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Rate the Unit-Three Houses, Day 5: Caspar


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Rules

- Ratings are assumed to be on Hard or Maddening Mode. Also, they should be based on when the unit is first available. (When rating a unit, please specify whether you are rating assuming Hard or Maddening.)

- Votes need some explanation regarding their gameplay performance to be counted (unless they fall into the general parameters of the average rating, but reasoning is still strongly encouraged on those even if you just wanna quote people) — incredibly low scores or high scores without proper justification will not be counted. Don't put in some random text thinking it'd count as justification. Put in at least a little thought and give REAL reasoning.

- Numbers for votes, please - not something like "Marcus/10", etc. Proper Justification will be determined by me and whoever decides to help.

+/- ≤1 point extra regarding personality/appearance is okay, but no more.

- Votes out of 10, or something proportional to it. Makes it easy to calculate, please and thank you~!

-The rating you give to a unit assumes a good build for said unit-nothing among the lines of, "Dedue is 2/10 because he's a bad mage."

-The ranking assumes no grinding of any form, no DLC and minor, (one or two stat boosters per month) use of the Greenhouse.

- Make votes easily visible, please! "[Explanation text]: So, overall, I think X unit is a 7.5/10, with a +1 bias included for being hawt/cute/funny/etc.."

- Every ranking phase ends approximately at 20:00 PST. Do the math for your timezone, please!

-We will ask you to not use the "Not X unit" reason. Because it will be used a lot. I.E, do not say "Linhardt bad because not Lysithea."

-The Black Eagles may be assessed based on their performances in either Silver Snow or Crimson Flower, other than when not applicable.

 

Scores:

Edelgard: 9.00

Hubert: 5.525

Ferdinand: 7.78

Linhardt: 7.11

Average score for Black Eagles: 7.285

 

Day 5: Caspar

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5/10

Not great, but not awful. Perfectly mediocre.

Before you grab your pitchforks for me not giving him a 1 or something, I'd like to point out that most of my ratings are of the unit in a vacuum- I'm trying to minimise comparisons to other units where possible. And when you don't compare Caspar to the other students, he's really not that bad.

The big flaw that everybody always brings up is his bases. To be blunt, they suck. His biggest claim to fame is tying for the highest base defence in the house, at 6 which is still meh. But his speed is somehow the lowest in the house, and his strength isn't particularly impressive either. The fact that he joins with an axe hurts him further by weighing him down to hell and back (except not really back because he doesn't magically get a good speed stat), and as a result he excels at nothing at base. Petra ties for strength and loses in defence by 1 point, but she has way more speed. Bernadetta may have similarly low base stats, but her personal skill gives her a strength advantage that he lacks. Speaking of personal skills, its the one thing that he has going for him at this stage of the game. The debuff to enemy avoid not only makes his hit rate more reliable, but can also help his classmates with proper positioning. Other than that, Caspar is without a doubt the worst of the Black Eagles at base.

His growths aren't particularly impressive either- none of them, other than his charm growth, are bad, but they don't do a lot to fix his low bases. They're just... average.

OK. So his stats are bad. Well what about his combat arts? They're... ok. Bombard is nice as a straight might boosting combat art to gauntlets, by still double attacking and adding 3 might and 10 crit to each hit. It's nice if you need a small damage boost to kill an enemy, but it'll fall off after a point. Mighty Blow is held back by being a gauntlet art, which, unlike Bombard, gives up the brave effect for 10 extra damage , -5 hit and 20 crit. Not really worth it unless you want to bank on the crit. His axe arts include Wild Abandon, which is great if you want to see powerful attacks miss most of the time (in all seriousness I've never really used it, Caspar can negate some of the hit penalty, but he'll still need help to connect this) and Exhaustive Strike, which is by far the most spammable combat art in the game (I don't have an "in all seriousness" to put here, this art is a meme. OK fine. In all seriousness the damage can be nice at times, but its not worth burning through all your weapons faster than a QR Swordmaster. I don't like it at all.). For abilities, he learns Battalion Wrath but that's it- and his proficiencies include a bane in authority anyway.

Speaking of proficiencies, he gets a boon in axes and brawling for War Master, which I honestly don't know why you wouldn't put him in War Master, and a bane in bows (makes Hit +20 more annoying, but not at all a massive issue) and authority (I thought storywise he was supposed to inspire the troops with his enthusiasm or something? Gdi game.).

Yes, this entire post has been me crapping on Caspar. Despite all his flaws, I still maintain his 5/10 rating, for the opposite reason I gave Hubert a 5/10. While Hubert is good early game but falls off later on, Caspar gets really good later on- assuming you put him into War Master or Grappler. His proficiencies give him the easiest time of it compared to the rest of the class, and if you stick with him through his rough start, he's almost guaranteed to be good in the end. Brawling is just that good.

And yes, it may be unfair of me to rate him based almost solely off his recommended classes, since technically any other male can access them. But its not like he has anything better to do anyway. And if you made all your males War Masters, he might be outshined, yes, but he'd still be good- and ultimately I'm trying to rate how good units can be at their particular niche. So yeah.

 

I'm about to get absolutely dumped on by everybody on this forum aren't I.

Edited by Anathaco
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Fun fact: in my very first play through Three Houses, Caspar ended up being my best unit. The one who I had to be careful not to use too much because he'd take experience from everyone else, but that I could always have in reserve to come in and absolutely wreck whenever I was in trouble. Knowing what I know now, I really don't know how that happened and dread to think how RNG-blessed he must have been. It is amusing to look back, though, and remember the time when I considered Caspar the god tier unit.

As for how good he actually is? Well, not very good. Few skill proficiencies, uninspired combat arts, mediocre to bad bases and growths, no crest, and terrible recruitment. That said, there are two things that I do like about Caspar. First is his personal. Being able to give adjacent enemies -10 avoid is pretty great. It's a passie bonus that you don't even have to think about that will make him hit more often, but it can also be useful to deliberately position him to help someone else land their hit. I definitely consider it one of the better personals in the game. The second thing I like about him is that even though he isn't well suited to many classes, the classes that he is suited to are really good. The obvious classes to put him into are grappler and war master, and if you put him into either of them, he'll be a good combat unit on the basis of the class alone. He's also a reasonable fit to go into wyvern rider and wyvern lord, with his strength in axes and neutral in flying. Again, if you go down that route he'll turn into a pretty great unit just on the basis of the class. He won't be as good as other wyvern lords or other war masters or grapplers, but he will still be good.

Overall, he's still not a particular impressive unit, but I still give him a passing grade of 4/10.

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I got into Crimson Flower with the expectations that Caspar was gonna be terrible throughout the whole game (after reading many things about him), but Caspar came in super clutch mid-late game for me. He's pretty bad in the start, yes, but his late game in my personal experience was invaluable to my CF team. I'm ngl, I actually love Caspar LOL.

I'll start off with the bad so that we end on a good note LOL:
It's pretty widely accepted that Caspar has, hands down, the worst base stats out of any unit in the game--most notably his speed and strength. Unfortunately, for being a designated frontliner, his defense is pretty bad as well with a base of 6 and a growth rate of 30%. His overall growth rates are pretty average at best, with 55% growth HP being his only asset. But what good is his HP if his defense can't save it? On top of that, he starts off with an axe, which is heavy and inaccurate so it is highly recommended to get him gauntlets ASAP. Even then, he'll still get doubled. With all of this combined, trying to keep Caspar alive will definitely be a struggle in the beginning. His axe combat arts are pretty underwhelming as well. Personally, I don't like the idea of Exhaustive Strike and absolutely never used it, and I don't like risking a missed hit with Wild Abandon. His brawl combat arts include Bombard, which I find actually really good, so I'll get into that later. Lastly, his skill proficiencies give him a bane in both bows and authority. And unfortunately, these 2 skills are considered the best to have for any unit. Poor guy got everything a terrible unit would have.

Okay, now let's get into the good:
Okay so the reason why I found Caspar to be so good in my late game was basically because of the War Master class. It may have been because the class itself is great and can salvage any bad unit, but Caspar's natural affinity towards its skill proficiencies make the path much easier to class into. Despite having only a 45% dex growth and a base of 5, his crit rate ranged from 60-80 with Killer Knuckles+ and the innate +20 crit from War Master. To be 100% fair, I did baby him quite a bit and this may have been just me getting lucky with a bad unit, but hey, he carried my team at times and I couldn't doubt that. But anyways, let me just get into Caspar in general as opposed to my own experience with him. There's honestly not a lot going for Caspar that's actually that great, as his only saving grace is his boon in axes to make it easier to get into Wyvern classes--which is pretty widely accepted as the best class in the game next to Falcon Knight. But also, I really want to point out that despite Caspar having a bad speed start, when you look at the other "designated" Brawlers/Fortress Knights aka Raphael and Dedue, Caspar is f a s t. He essentially plays the same or at least a similar role as Dedue and Raphael in their respective houses, but at least Caspar has the benefit of having higher speed. But yeah, he's definitely not fast enough to double or dodge consistently, but he can at least have enough speed to resist getting doubled on some certain enemies unlike the other aforementioned two.  Lastly, BOMBARD. Bombard, I find, is a really underrated combat art. Extra might, +10 Crit, low durability cost, and a guaranteed double (even though gauntlets already naturally double) is nothing to scoff at. You can potentially wipe out a demonic beast's whole HP bar with this. Potentially LOL.

EDIT: I also forgot to mention his personal! Avoid -10 on adjacent enemies is really good and worth noting as it is fairly similar to Ignatz's Hit +20. I find it actually one of the better personal skills in the game as reducing dodge means higher accuracy, which is really REALLY useful on late game Assassins and Swordmasters. It won't mean a guaranteed hit, but it is at least very helpful. Caspar's not hitting anything long-range anyways, so he's pretty much always going to activate this in combat and can prove useful if other teammates want to land a hit on enemies next to Caspar.

Overall I give Caspar a 6/10. He has the roughest start out of any unit with terrible base stats and only average at best growths, as well as having surprisingly bad survivability potential for a frontliner. However, he can perform pretty well late-game as long as time is invested in him but will still be outperformed by his fellow housemates. (but in my personal CF run, I'd give him an 8/10 LOL)

Edited by kia_kula
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Welp, guess I'll play the bad guy then: 3/10

I'll say up front that compared to units in the entire franchise, Caspar deserves higher, but I think he's without a doubt one of the worst units in the game. A lot of people quote his bases as being the reason he's bad, but while his bases certainly aren't good my main issue is more that... he just doesn't have anything to compensate.

Almost every unit in this game gets something: a broken combat art, a strong personal, a good spell list, insane bases, anything. Caspar is one of the few units who just feels... overlooked. Having easier access to Grappler and Warmaster is nice, but most physical units can get to that class if they focus on it (well, male units anyway) and he's not all that much better in those classes than said other units. That still makes him a good unit when he gets there, sure, but that's because Grappler and Warmaster can make anyone look good.

I will admit Bombard is nice to have before mastering Grappler (or to use in warmaster) and he's probably your best bet for creating a tank in CF (if you don't have DLC for Balthus). It just feels very undewhelming compared to what everyone else gets in this game.

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Caspar is a rather mediocre unit in a game where most units can be OP with the right builds. He won't ever be OP and he does have a rough start, but he's still usable. His weapon preferences will have him lean towards War Master or Wyvern Lord as his endgame class, which are very good, but any unit can do that with favoritism. However, Caspar will have an easier time to do that.

His recruitment isn't too hard (C Brawling and 10 Strength), with only Brawling being your main concern. As an adjutant, he works well as a defensive adjutant, which is a plus for me. (yes, I know anyone can be a guard adjutant, but 2/3 of your main adjutants will be deployed as units in endgame, and you don't want to make a character a guard adjutant when they're better off training in something else.)

If this wasn't Three Houses, Caspar wouldn't look too bad or too unusual. BUT since this is Three Houses, a game where a sizable portion of the cast has crests, OP weapons, and/or good personal skill, Caspar falls short.

He's a 5/10 for me. Middling.

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7/10 +1 Bias so 8/10

Okay so, hear me out before setting my house ablaze. He starts out with meh bases but once he gets his killer gauntlets or killing axe, he becomes a BEAST. He can reliably get over 80% crit and even 100% crit once he's become a war master and can just nuke every unit he faces with the power of crits. The way he starts out is kind of rough but he can become a really good unit. The downside is that he has virtually no enemy phase on maddening until he gets quick riposte from war master, but 3h is a player phase centric game and reposition exists so that's less of a problem compared to other games. The one thing about Caspar is that he's a pain to recruit in the non Black eagles, but we aren't considering that for his rating, so I won't take that into consideration. He can also become a very good Wyvern lord without much trouble and Wyvern lord is the best class of the game so that gives him plus points aswell.

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Hey look it's the little punching boy. Let's look at him.

Caspar doesn't like numbers:

Spoiler

Caspar's bases.... let's just say they're not the best. 9 Str is not all that good when you remember Edelgard and how Ferdinand's 8 was bad, while his others aren't anything to write home about either, not even having the higher defence of the BE thanks to it being a measly 6. His growths on the other hand give him a pretty decent if unexceptional chance for improvement as Str, Spd and Dex are all 45%, he has a good HP growth at 55%, though his Def isn't as high as would be liked at 30%. His Mag, Res and Cha are all pretty low, but this doesn't have to ruin him either. And yet. It seems like everyone doesn't get much benefit from his growth rates playing this game.

His strengths and weaknesses are also a topic worth raising. His weakness in Reason is totally irrelevant to him because he's not a good mage, though weaknesses in authority and bows aren't good at all. Meanwhile he has only two strengths, Axes and Brawling and he can totally live off these all game. If you decide WL however, at least lances and flying aren't weaknesses.

His magic is thankfully short. Reason has Fire and Bolganone (I titter and shake my head), while his faith has H+N and Recover, easily one of the weakest lists in this game.

His personal skill's actually pretty good, giving foes -10 avoid when he's next to them. He's also crestless, so moving on.

His combat arts could be better. For his axes, Wild Abandon loses too much hit to be worth considering on Maddening, while Exhaustive Strike is a weapon breaker and the best damage boost you can get is 19 from the Training Axe (while it's low might to begin with), while you're better off using Steel Axe+ and it's 16 boost to damage. As for gauntlets, Mighty Blow could be better, with only +10 might being disappointing for what it is, though 20 crit is nice it also drops hit. However, Bombard is actually pretty good. It's one that doubles like an actual gauntlet, +3 might and +10 crit are nice for what is only one more durability and he's one of only two units to get it. Meanwhile, the one skill he gets off authority is Battalion Wrath, which if you have to get one, this ain't one to complain about and he can crit stack for sure with it and everything else he can look for.

His recruitment is also limited as he also can't get B rank. Thankfully, he has more sense than Ferdinand and picks one of Byleth's strengths for proficiency and Byleth has E+ to start. As for the fact that getting the Scythe of Sariel off DK means having him kill DK and how laughable that is on EP without QR, I tend to recommend Killer Knuckles for the job. And it s a good job, because with a bit of crit raising from stuff like being in War Master (more than achievable unless you recruited him late and didn't use him at all) you can easily get him to a range where 1 crit will do as he isn't that weak, especially if recruited from outside his house.

How did I find him?:

Spoiler

So, a clarification: I have stuck to type with the guy, especially with my maddening run. Used him in CF, AM, SS and my current Maddening run.

In my CF playthrough, he actually was alright enough, though this being my second playthrough and me not knowing what I was doing doesn't help his case. He went through the axe route, nothing too complex.

AM saw him go down the same route, with similar results, only more because he'd gotten more levels.

My SS run saw him be much improved however. Probably the strongest and fastest I ever had him, going down Grappler instead of Warrior might have made the difference. Of course this Caspar wrecked DK in the Face Underneath.

As for my Maddening run, he kinda proves he's worth using as an out of house recruit. Kinda. As it stands I've got him sitting on a pretty high 38 Str in WM, while running circles around Raphael at 26 Spd. Sadly that's not much of a positive in Maddening, where either you're stupid fast or you get doubled. His defences aren't great either, but his HP is big enough to work with if he gets doubled. And yet. He has one of the best records against the death knight (Chasing him down in Merceus, of course The Face Beneath) and in Retribution managed to take out the bosses thanks to his crit rates with the killer knuckles, removing half the map in two combat rounds and should have been the MVP instead of.... I think it was Lysithea, who to be fair warped him, or was it someone else? Never mind. He had both Grappler and Warrior done, though he also wants to master Archer now because his hit's not that good.

I guess I should treat this as Killer Knuckles good, Caspar can use them. Eh? Eh? I'll rate him 5/10, mainly because for all that I think he can be more than useable, I see why people would argue otherwise. But again, gauntlets strength can be underappreciated for Player Phase shenanigans.

Edited by Dayni
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5.5 / 10 on Hard

the good:

  • Boon in Axe and Brawling => Easy access to Brigand and Guard Adjutant classes, as well as easier certification for strong endgame physical classes like Grappler, War Master or Wyvern.
  • Learns Bombard at C+ Brawling. Hitting twice with added Mt and Crit is handy when unable to quad with gauntlet.
  • Battalion Wrath, useful for Vantage-Wrath build or after mastering Quick Riposte.
  • Useful personal ability that can benefit the entire team against an enemy with high Avo when planned around his positioning.

the not-so-good:

  • Bane in Bow and Authority => More hassle to access Hit+20, Battalion Wrath and good battalions, especially if aiming for Wyvern. Although Jeralt’s Mercenaries is still a pretty good option if he stays grounded.
  • Relatively difficult early game, resulting from a combination of his unimpressive base (namely low base Spd and okay base Str and Def for a melee unit), lack of a personal ability that boosts said stats, and no rally or ability to boost his teammates’ combat performance in a more direct way.
  • Low Charm base and growth => Need to be more careful with enemy battalions if going for a Vantage-Wrath build.
  • No crest => Penalty when using Freikugel if going Silver Snow, which can be impractical but not a dealbreaker.
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Unfortunately, Caspar is in the running for worst character in the game.  I think others beat him out for that, but not by much.  There just isn't much to recommend him on Maddening.  His default promotion path is either Warrior/Grappler->War Master, but he doesn't have the strength or bulk to be effective in those roles.  My understanding is he's supposed to a more of crit oriented build for a grappler, but it just doesn't work.  His combat arts are unremarkable, and his personal ability is of modest utility.  He has no crest and no Hero's Relic.  He's a pain in the ass to recruit when he's out of house.  He basically has to be carried through the game by the rest of the party until he gets Quick Riposte, but that's a skill that nearly anyone can pick up.

The only nice thing is that he has the opportunity to get the Scythe of Sariel in his paralogue, but unfortunately that requires using him for 30 levels so he's strong enough to do damage to the Death Knight.

2.5/10.

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Caspar feels like a character that wants to be a good front line attacker but lacks the stat growths to be one. His best growth is HP but the rest of his stats kind of pales since he is rather below average at best. He has the lowest speed stat out of anyone else in the Black Eagles and him having an Iron Axe to start off further weighs him down to be doubled more often than not. He has a boon and axes and brawling he can easily be a grappler or warmaster if one decides to build him up. His personal ability Born Fighter inflicting a avoid -10 to adjacent enemies is actually not bad. You could in theory have caspar be next to an enemy and either have him soften someone up with a combat art or have him stand next to an enemy, do nothing, and allow your other units to pick off the enemy with the added accuracy (or in the enemy's case, loss of avoid). 

Bombard for a good while will be his best combat art to use since it will strike twice consecutively and have a nice crit chance of 10. Killer Gauntlets+ will amplify this combat art. His axe combat art though are not as good as you would hope they be. Wild Abandon may have the high risk high reward it offers but having -30 hit in exchange for 30 crit just isn't worth the risk. And Exhaustive Strike while it may sound like a nice way to nuke an enemy will break your weapon immediately and just repairing it over and over again just gets annoying. He does have access to Battalion Wrath which can combo well with Quick Riposte but he has a bane in authority so this makes difficult for Caspar to work towards even on hard/maddening. Even Raphael has a better time gaining points in authority and has access to rally strength which is a nice tool for him to have early. Caspar does not get that luxury.

His best options are obviously either War Master or Grappler. War Master if you want the added crit +20 and the battalion wrath + quick riposte set I've mentioned above. Or Grappler with Fierce Iron Fist. Death Blow is a must for him obviously. He could also go Wyvern Lord if you want to ignore his brawling entirely and work on his lances and flying in addition to axes. Of course flying battalions are limited in terms of selection and are only limited to follow up adjutants that also fly. While born fighter would help is accuracy issues while flying a wyvern Caspar is not the best candidate to be one and Wyvern Lord is without a doubt one of the best if not the best class in the game. The class will do Caspar some good don't get me wrong, but there are better candidates like Seteth, Sylvain, Petra, etc. Outside of Black Eagles, you would need to recruit him at least on Blue Lions to unlock a paralogue battle with Mercedes in part 2 in effort to gaining the Rafail Gem and Scythe of Sariel, both of which are potent items to gain. Also if you do recruit Caspar early in part 1, anytime between chapter 3 and 5, he'll have a bow rank of D which is also one of his banes. So you could work towards bow rank D+ and allow him to access the archer class to gain hit +20. Other than that, he's not that special.

Overall I feel he is a 4/10 unit. He has a bad start and I suppose he can be decent by the end if you're willing to work with him. But he is perfectly replaceable with a better brawling/axe swinging candidate like Balthus or Felix for basically similar roles Caspar tries to fulfill. Perhaps if his speed growth was improved this would be a different story but c'est la vie

Edited by Barren
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Caspar is probably the worst student in the game. He's not the worst unit in the game because joining late is a big downside, but otherwise...

There's not much good to say about him, honestly. If I had to look for something, I guess I'd bring up the Bombard combat art, which gives him +3 damage and helps bring his strength up to Raphael level when specifically considering player phase punching... at least outside of Fierce Iron Fist. He also has a pretty good personal, giving him an effective +10 hit at melee and also helping out his allies. And finally, since I'm scraping the bottom of the barrel, I will emphasize that joining early is a big help; you can start training him however you want, get him useful masteries like Reposition, etc. This will be relevant when we discuss the actual worst character in the game.

Otherwise, the bad... hoo boy. Let's start with his talent list. He only has +axes, which every physical Eagle gets sans Bernadetta, and +brawling. Brawling isn't really that great to start with, IMO (Wyvern Lord is the OP axe class, not War Master). But okay, let's say you disagree. His talent list is still bad because he's -authority. Compared to say, War Master Ferdinand (nobody recommends War Master Ferdinand), Caspar is +brawling but -authority, which will lead to about the same amount of training needed to reach for this build.

The stats are also just terrible. 9+45% str is only fractionally better (either 1 base or 5% growth) than the far superior Ferdinand and Petra. 6 base speed is terrible. And while the growth is better than Raphael (the only other physical character to start this slow), it's still poor enough that on average, he'll only barely be ahead of the 14 speed base of all the Advanced tier physical jobs at Level 20... and behind the 20 speed base of Wyvern Lord at Level 30. His charm and res are both bad. His durability is also mediocre, with raw HP/def that trail Edelgard and Ferdinand being held back further by his poor spd, charm, and res. In other words: probably the worst stat build in the game.

Caspar gets a 2.5/10.

Edited by Dark Holy Elf
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41 minutes ago, SumG said:

The only nice thing is that he has the opportunity to get the Scythe of Sariel in his paralogue, but unfortunately that requires using him for 30 levels so he's strong enough to do damage to the Death Knight.

You're aware you can just train his lance rank to C for knightkeeler and dump a Lance of Ruin on him, right? It's something anyone can do, so not really relevant when rating Caspar, but felt like pointing it out to save some grinding for you.

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On Maddening mode, I hate to do this because I like his character and design but he shall receive a 3/10. Basically for the reasons others said, bad bases, bad growths, hard to recruit. That stuff. On hard mode he destroys everything as a war master, which is what the game wants you to make him, but so does everyone else soooo. He has the bombard combat art which can pretty good, and..... that’s really it, he’s basically a dead weight until advanced tier that you have to baby around on maddening if you want to use him. He cAn be good but it’s just not worth it when others can be good sooner and are far far far far far better than him. Sorry Caspar, still love your pre time skip design and your overall character.

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I rate him a 4.

Pros: (they aren't amazing)

Can make decent ish grappler or wyvern

Good personal consider hit rates are pretty bad early game.

Gets battalion wrath.

Cons:

Terrible bases. 9 att is meh and 6 spd and 4 cha is awful.

Terrible proficiencies. Bad in authority and bows. Not to mention he is only good at 2 things.

Growths are meh. 45% att and spd.

No good combat art

 

There really isn't anything outstanding about Caspar that other units can do. Battalion wrath doesn't really help him due to his terrible speed and meh bulk. Cannot really be an enemy phase unit(not to mention he has a bane in authority, making it harder to get the skill). Imo he does better in out of house routes so you don't have to deal with him terrible bases. I rate him 4 that is the lowest I will rate a grappler/wyvern.

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2 hours ago, Bartozio said:

You're aware you can just train his lance rank to C for knightkeeler and dump a Lance of Ruin on him, right? It's something anyone can do, so not really relevant when rating Caspar, but felt like pointing it out to save some grinding for you.

Caspar can actually deal decent damage to the Deathknight at base level when recurited at Chapter 12.

Lance of Ruin would be too inaccurate to really be of use and wouldn't one shot anyways barring a unreliable Crit. Luin would be better, but it's really not worth rasing him to C Lances. 

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8 minutes ago, LoneRecon400 said:

Caspar can actually deal decent damage to the Deathknight at base level when recurited at Chapter 12.

Lance of Ruin would be too inaccurate to really be of use and wouldn't one shot anyways barring a unreliable Crit. Luin would be better, but it's really not worth rasing him to C Lances. 

Yeah, that's fair. I was mostly trying to dissprove you'd need to train Caspar to lvl 30 to even do damage, but this is a much easier way to do it.

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God I love Caspar. The reason why I've always gushed about gauntlet users in the game is how quickly they snowball on Maddening and how they only need one stat to function. Combine Death Blow with bombard and Str +2  and you're already ORKOing enemies at no counterattack in early-mid game. That will never stop, and their damage output ends up being crucial to draining hundreds of points of HP off monster enemies at once. Of course it's possible for Caspar to not level up strength , but a strength booster here or there can patch up that performance. Grappler base speed is also good enough to quad armor knights for a kill, and gauntlet accuracy and evasion being so high really aids fights taking place within terrain. And the low weight of gauntlets lets you tack on a shield for some extra bulk.

But yeah, Caspar deserves flak for his base stats and unremarkable growths. Even using Smash, he'll struggle to land double digit damage at the start and face doubles from most enemies when (although I guess he's guaranteed to land some damage, unlike Hubert/Dorothea). I think his personal skill is underrated, especially early on. Since it's not only a permanent boost to his own melee attack accuracy, it applies to other units as well when he's standing next to a target. When everybody's mobbing the same guy, it can be a big help to send Caspar in first. At the start of the game it's a better boost than three linked attack bonuses. I've seen people argue Caspar's stat spread is better suited to being a wyvern, but there are so many better wyverns out there, even among his starting class. The lack of flying battallions also segues into my biggest issue with him - the authority bane. Definitely the worst bane to have in the game since he'll rank it up 50% slower than your other units forever. It leads to him still being stuck with Jeralt's Mercs while everybody's having fun with C rank batallions, and he has much later access to batallion wrath than similar units.

It's a shame because Caspar was my (literal) MVP in Maddening with the highest stats and KOs on my crew. I don't think he was blessed so much as everybody else was screwed. Looking at Caspar on paper, I rate him a 3.0 in CF and a 4.0 in SS, leading to a compiled rating of 3.5. He's better in SS because you need all the help you can get in that version of Chapter 13, and that route has way more monster battles than CF, including the dreaded white beasts in the finale who have a ton of speed and +30 avoid against other physical weapon types. Granting him another point feels appropriate in the other two routes because Recruit!Caspar will have better stats and have autotrained in the two skill proficiencies you wanted him to anyway. But in those routes the one thing that would keep me from adding Caspar to the team is just Alois. Alois has better stats and better skill ranks than Caspar would have at that part of the game. Sure, you can never have enough war masters, but Raphael and Felix also have more going for them as recruited or in-House units. I've run four war masters in Maddening to great effect, but not everybody is addicted to cocaine like I am.

Edited by Glennstavos
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Overall, I'd give Caspar a 4.5/10 +1 for Bias because Killer Gauntlets so 5.5/10 on Hard

Honestly, everything Caspar has is mediocre, I have never used Bombard, or any combat art he has. I always just gave him some iron gauntlets and had him target the low hp units at low levels. Once he got a few levels he took off for me, I rushed him through the classes, got Death Blow from Brigand and got to War Master at around chapter 15, then because gauntlets are broken I gave him Killer Gauntlets+ and since he has become a insane crit machine. Destroying monsters and everything else that the game throws at him.

His bases are pretty bad, his growths are average, but still good enough that he can grow really well. His saving grace is how good gauntlets and quick riposte are, if you decide to move him to WL, he will be great, as it's the best class, though you will have to train lances and flying, which is harder than axes and gauntlets and there are a lot more units better suited to Wyverns. His niche is War Master, and using gauntlets, and at that he does extremely well. His bad talent with authority really does hurt him, but Jeralt's Mercenaries are good enough to give him a decent boost.

In essence he is the most average student in the game, he isn't too good, and not too bad. Which ends up him being kinda average, though he can be one of your best units. dealing hundreds of damage in a single round. It can be said of any unit that if you baby them they can be good, but Caspar benefits so much more than most units from being babied.

I haven't done too deep of analysis and am not very good with words, so take this with a grain of salt.

(Edit: I changed a lot of it because i was being biased because people don't like him)

 

On 10/13/2020 at 11:57 AM, Glennstavos said:

My rating system is just how much I recommend that unit on a scale of 1 to 10. And a recommendation based solely on my own experience and luck isn't much help to others. It has to be grounded in the realities of the game. Please don't shame the way I vote.

Well my first response and I already say something wrong, I’m sorry for offending you, and now I understand how you scored him. I’m not trying to shame people so I’m really sorry if it comes off that way. I really wasn’t thinking when I responded. I really am sorry.

Edited by WinterRain
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1 minute ago, WinterRain said:

I'm kinda confused at how you complimented his strengths and how well he can do, then gave him a 3.5 "on paper." On paper, my Cyril has a 60% spd growth but whenever I use him he is almost as slow as Dedue, and he can't take a hit, so I think the stats on paper only is a fraction of his actual strength and potential. It all depends on your own experience and luck.

My rating system is just how much I recommend that unit on a scale of 1 to 10. And a recommendation based solely on my own experience and luck isn't much help to others. It has to be grounded in the realities of the game. Please don't shame the way I vote.

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I think Caspar is a 3/10. Struggling to get onto a mount, and having a lack of good ranged options (other than a training bow/iron bow) hurt him in the late game, while his low bases put him in a difficult spot in the early game. If I'm recruiting units from other classes in CF/SS he's the first one to get demoted to adjunct. 

That doesn't mean he's without his uses though, Killer Gauntlets War Master is a great way to take a bar from a demonic beast, and I even remember once giving him a full Steel Axe+ to OHKO the Death Knight with Exhaustive Strike in his paralogue (on SS of course). 

I don't think he's the worst unit in the game, but if 5 is average he's well beneath that.

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