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Good point! I chose Gilbert - he's easily the character I least wanted to S-rank in the entire game, but I wanted to see which pairings I got from the rest of my army, without Byleth messing things up. Also, it kinda felt like I should choose a BL-specific character, but I wanted Dimitri and Dedue to pair up (they didn't in the end). My Constance hit A-rank gauntlets in Ch. 16 (I think her Reason was nearly A-rank, Faith past B, and she already had B Authority at this point). Protecting her wasn't super-hard during/prior to this. And provided you're doing at least one set of aux battles per month (which is pretty optimal anyway), you should mostly be good on finances. There's nothing else to spend gold on, really (maybe gifts?) so yeah I never really got your argument from resource scarcity. Constance beat basically everything in the game with Aura Knuckles from the moment she got it up to the end of the game without help. She still got ORKOs at endgame - I gave her extra Mag so she could get a few more enemies, but she barely needed it before then. Pre-Aura Knuckles, Mystic Blow + Fistfaire beat every enemy Constance faced from the moment that became available (Ch. 11). I challenge you to find another magic build who is ORKOing for that period of time without significant stat booster help or favouritism in mastering classes. Even amongst physical builds, not much comes online by Ch. 11 and lasts to endgame (especially if they don't use relics). Yeah my Catherine at least couldn't beat the War Masters with Nimble Combo (unless she got a crit, her crit rates weren't stellar). But even War Cleric would have quadded almost everything else (there are a couple of Grapplers she would need a couple of points of Spd to get to), and like I said in the review, access to Recover would have actually made Catherine more useful at endgame.

This was a lategame-specific comment - if she'd gone into War Cleric for endgame, she would have needed extra Spd boosters to quad everyone at endgame that I wasn't willing to give her. A woman using gauntlets who had lower Str than Catherine may have wanted to focus on a crit-build instead, and War Cleric would have been much better for that. Catherine also still needed to spend time in War Cleric for Brawl Avo +20, and ORKO'd for the entire time she was in the class (which she wouldn't have done without Fistfaire). I mean, you know I disagree on this. Because I just documented how it worked for Constance in the log. Yeah, that fence isn't there in VW/SS I'm pretty sure. Enbarr plays quite differently on AM, so I guess the fence is there to help protect the Dark Knights/Bow Knights for their hit-and-run attacks.

I wouldn't go that far - Constance was ORKOing in it from the moment she certified, right the way through to the end of the game, while still being able to use Rescue and provide linked attack boosts with Bolting (normally she didn't even need to cast offensively). Catherine was also ORKOing in War Cleric for most of the game, but the class couldn't keep up in late-game because of the massive increase in lategame AS. And Recover on its own made Catherine more useful in War Cleric than she was in Assassin - I mainly kept her in that class for its Dex/Spd growths. Wouldn't be able to help with this unfortunately!

Yeah I see what point you were making @Shadow Mir. In practice, Constance still spent a lot of time in War Cleric - but I'd say her amazing Magic growth carried her through, rather than War Cleric specifically. I mean, it still has the benefits of being a Fistfaire class for women, and allowing for optimised Aura Knuckles+, so I'm not willing to write it off completely, but yeah I was surprised to have to drop it at endgame. On your point @Dark Holy Elf, you're right about how the numbers come out. But for gauntlets users, where every attack is brave, quadding is often more optimal than increasing the power of two attacks. Provided you have a way of dealing with the counter (like Desperation or decent Avo) and you're not trying to down armours, AS is more relevant than Atk for gauntlets users in the late game. Even late-game Dedue is struggling for kills against War Masters with One-Two Punch, unless he crits. Catherine was still great and quadding units in War Cleric in early Part 2, but Assassin ended up massively winning the damage calculations in late Part 2. Yeah, I was inspired by the fact that the RNG for random items in the monastery is partially determined by the direction from which you approach them. What I meant by "repeat Step 2" was that I normally changed direction sharply twice (Step 2 + Step 3) before I attempted faculty training. But the first direction change should take you away from the tutor, and the second direction change should take you back. Yeah, I think I agree, although it seems more practical to farm Magic boosters. I might try it on a normal unit with a simple build plan (Annette?) if I ever run the game again, although I'm still not sure it'd do enough to save her lategame combat. I've actually never tried this with Catherine/Shamir - will add it to the list!

Hope people had a restful holiday break - I hope this final edition of the log finds you all well! I finished this run in 2022, but the last edition of this log has been a mammoth, so is coming out now in 2023. Thanks for reading along - I've enjoyed writing everything up, and I look forward to putting it to use when I run Three Hopes. I'm not sure whether I'll start the Three Hopes run straightaway, because Engage is just around the corner, and I don't want to get burnt out on Fire Emblem before that happens. But I definitely will do the Three Hopes run at some point, so watch this space. Anyway, here we go! Chapter 20 Chapter 21 Endgame Now, we have the unit reviews. I still haven't figured out why I can only download low-quality screenshots, so unfortunately I have to make do without them. I'm following the same format as I did for the half-time reviews, except this time there's some extra info about their endgame set-up, I've also worked +2 Cha from birthdays and battalion boosts to Cha into the average stats comparison, and I've included the build path (classes they certified into/used but didn't master are in brackets). All stats are taken from the very end of the game, literally just before Dimitri finished the map. Fulltime Review - Blue Lions Fulltime Review - Other Units Numbers for the Run General Notes

The RD map you mentioned is absolutely nuts on that front - I find highlighting every enemy range actively works against me there, because it messes up my ability to class threats by high/mid/low priority. I normally lean towards the school "focus on what's in front of you", which works for me generally, but in an effort to be a better player I actively try to fix that by checking enemies most turns. If there's a difference between our playstyles, it's probably that I enjoy that activity a bit more than you might, but it definitely adds real time to a battle, and often for not much benefit. Despite this, I still make mistakes, mainly because I've either been over-ambitious with what I want to do on Player Phase (which is consistently a flaw throughout my FE-playing career), or I've misread enemy AI (and there's no way around that except spending more time with the game in question). As I'm sure you're aware, full map awareness isn't physically possible for certain maps (ie. Fog of War, or where the majority of enemies show up as reinforcements) and sometimes it works against you, because the best tactic relatively speaking might be the one where you ignore lots of enemies (i.e. quick clears), so trying to be aware of everything can put you on a one-track mindset. So I don't feel too bad when I haven't predicted everything. The thing that's helped me the most with FE playing (apart from hearing about other people's playstyles and tips) is XCOM 2. The mechanics are fairly different, but that game is really explicit about treating enemies as pods, or small groups, following similar objectives/movement patterns and so on. In XCOM 2, it's pretty obvious what counts as a pod because of how enemies are placed, and sometimes it's less clear in FE when lots of enemies are bunched up and their movement triggers overlap. But the general lesson is that instead of seeing enemies as individual units, it's better to see them as threat groups, with the grouping decided by placement/movement type/attack type etc. Which cuts down on the number of different items you're tracking as you play, while maintaining a rough idea of who's coming where, and their level of importance. I think FE does encourage this sometimes, and experienced players are probably already doing this instinctively, but sometimes pointing out the obvious is also helpful. I also freely admit to spending real time each turn just understanding how the map works, how it's changed, and whether there are any immediate red flags - even if I did it the previous turn and not much has changed since then. Which others might find a bit dull. It definitely helps me cut down on the mistakes you describe (just forgetting or not noticing an enemy). Even though sometimes I get suckered because the AI changes its mind between your turn and its turn, I think it's an improvement even FE purists would appreciate. If there's any tweak I'd make, it's for the colour of the line(s) to change if the unit is predicted to survive or die that Enemy Phase, according to the battle windows. That way, it might be a bit easier to take the map in at a glance. Hardly a crucial change, though. Fully concur with this. On higher difficulties, just having reinforcements that act immediately is an insane advantage for the red team - even if the player knows exactly what's about to come, that doesn't necessarily mean they can be trivialised. So players should at least have the opportunity to figure out, without relying on a guide, whether, when and from where reinforcements might arrive. Completely obscuring knowledge from the player should only happen in a few, critical scenarios, ideally aligned with big story events (like a sudden betrayal or smth), not as a shorthand for building difficulty.

So much for that Christmas deadline - life always finds a way to get in the way. The log is very late, but we are in the home stretch, so bear with me a little longer! Rhea's Paralogue Lysithea/Ferdinand's Paralogue Chapter 17 Chapter 18 Dimitri's Paralogue Chapter 19

Massively enjoyed this thread, thanks for hosting! I know that our sample size for scores wasn't huge, and I at least was getting pretty subjective by the end, but it's really great to have a wider pool of user experience data behind this huge mechanic in the game. Things like Alliance Youths being definitively the worst, and Immortal Corps the best, are fun takeaways, and I'm sure there are other cool things in the data as well (for example, my eyeball analysis says AM > CF > VW > SS by quality of battalions). Really appreciated all the effort you went to!

School of Sorcery Soldiers - 5/10 It's perhaps the best magic battalion at C-rank, or at the very least competitive with the Nuvelle mag-boosting battalion. But it's locked to one route, its linked character (Annette) will likely be at B Authority and have access to better, and in general mages will have already hit B Authority or be there soon after this becomes available. Given this it's not worth training up, although it gets a 5 on the off-chance you're struggling with B-rank/missed better battalions/are running 5+ mages. Church Soldiers - 0.75/10 I knew this was bad, but this is actually straightforwardly awful. Wow. Bergliez War Group - 1.75/10 +8 Atk on its own isn't enough to justify fielding this battalion over its competitors. Aegir Astral Knights - 6.5/10 If you're a regular grounded dodgetank (i.e. not building crit) I think this is the battalion you run. Unless your dodgetank's Cha is abysmal or they have Canto, they'd rather have an offensive gambit over Stride provided by Gautier Knights, because they want to be at the front of your charge, not at the back. It doesn't match Gautier's score due to its late arrival (and it's also behind a tough paralogue), but it's pretty good. Ordelia Sorcery Co. - 7/10 I'm often running this from join to endgame, but being the latest battalion that actually makes my endgame means its score caps at 7. Opera Co. Volunteers - 6.5/10 Probably the least accessible battalion in the game, all things told. However, even unlevelled, it is an upgrade on fully levelled Blue Lion Dancers (+1 Atk, +10 Hit, -10 Avo, -3 Prt, -3 Res, B Authority), and your only source of Dance of the Goddess outside of AM. Docking it half a point compared to Blue Lion Dancers seems fair.

I've definitely slowed down a bit recently, but I'm still hopeful of completing this log before the Christmas period. Next section below! Bernadetta/Petra's Paralogue Chapter 15 Caspar/Mercedes' Paralogue Marianne's Paralogue Linhardt/Leonie's Paralogue Chapter 16

Do you find yourself struggling to reach certification ranks by the time you hit level requirements? Do you get for one unit two ranks or more to A+ by endgame? If you use Lysithea, would you expect S+ and not just S rank? When you say that it isn't worth it to chase all this stuff, I'm left wondering what it is you do after your unit meets all their build requirements. Or maybe your units don't meed build requirements till very late? This is why I was asking the question. I agree that Cyril is not the best. But PBV, even on Cyril, is good enough to net you kills consistently through the game. The 30% thing we'll just agree to disagree on. But as far as Luck is concerned, it'll depend on your units. Some will reach 20 Luck on average by Lvl 30, and you could help a couple of others with Goddess Icons. Getting to 20 Luck, depending on unit, may be easier than picking up another weapon rank, so it's worth considering.

Brigid Mercenaries - 1.25/10 Okay for E-rank, but entirely unnecessary when you get them. Brigid Hunters - 6.5/10 I've mentioned this battalion before, because it's the best at its (small) niche, for grounded crit dodge tanks. You may not have any in a given run, but if you do they should be running this over any of the other +20 Avo battalions. Being the best at what it does puts it over a 6, but if you don't have this specific build you shouldn't be using this. Varley Archers - 1.25/10 Even if you're running more than one unit that requires significant hit help, this shouldn't make your party. 0 Atk/Crit and negative Avo means this battalion only brings one useful thing to your build - you'd rather have slightly lower hit from somewhere else (provided you can't use Edmund Troops/Essar for some reason) because there are other ways to build hit. Hevring Prayer Troops - 4/10 On stats alone, it's not good enough for endgame unless you've missed other battalions. But it's a bigger Mag Atk boost than Essar, and more available than Alliance Sages. So if you do run Blessing, you might pick this over Essar - although Essar can suit physical units, requires no Authority investment, and has a significant boost to Hit, so it's not the obvious winner. Better than the other house battalions with Blessing, which deserves to be reflected in score. Sauin Militia - 1.25/10 If it weren't for its Hit boost, it'd be a 1 or lower. Given the effort you go through for this, its stats are practically disrespectful. Holst's Chosen - 3/10 A worse Holy Knights of Seiros, with much worse accessibility. It's not bad though. Edmund Troops - 7.5/10 An excellent battalion. Top in its niche (boosting Hit), it also provides respectable boosts to both Phys and Mag Atk, and a solid offensive gambit. Multiple kinds of builds should be considering this a candidate for endgame. Its relative lateness is mitigated by the fact that it arrives before enemies with really serious Avo show up (and just in time for the completion of builds for units that appreciate it).

So you're agreeing with my points above, or not? I feel like something's been lost in translation here. I'm saying getting Wyvern Lord + Bow Knight on Cyril/Leonie is easier, or at least comparable, to trying to pick up high-investment skills like Bow Crit +10. I'm also saying raising 4-6 ranks to C or B by Level 30 or so is more than doable, not least because I have actually done it. Going beyond B+ in secondary ranks, as you would if you're trying to get high certification rates in Master classes, is often sub-optimal, as the benefits tends to diminish. But E to B is far more manageable, especially when compared to the effort needed for A+ and beyond, which is why it isn't ridiculous to suggest you can get both Wyvern Lord/Bow Knight, while maintaining Authority. As a data point, my Ingrid on this run hit Level 30 in Ch. 15, and certified for Bow Knight (30% rates) at the third time of asking. Seeing that she was at Lvl 30, I decided to do something similar to my Cyril plan with Ingrid - sending her to get a Falcon Knight cert so she can build Spd before the endgame. She started training Swords at the beginning of Ch.15 - it was one of her two goals (alongside Armour, which will contribute to her final skillset but is not a priority). She received sauna and tutoring, and spent a paralogue as an adjutant (no grinding, completed in 9 turns), and she went from E+ to C, classing into Assassin by the Ch. 15 story battle. She got most of her Flying WEXP from Pegasus Knight, and didn't even need a full week of active instruction to hit C+ Flying. She passed through C+ Lances in Ch. 16, and will likely hit B Lances during Ch. 17 (she trained to C pretty easily in the early game and Peg Knight). At that point, she can attempt the Falcon Knight cert. That's less than three whole chapters to complete a pivot from Bow Knight to Falcon Knight. Falcon Knight is a bit kinder than Wyvern Lord for certification, and she spent a decent amount of time in Peg Knight. But even if she hadn't, I'd hardly call what I'm doing a sacrifice, since Spd is even more important to a non-Cyril/Leonie Bow Knight than Mv+1, or any other high-investment skill. I've been doing a lot of talking, so I should ask what your experiences/expectations are for a build by endgame, as that seems to be the major difference between our views.

I take the point that it's building more ranks than strictly necessary. But as I said before, I'm actually trying this right now, and have (almost) achieved it with Cyril, so I know it can be done in a timely manner and without aux battle grinding. If there are sacrifices, they are potentially in getting abilities tied to higher ranks - I won't be trying for Alert Stance+ or Mv +1 on Cyril, and Bow Crit +10 may or may not be possible. And PBV Cyril/Leonie would definitely appreciate Mv +1/Bow Crit +10 (Mv +1 is a shoo-in for anybody's endgame, Bow Crit +10 is a bit less competitive but still great for PBV). However, since Cyril/Leonie want C Lances anyway for Bow Knight, and at least D+ Axes (C Axes if you want 100% certs) for Death Blow, they need 1060-1180 WEXP to get to 30% pass rates for Wyvern Lord, another (assuming 20 Luck) 280 WEXP to get to 50%, and a further 280 WEXP to get to 70%. On the other hand, B Riding to A+ Riding is 1080 WEXP. B Bows to S Bows is 1840 WEXP. If you're only raising Bows/Riding/Authority by the time you get to Lvl 30, you should probably do better than B in Bows/Riding (although depending on build plan, you may only be raising Riding in the classroom so B may be fair). But it's still a big chunk of WEXP (and of the game) that you're waiting on Mv+1 or Bow Crit+10. You should be able to certify for Wyvern Lord much earlier than you can get either of those abilities. And, like I said before, Wyvern Lord allows these units to reach enemies they otherwise couldn't in at least some Part 2 maps, which is a crucial pillar of the build. In all honesty, it's getting to A+ and higher in secondary ranks, or to S rank and beyond in your primary rank, that should be framed as the sacrifice. Offensive mages love S Rank Reason, but are also fairly unlikely to be killing things in late-game Maddening. Every other build should be thinking long and hard about whether they need to get ranks beyond B+ or A, because generally speaking the returns do diminish from that point on.

The minimum pass thing seems to divide people here. Yes, it's a RNG lottery that is much more against you if you try for 30% than for 67%, or 100%. If you won't save-scum, and don't want to spare money for more Master Seals, then yeah maybe you shouldn't bother trying at that degree of chance. But if you allow 30% certification rates, you should be able to try certifying the moment you hit your level requirement, while raising other relevant ranks (i.e. Authority/Bows). If you're gunning for 100% certification rates, that's roughly an extra 1000-1300 WEXP (depending on which combo of ranks you had for 30%), which will take even units aiming for infantry Master Classes at least 2-3 months more to get, where those ranks may not be relevant outside of the certification itself. Even if all the ranks you're raising are relevant for that build's combat, the 100% build is only better off than the 30% if the 30% build fails to certify for the entire time it would have taken to get to 100% pass rates. Which is not impossible, but is pretty unlikely. Also, what do you mean by niche here? Bow Knight is a class you agree is good. Wyvern Lord is a class that almost everybody else agrees is good, and is the highest Str flying class in the game, which is relevant for many builds. Normally, units don't want Bow Knight if they have Wyvern Lord, but bow users, and Cyril/Leonie in particular, would like both. Because Point-Blank Volley can get between +6 and +14 damage in Bow Knight compared to Wyvern Lord, likely with better Hit and Crit too. Endgame enemies on average exceed the HP/Prt of their counterparts two chapters earlier by similar intervals - even assuming you've picked up some levels in between, units that get KOs two chapters before endgame will likely need help to get KOs on equivalent units in the final chapter. Giving them another class takes some pressure off using stat-boosters on them. I agree Great Knight has awkward certification requirements, which is why I suggested only units interested in both Paladin and Fortress Knight have an easy time of it. But getting to B-rank just via tutoring/instruction is more than achievable by Lvl 30, and with 30% certification no rank ever needs to be higher than B. The bigger issue with Great Knight is that its niche is trampled by Paladin (better mobility/Lancefaire), Fortress Knight (better bulk), and Wyvern Lord (better compromise of mobility/power/bulk with Axefaire, and competitive for lance users too). As a class, it was designed for compromise between Paladin and Fortress Knight, but Maddening encourages builds that double down on one specialism. If it were a better class, people wouldn't complain so much about the cert requirements - people didn't complain nearly as much about Dark Knight, even pre-DLC.

This makes a lot of sense to me, although as you say I don't recognise Duscur Cavalry from anywhere else on AM. Collecting every battalion and maxing their level is something I tried (and failed) to do, so I could see the appeal from a completionist perspective. Although I still resent -10 Avo, even if it's coherent with cavalry battalions generally having Avo penalties. I don't know if anyone has actually levelled up every single battalion in the game to max on one save file - I imagine if there were rewards to that it'd be recorded somewhere. The reason I thought to try collecting every battalion was because of how meaninglessly large the barracks are for a NG save file, so it'd make sense if there were...

Alliance Youths - 0.25/10 Empire Youths but later. I won't give a 0 on principle, but this is as close as it gets. Pirates/Rogues - 1/10 Exactly the same, except they come from different quests? Devs, why did you bother? Reaper Knights - 6/10 I quite like the quest for this, and given Jeritza is basically shoved into Anna's paralogue, I think this counts as his battalion. Which makes sense, boosting Crit and Avo, which certain versions of him appreciate (i.e. Swordmaster/Grappler Jeritza). Does +10 Crit offset the -5 loss to Avo compared with Gautier Knights? The answer is maybe, but people who want this will prefer Stride to Assault Troop (especially when there's only a +1 Cha boost to the battalion). Still a solid battalion, that I enjoy getting. It's also a rough upgrade on Brigid Hunters (+3 Atk, +4 Prt, Assault Troop vs +5 Avo, +6 Cha, Poison Tactic) so there's that as well. Morfis Magic Corps - 3/10 In a poor slot where mages you actually use should have B Authority, and mages you don't use won't have C Authority. Given that you should have fully levelled magic battalions at C-rank (and at least those two Nuvelle battalions are straightforwardly better) this just won't get used, but isn't so bad as to be on the level of these other battalions. Thieves - 0.75/10 It feels kinda ridiculous to punish this battalion for being the same as Pirates/Rogues but later - yet that is exactly what I'm doing. Duscur Infantry - 0.75/10 Slightly better than Thieves, but on only one route. Same score seems appropriate. Duscur Cavalry - 0.75/10 Maybe it's slightly better than Duscur Infantry? Why give an E-rank battalion available from Ch. 18 on one route -10 in Avo? Aren't there already enough obstacles to using it? I'm giving it the same score as Duscur Infantry, because it definitely sits somewhere between 0.5 and 1 and I can't weigh up where.

Pretty practical imo, provided you're willing to have 30% acceptance rates. My Cyril at the moment (end of Ch. 15 AM) has B Axes/Flying, C Lances, B+ Bows, C Riding and B Authority. So he's already able to try for Wyvern Lord, and is about 200 WEXP from trying for Bow Knight. For context, he's only had the Knowledge Gem when he was mastering Brigand, otherwise I've mostly been fielding him in battle without it. In my particular case, I think Cyril will stay in Wyvern Lord until the endgame chapters, because he hopefully won't need the Bow Knight power boost till then. Which buys me extra time - but I'm in the position of being able to get Bow Knight and Wyvern Lord much earlier than that. I guess bear in mind that Cyril has boons in every relevant rank here bar Authority, but yeah it's doable. For what it's worth, Great Knight is only an issue if you don't plan on going through Fortress Knight and Paladin. Again, assuming 30% certs, you only need C+ Axes, B Armour, and B+ Riding. If you're gunning for Mv+1 and using Paladin, then you should reach B+ pretty naturally, and you need C+ Axes/C+ Armour to try for Fortress Knight, spending some time in Fortress Knight should get you to B. Of course, it'll be harder if you won't use both those classes. Alternatively, getting to B+ Axes and B+ Riding means you only need C Armour, which isn't much of an investment and Wt-3 is quite useful. It isn't for everyone, but it's not unmanageable. At the end of Ch. 15 AM, my Ferdinand is at C+ Axes, B Armour, and 40 WEXP shy of B+ Riding - and he just got Swift Strikes. He mastered Fortress Knight as an adjutant, and uses Paladin for combat. I don't particularly care about getting him to Great Knight, but he will have that option. Definitely a concern. I think I have a shot at A+ in primary weapon even for those units raising 5 ranks or more, but it will probably depend on how much combat they see. And I'm really not sure about A+ in movement ranks - I wasn't planning to anyway, but my Cyril definitely won't get Mv+1, for example. But I think my Ferdinand has a shot, even without grinding. Let's see, I guess. Well exactly. Again, since for you it's basically an arbitrary rank, times when she isn't fighting would be the ideal times to have her work on Axes. Aux battling quickly gets tiring, even for people who aren't opposed to it in principle, so yeah I get it. Even without aux battles though, and assuming you want mastery by Ch. 20 AM/SS, or Ch. 21 VW, you won't need to average more than 12 actions per map at most - which is acting most Player Phases on a map, and having a couple of Enemy Phases (which a War Master should be capable of). Provided you aren't LTC-ing maps, just the story and paralogue maps you have available should be enough, provided that you keep their class mastery progress in mind as you play. And all this is assuming no Knowledge Gem, which obviously speeds things up a lot. I do believe it's gettable without aux battling, although I am doing some aux battles in my current run for various reasons - we'll see if/how much that helps.

Yeah, it is. So CF is one short, although I guess it's relatively foolhardy to try for Lifetaker Wyvern Ferdinand there anyway. I did this paralogue recently and I don't remember there being a Goddess Icon there (the droppable stat booster is a Secret Book I think) - I do know the wiki has it listed as a reward, but I'm pretty sure it's wrong on that front. I'm not sure actually. I think it probably isn't optimal (or that important) to pick up Lifetaker at Lvl 20 or immediately after. At Lvl 20 Wyvern Rider, Ferdinand's AS won't be higher than 20 on average. Before B-rank Authority he can get +10 Avo from a battalion on GD and +5 otherwise, so assuming B Lances you can get up to 70-75 Avo against non-sword users, which is good but a bit shy of confident. For a flying dodge tank, I'd want at least 90 Avo. Assuming B+ Lances and B Authority, an average Wyvern Lord Ferdinand can get there at Lvl 32 or so. Obviously, if your standard for acceptable Avoid is higher/lower then the level threshold should reflect that. Assuming Str +2, Death Blow, B Lances, no Dark Bishop, and Secret Transport Force, Lv 27 Ferdinand's Player Phase Atk with a Training Lance+ (to facilitate max AS/Avo) is 40 Atk, only likely to double Fortress Knights and one weirdly slow Paladin in Ch. 14 on Church routes, who he can't ORKO. With a Silver Lance+ and Tempest Lance, that's 58 Atk, which can get a couple of Mages and an Archer on that map. With Horseslayer+ Tempest Lance or Silver Lance+ Knightkneeler, he could get four Cavaliers but still can't get any Paladins, and with a Brave Lance+ he can pick up a Mercenary, a Warlock, and a Dark Bishop. However, his max Avo falls to 80 with a Silver Lance+, and a little bit lower with the other lances - Randolph and his Warriors are packing Lancebreaker+, and the extra weight puts most enemies on the map into doubling range (and thus ORKO range) against Ferdinand. My point with the above snapshot is that even a standard version of the Ferdinand build isn't fully online in the late Lvl 20s, with the power to kill maybe a quarter of enemies or less and avoidance rates that are a bit on the unreliable side. Given that this is true, Lifetaker isn't yet worth it, since it isn't activating that often, and even when it does his personal still doesn't put him into safety. So, Lifetaker shouldn't be a priority when the rest of the build is also not ready. Once Swift Strikes (i.e. consistent ORKOing) and acceptable Avo that isn't destabilised by Swift Strikes has been achieved, is when Lifetaker should be introduced into the skillset. I suggested before that you could get to this point with Lvl 35 Ferdinand, so attempting to class into Dark Bishop around the time Ferdinand is aiming for Wyvern Lord would give you plenty of time to pick up Lifetaker before Lvl 35. Put another way, you normally wouldn't expect Alert Stance+ before Lvl 35, if not well after, and people price that in when they consider building a unit around it. Lifetaker is accessible earlier, but is most relevant for the latter part of Ferdinand's combat, so a build plan should treat it similarly.

Yeah, all other classes arrive early enough/are easy enough to master that you can do it naturally, if you don't care about when they master it, but Master Classes require an active commitment, and probably planning in advance. But it certainly can be done, especially on Maddening where the combat is tougher and your units see more combat on average. Consider that you're normally hitting Master Classes by Ch.15-6, you need between 50-100 actions (depending on how much you use the Knowledge Gem) to master the class, and you're likely to have anywhere between 10-16 story/paralogue maps, plus however much you aux battle in Part 2, before the endgame. Without significant grinding, you're unlikely to get more than a unit or two to master a Master Class in a timely fashion, but it's certainly possible - and War Master has arguably the best class mastery of anything in that tier. So I wouldn't write it off (I'm trying this for Felix in my current run, will keep track of if/when he masters the class). Incidentally, I mastered War Master for Byleth in CF (Ch. 16 I think) after some favouritism and a bit of grinding, so if you're open to that I guess that's also a route. Without significant help, Hilda isn't going to be able to hit regularly at 3 spaces, let alone 4. And the battalions which help hit rate enough to mitigate bow penalties (i.e. Edmund Troops, Essar Research Group, and I guess Golden Deer/Varley Archers too, although I can't recommend either to anyone) only give attack boosts in the realm of C-rank flying battalions. Unless you're doing some interesting things, like having Hilda master Archer and Valkyrie, she's still going to be soft locked to 2-range, or 3-range Curved Shot, no matter which class she runs. The passive linked attack boost is more generally relevant - but I'm not sure it's enough of a difference-maker between Bow Knight and Wyvern Lord. I may have been a bit unclear there - I'm not actually saying she needs to be an adjutant, just that she'd get pretty close to B-rank Axes even as an adjutant, because you said previously you wouldn't use Axes in actual combat. Even if you only have Axes as tutoring/passive goal, she'll be very capable of C/C+ Axes by Lvl 20 and B Axes by Lvl 30. This isn't completely true. Bow Range +2 is cool (and it is a selling point), but the big selling point of Bow Knight is having mounted Bowfaire. Bow Range +2 is a bonus that you have to build a unit specifically for in order to utilise well, and is otherwise just a passive boost for other units. At least, this is how it is on Maddening. Although from my experience even on Hard, Bow Knight's are struggling to hit things at 4 spaces without Curved Shot or other help. In the case of Cyril/Leonie, mounted Bowfaire (and, as you mention, greater choice of high-quality battalions from being grounded) mean you can optimise Point-Blank Volley for max damage, while maintaining the ability to get close enough to enemies to launch it. On some maps, you'd still rather be a flier, because reaching an enemy with PBV is more important than maxing out its damage, but provided the terrain is accommodating, Bow Knight is the better choice.

I assumed B Reason and 30% certification because I was assuming only B Axes/Flying when either build attempts the Wyvern Lord cert - that would also need 20 Luck and leave you with 30% chances, and classing into Dark Bishop doesn't need to happen much before then. Of course, Dark Bishop does involve a literal extra certification you're at RNG mercy for, but it's already what I was expecting to do for Wyvern Lord, and you could be trying for both concurrently, so yeah it's not a big deal to me. And, at my count, there are three 'free' Goddess Icons in Part 1 - one from saving the greens in Ch. 3 rewards, one from Anna's first Peculiar Trend quest (which requires doing any three non-paralogue battles, you get more than three battle quests in Part 1 so I think it's fair game), and one from an NPC in the Abyss in Ch. 12. Yes, two of those are DLC, and all three are easily missable, but given there's next to no demand for them I think it's fine to assume you give one to Ferdinand. Although I didn't get a single Miracle Bean from anyone I recruited my current run - maybe there's a chance there's one on a BL recruit or I recruited someone at a level where they don't come with stat-boosters. I think you're right on both counts. As long as they keep the Knowledge Gem the entire time (which is definitely an investment as you say), mastering an Advanced/DLC class via adjutant can take anyone as little as two levels. Even with Swift Strikes, I'm not likely to be so reliant on Ferdinand that I'll miss him that much for that period of time, so I'm not too concerned about the cost of being in Dark Bishop. As for Alert Stance+, there's definitely more freedom in how you get it compared to Lifetaker, and having an inferior version already available means Ferdinand doesn't miss it nearly as much as pre-Lifetaker vs. post-Lifetaker. Although you could flip that point on its head and say that for Ferdinand, vanilla Alert Stance is enough (and potentially drop Str +2 from the build above as lenticular suggested).

I thought I'd be speeding up now, but writing this episode of the log still took me time. Below, I've written out some profiles of my units going into Ch. 12 story battle. Because while I've seen a fair few endgame parties from being on these forums, and I have an idea of where other players get to by the end, I'd also be interested in knowing where people are at this point - a lot of conversations I have on here often hinge on assumptions I make about build progress, which might not be shared by the community. Note that where I list stats, they are the stats of that unit in their timeskip class (so with class boosts, stat boosters, skills, and every non-Byleth character got +1 Cha from their birthday tea) - I've also added those in for their average stats, which are rounded to the nearest whole number. But I may have messed up the maths here or there. Also, where a weapon rank has a * next to it, that means the rank was achieved in the Ch. 12 battle and not before. I had planned to reach all the starred ranks before Ch. 12, but I didn't due to my own error (more on this in the Ch. 12 log). If I don't mention a weapon rank, that is because it is still at base rank for that character. Also, please excuse crappy formatting - I would have posted screenshots, but the quality is pretty bad. Halftime Review - Blue Lions Halftime Review - Other Units Chapter 12 Chapter 13 Gilbert/Annette's Paralogue Chapter 14

Alliance Pavise Co. - 1.6/10 CF is the worse route for face-tanking, mainly because of how truncated it is, meaning less build time before the endgame stat spike. VW is the next worst, for the opposite reasons - you have the most time/freedom to build your army, with the best house overall as your base, and a Part 2 that especially favours strategies reliant on high Mv and range. What I'm getting at is, I don't want a def-tank in VW Part 2, and no other unit wants this. Better stats than the Kingdom equivalent mean a minor score bump. Alliance Physicians - 1/10 I didn't think a post-skip battalion would bring my scoring this low. Alliance Sages - 7.75/10 Compared to Timotheos Magi Corps, a slight downgrade on stats and a worse gambit. But +8 Mag atk means I tend to run this from join to end, especially since magic attackers are so good (and plentiful) on this route. Alliance Master Archers - 3/10 I kinda see what they're going for here - it's a bit of a remix of Jeralt's Mercenaries, but with the lean on Crit instead of Avo. There actually aren't many battalions that boost both by +10 or more. However, the niche (crit dodgetank) is very small, especially since the premier one on this route is Claude, who should be flying. Those kinds of units would also prefer the higher boost to Avo than to Crit - so if you're at B-rank, this is outdone by Brigid Hunters. Alliance Guard - 2.25/10 A C-rank battalion masquerading as a B-rank one. Which is at least less irritating than Kingdom Heavy Soldiers. Golden Deer Wyvern Co. - 2.75/10 Like I said before, I've never run or felt the need to run four physical fliers (this battalion ranks 4th or 5th for fliers on this route), and unlike BE Pegasi there's no further niche to this. I'm not getting another flier to A-rank for it. Golden Deer Archers - 1.5/10 Again, I kinda see where they're going with this thematically, as a battalion providing high Hit for physical and gambit attacks. But Edmund Troops is free on this route, and nobody is getting to A rank for +2 Atk and Poison Tactic. Golden Deer Cavalry - 4.25/10 This is at least acceptable (especially given this collection of dross above it), and there's a chance you're running a lot of grounded physical attackers, and one has room for A Authority. The +8 Atk and Linked Horses legitimises it, and +7 Prt is nice even if I'm not building around it. Outside bet for endgame.

Yeah, this is just true, isn't it. Well, I tried, Dark Bishop. I had a quick look at some numbers. An average Ferdinand on this build is hitting about 30 Str at Lvl 35, and will hit 36 Str at Lvl 45. Using Death Blow, a +7 battalion, and 18 Mt Lance of Zoltan+ (you get the base version from his paralogue) as our benchmark, Swift Strikes has 69x2 Atk as a Lvl 45 Wyvern Lord, and 71x2 with Str+2 in the mix. This makes the difference for ORKOing a couple of Grapplers in AM endgame and a fair few Falcon Knights in SS endgame (ofc Areadbhar/LoR obviates the need for Str+2). I haven't scanned through earlier chapters for thresholds, so there may be more. But Str +2 may matter less if you're fishing for crits via Swift Strikes instead of using high-Mt lances, Alert Stance with his personal does make Ferdinand that much safer, and dodge tanks are especially good for those endgame maps. So yeah, it's a toss-up. Of course, simply subbing in AS/AS+ for Lifetaker as suggested above makes even more sense, I suppose. Yeah this isn't something I had taken into account before, and could definitely make a difference. I agree that Alert Stance is basically free, but the gap between AS+ and Lifetaker isn't as big as you'd think. Take as given B Axes from Wyvern Rider and B Flying to class into Wyvern Lord, since both straight Wyvern and Lifetaker Wyvern Ferdinand need to get that far. A+ Flying is 1080 WEXP on top of that. On the other hand, E to B Reason is 680 WEXP of tutoring. Then there's mastering Dark Bishop. If Ferdinand had spent the time mastering Dark Bishop in Wyvern Rider/Lord, they would have gotten an extra 375 Flying WEXP. So the cost in Flying WEXP of getting Lifetaker is 1055 WEXP, which is slightly less than needed for A+ Flying, albeit with a more rigid distribution of tutoring to combat. Of course, on top of the WEXP comparison, there is the cost of being in Dark Bishop stats-wise, and smaller gains to Lance WEXP/inferior combat for the period spent in Dark Bishop. Which can all be mitigated by Knowledge Gem adjutant-ing, but this in itself is a use of resources that straight Wyvern Ferdinand doesn't necessarily require. I think everything put together does make AS+ a smaller investment, but not by that much.

Riffing on a few of the ideas here before, what do people think of the following use of Lifetaker: Build: Wyvern Lord Ferdinand Progression: Noble > Fighter > Brigand > Wyvern Rider (> Dark Mage cert only) > Dark Bishop > Wyvern Lord Abilities: Lance Prowess Lvl 5, Death Blow, Lifetaker, Swordbreaker, Str +2? Other kit: Evasion Ring, Secret Transport Force, his personal The build idea is a self-reliant flying tank, that also has a significant Player Phase (a la the fliers of FE past). Provided he only spends a couple of levels mastering Dark Bishop, an average Ferdinand with an Iron Lance+ or the Scythe of Sariel can get to 30 AS around Lvl 35 or so. Combined with the setup above, he should then hit 95 Avo, which is at the very least par for an endgame dodgetank. Obviously better weapons will be heavier, but hopefully he will have a few more levels left to increase Spd, and/or hit a multiple of 5 with Str. Then, Ferdinand can use Swift Strikes (or attack normally, but the more damage the better) to kill something on Player Phase. The role of Lifetaker will be in maintaining his personal without anyone else using an action, keeping his Avo up for Enemy Phase. The best criticisms I can think of: 1) You don't need Lifetaker for this build. I can't help but agree, but as you can see above there isn't immense pressure on Ferdinand's build (Lances are the only rank that need to go above B, there's at least one free skill slot too) so I think you could find space for it, especially outside CF. As for being needed, I'm not sure how often this version of Ferdinand will take damage in the first place, so I can't declare that it is necessary. But at the very least it'll cover level-ups, and I'm never totally confident in a dodge tank's abilities, so Lifetaker could help secure some peace of mind? 2) Reaching minimum B Reason and mastering Dark Bishop, just for the Lifetaker effect, is not worth it. It's easy enough to use Physic, after all - but your healer(s) may have a better use of a turn, or more rarely be out of range. The heal effect could also be achieved with Spear of Assal/Blessed Lance+. But if you're using them for Swift Strikes and Enemy Phase they will quickly run out of uses, and I at least find there's enough independent pressure on my Mythril stocks to consider an alternative. And the Ochain/Seiros Shields would drag down his Avo further. In combat at least, Lifetaker is the most efficient way of keeping Ferdinand's personal working, and for this version of him the personal makes the difference between solid and maybe slightly iffy Avo. Whether it's worth this much effort or not, I'm genuinely not sure - hopefully you'll let me know what you think. 3) I'd rather have Alert Stance+ and higher Avo than a dodge tank with worse Avo and a good Player Phase. Again, a fair enough criticism. My only response is to say that I don't like doing nothing on Player Phase, especially if there's something I can do. There are definitely situations in which it's better to Wait (for example, early doors AM with Dedue), but by the time I have vanilla Alert Stance I can normally do something useful with an action instead of waiting, so I'd rather do that. This allows me to have my cake and eat it. Yes, I have to tolerate higher enemy hit rates, and a higher chance that I can get hit/need a Divine Pulse etc., and the min-max doctrine dictates that this is the worse choice. But it probably isn't ~so~ wrong that it couldn't work. Anyway, this is the result of me thinking about everyone's suggestions/comments etc. Would people run this? Any improvements, or criticisms I've missed?