LoneRecon400

I'd say that was caused by Arthur using a Hand Axe on enemy phase rather than the Iron Axe that showed up in the calculations. Equipped items don't change unless you actually go through with attacking or equip them outside of the forecast. There's a 1 might difference between the two weapons and a base Arthur with a Spear Fighter pair up does not get doubled by Oboro. The only thing that could cause that is Arthur wielding a Hand Axe. Either way, there is no shame in switching to Casual mode. Experimenting strategies with battle saves is a lot better than just resorting to something like turtling and can help you become a better player as long as you don't go through each battle with units dying.

Pretty much. The 3 Bow Cavs are at the back of the squad Javarro comes out with. So you can put Leif in range of 5 Sword Cavs without being in range of them and then clear them out on player phase. Javarro will then get his reinforcmenets and you can repeat the process until Seliph's catches up.

Giving him the things i have mentioned, having Leif clear out the arena and bop some dark mages on the way, he should reach Darna at Level 9. That gives him ~41 HP, 17 Str, 13 Spd, and 13 Def. With the Chapter 6 Silver Sword he can cleanly one round the Sword Cavs and gets 6 Round KO'd by them. Here's the thing though: Those enemies are at level 13, which makes Leif gain 80-60 Exp a pop for everyone he offs. On an Enemy Phase facing off against 5 Sword Cavs, he can gain as many as 4 levels in a single Enemy Phase. Suddenly gaining ~+5 HP, +2 Str, +2 Spd, +3 Def is what allows him to take on the Reinforcements with the Light Brand pretty comfortably. Javarro does have a pretty high chance of killing if he targets Leif. But if everyone he comes out of the castle with is wiped out even on enemy phase, he will always resort running back into the castle for reinforcements. So you can manipulate him into not attacking all if you keep your distance and manage to off his squad before he can attack. Now admittedly, this whole strategy relies on blatant favoritism to have a unit snowball. If this were anyone but Lief, I would decry it for taking too many resources for not enough gain. But a mounted Rescue Staff is so inordinately useful that it makes it worth this investment worth it. Being able to rescue a dancer after refreshing, for example, allows them to keep up so much better with mounted units without having to rely on the Knight and Leg Ring and frees those up for other units to use. That Rescue utility is what makes putting up with Leif through all of this worth it.

By the time Ethlyn and Quan leave by the end of Chapter 3, the Bargain band as already seen most of it's use swapping around the Paragon Ring since most Gen 1 units have already promoted by then. Missing it out on Chapter 6 doesn't really matter since that chapter should be almost completely dedicated to raising Seliph, leaving minimal time for Paragon swapping shenanigans. Having Lief at Darna doesn't hurt the turn count if he goes while it's neutral. Even when promoted and with the leg ring, it still takes Seliph a couple turn to reach the castle, leaving Leif ample time to tear through the enemies there with the Light Brand. Main reason why I don't like Horseti is that Leywn Arthur takes too much away from other units in the earlygame of Gen 2. He requires a lot of Exp to promote at a time when other units also really need thee Exp, needs valuable rings to one round anything without Forseti, needs a lot of gold to fuel his Forseti usage, and pales lategame comparative to Ced. It's just a lot of hassle for a unit that substantial overkill when most units in Gen 2 are already super overkill.

You don't have to pass the Pursuit Ring to Leif for him to use in Chapter 7. You could just pass him down the Return Ring with some high value items like the Skill Ring and have him buy the Pursuit ring in Rivough. By adding the Bargain and Paragon Ring to the mix, you can have Leif promote by the end of chapter 7 pretty easily if you have him grind on the Darna Reinforcements while Seliph takes his time coming back from Melgen. As for Arthur, I always found Horesti to be pretty overrated myself. It's very overkill in the early gen 2 chapters and not as good at bosskilling in the later chapters compared to Ced. Adding on other annoying aspects such as having low resistance for status staves and really wanting the Bargin Ring, I never found it to be Horesti to particularly worthwhile.

I think it'd be very easy to justify the Black Eagles not joining Edelgard in Silver Snow. Just have her use the Crest Stones she obtains from the tomb to turn some of the knights and people living near Garreg Mach into Demonic Beasts. It makes sense from a pragmatic point of view for her to do since she'd weaken the church with no loss of own but would be very hard for the rest of the Black Eagles to stomach. I feel like it also contrast her character well in CF where she would not go with such a plan due to the assurance the professor provides her. This would result in needing to change the invasion in other routes to give motivation for the black eagles to side with her, but the less story overlap the better.

The cavalier in the Death Knight's room should pose no issue since you can just use stride to engage the Death Knight and defeat him in one turn. One tip that could help getting in chip damage on the DK is getting Fading Blow on Byleth. The art grants +30 Crit Avoid, so the Death Knight would be unable to crit Byleth or double them with Rally Speed. Add in some gambits and a Knight Kneeler Steel Lance from Leonie, even with base stats the Dark Knight should go down easy without having Dark Spikes on Lysithea. Here some tips from my experience dealing with no Monastery playthrough that may help: - Don't use too many units at the beginning. Without Quest and Aux Battles, regular exp and, more importantly, class exp will be very limited and result in weakening your better units if you give exp to weaker units. Better to raise your weaker units later through Adjutants when you have you have reliable units rather than dilute the pool of exp when you're at the hardest part of the game. Not having enough gold is just a short term symptom of this. - Use your weaker units to support your stronger units through utility. Things like Healing Rallies, or Utility gambits such as Impregnable Wall will be good regardless of the what level a unit is at. Lorenz, for example, could help Leonie or Byelth better tank Mages by learning Ward at C Faith. - Find ways low investment ways to make your units better. One overlooked fact about Leonie, for example, is that she learns Battalion Desperation at C Authority. That skill can be quite useful since it'd mean she'd need less healing between attacks.

Here's an example of beating this chapter on Maddening using a scuffed team. Pretty much any map can be beaten with a combination of turtling and using the mechanics to their fullest. I'd recommend trying to play maps out differently by defeating annoying enemies before they become a problem as with this map.

Great Knight Jakob would be a good budget way of taking down Garon in chapter 12 without going out of your way too much. At base he'd have 29 HP and 14 Def with both tonics applied. Add on Armored Blow with a Corrin Pair up and he'd be able to survive hit the 54 attack from Ganon with a Katana at base stats. Speed would also be a trivial issue. He'd have 7 at base, but with a generic Samurai pair up, Katana Boost, and Tonic, that'd already be 14 Speed. He'd only need 4 procs of Speed in ~15 levels to avoid being doubled even with Draconic Hex. Add in Luna to the mix to occasionally lower Garon's Defense by 8, he'd also be beating Garon at a much faster rate than most other units. Overall, Garon is pretty easy to beat as long as you make use of certain niches and shelter dancing.

Combat arts that give Avoid also give the same amount of Crit Avoid. So that'd give Felix 20 Crit Avoid when using Nimble Combo.

If you really want to get silly, you could also combine it with some form of Wrath and watch as they solo sections of entire maps even on Maddening.

Here's a practical demonstration of that.

No I do mean Great Knight making Edelgard being a better mixed attacker than War Monk. Using Lighting Axe with a Silver Axe + already out damages Hades by at least 6 might plus Axefaire. Put it this way: a Great Knight Edelgard is capable of oneshoting Fortress Knights with a Hammer without even the need for Fiendish Blow. Add on the capability of chipping from three range with the Bolt Axe + and being able to better support Raging Storm due to Canto and Axefaire, it is a much better mixed attack class. War Monk actively hampers using both offensive and supportive magic. Just because the class has a feature of being able to use magic does not mean it should be the metric of what units are judged by. The class should instead be judged by the usual metrics of how capable it is of one rounding, how much investment it takes to get there, and what kind of support it can provide, etc. War Cleric cannot one round any enemies bar fortress Knights through casting spells. But it can give female units a niche in allowing them access to a Fistfaire class. Enabling a unit like Leonie the capability of being able to attack four times in a row in a way that's not constrained by Wootz Steel makes it already very good. Adding on Brawl Avoid +20 and making her able to to extend the durability of her battalions as well a participate on Enemy Phase with very little risk makes it exceptional. The point of this thread is to ask what is the ideal performance of a class. How well a unit can cast magic should not factor into that if the class cannot enable anything with it.

I'd really disagree with the idea of Edelgard being a good mixed attacker as a War Monk. War Monk offers no good base Magic, no Tomefaire or Mag class modifier, and only allows one cast of Luna and Hades. While Aura Knuckles can be used to one round Armor Knights, any base War Monk would be able to one round even endgame Fortress Knights with them. I'd argue Great Knight Edelgard would be a better mixed attacker than War Monk. Even then other lords would be far better off as a War Cleric than Edelgard. Brawl Avoid +20 by itself is pretty good, but when combined with Battalion Wrath and Dimitri's Personal or Cluade's Fallen Star, it can lead to some really good results. But they have no reason to actually stay in War Monk compared to War Master, so I wouldn't say they are the best of the class. Instead, I'd suggest Leonie as best War Cleric. Battalion Desperation is a skill that is not mention often, but it works very well here. Combining that ability to be able to quad with a high speed growth allows Leonie to have pseudo brave art that doesn't require getting A Rank in a weapons skill while also drastically lowers the amount Strength she need to one round. It also makes her quite the apt dodgetank with Brawl Avoid +20 and her high Speed Growth. So while War Monk may be a mixed class, I'd argue the best use of it is to not even make use of magic and just focus entirely on physical side of things.

Link attacks don't get applied on enemy phase. While they will work for adjutants, having a enemy be in range of a unit on Enemy Phase does nothing.

The ones in random aux battles do.

Eh, those guys are pretty bulky. 23 Defense ain't nothing. Giant Birds in random monster Aux Battles would be your best bet. I don't know how well they scale, but considering this example I'd say it's less the than the might difference of fighting non monster enemies.

Thing is that there's quite a few things that can't be killed on EP. Enemy Monsters, Fortress Knights, Siege Equipment, and Gambits are all rather concerning for any Vantage setup. The only thing a dodgetank has to worry about are enemy Gambits making them a lot more flexible. Vantage setups can be used to great effect, but they're more limited compared to dodgetanks.

Nope. They just cease to exist by the time Part 2 rolls around if you don't do them.

Derp. Should've read it more thoroughly. Still, there's nothing to say to you can't combine Wrath and Dodgetanking. Battalion Wrath works quite well, but even Defiant Crit works. For Example.

This is straight up Echidna erasure.

The point of the comparison was that there was not a significant Avoid Difference between Wyvern Lord and Falcon Knight. As such, Ingrid would be better valued as Wyvern Lord rather than Falcon Knight due to the significant Strength difference between the two. I'm confused by the second point. Why would more Crit be unnecessary? Wrath by itself is not enough to achieve consistent Crit rates of 90-100%. Killer Weaponsare massive reliability boosters that dodgetanks really shouldn't go without even if they are rather heavy.

I just wanted to show how overkill Vengeance is, so that's why I went with Expected Stats rather than Capped Stats. I'm pretty sure Dedue can't even hit his HP Cap even with heavy Gardening abuse since Fruits of Life only give 1 HP a pop. Only way to get him to that would be to grind on Normal Mode or use the Dancer EXP Exploit. Fair point on the Monster Weakness though. King of Beast Steak would be better than Sacred Beast Roast since the former gives +3 HP while the latter gives +1 HP and +1 Strength instead. It's about a 4 damage difference. I don't think trying to maximize damage before the timeskip wouldn't work. Not only would you be missing out A Rank Dimtri Support and King of Lions Battalion, you'd also miss out on a 4th week of cooking since there's no 5 week month in Part 1. It'd really depend on how much tougher Monsters in Part 2 Aux Battles are compared to Part 1 Quest enemies. I don't have hard stats on that, but I'd be willing to bet that they're not that bulkier to the extent it'd overcome the might difference.

Vengeance on Dedue would be your best bet. There's a reason why a base Cyril can one shot Nemesis. A level 40 Great Knight Dedue coming from Fighter -> Brigand ->Warrior -> War Master would average around ~70 HP and 36 Strength. That by itself would be 108 attack. Now lets tack on every Strength Booster in the game. 113 Lancefaire 118 S+ Lancefaire 120 Strength +2 128 Defiant Strength 134 Deathblow 139 HP +5 148 King of Beasts Meal x3 170 Lance of Ruin 173 Sacred Power 176 Charm 179 A Rank Dimtri Link Attack 183 Rally Strength 193 King of Lions Battalion 196 Advocate 201 Seraph Robe He wouldn't need that Seraph Robe and a couple of other things if you used the Spear Assval on a cavalry unit, as that'd be difference of 39 Might vs the Lance of Ruin's 22. He could also benefit from the Blaiddyd Crest Stone like Dimtri on NG+, so he could reach reach that 200 attack benchmark that way without needing anything that's listed on here. If you added that plus a crit, he'd break the displayed damage cap of 999 damage.

There really isn't a significant Speed Difference between Falcon Knight and Wyvern Lord. +1 Speed and 10% Speed Growth aren't really enough to be that significant, espically when it comes to dodgetanking. Compare a Falcon Knight Ingird's performance to a Wyvern Lord Ingird. That extra Strength from Wyvern really helps Ingird compared to the simple Speed boost from Falcon Knight. But the real reason why people value Wyvern so highly is that they typically combine it with a good personal Combat Art to make use of it's high Strength and flight. Combat arts like Swift Strikes are enough to one round enemies without a class faire thanks to Wyvern's Strength Mod. A paladin using Swift Strikes would deal only 4 damage more than a Wyvern Lord even considering Lancefaire, so it's worthwhile trade to increase mobility of unit. Add to that having some of the best class bases in the game and being able to access Defiant Crit, it can lead to some pretty dumb things.