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Ilyana is kind of bad ]:


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I always enjoy training her in Part 1, it's just that her context within the game is kind of awkward. She starts out with pretty solid stats (namely Spd), but then she's slightly overleveled, meaning she levels a bit slower. And then there's her strange growths, favouring anything but her Spd (her worst growth tied with Def). And unlike characters like Aran- or even something like Laura, she can't viably use the BEXP exploit to cap certain stats to bring up her lower ones.

And to top it all of, she's constantly competing with other fellow members for Exp, Exp of which she'll just end up shipping away to the GMs and be a worst Soren, at best. I've seen people talk about her Endgame performance against Dragons, but that's literally only one chapter. She could be a lot better if her availability played more to her favour, or something like that.

 

EDIT:

oh yeah, her Str growth is almost as much as her Mag growth, for some reason. :awesome:

Edited by the actual real soul
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Ilyana is more of an assassin then a mage, her main draw is her higher crit rate and her high chance of procing Flare. Soren is much more reliable but Ilyana is just more fun to use. She has no competition for her best weapon Rexbolt. Which gives Skl increasing her crit rate even more and giving her a 18.5% chance to proc Flare. She also has unrivaled availably. And for some reason she has a higher Spd cap then Soren as a Sage but a lower one as a Archsage.

Edited by ciphertul
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Base Ilyana, being about eight levels higher than the rest, can ORKO two enemies in her debut. That's all her usefulness. If she could get a level and even gained speed, she can double a few tigers in 1-4. That's not all that much going for her.

However magic and speed transferred Ilyana can do some stuff at least in her first two chapters. In 1-3 she at least has a similar offense power to Sothe, if she can double. In 1-4 she can almost ORKO the tigers. Still thunder is inaccurate.

overall Ilyana's best usage: convoy

Edited by Zan Partizanne
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10 hours ago, the actual real soul said:

I've seen people talk about her Endgame performance against Dragons, but that's literally only one chapter. She could be a lot better if her availability played more to her favour, or something like that.

Plus, it's a chapter where you have two units (Kurthnaga and Ena) who will not be attacked by any of the enemy units and who are indestructible on that chapter as a result. I never understood someone going, "Oh, make sure to have this unit for the dragon chapter" as I just can't help but think that it's the chapter where you least need units that are particularly viable for it specifically.

Plus, if you really want to bring thunder tomes to the endgame, there's Pelleas, though he can only get up to S rank with it, and I prefer having him use his dark magic because the long-range one packs so much punch (and he gains enough strength, skill and speed) that he can fairly-reliably ORKO most enemies with it after he gains enough levels.

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To be fair, most mages in this game have speed issues. Anyway, she doesn't have it as bad as Tormod (who is grossly overleveled in three of his chapters, then vanishes until right before endgame, and he and his friends are way behind your party, never mind the enemies) or Pelleas (uses dark magic in one of the worst games for dark magic, and comes underleveled, though it ain't as bad as Tormod; for someone who requires a second playthrough or later, I'd expect him to be better than he is).

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2 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

To be fair, most mages in this game have speed issues. Anyway, she doesn't have it as bad as Tormod (who is grossly overleveled in three of his chapters, then vanishes until right before endgame, and he and his friends are way behind your party, never mind the enemies) or Pelleas (uses dark magic in one of the worst games for dark magic, and comes underleveled, though it ain't as bad as Tormod; for someone who requires a second playthrough or later, I'd expect him to be better than he is).

But it's not just her Spd, but more like the sum of all those things playing against her. She has a ton of availability and potential resources, but she has to heavily compete in Part 1 for it, only to leave the team and any potential resource she might take from them. And then she comes back in Part 3, only to be worse than Soren. Even a 20/1 Ilyana is worse than Soren, and can't take much advantage of the BEXP exploit.

The other mages:

- Micaiah heals and has Thanibombing, as well as Sacrifice+Wrath (if you're not using Edward). This makes her the best ranged attacker (not that it's great competition), but at least she potentially oneshots things.

- Soren can use BEXP exploit, capping Mag, Skill & Res really quickly and being able to bring Spd up. The Ike support really helps.

- Callil is pretty solid and one of the faster mages, her only issue is availability.

- Sanaki with Daunt + Resolve actually makes her really workable, and even a potentially good Rexflame user in Endgame. I've used her in HM a couple of times and she's better than people gave her credit for.

 

5 minutes ago, Vicious Sal said:

At least ilyana is fantastic in Reverse Recruitment. =]

But then she comes it at like the end of the game??? I never played FE10 hax. ]:

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8 hours ago, ciphertul said:

Ilyana is more of an assassin then a mage, her main draw is her higher crit rate and her high chance of procing Flare. Soren is much more reliable but Ilyana is just more fun to use. She has no competition for her best weapon Rexbolt. Which gives Skl increasing her crit rate even more and giving her a 18.5% chance to proc Flare. She also has unrivaled availably. And for some reason she has a higher Spd cap then Soren as a Sage but a lower one as a Archsage.

That's assuming she's 3rd tier to begin with. And if you need a special or a critical to oneround by then, there's clearly a problem.

6 hours ago, Zan Partizanne said:

Base Ilyana, being about eight levels higher than the rest, can ORKO two enemies in her debut. That's all her usefulness. If she could get a level and even gained speed, she can double a few tigers in 1-4. That's not all that much going for her.

However magic and speed transferred Ilyana can do some stuff at least in her first two chapters. In 1-3 she at least has a similar offense power to Sothe, if she can double. In 1-4 she can almost ORKO the tigers. Still thunder is inaccurate.

overall Ilyana's best usage: convoy

I'm playing HM right now, and those enemies she can double are very few outliers here and there. Most Tigers have 12 AS, and the 1-2 enemies she can double might not even 1RKO (i.e the Knights). That's hardly utility.

 

I'm lowkey thinking Meg is terribly underrated, and better than Ilyana.

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She's one of the many units in this game who could have benefited from auto-leveling between Parts 1 and 3. So that, when she shows up with the GMs, she'll be close to promotion. Or just auto-promote her in between, and go on from there. She'd still be worse than Soren, but she might become salvageable.

Also, Thunder magic was nerfed too hard. It should at least be higher-Might than (the lighter, more accurate) Wind tomes. That said, tomes in general get a bum steer in Radiant Dawn.

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5 hours ago, the actual real soul said:

But it's not just her Spd, but more like the sum of all those things playing against her. She has a ton of availability and potential resources, but she has to heavily compete in Part 1 for it, only to leave the team and any potential resource she might take from them. And then she comes back in Part 3, only to be worse than Soren. Even a 20/1 Ilyana is worse than Soren, and can't take much advantage of the BEXP exploit.

The other mages:

- Micaiah heals and has Thanibombing, as well as Sacrifice+Wrath (if you're not using Edward). This makes her the best ranged attacker (not that it's great competition), but at least she potentially oneshots things.

- Soren can use BEXP exploit, capping Mag, Skill & Res really quickly and being able to bring Spd up. The Ike support really helps.

- Callil is pretty solid and one of the faster mages, her only issue is availability.

- Sanaki with Daunt + Resolve actually makes her really workable, and even a potentially good Rexflame user in Endgame. I've used her in HM a couple of times and she's better than people gave her credit for.

When I was talking about speed issues, I was also talking about caps; all the mages have low speed caps (with the exception of Lehran), as opposed to in Path of Radiance, where they had a rather good 28 speed cap (tying with other classes for the second best speed cap among beorc classes), and that's just one problem they have. Considering that 34 speed or higher is what people consider good, that hurts. Anyway, I agree with you on most of the others, to some extent at least, but Resolve on Sanaki is just playing with fire, considering that unlike Micaiah, who could lower her health safely via Sacrifice, Sanaki needs to see combat and take damage - and 28/10 Hp/Def is terrible. Even then, I think that combo could be used by any other mage (though they probably won't one-round). 

5 hours ago, the actual real soul said:

That's assuming she's 3rd tier to begin with. And if you need a special or a critical to oneround by then, there's clearly a problem.

Let's put it this way - most mages probably won't one-round in part 4 without crits or specials because aside from their speed problems, tomes are weak in this game (almost all of the tomes with double-digit might are S or SS rank), and for the most part, you don't get high rank tomes until part 4. Enemies having much higher resistance than in prior games doesn't help their case.

5 hours ago, the actual real soul said:

I'm lowkey thinking Meg is terribly underrated, and better than Ilyana.

I'd say you're grasping at straws there - Meg has poor growths in important stats, and for an armored unit, she hits more like a wet noodle, and is as durable as toilet paper. If you're an armored knight, which is supposed to be a tanky class, and you are easily killed by physical units when they aren't using weapons meant to be used against armored units, that's a serious failure of role.

Edited by Shadow Mir
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To be fair, magic in general is not great in this game. It's one of the only FEs where enemies actually have decent res stats. On top of that, recruitment and availability is awkward for nearly everyone, even though Ilyana technically has the best availability. None of the mages are exactly high tier characters- Soren is probably the best but that's not saying much.

I do agree she comes in overleveled and you're better off not using her too much in Part 1 because the GM need the experience more because Ilyana will leave them. The GM will already have a hard time in Part 3, and you're shooting yourself in the foot if you neglect them in Part 1.

While she is a mediocre unit, she at least has her uses/niche. I know you mentioned the dragon chapter in endgame, but she is one of the best characters to use for that level. Giving her a blessed Rexbolt and Bolting can make your life a lot easier than not using her that level. It's definitely possible to beat it without her (I have done it) but it sure is nice to have her there. 

And she has staff utility as well.

4 hours ago, the actual real soul said:

I'm lowkey thinking Meg is terribly underrated, and better than Ilyana.

How so? Meg comes in a chapter where she dies easily. This is normal for FE, but when you realize Meg's class type is an armor knight, where her HP and DEF should be better than the rest of your party's, she underperforms. Again, I know she can become good, but what niche does she really have? Tauroneo is a better armor knight/general and Edward/Zihark are better sword users. You're better off using one of them (and Zihark can probably take more hits than her too). At least Ilyana has the distinction of being the only thunder concentrated mage and has access to Rexbolt.

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Eh, DB's experience spread is a bit overblown imo. Funnel Nolan and Jill (the former kinda naturally happens), Micaiah hits 20 by chipping and using Sacrifice, and you're left with enough extra experience to get significant levels on someone like Illy, Leo, or Edward as long as you aren't throwing free exp away to Zihark, Volug, Sothe etc. unless absolutely necessary. At least, that was my experience playing blind on HM recently, which for sure would be improved upon in terms of spread for anyone that knows the game already. The only thing I regret about pulling a save to run through hard is not knowing about beastfoe, definitely would have preferred to reset a handful of times less than I did due to not knowing it existed.

It would probably be akin to pulling teeth, but I feel pretty confident you could promote 4 of the DB units by the end of 1-E, especially like Leo/Ill due to poke potential.

Edited by Relytive
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7 minutes ago, Relytive said:

Eh, DB's experience spread is a bit overblown imo. Funnel Nolan and Jill (the former kinda naturally happens), Micaiah hits 20 by chipping and using Sacrifice, and you're left with enough extra experience to get significant levels on someone like Illy, Leo, or Edward as long as you aren't throwing free exp away to Zihark, Volug, Sothe etc. unless absolutely necessary. At least, that was my experience playing blind on HM recently, which for sure would be improved upon in terms of spread for anyone that knows the game already. The only thing I regret about pulling a save to run through hard is not knowing about beastfoe, definitely would have preferred to reset a handful of times less than I did due to not knowing it existed.

It would probably be akin to pulling teeth, but I feel pretty confident you could promote 4 of the DB units by the end of 1-E, especially like Leo/Ill due to poke potential.

Ok so let's say you've got Edward at 20/1. What is he going to do in 3-6? He's still just worse Zihark, except for 6 extra luck.
Zihark meanwhile has the option to have B or A Earth/Earth affinity for durability. Meanwhile Edward has... hit and Def for affinity.

Leo at least has corssbow/lughnasadh chip. Nolan and jill can actually do something. getting Micaiah to 20 is also kind of a pipe dream on HM unless you're taking multiple turn s past the BEXp limit. 
there is no such thing as throwing Exp away. Volug, Zihark and Edward might gain less EXp, but what they get in combat is worth more than what units like edward are most likely to contribute. 

Ilyana being used is one of the few cases where  EXp distribution can actually be considered detrimental since the investment is never payed out for the DB. Since she leaves, and is underleved in the team she joins regardless of the EXp you push in.

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19 hours ago, Dandy Druid said:

How so? Meg comes in a chapter where she dies easily. This is normal for FE, but when you realize Meg's class type is an armor knight, where her HP and DEF should be better than the rest of your party's, she underperforms. Again, I know she can become good, but what niche does she really have? Tauroneo is a better armor knight/general and Edward/Zihark are better sword users. You're better off using one of them (and Zihark can probably take more hits than her too). At least Ilyana has the distinction of being the only thunder concentrated mage and has access to Rexbolt.

Meg eventually becomes a tank rivaling characters like Aran and Jill, and she's even dodgier thanks to her high Luck. Her Str/Def growths are lacking, but her bases and promotion gains keep those somewhat competent. It's not like her durability really struggles, save for the slump that is Part 1 (where every other one of your 1rst tiers still struggle). If you train Meg seriously, she can be really good in Part 3, and that's more than what Ilyana can say. Her one chapter at the end of the game hardly matters, let alone when the most optimal way to finish 4-E-3 is to rush it.

People really underrate Meg because she comes somewhat underleveled and gets doubled in her starting chapter, but then she also has a ton of availability to work with, and doesn't leave the team with the Exp you're taking. I never found her Mov to be an issue, since maps aren't a huge open field or anything.

13 hours ago, Relytive said:

Eh, DB's experience spread is a bit overblown imo. Funnel Nolan and Jill (the former kinda naturally happens), Micaiah hits 20 by chipping and using Sacrifice, and you're left with enough extra experience to get significant levels on someone like Illy, Leo, or Edward as long as you aren't throwing free exp away to Zihark, Volug, Sothe etc. unless absolutely necessary. At least, that was my experience playing blind on HM recently, which for sure would be improved upon in terms of spread for anyone that knows the game already. The only thing I regret about pulling a save to run through hard is not knowing about beastfoe, definitely would have preferred to reset a handful of times less than I did due to not knowing it existed.

It would probably be akin to pulling teeth, but I feel pretty confident you could promote 4 of the DB units by the end of 1-E, especially like Leo/Ill due to poke potential.

I have a lot of trouble seeing that in HM. I started playing the other day again, and I can barely get Edward, Nolan, Aran and Ilyana to lvl.16, 17, 13 & 17 respectively. Micaiah is lvl.10-12, and I just gave up on her so the others could get Exp. And I was taking my time, too. lvl.20 for 2 characters by 1-E is generous, let alone 3 or even 4.

13 hours ago, Vicious Sal said:

Ok so let's say you've got Edward at 20/1. What is he going to do in 3-6? He's still just worse Zihark, except for 6 extra luck.
Zihark meanwhile has the option to have B or A Earth/Earth affinity for durability. Meanwhile Edward has... hit and Def for affinity.

Leo at least has corssbow/lughnasadh chip. Nolan and jill can actually do something. getting Micaiah to 20 is also kind of a pipe dream on HM unless you're taking multiple turn s past the BEXp limit. 
there is no such thing as throwing Exp away. Volug, Zihark and Edward might gain less EXp, but what they get in combat is worth more than what units like edward are most likely to contribute. 

Ilyana being used is one of the few cases where  EXp distribution can actually be considered detrimental since the investment is never payed out for the DB. Since she leaves, and is underleved in the team she joins regardless of the EXp you push in.

Edward is another character that's really underrated. He has a lot of time to train, and he's pretty vicious after you do get past his Part 1 slump. He's one of the two only characters that can use the Wrath/Resolve combo, and access to Cadabogl and a fast support with Nolan makes him almost as dodgy as Zihark with double Earth, but with far better offense. He's one of the best characters to kill Ike.

21 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

When I was talking about speed issues, I was also talking about caps; all the mages have low speed caps (with the exception of Lehran), as opposed to in Path of Radiance, where they had a rather good 28 speed cap (tying with other classes for the second best speed cap among beorc classes), and that's just one problem they have. Considering that 34 speed or higher is what people consider good, that hurts.

Their Spd caps don't really become an issue until Endgame (save for characters like Rhys, who have 30 Spd cap). I mentioned earlier, in the Gatrie topic, that characters with like 31 Spd (Gatrie and Oscar) can double up to around 4-E-1, and that really enough to get you through most of the game. Caps aren't a problem as we once thought they were, and we ought to recognize that.

Fire Sages, in particular, they have access to Rexflame, which gives them +3 Spd. A Sanaki with capped Spd and enough Str (not hard to reach with some BEXP) can actually reach 35 Spd, if that's a concern.

21 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

Anyway, I agree with you on most of the others, to some extent at least, but Resolve on Sanaki is just playing with fire, considering that unlike Micaiah, who could lower her health safely via Sacrifice, Sanaki needs to see combat and take damage - and 28/10 Hp/Def is terrible. Even then, I think that combo could be used by any other mage (though they probably won't one-round).

She just need to take a hit from any enemy that isn't a Warrior. I've done it a couple of times, and it works well in practice. It's actually easier than Part 1 Micaiah, ironically.

21 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

Let's put it this way - most mages probably won't one-round in part 4 without crits or specials because aside from their speed problems, tomes are weak in this game (almost all of the tomes with double-digit might are S or SS rank), and for the most part, you don't get high rank tomes until part 4. Enemies having much higher resistance than in prior games doesn't help their case.

No, they do pretty well, assuming you have trained them (why would you bring them to Part 4, otherwise?). Soren and Callil are the most likely ones to pull through, but Ilyana takes a lot of work to get her there without getting lucky in Spd or favouritism of some sort.

21 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

I'd say you're grasping at straws there - Meg has poor growths in important stats, and for an armored unit, she hits more like a wet noodle, and is as durable as toilet paper. If you're an armored knight, which is supposed to be a tanky class, and you are easily killed by physical units when they aren't using weapons meant to be used against armored units, that's a serious failure of role.

She has a bad start, but a ton of availability and resources (which she can use well) to work with. She's honestly not that much worse than the other unpromoted units, since they're all getting 2HKO'd. She does get doubled in her starting chapter, but I also know she gains Spd fast enough to get out of that and start taking hits later.

She's a solid Part 3 frontliner, and it's sadly more than what Ilyana can say.

 

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On 6/11/2021 at 11:35 PM, the actual real soul said:

That's assuming she's 3rd tier to begin with. And if you need a special or a critical to oneround by then, there's clearly a problem.

I'm playing HM right now, and those enemies she can double are very few outliers here and there. Most Tigers have 12 AS, and the 1-2 enemies she can double might not even 1RKO (i.e the Knights). That's hardly utility.

 

I'm lowkey thinking Meg is terribly underrated, and better than Ilyana.

Ilyana's instant usefulness in the early chapters of Part 1, which let's face it, are some of the hardest chapters in the game, puts her far and away better than Meg who is stuck in "Hypothetically okay if you put in a tonne of investment". Ilyana might not be great in the long run, but she's one of the best killers the Dawn Brigade has in part 1.

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

She's one of the many units in this game who could have benefited from auto-leveling between Parts 1 and 3. So that, when she shows up with the GMs, she'll be close to promotion. Or just auto-promote her in between, and go on from there. She'd still be worse than Soren, but she might become salvageable.

Imo you have it backwards, instead of auto leveling, the part 2 and 3 characters should all have been tier 1 units. Silly to make a game with three tiers of promotion and then make 90% of the class prepromotes. This game doesn't have three tiers, it just gives you a bunch of Sacred Stones trainees at the start of the game >.>

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5 minutes ago, Jotari said:

Ilyana's instant usefulness in the early chapters of Part 1, which let's face it, are some of the hardest chapters in the game, puts her far and away better than Meg who is stuck in "Hypothetically okay if you put in a tonne of investment". Ilyana might not be great in the long run, but she's one of the best killers the Dawn Brigade has in part 1.

She's not that good even for that. Sometimes she'll even struggle to 2HKO without a forge or a Spirit Dust, and her hitrates are consistently within the 70s. That's only better in the first chapters, then it's just that. Meg is not "just okay" in Part 3, if you are using her seriously. She's pretty solid. Most of why people think she's bottom tier do so because of her Part 1 performance, when everyone is bad in Part 1 save for like Nolan and Jill (among the unpromoted characters).

If you train Meg, you get an actual good unit. If you train Ilyana, you get a worse version of subpar unit.

Quote

Imo you have it backwards, instead of auto leveling, the part 2 and 3 characters should all have been tier 1 units. Silly to make a game with three tiers of promotion and then make 90% of the class prepromotes. This game doesn't have three tiers, it just gives you a bunch of Sacred Stones trainees at the start of the game >.>

th?id=OIP.Xh9ZvpJuHPUmRmsjaCs-RgHaHa&pid

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14 hours ago, Vicious Sal said:

Ok so let's say you've got Edward at 20/1. What is he going to do in 3-6? He's still just worse Zihark, except for 6 extra luck.
Zihark meanwhile has the option to have B or A Earth/Earth affinity for durability. Meanwhile Edward has... hit and Def for affinity.

Leo at least has corssbow/lughnasadh chip. Nolan and jill can actually do something. getting Micaiah to 20 is also kind of a pipe dream on HM unless you're taking multiple turn s past the BEXp limit. 
there is no such thing as throwing Exp away. Volug, Zihark and Edward might gain less EXp, but what they get in combat is worth more than what units like edward are most likely to contribute. 

Ilyana being used is one of the few cases where  EXp distribution can actually be considered detrimental since the investment is never payed out for the DB. Since she leaves, and is underleved in the team she joins regardless of the EXp you push in.

I never said Edward>Zihark? I used the latter the entire time he was available due to mentioned earth affinity, the same reason I used Oscar as my chosen Cav and benched Ed. The point was exp isn't as barren as it's made out to be, but sure, investing it all into Jill/Nolan makes more sense than spreading it. The point was you probably can get away with it, even on hard.

Things get overblown online about the difficulty of these games though, an example being that if I blindly trusted what I'd heard, I would have reset for beastfoe because otherwise 3-6 and (13? Iirc) would be nearly impossible... which wasn't close to the reality, though it certainly would make them easier I'd presume.

I didn't get the bexp bonus every single map as like I said, I was playing blind, but my Mic hit 20 at the start of 1's endgame. I only trained Jill/Nolan significantly otherwise though, so maybe I just ended up sac'ing and chipping more than someone replaying through with ltc strats would (very likely the case).

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@Relytive It's not exaggerated at all. It's really that hard to train that many characters in HM. In things like NM, it's far, far easier to do it. And I mentioned an example where I was going pretty slow and I didn't get a single one of them to lvl.20 as of yet (granted, I'm not using Jill).

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45 minutes ago, the actual real soul said:

Meg is not "just okay" in Part 3, if you are using her seriously. She's pretty solid.

Really not sure how you can say this. Her tier 2 Spd cap of 22 misses a lot of doubles, basically only getting some generals in 3-12. Her Spd and Luck cap so quickly that those growths are just wasted, and since the rest of her growths are so lopsided she doesn't even use BEXP well (Her HP, Skl, and Res growths are all still higher than her Str/Def growths). She literally has the same Def growth as Edward, and he has a higher HP growth and caps more stats in a reasonable time than she does, so in all likelihood even Edward can become about as tanky. Oh, and he has Light affinity to close the gap more. Aran hits 25 Def at 20/7, a number Meg doesn't hit until she's tier 3. Jill's Def is more on par with hers, but she still has a Def boosting affinity (Thunder) and Canto to help her avoid excess damage. Jill also has similar Luck and better Spd.

Her Heaven affinity doesn't give her partner anything useful (ironically, she does kind of need it herself), so she's just deadweight to them, her armored movement is actually really bad for multiple Dawn Brigade chapters considering thickets, swamps, and ledges, she has to start with E rank lances when she promotes...She's not solid in part 3. She's a bland "okay, I guess" at best.

You can hyper-invest in her, dump a mountain of BEXP and a Master Crown on her and get something that you can maybe call "good" (her movement will be bad forever but this at least fixes her weapon levels and lets her start getting some real Spd). But that's a really bad look. I'd rather put that much effort into Fiona of all characters, who starts worse but finishes much better. Or Ilyana, for that matter, who has noticeably better availability and at least some kind of niche late game as a dragon slayer.

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3 hours ago, the actual real soul said:

She has a bad start, but a ton of availability and resources (which she can use well) to work with. She's honestly not that much worse than the other unpromoted units, since they're all getting 2HKO'd. She does get doubled in her starting chapter, but I also know she gains Spd fast enough to get out of that and start taking hits later.

She's a solid Part 3 frontliner, and it's sadly more than what Ilyana can say.

Yeah, if you ignore the part where she starts way behind everyone else and needs a metric ton of investment (in a group that already has it bad, at that) just to be barely okay at best.  There's still the matter where her stats don't gel with her class, too; again, for someone who's an armored unit, a class that's supposed to have high durability as their defining point, Meg's 10 base + 35 growth is laughable. Her best growths are in HP, speed, luck, and resistance, of which only one is important, and she's stuck with a laughable cap in it. If I was okay with putting that amount of investment into someone who started out behind everyone else, I'd rather do that with Fiona, who, while she has a bad start herself, at least has some semblance of long-term potential, unlike Meg.

3 hours ago, the actual real soul said:

Edward is another character that's really underrated. He has a lot of time to train, and he's pretty vicious after you do get past his Part 1 slump. He's one of the two only characters that can use the Wrath/Resolve combo, and access to Cadabogl and a fast support with Nolan makes him almost as dodgy as Zihark with double Earth, but with far better offense. He's one of the best characters to kill Ike.

I hard disagree - with Radiant Dawn putting the "Hell" in Early Game Hell, why would I attempt the tooth-pulling task of training him when in practice, all he does is make part 1 much harder than it needs to be??? Especially since Zihark renders him obsolete. Regarding Wrath, I'd consider Wrath better used by a mage, as they don't need to risk dying.

3 hours ago, the actual real soul said:

Fire Sages, in particular, they have access to Rexflame, which gives them +3 Spd. A Sanaki with capped Spd and enough Str (not hard to reach with some BEXP) can actually reach 35 Spd, if that's a concern.

That's nice, but only Calill has any argument for Rexflame, because I'd consider it wasteful to have to put that much investment in Sanaki for no real gain.

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12 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

There's still the matter where her stats don't gel with her class, too; again, for someone who's an armored unit, a class that's supposed to have high durability as their defining point, Meg's 10 base + 35 growth is laughable.

10+35% def is pretty good for Level 3! Especially when you consider that female units get a bonus def point on promo each time so it's probably better to think of their def growths as 5% higher than listed. She's got +5 base on Edward (one level lower), +1 base on Nolan (six levels lower), and better promo bonuses than them, so she has no problems exceeding them in def.

Granted, she does compare very poorly at this role with Aran.

I do agree that Meg is a bit underrated but only in the sense that you have people who compare her unfavourably to Fiona. I've used both and there's no comparison. Meg is quite comparable with units like Edward (i.e. mediocre but you can use her relatively easily if you actually want to), Fiona is on her own tier of bad. For starters she basically has Meg's base stats (arguably worse? -2 str and -2 def are both bitter pills) four maps later, despite being significantly higher-levelled. And then she misses a fifth map. And is very difficult to use in a sixth due to being unable to enter water.

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2 hours ago, Dark Holy Elf said:

 

10+35% def is pretty good for Level 3! Especially when you consider that female units get a bonus def point on promo each time so it's probably better to think of their def growths as 5% higher than listed. She's got +5 base on Edward (one level lower), +1 base on Nolan (six levels lower), and better promo bonuses than them, so she has no problems exceeding them in def.

Granted, she does compare very poorly at this role with Aran.

I do agree that Meg is a bit underrated but only in the sense that you have people who compare her unfavourably to Fiona. I've used both and there's no comparison. Meg is quite comparable with units like Edward (i.e. mediocre but you can use her relatively easily if you actually want to), Fiona is on her own tier of bad. For starters she basically has Meg's base stats (arguably worse? -2 str and -2 def are both bitter pills) four maps later, despite being significantly higher-levelled. And then she misses a fifth map. And is very difficult to use in a sixth due to being unable to enter water.

I can't say I've ever put any effort into trying to make Meg good, but I think even just in terms of contribution Leo is going to out perform Meg. Like Leo is by no means a great unit, but he can reliably do chip damage to help other units score kills and Lughnasadh does help him double later during the Part 3 Dawn Brigade chapters. That chip damage by no means vital, but it is something. What can Meg actually contribute without pouring in resources that are better off going to Nolan or Jill? She's too flimsy to fight enemies head on (sure that defense stat is good, but if I remember her HP is absolutely atrocious meaning she is not tanking many hits) and too inaccurate to provide chip damage from afar. Even if statistically Meg and Leo come out as being of the same relative power, Leo actually having an early game niche makes him look better in my eyes. Or maybe put it another way, I've never felt it necessary to train Meg up, but I've had to use Leo in many part 1 maps simply because they're are no better options and he can contribute something.

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On 6/10/2021 at 10:53 PM, the actual real soul said:

I've seen people talk about her Endgame performance against Dragons, but that's literally only one chapter. She could be a lot better if her availability played more to her favour, or something like that.

I get the feeling a lot of that Endgame Ilyana talk is a lot of theory crafting. I have taken her to endgame, and the white dragons are the only thing she does well against thanks to her terrible physical bulk. Most mages can carry a bolting at base, so the main gain to using her on that chapter is access to Rexbolt, and it isn't as impressive as it seems. She can one round the generic dragons, but she has to take a counter (or proc a crit/skill) to do so, and the Reds kill her in two hits even if she is on the cover tiles. Finding a way to deal with Dheginsea is the core of this chapter, and she doesn't do well against him due to her bulk. Against Dheginsea, she needs almost capped HP+Defense stats plus the cover tile not to be one shot, and with capped stats and extra attack from support, she matches his healing factor in damage. The need to heal her to full (as even a few points below her HP cap means death) after every attack against Dhegonsea (and his crit and skill immunity from Mantle), keeps her from really doing well against him. Giving your favorite mage a bolting would work out better in most cases...

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19 hours ago, Dark Holy Elf said:

10+35% def is pretty good for Level 3! Especially when you consider that female units get a bonus def point on promo each time so it's probably better to think of their def growths as 5% higher than listed. She's got +5 base on Edward (one level lower), +1 base on Nolan (six levels lower), and better promo bonuses than them, so she has no problems exceeding them in def.

Granted, she does compare very poorly at this role with Aran.

I do agree that Meg is a bit underrated but only in the sense that you have people who compare her unfavourably to Fiona. I've used both and there's no comparison. Meg is quite comparable with units like Edward (i.e. mediocre but you can use her relatively easily if you actually want to), Fiona is on her own tier of bad. For starters she basically has Meg's base stats (arguably worse? -2 str and -2 def are both bitter pills) four maps later, despite being significantly higher-levelled. And then she misses a fifth map. And is very difficult to use in a sixth due to being unable to enter water.

That doesn't really make up for - or change - the fact that Meg underperforms at what is supposed to be her role - armored knights are supposed to take the brunt of the enemy assault head-on, but she's too flimsy for that. 

1 hour ago, Eltosian Kadath said:

Giving your favorite mage a bolting would work out better in most cases...

IF you could get one - which is a really big if.

Edited by Shadow Mir
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4 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

IF you could get one - which is a really big if.

The point is that Ilyana doesn't really bring much that's unique to the table for the dragon chapter. Bolting, if you are able to get it (and I agree that it's tough to get), is equally usable by any elemental mage. Ilyana's only advantage over other mages is Rexbolt, which gives 9 extra mt against dragons compared to Thoron. This is relevant for damaging Dheginsea, but she isn't great at damaging Dheginsea anyway because she can't double (base Caineghis, for instance, does significantly more). What mages are pretty good at on that map is dealing damage to red dragons, since most of your units struggle to 2HKO them even with a wyrmslayer due to their def... and any mage does that just as well as Ilyana.

Now what I'm not sure about is if Rexbolt can 2HKO white dragons. When I used her in endgame, she was missing the 2HKO, but it's possible she might with capped magic and/or a might support. I'm too lazy to look up enemy stats to check that.

As long as we're talking about how mediocre PCs do if you actually get them there, I would say Meg is definitely better for the dragon chapter, because she is one of the few PCs who can get very high def and res (averaging 37 def and 32 res by Level 14 with Alondite, for instance), and as such she does a good job of tanking mixed groups of dragons and dealing damage back due to 1-2 range. Place her on the correct panel with Kurth by her side and she can deal with something like five or six at once, something few others can do (just earth/earth dodgetanks really, like Zihark).

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