What is your unpopular Fire Emblem opinion?

[Sooks]

Just now, twilitfalchion said:

No, I just meant that there are games/media for something like that, and they have an audience. I really wasn't talking about anything else.

But then

6 minutes ago, twilitfalchion said:

And the bolded statement is oBjEcTiVeLy wrong because that's your opinion and you're entitled to have it. 🙂

what’s the deal with this? Do I come across as an audience member? xD

[joevar]

2 hours ago, Murozaki said:

I don't know if this is an unpopular opinion but based on previous FE discussion-focused places i assume it is: "Moral Gray" and "Realism" when it comes to Fire Emblem are both very overvalued.

When it comes to the topic of "Moral Gray", i feel the FE fandom overlooks the fact that usually when it comes to villains' and antagonists' motivations and actions (Since they are the types of characters most talked about when this topic comes up from past experieces), the most important thing is that said motivations and actions complement the greater picture of what the story is about.

unpopular to me, strictly because the moral side of the story (good / bad) in FE usually a clear thing to distinguish. so moral grey is luxury hence people craved more about it? thats my take anyway.

2 hours ago, Murozaki said:

Which also extends i feel to how the FE fandom talks about characters in all honesty, too much talking about characters and individual story elements in a vacuum and not about how said characters and elements fit into the greater puzzle.

now this is something that i actually often see in this forum but rarely outside. because people tend to get overly analytical when talking stuff they love, and start detaching / attaching things when talking a character. its bound to happen i guess

--------------------

is female character as general in FE really in bad light (in terms of writing quality/characterization/action/etc) ? or is it exclusive for the "lord" character? i feel its the latter

iirc even in marth story (which is the template for future FE) Caeda has its moment without something glaring holding her back. but she's not lord, so people rarely talk about it. Then theres Eirika and half end of Celica routes. but does Female side-character in either route of that particular games also bad? cant remember.

 

[That One Trec Stan]

Here's one: Lilina is a garbage unit and contributes about as much as Roy.

She has awful bases and gets one-rounded by just about everything when she joins. Her defenses are absolutely laughable. You may think being a growth unit would fix her stat issues, but her growths... aren't even good?

Just look at her growths: 45% HP, 20% Skill, 35% Speed, and a whopping 10% Defense. Aside from that, her only good growths are an admittedly solid 75% Magic, 35% Resistance (which is relatively high), and 50% Luck, but Luck hardly matters compared to other stats anyway, and letting her dodge things isn't that great when she's still risking getting one-shot by nearly everything that does so much as glance in her general direction. Her HP and Defense growths are even more laughable when you consider that her base HP and Defense are 16 and 2, respectively. Still think I'm exaggerating when I say everything one-rounds her? I'm not. Even with average levels, by level 20, unpromoted, she still has roughly 25 HP and 4 Defense. Yowch. Even after promo, that leaves her at 20/1 with 28 HP and 5 Defense. Absolutely pitiful. Not to mention, even her Speed is below average and gets her doubled frequently. At level 20/1, on average, she'll still only have about 14 Speed. Now, 14 Speed isn't that bad thanks to the +3 on promo, but unless you've been cramming kills down her throat for the entire game since she's joined, you'll still be very late into the game by that point, where enemies are still going to double and kill her on occasion. Because of this, most of Lilina's action on enemy phase is heavily dependent on dodge-tanking (hmm, almost like a certain other character who is implied to be her mother that some people still defend like crazy...).

20% Skill doesn't seem like much of an issue, and with Fire tomes, it honestly isn't. However, that's only because Fire happens to have an excellent hit rate, and switching away from vanilla Fire tomes to increase her damage output means taking a hit to her accuracy. Combined with the fact that she rarely doubles enemies that aren't armored, this means that Lilina sticking with Fire tomes will cause her damage output to be unimpressive even with her crazy Magic growth.

Roy isn't great either; he's still hurt massively by his late promo, and his base stats leave something to be desired. However, Roy still has perfect availability, a decent early personal weapon (which, by the way, has the same hit rate as a Fire tome), is force-deployed for every chapter, and obtains a super busted personal weapon near the end of the game. Force-deployment doesn't mean you need to use him, of course, but I feel ignoring force-deployment completely is still somewhat unfair, especially when they're deployed for every single chapter. Since he's around for every map, you might as well at least use him some, and he's actually useful in chapter 4 because of all the cavaliers and dodgy nomads. His late promotion may be an afterthought, but it still means he can contribute decently in the last few maps without much training, so it's not worthless either. Again, it's not like you need to feed tons of kills to him, but there's no reason not to kill just some enemies with him, and his contributions with the Binding Blade are actually decent. It's more than Lilina will do without heavy investment.

And for those who will still defend her because she gets decent with investment: Why should I even invest that much into her? The majority of other units around when she joins are superior to her in most ways. Allen and Lance are both mounted, have better bases, better Speed, and better bulk. They also join earlier, so feeding kills to them is easy to do without having to suck it up from the rest of your army. And on that note, why should I train Lilina when investing so much into her leaves me weaker off overall? Again, every other unit is at a higher level than her by then, and most arguably benefit even more than she does from it. The only units I can think of by then that are arguably worse than her are the axe fighters, the knights, and maybe Wolt, and even then I feel that Lot and Wolt aren't that bad and have some decent uses.

Here, let's compare her to another unit which is often hated and regarded as very low-tier: Trec. Now, even though Trec is my favorite character, this is putting all personal bias aside. Trec really isn't very good, since his bases are just alright, his weapon ranks are mediocre, and his speed isn't great. However, Trec still has things that Lilina doesn't: A mount, and actual bulk. Right off the bat, Trec's horse means that he has good rescue utility and is very versatile because of his high movement. His bulk also means his survivability is actually good, and he can easily utilize that extra movement of his. Oh, and that thing about his speed? It's actually better than Lilina, since he has a lead of 3 points at base level, and Lilina will only shorten that gap by 1 point on average once she hits Trec's base level of 4. He does gain one less point on promo, but that still means he'll be ahead by 1 point. Yeah, not much, but Lilina also has to gain more levels to catch up to him, so he'll be getting doubled much less than Lilina for a while, plus he joins a chapter earlier. Lilina gains exp faster than Trec at base level, but that means nothing, since she still needs extra levels and still isn't that great after the fact, meaning she actually needs much more exp to function. He also takes better advantage of promoting early, since he has better bases and doesn't need as many levels to be competent. Yeah he gets doubled sometimes, but remember, he barely beats Lilina in Speed, meaning every unit that doubles Trec will double Lilina, and Lilina gets doubled more than Trec overall.

Besides being a garbage unit, I don't think Lilina is very interesting as a character, either. She's compassionate, sure, but is there really much more to her? Her trait of seeing her knights as equals can be said about just about every lord in the series. Roy at least has a neat character arc where he starts off as a helpless young boy and ends up as a powerful general who learns to command a large army. I can't even say that much about Lilina. I've genuinely tried to come up with an interesting part of her character and come up with nothing. She's not the worst, but I can't see what kind of depth she's supposed to have. Hmm... I-it couldn't possibly be because she's... a cute mage girl? No, of course not, that would be stupid! Nobody in this community would have a major bias towards characters and exaggerate about how good they are just because they think they're cute! And besides, who thinks of Lilina as a waifu, anyway? I mean, she's only 15, so there's no way there are grown men who actually waifu her and obsess over her... right?

[eclipse]

41 minutes ago, JuMs said:

Here's one: Lilina is a garbage unit and contributes about as much as Roy.

Well, that's interesting, let's see the logic behind that!

41 minutes ago, JuMs said:

She has awful bases and gets one-rounded by just about everything when she joins. Her defenses are absolutely laughable. You may think being a growth unit would fix her stat issues, but her growths... aren't even good?

I'll assume you know what to do and what not to do with a mage, which is "don't throw them into a horde of Wyvern Lords without protection".  And ballista, but IMO if we're going to complain about those, I'm going to bring up Bolting mages that OHKO Roy.  At least Lilina won't generate a Game Over if she bites the dust!

41 minutes ago, JuMs said:

Just look at her growths: 45% HP, 20% Skill, 35% Speed, and a whopping 10% Defense. Aside from that, her only good growths are an admittedly solid 75% Magic, 35% Resistance (which is relatively high), and 50% Luck, but Luck hardly matters compared to other stats anyway, and letting her dodge things isn't that great when she's still risking getting one-shot by nearly everything that does so much as glance in her general direction. Her HP and Defense growths are even more laughable when you consider that her base HP and Defense are 16 and 2, respectively. Still think I'm exaggerating when I say everything one-rounds her? I'm not. Even with average levels, by level 20, unpromoted, she still has roughly 25 HP and 4 Defense. Yowch. Even after promo, that leaves her at 20/1 with 28 HP and 5 Defense. Absolutely pitiful. Not to mention, even her Speed is below average and gets her doubled frequently. At level 20/1, on average, she'll still only have about 14 Speed. Now, 14 Speed isn't that bad thanks to the +3 on promo, but unless you've been cramming kills down her throat for the entire game since she's joined, you'll still be very late into the game by that point, where enemies are still going to double and kill her on occasion. Because of this, most of Lilina's action on enemy phase is heavily dependent on dodge-tanking (hmm, almost like a certain other character who is implied to be her mother that some people still defend like crazy...).

So, um, ballista aside, why would she need that Defense stat?  HP might be relevant since her Res is high enough for her to tank mages.  She's obviously not going to double everything (but let's face it, mages that aren't a banana aren't exactly speedy), which leaves her Skill.

And if you're SUPER WORRIED about being blicked by a random archer, a Robe solves that problem handily.  I think I used one later, to ensure that she wasn't one-shot by a wyvern.  Yes, a wyvern.

41 minutes ago, JuMs said:

20% Skill doesn't seem like much of an issue, and with Fire tomes, it honestly isn't. However, that's only because Fire happens to have an excellent hit rate, and switching away from vanilla Fire tomes to increase her damage output means taking a hit to her accuracy. Combined with the fact that she rarely doubles enemies that aren't armored, this means that Lilina sticking with Fire tomes will cause her damage output to be unimpressive even with her crazy Magic growth.

And supports.  And what's even more surprising is that she gets a super-fast one that'll give her +15% hit at A.

Hell, if I can pull off a decent hit rate with Cecilia support of all units, Lilina will be okay.  Just don't throw her up against a Druid on a throne.

41 minutes ago, JuMs said:

Roy isn't great either; he's still hurt massively by his late promo, and his base stats leave something to be desired. However, Roy still has perfect availability, a decent early personal weapon (which, by the way, has the same hit rate as a Fire tome), is force-deployed for every chapter, and obtains a super busted personal weapon near the end of the game. Force-deployment doesn't mean you need to use him, of course, but I feel ignoring force-deployment completely is still somewhat unfair, especially when they're deployed for every single chapter. Since he's around for every map, you might as well at least use him some, and he's actually useful in chapter 4 because of all the cavaliers and dodgy nomads. His late promotion may be an afterthought, but it still means he can contribute decently in the last few maps without much training, so it's not worthless either. Again, it's not like you need to feed tons of kills to him, but there's no reason not to kill just some enemies with him, and his contributions with the Binding Blade are actually decent. It's more than Lilina will do without heavy investment.

He also nets a Game Over when he dies, and later siege tomes can one-shot him.  No matter how much you dislike Lilina, you can safely kill her off and not have to worry about losing all of your progress.

41 minutes ago, JuMs said:

And for those who will still defend her because she gets decent with investment: Why should I even invest that much into her? The majority of other units around when she joins are superior to her in most ways. Allen and Lance are both mounted, have better bases, better Speed, and better bulk. They also join earlier, so feeding kills to them is easy to do without having to suck it up from the rest of your army. And on that note, why should I train Lilina when investing so much into her leaves me weaker off overall? Again, every other unit is at a higher level than her by then, and most arguably benefit even more than she does from it. The only units I can think of by then that are arguably worse than her are the axe fighters, the knights, and maybe Wolt, and even then I feel that Lot and Wolt aren't that bad and have some decent uses.

. . .at this point, I'm going to stop, because you've somehow missed Lilina's biggest selling point.  She targets Res.  HARD.  Which makes armored units a lot easier to deal with, wyverns less threatening (or just an outright joke if she steals Aircalibur), softens up mostly everything else, and can safely bait most mages.  About the only things she'll struggle against are super-dodgy things, but let's face it, most of your units won't like Sacae.  Oh, and any sort of Druid that is both dodgy and hits really hard, but again, why are you in Sacae again?

Add healing staves to the mix when she hits Sage, and she can hang back if things get dicey.

Lilina isn't the end-all to FE units.  Her job is to do magic damage, and she does it just fine.  She isn't meant to dodgetank anything that isn't a magic attack, and that's okay.  I can play to her strengths, and she'll do just fine.  Besides, Binding Blade doesn't need an overwhelming stat advantage for a unit to do well - but Lilina just so happens to have a massive Magic stat to the opponent's Res.

Edited November 22, 2020 by eclipse

[That One Trec Stan]

1 hour ago, eclipse said:

I'll assume you know what to do and what not to do with a mage, which is "don't throw them into a horde of Wyvern Lords without protection".  And ballista, but IMO if we're going to complain about those, I'm going to bring up Bolting mages that OHKO Roy.  At least Lilina won't generate a Game Over if she bites the dust!

Yeah, because getting one-rounded by archers and one-shot by armors is the same as being thrown into hordes of enemies without protection.

Also, I'd prefer being able to expose units on enemy phase because, you know, I like being able to kill more enemies. Yeah, this may be more of a Mage issue than a Lilina-specific issue, but that makes it no less of a problem. Point is, when Lilina is only able to chip one enemy on player phase before I have to pull her away to avoid getting killed by a nearby archer, I'd rather just bench her in favor of a unit that can see more combat with less risk, such as tanks like Lot or Trec.

1 hour ago, eclipse said:

So, um, ballista aside, why would she need that Defense stat?

Because I don't want my units dying from trying to expose them to just a little bit of enemy phase combat? Having good defense means being able to survive longer in tight situations, and with FE6's enemy quality you need units who have good survivability and can get you out of those situations, not another one who just dies if you ever get cornered.

1 hour ago, eclipse said:

And if you're SUPER WORRIED about being blicked by a random archer, a Robe solves that problem handily.  I think I used one later, to ensure that she wasn't one-shot by a wyvern.  Yes, a wyvern.

And why should that go to Lilina? You seem to have issues with Roy's survivability, so why not give it to him? Or better yet, why not give it to Shanna so she can use her flier utility more safely and engage in combat more often with her high movement? Yeah, it helps Lilina's issues a bit, but it doesn't fix the problem and it's better used on other units who are more versatile.

1 hour ago, eclipse said:

And supports.  And what's even more surprising is that she gets a super-fast one that'll give her +15% hit at A.

Hell, if I can pull off a decent hit rate with Cecilia support of all units, Lilina will be okay.  Just don't throw her up against a Druid on a throne.

Support is nice, but it's still something you need to build up, and it's hard to be able to transport Roy to the throne and kill things with Lilina when you're having to ensure they can get that boost. I'd rather just ignore it since I can easily beat the game without it and have to use specific positioning for it to actually work and pay off.

1 hour ago, eclipse said:

He also nets a Game Over when he dies, and later siege tomes can one-shot him.  No matter how much you dislike Lilina, you can safely kill her off and not have to worry about losing all of your progress.

Sorry, what? Lilina being able to die makes her more useful? I get what you mean; Lilina isn't required to be protected and as such isn't as much of a pain to use. But that says nothing about her viability. Being able to die doesn't make her any more useful than Roy; if anything, it makes her worse in that aspect because it means Roy is more likely to see some form of use, since dead units can't contribute, unlike weak units. It's not like trying to use Roy means he'll die either, since, like I said, you can give him an angelic robe instead to improve his durability and make protecting him easier, and his bulk is already better than Lilina's by default.

1 hour ago, eclipse said:

. . .at this point, I'm going to stop, because you've somehow missed Lilina's biggest selling point.  She targets Res.  HARD.  Which makes armored units a lot easier to deal with, wyverns less threatening (or just an outright joke if she steals Aircalibur), softens up mostly everything else, and can safely bait most mages.  About the only things she'll struggle against are super-dodgy things, but let's face it, most of your units won't like Sacae.  Oh, and any sort of Druid that is both dodgy and hits really hard, but again, why are you in Sacae again?

But I'm not going to Sacae? Enemies in FE6 are generally dodgy, it's not a problem exclusive to certain enemies.

I'm not "ignoring" Lilina targeting Res, it's that it isn't a big enough boon to make up for her other issues. She still won't double, and unless you feed her lots of kills her damage output won't be good either (and again, why am I giving that exp to Lilina?). For armored units there are already armorslayers, which are arguably more effective because they deal bonus damage, and there are mounted units who can wield them. Not to mention, they're also super accurate, so accuracy isn't an issue. For Wyverns, there are already bow units I have like Shin and Sue, who are both mounted and have access to weapons like the Brave Bow to deal better and more reliable damage.

Being able to bait mages honestly isn't that important. Mages have low base stats already and are easily one-rounded by units who are able to double them, and units like the Pegasus Knights also have good enough Res to bait them if you truly need someone to do that.

1 hour ago, eclipse said:

Add healing staves to the mix when she hits Sage, and she can hang back if things get dicey.

Healing staves are nice, but there are already other staff units at that point who can heal and also have a much better shot at reaching a good staff rank for Physic and even Warp. When you also factor in the fact that this consumes Lilina's turn and means she can't attack, it's not worth it to promote her for staves when you can just deploy units who can use more staves than her to save up on deployment slots. You rarely need more than one or two staff units anyway, and at least one of them is mainly for warping.

1 hour ago, eclipse said:

Lilina isn't the end-all to FE units.  Her job is to do magic damage, and she does it just fine.  She isn't meant to dodgetank anything that isn't a magic attack, and that's okay.  I can play to her strengths, and she'll do just fine.  Besides, Binding Blade doesn't need an overwhelming stat advantage for a unit to do well - but Lilina just so happens to have a massive Magic stat to the opponent's Res.

She isn't the worst, there are definitely worse units than her, such as Wendy, Barth, and Sophia.

"Playing to her strengths" is where I have issues, because as previously stated, she doesn't have many strengths, and most of what she does have is either an unimportant strength or something that other units do better. She also has no major or unique utility and is foot-locked in a game that heavily emphasizes movement and rescuing. Besides that, "playing to her strengths" also means having to shield her from just about everything on enemy phase, something that the majority of other units don't need. Less enemy phase action = less combat. Less combat = less overall contribution. Less overall contribution = less usefulness.

Again, since she's not doubling, her damage output still isn't great, and not being able to handle enemy phases also means less damage dealt, so it seems she doesn't do her main job very well.

Yeah, Binding Blade doesn't need an overwhelming stat advantage for units to do well. But you know what it does need? Units who don't get one-rounded by nearly every enemy in the game and need an angelic robe to survive a single enemy.

Just to highlight this, you're still giving Lilina special treatment here. Discussing Lilina isn't quite enough to show how bad she is, hence why I compare her to other units, since it's less important to consider the good qualities of one unit alone than to consider how many of those qualities are actually important or if there are other options that perform better then them.

Edited November 22, 2020 by JuMs

[eclipse]

1 hour ago, JuMs said:

Yeah, because getting one-rounded by archers and one-shot by armors is the same as being thrown into hordes of enemies without protection.

If she's in range of an armor, then that's on you.  FE is a strategy game, after all.  I'm hardly an expert at this game, but I can keep her the hell away from a slow-moving unit with a Steel Lance.  Archers may be a bit trickier, but I can usually work around them.

1 hour ago, JuMs said:

Also, I'd prefer being able to expose units on enemy phase because, you know, I like being able to kill more enemies. Yeah, this may be more of a Mage issue than a Lilina-specific issue, but that makes it no less of a problem. Point is, when Lilina is only able to chip one enemy on player phase before I have to pull her away to avoid getting killed by a nearby archer, I'd rather just bench her in favor of a unit that can see more combat with less risk, such as tanks like Lot or Trec.

And you think that adding thought to final positioning won't be able to accomplish the same thing?

1 hour ago, JuMs said:

Because I don't want my units dying from trying to expose them to just a little bit of enemy phase combat? Having good defense means being able to survive longer in tight situations, and with FE6's enemy quality you need units who have good survivability and can get you out of those situations, not another one who just dies if you ever get cornered.

Numbers always help an argument.  You'll have to excuse the formatting, this was done on an older version of the forum software, and the update broke the topic.

What also helps is knowing how to counter a threat, whether it be careful targeting, good positioning when you end your turn, or knowing how to bait (if necessary).

1 hour ago, JuMs said:

And why should that go to Lilina? You seem to have issues with Roy's survivability, so why not give it to him? Or better yet, why not give it to Shanna so she can use her flier utility more safely and engage in combat more often with her high movement? Yeah, it helps Lilina's issues a bit, but it doesn't fix the problem and it's better used on other units who are more versatile.

You're right, rigging 1 Def every now and then will do the same thing.  Which is also pretty trivial, I might add.  Except that one Ironman run I was a part of.

1 hour ago, JuMs said:

Support is nice, but it's still something you need to build up, and it's hard to be able to transport Roy to the throne and kill things with Lilina when you're having to ensure they can get that boost. I'd rather just ignore it since I can easily beat the game without it and have to use specific positioning for it to actually work and pay off.

Imagine the horror of having Lilina and Roy stand together for a single turn.  Which is exactly how long it takes to get their C support (+5 hit and a bunch of other things she appreciates).

1 hour ago, JuMs said:

Sorry, what? Lilina being able to die makes her more useful? I get what you mean; Lilina isn't required to be protected and as such isn't as much of a pain to use. But that says nothing about her viability. Being able to die doesn't make her any more useful than Roy; if anything, it makes her worse in that aspect because it means Roy is more likely to see some form of use, since dead units can't contribute, unlike weak units. It's not like trying to use Roy means he'll die either, since, like I said, you can give him an angelic robe instead to improve his durability and make protecting him easier, and his bulk is already better than Lilina's by default.

It means that if you screw up with Roy, you've lost progress.  If Lilina's that bad, then she'll just be gone from my roster.  And since you're hyping her to be the most fragile thing since glass, it shouldn't take very long before she kicks the bucket.  You'll miss out on a few recruitables, but eh.

1 hour ago, JuMs said:

But I'm not going to Sacae? Enemies in FE6 are generally dodgy, it's not a problem exclusive to certain enemies.

I thought you were the one that wanted to do things quickly?  And what faster way is there than a two-range unit on a horse that doesn't count as a horse?

(and in Shin's case, gets HM bonuses to boot)

1 hour ago, JuMs said:

I'm not "ignoring" Lilina targeting Res, it's that it isn't a big enough boon to make up for her other issues. She still won't double, and unless you feed her lots of kills her damage output won't be good either (and again, why am I giving that exp to Lilina?). For armored units there are already armorslayers, which are arguably more effective because they deal bonus damage, and there are mounted units who can wield them. Not to mention, they're also super accurate, so accuracy isn't an issue. For Wyverns, there are already bow units I have like Shin and Sue, who are both mounted and have access to weapons like the Brave Bow to deal better and more reliable damage.

You're comparing her to a bunch of physical units.  That tells me that you don't appreciate that type of damage - or the fact that it's 1-2 by default

Never mind the fact that Fire is way more common than -slayer weapons in general, or that Armorslayers/Wyrmslayers usually have WTD built-in (don't get me started on Hammers).

1 hour ago, JuMs said:

Being able to bait mages honestly isn't that important. Mages have low base stats already and are easily one-rounded by units who are able to double them, and units like the Pegasus Knights also have good enough Res to bait them if you truly need someone to do that.

I get the feeling that we're playing different games, since mine seems to have enough of them for my other units to worry about.

1 hour ago, JuMs said:

Healing staves are nice, but there are already other staff units at that point who can heal and also have a much better shot at reaching a good staff rank for Physic and even Warp. When you also factor in the fact that this consumes Lilina's turn and means she can't attack, it's not worth it to promote her for staves when you can just deploy units who can use more staves than her to save up on deployment slots. You rarely need more than one or two staff units anyway, and at least one of them is mainly for warping.

Wow, that's quite the insult to Saul/Ellen/Clarine, since they're not attacking until they promote (never mind the fact that Ellen/Clarine are even more paper-thin than Lilina when it comes to tanking physical hits).

So your staffbot is Saul, then.

1 hour ago, JuMs said:

She isn't the worst, there are definitely worse units than her, such as Wendy, Barth, and Sophia.

Your original claim: "Lilina is a garbage unit, and contributes about as much as Roy".

1 hour ago, JuMs said:

"Playing to her strengths" is where I have issues, because as previously stated, she doesn't have many strengths, and most of what she does have is either an unimportant strength or something that other units do better. She also has no major or unique utility and is foot-locked in a game that heavily emphasizes movement and rescuing. Besides that, "playing to her strengths" also means having to shield her from just about everything on enemy phase, something that the majority of other units don't need. Less enemy phase action = less combat. Less combat = less overall contribution. Less overall contribution = less usefulness.

Hitting Res.  Hitting Res hard.  Hitting Res hard and probably getting away with it because not every enemy has a Javelin.  Unimportant.

I think we have vastly different definitions of the word "unimportant".

Movement's nice, but not the end-all of everything.  Ditto rescuing, though mine is usually "keep Roy away from the thing with the Steel Lance, because it makes him cry".

1 hour ago, JuMs said:

Again, since she'd not doubling, her damage output still isn't great, and not being able to handle enemy phases also means less damage dealt, so it seems she doesn't do her main job very well.

That's it, numbers time.  In spoilers.
 

Spoiler

 

I'm going to take Chapter 16 HM.  I'm also going to assume that Lilina's 20/1 for the sake of  my sanity.  That gives her 22 base Atk, 11-12 Skl (80% chance for 12 Skl), and 13-14 Spd (65% chance of 14 Spd) for offense, and 27-28 HP, 13-14 Lck, 4-5 Def (probably 5), and 15-16 Res.

Of the enemies:

- Mages don't double her (11-13 AS), and she's 3HKO by them at absolute worst-case scenario.  It'll most likely be a 4HKO.  She, in turn, will 2-3HKO them with Fire.  Except that jerk with Bolting.  Do mind him!

- The fastest armor has 5 AS, and the most Res they get is 2.  She doubles and kills all of them.

- Mercs are fast (16 AS), but they can't double her.  Furthermore, she isn't OHKO'd by them (22-24 Atk, and she has 27 HP).  The only one she needs to worry about is the guy with the Killing Edge, and that's assuming he gets the crit (but let's be real, if he's being baited, it's going to be against someone who can actually take the crit).  She'll have ~80% hit rate on them, for a 2HKO (43 HP and 5 Res at max).  The lance equivalent of a 2HKO requires 31 total Atk (30 since you'll have WTA, so it's a split between the unit's strength and their weapon).

- With 8 AS and 2 Res, she doubles and kills all the fighters.

- She's not going to put gigantic dents in the Bishops, but they're going to tickle her in response.

- The Sniper with the Silver Bow can OHKO her unless she gets that extra HP point.  The one with the Steel Bow can't.  She'll put a sizeable dent in them, but there's better ways of dealing with them.

- She can safely snipe the Manaketes.  Not that you want any of your units to face 40 Atk!

- That Paladin sucks no matter how you cut it, but she'll survive a hit from him.

- The reinforcements are mostly the same.

Her absolute worst-case in terms of damage is against the Bishops, followed by the Paladin, then the Snipers.  After that, the enemies either can't counter, die in 2 hits, or both.  Hardly what i call bad damage output!

 

 

1 hour ago, JuMs said:

Yeah, Binding Blade doesn't need an overwhelming stat advantage for units to do well. But you know what it does need? Units who don't get one-rounded by nearly every enemy in the game and need an angelic robe to survive a single enemy.

Just to highlight this, you're still giving Lilina special treatment here. Discussing Lilina isn't quite enough to show how bad she is, hence why I compare her to other units, since it's less important to consider the good qualities of one unit alone than to consider how many of those qualities are actually important or if there are other options that perform better then them.

Nearly every enemy in the game?  Only around the time she's first recruited.  Once her HP growth kicks in (which is absolutely hilarious to say when it's at 45%), she'll be able to survive a bit better.  Assuming you're not leaving her out to dry in the first place.

I think hard, accurate chip damage is important, because I don't need to worry about leaving her open if everything else is dead.  If feeding her kills is considered favoritism, then I'm going to argue the same for every other unit (especially Shanna, whose HP/Def growths are the same as LIlina's).  The closest would be that Robe, followed by a Speedwings/Dracoshield - but again, your argument is that Lilina is garbage, which she's clearly not.

Edited November 22, 2020 by eclipse

[Shanty Pete's 1st Mate]

4 hours ago, JuMs said:

Here's one: Lilina is a garbage unit and contributes about as much as Roy.

Is this take even hot? My impression was, she's generally regarded as like a 2/5 unit. Maybe low-C, high-D on a tier list. That she's worse than Lugh, because she's slower, joins later, and will take longer to promote and get staves. But I don't really know.

Also, she definitely contributes less than Roy. Because you need Roy to sieze to progress in the game. Which may not make him a "good" unit, but certainly makes him a "crucial" one, in a way that Lilina is not.

[Shrimpica]

Since i've been replaying Conquest lately, i gotta say...

I reallly really want Attack stance to return one day in some form. It's really really fun playing around that. 

While i am not a big fan of Defence Stance, it could return without the stat boosts, just as a way to counter attack stance and a movement tool (since good old rescue is never returning or something)

[eclipse]

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

Is this take even hot? My impression was, she's generally regarded as like a 2/5 unit. Maybe low-C, high-D on a tier list. That she's worse than Lugh, because she's slower, joins later, and will take longer to promote and get staves. But I don't really know.

Also, she definitely contributes less than Roy. Because you need Roy to sieze to progress in the game. Which may not make him a "good" unit, but certainly makes him a "crucial" one, in a way that Lilina is not.

She's okayish, if you're not going pure LTC.  If you are, then she'll chip a few times in 8/8x or something like that.  But then a lot more of the cast is ignored.

[That One Trec Stan]

 

11 minutes ago, eclipse said:

And you think that adding thought to final positioning won't be able to accomplish the same thing?

No, I'd just rather not waste another unit's turn having to rescue and drop Lilina out of the way when there are other units who can survive and keep a better action economy.

13 minutes ago, eclipse said:

Numbers always help an argument.  You'll have to excuse the formatting, this was done on an older version of the forum software, and the update broke the topic.

Fair enough, but let me just say that saying she gets one-rounded by everything is just used to make a point. I realize this may create misunderstandings with my argument, but I'm just saying that she's still way more fragile than other units and needs more babying and special protection.

16 minutes ago, eclipse said:

Imagine the horror of having Lilina and Roy stand together for a single turn.  Which is exactly how long it takes to get their C support (+5 hit and a bunch of other things she appreciates).

But you specifically mention the A support, which will take longer to build. Yes, it is a very fast support compared to most, but it's not like the A support is a huge game-changer for her either, compared to other units.

18 minutes ago, eclipse said:

I thought you were the one that wanted to do things quickly?  And what faster way is there than a two-range unit on a horse that doesn't count as a horse?

Sacae may technically be faster, but is also more difficult and requires more specific strategies for efficiency. When I say "efficiency," I'm not referring to super rigged LTCs or anything, I'm referring to strategies that will generally yield a lower turn count without any rigging or meticulous planning for every chapter from the very beginning. If we're talking about strict LTC strats, they don't apply as well since those use rigging, and almost anyone can be good with rigging.

21 minutes ago, eclipse said:

I get the feeling that we're playing different games, since mine seems to have enough of them for my other units to worry about.

I'm confused by your phrasing of this? It's hard to tell what you mean.

21 minutes ago, eclipse said:

Wow, that's quite the insult to Saul/Ellen/Clarine, since they're not attacking until they promote (never mind the fact that Ellen/Clarine are even more paper-thin than Lilina when it comes to tanking physical hits).

So your staffbot is Saul, then.

Again, I'm confused by this. I'm saying Lilina as a staff bot isn't worth deploying because doing so means she can't attack, and since she doesn't do enemy phase very well that can mean a lot. And don't forget my emphasis on having E staves in FE6. Yeah, usually my staffbot is Saul. What I'm trying to point out here is that the actual staff units make way better use of staves than Lilina, and her getting staves adds very little to her prowess.

24 minutes ago, eclipse said:

Your original claim: "Lilina is a garbage unit, and contributes about as much as Roy".

And how exactly do I contradict this? I said she's a garbage unit, AKA not worth using and slows down progress. I never said she was among the absolute worst like Wendy, and I don't think Roy falls along those lines either.

26 minutes ago, eclipse said:

Hitting Res.  Hitting Res hard.  Hitting Res hard and probably getting away with it because not every enemy has a Javelin.  Unimportant.

I think we have vastly different definitions of the word "unimportant".

Fair point, she does deal good damage with that one hit that she actually lands, but again, attacking with her often requires inputting more actions and wasting turns from your mounted units to move her out of the way. With the right weapons, anyone can still do good damage, and when you really need to do heavy damage, there are still units like Rutger who can double reliably and frequently crit, and Fir also doubles pretty reliably with training, plus her hard mode bonuses means she isn't that bad at base level either (there are others, but this is just to name a couple).

 

30 minutes ago, eclipse said:

That's it, numbers time.  In spoilers.
 

Spoiler

I'm going to take Chapter 16 HM.  I'm also going to assume that Lilina's 20/1 for the sake of  my sanity.  That gives her 22 base Atk, 11-12 Skl (80% chance for 12 Skl), and 13-14 Spd (65% chance of 14 Spd) for offense, and 27-28 HP, 13-14 Lck, 4-5 Def (probably 5), and 15-16 Res.

Of the enemies:

- Mages don't double her (11-13 AS), and she's 3HKO by them at absolute worst-case scenario.  It'll most likely be a 4HKO.  She, in turn, will 2-3HKO them with Fire.  Except that jerk with Bolting.  Do mind him!

- The fastest armor has 5 AS, and the most Res they get is 2.  She doubles and kills all of them.

- Mercs are fast (16 AS), but they can't double her.  Furthermore, she isn't OHKO'd by them (22-24 Atk, and she has 27 HP).  The only one she needs to worry about is the guy with the Killing Edge, and that's assuming he gets the crit (but let's be real, if he's being baited, it's going to be against someone who can actually take the crit).  She'll have ~80% hit rate on them, for a 2HKO (43 HP and 5 Res at max).  The lance equivalent of a 2HKO requires 31 total Atk (30 since you'll have WTA, so it's a split between the unit's strength and their weapon).

- With 8 AS and 2 Res, she doubles and kills all the fighters.

- She's not going to put gigantic dents in the Bishops, but they're going to tickle her in response.

- The Sniper with the Silver Bow can OHKO her unless she gets that extra HP point.  The one with the Steel Bow can't.  She'll put a sizeable dent in them, but there's better ways of dealing with them.

- She can safely snipe the Manaketes.  Not that you want any of your units to face 40 Atk!

- That Paladin sucks no matter how you cut it, but she'll survive a hit from him.

- The reinforcements are mostly the same.

Her absolute worst-case in terms of damage is against the Bishops, followed by the Paladin, then the Snipers.  After that, the enemies either can't counter, die in 2 hits, or both.  Hardly what i call bad damage output!

There are specific things I could point out here, but I just want to note that this is also assuming Lilina is 20/1, which would mean feeding her kills until she hits level 20 and waiting all the way to that point to finally give her +1 move and staves. This means that you're still dealing with a 5 move, frail, slow unit with no utility for the last 8 chapters. If not for Lilina, you could be focusing on other units, such as your cavs, since they have more utility than her and are better at base level.

37 minutes ago, eclipse said:

Nearly every enemy in the game?  Only around the time she's first recruited.  Once her HP growth kicks in (which is absolutely hilarious to say when it's at 45%), she'll be able to survive a bit better.  Assuming you're not leaving her out to dry in the first place.

Fair enough. Again, I was exaggerating to prove my point, but I understand that it makes my argument sound less like what I actually mean. I just mean that she's more frail than average, and not being able to sustain many physical attacks is still an issue.

39 minutes ago, eclipse said:

I think hard, accurate chip damage is important, because I don't need to worry about leaving her open if everything else is dead.

Accurate chip damage is good, but you also have other units who can chip accurately, like Shin and Sue, as well as really good effective weaponry for your mounted units, including horseslayers. FE6's enemy quality is still high enough that it's not like her contributions are going to change everything, though. Since Guiding Rings are also limited, she has trouble promoting at a convenient time while also leaving your army better off, since Saul/Clarine and Lugh arguably bring more benefit with it than she does.

42 minutes ago, eclipse said:

If feeding her kills is considered favoritism, then I'm going to argue the same for every other unit (especially Shanna, whose HP/Def growths are the same as LIlina's).

It isn't just about feeding her kills, it's also considering who you'd be taking kills away from, and in Lilina's case, it's mostly early units who have important leads against her in speed and bulk and reach level 10 much faster. Shanna is also different in that she has more utility and versatility with her pegasus and 7 move, as well as better availability. This means that feeding kills to her is much easier and will arguably pay off more since she has better movement and more time around. Let's also add, I'm not specifically saying you should feed kills to Shanna, because she's already great by default thanks to her class and availability, whereas Lilina relies on stats and good levels.

[That One Trec Stan]

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

Is this take even hot? My impression was, she's generally regarded as like a 2/5 unit. Maybe low-C, high-D on a tier list. That she's worse than Lugh, because she's slower, joins later, and will take longer to promote and get staves. But I don't really know.

Also, she definitely contributes less than Roy. Because you need Roy to sieze to progress in the game. Which may not make him a "good" unit, but certainly makes him a "crucial" one, in a way that Lilina is not.

From what I've seen, even today, a lot of people seem to think that Lilina is a really good unit, and I've even run into some that believe her to be one of the best in the game. Definitely worse than Lugh, for the reasons you mentioned.

Specifically I believe this because I feel like a lot of these claims come from hypocrisy that stems from the "but they were really good when I played the game" argument, where there are some people who feed all of their resources to one unit or baby them for the whole game and then claim that they're good by default.

I just think Lilina is worse than Roy because he's forced, required to travel across the map, and makes okay use of resources like angelic robes, and because he's actually useful near the end of the game. While being forced in maps doesn't necessarily mean a unit should be used often, I think Roy is at least not a bad contender for some of the early resources, since it makes lugging him around each map less annoying and diffcult.

[Florete]

Lilina has always been regarded as pretty bad as far as I've seen. At the least, I would imagine thinking she's actually good to be considered the unpopular opinion.

[Baldrick]

38 minutes ago, JuMs said:

From what I've seen, even today, a lot of people seem to think that Lilina is a really good unit, and I've even run into some that believe her to be one of the best in the game. Definitely worse than Lugh, for the reasons you mentioned.

I have a fairly high opinion of her, but I wouldn’t go that far. 

38 minutes ago, JuMs said:

I just think Lilina is worse than Roy because he's forced, required to travel across the map, 

That’s a bad thing. If neither is worth investment, the former can be left for dead or benched forever, whereas the latter needs to escorted across the map and makes the game harder by existing.

38 minutes ago, JuMs said:

and because he's actually useful near the end of the game.

Most of your army should be able to explode dragons at that point, whereas Lilina’s accurate res-targeting chip is a lot harder to replicate. If Lilina’s utility does not justify giving her resources, Roy’s utility definitely does not.

38 minutes ago, JuMs said:

While being forced in maps doesn't necessarily mean a unit should be used often, I think Roy is at least not a bad contender for some of the early resources, since it makes lugging him around each map less annoying and diffcult.

But giving him those resources also hurts Alance and other units you’d want to invest in, no?

[joevar]

5 hours ago, JuMs said:

Here's one: Lilina is a garbage unit and contributes about as much as Roy.

LIlina not the best unit? sure, the limited promotion item, join right after you pass the arena, with lvl 1 no less. but treating her as garbage? by that definition more than half are garbage, and i assume its for LTC run that you care so much about availability. since people thats not a diehard LTC runner would compare her when Lilina catch up a bit. She can contribute more to kill bulky in later half of the game enemy since the higher tiered character are mostly non magic

i actually find Lugh not performing well enough compared to her in later half even tho both are promoted and lvled up

and why would you compare her with roy? she's not Lord character..

but since its unpopular opinion. i have to agree 😄

[eclipse]

1 hour ago, JuMs said:

No, I'd just rather not waste another unit's turn having to rescue and drop Lilina out of the way when there are other units who can survive and keep a better action economy.

Rolling offense.  That means your back row attacks the weakened enemies, then your front row advances.  If anything, Lilina's more likely to be left behind.  Which may or may not be a bad thing, depending on the reinforcement pattern.

1 hour ago, JuMs said:

Fair enough, but let me just say that saying she gets one-rounded by everything is just used to make a point. I realize this may create misunderstandings with my argument, but I'm just saying that she's still way more fragile than other units and needs more babying and special protection.

It has to do with enemy scaling.  They hit hard initially, but their defenses ramp harder than their offenses (note how Chapter 16 enemies had ~7-8 more MT compared to their Chapter 8 counterparts, but far more HP alongside gains in Def/Res).  Thus, you'll want just enough defense to survive, and offense to counter that defensive buff.

1 hour ago, JuMs said:

But you specifically mention the A support, which will take longer to build. Yes, it is a very fast support compared to most, but it's not like the A support is a huge game-changer for her either, compared to other units.

1/15/20, to be precise.  Again, unless you're doing strict LTC, you'll have some dead turns (did I mention that the water stage can drown?).  If you're worried about her accuracy, it's nice.  She also has quite a few options, which can help her bulk (I still think Cecilia's her best option in terms of overall stats, even if they have different move types).

1 hour ago, JuMs said:

Sacae may technically be faster, but is also more difficult and requires more specific strategies for efficiency. When I say "efficiency," I'm not referring to super rigged LTCs or anything, I'm referring to strategies that will generally yield a lower turn count without any rigging or meticulous planning for every chapter from the very beginning. If we're talking about strict LTC strats, they don't apply as well since those use rigging, and almost anyone can be good with rigging.

Strict LTC means that your unit pool is VERY limited, and Lilina's one of many units that will be outright ignored.  Efficiency depends on what you're going for, with some of the riskier strats involving RNG rigging for dodgetanking/crit dodging.

1 hour ago, JuMs said:

I'm confused by your phrasing of this? It's hard to tell what you mean.

Mages.  A lot of melee units don't like them.  Some magical ones don't, either.

1 hour ago, JuMs said:

Again, I'm confused by this. I'm saying Lilina as a staff bot isn't worth deploying because doing so means she can't attack, and since she doesn't do enemy phase very well that can mean a lot. And don't forget my emphasis on having E staves in FE6. Yeah, usually my staffbot is Saul. What I'm trying to point out here is that the actual staff units make way better use of staves than Lilina, and her getting staves adds very little to her prowess.

It's a means of getting EXP, even if she can't reach the front lines.  Non-promoted staffbots, by their very nature, will be worse than any combat unit due to their complete inability to attack back.  And in Ellen/Clarine's case, they face very real OHKO possibilities.  In other words, if you can protect them, you can do something about Lilina.

(but again, let's be real, the best staffbots don't need a promotion item)

1 hour ago, JuMs said:

And how exactly do I contradict this? I said she's a garbage unit, AKA not worth using and slows down progress. I never said she was among the absolute worst like Wendy, and I don't think Roy falls along those lines either.

Roy has the same movement as Lilina and is mostly locked to melee.  AND faces WTD against a common weapon type.

1 hour ago, JuMs said:

Fair point, she does deal good damage with that one hit that she actually lands, but again, attacking with her often requires inputting more actions and wasting turns from your mounted units to move her out of the way. With the right weapons, anyone can still do good damage, and when you really need to do heavy damage, there are still units like Rutger who can double reliably and frequently crit, and Fir also doubles pretty reliably with training, plus her hard mode bonuses means she isn't that bad at base level either (there are others, but this is just to name a couple).

Lilina's hit chances are higher than anyone's crit chances.  Hit is 2RN, crit is 1RN.

Man, I have a lot to say about Fir - she's basically Rutger recruited a bunch of chapters later.  But alas, this isn't the time.

1 hour ago, JuMs said:

There are specific things I could point out here, but I just want to note that this is also assuming Lilina is 20/1, which would mean feeding her kills until she hits level 20 and waiting all the way to that point to finally give her +1 move and staves. This means that you're still dealing with a 5 move, frail, slow unit with no utility for the last 8 chapters. If not for Lilina, you could be focusing on other units, such as your cavs, since they have more utility than her and are better at base level.

Last run I had, the only one who was outpacing Lilina in terms of chip was Shin.  Cavs had shakier hit rates (~70%) and faced something like a 3HKO, which meant that whittling away HP for free was more than welcome.

(it would've been Lugh, but someone else killed him off for me. . .and later on, someone else killed off Treck)

1 hour ago, JuMs said:

Fair enough. Again, I was exaggerating to prove my point, but I understand that it makes my argument sound less like what I actually mean. I just mean that she's more frail than average, and not being able to sustain many physical attacks is still an issue.

For a backline unit, she's not bad - not the most frail, but definitely doesn't have the bulk of a melee unit.  Then again, the best staffbot has 25 HP/5 DEF and is probably not gaining more of either.

1 hour ago, JuMs said:

Accurate chip damage is good, but you also have other units who can chip accurately, like Shin and Sue, as well as really good effective weaponry for your mounted units, including horseslayers. FE6's enemy quality is still high enough that it's not like her contributions are going to change everything, though. Since Guiding Rings are also limited, she has trouble promoting at a convenient time while also leaving your army better off, since Saul/Clarine and Lugh arguably bring more benefit with it than she does.

Of the Guiding Ring candidates, I'd argue that it's Lugh, followed by everyone else.  Ellen/Clarine are even more frail than Lilina (never mind their weapon ranks), and Saul's luck becomes an issue once he starts seeing more combat.  Sophia's only job is to net the Guiding Ring, Hugh costs money on top of a Guiding Ring, and Raigh is debatable (I like him, but there's a better argument for skipping him).  Lilina gains enough HP/Spd to not worry so much about dying, and becomes pretty potent with only a Heal staff.

I'm also of a mind that Armorslayers are far less effective than a fireball cast by anyone (even Clarine).  Wyrmslayers have some competition in the form of an entire weapon type and Aircalibur.  Effective axes are a nice thought, but the fun part is getting them to hit their target (if mages are considered inaccurate, then these weapons are measurably worse).  Horseslayers are great when they're necessary, because lategame Paladins are annoying.

1 hour ago, JuMs said:

It isn't just about feeding her kills, it's also considering who you'd be taking kills away from, and in Lilina's case, it's mostly early units who have important leads against her in speed and bulk and reach level 10 much faster. Shanna is also different in that she has more utility and versatility with her pegasus and 7 move, as well as better availability. This means that feeding kills to her is much easier and will arguably pay off more since she has better movement and more time around. Let's also add, I'm not specifically saying you should feed kills to Shanna, because she's already great by default thanks to her class and availability, whereas Lilina relies on stats and good levels.

Chip produces EXP, too.

Promotion is a tricky issue, since it's a one-time gain over reduced EXP gain.  I use it when needed, which is why it's not uncommon for me to promote at level 15+.  If a unit can do its job unpromoted, then there's no reason to shank my EXP gains.  Staffbots are the exception to this, as they gain a better source of EXP in the form of combat.

If you're using Shanna as a flying rescuebot, then she becomes dead weight later on.  Your horses can probably pull the same thing, and don't die the minute an archer appears on the map.  She'll need kills.  One day, I'll get one that isn't a complete disappointment (mostly because I get Melady later).

[joevar]

5 hours ago, JuMs said:

Besides being a garbage unit, I don't think Lilina is very interesting as a character, either. She's compassionate, sure, but is there really much more to her? Her trait of seeing her knights as equals can be said about just about every lord in the series. Roy at least has a neat character arc where he starts off as a helpless young boy and ends up as a powerful general who learns to command a large army. I can't even say that much about Lilina. I've genuinely tried to come up with an interesting part of her character and come up with nothing. She's not the worst, but I can't see what kind of depth she's supposed to have.

now why this complaint  come up coupled with her unit stat argument?

look at that bold words. you said a good thing, while saying its nothing in same paragraphs. you're close to ranting like someone who hated her getting some favoritism.

she recruited two of the most old + ugly character in BB that start as enemy you know.. no one in Roy army insane enough to do that, lol

[That One Trec Stan]

8 minutes ago, joevar said:

now why this complaint  come up coupled with her unit stat argument?

Because it’s on the topic of Lilina. I wanted to just add it because I think it’s also an unpopular opinion, more unpopular than saying she’s a bad unit.

9 minutes ago, joevar said:

you said a good thing, while saying its nothing in same paragraphs. you're close to ranting like someone who hated her getting some favoritism.

I just disagree with people who say that she’s super interesting. Trust me, I’m not the type of person to go ranting because someone else likes a character or uses a bad unit, I’m just talking about this because I don’t find her interesting, which is an unpopular opinion.

10 minutes ago, joevar said:

she recruited two of the most old + ugly character in BB that start as enemy you know.. no one in Roy army insane enough to do that, lol

True, but did she recruit the greatest characters in fiction, Trec and Noah? Didn’t think so 😎

Seriously this time, that is a good point, I just personally don’t care for Lilina as a character and I don’t find her interactions interesting. People are free to disagree with me though. Where I have a problem is people that claim Lilina is objectively good because of their bias towards her in gameplay, because there really isn’t a perfect “objective” way to rank a unit, and I have a problem with people who claim that units like Lilina are “objectively” good when it partially comes down to playstyle and personal experience.

[joevar]

18 minutes ago, JuMs said:

Because it’s on the topic of Lilina. I wanted to just add it because I think it’s also an unpopular opinion, more unpopular than saying she’s a bad unit.

I just disagree with people who say that she’s super interesting. Trust me, I’m not the type of person to go ranting because someone else likes a character or uses a bad unit, I’m just talking about this because I don’t find her interesting, which is an unpopular opinion.

True, but did she recruit the greatest characters in fiction, Trec and Noah? Didn’t think so 😎

Seriously this time, that is a good point, I just personally don’t care for Lilina as a character and I don’t find her interactions interesting. People are free to disagree with me though. Where I have a problem is people that claim Lilina is objectively good because of their bias towards her in gameplay, because there really isn’t a perfect “objective” way to rank a unit, and I have a problem with people who claim that units like Lilina are “objectively” good when it partially comes down to playstyle and personal experience.

no objection about trec and noah being good character. but they recruit themselves into Roy army. if anything its Eliwood/hector (cant remember which) who recruit them by making contract.
but dont you find it funny/weird that teenager girl is the one who recruit those guy, and she's the one who have too many conversation with old man (gonzales, garret, marcus, astolfo, barth?). not even Roy care to do that. hence why i said she (borderline) insane.
or (yes, this part fall into favoritism, and nonsensical) its actually in line with how she taught, that hector will die horrible death someday, and she need to learn to manage the state fast by learning to socialize with older man

i like her, but didnt put her in S/A list either

[Florete]

1 hour ago, Baldrick said:

Most of your army should be able to explode dragons at that point, whereas Lilina’s accurate res-targeting chip is a lot harder to replicate. If Lilina’s utility does not justify giving her resources, Roy’s utility definitely does not.

Lilina is not especially accurate, though. Her Skl is bad, her Luck is only decent, and she doesn't get weapon triangle boosts on the physical enemies she's strongest against.

She's no Gonzales (in practice, that is; her Skl is on his level, but her weapons are more accurate), but her accuracy is nothing to boast about.

[Jotari]

Yeah I'm going to echo the sentiment that thinking Lilina is good is the true hot take. She's generally regarded as pretty bad. Yet she is stilla  pretty popular unit. I've talked about this somewhere before recently but I can't remember where. Basically my opinion is that casual players are likely to enjoy using her a lot more than serious (ie LTC/Draft) players. That's because she can become good with some minor investment. And investment that isn't all that highly contested (no one is really going to be wanting Secret Books as much as her, unless you really want to train up a mono axe user, and the units she contests with Roy aren't anything to write home about aside from the cavaliers who will be out pacing his movement anyway).  As a filthy casual I have used Lilina and she has contributed decently to my army. Probably not as good as Lugh, but that still leaves her better than pretty much every other mage in the game who joins way later than her (Hugh), uses awful dark magic (Sophia, Raigh) or is basically a staff bot that got light magic on promotion.

Edited November 23, 2020 by Jotari

[Baldrick]

3 hours ago, Florete said:

Lilina is not especially accurate, 

Fire has 95 hit, she has enough strength growth that one should never feel the need to give her any other tome, and she has access to a fast support with the lord, who has the same move as her, that boosts accuracy by up to 15. In the context of FE6, she can absolutely boast about her accuracy.

[Axie]

no one has thought lilina is a very good unit in BinBla [still making this happen] since the pre-efficiency days when lugh vs lilina mattered lol

her stat spread (enormous magic, low speed and defense) has been repeated many times since then and the degree of success depends almost entirely on how nice the game is to that. which, BinBla is not, but lilina is still redeemable since anima is so good in that game

[null]

I have no idea how unpopular this is, but hey.

I think that FE8 actually has one of the better, or more cohesive narratives in the series. I know it's nothing spectacular or unique, but I think the lords and the remaining cast of characters are all portrayed in a way that really makes sense in relation to the overall story. While I wouldn't say the cast of characters is as memorable to me as FE7's cast when taken as a whole, I think that they're woven into the story a bit better than the cast of FE7 was. As to protagonists, I actually find that I like Eirika more than any of the FE7 lords (in Lyn's case, this is due to her relevance to the story basically ending at Ch. 10), and I appreciate her arc (including the scene with Lyon). Again, this may not be that unpopular, but I get the idea from other FE fans that Sacred Stones is pretty unmemorable overall. I actually liked it quite a bit, personally. It's definitely no Tellius, but I think it's quite good in its own right.

Edited November 25, 2020 by twilitfalchion

[Axie]

7 hours ago, twilitfalchion said:

I have no idea how unpopular this is, but hey.

I think that FE8 actually has one of the better, or more cohesive narratives in the series. I know it's nothing spectacular or unique, but I think the lords and the remaining cast of characters are all portrayed in a way that really makes sense in relation to the overall story. While I wouldn't say the cast of characters is as memorable to me as FE7's cast when taken as a whole, I think that they're woven into the story a bit better than the cast of FE7 was. As to protagonists, I actually find that I like Eirika more than any of the FE7 lords (in Lyn's case, this is due to her relevance to the story basically ending at Ch. 10), and I appreciate her arc (including the scene with Lyon). Again, this may not be that unpopular, but I get the idea from other FE fans that Sacred Stones is pretty unmemorable overall. I actually liked it quite a bit, personally. It's definitely no Tellius, but I think it's quite good in its own right.

oh, i definitely agree. most criticism of sacred stones seems to conflate "eirika does bad decisions" with "eirika is badly written", anyway. i wish she was portrayed in a more empowering way, but give me her restrained and mistake-ridden but ultimately meaningful arc over blazing blade hoodwinking you into buying a story where pretty much nothing ever actually happened ever.

i think this used to be the popular opinion five years ago, though. it seems to be recent that we have reversed back to BlaBla's story [yes i did it] being more enjoyed than SS's.

[Etrurian emperor]

7 hours ago, twilitfalchion said:

I have no idea how unpopular this is, but hey.

I think that FE8 actually has one of the better, or more cohesive narratives in the series. I know it's nothing spectacular or unique, but I think the lords and the remaining cast of characters are all portrayed in a way that really makes sense in relation to the overall story. While I wouldn't say the cast of characters is as memorable to me as FE7's cast when taken as a whole, I think that they're woven into the story a bit better than the cast of FE7 was. As to protagonists, I actually find that I like Eirika more than any of the FE7 lords (in Lyn's case, this is due to her relevance to the story basically ending at Ch. 10), and I appreciate her arc (including the scene with Lyon). Again, this may not be that unpopular, but I get the idea from other FE fans that Sacred Stones is pretty unmemorable overall. I actually liked it quite a bit, personally. It's definitely no Tellius, but I think it's quite good in its own right.

The story of Stones is very fine. It rarely screws up and its got quite the neat little collection of villains. Lyon especially seems widely appreciated as a villain.

But personally I never really connected much to the story of Stones. I feel there's a lack of ''weight'' behind everything that happens. The Gemstone generals and Lyon are all great but I think the demons and their king are far too boring to be the threat the story needs them to be, and Grado is also rather pitiful as an enemy nation. The world building in general seems pretty terrible which makes it far harder to care about anything that happens.

The story is very cohesive and competently told but its also very conventional and many important factors such as villains and nations are kinda absent.