LoneRecon400

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.

Point Blank Volley adds +10 Hit, so Cyril would be looking at 83 Hit at worst again the enemy thieves. If you manage to get him to level 10 (Easy to do with the two quest battles in that month) and have certify for Brigand for a +2 Strength class mod, he can afford to drop Alliance Brawlers for Seiros Mercs. That will raise his Hit by another 10, giving him 93 Hit on the thieves.

Cyril can actually have 11 Strength at base since he can certify into Fighter for +1 Strength. So he wouldn’t even need a Star booster or Advocate to one round the majority of enemies in Chapter 5.

I see people still making comments of how difficult Hunting By Daybreak is. While they are correct in saying that it is a map to be prepared for, I find that people don’t give very good advice about it. Either they say to use very specific map skipping strategies that requires a lot of foresight to work or instead just give vague advice such as raise in house units without really looking to understand how the map works The biggest piece of advice to beating Hunting By Daybreak is easily this: The two groups of enemies are triggered by the enemy Snipers. Aside from the two thieves at the very beginning, they're 14 enemies at the start of the map that are split into two groups between the North and South. They’re triggered by a unit stepping into range of the two enemy Snipers in each group, regardless of if it’s a player or enemy unit. What typically gets players killed is that they trigger instantly trigger all 14 enemies at once by going Into the Northern Bush since that’s in range of both Snipers. If they instead go into the Southern Bush, they still trigger both groups as enemies from the back end of the south group will always walk into the range of the Northern Sniper and trigger that group anyways. As such, the easiest solution to beating Hunting By Daybreak is this: have Byleth and the other route character fly to the north corner of the map where Caspar/Gilbert/Ignatz show up. This will cause the Northern Group to aggro, but will prevent the Southern Group from aggroing and really limits the amount of enemies they have to face. This does requires a Byleth in a flying class, but it’s a lot less restrictive than say having a specific unit be a Dance. On AM this also requires Byleth to learn Reposition since Dimitri is footlocked, but can use Reposition to go through the northern wall. But once the Northern group is dealt with, the map is easy pickings. There’s never a point where you’re swarmed by that many enemies compared to beginning. You can even go so far as to go straight through the North right to the boss without having to engage the south group at all. TL:DR; Make a flying Byleth and head to the north corner. Makes you have to face only 6 enemies at once rather than 14. Be sure to have Reposition to move a wild boar through a wall for it’s own safety.

Defiant Speed can make a difference even on Maddening. In conjunction with Darting Blow and the Speed Ring, that’s +16 Speed. Add bullheads and Dismounting on top of that, that’s +20-22 Speed. That opens up being able to quad with Brave Bows for some speedy units like Leonie, which are usually too heavy to quad with. But the issue with that is it drys up Wootz Steel pretty quickly. You could use it as a War Cleric with battalion desperation, but having to manage battalion durability with a defiant skill for a knock off version of Fierce Iron Fist doesn’t sound particularly worth it. On the flip side though, it is good for memes.

Can I just say I that people really underestimate how plentiful Activity points are outside the earlygame? You can easily B+ Rank Professor ranking by Chapter 7 without doing even any fishing or tournaments. That’s 8 Activity Points and 6 Lecture points. Even with 3 meals and cooking, that’s still 4 activity points left over. It’s more than plenty to afford 1 Tea Party a week.

Just when do you expect to master Warrior exactly? In runs where I don't use any Aux battles, I struggle to get Advanced Class masteries at all. Like I had to purposefully had to keep some units from going into master classes just so that they could reach it. Just in my last run alone I made Sylvain into a warrior, but he didn't master until Chapter 18 of Azure Moon. Had I been playing Crimson Flower the game would've already been over already. Granted that run never recruited out of house, but you shouldn't have do that to obtain class masteries. I find that Advanced Classes and Master Classes you purposefully have to go out of your way for otherwise they’ll really will never be relevant.

How is it near the timeskip is where the largest concentration of battles is fought? Most paralogue battles are starting to expire by the time Chapter 11 rolls around, and that's generally when most of my units hit Advanced classes. I find most paralogues are done before most characters even hit Advanced classes unless you purposefully delay them. I also find most units hit Master classes by Chapter 14-15, usually depending on Auto levels. I generally play one of two ways: Either no Aux battles at all which make Class masteriers pretty non existent or I do some to quickly master something. Like there's a quest battle in Part 2 that has nothing but 8 archers on a section of a map. If you have a unit be attacked by all them for just 4 turns, that's 32 of 50 battles on two units right there. Perhaps that may qualify as grinding, but you most certainly aren't going to master Warrior that quickly either without doing the same. If you don't purposefully go out of your way to get Defiant Crit, it will admittedly take quite a while to obtain it. But I don't see how that same logic wouldn't be applied to Warrior, espically when it is far inferior to Wyvern Rider.

But what if a unit isn't running a Enemy Phase Setup? Not all threats can be taken out on Enemy Phase. Some units have to be there to care take of enemies who have gambits or Siege Equipment as well monsters. Defiant Crit giving a 100% Crit rate on Player phase can make huge difference in what unit need to oneshot enemies. Vengeance is locked three units, one of which is route locked. And magical Hunter's Volley is dependent on a resource that you don't even get a consistent supply of until Chapter 16. Defiant Crit is ubiquitous and doesn't even require a unit to have the tools that every unit typically uses such as Deathblow or good battalions to one shot bulky enemies. I also don't understand how mastering Wyvern Lord is a inconvenience but Warrior isn't. You telling me that 38 battles as a footlocked 5 mov class or as a adjutant is doable but 50 battles in the best offensive class isn't?

Wouldn't recommend picking up this game. The gameplay is extremely faithful to the original to a very detrimental degree. Map Design is a prime example, as Map like these were bad all the way back in 1992, yet the game keeps them exactly the same 20 years later. They also keep their annoying quirks as well, such as certain enemies being summon 2-7 cannon fodder enemies a turn and slow down maps significantly, some enemies able to teleport and just snipe off a player character completely at random, as well as just a bunch of minor things such as a great deal of maps having terrain reducing your unit's movement to 1-2, having to backtrack for promotions and improving weapons, and enemies spawning on the world map randomly. And a lot of the things they added either really don't add to the game or just very user unfriendly. The Point and Click exploration may add some humorous flavor text from time to time, but there's really no engaging gameplay with it. Dungeons are rather tedious as encounters all play out on the same map that are even more barebones than the map used in the above example. Forging weapons is really beneficial to units, but they never tell you how the weapon is going to improve until you spend the money and there's no way to get it back if you don't like the upgrade. The characters are worth some praise, but they're simply isn't that many moments with them. You can count the number of characters that have more than 2 support conversations on one hand, which is really disappointing since they are good characters. Some characters don't even really get that much since some character's one support doesn't say a lot about them such as with Slique or Deen. The story is something I found to be lacking, as the characters aren't really morally challenged and often make frustrating decisions just for the sake of Drama. Add to that the lack of compelling villains and every player character not named Alm or Celica slowly being pushed to the sidelines makes the plot one one of the weakest in the series. Your opinion may differ though. Overall if you want to experience Echoes, just watch it on Youtube. You not missing out on much if you decide not to play it. But i would agree with the poster above to check out the Rise of the Deliverance. It's the only part of the game I truly enjoyed.

Defiant Crit is way better than a Marginal Improvement. It allows for 100% Crit Rates on Player Phase without having to go into War Master, lessens the need for having a good flight battalion, doesn't require 75-38 battles as footlocked 5 mov class or adjutant, has good synegry with dodgetanking setups, and is not limited to a select few units like Battalion Wrath while also not requiring micromanaging battalion durability. It's honestly one of the best skills in the game, only really hampered by it's availability and set up. But when set up to it's fullest, it's hard to argue against the results.

1. Then just finish up Alm's route if you don't want reinforcements. Don't even really see why Reinforcements would be a issue, since that's just free EXP and Silver. 2. It's not like Valbar is going to one round enemies either. Mages with the Shield would dish out about the same damage, especially considering that Celica's Route doesn't even give a good lance until the Lost Woods without spending lots of Silver. 3. I mean, have you actually done it? I did it on my first playthrough pretty easily. For Slayde all you need to do is get him to low enough HP to retreat and then have him go back forth by blocking and unblocking entrances to the Heal tiles. He won't even bother to attack healers like this. Desaix is easy to enough to corner and take down considering you can pretty easily have 2 Archers, a mage, and especially the Lighting Sword if you have Foudroyant. It becomes even faster when he runs low on HP and stops even bothering to attack and instead run around like Slayde.

You know, if all you wanted was a chunky wall, beating Desaix for his Draco Shield and shipping it to Celica would be all it would take. +13 Defense would make Genny as durable Barron Valbar when promoted to Saint for 5 Base Defense. Giving that to some physical unit sounds a lot more convenient than having to grind Valbar in dungeon encounters.

The issue with the Monastery is just how much customization and optimization is locked behind doing repetitive busy work. If you don't utilize the Monastery, you're going to be stuck with units who can't go into other classes that they don't have a Boon in, will not be able to utilize high ranking battalions, and will miss out on some other pretty major benefits such as more Adjutant slots, cooking +Spd/Def meals, and being able to recruit other units. Those things are never essential to beating the game sure, but that's where a lot of customization comes from. For example, Desperation is very good on Dedue because of One Two punch, but you'd never be able to get him to certify into Cavalier and also have him get Deathblow without instructing him every week. Missing out on extra Adjutant slots also make more difficult for units who are only in classes for their mastery such as Wyvern Annette who want to be a Archer for Hit +20 pretty badly but can’t fight well in it. And not being able to recruit units not only locks out good battalions and other tools, it also means some potentially interesting units to mess around with are off they table if you don't feel like running around acting like a Florist. I've played the game without utilizing the Monastery that much on a SS Maddening run, and that was by far my least favorite play through of the game. It felt so artificially hamstinged since a lot of units had a very hard time promoting to Advanced Classes due to weapon ranks, Interesting Gambits such as Retribution could only be used in the very late game due to the A Authority requirement, and was overall just very reliant on a select few units rather than having everyone equally pull their weight. Utilizing the Monetary can be so much of a chore that it feels more time is spent doing monotonous busywork rather than actually playing the game. But by not utilizing it, the game becomes a lot more limiting to play and any customization that one might have a unit pretty much flies out the window. A player should not have to choose whether to have tedious playthrough or one that's not engaging.

I don’t think rating every battalion would be that interesting. There’s quite a lot of them and most of don’t really stand out. What’s there to talk Alliance Infantry other than how terrible it is for example? I think instead it would be much more fun to create a list of top 5 of battalions for a faction and a separate category for paralogue ones. It’d be interesting to talk about how a battalion like a battalion like Alliance Wyvern Corp compares to Immortal Corps or how valuable something like Indech Sword fighters is compared to Seiros Holy Monks. I’d think there’d be a lot of interesting discussion to be made if we did something like that.

Absolute Defense: 3/10 Defense just isn't a stat that scales well. With how hard enemies hit, most units want to just avoid counters entirely by using brave arts, one shoting, dodgetanking, or just attacking out of range. When enemies are hitting upwards of 40 attack by the time you get it, +6 Defense may not even save a unit on taking another hit without a good defensive battalion and shield. Worse part is units who actually try to stack Defense don't need it at all. Fortress Knight's 10 Defense Class mod with 17 base means it's very easy to hit 40+ Prt, so it's completely unnecessary for them. Even if this gambit would last as long as Retribution, I'd still give it the same rating. Good stats on it's battalion though. Battlefield Cafe: 4/10. I'd actually value Rally Strength higher than this gambit. Two reasons for that. 1: Most units with Rally Strength provide some additional benefit such as applying Rally Speed from Annette or providing Luck like Alois for more consistent crit rates. 2: The only units that really benefit from rallies outside the earlygame is Wrath / Vantage users and Dodgetanks, of which you're really only limited to three so there's really not a need for AOE Rally Strength. Increasing the amount of Strength Player Phase units get is really unnecessary considering how easy it is for units to one round in Three Houses. +4 Strength isn't really necessary when you can stack +20 Attack on any given unit. Maybe if the map permanent Strength boost glitch was still around this would be higher. But alas, this is where this gambit belongs when functioning properly.

Blessing: 8/10 A very valuable Gambit that aids Enemy Phase setups pretty substantially. It helps boost the consistency of dogdetanking in conjuction with Wrath or Defiant Crit, allows Vantage users to keep on living if they miss criting an enemy, enables a quick setup on flying Vengeance users rather than having to rely on Devil Weapons or not having a crest, and allows a good amount of units to fight bosses that otherwise would've just straight up oneshot them. Guard Adjutants also doesn't fulfill the same role as Blessing as they do nothing for the first attack. If a unit doesn't get doubled, Guard Adjutants aren't accomplishing anything of value. Of course if a unit does get doubled, they work best together as a Guard Adjutant will prevent Blessing from activating if it's the one taking the lethal blow, which can be very useful for Vantage users. A very good Gambit that really complements the reliability of Enemy Phase setups. It may be valued less if one doesn't value EP setups, but the extent it helps them out cannot be understated. Dance of the Goddess: 10/10 A flat out gamebreaking gambit. Allowing for potential 5 extra actions per turn in a game with battle Canto is just asinine. It's one use sure, but it's the primary reason why incredibly bulky bosses like the SS Immaculate One and Indech are able to be one turned. One use is all you need when 90% of this game objectives are defeat the boss. Even if you don't use it for one turn clears, the Gambit is still extremely busted. It can be used to help remove enemies with Battalions on Player Phase so they're not a a threat on Enemy Phase, allow additional uses of other support gambits like Impregnable Wall, and can allow up to 4 actions per turn on your best unit. It's practical applications are quite versatile and can fit in a variety of situations. The only that keeps it somewhat balanced is it's availability and stats, but this list doesn't account for the former and isn't even a factor in AM where you get in Chapter 14. The latter cannot be somewhat annoying, but the gambit is worth bringing for itself. It also could be used on a unit on that's not reliant on stats like Ignatz, who can provide utility in rallying and using Break Shot on monsters. But those things are footnotes to compared to how useful this gambit is. In short, if Stride was not in this game, this would be the best Gambit in the game hands down.

Resonant White Magic: 3/10 Probably the worst support Gambit. It might see some use in Chapter 3 an maybe 4 since most mages will only have half Heal uses, but once they promote to Monk it really falls to the wayside. A 3x2 box at one range is pretty awkward to make good use of, not to mention how earlygame units really don't want to be eating counters since they want one shot with steel weapons after some chip damage instead. It doesn't even has the courtesy of healing most units to full, usually barely even healing for 12 HP. Not much to say here other than Cethline Monks would've benefited a lot more from not having it as it's gambit. Retribution: 9/10 A core reason as to why Wrath/Vantage is as strong as it is. Making unit who'd otherwise be constrained to one range makes otherwise intimidating enemies like Siege magic users a non issue. Only reason why it's not a 10/10 is because of it being locked to A rank battalions on non AM routes and you need to a enemy phase set up to really make great use of it. It's gambit that takes a lot of investment to get and make use out of, but is worth every bit of that investment.

A 85% displayed Chance to hit with a 100 Hit Spell isn't exactly impressive, especially when most mages are going to be a lot lower than that without better +Hit Battalions. Issue with doing that is that mages are a lot better off utilizing support gambits since they struggle to oneshot with spells by this point due to rampant HP inflation. Losing out on something like Blessing or Stride so that mages can do accurate Chip damage just simply isn't worth it by that point. The great thing about Sacred Shield for bosses is just how stat agnostic it makes units. Like with Cornelia, if a unit doesn't have the Strength to one round her, they are absolute of no use against her considering how easy it is for her to one shot them. With Sacred Shield, any unit can contribute to any boss fight regardless of how lacking they are in durability they may be so that you don't have to rely on tools like Atrocity or a 4 range Excalibur to be relevant in a fight. I'd also say the opposite on the matter of Gambit slots. Offensive Gambits become a lot less appealing as Enemy phase Set Ups become a lot more effective with support gambits like Sacred Shield and Blessing.

Fun fact: Bows can counter at one range without Close Counter if the unit has the Retribution gambit applied. There’s really not a case for 1-2 weapons in this game at all.

Claude has Flier Effect Null, so Snipers won’t do that much damage as you might think. Mages could strike from 4 range, but 65 Avoid makes their Hit rates pretty shaky without Maculi or Uncanny Blow. Besides, it’s just not Claude that’s an issue. A lot of bosses from chapter 16 onwards are usually very bulky while being quite evasive. Like Cornelia has the same Protection as Edelgard in Grondor while also having 56 Avoid on top of being able to one shot most units. Being able to apply damage without retaliation makes her easy to get rid of without having to rely on High Strength / Magic units or specific set ups.

Finally some interesting Gambits worth talking about. Impregnable Wall: 8/10 An extremely useful gambit. Not only is it able to make any unit effectively ignore any enemy for one turn, it also allows for more aggression positioning. You could, for example, afford to place units in the range of same turn reinforcements to lure them out or prevent units from being Gambited, as the AI will always prioritize attacking regularly than with gambits since they do more damage doubling. It also has some good synergy with Assassin's Stealth, as enemies will ignore the assassin completely if there's another unit in range even with Impregnable Wall applied, but that's admittedly pretty niche. One thing that hasn't been mentioned is just how much can help to speed up Class Mastery. Being able to be attacked without the fear of death means you can afford to have units face a lot more than the usual 1-2 enemies on Enemy Phase they're limited to in the later segments of Part 1. It's espically useful since it exists before setups like dodgetanking or Vantage / Wrath begin to become consistent. That's admittedly less important if you regularly partake in Aux Battles, but for those who don't it's pretty invaluable. Either way it's a gambit most certainly worth bringing to every battle. Sacred Shield: 8/10 Another very useful Gambit that's unfortunately route locked, but this list doesn't care for that. The thing about this Gambit that makes it good are how it enables Enemy Phase setups and it makes Bosses a non issue. Dodgetanks often struggle with magic hit rates since their Luck tends to be notable lower than their Speed and most enemy mages use accurate spells. Sacred Shield makes this a non issue since most mages won't have the range to attack at one range and prevent them from getting in lucky low % Hits in. It also enables Vantage / Wrath users by eliminating their weaknesses to siege weapons / magic and mitigates the threat of monsters somewhat with proper positioning. If you want an example of how well it enables Vantage units, Here you go. But the main thing that makes it shine is how much easier it makes boss killing. A lot of units have to worry about being one rounded by lategame bosses and have to use things like Blessing and Guard Adjutants to avoid that. With this gambit, a lot of units that'd otherwise be unable to survive such as a Snipers have free reign to attack a enemy like Claude or Hegemon Edelgard without so much as a scratch in return. It's definitely the most underrated Gambit in Three Houses. I blame the mistranslation for that one.

None of the scaling arts benefit from any of the - Blow skills. Take Warding Blow and Soulblade for example.

What causes the decline in Aux Battle Exp is the level difference. Enemies there are typically the recommended level for the chapter rather than 6 levels higher like they are for main chapter battles or Paralogues. That means that enemies in later part 1 Aux battles will still be around level 20, making it quite easy to get a level 1 unit to level 10. Rare monsters sighting also have enemies that are 6 levels higher than other Aux battles, so you could potentially push Byleth to even level 20 if you really wanted.

It can easily happen on Maddening if you allow Byleth to level via Adjutant. Just getting them to something like Pegasus Knight or Armored Knight is enough for them to take on the chapter. Mekkah went with the double crit killer bow strat and had Byleth in range of three beasts in the center on turn 2 to prevent Jeralt from dying. It was quite painful as their Byleth didn’t reach the 47 Attack needed to one round, didn’t have the Evasion Ring or Alertstance +, and didn’t have any form of Wrath which resulted in mid 70 Crit Rates. It was really just a matter of resetting until the RNG decided to cooperate.