AnonymousSpeed Posted July 8, 2019 Share Posted July 8, 2019 (edited) Niime, the Mountain Hermit, is a grouchy groucher. She's a bitter, nagging old woman. I was a little surprised this isn't played more comedically in her supports, it's really only with Hugh you really get to see that, which is a bit disappointing because her constantly berating her grandson is funny. Yet she also shows that maternal caring which any good grouchy grandma character needs. Another support I like is her Fa support. Niime's research makes her rightly worried about the power of dragons and she considers Fa a potential threat needing to be kept under watch. Through her observations though, Niime learns that she needn't worry about the innocent manakete, showing that same caring aspect. The last support of hers I really like is her Yoder support too, but mostly for what it does for Yoder. *** Now for her uses as a unit. Joining at the start of Chapter 19 (Illia) / 20 (Sacae), Niime doesn't have a lot of the game left to contribute. She more than makes up for it with how much she can do in that span of time, though. Let's take a look at her joining stats. Because her growths are awful and she joins at level 18, we will assume these don't improve much. Her massive 21 base magic means she has an excellent 15 range with range staves, allowing her to reach basically wherever she needs to. Meanwhile, her initial A rank in staves lets her use every staff but the Saint Staff at base. This is an incredibly powerful combination which gives Niime the highest staff utility of every unit in the game. She can use her incredibly physic range to heal any ally who needs it. You can make aggressive pushes into enemy lines, take out key targets, and rely on Niime to heal off any damage taken from a safe distance. Such a potent physic user increases the reliability of all strategies, and provides a safety net for daring gambits, which increases the rate at which your army can move forward. In addition to being your best physic user, Niime is your best status staff user as well. She can berserk, silence, and sleep halfway across the map right out of the gate. You can use these to neutralize those pesky status staff Druids (hah!), or you can use Berserk to wear down difficult enemy formations before you need to get in range of them. The winding halls of Chapter 22 come to mind as an excellent place to utilize these advantages. Hard Mode Heroes are terrifying, so why not turn some of that terrifying power against your other enemies? Icing on the status staff is that Niime's high magic makes her pretty accurate with these staves. Lastly and most importantly, Niime is the best warp user in the game. I don't think we need to repeat all the advantages of Warp. Instead, I'd like to reiterate that Niime can use warp with 15 range and no investment at all, which is leagues better than any potential rival warper can do. Niime would be incredible even if she was staff-locked, but she also has access to dark magic and is sufficiently effective with it. I'll be using the enemies in Chapter 21 as a general indication of the kinds of enemies Niime will be encountering. This is my statistical reference: Niime only needs a seraph robe to avoid be one-shot by most of these enemies. The only notable exception is the Wyvern Lords, but they tear up everyone, and a second Seraph Robe solves that problem if you really need Niime to enemy phase Wyvern Lords. You shouldn't need her too, so I don't consider it an issue. You might say that not getting killed in one isn't fantastic durability, especially when Niime still gets two-shot by most enemies. Thankfully, nosferatu is really good in this game. If Niime gets hit, she can heal herself to full or nearly full on counter attack, due to her massive magic stat and poor enemy resistance. Tomes have an actual reasonable weight in FE6, so Niime only looses 2 AS when equipped with Nosferatu. This gives her a fairly decent 14 attack speed, which is enough to avoid getting doubled by most enemies, including a few of the Chapter 22 heroes. She even doubles a few (such as Steel Lance wyvern riders), and most enemies which Niime hits twice are dead. Nostanking and not getting doubled greatly improve Niime's durability, but she admittedly can get worn down, as some enemies do deal more damage than they take in return. Thankfully, Niime has 43 avoid before terrain with Nosferaru equipped. It's common for many of these enemies to have ~100 hit, some even lower than that. Niime should be able to dodge enough attacks to avoid death by a thousand cuts, especially if placed on a forest. All of this is mostly to say that you can bring Niime close to the front and she'll survive. Her decent combat is great to have because it enables her to be rescue dropped over a mountain or moved much closer to enemy lines. This artificially increases her staff range. The fact that she can sit on rough terrain and wear down a swarm of enemies is a bonus, but it's the positioning options it opens up which are the real treasures. She can move closer to where she needs to warp to, or inch into enemy range so she can put an enemy in Sleep range. Late game chapters consist of: Get close enough to the throne Warp boss killer Dance Warp Roy Seize Niime doesn't have to worry to much about you clearing all the enemies out in the process of step one. A few additional notes about using Niime in combat. She uses tomes, consistent 1-2 range which is much more accurate than javelins. Because she has such high magic and hits such low resistance, she deals absurd damage, and is decently fast to boot. This means that Niime can offer solid support in battle in addition to being a top-tier staff bot, while Percival will only ever have uses in combat and rescue-dropping. Her combat ability also allows her to hit S Dark (for Apocalypse use) without too much trouble. That gives her +5 magic, bringing her to 18 staff range, a nice little bonus for the last few chapters. Lastly, I'd like to reiterate that Niime's big selling point isn't her combat, it's something far more unique to her. I admit that there are better frontline units. Lance, Allen, Miledy, and even Percival are better choices to take on the hoards. What Niime offers is unmatched staff utility. There is no list of units followed by "and even Niime," with the arguable exception of Yoder, who isn't around as long and doesn't have as much staff range. Saul and Ellen aren't going to hit 21 magic and Lilina isn't going to hit A staves. Niime does both right out of the box. You can substitute units for Percival, but you can't really do that with Niime. *** This took me longer than expect, sorry. @side bee, hope this is a good start. Edited July 9, 2019 by AnonymousSpeed Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
side bee Posted July 10, 2019 Share Posted July 10, 2019 percival is regarded very highly in binding blade. he is, at various points, called narcian's best general, a knight among knights, and the future of etruria incarnate. these titles are not given to him for no reason, however. as a character and as a unit, percival is a beacon of strength and dependability. most of percivals supports discuss his competence or the admiration he is awarded or his stoic demeanor. while many of percivals supports are good, the two id like to specifically draw attention to are klein and dorothys. in percivals supports with klein, we get a glimpse into the type of man percival was prior to the war, prior to etrurias collapse. percival begins by asking klein if klein is comfortable within roys army, then follows by explaining that he cant be fully comfortable within roys ranks, as a knight of etruria. although he never outright says it, he feels he is contributing to the destruction of his home nation by joining up with roy and pals. then, klein asks about percivals favorite foods and whether theyve changed, since the cooks of roys army had expressed confusion and concern over what to feed percival, since he remains absolutely expressionless no matter what he eats. percival explains that his favorite foods have not, in fact, changed. klein then gets to reminiscing on their past, which prompts percival to declare his loyalty to etruria, and to explain that he intends to cut everyone he cant trust to be absolutely loyal to his nation out of his life and dedicate his every waking moment to the reconstruction of etruria, which klein then talks percy down from, reminiscing further on their shared past, where klein could look up to percy as an older brother, and telling percy that he wants to help rebuild etruria with percy, but he wants to do so laughing, and cheerfully. percy takes this into serious consideration. this helps to humanize percival as someone who was not always the stern, stoic general the player would get to see him as otherwise. if it werent for kleins unique past with percy, we likely would have never even heard a small detail like percival having favorite foods or anybody knowing what they are in the first place, as this is a degree of frivolity percival would probably not have tolerated from anybody else. in his dorothy supports, dorothy almost shoots him right away. immediately, percival makes clear to her that its not a big deal, mishaps like this happen all the time. he even takes some of the blame himself, which he probably means in 100% earnest, but its still a nice thing to do. in their next meeting, percival approaches dorothy as she trains, praising her for training and giving her pointers on how to improve her form, specifically mentioning the fact that she tends to get nervous when she shoots, and percival explains to her that she is perfectly safe. she asks if she is of use to him, which he affirms. at long last, dorothy is able to let her fear and inhibition go, and perform on the battlefield. these supports show a more observant, empathetic side to percival that we dont get to see that often. percival goes out of his way to observe and give guidance to all of his subordinates, and he knows how to tell if theyre getting nervous, he knows exactly how to soothe these fears, and he frequently goes out of his way to do so. percival is a strong, dependable man throughout most of his supports, but this is among my favorites because it shows a kinder, softer side to this otherwise relatively cold, stoic person. but hes just as dependable as a unit as he is a man, and much like his supports, his utility in battle is better than niime(you like that transition? smooth as af) On 7/8/2019 at 7:29 PM, AnonymousSpeed said: Joining at the start of Chapter 19 (Illia) / 20 (Sacae), Niime doesn't have a lot of the game left to contribute. She more than makes up for it with how much she can do in that span of time, though. all of her 4 chapters? she would have to be beyond perfect to make up for that. and she isnt. shes a good unit, not that good though. she isnt even an option in 80% of the game, not counting gaiden chapters, which just make her availability worse, per capita. On 7/8/2019 at 7:29 PM, AnonymousSpeed said: Her massive 21 base magic means she has an excellent 15 range with range staves, allowing her to reach basically wherever she needs to. Meanwhile, her initial A rank in staves lets her use every staff but the Saint Staff at base. This is an incredibly powerful combination which gives Niime the highest staff utility of every unit in the game. She can use her incredibly physic range to heal any ally who needs it. You can make aggressive pushes into enemy lines, take out key targets, and rely on Niime to heal off any damage taken from a safe distance. Such a potent physic user increases the reliability of all strategies, and provides a safety net for daring gambits, which increases the rate at which your army can move forward. -range which is largely unnecessary -keep that bit about not being able to wield the saints staff at base in mind a minute -for 4 chapters, and its not uncontested -any healer can make use of physic range to not get themselves killed whilst also keeping your relatively bulky frontline units from getting their own dumb asses murked. On 7/8/2019 at 7:29 PM, AnonymousSpeed said: Lastly and most importantly, Niime is the best warp user in the game. I don't think we need to repeat all the advantages of Warp. Instead, I'd like to reiterate that Niime can use warp with 15 range and no investment at all, which is leagues better than any potential rival warper can do. this is, i would argue, less an advantage for her to have, and more that she would be entirely useless if she didnt have it, since units have been showing up with a weapon ranks since, like, chapter 13. and many, many units youve obtained before niime can pretty easily obtain a or even s weapon ranks by the time she turns up. she is a great warp user while shes around, but shes around for basically no time at all, and other staffbots have been using warp way longer. she has a few tiles over other warp users, but other warp users can reasonably have 6 chapters on her to be use warp. shes a good warp user, but the best? no. On 7/8/2019 at 7:29 PM, AnonymousSpeed said: Niime only needs a seraph robe to avoid be one-shot by most of these enemies. The only notable exception is the Wyvern Lords, but they tear up everyone, and a second Seraph Robe solves that problem if you really need Niime to enemy phase Wyvern Lords. You shouldn't need her too, so I don't consider it an issue. those are robes which other units really want though, so there is still an element of investment which percy doesnt have, since all of his bases, especially in hard mode, are really good, and he has a rank in swords and lances right away, and his c rank in axes is enough to wield killer axes, which is all he needs to punch a hole in any lance user he may need to fight. but, he also has plenty of time to s rank either swords or lances, and its really not difficult for him to do so. niime doesnt have such time to s rank either dark magic or staves, meaning she may never get to use the saints staff, which, in the hands of a unit who can use it, completely trivializes niimes magic base. On 7/8/2019 at 7:29 PM, AnonymousSpeed said: Thankfully, nosferatu is really good in this game not for niime if you decide to put the seraph robe to literally anybody else. and considering her primary draw is a staffbot, why would you bother? she evidently has enough magic range that you can keep her out of harms way, so why bother wasting this item on a unit who shouldnt see combat anyway? On 7/8/2019 at 7:29 PM, AnonymousSpeed said: Tomes have an actual reasonable weight in FE6, so Niime only looses 2 AS when equipped with Nosferatu. This gives her a fairly decent 14 attack speed, which is enough to avoid getting doubled by most enemies, including a few of the Chapter 22 heroes well, thats ignoring brave weapons, which are a death sentence for niime, and not uncommon in the late game. On 7/8/2019 at 7:29 PM, AnonymousSpeed said: Her decent combat is great to have because it enables her to be rescue dropped over a mountain or moved much closer to enemy lines. This artificially increases her staff range. though this will slow your army down significantly. at least two other units need to use their turns to move niime to where you want her to be, though this often leaves all three units in direct jeopardy, and basically wastes three unit moves which could be better spent doing anything other than unnecessarily yeeting niime into harms way. basically, youre wasting time with this strat, not saving it. On 7/8/2019 at 7:29 PM, AnonymousSpeed said: A few additional notes about using Niime in combat. She uses tomes, consistent 1-2 range which is much more accurate than javelins. Because she has such high magic and hits such low resistance, she deals absurd damage, and is decently fast to boot. This means that Niime can offer solid support in battle in addition to being a top-tier staff bot, while Percival will only ever have uses in combat and rescue-dropping. my man percy shows up with great combat, good utility, and weapon levels five chapters before niime. he gets to be useful through more of the game, roughly 20% more, and niime just cant really keep up. he comes with weapon triangle control, recuedropping in gba games is stupid good, and niime has utility already sufficiently covered by several units whove been around since before the route split. On 7/8/2019 at 7:29 PM, AnonymousSpeed said: Lastly, I'd like to reiterate that Niime's big selling point isn't her combat, it's something far more unique to her. I admit that there are better frontline units. Lance, Allen, Miledy, and even Percival are better choices to take on the hoards. What Niime offers is unmatched staff utility. There is no list of units followed by "and even Niime," with the arguable exception of Yoder, who isn't around as long and doesn't have as much staff range. Saul and Ellen aren't going to hit 21 magic and Lilina isn't going to hit A staves. Niime does both right out of the box. You can substitute units for Percival, but you can't really do that with Niime. so heres the kicker. you have this exactly backwards. niimes selling point is more "unique to her?" mi hermano, any staff user in the game can hypothetically use warp. you want an "and even niime" list? ill give you a couple. list of units to give seraph robe; shanna, juno, alan, lance, rutger, and even niime. everybody else here is more deserving since theyre all more likely to see bloodshed, and could stand to gain from a bit more bulk. list of units who can ferry units across the map; alan, lance, percy himself, shanna, thea, juno, zeiss, milady, any potential staff user, especially clarine, or even niime. everybody else here is better simply because they can do it longer. even if you wanna argue about gaps percy and the cavs cant cross, thats still a pretty hefty list of units holding the ability to move boss killers quickly. list of units who can effectively staffbot; elen, saul, clarine, yodel, or even niime. the only one of these who doesnt have a significantly better amount of availability than niime is yodel, who joins one chapter after and requires absolutely no investment to use literally any staff in the game. the thing about all of the units in the "and even niime" lists is that they all have significant advantages they can hold over her head. not so for the "and even percival" list. yes, every unit in your "and even percival" list does have better availability, but percival has something over them; excellent bases and weapon ranks at no cost to the player. why is it significant with percy but not niime? im gonna sound like a broken record, but it really is all about availability. when niime shows up, you dont have to have tried super hard to invest in any other staff user for them to get to use warp, which they get more use out of anyway, seeing as niime only gets it for four or five chapters, one of which is a rout chapter which shes basically useless for anyway. but when percival joins, promo items are still at a premium, and are still extremely precious commodities. percival not needing to take one, as opposed to miledy or alan or lance means he doesnt have anyone to compete with, and he just gets to have everything you could possibly want him to have. back to my telling you that you have uniqueness exactly backwards, let me explain. a staffbot neednt be compared to the enemy. a staffbot, even just using heal, is likely to heal more damage than any given unit will take in a turn anyway. that extra tile or two niime gets over her competition? basically accounted for by the high movement of the rest of roys army in the end game. most boss killers(rutger notwithstanding) dont really care about being a square farther away, since they can use 1-2 range weapons should the need arise. a frontline unit like percy who lives and dies in his combat performance, their being competitive is way more important, and percival really carries through. staffbots are easily replaced; a frontline powerhouse is not so. sorry it took a while to respond. my schedule likes to be erratic and exhausting simultaneously. but it is now midnight, so i am gonna go to sleep now. good luck, im looking forward to playing this game more. 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AnonymousSpeed Posted July 11, 2019 Author Share Posted July 11, 2019 On 7/10/2019 at 12:19 AM, side bee said: percival is regarded very highly in binding blade. he is, at various points, called narcian's best general, a knight among knights, and the future of etruria incarnate. What horrid lies! Narcian is Narcian's best general. 44 minutes ago, side bee said: but hes just as dependable as a unit as he is a man, and much like his supports, his utility in battle is better than niime(you like that transition? smooth as af) Better in direct combat? Sure, but better supports? Don't underestimate a grouchy grandma. *** 44 minutes ago, side bee said: for 4 chapters ... she is a great warp user while shes around, but shes around for basically no time at all, and other staffbots have been using warp way longer. she has a few tiles over other warp users, but other warp users can reasonably have 6 chapters on her to be use warp. shes a good warp user, but the best? no. ... my man percy shows up with great combat, good utility, and weapon levels five chapters before niime. he gets to be useful through more of the game, roughly 20% more, and niime just cant really keep up. he comes with weapon triangle control, recuedropping in gba games is stupid good, and niime has utility already sufficiently covered by several units whove been around since before the route split. ... im gonna sound like a broken record, but it really is all about availability. when niime shows up, you dont have to have tried super hard to invest in any other staff user for them to get to use warp, which they get more use out of anyway, seeing as niime only gets it for four or five chapters Even assuming you go Sacae, Niime can participate in Chapters 20, 20x 21, 21x, 22, 23, and 24. That's seven chapters, eight if you go the route you really should. That's only 4-5 chapters Percival has over Niime. Besides, contributions are not about the number of chapters available. Wolt is available for 100% of the game, but we surely agree he isn't worth much. What we need to look at is the amount of time and effort the unit saves you when compared to a run that doesn't use them. Niime's warping cuts out so much walking and fighting that it can reasonably save you 10+ turns per chapter as compared to not warping. Compared to other warpers, she can still save you a couple turns per map, which I will elaborate on below. Also, saying Niime is missing 6 chapters of warp is a bit of an exaggeration. You get warp in Chapter 14, too late to actually use it. Chapter 15, when you're likely to recruit Percival, is very easily skipped with airdropping, so using warp here is a bit of a waste of uses. This skip also means that Percival is not likely to make a major contribution this chapter, even if you slow down enough to recruit Garret. (The following assumes Illia route, not because Niime joins earlier but because everyone goes Illia route) This means Percival and other warp users really only get Chapters 16, 16x, 17, and 18 over Niime. Of those, Chapter 17 is better flier skipped than warp skipped, because there's no way Saul is warping a unit all the way across that ocean. That's a mere three to four chapters which Percy and rival warpers have over Niime, which you seemed to indicate was a fairly insignificant number in the above. Even three chapters might be generous, because you may not want to burn warp uses on all those chapters. Specifically, Chapter 17 has no walls to slow fliers and so you would be justified in saving your 13 (4, repair, 4, repair, 5, break) warp uses for later, larger, wallier maps. This would make the availability advantage of other warpers even more insignificant. Skipping over these pre-Niime chapters also means skipping instances where Percival might contribute, further negating his availability advantage. Lastly, all because you use a previous warper for a little bit doesn't make Niime any worse of a warper. You get to use Alan and Lance for a lot longer than Percival and they consume a promotion item Percy doesn't, similar to relationship of Saul and Niime. As handsome as Saul is, settling for him for a couple of chapters doesn't make Niime redundant. If it did, that would mean Percival is redundant because you settle for other mounted units for 14 chapters before you recruit him. Now then, let us move on from availability to stats. 44 minutes ago, side bee said: -range which is largely unnecessary It'd be a bit generous to say that Saul, Elen, or Clarine have gained 20 levels and promoted by the time Niime joins.http://fea.fewiki.net/fea.php?game=6 Even with that benefit, the footies are only averaging 13-15 magic and Clarine should be sitting at a handsome 10. That translates to 12 and 10 warp range, respectively. Let's compare 12 warp range to 15 warp range in a couple of chapters. In Chapter 19 Illia, Niime has just barely enough warp range to send Roy from the central mountain pass to a spot close enough to the gate to seize the turn he's warped. In Chapter 20x Illia, Niime's extra range lets you warp into the boss room while moving through one less "breakable wall" room In Chapter 21, Niime's extra warp range lets you clear the initial mountain range from default position, so the warped unit can still have an action available upon getting there. There are other examples, but these two spring to mind. This also doesn't include all the instances where having a little extra warp range makes positioning more lenient. Having just barely enough range means it takes more planning and effort to get everyone in position. You can afford to be a little more spontaneous and flexible with 15 warp range even in instances where 12 is sufficient, which is convenient for you, the player. It also doesn't account for instances where Saul and Elen will have 1-3 too few move to get into warping position, whereas Niime in the same situation would be able to walk to the exact same location except actually do what she's supposed to. Lacking that 3 range can often be the difference between getting something done on immediately or having to do it next turn, which means not doing something else beneficial that turn. Besides, if being three tiles further ahead was largely unnecessary, would we value the +2 move of mounted units over foot units? Even more situationally, extra movement is extra movement. ... On the note of Niime's higher magic and the advantages it conveys, let's not forget those status staves either. In FE6, the formula for status staff accuracy is: 30 + (User Magic - Target Resistance) x 6 + Skill - Distance That means having 21 magic versus 14 magic means you not only have +3 status staff range, but also +42 status staff hit. Which is insane, and also doesn't account for skill- Niime's skill is also better than her staffbot rivals at the aforementioned average. Even if you do have a very high level Saul, you're barely warping where Niime warps easily and you're losing out on the incredible potential of status staves. Using status staves for distance and dangerous enemies saves you a massive headache. A sleeping Wyvern Lord can't attack anyone, it can be ignored and the chapter nearly cleared before it wakes up. An awake Wyvern Lord that can attack Percival can usually attack someone else. *** On 7/10/2019 at 12:19 AM, side bee said: -any healer can make use of physic range to not get themselves killed whilst also keeping your relatively bulky frontline units from getting their own dumb asses murked. Fair enough, though Niime's physic range will still be longer and still allow her to heal allies who are further extended than her fellow staff bots can. On 7/10/2019 at 12:19 AM, side bee said: mi hermano, any staff user in the game can hypothetically use warp. Any unit can hypothetically use warp, but none of them can use it as well as Niime can. On 7/10/2019 at 12:19 AM, side bee said: list of units who can ferry units across the map; alan, lance, percy himself, shanna, thea, juno, zeiss, milady, any potential staff user, especially clarine, or even niime. Clarine probably won't get more than 10-11 warp range, which is massively handicapped compared to 15. On 7/10/2019 at 12:19 AM, side bee said: list of units who can effectively staffbot; elen, saul, clarine, yodel, or even niime. the only one of these who doesnt have a significantly better amount of availability than niime is yodel, who joins one chapter after Not quite- If you go Sacae, Niime joins in 20 and Yoder in 21, but with 20x in between. That's two chapters, and gaiden chapters beg to be warp skipped. Meanwhile, as stated, most people go Illia, so Niime's Illia route performance is a more accurate indicator of her worth, and in that case she has three chapters over Yoder. Not a massive availability advantage, but it's more accurate than "one chapter" and is comparable to what Percival has over Niime, as explained above. 44 minutes ago, side bee said: niime doesnt have such time to s rank either dark magic or staves, meaning she may never get to use the saints staff, which, in the hands of a unit who can use it, completely trivializes niimes magic base. Nonsense. Saint Staff is "heal everyone," not "warp anywhere," or "berserk anywhere." Niime's base magic still has plenty of use without the Saint Staff. 44 minutes ago, side bee said: well, thats ignoring brave weapons, which are a death sentence for niime, and not uncommon in the late game. Are they really not uncommon, though? 21x has two brave sword heroes Niime shouldn't even be fighting, because you definitely warp skip this map. Chapter 22 has three enemies with brave weapons, and two of those are stationary. If the Brave Bow sniper is all that dangerous and it's simply impossible to keep Niime out of its range, then Niime can berserk it before Percival can get attacked from two range by it. On 7/10/2019 at 12:19 AM, side bee said: this is, i would argue, less an advantage for her to have, and more that she would be entirely useless if she didnt have it, since units have been showing up with a weapon ranks since, like, chapter 13. Chapter 1, actually. Thing is that Niime does have it, and having it is extremely useful. How useful she'd be if she was a different unit (which she would be if she had different stats) is irrelevant. On 7/10/2019 at 12:19 AM, side bee said: those are robes which other units really want though, so there is still an element of investment which percy doesnt have not for niime if you decide to put the seraph robe to literally anybody else. and considering her primary draw is a staffbot, why would you bother? she evidently has enough magic range that you can keep her out of harms way, so why bother wasting this item on a unit who shouldnt see combat anyway? list of units to give seraph robe; shanna, juno, alan, lance, rutger, and even niime. everybody else here is more deserving since theyre all more likely to see bloodshed, and could stand to gain from a bit more bulk. I was going to make a joke about using Juno, but let's instead go over why you give Niime a seraph robe again. It lets you throw her further ahead and thus closer to the objective. This means warping to the objective sooner. The fact that Niime can take a Nosferatu tome into battle and come out alright is a huge advantage your other staffbots don't have- each time they get hit is damage they have to bear with until they get healed or use an elixir. Niime is a staffbot that can see combat, which should be taken as an advantage, not a useless gimmick. It allows you to send her places other staffbots can't go, which only magnifies her staff range advantages. Let's also consider whether any of those robe candidates gain as much usefulness from that single statbooster as Niime does. Seraph Robe Niime can walk into enemy lines, survive, and then warp someone to the throne. This skips over massive quantities of enemies, so the units who do the heavy lifting in battle don't even need the Seraph Robe at that point, because they aren't taking as many hits. Not to mention that Rutger, Alan and Lance should all be at 40+ HP at this point, and you aren't limited to just one seraph robe. You get two before Niime joins and one slightly after, not counting secret shops (not that I'd expect you to spend good money on a seraph robe). Surely it's not too much trouble to give the old woman one of your three coats? On 7/10/2019 at 12:19 AM, side bee said: though this will slow your army down significantly. at least two other units need to use their turns to move niime to where you want her to be, though this often leaves all three units in direct jeopardy, and basically wastes three unit moves which could be better spent doing anything other than unnecessarily yeeting niime into harms way. basically, youre wasting time with this strat, not saving it. Is there a better use of a Pegasus Knight's time than to drop a critical unit closer to the object, though? Not to mention that you can rescue one turn, stay out of enemy range, and then rush even further forward and drop the next, using only one extra unit. Because of canto, you can move them out range after their glorious yeet, which does not waste time because Niime can survive being in harms way and she'll be even closer to getting within 15 tiles of where she wants to warp to. Paladins and Wyvern Lords are potential yeeters who don't even need to retreat after yeet. *** Now for the part where we talk about her Percival, while pretty good, isn't as great as you're making him out to be. 44 minutes ago, side bee said: but when percival joins, promo items are still at a premium, and are still extremely precious commodities. percival not needing to take one, as opposed to miledy or alan or lance means he doesnt have anyone to compete with, and he just gets to have everything you could possibly want him to have. There are three Elysian whips which are practical to get in FE6 outside of the secret shop, so you'll have enough of those unless you use every unpromoted flier in the game, and even then there's a secret shop in Zeiss's joining chapter which sells Elysian whips. Knights Crests aren't really an issue either. You get one in Chapter 8 and then another one right at the end of the chapter Percival joins. You can promote two cavaliers of your choosing quite easily, and Percival's being-a-paladin duration will only be marginally higher than one of them. On 7/10/2019 at 12:19 AM, side bee said: those are robes which other units really want though, so there is still an element of investment which percy doesnt have, since all of his bases, especially in hard mode, are really good, and he has a rank in swords and lances right away, and his c rank in axes is enough to wield killer axes, which is all he needs to punch a hole in any lance user he may need to fight. but, he also has plenty of time to s rank either swords or lances, and its really not difficult for him to do so. my man percy shows up with great combat, good utility, and weapon levels five chapters before niime. he gets to be useful through more of the game, roughly 20% more, and niime just cant really keep up. he comes with weapon triangle control, recuedropping in gba games is stupid good, and niime has utility already sufficiently covered by several units whove been around since before the route split. How good is Killer Axe versus Killer Lance, though? It's only +1 might, +2 against lance users. What enemy can you just barely 2 hit kill with a Killer Axe and not a Killer Lance? What enemies dies to a Killer Axe crit but not a Killer Lance crit? Alan and Lance can easily use Killer Lances and aren't missing out on too much by not using Killer Axes. They can quite easily hit S inn lances or swords as well. Percival's weapon rank advantages are either not unique or not particularly meaningul. We've already discussed Niime's advantages over the "sufficient" units who come before, and I need not remind you that while rescue dropping is good, so is staff utility. Honestly, because Niime is a tiny old prune, she benefits a lot from rescue dropping, since so many units can pick her up. Remember that rescue dropping is good because it helps keep your foot units beside the mounts, sharing the latter's movement advantages. Rescue dropping is stupid good, and its a tool which benefits Niime's usability. On 7/10/2019 at 12:19 AM, side bee said: the thing about all of the units in the "and even niime" lists is that they all have significant advantages they can hold over her head. not so for the "and even percival" list. yes, every unit in your "and even percival" list does have better availability, but percival has something over them; excellent bases and weapon ranks at no cost to the player. why is it significant with percy but not niime? To 4HKO Murdock, a unit needs 19 strength and an armorslayer. Alan can quite reasonably have 19 strength and an armorslayer by this point in the game, and will most likely double Murdock. Percival isn't killing that boss any more efficiently than Alan is. Either of them 2HKOs Wyvern Lords with the wyrmslayer or 1HKOs with Maltet or Durandal. They enemies they double are mostly the same. Percival's stats are better but not in a way that's significantly elevated above a trained Alan in practice. On 7/10/2019 at 12:19 AM, side bee said: most boss killers(rutger notwithstanding) dont really care about being a square farther away, since they can use 1-2 range weapons should the need arise. Javelins aren't particularly good in FE6, hand axes even more so. Your boss killers are mostly relying on armorslayers since so many bosses are armored. On 7/10/2019 at 12:19 AM, side bee said: the thing about all of the units in the "and even niime" lists is that they all have significant advantages they can hold over her head. not so for the "and even percival" list. yes, every unit in your "and even percival" list does have better availability, but percival has something over them; excellent bases and weapon ranks at no cost to the player. why is it significant with percy but not niime? back to my telling you that you have uniqueness exactly backwards, let me explain. a staffbot neednt be compared to the enemy. a staffbot, even just using heal, is likely to heal more damage than any given unit will take in a turn anyway. that extra tile or two niime gets over her competition? basically accounted for by the high movement of the rest of roys army in the end game. most boss killers(rutger notwithstanding) dont really care about being a square farther away, since they can use 1-2 range weapons should the need arise. a frontline unit like percy who lives and dies in his combat performance, their being competitive is way more important, and percival really carries through. staffbots are easily replaced; a frontline powerhouse is not so. sorry it took a while to respond. my schedule likes to be erratic and exhausting simultaneously. but it is now midnight, so i am gonna go to sleep now. good luck, im looking forward to playing this game more. On 7/10/2019 at 12:19 AM, side bee said: sorry it took a while to respond. my schedule likes to be erratic and exhausting simultaneously. but it is now midnight, so i am gonna go to sleep now. good luck, im looking forward to playing this game more. Not a problem. It's late, so let me know if I missed anything. On 7/10/2019 at 12:19 AM, side bee said: this is, i would argue, less an advantage for her to have, and more that she would be entirely useless if she didnt have it, since units have been showing up with a weapon ranks since, like, chapter 13. and many, many units youve obtained before niime can pretty easily obtain a or even s weapon ranks by the time she turns up. she is a great warp user while shes around, but shes around for basically no time at all, and other staffbots have been using warp way longer. she has a few tiles over other warp users, but other warp users can reasonably have 6 chapters on her to be use warp. shes a good warp user, but the best? no. those are robes which other units really want though, so there is still an element of investment which percy doesnt have, since all of his bases, especially in hard mode, are really good, and he has a rank in swords and lances right away, and his c rank in axes is enough to wield killer axes, which is all he needs to punch a hole in any lance user he may need to fight. but, he also has plenty of time to s rank either swords or lances, and its really not difficult for him to do so. niime doesnt have such time to s rank either dark magic or staves, meaning she may never get to use the saints staff, which, in the hands of a unit who can use it, completely trivializes niimes magic base. not for niime if you decide to put the seraph robe to literally anybody else. and considering her primary draw is a staffbot, why would you bother? she evidently has enough magic range that you can keep her out of harms way, so why bother wasting this item on a unit who shouldnt see combat anyway? well, thats ignoring brave weapons, which are a death sentence for niime, and not uncommon in the late game. though this will slow your army down significantly. at least two other units need to use their turns to move niime to where you want her to be, though this often leaves all three units in direct jeopardy, and basically wastes three unit moves which could be better spent doing anything other than unnecessarily yeeting niime into harms way. basically, youre wasting time with this strat, not saving it. my man percy shows up with great combat, good utility, and weapon levels five chapters before niime. he gets to be useful through more of the game, roughly 20% more, and niime just cant really keep up. he comes with weapon triangle control, recuedropping in gba games is stupid good, and niime has utility already sufficiently covered by several units whove been around since before the route split. so heres the kicker. you have this exactly backwards. niimes selling point is more "unique to her?" mi hermano, any staff user in the game can hypothetically use warp. you want an "and even niime" list? ill give you a couple. list of units to give seraph robe; shanna, juno, alan, lance, rutger, and even niime. everybody else here is more deserving since theyre all more likely to see bloodshed, and could stand to gain from a bit more bulk. list of units who can ferry units across the map; alan, lance, percy himself, shanna, thea, juno, zeiss, milady, any potential staff user, especially clarine, or even niime. everybody else here is better simply because they can do it longer. even if you wanna argue about gaps percy and the cavs cant cross, thats still a pretty hefty list of units holding the ability to move boss killers quickly. list of units who can effectively staffbot; elen, saul, clarine, yodel, or even niime. the only one of these who doesnt have a significantly better amount of availability than niime is yodel, who joins one chapter after and requires absolutely no investment to use literally any staff in the game. the thing about all of the units in the "and even niime" lists is that they all have significant advantages they can hold over her head. not so for the "and even percival" list. yes, every unit in your "and even percival" list does have better availability, but percival has something over them; excellent bases and weapon ranks at no cost to the player. why is it significant with percy but not niime? im gonna sound like a broken record, but it really is all about availability. when niime shows up, you dont have to have tried super hard to invest in any other staff user for them to get to use warp, which they get more use out of anyway, seeing as niime only gets it for four or five chapters, one of which is a rout chapter which shes basically useless for anyway. but when percival joins, promo items are still at a premium, and are still extremely precious commodities. percival not needing to take one, as opposed to miledy or alan or lance means he doesnt have anyone to compete with, and he just gets to have everything you could possibly want him to have. back to my telling you that you have uniqueness exactly backwards, let me explain. a staffbot neednt be compared to the enemy. a staffbot, even just using heal, is likely to heal more damage than any given unit will take in a turn anyway. that extra tile or two niime gets over her competition? basically accounted for by the high movement of the rest of roys army in the end game. most boss killers(rutger notwithstanding) dont really care about being a square farther away, since they can use 1-2 range weapons should the need arise. a frontline unit like percy who lives and dies in his combat performance, their being competitive is way more important, and percival really carries through. staffbots are easily replaced; a frontline powerhouse is not so. sorry it took a while to respond. my schedule likes to be erratic and exhausting simultaneously. but it is now midnight, so i am gonna go to sleep now. good luck, im looking forward to playing this game more. 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AnonymousSpeed Posted July 11, 2019 Author Share Posted July 11, 2019 On 7/10/2019 at 12:19 AM, side bee said: back to my telling you that you have uniqueness exactly backwards, let me explain. a staffbot neednt be compared to the enemy. a staffbot, even just using heal, is likely to heal more damage than any given unit will take in a turn anyway. staffbots are easily replaced; a frontline powerhouse is not so. Niime doesn't need to fight enemies to be good, but the fact that this staffbot can be compared to an enemy is a benefit she has over her competition. Niime can be moved further forward and tolerate more mistakes, which means she saved time and stress. Not only that, but Niime's staffbotting is so much more than what other units can do, between her higher warp range and excellent status staff use. I hope I've convinced you of this. *** Apologies for the weird quotes at the end of that last post. It decided to post my reply without my permission, for some reason, and now I can't edit it. Whoops. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
side bee Posted July 12, 2019 Share Posted July 12, 2019 On 7/11/2019 at 3:11 AM, AnonymousSpeed said: Don't underestimate a grouchy grandma man, i wouldnt have if u didnt say u were disappointed by its underutilization -------------------------------------------- On 7/11/2019 at 3:11 AM, AnonymousSpeed said: Even assuming you go Sacae, Niime can participate in Chapters 20, 20x 21, 21x, 22, 23, and 24. That's seven chapters, eight if you go the route you really should. That's only 4-5 chapters Percival has over Niime youre right, i just didnt count gaiden chapters bc i kinda saw them as side missions and therefore not worth counting, but if you wanna count gaiden chapters, im gonna ask you count them for percy as well. counting gaiden chapters, percy has 8 over niime, even if you go illia. percy joins 13, is available 14, 14x, 15, 16, 16x, 17, 18 and then niime joins in 19. if we dont count percys joining chapter, with the argument that he joins like halfway through and you do have to do some work for him, thats still 7 chapters, which is like an extra fifth of the game. percy is around literally twice as long as niime, by your count. On 7/11/2019 at 3:11 AM, AnonymousSpeed said: Wolt is available for 100% of the game, but we surely agree he isn't worth much im almost offended you would compare my mans to wolt. yeah, wolt sucks, so his availability doesnt mean anything. this is why i didnt bother mentioning a list of units who can use apocalypse, incidentally, bc theres only 2 to my memory and one of those is sophia, so theres really only 1. basically the reason percys availability is good is bc hes good. i agree that, were he a bad unit, his availability would not be that helpful, but we can both agree that percy is significantly better and more useful than wolt. i dont really think thats an argument anybody would take with me. On 7/11/2019 at 3:11 AM, AnonymousSpeed said: Chapter 15, when you're likely to recruit Percival why would you wait until chapter 15 to recruit percival rather than 13? it isnt that much harder to get him in 13 than in 15, plus it gives you that shiny, shiny knights crest earlier. ill admit its a pain, but getting to have an extra paladin a couple chapters early, i figure, is worth the hassle. On 7/11/2019 at 3:11 AM, AnonymousSpeed said: Lastly, all because you use a previous warper for a little bit doesn't make Niime any worse of a warper. You get to use Alan and Lance for a lot longer than Percival and they consume a promotion item Percy doesn't, similar to relationship of Saul and Niime. As handsome as Saul is, settling for him for a couple of chapters doesn't make Niime redundant. If it did, that would mean Percival is redundant because you settle for other mounted units for 14 chapters before you recruit him im gonna go ahead and let most of this slide, but its not fair to start comparing units based on attractiveness! percy, no matter how handsome he may or may not be, is gonna get fucking slaughtered! if you google stone cold fox right now, its just niime all the way down! have some mercy, please! On 7/11/2019 at 3:11 AM, AnonymousSpeed said: Besides, if being three tiles further ahead was largely unnecessary, would we value the +2 move of mounted units over foot units the reason its valued is bc its a consistent increase. On 7/11/2019 at 3:11 AM, AnonymousSpeed said: I was going to make a joke about using Juno, but let's instead go over why you give Niime a seraph robe again tbh there was a part of me that thought to mention thea, but i thought that was maybe pushing my luck too far. On 7/11/2019 at 3:11 AM, AnonymousSpeed said: Chapter 1, actually. damn you marcus makin me look a fool! worst unit. worst unit in the series. exp sponge. On 7/11/2019 at 3:11 AM, AnonymousSpeed said: It allows you to send her places other staffbots can't go but cant they? lets have a look-see at saul. lets say you decide to use saul, and you promote him immediately upon reaching level 10 with the guiding ring found in chapter 8. if he then reaches level 10 bishop by the time niime shows up, he should have roughly 19 speed(15 levels x.45 growth rate=6.75+2 promo bonus=8.75+10 base=18.75, round up to 19 since fire emblem dont fuck with decimals), 31 hp(15 levels x.6 growth rate=9+3 promo bonus=11+20 base=31), and 6 defense(15 levels x.15 growth=2.25+2 promo bonus=4.25+2 base=6.25 and since decimals are for communists round down to 6). even by these pretty loose parameters, it looks like saul is out-bulking our lovely lil prune, with some potential growth to spare. and honestly, i think 15 levels across 18 chapters is pretty fair. though, i will confess she beats his magic by a landslide, saul is still outpacing her everywhere else, so if we really want to take a warper halfway across the map and across enemy lines, should we not bring the one who wont collapse if breathed on a little too h On 7/11/2019 at 3:11 AM, AnonymousSpeed said: How good is Killer Axe versus Killer Lance, though? It's only +1 might, +2 against lance users. What enemy can you just barely 2 hit kill with a Killer Axe and not a Killer Lance? What enemies dies to a Killer Axe crit but not a Killer Lance crit? Alan and Lance can easily use Killer Lances and aren't missing out on too much by not using Killer Axes. They can quite easily hit S inn lances or swords as well. Percival's weapon rank advantages are either not unique or not particularly meaningul. its useful to have the option of wta available at all times, but even disregarding that, lets ask ourselves a question; what are we gonna do with armads? it wouldnt do to just let a perfectly good s rank weapon go to waste, right? we cant just disrespect hector by letting his weapon rust on a shelf somewhere. but who should claim it? i think percy is the most deserving heir. out of a list of all potential axe users in game, we can quickly strike off a number of them; marcus, while borderline necessary in the early game, does fall off before his potential ability to use armads at all would be helpful, alan, lance, dieck, trec, and noah are all capable of wielding axes, but its only upon promotion and they start with e rank axes, so good luck with that, and wade and lot are questionable units even when first recruited. then theres three. gonzales, zelot, and the man of the hour, percival. im not about to go into a full character analysis of these three, but suffice it to say, gonzales is out for lack of utility and combat options, and while zelot could do it, he only comes with d axes, which means he does have to go out of his way to use steel axes until he can finally wield killer axes, and thats a massive pain in the ass to do. but percival doesnt need to wait to use killer axes, he just can. though, they can both use hammers at base. percys competition for armads, when you really get down to it, is pretty sparse. hes only really got one competitor, similarly to niime. technically theres 2 other shaman/druids, but one of them is sophia, who youre only gonna use if youre really suffering from waifu disease. but even then, sophia is not "derail the war effort so she can be even slightly useful" cute, shes "see a few times in art class, and ask out only for the date to be bad since youre both really nervous and awkward about the whole thing so no real conversation starts up but you consider still trying anyway until you see her sketchbook has homestuck fanart in it at which point you wisely get the hell out of dodge" cute. raigh has his uses on the other hand, and similarly to zelot, does have some advantages to using over niime. On 7/11/2019 at 3:11 AM, AnonymousSpeed said: Knights Crests aren't really an issue either. You get one in Chapter 8 and then another one right at the end of the chapter Percival joins. You can promote two cavaliers of your choosing quite easily, and Percival's being-a-paladin duration will only be marginally higher than one of them here we actually get to see one of percys greatest draws; the knights crest. percy provides your army with not 1 shiny new paladin, but 2. and this is something only percival can provide, as early as chapter 13. perhaps the most unique bonus either of these give you is an extra promotion, so while percys being-a-paladin advantage doesnt hold too terribly long for himself, he can give another unit a being-a-paladin advantage, something which niime cant quite match, keeping in mind that a promo is like using several statboosters all at once, so percy, at the bare minimum, gives a cavalier a permanent advantage throughout the rest of the game. now, im feeling kinda cute, i feel like i kinda wanna throw out a super "quirky xD" argument, just kinda to see what happens. lets conjure up a hypothetical playthrough in which we decide that we will use neither of these units. they are both benched, immediately. their only use, therefore, is what they give us in terms of weapons, items, etc. niime gives us two dark tomes and two staves. one of these staves is heal, so i dont really think we should even bother counting it, and if we did all wed get is an obsolete staff, physic, which is the best thing she gives you, and the dark tomes are only applicable to 2 other characters, one of whom is sophia, who i think ive taken more than enough pot shots at for one night, and raigh. not useless, but not nearly as useful as percys stuff. even if you only recruit him in chapter 13, he still gives you a silver lance, a super useful weapon for a number of important units, and a knights crest, which i just explained the use of. but if you wait for chapter 15, he also gives you a silver sword on top of those other things, which is also useful to a number of extremely helpful units. in terms of looking for a sugar parent, percy comes out on top. 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AnonymousSpeed Posted July 13, 2019 Author Share Posted July 13, 2019 10 minutes ago, side bee said: man, i wouldnt have if u didnt say u were disappointed by its underutilization darn, i played myself. 10 minutes ago, side bee said: youre right, i just didnt count gaiden chapters bc i kinda saw them as side missions and therefore not worth counting, but if you wanna count gaiden chapters, im gonna ask you count them for percy as well. counting gaiden chapters, percy has 8 over niime, even if you go illia. percy joins 13, is available 14, 14x, 15, 16, 16x, 17, 18 and then niime joins in 19. if we dont count percys joining chapter, with the argument that he joins like halfway through and you do have to do some work for him, thats still 7 chapters, which is like an extra fifth of the game. percy is around literally twice as long as niime, by your count. ... why would you wait until chapter 15 to recruit percival rather than 13? it isnt that much harder to get him in 13 than in 15, plus it gives you that shiny, shiny knights crest earlier. ill admit its a pain, but getting to have an extra paladin a couple chapters early, i figure, is worth the hassle. On the note of availability, I was counting Gaiden chapters. The thing is that Percival is not only easier to recruit in Chapter 15 (where he comes to you, while he has to be baited in Chapter 13), and not only does he come with a silver sword only in Chapter 15, but recruiting him in Chapter 15 is the only scenario where he gets Hard Mode bonuses. The way they work in FE6 is that they're only given to units who spawn in after the start of the map. Rutger and Chapter 15 Percival get them, but not Raigh or Chapter 13 Percival. Since Chapter 14 is a desert which sucks for Paladins, the ideal recruitment time for him is Chapter 15. That means he can contribute in 15, 16, 16x, 17, and 18. 10 minutes ago, side bee said: basically the reason percys availability is good is bc hes good. i agree that, were he a bad unit, his availability would not be that helpful, but we can both agree that percy is significantly better and more useful than wolt. i dont really think thats an argument anybody would take with me. Agreed on these points. I mean, there are some people who would argue with you solely because Percival is a pre-promote, but they're wrong. 10 minutes ago, side bee said: im gonna go ahead and let most of this slide, but its not fair to start comparing units based on attractiveness! percy, no matter how handsome he may or may not be, is gonna get fucking slaughtered! if you google stone cold fox right now, its just niime all the way down! have some mercy, please! No mercy. 10 minutes ago, side bee said: the reason its valued is bc its a consistent increase. tbh there was a part of me that thought to mention thea, but i thought that was maybe pushing my luck too far. damn you marcus makin me look a fool! worst unit. worst unit in the series. exp sponge. Fair point. I think Tate Thea would have been a stronger case, honestly. Better than Percival just for that early game. Thus, if Marcus is the worst unit, Percival is worse than the worst, so bad he breaks logic itself. 10 minutes ago, side bee said: but cant they? lets have a look-see at saul. lets say you decide to use saul, and you promote him immediately upon reaching level 10 with the guiding ring found in chapter 8. if he then reaches level 10 bishop by the time niime shows up, he should have roughly 19 speed(15 levels x.45 growth rate=6.75+2 promo bonus=8.75+10 base=18.75, round up to 19 since fire emblem dont fuck with decimals), 31 hp(15 levels x.6 growth rate=9+3 promo bonus=11+20 base=31), and 6 defense(15 levels x.15 growth=2.25+2 promo bonus=4.25+2 base=6.25 and since decimals are for communists round down to 6). even by these pretty loose parameters, it looks like saul is out-bulking our lovely lil prune, with some potential growth to spare. and honestly, i think 15 levels across 18 chapters is pretty fair. though, i will confess she beats his magic by a landslide, saul is still outpacing her everywhere else, so if we really want to take a warper halfway across the map and across enemy lines, should we not bring the one who wont collapse if breathed on a little too hard Saul might have marginally better statistical durability than Niime, but he also can't weild Nosferatu. Both die to two hits. If Saul gets hit, he dies when hit again. If Niime gets hit, she can heal back to full on counter attack. So Niime's practical durability is better. 10 minutes ago, side bee said: alan, lance, dieck, trec, and noah are all capable of wielding axes, but its only upon promotion and they start with e rank axes, so good luck with that, and wade and lot are questionable units even when first recruited. then theres three. gonzales, zelot, and the man of the hour, percival. RIP Oujay, Geese, Echidna, Bartre, and Garret. 10 minutes ago, side bee said: its useful to have the option of wta available at all times, but even disregarding that, lets ask ourselves a question; what are we gonna do with armads? it wouldnt do to just let a perfectly good s rank weapon go to waste, right? we cant just disrespect hector by letting his weapon rust on a shelf somewhere. but who should claim it? i think percy is the most deserving heir. out of a list of all potential axe users in game, we can quickly strike off a number of them; marcus, while borderline necessary in the early game, does fall off before his potential ability to use armads at all would be helpful, alan, lance, dieck, trec, and noah are all capable of wielding axes, but its only upon promotion and they start with e rank axes, so good luck with that, and wade and lot are questionable units even when first recruited. then theres three. gonzales, zelot, and the man of the hour, percival. im not about to go into a full character analysis of these three, but suffice it to say, gonzales is out for lack of utility and combat options, and while zelot could do it, he only comes with d axes, which means he does have to go out of his way to use steel axes until he can finally wield killer axes, and thats a massive pain in the ass to do. but percival doesnt need to wait to use killer axes, he just can. though, they can both use hammers at base. Percival might make pretty good use of the Armads compared to others, that is fair. In practice, I think that hampers his usefulness more than anything. Joining with C axes still means Percival has to perform about 150 axe swings before he can use Armads, which should happen around the time you kill Jahn. Because FE6 axes have pretty low accuracy, that much investment into their use means Percival is missing a lot more than if he focused on Swords and Lances, severely hampering his usefulness. His high axe rank does convey some advantage, but its largely redundent given his Lance rank. Sorry, Hector. We just can't spare someone to follow your violent path into the afterlife. 10 minutes ago, side bee said: percys competition for armads, when you really get down to it, is pretty sparse. hes only really got one competitor, similarly to niime. technically theres 2 other shaman/druids, but one of them is sophia, who youre only gonna use if youre really suffering from waifu disease. but even then, sophia is not "derail the war effort so she can be even slightly useful" cute, shes "see a few times in art class, and ask out only for the date to be bad since youre both really nervous and awkward about the whole thing so no real conversation starts up but you consider still trying anyway until you see her sketchbook has homestuck fanart in it at which point you wisely get the hell out of dodge" cute. I don't know if this elaborate metaphor was really necessary. But it speaks to me on a very deep level, so I appreciate you making it. Sophia also has a weird neck, so that's like, a double no-go. ... Wait a minute. If Niime is a stone cold fox, then surely she is "derail the war effort" level, right? Not only that, she's useful without even doing that much for her. Surely that puts her above Percival, yes? 10 minutes ago, side bee said: here we actually get to see one of percys greatest draws; the knights crest. percy provides your army with not 1 shiny new paladin, but 2. and this is something only percival can provide, as early as chapter 13. perhaps the most unique bonus either of these give you is an extra promotion, so while percys being-a-paladin advantage doesnt hold too terribly long for himself, he can give another unit a being-a-paladin advantage, something which niime cant quite match, keeping in mind that a promo is like using several statboosters all at once, so percy, at the bare minimum, gives a cavalier a permanent advantage throughout the rest of the game. Interesting argument, funny you mention it right after the free guiding ring known as Sophia too. It's arguable whether this counts as an advantage for Percival or not, with the answer probably being the same as whether Sophia's guiding ring counts as an advantage. I can honestly see it going either way, but for the sake of debate I'll say this doesn't count in Percival's favor here. You can get the Knights Crest and drop him, just like you can drop Sophia after Chapter 14 or Geese after pirating his brave axe. Getting the Chapter 13/15 Knights Crest doesn't require utilization of Percival's strengths, it just requires that you keep his allies alive under the turn ends. Percival could be sucking his thumb a safe three tiles behind the front just like Sophia would be, the main difference being you would actually want Percival to contribute. Honestly I disagree, because Hard Move Percival is a little better than your other Paladins. My point was that he isn't so much better than you can't substitute him out, while Niime is just that far about Saul in staffbotting use. 10 minutes ago, side bee said: now, im feeling kinda cute, i feel like i kinda wanna throw out a super "quirky xD" argument, just kinda to see what happens. What could pawsibly go wrong? 10 minutes ago, side bee said: lets conjure up a hypothetical playthrough in which we decide that we will use neither of these units. they are both benched, immediately. their only use, therefore, is what they give us in terms of weapons, items, etc. niime gives us two dark tomes and two staves. one of these staves is heal, so i dont really think we should even bother counting it, and if we did all wed get is an obsolete staff, physic, which is the best thing she gives you, and the dark tomes are only applicable to 2 other characters, one of whom is sophia, who i think ive taken more than enough pot shots at for one night, and raigh. not useless, but not nearly as useful as percys stuff. even if you only recruit him in chapter 13, he still gives you a silver lance, a super useful weapon for a number of important units, and a knights crest, which i just explained the use of. but if you wait for chapter 15, he also gives you a silver sword on top of those other things, which is also useful to a number of extremely helpful units. in terms of looking for a sugar parent, percy comes out on top. Can't object, especially because one of Niime's joining tomes is Eclipse. Being a mountain hermit just isn't as prestigious as being a hot shot Etrurian general, I guess. *** Since this is my last post, I would like to try and hammer in my big points to end of. Niime gets much more from the use of Warp and status staves than her rival staffbot units. Warp and status staves are just really good in general, but especially in Niime's hands. Percival doesn't eclipse his competition nearly to the same level. The difference between her and Saul (our go to example) is must greater than the difference between Percival and Alan (our other go to example). Points 2-4 reinforce this. Status staves in particular let her neutralize major threats from up to 15 tiles away from her current location, allowing status staff druids and wyvern lords and all other manner of nasties to be dealt without well before they can even think of counterattacking. In addition to being a staffbot, Niime can use Nosferatu to boost her survivability. This gives her more freedom in positioning. Even without a Seraph Robe, she survives one hit from a decent number of hard mode enemies, then heals back to full. In addition to letting her get closer to where she needs to be, this also gives her a secondary use in taking out enemies which is strictly an advantage compared to being useless in combat. Because of Niime's self-healing and higher staff range, she gives the player more room to make mistakes or be inexact. Thus, compared with other staff bots, Niime saves the player headache. Niime joins late, but confers major advantages during her time in the party, which is still about 8 chapters. She isn't missing out on a bunch of productive warping time in the lead up to then. Percival's availability advantages are not particularly large when taking that into account. Good debate, Mr. Bee. I look forward to seeing your response, and hope it is as well humored as your last one. No pressure, though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
side bee Posted July 15, 2019 Share Posted July 15, 2019 ok so this is the last post, its gonna basically just be the dry bit up front where i summarize my points and where i take issue with yours, but then, after the dry bit, im gonna goof off a bit. but first a thanks to you, for a fun match, you had a lot of tricky arguments. id love to do this again with you, mr speed. point the first, armads. i made it, although i may not have made its significance quite clear. while percy is a solid competitor for maltet and/or durandal, its possible a player may prefer to give these weapons to alan, or lance, or dieck, or whoever. and while there is a lot of competition for maltet and durandal, there is very little competition for armads, so while percy is a great competitor for these weapons, he can also opt out of competition altogether. this frees up the players options quite a bit. the issue of the knight crest is interesting, as you did mention that sophia had basically the same thing going for her. indeed, i think its sophias only real saving grace that this is a special, free item that a lot of units want pretty badly is only available through her, and we hear a similar story with percival and the knight crest. the difference of course being that theres a good reason to actually use percival beyond the knight crest being obtained as his bases are excellent, his growths, for a midgame prepromote are pretty good, and he has really good weapon ranks. but the point with the knight crest is that it gives another unit permanent stat buffs, more move, and better weapon ranks, and the free one percy gives you can only be given to you by percy. finally, the point of availability. niime misses one of the worst chapters in the game, chapter 14. in chapter 14, no one is allowed to move anywhere, ever, and theres fog of war. torch+warp can make this map at least somewhat tolerable. her availability makes it so she loses out on many difficult, important chapters such as 14, and since percival can, at most, have 7 or 8 chapters on her, where hes a good choice for anything you may need him to do, really highlights his overall worth as a unit. On 7/12/2019 at 9:00 PM, AnonymousSpeed said: Niime gets much more from the use of Warp and status staves than her rival staffbot units. Warp and status staves are just really good in general, but especially in Niime's hands. Percival doesn't eclipse his competition nearly to the same level. The difference between her and Saul (our go to example) is must greater than the difference between Percival and Alan (our other go to example). thats kinda sketchy, since saul has been around in more vital, difficult chapters throughout the game. alan has too, but hes not especially spectacular in the early game, and only really gets good if you promote him. percy just starts that good and stays that way. sauls statistical trouble in the earlygame isnt a huge deal because hes a staffbot, and stats are basically meaningless to him anyway until he promotes, but alan is a combat unit who is okay in the early game. less likely to die than lance, but not any more likely to double. alan isnt bad, hes just not as useful as saul or percy when the latter two join compared to how useful alan is when he joins. On 7/12/2019 at 9:00 PM, AnonymousSpeed said: Status staves in particular let her neutralize major threats from up to 15 tiles away from her current location, allowing status staff druids and wyvern lords and all other manner of nasties to be dealt without well before they can even think of counterattacking. true, but any other staffbot can still use these staves from a very safe distance, and theyve been able to for longer. binding blades early game is way harder than its late game, so being able to berserk or sleep or whatever xyz status you wanna inflict on an enemy for longer is a big deal. On 7/12/2019 at 9:00 PM, AnonymousSpeed said: In addition to being a staffbot, Niime can use Nosferatu to boost her survivability. This gives her more freedom in positioning. Even without a Seraph Robe, she survives one hit from a decent number of hard mode enemies, then heals back to full. In addition to letting her get closer to where she needs to be, this also gives her a secondary use in taking out enemies which is strictly an advantage compared to being useless in combat while her combat isnt awful, niime is not going to be "taking out enemies" anytime soon. shes maybe quick enough to not get doubled, but almost certainly not quick enough to double, herself. nosferatu, to my memory isnt exactly the most accurate thing in the world either, so if she misses shes prolly dead. On 7/12/2019 at 9:00 PM, AnonymousSpeed said: Because of Niime's self-healing and higher staff range, she gives the player more room to make mistakes or be inexact. Thus, compared with other staff bots, Niime saves the player headache not in a really significant way. i understand we arent assuming ltc here, just efficient play, but even so, an informed, careful player really doesnt need that much margin of error, especially as player units in the late game can generally take care of themselves, and an informed player is gonna be pretty well aware of enemy ranges, not enough to map them out, but at least to where they could count it out. and an informed player is capable of using saul for some calculated risks. and theyve been able to do this with saul all game long. On 7/12/2019 at 9:00 PM, AnonymousSpeed said: Niime joins late, but confers major advantages during her time in the party, which is still about 8 chapters. She isn't missing out on a bunch of productive warping time in the lead up to then. Percival's availability advantages are not particularly large when taking that into account. maybe not much warping time, but again, binding blades difficulty is very frontloaded. warp is handy to have, but its not as likely to save a life as sleep, or cut through enemy lines like berserk. these staves are super helpful for the early game, and if marcus somehow gets murked, those are your best bets. even with marcus around, those staves are really good, and niime misses out on them for so so long. sorry about the weird, inconsistent quoting shit, im using my trackpad rn since i have no clue where the hell my mouse went. but now? now its goof time. On 7/12/2019 at 9:00 PM, AnonymousSpeed said: I look forward to seeing your response, and hope it is as well humored as your last one. No pressure, though. well, mr speed, i hope this lives up to your high expectations. On 7/12/2019 at 9:00 PM, AnonymousSpeed said: I don't know if this elaborate metaphor was really necessary. But it speaks to me on a very deep level, so I appreciate you making it. thank you, im just happy to have made a human connection over the internet today with a stranger over the internet whose own name indicates namelessness. On 7/12/2019 at 9:00 PM, AnonymousSpeed said: RIP Oujay, Geese, Echidna, Bartre, and Garret. ok well two of those are named after animals, so theyre furries, and gone based on moral principle. bartre died in my fe7 playthrough, so hes dead to me forever. im pretty sure garret is the guy from final fantasy 7 so idk what hes doing here, and oujay is named after a sportscaster who murdered his wife so, again, moral principle. On 7/12/2019 at 9:00 PM, AnonymousSpeed said: Thus, if Marcus is the worst unit, Percival is worse than the worst, so bad he breaks logic itself. which means he horseshoes around into being broken beyond belief. checkmate On 7/12/2019 at 9:00 PM, AnonymousSpeed said: darn, i played myself. you sure did On 7/12/2019 at 9:00 PM, AnonymousSpeed said: Since Chapter 14 is a desert which sucks for Paladins, lemme fix that rq "Since Chapter 14 is a desert chapter which sucks for Paladins" On 7/12/2019 at 9:00 PM, AnonymousSpeed said: Wait a minute. If Niime is a stone cold fox, then surely she is "derail the war effort" level, right? Not only that, she's useful without even doing that much for her. Surely that puts her above Percival, yes? wait no i know you said no mercy but this is almost cruel! i have a family, please, i cant get mutilated in this way! On 7/12/2019 at 9:00 PM, AnonymousSpeed said: What could pawsibly go wrong? you cant just break a man like what you did in the previous quote and then quote bubsy and expect forgiveness. despite his stauts as a classic platformer mascot, it just aint so easy. seriously though, this was great. godspeed, anonymousspeed. godspeed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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