PAIRINGS The Pairing Thread

[Ebony]

The only Owain I accept is blond Owain.

Same. So it's usually Libra for me... hmm...

[Admiral "Bull" Halsey]

Well if you guys care about Owain's character so much theres Vaike!Owain. (even though its probably a bad choice)

[Radiant head]

Yeah, but between Libra and Vaike, it's kind of a no-brainer.

Henry is close enough as well.

Edited October 5, 2015 by Radiant head

[TheSilentChloey]

The only Owain I accept is blond Owain.

Well I like Lon'qu! Owain...lifts his speed makes him a nice option for swordmaster

[Admiral "Bull" Halsey]

By Owain's character, I was referring to how he's meant to be a physical unit supposedly. (i.e. his 'sword-hands') But thats beside the point.

Anyways I've said what I need about Owain, its a real shame because I really like him...

Edited October 6, 2015 by Formerly Colm

[Czar_Yoshi]

Hey!! don´t stop people using this pais just because of the hair color!! is not as bad as you say, and support wise i think barring the avatar she will only love him and Gregor, so that´s a plus for an awesome Severa, i always do Stahl!Severa and she´s awesome no matter what.

I've been here for over a year and I've seen enough people who have planned out a team, started building it, and then gone back to the drawing board once they saw her hair (even people who say they don't care about aesthetics) that I have to attach a warning about it whenever it's brought up. Whether or not I happen to like it is beside the point, it's an issue that's happened before and will happen again that people should probably be aware of.

Is that saying nobody should use it? No (although it's not as great gameplay-wise as people make it out to be- Severa deserves to be fast). It's a warning about something that has changed plans in the past.

Well if you guys care about Owain's character so much theres Vaike!Owain. (even though its probably a bad choice)

It is a pretty bad choice, Owain winds up with some of the worst mod clash in the game (he has no mods above +2, which is less than some first gens can say) and doesn't get anything useful class/skill-wise out of Vaike to make up for it.

Granted, Owain's mods will almost always be bad, but that only makes having an epic class (something he really can achieve) set all the more important, and that's another strike against Vaike.

To anyone wanting a physical Owain, use Stahl. He's only 1 Str behind Vaike and has Luna, Hit+20, Paladin, Sniper and BK to show for it, which is a lot coupled with his natural Sage, Tomefaire, Swordfaire and Galeforce. He also makes a nice Dread Fighter, should you want one.

[Radiant head]

I haven't actually tried this yet, but I imagine MU!Owain, especially with Ignis, would probably be a huge gift to an Owain who wants to be physical.

[ChickenWings]

I actually like Stahl!Severa's hair. Then again, it could be because I've seen worse kid's hairs.

*shudders at Virion!Kjelle's portrait*

Edited October 6, 2015 by ChickenWings

[Ebony]

I actually like Stahl!Severa's hair. Then again, it could be because I've seen worse kid's hairs.

*shudders at Virion!Kjelle's portrait*

.... ahhh I've honestly seen worse? As far as kids go I think she takes it better then some others.

[sylveonzoroark]

.... ahhh I've honestly seen worse? As far as kids go I think she takes it better then some others.

...I actually like Virion!Kjelle aesthetic-wise.

Edited October 6, 2015 by sylveonzoroark

[Zoran]

The #1 greatest argument in favor of Donnel!Kjelle is her magnificent hair, IMO.

Stahl!Owain also gets Hit+20 Berserker, which can become useful in challenge runs.. That's also a perk for Ricken/Stahl!Inigo (and technically Ricken!Owain, but, you know, -2 Str & +5 Mag).

[Ebony]

The #1 greatest argument in favor of Donnel!Kjelle is her magnificent hair, IMO.

Stahl!Owain also gets Hit+20 Berserker, which can become useful in challenge runs.. That's also a perk for Ricken/Stahl!Inigo (and technically Ricken!Owain, but, you know, -2 Str & +5 Mag).

Yeah though as far as hair colors go, I think Donnel has the best hair color. No matter the mods, all the kids tend to look good in it.

[Admiral "Bull" Halsey]

tbh, I don't find that the hair colour for certain kids to be a factor...

[ChickenWings]

True, I remembered about Gaius.

It's just something about that portrait. (The hair seems too bright perhaps?)

[Czar_Yoshi]

I haven't actually tried this yet, but I imagine MU!Owain, especially with Ignis, would probably be a huge gift to an Owain who wants to be physical.

He is, but moreso due to offering Owain a +5 Spd mod while not sabotaging Morgan and Robin's own prospects. I rank Robin x Lissa as the third best 1st gen male Robin pair with everything taken into account (the first two being Cordelia and Sumia).

[Ebony]

He is, but moreso due to offering Owain a +5 Spd mod while not sabotaging Morgan and Robin's own prospects. I rank Robin x Lissa as the third best 1st gen male Robin pair with everything taken into account (the first two being Cordelia and Sumia).

Oh gawds. How would you rank Cherche or Nowi then? Now I'm kind of curious...

[Radiant head]

He is, but moreso due to offering Owain a +5 Spd mod while not sabotaging Morgan and Robin's own prospects. I rank Robin x Lissa as the third best 1st gen male Robin pair with everything taken into account (the first two being Cordelia and Sumia).

I might try that after I'm done with the FeMu run. I'd probably do Build 02 to not make it creepy.

From what I understand, Cordelia is Robin's best wife, but Robin isn't necessarily Cordelia's best husband?

Are you perhaps referring to the love of my life

Yep! (forgot to respond to this earlier)

Edited October 6, 2015 by Radiant head

[Xenomata]

Oh gawds. How would you rank Cherche or Nowi then? Now I'm kind of curious...

With Cherche... well Cherche has no weaponfaire skills for the classes she actually wants to end in, so she will always be weaker than other potential wives. Another thing is that Cherche hurts Morgan's speed when Morgan really just wants mods. Gerome becomes a second Morgan, but he doesn't benefit from having access to all classes when he can't be a Galeboy. He just wants Berserker and Anathema, and Henry gives him those without bringing down another unit.

Nowi is a mixed bag. In the longrun, Manakete won't be a good class. Yeah they have amazing Defensive ability and pack quite the punch, but they just can't get enough speed to double most enemy units, and the lack of a Brave Dragonstone hurts the overall damage output. However, she does get Tomefaire and doesn't have trash magic like Cherche does, so she can run Dark Knight or Sage just fine.

Nah and Morgan on the other hand are severely hurt by Nowi's lack of speed, which even with a speed asset avatar just brings them to a +3 modifier. They are blessed with every class in the game though, which becomes even better for Nah, who is otherwise one of the worser child units since she can't get everything she wants or needs from a single father, needing the Avatar to get what she wants, and she basically becomes a second Morgan. Plus, they get perma Dragon weaknesses, so Wyrmslayers become your worst enemy.

I know I'm not the most positive about Avatar x Nowi, but it is actually the pair that, if I could, I would do on every run ever. I'm starting to think Nowi is evolving to "waifu" status...

[Vascela]

Well, technically Robin is the best spouse and parent. There are plenty of reasons to do MaMU x Cordelia that outrank many other Severa alternatives... but I don't know them. It's a good thing we have a specialist in the field with us (cue for Astro).

Stahl!Owain also gets Hit+20 Berserker, which can become useful in challenge runs.. That's also a perk for Ricken/Stahl!Inigo (and technically Ricken!Owain, but, you know, -2 Str & +5 Mag).

I suppose my definition of useful on challenge run lies with "being at least Avatar quality." But hey, it's a good thing I'm not the only one that does them.

[Rizziah]

Not sure about Cherche as a wife, but Gerome is probably MU's worst kid, if that says anything.

[Ebony]

Well damn, apparently I have a shit tier waifu.

[TheSilentChloey]

So then who's the best second gen wife then? I know I'm planing a Lucina x maMu but I am curious

[Radiant head]

Yeah it's Lucina. Aether!Morgan is insane

[Rizziah]

Well damn, apparently I have a shit tier waifu.

Mm, probably not in a vacuum. Like if we just look at MU x Anybody and ignore the other things like kids and such, there's certainly worse than Cherche.

Looking at you, Anna.

[Czar_Yoshi]

Oh gawds. How would you rank Cherche or Nowi then? Now I'm kind of curious...

With those top three, they're pretty much good at everything so it's fairly easy to rank them. Cherche and Nowi both have big advantages in some contexts and massive failings in others, and since I'm considering overall utility at everything it's a lot less cut-and-dried. That said, here's how they stack up.

Nowi's true power lies in her tanking potential on Vanilla Lunatic, where the game is hard enough to make her useful but not so hard that she's limited in what she can do. Thanks to the way the exp formula works, Nowi can keep reclassing back into Manakete again and again while still gaining large amounts of exp. She starts out weak to try to balance that, but she also comes at a point in the game where the going isn't tough and you have the opportunity to easily feed foes.

While there are several things you can (and should) do to get her started, giving her a good pairup right off the bat is one of the best, and fortunately Merc Robin both gives exactly what she needs, and is someone you'll very likely have (always train Robin, and Merc is a good reclass on Lunatic). So at the very least, he's good for getting her going and they'll rack up several support levels doing that.

From there, the benefits to pairing them include getting two Veteran Manaketes (whether or not you keep them as Manaketes is up to you, but they're very good at it), and sticking with what works. Most units in Lunatic suffer from getting stat-capped and having the enemies catch back up, destroying their tanking potential. Nowi? Nope. So she's a good long-term investment.

On to postgame/Apo. A long time ago, Robin x Nowi was considered quite good, since it gives Nah her otherwise unobtainable GF/Proc combo. The first thing that happened to hurt this was that people realized that having a 2nd gen Morgan means that one child has to go unmarried, which equates to benching in Apo (S supports are just too good). But the benched child will have to be female, and since Robin x Nowi means all seven of your girls will have GF, you're forced to bench a Galegirl, negating any advantage you gained from the pair. Furthermore, since you have to bench a Galegirl, it makes sense to do it to the worst one... And Nowi's mods make Morgan/Nah uncomfortably close to that position. Doing Robin x Nowi for the sole purpose of getting Galeforce on Nah and then benching her doesn't make much sense.

Robin himself is also a particularly good unit; he has a full set of everything a Hard Support could possibly ask for (except DSt+, which is part of why I consider Chrom to sometimes be better than him). But in order to make good use of a good hard support, you need to be a good lead, and the four hallmarks of that are (in order of importance): Galeforce, a proc, a Faire, and a good Spd mod. Nowi only has a single Faire, and odds are she won't even be using it. Basically, once her tanking potential runs out (the moment Lunatic+ skills enter the field), she's got nothing.

This is, of course, assuming a goal of full deployment, which is what the meta mostly focuses on (since having all the kids be good sounds much better than having some of the kids be good). You don't have to do that, though- using a smaller number of child pairs (2-5) glosses over the benching issue caused by a 2nd gen Morgan and often is actually beneficial to gameplay since you can field more Staffbots.

The only issue with doing this (and this is an issue that comes up a lot) is that both Robin-M and Chrom have daughters attached to them. Chrom's best pairing gives another daughter, and in this case Robin's is giving another daughter as well. So you've got four good daughters who you really want to keep... But once you find four good husbands for them, you're pretty close to a full team and you still have the likes of Severa and Kjelle (top-tier units) left out. It's pretty awkward and a big point in Lissa's favor (Sumia and Cordelia both give girls, Lissa gives a boy, meaning you only need two extra husbands instead of four).

So basically Nowi runs the gamut between one of the best units in the game and one of the worst, depending on context. Want to use her? Use her where she's good.

Cherche's position is somewhat similar to Nowi's, though a little different. Ingame, she has the bases to be immediately usable on Lunatic (with a good pairup and some caution), but she comes fairly late and as a result will give a late Morgan. Postgame, someone will still have to be benched, though it won't be one of Robin's kids (Gerome actually really likes Robin as a dad and will usually be a great unit). Cherche can't do much to lead for Robin, though, and Morgan will still be slow.

They do, however, fare much better on a limited deployment team, since Robin/Cherche can stay out (or as a Staffbot and Rallybot, if you don't want to use Spotpass) and letting Gerome revel in his Hit+20 Berserker and Morgan try to use her Str to make up for her Spd (it works a lot better than trying to let Def make up for Spd).

Well, technically Robin is the best spouse and parent. There are plenty of reasons to do MaMU x Cordelia that outrank many other Severa alternatives... but I don't know them. It's a good thing we have a specialist in the field with us (cue for Astro).

The big one is just the +7 Spd mod (3rd gen Morgan tier) on two girls instead of one. Among other things it gives you a 75 Spd Wyvern x Berserker with no All+2 (aka room for a procstack) and 75 Spd Valkyrie x Sage with no All+2 (same deal). Add that to Cordelia having everything Robin wants in a lead (except maybe a Faire, depending on her class), and they're well set for Apo. But they also work together very well ingame on Lunatic(+), thanks to the possibility for a quadruple Galeforce passdown, Cord's high Str/low Mag combo and the fact that Pegs generally rule.