Geriba

Ephraim is great and all, but he doesn't measure up to Eliwood Mode Hector, who is arguably the best unit in FE history (excluding Sigurd obviously). HM Hector, with his late promotion, is indeed second best.

This argument is having such a tough time reaching a resolution because people are enforcing conflicting standards. Ranked runs, Nino wins without question: not only does she contribute more to the ranks themselves, but is a unit in a game where perfect rankings are actually difficult to achieve. Next, we need to distinguish between Net and Gross. If you're using Gross standards, then Lilina obliterates Nino completely due to a massive join time advantage; if you're using Net standards, then Nino wins primarily because of her high bases and the innate weaknesses of FE7 enemy units.

You're completely right in that adopting a Gross system has serious implications to the tier list that must be embraced, but I still disagree with using a Gross system to justify Rebecca > Harken. As an archer, Rebecca is usually just attacking during the Player Phase, which constitutes ~30% of the actual battles. She also happens to be quite terrible during this 30% of performance, as she's locked to a garbage weapon type with piss-poor bases and growths that are not in any way good enough to make up for her numerous shortcomings. Harken, by contrast, has HHM-boosted bases, excellent weapon diversity, and just wrecks everything in the game until the end. Rebecca's 20 or so chapters of additional utility over her competition are certainly relevant, but they definitely don't add up to much (because she's only contributing about a third of the time, she's really got six or seven chapters of "net" utility over Harken, during which she under-performs relative to pretty much everyone).

...Supports aren't viable in ranked? They most certainly are! And honestly, Matthew provides some excellent ones (to Guy in particular). Moreover, his combat is actually fairly decent, since he's one of your few early-game units who can consistently double, especially if he's been raised a few levels in LHM. None of this matters relative to his main contribution, however... There's a bit of a "Tier List Fallacy" going on here. Nabbing the Silver Card is quite a bit different than Seizing: Seizing is required to beat the game, stealing the Silver Card is definitely not. Remember, we don't count things that are essential to the game's basic completion. That's why Roy isn't top tier on the FE6 tier lists. If the Funds rank was not 5*-able without the Silver Card, then you'd have a point. I completely agree. Over on the GameFAQs list, we've moved Ninils down to the top of High, and Priscilla to the bottom of top. With the proper set-up, he can reliably ORKO ~99% of the enemies in the game. That's... completely ridiculous, to say the least. I don't have time to do a thorough rebuttal on the Isadora/Hawkeye debate, but this point in particular stood out: Are you honestly going to make this argument? You're looking at things in a vacuum; in reality, neither Isadora nor Hawkeye are even going to be contenders for the job of rescuing Zephiel.

I think I speak for everyone here when I say that it would be greatly appreciated. Particularly for HHM, since that's the basis for both the Efficiency and Ranking tier list.

Right, I guess we got side-tracked right after that point. I read your arguments, and you seem to simply be defending Isadora's shortcomings instead of arguing her worth over Hawkeye's. Availability is about the same (she has a single chapter advantage which is made up for by Hawkeye's ability to move in chapter 23 anyway), but what Isadora lacks in defense Hawkeye has in spades. You claim that Isadora won't be put in real harm's way, but there are numerous instances in the chapters following their recruitment where defense comes in handy, and Hawkeye's ability to walk on water is surprisingly effective as well. A brief chapter-by-chapter analysis: Chapter 24G provides numerous opportunities for both Hawkeye and Isadora to shine, but only Hawkeye can lay an early claim to the Corsairs. Hawkeye can charge the east-most fortress in Crazed Beast with a Pure Water handy, and can contribute greatly to the other two with no need for babying. Isadora's movement lead and weapon triangle dominance mean almost nothing here, since she'll have to stay back until the cavalier reinforcements have been taken care of. Chapter 26 is a defend chapter, so Hawkeye scores a clear win here. Chapter 27A has a bolting mage, for which Isadora will be a prime target because of her pathetic defenses; in either case, the snow will limit Isadora's movement lead for most of the chapter. Chapter 28 is FoW with Ursula, meaning that units with defense can move more confidently and freely. Chapter 28x is absolutely perfect for Hawkeye, making him far more mobile and capable than his Paladin counterpart. I would consider Chapter 29 a tie: since there are so many different roles to perform in order to handle the onslaught, both units can contribute positively. Chapter 30 is probably a win for Hawkeye. With the Hand Axe, Hawkeye can sit there and take the punishment while dealing some impressive damage. Because of the dense cluster of archers, Isadora probably won't be having this kind of luxury. Chapter 31 is where I'd give Isadora a distinct lead thanks to her movement advantage. Isadora has no place in Light to speak of, but Hawkeye can be useful in taking care of the Darin room as well as cleaning up the General reinforcements. I don't really see where Isadora is performing any better than Hawkeye is. Obviously the above analysis is very simplified, so if there are any specific stats/points you have that dispute some of the above, I'd like to here it; but I'm fairly confident that this overview is indicative of a larger trend leaning towards Hawkeye, since Isadora's advantages don't work out as well in practice as they do in theory.

If we're all fairly in agreement with Bartre's placement, we should move on to the Isadora issue. Does anyone want to type up a formal argument in her defense?

This post comes from the user Mercury_Wing over at GameFAQs. It summarizes my views on why Dart > Bartre should remain as-is: I'd call Bartre low-tier, for having an early game that is so bad that having him is worse than having an empty slot. It's fairly close to being prohibitive. He has the unique hazard of having a speed base of 3. With his luck base of 4, that's just 10 base evasion. To give you an idea, even with advantageous terrain AND WTA, the enemy will have a slightly over 50% chance to hit Bartre. That wouldn't be a problem if Bartre's base defense were good. It isn't. With a defense base of 4 and enemies' attack (strength + weapon) usually hovering at 11-14, Bartre's taking 6-11 damage (allowing for possible WTA's and WTD's) most times he engages in direct combat. Even his 29 HP won't last long. He does have the indirect combat option with Hand Axe, but there are accuracy issues involved with that. The bigger problem is the units that can double Bartre at 3 speed. I really don't care about the brigands, you can keep Bartre away from them and only a few have 7 speed. I also won't worry about mercenaries and myrmidons, as you won't be putting any axe user other than Hector (maybe) in their way. However, some Peg knights (a major source of Bartre's early EXP) can double him. Even worse, all Nomads can, as well. And since chapter 13x your first nomad encounter is fog-of-war, using Bartre at all in that chapter becomes risky. These risks stick with Bartre until his speed hits 5. With 40% growth for speed, Bartre is projected to hit 5 speed at level 6 or 7. (At level 6, Bartre's speed is 4.6, which is technically rounded up, but still very suspect. Level 7 can be considered reliable.) That means Bartre is at risk for 4-5 levels, and because of his at-risk status, those levels will likely come slower than they do for most other units. Once he gets past that point, I'd say (without going into detail) that he's decent, but not extraordinary. But his early game is so bad that trying to use him is a headache matched only by the headache Bartre himself gets when someone uses a big word.

Bartre's a liability early-game, and mediocre mid-game. Dart is mediocre mid-game. I'd give the win to Dart, even with the Gross system being used.

I'm not stubborn or anything. You've put into words what I've been trying to say for a while now. Even if it's not the most "convenient" answer, it makes good logical sense; why wouldn't I agree with it? Now, were to to unanimously adopt a Gross system where opportunity costs are ignored for unit slots, what would the implications be? Using a unit still isn't "free," since experience remains limited and needs to be distributed properly. In that way, we still may end up with units who contribute negatively to the team's utility if used, but it's far less extreme than what we have now. For specific comparisons, this gives further credibility to having Guy equal to Raven, since Guy's early-game is now 100% better than Raven's (as opposed to before, when taking up a unit slot hurt Guy's performance somewhat). Hm... anything important I'm missing?

...This is easily the best summary of the problem I've seen. A tip of my hat, sir.

That's definitely something to consider, but I too would place more of an importance on Florina's early promotion. ...Which translates into the three categories I mentioned before, yes? In this case, I was referring to yours. It's a definite Catch-22. If we go by a "gross" system, then unit slots get no value. If we go by a "net" system, then (in my mind) unit slots get too much value. As a matter of fact, they end up determining the placement of several characters on their own. Back over at GameFAQs, I proposed that we should make two tier lists, one gross (more like the one we have now) and one net (the kind of list that, honestly, I've never seen completed before). Afterward, we could compare and contrast to see which fits best. Right around that point, Moribalken proposed her middle-ground solution which I've been supporting ever since, as it clears up certain close calls without messing up the tier stability too much. Granted, there's a chance that such a method IS somewhat inconsistent, and it's something that we should explore more. But before we do, I'd like to here what Moribalken herself has to say. It's her solution, after all, and I feel that she can defend it better than I can. This is probably true in a "net" system, since Canas won't even be seeing play outside of Chapter 17x! This is just another reason why we need to sort out the core principles of the list before proceeding further.

Seeing as the experience pool a promoted Canas has to work with is in much less demand, I'd say no. Flight is one thing; virtually no competition for her promotion item is another. Even from the analysis you gave, I see that Florina is the winner- although it's certainly close, hence them being adjacent to one another.

Seeing as I'm currently studying economics, I don't appreciate being accused of "twisting" terms around. What you all are failing to consider is the end result of applying this "net gain" system fully. What will inevitably happen is that all units will be divided into three categories: those who will always be used (because they contribute a net gain), those who will sometimes be used (because they are either good for a time or free for a time; see Dorcas/Bartre), and those who will never be used. It's no longer a question of individual unit quality. What we get instead is a mandate for how to play the game. Logically, such a position makes sense, but you have to wonder if it doesn't outright contradict the purpose of these tiers in the first place. We can either take the principle to the extreme, or simply consider it as one factor among many. Both are acceptable ways of doing things, but the final results differ greatly.

Your entire argument pretty much rests upon the notion that Bartre/Hawkeye/etc. won't be used beyond the point where they contribute ONLY a positive "net gain." I reject that for reasons stated earlier, so much of what you said doesn't hold much weight. However, you mentioned that Isadora > Canas was decided here earlier. The reason he's so high in our list is because of an interesting possibility that I proposed earlier this year: if Canas promotes at level 10, he goes from mediocre offensive unit to above-average healer. That puts him above Isadora for sure.

No, there won't be "logical inconsistencies." Docking Bartre because he consumes a unit slot that better characters could also use is far different than strictly limiting him to only those chapters where the opportunity cost of his use is zero. The same principle can be used for Hawkeye, or any other character that isn't the cream-of-the-crop. And using Bartre isn't going to help your rankings very much: because he gets doubled by everything left and right for at least a few levels (if not more), putting him in harm's way over more sturdy units is going to impact your Tactics ranking. This is coupled with the fact that, even early on, there are plenty of superior contenders for helping with the experience rank. Although he has his guaranteed slot for a few chapters, using Bartre certainly isn't "free." Having him takes hits and kills is a poor allocation of experience; you wouldn't use Hector for combat once he hits level 20/--, right? Even though he's "free" to use? You act as if these were arbitrary placements. Things like Vaida > Isadora and Canas > Isadora have been discussed and debated thoroughly, so the burden's on you to take the appropriate place. I'd recommend starting either with an Isadora > Canas or Vaida > Hawkeye argument first, since it would be easier for you and us both. You answered your own question! There's no opportunity cost for Bartre's deployment, but his USE is an entirely different issue altogether.

Also, it's worth noting that debating Isadora over Hawkeye is getting several steps ahead. You'd need to solidify Isadora > Canas and Vaida before trying to move him up even further.

I'm going to stay out of the Isadora/Hawkeye deabte for now, but on the above point... This is why we don't take the "net gain" method to its extreme, because it yields rather ridiculous results like Bartre > Hawkeye. True, Bartre is free to use for more chapters than Hawkeye, but there's also the fact that he's a garbage unit whose use- even in the "free" chapters- takes away experience from far better units down the road. Rebecca's chip damage isn't nearly large enough to be considered significant, and Bartre is *far* from being helpful in the early-game: because he needs to be babied so much, using him is sure to hurt your Tactics rank. Besides, Dorcas does his job about a thousand times better. Also, Moribalken's a girl? News to me!

Hawkeye has some solid offense thanks to his Killer Axe and built-in +15% crit, and his huge HP allows him to tank fairly well. Vaida may come late, but her HHM-boosted bases make her a good choice for late-game filler. Sure, they're not the best units in the game, but they deserve their slots relative to who's beneath them.

Hey there! I'm both a Serenes lurker and a GameFAQs FE7 regular, and since Moribalken has decided to hop on over here, I figured I'd follow suit. A little bit of background: contrary to popular belief, the fad-starting perverts with which the GFaqs FE boards are normally associated do not represent those of us who play Fire Emblem seriously. In fact, we've had consistent and productive Tier List discussion since the game's release almost six years ago. I'd like to think that our current list is the most definitive one available, especially considering how far we've come. The list itself is mostly finished, with only a few minor blemishes in need of wrinkling out; now it's simply a matter of defending it and seeing how well it holds up. Any input on the list, then, is much appreciated, since it allows us to gauge how successful our efforts have been. Since it's been brought up, allow me to elaborate upon the "net gain" system. Intuitively, the idea's been present in the minds of many since day 1- that you can't compare units in a vacuum. Just because Unit A and Unit B are both being used doesn't mean that they're also guaranteed unit slots, promotion items, etc. free of charge. Rather, using a more comprehensive, opportunity-cost system yields a more accurate result. This wasn't formalized until recently, because... we honestly haven't needed it until recently. Debates like Guy/Raven and Lowen/Kent/Sain have proven close enough to warrant these additional measures of quality, making a unit's performance less "gross" and more "net". Hence the name. However, one can't take this principle to the extreme. If net benefit is the sole determinant of unit quality, then all characters will inevitably be lumped under the headings of Always Used, Sometimes Used, and Never Used; not particularly helpful! So, this system is always CONSIDERED as a factor, but is never taken to a logical extremity unless the variance in unit performance is marginal enough to warrant it. At least, that's the current train of thought. Anyway, this is some great discussion so far, and I hope you guys like having me on board! If you have any questions about why we've made certain decisions on the list, feel free to ask.