any perspective on their characters, even on BE, and they come off as cannon fodder at best (no joke, that's how they die on all routes). Especially Ladislava doesn't have anything beyond "I owe Edelgard for some unnamed reason" and that's pretty sad. I guess they ran out of resources to make more support convos?

Just going to confirm the obvious (since it's still on the main page) but Gilbert is a BL-only unit. He will not join on the True BE, Church BE or GD routes. A very easy proof (aside from playing all the routes) is looking at supports. Only on the BL path you can support with him in Part 1, all the other routes do not allow that (akin to the other Lords, Hubert and Dedue).

Formatting guys. You are free to copy my flawless 1 min work, kek. For my comments I will just combine the - tiers with the lower tier (B- and C becoming C and so on, I just find too many tiers unnecessary, especially with a small cast as this).