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Finally finished my first ever NG Maddening Run!! (Azure Moon)


Ari Chan
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On 11/10/2022 at 10:11 PM, Ari Chan said:

I do use PBV when needed but there are situations where it is safer to kill enemy from a safe distance that’s why I put Darting Blow on Leonie, also it allows her to quad slower but tankier enemies using brave weapons especially monsters who have gigantic health pools.

Ah I see. I am going to guess that's why Nuvelle Chambarlain was her battalion, for the +8mt and the +10hit to help with the bow range hit penalty and give her an extra oomph.

On 11/13/2022 at 1:09 PM, Ari Chan said:

Dorothea also falls off hard unless you make her a dancer, she has a good list but lacks the Magic to take advantage of it unlike Constance and Lysithea

The difference in magic stat is about 5 points between Dorothea vs Lysethia, on average anyways by level 30 iirc. This is assuming Dorothea follows a pretty standard Commoner -> Monk -> Mage -> Warlock -> Gremory path, vs Lysethia following Noble -> Monk -> Priest -> Bishop -> Gremory.

It's a difference, but not a massive difference honestly. The reason I tend to prefer Lysethia is moreso because Warp, Dark Spikes and Luna are just plain better spells.

There's a funny meme but effective setup with Dorothea you can do though, if you master Gremory for Defiant Magic and equip her with the Thyrsus staff. She'll damage herself each turn, activate the +8 magic boost, and then you can reap the benefits of both combat and extra Physic range. It's silly, and not at all "optimal" but it's very entertaining. 

And yeah personally I agree with Dark Holy Elf; I go for mages offensively when I need them to kill specific enemies. Armors are one of them, but that's also why I like dark spikes. Some mounted units can be annoyingly sturdy as well I find. Typically I tend to stick to just one unit for that kinda role.

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On 11/13/2022 at 11:07 PM, Ari Chan said:

Even if Linhardt had access to female classes, Bishop would still be his best class since Warp + Physic are his biggest assets and none of the female mounted class has x2 white magic or white magic heal + 10 for Linhardt to take advantage of, plus Physic usually has enough range that he doesn’t need the extra mobility to reach people to heal. Offensive-wise Linhardt has exactly one good spell by late-game which is Excalibur and that is nowhere as useful as Warp. Mercedes also doesn’t benefit much from Female-exclusive class as well, she has a bad Reason list and would much prefer having stronger heals and extra Physic usage (or ditch healing altogether for a Magic Bow Sniper build that can actually kill on player-phase). Marianne and Flayn are the designated healers that benefit greatly from DLC classes since they have the tools to take advantage of their mobility and skills.

Hubert is the one that got majorly fucked by being a male mage, he had a good Reason List + Frozen Lance so Valkyrie would’ve been the perfect class for him, Dark Bishop is a bad class and if he goes Paladin to spam Frozen Lance he has to forgo his spell list. By the time he reaches Dark Knight, late game CF is really anti-cav which limits his overall usefulness.

I'd consider it a losing trade when he needs to reach people to warp them.

RE: Magic Bow Sniper Mercedes, I disagree. That sounds like a shitload of work for something that one, fails to justify it, and two, is expensive to maintain.

19 hours ago, Mordred said:

Maybe it's just me but I find healers in general getting benched mid game and late game of FE3H.  There are very few times where I have thought a healer was essential especially with utility gambits or just mages having nothing better to do a lot of turns mid and late game then heal.  I think having Linhardt is going to generally be better than Mercedes who only really has a better offensive spell list when Linhardt's spell list should generally be enough and they generally aren't looking to be attacking a lot anyways.  As Linhardt actually can open up new strategies while Mercedes will generally not I would say Linhardt is someone to consider more often than Mercedes.

Honestly, there's only ONE good reason to recruit Linhardt, and Warp ain't it.

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42 minutes ago, Shadow Mir said:

RE: Magic Bow Sniper Mercedes, I disagree. That sounds like a shitload of work for something that one, fails to justify it, and two, is expensive to maintain

The main benefit of Magic Bow+ is that forged you can get 3-range with it, so essentially a 5-range Hunter's Volley as Sniper.

Getting her to Sniper isn't a ton of work necessarily either; Magic+2, Fiendish Blow, Hit+20 are pretty much the only masteries she cares about. She easily leans towards those classes too, and mastering Archer is easy as an adjutant.

However, I will agree that it's expensive to maintain. I haven't specifically tried Mercedes as Sniper, but I have tried Hubert as a Sniper and he runs into what I imagine would be the same issue for her and probably Hanneman; Magic Bow+ eventually breaks, requires Arcane Crystals to repair which are not common until late-game, and it doesn't help that Hunter's Volley costs 5 durability.

I'd say that it's more of a side build more than anything.

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1 minute ago, DaveCozy said:

I have tried Hubert as a Sniper and he runs into the same issue; Magic Bow+ eventually breaks, requires Arcane Crystals to repair which are not common, and it doesn't help that Hunter's Volley costs 5 durability.

What's more damning for Magic Bow Sniper Hubert is that Arcane Crystals are not buyable until chapter 16... which is right before endgame.

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23 minutes ago, DaveCozy said:

The main benefit of Magic Bow+ is that forged you can get 3-range with it, so essentially a 5-range Hunter's Volley as Sniper.

Getting her to Sniper isn't a ton of work necessarily either; Magic+2, Fiendish Blow, Hit+20 are pretty much the only masteries she cares about. She easily leans towards those classes too, and mastering Archer is easy as an adjutant.

However, I will agree that it's expensive to maintain. I haven't specifically tried Mercedes as Sniper, but I have tried Hubert as a Sniper and he runs into what I imagine would be the same issue for her and probably Hanneman; Magic Bow+ eventually breaks, requires Arcane Crystals to repair which are not common until late-game, and it doesn't help that Hunter's Volley costs 5 durability.

I'd say that it's more of a side build more than anything.

All good points - but I don't think you can write it off as a side-build because of it. Hubert is one of the easiest characters for this build, because he gets reliable kills from Frozen Lance, meaning he can actually fight while gaining class EXP in Archer. His high Mag stat and Heavy Draw means he could get kills in the mid-game without Hunter's Volley. And, if you have the space for it, he could pick up Poison Strike as well, which makes normal Magic Bow chip pretty overwhelming pre-mastering Sniper. It is true you need to keep a Magic Bow+ maintained - but to me this is at least equivalent, if not less maintenance, than using any Relic regularly (i.e. Swift Strikes LoR). I don't see anyone saying those builds are prohibitively high-maintenance. And if you've tried it you're more than aware of its benefits (especially on CF, where enemy Res doesn't spike to the same degree as other late-games). 

You could probably get Hubert into Dark Bishop/Warlock/Dark Knight/Paladin as well as Sniper, but since mastering Sniper is necessary for this build to come fully online, you should probably either double down on the build or not do it, rather than trying to put feet in both camps.

14 minutes ago, Shadow Mir said:

What's more damning for Magic Bow Sniper Hubert is that Arcane Crystals are not buyable until chapter 16... which is right before endgame.

Of course, the build functions for less time than it would on other routes, but that's true of just about every build available in CF. You probably won't have mastered an Advanced class before Part 2 unless you've shown the unit a lot of favouritism, so lots of builds at the top of the meta (FIF Grapplers, brawling dodge tanks, normal Vantage/Wrath, normal Hunter's Volley) won't be online yet. Not even Aymr-Wyvern Edelgard, arguably the most broken build in 3H, is available before Ch. 13. Given that this is the lifespan for many good builds, Magic Bow Sniper is not out of step on this - and the significant burn on Magic Bow uses doesn't come till Sniper is mastered.

Onto Arcane Crystal availability - there's not huge competition for Arcane Crystal when you'd class into Sniper (maybe somebody wants a Levin Sword+? I can't imagine it being crucial). So unless you don't do the monastery and never do any aux battles for ore, you're likely to have more than enough Arcane Crystal for a Magic Bow pre-skip, which then gets repaired for post-skip. You then have three chapter battles and (up to 6 if you're in a rush, more likely 2-3) paralogues in Part 2 before the Arcane Crystal merchant becomes available, and then probably the remainder of your paralogues and three chapter battles before the end of the run. In other words, Arcane Crystal becomes readily buyable halfway through Part 2 on CF from the perspective of combats faced. And it's sometime in the first half of Part 2 that the build is likely to come online. So it's not quite as bad as you've painted it here. Well, we've had this argument before, so I know I won't convince you of anything, but here you go anyway.

1 hour ago, Shadow Mir said:

RE: Magic Bow Sniper Mercedes, I disagree. That sounds like a shitload of work for something that one, fails to justify it, and two, is expensive to maintain.

Hmm I'd ask you to say why you think Magic Bow Mercedes doesn't justify herself, but I think we'll just end up with the same talking points. 

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22 minutes ago, haarhaarhaar said:

All good points - but I don't think you can write it off as a side-build because of it. Hubert is one of the easiest characters for this build, because he gets reliable kills from Frozen Lance, meaning he can actually fight while gaining class EXP in Archer. His high Mag stat and Heavy Draw means he could get kills in the mid-game without Hunter's Volley. And, if you have the space for it, he could pick up Poison Strike as well, which makes normal Magic Bow chip pretty overwhelming pre-mastering Sniper. It is true you need to keep a Magic Bow+ maintained - but to me this is at least equivalent, if not less maintenance, than using any Relic regularly (i.e. Swift Strikes LoR). I don't see anyone saying those builds are prohibitively high-maintenance. And if you've tried it you're more than aware of its benefits (especially on CF, where enemy Res doesn't spike to the same degree as other late-games). 

You could probably get Hubert into Dark Bishop/Warlock/Dark Knight/Paladin as well as Sniper, but since mastering Sniper is necessary for this build to come fully online, you should probably either double down on the build or not do it, rather than trying to put feet in both camps.

I suppose this might be playstyle, but being in a 5mov class with only Frozen Lance (which is 1-range) to fight with wasn't exactly that great for me. I just adjutanted Hubert instead to master Archer and Sniper quick with Knowledge Gem equipped. He gives +mt to Edelgard anyways and she still had to master Hit+20 (thanks to her bow bane), so it was a non-issue finding a good unit to adjutant him to when it came time to master Sniper.

Lance of Ruin uses Umbral Steel too, which is a much more common drop that you can get from breaking monster barriers. Repairing it is a lot easier as a result. Arcane Crystal, as Shadow Mir pointed out, is only available in bulk once you can buy it from the Dark Merchant, late into the game.

I still liked Sniper Hubert mind you, but I do think that the lack of steady ore to upkeep the Magic Bow was what made it more of a pain to keep it up. That's all I'm saying.

My path was Noble -> Monk -> Mage -> Dark Mage (for -avo support) -> Archer -> Sniper

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1 minute ago, DaveCozy said:

I suppose this might be playstyle, but being in a 5mov class with only Frozen Lance (which is 1-range) to fight with wasn't exactly that great for me. I just adjutanted Hubert instead to master Archer and Sniper quick with Knowledge Gem equipped.

Fair enough - adjutant + Knowledge Gem is how I normally get mages through physical classes as well. Archer is still as mobile as any other non-mounted physical unit, so I didn't face this issue in mid-Part 1. I don't often run Cavaliers though, so maybe the Mv gap is more pronounced in Intermediate classes for other people.

6 minutes ago, DaveCozy said:

Lance of Ruin uses Umbral Steel too, which is a much more common drop that you can get from breaking monster barriers. Repairing it is a lot easier as a result. Arcane Crystal, as Shadow Mir pointed out, is only available in bulk once you can buy it from the Dark Merchant, late into the game.

True, I mainly just wanted to compare the competition/costs for repairing Magic Bows with repairing Relics. Umbral Steel is available earlier and more reliably, but more units want it, you need to barrier break certain beasts to get it, and repairs aren't cheap (relatively speaking - in general I'm not worried about my finances in Part 2 anyway). Arcane Crystal is relatively pricey when you buy it and fairly unavailable before then, but almost nobody else wants it. I could definitely see the comparison going the way of Umbral Steel, but I don't think there's much in it.

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7 hours ago, DaveCozy said:

However, I will agree that it's expensive to maintain. I haven't specifically tried Mercedes as Sniper, but I have tried Hubert as a Sniper and he runs into what I imagine would be the same issue for her and probably Hanneman; Magic Bow+ eventually breaks, requires Arcane Crystals to repair which are not common until late-game, and it doesn't help that Hunter's Volley costs 5 durability.

I'd say that it's more of a side build more than anything.

Magic Bow Sniper is a build which is just plain worse on CF, imo. While I agree with @haarhaarhaar's point that all builds end sooner on CF, Magic Bow Sniper is a build which, notably, is quite mediocre until late, so the less time with "late" builds, the more costly this investment feels. For instance, in Hubert's case, all the time he's running around as a Sniper with Frozen Lance is a time he isn't in Paladin. Frozen Lance Paladin Hubert one-shots a huge number of enemies, Sniper not only misses some of those (due to no Lancefaire), but has 3 less move and no Canto. Hubert is simply a far less effective unit than he otherwise would be during this time. It's a fair point that he can be an adjutant during this time, but that raises the questions of who you're going to bench when you move him from adjutant back to the field, and if you are spreading yourself thinner on training to make this happen. Also, while the Edelgard might bonus sounds nice, Edelgard's preferred class is Wyvern, so she can't take a Sniper adjutant while she is one.

Other units like Mercedes/Hanneman are also functioning at well below par during the Sniper-mastering phase, but they can potentially have a lot more maps where Magic Bow Sniper really shines to make up for it after. To top it off, I'd argue Magic Bow Sniper is also just better in the lategame of other routes, both because Sniper is an underwhelming class in CF endgame due to mobility, and because the crazy-high kill potential of brave magic is more valuable on other routes where enemy HP goes higher, generally. e.g. Magic Bow Sniper is a great way to reliably kill War Masters (probably the trickiest generic human enemies to reliably kill), and CF doesn't have enemy War Masters.

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12 hours ago, haarhaarhaar said:

Onto Arcane Crystal availability - there's not huge competition for Arcane Crystal when you'd class into Sniper (maybe somebody wants a Levin Sword+? I can't imagine it being crucial). So unless you don't do the monastery and never do any aux battles for ore, you're likely to have more than enough Arcane Crystal for a Magic Bow pre-skip, which then gets repaired for post-skip. You then have three chapter battles and (up to 6 if you're in a rush, more likely 2-3) paralogues in Part 2 before the Arcane Crystal merchant becomes available, and then probably the remainder of your paralogues and three chapter battles before the end of the run. In other words, Arcane Crystal becomes readily buyable halfway through Part 2 on CF from the perspective of combats faced. And it's sometime in the first half of Part 2 that the build is likely to come online. So it's not quite as bad as you've painted it here. Well, we've had this argument before, so I know I won't convince you of anything, but here you go anyway.

My experience with Arcane Crystals (prior to unlocking the Dark Merchant) is that they are inconsistent and unreliable. Sometimes, I will find some in the monastery or an auxiliary battle, but sometimes I won't. And as far as I'm aware, this is entirely down to RNG. Sure, you can skew the odds in your favour by meticulously searching the monastery every month and by going for lots of auxiliary battles that reward ore, but if the RNG says no then there's not too much you can do about it. And the more you do try to skew the odds, the more you get into the territory of tedious grind. I'm fine picking up monastery items that I pass while I'm doing other monastery tasks, but I don't do a full sweep every month. I'm fine doing an occasional auxiliary battle when I have a spare battle point after doing a paralogue, but I'm not doing three every month. And I'm definitely not using every single piece of bait to catch fish and feeding all of the fish to the monastery's cats.

Now, there's nothing that says that you can't pivot to a different build if you don't get the arcane crystals that you need. Having Hit +20 and Curved Shot is almost always better than not having them. But the "wasted" investment does hurt, and can make it harder to switch to some other builds, especially more expensive ones. I'm also the sort of person who generally likes to have all my builds planned out beforehand, so I don't like to have to change things up mid-game. So my assumption will always be that I'll have bad luck with Arcane Crystals, and will only run builds that I think are viable even with bad luck.

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8 hours ago, Dark Holy Elf said:

For instance, in Hubert's case, all the time he's running around as a Sniper with Frozen Lance is a time he isn't in Paladin. Frozen Lance Paladin Hubert one-shots a huge number of enemies, Sniper not only misses some of those (due to no Lancefaire), but has 3 less move and no Canto. Hubert is simply a far less effective unit than he otherwise would be during this time.

So this is a tough one to adjudicate. If you're quite quick, you can get Hubert to Paladin/Sniper in Ch. 10, especially if you do a lot of paralogues. If you don't do that, then he'll only reach Paladin/Sniper in Chapter 12. I'd expect to master Sniper by Ch.14 or Ch.15 at the latest (I think this would be worthy of sticking a Knowledge Gem on him, but I won't assume it). In that case, you've got three to four chapter battles, and maybe some post-skip paralogues, where Paladin outshines Sniper with its higher power and Mv. After Hubert masters Sniper, he should have the chapter battles from Ch. 15-8, and any remaining paralogues, with Hunter's Volley. I think for every one of those battles, Magic Bow Sniper is better than Paladin (you want to keep Hubert safe in Ch.15 and sniping is better than Canto for that there, Ch. 16 is mage-heavy but HV gets kills Frozen Lance doesn't, and the last two chapters nerf Paladin's Mv but not Sniper's range). So it's a question of where you want Hubert to do his best work, and there is a choice to be made.

9 hours ago, Dark Holy Elf said:

To top it off, I'd argue Magic Bow Sniper is also just better in the lategame of other routes, both because Sniper is an underwhelming class in CF endgame due to mobility, and because the crazy-high kill potential of brave magic is more valuable on other routes where enemy HP goes higher, generally. e.g. Magic Bow Sniper is a great way to reliably kill War Masters (probably the trickiest generic human enemies to reliably kill), and CF doesn't have enemy War Masters.

I think you're right that brave magic is generally more valuable on other routes - but Chapter 17 alone makes the case for having one on CF I think. There are enough units that you want to delete straightaway (fliers, units transforming into monsters, etc.) that a powerful ORKO build makes the difference on that map. Outside of fliers, Magic Bow Sniper is one of the better builds for that. 

3 hours ago, lenticular said:

My experience with Arcane Crystals (prior to unlocking the Dark Merchant) is that they are inconsistent and unreliable. Sometimes, I will find some in the monastery or an auxiliary battle, but sometimes I won't. And as far as I'm aware, this is entirely down to RNG. Sure, you can skew the odds in your favour by meticulously searching the monastery every month and by going for lots of auxiliary battles that reward ore, but if the RNG says no then there's not too much you can do about it. And the more you do try to skew the odds, the more you get into the territory of tedious grind. I'm fine picking up monastery items that I pass while I'm doing other monastery tasks, but I don't do a full sweep every month. I'm fine doing an occasional auxiliary battle when I have a spare battle point after doing a paralogue, but I'm not doing three every month. And I'm definitely not using every single piece of bait to catch fish and feeding all of the fish to the monastery's cats.

I think I agree with all of this. I do sweep the monastery every month, but apart from that I play exactly as you describe. 2 Arcane Crystal for normal Magic Bow (Magic Bow+ is obviously better, but I don't normally bother with it until I need to repair my Magic Bow or I get Hunter's Volley) has never felt like a lot to me, and pre-Hunter's Volley I don't normally get through 50 uses (25 pre-skip, 25-post skip). Getting Hunter's Volley will likely mean I need more Arcane Crystal, but by that point again I haven't felt such resource pressure that I'm worried about not being able to run the build. So it may just be the case that I have been RNG-blessed all this time (or you've been cursed).

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18 hours ago, DaveCozy said:

The main benefit of Magic Bow+ is that forged you can get 3-range with it, so essentially a 5-range Hunter's Volley as Sniper.

That's not how combat arts work. Hunter's Volley has an innate 2-3 range, regardless of which Bow the unit in question is using. This is boosted by Sniper's Bowrange +1, to an effective 2-4 range. But doing it with a Longbow, Failnaught, or Magic Bow+ doesn't bump it up to 2-5 range.

19 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

Honestly, there's only ONE good reason to recruit Linhardt, and Warp ain't it.

At long last, someone recognizes the value of his personal skill, Catnap!

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

At long last, someone recognizes the value of his personal skill, Catnap!

That's some blatant sarcasm. I meant the paralogue he shares with Leonie.

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On 11/15/2022 at 11:06 AM, Shadow Mir said:

Honestly, there's only ONE good reason to recruit Linhardt, and Warp ain't it.

I agree you should generally be recruiting Linhardt always if just for the paralogue but also Warp is really good?  If you're going to recruit a healer and use them Linhardt has the most incentive to recruit out of house, especially without DLC.  Your only other two options without DLC will be Lysithea or Manuela and having two warpers is extremely useful.  With two warpers you can warp chain allowing you to skip maps more easily.

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

At long last, someone recognizes the value of his personal skill, Catnap!

Unironically Catnap is prolly one of the better personal skill of the healers since they generally have bad personals except Dorothea's early game healing with hers.

On 11/15/2022 at 12:57 PM, haarhaarhaar said:

All good points - but I don't think you can write it off as a side-build because of it. Hubert is one of the easiest characters for this build, because he gets reliable kills from Frozen Lance, meaning he can actually fight while gaining class EXP in Archer. His high Mag stat and Heavy Draw means he could get kills in the mid-game without Hunter's Volley. And, if you have the space for it, he could pick up Poison Strike as well, which makes normal Magic Bow chip pretty overwhelming pre-mastering Sniper. It is true you need to keep a Magic Bow+ maintained - but to me this is at least equivalent, if not less maintenance, than using any Relic regularly (i.e. Swift Strikes LoR). I don't see anyone saying those builds are prohibitively high-maintenance. And if you've tried it you're more than aware of its benefits (especially on CF, where enemy Res doesn't spike to the same degree as other late-games). 

You could probably get Hubert into Dark Bishop/Warlock/Dark Knight/Paladin as well as Sniper, but since mastering Sniper is necessary for this build to come fully online, you should probably either double down on the build or not do it, rather than trying to put feet in both camps.

Of course, the build functions for less time than it would on other routes, but that's true of just about every build available in CF. You probably won't have mastered an Advanced class before Part 2 unless you've shown the unit a lot of favouritism, so lots of builds at the top of the meta (FIF Grapplers, brawling dodge tanks, normal Vantage/Wrath, normal Hunter's Volley) won't be online yet. Not even Aymr-Wyvern Edelgard, arguably the most broken build in 3H, is available before Ch. 13. Given that this is the lifespan for many good builds, Magic Bow Sniper is not out of step on this - and the significant burn on Magic Bow uses doesn't come till Sniper is mastered.

Onto Arcane Crystal availability - there's not huge competition for Arcane Crystal when you'd class into Sniper (maybe somebody wants a Levin Sword+? I can't imagine it being crucial). So unless you don't do the monastery and never do any aux battles for ore, you're likely to have more than enough Arcane Crystal for a Magic Bow pre-skip, which then gets repaired for post-skip. You then have three chapter battles and (up to 6 if you're in a rush, more likely 2-3) paralogues in Part 2 before the Arcane Crystal merchant becomes available, and then probably the remainder of your paralogues and three chapter battles before the end of the run. In other words, Arcane Crystal becomes readily buyable halfway through Part 2 on CF from the perspective of combats faced. And it's sometime in the first half of Part 2 that the build is likely to come online. So it's not quite as bad as you've painted it here. Well, we've had this argument before, so I know I won't convince you of anything, but here you go anyway.

Hmm I'd ask you to say why you think Magic Bow Mercedes doesn't justify herself, but I think we'll just end up with the same talking points. 

To talk about the Magic Sniper Mercedes/Hubert build is to talk about efficiency.  To put it simply does making Mercedes/Hubert a Magic Sniper actually create competition between normal Snipers or does it open up a new option.  The answer to both of these is no.  Is it a bad build though?  No.  Magic Sniper isn't a bad build and generally anyone can pull of using a Magic Sniper Mercedes run in Maddening.  However, we also have to consider the reasons to choose Sniper over the more standard builds on Mercedes/Hubert and what the trade off is.  Both Hubert and Mercedes are low investment units who generally don't need to much focus on their skills or classes to be and stay useful.  Mercedes is a perfectly fine candidate to become a Bishop/Gremory and Hubert is perfectly serviceable as a Warlock.  This is mostly due to their innate spells list which allows them to stay low investment and stay useful even at low levels.  However, if one chooses to make them a sniper they must contend with other units in your party for exp.  This may not be as big of a problem in other routes but in a route like CF which is shorter than other routes it can become a problem.  Becoming a Magic Sniper also does not make them a better unit than other Snipers.  For example a Sniper Ashe would be a same tier unit that is a Magic Sniper Hubert/Mercedes simply because they will be ORKOing everything a normal Sniper could have already one rounded except for Armor units like Fortress knights.  However, killing Fortress Knights isn't a significant enough of a boon for a Magic Sniper to be a better option as Mages can already do that regardless of them being a Magic Sniper. Hubert specifically is also losing utility when becoming a Magic Sniper, most notably Banshee and Mire.  Banshee gives an insane amount of utility to Hubert due to the -5 mov penalty brought upon it's target.  This can allow you to create choke points or to simply delay an enemy from reaching a certain point.  Mire of course can set up kills while also making Monsters that can't really get ORKOed easier to kill.  

So in terms of efficiency, no Magic Sniper would not be something that justifies itself to always use.  On the other hand you can use it quite easily and it is a good build.  Like most builds in FE3H it can help break the game and simply put FE3H is a game that is easily broken with any decently thought out build and to say Magic Sniper is bad is a bit disingenuous. 

19 hours ago, haarhaarhaar said:

I think you're right that brave magic is generally more valuable on other routes - but Chapter 17 alone makes the case for having one on CF I think. There are enough units that you want to delete straightaway (fliers, units transforming into monsters, etc.) that a powerful ORKO build makes the difference on that map. Outside of fliers, Magic Bow Sniper is one of the better builds for that. 

To be honest I do think that Chapter 17 isn't too much of a case for Magic Sniper as that map is generally the best map to use every Amyr use to skip in my honest opinion.  To be honest I don't even remember the last time I've done that map without just Amyr skipping it with Edelgard.  On the other hand Chapter 18 is a map that Magic Sniper wouldn't be too bad just due to all the Armor Knights.  It's something a Sniper wouldn't normally be able to ORKO and Magic Sniper should be able to ORKO the ones a normal Sniper could.  Of course this is assuming you just ignore all the golems and don't agro any of them.

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On 11/14/2022 at 1:30 PM, Dark Holy Elf said:

I think you're underestimating Hapi as a low-investment Warper. Get her in Chapter 3 when she has a D rank, set her goal to faith and prioritize faith spells for her either in battle or as an adjutant, to taste. Yes she gets Warp around 2 chapters later than Linhardt due to neutral instead of boon (a bit later if you use her reason spells a lot), but she'll still get it with no problems. I guess it depends how quickly you want a second Warper. It's quite easy to get by the timeskip if that's your priority, even with minimal tutoring (though it'd probably take mono-focus for much of that time). Once she does get it, she's just a better Linhardt (reason list, class options). And there are maps where she'll contribute more than him before then; in particular she just breaks Sothis's paralogue with her personal + Impregnable Wall. Banshee is also very neat and helps her clearly outclass Linhardt during the pre-either-of-them-having-Warp phase.

That makes sense, Hapi seems like a much stronger unit if you spend a little bit more resources investing on her.

On 11/14/2022 at 1:30 PM, Dark Holy Elf said:

Yeah that's fair! I don't know if the investment gap is as large as you think it is - keep in mind Constance needs only B faith instead of A, which more than offsets boon vs neutral - but I obviously I'm not going to argue that you should run no Physic at all. (Flayn gets Fortify, at least, but it's late and Flayn has some investment issues because her start is so bad, E reason E authority in Chapter 7 whyyy).

Yeah but Constance also needs to be put in Dark Flier to make full use of her Rescue which can take more time than putting Linhardt in bishop, she’s a much better unit overall though especially if you funnel mag stat boosters into her though thanks to her high base Mag and access to Bolting.

I used Flayn on my last VW NG+ run as a Rescue flier bot and I pretty much only used her Fortify like a bootleg Physic, also Vengeance and VanWrath starts also make it a lot harder to utilize the spell as well. 

On 11/14/2022 at 1:30 PM, Dark Holy Elf said:

The main place I care about their offence is killing armours, which actually is kinda annoying for my physical units. I generally want my magical units to kill armours and then otherwise provide utility (faith spells, linked attacks, Hapi's personal, Rally I guess). They can also provide chip against unusually durable enemies like bosses and lategame War Masters (non-CF), but any mage does that competently (though mounted mages do it better just because they reach more enemies, ditto mages with Thoron/Mire/Death). But otherwise I overall agree - you don't use mages for pure offence in this game.

Agreed, mages offence aren’t great unless vsing Armors, you also only have enough stat boosters around to allow 1 mage to reliably OHKO (unless the player use gardening but there are better stat boosters to farm from there) and even then only Lysithea and Constance are really worth getting funnelled.  I actually had Lysithea as a Valkyrie in a lot of maps and she ended up being MVP in most of them, the extra mobility really helped if I didn’t need extra Warp, Luna or Dark Spikes uses.

 

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2 hours ago, Mordred said:

Unironically Catnap is prolly one of the better personal skill of the healers since they generally have bad personals except Dorothea's early game healing with hers.

I'm really curious to hear your resoning here. I generally consider Catnap to be the worst personal ability in the game, or possibly the second worst behind Raphael's Goodie Basket. I can certainly see rating it above Marianne's clunker of a personal (even though I'd disagree), but it's hard for me to see how it could be considered better than Live to Serve (Mercedes), Lily's Poise (Flayn) or Monstrous Appeal (Hapi). What is it that you like about it?

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3 hours ago, Mordred said:

Both Hubert and Mercedes are low investment units who generally don't need to much focus on their skills or classes to be and stay useful.  Mercedes is a perfectly fine candidate to become a Bishop/Gremory and Hubert is perfectly serviceable as a Warlock.

The short answer is yes and no. 

Warlock does nothing for Hubert, and Dark Bishop is not ideal as an endgame class (or in general). So his ideal endgame classes are Dark Knight or Paladin (or Sniper). Dark Knight keeps magic access, Paladin and Sniper provide greater power but with different trade-offs. But with all three of those builds, you will need to train at least three to four different ranks. It still isn't particularly high-investment, because Hubert is proficient in everything he wants except Riding (and, arguably, Faith). But he does need some focus, especially because Frozen Lance in the early game is a crucial way of getting OHKOs.

As for Mercedes, she does do just fine as a support unit with Physic and Fortify. However, outside of Blue Lions, you don't really need her as a healer (and if you have the DLC, you certainly don't need her to heal). So what do you do with her if she doesn't heal? She could be a Dancer, I guess - but if you want her to contribute offensively, Magic Bow Sniper is her best option by far. 

3 hours ago, Mordred said:

However, if one chooses to make them a sniper they must contend with other units in your party for exp.  This may not be as big of a problem in other routes but in a route like CF which is shorter than other routes it can become a problem. 

This is a fair point - you have limited investing resources, so putting them on a unit who doesn't need them to be decent means potentially detracting from somewhere necessary. But, where would that be on CF? Offense-wise, you're putting resources into Edelgard, Byleth, and probably Petra and Bernadetta. Linhardt/Caspar/Dorothea all have mediocre combat generally, and their best classes (Bishop/Grappler/Dancer) require little investment. Jeritza basically comes ready-made, unless you want to make him a flier. Then there's anyone else you've recruited. Given you have 12 slots for endgame, and four of them on a standard run require little-to-no investment, I think there is enough space to put work into Hubert, especially since it yields massive benefits in the later game (see below). If you're running lots of high-investment builds, then you can of course drop Sniper Hubert if you want - I'm certainly not saying you have to do it. But on a standard CF run, there's no issue with running that here.

3 hours ago, Mordred said:

Hubert specifically is also losing utility when becoming a Magic Sniper, most notably Banshee and Mire.  Banshee gives an insane amount of utility to Hubert due to the -5 mov penalty brought upon it's target.  This can allow you to create choke points or to simply delay an enemy from reaching a certain point.  Mire of course can set up kills while also making Monsters that can't really get ORKOed easier to kill.  

Banshee is at its most effective in the early-to-midgame, when you can genuinely shut down units - and Hubert should be in Mage at that point no matter what build you go for, so no issue there. It's still decent later on, but enemies with Mv of 6 or higher (which are quite a lot of them) can reach Hubert after he hits them with Banshee, basically meaning he's dead. Mire is similarly situational in the mid-to-late game, because enemy AS is normally either already within doubling range, or well outside of doubling range. I'm not saying there's no lategame utility to be had here, but it's certainly not a huge sacrifice for increased attack power. 

3 hours ago, Mordred said:

For example a Sniper Ashe would be a same tier unit that is a Magic Sniper Hubert/Mercedes simply because they will be ORKOing everything a normal Sniper could have already one rounded except for Armor units like Fortress knights.

Let's say you recruit Ashe in Ch. 6 on CF, and he hits Lvl 35 by Ch. 17, spending 5 levels in Archer, 5 in Brigand, and the remainder in Sniper. That's an average 24 Str. With a Silver Bow+, Death Blow, Sniper Bowfaire and a +8 physical battalion, that gets to 56 Atk. With Hunter's Volley, that's 57 Atk x2. Outside of mages (excluding Dark Knights), enemies on this map have Def stats of 30 or higher. No enemy on this map has HP below 54. So, without other help, over-levelling or stacking crit, Sniper Ashe can only ORKO non-mounted mages (maybe Mercedes depending on Rafael Gem/Miracle) and fliers in Ch. 17.

In comparison, Hubert (progression Noble > Monk > Mage (lvl 10) > Archer (lvl 16) > Sniper (lvl 20)) hits on average 31 Mag at Lvl 35. With a Magic Bow+, Fiendish Blow, Mag +2, Sniper Bowfaire and a +7 magic battalion, that gets to 59 Atk. With Hunter's Volley, that's 60 Atk x2. Because Res stats are only above 30 on Falcon Knights, mages and Rhea, Sniper Hubert can ORKO everything on this map except mounted mages, Mercedes, Rhea, the Golems, monster Dedue, and the final bars of other non-Golem monsters. I know Ashe is a bad unit that you're using to make a point, but no, Sniper Ashe is most certainly not on the same tier as a Magic Sniper build. 

EDIT: Rewrote calculations/conclusions to include Bowfaire.

Edited by haarhaarhaar
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37 minutes ago, haarhaarhaar said:

As for Mercedes, she does do just fine as a support unit with Physic and Fortify. However, outside of Blue Lions, you don't really need her as a healer (and if you have the DLC, you certainly don't need her to heal). So what do you do with her if she doesn't heal? She could be a Dancer, I guess - but if you want her to contribute offensively, Magic Bow Sniper is her best option by far. 

I feel like it’s pretty much up to the players if they want to transition Mercedes into a Sniper by late-game or keep her as a healer, if they are running all “meta” builds that either want to stay in low health or not get hit at all (Dodgetank, VanWrath, Sniper, Grappler, Brave CAs, etc.) then she’s gonna see little to no use as a healbot and the players might want to start building a Magic Bow Sniper Mercie who can keep up with other units here. On the other hand if the player is running a team that want to utilize more healing then she is fine staying as a Bishop/Gremory.

54 minutes ago, haarhaarhaar said:

Banshee is at its most effective in the early-to-midgame, when you can genuinely shut down units - and Hubert should be in Mage at that point no matter what build you go for, so no issue there. It's still decent later on, but enemies with Mv of 6 or higher (which are quite a lot of them) can reach Hubert after he hits them with Banshee, basically meaning he's dead. Mire is similarly situational in the mid-to-late game, because enemy AS is normally either already within doubling range, or well outside of doubling range. I'm not saying there's no lategame utility to be had here, but it's certainly not a huge sacrifice for increased attack power. 

Mire actually debuffs def iirc but agree with this, Banshee and Mire drop off in effectiveness, Hubert also learn Dark Spikes which allow him to reliably OHKO Cavs but a Magic Bow Sniper Hubert will oneshot them just fine.

On 11/16/2022 at 12:32 AM, DaveCozy said:

The difference in magic stat is about 5 points between Dorothea vs Lysethia, on average anyways by level 30 iirc. This is assuming Dorothea follows a pretty standard Commoner -> Monk -> Mage -> Warlock -> Gremory path, vs Lysethia following Noble -> Monk -> Priest -> Bishop -> Gremory.

It's a difference, but not a massive difference honestly. The reason I tend to prefer Lysethia is moreso because Warp, Dark Spikes and Luna are just plain better spells.

There's a funny meme but effective setup with Dorothea you can do though, if you master Gremory for Defiant Magic and equip her with the Thyrsus staff. She'll damage herself each turn, activate the +8 magic boost, and then you can reap the benefits of both combat and extra Physic range. It's silly, and not at all "optimal" but it's very entertaining. 

And yeah personally I agree with Dark Holy Elf; I go for mages offensively when I need them to kill specific enemies. Armors are one of them, but that's also why I like dark spikes. Some mounted units can be annoyingly sturdy as well I find. Typically I tend to stick to just one unit for that kinda role.

I should’ve clarified this better, I did say in my original post that Lysithea becomes pretty mediocre combat-wise after she runs out of Luna and Dark Spikes, I agree that it’s a combination of good spell list + Mag lead + Warp that makes her better than Dorothea in the late game. 

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1 minute ago, Ari Chan said:

Mire actually debuffs def iirc but agree with this, Banshee and Mire drop off in effectiveness, Hubert also learn Dark Spikes which allow him to reliably OHKO Cavs but a Magic Bow Sniper Hubert will oneshot them just fine.

Was thinking of Swarm - good catch! Yeah completely agreed.

3 minutes ago, Ari Chan said:

I feel like it’s pretty much up to the players if they want to transition Mercedes into a Sniper by late-game or keep her as a healer, if they are running all “meta” builds that either want to stay in low health or not get hit at all (Dodgetank, VanWrath, Sniper, Grappler, Brave CAs, etc.) then she’s gonna see little to no use as a healbot and the players might want to start building a Magic Bow Sniper Mercie who can keep up with other units here. On the other hand if the player is running a team that want to utilize more healing then she is fine staying as a Bishop/Gremory.

Yeah, I don't want to paint it as Mercedes must be a sniper or else. The build requires plenty of time and investment, and it may not be necessary depending on who else you're running. Bishop Mercedes is also perfectly serviceable - I just think that Magic Bow Sniper is often the best justification of Mercedes' deployment slot (in the mid-to-lategame, anyway).

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Late to the thread but wanted to say GG on your run!

Only thing I wonder about is:

1) why no quick riposte on your war masters?

2) why no brawl avo+20 on your brawlers/warmasters?

 

Just questions, not criticisms. Congrats!

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6 hours ago, Bylift said:

Late to the thread but wanted to say GG on your run!

Only thing I wonder about is:

1) why no quick riposte on your war masters?

2) why no brawl avo+20 on your brawlers/warmasters?

 

Just questions, not criticisms. Congrats!

1) Usually when people make Warmasters on Maddening for their Wrath-Vantage build (Axefaire + 20 crit combo is perfect for this) quick riposte just doesn’t make any sense in this build considering VanWrath can kill a lot more on Enemy Phase.

2) Your grapplers should be oneshotting with FIF and avoid getting hits if possible, Avoid on Warmaster also doesn’t make much sense cause they want to stack high Hits and Crits for VanWrath and they should be equipping Axes most of the time.

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18 hours ago, Mordred said:

Unironically Catnap is prolly one of the better personal skill of the healers since they generally have bad personals except Dorothea's early game healing with hers.

You're kidding, right? Please tell me you're kidding. Admittedly, Animal Friend is gonna be useless early, but to argue Live to Serve is worse is a very hard sell.

18 hours ago, Mordred said:

I agree you should generally be recruiting Linhardt always if just for the paralogue but also Warp is really good?  If you're going to recruit a healer and use them Linhardt has the most incentive to recruit out of house, especially without DLC.  Your only other two options without DLC will be Lysithea or Manuela and having two warpers is extremely useful.  With two warpers you can warp chain allowing you to skip maps more easily.

Honestly, if I recruited Linhardt on GD it's gonna be VERY obvious that Warp has nothing to do with it. And for the record, I don't worship the ground Warp walks on.

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Damn, honestly I forgot that Snipers Hunters Volley didn't take +1 range into account, and was just locked to the base combat art range. That's my bad.

16 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

Honestly, if I recruited Linhardt on GD it's gonna be VERY obvious that Warp has nothing to do with it. And for the record, I don't worship the ground Warp walks on.

I love warp myself. I usually recruit Linhardt for Warp. I'll even run Manuela, Lysethia and Linhardt just to warp-chain Byleth to Flame Emperor in ch11 and clear it in turn 1. No crest stones get stolen that way and you get the best rewards.

But yeah, this is playstyle preference. I can respect wanting him for Turtle paralogue... Inexhaustible is a pretty good bow on a fast Darting Blow unit. But man I hate it that one; why is the boss so tanky? Why is the boss still alive? Why am I getting one-rounded by an AoE attack? Why'd they give it Miracle?

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6 hours ago, DaveCozy said:

I love warp myself. I usually recruit Linhardt for Warp. I'll even run Manuela, Lysethia and Linhardt just to warp-chain Byleth to Flame Emperor in ch11 and clear it in turn 1. No crest stones get stolen that way and you get the best rewards.

It's extremely simple to prevent the crest stones from being stolen, with or without Warp. In order for a crest stone to be "stolen", the enemy with it has to make it to the pink escape point at the end of the map. I've literally never seen this happen, even on challenge runs.

But even if you want to warpskip the map, you're greatly overestimating how difficult it is to do! You can do so with one Warper (e.g. Lysithea) easily. The closest blue unit needs to move 18 squares to reach the Flame Emperor with a melee attack (e.g. a doubled Hammer, which one-rounds even at Wyvern base Str). A Wyvern Rider has 7 move, Stride brings this to 12. So long as Lysithea has at least 20 magic, she can easily walk in front of your boss-killer, and warp them the extra 6 squares needed. That's without the March Ring, even.

Multi-Warp is useful for one-turning some later fights if that's your thing, but should not be relevant for this one unless Byleth is your only Wyvern Rider.

 

I really enjoy the turtle, I think he's a good test of your party's boss-fighting. I do not enjoy fog because memorizing enemy positions is not my jam, and this late in the game some of them will likely just one-round quite a few of your units.

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On 11/17/2022 at 7:33 PM, Shadow Mir said:

You're kidding, right? Please tell me you're kidding. Admittedly, Animal Friend is gonna be useless early, but to argue Live to Serve is worse is a very hard sell.

Honestly, if I recruited Linhardt on GD it's gonna be VERY obvious that Warp has nothing to do with it. And for the record, I don't worship the ground Warp walks on.

At least for me Live to Serve was never really used past chapter 3 on purpose.  Catnap is also not good but at least it can help with turn economy late-mid game.  Though ngl it usually doesn't make too much a difference and is incredibly inconsistent to activate.

I agree that warp isn't the end all be all but what other selling point does any of the other healers have?  You generally don't even have recruiting healers as a priority and they honestly don't have many selling points.  The only thing I can think of wanting to recruit any healer is Warp or paralogue. 

Edited by Mordred
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On 11/18/2022 at 9:58 PM, Dark Holy Elf said:

I really enjoy the turtle, I think he's a good test of your party's boss-fighting. I do not enjoy fog because memorizing enemy positions is not my jam, and this late in the game some of them will likely just one-round quite a few of your units.

The fog does allow for the frankly hilarious scenario where Leonie is holding a conversation with a giant turtle, on the other side of the map, whom she can't even see.

Re: Chapter 11, I believe it's possible to one-turn that one without Warp, so long as you have a Dancer who also gets Strided.

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