Xenomata

1) We don't know for sure which of the new units will be demoted. Right now Mikoto does seem the likliest, as she does not have a personal weapon, brings a seasonal weapon to the regular summoning pool as Libra did with Wo Gun and Kaze did with Barb Shuriken, and would introduce Brazen Atk/Res to the 4* pool as Ares did with Brazen Atk/Def, but it's just as likely there won't be a demotion in the first place, given the power behind Flash. ...then again, I don't think non-limited quanity Alts have gotten dropped to 4* yet... 2) Florina's new weapon makes her a great enemy-phase asset, boosting her defensive ability even further, while also coming with free armor-effectiveness. Mikoto, on the other hand, would come with one of the better weapons she could have by default, and Staff units are among the best offensive and offensive support units in the game with the many effects behind the staves they wield, all of which can't be counterattacked, but will be expensive to build (which you do at least have Wrathful Staff fodder), and this goes off the assumption she gets demoted. 3) Do not give Loki Wrathful Staff. Thökk, her personal weapon, has Wrathful Staff built in by default, and there's not much reason to take away Loki's only real notable trait that separates her from other Infantry Staff units. 4) Yes, they do. All learned skills, regardless if they were unlocked by the unit, will be carried over to the unit receiving the merge. So your new Olivia would have all the learned skills of the old Olivia, as well as any inherited skills, so if you gave old Olivia Moonbow, new Olivia would have it as well. Just saying, there is nothing wrong with focusing on more than one healer. As said before, they are among the best nukes in the game right now, being able to inflict raw damage which the enemy can't counterattack, as well as inflicting deadly statuses that either hinder the opposition or flat out greatly hurts them. Veronica especially has a powerful Spectrum debuff equal to Peshkatz that the enemy cannot stop. @XRay That's... actually why didn't I think of that beforehand, that's literally what some of my other armor killers are doing. Noted, thanks. Will probably switch to +Atk -Res the moment it becomes available to me, but I'm not expecting it to anytime soon. EDIT: WELP NEVER FREAKING MIND THE BARTRE I THOUGHT WAS +ATK WAS +HP GOD FREAKING... at least the +Def -Res is actually +Def -Res...

Not necessarily in need of a "cheap blue armor counter", but it's a fancy Slaying Hammer with Fury available to it. Plus I been meaning to build Bartre anyways, but halted all plans when he was announced to be getting a new weapon... Anyways, that makes sense actually I'll look into keeping QR available for him. Should I stick to +Def -Res by the way? +Atk -Def is... alright I guess, but the loss of Defense on someone who can be so bulky hurts a tad.

So of the three who got their special weapons recently, who seems like a good choice for promotion, keeping in mind I'll probably be going for their Special Refines? I have Bartre with +Atk -Def and +Def -Res, Shanna with +Spd -HP, and Florina with +Def -Spd. Bartre will most likely be +Def since that's a pretty sizable boost to defense while not losing much in the way of Atk, stacking both the refine Fury and his already owned Fury. I'm not sure if I'd want to let him run Quick Riposte, since he'd need high maintenance healing to keep it active, but I'm willing to do it if need be. Shanna... well, it's obvious what'll happen to someone who has a Lance version of Hauteclere. I'm not decided on if I want to put Life and Death or Fury on her, since her Fury boosted Res is decent enough for Speed Ploy to help fix the difference in Spd between Fury and LnD3. Florina doesn't seem like she'd be that different from Florinas of the past, besides running Iceberg over Glacies. I'm leaning most towards Bartre since I'm fairly short on Greens who can take on Armors effectively, but second opinions would be nice to have.

I just grinded out the remaining bonds I needed for Forging Bonds, my god the AI is so dumb on auto-battle. Please stop walking directly into the path of armor slaying enemies, my Armors. Mine is +Atk -Res, which... might be decent for what I'd want him to do. At least he can take a hit or two from Bows, if not Magic.

Decent I guess, slap that on another Dancer. So glad I finished my Uberwall Chrom now :) ...well, I guess if they had to make one a SS, it had to be the one we couldn't get en masse before... Wow, so glad the seals this time are so... meh as always!

Oh. That's... weird, but okay.

Is she listed without Sing for any special reason? That feels... a little concerning to me... But otherwise, I wasn't sure what to expect when hearing Young Songstress, but this I am okay with. uguuuu so kawaii desu~nya it's a lil Azuraaaaa~

Also...

Hm... then he could theoretically run with Moonbow, Quick Riposte or Vantage, and Quickened Pulse to always have an offensive Special handy to, that is if he is willing to forego the defensive boost offered by Pavise/Aegis. Alternatively, Escutcheon/Sacred Cowl and Quickened Pulse would let him run a different A slot. I don't think Saber needs one of the Breaths by the way. Assuming he were to be hit and counterattack, he'd have Pavise/Aegis ready by battles end unless the enemy had Guard, Special Fighter, or any of The Lands Bounty weapons, which given the tiers I assume he'd be most viable at I find doubtful.

Looking at Golden Dagger, it only says if Special is ready, not if Special will trigger... Does that mean Saber just always has all stat +3 and Distant Counter so long as his Special is available? Because if so... wow. Otherwise the other weapons sound okay for the most part. Very underwhelming upgrades from their original weapons IMO, given that they're all literally the same weapon but slightly stronger, but then it's not like we were asking for a lot either.

Book III for December. Well that wasn't the most sinister way they could have announced it. Is Fjorm going to be lost to time?

As much as I want to say I have low expectations, that's be an understatement. After the Smash direct, I know better than to hope for something as high and mighty as 6* rarity

Goddamnit, I completely forgot about the voting gauntlet and got a horribly low feather total. ...oh and dangit rein won I guess, but MAN that's a lot of potential feathers gone...

Wait... if they're revealing the characters today, then what in gods name will be revealed tomorrow on Feh Channel?

Does... does anyone like this banner at all? I'm partial to it... Draconic Rage looks okay. slap Moonbow/Glimmer and Distant Counter on one of those two, and you'll be popping powerful strikes every turn. Rally Atk/Spd+ is insane. Basically a Hone Movement buff on literally any unit so long as you put it on someone willing to give up their turn. Corrin herself looks to have some pretty raw power and speed, so long as they don't both her like they did her base form. Corrin... um... no, please put on something a little more masculine. Don't care what, anything is fine, just take off Azura's dress please, it looks so wrong. But on the bright side, we finally have a skill that will directly counter Armor units! Otherwise he looks to be powerful and bulky. Camilla... I dunno, she looks to focus on Attack and Res mostly, but I don't know if Book of Dreams is gonna be all that great. It'd be nice to have to ensure the enemy is slow and weak enough for her to attack safely, and Flier specific passives may help meet the conditions, but... I dunno, it doesn't feel like it'll be that game-changing... Mikoto introduced 3 Seasonal-exclusive skills to the regular summoning pool in one go, which is insane. She herself may be someone to look out for, depending on just how much Attack she has to work with. A small shame she doesn't come with Wrathful or Dazzling Staff like Lyn does, but... well, whatever, she should do fine. Azura I wonder about... is she going to be a free dancer for everyone, or will she try to emulate one of the Corrins or even Arete and lose Dancer status finally?

Oh my god why did I think pulling an all-nighter to clear both Abyssal maps was a good idea on the night before Arena and Arena Assault will reset? Oh god I'm gonna need more... more... zzzzzzzz...

I want it known that figuring out Abyssal took me all night, with some pointless SI and SS upgrading, and then I went and decided to redo it for the sake of recording, and there went another 2 hours trying to remember what the hell I did, but it's done. My god it is done. Team used: The Axe Cav was HORRIBlE for me. Lots of defense and HP meant they withstood any assault unleashed on them by a lot, the Defense meant they weren't taking a lot of damage from Blazing Flame, and their being a Cav meant I needed to halt their movement somehow, but I just couldn't figure out how. Below is the video. Below is the play-by-play, which I recommend reading because the video goes by much too fast to properly understand just what I did.

Damnit why do I keep forgetting to do Voting Gauntlet, I'm not even working right now so I don't even have an excuse... Well whatever. Maybe I should have joined Linde after Ophelia, but... I mean, I already had my priorities ordered, and I'd rather follow it to a tee. Though it does mean I'll be on Team Linde next. Reminder for the final round:

Finished. Team used... Step-by-step of what I did...

+res -hp Ayra on brave redux... I can tell when I'm not welcome on a banner game, sheesh...

You can't exploit a trading feature if you add a security wall that prevents new account creation abuse, such as a daily limit an IP can create a new account, requiring a link to a Nintendo account of a certain age (a Week seems fair) before accessing features like trading or even Arena and other game modes that access other users data, and maybe even inflicting harsh punishment on accounts being found to take purposeful advantage of such features.

Do people not realize that Blue is kind of a terrible color this Voting Gauntlet because everybody is going to be using a Blue character? Do they not know how to set up their unit being sent to others castles? Because I shouldn't be resetting and hoping I get a setup of allies who aren't Blue.

And for my last Legendary Banner trick, I present [+Atk -HP] Sumia. Hot damn. I am down for having Sumia with that decent a nature.

Ophelia lost, not really surprising, glad to see Voting Gauntlets are back to "the team that Xenomata and Xenomata specifically picks will lose" because that was weird last time. I have got to remember to check for Pity Rate time...

Just wondering, did Ophelia ever enter pity rate? Because literally every single time I got on, Ophelia was stronger.