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First BL Maddening Run (no NG+) questions


Aethelstan
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1 hour ago, Sooks said:

What makes dancer and siege tome such a good combo?

The idea is that any allies standing within the spell's range (or at least the ones who can support with the dancer) receive linked attack bonuses. However this comes at a few costs. Having a siege spell equipped means giving up the benefits of Sword Avoid +20, which is an important skill for Dancers. Also, only three students (Dorothea, Constance and Hilda) actually learn siege spells and each of them are better off in purely offensive classes. The debate is about whether or not that trade-off is really worth it, which I don't think it is.

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46 minutes ago, RainbowMoon said:

The idea is that any allies standing within the spell's range (or at least the ones who can support with the dancer) receive linked attack bonuses. However this comes at a few costs. Having a siege spell equipped means giving up the benefits of Sword Avoid +20, which is an important skill for Dancers. Also, only three students (Dorothea, Constance and Hilda) actually learn siege spells and each of them are better off in purely offensive classes. The debate is about whether or not that trade-off is really worth it, which I don't think it is.

The reason why it's such a strong combo is that you can refresh your powerhouse, give 'em a Spd/Dex/Lck boost, and have newly refreshed unit attack the enemy with a Accuracy and Avoid bonus. All in one go! That's the reason why it's so popular.

Regardless of who you choose as a dancer, it always come with an opportunity cost. You are sacrificing the potential of a physical or magical unit in order to dance. Although, I'm definitely gonna try Dancer Ferdinand/Dimitri to see how far their avoiding capabilities can go lol.

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6 hours ago, RainbowMoon said:

Bolting support is nice and all, but think about what you're throwing away by making Hilda your Dancer. Her Str and Spd growths, B.Wrath and her personal Relic all make her absolutely devastating as a Wyvern Lord. Dancer by comparison is a straight up waste of her talents.

I think the argument for losing out on using Hilda as an offensive unit was more important before DLC. Now you have such easy replacement units that you really are not missing on on much by making Hilda a Dancer. Catherine, Shamir, Cyril, Constance, and Hapi are all incredible units that can be recruited at no cost to replace Hilda as an offensive unit.

On top of that, Hilda is not even that great of a unit all things considered. She really struggles with accuracy and has a low crit chance. Her strength is not high enough to make up for bad accuracy and crit. She just feels like a worse petra.

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I feel like one thing people forget about when choosing a Dancer is oppprtunity cost. What you're giving up to make someone your Dancer is just as important as their performance as one. Yes, you may enjoy Bolting/Meteor support, but when that's coming at the cost of Hilda's potential as a Wyvern (or Dorothea's as a Gremory/Dark Flier), is it really worth it? Personally, I say no. You take someone like Marianne or Ferdinand, however, and you're looking at a significantly better trade-off. I'm not saying Ferdie isn't a good unit, but the dude's more or less a carbon copy of Sylvain. And when you compare the two, Sylvain's available for free on every route (as long as you're playing female Byleth, which is better for Maddening anyway because Darting Blow/Falcon Knight access), he's got a much stronger early game performace and he has one of the best Relic weapons, which you can even get as early as Ch.5. Basically, as long as you have Sylvain, there's no reason not to make Ferdie your Dancer. After all, he's got both the appropriate boons, a good Spd growth and a personal that makes him perfect for the role.

If you are using the opprotunity cost argument, then using Ferd as a Dancer is way higher cost than Dorothea. As a mage, Dorothea cannot kill anything. She is not fast enough to double and lacks the magic stat of someone like Lys or Constance to one shot with any of her spells. Running two Sylvians is going to be stronger than 1 Sylvain and a Dorothea. Both Sylvain and Ferd can reliably kill most enemies with Swift Strikes while in 8 move classes with Canto.

Both Sylvian and Ferd can use Lance of Ruin. although its really not needed on either because Swift Strikes is strong even enough without a high Mt lance.

The reason not to make Ferd your Dancer is because you could be running a stronger dancer like Dorothea or someone who is actually normally a bad unit like Caspar.

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As for Marianne, she's got a decent Reason list but far from the best. Thoron's really all she's got in that department. No Sagittae or siege tome like Dorothea or Constance. No dark magic like Lysithea. Meanwhile she's got a good Faith list, but nothing that really satisfies the dedicated healer role better than Mercedes or Linhardt. A case could be made for a Frozen Lance Falcon Knight build if you wanted to do something interesting with her, but the simplest option is still to make her a Dancer. She's got the sword and riding boons to make it work and she can even keep up the healing if the situation calls for it.

Marianne gets Frozen Lance. Its a magic based attack that actually kills. Dorothea's Meteor is just chip damage. Sagittae is also just chip damage. On top of that she has Riding/Flying strengths so she can actually get into strong offensive classes like Dark Knight, Dark Flier, or Falcon Knight.

All a dedicated healer needs is Physic. Everything else is extra that just makes them better. Marianne still has Frozen Lance as a healer, so she can actually deal with Assassin or any other enemy that gets close. She also has Silence, which is situational but strong. Her Riding boon is also great on your healer to give them slightly more mobility. And unlike Mercedes, and Lin she has a 3 range spell to use for chip damage or linked attacks. I'm not saying she is better than Lin, but she is certainly better than Mercedes.

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Isn't it better to have one less squishy unit to babysit though? If your Dancer can take care of themselves on the enemy phase, it means you don't have to worry as much about where you left them on the player phase.

Shouldn't your enemy phase units be killing things consistently? Wouldn't it be better for the enemies units to run into your Battalion Wrath Petra which can actually kill. Also if you are dancing a unit, usually they are going to move forward. So having a bulky dancer alone won't prevent enemy phase damage, the unit you are dancing is also going to need to be durable.

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Of course it would. That's why I said backup healer, not dedicated healer. If Felix is one hit away from death and Marianne can't get to Mercedes for whatever reason, isn't it good that she also has the ability to heal him up? That's all I meant, not that Marianne wouldn't normally just dance Mercedes. It's a backup option in case you get into a situation where that can't happen.

The situations where this actually comes are rare because Physic has such long range. But yes its situationally useful. But either way Dorothea learns Physic.

20 hours ago, Dark Holy Elf said:
  • +20 from Sword Prowess 5 = 115

I stand corrected on the math. 

Just think of it this way, is it more important to have 20% Avoid on your dancer or 10% Hit & Avoid on all your other units. One of these just seems way more impactful considering that you have only 1 dancer and 9-10 other units, one of which is going to attack twice. Not to mention any those 9-10 units are going to be seeing way more combat than your dancer. Its even more impactful when you consider gambits, which get +4 Mt and +20 Hit from having A support.

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4 hours ago, Sooks said:

What makes dancer and siege tome such a good combo?

What makes it a good combo is that they would have support with some units up to A rank, which allows them to give them stat buffs like more avoid and hit rates.

It’s called linked attacks. They can also give your allies a boost in hit rate when using battalions which tends to be inaccurate most of the time.

For example, say Dorothea is your dancer and she has an A support rank with people like Edelgard, Byleth, Hubert, Ferdinand, Caspar and Petra. If they are within her 10 panel range while she has meteor equipped, they get the stat buffs that will help them out in battle.

However, this does have their drawbacks. First off, you’re sacrificing the potency of siege tome damage for utility. Siege tomes are meant to inflict heavy damage from afar. In some cases, if you’re going to kill a boss as soon as possible having someone with Meteor or Bolting can help accomplish that.

Making someone a dancer is a give and take type of decision. 

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20 minutes ago, Barren said:

What makes it a good combo is that they would have support with some units up to A rank, which allows them to give them stat buffs like more avoid and hit rates.

It’s called linked attacks. They can also give your allies a boost in hit rate when using battalions which tends to be inaccurate most of the time.

For example, say Dorothea is your dancer and she has an A support rank with people like Edelgard, Byleth, Hubert, Ferdinand, Caspar and Petra. If they are within her 10 panel range while she has meteor equipped, they get the stat buffs that will help them out in battle.

I know but what does that have to do with being a dancer? Linked attacks aren’t exclusive or anything.

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11 minutes ago, Sooks said:

I know but what does that have to do with being a dancer? Linked attacks aren’t exclusive or anything.

In order for the linked attack to work, you need to an attack equipped that is in range of the enemy. If you are running Gremory Dorothea, then you get only 2 uses of Meteor. This means you only really get two turns of linked attacks, unless you just have Dorothea sitting around with Meteor equipped not attacking. As a dancer, you can just leave Meteor equipped and never use it while Dancing.

Another thing to consider is that having a siege tome dancer is nothing but upside. Running Dancer Hilda means that all of your other units get +10% Hit/Avoid in addition to having a Dancer. If you were to run Hilda as a Wyvern Lord and Marianne as a Dancer, then you would still have a Dancer but none of your units would get that free AoE buff. Siege Dancers are doing the strong dancer thing where you get take double turns while also giving an AoE buff.

 

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28 minutes ago, Objeckts said:

Catherine, Shamir, Cyril, Constance, and Hapi are all incredible units that can be recruited at no cost to replace Hilda as an offensive unit.

Are we comparing physical powerhouses to mages now? I'm not sure what this argument's even supposed to prove. That there are other units in the game that can kill stuff?

31 minutes ago, Objeckts said:

If you are using the opprotunity cost argument, then using Ferd as a Dancer is way higher cost than Dorothea. As a mage, Dorothea cannot kill anything. She is not fast enough to double and lacks the magic stat of someone like Lys or Constance to one shot with any of her spells.

This is completely false. And if your idea is that a mage needs to have the magic stat of Lys or Constance to do anything, then how's Marianne any better? By your definition, wouldn't she just be doing "chip damage" too? Especially since her Reason list pales in comparison to Dorothea's.

41 minutes ago, Objeckts said:

Running two Sylvians is going to be stronger than 1 Sylvain and a Dorothea. Both Sylvain and Ferd can reliably kill most enemies with Swift Strikes while in 8 move classes with Canto.

Think about it this way. If Ferdie dances for Sylvain, then you've accomplished the same thing as running two Sylvains. In other words, Dancer Ferdie essentially lets you run two Sylvains and a Dorothea, which is obviously stronger than two Sylvains alone regardless of what you think about Dorothea's damage.

1 hour ago, Objeckts said:

Marianne gets Frozen Lance. Its a magic based attack that actually kills

And Dorothea gets Hexblade. A magic based attack that actually kills.

49 minutes ago, Objeckts said:

Dorothea's Meteor is just chip damage. Sagittae is also just chip damage.

Again, not true. All comments like this tell me is that you've either never used Dorothea or you completely failed to build her properly.

52 minutes ago, Objeckts said:

On top of that she has Riding/Flying strengths so she can actually get into strong offensive classes like Dark Knight, Dark Flier, or Falcon Knight.

Dorothea has absolutely no trouble at all getting into Dark Flier. Or Pegasus Knight for that matter. She can easily be running Sword Prowess, Reason Prowess, Fiendish Blow and Darting Blow as a Dark Flier before the timeskip rolls around.

54 minutes ago, Objeckts said:

Shouldn't your enemy phase units be killing things consistently? Wouldn't it be better for the enemies units to run into your Battalion Wrath Petra which can actually kill. Also if you are dancing a unit, usually they are going to move forward. So having a bulky dancer alone won't prevent enemy phase damage, the unit you are dancing is also going to need to be durable.

Again, the goal of avoid stacking on your Dancer isn't to turn them into an enemy phase nuke like Dimitri. It's to increase survivability, so that they can dance somebody who's in attack range of, say, six or seven strong enemies and not get their frail asses pounded into paste should any of those enemies still be alive on the enemy phase. What's better, a Dancer who has to tiptoe around any actual danger or one who can actually take the heat if they have to?

Anyway, this is derailing into a much bigger argument so let's just call it even and move on for the sake of the topic. After all, nobody's ever gonna agree on who the best Dancer is so there's no need to keep squabbling over it.

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On 12/28/2020 at 4:27 PM, Aethelstan said:

Aux battles seem to give so little exp. Should I just be doing monastery stuff every week instead? 

If you have the DLC, are you doing the gold-exclamation-point Aux battles? Those have more enemies, at a higher level. So they're tougher, but I found them to give decent experience. 

On 12/28/2020 at 4:27 PM, Aethelstan said:

I'm planning on recruiting the DLC characters. What's the best chapter to do it?

If you're going to use them long-term, I would say in chapters 3, 4, or 5. At that point, they join in Beginner classes, which means benefits like D Faith on Hapi (normally E), or D Bows on Balthus (again, normally E). And you can start directing their skill levels, including Authority, immediately. Yuri is the main exception - he auto-levels Swords and Authority, so picking him up as a Myrmidon doesn't help his skill levels.

On 12/28/2020 at 4:27 PM, Aethelstan said:

I'm trying to train everyone physical in axes to reclass to brigand for death blow. Other than that are there any must have skills I should be going for?

Honestly, I really like Str/Mag +2 from Fighter and Monk, respectively. Monk and Soldier alao give really good repositional arts, in Draw Back and Reposition. Others have said Hit +20, Fiendish Blow, and Darting Blow, and I second all of those.

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1 hour ago, RainbowMoon said:

Are we comparing physical powerhouses to mages now? I'm not sure what this argument's even supposed to prove. That there are other units in the game that can kill stuff?

They are all other units who can fill the same role an offensive unit like Hilda can. Most of those units are going to be generally better than Hilda in most situations. There is not a real opportunity cost to making Hilda your dancer because you can just recruit stronger units to replace her

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This is completely false. And if your idea is that a mage needs to have the magic stat of Lys or Constance to do anything, then how's Marianne any better? By your definition, wouldn't she just be doing "chip damage" too? Especially since her Reason list pales in comparison to Dorothea's.

Yes, Marianne's spells also only do chip damage. If she was limited to only using spells for damage, then Marianne would be a pretty bad mage too. But she can use Frozen Lance with high Mt Lances, which will consistently kill most enemies on Maddenning.

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Think about it this way. If Ferdie dances for Sylvain, then you've accomplished the same thing as running two Sylvains. In other words, Dancer Ferdie essentially lets you run two Sylvains and a Dorothea, which is obviously stronger than two Sylvains alone regardless of what you think about Dorothea's damage.

By that logic, wouldn't Dancer Dorothea would let you run 3 Sylvains. Each of which also have +10% Hit/Avoid. Sylvian/Ferd are just so much stronger than Dorothea, even more so when they have extra accuracy.

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And Dorothea gets Hexblade. A magic based attack that actually kills.

At level 40, Dorothea's Hexblade is going to be ~7-8 Mt less than Marianne's Frozen Lance when using regular weapons. When using relic weapons, Hexblade is 16-19 Mt less. There is a noticeable amount of enemies that Marianne can kill that Dorothea cannot.

 

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Again, not true. All comments like this tell me is that you've either never used Dorothea or you completely failed to build her properly.

Dorothea has absolutely no trouble at all getting into Dark Flier. Or Pegasus Knight for that matter. She can easily be running Sword Prowess, Reason Prowess, Fiendish Blow and Darting Blow as a Dark Flier before the timeskip rolls around.

Maybe I am missing a number here, but all that does not seem fast enough for Dorothea to double. At level 40 she gets:

  • 7 Speed base
  • .4*39 Speed from growth
  • .1*20 Speed from 20 levels in Dark Flier
  • 4 Speed from Dark Flier
  • 4 Speed from eating together
  • 6 AS from Darting Blow

For a total of 38 Spd. Looking at enemy stats here, that is not enough speed to double anything besides a few mages and the fortress knights. Marianne can reliably kill with Frozen Lance, which is why she is strong.

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Again, the goal of avoid stacking on your Dancer isn't to turn them into an enemy phase nuke like Dimitri. It's to increase survivability, so that they can dance somebody who's in attack range of, say, six or seven strong enemies and not get their frail asses pounded into paste should any of those enemies still be alive on the enemy phase. What's better, a Dancer who has to tiptoe around any actual danger or one who can actually take the heat if they have to?

If your team struggles to kill enemies, then you would need the tanky one. But if your team is strong enough to deal with threats then it would be better to have the 10% Hit/Avoid.

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Anyway, this is derailing into a much bigger argument so let's just call it even and move on for the sake of the topic. After all, nobody's ever gonna agree on who the best Dancer is so there's no need to keep squabbling over it.

Agreed. I doubt this is going anywhere.

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12 hours ago, Objeckts said:

For a total of 38 Spd. Looking at enemy stats here, that is not enough speed to double anything besides a few mages and the fortress knights. Marianne can reliably kill with Frozen Lance, which is why she is strong.

38 Spd is definitely a bit better than you're giving credit. Checking the CF/SS enemy stats, it doubles...

  • everything on Crimson Flower endgame except Falconknights and a couple named characters
  • everything on Crimson Flower 17 except Falconknight, Swordmasters, and a named character
  • about half the enemies on Silver Snow endgame (as you said, the mages and great knights, but that's a lot)

VW enemies are just a bit faster, I guess. (Not that it matters much when most of them are rendered sitting ducks by the swamp, but I digress.)

Also in my experience magic combat arts (and indeed, most forms of magical offence in general) stop killing in one attack by endgame anyway. It's a weakness of them which has been acknowledged elsewhere. (Some of the endgames are also punitive for trying to close to melee range with non-fliers... though in fairness, AM, the route nominally being discussed here, isn't one.) Fortunately, even when that happens good mages can fall back on their high-range chip, linked attack support, and faith support spells.

14 hours ago, Objeckts said:

Just think of it this way, is it more important to have 20% Avoid on your dancer or 10% Hit & Avoid on all your other units. One of these just seems way more impactful considering that you have only 1 dancer and 9-10 other units, one of which is going to attack twice. Not to mention any those 9-10 units are going to be seeing way more combat than your dancer. Its even more impactful when you consider gambits, which get +4 Mt and +20 Hit from having A support.

Well, stacking avoid up on one unit is actually extremely effective compared to avoid elsewhere (also the avoid from linked attacks doesn't affect enemy phase, which is where you want avoid most) because that unit becomes completely safe. You're definitely underrating how good a powerful dodgetank is, I feel. That said I think both types of dancers are very good and don't really care to debate which is better; we can acknowledge multiple things are very effective in this game.

13 hours ago, Objeckts said:

In order for the linked attack to work, you need to an attack equipped that is in range of the enemy. If you are running Gremory Dorothea, then you get only 2 uses of Meteor. This means you only really get two turns of linked attacks, unless you just have Dorothea sitting around with Meteor equipped not attacking. As a dancer, you can just leave Meteor equipped and never use it while Dancing.

The bolded part is absolutely not true. Typical player phase with a siege tome user can look like this:

  1. have your siege tome user equip their siege tome
  2. have characters who need the accuracy boost attack or use gambits
  3. have your siege tome user attack, using whatever weapon you wish. Or, if they're going to use Physic, you can just keep Meteor/Bolting equipped

Siege tomes are really great regardless of whether you're a Dancer or not. The reason a siege tome Dancer is good isn't because you're "gaining" a siege tome, but rather because you still get its benefits on your Dancer, who can't benefit from most other character-specific benefits (e.g. your Dancer having Swift Strikes doesn't matter because they could dance for someone else who does just as much damage anyway).

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14 hours ago, Objeckts said:

By that logic, wouldn't Dancer Dorothea would let you run 3 Sylvains.

That's true of any non-Ferdinand Dancer though, even crappy ones like Raphael or Caspar. If you value Ferdie's combat potential that much, then you can always use Marianne instead since her spells are chip damage by your definition (a good mage shouldn't just rely on CAs like Frozen Lance imo, since they're 1-range only). That's three Sylvains, or possibly up to five (or even seven) if you have someone use the dance battalion on Sylvain/Ferdie and Marianne, without sacrificing Dorothea.

I'm not saying that one way's better than the other, just that there's many viable options here that each have their own upsides and downsides. So I don't think we can say there's really any one best dancer, it's just which trade-off we each consider more beneficial. For you, it's Dorothea/Hilda, and for me it's Ferdie/Marianne, and there's nothing wrong with either decision.

I actually kinda wanna try that seven Sylvains trick now lol

Edited by RainbowMoon
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On 12/31/2020 at 11:00 AM, Dark Holy Elf said:

38 Spd is definitely a bit better than you're giving credit. Checking the CF/SS enemy stats, it doubles...

  • everything on Crimson Flower endgame except Falconknights and a couple named characters
  • everything on Crimson Flower 17 except Falconknight, Swordmasters, and a named character
  • about half the enemies on Silver Snow endgame (as you said, the mages and great knights, but that's a lot)

VW enemies are just a bit faster, I guess. (Not that it matters much when most of them are rendered sitting ducks by the swamp, but I digress.)

That 38 was calculated by using a level 40 Dorothea in chapter 22, where the enemies are level 50. It's unlikely to have a level 40 Dorothea in CF chapter 17 when enemies are only level 42. Your Dorothea is going to be closer to level 35 in Ch17 CF. Which is -2.5 Speed from growths. Then you lose more AS because Dorothea's lighest spell is 4 Wt, but her expected Str is only 12 (so -2 AS). That puts Dorothea around 33 Spd, which is back to doubling just armored enemies and mages.

The enemies a 36 AS Dorothea is doubling on ch21 SS are Bishops, Holy Knights, Great Knights, and some Snipers. Of those, the Bishops and Holy Knights are not going to die to magic attacks. The Great Knights and the 27 AS Sniper are going to die to any mage. 38 Speed is not enough to stand out.

On 12/31/2020 at 11:00 AM, Dark Holy Elf said:

Also in my experience magic combat arts (and indeed, most forms of magical offence in general) stop killing in one attack by endgame anyway. It's a weakness of them which has been acknowledged elsewhere. (Some of the endgames are also punitive for trying to close to melee range with non-fliers... though in fairness, AM, the route nominally being discussed here, isn't one.) Fortunately, even when that happens good mages can fall back on their high-range chip, linked attack support, and faith support spells.

Frozen Lance will always kill Cavalry because you can use a Horseslayer. From experience on VW, it killed everything else up until ~Ch20. At which point I had to stop using Steel Weapons and swap to Lance of Ruin to kill the bulkier enemies. But it always one rounds throughout the game.

On 12/31/2020 at 11:00 AM, Dark Holy Elf said:

Well, stacking avoid up on one unit is actually extremely effective compared to avoid elsewhere (also the avoid from linked attacks doesn't affect enemy phase, which is where you want avoid most) because that unit becomes completely safe. You're definitely underrating how good a powerful dodgetank is, I feel. That said I think both types of dancers are very good and don't really care to debate which is better; we can acknowledge multiple things are very effective in this game.

I think every team wants a dodge tank, but you really want a dodge tank that consistently kills. Not your Dancer. A fist based War Master or a Battalion Wrath dodge tank are what you want for consistent enemy phase kills.

On 12/31/2020 at 11:00 AM, Dark Holy Elf said:

The bolded part is absolutely not true. Typical player phase with a siege tome user can look like this:

  1. have your siege tome user equip their siege tome
  2. have characters who need the accuracy boost attack or use gambits
  3. have your siege tome user attack, using whatever weapon you wish. Or, if they're going to use Physic, you can just keep Meteor/Bolting equipped

I am aware you can do this on an offensive Dorothea, but this has downsides. First this means you cannot use Meteor offensively without giving up the linked attacks. Second, mages like Dorothea are mainly doing chip damage, which you want do before your other units attack. This means the units following up on Dorothea's chip damage are not going get the linked attacks.

Meteor is obviously a bonus on an offensive Dorothea, but it's not going to be as consistent as it would be on a healer or dancer Dorothea. On top of that, you have to run Dorothea as an offensive unit which is just mediocre compared to other magic options.

On 12/31/2020 at 11:00 AM, Dark Holy Elf said:

Siege tomes are really great regardless of whether you're a Dancer or not. The reason a siege tome Dancer is good isn't because you're "gaining" a siege tome, but rather because you still get its benefits on your Dancer, who can't benefit from most other character-specific benefits (e.g. your Dancer having Swift Strikes doesn't matter because they could dance for someone else who does just as much damage anyway).

This is exactly the point I am trying to make. Siege Tomes on your Dancer provides a benefit to your team that normally could not come from the Dancer role.

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3 hours ago, Objeckts said:

I think every team wants a dodge tank, but you really want a dodge tank that consistently kills. Not your Dancer. A fist based War Master or a Battalion Wrath dodge tank are what you want for consistent enemy phase kills.

A dodge-tank is also good for drawing in enemies, then getting the kill on player phase - say, with a brave weapon, gambit, or combat art. The game gives you a lot more tools to kill on player phase than enemy phase. That said, a murder-phase dodgetank can be constructed - but apart from murder hobo Dimitri, it takes a ton of setup (i.e. getting both Defiant Avoid and Defiant Crit on your flier). A Dancer being a combat-limited dodgetank isn't a bad thing, it's just less good (but less work) than a murder-phase dodge tank. Anyway, you can have one of each.

3 hours ago, Objeckts said:

This is exactly the point I am trying to make. Siege Tomes on your Dancer provides a benefit to your team that normally could not come from the Dancer role.

But the benefit comes from any unit with the siege spell, whether their class is Dancer or not. I could just as easily say that "Meteor on Bishop/Gremory Dorothea provides a benefit to your team that normally could not come from the Healer role."

3 hours ago, Objeckts said:

Frozen Lance will always kill Cavalry because you can use a Horseslayer. From experience on VW, it killed everything else up until ~Ch20. At which point I had to stop using Steel Weapons and swap to Lance of Ruin to kill the bulkier enemies. But it always one rounds throughout the game.

This is a solid point, and I'm absolutely a shill for magical combat arts. But let's give Swords their due - the Rapier+ actually has more Mt (9) than the Horseslayer+ (8), because it's absurdly overtuned. So Hexblade and Soulblade can perform comparably against horses, while also decimating Armors.

On 12/31/2020 at 12:50 PM, RainbowMoon said:

That's true of any non-Ferdinand Dancer though, even crappy ones like Raphael or Caspar. If you value Ferdie's combat potential that much, then you can always use Marianne instead since her spells are chip damage by your definition (a good mage shouldn't just rely on CAs like Frozen Lance imo, since they're 1-range only). That's three Sylvains, or possibly up to five (or even seven) if you have someone use the dance battalion on Sylvain/Ferdie and Marianne, without sacrificing Dorothea.

I'm not saying that one way's better than the other, just that there's many viable options here that each have their own upsides and downsides. So I don't think we can say there's really any one best dancer, it's just which trade-off we each consider more beneficial. For you, it's Dorothea/Hilda, and for me it's Ferdie/Marianne, and there's nothing wrong with either decision.

I actually kinda wanna try that seven Sylvains trick now lol

Still, technically an argument against Dancer Ferdinand/Sylvain. And, how many Swift Strikes can we get?

Say we're fielding Sylvain, Ferdinand, and Seteth, all with Swift Strikes. Dancer Marianne. And Manuela, with Dance-of-the-Goddess.

The Swift Strikers attack, we get three. Marianne dances for Sylvain, we get four. Manuela gambits them all. Three more attacks, up to seven. Marianne dances for Seteth, we're at eight.

So with proper prep and placement, it's possible to use Swift Strikes eight times in one turn.

Anyway, generally agreed that there can be different conditions for an "ideal Dancer". Dancing is such a powerful technique, and agnostic to most other traits of a unit, that pretty much anyone can do well as one. Beyond that hump, it's basically a battle of inches.

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3 hours ago, Objeckts said:

I think every team wants a dodge tank, but you really want a dodge tank that consistently kills. Not your Dancer. A fist based War Master or a Battalion Wrath dodge tank are what you want for consistent enemy phase kills.

For me, the most important thing is that your dodgetank consistently dodges - kills are optional. While there are some setups that let you one-round on the enemy phase, most of them are kinda finnicky (anything relying on a battalion skill, for instance, since if something sneaks through your evade and your battalion retreats, you're hooped for the fight... and will have to reprep your battalion for low HP again, which is annoying) and frankly, unnecessary, since any things you don't kill on EP are simple to sweep on PP since PP offence is so powerful in this game. Sword Avoid is also the earliest great dodgetank skill - you get it well before Brawl Avoid (which doesn't even exist without DLC) or Alert Stance+ (which requires A+ flying)

3 hours ago, Objeckts said:

I am aware you can do this on an offensive Dorothea, but this has downsides. First this means you cannot use Meteor offensively without giving up the linked attacks. Second, mages like Dorothea are mainly doing chip damage, which you want do before your other units attack. This means the units following up on Dorothea's chip damage are not going get the linked attacks.

Meteor is obviously a bonus on an offensive Dorothea, but it's not going to be as consistent as it would be on a healer or dancer Dorothea. On top of that, you have to run Dorothea as an offensive unit which is just mediocre compared to other magic options.

Well, it depends - Warlock and Gremory still get one use before losing it. The last use is indeed a tradeoff, of course. Still, having the option to use it is nice.

The followup to Dorothea's chip damage actually often will get linked attacks, because whatever she just attacked will still be in her range, unless she used up the last shot of her spell or she's in a class with Canto and needed to retreat.

Seeing Dorothea as "offensive" vs. "healer" as if they're too different builds seems to miss the point, to me. Except Assassin, every class Dorothea would consider for magical offence will have access to Physic as well; she has both, depending on what you need. If you need ranged chip, she can do that. If you need healing, she can do that. If you need to OHKO things, she can do that surprisingly often too. You mentioned Marianne OHKOs things with Steel Lance Frozen Lance for a huge chunk of the game; I agree. But consider that Steel Lance+ Frozen Lance has 18-20 mt (3 more if she uses silver+), assuming 14-23 dex. Silver Sword+ Hexblade has 20, Agnea's Arrow has 16. But there's no Lancefaire class with Physic access or a positive magic mod... so we can reasonably spot Dorothea +5 damage in these comparisons due to -faire. Marianne has 10% more magic growth (~3 more damage in the second half of the game), but Dorothea has access to a +dmg adjutant. As you can see, if Marianne is OHKOing something without a relic, Dorothea probably is too. It's very much a point that if Marianne needs more damage she can switch to a relic and Dorothea can't, and that's a perk she has for sure (how big of one depends how much demand other units have on the lance relics), but Dorothea has her own perks, i.e. having Meteor, and also an easier time getting Black Range+1. I'm a pretty big fan of both as units, myself.

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8 hours ago, Objeckts said:

Then you lose more AS because Dorothea's lighest spell is 4 Wt, but her expected Str is only 12 (so -2 AS). That puts Dorothea around 33 Spd, which is back to doubling just armored enemies and mages.

It's very easy to raise Dorothea's strength by certifying her in Sword using classes. 17 is Mortal Savant's base strength.

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6 hours ago, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

Still, technically an argument against Dancer Ferdinand/Sylvain.

That's true. If someone's aiming to get the most uses out of Swift Strikes, then they're definitely gonna want a Dancer that isn't Ferdie, like Marianne. My point was more that Dancer Ferdie won't leave that big a gap if you're content with just one or two Swift Strikes uses per turn.

7 hours ago, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

And, how many Swift Strikes can we get?

Say we're fielding Sylvain, Ferdinand, and Seteth, all with Swift Strikes. Dancer Marianne. And Manuela, with Dance-of-the-Goddess.

The Swift Strikers attack, we get three. Marianne dances for Sylvain, we get four. Manuela gambits them all. Three more attacks, up to seven. Marianne dances for Seteth, we're at eight.

So with proper prep and placement, it's possible to use Swift Strikes eight times in one turn.

Possibly even more if we bring in someone like Mercedes with the Blue Lion Dancers.

  • Sylvain, Ferdie and Seteth attack, that's three.
  • Marianne dances Sylvain, four.
  • Mercedes gambits them all, seven.
  • Marianne dances Seteth, eight.
  • Manuela gambits them all, eleven.
  • Marianne dances Ferdie, bringing us to a total of twelve.

I'm actually tempted to try out this memetastic strategy now lol

Proceeds to no-Elites bum rush Nemesis

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Giving an update for whoever still cares. I've made it to Chapter 10 and haven't lost anyone. I took everyone's advice and narrowed my team down to all the Blue Lions except Dedue, plus Ferdinand, Leonie, Lysithea and Caspar. I'm debating switiching Seteth into my main team when I get him.

I made Ferdinand my Dancer and he's been broken. Using him feels like Lewyn from FE4. Everything except a few assassins have less than a 20% chance of hitting him. I also got Seal Speed from his budding talent so he was great at helping Ashe and Leonie get kills after weakening units on enemy phase. I used to always use Dorothea as my dancer for the linked attack boost with meteor but in terms of utility I now think Ferdinand is more valuable. Being able to dance frontline fighters in dangerous locations and not have to worry gives you much more flexibility. Also Ferdie looks godly in the dancer outfit.

I know many people recommend getting Mov +1 for Dancer Ferdinand but I just gave him the movement stat booster and I'm interested in hearing what other skills might be useful. I'm kind of thinking Alert Stance to help with the few enemies Ferdie is still struggling to dodge. But not sure it's best because I almost always find it more useful to dance another unit rather than wait. Please give me suggestions.

Also do people usually make Annette a WR before the timeskip? I don't have a Bolt Axe or Crusher yet but she does know Lightning Axe and can kill with it, she would just be useless/vulnerable on enemy phase having to rely on her bad strength if I lost access to her magic right now. But I know flying movement can be useful for Chapter 13. That was my original idea behind WR Ashe, I'm just less worried about him now.

I get why people dislike Ashe. He certainly took a lot of investment. But A) His chip damage was an absolute necessity for me many times in the early game where many units could not afford to take damage on player phase but could kill in one hit with a combat art after chip damage and B) After getting Death Blow and Bowfaire from Sniper he's become of my better units. He would really appreciate having Hunter's Volley but I don't think he's bad without it, just not amazing.

Appreciate all the help thus far! 

Edited by Aethelstan
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44 minutes ago, Aethelstan said:

Giving an update for whoever still cares. I've made it to Chapter 10 and haven't lost anyone. I took everyone's advice and narrowed my team down to all the Blue Eagles except Dedue, plus Ferdinand, Leonie, Lysithea and Caspar. I'm debating switiching Seteth into my main team when I get him.

I made Ferdinand my Dancer and he's been broken. Using him feels like Lewyn from FE4. Everything except a few assassins have less than a 20% chance of hitting him. I also got Seal Speed from his budding talent so he was great at helping Ashe and Leonie get kills after weaking units on enemy phase. I used to always use Dorothea as my dancer for the linked attack boost with meteor but in terms of utility I now think Ferdinand is more valuable. Being able to dance frontline fighters in dangerous locations and not have to worry gives you much more flexibility. Also Ferdie looks godly in the dancer outfit.

I know many people recommend getting Mov +1 for Dancer Ferdinand but I just gave him the movement stat booster and I'm interested in hearing what other skills might be useful. I'm kind of thinking Alert Stance to help with the few enemies Ferdie is still struggling to dodge. But not sure it's best because I almost always find it more useful to dance another unit rather than wait. Please give me suggestions.

Also do people usually make Annette a WR before the timeskip? I don't have a Bolt Axe or Crusher yet but she does know Lightning Axe and can kill with it, she would just be useless/vulnerable on enemy phase having to rely on her bad strength if I lost access to her magic right now. But I know flying movement can be useful for Chapter 13. That was my original idea behind WR Ashe, I'm just less worried about him now.

I get why people dislike Ashe. He certainly took a lot of investment. But A) His chip damage was an absolute necessity for me many times in the early game where many units could not afford to take damage on player phase but could kill in one hit with a combat art after chip damage and B) After getting Death Blow and Bowfaire from Sniper he's become of my better units. He would really appreciate having Hunter's Volley but I don't think he's bad without it, just not exceptional.

Appreciate all the help thus far! 

Dancer Ferdinand is a solid choice for sure. I wouldn't get Alert Stance for him because that would mean giving up a turn of him dancing. While it would still grant him even more avoid than normal, the only time I can ever see that happening is if somehow no one is within in range for him to dance. If you want something simple, Sword Prowess Level 5, Sword Avoid +20, Axebreaker/HP +5, Special Dance and Movement +1 are good abilities for your dancer. You could give him an evasion ring as well if you want more avoid or march ring if you want him to catch up. If you're unsure on what else to give him, you could do Goddess Ring. It not only replenishes his HP but +4 luck while not spectacular is better than nothing. Plus should he get a level up and his HP increases, at least his HP would regenerate the next turn.

Wyvern Lord Annette can be quite powerful as long as she doesn't run into enemies that can kill her back since she isn't the bulkiest thing alive. Flying around rallying or using a CA is the best way for her to function in this class. At least WL will increase her strength to 18 and speed to 20. Plus thanks to the class bonus it'll jack up her speed to 24 (assuming she hasn't reached 24 speed at that point). Lancebreaker can be your friend as well at times.

Ashe being a Sniper is his best class (though Bow Knight is also an okay pick for him). If you want him to have super reliable damage, get the Edmund's Troops battalion (if you have recruited Marianne). Leveling that up grants you a Strength +5 and Hit +40 most notably. You just need his authority up to rank B and then you're set.

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3 hours ago, Aethelstan said:

Giving an update for whoever still cares. I've made it to Chapter 10 and haven't lost anyone. I took everyone's advice and narrowed my team down to all the Blue Lions except Dedue, plus Ferdinand, Leonie, Lysithea and Caspar. I'm debating switiching Seteth into my main team when I get him.

I made Ferdinand my Dancer and he's been broken. Using him feels like Lewyn from FE4. Everything except a few assassins have less than a 20% chance of hitting him. I also got Seal Speed from his budding talent so he was great at helping Ashe and Leonie get kills after weakening units on enemy phase. I used to always use Dorothea as my dancer for the linked attack boost with meteor but in terms of utility I now think Ferdinand is more valuable. Being able to dance frontline fighters in dangerous locations and not have to worry gives you much more flexibility. Also Ferdie looks godly in the dancer outfit.

I know many people recommend getting Mov +1 for Dancer Ferdinand but I just gave him the movement stat booster and I'm interested in hearing what other skills might be useful. I'm kind of thinking Alert Stance to help with the few enemies Ferdie is still struggling to dodge. But not sure it's best because I almost always find it more useful to dance another unit rather than wait. Please give me suggestions.

Also do people usually make Annette a WR before the timeskip? I don't have a Bolt Axe or Crusher yet but she does know Lightning Axe and can kill with it, she would just be useless/vulnerable on enemy phase having to rely on her bad strength if I lost access to her magic right now. But I know flying movement can be useful for Chapter 13. That was my original idea behind WR Ashe, I'm just less worried about him now.

I get why people dislike Ashe. He certainly took a lot of investment. But A) His chip damage was an absolute necessity for me many times in the early game where many units could not afford to take damage on player phase but could kill in one hit with a combat art after chip damage and B) After getting Death Blow and Bowfaire from Sniper he's become of my better units. He would really appreciate having Hunter's Volley but I don't think he's bad without it, just not amazing.

Appreciate all the help thus far! 

Glad we could help! And thanks for putting up with our bickering lol

If you decide to train up Dedue, he functions well as a War Master to help his doubling issues slightly or a Vengeance spamming Paladin/Wyvern as a substitute for Bernadetta.

Dancer Ferdie's lots of fun to use, and he's sure to be a huge help on some of the more crowded Blue Lion maps (looking at you, Enbarr), especially on Maddening. As for skills, I find Sword Prowess, Sword Avoid +20, Axebreaker, Movement +1 and Special Dance to be the best combo for Dancers. Alert Stance, as Barren pointed out, isn't an ideal choice since Ferdie should be dancing every turn.

Yeah, Ashe isn't all that impressive unfortunately. No fault of his own, he's just forced to compete with Leonie who's got so much more to offer. I still like to use him though. Like you said, he doesn't suck, he's just not amazing. I typically build him as a Sniper to take advantage of its Dex growth and Hunter's Volley. A nice setup for him is Bow Prowess, Death Blow, Hit +20, Close Counter and Dex +4 with a Critical Ring and a high crit battalion like Fraldarius or Goneril. His Str will always be middling unless you stuff him full of Rocky Burdocks and Energy Drops, but a crit from him should be enough to kill most normal enemies. Of course, Wyvern's always another solid choice thanks to his axe boon.

Anyway, enjoy the rest of your run! 🙂

Edited by RainbowMoon
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5 hours ago, Aethelstan said:

I made Ferdinand my Dancer and he's been broken. Using him feels like Lewyn from FE4. Everything except a few assassins have less than a 20% chance of hitting him. I also got Seal Speed from his budding talent so he was great at helping Ashe and Leonie get kills after weakening units on enemy phase. I used to always use Dorothea as my dancer for the linked attack boost with meteor but in terms of utility I now think Ferdinand is more valuable. Being able to dance frontline fighters in dangerous locations and not have to worry gives you much more flexibility. Also Ferdie looks godly in the dancer outfit.

I know many people recommend getting Mov +1 for Dancer Ferdinand but I just gave him the movement stat booster and I'm interested in hearing what other skills might be useful. I'm kind of thinking Alert Stance to help with the few enemies Ferdie is still struggling to dodge. But not sure it's best because I almost always find it more useful to dance another unit rather than wait. Please give me suggestions.

Of the four students I've made my Dancer thus far (Annette, Ferdinand, Hilda, and Linhardt), Ferdie was my favorite. As for movement, there's no reason you can't stack it. If a 7-move Dancer is great, then an 8-move Dancer is greater. It's up to you whether it's worth it, but I rarely find other areas to train my Dancer in (Swords and Authority, I guess?).

5 hours ago, Aethelstan said:

Also do people usually make Annette a WR before the timeskip? I don't have a Bolt Axe or Crusher yet but she does know Lightning Axe and can kill with it, she would just be useless/vulnerable on enemy phase having to rely on her bad strength if I lost access to her magic right now. But I know flying movement can be useful for Chapter 13. That was my original idea behind WR Ashe, I'm just less worried about him now.

Is Annette ever good on enemy phase, though? Her bulk is poor, and her speed isn't enough to dodge. Anyway, I used Wyvern Rider Annette, and was super happy with her. She can one shot anybody in a suit of armor (Hammer + Lightning Axe), and have pretty good hit against Paladins with Lancebreaker. Plus, flying mobility gives her more options in whom to Rally - and she can Canto away afterward. And with the Bolt Axe+, in Wyvern Lord, she gets an unprecedented 11 attack range.

5 hours ago, Aethelstan said:

I get why people dislike Ashe. He certainly took a lot of investment. But A) His chip damage was an absolute necessity for me many times in the early game where many units could not afford to take damage on player phase but could kill in one hit with a combat art after chip damage and B) After getting Death Blow and Bowfaire from Sniper he's become of my better units. He would really appreciate having Hunter's Volley but I don't think he's bad without it, just not amazing

It sounds like you made him good - granted, any unit can be made good in Three Houses. I was really happy with him as a Wyvern Lord, but Sniper is also good for him, especially when mastery comes. Having built him up, there's no reason to drop him now.

Good luck with the rest of it, and keep us apprised!

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11 hours ago, Aethelstan said:

I get why people dislike Ashe. He certainly took a lot of investment. But A) His chip damage was an absolute necessity for me many times in the early game where many units could not afford to take damage on player phase but could kill in one hit with a combat art after chip damage and B) After getting Death Blow and Bowfaire from Sniper he's become of my better units. He would really appreciate having Hunter's Volley but I don't think he's bad without it, just not amazing.

I feel like Ashe is definitely a little underrated because, like you said, his ranged chip damage is really useful. On top of that, when you give him time, he becomes a crit machine in the late game (according to what I've seen on Reddit LOL, his crit growth is the same as Petra's at 95%). If you plug a Killer Bow+ on him, his late game crit rate can be well above 60-70%, or at least that's how it was for me in hard mode. But honestly, I'm just happy to see that Ashe is doing you well cause I know a lot of people tend to replace him for better archers LOL.

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7 hours ago, Tenma said:

I feel like Ashe is definitely a little underrated because, like you said, his ranged chip damage is really useful. On top of that, when you give him time, he becomes a crit machine in the late game (according to what I've seen on Reddit LOL, his crit growth is the same as Petra's at 95%). If you plug a Killer Bow+ on him, his late game crit rate can be well above 60-70%, or at least that's how it was for me in hard mode. But honestly, I'm just happy to see that Ashe is doing you well cause I know a lot of people tend to replace him for better archers LOL.

Battalions and Critical Ring does help. If manage to give him either Fraldarius Soldiers or Goneril Valkyries will increase his crit rate. His authority has to be at rank B though 

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11 minutes ago, Barren said:

Battalions and Critical Ring does help. If manage to give him either Fraldarius Soldiers or Goneril Valkyries will increase his crit rate. His authority has to be at rank B though 

That's one of the good points of the Sniper line. Since all he needs is bows I spent the extra time building up his authority. He's already at B

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57 minutes ago, Aethelstan said:

That's one of the good points of the Sniper line. Since all he needs is bows I spent the extra time building up his authority. He's already at B

Then you should be pretty much good to go. On a side note, Defensive Tactics can be okay if you’re trying to preserve the battalion’s endurance.

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15 hours ago, Tenma said:

I feel like Ashe is definitely a little underrated because, like you said, his ranged chip damage is really useful. On top of that, when you give him time, he becomes a crit machine in the late game (according to what I've seen on Reddit LOL, his crit growth is the same as Petra's at 95%). If you plug a Killer Bow+ on him, his late game crit rate can be well above 60-70%, or at least that's how it was for me in hard mode. But honestly, I'm just happy to see that Ashe is doing you well cause I know a lot of people tend to replace him for better archers LOL.

I was happy with my Ashe in my run. He's imo one of your better units early on because of curved shot and he's good late because of hunter's volley. His weakest section is in the midgame in the period when your other units got their bows to curved shot but he hasn't gotten hunter's volley yet, but fortunately for him this is probably the easiest section of maddening AM. I was playing both Bernadetta and Ashe in my run and its obvious how Bernie's the better unit because of the options that vengeance and encloser provide her, but Ashe is perfectly serviceable.

Edited by Marienburg
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