ITT I rank the characters

[Lord Raven]

Why boyd isn't average: Transfer bonuses. Considering boyd's awesome in por I will go out on a limb and say everyone and there mother has a transfer for boyd where he capped hp, strength, skill, speed, and maybe even defense.

The fuck? At best it's just capped HP and Str. The only way to get capped skl (I may give you this but given the nature of the stat it's irrelevant anyway), Spd, or Def (!!) is through abuse, ESPECIALLY if you want Def.

[Progenitus]

I'm going to take a closer look at Boyd's performance in part 4, but...

The irony of it all... So if Boyd is considered "average" do I dare ask how Aran and Oscar are well beyond that?

... the fuck? I already explained Oscar. And you should know that I've defended Aran so often that I'm getting sick of it.

[Mr. Francis York Morgan]

The fuck? At best it's just capped HP and Str. The only way to get capped skl (I may give you this but given the nature of the stat it's irrelevant anyway), Spd, or Def (!!) is through abuse, ESPECIALLY if you want Def.

Favoritism... have you heard of it? Since this is about a unit that kicks ass and gets close to speed and skill it isn't much of a stretch for them to cap either.

Just because it's against tier rules doesn't mean that it doesn't happen.... And we all know he is a likely candidate for it.

Let me put it this way... If I am 3 levels away from 20/20 and I am two points from capping speed on average on any given character that prob won't cap speed and I plan on using them in a runthrough in rd.... who the hell isn't resetting now?

If I did 10 playthroughs of por and boyd happened to be on my team in 7 of them don't you think I might have a blessed version or two of him lying around?

Edited July 24, 2009 by Lancelot

[Colonel M]

Him doubling isn't a problem (well... it kind of is). His problem is he needs to be somewhat reliant on doubling.

Just to compare give Boyd 3 Levels and Oscar 2:

Boyd - 47.4 HP | 23.95 Str | 1.15 Mag | 21.35 Skl | 19.35 Spd | 14.2 Luck | 16.5 Def | 8.3 Res

Forged Steel Axe - 39.95 Atk

Oscar - 39 HP | 20.7 Str | 7.4 Mag | 23.3 Skl | 22.2 Spd | 19.1 Luck | 17.6 Def | 13.4 Res

Forged Steel Lance - 35.7 Atk

This should happen about... 3-3 probably. Oscar can double 3 Generals, Sages (barring 1), and Ellight Bishop.

Boyd will always 2RKO the Halberdiers. Oscar actually 3RKOes them. See what I mean?

1x Halberdier lvl 9 (Steel Lance)

HP 37, Atk 29, AS 20, Hit 133, Avo 53, DEF 19, RES 13, Crit 15, Ddg 13

2x Halberdier lvl8 (Steel Lance)

HP 36, Atk 29, AS 20, Hit 133, Avo 53, DEF 18, RES 13, Crit 14, Ddg 13

1x Halberdier lvl 9 (Javelin)

HP 37, Atk 26, AS 20, Hit 119, Avo 54, DEF 19, RES 13, Crit 15, Ddg 14

1x Halberdier lvl 9 (Short Spear)

HP 37, Atk 29, AS 20, Hit 108, Avo 53, DEF 19, RES 13, Crit 15, Ddg 13

1x Halberdier lvl 10 (Short Spear)

HP 37, Atk 30, AS 20, Hit 109, Avo 54, DEF 19, RES 13, Crit 15, Ddg 14

1x Halberdier lvl 11 (Short Spear)

HP 38, Atk 30, AS 21, Hit 112, Avo 57, DEF 20, RES 13, Crit 15, Ddg 15

Boyd roughly 3RKOes the Generals (Hammer isn't included here). If Oscar doesn't double, he risks 4RKOing. If he does double, he can 2RKO. But that's only 3 Generals anyway. Sages are Oscar's victory. FFS, Oscar only 3RKOes Snipers!

Now defensively. Halberdiers range from 29-30 Atk. Boyd gets 4RKOed by these things. Oscar runs into the risk of getting 3RKOed by 20 Atk Halberdiers. For Generals, it's 30-33 Atk. Any of them that have 30-31 Atk (4 of them) 4RKO him. Any higher ends 3RKO. For Oscar he is always 3RKOed.

This of course slightly excludes the support factoid. Oscar's looking for offense and, shockingly, Boyd is his best bet. Now they both have +1 Atk and a little more Avoid for each other. It does help with Oscar's offense a bit (he can 2RKO 2 Halberdiers and a Sniper now!).

I know this isn't totally convincing, but it's kind of digging more into how Boyd isn't so terrible. Almost guaranteed 2RKOes except on Generals is pretty good while Oscar can even struggle with that.

[Lord Raven]

Favoritism... have you heard of it? Since this is about a unit that kicks ass and gets close to speed and skill it isn't much of a stretch for them to cap either.

16% chance of capping Skill and 17% chance of capping Speed. Oh boy that's really close with the 20/20 averages (24.3 and 23.4) making your point seem all the more legit. Note I'm arguing his likelihood to cap the stats not his quality here. At any rate, why favoritism towards just Boyd, in that case? Just level and abuse the crap out of everyone else for the boost.

[Mr. Francis York Morgan]

16% chance of capping Skill and 17% chance of capping Speed. Oh boy that's really close with the 20/20 averages (24.3 and 23.4) making your point seem all the more legit. Note I'm arguing his likelihood to cap the stats not his quality here. At any rate, why favoritism towards just Boyd, in that case? Just level and abuse the crap out of everyone else for the boost.

I never said just boyd. But your focusing on one part of that statement. He is only 4 points away from capping speed/skill on average anyway at max level. That is not that far especially when you factor in items like a thief/archer ring and the 37 level ups he gets. If he is given either item immediately he can gain nearly +2 more points to both speed and skill. Then if he still doesn't cap either you can always just use a skill book and a speed wing.

Another point is if Ike is in use every playthrough due to being a required unit eventually someone is going to get a playthrough where he is blessed. Boyd is an even higher tier than ike and is more useful overall so the same can be said of him.

edit: sorry my post was unclear. I meant to say boyd is a superior unit to ike in terms of performance. I was using higher tier to refer to said performance.

Edited July 24, 2009 by Lancelot

[Lord Raven]

I never said just boyd. But your focusing on one part of that statement. He is only 4 points away from capping speed/skill on average anyway at max level. That is not that far especially when you factor in items like a thief/archer ring and the 39 level ups he gets. If he is given either item immediately he can gain nearly +2 more points to both speed and skill. Then if he still doesn't cap either you can always just use a skill book and a speed wing.

Why are we worried about Skill anyway?

Thief/Archer Ring only give 5% boost btw, and he has 37 level-ups. It doesn't make much of a difference. And he probably won't get it until he's Level 10+, which is not for a while, so it doesn't give the full +2 you're expecting.

Another point is if Ike is in use every playthrough due to being a required unit eventually someone is going to get a playthrough where he is blessed. Boyd is an even higher tier than ike and is more useful overall so the same can be said of him.

Boyd's a higher tier than Ike because he's more useful, not because he's more likely to cap. -_-

[Mr. Francis York Morgan]

Boyd's a higher tier than Ike because he's more useful, not because he's more likely to cap. -_-

I edited out the 39 to 37 as you typed.

I never said that boyd was better due to caps. I said he was a better unit overall than ike as in performance wise. Also I know the exact boosts.

edit: actually my post was unclear on whether or not he was better due to caps or performance. Sorry.

Edited July 24, 2009 by Lancelot

[Progenitus]

Now I have doubts that Boyd will actaully reach 20/20/1 by the start of part 4 (I know my Mia had paragon for 3-11 and 3-E and still was only 20/20... although Boyd starts 1 level higher than her, but that gap would have closed by 3-11, so I doubt Boyd would promote), but I'll push him to 3rd tier anyway, since he'll be third tier after a bunch of kills or so.

Now since we're trying to see if he should move up, I'll compare him to Neph. Neph is even less likely to promote before part 4, since she's like 20/5 or so in 3-2 when Boyd's like 20/9. So I'm guessing by the start of part 4 Boyd would be ~20/20 and Neph would be ~20/18.

In any case, I'll just assume that for 4-1, Boyd will be 20/20/3 and Neph will be 20/20/1. Which I suppose isn't unreasonable, since they'll hit these levels about halfway through the chapter anyway, since people gain exp like mad in part 4.

20/20/3 Boyd

58.6 HP, 33.1 str, 28.3 skl, 26.3 spd, 18.6 lck, 24 def, 13.4 res

(raw stats)

33.1 att, 26.3 AS, 75.2 hit, 14.15 crit - - 71.2 avo, 58.6 HP, 24.0 def, 13.4 res, 18.6 critavo - - 28.3% Colossus

20/20/1 Neph

44.55 HP, 24.65 str, 28 skl, 29 spd, 19.6 lck, 24.65 def, 22 res

(raw stats)

24.65 att, 29.0 AS, 75.6 hit, 24.0 crit - - 77.6 avo, 44.55 HP, 24.65 def, 22.0 res, 19.6 critavo - - 28% Impale

Authority stars weren't applied, but it doesn't really matter since everyone gets them anyway.

Neph doubles warriors/halbs/snipers while Boyd doesn't, giving Neph ~48% chance for Impale to Boyd's ~28% Colossus (and Neph has a small crit on them, so roughly a 50% chance to kill), and since she can 3HKO she can use adept better than Boyd too. Boyd can take a speedwing, but he's still pretty borderline, and a speedwing is a much greater resource than adept (note that while Neph only wins spd by 1 if Boyd got a speedwing, she was sitting at her 2nd tier spd cap for a long time, basically ensuring that she'll have 29 spd at 3rd tier). Boyd can 2HKO with killer, but that still only gives him ~24 crit since the enemies have ~20 lck, although if Neph uses a killer lance she has issues 4HKOing.

Boyd, however, doubles (though very, very borderline even at 20/20/3) and 2HKOs generals with any support, with no speedwing. Neph has issues 3HKOing unless she gets an att support, though she still has ~50% chance to kill with a mastery.

There's a lot more halbs/warriors/snipers than there are generals though.

Defensively, their def is too close to care. Which leaves 6-7 avo and 8-9 res vs 14 HP, which is fairly even (at face value, I generally consider 1 avo = 1 HP, and 1 res slightly less than 1 HP), but Neph gets avoid from her own affinity while Boyd doesn't get either def or att. So she wins durability by a small amount.

She also has some opportunities in part 3 to finish her level off with BEXP since she's capped 3 stats by 20/12, while Boyd only caps his first stat by 20/18.

So Neph wins at the moment, but since Neph spent more time in 2nd tier than Boyd did in this chapter (or required more resources to promote than Boyd), that probably balances out.

It doesn't look like it'll improve for Boyd, because he still has issues doubling anything, and chances are Neph is going to be beating him forever.

And since everyone is complaining about Shinon, I may as well bring him up too. Since no one cares about his durability (even though he's beating Boyd and Neph), I'll just talk about his offense.

Now Shinon starts 5 levels higher than Boyd in 3-P, so if the level I use for Boyd in this chapter is 20/20/3, then it seems reasonable to put Shinon at 20/20/5.

27.4 str, 30.6 spd..... 32.4 crit, 17.4% Deadeye

With Silencer he has 43-44 att. With Brave Bow (I explained earlier why this is basically his prf weapon) he has 36-37 att. Killer Bow is 35-36 att.

He's borderline 2HKOing on halbs/snipers. With an att support he can cleanly 2HKO. Or he can use a brave bow which 4HKOs with or without att support (however, he can always crit/deadeye to save on uses. Against a 20 lck enemy, he has ~62% chance of getting a crit or deadeye by the third attack). A killer bow also gives him ~42 crit since the enemies have ~20 lck, so ~77% chance for a crit or deadeye.

His offense looks pretty damn good if you ask me.

btw, before anyone brings up silver forges, you can't make any until 4-2, since the forge goes with Tibarn. I suppose if we sent these guys with Tibarn we could see how they fare with forges, but then Shinon can get a 20 mt silver bow forge anyway (as opposed to 16 mt silencer) versus Neph using an 18 mt forge and Boyd a 19 mt forge (not like he needs more att anyway).

And then since Colonel doesn't like Oscar, I'll bring him up too. Putting him at 20/20/4 sounds reasonable.

20/20/4 Oscar

26.2 att, 28.4 AS, 81.8 hit, 14.3 crit - - 81.4 avo, 48.0 HP, 22.6 def, 19.4 res, 24.6 critavo - - 14.3% Sol

He's borderline doubling warriors/halbs/snipers (though not as borderline as Boyd + speedwing, since like Neph, he's been sitting at his spd cap in 2nd tier, ensuring a greater chance to have 28+ spd at this point). And his mastery sucks and he has no crit (~26.6% chance for Sol even with doubling), and his att is almost as bad as Neph, so yeah, his offense is pretty poor.

However, he's definitely winning durability. Compare him to Neph, for example, 5 avo + 3-4 HP vs 2 def + 2-3 res, but this is before any supports at all, and Oscar gets 15 extra avoid just from his own affinity. 3-4 HP already beats 2-3 res, and 20 avo swallows 2 def.

Here are their relevant defensive stats after applying authority stars. I'm going to assume their support partner doesn't give any bonuses (since partners can be highly debated/argued/etc.)

Oscar

48 HP, 22.6 def, 19.4 res, 119.4 avo

Boyd

58.6 HP, 24 def, 13.4 res, 86.2 avo

Neph

44.55 HP, 24.65 def, 22 res, 100.6 avo

A couple of enemies...

1x Halb lvl 8 (Stl Lance):

45 HP, 34 Atk, 24 AS, 150 Hit, 68 Avo, 22 Def, 18 Res, 17 Crit, 20 Ddg

11-12 damage to Oscar at 30-31 hit (~18-19 real). Assuming it does 12, which will barely 4HKO, Oscar doesn't even break a 1% chance of dying until 6 attacks (and a very negligible chance of dying in 4 or 5). If it 5HKOs, then Oscar has a 0.019% chance of dying in 5 attacks. Doesn't even break a 1% chance of dying until 9 attacks.

10 damage to Boyd at 64 hit (~74 real). Boyd has ~16.4% chance of dying in 6 attacks, 42% in 7, 65% in 8.

9-10 damage to Neph at 49-50 hit (~50 real). 3% chance of dying in 5 attacks, 11% in 6.

3x Warrior lvl 8 (Stl Axe):

50 HP, 38 Atk, 25 AS, 145 Hit, 70 Avo, 20 Def, 13 Res, 12 Crit, 20 Ddg

16-17 damage to Oscar at 25-26 hit (~14 real). 0.27% chance of dying in 3 hits, 0.98% in 4, 2.2% in 5.

14 damage to Boyd at 59 hit (~67 real). 13.5% chance of dying in 5 hits. 35.8% in 6.

13-14 damage to Neph at 44-45 hit (~40 real). 2.56% chance of dying in 4 hits, 8.7% in 5, 17.9% in 6.

And these are high hit enemies, which hurt Oscar more than Boyd/Neph, and he's already faring better. Now let's take an enemy with lower hit.

1x Halb lvl 7 (Stl Great):

44 HP, 37 Atk, 24 AS, 137 Hit, 67 Avo, 21.5 Def, 18 Res, 17 Crit, 19 Ddg

14-15 damage to Oscar at 17-18 hit (~6 real). Even if for some reason Oscar is getting 3HKO'd by this guy, he has a 0.0216% chance of dying in 3 attacks. 0.0825% in 4. 0.197% in 5. He doesn't even break a 1% chance of dying until 9 attacks.

13 damage to Boyd at 51 hit (~52 real). 3.8% chance of dying in just 5 attacks. By 9 attacks he has a 54.9% chance of dying.

12-13 damage to Neph at 36-37 hit (~27 real). 0.53% chance of dying in 4 hits. 2.08% chance of dying in 5. By 9 attacks she has a 20.5% chance of dying.

Here's a good one...

1x Lance Gen lvl 8 (Horseslayer):

46 HP, 37 Atk, 22 AS, 135 Hit, 66 Avo, 27 Def, 18 Res, 12 Crit, 22 Ddg

38-39 damage to Oscar at 16-17 hit (5-6 real). 0.3% chance of dying in 2 hits. 0.87% in 3. 1.68% in 4. 2.7% in 5.

The general has same att and slightly lower hit to the steel greatlance halb listed above so I'm not going to redo Boyd and Neph, though they improve SLIGHTLY. The sad thing is they're barely any better against A HORSESLAYER.

So Oscar wins durability by a pretty crushing amount.

And then realize that Oscar's affinity will ALSO benefit someone else. Let him support (gasp) Boyd, for example, and Boyd's durability will skyrocket, thanks to Oscar's affinity, of course. With +23 avoid, he can at least cut down the true hit he faces by half.

And of course Oscar has the benefits of a horse.

Sounds reasonable to say Oscar > Boyd (and Neph).

Of course this is only one chapter, but I highly doubt things will change in future chapters. The only big chapters I see Boyd and Neph getting a significant win in are 4-E-4 and 4-E-5 (34 spd cap lol), but then Oscar is probably winning 4-E-3 to counteract that, since dragons are godly and durability really matters against them (so does offense, but when you're getting 2-3HKO'd at scary hit rates, durability > offense).

For Colonel M...

Only 2 levels for Oscar in 3 chapters? What? It should like 3 (Boyd can get 4).

Not to mention you neglected leveling up during this chapter anyway, so even if Oscar doesn't get 3 full level ups from 3-P, 3-1, and 3-2, he's get the third level quickly in 3-3 anyway. And when oscar levels up, he actually gets a non-negligible chance of having enough spd to double stuff like generals. Boyd is so slow he needs a speedwing to STILL be borderline.

And then since you picked 3-3, you also ignore that this is chokepoint heaven, which means Oscar can hit and run and not get in the way, thanks to canto.

And since it's also 3-3, Oscar can also do utility things like set supplies on fire and then start moving towards the fights quicker than Boyd can, thanks to canto again.

Oscar is also building a support at the moment, which gives him more durability than Boyd (their concrete durability is too similar right now to really give a damn, but then Oscar has more avoid/res). Also, Boyd's in danger of getting doubled by swordmasters, even if I give him another level, since they have 23-24 spd.

Want to look at chapters more down the line? Oscar gets even more spd, giving him an even greater chance of doubling things like generals and paladins. Boyd's sore out of luck. And Oscar builds his support up even more. Boyd still doesn't double, he gets more HP/def but still loses durability anyway since he doesn't have lolearth, and he gets more overkill att.

The only time Boyd can even think of beating Oscar is the last half of 3-4, and then 3-7 but performance doesn't really matter there since I could just mash end turn to beat it anyway, so anything anyone does in 3-7 is for self-improvement.

So when you sandbag Oscar as much as you could possibly can, Boyd looks better relative to Oscar. Of course no one really cares. I might as well give Ike an iron sword and complain about how terrible his offense is.

Edited July 24, 2009 by smash fanatic

[Mr. Francis York Morgan]

Ultimately whether boyd caps speed/skill is meaningless since he caps something far more valuable for rd. HP. With a hp capped boyd which there is a probability of 66 getting not counting the fact I can let boyd keep his fighter ring to give it an even higher chance of happening. This gives me a +5 stat boost for rd. The +5 hp allows boyd to cap hp as soon as level 12. This lowers his overall stat gain from 3.4 to 2.6 making him ripe for bexp potential. If boyd caps strength as well which he has a 72 chance of happening in por without the fighter ring and ultimately reaches the cap at level 18 second tier this will give him a base 24 strength which will allow him to cap strength on average at level 18 second tier in rd. This in combination with his capped hp lowers his overall growth gain to 1.95 not factoring in the fact that he was already ripe for bexp potential 6 levels ago.

Edit:

Once he caps hp his growth for bexp are spread amoung strength at the highest with 65%, then defense at 50%, then speed/skill at 45%, and finally luck at 40% meaning he should cap strength pretty quickly and the rest of the stats will be pretty evenly divided among the other 4.

Boyd has a base of 45 hp and 22 strength on average in rd btw. He has a 53 for his hp cap and a 30 for his strength cap at second tier and his hp growth is 80%. I didn't post the magic/res growths cause they were both 5 and 10 respectively.

Edited July 24, 2009 by Lancelot

[Colonel M]

I'm comparing them solely in combat. I don't need a lesson on Oscar's utility in a few areas, I've played this game. Just keep in mind that Boyd has freedom to go anywhere in 3-4 and in 3-7 "End Turn mashing" doesn't cut it (if that's what you're implying) while Oscar is limited in that department. You're also forgetting that Boyd is Level 8 and Oscar is Level 12. It's difficult enough getting Gatrie a level up per chapter and for Oscar it doesn't get any better. Since Boyd is at least 2RKOing all the time he has a better chance of netting kills while Oscar is borderline on that (3RKOing when the vast majority of GMs are 2RKOing is not signifying that you're good). The only time Oscar actually can beat Boyd in offense is very rarely since Oscar is borderline doubling some units and then factor that Warriors, Halberdiers, and Swordmasters make up for most of the enemies (Generals too) and seeing Paladins are only in a few chapters and if he does double he's probably 2RKOing anyway like Boyd.

I'm not doing serious sandbagging on Oscar at all. The point is Boyd has enough power to circumvent his lack of Spd in general. It hurts him in a few areas (i.e. getting skills like Adept), but that shouldn't automatically mean he's "average". There's a major difference between "average" and "being semi-comparable to the team" and for the most part Boyd is doing the latter more often than the former.

Don't play me as a stupid person; it won't work.

Edited July 24, 2009 by Colonel M

[Progenitus]

I'm comparing them solely in combat. I don't need a lesson on Oscar's utility in a few areas, I've played this game.

Except ignoring everything outside of combat gives us a ridiculously inaccurate review of their performances. And not just combat, you cared almost entirely about their offense, which wasn't even very accurate anyway, and then when you talked about their durability you completely ignored Oscar's extra avoid/res and the durability aspect from supports (you had a few sentences about supports, but completely ignored the durability advantage it gave Oscar and talked about the amazing +1 att id did, plus why the hell is Oscar even supporting Boyd when he could get a sexier affinity?) and the fact that boyd might get doubled by swordmasters.

in 3-7 "End Turn mashing" doesn't cut it (if that's what you're implying)

The chapter takes 12 turns to beat no matter what you do. You cannot speed this up, or slow it down.

There are no items to obtain. Not even hidden ones (other than a bunch of stupid coins). Any items you could possibly obtain are from disarm/steal, which barely even happens because of how awful disarm's activation rate is.

We also don't have any tile to protect or NPCs to keep alive or any other objective (unlike, say, 1-5, where dumbass Jill likes suiciding and giving us game overs, so we have to rush over to protect her nub ass), so that's out too.

The only incentive left to actually do anything in this chapter is to gain exp, which has no actual worth in terms of beating the chapter, since "gaining exp" doesn't benefit anyone except the unit getting the exp, and doesn't immediately increase our efficiency (unlike, say, 3-3, where you kill enemies because they're in the way of setting the supplies on fire, and the exp just is a bonus, or a chapter like 3-1 which is a rout).

So the only thing that happens in 3-7 is that Boyd gets more access to kills than Oscar. Boyd doesn't actually help us beat the chapter any faster or slower than Oscar and thus neither gain any positive utility (however, if one of them manages to die on us, most likely Boyd because he has less durability and will be facing more enemies than Oscar if he wants to be getting his extra exp, or something like that, they're obviously being negative).

Also, the DB like wasting uses off their good weapons (like Zihark's brave sword), so that's actually another small incentive to not do anything in the chapter. YOu can't even trade their weapons away, since 3-6 might end on enemy phase and you wont' have an opportunity to do so.

You're also forgetting that Boyd is Level 8 and Oscar is Level 12. It's difficult enough getting Gatrie a level up per chapter and for Oscar it doesn't get any better.

I already gave boyd an extra level compared to Oscar because of the level gap.

Since Boyd is at least 2RKOing all the time he has a better chance of netting kills while Oscar is borderline on that (3RKOing when the vast majority of GMs are 2RKOing is not signifying that you're good).

Since Oscar has more durability than Boyd, this means he can counter more enemies on enemy phase without dying and/or require fewer player phases using healing items, and thus can fight against more enemies and get more kills.

While we're at it, since Oscar has more mobility, he can reach more enemies and thus fight more enemies and thus gain more kills.

Sorry, your argument doesn't work like that. "My guy is better than yours in this one specific area and thus is entitled to more kills". If "lol unit A > unit B, thus unit A gets more kills", then comparisons would be retardedly biased towards the units that start off stronger and growth units like Mia would never get their time in the spotlight because we're feeding all the kills to people who fight better like Ike and Haar.

So in order that we don't get these retardedly biased comparisons, both units in question are being given the same number of kills, regardless of their performance in combat. The only times "unit A gets more kills than unit B" is valid are...

- Unit B doesn't need kills (see: healers)

- Unit B cannot get as many kills as unit A due to some sort of availability/existing problem (such as in 3-4 where Boyd can go to the top levels and Oscar can't. Or something like Boyd vs Ranulf, where the latter cannot get any kills in 3-P to 3-3 because he doesn't exist).

- Unit B decides to give some of their kills to another arbitrary unit on the team to increase that unit's level (like what you'd do with a jeigan such as part 1 Volug or Marcus where they weaken something and then let others get the kills. Though this is only done when no efficiency is lost, but since that's rather difficult to determine, this point is generally not used often and only considered as an arbitrary advantage. Of course this is only done if the unit could actually kill it on his/her own but decides to give it to someone else. For example, Rolf in early part 3 is very rarely ever going to give up his kill to someone else, since he sucks at fighting and thus he wouldn't even be able to kill it on his own anyway. But I'm going off on a tangent, so I'll stop here for now).

So now that we're out of this little fantasy world where unit A gets more kills than unit B because unit A has more offense or something equally retarded, let's use a more realistic scenario where both fighters are getting the same number of kills so we don't end up with stupid, inaccurate comparisons.

The only time Oscar actually can beat Boyd in offense is very rarely since Oscar is borderline doubling some units and then factor that Warriors, Halberdiers, and Swordmasters make up for most of the enemies (Generals too) and seeing Paladins are only in a few chapters and if he does double he's probably 2RKOing anyway like Boyd.

3-3 has...

7 halbs

7 generals

5 sages

2 snipers

This is before reinforcements though, which include a few snipers/sages/swordmasters, a bunch of halbs, and then a bunch of generals you're probably never killing, but there doesn't seem to be significantly more halbs/snipers than generals/sages. And the swordmasters don't matter, because Boyd doesn't want to fight them, because they might double him, and Oscar 2HKOs them anyway so Boyd's extra damage doesn't really matter.

But then look at a chapter like 3-8. Including reinforcements.

3 warriors

7 halbs

3 SMs

16 generals

3 snipers

9 sages

2 druids

1 lolbishop

lolseptimus

45 enemies total

Oscar at 24 spd (20/17) doubles all the generals, all the sages, two snipers, lolseptimus, lolbishop. That's almost 2/3rds of the map.

Boyd at 21 spd (20/15) doubles... 1 general.

lolollololololololooll

And then there are quite a few paladin heavy chapters. 3-2, 3-5, 3-10, and 3-11 have a lot.

And 3-7 doesn't really count as a chapter. 3-E barely counts as one (lol, skrimir and tibarn and the NPCs can solo the map), and there's paladins in it anyway. And 3-P is very, very short.

So paladins are basically in like half the GM chapters that matter. lol @ thinking they don't show up often

btw, Oscar with a max mt steel lance is actually 2HKOing a bunch of paladins in 3-2. If he manages to get either +str, or an att support, he 2HKOs a lot more. It's trickier in 3-5, but he can possibly 2HKO again in 3-10 and 3-11. If not, he can use the silver greatlance (dropped from an enemy in 2-E). And if not, he leaves them at such a low HP that even a nub like Mist can finish them off, while Boyd will probably require a high tier to attack with him or Boyd has to attack it again.

[Progenitus]

Lehran

This post isn't really about Lehran's usefulness, but rather how to rank usefulness in general.

Lehran is essentially the epitome of neutral utility. He exists for such a short time that he has almost no impact on the team, negative or positive. Granted, the time he does exist for, he's hilariously awesome.

I know a lot of people say, "Why does he get such a high score?" The big problem is that people horrendously overrate availability, and generally get usefulness between different units mixed up.

For example, let's take Tormod. He's nice in part 1. And then disappears. And is utter crap for the rest of the game. Now you may think, "We can drop him!" And we can. But what happens to his unit slot, especially in 4-E? Usually, we have enough unit slots so that we can still field the rest of the team without worrying. But in 4-E, since we're rating Tormod's usefulness, we still need to bring him along, and then decide what to do with him (we'll probably have him hide in a corner, or maybe crown him so he can heal, or maybe just leave the slot empty). "But we can give his unit slot to another unit", well the problem is that it's THAT unit's usefulness, not Tormod's. Say our 10 units is Tibarn/Cain/Giffca/Nailah/Naesala/Nolan/Zihark/Mia/Shinon/Tormod. Now if you say "let's replace Tormod's unit slot with Jill", you're not measuring Tormod's usefulness anymore, you're measuring Jill's. And the comparison is now Tormod + Jill vs Lehran, not just Tormod vs Lehran. You can see the obvious problem with that.

I'm saying that you should at LEAST dedicate a unit slot for the person in question for every chapter they're available in. So for someone like Tormod, or Geoffrey, who are only useful for their first few chapters and then awful for the rest of the game, you still have to at least give them a unit slot (whether you actually deploy them or not is up to you). Now since Lehran joins in 4-E-5, he's not available for chapters like 4-E-1, so you don't need to leave a slot empty for him, since he's not even part of the team yet. In this case, Lehran's team > Tormod's team, since Tormod is most likely worse than the 10th unit on Lehran's team, and if we don't even deploy Tormod and leave the slot empty, then the 10th unit on Lehran's team just needs to be better than an empty slot to be superior overall, which will generally happen.

So is Tormod's contribution in part 1 enough to overcome taking a slot in 4-E as well as Lehran doing his stuff in 4-E-5? Maybe, maybe not. Since Tormod does have 9 other units to pick up on his slack in 4-E, Lehran's team having a 10th extra guy may seem insignificant, but Tormod's part 1 could also be labeled as insignificant, since 1-7 and 1-8 are pretty short, and 1-E we have Black Knight/Nailah, plus Muarim who's a poor man's Nailah, plus Rafiel, as well as the other DB units who can generally hold their own or are arguably better than Tormod anyway (like Volug).

I used Tormod as an example, but this also applies to other units who are only useful for their first few chapters, like Geoffrey or Ilyana, or even Sothe (granted, since Sothe rapes for so long, he >>> Lehran anyway, and Sothe technically doesn't even take up a unit slot in 4-E anyway. But the same logic is applied).

5.5/10

[Narga_Rocks]

The chapter takes 12 turns to beat no matter what you do. You cannot speed this up, or slow it down.

There are no items to obtain. Not even hidden ones (other than a bunch of stupid coins). Any items you could possibly obtain are from disarm/steal, which barely even happens because of how awful disarm's activation rate is.

We also don't have any tile to protect or NPCs to keep alive or any other objective (unlike, say, 1-5, where dumbass Jill likes suiciding and giving us game overs, so we have to rush over to protect her nub ass), so that's out too.

The only incentive left to actually do anything in this chapter is to gain exp, which has no actual worth in terms of beating the chapter, since "gaining exp" doesn't benefit anyone except the unit getting the exp, and doesn't immediately increase our efficiency (unlike, say, 3-3, where you kill enemies because they're in the way of setting the supplies on fire, and the exp just is a bonus, or a chapter like 3-1 which is a rout).

So the only thing that happens in 3-7 is that Boyd gets more access to kills than Oscar. Boyd doesn't actually help us beat the chapter any faster or slower than Oscar and thus neither gain any positive utility (however, if one of them manages to die on us, most likely Boyd because he has less durability and will be facing more enemies than Oscar if he wants to be getting his extra exp, or something like that, they're obviously being negative).

So, in one of smash's posts, he says "The only incentive left to actually do anything in this chapter is to gain exp" about 3-7. What's the first word in his very next post?

Lehran

Does anyone else see the irony in his very next post refuting what he said in the previous one?

Way to downplay Oscar being mostly useless in 3-7. There is a goal in 3-7. Having Ike card the black knight. 3-7 isn't the entire game, of course, just saying what you are doing is inconsistent.

[Progenitus]

I don't recall tier ilsts (which this ranking basically is) caring about who recruited who. No one really cares if someone like Roy recruits half the cast in FE6, or Laura recruiting Aran in this game. 3-7 is pretty much the same deal, except instead we don't have a specific unit required to recruit Lehran. I made that post using this assumption.

[Vykan12]

Recruiting Lehran isn't a goal for 3-7, it's more like "if I can pull it off without too much trouble I might as well do it". Though even if 3-7 was declared important, the enemies have pretty low levels and have movement impededed just as badly as your foot soldiers in swamps. In other words, it's an easy chapter no matter what you choose to do.

[Narga_Rocks]

I don't recall tier ilsts (which this ranking basically is) caring about who recruited who. No one really cares if someone like Roy recruits half the cast in FE6, or Laura recruiting Aran in this game. 3-7 is pretty much the same deal, except instead we don't have a specific unit required to recruit Lehran. I made that post using this assumption.

It's your rating topic, which is why I've only posted a couple minor gripes here.

In reference to recruiting, I agree that if a specific character is doing the recruiting they don't get credit for everything the recruited character did. I think this chapter is different, though, because of the fact that you need to fight your way down there to get him, and it is desirable to do so. It isn't quite the same as having the chapter requirement to be kill boss or arrive or something. I know that. But the point is, everyone who can kill stuff on the way to the black knight to set up the carding is getting positive utility. I'll grant, though, that Boyd isn't likely to be in the vanguard. Ike, Gatrie, the hawks, Haar, and Ike's support partner (if his support partner has a good kill%) are pretty much the frontal assault, and everyone else is just killing leftovers so that Ike and co. can press forward (Oh, and possibly having shinon just a bit behind to take care of the things with two range on player phase so that Ike/Gatrie/Mia/Haar don't need to equip 2 range weapons on enemy phase). This doesn't leave much positive utility for Boyd, but it does help him to reduce the level difference between him and Oscar. That's all I'm really saying.

Further, if we are rating Oscar, then by your post about availability he is taking up a slot that could have gone to a unit that can actually assist in the pressing forward. If we have to reserve a slot for the character we are rating, then that means Oscar in 3-7 for his rating, and Titania in 3-7 for her rating. It's only a little bit of negative utility, but it seems to be ignored.

Still, your topic, your rules, your ratings.

[Florete]

Lehran

This post isn't really about Lehran's usefulness, but rather how to rank usefulness in general.

Lehran is essentially the epitome of neutral utility. He exists for such a short time that he has almost no impact on the team, negative or positive. Granted, the time he does exist for, he's hilariously awesome.

I know a lot of people say, "Why does he get such a high score?" The big problem is that people horrendously overrate availability, and generally get usefulness between different units mixed up.

For example, let's take Tormod. He's nice in part 1. And then disappears. And is utter crap for the rest of the game. Now you may think, "We can drop him!" And we can. But what happens to his unit slot, especially in 4-E? Usually, we have enough unit slots so that we can still field the rest of the team without worrying. But in 4-E, since we're rating Tormod's usefulness, we still need to bring him along, and then decide what to do with him (we'll probably have him hide in a corner, or maybe crown him so he can heal, or maybe just leave the slot empty). "But we can give his unit slot to another unit", well the problem is that it's THAT unit's usefulness, not Tormod's. Say our 10 units is Tibarn/Cain/Giffca/Nailah/Naesala/Nolan/Zihark/Mia/Shinon/Tormod. Now if you say "let's replace Tormod's unit slot with Jill", you're not measuring Tormod's usefulness anymore, you're measuring Jill's. And the comparison is now Tormod + Jill vs Lehran, not just Tormod vs Lehran. You can see the obvious problem with that.

I'm saying that you should at LEAST dedicate a unit slot for the person in question for every chapter they're available in. So for someone like Tormod, or Geoffrey, who are only useful for their first few chapters and then awful for the rest of the game, you still have to at least give them a unit slot (whether you actually deploy them or not is up to you). Now since Lehran joins in 4-E-5, he's not available for chapters like 4-E-1, so you don't need to leave a slot empty for him, since he's not even part of the team yet. In this case, Lehran's team > Tormod's team, since Tormod is most likely worse than the 10th unit on Lehran's team, and if we don't even deploy Tormod and leave the slot empty, then the 10th unit on Lehran's team just needs to be better than an empty slot to be superior overall, which will generally happen.

So is Tormod's contribution in part 1 enough to overcome taking a slot in 4-E as well as Lehran doing his stuff in 4-E-5? Maybe, maybe not. Since Tormod does have 9 other units to pick up on his slack in 4-E, Lehran's team having a 10th extra guy may seem insignificant, but Tormod's part 1 could also be labeled as insignificant, since 1-7 and 1-8 are pretty short, and 1-E we have Black Knight/Nailah, plus Muarim who's a poor man's Nailah, plus Rafiel, as well as the other DB units who can generally hold their own or are arguably better than Tormod anyway (like Volug).

I used Tormod as an example, but this also applies to other units who are only useful for their first few chapters, like Geoffrey or Ilyana, or even Sothe (granted, since Sothe rapes for so long, he >>> Lehran anyway, and Sothe technically doesn't even take up a unit slot in 4-E anyway. But the same logic is applied).

5.5/10

I don't agree with your rating of Lehran, but that is not the main point of this post. The main point of this post is determining if your logic is correct in your comparison of Lehran vs. Tormod.

Well, on the tier list, Tormod's ranking is based pretty much on what he does in part 1, with part 4 pretty much left out. You said this topic is basically like a tier list. So why are you effectively giving Tormod negative for part 4 when the tier list generally doesn't do that? I brought this up in the FE6 tier topic, though it works much better for this game. For a unit like Tormod, or Sothe, or Geoffrey, who starts great but ends up bad/terrible, why should they get negative for suck they don't have to go through? Now, I do agree that we should see and compare how these units do for their time of suck. But why should they get negative for suck they don't have to go through, since if you just dropped them, they'd get neutral utility for the rest of the game? It makes no sense. If you're going to field them for the rest of the game, it should be neutral utility at worst, since there's nothing stopping you from dropping them and acquiring neutral instead of negative utility.

You might say something like "Well then all the Bottom tiers should move to Mid because we never have to field them" but that's not the case at all. We have to use craptastic characters like Lyre and Fiona to even give them a ranking, and they have to suck if we use them, they have no choice. We can use units like Tormod and Sothe and never have them suck, because we don't have to use them at the times when they end up sucking, because they've already acquired enough positive utility to warrant a good ranking. If we do look at their performance later (which, again, I think we should), we should assume our "tier player" or whatever has enough room/resources to use for this unit, making everything they do neutral-at-worst utility and not negative, because they'd just be dropped otherwise. Remember, we don't assume the player is an idiot.

In the end, if Jill takes Tormod's 4-E slot, Tormod is neutral, and he's likely acquired enough positive utility at this point to be > Lehran. Make sense?

[Rodykitty]

Gotta look at the period of suck to figure out why we're ditching said unit in the first place. I know on H5's tier list Wendell was on his way to becoming top tier because his period of lategame suck kept getting ignored in favor of his early game ownage before he got brought back down to Upper Mid like he should have always been.

Edited July 27, 2009 by Chainey

[-Cynthia-]

I agree with Red Fox, negative utility only really comes into play when a unit goes from bad--> good, not from good---> bad. In the first case, the unit has to suffer through being a negative for a while before becoming a positive, which means it's unavoidable. In the second case, we can simply not field the unit, their performance should still be considered, but not weighed as highly. It seems rather counter-intuituve to punish units for being available, when they can simply be dropped.

Note that if you want to go with "units are being used every chapter", some changes need to be made, mainly to Heather. Being forced to field Heather on 4-E is such a massive negative she should probably drop down to a 5 or something(we all know how much she fails at combat), not to mention the several GM maps she's being forced into that have nothing to steal/hidden items. When we tier Heather, we usually don't assume she's heading to 4-E or other chapters where she has nothing to steal, because that would be stupid.

Most of the problems with Lehran's rating itself has to do with smash not rating to scale, several characters below him get far more positive utility in their chapters than Lehran does with his 0.5 chapter of availability. It shouldn't be 5.5 and up +, 4.5 and below -, the ratings should be in comparison to the rest of the units in the game, a character with a score of 5 would be in the exact middle, Lehran is not in the upper half of characters. smash's criteria is...odd to say the least.

Edited July 27, 2009 by -Cynthia-

[Progenitus]

It's your rating topic, which is why I've only posted a couple minor gripes here.

In reference to recruiting, I agree that if a specific character is doing the recruiting they don't get credit for everything the recruited character did. I think this chapter is different, though, because of the fact that you need to fight your way down there to get him, and it is desirable to do so. It isn't quite the same as having the chapter requirement to be kill boss or arrive or something. I know that. But the point is, everyone who can kill stuff on the way to the black knight to set up the carding is getting positive utility. I'll grant, though, that Boyd isn't likely to be in the vanguard. Ike, Gatrie, the hawks, Haar, and Ike's support partner (if his support partner has a good kill%) are pretty much the frontal assault, and everyone else is just killing leftovers so that Ike and co. can press forward (Oh, and possibly having shinon just a bit behind to take care of the things with two range on player phase so that Ike/Gatrie/Mia/Haar don't need to equip 2 range weapons on enemy phase). This doesn't leave much positive utility for Boyd, but it does help him to reduce the level difference between him and Oscar. That's all I'm really saying.

Further, if we are rating Oscar, then by your post about availability he is taking up a slot that could have gone to a unit that can actually assist in the pressing forward. If we have to reserve a slot for the character we are rating, then that means Oscar in 3-7 for his rating, and Titania in 3-7 for her rating. It's only a little bit of negative utility, but it seems to be ignored.

Still, your topic, your rules, your ratings.

The difference is that we don't HAVE to fight our way down to the BK. It's not part of the chapter's objective.

Even if helping the push towards Lehran mattered towards beating 3-7, I don't see how Boyd is positive utility.

Yes, he's helping the push, but he's also taking exp away from the rest of the team. And since units have like 2 move in the water, along with Haar/Janaff/Ulki/Reyson flying wherever they want, it's not like we need an extra fighter in Boyd.

As for Oscar and Titania, I do assume we're fielding them, but since I assume that 3-7 doesn't really matter, they don't accumulate any real negative or positive utility in the chapter. They just end up with less kills than the rest of the team.

In the end, if Jill takes Tormod's 4-E slot, Tormod is neutral, and he's likely acquired enough positive utility at this point to be > Lehran. Make sense?

...wtf? Did you even READ my rating?

I said that if we do stuff like "let's replace Tormod's unit slot with someone else", the comparison is now Tormod + that someone else vs Lehran, and you can obviously see the problem with that. This is why we have to at least dedicate a unit slot for Tormod in every chapter he's available in. I never said we should necessarily USE Tormod, or even field him.

[Jaybee]

The difference is that we don't HAVE to fight our way down to the BK. It's not part of the chapter's objective.

Even if helping the push towards Lehran mattered towards beating 3-7, I don't see how Boyd is positive utility.

Yes, he's helping the push, but he's also taking exp away from the rest of the team. And since units have like 2 move in the water, along with Haar/Janaff/Ulki/Reyson flying wherever they want, it's not like we need an extra fighter in Boyd.

As for Oscar and Titania, I do assume we're fielding them, but since I assume that 3-7 doesn't really matter, they don't accumulate any real negative or positive utility in the chapter. They just end up with less kills than the rest of the team.

*Facedesk*

By getting less kills, they are generating less utility than the team, which means that overall they have negative utility since I could have deployed someone else that could actually cross the fucking water.

And of course he's taking exp away from the team. Everyone is doing this. E.g. Ike got 15 exp. Oops, he's taking exp away from the team. Haar gets 10 exp. Oops, he;s taking exp away from the team. Why don't we not kill anyone so that no exp is taken away from anyone/ That's a great idea, ja?

I said that if we do stuff like "let's replace Tormod's unit slot with someone else", the comparison is now Tormod + that someone else vs Lehran, and you can obviously see the problem with that. This is why we have to at least dedicate a unit slot for Tormod in every chapter he's available in. I never said we should necessarily USE Tormod, or even field him.

*Facedesk*

If its Tormod and not Jill, we are comparing Tormod t oLehran head up. If we replace Tormod with Jill, it's Jill vs Lehran and not Tormod vs Lehran since Tormod is not deployed.

Also,

*Double facedesk*

Edited July 27, 2009 by Joshybear25

[Florete]

...wtf? Did you even READ my rating?

I said that if we do stuff like "let's replace Tormod's unit slot with someone else", the comparison is now Tormod + that someone else vs Lehran, and you can obviously see the problem with that. This is why we have to at least dedicate a unit slot for Tormod in every chapter he's available in. I never said we should necessarily USE Tormod, or even field him.

Yes, I read your fucking rating. You and your habit of treating others like idiots is really starting to piss me off.

You also said:

So is Tormod's contribution in part 1 enough to overcome taking a slot in 4-E

Why does he have to "overcome" that to be considered better than Lehran? It doesn't make sense. Why should he acquire negative utility when he's already acquired enough positive to be considered better than Lehran and we have the choice to field him or not field him? Think about it, if Tormod had a storyline death after part 1, would you still consider Lehran > him?

Oh, and why the fuck would we give Tormod a 4-E slot and not even use/field him? That's just simply retarded. We don't assume the player is retarded, smash.

[Jaybee]

Maybe Smash thinks the player is retarded because he is a retard himself. His avy is proof.

[Rodykitty]

I think Smash is trying to say that Tormod needs to be compared to Leharan to show who is better during that time rather than comparing Leharan to a non-existing unit.