Hard Playthrough

[Agility]

Hello everyone. I have not been on this forums in ages it feels like. I am glad everybody is still around! Still my favorite site for fire emblem resources 🙂

I just wanted suggestions on who I should put on my team for a playthrough I am about to start. Also some debates on who are your favorite characters and skills associated with them. Also possible items you give them to boost stats.

For starters this is my idea, I tend to run teams of 8-10.

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One and only Lord

Ike (Given) (Wrath) (Resolve)

Before BK fight: I usually run Nihil with Wrath.

After BK fight: I get rid of Nihil and give Ike Resolve.

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The 4 Occult Warriors

Mist (BK fight) (Sol)

Boyd (Statue Frags & Colossus)

Volke (Only Assassin) (Lethality)

Brom (Luna)

Reason: I really like the idea of a A support between Boyd & Mist. As for Brom and Volke, I think those mastery skills are more useful then others in the games. Being able cut defense in half and have instant deaths seems appealing.

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The Mighty Dragons

Ena or Nasir

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Possible Others

Nephenee (Wrath)(Vantage)(A support with Brom)

 

That is a total of 6 without the dragon or king. I'm excited to see what you guys come up with 🙂 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[AnonymousSpeed]

2 minutes ago, Agility said:

Volke (Only Assassin) (Lethality)

Aw heck yeah. Volke is cool.

I don't know if Shinon counts as good, but I like him.

[Agility]

Shinon is pretty sweet. You ever pair him up with rolf? The support bonus really helps with Dodging. Sometimes I pair him up with Janaff too.

I agree Volke is pretty cool. It wish he had more supports besides bastian XD

[Shadow Mir]

Honestly, Nihil is pretty much useless; mooks tend to not have skills, and it comes late. Also, I think you can do better than Colossus and Lethality, seeing as statue frags are best sold and an instant kill isn't very useful when the chance for it to work is very small, which it'll be since it's only half of your crit chance, which, because enemies have luck stats and Volke is limited to knives, of which the best has only 10 crit, will not be at reliable numbers, to put it lightly.

Edited August 31, 2020 by Shadow Mir

[Agility]

Oh wow Shadow Mir, your so intelligent! How would you allocate your mastery skills then and on who?

[Shadow Mir]

^Probably a Paladin or two, since aside from Ike, theirs is one of the few that's actually useful. It's definitely much better than an instant kill that I can't rely on (and honestly, more often than not, instant kills tend to be useless anyhow). Or a slight damage boost that requires satisfying a condition that the user can't satisfy against most enemies. Speaking of, I'm surprised you aren't using any of them, or Marcia or Jill.

Edited September 1, 2020 by Shadow Mir

[Agility]

I do agree with the usefulness of the paladin's and being able to heal. Ive never really used the flyers that much besides Jill. I don't like how they are vulnerable to arrows. When I do use Jill I give her full guard. I guess I could be more tactical and try a flyer playthrough someday, that could be fun. Im working towards beating the game 15 times so I can unlock Ashnard. I think im 1-2 games from getting bruce right now.

However I've gotten away from using paladins mainly because they tend to have average caps in everything. I like how Warriors have more cap strength or Swordmasters have more cap speed.

[whase]

If you want to try another flyer, might I suggest Tanith? Her fighting capabilities may not be the best, but her reinforce ability is a lot of fun to play around with.

And I can't not suggest using Mia, she's my favorite from this game. Her strength might be a bit low, but her innate vantage is a lot of fun. I always give her adept so she can kill on enemy phase more easily. 

I am noticing a lack of magic here, and you could use another early game unit, why not go with Soren?

As for occult scrolls, give one to Ike on promotion, Aether is a great skill that makes him able to take on armies by himself. By the time you get to Ashnard you can swap it for wrath-resolve if you want, but usually he doesn't need it. Other than him, occult scrolls are only useful for paladins, and I think Mist also gets sol? 

[Shadow Mir]

On 9/1/2020 at 11:18 PM, Agility said:

I do agree with the usefulness of the paladin's and being able to heal. Ive never really used the flyers that much besides Jill. I don't like how they are vulnerable to arrows. When I do use Jill I give her full guard. I guess I could be more tactical and try a flyer playthrough someday, that could be fun. Im working towards beating the game 15 times so I can unlock Ashnard. I think im 1-2 games from getting bruce right now.

However I've gotten away from using paladins mainly because they tend to have average caps in everything. I like how Warriors have more cap strength or Swordmasters have more cap speed.

Caps don't tell the whole story, needless to say. You spend much more time without capped stats than you do with them. That being said, the effective bonus was lowered to double might. Again.

2 hours ago, whase said:

And I can't not suggest using Mia, she's my favorite from this game. Her strength might be a bit low, but her innate vantage is a lot of fun. I always give her adept so she can kill on enemy phase more easily. 

I would agree... if you were talking about Radiant Dawn's Mia, that is. In Path of Radiance, I find it hard to recommend using her, because she's sword-locked with poor strength.

Edited September 3, 2020 by Shadow Mir

[whase]

40 minutes ago, Shadow Mir said:

I would agree... if you were talking about Radiant Dawn's Mia, that is. In Path of Radiance, I find it hard to recommend using her, because she's sword-locked with poor strength.

While yes, you have a point, I I still can't not recommend her, I just like her too much. Besides, this game is easy enough that everybody can contribute. =3

[Shadow Mir]

3 hours ago, whase said:

While yes, you have a point, I I still can't not recommend her, I just like her too much. Besides, this game is easy enough that everybody can contribute. =3

Even if the game is easy, Mia's still bad. And I'd say Rofl would likely not contribute much, if at all. Archer is a shitty class to be in, and for a combat unit, coming in at level 1 when everyone else is coming up on double digits is a really bad position to be in.

Edited September 3, 2020 by Shadow Mir

[Agility]

I actually like how Swordmasters & Archers have higher crit rates. However snipers being locked into indirect combat can be annoying and swordmasters not being able to attack from a distance (besides runesword & sonic sword) can be annoying. I tend to enjoy axes/lances better because of possible forging of handaxe and javelins. 

A good duo I used to rock was Zihark & Mia. Since you get 1 adept and 1 vantage in the game. They are practically the same person XD

As for mages, I tend to not like Soren as much anymore because he doesn't get a lot of level up in strength. I think Tormod is the way to go. Your probably wondering why a mage would need strength! It actually helps them dodge attacks! He also has the highest defense growth rate among the mages I think besides calil & bastian which I believe are terrible lol.

Anyway Whale and Shadow Mir, I was wondering what would your roster look like full of 8 players! Im interested in your opinions and taste!

 

[Benice]

11 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

And I'd say Rofl would likely not contribute much, if at all. Archer is a shitty class to be in, and for a combat unit, coming in at level 1 when everyone else is coming up on double digits is a really bad position to be in.

I mean, Rolf doubles some of the enemies in his joining chapter. On Hard Mode. His biggest problem is that he's in a bad class, he'd have few problems if he were in a better one, as BEXP would bring him to good enough to deal some thicc damage to most enemies. He'd still be not very good, but entirely serviceable.

36 minutes ago, Agility said:

As for mages, I tend to not like Soren as much anymore because he doesn't get a lot of level up in strength.

Ilyana has a higher strength growth than Tormod, so she'd have higher strength than him if you used 'em both, as Tormod only has one point of strength on base level Ilyana. That said, Ilyana probably won't be doubling all that much, whereas Tormod might eventually do so. In addition to that, Tormod's not really bulky enough to Seth the whole game-His defense base still ain't great, and his growth isn't really good enough to give him a "tanky mage" Niche role.

42 minutes ago, Agility said:

I think besides calil & bastian which I believe are terrible lol.

Well, Calil has good bases, and an average Tormod needs to be a level 20/6 Sage just to match Calil's bases-That's a lot of investment to match a prepromote who needs zilch to contribute from the get-go, and you won't necessarily want to get Tormod all the way to level 20 before promotion. Calil's weapon ranks are another point in her favor, but she doesn't have staves, which Tormod will likely have.

Bastian...Yeah, he's not so great.

Of course, you can use whoever you want, as PoR is pretty easy, and one of the good things about that is that everybody is viable, even on hard. Hope you have fun with this run!

[ping]

5 hours ago, Agility said:

As for mages, I tend to not like Soren as much anymore because he doesn't get a lot of level up in strength. I think Tormod is the way to go. Your probably wondering why a mage would need strength! It actually helps them dodge attacks! He also has the highest defense growth rate among the mages I think besides calil & bastian which I believe are terrible lol.

In Soren's defense: If he procs Str only once, he won't lose any attack speed from a Thunder tome once he promotes, and Thunder with +5 Might forged into it is just about the strongest tome you can get. It's as powerful as Bolganone, only one point weaker than Thoron, and stronger than Tornado, so Soren awful Str doesn't really impede him all that much in the longterm.

That said, Tormod does have a good stat distribution, especially when taking his +2 move into account. It's only a shame that he joins so late compared to Soren and Ilyana.

[Agility]

That's sweet ping, never realized how strong forged magic is. I do got to say 2 of my favorite players are Soren & Stephan. Not because of there stats or classes but because of the lore behind them. 

(Spoiler Alert)

Spoiler

They are both branded and descendants of very strong people. Soren is ashnard's and almedah's Son. Stephan is a descendant from Soan! They are most definitely some of the coolest players in the game in my book.

 

[Shadow Mir]

13 hours ago, Benice said:

I mean, Rolf doubles some of the enemies in his joining chapter. On Hard Mode. His biggest problem is that he's in a bad class, he'd have few problems if he were in a better one, as BEXP would bring him to good enough to deal some thicc damage to most enemies. He'd still be not very good, but entirely serviceable.

The problem is, he joins at level 1 in chapter 9 with shitty archer bases. That's really damning. Even though Wil, Rebecca and Neimi also sucked, they at least joined early enough to actually do something, and enemies in their games aren't as durable. BEXP can help him become usable, but unfortunately for him, a lot of other units who would also like BEXP to help them get started start joining not long after. That being said, despite him being able to double some things, Rolf struggles to dent most physical units in his joining chapter.

13 hours ago, Agility said:

I actually like how Swordmasters & Archers have higher crit rates. However snipers being locked into indirect combat can be annoying and swordmasters not being able to attack from a distance (besides runesword & sonic sword) can be annoying. I tend to enjoy axes/lances better because of possible forging of handaxe and javelins. 

A good duo I used to rock was Zihark & Mia. Since you get 1 adept and 1 vantage in the game. They are practically the same person XD

As for mages, I tend to not like Soren as much anymore because he doesn't get a lot of level up in strength. I think Tormod is the way to go. Your probably wondering why a mage would need strength! It actually helps them dodge attacks! He also has the highest defense growth rate among the mages I think besides calil & bastian which I believe are terrible lol.

Anyway Whale and Shadow Mir, I was wondering what would your roster look like full of 8 players! Im interested in your opinions and taste!

I consider it a pity, then, that Path of Radiance is a low point for both.

Zihark is decent. Mia, not so much; I cannot be impressed by what Vantage can help her do when she doesn't have enough power behind her hits to actually kill her attacker.

Personally, I find it hard to justify using Tormod because he comes in late and underleveled. He's not that tanky either. That said, he's still usable here, unlike in Radiant Dawn. . .

You won't get such a list from me, because I don't low-man.

Edited September 4, 2020 by Shadow Mir

[Benice]

6 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

The problem is, he joins at level 1 in chapter 9 with shitty archer bases. That's really damning.

I wasn't really arguing, "Rofl good" I was mostly arguing, "PoR enemies worse than FE8 bad" so it mattered little who he wanted to use if he's not going for maximum efficiency. Rolf is bad, but he's not going to struggle like Amelia, Ross or Ewan.

[Shadow Mir]

27 minutes ago, Benice said:

I wasn't really arguing, "Rofl good" I was mostly arguing, "PoR enemies worse than FE8 bad" so it mattered little who he wanted to use if he's not going for maximum efficiency. Rolf is bad, but he's not going to struggle like Amelia, Ross or Ewan.

They can at least be ground up in the tower until they get out of their trainee phase. Rolf has no such luxury, having to instead settle for a limited BEXP pool. And I don't see how the point I bolded is true when they're more durable than FE8 enemies. So yes, he's going to struggle harder than those three.

[Benice]

1 minute ago, Shadow Mir said:

So yes, he's going to struggle harder than those three.

tbh BEXP is about as limited as grinding in the tower-Rolf doesn't get ORKO'd by every single enemy on the map-Ross and Amelia do. You have to go out of your way to train any of those three. You can just passively use Rolf and he'll be fine. It's a heck of a lot harder to use Rossmeliewan, even with the tower. They still die a lot.

4 minutes ago, Shadow Mir said:

And I don't see how the point I bolded is true when they're more durable than FE8 enemies.

They basically can't kill anything at all. Wind Mages deal, like, two damage to Marcia.

[Shadow Mir]

41 minutes ago, Benice said:

Wind Mages deal, like, two damage to Marcia.

Because wind has only 2 might and the effective bonus was knocked down to double might again. Which, incidentally, hurts Rolf, because that means the one thing his class is supposed to have going for it doesn't help him much.

41 minutes ago, Benice said:

tbh BEXP is about as limited as grinding in the tower-Rolf doesn't get ORKO'd by every single enemy on the map-Ross and Amelia do. You have to go out of your way to train any of those three. You can just passively use Rolf and he'll be fine. It's a heck of a lot harder to use Rossmeliewan, even with the tower. They still die a lot.

What. Just... What. This is so dumb, I think just reading this made my IQ drop. Revenants, which is most of what you see in the first floor of the tower, are piss weak. Unless you were talking about actually trying to use them on their joining chapters, which I don't do for any of the trainees besides Ross, because he joins early enough to let him take potshots at enemies. I don't see how "you can just passively use Rolf and he'll be fine" unless your plan involved a lot of BEXP, because most enemy units at that point laugh off his shots.

Edited September 4, 2020 by Shadow Mir

[Benice]

8 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

What. Just... What. This is so dumb, I think just reading this made my IQ drop.

Thanks. Being a world-class idiot is my full-time job.

8 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

Revenants, which is most of what you see in the first floor of the tower, are piss weak.

And watching the trainees walk around with weak enemies ain't fun. I'd rather have to deal with using a weak archer who still is hard to get killed than grind in the tower for 25 minutes so I can farther break the game in half- BEXP is just a faster way to Tower Grind. Unless you're going for an efficient run, there isn't much deterring you from using Rolf. One or two BEXP levels and a deployment slot is good enough. Even in an inefficient run, there is a reason not use Rossmeliewan-Training people up in the tower is a really, really boring timesink.

8 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

Unless you were talking about actually trying to use them on their joining chapters

Trying to use them in their joining chapters is honestly more efficient than training them up in the tower in terms of time spent.

If I'm doing a run through FE9 using mostly good units, (Marcia, Kieran, etc.) then decide on a whim to use Rolf, I can. Nobody else on the team actually needs BEXP to stay relevant; it mostly makes them more overpowered than they already were. I give Rolf, say, five levels then just give him chip and the occasional level-Even if it takes investment, it's not a very costly investment. Heck, I could give him all of the BEXP if I wanted to-nobody else needs it much, barring maybe Mist for mounted healer earlier.

If I'm doing a run through FE8 using mostly good units, then decide on a whim to use Amelia/Ewan, I have to decide to either deal with their bad bases and try to train them in-chapter or go to the tower, give them ten levels, promote them, then grind some more because at 10/1 they're still bad. It takes a lot more time and effort to use them.

9 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

Because wind has only 2 might and the effective bonus was knocked down to double might again. Which, incidentally, hurts Rolf, because that means the one thing his class is supposed to have going for it doesn't help him much.

If we're arguing about whether FE9 is harder than FE8, this is a strong point for FE8-I can't just send my flier into 12 archers, and FE9 has its own Seth, and her name is Titania.

I'm not arguing that Rolf is good, I'm arguing that Rolf is easier to use than the trainees.

[Shadow Mir]

12 hours ago, Benice said:

If we're arguing about whether FE9 is harder than FE8, this is a strong point for FE8-I can't just send my flier into 12 archers, and FE9 has its own Seth, and her name is Titania.

I'm not arguing that Rolf is good, I'm arguing that Rolf is easier to use than the trainees.

Would you argue it's harder than Blazing Blade then? Because Blazing Blade knocked the effective bonus down to double in the overseas release. Also, counterpoint: the monsters in Sacred Stones are even less threatening than the human enemies, and it's not like the human enemies in that game are that much of a threat. FFS, a base level Seth can hold his own against endgame enemies. ON FREAKING HARD MODE. That's not something I should be able to say.

And I think that is BS. How weak do you think Path of Radiance enemies are???

13 hours ago, Benice said:

And watching the trainees walk around with weak enemies ain't fun. I'd rather have to deal with using a weak archer who still is hard to get killed than grind in the tower for 25 minutes so I can farther break the game in half- BEXP is just a faster way to Tower Grind. Unless you're going for an efficient run, there isn't much deterring you from using Rolf. One or two BEXP levels and a deployment slot is good enough. Even in an inefficient run, there is a reason not use Rossmeliewan-Training people up in the tower is a really, really boring timesink.

Neither is trying to raise a level 1 archer who does next to no damage against most enemies at the point of the game he joins in. Also, saying that it's hard to kill Rolf is BS. Once again, how weak do you think this game's enemies are??? Because it only takes 15 (11 for mages) attack to 2HKO him, which most enemies in his joining chapter clear. Anyway, looking at chapter 10, you have these units, and you can only take 9 (Ike included):

• Ike
• Titania
• Oscar
• Boyd
• Rhys
• Soren
• Ilyana
• Mia
• Lethe
• Mordecai
• Volke
• Mist
• Rolf
• Marcia

Ike aside due to him being the main character, just how many of these units can you justify benching to field Rolf? Because I can't make a convincing case to field Rolf over any of these units.

14 hours ago, Benice said:

Trying to use them in their joining chapters is honestly more efficient than training them up in the tower in terms of time spent.

If I'm doing a run through FE9 using mostly good units, (Marcia, Kieran, etc.) then decide on a whim to use Rolf, I can. Nobody else on the team actually needs BEXP to stay relevant; it mostly makes them more overpowered than they already were. I give Rolf, say, five levels then just give him chip and the occasional level-Even if it takes investment, it's not a very costly investment. Heck, I could give him all of the BEXP if I wanted to-nobody else needs it much, barring maybe Mist for mounted healer earlier.

If I'm doing a run through FE8 using mostly good units, then decide on a whim to use Amelia/Ewan, I have to decide to either deal with their bad bases and try to train them in-chapter or go to the tower, give them ten levels, promote them, then grind some more because at 10/1 they're still bad. It takes a lot more time and effort to use them.

At the same time, I could ask, does anyone else really need the tower? Also, personally, I find that Amelia could hold her own in chapter 10 once she becomes a Cavalier. Ross comes early enough that he can feasibly get to level 10 without the need for the tower. Going back to Rolf, if I decide to use him, I am pretty much forced to put up with his bad bases and the fact that he needs to have enemies get chipped really low before he can kill them. While BEXP can alleviate that, a lot of other units that start underleveled and thus would like BEXP to help them get started join around that time (Ilyana, Mist, Marcia, Nephenee, Jill...), which begs the question, why not BEXP one of them instead? Especially since he's still an archer in one of the worst games for archers.

[Benice]

4 minutes ago, Shadow Mir said:

Would you argue it's harder than Blazing Blade then? Because Blazing Blade knocked the effective bonus down to double in the overseas release.

No, but double effectiveness does make the game easier than it would be otherwise. Marcia can go ham with the moment she joins because of this-None of the pegasi in FE7 or FE8 can say that. Bows, and especially magic, are a minor deterrent.

6 minutes ago, Shadow Mir said:

Also, counterpoint: the monsters in Sacred Stones are even less threatening than the human enemies, and it's not like the human enemies in that game are that much of a threat.

They sure as heck die easily, but they have somewhat high attack and can pose a threat-The hardest chapter in Sacred Stones has only monster enemies.

8 minutes ago, Shadow Mir said:

And I think that is BS. How weak do you think Path of Radiance enemies are???

Very-They're bulkier, but they lack the attack power to do much at all. Heck, Ike takes, like, three damage from everything in the earlygame. Titania isn't much worse than Seth-she falls off eventually but completely snaps the game in half for the first half. She's certainly fast enough to double everything except for Ravens.

To me, PoR enemies are frustrating more than anything else.

10 minutes ago, Shadow Mir said:

Neither is trying to raise a level 1 archer who does next to no damage against most enemies at the point of the game he joins in.

But he doesn't require seeing combat to level up-Bonus experience exists.

12 minutes ago, Shadow Mir said:

, saying that it's hard to kill Rolf is BS. Once again, how weak do you think this game's enemies are??? Because it only takes 15 (11 for mages) attack to 2HKO him, which most enemies in his joining chapter clear. 

And Rolf should be getting counterattacked/attacked twice in a turn in his joining chapter because? He's not supposed to be a tank and shouldn't be having combat initiated on him by much. If he were an armor knight, then this would be a bigger problem.

13 minutes ago, Shadow Mir said:

Anyway, looking at chapter 10, you have these units, and you can only take 9 (Ike included):

• Ike
• Titania
• Oscar
• Boyd
• Rhys
• Soren
• Ilyana
• Mia
• Lethe
• Mordecai
• Volke
• Mist
• Rolf
• Marcia

Ike aside due to him being the main character, just how many of these units can you justify benching to field Rolf? Because I can't make a convincing case to field Rolf over any of these units.

Again, I'm not arguing that Rolf is good-I'm arguing that he's easier to use than the trainees! If we were talking about efficiency and effective play, or even "Is x unit worth deploying," neither Rolf nor the trainees should be anywhere in the conversation.

23 minutes ago, Shadow Mir said:

Going back to Rolf, if I decide to use him, I am pretty much forced to put up with his bad bases and the fact that he needs to have enemies get chipped really low before he can kill them. While BEXP can alleviate that, a lot of other units that start underleveled and thus would like BEXP to help them get started join around that time (Ilyana, Mist, Marcia, Nephenee, Jill...),

Mist's the only one who really needs dat BEXP. Marcia's good enough at base, Nephenee can get easy kills with Wrath abuse, Jill has speedwings the chapter after she joins and her bases are otherwise good enough-There's nothing wrong with giving Rolf a few levels. He's bad, but it's still much, much faster than Tower Grinding. PoR is still fairly easy without using any BEXP at all.

29 minutes ago, Shadow Mir said:

which begs the question, why not BEXP one of them instead? Especially since he's still an archer in one of the worst games for archers.

Because if you're going to bother using Rolf, he needs it. There's no actual reason to use Amelia either, since she has 4 move and takes time to raise. Why deploy her over the pegasi, Cormag, Franz, etc? Because some people just like using bad units. That's just how it be.

[whase]

Kind of sounds like we all agree that Rolf is bad, but don't all agree about how easy this game is? 

I'm on team this game is easy enough that any unit can be useful if you want without making the game that much harder.

Once again, this all revolves around preference in playstyle I think? 

[Agility]

Shinon > Rolf (I like double Bow)

However, the chapter you get rolf in, if you kill all enemies and then just boss abuse he can easily get lvl 9. You just have to sacrifice earning bonus experience for that level and have the patience of a God. Ive gotten him promoted to Sniper by the chapter 15 with boss abuse and some BEXP. Not to mention if you give him an A support with shinon in the game later, he dodges alot.