FE: Awakening Hard Mode Tier List

[Titamon]

His def growth is still crap as a Wyvern Rider and now your adding a bow/wind weakness on top of it.

And why does Lon'qu want to give his sword rank up?

[Alondite]

I feel like there are way to many arbitrary limitations in place to make this tier list meaningful. Not only that, but the sheer number of options and possibilities in this game seriously undermine any attempt to create a stable tier list.

Now if you're going to turn this into a "Fire Emblem Nuzlocke Challenge," then we absolutely could create some sort of tier list. However, that would require more specific and expansive player-imposed rules.

[Interceptor]

I feel like there are way to many arbitrary limitations in place to make this tier list meaningful. Not only that, but the sheer number of options and possibilities in this game seriously undermine any attempt to create a stable tier list.

Now if you're going to turn this into a "Fire Emblem Nuzlocke Challenge," then we absolutely could create some sort of tier list. However, that would require more specific and expansive player-imposed rules.

You seem to have a fundamental misunderstanding of what a tier list is for.

[Sol Hiryu]

So, uh, back to Chrom for a moment.

I can see him below Stahl in A tier, and the only issue there is if Stahl's early game speed issues outweigh everything else he has on Chrom. When does the first Speedwing turn up? If it's early enough, Stahl has a good claim to it to help him through his rut.

[Alondite]

You seem to have a fundamental misunderstanding of what a tier list is for.

Yeah...not exactly. I've been a regular contributor to the Super Smash Bros tiers for almost a decade now, I understand how tiers work. However, the more rules you have to impose upon a system for your conclusion to be correct, the weaker your conclusion.

Awakening allows limitless grinding with no penalty for doing so. Characters don't have to compete for exp, you're not graded on completion time, and you can spend as much money as you'd like with no penalty. If there's no penalty for making any and all characters combat ready, then why not do it? There are not clearly-defined ways in which to gauge and compare the abilities of characters within the system because there are not clearly-defined ways in which to measure your overall success (no rankings).

The only way to make a tier list relevant for this game is to impose arbitrary rules on the system, which weakens the integrity of the tier list because it's only true under those specific conditions. That, and constructing a tier list around a system governed almost entirely by a RNG seems futile and pointless to me. The conditions you assume to be true (like character stats) while constructing the list will invariably be false in practice, making the whole list largely irrelevant.

[Elieson]

Yeah...not exactly. I've been a regular contributor to the Super Smash Bros tiers for almost a decade now, I understand how tiers work. However, the more rules you have to impose upon a system for your conclusion to be correct, the weaker your conclusion.

Awakening allows limitless grinding with no penalty for doing so. Characters don't have to compete for exp, you're not graded on completion time, and you can spend as much money as you'd like with no penalty. If there's no penalty for making any and all characters combat ready, then why not do it? There are not clearly-defined ways in which to gauge and compare the abilities of characters within the system because there are not clearly-defined ways in which to measure your overall success (no rankings).

The only way to make a tier list relevant for this game is to impose arbitrary rules on the system, which weakens the integrity of the tier list because it's only true under those specific conditions. That, and constructing a tier list around a system governed almost entirely by a RNG seems futile and pointless to me. The conditions you assume to be true (like character stats) while constructing the list will invariably be false in practice, making the whole list largely irrelevant.

So what's your suggestion to base unit value on? If contribution to a nonexistent number of efficiency doesn't matter, then there is nothing to rate a units' worth by.

Because inevitably, people are going to seek answers to questions like "Is X good?" And according to your statements, everybody is essentially equal because as long as the game is completed, time and effort shouldn't have an impact on an answer.

[Redwall]

We don't have an ab initio way of determining the One Playstyle to Rule Them All, so yes, at the end of the day, it's fine to pick an arbitrary set of rules that makes the game somewhat fun and that rewards strategy (seeing as this is an ostensible strategy game). The goal of the tier list is to determine which units best fulfill the chosen tier list objective, and nothing more.

[Interceptor]

Yeah...not exactly. I've been a regular contributor to the Super Smash Bros tiers [...]

Like I said: fundamental misunderstanding. I'm not talking about tier lists for pseudo-fighting games; this is Fire Emblem, which you may have noticed is basically a single player game. While I'm sure you have at least two years tennis experience, and your arrival in this 44-page thread heralds the Second Coming, maybe you ought to attempt to understand what exactly it is that you're complaining about before flipping the table over.

[Vorena]

Yeah...not exactly. I've been a regular contributor to the Super Smash Bros tiers for almost a decade now, I understand how tiers work. However, the more rules you have to impose upon a system for your conclusion to be correct, the weaker your conclusion.

Awakening allows limitless grinding with no penalty for doing so. Characters don't have to compete for exp, you're not graded on completion time, and you can spend as much money as you'd like with no penalty. If there's no penalty for making any and all characters combat ready, then why not do it? There are not clearly-defined ways in which to gauge and compare the abilities of characters within the system because there are not clearly-defined ways in which to measure your overall success (no rankings).

The only way to make a tier list relevant for this game is to impose arbitrary rules on the system, which weakens the integrity of the tier list because it's only true under those specific conditions. That, and constructing a tier list around a system governed almost entirely by a RNG seems futile and pointless to me. The conditions you assume to be true (like character stats) while constructing the list will invariably be false in practice, making the whole list largely irrelevant.

I think you need to get accustomed to other communities. If you would understand the Brawl Tier List system, then you should understand that all tier list positions are made with the understanding that all matches are typically of a best of 3, 5, 7 matches with a counterpick system on certain stages under no item conditions. Even then, there is also the assumption of an 8 minute timer, 3 stocks, no handicap, damage ratio x1, etc.

The super smash bros community places just as many implicit rules when making tier lists as FE community does with its own. We typically impose rules which fit the general trend of things found in this community and one of them is typically low turn counts. Yes, you could completely falsify this tier list if you allowed skirmishes, but you could do the same with Brawl tier list by allowing damage ratio to x2 or allowing items on.

As for an RNG based system, we work with averages. Characters will on average approach a general trend of stats over a period of many games. This is generally the basis for any sort of stat comparison. And it works rather well too since some characters have too low of a growth to be concerned useful no matter what. Additionally, Character strategies can be viewed as a nearly always works bases like 90%+ accuracy ratings or high chance of success given a few tries. Many times, there is no luck based strategies and they will always work. In a way, Fire Emblem is much easier to objectify because you can work with averages over a long run and have guaranteed results.

The smash tier lists are far more flimsy as you have a human element to consider in matches that is extremely hard to objectify.

===============================================================================================================

Morgan (Donnel)

Okay, so I think Morgan can be tiered to be about the same level as Lucina (Avatar), but underneath still. A Morgan(Donnel) is completely workable without training Donnel at all. Donnel needs only a Barbarian (40 exp) and Thief (60 exp) kill on his join chapter to gain a level. Very easy to set-up since you can lure in a barbarian to weaken on turn 1 for Donnel to kill on turn phase, then set-up a KO for the thief on enemy phase for donnel to kill on turn 2. After this, he can get paired up with Avatar for S rank support. Avatar will never need pair support bonuses while holding Donnel due to 1.5exp gain allowing Avatar to be above enemy stats all the time.

It can be done to get Avatar to ~20/10 by Morgan's join time while maintaining relatively low turn count and not absolutely spamming MU at every possible moment. With a rescue, Second Seal (will have three (if including renown) by this point in the game), and reclass to Cavalier, Morgan has perfectly usable stats to start gaining kills on turn one of his join chapter. I finished it in 5 turns to have Morgan sitting at level 7.88 and an average of 5.8 stat gains per level. Interceptors Morgan was only a little bit better than my own Morgan (untrained donnel) by only a couple points in stats here and there. As Interceptor has pointed out, Morgan gets a +1 level when paired and Veteran with every kill until about level 5 from reclass on his join chapter.

To recap, Morgan(donnel) is good because of Veteran/Aptitude. He has completely workable bases when reclassed and only with Avatar being used. His join chapter allows enough experience to be gained to get high enough stat gains to catch-up with the rest of your units. He will need another chapter or two at most to surpass the other units. And all of this can be accomplished with a relatively low turn count.

The only reason I would put Morgan underneath Lucina (Avatar) is because Lucina requires less resources to more or less be the same as Morgan at join time. Morgan requires a reclass and a number of level-ups on his join chapter to be on par with the rest of your units. Lucina will more or less achieve this simply by you using Chrom/Avatar through out the game to give great bases. In the long run though, Morgan would turn into a better unit with Aptitude.

Edited April 15, 2013 by Vorena

[Seven Deadly Sins]

I feel like there are way to many arbitrary limitations in place to make this tier list meaningful. Not only that, but the sheer number of options and possibilities in this game seriously undermine any attempt to create a stable tier list.

Now if you're going to turn this into a "Fire Emblem Nuzlocke Challenge," then we absolutely could create some sort of tier list. However, that would require more specific and expansive player-imposed rules.

These posts confuse me. There's plenty of discussion going on between sane people, and then every once in a while someone goes "this tier list's restrictions displease me, change them so that i may discuss on my terms, oh also i won't say anything useful about what i'm looking for." It's wearing a bit thin.

On topic, I agree with Chrom down, but more notably, I want Stahl to go up to bottom of S. I think he's vastly underrated- with Frederick in his pocket he can gain a ton of levels in Chapter 2, and then in Chapter 3 he completes his brotp with Kellam, a combination that is damn near uncrackable for a very long time. By the time his Speed actually gets to be a drag, he can pick up a Cordelia support, which combine with Tonics to give him the speed he needs to stay competitive. By endgame, he can elect to stay as-is or swap to Swordmaster if he wants, In a playthrough I've been doing, he has managed to be the highest level on the team (even higher than Avatar) in a fairly brisk run of the game, and has been incredibly clutch.

Thoughts?

[eclipse]

I've never been impressed with Stahl's speed, even with a speed support.

[Alondite]

Like I said: fundamental misunderstanding. I'm not talking about tier lists for pseudo-fighting games; this is Fire Emblem, which you may have noticed is basically a single player game. While I'm sure you have at least two years tennis experience, and your arrival in this 44-page thread heralds the Second Coming, maybe you ought to attempt to understand what exactly it is that you're complaining about before flipping the table over.

It's not a misunderstanding. The objective of any tier list is the same. I've entered discussions on FE tier lists in the past, it's only this particular FE that I don't feel breaks down into tiers clealy. Blazing Sword, for example, has a nice ratings system that makes it easy to identify what classifies as "good play," and what characters then facilitate that.

I think you need to get accustomed to other communities. If you would understand the Brawl Tier List system, then you should understand that all tier list positions are made with the understanding that all matches are typically of a best of 3, 5, 7 matches with a counterpick system on certain stages under no item conditions. Even then, there is also the assumption of an 8 minute timer, 3 stocks, no handicap, damage ratio x1, etc.

The super smash bros community places just as many implicit rules when making tier lists as FE community does with its own. We typically impose rules which fit the general trend of things found in this community and one of them is typically low turn counts. Yes, you could completely falsify this tier list if you allowed skirmishes, but you could do the same with Brawl tier list by allowing damage ratio to x2 or allowing items on.

As for an RNG based system, we work with averages. Characters will on average approach a general trend of stats over a period of many games. This is generally the basis for any sort of stat comparison. And it works rather well too since some characters have too low of a growth to be concerned useful no matter what. Additionally, Character strategies can be viewed as a nearly always works bases like 90%+ accuracy ratings or high chance of success given a few tries. Many times, there is no luck based strategies and they will always work. In a way, Fire Emblem is much easier to objectify because you can work with averages over a long run and have guaranteed results.

The smash tier lists are far more flimsy as you have a human element to consider in matches that is extremely hard to objectify.

As I said, I've already discussed FE tiers before, and at length. It has nothing to do with acclimating to the community.

I also understand that Smash tiers are done under an imposition of rules upon the system. However, the rules are fixed, and consistent from match to match. The rules are also clearly defined and established among the community. Smash tiers are not meant to answer "who is the best character," they aim to show who currently performs the best. Smash tiers are made from tournament results, which are entirely objective.

An average is the most-likely singular outcome, but the odds of the outcome being any outcome other than the average are still greater than those of it being the average. Growths definitely count for something, but I actually believe the growth percentage itself, rather than the average, is more meaningful in this case because it's a fixed number. Yes, yes, I know "average stats are a function of growths." Yes, and they are also a function of bases and level. I think it's cleaner to look at bases and growths individually. I'm a research scientist, I like clean data because you can do more with it without it dynamically affecting the rest of the data. For example, I like to plug my FE stats into Excel to do various things.

On a similar note, growths in FE:A are so high, and so similar among characters (compared to other FEs) that I feel they are trivialized somewhat; the overall balance is far better than in previous games. I think bases and starting items are more useful barometer.

So what's your suggestion to base unit value on? If contribution to a nonexistent number of efficiency doesn't matter, then there is nothing to rate a units' worth by.

Because inevitably, people are going to seek answers to questions like "Is X good?" And according to your statements, everybody is essentially equal because as long as the game is completed, time and effort shouldn't have an impact on an answer.

Well, in order to define a character's usefulness, you need to first define what it means to be useful. In FE, particularly this one, there are multiple ways to be useful. You then need to decide which uses are more valuable. I think it would be cleaner to break characters down into how they would best be used first, and then rank them accordingly. A global tier list could be pieced together after that.

These posts confuse me. There's plenty of discussion going on between sane people, and then every once in a while someone goes "this tier list's restrictions displease me, change them so that i may discuss on my terms, oh also i won't say anything useful about what i'm looking for." It's wearing a bit thin.

You misunderstand my intentions. I don't want to throw a wrench into the conversation, I want to find ways to improve it. I love talking numbers and debating things, and I love Fire Emblem. It goes without saying that I like to debate and quantify Fire Emblem. However, after looking over this thread I'm seeing a lot of abstract reasoning and unclear terms. I think it would be more effective if we first created a well-defined framework and language within which to operate.

What is a character's purpose? How is a character's purpose defined? Is their purpose a useful one? How good are they at serving their purpose? What are our rules? Why are we implementing said rules? That's only the beginning. I know that stuff isn't as interesting, and it might seem overkill, but it could really help keep everyone on the same page with a clear objective.

[Interceptor]

Morgan (Donnel)

Okay, so I think Morgan can be tiered to be about the same level as Lucina (Avatar), but underneath still. A Morgan(Donnel) is completely workable without training Donnel at all. Donnel needs only a Barbarian (40 exp) and Thief (60 exp) kill on his join chapter to gain a level. Very easy to set-up since you can lure in a barbarian to weaken on turn 1 for Donnel to kill on turn phase, then set-up a KO for the thief on enemy phase for donnel to kill on turn 2. After this, he can get paired up with Avatar for S rank support. Avatar will never need pair support bonuses while holding Donnel due to 1.5exp gain allowing Avatar to be above enemy stats all the time.

It can be done to get Avatar to ~20/10 by Morgan's join time while maintaining relatively low turn count and not absolutely spamming MU at every possible moment. With a rescue, Second Seal (will have three (if including renown) by this point in the game), and reclass to Cavalier, Morgan has perfectly usable stats to start gaining kills on turn one of his join chapter. I finished it in 5 turns to have Morgan sitting at level 7.88 and an average of 5.8 stat gains per level. Interceptors Morgan was only a little bit better than my own Morgan (untrained donnel) by only a couple points in stats here and there. As Interceptor has pointed out, Morgan gets a +1 level when paired and Veteran with every kill until about level 5 from reclass on his join chapter.

To recap, Morgan(donnel) is good because of Veteran/Aptitude. He has completely workable bases when reclassed and only with Avatar being used. His join chapter allows enough experience to be gained to get high enough stat gains to catch-up with the rest of your units. He will need another chapter or two at most to surpass the other units. And all of this can be accomplished with a relatively low turn count.

The only reason I would put Morgan underneath Lucina (Avatar) is because Lucina requires less resources to more or less be the same as Morgan at join time. Morgan requires a reclass and a number of level-ups on his join chapter to be on par with the rest of your units. Lucina will more or less achieve this simply by you using Chrom/Avatar through out the game to give great bases. In the long run though, Morgan would turn into a better unit with Aptitude.

I basically agree with all of this. The biggest surprise of my PT was the thing that I never even intended to look at in the first place: Veteran/Aptitude Morgan. Even though the loss of a third of his father's stats does hurt, it's counterbalanced by Avatar's stats, the ease of getting him kills in his recruitment chapter, and his crazy growth potential. Never has a unit gone from Zero (ORKOed at point of recruitment) to Hero (best unit in your entire army) so hard and so fast.

The only issue I have with this is that Morgan is a non-Lucina child. We're very squishy on children right now. It might not be the best time to wrestle with it, since I think that the question of child paralogues is a big X factor (I personally only did Morgan's, and nobody else's).

On topic, I agree with Chrom down, but more notably, I want Stahl to go up to bottom of S. I think he's vastly underrated- with Frederick in his pocket he can gain a ton of levels in Chapter 2, and then in Chapter 3 he completes his brotp with Kellam, a combination that is damn near uncrackable for a very long time. By the time his Speed actually gets to be a drag, he can pick up a Cordelia support, which combine with Tonics to give him the speed he needs to stay competitive. By endgame, he can elect to stay as-is or swap to Swordmaster if he wants, In a playthrough I've been doing, he has managed to be the highest level on the team (even higher than Avatar) in a fairly brisk run of the game, and has been incredibly clutch.

Thoughts?

I don't have much to say about Stahl because I don't know how long that his SPD is a liability. He will quickly fall behind if he can't get to doubling status (Pair-Up + tonics is fine), so unless he has the ability to man-mode half of a map like Nowi does, that could be a problem.

Your first easy Speedwing is in Chapter 16. The one is Chapter 11 is on a reinforcement unit that you're unlikely to fight (if I remember correctly... I never got it), and the next one doesn't show up until a child paralogue. This is maybe a red flag for him.

It's not a misunderstanding. The objective of any tier list is the same. I've entered discussions on FE tier lists in the past, it's only this particular FE that I don't feel breaks down into tiers clealy. Blazing Sword, for example, has a nice ratings system that makes it easy to identify what classifies as "good play," and what characters then facilitate that. [..] However, after looking over this thread I'm seeing a lot of abstract reasoning and unclear terms. I think it would be more effective if we first created a well-defined framework and language within which to operate.

Yes, it is a misunderstanding. Maybe once we get to the sixth person that disagrees with you, you might begin to realize that your (lack of) understanding is the one constant in this math equation.

We do not discuss tiering philosophy in this thread. All of us are sick to death of arguing about it with the FE Fusion refugees and their groupies. If you want to talk about Blazing Sword and the relative merit of rank-based tiering, you're going to have to do it somewhere else (I suggest General). If you want to make your own tier list for Awakening, with Blackjack and hookers, you have the blessing of every mod, woman, and child on this forum to do so in another thread.

To the part of your post that wasn't a forbidden topic: there is a lot of abstract reasoning in this thread, because 1) most of the people here understand the gist of the framework without needing it spelled out for them, and 2) specifics are an eyedropper where a bucket is still called for. The ordering of the list is still subject to sweeping changes due to the relative inexperience of all participants with this particular set of guidelines. A few of us are running playthroughs to see how some of the assumptions of the list hold up; as it turns out, there's a lot of room for improvement.

Some day the scalpel is appropriate (see: argument for Sully > Panne done by aku chi), but for a lot of comparisons, that day is not today.

[Redwall]

You might want to read this

I also understand that Smash tiers are done under an imposition of rules upon the system. However, the rules are fixed, and consistent from match to match. The rules are also clearly defined and established among the community. Smash tiers are not meant to answer "who is the best character," they aim to show who currently performs the best. Smash tiers are made from tournament results, which are entirely objective.

FE tiers are made from efficiency results, which are no less objective than tournament results. The choice to adopt low turns as the metric of choice is somewhat arbitrary, but after adopting this standard, the actual teasing-out of who's-more-efficient-than-whom is not.

An average is the most-likely singular outcome, but the odds of the outcome being any outcome other than the average are still greater than those of it being the average. Growths definitely count for something, but I actually believe the growth percentage itself, rather than the average, is more meaningful in this case because it's a fixed number. Yes, yes, I know "average stats are a function of growths." Yes, and they are also a function of bases and level. I think it's cleaner to look at bases and growths individually. I'm a research scientist, I like clean data because you can do more with it without it dynamically affecting the rest of the data. For example, I like to plug my FE stats into Excel to do various things.

Um, okay? Michael Jordan was unequivocally a better player than Charles Barkley, but that certainly didn't mean that Jordan would necessarily outperform Barkley on any given night. As this pertains to FE, the law of large numbers gives us a very good chance of preventing the observed average stats of any heavily-leveled character from deviating sharply from the true average. This need not mean that Panne is necessarily going to saving more turns than Gaius in any given playthrough; only that the chances of this happening are high.

On a similar note, growths in FE:A are so high, and so similar among characters (compared to other FEs) that I feel they are trivialized somewhat; the overall balance is far better than in previous games. I think bases and starting items are more useful barometer.

Bases and availability (both of which present opportunities for saving turns) mean something, too. The balance is much worse than in previous games if you're referring to the disparity between above-average and below-average units, though if you're referring to the usability of below-average units, then I would agree; nonetheless, using below-average units over better ones has a larger opportunity cost than in previous games due to the high emphasis on rout maps and enemy-phase combat.

Well, in order to define a character's usefulness, you need to first define what it means to be useful. In FE, particularly this one, there are multiple ways to be useful. You then need to decide which uses are more valuable. I think it would be cleaner to break characters down into how they would best be used first, and then rank them accordingly. A global tier list could be pieced together after that.

What is a character's purpose? How is a character's purpose defined? Is their purpose a useful one? How good are they at serving their purpose? What are our rules? Why are we implementing said rules? That's only the beginning. I know that stuff isn't as interesting, and it might seem overkill, but it could really help keep everyone on the same page with a clear objective.

As stated in the tier list FAQ, the metric of usefulness is efficiency; playthroughs adopting the tier list playstyle tend to shoot for low turncounts. High-ranking characters allow for faster completions than do low-ranking characters, though in this particular tier list, giant Rescue/Dance chains are not assumed.

Edited April 15, 2013 by Redwall

[Lord Raven]

Stahl doesn't need Speed for a while, Kellam support once you hit Chapter 3 is far better than Frederick (but he can have Frederick ride him until then). As I said, impenetrable late early-game and entire mid-game, and then he has Swordmaster to fix the gap afterwards.

Maybe once we get to the sixth person that disagrees with you, you might begin to realize that your (lack of) understanding is the one constant in this math equation.

let me be #6 but I won't really get into why because i wasnt asked for my opinion

can we all please start another discussion in the general board instead of shitting up a storm in this thread about efficiency conditions? ~_~

Edited April 15, 2013 by Lord Raven

[Niddo]

I think people are underestimating the power of Rightful King + Aether when talking about Chrom, or Rightful King in general. He's one of two characters that can have that combo, and one of 3 characters in a playthrough that can have Rightful King period. The ability to boost the proc rate of either Aether or Luna isn't something to be ignored, it's a serious boost to offense in either case, and in one case a boost to survivability as well.

There is also the fact that he always has an answer to Wyvrens in the shape of Falchion. Particularly helpful in Chapter 5 and either 7 or 8 I think it was, but it's always an advantage that never runs out. And of course, Falchion's late game boost into an absolutely amazing weapon. Early game he also gets his Rapier to keep his offense up against key targets, a weapon you can easily keep uses on at least until Lucina joins. When Lucina joins, she's only going to want her Rapier for a little while at best, Parallel Falchion takes care of most of her early game needs. No reason not to give Chrom her Rapier, not like there is any other competition for it.

Add that in with Chrom being one of the best support characters between Dual Strike+, potential Dual Guard+, and his bonuses, and I believe he should stay in low S Rank. He's good early game, and only falters a bit mid game until he can get Aether and Rightful King going, then he's back up to where he was before. He never falls off the map, he's just a little bit slower at reaching his peak.

[JSND Alter Dragon Boner]

think people are underestimating the power of Rightful King + Aether when talking about Chrom

Which takes like..... a Seal, the EXP to promote, and Level 15

or Rightful King in general

10% proc is pretty cool

Aether or Luna

You need to level to 15 GL, and then Reclass into GK and go into 15. Doesn't it take too long especially for character who are expected to Reclass Cavs?

I liked Falchion Wyvern utility though, but outside Lunatic Chapter 5, it was not particularly useful(and this is HM)

Edited April 15, 2013 by JSND

[Interceptor]

So here's my issue with Rightful King: with the exception of the Sol portion of Aether, it only matters when you can't ORKO something to begin with, and if you're in a position where you can't ORKO, you're already in the gutter offensively (because Hard mode). Nowi never gets an activation skill; she also doesn't care, because if she's doubling, the target is dead anyway. While it's nice for Chrom (and kid), it's nice because Chrom isn't that great to begin with. Also takes quite a while to get there, in terms of investment of resources (except for Morgan, but Morgan doesn't need skill activations, either).

Rapier is nice (because Valm), and so is Falchion (both versions), but Chrom has real issues with consistent 1-2 range combat. Rapier is also mutually exclusive with Cavalier. Admittedly, Chrom is probably the greatest Pair Up partner in the entire playable cast, but it's hard to give him S-tier credit for efficient completion as a Support unit.

[Vorena]

I basically agree with all of this. The biggest surprise of my PT was the thing that I never even intended to look at in the first place: Veteran/Aptitude Morgan. Even though the loss of a third of his father's stats does hurt, it's counterbalanced by Avatar's stats, the ease of getting him kills in his recruitment chapter, and his crazy growth potential. Never has a unit gone from Zero (ORKOed at point of recruitment) to Hero (best unit in your entire army) so hard and so fast.

The only issue I have with this is that Morgan is a non-Lucina child. We're very squishy on children right now. It might not be the best time to wrestle with it, since I think that the question of child paralogues is a big X factor (I personally only did Morgan's, and nobody else's).

I personally do not see a problem with adding on Children from time to time when its pretty clear they can be useful. Especially when you evaluate them one-by-one without any other children getting in the way. We already assume paralogue completion in this list anyway. Morgan has the same accessibility as Lucina does being available right after she comes by. Albeit, you finished his join chapter two chapters later in 3 turns with a lv 8.60 Morgan (trained donnel) while I completed it in 5 turns directly after getting Lucina and ended up with a lv7.88 morgan (untrained donnel).

So with directly having the effectively the same availability, join chapter to get going, and on par combat after this, I do not see why Morga (Donnel) shouldn't get tier'd. Although, I suppose it would be better to have a fairly sorted out Tier before trying to tier them to avoid confusion.

[Elieson]

In what Brisk Playthrough is Chrom reaching XX/15? Maybe by late/endgame he would be there but considering the fact that avatar, Nowi, hell Gregor (because unparalleled quick Sol) can charge rush and out tank Chrom for approximately always

And considering Rightful King is +10% skill activation to only Aether and Luna, Luna being a skill he probably won't even access due to the suck speed GK deficit cramping his LATEGAME combat.

If Chrom is siting in Support, then he's gaining exp extremely slowly. If he's charging offense, he's doing alright but isn't tanking forever unlike several other units around him.

Not to mention that he caps Skill (27) as a lord if he's lucky, then promotes and has a cap of 41 to mess around with Aether and Rightful King. I'm not buying this apparently overhyped value of approximately 30% activation (before tonics woo bonus 1% and pairUp potentially giving a maximum of +4% Aether activation).

Chroms maximum possible Aether rate is roughly 33% with Rightful King and a perfect non-DLC SKILL setup. Why are we counting that as reliable?

Edited April 15, 2013 by Elieson

[Interceptor]

Morgan is definitely the second-easiest child to tier, since his Paralogue has 1) crappy enemies, 2) Naga's Tear, and 3) isn't a Rout.

But eventually the child Paralogues are going to be a thing. I completely skipped over Kjelle, Cynthia, Severa, and Nah (I also avoided Tiki, now that I think of it) in my run. Realistically, that would have given other members of the army that were behind (Sully, Cordelia, etc) a chance to make up some ground with kills... but there's still 7 other Paralogues that I didn't even unlock.

[Narga_Rocks]

If Alondite wasn't about to post again, then this is a waste of time, but tiering philosophy and all that discussion can be done elsewhere. I even made a topic for y'all.

http://serenesforest.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=39440

Don't do it here anymore!

I will probably be moving new relevant posts that I see in tiers into my topic, fyi.

Edited April 15, 2013 by Narga_Rocks

[Elieson]

I math'd it quickly because I already spent 5 hours math'ing my Tier1 Run.

Maximum Skill for Chrom

Sniper Cap = 49**

Maximum Support Bonus = 8

Skill Tonic = 2

Rally Bonuses = 4+4+2

Surge = 4

Total Max Skill = 73

Pile on Rightful King, and you have Aether activation rate of (73/2)+10)%, or 46.5%.

**Chrom!Bow Knight, Skill cap is reduced to 44 but can equip Mystelltainn for +5 skill, resulting in the same**

Him remaining in his Great Lord class long enough to learn Aether/RK to begin with would take long enough, and with maximum support options and surges from Barracks, he still won't ever reach a 50% activation rate. I don't think RK should be considered in Chrom's placement unless it's being exclusively applied to either Luna or Aegis, as those can easily reach 40%+ (and not a huge stretch to reach 50%+) activation rates in any Tier2 class with little more than the base class caps and a support unit on his back.

[Jediabiwan]

Random question, but what's the opinion on weapon types for this game? I know a lot of it just depends on early game availability, but what are you guys thinking is the best weapon type in general or lategame?

Edit: I'm thinking of physical weapons, magic is obviously awesome (and dark magic is pretty OP)

Edited April 16, 2013 by Jediabiwan

[OrangeCrush980]

I'm pretty sure it's Axes > Lances > Swords > Bows, just like it's been since FE7