Garon: King of Nohr

[Mercakete]

So, I've never played his home game, but I like how unique his special weapon is. I was actually able to complete a build for this guy really quickly, so I was excited to show off what I put together for him. I hope you find this helpful, and maybe even inspiring to put together your own Garon!

 

Garon is an infantry red dragonstone user only available as a Grand Hero Battle (GHB) reward at the time of this writing. Therefore, at present, it's only possible to bring him to a maximum of +2, and he's limited to a neutral nature. However, he fills an interesting niche, not only being the first red dragonstone user who isn't Tiki, but also having a unique exclusive weapon which eliminates the "effective against dragons" affect when such weapons are used against him. This weapon, Breath of Blight, also has a secondary affect which triggers automatically on turn 4. It deals 10 damage to foes within 3 spaces, and restores HP to Garon equal to the number of foes within 3 spaces x5. It also carries the passive affect that's becoming more common on special breaths which calculates damage against ranged units using the lower of the foe's Def or Res.

 

Stats (at 5*, lvl 40)

HP: 43, ATK: 33, SPD: 22, DEF: 33, RES: 32

Total: 163

As you can see, Garon has fairly balanced defensive stats. I'm not really an expert on what's amazing and what's mediocre, but from what frame of reference I have, he's a fairly tanky dragon with very good defense and resistance, fair HP and attack (remember, the weapon will add to the effective attack), and kind of low speed.

 

Starting Kit (that is, the base skills Garon comes with without having to inherit anything)

Weapons: Fire Breath, Fire Breath+, Flametongue, Breath of Blight (this last one is unique to him at the time of this writing)

Assists: N/A (Not a very helpful guy by nature)

Specials: Dragon Gaze, Dragon Fang

Passives: Distant Defense 1-3 (A passive), Panic Ploy 1-3 (C passive)

 

Builds

Epidemic Feast

This first build focuses on enhancing the effects of this special weapon: dealing damage outside of combat, restoring Garon's HP, and being able to counter ranged enemies.

Weapon: Breath of Blight

Assist: Swap/other

Special: Aether/Sol/Noontime

Passive A: Distant Counter/Distant Defense 3

Passive B: Poison Strike 3/Renewal 3

Passive C: Savage Blow 3/Dragon skill (if on dragon team)

Seal: Savage Blow 3

Investment: high

Best use: versatile/best for player phase or mixed phase teams/high enemy count

Indeed, this is an expensive build. Not even counting the amount of SP you'll need to spend on this build, it requires a 5* Chrom: Exalted Prince (the easiest unit to get for Aether, all of which need to be 5*) or someone else with Aether to be sacrificed to the King of Nohr. Aether has a whopping 5-turn charge time, but given that it combines Sol and Luna, it has a much higher damage and healing threshold than Sol by itself. Sol does have a shorter charge time (3 turns) and still heals 50% of damage dealt, but that damage isn't enhanced by Luna's effect like it is for Aether. Alternatively, Noontime's turn charge is only 2, but it also only heals 30% of the damage dealt. So, adjust to your preference. For his passive A slot, Garon gets Distant Counter from Hector (either General of Ostia, Just Here to Fight, or Marquess of Ostia -- whoever you have a spare of.) Hectors are hard to come by, though, and there's a lot of demand for this particular skill. So, a decent budget alternative is Garon's native Distant Defense 3. It'll make him tankier against ranged foes, even though he won't be able to hit them back unless he can reach them on the next turn. Distant Counter (DC), however, enables full use of Breath of Blight's effect to hit the lower of a ranged foe's Def or Res. His B passive depends on whether you want to focus on his damage-dealing potential or on his survivability. Renewal 3 best comes from Fae: Divine Dragon, or L'Arachel: Princess of Light, as it comes on them at 4*. Just choose whoever you have extras of and don't plan on using for other skills/merges/etc. This is a good "just in case" for when Garon keeps activating his special on foes with, like, 3HP left or something, ensuring that his HP gets replenished over time with 10HP regenerated every 2nd turn. Poison Strike 3, alternatively, best comes from Saizo: Angry Ninja, as it's available at 4* and doesn't come from a unit with limited copies (like Clarisse: Sniper in the Dark, who also has this skill at 4*, but isn't in the summoning pool at the time of this writing.) This skill inflicts 10 damage to the targetted enemy unit after combat (but doesn't reduce the enemy's HP lower than 1), adding to the amount of out-of-combat damage Garon does to his foes (although this damage is applied at the end of combat, not at the start of the turn, and so does not stack with his unique weapon's ability. However, it's also not limited to activating only at the start of turn 4, making his out-of-combat presence scarier for foes.) For his C passive, I gave him Savage Blow 3 for the same reasons I gave him Poison Strike 3. Both do damage after combat if Garon initiates combat, and these two effects stack. However, Savage blow 3 targets foes within 2 spaces of the target foe after combat, whereas Poison Strike 3 targets only the target foe. Savage Blow 3 also only does 7 damage, but that's to all foes within 2 spaces of the target foe. This skill comes from Camilla: Bewitching Beauty, as it's available to her at 4*. If Garon's on a dragon team, you may prefer to give him Goad/Hone/Fortify/Ward Dragons instead in order to buff his allies. Garon does very well on dragon teams since (if he has Breath of Blight equipped) he isn't affected by the extra damage from dragon-effective weapons (such as Falchion, Naga, and Divine Mist.) Especially with Distant Counter, Naga and Divine Naga troubles are a thing of the past! Realize that you'll be taking away from his individual out-of-combat damage output if you switch his C passive out with a dragon-buffing skill, of course. I gave Garon Savage Blow 3 for his seal, too, since it stacks with the other Savage Blow and Poison Strike. For his assist skill, I gave him Swap because it's helpful for when I want to get someone out of the way and works well in tight spaces. Garon, generally speaking, can take a hit, after all (and it makes shielding his dragon allies that much easier,) but feel free to replace this with your favorite/most helpful assist skills. If you want Swap, the following units have it at 3* and are in the general summoning pool: Seth: Silver Knight, Subaki: Perfect Expert, Stahl: Viridian Knight, and Arthur: Hapless Hero. This build makes turn 4 guaranteed to be painful for all the foes Garon faces, especially if there are a lot of them surrounding him. He has a very good chance of surviving such encounters as well, makes a great ally for fellow dragons, and makes full use of his special weapon's abilities.

 

Credits: feheroes on gamepedia is amazing and helpful for making sure I have accurate lists here.

Edited October 18, 2018 by Mercakete

[Ice Dragon]

I haven't gotten around to reading everything, but it would probably help to do some formatting to make things look prettier.

On not-mobile, you can use Shift+Enter to insert a new line without starting a new paragraph, which will get rid of the space between lines for things that don't need the extra space (such as where you're listing skills).

You can also break up the write-up portion into paragraphs or even add sub-headers to make it more easily digestible.

 

As for the build itself, I highly suggest Quick Riposte on Garon regardless of the rest of his build (either in the B slot or the Sacred Seal slot) to give him more damage output potential and charge his Special faster.

Oh, and you'll probably want to call out in the thread title that this thread is for a single build and is not meant to be a complete analysis.

Edited October 18, 2018 by Ice Dragon