Thoughts on Fortress Knight Bernie?

[TheChoZenOne]

Okay so I might actually want to use Bernadetta for my upcoming Iron Man. Is Fortress Knight a good ending class for her? Can she be my team's tank? Cuz she has proficiencies in Axes and Armor, and this class allows her personal skill to be used often since she will be taking hits a lot. Maybe add some kind of wrath or vantage skill so she can crit more as an enemy phase unit? Maybe have bows as her secondary weapon so she can still use encloser? Let me know some tips. I'm not too experienced with Bernadetta. I made her my armored knight in my last iron man run but she was.... my least used unit on my main team so I didn't really learn much about her worth 🤣 (she sat on the ballista for the entirey of the GD Endgame) lol I want to use the BERNIE!!

Edited November 10, 2021 by TheChoZenOne

[Barren]

59 minutes ago, TheChoZenOne said:

Okay so I might actually want to use Bernadetta for my upcoming Iron Man. Is Fortress Knight a good ending class for her? Can she be my team's tank? Cuz she has proficiencies in Axes and Armor, and this class allows her personal skill to be used often since she will be taking hits a lot. Maybe add some kind of wrath or vantage skill so she can crit more as an enemy phase unit? Maybe have bows as her secondary weapon so she can still use encloser? Let me know some tips. I'm not too experienced with Bernadetta. I made her my armored knight in my last iron man run but she was.... my least used unit on my main team so I didn't really learn much about her worth 🤣 (she sat on the ballista for the entirey of the GD Endgame) lol I want to use the BERNIE!!

Bernadetta actually has a bane in axes and heavy armor so it does hamper progression quite a lot. Though if you have the patience to work on her ranks then I ain’t stopping you.
 

If you want to try any sort of vantage build, there is Vantage + Battalion Wrath. She does have a bane in swords but it isn’t as hard to get her into Mercenary as it would be for her to access Fortress Knight. Paladin, Falcon Knight or Bow Knight Bernie would be ideal fits for her if you’re using this set up. Of course if it’s going to be Falcon Knight, you would have to make sure that she has Blessing applied so she can live with 1 HP. Fliers can’t have guard adjutants after all.

Bernadetta has access to Vengeance which is her most potent combat art at a rank of C+ in lances. You can amplify her damage output with strength +2, death blow and even HP +5 which adds more damage with Vengeance. She can also use Dead Eye at C rank in bows for long range and Encloser with an A rank in bows to keep enemies from moving. Encloser in particular can be useful in scenarios where Vengeance is not.

Whichever one you pick she can be an absolute monster on player phase.

 

Edited November 11, 2021 by Barren

[TheChoZenOne]

You are right. But I saw this picture and idk where this guy got this info but its different than the Serenes Forest one. It says she has boons in Lance and Armor? Its wierd. But yeah I will make her a lance user then 🙂 Thanks for all the help!! I appreciate it!! 😁

Edited November 11, 2021 by TheChoZenOne

[Shanty Pete's 1st Mate]

25 minutes ago, TheChoZenOne said:

You are right. But I saw this picture and idk where this guy got this info but its different than the Serenes Forest one. It says she has boons in Lance and Armor? Its wierd. But yeah I will make her a lance user then 🙂 Thanks for all the help!! I appreciate it!! 😁

 

That page is inaccurate - it appears to be an early version of the SF page, possibly based on incomplete leaks. Here is the accurate version of the page.

If you're playing Crimson Flower, I would consider Edelgard, Ferdinand, and Caspar the most obvious candidates for an armored build. Mind you, I don't think Fortress Knight is the best class for any of them, but I think it fits their growths and proficiencies. Considering the DLC, Balthus can be another very solid armored pick - with his proficiencies, growths, personal skill, and Crest, he's possibly the best Fortress Knight in the game. I've also used Great Knight Petra to humorous effect, but I don't see her holding up nearly as well on Maddening as she did on Hard.

As for Bernadetta, she brings a few interesting things to the table. Her Budding Talent in Riding gives her the Pass ability, letting her move through enemy units. This can give her many more options, particularly in highly-mobile classes. She also learns the Rescue spell by training Faith, so in combination, she can move allies well into enemy lines, which may be handy in boss-kill maps. That said, her magic growth is lackluster, so while she gets Rescue and some other solid spells (Thoron, Physic), she won't be especially effective with any of them. As @Barren said, Vengeance and Encloser are two really strong arts she brings to the table. I'd suggest going either Paladin or Falcon Knight on a Vengeance-centered build, and either Sniper or Bow Knight on a build focused more on what she can do with bows.

[TheChoZenOne]

57 minutes ago, Shanty Pete's 1st Mate said:

That page is inaccurate - it appears to be an early version of the SF page, possibly based on incomplete leaks. Here is the accurate version of the page.

If you're playing Crimson Flower, I would consider Edelgard, Ferdinand, and Caspar the most obvious candidates for an armored build. Mind you, I don't think Fortress Knight is the best class for any of them, but I think it fits their growths and proficiencies. Considering the DLC, Balthus can be another very solid armored pick - with his proficiencies, growths, personal skill, and Crest, he's possibly the best Fortress Knight in the game. I've also used Great Knight Petra to humorous effect, but I don't see her holding up nearly as well on Maddening as she did on Hard.

As for Bernadetta, she brings a few interesting things to the table. Her Budding Talent in Riding gives her the Pass ability, letting her move through enemy units. This can give her many more options, particularly in highly-mobile classes. She also learns the Rescue spell by training Faith, so in combination, she can move allies well into enemy lines, which may be handy in boss-kill maps. That said, her magic growth is lackluster, so while she gets Rescue and some other solid spells (Thoron, Physic), she won't be especially effective with any of them. As @Barren said, Vengeance and Encloser are two really strong arts she brings to the table. I'd suggest going either Paladin or Falcon Knight on a Vengeance-centered build, and either Sniper or Bow Knight on a build focused more on what she can do with bows.

Noted!! Thank you so much for the tips!! 😁

[LoneStar]

Sylvain could be a good Fortress Knight -> Great Knight. I can't test it right now, since I uninstalled Three Houses for SMTV, but I'd suspect his personal skill + Mauela with her's as an adjutant can make a good tank.

And general advice when looking up information is to see if it is up to date, since that reddit post is 2+ years old.

[TheChoZenOne]

11 minutes ago, LoneStar said:

Sylvain could be a good Fortress Knight -> Great Knight. I can't test it right now, since I uninstalled Three Houses for SMTV, but I'd suspect his personal skill + Mauela with her's as an adjutant can make a good tank.

And general advice when looking up information is to see if it is up to date, since that reddit post is 2+ years old.

I heard Sylvain isn't good as GK cuz its a bad class, cuz of being armored and that meaning he's acceptable to horseslayers and armorslayers. Also yeah I know it was old, I just thought they were sharing the actual Bernadetta proficiencies, I didn't realize that was before the game even properly revealed it haha

Edited November 11, 2021 by TheChoZenOne

[SnowFire]

4 minutes ago, TheChoZenOne said:

I heard Sylvain isn't good as GK cuz its a bad class, cuz of being armored and that meaning he's acceptable to horseslayers and armorslayers.

It's not so much the armored part - armor weakness hitting weapons are not very common in enemy loadouts.  It's more that GK is usually worse than Paladin, yet Paladin is easier to qualify for Sylvain.  GK's growths are flat worse than Pally, and the modifiers are +3 HP, -1 Str (!!), -1 Dex, -3 Spd while dismounted,  +4 Def, -2 Res, -1 Move (!!).  You get more raw Def in GK but worse Str, Res, and Move...   a bad trade.

[TheChoZenOne]

5 minutes ago, SnowFire said:

It's not so much the armored part - armor weakness hitting weapons are not very common in enemy loadouts.  It's more that GK is usually worse than Paladin, yet Paladin is easier to qualify for Sylvain.  GK's growths are flat worse than Pally, and the modifiers are +3 HP, -1 Str (!!), -1 Dex, -3 Spd while dismounted,  +4 Def, -2 Res, -1 Move (!!).  You get more raw Def in GK but worse Str, Res, and Move...   a bad trade.

Ahhhhhhhhhh okay that makes sense. I might have skimmed too fast at the reasoning but I recall it being worse or something. XD I see, thanks for the clarification 😁

[SnowFire]

Also, I take it you haven't played the Crimson Flower route before?  This is relevant for Bernadetta too, but A) CF is shorter than the other three routes, so *any* master class is less relevant simply because there'll be fewer missions with the cast over level 30 to use them in, and B) the CF final map is very unfriendly to mounted units, with lots of terrain that costs 4 movement points per square for a mounted unit to pass.  Some mounted units can compensate slightly by dismounting and using their powerful passive skills anyway (say, Dark Knight Hubert still having Dark Tomefaire or Bow Knights still having Bow Range +2), but this hurts Great Knight particularly hard, as they lose a catastrophic 3 Move from dismounting and don't even have a cool passive to show for it.  (If you are first-timing CF Ironman, I would also heartily suggest reading up about reinforcement mechanics, lest surprise Falcon Knights ruin your day.)

Going back to Bernadetta, you might find the "rate the units" thread interesting and relevant to look at.  Bern mostly gets hype for two things: Encloser and Vengeance.  I'll be honest, if you haven't seriously used Bern much before, you might want to consider the safer, simpler option of Sniper or Bow Knight that spams either Encloser or Hunter's Volley.  Pegasus Knight Bern is a high risk / high reward set that intentionally gets her to low HP somehow (Blessing Gambit?) then assassinates units with powerful Vengeances.  It works a lot better if you know exactly where the relevant units to kill are and how to position safely afterward if killing them doesn't end the map on the spot.  Sniper/BK Bern is a lot simpler: Just get her damaged somehow, avoid hanging out near Dorothea, then keep her safely out of enemy fire.  (And per above comments, in CF, there's a bit more argument than usual for Sniper just to avoid BK horse problems on the final map.  Although BK is still good anyway for other reasons.)

 

[TheChoZenOne]

3 hours ago, SnowFire said:

Also, I take it you haven't played the Crimson Flower route before?  This is relevant for Bernadetta too, but A) CF is shorter than the other three routes, so *any* master class is less relevant simply because there'll be fewer missions with the cast over level 30 to use them in, and B) the CF final map is very unfriendly to mounted units, with lots of terrain that costs 4 movement points per square for a mounted unit to pass.  Some mounted units can compensate slightly by dismounting and using their powerful passive skills anyway (say, Dark Knight Hubert still having Dark Tomefaire or Bow Knights still having Bow Range +2), but this hurts Great Knight particularly hard, as they lose a catastrophic 3 Move from dismounting and don't even have a cool passive to show for it.  (If you are first-timing CF Ironman, I would also heartily suggest reading up about reinforcement mechanics, lest surprise Falcon Knights ruin your day.)

Going back to Bernadetta, you might find the "rate the units" thread interesting and relevant to look at.  Bern mostly gets hype for two things: Encloser and Vengeance.  I'll be honest, if you haven't seriously used Bern much before, you might want to consider the safer, simpler option of Sniper or Bow Knight that spams either Encloser or Hunter's Volley.  Pegasus Knight Bern is a high risk / high reward set that intentionally gets her to low HP somehow (Blessing Gambit?) then assassinates units with powerful Vengeances.  It works a lot better if you know exactly where the relevant units to kill are and how to position safely afterward if killing them doesn't end the map on the spot.  Sniper/BK Bern is a lot simpler: Just get her damaged somehow, avoid hanging out near Dorothea, then keep her safely out of enemy fire.  (And per above comments, in CF, there's a bit more argument than usual for Sniper just to avoid BK horse problems on the final map.  Although BK is still good anyway for other reasons.)

 

Yeah I am aware of the length, thanks for the tips tho!! I will keep this all in mind!! Also that final map tip is a BIG help!! Thanks so much, I appreciate it!! 😁