Ranking each game by class: Wyverns

[Zapp Branniglenn]

There's always been a lot of discrepancies in the differences between "wild dragons" and wyverns in the Fire Emblem universe. And that's going to seep into our discussion here. Do Archanea's Dracoknights count for a Wyverns discussion despite being seemingly morphed from pegasi? I'm going to go with Yes just like I did last time, but defer to that thread as I have no interest in reiterating details. It's ultimately up to you what classes you think should qualify for your own personal rankings. Previous discussions can be found here:

• Myrmidons / Swordmasters
• Mercenaries / Heroes
• Thieves / Assassins
• Fighter / Warrior
• Brigand / Pirate / Berserkers
• Archers / Snipers
• Nomads / Bow Knights
• Armor Knights / Generals
• Cavaliers / Paladins
• Dancers / Refresh Units
• Pegasus / Falcoknights

Here are my rankings:

Spoiler

1. Three Houses: King on Normal/Hard modes, and remain very versatile units on Maddening for their ease of reaching objectives. It's also the only flier class available for men. A lot of what’s strong about the Wyvern meta is well established, but when you dig into the details their case tends to get even stronger for seemingly no balance-related reason. As their weaknesses are minor enough to feel like nitpicks. Seal Def is a waste (would be incredible on Sothis paralogue if you could feasibly get it in time). Defiant Crit pairs well with a late game avoid stacking build (btw, hello Alert Stance. You must be the unofficial mastery skill for Wyvern Rider).
2. FE3 Book 2: See pegasus write up
3. FE6: Miledy and her bro are both excellent - and run away with some of the most outrageous Hard Mode Bonuses that add up to about ten extra levels worth of stats. These are great units on Ilia route, but Miledy with an Iote’s shield can be your greatest combatant on Sacae route. Early Promotion is advised for both units. It’s funny that Zeis is the closest thing to an “Est” in FE6, because he feels like anything but. All he has are speed and weapon rank issues which is honestly common in FE6’s roster. Miledy’s problem is her Con – too much of it. Once she promotes she can’t carry paladins around. Certainly doesn’t hurt her combat, but as a flier she’s fumbling her duties as an uber driver. I’ve seen players give her the body ring because, well, the problem doesn’t get any worse with two more Con. She can still lift Rutger, mages, staff users, and promoted Roy. As for normal difficulty, these two shouldn't disappoint, certainly not compared to the pegasus knights.
4. FE11: See pegasus write up
5. FE9: Two units who have less availability than Marcia/Tanith, but still handily making a case for themselves like any mounted FE9 unit. Jill's join chapter performance is frankly awful on Hard Mode. The Laguz guard keeps her alive, but only momentarily before needing to retreat behind your circle of units. She relies even heavier than Marcia on Bonus Exp to get going but it’s a worthwhile investment and the next map will prove why. Haar’s pretty underwhelming compared to Tanith, but at least his join chapter performance is much improved. FE9 deployment slots run the gamut between 9 and 17 that late in the game, so he’s one of the better filler pre-promotes. He’s got speed issues and tends to rely on the brave axe he joins with until it breaks. 
6. FE8: Cormag’s got fantastic availability on Ephraim route. He blows Tana’s starting stats out of the water, and an early promoted Vanessa is generally a match for him. As for his promotion, Wyvern Knight is an easy pick, since it comes with an occasionally useful skill, and three more speed. I’m not sure what they were thinking with Wyvern Lord. And last time we discussed that Wyvern Knight is certainly the better choice for Vanessa/Tana, at least in a vacuum. So I guess that makes up for the fact that this game has just one unit to look at.
7. FE4: Altena has only a little game left to contribute, but she’s great if you mind what she can and cannot do. Her susceptibility to magic is something Fee certainly doesn’t share for one thing. Altena’s performance is not impacted by your Gen 1 pairings and there's no gross substitute version of her either. It's not necessary tp load Quan up with awesome lances at the expense of Finn. She always has the awesome relic, great stat growths, and some decent skills. Followup is earned upon promotion and she just needs to hit the arena to get it. She won’t be pulling many doubles with Gae Bolg, but her holy blood gives her access to all swords, and some of those might be worth considering for a few more combat benchmarks.
8. The Last Promise: Karina’s bases are obscene compared to who else you have at that point of the game. It's owed to her high starting level, but the game has FE7 Normal Mode EXP calculations which don't scale exp as harshly. Being your first flier in Anakin mode grants her a lot of utility, like getting him across all the nonsense in chapter 14 to recruit the green units. Speaking of that map, the boss has the first (of two) Delphi shield to steal. Ben is another level 10 wyvern. Having stats and growths firmly balanced against Karina but joining five chapters later. He has 5 more res and 4 con over her. Usable, but not interesting. Leopold is the final wyvern, and he comes with the opportunity cost of gold (gold is valuable for all of the same reasons as in FE6), and a unique 1-2 range S rank Lance that has built in Delphi Shield protection. Most players seem to prefer that choice, but I’ve used Leopold and he’s fine. Generally needs brave weapons to kill anything, but he’s mobile and bulky.
9. FE7: Similar to FE6, we’ve got two wyverns, both of whom benefit from hard mode bonuses. But the bonuses have been very toned down since FE6. Base level Fiora and Hard Mode Heath have the same AS with a steel lance which I’ve always found funny. There’s an obvious availability discrepancy but Heath has plenty of potential while Vaida is good from the get go. On serious playthroughs, odds are good your roster lacks a dedicated sword user, so the brave sword should pick up many ORKOs she wouldn’t get otherwise. In general I don’t value FE7 fliers as growth units since the hardest maps of the game are almost always indoor chapters. Only Cog of Destiny is up there as a map where having raised fliers to have good combat actively pays off in making it easier, and the pegs have an edge there since most of the enemies are magic attackers waiting to be Javved.
10. FE1: See Pegasus write up
11. FE3 Book 1: See Pegasus write up

If I put these into tiers 1-2 are S tier, 3-5 are A tier. The rest are B

Next time we'll be going over Lord Classes. So get your Lyn is Good essays ready.

[SnowFire]

Amazing: Three Houses, Path of Radiance, Shadow Dragon / New Mystery (if counting the full Peg-> Dracoknight)

Very good: Radiant Dawn, Fates, Binding Blade, Engage

Good: Awakening, Blazing Blade

Average: Sacred Stones

--

Three Houses is wyvern-premacy for reasons discussed before.  I used to think that at least WL's balance was mildly offset by skill requirements, but Serenes Forest taught me that Wyvern Rider is actually incredibly generous to get into, even if you wait until 100% qualification chance, and will set up WL requirements just fine.   But...  it's pretty crazy when perma-dismounted Wyvern Lord is probably a better class than Warrior.  Just insane stats, an Avoid boost in a game where Avoid boosts are very good, Axefaire when Axes are good, combat Canto and super-range.

Path of Radiance Jill will turn out a bit better than Marcia by the second half, but joins later and has a worse start.  But whatever.  Still a godlike unit.  Haar is solid filler for the short time he exists.

FE11/12 were covered before (although weird to rank...  would we be only ranking the time spent promoted?).  As a mild note, FE12 Dracoknight has an annoyingly low Speed stat cap that sabotages its performance at the very endgame some...  but oh well, you'll just have to settle for super performance over only 80% of the game.

It feels weird not sticking Radiant Dawn in top tier, when Haar / Jill get such hype (and they can even carry around an A-support backpack for free if they equip Savior - Adjutanting before Adjuatants?!).  It's just that it's Radiant Dawn, a game that also hands you nigh-immortal endgame-ready units in the Laguz Lords, which kinda wreck the curve for everyone else.  (Also, Jill can have a bit of a rocky start before she gets rolling.)

Fates Wyvern Riders are really good, even if we hypothetically exclude Malig Knight for some sort of Dark Flier category.  It's not just Camilla being good, either; switching other characters into the Wyvern line is totally legit like Xander.  Their skills are all pretty solid.  Scarlet has some nice utility in Birthright (e.g. immune to the gimmick in Leo's swamp map).  Even Beruka, the weakest native Wyvern Rider, is just totally usable and fine.

Binding Blade is swingy based on if the Hard Mode bonuses are baked in.  Miredy's fine even on Normal, though.

Engage is a little weird to rate.  Rosado is not that special - he's usable, sure, but joins lateish and with some sort of Nino / Est growth pattern.  So a mere Average performance if you're playing with no Second Seals.  That said, if you're allowing Second Seals, sticking Kagetsu / etc. on a Wyvern takes any ol' good physical beater and gives them much better range and flying utility in a game that really rewards that at times.  So the value shoots way up then.

Cherche & Gerome are solid in Awakening and tend to be able to go for goofy omni-breaker setups in the postgame if you care.  Pair-up flying taxies are still a thing, but the Wyvern line misses the mighty Galeforce, and obviously aren't doing Nosferatu cheeze either, and can't quite get to the screw-you Defense values of Manaketes / Generals.  So very good if playing fair, but misses three of the major "meta" Awakening strategies.

Heath is...  fine.  He's fine.  Like most Blazing Blade characters, you can give him Iote's Shield and a Javelin and rain some destruction down if you level him up enough, although the availability is worse than the Lowens of the world of course.

Sacred Stones Cormag is less good.  Usable, hence "Average" not "Bad", but he definitely feels like the most restrained we see of the Wyvern class line.

[Whisky]

Wyverns are one of, if not The best class in most FE games. It makes them hard to rank between games because of how strong the class is in every game. In randomizers I’ve played of the GBA games, having a unit randomized into Wyvern Rider is pretty much a guarantee that they’ll be good. In games with reclassing, Wyvern is always a very tempting option to reclass units into.

Three Houses

“Make everyone a Wyvern” is a meme and isn’t actually the optimal strategy, but regardless, I do think Wyvern is the best class overall, the best class for many units, and a very good class for most units. It has a lot of strengths with very few weaknesses, with high stats, the best mobility in the game, combat Cantó, the ability to dismount if you need to remove their weakness to arrows. You really can’t go wrong here. They don’t have as much killing power as a WarMaster or a Grappler or Sniper with Fierce Iron Fist or Hunters Volley, but they’re still pretty strong and are extremely versatile.

Path of Radiance

I’ve said before that I thing the disparity between mounted and infantry units is the biggest in PoR. High move and combat Cantó is just too good, add flight on top of that and it gets even better. Infantry units don’t even have the advantages they have in 3H with higher killing power. In PoR, mounted units are often just as strong if not stronger than most infantry units. The actual units in this class are Jill and Captain Harr, the later of which isn’t considered great, mainly because of low availability, but he’s still good once he joins. Jill is considered one of the best units in the game. Oh yeah, and they have Rescue/Dropping in this game.

The GBA games

The class line is very strong in all of these games. Like I mentioned earlier, Wyvern is a great class to see in a randomizer. It’s probably the best class in these games in a vacuum. If I rated the units in the class I’d go with:

Binding Blade

Sacred Stones

Blazing Sword

Miledy is really good. Probably the best unit in FE6. Really good combat and flying utility. As someone mentioned above she does have lower Aid than other fliers so she’s not as good as a sky ferry as them but it’s still useful (and another reason why Pegasus Knights are really good in FE6). Zeiss isn’t nearly as good but is still pretty decent too.

Cormag isn’t as good on Erika’s route, but on Ephraim’s route he’s really good.

Heath joins a big underleveled and needs a bit to get going, but he’s pretty solid once he’s trained up a bit and promoted. Not as immediately strong as Miledy or Cormag who instantly become one of your best units as soon as they join. Vaida is pretty good but joins super late.

Shadow Dragon

I don’t know much about SD’s meta, but DracoKnight seems really good to me. Not only does it have high Move and flight, but good stats too. Seems like a really good class to reclass units into.

Engage

It does still seem pretty good with pretty solid stats and flight, but only 1 more move than infantry units in this game and no Rescue/Drop or Cantó. I promoted Chloe to Wyvern Rider in my Maddening run and that worked out great. It’s still good, it just doesn’t seem nearly as dominant as it is in other games to me.

12 hours ago, SnowFire said:

So a mere Average performance if you're playing with no Second Seals.

Chloe can promote directly into Wyvern Rider without a Second Seal which works out great from my experience. You just need to get her Sword or Axe proficiency.

12 hours ago, SnowFire said:

Sacred Stones Cormag is less good.  Usable, hence "Average" not "Bad", but he definitely feels like the most restrained we see of the Wyvern class line.

Are you only talking about Eirika route, or, what are we not on the same page about I wonder? As soon as Cormag joins in Ephraim’s route you can insta promote him and he’s immediately really good at killing things while having flying utility. He seems really good to me.

[SnowFire]

Whisky: Shoulda clarified - "No Second Seals, baseline promotions," so excluding Emblem-granted proficiencies.  For all that I think Wyvern is a mistake for Chloe anyway - she has a good Magic growth so getting her Staves from Griffin + Flame Lance is better than marginally more Strength.

For Cormag, I'd rank his two routes equally.  I don't think it's worth getting TOO in the weeds of FE8 tier list type stuff because it's generally agreed that the game isn't that hard even on Hard mode, which means everyone is viable and blends into an Average-tier mass.  (Usual reminder that "Average" is not "bad"...  we've just been ranking some incredibly good classes lately in Dancers / Fliers.)  By the time Cormag joins, you could already have a monster Vanessa rolling through (even excluding Seth cheese!) or a decent Tana.  Mentioned it on the Pegasus Knight thread, but I don't find flying utility quite as helpful in FE8 as some other games in the series.  Lots of enemies that just politely stand around waiting to get baited without too much need to hurry up, barring stuff like the hatching Gorgon eggs map.

[samthedigital]

30 minutes ago, SnowFire said:

By the time Cormag joins, you could already have a monster Vanessa rolling through (even excluding Seth cheese!) or a decent Tana.  Mentioned it on the Pegasus Knight thread, but I don't find flying utility quite as helpful in FE8 as some other games in the series.  Lots of enemies that just politely stand around waiting to get baited without too much need to hurry up, barring stuff like the hatching Gorgon eggs map.

It really depends on the context of the discussion here. In an "efficiency" setting Cormag gets the nod because there isn't a training arc and we don't have to spend the time to get the Elysian Whip in chapter 8. From what I understand Eirika route needs a promoted flyer asap, and by the time we get Cormag we've already used all of our resources. I'm guessing that this this the angle that Whisky is taking whereas turns and the like aren't as much of a concern for you.

2 hours ago, Whisky said:

It does still seem pretty good with pretty solid stats and flight, but only 1 more move than infantry units in this game and no Rescue/Drop or Cantó. I promoted Chloe to Wyvern Rider in my Maddening run and that worked out great. It’s still good, it just doesn’t seem nearly as dominant as it is in other games to me.

My issue with wyverns in Engage is the lack of a good 1-2 range weapon without Roy. If it wasn't for that I think that they'd still be the best class in the game without question. Micaiah (and Sigurd to some degree) also has a notable impact when she's around because then the movement isn't quite as important; I've seen Generals being used to hit one shot breakpoints in an LTC for example.

Out of curiosity did you dump all of your early game stat boosters into Chloe? I remember this being the meta early on in Engage; I'm not sure whether it is or not now though.

[ping]

• RD - I mean, Haar doesn't need much explanation. Jill goes from great to amazing if you play with transfers, but even if you don't factor that in, I think that both the best unit in the game and potentially the best unit of Miccy's squad being Wyverns makes this the best showing of the series / the games that I've played.
• BinBla - Milady is the greatest, at least on HM, but Zeiss is much more middling, despite his insane base Str. D rank that late in the game will do that to a character. Still an excellent showing.
• PoR - Again with one amazing unit and one mediocre one. There're more contention about who's the best character in the game than in RD or BinBla - Jill has good arguments on Maniac, I find, but not so much on Hard, so that's a bit below RD!Haar and Milady. And PoR!Haar isn't much more than a decent filler, I find. Probably better than Zeiss considering the (lack of) necessary investment, but not enough for me to put the class as a whole above BinBla.
• Shadow Dragon - Very tentatively. Shiida is OP and promotes into Wyvern. I can't really say anymore how good Minerva is - I think she's great, but it's been too long since I've played to remember exactly.
• New Mystery - Palla and Catria are both stupid good, of course, and promote into Wyvern. However, I'm docking some points because I don't find the prepromoted Wyverns to be that amazing, and Wyverns do fall off a bit in the lategame because of their low Spd cap. I actually like promoting Catria into a Falcoknight, despite the delay on the promotion if you do that.
• FE1 - Minerva is pretty good - stats of an Armour Knight, but highly mobile, with good growths to boot. The promotion is very satisfying for Sheeda, since it fixes her two most problematic stats, but it comes really late (at a point where 9 Str actually isn't that great anymore, either).
• BlaBla - I found more appreciation for Heath in my ranked run, where his low level is actually a boon. Outside of that context, he's a high investment / high reward kind of character - once he gets rolling, his combat is better than any other flyers, but his start is a bit rough. In contrast, Vaida is immediately very good when she joins... but she joins really late.
• SacSto - Cormag is good, of course, probably even a bit better than Heath if you average between the two routes. But since there's no excellent lategame Wyvern Lord in this one, I'll still rate it below BlaBla. Still a good class, of course, which says a lot about the consistency of the class over the course of the series. Maybe you could argue that it should be above BlaBla because Vanessa and Tana both can and should promote into Wyvern Knight... but I'll keep it like this, because I like Heath as a unit.

[Shadow Mir]

2 hours ago, SnowFire said:

For all that I think Wyvern is a mistake for Chloe anyway - she has a good Magic growth so getting her Staves from Griffin + Flame Lance is better than marginally more Strength.

I'd consider it better to make her a sword griffin instead if I wanted her to use a magic weapon - the Flame Lance is a fucking joke in comparison to the Levin Sword. 16 weight (FFS, that's even heavier than most axes!) for only 10 might? Pass.

Edited October 13, 2023 by Shadow Mir

[Shanty Pete's 1st Mate]

Feathery fliers one week, and scaly fliers the next! For the record, I will be counting all wyvern-mounted classes. The one exception is in Archanea, where Pegasus Knights who promote into Dracoknights will not be counted (I covered them last week).

So, time for the ratings. To wing, brothers! Keep up with me if you can!

Spoiler

10. Genealogy. So last week, I was a stern apologist for the Pegasi of FE4. I felt that their flaws were overstated, and their uses overlooked. Of the Wyverns, I cannot say the same. You have zero in the first generation, and Altenna for less than half of the second. She lacks Pursuit at the very start, and while Gae Bolg buffs her defenses, it really tanks her AS. She has her uses, such as saving Pallmark's kids on the Chalphy peninsula, but even then, Fee is mostly better. Just a barely-present class in this game.

9. Awakening. Not a bad class, but Cherche is something of a "late joiner" within the first generation. This also makes Gerome something of a chore to even acquire. The best "Wyvern Rider" is probably a reclassed Panne, who has great stats and utility, albeit at the cost of a Second Seal. Decent enough skills, too, but nothing you can't live without.

8. Shadow Dragon. Minerva comes with "just okay" stats for a prepromote, but immediate access to Hauteclere is pretty cool. The other apparent user is Jagen, who can gain flying mobility while holding onto his Silver Lance. Flying is very cool, even if that's about all they can do here.

7. FE7. Looking at GBAFE, suddenly all the fliers can Rescue-Carry, which is a huge deal. In FE7, though, both the fliers just cone across as "okay". Heath won't necessarily impress, if you've bern training up Florina or Fiora, although he can come into his own. And Vaida is a bit of lategame filler, whose high Con kneecaps her Aid. Reduced Bow/Ballista damage is nice, but the same applies to Pegasus Knights.

6. Sacred Stones. We've gone from two Wyverns to one, in Cormag. But judging him on Ephraim Mode... Cormag is good. Like, really good. Showing up a chapter later than Tana, with superior stats in most regards, and a short path to promoting. He can Rescue-Carry, or serve as a competent combatant in his own right, especially as a Piercing Wyvern Knight.

5. Fates. Now, we're entering the games where a Wyvern Rider is on the shortlist for "best unit in the game". In the case of Conquest, it's Camilla, of course! She joins as a much-appreciated prepromote on a tough defense map - but one who has great growth rates, and still gains solid EXP. Malig Knight gets some great damage-boosting skills, while Wyvern Knight gets Lance access (I like it on CQ!Gunter, FYI). It's also a good class on Rev's trippy maps, while I can't really speak to Scarlet on BR.

4. FE6. In this case, the top-tier Wyvern is Miledy, who gains some meaty Hard Mode boosts. So does Zeiss, although he comes late enough to be a nice piece of overkill. Anyway, being a flier in a game with a 5-move Lord, where every map is Seize... fun stuff! She definitely eclipses the Pegasi in raw stats, too.

3. Path of Radiance. Jill joins a bit later than Marcia, but with better starting stats, and greater long-term potential, thanks to Axes on promotion. As in the GBA titles, she can Rescue-carry, but now she can Canto after combat, too! Also, weaker effective damage is to her benefit. Maybe it's better to invest in Marcia ASAP, but if you wait for Jill, she'll make a great carry. ...Oh, and Haar exists, as just a pretty solid lategame filler.

2. Radiant Dawn. Haar is, at least through Parts II and III, the single-best unit on any given map where he's deployable. Removing Wyvern's bow weakness was a min-meltingly poor balancing choice, but hey, Haar won't turn it down! He's immensely useful, his only real flaws coming in Res and Speed. As for Jill, while she can become a force to be reckoned with, she doesn't start out that way. She takes investment, which is especially competetive in the Hard Mode DB. Without BEXP and boosters, she'll be passable at best. Finally, it's worth mentioning - due to the game's structure, you'll have to go quite a few maps sith no Wyvern. In particular, at least two of the Part IV maps. It's a shame, but also, the only sense in which the class might be considered "balanced".

1. Three Houses. It's pretty clearly the best physical class in the game, with great offense, physical bulk, and mobility. Plus, this game decided to give their fliers avoid boosting skills, on top of their ability to dismount into a forest! It's the obvious choice for Edelgard, Petra, Hilda, Cyril, Seteth; and a considerable pick for (breathes in) Ferdinand, Caspar, Dimitri, Dedue, Annette, Felix, Ashe, Sylvain, Claude, Raphael, Catherine, Alois, Gilbert, Balthus, and Hapi. The only "balancing" aspects are the bow weakness (irrelevant with the Aurora Shield, or if Bow users can't hit them), and the lack of access to grounded battalions. And the only reason Wyvern Rider isn't "endgame-viable" is that Wyvern Lord is strictly better! If you're playing this game, and not using Wyvern classes, then you're playing with two wings tied behind your back.

Well, that's that! Let me know what you think. Look forward to seeing how they "scale" in other's reviews!

Edited October 14, 2023 by Shanty Pete's 1st Mate
Typo/clarification.

[Eltosian Kadath]

Time for another tier list to show my opinion, although fair warning before I start, I have liked the Wyvern classes since I was a kid, so my views on the class will probably be skewed by that.

 

S Tier: One of the Best Classes in the Game

Three Houses: People joke about the all Wyvern army for a reason, as it is by far the best physical class to be in.

 

Shadow Dragon: This is literally the same class line as Pegasus, so I will just copy-paste that entry. Great weapon ranks for the effective forges that break the game, the best possible mobility thanks to flight in a game with very rigid mobility, and of course the ease of just keeping the busted Wingspear in this class, makes this a clear S tier option.

 

Binding Blade: Miledy is an amazing unit straight out of the box, made even better with Hard Mode bonuses, and even starting at too low a level for his recruitment time, Zeiss is still solid thanks to his own Hard Mode bonuses, and with a little training becomes another excellent unit to use. Both the wyverns have great combat, have flying utility, and can help with plenty of rescue dropping, although Miledy does have too low of aid to carry the armored knight, and Axe units you probably aren't using anyway because this is Binding Blade, and after promotion a few Paladin that have excellent move all on their own.

 

Radiant Dawn: Haar is often considered the best unit in Radiant Dawn for a reason...the reason being everyone with better combat has far, far, far worse availability. Add to that Jill, whom is considered the best of the Dawn Brigade to feed exp to, as she can grow into the best unit for the army that needs the most help, makes this one of the best classes in RD. Having flight mitigates quite a few of the ways RD tried to debuff mounted units, and even buffed Wyverns in particular by trading the common flying weakness of bows for the rather rare weakness of thunder magic.

 

Path of Radiance: Seeing as I gave S tier to Cavs, I have to give S tier to Wyverns too. Its a rarer class to be sure, but an excellent one, able to do a lot of what the best class of pegs can, but coming just a little later in both cases.

 

Fates: Wyverns have solid combat on them, and Camilla (if you actually use, which usually I don't) is probably one of your best unit for a majority of the game, although its the utility the class provides that draws me to them far more. Defense Rally is rather useful in surviving the well crafted enemy formations of Conquest. Lunge is rather useful in how it lets you play with positioning, either helping you setup your own attack stance chains, or disrupting dangerous attack stances of the enemy formations, or moving enemies close enough for units further out to finish off, or lunging things through walls to disarm dangerous enemy formations in creative ways, plus there can be times where lunge is the thing you need to save the run. Finally, having flight in any form can open up paths otherwise unavailable to you, which can be vital in numerous Conquest maps (off the top of my head Fuga's Wild Ride, the Eternal Staircase, Takumi's Wall, and Hinoka all come to mind for this), and Wyverns are the easiest way to access flight in that game. Even in Birthright you get Scarlet to show off the power of this class line, and a lot of the weird maps of Revelation are made much easier with flight. I guess Maligknight is worth mentioning as an interesting class if nothing else, personally I think of it as about the third best non-DLC magic class in Conquest with the unique utility of being the flying magic class for a reason to really pick it over Sorcerer or Strategist, more of an A or B tier class on its own.

 

Engage: I waffled a bit back and forth whether this should A or S, but what decided it for me was the realization that Ivy's personal classes should probably count as a Wyvern too. Starting with the generic wyvern classes, its a class good enough that you want to reclass people into it, which is the sign of a very good class, but made a bit less dominant due to some other solid alternatives, hence the earlier waffling about whether it should make it to S tier. Add in Ivy's class, the combat focused flying mage, with staff utility as well, both of which I find to be especially useful on a flyer in Enage, and my favorite class for her. I wish there was a generic flying magic class, as it is a useful combination in Engage.

 

A Tier: A Good Class

New Mystery of the Emblem: This is literally the same class line as Pegasus, so I will just copy-paste that entry. I am very tempted to make this S rank, but deciding to put this in A tier is a clear sign that I don't think any of the New Mystery classes are dominate enough to reach S rank, as this is certainly the class that comes closest. For a significant portion of the game this is the best class you can be in, but it doesn't have the right caps for the last stretch of the game, and as you approach that late stage, you end up having to transition away from it. In fact the DracoKnight has the lowest Speed Cap of any promoted class, and this is a game where that really matters. This isn't a game where being a Pegasus/Wyvern gives you some great skill for the future, or is one of the classes with stellar growth rates, its just a great to be in for a significant portion of the game.

 

Thracia 776: The dismounting debuff is definitely keeping this class out of S tier, but it has a far more solid place in A tier than the other canto units. It has all the better flying utility of pegs, with combat at least on par with, if not better than the cavs, the best of both worlds of the mounted classes. Dean is just an excellent unit right out of the box, with A rank Swords to even keep him solid on dismount maps with stats that can survive the debuffs. Admittedly Eda is far worse than her brother, needing actual training, and without the personal weapon available (but tricky to get) with him, but if trained she will be solid as well (something I learned just fine in an ironman). Alright, my Wyvern bias might be showing a bit here too.

Sacred Stones: For a very brief moment I considered putting this in S tier, but then I remembered that Eirka's route exists. To be fair, while Cormag is very good on Ephraim's route, I don't think he would have made the S tier cut in either case, but him coming much later in Eirka's route cemented this placing in A tier.

 

Awakening: This class doesn't get one of the things that breaks this game wide open, but it is a solid class to be in otherwise. My Wyvern bias may be buoying this one up a bit too if I think more about it...

 

B Tier: An OK Class

Blazing Sword: I love all the units you get in Kinship Bond, but Heath comes at a bit too weak for as late as he arrives for me to actually call him good. Vaida in a similar way arrives very late, so late she has little left to do. If both these units came a bit earlier, and they would have been easy A or S tier, but sadly enough they just arrive a little too late to really shine.

 

Genealogy of the Holy War:  I considered putting Altena in C tier with the good infantry, but Canto is still too good, and flight does have utility occasionally. She is the only Wyvern you get, comes very late into the game (the second to last you recruit), and has all the movement issues flying units do in this game. She gets amazing physical stats, but the stretch of the game she is dropped into is filled with powerful magic as the biggest threats, and often long range staff/magic, which greatly limits her abilities, despite coming with a holy weapon. There are a few points at this late stage where flight has particularly valuable utility, but in each case the threats you are flying to deal with are magic threats, which she has a very hard time dealing with. I wish she was better than she was, as Wyvern has been my favorite class line since I started playing these games as a kid, but she simply isn't.

 

C Tier:  A Subpar Class

 

 

D Tier: A Bad Class

 

[Cysx]

Sure, let's, why not ? Doesn't include the Archanea games, I lack experience with them on harder difficulties(or period).
 

Spoiler

What were they thinking Tier :

Radiant Dawn :
I'll spare you the long explanations when it's obvious, and here, well we all know why. I will say that removing their Bow/Crossbow/Wind weakness is a big part of what lands them in this tier for me.

Three Houses :
The class has everything, it simply does. It's overpowered without question, and Wyvern rider is really easy to reclass into as well. What is balancing.

Binding Blade :
For this one it's more about the Hard mode bonuses than the class itself(+5 Str ? Sure, why not); in fact, lances aren't exactly the best weapon type in FE6, and Zeiss actually gets to feel that a little. Not Miredy though, since she's one of the most accurate units in the game. Either way, she in particular breaks it the instant she joins, so, you know.
 

Still amazing Tier :

Engage :
Extremely good bases, top of the line growths in everything but speed, flight, higher mobility, and even a class skill that's situationally useful, which is more than can be said for a lot of them... It's hands down the best physical class for most units. The only thing that brings it down is bad longterm AS, but that can be compensated for in a number of ways, and is a common struggle in Engage.

Sacred Stones :
I'm assuming Wyvern Knight counts ? Otherwise if it's "just" Cormag, it probably drops a tier. Wyvern Knight is pretty much the definite promotion for pegs, apparently they thought E swords was a fine alternative to having +2 in everything. I noticed Eirika route really likes having flying enemy squads placed on top of mountains, too, where only fliers and Berserkers can interact with them. Just makes them even more of a no-brainer.

Conquest :
It's just a great class. Camilla is an obvious reason, but so is Elise. Conquest's map design is so intricate that flying is useful in almost any situation. They're even good pairup bots.

Path of Radiance :
Can't really go into details since I haven't played the game in a long time. Here as well I'll spare you the obvious mentions and leave it at that.
 

Really good Tier :

Awakening :
I feel like I get to bring a bit more to the table on this one. Cherche is a decent zero investment pairup bot, since she can be immediately promoted and reach precisely 20 Strength for a +6 bonus on top of high movement flight. Jerome is usually not really worth going for. So, not amazing thus far.
Wyvern is instead great for characters who don't start in it. People know of Panne, but it's also true of Lon'qu. Just like in Conquest, the solid base plus axes and immediate acquisition of Str +2 gives them great offense, and flight is extremely valuable in the late earlygame, due to desert terrain and paralogues filled with forests. Weapon ranks build extremely fast in Awakening and you only really need D for Handaxes, which is 15 battles away from E rank. The class also has remarkably good caps outside of Speed (which doesn't matter too much), at 46 Str 46 Def, which very few can match let alone beat, and caps happen to matter in this game.
In terms of skills, almost everything here is really good, and Wyverns can stack more avoid than anyone else (enough so in fact that it partially enables solo strategies on Lunatic), and Swordbreaker is just amazing because it removes one of their two weak spots completely.

... the second one being flier effectiveness, which is extremely relevant in Awakening. Most maps past the midgame have half a dozen bow/wind users, some of them Warriors with outrageous damage numbers on Lunatic. These are also among the most accurate enemies you'll face, so you need really high Avo to cover them, and Wyvern skills alone don't make the cut. In a multi-man army (aka no more than 3-4 combat units, this is still Awakening after all), this is fine, while in a solo fortunately for them, Panne and Lon'qu both have access to Lucky Seven. Still, it's undeniably a weakness, so with that and the state of the only natural Wyvern riders I couldn't in good conscience put the class higher. But I feel that it's better than people realize in the right circumstances.

Quick note about Galeforce, since I'm seeing it mentioned left and right; it's too complicated to get in you average Awakening lunatic run, and most kids are very inefficient picks/training projects. As said, there's a lot of anti flying past a certain point, so most characters struggle greatly to gain exp as a Dark flier. It's a really good skill, especially on Robin, but not having it isn't a deal breaker at all, as realistically that'll be true for basically everyone.

Thracia 776 :
I feel like people tend to emphasize the lategame gauntlet of indoor maps a little bit less when it comes to Wyverns(or rather, when it comes to Dean). That being said, both of the two in this game still have a lot going for them. Dean suffers indoors but dominates hard outdoors and gets easy, very strong support bonuses(in fact he's the only unit in the game that can get +30 from them), and a decent Prf he doesn't really need but that saves weapon uses, and that really isn't that hard to get with staves.
Eda on the other hand is a training project that joins at exactly the right time (a defend map) to abuse scrolls just as you obtain arguably the best one in the game (Daein). It's not without risk and you don't really have to do it, but one or especially two movement level ups can give her completely unique utility outdoors, and keep her very relevant indoors.
 

Blazing Blade :
Both are pretty good units relative to their join time, in every difficulty mode. Not too much to say here, it's been a while with this one as well.
 

Not as good Tier :

Altenna, I mean Genealogy of the Holy war :
I mean, yeah. Barely around, very susceptible to status staves and magic which are very prevalent at that point, only okay combat... She's not a bad unit, but I don't think many would call her game changing.

 

Edited October 14, 2023 by Cysx

[Shadow Mir]

On 10/13/2023 at 10:59 AM, Whisky said:

You really can’t go wrong here.

I agree... if and ONLY IF you're talking about physical units, that is.

Anyway...

D tier in Holy War. Kinda harsh, but you only get one, she doesn't come until the second generation, and the second half of it at that. She also has issues keeping up with cavalry. And even if she could, her susceptibility to status staves and magic limits her usefulness. 

A tier in Binding Blade. This has everything to do with Miledy being as dominant as she is. Her brother, on the other hand? A classic case of a high investment unit that doesn't pay off. Of course, his coming so late also makes him a *very* hard sell.

C tier in Blazing Blade. Heath comes underleveled, and doesn't really outdo any of the Pegasus Knights for all that investment. Doesn't help HHM Cog of Destiny is full of his Kryptonite, aka mages. Vaida is pretty good, but comes late (and in Cog of Destiny to boot, which sucks for her for the same reasons it does for Heath in HHM).

B tier in Path of Radiance. Much like pegasi, they benefit from various factors (most of which also apply to wyverns) to excel in this game.

A tier in Radiant Dawn. Haar carries this to the top. But I have to wonder why they made wyvern units weak against thunder instead of the typical flying weaknesses... especially when thunder magic got nerfed. Speaking of, mages in general are at their worst in Radiant Dawn... but that's a topic for later.

A tier in Fates. Camilla is a huge asset in Conquest, as well as in Revelation. Especially as a Wyvern Lord. Scarlet is similarly amazing in Birthright. Malig Knight, on the other hand, is an utterly laughable afterthought. As an aside, while Wyvern Elise seems to get a lot of traction here, it's a joke. A scam. To be blunt, there's no fucking way I can see what's basically "let's turn my excellent support unit into the exact opposite of that, aka a shitty melee unit!" as anything other than shooting myself in the foot multiple times over. And to be blunt, "just capture a generic healer" is copium of the highest order thanks to capture in general being very poorly designed in Fates. Especially now that the online features' days are numbered. 

On 10/14/2023 at 7:42 AM, Cysx said:

in a solo fortunately for them, Panne and Lon'qu both have access to Lucky Seven.

Time to ask the obvious question... how in the seven hells would you have Panne or Lon'qu solo the game??? Because from my POV, they cannot solo the game because they are not around from the start.

On 10/14/2023 at 7:42 AM, Cysx said:

caps happen to matter in this game.

How come? Radiant Dawn is the only game where I could legit say caps mattered. And why the only place Haar stumbles is in endgame. 

Edited October 17, 2023 by Shadow Mir

[Cysx]

6 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

Time to ask the obvious question... how in the seven hells would you have Panne or Lon'qu solo the game??? Because from my POV, they cannot solo the game because they are not around from the start.

Awakening is quite solo-friendly, so it's just a way of saying a unit eventually balloons out of control and deals with what's left on their own. It is indeed not technically accurate and only starts around ch 10-11 for most candidates.

6 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

How come? Radiant Dawn is the only game where I could legit say caps mattered. And why the only place Haar stumbles is in endgame. 

Just a combination of how reasonable they are to reach, and enemy density later on. It's not necessarily about hard benchmarks, very little is in Awakening.

You can easily get overwhelmed in later chapters(namely ch 23 and 24, which unlike the ones before are rout) and massive stats are one of the primary ways to avoid it.

[Shadow Mir]

5 hours ago, Cysx said:

Awakening is quite solo-friendly, so it's just a way of saying a unit eventually balloons out of control and deals with what's left on their own. It is indeed not technically accurate and only starts around ch 10-11 for most candidates.

It doesn't sound solo-friendly if it takes that long to get to that point... also, by that logic, many other FEs are solo-friendly. 

5 hours ago, Cysx said:

Just a combination of how reasonable they are to reach, and enemy density later on. It's not necessarily about hard benchmarks, very little is in Awakening.

You can easily get overwhelmed in later chapters(namely ch 23 and 24, which unlike the ones before are rout) and massive stats are one of the primary ways to avoid it.

The only thing caps are meaningful for is the harder DLC, especially Apotheosis. 

[Whisky]

13 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

I agree... if and ONLY IF you're talking about physical units, that is.

Mostly just physical units yeah, but I have heard Annette is pretty good as a Wyvern Rider. I haven’t tried it myself.

13 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

A tier in Binding Blade. This has everything to do with Miledy being as dominant as she is. Her brother, on the other hand? A classic case of a high investment unit that doesn't pay off. Of course, his coming so late also makes him a *very* hard sell.

Zeiss is no where near as good as Miledy, that’s undeniable, but to be honest I don’t see how he fits the above description. He’s starts significantly stronger than common examples of late joining high investment units, like Est, Nino, Etc. I don’t think he’s all that high investment either. He only needs a few levels to be able to promote and he’s quite strong, starting with nearly capped Str. He’s not great due to the highlighted weaknesses he has, but I’d say he’s one of the best underleveled late joining units throughout the series.

Edited October 17, 2023 by Whisky

[Shadow Mir]

1 hour ago, Whisky said:

Mostly just physical units yeah, but I have heard Annette is pretty good as a Wyvern Rider. I haven’t tried it myself.

Spoiler alert: it's bullshit. Do not buy into stuff like that without question. Nothing good ever comes out of that.

1 hour ago, Whisky said:

Zeiss is no where near as good as Miledy, that’s undeniable, but to be honest I don’t see how he fits the above description. He’s starts significantly stronger than common examples of late joining high investment units, like Est, Nino, Etc. I don’t think he’s all that high investment either. He only needs a few levels to be able to promote and he’s quite strong, starting with nearly capped Str. He’s not great due to the highlighted weaknesses he has, but I’d say he’s one of the best underleveled late joining units throughout the series.

The problem is the chapters after his joining are NOT friendly to him (and he does jackshit on his joining chapter because you killed almost everything getting to him). Especially Sacae, but Ilia is also bad for him.

[Shanty Pete's 1st Mate]

1 hour ago, Whisky said:

Mostly just physical units yeah, but I have heard Annette is pretty good as a Wyvern Rider. I haven’t tried it myself.

"Wyvern Rider Annette"

Oh no, you said the thing! Man your stations, this is not a drill! Alert, alert!

...Ahem. It's something of a divisive build for Annette. I'm personally a fan of it. Flying mobility, plus the 3-range of Bolt Axe+, gives her a wider attack range than she could hope for in magical classes (tying with a Thyrsus Dark Flier). Using the Lightning Axe Art with a Hammer is an instant delete button on Armored enemies, while Crusher's Dust can reach staggering damage outputs. The two common objections to the build are: hit rates, and battalion choice. To the latter, there's only one flying battalion that boosts magical attack, and it's DLC-only. While I think it's the ideal battalion for Wyvern Annette, she can still do nearly as well with a physical flying battalion, particularly one that boosts her Hit rate. Speaking of which, her Hit issues are somewhat resolved by Axe Prowess Lv. 5. Notably, when doing magical damage, she ignores avoid boosts from terrain. That said, I'd recommend some combination of Hit +20, Lancebreaker, Uncanny Blow, and the Accuracy Ring, if you're worried about her missing. Finally, if your main purpose in using her is Rally Support, then a flying class is ideal. It gives her the most flexibility in whom she targets, and where she ends up.

So yeah, I'm a fan of it. Some others are not. I'll try not to say anything more about the build, lest the thread be devoured in flames, other than to suggest that you try it out and make up your own mind.

1 hour ago, Whisky said:

Zeiss is no where near as good as Miledy, that’s undeniable, but to be honest I don’t see how he fits the above description. He’s starts significantly stronger than common examples of late joining high investment units, like Est, Nino, Etc. I don’t think he’s all that high investment either. He only needs a few levels to be able to promote and he’s quite strong, starting with nearly capped Str. He’s not great due to the highlighted weaknesses he has, but I’d say he’s one of the best underleveled late joining units throughout the series.

I think this is one of the big discrepancies between Normal and Hard Modes. In the former, Zeiss joins with 28 HP, 14 Str, and 8 Spd. In the latter, he's around 36 HP, 19 Str, and 11 Spd. That's a huge glow-up, and changes the calculus around him in a big way. The only flaw that sticks with him is D-rank Lances, which does suck that late. But yeah, my guess is Mir was imagining NM Zeiss when putting him down.

[Shadow Mir]

2 minutes ago, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

"Wyvern Rider Annette"

Oh no, you said the thing! Man your stations, this is not a drill! Alert, alert!

...Ahem. It's something of a divisive build for Annette. I'm personally a fan of it. Flying mobility, plus the 3-range of Bolt Axe+, gives her a wider attack range than she could hope for in magical classes (tying with a Thyrsus Dark Flier). Using the Lightning Axe Art with a Hammer is an instant delete button on Armored enemies, while Crusher's Dust can reach staggering damage outputs. The two common objections to the build are: hit rates, and battalion choice. To the latter, there's only one flying battalion that boosts magical attack, and it's DLC-only. While I think it's the ideal battalion for Wyvern Annette, she can still do nearly as well with a physical flying battalion, particularly one that boosts her Hit rate. Speaking of which, her Hit issues are somewhat resolved by Axe Prowess Lv. 5. Notably, when doing magical damage, she ignores avoid boosts from terrain. That said, I'd recommend some combination of Hit +20, Lancebreaker, Uncanny Blow, and the Accuracy Ring, if you're worried about her missing. Finally, if your main purpose in using her is Rally Support, then a flying class is ideal. It gives her the most flexibility in whom she targets, and where she ends up.

So yeah, I'm a fan of it. Some others are not. I'll try not to say anything more about the build, lest the thread be devoured in flames, other than to suggest that you try it out and make up your own mind.

I think this is one of the big discrepancies between Normal and Hard Modes. In the former, Zeiss joins with 28 HP, 14 Str, and 8 Spd. In the latter, he's around 36 HP, 19 Str, and 11 Spd. That's a huge glow-up, and changes the calculus around him in a big way. The only flaw that sticks with him is D-rank Lances, which does suck that late. But yeah, my guess is Mir was imagining NM Zeiss when putting him down.

So you admit Wyvern Annette needs an absolute shitload of investment. To be blunt, if I need that much investment for a build to go online, I would expect it to do well enough to justify that investment, but... I just do not see that with Wyvern Annette whatsoever.

On Zeiss: to be honest I'd still consider him a hard sell on hard mode, because he still has D lances, the chapters afterwards are still bad for him, and most damning of all, he comes too late.

[Zapp Branniglenn]

I've used Normal Mode Zeiss on Sacae route and he was fine.. There's an arena on that very first map of Sacae route, and he just flew straight there and back to Cecilia for healing the entire map - no enemies in that corner from what I recall. Miledy was the better combat unit for the following maps, but Zeiss helped out with carrying units across rivers and mountains. By the finale he was plenty tough, especially since he and his sister really only have each other to realistically build up supports by the end of the game.

[Shadow Mir]

1 hour ago, Zapp Branniglenn said:

I've used Normal Mode Zeiss on Sacae route and he was fine.. There's an arena on that very first map of Sacae route, and he just flew straight there and back to Cecilia for healing the entire map - no enemies in that corner from what I recall. Miledy was the better combat unit for the following maps, but Zeiss helped out with carrying units across rivers and mountains. By the finale he was plenty tough, especially since he and his sister really only have each other to realistically build up supports by the end of the game.

The problem with arenas is that Zeiss is the type of unit that attracts silver weapons... which is likely to end *very* poorly for him. 

[Cysx]

4 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

It doesn't sound solo-friendly if it takes that long to get to that point... also, by that logic, many other FEs are solo-friendly. 

Awakening is solo friendly on higher difficulties because it's complicated for many units to keep up statistically at once. Meanwhile, minimum exp gains being unusually high means it's just much easier to have one god unit deal with everything. Surely you've heard of Robin soloing Awakening.

5 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

The only thing caps are meaningful for is the harder DLC, especially Apotheosis. 

Kay

[Shadow Mir]

10 minutes ago, Cysx said:

Awakening is solo friendly on higher difficulties because it's complicated for many units to keep up statistically at once. Meanwhile, minimum exp gains being unusually high means it's just much easier to have one god unit deal with everything. Surely you've heard of Robin soloing Awakening.

I have. And Robin is literally the only unit that can solo Awakening. 

By the by, if it's not obvious enough, I consider Awakening Lunatic a dumpster fire, a cesspool of poor design choices. It's why I much prefer discussing hard mode. Granted, it may not be THAT hard, but it's still a better experience than one that makes almost the entire fucking cast useless. I cannot respect a difficulty mode that triples down on poor design choices from prior games, which Awakening Lunatic is in a nutshell. 

Edited October 17, 2023 by Shadow Mir

[Cysx]

7 minutes ago, Shadow Mir said:

I have. And Robin is literally the only unit that can solo Awakening. 

By the by, if it's not obvious enough, I consider Awakening Lunatic a dumpster fire, a cesspool of poor design choices. It's why I much prefer discussing hard mode. Granted, it may not be THAT hard, but it's still a better experience than one that makes almost the entire fucking cast useless. I cannot respect a difficulty mode that triples down on poor design choices from prior games, which Awakening Lunatic is in a nutshell. 

Feels like the community is slowly coming around in that regard, since many shared your stance a while ago.

The unfortunate truth is that there's no winning with Awakening. It's horribly balanced, and making it easier does nothing to fix that. Lunatic is also not all that it's been built up to be, characters who cannot reasonably function in it are actually relatively few.
... And then you have Lunatic+, and suddenly I'm the one whose line is getting crossed.

Anyway, within the context of Awakening HM, Wyverns definitely don't mind effective damage nearly as much, so maybe they'd be up a tier relative to where I rated them. That being said, Galeforce also has more of a tangible presence. Maybe. It's been ages since I last played on that difficulty.

[Shadow Mir]

18 minutes ago, Cysx said:

The unfortunate truth is that there's no winning with Awakening. It's horribly balanced, and making it easier does nothing to fix that. Lunatic is also not all that it's been built up to be, characters who cannot reasonably function in it are actually relatively few.
... And then you have Lunatic+, and suddenly I'm the one whose line is getting crossed.

Agreed. Though... Every FE game has its share of balance issues. But I wouldn't consider Awakening in the bottom 3, personally. As for Lunatic+, my thoughts in a nutshell are this... WHAT THE FUCK WERE THE DEVELOPERS EVEN THINKING!??! WAS THIS SHIT PLAYTESTED!?! ...yeah. That is utterly indefensible. Take an already poorly designed difficulty mode and add ten billion layers of RNG... Whoopee.

Edited October 17, 2023 by Shadow Mir

[samthedigital]

36 minutes ago, Shadow Mir said:

And Robin is literally the only unit that can solo Awakening.

Freddy can solo Lunatic also, though it's probably better to call it carry since technically Chrom is helping.

[Samu_77]

On 10/18/2023 at 5:25 AM, Zapp Branniglenn said:

I've used Normal Mode Zeiss on Sacae route and he was fine.. There's an arena on that very first map of Sacae route, and he just flew straight there and back to Cecilia for healing the entire map - no enemies in that corner from what I recall. Miledy was the better combat unit for the following maps, but Zeiss helped out with carrying units across rivers and mountains. By the finale he was plenty tough, especially since he and his sister really only have each other to realistically build up supports by the end of the game.

Okay, but for starters, Arena Abuse isn't a great argument, it may be true that Zeiss would end up better then a lot other units with Arena abuse because he has naturally great traits (Canto Rescue, high defense, Flight) and has good growths, I can arena or boss abuse anybody in this game and have an absolute monster that steamrolls through the game. 

Going past that, Zeiss feels almost personally tailored to be just barely outside of being a great unit. The inability to use Killer Lances means he's going to have accuracy issues for a while, especially if Sacae is your route and these enemies can be pretty fast. The inability to promote for three levels with these accuracy issues is also damning, because Miledy could just be going in and destroying almost everything while Zeiss has lower movement and accuracy, although it is nice that the promotion item that Zeiss uses is only fought over by usually Tate (Or just buy one in this chapter if you don't want another pair of boots). 11 speed at base is terrible, and will let you double almost nothing, even assuming he is lucky and gets two speed procs in leading up to Promotion, 15 speed isn't going to serve you that well either. Zeiss is rarely going to be one-rounding anything,  with makes his high-strength less impressive. If your only use for Zeiss is rescue dropping then Juno is unironically better because you have higher movement at base, don't need to use an Elysian Whip and if you've been using both Peagasus Knights you have access to Triangle Attack (although that last one is incredibly situational). 

I hate this unit, they are so close to being great but are just short of it. Another small thing is that Zeiss is required for the best ending up through chapter 21, so you have to take even more care then usual to keep him alive if you are using him (it's a very small thing but when the character has 3x weakness to common weapons in Sacae rout it's worth mentioning).

Miredy alone elevates Binding Blade's Wyvern Score super high though, this unit is cracked and only gets better as time goes on.