Silver Snow Recruitment Recommendations

[vanguard333]

I recently completed my first Azure Moon playthrough. Since I previously played through Crimson Flower and Verdant Wind, all that remains is Silver Snow.

I try to limit the number of student characters that I recruit, both for story reasons and so that I don't risk training characters that I won't accidentally train units that I ultimately won't use. With Silver Snow, there is extra incentive to recruit characters as you lose Edelgard and Hubert, but at the same time, once they leave, there's one less slot compared to Verdant Wind. I also want to consider using the church units; I've basically ignored all of them except for Flayn in my previous playthroughs, and even then, I usually end up dropping Flayn, so it would be neat to maybe use some of them here; it is the church route after all.

I immediately knew I would be recruiting Lysithea, as she's basically the perfect replacement for Hubert, she's necessary for Ferdinand's paralogue and her pairing with Linhardt is sweet. If I'm recruiting Lysithea, then I'm probably recruiting Lorenz (but not using him as he isn't very good or relevant) for his relic so I can give it to Lysithea. For paralogues, I'd have to recruit Mercedes for Caspar's and Leonie for Linhardt's. However, I don't know if I really want to use them; in Mercedes' case, there's already Linhardt, Flayn and Dorothea for healing, and for Leonie, there's already Bernadetta for horseback archery.

One issue that I have is that I like to have everyone paired up with someone at the end, and with my plan to have Byleth s-support either Rhea or one of the other church units such as Shamir, my current roster leaves Petra single. Usually, I pair her with Ashe, but he's just as redundant as Leonie.

Anyway, what recruits do you recommend for Silver Snow?

[Fire Emblem Fan]

I always recommend recruiting Marianne in every route, because she's the one single student who will NEVER appear in Part 2 unless she's recruited. Outside of her own Verdant Wind route, of course. Recruiting her is the only way to access any part of her story and her Relic. I'd also recruit anyone you need to complete a Black Eagle students' paralogue.

[vanguard333]

11 minutes ago, Fire Emblem Fan said:

I always recommend recruiting Marianne in every route, because she's the one single student who will NEVER appear in Part 2 unless she's recruited. Outside of her own Verdant Wind route, of course. Recruiting her is the only way to access any part of her story and her Relic. I'd also recruit anyone you need to complete a Black Eagle students' paralogue.

I already plan to recruit those that I need for the paralogues (Mercedes, Leonie and Lysithea), but outside Lysithea, I don't really intend to use them, so I'm looking for a unit that would be good to use alongside the Black Eagles.

[lenticular]

Somewhat infuriatingly, Silver Snow isn't really a particularly good choice for really using Church units. Specifically, Cyril and Catherine are both a lot weaker in Silver Snow than they are in Verdant Wind and Azure Moon, since you can't recruit them until chapter 12. For Catherine, that means missing out on her strong early-mid game performance. For Cyril, it means that his auto levelling is done in the Commoner class, which does him no favours. For both of them, it means they miss out on all the customisation and training that you do prior to that point. I wouldn't recommend using either of them on Silver Snow. The two Church units I would be most inclined to recommend would be Seteth and Shamir. Both are strong units, and Seteth is forced deployed in Chapter 13, so is worth showing a little bit of love to even if you don't plan to use him longterm.

For students, other than grabbing the ones that you need for paralogues, I'd mostly just say to pick your favourites. Pretty much anyone will work fine. Looking at supports isn't a bad way to go, though. Choosing people who support with Dorothea can be particularly nice, since they can take advantage of linked attack from her Meteor, once she has it. Manuela is a standout on that front, since her linked attack with Dorothea gives +might, or Ingrid could be good for the better rewards for their paralogue. Really though, I wouldn't stress it too much. Just go with the units you like or want to try out and it will be fine.

[vanguard333]

12 hours ago, lenticular said:

Somewhat infuriatingly, Silver Snow isn't really a particularly good choice for really using Church units. Specifically, Cyril and Catherine are both a lot weaker in Silver Snow than they are in Verdant Wind and Azure Moon, since you can't recruit them until chapter 12. For Catherine, that means missing out on her strong early-mid game performance. For Cyril, it means that his auto levelling is done in the Commoner class, which does him no favours. For both of them, it means they miss out on all the customisation and training that you do prior to that point. I wouldn't recommend using either of them on Silver Snow. The two Church units I would be most inclined to recommend would be Seteth and Shamir. Both are strong units, and Seteth is forced deployed in Chapter 13, so is worth showing a little bit of love to even if you don't plan to use him longterm.

For students, other than grabbing the ones that you need for paralogues, I'd mostly just say to pick your favourites. Pretty much anyone will work fine. Looking at supports isn't a bad way to go, though. Choosing people who support with Dorothea can be particularly nice, since they can take advantage of linked attack from her Meteor, once she has it. Manuela is a standout on that front, since her linked attack with Dorothea gives +might, or Ingrid could be good for the better rewards for their paralogue. Really though, I wouldn't stress it too much. Just go with the units you like or want to try out and it will be fine.

Yeah; I wasn't planning to use Cyril anyway since he isn't a good unit, but thanks for the reminder about Catherine not being available until chapter 12. I might use Seteth; my main concern with him is that he's a wyvern rider with the Crest of Cichol, and I usually train Ferdinand to become a wyvern rider and he has the same crest.

I see. Thanks.

Edited July 9, 2022 by vanguard333

[lenticular]

1 hour ago, vanguard333 said:

Yeah; I wasn't planning too use Cyril anyway since he isn't a good unit, but thanks for the reminder about Catherine not being available until chapter 12. I might use Seteth; my main concern with him is that he's a wyvern rider with the Crest of Cichol, and I usually train Ferdinand to become a wyvern rider and he has the same crest.

Yeah, they're pretty similar units. Not just with the same crest, but with similar weapon proficienies and both having access to Swift Strikes. And on the one hand, Seteth having the major crest does help out with its activation rate, but on the other hand, how many enemies are actually surviving being hit with Swift Strikes to the point where you even care about their counterattack? If I wanted to use both of them, I'd probably put Ferdinand into a different class. He's pretty flexible, and can make a lot of different builds work at least reasonably well. Seteth can be put into other classes too, but it generally takes more work due to his late join time, so I'd prefer to stick with him on a wyvern and change up Ferdinand.

[SnowFire]

If you've already beaten the game 3 times, I'd just recommend being bold and using any characters you haven't used yet, or intentionally using different builds of characters you have used.  Variety is the spice of life, after all.  (Only possible exception: if you only beat the game on Normal or Hard before and also plan on upping the difficulty level for SS, then using some "safety" builds you know work can make sense.)  You used Wyvern Ferdinand before?  Great, time for Swift Strikes Paladin or Dodgetank Dancer Ferdie.  Gremory Dorothea?  Time to try out her Dancer support build or her Mortal Savant Levin Sword+ build.  Sniper Bernie?  Time for Bow Knight, Falcon Knight, or Holy Knight Bernie.  And so on.  If you haven't used the Ashen Wolves yet, getting the DLC then deploying them also can put a new twist on things.

Agree with others that sadly, SS isn't that great for Catherine nor Cyril.  (And a worse Catherine also means a slightly worse Shamir, since she loses out on their good +damage support.)  That said, you can go nuts with Flayn, Seteth, Alois, & the teachers at least if you want to use some Church units.

I haven't beaten Silver Snow myself but from people who have, one tip that's come up before that isn't mentioned in this thread is that the SS final map, the only one unique to SS, is a good map for archers.  So might be worth making sure you have a Sniper/Bow Knight or two.  The Rafail Gem is also supposed to be useful vs. the fairly badass final boss, so possible an excuse to recruit Mercedes.

[vanguard333]

32 minutes ago, SnowFire said:

If you've already beaten the game 3 times, I'd just recommend being bold and using any characters you haven't used yet, or intentionally using different builds of characters you have used.  Variety is the spice of life, after all.  (Only possible exception: if you only beat the game on Normal or Hard before and also plan on upping the difficulty level for SS, then using some "safety" builds you know work can make sense.)  You used Wyvern Ferdinand before?  Great, time for Swift Strikes Paladin or Dodgetank Dancer Ferdie.  Gremory Dorothea?  Time to try out her Dancer support build or her Mortal Savant Levin Sword+ build.  Sniper Bernie?  Time for Bow Knight, Falcon Knight, or Holy Knight Bernie.  And so on.  If you haven't used the Ashen Wolves yet, getting the DLC then deploying them also can put a new twist on things.

Agree with others that sadly, SS isn't that great for Catherine nor Cyril.  (And a worse Catherine also means a slightly worse Shamir, since she loses out on their good +damage support.)  That said, you can go nuts with Flayn, Seteth, Alois, & the teachers at least if you want to use some Church units.

I haven't beaten Silver Snow myself but from people who have, one tip that's come up before that isn't mentioned in this thread is that the SS final map, the only one unique to SS, is a good map for archers.  So might be worth making sure you have a Sniper/Bow Knight or two.  The Rafail Gem is also supposed to be useful vs. the fairly badass final boss, so possible an excuse to recruit Mercedes.

I have been considering different builds. The problem is that certain characters are only really suited for one particular build: Linhardt and Lysithea, for instance, are really only suited for bishop and gremory respectively. I was considering making Ferdinand a paladin rather than a wyvern rider, but the problem is that one pretty much needs a flier unit for the remire village chapter in order to save all the villagers, and the only other Black Eagle suited to being a flier is Petra, and making her a flier means missing out on an assassin (plus, I already made her a flier in my Azure Moon playthrough). I made Dorothea the dancer in my Crimson Flower playthrough, so making someone else the dancer might not be a bad idea. As for Bernadetta, I made her a bow knight in my Crimson Flower playthrough

Yeah, if I do use any church units, it'll probably end up being Seteth and/or Shamir. I will probably recruit at least one of the teachers anyway for the paralogue as it's one of the only ways to get the rapier.

I see. I'll be sure to train two archers then. Bernadetta will obviously be one of them, but as for the other, who to pick: Ashe for support with Petra (I recruited Ashe in Crimson Flower and made him a bow knight), or Shamir?

Edited July 9, 2022 by vanguard333

[SnowFire]

I would consider reframing your worries as a CHALLENGE (the good kind).  One of my 3H achievements I'm most proud of was beating Crimson Flower C14 with no flyers (first time).  Flyers are great, so it was tough, but it was doable.  For Remire, a flyer is helpful for grabbing that treasure chest that's "locked" behind a door without getting ganked by the DK & crew, but that treasure chest is also missable.  Consider it an "achievement unlocked" kind of thing!  (Besides, will you be high enough level to qualify for Wyvern Rider in C8, anyway?  That's a little early...  Pegasus Knight, sure, but Ferdie sadly can't qualify for that.)  A chance to use Cavaliers, Stride, Reposition, and friends to hustle it on over to the villagers on foot.  It's definitely doable.

For your options, I suspect Shamir would be stronger just because starting A-rank bows in C6 if recruited ASAP is great, gets her to Bow Crit +10 and even Bowfaire if she keeps training Bows.  That said, my actual recommendation is Ashe if you don't have his Petra support yet and are building support libraries, because it sounds more fun.  Just make sure to recruit him in C3-5 when he's a Fighter and gets D Axe/Bow for free, and then go through Brigand for the badly needed Deathblow on him to patch up his suspect Strength.  Getting his Support level up means that Byleth shouldn't have to train Lance THAT hard.

[Dark Holy Elf]

Snowfire and lenticular have already made excellent points and I'll broadly second them.

One thing I'll add: Silver Snow is a route with two stand-out tricky maps: the first post-timeskip map and the last. Your decisions should keep those in mind:

Reunion at Dawn is generally made easier by carefully considering the builds of the west-side joiners; for SS this is Dorothea, Petra, and Caspar. Flying classes, Dancer, and classes built around magical combat arts (Hexblade Assassin for Dorothea) are all outstandingly effective there. If you make any of them a Grappler or Sniper, I suggest stapling a Knowledge Gem to them in the hopes of getting their good combat art by that chapter.

The final battle is generally made easier by having several bow-users, preferably with either Hunter's Volley or Brave Bow/Inexhaustible to hit twice. They don't have to be Snipers/Bow Knights necessarily (you can do flying archers or assassin archers too). This means recruiting Leonie for Inexhaustible is great. Petra and Bernadetta are obviously good natural bow users; I'd certainly consider another (Leonie, Shamir).

2 hours ago, vanguard333 said:

Linhardt and Lysithea, for instance, are really only suited for bishop and gremory respectively. I was considering making Ferdinand a paladin rather than a wyvern rider, but the problem is that one pretty much needs a flier unit for the remire village chapter in order to save all the villagers, and the only other Black Eagle suited to being a flier is Petra, and making her a flier means missing out on an assassin (plus, I already made her a flier in my Azure Moon playthrough). I made Dorothea the dancer in my Crimson Flower playthrough, so making someone else the dancer might not be a bad idea. As for Bernadetta, I made her a bow knight in my Crimson Flower playthrough

Lysithea is also great as a Dark Knight (her best magic damage due to Dark Tomefaire, good move), and Mortal Savant's fun as an off-build to emphasize sword damage. The DLC mages classes are great for her too.

Remire can be done with Physic though yes I do like having a flier there. That said, Ferdinand's not likely to be Level 20 by that point on Maddening, at least in my experience. That said, Pegasus Knight is a good class for Bernadetta, Petra, and female Byleth in Intermediate even if you have other plans for them long-term (because it's a good class and Darting Blow is a good skill; if using FByleth, it's noteworthy that the lance+flying training will also get you Ingrid/Ashe/Leonie, who are all useful recruits due to their paralogues). Edelgard can also be one, and she is forced there.

[vanguard333]

1 hour ago, SnowFire said:

For your options, I suspect Shamir would be stronger just because starting A-rank bows in C6 if recruited ASAP is great, gets her to Bow Crit +10 and even Bowfaire if she keeps training Bows.  That said, my actual recommendation is Ashe if you don't have his Petra support yet and are building support libraries, because it sounds more fun.  Just make sure to recruit him in C3-5 when he's a Fighter and gets D Axe/Bow for free, and then go through Brigand for the badly needed Deathblow on him to patch up his suspect Strength.  Getting his Support level up means that Byleth shouldn't have to train Lance THAT hard.

I already have seen Ashe and Petra's support twice (once from my Crimson Flower playthrough, and a second time from my Azure Moon playthrough), so probably Shamir.

Yeah; I know to make him a brigand for death blow.

 

33 minutes ago, Dark Holy Elf said:

Snowfire and lenticular have already made excellent points and I'll broadly second them.

One thing I'll add: Silver Snow is a route with two stand-out tricky maps: the first post-timeskip map and the last. Your decisions should keep those in mind:

Reunion at Dawn is generally made easier by carefully considering the builds of the west-side joiners; for SS this is Dorothea, Petra, and Caspar. Flying classes, Dancer, and classes built around magical combat arts (Hexblade Assassin for Dorothea) are all outstandingly effective there. If you make any of them a Grappler or Sniper, I suggest stapling a Knowledge Gem to them in the hopes of getting their good combat art by that chapter.

The final battle is generally made easier by having several bow-users, preferably with either Hunter's Volley or Brave Bow/Inexhaustible to hit twice. They don't have to be Snipers/Bow Knights necessarily (you can do flying archers or assassin archers too). This means recruiting Leonie for Inexhaustible is great. Petra and Bernadetta are obviously good natural bow users; I'd certainly consider another (Leonie, Shamir).

Lysithea is also great as a Dark Knight (her best magic damage due to Dark Tomefaire, good move), and Mortal Savant's fun as an off-build to emphasize sword damage. The DLC mages classes are great for her too.

Remire can be done with Physic though yes I do like having a flier there. That said, Ferdinand's not likely to be Level 20 by that point on Maddening, at least in my experience. That said, Pegasus Knight is a good class for Bernadetta, Petra, and female Byleth in Intermediate even if you have other plans for them long-term (because it's a good class and Darting Blow is a good skill; if using FByleth, it's noteworthy that the lance+flying training will also get you Ingrid/Ashe/Leonie, who are all useful recruits due to their paralogues). Edelgard can also be one, and she is forced there.

And now I'm torn on whether to use Shamir or Leonie.

Dark Knight? But she has a bane in lances and dark knight requires C in lances (I know you don't have to reach C-rank in lances, but it means the odds of passing are nonexistent unless at least D-rank).

I'm not playing on Maddening.

[Dark Holy Elf]

2 hours ago, vanguard333 said:

And now I'm torn on whether to use Shamir or Leonie.

Dark Knight? But she has a bane in lances and dark knight requires C in lances (I know you don't have to reach C-rank in lances, but it means the odds of passing are nonexistent unless at least D-rank).

I'm not playing on Maddening.

Getting a C rank by Level 30 is so easy that the bane doesn't really matter. If you're playing on Hard, you still get 20 exp from passive instruction per week even with a bane, i.e. it takes 15 weeks or about 5 chapters. (If you're playing on Normal, the figure is 24 instead = 12.5 weeks.) Any active instruction you do can only speed this up... as can, of course, stopping early. With D+ lances you'll have a ~90% chance, with D you'll have ~70%. (Although it's actually more efficient to short-change riding, if you aren't planning on getting Move+1.)

[vanguard333]

1 hour ago, Dark Holy Elf said:

Getting a C rank by Level 30 is so easy that the bane doesn't really matter. If you're playing on Hard, you still get 20 exp from passive instruction per week even with a bane, i.e. it takes 15 weeks or about 5 chapters. (If you're playing on Normal, the figure is 24 instead = 12.5 weeks.) Any active instruction you do can only speed this up... as can, of course, stopping early. With D+ lances you'll have a ~90% chance, with D you'll have ~70%. (Although it's actually more efficient to short-change riding, if you aren't planning on getting Move+1.)

I see. Thanks for the information.

[haarhaarhaar]

I've always liked Petra and Ignatz's support for the relative breeziness of it, and I get the feeling that it isn't viewed that much because people don't normally put them together. He's easily recruitable and requires little effort to be built as an archer or your Dancer. Even if you don't want to use him long-term, he has a high hit rate, rallies early on, and a very accessible paralogue if you're looking for cash/grinding. And, although he isn't a member of the Church faction, he does lean heavily towards them, so wouldn't be a ridiculous choice story-wise either. Hard is probably the difficulty mode where he shines the least, but otherwise he fits all your requirements. If the choice is between him and Shamir, I guess I'd still pick Shamir because I like her a lot and she's stronger, but I'm still happy to make the case for Ignatz here.

[DaveCozy]

On 7/9/2022 at 11:01 AM, vanguard333 said:

I wasn't planning to use Cyril anyway since he isn't a good unit

Sans Silver Snow, Cyril is actually a pretty good unit and I recommend you give him a try if you ever do another route.

Point-Blank Volley at C+ bows is basically Swift Strikes but with a bow and is really good for letting you double anything with any bow on your turn. If you recruit him in Chapter 5 he's at C bows automatically so he basically has PBV on join if you tutor him.

He's also at C axes to reclass immediately to Brigand for good stat modifiers and can start mastering it for Death Blow, so he's a pretty good unit in VW an AM runs if you ask me. Can be instantly useful as soon as he joins.

--

For your SS run, I'll echo that having multiple units that are good with bows for the final map is going to be very helpful. I'm personally fond of running Wyvern Lord Petra using Brave Bows for player phase offense in that last map against the flying enemies (lack of bowfaire doesn't matter, the extra effective damage makes that up).

Edited July 20, 2022 by DaveCozy

[LoneRecon400]

Even in SS, Cyril is still a pretty good unit.

Getting him to Vengance will allow him to one shot even endgame units even without any class masteries. That's not bad for a Filler Unit.

Edited July 20, 2022 by LoneRecon400

[Barren]

12 hours ago, LoneRecon400 said:

Even in SS, Cyril is still a pretty good unit.

Getting him to Vengance will allow him to one shot even endgame units even without any class masteries. That's not bad for a Filler Unit.

I can also attest to that. I certified him as a brigand the week he joins on silver snow and then archer the following week and got him to master death blow and hit +20 on the same weekend using the rusted weapon exploit while grinding.

 

Plus him being able to ORKO Wyvern Riders on his and Hilda’s paralogue with PBV at base with these aforementioned abilities in mind is still quite good.

[Shadow Mir]

On the subject of Ashe, as Catherine is not available in part 1 for the Eagles, if ye want the Boots or whatever they're called in this game, you're gonna need him to access the paralogue with them.

[vanguard333]

40 minutes ago, Shadow Mir said:

On the subject of Ashe, as Catherine is not available in part 1 for the Eagles, if ye want the Boots or whatever they're called in this game, you're gonna need him to access the paralogue with them.

Thanks. Yeah; that's definitely good reason to recruit him.